The Marble Faun; Or, The Romance of Monte Beni - Volume 1

by Nathaniel Hawthorne

  CHAPTER XVIII

  ON THE EDGE OF A PRECIPICE

  "Let us settle it," said Kenyon, stamping his foot firmly down, "thatthis is precisely the spot where the chasm opened, into which Curtiusprecipitated his good steed and himself. Imagine the great, dusky gap,impenetrably deep, and with half-shaped monsters and hideous faceslooming upward out of it, to the vast affright of the good citizens whopeeped over the brim! There, now, is a subject, hitherto unthought of,for a grim and ghastly story, and, methinks, with a moral as deep asthe gulf itself. Within it, beyond a question, there were propheticvisions,--intimations of all the future calamities of Rome,--shades ofGoths, and Gauls, and even of the French soldiers of to-day. It was apity to close it up so soon! I would give much for a peep into such achasm."

  "I fancy," remarked Miriam, "that every person takes a peep into itin moments of gloom and despondency; that is to say, in his moments ofdeepest insight."

  "Where is it, then?" asked Hilda. "I never peeped into it."

  "Wait, and it will open for you," replied her friend. "The chasm wasmerely one of the orifices of that pit of blackness that lies beneathus, everywhere. The firmest substance of human happiness is but a thincrust spread over it, with just reality enough to bear up the illusivestage scenery amid which we tread. It needs no earthquake to open thechasm. A footstep, a little heavier than ordinary, will serve; and wemust step very daintily, not to break through the crust at any moment.By and by, we inevitably sink! It was a foolish piece of heroism inCurtius to precipitate himself there, in advance; for all Rome, you see,has been swallowed up in that gulf, in spite of him. The Palace of theCaesars has gone down thither, with a hollow, rumbling sound of itsfragments! All the temples have tumbled into it; and thousands ofstatues have been thrown after! All the armies and the triumphs havemarched into the great chasm, with their martial music playing, as theystepped over the brink. All the heroes, the statesmen, and the poets!All piled upon poor Curtius, who thought to have saved them all! I amloath to smile at the self-conceit of that gallant horseman, but cannotwell avoid it."

  "It grieves me to hear you speak thus, Miriam," said Hilda, whosenatural and cheerful piety was shocked by her friend's gloomy view ofhuman destinies. "It seems to me that there is no chasm, nor any hideousemptiness under our feet, except what the evil within us digs. If therebe such a chasm, let us bridge it over with good thoughts and deeds, andwe shall tread safely to the other side. It was the guilt of Rome, nodoubt, that caused this gulf to open; and Curtius filled it up with hisheroic self-sacrifice and patriotism, which was the best virtue that theold Romans knew. Every wrong thing makes the gulf deeper; every rightone helps to fill it up. As the evil of Rome was far more than its good,the whole commonwealth finally sank into it, indeed, but of no originalnecessity."

  "Well, Hilda, it came to the same thing at last," answered Miriamdespondingly.

  "Doubtless, too," resumed the sculptor (for his imagination was greatlyexcited by the idea of this wondrous chasm), "all the blood that theRomans shed, whether on battlefields, or in the Coliseum, or on thecross,--in whatever public or private murder,--ran into this fatal gulf,and formed a mighty subterranean lake of gore, right beneath our feet.The blood from the thirty wounds in Caesar's breast flowed hitherward,and that pure little rivulet from Virginia's bosom, too! Virginia,beyond all question, was stabbed by her father, precisely where we arestanding."

  "Then the spot is hallowed forever!" said Hilda.

  "Is there such blessed potency in bloodshed?" asked Miriam. "Nay, Hilda,do not protest! I take your meaning rightly."

  They again moved forward. And still, from the Forum and the Via Sacra,from beneath the arches of the Temple of Peace on one side, and theacclivity of the Palace of the Caesars on the other, there arose singingvoices of parties that were strolling through the moonlight. Thus,the air was full of kindred melodies that encountered one another, andtwined themselves into a broad, vague music, out of which no singlestrain could be disentangled. These good examples, as well as theharmonious influences of the hour, incited our artist friends to makeproof of their own vocal powers. With what skill and breath they had,they set up a choral strain,--"Hail, Columbia!" we believe, whichthose old Roman echoes must have found it exceeding difficult to repeataright. Even Hilda poured the slender sweetness of her note into hercountry's song. Miriam was at first silent, being perhaps unfamiliarwith the air and burden. But suddenly she threw out such a swell andgush of sound, that it seemed to pervade the whole choir of othervoices, and then to rise above them all, and become audible in whatwould else have been thee silence of an upper region. That volume ofmelodious voice was one of the tokens of a great trouble. There had longbeen an impulse upon her--amounting, at last, to a necessity to shriekaloud; but she had struggled against it, till the thunderous anthem gaveher an opportunity to relieve her heart by a great cry.

  They passed the solitary Column of Phocas, and looked down into theexcavated space, where a confusion of pillars, arches, pavements, andshattered blocks and shafts--the crumbs of various ruin dropped from thedevouring maw of Time stand, or lie, at the base of the Capitoline Hill.That renowned hillock (for it is little more) now arose abruptly abovethem. The ponderous masonry, with which the hillside is built up, is asold as Rome itself, and looks likely to endure while the world retainsany substance or permanence. It once sustained the Capitol, and nowbears up the great pile which the mediaeval builders raised on theantique foundation, and that still loftier tower, which looks abroadupon a larger page of deeper historic interest than any other scenecan show. On the same pedestal of Roman masonry, other structures willdoubtless rise, and vanish like ephemeral things.

  To a spectator on the spot, it is remarkable that the events of Romanhistory, and Roman life itself, appear not so distant as the Gothic ageswhich succeeded them. We stand in the Forum, or on the height of theCapitol, and seem to see the Roman epoch close at hand. We forget thata chasm extends between it and ourselves, in which lie all those dark,rude, unlettered centuries, around the birth-time of Christianity, aswell as the age of chivalry and romance, the feudal system, and theinfancy of a better civilization than that of Rome. Or, if we rememberthese mediaeval times, they look further off than the Augustan age. Thereason may be, that the old Roman literature survives, and creates forus an intimacy with the classic ages, which we have no means of formingwith the subsequent ones.

  The Italian climate, moreover, robs age of its reverence and makes itlook newer than it is. Not the Coliseum, nor the tombs of the AppianWay, nor the oldest pillar in the Forum, nor any other Roman ruin, beit as dilapidated as it may, ever give the impression of venerableantiquity which we gather, along with the ivy, from the gray walls of anEnglish abbey or castle. And yet every brick or stone, which we pick upamong the former, had fallen ages before the foundation of the latterwas begun. This is owing to the kindliness with which Natures takes anEnglish ruin to her heart, covering it with ivy, as tenderly as RobinRedbreast covered the dead babes with forest leaves. She strives to makeit a part of herself, gradually obliterating the handiwork of man, andsupplanting it with her own mosses and trailing verdure, till she haswon the whole structure back. But, in Italy, whenever man has once hewna stone, Nature forthwith relinquishes her right to it, and never laysher finger on it again. Age after age finds it bare and naked, in thebarren sunshine, and leaves it so. Besides this natural disadvantage,too, each succeeding century, in Rome, has done its best to ruin thevery ruins, so far as their picturesque effect is concerned, by stealingaway the marble and hewn stone, and leaving only yellow bricks, whichnever can look venerable.

  The party ascended the winding way that leads from the Forum to thePiazza of the Campidoglio on the summit of the Capitoline Hill. Theystood awhile to contemplate the bronze equestrian statue of MarcusAurelius. The moonlight glistened upon traces of the gilding whichhad once covered both rider and steed; these were almost gone, but theaspect of dignity was still perfect, clothing the figure as it were withan imperial robe of light. It is
the most majestic representation ofthe kingly character that ever the world has seen. A sight of the oldheathen emperor is enough to create an evanescent sentiment of loyaltyeven in a democratic bosom, so august does he look, so fit to rule,so worthy of man's profoundest homage and obedience, so inevitablyattractive of his love. He stretches forth his hand with an air of grandbeneficence and unlimited authority, as if uttering a decree from whichno appeal was permissible, but in which the obedient subject wouldfind his highest interests consulted; a command that was in itself abenediction.

  "The sculptor of this statue knew what a king should be," observedKenyon, "and knew, likewise, the heart of mankind, and how it craves atrue ruler, under whatever title, as a child its father."

  "O, if there were but one such man as this?" exclaimed Miriam. "One suchman in an age, and one in all the world; then how speedily would thestrife, wickedness, and sorrow of us poor creatures be relieved. Wewould come to him with our griefs, whatever they might be,--even a poor,frail woman burdened with her heavy heart,--and lay them at his feet,and never need to take them up again. The rightful king would see toall."

  "What an idea of the regal office and duty!" said Kenyon, with a smile."It is a woman's idea of the whole matter to perfection. It is Hilda's,too, no doubt?"

  "No," answered the quiet Hilda; "I should never look for such assistancefrom an earthly king."

  "Hilda, my religious Hilda," whispered Miriam, suddenly drawing the girlclose to her, "do you know how it is with me? I would give all I have orhope--my life, O how freely--for one instant of your trust in God! Youlittle guess my need of it. You really think, then, that He sees andcares for us?"

  "Miriam, you frighten me."

  "Hush, hush? do not let them hear yet!" whispered Miriam. "I frightenyou, you say; for Heaven's sake, how? Am I strange? Is there anythingwild in my behavior?"

  "Only for that moment," replied Hilda, "because you seemed to doubtGod's providence."

  "We will talk of that another time," said her friend. "Just now it isvery dark to me."

  On the left of the Piazza of the Campidoglio, as you face cityward, andat the head of the long and stately flight of steps descending from theCapitoline Hill to the level of lower Rome, there is a narrow laneor passage. Into this the party of our friends now turned. The pathascended a little, and ran along under the walls of a palace, but soonpassed through a gateway, and terminated in a small paved courtyard. Itwas bordered by a low parapet.

  The spot, for some reason or other, impressed them as exceedinglylonely. On one side was the great height of the palace, with themoonshine falling over it, and showing all the windows barred andshuttered. Not a human eye could look down into the little courtyard,even if the seemingly deserted palace had a tenant. On all other sidesof its narrow compass there was nothing but the parapet, which as it nowappeared was built right on the edge of a steep precipice. Gazingfrom its imminent brow, the party beheld a crowded confusion of roofsspreading over the whole space between them and the line of hills thatlay beyond the Tiber. A long, misty wreath, just dense enough to catcha little of the moonshine, floated above the houses, midway towards thehilly line, and showed the course of the unseen river. Far away on theright, the moon gleamed on the dome of St. Peter's as well as on manylesser and nearer domes.

  "What a beautiful view of the city!" exclaimed Hilda; "and I never sawRome from this point before."

  "It ought to afford a good prospect," said the sculptor; "for itwas from this point--at least we are at liberty to think so, if wechoose--that many a famous Roman caught his last glimpse of his nativecity, and of all other earthly things. This is one of the sides of theTarpeian Rock. Look over the parapet, and see what a sheer tumble theremight still be for a traitor, in spite of the thirty feet of soil thathave accumulated at the foot of the precipice."

  They all bent over, and saw that the cliff fell perpendicularly downwardto about the depth, or rather more, at which the tall palace rose inheight above their heads. Not that it was still the natural, shaggyfront of the original precipice; for it appeared to be cased in ancientstonework, through which the primeval rock showed its face here andthere grimly and doubtfully. Mosses grew on the slight projections, andlittle shrubs sprouted out of the crevices, but could not much softenthe stern aspect of the cliff. Brightly as the Italian moonlight felladown the height, it scarcely showed what portion of it was man's workand what was nature's, but left it all in very much the same kind ofambiguity and half-knowledge in which antiquarians generally leave theidentity of Roman remains.

  The roofs of some poor-looking houses, which had been built against thebase and sides of the cliff, rose nearly midway to the top; but from anangle of the parapet there was a precipitous plunge straight downwardinto a stonepaved court.

  "I prefer this to any other site as having been veritably the Traitor'sLeap," said Kenyon, "because it was so convenient to the Capitol. It wasan admirable idea of those stern old fellows to fling their politicalcriminals down from the very summit on which stood the Senate House andJove's Temple, emblems of the institutions which they sought to violate.It symbolizes how sudden was the fall in those days from the utmostheight of ambition to its profoundest ruin."

  "Come, come; it is midnight," cried another artist, "too late to bemoralizing here. We are literally dreaming on the edge of a precipice.Let us go home."

  "It is time, indeed," said Hilda.

  The sculptor was not without hopes that he might be favored with thesweet charge of escorting Hilda to the foot of her tower. Accordingly,when the party prepared to turn back, he offered her his arm. Hilda atfirst accepted it; but when they had partly threaded the passage betweenthe little courtyard and the Piazza del Campidoglio, she discovered thatMiriam had remained behind.

  "I must go back," said she, withdrawing her arm from Kenyon's; "but praydo not come with me. Several times this evening I have had a fancy thatMiriam had something on her mind, some sorrow or perplexity, which,perhaps, it would relieve her to tell me about. No, no; do not turnback! Donatello will be a sufficient guardian for Miriam and me."

  The sculptor was a good deal mortified, and perhaps a little angry: buthe knew Hilda's mood of gentle decision and independence too well not toobey her. He therefore suffered the fearless maiden to return alone.

  Meanwhile Miriam had not noticed the departure of the rest of thecompany; she remained on the edge of the precipice and Donatello alongwith her.

  "It would be a fatal fall, still," she said to herself, looking over theparapet, and shuddering as her eye measured the depth. "Yes; surely yes!Even without the weight of an overburdened heart, a human body wouldfall heavily enough upon those stones to shake all its joints asunder.How soon it would be over!"

  Donatello, of whose presence she was possibly not aware, now pressedcloser to her side; and he, too, like Miriam, bent over the low parapetand trembled violently. Yet he seemed to feel that perilous fascinationwhich haunts the brow of precipices, tempting the unwary one to flinghimself over for the very horror of the thing; for, after drawinghastily back, he again looked down, thrusting himself out farther thanbefore. He then stood silent a brief space, struggling, perhaps, to makehimself conscious of the historic associations of the scene.

  "What are you thinking of, Donatello?" asked Miriam.

  "Who are they," said he, looking earnestly in her face, "who have beenflung over here in days gone by?"

  "Men that cumbered the world," she replied. "Men whose lives were thebane of their fellow creatures. Men who poisoned the air, which is thecommon breath of all, for their own selfish purposes. There was shortwork with such men in old Roman times. Just in the moment of theirtriumph, a hand, as of an avenging giant, clutched them, and dashed thewretches down this precipice."

  "Was it well done?" asked the young man.

  "It was well done," answered Miriam; "innocent persons were saved by thedestruction of a guilty one, who deserved his doom."

  While this brief conversation passed, Donatello had once or twiceglance
d aside with a watchful air, just as a hound may often be seen totake sidelong note of some suspicious object, while he gives his moredirect attention to something nearer at, hand. Miriam seemed now firstto become aware of the silence that had followed upon the cheerful talkand laughter of a few moments before.

  Looking round, she perceived that all her company of merry friends hadretired, and Hilda, too, in whose soft and quiet presence she had alwaysan indescribable feeling of security. All gone; and only herself andDonatello left hanging over the brow of the ominous precipice.

  Not so, however; not entirely alone! In the basement wall of the palace,shaded from the moon, there was a deep, empty niche, that had probablyonce contained a statue; not empty, either; for a figure now came forthfrom it and approached Miriam. She must have had cause to dread someunspeakable evil from this strange persecutor, and to know that this wasthe very crisis of her calamity; for as he drew near, such a cold, sickdespair crept over her that it impeded her breath, and benumbed hernatural promptitude of thought. Miriam seemed dreamily to rememberfalling on her knees; but, in her whole recollection of that wildmoment, she beheld herself as in a dim show, and could not welldistinguish what was done and suffered; no, not even whether she werereally an actor and sufferer in the scene.

  Hilda, meanwhile, had separated herself from the sculptor, and turnedback to rejoin her friend. At a distance, she still heard the mirth ofher late companions, who were going down the cityward descent of theCapitoline Hill; they had set up a new stave of melody, in which herown soft voice, as well as the powerful sweetness of Miriam's, was sadlymissed.

  The door of the little courtyard had swung upon its hinges, andpartly closed itself. Hilda (whose native gentleness pervaded all hermovements) was quietly opening it, when she was startled, midway, by thenoise of a struggle within, beginning and ending all in one breathlessinstant. Along with it, or closely succeeding it, was a loud, fearfulcry, which quivered upward through the air, and sank quiveringdownward to the earth. Then, a silence! Poor Hilda had looked into thecourt-yard, and saw the whole quick passage of a deed, which took butthat little time to grave itself in the eternal adamant.