Captain Mansana and Mother's Hands

ublished in one of the Florence journals, immediately arrested my attention. It carried me back thirteen years, and brought to mind a former visit

in the course of the next few days, they were to be received by the town council and escorted by deputations from various patriotic associations in Rome and the neighbouring cities to A-

time in prison in Rome, the other in exile in Genoa. The newspaper recapitulated the story of the elder Mansana's career. With all, except the latter portion, I was already pretty well a

boots, and broad-leaved plumed hats. But what faces these were! How instinct with purpose and determination! Look at the well-known portrait of Orsini, the man who threw bombs at Napoleon III.; in him you have the typical Italian cast of countenance often seen in the men who had risen against the tyranny in Church and State, braving the dungeon and the scaffold, and had leagued themselves together in those formidable organisations from which sprang the army that liberated Italy. Louis Napoleon had

heir breasts proved that they had been present at Porta San Pancrazio in 1849 (when Garibaldi, though outnumbered by the French troops, twice forced them to retreat), in 1858, at the Lake of Garda, in 1859 in Sicily and Naples. And it was probable enough, though there were no medals to testify to that fact, that the history of their lives would have revealed their share in the day of Mentana. This is one of those

frivolity, the stronger and fiercer must be the passionate energy of those who would prevail against it. And through my brain there coursed reminiscences of the past history of Italy, with its contrasts of strange levity and dark purpose. Backward and forward my thoughts swayed, from Brutus to Orsini, from Catiline to C?sar Borgia, from Lucullus to Leo X., from Savonarola to Garibaldi. Meanwhile the company got itself in motion, the banners streamed out, loud-voiced street-vendors offered for sale leaflets and pamphlets containing accounts of Mansana's career, and the procession passed into the Via Felice. Silence greeted it as it moved on. The lofty houses showed few spectators at this early h

nes at these boys as they stood laughing, beyond her reach. I had a sudden distinct vision of the old woman's keen, angry eyes, of her sinewy, wrinkled hands, her grey bristling hai

Assuredly they had, for hate breeds hate, and strife strife. But how did it begin? I wa

d with a passionate frenzy of which the lads themselves eventually grew weary. Then, too, when they understood the species of cunning that lay in the use she made of her opportunities as a fascinating young widow, to gain material advantages for her sons, they began to feel a certain contempt for her. And so they turn

ions had procured for them a circle of acquaintance that extended far beyond the town and the society to which her family belonged. Each of them brought home a bride from a household of a higher social standing than their m

and justice. Now, indeed, in the end the old woman had won! But what did victory mean? Tears for her slighted affection, her rejected counsels, her ruined property; and she would rise and curse the sons who had deceived and plundered her, till a single glance from her elder daughter-in-law drove her back to the chimney corner, where she used to sit and pass her time in silent torpor, while this mood was upon her. Then she would sally out, and if she met her grandsons, in whom she sorrowfully noticed the same keen glance under the low brows, which she had first loved and afterwards learned to fear in her own sons, she would draw them to her with a torrent of angry words. She would warn them against their father's example, and inveigh against the people, as a mere rabble, not worth the sacrifice of a farthing, to say nothing of the loss of fortune, family, and freedom; and she would rail at her sons, the fathers of these boys, a

der that she might supply his deficiencies. She had undoubtedly increased the value of his property; but in the process she wore him down. This man with his gentle smile, his varied intellectual interests, and his lofty ideals, suffered in her society. She could not destroy his nobler nature, but his peace of mind and content she di

The younger-the one in civilian dress-had a smile round his somewhat thin lips, a smile in his small eyes; but it seemed to me that it would hardly be safe to presume on this. He had o

ng men had an appearance of athletic power, as if they could have leaped over the hearse, the elder gave you the further impression that he was actually longing to perform some such feat. The younger brother's half languid gait, that told of bodily strength impaired by disuse, h

at the age of ninety-five. I could see that her character was pretty well understood. With no less eagerness these gossips also informed me that she had lived to see the house freed from the mortgage, one vineyard bought back, and the whole property cleared of encumbrance. All

had lived long eno

that they were waiting for Mansana to escape in order that he might carry forward the movement in Rome itself. Escape he did, thanks to his own strength of will, and his wife's acuteness and devotion. By her advice he feigned insanity; he screamed till his voice gave way, and indeed, till his strength was exhausted, for he had refused to touch food or drink. At the imminent risk of death he persevered in this pretence, till they sent him to an asylum for lunatics. Here his wife was able to visit him, and to arrange his flight. But when he had escaped from captivity, he would not leave the town; the important preparations on foot required his presence. His wife first nursed him back to health and then took part in his hazardous enterprise. What other man in his place, after this long imprison

lled the flag-bedecked churchyard of Mansana's native town. The monumental tomb was finished, and that day, after the funeral ceremony w

llages had gathered on the line of route. Bands of music filled the narrow streets with sound, bunting and coloured cloths hung from the windows, wreaths were thrown as the procession passed, flowers were strewn before it, handkerchiefs waved, and not a few eyes gleamed bright thr

he had lost, nor could it add one jot to the honours her own heart had long since rendered to the dead. She looked upon it all as upon something she had seen and known years ago. How beautiful she still was, I thought; and that not merely because of the noble curves that time had not yet wholly swept from brow and cheek, nor because of the eyes, which once had been the loveliest in the town, and indeed were so even when I knew

ief at his eyes. The elder brother stood rooted to the spot when she had released him from her clasp. She looked long and intently upon him. Following her eyes, the gaze of the whole multitude was riveted upon him, while his cheek crimsoned under the ordeal. Her expression was full of an unfathomable insight, a sorrow beyond the reach of words. How often have