Part 15

Miss Roma Lister, when residing in Florence, having written to her old nurse Maria, in Rome, asking her if she knew, or could find, any tales of Virgil, received after a while the following letter, written out by her son, who has evidently been well educated, to judge by his style and admirable handwriting:

“ROME, _January_ 28, 1897.

“MIA BUONA SIGNORINA,

“I have been seeking for some old person, a native of the Castelli Romani, who knew something relative to the magician Virgil, and I found in a street of the new quarters of Rome an old acquaintance, a man who is more than eighty years of age; and on asking him for what I wanted, he, after some reflection, recalled the following story:

“‘I was a small boy when my parents told me that in the Montagna della Sibilla there was once an old man who was indeed so very old that the most ancient people had ever known him as appearing of the same age, and he was called the magician Virgilio.

“‘One day three shepherds were in a cabin at the foot of the mountain, when the magician entered, and they were at first afraid of him, knowing his reputation. But he calmed them by saying that he never did harm to anyone, and that he had come down from the mountain to beg a favour from them.

“‘“There is,” he continued, “half-way up the mountain, a grotto, in which there is a great serpent which keeps me from entering. Therefore I beg you do me the kindness to capture it.”

“‘The shepherds replied that they would do so, thinking that he wanted them to kill the snake, but he explained to them that he wished to have it taken in a very large bottle (_grandissimo boccione_) {165} by means of certain herbs which he had provided.

“‘And the next day he came with the bottle and certain herbs which were strange to them, and certainly not grown in the country. And he said:

“‘“Go to the grotto, and lay the bottle down with its mouth towards the cavern, and when the serpent shall smell the herbs he will enter the bottle. Then do ye close it quickly and bring it to me. And all of this must be done without a word being spoken, else ye will meet with disaster.”

“‘So the three shepherds went their way, and after a time came to the grotto, which they entered, and did as the magician had ordered. Then, after a quarter of an hour, the serpent, smelling the herbs, came forth and entered the bottle. No sooner was he in it than one of the shepherds adroitly closed it, and cried unthinkingly:

“‘“Now you’re caught!”

“‘When all at once they felt the whole mountain shake, and heard an awful roar, and crashing timber round on every side, so that they fell on the ground half dead with fear. When they came to their senses each one found himself on the summit of a mountain, and the three peaks were far apart. It took them several days to return to their cabin, and all of them died a few days after.

“‘From that time the magician Virgil was no more seen in the land.’

“This is all which I could learn; should I hear more I will write at once to you.”

This is beyond question an imperfectly-told tale. What the sorcerer intended and effected was to divide a mountain into three peaks, as did Michael Scott, of whom legends are still left in Italy, as the reader may find by consulting the interesting work by the Rev. J. Wood Brown. {166} In the Italian tale the three shepherds who were together find themselves suddenly apart on the tops of three peaks, which clearly indicates the real aim of the narrative.

An old Indian woman, widow of an Indian governor, told me, as a thing unknown, that the three hills of Boston had been thus split by Glusgábe or Glooscap, the great Algonkin god. As this deity introduced culture to North America, it will be at once perceived that there was something truly _weirdly_, or strangely prophetic, in this act. As Glooscap was the first to lay out Boston—_à la Trinité_—he certainly ought to be regarded as the patron saint of that cultured city, and have at least a library, a lyceum, or a hotel named after him in the American Athens. The coincidence is very singular—Rome and Boston!

Eildon Hill, by which, as I have heard, Andrew Lang was born, is one of the picturesque places which attract legends and masters in folk-lore. Of it I have a strange souvenir. While in its vicinity I for three nights saw in a dream the Fairy Queen, and the “vision” was remarkably vivid, or so much so as to leave a strong or haunting impression on my waking hours. It was like a glimpse into elf-land. Of course it was simply the result of my recalling and thinking deeply on the legend of “True Thomas,” but the dream was very pleasant and sympathetic.

THE GOLDEN PINE-CONE.

“Quid sibi vult, illa _Pinus_, quàm semper statis diebus in deum matris intromittis sanctuarium?”—ARNOBIUS, i. 5.

There was once a young man named Constanzo, who was blessed, as they say, in form and fortune, he being both fair in face and rich. Now, whether it was that what he had seen and learned of ladies at court had displeased him, is not recorded or remembered, but one thing is certain, that he had made up his mind to marry a poor girl, and so began to look about among humble folk at the maids, which indeed pleased many of them beyond belief, though it was taken ill by their parents, who had but small faith in such attentions.

But the one whom it displeased most of all was the mother of Constanzo, who, when he said that he would marry a poor girl, declared in a rage that he should do nothing of the kind, because she would allow no such person to come in the house. To which he replied that as he was of age, and the master, he would do as he pleased. Then there were ill words, for the mother had a bad temper and worse will, and had gone the worst way to work, because of all things her son could least endure being governed. And she was the more enraged because her son had hitherto always been docile and quiet, but she now found that she had driven him up to a height which he had not before dreamed of occupying and where he would now remain. But she vowed vengeance in her heart, saying: “Marry or not—this shall cost thee dear. _Te lo farò pagare_!”

Many months passed, and no more was said, when one day the young gentleman went to the chase with his friends, and impelled by some strange influence, took a road and went afar into a part of the country which was unknown to him. At noon they dismounted to rest, when, being very thirsty, Constanzo expressed a desire for water.

And just as he said it there came by a _contadina_, carrying two jars of water, cold and dripping, fresh from a fountain. And the young signor having drunk, observed that the girl was of enchanting or dazzling beauty, with a charming expression of innocence, which went to his heart.

“What is thy name?” he asked.

“Constanza,” the girl replied.

“And I am Constanzo,” he cried; “and as our names so our hearts shall be—one made for the other!”

“But you are a rich lord, and I am a poor girl,” she slowly answered, “so it can never be.”

But as both had loved at sight, and sincerely, it was soon arranged, and the end was that the pair were married, and Constanza became a signora and went to live in the castle with her lord. His mother, who was more his enemy than ever, and ten times that of his wife, made no sign of anger, but professed love and devotion, expressing delight every day and oftener that her son had chosen so fair a wife, and one so worthy of him.

It came to pass that Constanza was about to become a mother, and at this time her husband was called to the wars, and that so far away that many days must pass before he could send a letter to his home. But his mother showed herself so kind, though she had death and revenge at her heart, that Constanzo was greatly relieved, and departed almost light of heart, for he was a brave man, as well as good, and such people borrow no trouble ere it is due.

But the old signora looked after him with bitterness, saying, “Thou shalt pay me, and the hour is not far off.” And when she saw his wife she murmured:

“Now revenge shall take its shape; Truly thou canst not escape; Be it death or be it dole, I will sting thee to the soul.”

Then when the hour came that the countess was to be confined, the old woman told her that she herself alone would serve and attend to all—_e che avrebbe fatto tutto da se_. But going forth, she found a pine-tree and took from it a cone, which she in secret set to boil in water, singing to it:

“Bolli, bolli! Senza posa. Che nel letto Vi é la sposa, Un fanciullo Alla luce mi dara, E una pina diventera!

“Bolli, bolli! Mio decotto Bolli, bolli! Senza posa! Il profumo Che tu spandi, Si spanda In corpo alla Alla sposa e il figlio, Il figlio che fara Pina d’ oro diventera!”

“Boil and boil, Rest defying! In the bed The wife is lying; Soon her babe The light will see, But a pine-cone It shall be!

“Boil and boil, And well digest! Boil and boil, And never rest! May the perfume Which you spread Thrill the body To the head, And the child Which we shall see, A golden pine-cone Let it be!”

And soon the countess gave birth to a beautiful daughter with golden hair, but the old woman promptly took the little one and bathed it in the water in which she had boiled the pine-cone, whereupon it became a golden pine-cone, and the poor mother was made to believe that this was her first-born; and the same was written to the father, who replied to his wife that, whatever might happen, he would ever remain as he had been.

The mother-in-law took the pine-cone and placed it on a mantelpiece, as such curious or odd things are generally disposed of. And when her son returned she contrived in so many ways and with craft to calumniate his wife that the poor lady was ere long imprisoned in a tower.

But a strange thing now happened, for every night the pine-cone, unseen by all, left like a living thing its place on the chimney-piece and wandered over the castle, returning at five o’clock to its place, but ever going just below the lady’s window, where it sang:

“O cara madre mia! Luce degli occhi miei! Cessa quel pianto, E non farmi più soffrir!”

“O mother, darling mother, Light of my eyes, I pray That thou wilt cease thy weeping, So mine may pass away.”

Yet, after he had shut his wife up in the tower, Constanzo had not an instant’s peace of mind. Therefore, to be assured, he one day went to consult the great magician Virgil. And having told all that had happened, the wise man said:

“Thou hast imprisoned thy wife, she who is pure and true, in a tower, and all on the lying words and slanders of that vile witch your mother. And thou hast suffered bitterly, and well deserved it, as all do who are weak enough to believe evil reports of a single witness; for who is there who may not lie, especially among women, when they are jealous and full of revenge? Now do thou set free thy wife (and bid her come to me and I will teach her what to do).”

So the count obeyed.

Then the mother took the pine-cone and threw it up three times into the air, singing:

“Pina, mia bella pina! Dei pini tu sei regina! Dei pini sei prottetrice, D’ un pino pianta la radice! E torna una fanciulla bella Come un occhio Di sole in braccio A tuo padre Ed a tua madre!

“Pine, the fairest ever seen, Of all cones thou art the queen! Guarding them in sun or shade, And ’tis granted that, when planted, Thou shalt be a charming maid, Ever sweet and ever true To thy sire and mother too.”

And this was done, and the cone forthwith grew up a fair maid, who was the joy of her parents’ life. But the people in a rage seized on the old witch, who was covered with a coat of pitch and burned alive in the public square.

* * * * *

This legend was gathered in and sent to me from Siena. As a narrative it is a fairy-tale of the most commonplace description, its incidents being found in many others. But so far as the pine-cone is concerned it is of great originality, and retains remarkable relics of old Latin lore. The pine-tree was a favourite of Cybele, and it was consecrated to Silvanus, who is still known and has a cult in the mountains of the Romagna Toscana. This rural deity often bore a pine-cone in his hand. Propertius also assigns the pine to Pan. The cone was pre-eminently a phallic emblem, therefore specially holy; in this sense it was placed on the staff borne by the specially initiated to Bacchus. It was incredibly popular as an amulet, on account of its supposed magical virtues, therefore no one object is more frequently produced in ancient art. A modern writer, observing this, and not being able to account for it, very feebly attributes it to the fact that the object is so common that it is naturally used for a model. “Artists,” he says, “in fact prefer to use what comes ready to hand, and to copy such plants as are ever under their eye.” So writes the great dilettante Caylus, forgetting that a thousand objects quite as suitable to decoration as the pine-cone, and quite as common, were not used at all.

The pine typified a new birth, according to Friedrich; this was because it was evergreen, and therefore sacred as immortal to Cybele. Thus Ovid (“Metamorphoses,” x. 103) writes, “_Pinus grata deum matri_.” The French Layard, in the new “Annales de l’Institut Archæologique,” vol. xix., has emphatically indicated the connection of the pine-cone with the cult of Venus, and as a reproductive symbol. It is in this sense clearly set forth in the Italian or Sienese legend, where the pine-cone planted in the earth grows up as the girl with golden locks. This is very probably indeed the relic of an old Roman mythical tale or poem.

The golden pine-cone appears in other tales. Wolf (“Zeitschrift für deutsche Mythologie,” vol. i., p. 297) says that in Franconia there were once three travelling _Handwerksburschen_, or craftsmen, who met with a beautiful lady, who when asked for alms gave to each a pine-cone from a tree. Two of them threw the gifts away, but the third found his changed to solid gold. In order to make an amulet which is kept in the house, pine-cones are often gilded in Italy. I have seen them here in Florence, and very pretty ornaments they make.

VIRGIL’S MAGIC LOOM.

“I heard a loom at work, and thus it spoke, As though its clatter like a metre woke, And echoed in my mind like an old song, Rising while growing dimmer e’en like smoke.

“And thus it spoke, ‘God is a loom like me, His chiefest weaving is Humanity, And man and woman are the warp and woof, Which make a mingling light of mystery.’”

_The Loom_: C. G. L.

Gega was a girl of fifteen years of age, and without parents or friends, with nothing in the world but eyes to weep and arms to work. Yet she had this luck, that an old woman who was a fellow-lodger in the place where she lived, {172} moved by compassion, took the girl to live with her, though all she had was a very small room, in which was a poor bed and a little loom, so crazy-looking and old that it seemed impossible to work with it.

Nunzia, {173} for such was the old woman’s name, took Gega indeed as a daughter, and taught her to weave, which was a good trade in those days, and in that place where few practised it. So it came to pass that they made money, which was laid by. [This was no great wonder, for the old loom had a strange enchantment in it, by which marvellous work could be produced.]

The old woman very often bade Gega take great care of the loom, and the girl could not understand why Nunzia thought so much of it, since it seemed to her to be like any other. [For it never appeared strange to her that when she wove the cloth seemed to almost come of itself—a great deal for a little thread—and that its quality or kind improved as she applied herself to work, for in her ignorance she believed that this was the way with all weaving.]

At last the old Mamma Nunzia died, and Gega, left alone, began to make acquaintances and friends with other girls who came to visit her. Among these was one named Ermelinda, who was at heart as treacherous and rapacious as she was shrewd, yet one withal who, what with her beauty and deceitful airs, knew how to flatter and persuade to perfection, so that she could make a simple girl like Gega believe that the moon was a pewter plate, or a black fly white.

Now, the first time that she and several others, who were all weavers, saw Gega at work, they were greatly amazed, for the cloth seemed to come of itself from a wretched old loom which appeared to be incapable of making anything, and it was so fine and even, and had such a gloss that it looked like silk.

“How wonderful! One would say it was silk!” cried a girl.

“Oh, I can make silk when I try,” answered Gega; and applying her will to it, she presently spun from cotton-thread a yard of what was certainly real silk stuff.

And seeing this, all present declared that Gega must be a witch.

“Nonsense,” she replied; “you could all do it if you tried as I do. As for being a witch, it is Ermelinda and not I who should be so, for she first said it was like silk, and made it so.”

Then Ermelinda saw that there was magic in the loom, of which Gega knew nothing, so she resolved to do all in her power to obtain it. And this she effected firstly by flattery, and giving the innocent girl extravagant ideas of her beauty, assuring her that she had an attractiveness which could not fail to win her a noble husband, and that, having laid by a large sum of money, she should live on it in style till married, and that in any case she could go back to her weaving. But that on which she laid most stress was that Gega should leave her old lodging and get rid of her dirty old furniture, and especially of that horrible, crazy old loom, persuading her that, if she ever should have occasion to weave again, she, with her talent, could do far better with a new loom, and probably gain thrice as much, all of which the simple girl believed, and so let her false friend dispose of everything, in doing which Ermelinda did not fail to keep the loom herself, declaring that nobody would buy it.

“Now,” said the latter, “I am content. Thou art very beautiful; all that thou needest is to be elegantly dressed, and have fine things about thee, to soon catch a fine husband.”

Gega assented to this, but was loth to part with her old loom, which she had promised Nunzia should never be neglected; but Ermelinda promised so faithfully to keep it carefully for her, that she was persuaded to let her have it. Then the young girl took a fine apartment, well furnished, and bought herself beautiful clothes, and, guided by her false friend, began to go to entertainments and make fashionable friends, and live as if she were rich.

Then Ermelinda, having obtained the old loom, went to work with it, in full hope that she too could spin silk out of cotton, but found out to her amazement and rage that she could do nothing of the kind—nay, she could not so much as weave common cloth from it; all that she got after hours of fruitless effort was a headache, and the conviction that she had thrown away all her time and trouble, which made her hate Gega all the more.

Meanwhile the latter for a time enjoyed life as she had never done before; but though she looked anxiously to the right and the left for a husband, found none, the well-to-do young men being quite as anxious to wed wealth as she was, and all of them soon discovered on inquiry that she had little or nothing, despite her style of living, and her money rapidly melted away, till at last she found that to live she must work—there was no help for it. With what remained she bought a fine loom and thread, and sat down to weave; but though she succeeded in making common stuff like others, it was not silk, nor anything like it, nor was there anyone who would buy what she made. In despair she remembered what Mamma Nunzia had solemnly said to her, that she must never part from the old loom, so she went to Ermelinda to reclaim it. But her false friend, although she could do nothing with the loom herself, was not willing that Gega, whom she hated with all her heart, should in any way profit, and declared that her mother had broken up and burned the rubbishy old thing, and to this story she adhered, and when Gega insisted on proof of it, drove her in a rage out of the house.

While Mamma Nunzia was living she, being a very wise woman, had taught Gega with care the properties and nature of plants, roots, herbs, and flowers, saying that some day it might be of value to her, as it is to everyone. So whenever they had a holiday they had gone into the fields and woods, where the girl became so expert that she could have taught many a doctor very strange secrets; and withal, the Mamma also made her learn the charms and incantations which increase the power of the plants. So now, having come to her last coin, and finding there was some profit in it, she began to gather herbs for medicine, which she sold to chemists and others in the towns. And finding a deserted old tower in a wild and rocky place, she was allowed to make it her home; and indeed, after all she had gone through, and her disappointment both as to friends and lovers, she found herself far happier when alone than when in a town, where she was ashamed to meet people who had known her when she lived in style.

One evening as she was returning home she heard a groaning in the woods as of someone in great suffering, and, guided by the sound, found a poor old woman seated on a stone, who told her that she had hurt her leg by slipping from a rock. And Gega, who was as strong as she was kind and compassionate, carried the poor soul in her arms to the tower, where she bound an application of healing herbs to the wound, and bade her remain and welcome.

“I have nothing to give you for it all,” said the old woman on the following day.

“Nor did I do it in the hope of aught,” replied Gega.

“And yet,” said the sufferer, “I might be of use to you. If, for example, you have lost anything, I can tell you how to recover it or where it is.”

“Ah!” cried Gega, “if thou canst do that, thou wilt be a friend indeed, for I have lost my fortune—it was a loom which was left to me by Mamma Nunzia. I did not regard her advice never to part with it, and I have bitterly repented my folly. I trusted it to a friend, who betrayed me, for she burned it.”

“No, my dear, she did nothing of the kind,” replied the old woman; “she has it yet, and I will make it return to thee.”

Then she repeated this invocation:

“Telaio! Telaio! Telaio! Che per opera e virtú Del gran mago Virgilio Fosti fabricato, E di tante virtù adornato Ti prego per opera e virtu Del gran mago Virgilio Tu possa di una tela Di oro di argento Essere ordito. E come il vento, Dalla casa di Ermelinda, Tu possa sortire, Sortire e tornare Nella vecchia sofitta Della figlia mia Per opera e virtú Dal gran mago Virgilio!”

“Loom! Loom! O loom! Who by the labour and skill Of the great magician Virgil Wert made so long ago, And gifted with such power! I pray thee by that skill And labour given by Virgil, the great magician, As thou canst spin a web Of silver or of gold, Fly like the wind away From Ermelinda’s house Into the small old room Where once my daughter dwelt, All by the skill and power Of great Virgilius!”