French cannon? Does she walk round slowly, that
silent melancholy lady, and take counsel, with her
portraits looking out at her to the full as sadly?
Does she, who is queen of the Ruspigliosi, ever
fling herself wearily back in her chair, and, with
face upturned, feast on the glories of the rising
morn, on the bright yellows, the melting gold, the
delicate turquoise tinge, that wait on that
dazzling procession of the young Aurora, sung by
Guido? What a hymn, and what a singer! O noble
lady! were your heart heavy as stone, here is
comfort and balm, such as lies not in Gilead!
With such a thing of beauty and joy for ever,
enshrined as plafond for your ceiling; with that
delicious progress trooping out each morning
with the sun; with that glorious company but a
room away, waiting rapturous visits and a daily
homage; can we conceive you down-hearted?
The idea intoxicates; and yet here descend the
great stair, some homely-clad ladies, with the
eternal children behind, going out for an airing
in the sober practical clarence that waits drawn
up at the door. And something whispers me that
Aurora in her car is no more for them than the
house keys, than the ordering of dinner, the
hiring of a servant.

Strict are the laws of caste, and grim is the
heraldic faith of the suttees in the faubourg of St.
Germain; and yet those lean but blue-veined
dowagers are not fiercer in their creed than our
Roman dames. There is but one exclusive
religion (of fashion), and out of that there
is no salvation. You and I, mere strangers,
are not worthy to touch their garments' hem.
It is their boast that they keep the
shopkeeping islanders at a distance. Armed even
with letters, you can scarcely break that
hollow square, bristling with points; not the
right-hand of fellowship, but the frigid welcome
of the finger tip is held out to you. But their
gentility has sustained cruel shocks. Needy
members of their guild have at times
intermarried with daughters of the shopkeeping
nation, seduced by the golden scales of such
mermaidens; which grievous trials are happily
unfrequent, and in a manner exceptional, for
our noble princes, true to their character, will
chaffer and higgle, and set themselves up, as it
were, in market overt, and cry off on an issue
of a few hundreds. There was Miss Smith, of
Bloomsbury. She might have queened it there
for years to come, had not her aunt made
that now famous pilgrimage to the City Eternal.
How her heavy balances with the prince banker,
and her scattering of her pieces broadcast,
with the remains of her handsome fortune
—forty thousand, not a shilling less, believe
me—made her an honoured guest at that
moneyed person's entertainments, and how the
Principe Liquorista first saw her in those
gilded saloons, and thereon became desperately
enamoured, and turned Miss Smith into the
Princess Liquorista, having previously had
all things settled to his use, these things
are, in a manner, matters of history,
enrolled in the fasti of the house of Smith. So
was it, too, with the Signora Murphiana, long
nymph of the river Lee, and known with honour
in Cork. The Marquis Babuino came and
wooed the simple maid (her ingots came of the
justly celebrated staple of that city), and she
now sits in a cold chamber of a barrack, and
has positively a Guido or Domenichino, which
strangers, cognoscenti, ask for! But the noble
dames welcome these gentle aliens but coldly,
and tolerate them only on the bare edge of those
select slopes where they air their nobility.

As I return home late in the evening and
stride magnificently up the marble staircase of
my palace, in which I play prince and duke at so
many scudi a day, there flashes out upon me
suddenly, from adjoining door, the figure of
the well-known bandit chieftain's wife, of the
melodrame—Maria Grazia, or Graziella, or some
such name. I had thought that she, with all
her sisterhood, were long since dead, and only
walked by night as wraiths, when the
footlamps were lit, or at least, in masqued balls;
but here is a real flesh and blood Italian woman,
such as I sought vainly all day long, perfect in
dress and feature, carrying a water-pail.

Maria Grazia, or Graziella (I protest I
cannot vouch for the accuracy of either name),
had taken service as a chambermaid—a highly
picturesque chambermaid—the old long-lost
type. Richest glossy black hair, so massive
it must be pounds in weight, the even peach
blossom tint of skin, the large eyes, the heavy
features, the air of magnificent dulness and
repose, the barbaric gold in her ears, the
ropes of coral twisted about her neck, the
white bodice and Indian red of her short
petticoat throwing out the figure in finest
relief,—this apparition, I say, was positively
refreshing and inspiring. There is a superb stolidness
about her; a stolidness that could be
wakened into savageness. Incredulous before,
I now accept the history of my Lord Byron's
Italian—that magnificent "animal"—and can
well imagine this one too, lying in wait with a
knife, or flinging herself madly on the earth,
or casting herself into the lake with furious
persistence in being drowned.

The Fifteenth Journey of
THE UNCOMMERCIAL TRAVELLER,
A SERIES OF OCCASIONAL JOURNEYS,
BY CHARLES DICKENS,
Will appear in No. 75.

Now ready, at all the Libraries, in Three Volumes
post 8vo,
THE WOMAN IN WHITE.
By WILKIE COLLINS.
SAMPSON LOW, SON, and CO., 47, Ludgate-hill.