The Charterhouse of Parma Read Online Free PDF Page A

to omens that if, at the moment of pushing off, someone glimpsed a priest on the shore or a raven flying away to the left, the locks would be restored to the boat-chains at once, and everyone went back to bed. Thus Abbé Blanès had not imparted his rather abstruse learning to Fabrizio, but unwittingly had instilled in him a limitless trust in signs which can foretell the future.
    The Marchese felt that an accident occurring to his coded correspondence might place him at his sister’s mercy; hence every year, on the Feast of Saint Angela, Countess Pietranera’s patron saint, Fabrizio was given permission to spend eight days in Milan. He lived the whole year in the hope or the recollection of these eight days. Upon this great occasion, to defray the expenses of this politic journey, the Marchese handed his son four scudi, and as was his habit, gave nothing to his wife, who was accompanying the boy. But one of the cooks, six lackeys, and a coachman and pair left for Como the eve of the journey, and every day in Milan the Marchesa would find a carriage at her disposal and a table set for twelve.
    The sort of sullen life led by the Marchese del Dongo was anything but diverting, yet it had this advantage: it permanently enriched the families who were so good as to give themselves up to it. The Marchese, whose annual income exceeded two hundred thousand francs, did not expend a quarter of this sum; he lived on hopes. During the thirteen years that had passed since 1800, he continually and firmly believed that Napoléon would be overthrown before six months had passed. Judge of his delight when, early in 1813, he learned of the disasters of the Beresina ! The capture of Paris and Napoléon’s fall madehim nearly lose his mind, and he permitted himself the most outrageous remarks to his wife and his sister. Finally, after a wait of fourteen years, he had the inexpressible joy of seeing the Austrian troops re-enter Milan. Following orders from Vienna, the Marchese del Dongo was received by the Austrian general with a consideration bordering upon respect; an offer was immediately tendered of one of the highest positions in the government, which the Marchese accepted as the payment of a debt. His elder son received a lieutenancy in one of the Monarchy’s finest regiments, but his younger obdurately rejected the proposed rank of cadet. The Marchese’s triumph, in which he revelled with unusual insolence, lasted but a few months and was followed by a humiliating reversal. He had never possessed a talent for business, and fourteen years spent in the country among his lackeys, his notary, and his doctor, combined with the petulance of his advancing years, had rendered him utterly incompetent. Now it is impossible, under Austrian rule, to retain an important position without possessing the kind of talent required by the slow, complex, but entirely logical administration of that ancient Monarchy. The Marchese del Dongo’s blunders scandalized the staff and even obstructed the progress of business. His ultra-monarchical observations irritated the very populations who were to be lulled into slumbrous apathy. One fine day, he learned that His Gracious Majesty had deigned to accept his resignation from the post he occupied in the government, and had simultaneously conferred upon him the rank of
Second Grand Major-domo Major
of the Lombardo-Venetian Kingdom. The Marchese was outraged by the cruel injustice of which he was the victim; he published a Letter to a Friend, he who so loathed the freedom of the press! And even wrote to the Emperor that his ministers were betraying him, being no better than Jacobins. These things done, he sadly returned to his Castle of Grianta. There was one consolation. After Napoléon’s fall, certain powerful persons in Milan fomented a street attack upon Count Prina, former minister of the King of Italy and a man of the first order. Count Pietranera risked his life to save the Minister, who was beaten to death