UNDER THE LEADS - Chapter XXVI
Under The Leads--The Earthquake
What a strange and unexplained power certain words exercise upon the
soul! I, who the evening before so bravely fortified myself with my
innocence and courage, by the word tribunal was turned to a stone,
with merely the faculty of passive obedience left to me.
My desk was open, and all my papers were on a table where I was
accustomed to write.
"Take them," said I, to the agent of the dreadful Tribunal, pointing
to the papers which covered the table. He filled a bag with them,
and gave it to one of the sbirri, and then told me that I must also
give up the bound manuscripts which I had in my possession. I shewed
him where they were, and this incident opened my eyes. I saw now,
clearly enough, that I had been betrayed by the wretch Manuzzi. The
books were, "The Key of Solomon the King," "The Zecorben," a
"Picatrix," a book of "Instructions on the Planetary Hours," and the
necessary incantations for conversing with demons of all sorts.
Those who were aware that I possessed these books took me for an
expert magician, and I was not sorry to have such a reputation.
Messer-Grande took also the books on the table by my bed, such as
Petrarch, Ariosto, Horace. "The Military' Philosopher" (a manuscript
which Mathilde had given me), "The Porter of Chartreux," and "The
Aretin," which Manuzzi had also denounced, for Messer-Grande asked me
for it by name. This spy, Manuzzi, had all the appearance of an
honest man--a very necessary qualification for his profession. His
son made his fortune in Poland by marrying a lady named Opeska, whom,
as they say, he killed., though I have never had any positive proof
on the matter, and am willing to stretch Christian charity to the
extent of believing he was innocent, although he was quite capable of
such a crime.
While Messer-Grande was thus rummaging among my manuscripts, books
and letters, I was dressing myself in an absent-minded manner,
neither hurrying myself nor the reverse. I made my toilette, shaved
myself, and combed my hair; putting on mechanically a laced shirt and
my holiday suit without saying a word, and without Messer-Grande--who
did not let me escape his sight for an instant--complaining that I
was dressing myself as if I were going to a wedding.
As I went out I was surprised to see a band of forty men-at-arms in
the ante-room. They had done me the honour of thinking all these men
necessary for my arrest, though, according to the axiom 'Ne Hercules
quidem contra duos', two would have been enough. It is curious that
in London, where everyone is brave, only one man is needed to arrest
another, whereas in my dear native land, where cowardice prevails,
thirty are required. The reason is, perhaps, that the coward on the
offensive is more afraid than the coward on the defensive, and thus a
man usually cowardly is transformed for the moment into a man of
courage. It is certain that at Venice one often sees a man.
defending himself against twenty sbirri, and finally escaping after
beating them soundly. I remember once helping a friend of mine at
Paris to escape from the hands of forty bum-bailiffs, and we put the
whole vile rout of them to flight.
Messer-Grande made me get into a gondola, and sat down near me with
an escort of four men. When we came to our destination he offered me
coffee, which I refused; and he then shut me up in a room. I passed
these four hours in sleep, waking up every quarter of an hour to pass
water--an extraordinary occurrence, as I was not at all subject to
stranguary; the heat was great, and I had not supped the evening
before. I have noticed at other times that surprise at a deed of
oppression acts on me as a powerful narcotic, but I found out at the
time I speak of that great surprise is also a diuretic. I make this
discovery over to the doctors, it is possible that some learned man
may make use of it to solace the ills of humanity. I remember
laughing very heartily at Prague six years ago, on learning that some
thin-skinned ladies, on reading my flight from The Leads, which was
published at that date, took great offence at the above account,
which they thought I should have done well to leave out. I should
have left it out, perhaps, in speaking to a lady, but the public is
not a pretty woman whom I am intent on cajoling, my only aim is to be
instructive. Indeed, I see no impropriety in the circumstance I have
narrated, which is as common to men and women as eating and drinking;
and if there is anything in it to shock too sensitive nerves, it is
that we resemble in this respect the cows and pigs.
It is probable that just as my overwhelmed soul gave signs of its
failing strength by the loss of the thinking faculty, so my body
distilled a great part of those fluids which by their continual
circulation set the thinking faculty in motion. Thus a sudden shock
might cause instantaneous death, and send one to Paradise by a cut
much too short.
In course of time the captain of the men-at-arms came to tell me that
he was under orders to take me under the Leads. Without a word I
followed him. We went by gondola, and after a thousand turnings
among the small canals we got into the Grand Canal, and landed at the
prison quay. After climbing several flights of stairs we crossed a
closed bridge which forms the communication between the prisons and
the Doge's palace, crossing the canal called Rio di Palazzo. On the
other side of this bridge there is a gallery which we traversed. We
then crossed one room, and entered another, where sat an individual
in the dress of a noble, who, after looking fixedly at me, said,
"E quello, mettetelo in deposito:"
This man was the secretary of the Inquisitors, the prudent Dominic
Cavalli, who was apparently ashamed to speak Venetian in my presence
as he pronounced my doom in the Tuscan language.
Messer-Grande then made me over to the warden of The Leads, who stood
by with an enormous bunch of keys, and accompanied by two guards,
made me climb two short flights of stairs, at the top of which
followed a passage and then another gallery, at the end of which he
opened a door, and I found myself in a dirty garret, thirty-six feet
long by twelve broad, badly lighted by a window high up in the roof.
I thought this garret was my prison, but I was mistaken; for, taking
an enormous key, the gaoler opened a thick door lined with iron,
three and a half feet high, with a round hole in the middle, eight
inches in diameter, just as I was looking intently at an iron
machine. This machine was like a horse shoe, an inch thick and about
five inches across from one end to the other. I was thinking what
could be the use to which this horrible instrument was put, when the
gaoler said, with a smile,
"I see, sir, that you wish to know what that is for, and as it
happens I can satisfy your curiosity. When their excellencies give
orders that anyone is to be strangled, he is made to sit down on a
stool, the back turned to this collar, and his head is so placed that
the collar goes round one half of the neck. A silk band, which goes
round the other half, passes through this hole, and the two ends are
connected with the axle of a wheel which is turned by someone until
the prisoner gives up the ghost, for the confessor, God be thanked!
never leaves him till he is dead."
"All this sounds very ingenious, and I should think that it is you
who have the honour of turning the wheel."
He made no answer, and signing to me to enter, which I did by bending
double, he shut me up, and afterwards asked me through the grated
hole what I would like to eat.
"I haven't thought anything about it yet," I answered. And he went
away, locking all the doors carefully behind him.
Stunned with grief, I leant my elbows on the top of the grating. It
was crossed, by six iron bars an inch thick, which formed sixteen
square holes. This opening would have lighted my cell, if a square
beam supporting the roof which joined the wall below the window had
not intercepted what little light came into that horrid garret.
After making the tour of my sad abode, my head lowered, as the cell
was not more than five and a half feet high, I found by groping along
that it formed three-quarters of a square of twelve feet. The fourth
quarter was a kind of recess, which would have held a bed; but there
was neither bed, nor table, nor chair, nor any furniture whatever,
except a bucket--the use of which may be guessed, and a bench fixed
in the wall a foot wide and four feet from the ground. On it I
placed my cloak, my fine suit, and my hat trimmed with Spanish paint
and adorned with a beautiful white feather. The heat was great, and
my instinct made me go mechanically to the grating, the only place
where I could lean on my elbows. I could not see the window, but I
saw the light in the garret, and rats of a fearful size, which walked
unconcernedly about it; these horrible creatures coming close under
my grating without shewing the slightest fear. At the sight of these
I hastened to close up the round hole in the middle of the door with
an inside shutter, for a visit from one of the rats would have frozen
my blood. I passed eight hours in silence and without stirring, my
arms all the time crossed on the top of the grating.
At last the clock roused me from my reverie, and I began to feel
restless that no one came to give me anything to eat or to bring me a
bed whereon to sleep. I thought they might at least let me have a
chair and some bread and water. I had no appetite, certainly; but
were my gaolers to guess as much? And never in my life had I been so
thirsty. I was quite sure, however, that somebody would come before
the close of the day; but when I heard eight o'clock strike I became
furious, knocking at the door, stamping my feet, fretting and fuming,
and accompanying this useless hubbub with loud cries. After more
than an hour of this wild exercise, seeing no one, without the
slightest reason to think I could be heard, and shrouded in darkness,
I shut the grating for fear of the rats, and threw myself at full
length upon the floor. So cruel a desertion seemed to me unnatural,
and I came to the conclusion that the Inquisitors had sworn my death.
My investigation as to what I had done to deserve such a fate was not
a long one, for in the most scrupulous examination of my conduct I
could find no crimes. I was, it is true, a profligate, a gambler, a
bold talker, a man who thought of little besides enjoying this
present life, but in all that there was no offence against the state.
Nevertheless, finding myself treated as a criminal, rage and despair
made me express myself against the horrible despotism which oppressed
me in a manner which I will leave my readers to guess, but which I
will not repeat here. But notwithstanding my brief and anxiety, the
hunger which began to make itself felt, and the thirst which
tormented me, and the hardness of the boards on which I lay, did not
prevent exhausted nature from reasserting her rights; I fell asleep.
My strong constitution was in need of sleep; and in a young and
healthy subject this imperious necessity silences all others, and in
this way above all is sleep rightly termed the benefactor of man.
The clock striking midnight awoke me. How sad is the awaking when it
makes one regret one's empty dreams. I could scarcely believe that I
had spent three painless hours. As I lay on my left side, I
stretched out my right hand to get my handkerchief, which I
remembered putting on that side. I felt about for it, when--heavens!
what was my surprise to feel another hand as cold as ice. The fright
sent an electric shock through me, and my hair began to stand on end.
Never had I been so alarmed, nor should I have previously thought
myself capable of experiencing such terror. I passed three or four
minutes in a kind of swoon, not only motionless but incapable of
thinking. As I got back my senses by degrees, I tried to make myself
believe that the hand I fancied I had touched was a mere creature of
my disordered imagination; and with this idea I stretched out my hand
again, and again with the same result. Benumbed with fright, I
uttered a piercing cry, and, dropping the hand I held, I drew back my
arm, trembling all over:
Soon, as I got a little calmer and more capable of reasoning, I
concluded that a corpse had been placed beside me whilst I slept, for
I was certain it was not there when I lay down.
"This," said I, "is the body of some strangled wretch, and they would
thus warn me of the fate which is in store for me."
The thought maddened me; and my fear giving place to rage, for the
third time I stretched my arm towards the icy hand, seizing it to
make certain of the fact in all its atrocity, and wishing to get up,
I rose upon my left elbow, and found that I had got hold of my other
hand. Deadened by the weight of my body and the hardness of the
boards, it had lost warmth, motion, and all sensation.
In spite of the humorous features in this incident, it did not cheer
me up, but, on the contrary, inspired me with the darkest fancies. I
saw that I was in a place where, if the false appeared true, the
truth might appear false, where understanding was bereaved of half
its prerogatives, where the imagination becoming affected would
either make the reason a victim to empty hopes or to dark despair. I
resolved to be on my guard; and for the first time in my life, at the
age of thirty, I called philosophy to my assistance. I had within me
all the seeds of philosophy, but so far I had had no need for it.
I am convinced that most men die without ever having thought, in the
proper sense of the word, not so much for want of wit or of good
sense, but rather because the shock necessary to the reasoning
faculty in its inception has never occurred to them to lift them out
of their daily habits.
After what I had experienced, I could think of sleep no more, and to
get up would have been useless as I could not stand upright, so I
took the only sensible course and remained seated. I sat thus till
four o'clock in the morning, the sun would rise at five, and I longed
to see the day, for a presentiment which I held infallible told me
that it would set me again at liberty. I was consumed with a desire
for revenge, nor did I conceal it from myself. I saw myself at the
head of the people, about to exterminate the Government which had
oppressed me; I massacred all the aristocrats without pity; all must
be shattered and brought to the dust. I was delirious; I knew the
authors of my misfortune, and in my fancy I destroyed them. I
restored the natural right common to all men of being obedient only
to the law, and of being tried only by their peers and by laws to
which they have agreed-in short, I built castles in Spain. Such is
man when he has become the prey of a devouring passion. He does not
suspect that the principle which moves him is not reason but wrath,
its greatest enemy.
I waited for a less time than I had expected, and thus I became a
little more quiet. At half-past four the deadly silence of the
place--this hell of the living--was broken by the shriek of bolts
being shot back in the passages leading to my cell.
"Have you had time yet to think about what you will take to eat?"
said the harsh voice of my gaoler from the wicket.
One is lucky when the insolence of a wretch like this only shews
itself in the guise of jesting. I answered that I should like some
rice soup, a piece of boiled beef, a roast, bread, wine, and water.
I saw that the lout was astonished not to hear the lamentations he
expected. He went away and came back again in a quarter of an hour
to say that he was astonished I did not require a bed and the
necessary pieces of furniture, "for" said he, "if you flatter
yourself that you are only here for a night, you are very much
mistaken."
"Then bring me whatever you think necessary."
"Where shall I go for it? Here is a pencil and paper; write it
down."
I skewed him by writing where to go for my shirts, stockings, and
clothes of all sorts, a bed, table, chair, the books which Messer-
Grande had confiscated, paper, pens, and so forth. On my reading out
the list to him (the lout did not know how to read) he cried,
"Scratch out," said he, "scratch out books, paper, pens, looking-
glass and razors, for all that is forbidden fruit here, and then give
me some money to get your dinner." I had three sequins so I gave him
one, and he went off. He spent an hour in the passages engaged, as I
learnt afterwards, in attending on seven other prisoners who were
imprisoned in cells placed far apart from each other to prevent all
communication.
About noon the gaoler reappeared followed by five guards, whose duty
it was to serve the state prisoners. He opened: the cell door to
bring in my dinner and the furniture I had asked for. The bed was
placed in the recess; my dinner was laid out on a small table, and I
had to eat with an ivory spoon he had procured out of the money I had
given him; all forks, knives, and edged tools being forbidden.
"Tell me what you would like for to-morrow," said he, "for I can only
come here once a day at sunrise. The Lord High Secretary has told me
to inform you that he will send you some suitable books, but those
you wish for are forbidden."
"Thank him for his kindness in putting me by myself."
"I will do so, but you make a mistake in jesting thus."
"I don't jest at all, for I think truly that it is much better to be
alone than to mingle with the scoundrels who are doubtless here."
"What, sir! scoundrels? Not at all, not at all. They are only
respectable people here, who, for reasons known to their excellencies
alone, have to be sequestered from society. You have been put by
yourself as an additional punishment, and you want me to thank the
secretary on that account?"
"I was not aware of that."
The fool was right, and I soon found it out. I discovered that a man
imprisoned by himself can have no occupations. Alone in a gloomy
cell where he only sees the fellow who brings his food once a day,
where he cannot walk upright, he is the most wretched of men. He
would like to be in hell, if he believes in it, for the sake of the
company. So strong a feeling is this that I got to desire the
company of a murderer, of one stricken with the plague, or of a bear.
The loneliness behind the prison bars is terrible, but it must be
learnt by experience to be understood, and such an experience I would
not wish even to my enemies. To a man of letters in my situation,
paper and ink would take away nine-tenths of the torture, but the
wretches who persecuted me did not dream of granting me such an
alleviation of my misery.
After the gaoler had gone, I set my table near the grating for the
sake of the light, and sat down to dinner, but I could only swallow a
few spoonfuls of soup. Having fasted for nearly forty-eight hours,
it was not surprising that I felt ill. I passed the day quietly
enough seated on my sofa, and proposing myself to read the "suitable
books" which they had been good enough to promise me. I did not shut
my eyes the whole night, kept awake by the hideous noise made by the
rats, and by the deafening chime of the clock of St. Mark's, which
seemed to be striking in my room. This double vexation was not my
chief trouble, and I daresay many of my readers will guess what I am
going to speak of-namely, the myriads of fleas which held high
holiday over me. These small insects drank my blood with unutterable
voracity, their incessant bites gave me spasmodic convulsions and
poisoned my blood.
At day-break, Lawrence (such was the gaoler's name) came to my cell
and had my bed made, and the room swept and cleansed, and one of the
guards gave me water wherewith to wash myself. I wanted to take a
walk in the garret, but Lawrence told me that was forbidden. He gave
me two thick books which I forbore to open, not being quite sure of
repressing the wrath with which they might inspire me, and which the
spy would have infallibly reported to his masters. After leaving me
my fodder and two cut lemons he went away.
As soon as I was alone I ate my soup in a hurry, so as to take it
hot, and then I drew as near as I could to the light with one of the
books, and was delighted to find that I could see to read. I looked
at the title, and read, "The Mystical City of Sister Mary of Jesus,
of Agrada." I had never heard of it. The other book was by a Jesuit
named Caravita. This fellow, a hypocrite like the rest of them, had
invented a new cult of the "Adoration of the Sacred Heart of our Lord
Jesus Christ." This, according to the author, was the part of our
Divine Redeemer, which above all others should be adored a curious
idea of a besotted ignoramus, with which I got disgusted at the first
page, for to my thinking the heart is no more worthy a part than the
lungs, stomach; or any other of the inwards. The "Mystical City"
rather interested me.
I read in it the wild conceptions of a Spanish nun, devout to
superstition, melancholy, shut in by convent walls, and swayed by the
ignorance and bigotry of her confessors. All these grotesque,
monstrous, and fantastic visions of hers were dignified with the name
of revelations. The lover and bosom-friend of the Holy Virgin, she
had received instructions from God Himself to write the life of His
divine mother; the necessary information was furnished her by the
Holy Ghost.
This life of Mary began, not with the day of her birth, but with her
immaculate conception in the womb of Anne, her mother. This Sister
Mary of Agrada was the head of a Franciscan convent founded by
herself in her own house. After telling in detail all the deeds of
her divine heroine whilst in her mother's womb, she informs us that
at the age of three she swept and cleansed the house with the
assistance of nine hundred servants, all of whom were angels whom God
had placed at her disposal, under the command of Michael, who came
and went between God and herself to conduct their mutual
correspondence.
What strikes the judicious reader of the book is the evident belief
of the more than fanatical writer that nothing is due to her
invention; everything is told in good faith and with full belief.
The work contains the dreams of a visionary, who, without vanity but
inebriated with the idea of God, thinks to reveal only the
inspirations of the Divine Spirit.
The book was published with the permission of the very holy and very
horrible Inquisition. I could not recover from my astonishment! Far
from its stirring up in my breast a holy and simple zeal of religion,
it inclined me to treat all the mystical dogmas of the Faith as
fabulous.
Such works may have dangerous results; for example, a more
susceptible reader than myself, or one more inclined to believe in
the marvellous, runs the risk of becoming as great a visionary as the
poor nun herself.
The need of doing something made me spend a week over this
masterpiece of madness, the product of a hyper-exalted brain. I took
care to say nothing to the gaoler about this fine work, but I began
to feel the effects of reading it. As soon as I went off to sleep I
experienced the disease which Sister Mary of Agrada had communicated
to my mind weakened by melancholy, want of proper nourishment and
exercise, bad air, and the horrible uncertainty of my fate. The
wildness of my dreams made me laugh when I recalled them in my waking
moments. If I had possessed the necessary materials I would have
written my visions down, and I might possibly have produced in my
cell a still madder work than the one chosen with such insight by
Cavalli.
This set me thinking how mistaken is the opinion which makes human
intellect an absolute force; it is merely relative, and he who
studies himself carefully will find only weakness. I perceived that
though men rarely become mad, still such an event is well within the
bounds of possibility, for our reasoning faculties are like powder,
which, though it catches fire easily, will never catch fire at all
without a spark. The book of the Spanish nun has all the properties
necessary to make a man crack-brained; but for the poison to take
effect he must be isolated, put under the Leads, and deprived of all
other employments.
In November, 1767, as I was going from Pampeluna to Madrid, my
coachman, Andrea Capello, stopped for us to dine in a town of Old
Castille. So dismal and dreary a place did I find it that I asked
its name. How I laughed when I was told that it was Agrada!
"Here, then," I said to myself, "did that saintly lunatic produce
that masterpiece which but for M. Cavalli I should never have known."
An old priest, who had the highest possible opinion of me the moment
I began to ask him about this truthful historian of the mother of
Christ, shewed me the very place where she had written it, and
assured me that the father, mother, sister, and in short all the
kindred of the blessed biographer, had been great saints in their
generation. He told me, and spoke truly, that the Spaniards had
solicited her canonization at Rome, with that of the venerable
Palafox. This "Mystical City," perhaps, gave Father Malagrida the
idea of writing the life of St. Anne, written, also, at the dictation
of the Holy Ghost, but the poor devil of a Jesuit had to suffer
martyrdom for it--an additional reason for his canonization, if the
horrible society ever comes to life again, and attains the universal
power which is its secret aim.
At the end of eight or nine days I found myself moneyless. Lawrence
asked me for some, but I had not got it.
"Where can I get some?"
"Nowhere."
What displeased this ignorant and gossiping fellow about me was my
silence and my laconic manner of talking.
Next day he told me that the Tribunal had assigned me fifty sous per
diem of which he would have to take charge, but that he would give me
an account of his expenditure every month, and that he would spend
the surplus on what I liked.
"Get me the Leyden Gazette twice a week."
"I can't do that, because it is not allowed by the authorities."
Sixty-five livres a month was more than I wanted, since I could not
eat more than I did: the great heat and the want of proper
nourishment had weakened me. It was in the dog-days; the strength of
the sun's rays upon the lead of the roof made my cell like a stove,
so that the streams of perspiration which rolled off my poor body as
I sat quite naked on my sofa-chair wetted the floor to right and left
of me.
I had been in this hell-on-earth for fifteen days without any
secretion from the bowels. At the end of this almost incredible time
nature re-asserted herself, and I thought my last hour was come. The
haemorrhoidal veins were swollen to such an extent that the pressure
on them gave me almost unbearable agony. To this fatal time I owe
the inception of that sad infirmity of which I have never been able
to completely cure myself. The recurrence of the same pains, though
not so acute, remind me of the cause, and do not make my remembrance
of it any the more agreeable. This disease got me compliments in
Russia when I was there ten years later, and I found it in such
esteem that I did not dare to complain. The same kind of thing
happened to me at Constantinople, when I was complaining of a cold in
the head in the presence of a Turk, who was thinking, I could see,
that a dog of a Christian was not worthy of such a blessing.
The same day I sickened with a high fever and kept my bed. I said
nothing to Lawrence about it, but the day after, on finding my dinner
untouched, he asked me how I was.
"Very well."
"That can't be, sir, as you have eaten nothing. You are ill, and you
will experience the generosity of the Tribunal who will provide you,
without fee or charge, with a physician, surgeon, and all necessary
medicines."
He went out, returning after three hours without guards, holding a
candle in his hand, and followed by a grave-looking personage; this
was the doctor. I was in the height of the fever, which had not left
me for three days. He came up to me and began to ask me questions,
but I told him that with my confessor and my doctor I would only
speak apart. The doctor told Lawrence to leave the room, but on the
refusal of that Argus to do so, he went away saying that I was
dangerously ill, possibly unto death. For this I hoped, for my life
as it had become was no longer my chiefest good. I was somewhat glad
also to think that my pitiless persecutors might, on hearing of my
condition, be forced to reflect on the cruelty of the treatment to
which they had subjected me.
Four hours afterwards I heard the noise of bolts once more, and the
doctor came in holding the candle himself. Lawrence remained
outside. I had become so weak that I experienced a grateful
restfulness. Kindly nature does not suffer a man seriously ill to
feel weary. I was delighted to hear that my infamous turnkey was
outside, for since his explanation of the iron collar I had looked an
him with loathing.
In a quarter of an hour I had told the doctor all.
"If we want to get well," said he, "we must not be melancholy."
"Write me the prescription, and take it to the only apothecary who
can make it up. M. Cavalli is the bad doctor who exhibited 'The
Heart of Jesus,' and 'Tire Mystical City.'"
"Those two preparations are quite capable of having brought on the
fever and the haemorrhoids. I will not forsake you"
After making me a large jug of lemonade, and telling the to drink
frequently, he went away. I slept soundly, dreaming fantastic
dreams.
In he morning the doctor came again with Lawrence and a surgeon, who
bled me. The doctor left me some medicine which he told me to take
in the evening, and a bottle of soap. "I have obtained leave," said
he, "for you to move into the garret where the heat is less, and the
air better than here."
"I decline the favour, as I abominate the rats, which you know
nothing about, and which would certainly get into my bed."
"What a pity! I told M. Cavalli that he had almost killed you with
his books, and he has commissioned me to take them back, and to give
you Boethius; and here it is."
"I am much obliged to you. I like it better than Seneca, and I am
sure it will do me good."
"I am leaving you a very necessary instrument, and some barley water
for you to refresh yourself with."
He visited me four times, and pulled me through; my constitution did
the rest, and my appetite returned. At the beginning of September I
found myself, on the whole, very well, suffering from no actual ills
except the heat, the vermin, and weariness, for I could not be always
reading Boethius.
One day Lawrence told me that I might go out of my cell to wash
myself whilst the bed was being made and the room swept. I took
advantage of the favour to walk up and down for the ten minutes taken
by these operations, and as I walked hard the rats were alarmed and
dared not shew themselves. On the same day Lawrence gave me an
account of my money, and brought himself in as my debtor to the
amount of thirty livres, which however, I could not put into my
pocket. I left the money in his hands, telling him to lay it out on
masses on my behalf, feeling sure that he would make quite a
different use of it, and he thanked me in a tone that persuaded me he
would be his own priest. I gave him the money every month, and I
never saw a priest's receipt. Lawrence was wise to celebrate the
sacrifice at the tavern; the money was useful to someone at all
events.
I lived from day to day, persuading myself every night that the next
day I should be at liberty; but as I was each day deceived, I decided
in my poor brain that I should be set free without fail on the 1st of
October, on which day the new Inquisitors begin their term of office.
According to this theory, my imprisonment would last as long as the
authority of the present Inquisitors, and thus was explained the fact
that I had seen nothing of the secretary, who would otherwise have
undoubtedly come to interrogate, examine, and convict me of my
crimes, and finally to announce my doom. All this appeared to me
unanswerable, because it seemed natural, but it was fallacious under
the Leads, where nothing is done after the natural order. I imagined
the Inquisitors must have discovered my innocence and the wrong they
had done me, and that they only kept me in prison for form's sake,
and to protect their repute from the stain of committing injustice;
hence I concluded that they would give me my freedom when they laid
down their tyrannical authority. My mind was so composed and quiet
that I felt as if I could forgive them, and forget the wrong that
they had done me. "How can they leave me here to the mercy of their
successors," I thought, "to whom they cannot leave any evidence
capable of condemning me?" I could not believe that my sentence had
been pronounced and confirmed, without my being told of it, or of the
reasons by which my judges had been actuated. I was so certain that
I had right on my side, that I reasoned accordingly; but this was not
the attitude I should have assumed towards a court which stands aloof
from all the courts in the world for its unbounded absolutism. To
prove anyone guilty, it is only necessary for the Inquisitors to
proceed against him; so there is no need to speak to him, and when he
is condemned it would be useless to announce to the prisoner his
sentence, as his consent is not required, and they prefer to leave
the poor wretch the feeling of hope; and certainly, if he were told
the whole process, imprisonment would not be shortened by an hour.
The wise man tells no one of his business, and the business of the
Tribunal of Venice is only to judge and to doom. The guilty party is
not required to have any share in the matter; he is like a nail,
which to be driven into a wall needs only to be struck.
To a certain extent I was acquainted with the ways of the Colossus
which was crushing me under foot, but there are things on earth which
one can only truly understand by experience. If amongst my readers
there are any who think such laws unjust, I forgive them, as I know
they have a strong likeness to injustice; but let me tell them that
they are also necessary, as a tribunal like the Venetian could not
subsist without them. Those who maintain these laws in full vigour
are senators, chosen from amongst the fittest for that office, and
with a reputation for honour and virtue.
The last day of September I passed a sleepless night, and was on
thorns to see the dawn appear, so sure was I that that day would make
me free. The reign of those villains who had made me a captive drew
to a close; but the dawn appeared, Lawrence came as usual, and told
me nothing new. For five or six days I hovered between rage and
despair, and then I imagined that for some reasons which to me were
unfathomable they had decided to keep me prisoner for the remainder
of my days. This awful idea only made me laugh, for I knew that it
was in my power to remain a slave for no long time, but only till I
should take it into my own hands to break my prison. I knew that I
should escape or die: 'Deliberata morte ferocior'.
In the beginning of November I seriously formed the plan of forcibly
escaping from a place where I was forcibly kept. I began to rack my
brains to find a way of carrying the idea into execution, and I
conceived a hundred schemes, each one bolder than the other, but a
new plan always made me give up the one I was on the point of
accepting.
While I was immersed in this toilsome sea of thought, an event
happened which brought home to me the sad state of mind I was in.
I was standing up in the garret looking towards the top, and my
glance fell on the great beam, not shaking but turning on its right
side, and then, by slow and interrupted movement in the opposite
direction, turning again and replacing itself in its original
position. As I lost my balance at the same time, I knew it was the
shock of an earthquake. Lawrence and the guards, who just then came
out of my room, said that they too, had felt the earth tremble. In
such despair was I that this incident made me feel a joy which I kept
to myself, saying nothing. Four or five seconds after the same
movement occurred, and I could not refrain from saying,
"Another, O my God! but stronger."
The guards, terrified with what they thought the impious ravings of a
desperate madman, fled in horror.
After they were gone, as I was pondering the matter over, I found
that I looked upon the overthrow of the Doge's palace as one of the
events which might lead to liberty; the mighty pile, as it fell,
might throw me safe and sound, and consequently free, on St. Mark's
Place, or at the worst it could only crush me beneath its ruins.
Situated as I was, liberty reckons for all, and life for nothing, or
rather for very little. Thus in the depths of my soul I began to
grow mad.
This earthquake shock was the result of those which at the same time
destroyed Lisbon.
