Don Orsino | Page 3

Rome must be Rome still. He stands aloof and
gazes at the sight as upon a play in which Rome herself is the great
heroine and actress. He knows the woman and he sees the artist for the
first time, not recognising her. She is a dark-eyed, black-haired,
thoughtful woman when not upon the stage. How should he know her
in the strange disguise, her head decked with Gretchen's fair tresses, her
olive cheek daubed with pink and white paint, her stately form clothed
in garments that would be gay and girlish but which are only
unbecoming? He would gladly go out and wait by the stage door until
the performance is over, to see the real woman pass him in the dim
light of the street lamps as she enters her carriage and becomes herself
again. And so, in the reality, he turns his back upon the crowd and
strolls away, not caring whither he goes until, by a mere accident, he
finds himself upon the height of Sant' Onofrio, or standing before the
great fountains of the Acqua Paola, or perhaps upon the drive which
leads through the old Villa Corsini along the crest of the Janiculum.
Then, indeed, the scene thus changes, the actress is gone and the
woman is before him; the capital of modern Italy sinks like a vision
into the earth out of which it was called up, and the capital of the world
rises once more, unchanged, unchanging and unchangeable, before the
wanderer's eyes. The greater monuments of greater times are there still,
majestic and unmoved, the larger signs of a larger age stand out clear
and sharp; the tomb of Hadrian frowns on the yellow stream, the heavy
hemisphere of the Pantheon turns its single opening to the sky, the
enormous dome of the world's cathedral looks silently down upon the
sepulchre of the world's masters.
Then the sun sets and the wanderer goes down again through the chilly
evening air to the city below, to find it less modern than he had thought.
He has found what he sought and he knows that the real will outlast the
false, that the stone will outlive the stucco and that the builder of to-day
is but a builder of card-houses beside the architects who made Rome.

So his heart softens a little, or at least grows less resentful, for he has
realised how small the change really is as compared with the first effect
produced. The great house has fallen into new hands and the latest
tenant is furnishing the dwelling to his taste. That is all. He will not tear
down the walls, for his hands are too feeble to build them again, even if
he were not occupied with other matters and hampered by the
disagreeable consciousness of the extravagances he has already
committed.
Other things have been accomplished, some of which may perhaps
endure, and some of which are good in themselves, while some are
indifferent and some distinctly bad. The great experiment of Italian
unity is in process of trial and the world is already forming its opinion
upon the results. Society, heedless as it necessarily is of contemporary
history, could not remain indifferent to the transformation of its
accustomed surroundings; and here, before entering upon an account of
individual doings, the chronicler may be allowed to say a few words
upon a matter little understood by foreigners, even when they have
spent several seasons in Rome and have made acquaintance with each
other for the purpose of criticising the Romans.
Immediately after the taking of the city in 1870, three distinct parties
declared themselves, to wit, the Clericals or Blacks, the Monarchists or
Whites, and the Republicans or Beds. All three had doubtless existed
for a considerable time, but the wine of revolution favoured the
expression of the truth, and society awoke one morning to find itself
divided into camps holding very different opinions.
At first the mass of the greater nobles stood together for the lost
temporal power of the Pope, while a great number of the less important
families followed two or three great houses in siding with the Royalists.
The Republican idea, as was natural, found but few sympathisers in the
highest class, and these were, I believe, in all cases young men whose
fathers were Blacks or Whites, and most of whom have since thought
fit to modify their opinions in one direction or the other. Nevertheless
the Red interest was, and still is, tolerably strong and has been destined
to play that powerful part in parliamentary life, which generally falls to

the lot of a compact third party, where a fourth does not yet exist, or
has no political influence, as is the case in Rome.
For there is a fourth body in Rome, which