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618 have drawn the better or higher numbers, to limit the suffering and the discontent within as narrow a circle as may be, and not to extend them to those who have had reasonable ground to think that they had escaped. Hence arise sharp conflicts between the two authorities, ending of course very variously, according to the weight, or courage, or energy, or skill of the contending parties. And thus another element of great uncertainty is imported into the lottery.

And now the day had been fixed for the drawing up of the communal lists. Little else was talked about in the country districts, and even in the cities the conscription became the leading topic of interest to all men, and certainly not less so to all women.

At Bella Luce the anxiety was certainly as keenly felt as in any homestead of all the district. There were two sons there, but the conscription could not take them both. The monster, ruthless as it was, had some bowels of compassion. It did not deprive parents of an only son! Carlo Vanni therefore was safe! His name would be returned in the communal list, but merely for the formal fulfilment of the law. His claim to exemption would be immediately allowed as a matter of course. But Beppo was of course liable. There was no chance of any objection being made to him. On the contrary, if his number should be at all within reach, it was very certain that the military officers would make every effort to lay their hands on the finest young fellow in all the country side.

But of course it was supposed in the world of Santa Lucia that Beppo Vanni would never have to serve. What! the son of old Paolo Vanni of Bella Luce! Why he could buy a dozen substitutes if needed! The old fellows who knew Paolo Vanni well, had some doubt upon this subject. Don Evandro, who knew him thoroughly well, had no doubt at all about it. It might have been in his power to induce his old parishioner and friend to come down with a part of his hoarded scudi to buy his son’s freedom. But Don Evandro had no intention to do anything of the sort. He had more than one reason for not wishing that any part of old Paolo Vanni’s money should be spent in such a manner. In the first place it would be lending aid and support to the heretical and accursed Italian government. Don Evandro, as has been said, was a keen politician. He was a priest of that class, which, while entirely giving up the world, in so far as making themselves before all things churchmen, and having no interest, or ambition, or affection for anything save the Church can be called giving up the world, yet remain, to all spiritual interests and purposes, intensely worldly. He was a sworn, true, and loyal churchman, ready to sacrifice much, to dare all things, and to deem all things permissible for the service of the Church. But of any other meaning of the term, save the visible and bodily constitution of the great corporation to which he belonged, he had about as much idea as a Red Indian.

The curate of Santa Lucia intended, therefore, that his parish should furnish as few men to Victor Emmanuel as might be. There were the hills near at hand! There was no contending influence on the spot to thwart his—no resident land-owners, no gentry! He had always possessed a very powerful influence over his—not all very poor, but all very ignorant—parishioners; and now he meant to use it. It was necessary to be careful, however! The government was on the watch; it knew very well that the priests were almost to a man its enemies; its suspicions were fully aroused; and the game to be played was not one altogether without danger.

But the curato had in the special case of Beppo Vanni a second reason for not choosing that he should either serve his time in the army or be bought off by his father. He had thoroughly espoused his old friend’s cause in the matter of Beppo’s marriage. It was all in the line of his own duty and scheme of conduct to secure Sandro Bertoldi’s money to the right side, instead of allowing it to go entirely to swell the means of the enemy, as would be the case if Lisa married Captain Brilli: not to mention that a match between Giulia and Beppo might, as the priest shrewdly guessed from all he had ever seen of Giulia, go far to endanger the subserviency of the Vanni money also to the good cause. It was therefore on all accounts necessary that Beppo should marry Lisa, and should not marry Giulia.

Those who live in a state of society in which priestly influence has comparatively little power over the secular affairs of private life, and which is not divided into two utterly opposed parties by any such broad line of demarcation as that which separates Italian society into irreconcileably hostile camps, can hardly appreciate at its real importance the effects of such a system of tactics, as that above indicated, carved out by so powerfully an organised body as the Italian clergy consistently, perseveringly, and unfailingly.

Now, if Beppo went to serve his time, he would come back with an additional prestige in Giulia’s eyes, utterly emancipated from priestly control, and very probably in a great degree emancipated from parental control also. His return might be looked for at a fixed and known time, and there was every thing to encourage Giulia to wait for him.

If, on the other hand, his father were induced to conquer his avarice so far as to pay the sum necessary to procure a substitute, he would remain in the country free to continue his pursuit of Giulia, and it would be very difficult to keep them apart.

But if, on the contrary, old Paolo were counselled to refuse to pay for a substitute,—counsel which he would be only too ready to follow—and if Beppo should get a bad number, and could be persuaded to go off to the hills, Victor Emmanuel would lose a first-rate soldier; a contribution to the general lawlessness, discontent, and ungovernableness of the country would be achieved, and Beppo would be effectually separated from Giulia; his return uncertain; his entire future precarious and full of difficulty; and possibly—who could tell?—Old Paolo’s succession secured to the much promising and well-disposed Carlo.

And what were the views of honest Beppo himself respecting this dreaded conscription?