Page:Once a Week Volume V.djvu/49

42 which has just befallen the insurance companies, leads them to call the earnest attention of the legislature to the points which we have pointed out to our readers, even the three acres of ruins, now to be seen from London Bridge, will not tell their tale in vain.

are the waters wandering? The miller’s daughter asks; Under the mill-wheel, over the mill-dam, Plying their noisy tasks, They murmur and brawl for a moment, Then onward and onward they go; Ever advancing, never returning— Where do the waters flow?

Where are the waters wandering? Lying, last night, on my bed, List’ning their restless dashing, Methought their wild voices said: So shall it be on life's current— A hope or a joy once o’er— A wish or a dream once uttered— Like us, shall return no more!”

Then my busy thoughts went wand’ring Far into my coming life— Shall it bear me hence on its bosom, To mingle with care and strife? Never, ah! never returning, As those sad whispers foretold, To the happy hours of the present— The careless dreaming of old? With the voice of the wand’ring waters Mingled at early morn The sound of the whirring mill-wheel, The gentle fall of the corn; And the twilight, misty and mournful, Faded away from my sight, Till the drooping boughs of the willows Were tinted with rosy light; And the waters onward wand’ring, Laughing and sparkling went; Till my lips their smiles repeated, And I learned the lesson, Content. Shall I fear—whilst a loving heaven Such smiles and guidance bestows— To float on life’s darksome waters, Or reck where its current flows?

lean man in a student’s long gown, much patched and torn, crouched before a furnace, the crimson glow lighting up weirdly the many lines and hollows of his wan face. His beard was ragged, his hair long and matted—once dead black in hue, now part grey from time and trial, part brown from dust, and singeing, and neglect: he had wild-looking, bleared eyes, scorched, claw-like hands, a painful shortness of breath, and the tremor as of palsy vibrating every now and then through his whole frame. The room was large, low-roofed, and lighted almost altogether by the fire, for the sun could hardly pour any of its rays through the long narrow slit of a window cut in the very deep wall of rubble and rough-shaped stones. An utter want of order prevailed in the room and its garniture. Open books and tattered manuscripts, flung about anyhow, covered the floor. Alembics, retorts, crucibles, jars, and bottles of various forms, thick cobweb festoons and coatings of dust; here a pile of faggots, there a heap of charcoal; while mingling with these and in equal confusion a painter’s implements—the easel and wand, the pigments and stack of canvases and panels. The ceiling was black from smoke, and the air hot and stifling, charged as it seemed with poisonous fumes. Molten metals bubbled and seethed over the red fire. In the doorway stood a young man in a grey surcoat with silver buttons, a silver-hilted dagger swinging from his belt. He was fanning his face with his cap, evidently oppressed by the intense heat of the chamber.

“I have been deceived then. You are not Francesco Mazzuoli?” he said.

He was small in stature, light and supple in figure, with long abundant brown hair and delicate if not regular features.

“No,” answered the man by the fire, without turning round. “I am not he whom you seek.”

“And yet they told me I should find him here. He is my relative—my cousin.”

“Your name?”

“Geronimo Mazzuoli.”

“The son of Michele?”

“The same.”

“Come nearer.”

“I may not, the furnace is too hot.”

“To the window then, Geronimo,” and the watcher by the fire rose with difficulty and dragged himself, rather than walked, to the place indicated. He stood there a moment, letting the daylight fall upon his haggard features.

“Now look upon me,” he said. “Should you know your cousin?”

“For years I have not seen him. We parted at Parma a long while back. He journeyed to Rome. I have been there since, and learnt tidings of him. Surely I should remember his face; and I have seen his picture, and lately too, at Arezzo, in the house of Messer Pietro, the poet. It was given to him by his master, the Sovereign Pontiff.”

“Well, and how looked he in his picture?”

“It was painted by himself, and strangely like him, so it seemed to me, and so all have told me. A noble youth, with the beauty of an angel rather than a man—in his eyes a glory—”

“Enough. Why do you seek him?”

“I bring him news from Parma. I am a painter also, but younger—poorer—I seek of him instruction and help. I would learn from him the secrets of his art. But you are not he, let me go hence therefore.”

“Peace! I am Francesco Mazzuoli!”

“Impossible!” and Geronimo started back at the wild, crazed look in the other’s eyes. “You are old and bent, and—yet pardon me. I should not speak such words to you.”

“Where is my mirror? You are right, Geronimo. It is not the same face I painted at Parma in the house of Michele, your father. The same yet not the same—I am old and broken; black from the fire, withered and dying.”