A TRUE ROMANCE.

Among my friends at Rome, during a few weeks that I spent there, was one old resident of the 'Eternal City' whom I had often begged to give me some authentic narrative of Catholic experience. He was naturally reserved, jealously truthful, a 'know-nothing' upon religious controversy, not at all the man to invent an exciting story, not fond of legends, Romish or Genevan, not a violent partisan of republicanism in church or state, and not familiar enough with American thought to suspect the use that might be made in the United States of such an incident as I am now to repeat. In fact, as I compare him with other sources of intelligence open to travelers, sure as I am that no one could question his belief of whatever he told, every weight that character, intelligence, years, experience, could confer, rests upon the only monkish secret which he professed to know. One night he invited me to a subterranean restaurant, famous for its excellent creature-comforts, and there over some royal English beer, without any graces of style or attempts to exaggerate the incidents, he unfolded what I believe to be a true record of unblessed love.

General readers are familiar with the fact that many a nun immures herself for life under a sort of moral compulsion, because her high-born family has become too indigent to maintain its stately style of living, because the lady herself is in danger of contracting some degrading alliance, declines peremptorily such connection as her relations approve, or has committed some imprudence that clouds over her future prospects. The secret influences which entangle men in the Catholic orders correspond to this. It would be arrant bigotry to doubt that some offer up an unstained heart, in aspirations for usefulness or sighs for holiness; but many times a youth is led blindfold to the altar by ambitious relatives, like Talleyrand, and discovers too late his perfect unfitness for the vow he has assumed. And these last are they whose lives become a scandal to their profession, whose levity shocks so many Protestant observers, whose consciences have no true peace, who die sometimes in open unbelief and, living, are the worst enemies of the cause they advocate.

As my story goes, at nearly the same time that a gallant young man of high family disappeared from the gay circles of Rome, a lovely girl of distinguished parentage had suffered her blonde tresses to be shorn, her graceful limbs draped in forlorn russet, her merry meetings with girlish spirits like herself exchanged for the tears of the confessional, the lengthened prayers of the cloister, the frequent fastings and sometimes scourgings of monastic life. The cause of this contemporaneous disappearance was known only to the most intimate friends of two celebrated but no longer wealthy families, who deemed the sacrifice necessary, and so recked not of the wounds it might make, the perjuries it might tempt, the life-struggle of duty with feeling it might cause.

Time passed on. Forgotten by society, it was supposed these victims of artificial life had forgotten the circles they were wont to charm, forgotten almost themselves in a system most ingeniously arranged to blot out one's individuality and to make its subject a perfectly ordered part of a grand machine. But, unsuspected by their friends, unknown to their superiors, these two pledged hearts had met. Love will break through even convent-walls, will speak amidst monastic silence, will rise unbidden under ascetic discipline. No one can tell, very few can imagine how they agreed upon their trysting hour. Through a neglected drain, from some underground apartment, where she had been imprisoned for negligence, the slender form of the delicate maiden worked its way into the free air where her lover awaited her in the eagerness of a stolen pleasure; and the hours supposed to be given to prayer or repose flew fast in the worship of the 'winged god.' If I recollect rightly, there were deeply-shaded groves not far from their place of meeting, in which they felt secure from observation during the night season.

But Love has always been blind to its own peril: a prudent lover would be indeed a black swan; if such there have been, these were not. And one night, when the beautiful nun would return through the friendly passage in season, that her absence might not be detected when the sisters were summoned to their matin service, the rain, whose torrents she had not noticed while her lover's arm sheltered her, had filled up the only pathway to her cell, and not even by the hazard of life could she recover her room once more. A few hours more, and her absence would inevitably come to light, would be fearfully punished, if not by a death such as Scott portrays in one of his poetical legends, by a disgrace far worse than physical suffering, from which nothing but the grave could give her relief. The alternative, flight, where no provision had been made, with no possible help from any friend, with the likelihood of treachery where they might least expect it, seemed impossible.

In despair rather than hope, the forlorn lady recollected that her uncle, who had some spiritual supervision over the Roman convents, though he was sure to be more outraged by her misstep than any one else, had (besides the motive of shielding a family name from disgrace) perhaps some remaining affection for his favorite niece. At any rate, if she were to die, she thought it would be a satisfaction to die humanely, by the speedy stroke of offended honor than by such cruel penances as would slowly wear life away. And, what might she not hope, if there were still one humane drop in that aged bosom, one indulgent memory of youthful passion beneath that austere cowl, one fond thought of a childhood which seemed to herself a dream of paradise, when his hand blessed her curling head, and his lips gave a parting kiss, returned so heartily by herself.

There was not a moment to lose—they hardly knew how time had sped, but they had never found his wings slow when they were together. So, hand in hand they hastened to the presence which was to be either deliverance or condemnation to them both; and when at last they reached the palace, and after some delay were admitted to kneel before his eminence, no words can paint the horror with which he exchanged his dreams of the papal chair for a sight of the apostate priest and self-doomed nun confessing in one breath that they had 'loved not wisely, but too well'—that God once brought together those whom cruel relatives tore asunder—that he was their only escape from double ruin, and infamy worse than death.

The moments seemed hours while he who had approved the punishment of other celibates for no greater sins, sought how he might ward off a blow that struck so near his own bosom—that was to crush one the grace of whose childhood had not been more marked than her affection for himself—than the earnestness of the tone with which she was wont to declare herself 'his little daughter.' He had not the courage to hazard his position by espousing her cause or undertaking her escape. He felt that she had been more sinned against than sinning, in having been forced into a vow of perpetual virginity when she had already made another vow which her loving nature had rejoiced to keep.

And yet, the preservation of his dignity was of infinite moment to his peace—nor could he help seeing that a flood of disgrace would sweep over the Church were such breaches widened by the public protection of the offenders, and, of course, the enemies of monastic institutions would seize upon the opening for fiercer assaults.

Suddenly he dismissed the erring brother in too much trouble to bestow the admonition which the other was in too great anxiety to heed—threw over the trembling girl the cloak and hat of a common citizen—summoned his household servants together as quickly as possible, and hastened in the twilight of early dawn to the sleeping convent with as large an attendance as such hot haste would permit.

For some time no admittance could be obtained; and the rain seemed to pour down in sheets, as if all the windows of heaven were open. But his orders were peremptory, his authority was ample, his excuse ingenuity itself: 'He had just heard that a man was secreted within those consecrated walls; he was determined to see for himself, if he had to tear one stone from another; under his supervision no such infamy should be so much as suspected.' And so, making a virtue of necessity, the panic-struck lady abbess yielded her dignity, and the posse of pretended inspectors stood within the drowsy walls before one rose-tint in the East threatened their secret with exposure.

So responsible an official could not be satisfied with seeing the nuns together, or witnessing their earliest chapel-service; he must enter every room, survey every cranny, and leave no possibility of deception, no corner for concealment. And posting some of his servants—whose excessive watchfulness might prove a little inconvenient—at the two principal entrances, with his remaining attendants he proceeded orderly from room to room, the superior refusing, as was expected, to sanction by her presence such an invasion of the sacred privacy of her institution. When they reached the cell adjoining that where our tale properly ends, the disguised nun was far enough in the rear of the feebly-lighted party, and they too busy in the pretended search, for her disappearance to be noticed—her uncle had made her see that this was the only chance—so, flinging the coat and hat through an open window into the yard, she glided with ghost-like tread into her own apartment, and when the drowsy servitors opened her door, she was seen upon her knees before the crucifix, praying more fervently than ever the jubilant prayer of a newly-rescued soul.

The trouble threatened to lead to some farther difficulties. For these ladies were of the Roman aristocracy, and their honor had been impeached, their sanctuary invaded, their solemn asseverations had been disregarded, their protector had become their accuser. It might have gone hard with the father who had planned this ingenious device to save his name from disgrace and shield his niece from suffering. But, just before the party turned from the convent-gate, a keen eye detected the fallen mantle; and the trophy was exhibited to the agitated superior, in proof that some of the forbidden sex had been lurking around, and had stolen away in terror from so formidable a search; she was warned to new vigilance, and offered every assistance for the future which the papal guards could bestow.

And so ends all that my informant knew of the love-lost girl. Her accomplice in guilt, who did not desert her till he saw there was hope in her uncle's face, was hurried away as a missionary to South-America; and, as the waves of the sea rolled between him and his only object of affection, he must have 'rejoiced with trembling' that the crimson waves of death had not mingled her and him in a common doom. He wanted the independence to detect the injustice of a system which made a pure attachment guilt, and its discovery condemnation; so he raised no protesting voice against it. Truly, the day of strange stories in Italy is not yet over.