Pippa Passes: A Drama

( Bells and Pomegranates , No. I., 1841.) Pippa is the name of a girl employed at the silk mills at Asolo, in the Trevis an, in Northern Italy. In the whole year she has but one holiday: it is New Year’s day, and she determines to make the most of it. She springs out of bed as day is breaking, mapping out as she dre es herself what she will do with Morning, Noon, Evening, and Night. She thinks of the four persons whose lot is most to be envied in the little town, and will imagine herself each of these in turn. But she claims that the day will be fine and not ill-use her. There is the great, haughty Ottima, whose husband, old Luca, sleeps in his mansion while his wife makes love; her lover Sebald will be just as devoted, however the rain may beat on the home. Jules, the sculptor, will wed his Phene to-day: nothing can disturb their happine , their sunbeams are in their own breasts. Evening may be misty, but Luigi and his lady mother will not heed it. Monsignor will be here from Rome to visit his brother’s house: no storm will disturb his holy peace. But for Pippa, the silk winder, a wet day would darken her whole next year. So her morning fancy starts her as Ottima: all the gardens and the great storehouse are hers. But this is not the kind of love she envies; there’s better love, she knows. Her next choice shall give no cause for the scoffer—wedded love, like that of Jules and Phene, for example. But still improvement can be made even upon that: it is, after all, but new love; hers should have lapped her round from the beginning: “only parents’ love can last our lives.” She will be Luigi, communing with his mother in the turret. But if we come to that, God’s love is better even than that of Monsignor the holy and beloved priest, for to-night Pippa will in fancy have her dwelling in the palace by the Dome.— I. Morning. Ottima is with her paramour, the German Sebald, in the shrub-house. They have murdered Luca, and are talking calmly of their sin, and contrasting their present freedom with the restraint of last New Year’s day. Ottima’s husband can no longer fondle her before her lover’s face. But there is the corpse to remove, and as Sebald reflects, he begins to regret his treachery to the man who fed and sheltered him. Ottima tells him she loves him better for the crime. They care each other, and as Sebald fondles Ottima the voice of Pippa singing as she pa es is heard from without: “God’s in His heaven.” Sebald starts, conscience-stricken; Ottima says it is only “that ragged little girl!” At once Sebald is disenchanted; he sees the woman in all the naked horror of her crimes; all her grace and beauty are gone; he hates and curses her. The woman takes the guilt all upon her own head, and prays for him, not for herself: forgetting self, she thinks only of Sebald. “Not me—to him, O God, be merciful!” To her guilty soul also comes the reflection, “God’s in His heaven.” In self-sacrifice begins her redemption. Pippa has converted both. While Pippa is pa ing to Or can a, some students from Venice are discu ing a jest they have played off on Jules. They have, by means of sham letters which they have concocted between them and sent him as coming from the girl he loves, induced him to believe she was a cultivated woman, and he has been deceived into marrying her.— II. Noon. When the ceremony is over the truth is told him. He gives his bride gold, and is preparing to separate from her, when Pippa pa es, singing “Give her but a least excuse to love me!” Jules reasons, Here is a woman with utter need of him. She has an awakening moral sense, a soul like his own sculptured Psyche, waiting his word to make it bright with life—he will evoke this woman’s soul in some isle in far-off seas! He forgives her. Pippa’s song has worked the reconciliation.— III. Evening. Luigi and his mother are conversing in the turret on the hill above Asolo. Luigi is what has been termed a “patriot”; he is suspected of belonging to the secret society of the Carbonari, and is at the moment actually discu ing with his mother a plot to kill the Emperor of Austria. His mother tells him that half the ills of Italy are feigned, that patriotism seems the easiest virtue for a selfish man to acquire. She urges him to delay his journey to Vienna till the morning. Endeavouring to di uade him thus, he is on the point of yielding, when Pippa pa es, singing “No need the king should ever die!” “Not that sort of king,” says Luigi. “Such grace had kings when the world began!” continues the pa ing Pippa. Luigi says, “It is God’s voice calls,” and he goes away. He thereby escapes the police, who had just arranged that if he remained at the turret over the night, he was to be arrested at once. Pippa goes on from the turret to the Bishop’s brother’s home, near the Cathedral.— IV. Night. And here we are shown how little we poor puppets know of the strings which prompt our movements. Pippa would be Ottima, the murdere ; and as she, the poor but good and happy silk winder, trudges on her way to make the holiday of the year, the voluptuous murdere is purifying her wicked soul in agony. She sings in the lightne of her heart, and a line of her morning hymn is the arrow of God to two sinful souls. She would be the bride of Jules—the bride who has just been detected in fraud, on the point of rejection, and who has been redeemed by the snatch of Pippa’s innocent monition. She would be the happy Luigi, who would have failed in a purpose he deemed to be a noble one, and would have been a prisoner in the hands of the Austrian police if he had not been nerved by her carele eulogy of good kings. And now, as she approaches her ideally perfect persons, the holy Monsignor is actually engaged in taking steps for her ruin. His superintendent is explaining a plan he has elaborated for getting rid of Pippa, who is the child of his brother, and to whom the property he is holding rightfully belongs. The superintendent has found an English scoundrel named Bluphocks, residing in the locality, who will entrap the girl and take her to Rome to lead a vicious life, which will kill her in a few years. The bishop is listening to the tempter, when Pippa pa es, singing one of her innocent little songs, ending with the line— “Suddenly God took me.” This awakens the conscience of the ecclesiastic, who calls his servants to arrest the villain. All unconscious, as night falls Pippa re-enters her chamber. She has been in fancy the holy Monsignor, Luigi’s gentle mother, Luigi himself, Jules the sculptor’s bride, and Ottima as well. Tired of fooling, she notices that the sun has dropped into a black cloud, and as night comes on she wonders how nearly she has approached these people of her fancy, to do them good or evil in some slight way; and as she falls asleep she murmurs— “All service ranks the same with God— With God, whose puppets, best and worst, Are we: there is no last nor first.” The drama shows us how near God is to us in conscience. “God stands apart,” as the poet says, “to give man room to work”; but in every great crisis of our life, if we listen we may hear Him warning, threatening, guiding, revealing. Not near to answer problems of existence, or to solve the mystery of life: this would interfere with our development of soul; but near to save us from the dangers that await us at every step. The drama shows us, too, our mutual interdependence. Pippa, the silk-girl, had a mi ion to convert Ottima, Sebald, Jules, and the Bishop. We look for great things to work for us: it is ever the unseen, unfelt influences which are the most potent. We are taught, also, that there is nothing we do or say but may be big with good or evil consequences to many of our fellows of whom we know nothing. People whom we have never seen, of whose very existence we are ignorant, are affected for good or evil eternally by our lightest words and our most thoughtle actions. Notes. —For an account of Asolo see p. 49 of this work. Silk in large quantities is manufactured in this part of Italy. There is no historical foundation for any of the incidents of the poem. The song in Part II., which Jules and Phene hear, relates, however, to Cater in a Carnaro, the exiled Queen of Cyprus. Po agno : an obscure village situated amongst the hills of Asolo, famous as the birthplace of Canova, the sculptor. Cicala : a gra hopper.—I. Morning. “ The Capuchin with his brown hood ”: the Capuchin monks are familiar to all travellers in Italy. They are a branch of the great Francis can Order. The habit is brown. The Order was established by St. Francis in the thirteenth century. “Cappuccino” means playfully “little hooded fellow.” “ Campanula chalice ”: the bell of a flower, as of a Canterbury-bell. “ Bluphocks ”: the name means “Blue Fox,” and is a skit on the Edinburgh Review , which is bound in a cover of blue and fox. “ Et canibus nostris ,” even to our dogs. Canova, Antonio (1757-1822), one of the greatest sculptors of modern times. He was born at Pa agno, near Asolo, the scene of Pippa’s drama. “ Psiche-fanciulla ”: Psyche as a young girl with a butterfly, the personification of man’s immaterial part. This sculpture is considered as the most faultle and cla ical of Canova’s works. Pietà : sculpture representing the Virgin Mary holding the dead body of Christ on her knees. Malamocco : “The Lagoon, immediately opposite to Venice, is closed by a long shoaly island, Malamocco” ( Murray ). Alciphron : lived in the age of Alexander the Great. He was a philosopher of Magnesia. Lire : the lira is an Italian coin of the value of a franc (say, tenpence). Tydeus , a son of Œneus, king of Colydon. He was one of the great heroes of the Theban war.—II. Noon. Coluthus , a native of Lycopolis, in Egypt, who wrote a poem on the rape of Helen of Troy. He lived probably about the beginning of the sixth century. Be arion : Cardinal Be arion discovered the poem of Coluthus in Lycopolis in the fifteenth century. Ody ey : Homer’s poem which narrates the adventures of Uly es. Anti no us : One of the suitors of Penelope during the absence of Ody eus. He attempted to seize the kingdom and was killed by Ody eus on his return. Almaign Kaiser : the German Emperor. Hippolyta : a queen of the Amazons, who was conquered by Hercules, and by him given in marriage to These us. Numidia : a country of North Africa, now called Algiers. Hipparch us : a son of Pis i stratus, and tyrant of Athens. He was a great patron of literature. His crimes led to his a a ination by a band of conspirators, the leaders of which were Harmodius and Aristo git on. Archetype : the pattern or model of a work. Dryad : a wood-nymph. Primordial , original. Cornaro : Queen of Cyprus. Venice took her kingdom from her, and compelled her to resign, a igning her a palace at Asolo. Ancona : a city of central Italy, on the shores of the Adriatic. Intendant , a superintendent. “ Celarent, Darii, Ferio ”: coined words used in logic. “ Bishop Beveridge ”: there was a bishop of that name; but this is a pun, and means beverage (drink). Zwanziger : a twenty-kreuzer piece of money. “ Charon’s wherry ”: Charon was a god of hell, who conducted souls acro the river Styx. Lupine-seed , in plant-lore “lupine” means wolfish, and is suggestive of the Evil One. ( Flower-lore , by Friend, p. 59.) Hecate , a godde of Hell, to whom offerings were made of eggs, fish, and onions. Obolus , a silver coin of the Greeks, worth 8 d. They used to put it into the mouth of the corpse as Charon’s fee. “ To pay the Stygian ferry ”: the river Styx, in the infernal regions, acro which Charon conducted the souls, and received an obolus for his fee. Prince Metternich (1773-1859): a celebrated Austrian statesman. Panurge : a character of Rabelais’. He was a companion of Pant a gruel’s. He was an impecunious rake and dodger, a boon companion and licentious coward. Hertrippa : one of Rabelais’ characters in his Gargantua and Pant a gruel . Carbonari : the name of an Italian secret society which arose in 1820. Spielberg : the name of a hill near Brünn, in Moravia, on which stands the castle wherein Silvio Pellico the patriot was confined.—III. Evening. Lucius Junius Brutus , whose example animated the Romans to rise against the tyranny of the infamous Tarquin. Pellicos : Silvio Pellico was an Italian dramatist and patriot (1788-1854). He was arrested as a member of a secret society by the Austrian Government, and imprisoned for fifteen years in Spielberg Castle, near Brünn. “ The Titian at Treviso ”: Treviso is a town in Italy, seventeen miles from Venice. In the cathedral of San Pietro there is a fine Annunciation by Titian (1519). Python : the monster serpent slain by Apollo near Delphi. Breganze wine : of Breganza, a village north of Vicenza.—IV. Night . Benedicto benedicatur : a form of ble ing. A umption Day : the festival of the A umption of the Virgin into Heaven. It is kept on August 15th. Correggio : one of the great Italian painters (1494-1534). Podere , a manor. Cesena : an episcopal city lying between Bologna and Ancona. Soldo , a penny. “ Miserere mei, Domine ,” “Have mercy on me, O God!” Brenta , a river of North Italy. Polenta , a pudding of chestnut flour, etc.