TITANIA. If you will patiently dance in our round,
And see our moon-light revels, go with us.
MIDSUMMER NIGHT'S DREAM
Early on the following morning, the travellers set out for Turin.
The luxuriant plain, that extends from the feet of the Alps to that
magnificent city, was not then, as now, shaded by an avenue of trees
nine miles in length; but plantations of olives, mulberry and palms,
festooned with vines, mingled with the pastoral scenery, through with
the rapid Po, after its descent from the mountains, wandered to meet
the humble Doria at Turin.
As they advanced towards this city, the Alps,
seen at some distance, began to appear in all their awful sublimity;
chain rising over chain in long succession, their higher points darkened
by the hovering clouds, sometimes hid, and at others seen shooting up
far above them; while their lower steeps, broken into fantastic forms,
were touched with blue and purplish tints, which, as they changed in
light and shade, seemed to open new scenes to the eye. To the east
stretched the plains of Lombardy, with the towers of Turin rising at a
distance; and beyond, the Apennines, bounding the horizon.
The general magnificence of that city, with its vistas of churches and
palaces, branching from the grand square, each opening to a landscape of
the distant Alps or Apennines, was not only such as Emily had never seen
in France, but such as she had never imagined.
Montoni, who had been often at Turin, and cared little about views of
any kind, did not comply with his wife's request, that they might survey
some of the palaces; but staying only till the necessary refreshments
could be obtained, they set forward for Venice with all possible
rapidity. Montoni's manner, during this journey, was grave, and even
haughty; and towards Madame Montoni he was more especially reserved; but
it was not the reserve of respect so much as of pride and discontent.
Of Emily he took little notice. With Cavigni his conversations were
commonly on political or military topics, such as the convulsed state
of their country rendered at this time particularly interesting, Emily
observed, that, at the mention of any daring exploit, Montoni's eyes
lost their sullenness, and seemed instantaneously to gleam with fire;
yet they still retained somewhat of a lurking cunning, and she sometimes
thought that their fire partook more of the glare of malice than the
brightness of valour, though the latter would well have harmonized with
the high chivalric air of his figure, in which Cavigni, with all his gay
and gallant manners, was his inferior.
On entering the Milanese, the gentlemen exchanged their French hats for
the Italian cap of scarlet cloth, embroidered; and Emily was somewhat
surprised to observe, that Montoni added to his the military plume,
while Cavigni retained only the feather: which was usually worn with
such caps: but she at length concluded, that Montoni assumed this ensign
of a soldier for convenience, as a means of passing with more safety
through a country over-run with parties of the military.