Tales and Historic Scenes/The Death of Conradin

by Felicia Hemans

THE

 

DEATH OF CONRADIN.

FROM SISMONDI'S "REPUBLIQUES ITALIENNES."

"La défaite de Conradin ne devoit mettre une terme ni à ses malheurs, ni aux vengeances du roi (Charles d'Anjou). L'amour du peuple pour l'héritier légitime du trône, avoit éclaté d'une manière effrayante; il pouvoit causer de nouvelles révolutions, si Conradin demeuroit en vie; et Charles, revêtant sa défiance et sa cruauté des formes de la justice, resolut de faire périr sur l'échafaud le dernier rejeton de la Maison de Souabe, l'unique espérance de son parti. Un seul juge provençal et sujet de Charles, dont les historiens n'ont pas voulu conserver le nom, osa voter pour la mort, d'autres se renfermèrent dans un timide et coupable silence; et Charles, sur l'autorité de ce seul juge, fit prononcer, par Robert de Bari, protonotaire du royaume, la sentence de mort contre Conradin et tous ses compagnons. Cette sentence fut communiquée à Conradin, comme il jouoit aux échecs; on lui laissa peu de temps pour se preparer à son exécution, et le 26 d'Octobre, il fut conduit, avec tous ses amis, sur la Place du Marché de Naples, le long du rivage de la mer. Charles étoit présent, avec toute sa cour, et une foule immense entouroit le roi vainqueur et le roi condamné. Conradin étoit entre les mains des bourreaux; il détacha lui-même son manteau, et s'étant mis à genoux pour prier, il se releva en s'écriant: 'Oh, ma mère, quelle profonde douleur te causera la nouvelle qu'on va te porter de moi!" Puis il tourna les yeux sur la foule qui l'entouroit; il vit les larmes, il entendit les sanglots de son peuple; alors, détachant son gant, il jeta au milieu de ses sujets ce gage d'un combat de vengeance, et rendit sa tête au bourreau. Après lui, sur le même echafaud, Charles fit trancher la tête au Duc d'Autriche, aux Comtes Gualferano et Bartolommeo Lancia, et aux Comtes Gerard et Galvano Donoratico de Pise. Par un rafinement de cruauté, Charles voulut que le premier, fils du sécond, précédât son père, et mourût entre ses bras. Les cadavres, d'après ses ordres, furent exclus d'une terre sainte, et inhumés sans pompe sur le rivage de la mer. Charles II., cependant fit dans la suite, bâtir sur le même lieu, une église de Carmelites, comme pour appaiser ces ombres irritées."

THE

DEATH OF CONRADIN.

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No cloud to dim the splendor of the day
Which breaks o'er Naples and her lovely bay,
And lights that brilliant sea and magic shore
With every tint that charm'd the great of yore;
Th' imperial ones of earth—who proudly bade
Their marble domes e'en Ocean's realm invade.

That race is gone—but glorious Nature here
Maintains unchanged her own sublime career,
And bids these regions of the sun display
Bright hues, surviving empires past away.

The beam of Heaven expands—its kindling smile
Reveals each charm of many a fairy isle,

Whose image floats, in softer colouring drest,
With all its rocks and vines, on Ocean's breast.
Misenum's cape hath caught the vivid ray,
On Roman streamers there no more to play;
Still as of old, unalterably bright,
Lovely it sleeps on Posilippo's height,
With all Italia's sunshine to illume
The ilex canopy of Virgil's tomb.
Campania's plains rejoice in light, and spread
Their gay luxuriance o'er the mighty dead;
Fair glittering to thine own transparent skies,
Thy palaces, exulting Naples! rise;
While, far on high, Vesuvius rears his peak,
Furrow'd and dark with many a lava streak.

O ye bright shores of Circe and the Muse!
Rich with all Nature's and all fiction's hues;
Who shall explore your regions, and declare
The poet err'd to paint Elysium there?
Call up his spirit, wanderer! bid him guide.
Thy steps, those siren-haunted seas beside,
And all the scene a lovelier light shall wear,
And spells more potent shall pervade the air.

What though his dust be scatter'd, and his urn
Long from its sanctuary of slumber torn,^1[1]
Still dwell the beings of his verse around,
Hovering in beauty o'er th'enchanted ground;
His lays are murmur'd in each breeze that roves
Soft o'er the sunny waves and orange-groves.
His memory's charm is spread o'er shore and sea,
The soul, the genius of Parthenope;
Shedding o'er myrtle-shade and vine-clad hill
The purple radiance of Elysium still.

Yet that fair soil and calm resplendent sky
Have witness'd many a dark reality.
Oft o'er those bright blue seas the gale hath borne
The sighs of exiles, never to return.^2[2]
There with the whisper of Campania's gale
Hath mingled oft affection's funeral-wail,
Mourning for buried heroes—while to her
That glowing land was but their sepulchre.^3[3]
And there of old, the dread, mysterious moan
Swell'd from strange voices of no mortal tone;
And that wild trumpet, whose unearthly note
Was heard, at midnight, o'er the hills to float

Around the spot where Agrippina died,
Denouncing vengeance on the matricide,^4[4]

Past are those ages—yet another crime,
Another woe, must stain th' Elysian clime.
There stands a scaffold on the sunny shore—
It must be crimson'd ere the day is o'er!
There is a throne in regal pomp array'd,—
A scene of death from thence must be survey'd.
Mark'd ye the rushing throngs?—each mien is pale,
Each hurried glance reveals a fearful tale;
But the deep workings of th' indignant breast,
Wrath, hatred, pity, must be all suppress'd;
The burning tear awhile must check its course,
Th' avenging thought concentrate all its force,
For tyranny is near—and will not brook
Aught but submission in each guarded look.

Girt with his fierce Provençals, and with mien
Austere in triumph, gazing on the scene,^5[5]
And in his eye a keen suspicious glance
Of jealous pride and restless vigilance,
Behold the conqueror!—vainly in his face,
Of gentler feeling hope would seek a trace;

Cold, proud, severe, the spirit which hath lent
Its haughty stamp to each dark lineament;
And pleading mercy, in the sternness there,
May read at once her sentence—to despair!

But thou, fair boy! the beautiful, the brave,
Thus passing from the dungeon to the grave,
While all is yet around thee which can give
A charm to earth, and make it bliss to live;
Thou on whose form hath dwelt a mother's eye,
Till the deep love that not with thee shall die
Hath grown too full for utterance—can it be?
And is this pomp of death prepared for thee?
Young, royal Conradin! who should'st have known
Of life as yet the sunny smile alone!
Oh! who can view thee, in the pride and bloom
Of youth, array'd thus richly for the tomb,
Nor feel, deep-swelling in his inmost soul,
Emotions tyranny may ne'er control?
Bright victim! to ambition's altar led,
Crown'd with all flowers that heaven on earth can shed,
Who, from th' oppressor towering in his pride,
May hope for mercy—if to thee denied?

There is dead silence on the breathless throng,
Dead silence all the peopled shore along,
As on the captive moves—the only sound,
To break that calm so fearfully profound,
The low, sweet murmur of the rippling wave,
Soft as it glides, the smiling shore to lave;
While on that shore, his own fair heritage,
The youthful martyr to a tyrant's rage
Is passing to his fate—the eyes are dim
Which gaze, through tears that dare not flow, on him:
He mounts the scaffold—doth his footstep fail?
Doth his lip quiver? doth his cheek turn pale?
Oh! it may be forgiven him, if a thought
Cling to that world, for him with beauty fraught,
To all the hopes that promised Glory's meed,
And all th' affections that with him shall bleed!
If, in his life's young day-spring, while the rose
Of boyhood on his cheek yet freshly glows,
One human fear convulse his parting breath,
And shrink from all the bitterness of death!

But no!—the spirit of his royal race
Sits brightly on his brow—that youthful face

Beams with heroic beauty—and his eye
Is eloquent with injured majesty.
He kneels—but not to man—his heart shall own
Such deep submission to his God alone!
And who can tell with what sustaining power
That God may visit him in fate's dread hour?
How the still voice, which answers every moan,
May speak of hope, when hope on earth is gone?

That solemn pause is o'er—the youth hath given
One glance of parting love to earth and heaven;
The sun rejoices in th' unclouded sky,
Life all around him glows—and he must die!
Yet 'midst his people, undismay'd, he throws
The gage of vengeance for a thousand woes;
Vengeance, that like their own volcano's fire,
May sleep suppress'd awhile—but not expire.
One softer image rises o'er his breast,
One fond regret, and all shall be at rest!
"Alas, for thee, my mother! who shall bear
To thy sad heart the tidings of despair,
When thy lost child is gone?"—that thought can thrill
His soul with pangs one moment more shall still.

The lifted axe is glittering in the sun—
It falls—the race of Conradin is run!
Yet from the blood which flows that shore to stain,
A voice shall cry to heaven—and not in vain!
Gaze thou, triumphant from thy gorgeous throne,
In proud supremacy of guilt alone,
Charles of Anjou!—but that dread voice shall be
A fearful summoner e'en yet to thee!

The scene of death is closed—the throngs depart,
A deep stern lesson graved on every heart.
No pomp, no funeral rites, no streaming eyes,
High-minded boy! may grace thine obsequies.
O vainly royal and beloved! thy grave,
Unsanctified, is bath'd by ocean's wave,
Mark'd by no stone, a rude, neglected spot,
Unhonour'd, unadorn'd—but unforgot;
For thy deep wrongs in tameless hearts shall live,
Now mutely suffering—never to forgive!

The sunset fades from purple heavens away,—
A bark hath anchor'd in th' unruffled bay;
Thence on the beach descends a female form,^6[6]
Her mien with hope and tearful transport warm;

But life hath left sad traces on her cheek,
And her soft eyes a chasten'd heart bespeak,
Inured to woes—yet what were all the past!
She sunk not feebly 'neath affliction's blast,
While one bright hope remain'd—who now shall tell
Th' uncrown'd, the widow'd, how her loved-one fell?
To clasp her child, to ransom and to save,
The mother came—and she hath found his grave!
And by that grave, transfix'd in speechless grief,
Whose death-like trance denies a tear's relief,
Awhile she kneels—till roused at length to know,
To feel the might, the fulness of her woe,
On the still air a voice of anguish wild,
A mother's cry, is heard—"My Conradin! my child!"

NOTES.

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1. Note 1, page 217, line 2.
   Long from its sanctuary of slumber torn.

   The urn, supposed to have contained the ashes of Virgil, has long since been lost.

2. Note 2, page 217, line 14.
   The sighs of exiles, never to return.

   Many Romans of exalted rank were formerly banished to some of the small islands in the Mediterranean, on the coast of Italy. Julia, the daughter of Augustus, was confined many years in the isle of Pandataria, and her daughter, Agrippina, the widow of Germanicus, afterwards died in exile on the same desolate spot.

3. Note 3, page 217, line 18.
   That glowing land was but their sepulchre.

   "Quelques souvenirs du cœur, quelques noms de femmes, réclament aussi vos pleurs. C'est à Misène, dans le lieu même où nous sommes, que la veuve de Pompée, Cornélie, conserva jusqu'à la mort son noble deuil; Agrippine pleura long-temps Germanicus sur ces bords. Un jour, le même assassin qui lui ravit son époux la trouva digne de le suivre. L'île de Nisida fut témoin des adieux de Brutus et de Porcie."-Madame de Stael-Corinne.

4. Note 4, page 218, line 4.
   Denouncing vengeance on the matricide.

   The sight of that coast, and those shores where the crime had been perpetrated, filled Nero with continual horrors; besides, there were some who imagined they heard horrid shrieks and cries from Agrippina's tomb, and a mournful sound of trumpets from the neighbouring cliffs and hills. Nero, therefore, flying from such tragical scenes, withdrew to Naples-See Ancient Universal History.

5. Note 5, page 218, line 18.
   Austere in triumph, gazing on the scene.

   "Ce Charles," dit Giovanni Villani, "fut sage et prudent dans les conseils, preux dans les armes, âpre et fort redouté de tous les rois du monde, magnanime et, de hautes pensées qui l'égaloient aux plus grandes enterprises; inébranlable dans l'adversité, ferme et fidèle dans toutes ses promesses, parlant peu et agissant beaucoup, ne riant presque jamais, décent comme un religieux, zélé catholique, âpre à rendre justice, féroce dans ses regards. Sa taille étoit grande et nerveuse, sa couleur olivâtre, son nez fort grand. Il paroissoit plus fait qu'aucun autre chevalier pour la majesté royale. Il ne dormoit presque point. Jamais il ne prit de plaisir aux mimes, aux troubadours, et aux gens de cour."—Sismondi, Republiques Italiennes, vol. iii.

6. Note 6, page 222, line 21.
   Thence on the beach descends a female form.

   "The Carmine (at Naples) calls to mind the bloody catastrophe of those royal youths, Conradin and Frederick of Austria, butchered before its door. Whenever I traversed that square, my heart yearned at the idea of their premature fate, and at the deep distress of Conradin's mother, who, landing on the beach with her son's ransom, found only a lifeless trunk to redeem from the fangs of his barbarous conqueror."—Swinburne's Travels in the Two Sicilies.