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Rapp. You say so; but your anti-chambers are full of those complaisants, who have always flattered your inclination for

the Tuilleries in 1814, and found, as he says, that the enemy had invaded everything. He meets many of his subalterns in favour, who regard the veteran de haut en bas. Of one of these gentry, he gives an anecdote, curiously descriptive of French life:

"J'en rencontrais un troisième, que ma presence ne mit pas à l'aise. Attaché autrefois à Joséphine, il avait fait preuve d'une prévoyance véritablement exquise: afin d'être en mesure contre les cas inprévus qui pouvaient survenir dans les promenades et les voyages, il s'était muni d'un vase de vermeil, qu'il portait constamment sur lui. Quand la circonstance l'exigeait, il le tirait de sa poche, le présentait, le reprenait, le vidait, l'essuyait, et le serrait avec soin. C'etait avoir l'instinct de la domesticité."

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"But all these preux," says Rapp, eager for money, decoration, and commandments, soon gave sample of their courage. Napoleon appeared, they were eclipsed. They besieged Louis XVIII., the dispenser of favours; they had not a match to burn for Louis XVIII. unfor tunate."

We shall not trouble our readers with more of General Rapp, with the exception of the following dialogue, which took place between him and Napoleon. When the latter returned in 1815, he sent for Rapp, who made his appearance.

"Napoleon. There you are, General Rapp; you have been wanting. Whence came you?

Rapp. From Ecouen, where I have left my troops at the disposition of the minister of war.

Nap. Do you really intend fighting against me?

Rapp. Yes, sire.

Nap. The devil! Dare you draw upon me?

Rapp. Without doubt-My duty——

Nap. 'Tis too much. But your soldiers would not have obeyed you. I tell you, the peasants of your native Alsace would have stoned you, were you guilty of such a treachery.

Rapp. Allow, sire, that the position is painful; you abdicate, you depart, you engage us to serve the King; you returnAll the force even of old remembrances cannot even deceive us

Nap. How? What would you say? Think you I return without alliance, without agreement? And, besides, my system is changed no more of wars or conquests -I wish to reign in peace, and bring happiness to my subjects.

arms.

Nap. Bah! Bah! experience willbut went you often to the Tuilleries? Rapp. Sometimes, sire.

Nap. How did those folks treat you?
Rapp. I could not complain.
Nap. Did the king receive you well on
your return from Russia?

Rapp. Certainly, sire.

Nap. Doubtless. First cajoled, then sent adrift. 'Twas what awaited you all; for, in fine, you were not their men.

Rapp. The King at least cleared France of the Allies.

Nap. At what price? And his engage. ments, has he kept them? Why did he not hang Ferrand for his speech on national properties? It is that it is the insolence of the priests and nobles that has made me leave Elba. I could have arrived with three millions of peasantry, who ran to offer me their services. But I was sure of not finding resistance before Paris. The Bourbons are lucky that I have returned; without me affairs had finished by a terriphlet of Chateaubriand, which does not even ble revolution. Have you seen the pamgrant me courage on the field of battle? Have you ever seen me amidst the fire? Am I a coward?

dignation with all honourable men, at an Rapp. I have partaken of the same inaccusation as unjust as it is base.

Nap. Saw you ever the Duke of Orleans ?

Rapp. But once.

Nap. It is he that has tact and conduct. The others are ill-surrounded, ill-counselled. They hate me. They are about to be more furious than ever. They have wherewith. I am arrived without striking a blow. It is now they'll cry out upon my ambition; it is the eternal reproach; they know nothing else to say.

Rapp. They are not alone in charging you with ambition.

Nap. How? Am I ambitious, I? Eston gros comme moi quand on a de l'ambition? Are men fat, like me, when they are ambitious? (and he struck his two hands with violence upon his belly.")

Beyond this argumentum ad stomachum, we cannot quote another line. It is too good, and so staggered poor Rapp, that he took the command of the army of the Rhine from Napoleon, and scarce had joined it, when the news of Waterloo and its consequences shattered his new hopes, and set his army in mutiny against him.

10

FROM THE NOVELS OF LASCA.

No. IV.

TENTH AND LAST TALE OF THE THIRD SUPPER.

Of the Hoar of Hoaxes, practised by Lorenzo de Medici upon Master Manente the Physician, and of the many rare and diverting Occurrences which proceeded from it.

THE following Tale possesses, on many accounts, very peculiar merit-first, as exhibiting a picture, or rather a series of pictures, of national manners and customs, not exceeded in liveliness and fidelity by those which are presented to us in that invaluable repository of Oriental portraiture, the Arabian Nights' Entertainments, to which it will also strike the reader as bearing no little affinity in the resemblance between its hero, Lorenzo de Medici (commonly called the Magnificent,) and the Caliph Haroun Alraschid, a name so familiarly interwoven with all our recollections of childhood, by its frequent occurrence in that delightful store-house of fiction. Secondly, It is no less worthy of notice on account of the new light which it casts on the character of that hero, whom his illustrious English biographer has certainly omitted to represent to us in this view of his features. And lastly, it affords a very wide field for reflection, when it leads us to consider to what an extent, even under the forms of a popular and democratic government, the middling and lower classes of society were held as lawful subjects for the jest and diversion of the great, when so popular a chief as Lorenzo made no scruple of playing his favourite physician a trick, which cost him his liberty and his honour, and exposed his life and reason to the utmost peril, for no cause more just than that he was apt to make too free use of his bottle, especially when he could contrive to do so at a friend's expense. The treatment sustained by the worthy knight of La Mancha, at the hands of the unfeeling grandees of Spain, to whom he had the misfortune of becoming a laughing-stock, bears some analogy, (in that respect at least) to the present story; but I will not conclude these prefatory remarks without repeating, that it seems impossible to regard the tale as a mere fiction, or otherwise than as a narrative (perhaps highly coloured) of some real occurrences, the account of which was in general circulation at the time when the author composed it, that is, not more than fifty years after the death of the most distinguished personage whose name is mentioned in it.

The distinction of "Lorenzo il Vecchio," or The Elder, by which the hero of the jest is identified, led me once to imagine that another Lorenzo (the brother of Cosmo, surnamed Parens Patriæ,) was here intended; and the epithet "Il Magnifico" assigned to him, would not alone have disproved the supposi tion, but have only confirmed the truth of an undeniable assertion, made by Sismondi, and somewhat petulantly called in question by Roscoe, that the appellation itself was no other than an honorary mark of distinction, conferred indiscriminately on persons illustrious by birth or office. However, the mention of the "Selve d'Amore," (an undoubted work of the Lorenzo whom we usually distinguish by the name of the Magnificent,) seems to prove that no other than he was the person here meant to be referred to; and the phrase of "Il Vecchio" applied to him, must therefore be taken in contradistinction to a third Lorenzo, (commonly called Lorenzino,) the assassin of the first Duke Alexander.

INTRODUCTION.

Giacinto had arrived at the conclusion of his novel, with which he had not a little rejoiced and enlivened his auditory, when Amarantha, to whom alone now remained the task of paying the expected tribute, thus, sweetly smiling, began "I design, most fair ladies, and gentle sirs, to relate to you an anecdote of mystification, which, albeit not brought to perfection under the guidance of Scheggia, or Zoroastro, or any other of the great masters of the art already noticed, I humbly opine that you will think no less worthy of admiration, nor less artificially contrived and executed, than any which you have VOL. XIV.

F

had already recounted to you. It is one which was practised by the Magni[July, fico, Lorenzo the Elder, upon a certain physician, one of the most arrogant and assuming that the world ever witnessed. In the which so many strange accidents intervened, and such various chances were given birth to, that, if you ever in your lives were moved to surprise or laughter, you will now find matter for both, to your hearts' content.'

Lorenzo, the elder de' Medici (as it behoves you to know,) was (if ever there was in this world) a man, not only endowed with all manner of virtue and excellence, but a lover and rewarder of virtue in others, and that in the highest degree imaginable. In his days there dwelt at Florence a certain physician, by name Master Manente della Piève, who practised both physic and surgery, but was more of a practitioner than a man of science; one, in truth, of much humour and pleasantry, but so impertinent and assuming, that there was no bearing him. Amongst his other qualifications, he was a great lover of the bottle, a hard drinker, and one who made it his boast that he was a consummate judge of good wine; and frequently, without being invited, would he go of his own accord to dine or sup with the Magnifico, who at length conceived such a dislike of him by reason of his perpetual intrusiveness and impertinence, that he could not endure his sight, and deliberated within himself in what manner he might play such a trick upon him as might effectually prevent him from repeating his usual annoyances. It happened that, one afternoon among others, the aforesaid Master Manente, having been drinking at the tavern, called Delle Bertucce, (which was his favourite haunt,) had mnade himself so intoxicated, that he could scarcely stand; and mine host, when it came to shutting-up time, caused him to be carried on boys' shoulders out into the street, and laid along on one of the benches in St Martin's market-place, where he fell so sound asleep that a discharge of cannon would not have awakened him. By some chance Lorenzo was made acquainted with this accident, and, thinking it a most favourable opportunity for the accomplishment of his project, he pretended to pay no attention to the person who was his informant, but feigning a desire to go to sleep, (it being already far advanced towards midnight, and he at all times a little sleeper, making it his constant habit to stay up till about that hour,)

caused two of his most faithful grooms them instructions how they were to to be sent for to his chamber, and gave proceed; who, accordingly, well hooded and disguised, sallied forth from the palace, and went (by Lorenzo's commission) to the place of St Martin, where they found the sleeper still snoring most musically, whom they first placed on his legs, then muffled him, and, laying him like a wallet with them. across their shoulders, took him away

thus treated, full surely imagined that The poor physician, finding himself he was in the hands of some of his own companions, and so quietly suffered himself to be ushered, by a back door of the palace of the Medici, into the presence of the Magnifico, who was alone, waiting with incredible imand who now directed them to carry, patience the return of his messengers, their load into a remote upper apartment, where, having deposited him on a feather-bed, they stripped him to his shirt, (he knowing no more of the matter than if he had been a dead man,) and, taking away with them all his habiliments, left him securely locked up in his new lodgings.

for the buffoon Monaco-a personage Lorenzo's next concern was to send remarkably well skilled in counterfeiting voices-whom, having first made him exchange his own clothes for those of the physician, and given him the necessary directions, he dispatched, just as the bells were ringing for matins, to Master Manente's house in the street de' Fossi. month of September, and the physiIt was in the cian's family (consisting of a wife, an infant son, and a servant-maid,) were residing at his country-house in the Mugello, while he himself remained at home except at night when he reat Florence, but was never to be found turned to sleep, making it his constant practice to dine either at a tavern, his friends' houses; insomuch, that with his boon companions, or else at Monaco, having found the house key in the owner's pocket, easily let himself in, and, in great glee at the thought

of at once hoaxing the doctor, and gratifying the humour of the Magnifico, laid him down on Master Manente's bed, and went to sleep. It was nine o'clock before he woke, and then, having dressed himself again in Manente's clothes, and assuming the master's voice, he called out of the window of the court-yard to a female neighbour who dwelt opposite, saying that he felt himself very unwell, with a pain in his throat, which he had accordingly wrapped in a woollen handkerchief.

Now there was at this time great fear of the plague at Florence, where some symptoms had already discovered themselves; so that the good woman, dreading what might follow, asked him, in great trepidation, what he might please to want of her? To whom he answered, that he begged for a couple of new-laid eggs, and a little fire; and then, pretending that he was too ill to support himself, withdrew from the window. The good woman made haste to provide what he wanted, and called to him as loudly as she was able, to tell him that she had placed the articles at the door of his house, and that he must come and fetch them -the which he did accordingly-at the same time exhibiting to the bystanders the appearance of a person scarcely able to totter along through exhaustion, with his mouth and throat muffled up, and altogether so pitiable an object, that all who beheld him were forced to believe that he was in the worst stage of the dreaded disorder.

should be sought for to have charge of the sick man, and told Niccolajo where he might find such a person, in the hospital of St Maria Nuova. To the hospital Niccolajo accordingly went, and found the person in question, who had already been instructed as to the part he had to perform; and who, having undertaken the office, entered the house forthwith, (by the aid of a locksmith,) and shortly afterwards opened one of the windows, and called out to inform the by-standers, that Master Manente had, in good sooth, a plagueboil on his throat as big as a peach, and was already lying at death's door. Upon hearing this, Lorenzo gave orders that the attendant should be supplied, through the window, with food and all other necessaries, and then departed, with great shew of grief and affliction; while the attendant, having received the supply of provisions, closed the window again, and, in company with the pretended dying man, made good cheer on the victuals which were sent him, to which they added a flask or two of the choicest wine which the doctor had in his cellar.

While these things were going on, the poor abused doctor, having slept away a whole day and night, at length awoke, and finding himself in bed, and in the dark, could not imagine what place he had come to, but, calling to mind what had passed before he lost his powers of recollection, persuaded himself that, having been drinking with his friends at the Bertucce, and become intoxicated, they had carried him back to his own house, as had not The rumour soon spread through unfrequently before happened to him. the city; and a brother of Master He therefore got out of bed under this Manente's wife, (a goldsmith by trade impression, and groped his way to -by name Niccolajo,) came running where he expected to have found the forthwith to know how the matter window, where finding none, he was really stood. He knocked, and knock- in utter amazement; and, after some ed again, without receiving an answer, vain efforts to enlighten himself, not but was assured by all the neighbours, having been able to ascertain the place that the poor doctor's was, without of either door or window in the apartdoubt, a lost case. Just at this moment, he finished by returning to bed ment Lorenzo rode by the spot on horseback, (as if by accident,) attended by a numerous troop of gentlemen, and, observing the crowd collected round the door, asked what it meant. The goldsmith replied, that he was fearful his brother-in-law, Master Manente, was attacked by the plague, and related all he had heard on the subject. Upon this, the Magnifico gave immediate directions that some fit attendant

again, where he lay in stupid wonder, and, although half famished, afraid to call out, not knowing what mischief might follow.

Lorenzo, in the meantime, proceeding with the management of the drama, ordered the two grooms, who had before been employed by him in this service, to disguise themselves as white friars, with long hoods on their heads, and grinning Carnival masks on their

faces; and, thus accoutred, he caused one of them to arm himself with a naked sword in the one hand, and a lighted torch in the other, while the second carried two flasks of excellent wine, two loaves of bread in a napkin, two cold capons, with a piece of roasted veal, and the proper fruits of the season, with which they proceeded in silence to the doctor's apartinent. The door being locked on the outside, they opened it with a loud noise, and forth with entered the man with the sword and torch keeping guard before the door, to prevent the escape of the prisoner, while the other, advancing to the middle of the room, slowly spread his napkin upon a little table which stood there, and placed the provisions in order.

As soon as Master Manente heard the door open, he started up in his bed, intending to run out immediate ly-but no sooner did he behold the strange figures of those who entered, than fear overcame him, and not a word was he able to utter. Seeing the sword and torch, he expected little short of instant death; but a glimpse of the victuals somewhat revived him, and he sat patiently for a minute while the table was spread; but, when that was accomplished, and the dumb friar, by signs, invited him to partake, hunger at once became more strong than any other feeling, and, leaping out of bed, he rushed voraciously to the spot, without anything on him but his shirt, till the attendant pointing to a dressing-gown and slippers which were placed on a chair beside him, he accepted the invitation to clothe himself in them; then, taking his seat at the table, fell to work with as keen an appetite, as if he had totally forgotten the surprising nature of the circumstances in which he was placed. The attendants, seeing him thus occupied, quitted the apartment with the like speed and silence as they had entered it, and, leaving him without light as before, locked the door after them, and went to relate the success of their mission to the Magnifico. The doctor, meanwhile, found that hunger (like love) can see in the dark; and the there touch and smell of those good victuals, and those delicious wineflasks, gave him such spirits, that he said to himself, "It is well, Master Manente things are not near so des perate as they might have been; and,

come what will, if I am doomed to die, I shall at least have the satisfaction of dying with my belly full." So saying, he fell to with marvellous appetite, and, having consumed the best part of the provision which was laid before him, and carefully wrapped up in the napkin, and stowed away, the remainder, to serve for a future emergency, finding nothing better to be done, and flattering himself, (in the beatitude of a well-filled stomach) with the belief, that it was a mere trick of some of his companions, who would soon return to release him, he went into bed again, where he lay for some time, thinking upon the grinning masks which had saluted him, till the very thought of them made him laugh inwardly, and at last fell asleep as soundly as before.

Early the next morning, the attendant from the hospital threw open the doctor's window, and, in a loud voice, proclaimed to the neighbours, that his patient had passed a good night; that the boil had come to a head with the help of poultices; and that he enter tained good hopes of his recovery. So passed the day without further inquiry, and, towards evening, the Magnifico made known to his coadjutors, that an excellent opportunity had presented itself for carrying on the jest, by the accidental death of a certain young gal lant, named Franciosino, who had fallen from his horse and broken his neck, in the square of St Maria Novella, and had been laid out for interment, and buried that same evening, by the friars of the monastery, in one of the vaults without-side the principal entrance to their church, As soon as this occurrence was made known to them, together with what was Lorenzo's pleasure as to the prosecution of the adventure, they be gan to give effect to it by the hospital servant, in the first place, going again to the window, and declaring, in dolo rous accents, that the disease had ta ken a new turn, and the plague-boil so much increased, that poor Manente was almost choked by it, and very unable either to eat or speak. Upon this, the goldsmith, Niccolajo, became very anxious that he should have somebody sent to him, to make his last will and testament; but he was answered that the thing was impossible for that night, but he might return the next morning, when measures might be taken for accomplishing it ; and also for confessing the patient,

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