Nathaniel Hawthorne/Nathaniel Hawthorne.iso/pc/articles/a1/t0031

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                                           Rappaccini's Daughter
                          FROM THE WRITINGS OF AUBEPINE

WE do not remember to have seen any translated specimens of the
productions of M. de l'Aubépine; a fact the less to be wondered at, as
his very name is unknown to many of his own countrymen, as well as to
the student of foreign literature. As a writer, he seems to occupy an
unfortunate position between the Transcendentalists (who, under one name
or another, have their share in all the current literature of the world), and the
great body of pen-and-ink men who address the intellect and sympathies of
the multitude. If not too refined, at all events too remote, too shadowy and
unsubstantial in his modes of development, to suit the taste of the latter
class, and yet too popular to satisfy the spiritual or metaphysical requisitions
of the former, he must necessarily find himself without an audience; except
here and there an individual, or possibly an isolated clique. His writings, to
do them justice, are not altogether destitute of fancy and originality; they
might have won him greater reputation but for an inveterate love of allegory,
which is apt to invest his plots and characters with the aspect of scenery and
people in the clouds, and to steal away the human warmth out of his
conceptions. His fictions are sometimes historical, sometimes of the present
day, and sometimes, so far as can be discovered, have little or no reference
either to time or space. In any case, he generally contents himself with a
very slight embroidery of outward manners,--the faintest possible
counterfeit of real life,--and endeavors to create an interest by some less
obvious peculiarity of the subject. Occasionally, a breath of nature, a rain-
drop of pathos and tenderness, or a gleam of humor, will find its way into
                                           Rappaccini's Daughter                                       2

the midst of his fantastic imagery, and make us feel as if, after all, we were
yet within the limits of our native earth. We will only add to this very
cursory notice, that M. de l'Aubépine's productions, if the reader chance to
take them in precisely the proper point of view, may amuse a leisure hour as
well as those of a brighter man; if otherwise, they can hardly fail to look
excessively like nonsense.
     Our author is voluminous; he continues to write and publish with as
much praiseworthy and indefatigable prolixity, as if his efforts were
crowned with the brilliant success that so justly attends those of Eugene
Sue. His first appearance was by a collection of stories, in a long series of
volumes, entitled "Contes deux fois racontées." The titles of some
of his more recent works (we quote from memory) are as follows:-- " Le
Voyage Céleste à Chemin de Fer, " 3 tom. 1838. " Le nouveau
Père Adam et la nouvelle Mère Eve," 2 tom. 1839. " Roderic; ou
le Serpent à l'estomac," 2 tom. 1840. " Le Culte du Feu," a folio
volume of ponderous research into the religion and ritual of the old Persian
Ghebers, published in 1841. " La Soirée du Chateau en Espagne, "
1 tom. 8vo. 1842; and " L'Artiste du Beau; ou le Papillon
Mécanique, " 5 tom. 4to. 1843. Our somewhat wearisome perusal of this
startling catalogue of volumes has left behind it a certain personal affection
and sympathy, though by no means admiration, for M. de l'Aubépine; and
we would fain do the little in our power towards introducing him favorably
to the American public. The ensuing tale is a translation of his " Beatrice;
ou la Belle Empoisonneuse," recently published in " La Revue
                                           Rappaccini's Daughter                                       3

Anti-Aristocratique. " This journal, edited by the Comte de Bearhaven,
has, for some years past, led the defence of liberal principles and popular
rights, with a faithfulness and ability worthy of all praise.

A YOUNG man, named Giovanni Guasconti, came, very long ago, from
the more southern region of Italy, to pursue his studies at the University of
Padua. Giovanni, who had but a scanty supply of gold ducats in his pocket,
took lodgings in a high and gloomy chamber of an old edifice, which
looked not unworthy to have been the palace of a Paduan noble, and which,
in fact, exhibited over its entrance the armorial bearings of a family long
since extinct. The young stranger, who was not unstudied in the great poem
of his country, recollected that one of the ancestors of this family, and
perhaps an occupant of this very mansion, had been pictured by Dante as a
partaker of the immortal agonies of his Inferno. These reminiscences and
associations, together with the tendency to heart-break natural to a young
man for the first time out of his native sphere, caused Giovanni to sigh
heavily, as he looked around the desolate and ill-furnished apartment.
"Holy Virgin, Signor," cried old dame Lisabetta, who, won by the youth's
remarkable beauty of person, was kindly endeavoring to give the chamber a
habitable air, "what a sigh was that to come out of a young man's heart! Do
you find this old mansion gloomy? For the love of heaven, then, put your
head out of the window, and you will see as bright sunshine as you have
left in Naples."
     Guasconti mechanically did as the old woman advised, but could not
                                           Rappaccini's Daughter                                       4

quite agree with her that the Paduan sunshine was as cheerful as that of
southern Italy. Such as it was, however, it fell upon a garden beneath the
window, and expended its fostering influences on a variety of plants, which
seemed to have been cultivated with exceeding care.
     "Does this garden belong to the house?" asked Giovanni. "Heaven
forbid, Signor!--unless it were fruitful of better pot-herbs than any that
grow there now," answered old Lisabetta. "No; that garden is cultivated by
the own hands of Signor Giacomo Rappaccini, the famous Doctor, who, I
warrant him, has been heard of as far as Naples. It is said that he distils
these plants into medicines that are as potent as a charm. Oftentimes you
may see the Signor Doctor at work, and perchance the Signora his daughter,
too, gathering the strange flowers that grow in the garden."
     The old woman had now done what she could for the aspect of the
chamber, and, commending the young man to the protection of the saints,
took her departure.
     Giovanni still found no better occupation than to look down into the
garden beneath his window. From its appearance, he judged it to be one of
those botanic gardens, which were of earlier date in Padua than elsewhere in
Italy, or in the world. Or, not improbably, it might once have been the
pleasure-place of an opulent family; for there was the ruin of a marble
fountain in the centre, sculptured with rare art, but so wofully shattered that
it was impossible to trace the original design from the chaos of remaining
fragments. The water, however, continued to gush and sparkle into the
sunbeams as cheerfully as ever. A little gurgling sound ascended to the
                                           Rappaccini's Daughter                                       5

young man's window, and made him feel as if the fountain were an
immortal spirit, that sung its song unceasingly, and without heeding the
vicissitudes around it; while one century embodied it in marble, and another
scattered the perishable garniture on the soil. All about the pool into which
the water subsided, grew various plants, that seemed to require a plentiful
supply of moisture for the nourishment of gigantic leaves, and, in some
instances, flowers gorgeously magnificent. There was one shrub in
particular, set in a marble vase in the midst of the pool, that bore a profusion
of purple blossoms, each of which had the lustre and richness of a gem; and
the whole together made a show so resplendent that it seemed enough to
illuminate the garden, even had there been no sunshine. Every portion of
the soil was peopled with plants and herbs, which, if less beautiful, still
bore tokens of assiduous care; as if all had their individual virtues, known
to the scientific mind that fostered them. Some were placed in urns, rich
with old carving, and others in common garden-pots; some crept serpent-
like along the ground, or climbed on high, using whatever means of ascent
was offered them. One plant had wreathed itself round a statue of
Vertumnus, which was thus quite veiled and shrouded in a drapery of
hanging foliage, so happily arranged that it might have served a sculptor for
a study.
     While Giovanni stood at the window, he heard a rustling behind a screen
of leaves, and became aware that a person was at work in the garden. His
figure soon emerged into view, and showed itself to be that of no common
laborer, but a tall, emaciated, sallow, and sickly-looking man, dressed in a
                                           Rappaccini's Daughter                                       6

scholar's garb of black. He was beyond the middle term of life, with grey
hair, a thin grey beard, and a face singularly marked with intellect and
cultivation, but which could never, even in his more youthful days, have
expressed much warmth of heart.
     Nothing could exceed the intentness with which this scientific gardener
examined every shrub which grew in his path; it seemed as if he was
looking into their inmost nature, making observations in regard to their
creative essence, and discovering why one leaf grew in this shape, and
another in that, and wherefore such and such flowers differed among
themselves in hue and perfume. Nevertheless, in spite of this deep
intelligence on his part, there was no approach to intimacy between himself
and these vegetable existences. On the contrary, he avoided their actual
touch, or the direct inhaling of their odors, with a caution that impressed
Giovanni most disagreeably; for the man's demeanor was that of one
walking among malignant influences, such as savage beasts, or deadly
snakes, or evil spirits, which, should he allow them one moment of license,
would wreak upon him some terrible fatality. It was strangely frightful to
the young man's imagination, to see this air of insecurity in a person
cultivating a garden, that most simple and innocent of human toils, and
which had been alike the joy and labor of the unfallen parents of the race.
Was this garden, then, the Eden of the present world?--and this man, with
such a perception of harm in what his own hands caused to grow, was he
the Adam?
     The distrustful gardener, while plucking away the dead leaves or pruning
                                           Rappaccini's Daughter                                       7

the too luxuriant growth of the shrubs, defended his hands with a pair of
thick gloves. Nor were these his only armor. When, in his walk through the
garden, he came to the magnificent plant that hung its purple gems beside
the marble fountain, he placed a kind of mask over his mouth and nostrils,
as if all this beauty did but conceal a deadlier malice. But finding his task
still too dangerous, he drew back, removed the mask, and called loudly, but
in the infirm voice of a person affected with inward disease:
     "Beatrice!--Beatrice!"
     "Here am I, my father! What would you?" cried a rich and youthful
voice from the window of the opposite house; a voice as rich as a tropical
sunset, and which made Giovanni, though he knew not why, think of deep
hues of purple or crimson, and of perfumes heavily delectable.--"Are you in
the garden?"
     "Yes, Beatrice," answered the gardener, "and I need your help."
     Soon there emerged from under a sculptured portal the figure of a young
girl, arrayed with as much richness of taste as the most splendid of the
flowers, beautiful as the day, and with a bloom so deep and vivid that one
shade more would have been too much. She looked redundant with life,
health, and energy; all of which attributes were bound down and
compressed, as it were, and girdled tensely, in their luxuriance, by her
virgin zone. Yet Giovanni's fancy must have grown morbid, while he
looked down into the garden; for the impression which the fair stranger
made upon him was as if here were another flower, the human sister of
those vegetable ones, as beautiful as they--more beautiful than the richest of
                                           Rappaccini's Daughter                                       8

them--but still to be touched only with a glove, nor to be approached
without a mask. As Beatrice came down the garden path, it was observable
that she handled and inhaled the odor of several of the plants, which her
father had most sedulously avoided.
     "Here, Beatrice," said the latter,--"see how many needful offices require
to be done to our chief treasure. Yet, shattered as I am, my life might pay
the penalty of approaching it so closely as circumstances demand.
Henceforth, I fear, this plant must be consigned to your sole charge."
     "And gladly will I undertake it," cried again the rich tones of the young
lady, as she bent towards the magnificent plant, and opened her arms as if
to embrace it. "Yes, my sister, my splendor, it shall be Beatrice's task to
nurse and serve thee; and thou shalt reward her with thy kisses and
perfumed breath, which to her is as the breath of life!"
     Then, with all the tenderness in her manner that was so strikingly
expressed in her words, she busied herself with such attentions as the plant
seemed to require; and Giovanni, at his lofty window, rubbed his eyes, and
almost doubted whether it were a girl tending her favorite flower, or one
sister performing the duties of affection to another. The scene soon
terminated. Whether Doctor Rappaccini had finished his labors in the
garden, or that his watchful eye had caught the stranger's face, he now took
his daughter's arm and retired. Night was already closing in; oppressive
exhalations seemed to proceed from the plants, and steal upward past the
open window; and Giovanni, closing the lattice, went to his couch, and
dreamed of a rich flower and beautiful girl. Flower and maiden were
                                           Rappaccini's Daughter                                       9

different and yet the same, and fraught with some strange peril in either
shape.
     But there is an influence in the light of morning that tends to rectify
whatever errors of fancy, or even of judgment, we may have incurred
during the sun's decline, or among the shadows of the night, or in the less
wholesome glow of moonshine. Giovanni's first movement on starting
from sleep, was to throw open the window, and gaze down into the garden
which his dreams had made so fertile of mysteries. He was surprised, and a
little ashamed, to find how real and matter-of-fact an affair it proved to be,
in the first rays of the sun, which gilded the dew-drops that hung upon leaf
and blossom, and, while giving a brighter beauty to each rare flower,
brought everything within the limits of ordinary experience. The young man
rejoiced, that, in the heart of the barren city, he had the privilege of
overlooking this spot of lovely and luxuriant vegetation. It would serve, he
said to himself, as a symbolic language, to keep him in communion with
Nature. Neither the sickly and thought-worn Doctor Giacomo Rappaccini, it
is true, nor his brilliant daughter, were now visible; so that Giovanni could
not determine how much of the singularity which he attributed to both, was
due to their own qualities, and how much to his wonder-working fancy.
But he was inclined to take a most rational view of the whole matter.
     In the course of the day, he paid his respects to Signor Pietro Baglioni,
professor of medicine in the University, a physician of eminent repute, to
whom Giovanni had brought a letter of introduction. The Professor was an
elderly personage, apparently of genial nature, and habits that might almost
                                           Rappaccini's Daughter                                     10

be called jovial; he kept the young man to dinner, and made himself very
agreeable by the freedom and liveliness of his conversation, especially when
warmed by a flask or two of Tuscan wine. Giovanni, conceiving that men
of science, inhabitants of the same city, must needs be on familiar terms
with one another, took an opportunity to mention the name of Doctor
Rappaccini. But the Professor did not respond with so much cordiality as he
had anticipated.
     "Ill would it become a teacher of the divine art of medicine," said
Professor Pietro Baglioni, in answer to a question of Giovanni, "to
withhold due and well-considered praise of a physician so eminently skilled
as Rappaccini. But, on the other hand, I should answer it but scantily to my
conscience, were I to permit a worthy youth like yourself, Signor Giovanni,
the son of an ancient friend, to imbibe erroneous ideas respecting a man
who might hereafter chance to hold your life and death in his hands. The
truth is, our worshipful Doctor Rappaccini has as much science as any
member of the faculty--with perhaps one single exception--in Padua, or all
Italy. But there are certain grave objections to his professional character."
     "And what are they?" asked the young man.
     "Has my friend Giovanni any disease of body or heart, that he is so
inquisitive about physicians?" said the Professor, with a smile. "But as for
Rappaccini, it is said of him--and I, who know the man well, can answer
for its truth--that he cares infinitely more for science than for mankind. His
patients are interesting to him only as subjects for some new experiment. He
would sacrifice human life, his own among the rest, or whatever else was
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dearest to him, for the sake of adding so much as a grain of mustard-seed to
the great heap of his accumulated knowledge."
     "Methinks he is an awful man, indeed," remarked Guasconti, mentally
recalling the cold and purely intellectual aspect of Rappaccini. "And yet,
worshipful Professor, is it not a noble spirit? Are there many men capable
of so spiritual a love of science?"
     "God forbid," answered the Professor, somewhat testily--"at least,
unless they take sounder views of the healing art than those adopted by
Rappaccini. It is his theory, that all medicinal virtues are comprised within
those substances which we term vegetable poisons. These he cultivates with
his own hands, and is said even to have produced new varieties of poison,
more horribly deleterious than Nature, without the assistance of this learned
person, would ever have plagued the world withal. That the Signor Doctor
does less mischief than might be expected, with such dangerous substances,
is undeniable. Now and then, it must be owned, he has effected--or seemed
to effect--a marvellous cure. But, to tell you my private mind, Signor
Giovanni, he should receive little credit for such instances of success--they
being probably the work of chance--but should be held strictly accountable
for his failures, which may justly be considered his own work."
     The youth might have taken Baglioni's opinions with many grains of
allowance, had he known that there was a professional warfare of long
continuance between him and Doctor Rappaccini, in which the latter was
generally thought to have gained the advantage. If the reader be inclined to
judge for himself, we refer him to certain black-letter tracts on both sides,
                                           Rappaccini's Daughter                                     12

preserved in the medical department of the University of Padua.
     "I know not, most learned Professor," returned Giovanni, after musing
on what had been said of Rappaccini's exclusive zeal for science--"I know
not how dearly this physician may love his art; but surely there is one object
more dear to him. He has a daughter."
     "Aha!" cried the Professor with a laugh. "So now our friend Giovanni's
secret is out. You have heard of this daughter, whom all the young men in
Padua are wild about, though not half a dozen have ever had the good hap
to see her face. I know little of the Signora Beatrice, save that Rappaccini is
said to have instructed her deeply in his science, and that, young and
beautiful as fame reports her, she is already qualified to fill a professor's
chair. Perchance her father destines her for mine! Other absurd rumors there
be, not worth talking about, or listening to. So now, Signor Giovanni,
drink off your glass of Lacryma."
     Guasconti returned to his lodgings somewhat heated with the wine he
had quaffed, and which caused his brain to swim with strange fantasies in
reference to Doctor Rappaccini and the beautiful Beatrice. On his way,
happening to pass by a florist's, he bought a fresh bouquet of flowers.
     Ascending to his chamber, he seated himself near the window, but
within the shadow thrown by the depth of the wall, so that he could look
down into the garden with little risk of being discovered. All beneath his eye
was a solitude. The strange plants were basking in the sunshine, and now
and then nodding gently to one another, as if in acknowledgment of
sympathy and kindred. In the midst, by the shattered fountain, grew the
                                           Rappaccini's Daughter                                     13

magnificent shrub, with its purple gems clustering all over it; they glowed in
the air, and gleamed back again out of the depths of the pool, which thus
seemed to overflow with colored radiance from the rich reflection that was
steeped in it. At first, as we have said, the garden was a solitude. Soon,
however,--as Giovanni had half-hoped, half-feared, would be the case,--a
figure appeared beneath the antique sculptured portal, and came down
between the rows of plants, inhaling their various perfumes, as if she were
one of those beings of old classic fable, that lived upon sweet odors. On
again beholding Beatrice, the young man was even startled to perceive how
much her beauty exceeded his recollection of it; so brilliant, so vivid was its
character, that she glowed amid the sunlight, and, as Giovanni whispered to
himself, positively illuminated the more shadowy intervals of the garden
path. Her face being now more revealed than on the former occasion, he
was struck by its expression of simplicity and sweetness; qualities that had
not entered into his idea of her character, and which made him ask anew,
what manner of mortal she might be. Nor did he fail again to observe, or
imagine, an analogy between the beautiful girl and the gorgeous shrub that
hung its gem-like flowers over the fountain; a resemblance which Beatrice
seemed to have indulged a fantastic humor in heightening, both by the
arrangement of her dress and the selection of its hues.
     Approaching the shrub, she threw open her arms, as with a passionate
ardor, and drew its branches into an intimate embrace; so intimate, that her
features were hidden in its leafy bosom, and her glistening ringlets all
intermingled with the flowers.
                                           Rappaccini's Daughter                                     14

     "Give me thy breath, my sister," exclaimed Beatrice; "for I am faint with
common air! And give me this flower of thine, which I separate with
gentlest fingers from the stem, and place it close beside my heart."
     With these words, the beautiful daughter of Rappaccini plucked one of
the richest blossoms of the shrub, and was about to fasten it in her bosom.
But now, unless Giovanni's draughts of wine had bewildered his senses, a
singular incident occurred. A small orange-colored reptile, of the lizard or
chameleon species, chanced to be creeping along the path, just at the feet of
Beatrice. It appeared to Giovanni--but, at the distance from which he gazed,
he could scarcely have seen anything so minute--it appeared to him,
however, that a drop or two of moisture from the broken stem of the flower
descended upon the lizard's head. For an instant, the reptile contorted itself
violently, and then lay motionless in the sunshine. Beatrice observed this
remarkable phenomenon, and crossed herself, sadly, but without surprise;
nor did she therefore hesitate to arrange the fatal flower in her bosom. There
it blushed, and almost glimmered with the dazzling effect of a precious
stone, adding to her dress and aspect the one appropriate charm, which
nothing else in the world could have supplied. But Giovanni, out of the
shadow of his window, bent forward and shrank back, and murmured and
trembled.
     "Am I awake? Have I my senses?" said he to himself. "What is this
being?--beautiful, shall I call her?--or inexpressibly terrible?"
     Beatrice now strayed carelessly through the garden, approaching closer
beneath Giovanni's window, so that he was compelled to thrust his head
                                           Rappaccini's Daughter                                     15

quite out of its concealment in order to gratify the intense and painful
curiosity which she excited. At this moment, there came a beautiful insect
over the garden wall; it had perhaps wandered through the city and found no
flowers nor verdure among those antique haunts of men, until the heavy
perfumes of Doctor Rappaccini's shrubs had lured it from afar. Without
alighting on the flowers, this winged brightness seemed to be attracted by
Beatrice, and lingered in the air and fluttered about her head. Now, here it
could not be but that Giovanni Guasconti's eyes deceived him. Be that as it
might, he fancied that while Beatrice was gazing at the insect with childish
delight, it grew faint and fell at her feet;--its bright wings shivered; it was
dead--from no cause that he could discern, unless it were the atmosphere of
her breath. Again Beatrice crossed herself and sighed heavily, as she bent
over the dead insect.
     An impulsive movement of Giovanni drew her eyes to the window.
There she beheld the beautiful head of the young man--rather a Grecian than
an Italian head, with fair, regular features, and a glistening of gold among
his ringlets--gazing down upon her like a being that hovered in midair.
Scarcely knowing what he did, Giovanni threw down the bouquet which he
had hitherto held in his hand.
     "Signora," said he, "there are pure and healthful flowers. Wear them for
the sake of Giovanni Guasconti!"
     "Thanks, Signor," replied Beatrice, with her rich voice, that came forth
as it were like a gush of music; and with a mirthful expression half childish
and half woman-like. "I accept your gift, and would fain recompense it with
                                           Rappaccini's Daughter                                     16

this precious purple flower; but if I toss it into the air, it will not reach you.
So Signor Guasconti must even content himself with my thanks."
     She lifted the bouquet from the ground, and then as if inwardly ashamed
at having stepped aside from her maidenly reserve to respond to a stranger's
greeting, passed swiftly homeward through the garden. But, few as the
moments were, it seemed to Giovanni when she was on the point of
vanishing beneath the sculptured portal, that his beautiful bouquet was
already beginning to wither in her grasp. It was an idle thought; there could
be no possibility of distinguishing a faded flower from a fresh one at so
great a distance.
     For many days after this incident, the young man avoided the window
that looked into Doctor Rappaccini's garden, as if something ugly and
monstrous would have blasted his eyesight, had he been betrayed into a
glance. He felt conscious of having put himself, to a certain extent, within
the influence of an unintelligible power, by the communication which he
had opened with Beatrice. The wisest course would have been, if his heart
were in any real danger, to quit his lodgings and Padua itself, at once; the
next wiser, to have accustomed himself, as far as possible, to the familiar
and day-light view of Beatrice; thus bringing her rigidly and systematically
within the limits of ordinary experience. Least of all, while avoiding her
sight, ought Giovanni to have remained so near this extraordinary being,
that the proximity and possibility even of intercourse, should give a kind of
substance and reality to the wild vagaries which his imagination ran riot
continually in producing. Guasconti had not a deep heart--or at all events,
                                           Rappaccini's Daughter                                     17

its depths were not sounded now--but he had a quick fancy, and an ardent
southern temperament, which rose every instant to a higher fever-pitch.
Whether or no Beatrice possessed those terrible attributes--that fatal breath--
the affinity with those so beautiful and deadly flowers--which were
indicated by what Giovanni had witnessed, she had at least instilled a fierce
and subtle poison into his system. It was not love, although her rich beauty
was a madness to him; nor horror, even while he fancied her spirit to be
imbued with the same baneful essence that seemed to pervade her physical
frame; but a wild offspring of both love and horror that had each parent in
it, and burned like one and shivered like the other. Giovanni knew not what
to dread; still less did he know what to hope; yet hope and dread kept a
continual warfare in his breast, alternately vanquishing one another and
starting up afresh to renew the contest. Blessed are all simple emotions, be
they dark or bright! It is the lurid intermixture of the two that produces the
illuminating blaze of the infernal regions.
     Sometimes he endeavored to assuage the fever of his spirit by a rapid
walk through the streets of Padua, or beyond its gates; his footsteps kept
time with the throbbings of his brain, so that the walk was apt to accelerate
itself to a race. One day, he found himself arrested; his arm was seized by a
portly personage who had turned back on recognizing the young man, and
expended much breath in overtaking him.
     "Signor Giovanni!--stay, my young friend!" cried he. "Have you
forgotten me? That might well be the case, if I were as much altered as
yourself."
                                           Rappaccini's Daughter                                     18

     It was Baglioni, whom Giovanni had avoided, ever since their first
meeting, from a doubt that the Professor's sagacity would look too deeply
into his secrets. Endeavoring to recover himself, he stared forth wildly from
his inner world into the outer one, and spoke like a man in a dream:
     "Yes; I am Giovanni Guasconti. You are Professor Pietro Baglioni.
Now let me pass!"
     "Not yet--not yet, Signor Giovanni Guasconti," said the Professor,
smiling, but at the same time scrutinizing the youth with an earnest glance.--
"What; did I grow up side by side with your father, and shall his son pass
me like a stranger, in these old streets of Padua? Stand still, Signor
Giovanni; for we must have a word or two, before we part."
     "Speedily, then, most worshipful Professor, speedily!" said Giovanni,
with feverish impatience. "Does not your worship see that I am in haste?"
     Now, while he was speaking, there came a man in black along the street,
stooping and moving feebly, like a person in inferior health. His face was
all overspread with a most sickly and sallow hue, but yet so pervaded with
an expression of piercing and active intellect, that an observer might easily
have overlooked the merely physical attributes, and have seen only this
wonderful energy. As he passed, this person exchanged a cold and distant
salutation with Baglioni, but fixed his eyes upon Giovanni with an
intentness that seemed to bring out whatever was within him worthy of
notice. Nevertheless, there was a peculiar quietness in the look, as if taking
merely a speculative, not a human, interest in the young man.
     "It is Doctor Rappaccini!" whispered the Professor, when the stranger
                                           Rappaccini's Daughter                                     19

had passed.--"Has he ever seen your face before?"
     "Not that I know," answered Giovanni, starting at the name.
     "He has  seen you!--he must have seen you!" said Baglioni, hastily.
"For some purpose or other, this man of science is making a study of you. I
know that look of his! It is the same that coldly illuminates his face, as he
bends over a bird, a mouse, or a butterfly, which, in pursuance of some
experiment, he has killed by the perfume of a flower;--a look as deep as
Nature itself, but without Nature's warmth of love. Signor Giovanni, I will
stake my life upon it, you are the subject of one of Rappaccini's
experiments!"
     "Will you make a fool of me?" cried Giovanni, passionately. "That,
Signor Professor, were an untoward experiment."
     "Patience, patience!" replied the imperturbable Professor.--"I tell thee,
my poor Giovanni, that Rappaccini has a scientific interest in thee. Thou
hast fallen into fearful hands! And the Signora Beatrice? What part does she
act in this mystery?"
     But Guasconti, finding Baglioni's pertinacity intolerable, here broke
away, and was gone before the Professor could again seize his arm. He
looked after the young man intently, and shook his head.
     "This must not be," said Baglioni to himself. "The youth is the son of
my old friend, and shall not come to any harm from which the arcana of
medical science can preserve him. Besides, it is too insufferable an
impertinence in Rappaccini, thus to snatch the lad out of my own hands, as
I may say, and make use of him for his infernal experiments. This daughter
                                           Rappaccini's Daughter                                     20

of his! It shall be looked to. Perchance, most learned Rappaccini, I may foil
you where you little dream of it!"
     Meanwhile, Giovanni had pursued a circuitous route, and at length
found himself at the door of his lodgings. As he crossed the threshold, he
was met by old Lisabetta, who smirked and smiled, and was evidently
desirous to attract his attention; vainly, however, as the ebullition of his
feelings had momentarily subsided into a cold and dull vacuity. He turned
his eyes full upon the withered face that was puckering itself into a smile,
but seemed to behold it not. The old dame, therefore, laid her grasp upon
his cloak.
     "Signor!--Signor!" whispered she, still with a smile over the whole
breadth of her visage, so that it looked not unlike a grotesque carving in
wood, darkened by centuries--"Listen, Signor! There is a private entrance
into the garden!"
     "What do you say?" exclaimed Giovanni, turning quickly about, as if an
inanimate thing should start into feverish life.--"A private entrance into
Doctor Rappaccini's garden!"
     "Hush! hush!--not so loud!" whispered Lisabetta, putting her hand over
his mouth. "Yes; into the worshipful Doctor's garden, where you may see
all his fine shrubbery. Many a young man in Padua would give gold to be
admitted among those flowers."
     Giovanni put a piece of gold into her hand. "Show me the way," said he.
     A surmise, probably excited by his conversation with Baglioni, crossed
his mind, that this interposition of old Lisabetta might perchance be
                                           Rappaccini's Daughter                                     21

connected with the intrigue, whatever were its nature, in which the
Professor seemed to suppose that Doctor Rappaccini was involving him.
But such a suspicion, though it disturbed Giovanni, was inadequate to
restrain him. The instant that he was aware of the possibility of approaching
Beatrice, it seemed an absolute necessity of his existence to do so. It
mattered not whether she were angel or demon; he was irrevocably within
her sphere, and must obey the law that whirled him onward, in ever
lessening circles, towards a result which he did not attempt to foreshadow.
And yet, strange to say, there came across him a sudden doubt, whether this
intense interest on his part were not delusory--whether it were really of so
deep and positive a nature as to justify him in now thrusting himself into an
incalculable position--whether it were not merely the fantasy of a young
man's brain, only slightly, or not at all, connected with his heart!
     He paused--hesitated--turned half about--but again went on. His
withered guide led him along several obscure passages, and finally undid a
door, through which, as it was opened, there came the sight and sound of
rustling leaves, with the broken sunshine glimmering among them.
Giovanni stepped forth, and forcing himself through the entanglement of a
shrub that wreathed its tendrils over the hidden entrance, he stood beneath
his own window, in the open area of Doctor Rappaccini's garden.
     How often is it the case, that, when impossibilities have come to pass,
and dreams have condensed their misty substance into tangible realities, we
find ourselves calm, and even coldly self-possessed, amid circumstances
which it would have been a delirium of joy or agony to anticipate! Fate