, whose name
was Goldie. I do not recollect the number of his regiment, for he was not
in uniform when brought to me. He was a handsome man, but represented as a
terrible one, who had made a violent attempt to escape after being taken
prisoner, and his desperate bravery in the field was also recorded. I was
requested to treat him with the respect due to a brave man, but, at the
same time, to keep a strict watch over him, and to allow him even less
liberty than I might do to an ordinary prisoner. His being a captive did
not humble him; he treated his keepers and his guards with as much contempt
as though he had been their conqueror on the field. We had confined his
body, but there was no humbling of his spirit. I heard so much of him, that
I took an interest in the haughty Briton. But he treated me with the same
sullen disdain that he showed towards my inferiors. I had a daughter, who
was as dear to me as life itself, for she had had five brothers, and they
had all fallen in the cause of the great emperor, with the tricolor on
their brow, and the wing of the eagle over them. She was
beautiful--beautiful as her sainted mother, than whom Italy boasted not a
fairer daughter, (for she was a native of Rome.) Hers was not a beauty that
you may see every day amongst a thousand in the regions of the north--hers
was the rare beauty amongst ten thousand of the daughters of the sunny
south, with a face beaming with as bright a loveliness, and I would say
divinity, as the Medici. Of all the children which that fair being bore
unto me, I had but one, a daughter, left--beautiful as I have
said--beautiful as her mother. I had a garden beneath the castle, and over
it was a terrace, in which the British prisoner, Goldie, was allowed to
walk. They saw each other. They became acquainted with each other. He had
despised all who approached; he had even treated me, who had his life in my
hand, as a dog. But he did not so treat my daughter. I afterwards learned,
when it was too late, that they had been seen exchanging looks, words, and
signs with each other. He had been eighteen months my prisoner; and one
morning when I awoke, I was told that my daughter was not to be found, and
that the English prisoner, Lieutenant Goldie, also had escaped. I cursed
both in my heart; for they had robbed me of my happiness--he had robbed me
of my child; though she only could have accomplished it. Shortly after
this, (and perhaps because of it,) I was again calle