There is a short season in which a villa within the walls of old Rome realizes all that is positive ecstasy in the life of Italy. This season begins usually towards the end of February, and continues through the month of March. This interval—which in less favored lands is dedicated to storms of rain and sleet, east winds and equinoctial gales, tumbling chimney-pots and bronchitis—is here signalized by all that Spring, in its most voluptuous abundance, can pour forth. Vegetation comes out, not with the laggard step of northern climes,—slow, cautious, and distrustful,—but bursting at once from bud to blossom, as though impatient for the fresh air of life and the warm rays of the sun. The very atmosphere laughs and trembles with vitality. From the panting lizard on the urn to the myriad of insects on the grass, it is life everywhere; and over all sweeps the delicious odor of the verbena and the violet, almost overpowering with perfume, so that one feels, in such a land, the highest ecstasy of existence is that same dreamy state begotten of impressions derived from blended sense, where tone and tint and odor mingle almost into one. Perhaps the loveliest spot of Rome in this loveliest of seasons was the Villa Altieri. It stood on a slope of the Pincian, defended from north and east, and looking eastward over the Campagna towards the hills of Albano. A thick ilex grove, too thick and dark for Italian, though perfect to English taste, surrounded the house, offering alleys of shade that even the noonday's sun found impenetrable; while beneath the slope, and under shelter of the hill, lay a delicious garden, memorable by a fountain designed by Thorwaldsen, where four Naiades splash the water at each other under the fall of a cataract,—this being the costly caprice of the Cardinal Altieri, to complete which he had to conduct the water from the Lake of Albano. Unlike most Italian gardens, the plants and shrubs were not merely those of the south, but all that the culture of Holland and England could contribute to fragrance and color were also there, and the gorgeous tulips of the Hague, the golden ranunculus and crimson carnation, which attain their highest beauty in moister climates, here were varied with chrysanthemums and camellias. Gorgeous creepers trailed from tree to tree or gracefully trained themselves around the marble groups, and clusters of orange-trees, glittering with golden fruit, relieved in their darker green the almost too glaring brilliancy of color.

At a window which opened to the ground—and from which a view of the garden, and beyond the garden the rich woods of the Borghese Villa, and beyond these again, the massive dome of St. Peter's, extended—sat two ladies, so wonderfully alike that a mere glance would have proclaimed them to be sisters. It is true the Countess Balderoni was several years older than Lady Augusta Bramleigh; but whether from temperament or the easier flow of an Italian life in comparison with the more wearing excitement of an English existence, she certainly looked little, if anything, her senior.

They were both handsome,—at least, they had that character of good looks which in Italy is deemed beauty; they were singularly fair, with large, deep-set blue-gray eyes, and light brown hair of a marvellous abundance and silkiest fibre. They were alike soft-voiced and gentle-mannered, and alike strong-willed and obstinate, of an intense selfishness, and very capricious.

“His eminence is late this evening,” said Lady Augusta, looking at her watch. “It is nigh eight o'clock.”

“I fancy, Gusta, he was not quite pleased with you last night. On going away he said something, I did n't exactly catch it, but it sounded like 'leggierezza;' he thought you had not treated his legends of St. Francis with becoming seriousness.”

“If he wanted me to be grave he oughtn't to tell me funny stories.”

“The lives of the saints, Gusta!”

“Well, dearest, that scene in the forest where St. Francis asked the devil to flog him, and not to desist, even though he should be weak enough to implore it—was n't that dialogue as droll as anything in Boccaccio?”

“It's not decent, it's not decorous to laugh at any incident in the lives of holy men.”

“Holy men, then, should never be funny, at least when they are presented to me, for it's always the absurd side of everything has the greatest attraction for me.”

“This is certainly not the spirit which will lead you to the Church!”

“But I thought I told you already, dearest, that it 's the road I like, not the end of the journey. Courtship is confessedly better than marriage, and the being converted is infinitely nicer than the state of conviction.”

“Oh, Gusta, what are you saying?”

“Saying what I most fervently feel to be true. Don't you know, better even than myself, that it is the zeal to rescue me from the fold of the heretics surrounds me every evening with monsignori and vescovi, and attracts to the sofa where I happen to sit, purple stockings and red, a class of adorers, I am free to own, there is nothing in the lay world to compare with; and don't you know, too, that the work of conversion accomplished, these seductive saints will be on the look-out for a new sinner?”

“And is this the sincerity in which you profess your new faith? is it thus that you mean to endow a new edifice to the honor of the Holy Religion?”

“Cara mia! I want worship, homage, and adoration myself, and it is as absolute a necessity of my being, as if I had been born up there, and knew nothing of this base earth and its belongings. Be just, my dearest sister, and see for once the difference between us. You have a charming husband, who never plagues, never bores you, whom you see when it is pleasant to see, and dismiss when you are weary of him. He never worries you about money, he has no especial extravagance, and does not much trouble himself about anything—I have none of these. I am married to a man almost double my age, taken from another class, and imbued with a whole set of notions different from my own. I can't live with his people; my own won't have me. What then is left but the refuge of that emotional existence which the Church offers?—a sort of pious flirtation with a runaway match in the distance, only it is to be heaven, not Gretna Green.”

“So that all this while you have never been serious, Gusta?”

“Most serious! I have actually written to my husband,—you read the letter,—acquainting him with my intended change of religion, and my desire to mark the sincerity of my profession by that most signal of all proofs,—a moneyed one. As I told the Cardinal last night, Heaven is never so sure of us as when we draw on our banker to go there!”

“How you must shock his eminence when you speak in this way!”

“So he told me; but I must own he looked very tenderly into my eyes as he said so. Isn't it provoking?” said she, as she arose and moved out into the garden. “No post yet! It is always so when one is on thorns for a letter. Now, when one thinks that the mail arrives at daybreak, what can they possibly mean by not distributing the letters till evening? Did I tell you what I said to Monsignore Ricci, who has some function at the Post Office?”

“No, but I trust it was not a rude speech; he is always so polite.”

“I said that as I was ever very impatient for my letters, I had requested all my correspondents to write in a great round legible hand, which would give the authorities no pretext for delay, while deciphering their contents.”

“I declare, Gusta, I am amazed at you. I cannot imagine how you can venture to say such things to persons in office.”

“My dear sister, it is the only way they could ever hear them. There is no freedom of the press here; in society nobody speaks out. What would become of those people if they only heard the sort of stories they tell each other; besides, I 'm going to be one of them. They must bear with a little indiscipline.' The sergeant always pardons the recruit for being disorderly on the day of enlistment.”

The Countess shook her head disapprovingly, and was silent.

“Oh, dear! oh, dear!” sighed Lady Augusta. “I wonder what tidings the post will bring me! Will my affectionate and afflicted husband comply with my prayer, and be willing to endow the Church, and secure his own freedom; or will he be sordid, and declare that he can't live without me? I know you'd laugh, dear, or I'd tell you that the man is actually violently in love with me. You 've no notion of the difficulty I have to prevent him writing tender letters to me.”

“You are too, too bad, I declare,” said the other, smothering a rising laugh.

“Of course I 'd not permit such a thing. I stand on my dignity, and say, 'Have a care, sir.' Oh, here it comes! here's the post! What! only two letters, after all? She's a dun! Madame la Ruelle, Place VendÔme,—the cruellest creature that ever made a ball-dress. It is to tell me she can't wait; and I 'm so sick of saying she must, that I 'll not write any more. And who is this? The postmark is 'Portshandon.' Oh! I see; here's the name in the corner. This is from our eldest son, the future head of the house. Mr. Augustus Bramleigh is a bashful creature of about my own age, who was full of going to New Zealand and turning sheep-farmer. True, I assure you; he is an enthusiast about independence; which means he has a grand vocation for the workhouse.”

“By what strange turn of events has he become your correspondent?”

“I should say, Dora, it looks ill as regards the money. I'm afraid that this bodes a refusal.”

“Would not the shorter way be to read it?” said the other, simply.

“Yes, the shorter, but perhaps not the sweeter. There are little events in life which are worse than even uncertainties; but here goes:—

“'Castello.”

“'My dear Lady Augusta,—

“A very pretty beginning from my son—I mean my husband's son; and yet he could not have commenced 'Dearest Mamma.'”

“'I write my first letter to you at a very painful moment. My poor father was seized on Tuesday last with a most serious and sudden illness, to which the physician as yet hesitates to give a name. It is, however, on the brain or the membranes, and deprives him of all inclination, though not entirely of all power, to use his faculties. He is, moreover, enjoined to avoid every source of excitement, and even forbidden to converse. Of course, under these afflicting circumstances, everything which relates to business in any way is imperatively excluded from his knowledge; and must continue to be so till some change occurs.

“'It is not at such a moment you would expect to hear of a marriage in the family, and yet yesterday my sister Marion was married to Lord Viscount Culduff.'”

Here she laid down the letter, and stared with an expression of almost overwhelmed amazement at her sister. “Lord Culduff! Where's the 'Peerage,' Dora? Surely it must be the same who was at Dresden when we were children; he wasn't married—there can be no son. Oh, here he is: 'Henry Plantagenet de Lacey, fourteenth Viscount Culduff; born 9th February, 17—.' Last century. Why, he 's the patriarch of the peers, and she 's twenty-four! What can the girl mean?”

“Do read on; I'm impatient for more.”

“'The imperative necessity for Lord Culduff to hold himself in readiness for whatever post in the diplomatic service the Minister might desire him to occupy, was the chief reason for the marriage taking place at this conjuncture. My father, however, himself, was very anxious on the subject; and indeed, insisted strongly on being present. The ceremony was accordingly performed in his own room, and I rejoice to say that, though naturally much excited, he does not appear to have sustained any increase of malady from this trying event. I need not tell you the great disparity of age between my sister and her husband: a disparity which I own enlisted me amongst those who opposed the match. Marion, however, so firmly insisted on her right to choose for herself, and her fortune being completely at her own disposal, that all continued opposition would have been not alone unavailing for the present, but a source of coldness and estrangement for the future.

“'The Culduffs'—(how sweetly familiar)—'the Culduffs left this for Paris this day, where I believe they intend to remain till the question of Lord Culduff's post is determined on. My sister ardently hopes it may be in Italy, as she is most desirous to be near you.'

“Can you imagine such a horror as this woman playing daughter to me, and yet going in to dinner before me, and making me feel her rank on every possible occasion! All this here I see is business,—nothing but business. The Colonel, it would seem, must have been breaking before they suspected, for all his late speculations have turned out ill. Penstyddin Copper Mine is an utter failure; the New Caledonian Packet Line a smash; and there 's a whole list of crippled enterprises. It 's very nice of Augustus, however, to say that, though he mentions these circumstances, which might possibly reach me through other channels, no event that he could contemplate should in any way affect my income, or any increase of it that I deem essential to my comfort or convenience; and although in total ignorance as he is of all transactions of the house, he begs me to write to himself directly when any question of increased expense should arise—which I certainly will. He 's a buon figliuolo, Dolly, that must be said, and it would be shameful not to develop such generous instincts.

“'If my father's illness should be unhappily protracted, means must be taken, I believe, to devolve his share in business matters upon some other. I regret that it cannot possibly be upon myself; but I am totally unequal to the charge, and have not, besides, courage for the heavy responsibility.'

“That's the whole of it,” said she, with a sigh; “and all things considered, it might have been worse.”