The Manzoni Family (21 page)

‘And what is the cause of all this? I'll tell you. It comes from having almost abandoned the good practices you told me you observed as a girl. You go to Church like Protestants to their chapel, once on Sunday and that's all: I've seen it in Azeglio, in Milan, in Cernobio. All good things come from God. If we do not pray, He is not obliged to grant us that higher grace to practise virtue. If you had an irreligious husband I would say to you, just do what is prescribed, refrain from anything further to avoid upsetting him; but this is not your case: why not attend holy communion sometimes, or a short act of worship if you can't get to Mass: why stay away from the sacred fount of every grace for 4 or 5 months? At least for the chief festivals: pause to consider what you read, the society you surround yourself with every evening at your home, which J
entirely disapprove of;
the cutting things I have so often heard you utter. You waste so much time, when you could be cultivating the talents you have, to your husband's great satisfaction, and acquire a store of sound instruction for your daughter.

‘I told your family you were a good housekeeper, but to you I can say you have not been so this year. I have observed what has been spent in the house, and it is far too much. Enough furniture to fill two more rooms: a carpet that couldn't have cost less than 500 or 600 francs, when a clean drugget would have been sufficient: then all those trinkets on the tables, they must be yours, why not save your money for more solid things? When you showed me your account books, I saw one said liveries; and 25 lire or francs for 5 little dresses for the baby, I never dreamed I would see such a thing in an account-book. The material must be bought but made up at home. Lenin has other things to do. . . but you can sew very well, my dear; instead of spending so much time at your embroidery frame making costly things that damage your health, busy yourself doing what a woman does best. I have calculated roughly what you have had this year - certainly far more than I from tenants at Cal.na - and now I don't know how you stand. You have certainly put nothing aside. And since we are on this subject I warn you you can expect little from me, with all the expenses I have; so you would really be advised to be sensible. I give you this advice regarding your budget.

‘It remains to say a word about the servants. The nurse is not what she was; more than once I've seen her up to unseemly tricks. At Cernobio she gave the baby to someone else, then escaped to the kitchen or to the harbour to chatter with boatmen, and I feel she has too much to say for herself in the house; I am not saying she is vicious, but too frivolous, which won't do at all when Sandrine is 4. Too much gossip arises from her chatter, and you encourage her.

‘My dear Giulia, I have touched upon all the main points I had chosen. I have spoken the truth, I have tried to speak frankly, but not in a spirit of offence, but the truth is often painful; I hope its effect on you will not be sad or unavailing, but that it will serve to make you examine yourself, and profit by the advice of a mother who truly loves you and is not afraid to make painful incisions for your good, and for the good of our Massimo.

‘If this letter arrives when you are in a disturbed state of mind, postpone reading it so that it may be as medicine to you, and not poison; this is the wish of one who writes to you with painful effort. If it does you good, if God blesses my words, all else is as nothing. Keep this paper, perhaps it will be the last so prolix and from a heart so full. I have not long to live, but I shall have the consolation of having given you this proof of my sincerity and love. '

Together with the preaching, moral judgements, recollections full of bitter rancour, angry reflections about expenditure, and furious rage at the idea that her beloved son should have to live with a woman ‘who does not make him happy', the Marchesa Cristina's letter also reflects, albeit painted in the acrid colours of anger, the figure of Giulietta as she then was. No longer the melancholy girl who wrote tender letters to Cousin Giacomo who did not take much notice of her, or tender letters to Fauriel who never answered. No longer the melancholy girl in the Grigioni, consumed with home-sickness for her sisters and brothers, her mother, her home. No longer melancholy, but desperate. She listened to the gossip of the nurse which may have touched on
tante
Louise and her jealousy. She was buying furniture frenziedly. Apparently she demanded to be called Marchesa (though the only true marchesa was her mother-in-law). She despised her husband's relatives
(‘la cousinaille\
she called them in a letter home, written in a scrawl that was almost entirely indecipherable) and felt humiliated and that she had come down many degrees to an ambience inferior to her own. But above all, she saw nothing around her resembling her girlhood dreams. She fled from her sick mother's room, and would not stay and nurse her like the others; she fled because she knew this time her mother would not survive the winter, and her own unhappiness was too great to stand this approaching separation. She fled so that her dying mother should be spared the sight of her unhappiness and the evident failure of her marriage.

Massimo must have been, like her, disappointed in the marriage, and found their life together extremely uncomfortable; but perhaps this did not completely destroy his happiness as it did hers; he had other resources, work, friends, and probably other women (whether or not it really was already a question of
tante
Louise, as Giulietta thought, we cannot know). His relations with his wife's family, however, remained warm and affectionate. In the winter he wrote to his cousin Cesare Balbo, telling him about Enrichetta's illness:

‘Poor Manzoni faces the likelihood of losing his wife soon; she seems to be wasting away. You would have to know, as I have done, their hearts and their life together, the love they have borne each other for twenty-five years, the angelic life they have spent together, to have any idea of the blow of this separation. Moreover, when you think that three boys, two little girls, and two girls of marriageable age will remain motherless, the whole family without a guide, that the grandmother is turned seventy and not fit to run the house; because of his health and his habitual way of life, Papa is more in need of others to look after him than the reverse: you see how many misfortunes greater than words can tell are contained in this one. I wish you could see Papa these days. I thought I knew what man he was, but I did not know: I have discovered that his talents are as nothing to his life. If you heard the things he has uttered! The other evening, for example, when all the family were gathered together in a moment of terrible stress, he said to the children: let us say an Ave Maria for your mother. When they had said it: let us say another for the people who have hurt us most, so God will more gladly accept our prayers.'

In early December Vittoria came from Lodi. On the twelfth she was sent back. She would not see her mother again. Cousin Giacomo wrote to Uncle Giulio Beccaria: ‘This morning I saw Grossi. . . he confirmed that Enrichetta was not in danger for the moment, and may be said to have improved a little. In any case, we have taken the necessary steps, if the worst comes to the worst, and arrangements would be made by me and by Grossi for the family to come to you at Gessate at a time of their choice, and Grossi would be very willing to accompany them. But let us still cling to the hope that such a tragedy may not occur or at least not so suddenly. . .'

And the Marchesa Cristina wrote to Massimo:

‘Just a line, Massimo dear, with Christmas greetings to you, Giulia, Sandrina and all the Manzonis and friends. My dear, this is a very sad Christmas, but I offer my greetings in a Christian sense, that is, I pray for you all with the courage and resignation which makes profitable for the soul those afflictions that the Lord visits upon His children. You cannot imagine how grief-stricken I am at the griefs of a family with whom I feel at one as with my own. From the moment I heard that angel had taken the last rites, I have known no comfort, and my stomach is upset all the time. '

Enrichetta died on Christmas Day, at eight in the evening. The funeral took place on the 27th at the neighbouring parish church of San Fedele. The body was taken to Brusuglio. Manzoni wrote the epitaph for her tomb. ‘To Enrichetta Manzoni, née Blondel, incomparable daughter-in-law, wife and mother; her mother-in-law, husband and children pray with bitter tears but in living faith that she may enter into the glory of Heaven.'

Then they all went to Uncle Giulio Beccaria's at Gessate. On 31st December Grandmother Giulia wrote from there to Vittoria:

‘My darling Vittoria, God has taken from us the angelic creature He had given to us in His mercy — to you as mother, to me as the dearest daughter, to your father as an incomparable companion. Oh! Vittoria dear, the pain and desolation are indeed great, and we will feel the loss of that angel in every minute of every day.

‘What a life and what a death was hers! You had to leave her before she left us all: offer up to God your sacrifice, and hers in sending you back, which cost her very dear! She made a like sacrifice in not seeing her dear Matilde again, saying: “I have already sacrificed her to the Lord”.

‘I will not go into many details now, although they are sacred and precious; I will just tell you that for several days she was longing for Christmas Eve, and indeed on that day she received the Holy Eucharist and extreme unction for the second time. She spent the day until evening in a gentle agony, conscious and praying all the time. Our good Rector was with her all the time. The moment came. She was supported by Pietro and Massimo; everyone was praying; a faint sigh told the Rector she had passed to Heaven, and he announced it to us in these words:
We are praying for her, now she is praying for us.

‘Then I saw the angel again: a heavenly smile had formed on her lips; everyone came to see her with love and veneration; she was taken to Brusuglio amid the tears and prayers of all. . .

‘Your poor, desolate father is resigned to the will of God, but submerged in the most profound, I might even say unimaginable grief; and us? . . . Oh, dear Vittorina, may the Lord help us! I say no more. We went to the Beccaria house, and now we have come here to Gessate. Excuse my bad writing: I am writing in the evening and I can't see very well.

‘My Vittoria, dearest girl, if we would die like her, we must live like her. Oh Vittoria, remember that you are Enrichetta's daughter! — This name says
everything — everything
that is good and holy on this earth. Vittoria, my little one, I can't write any more. Your Papa presses you to his poor heart; everybody sends their love, including Uncle and “la zietta” . . . Oh Vittoria, remember the life your mother led! As long as I live, I shall always be your most loving Grandmother. '

She wrote a long letter to her friend Euphrosine Planta. The Falquet-Plantas lived in Grenoble. They were old friends of the Manzonis. One of their sons, Henri, had spent a few days at Brusuglio that summer when Enrichetta had fallen ill.

‘Alas! my dearest Euphrosine, your tender heart spoke true when it presaged some misfortune, for the greatest possible has befallen us. Our angelic Enrichetta is no longer in this world of woe. Alas! I have very painful details to tell, but let me say a word about us, poor, unhappy creatures that we are. Our pain reached its peak, but in the end it has to lose some force to be bearable at all, but the deprivation, day by day, minute by minute, of one who was the soul, the counsel, the pillar of the whole family, one who was for 26 years our model and our joy, no! my friend, no, one cannot grow accustomed to such a loss. I have, so to speak, lost my daily bread, and as our grief is continuous, it is all the more scorching and hard to bear. If I say this, judge for yourself the state of my unhappy son; his lamentations (oh! they come from the very heart!) follow wave on wave, grief engenders grief, he lives on pain and resignation, resignation and pain, for her presence is everywhere with us. All our children have felt this irreparable loss, and feel it still. Each day they pay their tribute to her of veneration, love and grief. But let me speak of her, not us. A few days after your Henri left us, she felt worse than usual, but without taking to bed. Our two girls were staying with their sister at the lake and we were to go there too for the 24th (July) to celebrate Saint Cristina's day, but Enrichetta was not well enough for that short journey. Alessandro and Pietro went on their own. They all came back together two days later and found Enrichetta in bed; gradually she began to suffer very bad pain in her intestines, so she was bled a great deal, and so two months passed, her illness fluctuating all the time, in the most alarming way. On top of all this a dreadful catarrhal cough, chest infection, and her sufferings endlessly renewed by endless remedies, but with such patience in face of every trial! Fortunately the season was clement, but winter was coming on and our house is no good at all for the winter.

‘To bring my story to a close, on the 23rd November we were able to take her to Milan. She did not suffer at all on the short journey; everything had been prepared to receive her. After a few quieter days in which she wanted to take the holy sacrament, she began to suffer greatly once more, and consultations were arranged, etc. . . . Our good doctor from the country moved in to be with her day and night. She was gripped by frequent convulsions, and her poor body was wasted away. She knew she was dying, but she did not want to talk about it to us: “Oh! they get too distressed!” She consoled herself by gazing at a little picture of the Holy Virgin, saying
“She is my consolation.
“ Not a word of complaint; her resignation was complete. She only asked her women: “Tell me, when is Christmas Eve?” Hearing her ask this, the women and I were anxious. Alas! it was on Christmas Eve that she asked for her confessor again. She wanted to take the holy sacrament again, since she had received it not many days before, he told her that if she were well enough, the parish priest would certainly bring it. Her poor husband, who for some time had talked to her of nothing but the bliss of her eternal life, kept saying to her: “I offer you to God and beg you of Him." Oh, God! what a time that was! At last came that Christmas night. About midnight a strong convulsion gripped her; at once we called our good priest, a young man but full of doctrine, virtue and deep spiritual feeling; he gave her the holy oil, and since she was calm and in her right mind, he brought her the holy sacrament. We were beside her bed, we asked her blessing, she held my head in her hands, saying: “Oh! my poor
nonna!”
She said to Alessandro: “I commend my little babe to you."  But she did not want to see her, saying: “I have already sacrificed her to God. “ Not a complaint, no sign of weakness, but loving and grateful for any little service done to her. She was as if already absorbed into God, and consoled herself with a little picture of the Holy Virgin she held before her. The priest did not leave her, she did not want him to go, he was praying all the time. Her son Pietro and her son-in-law were supporting her. The whole of Christmas Day passed in this way; we wandered from one room to another, stifling our laments and sobs. Alessandro was in a desperate state, but always at prayer. At eight in the evening the children and I were in the other room, Alessandro prostrate at the end of his wife's room, his head on the ground, seeing and hearing nothing, the priest was commending her soul, when d'Azeglio said: “Her pulse has stopped beating." The priest turned to seek Alessandro; he found him on the ground, knelt before him and said: “We were praying for her, now she is praying for us."