The Song of Triumphant Love by Ivan Turgenev
(chapters 1-5)
This is what I read in an old Italian manuscript:—
I
About the middle of the sixteenth century there
were living in Ferrara (it
was at that time flourishing under the sceptre of
its magnificent arch-
dukes, the patrons of the arts and poetry) two
young men, named Fabio
and Muzzio. They were of the same age, and of near
kinship, and were
scarcely ever apart; the warmest affection had
united them from early
childhood ... the similarity of their positions
strengthened the bond. Both
belonged to old families; both were rich,
independent, and without fam-
ily ties; tastes and inclinations were alike in
both. Muzzio was devoted to
music, Fabio to painting. They were looked upon
with pride by the whole
of Ferrara, as ornaments of the court, society,
and town. In appearance,
however, they were not alike, though both were
distinguished by a grace-
ful, youthful beauty. Fabio was taller, fair of
face and flaxen of hair, and he
had blue eyes. Muzzio, on the other hand, had a
swarthy face and black
hair, and in his dark brown eyes there was not the
merry light, nor on his
lips the genial smile of Fabio; his thick eyebrows
overhung narrow eyelids,
while Fabio’s golden eyebrows formed delicate
half-circles on his pure,
smooth brow. In conversation, too, Muzzio was less
animated. For all
that, the two friends were both alike looked on
with favour by ladies, as
well they might be, being models of chivalrous
courtliness and generosity.
At the same time there was living in Ferrara a
girl named Valeria. She
was considered one of the greatest beauties in the
town, though it was very
seldom possible to see her, as she led a retired
life, and never went out
except to church, and on great holidays for a
walk. She lived with her
mother, a widow of noble family, though of small
fortune, who had no
other children. In every one whom Valeria met she
inspired a sensation of
involuntary admiration, and an equally involuntary
tenderness and re-
spect, so modest was her mien, so little, it
seemed, was she aware of all the
power of her own charms. Some, it is true, found
her a little pale; her eyes,
almost always downcast, expressed a certain
shyness, even timidity; her
lips rarely smiled, and then only faintly; her
voice scarcely any one had
heard. But the rumour went that it was most
beautiful, and that, shut up
in her own room, in the early morning when
everything still slumbered in
the town, she loved to sing old songs to the sound
of the lute, on which
she used to play herself. In spite of her pallor,
Valeria was blooming with
health; and even old people, as they gazed on her,
could not but think,
‘Oh, how happy the youth for whom that pure maiden
bud, still enfolded
in its petals, will one day open into full
flower!’
II
Fabio and Muzzio saw Valeria for the first time at
a magnificent public
festival, celebrated at the command of the
Archduke of Ferrara, Ercol, son
of the celebrated Lucrezia Borgia, in honour of
some illustrious grandees
who had come from Paris on the invitation of the
Archduchess, daughter
of the French king, Louis XII. Valeria was sitting
beside her mother on an
elegant tribune, built after a design of Palladio,
in the principal square of
Ferrara, for the most honourable ladies in the
town. Both Fabio and Muzzio
fell passionately in love with her on that day;
and, as they never had any
secrets from each other, each of them soon knew
what was passing in his
friend’s heart. They agreed together that both
should try to get to know
Valeria; and if she should deign to choose one of
them, the other should
submit without a murmur to her decision. A few
weeks later, thanks to
the excellent renown they deservedly enjoyed, they
succeeded in penetrat-
ing into the widow’s house, difficult though it
was to obtain an entry to it;
she permitted them to visit her. From that time
forward they were able
almost every day to see Valeria and to converse
with her; and every day the
passion kindled in the hearts of both young men
grew stronger and stron-
ger. Valeria, however, showed no preference for
either of them, though
their society was obviously agreeable to her. With
Muzzio, she occupied
herself with music; but she talked more with
Fabio, with him she was less
timid. At last, they resolved to learn once for
all their fate, and sent a letter
to Valeria, in which they begged her to be open
with them, and to say to
which she would be ready to give her hand. Valeria
showed this letter to
her mother, and declared that she was willing to
remain unmarried, but if
her mother considered it time for her to enter
upon matrimony, then she
would marry whichever one her mother’s choice
should fix upon. The ex-
cellent widow shed a few tears at the thought of
parting from her beloved
child; there was, however, no good ground for
refusing the suitors, she con-
sidered both of them equally worthy of her
daughter’s hand. But, as she
secretly preferred Fabio, and suspected that
Valeria liked him the better, she
fixed upon him. The next day Fabio heard of his
happy fate, while all that
was left for Muzzio was to keep his word, and
submit. And this he did; but
to be the witness of the triumph of his friend and
rival was more than he
could do. He promptly sold the greater part of his
property, and collecting
some thousands of ducats, he set off on a far
journey to the East. As he said
farewell to Fabio, he told him that he should not
return till he felt that the
last traces of passion had vanished from his
heart. It was painful to Fabio to
part from the friend of his childhood and youth
... but the joyous anticipa-
tion of approaching bliss soon swallowed up all
other sensations, and he
gave himself up wholly to the transports of
successful love.
Shortly after, he celebrated his nuptials with
Valeria, and only then learnt
the full worth of the treasure it had been his
fortune to obtain. He had a
charming villa, shut in by a shady garden, a short
distance from Ferrara;
he moved thither with his wife and her mother.
Then a time of happiness
began for them. Married life brought out in a new
and enchanting light
all the perfections of Valeria. Fabio became an
artist of distinction—no
longer a mere amateur, but a real master.
Valeria’s mother rejoiced, and
thanked God as she looked upon the happy pair.
Four years flew by un-
perceived, like a delicious dream. One thing only
was wanting to the young
couple, one lack they mourned over as a sorrow:
they had no children ...
but they had not given up all hope of them. At the
end of the fourth year
they were overtaken by a great, this time a real
sorrow; Valeria’s mother
died after an illness of a few days.
Many tears were shed by Valeria; for a long time
she could not accustom
herself to her loss. But another year went by;
life again asserted its rights
and flowed along its old channel. And behold, one
fine summer evening,
unexpected by every one, Muzzio returned to
Ferrara.
III
During the whole space of five years that had
elapsed since his departure
no one had heard anything of him; all talk about
him had died away, as
though he had vanished from the face of the earth.
When Fabio met his
friend in one of the streets of Ferrara he almost
cried out aloud, first in
alarm and then in delight, and he at once invited
him to his villa. There
happened to be in his garden there a spacious
pavilion, apart from the
house; he proposed to his friend that he should
establish himself in this
pavilion. Muzzio readily agreed and moved thither
the same day together
with his servant, a dumb Malay—dumb but not deaf,
and indeed, to
judge by the alertness of his expression, a very
intelligent man.... His
tongue had been cut out. Muzzio brought with him
dozens of boxes,
filled with treasures of all sorts collected by
him in the course of his pro-
longed travels. Valeria was delighted at Muzzio’s
return; and he greeted
her with cheerful friendliness, but composure; it
could be seen in every
action that he had kept the promise given to
Fabio. During the day he
completely arranged everything in order in his
pavilion; aided by his Malay,
he unpacked the curiosities he had brought; rugs,
silken stuffs, velvet and
brocaded garments, weapons, goblets, dishes and
bowls, decorated with
enamel, things made of gold and silver, and inlaid
with pearl and tur-
quoise, carved boxes of jasper and ivory, cut
bottles, spices, incense, skins
of wild beasts, and feathers of unknown birds, and
a number of other
things, the very use of which seemed mysterious
and incomprehensible.
Among all these precious things there was a rich
pearl necklace, bestowed
upon Muzzio by the king of Persia for some great
and secret service; he
asked permission of Valeria to put this necklace
with his own hand about
her neck; she was struck by its great weight and a
sort of strange heat in it
... it seemed to burn to her skin.
the terrace of the villa in the shade of the
oleanders and laurels, Muzzio
began to relate his adventures. He told of the
distant lands he had seen, of
cloud-topped mountains and deserts, rivers like
seas; he told of immense
buildings and temples, of trees a thousand years
old, of birds and flowers
of the colours of the rainbow: he named the cities
and the peoples he had
visited ... their very names seemed like a fairy
tale. The whole East was
familiar to Muzzio; he had traversed Persia,
Arabia, where the horses are
nobler and more beautiful than any other living
creatures; he had pen-
etrated into the very heart of India, where the
race of men grow like stately
trees; he had reached the boundaries of China and
Thibet, where the liv-
ing god, called the Grand Llama, dwells on earth
in the guise of a silent
man with narrow eyes. Marvellous were his tales.
Both Fabio and Valeria
listened to him as if enchanted. Muzzio’s features
had really changed very
little; his face, swarthy from childhood, had
grown darker still, burnt un-
der the rays of a hotter sun, his eyes seemed more
deep-set than before—
and that was all; but the expression of his face had
become different: con-
centrated and dignified, it never showed more life
when he recalled the
dangers he had encountered by night in forests
that resounded with the
roar of tigers or by day on solitary ways where
savage fanatics lay in wait
for travellers, to slay them in honour of their
iron goddess who demands
human sacrifices. And Muzzio’s voice had grown
deeper and more even;
his hands, his whole body had lost the freedom of
gesture peculiar to the
Italian race. With the aid of his servant, the
obsequiously alert Malay, he
showed his hosts a few of the feats he had learnt
from the Indian Brah-
mins. Thus for instance, having first hidden
himself behind a curtain, he
suddenly appeared sitting in the air cross-legged,
the tips of his fingers
pressed lightly on a bamboo cane placed
vertically, which astounded Fabio
not a little and positively alarmed Valeria....
‘Isn’t he a sorcerer?’ was her
thought. When he proceeded, piping on a little
flute, to call some tame
snakes out of a covered basket, where their dark
flat heads with quivering
tongues appeared under a parti-coloured cloth,
Valeria was terrified and
begged Muzzio to put away these loathsome horrors
as soon as possible.
At supper Muzzio regaled his friends with wine of
Shiraz from a round
long-necked flagon; it was of extraordinary
fragrance and thickness, of a
golden colour with a shade of green in it, and it
shone with a strange
brightness as it was poured into the tiny jasper
goblets.
unlike European wines: it was very sweet and
spicy, and, drunk slowly in
small draughts, produced a sensation of pleasant
drowsiness in all the
limbs. Muzzio made both Fabio and Valeria drink a
goblet of it, and he
drank one himself. Bending over her goblet he
murmured something,
moving his fingers as he did so. Valeria noticed
this; but as in all Muzzio’s
doings, in his whole behaviour, there was
something strange and out of
the common, she only thought; ‘Can he have adopted
some new faith in
India, or is that the custom there?’ Then after a
short silence she asked
him: ‘Had he persevered with music during his
travels?’ Muzzio, in reply,
bade the Malay bring his Indian violin.
instead of four strings it had only three, the
upper part of it was covered
with a bluish snake-skin, and the slender bow of
reed was in the form of a
half-moon, and on its extreme end glittered a
pointed diamond.
Muzzio played first some mournful airs, national
songs as he told them,
strange and even barbarous to an Italian ear; the
sound of the metallic
strings was plaintive and feeble. But when Muzzio
began the last song, it
suddenly gained force and rang out tunefully and
powerfully; the passion-
ate melody flowed out under the wide sweeps of the
bow, flowed out,
exquisitely twisting and coiling like the snake
that covered the violin-top;
and such fire, such triumphant bliss glowed and
burned in this melody
that Fabio and Valeria felt wrung to the heart and
tears came into their
eyes; ... while Muzzio, his head bent, and pressed
close to the violin, his
cheeks pale, his eyebrows drawn together into a
single straight line, seemed
still more concentrated and solemn; and the
diamond at the end of the
bow flashed sparks of light as though it too were
kindled by the fire of the
divine song. When Muzzio had finished, and still
keeping fast the violin
between his chin and his shoulder, dropped the
hand that held the bow,
‘What is that? What is that you have been playing
to us?’ cried Fabio.
Valeria uttered not a word—but her whole being
seemed echoing her
husband’s question. Muzzio laid the violin on the
table—and slightly toss-
ing back his hair, he said with a polite smile:
‘That—that melody ... that
song I heard once in the island of Ceylon. That
song is known there among
the people as the song of happy, triumphant love.’
‘Play it again,’ Fabio
was murmuring. ‘No; it can’t be played again,’
answered Muzzio. ‘Besides,
it is now too late. Signora Valeria ought to be at
rest; and it’s time for me
too ... I am weary.’ During the whole day Muzzio
had treated Valeria with
respectful simplicity, as a friend of former days,
but as he went out he
clasped her hand very tightly, squeezing his
fingers on her palm, and look-
ing so intently into her face that though she did
not raise her eyelids, she
yet felt the look on her suddenly flaming cheeks.
She said nothing to
Muzzio, but jerked away her hand, and when he was
gone, she gazed at
the door through which he had passed out. She
remembered how she had
been a little afraid of him even in old days ...
and now she was overcome
by perplexity. Muzzio went off to his pavilion:
the husband and wife went
to their bedroom.
IV
Valeria did not quickly fall asleep; there was a
faint and languid fever in
her blood and a slight ringing in her ears ...
from that strange wine, as she
supposed, and perhaps too from Muzzio’s stories,
from his playing on the
violin ... towards morning she did at last fall
asleep, and she had an ex-
traordinary dream. She dreamt that she was going
into a large room with a low
ceiling....
Such a room she had never seen in her life. All
the walls were covered with
tiny blue tiles with gold lines on them; slender
carved pillars of alabaster
supported the marble ceiling; the ceiling itself
and the pillars seemed half
transparent ... a pale rosy light penetrated from
all sides into the room,
throwing a mysterious and uniform light on all the
objects in it; brocaded
cushions lay on a narrow rug in the very middle of
the floor, which was
smooth as a mirror. In the corners almost unseen
were smoking lofty cen-
sers, of the shape of monstrous beasts; there was
no window anywhere; a
door hung with a velvet curtain stood dark and
silent in a recess in the
wall. And suddenly this curtain slowly glided,
moved aside ... and in
came Muzzio. He bowed, opened his arms,
laughed.... His fierce arms
enfolded Valeria’s waist; his parched lips burned
her all over.... She fell
backwards on the cushions.
* * *
Moaning with horror, after long struggles, Valeria
awaked. Still not realising
where she was and what was happening to her, she
raised herself on her
bed, looked round.... A tremor ran over her whole
body ... Fabio was
lying beside her. He was asleep; but his face in
the light of the brilliant full
moon looking in at the window was pale as a
corpse’s ... it was sadder
than a dead face. Valeria waked her husband, and
directly he looked at
her. ‘What is the matter?’ he cried. ‘I had—I had
a fearful dream,’ she
whispered, still shuddering all over. But at that
instant from the direction of
the pavilion came floating powerful sounds, and
both Fabio and Valeria
recognised the melody Muzzio
had played to them, calling it the song of
blissful triumphant love. Fabio
looked in perplexity at Valeria ... she closed her
eyes, turned away, and
both holding their breath, heard the song out to
the end. As the last note
died away, the moon passed behind a cloud, it was
suddenly dark in the
room.... Both the young people let their heads
sink on their pillows with-
out exchanging a word, and neither of them noticed
when the other fell
asleep.
V
The next morning Muzzio came in to breakfast; he
seemed happy and
greeted Valeria cheerfully. She answered him in
confusion—stole a glance
at him—and felt frightened at the sight of that
serene happy face, those
piercing and inquisitive eyes. Muzzio was
beginning again to tell some
story ... but Fabio interrupted him at the first
word.
‘You could not sleep, I see, in your new quarters.
My wife and I heard
you playing last night’s song.’
‘Yes! Did you hear it?’ said Muzzio. ‘I played it
indeed; but I had been
asleep before that, and I had a wonderful dream
too.’
Valeria was on the alert. ‘What sort of dream?’
asked Fabio.
‘I dreamed,’ answered Muzzio, not taking his eyes
off Valeria, ‘I was
entering a spacious apartment with a ceiling
decorated in Oriental fash-
ion, carved columns supported the roof, the walls
were covered with tiles,
and though there were neither windows nor lights,
the whole room was
filled with a rosy light, just as though it were
all built of transparent stone.
In the corners, Chinese censers were smoking, on
the floor lay brocaded
cushions along a narrow rug. I went in through a
door covered with a
curtain, and at another door just opposite
appeared a woman whom I
once loved. And so beautiful she seemed to me,
that I was all aflame with
my old love....’
Muzzio broke off significantly. Valeria sat
motionless, and only gradu-
ally she turned white ... and she drew her breath
more slowly.
‘Then,’ continued Muzzio, ‘I waked up and played
that song.’
‘But who was that woman?’ said Fabio.
‘Who was she? The wife of an Indian—I met her in
the town of Delhi....
She is not alive now—she died.’
‘And her husband?’ asked Fabio, not knowing why he
asked the ques-
tion. ‘Her husband, too, they say is dead. I soon
lost sight of them both.’
‘Strange!’ observed Fabio. ‘My wife too had an
extraordinary dream last
night’—Muzzio gazed intently at Valeria—’which she
did not tell me,’
added Fabio.
But at this point Valeria got up and went out of
the room. Immediately
after breakfast, Muzzio too went away, explaining that he had to be
in
Ferrara on business, and that he would not be back
before the evening.
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