Francis Lathom

Francis Lathom. Astonishment!!! A Romance of a Century Ago

London:  T. N. Longman and O. Rees, 1802.

 

Synopsis of Astonishment!!!

The Marchese di Bartelma and his new wife Julia want to have children, but are unable to. One day, while in church, the Marchese is given a letter by a mysterious old woman, asking him to take care of a baby whose parents cannot care for it. On returning home, the Marchese finds the child, a two year old boy, left in the pavilion on his property. He brings it home and the Marchese and Marchesa name it Claudio and raise it as their own son. All they know of Claudio's true identity is through a letter left with him in the pavilion, instructing both them and Claudio to never attempt to discover his true identity and never reveal to anyone that he is not the Marchese di Bartelma's son, because it would put his life at risk. Also left with Claudio is a bracelet, which the letter states he must wear at all times, but should be keep hidden under his sleeve.

Years pass, and Claudio grows up. Despite his anguish both at learning at the age of ten that he is not truly the Marchese's son and the death of the Marchesa when he is twelve, Claudio has a happy and quiet youth. Claudio eventually grows up to be the ideal young nobleman. He is attractive, intelligent, virtuous, honorable, and excels at all courtly and noble activities. On Claudio's fifteenth birthday, the Marchese throws him a large party. During the feast, a group of pilgrims stop at the Villa di Bartelma to ask for food and shelter for the night. Being benevolent, the Marchese invites the pilgrims to join in the celebration and places them at the head table with himself and Claudio. The pilgrim seated next to Claudio is very kind and asks him many questions about his life. In particular, the pilgrim wants to know if Claudio is happy with his life. Claudio responds that he is quite happy, a fact which pleases the pilgrim very much. The pilgrim makes quite an impression on Claudio, and Claudio wonders if the pilgrim is perhaps his real father.

When he is eighteen years old, the Marchese sends Claudio to study at the university in Rome. On the way there, they meet Count Montano di Ponta, the Marchese's best friend from his own years at the university. The Count is taking his son, Lodovico, to the university in Rome for the first time as well.

Now, the back-story of the count is told. Originally, Montano's cousin Angelo was the wealthy Count di Ponta, and Montano was merely an untitled relative. However, Angelo caught his beautiful wife Horatia cheating on him with Montano. In a fit of anger, Angelo killed his wife, and then committed suicide in his grief. This is how Montano became the Count di Ponta and obtained all of his lands and fortune.

At the university, Claudio and Lodovico become the very of best friends. They spend all of their free time together, going to parties, drinking, visiting ladies in town, and dancing. One evening, while walking home from a party, Lodovico notices a Benedictine monk that keeps watching them and following them. They see him following them on several more occasions and wonder who he is. Claudio suggests that he may be a spy from the university, sent to find out what bad deeds the students commit in their free time, so that they must do penance for them later. Secretly though, Claudio believes that this monk might have something to do with his own life or identity.

The night before Claudio and Lodovico leave to spend their vacation with the Marchese di Bartelma near the city of Florence, Claudio finally meets the Benedictine monk. He claims that he has a secret to share with Claudio and that he must meet him the next night at midnight. Claudio refuses, because he is about to leave Rome for vacation. The Benedictine monk is disappointed, but leaves Claudio alone. In the morning, Claudio and Lodovico leave for the Villa di Bartelma. There, they have a wonderful time and Claudio forgets all about the monk.

Upon his return to Rome though, Claudio thinks of the monk again and decides that he wants to meet him. He takes many walks throughout the city alone in hopes of meeting him and finally does late one night. The monk has Claudio meet him again the following night at midnight by an ancient ruin. There, the monk leads Claudio through a long series of secret, underground passageways. They pass through a huge cathedral which is lined entirely by human skulls. Through the whole length of the secret passage, Claudio hears the screams of people in agony. At the end of the passageway, the monk leads Claudio to a beautifully decorated room that is the very picture of luxury, ease, and wealth. There, he meets a woman called Viola, who is very beautiful. She claims to be both a prisoner of this place, but also its supreme mistress and wants Claudio to visit her from time to time to keep her company. He agrees, and returns a few days later, where Viola introduces him to her young friend Zelia. Although captivated by Viola's beauty and charms, Claudio instantly falls in love with Zelia. Claudio returns again almost a week later and Viola begins to tell him the sad story of her life. She tells Claudio about her passion for a young man named Rinaldo, who was killed before they could be married, and of the bastard child she had by Rinaldo. Then, overcome with emotion, Viola breaks off her tale and decides to seduce Claudio instead. In doing so, she discovers the bracelet Claudio always wears, shrieks, and sends him away, saying she never wants to see him again. This leads Claudio to speculate that Viola may be his mother. The Benedictine monk tells Claudio that Viola is under the protection of the Inquisition and that he is therefore ordered to keep everything that has happened to him a secret. Since Claudio can never see Viola again, he decides to forget about the whole thing and move on.

During their next vacation, Claudio and Lodovico decide to go visit Lodovico's father, Count Montano, at the Pallazo di Ponta. They have a wonderful time there and Claudio nearly does forget about the Benedictine monk, Viola, and Zelia. Halfway through their vacation, Montano, Lodovico, and Claudio go Mantua to pick up the Count's daughter Valeria from the convent of the Holy Virgin, where she had been receiving her education for the past four years. Claudio is quite taken with Valeria, but while in Mantua, he sees the Benedictine monk and Zelia, both disguised as pilgrims. He soon receives a letter, telling him to cherish the love he felt for Zelia, because she is prepared to become his wife. Claudio is confused and muses over this a great deal. Also while in Mantua, they meet Signor Roderigo di Viratti, an older gentleman who travels in search of Livia, the young woman he is engaged to, but who ran away several years earlier because she did not wish to marry him. Signor Roderigo tells Claudio and Lodovico his sad story, and they have a good laugh over it in private.

Claudio and Lodovico soon return to Rome and finish their studies. During this time, Claudio feels torn between his best friend's sister Valeria and the mysterious Zelia whom he has only met once, but has offered to marry him. When they are done with their studies at the university, Claudio and Lodovico decide to travel across Italy, France, and Germany together.

While crossing the Alps, they meet the mysterious pilgrim whom Claudio first met at his fifteenth birthday party and who paid so much attention to him. The pilgrim again asks Claudio if he is happy and Claudio responds that he is. The pilgrim is pleased and then enjoins Claudio to not seek him out in the future and, if they should ever meet again by chance, he must pretend not know him. Claudio agrees to this and the pilgrim disappears. During this time, Lodovico meets and falls in love with Nina de Saint Pierre, a peasant's daughter, whom many people believe is actually a nobleman's daughter who was simply raised by this peasant.

Claudio and Lodovico continue their travels and enjoy themselves greatly. By the time they reach Paris, Claudio has decided that he is in love with Valeria and wants to marry her. He plans on telling this to Lodovico, but the night before his planned revelation, Claudio sees flaming words appear on the wall of his bedroom in the hotel, telling him that he cannot marry Valeria and that he is destined to marry a girl he will see in a vision. Unable to discern the meaning of this mysterious message, Claudio decides to delay the revelation of his love for Valeria to Lodovico.

Soon after, Claudio and Lodovico again meet the mysterious pilgrim, this time at a party in Paris. Here, the pilgrim is dressed as a wealthy gentleman and calls himself the Chevalier de Gramont. According to the wishes of the pilgrim, Claudio pretends not to know him. At the party, when the Chevalier de Gramont hears Lodovico's name, he reacts wildly and quickly leaves. The next day, while relaxing alone in a garden, Claudio hears a voice tell him to "Beware of di Ponta!" Claudio chases the voice and sees a white figure. But on approaching it, he finds only a white cloak hanging on a branch. Later that night, Claudio dreams of Zelia and believes that this is the promised vision of his destined wife.

On their return to Italy, Claudio and Lodovico stop at the Pallazo di Ponta to visit Count Montano and Valeria. Claudio decides that he does, in fact, still want to marry Valeria, and decides to ask the Marchese's opinion on all the strange occurrences that have happened to him in the past few years, in Rome, Mantua, and abroad, once he gets home. Before leaving, Count Montano, Lodovico, and Valeria decide to go with Claudio to the Villa di Bartelma to visit the Marchese.

On arriving at the Villa di Bartelma, however, they learn that the Marchese is dying. It is the Marchese's dying wish that Claudio and Valeria should marry, a proposal to which all concerned parties readily agree. After the death of the Marchese, Count Montano and Valeria return to the Pallazo di Ponta to allow Claudio plenty of time to grieve before the wedding. Lodovico stays with his friend Claudio to console him.

After a few months, Claudio begins to recover from the loss of his foster-father and look forward to his approaching marriage to Valeria. However, one day, while sitting alone on the bank beside the river, Claudio is abducted by a gondola full of masked men. They blindfold him and take him into Florence, where he is forcibly married to Zelia by the Benedictine monk. After that, he is returned to his Villa, where Lodovico is anxiously searching for Claudio.

While Claudio was being kidnapped and forced to marry Zelia, Lodovico was accosted by a strange man on the road between Florence and the Villa di Bartelma. The man asked Lodovico his name, and then forced him to promise, at knifepoint, to always be the loyal and true friend of Claudio. Lodovico tells Claudio all of this upon his return. At a complete loss as to what he ought to do, Claudio tells Lodovico all about Viola, the Benedictine monk, Zelia, the mysterious pilgrim, his strange abduction, and forced marriage. The next day, Lodovico takes Claudio to the spot where he was accosted the previous night. There, Claudio finds a bracelet exactly like the one he always wears. Believing that Lodovico's attacker was his real father, Claudio is overcome with emotion and reveals to Lodovico that he is not actually the son of the Marchese di Bartelma and tells him his entire life story. They agree to send a letter to Count Montano, asking him to come to the Villa di Bartelma alone, so they can have his opinion on all of these strange occurrences.

Time passes, and, just before the expected arrival of Count Montano, Lodovico discovers, to his great joy, that Nina de Saint Pierre is in Florence with her father. It appears that her father is planning to prostitute Nina out, because every day he takes her on long walks around the city, showing her off, always expecting a gentleman to meet with them. Overjoyed, Lodovico goes to Florence to get Nina. He brings her back to the Villa di Bartelma and tries to seduce her. Claudio defends Nina and ends up stabbing his drunken friend, just as Count Montano arrives in one gondola and Nina de Saint Pierre's father and the mysterious pilgrim arrive in another. The pilgrim and her father take Nina away and Nina embraces the pilgrim and calls him Father. Count Montano and the pilgrim recognize each other and react wildly. Afraid that he has killed Lodovico and will suffer the wrath of Count Montano, Claudio flees and goes into hiding.

Soon after, Claudio hears that Montano has imprisoned the pilgrim and plans to have him executed as a murderer. Thinking that the pilgrim was mistakenly accused of killing Lodovico, a crime that Claudio believes he committed, Claudio goes to the jail to set the record straight. There, he meets the pilgrim and learns that he is actually the supposed-dead Angelo, the cousin of Count Montano. Angelo reveals that, after killing his wife Horatia for betraying him and committing adultery with Montano, Montano allowed him to escape alive so long as he got all of Angelo's property. They faked his death and Angelo escaped on the condition that he never show his face in Italy again. Having again appeared openly in Italy, Montano had Angelo arrested and he is now going to be executed for the murder of his wife Horatia. Angelo now reveals that he is actually Claudio's father and that Nina, whom Lodovico tried to seduce, is really Claudio's sister. Having grown tired of wandering alone, Angelo decided to meet up with his daughter and then retire into the countryside with her and her foster-father. He sent instructions to Nina's foster-father to have them meet in Florence before making their way back into the safety of the Alps. It was while they were waiting for Angelo in Florence that Lodovico tried to seduce Nina. Angelo also reveals that it was he, in Paris, that warned Claudio to "Beware of di Ponta", for, if Count Montano knew who Claudio really was, he would have had him killed. It was also he that threatened Lodovico on the road the previous night and made him promise to be a true and loyal friend to Claudio.

Claudio then gets a message that Lodovico is indeed alive and wants to speak to Claudio. He warily returns to the Villa di Bartelma. There, unaware of the revelations that Claudio has received, Lodovico tells Claudio that he now wishes to marry Nina, even though he still believes her to be a peasant, in an attempt to make up for having tried to seduce her. Count Montano threatens to disown Lodovico if he does marry Nina, whom he knows is actually Angelo's daughter. Lodovico asks Claudio to carry his wishes to Nina and make a case for him, as well as to help convince Count Montano to allow Lodovico to marry Nina. Count Montano, in turn, asks Claudio to convince his friend to give up the idea of marrying Nina. During this time, Claudio also receives a letter from the Benedictine monk and is instructed to open it only upon the death of Count Montano. The next day, Claudio goes to see Lodovico again and discovers that, during the night, Nina's foster-father visited Lodovico and told him everything. Lodovico now takes Claudio's side against his father and reiterates his desire to marry Nina.

Meanwhile, Angelo sees a vision of his dead wife, Horatia, telling him that she was innocent of adultery and that Montano was a villain and had orchestrated the entire thing. Excited, Angelo summons Montano to confront him with this information. When Montano arrives at the prison where Angelo is being held, he denies Angelo's accusations. Then, Horatia, who is apparently not a ghost, but a real person, appears again and stabs Montano, who stabs her as well. They both die just as Claudio arrives and recognizes his mother Horatia as the beautiful woman Viola who tried to seduce him.

Now the letter the Benedictine monk sent to Claudio is opened and everything is revealed. Horatia (called Viola) gave birth to the bastard daughter of her lover Rinaldo, and named the child Valeria. Afraid of the disgrace of being an unwed mother, she gave the child to her best friend, Aurelia, who was the wife of Montano, to raise as her own because thus far they were unable to have children. Aurelia pretended to be pregnant and deceived Montano into thinking that Valeria was their own child. A year later, Aurelia gave birth to Lodovico and died immediately after. During this time, Angelo married Horatia, not knowing that she already had a bastard daughter. They had two children, Claudio and Fulvia, who was now called Nina.

Montano, desiring Angelo's property and title, decided to attempt to seduce Horatia at a time when he knew Angelo would walk in. Horatia rejected Montano's advances, but Angelo came into the room at an inopportune moment and thought that Horatia was cheating on him with Montano. In a rage, he stabbed Horatia, who fainted. Montano then convinced Angelo that he had actually killed Horatia, and Angelo and his children went into hiding after faking his death. Now the master of his cousin's property, Montano just had to get rid of Horatia, who was merely wounded by Angelo's sword. Montano had his personal priest, Father Julio, who turned out to the Benedictine monk, make a poison to kill Horatia. However, Julio desired Horatia, so he told her that Angelo was dead and that Montano wanted to kill her. Julio then offered to take Horatia away to protect her, if only she would become his lover. Having little other option, Horatia agreed, and Julio faked her death. They then escaped to Rome, where they lived happily together for several years. During this time, Julio also had an affair with another woman, the result of which was a daughter, Livia. Livia was betrothed against her will to the much older Signor Roderigo di Viratti, whom Claudio and Lodovico had previously met. Julio eventually ran out of money, so, to support herself and Julio, Horatia became the mistress of the head of the Inquisition. Bored with both the head of the Inquisition and Julio, Horatia eventually had Julio procure handsome young men for her to seduce, one of which was Claudio. To protect his daughter from a marriage she did not want, Julio asked Horatia to take care of Livia. They changed Livia's name to Zelia to hide her, and it was she to whom Claudio was secretly married.

All of the mysterious occurrences, such as the visions and flaming writing urging Claudio to marry Zelia were the doings of Julio, because he wanted his own daughter to marry a nobleman, and because he wanted to discourage Claudio from marrying Valeria, who it turns out is his own half-sister.

In the end, Angelo is cleared of the crime of murder and gets his titles and property back. Lodovico and Fulvia (called Nina) get married and move in to the Pallazo di Ponta with Angelo. Claudio and Livia (called Zelia) remain married and live in the Villa di Bartelma. Valeria returns to the convent and becomes a nun. Julio takes new vows of purity and celibacy and enters a monastery, far away from the concerns of the world. Everyone lives happily ever after.

-- Prepared by Elisabeth Chretien, University of Nebraska, April 2006.
© Elisabeth Chretien, 2006.