CHAPTER I.--THE BRIDE 1 CHAPTER II.--THE BRIDEGROOM 14 CHAPTER III.--REGINA APOSTOLORUM 25 CHAPTER IV.--THE HEIR 33 CHAPTER V.--FLORENCE 46 CHAPTER VI.--ALFIERI 57 CHAPTER VII.--THE CAVALIERE SERVENTE 72 CHAPTER VIII.--THE ESCAPE 80 CHAPTER IX.--ROME 91 CHAPTER X--ANTIGONE 102 CHAPTER XI.--SEPARATION 120 CHAPTER XII.--COLMAR 134 CHAPTER XIII.--RUE DE BOURGOYNE 142 CHAPTER XIV.--BEFORE THE STORM 155 CHAPTER XV.--ENGLAND 166 CHAPTER XVI.--THE MISOGALLO 176 CHAPTER XVII.--CASA GIANFIGLIAZZI 190 CHAPTER XVIII.--FABRE 199 CHAPTER XIX.--THE SALON OF THE COUNTESS 207 CHAPTER XX.--SANTA CROCE 220 ILLUSTRATIONS ALFIERI AND THE COUNTESS OF ALBANY _From the original portrait in the possession of the Marchesa A. Alfieri de Sostegno_ CHARLES EDWARD STUART _From a pastel, painter unknown, once in the possession of the heir of the Countess of Albany's heir Fabre. Now in the possession of Mrs. Horace Walpole, of Heckfield Place, Winchfield, Hants_ LOUISE, COUNTESS OF ALBANY _From a pastel once in the possession of the heirs of Fabre, now in the possession of Mrs. Horace Walpole, of Heckfield Place, Winchfield, Hants._ THE COUNTESS OF ALBANY. CHAPTER I. THE BRIDE. On the Wednesday or Thursday of Holy Week of the year 1772 the inhabitants of the squalid and dilapidated little mountain towns between Ancona and Loreto were thrown into great excitement by the passage of a travelling equipage, doubtless followed by two or three dependent chaises, of more than usual magnificence. The people of those parts have little to do now-a-days, and must have had still less during the Pontificate of His Holiness Pope Clement XIV.; and we can imagine how all the windows of the unplastered houses, all the black and oozy doorways, must have been lined with heads of women and children; how the principal square of each town, where the horses were changed, must have been crowded with inquisitive townsfolk and peasants, whispering, as they hung about the carriages, that the great traveller was the young Queen of England going to meet her bridegroom; a thing to be remembered in such world-forgotten places as these, and which must have furnished the subject of conversation for months and years, till that Queen of England and her bridegroom had become part and parcel of the tales of the "Three Golden Oranges," of the "King of Portugal's Cowherd," of the "Wonderful Little Blue Bird," and such-like stories in the minds of the children of those Apennine cities. The Queen of England going to meet her bridegroom at the Holy House of Loreto. The notion, even to us, does savour strangely of the fairy tale.