Melema, Tito

A handsome young Greek scholar; a bright, gentle, likeable and entirely selfish egoist, who, by always taking the easy course, ends by being a traitor to everyone to whom he should have been loyal. "And he had been docile, pliable, quick of apprehension, ready to acquire; a very bright lovely boy, a youth of even splendid grace, who seemed quite without vices, as if that beautiful form represented a vitality so exquisitely poised and balanced that it could know no uneasy desires, no unrest--a radiant presence for a lonely man to have won for himself. If he were silent when his father expected some response, still he did not look moody; if he declined some labour--why he flung himself down with such a charming, half-smiling, halfpleading air, that the pleasure of looking at him made amends . . . the curves of Tito's mouth had ineffable good humour in them. And then, the quick talent to which everything came readily, from philosophical systems to the rhymes of a street ballad caught up at a hearing!" "[He] made almost every one fond of him, for he was young, and clever, and beautiful, and his manners to all were gentle and kind. I believe, when I first knew him, he never thought of anything cruel or base. But because he tried to slip away from everything that was unpleasant, and cared for nothing else so much as his own safety, he came at last to commit some of the basest deeds-such as make men infamous. He denied his father, and left him to misery; he betrayed every trust that was reposed in him, that he might keep himself safe and get rich and prosperous." He owes everything to his foster-father, Baldassarre CaJvo, who had brought him up as his own son. On a trip to Delos their boat was attacked by pirat.es and Baldassarre was captured, while Tito, who was carrying all their fortune in gems, escaped by swimming. In Florence, to which he makes his way after this misfortune, his brightness and charm
at once win him friends-Tessa, the contadina, shares her breakfast with him, and Nello, the barber, takes him under his protection and introduces him to the blind scholar, Bardo de' Bardi, through whose aid he succeeds in selling his gems and obtaining a post as professor of Greek. He acts as secretary to Bardo, winning both the confidence of the old scholar and the love of Bardo's beautiful daughter, Romola. Tito has allowed himself to keep up an acquaintance with Tessa, and eventually as a jest goes through a mock marriage with her. After selling his gems for a large sum he had made no attempt to use the money to find his father, persuading himself, instead, that the old man must be dead, and he even rejects a direct appeal for aid which the monk, Fra Luca, brings him from his father. His marriage to Romola is at first happy, but many things, especially his bad faith in selling her father's library, soon make her see that he is faithless and conscienceless, and they drift apart. When Baldassarre Calvo, as an escaped prisoner, comes upon Tito in Florence, Tito denies him and later even carries his treachery so far as to have Baldassarre imprisoned for two years. His tact and versatility have made him useful t.o many people, and he serves all three political parties at the same time, without any real loyalty to any, considering nothing but his own interest, working against Savonarola while pretending to be of his party, and even consenting to the death of Romola's godfather. He over-reaches himself, however, by arousing the resentment of Dolfo Spini whom he serves for his own ends, is attacked by Spini's followers, the Compagnacci, and, just as he succeeds in escaping from them, is found and killed by his deserted old father, the most sinned against of the many whom his selfishness has injured.

<em>Romola</em>

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