Lucia - Andrea Di Robilant [146]
Alvisetto did not improve the general atmosphere when he graduated rather ingloriously from the seminary at the end of the summer. “He could easily have distinguished himself more,” Lucia snapped, clearly irritated by her son’s lack of diligence. What was she going to do with him now? “God willing he will keep away from poisonous occasions,” she wrote to Vérand, “[as you know] his youthful fervour is so much greater than his strength of character.”22 After briefly considering the possibility that Alvisetto join her in running the Agency, Lucia returned to the original plan of sending him to university. She was encouraged in this choice by Mattia Soranzo Mocenigo, a distant cousin with a reputation for wisdom whom Alvise had named “consultant” to his wife in his will. Alvise’s old project of sending Alvisetto to a prestigious university in Germany was quickly discarded. Lucia wanted him to be close at hand so that he could visit her often and gain familiarity with Alvisopoli and the other estates. It was decided he would study law at the university of Padua. “Alvisetto too seems comfortable with the idea,”23 she observed.
Vérand felt this was the right moment to make a long-delayed journey to France to attend to pressing family business of his own. After all, Alvisetto was eighteen years old and out of school; he could easily do without his supervision for a few months. But Vérand underestimated the degree to which Lucia, so completely absorbed by work, had come to rely on him with regard to Alvisetto. She nipped Vérand’s plan in the bud:
You well understand how important your continued assistance to my son is at an age in which proper counselling is especially needed. The supervision on the part of an honest and wise educator is necessary to keep him away from all those dangers and enticements that lurk in the path of a young man…To abandon him at this early stage would be tantamount to losing at once all the gains obtained by your good governance.24
Lucia was under tremendous pressure. The summer’s poor harvest at Alvisopoli meant more resources would have to be transferred from the other Mocenigo estates to avoid sinking further into debt. She received an even harder blow in February, when the government rejected Alvise’s petition to have the fiscal burden on Alvisopoli reduced. Lucia spent the rest of the winter with lawyers and family advisers trying to reverse the decision. “I find myself absolutely unable to submit myself to such an excessive burden,” she declared in her final statement to the authorities, adding that if the order were not repealed she would be “forced to give up the estate.”25
Alvisopoli was not her only worry. The situation in Venice continued to deteriorate. The combination of trade barriers and the rise of Trieste as Vienna’s favoured port in the Adriatic had crippled the local economy. During his visit to the city, Archduke Rainier had written back to Vienna that he was stunned to find such poverty and squalor. Shops were still closed. Housing and health conditions were appalling. The active population was declining quickly. The streets were filled with beggars, rubbish and debris from crumbling buildings. Four years had gone by since the end of the siege. The Austrians had been running the city ever since, yet they had done little to lift Venice out of its dismal situation.
Lucia, who relied on her income from family properties in the city to run Palazzo Mocenigo, could no longer afford the maintenance costs and living expenses. The sprawling palazzo was falling into disrepair. She had already closed off entire floors because she could not afford to heat them in the winter, giving up room after room in her losing struggle with rats. She would soon have to start dismissing the staff; she might even have to abandon Palazzo Mocenigo, as so many families had already done with their palaces. But this depressing state of affairs was shaken up by an unexpected business opportunity.
Lucia had met Lord Byron a few times at the