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+The Project Gutenberg EBook of Rienzi, by Edward Bulwer Lytton
+
+This eBook is for the use of anyone anywhere at no cost and with
+almost no restrictions whatsoever.  You may copy it, give it away or
+re-use it under the terms of the Project Gutenberg License included
+with this eBook or online at www.gutenberg.org
+
+
+Title: Rienzi
+
+Author: Edward Bulwer Lytton
+
+Release Date: February 15, 2006 [EBook #1396]
+Last Updated: August 29, 2016
+
+Language: English
+
+Character set encoding: UTF-8
+
+*** START OF THIS PROJECT GUTENBERG EBOOK RIENZI ***
+
+
+
+
+Produced by Sue Asscher and David Widger
+
+
+
+
+
+RIENZI,
+
+The Last of the Roman Tribunes
+
+
+by
+
+Sir Edward Bulwer Lytton, Bart.
+
+     Then turn we to her latest Tribune’s name,
+     From her ten thousand tyrants turn to thee,
+     Redeemer of dark centuries of shame--
+     The friend of Petrarch--hope of Italy--
+     Rienzi, last of Romans!  While the tree
+     Of Freedom’s wither’d trunk puts forth a leaf,
+     Even for thy tomb a garland let it be--
+     The Forum’s champion, and the People’s chief--
+     Her new-born Numa thou!
+
+     Childe Harold, cant. iv. stanza 114.
+
+
+     Amidst the indulgence of enthusiasm and eloquence, Petrarch,
+     Italy, and Europe, were astonished by a revolution, which
+     realized for a moment his most splendid visions.--Gibbon,
+     chap. 1xx.
+
+
+Dedication of Rienzi.
+
+To Alessandro Manzoni, as to the Genius of the Place,
+
+Are Dedicated These Fruits, gathered on The Soil of Italian Fiction.
+
+London, Dec. 1, 1835.
+
+
+
+Dedication,
+
+Prefixed to the First Collected Edition of the Author’s Works in 1840.
+
+My Dear Mother,
+
+In inscribing with your beloved and honoured name this Collection of my
+Works, I could wish that the fruits of my manhood were worthier of the
+tender and anxious pains bestowed upon my education in youth.
+
+Left yet young, and with no ordinary accomplishments and gifts, the sole
+guardian of your sons, to them you devoted the best years of your useful
+and spotless life; and any success it be their fate to attain in the
+paths they have severally chosen, would have its principal sweetness
+in the thought that such success was the reward of one whose hand aided
+every struggle, and whose heart sympathized in every care.
+
+From your graceful and accomplished taste, I early learned that
+affection for literature which has exercised so large an influence
+over the pursuits of my life; and you who were my first guide, were my
+earliest critic. Do you remember the summer days, which seemed to me
+so short, when you repeated to me those old ballads with which Percy
+revived the decaying spirit of our national muse, or the smooth couplets
+of Pope, or those gentle and polished verses with the composition of
+which you had beguiled your own earlier leisure? It was those easy
+lessons, far more than the harsher rudiments learned subsequently
+in schools, that taught me to admire and to imitate; and in them I
+recognise the germ of the flowers, however perishable they be, that I
+now bind up and lay upon a shrine hallowed by a thousand memories of
+unspeakable affection. Happy, while I borrowed from your taste, could I
+have found it not more difficult to imitate your virtues--your spirit of
+active and extended benevolence, your cheerful piety, your considerate
+justice, your kindly charity--and all the qualities that brighten a
+nature more free from the thought of self, than any it has been my lot
+to meet with. Never more than at this moment did I wish that my writings
+were possessed of a merit which might outlive my time, so that at least
+these lines might remain a record of the excellence of the Mother, and
+the gratitude of the Son.
+
+E.L.B. London: January 6, 1840.
+
+
+
+Preface
+
+to
+
+The First Edition of Rienzi.
+
+I began this tale two years ago at Rome. On removing to Naples, I
+threw it aside for “The Last Days of Pompeii,” which required more
+than “Rienzi” the advantage of residence within reach of the scenes
+described. The fate of the Roman Tribune continued, however, to haunt
+and impress me, and, some time after “Pompeii” was published, I renewed
+my earlier undertaking. I regarded the completion of these volumes,
+indeed, as a kind of duty;--for having had occasion to read the original
+authorities from which modern historians have drawn their accounts of
+the life of Rienzi, I was led to believe that a very remarkable man had
+been superficially judged, and a very important period crudely examined.
+(See Appendix, Nos. I and II.) And this belief was sufficiently strong
+to induce me at first to meditate a more serious work upon the life and
+times of Rienzi. (I have adopted the termination of Rienzi instead of
+Rienzo, as being more familiar to the general reader.--But the latter
+is perhaps the more accurate reading, since the name was a popular
+corruption from Lorenzo.) Various reasons concurred against this
+project--and I renounced the biography to commence the fiction. I have
+still, however, adhered, with a greater fidelity than is customary
+in Romance, to all the leading events of the public life of the Roman
+Tribune; and the Reader will perhaps find in these pages a more full
+and detailed account of the rise and fall of Rienzi, than in any English
+work of which I am aware. I have, it is true, taken a view of his
+character different in some respects from that of Gibbon or Sismondi.
+But it is a view, in all its main features, which I believe (and think I
+could prove) myself to be warranted in taking, not less by the facts of
+History than the laws of Fiction. In the meanwhile, as I have given the
+facts from which I have drawn my interpretation of the principal agent,
+the reader has sufficient data for his own judgment. In the picture of
+the Roman Populace, as in that of the Roman Nobles of the fourteenth
+century, I follow literally the descriptions left to us;--they are not
+flattering, but they are faithful, likenesses.
+
+Preserving generally the real chronology of Rienzi’s life, the plot of
+this work extends over a space of some years, and embraces the variety
+of characters necessary to a true delineation of events. The story,
+therefore, cannot have precisely that order of interest found in
+fictions strictly and genuinely dramatic, in which (to my judgment at
+least) the time ought to be as limited as possible, and the characters
+as few;--no new character of importance to the catastrophe being
+admissible towards the end of the work. If I may use the word Epic in
+its most modest and unassuming acceptation, this Fiction, in short,
+though indulging in dramatic situations, belongs, as a whole, rather to
+the Epic than the Dramatic school.
+
+I cannot conclude without rendering the tribute of my praise and homage
+to the versatile and gifted Author of the beautiful Tragedy of Rienzi.
+Considering that our hero be the same--considering that we had the same
+materials from which to choose our several stories--I trust I shall
+be found to have little, if at all, trespassed upon ground previously
+occupied. With the single exception of a love-intrigue between a
+relative of Rienzi and one of the antagonist party, which makes the
+plot of Miss Mitford’s Tragedy, and is little more than an episode in my
+Romance, having slight effect on the conduct and none on the fate of the
+hero, I am not aware of any resemblance between the two works; and even
+this coincidence I could easily have removed, had I deemed it the least
+advisable:--but it would be almost discreditable if I had nothing that
+resembled a performance possessing so much it were an honour to imitate.
+
+In fact, the prodigal materials of the story--the rich and exuberant
+complexities of Rienzi’s character--joined to the advantage possessed by
+the Novelist of embracing all that the Dramatist must reject (Thus the
+slender space permitted to the Dramatist does not allow Miss Mitford to
+be very faithful to facts; to distinguish between Rienzi’s earlier and
+his later period of power; or to detail the true, but somewhat intricate
+causes of his rise, his splendour, and his fall.)--are sufficient to
+prevent Dramatist and Novelist from interfering with each other.
+
+London, December 1, 1835.
+
+
+Preface to the Present Edition, 1848.
+
+From the time of its first appearance, “Rienzi” has had the good fortune
+to rank high amongst my most popular works--though its interest is
+rather drawn from a faithful narration of historical facts, than from
+the inventions of fancy. And the success of this experiment confirms me
+in my belief, that the true mode of employing history in the service
+of romance, is to study diligently the materials as history; conform to
+such views of the facts as the Author would adopt, if he related them
+in the dry character of historian; and obtain that warmer interest which
+fiction bestows, by tracing the causes of the facts in the characters
+and emotions of the personages of the time. The events of his work are
+thus already shaped to his hand--the characters already created--what
+remains for him, is the inner, not outer, history of man--the chronicle
+of the human heart; and it is by this that he introduces a new harmony
+between character and event, and adds the completer solution of what is
+actual and true, by those speculations of what is natural and probable,
+which are out of the province of history, but belong especially to the
+philosophy of romance. And--if it be permitted the tale-teller to come
+reverently for instruction in his art to the mightiest teacher of all,
+who, whether in the page or on the scene, would give to airy fancies the
+breath and the form of life,--such, we may observe, is the lesson the
+humblest craftsman in historical romance may glean from the Historical
+Plays of Shakespeare. Necessarily, Shakespeare consulted history
+according to the imperfect lights, and from the popular authorities, of
+his age; and I do not say, therefore, that as an historian we can rely
+upon Shakespeare as correct. But to that in which he believed he rigidly
+adhered; nor did he seek, as lesser artists (such as Victor Hugo and his
+disciples) seek now, to turn perforce the Historical into the Poetical,
+but leaving history as he found it, to call forth from its arid prose
+the flower of the latent poem. Nay, even in the more imaginative plays
+which he has founded upon novels and legends popular in his time, it is
+curious and instructive to see how little he has altered the original
+ground-work--taking for granted the main materials of the story, and
+reserving all his matchless resources of wisdom and invention, to
+illustrate from mental analysis, the creations whose outline he was
+content to borrow. He receives, as a literal fact not to be altered,
+the somewhat incredible assertion of the novelist, that the pure and
+delicate and highborn Venetian loves the swarthy Moor--and that Romeo
+fresh from his “woes for Rosaline,” becomes suddenly enamoured of
+Juliet: He found the Improbable, and employed his art to make it
+truthful.
+
+That “Rienzi” should have attracted peculiar attention in Italy, is of
+course to be attributed to the choice of the subject rather than to the
+skill of the Author. It has been translated into the Italian language by
+eminent writers; and the authorities for the new view of Rienzi’s times
+and character which the Author deemed himself warranted to take, have
+been compared with his text by careful critics and illustrious scholars,
+in those states in which the work has been permitted to circulate. (In
+the Papal States, I believe, it was neither, prudently nor effectually,
+proscribed.) I may say, I trust without unworthy pride, that the result
+has confirmed the accuracy of delineations which English readers relying
+only on the brilliant but disparaging account in Gibbon deemed too
+favourable; and has tended to restore the great Tribune to his long
+forgotten claims to the love and reverence of the Italian land. Nor, if
+I may trust to the assurances that have reached me from many now engaged
+in the aim of political regeneration, has the effect of that revival of
+the honours due to a national hero, leading to the ennobling study
+of great examples, been wholly without its influence upon the rising
+generation of Italian youth, and thereby upon those stirring events
+which have recently drawn the eyes of Europe to the men and the lands
+beyond the Alps.
+
+In preparing for the Press this edition of a work illustrative of the
+exertions of a Roman, in advance of his time, for the political freedom
+of his country, and of those struggles between contending principles,
+of which Italy was the most stirring field in the Middle Ages, it is not
+out of place or season to add a few sober words, whether as a student of
+the Italian Past, or as an observer, with some experience of the social
+elements of Italy as it now exists, upon the state of affairs in that
+country.
+
+It is nothing new to see the Papal Church in the capacity of a popular
+reformer, and in contra-position to the despotic potentates of the
+several states, as well as to the German Emperor, who nominally inherits
+the sceptre of the Caesars. Such was its common character under its more
+illustrious Pontiffs; and the old Republics of Italy grew up under the
+shadow of the Papal throne, harbouring ever two factions--the one for
+the Emperor, the one for the Pope--the latter the more naturally
+allied to Italian independence. On the modern stage, we almost see the
+repetition of many an ancient drama. But the past should teach us to
+doubt the continuous and stedfast progress of any single line of policy
+under a principality so constituted as that of the Papal Church--a
+principality in which no race can be perpetuated, in which no objects
+can be permanent; in which the successor is chosen by a select
+ecclesiastical synod, under a variety of foreign as well as of national
+influences; in which the chief usually ascends the throne at an age
+that ill adapts his mind to the idea of human progress, and the active
+direction of mundane affairs;--a principality in which the peculiar
+sanctity that wraps the person of the Sovereign exonerates him from
+the healthful liabilities of a power purely temporal, and directly
+accountable to Man. A reforming Pope is a lucky accident, and dull
+indeed must be the brain which believes in the possibility of a long
+succession of reforming Popes, or which can regard as other than
+precarious and unstable the discordant combination of a constitutional
+government with an infallible head.
+
+It is as true as it is trite that political freedom is not the growth of
+a day--it is not a flower without a stalk, and it must gradually develop
+itself from amidst the unfolding leaves of kindred institutions.
+
+In one respect, the Austrian domination, fairly considered, has been
+beneficial to the States over which it has been directly exercised, and
+may be even said to have unconsciously schooled them to the capacity for
+freedom. In those States the personal rights which depend on impartial
+and incorrupt administration of the law, are infinitely more secure than
+in most of the Courts of Italy. Bribery, which shamefully predominates
+in the judicature of certain Principalities, is as unknown in the
+juridical courts of Austrian Italy as in England. The Emperor himself is
+often involved in legal disputes with a subject, and justice is as
+free and as firm for the humblest suitor, as if his antagonist were his
+equal. Austria, indeed, but holds together the motley and inharmonious
+members of its vast domain on either side the Alps, by a general
+character of paternal mildness and forbearance in all that great
+circle of good government which lies without the one principle of
+constitutional liberty. It asks but of its subjects to submit to be well
+governed--without agitating the question “how and by what means that
+government is carried on.” For every man, except the politician, the
+innovator, Austria is no harsh stepmother. But it is obviously clear
+that the better in other respects the administration of a state it does
+but foster the more the desire for that political security, which is
+only found in constitutional freedom: the reverence paid to personal
+rights, but begets the passion for political; and under a mild despotism
+are already half matured the germs of a popular constitution. But it is
+still a grave question whether Italy is ripe for self-government--and
+whether, were it possible that the Austrian domination could be shaken
+off--the very passions so excited, the very bloodshed so poured forth,
+would not ultimately place the larger portion of Italy under auspices
+less favourable to the sure growth of freedom, than those which silently
+brighten under the sway of the German Caesar.
+
+The two kingdoms, at the opposite extremes of Italy, to which
+circumstance and nature seem to assign the main ascendancy, are Naples
+and Sardinia. Looking to the former, it is impossible to discover on
+the face of the earth a country more adapted for commercial prosperity.
+Nature formed it as the garden of Europe, and the mart of the
+Mediterranean. Its soil and climate could unite the products of the East
+with those of the Western hemisphere. The rich island of Sicily should
+be the great corn granary of the modern nations as it was of the
+ancient; the figs, the olives, the oranges, of both the Sicilies, under
+skilful cultivation, should equal the produce of Spain and the Orient,
+and the harbours of the kingdom (the keys to three-quarters of the
+globe) should be crowded with the sails and busy with the life of
+commerce. But, in the character of its population, Naples has been
+invariably in the rear of Italian progress; it caught but partial
+inspiration from the free Republics, or even the wise Tyrannies, of the
+Middle Ages; the theatre of frequent revolutions without fruit; and
+all rational enthusiasm created by that insurrection, which has lately
+bestowed on Naples the boon of a representative system, cannot but be
+tempered by the conviction that of all the States in Italy, this is the
+one which least warrants the belief of permanence to political freedom,
+or of capacity to retain with vigour what may be seized by passion. (If
+the Electoral Chamber in the new Neapolitan Constitution, give a
+fair share of members to the Island of Sicily, it will be rich in
+the inevitable elements of discord, and nothing save a wisdom and
+moderation, which cannot soberly be anticipated, can prevent the
+ultimate separation of the island from the dominion of Naples. Nature
+has set the ocean between the two countries--but differences in
+character, and degree and quality of civilisation--national jealousies,
+historical memories, have trebled the space of the seas that roll
+between them.--More easy to unite under one free Parliament, Spain
+with Flanders; or re-annex to England its old domains of Aquitaine
+and Normandy--than to unite in one Council Chamber truly popular, the
+passions, interests, and prejudices of Sicily and Naples.--Time will
+show.)
+
+Far otherwise is it, with Sardinia. Many years since, the writer of
+these pages ventured to predict that the time must come when Sardinia
+would lead the van of Italian civilisation, and take proud place amongst
+the greater nations of Europe. In the great portion of this population
+there is visible the new blood of a young race; it is not, as with other
+Italian States, a worn-out stock; you do not see there a people
+fallen, proud of the past, and lazy amidst ruins, but a people rising,
+practical, industrious, active; there, in a word, is an eager youth to
+be formed to mature development, not a decrepit age to be restored to
+bloom and muscle. Progress is the great characteristic of the Sardinian
+state. Leave it for five years; visit it again, and you behold
+improvement. When you enter the kingdom and find, by the very skirts of
+its admirable roads, a raised footpath for the passengers and travellers
+from town to town, you become suddenly aware that you are in a land
+where close attention to the humbler classes is within the duties of
+a government. As you pass on from the more purely Italian part of
+the population,--from the Genoese country into that of Piedmont,--the
+difference between a new people and an old, on which I have dwelt,
+becomes visible in the improved cultivation of the soil, the better
+habitations of the labourer, the neater aspect of the towns, the greater
+activity in the thoroughfares. To the extraordinary virtues of the
+King, as King, justice is scarcely done, whether in England or abroad.
+Certainly, despite his recent concessions, Charles Albert is not and
+cannot be at heart, much of a constitutional reformer; and his strong
+religious tendencies, which, perhaps unjustly, have procured him in
+philosophical quarters the character of a bigot, may link him more than
+his political, with the cause of the Father of his Church. But he is
+nobly and preeminently national, careful of the prosperity and jealous
+of the honour of his own state, while conscientiously desirous of the
+independence of Italy. His attention to business, is indefatigable.
+Nothing escapes his vigilance. Over all departments of the kingdom is
+the eye of a man ever anxious to improve. Already the silk manufactures
+of Sardinia almost rival those of Lyons: in their own departments the
+tradesmen of Turin exhibit an artistic elegance and elaborate finish,
+scarcely exceeded in the wares of London and Paris. The King’s internal
+regulations are admirable; his laws, administered with the most
+impartial justice--his forts and defences are in that order, without
+which, at least on the Continent, no land is safe--his army is the most
+perfect in Italy. His wise genius extends itself to the elegant as to
+the useful arts--an encouragement that shames England, and even France,
+is bestowed upon the School for Painters, which has become one of the
+ornaments of his illustrious reign. The character of the main part of
+the population, and the geographical position of his country, assist the
+monarch and must force on himself, or his successors, in the career
+of improvement so signally begun. In the character of the people, the
+vigour of the Northman ennobles the ardour and fancy of the West. In
+the position of the country, the public mind is brought into constant
+communication with the new ideas in the free lands of Europe.
+Civilisation sets in direct currents towards the streets and marts of
+Turin. Whatever the result of the present crisis in Italy, no power
+and no chance which statesmen can predict, can preclude Sardinia from
+ultimately heading all that is best in Italy. The King may improve his
+present position, or peculiar prejudices, inseparable perhaps from the
+heritage of absolute monarchy, and which the raw and rude councils of
+an Electoral Chamber, newly called into life, must often irritate and
+alarm, may check his own progress towards the master throne of the
+Ausonian land. But the people themselves, sooner or later, will do the
+work of the King. And in now looking round Italy for a race worthy of
+Rienzi, and able to accomplish his proud dreams, I see but one for which
+the time is ripe or ripening, and I place the hopes of Italy in the men
+of Piedmont and Sardinia.
+
+London, February 14, 1848.
+
+
+
+
+RIENZI, The Last of the Tribunes.
+
+
+
+
+BOOK I. -- THE TIME, THE PLACE, AND THE MEN.
+
+“_Fu da sua gioventudine nutricato di latte di eloquenza; buono
+grammatico, megliore rettorico, autorista buono...Oh, come spesso
+diceva, ‘Dove sono questi buoni Romani? Dov’e loro somma giustizia?
+Poterommi trovare in tempo che questi fioriscano?’ Era bell
+‘omo...Accadde che uno suo frate fu ucciso, e non ne fu fatta vendetta
+di sua morte: non lo poteo aiutare; pensa lungo mano vendicare ‘l
+sangue di suo frate; pensa lunga mano dirizzare la cittate di Roma male
+guidata_.”--“Vita di Cola di Rienzi” Ed. 1828. Forli.
+
+“From his youth he was nourished with the milk of eloquence; a good
+grammarian, a better rhetorician, well versed in the writings of
+authors...Oh, how often would he say, ‘Where are those good Romans?
+Where is their supreme justice? Shall I ever behold such times as those
+in which they flourished?’ He was a handsome man...It happened that a
+brother of his was slain, and no retribution was made for his death:
+he could not help him; long did he ponder how to avenge his brother’s
+blood; long did he ponder how to direct the ill guided state of
+Rome.”--“Life of Cola di Rienzi.”
+
+
+
+Chapter 1.I. The Brothers.
+
+The celebrated name which forms the title to this work will sufficiently
+apprise the reader that it is in the earlier half of the fourteenth
+century that my story opens.
+
+It was on a summer evening that two youths might be seen walking beside
+the banks of the Tiber, not far from that part of its winding course
+which sweeps by the base of Mount Aventine. The path they had selected
+was remote and tranquil. It was only at a distance that were seen the
+scattered and squalid houses that bordered the river, from amidst which
+rose, dark and frequent, the high roof and enormous towers which marked
+the fortified mansion of some Roman baron. On one side of the river,
+behind the cottages of the fishermen, soared Mount Janiculum, dark with
+massive foliage, from which gleamed at frequent intervals, the grey
+walls of many a castellated palace, and the spires and columns of a
+hundred churches; on the other side, the deserted Aventine rose abrupt
+and steep, covered with thick brushwood; while, on the height, from
+concealed but numerous convents, rolled, not unmusically, along the
+quiet landscape and the rippling waves, the sound of the holy bell.
+
+Of the young men introduced in this scene, the elder, who might have
+somewhat passed his twentieth year, was of a tall and even commanding
+stature; and there was that in his presence remarkable and almost noble,
+despite the homeliness of his garb, which consisted of the long, loose
+gown and the plain tunic, both of dark-grey serge, which distinguished,
+at that time, the dress of the humbler scholars who frequented the
+monasteries for such rude knowledge as then yielded a scanty return for
+intense toil. His countenance was handsome, and would have been rather
+gay than thoughtful in its expression, but for that vague and abstracted
+dreaminess of eye which so usually denotes a propensity to revery and
+contemplation, and betrays that the past or the future is more congenial
+to the mind than the enjoyment and action of the present hour.
+
+The younger, who was yet a boy, had nothing striking in his appearance
+or countenance, unless an expression of great sweetness and gentleness
+could be so called; and there was something almost feminine in the
+tender deference with which he appeared to listen to his companion.
+His dress was that usually worn by the humbler classes, though somewhat
+neater, perhaps, and newer; and the fond vanity of a mother might be
+detected in the care with which the long and silky ringlets had been
+smoothed and parted as they escaped from his cap and flowed midway down
+his shoulders.
+
+As they thus sauntered on, beside the whispering reeds of the river,
+each with his arm round the form of his comrade, there was a grace
+in the bearing, in the youth, and in the evident affection of the
+brothers--for such their connexion--which elevated the lowliness of
+their apparent condition.
+
+“Dear brother,” said the elder, “I cannot express to thee how I enjoy
+these evening hours. To you alone I feel as if I were not a mere
+visionary and idler when I talk of the uncertain future, and build up my
+palaces of the air. Our parents listen to me as if I were uttering fine
+things out of a book; and my dear mother, Heaven bless her! wipes her
+eyes, and says, ‘Hark, what a scholar he is!’ As for the monks, if I
+ever dare look from my Livy, and cry ‘Thus should Rome be again!’ they
+stare, and gape, and frown, as though I had broached an heresy. But you,
+sweet brother, though you share not my studies, sympathize so kindly
+with all their results--you seem so to approve my wild schemes, and to
+encourage my ambitious hopes--that sometimes I forget our birth, our
+fortunes, and think and dare as if no blood save that of the Teuton
+Emperor flowed through our veins.”
+
+“Methinks, dear Cola,” said the younger brother, “that Nature played us
+an unfair trick--to you she transmitted the royal soul, derived from
+our father’s parentage; and to me only the quiet and lowly spirit of my
+mother’s humble lineage.”
+
+“Nay,” answered Cola, quickly, “you would then have the brighter
+share,--for I should have but the Barbarian origin, and you the Roman.
+Time was, when to be a simple Roman was to be nobler than a northern
+king.--Well, well, we may live to see great changes!”
+
+“I shall live to see thee a great man, and that will content me,” said
+the younger, smiling affectionately; “a great scholar all confess you
+to be already: our mother predicts your fortunes every time she hears of
+your welcome visits to the Colonna.”
+
+“The Colonna!” said Cola, with a bitter smile; “the Colonna--the
+pedants!--They affect, dull souls, the knowledge of the past, play the
+patron, and misquote Latin over their cups! They are pleased to welcome
+me at their board, because the Roman doctors call me learned, and
+because Nature gave me a wild wit, which to them is pleasanter than the
+stale jests of a hired buffoon. Yes, they would advance my fortunes--but
+how? by some place in the public offices, which would fill a dishonoured
+coffer, by wringing, yet more sternly, the hard-earned coins from our
+famishing citizens! If there be a vile thing in the world, it is a
+plebeian, advanced by patricians, not for the purpose of righting his
+own order, but for playing the pander to the worst interests of theirs.
+He who is of the people but makes himself a traitor to his birth, if he
+furnishes the excuse for these tyrant hypocrites to lift up their hands
+and cry--‘See what liberty exists in Rome, when we, the patricians, thus
+elevate a plebeian!’ Did they ever elevate a plebeian if he sympathized
+with plebeians? No, brother; should I be lifted above our condition, I
+will be raised by the arms of my countrymen, and not upon their necks.”
+
+“All I hope, is, Cola, that you will not, in your zeal for your
+fellow-citizens, forget how dear you are to us. No greatness could ever
+reconcile me to the thought that it brought you danger.”
+
+“And I could laugh at all danger, if it led to greatness. But
+greatness--greatness! Vain dream! Let us keep it for our night sleep.
+Enough of my plans; now, dearest brother, of yours.”
+
+And, with the sanguine and cheerful elasticity which belonged to him,
+the young Cola, dismissing all wilder thoughts, bent his mind to listen,
+and to enter into, the humbler projects of his brother. The new boat and
+the holiday dress, and the cot removed to a quarter more secure from the
+oppression of the barons, and such distant pictures of love as a dark
+eye and a merry lip conjure up to the vague sentiments of a boy;--to
+schemes and aspirations of which such objects made the limit, did the
+scholar listen, with a relaxed brow and a tender smile; and often, in
+later life, did that conversation occur to him, when he shrank from
+asking his own heart which ambition was the wiser.
+
+“And then,” continued the younger brother, “by degrees I might save
+enough to purchase such a vessel as that which we now see, laden,
+doubtless, with corn and merchandise, bringing--oh, such a good
+return--that I could fill your room with books, and never hear you
+complain that you were not rich enough to purchase some crumbling old
+monkish manuscript. Ah, that would make me so happy!” Cola smiled as he
+pressed his brother closer to his breast.
+
+“Dear boy,” said he, “may it rather be mine to provide for your wishes!
+Yet methinks the masters of yon vessel have no enviable possession,
+see how anxiously the men look round, and behind, and before: peaceful
+traders though they be, they fear, it seems, even in this city (once the
+emporium of the civilised world), some pirate in pursuit; and ere the
+voyage be over, they may find that pirate in a Roman noble. Alas, to
+what are we reduced!”
+
+The vessel thus referred to was speeding rapidly down the river, and
+some three or four armed men on deck were indeed intently surveying the
+quiet banks on either side, as if anticipating a foe. The bark soon,
+however, glided out of sight, and the brothers fell back upon those
+themes which require only the future for a text to become attractive to
+the young.
+
+At length, as the evening darkened, they remembered that it was past the
+usual hour in which they returned home, and they began to retrace their
+steps.
+
+“Stay,” said Cola, abruptly, “how our talk has beguiled me! Father
+Uberto promised me a rare manuscript, which the good friar confesses
+hath puzzled the whole convent. I was to seek his cell for it this
+evening. Tarry here a few minutes, it is but half-way up the Aventine. I
+shall soon return.”
+
+“Can I not accompany you?”
+
+“Nay,” returned Cola, with considerate kindness, “you have borne toil
+all the day, and must be wearied; my labours of the body, at least, have
+been light enough. You are delicate, too, and seem fatigued already; the
+rest will refresh you. I shall not be long.”
+
+The boy acquiesced, though he rather wished to accompany his brother;
+but he was of a meek and yielding temper, and seldom resisted the
+lightest command of those he loved. He sat him down on a little bank by
+the river-side, and the firm step and towering form of his brother were
+soon hid from his gaze by the thick and melancholy foliage.
+
+At first he sat very quietly, enjoying the cool air, and thinking over
+all the stories of ancient Rome that his brother had told him in their
+walk. At length he recollected that his little sister, Irene, had begged
+him to bring her home some flowers; and, gathering such as he could find
+at hand (and many a flower grew, wild and clustering, over that desolate
+spot), he again seated himself, and began weaving them into one of those
+garlands for which the southern peasantry still retain their ancient
+affection, and something of their classic skill.
+
+While the boy was thus engaged, the tramp of horses and the loud
+shouting of men were heard at a distance. They came near, and nearer.
+
+“Some baron’s procession, perhaps, returning from a feast,” thought the
+boy. “It will be a pretty sight--their white plumes and scarlet mantles!
+I love to see such sights, but I will just move out of their way.”
+
+So, still mechanically platting his garland, but with eyes turned
+towards the quarter of the expected procession, the young Roman moved
+yet nearer towards the river.
+
+Presently the train came in view,--a gallant company, in truth; horsemen
+in front, riding two abreast, where the path permitted, their steeds
+caparisoned superbly, their plumes waving gaily, and the gleam of their
+corselets glittering through the shades of the dusky twilight. A large
+and miscellaneous crowd, all armed, some with pikes and mail, others
+with less warlike or worse fashioned weapons, followed the cavaliers;
+and high above plume and pike floated the blood-red banner of the
+Orsini, with the motto and device (in which was ostentatiously displayed
+the Guelfic badge of the keys of St. Peter) wrought in burnished gold.
+A momentary fear crossed the boy’s mind, for at that time, and in that
+city, a nobleman begirt with his swordsmen was more dreaded than a wild
+beast by the plebeians; but it was already too late to fly--the train
+were upon him.
+
+“Ho, boy!” cried the leader of the horsemen, Martino di Porto, one of
+the great House of the Orsini; “hast thou seen a boat pass up the
+river?--But thou must have seen it--how long since?”
+
+“I saw a large boat about half an hour ago,” answered the boy, terrified
+by the rough voice and imperious bearing of the cavalier.
+
+“Sailing right a-head, with a green flag at the stern?”
+
+“The same, noble sir.”
+
+“On, then! we will stop her course ere the moon rise,” said the baron.
+“On!--let the boy go with us, lest he prove traitor, and alarm the
+Colonna.”
+
+“An Orsini, an Orsini,” shouted the multitude; “on, on!” and, despite
+the prayers and remonstrances of the boy, he was placed in the
+thickest of the crowd, and borne, or rather dragged along with the
+rest--frightened, breathless, almost weeping, with his poor little
+garland still hanging on his arm, while a sling was thrust into his
+unwilling hand. Still he felt, through all his alarm, a kind of childish
+curiosity to see the result of the pursuit.
+
+By the loud and eager conversation of those about him, he learned that
+the vessel he had seen contained a supply of corn destined to a fortress
+up the river held by the Colonna, then at deadly feud with the Orsini;
+and it was the object of the expedition in which the boy had been thus
+lucklessly entrained to intercept the provision, and divert it to
+the garrison of Martino di Porto. This news somewhat increased his
+consternation, for the boy belonged to a family that claimed the
+patronage of the Colonna.
+
+Anxiously and tearfully he looked with every moment up the steep ascent
+of the Aventine; but his guardian, his protector, still delayed his
+appearance.
+
+They had now proceeded some way, when a winding in the road brought
+suddenly before them the object of their pursuit, as, seen by the light
+of the earliest stars, it scudded rapidly down the stream.
+
+“Now, the Saints be blest!” quoth the chief; “she is ours!”
+
+“Hold!” said a captain (a German) riding next to Martino, in a half
+whisper; “I hear sounds which I like not, by yonder trees--hark! The
+neigh of a horse!--by my faith, too, there is the gleam of a corselet.”
+
+“Push on, my masters,” cried Martino; “the heron shall not balk the
+eagle--push on!”
+
+With renewed shouts, those on foot pushed forward, till, as they had
+nearly gained the copse referred to by the German, a small compact body
+of horsemen, armed cap-a-pie, dashed from amidst the trees, and, with
+spears in their rests, charged into the ranks of the pursuers.
+
+“A Colonna! a Colonna!” “An Orsini! an Orsini!” were shouts loudly
+and fiercely interchanged. Martino di Porto, a man of great bulk and
+ferocity, and his cavaliers, who were chiefly German Mercenaries, met
+the encounter unshaken. “Beware the bear’s hug,” cried the Orsini, as
+down went his antagonist, rider and steed, before his lance.
+
+The contest was short and fierce; the complete armour of the horsemen
+protected them on either side from wounds,--not so unscathed fared the
+half-armed foot-followers of the Orsini, as they pressed, each pushed on
+by the other, against the Colonna. After a shower of stones and darts,
+which fell but as hailstones against the thick mail of the horsemen,
+they closed in, and, by their number, obstructed the movements of the
+steeds, while the spear, sword, and battle-axe of their opponents made
+ruthless havoc amongst their undisciplined ranks. And Martino, who cared
+little how many of his mere mob were butchered, seeing that his foes
+were for the moment embarrassed by the wild rush and gathering circle
+of his foot train (for the place of conflict, though wider than the
+previous road, was confined and narrow), made a sign to some of his
+horsemen, and was about to ride forward towards the boat, now nearly out
+of sight, when a bugle at some distance was answered by one of his enemy
+at hand; and the shout of “Colonna to the rescue!” was echoed afar off.
+A few moments brought in view a numerous train of horse at full speed,
+with the banners of the Colonna waving gallantly in the front.
+
+“A plague on the wizards! who would have imagined they had divined us
+so craftily!” muttered Martino; “we must not abide these odds;” and the
+hand he had first raised for advance, now gave the signal of retreat.
+
+Serried breast to breast and in complete order, the horsemen of Martino
+turned to fly; the foot rabble who had come for spoil remained but for
+slaughter. They endeavoured to imitate their leaders; but how could they
+all elude the rushing chargers and sharp lances of their antagonists,
+whose blood was heated by the affray, and who regarded the lives at
+their mercy as a boy regards the wasp’s nest he destroys. The crowd
+dispersing in all directions,--some, indeed, escaped up the hills, where
+the footing was impracticable to the horses; some plunged into the river
+and swam across to the opposite bank--those less cool or experienced,
+who fled right onwards, served, by clogging the way of their enemy, to
+facilitate the flight of their leaders, but fell themselves, corpse upon
+corpse, butchered in the unrelenting and unresisted pursuit.
+
+“No quarter to the ruffians--every Orsini slain is a robber the
+less--strike for God, the Emperor, and the Colonna!” such were the
+shouts which rung the knell of the dismayed and falling fugitives. Among
+those who fled onward, in the very path most accessible to the cavalry,
+was the young brother of Cola, so innocently mixed with the affray. Fast
+he fled, dizzy with terror--poor boy, scarce before ever parted from his
+parents’ or his brother’s side!--the trees glided past him--the banks
+receded:--on he sped, and fast behind came the tramp of the hoofs--the
+shouts--the curses--the fierce laughter of the foe, as they bounded over
+the dead and the dying in their path. He was now at the spot in which
+his brother had left him; hastily he glanced behind, and saw the couched
+lance and horrent crest of the horseman close at his rear; despairingly
+he looked up, and behold! his brother bursting through the tangled
+brakes that clothed the mountain, and bounding to his succour.
+
+“Save me! save me, brother!” he shrieked aloud, and the shriek reached
+Cola’s ear;--the snort of the fiery charger breathed hot upon him;--a
+moment more, and with one wild shrill cry of “Mercy, mercy” he fell
+to the ground--a corpse: the lance of the pursuer passing through and
+through him, from back to breast, and nailing him on the very sod where
+he had sate, full of young life and careless hope, not an hour ago.
+
+The horseman plucked forth his spear, and passed on in pursuit of
+new victims; his comrades following. Cola had descended,--was on the
+spot,--kneeling by his murdered brother. Presently, to the sound of
+horn and trumpet, came by a nobler company than most of those hitherto
+engaged; who had been, indeed, but the advanced-guard of the Colonna. At
+their head rode a man in years, whose long white hair escaped from his
+plumed cap and mingled with his venerable beard. “How is this?” said the
+chief, reining in his steed, “young Rienzi!”
+
+The youth looked up, as he heard that voice, and then flung himself
+before the steed of the old noble, and, clasping his hands, cried out
+in a scarce articulate tone: “It is my brother, noble Stephen,--a boy,
+a mere child!--the best--the mildest! See how his blood dabbles the
+grass;--back, back--your horse’s hoofs are in the stream! Justice, my
+Lord, justice!--you are a great man.”
+
+“Who slew him? an Orsini, doubtless; you shall have justice.”
+
+“Thanks, thanks,” murmured Rienzi, as he tottered once more to his
+brother’s side, turned the boy’s face from the grass, and strove wildly
+to feel the pulse of his heart; he drew back his hand hastily, for it
+was crimsoned with blood, and lifting that hand on high, shrieked out
+again, “Justice! justice!”
+
+The group round the old Stephen Colonna, hardened as they were in such
+scenes, were affected by the sight. A handsome boy, whose tears ran
+fast down his cheeks, and who rode his palfrey close by the side of the
+Colonna, drew forth his sword. “My Lord,” said he, half sobbing, “an
+Orsini only could have butchered a harmless lad like this; let us lose
+not a moment,--let us on after the ruffians.”
+
+“No, Adrian, no!” cried Stephen, laying his hand on the boy’s shoulder;
+“your zeal is to be lauded, but we must beware an ambush. Our men have
+ventured too far--what, ho, there!--sound a return.”
+
+The bugles, in a few minutes, brought back the pursuers,--among them,
+the horseman whose spear had been so fatally misused. He was the leader
+of those engaged in the conflict with Martino di Porto; and the gold
+wrought into his armour, with the gorgeous trappings of his charger,
+betokened his rank.
+
+“Thanks, my son, thanks,” said the old Colonna to this cavalier, “you
+have done well and bravely. But tell me, knowest thou, for thou hast
+an eagle eye, which of the Orsini slew this poor boy?--a foul deed; his
+family, too, our clients!”
+
+“Who? yon lad?” replied the horseman, lifting the helmet from his
+head, and wiping his heated brow; “say you so! how came he, then, with
+Martino’s rascals? I fear me the mistake hath cost him dear. I could but
+suppose him of the Orsini rabble, and so--and so--”
+
+“You slew him!” cried Rienzi, in a voice of thunder, starting from
+the ground. “Justice! then, my Lord Stephen, justice! you promised me
+justice, and I will have it!”
+
+“My poor youth,” said the old man, compassionately, “you should have had
+justice against the Orsini; but see you not this has been an error? I
+do not wonder you are too grieved to listen to reason now. We must make
+this up to you.”
+
+“And let this pay for masses for the boy’s soul; I grieve me much for
+the accident,” said the younger Colonna, flinging down a purse of gold.
+“Ay, see us at the palace next week, young Cola--next week. My father,
+we had best return towards the boat; its safeguard may require us yet.”
+
+“Right, Gianni; stay, some two of you, and see to the poor lad’s
+corpse;--a grievous accident! how could it chance?”
+
+The company passed back the way they came, two of the common soldiers
+alone remaining, except the boy Adrian, who lingered behind a few
+moments, striving to console Rienzi, who, as one bereft of sense,
+remained motionless, gazing on the proud array as it swept along, and
+muttering to himself, “Justice, justice! I will have it yet.”
+
+The loud voice of the elder Colonna summoned Adrian, reluctantly
+and weeping, away. “Let me be your brother,” said the gallant boy,
+affectionately pressing the scholar’s hand to his heart; “I want a
+brother like you.”
+
+Rienzi made no reply; he did not heed or hear him--dark and stern
+thoughts, thoughts in which were the germ of a mighty revolution, were
+at his heart. He woke from them with a start, as the soldiers were now
+arranging their bucklers so as to make a kind of bier for the corpse,
+and then burst into tears as he fiercely motioned them away, and clasped
+the clay to his breast till he was literally soaked with the oozing
+blood.
+
+The poor child’s garland had not dropped from his arm even when he fell,
+and, entangled by his dress, it still clung around him. It was a sight
+that recalled to Cola all the gentleness, the kind heart, and winning
+graces of his only brother--his only friend! It was a sight that
+seemed to make yet more inhuman the untimely and unmerited fate of that
+innocent boy. “My brother! my brother!” groaned the survivor; “how shall
+I meet our mother?--how shall I meet even night and solitude again?--so
+young, so harmless! See ye, sirs, he was but too gentle. And they will
+not give us justice, because his murderer was a noble and a Colonna.
+And this gold, too--gold for a brother’s blood! Will they not”--and the
+young man’s eyes glared like fire--“will they not give us justice?
+Time shall show!” so saying, he bent his head over the corpse; his lips
+muttered, as with some prayer or invocation; and then rising, his face
+was as pale as the dead beside him,--but it was no longer pale with
+grief!
+
+From that bloody clay, and that inward prayer, Cola di Rienzi rose a new
+being. With his young brother died his own youth. But for that event,
+the future liberator of Rome might have been but a dreamer, a scholar, a
+poet; the peaceful rival of Petrarch; a man of thoughts, not deeds. But
+from that time, all his faculties, energies, fancies, genius, became
+concentrated into a single point; and patriotism, before a vision, leapt
+into the life and vigour of a passion, lastingly kindled, stubbornly
+hardened, and awfully consecrated,--by revenge!
+
+
+
+Chapter 1.II. An Historical Survey--not to Be Passed Over, Except by
+Those Who Dislike to Understand What They Read.
+
+Years had passed away, and the death of the Roman boy, amidst more noble
+and less excusable slaughter, was soon forgotten,--forgotten almost
+by the parents of the slain, in the growing fame and fortunes of their
+eldest son,--forgotten and forgiven never by that son himself.
+But, between that prologue of blood, and the political drama which
+ensues,--between the fading interest, as it were, of a dream, and the
+more busy, actual, and continuous excitements of sterner life,--this may
+be the most fitting time to place before the reader a short and rapid
+outline of the state and circumstances of that city in which the
+principal scenes of this story are laid;--an outline necessary, perhaps,
+to many, for a full comprehension of the motives of the actors, and the
+vicissitudes of the plot.
+
+Despite the miscellaneous and mongrel tribes that had forced their
+settlements in the City of the Caesars, the Roman population retained
+an inordinate notion of their own supremacy over the rest of the world;
+and, degenerated from the iron virtues of the Republic, possessed all
+the insolent and unruly turbulence which characterised the Plebs of the
+ancient Forum. Amongst a ferocious, yet not a brave populace, the
+nobles supported themselves less as sagacious tyrants than as relentless
+banditti. The popes had struggled in vain against these stubborn and
+stern patricians. Their state derided, their command defied, their
+persons publicly outraged, the pontiff-sovereigns of the rest of Europe
+resided, at the Vatican, as prisoners under terror of execution.
+When, thirty-eight years before the date of the events we are about to
+witness, a Frenchman, under the name of Clement V., had ascended the
+chair of St. Peter, the new pope, with more prudence than valour, had
+deserted Rome for the tranquil retreat of Avignon; and the luxurious
+town of a foreign province became the court of the Roman pontiff, and
+the throne of the Christian Church.
+
+Thus deprived of even the nominal check of the papal presence, the power
+of the nobles might be said to have no limits, save their own caprice,
+or their mutual jealousies and feuds. Though arrogating through fabulous
+genealogies their descent from the ancient Romans, they were, in
+reality, for the most part, the sons of the bolder barbarians of the
+North; and, contaminated by the craft of Italy, rather than imbued with
+its national affections, they retained the disdain of their foreign
+ancestors for a conquered soil and a degenerate people. While the rest
+of Italy, especially in Florence, in Venice, and in Milan, was fast and
+far advancing beyond the other states of Europe in civilisation and in
+art, the Romans appeared rather to recede than to improve;--unblest by
+laws, unvisited by art, strangers at once to the chivalry of a warlike,
+and the graces of a peaceful, people. But they still possessed the
+sense and desire of liberty, and, by ferocious paroxysms and desperate
+struggles, sought to vindicate for their city the title it still assumed
+of “the Metropolis of the World.” For the last two centuries they had
+known various revolutions--brief, often bloody, and always unsuccessful.
+Still, there was the empty pageant of a popular form of government. The
+thirteen quarters of the city named each a chief; and the assembly of
+these magistrates, called Caporioni, by theory possessed an authority
+they had neither the power nor the courage to exert. Still there was the
+proud name of Senator; but, at the present time, the office was confined
+to one or to two persons, sometimes elected by the pope, sometimes by
+the nobles. The authority attached to the name seems to have had no
+definite limit; it was that of a stern dictator, or an indolent puppet,
+according as he who held it had the power to enforce the dignity he
+assumed. It was never conceded but to nobles, and it was by the nobles
+that all the outrages were committed. Private enmity alone was gratified
+whenever public justice was invoked: and the vindication of order was
+but the execution of revenge.
+
+Holding their palaces as the castles and fortresses of princes, each
+asserting his own independency of all authority and law, and planting
+fortifications, and claiming principalities in the patrimonial
+territories of the Church, the barons of Rome made their state still
+more secure, and still more odious, by the maintenance of troops of
+foreign (chiefly of German) mercenaries, at once braver in disposition,
+more disciplined in service, and more skilful in arms, than even the
+freest Italians of that time. Thus they united the judicial and the
+military force, not for the protection, but for the ruin of Rome. Of
+these barons, the most powerful were the Orsini and Colonna; their feuds
+were hereditary and incessant, and every day witnessed the fruits of
+their lawless warfare, in bloodshed, in rape, and in conflagration.
+The flattery or the friendship of Petrarch, too credulously believed by
+modern historians, has invested the Colonna, especially of the date now
+entered upon, with an elegance and a dignity not their own. Outrage,
+fraud, and assassination, a sordid avarice in securing lucrative offices
+to themselves, an insolent oppression of their citizens, and the
+most dastardly cringing to power superior to their own (with but few
+exceptions), mark the character of the first family of Rome. But,
+wealthier than the rest of the barons, they were, therefore, more
+luxurious, and, perhaps, more intellectual; and their pride was
+flattered in being patrons of those arts of which they could never
+have become the professors. From these multiplied oppressors the Roman
+citizens turned with fond and impatient regret to their ignorant and
+dark notions of departed liberty and greatness. They confounded the
+times of the Empire with those of the Republic; and often looked to the
+Teutonic king, who obtained his election from beyond the Alps, but his
+title of emperor from the Romans, as the deserter of his legitimate
+trust and proper home; vainly imagining that, if both the Emperor and
+the Pontiff fixed their residence in Rome, Liberty and Law would again
+seek their natural shelter beneath the resuscitated majesty of the Roman
+people.
+
+The absence of the pope and the papal court served greatly to impoverish
+the citizens; and they had suffered yet more visibly by the depredations
+of hordes of robbers, numerous and unsparing, who infested Romagna,
+obstructing all the public ways, and were, sometimes secretly,
+sometimes, openly, protected by the barons, who often recruited their
+banditti garrisons by banditti soldiers.
+
+But besides the lesser and ignobler robbers, there had risen in Italy
+a far more formidable description of freebooters. A German, who assumed
+the lofty title of the Duke Werner, had, a few years prior to the period
+we approach, enlisted and organised a considerable force, styled “The
+Great Company,” with which he besieged cities and invaded states,
+without any object less shameless than that of pillage. His example was
+soon imitated: numerous “Companies,” similarly constituted, devastated
+the distracted and divided land. They appeared, suddenly raised, as if
+by magic, before the walls of a city, and demanded immense sums as the
+purchase of peace. Neither tyrant nor common wealth maintained a force
+sufficient to resist them; and if other northern mercenaries were
+engaged to oppose them, it was only to recruit the standards of the
+freebooters with deserters. Mercenary fought not mercenary--nor German,
+German: and greater pay, and more unbridled rapine, made the tents of
+the “Companies” far more attractive than the regulated stipends of a
+city, or the dull fortress and impoverished coffers of a chief. Werner,
+the most implacable and ferocious of all these adventurers, and who had
+so openly gloried in his enormities as to wear upon his breast a silver
+plate, engraved with the words, “Enemy to God, to Pity, and to Mercy,”
+ had not long since ravaged Romagna with fire and sword. But, whether
+induced by money, or unable to control the fierce spirits he had
+raised, he afterwards led the bulk of his company back to Germany. Small
+detachments, however, remained, scattered throughout the land, waiting
+only an able leader once more to re-unite them: amongst those who
+appeared most fitted for that destiny was Walter de Montreal, a Knight
+of St. John, and gentleman of Provence, whose valour and military genius
+had already, though yet young, raised his name into dreaded celebrity;
+and whose ambition, experience, and sagacity, relieved by certain
+chivalric and noble qualities, were suited to enterprises far greater
+and more important than the violent depredations of the atrocious
+Werner. From these scourges, no state had suffered more grievously than
+Rome. The patrimonial territories of the pope,--in part wrested from him
+by petty tyrants, in part laid waste by these foreign robbers,--yielded
+but a scanty supply to the necessities of Clement VI., the most
+accomplished gentleman and the most graceful voluptuary of his time; and
+the good father had devised a plan, whereby to enrich at once the Romans
+and their pontiff.
+
+Nearly fifty years before the time we enter upon, in order both to
+replenish the papal coffers and pacify the starving Romans, Boniface
+VIII. had instituted the Festival of the Jubilee, or Holy Year; in fact,
+a revival of a Pagan ceremonial. A plenary indulgence was promised
+to every Catholic who, in that year, and in the first year of every
+succeeding century, should visit the churches of St. Peter and St. Paul.
+An immense concourse of pilgrims, from every part of Christendom, had
+attested the wisdom of the invention; “and two priests stood night and
+day, with rakes in their hands, to collect without counting the heaps
+of gold and silver that were poured on the altar of St. Paul.” (Gibbon,
+vol. xii. c. 59.)
+
+It is not to be wondered at that this most lucrative festival should,
+ere the next century was half expired, appear to a discreet pontiff
+to be too long postponed. And both pope and city agreed in thinking it
+might well bear a less distant renewal. Accordingly, Clement VI. had
+proclaimed, under the name of the Mosaic Jubilee, a second Holy Year
+for 1350--viz., three years distant from that date at which, in the
+next chapter, my narrative will commence. This circumstance had a great
+effect in whetting the popular indignation against the barons, and
+preparing the events I shall relate; for the roads were, as I before
+said, infested by the banditti, the creatures and allies of the barons.
+And if the roads were not cleared, the pilgrims might not attend. It
+was the object of the pope’s vicar, Raimond, bishop of Orvietto (bad
+politician and good canonist), to seek, by every means, to remove all
+impediment between the offerings of devotion and the treasury of St.
+Peter.
+
+Such, in brief, was the state of Rome at the period we are about to
+examine. Her ancient mantle of renown still, in the eyes of Italy and of
+Europe, cloaked her ruins. In name, at least, she was still the queen
+of the earth; and from her hands came the crown of the emperor of the
+north, and the keys of the father of the church. Her situation was
+precisely that which presented a vase and glittering triumph to
+bold ambition,--an inspiring, if mournful, spectacle to determined
+patriotism,--and a fitting stage for that more august tragedy which
+seeks its incidents, selects its actors, and shapes its moral, amidst
+the vicissitudes and crimes of nations.
+
+
+
+Chapter 1.III. The Brawl.
+
+On an evening in April, 1347, and in one of those wide spaces in which
+Modern and Ancient Rome seemed blent together--equally desolate and
+equally in ruins--a miscellaneous and indignant populace were assembled.
+That morning the house of a Roman jeweller had been forcibly entered and
+pillaged by the soldiers of Martino di Porto, with a daring effrontery
+which surpassed even the ordinary licence of the barons. The sympathy
+and sensation throughout the city were deep and ominous.
+
+“Never will I submit to this tyranny!”
+
+“Nor I!”
+
+“Nor I!”
+
+“Nor by the bones of St. Peter, will I!”
+
+“And what, my friends, is this tyranny to which you will not submit?”
+ said a young nobleman, addressing himself to the crowd of citizens who,
+heated, angry, half-armed, and with the vehement gestures of Italian
+passion, were now sweeping down the long and narrow street that led to
+the gloomy quarter occupied by the Orsini.
+
+“Ah, my lord!” cried two or three of the citizens in a breath, “you will
+right us--you will see justice done to us--you are a Colonna.”
+
+“Ha, ha, ha!” laughed scornfully one man of gigantic frame, and wielding
+on high a huge hammer, indicative of his trade. “Justice and Colonna!
+body of God! those names are not often found together.”
+
+“Down with him! down with him! he is an Orsinist--down with him!” cried
+at least ten of the throng: but no hand was raised against the giant.
+
+“He speaks the truth,” said a second voice, firmly.
+
+“Ay, that doth he,” said a third, knitting his brows, and unsheathing
+his knife, “and we will abide by it. The Orsini are tyrants--and the
+Colonnas are, at the best, as bad.”
+
+“Thou liest in thy teeth, ruffian!” cried the young noble, advancing
+into the press and confronting the last asperser of the Colonna.
+
+Before the flashing eye and menacing gesture of the cavalier, the worthy
+brawler retreated some steps, so as to leave an open space between the
+towering form of the smith, and the small, slender, but vigorous frame
+of the young noble.
+
+Taught from their birth to despise the courage of the plebeians, even
+while careless of much reputation as to their own, the patricians of
+Rome were not unaccustomed to the rude fellowship of these brawls; nor
+was it unoften that the mere presence of a noble sufficed to scatter
+whole crowds, that had the moment before been breathing vengeance
+against his order and his house.
+
+Waving his hand, therefore, to the smith, and utterly unheeding either
+his brandished weapon or his vast stature, the young Adrian di Castello,
+a distant kinsman of the Colonna, haughtily bade him give way.
+
+“To your homes, friends! and know,” he added, with some dignity, “that
+ye wrong us much, if ye imagine we share the evil-doings of the Orsini,
+or are pandering solely to our own passions in the feud between their
+house and ours. May the Holy Mother so judge me,” continued he, devoutly
+lifting up his eyes, “as I now with truth declare, that it is for your
+wrongs, and for the wrongs of Rome, that I have drawn this sword against
+the Orsini.”
+
+“So say all the tyrants,” rejoined the smith, hardily, as he leant his
+hammer against a fragment of stone--some remnant of ancient Rome--“they
+never fight against each other, but it is for our good. One Colonna cuts
+me the throat of Orsini’s baker--it is for our good! Another Colonna
+seizes on the daughter of Orsini’s tailor--it is for our good! our
+good--yes, for the good of the people! the good of the bakers and
+tailors, eh?”
+
+“Fellow,” said the young nobleman, gravely, “if a Colonna did thus, he
+did wrong; but the holiest cause may have bad supporters.”
+
+“Yes, the holy Church itself is propped on very in different columns,”
+ answered the smith, in a rude witticism on the affection of the pope for
+the Colonna.
+
+“He blasphemes! the smith blasphemes!” cried the partisans of that
+powerful house. “A Colonna, a Colonna!”
+
+“An Orsini, an Orsini!” was no less promptly the counter cry.
+
+“The People!” shouted the smith, waving his formidable weapon far above
+the heads of the group.
+
+In an instant the whole throng, who had at first united against the
+aggression of one man, were divided by the hereditary wrath of faction.
+At the cry of Orsini, several new partisans hurried to the spot; the
+friends of the Colonna drew themselves on one side--the defenders of
+the Orsini on the other--and the few who agreed with the smith that both
+factions were equally odious, and the people was the sole legitimate
+cry in a popular commotion, would have withdrawn themselves from the
+approaching melee, if the smith himself, who was looked upon by them as
+an authority of great influence, had not--whether from resentment at the
+haughty bearing of the young Colonna, or from that appetite of contest
+not uncommon in men of a bulk and force which assure them in all
+personal affrays the lofty pleasure of superiority--if, I say, the smith
+himself had not, after a pause of indecision, retired among the Orsini,
+and entrained, by his example, the alliance of his friends with the
+favourers of that faction.
+
+In popular commotions, each man is whirled along with the herd, often
+half against his own approbation or assent. The few words of peace
+by which Adrian di Castello commenced an address to his friends were
+drowned amidst their shouts. Proud to find in their ranks one of the
+most beloved, and one of the noblest of that name, the partisans of
+the Colonna placed him in their front, and charged impetuously on their
+foes. Adrian, however, who had acquired from circumstances something of
+that chivalrous code which he certainly could not have owed to his Roman
+birth, disdained at first to assault men among whom he recognised no
+equal, either in rank or the practice of arms. He contented himself with
+putting aside the few strokes that were aimed at him in the gathering
+confusion of the conflict--few; for those who recognised him, even
+amidst the bitterest partisans of the Orsini, were not willing to expose
+themselves to the danger and odium of spilling the blood of a man, who,
+in addition to his great birth and the terrible power of his connexions,
+was possessed of a personal popularity, which he owed rather to a
+comparison with the vices of his relatives than to any remarkable
+virtues hitherto displayed by himself. The smith alone, who had as
+yet taken no active part in the fray, seemed to gather himself up in
+determined opposition as the cavalier now advanced within a few steps of
+him.
+
+“Did we not tell thee,” quoth the giant, frowning, “that the Colonna
+were, not less than the Orsini, the foes of the people? Look at thy
+followers and clients: are they not cutting the throats of humble men by
+way of vengeance for the crime of a great one? But that is the way one
+patrician always scourges the insolence of another. He lays the rod on
+the backs of the people, and then cries, ‘See how just I am!’”
+
+“I do not answer thee now,” answered Adrian; “but if thou regrettest
+with me this waste of blood, join with me in attempting to prevent it.”
+
+“I--not I! let the blood of the slaves flow today: the time is fast
+coming when it shall be washed away by the blood of the lords.”
+
+“Away, ruffian!” said Adrian, seeking no further parley, and touching
+the smith with the flat side of his sword. In an instant the hammer of
+the smith swung in the air, and, but for the active spring of the young
+noble, would infallibly have crushed him to the earth. Ere the smith
+could gain time for a second blow, Adrian’s sword passed twice through
+his right arm, and the weapon fell heavily to the ground.
+
+“Slay him, slay him!” cried several of the clients of the Colonna, now
+pressing, dastard-like, round the disarmed and disabled smith.
+
+“Ay, slay him!” said, in tolerable Italian, but with a barbarous accent,
+one man, half-clad in armour, who had but just joined the group, and who
+was one of those wild German bandits whom the Colonna held in their pay;
+“he belongs to a horrible gang of miscreants sworn against all order
+and peace. He is one of Rienzi’s followers, and, bless the Three Kings!
+raves about the People.”
+
+“Thou sayest right, barbarian,” said the sturdy smith, in a loud voice,
+and tearing aside the vest from his breast with his left hand; “come
+all--Colonna and Orsini--dig to this heart with your sharp blades, and
+when you have reached the centre, you will find there the object of your
+common hatred--‘Rienzi and the People!’”
+
+As he uttered these words, in language that would have seemed above his
+station (if a certain glow and exaggeration of phrase and sentiment were
+not common, when excited, to all the Romans), the loudness of his voice
+rose above the noise immediately round him, and stilled, for an instant,
+the general din; and when, at last, the words, “Rienzi and the People”
+ rang forth, they penetrated midway through the increasing crowd, and
+were answered as by an echo, with a hundred voices--“Rienzi and the
+People!”
+
+But whatever impression the words of the mechanic made on others, it was
+equally visible in the young Colonna. At the name of Rienzi the glow
+of excitement vanished from his cheek; he started back, muttered to
+himself, and for a moment seemed, even in the midst of that stirring
+commotion, to be lost in a moody and distant revery. He recovered, as
+the shout died away; and saying to the smith, in a low tone, “Friend, I
+am sorry for thy wound; but seek me on the morrow, and thou shalt find
+thou hast wronged me;” he beckoned to the German to follow him, and
+threaded his way through the crowd, which generally gave back as he
+advanced. For the bitterest hatred to the order of the nobles was at
+that time in Rome mingled with a servile respect for their persons, and
+a mysterious awe of their uncontrollable power.
+
+As Adrian passed through that part of the crowd in which the fray had
+not yet commenced, the murmurs that followed him were not those which
+many of his race could have heard.
+
+“A Colonna,” said one.
+
+“Yet no ravisher,” said another, laughing wildly.
+
+“Nor murtherer,” muttered a third, pressing his hand to his breast.
+“‘Tis not against him that my father’s blood cries aloud.”
+
+“Bless him,” said a fourth, “for as yet no man curses him!”
+
+“Ah, God help us!” said an old man, with a long grey beard, leaning on
+his staff: “The serpent’s young yet; the fangs will show by and by.”
+
+“For shame, father! he is a comely youth, and not proud in the least.
+What a smile he hath!” quoth a fair matron, who kept on the outskirt of
+the melee.
+
+“Farewell to a man’s honour when a noble smiles on his wife!” was the
+answer.
+
+“Nay,” said Luigi, a jolly butcher, with a roguish eye, “what a man
+can win fairly from maid or wife, that let him do, whether plebeian or
+noble--that’s my morality; but when an ugly old patrician finds fair
+words will not win fair looks, and carries me off a dame on the back of
+a German boar, with a stab in the side for comfort to the spouse,--then,
+I say, he is a wicked man, and an adulterer.”
+
+While such were the comments and the murmurs that followed the noble,
+very different were the looks and words that attended the German
+soldier.
+
+Equally, nay, with even greater promptitude, did the crowd make way at
+his armed and heavy tread; but not with looks of reverence:--the eye
+glared as he approached; but the cheek grew pale--the head bowed--the
+lip quivered; each man felt a shudder of hate and fear, as recognizing
+a dread and mortal foe. And well and wrathfully did the fierce
+mercenary note the signs of the general aversion. He pushed on
+rudely--half-smiling in contempt, half-frowning in revenge, as he looked
+from side to side; and his long, matted, light hair, tawny-coloured
+moustache, and brawny front, contrasted strongly with the dark eyes,
+raven locks, and slender frames of the Italians.
+
+“May Lucifer double damn those German cut-throats!” muttered, between
+his grinded teeth, one of the citizens.
+
+“Amen!” answered, heartily, another.
+
+“Hush!” said a third, timorously looking round; “if one of them hear
+thee, thou art a lost man.”
+
+“Oh, Rome! Rome! to what art thou fallen!” said bitterly one citizen,
+clothed in black, and of a higher seeming than the rest; “when thou
+shudderest in thy streets at the tread of a hired barbarian!”
+
+“Hark to one of our learned men, and rich citizens!” said the butcher,
+reverently.
+
+“‘Tis a friend of Rienzi’s,” quoth another of the group, lifting his
+cap.
+
+With downcast eyes, and a face in which grief, shame, and wrath, were
+visibly expressed, Pandulfo di Guido, a citizen of birth and repute,
+swept slowly through the crowd, and disappeared.
+
+Meanwhile, Adrian, having gained a street which, though in the
+neighbourhood of the crowd, was empty and desolate, turned to his fierce
+comrade. “Rodolf!” said he, “mark!--no violence to the citizens. Return
+to the crowd, collect the friends of our house, withdraw them from the
+scene; let not the Colonna be blamed for this day’s violence; and assure
+our followers, in my name, that I swear, by the knighthood I received at
+the Emperor’s hands, that by my sword shall Martino di Porto be punished
+for his outrage. Fain would I, in person, allay the tumult, but my
+presence only seems to sanction it. Go--thou hast weight with them all.”
+
+“Ay, Signor, the weight of blows!” answered the grim soldier. “But the
+command is hard; I would fain let their puddle-blood flow an hour or
+two longer. Yet, pardon me; in obeying thy orders, do I obey those of my
+master, thy kinsman? It is old Stephen Colonna--who seldom spares blood
+or treasure, God bless him--(save his own!)--whose money I hold, and to
+whose hests I am sworn.”
+
+“Diavolo!” muttered the cavalier, and the angry spot was on his cheek;
+but, with the habitual self-control of the Italian nobles, he smothered
+his rising choler, and said aloud, with calmness, but dignity--
+
+“Do as I bid thee; check this tumult--make us the forbearing party.
+Let all be still within one hour hence, and call on me tomorrow for thy
+reward; be this purse an earnest of my future thanks. As for my kinsman,
+whom I command thee to name more reverently, ‘tis in his name I speak.
+Hark! the din increases--the contest swells--go--lose not another
+moment.”
+
+Somewhat awed by the quiet firmness of the patrician, Rodolf nodded,
+without answer, slid the money into his bosom, and stalked away into the
+thickest of the throng. But, even ere he arrived, a sudden reaction had
+taken place.
+
+The young cavalier, left alone in that spot, followed with his eyes the
+receding form of the mercenary, as the sun, now setting, shone slant
+upon his glittering casque, and said bitterly to himself--“Unfortunate
+city, fountain of all mighty memories--fallen queen of a thousand
+nations--how art thou decrowned and spoiled by thy recreant and apostate
+children! Thy nobles divided against themselves--thy people cursing thy
+nobles--thy priests, who should sow peace, planting discord--the father
+of thy church deserting thy stately walls, his home a refuge, his mitre
+a fief, his court a Gallic village--and we! we, of the haughtiest
+blood of Rome--we, the sons of Caesars, and of the lineage of demigods,
+guarding an insolent and abhorred state by the swords of hirelings, who
+mock our cowardice while they receive our pay--who keep our citizens
+slaves, and lord it over their very masters in return! Oh, that we, the
+hereditary chiefs of Rome, could but feel--oh, that we could but find,
+our only legitimate safeguard in the grateful hearts of our countrymen!”
+
+So deeply did the young Adrian feel the galling truth of all he uttered,
+that the indignant tears rolled down his cheeks as he spoke. He felt no
+shame as he dashed them away; for that weakness which weeps for a fallen
+race, is the tenderness not of women but of angels.
+
+As he turned slowly to quit the spot, his steps were suddenly arrested
+by a loud shout: “Rienzi! Rienzi!” smote the air. From the walls of the
+Capitol to the bed of the glittering Tiber, that name echoed far and
+wide; and, as the shout died away, it was swallowed up in a silence so
+profound, so universal, so breathless, that you might have imagined that
+death itself had fallen over the city. And now, at the extreme end of
+the crowd, and elevated above their level, on vast fragments of stone
+which had been dragged from the ruins of Rome in one of the late
+frequent tumults between contending factions, to serve as a barricade
+for citizens against citizens,--on these silent memorials of the past
+grandeur, the present misery, of Rome, stood that extraordinary man,
+who, above all his race, was the most penetrated with the glories of the
+one time, with the degradation of the other.
+
+From the distance at which he stood from the scene, Adrian could only
+distinguish the dark outline of Rienzi’s form; he could only hear the
+faint sound of his mighty voice; he could only perceive, in the subdued
+yet waving sea of human beings that spread around, their heads bared
+in the last rays of the sun, the unutterable effect which an eloquence,
+described by contemporaries almost as miraculous,--but in reality
+less so from the genius of the man than the sympathy of the
+audience,--created in all, who drank into their hearts and souls the
+stream of its burning thoughts.
+
+It was but for a short time that that form was visible to the earnest
+eye, that that voice at intervals reached the straining ear, of Adrian
+di Castello; but that time sufficed to produce all the effect which
+Adrian himself had desired.
+
+Another shout, more earnest, more prolonged than the first--a shout,
+in which spoke the release of swelling thoughts, of intense
+excitement--betokened the close of the harangue; and then you might
+see, after a minute’s pause, the crowd breaking in all directions, and
+pouring down the avenues in various knots and groups, each testifying
+the strong and lasting impression made upon the multitude by that
+address. Every cheek was flushed--every tongue spoke: the animation of
+the orator had passed, like a living spirit, into the breasts of the
+audience. He had thundered against the disorders of the patricians, yet,
+by a word, he had disarmed the anger of the plebeians--he had preached
+freedom, yet he had opposed licence. He had calmed the present, by a
+promise of the future. He had chid their quarrels, yet had supported
+their cause. He had mastered the revenge of today, by a solemn assurance
+that there should come justice for the morrow. So great may be the
+power, so mighty the eloquence, so formidable the genius, of one
+man,--without arms, without rank, without sword or ermine, who addresses
+himself to a people that is oppressed!
+
+
+
+Chapter 1.IV. An Adventure.
+
+Avoiding the broken streams of the dispersed crowd, Adrian Colonna
+strode rapidly down one of the narrow streets leading to his palace,
+which was situated at no inconsiderable distance from the place in which
+the late contest had occurred. The education of his life made him feel
+a profound interest, not only in the divisions and disputes of his
+country, but also in the scene he had just witnessed, and the authority
+exercised by Rienzi.
+
+An orphan of a younger, but opulent branch of the Colonna, Adrian had
+been brought up under the care and guardianship of his kinsman, that
+astute, yet valiant Stephen Colonna, who, of all the nobles of Rome, was
+the most powerful, alike from the favour of the pope, and the number
+of armed hirelings whom his wealth enabled him to maintain. Adrian
+had early manifested what in that age was considered an extraordinary
+disposition towards intellectual pursuits, and had acquired much of
+the little that was then known of the ancient language and the ancient
+history of his country.
+
+Though Adrian was but a boy at the time in which, first presented to the
+reader, he witnessed the emotions of Rienzi at the death of his brother,
+his kind heart had been penetrated with sympathy for Cola’s affliction,
+and shame for the apathy of his kinsmen at the result of their own
+feuds. He had earnestly sought the friendship of Rienzi, and, despite
+his years, had become aware of the power and energy of his character.
+But though Rienzi, after a short time, had appeared to think no more of
+his brother’s death--though he again entered the halls of the Colonna,
+and shared their disdainful hospitalities, he maintained a certain
+distance and reserve of manner, which even Adrian could only partially
+overcome. He rejected every offer of service, favour, or promotion; and
+any unwonted proof of kindness from Adrian seemed, instead of making him
+more familiar, to offend him into colder distance. The easy humour and
+conversational vivacity which had first rendered him a welcome guest
+with those who passed their lives between fighting and feasting, had
+changed into a vein ironical, cynical, and severe. But the dull barons
+were equally amused at his wit, and Adrian was almost the only one who
+detected the serpent couched beneath the smile.
+
+Often Rienzi sat at the feast, silent, but observant, as if watching
+every look, weighing every word, taking gauge and measurement of the
+intellect, policy, temperament, of every guest; and when he had seemed
+to satisfy himself, his spirits would rise, his words flow, and
+while his dazzling but bitter wit lit up the revel, none saw that the
+unmirthful flash was the token of the coming storm. But all the while,
+he neglected no occasion to mix with the humbler citizens, to stir up
+their minds, to inflame their imaginations, to kindle their emulation,
+with pictures of the present and with legends of the past. He grew in
+popularity and repute, and was yet more in power with the herd, because
+in favour with the nobles. Perhaps it was for that reason that he had
+continued the guest of the Colonna.
+
+When, six years before the present date, the Capitol of the Caesars
+witnessed the triumph of Petrarch, the scholastic fame of the young
+Rienzi had attracted the friendship of the poet,--a friendship that
+continued, with slight interruption, to the last, through careers
+so widely different; and afterwards, one among the Roman Deputies to
+Avignon, he had been conjoined with Petrarch (According to the modern
+historians; but it seems more probable that Rienzi’s mission to Avignon
+was posterior to that of Petrarch. However this be, it was at Avignon
+that Petrarch and Rienzi became most intimate, as Petrarch himself
+observes in one of his letters.) to supplicate Clement VI. to remove
+the Holy See from Avignon to Rome. It was in this mission that, for
+the first time, he evinced his extraordinary powers of eloquence and
+persuasion. The pontiff, indeed, more desirous of ease than glory, was
+not convinced by the arguments, but he was enchanted with the pleader;
+and Rienzi returned to Rome, loaded with honours, and clothed with the
+dignity of high and responsible office. No longer the inactive scholar,
+the gay companion, he rose at once to pre-eminence above all his
+fellow-citizens. Never before had authority been borne with so austere
+an integrity, so uncorrupt a zeal. He had sought to impregnate his
+colleagues with the same loftiness of principle--he had failed. Now
+secure in his footing, he had begun openly to appeal to the people; and
+already a new spirit seemed to animate the populace of Rome.
+
+While these were the fortunes of Rienzi, Adrian had been long separated
+from him, and absent from Rome.
+
+The Colonna were staunch supporters of the imperial party, and Adrian di
+Castello had received and obeyed an invitation to the Emperor’s court.
+Under that monarch he had initiated himself in arms, and, among the
+knights of Germany, he had learned to temper the natural Italian
+shrewdness with the chivalry of northern valour.
+
+In leaving Bavaria, he had sojourned a short time in the solitude of one
+of his estates by the fairest lake of northern Italy; and thence, with
+a mind improved alike by action and study, had visited many of the free
+Italian states, imbibed sentiments less prejudiced than those of his
+order, and acquired an early reputation for himself while inly marking
+the characters and deeds of others. In him, the best qualities of the
+Italian noble were united. Passionately addicted to the cultivation
+of letters, subtle and profound in policy, gentle and bland of manner,
+dignifying a love of pleasure with a certain elevation of taste, he yet
+possessed a gallantry of conduct, and purity of honour, and an
+aversion from cruelty, which were then very rarely found in the Italian
+temperament, and which even the Chivalry of the North, while maintaining
+among themselves, usually abandoned the moment they came into contact
+with the systematic craft and disdain of honesty, which made the
+character of the ferocious, yet wily, South. With these qualities he
+combined, indeed, the softer passions of his countrymen,--he adored
+Beauty, and he made a deity of Love.
+
+He had but a few weeks returned to his native city, whither his
+reputation had already preceded him, and where his early affection for
+letters and gentleness of bearing were still remembered. He returned to
+find the position of Rienzi far more altered than his own. Adrian had
+not yet sought the scholar. He wished first to judge with his own eyes,
+and at a distance, of the motives and object of his conduct; for partly
+he caught the suspicions which his own order entertained of Rienzi, and
+partly he shared in the trustful enthusiasm of the people.
+
+“Certainly,” said he now to himself, as he walked musingly onward,
+“certainly, no man has it more in his power to reform our diseased
+state, to heal our divisions, to awaken our citizens to the
+recollections of ancestral virtue. But that very power, how dangerous
+is it! Have I not seen, in the free states of Italy, men, called into
+authority for the sake of preserving the people, honest themselves at
+first, and then, drunk with the sudden rank, betraying the very cause
+which had exalted them? True, those men were chiefs and nobles; but are
+plebeians less human? Howbeit I have heard and seen enough from afar,--I
+will now approach, and examine the man himself.”
+
+While thus soliloquizing, Adrian but little noted the various
+passengers, who, more and more rarely as the evening waned, hastened
+homeward. Among these were two females, who now alone shared with Adrian
+the long and gloomy street into which he had entered. The moon was
+already bright in the heavens, and, as the women passed the cavalier
+with a light and quick step, the younger one turned back and regarded
+him by the clear light with an eager, yet timid glance.
+
+“Why dost thou tremble, my pretty one!” said her companion, who might
+have told some five-and-forty years, and whose garb and voice bespoke
+her of inferior rank to the younger female. “The streets seem quiet
+enough now, and, the Virgin be praised! we are not so far from home
+either.”
+
+“Oh, Benedetta, it is he! it is the young signor--it is Adrian!”
+
+“That is fortunate,” said the nurse, for such was her condition, “since
+they say he is as bold as a Northman: and as the Palazzo Colonna is not
+very far from hence, we shall be within reach of his aid should we want
+it: that is to say, sweet one, if you will walk a little slower than you
+have yet done.”
+
+The young lady slackened her pace, and sighed.
+
+“He is certainly very handsome,” quoth the nurse: “but thou must not
+think more of him; he is too far above thee for marriage, and for aught
+else, thou art too honest, and thy brother too proud--”
+
+“And thou, Benedetta, art too quick with thy tongue. How canst thou talk
+thus, when thou knowest he hath never, since, at least, I was a mere
+child, even addressed me: nay, he scarce knows of my very existence. He,
+the Lord Adrian di Castello, dream of the poor Irene! The mere thought
+is madness!”
+
+“Then why,” said the nurse, briskly, “dost thou dream of him?”
+
+Her companion sighed again more deeply than at first.
+
+“Holy St. Catherine!” continued Benedetta, “if there were but one man in
+the world, I would die single ere I would think of him, until, at least,
+he had kissed my hand twice, and left it my own fault if it were not my
+lips instead.”
+
+The young lady still replied not.
+
+“But how didst thou contrive to love him?” asked the nurse. “Thou canst
+not have seen him very often: it is but some four or five weeks since
+his return to Rome.”
+
+“Oh, how dull art thou?” answered the fair Irene. “Have I not told thee
+again and again, that I loved him six years ago?”
+
+“When thou hadst told but thy tenth year, and a doll would have been thy
+most suitable lover! As I am a Christian, Signora, thou hast made good
+use of thy time.
+
+“And during his absence,” continued the girl, fondly, yet sadly, “did
+I not hear him spoken of, and was not the mere sound of his name like a
+love-gift that bade me remember? And when they praised him, have I not
+rejoiced? and when they blamed him, have I not resented? and when they
+said that his lance was victorious in the tourney, did I not weep with
+pride? and when they whispered that his vows were welcome in the bower,
+wept I not as fervently with grief? Have not the six years of his
+absence been a dream, and was not his return a waking into light--a
+morning of glory and the sun? and I see him now in the church when he
+wots not of me; and on his happy steed as he passes by my lattice: and
+is not that enough of happiness for love?”
+
+“But if he loves not thee?”
+
+“Fool! I ask not that;--nay, I know not if I wish it. Perhaps I would
+rather dream of him, such as I would have him, than know him for what
+he is. He might be unkind, or ungenerous, or love me but little; rather
+would I not be loved at all, than loved coldly, and eat away my heart by
+comparing it with his. I can love him now as something abstract, unreal,
+and divine: but what would be my shame, my grief, if I were to find him
+less than I have imagined! Then, indeed, my life would have been wasted;
+then, indeed, the beauty of the earth would be gone!”
+
+The good nurse was not very capable of sympathizing with sentiments like
+these. Even had their characters been more alike, their disparity of age
+would have rendered such sympathy impossible. What but youth can echo
+back the soul of youth--all the music of its wild vanities and romantic
+follies? The good nurse did not sympathize with the sentiments of her
+young lady, but she sympathised with the deep earnestness with which
+they were expressed. She thought it wondrous silly, but wondrous moving;
+she wiped her eyes with the corner of her veil, and hoped in her secret
+heart that her young charge would soon get a real husband to put such
+unsubstantial fantasies out of her head. There was a short pause in
+their conversation, when, just where two streets crossed one another,
+there was heard a loud noise of laughing voices and trampling feet.
+Torches were seen on high affronting the pale light of the moon; and,
+at a very short distance from the two females, in the cross street,
+advanced a company of seven or eight men, bearing, as seen by the red
+light of the torches, the formidable badge of the Orsini.
+
+Amidst the other disorders of the time, it was no unfrequent custom
+for the younger or more dissolute of the nobles, in small and armed
+companies, to parade the streets at night, seeking occasion for a
+licentious gallantry among the cowering citizens, or a skirmish at arms
+with some rival stragglers of their own order. Such a band had Irene and
+her companion now chanced to encounter.
+
+“Holy mother!” cried Benedetta, turning pale, and half running, “what
+curse has befallen us? How could we have been so foolish as to tarry so
+late at the lady Nina’s! Run, Signora,--run, or we shall fall into their
+hands!”
+
+But the advice of Benedetta came too late,--the fluttering garments
+of the women had been already descried: in a moment more they were
+surrounded by the marauders. A rude hand tore aside Benedetta’s veil,
+and at sight of features, which, if time had not spared, it could never
+very materially injure, the rough aggressor cast the poor nurse against
+the wall with a curse, which was echoed by a loud laugh from his
+comrades.
+
+“Thou hast a fine fortune in faces Giuseppe!”
+
+“Yes; it was but the other day that he seized on a girl of sixty.”
+
+“And then, by way of improving her beauty, cut her across the face with
+his dagger, because she was not sixteen!”
+
+“Hush, fellows! whom have we here?” said the chief of the party, a man
+richly dressed, and who, though bordering upon middle age, had only
+the more accustomed himself to the excesses of youth; as he spoke,
+he snatched the trembling Irene from the grasp of his followers. “Ho,
+there! the torches! Oh che bella faccia! what blushes--what eyes!--nay,
+look not down, pretty one; thou needst not be ashamed to win the love
+of an Orsini--yes; know the triumph thou hast achieved--it is Martino di
+Porto who bids thee smile upon him!”
+
+“For the blest Mother’s sake release me! Nay, sir, this must not be--I
+am not unfriended--this insult shall not pass!”
+
+“Hark to her silver chiding; it is better than my best hound’s bay!
+This adventure is worth a month’s watching. What! will you not
+come?--restive--shrieks too!--Francesco, Pietro, ye are the gentlest of
+the band. Wrap her veil around her,--muffle this music;--so! bear her
+before me to the palace, and tomorrow, sweet one, thou shalt go home
+with a basket of florins which thou mayest say thou hast bought at
+market.”
+
+But Irene’s shrieks, Irene’s struggles, had already brought succour to
+her side, and, as Adrian approached the spot, the nurse flung herself on
+her knees before him.
+
+“Oh, sweet signor, for Christ’s grace save us! Deliver my young
+mistress--her friends love you well! We are all for the Colonna,
+my lord; yes, indeed, all for the Colonna! Save the kin of your own
+clients, gracious signor!”
+
+“It is enough that she is a woman,” answered Adrian, adding, between his
+teeth, “and that an Orsini is her assailant.” He strode haughtily into
+the thickest of the group; the servitors laid hands on their swords, but
+gave way before him as they recognised his person; he reached the two
+men who had already seized Irene; in one moment he struck the foremost
+to the ground, in another, he had passed his left arm round the light
+and slender form of the maiden, and stood confronting the Orsini with
+his drawn blade, which, however, he pointed to the ground.
+
+“For shame, my lord--for shame!” said he, indignantly. “Will you force
+Rome to rise, to a man, against our order? Vex not too far the lion,
+chained though he be; war against us if ye will! draw your blades upon
+men, though they be of your own race, and speak your own tongue: but
+if ye would sleep at nights, and not dread the avenger’s gripe,--if ye
+would walk the market-place secure,--wrong not a Roman woman! Yes, the
+very walls around us preach to you the punishment of such a deed: for
+that offence fell the Tarquins,--for that offence were swept away the
+Decemvirs,--for that offence, if ye rush upon it, the blood of your
+whole house may flow like water. Cease, then, my lord, from this mad
+attempt, so unworthy your great name; cease, and thank even a Colonna
+that he has come between you and a moment’s frenzy!”
+
+So noble, so lofty were the air and gesture of Adrian, as he thus
+spoke, that even the rude servitors felt a thrill of approbation and
+remorse--not so Martino di Porto. He had been struck with the beauty of
+the prey thus suddenly snatched from him; he had been accustomed to
+long outrage and to long impunity; the very sight, the very voice of a
+Colonna, was a blight to his eye and a discord to his ear: what, then,
+when a Colonna interfered with his lusts, and rebuked his vices?
+
+“Pedant!” he cried, with quivering lips, “prate not to me of thy vain
+legends and gossip’s tales! think not to snatch from me my possession
+in another, when thine own life is in my hands. Unhand the maiden! throw
+down thy sword! return home without further parley, or, by my faith, and
+the blades of my followers--(look at them well!)--thou diest!”
+
+“Signor,” said Adrian, calmly, yet while he spoke he retreated gradually
+with his fair burthen towards the neighbouring wall, so as at least to
+leave only his front exposed to those fearful odds: “Thou will not so
+misuse the present chances, and wrong thyself in men’s mouths, as to
+attack with eight swords even thy hereditary foe, thus cumbered, too, as
+he is. But--nay hold!--if thou art so proposed, bethink thee well, one
+cry of my voice would soon turn the odds against thee. Thou art now in
+the quarter of my tribe; thou art surrounded by the habitations of the
+Colonna: yon palace swarms with men who sleep not, save with harness
+on their backs; men whom my voice can reach even now, but from whom, if
+they once taste of blood, it could not save thee!”
+
+“He speaks true, noble Lord,” said one of the band: “we have wandered
+too far out of our beat; we are in their very den; the palace of old
+Stephen Colonna is within call; and, to my knowledge,” added he, in
+a whisper, “eighteen fresh men-of-arms--ay, and Northmen too--marched
+through its gates this day.”
+
+“Were there eight hundred men at arm’s length,” answered Martino
+furiously, “I would not be thus bearded amidst mine own train! Away with
+yon woman! To the attack! to the attack!”
+
+Thus saying, he made a desperate lunge at Adrian, who, having kept his
+eye cautiously on the movements of his enemy, was not unprepared for the
+assault. As he put aside the blade with his own, he shouted with a loud
+voice--“Colonna! to the rescue, Colonna!”
+
+Nor had it been without an ulterior object that the acute and
+self-controlling mind of Adrian had hitherto sought to prolong the
+parley. Even as he first addressed Orsini, he had perceived, by the
+moonlight, the glitter of armour upon two men advancing from the far end
+of the street, and judged at once, by the neighbourhood, that they must
+be among the mercenaries of the Colonna.
+
+Gently he suffered the form of Irene, which now, for she had swooned
+with the terror, pressed too heavily upon him, to slide from his left
+arm, and standing over her form, while sheltered from behind by the wall
+which he had so warily gained, he contented himself with parrying the
+blows hastily aimed at him, without attempting to retaliate. Few of the
+Romans, however accustomed to such desultory warfare, were then well
+and dexterously practised in the use of arms; and the science Adrian had
+acquired in the schools of the martial north, befriended him now, even
+against such odds. It is true, indeed, that the followers of Orsini did
+not share the fury of their lord; partly afraid of the consequence to
+themselves should the blood of so highborn a signor be spilt by their
+hands, partly embarrassed with the apprehension that they should see
+themselves suddenly beset with the ruthless hirelings so close within
+hearing, they struck but aimless and random blows, looking every moment
+behind and aside, and rather prepared for flight than slaughter. Echoing
+the cry of “Colonna,” poor Benedetta fled at the first clash of swords.
+She ran down the dreary street still shrieking that cry, and passed the
+very portals of Stephen’s palace (where some grim forms yet loitered)
+without arresting her steps there, so great were her confusion and
+terror.
+
+Meanwhile, the two armed men, whom Adrian had descried, proceeded
+leisurely up the street. The one was of a rude and common mould, his
+arms and his complexion testified his calling and race; and by the great
+respect he paid to his companion, it was evident that that companion was
+no native of Italy. For the brigands of the north, while they served the
+vices of the southern, scarce affected to disguise their contempt for
+his cowardice.
+
+The companion of the brigand was a man of a martial, yet easy air. He
+wore no helmet, but a cap of crimson velvet, set off with a white plume;
+on his mantle, or surcoat, which was of scarlet, was wrought a broad
+white cross, both at back and breast; and so brilliant was the polish
+of his corselet, that, as from time to time the mantle waved aside and
+exposed it to the moonbeams, it glittered like light itself.
+
+“Nay, Rodolf,” said he, “if thou hast so good a lot of it here with that
+hoary schemer, Heaven forbid that I should wish to draw thee back again
+to our merry band. But tell me--this Rienzi--thinkest thou he has any
+solid and formidable power?”
+
+“Pshaw! noble chieftain, not a whit of it. He pleases the mob; but as
+for the nobles, they laugh at him; and, as for the soldiers, he has no
+money!”
+
+“He pleases the mob, then!”
+
+“Ay, that doth he; and when he speaks aloud to them, all the roar of
+Rome is hushed.”
+
+“Humph!--when nobles are hated, and soldiers are bought, a mob may, in
+any hour, become the master. An honest people and a weak mob,--a corrupt
+people and a strong mob,” said the other, rather to himself than to
+his comrade, and scarce, perhaps, conscious of the eternal truth of his
+aphorism. “He is no mere brawler, this Rienzi, I suspect--I must see to
+it. Hark! what noise is that? By the Holy Sepulchre, it is the ring of
+our own metal!”
+
+“And that cry--‘a Colonna!’” exclaimed Rodolf. “Pardon me, master,--I
+must away to the rescue!”
+
+“Ay, it is the duty of thy hire; run;--yet stay, I will accompany thee,
+gratis for once, and from pure passion for mischief. By this hand, there
+is no music like clashing steel!”
+
+Still Adrian continued gallantly and unwounded to defend himself, though
+his arm now grew tired, his breath well-nigh spent, and his eyes began
+to wink and reel beneath the glare of the tossing torches. Orsini
+himself, exhausted by his fury, had paused for an instant, fronting
+his foe with a heaving breast and savage looks, when, suddenly,
+his followers exclaimed, “Fly! fly!--the bandits approach--we are
+surrounded!”--and two of the servitors, without further parley, took
+fairly to their heels. The other five remained irresolute, and waiting
+but the command of their master, when he of the white plume, whom I have
+just described, thrust himself into the melee.
+
+“What! gentles,” said he, “have ye finished already? Nay, let us not
+mar the sport; begin again, I beseech you. What are the odds? Ho! six
+to one!--nay, no wonder that ye have waited for fairer play. See, we two
+will take the weaker side. Now then, let us begin again.”
+
+“Insolent!” cried the Orsini. “Knowest thou him whom thou addressest
+thus arrogantly?--I am Martino di Porto. Who art thou?”
+
+“Walter de Montreal, gentleman of Provence, and Knight of St. John!”
+ answered the other, carelessly.
+
+At that redoubted name--the name of one of the boldest warriors, and of
+the most accomplished freebooter of his time--even Martino’s cheek grew
+pale, and his followers uttered a cry of terror.
+
+“And this, my comrade,” continued the Knight, “for we may as well
+complete the introduction, is probably better known to you than I am,
+gentles of Rome; and you doubtless recognize in him Rodolf of Saxony, a
+brave man and a true, where he is properly paid for his services.”
+
+“Signor,” said Adrian to his enemy, who, aghast and dumb, remained
+staring vacantly at the two new-comers, “you are now in my power. See,
+our own people, too, are approaching.”
+
+And, indeed, from the palace of Stephen Colonna, torches began to blaze,
+and armed men were seen rapidly advancing to the spot.
+
+“Go home in peace, and if, tomorrow, or any day more suitable to thee,
+thou wilt meet me alone, and lance to lance, as is the wont of the
+knights of the empire; or with band to band, and man for man, as is
+rather the Roman custom; I will not fail thee--there is my gage.”
+
+“Nobly spoken,” said Montreal; “and, if ye choose the latter, by your
+leave, I will be one of the party.”
+
+Martino answered not; he took up the glove, thrust it in his bosom, and
+strode hastily away; only, when he had got some paces down the street,
+he turned back, and, shaking his clenched hand at Adrian, exclaimed, in
+a voice trembling with impotent rage--“Faithful to death!”
+
+The words made one of the mottoes of the Orsini; and, whatever its
+earlier signification, had long passed into a current proverb, to
+signify their hatred to the Colonna.
+
+Adrian, now engaged in raising, and attempting to revive Irene, who was
+still insensible, disdainfully left it to Montreal to reply.
+
+“I doubt not, Signor,” said the latter, coolly, “that thou wilt be
+faithful to Death: for Death, God wot, is the only contract which men,
+however ingenious, are unable to break or evade.”
+
+“Pardon me, gentle Knight,” said Adrian, looking up from his charge, “if
+I do not yet give myself wholly to gratitude. I have learned enough of
+knighthood to feel thou wilt acknowledge that my first duty is here--”
+
+“Oh, a lady, then, was the cause of the quarrel! I need not ask who
+was in the right, when a man brings to the rivalry such odds as yon
+caitiff.”
+
+“Thou mistakest a little, Sir Knight,--it is but a lamb I have rescued
+from the wolf.”
+
+“For thy own table! Be it so!” returned the Knight, gaily.
+
+Adrian smiled gravely, and shook his head in denial. In truth, he was
+somewhat embarrassed by his situation. Though habitually gallant, he was
+not willing to expose to misconstruction the disinterestedness of his
+late conduct, and (for it was his policy to conciliate popularity) to
+sully the credit which his bravery would give him among the citizens,
+by conveying Irene (whose beauty, too, as yet, he had scarcely noted)
+to his own dwelling; and yet, in her present situation, there was no
+alternative. She evinced no sign of life. He knew not her home, nor
+parentage. Benedetta had vanished. He could not leave her in the
+streets; he could not resign her to the care of another; and, as she lay
+now upon his breast, he felt her already endeared to him, by that sense
+of protection which is so grateful to the human heart. He briefly,
+therefore, explained to those now gathered round him, his present
+situation, and the cause of the past conflict; and bade the
+torch-bearers precede him to his home.
+
+“You, Sir Knight,” added he, turning to Montreal, “if not already more
+pleasantly lodged, will, I trust, deign to be my guest?”
+
+“Thanks, Signor,” answered Montreal, maliciously, “but I, also, perhaps,
+have my own affairs to watch over. Adieu! I shall seek you at the
+earliest occasion. Fair night, and gentle dreams!
+
+
+  ‘Robers Bertrams qui estoit tors Mais a ceval estoit mult fors
+  Cil avoit o lui grans effors Multi ot ‘homes per lui mors.’”
+
+     (“An ill-favoured man, but a stout horseman, was Robert
+     Bertram. Great deeds were his, and many a man died by his
+     hand.”)
+
+
+And, muttering this rugged chant from the old “Roman de Rou,” the
+Provencal, followed by Rodolf, pursued his way.
+
+The vast extent of Rome, and the thinness of its population, left many
+of the streets utterly deserted. The principal nobles were thus
+enabled to possess themselves of a wide range of buildings, which they
+fortified, partly against each other, partly against the people; their
+numerous relatives and clients lived around them, forming, as it were,
+petty courts and cities in themselves.
+
+Almost opposite to the principal palace of the Colonna (occupied by his
+powerful kinsman, Stephen) was the mansion of Adrian. Heavily swung back
+the massive gates at his approach; he ascended the broad staircase, and
+bore his charge into an apartment which his tastes had decorated in a
+fashion not as yet common in that age. Ancient statues and busts were
+arranged around; the pictured arras of Lombardy decorated the walls, and
+covered the massive seats.
+
+“What ho! Lights here, and wine!” cried the Seneschal.
+
+“Leave us alone,” said Adrian, gazing passionately on the pale cheek of
+Irene, as he now, by the clear light, beheld all its beauty; and a sweet
+yet burning hope crept into his heart.
+
+
+
+Chapter 1.V. The Description of a Conspirator, and the Dawn of the
+Conspiracy.
+
+Alone, by a table covered with various papers, sat a man in the prime
+of life. The chamber was low and long; many antique and disfigured
+bas-reliefs and torsos were placed around the wall, interspersed, here
+and there, with the short sword and close casque, time-worn relics of
+the prowess of ancient Rome. Right above the table at which he sate, the
+moonlight streamed through a high and narrow casement, deep sunk in the
+massy wall. In a niche to the right of this window, guarded by a sliding
+door, which was now partially drawn aside--but which, by its solid
+substance, and the sheet of iron with which it was plated, testified how
+valuable, in the eyes of the owner, was the treasure it protected--were
+ranged some thirty or forty volumes, then deemed no inconsiderable
+library; and being, for the most part, the laborious copies in
+manuscript by the hand of the owner, from immortal originals.
+
+Leaning his cheek on his hand, his brow somewhat knit, his lip slightly
+compressed, that personage, indulged in meditations far other than the
+indolent dreams of scholars. As the high and still moonlight shone upon
+his countenance, it gave an additional and solemn dignity to features
+which were naturally of a grave and majestic cast. Thick and auburn
+hair, the colour of which, not common to the Romans, was ascribed to his
+descent from the Teuton emperor, clustered in large curls above a high
+and expansive forehead; and even the present thoughtful compression of
+the brow could not mar the aspect of latent power, which it derived from
+that great breadth between the eyes, in which the Grecian sculptors of
+old so admirably conveyed the expression of authority, and the silent
+energy of command. But his features were not cast in the Grecian, still
+less in the Teuton mould. The iron jaw, the aquiline nose, the somewhat
+sunken cheek, strikingly recalled the character of the hard Roman
+race, and might not inaptly have suggested to a painter a model for the
+younger Brutus.
+
+The marked outline of the face, and the short, firm upper lip, were not
+concealed by the beard and mustachios usually then worn; and, in the
+faded portrait of the person now described, still extant at Rome, may
+be traced a certain resemblance to the popular pictures of Napoleon;
+not indeed in the features, which are more stern and prominent in the
+portrait of the Roman, but in that peculiar expression of concentrated
+and tranquil power which so nearly realizes the ideal of intellectual
+majesty. Though still young, the personal advantages most peculiar to
+youth,--the bloom and glow, the rounded cheek in which care has not yet
+ploughed its lines, the full unsunken eye, and the slender delicacy of
+frame,--these were not the characteristics of that solitary student.
+And, though considered by his contemporaries as eminently handsome, the
+judgment was probably formed less from the more vulgar claims to such
+distinction, than from the height of the stature, an advantage at that
+time more esteemed than at present, and that nobler order of beauty
+which cultivated genius and commanding character usually stamp upon even
+homely features;--the more rare in an age so rugged.
+
+The character of Rienzi (for the youth presented to the reader in the
+first chapter of this history is now again before him in maturer years)
+had acquired greater hardness and energy with each stepping-stone
+to power. There was a circumstance attendant on his birth which had,
+probably, exercised great and early influence on his ambition. Though
+his parents were in humble circumstances, and of lowly calling, his
+father was the natural son of the Emperor, Henry VII.; (De Sade supposes
+that the mother of Rienzi was the daughter of an illegitimate son of
+Henry VII., supporting his opinion from a MS. in the Vatican. But,
+according to the contemporaneous biographer, Rienzi, in addressing
+Charles, king of Bohemia claims the relationship from his father “Di
+vostro legnaggio sono--figlio di bastardo d’Enrico imperatore,” &c. A
+more recent writer, il Padre Gabrini, cites an inscription in support of
+this descent: “Nicolaus Tribunus...Laurentii Teutonici Filius,” &c.)
+and it was the pride of the parents that probably gave to Rienzi
+the unwonted advantages of education. This pride transmitted to
+himself,--his descent from royalty dinned into his ear, infused into his
+thoughts, from his cradle,--made him, even in his earliest youth, deem
+himself the equal of the Roman signors, and half unconsciously aspire
+to be their superior. But, as the literature of Rome was unfolded to
+his eager eye and ambitious heart, he became imbued with that pride of
+country which is nobler than the pride of birth; and, save when stung by
+allusions to his origin, he unaffectedly valued himself more on being
+a Roman plebeian than the descendant of a Teuton king. His brother’s
+death, and the vicissitudes he himself had already undergone, deepened
+the earnest and solemn qualities of his character; and, at length, all
+the faculties of a very uncommon intellect were concentrated into one
+object--which borrowed from a mind strongly and mystically religious,
+as well as patriotic, a sacred aspect, and grew at once a duty and a
+passion.
+
+“Yes,” said Rienzi, breaking suddenly from his revery, “yes, the day
+is at hand when Rome shall rise again from her ashes; Justice shall
+dethrone Oppression; men shall walk safe in their ancient Forum. We will
+rouse from his forgotten tomb the indomitable soul of Cato! There shall
+be a people once more in Rome! And I--I shall be the instrument of that
+triumph--the restorer of my race! mine shall be the first voice to swell
+the battle-cry of freedom--mine the first hand to rear her banner--yes,
+from the height of my own soul as from a mountain, I see already rising
+the liberties and the grandeur of the New Rome; and on the corner-stone
+of the mighty fabric posterity shall read my name.”
+
+Uttering these lofty boasts, the whole person of the speaker seemed
+instinct with his ambition. He strode the gloomy chamber with light and
+rapid steps, as if on air; his breast heaved, his eyes glowed. He felt
+that love itself can scarcely bestow a rapture equal to that which is
+felt, in his first virgin enthusiasm, by a patriot who knows himself
+sincere!
+
+There was a slight knock at the door, and a servitor, in the rich
+liveries worn by the pope’s officials, (Not the present hideous
+habiliments, which are said to have been the invention of Michael
+Angelo.) presented himself.
+
+“Signor,” said he, “my Lord, the Bishop of Orvietto, is without.”
+
+“Ha! that is fortunate. Lights there!--My Lord, this is an honour which
+I can estimate better than express.”
+
+“Tut, tut! my good friend,” said the Bishop, entering, and seating
+himself familiarly, “no ceremonies between the servants of the Church;
+and never, I ween well, had she greater need of true friends than now.
+These unholy tumults, these licentious contentions, in the very shrines
+and city of St. Peter, are sufficient to scandalize all Christendom.”
+
+“And so will it be,” said Rienzi, “until his Holiness himself shall
+be graciously persuaded to fix his residence in the seat of his
+predecessors, and curb with a strong arm the excesses of the nobles.”
+
+“Alas, man!” said the Bishop, “thou knowest that these words are but as
+wind; for were the Pope to fulfil thy wishes, and remove from Avignon to
+Rome, by the blood of St. Peter! he would not curb the nobles, but
+the nobles would curb him. Thou knowest well that until his blessed
+predecessor, of pious memory, conceived the wise design of escaping
+to Avignon, the Father of the Christian world was but like many other
+fathers in their old age, controlled and guarded by his rebellious
+children. Recollectest thou not how the noble Boniface himself, a man of
+great heart, and nerves of iron, was kept in thraldom by the ancestors
+of the Orsini--his entrances and exits made but at their will--so that,
+like a caged eagle, he beat himself against his bars and died? Verily,
+thou talkest of the memories of Rome--these are not the memories that
+are very attractive to popes.”
+
+“Well,” said Rienzi, laughing gently, and drawing his seat nearer to the
+Bishop’s, “my Lord has certainly the best of the argument at present;
+and I must own, that strong, licentious, and unhallowed as the order of
+nobility was then, it is yet more so now.”
+
+“Even I,” rejoined Raimond, colouring as he spoke, “though Vicar of the
+Pope, and representative of his spiritual authority, was, but three days
+ago, subjected to a coarse affront from that very Stephen Colonna, who
+has ever received such favour and tenderness from the Holy See. His
+servitors jostled mine in the open streets, and I myself,--I, the
+delegate of the sire of kings--was forced to draw aside to the wall,
+and wait until the hoary insolent swept by. Nor were blaspheming words
+wanting to complete the insult. ‘Pardon, Lord Bishop,’ said he, as
+he passed me; ‘but this world, thou knowest, must necessarily take
+precedence of the other.’”
+
+“Dared he so high?” said Rienzi, shading his face with his hand, as a
+very peculiar smile--scarcely itself joyous, though it made others gay,
+and which completely changed the character of his face, naturally grave
+even to sternness--played round his lips. “Then it is time for thee,
+holy father, as for us, to--”
+
+“To what?” interrupted the Bishop, quickly. “Can we effect aught!
+Dismiss thy enthusiastic dreamings--descend to the real earth--look
+soberly round us. Against men so powerful, what can we do?”
+
+“My Lord,” answered Rienzi, gravely, “it is the misfortune of signors of
+your rank never to know the people, or the accurate signs of the time.
+As those who pass over the heights of mountains see the clouds sweep
+below, veiling the plains and valleys from their gaze, while they, only
+a little above the level, survey the movements and the homes of men;
+even so from your lofty eminence ye behold but the indistinct and sullen
+vapours--while from my humbler station I see the preparations of the
+shepherds, to shelter themselves and herds from the storm which those
+clouds betoken. Despair not, my Lord; endurance goes but to a certain
+limit--to that limit it is already stretched; Rome waits but the
+occasion (it will soon come, but not suddenly) to rise simultaneously
+against her oppressors.”
+
+The great secret of eloquence is to be in earnest--the great secret of
+Rienzi’s eloquence was in the mightiness of his enthusiasm. He never
+spoke as one who doubted of success. Perhaps, like most men who
+undertake high and great actions, he himself was never thoroughly aware
+of the obstacles in his way. He saw the end, bright and clear, and
+overleaped, in the vision of his soul, the crosses and the length of
+the path; thus the deep convictions of his own mind stamped themselves
+irresistibly upon others. He seemed less to promise than to prophesy.
+
+The Bishop of Orvietto, not over wise, yet a man of cool temperament
+and much worldly experience, was forcibly impressed by the energy of his
+companion; perhaps, indeed, the more so, inasmuch as his own pride and
+his own passions were also enlisted against the arrogance and licence of
+the nobles. He paused ere he replied to Rienzi.
+
+“But is it,” he asked, at length, “only the plebeians who will rise?
+Thou knowest how they are caitiff and uncertain.”
+
+“My Lord,” answered Rienzi, “judge, by one fact, how strongly I am
+surrounded by friends of no common class: thou knowest how loudly
+I speak against the nobles--I cite them by their name--I beard the
+Savelli, the Orsini, the Colonna, in their very hearing. Thinkest thou
+that they forgive me? thinkest thou that, were only the plebeians my
+safeguard and my favourers, they would not seize me by open force,--that
+I had not long ere this found a gag in their dungeons, or been swallowed
+up in the eternal dumbness of the grave? Observe,” continued he, as,
+reading the Vicar’s countenance, he perceived the impression he had
+made--“observe, that, throughout the whole world, a great revolution has
+begun. The barbaric darkness of centuries has been broken; the Knowledge
+which made men as demigods in the past time has been called from her
+urn; a Power, subtler than brute force, and mightier than armed men, is
+at work; we have begun once more to do homage to the Royalty of Mind.
+Yes, that same Power which, a few years ago, crowned Petrarch in the
+Capitol, when it witnessed, after the silence of twelve centuries, the
+glories of a Triumph,--which heaped upon a man of obscure birth, and
+unknown in arms, the same honours given of old to emperors and the
+vanquishers of kings,--which united in one act of homage even the rival
+houses of Colonna and Orsini,--which made the haughtiest patricians
+emulous to bear the train, to touch but the purple robe, of the son of
+the Florentine plebeian,--which still draws the eyes of Europe to
+the lowly cottage of Vaucluse,--which gives to the humble student the
+all-acknowledged licence to admonish tyrants, and approach, with haughty
+prayers, even the Father of the Church;--yes, that same Power, which,
+working silently throughout Italy, murmurs under the solid base of
+the Venetian oligarchy; (It was about eight years afterwards that the
+long-smothered hate of the Venetian people to that wisest and most
+vigilant of all oligarchies, the Sparta of Italy, broke out in the
+conspiracy under Marino Faliero.) which, beyond the Alps, has wakened
+into visible and sudden life in Spain, in Germany, in Flanders; and
+which, even in that barbarous Isle, conquered by the Norman sword, ruled
+by the bravest of living kings, (Edward III., in whose reign opinions
+far more popular than those of the following century began to work. The
+Civil Wars threw back the action into the blood. It was indeed an age
+throughout the world which put forth abundant blossoms, but crude and
+unripened fruit;--a singular leap, followed by as singular a pause.)
+has roused a spirit Norman cannot break--kings to rule over must rule
+by--yes, that same Power is everywhere abroad: it speaks, it conquers in
+the voice even of him who is before you; it unites in his cause all on
+whom but one glimmering of light has burst, all in whom one generous
+desire can be kindled! Know, Lord Vicar, that there is not a man in
+Rome, save our oppressors themselves--not a man who has learned one
+syllable of our ancient tongue--whose heart and sword are not with me.
+The peaceful cultivators of letters--the proud nobles of the second
+order--the rising race, wiser than their slothful sires; above all, my
+Lord, the humbler ministers of religion, priests and monks, whom luxury
+hath not blinded, pomp hath not deafened, to the monstrous outrage to
+Christianity daily and nightly perpetrated in the Christian Capital;
+these,--all these,--are linked with the merchant and the artisan in one
+indissoluble bond, waiting but the signal to fall or to conquer, to live
+freemen, or to die martyrs, with Rienzi and their country!”
+
+“Sayest thou so in truth?” said the Bishop, startled, and half rising.
+“Prove but thy words, and thou shalt not find the ministers of God are
+less eager than their lay brethren for the happiness of men.”
+
+“What I say,” rejoined Rienzi, in a cooler tone, “that can I show; but I
+may only prove it to those who will be with us.”
+
+“Fear me not,” answered Raimond: “I know well the secret mind of his
+Holiness, whose delegate and representative I am; and could he see but
+the legitimate and natural limit set to the power of the patricians,
+who, in their arrogance, have set at nought the authority of the Church
+itself, be sure that he would smile on the hand that drew the line.
+Nay, so certain of this am I, that if ye succeed, I, his responsible but
+unworthy vicar, will myself sanction the success. But beware of crude
+attempts; the Church must not be weakened by linking itself to failure.”
+
+“Right, my Lord,” answered Rienzi; “and in this, the policy of religion
+is that of freedom. Judge of my prudence by my long delay. He who can
+see all around him impatient--himself not less so--and yet suppress the
+signal, and bide the hour, is not likely to lose his cause by rashness.”
+
+“More, then, of this anon,” said the Bishop, resettling himself in his
+seat. “As thy plans mature, fear not to communicate with me. Believe
+that Rome has no firmer friend then he who, ordained to preserve order,
+finds himself impotent against aggression. Meanwhile, to the object of
+my present visit, which links itself, in some measure, perhaps, with the
+topics on which we have conversed...Thou knowest that when his Holiness
+intrusted thee with thy present office, he bade thee also announce his
+beneficent intention of granting a general Jubilee at Rome for the year
+1350--a most admirable design for two reasons, sufficiently apparent
+to thyself: first, that every Christian soul that may undertake the
+pilgrimage to Rome on that occasion, may thus obtain a general remission
+of sins; and secondly, because, to speak carnally, the concourse of
+pilgrims so assembled, usually, by the donations and offerings their
+piety suggests, very materially add to the revenues of the Holy See:
+at this time, by the way, in no very flourishing condition. This thou
+knowest, dear Rienzi.”
+
+Rienzi bowed his head in assent, and the prelate continued--
+
+“Well, it is with the greatest grief that his Holiness perceives that
+his pious intentions are likely to be frustrated: for so fierce and
+numerous are now the brigands in the public approaches to Rome, that,
+verily, the boldest pilgrim may tremble a little to undertake the
+journey; and those who do so venture will, probably, be composed of the
+poorest of the Christian community,--men who, bringing with them neither
+gold, nor silver, nor precious offerings, will have little to fear from
+the rapacity of the brigands. Hence arise two consequences: on the
+one hand, the rich--whom, Heaven knows, and the Gospel has, indeed,
+expressly declared, have the most need of a remission of sins--will be
+deprived of this glorious occasion for absolution; and, on the other
+hand, the coffers of the Church will be impiously defrauded of that
+wealth which it would otherwise doubtless obtain from the zeal of her
+children.”
+
+“Nothing can be more logically manifest, my Lord,” said Rienzi.
+
+The Vicar continued--“Now, in letters received five days since from his
+Holiness, he bade me expose these fearful consequences to Christianity
+to the various patricians who are legitimately fiefs of the Church, and
+command their resolute combination against the marauders of the road.
+With these have I conferred, and vainly.”
+
+“For by the aid, and from the troops, of those very brigands, these
+patricians have fortified their palaces against each other,” added
+Rienzi.
+
+“Exactly for that reason,” rejoined the Bishop. “Nay, Stephen Colonna
+himself had the audacity to confess it. Utterly unmoved by the loss to
+so many precious souls, and, I may add, to the papal treasury, which
+ought to be little less dear to right-discerning men, they refuse
+to advance a step against the bandits. Now, then, hearken the second
+mandate of his Holiness:--‘Failing the nobles,’ saith he, in his
+prophetic sagacity, ‘confer with Cola di Rienzi. He is a bold man, and a
+pious, and, thou tellest me, of great weight with the people; and say to
+him, that if his wit can devise the method for extirpating these sons
+of Belial, and rendering a safe passage along the public ways, largely,
+indeed, will he merit at our hands,--lasting will be the gratitude we
+shall owe to him; and whatever succour thou, and the servants of our
+See, can render to him, let it not be stinted.’”
+
+“Said his Holiness thus!” exclaimed Rienzi. “I ask no more--the
+gratitude is mine that he hath thought thus of his servant, and
+intrusted me with this charge; at once I accept it--at once I pledge
+myself to success. Let us, my Lord, let us, then, clearly understand
+the limits ordained to my discretion. To curb the brigands without the
+walls, I must have authority over those within. If I undertake, at peril
+of my life, to clear all the avenues to Rome of the robbers who now
+infest it, shall I have full licence for conduct bold, peremptory, and
+severe?”
+
+“Such conduct the very nature of the charge demands,” replied Raimond.
+
+“Ay,--even though it be exercised against the arch offenders--against
+the supporters of the brigands--against the haughtiest of the nobles
+themselves?”
+
+The Bishop paused, and looked hard in the face of the speaker. “I
+repeat,” said he, at length, sinking his voice, and with a significant
+tone, “in these bold attempts, success is the sole sanction. Succeed,
+and we will excuse thee all--even to the--”
+
+“Death of a Colonna or an Orsini, should justice demand it; and provided
+it be according to the law, and only incurred by the violation of the
+law!” added Rienzi, firmly.
+
+The Bishop did not reply in words, but a slight motion of his head was
+sufficient answer to Rienzi.
+
+“My Lord,” said he, “from this time, then, all is well; I date the
+revolution--the restoration of order, of the state--from this hour, this
+very conference. Till now, knowing that justice must never wink upon
+great offenders, I had hesitated, through fear lest thou and his
+Holiness might deem it severity, and blame him who replaces the law,
+because he smites the violaters of law. Now I judge ye more rightly.
+Your hand, my Lord.”
+
+The Bishop extended his hand; Rienzi grasped it firmly, and then raised
+it respectfully to his lips. Both felt that the compact was sealed.
+
+This conference, so long in recital, was short in the reality; but its
+object was already finished, and the Bishop rose to depart. The outer
+portal of the house was opened, the numerous servitors of the Bishop
+held on high their torches, and he had just termed from Rienzi, who
+had attended him to the gate, when a female passed hastily through the
+Prelate’s train, and starting as she beheld Rienzi, flung herself at his
+feet.
+
+“Oh, hasten, Sir! hasten, for the love of God, hasten! or the young
+Signora is lost for ever!”
+
+“The Signora!--Heaven and earth, Benedetta, of whom do you speak?--of my
+sister--of Irene? is she not within?”
+
+“Oh, Sir--the Orsini--the Orsini!”
+
+“What of them?--speak, woman!”
+
+Here, breathlessly, and with many a break, Benedetta recounted to
+Rienzi, in whom the reader has already recognised the brother of Irene,
+so far of the adventure with Martino di Porto as she had witnessed: of
+the termination and result of the contest she knew nought.
+
+Rienzi listened in silence; but the deadly paleness of his countenance,
+and the writhing of the nether lip, testified the emotions to which he
+gave no audible vent.
+
+“You hear, my Lord Bishop--you hear,” said he, when Benedetta had
+concluded; and turning to the Bishop, whose departure the narrative had
+delayed--“you hear to what outrage the citizens of Rome are subjected.
+My hat and sword! instantly! My Lord, forgive my abruptness.”
+
+“Whither art thou bent, then?” asked Raimond.
+
+“Whither--whither!--Ay, I forgot, my Lord, you have no sister. Perhaps
+too, you had no brother?--No, no; one victim at least I will live to
+save. Whither, you ask me?--to the palace of Martino di Porto.”
+
+“To an Orsini alone, and for justice?”
+
+“Alone, and for justice!--No!” shouted Rienzi, in a loud voice, as he
+seized his sword, now brought to him by one of his servants, and rushed
+from the house; “but one man is sufficient for revenge!”
+
+The Bishop paused for a moment’s deliberation. “He must not be lost,”
+ muttered he, “as he well may be, if exposed thus solitary to the wolf’s
+rage. What, ho!” he cried aloud; “advance the torches!--quick, quick! We
+ourself--we, the Vicar of the Pope--will see to this. Calm yourselves,
+good people; your young Signora shall be restored. On! to the palace of
+Martino di Porto!”
+
+
+
+Chapter 1.VI. Irene in the Palace of Adrian di Castello.
+
+As the Cyprian gazed on the image in which he had embodied a youth of
+dreams, what time the living hues flushed slowly beneath the marble,--so
+gazed the young and passionate Adrian upon the form reclined before him,
+re-awakening gradually to life. And, if the beauty of that face were
+not of the loftiest or the most dazzling order, if its soft and quiet
+character might be outshone by many, of loveliness less really perfect,
+yet never was there a countenance that, to some eyes, would have seemed
+more charming, and never one in which more eloquently was wrought that
+ineffable and virgin expression which Italian art seeks for in its
+models,--in which modesty is the outward, and tenderness the latent,
+expression; the bloom of youth, both of form and heart, ere the first
+frail and delicate freshness of either is brushed away: and when even
+love itself, the only unquiet visitant that should be known at such an
+age, is but a sentiment, and not a passion!
+
+“Benedetta!” murmured Irene, at length opening her eyes, unconsciously,
+upon him who knelt beside her,--eyes of that uncertain, that most liquid
+hue, on which you might gaze for years and never learn the secret of the
+colour, so changed it with the dilating pupil,--darkening in the shade,
+and brightening into azure in the light:
+
+“Benedetta,” said Irene, “where art thou? Oh, Benedetta! I have had such
+a dream.”
+
+“And I, too, such a vision!” thought Adrian.
+
+“Where am I?” cried Irene, rising from the couch. “This room--these
+hangings--Holy Virgin! do I dream still!--and you! Heavens!--it is the
+Lord Adrian di Castello!”
+
+“Is that a name thou hast been taught to fear?” said Adrian; “if so, I
+will forswear it.”
+
+If Irene now blushed deeply, it was not in that wild delight with which
+her romantic heart motive foretold that she would listen to the
+first words of homage from Adrian di Castello. Bewildered and
+confused,--terrified at the strangeness of the place and shrinking even
+from the thought of finding herself alone with one who for years had
+been present to her fancies,--alarm and distress were the emotions
+she felt the most, and which most were impressed upon her speaking
+countenance; and as Adrian now drew nearer to her, despite the
+gentleness of his voice and the respect of his looks, her fears, not the
+less strong that they were vague, increased upon her: she retreated to
+the further end of the room, looked wildly round her, and then, covering
+her face with her hands, burst into a paroxysm of tears.
+
+Moved himself by these tears, and divining her thoughts, Adrian forgot
+for moment all the more daring wishes he had formed.
+
+“Fear not, sweet lady,” said he, earnestly: “recollect thyself, I
+beseech thee; no peril, no evil can reach thee here; it was this hand
+that saved thee from the outrage of the Orsini--this roof is but the
+shelter of a friend! Tell me, then, fair wonder, thy name and residence,
+and I will summon my servitors, and guard thee to thy home at once.”
+
+Perhaps the relief of tears, even more than Adrian’s words, restored
+Irene to herself, and enabled her to comprehend her novel situation;
+and as her senses, thus cleared, told her what she owed to him whom her
+dreams had so long imaged as the ideal of all excellence, she recovered
+her self-possession, and uttered her thanks with a grace not the less
+winning, if it still partook of embarrassment.
+
+“Thank me not,” answered Adrian, passionately. “I have touched thy
+hand--I am repaid. Repaid! nay, all gratitude--all homage is for me to
+render!”
+
+Blushing again, but with far different emotions than before, Irene,
+after a momentary pause, replied, “Yet, my Lord, I must consider it a
+debt the more weighty that you speak of it so lightly. And now, complete
+the obligation. I do not see my companion--suffer her to accompany me
+home; it is but a short way hence.”
+
+“Blessed, then, is the air that I have breathed so unconsciously!” said
+Adrian. “But thy companion, dear lady, is not here. She fled, I imagine,
+in the confusion of the conflict; and not knowing thy name, nor being
+able, in thy then state, to learn it from thy lips, it was my happy
+necessity to convey thee hither;--but I will be thy companion. Nay, why
+that timid glance? my people, also, shall attend us.”
+
+“My thanks, noble Lord, are of little worth; my brother, who is not
+unknown to thee, will thank thee more fittingly. May I depart?” and
+Irene, as she spoke, was already at the door.
+
+“Art thou so eager to leave me?” answered Adrian, sadly. “Alas! when
+thou hast departed from my eyes, it will seem as if the moon had left
+the night!--but it is happiness to obey thy wishes, even though they
+tear thee from me.”
+
+A slight smile parted Irene’s lips, and Adrian’s heart beat audibly
+to himself, as he drew from that smile, and those downcast eyes, no
+unfavourable omen.
+
+Reluctantly and slowly he turned towards the door, and summoned his
+attendants. “But,” said he, as they stood on the lofty staircase, “thou
+sayest, sweet lady, that thy brother’s name is not unknown to me. Heaven
+grant that he be, indeed, a friend of the Colonna!”
+
+“His boast,” answered Irene, evasively; “the boast of Cola di Rienzi is,
+to be a friend to the friends of Rome.”
+
+“Holy Virgin of Ara Coeli!--is thy brother that extraordinary man?”
+ exclaimed Adrian, as he foresaw, at the mention of that name, a barrier
+to his sudden passion. “Alas! in a Colonna, in a noble, he will see no
+merit; even though thy fortunate deliverer, sweet maiden, sought to be
+his early friend!”
+
+“Thou wrongest him much, my Lord,” returned Irene, warmly; “he is a man
+above all others to sympathize with thy generous valour, even had it
+been exerted in defence of the humblest woman in Rome,--how much more,
+then, when in protection of his sister!”
+
+“The times are, indeed, diseased,” answered Adrian, thoughtfully, as
+they now found themselves in the open street, “when men who alike mourn
+for the woes of their country are yet suspicious of each other; when to
+be a patrician is to be regarded as an enemy to the people; when to
+be termed the friend of the people is to be considered a foe to the
+patricians: but come what may, oh! let me hope, dear lady, that no
+doubts, no divisions, shall banish from thy breast one gentle memory of
+me!”
+
+“Ah! little, little do you know me!” began Irene, and stopped suddenly
+short.
+
+“Speak! speak again!--of what music has this envious silence deprived my
+soul! Thou wilt not, then, forget me? And,” continued Adrian, “we shall
+meet again? It is to Rienzi’s house we are bound now; tomorrow I shall
+visit my old companion,--tomorrow I shall see thee. Will it not be so?”
+
+In Irene’s silence was her answer.
+
+“And as thou hast told me thy brother’s name, make it sweet to my ear,
+and add to it thine own.”
+
+“They call me Irene.”
+
+“Irene, Irene!--let me repeat it. It is a soft name, and dwells upon the
+lips as if loath to leave them--a fitting name for one like thee.”
+
+Thus making his welcome court to Irene, in that flowered and glowing
+language which, if more peculiar to that age and to the gallantry of
+the south, is also the language in which the poetry of youthful passion
+would, in all times and lands, utter its rich extravagance, could heart
+speak to heart, Adrian conveyed homeward his beautiful charge, taking,
+however, the most circuitous and lengthened route; an artifice which
+Irene either perceived not, or silently forgave. They were now within
+sight of the street in which Rienzi dwelt, when a party of men bearing
+torches, came unexpectedly upon them. It was the train of the Bishop of
+Orvietto, returning from the palace of Martino di Porto, and in their
+way (accompanied by Rienzi) to that of Adrian. They had learned at the
+former, without an interview with the Orsini, from the retainers in
+the court below, the fortune of the conflict, and the name of Irene’s
+champion; and, despite Adrian’s general reputation for gallantry, Rienzi
+knew enough of his character, and the nobleness of his temper, to feel
+assured that Irene was safe in his protection. Alas! in that very safety
+to the person is often the most danger to the heart. Woman never so
+dangerously loves, as when he who loves her, for her sake, subdues
+himself.
+
+Clasped to her brother’s breast, Irene bade him thank her deliverer;
+and Rienzi, with that fascinating frankness which sits so well on those
+usually reserved, and which all who would rule the hearts of their
+fellow-men must at times command, advanced to the young Colonna, and
+poured forth his gratitude and praise.
+
+“We have been severed too long,--we must know each other again,” replied
+Adrian. “I shall seek thee, ere long, be assured.”
+
+Turning to take his leave of Irene, he conveyed her hand to his lips,
+and pressing it, as it dropped from his clasp, was he deceived in
+thinking that those delicate fingers lightly, involuntarily, returned
+the pressure?
+
+
+
+Chapter 1.VII. Upon Love and Lovers.
+
+If, in adopting the legendary love tale of Romeo and Juliet, Shakespeare
+had changed the scene in which it is cast for a more northern clime, we
+may doubt whether the art of Shakespeare himself could have reconciled
+us at once to the suddenness and the strength of Juliet’s passion. And,
+even as it is, perhaps there are few of our rational and sober-minded
+islanders who would not honestly confess, if fairly questioned, that
+they deem the romance and fervour of those ill-starred lovers of Verona
+exaggerated and over-drawn. Yet, in Italy, the picture of that affection
+born of a night--but “strong as death”--is one to which the veriest
+commonplaces of life would afford parallels without number. As in
+different ages, so in different climes, love varies wonderfully in the
+shapes it takes. And even at this day, beneath Italian skies, many a
+simple girl would feel as Juliet, and many a homely gallant would rival
+the extravagance of Romeo. Long suits in that sunny land, wherein, as
+whereof, I now write, are unknown. In no other land, perhaps, is there
+found so commonly the love at first sight, which in France is a jest,
+and in England a doubt; in no other land, too, is love, though so
+suddenly conceived, more faithfully preserved. That which is ripened
+in fancy comes at once to passion, yet is embalmed through all time by
+sentiment. And this must be my and their excuse, if the love of
+Adrian some too prematurely formed, and that of Irene too romantically
+conceived;--it is the excuse which they take from the air and sun, from
+the customs of their ancestors, from the soft contagion of example.
+But while they yielded to the dictates of their hearts, it was with a
+certain though secret sadness--a presentiment that had, perhaps, its
+charm, though it was of cross and evil. Born of so proud a race, Adrian
+could scarcely dream of marriage with the sister of a plebeian; and
+Irene, unconscious of the future glory of her brother, could hardly
+have cherished any hope, save that of being loved. Yet these adverse
+circumstances, which, in the harder, the more prudent, the more
+self-denying, perhaps the more virtuous minds, that are formed beneath
+the northern skies, would have been an inducement to wrestle against
+love so placed, only contributed to feed and to strengthen theirs by
+an opposition which has ever its attraction for romance. They found
+frequent, though short, opportunities of meeting--not quite alone, but
+only in the conniving presence of Benedetta: sometimes in the public
+gardens, sometimes amidst the vast and deserted ruins by which the house
+of Rienzi was surrounded. They surrendered themselves, without much
+question of the future, to the excitement--the elysium--of the hour:
+they lived but from day to day; their future was the next time they
+should meet; beyond that epoch, the very mists of their youthful love
+closed in obscurity and shadow which they sought not to penetrate: and
+as yet they had not arrived at that period of affection when there was
+danger of their fall,--their love had not passed the golden portal where
+Heaven ceases and Earth begins. Everything for them was the poetry,
+the vagueness, the refinement,--not the power, the concentration, the
+mortality,--of desire! The look--the whisper--the brief pressure of the
+hand, at most, the first kisses of love, rare and few,--these marked the
+human limits of that sentiment which filled them with a new life, which
+elevated them as with a new soul.
+
+The roving tendencies of Adrian were at once fixed and centered; the
+dreams of his tender mistress had awakened to a life dreaming still, but
+“rounded with a truth.” All that earnestness, and energy, and fervour of
+emotion, which, in her brother, broke forth in the schemes of patriotism
+and the aspirations of power, were, in Irene, softened down into one
+object of existence, one concentration of soul,--and that was love. Yet,
+in this range of thought and action, so apparently limited, there was,
+in reality, no less boundless a sphere than in the wide space of her
+brother’s many-pathed ambition. Not the less had she the power and
+scope for all the loftiest capacities granted to our clay. Equal was her
+enthusiasm for her idol; equal, had she been equally tried, would have
+been her generosity, her devotion:--greater, be sure, her courage; more
+inalienable her worship; more unsullied by selfish purposes and sordid
+views. Time, change, misfortune, ingratitude, would have left her the
+same! What state could fall, what liberty decay, if the zeal of man’s
+noisy patriotism were as pure as the silent loyalty of a woman’s love?
+
+In them everything was young!--the heart unchilled, unblighted,--that
+fulness and luxuriance of life’s life which has in it something of
+divine. At that age, when it seems as if we could never die, how
+deathless, how flushed and mighty as with the youngness of a god, is all
+that our hearts create! Our own youth is like that of the earth itself,
+when it peopled the woods and waters with divinities; when life
+ran riot, and yet only gave birth to beauty;--all its shapes, of
+poetry,--all its airs, the melodies of Arcady and Olympus! The Golden
+Age never leaves the world: it exists still, and shall exist, till love,
+health, poetry, are no more; but only for the young!
+
+If I now dwell, though but for a moment, on this interlude in a drama
+calling forth more masculine passions than that of love, it is because
+I foresee that the occasion will but rarely recur. If I linger on the
+description of Irene and her hidden affection, rather than wait for
+circumstances to portray them better than the author’s words can, it is
+because I foresee that that loving and lovely image must continue to the
+last rather a shadow than a portrait,--thrown in the background, as is
+the real destiny of such natures, by bolder figures and more gorgeous
+colours; a something whose presence is rather felt than seen, and whose
+very harmony with the whole consists in its retiring and subdued repose.
+
+
+
+Chapter 1.VIII. The Enthusiastic Man Judged by the Discreet Man.
+
+“Thou wrongest me,” said Rienzi, warmly, to Adrian, as they sat alone,
+towards the close of a long conference; “I do not play the part of a
+mere demagogue; I wish not to stir the great deeps in order that my
+lees of fortune may rise to the surface. So long have I brooded over the
+past, that it seems to me as if I had become a part of it--as if I
+had no separate existence. I have coined my whole soul into one master
+passion,--and its end is the restoration of Rome.”
+
+“But by what means?”
+
+“My Lord! my Lord! there is but one way to restore the greatness of a
+people--it is an appeal to the people themselves. It is not in the power
+of princes and barons to make a state permanently glorious; they
+raise themselves, but they raise not the people with them. All great
+regenerations are the universal movement of the mass.”
+
+“Nay,” answered Adrian, “then have we read history differently. To
+me, all great regenerations seem to have been the work of the few, and
+tacitly accepted by the multitude. But let us not dispute after the
+manner of the schools. Thou sayest loudly that a vast crisis is at hand;
+that the Good Estate (buono stato) shall be established. How? where are
+your arms?--your soldiers? Are the nobles less strong than heretofore?
+Is the mob more bold, more constant? Heaven knows that I speak not with
+the prejudices of my order--I weep for the debasement of my country! I
+am a Roman, and in that name I forget that I am a noble. But I tremble
+at the storm you would raise so hazardously. If your insurrection
+succeed, it will be violent: it will be purchased by blood--by the blood
+of all the loftiest names of Rome. You will aim at a second expulsion of
+the Tarquins; but it will be more like a second proscription of Sylla.
+Massacres and disorders never pave the way to peace. If, on the other
+hand, you fail, the chains of Rome are riveted for ever: an ineffectual
+struggle to escape is but an excuse for additional tortures to the
+slave.”
+
+“And what, then, would the Lord Adrian have us do?” said Rienzi, with
+that peculiar and sarcastic smile which has before been noted. “Shall
+we wait till the Colonna and Orsini quarrel no more? shall we ask the
+Colonna for liberty, and the Orsini for justice? My Lord, we cannot
+appeal to the nobles against the nobles. We must not ask them to
+moderate their power; we must restore to ourselves that power. There may
+be danger in the attempt--but we attempt it amongst the monuments of the
+Forum: and if we fall--we shall perish worthy of our sires! Ye have
+high descent, and sounding titles, and wide lands, and you talk of your
+ancestral honours! We, too,--we plebeians of Rome,--we have ours! Our
+fathers were freemen! where is our heritage? not sold--not given away:
+but stolen from us, now by fraud, now by force--filched from us in
+our sleep; or wrung from us with fierce hands, amidst our cries and
+struggles. My Lord, we but ask that lawful heritage to be restored to
+us: to us--nay, to you it is the same; your liberty, alike, is gone. Can
+you dwell in your father’s house, without towers, and fortresses, and
+the bought swords of bravos? can you walk in the streets at dark without
+arms and followers? True, you, a noble, may retaliate; though we dare
+not. You, in your turn, may terrify and outrage others; but does licence
+compensate for liberty? They have given you pomp and power--but the
+safety of equal laws were a better gift. Oh, were I you--were I Stephen
+Colonna himself, I should pant, ay, thirstily as I do now, for that
+free air which comes not through bars and bulwarks against my
+fellow-citizens, but in the open space of Heaven--safe, because
+protected by the silent Providence of Law, and not by the lean fears
+and hollow-eyed suspicions which are the comrades of a hated power.
+The tyrant thinks he is free, because he commands slaves: the meanest
+peasant in a free state is more free than he is. Oh, my Lord, that
+you--the brave, the generous, the enlightened--you, almost alone amidst
+your order, in the knowledge that we had a country--oh, would that you
+who can sympathise with our sufferings, would strike with us for their
+redress!”
+
+“Thou wilt war against Stephen Colonna, my kinsman; and though I have
+seen him but little, nor, truth to say, esteem him much, yet he is the
+boast of our house,--how can I join thee?”
+
+“His life will be safe, his possessions safe, his rank safe. What do we
+war against? His power to do wrong to others.”
+
+“Should he discover that thou hast force beyond words, he would be less
+merciful to thee.”
+
+“And has he not discovered that? Do not the shouts of the people tell
+him that I am a man whom he should fear? Does he--the cautious, the
+wily, the profound--does he build fortresses, and erect towers, and not
+see from his battlements the mighty fabric that I, too, have erected?”
+
+“You! where, Rienzi?”
+
+“In the hearts of Rome! Does he not see?” continued Rienzi. “No, no;
+he--all, all his tribe, are blind. Is it not so?”
+
+“Of a certainty, my kinsman has no belief in your power, else he would
+have crushed you long ere this. Nay, it was but three days ago that he
+said, gravely, he would rather you addressed the populace than the best
+priest in Christendom; for that other orators inflamed the crowd, and no
+man so stilled and dispersed them as you did.”
+
+“And I called him profound! Does not Heaven hush the air most when
+most it prepares the storm? Ay, my Lord, I understand. Stephen Colonna
+despises me. I have been”--(here, as he continued, a deep blush mantled
+over his cheek)--“you remember it--at his palace in my younger days,
+and pleased him with witty tales and light apophthegms. Nay--ha! ha!--he
+would call me, I think, sometimes, in gay compliment, his jester--his
+buffoon! I have brooked his insult; I have even bowed to his applause.
+I would undergo the same penance, stoop to the same shame, for the same
+motive, and in the same cause. What did I desire to effect? Can you tell
+me? No! I will whisper it, then, to you: it was--the contempt of Stephen
+Colonna. Under that contempt I was protected, till protection became
+no longer necessary. I desired not to be thought formidable by the
+patricians, in order that, quietly and unsuspected, I might make my way
+amongst the people. I have done so; I now throw aside the mask. Face
+to face with Stephen Colonna, I could tell him, this very hour, that I
+brave his anger; that I laugh at his dungeons and armed men. But if he
+think me the same Rienzi as of old, let him; I can wait my hour.”
+
+“Yet,” said Adrian, waiving an answer to the haughty language of his
+companion, “tell me, what dost thou ask for the people, in order to
+avoid an appeal to their passions?--ignorant and capricious as they are,
+thou canst not appeal to their reason.”
+
+“I ask full justice and safety for all men. I will be contented with no
+less a compromise. I ask the nobles to dismantle their fortresses; to
+disband their armed retainers; to acknowledge no impunity for crime in
+high lineage; to claim no protection save in the courts of the common
+law.”
+
+“Vain desire!” said Adrian. “Ask what may yet be granted.”
+
+“Ha--ha!” replied Rienzi, laughing bitterly, “did I not tell you it was
+a vain dream to ask for law and justice at the hands of the great? Can
+you blame me, then, that I ask it elsewhere?” Then, suddenly changing
+his tone and manner, he added with great solemnity--“Waking life hath
+false and vain dreams; but sleep is sometimes a mighty prophet. By sleep
+it is that Heaven mysteriously communes with its creatures, and guides
+and sustains its earthly agents in the path to which its providence
+leads them on.”
+
+Adrian made no reply. This was not the first time he had noted that
+Rienzi’s strong intellect was strangely conjoined with a deep and
+mystical superstition. And this yet more inclined the young noble, who,
+though sufficiently devout, yielded but little to the wilder credulities
+of the time, to doubt the success of the schemer’s projects. In this
+he erred greatly, though his error was that of the worldly wise. For
+nothing ever so inspires human daring, as the fond belief that it is the
+agent of a Diviner Wisdom. Revenge and patriotism, united in one man
+of genius and ambition--such are the Archimedian levers that find, in
+FANATICISM, the spot out of the world by which to move the world. The
+prudent man may direct a state; but it is the enthusiast who regenerates
+it,--or ruins.
+
+
+
+Chapter 1.IX. “When the People Saw this Picture, Every One Marvelled.”
+
+Before the market-place, and at the foot of the Capitol, an immense
+crowd was assembled. Each man sought to push before his neighbour; each
+struggled to gain access to one particular spot, round which the crowd
+was wedged think and dense.
+
+“Corpo di Dio!” said a man of huge stature, pressing onward, like some
+bulky ship, casting the noisy waves right and left from its prow, “this
+is hot work; but for what, in the holy Mother’s name, do ye crowd so?
+See you not, Sir Ribald, that my right arm is disabled, swathed, and
+bandaged, so that I cannot help myself better than a baby? And yet you
+push against me as if I were an old wall!”
+
+“Ah, Cecco del Vecchio!--what, man! we must make way for you--you are
+too small and tender to bustle through a crowd! Come, I will protect
+you!” said a dwarf of some four feet high, glancing up at the giant.
+
+“Faith,” said the grim smith, looking round on the mob, who laughed loud
+at the dwarf’s proffer, “we all do want protection, big and small. What
+do you laugh for, ye apes?--ay, you don’t understand parables.”
+
+“And yet it is a parable we are come to gaze upon,” said one of the mob,
+with a slight sneer.
+
+“Pleasant day to you, Signor Baroncelli,” answered Cecco del Vecchio;
+“you are a good man, and love the people; it makes one’s heart smile to
+see you. What’s all this pother for?”
+
+“Why the Pope’s Notary hath set up a great picture in the marketplace,
+and the gapers say it relates to Rome; so they are melting their brains
+out, this hot day, to guess at the riddle.”
+
+“Ho! ho!” said the smith, pushing on so vigorously that he left the
+speaker suddenly in the rear; “if Cola di Rienzi hath aught in the
+matter, I would break through stone rocks to get to it.”
+
+“Much good will a dead daub do us,” said Baroncelli, sourly, and turning
+to his neighbours; but no man listened to him, and he, a would-be
+demagogue, gnawed his lip in envy.
+
+Amidst half-awed groans and curses from the men whom he jostled aside,
+and open objurgations and shrill cries from the women, to whose robes
+and headgear he showed as little respect, the sturdy smith won his way
+to a space fenced round by chains, in the centre of which was placed a
+huge picture.
+
+“How came it hither?” cried one; “I was first at the market.”
+
+“We found it here at daybreak,” said a vender of fruit: “no one was by.”
+
+“But why do you fancy Rienzi had a hand in it?”
+
+“Why, who else could?” answered twenty voices.
+
+“True! Who else?” echoed the gaunt smith. “I dare be sworn the good man
+spent the whole night in painting it himself. Blood of St. Peter! but it
+is mighty fine! What is it about?”
+
+“That’s the riddle,” said a meditative fish-woman; “if I could make it
+out, I should die happy.”
+
+“It is something about liberty and taxes, no doubt,” said Luigi, the
+butcher, leaning over the chains. “Ah, if Rienzi were minded, every poor
+man would have his bit of meat in his pot.”
+
+“And as much bread as he could eat,” added a pale baker.
+
+“Chut! bread and meat--everybody has that now!--but what wine the
+poor folks drink! One has no encouragement to take pains with one’s
+vineyard,” said a vine-dresser.
+
+“Ho, hollo!--long life to Pandulfo di Guido! Make way for master
+Pandulfo; he is a learned man; he is a friend of the great Notary’s; he
+will tell us all about the picture; make way, there--make way!”
+
+Slowly and modestly, Pandulfo di Guido, a quiet, wealthy, and honest man
+of letters, whom nought save the violence of the times could have roused
+from his tranquil home, or his studious closet, passed to the chains. He
+looked long and hard at the picture, which was bright with new, and yet
+moist colours, and exhibited somewhat of the reviving art, which,
+though hard and harsh in its features, was about that time visible, and,
+carried to a far higher degree, we yet gaze upon in the paintings of
+Perugino, who flourished during the succeeding generation. The people
+pressed round the learned man, with open mouths; now turning their eyes
+to the picture, now to Pandulfo.
+
+“Know you not,” at length said Pandulfo, “the easy and palpable meaning
+of this design? Behold how the painter has presented to you a vast and
+stormy sea--mark how its waves--”
+
+“Speak louder--louder!” shouted the impatient crowd.
+
+“Hush!” cried those in the immediate vicinity of Pandulfo, “the worthy
+Signor is perfectly audible!”
+
+Meanwhile, some of the more witty, pushing towards a stall in the
+marketplace, bore from it a rough table, from which they besought
+Pandulfo to address the people. The pale citizen, with some pain and
+shame, for he was no practised spokesman, was obliged to assent; but
+when he cast his eyes over the vast and breathless crowd, his own deep
+sympathy with their cause inspired and emboldened him. A light broke
+from his eyes; his voice swelled into power; and his head, usually
+buried in his breast, became erect and commanding in its air.
+
+“You see before you in the picture” (he began again) “a mighty and
+tempestuous sea: upon its waves you behold five ships; four of them are
+already wrecks,--their masts are broken, the waves are dashing through
+the rent planks, they are past all aid and hope: on each of these ships
+lies the corpse of a woman. See you not, in the wan face and livid
+limbs, how faithfully the limner hath painted the hues and loathsomeness
+of death? Below each of these ships is a word that applies the metaphor
+to truth. Yonder, you see the name of Carthage; the other three are
+Troy, Jerusalem, and Babylon. To these four is one common inscription.
+‘To exhaustion were we brought by injustice!’ Turn now your eyes to the
+middle of the sea,--there you behold the fifth ship, tossed amidst the
+waves, her mast broken, her rudder gone, her sails shivered, but not
+yet a wreck like the rest, though she soon may be. On her deck kneels
+a female, clothed in mourning; mark the wo upon her countenance,--how
+cunningly the artist has conveyed its depth and desolation; she
+stretches out her arms in prayer, she implores your and Heaven’s
+assistance. Mark now the superscription--‘This is Rome!’--Yes, it is
+your country that addresses you in this emblem!”
+
+The crowd waved to and fro, and a deep murmur crept gathering over the
+silence which they had hitherto kept.
+
+“Now,” continued Pandulfo, “turn your gaze to the right of the picture,
+and you will behold the cause of the tempest,--you will see why the
+fifth vessel is thus perilled, and her sisters are thus wrecked. Mark,
+four different kinds of animals, who, from their horrid jaws, send forth
+the winds and storms which torture and rack the sea. The first are the
+lions, the wolves, the bears. These, the inscription tells you, are
+the lawless and savage signors of the state. The next are the dogs
+and swine,--these are the evil counsellors and parasites. Thirdly,
+you behold the dragons and the foxes,--and these are false judges and
+notaries, and they who sell justice. Fourthly, in the hares, the goats,
+the apes, that assist in creating the storm, you perceive, by the
+inscription, the emblems of the popular thieves and homicides, ravishers
+and spoliators. Are ye bewildered still, O Romans! or have ye mastered
+the riddle of the picture?”
+
+Far in their massive palaces the Savelli and Orsini heard the echo of
+the shouts that answered the question of Pandulfo.
+
+“Are ye, then, without hope!” resumed the scholar, as the shout ceased,
+and hushing, with the first sound of his voice, the ejaculations and
+speeches which each man had turned to utter to his neighbour. “Are ye
+without hope? Doth the picture, which shows your tribulation, promise
+you no redemption? Behold, above that angry sea, the heavens open, and
+the majesty of God descends gloriously, as to judgment: and, from the
+rays that surround the Spirit of God extend two flaming swords, and
+on those swords stand, in wrath, but in deliverance, the two patron
+saints--the two mighty guardians of your city! People of Rome, farewell!
+The parable is finished.” (M. Sismondi attributes to Rienzi a fine
+oration at the showing of the picture, in which he thundered against
+the vices of the patricians. The contemporary biographer of Rienzi
+says nothing of this harangue. But, apparently (since history has its
+liberties as well as fiction), M. Sismondi has thought it convenient to
+confound two occasions very distinct in themselves.)
+
+
+
+Chapter 1.X. A Rough Spirit Raised, Which May Hereafter Rend the Wizard.
+
+While thus animated was the scene around the Capitol, within one of
+the apartments of the palace sat the agent and prime cause of that
+excitement. In the company of his quiet scribes, Rienzi appeared
+absorbed in the patient details of his avocation. While the murmur and
+the hum, the shout and the tramp, of multitudes, rolled to his chamber,
+he seemed not to heed them, nor to rouse himself a moment from his task.
+With the unbroken regularity of an automaton, he continued to enter
+in his large book, and with the clear and beautiful characters of
+the period, those damning figures which taught him, better than
+declamations, the frauds practised on the people, and armed him with
+that weapon of plain fact which it is so difficult for abuse to parry.
+
+“Page 2, Vol. B.,” said he, in the tranquil voice of business, to the
+clerks; “see there, the profits of the salt duty; department No.3--very
+well. Page 9, Vol. D.--what is the account rendered by Vescobaldi, the
+collector? What! twelve thousand florins?--no more?--unconscionable
+rascal!” (Here was a loud shout without of ‘Pandulfo!--long live
+Pandulfo!’) “Pastrucci, my friend, your head wanders; you are listening
+to the noise without--please to amuse yourself with the calculation I
+entrusted to you. Santi, what is the entry given in by Antonio Tralli?”
+
+A slight tap was heard at the door, and Pandulfo entered.
+
+The clerks continued their labour, though they looked up hastily at the
+pale and respectable visitor, whose name, to their great astonishment,
+had thus become a popular cry.
+
+“Ah, my friend,” said Rienzi, calmly enough in voice, but his hands
+trembled with ill-suppressed emotion, “you would speak to me alone,
+eh? well, well--this way.” Thus saying, he led the citizen into a small
+cabinet in the rear of the room of office, carefully shut the door,
+and then giving himself up to the natural impatience of his character,
+seized Pandulfo by the hand: “Speak!” cried he: “do they take the
+interpretation?--have you made it plain and palpable enough?--has it
+sunk deep into their souls?”
+
+“Oh, by St. Peter! yes!” returned the citizen, whose spirits were
+elevated by his recent discovery that he, too, was an orator--a
+luxurious pleasure for a timid man. “They swallowed every word of the
+interpretation; they are moved to the marrow--you might lead them this
+very hour to battle, and find them heroes. As for the sturdy smith--”
+
+“What! Cecco del Vecchio?” interrupted Rienzi; “ah, his heart is wrought
+in bronze--what did he?”
+
+“Why, he caught me by the hem of my robe as I descended my rostrum, (oh!
+would you could have seen me!--per fede I had caught your mantle!--I was
+a second you!) and said, weeping like a child, ‘Ah, Signor, I am but a
+poor man, and of little worth; but if every drop of blood in this body
+were a life, I would give it for my country!’”
+
+“Brave soul,” said Rienzi, with emotion; “would Rome had but fifty
+such! No man hath done us more good among his own class than Cecco del
+Vecchio.”
+
+“They feel a protection in his very size,” said Pandulfo. “It is
+something to hear such big words from such a big fellow.”
+
+“Were there any voices lifted in disapprobation of the picture and its
+sentiment?”
+
+“None.”
+
+“The time is nearly ripe, then--a few suns more, and the fruit must be
+gathered. The Aventine,--the Lateran,--and then the solitary trumpet!”
+ Thus saying, Rienzi, with folded arms and downcast eyes, seemed sunk
+into a reverie.
+
+“By the way,” said Pandulfo, “I had almost forgot to tell thee, that the
+crowd would have poured themselves hither, so impatient were they to see
+thee; but I bade Cecco del Vecchio mount the rostrum, and tell them, in
+his blunt way, that it would be unseemly at the present time, when thou
+wert engaged in the Capitol on civil and holy affairs, to rush in so
+great a body into thy presence. Did I not right?”
+
+“Most right, my Pandulfo.”
+
+“But Cecco del Vecchio says he must come and kiss thy hand: and thou
+mayst expect him here the moment he can escape unobserved from the
+crowd.”
+
+“He is welcome!” said Rienzi, half mechanically, for he was still
+absorbed in thought.
+
+“And, lo! here he is,”--as one of the scribes announced the visit of the
+smith.
+
+“Let him be admitted!” said Rienzi, seating himself composedly.
+
+When the huge smith found himself in the presence of Rienzi, it amused
+Pandulfo to perceive the wonderful influences of mind over matter. That
+fierce and sturdy giant, who, in all popular commotions, towered above
+his tribe, with thews of stone, and nerves of iron, the rallying point
+and bulwark of the rest,--stood now colouring and trembling before the
+intellect, which (so had the eloquent spirit of Rienzi waked and fanned
+the spark which, till then, had lain dormant in that rough bosom)
+might almost be said to have created his own. And he, indeed, who first
+arouses in the bondsman the sense and soul of freedom, comes as near as
+is permitted to man, nearer than the philosopher, nearer even than the
+poet, to the great creative attribute of God!--But, if the breast be
+uneducated, the gift may curse the giver; and he who passes at once from
+the slave to the freeman may pass as rapidly from the freeman to the
+ruffian.
+
+“Approach, my friend,” said Rienzi, after a moment’s pause; “I know all
+that thou hast done, and wouldst do, for Rome! Thou art worthy of her
+best days, and thou art born to share in their return.”
+
+The smith dropped at the feet of Rienzi, who held out his hand to raise
+him, which Cecco del Vecchio seized, and reverentially kissed.
+
+“This kiss does not betray,” said Rienzi, smiling; “but rise, my
+friend,--this posture is only due to God and his saints!”
+
+“He is a saint who helps us at need!” said the smith, bluntly, “and that
+no man has done as thou hast. But when,” he added, sinking his voice,
+and fixing his eyes hard on Rienzi, as one may do who waits a signal to
+strike a blow, “when--when shall we make the great effort?”
+
+“Thou hast spoken to all the brave men in thy neighbourhood,--are they
+well prepared?”
+
+“To live or die, as Rienzi bids them!”
+
+“I must have the list--the number--names--houses and callings, this
+night.”
+
+“Thou shalt.”
+
+“Each man must sign his name or mark with his own hand.”
+
+“It shall be done.”
+
+“Then, harkye! attend Pandulfo di Guido at his house this evening,
+at sunset. He shall instruct thee where to meet this night some brave
+hearts;--thou art worthy to be ranked amongst them. Thou wilt not fail!”
+
+“By the holy Stairs! I will count every minute till then,” said the
+smith, his swarthy face lighted with pride at the confidence shown him.
+
+“Meanwhile, watch all your neighbours; let no man flag or grow
+faint-hearted,--none of thy friends must be branded as a traitor!”
+
+“I will cut his throat, were he my own mother’s son, if I find one
+pledged man flinch!” said the fierce smith.
+
+“Ha, ha!” rejoined Rienzi, with that strange laugh which belonged to
+him; “a miracle! a miracle! The Picture speaks now!”
+
+It was already nearly dusk when Rienzi left the Capitol. The broad space
+before its walls was empty and deserted, and wrapping his mantle closely
+round him, he walked musingly on.
+
+“I have almost climbed the height,” thought he, “and now the precipice
+yawns before me. If I fail, what a fall! The last hope of my country
+falls with me. Never will a noble rise against the nobles. Never will
+another plebeian have the opportunities and the power that I have! Rome
+is bound up with me--with a single life. The liberties of all time are
+fixed to a reed that a wind may uproot. But oh, Providence! hast thou
+not reserved and marked me for great deeds? How, step by step, have I
+been led on to this solemn enterprise! How has each hour prepared its
+successor! And yet what danger! If the inconstant people, made cowardly
+by long thraldom, do but waver in the crisis, I am swept away!”
+
+As he spoke, he raised his eyes, and lo, before him, the first star of
+twilight shone calmly down upon the crumbling remnants of the Tarpeian
+Rock. It was no favouring omen, and Rienzi’s heart beat quicker as that
+dark and ruined mass frowned thus suddenly on his gaze.
+
+“Dread monument,” thought he, “of what dark catastrophes, to what
+unknown schemes, hast thou been the witness! To how many enterprises, on
+which history is dumb, hast thou set the seal! How know we whether they
+were criminal or just? How know we whether he, thus doomed as a traitor,
+would not, if successful, have been immortalized as a deliverer? If I
+fall, who will write my chronicle? One of the people? alas! blinded and
+ignorant, they furnish forth no minds that can appeal to posterity. One
+of the patricians? in what colours then shall I be painted! No tomb will
+rise for me amidst the wrecks; no hand scatter flowers upon my grave!”
+
+Thus meditating on the verge of that mighty enterprise to which he had
+devoted himself, Rienzi pursued his way. He gained the Tiber, and paused
+for a few moments beside its legendary stream, over which the purple and
+starlit heaven shone deeply down. He crossed the bridge which leads
+to the quarter of the Trastevere, whose haughty inhabitants yet boast
+themselves the sole true descendants of the ancient Romans. Here he step
+grew quicker and more light; brighter, if less solemn, thoughts crowded
+upon his breast; and ambition, lulled for a moment, left his strained
+and over-laboured mind to the reign of a softer passion.
+
+
+
+Chapter 1.XI. Nina di Raselli.
+
+“I tell you, Lucia, I do not love those stuffs; they do not become me.
+Saw you ever so poor a dye?--this purple, indeed! that crimson! Why did
+you let the man leave them? Let him take them elsewhere tomorrow.
+They may suit the signoras on the other side the Tiber, who imagine
+everything Venetian must be perfect; but I, Lucia, I see with my own
+eyes, and judge from my own mind.”
+
+“Ah, dear lady,” said the serving-maid, “if you were, as you doubtless
+will be, some time or other, a grand signora, how worthily you would
+wear the honours! Santa Cecilia! No other dame in Rome would be looked
+at while the Lady Nina were by!”
+
+“Would we not teach them what pomp was?” answered Nina. “Oh! what
+festivals would we hold! Saw you not from the gallery the revels given
+last week by the Lady Giulia Savelli?”
+
+“Ay, signora; and when you walked up the hall in your silver and pearl
+tissue, there ran such a murmur through the gallery; every one cried,
+‘The Savelli have entertained an angel!’”
+
+“Pish! Lucia; no flattery, girl.”
+
+“It is naked truth, lady. But that was a revel, was it not? There was
+grandeur!--fifty servitors in scarlet and gold! and the music playing
+all the while. The minstrels were sent for from Bergamo. Did not that
+festival please you? Ah, I warrant many were the fine speeches made to
+you that day!”
+
+“Heigho!--no, there was one voice wanting, and all the music was marred.
+But, girl, were I the Lady Giulia, I would not have been contented with
+so poor a revel.”
+
+“How, poor! Why all the nobles say it outdid the proudest marriage-feast
+of the Colonna. Nay, a Neapolitan who sat next me, and who had served
+under the young Queen Joanna, at her marriage, says, that even Naples
+was outshone.”
+
+“That may be. I know nought of Naples; but I know what my court should
+have been, were I what--what I am not, and may never be! The banquet
+vessels should have been of gold; the cups jewelled to the brim; not
+an inch of the rude pavement should have been visible; all should
+have glowed with cloth of gold. The fountain in the court should have
+showered up the perfumes of the East; my pages should not have been
+rough youths, blushing at their own uncouthness, but fair boys, who had
+not told their twelfth year, culled from the daintiest palaces of Rome;
+and, as for the music, oh, Lucia!--each musician should have worn a
+chaplet, and deserved it; and he who played best should have had a
+reward, to inspire all the rest--a rose from me. Saw you, too, the
+Lady Giulia’s robe? What colours! they might have put out the sun
+at noonday!--yellow, and blue, and orange, and scarlet! Oh, sweet
+Saints!--but my eyes ached all the next day!”
+
+“Doubtless, the Lady Giulia lacks your skill in the mixture of colours,”
+ said the complaisant waiting-woman.
+
+“And then, too, what a mien!--no royalty in it! She moved along the
+hall, so that her train well nigh tripped her every moment; and then
+she said, with a foolish laugh, ‘These holyday robes are but troublesome
+luxuries.’ Troth, for the great there should be no holyday robes; ‘tis
+for myself, not for others, that I would attire! Every day should
+have its new robe, more gorgeous than the last;--every day should be a
+holyday!”
+
+“Methought,” said Lucia, “that the Lord Giovanni Orsini seemed very
+devoted to my Lady.”
+
+“He! the bear!”
+
+“Bear, he may be! but he has a costly skin. His riches are untold.”
+
+“And the fool knows not how to spend them.”
+
+“Was not that the young Lord Adrian who spoke to you just by the
+columns, where the music played?”
+
+“It might be,--I forget.”
+
+“Yet, I hear that few ladies forget when Lord Adrian di Castello woos
+them.”
+
+“There was but one man whose company seemed to me worth the
+recollection,” answered Nina, unheeding the insinuation of the artful
+handmaid.
+
+“And who was he?” asked Lucia.
+
+“The old scholar from Avignon!”
+
+“What! he with the gray beard? Oh, Signora!”
+
+“Yes,” said Nina, with a grave and sad voice; “when he spoke, the whole
+scene vanished from my eyes,--for he spoke to me of HIM!”
+
+As she said this, the Signora sighed deeply, and the tears gathered to
+her eyes.
+
+The waiting-woman raised her lips in disdain, and her looks in wonder;
+but she did not dare to venture a reply.
+
+“Open the lattice,” said Nina, after a pause, “and give me yon paper.
+Not that, girl--but the verses sent me yesterday. What! art thou
+Italian, and dost thou not know, by instinct, that I spoke of the rhyme
+of Petrarch?”
+
+Seated by the open casement, through which the moonlight stole soft
+and sheen, with one lamp beside her, from which she seemed to shade her
+eyes, though in reality she sought to hide her countenance from Lucia,
+the young Signora appeared absorbed in one of those tender sonnets which
+then turned the brains and inflamed the hearts of Italy. (Although it is
+true that the love sonnets of Petrarch were not then, as now, the most
+esteemed of his works, yet it has been a great, though a common error,
+to represent them as little known and coldly admired. Their effect was,
+in reality, prodigious and universal. Every ballad-singer sung them
+in the streets, and (says Filippo Villani), “Gravissimi nesciebant
+abstinere”--“Even the gravest could not abstain from them.”)
+
+Born of an impoverished house, which, though boasting its descent from
+a consular race of Rome, scarcely at that day maintained a rank
+amongst the inferior order of nobility, Nina di Raselli was the spoiled
+child--the idol and the tyrant--of her parents. The energetic and
+self-willed character of her mind made her rule where she should have
+obeyed; and as in all ages dispositions can conquer custom, she had,
+though in a clime and land where the young and unmarried of her sex
+are usually chained and fettered, assumed, and by assuming won, the
+prerogative of independence. She possessed, it is true, more learning
+and more genius than generally fell to the share of women in that day;
+and enough of both to be deemed a miracle by her parents;--she had,
+also, what they valued more, a surpassing beauty; and, what they feared
+more, an indomitable haughtiness;--a haughtiness mixed with a thousand
+soft and endearing qualities where she loved; and which, indeed, where
+she loved, seemed to vanish. At once vain yet high-minded, resolute yet
+impassioned, there was a gorgeous magnificence in her very vanity and
+splendour,--an ideality in her waywardness: her defects made a part
+of her brilliancy; without them she would have seemed less woman; and,
+knowing her, you would have compared all women by her standard. Softer
+qualities beside her seemed not more charming, but more insipid. She had
+no vulgar ambition, for she had obstinately refused many alliances which
+the daughter of Raselli could scarcely have hoped to form. The untutored
+minds and savage power of the Roman nobles seemed to her imagination,
+which was full of the poetry of rank, its luxury and its graces, as
+something barbarous and revolting, at once to be dreaded and despised.
+She had, therefore, passed her twentieth year unmarried, but not without
+love. The faults, themselves, of her character, elevated that ideal of
+love which she had formed. She required some being round whom all her
+vainer qualities could rally; she felt that where she loved she must
+adore; she demanded no common idol before which to humble so strong and
+imperious a mind. Unlike women of a gentler mould, who desire, for a
+short period, to exercise the caprices of sweet empire,--when she loved
+she must cease to command; and pride, at once, be humbled to devotion.
+So rare were the qualities that could attract her; so imperiously did
+her haughtiness require that those qualities should be above her own,
+yet of the same order; that her love elevated its object like a god.
+Accustomed to despise, she felt all the luxury it is to venerate! And
+if it were her lot to be united with one thus loved, her nature was
+that which might become elevated by the nature that it gazed on. For
+her beauty--Reader, shouldst thou ever go to Rome, thou wilt see in the
+Capitol the picture of the Cumaean Sibyl, which, often copied, no copy
+can even faintly represent. I beseech thee, mistake not this sibyl for
+another, for the Roman galleries abound in sibyls. (The sibyl referred
+to is the well-known one by Domenichino. As a mere work of art, that by
+Guercino, called the Persian sibyl, in the same collection, is perhaps
+superior; but in beauty, in character, there is no comparison.) The
+sibyl I speak of is dark, and the face has an Eastern cast; the robe
+and turban, gorgeous though they be, grow dim before the rich, but
+transparent roses of the cheek; the hair would be black, save for that
+golden glow which mellows it to a hue and lustre never seen but in the
+south, and even in the south most rare; the features, not Grecian, are
+yet faultless; the mouth, the brow, the ripe and exquisite contour, all
+are human and voluptuous; the expression, the aspect, is something more;
+the form is, perhaps, too full for the perfection of loveliness, for the
+proportions of sculpture, for the delicacy of Athenian models; but the
+luxuriant fault has a majesty. Gaze long upon that picture: it charms,
+yet commands, the eye. While you gaze, you call back five centuries. You
+see before you the breathing image of Nina di Raselli!
+
+But it was not those ingenious and elaborate conceits in which Petrarch,
+great Poet though he be, has so often mistaken pedantry for passion,
+that absorbed at that moment the attention of the beautiful Nina. Her
+eyes rested not on the page, but on the garden that stretched below the
+casement. Over the old fruit-trees and hanging vines fell the moonshine;
+and in the centre of the green, but half-neglected sward, the waters of
+a small and circular fountain, whose perfect proportions spoke of days
+long past, played and sparkled in the starlight. The scene was still
+and beautiful; but neither of its stillness nor its beauty thought Nina:
+towards one, the gloomiest and most rugged, spot in the whole garden,
+turned her gaze; there, the trees stood densely massed together, and
+shut from view the low but heavy wall which encircled the mansion of
+Raselli. The boughs on those trees stirred gently, but Nina saw them
+wave; and now from the copse emerged, slowly and cautiously, a solitary
+figure, whose shadow threw itself, long and dark, over the sward. It
+approached the window, and a low voice breathed Nina’s name.
+
+“Quick, Lucia!” cried she, breathlessly, turning to her handmaid:
+“quick! the rope-ladder! it is he! he is come! How slow you are! haste,
+girl,--he may be discovered! There,--O joy,--O joy!--My lover! my hero!
+my Rienzi!”
+
+“It is you!” said Rienzi, as, now entering the chamber, he wound his
+arms around her half-averted form, “and what is night to others is day
+to me!”
+
+The first sweet moments of welcome were over; and Rienzi was seated at
+the feet of his mistress: his head rested on her knees--his face looking
+up to hers--their hands clasped each in each.
+
+“And for me thou bravest these dangers!” said the lover; “the shame of
+discovery, the wrath of thy parents!”
+
+“But what are my perils to thine? Oh, Heaven! if my father found thee
+here thou wouldst die!”
+
+“He would think it then so great a humiliation, that thou, beautiful
+Nina, who mightst match with the haughtiest names of Rome, shouldst
+waste thy love on a plebeian--even though the grandson of an emperor!”
+
+The proud heart of Nina could sympathize well with the wounded pride of
+her lover: she detected the soreness which lurked beneath his answer,
+carelessly as it was uttered.
+
+“Hast thou not told me,” she said, “of that great Marius, who was no
+noble, but from whom the loftiest Colonna would rejoice to claim his
+descent? and do I not know in thee one who shall yet eclipse the power
+of Marius, unsullied by his vices?”
+
+“Delicious flattery! sweet prophet!” said Rienzi, with a melancholy
+smile; “never were thy supporting promises of the future more welcome to
+me than now; for to thee I will say what I would utter to none else--my
+soul half sinks beneath the mighty burthen I have heaped upon it. I want
+new courage as the dread hour approaches; and from thy words and looks I
+drink it.”
+
+“Oh!” answered Nina, blushing as she spoke, “glorious is indeed the lot
+which I have bought by my love for thee: glorious to share thy schemes,
+to cheer thee in doubt, to whisper hope to thee in danger.”
+
+“And give grace to me in triumph!” added Rienzi, passionately. “Ah!
+should the future ever place upon these brows the laurel-wreath due to
+one who has saved his country, what joy, what recompence, to lay it
+at thy feet! Perhaps, in those long and solitary hours of languor and
+exhaustion which fill up the interstices of time,--the dull space for
+sober thought between the epochs of exciting action,--perhaps I should
+have failed and flagged, and renounced even my dreams for Rome, had they
+not been linked also with my dreams for thee!--had I not pictured to
+myself the hour when my fate should elevate me beyond my birth; when thy
+sire would deem it no disgrace to give thee to my arms; when thou,
+too, shouldst stand amidst the dames of Rome, more honoured, as more
+beautiful, than all; and when I should see that pomp, which my own soul
+disdains, [‘Quem semper abhorrui sicut cenum’ is the expression used by
+Rienzi, in his letter to his friend at Avignon, and which was probably
+sincere. Men rarely act according to the bias of their own tastes.) made
+dear and grateful to me because associated with thee! Yes, it is these
+thoughts that have inspired me, when sterner ones have shrunk back
+appalled from the spectres that surround their goal. And oh! my Nina,
+sacred, strong, enduring must be, indeed, the love which lives in the
+same pure and elevated air as that which sustains my hopes of liberty
+and fame!”
+
+This was the language which, more even than the vows of fidelity and the
+dear adulation which springs from the heart’s exuberance, had bound the
+proud and vain soul of Nina to the chains that it so willingly wore.
+Perhaps, indeed, in the absence of Rienzi, her weaker nature pictured to
+herself the triumph of humbling the highborn signoras, and eclipsing the
+barbarous magnificence of the chiefs of Rome; but in his presence,
+and listening to his more elevated and generous ambition, as yet all
+unsullied by one private feeling save the hope of her, her higher
+sympathies were enlisted with his schemes, her mind aspired to raise
+itself to the height of his, and she thought less of her own rise than
+of his glory. It was sweet to her pride to be the sole confidante of his
+most secret thoughts, as of his most hardy undertakings; to see bared
+before her that intricate and plotting spirit; to be admitted even to
+the knowledge of its doubts and weakness, as of its heroism and power.
+
+Nothing could be more contrasted than the loves of Rienzi and Nina,
+and those of Adrian and Irene: in the latter, all were the dreams, the
+phantasies, the extravagance, of youth; they never talked of the future;
+they mingled no other aspirations with those of love. Ambition, glory,
+the world’s high objects, were nothing to them when together; their love
+had swallowed up the world, and left nothing visible beneath the sun,
+save itself. But the passion of Nina and her lover was that of more
+complicated natures and more mature years: it was made up of a thousand
+feelings, each naturally severed from each, but compelled into one focus
+by the mighty concentration of love; their talk was of the world; it was
+from the world that they drew the aliment which sustained it; it was of
+the future they spoke and thought; of its dreams and imagined glories
+they made themselves a home and altar; their love had in it more of the
+Intellectual than that of Adrian and Irene; it was more fitted for this
+hard earth; it had in it, also, more of the leaven of the later and iron
+days, and less of poetry and the first golden age.
+
+“And must thou leave me now?” said Nina, her cheek no more averted from
+his lips, nor her form from his parting embrace. “The moon is high yet;
+it is but a little hour thou hast given me.”
+
+“An hour! Alas!” said Rienzi, “it is near upon midnight--our friends
+await me.”
+
+“Go, then, my soul’s best half! Go; Nina shall not detain thee one
+moment from those higher objects which make thee so dear to Nina.
+When--when shall we meet again!”
+
+“Not,” said Rienzi, proudly, and with all his soul upon his brow, “not
+thus, by stealth! no! nor as I thus have met thee, the obscure and
+contemned bondsman! When next thou seest me, it shall be at the head of
+the sons of Rome! her champion! her restorer! or--” said he, sinking his
+voice--
+
+“There is no or!” interrupted Nina, weaving her arms round him, and
+catching his enthusiasm; “thou hast uttered thine own destiny!”
+
+“One kiss more!--farewell!--the tenth day from the morrow shines upon
+the restoration of Rome!”
+
+
+
+Chapter 1.XII. The Strange Adventures that Befel Walter de Montreal.
+
+It was upon that same evening, and while the earlier stars yet shone
+over the city, that Walter de Montreal, returning, alone, to the convent
+then associated with the church of Santa Maria del Priorata (both of
+which belonged to the Knights of the Hospital, and in the first of which
+Montreal had taken his lodgment), paused amidst the ruins and desolation
+which lay around his path. Thou little skilled in the classic memories
+and associations of the spot, he could not but be impressed with the
+surrounding witnesses of departed empire; the vast skeleton, as it were,
+of the dead giantess.
+
+“Now,” thought he, as he gazed around upon the roofless columns and
+shattered walls, everywhere visible, over which the starlight shone,
+ghastly and transparent, backed by the frowning and embattled fortresses
+of the Frangipani, half hid by the dark foliage that sprung up amidst
+the very fanes and palaces of old--Nature exulting over the frailer
+Art; “now,” thought he, “bookmen would be inspired, by this scene, with
+fantastic and dreaming visions of the past. But to me these monuments of
+high ambition and royal splendour create only images of the future. Rome
+may yet be, with her seven-hilled diadem, as Rome has been before, the
+prize of the strongest hand and the boldest warrior,--revived, not by
+her own degenerate sons, but the infused blood of a new race. William
+the Bastard could scarce have found the hardy Englishers so easy a
+conquest as Walter the Well-born may find these eunuch Romans. And which
+conquest were the more glorious,--the barbarous Isle, or the Metropolis
+of the World? Short step from the general to the podesta--shorter step
+from the podesta to the king!”
+
+While thus revolving his wild, yet not altogether chimerical ambition,
+a quick light step was heard amidst the long herbage, and, looking up,
+Montreal perceived the figure of a tall female descending from that
+part of the hill then covered by many convents, towards the base of the
+Aventine. She supported her steps with a long staff, and moved with such
+elasticity and erectness, that now, as her face became visible by the
+starlight, it was surprising to perceive that it was the face of one
+advanced in years,--a harsh, proud countenance, withered, and deeply
+wrinkled, but not without a certain regularity of outline.
+
+“Merciful Virgin!” cried Montreal, starting back as that face gleamed
+upon him: “is it possible? It is she:--it is--”
+
+He sprung forward, and stood right before the old woman, who seemed
+equally surprised, though more dismayed, at the sight of Montreal.
+
+“I have sought thee for years,” said the Knight, first breaking the
+silence; “years, long years,--thy conscience can tell thee why.”
+
+“Mine, man of blood!” cried the female, trembling with rage or fear;
+“darest thou talk of conscience? Thou, the dishonourer--the robber--the
+professed homicide! Thou, disgrace to knighthood and to birth! Thou,
+with the cross of chastity and of peace upon thy breast! Thou talk of
+conscience, hypocrite!--thou?”
+
+“Lady--lady!” said Montreal, deprecatingly, and almost quailing beneath
+the fiery passion of that feeble woman, “I have sinned against thee and
+thine. But remember all my excuses!--early love--fatal obstacles--rash
+vow--irresistible temptation! Perhaps,” he added, in a more haughty
+tone, “perhaps, yet, I may have the power to atone my error, and wring,
+with mailed hand, from the successor of St Peter, who hath power to
+loose as to bind--”
+
+“Perjured and abandoned!” interrupted the female; “dost thou dream that
+violence can purchase absolution, or that thou canst ever atone the
+past?--a noble name disgraced, a father’s broken heart and dying curse!
+Yes, that curse, I hear it now! it rings upon me thrillingly, as when I
+watched the expiring clay! it cleaves to thee--it pursues thee--it shall
+pierce thee through thy corselet--it shall smite thee in the meridian of
+thy power! Genius wasted--ambition blasted--penitence deferred--a life
+of brawls, and a death of shame--thy destruction the offspring of thy
+crime!--To this, to this, an old man’s curse hath doomed thee!--AND THOU
+ART DOOMED!”
+
+These words were rather shrieked than spoken: and the flashing eye, the
+lifted hand, the dilated form of the speaker--the hour--the solitude of
+the ruins around--all conspired to give to the fearful execration the
+character of prophecy. The warrior, against whose undaunted breast a
+hundred spears had shivered in vain, fell appalled and humbled to the
+ground. He seized the hem of his fierce denouncer’s robe, and cried, in
+a choked and hollow voice, “Spare me! spare me!”
+
+“Spare thee!” said the unrelenting crone; “hast thou ever spared
+man in thy hatred, or woman in thy lust? Ah, grovel in the
+dust!--crouch--crouch!--wild beast as thou art! whose sleek skin and
+beautiful hues have taught the unwary to be blind to the talons that
+rend, and the grinders that devour;--crouch, that the foot of the old
+and impotent may spurn thee!”
+
+“Hag!” cried Montreal, in the reaction of sudden fury and maddened
+pride, springing up to the full height of his stature. “Hag! thou hast
+passed the limits to which, remembering who thou art, my forbearance
+gave thee licence. I had well-nigh forgot that thou hadst assumed my
+part--I am the Accuser! Woman!--the boy!--shrink not! equivocate not!
+lie not!--thou wert the thief!”
+
+“I was. Thou taughtest me the lesson how to steal a--”
+
+“Render--restore him!” interrupted Montreal, stamping on the ground with
+such force that the splinters of the marble fragments on which he stood
+shivered under his armed heel.
+
+The woman little heeded a violence at which the fiercest warrior of
+Italy might have trembled; but she did not make an immediate answer. The
+character of her countenance altered from passion into an expression
+of grave, intent, and melancholy thought. At length she replied to
+Montreal; whose hand had wandered to his dagger-hilt, with the instinct
+of long habit, whenever enraged or thwarted, rather than from any design
+of blood; which, stern and vindictive as he was, he would have been
+incapable of forming against any woman,--much less against the one then
+before him.
+
+“Walter de Montreal,” said she, in a voice so calm that it almost
+sounded like that of compassion, “the boy, I think, has never known
+brother or sister: the only child of a once haughty and lordly race, on
+both sides, though now on both dishonoured--nay, why so impatient? thou
+wilt soon learn the worst--the boy is dead!”
+
+“Dead!” repeated Montreal, recoiling and growing pale; “dead!--no,
+no--say not that! He has a mother,--you know he has!--a fond,
+meekhearted, anxious, hoping mother!--no!--no, he is not dead!”
+
+“Thou canst feel, then, for a mother?” said the old woman, seemingly
+touched by the tone of the Provencal. “Yet, bethink thee; is it not
+better that the grave should save him from a life of riot, of bloodshed,
+and of crime? Better to sleep with God than to wake with the fiends!”
+
+“Dead!” echoed Montreal; “dead!--the pretty one!--so young!--those
+eyes--the mother’s eyes--closed so soon?”
+
+“Hast thou aught else to say? Thy sight scares my very womanhood from my
+soul!--let me be gone.”
+
+“Dead!--may I believe thee? or dost thou mock me? Thou hast uttered thy
+curse, hearken to my warning:--If thou hast lied in this, thy last hour
+shall dismay thee, and thy death-bed shall be the death-bed of despair!”
+
+“Thy lips,” replied the female, with a scornful smile, “are better
+adapted for lewd vows to unhappy maidens, than for the denunciations
+which sound solemn only when coming from the good. Farewell!”
+
+“Stay! inexorable woman! stay!--where sleeps he? Masses shall be sung!
+priests shall pray!--the sins of the father shall not be visited on that
+young head!”
+
+“At Florence!” returned the woman, hastily. “But no stone records the
+departed one!--The dead boy had no name!”
+
+Waiting for no further questionings, the woman now passed on,--pursued
+her way;--and the long herbage, and the winding descent, soon snatched
+her ill-omened apparition from the desolate landscape.
+
+Montreal, thus alone, sunk with a deep and heavy sigh upon the ground,
+covered his face with his hands, and burst into an agony of grief; his
+chest heaved, his whole frame trembled, and he wept and sobbed aloud,
+with all the fearful vehemence of a man whose passions are strong and
+fierce, but to whom the violence of grief alone is novel and unfamiliar.
+
+He remained thus, prostrate and unmanned, for a considerable time,
+growing slowly and gradually more calm as tears relieved his emotion;
+and, at length, rather indulging a gloomy reverie than a passionate
+grief. The moon was high and the hour late when he arose, and then few
+traces of the past excitement remained upon his countenance; for Walter
+de Montreal was not of that mould in which woe can force a settlement,
+or to which any affliction can bring the continued and habitual
+melancholy that darkens those who feel more enduringly, though with
+emotions less stormy. His were the elements of the true Franc character,
+though carried to excess: his sternest and his deepest qualities
+were mingled with fickleness and caprice; his profound sagacity often
+frustrated by a whim; his towering ambition deserted for some frivolous
+temptation; and his elastic, sanguine, and high-spirited nature,
+faithful only to the desire of military glory, to the poetry of a daring
+and stormy life, and to the susceptibilities of that tender passion
+without whose colourings no portrait of chivalry is complete, and in
+which he was capable of a sentiment, a tenderness, and a loyal devotion,
+which could hardly have been supposed compatible with his reckless
+levity and his undisciplined career.
+
+“Well,” said he, as he rose slowly, folded his mantle round him, and
+resumed his way, “it was not for myself I grieved thus. But the pang is
+past, and the worst is known. Now, then, back to those things that never
+die--restless projects and daring schemes. That hag’s curse keeps my
+blood cold still, and this solitude has something in it weird and awful.
+Ha!--what sudden light is that?”
+
+The light which caught Montreal’s eye broke forth almost like a star,
+scarcely larger, indeed, but more red and intense in its ray. Of itself
+it was nothing uncommon, and might have shone either from convent or
+cottage. But it streamed from a part of the Aventine which contained
+no habitations of the living, but only the empty ruins and shattered
+porticoes, of which even the names and memories of the ancient
+inhabitants were dead. Aware of this, Montreal felt a slight awe (as the
+beam threw its steady light over the dreary landscape); for he was
+not without the knightly superstitions of the age, and it was now the
+witching hour consecrated to ghost and spirit. But fear, whether of
+this world or the next, could not long daunt the mind of the hardy
+freebooter; and, after a short hesitation, he resolved to make a
+digression from his way, and ascertain the cause of the phenomenon.
+Unconsciously, the martial tread of the barbarian passed over the site
+of the famed, or infamous, Temple of Isis, which had once witnessed
+those wildest orgies commemorated by Juvenal; and came at last to a
+thick and dark copse, from an opening in the centre of which gleamed the
+mysterious light. Penetrating the gloomy foliage, the Knight now found
+himself before a large ruin, grey and roofless, from within which came,
+indistinct and muffled, the sound of voices. Through a rent in the wall,
+forming a kind of casement, and about ten feet from the ground, the
+light now broke over the matted and rank soil, embedded, as it were, in
+vast masses of shade, and streaming through a mouldering portico hard at
+hand. The Provencal stood, though he knew it not, on the very place once
+consecrated by the Temple: the Portico and the Library of Liberty (the
+first public library instituted in Rome). The wall of the ruin was
+covered with innumerable creepers and wild brushwood, and it required
+but little agility on the part of Montreal, by the help of these, to
+raise himself to the height of the aperture, and, concealed by the
+luxuriant foliage, to gaze within. He saw a table, lighted with tapers,
+in the centre of which was a crucifix; a dagger, unsheathed; an open
+scroll, which the event proved to be of sacred character; and a brazen
+bowl. About a hundred men, in cloaks, and with black vizards, stood
+motionless around; and one, taller than the rest, without disguise or
+mask--whose pale brow and stern features seemed by that light yet
+paler and yet more stern--appeared to be concluding some address to his
+companions.
+
+“Yes,” said he, “in the church of the Lateran I will make the last
+appeal to the people. Supported by the Vicar of the Pope, myself an
+officer of the Pontiff, it will be seen that Religion and Liberty--the
+heroes and the martyrs--are united in one cause. After that time, words
+are idle; action must begin. By this crucifix I pledge my faith, on this
+blade I devote my life, to the regeneration of Rome! And you (then no
+need for mask or mantle!), when the solitary trump is heard, when the
+solitary horseman is seen,--you, swear to rally round the standard of
+the Republic, and resist--with heart and hand, with life and soul,
+in defiance of death, and in hope of redemption--the arms of the
+oppressor!”
+
+“We swear--we swear!” exclaimed every voice: and, crowding toward cross
+and weapon, the tapers were obscured by the intervening throng, and
+Montreal could not perceive the ceremony, nor hear the muttered
+formula of the oath: but he could guess that the rite then common to
+conspiracies--and which required each conspirator to shed some drops
+of his own blood, in token that life itself was devoted to the
+enterprise--had not been omitted, when, the group again receding, the
+same figure as before had addressed the meeting, holding on high the
+bowl with both hands,--while from the left arm, which was bared,
+the blood weltered slowly, and trickled, drop by drop, upon the
+ground,--said, in a solemn voice and upturned eyes:
+
+“Amidst the ruins of thy temple, O Liberty! we, Romans, dedicate to
+thee this libation! We, befriended and inspired by no unreal and fabled
+idols, but by the Lord of Hosts, and Him who, descending to earth,
+appealed not to emperors and to princes, but to the fisherman and the
+peasant,--giving to the lowly and the poor the mission of Revelation.”
+ Then, turning suddenly to his companions, as his features, singularly
+varying in their character and expression, brightened, from solemn awe,
+into a martial and kindling enthusiasm, he cried aloud, “Death to
+the Tyranny! Life to the Republic!” The effect of the transition was
+startling. Each man, as by an involuntary and irresistible impulse, laid
+his hand upon his sword, as he echoed the sentiment; some, indeed, drew
+forth their blades, as if for instant action.
+
+“I have seen enow: they will break up anon,” said Montreal to himself:
+“and I would rather face an army of thousands, than even half-a-dozen
+enthusiasts, so inflamed,--and I thus detected.” And, with this thought,
+he dropped on the ground, and glided away, as, once again, through the
+still midnight air, broke upon his ear the muffled shout--“DEATH TO THE
+TYRANNY!--LIFE TO THE REPUBLIC!”
+
+
+
+
+BOOK II. THE REVOLUTION
+
+     “Ogni Lascivia, ogni male, nulla giustizia, nullo freno.
+     Non c’era piu remedia, ogni persona periva.  Allora Cola di
+     Rienzi.” &c.--“Vita di Cola di Rienzi”, lib. i. chap. 2.
+
+     “Every kind of lewdness, every form of evil; no justice, no
+     restraint. Remedy there was none; perdition fell on all.
+     Then Cola di Rienzi,” &c.--“Life of Cola di Rienzi”.
+
+
+
+Chapter 2.I. The Knight of Provence, and his Proposal.
+
+It was nearly noon as Adrian entered the gates of the palace of Stephen
+Colonna. The palaces of the nobles were not then as we see them now,
+receptacles for the immortal canvas of Italian, and the imperishable
+sculpture of Grecian Art; but still to this day are retained the massive
+walls, and barred windows, and spacious courts, which at that time
+protected their rude retainers. High above the gates rose a lofty and
+solid tower, whose height commanded a wide view of the mutilated remains
+of Rome: the gate itself was adorned and strengthened on either side by
+columns of granite, whose Doric capitals betrayed the sacrilege that
+had torn them from one of the many temples that had formerly crowded
+the sacred Forum. From the same spoils came, too, the vast fragments of
+travertine which made the walls of the outer court. So common at that
+day were these barbarous appropriations of the most precious monuments
+of art, that the columns and domes of earlier Rome were regarded by all
+classes but as quarries, from which every man was free to gather the
+materials, whether for his castle or his cottage,--a wantonness of
+outrage far greater than the Goths’, to whom a later age would fain have
+attributed all the disgrace, and which, more perhaps than even heavier
+offences, excited the classical indignation of Petrarch, and made him
+sympathise with Rienzi in his hopes of Rome. Still may you see
+the churches of that or even earlier dates, of the most shapeless
+architecture, built on the sites, and from the marbles, consecrating
+(rather than consecrated by) the names of Venus, of Jupiter, of Minerva.
+The palace of the Prince of the Orsini, duke of Gravina, is yet reared
+above the graceful arches (still visible) of the theatre of Marcellus;
+then a fortress of the Savelli.
+
+As Adrian passed the court, a heavy waggon blocked up the way, laden
+with huge marbles, dug from the unexhausted mine of the Golden House
+of Nero: they were intended for an additional tower, by which Stephen
+Colonna proposed yet more to strengthen the tasteless and barbarous
+edifice in which the old noble maintained the dignity of outraging the
+law.
+
+The friend of Petrarch and the pupil of Rienzi sighed deeply as he
+passed this vehicle of new spoliations, and as a pillar of fluted
+alabaster, rolling carelessly from the waggon, fell with a loud crash
+upon the pavement. At the foot of the stairs grouped some dozen of the
+bandits whom the old Colonna entertained: they were playing at dice upon
+an ancient tomb, the clear and deep inscription on which (so different
+from the slovenly character of the later empire) bespoke it a memorial
+of the most powerful age of Rome, and which, now empty even of ashes,
+and upset, served for a table to these foreign savages, and was strewn,
+even at that early hour, with fragments of meat and flasks of wine. They
+scarcely stirred, they scarcely looked up, as the young noble passed
+them; and their fierce oaths and loud ejaculations, uttered in a
+northern patois, grated harsh upon his ear, as he mounted, with a slow
+step, the lofty and unclean stairs. He came into a vast ante-chamber,
+which was half-filled with the higher class of the patrician’s
+retainers: some five or six pages, chosen from the inferior noblesse,
+congregated by a narrow and deep-sunk casement, were discussing the
+grave matters of gallantry and intrigue; three petty chieftains of the
+band below, with their corselets donned, and their swords and casques
+beside them, were sitting, stolid and silent, at a table, in the middle
+of the room, and might have been taken for automatons, save for
+the solemn regularity with which they ever and anon lifted to their
+moustachioed lips their several goblets, and then, with a complacent
+grunt, re-settled to their contemplations. Striking was the contrast
+which their northern phlegm presented to a crowd of Italian clients, and
+petitioners, and parasites, who walked restlessly to and fro, talking
+loudly to each other, with all the vehement gestures and varying
+physiognomy of southern vivacity. There was a general stir and sensation
+as Adrian broke upon this miscellaneous company. The bandit captains
+nodded their heads mechanically; the pages bowed, and admired the
+fashion of his plume and hose; the clients, and petitioners, and
+parasites, crowded round him, each with a separate request for interest
+with his potent kinsman. Great need had Adrian of his wonted urbanity
+and address, in extricating himself from their grasp; and painfully
+did he win, at last, the low and narrow door, at which stood a tall
+servitor, who admitted or rejected the applicants, according to his
+interest or caprice.
+
+“Is the Baron alone?” asked Adrian.
+
+“Why, no, my Lord: a foreign signor is with him--but to you he is of
+course visible.”
+
+“Well, you may admit me. I would inquire of his health.”
+
+The servitor opened the door--through whose aperture peered many a
+jealous and wistful eye--and consigned Adrian to the guidance of a page,
+who, older and of greater esteem than the loiterers in the ante-room,
+was the especial henchman of the Lord of the Castle. Passing another,
+but empty chamber, vast and dreary, Adrian found himself in a small
+cabinet, and in the presence of his kinsman.
+
+Before a table, bearing the implements of writing, sate the old Colonna:
+a robe of rich furs and velvet hung loose upon his tall and stately
+frame; from a round skull-cap, of comforting warmth and crimson hue, a
+few grey locks descended, and mixed with a long and reverent beard. The
+countenance of the aged noble, who had long passed his eightieth year,
+still retained the traces of a comeliness for which in earlier manhood
+he was remarkable. His eyes, if deep-sunken, were still keen and lively,
+and sparkled with all the fire of youth; his mouth curved upward in a
+pleasant, though half-satiric, smile; and his appearance on the whole
+was prepossessing and commanding, indicating rather the high blood, the
+shrewd wit, and the gallant valour of the patrician, than his craft,
+hypocrisy, and habitual but disdainful spirit of oppression.
+
+Stephen Colonna, without being absolutely a hero, was indeed far braver
+than most of the Romans, though he held fast to the Italian maxim--never
+to fight an enemy while it is possible to cheat him. Two faults,
+however, marred the effect of his sagacity: a supreme insolence of
+disposition, and a profound belief in the lights of his experience. He
+was incapable of analogy. What had never happened in his time, he was
+perfectly persuaded never could happen. Thus, though generally esteemed
+an able diplomatist, he had the cunning of the intriguant, and not
+the providence of a statesman. If, however, pride made him arrogant
+in prosperity, it supported him in misfortune. And in the earlier
+vicissitudes of a life which had partly been consumed in exile, he
+had developed many noble qualities of fortitude, endurance, and real
+greatness of soul; which showed that his failings were rather acquired
+by circumstance than derived from nature. His numerous and highborn race
+were proud of their chief; and with justice; for he was the ablest and
+most honoured, not only of the direct branch of the Colonna, but also,
+perhaps, of all the more powerful barons.
+
+Seated at the same table with Stephen Colonna was a man of noble
+presence, of about three or four and thirty years of age, in whom Adrian
+instantly recognised Walter de Montreal. This celebrated knight was
+scarcely of the personal appearance which might have corresponded with
+the terror his name generally excited. His face was handsome, almost to
+the extreme of womanish delicacy. His fair hair waved long and freely
+over a white and unwrinkled forehead: the life of a camp and the suns of
+Italy had but little embrowned his clear and healthful complexion, which
+retained much of the bloom of youth. His features were aquiline
+and regular; his eyes, of a light hazel, were large, bright, and
+penetrating; and a short, but curled beard and moustachio, trimmed
+with soldier-like precision, and very little darker than the hair, gave
+indeed a martial expression to his comely countenance, but rather the
+expression which might have suited the hero of courts and tournaments,
+than the chief of a brigand’s camp. The aspect, manner, and bearing, of
+the Provencal were those which captivate rather than awe,--blending,
+as they did, a certain military frankness with the easy and graceful
+dignity of one conscious of gentle birth, and accustomed to mix, on
+equal terms, with the great and noble. His form happily contrasted and
+elevated the character of a countenance which required strength and
+stature to free its uncommon beauty from the charge of effeminacy,
+being of great height and remarkable muscular power, without the least
+approach to clumsy and unwieldy bulk: it erred, indeed, rather to the
+side of leanness than flesh,--at once robust and slender. But the chief
+personal distinction of this warrior, the most redoubted lance of Italy,
+was an air and carriage of chivalric and heroic grace, greatly set off
+at this time by his splendid dress, which was of brown velvet sown with
+pearls, over which hung the surcoat worn by the Knights of the Hospital,
+whereon was wrought, in white, the eight-pointed cross that made
+the badge of his order. The Knight’s attitude was that of earnest
+conversation, bending slightly forward towards the Colonna, and resting
+both his hands--which (according to the usual distinction of the old
+Norman race, (Small hands and feet, however disproportioned to the rest
+of the person, were at that time deemed no less a distinction of the
+well-born, than they have been in a more refined age. Many readers
+will remember the pain occasioned to Petrarch by his tight shoes. The
+supposed beauty of this peculiarity is more derived from the feudal than
+the classic time.) from whom, though born in Provence, Montreal boasted
+his descent) were small and delicate, the fingers being covered with
+jewels, as was the fashion of the day--upon the golden hilt of an
+enormous sword, on the sheath of which was elaborately wrought the
+silver lilies that made the device of the Provencal Brotherhood of
+Jerusalem.
+
+“Good morrow, fair kinsman!” said Stephen. “Seat thyself, I pray; and
+know in this knightly visitor the celebrated Sieur de Montreal.”
+
+“Ah, my Lord,” said Montreal, smiling, as he saluted Adrian; “and how is
+my lady at home?”
+
+“You mistake, Sir Knight,” quoth Stephen; “my young kinsman is not yet
+married: faith, as Pope Boniface remarked, when he lay stretched on a
+sick bed, and his confessor talked to him about Abraham’s bosom, ‘that
+is a pleasure the greater for being deferred.’”
+
+“The Signor will pardon my mistake,” returned Montreal.
+
+“But not,” said Adrian, “the neglect of Sir Walter in not ascertaining
+the fact in person. My thanks to him, noble kinsman, are greater than
+you weet of; and he promised to visit me, that he might receive them at
+leisure.”
+
+“I assure you, Signor,” answered Montreal, “that I have not forgotten
+the invitation; but so weighty hitherto have been my affairs at Rome,
+that I have been obliged to parley with my impatience to better our
+acquaintance.”
+
+“Oh, ye knew each other before?” said Stephen. “And how?”
+
+“My Lord, there is a damsel in the case!” replied Montreal. “Excuse my
+silence.”
+
+“Ah, Adrian, Adrian! when will you learn my continence!” said Stephen,
+solemnly stroking his grey beard. “What an example I set you! But a
+truce to this light conversation,--let us resume our theme. You must
+know, Adrian, that it is to the brave band of my guest I am indebted for
+those valiant gentlemen below, who keep Rome so quiet, though my poor
+habitation so noisy. He has called to proffer more assistance, if need
+be; and to advise me on the affairs of Northern Italy. Continue, I pray
+thee, Sir Knight; I have no disguises from my kinsman.”
+
+“Thou seest,” said Montreal, fixing his penetrating eyes on Adrian,
+“thou seest, doubtless, my Lord, that Italy at this moment presents to
+us a remarkable spectacle. It is a contest between two opposing powers,
+which shall destroy the other. The one power is that of the unruly and
+turbulent people--a power which they call ‘Liberty;’ the other power is
+that of the chiefs and princes--a power which they more appropriately
+call ‘Order.’ Between these parties the cities of Italy are divided.
+In Florence, in Genoa, in Pisa, for instance, is established a Free
+State--a Republic, God wot! and a more riotous, unhappy state of
+government, cannot well be imagined.”
+
+“That is perfectly true,” quoth Stephen; “they banished my own first
+cousin from Genoa.”
+
+“A perpetual strife, in short,” continued Montreal, “between the
+great families; an alternation of prosecutions, and confiscations, and
+banishments: today, the Guelfs proscribe the Ghibellines--tomorrow, the
+Ghibellines drive out the Guelfs. This may be liberty, but it is the
+liberty of the strong against the weak. In the other cities, as Milan,
+as Verona, as Bologna, the people are under the rule of one man,--who
+calls himself a prince, and whom his enemies call a tyrant. Having more
+force than any other citizen, he preserves a firm government; having
+more constant demand on his intellect and energies than the other
+citizens, he also preserves a wise one. These two orders of government
+are enlisted against each other: whenever the people in the one rebel
+against their prince, the people of the other--that is, the Free
+States--send arms and money to their assistance.”
+
+“You hear, Adrian, how wicked those last are,” quoth Stephen.
+
+“Now it seems to me,” continued Montreal, “that this contest must end
+some time or other. All Italy must become republican or monarchical. It
+is easy to predict which will be the result.”
+
+“Yes, Liberty must conquer in the end!” said Adrian, warmly.
+
+“Pardon me, young Lord; my opinion is entirely the reverse. You perceive
+that these republics are commercial,--are traders; they esteem wealth,
+they despise valour, they cultivate all trades save that of the
+armourer. Accordingly, how do they maintain themselves in war: by their
+own citizens? Not a whit of it! Either they send to some foreign chief,
+and promise, if he grant them his protection, the principality of the
+city for five or ten years in return; or else they borrow from some
+hardy adventurer, like myself, as many troops as they can afford to pay
+for. Is it not so, Lord Adrian?”
+
+Adrian nodded his reluctant assent.
+
+“Well, then, it is the fault of the foreign chief if he do not make his
+power permanent; as has been already done in States once free by the
+Visconti and the Scala: or else it is the fault of the captain of the
+mercenaries if he do not convert his brigands into senators, and himself
+into a king. These are events so natural, that one day or other
+they will occur throughout all Italy. And all Italy will then become
+monarchical. Now it seems to me the interest of all the powerful
+families--your own, at Rome, as that of the Visconti, at Milan--to
+expedite this epoch, and to check, while you yet may with ease, that
+rebellious contagion amongst the people which is now rapidly spreading,
+and which ends in the fever of licence to them, but in the corruption of
+death to you. In these free States, the nobles are the first to suffer:
+first your privileges, then your property, are swept away. Nay, in
+Florence, as ye well know, my Lords, no noble is even capable of holding
+the meanest office in the State!”
+
+“Villains!” said Colonna, “they violate the first law of nature!”
+
+“At this moment,” resumed Montreal, who, engrossed with his subject,
+little heeded the interruptions he received from the holy indignation of
+the Baron: “at this moment, there are many--the wisest, perhaps, in the
+free States--who desire to renew the old Lombard leagues, in defence of
+their common freedom everywhere, and against whosoever shall aspire to
+be prince. Fortunately, the deadly jealousies between these
+merchant States--the base plebeian jealousies--more of trade than of
+glory--interpose at present an irresistible obstacle to this design; and
+Florence, the most stirring and the most esteemed of all, is happily so
+reduced by reverses of commerce as to be utterly unable to follow out
+so great an undertaking. Now, then, is the time for us, my Lords; while
+these obstacles are so great for our foes, now is the time for us to
+form and cement a counter-league between all the princes of Italy. To
+you, noble Stephen, I have come, as your rank demands,--alone, of all
+the barons of Rome,--to propose to you this honourable union. Observe
+what advantages it proffers to your house. The popes have abandoned Rome
+for ever; there is no counterpoise to your ambition,--there need be none
+to your power. You see before you the examples of Visconti and Taddeo
+di Pepoli. You may found in Rome, the first city of Italy, a supreme and
+uncontrolled principality, subjugate utterly your weaker rivals,--the
+Savelli, the Malatesta, the Orsini,--and leave to your sons’ sons an
+hereditary kingdom that may aspire once more, perhaps, to the empire of
+the world.”
+
+Stephen shaded his face with his hand as he answered: “But this, noble
+Montreal, requires means:--money and men.”
+
+“Of the last, you can command from me enow--my small company, the best
+disciplined, can (whenever I please) swell to the most numerous in
+Italy: in the first, noble Baron, the rich House of Colonna cannot fail;
+and even a mortgage on its vast estates may be well repaid when you have
+possessed yourselves of the whole revenues of Rome. You see,” continued
+Montreal, turning to Adrian, in whose youth he expected a more warm ally
+than in the his hoary kinsman: “you see, at a glance, how feasible is
+this project, and what a mighty field it opens to your House.”
+
+“Sir Walter de Montreal,” said Adrian, rising from his seat, and giving
+vent to the indignation he had with difficulty suppressed, “I grieve
+much that, beneath the roof of the first citizen of Rome, a stranger
+should attempt thus calmly, and without interruption, to excite the
+ambition of emulating the execrated celebrity of a Visconti or a Pepoli.
+Speak, my Lord! (turning to Stephen)--speak, noble kinsman! and tell
+this Knight of Provence, that if by a Colonna the ancient grandeur of
+Rome cannot be restored, it shall not be, at least, by a Colonna that
+her last wrecks of liberty shall be swept away.”
+
+“How now, Adrian!--how now, sweet kinsman!” said Stephen, thus suddenly
+appealed to, “calm thyself, I pr’ythee. Noble Sir Walter, he is
+young--young, and hasty--he means not to offend thee.”
+
+“Of that I am persuaded,” returned Montreal, coldly, but with great
+and courteous command of temper. “He speaks from the impulse of the
+moment,--a praiseworthy fault in youth. It was mine at his age, and
+many a time have I nearly lost my life for the rashness. Nay, Signor,
+nay!--touch not your sword so meaningly, as if you fancied I intimated a
+threat; far from me such presumption. I have learned sufficient caution,
+believe me, in the wars, not wantonly to draw against me a blade which I
+have seen wielded against such odds.”
+
+Touched, despite himself, by the courtesy of the Knight, and the
+allusion to a scene in which, perhaps, his life had been preserved by
+Montreal, Adrian extended his hand to the latter.
+
+“I was to blame for my haste,” said he, frankly; “but know, by my very
+heat,” he added more gravely, “that your project will find no friends
+among the Colonna. Nay, in the presence of my noble kinsman, I dare
+to tell you, that could even his high sanction lend itself to such a
+scheme, the best hearts of his house would desert him; and I myself, his
+kinsman, would man yonder castle against so unnatural an ambition!”
+
+A slight and scarce perceptible cloud passed over Montreal’s countenance
+at these words; and he bit his lip ere he replied:
+
+“Yet if the Orsini be less scrupulous, their first exertion of power
+would be heard in the crashing house of the Colonna.”
+
+“Know you,” returned Adrian, “that one of our mottoes is this haughty
+address to the Romans,--‘If we fall, ye fall also?’ And better that
+fate, than a rise upon the wrecks of our native city.”
+
+“Well, well, well!” said Montreal, reseating himself, “I see that I must
+leave Rome to herself,--the League must thrive without her aid. I did
+but jest, touching the Orsini, for they have not the power that would
+make their efforts safe. Let us sweep, then, our past conference from
+our recollection. It is the nineteenth, I think, Lord Colonna, on which
+you propose to repair to Corneto, with your friends and retainers, and
+on which you have invited my attendance?”
+
+“It is on that day, Sir Knight,” replied the Baron, evidently much
+relieved by the turn the conversation had assumed. “The fact is, that
+we have been so charged with indifference to the interests of the good
+people, that I strain a point in this expedition to contradict the
+assertion; and we propose, therefore, to escort and protect, against the
+robbers of the road, a convoy of corn to Corneto. In truth, I may add
+another reason, besides fear of the robbers, that makes me desire as
+numerous a train as possible. I wish to show my enemies, and the people
+generally, the solid and growing power of my house; the display of
+such an armed band as I hope to levy, will be a magnificent occasion
+to strike awe into the riotous and refractory. Adrian, you will collect
+your servitors, I trust, on that day; we would not be without you.”
+
+“And as we ride along, fair Signor,” said Montreal, inclining to Adrian,
+“we will find at least one subject on which we can agree: all brave men
+and true knights have one common topic,--and its name is Woman. You must
+make me acquainted with the names of the fairest dames of Rome; and we
+will discuss old adventures in the Parliament of Love, and hope for
+new. By the way, I suppose, Lord Adrian, you, with the rest of your
+countrymen, are Petrarch-stricken?”
+
+“Do you not share our enthusiasm? slur not so your gallantry, I pray
+you.”
+
+“Come, we must not again disagree; but, by my halidame, I think one
+troubadour roundel worth all that Petrarch ever wrote. He has but
+borrowed from our knightly poesy, to disguise it, like a carpet
+coxcomb.”
+
+“Well,” said Adrian, gaily, “for every line of the troubadours that
+you quote, I will cite you another. I will forgive you for injustice to
+Petrarch, if you are just to the troubadours.”
+
+“Just!” cried Montreal, with real enthusiasm: “I am of the land, nay
+the very blood of the troubadour! But we grow too light for your noble
+kinsman; and it is time for me to bid you, for the present, farewell. My
+Lord Colonna, peace be with you; farewell, Sir Adrian,--brother mine in
+knighthood,--remember your challenge.”
+
+And with an easy and careless grace the Knight of St. John took his
+leave. The old Baron, making a dumb sign of excuse to Adrian, followed
+Montreal into the adjoining room.
+
+“Sir Knight!” said he, “Sir Knight!” as he closed the door upon Adrian,
+and then drew Montreal to the recess of the casement,--“a word in your
+ear. Think not I slight your offer, but these young men must be managed;
+the plot is great--noble,--grateful to my heart; but it requires time
+and caution. I have many of my house, scrupulous as yon hot-skull, to
+win over; the way is pleasant, but must be sounded well and carefully;
+you understand?”
+
+From under his bent brows, Montreal darted one keen glance at Stephen,
+and then answered:
+
+“My friendship for you dictated my offer. The League may stand without
+the Colonna,--beware a time when the Colonna cannot stand without the
+League. My Lord, look well around you; there are more freemen--ay, bold
+and stirring ones, too--in Rome, than you imagine. Beware Rienzi! Adieu,
+we meet soon again.”
+
+Thus saying, Montreal departed, soliloquising as he passed with his
+careless step through the crowded ante-room:
+
+“I shall fail here!--these caitiff nobles have neither the courage to
+be great, nor the wisdom to be honest. Let them fall!--I may find an
+adventurer from the people, an adventurer like myself, worth them all.”
+
+No sooner had Stephen returned to Adrian than he flung his arms
+affectionately round his ward, who was preparing his pride for some
+sharp rebuke for his petulance.
+
+“Nobly feigned,--admirable, admirable!” cried the Baron; “you have
+learned the true art of a statesman at the Emperor’s court. I always
+thought you would--always said it. You saw the dilemma I was in,
+thus taken by surprise by that barbarian’s mad scheme; afraid to
+refuse,--more afraid to accept. You extricated me with consummate
+address: that passion,--so natural to your age,--was a famous feint;
+drew off the attack; gave me time to breathe; allowed me to play with
+the savage. But we must not offend him, you know: all my retainers would
+desert me, or sell me to the Orsini, or cut my throat, if he but held up
+his finger. Oh! it was admirably managed, Adrian--admirably!”
+
+“Thank Heaven!” said Adrian, with some difficulty recovering the breath
+which his astonishment had taken away, “you do not think of embracing
+that black proposition?”
+
+“Think of it! no, indeed!” said Stephen, throwing himself back on his
+chair. “Why, do you not know my age, boy? Hard on my ninetieth year, I
+should be a fool indeed to throw myself into such a whirl of turbulence
+and agitation. I want to keep what I have, not risk it by grasping more.
+Am I not the beloved of the pope? shall I hazard his excommunication? Am
+I not the most powerful of the nobles? should I be more if I were king?
+At my age, to talk to me of such stuff!--the man’s an idiot. Besides,”
+ added the old man, sinking his voice, and looking fearfully round, “if
+I were a king, my sons might poison me for the succession. They are
+good lads, Adrian, very! But such a temptation!--I would not throw it in
+their way; these grey hairs have experience! Tyrants don’t die a natural
+death; no, no! Plague on the Knight, say I; he has already cast me into
+a cold sweat.”
+
+Adrian gazed on the working features of the old man, whose selfishness
+thus preserved him from crime. He listened to his concluding words--full
+of the dark truth of the times; and as the high and pure ambition of
+Rienzi flashed upon him in contrast, he felt that he could not blame its
+fervour, or wonder at its excess.
+
+“And then, too,” resumed the Baron, speaking more deliberately as he
+recovered his self-possession, “this man, by way of a warning, shows me,
+at a glance, his whole ignorance of the state. What think you? he has
+mingled with the mob, and taken their rank breath for power; yes, he
+thinks words are soldiers, and bade me--me, Stephen Colonna--beware--of
+whom, think you? No, you will never guess!--of that speech-maker,
+Rienzi! my own old jesting guest! Ha! ha! ha!--the ignorance of these
+barbarians! Ha! ha! ha! and the old man laughed till the tears ran down
+his cheeks.
+
+“Yet many of the nobles fear that same Rienzi,” said Adrian, gravely.
+
+“Ah! let them, let them!--they have not our experience--our knowledge
+of the world, Adrian. Tut, man,--when did declamation ever overthrow
+castles, and conquer soldiery? I like Rienzi to harangue the mob about
+old Rome, and such stuff; it gives them something to think of and prate
+about, and so all their fierceness evaporates in words; they might burn
+a house if they did not hear a speech. But, now I am on that score, I
+must own the pedant has grown impudent in his new office; here, here,--I
+received this paper ere I rose today. I hear a similar insolence has
+been shown to all the nobles. Read it, will you,” and the Colonna put a
+scroll into his kinsman’s hand.
+
+“I have received the like,” said Adrian, glancing at it. “It is a
+request of Rienzi’s to attend at the Church of St. John of Lateran, to
+hear explained the inscription on a Table just discovered. It bears, he
+saith, the most intimate connexion with the welfare and state of Rome.”
+
+“Very entertaining, I dare to say, to professors and bookmen. Pardon me,
+kinsman; I forgot your taste for these things; and my son, Gianni, too,
+shares your fantasy. Well, well! it is innocent enough! Go--the man
+talks well.”
+
+“Will you not attend, too?”
+
+“I--my dear boy--I!” said the old Colonna, opening his eyes in such
+astonishment that Adrian could not help laughing at the simplicity of
+his own question.
+
+
+
+Chapter 2.II. The Interview, and the Doubt.
+
+As Adrian turned from the palace of his guardian, and bent his way in
+the direction of the Forum, he came somewhat unexpectedly upon Raimond,
+bishop of Orvietto, who, mounted upon a low palfrey, and accompanied
+by some three or four of his waiting-men, halted abruptly when he
+recognised the young noble.
+
+“Ah, my son! it is seldom that I see thee: how fares it with
+thee?--well? So, so! I rejoice to hear it. Alas! what a state of society
+is ours, when compared to the tranquil pleasures of Avignon! There,
+all men who, like us, are fond of the same pursuits, the same studies,
+deliciae musarum, hum! hum! (the Bishop was proud of an occasional
+quotation, right or wrong), are brought easily and naturally together.
+But here we scarcely dare stir out of our houses, save upon great
+occasions. But, talking of great occasions, and the Muses, reminds me of
+our good Rienzi’s invitation to the Lateran: of course you will attend;
+‘tis a mighty knotty piece of Latin he proposes to solve--so I hear, at
+least; very interesting to us, my son,--very!”
+
+“It is tomorrow,” answered Adrian. “Yes, assuredly; I will be there.”
+
+“And, harkye, my son,” said the Bishop, resting his hand affectionately
+on Adrian’s shoulder, “I have reason to hope that he will remind our
+poor citizens of the Jubilee for the year Fifty, and stir them towards
+clearing the road of the brigands: a necessary injunction, and one to be
+heeded timeously; for who will come here for absolution when he stands
+a chance of rushing unannealed upon purgatory by the way? You have heard
+Rienzi,--ay? quite a Cicero--quite! Well, Heaven bless you, my son! You
+will not fail?”
+
+“Nay, not I.”
+
+“Yet, stay--a word with you: just suggest to all whom you may meet
+the advisability of a full meeting; it looks well for the city to show
+respect to letters.”
+
+“To say nothing of the Jubilee,” added Adrian, smiling.
+
+“Ah, to say nothing of the Jubilee--very good! Adieu for the present!”
+ And the Bishop, resettling himself on his saddle, ambled solemnly on to
+visit his various friends, and press them to the meeting.
+
+Meanwhile, Adrian continued his course till he had passed the Capitol,
+the Arch of Severus, the crumbling columns of the fane of Jupiter,
+and found himself amidst the long grass, the whispering reeds, and the
+neglected vines, that wave over the now-vanished pomp of the Golden
+House of Nero. Seating himself on a fallen pillar--by that spot where
+the traveller descends to the (so called) Baths of Livia--he looked
+impatiently to the sun, as to blame it for the slowness of its march.
+
+Not long, however, had he to wait before a light step was heard crushing
+the fragrant grass; and presently through the arching vines gleamed a
+face that might well have seemed the nymph, the goddess of the scene.
+
+“My beautiful! my Irene!--how shall I thank thee!”
+
+It was long before the delighted lover suffered himself to observe upon
+Irene’s face a sadness that did not usually cloud it in his presence.
+Her voice, too, trembled; her words seemed constrained and cold.
+
+“Have I offended thee?” he asked; “or what less misfortune hath
+occurred?”
+
+Irene raised her eyes to her lover’s, and said, looking at him
+earnestly, “Tell me, my Lord, in sober and simple truth, tell me, would
+it grieve thee much were this to be our last meeting?”
+
+Paler than the marble at his feet grew the dark cheek of Adrian. It was
+some moments ere he could reply, and he did so then with a forced smile
+and a quivering lip.
+
+“Jest not so, Irene! Last!--that is not a word for us!”
+
+“But hear me, my Lord--”
+
+“Why so cold?--call me Adrian!--friend!--lover! or be dumb!”
+
+“Well, then, my soul’s soul! my all of hope! my life’s life!” exclaimed
+Irene, passionately, “hear me! I fear that we stand at this moment upon
+some gulf whose depth I see not, but which may divide us for ever! Thou
+knowest the real nature of my brother, and dost not misread him as many
+do. Long has he planned, and schemed, and communed with himself, and,
+feeling his way amidst the people, prepared the path to some great
+design. But now--(thou wilt not betray--thou wilt not injure him?--he is
+thy friend!)”
+
+“And thy brother! I would give my life for his! Say on!”
+
+“But now, then,” resumed Irene, “the time for that enterprise, whatever
+it be, is coming fast. I know not of its exact nature, but I know that
+it is against the nobles--against thy order--against thy house itself!
+If it succeed--oh, Adrian! thou thyself mayst not be free from danger;
+and my name, at least, will be coupled with the name of thy foes. If it
+fail,--my brother, my bold brother, is swept away! He will fall a victim
+to revenge or justice, call it as you will. Your kinsman may be his
+judge--his executioner; and I--even if I should yet live to mourn over
+the boast and glory of my humble line--could I permit myself to love,
+to see, one in whose veins flowed the blood of his destroyer? Oh! I am
+wretched--wretched! these thoughts make me well-nigh mad!” and, wringing
+her hands bitterly, Irene sobbed aloud.
+
+Adrian himself was struck forcibly by the picture thus presented to
+him, although the alternative it embraced had often before forced itself
+dimly on his mind. It was true, however, that, not seeing the schemes of
+Rienzi backed by any physical power, and never yet having witnessed the
+mighty force of a moral revolution, he did not conceive that any rise
+to which he might instigate the people could be permanently successful:
+and, as for his punishment, in that city, where all justice was the
+slave of interest, Adrian knew himself powerful enough to obtain
+forgiveness even for the greatest of all crimes--armed insurrection
+against the nobles. As these thoughts recurred to him, he gained the
+courage to console and cheer Irene. But his efforts were only partially
+successful. Awakened by her fears to that consideration of the future
+which hitherto she had forgotten, Irene, for the first time, seemed deaf
+to the charmer’s voice.
+
+“Alas!” said she, sadly, “even at the best, what can this love, that we
+have so blindly encouraged--what can it end in? Thou must not wed with
+one like me; and I! how foolish I have been!”
+
+“Recall thy senses then, Irene,” said Adrian, proudly, partly perhaps
+in anger, partly in his experience of the sex. “Love another, and more
+wisely, if thou wilt; cancel thy vows with me, and continue to think it
+a crime to love, and a folly to be true!”
+
+“Cruel!” said Irene, falteringly, and in her turn alarmed. “Dost thou
+speak in earnest?”
+
+“Tell me, ere I answer you, tell me this: come death, come anguish, come
+a whole life of sorrow, as the end of this love, wouldst thou yet repent
+that thou hast loved? If so, thou knowest not the love that I feel for
+thee.”
+
+“Never! never can I repent!” said Irene, falling upon Adrian’s neck;
+“forgive me!”
+
+“But is there, in truth,” said Adrian, a little while after this
+lover-like quarrel and reconciliation, “is there, in truth, so marked
+a difference between thy brother’s past and his present bearing? How
+knowest thou that the time for action is so near?”
+
+“Because now he sits closeted whole nights with all ranks of men; he
+shuts up his books,--he reads no more,--but, when alone, walks to and
+fro his chamber, muttering to himself. Sometimes he pauses before the
+calendar, which of late he has fixed with his own hand against the wall,
+and passes his finger over the letters, till he comes to some chosen
+date, and then he plays with his sword and smiles. But two nights since,
+arms, too, in great number were brought to the house; and I heard the
+chief of the men who brought them, a grim giant, known well amongst the
+people, say, as he wiped his brow,--‘These will see work soon!’”
+
+“Arms! Are you sure of that?” said Adrian, anxiously. “Nay, then, there
+is more in these schemes than I imagined! But (observing Irene’s gaze
+bent fearfully on him as his voice changed, he added, more gaily)--but
+come what may, believe me--my beautiful! my adored! that while I live,
+thy brother shall not suffer from the wrath he may provoke,--nor I,
+though he forget our ancient friendship, cease to love thee less.”
+
+“Signora! Signora! child! it is time! we must go!” said the shrill voice
+of Benedetta, now peering through the foliage. “The working men pass
+home this way; I see them approaching.”
+
+The lovers parted; for the first time the serpent had penetrated into
+their Eden,--they had conversed, they had thought, of other things than
+Love.
+
+
+
+Chapter 2.III. The Situation of a Popular Patrician in Times of Popular
+Discontent.--Scene of the Lateran.
+
+The situation of a Patrician who honestly loves the people is, in those
+evil times, when power oppresses and freedom struggles,--when the two
+divisions of men are wrestling against each other,--the most irksome and
+perplexing that destiny can possibly contrive. Shall he take part with
+the nobles?--he betrays his conscience! With the people?--he deserts
+his friends! But that consequence of the last alternative is not the
+sole--nor, perhaps, to a strong mind, the most severe. All men are
+swayed and chained by public opinion--it is the public judge; but public
+opinion is not the same for all ranks. The public opinion that excites
+or deters the plebeian, is the opinion of the plebeians,--of those
+whom he sees, and meets, and knows; of those with whom he is brought
+in contact,--those with whom he has mixed from childhood,--those whose
+praises are daily heard,--whose censure frowns upon him with every
+hour. (It is the same in still smaller divisions. The public opinion for
+lawyers is that of lawyers; of soldiers, that of the army; of scholars,
+it is that of men of literature and science. And to the susceptible
+amongst the latter, the hostile criticism of learning has been more
+stinging than the severest moral censures of the vulgar. Many a man has
+done a great act, or composed a great work, solely to please the two
+or three persons constantly present to him. Their voice was his public
+opinion. The public opinion that operated on Bishop, the murderer, was
+the opinion of the Burkers, his comrades. Did that condemn him? No! He
+knew no other public opinion till he came to be hanged, and caught the
+loathing eyes, and heard the hissing execrations of the crowd below his
+gibbet.) So, also, the public opinion of the great is the opinion of
+their equals,--of those whom birth and accident cast for ever in their
+way. This distinction is full of important practical deductions; it
+is one which, more than most maxims, should never be forgotten by a
+politician who desires to be profound. It is, then, an ordeal terrible
+to pass--which few plebeians ever pass, which it is therefore unjust to
+expect patricians to cross unfaulteringly--the ordeal of opposing the
+public opinion which exists for them. They cannot help doubting their
+own judgment,--they cannot help thinking the voice of wisdom or of
+virtue speaks in those sounds which have been deemed oracles from
+their cradle. In the tribunal of Sectarian Prejudice they imagine
+they recognise the court of the Universal Conscience. Another powerful
+antidote to the activity of a patrician so placed, is in the certainty
+that to the last the motives of such activity will be alike misconstrued
+by the aristocracy he deserts and the people he joins. It seems so
+unnatural in a man to fly in the face of his own order, that the world
+is willing to suppose any clue to the mystery save that of honest
+conviction or lofty patriotism. “Ambition!” says one. “Disappointment!”
+ cries another. “Some private grudge!” hints a third. “Mob-courting
+vanity!” sneers a fourth. The people admire at first, but suspect
+afterwards. The moment he thwarts a popular wish, there is no redemption
+for him: he is accused of having acted the hypocrite,--of having worn
+the sheep’s fleece: and now, say they,--“See! the wolf’s teeth
+peep out!” Is he familiar with the people?--it is cajolery! Is he
+distant?--it is pride! What, then, sustains a man in such a situation,
+following his own conscience, with his eyes opened to all the perils
+of the path? Away with the cant of public opinion,--away with the poor
+delusion of posthumous justice; he will offend the first, he will never
+obtain the last. What sustains him? HIS OWN SOUL! A man thoroughly great
+has a certain contempt for his kind while he aids them: their weal or
+woe are all; their applause--their blame--are nothing to him. He walks
+forth from the circle of birth and habit; he is deaf to the little
+motives of little men. High, through the widest space his orbit may
+describe, he holds on his course to guide or to enlighten; but the
+noises below reach him not! Until the wheel is broken,--until the dark
+void swallow up the star,--it makes melody, night and day, to its own
+ear: thirsting for no sound from the earth it illumines, anxious for no
+companionship in the path through which it rolls, conscious of its own
+glory, and contented, therefore, to be alone!
+
+But minds of this order are rare. All ages cannot produce them. They
+are exceptions to the ordinary and human virtue, which is influenced
+and regulated by external circumstance. At a time when even to be merely
+susceptible to the voice of fame was a great pre-eminence in moral
+energies over the rest of mankind, it would be impossible that any
+one should ever have formed the conception of that more refined and
+metaphysical sentiment, that purer excitement to high deeds--that glory
+in one’s own heart, which is so immeasurably above the desire of a
+renown that lackeys the heels of others. In fact, before we can
+dispense with the world, we must, by a long and severe novitiate--by the
+probation of much thought, and much sorrow--by deep and sad conviction
+of the vanity of all that the world can give us, have raised our
+selves--not in the fervour of an hour, but habitually--above the world:
+an abstraction--an idealism--which, in our wiser age, how few even of
+the wisest, can attain! Yet, till we are thus fortunate, we know not
+the true divinity of contemplation, nor the all-sufficing mightiness of
+conscience; nor can we retreat with solemn footsteps into that Holy of
+Holies in our own souls, wherein we know, and feel, how much our nature
+is capable of the self-existence of a God!
+
+But to return to the things and thoughts of earth. Those considerations,
+and those links of circumstance, which, in a similar situation have
+changed so many honest and courageous minds, changed also the mind of
+Adrian. He felt in a false position. His reason and conscience shared in
+the schemes of Rienzi, and his natural hardihood and love of enterprise
+would have led him actively to share the danger of their execution. But
+this, all his associations, his friendships, his private and household
+ties, loudly forbade. Against his order, against his house, against the
+companions of his youth, how could he plot secretly, or act sternly?
+By the goal to which he was impelled by patriotism, stood hypocrisy and
+ingratitude. Who would believe him the honest champion of his country
+who was a traitor to his friends? Thus, indeed,
+
+     “The native hue of resolution
+     Was sicklied o’er with the pale cast of thought!”
+
+And he who should have been by nature a leader of the time became only
+its spectator. Yet Adrian endeavoured to console himself for his present
+passiveness in a conviction of the policy of his conduct. He who takes
+no share in the commencement of civil revolutions, can often become,
+with the most effect, a mediator between the passions and the parties
+subsequently formed. Perhaps, under Adrian’s circumstances, delay was
+really the part of a prudent statesman; the very position which cripples
+at the first, often gives authority before the end. Clear from the
+excesses, and saved from the jealousies, of rival factions, all men
+are willing to look with complaisance and respect to a new actor in a
+turbulent drama; his moderation may make him trusted by the people; his
+rank enable him to be a fitting mediator with the nobles; and thus the
+qualities that would have rendered him a martyr at one period of the
+Revolution, raise him perhaps into a saviour at another.
+
+Silent, therefore, and passive, Adrian waited the progress of events. If
+the projects of Rienzi failed, he might, by that in activity, the better
+preserve the people from new chains, and their champion from death.
+If those projects succeeded, he might equally save his house from the
+popular wrath--and, advocating liberty, check disorder. Such, at least,
+were his hopes; and thus did the Italian sagacity and caution of his
+character control and pacify the enthusiasm of youth and courage.
+
+The sun shone, calm and cloudless, upon the vast concourse gathered
+before the broad space that surrounds the Church of St. John of
+Lateran. Partly by curiosity--partly by the desire of the Bishop of
+Orvietto--partly because it was an occasion in which they could display
+the pomp of their retinues--many of the principal Barons of Rome had
+gathered to this spot.
+
+On one of the steps ascending to the church, with his mantle folded
+round him, stood Walter de Montreal, gazing on the various parties that,
+one after another, swept through the lane which the soldiers of the
+Church preserved unimpeded, in the middle of the crowd, for the access
+of the principal nobles. He watched with interest, though with his usual
+carelessness of air and roving glance, the different marks and looks
+of welcome given by the populace to the different personages of note.
+Banners and penons preceded each Signor, and, as they waved aloft, the
+witticisms or nicknames--the brief words of praise or censure, that
+imply so much--which passed to and fro among that lively crowd, were
+treasured carefully in his recollection.
+
+“Make way, there!--way for my Lord Martino Orsini--Baron di Porto!”
+
+“Peace, minion!--draw back! way for the Signor Adrian Colonna, Baron di
+Castello, and Knight of the Empire.”
+
+And at those two rival shouts, you saw waving on high the golden bear of
+the Orsini, with the motto--“Beware my embrace!” and the solitary column
+on an azure ground, of the Colonna, with Adrian’s especial device--“Sad,
+but strong.” The train of Martino Orsini was much more numerous than
+that of Adrian, which last consisted but of ten servitors. But Adrian’s
+men attracted far greater admiration amongst the crowd, and pleased more
+the experienced eye of the warlike Knight of St. John. Their arms were
+polished like mirrors; their height was to an inch the same; their march
+was regular and sedate; their mien erect; they looked neither to the
+right nor left; they betrayed that ineffable discipline--that harmony
+of order--which Adrian had learned to impart to his men during his own
+apprenticeship of arms. But the disorderly train of the Lord of Porto
+was composed of men of all heights. Their arms were ill-polished and
+ill-fashioned, and they pressed confusedly on each other; they laughed
+and spoke aloud; and in their mien and bearing expressed all the
+insolence of men who despised alike the master they served and the
+people they awed. The two bands coming unexpectedly on each other
+through this narrow defile, the jealousy of the two houses presently
+declared itself. Each pressed forward for the precedence; and, as the
+quiet regularity of Adrian’s train, and even its compact paucity of
+numbers, enabled it to pass before the servitors of his rival, the
+populace set up a loud shout--“A Colonna for ever!”--“Let the Bear dance
+after the Column!”
+
+“On, ye knaves!” said Orsini aloud to his men. “How have ye suffered
+this affront?” And passing himself to the head of his men, he would have
+advanced through the midst of his rival’s train, had not a tall guard,
+in the Pope’s livery, placed his baton in the way.
+
+“Pardon, my Lord! we have the Vicar’s express commands to suffer no
+struggling of the different trains one with another.”
+
+“Knave! dost thou bandy words with me?” said the fierce Orsini; and with
+his sword he clove the baton in two.
+
+“In the Vicar’s name, I command you to fall back!” said the sturdy
+guard, now placing his huge bulk in the very front of the noble’s path.
+
+“It is Cecco del Vecchio!” cried those of the populace, who were near
+enough to perceive the interruption and its cause.
+
+“Ay,” said one, “the good Vicar has put many of the stoutest fellows
+in the Pope’s livery, in order the better to keep peace. He could have
+chosen none better than Cecco.”
+
+“But he must not fall!” cried another, as Orsini, glaring on the smith,
+drew back his sword as if to plunge it through his bosom.
+
+“Shame--shame! shall the Pope be thus insulted in his own city?” cried
+several voices. “Down with the sacrilegious--down!” And, as if by a
+preconcerted plan, a whole body of the mob broke at once through
+the lane, and swept like a torrent over Orsini and his jostled and
+ill-assorted train. Orsini himself was thrown on the ground with
+violence, and trampled upon by a hundred footsteps; his men, huddled and
+struggling as much against themselves as against the mob, were scattered
+and overset; and when, by a great effort of the guards, headed by the
+smith himself, order was again restored, and the line reformed, Orsini,
+well nigh choked with his rage and humiliation, and greatly bruised by
+the rude assaults he had received, could scarcely stir from the ground.
+The officers of the Pope raised him, and, when he was on his legs, he
+looked wildly around for his sword, which, falling from his hand, had
+been kicked amongst the crowd, and seeing it not, he said, between his
+ground teeth, to Cecco del Vecchio--
+
+“Fellow, thy neck shall answer this outrage, or may God desert me!” and
+passed along through the space; while a half-suppressed and exultant
+hoot from the bystanders followed his path.
+
+“Way there!” cried the smith, “for the Lord Martino di Porto, and may
+all the people know that he has threatened to take my life for the
+discharge of my duty in obedience to the Pope’s Vicar!”
+
+“He dare not!” shouted out a thousand voices; “the people can protect
+their own!”
+
+This scene had not been lost on the Provencal, who well knew how to
+construe the wind by the direction of straws, and saw at once, by the
+boldness of the populace, that they themselves were conscious of a
+coming tempest. “Par Dieu,” said he, as he saluted Adrian, who, gravely,
+and without looking behind, had now won the steps of the church, “yon
+tall fellow has a brave heart, and many friends, too. What think you,”
+ he added, in a low whisper, “is not this scene a proof that the nobles
+are less safe than they wot of?”
+
+“The beast begins to kick against the spur, Sir Knight,” answered
+Adrian, “a wise horseman should, in such a case, take care how he
+pull the rein too tight, lest the beast should rear, and he be
+overthrown--yet that is the policy thou wouldst recommend.”
+
+“You mistake,” returned Montreal, “my wish was to give Rome one
+sovereign instead of many tyrants,--but hark! what means that bell?”
+
+“The ceremony is about to begin,” answered Adrian. “Shall we enter the
+church together?”
+
+Seldom had a temple consecrated to God witnessed so singular a spectacle
+as that which now animated the solemn space of the Lateran.
+
+In the centre of the church, seats were raised in an amphitheatre, at
+the far end of which was a scaffolding, a little higher than the rest;
+below this spot, but high enough to be in sight of all the concourse,
+was placed a vast table of iron, on which was graven an ancient
+inscription, and bearing in its centre a clear and prominent device,
+presently to be explained.
+
+The seats were covered with cloth and rich tapestry. In the rear of
+the church was drawn a purple curtain. Around the amphitheatre were the
+officers of the Church, in the party-coloured liveries of the Pope. To
+the right of the scaffold sate Raimond, Bishop of Orvietto, in his robes
+of state. On the benches round him you saw all the marked personages of
+Rome--the judges, the men of letters, the nobles, from the lofty rank
+of the Savelli to the inferior grade of a Raselli. The space beyond the
+amphitheatre was filled with the people, who now poured fast in, stream
+after stream: all the while rang, clear and loud, the great bell of the
+church.
+
+At length, as Adrian and Montreal seated themselves at a little distance
+from Raimond, the bell suddenly ceased--the murmurs of the people were
+stilled--the purple curtain was withdrawn, and Rienzi came forth with
+slow and majestic steps. He came--but not in his usual sombre and plain
+attire. Over his broad breast he wore a vest of dazzling whiteness--a
+long robe, in the ample fashion of the toga, descended to his feet
+and swept the floor. On his head he wore a fold of white cloth, in the
+centre of which shone a golden crown. But the crown was divided, or
+cloven, as it were, by the mystic ornament of a silver sword, which,
+attracting the universal attention, testified at once that this strange
+garb was worn, not from the vanity of display, but for the sake of
+presenting to the concourse--in the person of the citizen--a type and
+emblem of that state of the city on which he was about to descant.
+
+“Faith,” whispered one of the old nobles to his neighbour, “the plebeian
+assumes it bravely.”
+
+“It will be rare sport,” said a second. “I trust the good man will put
+some jests in his discourse.”
+
+“What showman’s tricks are these?” said a third.
+
+“He is certainly crazed!” said a fourth.
+
+“How handsome he is!” said the women, mixed with the populace.
+
+“This is a man who has learned the people by heart,” observed Montreal
+to Adrian. “He knows he must speak to the eye, in order to win the mind:
+a knave,--a wise knave!”
+
+And now Rienzi had ascended the scaffold; and as he looked long and
+steadfastly around the meeting, the high and thoughtful repose of
+his majestic countenance, its deep and solemn gravity, hushed all the
+murmurs, and made its effect equally felt by the sneering nobles as the
+impatient populace.
+
+“Signors of Rome,” said he, at length, “and ye, friends, and citizens,
+you have heard why we are met together this day; and you, my Lord
+Bishop of Orvietto,--and ye, fellow labourers with me in the field of
+letters,--ye, too, are aware that it is upon some matter relative to
+that ancient Rome, the rise and the decline of whose past power and
+glories we have spent our youth in endeavouring to comprehend. But
+this, believe me, is no vain enigma of erudition, useful but to the
+studious,--referring but to the dead. Let the Past perish!--let darkness
+shroud it!--let it sleep for ever over the crumbling temples and
+desolate tombs of its forgotten sons,--if it cannot afford us, from
+its disburied secrets, a guide for the Present and the Future. What, my
+Lords, ye have thought that it was for the sake of antiquity alone that
+we have wasted our nights and days in studying what antiquity can teach
+us! You are mistaken; it is nothing to know what we have been, unless it
+is with the desire of knowing that which we ought to be. Our ancestors
+are mere dust and ashes, save when they speak to our posterity; and then
+their voices resound, not from the earth below, but the heaven above.
+There is an eloquence in Memory, because it is the nurse of Hope.
+There is a sanctity in the Past, but only because of the chronicles it
+retains,--chronicles of the progress of mankind,--stepping-stones in
+civilisation, in liberty, and in knowledge. Our fathers forbid us to
+recede,--they teach us what is our rightful heritage,--they bid us
+reclaim, they bid us augment, that heritage,--preserve their virtues,
+and avoid their errors. These are the true uses of the Past. Like the
+sacred edifice in which we are,--it is a tomb upon which to rear a
+temple. I see that you marvel at this long beginning; ye look to each
+other--ye ask to what it tends. Behold this broad plate of iron; upon it
+is graven an inscription but lately disinterred from the heaps of stone
+and ruin, which--O shame to Rome!--were once the palaces of empire, and
+the arches of triumphant power. The device in the centre of the table,
+which you behold, conveys the act of the Roman Senators,--who are
+conferring upon Vespasian the imperial authority. It is this inscription
+which I have invited you to hear read! It specifies the very terms and
+limits of the authority thus conferred. To the Emperor was
+confided the power of making laws and alliances with whatsoever
+nation,--of increasing, or of diminishing the limits of towns and
+districts,--of--mark this, my Lords!--exalting men to the rank of dukes
+and kings,--ay, and of deposing and degrading them;--of making cities,
+and of unmaking: in short, of all the attributes of imperial power.
+Yes, to that Emperor was confided this vast authority; but, by whom?
+Heed--listen, I pray you--let not a word be lost;--by whom, I say? By
+the Roman Senate! What was the Roman Senate? The Representative of the
+Roman People!”
+
+“I knew he would come to that!” said the smith, who stood at the door
+with his fellows, but to whose ear, clear and distinct, rolled the
+silver voice of Rienzi.
+
+“Brave fellow! and this, too, in the hearing of the Lords!”
+
+“Ay, you see what the people were! and we should never have known this
+but for him.”
+
+“Peace, fellows;” said the officer to those of the crowd, from whom came
+these whispered sentences.
+
+Rienzi continued.--“Yes, it is the people who intrusted this power--to
+the people, therefore, it belongs! Did the haughty Emperor arrogate the
+crown? Could he assume the authority of himself? Was it born with
+him? Did he derive it, my Lord Barons, from the possession of towered
+castles--of lofty lineage? No! all-powerful as he was, he had no right
+to one atom of that power, save from the voice and trust of the Roman
+people. Such, O my countrymen! such was even that day, when Liberty
+was but the shadow of her former self,--such was the acknowledged
+prerogative of your fathers! All power was the gift of the people. What
+have ye to give now? Who, who, I say,--what single person, what petty
+chief, asks you for the authority he assumes? His senate is his
+sword; his chart of license is written, not with ink, but blood. The
+people!--there is no people! Oh! would to God that we might disentomb
+the spirit of the Past as easily as her records!”
+
+“If I were your kinsman,” whispered Montreal to Adrian, “I would give
+this man short breathing-time between his peroration and confession.”
+
+“What is your Emperor?” continued Rienzi; “a stranger! What the great
+head of your Church?--an exile! Ye are without your lawful chiefs; and
+why? Because ye are not without your law-defying tyrants! The licence
+of your nobles, their discords, their dissensions, have driven our Holy
+Father from the heritage of St. Peter;--they have bathed your streets in
+your own blood; they have wasted the wealth of your labours on private
+quarrels and the maintenance of hireling ruffians! Your forces are
+exhausted against yourselves. You have made a mockery of your country,
+once the mistress of the world. You have steeped her lips in gall--ye
+have set a crown of thorns upon her head! What, my Lords!” cried he,
+turning sharply round towards the Savelli and Orsini, who, endeavouring
+to shake off the thrill which the fiery eloquence of Rienzi had stricken
+to their hearts, now, by contemptuous gestures and scornful smiles,
+testified the displeasure they did not dare loudly to utter in the
+presence of the Vicar and the people.--“What! even while I speak--not
+the sanctity of this place restrains you! I am an humble man--a citizen
+of Rome;--but I have this distinction: I have raised against myself
+many foes and scoffers for that which I have done for Rome. I am hated,
+because I love my country; I am despised, because I would exalt her. I
+retaliate--I shall be avenged. Three traitors in your own palaces shall
+betray you: their names are--Luxury, Envy, and Dissension!”
+
+“There he had them on the hip!”
+
+“Ha, ha! by the Holy Cross, that was good!”
+
+“I would go to the hangman for such another keen stroke as that!”
+
+“It is a shame if we are cowards, when one man is thus brave,” said the
+smith.
+
+“This is the man we have always wanted!”
+
+“Silence!” proclaimed the officer.
+
+“O Romans!” resumed Rienzi, passionately--“awake! I conjure you! Let
+this memorial of your former power--your ancient liberties--sink deep
+into your souls. In a propitious hour, if ye seize it,--in an evil one,
+if ye suffer the golden opportunity to escape,--has this record of the
+past been unfolded to your eyes. Recollect that the Jubilee approaches.”
+
+The Bishop of Orvietto smiled, and bowed approvingly; the people, the
+citizens, the inferior nobles, noted well those signs of encouragement;
+and, to their minds, the Pope himself, in the person of his Vicar,
+looked benignly on the daring of Rienzi.
+
+“The Jubilee approaches,--the eyes of all Christendom will be directed
+hither. Here, where, from all quarters of the globe, men come for peace,
+shall they find discord?--seeking absolution, shall they perceive
+but crime? In the centre of God’s dominion, shall they weep at your
+weakness?--in the seat of the martyred saints, shall they shudder at
+your vices?--in the fountain and source of Christ’s law, shall they
+find all law unknown? You were the glory of the world--will you be its
+by-word? You were its example--will you be its warning? Rise, while it
+is yet time!--clear your roads from the bandits that infest them!--your
+walls from the hirelings that they harbour! Banish these civil discords,
+or the men--how proud, how great, soever--who maintain them! Pluck
+the scales from the hand of Fraud!--the sword from the hand of
+Violence!--the balance and the sword are the ancient attributes of
+Justice!--restore them to her again! This be your high task,--these be
+your great ends! Deem any man who opposes them a traitor to his country.
+Gain a victory greater than those of the Caesars--a victory over
+yourselves! Let the pilgrims of the world behold the resurrection of
+Rome! Make one epoch of the Jubilee of Religion and the Restoration of
+Law! Lay the sacrifice of your vanquished passions--the first-fruits of
+your renovated liberties--upon the very altar that these walls contain!
+and never! oh, never! since the world began, shall men have made a more
+grateful offering to their God!”
+
+So intense was the sensation these words created in the audience--so
+breathless and overpowered did they leave the souls with they took by
+storm--that Rienzi had descended the scaffold, and already disappeared
+behind the curtain from which he had emerged, ere the crowd were fully
+aware that he had ceased.
+
+The singularity of this sudden apparition--robed in mysterious
+splendour, and vanishing the moment its errand was fulfilled--gave
+additional effect to the words it had uttered. The whole character of
+that bold address became invested with a something preternatural and
+inspired; to the minds of the vulgar, the mortal was converted into the
+oracle; and, marvelling at the unhesitating courage with which their
+idol had rebuked and conjured the haughty barons,--each of whom they
+regarded in the light of sanctioned executioners, whose anger could be
+made manifest at once by the gibbet or the axe,--the people could not
+but superstitiously imagine that nothing less than authority from above
+could have gifted their leader with such hardihood, and preserved him
+from the danger it incurred. In fact, it was in this very courage of
+Rienzi that his safety consisted; he was placed in those circumstances
+where audacity is prudence. Had he been less bold, the nobles would have
+been more severe; but so great a license of speech in an officer of the
+Holy See, they naturally imagined, was not unauthorised by the assent of
+the Pope, as well as by the approbation of the people. Those who did not
+(like Stephen Colonna) despise words as wind, shrank back from the task
+of punishing one whose voice might be the mere echo of the wishes of the
+pontiff. The dissensions of the nobles among each other, were no less
+favourable to Rienzi. He attacked a body, the members of which had no
+union.
+
+“It is not my duty to slay him!” said one.
+
+“I am not the representative of the barons!” said another.
+
+“If Stephen Colonna heeds him not, it would be absurd, as well as
+dangerous, in a meaner man to make himself the champion of the order!”
+ said a third.
+
+The Colonna smiled approval, when Rienzi denounced an Orsini--an Orsini
+laughed aloud, when the eloquence burst over a Colonna. The lesser
+nobles were well pleased to hear attacks upon both: while, on the other
+hand, the Bishop, by the long impunity of Rienzi, had taken courage
+to sanction the conduct of his fellow-officer. He affected, indeed, at
+times, to blame the excess of his fervour, but it was always accompanied
+by the praises of his honesty; and the approbation of the Pope’s Vicar
+confirmed the impression of the nobles as to the approbation of the
+Pope. Thus, from the very rashness of his enthusiasm had grown his
+security and success.
+
+Still, however, when the barons had a little recovered from the stupor
+into which Rienzi had cast them, they looked round to each other; and
+their looks confessed their sense of the insolence of the orator, and
+the affront offered to themselves.
+
+“Per fede!” quoth Reginaldo di Orsini, “this is past bearing,--the
+plebeian has gone too far!”
+
+“Look at the populace below! how they murmur and gape,--and how their
+eyes sparkle--and what looks they bend at us!” said Luca di Savelli to
+his mortal enemy, Castruccio Malatesta: the sense of a common danger
+united in one moment, but only for a moment, the enmity of years.
+
+“Diavolo!” muttered Raselli (Nina’s father) to a baron, equally poor,
+“but the clerk has truth in his lips. ‘Tis a pity he is not noble.”
+
+“What a clever brain marred!” said a Florentine merchant. “That man
+might be something, if he were sufficiently rich.”
+
+Adrian and Montreal were silent: the first seemed lost in thought,--the
+last was watching the various effects produced upon the audience.
+
+“Silence!” proclaimed the officers. “Silence, for my Lord Vicar.”
+
+At this announcement, every eye turned to Raimond, who, rising with much
+clerical importance, thus addressed the assembly:--
+
+“Although, Barons and Citizens of Rome, my well-beloved flock, and
+children,--I, no more than yourselves, anticipated the exact nature of
+the address ye have just heard,--and, albeit, I cannot feel unalloyed
+contentment at the manner, nor, I may say, at the whole matter of that
+fervent exhortation--yet (laying great emphasis on the last word), I
+cannot suffer you to depart without adding to the prayers of our
+Holy Father’s servant, those, also, of his Holiness’s spiritual
+representative. It is true! the Jubilee approaches! The Jubilee
+approaches--and yet our roads, even to the gates of Rome, are infested
+with murderous and godless ruffians! What pilgrim can venture across the
+Apennines to worship at the altars of St. Peter? The Jubilee
+approaches: what scandal shall it be to Rome if these shrines be without
+pilgrims--if the timid recoil from, if the bold fall victims to, the
+dangers of the way! Wherefore, I pray you all, citizens and chiefs
+alike,--I pray you all to lay aside those unhappy dissensions which have
+so long consumed the strength of our sacred city; and, uniting with each
+other in the ties of amity and brotherhood, to form a blessed league
+against the marauders of the road. I see amongst you, my Lords, many of
+the boasts and pillars of the state; but, alas! I think with grief
+and dismay on the causeless and idle hatred that has grown up between
+you!--a scandal to our city, and reflecting, let me add, my Lords, no
+honour on your faith as Christians, nor on your dignity as defenders of
+the Church.”
+
+Amongst the inferior nobles--along the seats of the judges and the men
+of letters--through the vast concourse of the people--ran a loud murmur
+of approbations at these words. The greater barons looked proudly, but
+not contemptuously, at the countenance of the prelate, and preserved a
+strict and unrevealing silence.
+
+“In this holy spot,” continued the Bishop, “let me beseech you to bury
+those fruitless animosities which have already cost enough of blood and
+treasure; and let us quit these walls with one common determination to
+evince our courage and display our chivalry only against our universal
+foes;--those ruffians who lay waste our fields, and infest our public
+ways,--the foes alike of the people we should protect, and the God whom
+we should serve!”
+
+The Bishop resumed his seat; the nobles looked at each other without
+reply; the people began to whisper loudly among themselves; when, after
+a short pause, Adrian di Castello rose.
+
+“Pardon me, my Lords, and you, reverend Father, if I, inexperienced in
+years and of little mark or dignity amongst you, presume to be the first
+to embrace the proposal we have just heard. Willingly do I renounce all
+ancient cause of enmity with any of my compeers. Fortunately for me,
+my long absence from Rome has swept from my remembrance the feuds and
+rivalries familiar to my early youth; and in this noble conclave I see
+but one man (glancing at Martino di Porto, who sat sullenly looking
+down) against whom I have, at any time, deemed it a duty to draw my
+sword; the gage that I once cast to that noble is yet, I rejoice to
+think, unredeemed. I withdraw it. Henceforth my only foes shall be the
+foes of Rome!”
+
+“Nobly spoken!” said the Bishop, aloud.
+
+“And,” continued Adrian, casting down his glove amongst the nobles, “I
+throw, my Lords, the gage, thus resumed, amongst you all, in challenge
+to a wider rivalry, and a more noble field. I invite any man to vie with
+me in the zeal that he shall show to restore tranquillity to our roads,
+and order to our state. It is a contest in which, if I be vanquished
+with reluctance, I will yield the prize without envy. In ten days from
+this time, reverend Father, I will raise forty horsemen-at-arms, ready
+to obey whatever orders shall be agreed upon for the security of the
+Roman state. And you, O Romans, dismiss, I pray you, from your minds,
+those eloquent invectives against your fellow-citizens which ye have
+lately heard. All of us, of what rank soever, may have shared in the
+excesses of these unhappy times; let us endeavour, not to avenge nor to
+imitate, but to reform and to unite. And may the people hereafter find,
+that the true boast of a patrician is, that his power the better enables
+him to serve his country.”
+
+“Brave words!” quoth the smith, sneeringly.
+
+“If they were all like him!” said the smith’s neighbour.
+
+“He has helped the nobles out of a dilemma,” said Pandulfo.
+
+“He has shown grey wit under young hairs,” said an aged Malatesta.
+
+“You have turned the tide, but not stemmed it, noble Adrian,” whispered
+the ever-boding Montreal, as, amidst the murmurs of the general
+approbation, the young Colonna resumed his seat.
+
+“How mean you?” said Adrian.
+
+“That your soft words, like all patrician conciliations, have come too
+late.”
+
+Not another noble stirred, though they felt, perhaps, disposed to join
+in the general feeling of amnesty, and appeared, by signs and whispers,
+to applaud the speech of Adrian. They were too habituated to the
+ungracefulness of an unlettered pride, to bow themselves to address
+conciliating language either to the people or their foes. And Raimond,
+glancing round, and not willing that their unseemly silence should be
+long remarked, rose at once, to give it the best construction in his
+power.
+
+“My son, thou hast spoken as a patriot and a Christian; by the approving
+silence of your peers we all feel that they share your sentiments. Break
+we up the meeting--its end is obtained. The manner of our proceeding
+against the leagued robbers of the road requires maturer consideration
+elsewhere. This day shall be an epoch in our history.”
+
+“It shall,” quoth Cecco del Vecchio, gruffly, between his teeth.
+
+“Children, my blessing upon you all!” concluded the Vicar, spreading his
+arms.
+
+And in a few minutes more the crowd poured from the church. The
+different servitors and flag-bearers ranged themselves on the steps
+without, each train anxious for their master’s precedence; and the
+nobles, gravely collecting in small knots, in the which was no mixture
+of rival blood, followed the crowd down the aisles. Soon rose again the
+din, and the noise, and the wrangling, and the oaths, of the hostile
+bands, as, with pain and labour, the Vicar’s officers marshalled them in
+“order most disorderly.”
+
+But so true were Montreal’s words to Adrian, that the populace already
+half forgot the young noble’s generous appeal, and were only bitterly
+commenting on the ungracious silence of his brother Lords. What, too, to
+them was this crusade against the robbers of the road? They blamed
+the good Bishop for not saying boldly to the nobles--“Ye are the first
+robbers we must march against!” The popular discontents had gone far
+beyond palliatives; they had arrived at that point when the people
+longed less for reform than change. There are times when a revolution
+cannot be warded off; it must come--come alike by resistance or
+by concession. Wo to that race in which a revolution produces no
+fruits!--in which the thunderbolt smites the high place, but does
+not purify the air! To suffer in vain is often the lot of the
+noblest individuals; but when a People suffer in vain, let them curse
+themselves!
+
+
+
+Chapter 2.IV. The Ambitious Citizen, and the Ambitious Soldier.
+
+The Bishop of Orvietto lingered last, to confer with Rienzi, who awaited
+him in the recesses of the Lateran. Raimond had the penetration not
+to be seduced into believing that the late scene could effect any
+reformation amongst the nobles, heal their divisions, or lead them
+actively against the infestors of the Campagna. But, as he detailed to
+Rienzi all that had occurred subsequent to the departure of that hero of
+the scene, he concluded with saying:--
+
+“You will perceive from this, one good result will be produced: the
+first armed dissension--the first fray among the nobles--will seem like
+a breach of promise; and, to the people and to the Pope, a reasonable
+excuse for despairing of all amendment amongst the Barons,--an excuse
+which will sanction the efforts of the first, and the approval of the
+last.”
+
+“For such a fray we shall not long wait,” answered Rienzi.
+
+“I believe the prophecy,” answered Raimond, smiling; “at present all
+runs well. Go you with us homeward?”
+
+“Nay, I think it better to tarry here till the crowd is entirely
+dispersed; for if they were to see me, in their present excitement, they
+might insist on some rash and hasty enterprise. Besides, my Lord,” added
+Rienzi, “with an ignorant people, however honest and enthusiastic, this
+rule must be rigidly observed--stale not your presence by custom. Never
+may men like me, who have no external rank, appear amongst the crowd,
+save on those occasions when the mind is itself a rank.”
+
+“That is true, as you have no train,” answered Raimond, thinking of his
+own well-liveried menials. “Adieu, then! we shall meet soon.”
+
+“Ay, at Philippi, my Lord. Reverend Father, your blessing!”
+
+It was some time subsequent to this conference that Rienzi quitted the
+sacred edifice. As he stood on the steps of the church--now silent and
+deserted--the hour that precedes the brief twilight of the South lent
+its magic to the view. There he beheld the sweeping arches of the mighty
+Aqueduct extending far along the scene, and backed by the distant and
+purpled hills. Before--to the right--rose the gate which took its
+Roman name from the Coelian Mount, at whose declivity it yet stands.
+Beyond--from the height of the steps--he saw the villages scattered
+through the grey Campagna, whitening in the sloped sun; and in the
+furthest distance the mountain shadows began to darken over the roofs
+of the ancient Tusculum, and the second Alban (The first Alba--the Alba
+Longa--whose origin Fable ascribes to Ascanius, was destroyed by Tullus
+Hostilius. The second Alba, or modern Albano, was erected on the plain
+below the ancient town, a little before the time of Nero.) city, which
+yet rises, in desolate neglect, above the vanished palaces of Pompey and
+Domitian.
+
+The Roman stood absorbed and motionless for some moments, gazing on the
+scene, and inhaling the sweet balm of the mellow air. It was the soft
+springtime--the season of flowers, and green leaves, and whispering
+winds--the pastoral May of Italia’s poets: but hushed was the voice of
+song on the banks of the Tiber--the reeds gave music no more. From the
+sacred Mount in which Saturn held his home, the Dryad and the Nymph, and
+Italy’s native Sylvan, were gone for ever. Rienzi’s original nature--its
+enthusiasm--its veneration for the past--its love of the beautiful and
+the great--that very attachment to the graces and pomp which give so
+florid a character to the harsh realities of life, and which power
+afterwards too luxuriantly developed; the exuberance of thoughts
+and fancies, which poured itself from his lips in so brilliant and
+inexhaustible a flood--all bespoke those intellectual and imaginative
+biasses, which, in calmer times, might have raised him in literature to
+a more indisputable eminence than that to which action can ever lead;
+and something of such consciousness crossed his spirit at that moment.
+
+“Happier had it been for me,” thought he, “had I never looked out from
+my own heart upon the world. I had all within me that makes contentment
+of the present, because I had that which can make me forget the present.
+I had the power to re-people--to create: the legends and dreams of
+old--the divine faculty of verse, in which the beautiful superfluities
+of the heart can pour themselves--these were mine! Petrarch chose
+wisely for himself! To address the world, but from without the world;
+to persuade--to excite--to command,--for these are the aim and glory
+of ambition;--but to shun its tumult, and its toil! His the quiet cell
+which he fills with the shapes of beauty--the solitude, from which he
+can banish the evil times whereon we are fallen, but in which he can
+dream back the great hearts and the glorious epochs of the past.
+For me--to what cares I am wedded! to what labours I am bound! what
+instruments I must use! what disguises I must assume! to tricks and
+artifice I must bow my pride! base are my enemies--uncertain my friends!
+and verily, in this struggle with blinded and mean men, the soul itself
+becomes warped and dwarfish. Patient and darkling, the Means creep
+through caves and the soiling mire, to gain at last the light which is
+the End.”
+
+In these reflections there was a truth, the whole gloom and sadness of
+which the Roman had not yet experienced. However august be the object
+we propose to ourselves, every less worthy path we take to insure it
+distorts the mental sight of our ambition; and the means, by degrees,
+abase the end to their own standard. This is the true misfortune of a
+man nobler than his age--that the instruments he must use soil himself:
+half he reforms his times; but half, too, the times will corrupt the
+reformer. His own craft undermines his safety;--the people, whom he
+himself accustoms to a false excitement, perpetually crave it; and when
+their ruler ceases to seduce their fancy, he falls their victim. The
+reform he makes by these means is hollow and momentary--it is swept away
+with himself: it was but the trick--the show--the wasted genius of a
+conjuror: the curtain falls--the magic is over--the cup and balls are
+kicked aside. Better one slow step in enlightenment,--which being made
+by the reason of a whole people, cannot recede,--than these sudden
+flashes in the depth of the general night, which the darkness, by
+contrast doubly dark, swallows up everlastingly again!
+
+As, slowly and musingly, Rienzi turned to quit the church, he felt a
+light touch upon his shoulder.
+
+“Fair evening to you, Sir Scholar,” said a frank voice.
+
+“To you, I return the courtesy,” answered Rienzi, gazing upon the person
+who thus suddenly accosted him, and in whose white cross and martial
+bearing the reader recognises the Knight of St. John.
+
+“You know me not, I think?” said Montreal; “but that matters little,
+we may easily commence our acquaintance: for me, indeed, I am fortunate
+enough to have made myself already acquainted with you.”
+
+“Possibly we have met elsewhere, at the house of one of those nobles to
+whose rank you seem to belong?”
+
+“Belong! no, not exactly!” returned Montreal, proudly. “Highborn and
+great as your magnates deem themselves, I would not, while the mountains
+can yield one free spot for my footstep, change my place in the world’s
+many grades for theirs. To the brave, there is but one sort of plebeian,
+and that is the coward. But you, sage Rienzi,” continued the Knight, in
+a gayer tone, “I have seen in more stirring scenes than the hall of a
+Roman Baron.”
+
+Rienzi glanced keenly at Montreal, who met his eye with an open brow.
+
+“Yes!” resumed the Knight--“but let us walk on; suffer me for a few
+moments to be your companion. Yes! I have listened to you--the other
+eve, when you addressed the populace, and today, when you rebuked the
+nobles; and at midnight, too, not long since, when (your ear, fair
+Sir!--lower, it is a secret!)--at midnight, too, when you administered
+the oath of brotherhood to the bold conspirators, on the ruined
+Aventine!”
+
+As he concluded, the Knight drew himself aside to watch, upon Rienzi’s
+countenance, the effect which his words might produce.
+
+A slight tremor passed over the frame of the conspirator--for so, unless
+the conspiracy succeed, would Rienzi be termed, by others than Montreal:
+he turned abruptly round to confront the Knight, and placed his hand
+involuntarily on his sword, but presently relinquished the grasp.
+
+“Ha!” said the Roman, slowly, “if this be true, fall Rome! There is
+treason even among the free!”
+
+“No treason, brave Sir!” answered Montreal; “I possess thy secret--but
+none have betrayed it to me.”
+
+“And is it as friend or foe that thou hast learned it?”
+
+“That as it may be,” returned Montreal, carelessly. “Enough, at present,
+that I could send thee to the gibbet, if I said but the word,--to show
+my power to be thy foe; enough, that I have not done it, to prove my
+disposition to be thy friend.”
+
+“Thou mistakest, stranger! that man does not live who could shed my
+blood in the streets of Rome! The gibbet! Little dost thou know of the
+power which surrounds Rienzi.”
+
+These words were said with some scorn and bitterness; but, after a
+moment’s pause, Rienzi resumed, more calmly:--
+
+“By the cross on thy mantle, thou belongest to one of the proudest
+orders of knighthood: thou art a foreigner, and a cavalier. What
+generous sympathies can convert thee into a friend of the Roman people?”
+
+“Cola di Rienzi,” returned Montreal, “the sympathies that unite us are
+those which unite all men who, by their own efforts, rise above the
+herd. True, I was born noble--but powerless and poor: at my beck now
+move, from city to city, the armed instruments of authority: my breath
+is the law of thousands. This empire I have not inherited; I won it by a
+cool brain and a fearless arm. Know me for Walter de Montreal; is it
+not a name that speaks a spirit kindred to thine own? Is not ambition
+a common sentiment between us? I do not marshal soldiers for gain only,
+though men have termed me avaricious--nor butcher peasants for the
+love of blood, though men have called me cruel. Arms and wealth are
+the sinews of power; it is power that I desire;--thou, bold Rienzi,
+strugglest thou not for the same? Is it the rank breath of the
+garlic-chewing mob--is it the whispered envy of schoolmen--is it the
+hollow mouthing of boys who call thee patriot and freeman, words to
+trick the ear--that will content thee? These are but thy instruments to
+power. Have I spoken truly?”
+
+Whatever distaste Rienzi might conceive at this speech he masked
+effectually. “Certes,” said he, “it would be in vain, renowned Captain,
+to deny that I seek but that power of which thou speakest. But what
+union can there be between the ambition of a Roman citizen and the
+leader of paid armies that take their cause only according to their
+hire--today, fight for liberty in Florence--tomorrow, for tyranny in
+Bologna? Pardon my frankness; for in this age that is deemed no disgrace
+which I impute to thy armies. Valour and generalship are held to
+consecrate any cause they distinguish; and he who is the master of
+princes, may be well honoured by them as their equal.”
+
+“We are entering into a less deserted quarter of the town,” said the
+Knight; “is there no secret place--no Aventine--in this direction, where
+we can confer?”
+
+“Hush!” replied Rienzi, cautiously looking round. “I thank thee, noble
+Montreal, for the hint; nor may it be well for us to be seen together.
+Wilt thou deign to follow me to my home, by the Palatine Bridge? (The
+picturesque ruins shown at this day as having once been the habitation
+of the celebrated Cola di Rienzi, were long asserted by the antiquarians
+to have belonged to another Cola or Nicola. I believe, however, that the
+dispute has been lately decided: and, indeed, no one but an antiquary,
+and that a Roman one, could suppose that there were two Colas to
+whom the inscription on the house would apply.) there we can converse
+undisturbed and secure.”
+
+“Be it so,” said Montreal, falling back.
+
+With a quick and hurried step, Rienzi passed through the town, in which,
+wherever he was discovered, the scattered citizens saluted him with
+marked respect; and, turning through a labyrinth of dark alleys, as
+if to shun the more public thoroughfares, arrived at length at a broad
+space near the river. The first stars of night shone down on the
+ancient temple of Fortuna Virilis, which the chances of Time had
+already converted into the Church of St. Mary of Egypt; and facing the
+twice-hallowed edifice stood the house of Rienzi.
+
+“It is a fair omen to have my mansion facing the ancient Temple of
+Fortune,” said Rienzi, smiling, as Montreal followed the Roman into the
+chamber I have already described.
+
+“Yet Valour need never pray to Fortune,” said the Knight; “the first
+commands the last.”
+
+Long was the conference between these two men, the most enterprising of
+their age. Meanwhile, let me make the reader somewhat better acquainted
+with the character and designs of Montreal, than the hurry of events has
+yet permitted him to become.
+
+Walter de Montreal, generally known in the chronicles of Italy by the
+designation of Fra Moreale, had passed into Italy--a bold adventurer,
+worthy to become a successor of those roving Normans (from one of the
+most eminent of whom, by the mother’s side, he claimed descent) who
+had formerly played so strange a part in the chivalric errantry of
+Europe,--realizing the fables of Amadis and Palmerin--(each knight,
+in himself a host), winning territories and oversetting thrones;
+acknowledging no laws save those of knighthood; never confounding
+themselves with the tribe amongst which they settled; incapable of
+becoming citizens, and scarcely contented with aspiring to be kings.
+At that time, Italy was the India of all those well-born and penniless
+adventurers who, like Montreal, had inflamed their imagination by the
+ballads and legends of the Roberts and the Godfreys of old; who had
+trained themselves from youth to manage the barb, and bear, through the
+heats of summer, the weight of arms; and who, passing into am effeminate
+and distracted land, had only to exhibit bravery in order to command
+wealth. It was considered no disgrace for some powerful chieftain to
+collect together a band of these hardy aliens,--to subsist amidst the
+mountains on booty and pillage,--to make war upon tyrant or republic, as
+interest suggested, and to sell, at enormous stipends, the immunities
+of peace. Sometimes they hired themselves to one state to protect it
+against the other; and the next year beheld them in the field against
+their former employers. These bands of Northern stipendiaries assumed,
+therefore, a civil, as well as a military, importance; they were as
+indispensable to the safety of one state as they were destructive to the
+security of all. But five years before the present date, the Florentine
+Republic had hired the services of a celebrated leader of these
+foreign soldiers,--Gualtier, duke of Athens. By acclamation, the people
+themselves had elected that warrior to the state of prince, or tyrant,
+of their state; before the year was completed, they revolted against his
+cruelties, or rather against his exactions,--for, despite all the boasts
+of their historians, they felt an attack on their purses more deeply
+than an assault on their liberties,--they had chased him from their
+city, and once more proclaimed themselves a Republic. The bravest, and
+most favoured of the soldiers of the Duke of Athens had been Walter de
+Montreal; he had shared the rise and the downfall of his chief. Amongst
+popular commotions, the acute and observant mind of the Knight of St.
+John had learned no mean civil experience; he had learned to sound a
+people--to know how far they would endure--to construe the signs of
+revolution--to be a reader of the times. After the downfall of the Duke
+of Athens, as a Free Companion, in other words a Freebooter, Montreal
+had augmented under the fierce Werner his riches and his renown. At
+present without employment worthy his spirit of enterprise and intrigue,
+the disordered and chiefless state of Rome had attracted him thither. In
+the league he had proposed to Colonna--in the suggestions he had made
+to the vanity of that Signor--his own object was to render his services
+indispensable--to constitute himself the head of the soldiery whom his
+proposed designs would render necessary to the ambition of the Colonna,
+could it be excited--and, in the vastness of his hardy genius for
+enterprise, he probably foresaw that the command of such a force would
+be, in reality, the command of Rome;--a counter-revolution might
+easily unseat the Colonna and elect himself to the principality. It
+had sometimes been the custom of Roman, as of other Italian, States, to
+prefer for a chief magistrate, under the title of Podesta, a foreigner
+to a native. And Montreal hoped that he might possibly become to Rome
+what the Duke of Athens had been to Florence--an ambition he knew well
+enough to be above the gentleman of Provence, but not above the leader
+of an army. But, as we have already seen, his sagacity perceived at once
+that he could not move the aged head of the patricians to those hardy
+and perilous measures which were necessary to the attainment of supreme
+power. Contented with his present station, and taught moderation by his
+age and his past reverses, Stephen Colonna was not the man to risk a
+scaffold from the hope to gain a throne. The contempt which the old
+patrician professed for the people, and their idol, also taught the
+deep-thinking Montreal that, if the Colonna possessed not the ambition,
+neither did he possess the policy, requisite for empire. The Knight
+found his caution against Rienzi in vain, and he turned to Rienzi
+himself. Little cared the Knight of St. John which party were
+uppermost--prince or people--so that his own objects were attained; in
+fact, he had studied the humours of a people, not in order to serve, but
+to rule them; and, believing all men actuated by a similar ambition, he
+imagined that, whether a demagogue or a patrician reigned, the people
+were equally to be victims, and that the cry of “Order” on the one hand,
+or of “Liberty” on the other, was but the mere pretext by which the
+energy of one man sought to justify his ambition over the herd. Deeming
+himself one of the most honourable spirits of his age, he believed in
+no honour which he was unable to feel; and, sceptic in virtue, was
+therefore credulous of vice.
+
+But the boldness of his own nature inclined him, perhaps, rather to
+the adventurous Rienzi than to the self-complacent Colonna; and he
+considered that to the safety of the first he and his armed minions
+might be even more necessary than to that of the last. At present
+his main object was to learn from Rienzi the exact strength which he
+possessed, and how far he was prepared for any actual revolt.
+
+The acute Roman took care, on the one hand, how he betrayed to the
+Knight more than he yet knew, or he disgusted him by apparent reserve on
+the other. Crafty as Montreal was, he possessed not that wonderful art
+of mastering others which was so preeminently the gift of the eloquent
+and profound Rienzi, and the difference between the grades of their
+intellect was visible in their present conference.
+
+“I see,” said Rienzi, “that amidst all the events which have lately
+smiled upon my ambition, none is so favourable as that which assures
+me of your countenance and friendship. In truth, I require some
+armed alliance. Would you believe it, our friends, so bold in private
+meetings, yet shrink from a public explosion. They fear not the
+patricians, but the soldiery of the patricians; for it is the remarkable
+feature in the Italian courage, that they have no terror for each other,
+but the casque and sword of a foreign hireling make them quail like
+deer.”
+
+“They will welcome gladly, then, the assurance that such hirelings shall
+be in their service--not against them; and as much as you desire for the
+revolution, so many shall you receive.”
+
+“But the pay and the conditions,” said Rienzi, with his dry, sarcastic
+smile. “How shall we arrange the first, and what shall we hold to be the
+second?”
+
+“That is an affair easily concluded,” replied Montreal. “For me, to
+tell you frankly, the glory and excitement of so great a revulsion would
+alone suffice. I like to feel myself necessary to the completion of high
+events. For my men it is otherwise. Your first act will be to seize the
+revenues of the state. Well, whatever they amount to, the product of
+the first year, great or small, shall be divided amongst us. You the one
+half, I and my men the other half.”
+
+“It is much,” said Rienzi, gravely, and as if in calculation,--“but Rome
+cannot purchase her liberties too dearly. So be it then decided.”
+
+“Amen!--and now, then, what is your force? for these eighty or a hundred
+signors of the Aventine,--worthy men, doubtless,--scarce suffice for a
+revolt!”
+
+Gazing cautiously round the room, the Roman placed his hand on
+Montreal’s arm--
+
+“Between you and me, it requires time to cement it. We shall be unable
+to stir these five weeks. I have too rashly anticipated the period. The
+corn is indeed cut, but I must now, by private adjuration and address,
+bind up the scattered sheaves.”
+
+“Five weeks,” repeated Montreal; “that is far longer than I
+anticipated.”
+
+“What I desire,” continued Rienzi, fixing his searching eyes upon
+Montreal, “is, that, in the meanwhile, we should preserve a profound
+calm,--we should remove every suspicion. I shall bury myself in my
+studies, and convoke no more meetings.”
+
+“Well--”
+
+“And for yourself, noble Knight, might I venture to dictate, I would
+pray you to mix with the nobles--to profess for me and for the people
+the profoundest contempt--and to contribute to rock them yet more in the
+cradle of their false security. Meanwhile, you could quietly withdraw as
+many of the armed mercenaries as you influence from Rome, and leave the
+nobles without their only defenders. Collecting these hardy warriors in
+the recesses of the mountains, a day’s march from hence, we may be able
+to summon them at need, and they shall appear at our gates, and in the
+midst of our rising--hailed as deliverers by the nobles, but in reality
+allies with the people. In the confusion and despair of our enemies at
+discovering their mistake, they will fly from the city.”
+
+“And its revenues and its empire will become the appanage of the hardy
+soldier and the intriguing demagogue!” cried Montreal, with a laugh.
+
+“Sir Knight, the division shall be equal.”
+
+“Agreed!”
+
+“And now, noble Montreal, a flask of our best vintage!” said Rienzi,
+changing his tone.
+
+“You know the Provencals,” answered Montreal, gaily.
+
+The wine was brought, the conversation became free and familiar, and
+Montreal, whose craft was acquired, and whose frankness was natural,
+unwittingly committed his secret projects and ambition more nakedly to
+Rienzi than he had designed to do. They parted apparently the best of
+friends.
+
+“By the way,” said Rienzi, as they drained the last goblet. “Stephen
+Colonna betakes him to Corneto, with a convoy of corn, on the 19th.
+Will it not be as well if you join him? You can take that opportunity to
+whisper discontent to the mercenaries that accompany him on his mission,
+and induce them to our plan.”
+
+“I thought of that before,” returned Montreal; “it shall be done. For
+the present, farewell!”
+
+     “‘His barb, and his sword,
+     And his lady, the peerless,
+     Are all that are prized
+     By Orlando the fearless.
+
+     “‘Success to the Norman,
+     The darling of story;
+     His glory is pleasure--
+     His pleasure is glory.’”
+
+Chanting this rude ditty as he resumed his mantle, the Knight waved his
+hand to Rienzi, and departed.
+
+Rienzi watched the receding form of his guest with an expression of hate
+and fear upon his countenance. “Give that man the power,” he muttered,
+“and he may be a second Totila. (Innocent VI., some years afterwards,
+proclaimed Montreal to be worse than Totila.) Methinks I see, in his
+griping and ferocious nature,--through all the gloss of its gaiety and
+knightly grace,--the very personification of our old Gothic foes. I
+trust I have lulled him! Verily, two suns could no more blaze in one
+hemisphere, than Walter de Montreal and Cola di Rienzi live in the same
+city. The star-seers tell us that we feel a secret and uncontrollable
+antipathy to those whose astral influences destine them to work us evil;
+such antipathy do I feel for yon fair-faced homicide. Cross not my path,
+Montreal!--cross not my path!”
+
+With this soliloquy Rienzi turned within, and, retiring to his
+apartment, was seen no more that night.
+
+
+
+Chapter 2.V. The Procession of the Barons.--The Beginning of the End.
+
+It was the morning of the 19th of May, the air was brisk and clear,
+and the sun, which had just risen, shone cheerily upon the glittering
+casques and spears of a gallant procession of armed horsemen, sweeping
+through the long and principal street of Rome. The neighing of the
+horses, the ringing of the hoofs, the dazzle of the armour, and the
+tossing to and fro of the standards, adorned with the proud insignia of
+the Colonna, presented one of the gay and brilliant spectacles peculiar
+to the middle ages.
+
+At the head of the troop, on a stout palfrey, rode Stephen Colonna.
+At his right was the Knight of Provence, curbing, with an easy hand,
+a slight, but fiery steed of the Arab race: behind him followed two
+squires, the one leading his war-horse, the other bearing his lance and
+helmet. At the left of Stephen Colonna rode Adrian, grave and silent,
+and replying only by monosyllables to the gay bavardage of the Knight
+of Provence. A considerable number of the flower of the Roman nobles
+followed the old Baron; and the train was closed by a serried troop of
+foreign horsemen, completely armed.
+
+There was no crowd in the street,--the citizens looked with seeming
+apathy at the procession from their half-closed shops.
+
+“Have these Romans no passion for shows?” asked Montreal; “if they could
+be more easily amused they would be more easily governed.”
+
+“Oh, Rienzi, and such buffoons, amuse them. We do better,--we terrify!”
+ replied Stephen.
+
+“What sings the troubadour, Lord Adrian?” said Montreal.
+
+     “‘Smiles, false smiles, should form the school
+     For those who rise, and those who rule:
+     The brave they trick, and fair subdue,
+     Kings deceive, the States undo.
+     Smiles, false smiles!
+
+     “‘Frowns, true frowns, ourselves betray,
+     The brave arouse, the fair dismay,
+     Sting the pride, which blood must heal,
+     Mix the bowl, and point the steel.
+     Frowns, true frowns!’
+
+“The lay is of France, Signor; yet methinks it brings its wisdom from
+Italy;--for the serpent smile is your countrymen’s proper distinction,
+and the frown ill becomes them.”
+
+“Sir Knight,” replied Adrian, sharply, and incensed at the taunt, “you
+Foreigners have taught us how to frown:--a virtue sometimes.”
+
+“But not wisdom, unless the hand could maintain what the brow menaced,”
+ returned Montreal, with haughtiness; for he had much of the Franc
+vivacity which often overcame his prudence; and he had conceived a
+secret pique against Adrian since their interview at Stephen’s palace.
+
+“Sir Knight,” answered Adrian, colouring, “our conversation may lead to
+warmer words than I would desire to have with one who has rendered me so
+gallant a service.”
+
+“Nay, then, let us go back to the troubadours,” said Montreal,
+indifferently. “Forgive me if I do not think highly, in general, of
+Italian honour, or Italian valour; your valour I acknowledge, for I have
+witnessed it, and valour and honour go together,--let that suffice!”
+
+As Adrian was about to answer, his eye fell suddenly on the burly form
+of Cecco del Vecchio, who was leaning his bare and brawny arms over his
+anvil, and gazing, with a smile, upon the group. There was something in
+that smile which turned the current of Adrian’s thoughts, and which he
+could not contemplate without an unaccountable misgiving.
+
+“A strong villain, that,” said Montreal, also eyeing the smith. “I
+should like to enlist him. Fellow!” cried he, aloud, “you have an arm
+that were as fit to wield the sword as to fashion it. Desert your anvil,
+and follow the fortunes of Fra Moreale!”
+
+The smith nodded his head. “Signor Cavalier,” said he, gravely, “we poor
+men have no passion for war; we want not to kill others--we desire only
+ourselves to live,--if you will let us!”
+
+“By the Holy Mother, a slavish answer! But you Romans--”
+
+“Are slaves!” interrupted the smith, turning away to the interior of his
+forge.
+
+“The dog is mutinous!” said the old Colonna. And as the band swept on,
+the rude foreigners, encouraged by their leaders, had each some taunt
+or jest, uttered in a barbarous attempt at the southern patois, for the
+lazy giant, as he again appeared in front of his forge, leaning on his
+anvil as before, and betraying no sign of attention to his insultors,
+save by a heightened glow of his swarthy visage;--and so the gallant
+procession passed through the streets, and quitted the Eternal City.
+
+There was a long interval of deep silence--of general calm--throughout
+the whole of Rome: the shops were still but half-opened; no man betook
+himself to his business; it was like the commencement of some holyday,
+when indolence precedes enjoyment.
+
+About noon, a few small knots of men might be seen scattered about the
+streets, whispering to each other, but soon dispersing; and every now
+and then, a single passenger, generally habited in the long robes used
+by the men of letters, or in the more sombre garb of monks, passed
+hurriedly up the street towards the Church of St. Mary of Egypt, once
+the Temple of Fortune. Then, again, all was solitary and deserted.
+Suddenly, there was heard the sound of a single trumpet! It swelled--it
+gathered on the ear. Cecco del Vecchio looked up from his anvil! A
+solitary horseman paced slowly by the forge, and wound a long loud blast
+of the trumpet suspended round his neck, as he passed through the middle
+of the street. Then might you see a crowd, suddenly, and as by magic,
+appear emerging from every corner; the street became thronged with
+multitudes; but it was only by the tramp of their feet, and an
+indistinct and low murmur, that they broke the silence. Again
+the horseman wound his trump, and when the note ceased, he cried
+aloud--“Friends and Romans! tomorrow, at dawn of day, let each man find
+himself unarmed before the Church of St. Angelo. Cola di Rienzi convenes
+the Romans to provide for the good state of Rome.” A shout, that seemed
+to shake the bases of the seven hills, broke forth at the end of
+this brief exhortation; the horseman rode slowly on, and the crowd
+followed.--This was the commencement of the Revolution!
+
+
+
+Chapter 2.VI. The Conspirator Becomes the Magistrate.
+
+At midnight, when the rest of the city seemed hushed in rest, lights
+were streaming from the windows of the Church of St. Angelo. Breaking
+from its echoing aisles, the long and solemn notes of sacred music
+stole at frequent intervals upon the air. Rienzi was praying within the
+church; thirty masses consumed the hours from night till morn, and all
+the sanction of religion was invoked to consecrate the enterprise of
+liberty. (In fact, I apprehend that if ever the life of Cola di Rienzi
+shall be written by a hand worthy of the task, it will be shown that a
+strong religious feeling was blended with the political enthusiasm of
+the people,--the religious feeling of a premature and crude reformation,
+the legacy of Arnold of Brescia. It was not, however, one excited
+against the priests, but favoured by them. The principal conventual
+orders declared for the Revolution.) The sun had long risen, and the
+crowd had long been assembled before the church door, and in vast
+streams along every street that led to it,--when the bell of the
+church tolled out long and merrily; and as it ceased, the voices of the
+choristers within chanted the following hymn, in which were somewhat
+strikingly, though barbarously, blended, the spirit of the classic
+patriotism with the fervour of religious zeal:--
+
+The Roman Hymn of Liberty.
+
+     Let the mountains exult around!
+
+     (“Exultent in circuito Vestro Montes,” &c.--Let the
+     mountains exult around!  So begins Rienzi’s letter to the
+     Senate and Roman people: preserved by Hocsemius.)
+
+     On her seven-hill’d throne renown’d,
+     Once more old Rome is crown’d!
+     Jubilate!
+
+     Sing out, O Vale and Wave!
+     Look up from each laurell’d grave,
+     Bright dust of the deathless brave!
+     Jubilate!
+
+     Pale Vision, what art thou?--Lo,
+     From Time’s dark deeps,
+     Like a Wind, It sweeps,
+     Like a Wind, when the tempests blow:
+
+     A shadowy form--as a giant ghost--
+     It stands in the midst of the armed host!
+     The dead man’s shroud on Its awful limbs;
+     And the gloom of Its presence the daylight dims:
+     And the trembling world looks on aghast--
+     All hail to the SOUL OF THE MIGHTY PAST!
+     Hail! all hail!
+
+     As we speak--as we hallow--It moves, It breathes;
+     From its clouded crest bud the laurel wreaths--
+     As a Sun that leaps up from the arms of Night,
+     The shadow takes shape, and the gloom takes light.
+     Hail! all hail!
+
+     The Soul of the Past, again
+     To its ancient home,
+     In the hearts of Rome,
+     Hath come to resume its reign!
+
+     O Fame, with a prophet’s voice,
+     Bid the ends of the Earth rejoice!
+     Wherever the Proud are Strong,
+     And Right is oppress’d by Wrong;--
+     Wherever the day dim shines
+     Through the cell where the captive pines;--
+     Go forth, with a trumpet’s sound!
+     And tell to the Nations round--
+     On the Hills which the Heroes trod--
+     In the shrines of the Saints of God--
+     In the Caesars’ hall, and the Martyrs’ prison--
+     That the slumber is broke, and the Sleeper arisen!
+     That the reign of the Goth and the Vandal is o’er:
+     And Earth feels the tread of THE ROMAN once more!
+
+As the hymn ended, the gate of the church opened; the crowd gave way on
+either side, and, preceded by three of the young nobles of the inferior
+order, bearing standards of allegorical design, depicting the triumph
+of Liberty, Justice, and Concord, forth issued Rienzi, clad in complete
+armour, the helmet alone excepted. His face was pale with watching and
+intense excitement--but stern, grave, and solemnly composed; and its
+expression so repelled any vociferous and vulgar burst of feeling, that
+those who beheld it hushed the shout on their lips, and stilled, by a
+simultaneous cry of reproof, the gratulations of the crowd behind.
+Side by side with Rienzi moved Raimond, Bishop of Orvietto: and behind,
+marching two by two, followed a hundred men-at-arms. In complete silence
+the procession began its way, until, as it approached the Capitol, the
+awe of the crowd gradually vanished, and thousands upon thousands of
+voices rent the air with shouts of exultation and joy.
+
+Arrived at the foot of the great staircase, which then made the
+principal ascent to the square of the Capitol, the procession halted;
+and as the crowd filled up that vast space in front--adorned and
+hallowed by many of the most majestic columns of the temples of
+old--Rienzi addressed the Populace, whom he had suddenly elevated into a
+People.
+
+He depicted forcibly the servitude and misery of the citizens--the
+utter absence of all law--the want even of common security to life
+and property. He declared that, undaunted by the peril he incurred, he
+devoted his life to the regeneration of their common country; and he
+solemnly appealed to the people to assist the enterprise, and at once
+to sanction and consolidate the Revolution by an established code of law
+and a Constitutional Assembly. He then ordered the chart and outline of
+the Constitution he proposed, to be read by the Herald to the multitude.
+
+It created,--or rather revived, with new privileges and powers,--a
+Representative Assembly of Councillors. It proclaimed, as its first law,
+one that seems simple enough to our happier times, but never hitherto
+executed at Rome: Every wilful homicide, of whatever rank, was to be
+punished by death. It enacted, that no private noble or citizen should
+be suffered to maintain fortifications and garrisons in the city or the
+country; that the gates and bridges of the State should be under the
+control of whomsoever should be elected Chief Magistrate. It forbade all
+harbour of brigands, mercenaries, and robbers, on payment of a thousand
+marks of silver; and it made the Barons who possessed the neighbouring
+territories responsible for the safety of the roads, and the transport
+of merchandise. It took under the protection of the State the widow and
+the orphan. It appointed, in each of the quarters of the city, an armed
+militia, whom the tolling of the bell of the Capitol, at any hour, was
+to assemble to the protection of the State. It ordained, that in each
+harbour of the coast, a vessel should be stationed, for the safeguard
+of commerce. It decreed the sum of one hundred florins to the heirs of
+every man who died in the defence of Rome; and it devoted the public
+revenues to the service and protection of the State.
+
+Such, moderate at once and effectual, was the outline of the New
+Constitution; and it may amuse the reader to consider how great must
+have been the previous disorders of the city, when the common and
+elementary provisions of civilisation and security made the character of
+the code proposed, and the limit of a popular revolution.
+
+The most rapturous shouts followed this sketch of the New Constitution:
+and, amidst the clamour, up rose the huge form of Cecco del Vecchio.
+Despite his condition, he was a man of great importance at the present
+crisis: his zeal and his courage, and, perhaps, still more, his brute
+passion and stubborn prejudice, had made him popular. The lower order of
+mechanics looked to him as their head and representative; out, then, he
+spake loud and fearlessly,--speaking well, because his mind was full of
+what he had to say.
+
+“Countrymen and Citizens!--This New Constitution meets with your
+approbation--so it ought. But what are good laws, if we do not have
+good men to execute them? Who can execute a law so well as the man
+who designs it? If you ask me to give you a notion how to make a good
+shield, and my notion pleases you, would you ask me, or another smith,
+to make it for you? If you ask another, he may make a good shield,
+but it would not be the same as that which I should have made, and the
+description of which contented you. Cola di Rienzi has proposed a Code
+of Law that shall be our shield. Who should see that the shield become
+what he proposes, but Cola di Rienzi? Romans! I suggest that Cola di
+Rienzi be intrusted by the people with the authority, by whatsoever name
+he pleases, of carrying the New Constitution into effect;--and whatever
+be the means, we, the People, will bear him harmless.”
+
+“Long life to Rienzi!--long live Cecco del Vecchio! He hath spoken
+well!--none but the Law-maker shall be the Governor!”
+
+Such were the acclamations which greeted the ambitious heart of the
+Scholar. The voice of the people invested him with the supreme power. He
+had created a Commonwealth--to become, if he desired it, a Despot!
+
+
+
+Chapter 2.VII. Looking after the Halter when the Mare is Stolen.
+
+While such were the events at Rome, a servitor of Stephen Colonna was
+already on his way to Corneto. The astonishment with which the old Baron
+received the intelligence may be easily imagined. He lost not a moment
+in convening his troop; and, while in all the bustle of departure, the
+Knight of St. John abruptly entered his presence. His mien had lost its
+usual frank composure.
+
+“How is this?” said he, hastily; “a revolt?--Rienzi sovereign of
+Rome?--can the news be believed?”
+
+“It is too true!” said Colonna, with a bitter smile. “Where shall we
+hang him on our return?”
+
+“Talk not so wildly, Sir Baron,” replied Montreal, discourteously;
+“Rienzi is stronger than you think for. I know what men are, and you
+only know what noblemen are! Where is your kinsman, Adrian?”
+
+“He is here, noble Montreal,” said Stephen, shrugging his shoulders,
+with a half-disdainful smile at the rebuke, which he thought it more
+prudent not to resent; “he is here!--see him enter!”
+
+“You have heard the news?” exclaimed Montreal.
+
+“I have.”
+
+“And despise the revolution?”
+
+“I fear it!”
+
+“Then you have some sense in you. But this is none of my affair: I
+will not interrupt your consultations. Adieu for the present!” and, ere
+Stephen could prevent him, the Knight had quitted the chamber.
+
+“What means this demagogue?” Montreal muttered to himself. “Would he
+trick me?--has he got rid of my presence in order to monopolise all the
+profit of the enterprise? I fear me so!--the cunning Roman! We northern
+warriors could never compete with the intellect of these Italians but
+for their cowardice. But what shall be done? I have already bid Rodolf
+communicate with the brigands, and they are on the eve of departure from
+their present lord. Well! let it be so! Better that I should first break
+the power of the Barons, and then make my own terms, sword in hand, with
+the plebeian. And if I fail in this,--sweet Adeline! I shall see thee
+again!--that is some comfort!--and Louis of Hungary will bid high for
+the arm and brain of Walter de Montreal. What, ho! Rodolf!” he
+exclaimed aloud, as the sturdy form of the trooper, half-armed and
+half-intoxicated, reeled along the courtyard. “Knave! art thou drunk at
+this hour?”
+
+“Drunk or sober,” answered Rodolf, bending low, “I am at thy bidding.”
+
+“Well said!--are thy friends ripe for the saddle?”
+
+“Eighty of them already tired of idleness and the dull air of Rome, will
+fly wherever Sir Walter de Montreal wishes.”
+
+“Hasten, then,--bid them mount; we go not hence with the Colonna--we
+leave while they are yet talking! Bid my squires attend me!”
+
+And when Stephen Colonna was settling himself on his palfrey, he heard,
+for the first time, that the Knight of Provence, Rodolf the trooper, and
+eighty of the stipendiaries, had already departed,--whither, none knew.
+
+“To precede us to Rome! gallant barbarian!” said Colonna. “Sirs, on!”
+
+
+
+Chapter 2.VIII. The Attack--the Retreat--the Election--and the Adhesion.
+
+Arriving at Rome, the company of the Colonna found the gates barred, and
+the walls manned. Stephen bade advance his trumpeters, with one of his
+captains, imperiously to demand admittance.
+
+“We have orders,” replied the chief of the town-guard, “to admit none
+who bear arms, flags, or trumpets. Let the Lords Colonna dismiss their
+train, and they are welcome.”
+
+“Whose are these insolent mandates?” asked the captain.
+
+“Those of the Lord Bishop of Orvietto and Cola di Rienzi, joint
+protectors of the Buono Stato.” (Good Estate.)
+
+The captain of the Colonna returned to his chief with these tidings. The
+rage of Stephen was indescribable. “Go back,” he cried, as soon as
+he could summon voice, “and say, that, if the gates are not forthwith
+opened to me and mine, the blood of the plebeians be on their own head.
+As for Raimond, Vicars of the Pope have high spiritual authority, none
+temporal. Let him prescribe a fast, and he shall be obeyed; but, for
+the rash Rienzi, say that Stephen Colonna will seek him in the Capitol
+tomorrow, for the purpose of throwing him out of the highest window.”
+
+These messages the envoy failed not to deliver.
+
+The captain of the Romans was equally stern in his reply.
+
+“Declare to your Lord,” said he, “that Rome holds him and his as rebels
+and traitors; and that the moment you regain your troop, our archers
+receive our command to draw their bows--in the name of the Pope, the
+City, and the Liberator.”
+
+This threat was executed to the letter; and ere the old Baron had time
+to draw up his men in the best array, the gates were thrown open, and
+a well-armed, if undisciplined, multitude poured forth, with fierce
+shouts, clashing their arms, and advancing the azure banners of the
+Roman State. So desperate their charge, and so great their numbers, that
+the Barons, after a short and tumultuous conflict, were driven back,
+and chased by their pursuers for more than a mile from the walls of the
+city.
+
+As soon as the Barons recovered their disorder and dismay, a hasty
+council was held, at which various and contradictory opinions were
+loudly urged. Some were for departing on the instant to Palestrina,
+which belonged to the Colonna, and possessed an almost inaccessible
+fortress. Others were for dispersing, and entering peaceably, and in
+detached parties, through the other gates. Stephen Colonna--himself
+incensed and disturbed from his usual self-command--was unable to
+preserve his authority; Luca di Savelli, (The more correct orthography
+were Luca di Savello, but the one in the text is preserved as more
+familiar to the English reader.) a timid, though treacherous and subtle
+man, already turned his horse’s head, and summoned his men to follow him
+to his castle in Romagna, when the old Colonna bethought himself of a
+method by which to keep his band from a disunion that he had the sense
+to perceive would prove fatal to the common cause. He proposed that they
+should at once repair to Palestrina, and there fortify themselves; while
+one of the chiefs should be selected to enter Rome alone, and
+apparently submissive, to examine the strength of Rienzi; and with the
+discretionary power to resist if possible,--or to make the best terms he
+could for the admission of the rest.
+
+“And who,” asked Savelli, sneeringly, “will undertake this dangerous
+mission? Who, unarmed and alone, will expose himself to the rage of the
+fiercest populace of Italy, and the caprice of a demagogue in the first
+flush of his power?”
+
+The Barons and the Captains looked at each other in silence. Savelli
+laughed.
+
+Hitherto Adrian had taken no part in the conference, and but little in
+the previous contest. He now came to the support of his kinsman.
+
+“Signors!” said he, “I will undertake this mission,--but on mine own
+account, independently of yours;--free to act as I may think best, for
+the dignity of a Roman noble, and the interests of a Roman citizen; free
+to raise my standard on mine own tower, or to yield fealty to the new
+estate.”
+
+“Well said!” cried the old Colonna, hastily. “Heaven forbid we should
+enter Rome as foes, if to enter it as friends be yet allowed us! What
+say ye, gentles?”
+
+“A more worthy choice could not be selected,” said Savelli; “but I
+should scarce deem it possible that a Colonna could think there was an
+option between resistance and fealty to this upstart revolution.”
+
+“Of that, Signor, I will judge for myself; if you demand an agent for
+yourselves, choose another. I announce to ye frankly, that I have seen
+enough of other states to think the recent condition of Rome demanded
+some redress. Whether Rienzi and Raimond be worthy of the task they have
+assumed, I know not.”
+
+Savelli was silent. The old Colonna seized the word.
+
+“To Palestrina, then!--are ye all agreed on this? At the worst, or at
+the best, we should not be divided! On this condition alone I hazard the
+safety of my kinsman!”
+
+The Barons murmured a little among themselves;--the expediency of
+Stephen’s proposition was evident, and they at length assented to it.
+
+Adrian saw them depart, and then, attended only by his squire, slowly
+rode towards a more distant entrance into the city. On arriving at the
+gates, his name was demanded--he gave it freely.
+
+“Enter, my Lord,” said the warder, “our orders were to admit all that
+came unarmed and unattended. But to the Lord Adrian di Castello, alone,
+we had a special injunction to give the honours due to a citizen and a
+friend.”
+
+Adrian, a little touched by this implied recollection of friendship, now
+rode through a long line of armed citizens, who saluted him respectfully
+as he passed, and, as he returned the salutation with courtesy, a loud
+and approving shout followed his horse’s steps.
+
+So, save by one attendant, alone, and in peace, the young patrician
+proceeded leisurely through the long streets, empty and deserted,--for
+nearly one half of the inhabitants were assembled at the walls, and
+nearly the other half were engaged in a more peaceful duty,--until,
+penetrating the interior, the wide and elevated space of the Capitol
+broke upon his sight. The sun was slowly setting over an immense
+multitude that overspread the spot, and high above a scaffold raised
+in the centre, shone, to the western ray, the great Gonfalon of Rome,
+studded with silver stars.
+
+Adrian reined in his steed. “This,” thought he, “is scarcely the hour
+thus publicly to confer with Rienzi; yet fain would I, mingled with the
+crowd, judge how far his power is supported, and in what manner it is
+borne.” Musing a little, he withdrew into one of the obscurer streets,
+then wholly deserted, surrendered his horse to his squire, and,
+borrowing of the latter his morion and long mantle, passed to one of
+the more private entrances of the Capitol, and, enveloped in his cloak,
+stood--one of the crowd--intent upon all that followed.
+
+“And what,” he asked of a plainly dressed citizen, “is the cause of this
+assembly?”
+
+“Heard you not the proclamation?” returned the other in some surprise.
+“Do you not know that the Council of the City and the Guilds of the
+Artisans have passed a vote to proffer to Rienzi the title of king of
+Rome?”
+
+The Knight of the Emperor, to whom belonged that august dignity, drew
+back in dismay.
+
+“And,” resumed the citizen, “this assembly of all the lesser Barons,
+Councillors, and Artificers, is convened to hear the answer.”
+
+“Of course it will be assent?”
+
+“I know not--there are strange rumours; hitherto the Liberator has
+concealed his sentiments.”
+
+At that instant a loud flourish of martial music announced the approach
+of Rienzi. The crowd tumultuously divided, and presently, from the
+Palace of the Capitol to the scaffold, passed Rienzi, still in complete
+armour, save the helmet, and with him, in all the pomp of his episcopal
+robes, Raimond of Orvietto.
+
+As soon as Rienzi had ascended the platform, and was thus made visible
+to the whole concourse, no words can suffice to paint the enthusiasm
+of the scene--the shouts, the gestures, the tears, the sobs, the wild
+laughter, in which the sympathy of those lively and susceptible children
+of the South broke forth. The windows and balconies of the Palace were
+thronged with the wives and daughters of the lesser Barons and more
+opulent citizens; and Adrian, with a slight start, beheld amongst
+them,--pale--agitated--tearful,--the lovely face of his Irene--a face
+that even thus would have outshone all present, but for one by her side,
+whose beauty the emotion of the hour only served to embellish. The dark,
+large, and flashing eyes of Nina di Raselli, just bedewed, were fixed
+proudly on the hero of her choice: and pride, even more than joy, gave a
+richer carnation to her cheek, and the presence of a queen to her noble
+and rounded form. The setting sun poured its full glory over the spot;
+the bared heads--the animated faces of the crowd--the grey and vast mass
+of the Capitol; and, not far from the side of Rienzi, it brought into
+a strange and startling light the sculptured form of a colossal Lion of
+Basalt, (The existent Capitol is very different from the building at
+the time of Rienzi; and the reader must not suppose that the present
+staircase, designed by Michael Angelo, at the base of which are two
+marble lions, removed by Pius IV. from the Church of St. Stephen del
+Cacco, was the staircase of the Lion of Basalt, which bears so stern a
+connexion with the history of Rienzi. That mute witness of dark deeds is
+no more.) which gave its name to a staircase leading to the Capitol.
+It was an old Egyptian relic,--vast, worn, and grim; some symbol of a
+vanished creed, to whose face the sculptor had imparted something of the
+aspect of the human countenance. And this producing the effect
+probably sought, gave at all times a mystic, preternatural, and fearful
+expression to the stern features, and to that solemn and hushed repose,
+which is so peculiarly the secret of Egyptian sculpture. The awe which
+this colossal and frowning image was calculated to convey, was felt yet
+more deeply by the vulgar, because “the Staircase of the Lion” was the
+wonted place of the state executions, as of the state ceremonies.
+And seldom did the stoutest citizen forget to cross himself, or feel
+unchilled with a certain terror, whenever, passing by the place, he
+caught, suddenly fixed upon him, the stony gaze and ominous grin of that
+old monster from the cities of the Nile.
+
+It was some minutes before the feelings of the assembly allowed
+Rienzi to be heard. But when, at length, the last shout closed with a
+simultaneous cry of “Long live Rienzi! Deliverer and King of Rome!” he
+raised his hand impatiently, and the curiosity of the crowd procured a
+sudden silence.
+
+“Deliverer of Rome, my countrymen!” said he. “Yes! change not that
+title--I am too ambitious to be a King! Preserve your obedience to your
+Pontiff--your allegiance to your Emperor--but be faithful to your
+own liberties. Ye have a right to your ancient constitution; but that
+constitution needed not a king. Emulous of the name of Brutus, I am
+above the titles of a Tarquin! Romans, awake! awake! be inspired with
+a nobler love of liberty than that which, if it dethrones the tyrant of
+today, would madly risk the danger of tyranny for tomorrow! Rome wants
+still a liberator--never an usurper!--Take away yon bauble!”
+
+There was a pause; the crowd were deeply affected--but they uttered no
+shouts; they looked anxiously for a reply from their councillors, or
+popular leaders.
+
+“Signor,” said Pandulfo di Guido, who was one of the Caporioni, “your
+answer is worthy of your fame. But, in order to enforce the law, Rome
+must endow you with a legal title--if not that of King, deign to accept
+that of Dictator or of Consul.”
+
+“Long live the Consul Rienzi!” cried several voices.
+
+Rienzi waved his hand for silence.
+
+“Pandulfo di Guido! and you, honoured Councillors of Rome! such title is
+at once too august for my merits, and too inapplicable to my functions.
+I am one of the people--the people are my charge; the nobles can protect
+themselves. Dictator and Consul are the appellations of patricians.
+No,” he continued after a short pause, “if ye deem it necessary, for
+the preservation of order, that your fellow-citizen should be intrusted
+with a formal title and a recognised power, be it so: but let it be
+such as may attest the nature of our new institutions, the wisdom of the
+people, and the moderation of their leaders. Once, my countrymen, the
+people elected, for the protectors of their rights and the guardians of
+their freedom, certain officers responsible to the people,--chosen from
+the people,--provident for the people. Their power was great, but it was
+delegated: a dignity, but a trust. The name of these officers with that
+of Tribune. Such is the title that conceded, not by clamour alone,
+but in the full Parliament of the people, and accompanied by, such
+Parliament, ruling with such Parliament,--such is the title I will
+gratefully accept.”
+
+     (Gibbon and Sismondi alike, (neither of whom appears to have
+     consulted with much attention the original documents
+     preserved by Hocsemius,) say nothing of the Representative
+     Parliament, which it was almost Rienzi’s first public act to
+     institute or model. Six days from the memorable 19th of May,
+     he addressed the people of Viterbo in a letter yet extant.
+     He summons them to elect and send two syndics, or
+     ambassadors, to the general Parliament.)
+
+The speech, the sentiments of Rienzi were rendered far more impressive
+by a manner of earnest and deep sincerity; and some of the Romans,
+despite their corruption, felt a momentary exultation in the forbearance
+of their chief. “Long live the Tribune of Rome!” was shouted, but less
+loud than the cry of “Live the King!” And the vulgar almost thought the
+revolution was incomplete, because the loftier title was not assumed.
+To a degenerate and embruted people, liberty seems too plain a thing, if
+unadorned by the pomp of the very despotism they would dethrone. Revenge
+is their desire, rather than Release; and the greater the new power they
+create, the greater seems their revenge against the old. Still all that
+was most respected, intelligent, and powerful amongst the assembly,
+were delighted at a temperance which they foresaw would free Rome from
+a thousand dangers, whether from the Emperor or the Pontiff. And their
+delight was yet increased, when Rienzi added, so soon as returning
+silence permitted--“And since we have been equal labourers in the same
+cause, whatever honours be awarded to me, should be extended also to the
+Vicar of the Pope, Raimond, Lord Bishop of Orvietto. Remember, that both
+Church and State are properly the rulers of the people, only because
+their benefactors.--Long live the first Vicar of a Pope that was ever
+also the Liberator of a State!”
+
+Whether or not Rienzi was only actuated by patriotism in his moderation,
+certain it is, that his sagacity was at least equal to his virtue; and
+perhaps nothing could have cemented the revolution more strongly, than
+thus obtaining for a colleague the Vicar, and Representative of the
+Pontifical power: it borrowed, for the time, the sanction of the Pope
+himself--thus made to share the responsibility of the revolution,
+without monopolising the power of the State.
+
+While the crowd hailed the proposition of Rienzi; while their shouts
+yet filled the air; while Raimond, somewhat taken by surprise, sought by
+signs and gestures to convey at once his gratitude and his humility,
+the Tribune-Elect, casting his eyes around, perceived many hitherto
+attracted by curiosity, and whom, from their rank and weight, it
+was desirable to secure in the first heat of the public enthusiasm.
+Accordingly, as soon as Raimond had uttered a short and pompous
+harangue,--in which his eager acceptance of the honour proposed him was
+ludicrously contrasted by his embarrassed desire not to involve himself
+or the Pope in any untoward consequences that might ensue,--Rienzi
+motioned to two heralds that stood behind upon the platform, and one of
+these advancing, proclaimed--“That as it was desirable that all hitherto
+neuter should now profess themselves friends or foes, so they were
+invited to take at once the oath of obedience to the laws, and
+subscription to the Buono Stato.”
+
+So great was the popular fervour, and so much had it been refined and
+deepened in its tone by the addresses of Rienzi, that even the most
+indifferent had caught the contagion: and no man liked to be seen
+shrinking from the rest: so that the most neutral, knowing themselves
+the most marked, were the most entrapped into allegiance to the Buono
+Stato. The first who advanced to the platform and took the oath was the
+Signor di Raselli, the father of Nina.--Others of the lesser nobility
+followed his example.
+
+The presence of the Pope’s Vicar induced the aristocratic; the fear
+of the people urged the selfish; the encouragement of shouts and
+gratulations excited the vain. The space between Adrian and Rienzi was
+made clear. The young noble suddenly felt the eyes of the Tribune were
+upon him; he felt that those eyes recognised and called upon him--he
+coloured--he breathed short. The noble forbearance of Rienzi had touched
+him to the heart;--the applause--the pageant--the enthusiasm of the
+scene, intoxicated--confused him.--He lifted his eyes and saw before
+him the sister of the Tribune--the lady of his love! His indecision--his
+pause--continued, when Raimond, observing him, and obedient to a
+whisper from Rienzi, artfully cried aloud--“Room for the Lord Adrian di
+Castello! a Colonna! a Colonna!” Retreat was cut off. Mechanically, and
+as if in a dream, Adrian ascended to the platform: and to complete the
+triumph of the Tribune, the sun’s last ray beheld the flower of the
+Colonna--the best and bravest of the Barons of Rome--confessing his
+authority, and subscribing to his laws!
+
+
+
+
+BOOK III. THE FREEDOM WITHOUT LAW.
+
+     “Ben furo avventurosi i cavalieri
+     Ch’ erano a quella eta, che nei vallone,
+     Nelle scure spelonche e boschi fieri,
+     Tane di serpi, d’orsi e di leoni,
+     Trovavan quel che nei palazzi altieri
+     Appena or trovar pon giudici buoni;
+     Donne che nella lor piu fresca etade
+     Sien degne di aver titol di beltade.”
+
+     Ariosto, Orlando Furioso, can. xiii. 1.
+
+
+
+Chapter 3.I. The Return of Walter de Montreal to his Fortress.
+
+When Walter de Montreal and his mercenaries quitted Corneto, they made
+the best of their way to Rome; arriving there, long before the Barons,
+they met with a similar reception at the gates, but Montreal prudently
+forbore all attack and menace, and contented himself with sending his
+trusty Rodolf into the city to seek Rienzi, and to crave permission
+to enter with his troop. Rodolf returned in a shorter time than was
+anticipated. “Well,” said Montreal impatiently, “you have the order I
+suppose. Shall we bid them open the gates?”
+
+“Bid them open our graves,” replied the Saxon, bluntly. “I trust my next
+heraldry will be to a more friendly court.”
+
+“How! what mean you?”
+
+“Briefly this:--I found the new governor, or whatever his title, in the
+palace of the Capitol, surrounded by guards and councillors, and in a
+suit of the finest armour I ever saw out of Milan.”
+
+“Pest on his armour! give us his answer.”
+
+“‘Tell Walter de Montreal,’ said he, then, if you will have it, ‘that
+Rome is no longer a den of thieves; tell him, that if he enters, he must
+abide a trial--’”
+
+“A trial!” cried Montreal, grinding his teeth.
+
+“‘For participation in the evil doings of Werner and his freebooters.’”
+
+“Ha!”
+
+“‘Tell him, moreover, that Rome declares war against all robbers,
+whether in tent or tower, and that we order him in forty-eight hours to
+quit the territories of the Church.’”
+
+“He thinks, then, not only to deceive, but to menace me? Well, proceed.”
+
+“That was all his reply to you; to me, however, he vouchsafed a caution
+still more obliging. ‘Hark ye, friend,’ said he, for every German bandit
+found in Rome after tomorrow, our welcome will be cord and gibbet!
+Begone.’”
+
+“Enough! enough!” cried Montreal, colouring with rage and shame.
+“Rodolf, you have a skilful eye in these matters, how many Northmen
+would it take to give that same gibbet to the upstart?”
+
+Rodolf scratched his huge head, and seemed awhile lost in calculation;
+at length he said, “You, Captain, must be the best judge, when I tell
+you, that twenty thousand Romans are the least of his force, so I heard
+by the way; and this evening he is to accept the crown, and depose the
+Emperor.”
+
+“Ha, ha!” laughed Montreal, “is he so mad? then he will want not our aid
+to hang himself. My friends, let us wait the result. At present neither
+barons nor people seem likely to fill our coffers. Let us across the
+country to Terracina. Thank the saints,” and Montreal (who was not
+without a strange kind of devotion,--indeed he deemed that virtue
+essential to chivalry) crossed himself piously, “the free companions are
+never long without quarters!”
+
+“Hurrah for the Knight of St. John!” cried the mercenaries. “And hurrah
+for fair Provence and bold Germany!” added the Knight, as he waved his
+hand on high, struck spurs into his already wearied horse, and, breaking
+out into his favourite song,
+
+     “His steed and his sword,
+     And his lady the peerless,” &c.,
+
+Montreal, with his troop, struck gallantly across the Campagna.
+
+The Knight of St. John soon, however, fell into an absorbed and moody
+reverie; and his followers imitating the silence of their chief, in a
+few minutes the clatter of their arms and the jingle of their spurs,
+alone disturbed the stillness of the wide and gloomy plains across
+which they made towards Terracina. Montreal was recalling with bitter
+resentment his conference with Rienzi; and, proud of his own sagacity
+and talent for scheming, he was humbled and vexed at the discovery that
+he had been duped by a wilier intriguer. His ambitious designs on Rome,
+too, were crossed, and even crushed for the moment, by the very means
+to which he had looked for their execution. He had seen enough of the
+Barons to feel assured that while Stephen Colonna lived, the head of the
+order, he was not likely to obtain that mastery in the state which, if
+leagued with a more ambitious or a less timid and less potent signor,
+might reward his aid in expelling Rienzi. Under all circumstances, he
+deemed it advisable to remain aloof. Should Rienzi grow strong, Montreal
+might make the advantageous terms he desired with the Barons; should
+Rienzi’s power decay, his pride, necessarily humbled, might drive him
+to seek the assistance, and submit to the proposals, of Montreal.
+The ambition of the Provencal, though vast and daring, was not of a
+consistent and persevering nature. Action and enterprise were dearer to
+him, as yet, than the rewards which they proffered; and if baffled
+in one quarter, he turned himself, with the true spirit of the
+knight-errant, to any other field for his achievements. Louis, king of
+Hungary, stern, warlike, implacable, seeking vengeance for the murder of
+his brother, the ill-fated husband of Joanna, (the beautiful and guilty
+Queen of Naples--the Mary Stuart of Italy,) had already prepared himself
+to subject the garden of Campania to the Hungarian yoke. Already his
+bastard brother had entered Italy--already some of the Neapolitan states
+had declared in his favour--already promises had been held out by the
+northern monarch to the scattered Companies--and already those fierce
+mercenaries gathered menacingly round the frontiers of that Eden of
+Italy, attracted, as vultures to the carcass, by the preparation of war
+and the hope of plunder. Such was the field to which the bold mind
+of Montreal now turned its thoughts; and his soldiers had joyfully
+conjectured his design when they had heard him fix Terracina as their
+bourne. Provident of every resource, and refining his audacious and
+unprincipled valour by a sagacity which promised, when years had more
+matured and sobered his restless chivalry, to rank him among the most
+dangerous enemies Italy had ever known, on the first sign of Louis’s
+warlike intentions, Montreal had seized and fortified a strong castle on
+that delicious coast beyond Terracina, by which lies the celebrated pass
+once held by Fabius against Hannibal, and which Nature has so favoured
+for war as for peace, that a handful of armed men might stop the march
+of an army. The possession of such a fortress on the very frontiers of
+Naples, gave Montreal an importance of which he trusted to avail
+himself with the Hungarian king: and now, thwarted in his more grand and
+aspiring projects upon Rome, his sanguine, active, and elastic spirit
+congratulated itself upon the resource it had secured.
+
+The band halted at nightfall on this side the Pontine Marshes, seizing
+without scruple some huts and sheds, from which they ejected the
+miserable tenants, and slaughtering with no greater ceremony the swine,
+cattle, and poultry of a neighbouring farm. Shortly after sunrise they
+crossed those fatal swamps which had already been partially drained by
+Boniface VIII.; and Montreal, refreshed by sleep, reconciled to his late
+mortification by the advantages opened to him in the approaching war
+with Naples, and rejoicing as he approached a home which held one who
+alone divided his heart with ambition, had resumed all the gaiety which
+belonged to his Gallic birth and his reckless habits. And that deadly
+but consecrated road, where yet may be seen the labours of Augustus,
+in the canal which had witnessed the Voyage so humourously described by
+Horace, echoed with the loud laughter and frequent snatches of wild song
+by which the barbarian robbers enlivened their rapid march.
+
+It was noon when the company entered upon that romantic pass I have
+before referred to--the ancient Lantulae. High to the left rose steep
+and lofty rocks, then covered by the prodigal verdure, and the countless
+flowers, of the closing May; while to the right the sea, gentle as a
+lake, and blue as heaven, rippled musically at their feet. Montreal, who
+largely possessed the poetry of his land, which is so eminently allied
+with a love of nature, might at another time have enjoyed the beauty of
+the scene; but at that moment less external and more household images
+were busy within him.
+
+Abruptly ascending where a winding path up the mountain offered a rough
+and painful road to their horses’ feet, the band at length arrived
+before a strong fortress of grey stone, whose towers were concealed by
+the lofty foliage, until they emerged sullenly and suddenly from the
+laughing verdure. The sound of the bugle, the pennon of the knight, the
+rapid watchword, produced a loud shout of welcome from a score or two
+of grim soldiery on the walls; the portcullis was raised, and Montreal,
+throwing himself hastily from his panting steed, sprung across the
+threshold of a jutting porch, and traversed a huge hall, when a
+lady--young, fair, and richly dressed--met him with a step equally
+swift, and fell breathless and overjoyed into his arms.
+
+“My Walter! my dear, dear Walter; welcome--ten thousand welcomes!”
+
+“Adeline, my beautiful--my adored--I see thee again!”
+
+Such were the greetings interchanged as Montreal pressed his lady to
+his heart, kissing away her tears, and lifting her face to his, while
+he gazed on its delicate bloom with all the wistful anxiety of affection
+after absence.
+
+“Fairest,” said he, tenderly, “thou hast pined, thou hast lost roundness
+and colour since we parted. Come, come, thou art too gentle, or too
+foolish, for a soldier’s love.”
+
+“Ah, Walter!” replied Adeline, clinging to him, “now thou art returned,
+and I shall be well. Thou wilt not leave me again a long, long time.”
+
+“Sweet one, no;” and flinging his arm round her waist, the lovers--for
+alas! they were not wedded!--retired to the more private chambers of the
+castle.
+
+
+
+Chapter 3.II. The Life of Love and War--the Messenger of Peace--the
+Joust.
+
+Girt with his soldiery, secure in his feudal hold, enchanted with the
+beauty of the earth, sky, and sea around, and passionately adoring his
+Adeline, Montreal for awhile forgot all his more stirring projects and
+his ruder occupations. His nature was capable of great tenderness, as of
+great ferocity; and his heart smote him when he looked at the fair cheek
+of his lady, and saw that even his presence did not suffice to bring
+back the smile and the fresh hues of old. Often he cursed that fatal
+oath of his knightly order which forbade him to wed, though with one
+more than his equal; and remorse embittered his happiest hours. That
+gentle lady in that robber hold, severed from all she had been taught
+most to prize--mother, friends, and fair fame--only loved her seducer
+the more intensely; only the more concentrated upon one object all the
+womanly and tender feelings denied every other and less sinful vent.
+But she felt her shame, though she sought to conceal it, and a yet
+more gnawing grief than even that of shame contributed to prey upon her
+spirits and undermine her health. Yet, withal, in Montreal’s presence
+she was happy, even in regret; and in her declining health she had at
+least a consolation in the hope to die while his love was undiminished.
+Sometimes they made short excursions, for the disturbed state of the
+country forbade them to wander far from the castle, through the sunny
+woods, and along the glassy sea, which make the charm of that delicious
+scenery; and that mixture of the savage with the tender, the wild
+escort, the tent in some green glade in the woods at noon, the lute and
+voice of Adeline, with the fierce soldiers grouped and listening at the
+distance, might have well suited the verse of Ariosto, and harmonised
+singularly with that strange, disordered, yet chivalric time, in which
+the Classic South became the seat of the Northern Romance. Still,
+however, Montreal maintained his secret intercourse with the Hungarian
+king, and, plunged in new projects, willingly forsook for the present
+all his designs on Rome. Yet deemed he that his more august ambition
+was only delayed, and, bright in the more distant prospects of his
+adventurous career, rose the Capitol of Rome and shone the sceptre of
+the Caesars.
+
+One day, as Montreal, with a small troop in attendance, passed on
+horseback near the walls of Terracina, the gates were suddenly thrown
+open, and a numerous throng issued forth, preceded by a singular figure,
+whose steps they followed bareheaded and with loud blessings; a train
+of monks closed the procession, chanting a hymn, of which the concluding
+words were as follows:--
+
+Beauteous on the mountains--lo, The feet of him glad tidings gladly
+bringing; The flowers along his pathway grow, And voices, heard aloft,
+to angel harps are singing: And strife and slaughter cease Before thy
+blessed way, Young Messenger of Peace! O’er the mount, and through the
+moor, Glide thy holy steps secure. Day and night no fear thou knowest,
+Lonely--but with God thou goest. Where the Heathen rage the fiercest,
+Through the armed throng thou piercest. For thy coat of mail, bedight
+In thy spotless robe of white. For the sinful sword--thy hand Bearing
+bright the silver wand: Through the camp and through the court, Through
+the bandit’s gloomy fort, On the mission of the dove, Speeds the
+minister of love; By a word the wildest taming, And the world to Christ
+reclaiming: While, as once the waters trod By the footsteps of thy
+God, War, and wrath, and rapine cease, Hush’d round thy charmed path, O
+Messenger of Peace!
+
+The stranger to whom these honours were paid was a young, unbearded man,
+clothed in white wrought with silver; he was unarmed and barefooted: in
+his hand he held a tall silver wand. Montreal and his party halted in
+astonishment and wonder, and the Knight, spurring his horse toward the
+crowd, confronted the stranger.
+
+“How, friend,” quoth the Provencal, “is thine a new order of pilgrims,
+or what especial holiness has won thee this homage?”
+
+“Back, back,” cried some of the bolder of the crowd, “let not the robber
+dare arrest the Messenger of Peace.”
+
+Montreal waved his hand disdainfully.
+
+“I speak not to you, good sirs, and the worthy friars in your rear know
+full well that I never injured herald or palmer.”
+
+The monks, ceasing from their hymn, advanced hastily to the spot; and
+indeed the devotion of Montreal had ever induced him to purchase the
+goodwill of whatever monastery neighboured his wandering home.
+
+“My son,” said the eldest of the brethren, “this is a strange spectacle,
+and a sacred: and when thou learnest all, thou wilt rather give the
+messenger a passport of safety from the unthinking courage of thy
+friends than intercept his path of peace.”
+
+“Ye puzzle still more my simple brain,” said Montreal, impatiently, “let
+the youth speak for himself; I perceive that on his mantle are the
+arms of Rome blended with other quarterings, which are a mystery to
+me,--though sufficiently versed in heraldic art as befits a noble and a
+knight.”
+
+“Signor,” said the youth, gravely, “know in me the messenger of Cola di
+Rienzi, Tribune of Rome, charged with letters to many a baron and prince
+in the ways between Rome and Naples. The arms wrought upon my mantle are
+those of the Pontiff, the City, and the Tribune.”
+
+“Umph; thou must have bold nerves to traverse the Campagna with no other
+weapon than that stick of silver!”
+
+“Thou art mistaken, Sir Knight,” replied the youth, boldly, “and judgest
+of the present by the past; know that not a single robber now lurks
+within the Campagna, the arms of the Tribune have rendered every road
+around the city as secure as the broadest street of the city itself.”
+
+“Thou tellest me wonders.”
+
+“Through the forest--and in the fortress,--through the wildest
+solitudes,--through the most populous towns,--have my comrades borne
+this silver wand unmolested and unscathed; wherever we pass along,
+thousands hail us, and tears of joy bless the messengers of him who
+hath expelled the brigand from his hold, the tyrant from his castle, and
+ensured the gains of the merchant and the hut of the peasant.”
+
+“Pardieu,” said Montreal, with a stern smile, “I ought to be thankful
+for the preference shown to me; I have not yet received the commands,
+nor felt the vengeance, of the Tribune; yet, methinks, my humble castle
+lies just within the patrimony of St. Peter.”
+
+“Pardon me, Signor Cavalier,” said the youth; “but do I address the
+renowned Knight of St. John, warrior of the Cross, yet leader of
+banditti?”
+
+“Boy, you are bold; I am Walter de Montreal.”
+
+“I am bound, then, Sir Knight, to your castle.”
+
+“Take care how thou reach it before me, or thou standest a fair chance
+of a quick exit. How now, my friends!” seeing that the crowd at these
+words gathered closer round the messenger, “Think ye that I, who have
+my mate in kings, would find a victim in an unarmed boy? Fie! give
+way--give way. Young man, follow me homeward; you are safe in my castle
+as in your mother’s arms.” So saying, Montreal, with great dignity
+and deliberate gravity, rode slowly towards his castle, his soldiers,
+wondering, at a little distance, and the white-robed messenger following
+with the crowd, who refused to depart; so great was their enthusiasm,
+that they even ascended to the gates of the dreaded castle, and insisted
+on waiting without until the return of the youth assured them of his
+safety.
+
+Montreal, who, however lawless elsewhere, strictly preserved the rights
+of the meanest boor in his immediate neighbourhood, and rather affected
+popularity with the poor, bade the crowd enter the courtyard, ordered
+his servitors to provide them with wine and refreshment, regaled the
+good monks in his great hall, and then led the way to a small room,
+where he received the messenger.
+
+“This,” said the youth, “will best explain my mission,” as he placed a
+letter before Montreal.
+
+The Knight cut the silk with his dagger, and read the epistle with great
+composure.
+
+“Your Tribune,” said he, when he had finished it, “has learned the
+laconic style of power very soon. He orders me to render this castle,
+and vacate the Papal Territory within ten days. He is obliging; I must
+have breathing time to consider the proposal; be seated, I pray you,
+young sir. Forgive me, but I should have imagined that your lord had
+enough upon his hands with his Roman barons, to make him a little more
+indulgent to us foreign visitors. Stephen Colonna--”
+
+“Is returned to Rome, and has taken the oath of allegiance; the Savelli,
+the Orsini, the Frangipani, have all subscribed their submission to the
+Buono Stato.”
+
+“How!” cried Montreal, in great surprise.
+
+“Not only have they returned, but they have submitted to the
+dispersion of all their mercenaries, and the dismantling of all their
+fortifications. The iron of the Orsini palace now barricades the
+Capitol, and the stonework of the Colonna and the Savelli has added new
+battlements to the gates of the Lateran and St. Laurence.”
+
+“Wonderful man!” said Montreal, with reluctant admiration. “By what
+means was this effected?”
+
+“A stern command and a strong force to back it. At the first sound of
+the great bell, twenty thousand Romans rise in arms. What to such an
+army are the brigands of an Orsini or a Colonna?--Sir Knight, your
+valour and renown make even Rome admire you; and I, a Roman, bid you
+beware.”
+
+“Well, I thank thee--thy news, friend, robs me of breath. So the Barons
+submit, then?”
+
+“Yes: on the first day, one of the Colonna, the Lord Adrian, took the
+oath; within a week, Stephen, assured of safe conduct, left Palestrina,
+the Savelli in his train; the Orsini followed--even Martino di Porto has
+silently succumbed.”
+
+“The Tribune--but is that his dignity--methought he was to be king--”
+
+“He was offered, and he refused, the title. His present rank, which
+arrogates no patrician honours, went far to conciliate the nobles.”
+
+“A wise knave!--I beg pardon, a sagacious prince!--Well, then, the
+Tribune lords it mightily, I suppose, over the great Roman names?”
+
+“Pardon me--he enforces impartial justice from peasant or patrician; but
+he preserves to the nobles all their just privileges and legal rank.”
+
+“Ha!--and the vain puppets, so they keep the semblance, scarce miss the
+substance--I understand. But this shows genius--the Tribune is unwed, I
+think. Does he look among the Colonna for a wife?”
+
+“Sir Knight, the Tribune is already married; within three days after his
+ascension to power, he won and bore home the daughter of the Baron di
+Raselli.”
+
+“Raselli! no great name; he might have done better.”
+
+“But it is said,” resumed the youth, smiling, “that the Tribune will
+shortly be allied to the Colonna, through his fair sister the Signora
+Irene. The Baron di Castello woos her.”
+
+“What, Adrian Colonna! Enough! you have convinced me that a man who
+contents the people and awes or conciliates the nobles is born for
+empire. My answer to this letter I will send myself. For your news, Sir
+Messenger, accept this jewel,” and the knight took from his finger a gem
+of some price. “Nay, shrink not, it was as freely given to me as it is
+now to thee.”
+
+The youth, who had been agreeably surprised, and impressed, by the
+manner of the renowned freebooter, and who was not a little astonished
+himself with the ease and familiarity with which he had been relating
+to Fra Moreale, in his own fortress, the news of Rome, bowed low as he
+accepted the gift.
+
+The astute Provencal, who saw the evident impression he had made,
+perceived also that it might be of advantage in delaying the measures
+he might deem it expedient to adopt. “Assure the Tribune,” said he, on
+dismissing the messenger, “shouldst thou return ere my letter arrive,
+that I admire his genius, hail his power, and will not fail to consider
+as favourably as I may of his demand.”
+
+“Better,” said the messenger, warmly (he was of good blood, and gentle
+bearing),--“better ten tyrants for our enemy, than one Montreal.”
+
+“An enemy! believe me, sir, I seek no enmity with princes who know how
+to govern, or a people that has the wisdom at once to rule and to obey.”
+
+The whole of that day, however, Montreal remained thoughtful and uneasy;
+he despatched trusty messengers to the Governor of Aquila (who was then
+in correspondence with Louis of Hungary), to Naples, and to Rome:--the
+last charged with a letter to the Tribune, which, without absolutely
+compromising himself, affected submission, and demanded only a longer
+leisure for the preparations of departure. But, at the same time, fresh
+fortifications were added to the castle, ample provisions were laid in,
+and, night and day, spies and scouts were stationed along the pass, and
+in the town of Terracina. Montreal was precisely the chief who prepared
+most for war when most he pretended peace.
+
+One morning, the fifth from the appearance of the Roman messenger,
+Montreal, after narrowly surveying his outworks and his stores, and
+feeling satisfied that he could hold out at least a month’s siege,
+repaired, with a gayer countenance than he had lately worn, to the
+chamber of Adeline.
+
+The lady was seated by the casement of the tower, from which might be
+seen the glorious landscape of woods, and vales, and orange groves--a
+strange garden for such a palace! As she leant her face upon her hand,
+with her profile slightly turned to Montreal, there was something
+ineffably graceful in the bend of her neck,--the small head so
+expressive of gentle blood,--with the locks parted in front in that
+simple fashion which modern times have so happily revived. But the
+expression of the half-averted face, the abstracted intentness of
+the gaze, and the profound stillness of the attitude, were so sad and
+mournful, that Montreal’s purposed greeting of gallantry and gladness
+died upon his lips. He approached in silence, and laid his hand upon her
+shoulder.
+
+Adeline turned, and taking the hand in hers, pressed it to her heart,
+and smiled away all her sadness. “Dearest,” said Montreal, “couldst thou
+know how much any shadow of grief on thy bright face darkens my heart,
+thou wouldst never grieve. But no wonder that in these rude walls--no
+female of equal rank near thee, and such mirth as Montreal can summon to
+his halls, grating to thy ear--no wonder that thou repentest thee of thy
+choice.”
+
+“Ah, no--no, Walter, I never repent. I did but think of our child as you
+entered. Alas! he was our only child! How fair he was, Walter; how he
+resembled thee!”
+
+“Nay, he had thine eyes and brow,” replied the Knight, with a faltering
+voice, and turning away his head.
+
+“Walter,” resumed the lady, sighing, “do you remember?--this is his
+birthday. He is ten years old today. We have loved each other eleven
+years, and thou hast not tired yet of thy poor Adeline.”
+
+“As well might the saints weary of paradise,” replied Montreal, with an
+enamoured tenderness, which changed into softness the whole character of
+his heroic countenance.
+
+“Could I think so, I should indeed be blest!” answered Adeline. “But
+a little while longer, and the few charms I yet possess must fade; and
+what other claim have I on thee?”
+
+“All claim;--the memory of thy first blushes--thy first kiss--of thy
+devoted sacrifices--of thy patient wanderings--of thy uncomplaining
+love! Ah, Adeline, we are of Provence, not of Italy; and when did Knight
+of Provence avoid his foe, or forsake his love? But enough, dearest, of
+home and melancholy for today. I come to bid thee forth. I have sent
+on the servitors to pitch our tent beside the sea,--we will enjoy the
+orange blossoms while we may. Ere another week pass over us, we may have
+sterner pastime and closer confines.”
+
+“How, dearest Walter! thou dost not apprehend danger?”
+
+“Thou speakest, lady-bird,” said Montreal, laughing, “as if danger were
+novelty; methinks by this time, thou shouldst know it as the atmosphere
+we breathe.”
+
+“Ah, Walter, is this to last for ever? Thou art now rich and renowned;
+canst thou not abandon this career of strife?”
+
+“Now, out on thee, Adeline! What are riches and renown but the means to
+power! And for strife, the shield of warriors was my cradle--pray the
+saints it be my bier! These wild and wizard extremes of life--from the
+bower to the tent--from the cavern to the palace--today a wandering
+exile, tomorrow the equal of kings--make the true element of the
+chivalry of my Norman sires. Normandy taught me war, and sweet Provence
+love. Kiss me, dear Adeline; and now let thy handmaids attire thee.
+Forget not thy lute, sweet one. We will rouse the echoes with the songs
+of Provence.”
+
+The ductile temper of Adeline yielded easily to the gaiety of her lord;
+and the party soon sallied from the castle towards the spot in which
+Montreal had designed their resting-place during the heats of day. But
+already prepared for all surprise, the castle was left strictly guarded,
+and besides the domestic servitors of the castle, a detachment of ten
+soldiers, completely armed, accompanied the lovers. Montreal himself
+wore his corselet, and his squires followed with his helmet and lance.
+Beyond the narrow defile at the base of the castle, the road at that day
+opened into a broad patch of verdure, circled on all sides, save that
+open to the sea, by wood, interspersed with myrtle and orange, and
+a wilderness of odorous shrubs. In this space, and sheltered by the
+broad-spreading and classic fagus (so improperly translated into the
+English “beech”), a gay pavilion was prepared, which commanded the
+view of the sparkling sea;--shaded from the sun, but open to the gentle
+breeze. This was poor Adeline’s favourite recreation, if recreation it
+might be called. She rejoiced to escape from the gloomy walls of her
+castellated prison, and to enjoy the sunshine and the sweets of that
+voluptuous climate without the fatigue which of late all exercise
+occasioned her. It was a gallantry on the part of Montreal, who foresaw
+how short an interval might elapse before the troops of Rienzi besieged
+his walls; and who was himself no less at home in the bower than in the
+field.
+
+As they reclined within the pavilion--the lover and his lady,--of the
+attendants without, some lounged idly on the beach; some prepared the
+awning of a pleasure-boat against the decline of the sun; some, in a
+ruder tent, out of sight in the wood, arranged the mid-day repast; while
+the strings of the lute, touched by Montreal himself with a careless
+skill, gave their music to the dreamy stillness of the noon.
+
+While thus employed, one of Montreal’s scouts arrived breathless and
+heated at the tent.
+
+“Captain,” said he, “a company of thirty lances completely armed, with
+a long retinue of squires and pages, have just quitted Terracina. Their
+banners bear the two-fold insignia of Rome and the Colonna.”
+
+“Ho!” said Montreal, gaily, “such a troop is a welcome addition to our
+company; send our squire hither.”
+
+The squire appeared.
+
+“Hie thee on thy steed towards the procession thou wilt meet with in the
+pass, (nay, sweet lady mine, no forbiddal!) seek the chief, and say that
+the good Knight Walter de Montreal sends him greeting, and prays him,
+in passing our proper territory, to rest awhile with us a welcome guest;
+and--stay,--add, that if to while an hour or so in gentle pastime be
+acceptable to him, Walter de Montreal would rejoice to break a lance
+with him, or any knight in his train, in honour of our respective
+ladies. Hie thee quick!”
+
+“Walter, Walter,” began Adeline, who had that keen and delicate
+sensitiveness to her situation, which her reckless lord often wantonly
+forgot; “Walter, dear Walter, canst thou think it honour to--”
+
+“Hush thee, sweet Fleur de lis! Thou hast not seen pastime this many
+a day; I long to convince thee that thou art still the fairest lady in
+Italy--ay, and of Christendom. But these Italians are craven knights,
+and thou needst not fear that my proffer will be accepted. But in truth,
+lady mine, I rejoice for graver objects, that chance throws a Roman
+noble, perhaps a Colonna, in my way;--women understand not these
+matters; and aught concerning Rome touches us home at this moment.”
+
+With that the Knight frowned, as was his wont in thought, and Adeline
+ventured to say no more, but retired to the interior division of the
+pavilion.
+
+Meanwhile the squire approached the procession that had now reached the
+middle of the pass. And a stately and gallant company it was:--if the
+complete harness of the soldiery seemed to attest a warlike purpose,
+it was contradicted on the other hand by a numerous train of unarmed
+squires and pages gorgeously attired, while the splendid blazon of
+two heralds preceding the standard-bearers, proclaimed their object
+as peaceful, and their path as sacred. It required but a glance at the
+company to tell the leader. Arrayed in a breast-plate of steel, wrought
+profusely with gold arabesques, over which was a mantle of dark green
+velvet, bordered with pearls, while above his long dark locks waved a
+black ostrich plume in a high Macedonian cap, such as, I believe, is now
+worn by the Grand Master of the order of St. Constantine, rode in the
+front of the party, a young cavalier, distinguished from his immediate
+comrades, partly by his graceful presence and partly by his splendid
+dress.
+
+The squire approached respectfully, and dismounting, delivered himself
+of his charge.
+
+The young cavalier smiled, as he answered, “Bear back to Sir Walter de
+Montreal the greeting of Adrian Colonna, Baron di Castello, and say,
+that the solemn object of my present journey will scarce permit me to
+encounter the formidable lance of so celebrated a knight; and I regret
+this the more, inasmuch as I may not yield to any dame the palm of my
+liege lady’s beauty. I must live in hope of a happier occasion. For
+the rest, I will cheerfully abide for some few hours the guest of so
+courteous a host.”
+
+The squire bowed low. “My master,” said he, hesitatingly, “will grieve
+much to miss so noble an opponent. But my message refers to all this
+knightly and gallant train; and if the Lord Adrian di Castello deems
+himself forbidden the joust by the object of his present journey, surely
+one of his comrades will be his proxy with my master.”
+
+Out and quickly spoke a young noble by the side of Adrian, Riccardo
+Annibaldi, who afterwards did good service both to the Tribune and to
+Rome, and whose valour brought him, in later life, to an untimely end.
+
+“By the Lord Adrian’s permission,” cried he, “I will break a lance
+with--”
+
+“Hush! Annibaldi,” interrupted Adrian. “And you, Sir Squire, know, that
+Adrian di Castello permits no proxy in arms. Avise the Knight of St.
+John that we accept his hospitality, and if, after some converse on
+graver matters, he should still desire so light an entertainment, I will
+forget that I am the ambassador to Naples, and remember only that I am a
+Knight of the Empire. You have your answer.”
+
+The squire with much ceremony made his obeisance, remounted his steed,
+and returned in a half-gallop to his master.
+
+“Forgive me, dear Annibaldi,” said Adrian, “that I balked your valour;
+and believe me that I never more longed to break a lance against any man
+than I do against this boasting Frenchman. But bethink you, that though
+to us, brought up in the dainty laws of chivalry, Walter de Montreal
+is the famous Knight of Provence, to the Tribune of Rome, whose grave
+mission we now fulfil, he is but the mercenary captain of a Free
+Company. Grievously in his eyes should we sully our dignity by so wanton
+and irrelevant a holiday conflict with a declared and professional
+brigand.”
+
+“For all that,” said Annibaldi, “the brigand ought not to boast that a
+Roman knight shunned a Provencal lance.”
+
+“Cease, I pray thee!” said Adrian, impatiently. In fact, the young
+Colonna, already chafed bitterly against his discreet and dignified
+rejection of Montreal’s proffer, and recollecting with much pique
+the disparaging manner in which the Provencal had spoken of the Roman
+chivalry, as well as a certain tone of superiority, which in all warlike
+matters Montreal had assumed over him,--he now felt his cheek burn, and
+his lip quiver. Highly skilled in the martial accomplishments of his
+time, he had a natural and excusable desire to prove that he was at
+least no unworthy antagonist even of the best lance in Italy: and, added
+to this, the gallantry of the age made him feel it a sort of treason to
+his mistress to forego any means of asserting her perfections.
+
+It was, therefore, with considerable irritation that Adrian, as the
+pavilion of Montreal became visible, perceived the squire returning
+to him. And the reader will judge how much this was increased when the
+latter, once more dismounting, accosted him thus:
+
+“My master, the Knight of St. John, on hearing the courteous answer of
+the Lord Adrian di Castello, bids me say, that lest the graver converse
+the Lord Adrian refers to should mar gentle and friendly sport, he
+ventures respectfully to suggest, that the tilt should preface the
+converse. The sod before the tent is so soft and smooth, that even a
+fall could be attended with no danger to knight or steed.”
+
+“By our Lady!” cried Adrian and Annibaldi in a breath, “but thy last
+words are discourteous; and” (proceeded Adrian, recovering himself)
+“since thy master will have it so, let him look to his horse’s girths. I
+will not gainsay his fancy.”
+
+Montreal, who had thus insisted upon the exhibition, partly, it may
+be, from the gay and ruffling bravado, common still amongst his brave
+countrymen; partly because he was curious of exhibiting before those who
+might soon be his open foes his singular and unrivalled address in arms,
+was yet more moved to it on learning the name of the leader of the
+Roman Company; for his vain and haughty spirit, however it had
+disguised resentment at the time, had by no means forgiven certain
+warm expressions of Adrian in the palace of Stephen Colonna, and in the
+unfortunate journey to Corneto. While Adrian, halting at the entrance of
+the defile, aided by his squires, indignantly, but carefully, indued the
+rest of his armour, and saw, himself, to the girths, stirrup-leathers,
+and various buckles in the caparison of his noble charger, Montreal in
+great glee kissed his lady, who, though too soft to be angry, was deeply
+vexed, (and yet her vexation half forgotten in fear for his safety,)
+snatched up her scarf of blue, which he threw over his breastplate, and
+completed his array with the indifference of a man certain of victory.
+He was destined, however, to one disadvantage, and that the greatest;
+his armour and lance had been brought from the castle--not his warhorse.
+His palfrey was too slight to bear the great weight of his armour, nor
+amongst his troop was there one horse that for power and bone could
+match with Adrian’s. He chose, however, the strongest that was at hand,
+and a loud shout from his wild followers testified their admiration when
+he sprung unaided from the ground into the saddle--a rare and difficult
+feat of agility in a man completely arrayed in the ponderous armour
+which issued at that day from the forges of Milan, and was worn far more
+weighty in Italy than any other part of Europe. While both companies
+grouped slowly, and mingled in a kind of circle round the green turf,
+and the Roman heralds, with bustling importance, attempted to marshal
+the spectators into order, Montreal rode his charger round the sward,
+forcing it into various caracoles, and exhibiting, with the vanity that
+belonged to him, his exquisite and practised horsemanship.
+
+At length, Adrian, his visor down, rode slowly into the green space,
+amidst the cheers of his party. The two Knights, at either end, gravely
+fronted each other; they made the courtesies with their lances, which,
+in friendly and sportive encounters, were customary; and, as they thus
+paused for the signal of encounter, the Italians trembled for the honour
+of their chief: Montreal’s stately height and girth of chest forming a
+strong contrast, even in armour, to the form of his opponent, which was
+rather under the middle standard, and though firmly knit, slightly and
+slenderly built. But to that perfection was skill in arms brought in
+those times, that great strength and size were far from being either
+the absolute requisites, or even the usual attributes, of the more
+celebrated knights; in fact, so much was effected by the power and the
+management of the steed, that a light weight in the rider was often
+rather to his advantage than his prejudice: and, even at a later period,
+the most accomplished victors in the tourney, the French Bayard and the
+English Sydney, were far from remarkable either for bulk or stature.
+
+Whatever the superiority of Montreal in physical power, was, in much,
+counterbalanced by the inferiority of his horse, which, though a
+thick-built and strong Calabrian, had neither the blood, bone, nor
+practised discipline of the northern charger of the Roman. The shining
+coat of the latter, coal black, was set off by a scarlet cloth wrought
+in gold; the neck and shoulders were clad in scales of mail; and from
+the forehead projected a long point, like the horn of an unicorn, while
+on its crest waved a tall plume of scarlet and white feathers. As the
+mission of Adrian to Naples was that of pomp and ceremony to a court of
+great splendour, so his array and retinue were befitting the occasion
+and the passion for show that belonged to the time; and the very bridle
+of his horse, which was three inches broad, was decorated with gold, and
+even jewels. The Knight himself was clad in mail, which had tested the
+finest art of the celebrated Ludovico of Milan; and, altogether, his
+appearance was unusually gallant and splendid, and seemed still more so
+beside the plain but brightly polished and artfully flexile armour of
+Montreal, (adorned only with his lady’s scarf,) and the common and rude
+mail of his charger. This contrast, however, was not welcome to the
+Provencal, whose vanity was especially indulged in warlike equipments;
+and who, had he foreseen the “pastime” that awaited him, would have
+outshone even the Colonna.
+
+The trumpeters of either party gave a short blast--the Knights remained
+erect as statues of iron; a second, and each slightly bent over his
+saddle-bow; a third, and with spears couched, slackened reins, and
+at full speed, on they rushed, and fiercely they met midway. With the
+reckless arrogance which belonged to him, Montreal had imagined, that at
+the first touch of his lance Adrian would have been unhorsed; but to his
+great surprise the young Roman remained firm, and amidst the shouts of
+his party, passed on to the other end of the lists. Montreal himself was
+rudely shaken, but lost neither seat nor stirrup.
+
+“This can be no carpet knight,” muttered Montreal between his teeth,
+as, this time, he summoned all his skill for a second encounter; while
+Adrian, aware of the great superiority of his charger, resolved to bring
+it to bear against his opponent. Accordingly, when the Knights again
+rushed forward, Adrian, covering himself well with his buckler, directed
+his care less against the combatant, whom he felt no lance wielded by
+mortal hand was likely to dislodge, than against the less noble animal
+he bestrode. The shock of Montreal’s charge was like an avalanche--his
+lance shivered into a thousand pieces, Adrian lost both stirrups, and
+but for the strong iron bows which guarded the saddle in front and rear,
+would have been fairly unhorsed; as it was, he was almost doubled back
+by the encounter, and his ears rung and his eyes reeled, so that for a
+moment or two he almost lost all consciousness. But his steed had well
+repaid its nurture and discipline. Just as the combatants closed, the
+animal, rearing on high, pressed forward with its mighty crest against
+its opponent with a force so irresistible as to drive back Montreal’s
+horse several paces: while Adrian’s lance, poised with exquisite skill,
+striking against the Provencal’s helmet, somewhat rudely diverted the
+Knight’s attention for the moment from his rein. Montreal, drawing the
+curb too tightly in the suddenness of his recovery, the horse reared
+on end; and, receiving at that instant, full upon his breastplate, the
+sharp horn and mailed crest of Adrian’s charger--fell back over its
+rider upon the sward. Montreal disencumbered himself in great rage and
+shame, as a faint cry from his pavilion reached his ear, and redoubled
+his mortification. He rose with a lightness which astonished the
+beholders; for so heavy was the armour worn at that day, that few
+knights once stretched upon the ground could rise without assistance;
+and drawing his sword, cried out fiercely--“On foot, on foot!--the fall
+was not mine, but this accursed beast’s, that I must needs for my sins
+raise to the rank of a charger. Come on--”
+
+“Nay, Sir Knight,” said Adrian, drawing off his gauntlets and unbuckling
+his helmet, which he threw on the ground, “I come to thee a guest and
+a friend; but to fight on foot is the encounter of mortal foes. Did I
+accept thy offer, my defeat would but stain thy knighthood.”
+
+Montreal, whose passion had beguiled him for the moment, sullenly
+acquiesced in this reasoning. Adrian hastened to soothe his antagonist.
+“For the rest,” said he, “I cannot pretend to the prize. Your lance lost
+me my stirrups--mine left you unshaken. You say right; the defeat, if
+any, was that of your steed.”
+
+“We may meet again when I am more equally horsed,” said Montreal, still
+chafing.
+
+“Now, our Lady forbid!” exclaimed Adrian, with so devout an earnestness
+that the bystanders could not refrain from laughing; and even Montreal
+grimly and half-reluctantly, joined in the merriment. The courtesy of
+his foe, however, conciliated and touched the more frank and soldierly
+qualities of his nature, and composing himself, he replied:--
+
+“Signor di Castello, I rest your debtor for a courtesy that I have but
+little imitated. Howbeit, if thou wouldst bind me to thee for ever, thou
+wilt suffer me to send for my own charger, and afford me a chance to
+retrieve mine honour. With that steed, or with one equal to thine, which
+seems to me of the English breed, I will gage all I possess, lands,
+castle, and gold, sword and spurs, to maintain this pass, one by one,
+against all thy train.”
+
+Fortunately, perhaps, for Adrian, ere he could reply, Riccardo Annibaldi
+cried, with great warmth, “Sir Knight, I have with me two steeds well
+practised in the tourney; take thy choice, and accept in me a champion
+of the Roman against the French chivalry;--there is my gage.”
+
+“Signor,” replied Montreal, with ill-suppressed delight, “thy proffer
+shows so gallant and free a spirit, that it were foul sin in me to balk
+it. I accept thy gage, and whichever of thy steeds thou rejectest, in
+God’s name bring it hither, and let us waste no words before action.”
+
+Adrian, who felt that hitherto the Romans had been more favoured by
+fortune than merit, vainly endeavoured to prevent this second hazard.
+But Annibaldi was greatly chafed, and his high rank rendered it
+impolitic in Adrian to offend him by peremptory prohibition; the
+Colonna reluctantly, therefore, yielded his assent to the engagement.
+Annibaldi’s steeds were led to the spot, the one a noble roan, the other
+a bay, of somewhat less breeding and bone, but still of great strength
+and price. Montreal finding the choice pressed upon him, gallantly
+selected the latter and less excellent.
+
+Annibaldi was soon arrayed for the encounter, and Adrian gave the word
+to the trumpeters. The Roman was of a stature almost equal to that of
+Montreal, and though some years younger, seemed, in his armour, nearly
+of the same thews and girth, so that the present antagonists appeared
+at the first glance more evenly matched than the last. But this time
+Montreal, well horsed, inspired to the utmost by shame and pride,
+felt himself a match for an army; and he met the young Baron with
+such prowess, that while the very plume on his casque seemed scarcely
+stirred, the Italian was thrown several paces from his steed, and it was
+not till some moments after his visor was removed by his squires that
+he recovered his senses. This event restored Montreal to all his natural
+gaiety of humour, and effectually raised the spirits of his followers,
+who had felt much humbled by the previous encounter.
+
+He himself assisted Annibaldi to rise with great courtesy, and a
+profusion of compliments, which the proud Roman took in stern silence,
+and then led the way to the pavilion, loudly ordering the banquet to be
+spread. Annibaldi, however, loitered behind, and Adrian, who penetrated
+his thoughts, and who saw that over their cups a quarrel between
+the Provencal and his friend was likely to ensue, drawing him aside,
+said:--“Methinks, dear Annibaldi, it would be better if you, with the
+chief of our following, were to proceed onward to Fondi, where I will
+join you at sunset. My squires, and some eight lances, will suffice for
+my safeguard here; and, to say truth, I desire a few private words
+with our strange host, in the hope that he may be peaceably induced
+to withdraw from hence without the help of our Roman troops, who have
+enough elsewhere to feed their valour.”
+
+Annibaldi pressed his companion’s hand: “I understand thee,” he replied
+with a slight blush, “and, indeed, I could but ill brook the complacent
+triumph of the barbarian. I accept thy offer.”
+
+
+
+Chapter 3.III. The Conversation between the Roman and the
+Provencal--Adeline’s History--the Moonlit Sea--the Lute and the Song.
+
+As soon as Annibaldi, with the greater part of the retinue, was gone,
+Adrian, divesting himself of his heavy greaves, entered alone the
+pavilion of the Knight of St. John. Montreal had already doffed all his
+armour, save the breastplate, and he now stepped forward to welcome his
+guest with the winning and easy grace which better suited his birth
+than his profession. He received Adrian’s excuses for the absence of
+Annibaldi and the other knights of his train with a smile which seemed
+to prove how readily he divined the cause, and conducted him to the
+other and more private division of the pavilion in which the repast
+(rendered acceptable by the late exercise of guest and host) was
+prepared; and here Adrian for the first time discovered Adeline. Long
+inurement to the various and roving life of her lover, joined to a
+certain pride which she derived from conscious, though forfeited, rank,
+gave to the outward manner of that beautiful lady an ease and freedom
+which often concealed, even from Montreal, her sensitiveness to her
+unhappy situation. At times, indeed, when alone with Montreal, whom she
+loved with all the devotion of romance, she was sensible only to the
+charm of a presence which consoled her for all things; but in his
+frequent absence, or on the admission of any stranger, the illusion
+vanished--the reality returned. Poor lady! Nature had not formed,
+education had not reared, habit had not reconciled, her to the breath of
+shame!
+
+The young Colonna was much struck by her beauty, and more by her gentle
+and highborn grace. Like her lord she appeared younger than she was;
+time seemed to spare a bloom which an experienced eye might have told
+was destined to an early grave; and there was something almost girlish
+in the lightness of her form--the braided luxuriance of her rich auburn
+hair, and the colour that went and came, not only with every moment,
+but almost with every word. The contrast between her and Montreal
+became them both--it was the contrast of devoted reliance and protecting
+strength: each looked fairer in the presence of the other: and as Adrian
+sate down to the well-laden board, he thought he had never seen a pair
+more formed for the poetic legends of their native Troubadours.
+
+Montreal conversed gaily upon a thousand matters--pressed the wine
+flasks--and selected for his guest the most delicate portions of the
+delicious spicola of the neighbouring sea, and the rich flesh of the
+wild boar of the Pontine Marshes.
+
+“Tell me,” said Montreal, as their hunger was now appeased--“tell me,
+noble Adrian, how fares your kinsman, Signor Stephen? A brave old man
+for his years.”
+
+“He bears him as the youngest of us,” answered Adrian.
+
+“Late events must have shocked him a little,” said Montreal, with an
+arch smile. “Ah, you look grave--yet commend my foresight;--I was the
+first who prophesied to thy kinsman the rise of Cola di Rienzi; he seems
+a great man--never more great than in conciliating the Colonna and the
+Orsini.”
+
+“The Tribune,” returned Adrian, evasively, “is certainly a man of
+extraordinary genius. And now, seeing him command, my only wonder is how
+he ever brooked to obey--majesty seems a very part of him.”
+
+“Men who win power, easily put on its harness, dignity,” answered
+Montreal; “and if I hear aright--(pledge me to your lady’s health)--the
+Tribune, if not himself nobly born will soon be nobly connected.”
+
+“He is already married to a Raselli, an old Roman house,” replied
+Adrian.
+
+“You evade my pursuit,--Le doulx soupir! le doulx soupir! as the old
+Cabestan has it”--said Montreal, laughing. “Well, you have pledged me
+one cup to your lady, pledge another to the fair Irene, the Tribune’s
+sister--always provided they two are not one.--You smile and shake your
+head.”
+
+“I do not disguise from you, Sir Knight,” answered Adrian, “that when my
+present embassy is over, I trust the alliance between the Tribune and a
+Colonna will go far towards the benefit of both.”
+
+“I have heard rightly, then,” said Montreal, in a grave and thoughtful
+tone. “Rienzi’s power must, indeed, be great.”
+
+“Of that my mission is a proof. Are you aware, Signor de Montreal, that
+Louis, King of Hungary--”
+
+“How! what of him?”
+
+“Has referred the decision of the feud between himself and Joanna of
+Naples, respecting the death of her royal spouse, his brother, to the
+fiat of the Tribune? This is the first time, methinks, since the death
+of Constantine, that so great a confidence and so high a charge were
+ever intrusted to a Roman!”
+
+“By all the saints in the calendar,” cried Montreal, crossing himself,
+“this news is indeed amazing! The fierce Louis of Hungary waive the
+right of the sword, and choose other umpire than the field of battle!”
+
+“And this,” continued Adrian, in a significant tone, “this it was which
+induced me to obey your courteous summons. I know, brave Montreal, that
+you hold intercourse with Louis. Louis has given to the Tribune the best
+pledge of his amity and alliance; will you do wisely if you--”
+
+“Wage war with the Hungarian’s ally,” interrupted Montreal. “This you
+were about to add; the same thought crossed myself. My Lord, pardon
+me--Italians sometimes invent what they wish. On the honour of a knight
+of the Empire, these tidings are the naked truth?”
+
+“By my honour, and on the Cross,” answered Adrian, drawing himself up;
+“and in proof thereof, I am now bound to Naples to settle with the Queen
+the preliminaries of the appointed trial.”
+
+“Two crowned heads before the tribunal of a plebeian, and one a
+defendant against the charge of murther!” muttered Montreal; “the news
+might well amaze me!”
+
+He remained musing and silent a little while, till looking up, he caught
+Adeline’s tender gaze fixed upon him with that deep solicitude with
+which she watched the outward effect of schemes and projects she was too
+soft to desire to know, and too innocent to share.
+
+“Lady mine,” said the Provencal, fondly, “how sayest thou? must we
+abandon our mountain castle, and these wild woodland scenes, for the
+dull walls of a city? I fear me so.--The Lady Adeline,” he continued,
+turning to Adrian, “is of a singular bias; she hates the gay crowds
+of streets and thoroughfares, and esteems no palace like the solitary
+outlaw’s hold. Yet, methinks, she might outshine all the faces of
+Italy,--thy mistress, Lord Adrian, of course, excepted.”
+
+“It is an exception which only a lover, and that too a betrothed lover,
+would dare to make,” replied Adrian, gallantly.
+
+“Nay,” said Adeline, in a voice singularly sweet and clear, “nay, I know
+well at what price to value my lord’s flattery, and Signor di Castello’s
+courtesy. But you are bound, Sir Knight, to a court, that, if fame speak
+true, boasts in its Queen the very miracle and mould of beauty.”
+
+“It is some years since I saw the Queen of Naples,” answered Adrian;
+“and I little dreamed then, when I gazed upon that angel face, that I
+should live to hear her accused of the foulest murther that ever stained
+even Italian royalty.”
+
+“And, as if resolved to prove her guilt,” said Montreal, “ere long
+be sure she will marry the very man who did the deed. Of this I have
+certain proof.”
+
+Thus conversing, the Knights wore away the daylight, and beheld from the
+open tent the sun cast his setting glow over the purple sea. Adeline
+had long retired from the board, and they now saw her seated with her
+handmaids on a mound by the beach; while the sound of her lute faintly
+reached their ears. As Montreal caught the air, he turned from the
+converse, and sighing, half shaded his face with his hand. Somehow or
+other the two Knights had worn away all the little jealousy or pique
+which they had conceived against each other at Rome. Both imbued with
+the soldier-like spirit of the age, their contest in the morning had
+served to inspire them with that strange kind of respect, and even
+cordiality, which one brave man even still (how much more at that day!)
+feels for another, whose courage he has proved while vindicating his
+own. It is like the discovery of a congenial sentiment hitherto latent;
+and, in a life of camps, often establishes sudden and lasting friendship
+in the very lap of enmity. This feeling had been ripened by their
+subsequent familiar intercourse, and was increased on Adrian’s side by
+the feeling, that in convincing Montreal of the policy of withdrawing
+from the Roman territories, he had obtained an advantage that well
+repaid whatever danger and delay he had undergone.
+
+The sigh, and the altered manner of Montreal, did not escape Adrian, and
+he naturally connected it with something relating to her whose music had
+been its evident cause.
+
+“Yon lovely dame,” said he, gently, “touches the lute with an exquisite
+and fairy hand, and that plaintive air seems to my ear as of the
+minstrelsy of Provence.”
+
+“It is the air I taught her,” said Montreal, sadly, “married as it is
+to indifferent words, with which I first wooed a heart that should never
+have given itself to me! Ay, young Colonna, many a night has my boat
+been moored beneath the starlit Sorgia that washes her proud father’s
+halls, and my voice awaked the stillness of the waving sedges with a
+soldier’s serenade. Sweet memories! bitter fruit!”
+
+“Why bitter? ye love each other still.”
+
+“But I am vowed to celibacy, and Adeline de Courval is leman where she
+should be wedded dame. Methinks I fret at that thought even more than
+she,--dear Adeline!”
+
+“Your lady, as all would guess, is then nobly born?”
+
+“She is,” answered Montreal, with a deep and evident feeling which, save
+in love, rarely, if ever, crossed his hardy breast. “She is! our tale is
+a brief one:--we loved each other as children: Her family was wealthier
+than mine: We were separated. I was given to understand that she
+abandoned me. I despaired, and in despair I took the cross of St. John.
+Chance threw us again together. I learned that her love was
+undecayed. Poor child!--she was even then, sir, but a child! I,
+wild,--reckless--and not unskilled, perhaps, in the arts that woo and
+win. She could not resist my suit or her own affection!--We fled. In
+those words you see the thread of my after history. My sword and
+my Adeline were all my fortune. Society frowned on us. The Church
+threatened my soul. The Grand Master my life. I became a knight of
+fortune. Fate and my right hand favoured me. I have made those who
+scorned me tremble at my name. That name shall yet blaze, a star or a
+meteor, in the front of troubled nations, and I may yet win by force
+from the Pontiff the dispensation refused to my prayers. On the same
+day, I may offer Adeline the diadem and the ring.--Eno’ of this;--you
+marked Adeline’s cheek!--Seems it not delicate? I like not that
+changeful flush,--and she moves languidly,--her step that was so
+blithe!”
+
+“Change of scene and the mild south will soon restore her health,” said
+Adrian; “and in your peculiar life she is so little brought in contact
+with others, especially of her own sex, that I trust she is but seldom
+made aware of whatever is painful in her situation. And woman’s love,
+Montreal, as we both have learned, is a robe that wraps her from many a
+storm!”
+
+“You speak kindly,” returned the Knight; “but you know not all our cause
+of grief. Adeline’s father, a proud sieur, died,--they said of a broken
+heart,--but old men die of many another disease than that! The mother, a
+dame who boasted her descent from princes, bore the matter more sternly
+than the sire; clamoured for revenge,--which was odd, for she is as
+religious as a Dominican, and revenge is not Christian in a woman,
+though it is knightly in a man!--Well, my Lord, we had one boy, our
+only child; he was Adeline’s solace in my absence,--his pretty ways were
+worth the world to her! She loved him so, that, but he had her eyes and
+looked like her when he slept, I should have been jealous! He grew up in
+our wild life, strong and comely; the young rogue, he would have been a
+brave knight! My evil stars led me to Milan, where I had business with
+the Visconti. One bright morning in June, our boy was stolen; verily
+that June was like a December to us!”
+
+“Stolen!--how?--by whom?”
+
+“The first question is answered easily,--the boy was with his nurse in
+the courtyard, the idle wench left him for but a minute or two--so she
+avers--fetch him some childish toy; when she returned he was gone; not a
+trace left, save his pretty cap with the plume in it! Poor Adeline, many
+a time have I found her kissing that relic till it was wet with tears!”
+
+“A strange fortune, in truth. But what interest could--”
+
+“I will tell you,” interrupted Montreal, “the only conjecture I could
+form;--Adeline’s mother, on learning we had a son, sent to Adeline a
+letter, that well nigh broke her heart, reproaching her for her love
+to me, and so forth, as if that had made her the vilest of the sex.
+She bade her take compassion on her child, and not bring him up to a
+robber’s life,--so was she pleased to style the bold career of Walter de
+Montreal. She offered to rear the child in her own dull halls, and fit
+him, no doubt, for a shaven pate and a monk’s cowl. She chafed much that
+a mother would not part with her treasure! She alone, partly in revenge,
+partly in silly compassion for Adeline’s child, partly, it may be, from
+some pious fanaticism, could, it so seemed to me, have robbed us of our
+boy. On inquiry, I learned from the nurse--who, but that she was of the
+same sex as Adeline, should have tasted my dagger,--that in their walks,
+a woman of advanced years, but seemingly of humble rank, (that might
+be disguise!) had often stopped, and caressed and admired the child. I
+repaired at once to France, sought the old Castle of De Courval;--it had
+passed to the next heir, and the old widow was go on, none knew whither,
+but, it was conjectured, to take the veil in some remote convent.”
+
+“And you never saw her since?”
+
+“Yes, at Rome,” answered Montreal, turning pale; “when last there I
+chanced suddenly upon her; and then at length I learned my boy’s fate,
+and the truth of my own surmise; she confessed to the theft--and my
+child was dead! I have not dared to tell Adeline of this; it seems to me
+as if it would be like plucking the shaft from the wounded side--and she
+would die at once, bereft of the uncertainty that rankles within her.
+She has still a hope--it comforts her; though my heart bleeds when I
+think on its vanity. Let this pass, my Colonna.”
+
+And Montreal started to his feet as if he strove, by a strong effort, to
+shake off the weakness that had crept over him in his narration.
+
+“Think no more of it. Life is short--its thorns are many--let us not
+neglect any of its flowers. This is piety and wisdom too; Nature that
+meant me to struggle and to toil, gave me, happily, the sanguine heart
+and the elastic soul of France; and I have lived long enough to own that
+to die young is not an evil. Come, Lord Adrian, let us join my lady ere
+you part, if part you must; the moon will be up soon, and Fondi is but
+a short journey hence. You know that though I admire not your Petrarch,
+you with more courtesy laud our Provencal ballads, and you must hear
+Adeline sing one that you may prize them the more. The race of the
+Troubadours is dead, but the minstrelsy survives the minstrel!”
+
+Adrian, who scarce knew what comfort to administer to the affliction of
+his companion, was somewhat relieved by the change in his mood, though
+his more grave and sensitive nature was a little startled at its
+suddenness. But, as we have before seen, Montreal’s spirit (and this
+made perhaps its fascination) was as a varying and changeful sky;
+the gayest sunshine, and the fiercest storm swept over it in rapid
+alternation; and elements of singular might and grandeur, which,
+properly directed and concentrated, would have made him the blessing and
+glory of his time, were wielded with a boyish levity, roused into war
+and desolation, or lulled into repose and smoothness, with all the
+suddenness of chance, and all the fickleness of caprice.
+
+Sauntering down to the beach, the music of Adeline’s lute sounded more
+distinctly in their ears, and involuntarily they hushed their steps
+upon the rich and odorous turf, as in a voice, though not powerful,
+marvellously sweet and clear, and well adapted to the simple fashion of
+the words and melody, she sang the following stanzas:--
+
+Lay of the Lady of Provence.
+
+     1.
+
+     Ah, why art thou sad, my heart?  Why
+     Darksome and lonely?
+     Frowns the face of the happy sky
+     Over thee only?
+     Ah me, ah me!
+     Render to joy the earth!
+     Grief shuns, not envies, Mirth;
+     But leave one quiet spot,
+     Where Mirth may enter not,
+     To sigh, Ah, me!--
+     Ah me.
+
+     2.
+
+     As a bird, though the sky be clear,
+     Feels the storm lower;
+     My soul bodes the tempest near,
+     In the sunny hour;
+     Ah me, ah me!
+     Be glad while yet we may!
+     I bid thee, my heart, be gay;
+     And still I know not why,--
+     Thou answerest with a sigh,
+     (Fond heart!) Ah me!--
+     Ah me!
+
+     3.
+
+     As this twilight o’er the skies,
+     Doubt brings the sorrow;
+     Who knows when the daylight dies,
+     What waits the morrow?
+     Ah me, ah me!
+     Be blithe, be blithe, my lute,
+     Thy strings will soon be mute;
+     Be blithe--hark! while it dies,
+     The note forewarning, sighs
+     Its last--Ah me!
+     Ah me!
+
+“My own Adeline--my sweetest night-bird,” half-whispered Montreal, and
+softly approaching, he threw himself at his lady’s feet--“thy song is
+too sad for this golden eve.”
+
+“No sound ever went to the heart,” said Adrian, “whose arrow was not
+feathered by sadness. True sentiment, Montreal, is twin with melancholy,
+though not with gloom.”
+
+The lady looked softly and approvingly up at Adrian’s face; she was
+pleased with its expression; she was pleased yet more with words of
+which women rather than men would acknowledge the truth. Adrian returned
+the look with one of deep and eloquent sympathy and respect; in fact,
+the short story he had heard from Montreal had interested him deeply in
+her; and never to the brilliant queen, to whose court he was bound, did
+his manner wear so chivalric and earnest a homage as it did to that lone
+and ill-fated lady on the twilight shores of Terracina.
+
+Adeline blushed slightly and sighed; and then, to break the awkwardness
+of a pause which had stolen over them, as Montreal, unheeding the last
+remark of Adrian, was tuning the strings of the lute, she said--“Of
+course the Signor di Castello shares the universal enthusiasm for
+Petrarch?”
+
+“Ay,” cried Montreal; “my lady is Petrarch mad, like the rest of them:
+but all I know is, that never did belted knight and honest lover woo in
+such fantastic and tortured strains.”
+
+“In Italy,” answered Adrian, “common language is exaggeration;--but even
+your own Troubadour poetry might tell you that love, ever seeking a new
+language of its own, cannot but often run into what to all but lovers
+seems distortion and conceit.”
+
+“Come, dear Signor,” said Montreal, placing the lute in Adrian’s hands,
+“let Adeline be the umpire between us, which music--yours or mine--can
+woo the more blandly.”
+
+“Ah,” said Adrian, laughing; “I fear me, Sir Knight, you have already
+bribed the umpire.”
+
+Montreal’s eyes and Adeline’s met; and in that gaze Adeline forgot all
+her sorrows.
+
+With a practised and skilful hand, Adrian touched the strings; and
+selecting a song which was less elaborate than those mostly in vogue
+amongst his countrymen, though still conceived in the Italian spirit,
+and in accordance with the sentiment he had previously expressed to
+Adeline, he sang as follows:--
+
+Love’s Excuse for Sadness.
+
+Chide not, beloved, if oft with thee I feel not rapture wholly; For aye
+the heart that’s fill’d with love, Runs o’er in melancholy. To streams
+that glide in noon, the shade From summer skies is given; So, if my
+breast reflects the cloud, ‘Tis but the cloud of heaven! Thine image
+glass’d within my soul So well the mirror keepeth; That, chide me not,
+if with the light The shadow also sleepeth.
+
+“And now,” said Adrian, as he concluded, “the lute is to you: I but
+preclude your prize.”
+
+The Provencal laughed, and shook his head.--“With any other umpire, I
+had had my lute broken on my own head, for my conceit in provoking such
+a rival; but I must not shrink from a contest I have myself provoked,
+even though in one day twice defeated.” And with that, in a deep and
+exquisitely melodious voice, which wanted only more scientific culture
+to have challenged any competition, the Knight of St. John poured forth:
+
+The Lay of the Troubadour.
+
+     1.
+
+     Gentle river, the moonbeam is hush’d on thy tide,
+     On thy pathway of light to my lady I glide.
+     My boat, where the stream laves the castle, I moor,--
+     All at rest save the maid and her young Troubadour!
+     As the stars to the waters that bore
+     My bark, to my spirit thou art;
+     Heaving yet, see it bound to the shore,
+     So moor’d to thy beauty my heart,--
+     Bel’ amie, bel’ amie, bel’ amie!
+
+     2.
+
+     Wilt thou fly from the world?  It hath wealth for the vain;
+     But Love breaks his bond when there’s gold in the chain;
+     Wilt thou fly from the world?  It hath courts for the proud;--
+     But Love, born in caves, pines to death in the crowd.
+     Were this bosom thy world, dearest one,
+     Thy world could not fail to be bright;
+     For thou shouldst thyself be its sun,
+     And what spot could be dim in thy light--
+     Bel’ amie, bel’ amie, bel’ amie?
+
+     3.
+
+     The rich and the great woo thee dearest; and poor,
+     Though his fathers were princes, thy young Troubadour!
+     But his heart never quail’d save to thee, his adored,--
+     There’s no guile in his lute, and no stain on his sword.
+     Ah, I reck not what sorrows I know,
+     Could I still on thy solace confide;
+     And I care not, though earth be my foe,
+     If thy soft heart be found by my side,--
+     Bel’ amie, bel’ amie, bel’ amie!
+
+     4.
+
+     The maiden she blush’d, and the maiden she sighed,
+     Not a cloud in the sky, not a gale on the tide;
+     But though tempest had raged on the wave and the wind,
+     That castle, methinks, had been still left behind!
+     Sweet lily, though bow’d by the blast,
+     (To this bosom transplanted) since then,
+     Wouldst thou change, could we call the past,
+     To the rock from thy garden again--
+     Bel’ amie, bel’ amie, bel’ amie?
+
+Thus they alternated the time with converse and song, as the wooded
+hills threw their sharp, long shadows over the sea; while from many a
+mound of waking flowers, and many a copse of citron and orange, relieved
+by the dark and solemn aloe, stole the summer breeze, laden with mingled
+odours; and, over the seas, coloured by the slow-fading hues of purple
+and rose, that the sun had long bequeathed to the twilight, flitted the
+gay fireflies that sparkle along that enchanted coast. At length, the
+moon slowly rose above the dark forest-steeps, gleaming on the gay
+pavilion and glittering pennon of Montreal,--on the verdant sward,--the
+polished mail of the soldiers, stretched on the grass in various groups,
+half-shaded by oaks and cypress, and the war-steeds grazing peaceably
+together--a wild mixture of the Pastoral and the Iron time.
+
+Adrian, reluctantly reminded of his journey, rose to depart.
+
+“I fear,” said he to Adeline, “that I have already detained you too late
+in the night air: but selfishness is little considerate.”
+
+“Nay, you see we are prudent,” said Adeline, pointing to Montreal’s
+mantle, which his provident hand had long since drawn around her form;
+“but if you must part, farewell, and success attend you!”
+
+“We may meet again, I trust,” said Adrian.
+
+Adeline sighed gently; and the Colonna, gazing on her face by the
+moonlight, to which it was slightly raised, was painfully struck by its
+almost transparent delicacy. Moved by his compassion, ere he mounted
+his steed, he drew Montreal aside,--“Forgive me if I seem presumptuous,”
+ said he; “but to one so noble this wild life is scarce a fitting career.
+I know that, in our time, War consecrates all his children; but surely
+a settled rank in the court of the Emperor, or an honourable
+reconciliation with your knightly brethren, were better--”
+
+“Than a Tartar camp, and a brigand’s castle,” interrupted Montreal, with
+some impatience. “This you were about to say--you are mistaken. Society
+thrust me from her bosom; let society take the fruit it hath sown. ‘A
+fixed rank,’ say you? some subaltern office, to fight at other men’s
+command! You know me not: Walter de Montreal was not formed to obey.
+War when I will, and rest when I list, is the motto of my escutcheon.
+Ambition proffers me rewards you wot not of; and I am of the mould as
+of the race of those whose swords have conquered thrones. For the rest,
+your news of the alliance of Louis of Hungary with your Tribune makes it
+necessary for the friend of Louis to withdraw from all feud with Rome.
+Ere the week expire, the owl and the bat may seek refuge in yon grey
+turrets.”
+
+“But your lady?”
+
+“Is inured to change.--God help her, and temper the rough wind to the
+lamb!”
+
+“Enough, Sir Knight: but should you desire a sure refuge at Rome for one
+so gentle and so highborn, by the right hand of a knight, I promise a
+safe roof and an honoured home to the Lady Adeline.”
+
+Montreal pressed the offered hand to his heart; then plucking his own
+hastily away, drew it across his eyes, and joined Adeline, in a silence
+that showed he dared not trust himself to speak. In a few moments Adrian
+and his train were on the march; but still the young Colonna turned
+back, to gaze once more on his wild host and that lovely lady, as
+they themselves lingered on the moonlit sward, while the sea rippled
+mournfully on their ears.
+
+It was not many months after that date, that the name of Fra Monreale
+scattered terror and dismay throughout the fair Campania. The right
+hand of the Hungarian king, in his invasion of Naples, he was chosen
+afterwards vicar (or vice-gerent) of Louis in Aversa; and fame and fate
+seemed to lead him triumphantly along that ambitious career which he had
+elected, whether bounded by the scaffold or the throne.
+
+
+
+
+BOOK IV. THE TRIUMPH AND THE POMP.
+
+     “Allora fama e paura di si buono reggimento, passa in ogni
+     terra.”--“Vita di Cola di Rienzi”, lib. i. cap. 21.
+
+     “Then the fame and the fear of that so good government
+     passed into every land.”--“Life of Cola di Rienzi”.
+
+
+
+Chapter 4.I. The Boy Angelo--the Dream of Nina Fulfilled.
+
+The thread of my story transports us back to Rome. It was in a small
+chamber, in a ruinous mansion by the base of Mount Aventine, that a
+young boy sate, one evening, with a woman of a tall and stately form,
+but somewhat bowed both by infirmity and years. The boy was of a fair
+and comely presence; and there was that in his bold, frank, undaunted
+carriage, which made him appear older than he was.
+
+The old woman, seated in the recess of the deep window, was apparently
+occupied with a Bible that lay open on her knees; but ever and anon she
+lifted her eyes, and gazed on her young companion with a sad and anxious
+expression.
+
+“Dame,” said the boy, who was busily employed in hewing out a sword of
+wood, “I would you had seen the show today. Why, every day is a show
+at Rome now! It is show enough to see the Tribune himself on his white
+steed--(oh, it is so beautiful!)--with his white robes all studded with
+jewels. But today, as I have just been telling you, the Lady Nina took
+notice of me, as I stood on the stairs of the Capitol: you know, dame, I
+had donned my best blue velvet doublet.”
+
+“And she called you a fair boy, and asked if you would be her little
+page; and this has turned thy brain, silly urchin that thou art--”
+
+“But the words are the least: if you saw the Lady Nina, you would own
+that a smile from her might turn the wisest head in Italy. Oh, how I
+should like to serve the Tribune! All the lads of my age are mad for
+him. How they will stare, and envy me at school tomorrow! You know too,
+dame, that though I was not always brought up at Rome, I am Roman. Every
+Roman loves Rienzi.”
+
+“Ay, for the hour: the cry will soon change. This vanity of thine,
+Angelo, vexes my old heart. I would thou wert humbler.”
+
+“Bastards have their own name to win,” said the boy, colouring deeply.
+“They twit me in the teeth, because I cannot say who my father and
+mother were.”
+
+“They need not,” returned the dame, hastily. “Thou comest of noble blood
+and long descent, though, as I have told thee often, I know not the
+exact names of thy parents. But what art thou shaping that tough sapling
+of oak into?”
+
+“A sword, dame, to assist the Tribune against the robbers.”
+
+“Alas! I fear me, like all those who seek power in Italy, he is more
+likely to enlist robbers than to assail them.”
+
+“Why, la you there, you live so shut up, that you know and hear nothing,
+or you would have learned that even that fiercest of all the robbers,
+Fra Moreale, has at length yielded to the Tribune, and fled from his
+castle, like a rat from a falling house.”
+
+“How, how!” cried the dame; “what say you? Has this plebeian, whom you
+call the Tribune--has he boldly thrown the gage to that dread warrior?
+and has Montreal left the Roman territory?”
+
+“Ay, it is the talk of the town. But Fra Moreale seems as much a bugbear
+to you as to e’er a mother in Rome. Did he ever wrong you, dame?”
+
+“Yes!” exclaimed the old woman, with so abrupt a fierceness, that even
+that hardy boy was startled.
+
+“I wish I could meet him, then,” said he, after a pause, as he
+flourished his mimic weapon.
+
+“Now Heaven forbid! He is a man ever to be shunned by thee, whether for
+peace or war. Say again this good Tribune holds no terms with the Free
+Lances.”
+
+“Say it again--why all Rome knows it.”
+
+“He is pious, too, I have heard; and they do bruit it that he sees
+visions, and is comforted from above,” said the woman, speaking to
+herself. Then turning to Angelo, she continued,--“Thou wouldst like
+greatly to accept the Lady Nina’s proffer?”
+
+“Ah, that I should, dame, if you could spare me.”
+
+“Child,” replied the matron, solemnly, “my sand is nearly run, and my
+wish is to see thee placed with one who will nurture thy young years,
+and save thee from a life of licence. That done, I may fulfil my vow,
+and devote the desolate remnant of my years to God. I will think more
+of this, my child. Not under such a plebeian’s roof shouldst thou have
+lodged, nor from a stranger’s board been fed: but at Rome, my last
+relative worthy of the trust is dead;--and at the worst, obscure honesty
+is better than gaudy crime. Thy spirit troubles me already. Back, my
+child; I must to my closet, and watch and pray.”
+
+Thus saying, the old woman, repelling the advance, and silencing the
+muttered and confused words, of the boy--half affectionate as they were,
+yet half tetchy and wayward--glided from the chamber.
+
+The boy looked abstractedly at the closing door, and then said to
+himself--“The dame is always talking riddles: I wonder if she know more
+of me than she tells, or if she is any way akin to me. I hope not, for
+I don’t love her much; nor, for that matter, anything else. I wish she
+would place me with the Tribune’s lady, and then we’ll see who among the
+lads will call Angelo Villani bastard.”
+
+With that the boy fell to work again at his sword with redoubled vigour.
+In fact, the cold manner of this female, his sole nurse, companion,
+substitute for parent, had repelled his affections without subduing his
+temper; and though not originally of evil disposition, Angelo Villani
+was already insolent, cunning, and revengeful; but not, on the other
+hand, without a quick susceptibility to kindness as to affront, a
+natural acuteness of understanding, and a great indifference to fear.
+Brought up in quiet affluence rather than luxury, and living much with
+his protector, whom he knew but by the name of Ursula, his bearing was
+graceful, and his air that of the well-born. And it was his carriage,
+perhaps, rather than his countenance, which, though handsome, was more
+distinguished for intelligence than beauty, which had attracted the
+notice of the Tribune’s bride. His education was that of one reared for
+some scholastic profession. He was not only taught to read and write,
+but had been even instructed in the rudiments of Latin. He did not,
+however, incline to these studies half so fondly as to the games of his
+companions, or the shows or riots in the street, into all of which
+he managed to thrust himself, and from which he had always the happy
+dexterity to return safe and unscathed.
+
+The next morning Ursula entered the young Angelo’s chamber. “Wear again
+thy blue doublet today,” said she; “I would have thee look thy best.
+Thou shalt go with me to the palace.”
+
+“What, today?” cried the boy joyfully, half leaping from his bed.
+“Dear dame Ursula, shall I really then belong to the train of the great
+Tribune’s lady?”
+
+“Yes; and leave the old woman to die alone! Your joy becomes you,--but
+ingratitude is in your blood. Ingratitude! Oh, it has burned my heart
+into ashes--and yours, boy, can no longer find a fuel in the dry
+crumbling cinders.”
+
+“Dear dame, you are always so biting. You know you said you wished to
+retire into a convent, and I was too troublesome a charge for you. But
+you delight in rebuking me, justly or unjustly.”
+
+“My task is over,” said Ursula, with a deep-drawn sigh.
+
+The boy answered not; and the old woman retired with a heavy step,
+and, it may be, a heavier heart. When he joined her in their common
+apartment, he observed what his joy had previously blinded him to--that
+Ursula did not wear her usual plain and sober dress. The gold chain,
+rarely assumed then by women not of noble birth--though, in the
+other sex, affected also by public functionaries and wealthy
+merchants--glittered upon a robe of the rich flowered stuffs of Venice,
+and the clasps that confined the vest at the throat and waist were
+adorned with jewels of no common price.
+
+Angelo’s eye was struck by the change, but he felt a more manly pride in
+remarking that the old lady became it well. Her air and mien were indeed
+those of one to whom such garments were habitual; and they seemed that
+day more than usually austere and stately.
+
+She smoothed the boy’s ringlets, drew his short mantle more gracefully
+over his shoulder, and then placed in his belt a poniard whose handle
+was richly studded, and a purse well filled with florins.
+
+“Learn to use both discreetly,” said she; “and, whether I live or die,
+you will never require to wield the poniard to procure the gold.”
+
+“This, then,” cried Angelo, enchanted, “is a real poniard to fight the
+robbers with! Ah, with this I should not fear Fra Moreale, who wronged
+thee so. I trust I may yet avenge thee, though thou didst rate me so
+just now for ingratitude.”
+
+“I am avenged. Nourish not such thoughts, my son, they are sinful;
+at least I fear so. Draw to the board and eat; we will go betimes, as
+petitioners should do.”
+
+Angelo had soon finished his morning meal, and sallying with Ursula to
+the porch, he saw, to his surprise, four of those servitors who then
+usually attended persons of distinction, and who were to be hired in
+every city, for the convenience of strangers or the holyday ostentation
+of the gayer citizens.
+
+“How grand we are today!” said he, clapping his hands with an eagerness
+which Ursula failed not to reprove.
+
+“It is not for vain show,” she added, “which true nobility can well
+dispense with, but that we may the more readily gain admittance to the
+palace. These princes of yesterday are not easy of audience to the over
+humble.”
+
+“Oh! but you are wrong this time,” said the boy. “The Tribune gives
+audience to all men, the poorest as the richest. Nay, there is not a
+ragged boor, or a bare-footed friar, who does not win access to him
+sooner than the proudest baron. That’s why the people love him so.
+And he devotes one day of the week to receiving the widows and the
+orphans;--and you know, dame, I am an orphan.”
+
+Ursula, already occupied with her own thoughts, did not answer, and
+scarcely heard, the boy; but leaning on his young arm, and preceded by
+the footmen to clear the way, passed slowly towards the palace of the
+Capitol.
+
+A wonderful thing would it have been to a more observant eye, to note
+the change which two or three short months of the stern but salutary
+and wise rule of the Tribune had effected in the streets of Rome. You
+no longer beheld the gaunt and mail-clad forms of foreign mercenaries
+stalking through the vistas, or grouped in lazy insolence before
+the embattled porches of some gloomy palace. The shops, that in many
+quarters had been closed for years, were again open, glittering with
+wares and bustling with trade. The thoroughfares, formerly either silent
+as death, or crossed by some affrighted and solitary passenger with
+quick steps, and eyes that searched every corner,--or resounding with
+the roar of a pauper rabble, or the open feuds of savage nobles, now
+exhibited the regular, and wholesome, and mingled streams of civilized
+life, whether bound to pleasure or to commerce. Carts and waggons laden
+with goods which had passed in safety by the dismantled holds of the
+robbers of the Campagna, rattled cheerfully over the pathways. “Never,
+perhaps,”--to use the translation adapted from the Italian authorities,
+by a modern and by no means a partial historian (Gibbon.)--“Never,
+perhaps, has the energy and effect of a single mind been more remarkably
+felt than in the sudden reformation of Rome by the Tribune Rienzi. A
+den of robbers was converted to the discipline of a camp or convent. ‘In
+this time,’ says the historian, (“Vita di Cola di Rienzi”, lib. i. c.
+9.) ‘did the woods begin to rejoice that they were no longer infested
+with robbers; the oxen began to plough; the pilgrims visited the
+sanctuaries; (Gibbon: the words in the original are “li pellegrini
+cominciaro a fere la cerca per la santuaria.”) the roads and inns
+were replenished with travellers: trade, plenty, and good faith, were
+restored in the markets; and a purse of gold might be exposed without
+danger in the midst of the highways.’”
+
+Amidst all these evidences of comfort and security to the people--some
+dark and discontented countenances might be seen mingled in the crowd,
+and whenever one who wore the livery of the Colonna or the Orsini felt
+himself jostled by the throng, a fierce hand moved involuntarily to the
+sword-belt, and a half-suppressed oath was ended with an indignant
+sigh. Here and there too,--contrasting the redecorated, refurnished, and
+smiling shops--heaps of rubbish before the gate of some haughty mansion
+testified the abasement of fortifications which the owner impotently
+resented as a sacrilege. Through such streets and such throngs did the
+party we accompany wend their way, till they found themselves amidst
+crowds assembled before the entrance of the Capitol. The officers there
+stationed kept, however, so discreet and dexterous an order, that they
+were not long detained; and now in the broad place or court of that
+memorable building, they saw the open doors of the great justice-hall,
+guarded but by a single sentinel, and in which, for six hours daily,
+did the Tribune hold his court, for “patient to hear, swift to redress,
+inexorable to punish, his tribunal was always accessible to the poor and
+stranger.” (Gibbon.)
+
+Not, however, to that hall did the party bend its way, but to the
+entrance which admitted to the private apartments of the palace. And
+here the pomp, the gaud, the more than regal magnificence, of the
+residence of the Tribune, strongly contrasted the patriarchal simplicity
+which marked his justice court.
+
+Even Ursula, not unaccustomed, of yore, to the luxurious state of
+Italian and French principalities, seemed roused into surprise at the
+hall crowded with retainers in costly liveries, the marble and gilded
+columns wreathed with flowers, and the gorgeous banners wrought with the
+blended arms of the Republican City and the Pontifical See, which blazed
+aloft and around.
+
+Scarce knowing whom to address in such an assemblage, Ursula was
+relieved from her perplexity by an officer attired in a suit of crimson
+and gold, who, with a grave and formal decorum, which indeed reigned
+throughout the whole retinue, demanded, respectfully, whom she sought?
+“The Signora Nina!” replied Ursula, drawing up her stately person, with
+a natural, though somewhat antiquated, dignity. There was something
+foreign in the accent, which influenced the officer’s answer.
+
+“Today, madam, I fear that the Signora receives only the Roman ladies.
+Tomorrow is that appointed for all foreign dames of distinction.”
+
+Ursula, with a slight impatience of tone, replied--“My business is of
+that nature which is welcome on any day, at palaces. I come, Signor, to
+lay certain presents at the Signora’s feet, which I trust she will deign
+to accept.”
+
+“And say, Signor,” added the boy, abruptly, “that Angelo Villani, whom
+the Lady Nina honoured yesterday with her notice, is no stranger but a
+Roman; and comes, as she bade him, to proffer to the Signora his homage
+and devotion.”
+
+The grave officer could not refrain a smile at the pert, yet not
+ungraceful, boldness of the boy.
+
+“I remember me, Master Angelo Villani,” he replied, “that the Lady
+Nina spoke to you by the great staircase. Madam, I will do your errand.
+Please to follow me to an apartment more fitting your sex and seeming.”
+
+With that the officer led the way across the hall to a broad staircase
+of white marble, along the centre of which were laid those rich Eastern
+carpets which at that day, when rushes strewed the chambers of an
+English monarch, were already common to the greater luxury of Italian
+palaces. Opening a door at the first flight, he ushered Ursula and
+her young charge into a lofty ante-chamber, hung with arras of wrought
+velvets; while over the opposite door, through which the officer now
+vanished, were blazoned the armorial bearings which the Tribune so
+constantly introduced in all his pomp, not more from the love of show,
+than from his politic desire to mingle with the keys of the Pontiff the
+heraldic insignia of the Republic.
+
+“Philip of Valois is not housed like this man!” muttered Ursula. “If
+this last, I shall have done better for my charge than I recked of.”
+
+The officer soon returned, and led them across an apartment of vast
+extent, which was indeed the great reception chamber of the palace.
+Four-and-twenty columns of the Oriental alabaster which had attested the
+spoils of the later emperors, and had been disinterred from forgotten
+ruins, to grace the palace of the Reviver of the old Republic, supported
+the light roof, which, half Gothic, half classic, in its architecture,
+was inlaid with gilded and purple mosaics. The tesselated floor was
+covered in the centre with cloth of gold, the walls were clothed, at
+intervals, with the same gorgeous hangings, relieved by panels freshly
+painted in the most glowing colours, with mystic and symbolical designs.
+At the upper end of this royal chamber, two steps ascended to the place
+of the Tribune’s throne, above which was the canopy wrought with the
+eternal armorial bearings of the Pontiff and the City.
+
+Traversing this apartment, the officer opened the door at its extremity,
+which admitted to a small chamber, crowded with pages in rich dresses of
+silver and blue velvet. There were few amongst them elder than Angelo;
+and, from their general beauty, they seemed the very flower and blossom
+of the city.
+
+Short time had Angelo to gaze on his comrades that were to be:--another
+minute, and he and his protectress were in the presence of the Tribune’s
+bride.
+
+The chamber was not large--but it was large enough to prove that the
+beautiful daughter of Raselli had realised her visions of vanity and
+splendour.
+
+It was an apartment that mocked description--it seemed a cabinet for the
+gems of the world. The daylight, shaded by high and deep-set casements
+of stained glass, streamed in a purple and mellow hue over all that the
+art of that day boasted most precious, or regal luxury held most dear.
+The candelabras of the silver workmanship of Florence; the carpets and
+stuffs of the East; the draperies of Venice and Genoa; paintings like
+the illuminated missals, wrought in gold, and those lost colours of blue
+and crimson; antique marbles, which spoke of the bright days of Athens;
+tables of disinterred mosaics, their freshness preserved as by magic;
+censers of gold that steamed with the odours of Araby, yet so subdued
+as not to deaden the healthier scent of flowers, which blushed in every
+corner from their marble and alabaster vases; a small and spirit-like
+fountain, which seemed to gush from among wreaths of roses, diffusing
+in its diamond and fairy spray, a scarce felt coolness to the air;--all
+these, and such as these, which it were vain work to detail, congregated
+in the richest luxuriance, harmonised with the most exquisite taste,
+uniting the ancient arts with the modern, amazed and intoxicated the
+sense of the beholder. It was not so much the cost, nor the luxury, that
+made the character of the chamber; it was a certain gorgeous and almost
+sublime phantasy,--so that it seemed rather the fabled retreat of
+an enchantress, at whose word genii ransacked the earth, and fairies
+arranged the produce, than the grosser splendour of an earthly queen.
+Behind the piled cushions upon which Nina half reclined, stood four
+girls, beautiful as nymphs, with fans of the rarest feathers, and at
+her feet lay one older than the rest, whose lute, though now silent,
+attested her legitimate occupation.
+
+But, had the room in itself seemed somewhat too fantastic and
+overcharged in its prodigal ornaments, the form and face of Nina would
+at once have rendered all appropriate; so completely did she seem the
+natural Spirit of the Place; so wonderfully did her beauty, elated as it
+now was with contented love, gratified vanity, exultant hope, body forth
+the brightest vision that ever floated before the eyes of Tasso, when
+he wrought into one immortal shape the glory of the Enchantress with the
+allurements of the Woman.
+
+Nina half rose as she saw Ursula, whose sedate and mournful features
+involuntarily testified her surprise and admiration at a loveliness
+so rare and striking, but who, undazzled by the splendour around, soon
+recovered her wonted self-composure, and seated herself on the cushion
+to which Nina pointed, while the young visitor remained standing, and
+spell-bound by childish wonder, in the centre of the apartment. Nina
+recognised him with a smile.
+
+“Ah, my pretty boy, whose quick eye and bold air caught my fancy
+yesterday! Have you come to accept my offer? Is it you, madam, who claim
+this fair child?”
+
+“Lady,” replied Ursula, “my business here is brief: by a train of
+events, needless to weary you with narrating, this boy from his infancy
+fell to my charge--a weighty and anxious trust to one whose thoughts
+are beyond the barrier of life. I have reared him as became a youth of
+gentle blood; for on both sides, lady, he is noble, though an orphan,
+motherless and sireless.”
+
+“Poor child!” said Nina, compassionately.
+
+“Growing now,” continued Ursula, “oppressed by years, and desirous only
+to make my peace with Heaven, I journeyed hither some months since, in
+the design to place the boy with a relation of mine; and, that trust
+fulfilled, to take the vows in the City of the Apostle. Alas! I found my
+kinsman dead, and a baron of wild and dissolute character was his heir.
+Here remaining, perplexed and anxious, it seemed to me the voice of
+Providence when, yester-evening, the child told me you had been pleased
+to honour him with your notice. Like the rest of Rome, he has already
+learned enthusiasm for the Tribune--devotion to the Tribune’s bride.
+Will you, in truth, admit him of your household? He will not dishonour
+your protection by his blood, nor, I trust, by his bearing.”
+
+“I would take his face for his guarantee, madam, even without so
+distinguished a recommendation as your own. Is he Roman? His name then
+must be known to me.”
+
+“Pardon me, lady,” replied Ursula: “He bears the name of Angelo
+Villani--not that of his sire or mother. The honour of a noble house for
+ever condemns his parentage to rest unknown. He is the offspring of a
+love unsanctioned by the church.”
+
+“He is the more to be loved, then, and to be pitied--victim of sin not
+his own!” answered Nina, with moistened eyes, as she saw the deep and
+burning blush that covered the boy’s cheeks. “With the Tribune’s reign
+commences a new era of nobility, when rank and knighthood shall be won
+by a man’s own merit--not that of his ancestors. Fear not, madam: in my
+house he shall know no slight.”
+
+Ursula was moved from her pride by the kindness of Nina: she approached
+with involuntary reverence, and kissed the Signora’s hand--
+
+“May our Lady reward your noble heart!” said she: “and now my mission is
+ended, and my earthly goal is won. Add only, lady, to your inestimable
+favours one more. These jewels”--and Ursula drew from her robe a casket,
+touched the spring, and the lid flying back, discovered jewels of great
+size and the most brilliant water,--“these jewels,” she continued,
+laying the casket at Nina’s feet, “once belonging to the princely house
+of Thoulouse, are valueless to me and mine. Suffer me to think that they
+are transferred to one whose queenly brow will give them a lustre it
+cannot borrow.”
+
+“How!” said Nina, colouring very deeply; “think you, madam, my kindness
+can be bought? What woman’s kindness ever was? Nay, nay--take back the
+gifts, or I shall pray you to take back your boy.”
+
+Ursula was astonished and confounded: to her experience such abstinence
+was a novelty, and she scarcely knew how to meet it. Nina perceived her
+embarrassment with a haughty and triumphant smile, and then, regaining
+her former courtesy of demeanour, said, with a grave sweetness--
+
+“The Tribune’s hands are clean,--the Tribune’s wife must not be
+suspected. Rather, madam, should I press upon you some token of exchange
+for the fair charge you have committed to me. Your jewels hereafter may
+profit the boy in his career: reserve them for one who needs them.”
+
+“No, lady,” said Ursula, rising and lifting her eyes to heaven;--“they
+shall buy masses for his mother’s soul; for him I shall reserve a
+competence when his years require it. Lady, accept the thanks of a
+wretched and desolate heart. Fare you well!”
+
+She turned to quit the room, but with so faltering and weak a step, that
+Nina, touched and affected, sprung up, and with her own hand guided
+the old woman across the room, whispering comfort and soothing to her;
+while, as they reached the door, the boy rushed forward, and, clasping
+Ursula’s robe, sobbed out--“Dear dame, not one farewell for your little
+Angelo! Forgive him all he has cost you! Now, for the first time, I feel
+how wayward and thankless I have been.”
+
+The old woman caught him in her arms, and kissed him passionately; when
+the boy, as if a thought suddenly struck him, drew forth the purse she
+had given him and said, in a choked and scarce articulate voice,--“And
+let this, dearest dame, go in masses for my poor father’s soul; for he
+is dead, too, you know!”
+
+These words seemed to freeze at once all the tenderer emotions of
+Ursula. She put back the boy with the same chilling and stern severity
+of aspect and manner which had so often before repressed him: and
+recovering her self-possession, at once quitted the apartment without
+saying another word. Nina, surprised, but still pitying her sorrow and
+respecting her age, followed her steps across the pages’ ante-room and
+the reception-chamber, even to the foot of the stairs,--a condescension
+the haughtiest princess of Rome could not have won from her; and
+returning, saddened and thoughtful, she took the boy’s hand, and
+affectionately kissed his forehead.
+
+“Poor boy!” she said, “it seems as if Providence had made me select thee
+yesterday from the crowd, and thus conducted thee to thy proper refuge.
+For to whom should come the friendless and the orphans of Rome, but to
+the palace of Rome’s first Magistrate?” Turning then to her attendants,
+she gave them instructions as to the personal comforts of her new
+charge, which evinced that if power had ministered to her vanity, it had
+not steeled her heart. Angelo Villani lived to repay her well!
+
+She retained the boy in her presence, and conversing with him
+familiarly, she was more and more pleased with his bold spirit and frank
+manner. Their conversation was however interrupted, as the day advanced,
+by the arrival of several ladies of the Roman nobility. And then it was
+that Nina’s virtues receded into shade, and her faults appeared. She
+could not resist the woman’s triumph over those arrogant signoras who
+now cringed in homage where they had once slighted with disdain. She
+affected the manner of, she demanded the respect due to, a queen. And by
+many of those dexterous arts which the sex know so well, she contrived
+to render her very courtesy a humiliation to her haughty guests. Her
+commanding beauty and her graceful intellect saved her, indeed, from the
+vulgar insolence of the upstart; but yet more keenly stung the pride, by
+forbidding to those she mortified the retaliation of contempt. Hers
+were the covert taunt--the smiling affront--the sarcasm in the mask of
+compliment--the careless exaction of respect in trifles, which could not
+outwardly be resented, but which could not inly be forgiven.
+
+“Fair day to the Signora Colonna,” said she to the proud wife of the
+proud Stephen; “we passed your palace yesterday. How fair it now seems,
+relieved from those gloomy battlements which it must often have saddened
+you to gaze upon. Signora, (turning to one of the Orsini), your lord
+has high favour with the Tribune, who destines him to great command.
+His fortunes are secured, and we rejoice at it; for no man more loyally
+serves the state. Have you seen, fair Lady of Frangipani, the last
+verses of Petrarch in honour of my lord?--they rest yonder. May we so
+far venture as to request you to point out their beauties to the Signora
+di Savelli? We rejoice, noble Lady of Malatesta, to observe that your
+eyesight is so well restored. The last time we met, though we stood
+next to you in the revels of the Lady Giulia, you seemed scarce to
+distinguish us from the pillar by which we stood!”
+
+“Must this insolence be endured!” whispered the Signora Frangipani to
+the Signora Malatesta.
+
+“Hush, hush; if ever it be our day again!”
+
+
+
+Chapter 4.II. The Blessing of A Councillor Whose Interests and Heart Are
+Our Own.--the Straws Thrown Upward,--Do They Portend A Storm.
+
+It was later that day than usual, when Rienzi returned from his tribunal
+to the apartments of the palace. As he traversed the reception hall, his
+countenance was much flushed; his teeth were set firmly, like a man who
+has taken a strong resolution from which he will not be moved; and his
+brow was dark with that settled and fearful frown which the
+describers of his personal appearance have not failed to notice as the
+characteristic of an anger the more deadly because invariably just.
+Close as his heels followed the Bishop of Orvietto and the aged Stephen
+Colonna. “I tell you, my Lords,” said Rienzi, “that ye plead in vain.
+Rome knows no distinction between ranks. The law is blind to the
+agent--lynx-eyed to the deed.”
+
+“Yet,” said Raimond, hesitatingly, “bethink thee, Tribune; the nephew of
+two cardinals, and himself once a senator.”
+
+Rienzi halted abruptly, and faced his companions. “My Lord Bishop,” said
+he, “does not this make the crime more inexcusable? Look you, thus it
+reads:--A vessel from Avignon to Naples, charged with the revenues of
+Provence to Queen Joanna, on whose cause, mark you, we now hold solemn
+council, is wrecked at the mouth of the Tiber; with that, Martino
+di Porto--a noble, as you say--the holder of that fortress whence
+he derives his title,--doubly bound by gentle blood and by immediate
+neighbourhood to succour the oppressed--falls upon the vessel with his
+troops (what hath the rebel with armed troops?)--and pillages the
+vessel like a common robber. He is apprehended--brought to my
+tribunal--receives fair trial--is condemned to die. Such is the
+law;--what more would ye have?”
+
+“Mercy,” said the Colonna.
+
+Rienzi folded his arms, and laughed disdainfully. “I never heard my Lord
+Colonna plead for mercy when a peasant had stolen the bread that was to
+feed his famishing children.”
+
+“Between a peasant and a prince, Tribune, I, for one, recognise a
+distinction:--the bright blood of an Orsini is not to be shed like that
+of a base plebeian--”
+
+“Which, I remember me,” said Rienzi, in a low voice, “you deemed small
+matter enough when my boy-brother fell beneath the wanton spear of your
+proud son. Wake not that memory, I warn you; let it sleep.--For shame,
+old Colonna--for shame; so near the grave, where the worm levels
+all flesh, and preaching, with those gray hairs, the uncharitable
+distinction between man and man. Is there not distinction enough at the
+best? Does not one wear purple, and the other rags? Hath not one ease,
+and the other toil? Doth not the one banquet while the other starves?
+Do I nourish any mad scheme to level the ranks which society renders
+a necessary evil? No. I war no more with Dives than with Lazarus. But
+before Man’s judgment-seat, as before God’s, Lazarus and Dives are made
+equal. No more.”
+
+Colonna drew his robe round him with great haughtiness, and bit his lip
+in silence. Raimond interposed.
+
+“All this is true, Tribune. But,” and he drew Rienzi aside, “you know
+we must be politic as well as just. Nephew to two Cardinals, what enmity
+will not this provoke at Avignon?”
+
+“Vex not yourself, holy Raimond, I will answer it to the Pontiff.” While
+they spoke the bell tolled heavily and loudly.
+
+Colonna started.
+
+“Great Tribune,” said he, with a slight sneer, “deign to pause ere it be
+too late. I know not that I ever before bent to you a suppliant; and I
+ask you now to spare mine own foe. Stephen Colonna prays Cola di Rienzi
+to spare the life of an Orsini.”
+
+“I understand thy taunt, old Lord,” said Rienzi, calmly, “but I resent
+it not. You are foe to the Orsini, yet you plead for him--it sounds
+generous; but hark you,--you are more a friend to your order than a foe
+to your rival. You cannot bear that one, great enough to have contended
+with you, should perish like a thief. I give full praise to such noble
+forgiveness; but I am no noble, and I do not sympathize with it. One
+word more;--if this were the sole act of fraud and violence that this
+bandit baron had committed, your prayers should plead for him; but is
+not his life notorious? Has he not been from boyhood the terror and
+disgrace of Rome? How many matrons violated, merchants pillaged,
+peaceful men stilettoed in the daylight, rise in dark witness against
+the prisoner? And for such a man do I live to hear an aged prince and a
+pope’s vicar plead for mercy?--Fie, fie! But I will be even with ye.
+The next poor man whom the law sentences to death, for your sake will I
+pardon.”
+
+Raimond again drew aside the Tribune, while Colonna struggled to
+suppress his rage.
+
+“My friend,” said the Bishop, “the nobles will feel this as an insult to
+their whole order; the very pleading of Orsini’s worst foe must convince
+thee of this. Martino’s blood will seal their reconciliation with each
+other, and they will be as one man against thee.”
+
+“Be it so: with God and the People on my side, I will dare, though
+a Roman, to be just. The bell ceases--you are already too late.” So
+saying, Rienzi threw open the casement; and by the staircase of the Lion
+rose a gibbet from which swung with a creaking sound, arrayed in his
+patrician robes, the yet palpitating corpse of Martino di Porto.
+
+“Behold!” said the Tribune, sternly, “thus die all robbers. For
+traitors, the same law has the axe and the scaffold!”
+
+Raimond drew back and turned pale. Not so the veteran noble. Tears
+of wounded pride started from his eyes; he approached, leaning on his
+staff, to Rienzi, touched him on his shoulder, and said,--
+
+“Tribune, a judge has lived to envy his victim!”
+
+Rienzi turned with an equal pride to the Baron.
+
+“We forgive idle words in the aged. My Lord, have you done with us?--we
+would be alone.”
+
+“Give me thy arm, Raimond,” said Stephen. “Tribune--farewell. Forget
+that the Colonna sued thee,--an easy task, methinks; for, wise as you
+are, you forget what every one else can remember.”
+
+“Ay, my Lord, what?”
+
+“Birth, Tribune, birth--that’s all!”
+
+“The Signor Colonna has taken up my old calling, and turned a wit,”
+ returned Rienzi, with an indifferent and easy tone.
+
+Then following Raimond and Stephen with his eyes, till the door closed
+upon them, he muttered, “Insolent! were it not for Adrian, thy grey
+beard should not bear thee harmless. Birth! what Colonna would not boast
+himself, if he could, the grandson of an emperor?--Old man, there is
+danger in thee which must be watched.” With that he turned musingly
+towards the casement, and again that griesly spectacle of death met his
+eye. The people below, assembled in large concourse, rejoiced at the
+execution of one whose whole life had been infamy and rapine--but who
+had seemed beyond justice--with all the fierce clamour that marks the
+exultation of the rabble over a crushed foe. And where Rienzi stood,
+he heard heir shouts of “Long live the Tribune, the just judge, Rome’s
+liberator!” But at that time other thoughts deafened his senses to the
+popular enthusiasm.
+
+“My poor brother!” he said, with tears in his eyes, “it was owing to
+this man’s crimes--and to a crime almost similar to that for which he
+has now suffered--that thou wert entrained to the slaughter; and they
+who had no pity for the lamb, clamour for compassion to the wolf! Ah,
+wert thou living now, how these proud heads would bend to thee; though
+dead, thou wert not worthy of a thought. God rest thy gentle soul, and
+keep my ambition pure as it was when we walked at twilight, side by side
+together!”
+
+The Tribune shut the casement, and turning away, sought the chamber of
+Nina. On hearing his step without, she had already risen from the couch,
+her eyes sparkling, her bosom heaving; and as he entered, she threw
+herself on his neck, and murmured as she nestled to his breast,--“Ah,
+the hours since we parted!”
+
+It was a singular thing to see that proud lady, proud of her beauty, her
+station, her new honours;--whose gorgeous vanity was already the talk
+of Rome, and the reproach to Rienzi,--how suddenly and miraculously she
+seemed changed in his presence! Blushing and timid, all pride in herself
+seemed merged in her proud love for him. No woman ever loved to the full
+extent of the passion, who did not venerate where she loved, and who
+did not feel humbled (delighted in that humility) by her exaggerated and
+overweening estimate of the superiority of the object of her worship.
+
+And it might be the consciousness of this distinction between himself
+and all other created things, which continued to increase the love of
+the Tribune to his bride, to blind him to her failings towards others,
+and to indulge her in a magnificence of parade, which, though to a
+certain point politic to assume, was carried to an extent which if it
+did not conspire to produce his downfall, has served the Romans with
+an excuse for their own cowardice and desertion, and historians with
+a plausible explanation of causes they had not the industry to fathom.
+Rienzi returned his wife’s caresses with an equal affection, and bending
+down to her beautiful face, the sight was sufficient to chase from his
+brow the emotions, whether severe or sad, which had lately darkened its
+broad expanse.
+
+“Thou has not been abroad this morning, Nina!”
+
+“No, the heat was oppressive. But nevertheless, Cola, I have not lacked
+company--half the matronage of Rome has crowded the palace.”
+
+“Ah, I warrant it.--But yon boy, is he not a new face?”
+
+“Hush, Cola, speak to him kindly, I entreat: of his story anon. Angelo,
+approach. You see your new master, the Tribune of Rome.”
+
+Angelo approached with a timidity not his wont, for an air of majesty
+was at all times natural to Rienzi, and since his power it had naturally
+taken a graver and austerer aspect, which impressed those who approached
+him, even the ambassadors of princes, with a certain involuntary awe.
+The Tribune smiled at the effect he saw he had produced, and being by
+temper fond of children, and affable to all but the great, he hastened
+to dispel it. He took the child affectionately in his arms, kissed him,
+and bade him welcome.
+
+“May we have a son as fair!” he whispered to Nina, who blushed, and
+turned away.
+
+“Thy name, my little friend?”
+
+“Angelo Villani.”
+
+“A Tuscan name. There is a man of letters at Florence, doubtless writing
+our annals from hearsay at this moment, called Villani. Perhaps akin to
+thee?”
+
+“I have no kin,” said the boy, bluntly; “and therefore I shall the
+better love the Signora and honour you, if you will let me. I am
+Roman--all the Roman boys honour Rienzi.”
+
+“Do they, my brave lad?” said the Tribune, colouring with pleasure;
+“that is a good omen of my continued prosperity.” He put down the boy,
+and threw himself on the cushions, while Nina placed herself on a kind
+of low stool beside him.
+
+“Let us be alone,” said he; and Nina motioned to the attendant maidens
+to withdraw.
+
+“Take my new page with you,” said she; “he is yet, perhaps, too fresh
+from home to enjoy the company of his giddy brethren.”
+
+When they were alone, Nina proceeded to narrate to Rienzi the adventure
+of the morning; but though he seemed outwardly to listen, his gaze
+was on vacancy, and he was evidently abstracted and self-absorbed. At
+length, as she concluded, he said, “Well, Nina, you have acted as ever,
+kindly and nobly. Let us to other themes. I am in danger.”
+
+“Danger!” echoed Nina, turning pale.
+
+“Why, the word must not appal you--you have a spirit like mine, that
+scorns fear; and, for that reason, Nina, in all Rome you are my only
+confidant. It was not only to glad me with thy beauty, but to cheer me
+with thy counsel, to support me with thy valour, that Heaven gave me
+thee as a helpmate.”
+
+“Now, our Lady bless thee for those words!” said Nina, kissing the hand
+that hung over her shoulder; “and if I started at the word danger, it
+was but the woman’s thought of thee,--an unworthy thought, my Cola, for
+glory and danger go together. And I am as ready to share the last as the
+first. If the hour of trial ever come, none of thy friends shall be so
+faithful to thy side as this weak form but undaunted heart.”
+
+“I know it, my own Nina; I know it,” said Rienzi, rising, and pacing the
+chamber with large and rapid strides. “Now listen to me. Thou knowest
+that to govern in safety, it is my policy as my pride to govern justly.
+To govern justly is an awful thing, when mighty barons are the culprits.
+Nina, for an open and audacious robbery, our court has sentenced Martin
+of the Orsini, the Lord of Porto, to death. His corpse swings now on the
+Staircase of the Lion.”
+
+“A dreadful doom!” said Nina, shuddering.
+
+“True; but by his death thousands of poor and honest men may live in
+peace. It is not that which troubles me: the Barons resent the deed, as
+an insult to them that law should touch a noble. They will rise--they
+will rebel. I foresee the storm--not the spell to allay it.”
+
+Nina paused a moment,--“They have taken,” she then said, “a solemn oath
+on the Eucharist not to bear arms against thee.”
+
+“Perjury is a light addition to theft and murder,” answered Rienzi, with
+his sarcastic smile.
+
+“But the people are faithful.”
+
+“Yes, but in a civil war (which the saints forefend!) those combatants
+are the stanchest who have no home but their armour, no calling but the
+sword. The trader will not leave his trade at the toll of a bell every
+day; but the Barons’ soldiery are ready at all hours.”
+
+“To be strong,” said Nina,--who, summoned to the councils of her lord,
+shewed an intellect not unworthy of the honour,--“to be strong in
+dangerous times, authority must seem strong. By shewing no fear, you may
+prevent the cause of fear.”
+
+“My own thought!” returned Rienzi, quickly. “You know that half my power
+with these Barons is drawn from the homage rendered to me by foreign
+states. When from every city in Italy the ambassadors of crowned princes
+seek the alliance of the Tribune, they must veil their resentment at the
+rise of the Plebeian. On the other hand, to be strong abroad I must seem
+strong at home: the vast design I have planned, and, as by a miracle,
+begun to execute, will fail at once if it seem abroad to be intrusted
+to an unsteady and fluctuating power. That design (continued Rienzi,
+pausing, and placing his hand on a marble bust of the young Augustus)
+is greater than his, whose profound yet icy soul united Italy in
+subjection,--for it would unite Italy in freedom;--yes! could we but
+form one great federative league of all the States of Italy, each
+governed by its own laws, but united for mutual and common protection
+against the Attilas of the North, with Rome for their Metropolis and
+their Mother, this age and this brain would have wrought an enterprise
+which men should quote till the sound of the last trump!”
+
+“I know thy divine scheme,” said Nina, catching his enthusiasm; “and
+what if there be danger in attaining it? Have we not mastered the
+greatest danger in the first step?”
+
+“Right, Nina, right! Heaven (and the Tribune, who ever recognised,
+in his own fortunes, the agency of the hand above, crossed himself
+reverently) will preserve him to whom it hath vouchsafed such lofty
+visions of the future redemption of the Land of the true Church, and the
+liberty and advancement of its children! This I trust: already many of
+the cities of Tuscany have entered into treaties for the formation
+of this league; nor from a single tyrant, save John di Vico, have I
+received aught but fair words and flattering promises. The time seems
+ripe for the grand stroke of all.”
+
+“And what is that?” demanded Nina, wonderingly.
+
+“Defiance to all foreign interference. By what right does a synod of
+stranger princes give Rome a king in some Teuton Emperor? Rome’s people
+alone should choose Rome’s governor;--and shall we cross the Alps to
+render the title of our master to the descendants of the Goth?”
+
+Nina was silent: the custom of choosing the sovereign by a diet beyond
+the Rhine, reserving only the ceremony of his subsequent coronation for
+the mock assent of the Romans, however degrading to that people, and
+however hostile to all nations of substantial independence, was so
+unquestioned at that time, that Rienzi’s daring suggestion left her
+amazed and breathless, prepared as she was for any scheme, however
+extravagantly bold.
+
+“How!” said she, after a long pause; “do I understand aright? Can you
+mean defiance to the Emperor?”
+
+“Why, listen: at this moment there are two pretenders to the throne
+of Rome--to the imperial crown of Italy--a Bohemian and a Bavarian. To
+their election our assent--Rome’s assent--is not requisite--not asked.
+Can we be called free--can we boast ourselves republican--when a
+stranger and a barbarian is thus thrust upon our necks? No, we will be
+free in reality as in name. Besides, (continued the Tribune, in a
+calmer tone,) this seems to me politic as well as daring. The people
+incessantly demand wonders from me: how can I more nobly dazzle, more
+virtuously win them, than by asserting their inalienable right to
+choose their own rulers? The daring will awe the Barons, and foreigners
+themselves; it will give a startling example to all Italy; it will be
+the first brand of an universal blaze. It shall be done, and with a pomp
+that befits the deed!”
+
+“Cola,” said Nina, hesitatingly, “your eagle spirit often ascends where
+mine flags to follow; yet be not over bold.”
+
+“Nay, did you not, a moment since, preach a different doctrine? To be
+strong, was I not to seem strong?”
+
+“May fate preserve you!” said Nina, with a foreboding sigh.
+
+“Fate!” cried Rienzi; “there is no fate! Between the thought and the
+success, God is the only agent; and (he added with a voice of deep
+solemnity) I shall not be deserted. Visions by night, even while thine
+arms are around me; omens and impulses, stirring and divine, by day,
+even in the midst of the living crowd--encourage my path, and point my
+goal. Now, even now, a voice seems to whisper in my ear--‘Pause not;
+tremble not; waver not;--for the eye of the All-Seeing is upon thee, and
+the hand of the All-Powerful shall protect!”
+
+As Rienzi thus spoke, his face grew pale, his hair seemed to bristle,
+his tall and proud form trembled visibly, and presently he sunk down on
+a seat, and covered his face with his hands.
+
+An awe crept over Nina, though not unaccustomed to such strange and
+preternatural emotions, which appeared yet the more singular in one who
+in common life was so calm, stately, and self-possessed. But with every
+increase of prosperity and power, those emotions seemed to increase
+in their fervour, as if in such increase the devout and overwrought
+superstition of the Tribune recognised additional proof of a mysterious
+guardianship mightier than the valour or art of man.
+
+She approached fearfully, and threw her arms around him, but without
+speaking.
+
+Ere yet the Tribune had well recovered himself, a slight tap at the door
+was heard, and the sound seemed at once to recall his self-possession.
+
+“Enter,” he said, lifting his face, to which the wonted colour slowly
+returned.
+
+An officer, half-opening the door, announced that the person he had sent
+for waited his leisure.
+
+“I come!--Core of my heart,” (he whispered to Nina,) “we will sup alone
+tonight, and will converse more on these matters:” so saying, with
+somewhat less than his usual loftiness of mien, he left the room,
+and sought his cabinet, which lay at the other side of the reception
+chamber. Here he found Cecco del Vecchio.
+
+“How, my bold fellow,” said the Tribune, assuming with wonderful ease
+that air of friendly equality which he always adopted with those of the
+lower class, and which made a striking contrast with the majesty, no
+less natural, which marked his manner to the great. “How now, my Cecco!
+Thou bearest thyself bravely, I see, during these sickly heats; we
+labourers--for both of us labour, Cecco--are too busy to fall ill as the
+idle do, in the summer, or the autumn, of Roman skies. I sent for thee,
+Cecco, because I would know how thy fellow-craftsmen are like to take
+the Orsini’s execution.”
+
+“Oh! Tribune,” replied the artificer, who, now familiarized with Rienzi,
+had lost much of his earlier awe of him, and who regarded the Tribune’s
+power as partly his own creation; “they are already out of their honest
+wits, at your courage in punishing the great men as you would the
+small.”
+
+“So;--I am repaid! But hark you, Cecco, it will bring, perhaps, hot work
+upon us. Every Baron will dread lest it be his turn next, and dread will
+make them bold, like rats in despair. We may have to fight for the Good
+Estate.”
+
+“With all my heart, Tribune,” answered Cecco, gruffly. “I, for one, am
+no craven.”
+
+“Then keep the same spirit in all your meetings with the artificers. I
+fight for the people. The people at a pinch must fight with me.”
+
+“They will,” replied Cecco; “they will!”
+
+“Cecco, this city is under the spiritual dominion of the Pontiff--so
+be it--it is an honour, not a burthen. But the temporal dominion, my
+friend, should be with Romans only. Is it not a disgrace to Republican
+Rome, that while we now speak, certain barbarians, whom we never heard
+of, should be deciding beyond the Alps on the merits of two sovereigns,
+whom we never saw? Is not this a thing to be resisted? An Italian
+city,--what hath it to do with a Bohemian Emperor?”
+
+“Little eno’, St. Paul knows!” said Cecco.
+
+“Should it not be a claim questioned?”
+
+“I think so!” replied the smith.
+
+“And if found an outrage on our ancient laws, should it not be a claim
+resisted?”
+
+“Not a doubt of it.”
+
+“Well, go to! The archives assure me that never was Emperor lawfully
+crowned but by the free votes of the people. We never chose Bohemian or
+Bavarian.”
+
+“But, on the contrary, whenever these Northmen come hither to be
+crowned, we try to drive them away with stones and curses,--for we are a
+people, Tribune, that love our liberties.”
+
+“Go back to your friends--see--address them, say that your Tribune will
+demand of these pretenders to Rome the right to her throne. Let them not
+be mazed or startled, but support me when the occasion comes.”
+
+“I am glad of this,” quoth the huge smith; “for our friends have grown a
+little unruly of late, and say--”
+
+“What do they say?”
+
+“That it is true you have expelled the banditti, and curb the Barons,
+and administer justice fairly;--”
+
+“Is not that miracle enough for the space of some two or three short
+months?”
+
+“Why, they say it would have been more than enough in a noble; but you,
+being raised from the people, and having such gifts and so forth, might
+do yet more. It is now three weeks since they have had any new thing to
+talk about; but Orsini’s execution today will cheer them a bit.”
+
+“Well, Cecco, well,” said the Tribune, rising, “they shall have more
+anon to feed their mouths with. So you think they love me not quite so
+well as they did some three weeks back?”
+
+“I say not so,” answered Cecco. “But we Romans are an impatient people.”
+
+“Alas, yes!”
+
+“However, they will no doubt stick close enough to you; provided,
+Tribune, you don’t put any new tax upon them.”
+
+“Ha! But if, in order to be free, it be necessary to fight--if to
+fight, it be necessary to have soldiers, why then the soldiers must be
+paid:--won’t the people contribute something to their own liberties;--to
+just laws, and safe lives?”
+
+“I don’t know,” returned the smith, scratching his head as if a little
+puzzled; “but I know that poor men won’t be overtaxed. They say they are
+better off with you than with the Barons before, and therefore they love
+you. But men in business, Tribune, poor men with families, must look to
+their bellies. Only one man in ten goes to law--only one man in twenty
+is butchered by a Baron’s brigand; but every man eats, and drinks, and
+feels a tax.”
+
+“This cannot be your reasoning, Cecco!” said Rienzi, gravely.
+
+“Why, Tribune, I am an honest man, but I have a large family to rear.”
+
+“Enough; enough!” said the Tribune quickly; and then he added
+abstractedly as to himself, but aloud,--“Methinks we have been too
+lavish; these shows and spectacles should cease.”
+
+“What!” cried Cecco; “what, Tribune!--would you deny the poor fellows a
+holiday. They work hard enough, and their only pleasure is seeing your
+fine shows and processions; and then they go home and say,--‘See, our
+man beats all the Barons! what state he keeps!’”
+
+“Ah! they blame not my splendour, then!”
+
+“Blame it; no! Without it they would be ashamed of you, and think the
+Buono Stato but a shabby concern.”
+
+“You speak bluntly, Cecco, but perhaps wisely. The saints keep you! Fail
+not to remember what I told you!”
+
+“No, no. It is a shame to have an Emperor thrust upon us;--so it is.
+Good evening, Tribune.”
+
+Left alone, the Tribune remained for some time plunged in gloomy and
+foreboding thoughts.
+
+“I am in the midst of a magician’s spell,” said he; “if I desist, the
+fiends tear me to pieces. What I have begun, that must I conclude. But
+this rude man shews me too well with what tools I work. For me failure
+is nothing, I have already climbed to a greatness which might render
+giddy many a born prince’s brain. But with my fall--Rome, Italy, Peace,
+Justice, Civilization--all fall back into the abyss of ages!”
+
+He rose; and after once or twice pacing his apartment, in which from
+many a column gleamed upon him the marble effigies of the great of old,
+he opened the casement to inhale the air of the now declining day.
+
+The Place of the Capitol was deserted save by the tread of the single
+sentinel. But still, dark and fearful, hung from the tall gibbet the
+clay of the robber noble; and the colossal shape of the Egyptian lion
+rose hard by, sharp and dark in the breathless atmosphere.
+
+“Dread statue!” thought Rienzi, “how many unwhispered and solemn rites
+hast thou witnessed by thy native Nile, ere the Roman’s hand transferred
+thee hither--the antique witness of Roman crimes! Strange! but when I
+look upon thee I feel as if thou hadst some mystic influence over my own
+fortunes. Beside thee was I hailed the republican Lord of Rome; beside
+thee are my palace, my tribunal, the place of my justice, my triumphs,
+and my pomp:--to thee my eyes turn from my bed of state: and if fated to
+die in power and peace, thou mayst be the last object my eyes will mark!
+Or if myself a victim--.” He paused--shrank from the thought presented
+to him--turned to a recess of the chamber--drew aside a curtain, that
+veiled a crucifix and a small table, on which lay a Bible and the
+monastic emblems of the skull and crossbones--emblems, indeed, grave and
+irresistible, of the nothingness of power, and the uncertainty of life.
+Before these sacred monitors, whether to humble or to elevate, knelt
+that proud and aspiring man; and when he rose, it was with a lighter
+step and more cheerful mien than he had worn that day.
+
+
+
+Chapter 4.III. The Actor Unmasked.
+
+“In intoxication,” says the proverb, “men betray their real characters.”
+ There is a no less honest and truth-revealing intoxication in
+prosperity, than in wine. The varnish of power brings forth at once the
+defects and the beauties of the human portrait.
+
+The unprecedented and almost miraculous rise of Rienzi from the rank of
+the Pontiff’s official to the Lord of Rome, would have been accompanied
+with a yet greater miracle, if it had not somewhat dazzled and seduced
+the object it elevated. When, as in well-ordered states and tranquil
+times, men rise slowly, step by step, they accustom themselves to
+their growing fortunes. But the leap of an hour from a citizen to a
+prince--from the victim of oppression to the dispenser of justice--is
+a transition so sudden as to render dizzy the most sober brain. And,
+perhaps, in proportion to the imagination, the enthusiasm, the genius
+of the man, will the suddenness be dangerous--excite too extravagant a
+hope--and lead to too chimerical an ambition. The qualities that made
+him rise, hurry him to his fall; and victory at the Marengo of his
+fortunes, urges him to destruction at its Moscow.
+
+In his greatness Rienzi did not so much acquire new qualities, as
+develop in brighter light and deeper shadow those which he had always
+exhibited. On the one hand he was just--resolute--the friend of
+the oppressed--the terror of the oppressor. His wonderful intellect
+illumined everything it touched. By rooting out abuse, and by searching
+examination and wise arrangement, he had trebled the revenues of the
+city without imposing a single new tax. Faithful to his idol of liberty,
+he had not been betrayed by the wish of the people into despotic
+authority; but had, as we have seen, formally revived, and established
+with new powers, the Parliamentary Council of the city. However
+extensive his own authority, he referred its exercise to the people; in
+their name he alone declared himself to govern, and he never executed
+any signal action without submitting to them its reasons or its
+justification. No less faithful to his desire to restore prosperity as
+well as freedom to Rome, he had seized the first dazzling epoch of his
+power to propose that great federative league with the Italian States
+which would, as he rightly said, have raised Rome to the indisputable
+head of European nations. Under his rule trade was secure, literature
+was welcome, art began to rise.
+
+On the other hand, the prosperity which made more apparent his justice,
+his integrity, his patriotism, his virtues, and his genius, brought out
+no less glaringly his arrogant consciousness of superiority, his love of
+display, and the wild and daring insolence of his ambition. Though
+too just to avenge himself by retaliating on the patricians their
+own violence, though, in his troubled and stormy tribuneship, not one
+unmerited or illegal execution of baron or citizen could be alleged
+against him, even by his enemies; yet sharing, less excusably, the
+weakness of Nina, he could not deny his proud heart the pleasure of
+humiliating those who had ridiculed him as a buffoon, despised him as a
+plebeian, and who, even now slaves to his face, were cynics behind his
+back. “They stood before him while he sate,” says his biographer; “all
+these Barons, bareheaded; their hands crossed on their breasts;
+their looks downcast;--oh, how frightened they were!”--a picture more
+disgraceful to the servile cowardice of the nobles than the haughty
+sternness of the Tribune. It might be that he deemed it policy to break
+the spirit of his foes, and to awe those whom it was a vain hope to
+conciliate.
+
+For his pomp there was a greater excuse: it was the custom of the time;
+it was the insignia and witness of power; and when the modern historian
+taunts him with not imitating the simplicity of an ancient tribune, the
+sneer betrays an ignorance of the spirit of the age, and the vain
+people whom the chief magistrate was to govern. No doubt his gorgeous
+festivals, his solemn processions, set off and ennobled--if parade can
+so be ennobled--by a refined and magnificent richness of imagination,
+associated always with popular emblems, and designed to convey the idea
+of rejoicing for Liberty Restored, and to assert the state and majesty
+of Rome Revived--no doubt these spectacles, however otherwise judged in
+a more enlightened age and by closet sages, served greatly to augment
+the importance of the Tribune abroad, and to dazzle the pride of a
+fickle and ostentatious populace. And taste grew refined, luxury called
+labour into requisition, and foreigners from all states were attracted
+by the splendour of a court over which presided, under republican names,
+two sovereigns, (Rienzi, speaking in one of his letters of his great
+enterprise, refers it to the ardour of youth. The exact date of his
+birth is unknown; but he was certainly a young man at the time now
+referred to. His portrait in the Museo Barberino, from which his
+description has been already taken in the first book of this work,
+represents him as beardless, and, as far as one can judge, somewhere
+above thirty--old enough, to be sure, to have a beard; and seven years
+afterwards he wore a long one, which greatly displeased his naive
+biographer, who seems to consider it a sort of crime. The head is very
+remarkable for its stern beauty, and little, if at all, inferior to that
+of Napoleon; to which, as I before remarked, it has some resemblance in
+expression, if not in feature.) young and brilliant, the one renowned
+for his genius, the other eminent for her beauty. It was, indeed, a
+dazzling and royal dream in the long night of Rome, spoiled of her
+Pontiff and his voluptuous train--that holyday reign of Cola di Rienzi!
+And often afterwards it was recalled with a sigh, not only by the poor
+for its justice, the merchant for its security, but the gallant for its
+splendour, and the poet for its ideal and intellectual grace!
+
+As if to show that it was not to gratify the more vulgar appetite and
+desire, in the midst of all his pomp, when the board groaned with
+the delicacies of every clime, when the wine most freely circled, the
+Tribune himself preserved a temperate and even rigid abstinence. (“Vita
+di Cola di Rienzi”.--The biographer praises the abstinence of the
+Tribune.) While the apartments of state and the chamber of his bride
+were adorned with a profuse luxury and cost, to his own private rooms he
+transported precisely the same furniture which had been familiar to him
+in his obscurer life. The books, the busts, the reliefs, the arms which
+had inspired him heretofore with the visions of the past, were endeared
+by associations which he did not care to forego.
+
+But that which constituted the most singular feature of his character,
+and which still wraps all around him in a certain mystery, was his
+religious enthusiasm. The daring but wild doctrines of Arnold of
+Brescia, who, two centuries anterior, had preached reform, but
+inculcated mysticism, still lingered in Rome, and had in earlier youth
+deeply coloured the mind of Rienzi; and as I have before observed,
+his youthful propensity to dreamy thought, the melancholy death of his
+brother, his own various but successful fortunes, had all contributed
+to nurse the more zealous and solemn aspirations of this remarkable
+man. Like Arnold of Brescia, his faith bore a strong resemblance to the
+intense fanaticism of our own Puritans of the Civil War, as if similar
+political circumstances conduced to similar religious sentiments. He
+believed himself inspired by awful and mighty commune with beings of the
+better world. Saints and angels ministered to his dreams; and without
+this, the more profound and hallowed enthusiasm, he might never
+have been sufficiently emboldened by mere human patriotism, to
+his unprecedented enterprise: it was the secret of much of his
+greatness,--many of his errors. Like all men who are thus self-deluded
+by a vain but not inglorious superstition, united with, and coloured by,
+earthly ambition, it is impossible to say how far he was the visionary,
+and how far at times he dared to be the impostor. In the ceremonies of
+his pageants, in the ornaments of his person, were invariably introduced
+mystic and figurative emblems. In times of danger he publicly professed
+to have been cheered and directed by divine dreams; and on many
+occasions the prophetic warnings he announced having been singularly
+verified by the event, his influence with the people was strengthened by
+a belief in the favour and intercourse of Heaven. Thus, delusion of
+self might tempt and conduce to imposition on others, and he might not
+scruple to avail himself of the advantage of seeming what he believed
+himself to be. Yet, no doubt this intoxicating credulity pushed him
+into extravagance unworthy of, and strangely contrasted by, his soberer
+intellect, and made him disproportion his vast ends to his unsteady
+means, by the proud fallacy, that where man failed, God would interpose.
+Cola di Rienzi was no faultless hero of romance. In him lay, in
+conflicting prodigality, the richest and most opposite elements of
+character; strong sense, visionary superstition, an eloquence and
+energy that mastered all he approached, a blind enthusiasm that mastered
+himself; luxury and abstinence, sternness and susceptibility, pride to
+the great, humility to the low; the most devoted patriotism and the most
+avid desire of personal power. As few men undertake great and desperate
+designs without strong animal spirits, so it may be observed, that with
+most who have risen to eminence over the herd, there is an aptness, at
+times, to a wild mirth and an elasticity of humour which often astonish
+the more sober and regulated minds, that are “the commoners of life:”
+ And the theatrical grandeur of Napoleon, the severe dignity of
+Cromwell, are strangely contrasted by a frequent, nor always seasonable
+buffoonery, which it is hard to reconcile with the ideal of their
+characters, or the gloomy and portentous interest of their careers. And
+this, equally a trait in the temperament of Rienzi, distinguished his
+hours of relaxation, and contributed to that marvellous versatility with
+which his harder nature accommodated itself to all humours and all men.
+Often from his austere judgment-seat he passed to the social board an
+altered man; and even the sullen Barons who reluctantly attended his
+feasts, forgot his public greatness in his familiar wit; albeit this
+reckless humour could not always refrain from seeking its subject in the
+mortification of his crest-fallen foes--a pleasure it would have been
+wiser and more generous to forego. And perhaps it was, in part, the
+prompting of this sarcastic and unbridled humour that made him often
+love to astonish as well as to awe. But even this gaiety, if so it may
+be called, taking an appearance of familiar frankness, served much to
+ingratiate him with the lower orders; and, if a fault in the prince, was
+a virtue in the demagogue.
+
+To these various characteristics, now fully developed, the reader must
+add a genius of designs so bold, of conceptions so gigantic and august,
+conjoined with that more minute and ordinary ability which masters
+details; that with a brave, noble, intelligent, devoted people to back
+his projects, the accession of the Tribune would have been the close of
+the thraldom of Italy, and the abrupt limit of the dark age of Europe.
+With such a people, his faults would have been insensibly checked,
+his more unwholesome power have received a sufficient curb. Experience
+familiarizing him with power, would have gradually weaned him from
+extravagance in its display; and the active and masculine energy of his
+intellect would have found field for the more restless spirits, as his
+justice gave shelter to the more tranquil. Faults he had, but whether
+those faults or the faults of the people, were to prepare his downfall,
+is yet to be seen.
+
+Meanwhile, amidst a discontented nobility and a fickle populace, urged
+on by the danger of repose to the danger of enterprise; partly blinded
+by his outward power, partly impelled by the fear of internal weakness;
+at once made sanguine by his genius and his fanaticism, and uneasy by
+the expectations of the crowd,--he threw himself headlong into the
+gulf of the rushing Time, and surrendered his lofty spirit to no
+other guidance than a conviction of its natural buoyancy and its
+heaven-directed haven.
+
+
+
+Chapter 4.IV. The Enemy’s Camp.
+
+While Rienzi was preparing, in concert, perhaps, with the ambassadors of
+the brave Tuscan States, whose pride of country and love of liberty
+were well fitted to comprehend, and even share them, his schemes for
+the emancipation from all foreign yoke of the Ancient Queen, and the
+Everlasting Garden, of the World; the Barons, in restless secrecy, were
+revolving projects for the restoration of their own power.
+
+One morning, the heads of the Savelli, the Orsini, and the Frangipani,
+met at the disfortified palace of Stephen Colonna. Their conference
+was warm and earnest--now resolute, now wavering, in its object--as
+indignation or fear prevailed.
+
+“You have heard,” said Luca di Savelli, in his usual soft and womanly
+voice, “that the Tribune has proclaimed, that, the day after tomorrow,
+he will take the order of knighthood, and watch the night before in the
+church of the Lateran: He has honoured me with a request to attend his
+vigil.”
+
+“Yes, yes, the knave. What means this new fantasy?” said the brutal
+Prince of the Orsini.
+
+“Unless it be to have the cavalier’s right to challenge a noble,” said
+old Colonna, “I cannot conjecture. Will Rome never grow weary of this
+madman?”
+
+“Rome is the more mad of the two,” said Luca di Savelli; “but methinks,
+in his wildness, the Tribune hath committed one error of which we may
+well avail ourselves at Avignon.”
+
+“Ah,” cried the old Colonna, “that must be our game; passive here, let
+us fight at Avignon.”
+
+“In a word then, he hath ordered that his bath shall be prepared in the
+holy porphyry vase in which once bathed the Emperor Constantine.”
+
+“Profanation! profanation!” cried Stephen. “This is enough to excuse a
+bull of excommunication. The Pope shall hear of it. I will despatch a
+courier forthwith.”
+
+“Better wait and see the ceremony,” said the Savelli; “some greater
+folly will close the pomp, be assured.”
+
+“Hark ye, my masters,” said the grim Lord of the Orsini; “ye are for
+delay and caution; I for promptness and daring; my kinsman’s blood calls
+aloud, and brooks no parley.”
+
+“And what do?” said the soft-voiced Savelli; “fight without soldiers,
+against twenty thousand infuriated Romans? not I.”
+
+Orsini sunk his voice into a meaning whisper. “In Venice,” said he,
+“this upstart might be mastered without an army. Think you in Rome no
+man wears a stiletto?”
+
+“Hush,” said Stephen, who was of far nobler and better nature than his
+compeers, and who, justifying to himself all other resistance to the
+Tribune, felt his conscience rise against assassination; “this must not
+be--your zeal transports you.”
+
+“Besides, whom can we employ? scarce a German left in the city; and
+to whisper this to a Roman were to exchange places with poor
+Martino--Heaven take him, for he’s nearer heaven than ever he was
+before,” said the Savelli.
+
+“Jest me no jests,” cried the Orsini, fiercely. “Jests on such a
+subject! By St. Francis I would, since thou lovest such wit, thou hadst
+it all to thyself; and, methinks, at the Tribune’s board I have seen
+thee laugh at his rude humour, as if thou didst not require a cord to
+choke thee.”
+
+“Better to laugh than to tremble,” returned the Savelli.
+
+“How! darest thou say I tremble?” cried the Baron.
+
+“Hush, hush,” said the veteran Colonna, with impatient dignity. “We are
+not now in such holiday times as to quarrel amongst ourselves. Forbear,
+my lords.”
+
+“Your greater prudence, Signor,” said the sarcastic Savelli, “arises
+from your greater safety. Your house is about to shelter itself under
+the Tribune’s; and when the Lord Adrian returns from Naples, the
+innkeeper’s son will be brother to your kinsman.”
+
+“You might spare me that taunt,” said the old noble, with some emotion.
+“Heaven knows how bitterly I have chafed at the thought; yet I would
+Adrian were with us. His word goes far to moderate the Tribune, and to
+guide my own course, for my passion beguiles my reason; and since his
+departure methinks we have been the more sullen without being the more
+strong. Let this pass. If my own son had wed the Tribune’s sister, I
+would yet strike a blow for the old constitution as becomes a noble, if
+I but saw that the blow would not cut off my own head.”
+
+Savelli, who had been whispering apart with Rinaldo Frangipani, now
+said--
+
+“Noble Prince, listen to me. You are bound by your kinsman’s approaching
+connection, your venerable age, and your intimacy with the Pontiff, to
+a greater caution than we are. Leave to us the management of the
+enterprise, and be assured of our discretion.”
+
+A young boy, Stefanello, who afterwards succeeded to the representation
+of the direct line of the Colonna, and whom the reader will once again
+encounter ere our tale be closed, was playing by his grandsire’s knees.
+He looked sharply up at Savelli, and said, “My grandfather is too wise,
+and you are too timid. Frangipani is too yielding, and Orsini is too
+like a vexed bull. I wish I were a year or two older.”
+
+“And what would you do, my pretty censurer?” said the smooth Savelli,
+biting his smiling lip.
+
+“Stab the Tribune with my own stiletto, and then hey for Palestrina!”
+
+“The egg will hatch a brave serpent,” quoth the Savelli. “Yet why so
+bitter against the Tribune, my cockatrice?”
+
+“Because he allowed an insolent mercer to arrest my uncle Agapet for
+debt. The debt had been owed these ten years; and though it is said that
+no house in Rome has owed more money than the Colonna, this is the first
+time I ever heard of a rascally creditor being allowed to claim his debt
+unless with doffed cap and bended knee. And I say that I would not live
+to be a Baron, if such upstart insolence is to be put upon me.”
+
+“My child,” said old Stephen, laughing heartily, “I see our noble order
+will be safe enough in your hands.”
+
+“And,” continued the child, emboldened by the applause he received, “if
+I had time after pricking the Tribune, I would fain have a second stroke
+at--”
+
+“Whom?” said the Savelli, observing the boy pause.
+
+“My cousin Adrian. Shame on him, for dreaming to make one a wife whose
+birth would scarce fit her for a Colonna’s leman!”
+
+“Go play, my child--go play,” said the old Colonna, as he pushed the boy
+from him.
+
+“Enough of this babble,” cried the Orsini, rudely. “Tell me, old lord;
+just as I entered, I saw an old friend (one of your former mercenaries)
+quit the palace--may I crave his errand?”
+
+“Ah, yes; a messenger from Fra Moreale. I wrote to the Knight, reproving
+him for his desertion on our ill-starred return from Corneto, and
+intimating that five hundred lances would be highly paid for just now.”
+
+“Ah,” said Savelli; “and what is his answer!”
+
+“Oh, wily and evasive: He is profuse in compliments and good wishes;
+but says he is under fealty to the Hungarian king, whose cause is before
+Rienzi’s tribunal; that he cannot desert his present standard; that he
+fears Rome is so evenly balanced between patricians and the people, that
+whatever party would permanently be uppermost must call in a Podesta;
+and this character alone the Provencal insinuates would suit him.”
+
+“Montreal our Podesta?” cried the Orsini.
+
+“And why not?” said Savelli; “as good a well-born Podesta as a low-born
+Tribune? But I trust we may do without either. Colonna, has this
+messenger from Fra Moreale left the city?”
+
+“I suppose so.”
+
+“No,” said Orsini; “I met him at the gate, and knew him of old: it is
+Rodolf, the Saxon (once a hireling of the Colonna), who has made some
+widows among my clients in the good old day. He is a little disguised
+now; however, I recognised and accosted him, for I thought he was one
+who might yet become a friend, and I bade him await me at my palace.”
+
+“You did well,” said the Savelli, musing, and his eyes met those of
+Orsini. Shortly afterwards a conference, in which much was said and
+nothing settled, was broken up; but Luca di Savelli, loitering at the
+porch, prayed the Frangipani, and the other Barons, to adjourn to the
+Orsini’s palace.
+
+“The old Colonna,” said he, “is well-nigh in his dotage. We shall come
+to a quick determination without him, and we can secure his proxy in his
+son.”
+
+And this was a true prophecy, for half-an-hour’s consultation with
+Rodolf of Saxony sufficed to ripen thought into enterprise.
+
+
+
+Chapter 4.V. The Night and its Incidents.
+
+With the following twilight, Rome was summoned to the commencement of
+the most magnificent spectacle the Imperial City had witnessed since the
+fall of the Caesars. It had been a singular privilege, arrogated by the
+people of Rome, to confer upon their citizens the order of knighthood.
+Twenty years before, a Colonna and an Orsini had received this popular
+honour. Rienzi, who designed it as the prelude to a more important
+ceremony, claimed from the Romans a similar distinction. From the
+Capitol to the Lateran swept, in long procession, all that Rome boasted
+of noble, of fair, and brave. First went horsemen without number, and
+from all the neighbouring parts of Italy, in apparel that well befitted
+the occasion. Trumpeters, and musicians of all kinds, followed, and
+the trumpets were of silver; youths bearing the harness of the knightly
+war-steed, wrought with gold, preceded the march of the loftiest
+matronage of Rome, whose love for show, and it may be whose admiration
+for triumphant fame, (which to women sanctions many offences,) made them
+forget the humbled greatness of their lords: amidst them Nina and Irene,
+outshining all the rest; then came the Tribune and the Pontiff’s Vicar,
+surrounded by all the great Signors of the city, smothering alike
+resentment, revenge, and scorn, and struggling who should approach
+nearest to the monarch of the day. The high-hearted old Colonna alone
+remained aloof, following at a little distance, and in a garb studiously
+plain. But his age, his rank, his former renown in war and state, did
+not suffice to draw to his grey locks and highborn mien a single one
+of the shouts that attended the meanest lord on whom the great Tribune
+smiled. Savelli followed nearest to Rienzi, the most obsequious of the
+courtly band; immediately before the Tribune came two men; the one bore
+a drawn sword, the other the pendone, or standard usually assigned to
+royalty. The tribune himself was clothed in a long robe of white
+satin, whose snowy dazzle (miri candoris) is peculiarly dwelt on by the
+historian, richly decorated with gold; while on his breast were many
+of those mystic symbols I have before alluded to, the exact meaning of
+which was perhaps known only to the wearer. In his dark eye, and on
+that large tranquil brow, in which thought seemed to sleep, as sleeps a
+storm, there might be detected a mind abstracted from the pomp around;
+but ever and anon he roused himself, and conversed partially with
+Raimond or Savelli.
+
+“This is a quaint game,” said the Orsini, falling back to the old
+Colonna: “but it may end tragically.”
+
+“Methinks it may,” said the old man, “if the Tribune overhear thee.”
+
+Orsini grew pale. “How--nay--nay, even if he did, he never resents
+words, but professes to laugh at our spoken rage. It was but the
+other day that some knave told him what one of the Annibaldi said of
+him--words for which a true cavalier would have drawn the speaker’s
+life’s blood; and he sent for the Annibaldi, and said, ‘My friend,
+receive this purse of gold,--court wits should be paid.’”
+
+“Did Annibaldi take the gold?”
+
+“Why, no; the Tribune was pleased with his spirit, and made him sup with
+him; and Annibaldi says he never spent a merrier evening, and no longer
+wonders that his kinsman, Riccardo, loves the buffoon so.”
+
+Arrived now at the Lateran, Luca di Savelli fell also back, and
+whispered to Orsini; the Frangipani, and some other of the nobles,
+exchanged meaning looks; Rienzi, entering the sacred edifice in which,
+according to custom, he was to pass the night watching his armour, bade
+the crowd farewell, and summoned them the next morning, “To hear things
+that might, he trusted, be acceptable to heaven and earth.”
+
+The immense multitude received this intimation with curiosity and
+gladness, while those who had been in some measure prepared by Cecco del
+Vecchio, hailed it as an omen of their Tribune’s unflagging resolution.
+The concourse dispersed with singular order and quietness; it was
+recorded as a remarkable fact, that in so great a crowd, composed of men
+of all parties, none exhibited licence or indulged in quarrel. Some of
+the barons and cavaliers, among whom was Luca di Savelli, whose sleek
+urbanity and sarcastic humour found favour with the Tribune, and a few
+subordinate pages and attendants, alone remained; and, save a single
+sentinel at the porch, that broad space before the Palace, the Basilica
+and Fount of Constantine, soon presented a silent and desolate void to
+the melancholy moonlight. Within the church, according to the usage of
+the time and rite, the descendant of the Teuton kings received the order
+of the Santo Spirito. His pride, or some superstition equally weak,
+though more excusable, led him to bathe in the porphyry vase which
+an absurd legend consecrated to Constantine; and this, as Savelli
+predicted, cost him dear. These appointed ceremonies concluded, his arms
+were placed in that part of the church, within the columns of St. John.
+And here his state bed was prepared. (In a more northern country, the
+eve of knighthood would have been spent without sleeping. In Italy, the
+ceremony of watching the armour does not appear to have been so rigidly
+observed.)
+
+The attendant barons, pages, and chamberlains, retired out of sight to
+a small side chapel in the edifice; and Rienzi was left alone. A single
+lamp, placed beside his bed, contended with the mournful rays of the
+moon, that cast through the long casements, over aisle and pillar, its
+“dim religious light.” The sanctity of the place, the solemnity of the
+hour, and the solitary silence round, were well calculated to deepen
+the high-wrought and earnest mood of that son of fortune. Many and high
+fancies swept over his mind--now of worldly aspirations, now of more
+august but visionary belief, till at length, wearied with his own
+reflections, he cast himself on the bed. It was an omen which graver
+history has not neglected to record, that the moment he pressed the bed,
+new prepared for the occasion, part of it sank under him: he himself was
+affected by the accident, and sprung forth, turning pale and muttering;
+but, as if ashamed of his weakness, after a moment’s pause, again
+composed himself to rest, and drew the drapery round him.
+
+The moonbeams grew fainter and more faint as the time proceeded, and
+the sharp distinction between light and shade faded fast from the marble
+floor; when from behind a column at the furthest verge of the building,
+a strange shadow suddenly crossed the sickly light--it crept on--it
+moved, but without an echo,--from pillar to pillar it flitted--it rested
+at last behind the column nearest to the Tribune’s bed--it remained
+stationary.
+
+The shades gathered darker and darker round; the stillness seemed to
+deepen; the moon was gone; and, save from the struggling ray of the lamp
+beside Rienzi, the blackness of night closed over the solemn and ghostly
+scene.
+
+In one of the side chapels, as I have before said, which, in the many
+alterations the church has undergone, is probably long since destroyed,
+were Savelli and the few attendants retained by the Tribune. Savelli
+alone slept not; he remained sitting erect, breathless and listening,
+while the tall lights in the chapel rendered yet more impressive the
+rapid changes of his countenance.
+
+“Now pray Heaven,” said he, “the knave miscarry not! Such an occasion
+may never again occur! He has a strong arm and a dexterous hand,
+doubtless; but the other is a powerful man. The deed once done, I care
+not whether the doer escape or not; if not, why we must stab him! Dead
+men tell no tales. At the worst, who can avenge Rienzi? There is no
+other Rienzi! Ourselves and the Frangipani seize the Aventine, the
+Colonna and the Orsini the other quarters of the city; and without the
+master-spirit, we may laugh at the mad populace. But if discovered;--”
+ and Savelli, who, fortunately for his foes, had not nerves equal to his
+will, covered his face and shuddered;--“I think I hear a noise!--no--is
+it the wind?--tush, it must be old Vico de Scotto, turning in his shell
+of mail!--silent--I like not that silence! No cry--no sound! Can the
+ruffian have played us false? or could he not scale the casement? It is
+but a child’s effort;--or did the sentry spy him?”
+
+Time passed on: the first ray of daylight slowly gleamed, when he
+thought he heard the door of the church close. Savelli’s suspense
+became intolerable: he stole from the chapel, and came in sight of the
+Tribune’s bed--all was silent.
+
+“Perhaps the silence of death,” said Savelli, as he crept back.
+
+Meanwhile the Tribune, vainly endeavouring to close his eyes, was
+rendered yet more watchful by the uneasy position he was obliged to
+assume--for the part of the bed towards the pillow having given way,
+while the rest remained solid, he had inverted the legitimate order
+of lying, and drawn himself up as he might best accommodate his limbs,
+towards the foot of the bed. The light of the lamp, though shaded by the
+draperies, was thus opposite to him. Impatient of his wakefulness, he at
+last thought it was this dull and flickering light which scared away the
+slumber, and was about to rise, to remove it further from him, when he
+saw the curtain at the other end of the bed gently lifted: he remained
+quiet and alarmed;--ere he could draw a second breath, a dark figure
+interposed between the light and the bed; and he felt that a stroke was
+aimed against that part of the couch, which, but for the accident that
+had seemed to him ominous, would have given his breast to the knife.
+Rienzi waited not a second and better-directed blow; as the assassin yet
+stooped, groping in the uncertain light, he threw on him all the weight
+and power of his large and muscular frame, wrenched the stiletto from
+the bravo’s hand, and dashing him on the bed, placed his knee on his
+breast.--The stiletto rose--gleamed--descended--the murtherer swerved
+aside, and it pierced only his right arm. The Tribune raised, for a
+deadlier blow, the revengeful blade.
+
+The assassin thus foiled was a man used to all form and shape of danger,
+and he did not now lose his presence of mind.
+
+“Hold!” said he; “if you kill me, you will die yourself. Spare me, and I
+will save you.”
+
+“Miscreant!”
+
+“Hush--not so loud, or you will disturb your attendants, and some of
+them may do what I have failed to execute. Spare me, I say, and I will
+reveal that which were worth more than my life; but call not--speak not
+aloud, I warn you!”
+
+The Tribune felt his heart stand still: in that lonely place, afar from
+his idolizing people--his devoted guards--with but loathing barons,
+or, it might be, faithless menials, within call, might not the baffled
+murtherer give a wholesome warning?--and those words and that doubt
+seemed suddenly to reverse their respective positions, and leave the
+conqueror still in the assassin’s power.
+
+“Thou thinkest to deceive me,” said he, but in a voice whispered and
+uncertain, which shewed the ruffian the advantage he had gained: “thou
+wouldst that I might release thee without summoning my attendants, that
+thou mightst a second time attempt my life.”
+
+“Thou hast disabled my right arm, and disarmed me of my only weapon.”
+
+“How camest thou hither?”
+
+“By connivance.”
+
+“Whence this attempt?”
+
+“The dictation of others.”
+
+“If I pardon thee--”
+
+“Thou shalt know all!”
+
+“Rise,” said the Tribune, releasing his prisoner, but with great
+caution, and still grasping his shoulder with one hand, while the other
+pointed the dagger at his throat.
+
+“Did my sentry admit thee? There is but one entrance to the church,
+methinks.”
+
+“He did not; follow me, and I will tell thee more.”
+
+“Dog! thou hast accomplices?”
+
+“If I have, thou hast the knife at my throat.”
+
+“Wouldst thou escape?”
+
+“I cannot, or I would.”
+
+Rienzi looked hard, by the dull light of the lamp, at the assassin. His
+rugged and coarse countenance, rude garb, and barbarian speech, seemed
+to him proof sufficient that he was but the hireling of others; and it
+might be wise to brave one danger present and certain, to prevent much
+danger future and unforeseen. Rienzi, too, was armed, strong, active, in
+the prime of life;--and at the worst, there was no part of the building
+whence his voice would not reach those within the chapel,--if they could
+be depended upon.
+
+“Shew me then thy place and means of entrance,” said he; “and if I but
+suspect thee as we move--thou diest. Take up the lamp.”
+
+The ruffian nodded; with his left hand took up the lamp as he was
+ordered; and with Rienzi’s grasp on his shoulder, while the wound from
+his right arm dropped gore as he passed, he moved noiselessly along the
+church--gained the altar--to the left of which was a small room for the
+use or retirement of the priest. To this he made his way. Rienzi’s heart
+misgave him a moment.
+
+“Beware,” he whispered, “the least sign of fraud, and thou art the first
+victim!”
+
+The assassin nodded again, and proceeded. They entered the room; and
+then the Tribune’s strange guide pointed to an open casement. “Behold my
+entrance,” said he; “and, if you permit me, my egress--”
+
+“The frog gets not out of the well so easily as he came in, friend,”
+ returned Rienzi, smiling. “And now, if I am not to call my guards, what
+am I to do with thee!”
+
+“Let me go, and I will seek thee tomorrow; and if thou payest me
+handsomely, and promisest not to harm limb or life, I will put thine
+enemies and my employers in thy power.”
+
+Rienzi could not refrain from a slight laugh at the proposition, but
+composing himself, replied--“And what if I call my attendants, and give
+thee to their charge?”
+
+“Thou givest me to those very enemies and employers; and in despair lest
+I betray them, ere the day dawn they cut my throat--or thine.”
+
+“Methinks knave, I have seen thee before.”
+
+“Thou hast. I blush not for name or country. I am Rodolf of Saxony!”
+
+“I remember me:--servitor of Walter de Montreal. He, then, is thy
+instigator!”
+
+“Roman, no! That noble Knight scorns other weapon than the open sword,
+and his own hand slays his own foes. Your pitiful, miserable, dastard
+Italians, alone employ the courage, and hire the arm, of others.”
+
+Rienzi remained silent. He had released hold of his prisoner, and stood
+facing him; every now and then regarding his countenance, and again
+relapsing into thought. At length, casting his eyes round the small
+chamber thus singularly tenanted, he observed a kind of closet, in which
+the priests’ robes, and some articles used in the sacred service, were
+contained. It suggested at once an escape from his dilemma: he pointed
+to it--
+
+“There, Rodolf of Saxony, shalt thou pass some part of this night--a
+small penance for thy meditated crime; and tomorrow, as thou lookest for
+life, thou wilt reveal all.”
+
+“Hark, ye, Tribune,” returned the Saxon, doggedly; “my liberty is in
+your power, but neither my tongue nor my life. If I consent to be caged
+in that hole, you must swear on the crossed hilt of the dagger that you
+now hold, that, on confession of all I know, you pardon and set me free.
+My employers are enough to glut your rage an’ you were a tiger. If you
+do not swear this--”
+
+“Ah, my modest friend!--the alternative?”
+
+“I brain myself against the stone wall! Better such a death than the
+rack!”
+
+“Fool, I want not revenge against such as thou. Be honest, and I swear
+that, twelve hours after thy confession, thou shalt stand safe and
+unscathed without the walls of Rome. So help me our Lord and his
+saints.”
+
+“I am content!--Donner und Hagel, I have lived long enough to care only
+for my own life, and the great captain’s next to it;--for the rest, I
+reck not if ye southerns cut each other’s throats, and make all Italy
+one grave.”
+
+With this benevolent speech, Rodolf entered the closet; but ere Rienzi
+could close the door, he stepped forth again--
+
+“Hold,” said he: “this blood flows fast. Help me to bandage it, or I
+shall bleed to death ere my confession.”
+
+“Per fede,” said the Tribune, his strange humour enjoying the man’s cool
+audacity; “but, considering the service thou wouldst have rendered me,
+thou art the most pleasant, forbearing, unabashed, good fellow, I have
+seen this many a year. Give us thine own belt. I little thought my first
+eve of knighthood would have been so charitably spent!”
+
+“Methinks these robes would make a better bandage,” said Rodolf,
+pointing to the priests’ gear suspended from the wall.
+
+“Silence, knave,” said the Tribune, frowning; “no sacrilege! Yet, as
+thou takest such dainty care of thyself, thou shalt have mine own scarf
+to accommodate thee.”
+
+With that the Tribune, placing his dagger on the ground, while he
+cautiously guarded it with his foot, bound up the wounded limb, for
+which condescension Rodolf gave him short thanks; resumed his weapon and
+lamp; closed the door; drew over it the long, heavy bolt without, and
+returned to his couch, deeply and indignantly musing over the treason he
+had so fortunately escaped.
+
+At the first grey streak of dawn he went out of the great door of the
+church, called the sentry, who was one of his own guard, and bade him
+privately, and now ere the world was astir, convey the prisoner to one
+of the private dungeons of the Capitol. “Be silent,” said he: “utter not
+a word of this to any one; be obedient, and thou shalt be promoted. This
+done, find out the councillor, Pandulfo di Guido, and bid him seek me
+here ere the crowd assemble.”
+
+He then, making the sentinel doff his heavy shoes of iron, led him
+across the church, resigned Rodolf to his care, saw them depart, and
+in a few minutes afterwards his voice was heard by the inmates of the
+neighbouring chapel; and he was soon surrounded by his train.
+
+He was already standing on the floor, wrapped in a large gown lined with
+furs; and his piercing eye scanned carefully the face of each man that
+approached. Two of the Barons of the Frangipani family exhibited
+some tokens of confusion and embarrassment, from which they speedily
+recovered at the frank salutation of the Tribune.
+
+But all the art of Savelli could not prevent his features from betraying
+to the most indifferent eye the terror of his soul;--and, when he felt
+the penetrating gaze of Rienzi upon him, he trembled in every joint.
+Rienzi alone did not, however, seem to notice his disorder; and when
+Vico di Scotto, an old knight, from whose hands he received his sword,
+asked him how he had passed the night, he replied, cheerfully--
+
+“Well, well--my brave friend! Over a maiden knight some good angel
+always watches. Signor Luca di Savelli, I fear you have slept but ill:
+you seem pale. No matter!--our banquet today will soon brighten the
+current of your gay blood.”
+
+“Blood, Tribune!” said di Scotto, who was innocent of the plot: “Thou
+sayest blood, and lo! on the floor are large gouts of it not yet dry.”
+
+“Now, out on thee, old hero, for betraying my awkwardness! I pricked
+myself with my own dagger in unrobing. Thank Heaven it hath no poison in
+its blade!”
+
+The Frangipani exchanged looks,--Luca di Savelli clung to a column for
+support,--and the rest of the attendants seemed grave and surprised.
+
+“Think not of it, my masters,” said Rienzi: “it is a good omen,
+and a true prophecy. It implies that he who girds on his sword
+for the good of the state, must be ready to spill his blood for it:
+that am I. No more of this--a mere scratch: it gave more
+blood than I recked of from so slight a puncture, and saves
+the leech the trouble of the lancet. How brightly breaks the day!
+We must prepare to meet our fellow-citizens--they will be here anon.
+Ha, my Pandulfo--welcome!--thou, my old friend, shalt buckle on this
+mantle!”
+
+And while Pandulfo was engaged in the task, the Tribune whispered a few
+words in his ear, which, by the smile on his countenance, seemed to the
+attendants one of the familiar jests with which Rienzi distinguished his
+intercourse with his more confidential intimates.
+
+
+
+Chapter 4.VI. The Celebrated Citation.
+
+The bell of the great Lateran church sounded shrill and loud, as the
+mighty multitude, greater even than that of the preceding night, swept
+on. The appointed officers made way with difficulty for the barons and
+ambassadors, and scarcely were those noble visitors admitted ere the
+crowd closed in their ranks, poured headlong into the church, and took
+the way to the chapel of Boniface VIII. There, filling every cranny,
+and blocking up the entrance, the more fortunate of the press beheld the
+Tribune surrounded by the splendid court his genius had collected, and
+his fortune had subdued. At length, as the solemn and holy music began
+to swell through the edifice, preluding the celebration of the mass, the
+Tribune stepped forth, and the hush of the music was increased by the
+universal and dead silence of the audience. His height, his air, his
+countenance, were such as always command the attention of crowds; and at
+this time they received every adjunct from the interest of the occasion,
+and that peculiar look of intent yet suppressed fervour, which is,
+perhaps, the sole gift of the eloquent that Nature alone can give.
+
+“Be it known,” said he, slowly and deliberately, “in virtue of that
+authority, power, and jurisdiction, which the Roman people, in general
+parliament, have assigned to us, and which the Sovereign Pontiff hath
+confirmed, that we, not ungrateful of the gift and grace of the Holy
+Spirit--whose soldier we now are--nor of the favour of the Roman people,
+declare, that Rome, capital of the world, and base of the Christian
+church; and that every City, State, and People of Italy, are henceforth
+free. By that freedom, and in the same consecrated authority, we
+proclaim, that the election, jurisdiction, and monarchy of the Roman
+empire appertain to Rome and Rome’s people, and the whole of Italy. We
+cite, then, and summon personally, the illustrious princes, Louis Duke
+of Bavaria, and Charles king of Bohemia, who would style themselves
+Emperors of Italy, to appear before us, or the other magistrates of
+Rome, to plead and to prove their claim between this day and the Day of
+Pentecost. We cite also, and within the same term, the Duke of Saxony,
+the Prince of Brandenburg, and whosoever else, potentate, prince, or
+prelate, asserts the right of Elector to the imperial throne--a
+right that, we find it chronicled from ancient and immemorial time,
+appertaineth only to the Roman people--and this in vindication of
+our civil liberties, without derogation of the spiritual power of
+the Church, the Pontiff, and the Sacred College. Herald, proclaim
+the citation, at the greater and more formal length, as written and
+intrusted to your hands, without the Lateran.”
+
+     (“Il tutto senza derogare all’ autorita della Chiesa, del
+     Papa e del Sacro Collegio.” So concludes this extraordinary
+     citation, this bold and wonderful assertion of the classic
+     independence of Italy, in the most feudal time of the
+     fourteenth century. The anonymous biographer of Rienzi
+     declares that the Tribune cited also the Pope and the
+     Cardinals to reside in Rome. De Sade powerfully and
+     incontrovertibly refutes this addition to the daring or the
+     extravagance of Rienzi. Gibbon, however, who has rendered
+     the rest of the citation in terms more abrupt and
+     discourteous than he was warranted by any authority, copies
+     the biographer’s blunder, and sneers at De Sade, as using
+     arguments “rather of decency than of weight.” Without
+     wearying the reader with all the arguments of the learned
+     Abbe, it may be sufficient to give the first two.
+
+     1st. All the other contemporaneous historians that have
+     treated of this event, G. Villani, Hocsemius, the Vatican
+     MSS. and other chroniclers, relating the citation of the
+     Emperor and Electors, say nothing of that of the Pope and
+     Cardinals; and the Pope (Clement VI.), in his subsequent
+     accusations of Rienzi, while very bitter against his
+     citation of the Emperor, is wholly silent on what would have
+     been to the Pontiff the much greater offence of citing
+     himself and the Cardinals.)
+
+     2. The literal act of this citation, as published formally
+     in the Lateran, is extant in Hocsemius, (whence is borrowed,
+     though not at all its length, the speech in the text of our
+     present tale;) and in this document the Pope and his
+     Cardinals are not named in the summons.
+
+     Gibbon’s whole account of Rienzi is superficial and unfair.
+     To the cold and sneering scepticism, which so often deforms
+     the gigantic work of that great writer, allowing nothing for
+     that sincere and urgent enthusiasm which, whether of liberty
+     or religion, is the most common parent of daring action, the
+     great Roman seems but an ambitious and fantastic madman. In
+     Gibbon’s hands what would Cromwell have been? what Vane?
+     what Hampden? The pedant, Julian, with his dirty person and
+     pompous affectation, was Gibbon’s ideal of a great man.)
+
+As Rienzi concluded this bold proclamation of the liberties of Italy,
+the Tuscan ambassadors, and those of some other of the free states,
+murmured low approbation. The ambassadors of those States that affected
+the party of the Emperor looked at each other in silent amaze and
+consternation. The Roman Barons remained with mute lips and downcast
+eyes; only over the aged face of Stephen Colonna settled a smile, half
+of scorn, half of exultation. But the great mass of the citizens were
+caught by words that opened so grand a prospect as the emancipation of
+all Italy: and their reverence of the Tribune’s power and fortune was
+almost that due to a supernatural being; so that they did not pause to
+calculate the means which were to correspond with the boast.
+
+While his eye roved over the crowd, the gorgeous assemblage near him,
+the devoted throng beyond;--as on his ear boomed the murmur of thousands
+and ten thousands, in the space without, from before the Palace of
+Constantine (Palace now his own!) sworn to devote life and fortune to
+his cause; in the flush of prosperity that yet had known no check; in
+the zenith of power, as yet unconscious of reverse, the heart of
+the Tribune swelled proudly: visions of mighty fame and limitless
+dominion,--fame and dominion, once his beloved Rome’s and by him to be
+restored, rushed before his intoxicated gaze; and in the delirious and
+passionate aspirations of the moment, he turned his sword alternately to
+the three quarters of the then known globe, and said, in an abstracted
+voice, as a man in a dream, “In the right of the Roman people this too
+is mine!” (“Questo e mio.”)
+
+Low though the voice, the wild boast was heard by all around as
+distinctly as if borne to them in thunder. And vain it were to describe
+the various sensations it excited; the extravagance would have moved the
+derision of his foes, the grief of his friends, but for the manner of
+the speaker, which, solemn and commanding, hushed for the moment even
+reason and hatred themselves in awe; afterwards remembered and repeated,
+void of the spell they had borrowed from the utterer, the words met the
+cold condemnation of the well-judging; but at that moment all
+things seemed possible to the hero of the people. He spoke as one
+inspired--they trembled and believed; and, as rapt from the spectacle,
+he stood a moment silent, his arm still extended--his dark dilating
+eye fixed upon space--his lip parted--his proud head towering and erect
+above the herd,--his own enthusiasm kindled that of the more humble and
+distant spectators; and there was a deep murmur begun by one, echoed by
+the rest, “The Lord is with Italy and Rienzi!”
+
+The Tribune turned, he saw the Pope’s Vicar astonished, bewildered,
+rising to speak. His sense and foresight returned to him at once, and,
+resolved to drown the dangerous disavowal of the Papal authority
+for this hardihood, which was ready to burst from Raimond’s lips, he
+motioned quickly to the musicians, and the solemn and ringing chant of
+the sacred ceremony prevented the Bishop of Orvietto all occasion of
+self-exoneration or reply.
+
+The moment the ceremony was over, Rienzi touched the Bishop, and
+whispered, “We will explain this to your liking. You feast with us at
+the Lateran.--Your arm.” Nor did he leave the good Bishop’s arm, nor
+trust him to other companionship, until to the stormy sound of horn
+and trumpet, drum and cymbal, and amidst such a concourse as might have
+hailed, on the same spot, the legendary baptism of Constantine, the
+Tribune and his nobles entered the great gates of the Lateran, then the
+Palace of the World.
+
+Thus ended that remarkable ceremony and that proud challenge of the
+Northern Powers, in behalf of the Italian liberties, which, had it been
+afterwards successful, would have been deemed a sublime daring; which,
+unsuccessful, has been construed by the vulgar into a frantic insolence;
+but which, calmly considering all the circumstances that urged on
+the Tribune, and all the power that surrounded him, was not, perhaps,
+altogether so imprudent as it seemed. And, even accepting that
+imprudence in the extremest sense,--by the more penetrating judge of
+the higher order of character, it will probably be considered as the
+magnificent folly of a bold nature, excited at once by position and
+prosperity, by religious credulities, by patriotic aspirings, by
+scholastic visions too suddenly transferred from revery to action,
+beyond that wise and earthward policy which sharpens the weapon ere it
+casts the gauntlet.
+
+
+
+Chapter 4.VII. The Festival.
+
+The Festival of that day was far the most sumptuous hitherto known. The
+hint of Cecco del Vecchio, which so well depicted the character of his
+fellow-citizens, as yet it exists, though not to such excess, in their
+love of holyday pomp and gorgeous show, was not lost upon Rienzi. One
+instance of the universal banqueting (intended, indeed, rather for
+the people than the higher ranks) may illustrate the more than royal
+profusion that prevailed. From morn till eve, streams of wine flowed
+like a fountain from the nostrils of the Horse of the great Equestrian
+Statue of Constantine. The mighty halls of the Lateran palace, open
+to all ranks, were prodigally spread; and the games, sports, and
+buffooneries of the time, were in ample requisition. Apart, the
+Tribunessa, as Nina was rather unclassically entitled, entertained
+the dames of Rome; while the Tribune had so effectually silenced or
+conciliated Raimond, that the good Bishop shared his peculiar table--the
+only one admitted to that honour. As the eye ranged each saloon
+and hall--it beheld the space lined with all the nobility and
+knighthood--the wealth and strength--the learning and the beauty--of the
+Italian metropolis; mingled with ambassadors and noble strangers, even
+from beyond the Alps; (The simple and credulous briographer of
+Rienzi declares his fame to have reached the ears of the Soldan of
+Babylon.)--envoys not only of the free states that had welcomed the rise
+of the Tribune, but of the highborn and haughty tyrants who had first
+derided his arrogance, and now cringed to his power. There, were not
+only the ambassadors of Florence, of Sienna, of Arezzo (which last
+subjected its government to the Tribune,) of Todi, of Spoleto, and of
+countless other lesser towns and states, but of the dark and terrible
+Visconti, prince of Milan; of Obizzo of Ferrara, and the tyrant rulers
+of Verona and Bologna; even the proud and sagacious Malatesta, lord of
+Rimini, whose arm afterwards broke for awhile the power of Montreal,
+at the head of his Great Company, had deputed his representative in his
+most honoured noble. John di Vico, the worst and most malignant despot
+of his day, who had sternly defied the arms of the Tribune, now subdued
+and humbled, was there in person; and the ambassadors of Hungary and of
+Naples mingled with those of Bavaria and Bohemia, whose sovereigns that
+day had been cited to the Roman Judgment Court. The nodding of plumes,
+the glitter of jewels and cloth of gold, the rustling of silks and
+jingle of golden spurs, the waving of banners from the roof, the sounds
+of minstrelsy from the galleries above, all presented a picture of such
+power and state--a court and chivalry of such show--as the greatest of
+the feudal kings might have beheld with a sparkling eye and a swelling
+heart. But at that moment the cause and lord of all that splendour,
+recovered from his late exhilaration, sat moody and abstracted,
+remembering with a thoughtful brow the adventure of the past night,
+and sensible that amongst his gaudiest revellers lurked his intended
+murtherers. Amidst the swell of the minstrelsy and the pomp of the
+crowd, he felt that treason scowled beside him; and the image of the
+skeleton obtruding, as of old, its grim thought of death upon the feast,
+darkened the ruby of the wine, and chilled the glitter of the scene.
+
+It was while the feast was loudest that Rienzi’s page was seen gliding
+through the banquet, and whispering several of the nobles; each bowed
+low, but changed colour as he received the message.
+
+“My Lord Savelli,” said Orsini, himself trembling, “bear yourself more
+bravely. This must be meant in honour, not revenge. I suppose your
+summons corresponds with mine.”
+
+“He--he--asks--asks--me to supper at the Capitol; a fri-endly
+meeting--(pest on his friendship!)--after the noise of the day.”
+
+“The words addressed also to me!” said Orsini, turning to one of the
+Frangipani.
+
+Those who received the summons soon broke from the feast, and collected
+in a group, eagerly conferring. Some were for flight, but flight was
+confession; their number, rank, long and consecrated impunity, reassured
+them, and they resolved to obey. The old Colonna, the sole innocent
+Baron of the invited guests, was also the only one who refused the
+invitation. “Tush!” said he, peevishly; “here is feasting enough for one
+day! Tell the Tribune that ere he sups I hope to be asleep. Grey hairs
+cannot encounter all this fever of festivity.”
+
+As Rienzi rose to depart, which he did early, for the banquet took place
+while yet morning, Raimond, eager to escape and confer with some of his
+spiritual friends, as to the report he should make to the Pontiff, was
+beginning his expressions of farewell, when the merciless Tribune said
+to him gravely--
+
+“My Lord, we want you on urgent business at the Capitol. A prisoner--a
+trial--perhaps (he added with his portentous and prophetic frown) an
+execution waits us! Come.”
+
+“Verily, Tribune,” stammered the good Bishop, “this is a strange time
+for execution!”
+
+“Last night was a time yet more strange.--Come.”
+
+There was something in the way in which the final word was pronounced,
+that Raimond could not resist. He sighed, muttered, twitched his robes,
+and followed the Tribune. As he passed through the halls, the company
+rose on all sides. Rienzi repaid their salutations with smiles and
+whispers of frank courtesy and winning address. Young as he yet was,
+and of a handsome and noble presence, that took every advantage from
+splendid attire, and yet more from an appearance of intellectual command
+in his brow and eye, which the less cultivated signors of that dark
+age necessarily wanted--he glittered through the court as one worthy to
+form, and fitted to preside over, it; and his supposed descent from the
+Teuton Emperor, which, since his greatness, was universally bruited and
+believed abroad, seemed undeniably visible to the foreign lords in the
+majesty of his mien and the easy blandness of his address.
+
+“My Lord Prefect,” said he to a dark and sullen personage in black
+velvet, the powerful and arrogant John di Vico, prefect of Rome, “we are
+rejoiced to find so noble a guest at Rome: we must repay the courtesy by
+surprising you in your own palace ere long;--nor will you, Signor (as he
+turned to the envoy from Tivoli,) refuse us a shelter amidst your groves
+and waterfalls ere the vintage be gathered. Methinks Rome, united with
+sweet Tivoli, grows reconciled to the Muses. Your suit is carried,
+Master Venoni: the council recognises its justice; but I reserved
+the news for this holyday--you do not blame me, I trust.” This was
+whispered, with a half-affectionate frankness, to a worthy citizen, who,
+finding himself amidst so many of the great, would have shrunk from
+the notice of the Tribune; but it was the policy of Rienzi to pay an
+especial and marked attention to those engaged in commercial pursuits.
+As, after tarrying a moment or two with the merchant, he passed on, the
+tall person of the old Colonna caught his eye--
+
+“Signor,” said he, with a profound inclination of his head, but with a
+slight emphasis of tone, “you will not fail us this evening.”
+
+“Tribune--” began the Colonna.
+
+“We receive no excuse,” interrupted the Tribune, hastily, and passed on.
+
+He halted for a few moments before a small group of men plainly attired,
+who were watching him with intense interest; for they, too, were
+scholars, and in Rienzi’s rise they saw another evidence of that
+wonderful and sudden power which intellect had begun to assume over
+brute force. With these, as if abruptly mingled with congenial spirits,
+the Tribune relaxed all the gravity of his brow. Happier, perhaps, his
+living career--more unequivocal his posthumous renown--had his objects
+as his tastes been theirs!
+
+“Ah, carissime!” said he to one, whose arm he drew within his own,--“and
+how proceeds thy interpretation of the old marbles?--half unravelled? I
+rejoice to hear it! Confer with me as of old, I pray thee. Tomorrow--no,
+nor the day after, but next week--we will have a tranquil evening. Dear
+poet, your ode transported me to the days of Horace; yet, methinks, we
+do wrong to reject the vernacular for the Latin. You shake your head?
+Well, Petrarch thinks with you: his great epic moves with the stride
+of a giant--so I hear from his friend and envoy,--and here he is. My
+Laeluis, is that not your name with Petrarch? How shall I express my
+delight at his comforting, his inspiring letter? Alas! he overrates not
+my intentions, but my power. Of this hereafter.”
+
+A slight shade darkened the Tribune’s brow at these words: but moving
+on, a long line of nobles and princes on either side, he regained his
+self-possession, and the dignity he had dropped with his former equals.
+Thus he passed through the crowd, and gradually disappeared.
+
+“He bears him bravely,” said one, as the revellers reseated themselves.
+“Noticed you the ‘we’--the style royal?”
+
+“But it must be owned that he lords it well,” said the ambassador of the
+Visconti: “less pride would be cringing to his haughty court.”
+
+“Why,” said a professor of Bologna, “why is the Tribune called proud? I
+see no pride in him.”
+
+“Nor I,” said a wealthy jeweller.
+
+While these, and yet more contradictory, comments followed the exit of
+the Tribune, he passed into the saloon, where Nina presided; and here
+his fair person and silver tongue (“Suavis colorataeque sententiae,”
+ according to the description of Petrarch) won him a more general favour
+with the matrons than he experienced with their lords, and not a little
+contrasted the formal and nervous compliments of the good Bishop, who
+served him on such occasions with an excellent foil.
+
+But as soon as these ceremonies were done, and Rienzi mounted his horse,
+his manner changed at once into a stern and ominous severity.
+
+“Vicar,” said he, abruptly, to the Bishop, “we might well need your
+presence. Learn that at the Capitol now sits the Council in judgment
+upon an assassin. Last night, but for Heaven’s mercy, I should have
+fallen a victim to a hireling’s dagger, Knew you aught of this?”
+
+And he turned so sharply on the Bishop, that the poor canonist nearly
+dropped from his horse in surprise and terror.
+
+“I,--” said he.
+
+Rienzi smiled--“No, good my Lord Bishop! I see you are of no murtherer’s
+mould. But to continue:--that I might not appear to act in mine own
+cause, I ordered the prisoner to be tried in my absence. In his trial
+(you marked the letter brought me at our banquet?)--”
+
+“Ay, and you changed colour.”
+
+“Well I might: in his trial, I say, he has confessed that nine of
+the loftiest lords of Rome were his instigators. They sup with me
+tonight!--Vicar, forwards!”
+
+
+
+
+BOOK V. THE CRISIS.
+
+     “Questo ha acceso ‘i fuoco e la fiamma laquale non la par
+     spotegnere.”--“Vita di Cola di Rienzi”, lib. i. cap. 29.
+
+     “He has kindled fire and flames which he will not be able to
+     extinguish.”--“Life of Cola di Rienzi”.
+
+
+
+Chapter 5.I. The Judgment of the Tribune.
+
+The brief words of the Tribune to Stephen Colonna, though they sharpened
+the rage of the proud old noble, were such as he did not on reflection
+deem it prudent to disobey. Accordingly, at the appointed hour, he found
+himself in one of the halls of the Capitol, with a gallant party of his
+peers. Rienzi received them with more than his usual graciousness.
+
+They sate down to the splendid board in secret uneasiness and alarm,
+as they saw that, with the exception of Stephen Colonna, none, save the
+conspirators, had been invited to the banquet. Rienzi, regardless
+of their silence and abstraction, was more than usually gay--the old
+Colonna more than usually sullen.
+
+“We fear we have but ill pleased you, my Lord Colonna, by our summons.
+Once, methinks, we might more easily provoke you to a smile.”
+
+“Situations are changed, Tribune, since you were my guest.”
+
+“Why, scarcely so. I have risen, but you have not fallen. Ye walk the
+streets day and night in security and peace; your lives are safe from
+the robber, and your palaces no longer need bars and battlements to
+shield you from your fellow-citizens. I have risen, but we all have
+risen--from barbarous disorder into civilized life! My Lord Gianni
+Colonna, whom we have made Captain over Campagna, you will not refuse a
+cup to the Buono Stato;--nor think we mistrust your valour, when we say,
+that we rejoice Rome hath no enemies to attest your generalship.”
+
+“Methinks,” quoth the old Colonna, bluntly, “we shall have enemies
+enough from Bohemia and Bavaria, ere the next harvest be green.”
+
+“And, if so,” replied the Tribune, calmly, “foreign foes are better than
+civil strife.”
+
+“Ay, if we have money in the treasury; which is but little likely, if we
+have many more such holydays.”
+
+“You are ungracious, my Lord,” said the Tribune; “and, besides, you are
+more uncomplimentary to Rome than to ourselves. What citizen would not
+part with gold to buy fame and liberty?”
+
+“I know very few in Rome that would,” answered the Baron. “But tell
+me, Tribune, you who are a notable casuist, which is the best for a
+state--that its governor should be over-thrifty or over-lavish?”
+
+“I refer the question to my friend, Luca di Savelli,” replied Rienzi.
+“He is a grand philosopher, and I wot well could explain a much knottier
+riddle, which we will presently submit to his acumen.”
+
+The Barons, who had been much embarrassed by the bold speech of the
+old Colonna, all turned their eyes to Savelli, who answered with more
+composure than was anticipated.
+
+“The question admits a double reply. He who is born a ruler, and
+maintains a foreign army, governing by fear, should be penurious. He who
+is made ruler, who courts the people, and would reign by love, must win
+their affection by generosity, and dazzle their fancies by pomp. Such, I
+believe, is the usual maxim in Italy, which is rife in all experience of
+state wisdom.”
+
+The Barons unanimously applauded the discreet reply of Savelli,
+excepting only the old Colonna.
+
+“Yet pardon me, Tribune,” said Stephen, “if I depart from the
+courtier-like decision of our friend, and opine, though with all due
+respect, that even a friar’s coarse serge, [‘Vestimenta da Bizoco,’
+was the phrase used by Colonna; a phrase borrowed from certain heretics
+(bizocchi) who affected extreme austerity; afterwards the word passed
+into a proverb.--See the comments of Zerfirino Re, in ‘Vita di Cola di
+Rienzi’.) the parade of humility, would better become thee, than this
+gaudy pomp, the parade of pride!” So saying, he touched the large loose
+sleeve fringed with gold, of the Tribune’s purple robe.
+
+“Hush, father!” said Gianni, Colonna’s son, colouring at the unprovoked
+rudeness and dangerous candour of the veteran.
+
+“Nay, it matters not,” said the Tribune, with affected indifference,
+though his lip quivered, and his eye shot fire; and then, after a pause,
+he resumed with an awful smile--“If the Colonna love the serge of the
+friar, he may see enough of it ere we part. And now, my Lord Savelli,
+for my question, which I pray you listen to; it demands all your wit.
+Is it best for a State’s Ruler to be over-forgiving, or over-just? Take
+breath to answer: you look faint--you grow pale--you tremble--you cover
+your face! Traitor and assassin, your conscience betrays you! My Lords,
+relieve your accomplice, and take up the answer.”
+
+“Nay, if we are discovered,” said the Orsini, rising in despair, “we
+will not fall unavenged--die, tyrant!”
+
+He rushed to the place where Rienzi stood--for the Tribune also
+rose,--and made a thrust at his breast with his dagger; the steel
+pierced the purple robe, yet glanced harmlessly away--and the Tribune
+regarded the disappointed murtherer with a scornful smile.
+
+“Till yesternight, I never dreamt that under the robe of state I should
+need the secret corselet,” said he. “My Lords, you have taught me a dark
+lesson, and I thank ye.”
+
+So saying, he clapped his hands, and suddenly the folding doors at the
+end of the hall flew open, and discovered the saloon of the Council
+hung with silk of a blood-red, relieved by rays of white,--the emblem of
+crime and death. At a long table sate the councillors in their robes; at
+the bar stood a ruffian form, which the banqueters too well recognised.
+
+“Bid Rodolf of Saxony approach!” said the Tribune.
+
+And led by two guards, the robber entered the hall.
+
+“Wretch, you then betrayed us!” said one of the Frangipani.
+
+“Rodolph of Saxony goes ever to the highest bidder,” returned the
+miscreant, with a horrid grin. “You gave me gold, and I would have slain
+your foe; your foe defeated me; he gives me life, and life is a greater
+boon than gold!”
+
+“Ye confess your crime, my Lords! Silent! dumb! Where is your wit,
+Savelli? Where your pride, Rinaldo di Orsini? Gianni Colonna, is your
+chivalry come to this?”
+
+“Oh!” continued Rienzi, with deep and passionate bitterness; “oh, my
+Lords, will nothing conciliate you--not to me, but to Rome? What hath
+been my sin against you and yours? Disbanded ruffians (such as your
+accuser)--dismantled fortresses--impartial law--what man, in all the
+wild revolutions of Italy, sprung from the people, ever yielded less to
+their licence? Not a coin of your coffers touched by wanton power,--not
+a hair of your heads harmed by private revenge. You, Gianni Colonna,
+loaded with honours, intrusted with command--you, Alphonso di
+Frangipani, endowed with new principalities,--did the Tribune remember
+one insult he received from you as the Plebeian? You accuse
+my pride;--was it my fault that ye cringed and fawned upon my
+power,--flattery on your lips, poison at your hearts? No, I have not
+offended you; let the world know, that in me you aimed at liberty,
+justice, law, order, the restored grandeur, the renovated rights of
+Rome! At these, the Abstract and the Immortal--not at this frail form,
+ye struck;--by the divinity of these ye are defeated;--for the outraged
+majesty of these,--criminals and victims,--ye must die!”
+
+With these words, uttered with the tone and air that would have become
+the loftiest spirit of the ancient city, Rienzi, with a majestic step,
+swept from the chamber into the Hall of Council. (The guilt of the
+Barons in their designed assassination of Rienzi, though hastily
+slurred over by Gibbon, and other modern writers, is clearly attested
+by Muratori, the Bolognese Chronicle &c.--They even confessed the crime.
+(See Cron. Estens: Muratori, tom. xviii. page 442.))
+
+All that night the conspirators remained within that room, the doors
+locked and guarded; the banquet unremoved, and its splendour strangely
+contrasting the mood of the guests.
+
+The utter prostration and despair of these dastard criminals--so unlike
+the knightly nobles of France and England, has been painted by the
+historian in odious and withering colours. The old Colonna alone
+sustained his impetuous and imperious character. He strode to and fro
+the room like a lion in his cage, uttering loud threats of resentment
+and defiance; and beating at the door with his clenched hands, demanding
+egress, and proclaiming the vengeance of the Pontiff.
+
+The dawn came, slow and grey upon that agonized assembly: and just as
+the last star faded from the melancholy horizon, and by the wan and
+comfortless heaven, they regarded each other’s faces, almost spectral
+with anxiety and fear, the great bell of the Capitol sounded the notes
+in which they well recognised the chime of death! It was then that the
+door opened, and a drear and gloomy procession of cordeliers, one to
+each Baron, entered the apartment! At that spectacle, we are told, the
+terror of the conspirators was so great, that it froze up the very power
+of speech. (“Diventarono si gelati, che non poteno favellare.”) The
+greater part at length, deeming all hope over, resigned themselves
+to their ghostly confessors. But when the friar appointed to Stephen
+approached that passionate old man, he waved his hand impatiently, and
+said--“Tease me not! Tease me not!”
+
+“Nay, son, prepare for the awful hour.”
+
+“Son, indeed!” quoth the Baron. “I am old enough to be thy grandsire;
+and for the rest, tell him who sent thee, that I neither am prepared
+for death, nor will prepare! I have made up my mind to live these twenty
+years, and longer too;--if I catch not my death with the cold of this
+accursed night.”
+
+Just at that moment a cry that almost seemed to rend the Capitol asunder
+was heard, as, with one voice, the multitude below yelled forth--
+
+“Death to the conspirators!--death! death!”
+
+While this the scene in that hall, the Tribune issued from his chamber,
+in which he had been closeted with his wife and sister. The noble spirit
+of the one, the tears and grief of the other (who saw at one fell stroke
+perish the house of her betrothed,) had not worked without effect upon
+a temper, stern and just indeed, but naturally averse from blood; and a
+heart capable of the loftiest species of revenge.
+
+He entered the Council, still sitting, with a calm brow, and even a
+cheerful eye.
+
+“Pandulfo di Guido,” he said, turning to that citizen, “you are right;
+you spoke as a wise man and a patriot, when you said that to cut off
+with one blow, however merited, the noblest heads of Rome would endanger
+the State, sully our purple with an indelible stain, and unite the
+nobility of Italy against us.”
+
+“Such, Tribune, was my argument, though the Council have decided
+otherwise.”
+
+“Hearken to the shouts of the populace, you cannot appease their honest
+warmth,” said the demagogue Baroncelli.
+
+Many of the Council murmured applause.
+
+“Friends,” said the Tribune, with a solemn and earnest aspect, “let
+not Posterity say that Liberty loves blood; let us for once adopt
+the example and imitate the mercy of our great Redeemer! We have
+triumphed--let us forbear; we are saved--let us forgive!”
+
+The speech of the Tribune was supported by Pandulfo, and others of the
+more mild and moderate policy; and for a short but animated discussion,
+the influence of Rienzi prevailed, and the sentence of death was
+revoked, but by a small majority.
+
+“And now,” said Rienzi, “let us be more than just; let us be generous.
+Speak--and boldly. Do any of ye think that I have been over-hard,
+over-haughty with these stubborn spirits?--I read your answer in your
+brows!--I have! Do any of ye think this error of mind may have stirred
+them to their dark revenge? Do any of you deem that they partake, as we
+do, of human nature,--that they are sensible to kindness, that they are
+softened by generosity,--that they can be tamed and disarmed by such
+vengeance as is dictated to noble foes by Christian laws?”
+
+“I think,” said Pandulfo, after a pause, “that it will not be in human
+nature, if the men you pardon, thus offending and thus convicted, again
+attempt your life!”
+
+“Methinks,” said Rienzi, “we must do even more than pardon. The first
+great Caesar, when he did not crush a foe, strove to convert him to a
+friend--”
+
+“And perished by the attempt,” said Baroncelli, abruptly.
+
+Rienzi started and changed colour.
+
+“If you would save these wretched prisoners, better not wait till the
+fury of the mob become ungovernable,” whispered Pandulfo.
+
+The Tribune roused himself from his revery.
+
+“Pandulfo,” said he, in the same tone, “my heart misgives me--the brood
+of serpents are in my hand--I do not strangle them--they may sting me to
+death, in return for my mercy--it is their instinct! No matter: it shall
+not be said that the Roman Tribune bought with so many lives his own
+safety: nor shall it be written upon my grave-stone, ‘Here lies the
+coward, who did not dare forgive.’ What, ho! there, officers, unclose
+the doors! My masters, let us acquaint the prisoners with their
+sentence.”
+
+With that, Rienzi seated himself on the chair of state, at the head
+of the table, and the sun, now risen, cast its rays over the blood-red
+walls, in which the Barons, marshalled in order into the chamber,
+thought to read their fate.
+
+“My Lords,” said the Tribune, “ye have offended the laws of God and man;
+but God teaches man the quality of mercy. Learn at last, that I bear a
+charmed life. Nor is he whom, for high purposes, Heaven hath raised from
+the cottage to the popular throne, without invisible aid and spiritual
+protection. If hereditary monarchs are deemed sacred, how much more one
+in whose power the divine hand hath writ its witness! Yes, over him who
+lives but for his country, whose greatness is his country’s gift, whose
+life is his country’s liberty, watch the souls of the just, and the
+unsleeping eyes of the sworded seraphim! Taught by your late failure and
+your present peril, bid your anger against me cease; respect the laws,
+revere the freedom of your city, and think that no state presents a
+nobler spectacle than men born as ye are--a patrician and illustrious
+order--using your power to protect your city, your wealth to nurture its
+arts, your chivalry to protect its laws! Take back your swords--and the
+first man who strikes against the liberties of Rome, let him be your
+victim; even though that victim be the Tribune. Your cause has been
+tried--your sentence is pronounced. Renew your oath to forbear all
+hostility, private or public, against the government and the magistrates
+of Rome, and ye are pardoned--ye are free!”
+
+Amazed, bewildered, the Barons mechanically bent the knee: the friars
+who had received their confessions, administered the appointed oath; and
+while, with white lips, they muttered the solemn words, they heard below
+the roar of the multitude for their blood.
+
+This ceremony ended, the Tribune passed into the banquet-hall, which
+conducted to a balcony, whence he was accustomed to address the people;
+and never, perhaps, was his wonderful mastery over the passions of an
+audience (ad persuadendum efficax dictator, quoque dulcis ac lepidus)
+(Petrarch of Rienzi.) more greatly needed or more eminently shown, than
+on that day; for the fury of the people was at its height, and it was
+long ere he succeeded in turning it aside. Before he concluded, however,
+every wave of the wild sea lay hushed.--The orator lived to stand on the
+same spot, to plead for a life nobler than those he now saved,--and to
+plead unheard and in vain!
+
+As soon as the Tribune saw the favourable moment had arrived, the Barons
+were admitted into the balcony:--in the presence of the breathless
+thousands, they solemnly pledged themselves to protect the Good Estate.
+And thus the morning which seemed to dawn upon their execution witnessed
+their reconciliation with the people.
+
+The crowd dispersed, the majority soothed and pleased;--the more
+sagacious, vexed and dissatisfied.
+
+“He has but increased the smoke and the flame which he was not able
+to extinguish,” growled Cecco del Vecchio; and the smith’s appropriate
+saying passed into a proverb and a prophecy.
+
+Meanwhile, the Tribune, conscious at least that he had taken the more
+generous course, broke up the Council, and retired to the chamber
+where Nina and his sister waited him. These beautiful young women had
+conceived for each other the tenderest affection. And their differing
+characters, both of mind and feature, seemed by contrast to heighten the
+charms of both; as in a skilful jewellery, the pearl and diamond borrow
+beauty from each other.
+
+And as Irene now turned her pale countenance and streaming eyes from
+the bosom to which she had clung for support, the timid sister, anxious,
+doubtful, wistful;--the proud wife, sanguine and assured, as if never
+diffident of the intentions nor of the power of her Rienzi:--the
+contrast would have furnished to a painter no unworthy incarnation of
+the Love that hopeth, and the Love that feareth, all things.
+
+“Be cheered, my sweet sister,” said the Tribune, first caught by Irene’s
+imploring look; “not a hair on the heads of those who boast the name of
+him thou lovest so well is injured.--Thank Heaven,” as his sister,
+with a low cry, rushed into his arms, “that it was against my life they
+conspired! Had it been another Roman’s, mercy might have been a crime!
+Dearest, may Adrian love thee half as well as I; and yet, my sister and
+my child, none can know thy soft soul like he who watched over it since
+its first blossom expanded to the sun. My poor brother! had he lived,
+your counsel had been his; and methinks his gentle spirit often whispers
+away the sternness which, otherwise, would harden over mine. Nina, my
+queen, my inspirer, my monitor--ever thus let thy heart, masculine in my
+distress, be woman’s in my power; and be to me, with Irene, upon earth,
+what my brother is in heaven!”
+
+The Tribune, exhausted by the trials of the night, retired for a few
+hours to rest; and as Nina, encircling him within her arms, watched over
+his noble countenance--care hushed, ambition laid at rest, its serenity
+had something almost of sublime. And tears of that delicious pride,
+which woman sheds for the hero of her dreams, stood heavy in the wife’s
+eyes, as she rejoiced more, in the deep stillness of her heart, at the
+prerogative, alone hers, of sharing his solitary hours, than in all the
+rank to which his destiny had raised her, and which her nature fitted
+her at once to adorn and to enjoy. In that calm and lonely hour she
+beguiled her heart by waking dreams, vainer than the sleeper’s; and
+pictured to herself the long career of glory, the august decline of
+peace, which were to await her lord.
+
+And while she thus watched and thus dreamed, the cloud, as yet no bigger
+than a man’s hand, darkened the horizon of a fate whose sunshine was
+well-nigh past!
+
+
+
+Chapter 5.II. The Flight.
+
+Fretting his proud heart, as a steed frets on the bit, old Colonna
+regained his palace. To him, innocent of the proposed crime of his kin
+and compeers, the whole scene of the night and morning presented but one
+feature of insult and degradation. Scarce was he in his palace, ere he
+ordered couriers, in whom he knew he could confide, to be in preparation
+for his summons. “This to Avignon,” said he to himself, as he concluded
+an epistle to the Pontiff.--“We will see whether the friendship of the
+great house of the Colonna will outweigh the frantic support of the
+rabble’s puppet.--This to Palestrina,--the rock is inaccessible!--This
+to John di Vico, he may be relied upon, traitor though he be!--This to
+Naples; the Colonna will disown the Tribune’s ambassador, if he throw
+not up the trust and hasten hither, not a lover but a soldier!--and may
+this find Walter de Montreal! Ah, a precious messenger he sent us, but
+I will forgive all--all, for a thousand lances.” And as with trembling
+hands he twined the silk round his letters, he bade his pages invite to
+his board, next day, all the signors who had been implicated with him on
+the previous night.
+
+The Barons came--far more enraged at the disgrace of pardon, than
+grateful for the boon of mercy. Their fears combined with their pride;
+and the shouts of the mob, the whine of the cordeliers, still ringing
+in their ears, they deemed united resistance the only course left to
+protect their lives, and avenge their affront.
+
+To them the public pardon of the Tribune seemed only a disguise to
+private revenge. All they believed was, that Rienzi did not dare to
+destroy them in the face of day; forgetfulness and forgiveness appeared
+to them as the means designed to lull their vigilance, while abasing
+their pride: and the knowledge of crime detected forbade them all hope
+of safety. The hand of their own assassin might be armed against
+them, or they might be ruined singly, one by one, as was the common
+tyrant-craft of that day. Singularly enough, Luca di Savelli was the
+most urgent for immediate rebellion. The fear of death made the coward
+brave.
+
+Unable even to conceive the romantic generosity of the Tribune, the
+Barons were yet more alarmed when, the next day, Rienzi, summoning them
+one by one to a private audience, presented them with gifts, and bade
+them forget the past: excused himself rather than them, and augmented
+their offices and honours.
+
+In the Quixotism of a heart to which royalty was natural, he thought
+that there was no medium course; and that the enmity he would not
+silence by death, he could crush by confidence and favours. Such conduct
+from a born king to hereditary inferiors might have been successful; but
+the generosity of one who has abruptly risen over his lords is but the
+ostentation of insult. Rienzi in this, and, perhaps, in forgiveness
+itself, committed a fatal error of policy, which the dark sagacity of a
+Visconti, or, in later times, of a Borgia, would never have perpetrated.
+But it was the error of a bright and a great mind.
+
+Nina was seated in the grand saloon of the palace--it was the day of
+reception for the Roman ladies.
+
+The attendance was so much less numerous than usual that it startled
+her, and she thought there was a coldness and restraint in the manner of
+the visitors present, which somewhat stung her vanity.
+
+“I trust we have not offended the Signora Colonna,” she said to the Lady
+of Gianni, Stephen’s son. “She was wont to grace our halls, and we miss
+much her stately presence.”
+
+“Madam, my Lord’s mother is unwell!”
+
+“Is she so? We will send for her more welcome news. Methinks we are
+deserted today.”
+
+As she spoke, she carelessly dropped her handkerchief--the haughty dame
+of the Colonna bent not--not a hand stirred; and the Tribunessa looked
+for a moment surprised and disconcerted. Her eye roving over the throng,
+she perceived several, whom she knew as the wives of Rienzi’s foes,
+whispering together with meaning glances, and more than one malicious
+sneer at her mortification was apparent. She recovered herself
+instantly, and said to the Signora Frangipani, with a smile, “May we be
+a partaker of your mirth? You seem to have chanced on some gay thought,
+which it were a sin not to share freely.”
+
+The lady she addressed coloured slightly, and replied, “We were
+thinking, madam, that had the Tribune been present, his vow of
+knighthood would have been called into requisition.”
+
+“And how, Signora?”
+
+“It would have been his pleasing duty, madam, to succour the
+distressed.” And the Signora glanced significantly on the kerchief still
+on the floor.
+
+“You designed me, then, this slight, Signoras,” said Nina, rising with
+great majesty. “I know not whether your Lords are equally bold to the
+Tribune; but this I know, that the Tribune’s wife can in future forgive
+your absence. Four centuries ago, a Frangipani might well have stooped
+to a Raselli; today, the dame of a Roman Baron might acknowledge a
+superior in the wife of the first magistrate of Rome. I compel not your
+courtesy, nor seek it.”
+
+“We have gone too far,” whispered one of the ladies to her neighbour.
+“Perhaps the enterprise may not succeed; and then--”
+
+Further remark was cut short by the sudden entrance of the Tribune. He
+entered with great haste, and on his brow was that dark frown which none
+ever saw unquailing.
+
+“How, fair matrons!” said he, looking round the room with a rapid
+glance, “ye have not deserted us yet? By the blessed cross, your Lords
+pay a compliment to our honour, to leave us such lovely hostages, or
+else, God’s truth, they are ungrateful husbands. So, madam,” turning
+sharp round to the wife of Gianni Colonna, “your husband is fled to
+Palestrina; yours, Signora Orsini, to Marino; yours with him, fair
+bride of Frangipani,--ye came hither to--. But ye are sacred even from a
+word!”
+
+The Tribune paused a moment, evidently striving to suppress his emotion,
+as he observed the terror he had excited--his eye fell upon Nina, who,
+forgetting her previous vexation, regarded him with anxious amazement.
+“Yes,” said he to her, “you alone, perhaps, of this fair assemblage,
+know not that the nobles whom I lately released from the headsman’s
+gripe are a second time forsworn. They have left home in the dead of the
+night, and already the Heralds proclaim them traitors and rebels. Rienzi
+forgives no more!”
+
+“Tribune,” exclaimed the Signora Frangipani, who had more bold blood in
+her veins than her whole house, “were I of thine own sex, I would
+cast the words, Traitor and Rebel, given to my Lord, in thine own
+teeth!--Proud man, the Pontiff soon will fulfil that office!”
+
+“Your Lord is blest with a dove, fair one,” said the Tribune,
+scornfully. “Ladies, fear not, while Rienzi lives, the wife even of his
+worst foe is safe and honoured. The crowd will be here anon; our guards
+shall attend ye home in safety, or this palace may be your shelter--for,
+I warn ye, that your Lords have rushed into a great peril. And ere many
+days be past, the streets of Rome may be as rivers of blood.”
+
+“We accept your offer, Tribune,” said the Signora Frangipani, who was
+touched, and, in spite of herself, awed by the Tribune’s manner. And
+as she spoke, she dropped on one knee, picked up the kerchief, and,
+presenting it respectfully to Nina, said, “Madam, forgive me. I alone of
+these present respect you more in danger than in pride.”
+
+“And I,” returned Nina, as she leaned in graceful confidence on Rienzi’s
+arm, “I reply, that if there be danger, the more need of pride.”
+
+All that day and all that night rang the great bell of the Capitol. But
+on the following daybreak, the assemblage was thin and scattered; there
+was a great fear stricken into the hearts of the people, by the flight
+of the Barons, and they bitterly and loudly upbraided Rienzi for sparing
+them to this opportunity of mischief. That day the rumours continued;
+the murmurers for the most part remained within their houses, or
+assembled in listless and discontented troops. The next day dawned; the
+same lethargy prevailed. The Tribune summoned his Council, (which was a
+Representative assembly.)
+
+“Shall we go forth as we are,” said he, “with such few as will follow
+the Roman standard!”
+
+“No,” replied Pandulfo, who, by nature timid, was yet well acquainted
+with the disposition of the people, and therefore a sagacious
+counsellor. “Let us hold back; let us wait till the rebels commit
+themselves by some odious outrage, and then hatred will unite the
+waverers, and resentment lead them.”
+
+This counsel prevailed; the event proved its wisdom. To give excuse and
+dignity to the delay, messengers were sent to Marino, whither the chief
+part of the Barons had fled, and which was strongly fortified, demanding
+their immediate return.
+
+On the day on which the haughty refusal of the insurgents was brought
+to Rienzi, came fugitives from all parts of the Campagna. Houses
+burned--convents and vineyards pillaged--cattle and horses
+seized--attested the warfare practised by the Barons, and animated
+the drooping Romans, by showing the mercies they might expect for
+themselves. That evening, of their own accord, the Romans rushed into
+the place of the Capitol:--Rinaldo Orsini had seized a fortress in the
+immediate neighbourhood of Rome, and had set fire to a tower, the flames
+of which were visible to the city. The tenant of the tower, a noble
+lady, old and widowed, was burnt alive. Then rose the wild clamour--the
+mighty wrath--the headlong fury. The hour for action had arrived.
+(“Ardea terre, arse la Castelluzza e case, e uomini. Non si schifo
+di ardere una nobile donna Vedova, veterana, in una torre. Per tale
+crudeltade li Romani furo piu irati,” &c.--“Vita di Cola di Rienzi”,
+lib. i. cap. 20.)
+
+
+
+Chapter 5.III. The Battle.
+
+“I have dreamed a dream,” cried Rienzi, leaping from his bed. “The
+lion-hearted Boniface, foe and victim of the Colonna, hath appeared
+to me, and promised victory. (“In questa notte mi e apparito Santo
+Bonifacio Papa,” &c.--“Vita di Cola di Rienzi” cap. 32.) Nina, prepare
+the laurel-wreath: this day victory shall be ours!”
+
+“O, Rienzi! today?”
+
+“Yes! hearken to the bell--hearken to the trumpet. Nay, I hear even now
+the impatient hoofs of my white warsteed! One kiss, Nina, ere I arm for
+victory,--stay--comfort poor Irene; let me not see her--she weeps that
+my foes are akin to her betrothed; I cannot brook her tears; I watched
+her in her cradle. Today, I must have no weakness on my soul! Knaves,
+twice perjured!--wolves, never to be tamed!--shall I meet ye at last
+sword to sword? Away, sweet Nina, to Irene, quick! Adrian is at Naples,
+and were he in Rome, her lover is sacred, though fifty times a Colonna.”
+
+With that, the Tribune passed into his wardrobe, where his pages and
+gentlemen attended with his armour. “I hear, by our spies,” said he,
+“that they will be at our gates ere noon--four thousand foot, seven
+hundred horsemen. We will give them a hearty welcome, my masters. How,
+Angelo Villani, my pretty page, what do you out of your lady’s service?”
+
+“I would fain see a warrior arm for Rome,” said the boy, with a boy’s
+energy.
+
+“Bless thee, my child; there spoke one of Rome’s true sons!”
+
+“And the Signora has promised me that I shall go with her guard to the
+gates, to hear the news--”
+
+“And report the victory?--thou shalt. But they must not let thee come
+within shaft-shot. What! my Pandulfo, thou in mail?”
+
+“Rome requires every man,” said the citizen, whose weak nerves were
+strung by the contagion of the general enthusiasm.
+
+“She doth--and once more I am proud to be a Roman. Now, gentles, the
+Dalmaticum: (A robe or mantle of white, borne by Rienzi; at one time
+belonging to the sacerdotal office, afterwards an emblem of empire.)
+I would that every foe should know Rienzi; and, by the Lord of Hosts,
+fighting at the head of the imperial people, I have a right to the
+imperial robe. Are the friars prepared? Our march to the gates shall be
+preceded by a solemn hymn--so fought our sires.”
+
+“Tribune, John di Vico is arrived with a hundred horse to support the
+Good Estate.”
+
+“He hath!--The Lord has delivered us then of a foe, and given our
+dungeons a traitor!--Bring hither yon casket, Angelo.--So--Hark thee!
+Pandulfo, read this letter.”
+
+The citizens read, with surprise and consternation, the answer of the
+wily Prefect to the Colonna’s epistle.
+
+“He promises the Baron to desert to him in the battle, with the
+Prefect’s banner,” said Pandulfo. “What is to be done?”
+
+“What!--take my signet--here--see him lodged forthwith in the prison
+of the Capitol. Bid his train leave Rome, and if found acting with the
+Barons, warn them that their Lord dies. Go--see to it without a moment’s
+delay. Meanwhile, to the chapel--we will hear mass.”
+
+Within an hour the Roman army--vast, miscellaneous--old men and boys,
+mingled with the vigour of life, were on their march to the Gate of San
+Lorenzo; of their number, which amounted to twenty thousand foot,
+not one-sixth could be deemed men-at-arms; but the cavalry were well
+equipped, and consisted of the lesser Barons and the more opulent
+citizens. At the head of these rode the Tribune in complete armour,
+and wearing on his casque a wreath of oak and olive leaves, wrought in
+silver. Before him waved the great gonfalon of Rome, while in front of
+this multitudinous array marched a procession of monks, of the order of
+St. Francis, (for the ecclesiastical body of Rome went chiefly with
+the popular spirit, and its enthusiastic leader,)--slowly chanting the
+following hymn, which was made inexpressibly startling and imposing at
+the close of each stanza, by the clash of arms, the blast of trumpets,
+and the deep roll of the drum; which formed, as it were, a martial
+chorus to the song:--
+
+Roman War-song.
+
+     1.
+
+     March, march for your hearths and your altars!
+     Cursed to all time be the dastard that falters,
+     Never on earth may his sins be forgiven
+     Death on his soul, shut the portals of heaven!
+     A curse on his heart, and a curse on his brain!--
+     Who strikes not for Rome, shall to Rome be her Cain!
+     Breeze fill our banners, sun gild our spears,
+     Spirito Santo, Cavaliers!
+
+     (Rienzi’s word of battle was “Spirito Santo Cavaliere”, i.e.
+     Cavalier in the singular number.  The plural number has been
+     employed in the text, as somewhat more animated, and
+     therefore better adapted to the kind of poetry into the
+     service of which the watchword has been pressed.)
+
+     Blow, trumpets, blow,
+     Blow, trumpets, blow,
+     Gaily to glory we come;
+     Like a king in his pomp,
+     To the blast of the tromp,
+     And the roar of the mighty drum!
+     Breeze fill our banners, sun gild our spears,
+     Spirito Santo, Cavaliers!
+
+     2.
+
+     March, march for your Freedom and Laws!
+     Earth is your witness--all Earth’s is your cause!
+     Seraph and saint from their glory shall heed ye,
+     The angel that smote the Assyrian shall lead ye;
+     To the Christ of the Cross man is never so holy
+     As in braving the proud in defence of the lowly!
+     Breeze fill our banners, sun gild our spears,
+     Spirito Santo, Cavaliers!
+     Blow, trumpets, blow,
+     Blow, trumpets, blow,
+     Gaily to glory we come;
+     Like a king in his pomp,
+     To the blast of the tromp,
+     And the roar of the mighty drum!
+     Breeze fill our banners, sun gild our spears,
+     Spirito Santo, Cavaliers!
+
+     3.
+
+     March, march! ye are sons of the Roman,
+     The sound of whose step was as fate to the foeman!
+     Whose realm, save the air and the wave, had no wall,
+     As he strode through the world like a lord in his hall;
+     Though your fame hath sunk down to the night of the grave,
+     It shall rise from the field like the sun from the wave.
+     Breeze fill our banners, sun gild our spears,
+     Spirito Santo, Cavaliers!
+     Blow, trumpets, blow,
+     Blow, trumpets, blow,
+     Gaily to glory we come;
+     Like a king in his pomp,
+     To the blast of the tromp,
+     And the roar of the mighty drum!
+     Breeze fill our banners, sun gild our spears,
+     Spirito Santo, Cavaliers!
+
+In this order they reached the wide waste that ruin and devastation
+left within the gates, and, marshalled in long lines on either side,
+extending far down the vistaed streets, and leaving a broad space in the
+centre, awaited the order of their leader.
+
+“Throw open the gates, and admit the foe!” cried Rienzi, with a loud
+voice; as the trumpets of the Barons, announced their approach.
+
+Meanwhile the insurgent Patricians, who had marched that morning from a
+place called the Monument, four miles distant, came gallantly and boldly
+on.
+
+With old Stephen, whose great height, gaunt frame, and lordly air,
+shewed well in his gorgeous mail, rode his sons,--the Frangipani and the
+Savelli, and Giordano Orsini, brother to Rinaldo.
+
+“Today the tyrant shall perish!” said the proud Baron; “and the flag of
+the Colonna shall wave from the Capitol.”
+
+“The flag of the Bear,” said Giordano Orsini, angrily.--“The victory
+will not be yours alone, my Lord!”
+
+“Our house ever took precedence in Rome,” replied the Colonna,
+haughtily.
+
+“Never, while one stone of the palaces of the Orsini stands upon
+another.”
+
+“Hush!” said Luca di Savelli; “are ye dividing the skin while the lion
+lives? We shall have fierce work today.”
+
+“Not so,” said the old Colonna; “John di Vico will turn, with his
+Romans, at the first onset, and some of the malcontents within have
+promised to open the gates.--How, knave?” as a scout rode up breathless
+to the Baron. “What tidings?”
+
+“The gates are opened--not a spear gleams from the walls!”
+
+“Did I not tell ye, Lords?” said the Colonna, turning round
+triumphantly. “Methinks we shall win Rome without a single
+blow.--Grandson, where now are thy silly forebodings?” This was said to
+Pietro, one of his grandsons--the first-born of Gianni--a comely youth,
+not two weeks wedded, who made no reply. “My little Pietro here,”
+ continued the Baron, speaking to his comrades, “is so new a bridegroom,
+that last night he dreamed of his bride; and deems it, poor lad, a
+portent.”
+
+“She was in deep mourning, and glided from my arms, uttering, ‘Woe, woe,
+to the Colonna!” said the young man, solemnly.
+
+“I have lived nearly ninety years,” replied the old man, “and I may have
+dreamed, therefore, some forty thousand dreams; of which, two came true,
+and the rest were false. Judge, then, what chances are in favour of the
+science!”
+
+Thus conversing, they approached within bow-shot of the gates, which
+were still open. All was silent as death. The army, which was composed
+chiefly of foreign mercenaries, halted in deliberation--when, lo!--a
+torch was suddenly cast on high over the walls; it gleamed a moment--and
+then hissed in the miry pool below.
+
+“It is the signal of our friends within, as agreed on,” cried old
+Colonna. “Pietro, advance with your company!” The young nobleman closed
+his visor, put himself at the head of the band under his command; and,
+with his lance in his rest, rode in a half gallop to the gates. The
+morning had been clouded and overcast, and the sun, appearing only at
+intervals, now broke out in a bright stream of light--as it glittered
+on the waving plume and shining mail of the young horseman, disappearing
+under the gloomy arch, several paces in advance of his troop. On swept
+his followers--forward went the cavalry headed by Gianni Colonna,
+Pietro’s father.--there was a minute’s silence, broken only by the
+clatter of the arms, and tramp of hoofs,--when from within the walls
+rose the abrupt cry--“Rome, the Tribune, and the People! Spirito Santo,
+Cavaliers!” The main body halted aghast. Suddenly Gianni Colonna was
+seen flying backward from the gate at full speed.
+
+“My son, my son!” he cried, “they have murdered him;”--he halted abrupt
+and irresolute, then adding, “But I will avenge!” wheeled round, and
+spurred again through the arch,--when a huge machine of iron, shaped as
+a portcullis, suddenly descended upon the unhappy father, and crushed
+man and horse to the ground--one blent, mangled, bloody mass.
+
+The old Colonna saw, and scarce believed his eyes; and ere his troop
+recovered its stupor, the machine rose, and over the corpse dashed
+the Popular Armament. Thousands upon thousands, they came on; a wild,
+clamorous, roaring stream. They poured on all sides upon their enemies,
+who drawn up in steady discipline, and clad in complete mail, received
+and broke their charge.
+
+“Revenge, and the Colonna!”--“The Bear and the Orsini!”--“Charity and
+the Frangipani!” (Who had taken their motto from some fabled ancestor
+who had broke bread with a beggar in a time of famine.) “Strike for
+the Snake (The Lion was, however, the animal usually arrogated by the
+heraldic vanity of the Savelli.) and the Savelli!” were then heard on
+high, mingled with the German and hoarse shout, “Full purses, and the
+Three Kings of Cologne.” The Romans, rather ferocious than disciplined,
+fell butchered in crowds round the ranks of the mercenaries: but as one
+fell, another succeeded; and still burst with undiminished fervour
+the countercry of “Rome, the Tribune, and the People!--Spirito Santo,
+Cavaliers!” Exposed to every shaft and every sword by his emblematic
+diadem and his imperial robe, the fierce Rienzi led on each assault,
+wielding an enormous battle-axe, for the use of which the Italians were
+celebrated, and which he regarded as a national weapon. Inspired by
+every darker and sterner instinct of his nature, his blood heated, his
+passions aroused, fighting as a citizen for liberty, as a monarch
+for his crown, his daring seemed to the astonished foe as that of one
+frantic; his preservation that of one inspired: now here, now there;
+wherever flagged his own, or failed the opposing, force, glittered his
+white robe, and rose his bloody battle-axe; but his fury seemed rather
+directed against the chiefs than the herd; and still where his charger
+wheeled was heard his voice, “Where is a Colonna?”--“Defiance to the
+Orsini!”--“Spirito Santo, Cavaliers!” Three times was the sally led from
+the gate; three times were the Romans beaten back; and on the third, the
+gonfalon, borne before the Tribune, was cloven to the ground. Then, for
+the first time, he seemed amazed and alarmed, and, raising his eyes to
+heaven, he exclaimed, “O Lord, hast thou then forsaken me?” With that,
+taking heart, once more he waved his arm, and again led forward his wild
+array.
+
+At eve the battle ceased. Of the Barons who had been the main object of
+the Tribune’s assault, the pride and boast was broken. Of the princely
+line of the Colonna, three lay dead. Giordano Orsini was mortally
+wounded; the fierce Rinaldo had not shared the conflict. Of the
+Frangipani, the haughtiest signors were no more; and Luca, the dastard
+head of the Savelli, had long since saved himself by flight. On the
+other hand, the slaughter of the citizens had been prodigious;--the
+ground was swamped with blood--and over heaps of slain, (steeds and
+riders,) the twilight star beheld Rienzi and the Romans returning
+victors from the pursuit. Shouts of rejoicing followed the Tribune’s
+panting steed through the arch; and just as he entered the space within,
+crowds of those whose infirmities, sex, or years, had not allowed them
+to share the conflict,--women, and children, and drivelling age, mingled
+with the bare feet and dark robes of monks and friars, apprised of the
+victory, were prepared to hail his triumph.
+
+Rienzi reined his steed by the corpse of the boy Colonna, which lay
+half immersed in a pool of water, and close by it, removed from the arch
+where he had fallen, lay that of Gianni Colonna,--(that Gianni Colonna
+whose spear had dismissed his brother’s gentle spirit.) He glanced over
+the slain, as the melancholy Hesperus played upon the bloody pool and
+the gory corselet, with a breast heaved with many emotions; and turning,
+he saw the young Angelo, who, with some of Nina’s guard, had repaired to
+the spot, and had now approached the Tribune.
+
+“Child,” said Rienzi, pointing to the dead, “blessed art thou who hast
+no blood of kindred to avenge!--to him who hath, sooner or later comes
+the hour; and an awful hour it is!”
+
+The words sank deep into Angelo’s heart, and in after life became words
+of fate to the speaker and the listener.
+
+Ere Rienzi had well recovered himself, and as were heard around him
+the shrieks of the widows and mothers of the slain--the groans of the
+dying--the exhortations of the friars--mingled with sounds of joy
+and triumph--a cry was raised by the women and stragglers on the
+battle-field without, of “The foe!--the foe!”
+
+“To your swords,” cried the Tribune; “fall back in order;--yet they
+cannot be so bold!”
+
+The tramp of horses, the blast of a trumpet, were heard; and presently,
+at full speed, some thirty horsemen dashed through the gate.
+
+“Your bows,” exclaimed the Tribune, advancing;--“yet hold--the leader
+is unarmed--it is our own banner. By our Lady, it is our ambassador of
+Naples, the Lord Adrian di Castello!”
+
+Panting--breathless--covered with dust--Adrian halted at the pool red
+with the blood of his kindred--and their pale faces, set in death,
+glared upon him.
+
+“Too late--alas! alas!--dread fate!--unhappy Rome!”
+
+“They fell into the pit they themselves had digged,” said the Tribune,
+in a firm but hollow voice.--“Noble Adrian, would thy counsels had
+prevented this!”
+
+“Away, proud man--away!” said Adrian, impatiently waving his
+hand,--“thou shouldst protect the lives of Romans, and--oh,
+Gianni!--Pietro!--could not birth, renown, and thy green years, poor
+boy--could not these save ye?”
+
+“Pardon him, my friends,” said the Tribune to the crowd,--“his grief is
+natural, and he knows not all their guilt.--Back, I pray ye--leave him
+to our ministering.”
+
+It might have fared ill for Adrian, but for the Tribune’s brief speech.
+And as the young Lord, dismounting, now bent over his kinsmen--the
+Tribune also surrendering his charger to his squires, approached, and,
+despite Adrian’s reluctance and aversion, drew him aside,--
+
+“Young friend,” said he, mournfully, “my heart bleeds for you; yet
+bethink thee, the wrath of the crowd is fresh upon them: be prudent.”
+
+“Prudent!”
+
+“Hush--by my honour, these men were not worthy of your name. Twice
+perjured--once assassins--twice rebels--listen to me!”
+
+“Tribune, I ask no other construing of what I see--they might have died
+justly, or been butchered foully. But there is no peace between the
+executioner of my race and me.”
+
+“Will you, too, be forsworn? Thine oath!--Come, come, I hear not these
+words. Be composed--retire--and if, three days hence, you impute any
+other blame to me than that of unwise lenity, I absolve you from your
+oath, and you are free to be my foe. The crowd gape and gaze upon us--a
+minute more, and I may not avail to save you.”
+
+The feelings of the young patrician were such as utterly baffle
+description. He had never been much amongst his house, nor ever received
+more than common courtesy at their hands. But lineage is lineage still!
+And there, in the fatal hazard of war, lay the tree and sapling, the
+prime and hope of his race. He felt there was no answer to the Tribune,
+the very place of their death proved they had fallen in an assault upon
+their countrymen. He sympathised not with their cause, but their fate.
+And rage, revenge alike forbidden--his heart was the more softened
+to the shock and paralysis of grief. He did not therefore speak, but
+continued to gaze upon the dead, while large and unheeded tears flowed
+down his cheeks, and his attitude of dejection and sorrow was so moving,
+that the crowd, at first indignant, now felt for his affliction.
+At length his mind seemed made up. He turned to Rienzi, and said,
+falteringly, “Tribune, I blame you not, nor accuse. If you have been
+rash in this, God will have blood for blood. I wage no war with you--you
+say right, my oath prevents me; and if you govern well, I can still
+remember that I am Roman. But--but--look to that bleeding clay--we meet
+no more!--your sister--God be with her!--between her and me flows a dark
+gulf!” The young noble paused some moments, choked by his emotions,
+and then continued, “These papers discharge me of my mission.
+Standard-bearers, lay down the banner of the Republic. Tribune, speak
+not--I would be calm--calm. And so farewell to Rome.” With a hurried
+glance towards the dead, he sprung upon his steed, and, followed by his
+train, vanished through the arch.
+
+The Tribune had not attempted to detain him--had not interrupted him.
+He felt that the young noble had thought--acted as became him best. He
+followed him with his eyes.
+
+“And thus,” said he gloomily, “Fate plucks from me my noblest friend and
+my justest counsellor--better man Rome never lost!”
+
+Such is the eternal doom of disordered states. The mediator between rank
+and rank,--the kindly noble--the dispassionate patriot--the first to
+act--the most hailed in action--darkly vanishes from the scene. Fiercer
+and more unscrupulous spirits alone stalk the field; and no neutral and
+harmonizing link remains between hate and hate,--until exhaustion, sick
+with horrors, succeeds to frenzy, and despotism is welcomed as repose!
+
+
+
+Chapter 5.IV. The Hollowness of the Base.
+
+The rapid and busy march of state events has led us long away from
+the sister of the Tribune and the betrothed of Adrian. And the sweet
+thoughts and gentle day-dreams of that fair and enamoured girl, however
+full to her of an interest beyond all the storms and perils of ambition,
+are not so readily adapted to narration:--their soft monotony a few
+words can paint. They knew but one image, they tended to but one
+prospect. Shrinking from the glare of her brother’s court, and eclipsed,
+when she forced herself to appear, by the more matured and dazzling
+beauty, and all-commanding presence, of Nina,--to her the pomp and
+crowd seemed an unreal pageant, from which she retired to the truth of
+life,--the hopes and musings of her own heart. Poor girl! with all the
+soft and tender nature of her dead brother, and none of the stern genius
+and the prodigal ambition,--the eye-fatiguing ostentation and fervour of
+the living--she was but ill-fitted for the unquiet but splendid region
+to which she was thus suddenly transferred.
+
+With all her affection for Rienzi, she could not conquer a certain fear
+which, conjoined with the difference of sex and age, forbade her to be
+communicative with him upon the subject most upon her heart.
+
+As the absence of Adrian at the Neapolitan Court passed the anticipated
+date, (for at no Court then, with a throne fiercely disputed, did
+the Tribune require a nobler or more intelligent representative,--and
+intrigues and counter-intrigues delayed his departure from week to
+week), she grew uneasy and alarmed. Like many, themselves unseen,
+inactive, the spectators of the scene, she saw involuntarily further
+into the time than the deeper intellect either of the Tribune or Nina;
+and the dangerous discontent of the nobles was visible and audible to
+her in looks and whispers, which reached not acuter or more suspected
+ears and eyes. Anxiously, restlessly, did she long for the return
+of Adrian, not from selfish motives alone, but from well-founded
+apprehensions for her brother. With Adrian di Castello, alike a noble
+and a patriot, each party had found a mediator, and his presence grew
+daily more needed, till at length the conspiracy of the Barons had
+broken out. From that hour she scarcely dared to hope; her calm sense,
+unblinded by the high-wrought genius which, as too often happens, made
+the Tribune see harsh realities through a false and brilliant light,
+perceived that the Rubicon was passed; and through all the events
+that followed she could behold but two images--danger to her brother,
+separation from her betrothed.
+
+With Nina alone could her full heart confer; for Nina, with all the
+differences of character, was a woman who loved. And this united them.
+In the earlier power of Rienzi, many of their happiest hours had been
+passed together, remote from the gaudy crowd, alone and unrestrained,
+in the summer nights, on the moonlit balconies, in that interchange
+of thought, sympathy, and consolation, which to two impassioned and
+guileless women makes the most interesting occupation and the most
+effectual solace. But of late, this intercourse had been much marred.
+From the morning in which the Barons had received their pardon, to that
+on which they had marched on Rome, had been one succession of fierce
+excitements. Every face Irene saw was clouded and overcast--all gaiety
+was suspended--bustling and anxious councillors, or armed soldiers, had
+for days been the only visitors of the palace. Rienzi had been seen but
+for short moments: his brow wrapt in care. Nina had been more fond, more
+caressing than ever, but in those caresses there seemed a mournful and
+ominous compassion. The attempts at comfort and hope were succeeded by
+a sickly smile and broken words; and Irene was prepared, by the
+presentiments of her own heart, for the stroke that fell--victory was to
+her brother--his foe was crushed--Rome was free--but the lofty house
+of the Colonnas had lost its stateliest props, and Adrian was gone for
+ever!--She did not blame him; she could not blame her brother; each
+had acted as became his several station. She was the poor sacrifice of
+events and fate--the Iphigenia to the Winds which were to bear the bark
+of Rome to the haven, or, it might be, to whelm it in the abyss. She was
+stunned by the blow; she did not even weep or complain; she bowed to the
+storm that swept over her, and it passed. For two days she neither took
+food nor rest; she shut herself up; she asked only the boon of solitude:
+but on the third morning she recovered as by a miracle, for on the third
+morning, the following letter was left at the palace:--
+
+“Irene,--Ere this you have learned my deep cause of grief; you feel
+that to a Colonna Rome can no longer be a home, nor Rome’s Tribune be
+a brother. While I write these words honour but feebly supports me: all
+the hopes I had formed, all the prospects I had pictured, all the love
+I bore and bear thee, rush upon my heart, and I can only feel that I am
+wretched. Irene, Irene, your sweet face rises before me, and in those
+beloved eyes I read that I am forgiven,--I am understood; and dearly as
+I know thou lovest me, thou wouldst rather I were lost to thee, rather I
+were in the grave with my kinsmen, than know I lived the reproach of my
+order, the recreant of my name. Ah! why was I a Colonna? why did Fortune
+make me noble, and nature and circumstance attach me to the people? I am
+barred alike from love and from revenge; all my revenge falls upon
+thee and me. Adored! we are perhaps separated for ever; but, by all
+the happiness I have known by thy side--by all the rapture of which I
+dreamed--by that delicious hour which first gave thee to my gaze, when
+I watched the soft soul returning to thine eyes and lip--by thy first
+blushing confession of love--by our first kiss--by our last farewell--I
+swear to be faithful to thee to the last. None other shall ever chase
+thine image from my heart. And now, when Hope seems over, Faith becomes
+doubly sacred; and thou, my beautiful, wilt thou not remember me? wilt
+thou not feel as if we were the betrothed of Heaven? In the legends of
+the North we are told of the knight who, returning from the Holy Land,
+found his mistress (believing his death) the bride of Heaven, and he
+built a hermitage by the convent where she dwelt; and, though they never
+saw each other more, their souls were faithful unto death. Even so,
+Irene, be we to each other--dead to all else--betrothed in memory--to
+be wedded above! And yet, yet ere I close, one hope dawns upon me. Thy
+brother’s career, bright and lofty, may be but as a falling star;
+should darkness swallow it, should his power cease, should his throne be
+broken, and Rome know no more her Tribune; shouldst thou no longer
+have a brother in the judge and destroyer of my house; shouldst thou be
+stricken from pomp and state; shouldst thou be friendless, kindredless,
+alone--then, without a stain on mine honour, without the shame and odium
+of receiving power and happiness from hands yet red with the blood of
+my race, I may claim thee as my own. Honour ceases to command when thou
+ceasest to be great. I dare not too fondly indulge this dream, perchance
+it is a sin in both. But it must be whispered, that thou mayest know
+all thy Adrian, all his weakness and his strength. My own loved, my
+ever loved, loved more fondly now when loved despairingly, farewell! May
+angels heal thy sorrow, and guard me from sin, that hereafter at least
+we may meet again!”
+
+“He loves me--he loves me still!” said the maiden, weeping at last; “and
+I am blest once more!”
+
+With that letter pressed to her heart she recovered outwardly from the
+depth of her affliction; she met her brother with a smile, and Nina
+with embraces; and if still she pined and sorrowed, it was in that
+“concealment” which is the “worm i’ the bud.”
+
+Meanwhile, after the first flush of victory, lamentation succeeded to
+joy in Rome; so great had been the slaughter that the private grief was
+large enough to swallow up all public triumph; and many of the mourners
+blamed even their defender for the swords of the assailant, “Roma fu
+terribilmente vedovata.” (“Rome was terribly widowed.”) The numerous
+funerals deeply affected the Tribune; and, in proportion to his sympathy
+with his people, grew his stern indignation against the Barons. Like all
+men whose religion is intense, passionate, and zealous, the Tribune had
+little toleration for those crimes which went to the root of religion.
+Perjury was to him the most base and inexpiable of offences, and the
+slain Barons had been twice perjured: in the bitterness of his wrath he
+forbade their families for some days to lament over their remains;
+and it was only in private and in secret that he permitted them to be
+interred in their ancestral vaults: an excess of vengeance which
+sullied his laurels, but which was scarcely inconsistent with the stern
+patriotism of his character. Impatient to finish what he had begun,
+anxious to march at once to Marino, where the insurgents collected their
+shattered force, he summoned his Council, and represented the certainty
+of victory, and its result in the complete restoration of peace. But
+pay was due to the soldiery; they already murmured; the treasury was
+emptied, it was necessary to fill it by raising a new tax.
+
+Among the councillors were some whose families had suffered grievously
+in the battle--they lent a lukewarm attention to propositions
+of continued strife. Others, among whom was Pandulfo, timid but
+well-meaning, aware that grief and terror even of their own triumph
+had produced reaction amongst the people, declared that they would not
+venture to propose a new tax. A third party, headed by Baroncelli--a
+demagogue whose ambition was without principle--but who, by pandering
+to the worst passions of the populace, by a sturdy coarseness of nature
+with which they sympathised--and by that affectation of advancing what
+we now term the “movement,” which often gives to the fiercest fool an
+advantage over the most prudent statesman, had quietly acquired a great
+influence with the lower ranks--offered a more bold opposition. They
+dared even to blame the proud Tribune for the gorgeous extravagance they
+had themselves been the first to recommend--and half insinuated
+sinister and treacherous motives in his acquittal of the Barons from
+the accusation of Rodolf. In the very Parliament which the Tribune
+had revived and remodelled for the support of freedom--freedom was
+abandoned. His fiery eloquence met with a gloomy silence, and finally,
+the votes were against his propositions for the new tax and the march
+to Marino. Rienzi broke up the Council in haste and disorder. As he left
+the hall, a letter was put into his hands; he read it, and remained for
+some moments as one thunderstruck. He then summoned the Captain of his
+Guards, and ordered a band of fifty horsemen to be prepared for his
+commands; he repaired to Nina’s apartment, he found her alone, and
+stood for some moments gazing upon her so intently that she was awed and
+chilled from all attempt at speech. At length he said, abruptly--
+
+“We must part.”
+
+“Part!”
+
+“Yes, Nina--your guard is preparing; you have relations, I have friends,
+at Florence. Florence must be your home.”
+
+“Cola,--”
+
+“Look not on me thus.--in power, in state, in safety--you were my
+ornament and counsellor. Now you but embarrass me. And--”
+
+“Oh, Cola, speak not thus! What hath chanced? Be not so cold--frown
+not--turn not away! Am I not something more to thee, than the partner
+of joyous hours--the minion of love? Am I not thy wife, Cola--not thy
+leman?”
+
+“Too dear--too dear to me,” muttered the Tribune; “with thee by my side
+I shall be but half a Roman. Nina, the base slaves whom I myself made
+free desert me.--Now, in the very hour in which I might sweep away for
+ever all obstacles to the regeneration of Rome--now, when one conquest
+points the path to complete success--now when the land is visible, my
+fortune suddenly leaves me in the midst of the seas! There is greater
+danger now than in the rage of the Barons--the Barons are fled; it is
+the People who are becoming traitors to Rome and to me.”
+
+“And wouldst thou have me traitor also! No, Cola; in death itself Nina
+shall be beside thee. Life and honour are reflected but from thee, and
+the stroke that slays the substance, shall destroy the humble shadow. I
+will not part from thee.”
+
+“Nina,” said the Tribune, contending with strong and convulsive
+emotion--“it may be literally of death that you speak.--Go! leave one
+who can no longer protect you or Rome!”
+
+“Never--Never.”
+
+“You are resolved?”
+
+“I am.”
+
+“Be it so,” said the Tribune, with deep sadness in his tone. “Arm
+thyself for the worst.”
+
+“There is no worst with thee, Cola!”
+
+“Come to my arms, brave woman; thy words rebuke my weakness. But my
+sister!--if I fall, you, Nina, will not survive--your beauty a prey to
+the most lustful heart and the strongest hand. We will have the same
+tomb on the wrecks of Roman liberty. But Irene is of weaker mould; poor
+child, I have robbed her of a lover, and now--”
+
+“You are right; let Irene go. And in truth we may well disguise from
+her the real cause of her departure. Change of scene were best for her
+grief; and under all circumstances would seem decorum to the curious. I
+will see and prepare her.”
+
+“Do so, sweetheart. I would gladly be a moment alone with thought. But
+remember, she must part today--our sands run low.”
+
+As the door closed on Nina, the Tribune took out the letter and again
+read it deliberately. “So the Pope’s Legate left Sienna:--prayed that
+Republic to withdraw its auxiliary troops from Rome--proclaimed me a
+rebel and a heretic;--thence repaired to Marino;--now in council with
+the Barons. Why, have my dreams belied me, then--false as the waking
+things that flatter and betray by day? In such peril will the people
+forsake me and themselves? Army of saints and martyrs, shades of heroes
+and patriots, have ye abandoned for ever your ancient home? No, no, I
+was not raised to perish thus; I will defeat them yet--and leave my name
+a legacy to Rome; a warning to the oppressor--an example to the free!”
+
+
+
+Chapter 5.V. The Rottenness of the Edifice.
+
+The kindly skill of Nina induced Irene to believe that it was but the
+tender consideration of her brother to change a scene embittered by her
+own thoughts, and in which the notoriety of her engagement with Adrian
+exposed her to all that could mortify and embarrass, that led to the
+proposition of her visit to Florence. Its suddenness was ascribed to the
+occasion of an unexpected mission to Florence, (for a loan of arms and
+money,) which thus gave her a safe and honoured escort.--Passively she
+submitted to what she herself deemed a relief; and it was agreed that
+she should for a while be the guest of a relation of Nina’s, who was the
+abbess of one of the wealthiest of the Florentine convents: the idea of
+monastic seclusion was welcome to the bruised heart and wearied spirit.
+
+But though not apprised of the immediate peril of Rienzi, it was with
+deep sadness and gloomy forebodings that she returned his embrace and
+parting blessing; and when at length alone in her litter, and beyond the
+gates of Rome, she repented a departure to which the chance of danger
+gave the appearance of desertion.
+
+Meanwhile, as the declining day closed around the litter and its troop,
+more turbulent actors in the drama demand our audience. The traders
+and artisans of Rome at that time, and especially during the popular
+government of Rienzi, held weekly meetings in each of the thirteen
+quarters of the city. And in the most democratic of these, Cecco del
+Vecchio was an oracle and leader. It was at that assembly, over which
+the smith presided, that the murmurs that preceded the earthquake were
+heard.
+
+“So,” cried one of the company--Luigi, the goodly butcher,--“they say
+he wanted to put a new tax on us; and that is the reason he broke up the
+Council today, because, good men, they were honest, and had bowels for
+the people: it is a shame and a sin that the treasury should be empty.”
+
+“I told him,” said the smith, “to beware how he taxed the people. Poor
+men won’t be taxed. But as he does not follow my advice, he must take
+the consequence--the horse runs from one hand, the halter remains in the
+other.”
+
+“Take your advice, Cecco! I warrant me his stomach is too high for that
+now. Why he is grown as proud as a pope.”
+
+“For all that, he is a great man,” said one of the party. “He gave us
+laws--he rid the Campagna of robbers--filled the streets with merchants,
+and the shops with wares--defeated the boldest lords and fiercest
+soldiery of Italy--”
+
+“And now wants to tax the people!--that’s all the thanks we get for
+helping him,” said the grumbling Cecco. “What would he have been without
+us?--we that make, can unmake.”
+
+“But,” continued the advocate, seeing that he had his supporters--“but
+then he taxes us for our own liberties.”
+
+“Who strikes at them now?” asked the butcher.
+
+“Why the Barons are daily mustering new strength at Marino.”
+
+“Marino is not Rome,” said Luigi, the butcher. “Let’s wait till they
+come to our gates again--we know how to receive them. Though, for
+the matter of that, I think we have had enough fighting--my two poor
+brothers had each a stab too much for them. Why won’t the Tribune, if he
+be a great man, let us have peace? All we want now is quiet.”
+
+“Ah!” said a seller of horse-harness. “Let him make it up with the
+Barons. They were good customers after all.”
+
+“For my part,” said a merry-looking fellow, who had been a gravedigger
+in bad times, and had now opened a stall of wares for the living, “I
+could forgive him all, but bathing in the holy vase of porphyry.”
+
+“Ah, that was a bad job,” said several, shaking their heads.
+
+“And the knighthood was but a silly show, an’ it were not for the wine
+from the horse’s nostrils--that had some sense in it.”
+
+“My masters,” said Cecco, “the folly was in not beheading the Barons
+when he had them all in the net; and so Messere Baroncelli says. (Ah,
+Baroncelli is an honest man, and follows no half measures!) It was a
+sort of treason to the people not to do so. Why, but for that, we should
+never have lost so many tall fellows by the gate of San Lorenzo.”
+
+“True, true, it was a shame; some say the Barons bought him.”
+
+“And then,” said another, “those poor Lords Colonna--boy and man--they
+were the best of the family, save the Castello. I vow I pitied them.”
+
+“But to the point,” said one of the crowd, the richest of the set; “the
+tax is the thing.--The ingratitude to tax us.--Let him dare to do it!”
+
+“Oh, he will not dare, for I hear that the Pope’s bristles are up at
+last; so he will only have us to depend upon!”
+
+The door was thrown open--a man rushed in open-mouthed--
+
+“Masters, masters, the Pope’s legate has arrived at Rome, and sent for
+the Tribune, who has just left his presence.”
+
+Ere his auditors had recovered their surprise, the sound of trumpets
+made them rush forth; they saw Rienzi sweep by with his usual cavalcade,
+and in his proud array. The twilight was advancing, and torch-bearers
+preceded his way. Upon his countenance was deep calm but it was not the
+calm of contentment. He passed on, and the street was again desolate.
+Meanwhile Rienzi reached the Capitol in silence, and mounted to the
+apartments of the palace, where Nina, pale and breathless, awaited his
+return.
+
+“Well, well, thou smilest! No--it is that dread smile, worse than
+frowns. Speak, beloved, speak! What said the Cardinal?”
+
+“Little thou wilt love to hear. He spoke at first high and solemnly,
+about the crime of declaring the Romans free; next about the treason of
+asserting that the election of the King of Rome was in the hands of the
+Romans.”
+
+“Well--thy answer.”
+
+“That which became Rome’s Tribune: I re-asserted each right, and proved
+it. The Cardinal passed to other charges.”
+
+“What?”
+
+“The blood of the Barons by San Lorenzo--blood only shed in our own
+defence against perjured assailants; this is in reality the main crime.
+The Colonna have the Pope’s ear. Furthermore, the sacrilege--yes, the
+sacrilege (come laugh, Nina, laugh!) of bathing in a vase of porphyry
+used by Constantine while yet a heathen.”
+
+“Can it be! What saidst thou?”
+
+“I laughed. ‘Cardinal,’ quoth I, ‘what was not too good for a heathen
+is not too good for a Christian Catholic!’ And verily the sour Frenchman
+looked as if I had smote him on the hip. When he had done, I asked him,
+in my turn, ‘Is it alleged against me that I have wronged one man in my
+judgment-court?’--Silence. ‘Is it said that I have broken one law of
+the state?’--Silence. ‘Is it even whispered that trade does not
+flourish--that life is not safe--that abroad or at home the Roman
+name is not honoured, to that point which no former rule can
+parallel?’--Silence. ‘Then,’ said I, ‘Lord Cardinal, I demand thy
+thanks, not thy censure.’ The Frenchman looked, and looked, and
+trembled, and shrunk, and then out he spake. ‘I have but one mission to
+fulfil, on the part of the Pontiff--resign at once thy Tribuneship, or
+the Church inflicts upon thee its solemn curse.’”
+
+“How--how?” said Nina, turning very pale; “what is it that awaits thee?”
+
+“Excommunication!”
+
+This awful sentence, by which the spiritual arm had so often stricken
+down the fiercest foe, came to Nina’s ear as a knell. She covered her
+face with her hands. Rienzi paced the room with rapid strides. “The
+curse!” he muttered; “the Church’s curse--for me--for ME!”
+
+“Oh, Cola! didst thou not seek to pacify this stern--”
+
+“Pacify! Death and dishonour! Pacify! ‘Cardinal,’ I said, and I felt his
+soul shrivel at my gaze, ‘my power I received from the people--to the
+people alone I render it. For my soul, man’s word cannot scathe it.
+Thou, haughty priest, thou thyself art the accursed, if, puppet and tool
+of low cabals and exiled tyrants, thou breathest but a breath in the
+name of the Lord of Justice, for the cause of the oppressor, and against
+the rights of the oppressed.’ With that I left him, and now--”
+
+“Ay, now--now what will happen? Excommunication! In the metropolis of
+the Church, too--the superstition of the people! Oh, Cola!”
+
+“If,” muttered Rienzi, “my conscience condemned me of one crime--if I
+had stained my hands in one just man’s blood--if I had broken one law
+I myself had framed--if I had taken bribes, or wronged the poor, or
+scorned the orphan, or shut my heart to the widow--then, then--but no!
+Lord, thou wilt not desert me!”
+
+“But man may!” thought Nina mournfully, as she perceived that one of
+Rienzi’s dark fits of fanatical and mystical revery was growing over
+him--fits which he suffered no living eye, not even Nina’s, to witness
+when they gathered to their height. And now, indeed, after a short
+interval of muttered soliloquy, in which his face worked so that the
+veins on his temples swelled like cords, he abruptly left the room, and
+sought the private oratory connected with his closet. Over the emotions
+there indulged let us draw the veil. Who shall describe those awful and
+mysterious moments, when man, with all his fiery passions, turbulent
+thoughts, wild hopes, and despondent fears, demands the solitary
+audience of his Maker?
+
+It was long after this conference with Nina, and the midnight bell had
+long tolled, when Rienzi stood alone, upon one of the balconies of the
+palace, to cool, in the starry air, the fever that yet lingered on his
+exhausted frame. The night was exceedingly calm, the air clear, but
+chill, for it was now December. He gazed intently upon those solemn orbs
+to which our wild credulity has referred the prophecies of our doom.
+
+“Vain science!” thought the Tribune, “and gloomy fantasy, that man’s
+fate is pre-ordained--irrevocable--unchangeable, from the moment of his
+birth! Yet, were the dream not baseless, fain would I know which of
+yon stately lights is my natal star,--which images--which reflects--my
+career in life, and the memory I shall leave in death.” As this thought
+crossed him, and his gaze was still fixed above, he saw, as if made
+suddenly more distinct than the stars around it, that rapid and fiery
+comet which in the winter of 1347 dismayed the superstitions of those
+who recognised in the stranger of the heavens the omen of disaster and
+of woe. He recoiled as it met his eye, and muttered to himself, “Is such
+indeed my type! or, if the legendary lore speak true, and these strange
+fires portend nations ruined and rulers overthrown, does it foretell my
+fate? I will think no more.” (Alas! if by the Romans associated with the
+fall of Rienzi, that comet was by the rest of Europe connected with the
+more dire calamity of the Great Plague that so soon afterwards ensued.)
+As his eyes fell, they rested upon the colossal Lion of Basalt in the
+place below, the starlight investing its grey and towering form with a
+more ghostly whiteness; and then it was, that he perceived two figures
+in black robes lingering by the pedestal which supported the statue, and
+apparently engaged in some occupation which he could not guess. A fear
+shot through his veins, for he had never been able to divest himself
+of the vague idea that there was some solemn and appointed connexion
+between his fate and that old Lion of Basalt. Somewhat relieved, he
+heard his sentry challenge the intruders; and as they came forward to
+the light, he perceived that they wore the garments of monks.
+
+“Molest us not, son,” said one of them to the sentry. “By order of the
+Legate of the Holy Father we affix to this public monument of justice
+and of wrath, the bull of excommunication against a heretic and rebel.
+WOE TO THE ACCURSED OF THE CHURCH!”
+
+
+
+Chapter 5.VI. The Fall of the Temple.
+
+It was as a thunderbolt in a serene day--the reverse of the Tribune in
+the zenith of his power, in the abasement of his foe; when, with but a
+handful of brave Romans, determined to be free, he might have crushed
+for ever the antagonist power to the Roman liberties--have secured the
+rights of his country, and filled up the measure of his own renown. Such
+a reverse was the very mockery of Fate, who bore him through disaster,
+to abandon him in the sunniest noon of his prosperity.
+
+The next morning not a soul was to be seen in the streets; the shops
+were shut--the churches closed; the city was as under an interdict. The
+awful curse of the papal excommunication upon the chief magistrate of
+the Pontifical City, seemed to freeze up all the arteries of life. The
+Legate himself, affecting fear of his life, had fled to Monte Fiascone,
+where he was joined by the Barons immediately after the publication of
+the edict. The curse worked best in the absence of the execrator.
+
+Towards evening a few persons might be seen traversing the broad space
+of the Capitol, crossing themselves, as the bull, placarded on the Lion,
+met their eyes, and disappearing within the doors of the great palace.
+By and by, a few anxious groups collected in the streets, but they
+soon dispersed. It was a paralysis of all intercourse and commune. That
+spiritual and unarmed authority, which, like the invisible hand of God,
+desolated the market-place, and humbled the crowned head, no physical
+force could rally against or resist. Yet, through the universal awe, one
+conviction touched the multitude--it was for them that their Tribune
+was thus blasted in the midst of his glories! The words of the
+Brand recorded against him on wall and column detailed his
+offences:--rebellion in asserting the liberties of Rome--heresy in
+purifying ecclesiastical abuses;--and, to serve for a miserable covert
+to the rest, it was sacrilege for bathing in the porphyry vase of
+Constantine! They felt the conviction; they sighed--they shuddered--and,
+in his vast palace, save a few attached and devoted hearts, the Tribune
+was alone!
+
+The staunchest of his Tuscan soldiery were gone with Irene. The rest
+of his force, save a few remaining guards, was the paid Roman militia,
+composed of citizens; who, long discontented by the delay of their
+stipends, now seized on the excuse of the excommunication to remain
+passive, but grumbling, in their homes.
+
+On the third day, a new incident broke upon the death-like lethargy of
+the city; a hundred and fifty mercenaries, with Pepin of Minorbino, a
+Neapolitan, half noble, half bandit, (a creature of Montreal’s) at their
+head, entered the city, seized upon the fortresses of the Colonna, and
+sent a herald through the city, proclaiming in the name of the Cardinal
+Legate, the reward of ten thousand florins for the head of Cola di
+Rienzi.
+
+Then, swelled on high, shrill but not inspiring as of old, the great
+bell of the Capitol--the people, listless, disheartened, awed by the
+spiritual fear of the papal authority, (yet greater, in such events,
+since the removal of the see,) came unarmed to the Capitol; and there,
+by the Place of the Lion, stood the Tribune. His squires, below the
+step, held his war-horse, his helm, and the same battle-axe which had
+blazed in the van of victorious war.
+
+Beside him were a few of his guard, his attendants, and two or three of
+the principal citizens.
+
+He stood bareheaded and erect, gazing upon the abashed and unarmed crowd
+with a look of bitter scorn, mingled with deep compassion; and, as the
+bell ceased its toll, and the throng remained hushed and listening, he
+thus spoke:--
+
+“Ye come, then, once again! Come ye as slaves or freemen? A handful
+of armed men are in your walls: will ye who chased from your gates the
+haughtiest knights--the most practised battle-men of Rome, succumb now
+to one hundred and fifty hirelings and strangers? Will ye arm for
+your Tribune? You are silent!--be it so. Will you arm for your own
+liberties--your own Rome? Silent still! By the saints that reign on the
+thrones of the heathen gods! are ye thus fallen from your birthright?
+Have you no arms for your own defence? Romans, hear me! Have I wronged
+you?--if so, by your hands let me die: and then, with knives yet reeking
+with my blood, go forward against the robber who is but the herald of
+your slavery; and I die honoured, grateful, and avenged. You weep! Great
+God! you weep! Ay, and I could weep, too--that I should live to speak
+of liberty in vain to Romans--Weep! is this an hour for tears? Weep
+now, and your tears shall ripen harvests of crime, and licence, and
+despotism, to come! Romans, arm! follow me at once to the Place of the
+Colonna: expel this ruffian--expel your enemy (no matter what afterwards
+you do to me):” he paused; no ardour was kindled by his words--“or,” he
+continued, “I abandon you to your fate.” There was a long, low, general
+murmur; at length it became shaped into speech, and many voices cried
+simultaneously: “The Pope’s bull!--Thou art a man accursed!”
+
+“What!” cried the Tribune; “and is it ye who forsake me, ye for whose
+cause alone man dares to hurl against me the thunders of his God? Is it
+not for you that I am declared heretic and rebel! What are my imputed
+crimes? That I have made Rome and asserted Italy to be free; that I
+have subdued the proud Magnates, who were the scourge both of Pope and
+People. And you--you upbraid me with what I have dared and done for you!
+Men, with you I would have fought, for you I would have perished. You
+forsake yourselves in forsaking me, and since I no longer rule over
+brave men, I resign my power to the tyrant you prefer. Seven months
+I have ruled over you, prosperous in commerce, stainless in
+justice--victorious in the field:--I have shown you what Rome could be;
+and, since I abdicate the government ye gave me, when I am gone, strike
+for your own freedom! It matters nothing who is the chief of a brave
+and great people. Prove that Rome hath many a Rienzi, but of brighter
+fortunes.”
+
+“I would he had not sought to tax us,” said Cecco del Vecchio, who
+was the very personification of the vulgar feeling: “and that he had
+beheaded the Barons!”
+
+“Ay!” cried the ex-gravedigger; “but that blessed porphyry vase!”
+
+“And why should we get our throats cut,” said Luigi, the butcher, “like
+my two brothers?--Heaven rest them!”
+
+On the face of the general multitude there was a common expression of
+irresolution and shame, many wept and groaned, none (save the aforesaid
+grumblers) accused; none upbraided, but none seemed disposed to arm. It
+was one of those listless panics, those strange fits of indifference and
+lethargy which often seize upon a people who make liberty a matter of
+impulse and caprice, to whom it has become a catchword, who have not
+long enjoyed all its rational, and sound, and practical, and blessed
+results; who have been affrayed by the storms that herald its dawn;--a
+people such as is common to the south: such as even the north has known;
+such as, had Cromwell lived a year longer, even England might have seen;
+and, indeed, in some measure, such a reaction from popular enthusiasm
+to popular indifference England did see, when her children madly
+surrendered the fruits of a bloody war, without reserve, without
+foresight, to the lewd pensioner of Louis, and the royal murderer of
+Sydney. To such prostration of soul, such blindness of intellect, even
+the noblest people will be subjected, when liberty, which should be the
+growth of ages, spreading its roots through the strata of a thousand
+customs, is raised, the exotic of an hour, and (like the Tree and Dryad
+of ancient fable) flourishes and withers with the single spirit that
+protects it.
+
+“Oh, Heaven, that I were a man!” exclaimed Angelo, who stood behind
+Rienzi.
+
+“Hear him, hear the boy,” cried the Tribune; “out of the mouths of babes
+speaketh wisdom! He wishes that he were a man, as ye are men, that
+he might do as ye should do. Mark me,--I ride with these faithful few
+through the quarter of the Colonna, before the fortress of your foe.
+Three times before that fortress shall my trumpets sound; if at the
+third blast ye come not, armed as befits ye--I say not all, but three,
+but two, but one hundred of ye--I break up my wand of office, and the
+world shall say one hundred and fifty robbers quelled the soul of Rome,
+and crushed her magistrate and her laws!”
+
+With those words he descended the stairs, and mounted his charger; the
+populace gave way in silence, and their Tribune and his slender train
+passed slowly on, and gradually vanished from the view of the increasing
+crowd.
+
+The Romans remained on the place, and after a pause, the demagogue
+Baroncelli, who saw an opening to his ambition, addressed them. Though
+not an eloquent nor gifted man, he had the art of uttering the most
+popular commonplaces. And he knew the weak side of his audience, in
+their vanity, indolence, and arrogant pride.
+
+“Look you, my masters,” said he, leaping up to the Place of the Lion;
+“the Tribune talks bravely--he always did--but the monkey used the cat
+for his chestnuts; he wants to thrust your paws into the fire; you will
+not be so silly as to let him. The saints bless us! but the Tribune,
+good man, gets a palace and has banquets, and bathes in a porphyry vase;
+the more shame on him!--in which San Sylvester christened the Emperor
+Constantine: all this is worth fighting for; but you, my masters, what
+do you get except hard blows, and a stare at a holyday spectacle? Why,
+if you beat these fellows, you will have another tax on the wine: that
+will be your reward!”
+
+“Hark!” cried Cecco, “there sounds the trumpet,--a pity he wanted to tax
+us!”
+
+“True,” cried Baroncelli, “there sounds the trumpet; a silver trumpet,
+by the Lord! Next week, if you help him out of the scrape, he’ll have
+a golden one. But go--why don’t you move, my friends?--‘tis but one
+hundred and fifty mercenaries. True, they are devils to fight, clad in
+armour from top to toe; but what then?--if they do cut some four or five
+hundred throats you’ll beat them at last, and the Tribune will sup the
+merrier.”
+
+“There sounds the second blast,” said the butcher. “If my old mother
+had not lost two of us already, ‘tis odds, but I’d strike a blow for the
+bold Tribune.”
+
+“You had better put more quicksilver in you,” continued Baroncelli, “or
+you will be too late. And what a pity that will be!--If you believe the
+Tribune, he is the only man that can save Rome. What, you, the finest
+people in the world--you, not able to save yourselves!--you, bound up
+with one man--you, not able to dictate to the Colonna and Orsini! Why,
+who beat the Barons at San Lorenzo? Was it not you? Ah! you got the
+buffets, and the Tribune the moneta! Tush, my friends, let the man go;
+I warrant there are plenty as good as he to be bought a cheaper bargain.
+And, hark! there is the third blast; it is too late now!”
+
+As the trumpet from the distance sent forth its long and melancholy
+note, it was as the last warning of the parting genius of the place;
+and when silence swallowed up the sound, a gloom fell over the whole
+assembly. They began to regret, to repent, when regret and repentance
+availed no more. The buffoonery of Baroncelli became suddenly
+displeasing; and the orator had the mortification of seeing his audience
+disperse in all directions, just as he was about to inform them what
+great things he himself could do in their behalf.
+
+Meanwhile the Tribune, passing unscathed through the dangerous quarter
+of the enemy, who, dismayed at his approach, shrunk within their
+fortress, proceeded to the Castle of St. Angelo, whither Nina had
+already preceded him; and which he entered to find that proud lady with
+a smile for his safety,--without a tear for his reverse.
+
+
+
+Chapter 5.VII. The Successors of an Unsuccessful Revolution--Who is to
+Blame--the Forsaken one or the Forsakers?
+
+Cheerfully broke the winter sun over the streets of Rome, as the army
+of the Barons swept along them. The Cardinal Legate at the head; the old
+Colonna (no longer haughty and erect, but bowed, and broken-hearted
+at the loss of his sons) at his right hand;--the sleek smile of Luca
+Savelli--the black frown of Rinaldo Orsini, were seen close behind. A
+long but barbarous array it was; made up chiefly of foreign hirelings;
+nor did the procession resemble the return of exiled citizens, but the
+march of invading foes.
+
+“My Lord Colonna,” said the Cardinal Legate, a small withered man, by
+birth a Frenchman, and full of the bitterest prejudices against the
+Romans, who had in a former mission very ill received him, as was their
+wont with foreign ecclesiastics; “this Pepin, whom Montreal has deputed
+at your orders, hath done us indeed good service.”
+
+The old Lord bowed, but made no answer. His strong intellect was already
+broken, and there was dotage in his glassy eye. The Cardinal muttered,
+“He hears me not; sorrow hath brought him to second childhood!” and
+looking back, motioned to Luca Savelli to approach.
+
+“Luca,” said the Legate, “it was fortunate that the Hungarian’s black
+banner detained the Provencal at Aversa. Had he entered Rome, we might
+have found Rienzi’s successor worse than the Tribune himself. Montreal,”
+ he added, with a slight emphasis and a curled lip, “is a gentleman, and
+a Frenchman. This Pepin, who is his delegate, we must bribe, or menace
+to our will.”
+
+“Assuredly,” answered Savelli, “it is not a difficult task: for Montreal
+calculated on a more stubborn contest, which he himself would have found
+leisure to close--”
+
+“As Podesta, or Prince of Rome! the modest man! We Frenchmen have a due
+sense of our own merits; but this sudden victory surprises him as it
+doth us, Luca; and we shall wrest the prey from Pepin, ere Montreal can
+come to his help! But Rienzi must die. He is still, I hear, shut up in
+St. Angelo. The Orsini shall storm him there ere the day be much older.
+Today we possess the Capitol--annul all the rebel’s laws--break up his
+ridiculous parliament, and put all the government of the city under
+three senators--Rinaldo Orsini, Colonna, and myself; you, my Lord, I
+trust, we shall fitly provide for.”
+
+“Oh! I am rewarded enough by returning to my palace; and a descent
+on the Jewellers’ quarter will soon build up its fortifications. Luca
+Savelli is not an ambitious man. He wants but to live in peace.”
+
+The Cardinal smiled sourly, and took the turn towards the Capitol.
+
+In the front space the usual gapers were assembled. “Make way! make
+way! knaves!” cried the guards, trampling on either side the crowd, who,
+accustomed to the sedate and courteous order of Rienzi’s guard, fell
+back too slowly for many of them to escape severe injury from the pikes
+of the soldiers and the hoofs of the horses. Our friend, Luigi, the
+butcher, was one of these, and the surliness of the Roman blood was past
+boiling heat when he received in his ample stomach the blunt end of a
+German’s pike. “There, Roman,” said the rude mercenary, in his barbarous
+attempt at Italian, “make way for your betters; you have had enough
+crowds and shows of late, in all conscience.”
+
+“Betters!” gulped out the poor butcher; “a Roman has no betters; and if
+I had not lost two brothers by San Lorenzo, I would--”
+
+“The dog is mutinous,” said one of the followers of the Orsini,
+succeeding the German who had passed on, “and talks of San Lorenzo!”
+
+“Oh!” said another Orsinist, who rode abreast, “I remember him of old.
+He was one of Rienzi’s gang.”
+
+“Was he?” said the other, sternly; “then we cannot begin salutary
+examples too soon;” and, offended at something swaggering and insolent
+in the butcher’s look, the Orsinist coolly thrust him through the heart
+with his pike, and rode on over his body.
+
+“Shame! Shame!” “Murder! Murder!” cried the crowd: and they began to
+press, in the passion of the moment, round the fierce guards.
+
+The Legate heard the cry, and saw the rush: he turned pale. “The rascals
+rebel again!” he faltered.
+
+“No, your Eminence--no,” said Luca; “but it may be as well to infuse a
+wholesome terror; they are all unarmed; let me bid the guards disperse
+them. A word will do it.”
+
+The Cardinal assented; the word was given; and, in a few minutes, the
+soldiery, who still smarted under the vindictive memory of defeat from
+an undisciplined multitude, scattered the crowd down the streets without
+scruple or mercy--riding over some, spearing others--filling the air
+with shrieks and yells, and strewing the ground with almost as many
+men as a few days before would have sufficed to have guarded Rome, and
+preserved the constitution! Through this wild, tumultuous scene, and
+over the bodies of its victims, rode the Legate and his train, to
+receive in the Hall of the Capitol the allegiance of the citizens, and
+to proclaim the return of the oppressors.
+
+As they dismounted at the stairs, a placard in large letters struck
+the eye of the Legate. It was placed upon the pedestal of the Lion of
+Basalt, covering the very place that had been occupied by the bull of
+excommunication. The words were few, and ran thus:
+
+“TREMBLE! RIENZI SHALL RETURN!”
+
+“How! what means this mummery!” cried the Legate, trembling already, and
+looking round to the nobles.
+
+“Please your Eminence,” said one of the councillors, who had come from
+the Capitol to meet the Legate, “we saw it at daybreak, the ink yet
+moist, as we entered the Hall. We deemed it best to leave it for your
+Eminence to deal with.”
+
+“You deemed! Who are you, then?”
+
+“One of the members of the Council, your Eminence, and a stanch opponent
+of the Tribune, as is well known, when he wanted the new tax--”
+
+“Council--trash! No more councils now! Order is restored at last. The
+Orsini and the Colonna will look to you in future. Resist a tax, did
+you? Well, that was right when proposed by a tyrant; but I warn you,
+friend, to take care how you resist the tax we shall impose. Happy
+if your city can buy its peace with the Church on any terms:--and his
+Holiness is short of the florins.”
+
+The discomfited councillor shrank back.
+
+“Tear off yon insolent placard. Nay, hold! fix over it our proclamation
+of ten thousand florins for the heretic’s head! Ten thousand? methinks
+that is too much now--we will alter the cipher. Meanwhile Rinaldo
+Orsini, Lord Senator, march thy soldiers to St. Angelo; let us see if
+the heretic can stand a siege.”
+
+“It needs not, your Eminence,” said the councillor, again officiously
+bustling up; “St. Angelo is surrendered. The Tribune, his wife, and one
+page, escaped last night, it is said, in disguise.”
+
+“Ha!” said the old Colonna, whose dulled sense had at length arrived at
+the conclusion that something extraordinary arrested the progress of his
+friends. “What is the matter? What is that placard? Will no one tell me
+the words? My old eyes are dim.”
+
+As he uttered the questions, in the shrill and piercing treble of age,
+a voice replied in a loud and deep tone--none knew whence it came; the
+crowd was reduced to a few stragglers, chiefly friars in cowl and
+serge, whose curiosity nought could daunt, and whose garb ensured them
+safety--the soldiers closed the rear: a voice, I say, came, startling
+the colour from many a cheek--in answer to the Colonna, saying:
+
+“TREMBLE! RIENZI SHALL RETURN!”
+
+
+
+
+BOOK VI. THE PLAGUE.
+
+     “Erano gli anni della fruttifera Incarnazione del Figliuolo
+     di Dio al numero pervenuti di mille trecento quarant’otto,
+     quando nell’ egregia citta di Fiorenza oltre ad ogni altra
+     Italica bellissima, pervenna la mortifera pestilenza.”--
+     Boccaccio, “Introduzione al Decamerone”.
+
+     “The years of the fructiferous incarnation of the Son of God
+     had reached the number of one thousand three hundred and
+     forty-eight, when into the illustrious city of Florence,
+     beautiful beyond every other in Italy, entered the death-
+     fraught pestilence.”--“Introduction to the Decameron”.
+
+
+
+
+Chapter 6.1. The Retreat of the Lover.
+
+By the borders of one of the fairest lakes of Northern Italy stood the
+favourite mansion of Adrian di Castello, to which in his softer and
+less patriotic moments his imagination had often and fondly turned;
+and thither the young nobleman, dismissing his more courtly and
+distinguished companions in the Neapolitan embassy, retired after his
+ill-starred return to Rome. Most of those thus dismissed joined the
+Barons; the young Annibaldi, whose daring and ambitious nature had
+attached him strongly to the Tribune, maintained a neutral ground; he
+betook himself to his castle in the Campagna, and did not return to Rome
+till the expulsion of Rienzi.
+
+The retreat of Irene’s lover was one well fitted to feed his melancholy
+reveries. Without being absolutely a fortress, it was sufficiently
+strong to resist any assault of the mountain robbers or petty tyrants in
+the vicinity; while, built by some former lord from the materials of
+the half-ruined villas of the ancient Romans, its marbled columns and
+tesselated pavements relieved with a wild grace the grey stone walls and
+massive towers of feudal masonry. Rising from a green eminence gently
+sloping to the lake, the stately pile cast its shadow far and dark over
+the beautiful waters; by its side, from the high and wooded mountains on
+the background, broke a waterfall, in irregular and sinuous course--now
+hid by the foliage, now gleaming in the light, and collecting itself at
+last in a broad basin--beside which a little fountain, inscribed with
+half-obliterated letters, attested the departed elegance of the classic
+age--some memento of lord and poet whose very names were lost; thence
+descending through mosses and lichen, and odorous herbs, a brief,
+sheeted stream bore its surplus into the lake. And there, amidst the
+sturdier and bolder foliage of the North, grew, wild and picturesque,
+many a tree transplanted, in ages back, from the sunnier East; not
+blighted nor stunted in that golden clime, which fosters almost every
+produce of nature as with a mother’s care. The place was remote and
+solitary. The roads that conducted to it from the distant towns were
+tangled, intricate, mountainous, and beset by robbers. A few cottages,
+and a small convent, a quarter of a league up the verdant margin, were
+the nearest habitations; and, save by some occasional pilgrim or some
+bewildered traveller, the loneliness of the mansion was rarely invaded.
+It was precisely the spot which proffered rest to a man weary of the
+world, and indulged the memories which grow in rank luxuriance over the
+wrecks of passion. And he whose mind, at once gentle and self-dependent,
+can endure solitude, might have ransacked all earth for a more fair and
+undisturbed retreat.
+
+But not to such a solitude had the earlier dreams of Adrian dedicated
+the place. Here had he thought--should one bright being have
+presided--here should love have found its haven: and hither, when love
+at length admitted of intrusion, hither might wealth and congenial
+culture have invited all the gentler and better spirits which had begun
+to move over the troubled face of Italy, promising a second and younger
+empire of poesy, and lore, and art. To the graceful and romantic but
+somewhat pensive and inert, temperament of the young noble, more
+adapted to calm and civilized than stormy and barbarous times, ambition
+proffered no reward so grateful as lettered leisure and intellectual
+repose. His youth coloured by the influence of Petrarch, his manhood
+had dreamed of a happier Vaucluse not untenanted by a Laura. The visions
+which had connected the scene with the image of Irene made the place
+still haunted by her shade; and time and absence only ministering to his
+impassioned meditations, deepened his melancholy and increased his love.
+
+In this lone retreat--which even in describing from memory, for these
+eyes have seen, these feet have trodden, this heart yet yearneth for,
+the spot--which even, I say, in thus describing, seems to me (and haply
+also to the gentle reader) a grateful and welcome transit from the
+storms of action and the vicissitudes of ambition, so long engrossing
+the narrative;--in this lone retreat Adrian passed the winter, which
+visits with so mild a change that intoxicating clime. The roar of the
+world without was borne but in faint and indistinct murmurings to his
+ear. He learned only imperfectly, and with many contradictions, the
+news which broke like a thunderbolt over Italy, that the singular and
+aspiring man--himself a revolution--who had excited the interest of all
+Europe, the brightest hopes of the enthusiastic, the profusest adulation
+of the great, the deepest terror of the despot, the wildest aspirations
+of all free spirits, had been suddenly stricken from his state, his name
+branded and his head proscribed. This event, which happened at the
+end of December, reached Adrian, through a wandering pilgrim, at the
+commencement of March, somewhat more than two months after the date; the
+March of that awful year 1348, which saw Europe, and Italy especially,
+desolated by the direst pestilence which history has recorded, accursed
+alike by the numbers and the celebrity of its victims, and yet strangely
+connected with some not unpleasing images by the grace of Boccaccio and
+the eloquence of Petrarch.
+
+The pilgrim who informed Adrian of the revolution at Rome was unable to
+give him any clue to the present fate of Rienzi or his family. It was
+only known that the Tribune and his wife had escaped, none knew whither;
+many guessed that they were already dead, victims to the numerous
+robbers who immediately on the fall of the Tribune settled back to their
+former habits, sparing neither age nor sex, wealth nor poverty. As all
+relating to the ex-Tribune was matter of eager interest, the pilgrim had
+also learned that, previous to the fall of Rienzi, his sister had left
+Rome, but it was not known to what place she had been conveyed.
+
+The news utterly roused Adrian from his dreaming life. Irene was then
+in the condition his letter dared to picture--severed from her brother,
+fallen from her rank, desolate and friendless. “Now,” said the generous
+and high-hearted lover, “she may be mine without a disgrace to my name.
+Whatever Rienzi’s faults, she is not implicated in them. Her hands are
+not red with my kinsman’s blood; nor can men say that Adrian di Castello
+allies himself with a House whose power is built upon the ruins of
+the Colonnas. The Colonna are restored--again triumphant--Rienzi is
+nothing--distress and misfortune unite me at once to her on whom they
+fall!”
+
+But how were these romantic resolutions to be executed--Irene’s
+dwelling-place unknown? He resolved himself to repair to Rome and make
+the necessary inquiries: accordingly he summoned his retainers:--blithe
+tidings to them, those of travel! The mail left the armoury--the banner
+the hall--and after two days of animated bustle, the fountain by which
+Adrian had passed so many hours of revery was haunted only by the
+birds of the returning spring; and the nightly lamp no longer cast its
+solitary ray from his turret chamber over the bosom of the deserted
+lake.
+
+
+
+Chapter 6.II. The Seeker.
+
+It was a bright, oppressive, sultry morning, when a solitary horseman
+was seen winding that unequalled road, from whose height, amidst
+figtrees, vines, and olives, the traveller beholds gradually break upon
+his gaze the enchanting valley of the Arno, and the spires and domes of
+Florence. But not with the traveller’s customary eye of admiration and
+delight passed that solitary horseman, and not upon the usual activity,
+and mirth, and animation of the Tuscan life, broke that noon-day sun.
+All was silent, void, and hushed; and even in the light of heaven there
+seemed a sicklied and ghastly glare. The cottages by the road-side were
+some shut up and closed, some open, but seemingly inmateless. The plough
+stood still, the distaff plied not: horse and man had a dreary holiday.
+There was a darker curse upon the land than the curse of Cain! Now
+and then a single figure, usually clad in the gloomy robe of a friar,
+crossed the road, lifting towards the traveller a livid and amazed
+stare, and then hurried on, and vanished beneath some roof, whence
+issued a faint and dying moan, which but for the exceeding stillness
+around could scarcely have pierced the threshold. As the traveller
+neared the city, the scene became less solitary, yet more dread. There
+might be seen carts and litters, thick awnings wrapped closely round
+them, containing those who sought safety in flight, forgetful that the
+Plague was everywhere! And while these gloomy vehicles, conducted by
+horses, gaunt, shadowy skeletons, crawling heavily along, passed by,
+like hearses of the dead, sometimes a cry burst the silence in which
+they moved, and the traveller’s steed started aside, as some wretch, on
+whom the disease had broke forth, was dropped from the vehicle by the
+selfish inhumanity of his comrades, and left to perish by the way.
+Hard by the gate a waggon paused, and a man with a mask threw out its
+contents in a green slimy ditch that bordered the road. These were
+garments and robes of all kind and value; the broidered mantle of the
+gallant, the hood and veil of my lady, and the rags of the peasant.
+While glancing at the labour of the masker, the cavalier beheld a herd
+of swine, gaunt and half famished, run to the spot in the hopes of
+food, and the traveller shuddered to think what food they might have
+anticipated! But ere he reached the gate, those of the animals that had
+been busiest rooting at the infectious heap, dropped down dead amongst
+their fellows. (The same spectacle greeted, and is recorded by,
+Boccaccio.)
+
+“Ho, ho,” said the masker, and his hollow voice sounded yet more hollow
+through his vizard,--“comest thou here to die, stranger? See, thy brave
+mantle of triple-pile and golden broidery will not save thee from the
+gavocciolo. (The tumour that made the fatal symptom.) Ride on, ride
+on;--today fit morsel for thy lady’s kiss, tomorrow too foul for the rat
+and worm!”
+
+Replying not to this hideous welcome, Adrian, for it was he, pursued his
+way. The gates stood wide open: this was the most appalling sign of all,
+for, at first, the most jealous precaution had been taken against the
+ingress of strangers. Now all care, all foresight, all vigilance, were
+vain. And thrice nine warders had died at that single post, and the
+officers to appoint their successors were dead too! Law and Police, and
+the Tribunals of Health, and the Boards of Safety, Death had stopped
+them all! And the Plague killed art itself, social union, the harmony
+and mechanism of civilization, as if they had been bone and flesh!
+
+So, mute and solitary, went on the lover, in his quest of love, resolved
+to find and to save his betrothed, and guided (that faithful and loyal
+knight!) through the Wilderness of Horror by the blessed hope of that
+strange passion, noblest of all when noble, basest of all when base!
+He came into a broad and spacious square lined with palaces, the usual
+haunt of the best and most graceful nobility of Italy. The stranger
+was alone now, and the tramp of his gallant steed sounded ghastly and
+fearful in his own ears, when just as he turned the corner of one of the
+streets that led from it, he saw a woman steal forth with a child in her
+arms, while another, yet in infancy clung to her robe. She held a large
+bunch of flowers to her nostrils, (the fancied and favourite mode to
+prevent infection), and muttered to the children, who were moaning with
+hunger,--“Yes, yes, you shall have food! Plenty of food now for the
+stirring forth. But oh, that stirring forth!”--and she peered about and
+round, lest any of the diseased might be near.
+
+“My friend,” said he, “can you direct me to the convent of--”
+
+“Away, man, away!” shrieked the woman.
+
+“Alas!” said Adrian, with a mournful smile, “can you not see that I am
+not, as yet, one to spread contagion?”
+
+But the woman, unheeding him, fled on; when, after a few paces, she was
+arrested by the child that clung to her.
+
+“Mother, mother!” it cried, “I am sick--I cannot stir.”
+
+The woman halted, tore aside the child’s robe, saw under the arm the
+fatal tumour, and, deserting her own flesh, fled with a shriek along the
+square. The shriek rang long in Adrian’s ears, though not aware of the
+unnatural cause;--the mother feared not for her infant, but herself. The
+voice of Nature was no more heeded in that charnel city than it is in
+the tomb itself! Adrian rode on at a brisker pace, and came at length
+before a stately church; its doors were wide open, and he saw within
+a company of monks (the church had no other worshippers, and they were
+masked) gathered round the altar, and chanting the Miserere Domine;--the
+ministers of God, in a city hitherto boasting the devoutest population
+in Italy, without a flock!
+
+The young Cavalier paused before the door, and waited till the service
+was done, and the monks descended the steps into the street.
+
+“Holy fathers,” said he then, “may I pray your goodness to tell me my
+nearest way to the convent Santa Maria de’ Pazzi?”
+
+“Son,” said one of these featureless spectres, for so they seemed in
+their shroud-like robes, and uncouth vizards,--“son, pass on your
+way, and God be with you. Robbers or revellers may now fill the holy
+cloisters you speak of. The abbess is dead; and many a sister sleeps
+with her. And the nuns have fled from the contagion.”
+
+Adrian half fell from his horse, and, as he still remained rooted to the
+spot, the dark procession swept on, hymning in solemn dirge through the
+desolate street the monastic chaunt--
+
+     “By the Mother and the Son,
+     Death endured and mercy won:
+     Spare us, sinners though we be;
+     Miserere Domine!”
+
+Recovering from his stupor, Adrian regained the brethren, and, as they
+closed the burthen of their song, again accosted them.
+
+“Holy fathers, dismiss me not thus. Perchance the one I seek may yet be
+heard of at the convent. Tell me which way to shape my course.”
+
+“Disturb us not, son,” said the monk who spoke before. “It is an ill
+omen for thee to break thus upon the invocations of the ministers of
+Heaven.”
+
+“Pardon, pardon! I will do ample penance, pay many masses; but I seek a
+dear friend--the way--the way--”
+
+“To the right, till you gain the first bridge. Beyond the third bridge,
+on the riverside, you will find the convent,” said another monk, moved
+by the earnestness of Adrian.
+
+“Bless you, holy father,” faltered forth the Cavalier, and spurred
+his steed in the direction given. The friars heeded him not, but again
+resumed their dirge. Mingled with the sound of his horse’s hoofs on the
+clattering pavement, came to the rider’s ear the imploring line--
+
+“Miserere Domine!”
+
+Impatient, sick at heart, desperate, Adrian flew through the street at
+the full speed of his horse. He passed the marketplace--it was empty
+as the desert;--the gloomy and barricadoed streets, in which the
+countercries of Guelf and Ghibeline had so often cheered on the Chivalry
+and Rank of Florence. Now huddled together in vault and pit, lay Guelf
+and Ghibeline, knightly spurs and beggar’s crutch. To that silence the
+roar even of civil strife would have been a blessing! The first bridge,
+the riverside, the second, the third bridge, all were gained, and Adrian
+at last reined his steed before the walls of the convent. He fastened
+his steed to the porch, in which the door stood ajar, half torn from its
+hinges, traversed the court, gained the opposite door that admitted to
+the main building, came to the jealous grating, now no more a barrier
+from the profane world, and as he there paused a moment to recover
+breath and nerve, wild laughter and loud song, interrupted and mixed
+with oaths, startled his ear. He pushed aside the grated door, entered,
+and, led by the sounds, came to the refectory. In that meeting-place of
+the severe and mortified maids of heaven, he now beheld gathered round
+the upper table, used of yore by the abbess, a strange, disorderly,
+ruffian herd, who at first glance seemed indeed of all ranks, for some
+wore serge, or even rags, others were tricked out in all the bravery
+of satin and velvet, plume and mantle. But a second glance sufficed to
+indicate that the companions were much of the same degree, and that the
+finery of the more showy was but the spoil rent from unguarded palaces
+or tenantless bazaars; for under plumed hats, looped with jewels, were
+grim, unwashed, unshaven faces, over which hung the long locks which the
+professed brethren of the sharp knife and hireling arm had just begun
+to assume, serving them often instead of a mask. Amidst these savage
+revellers were many women, young and middle-aged, foul and fair, and
+Adrian piously shuddered to see amongst the loose robes and uncovered
+necks of the professional harlots the saintly habit and beaded rosary
+of nuns. Flasks of wine, ample viands, gold and silver vessels, mostly
+consecrated to holy rites, strewed the board. As the young Roman paused
+spellbound at the threshold, the man who acted as president of the
+revel, a huge, swarthy ruffian, with a deep scar over his face, which,
+traversing the whole of the left cheek and upper lip, gave his large
+features an aspect preternaturally hideous, called out to him--
+
+“Come in, man--come in! Why stand you there amazed and dumb? We are
+hospitable revellers, and give all men welcome. Here are wine and women.
+My Lord Bishop’s wine and my Lady Abbess’s women!
+
+“Sing hey, sing ho, for the royal DEATH, That scatters a host with
+a single breath; That opens the prison to spoil the palace, And rids
+honest necks from the hangman’s malice. Here’s a health to the Plague!
+Let the mighty ones dread, The poor never lived till the wealthy were
+dead. A health to the Plague! May She ever as now Loose the rogue
+from his chain and the nun from her vow: To the gaoler a sword, to the
+captive a key, Hurrah for Earth’s Curse--‘tis a Blessing to me!”
+
+Ere this fearful stave was concluded, Adrian, sensible that in such
+orgies there was no chance of prosecuting his inquiries, left the
+desecrated chamber and fled, scarcely drawing breath, so great was the
+terror that seized him, till he stood once more in the court amidst the
+hot, sickly, stagnant sunlight, that seemed a fit atmosphere for the
+scenes on which it fell. He resolved, however, not to desert the place
+without making another effort at inquiry; and while he stood without the
+court, musing and doubtful, he saw a small chapel hard by, through whose
+long casement gleamed faintly, and dimmed by the noon-day, the light
+of tapers. He turned towards its porch, entered, and saw beside the
+sanctuary a single nun kneeling in prayer. In the narrow aisle, upon a
+long table, (at either end of which burned the tall dismal tapers whose
+rays had attracted him,) the drapery of several shrouds showed him the
+half-distinct outline of human figures hushed in death. Adrian himself,
+impressed by the sadness and sanctity of the place, and the touching
+sight of that solitary and unselfish watcher of the dead, knelt down and
+intensely prayed.
+
+As he rose, somewhat relieved from the burthen at his heart, the nun
+rose also, and started to perceive him.
+
+“Unhappy man!” said she, in a voice which, low, faint, and solemn,
+sounded as a ghost’s--“what fatality brings thee hither? Seest thou not
+thou art in the presence of clay which the Plague hath touched--thou
+breathest the air which destroys! Hence! and search throughout all the
+desolation for one spot where the Dark Visitor hath not come!”
+
+“Holy maiden,” answered Adrian, “the danger you hazard does not appal
+me;--I seek one whose life is dearer than my own.”
+
+“Thou needest say no more to tell me thou art newly come to Florence!
+Here son forsakes his father, and mother deserts her child. When life
+is most hopeless, these worms of a day cling to it as if it were the
+salvation of immortality! But for me alone, death has no horror. Long
+severed from the world, I have seen my sisterhood perish--the house of
+God desecrated--its altar overthrown, and I care not to survive,--the
+last whom the Pestilence leaves at once unperjured and alive.”
+
+The nun paused a few moments, and then, looking earnestly at
+the healthful countenance and unbroken frame of Adrian, sighed
+heavily--“Stranger, why fly you not?” she said. “Thou mightst as well
+search the crowded vaults and rotten corruption of the dead, as search
+the city for one living.”
+
+“Sister, and bride of the blessed Redeemer!” returned the Roman,
+clasping his hands--“one word I implore thee. Thou art, methinks, of the
+sisterhood of yon dismantled convent; tell me, knowest thou if Irene
+di Gabrini, (The family name of Rienzi was Gabrini.)--guest of the
+late Abbess, sister of the fallen Tribune of Rome,--be yet amongst the
+living?”
+
+“Art thou her brother, then?” said the nun. “Art thou that fallen Sun of
+the Morning?”
+
+“I am her betrothed,” replied Adrian, sadly. “Speak.”
+
+“Oh, flesh! flesh! how art thou victor to the last, even amidst the
+triumphs and in the lazar-house of corruption!” said the nun. “Vain man!
+Think not of such carnal ties; make thy peace with heaven, for thy days
+are surely numbered!”
+
+“Woman!” cried Adrian, impatiently--“talk not to me of myself, nor rail
+against ties whose holiness thou canst not know. I ask thee again, as
+thou thyself hopest for mercy and for pardon, is Irene living?”
+
+The nun was awed by the energy of the young lover, and after a moment,
+which seemed to him an age of agonized suspense, she replied--
+
+“The maiden thou speakest of died not with the general death. In the
+dispersion of the few remaining, she left the convent--I know not
+whither; but she had friends in Florence--their names I cannot tell
+thee.”
+
+“Now bless thee, holy sister! bless thee! How long since she left the
+convent?”
+
+“Four days have passed since the robber and the harlot have seized the
+house of Santa Maria,” replied the nun, groaning: “and they were quick
+successors to the sisterhood.”
+
+“Four days!--and thou canst give me no clue?”
+
+“None--yet stay, young man!”--and the nun, approaching, lowered her
+voice to a hissing whisper--“Ask the Becchini.” (According to the usual
+custom of Florence, the dead were borne to their resting-place on biers,
+supported by citizens of equal rank; but a new trade was created by the
+plague, and men of the lowest dregs of the populace, bribed by immense
+payment, discharged the office of transporting the remains of the
+victims. These were called Becchini.)
+
+Adrian started aside, crossed himself hastily, and quitted the convent
+without answer. He returned to his horse, and rode back into the
+silenced heart of the city. Tavern and hotel there were no more; but
+the palaces of dead princes were free to the living stranger. He entered
+one--a spacious and splendid mansion. In the stables he found forage
+still in the manger; but the horses, at that time in the Italian cities
+a proof of rank as well as wealth, were gone with the hands that fed
+them. The highborn Knight assumed the office of groom, took off the
+heavy harness, fastened his steed to the rack, and as the wearied
+animal, unconscious of the surrounding horrors, fell eagerly upon its
+meal, its young lord turned away, and muttered, “Faithful servant, and
+sole companion! may the pestilence that spareth neither beast nor man,
+spare thee! and mayst thou bear me hence with a lighter heart!”
+
+A spacious hall, hung with arms and banners--a wide flight of marble
+stairs, whose walls were painted in the stiff outlines and gorgeous
+colours of the day, conducted to vast chambers, hung with velvets
+and cloth of gold, but silent as the tomb. He threw himself upon the
+cushions which were piled in the centre of the room, for he had ridden
+far that morning, and for many days before, and he was wearied and
+exhausted, body and limb; but he could not rest. Impatience, anxiety,
+hope, and fear, gnawed his heart and fevered his veins, and, after a
+brief and unsatisfactory attempt to sober his own thoughts, and devise
+some plan of search more certain than that which chance might afford
+him, he rose, and traversed the apartments, in the unacknowledged hope
+which chance alone could suggest.
+
+It was easy to see that he had made his resting-place in the home of
+one of the princes of the land; and the splendour of all around him far
+outshone the barbarous and rude magnificence of the less civilized
+and wealthy Romans. Here, lay the lute as last touched--the gilded and
+illumined volume as last conned; there, were seats drawn familiarly
+together, as when lady and gallant had interchanged whispers last.
+
+“And such,” thought Adrian,--“such desolation may soon swallow up the
+vestige of the unwelcomed guest, as of the vanished lord!”
+
+At length he entered a saloon, in which was a table still spread with
+wine-flasks, goblets of glass, and one of silver, withered flowers,
+half-mouldy fruits, and viands. At one side the arras, folding-doors
+opened to a broad flight of stairs, that descended to a little garden
+at the back of the house, in which a fountain still played sparkling and
+livingly--the only thing, save the stranger, living there! On the steps
+lay a crimson mantle, and by it a lady’s glove. The relics seemed to
+speak to the lover’s heart of a lover’s last wooing and last farewell.
+He groaned aloud, and feeling he should have need of all his strength,
+filled one of the goblets from a half-emptied flask of Cyprus wine. He
+drained the draught--it revived him. “Now,” he said, “once more to my
+task!--I will sally forth,” when suddenly he heard heavy steps along the
+rooms he had quitted--they approached--they entered; and Adrian beheld
+two huge and ill-omened forms stalk into the chamber. They were wrapped
+in black homely draperies, their arms were bare, and they wore large
+shapeless masks, which descended to the breast, leaving only access to
+sight and breath in three small and circular apertures. The Colonna half
+drew his sword, for the forms and aspects of these visitors were not
+such as men think to look upon in safety.
+
+“Oh!” said one, “the palace has a new guest today. Fear us not,
+stranger; there is room,--ay, and wealth enough for all men now in
+Florence! Per Bacco! but there is still one goblet of silver left--how
+comes that?” So saying, the man seized the cup which Adrian had just
+drained, and thrust it into his breast. He then turned to Adrian, whose
+hand was still upon his hilt, and said, with a laugh which came choked
+and muffled through his vizard--“Oh, we cut no throats, Signor; the
+Invisible spares us that trouble. We are honest men, state officers, and
+come but to see if the cart should halt here tonight.”
+
+“Ye are then--”
+
+“Becchini!”
+
+Adrian’s blood ran cold. The Becchino continued--“And keep you this
+house while you rest at Florence, Signor?”
+
+“Yes, if the rightful lord claim it not.”
+
+“Ha! ha! ‘Rightful lord!’ The plague is Lord of all now! Why, I have
+known three gallant companies tenant this palace the last week, and
+have buried them all--all! It is a pleasant house enough, and gives good
+custom. Are you alone?”
+
+“At present, yes.”
+
+“Shew us where you sleep, that we may know where to come for you. You
+won’t want us these three days, I see.”
+
+“Ye are pleasant welcomers!” said Adrian;--“but listen to me. Can ye
+find the living as well as bury the dead? I seek one in this city who,
+if you discover her, shall be worth to you a year of burials!”
+
+“No, no! that is out of our line. As well look for a dropped sand on the
+beach, as for a living being amongst closed houses and yawning vaults;
+but if you will pay the poor gravediggers beforehand, I promise you, you
+shall have the first of a new charnel-house;--it will be finished just
+about your time.”
+
+“There!” said Adrian, flinging the wretches a few pieces of
+gold--“there! and if you would do me a kinder service, leave me, at
+least while living; or I may save you that trouble.” And he turned from
+the room.
+
+The Becchino who had been spokesman followed him. “You are generous,
+Signor, stay; you will want fresher food than these filthy fragments.
+I will supply thee of the best, while--while thou wantest it. And
+hark,--whom wishest thou that I should seek?”
+
+This question arrested Adrian’s departure. He detailed the name, and
+all the particulars he could suggest of Irene; and, with sickened heart,
+described the hair, features, and stature of that lovely and hallowed
+image, which might furnish a theme to the poet, and now gave a clue to
+the gravedigger.
+
+The unhallowed apparition shook his head when Adrian had concluded.
+“Full five hundred such descriptions did I hear in the first days of the
+Plague, when there were still such things as mistress and lover; but
+it is a dainty catalogue, Signor, and it will be a pride to the poor
+Becchino to discover or even to bury so many charms! I will do my best;
+meanwhile, I can recommend you, if in a hurry, to make the best use of
+your time, to many a pretty face and comely shape--”
+
+“Out, fiend!” muttered Adrian: “fool to waste time with such as thou!”
+
+The laugh of the gravedigger followed his steps.
+
+All that day did Adrian wander through the city, but search and question
+were alike unavailing; all whom he encountered and interrogated seemed
+to regard him as a madman, and these were indeed of no kind likely
+to advance his object. Wild troops of disordered, drunken revellers,
+processions of monks, or here and there, scattered individuals gliding
+rapidly along, and shunning all approach or speech, made the only
+haunters of the dismal streets, till the sun sunk, lurid and yellow,
+behind the hills, and Darkness closed around the noiseless pathway of
+the Pestilence.
+
+
+
+Chapter 6.III. The Flowers Amidst the Tombs.
+
+Adrian found that the Becchino had taken care that famine should not
+forestall the plague; the banquet of the dead was removed, and
+fresh viands and wines of all kinds,--for there was plenty then in
+Florence!--spread the table. He partook of the refreshment, though but
+sparingly, and shrinking from repose in beds beneath whose gorgeous
+hangings Death had been so lately busy, carefully closed door and
+window, wrapped himself in his mantle, and found his resting-place on
+the cushions of the chamber in which he had supped. Fatigue cast him
+into an unquiet slumber, from which he was suddenly awakened by the
+roll of a cart below, and the jingle of bells. He listened, as the cart
+proceeded slowly from door to door, and at length its sound died away in
+the distance.--He slept no more that night!
+
+The sun had not long risen ere he renewed his labours; and it was yet
+early when, just as he passed a church, two ladies richly dressed came
+from the porch, and seemed through their vizards to regard the young
+Cavalier with earnest attention. The gaze arrested him also, when one of
+the ladies said, “Fair sir, you are overbold: you wear no mask; neither
+do you smell to flowers.”
+
+“Lady, I wear no mask, for I would be seen: I search these miserable
+places for one in whose life I live.”
+
+“He is young, comely, evidently noble, and the plague hath not touched
+him: he will serve our purpose well,” whispered one of the ladies to the
+other.
+
+“You echo my own thoughts,” returned her companion; and then turning to
+Adrian, she said, “You seek one you are not wedded to, if you seek so
+fondly?”
+
+“It is true.”
+
+“Young and fair, with dark hair and neck of snow; I will conduct you to
+her.”
+
+“Signor!”
+
+“Follow us!”
+
+“Know you who I am, and whom I seek?”
+
+“Yes.”
+
+“Can you in truth tell me aught of Irene?”
+
+“I can: follow me.”
+
+“To her?”
+
+“Yes, yes: follow us!”
+
+The ladies moved on as if impatient of further parley. Amazed, doubtful,
+and, as if in a dream, Adrian followed them. Their dress, manner, and
+the pure Tuscan of the one who had addressed him, indicated them of
+birth and station; but all else was a riddle which he could not solve.
+
+They arrived at one of the bridges, where a litter and a servant on
+horseback holding a palfrey by the bridle were in attendance. The ladies
+entered the litter, and she who had before spoken bade Adrian follow on
+the palfrey.
+
+“But tell me--” he began.
+
+“No questions, Cavalier,” said she, impatiently; “follow the living in
+silence, or remain with the dead, as you list.”
+
+With that the litter proceeded, and Adrian mounted the palfrey
+wonderingly, and followed his strange conductors, who moved on at a
+tolerably brisk pace. They crossed the bridge, left the river on one
+side, and, soon ascending a gentle acclivity, the trees and flowers
+of the country began to succeed dull walls and empty streets. After
+proceeding thus somewhat less than half an hour, they turned up a green
+lane remote from the road, and came suddenly upon the porticoes of a
+fair and stately palace. Here the ladies descended from their litter;
+and Adrian, who had vainly sought to extract speech from the attendant,
+also dismounted, and following them across a spacious court, filled on
+either side with vases of flowers and orange-trees, and then through a
+wide hall in the farther side of the quadrangle, found himself in one of
+the loveliest spots eye ever saw or poet ever sung. It was a garden plot
+of the most emerald verdure, bosquets of laurel and of myrtle opened on
+either side into vistas half overhung with clematis and rose, through
+whose arcades the prospect closed with statues and gushing fountains; in
+front, the lawn was bounded by rows of vases on marble pedestals filled
+with flowers, and broad and gradual flights of steps of the whitest
+marble led from terrace to terrace, each adorned with statues and
+fountains, half way down a high but softly sloping and verdant hill.
+Beyond, spread in wide, various, and luxurious landscape, the vineyards
+and olive-groves, the villas and villages, of the Vale of Arno,
+intersected by the silver river, while the city, in all its calm, but
+without its horror, raised its roofs and spires to the sun. Birds of
+every hue and song, some free, some in net-work of golden wire, warbled
+round; and upon the centre of the sward reclined four ladies unmasked
+and richly dressed, the eldest of whom seemed scarcely more than twenty;
+and five cavaliers, young and handsome, whose jewelled vests and golden
+chains attested their degree. Wines and fruits were on a low table
+beside; and musical instruments, chess-boards, and gammon-tables, lay
+scattered all about. So fair a group, and so graceful a scene, Adrian
+never beheld but once, and that was in the midst of the ghastly
+pestilence of Italy!--such group and such scene our closet indolence may
+yet revive in the pages of the bright Boccaccio!
+
+On seeing Adrian and his companions approach, the party rose instantly;
+and one of the ladies, who wore upon her head a wreath of laurel-leaves,
+stepping before the rest, exclaimed, “well done, my Mariana! welcome
+back, my fair subjects. And you, sir, welcome hither.”
+
+The two guides of the Colonna had by this time removed their masks; and
+the one who had accosted him, shaking her long and raven ringlets over a
+bright, laughing eye and a cheek to whose native olive now rose a slight
+blush, turned to him ere he could reply to the welcome he had received.
+
+“Signor Cavalier,” said she, “you now see to what I have decoyed you.
+Own that this is pleasanter than the sights and sounds of the city we
+have left. You gaze on me in surprise. See, my Queen, how speechless
+the marvel of your court has made our new gallant; I assure you he
+could talk quickly enough when he had only us to confer with: nay, I was
+forced to impose silence on him.”
+
+“Oh! then you have not yet informed him of the custom and origin of the
+court he enters!” quoth she of the laurel wreath.
+
+“No, my Queen; I thought all description given in such a spot as our
+poor Florence now is would fail of its object. My task is done, I resign
+him to your Grace!”
+
+So saying the lady tripped lightly away, and began coquettishly sleeking
+her locks in the smooth mirror of a marble basin, whose waters trickled
+over the margin upon the grass below, ever and anon glancing archly
+towards the stranger, and sufficiently at hand to overhear all that was
+said.
+
+“In the first place, Signor, permit us to inquire,” said the lady who
+bore the appellation of Queen, “thy name, rank, and birth-place.”
+
+“Madam,” returned Adrian, “I came hither little dreaming to answer
+questions respecting myself; but what it pleases you to ask, it must
+please me to reply to. My name is Adrian di Castello, one of the Roman
+house of the Colonna.”
+
+“A noble column of a noble house!” answered the Queen. “For us,
+respecting whom your curiosity may perhaps be aroused, know that we six
+ladies of Florence, deserted by or deprived of our kin and protectors,
+formed the resolution to retire to this palace, where, if death comes,
+it comes stripped of half its horrors; and as the learned tell us that
+sadness engenders the awful malady, so you see us sworn foes to sadness.
+Six cavaliers of our acquaintance agreed to join us. We pass our days,
+whether many or few, in whatever diversions we can find or invent. Music
+and the dance, merry tales and lively songs, with such slight change of
+scene as from sward to shade, from alley to fountain, fill up our time,
+and prepare us for peaceful sleep and happy dreams. Each lady is by
+turns Queen of our fairy court, as is my lot this day. One law forms the
+code of our constitution--that nothing sad shall be admitted. We would
+live as if yonder city were not, and as if (added the fair Queen, with a
+slight sigh) youth, grace, and beauty, could endure for ever. One of our
+knights madly left us for a day, promising to return; we have seen him
+no more; we will not guess what hath chanced to him. It became necessary
+to fill up his place; we drew lots who should seek his substitute;
+it fell upon the ladies who have--not, I trust, to your
+displeasure--brought you hither. Fair sir, my explanation is made.”
+
+“Alas, lovely Queen,” said Adrian, wrestling strongly, but vainly,
+with the bitter disappointment he felt--“I cannot be one of your happy
+circle; I am in myself a violation of your law. I am filled with but one
+sad and anxious thought, to which all mirth would seem impiety. I am a
+seeker amongst the living and the dead for one being of whose fate I
+am uncertain; and it was only by the words that fell from my fair
+conductor, that I have been decoyed hither from my mournful task. Suffer
+me, gracious lady, to return to Florence.”
+
+The Queen looked in mute vexation towards the dark-eyed Mariana,
+who returned the glance by one equally expressive, and then suddenly
+stepping up to Adrian she said,--
+
+“But, Signor, if I should still keep my promise, if I should be able to
+satisfy thee of the health and safety of--of Irene.”
+
+“Irene!” echoed Adrian in surprise, forgetful at the moment that he had
+before revealed the name of her he sought--“Irene--Irene di Gabrini,
+sister of the once renowned Rienzi!”
+
+“The same,” replied Mariana, quickly; “I know her, as I told you. Nay,
+Signor, I do not deceive thee. It is true that I cannot bring thee to
+her; but better as it is,--she went away many days ago to one of the
+towns of Lombardy, which, they say, the Pestilence has not yet pierced.
+Now, noble sir, is not your heart lightened? and will you so soon be a
+deserter from the Court of Loveliness; and perhaps,” she added, with a
+soft look from her large dark eyes, “of Love?”
+
+“Dare I, in truth, believe you, Lady?” said Adrian, all delighted, yet
+still half doubting.
+
+“Would I deceive a true lover, as methinks you are? Be assured. Nay,
+Queen, receive your subject.”
+
+The Queen extended her hand to Adrian, and led him to the group that
+still stood on the grass at a little distance. They welcomed him as a
+brother, and soon forgave his abstracted courtesies, in compliment to
+his good mien and illustrious name.
+
+The Queen clapped her hands, and the party again ranged themselves
+on the sward. Each lady beside each gallant. “You, Mariana, if not
+fatigued,” said the Queen, “shall take the lute and silence these noisy
+grasshoppers, which chirp about us with as much pretension as if they
+were nightingales. Sing, sweet subject, sing; and let it be the song our
+dear friend, Signor Visdomini, (I know not if this be the same Visdomini
+who, three years afterwards, with one of the Medici, conducted so
+gallant a reinforcement to Scarperia, then besieged by Visconti
+d’Oleggio.) made for a kind of inaugural anthem to such as we admitted
+to our court.”
+
+Mariana, who had reclined herself by the side of Adrian, took up the
+lute, and, after a short prelude, sung the words thus imperfectly
+translated:--
+
+The Song of the Florentine Lady.
+
+Enjoy the more the smiles of noon If doubtful be the morrow; And know
+the Fort of Life is soon Betray’d to Death by Sorrow!
+
+Death claims us all--then, Grief, away! We’ll own no meaner master; The
+clouds that darken round the day But bring the night the faster.
+
+Love--feast--be merry while on earth, Such, Grave, should be thy moral!
+Ev’n Death himself is friends with Mirth, And veils the tomb with
+laurel. (At that time, in Italy, the laurel was frequently planted over
+the dead.)
+
+While gazing on the eyes I love, New life to mine is given--If joy the
+lot of saints above, Joy fits us best for Heaven.
+
+To this song, which was much applauded, succeeded those light and witty
+tales in which the Italian novelists furnished Voltaire and Marmontel
+with a model--each, in his or her turn, taking up the discourse, and
+with an equal dexterity avoiding every lugubrious image or mournful
+reflection that might remind those graceful idlers of the vicinity of
+Death. At any other time the temper and accomplishments of the young
+Lord di Castello would have fitted him to enjoy and to shine in that
+Arcadian court. But now he in vain sought to dispel the gloom from
+his brow, and the anxious thought from his heart. He revolved the
+intelligence he had received, wondered, guessed, hoped, and dreaded
+still; and if for a moment his mind returned to the scene about him, his
+nature, too truly poetical for the false sentiment of the place,
+asked itself in what, save the polished exterior and the graceful
+circumstance, the mirth that he now so reluctantly witnessed differed
+from the brutal revels in the convent of Santa Maria--each alike in its
+motive, though so differing in the manner--equally callous and equally
+selfish, coining horror into enjoyment. The fair Mariana, whose partner
+had been reft from her, as the Queen had related, was in no mind to lose
+the new one she had gained. She pressed upon him from time to time the
+wine-flask and the fruits; and in those unmeaning courtesies her
+hand gently lingered upon his. At length, the hour arrived when the
+companions retired to the Palace, during the fiercer heats of noon--to
+come forth again in the declining sun, to sup by the side of the
+fountain, to dance, to sing, and to make merry by torchlight and the
+stars till the hour of rest. But Adrian, not willing to continue the
+entertainment, no sooner found himself in the apartment to which he
+was conducted, than he resolved to effect a silent escape, as under
+all circumstances the shortest, and not perhaps the least courteous,
+farewell left to him. Accordingly, when all seemed quiet and hushed in
+the repose common to the inhabitants of the South during that hour, he
+left his apartment, descended the stairs, passed the outer court, and
+was already at the gate, when he heard himself called by a voice that
+spoke vexation and alarm. He turned to behold Mariana.
+
+“Why, how now, Signor di Castello, is our company so unpleasing, is our
+music so jarring, or are our brows so wrinkled, that you should fly as
+the traveller flies from the witches he surprises at Benevento? Nay, you
+cannot mean to leave us yet?”
+
+“Fair dame,” returned the cavalier, somewhat disconcerted, “it is in
+vain that I seek to rally my mournful spirits, or to fit myself for the
+court to which nothing sad should come. Your laws hang about me like a
+culprit--better timely flight than harsh expulsion.”
+
+As he spoke he moved on, and would have passed the gate, but Mariana
+caught his arm.
+
+“Nay,” said she, softly; “are there no eyes of dark light, and no neck
+of wintry snow, that can compensate to thee for the absent one? Tarry
+and forget, as doubtless in absence even thou art forgotten!”
+
+“Lady,” answered Adrian, with great gravity, not unmixed with an
+ill-suppressed disdain, “I have not sojourned long enough amidst the
+sights and sounds of woe, to blunt my heart and spirit into callousness
+to all around. Enjoy, if thou canst, and gather the rank roses of the
+sepulchre; but to me, haunted still by funeral images, Beauty fails to
+bring delight, and Love,--even holy love--seems darkened by the Shadow
+of Death. Pardon me, and farewell.”
+
+“Go, then,” said the Florentine, stung and enraged at his coldness; “go
+and find your mistress amidst the associations on which it pleases your
+philosophy to dwell. I did but deceive thee, blind fool! as I had hoped
+for thine own good, when I told thee Irene--(was that her name?)--was
+gone from Florence. Of her I know nought, and heard nought, save from
+thee. Go back and search the vault, and see whether thou lovest her
+still!”
+
+
+
+Chapter 6.IV. We Obtain What We Seek, and Know it Not.
+
+In the fiercest heat of the day, and on foot, Adrian returned to
+Florence. As he approached the city, all that festive and gallant scene
+he had quitted seemed to him like a dream; a vision of the gardens and
+bowers of an enchantress, from which he woke abruptly as a criminal
+may wake on the morning of his doom to see the scaffold and the
+deathsman;--so much did each silent and lonely step into the funeral
+city bring back his bewildered thoughts at once to life and to death.
+The parting words of Mariana sounded like a knell at his heart. And
+now as he passed on--the heat of the day, the lurid atmosphere, long
+fatigue, alternate exhaustion and excitement, combining with the
+sickness of disappointment, the fretting consciousness of precious
+moments irretrievably lost, and his utter despair of forming any
+systematic mode of search--fever began rapidly to burn through his
+veins. His temples felt oppressed as with the weight of a mountain; his
+lips parched with intolerable thirst; his strength seemed suddenly to
+desert him; and it was with pain and labour that he dragged one languid
+limb after the other.
+
+“I feel it,” thought he, with the loathing nausea and shivering dread
+with which nature struggles ever against death; “I feel it upon me--the
+Devouring and the Viewless--I shall perish, and without saving her; nor
+shall even one grave contain us!”
+
+But these thoughts served rapidly to augment the disease which began to
+prey upon him; and ere he reached the interior of the city, even thought
+itself forsook him. The images of men and houses grew indistinct and
+shadowy before his eyes; the burning pavement became unsteady and
+reeling beneath his feet; delirium gathered over him, and he went on his
+way muttering broken and incoherent words; the few who met fled from
+him in dismay. Even the monks, still continuing their solemn and sad
+processions, passed with a murmured bene vobis to the other side from
+that on which his steps swerved and faltered. And from a booth at the
+corner of a street, four Becchini, drinking together, fixed upon him
+from their black masks the gaze that vultures fix upon some dying
+wanderer of the desert. Still he crept on, stretching out his arms like
+a man in the dark, and seeking with the vague sense that yet struggled
+against the gathering delirium, to find out the mansion in which he
+had fixed his home; though many as fair to live, and as meet to die in,
+stood with open portals before and beside his path.
+
+“Irene, Irene!” he cried, sometimes in a muttered and low tone,
+sometimes in a wild and piercing shriek, “where art thou? Where? I come
+to snatch thee from them; they shall not have thee, the foul and ugly
+fiends! Pah! how the air smells of dead flesh! Irene, Irene! we will
+away to mine own palace and the heavenly lake--Irene!”
+
+While thus benighted, and thus exclaiming, two females suddenly emerged
+from a neighbouring house, masked and mantled.
+
+“Vain wisdom!” said the taller and slighter of the two, whose mantle, it
+is here necessary to observe, was of a deep blue, richly broidered with
+silver, of a shape and a colour not common in Florence, but usual in
+Rome, where the dress of ladies of the higher rank was singularly bright
+in hue and ample in fold--thus differing from the simpler and more
+slender draperies of the Tuscan fashion--“Vain wisdom, to fly a
+relentless and certain doom!”
+
+“Why, thou wouldst not have us hold the same home with three of the
+dead in the next chamber--strangers too to us--when Florence has so many
+empty halls? Trust me, we shall not walk far ere we suit ourselves with
+a safer lodgment.”
+
+“Hitherto, indeed, we have been miraculously preserved,” sighed the
+other, whose voice and shape were those of extreme youth; “yet would
+that we knew where to fly--what mount, what wood, what cavern, held my
+brother and his faithful Nina! I am sick with horrors!”
+
+“Irene, Irene! Well then, if thou art at Milan or some Lombard town, why
+do I linger here? To horse, to horse! Oh, no! no!--not the horse with
+the bells! not the death-cart.” With a cry, a shriek, louder than
+the loudest of the sick man’s, broke that young female away from her
+companion. It seemed as if a single step took her to the side of Adrian.
+She caught his arm--she looked in his face--she met his unconscious eyes
+bright with a fearful fire. “It has seized him!”--(she then said in a
+deep but calm tone)--“the Plague!”
+
+“Away, away! are you mad?” cried her companion; “hence, hence,--touch me
+not now thou hast touched him--go!--here we part!”
+
+“Help me to bear him somewhere, see, he faints, he droops, he
+falls!--help me, dear Signora, for pity, for the love of God!”
+
+But, wholly possessed by the selfish fear which overcame all humanity
+in that miserable time, the elder woman, though naturally kind, pitiful,
+and benevolent, fled rapidly away, and soon vanished. Thus left alone
+with Adrian, who had now, in the fierceness of the fever that preyed
+within him, fallen on the ground, the strength and nerve of that young
+girl did not forsake her. She tore off the heavy mantle which encumbered
+her arms, and cast it from her; and then, lifting up the face of her
+lover--for who but Irene was that weak woman, thus shrinking not from
+the contagion of death?--she supported him on her breast, and called
+aloud and again for help. At length the Becchini, in the booth before
+noticed, (hardened in their profession, and who, thus hardened,
+better than the most cautious, escaped the pestilence,) lazily
+approached--“Quicker, quicker, for Christ’s love!” said Irene. “I have
+much gold; I will reward you well: help me to bear him under the nearest
+roof.”
+
+“Leave him to us, young lady: we have had our eye upon him,” said one of
+the gravediggers. “We’ll do our duty by him, first and last.”
+
+“No--no! touch not his head--that is my care. There, I will help you;
+so,--now then,--but be gentle!”
+
+Assisted by these portentous officers, Irene, who would not release
+her hold, but seemed to watch over the beloved eyes and lips, (set and
+closed as they were,) as if to look back the soul from parting, bore
+Adrian into a neighbouring house, and laid him on a bed; from which
+Irene (preserving as only women do, in such times, the presence of mind
+and vigilant providence which make so sublime a contrast with their
+keen susceptibilities) caused them first to cast off the draperies and
+clothing, which might retain additional infection. She then despatched
+them for new furniture, and for whatsoever leech money might yet bribe
+to a duty, now chiefly abandoned to those heroic Brotherhoods who,
+however vilified in modern judgment by the crimes of some unworthy
+members, were yet, in the dark times, the best, the bravest, and the
+holiest agents, to whom God ever delegated the power to resist the
+oppressor--to feed the hungry--to minister to woe; and who, alone,
+amidst that fiery Pestilence, (loosed, as it were, a demon from the
+abyss, to shiver into atoms all that binds the world to Virtue and to
+Law,) seemed to awaken, as by the sound of an angel’s trumpet, to that
+noblest Chivalry of the Cross--whose faith is the scorn of self--whose
+hope is beyond the Lazar-house--whose feet, already winded for
+immortality, trample, with a conqueror’s march, upon the graves of
+Death!
+
+While this the ministry and the office of love,--along that street in
+which Adrian and Irene had met at last--came singing, reeling, roaring,
+the dissolute and abandoned crew who had fixed their quarters in the
+Convent of Santa Maria de’ Pazzi, their bravo chief at their head, and
+a nun (no longer in nun’s garments) upon either arm. “A health to the
+Plague!” shouted the ruffian: “A health to the Plague!” echoed his
+frantic Bacchanals.
+
+“A health to the Plague, may she ever, as now, Loose the rogue from his
+chain, and the nun from her vow; To the gaoler a sword--to the captive a
+key, Hurrah for Earth’s Curse! ‘tis a blessing to me.”
+
+“Holla!” cried the chief, stopping; “here, Margherita; here’s a brave
+cloak for thee, my girl: silver enow on it to fill thy purse, if it ever
+grow empty; which it may, if ever the Plague grow slack.”
+
+“Nay,” said the girl, who, amidst all the havoc of debauch, retained
+much of youth and beauty in her form and face; “nay, Guidotto; perhaps it
+has infection.”
+
+“Pooh, child, silver never infects. Clap it on, clap it on. Besides,
+fate is fate, and when it is thine hour there will be other means
+besides the gavocciolo.”
+
+So saying, he seized the mantle, threw it roughly over her shoulders,
+and dragged her on as before, half pleased with the finery, half
+frightened with the danger; while gradually died away, along the lurid
+air and the mournful streets, the chant of that most miserable mirth.
+
+
+
+Chapter 6.V. The Error.
+
+For three days, the fatal three days, did Adrian remain bereft of
+strength and sense. But he was not smitten by the scourge which
+his devoted and generous nurse had anticipated. It was a fierce and
+dangerous fever, brought on by the great fatigue, restlessness, and
+terrible agitation he had undergone.
+
+No professional mediciner could be found to attend him; but a good
+friar, better perhaps skilled in the healing art than many who claimed
+its monopoly, visited him daily. And in the long and frequent absences
+to which his other and numerous duties compelled the monk, there was one
+ever at hand to smooth the pillow, to wipe the brow, to listen to the
+moan, to watch the sleep. And even in that dismal office, when, in
+the frenzy of the sufferer, her name, coupled with terms of passionate
+endearment, broke from his lips, a thrill of strange pleasure crossed
+the heart of the betrothed, which she chid as if it were a crime. But
+even the most unearthly love is selfish in the rapture of being loved!
+Words cannot tell, heart cannot divine, the mingled emotions that broke
+over her when, in some of these incoherent ravings, she dimly understood
+that for her the city had been sought, the death dared, the danger
+incurred. And as then bending passionately to kiss that burning brow,
+her tears fell fast over the idol of her youth, the fountains from which
+they gushed were those, fathomless and countless, which a life could not
+weep away. Not an impulse of the human and the woman heart that was not
+stirred; the adoring gratitude, the meek wonder thus to be loved, while
+deeming it so simple a merit thus to love;--as if all sacrifice in her
+were a thing of course,--to her, a virtue nature could not paragon,
+worlds could not repay! And there he lay, the victim to his own fearless
+faith, helpless--dependent upon her--a thing between life and death,
+to thank, to serve--to be proud of, yet protect, to compassionate, yet
+revere--the saver, to be saved! Never seemed one object to demand at
+once from a single heart so many and so profound emotions; the romantic
+enthusiasm of the girl--the fond idolatry of the bride--the watchful
+providence of the mother over her child.
+
+And strange to say, with all the excitement of that lonely watch,
+scarcely stirring from his side, taking food only that her strength
+might not fail her,--unable to close her eyes,--though, from the same
+cause, she would fain have taken rest, when slumber fell upon her
+charge--with all such wear and tear of frame and heart, she seemed
+wonderfully supported. And the holy man marvelled, in each visit, to see
+the cheek of the nurse still fresh, and her eye still bright. In her
+own superstition she thought and felt that Heaven gifted her with a
+preternatural power to be true to so sacred a charge; and in this fancy
+she did not wholly err:--for Heaven did gift her with that diviner
+power, when it planted in so soft a heart the enduring might and energy
+of Affection! The friar had visited the sick man late on the third
+night, and administered to him a strong sedative. “This night,” said he
+to Irene, “will be the crisis: should he awaken, as I trust he may, with
+a returning consciousness, and a calm pulse, he will live; if not, young
+daughter, prepare for the worst. But should you note any turn in the
+disease, that may excite alarm, or require my attendance, this scroll
+will inform you where I am, if God spare me still, at each hour of the
+night and morning.”
+
+The monk retired, and Irene resumed her watch.
+
+The sleep of Adrian was at first broken and interrupted--his features,
+his exclamations, his gestures, all evinced great agony, whether mental
+or bodily: it seemed, as perhaps it was, a fierce and doubtful struggle
+between life and death for the conquest of the sleeper. Patient, silent,
+breathing but by long-drawn gasps, Irene sate at the bed-head. The lamp
+was removed to the further end of the chamber, and its ray, shaded by
+the draperies, did not suffice to give to her gaze more than the outline
+of the countenance she watched. In that awful suspense, all the thoughts
+that hitherto had stirred her mind lay hushed and mute. She was only
+sensible to that unutterable fear which few of us have been happy enough
+not to know. That crushing weight under which we can scarcely breathe
+or move, the avalanche over us, freezing and suspended, which we
+cannot escape from, beneath which, every moment, we may be buried and
+overwhelmed. The whole destiny of life was in the chances of that single
+night! It was just as Adrian at last seemed to glide into a deeper
+and serener slumber, that the bells of the death-cart broke with their
+boding knell the palpable silence of the streets. Now hushed, now
+revived, as the cart stopped for its gloomy passengers, and coming
+nearer and nearer after every pause. At length she heard the heavy
+wheels stop under the very casement, and a voice deep and muffled
+calling aloud, “Bring out the dead!” She rose, and with a noiseless
+step, passed to secure the door, when the dull lamp gleamed upon the
+dark and shrouded forms of the Becchini.
+
+“You have not marked the door, nor set out the body,” said one gruffly;
+“but this is the third night! He is ready for us.”
+
+“Hush, he sleeps--away, quick, it is not the Plague that seized him.”
+
+“Not the Plague?” growled the Becchino in a disappointed tone;
+“I thought no other illness dared encroach upon the rights of the
+gavocciolo!”
+
+“Go--here’s money; leave us.”
+
+And the grisly carrier sullenly withdrew. The cart moved on, the bell
+renewed its summons, till slowly and faintly the dreadful larum died in
+the distance.
+
+Shading the lamp with her hand, Irene stole to the bed side, fearful
+that the sound and the intrusion had disturbed the slumberer. But his
+face was still locked, as in a vice, with that iron sleep. He stirred
+not--the breath scarcely passed his lips--she felt his pulse, as the
+wan hand lay on the coverlid--there was a slight beat--she was
+contented--removed the light, and, retiring to a corner of the room,
+placed the little cross suspended round her neck upon the table, and
+prayed, in her intense suffering, to Him who had known death, and
+who--Son of Heaven though he was, and Sovereign of the Seraphim--had
+also prayed, in his earthly travail, that the cup might pass away.
+
+The Morning broke, not, as in the North, slowly and through shadow,
+but with the sudden glory with which in those climates Day leaps
+upon earth--like a giant from his sleep. A sudden smile--a burnished
+glow--and night had vanished. Adrian still slept; not a muscle seemed to
+have stirred; the sleep was even heavier than before; the silence became
+a burthen upon the air. Now, in that exceeding torpor so like unto
+death, the solitary watcher became alarmed and terrified. Time
+passed--morning glided to noon--still not a sound nor motion. The
+sun was midway in Heaven--the Friar came not. And now again touching
+Adrian’s pulse, she felt no flutter--she gazed on him, appalled and
+confounded; surely nought living could be so still and pale. “Was it
+indeed sleep, might it not be--” She turned away, sick and frozen; her
+tongue clove to her lips. Why did the father tarry?--she would go to
+him--she would learn the worst--she could forbear no longer. She glanced
+over the scroll the Monk had left her: “From sunrise,” it said, “I shall
+be at the Convent of the Dominicans. Death has stricken many of the
+brethren.” The Convent was at some distance, but she knew the spot, and
+fear would wing her steps. She gave one wistful look at the sleeper and
+rushed from the house. “I shall see thee again presently,” she murmured.
+Alas! what hope can calculate beyond the moment? And who shall claim the
+tenure of ‘The Again?’
+
+It was not many minutes after Irene had left the room, ere, with a long
+sigh, Adrian opened his eyes--an altered and another man; the fever was
+gone, the reviving pulse beat low indeed, but calm. His mind was once
+more master of his body, and, though weak and feeble, the danger was
+past, and life and intellect regained.
+
+“I have slept long,” he muttered; “and oh, such dreams! And methought
+I saw Irene, but could not speak to her, and while I attempted to grasp
+her, her face changed, her form dilated, and I was in the clutch of
+the foul gravedigger. It is late--the sun is high--I must be up and
+stirring. Irene is in Lombardy. No, no; that was a lie, a wicked lie;
+she is at Florence, I must renew my search.”
+
+As this duty came to his remembrance, he rose from the bed--he was
+amazed at his own debility: at first he could not stand without support
+from the wall; by degrees, however, he so far regained the mastery of
+his limbs as to walk, though with effort and pain. A ravening hunger
+preyed upon him, he found some scanty and light food in the chamber,
+which he devoured eagerly. And with scarce less eagerness laved his
+enfeebled form and haggard face with the water that stood at hand. He
+now felt refreshed and invigorated, and began to indue his garments,
+which he found thrown on a heap beside the bed. He gazed with surprise
+and a kind of self-compassion upon his emaciated hands and shrunken
+limbs, and began now to comprehend that he must have had some severe but
+unconscious illness. “Alone, too,” thought he; “no one near to tend me!
+Nature my only nurse! But alas! alas! how long a time may thus have
+been wasted, and my adored Irene--quick, quick, not a moment more will I
+lose.”
+
+He soon found himself in the open street; the air revived him; and that
+morning had sprung up the blessed breeze, the first known for weeks. He
+wandered on very slowly and feebly till he came to a broad square,
+from which, in the vista, might be seen one of the principal gates of
+Florence, and the fig-trees and olive-groves beyond, it was then that
+a Pilgrim of tall stature approached towards him as from the gate; his
+hood was thrown back, and gave to view a countenance of great but
+sad command; a face, in whose high features, massive brow, and proud,
+unshrinking gaze, shaded by an expression of melancholy more stern than
+soft, Nature seemed to have written majesty, and Fate disaster. As in
+that silent and dreary place, these two, the only tenants of the street,
+now encountered, Adrian stopped abruptly, and said in a startled and
+doubting voice: “Do I dream still, or do I behold Rienzi?”
+
+The Pilgrim paused also, as he heard the name, and gazing long on the
+attenuated features of the young lord, said: “I am he that was Rienzi!
+and you, pale shadow, is it in this grave of Italy that I meet with the
+gay and high Colonna? Alas, young friend,” he added, in a more relaxed
+and kindly voice, “hath the Plague not spared the flower of the Roman
+nobles? Come, I, the cruel and the harsh Tribune, I will be thy nurse:
+he who might have been my brother, shall yet claim from me a brother’s
+care.”
+
+With these words he wound his arm tenderly round Adrian; and the young
+noble, touched by his compassion, and agitated by the surprise, leaned
+upon Rienzi’s breast in silence.
+
+“Poor youth,” resumed the Tribune, for so, since rather fallen than
+deposed, he may yet be called; “I ever loved the young, (my brother died
+young;) and you more than most. What fatality brought thee hither?”
+
+“Irene!” replied Adrian, falteringly.
+
+“Is it so, really? Art thou a Colonna, and yet prize the fallen? The
+same duty has brought me also to the city of Death. From the furthest
+south--over the mountains of the robber--through the fastnesses of my
+foes--through towns in which the herald proclaimed in my ear the price
+of my head--I have passed hither, on foot and alone, safe under the
+wings of the Almighty One. Young man, thou shouldst have left this task
+to one who bears a wizard’s life, and whom Heaven and Earth yet reserve
+for an appointed end!”
+
+The Tribune said this in a deep and inward voice; and in his raised eye
+and solemn brow might be seen how much his reverses had deepened his
+fanaticism, and added even to the sanguineness of his hopes.
+
+“But,” asked Adrian, withdrawing gently from Rienzi’s arm, “thou
+knowest, then, where Irene is to be found; let us go together. Lose not
+a moment in this talk; time is of inestimable value, and a moment in
+this city is often but the border to eternity.”
+
+“Right,” said Rienzi, awakening to his object. “But fear not, I have
+dreamt that I shall save her, the gem and darling of my house. Fear not,
+I have no fear.”
+
+“Know you where to seek?” said Adrian, impatiently; “the Convent holds
+far other guests.”
+
+“Ha! so said my dream!”
+
+“Talk not now of dreams,” said the lover; “but if you have no other
+guide, let us part at once in quest of her. I will take yonder street,
+you take the opposite, and at sunset let us meet in the same spot.”
+
+“Rash man!” said the Tribune, with great solemnity; “scoff not at the
+visions which Heaven makes a parable to its Chosen. Thou seekest counsel
+of thy human wisdom; I, less presumptuous, follow the hand of the
+mysterious Providence, moving even now before my gaze as a pillar of
+light through the wilderness of dread. Ay, meet we here at sunset, and
+prove whose guide is the most unerring. If my dream tell me true, I
+shall see my sister living, ere the sun reach yonder hill, and by a
+church dedicated to St. Mark.”
+
+The grave earnestness with which Rienzi spoke impressed Adrian with a
+hope which his reason would not acknowledge. He saw him depart with that
+proud and stately step to which his sweeping garments gave a yet more
+imposing dignity, and then passed up the street to the right hand.
+He had not got half way when he felt himself pulled by the mantle. He
+turned, and saw the shapeless mask of a Becchino.
+
+“I feared you were sped, and that another had cheated me of my office,”
+ said the gravedigger, “seeing that you returned not to the old Prince’s
+palace. You don’t know me from the rest of us I see, but I am the one
+you told to seek--”
+
+“Irene!”
+
+“Yes, Irene di Gabrini; you promised ample reward.”
+
+“You shall have it.”
+
+“Follow me.”
+
+The Becchino strode on, and soon arrived at a mansion. He knocked twice
+at the porter’s entrance, an old woman cautiously opened the door. “Fear
+not, good aunt,” said the gravedigger; “this is the young Lord I spoke
+to thee of. Thou sayest thou hadst two ladies in the palace, who alone
+survived of all the lodgers, and their names were Bianca de Medici,
+and--what was the other?”
+
+“Irene di Gabrini, a Roman lady. But I told thee this was the fourth day
+they left the house, terrified by the deaths within it.”
+
+“Thou didst so: and was there anything remarkable in the dress of the
+Signora di Gabrini?”
+
+“Yes, I have told thee: a blue mantle, such as I have rarely seen,
+wrought with silver.”
+
+“Was the broidery that of stars, silver stars,” exclaimed Adrian, “with
+a sun in the centre?”
+
+“It was.”
+
+“Alas! alas! the arms of the Tribune’s family! I remember how I
+praised the mantle the first day she wore it--the day on which we were
+betrothed!” And the lover at once conjectured the secret sentiment
+which had induced Irene to retain thus carefully a robe so endeared by
+association.
+
+“You know no more of your lodgers?”
+
+“Nothing.”
+
+“And is this all you have learned, knave?” cried Adrian.
+
+“Patience. I must bring you from proof to proof, and link to link, in
+order to win my reward. Follow, Signor.”
+
+The Becchino then passing through the several lanes and streets, arrived
+at another house of less magnificent size and architecture. Again
+he tapped thrice at the parlour door, and this time came forth a man
+withered, old, and palsied, whom death seemed to disdain to strike.
+
+“Signor Astuccio,” said the Becchino, “pardon me; but I told thee I
+might trouble thee again. This is the gentleman who wants to know, what
+is often best unknown--but that’s not my affair. Did a lady--young and
+beautiful--with dark hair, and of a slender form, enter this house,
+stricken with the first symptom of the Plague, three days since?”
+
+“Ay, thou knowest that well enough; and thou knowest still better, that
+she has departed these two days: it was quick work with her, quicker
+than with most!”
+
+“Did she wear anything remarkable?”
+
+“Yes, troublesome man: a blue cloak, with stars of silver.”
+
+“Couldst thou guess aught of her previous circumstances?”
+
+“No, save that she raved much about the nunnery of Santa Maria de’
+Pazzi, and bravos, and sacrilege.”
+
+“Are you satisfied, Signor?” asked the gravedigger, with an air of
+triumph, turning to Adrian. “But no, I will satisfy thee better, if thou
+hast courage. Wilt thou follow?”
+
+“I comprehend thee; lead on. Courage! What is there on earth now to
+fear?”
+
+Muttering to himself, “Ay, leave me alone. I have a head worth
+something; I ask no gentleman to go by my word; I will make his own eyes
+the judge of what my trouble is worth,” the gravedigger now led the way
+through one of the gates a little out of the city. And here, under a
+shed, sat six of his ghastly and ill-omened brethren, with spades and
+pick-axes at their feet.
+
+His guide now turned round to Adrian, whose face was set, and resolute
+in despair.
+
+“Fair Signor,” said he, with some touch of lingering compassion,
+“wouldst thou really convince thine own eyes and heart?--the sight may
+appal, the contagion may destroy, thee,--if, indeed, as it seems to me,
+Death has not already written ‘mine’ upon thee.”
+
+“Raven of bode and woe!” answered Adrian, “seest thou not that all
+I shrink from is thy voice and aspect? Show me her I seek, living or
+dead.”
+
+“I will show her to you, then,” said the Becchino, sullenly, “such as
+two nights since she was committed to my charge. Line and lineament may
+already be swept away, for the Plague hath a rapid besom; but I have
+left that upon her by which you will know the Becchino is no liar. Bring
+hither the torches, comrades, and lift the door. Never stare; it’s the
+gentleman’s whim, and he’ll pay it well.”
+
+Turning to the right while Adrian mechanically followed his conductors,
+a spectacle whose dire philosophy crushes as with a wheel all the pride
+of mortal man--the spectacle of that vault in which earth hides all that
+on earth flourished, rejoiced, exulted--awaited his eye!
+
+The Becchini lifted a ponderous grate, lowered their torches (scarcely
+needed, for through the aperture rushed, with a hideous glare, the light
+of the burning sun,) and motioned to Adrian to advance. He stood upon
+the summit of the abyss and gazed below.
+
+It was a large deep and circular space, like the bottom of an exhausted
+well. In niches cut into the walls of earth around, lay, duly coffined,
+those who had been the earliest victims of the plague, when the
+Becchino’s market was not yet glutted, and priest followed, and friend
+mourned the dead. But on the floor below, there was the loathsome
+horror! Huddled and matted together--some naked, some in shrouds already
+black and rotten--lay the later guests, the unshriven and unblest! The
+torches, the sun, streamed broad and red over Corruption in all its
+stages, from the pale blue tint and swollen shape, to the moistened
+undistinguishable mass, or the riddled bones, where yet clung, in strips
+and tatters, the black and mangled flesh. In many, the face remained
+almost perfect, while the rest of the body was but bone; the long hair,
+the human face, surmounting the grisly skeleton. There was the infant,
+still on the mother’s breast; there was the lover, stretched across the
+dainty limbs of his adored! The rats, (for they clustered in numbers to
+that feast,) disturbed, not scared, sate up from their horrid meal as
+the light glimmered over them, and thousands of them lay round, stark,
+and dead, poisoned by that they fed on! There, too, the wild satire of
+the gravediggers had cast, though stripped of their gold and jewels, the
+emblems that spoke of departed rank;--the broken wand of the Councillor;
+the General’s baton; the Priestly Mitre! The foul and livid exhalations
+gathered like flesh itself, fungous and putrid, upon the walls, and
+the--
+
+But who shall detail the ineffable and unimaginable horrors that reigned
+over the Palace where the Great King received the prisoners whom the
+sword of the Pestilence had subdued?
+
+But through all that crowded court--crowded with beauty and with birth,
+with the strength of the young and the honours of the old, and the
+valour of the brave, and the wisdom of the learned, and the wit of
+the scorner, and the piety of the faithful--one only figure attracted
+Adrian’s eye. Apart from the rest, a latecomer--the long locks streaming
+far and dark over arm and breast--lay a female, the face turned
+partially aside, the little seen not recognisable even by the mother
+of the dead,--but wrapped round in that fatal mantle, on which, though
+blackened and tarnished, was yet visible the starry heraldry assumed by
+those who claimed the name of the proud Tribune of Rome. Adrian saw no
+more--he fell back in the arms of the gravediggers: when he recovered,
+he was still without the gates of Florence--reclined upon a green
+mound--his guide stood beside him--holding his steed by the bridle as it
+grazed patiently on the neglected grass. The other brethren of the axe
+had resumed their seat under the shed.
+
+“So, you have revived! Ah! I thought it was only the effluvia; few stand
+it as we do. And so, as your search is over, deeming you would now be
+quitting Florence if you have any sense left to you, I went for your
+good horse. I have fed him since your departure from the palace. Indeed
+I fancied he would be my perquisite, but there are plenty as good. Come,
+young sir, mount. I feel a pity for you, I know not why, except that you
+are the only one I have met for weeks who seem to care for another
+more than for yourself. I hope you are satisfied now that I showed some
+brains, eh! in your service; and as I have kept my promise, you’ll keep
+yours.”
+
+“Friend,” said Adrian, “here is gold enough to make thee rich; here,
+too, is a jewel that merchants will tell thee princes might vie to
+purchase. Thou seemest honest, despite thy calling, or thou mightest
+have robbed and murdered me long since. Do me one favour more.”
+
+“By my poor mother’s soul, yes.”
+
+“Take yon--yon clay from that fearful place. Inter it in some quiet and
+remote spot--apart--alone! You promise me?--you swear it?--it is well!
+And now help me on my horse. Farewell Italy, and if I die not with this
+stroke, may I die as befits at once honour and despair--with trumpet and
+banner round me--in a well-fought field against a worthy foe!--Save a
+knightly death, nothing is left to live for!”
+
+
+
+
+BOOK VII. THE PRISON.
+
+     “Fu rinchiuso in una torre grossa e larga; avea libri assai,
+     suo Tito Livio, sue storie di Roma, la Bibbia.” &c.--“Vita
+     di Cola di Rienzi”, lib. ii. c. 13.
+
+     “He was immured in a high and spacious tower; he had books
+     enough, his Titus Livius, his histories of Rome, the Bible,”
+      &c.
+
+
+
+Chapter 7.I. Avignon.--The Two Pages.--The Stranger Beauty.
+
+There is this difference between the Drama of Shakspeare, and that
+of almost every other master of the same art; that in the first, the
+catastrophe is rarely produced by one single cause--one simple and
+continuous chain of events. Various and complicated agencies work out
+the final end. Unfettered by the rules of time and place, each time,
+each place depicted, presents us with its appropriate change of action,
+or of actors. Sometimes the interest seems to halt, to turn aside, to
+bring us unawares upon objects hitherto unnoticed, or upon qualities of
+the characters hitherto hinted at, not developed. But, in reality, the
+pause in the action is but to collect, to gather up, and to grasp, all
+the varieties of circumstance that conduce to the Great Result: and the
+art of fiction is only deserted for the fidelity of history. Whoever
+seeks to place before the world the true representation of a man’s
+life and times, and, enlarging the Dramatic into the Epic, extends
+his narrative over the vicissitudes of years, will find himself
+unconsciously, in this, the imitator of Shakspeare. New characters, each
+conducive to the end--new scenes, each leading to the last, rise before
+him as he proceeds, sometimes seeming to the reader to delay, even while
+they advance, the dread catastrophe. The sacrificial procession sweeps
+along, swelled by new comers, losing many that first joined it; before,
+at last, the same as a whole, but differing in its components, the crowd
+reach the fated bourn of the Altar and the Victim!
+
+It is five years after the date of the events I have recorded, and my
+story conveys us to the Papal Court at Avignon--that tranquil seat of
+power, to which the successors of St. Peter had transplanted the luxury,
+the pomp, and the vices, of the Imperial City. Secure from the fraud or
+violence of a powerful and barbarous nobility, the courtiers of the See
+surrendered themselves to a holyday of delight--their repose was devoted
+to enjoyment, and Avignon presented, at that day, perhaps the gayest
+and most voluptuous society of Europe. The elegance of Clement VI. had
+diffused an air of literary refinement over the grosser pleasures of
+the place, and the spirit of Petrarch still continued to work its way
+through the councils of faction and the orgies of debauch.
+
+Innocent VI. had lately succeeded Clement, and whatever his own claims
+to learning, (Matteo Villani (lib. iii. cap. 44) says, that Innocent VI.
+had not much pretension to learning. He is reported, however, by other
+authorities, cited by Zefirino Re, to have been “eccellente canonista.”
+ He had been a professor in the University of Toulouse.) he, at least,
+appreciated knowledge and intellect in others; so that the graceful
+pedantry of the time continued to mix itself with the pursuit of
+pleasure. The corruption which reigned through the whole place was too
+confirmed to yield to the example of Innocent, himself a man of simple
+habits and exemplary life. Though, like his predecessor, obedient to the
+policy of France, Innocent possessed a hard and an extended ambition.
+Deeply concerned for the interests of the Church, he formed the project
+of confirming and re-establishing her shaken dominion in Italy; and he
+regarded the tyrants of the various states as the principal obstacles
+to his ecclesiastical ambition. Nor was this the policy of Innocent
+VI. alone. With such exceptions as peculiar circumstances necessarily
+occasioned, the Papal See was, upon the whole, friendly to the political
+liberties of Italy. The Republics of the Middle Ages grew up under the
+shadow of the Church; and there, as elsewhere, it was found, contrary
+to a vulgar opinion, that Religion, however prostituted and perverted,
+served for the general protection of civil freedom,--raised the lowly,
+and resisted the oppressor.
+
+At this period there appeared at Avignon a lady of singular and
+matchless beauty. She had come with a slender but well appointed retinue
+from Florence, but declared herself of Neapolitan birth; the widow of
+a noble of the brilliant court of the unfortunate Jane. Her name was
+Cesarini. Arrived at a place where, even in the citadel of Christianity,
+Venus retained her ancient empire, where Love made the prime business of
+life, and to be beautiful was to be of power; the Signora Cesarini had
+scarcely appeared in public before she saw at her feet half the rank and
+gallantry of Avignon. Her female attendants were beset with bribes
+and billets; and nightly, beneath her lattice, was heard the plaintive
+serenade. She entered largely into the gay dissipation of the town, and
+her charms shared the celebrity of the hour with the verse of Petrarch.
+But though she frowned on none, none could claim the monopoly of her
+smiles. Her fair fame was as yet unblemished; but if any might presume
+beyond the rest, she seemed to have selected rather from ambition than
+love, and Giles, the warlike Cardinal d’Albornoz, all powerful at the
+sacred court, already foreboded the hour of his triumph.
+
+It was late noon, and in the ante-chamber of the fair Signora waited
+two of that fraternity of pages, fair and richly clad, who, at that day,
+furnished the favourite attendants to rank of either sex.
+
+“By my troth,” cried one of these young servitors, pushing from him the
+dice with which himself and his companion had sought to beguile their
+leisure, “this is but dull work! and the best part of the day is gone.
+Our lady is late.”
+
+“And I have donned my new velvet mantle,” replied the other,
+compassionately eyeing his finery.
+
+“Chut, Giacomo,” said his comrade, yawning; “a truce with thy
+conceit.--What news abroad, I wonder? Has his Holiness come to his
+senses yet?”
+
+“His senses! what, is he mad then?” quoth Giacomo, in a serious and
+astonished whisper.
+
+“I think he is; if, being Pope, he does not discover that he may at
+length lay aside mask and hood. ‘Continent Cardinal--lewd Pope,’ is the
+old motto, you know; something must be the matter with the good man’s
+brain if he continue to live like a hermit.”
+
+“Oh, I have you! but faith, his Holiness has proxies eno’. The bishops
+take care to prevent women, Heaven bless them! going out of fashion; and
+Albornoz does not maintain your proverb, touching the Cardinals.”
+
+“True, but Giles is a warrior,--a cardinal in the church, but a soldier
+in the city.”
+
+“Will he carry the fort here, think you, Angelo?”
+
+“Why, fort is female, but--”
+
+“But what?”
+
+“The Signora’s brow is made for power, rather than love, fair as it is.
+She sees in Albornoz the prince, and not the lover. With what a step she
+sweeps the floor! it disdains even the cloth of gold!”
+
+“Hark!” cried Giacomo, hastening to the lattice, “hear you the hoofs
+below? Ah, a gallant company!”
+
+“Returned from hawking,” answered Angelo, regarding wistfully the
+cavalcade, as it swept the narrow street. “Plumes waving, steeds
+curvetting--see how yon handsome cavalier presses close to that dame!”
+
+“His mantle is the colour of mine,” sighed Giacomo.
+
+As the gay procession paced slowly on, till hidden by the winding
+street, and as the sound of laughter and the tramp of horses was yet
+faintly heard, there frowned right before the straining gaze of the
+pages, a dark massive tower of the mighty masonry of the eleventh
+century: the sun gleamed sadly on its vast and dismal surface, which was
+only here and there relieved by loopholes and narrow slits, rather
+than casements. It was a striking contrast to the gaiety around, the
+glittering shops, and the gaudy train that had just filled the space
+below. This contrast the young men seemed involuntarily to feel; they
+drew back, and looked at each other.
+
+“I know your thoughts, Giacomo,” said Angelo, the handsomer and elder of
+the two. “You think yon tower affords but a gloomy lodgment?”
+
+“And I thank my stars that made me not high enough to require so grand a
+cage,” rejoined Giacomo.
+
+“Yet,” observed Angelo, “it holds one, who in birth was not our
+superior.”
+
+“Do tell me something of that strange man,” said Giacomo, regaining his
+seat; “you are Roman and should know.”
+
+“Yes!” answered Angelo, haughtily drawing himself up, “I am Roman! and I
+should be unworthy my birth, if I had not already learned what honour is
+due to the name of Cola di Rienzi.”
+
+“Yet your fellow-Romans merely stoned him, I fancy,” muttered Giacomo.
+“Honour seems to lie more in kicks than money. Can you tell me,”
+ continued the page in a louder key, “can you tell me if it be true, that
+Rienzi appeared at Prague before the Emperor, and prophesied that the
+late Pope and all the Cardinals should be murdered, and a new Italian
+Pope elected, who should endue the Emperor with a golden crown, as
+Sovereign of Sicilia, Calabria, and Apulia, (An absurd fable, adopted
+by certain historians.) and himself with a crown of silver, as King of
+Rome, and all Italy? And--”
+
+“Hush!” interrupted Angelo, impatiently. “Listen to me, and you shall
+know the exact story. On last leaving Rome (thou knowest that, after
+his fall, he was present at the Jubilee in disguise) the Tribune--” here
+Angelo, pausing, looked round, and then with a flushed cheek and raised
+voice resumed, “Yes, the Tribune, that was and shall be--travelled in
+disguise, as a pilgrim, over mountain and forest, night and day, exposed
+to rain and storm, no shelter but the cave,--he who had been, they
+say, the very spoilt one of Luxury. Arrived at length in Bohemia,
+he disclosed himself to a Florentine in Prague, and through his aid
+obtained audience of the Emperor Charles.”
+
+“A prudent man, the Emperor!” said Giacomo, “close-fisted as a miser. He
+makes conquests by bargain, and goes to market for laurels,--as I have
+heard my brother say, who was under him.”
+
+“True; but I have also heard that he likes bookmen and scholars--is
+wise and temperate, and much is yet hoped from him in Italy! Before the
+Emperor, I say, came Rienzi. ‘Know, great Prince,’ said he, ‘that I am
+that Rienzi to whom God gave to govern Rome, in peace, with justice, and
+to freedom. I curbed the nobles, I purged corruption, I amended law. The
+powerful persecuted me--pride and envy have chased me from my dominions.
+Great as you are, fallen as I am, I too have wielded the sceptre and
+might have worn a crown. Know, too, that I am illegitimately of
+your lineage; my father the son of Henry VII.; (Uncle to the Emperor
+Charles.) the blood of the Teuton rolls in my veins; mean as were my
+earlier fortunes and humble my earlier name! From you, O King, I seek
+protection, and I demand justice.” (See, for this speech, “the Anonymous
+Biographer,” lib. ii. cap. 12.)
+
+“A bold speech, and one from equal to equal,” said Giacomo; “surely you
+swell us out the words.”
+
+“Not a whit; they were written down by the Emperor’s scribe, and every
+Roman who has once heard knows them by heart: once every Roman was the
+equal to a king, and Rienzi maintained our dignity in asserting his
+own.”
+
+Giacomo, who discreetly avoided quarrels, knew the weak side of
+his friend; and though in his heart he thought the Romans as
+good-for-nothing a set of turbulent dastards as all Italy might furnish,
+he merely picked a straw from his mantle, and said, in rather an
+impatient tone, “Humph! proceed! did the Emperor dismiss him?”
+
+“Not so: Charles was struck with his bearing and his spirit, received
+him graciously, and entertained him hospitably. He remained some time
+at Prague, and astonished all the learned with his knowledge and
+eloquence.” (His Italian contemporary delights in representing this
+remarkable man as another Crichton. “Disputava,” he says of him when at
+Prague, “disputava con Mastri di teologia; molto diceva, parlava cose
+meravigliose...abbair fea ogni persona.”--“He disputed with Masters of
+theology--he spoke much, he discoursed things wonderful--he astonished
+every one.”)
+
+“But if so honoured at Prague, how comes he a prisoner at Avignon?”
+
+“Giacomo,” said Angelo, thoughtfully, “there are some men whom we, of
+another mind and mould, can rarely comprehend, and never fathom. And of
+such men I have observed that a supreme confidence in their own fortunes
+or their own souls, is the most common feature. Thus impressed, and thus
+buoyed, they rush into danger with a seeming madness, and from danger
+soar to greatness, or sink to death. So with Rienzi; dissatisfied with
+empty courtesies and weary of playing the pedant, since once he had
+played the prince;--some say of his own accord, (though others relate
+that he was surrendered to the Pope’s legate by Charles,) he left the
+Emperor’s court, and without arms, without money, betook himself at once
+to Avignon!”
+
+“Madness indeed!”
+
+“Yet, perhaps his only course, under all circumstances,” resumed the
+elder page. “Once before his fall, and once during his absence from
+Rome, he had been excommunicated by the Pope’s legate. He was accused of
+heresy--the ban was still on him. It was necessary that he should clear
+himself. How was the poor exile to do so? No powerful friend stood
+up for the friend of the people. No courtier vindicated one who had
+trampled on the neck of the nobles. His own genius was his only friend;
+on that only could he rely. He sought Avignon, to free himself from the
+accusations against him; and, doubtless, he hoped that there was but one
+step from his acquittal to his restoration. Besides, it is certain that
+the Emperor had been applied to, formally to surrender Rienzi. He had
+the choice before him; for to that sooner or later it must come--to
+go free, or to go in bonds--as a criminal, or as a Roman. He chose the
+latter. Wherever he passed along, the people rose in every town, in
+every hamlet. The name of the great Tribune was honoured throughout all
+Italy. They besought him not to rush into the very den of peril--they
+implored him to save himself for that country which he had sought to
+raise. ‘I go to vindicate myself, and to triumph,’ was the Tribune’s
+answer. Solemn honours were paid him in the cities through which he
+passed; (“Per tutto la via li furo fatti solenni onori,” &c.--“Vita di
+Cola di Rienzi”, lib. ii. cap. 13.) and I am told that never ambassador,
+prince, or baron, entered Avignon with so long a train as that which
+followed into these very walls the steps of Cola di Rienzi.”
+
+“And on his arrival?”
+
+“He demanded an audience, that he might refute the charges against him.
+He flung down the gage to the proud cardinals who had excommunicated
+him. He besought a trial.”
+
+“And what said the Pope?”
+
+“Nothing--by word. Yon tower was his answer!”
+
+“A rough one!”
+
+“But there have been longer roads than that from the prison to the
+palace, and God made not men like Rienzi for the dungeon and the chain.”
+
+As Angelo said this with a loud voice, and with all the enthusiasm with
+which the fame of the fallen Tribune had inspired the youth of Rome, he
+heard a sigh behind him. He turned in some confusion, and at the door
+which admitted to the chamber occupied by the Signora Cesarini, stood a
+female of noble presence. Attired in the richest garments, gold and gems
+were dull to the lustre of her dark eyes, and as she now stood, erect
+and commanding, never seemed brow more made for the regal crown--never
+did human beauty more fully consummate the ideal of a heroine and a
+queen.
+
+“Pardon me, Signora,” said Angelo, hesitatingly; “I spoke loud, I
+disturbed you; but I am Roman, and my theme was--”
+
+“Rienzi!” said the lady, approaching; “a fit one to stir a Roman heart.
+Nay--no excuses: they would sound ill on thy generous lips. Ah, if--”
+ the Signora paused suddenly, and sighed again; then in an altered and
+graver tone she resumed--“If fate restore Rienzi to his proper fortunes,
+he shall know what thou deemest of him.”
+
+“If you, lady, who are of Naples,” said Angelo, with meaning emphasis,
+“speak thus of a fallen exile, what must I have felt who acknowledge a
+sovereign?”
+
+“Rienzi is not of Rome alone--he is of Italy--of the world,” returned
+the Signora. “And you, Angelo, who have had the boldness to speak thus
+of one fallen, have proved with what loyalty you can serve those who
+have the fortune to own you.”
+
+As she spoke, the Signora looked at the page’s downcast and blushing
+face long and wistfully, with the gaze of one accustomed to read the
+soul in the countenance.
+
+“Men are often deceived,” said she sadly, yet with a half smile; “but
+women rarely,--save in love. Would that Rome were filled with such as
+you! Enough! Hark! Is that the sound of hoofs in the court below?”
+
+“Madam,” said Giacomo, bringing his mantle gallantly over his shoulder,
+“I see the servitors of Monsignore the Cardinal d’Albornoz.--It is the
+Cardinal himself.”
+
+“It is well!” said the Signora, with a brightening eye; “I await
+him!” With these words she withdrew by the door through which she had
+surprised the Roman page.
+
+
+
+Chapter 7.II. The Character of a Warrior Priest--an Interview--the
+Intrigue and Counter-intrigue of Courts.
+
+Giles, (or Egidio, (Egidio is the proper Italian equivalent to the
+French name Gilles,--but the Cardinal is generally called, by the
+writers of that day, Gilio d’Albornoz.)) Cardinal d’Albornoz, was one of
+the most remarkable men of that remarkable time, so prodigal of genius.
+Boasting his descent from the royal houses of Aragon and Leon, he
+had early entered the church, and yet almost a youth, attained the
+archbishopric of Toledo. But no peaceful career, however brilliant,
+sufficed to his ambition. He could not content himself with the honours
+of the church, unless they were the honours of a church militant. In
+the war against the Moors, no Spaniard had more highly distinguished
+himself; and Alphonso XI. king of Castile, had insisted on receiving
+from the hand of the martial priest the badge of knighthood. After the
+death of Alphonso, who was strongly attached to him, Albornoz repaired
+to Avignon, and obtained from Clement VI. the cardinal’s hat. With
+Innocent he continued in high favour, and now, constantly in the
+councils of the Pope, rumours of warlike preparation, under the banners
+of Albornoz, for the recovery of the papal dominions from the various
+tyrants that usurped them, were already circulated through the court.
+(It is a characteristic anecdote of this bold Churchman, that Urban V.
+one day demanded an account of the sums spent in his military expedition
+against the Italian tyrants. The Cardinal presented to the Pope a wagon,
+filled with the keys of the cities and fortresses he had taken. “This is
+my account,” said he; “you perceive how I have invested your money.” The
+Pope embraced him, and gave him no further trouble about his accounts.)
+Bold, sagacious, enterprising, and cold-hearted,--with the valour of the
+knight, and the cunning of the priest,--such was the character of Giles,
+Cardinal d’Albornoz.
+
+Leaving his attendant gentlemen in the antechamber, Albornoz was ushered
+into the apartment of the Signora Cesarini. In person, the Cardinal
+was about the middle height; the dark complexion of Spain had faded by
+thought, and the wear of ambitious schemes, into a sallow but hardy hue;
+his brow was deeply furrowed, and though not yet passed the prime of
+life, Albornoz might seem to have entered age, but for the firmness
+of his step, the slender elasticity of his frame, and an eye which had
+acquired calmness and depth from thought, without losing any of the
+brilliancy of youth.
+
+“Beautiful Signora,” said the Cardinal, bending over the hand of the
+Cesarini with a grace which betokened more of the prince than of the
+priest; “the commands of his Holiness have detained me, I fear, beyond
+the hour in which you vouchsafed to appoint my homage, but my heart has
+been with you since we parted.”
+
+“The Cardinal d’Albornoz,” replied the Signora, gently withdrawing her
+hand, and seating herself, “has so many demands on his time, from the
+duties of his rank and renown, that methinks to divert his attention for
+a few moments to less noble thoughts is a kind of treason to his fame.”
+
+“Ah, Lady,” replied the Cardinal, “never was my ambition so nobly
+directed as it is now. And it were a prouder lot to be at thy feet than
+on the throne of St. Peter.”
+
+A momentary blush passed over the cheek of the Signora, yet it seemed
+the blush of indignation as much as of vanity; it was succeeded by an
+extreme paleness. She paused before she replied; and then fixing her
+large and haughty eyes on the enamoured Spaniard, she said, in a low
+voice,
+
+“My Lord Cardinal, I do not affect to misunderstand your words; neither
+do I place them to the account of a general gallantry. I am vain enough
+to believe you imagine you speak truly when you say you love me.”
+
+“Imagine!” echoed the Spaniard.
+
+“Listen to me,” continued the Signora. “She whom the Cardinal Albornoz
+honours with his love has a right to demand of him its proofs. In the
+papal court, whose power like his?--I require you to exercise it for
+me.”
+
+“Speak, dearest Lady; have your estates been seized by the barbarians of
+these lawless times? Hath any dared to injure you? Lands and titles, are
+these thy wish?--my power is thy slave.”
+
+“Cardinal, no! there is one thing dearer to an Italian and a woman than
+wealth or station--it is revenge!”
+
+The Cardinal drew back from the flashing eye that was bent upon him, but
+the spirit of her speech touched a congenial chord.
+
+“There,” said he, after a little hesitation, “there spake high descent.
+Revenge is the luxury of the well-born. Let serfs and churls forgive an
+injury. Proceed, Lady.”
+
+“Hast thou heard the last news from Rome?” asked the Signora.
+
+“Surely,” replied the Cardinal, in some surprise, “we were poor
+statesmen to be ignorant of the condition of the capital of the papal
+dominions; and my heart mourns for that unfortunate city. But wherefore
+wouldst thou question me of Rome?--thou art--”
+
+“Roman! Know, my Lord, that I have a purpose in calling myself of
+Naples. To your discretion I intrust my secret--I am of Rome! Tell me of
+her state.”
+
+“Fairest one,” returned the Cardinal, “I should have known that that
+brow and presence were not of the light Campania. My reason should have
+told me that they bore the stamp of the Empress of the World. The state
+of Rome,” continued Albornoz, in a graver tone, “is briefly told. Thou
+knowest that after the fall of the able but insolent Rienzi, Pepin,
+count of Minorbino, (a creature of Montreal’s) who had assisted in
+expelling him, would have betrayed Rome to Montreal,--but he was neither
+strong enough nor wise enough, and the Barons chased him as he had
+chased the Tribune. Some time afterwards a new demagogue, John Cerroni,
+was installed in the Capitol. He once more expelled the nobles; new
+revolutions ensued--the Barons were recalled. The weak successor of
+Rienzi summoned the people to arms--in vain: in terror and despair he
+abdicated his power, and left the city a prey to the interminable feuds
+of the Orsini, the Colonna, and the Savelli.”
+
+“Thus much I know, my Lord; but when his Holiness succeeded to the chair
+of Clement VI.--”
+
+“Then,” said Albornoz, and a slight frown darkened his sallow brow,
+“then came the blacker part of the history. Two senators were elected in
+concert by the Pope.”
+
+“Their names?”
+
+“Bertoldo Orsini, and one of the Colonna. A few weeks afterwards, the
+high price of provisions stung the rascal stomachs of the mob--they
+rose, they clamoured, they armed, they besieged the Capitol--”
+
+“Well, well,” cried the Signora, clasping her hands, and betokening in
+every feature her interest in the narration.
+
+“Colonna only escaped death by a vile disguise; Bertoldo Orsini was
+stoned.”
+
+“Stoned!--there fell one!”
+
+“Yes, lady, one of a great house; the least drop of whose blood were
+worth an ocean of plebeian puddle. At present, all is disorder, misrule,
+anarchy, at Rome. The contests of the nobles shake the city to the
+centre; and prince and people, wearied of so many experiments to
+establish a government, have now no governor but the fear of the sword.
+Such, fair madam, is the state of Rome. Sigh not, it occupies now our
+care. It shall be remedied; and I, madam, may be the happy instrument of
+restoring peace to your native city.”
+
+“There is but one way of restoring peace to Rome,” answered the Signora,
+abruptly, “and that is--The restoration of Rienzi!”
+
+The Cardinal started. “Madam,” said he, “do I hear aright?--are you not
+nobly born?--can you desire the rise of a plebeian? Did you not speak of
+revenge, and now you ask for mercy?”
+
+“Lord Cardinal,” said the beautiful Signora, earnestly, “I do not ask
+for mercy: such a word is not for the lips of one who demands justice.
+Nobly born I am--ay, and from a stock to whose long descent from the
+patricians of ancient Rome the high line of Aragon itself would be of
+yesterday. Nay, I would not offend you, Monsignore; your greatness is
+not borrowed from pedigrees and tombstones--your greatness is your own
+achieving: would you speak honestly, my Lord, you would own that you are
+proud only of your own laurels, and that, in your heart, you laugh at
+the stately fools who trick themselves out in the mouldering finery of
+the dead!”
+
+“Muse! prophetess! you speak aright,” said the high-spirited Cardinal,
+with unwonted energy; “and your voice is like that of the Fame I dreamed
+of in my youth. Speak on, speak ever!”
+
+“Such,” continued the Signora, “such as your pride, is the just pride of
+Rienzi. Proud that he is the workman of his own great renown. In such
+as the Tribune of Rome we acknowledge the founders of noble lineage.
+Ancestry makes not them--they make ancestry. Enough of this. I am of
+noble race, it is true; but my house, and those of many, have been
+crushed and broken beneath the yoke of the Orsini and Colonna--it is
+against them I desire revenge. But I am better than an Italian lady--I
+am a Roman woman--I weep tears of blood for the disorders of my unhappy
+country. I mourn that even you, my Lord,--yes, that a barbarian, however
+eminent and however great, should mourn for Rome. I desire to restore
+her fortunes.”
+
+“But Rienzi would only restore his own.”
+
+“Not so, my Lord Cardinal; not so. Ambitious and proud he may be--great
+souls are so--but he has never had one wish divorced from the welfare of
+Rome. But put aside all thought of his interests--it is not of these I
+speak. You desire to re-establish the papal power in Rome. Your senators
+have failed to do it. Demagogues fail--Rienzi alone can succeed; he
+alone can command the turbulent passions of the Barons--he alone can
+sway the capricious and fickle mob. Release, restore Rienzi, and through
+Rienzi the Pope regains Rome!”
+
+The Cardinal did not answer for some moments. Buried as in a revery,
+he sate motionless, shading his face with his hand. Perhaps he secretly
+owned there was a wiser policy in the suggestions of the Signora than he
+cared openly to confess. Lifting his head, at length, from his bosom,
+he fixed his eyes upon the Signora’s watchful countenance, and, with a
+forced smile, said,
+
+“Pardon me, madam; but while we play the politicians, forget not that
+I am thy adorer. Sagacious may be thy counsels, yet wherefore are they
+urged? Why this anxious interest for Rienzi? If by releasing him the
+Church may gain an ally, am I sure that Giles d’Albornoz will not raise
+a rival?”
+
+“My Lord,” said the Signora, half rising, “you are my suitor; but your
+rank does not tempt me--your gold cannot buy. If you love me, I have a
+right to command your services to whatsoever task I would require--it is
+the law of chivalry. If ever I yield to the addresses of mortal lover,
+it will be to the man who restores to my native land her hero and her
+saviour.”
+
+“Fair patriot,” said the Cardinal, “your words encourage my hope, yet
+they half damp my ambition; for fain would I desire that love and not
+service should alone give me the treasure that I ask. But hear me, sweet
+lady; you over-rate my power: I cannot deliver Rienzi--he is accused
+of rebellion, he is excommunicated for heresy. His acquittal rests with
+himself.”
+
+“You can procure his trial?”
+
+“Perhaps, Lady.”
+
+“That is his acquittal. And a private audience of his Holiness?”
+
+“Doubtless.”
+
+“That is his restoration! Behold all I ask!”
+
+“And then, sweet Roman, it will be mine to ask,” said the Cardinal,
+passionately, dropping on his knee, and taking the Signora’s hand. For
+one moment, that proud lady felt that she was woman--she blushed, she
+trembled; but it was not (could the Cardinal have read that heart) with
+passion or with weakness; it was with terror and with shame. Passively
+she surrendered her hand to the Cardinal, who covered it with kisses.
+
+“Thus inspired,” said Albornoz, rising, “I will not doubt of success.
+Tomorrow I wait on thee again.”
+
+He pressed her hand to his heart--the lady felt it not. He sighed his
+farewell--she did not hear it. Lingeringly he gazed; and slowly he
+departed. But it was some moments before, recalled to herself, the
+Signora felt that she was alone.
+
+“Alone!” she cried, half aloud, and with wild emphasis--“alone! Oh, what
+have I undergone--what have I said! Unfaithful, even in thought, to him!
+Oh, never! never! I, that have felt the kiss of his hallowing lips--that
+have slept on his kingly heart--I!--holy Mother, befriend and strengthen
+me!” she continued, as, weeping bitterly, she sunk upon her knees; and
+for some moments she was lost in prayer. Then, rising composed, but
+deadly pale, and with the tears rolling heavily down her cheeks, the
+Signora passed slowly to the casement; she threw it open, and bent
+forward; the air of the declining day came softly on her temples; it
+cooled, it mitigated, the fever that preyed within. Dark and huge
+before her frowned, in its gloomy shadow, the tower in which Rienzi was
+confined; she gazed at it long and wistfully, and then, turning away,
+drew from the folds of her robe a small and sharp dagger. “Let me save
+him for glory!” she murmured; “and this shall save me from dishonour!”
+
+
+
+Chapter 7.III. Holy Men.--Sagacious Deliberations.--Just Resolves.--And
+Sordid Motives to All.
+
+Enamoured of the beauty, and almost equally so of the lofty spirit, of
+the Signora Cesarini, as was the warlike Cardinal of Spain, love with
+him was not so master a passion as that ambition of complete success
+in all the active designs of life, which had hitherto animated his
+character and signalized his career. Musing, as he left the Signora, on
+her wish for the restoration of the Roman Tribune, his experienced and
+profound intellect ran swiftly through whatever advantages to his own
+political designs might result from that restoration. We have seen that
+it was the intention of the new Pontiff to attempt the recovery of the
+patrimonial territories, now torn from him by the gripe of able and
+disaffected tyrants. With this view, a military force was already in
+preparation, and the Cardinal was already secretly nominated the chief.
+But the force was very inadequate to the enterprise; and Albornoz
+depended much upon the moral strength of the cause in bringing recruits
+to his standard in his progress through the Italian states. The
+wonderful rise of Rienzi had excited an extraordinary enthusiasm in his
+favour through all the free populations of Italy. And this had been yet
+more kindled and inflamed by the influential eloquence of Petrarch, who,
+at that time, possessed of a power greater than ever, before or since,
+(not even excepting the Sage of Ferney,) wielded by a single literary
+man, had put forth his boldest genius in behalf of the Roman Tribune.
+Such a companion as Rienzi in the camp of the Cardinal might be a magnet
+of attraction to the youth and enterprise of Italy. On nearing Rome, he
+might himself judge how far it would be advisable to reinstate Rienzi
+as a delegate of the papal power. And, in the meanwhile, the Roman’s
+influence might be serviceable, whether to awe the rebellious nobles
+or conciliate the stubborn people. On the other hand, the Cardinal
+was shrewd enough to perceive that no possible good could arise from
+Rienzi’s present confinement. With every month it excited deeper and
+more universal sympathy. To his lonely dungeon turned half the hearts
+of republican Italy. Literature had leagued its new and sudden, and
+therefore mighty and even disproportioned, power with his cause; and the
+Pope, without daring to be his judge, incurred the odium of being his
+gaoler. “A popular prisoner,” said the sagacious Cardinal to himself,
+“is the most dangerous of guests. Restore him as your servant, or
+destroy him as your foe! In this case I see no alternative but acquittal
+or the knife!” In these reflections that able plotter, deep in the
+Machiavelism of the age, divorced the lover from the statesman.
+
+Recurring now to the former character, he felt some disagreeable and
+uneasy forebodings at the earnest interest of his mistress. Fain would
+he have attributed, either to some fantasy of patriotism or some purpose
+of revenge, the anxiety of the Cesarini; and there was much in her stern
+and haughty character which favoured that belief. But he was forced
+to acknowledge to himself some jealous apprehension of a sinister and
+latent motive, which touched his vanity and alarmed his love. “Howbeit,”
+ he thought, as he turned from his unwilling fear, “I can play with her
+at her own weapons; I can obtain the release of Rienzi, and claim my
+reward. If denied, the hand that opened the dungeon can again rivet the
+chain. In her anxiety is my power!”
+
+These thoughts the Cardinal was still revolving in his palace, when he
+was suddenly summoned to attend the Pontiff.
+
+The pontifical palace no longer exhibited the gorgeous yet graceful
+luxury of Clement VI., and the sarcastic Cardinal smiled to himself at
+the quiet gloom of the ante-chambers. “He thinks to set an example--this
+poor native of Limoges!” thought Albornoz; “and has but the
+mortification of finding himself eclipsed by the poorest bishop. He
+humbles himself, and fancies that the humility will be contagious.”
+
+His Holiness was seated before a small and rude table bestrewed with
+papers, his face buried in his hands; the room was simply furnished, and
+in a small niche beside the casement was an ivory crucifix; below, the
+death’s head and cross-bones, which most monks then introduced with a
+purpose similar to that of the ancients by the like ornaments,--mementos
+of the shortness of life, and therefore admonitions to make the best
+of it! On the ground lay a map of the Patrimonial Territory, with the
+fortresses in especial, distinctly and prominently marked. The Pope
+gently lifted up his head as the Cardinal was announced, and discovered
+a plain but sensible and somewhat interesting countenance. “My son!”
+ said he, with a kindly courtesy to the lowly salutation of the proud
+Spaniard, “scarcely wouldst thou imagine, after our long conference
+this morning, that new cares would so soon demand the assistance of thy
+counsels. Verily, the wreath of thorns stings sharp under the triple
+crown; and I sometimes long for the quiet abode of my old professor’s
+chair in Toulouse: my station is of pain and toil.”
+
+“God tempers the wind to the shorn lamb,” observed the Cardinal, with
+pious and compassionate gravity.
+
+Innocent could scarcely refrain a smile as he replied, “The lamb that
+carries the cross must have the strength of the lion. Since we parted,
+my son, I have had painful intelligence; our couriers have arrived from
+the Campagna--the heathen rage furiously--the force of John di Vico has
+augmented fearfully, and the most redoubted adventurer of Europe has
+enlisted under his banner.”
+
+“Does his Holiness,” cried the Cardinal, anxiously, “speak of Fra
+Moreale, the Knight of St. John?”
+
+“Of no less a warrior,” returned the Pontiff. “I dread the vast ambition
+of that wild adventurer.”
+
+“Your Holiness hath cause,” said the Cardinal, drily.
+
+“Some letters of his have fallen into the hands of the servants of the
+Church; they are here: read them, my son.”
+
+Albornoz received and deliberately scanned the letters; this done, he
+replaced them on the table, and remained for a few moments silent and
+absorbed.
+
+“What think you, my son?” said the Pope, at length, with an impatient
+and even peevish tone.
+
+“I think that, with Montreal’s hot genius and John di Vico’s frigid
+villany, your Holiness may live to envy, if not the quiet, at least the
+revenue, of the Professor’s chair.”
+
+“How, Cardinal!” said the Pope, hastily, and with an angry flush on his
+pale brow. The Cardinal quietly proceeded.
+
+“By these letters it seems that Montreal has written to all the
+commanders of free lances throughout Italy, offering the highest pay
+of a soldier to every man who will join his standard, combined with the
+richest plunder of a brigand. He meditates great schemes then!--I know
+the man!”
+
+“Well,--and our course?”
+
+“Is plain,” said the Cardinal, loftily, and with an eye that flashed
+with a soldier’s fire. “Not a moment is to be lost! Thy son should at
+once take the field. Up with the Banner of the Church!”
+
+“But are we strong enough? our numbers are few. Zeal slackens! the piety
+of the Baldwins is no more!”
+
+“Your Holiness knows well,” said the Cardinal, “that for the multitude
+of men there are two watchwords of war--Liberty and Religion. If
+Religion begins to fail, we must employ the profaner word. ‘Up with the
+Banner of the Church--and down with the tyrants!’ We will proclaim equal
+laws and free government; (In correcting the pages of this work, in the
+year 1847...strange coincidences between the present policy of the Roman
+Church and that by which in the 14th century it recovered both spiritual
+and temporal power cannot fail to suggest themselves.) and, God willing,
+our camp shall prosper better with those promises than the tents of
+Montreal with the more vulgar shout of ‘Pay and Rapine.’”
+
+“Giles d’Albornoz,” said the Pope, emphatically; and, warmed by the
+spirit of the Cardinal, he dropped the wonted etiquette of phrase, “I
+trust implicitly to you. Now the right hand of the Church--hereafter,
+perhaps, its head. Too well I feel that the lot has fallen on a lowly
+place. My successor must requite my deficiencies.”
+
+No changing hue, no brightening glance, betrayed to the searching eye of
+the Pope whatever emotion these words had called up in the breast of the
+ambitious Cardinal. He bowed his proud head humbly as he answered, “Pray
+Heaven that Innocent VI. may long live to guide the Church to glory.
+For Giles d’Albornoz, less priest than soldier, the din of the camp,
+the breath of the war-steed, suggest the only aspirations which he
+ever dares indulge. But has your Holiness imparted to your servant all
+that--”
+
+“Nay,” interrupted Innocent, “I have yet intelligence equally ominous.
+This John di Vico,--pest go with him!--who still styles himself (the
+excommunicated ruffian!) Prefect of Rome, has so filled that unhappy
+city with his emissaries, that we have well-nigh lost the seat of
+the Apostle. Rome, long in anarchy, seems now in open rebellion.
+The nobles--sons of Belial!--it is true, are once more humbled; but
+how?--One Baroncelli, a new demagogue, the fiercest--the most bloody
+that the fiend ever helped--has arisen--is invested by the mob with
+power, and uses it to butcher the people and insult the Pontiff. Wearied
+of the crimes of this man, (which are not even decorated by ability,)
+the shout of the people day and night along the streets is for ‘Rienzi
+the Tribune.’”
+
+“Ha!” said the Cardinal, “Rienzi’s faults then are forgotten in Rome,
+and there is felt for him the same enthusiasm in that city as in the
+rest of Italy?”
+
+“Alas! It is so.”
+
+“It is well, I have thought of this: Rienzi can accompany my progress--”
+
+“My son! the rebel, the heretic--”
+
+“By your Holiness’s absolution will become quiet subject and orthodox
+Catholic,” said Albornoz. “Men are good or bad as they suit our purpose.
+What matters a virtue that is useless, or a crime that is useful, to us?
+The army of the Church proceeds against tyrants--it proclaims everywhere
+to the Papal towns the restoration of their popular constitutions. Sees
+not your Holiness that the acquittal of Rienzi, the popular darling,
+will be hailed an earnest of your sincerity?--sees not your Holiness
+that his name will fight for us?--sees not your Holiness that the
+great demagogue Rienzi must be used to extinguish the little demagogue
+Baroncelli? We must regain the Romans, whether of the city or whether in
+the seven towns of John di Vico. When they hear Rienzi is in our camp,
+trust me, we shall have a multitude of deserters from the tyrants--trust
+me, we shall hear no more of Baroncelli.”
+
+“Ever sagacious,” said the Pope, musingly; “it is true, we can use this
+man: but with caution. His genius is formidable--”
+
+“And therefore must be conciliated; if we acquit, we must make him ours.
+My experience has taught me this, when you cannot slay a demagogue by
+law, crush him with honours. He must be no longer Tribune of the People.
+Give him the Patrician title of Senator, and he is then the Lieutenant
+of the Pope!”
+
+“I will see to this, my son--your suggestions please, but alarm me: he
+shall at least be examined;--but if found a heretic--”
+
+“Should, I humbly advise, be declared a saint.”
+
+The Pope bent his brow for a moment, but the effort was too much for
+him, and after a moment’s struggle, he fairly laughed aloud.
+
+“Go to, my son,” said he, affectionately patting the Cardinal’s sallow
+cheek. “Go to.--If the world heard thee, what would it say?”
+
+“That Giles d’Albornoz had just enough religion to remember that the
+State is a Church, but not too much to forget that the Church is a
+State.”
+
+With these words the conference ended. That very evening the Pope
+decreed that Rienzi should be permitted the trial he had demanded.
+
+
+
+Chapter 7.IV. The Lady and the Page.
+
+It wanted three hours of midnight, when Albornoz, resuming his character
+of gallant, despatched to the Signora Cesarini the following billet.
+
+“Your commands are obeyed. Rienzi will receive an examination on his
+faith. It is well that he should be prepared. It may suit your purpose,
+as to which I am so faintly enlightened, to appear to the prisoner what
+you are--the obtainer of this grace. See how implicitly one noble heart
+can trust another! I send by the bearer an order that will admit one of
+your servitors to the prisoner’s cell. Be it, if you will, your task to
+announce to him the new crisis of his fate. Ah! madam, may fortune be
+as favourable to me, and grant me the same intercessor--from thy lips my
+sentence is to come.”
+
+As Albornoz finished this epistle, he summoned his confidential
+attendant, a Spanish gentleman, who saw nothing in his noble birth that
+should prevent his fulfilling the various hests of the Cardinal.
+
+“Alvarez,” said he, “these to the Signora Cesarini by another hand; thou
+art unknown to her household. Repair to the state tower; this to the
+Governor admits thee. Mark who is admitted to the prisoner Cola di
+Rienzi: Know his name, examine whence he comes. Be keen, Alvarez. Learn
+by what motive the Cesarini interests herself in the prisoner’s
+fate. All too of herself, birth, fortunes, lineage, would be welcome
+intelligence. Thou comprehendest me? It is well. One caution--thou
+hast no mission from, no connexion with, me. Thou art an officer of the
+prison, or of the Pope,--what thou wilt. Give me the rosary; light the
+lamp before the crucifix; place yon hair-shirt beneath those arms.
+I would have it appear as if meant to be hidden! Tell Gomez that the
+Dominican preacher is to be admitted.”
+
+“Those friars have zeal,” continued the Cardinal to himself, as, after
+executing his orders, Alvarez withdrew. “They would burn a man--but only
+on the Bible? They are worth conciliating, if the triple crown be really
+worth the winning; were it mine, I would add the eagle’s plume to it.”
+
+And plunged into the aspiring future, this bold man forgot even the
+object of his passion. In real life, after a certain age, ambitious men
+love indeed; but it is only as an interlude. And indeed with most men,
+life has more absorbing though not more frequent concerns than those of
+love. Love is the business of the idle, but the idleness of the busy.
+
+The Cesarini was alone when the Cardinal’s messenger arrived, and he
+was scarcely dismissed with a few lines, expressive of a gratitude which
+seemed to bear down all those guards with which the coldness of the
+Signora usually fenced her pride, before the page Angelo was summoned to
+her presence.
+
+The room was dark with the shades of the gathering night when the youth
+entered, and he discerned but dimly the outline of the Signora’s stately
+form; but by the tone of her voice, he perceived that she was deeply
+agitated.
+
+“Angelo,” said she, as he approached, “Angelo--” and her voice failed
+her. She paused as for breath and again proceeded. “You alone have
+served us faithfully; you alone shared our escape, our wanderings,
+our exile--you alone know my secret--you of my train alone are
+Roman!--Roman! it was once a great name. Angelo, the name has fallen;
+but it is only because the nature of the Roman Race fell first. Haughty
+they are, but fickle; fierce, but dastard; vehement in promise, but
+rotten in their faith. You are a Roman, and though I have proved your
+truth, your very birth makes me afraid of falsehood.”
+
+“Madam,” said the page; “I was but a child when you admitted me of your
+service, and I am yet only on the verge of manhood. But boy though I
+yet be, I would brave the stoutest lance of knight, or freebooter, in
+defence of the faith of Angelo Villani, to his liege Lady and his native
+land.”
+
+“Alas! alas!” said the Signora, bitterly, “such have been the words
+of thousands of thy race. What have been their deeds? But I will trust
+thee, as I have trusted ever. I know that thou art covetous of honour,
+that thou hast youth’s comely and bright ambition.”
+
+“I am an orphan and a bastard,” said Angelo, bluntly! “And circumstance
+stings me sharply on to action; I would win my own name.”
+
+“Thou shalt,” said the Signora. “We shall live yet to reward thee.
+And now be quick. Bring hither one of thy page’s suits,--mantle and
+head-gear. Quick, I say, and whisper not to a soul what I have asked of
+thee.”
+
+
+
+Chapter 7.V. The Inmate of the Tower.
+
+The night slowly advanced, and in the highest chamber of that dark and
+rugged tower which fronted the windows of the Cesarini’s palace sate a
+solitary prisoner. A single lamp burned before him on a table of stone,
+and threw its rays over an open Bible; and those stern but fantastic
+legends of the prowess of ancient Rome, which the genius of Livy has
+dignified into history. (“Avea libri assai, suo Tito Livio, sue storie
+di Roma, la Bibbia et altri libri assai, non finava di studiare.”--“Vita
+di Cola di Rienzi”, lib. ii. cap. 13. See translation to motto to Book
+VII. page 202.) A chain hung pendent from the vault of the tower, and
+confined the captive; but so as to leave his limbs at sufficient liberty
+to measure at will the greater part of the cell. Green and damp were the
+mighty stones of the walls, and through a narrow aperture, high out of
+reach, came the moonlight, and slept in long shadow over the rude floor.
+A bed at one corner completed the furniture of the room. Such for months
+had been the abode of the conqueror of the haughtiest Barons, and the
+luxurious dictator of the stateliest city of the world!
+
+Care, and travel, and time, and adversity, had wrought their change in
+the person of Rienzi. The proportions of his frame had enlarged from the
+compact strength of earlier manhood, the clear paleness of his cheek was
+bespread with a hectic and deceitful glow. Even in his present
+studies, intent as they seemed, and genial though the lecture to a mind
+enthusiastic even to fanaticism, his eyes could not rivet themselves as
+of yore steadily to the page. The charm was gone from the letters.
+Every now and then he moved restlessly, started, re-settled himself, and
+muttered broken exclamations like a man in an anxious dream. Anon, his
+gaze impatiently turned upward, about, around, and there was a strange
+and wandering fire in those large deep eyes, which might have thrilled
+the beholder with a vague and unaccountable awe.
+
+Angelo had in the main correctly narrated the more recent adventures of
+Rienzi after his fall. He had first with Nina and Angelo betaken himself
+to Naples, and found a fallacious and brief favour with Louis, king
+of Hungary; that harsh but honourable monarch had refused to yield his
+illustrious guest to the demands of Clement, but had plainly declared
+his inability to shelter him in safety. Maintaining secret intercourse
+with his partisans at Rome, the fugitive then sought a refuge with the
+Eremites, sequestered in the lone recesses of the Monte Maiella, where
+in solitude and thought he had passed a whole year, save the time
+consumed in his visit to and return from Florence. Taking advantage of
+the Jubilee in Rome, he had then, disguised as a pilgrim, traversed the
+vales and mountains still rich in the melancholy ruins of ancient Rome,
+and entering the city, his restless and ambitious spirit indulged in new
+but vain conspiracies! (Rainald, Ann. 1350, N. 4, E. 5.) Excommunicated
+a second time by the Cardinal di Ceccano, and again a fugitive, he
+shook the dust from his feet as he left the city, and raising his
+hands towards those walls, in which are yet traced the witness of
+the Tarquins, cried aloud--“Honoured as thy prince--persecuted as thy
+victim--Rome, Rome, thou shalt yet receive me as thy conqueror!”
+
+Still disguised as a pilgrim, he passed unmolested through Italy into
+the Court of the Emperor Charles of Bohemia, where the page, who had
+probably witnessed, had rightly narrated, his reception. It is doubtful,
+however, whether the conduct of the Emperor had been as chivalrous as
+appears by Angelo’s relation, or whether he had not delivered Rienzi to
+the Pontiff’s emissaries. At all events it is certain, that from Prague
+to Avignon, the path of the fallen Tribune had been as one triumph. His
+strange adventures--his unbroken spirit--the new power that
+Intellect daily and wonderfully excited over the minds of the rising
+generation--the eloquence of Petrarch, and the common sympathy of the
+vulgar for fallen greatness,--all conspired to make Rienzi the hero of
+the age. Not a town through which he passed which would not have risked
+a siege for his protection--not a house that would not have sheltered
+him--not a hand that would not have struck in his defence. Refusing
+all offers of aid, disdaining all occasion of escape, inspired by his
+indomitable hope, and his unalloyed belief in the brightness of his own
+destinies, the Tribune sought Avignon--and found a dungeon!
+
+These, his external adventures, are briefly and easily told; but who
+shall tell what passed within?--who narrate the fearful history of
+the heart?--who paint the rapid changes of emotion and of thought--the
+indignant grief--the stern dejection--the haughty disappointment that
+saddened while it never destroyed the resolve of that great soul? Who
+can say what must have been endured, what meditated, in the hermitage
+of Maiella;--on the lonely hills of the perished empire it had been his
+dream to restore;--in the Courts of Barbarian Kings;--and above all,
+on returning obscure and disguised, amidst the crowds of the Christian
+world, to the seat of his former power? What elements of memory, and
+in what a wild and fiery brain! What reflections to be conned in the
+dungeons of Avignon, by a man who had pushed into all the fervour
+of fanaticism--four passions, a single one of which has, in excess,
+sufficed to wreck the strongest reason--passions, which in themselves
+it is most difficult to combine,--the dreamer--the aspirant--the very
+nympholept of Freedom, yet of Power--of Knowledge, yet of Religion!
+
+“Ay,” muttered the prisoner, “ay, these texts are
+comforting--comforting. The righteous are not alway oppressed.” With
+a long sigh he deliberately put aside the Bible, kissed it with great
+reverence, remained silent, and musing for some minutes; and then as a
+slight noise was heard at one corner of the cell, said softly, “Ah, my
+friends, my comrades, the rats! it is their hour--I am glad I put aside
+the bread for them!” His eye brightened as it now detected those strange
+and unsocial animals venturing forth through a hole in the wall, and,
+darkening the moonshine on the floor, steal fearlessly towards him.
+He flung some fragments of bread to them, and for some moments watched
+their gambols with a smile. “Manchino, the white-faced rascal! he beats
+all the rest--ha, ha! he is a superior wretch--he commands the tribe,
+and will venture the first into the trap. How will he bite against the
+steel, the fine fellow! while all the ignobler herd will gaze at him
+afar off, and quake and fear, and never help. Yet if united, they might
+gnaw the trap and release their leader! Ah, ye are base vermin, ye eat
+my bread, yet if death came upon me, ye would riot on my carcass. Away!”
+ and clapping his hands, the chain round him clanked harshly, and the
+noisome co-mates of his dungeon vanished in an instant.
+
+That singular and eccentric humour which marked Rienzi, and which had
+seemed a buffoonery to the stolid sullenness of the Roman nobles, still
+retained its old expression in his countenance, and he laughed loud as
+he saw the vermin hurry back to their hiding-place.
+
+“A little noise and the clank of a chain--fie, how ye imitate mankind!”
+ Again he sank into silence, and then heavily and listlessly
+drawing towards him the animated tales of Livy, said, “An hour to
+midnight!--waking dreams are better than sleep. Well, history tells us
+how men have risen--ay, and nations too--after sadder falls than that of
+Rienzi or of Rome!”
+
+In a few minutes, he was apparently absorbed in the lecture; so intent
+indeed, was he in the task, that he did not hear the steps which wound
+the spiral stairs that conducted to his cell, and it was not till the
+wards harshly grated beneath the huge key, and the door creaked on
+its hinges, that Rienzi, in amaze at intrusion at so unwonted an hour,
+lifted his eyes. The door had reclosed on the dungeon, and by the lonely
+and pale lamp he beheld a figure leaning, as for support, against the
+wall. The figure was wrapped from head to foot in the long cloak of the
+day, which, aided by a broad hat, shaded by plumes, concealed even the
+features of the visitor.
+
+Rienzi gazed long and wistfully.
+
+“Speak,” he said at length, putting his hand to his brow. “Methinks
+either long solitude has bewildered me, or, sweet sir, your apparition
+dazzles. I know you not--am I sure?--” and Rienzi’s hair bristled while
+he slowly rose--“Am I sure that it is living man who stands before
+me? Angels have entered the prison-house before now. Alas! an angel’s
+comfort never was more needed.”
+
+The stranger answered not, but the captive saw that his heart heaved
+even beneath his cloak; loud sobs choked his voice; at length, as by a
+violent effort, he sprung forward, and sunk at the Tribune’s feet. The
+disguising hat, the long mantle fell to the ground--it was the face of a
+woman that looked upward through passionate and glazing tears--the arms
+of a woman that clasped the prisoner’s knees! Rienzi gazed mute and
+motionless as stone. “Powers and Saints of Heaven!” he murmured at last,
+“do ye tempt me further!--is it?--no, no--yet speak!”
+
+“Beloved--adored!--do you not know me?”
+
+“It is--it is!” shrieked Rienzi wildly, “it is my Nina--my wife--my--”
+ His voice forsook him. Clasped in each other’s arms, the unfortunates
+for some moments seemed to have lost even the sense of delight at
+their reunion. It was as an unconscious and deep trance, through which
+something like a dream only faintly and indistinctively stirs.
+
+At length recovered--at length restored, the first broken exclamations,
+the first wild caresses of joy over--Nina lifted her head from her
+husband’s bosom, and gazed sadly on his countenance--“Oh, what thou hast
+known since we parted!--what, since that hour when, borne on by thy bold
+heart and wild destiny, thou didst leave me in the Imperial Court,
+to seek again the diadem and find the chain! Ah! why did I heed thy
+commands?--why suffer thee to depart alone? How often in thy progress
+hitherward, in doubt, in danger, might this bosom have been thy
+resting-place, and this voice have whispered comfort to thy soul? Thou
+art well, my Lord--my Cola! Thy pulse beats quicker than of old--thy
+brow is furrowed. Ah! tell me thou art well!”
+
+“Well,” said Rienzi, mechanically. “Methinks so!--the mind diseased
+blunts all sense of bodily decay. Well--yes! And thou--thou, at least,
+art not changed, save to maturer beauty. The glory of the laurel-wreath
+has not faded from thy brow. Thou shalt yet--” then breaking off
+abruptly--“Rome--tell me of Rome! And thou--how camest thou hither? Ah!
+perhaps my doom is sealed, and in their mercy they have vouchsafed that
+I should see thee once more before the deathsman blinds me. I remember,
+it is the grace vouchsafed to malefactors. When I was a lord of life and
+death, I too permitted the meanest criminal to say farewell to those he
+loved.”
+
+“No--not so, Cola!” exclaimed Nina, putting her hand before his mouth.
+“I bring thee more auspicious tidings. Tomorrow thou art to be heard.
+The favour of the Court is propitiated. Thou wilt be acquitted.”
+
+“Ha! speak again.”
+
+“Thou wilt be heard, my Cola--thou must be acquitted!”
+
+“And Rome be free!--Great God, I thank Thee!”
+
+The Tribune sank on his knees, and never had his heart, in his youngest
+and purest hour, poured forth thanksgiving more fervent, yet less
+selfish. When he rose again, the whole man seemed changed. His eye had
+resumed its earlier expressions of deep and serene command. Majesty sate
+upon his brow. The sorrows of the exile were forgotten. In his sanguine
+and rapid thoughts, he stood once more the guardian of his country,--and
+its sovereign!
+
+Nina gazed upon him with that intense and devoted worship, which steeped
+her vainer and her harder qualities in all the fondness of the softest
+woman. “Such,” thought she, “was his look eight years ago, when he left
+my maiden chamber, full of the mighty schemes which liberated Rome--such
+his look, when at the dawning sun he towered amidst the crouching
+Barons, and the kneeling population of the city he had made his throne!”
+
+“Yes, Nina!” said Rienzi, as he turned and caught her eye. “My soul
+tells me that my hour is at hand. If they try me openly, they dare not
+convict--if they acquit me, they dare not but restore. Tomorrow, saidst
+thou, tomorrow?”
+
+“Tomorrow, Rienzi; be prepared!”
+
+“I am--for triumph! But tell me what happy chance brought thee to
+Avignon?”
+
+“Chance, Cola!” said Nina, with reproachful tenderness. “Could I know
+that thou wert in the dungeons of the Pontiff, and linger in idle
+security at Prague? Even at the Emperor’s Court thou hadst thy
+partisans and favourers. Gold was easily procured. I repaired to
+Florence--disguised my name--and came hither to plot, to scheme, to win
+thy liberty, or to die with thee. Ah! did not thy heart tell thee that
+morning and night the eyes of thy faithful Nina gazed upon this gloomy
+tower; and that one friend, humble though she be, never could forsake
+thee!”
+
+“Sweet Nina! Yet--yet--at Avignon power yields not to beauty without
+reward. Remember, there is a worse death than the pause of life.”
+
+Nina turned pale. “Fear not,” she said, with a low but determined voice;
+“fear not, that men’s lips should say Rienzi’s wife delivered him. None
+in this corrupted Court know that I am thy wife.”
+
+“Woman,” said the Tribune, sternly; “thy lips elude the answer I would
+seek. In our degenerate time and land, thy sex and ours forget too
+basely what foulness writes a leprosy in the smallest stain upon a
+matron’s honour. That thy heart would never wrong me, I believe; but if
+thy weakness, thy fear of my death should wrong me, thou art a bitterer
+foe to Rienzi than the swords of the Colonna. Nina, speak!”
+
+“Oh, that my soul could speak,” answered Nina. “Thy words are music to
+me, and not a thought of mine but echoes them. Could I touch this hand,
+could I meet that eye, and not know that death were dearer to thee than
+shame? Rienzi, when last we parted, in sadness, yet in hope, what were
+thy words to me?”
+
+“I remember them well,” returned the Tribune: “‘I leave thee,’ I said,
+‘to keep alive at the Emperor’s Court, by thy genius, the Great Cause.
+Thou hast youth and beauty--and courts have lawless and ruffian suitors.
+I give thee no caution; it were beneath thee and me. But I leave thee
+the power of death.’ And with that, Nina--”
+
+“Thy hands tremblingly placed in mine this dagger. I live--need I say
+more?”
+
+“My noble and beloved Nina, it is enough. Keep the dagger yet.”
+
+“Yes; till we meet in the Capitol of Rome!”
+
+A slight tap was heard at the door; Nina regained, in an instant, her
+disguise.
+
+“It is on the stroke of midnight,” said the gaoler, appearing at the
+threshold.
+
+“I come,” said Nina.
+
+“And thou hast to prepare thy thoughts,” she whispered to Rienzi: “arm
+all thy glorious intellect. Alas! is it again we part? How my heart
+sinks!”
+
+The presence of the gaoler at the threshold broke the bitterness
+of parting by abridging it. The false page pressed her lips on the
+prisoner’s hand, and left the cell.
+
+The gaoler, lingering behind for a moment, placed a parchment on the
+table. It was the summons from the court appointed for the trial of the
+Tribune.
+
+
+
+Chapter 7.VI. The Scent Does Not Lie.--The Priest and the Soldier.
+
+On descending the stairs, Nina was met by Alvarez.
+
+“Fair page,” said the Spaniard, gaily, “thy name, thou tellest me, is
+Villani?--Angelo Villani--why I know thy kinsman, methinks. Vouchsafe,
+young master, to enter this chamber, and drink a night-cup to thy lady’s
+health; I would fain learn tidings of my old friends.”
+
+“At another time,” answered the false Angelo, drawing the cloak closer
+round her face; “it is late--I am hurried.”
+
+“Nay,” said the Spaniard, “you escape me not so easily;” and he caught
+firm hold of the page’s shoulder.
+
+“Unhand me, sir!” said Nina, haughtily, and almost weeping, for her
+strong nerves were yet unstrung. “Gaoler, at thy peril--unbar the
+gates.”
+
+“So hot,” said Alvarez, surprised at so great a waste of dignity in
+a page; “nay, I meant not to offend thee. May I wait on thy pageship
+tomorrow?”
+
+“Ay, tomorrow,” said Nina, eager to escape.
+
+“And meanwhile,” said Alvarez, “I will accompany thee home--we can
+confer by the way.”
+
+So saying, without regarding the protestations of the supposed page, he
+passed with Nina into the open air. “Your lady,” said he, carelessly,
+“is wondrous fair; her lightest will is law to the greatest noble of
+Avignon. Methinks she is of Naples--is it so? Art thou dumb, sweet
+youth?”
+
+The page did not answer, but with a step so rapid that it almost put the
+slow Spaniard out of breath, hastened along the narrow space between the
+tower and the palace of the Signora Cesarini, nor could all the efforts
+of Alvarez draw forth a single syllable from his reluctant companion,
+till they reached the gates of the palace, and he found himself
+discourteously left without the walls.
+
+“A plague on the boy!” said he, biting his lips; “if the Cardinal thrive
+as well as his servant, by’re Lady, Monsignore is a happy man!”
+
+By no means pleased with the prospect of an interview with Albornoz,
+who, like most able men, valued the talents of those he employed exactly
+in proportion to their success, the Spaniard slowly returned home. With
+the licence accorded to him, he entered the Cardinal’s chamber somewhat
+abruptly, and perceived him in earnest conversation with a Cavalier,
+whose long moustache, curled upward, and the bright cuirass worn
+underneath his mantle, seemed to betoken him of martial profession.
+Pleased with the respite, Alvarez hastily withdrew: and, in fact, the
+Cardinal’s thoughts at that moment, and for that night, were bent upon
+other subjects than those of love.
+
+The interruption served, however, to shorten the conversation between
+Albornoz and his guest. The latter rose.
+
+“I think,” said he, buckling on a short and broad rapier, which he laid
+aside during the interview,--“I think, my Lord Cardinal, you encourage
+me to consider that our negotiation stands a fair chance of a prosperous
+close. Ten thousand florins, and my brother quits Viterbo, and launches
+the thunderbolt of the Company on the lands of Rimini. On your part--”
+
+“On my part it is agreed,” said the Cardinal, “that the army of the
+Church interferes not with the course of your brother’s arms--there is
+peace between us. One warrior understands another!”
+
+“And the word of Giles d’Albornoz, son of the royal race of Arragon, is
+a guarantee for the faith of a Cardinal,” replied the Cavalier, with a
+smile. “It is, my Lord, in your former quality that we treat.”
+
+“There is my right hand,” answered Albornoz, too politic to heed the
+insinuation. The Cavalier raised it respectfully to his lips, and his
+armed tread was soon heard descending the stairs.
+
+“Victory,” cried Albornoz, tossing his arms aloof; “Victory, now thou
+art mine!”
+
+With that he rose hastily, deposited his papers in an iron chest, and
+opening a concealed door behind the arras, entered a chamber that rather
+resembled a monk’s cell than the apartment of a prince. Over a mean
+pallet hung a sword, a dagger, and a rude image of the Virgin. Without
+summoning Alvarez, the Cardinal unrobed, and in a few moments was
+asleep.
+
+
+
+Chapter 7.VII. Vaucluse and its Genius Loci.--Old Acquaintance Renewed.
+
+The next day at early noon the Cavalier, whom our last chapter presented
+to the reader, was seen mounted on a strong Norman horse, winding his
+way slowly along a green and pleasant path some miles from Avignon. At
+length he found himself in a wild and romantic valley, through which
+wandered that delightful river whose name the verse of Petrarch has
+given to so beloved a fame. Sheltered by rocks, and in this part winding
+through the greenest banks, enamelled with a thousand wild flowers and
+water-weeds, went the crystal Sorgia. Advancing farther, the landscape
+assumed a more sombre and sterile aspect. The valley seemed enclosed or
+shut in by fantastic rocks of a thousand shapes, down which dashed and
+glittered a thousand rivulets. And, in the very wildest of the scene,
+the ground suddenly opened into a quaint and cultivated garden, through
+which, amidst a profusion of foliage, was seen a small and lonely
+mansion,--the hermitage of the place. The horseman was in the valley
+of the Vaucluse; and before his eye lay the garden and the house of
+PETRARCH! Carelessly, however, his eye scanned the consecrated spot;
+and unconsciously it rested, for a moment, upon a solitary figure seated
+musingly by the margin of the river. A large dog at the side of the
+noonday idler barked at the horseman as he rode on. “A brave animal and
+a deep bay!” thought the traveller; to him the dog seemed an object much
+more interesting than its master. And so,--as the crowd of little men
+pass unheeding and unmoved, those in whom Posterity shall acknowledge
+the landmarks of their age,--the horseman turned his glance from the
+Poet!
+
+Thrice blessed name! Immortal Florentine! (I need scarcely say that it
+is his origin, not his actual birth, which entitles us to term Petrarch
+a Florentine.) not as the lover, nor even as the poet, do I bow before
+thy consecrated memory--venerating thee as one it were sacrilege to
+introduce in this unworthy page--save by name and as a shadow; but as
+the first who ever asserted to people and to prince the august majesty
+of Letters; who claimed to Genius the prerogative to influence states,
+to control opinion, to hold an empire over the hearts of men, and
+prepare events by animating passion, and guiding thought! What, (though
+but feebly felt and dimly seen)--what do we yet owe to Thee if Knowledge
+be now a Power; if MIND be a Prophet and a Fate, foretelling and
+foredooming the things to come! From the greatest to the least of us, to
+whom the pen is at once a sceptre and a sword, the low-born Florentine
+has been the arch-messenger to smooth the way and prepare the welcome.
+Yes! even the meanest of the aftercomers--even he who now vents his
+gratitude,--is thine everlasting debtor! Thine, how largely is the
+honour, if his labours, humble though they be, find an audience wherever
+literature is known; preaching in remotest lands the moral of forgotten
+revolutions, and scattering in the palace and the marketplace the seeds
+that shall ripen into fruit when the hand of the sower shall be dust,
+and his very name, perhaps, be lost! For few, alas! are they, whose
+names may outlive the grave; but the thoughts of every man who writes,
+are made undying;--others appropriate, advance, exalt them; and millions
+of minds unknown, undreamt of, are required to produce the immortality
+of one!
+
+Indulging meditations very different from those which the idea of
+Petrarch awakens in a later time, the Cavalier pursued his path.
+
+The valley was long left behind, and the way grew more and more faintly
+traced, until it terminated in a wood, through whose tangled boughs the
+sunlight broke playfully. At length, the wood opened into a wide glade,
+from which rose a precipitous ascent, crowned with the ruins of an old
+castle. The traveller dismounted, led his horse up the ascent, and,
+gaining the ruins, left his steed within one of the roofless chambers,
+overgrown with the longest grass and a profusion of wild shrubs; thence
+ascending, with some toil, a narrow and broken staircase, he found
+himself in a small room, less decayed than the rest, of which the roof
+and floor were yet whole.
+
+Stretched on the ground in his cloak, and leaning his head thoughtfully
+on his hand, was a man of tall stature, and middle age. He lifted
+himself on his arm with great alacrity as the Cavalier entered.
+
+“Well, Brettone, I have counted the hours--what tidings?”
+
+“Albornoz consents.”
+
+“Glad news! Thou givest me new life. Pardieu, I shall breakfast all the
+better for this, my brother. Hast thou remembered that I am famishing?”
+
+Brettone drew from beneath his cloak a sufficiently huge flask of wine,
+and a small panier, tolerably well filled; the inmate of the tower threw
+himself upon the provant with great devotion. And both the soldiers, for
+such they were, stretched at length on the ground, regaled themselves
+with considerable zest, talking hastily and familiarly between every
+mouthful.
+
+“I say, Brettone, thou playest unfairly; thou hast already devoured more
+than half the pasty: push it hitherward. And so the Cardinal consents!
+What manner of man is he? Able as they say?”
+
+“Quick, sharp, and earnest, with an eye of fire, few words, and comes to
+the point.”
+
+“Unlike a priest then;--a good brigand spoilt. What hast thou heard of
+the force he heads? Ho, not so fast with the wine.”
+
+“Scanty at present.--He relies on recruits throughout Italy.”
+
+“What his designs for Rome? There, my brother, there tends my secret
+soul! As for these petty towns and petty tyrants, I care not how they
+fall, or by whom. But the Pope must not return to Rome. Rome must be
+mine. The city of a new empire, the conquest of a new Attila! There,
+every circumstance combines in my favour!--the absence of the Pope, the
+weakness of the middle class, the poverty of the populace, the imbecile
+though ferocious barbarism of the Barons, have long concurred to render
+Rome the most facile, while the most glorious conquest!”
+
+“My brother, pray Heaven your ambition do not wreck you at last; you
+are ever losing sight of the land. Surely with the immense wealth we are
+acquiring, we may--”
+
+“Aspire to be something greater than Free Companions, generals today,
+and adventurers tomorrow. Rememberest thou, how the Norman sword won
+Sicily, and how the bastard William converted on the field of Hastings
+his baton into a sceptre. I tell thee, Brettone, that this loose Italy
+has crowns on the hedge that a dexterous hand may carry off at the point
+of the lance. My course is taken, I will form the fairest army in Italy,
+and with it I will win a throne in the Capitol. Fool that I was six
+years ago!--Instead of deputing that mad dolt Pepin of Minorbino, had
+I myself deserted the Hungarian, and repaired with my soldiery to Rome,
+the fall of Rienzi would have been followed by the rise of Montreal.
+Pepin was outwitted, and threw away the prey after he had hunted it
+down. The lion shall not again trust the chase to the jackal!”
+
+“Walter, thou speakest of the fate of Rienzi, let it warn thee!”
+
+“Rienzi!” replied Montreal; “I know the man! In peaceful times or with
+an honest people, he would have founded a great dynasty. But he dreamt
+of laws and liberty for men who despise the first and will not protect
+the last. We, of a harder race, know that a new throne must be built by
+the feudal and not the civil system; and into the city we must
+transport the camp. It is by the multitude that the proud Tribune gained
+power,--by the multitude he lost it; it is by the sword that I will win
+it, and by the sword will I keep it!”
+
+“Rienzi was too cruel, he should not have incensed the Barons,” said
+Brettone, about to finish the flask, when the strong hand of his brother
+plucked it from him, and anticipated the design.
+
+“Pooh,” said Montreal, finishing the draught with a long sigh, “he was
+not cruel enough. He sought only to be just, and not to distinguish
+between noble and peasant. He should have distinguished! He should have
+exterminated the nobles root and branch. But this no Italian can do.
+This is reserved for me.”
+
+“Thou wouldst not butcher all the best blood of Rome?”
+
+“Butcher! No, but I would seize their lands, and endow with them a new
+nobility, the hardy and fierce nobility of the North, who well know how
+to guard their prince, and will guard him, as the fountain of their own
+power. Enough of this now. And talking of Rienzi--rots he still in his
+dungeon?”
+
+“Why, this morning, ere I left, I heard strange news. The town was
+astir, groups in every corner. They said that Rienzi’s trial was to be
+today, and from the names of the judges chosen, it is suspected that
+acquittal is already determined on.”
+
+“Ha! thou shouldst have told me of this before.”
+
+“Should he be restored to Rome, would it militate against thy plans?”
+
+“Humph! I know not--deep thought and dexterous management would be
+needed. I would fain not leave this spot till I hear what is decided
+on.”
+
+“Surely, Walter, it would have been wiser and safer to have stayed
+with thy soldiery, and intrusted me with the absolute conduct of this
+affair.”
+
+“Not so,” answered Montreal; “thou art a bold fellow enough, and a
+cunning--but my head in these matters is better than thine. Besides,”
+ continued the Knight, lowering his voice, and shading his face, “I had
+vowed a pilgrimage to the beloved river, and the old trysting-place. Ah
+me!--But all this, Brettone, thou understandest not--let it pass. As for
+my safety, since we have come to this amnesty with Albornoz, I fear but
+little danger even if discovered: besides, I want the florins. There are
+those in this country, Germans, who could eat an Italian army at a meal,
+whom I would fain engage, and their leaders want earnest-money--the
+griping knaves!--How are the Cardinal’s florins to be paid?”
+
+“Half now--half when thy troops are before Rimini!”
+
+“Rimini! the thought whets my sword. Rememberest thou how that
+accursed Malatesta drove me from Aversa, (This Malatesta, a signior of
+illustrious family, was one of the most skilful warriors in Italy. He
+and his brother Galeotto had been raised to the joint-tyranny of Rimini
+by the voice of its citizens. After being long the foes of the Church,
+they were ultimately named as its captains by the Cardinal Albornoz.)
+broke up my camp, and made me render to him all my booty? There fell the
+work of years! But for that, my banner now would be floating over St.
+Angelo. I will pay back the debt with fire and sword, ere the summer has
+shed its leaves.”
+
+The fair countenance of Montreal grew terrible as he uttered these
+words; his hands griped the handle of his sword, and his strong frame
+heaved visibly; tokens of the fierce and unsparing passions, by the aid
+of which a life of rapine and revenge had corrupted a nature originally
+full no less of the mercy than the courage of Provencal chivalry.
+
+Such was the fearful man who now (the wildness of his youth sobered, and
+his ambition hardened and concentered) was the rival with Rienzi for the
+mastery of Rome.
+
+
+
+Chapter 7.VIII. The Crowd.--The Trial.--The Verdict.--The Soldier and
+the Page.
+
+It was on the following evening that a considerable crowd had gathered
+in the streets of Avignon. It was the second day of the examination
+of Rienzi, and with every moment was expected the announcement of the
+verdict. Amongst the foreigners of all countries assembled in that seat
+of the Papal splendour, the interest was intense. The Italians, even of
+the highest rank, were in favour of the Tribune, the French against him.
+As for the good townspeople of Avignon themselves, they felt but little
+excitement in any thing that did not bring money into their pockets; and
+if it had been put to the secret vote, no doubt there would have been a
+vast majority for burning the prisoner, as a marketable speculation!
+
+Amongst the crowd was a tall man in a plain and rusty suit of armour,
+but with an air of knightly bearing, which somewhat belied the
+coarseness of his mail; he wore no helmet, but a small morion of black
+leather, with a long projecting shade, much used by wayfarers in the
+hot climates of the south. A black patch covered nearly the whole of
+one cheek, and altogether he bore the appearance of a grim soldier, with
+whom war had dealt harshly, both in purse and person.
+
+Many were the jests at the shabby swordsman’s expense, with which that
+lively population amused their impatience; and though the shade of the
+morion concealed his eyes, an arch and merry smile about the corners of
+his mouth shewed that he could take a jest at himself.
+
+“Well,” said one of the crowd, (a rich Milanese,) “I am of a state that
+was free, and I trust the People’s man will have justice shewn him.”
+
+“Amen,” said a grave Florentine.
+
+“They say,” whispered a young student from Paris, to a learned doctor of
+laws, with whom he abode, “that his defence has been a masterpiece.”
+
+“He hath taken no degrees,” replied the doctor, doubtingly. “Ho, friend,
+why dost thou push me so? thou hast rent my robe.”
+
+This was said to a minstrel, or jongleur, who, with a small lute slung
+round him, was making his way, with great earnestness, through the
+throng.
+
+“I beg pardon, worthy sir,” said the minstrel; “but this is a scene to
+be sung of! Centuries hence; ay, and in lands remote, legend and song
+will tell the fortunes of Cola di Rienzi, the friend of Petrarch and the
+Tribune of Rome!”
+
+The young French student turned quickly round to the minstrel, with
+a glow on his pale face; not sharing the general sentiments of his
+countrymen against Rienzi, he felt that it was an era in the world when
+a minstrel spoke thus of the heroes of intellect--not of war.
+
+At this time the tall soldier was tapped impatiently on the back.
+
+“I pray thee, great sir,” said a sharp and imperious voice, “to withdraw
+that tall bulk of thine a little on one side--I cannot see through thee;
+and I would fain my eyes were among the first to catch a glimpse of
+Rienzi as he passes from the court.”
+
+“Fair sir page,” replied the soldier, good-humouredly, as he made way
+for Angelo Villani, “thou wilt not always find that way in the world is
+won by commanding the strong. When thou art older thou wilt beard the
+weak, and the strong thou wilt wheedle.”
+
+“I must change my nature, then,” answered Angelo, (who was of somewhat
+small stature, and not yet come to his full growth,) trying still to
+raise himself above the heads of the crowd.
+
+The soldier looked at him approvingly; and as he looked he sighed, and
+his lips worked with some strange emotion.
+
+“Thou speakest well,” said he, after a pause. “Pardon me the rudeness
+of the question; but art thou of Italy?--thy tongue savours of the Roman
+dialect; yet I have seen lineaments like thine on this side the Alps.”
+
+“It may be, good fellow,” said the page, haughtily; “but I thank Heaven
+that I am of Rome.”
+
+At this moment a loud shout burst from that part of the crowd nearest
+the court. The sound of trumpets again hushed the throng into deep and
+breathless silence, while the Pope’s guards, ranged along the space
+conducting from the court, drew themselves up more erect, and fell a
+step or two back upon the crowd.
+
+As the trumpet ceased, the voice of a herald was heard, but it did not
+penetrate within several yards of the spot where Angelo and the soldier
+stood; and it was only by a mighty shout that in a moment circled
+through, and was echoed back by, the wide multitude--by the waving of
+kerchiefs from the windows--by broken ejaculations, which were caught up
+from lip to lip, that the page knew that Rienzi was acquitted.
+
+“I would I could see his face!” sighed the page, querulously.
+
+“And thou shalt,” said the soldier; and he caught up the boy in his
+arms, and pressed on with the strength of a giant, parting the living
+stream from right to left, as he took his way to a place near the
+guards, and by which Rienzi was sure to pass.
+
+The page, half-pleased, half-indignant, struggled a little, but finding
+it in vain, consented tacitly to what he felt an outrage on his dignity.
+
+“Never mind,” said the soldier, “thou art the first I ever willingly
+raised above myself; and I do it now for the sake of thy fair face,
+which reminds me of one I loved.”
+
+But these last words were spoken low, and the boy, in his anxiety to see
+the hero of Rome, did not hear or heed them. Presently Rienzi came by;
+two gentlemen, of the Pope’s own following, walked by his side. He moved
+slowly, amidst the greetings and clamour of the crowd, looking neither
+to the right nor left. His bearing was firm and collected, and, save by
+the flush of his cheek, there was no external sign of joy or excitement.
+Flowers dropped from every balcony on his path; and just when he came to
+a broader space, where the ground was somewhat higher, and where he
+was in fuller view of the houses around, he paused--and, uncovering,
+acknowledged the homage he had received, with a look--a gesture--which
+each who beheld never forgot. It haunted even that gay and thoughtless
+court, when the last tale of Rienzi’s life reached their ears. And
+Angelo, clinging then round that soldier’s neck, recalled--but we must
+not anticipate.
+
+It was not, however, to the dark tower that Rienzi returned. His home
+was prepared at the palace of the Cardinal d’Albornoz. The next day he
+was admitted to the Pope’s presence, and on the evening of that day he
+was proclaimed Senator of Rome.
+
+Meanwhile the soldier had placed Angelo on the ground; and as the page
+faltered out no courteous thanks, he interrupted him in a sad and kind
+voice, the tone of which struck the page forcibly, so little did it suit
+the rough and homely appearance of the man.
+
+“We part,” he said, “as strangers, fair boy; and since thou sayest thou
+art of Rome, there is no reason why my heart should have warmed to thee
+as it has done; yet if ever thou wantest a friend,--seek him”--and the
+soldier’s voice sunk into a whisper--“in Walter de Montreal.”
+
+Ere the page recovered his surprise at that redoubted name, which his
+earliest childhood had been taught to dread, the Knight of St. John had
+vanished amongst the crowd.
+
+
+
+Chapter 7.IX. Albornoz and Nina.
+
+But the eyes which, above all others, thirsted for a glimpse of the
+released captive were forbidden that delight. Alone in her chamber, Nina
+awaited the result of the trial. She heard the shouts, the exclamations,
+the tramp of thousands along the street; she felt that the victory was
+won; and, her heart long overcharged, she burst into passionate tears.
+The return of Angelo soon acquainted her with all that had passed; but
+it somewhat chilled her joy to find Rienzi was the guest of the dreaded
+Cardinal. That shock, in which certainty, however happy, replaces
+suspense, had so powerful an effect on her frame, joined to her loathing
+fear of a visit from the Cardinal, that she became for three days
+alarmingly ill; and it was only on the fifth day from that which saw
+Rienzi endowed with the rank of Senator of Rome, that she was recovered
+sufficiently to admit Albornoz to her presence.
+
+The Cardinal had sent daily to inquire after her health, and his
+inquiries, to her alarmed mind, had appeared to insinuate a pretension
+to the right to make them. Meanwhile Albornoz had had enough to divert
+and occupy his thoughts. Having bought off the formidable Montreal from
+the service of John de Vico, one of the ablest and fiercest enemies of
+the Church, he resolved to march to the territories of that tyrant as
+expeditiously as possible, and so not to allow him time to obtain the
+assistance of any other band of the mercenary adventurers, who found
+Italy the market for their valour. Occupied with raising troops,
+procuring money, corresponding with the various free states, and
+establishing alliances in aid of his ulterior and more ambitious
+projects at the court of Avignon, the Cardinal waited with tolerable
+resignation the time when he might claim from the Signora Cesarini the
+reward to which he deemed himself entitled. Meanwhile he had held his
+first conversations with Rienzi, and, under the semblance of courtesy to
+the acquitted Tribune, Albornoz had received him as his guest, in order
+to make himself master of the character and disposition of one in whom
+he sought a minister and a tool. That miraculous and magic art, attested
+by the historians of the time, which Rienzi possessed over every one
+with whom he came into contact, however various in temper, station, or
+opinions, had not deserted him in his interview with the Pontiff. So
+faithfully had he described the true condition of Rome, so logically
+had he traced the causes and the remedies of the evils she endured, so
+sanguinely had he spoken of his own capacities for administering her
+affairs, and so brilliantly had he painted the prospects which that
+administration opened to the weal of the Church, and the interests
+of the Pope, that Innocent, though a keen and shrewd, and somewhat
+sceptical calculator of human chances, was entirely fascinated by the
+eloquence of the Roman.
+
+“Is this the man,” he is reported to have said, “whom for twelve months
+we have treated as a prisoner and a criminal? Would that it were on his
+shoulders only that the Christian empire reposed!”
+
+At the close of the interview he had, with every mark of favour and
+distinction, conferred upon Rienzi the rank of Senator, which, in
+fact, was that of Viceroy of Rome, and had willingly acceded to all the
+projects which the enterprising Rienzi had once more formed--not only
+for recovering the territories of the Church, but for extending the
+dictatorial sway of the Seven-hilled City, over the old dependencies of
+Italy.
+
+Albornoz, to whom the Pope retailed this conversation, was somewhat
+jealous of the favour the new Senator had so suddenly acquired, and
+immediately on his return home sought an interview with his guest. In
+his heart, the Lord Cardinal, emphatically a man of action and business,
+regarded Rienzi as one rather cunning than wise--rather fortunate than
+great--a mixture of the pedant and the demagogue. But after a long and
+scrutinizing conversation with the new Senator, even he yielded to
+the spell of his enchanting and master intellect. Reluctantly Albornoz
+confessed to himself that Rienzi’s rise was not the thing of chance;
+yet more reluctantly he perceived that the Senator was one whom he
+might treat with as an equal, but could not rule as a minion. And he
+entertained serious doubts whether it would be wise to reinstate him in
+a power which he evinced the capacity to wield and the genius to extend.
+Still, however, he did not repent the share he had taken in Rienzi’s
+acquittal. His presence in a camp so thinly peopled was a matter greatly
+to be desired. And through his influence, the Cardinal more than
+ever trusted to enlist the Romans in favour of his enterprise for the
+recovery of the territory of St. Peter!
+
+Rienzi, who panted once more to behold his Nina, endeared to him by
+trial and absence, as by fresh bridals, was not however able to discover
+the name she had assumed at Avignon; and his residence with the Cardinal
+closely but respectfully watched as he was, forbade Nina all opportunity
+of corresponding with him. Some half bantering hints which Albornoz had
+dropped upon the interest taken in his welfare by the most celebrated
+beauty of Avignon, had filled him with a vague alarm which he trembled
+to acknowledge even to himself. But the volto sciolto (Volto sciolto,
+pensieri stretti--the countenance open, the thoughts restrained.) which,
+in common with all Italian politicians, concealed whatever were his
+pensieri stretti--enabled him to baffle completely the jealous and
+lynxlike observation of the Cardinal. Nor had Alvarez been better
+enabled to satisfy the curiosity of his master. He had indeed sought the
+page Villani, but the imperious manner of that wayward and haughty
+boy had cut short all attempts at cross-examination. And all he could
+ascertain was, that the real Angelo Villani was not the Angelo Villani
+who had visited Rienzi.
+
+Trusting at last that he should learn all, and inflamed by such passion
+and such hope as he was capable of feeling, Albornoz now took his way to
+the Cesarini’s palace.
+
+He was ushered with due state into the apartment of the Signora. He
+found her pale, and with the traces of illness upon her noble and
+statuelike features. She rose as he entered; and when he approached,
+she half bent her knee, and raised his hand to her lips. Surprised and
+delighted at a reception so new, the Cardinal hastened to prevent the
+condescension; retaining both her hands, he attempted gently to draw
+them to his heart.
+
+“Fairest!” he whispered, “couldst thou know hear I have mourned thy
+illness--and yet it has but left thee more lovely, as the rain only
+brightens the flower. Ah! happy if I have promoted thy lightest wish,
+and if in thine eyes I may henceforth seek at once an angel to guide me
+and a paradise to reward.”
+
+Nina, releasing her hand, waved it gently, and motioned the Cardinal to
+a seat. Seating herself at a little distance, she then spoke with great
+gravity and downcast eyes.
+
+“My Lord, it is your intercession, joined to his own innocence, that has
+released from yonder tower the elected governor of the people of Rome.
+But freedom is the least of the generous gifts you have conferred;
+there is a greater in a fair name vindicated, and rightful honours
+re-bestowed. For this, I rest ever your debtor; for this, if I bear
+children, they shall be taught to bless your name; for this the
+historian who recalls the deeds of this age, and the fortunes of Cola
+di Rienzi, shall add a new chaplet to the wreaths you have already won.
+Lord Cardinal, I may have erred. I may have offended you--you may accuse
+me of woman’s artifice. Speak not, wonder not, hear me out. I have
+but one excuse, when I say that I held justified any means short of
+dishonour, to save the life and restore the fortunes of Cola di Rienzi.
+Know, my Lord, that she who now addresses you is his wife.”
+
+The Cardinal remained motionless and silent. But his sallow countenance
+grew flushed from the brow to the neck, and his thin lips quivered for
+a moment, and then broke into a withering and bitter smile. At length
+he rose from his seat, very slowly, and said, in a voice trembling with
+passion,
+
+“It is well, madam. Giles d’Albornoz has been, then, a puppet in the
+hands, a stepping-stone in the rise, of the plebeian demagogue of Rome.
+You but played upon me for your own purposes; and nothing short of a
+Cardinal of Spain, and a Prince of the royal blood of Aragon, was meet
+to be the instrument of a mountebank’s juggle! Madam, yourself and your
+husband might justly be accused of ambition--”
+
+“Cease, my Lord,” said Nina, with unspeakable dignity; “whatever offence
+has been committed against you was mine alone. Till after our last
+interview, Rienzi knew not even of my presence at Avignon.”
+
+“At our last interview, Lady, (you do well to recall it!) methinks there
+was a hinted and implied contract. I have fulfilled my part--I claim
+yours. Mark me! I do not forego that claim. As easily as I rend this
+glove can I rend the parchment which proclaims thy husband ‘the Senator
+of Rome.’ The dungeon is not death, and its door will open twice.”
+
+“My Lord--my Lord!” cried Nina, sick with terror, “wrong not so your
+noble nature, your great name, your sacred rank, your chivalric blood.
+You are of the knightly race of Spain, yours not the sullen, low, and
+inexorable vices that stain the petty tyrants of this unhappy land.
+You are no Visconti--no Castracani--you cannot stain your laurels with
+revenge upon a woman. Hear me,” she continued, and she fell abruptly at
+his feet; “men dupe, deceive our sex--and for selfish purposes; they are
+pardoned--even by their victims. Did I deceive you with a false hope?
+Well--what my object?--what my excuse? My husband’s liberty--my land’s
+salvation! Woman,--my Lord, alas, your sex too rarely understand her
+weakness or her greatness! Erring--all human as she is to others--God
+gifts her with a thousand virtues to the one she loves! It is from
+that love that she alone drinks her nobler nature. For the hero of her
+worship she has the meekness of the dove--the devotion of the saint;
+for his safety in peril, for his rescue in misfortune, her vain sense
+imbibes the sagacity of the serpent--her weak heart, the courage of the
+lioness! It is this which, in absence, made me mask my face in smiles,
+that the friends of the houseless exile might not despair of his
+fate--it is this which brought me through forests beset with robbers, to
+watch the stars upon yon solitary tower--it was this which led my steps
+to the revels of your hated court--this which made me seek a deliverer
+in the noblest of its chiefs--it is this which has at last opened the
+dungeon door to the prisoner now within your halls; and this,
+Lord Cardinal,” added Nina, rising, and folding her arms upon her
+heart--“this, if your anger seeks a victim, will inspire me to die
+without a groan,--but without dishonour!”
+
+Albornoz remained rooted to the ground.
+Amazement--emotion--admiration--all busy at his heart. He gazed at
+Nina’s flashing eyes and heaving bosom as a warrior of old upon a
+prophetess inspired. His eyes were riveted to hers as by a spell. He
+tried to speak, but his voice failed him. Nina continued:
+
+“Yes, my Lord; these are no idle words! If you seek revenge, it is in
+your power. Undo what you have done. Give Rienzi back to the dungeon,
+or to disgrace, and you are avenged; but not on him. All the hearts of
+Italy shall become to him a second Nina! I am the guilty one, and I the
+sufferer. Hear me swear--in that instant which sees new wrong to Rienzi,
+this hand is my executioner.--My Lord, I supplicate you no longer!”
+
+Albornoz continued deeply moved. Nina but rightly judged him, when she
+distinguished the aspiring Spaniard from the barbarous and unrelenting
+voluptuaries of Italy. Despite the profligacy that stained his sacred
+robe--despite all the acquired and increasing callousness of a hard,
+scheming, and sceptical man, cast amidst the worst natures of the worst
+of times--there lingered yet in his soul much of the knightly honour
+of his race and country. High thoughts and daring spirits touched a
+congenial string in his heart, and not the less, in that he had but
+rarely met them in his experience of camps and courts. For the first
+time in his life, he felt that he had seen the woman who could have
+contented him even with wedlock, and taught him the proud and faithful
+love of which the minstrels of Spain had sung. He sighed, and still
+gazing on Nina, approached her, almost reverentially; he knelt and
+kissed the hem of her robe. “Lady,” he said, “I would I could believe
+that you have altogether read my nature aright, but I were indeed lost
+to all honour, and unworthy of gentle birth, if I still harboured a
+single thought against the peace and virtue of one like thee. Sweet
+heroine,”--he continued--“so lovely, yet so pure--so haughty, and yet
+so soft--thou hast opened to me the brightest page these eyes have
+ever scanned in the blotted volume of mankind. Mayest thou have such
+happiness as life can give; but souls such as thine make their nest like
+the eagle, upon rocks and amidst the storms. Fear me no more--think
+of me no more--unless hereafter, when thou hearest men speak of
+Giles d’Albornoz, thou mayest say in thine own heart,”--and here the
+Cardinal’s lip curled with scorn--“he did not renounce every feeling
+worthy of a man, when Ambition and Fate endued him with the surplice of
+the priest.”
+
+The Spaniard was gone before Nina could reply.
+
+
+
+
+BOOK VIII. THE GRAND COMPANY.
+
+     “Montreal nourrissoit de plus vastes projets...il donnoit a
+     sa campagnie un gouvernement regulier...Par cette discipline
+     il faisoit regner l’abondance dans son camp; les gens de
+     guerre ne parloient, en Italie, que des richesses qu’on
+     acqueroit a son service.”--Sismondi, “Histoire des
+     Republiques Italiennes”, tom. vi. c. 42.
+
+     “Montreal cherished more vast designs...he subjected his
+     company to a regular system of government...By means of this
+     discipline he kept his camp abundantly supplied, and
+     military adventurers in Italy talked of nothing but the
+     wealth won in his service.”--Sismondi’s “History of Italian
+     Republics”.
+
+
+
+Chapter 8.I. The Encampment.
+
+It was a most lovely day, in the very glow and meridian of an Italian
+summer, when a small band of horsemen were seen winding a hill which
+commanded one of the fairest landscapes of Tuscany. At their head was a
+cavalier in a complete suit of chain armour, the links of which were
+so fine, that they resembled a delicate and curious network, but so
+strongly compacted, that they would have resisted spear or sword no
+less effectually than the heaviest corselet, while adapting themselves
+exactly and with ease to every movement of the light and graceful shape
+of the rider. He wore a hat of dark green velvet shaded by long plumes,
+while of two squires behind, the one bore his helmet and lance, the
+other led a strong warhorse, completely cased in plates of mail, which
+seemed, however, scarcely to encumber its proud and agile paces.
+The countenance of the cavalier was comely, but strongly marked, and
+darkened, by long exposure to the suns of many climes, to a deep bronze
+hue: a few raven ringlets escaped from beneath his hat down a cheek
+closely shaven. The expression of his features was grave and composed
+even to sadness; nor could all the loveliness of the unrivalled scene
+before him dispel the quiet and settled melancholy of his eyes. Besides
+the squires, ten horsemen, armed cap-a-pie, attended the knight; and the
+low and murmured conversation they carried on at intervals, as well as
+their long fair hair, large stature, thick short beards, and the studied
+and accurate equipment of their arms and steeds, bespoke them of a
+hardier and more warlike race than the children of the south. The
+cavalcade was closed with a man almost of gigantic height, bearing
+a banner richly decorated, wherein was wrought a column, with the
+inscription, “ALONE AMIDST RUINS.” Fair indeed was the prospect which
+with every step expanded yet more widely its various beauty. Right
+before stretched a long vale, now covered with green woodlands
+glittering in the yellow sunlight, now opening into narrow plains
+bordered by hillocks, from whose mosses of all hues grew fantastic and
+odorous shrubs; while, winding amidst them, a broad and silver stream
+broke into light at frequent intervals, snatched by wood and hillock
+from the eye, only to steal upon it again, in sudden and bright
+surprise. The opposite slope of gentle mountains, as well as that which
+the horsemen now descended, was covered with vineyards, trained in
+alleys and arcades: and the clustering grape laughed from every leafy
+and glossy covert, as gaily as when the Fauns held a holiday in the
+shade. The eye of the Cavalier roved listlessly over this enchanting
+prospect, sleeping in the rosiest light of a Tuscan heaven, and then
+became fixed with a more earnest attention on the grey and frowning
+walls of a distant castle, which, high upon the steepest of the opposite
+mountains, overlooked the valley.
+
+“Behold,” he muttered to himself, “how every Eden in Italy hath its
+curse! Wherever the land smiles fairest, be sure to find the brigand’s
+tent and the tyrant’s castle!”
+
+Scarce had these thoughts passed his mind, ere the shrill and sudden
+blast of a bugle that sounded close amongst the vineyards by the side
+of the path startled the whole group. The cavalcade halted abruptly. The
+leader made a gesture to the squire who led his war-horse. The noble
+and practised animal remained perfectly still, save by champing its bit
+restlessly, and moving its quick ear to and fro, as aware of a coming
+danger,--while the squire, unencumbered by the heavy armour of the
+Germans, plunged into the thicket and disappeared. He returned in a few
+minutes, already heated and breathless.
+
+“We must be on our guard,” he whispered; “I see the glimmer of steel
+through the vine leaves.”
+
+“Our ground is unhappily chosen,” said the Knight, hastily bracing on
+his helmet and leaping on his charger; and waving his hand towards a
+broader space in the road, which would permit the horsemen more room
+to act in union, with his small band he made hastily to the spot--the
+armour of the soldiers rattling heavily as two by two they proceeded on.
+
+The space to which the Cavalier had pointed was a green semicircle of
+several yards in extent, backed by tangled copses of brushwood sloping
+down to the vale below. They reached it in safety; they drew up breast
+to breast in the form of a crescent: every visor closed save that of the
+Knight, who looked anxiously and keenly round the landscape.
+
+“Hast thou heard, Giulio,” he said, to his favourite squire, (the only
+Italian of the band,) “whether any brigands have been seen lately in
+these parts?”
+
+“No, my Lord; on the contrary, I am told that every lance hath left the
+country to join the Grand Company of Fra Moreale. The love of his pay
+and plunder has drawn away the mercenaries of every Tuscan Signor.”
+
+As he ceased speaking, the bugle sounded again from nearly the same spot
+as before; it was answered by a brief and martial note from the very
+rear of the horsemen. At the same moment, from the thickets behind,
+broke the gleam of mail and spears. One after another, rank after rank,
+from the copse behind them, emerged men-at-arms, while suddenly, from
+the vines in front, still greater numbers poured forth with loud and
+fierce shouts.
+
+“For God, for the Emperor, and for the Colonna!” cried the Knight,
+closing his visor; and the little band, closely serried, the lance in
+every rest, broke upon the rush of the enemy in front. A score or so,
+borne to the ground by the charge, cleared a path for the horsemen, and,
+without waiting the assault of the rest, the Knight wheeled his charger
+and led the way down the hill, almost at full gallop, despite the
+roughness of the descent: a flight of arrows despatched after them fell
+idly on their iron mail.
+
+“If they have no horse,” cried the Knight, “we are saved!”
+
+And, indeed, the enemy seemed scarcely to think of pursuing them; but
+(gathered on the brow of a hill) appeared contented to watch their
+flight.
+
+Suddenly a curve in the road brought them before a broad and wide patch
+of waste land, which formed almost a level surface, interrupting the
+descent of the mountain. On the commencement of this waste, drawn up in
+still array, the sunlight broke on the breastplates of a long line of
+horsemen, whom the sinuosities of the road had hitherto concealed from
+the Knight and his party.
+
+The little troop halted abruptly--retreat--advance alike cut off; gazing
+first at the foe before them, that remained still as a cloud, every eye
+was then turned towards the Knight.
+
+“An thou wouldst, my Lord,” said the leader of the Northmen, perceiving
+the irresolution of their chief, “we will fight to the last. You are the
+only Italian I ever knew whom I would willingly die for!”
+
+This rude profession was received with a sympathetic murmur from the
+rest, and the soldiers drew closer around the Knight. “Nay, my brave
+fellows,” said the Colonna, lifting his visor, “it is not in so
+inglorious a field, after such various fortunes, that we are doomed to
+perish. If these be brigands, as we must suppose, we can yet purchase
+our way. If the troops of some Signor, we are strangers to the feud in
+which he is engaged. Give me yon banner--I will ride on to them.”
+
+“Nay, my Lord,” said Giulio; “such marauders do not always spare a flag
+of truce. There is danger--”
+
+“For that reason your leader braves it. Quick!”
+
+The Knight took the banner, and rode deliberately up to the horsemen. On
+approaching, his warlike eye could not but admire the perfect caparison
+of their arms, the strength and beauty of their steeds, and the steady
+discipline of their long and glittering line.
+
+As he rode up, and his gorgeous banner gleamed in the noonlight, the
+soldiers saluted him. It was a good omen, and he hailed it as such.
+“Fair sirs,” said the Knight, “I come, at once herald and leader of the
+little band who have just escaped the unlooked-for assault of armed men
+on yonder hill--and, claiming aid, as knight from knight, and soldier
+from soldier, I place my troop under the protection of your leader.
+Suffer me to see him.”
+
+“Sir Knight,” answered one, who seemed the captain of the band, “sorry
+am I to detain one of your gallant bearing, and still more so, on
+recognising the device of one of the most potent houses of Italy. But
+our orders are strict, and we must bring all armed men to the camp of
+our General.”
+
+“Long absent from my native land, I knew not,” replied the Knight, “that
+there was war in Tuscany. Permit me to crave the name of the general
+whom you speak of, and that of the foe against whom ye march.”
+
+The Captain smiled slightly.
+
+“Walter de Montreal is the General of the Great Company, and Florence
+his present foe.”
+
+“We have fallen, then, into friendly, if fierce, hands,” replied the
+Knight, after a moment’s pause. “To Sir Walter de Montreal I am known
+of old. Permit me to return to my companions, and acquaint them that
+if accident has made us prisoners, it is, at least, only to the most
+skilful warrior of his day that we are condemned to yield.”
+
+The Italian then turned his horse to join his comrades.
+
+“A fair Knight and a bold presence,” said the Captain of the Companions
+to his neighbour, “though I scarce think it is the party we are ordered
+to intercept. Praised be the Virgin, however, his men seem from the
+North. Them, perhaps, we may hope to enlist.”
+
+The Knight now, with his comrades, rejoined the troop. And, on receiving
+their parole not to attempt escape, a detachment of thirty horsemen
+were despatched to conduct the prisoners to the encampment of the Great
+Company.
+
+Turning from the main road, the Knight found himself conducted into a
+narrow defile between the hills, which, succeeded by a gloomy track of
+wild forest-land, brought the party at length into a full and abrupt
+view of a wide plain, covered with the tents of what, for Italian
+warfare, was considered a mighty army. A stream, over which rude and
+hasty bridges had been formed from the neighbouring timber, alone
+separated the horsemen from the encampment.
+
+“A noble sight!” said the captive Cavalier, with enthusiasm, as he
+reined in his steed, and gazed upon the wild and warlike streets of
+canvass, traversing each other in vistas broad and regular.
+
+One of the captains of the Great Company who rode beside him, smiled
+complacently.
+
+“There are few masters of the martial art who equal Fra Moreale,”
+ said he; “and savage, reckless, and gathered from all parts and all
+countries--from cavern and from marketplace, from prison and from
+palace, as are his troops, he has reduced them already into a discipline
+which might shame even the soldiery of the Empire.”
+
+The Knight made no reply; but, spurring his horse over one of the rugged
+bridges, soon found himself amidst the encampment. But that part at
+which he entered little merited the praises bestowed upon the discipline
+of the army. A more unruly and disorderly array, the Cavalier,
+accustomed to the stern regularity of English, French, and German
+discipline, thought he had never beheld: here and there, fierce,
+unshaven, half-naked brigands might be seen, driving before them the
+cattle which they had just collected by predatory excursions.
+Sometimes a knot of dissolute women stood--chattering, scolding,
+gesticulating--collected round groups of wild shagged Northmen, who,
+despite the bright purity of the summer-noon, were already engaged in
+deep potations. Oaths, and laughter, and drunken merriment, and fierce
+brawl, rang from side to side; and ever and anon some hasty conflict
+with drawn knives was begun and finished by the fiery and savage bravoes
+of Calabria or the Apennines, before the very eyes and almost in the
+very path of the troop. Tumblers, and mountebanks, and jugglers, and Jew
+pedlers, were exhibiting their tricks or their wares at every interval,
+apparently well inured to the lawless and turbulent market in which they
+exercised their several callings. Despite the protection of the horsemen
+who accompanied them, the prisoners were not allowed to pass without
+molestation. Groups of urchins, squalid, fierce, and ragged, seemed to
+start from the ground, and surrounded their horses like swarms of bees,
+uttering the most discordant cries; and, with the gestures of savages,
+rather demanding than beseeching money, which, when granted, seemed only
+to render them more insatiable. While, sometimes mingled with the
+rest, were seen the bright eyes and olive cheek, and half-pleading,
+half-laughing smile of girls, whose extreme youth, scarce emerged
+from childhood, rendered doubly striking their utter and unredeemed
+abandonment.
+
+“You did not exaggerate the decorum of the Grand Company!” cried the
+Knight, gravely, to his new acquaintance.
+
+“Signor,” replied the other, “you must not judge of the kernel by the
+shell. We are scarcely yet arrived at the camp. These are the outskirts,
+occupied rather by the rabble than the soldiers. Twenty thousand men
+from the sink, it must be owned, of every town in Italy, follow
+the camp, to fight if necessary, but rather for plunder, and for
+forage:--such you now behold. Presently you will see those of another
+stamp.”
+
+The Knight’s heart swelled high. “And to such men is Italy given up!”
+ thought he. His revery was broken by a loud burst of applause from some
+convivialists hard by. He turned, and under a long tent, and round a
+board covered with wine and viands, sate some thirty or forty bravoes. A
+ragged minstrel, or jongleur, with an immense beard and mustachios, was
+tuning, with no inconsiderable skill, a lute which had accompanied him
+in all his wanderings--and suddenly changing its notes into a wild and
+warlike melody, he commenced in a loud and deep voice the following
+song:--
+
+The Praise of the Grand Company.
+
+     1.
+
+     Ho, dark one from the golden South,--
+     Ho, fair one from the North;
+     Ho, coat of mail and spear of sheen--
+     Ho, wherefore ride ye forth?
+     “We come from mount, we come from cave,
+     We come across the sea,
+     In long array, in bright array,
+     To Montreal’s Companie.”
+      Oh, the merry, merry band.
+     Light heart, and heavy hand--
+     Oh, the Lances of the Free!
+
+     2.
+
+     Ho, Princes of the castled height--
+     Ho, Burghers of the town;
+     Apulia’s strength, Romagna’s pride,
+     And Tusca’s old renown!
+     Why quail ye thus? why pale ye thus?
+     What spectre do ye see?
+     “The blood-red flag, and trampling march,
+     Of Montreal’s Companie.”
+      Oh, the sunshine of your life--
+     Oh, the thunders of your strife!
+     Wild Lances of the Free!
+
+     3.
+
+     Ho, scutcheons o’er the vaulted tomb
+     Where Norman valour sleeps,
+     Why shake ye so? why quake ye so!
+     What wind the trophy sweeps?
+     “We shake without a breath--below,
+     The dead are stirred to see,
+     The Norman’s fame revived again
+     In Montreal’s Companie.”
+      Since Roger won his crown,
+     Who hath equalled your renown,
+     Brave Lances of the Free?
+
+     4.
+
+     Ho, ye who seek to win a name,
+     Where deeds are bravest done--
+     Ho, ye who wish to pile a heap,
+     Where gold is lightest won;
+     Ho, ye who loathe the stagnant life,
+     Or shun the law’s decree,
+     Belt on the brand, and spur the steed,
+     To Montreal’s Companie.
+     And the maid shall share her rest,
+     And the miser share his chest,
+     With the Lances of the Free!
+     The Free!
+     The Free!
+     Oh! the Lances of the Free!
+
+Then suddenly, as if inspired to a wilder flight by his own minstrelsy,
+the jongleur, sweeping his hand over the chords, broke forth into an
+air admirably expressive of the picture which his words, running into a
+rude, but lively and stirring doggerel, attempted to paint.
+
+The March of the Grand Company.
+
+     Tira, tirala--trumpet and drum--
+     Rising bright o’er the height of the mountain they come!
+     German, and Hun, and the Islandrie,
+     Who routed the Frenchman at famed Cressie,
+     When the rose changed its hue with the fleur-de-lis;
+     With the Roman, and Lombard, and Piedmontese,
+     And the dark-haired son of the southern seas.
+     Tira, tirala--more near and near
+     Down the steep--see them sweep;--rank by rank they appear!
+     With the Cloud of the Crowd hanging dark at their rear--
+     Serried, and steadied, and orderlie,
+     Like the course--like the force--of a marching sea!
+     Open your gates, and out with your gold,
+     For the blood must be spilt, or the ransom be told!
+     Woe, Burghers, woe!  Behold them led
+     By the stoutest arm and the wisest head,
+     With the snow-white cross on the cloth of red;--
+     With the eagle eye, and the lion port,
+     His barb for a throne, and his camp for a court:
+     Sovereign and scourge of the land is he--
+     The kingly Knight of the Companie!
+     Hurrah--hurrah--hurrah!
+     Hurrah for the army--hurrah for its lord--
+     Hurrah for the gold that is got by the sword--
+     Hurrah--hurrah--hurrah!
+     For the Lances of the Free!
+
+Shouted by the full chorus of those desperate boon-companions, and
+caught up and re-echoed from side to side, near and far, as the familiar
+and well-known words of the burthen reached the ears of more distant
+groups or stragglers, the effect of this fierce and licentious
+minstrelsy was indescribable. It was impossible not to feel the zest
+which that daring life imparted to its daring followers, and even the
+gallant and stately Knight who listened to it, reproved himself for an
+involuntary thrill of sympathy and pleasure.
+
+He turned with some impatience and irritation to his companion, who had
+taken a part in the chorus, and said, “Sir, to the ears of an Italian
+noble, conscious of the miseries of his country, this ditty is not
+welcome. I pray you, let us proceed.”
+
+“I humbly crave your pardon, Signor,” said the Free Companion; “but
+really so attractive is the life led by Free Lances, under Fra Moreale,
+that sometimes we forget the--; but pardon me--we will on.”
+
+A few moments more, and bounding over a narrow circumvallation, the
+party found themselves in a quarter, animated indeed, but of a wholly
+different character of animation. Long lines of armed men were drawn up
+on either side of a path, conducting to a large marquee, placed upon
+a little hillock, surmounted by a blue flag, and up this path armed
+soldiers were passing to and fro with great order, but with a pleased
+and complacent expression upon their swarthy features. Some that
+repaired to the marquee were bearing packets and bales upon their
+shoulders--those that returned seemed to have got rid of their burthens,
+but every now and then, impatiently opening their hands, appeared
+counting and recounting to themselves the coins contained therein.
+
+The Knight looked inquiringly at his companion.
+
+“It is the marquee of the merchants,” said the captain; “they have
+free admission to the camp, and their property and persons are rigidly
+respected. They purchase each soldier’s share of the plunder at fair
+prices, and either party is contented with the bargain.”
+
+“It seems, then, that there is some kind of rude justice observed
+amongst you,” said the Knight.
+
+“Rude! Diavolo! Not a town in Italy but would be glad of such even
+justice, and such impartial laws. Yonder lie the tents of the judges,
+appointed to try all offences of soldier against soldier. To the right,
+the tent with the golden ball contains the treasurer of the army. Fra
+Moreale incurs no arrears with his soldiery.”
+
+It was, indeed, by these means that the Knight of St. John had collected
+the best equipped and the best contented force in Italy. Every day
+brought him recruits. Nothing was spoken of amongst the mercenaries of
+Italy but the wealth acquired in his service, and every warrior in the
+pay of Republic or of Tyrant sighed for the lawless standard of Fra
+Moreale. Already had exaggerated tales of the fortunes to be made in the
+ranks of the Great Company passed the Alps; and, even now, the Knight,
+penetrating farther into the camp, beheld from many a tent the proud
+banners and armorial blazon of German nobility and Gallic knighthood.
+
+“You see,” said the Free Companion, pointing to these insignia, “we are
+not without our different ranks in our wild city. And while we speak,
+many a golden spur is speeding hitherward from the North!”
+
+All now in the quarter they had entered was still and solemn; only afar
+came the mingled hum, or the sudden shout of the pandemonium in the
+rear, mellowed by distance to a not unpleasing sound. An occasional
+soldier, crossing their path, stalked silently and stealthily to some
+neighbouring tent, and seemed scarcely to regard their approach.
+
+“Behold! we are before the General’s pavilion,” said the Free Lance.
+
+Blazoned with purple and gold, the tent of Montreal lay a little apart
+from the rest. A brooklet from the stream they had crossed murmured
+gratefully on the ear, and a tall and wide-spreading beech cast its
+shadow over the gorgeous canvass.
+
+While his troop waited without, the knight was conducted at once to the
+presence of the formidable adventurer.
+
+
+
+Chapter 8.II. Adrian Once More the Guest of Montreal.
+
+Montreal was sitting at the head of a table, surrounded by men, some
+military, some civil, whom he called his councillors, and with whom
+he apparently debated all his projects. These men, drawn from various
+cities, were intimately acquainted with the internal affairs of the
+several states to which they belonged. They could tell to a fraction
+the force of a signor, the wealth of a merchant, the power of a mob. And
+thus, in his lawless camp, Montreal presided, not more as a general than
+a statesman. Such knowledge was invaluable to the chief of the Great
+Company. It enabled him to calculate exactly the time to attack a foe,
+and the sum to demand for a suppression of hostilities. He knew what
+parties to deal with--where to importune--where to forbear. And it
+usually happened that, by some secret intrigue, the appearance of
+Montreal’s banner before the walls of a city was the signal for some
+sedition or some broil within. It may be that he thus also promoted an
+ulterior, as well as his present, policy.
+
+The divan were in full consultation when an officer entered, and
+whispered a few words in Montreal’s ear. His eyes brightened. “Admit
+him,” he said hastily. “Messires,” he added to his councillors, rubbing
+his hands, “I think our net has caught our bird. Let us see.”
+
+At this moment the drapery was lifted and the Knight admitted.
+
+“How!” muttered Montreal, changing colour, and in evident
+disappointment. “Am I to be ever thus balked?”
+
+“Sir Walter de Montreal,” said the prisoner, “I am once more your guest.
+In these altered features you perhaps scarcely recognise Adrian di
+Castello.”
+
+“Pardon me, noble Signor,” said Montreal, rising with great courtesy;
+“the mistake of my varlets disturbed my recollection for a moment.--I
+rejoice once more to press a hand that has won so many laurels since
+last we parted. Your renown has been grateful to my ears. Ho!” continued
+the chieftain, clapping his hands, “see to the refreshment and repose
+of this noble Cavalier and his attendants. Lord Adrian, I will join you
+presently.”
+
+Adrian withdrew. Montreal, forgetful of his councillors, traversed his
+tent with hasty strides; then summoning the officer who had admitted
+Adrian, he said, “Count Landau still keeps the pass?”
+
+“Yes, General!”
+
+“Hie thee fast back, then--the ambuscade must tarry till nightfall. We
+have trapped the wrong fox.”
+
+The officer departed, and shortly afterwards Montreal broke up the
+divan. He sought Adrian, who was lodged in a tent beside his own.
+
+“My Lord,” said Montreal, “it is true that my men had orders to stop
+every one on the roads towards Florence. I am at war with that city. Yet
+I expected a very different prisoner from you. Need I add, that you and
+your men are free?”
+
+“I accept the courtesy, noble Montreal, as frankly as it is rendered.
+May I hope hereafter to repay it? Meanwhile permit me, without any
+disrespect, to say that had I learned the Grand Company was in this
+direction, I should have altered my course. I had heard that your arms
+were bent (somewhat to my mind more nobly) against Malatesta, the tyrant
+of Rimini!”
+
+“They were so. He was my foe; he is my tributary. We conquered him. He
+paid us the price of his liberty. We marched by Asciano upon Sienna.
+For sixteen thousand florins we spared that city; and we now hang like
+a thunderbolt over Florence, which dared to send her puny aid to the
+defence of Rimini. Our marches are forced and rapid and our camp in this
+plain but just pitched.”
+
+“I hear that the Grand Company is allied with Albornoz, and that its
+General is secretly the soldier of the Church. Is it so?”
+
+“Ay--Albornoz and I understand one another,” replied Montreal,
+carelessly; “and not the less so that we have a mutual foe; whom both
+are sworn to crush, in Visconti, the archbishop of Milan.”
+
+“Visconti! the most potent of the Italian princes. That he has justly
+incurred the wrath of the Church I know--and I can readily understand
+that Innocent has revoked the pardon which the intrigues of the
+Archbishop purchased from Clement VI. But I do not see clearly why
+Montreal should willingly provoke so dark and terrible a foe.”
+
+Montreal smiled sternly. “Know you not,” he said, “the vast ambition of
+that Visconti? By the Holy Sepulchre, he is precisely the enemy my soul
+leaps to meet! He has a genius worthy to cope with Montreal’s. I have
+made myself master of his secret plans--they are gigantic! In a word,
+the Archbishop designs the conquest of all Italy. His enormous wealth
+purchases the corrupt--his dark sagacity ensnares the credulous--his
+daring valour awes the weak. Every enemy he humbles--every ally he
+enslaves. This is precisely the Prince whose progress Walter de Montreal
+must arrest. For this (he said in a whisper as to himself) is precisely
+the Prince who, if suffered to extend his power, will frustrate the
+plans and break the force of Walter de Montreal.”
+
+Adrian was silent, and for the first time a suspicion of the real nature
+of the Provencal’s designs crossed his breast.
+
+“But, noble Montreal,” resumed the Colonna, “give me, if your knowledge
+serves, as no doubt it does,--give me the latest tidings of my native
+city. I am Roman, and Rome is ever in my thoughts.”
+
+“And well she may,” replied Montreal, quickly. “Thou knowest that
+Albornoz, as Legate of the Pontiff, led the army of the Church into the
+Papal Territories. He took with him Cola di Rienzi. Arrived at Monte
+Fiascone, crowds of Romans of all ranks hastened thither to render
+homage to the Tribune. The Legate was forgotten in the popularity of
+his companion. Whether or not Albornoz grew jealous--for he is proud as
+Lucifer--of the respect paid to the Tribune, or whether he feared the
+restoration of his power, I cannot tell. But he detained him in his
+camp, and refused to yield him to all the solicitations and all the
+deputations of the Romans. Artfully, however, he fulfilled one of the
+real objects of Rienzi’s release. Through his means he formally regained
+the allegiance of Rome to the Church, and by the attraction of his
+presence swelled his camp with Roman recruits. Marching to Viterbo,
+Rienzi distinguished himself greatly in deeds of arms against the tyrant
+(“Vita di Cola di Rienzi”.) John di Vico. Nay, he fought as one worthy
+of belonging to the Grand Company. This increased the zeal of the
+Romans; and the city disgorged half its inhabitants to attend the person
+of the bold Tribune. To the entreaties of these worthy citizens (perhaps
+the very men who had before shut up their darling in St. Angelo) the
+crafty Legate merely replied, ‘Arm against John di Vico--conquer the
+tyrants of the Territory--re-establish the patrimony of St. Peter, and
+Rienzi shall then be proclaimed Senator, and return to Rome.’
+
+“These words inspired the Romans with so great a zeal, that they
+willingly lent their aid to the Legate. Aquapendente, Bolzena yielded,
+John di Vico was half reduced and half terrified into submission, and
+Gabrielli, the tyrant of Agobbio, has since succumbed. The glory is to
+the Cardinal, but the merit with Rienzi.”
+
+“And now?”
+
+“Albornoz continued to entertain the Senator-Tribune with great
+splendour and fair words, but not a word about restoring him to Rome.
+Wearied with this suspense, I have learned by secret intelligence that
+Rienzi has left the camp, and betaken himself with few attendants to
+Florence, where he has friends, who will provide him with arms and money
+to enter Rome.”
+
+“Ah then! now I guess,” said Adrian, with a half smile, “for whom I was
+mistaken!”
+
+Montreal blushed slightly. “Fairly conjectured!” said he.
+
+“Meanwhile, at Rome,” continued the Provencal--“at Rome, your worthy
+House, and that of the Orsini, being elected to the supreme power,
+quarrelled among themselves, and could not keep the authority they had
+won. Francesco Baroncelli, (This Baroncelli, who has been introduced to
+the reader in a former portion of this work, is called by Matteo Villani
+“a man of vile birth and little learning--he had been a Notary of the
+Capitol.” In the midst of the armed dissensions between the Barons,
+which followed the expulsion of Rienzi, Baroncelli contrived to make
+himself Master of the Capitol, and of what was considered an auxiliary
+of no common importance--viz. the Great Bell, by whose alarum Rienzi
+had so often summoned to arms the Roman people. Baroncelli was crowned
+Tribune, clothed in a robe of gold brocade, and invested with the
+crozier-sceptre of Rienzi. At first, his cruelty against the great took
+the appearance of protection to the humble; but the excesses of his sons
+(not exaggerated in the text), and his own brutal but bold ferocity,
+soon made him execrated by the people, to whom he owed his elevation. He
+had the folly to declare against the Pope; and this it really was that
+mainly induced Innocent to restore, and oppose to their New Demagogue,
+the former and more illustrious Tribune. Baroncelli, like Rienzi, was
+excommunicated; and in his instance, also, the curse of the Church
+was the immediate cause of his downfall. In attempting flight he was
+massacred by the mob, December, 1353. Some, however, have maintained
+that he was slain in combat with Rienzi; and others, by a confusion
+of dates, have made him succeed to Rienzi on the death of the
+latter.--Matteo Villani, lib. iii. cap. 78. Osservaz. Stor. di Zefirino
+Re. MS. Vat. Rip. dal Bzovio, ann. 1353. N. 2.) a new demagogue, a
+humble imitator of Rienzi, rose upon the ruins of the peace broken by
+the nobles, obtained the title of Tribune, and carried about the very
+insignia used by his predecessor. But less wise than Rienzi, he took
+the antipapal party. And the Legate was thus enabled to play the papal
+demagogue against the usurper. Baroncelli was a weak man, his sons
+committed every excess in mimicry of the highborn tyrants of Padua and
+Milan. Virgins violated and matrons dishonoured, somewhat contrasted the
+solemn and majestic decorum of Rienzi’s rule;--in fine, Baroncelli fell
+massacred by the people. And now, if you ask what rules Rome, I answer,
+‘It is the hope of Rienzi.’”
+
+“A strange man, and various fortunes. What will be the end of both!”
+
+“Swift murder to the first, and eternal fame to the last,” answered
+Montreal, calmly. “Rienzi will be restored; that brave phoenix will wing
+its way through storm and cloud to its own funereal pyre: I foresee, I
+compassionate, I admire.--And then,” added Montreal, “I look beyond!”
+
+“But wherefore feel you so certain that, if restored, Rienzi must fall?”
+
+“Is it not clear to every eye, save his, whom ambition blinds? How can
+mortal genius, however great, rule that most depraved people by popular
+means? The Barons--(you know their indomitable ferocity)--wedded to
+abuse, and loathing every semblance to law; the Barons, humbled for
+a moment, will watch their occasion, and rise. The people will again
+desert. Or else, grown wise in one respect by experience, the new
+Senator will see that popular favour has a loud voice, but a recreant
+arm. He will, like the Barons, surround himself by foreign swords. A
+detachment from the Grand Company will be his courtiers; they will be
+his masters! To pay them the people must be taxed. Then the idol is
+execrated. No Italian hand can govern these hardy demons of the north;
+they will mutiny and fall away. A new demagogue will lead on the people,
+and Rienzi will be the victim. Mark my prophecy!”
+
+“And then the ‘beyond’ to which you look?”
+
+“Utter prostration of Rome, for new and long ages; God makes not two
+Rienzis; or,” said Montreal, proudly, “the infusion of a new life into
+the worn-out and diseased frame,--the foundation of a new dynasty.
+Verily, when I look around me, I believe that the Ruler of nations
+designs the restoration of the South by the irruptions of the North; and
+that out of the old Franc and Germanic race will be built up the thrones
+of the future world!”
+
+As Montreal thus spoke, leaning on his great war-sword, with his fair
+and heroic features--so different, in their frank, bold, fearless
+expression, from the dark and wily intellect that characterises
+the lineaments of the South--eloquent at once with enthusiasm and
+thought--he might have seemed no unfitting representative of the genius
+of that northern chivalry of which he spake. And Adrian half fancied
+that he saw before him one of the old Gothic scourges of the Western
+World.
+
+Their conversation was here interrupted by the sound of a trumpet, and
+presently an officer entering, announced the arrival of ambassadors from
+Florence.
+
+“Again you must pardon me, noble Adrian,” said Montreal, “and let me
+claim you as my guest at least for tonight. Here you may rest secure,
+and on parting, my men shall attend you to the frontiers of whatsoever
+territory you design to visit.”
+
+Adrian, not sorry to see more of a man so celebrated, accepted the
+invitation.
+
+Left alone, he leaned his head upon his hand, and soon became lost in
+his reflections.
+
+
+
+Chapter 8.III. Faithful and Ill-fated Love.--The Aspirations Survive the
+Affections.
+
+Since that fearful hour in which Adrian Colonna had gazed upon the
+lifeless form of his adored Irene, the young Roman had undergone the
+usual vicissitudes of a wandering and adventurous life in those exciting
+times. His country seemed no longer dear to him. His very rank precluded
+him from the post he once aspired to take in restoring the liberties of
+Rome; and he felt that if ever such a revolution could be consummated,
+it was reserved for one in whose birth and habits the people could
+feel sympathy and kindred, and who could lift his hand in their behalf
+without becoming the apostate of his order and the judge of his own
+House. He had travelled through various courts, and served with renown
+in various fields. Beloved and honoured wheresoever he fixed a temporary
+home, no change of scene had removed his melancholy--no new ties had
+chased away the memory of the Lost. In that era of passionate and
+poetical romance, which Petrarch represented rather than created, Love
+had already begun to assume a more tender and sacred character than it
+had hitherto known, it had gradually imbibed the divine spirit which
+it derives from Christianity, and which associates its sorrows on
+earth with the visions and hopes of heaven. To him who relies upon
+immortality, fidelity to the dead is easy; because death cannot
+extinguish hope, and the soul of the mourner is already half in the
+world to come. It is an age that desponds of a future life--representing
+death as an eternal separation--in which, if men grieve awhile for the
+dead, they hasten to reconcile themselves to the living. For true is the
+old aphorism, that love exists not without hope. And all that romantic
+worship which the Hermit of Vaucluse felt, or feigned, for Laura, found
+its temple in the desolate heart of Adrian Colonna. He was emphatically
+the Lover of his time! Often as, in his pilgrimage from land to land,
+he passed the walls of some quiet and lonely convent, he seriously
+meditated the solemn vows, and internally resolved that the cloister
+should receive his maturer age. The absence of years had, however,
+in some degree restored the dimmed and shattered affection for his
+fatherland, and he desired once more to visit the city in which he had
+first beheld Irene. “Perhaps,” he thought, “time may have wrought some
+unlooked-for change; and I may yet assist to restore my country.”
+
+But with this lingering patriotism no ambition was mingled. In that
+heated stage of action, in which the desire of power seemed to stir
+through every breast, and Italy had become the El Dorado of wealth, or
+the Utopia of empire, to thousands of valiant arms and plotting minds,
+there was at least one breast that felt the true philosophy of the
+Hermit. Adrian’s nature, though gallant and masculine, was singularly
+imbued with that elegance of temperament which recoils from rude
+contact, and to which a lettered and cultivated indolence is the
+supremest luxury. His education, his experience, and his intellect, had
+placed him far in advance of his age, and he looked with a high contempt
+on the coarse villanies and base tricks by which Italian ambition
+sought its road to power. The rise and fall of Rienzi, who, whatever his
+failings, was at least the purest and most honourable of the self-raised
+princes of the age, had conspired to make him despond of the success of
+noble, as he recoiled from that of selfish aspirations. And the dreamy
+melancholy which resulted from his ill-starred love, yet more tended
+to wean him from the stale and hackneyed pursuits of the world. His
+character was full of beauty and of poetry--not the less so in that it
+found not a vent for its emotions in the actual occupation of the poet!
+Pent within, those emotions diffused themselves over all his thoughts
+and coloured his whole soul. Sometimes, in the blessed abstraction of
+his visions, he pictured to himself the lot he might have chosen had
+Irene lived, and fate united them--far from the turbulent and vulgar
+roar of Rome--but amidst some yet unpolluted solitude of the bright
+Italian soil. Before his eye there rose the lovely landscape--the palace
+by the borders of the waveless lake--the vineyards in the valley--the
+dark forests waving from the hill--and that home, the resort and refuge
+of all the minstrelsy and love of Italy, brightened by the “Lampeggiar
+dell’ angelico riso,” that makes a paradise in the face we love. Often,
+seduced by such dreams to complete oblivion of his loss, the young
+wanderer started from the ideal bliss, to behold around him the solitary
+waste of way--or the moonlit tents of war--or, worse than all, the
+crowds and revels of a foreign court.
+
+Whether or not such fancies now, for a moment, allured his meditations,
+conjured up, perhaps, by the name of Irene’s brother, which never
+sounded in his ears but to awaken ten thousand associations, the Colonna
+remained thoughtful and absorbed, until he was disturbed by his own
+squire, who, accompanied by Montreal’s servitors, ushered in
+his solitary but ample repast. Flasks of the richest Florentine
+wines--viands prepared with all the art which, alas, Italy has now
+lost!--goblets and salvers of gold and silver, prodigally wrought with
+barbaric gems--attested the princely luxury which reigned in the camp
+of the Grand Company. But Adrian saw in all only the spoliation of his
+degraded country, and felt the splendour almost as an insult. His lonely
+meal soon concluded, he became impatient of the monotony of his tent;
+and, tempted by the cool air of the descending eve, sauntered carelessly
+forth. He bent his steps by the side of the brooklet that curved,
+snakelike and sparkling, by Montreal’s tent; and finding a spot somewhat
+solitary and apart from the warlike tenements around, flung himself by
+the margin of the stream.
+
+The last rays of the sun quivered on the wave that danced musically over
+its stony bed; and amidst a little copse on the opposite bank broke the
+brief and momentary song of such of the bolder habitants of that purple
+air as the din of the camp had not scared from their green retreat. The
+clouds lay motionless to the west, in that sky so darkly and intensely
+blue, never seen but over the landscapes that a Claude or a Rosa loved
+to paint; and dim and delicious rose-hues gathered over the grey peaks
+of the distant Apennines. From afar floated the hum of the camp, broken
+by the neigh of returning steeds; the blast of an occasional bugle; and,
+at regular intervals, by the armed tramp of the neighbouring sentry.
+And opposite to the left of the copse--upon a rising ground, matted
+with reeds, moss, and waving shrubs--were the ruins of some old Etruscan
+building, whose name had perished, whose very uses were unknown.
+
+The scene was so calm and lovely, as Adrian gazed upon it, that it was
+scarcely possible to imagine it at that very hour the haunt of fierce
+and banded robbers, among most of whom the very soul of man was
+embruted, and to all of whom murder or rapine made the habitual
+occupation of life.
+
+Still buried in his reveries, and carelessly dropping stones into the
+noisy rivulet, Adrian was aroused by the sound of steps.
+
+“A fair spot to listen to the lute and the ballads of Provence,” said
+the voice of Montreal, as the Knight of St. John threw himself on the
+turf beside the young Colonna.
+
+“You retain, then, your ancient love of your national melodies,” said
+Adrian.
+
+“Ay, I have not yet survived all my youth,” answered Montreal, with a
+slight sigh. “But somehow or other, the strains that once pleased
+my fancy now go too directly to my heart. So, though I still welcome
+jongleur and minstrel, I bid them sing their newest conceits. I cannot
+wish ever again to hear the poetry I heard when I was young!”
+
+“Pardon me,” said Adrian, with great interest, “but fain would I have
+dared, though a secret apprehension prevented me hitherto,--fain would
+I have dared to question you of that lovely lady, with whom, seven
+years ago, we gazed at moonlight upon the odorous orange-groves and rosy
+waters of Terracina.”
+
+Montreal turned away his face; he laid his hand on Adrian’s arm, and
+murmured, in a deep and hoarse tone, “I am alone now!”
+
+Adrian pressed his hand in silence. He felt no light shock at thus
+learning the death of one so gentle, so lovely, and so ill-fated.
+
+“The vows of my knighthood,” continued Montreal, “which precluded
+Adeline the rights of wedlock--the shame of her house--the angry
+grief of her mother--the wild vicissitudes of my life, so exposed to
+peril--the loss of her son--all preyed silently on her frame. She did
+not die (die is too harsh a word!), but she drooped away, and glided
+into heaven. Even as on a summer’s morn some soft dream fleets across
+us, growing less and less distinct, until it fades, as it were, into
+light, and we awaken--so faded Adeline’s parting spirit, till the
+daylight of God broke upon it.”
+
+Montreal paused a moment, and then resumed: “These thoughts make the
+boldest of us weak sometimes, and we Provencals are foolish in these
+matters!--God wot, she was very dear to me!”
+
+The Knight bent down and crossed himself devoutly, his lips muttered a
+prayer. Strange as it may seem to our more enlightened age, so martial
+a garb did morality then wear, that this man, at whose word towns had
+blazed and torrents of blood had flowed, neither adjudged himself, nor
+was adjudged by the majority of his contemporaries, a criminal. His
+order, half monastic, half warlike, was emblematic of himself.
+He trampled upon man, yet humbled himself to God; nor had all his
+acquaintance with the refining scepticism of Italy shaken the sturdy and
+simple faith of the bold Provencal. So far from recognising any want
+of harmony between his calling and his creed, he held that man no true
+chevalier who was not as devout to the Cross as relentless with the
+sword.
+
+“And you have no child save the one you lost?” asked Adrian, when he
+observed the wonted composure of Montreal once more returning.
+
+“None!” said Montreal, as his brow again darkened. “No love-begotten
+heir of mine will succeed to the fortunes I trust yet to build. Never
+on earth shall I see upon the face of her child the likeness of Adeline!
+Yet, at Avignon, I saw a boy I would have claimed; for methought she
+must have looked her soul into his eyes, they were so like hers! Well,
+well! The Provence tree hath other branches; and some unborn nephew must
+be--what? The stars have not yet decided! But ambition is now the only
+thing in the world left me to love.”
+
+“So differently operates the same misfortune upon different characters,”
+ thought the Colonna. “To me, crowns became valueless when I could no
+longer dream of placing them on Irene’s brow!”
+
+The similarity of their fates, however, attracted Adrian strongly
+towards his host; and the two Knights conversed together with more
+friendship and unreserve than they had hitherto done. At length Montreal
+said, “By the way, I have not inquired your destination.”
+
+“I am bound to Rome,” said Adrian; “and the intelligence I have learned
+from you incites me thitherward yet more eagerly. If Rienzi return, I
+may mediate successfully, perchance, between the Tribune-Senator and the
+nobles; and if I find my cousin, young Stefanello, now the head of
+our house, more tractable than his sires, I shall not despair of
+conciliating the less powerful Barons. Rome wants repose; and whoever
+governs, if he govern but with justice, ought to be supported both by
+prince and plebeian!”
+
+Montreal listened with great attention, and then muttered to himself,
+“No, it cannot be!” He mused a little while, shading his brow with his
+hand, before he said aloud, “To Rome you are bound. Well, we shall meet
+soon amidst its ruins. Know, by the way, that my object here is already
+won: these Florentine merchants have acceded to my terms; they have
+purchased a two years’ peace; tomorrow the camp breaks up, and the
+Grand Company march to Lombardy. There, if my schemes prosper, and
+the Venetians pay my price, I league the rascals (under Landau, my
+Lieutenant) with the Sea-City, in defiance of the Visconti, and shall
+pass my autumn in peace amidst the pomps of Rome.”
+
+“Sir Walter de Montreal,” said Adrian, “your frankness perhaps makes
+me presumptuous; but when I hear you talk, like a huxtering trader, of
+selling alike your friendship and your forbearance, I ask myself, ‘Is
+this the great Knight of St. John; and have men spoken of him fairly,
+when they assert the sole stain on his laurels to be his avarice?”
+
+Montreal bit his lip; nevertheless, he answered calmly, “My frankness
+has brought its own penance, Lord Adrian. However, I cannot wholly leave
+so honoured a guest under an impression which I feel to be plausible,
+but not just. No, brave Colonna; report wrongs me. I value Gold,
+for Gold is the Architect of Power! It fills the camp--it storms the
+city--it buys the marketplace--it raises the palace--it founds the
+throne. I value Gold,--it is the means necessary to my end!”
+
+“And that end--”
+
+“Is--no matter what,” said the Knight coldly. “Let us to our tents, the
+dews fall heavily, and the malaria floats over these houseless wastes.”
+
+The pair rose;--yet, fascinated by the beauty of the hour, they lingered
+for a moment by the brook. The earliest stars shone over its crisping
+wavelets, and a delicious breeze murmured gently amidst the glossy
+herbage.
+
+“Thus gazing,” said Montreal, softly, “we reverse the old Medusan fable
+the poets tell us of, and look and muse ourselves out of stone. A little
+while, and it was the sunlight that gilded the wave--it now shines as
+brightly and glides as gaily beneath the stars; even so rolls the stream
+of time: one luminary succeeds the other equally welcomed--equally
+illumining--equally evanescent!--You see, the poetry of Provence still
+lives beneath my mail!”
+
+Adrian early sought his couch; but his own thoughts and the sounds of
+loud mirth that broke from Montreal’s tent, where the chief feasted the
+captains of his band, a revel from which he had the delicacy to excuse
+the Roman noble, kept the Colonna long awake; and he had scarcely fallen
+into an unquiet slumber, when yet more discordant sounds again invaded
+his repose. At the earliest dawn the wide armament was astir--the
+creaking of cordage--the tramp of men--loud orders and louder oaths--the
+slow rolling of baggage-wains--and the clank of the armourers, announced
+the removal of the camp, and the approaching departure of the Grand
+Company.
+
+Ere Adrian was yet attired, Montreal entered his tent.
+
+“I have appointed,” he said, “five score lances under a trusty leader,
+to accompany you, noble Adrian, to the borders of Romagna; they wait
+your leisure. In another hour I depart; the on-guard are already in
+motion.”
+
+Adrian would fain have declined the proffered escort; but he saw that
+it would only offend the pride of the chief, who soon retired. Hastily
+Adrian endued his arms--the air of the fresh morning, and the glad
+sun rising gorgeously from the hills, revived his wearied spirit. He
+repaired to Montreal’s tent, and found him alone, with the implements of
+writing before him, and a triumphant smile upon his countenance.
+
+“Fortune showers new favours on me!” he said, gaily. “Yesterday the
+Florentines spared me the trouble of a siege: and today (even since I
+last saw you--a few minutes since) puts your new Senator of Rome into my
+power.”
+
+“How! Have your bands then arrested Rienzi?”
+
+“Not so--better still! The Tribune changed his plan, and repaired to
+Perugia, where my brothers now abide--sought them--they have supplied
+him with money and soldiers enough to brave the perils of the way, and
+to defy the swords of the Barons. So writes my good brother Arimbaldo, a
+man of letters, whom the Tribune thinks rightly he has decoyed with old
+tales of Roman greatness, and mighty promises of grateful advancement.
+You find me hastily expressing my content at the arrangement. My
+brothers themselves will accompany the Senator-Tribune to the walls of
+the Capitol.”
+
+“Still, I see not how this places Rienzi in your power.”
+
+“No! His soldiers are my creatures--his comrades my brothers--his
+creditor myself! Let him rule Rome then--the time soon comes when the
+Vice-Regent must yield to--”
+
+“The Chief of the Grand Company,” interrupted Adrian, with a shudder,
+which the bold Montreal was too engrossed with the unconcealed
+excitement of his own thoughts to notice. “No, Knight of Provence,
+basely have we succumbed to domestic tyrants: but never, I trust, will
+Romans be so vile as to wear the yoke of a foreign usurper.”
+
+Montreal looked hard at Adrian, and smiled sternly.
+
+“You mistake me,” said he; “and it will be time enough for you to play
+the Brutus when I assume the Caesar. Meanwhile we are but host and
+guest. Let us change the theme.”
+
+Nevertheless this, their latter conference, threw a chill over both
+during the short time the Knights remained together, and they parted
+with a formality which was ill-suited to their friendly intercourse of
+the night before. Montreal felt he had in cautiously revealed himself,
+but caution was no part of his character, whenever he found himself
+at the head of an army, and at the full tide of fortune; and at that
+moment, so confident was he of the success of his wildest schemes, that
+he recked little whom he offended, or whom alarmed.
+
+Slowly, with his strange and ferocious escort, Adrian renewed his way.
+Winding up a steep ascent that led from the plain,--when he reached
+the summit, the curve in the road shewed him the whole army on its
+march;--the gonfalons waving--the armour flashing in the sun, line after
+line, like a river of steel, and the whole plain bristling with the
+array of that moving war;--while the solemn tread of the armed thousands
+fell subdued and stifled at times by martial and exulting music. As they
+swept on, Adrian descried at length the stately and towering form of
+Montreal upon a black charger, distinguished even at that distance from
+the rest, not more by his gorgeous armour than his lofty stature. So
+swept he on in the pride of his array--in the flush of his hopes--the
+head of a mighty armament--the terror of Italy--the hero that was--the
+monarch that might be!
+
+
+
+
+BOOK IX. THE RETURN.
+
+     “Allora la sua venuta fu a Roma sentita; Romani si
+     apparecchiavano a riceverlo con letizia...furo fatti archi
+     trionfali,” &c. &c.--“Vita di Cola di Rienzi”, lib. ii. c.
+     17.
+
+     “Then the fame of his coming was felt at Rome; the Romans
+     made ready to receive him with gladness...triumphal arches
+     were erected,” &c., &c.--“Life of Cola di Rienzi”.
+
+
+
+Chapter 9.I. The Triumphal Entrance.
+
+All Rome was astir!--from St. Angelo to the Capitol, windows, balconies,
+roofs, were crowded with animated thousands. Only here and there, in the
+sullen quarters of the Colonna, the Orsini, and the Savelli, reigned a
+death-like solitude and a dreary gloom. In those fortifications, rather
+than streets, not even the accustomed tread of the barbarian sentinel
+was heard. The gates closed--the casements barred--the grim silence
+around--attested the absence of the Barons. They had left the city so
+soon as they had learned the certain approach of Rienzi. In the villages
+and castles of the Campagna, surrounded by their mercenaries, they
+awaited the hour when the people, weary of their idol, should welcome
+back even those ferocious Iconoclasts.
+
+With these exceptions, all Rome was astir! Triumphal arches of drapery,
+wrought with gold and silver, raised at every principal vista, were
+inscribed with mottoes of welcome and rejoicing. At frequent intervals
+stood youths and maidens, with baskets of flowers and laurels. High
+above the assembled multitudes--from the proud tower of Hadrian--from
+the turrets of the Capitol--from the spires of the sacred buildings
+dedicated to Apostle and to Saint--floated banners as for a victory.
+Rome once more opened her arms to receive her Tribune!
+
+Mingled with the crowd--disguised by his large mantle--hidden by the
+pressure of the throng--his person, indeed, forgotten by most--and, in
+the confusion of the moment, heeded by none--stood Adrian Colonna! He
+had not been able to conquer his interest for the brother of Irene.
+Solitary amidst his fellow-citizens, he stood--the only one of the proud
+race of Colonna who witnessed the triumph of the darling of the people.
+
+“They say he has grown large in his prison,” said one of the bystanders;
+“he was lean enough when he came by daybreak out of the Church of St.
+Angelo!”
+
+“Ay,” said another, a little man with a shrewd, restless eye, “they say
+truly; I saw him take leave of the Legate.”
+
+Every eye was turned to the last speaker; he became at once a personage
+of importance. “Yes,” continued the little man with an elated and
+pompous air, “as soon, d’ye see, as he had prevailed on Messere
+Brettone, and Messere Arimbaldo, the brothers of Fra Moreale, to
+accompany him from Perugia to Monte Fiascone, he went at once to the
+Legate d’Albornoz, who was standing in the open air conversing with his
+captains. A crowd followed. I was one of them; and the Tribune nodded
+at me--ay, that did he!--and so, with his scarlet cloak, and his scarlet
+cap, he faced the proud Cardinal with a pride greater than his own.
+‘Monsignore,’ said he, ‘though you accord me neither money nor arms, to
+meet the dangers of the road and brave the ambush of the Barons, I
+am prepared to depart. Senator of Rome, his Holiness hath made me:
+according to custom, I pray you, Monsignore, forthwith to confirm the
+rank.’ I would you could have seen how the proud Spaniard stared, and
+blushed, and frowned; but he bit his lip, and said little.”
+
+“And confirmed Rienzi Senator?”
+
+“Yes; and blessed him, and bade him depart.”
+
+“Senator!” said a stalwart but grey-haired giant with folded arms; “I
+like not a title that has been borne by a patrician. I fear me, in the
+new title he will forget the old.”
+
+“Fie, Cecco del Vecchio, you were always a grumbler!” said a merchant
+of cloth, whose commodity the ceremonial had put in great request.
+“Fie!--for my part, I think Senator a less new-fangled title than
+Tribune. I hope there will be feasting enow, at last. Rome has been long
+dull. A bad time for trade, I warrant me!”
+
+The artisan grinned scornfully. He was one of those who distinguished
+between the middle class and the working, and he loathed a merchant as
+much as he did a noble. “The day wears,” said the little man; “he must
+be here anon. The Senator’s lady, and all his train, have gone forth to
+meet him these two hours.”
+
+Scarce were these words uttered, when the crowd to the right swayed
+restlessly; and presently a horseman rode rapidly through the street.
+“Way there! Keep back! Way--make way for the Most Illustrious the
+Senator of Rome!”
+
+The crowd became hushed--then murmuring--then hushed again. From balcony
+and casement stretched the neck of every gazer. The tramp of steeds was
+heard at a distance--the sound of clarion and trumpet;--then, gleaming
+through the distant curve of the streets, was seen the wave of the
+gonfalons--then, the glitter of spears--and then from the whole
+multitude, as from one voice, arose the shout,--“He comes! he comes!”
+
+Adrian shrunk yet more backward amongst the throng; and, leaning against
+the wall of one of the houses, contemplated the approaching pageant.
+
+First came, six abreast, the procession of Roman horsemen who had gone
+forth to meet the Senator, bearing boughs of olive in their hands; each
+hundred preceded by banners, inscribed with the words, “Liberty and
+Peace restored.” As these passed the group by Adrian, each more popular
+citizen of the cavalcade was recognised, and received with loud shouts.
+By the garb and equipment of the horsemen, Adrian saw that they belonged
+chiefly to the traders of Rome; a race who, he well knew, unless
+strangely altered, valued liberty only as a commercial speculation. “A
+vain support these,” thought the Colonna;--“what next?” on, then, came
+in glittering armour the German mercenaries, hired by the gold of the
+Brothers of Provence, in number two hundred and fifty, and previously
+in the pay of Malatesta of Rimini;--tall, stern, sedate,
+disciplined,--eyeing the crowd with a look, half of barbarian wonder,
+half of insolent disdain. No shout of gratulation welcomed these sturdy
+strangers; it was evident that their aspect cast a chill over the
+assembly.
+
+“Shame!” growled Cecco del Vecchio, audibly. “Has the people’s friend
+need of the swords which guard an Orsini or a Malatesta?--shame!”
+
+No voice this time silenced the huge malcontent.
+
+“His only real defence against the Barons,” thought Adrian, “if he pay
+them well! But their number is not sufficient!”
+
+Next came two hundred fantassins, or foot-soldiers, of Tuscany, with the
+corselets and arms of the heavy-armed soldiery--a gallant company, and
+whose cheerful looks and familiar bearing appeared to sympathise
+with the crowd. And in truth they did so,--for they were Tuscans,
+and therefore lovers of freedom. In them, too, the Romans seemed to
+recognise natural and legitimate allies,--and there was a general cry of
+“Vivano i bravi Toscani!”
+
+“Poor defence!” thought the more sagacious Colonna; “the Barons can awe,
+and the mob corrupt them.”
+
+Next came a file of trumpeters and standard-bearers;--and now the sound
+of the music was drowned by shouts, which seemed to rise simultaneously
+as from every quarter of the city;--“Rienzi! Rienzi!--Welcome,
+welcome!--Liberty and Rienzi! Rienzi and the Good Estate!” Flowers
+dropped on his path, kerchiefs and banners waved from every
+house;--tears might be seen coursing, unheeded, down bearded
+cheeks;--youth and age were kneeling together, with uplifted hands,
+invoking blessings on the head of the Restored. On he came the
+Senator-Tribune--“the Phoenix to his pyre!”
+
+Robed in scarlet, that literally blazed with gold, his proud head bared
+in the sun, and bending to the saddle bow, Rienzi passed slowly through
+the throng. Not in the flush of that hour were visible, on his glorious
+countenance, the signs of disease and care: the very enlargement of his
+proportions gave a greater majesty to his mien. Hope sparkled in his
+eye--triumph and empire sat upon his brow. The crowd could not contain
+themselves; they pressed forward, each upon each, anxious to catch the
+glance of his eye, to touch the hem of his robe. He himself was deeply
+affected by their joy. He halted; with faltering and broken words,
+he attempted to address them. “I am repaid,” he said,--“repaid for
+all;--may I live to make you happy!”
+
+The crowd parted again--the Senator moved on--again the crowd closed
+in. Behind the Tribune, to their excited imagination, seemed to move the
+very goddess of ancient Rome.
+
+Upon a steed, caparisoned with cloth of gold;--in snow-white robes,
+studded with gems that flashed back the day,--came the beautiful and
+regal Nina. The memory of her pride, her ostentation, all forgotten in
+that moment, she was scarce less welcome, scarce less idolized, than her
+lord. And her smile all radiant with joy--her lip quivering with proud
+and elate emotion,--never had she seemed at once so born alike for love
+and for command;--a Zenobia passing through the pomp of Rome,--not a
+captive, but a queen.
+
+But not upon that stately form riveted the gaze of Adrian--pale,
+breathless, trembling, he clung to the walls against which he leaned.
+Was it a dream? Had the dead revived? Or was it his own--his living
+Irene--whose soft and melancholy loveliness shone sadly by the side of
+Nina--a star beside the moon? The pageant faded from his eyes--all grew
+dim and dark. For a moment he was insensible. When he recovered, the
+crowd was hurrying along, confused and blent with the mighty stream
+that followed the procession. Through the moving multitude he caught the
+graceful form of Irene, again snatched by the closing standards of the
+procession from his view. His blood rushed back from his heart through
+every vein. He was as a man who for years had been in a fearful trance,
+and who is suddenly awakened to the light of heaven.
+
+One of that mighty throng remained motionless with Adrian. It was Cecco
+del Vecchio.
+
+“He did not see me,” muttered the smith to himself; “old friends are
+forgotten now! Well, well, Cecco del Vecchio hates tyrants still--no
+matter what their name, nor how smoothly they are disguised. He did not
+see ME! Umph!”
+
+
+
+Chapter 9.II. The Masquerade.
+
+The acuter reader has already learned, without the absolute intervention
+of the author as narrator, the incidents occurring to Rienzi in the
+interval between his acquittal at Avignon and his return to Rome. As the
+impression made by Nina upon the softer and better nature of Albornoz
+died away, he naturally began to consider his guest--as the profound
+politicians of that day ever considered men--a piece upon the great
+Chess-Board, to be moved, advanced, or sacrificed, as best suited
+the scheme in view. His purpose accomplished, in the recovery of the
+patrimonial territory, the submission of John di Vico, and the fall
+and death of the Demagogue Baroncelli, the Cardinal deemed it far from
+advisable to restore to Rome, and with so high a dignity, the able and
+ambitious Rienzi. Before the daring Roman, even his own great spirit
+quailed; and he was wholly unable to conceive or to calculate the policy
+that might be adopted by the new Senator, when once more Lord of
+Rome. Without affecting to detain, he therefore declined to assist in
+restoring him. And Rienzi thus saw himself within an easy march of Rome,
+without one soldier to protect him against the Barons by the way.
+But Heaven had decreed that no single man, however gifted, or however
+powerful, should long counteract or master the destinies of Rienzi: and
+perhaps in no more glittering scene of his life did he ever evince so
+dexterous and subtle an intellect as he now did in extricating himself
+from the wiles of the Cardinal. Repairing to Perugia, he had, as we have
+seen, procured, through the brothers of Montreal, men and money for his
+return. But the Knight of St. John was greatly mistaken, if he imagined
+that Rienzi was not thoroughly aware of the perilous and treacherous
+tenure of the support he had received. His keen eye read at a glance the
+aims and the characters of the brothers of Montreal--he knew that while
+affecting to serve him, they designed to control--that, made the debtor
+of the grasping and aspiring Montreal, and surrounded by the troops
+conducted by Montreal’s brethren, he was in the midst of a net which, if
+not broken, would soon involve fortune and life itself in its fatal and
+deadly meshes. But, confident in the resources and promptitude of his
+own genius, he yet sanguinely trusted to make those his puppets, who
+dreamed that he was their own; and, with empire for the stake, he cared
+not how crafty the antagonists he was compelled to engage.
+
+Meanwhile, uniting to all his rasher and all his nobler qualities, a
+profound dissimulation, he appeared to trust implicitly to his Provencal
+companions; and his first act on entering the Capitol, after the
+triumphal procession, was to reward with the highest dignities in his
+gift, Messere Arimbaldo and Messere Brettone de Montreal!
+
+High feasting was there that night in the halls of the Capitol; but
+dearer to Rienzi than all the pomp of the day, were the smiles of Nina.
+Her proud and admiring eyes, swimming with delicious tears, fixed upon
+his countenance, she but felt that they were re-united, and that the
+hours, however brilliantly illumined, were hastening to that moment,
+when, after so desolate and dark an absence, they might once more be
+alone.
+
+Far other the thoughts of Adrian Colonna, as he sate alone in the dreary
+palace in the yet more dreary quarter of his haughty race. Irene then
+was alive,--he had been deceived by some strange error,--she had escaped
+the devouring pestilence; and something in the pale sadness of her
+gentle features, even in that day of triumph, told him he was still
+remembered. But as his mind by degrees calmed itself from its first wild
+and tumultuous rapture, he could not help asking himself the question
+whether they were not still to be divided! Stefanello Colonna, the
+grandson of the old Stephen, and (by the death of his sire and brother)
+the youthful head of that powerful House, had already raised his
+standard against the Senator. Fortifying himself in the almost
+impregnable fastness of Palestrina, he had assembled around him all
+the retainers of his family, and his lawless soldiery now ravaged the
+neighbouring plains far and wide.
+
+Adrian foresaw that the lapse of a few days would suffice to bring the
+Colonna and the Senator to open war. Could he take part against those
+of his own blood? The very circumstance of his love for Irene would
+yet more rob such a proceeding of all appearance of disinterested
+patriotism, and yet more deeply and irremediably stain his knightly
+fame, wherever the sympathy of his equals was enlisted with the cause
+of the Colonna. On the other hand, not only his love for the Senator’s
+sister, but his own secret inclinations and honest convictions, were on
+the side of one who alone seemed to him possessed of the desire and the
+genius to repress the disorders of his fallen city. Long meditating, he
+feared no alternative was left him but in the same cruel neutrality to
+which he had been before condemned; but he resolved at least to make
+the attempt--rendered favourable and dignified by his birth and
+reputation--to reconcile the contending parties. To effect this, he saw
+that he must begin with his haughty cousin. He was well aware that were
+it known that he had first obtained an interview with Rienzi--did it
+appear as if he were charged with overtures from the Senator--although
+Stefanello himself might be inclined to yield to his representations,
+the insolent and ferocious Barons who surrounded him would not deign
+to listen to the envoy of the People’s chosen one; and instead of being
+honoured as an intercessor, he should be suspected as a traitor. He
+determined, then, to depart for Palestrina; but (and his heart beat
+audibly) would it not be possible first to obtain an interview with
+Irene? It was no easy enterprise, surrounded as she was, but he resolved
+to adventure it. He summoned Giulio.
+
+“The Senator holds a festival this evening--think you that the
+assemblage will be numerous?”
+
+“I hear,” answered Giulio, “that the banquet given to the Ambassadors
+and Signors today is to be followed tomorrow by a mask, to which all
+ranks are admitted. By Bacchus, (Still a common Roman expletive.) if the
+Tribune only invited nobles, the smallest closet in the Capitol would
+suffice to receive his maskers. I suppose a mask has been resolved on in
+order to disguise the quality of the visitors.”
+
+Adrian mused a moment; and the result of his revery was a determination
+to delay for another sun his departure to Palestrina--to take advantage
+of the nature of the revel, and to join the masquerade.
+
+That species of entertainment, though unusual at that season of the
+year, had been preferred by Rienzi, partly and ostensibly because it
+was one in which all his numerous and motley supporters could be best
+received; but chiefly and secretly because it afforded himself and his
+confidential friends the occasion to mix unsuspected amongst the throng,
+and learn more of the real anticipations of the Romans with respect
+to his policy and his strength, than could well be gathered from the
+enthusiasm of a public spectacle.
+
+The following night was beautifully serene and clear. The better to
+accommodate the numerous guests, and to take advantage of the warm and
+moonlit freshness of the air, the open court of the Capitol, with the
+Place of the Lion, (as well as the state apartments within,) was devoted
+to the festival.
+
+As Adrian entered the festive court with the rush of the throng, it
+chanced that in the eager impatience of some maskers, more vehement
+than the rest, his vizard was deranged. He hastily replaced it; but not
+before one of the guests had recognised his countenance.
+
+From courtesy, Rienzi and his family remained at first unmasked. They
+stood at the head of the stairs to which the old Egyptian Lion gave the
+name. The lights shone over that Colossal Monument--which, torn from its
+antique home, had witnessed, in its grim repose, the rise and lapse of
+countless generations, and the dark and stormy revolutions of avenging
+fate. It was an ill omen, often afterwards remarked, that the place of
+that state festival was the place also of the state executions. But at
+that moment, as group after group pressed forward to win smile and word
+from the celebrated man, whose fortunes had been the theme of Europe,
+or to bend in homage to the lustrous loveliness of Nina, no omen and no
+warning clouded the universal gladness.
+
+Behind Nina, well contented to shrink from the gaze of the throng, and
+to feel her softer beauty eclipsed by the dazzling and gorgeous charms
+of her brother’s wife, stood Irene. Amidst the crowd on her alone Adrian
+fixed his eyes. The years which had flown over the fair brow of the
+girl of sixteen--then animated by, yet trembling beneath, the first wild
+breath of Love;--youth in every vein--passion and childish tenderness
+in every thought, had not marred, but they had changed, the character
+of Irene’s beauty. Her cheek, no longer varying with every instant, was
+settled into a delicate and thoughtful paleness--her form, more rounded
+to the proportions of Roman beauty, had assumed an air of dignified and
+calm repose. No longer did the restless eye wander in search of some
+imagined object; no longer did the lip quiver into smiles at some untold
+hope or half-unconscious recollection. A grave and mournful expression
+gave to her face (still how sweet!) a gravity beyond her years. The
+bloom, the flush, the April of the heart, was gone; but yet neither
+time, nor sorrow, nor blighted love, had stolen from her countenance its
+rare and angelic softness--nor that inexpressible and virgin modesty of
+form and aspect, which, contrasting the bolder beauties of Italy, had
+more than aught else distinguished to Adrian, from all other women, the
+idol of his heart. And feeding his gaze upon those dark deep eyes, which
+spoke of thought far away and busy with the past, Adrian felt again and
+again that he was not forgotten! Hovering near her, but suffering the
+crowd to press one after another before him, he did not perceive that he
+had attracted the eagle eye of the Senator.
+
+In fact, as one of the maskers passed Rienzi, he whispered, “Beware,
+a Colonna is among the masks! beneath the reveller’s domino has often
+lurked the assassin’s dagger. Yonder stands your foe--mark him!”
+
+These words were the first sharp and thrilling intimation of the perils
+into which he had rushed, that the Tribune-Senator had received since
+his return. He changed colour slightly; and for some minutes the courtly
+smile and ready greeting with which he had hitherto delighted every
+guest, gave way to a moody abstraction.
+
+“Why stands yon strange man so mute and motionless?” whispered he to
+Nina. “He speaks to none--he approaches us not--a churl, a churl!--he
+must be seen to.”
+
+“Doubtless, some German or English barbarian,” answered Nina. “Let not,
+my Lord, so slight a cloud dim your merriment.”
+
+“You are right, dearest; we have friends here; we are well girt. And, by
+my father’s ashes, I feel that I must accustom myself to danger. Nina,
+let us move on; methinks we might now mix among the maskers--masked
+ourselves.”
+
+The music played loud and cheerily as the Senator and his party mingled
+with the throng. But still his eye turned ever towards the grey domino
+of Adrian, and he perceived that it followed his steps. Approaching the
+private entrance of the Capitol, he for a few moments lost sight of
+his unwelcome pursuer: but just as he entered, turning abruptly, Rienzi
+perceived him close at his side--the next moment the stranger had
+vanished amidst the throng. But that moment had sufficed to Adrian--he
+had reached Irene. “Adrian Colonna (he whispered) waits thee beside the
+Lion.”
+
+In the absorption of his own reflections, Rienzi fortunately did not
+notice the sudden paleness and agitation of his sister. Entered within
+his palace, he called for wine--the draught revived his spirits--he
+listened smilingly to the sparkling remarks of Nina; and enduing
+his mask and disguise, said, with his wonted cheerfulness, “Now for
+Truth--strange that in festivals it should only speak behind a vizard!
+My sweet sister, thou hast lost thine old smile, and I would rather see
+that than--Ha! has Irene vanished?”
+
+“Only, I suppose, to change her dress, my Cola, and mingle with the
+revellers,” answered Nina. “Let my smile atone for hers.”
+
+Rienzi kissed the bright brow of his wife as she clung fondly to his
+bosom. “Thy smile is the sunlight,” said he; “but this girl disturbs me.
+Methinks now, at least, she might wear a gladder aspect.”
+
+“Is there nothing of love beneath my fair sister’s gloom?” answered
+Nina. “Do you not call to mind how she loved Adrian Colonna?”
+
+“Does that fantasy hold still?” returned Rienzi, musingly. “Well, and
+she is fit bride for a monarch.”
+
+“Yet it were an alliance that would, better than one with monarchs,
+strengthen thy power at Rome!”
+
+“Ay, were it possible; but that haughty race!--Perchance this very
+masker that so haunted our steps was but her lover. I will look to this.
+Let us forth, my Nina. Am I well cloaked?”
+
+“Excellently well--and I?”
+
+“The sun behind a cloud.”
+
+“Ah, let us not tarry long; what hour of revel like that when thy hand
+in mine, this head upon thy bosom, we forget the sorrows we have known,
+and even the triumphs we have shared?”
+
+Meanwhile, Irene, confused and lost amidst a transport of emotion,
+already disguised and masked, was threading her way through the crowd
+back to the staircase of the Lion. With the absence of the Senator that
+spot had comparatively been deserted. Music and the dance attracted the
+maskers to another quarter of the wide space. And Irene now approaching,
+beheld the moonlight fall over the statue, and a solitary figure leaning
+against the pedestal. She paused, the figure approached, and again she
+heard the voice of her early love.
+
+“Oh, Irene! recognised even in this disguise,” said Adrian, seizing her
+trembling hand; “have I lived to gaze again upon that form--to touch
+this hand? Did not these eyes behold thee lifeless in that fearful
+vault, which I shudder to recall? By what miracle wert thou raised
+again? By what means did Heaven spare to this earth one that it seemed
+already to have placed amongst its angels?”
+
+“Was this, indeed, thy belief?” said Irene, falteringly, but with an
+accent eloquent of joy. “Thou didst not then willingly desert me? Unjust
+that I was, I wronged thy noble nature, and deemed that my brother’s
+fall, my humble lineage, thy brilliant fate, had made thee renounce
+Irene.”
+
+“Unjust indeed!” answered the lover. “But surely I saw thee amongst the
+dead!--thy cloak, with the silver stars--who else wore the arms of the
+Roman Tribune?”
+
+“Was it but the cloak then, which, dropped in the streets, was probably
+assumed by some more ill-fated victim; was it that sight alone, that
+made thee so soon despair? Ah! Adrian,” continued Irene, tenderly, but
+with reproach; “not even when I saw thee seemingly lifeless on the
+couch by which I had watched three days and nights, not even then did I
+despair!”
+
+“What, then, my vision did not deceive me! It was you who watched by my
+bed in that grim hour, whose love guarded, whose care preserved me! And
+I, wretch that I was!--”
+
+“Nay,” answered Irene, “your thought was natural. Heaven seemed to endow
+me with superhuman strength, whilst I was necessary to thee. But judge
+of my dismay. I left thee to seek the good friar who attended thee as
+thy leech; I returned, and found thee not. Heart-sick and terrified, I
+searched the desolate city in vain. Strong as I was while hope supported
+me, I sunk beneath fear.--And my brother found me senseless, and
+stretched on the ground, by the church of St. Mark.”
+
+“The church of St. Mark!--so foretold his dream!”
+
+“He had told me he had met thee; we searched for thee in vain; at length
+we heard that thou hadst left the city, and--and--I rejoiced, Adrian,
+but I repined!”
+
+For some minutes the young lovers surrendered themselves to the delight
+of reunion, while new explanations called forth new transports.
+
+“And now,” murmured Irene, “now that we have met--” she paused, and her
+mask concealed her blushes.
+
+“Now that we have met,” said Adrian, filling up the silence, “wouldst
+thou say further, ‘that we should not part?’ Trust me, dearest, that is
+the hope that animates my heart. It was but to enjoy these brief bright
+moments with thee, that I delayed my departure to Palestrina. Could
+I but hope to bring my young cousin into amity with thy brother, no
+barrier would prevent our union. Willingly I forget the past--the death
+of my unhappy kinsmen, (victims, it is true, to their own faults;)
+and, perhaps, amidst all the crowds that hailed his return, none more
+appreciated the great and lofty qualities of Cola di Rienzi, than did
+Adrian Colonna.”
+
+“If this be so,” said Irene, “let me hope the best; meanwhile, it is
+enough of comfort and of happiness to know, that we love each other as
+of old. Ah, Adrian, I am sadly changed; and often have I thought it
+a thing beyond my dreams, that thou shouldst see me again and love me
+still.”
+
+“Fairer art thou and lovelier than ever,” answered Adrian, passionately;
+“and time, which has ripened thy bloom, has but taught me more deeply to
+feel thy value. Farewell, Irene, I linger here no longer; thou wilt, I
+trust, hear soon of my success with my House, and ere the week be over I
+may return to claim thy hand in the face of day.”
+
+The lovers parted; Adrian lingered on the spot, and Irene hastened to
+bury her emotion and her raptures in her own chamber.
+
+As her form vanished, and the young Colonna slowly turned away, a tall
+mask strode abruptly towards him.
+
+“Thou art a Colonna,” it said, “and in the power of the Senator. Dost
+thou tremble?”
+
+“If I be a Colonna, rude masker,” answered Adrian, coldly, “thou
+shouldst know the old proverb, ‘He who stirs the column, shall rue the
+fall.’”
+
+The stranger laughed aloud, and then lifting his mask, Adrian saw that
+it was the Senator who stood before him.
+
+“My Lord Adrian di Castello,” said Rienzi, resuming all his gravity, “is
+it as friend or foe that you have honoured our revels this night?”
+
+“Senator of Rome,” answered Adrian, with equal stateliness, “I partake
+of no man’s hospitality but as a friend. A foe, at least to you, I trust
+never justly to be esteemed.”
+
+“I would,” rejoined Rienzi, “that I could apply to myself unreservedly
+that most flattering speech. Are these friendly feelings entertained
+towards me as the Governor of the Roman people, or as the brother of the
+woman who has listened to your vows?”
+
+Adrian, who when the Senator had unmasked had followed his example,
+felt at these words that his eye quailed beneath Rienzi’s. However, he
+recovered himself with the wonted readiness of an Italian, and replied
+laconically,
+
+“As both.”
+
+“Both!” echoed Rienzi. “Then, indeed, noble Adrian, you are welcome
+hither. And yet, methinks, if you conceived there was no cause for
+enmity between us, you would have wooed the sister of Cola di Rienzi
+in a guise more worthy of your birth; and, permit me to add, of that
+station which God, destiny, and my country, have accorded unto me. You
+dare not, young Colonna, meditate dishonour to the sister of the Senator
+of Rome. Highborn as you are, she is your equal.”
+
+“Were I the Emperor, whose simple knight I but am, your sister were my
+equal,” answered Adrian, warmly. “Rienzi, I grieve that I am discovered
+to you yet. I had trusted that, as a mediator between the Barons and
+yourself, I might first have won your confidence, and then claimed my
+reward. Know that with tomorrow’s dawn I depart for Palestrina, seeking
+to reconcile my young cousin to the choice of the People and the
+Pontiff. Various reasons, which I need not now detail, would have
+made me wish to undertake this heraldry of peace without previous
+communication with you. But since we have met, intrust me with any
+terms of conciliation, and I pledge you the right hand, not of a Roman
+noble--alas! the prisca fides has departed from that pledge!--but of a
+Knight of the Imperial Court, that I will not betray your confidence.”
+
+Rienzi, accustomed to read the human countenance, had kept his eyes
+intently fixed upon Adrian while he spoke; when the Colonna concluded,
+he pressed the proffered hand, and said, with that familiar and winning
+sweetness which at times was so peculiar to his manner,
+
+“I trust you, Adrian, from my soul. You were mine early friend in
+calmer, perchance happier, years. And never did river reflect the stars
+more clearly, than your heart then mirrored back the truth. I trust
+you!”
+
+While thus speaking, he had mechanically led back the Colonna to the
+statue of the Lion; there pausing, he resumed:
+
+“Know that I have this morning despatched my delegate to your cousin
+Stefanello. With all due courtesy, I have apprised him of my return to
+Rome, and invited hither his honoured presence. Forgetting all ancient
+feuds, mine own past exile, I have assured him, here, the station and
+dignity due to the head of the Colonna. All that I ask in return is
+obedience to the law. Years and reverses have abated my younger pride,
+and though I may yet preserve the sternness of the Judge, none shall
+hereafter complain of the insolence of the Tribune.”
+
+“I would,” answered Adrian, “that your mission to Stefanello had been
+delayed a day; I would fain have forestalled its purport. Howbeit, you
+increase my desire of departure, should I yet succeed in obtaining an
+honourable and peaceful reconciliation, it is not in disguise that I
+will woo your sister.”
+
+“And never did Colonna,” replied Rienzi, loftily, “bring to his House
+a maiden whose alliance more gratified ambition. I still see, as I have
+seen ever, in mine own projects, and mine own destinies, the chart of
+the new Roman Empire!”
+
+“Be not too sanguine yet, brave Rienzi,” replied Adrian, laying his hand
+on the Lion of Basalt: “bethink thee on how many scheming brains this
+dumb image of stone hath looked down from its pedestal--schemes of sand,
+and schemers of dust. Thou hast enough, at present, for the employ of
+all thine energy--not to extend thy power, but to preserve thyself. For,
+trust me, never stood human greatness on so wild and dark a precipice!”
+
+“Thou art honest,” said the Senator; “and these are the first words of
+doubt, and yet of sympathy, I have heard in Rome. But the People love
+me, the Barons have fled from Rome, the Pontiff approves, and the swords
+of the Northmen guard the avenues of the Capitol. But these are nought;
+in mine own honesty are my spear and buckler. Oh, never,” continued
+Rienzi, kindling with his enthusiasm, “never since the days of the old
+Republic, did Roman dream a purer and a brighter aspiration, than
+that which animates and supports me now. Peace restored--law
+established--art, letters, intellect, dawning upon the night of time;
+the Patricians, no longer bandits of rapine, but the guard of order;
+the People ennobled from a mob, brave to protect, enlightened to guide,
+themselves. Then, not by the violence of arms, but by the majesty of
+her moral power, shall the Mother of Nations claim the obedience of her
+children. Thus dreaming and thus hoping, shall I tremble or despond? No,
+Adrian Colonna, come weal or woe, I abide, unshrinking and unawed, by
+the chances of my doom!”
+
+So much did the manner and the tone of the Senator exalt his language,
+that even the sober sense of Adrian was enchanted and subdued. He kissed
+the hand he held, and said earnestly,
+
+“A doom that I will deem it my boast to share--a career that it will be
+my glory to smooth. If I succeed in my present mission--”
+
+“You are my brother!” said Rienzi.
+
+“If I fail?”
+
+“You may equally claim that alliance. You pause--you change colour.”
+
+“Can I desert my house?”
+
+“Young Lord,” said Rienzi, loftily, “say rather can you desert your
+country? If you doubt my honesty, if you fear my ambition, desist from
+your task, rob me not of a single foe. But if you believe that I have
+the will and the power to serve the State--if you recognise, even in the
+reverses and calamities I have known and mastered, the protecting hand
+of the Saviour of Nations--if those reverses were but the mercies of Him
+who chasteneth--necessary, it may be, to correct my earlier daring and
+sharpen yet more my intellect--if, in a word, thou believest me one
+whom, whatever be his faults, God hath preserved for the sake of Rome,
+forget that you are a Colonna--remember only that you are a Roman!”
+
+“You have conquered me, strange and commanding spirit,” said Adrian, in
+a low voice, completely carried away; “and whatever the conduct of my
+kindred, I am yours and Rome’s. Farewell.”
+
+
+
+Chapter 9.III. Adrian’s Adventures at Palestrina.
+
+It was yet noon when Adrian beheld before him the lofty mountains that
+shelter Palestrina, the Praeneste of the ancient world. Back to a
+period before Romulus existed, in the earliest ages of that mysterious
+civilisation which in Italy preceded the birth of Rome, could be traced
+the existence and the power of that rocky city. Eight dependent towns
+owned its sway and its wealth; its position, and the strength of those
+mighty walls, in whose ruins may yet be traced the masonry of the remote
+Pelasgi, had long braved the ambition of the neighbouring Rome. From
+that very citadel, the Mural Crown (Hence, apparently, its Greek name of
+Stephane. Palestrina is yet one of the many proofs which the vicinity of
+Rome affords of the old Greek civilization of Italy.) of the mountain,
+had waved the standard of Marius; and up the road which Adrian’s scanty
+troop slowly wound, had echoed the march of the murtherous Sylla, on his
+return from the Mithridatic war. Below, where the city spread towards
+the plain, were yet seen the shattered and roofless columns of the once
+celebrated Temple of Fortune; and still the immemorial olives clustered
+grey and mournfully around the ruins.
+
+A more formidable hold the Barons of Rome could not have selected; and
+as Adrian’s military eye scanned the steep ascent and the rugged walls,
+he felt that with ordinary skill it might defy for months all the power
+of the Roman Senator. Below, in the fertile valley, dismantled cottages
+and trampled harvests attested the violence and rapine of the insurgent
+Barons; and at that very moment were seen, in the old plain of the
+warlike Hernici, troops of armed men, driving before them herds of sheep
+and cattle, collected in their lawless incursions. In sight of that
+Praeneste, which had been the favourite retreat of the luxurious Lords
+of Rome in its most polished day, the Age of Iron seemed renewed.
+
+The banner of the Colonna, borne by Adrian’s troop, obtained ready
+admittance at the Porta del Sole. As he passed up the irregular
+and narrow streets that ascended to the citadel, groups of foreign
+mercenaries,--half-ragged, half-tawdry knots of abandoned women,--mixed
+here and there with the liveries of the Colonna, stood loitering amidst
+the ruins of ancient fanes and palaces, or basked lazily in the sun,
+upon terraces, through which, from amidst weeds and grass, glowed the
+imperishable hues of the rich mosaics, which had made the pride of that
+lettered and graceful nobility, of whom savage freebooters were now the
+heirs.
+
+The contrast between the Past and Present forcibly occurred to Adrian,
+as he passed along; and, despite his order, he felt as if Civilization
+itself were enlisted against his House upon the side of Rienzi.
+
+Leaving his train in the court of the citadel, Adrian demanded admission
+to the presence of his cousin. He had left Stefanello a child on his
+departure from Rome, and there could therefore be but a slight and
+unfamiliar acquaintance betwixt them, despite their kindred.
+
+Peals of laughter came upon his ear, as he followed one of Stefanello’s
+gentlemen through a winding passage that led to the principal chamber.
+The door was thrown open, and Adrian found himself in a rude hall, to
+which some appearance of hasty state and attempted comfort had been
+given. Costly arras imperfectly clothed the stone walls, and the rich
+seats and decorated tables, which the growing civilization of the
+northern cities of Italy had already introduced into the palaces of
+Italian nobles, strangely contrasted the rough pavement, spread with
+heaps of armour negligently piled around. At the farther end of the
+apartment, Adrian shudderingly perceived, set in due and exact order,
+the implements of torture.
+
+Stefanello Colonna, with two other Barons, indolently reclined on seats
+drawn around a table, in the recess of a deep casement, from which might
+be still seen the same glorious landscape, bounded by the dim spires
+of Rome, which Hannibal and Pyrrhus had ascended that very citadel to
+survey!
+
+Stefanello himself, in the first bloom of youth, bore already on his
+beardless countenance those traces usually the work of the passions and
+vices of maturest manhood. His features were cast in the mould of the
+old Stephen’s; in their clear, sharp, high-bred outline might be noticed
+that regular and graceful symmetry, which blood, in men as in animals,
+will sometimes entail through generations; but the features were wasted
+and meagre. His brows were knit in an eternal frown; his thin and
+bloodless lips wore that insolent contempt which seems so peculiarly
+cold and unlovely in early youth; and the deep and livid hollows round
+his eyes, spoke of habitual excess and premature exhaustion. By him sat
+(reconciled by hatred to one another) the hereditary foes of his race;
+the soft, but cunning and astute features of Luca di Savelli, contrasted
+with the broad frame and ferocious countenance of the Prince of the
+Orsini.
+
+The young head of the Colonna rose with some cordiality to receive his
+cousin. “Welcome,” he said, “dear Adrian; you are arrived in time to
+assist us with your well-known military skill. Think you not we shall
+stand a long siege, if the insolent plebeian dare adventure it? You know
+our friends, the Orsini and the Savelli? Thanks to St. Peter, or Peter’s
+delegate, we have now happily meaner throats to cut than those of each
+other!”
+
+Thus saying, Stefanello again threw himself listlessly on his seat, and
+the shrill, woman’s voice of Savelli took part in the dialogue.
+
+“I would, noble Signor, that you had come a few hours earlier: we are
+still making merry at the recollection--he, he, he!”
+
+“Ah, excellent,” cried Stefanello, joining in the laugh; “our cousin has
+had a loss. Know Adrian, that this base fellow, whom the Pope has
+had the impudence to create Senator, dared but yesterday to send us a
+varlet, whom he called--by our Lady!--his ambassador!”
+
+“Would you could have seen his mantle, Signor Adrian!” chimed in the
+Savelli: “purple velvet, as I live, decorated in gold, with the arms of
+Rome: we soon spoiled his finery.”
+
+“What!” exclaimed Adrian, “you did not break the laws of all nobility
+and knighthood?--you offered no insult to a herald!”
+
+“Herald, sayst thou?” cried Stefanello, frowning till his eyes were
+scarce visible. “It is for Princes and Barons alone to employ heralds.
+An’ I had had my will, I would have sent back the minion’s head to the
+usurper.”
+
+“What did ye then?” asked Adrian, coldly.
+
+“Bade our swineherds dip the fellow in the ditch, and gave him a night’s
+lodging in a dungeon to dry himself withal.”
+
+“And this morning--he, he, he!” added the Savelli, “we had him before
+us, and drew his teeth, one by one;--I would you could have heard the
+fellow mumble out for mercy!”
+
+Adrian rose hastily, and struck the table fiercely with his gauntlet.
+
+“Stefanello Colonna,” said he, colouring with noble rage, “answer me:
+did you dare to inflict this indelible disgrace upon the name we jointly
+bear? Tell me, at least, that you protested against this foul treason to
+all the laws of civilization and of honour. You answer not. House of the
+Colonna, can such be thy representative!”
+
+“To me these words!” said Stefanello, trembling with passion. “Beware!
+Methinks thou art the traitor, leagued perhaps with yon rascal mob. Well
+do I remember that thou, the betrothed of the Demagogue’s sister, didst
+not join with my uncle and my father of old, but didst basely leave the
+city to her plebeian tyrant.”
+
+“That did he!” said the fierce Orsini, approaching Adrian menacingly,
+while the gentle cowardice of Savelli sought in vain to pluck him back
+by the mantle--“that did he! and but for thy presence, Stefanello--”
+
+“Coward and blusterer!” interrupted Adrian, fairly beside himself with
+indignation and shame, and dashing his gauntlet in the very face of
+the advancing Orsini--“wouldst thou threaten one who has maintained, in
+every list of Europe, and against the stoutest Chivalry of the North,
+the honour of Rome, which thy deeds the while disgraced? By this gage,
+I spit upon and defy thee. With lance and with brand, on horse and on
+foot, I maintain against thee and all thy line, that thou art no knight
+to have thus maltreated, in thy strongholds, a peaceful and unarmed
+herald. Yes, even here, on the spot of thy disgrace, I challenge thee to
+arms!”
+
+“To the court below! Follow me,” said Orsini, sullenly, and striding
+towards the threshold. “What, ho there! my helmet and breast-plate!”
+
+“Stay, noble Orsini,” said Stefanello. “The insult offered to thee is my
+quarrel--mine was the deed--and against me speaks this degenerate scion
+of our line. Adrian di Castello--sometime called Colonna--surrender your
+sword: you are my prisoner!”
+
+“Oh!” said Adrian, grinding his teeth, “that my ancestral blood did
+not flow through thy veins--else--but enough! Me! your equal, and the
+favoured Knight of the Emperor, whose advent now brightens the frontiers
+of Italy!--me--you dare not detain. For your friends, I shall meet
+them yet perhaps, ere many days are over, where none shall separate our
+swords. Till then, remember, Orsini, that it is against no unpractised
+arm that thou wilt have to redeem thine honour!”
+
+Adrian, his drawn sword in his hand, strode towards the door, and passed
+the Orsini, who stood, lowering and irresolute, in the centre of the
+apartment.
+
+Savelli whispered Stefanello. “He says, ‘Ere many days be past!’ Be
+sure, dear Signor, that he goes to join Rienzi. Remember, the alliance
+he once sought with the Tribune’s sister may be renewed. Beware of him!
+Ought he to leave the castle? The name of a Colonna, associated with the
+mob, would distract and divide half our strength.”
+
+“Fear me not,” returned Stefanello, with a malignant smile. “Ere you
+spoke, I had determined!”
+
+The young Colonna lifted the arras from the wall, opened a door, and
+passed into a low hall, in which sate twenty mercenaries.
+
+“Quick!” said he. “Seize and disarm yon stranger in the green
+mantle--but slay him not. Bid the guard below find dungeons for his
+train. Quick! ere he reach the gate.”
+
+Adrian had gained the open hall below--his train and his steed were in
+sight in the court--when suddenly the soldiery of the Colonna, rushing
+through another passage than that which he had passed, surrounded and
+intercepted his retreat.
+
+“Yield thee, Adrian di Castello,” cried Stefanello from the summit of
+the stairs; “or your blood be on your own head.”
+
+Three steps did Adrian make through the press, and three of his enemies
+fell beneath his sword. “To the rescue!” he shouted to his band, and
+already those bold and daring troopers had gained the hall. Presently
+the alarum bell tolled loud--the court swarmed with soldiers. Oppressed
+by numbers, beat down rather than subdued, Adrian’s little train was
+soon secured, and the flower of the Colonna, wounded, breathless,
+disarmed, but still uttering loud defiance, was a prisoner in the
+fortress of his kinsman.
+
+
+
+Chapter 9.IV. The Position of the Senator.--The Work of Years.--The
+Rewards of Ambition.
+
+The indignation of Rienzi may readily be conceived, on the return of his
+herald mutilated and dishonoured. His temper, so naturally stern, was
+rendered yet more hard by the remembrance of his wrongs and trials; and
+the result which attended his overtures of conciliation to Stefanello
+Colonna stung him to the soul.
+
+The bell of the Capitol tolled to arms within ten minutes after the
+return of the herald. The great gonfalon of Rome was unfurled on the
+highest tower; and the very evening after Adrian’s arrest, the forces of
+the Senator, headed by Rienzi in person, were on the road to Palestrina.
+The troopers of the Barons had, however, made incursions as far as
+Tivoli with the supposed connivance of the inhabitants, and Rienzi
+halted at that beautiful spot to raise recruits, and receive the
+allegiance of the suspected, while his soldiers, with Arimbaldo and
+Brettone at their head, went in search of the marauders. The brothers of
+Montreal returned late at night with the intelligence, that the troopers
+of the Barons had secured themselves amidst the recesses of the wood of
+Pantano.
+
+The red spot mounted to Rienzi’s brow. He gazed hard at Brettone, who
+stated the news to him, and a natural suspicion shot across his mind.
+
+“How!--escaped!” he said. “Is it possible? Enough of such idle
+skirmishes with these lordly robbers. Will the hour ever come when I
+shall meet them hand to hand? Brettone,” and the brother of Montreal
+felt the dark eye of Rienzi pierce to his very heart; “Brettone!” said
+he, with an abrupt change of voice, “are your men to be trusted? Is
+there no connivance with the Barons?”
+
+“How!” said Brettone, sullenly, but somewhat confused.
+
+“How me no hows!” quoth the Tribune-Senator, fiercely. “I know that thou
+art a valiant Captain of valiant men. Thou and thy brother Arimbaldo
+have served me well, and I have rewarded ye well! Have I not? Speak!”
+
+“Senator,” answered Arimbaldo, taking up the word, “you have kept your
+word to us. You have raised us to the highest rank your power could
+bestow, and this has amply atoned our humble services.”
+
+“I am glad ye allow thus much,” said the Tribune.
+
+Arimbaldo proceeded, somewhat more loftily, “I trust, my Lord, you do
+not doubt us?”
+
+“Arimbaldo,” replied Rienzi, in a voice of deep, but half-suppressed
+emotion; “you are a lettered man, and you have seemed to share my
+projects for the regeneration of our common kind. You ought not to
+betray me. There is something in unison between us. But, chide me not, I
+am surrounded by treason, and the very air I breathe seems poison to my
+lips.”
+
+There was a pathos mingled with Rienzi’s words which touched the milder
+brother of Montreal. He bowed in silence. Rienzi surveyed him wistfully,
+and sighed. Then, changing the conversation, he spoke of their intended
+siege of Palestrina, and shortly afterwards retired to rest.
+
+Left alone, the brothers regarded each other for some moments in
+silence. “Brettone,” said Arimbaldo at length, in a whispered voice, “my
+heart misgives me. I like not Walter’s ambitious schemes. With our
+own countrymen we are frank and loyal, why play the traitor with this
+high-souled Roman?” (The anonymous biographer of Rienzi makes the
+following just remark: “Sono li tedeschi, come discendon de la Alemagna,
+semplici, puri, senza fraude, come si allocano tra’ taliani, diventano
+mastri coduti, viziosi, che sentono ogni malizia.”--“Vita di Cola di
+Rienzi”, lib. ii. cap. 16.)
+
+“Tush!” said Brettone. “Our brother’s hand of iron alone can sway this
+turbulent people; and if Rienzi be betrayed, so also are his enemies,
+the Barons. No more of this! I have tidings from Montreal; he will be in
+Rome in a few days.”
+
+“And then?”
+
+“Rienzi, weakened by the Barons (for he must not conquer)--the Barons,
+weakened by Rienzi--our Northmen seize the Capitol, and the soldiery,
+now scattered throughout Italy, will fly to the standard of the Great
+Captain. Montreal must be first Podesta, then King, of Rome.”
+
+Arimbaldo moved restlessly in his seat, and the brethren conferred no
+more on their projects.
+
+The situation of Rienzi was precisely that which tends the most to
+sour and to harden the fairest nature. With an intellect capable of the
+grandest designs, a heart that beat with the loftiest emotions, elevated
+to the sunny pinnacle of power and surrounded by loud-tongued adulators,
+he knew not among men a single breast in which he could confide. He was
+as one on a steep ascent, whose footing crumbles, while every bough at
+which he grasps seems to rot at his touch. He found the people more
+than ever eloquent in his favour, but while they shouted raptures as he
+passed, not a man was capable of making a sacrifice for him! The
+liberty of a state is never achieved by a single individual; if not the
+people--if not the greater number--a zealous and fervent minority, at
+least must go hand in hand with him. Rome demanded sacrifices in all who
+sought the Roman regeneration--sacrifices of time, ease, and money. The
+crowd followed the procession of the Senator, but not a single Roman
+devoted his life, unpaid, to his standard; not a single coin was
+subscribed in the defence of freedom. Against him were arrayed the most
+powerful and the most ferocious Barons of Italy; each of whom could
+maintain, at his own cost, a little army of practised warriors. With
+Rienzi were traders and artificers, who were willing to enjoy the fruits
+of liberty, but not to labour at the soil; who demanded, in return for
+empty shouts, peace and riches; and who expected that one man was to
+effect in a day what would be cheaply purchased by the struggle of a
+generation. All their dark and rude notion of a reformed state was to
+live unbutchered by the Barons and untaxed by their governors. Rome, I
+say, gave to her Senator not a free arm, nor a voluntary florin. (This
+plain fact is thoroughly borne out by every authority.) Well aware of
+the danger which surrounds the ruler who defends his state by foreign
+swords, the fondest wish, and the most visionary dream of Rienzi, was to
+revive amongst the Romans, in their first enthusiasm at his return, an
+organised and voluntary force, who, in protecting him, would protect
+themselves:--not, as before, in his first power, a nominal force of
+twenty thousand men, who at any hour might yield (as they did yield) to
+one hundred and fifty; but a regular, well disciplined, and trusty body,
+numerous enough to resist aggression, not numerous enough to become
+themselves the aggressors.
+
+Hitherto all his private endeavours, his public exhortations, had
+failed; the crowd listened--shouted--saw him quit the city to meet their
+tyrants, and returned to their shops, saying to each other, “What a
+great man!”
+
+The character of Rienzi has chiefly received for its judges men of the
+closet, who speculate upon human beings as if they were machines; who
+gauge the great, not by their merit, but their success; and who have
+censured or sneered at the Tribune, where they should have condemned the
+People! Had but one-half the spirit been found in Rome which ran
+through a single vein of Cola di Rienzi, the august Republic, if not
+the majestic empire, of Rome, might be existing now! Turning from the
+people, the Senator saw his rude and savage troops, accustomed to the
+licence of a tyrant’s camp, and under commanders in whom it was ruin
+really to confide--whom it was equal ruin openly to distrust. Hemmed
+in on every side by dangers, his character daily grew more restless,
+vigilant, and stern; and still, with all the aims of the patriot, he
+felt all the curses of the tyrant. Without the rough and hardening
+career which, through a life of warfare, had brought Cromwell to a
+similar power--with more of grace and intellectual softness in his
+composition, he resembled that yet greater man in some points of
+character--in his religious enthusiasm; his rigid justice, often
+forced by circumstance into severity, but never wantonly cruel or
+blood-thirsty; in his singular pride of country; and his mysterious
+command over the minds of others. But he resembled the giant Englishman
+far more in circumstance than original nature, and that circumstance
+assimilated their characters at the close of their several careers.
+Like Cromwell, beset by secret or open foes, the assassin’s dagger ever
+gleamed before his eyes; and his stout heart, unawed by real, trembled
+at imagined, terrors. The countenance changing suddenly from red to
+white--the bloodshot, restless eye, belying the composed majesty of
+mien--the muttering lips--the broken slumber--the secret corselet; these
+to both were the rewards of Power!
+
+The elasticity of youth had left the Tribune! His frame, which had
+endured so many shocks, had contracted a painful disease in the dungeon
+at Avignon (“Dicea che ne la prigione era stato ascarmato.” “Vita di
+Cola di Rienzi”, lib. ii. cap. 18.)--his high soul still supported him,
+but the nerves gave way. Tears came readily into his eyes, and often,
+like Cromwell, he was thought to weep from hypocrisy, when in truth
+it was the hysteric of over-wrought and irritable emotion. In all his
+former life singularly temperate, (“Solea prima esser sobrio, temperato,
+astinente, or a e diventato distemperatissimo bevitore,” &c.--Ibid.) he
+now fled from his goading thoughts to the beguiling excitement of wine.
+He drank deep, though its effects were never visible upon him except
+in a freer and wilder mood, and the indulgence of that racy humour,
+half-mirthful, half-bitter, for which his younger day had been
+distinguished. Now the mirth had more loudness, but the bitterness more
+gall.
+
+Such were the characteristics of Rienzi at his return to power--made
+more apparent with every day. Nina he still loved with the same
+tenderness, and, if possible, she adored him more than ever: but, the
+zest and freshness of triumphant ambition gone, somehow or other,
+their intercourse together had not its old charm. Formerly they talked
+constantly of the future--of the bright days in store for them. Now,
+with a sharp and uneasy pang, Rienzi turned from all thought of that
+“gay tomorrow.” There was no “gay tomorrow” for him! Dark and thorny
+as was the present hour, all beyond seemed yet less cheering and
+more ominous. Still he had some moments, brief but brilliant, when,
+forgetting the iron race amongst whom he was thrown, he plunged into
+scholastic reveries of the worshipped Past, and half-fancied that he
+was of a People worthy of his genius and his devotion. Like most men who
+have been preserved through great dangers, he continued with increasing
+fondness to nourish a credulous belief in the grandeur of his own
+destiny. He could not imagine that he had been so delivered, and for no
+end! He was the Elected, and therefore the Instrument, of Heaven.
+And thus, that Bible which in his loneliness, his wanderings, and his
+prison, had been his solace and support, was more than ever needed in
+his greatness.
+
+It was another cause of sorrow and chagrin to one who, amidst such
+circumstances of public danger, required so peculiarly the support and
+sympathy of private friends,--that he found he had incurred amongst his
+old coadjutors the common penalty of absence. A few were dead; others,
+wearied with the storms of public life, and chilled in their ardour
+by the turbulent revolutions to which, in every effort for her
+amelioration, Rome had been subjected, had retired,--some altogether
+from the city, some from all participation in political affairs. In his
+halls, the Tribune-Senator was surrounded by unfamiliar faces, and a new
+generation. Of the heads of the popular party, most were animated by a
+stern dislike to the Pontifical domination, and looked with suspicion
+and repugnance upon one who, if he governed for the People, had been
+trusted and honoured by the Pope. Rienzi was not a man to forget former
+friends, however lowly, and had already found time to seek an interview
+with Cecco del Vecchio. But that stern Republican had received him with
+coldness. His foreign mercenaries, and his title of Senator, were things
+that the artisan could not digest. With his usual bluntness, he had said
+so to Rienzi.
+
+“As for the last,” answered the Tribune, affably, “names do not alter
+natures. When I forget that to be delegate to the Pontiff is to be the
+guardian of his flock, forsake me. As for the first, let me but see five
+hundred Romans sworn to stand armed day and night for the defence of
+Rome, and I dismiss the Northmen.”
+
+Cecco del Vecchio was unsoftened; honest, but uneducated--impracticable,
+and by nature a malcontent, he felt as if he were no longer necessary
+to the Senator, and this offended his pride. Strange as it may seem, the
+sullen artisan bore, too, a secret grudge against Rienzi, for not
+having seen and selected him from a crowd of thousands on the day of his
+triumphal entry. Such are the small offences which produce deep danger
+to the great!
+
+The artisans still held their meetings, and Cecco del Vecchio’s voice
+was heard loud in grumbling forebodings. But what wounded Rienzi yet
+more than the alienation of the rest, was the confused and altered
+manner of his old friend and familiar, Pandulfo di Guido. Missing
+that popular citizen among those who daily offered their homage at the
+Capitol, he had sent for him, and sought in vain to revive their ancient
+intimacy. Pandulfo affected great respect, but not all the condescension
+of the Senator could conquer his distance and his restraint. In fact,
+Pandulfo had learned to form ambitious projects of his own; and but for
+the return of Rienzi, Pandulfo di Guido felt that he might now, with
+greater safety, and indeed with some connivance from the Barons, have
+been the Tribune of the People. The facility to rise into popular
+eminence which a disordered and corrupt state, unblest by a regular
+constitution, offers to ambition, breeds the jealousy and the rivalship
+which destroy union, and rot away the ties of party.
+
+Such was the situation of Rienzi, and yet, wonderful to say, he seemed
+to be adored by the multitude; and law and liberty, life and death, were
+in his hands!
+
+Of all those who attended his person, Angelo Villani was the most
+favoured; that youth who had accompanied Rienzi in his long exile,
+had also, at the wish of Nina, attended him from Avignon, through his
+sojourn in the camp of Albornoz. His zeal, intelligence, and frank and
+evident affection, blinded the Senator to the faults of his character,
+and established him more and more in the gratitude of Rienzi. He loved
+to feel that one faithful heart beat near him, and the page, raised to
+the rank of his chamberlain, always attended his person, and slept in
+his ante-chamber.
+
+Retiring that night at Tivoli, to the apartment prepared for him, the
+Senator sat down by the open casement, through which were seen, waving
+in the starlight, the dark pines that crowned the hills, while the
+stillness of the hour gave to his ear the dash of the waterfalls heard
+above the regular and measured tread of the sentinels below. Leaning his
+cheek upon his hand, Rienzi long surrendered himself to gloomy thought,
+and, when he looked up, he saw the bright blue eye of Villani fixed in
+anxious sympathy on his countenance.
+
+“Is my Lord unwell?” asked the young chamberlain, hesitating.
+
+“Not so, my Angelo; but somewhat sick at heart. Methinks, for a
+September night, the air is chill!”
+
+“Angelo,” resumed Rienzi, who had already acquired that uneasy curiosity
+which belongs to an uncertain power,--“Angelo, bring me hither yon
+writing implements; hast thou heard aught what the men say of our
+probable success against Palestrina?”
+
+“Would my Lord wish to learn all their gossip, whether it please or
+not?” answered Villani.
+
+“If I studied only to hear what pleased me, Angelo, I should never have
+returned to Rome.”
+
+“Why, then, I heard a constable of the Northmen say, meaningly, that the
+place will not be carried.”
+
+“Humph! And what said the captains of my Roman Legion?”
+
+“My Lord, I have heard it whispered that they fear defeat less than they
+do the revenge of the Barons, if they are successful.”
+
+“And with such tools the living race of Europe and misjudging posterity
+will deem that the workman is to shape out the Ideal and the Perfect!
+Bring me yon Bible.”
+
+As Angelo reverently brought to Rienzi the sacred book, he said,
+
+“Just before I left my companions below, there was a rumour that the
+Lord Adrian Colonna had been imprisoned by his kinsman.”
+
+“I too heard, and I believe, as much,” returned Rienzi: “these Barons
+would gibbet their own children in irons, if there were any chance of
+the shackles growing rusty for want of prey. But the wicked shall be
+brought low, and their strong places shall be made desolate.”
+
+“I would, my Lord,” said Villani, “that our Northmen had other captains
+than these Provencals.”
+
+“Why?” asked Rienzi, abruptly.
+
+“Have the creatures of the Captain of the Grand Company ever held faith
+with any man whom it suited the avarice or the ambition of Montreal to
+betray? Was he not, a few months ago, the right arm of John di Vico,
+and did he not sell his services to John di Vico’s enemy, the Cardinal
+Albornoz? These warriors barter men as cattle.”
+
+“Thou describest Montreal rightly: a dangerous and an awful man. But
+methinks his brothers are of a duller and meaner kind; they dare not
+the crimes of the Robber Captain. Howbeit, Angelo, thou hast touched a
+string that will make discord with sleep tonight. Fair youth, thy young
+eyes have need of slumber; withdraw, and when thou hearest men envy
+Rienzi, think that--”
+
+“God never made Genius to be envied!” interrupted Villani, with an
+energy that overcame his respect. “We envy not the sun, but rather the
+valleys that ripen beneath his beams.”
+
+“Verily, if I be the sun,” said Rienzi, with a bitter and melancholy
+smile, “I long for night,--and come it will, to the human as to the
+celestial Pilgrim!--Thank Heaven, at least, that our ambition cannot
+make us immortal!”
+
+
+
+Chapter 9.V. The Biter Bit.
+
+The next morning, when Rienzi descended to the room where his captains
+awaited him, his quick eye perceived that a cloud still lowered upon the
+brow of Messere Brettone. Arimbaldo, sheltered by the recess of the rude
+casement, shunned his eye.
+
+“A fair morning, gentles,” said Rienzi; “the Sun laughs upon our
+enterprise. I have messengers from Rome betimes--fresh troops will join
+us ere noon.”
+
+“I am glad, Senator,” answered Brettone, “that you have tidings which
+will counteract the ill of those I have to narrate to thee. The soldiers
+murmur loudly--their pay is due to them; and, I fear me, that without
+money they will not march to Palestrina.”
+
+“As they will,” returned Rienzi, carelessly. “It is but a few days since
+they entered Rome; pay did they receive in advance--if they demand
+more, the Colonna and Orsini may outbid me. Draw off your soldiers, Sir
+Knight, and farewell.”
+
+Brettone’s countenance fell--it was his object to get Rienzi more and
+more in his power, and he wished not to suffer him to gain that strength
+which would accrue to him from the fall of Palestrina: the indifference
+of the Senator foiled and entrapped him in his own net.
+
+“That must not be,” said the brother of Montreal, after a confused
+silence; “we cannot leave you thus to your enemies--the soldiers, it is
+true, demand pay--”
+
+“And should have it,” said Rienzi. “I know these mercenaries--it is
+ever with them, mutiny or money. I will throw myself on my Romans,
+and triumph--or fall, if so Heaven decrees, with them. Acquaint your
+constables with my resolve.”
+
+Scarce were these words spoken, ere, as previously concerted with
+Brettone, the chief constable of the mercenaries appeared at the door.
+“Senator,” said he, with a rough semblance of aspect, “your orders to
+march have reached me, I have sought to marshal my men--but--”
+
+“I know what thou wouldst say, friend,” interrupted Rienzi, waving
+his hand: “Messere Brettone will give you my reply. Another time, Sir
+Captain, more ceremony with the Senator of Rome--you may withdraw.”
+
+The unforeseen dignity of Rienzi rebuked and abashed the constable; he
+looked at Brettone, who motioned him to depart. He closed the door and
+withdrew.
+
+“What is to be done?” said Brettone.
+
+“Sir Knight,” replied Rienzi, gravely, “let us understand each other.
+Would you serve me or not? If the first, you are not my equal, but
+subordinate--and you must obey and not dictate; if the last, my debt to
+you shall be discharged, and the world is wide enough for both.”
+
+“We have declared allegiance to you,” answered Brettone, “and it shall
+be given.”
+
+“One caution before I re-accept your fealty,” replied Rienzi, very
+slowly. “For an open foe, I have my sword--for a traitor, mark me, Rome
+has the axe; of the first I have no fear; for the last, no mercy.”
+
+“These are not words that should pass between friends,” said Brettone,
+turning pale with suppressed emotion.
+
+“Friends!--ye are my friends, then!--your hands! Friends, so ye
+are!--and shall prove it! Dear Arimbaldo, thou, like myself, art
+book-learned,--a clerkly soldier. Dost thou remember how in the Roman
+history it is told that the Treasury lacked money for the soldiers? The
+Consul convened the Nobles. ‘Ye,’ said he, ‘that have the offices and
+dignity should be the first to pay for them.’ Ye heed me, my friends;
+the nobles took the hint, they found the money--the army was paid. This
+example is not lost on you. I have made you the leaders of my force,
+Rome hath showered her honours on you. Your generosity shall commence
+the example which the Romans shall thus learn of strangers. Ye gaze at
+me, my friends! I read your noble souls--and thank ye beforehand. Ye
+have the dignity and the office; ye have also the wealth!--pay the
+hirelings, pay them!” (See the anonymous biographer, lib. ii. cap. 19.)
+
+Had a thunderbolt fallen at the feet of Brettone, he could not have been
+more astounded than at this simple suggestion of Rienzi’s. He lifted
+his eyes to the Senator’s face, and saw there that smile which he had
+already, bold as he was, learned to dread. He felt himself fairly
+sunk in the pit he had digged for another. There was that in the
+Senator-Tribune’s brow that told him to refuse was to declare open war,
+and the moment was not ripe for that.
+
+“Ye accede,” said Rienzi; “ye have done well.”
+
+The Senator clapped his hands--his guard appeared.
+
+“Summon the head constables of the soldiery.”
+
+The brothers still remained dumb.
+
+The constables entered.
+
+“My friends,” said Rienzi, “Messere Brettone and Messere Arimbaldo have
+my directions to divide amongst your force a thousand florins. This
+evening we encamp beneath Palestrina.”
+
+The constables withdrew in visible surprise. Rienzi gazed a moment on
+the brothers, chuckling within himself--for his sarcastic humour enjoyed
+his triumph. “You lament not your devotion, my friends!”
+
+“No,” said Brettone, rousing himself; “the sum but trivially swells our
+debt.”
+
+“Frankly said--your hands once more!--the good people of Tivoli expect
+me in the Piazza--they require some admonitions. Adieu till noon.”
+
+When the door closed on Rienzi, Brettone struck the handle of his sword
+fiercely--“The Roman laughs at us,” said he. “But let Walter de Montreal
+once appear in Rome, and the proud jester shall pay us dearly for this.”
+
+“Hush!” said Arimbaldo, “walls have ears, and that imp of Satan, young
+Villani, seems to me ever at our heels!”
+
+“A thousand florins! I trust his heart hath as many drops,” growled the
+chafed Brettone, unheeding his brother.
+
+The soldiers were paid--the army marched--the eloquence of the Senator
+had augmented his force by volunteers from Tivoli, and wild and
+half armed peasantry joined his standard from the Campagna and the
+neighbouring mountains.
+
+Palestrina was besieged: Rienzi continued dexterously to watch the
+brothers of Montreal. Under pretext of imparting to the Italian
+volunteers the advantage of their military science, he separated them
+from their mercenaries, and assigned to them the command of the less
+disciplined Italians, with whom, he believed, they could not venture
+to tamper. He himself assumed the lead of the Northmen--and, despite
+themselves, they were fascinated by his artful, yet dignified
+affability, and the personal courage he displayed in some sallies of the
+besieged Barons. But as the huntsmen upon all the subtlest windings of
+their prey,--so pressed the relentless and speeding Fates upon Cola di
+Rienzi!
+
+
+
+Chapter 9.VI. The Events Gather to the End.
+
+While this the state of the camp of the besiegers, Luca di Savelli and
+Stefanello Colonna were closeted with a stranger, who had privately
+entered Palestrina on the night before the Romans pitched their tents
+beneath its walls. This visitor, who might have somewhat passed his
+fortieth year, yet retained, scarcely diminished, the uncommon beauty of
+form and countenance for which his youth had been remarkable. But it was
+no longer that character of beauty which has been described in his first
+introduction to the reader. It was no longer the almost woman delicacy
+of feature and complexion, or the highborn polish, and graceful suavity
+of manner, which distinguished Walter de Montreal: a life of vicissitude
+and war had at length done its work. His bearing was now abrupt and
+imperious, as that of one accustomed to rule wild spirits, and he had
+exchanged the grace of persuasion for the sternness of command. His
+athletic form had grown more spare and sinewy, and instead of the brow
+half shaded by fair and clustering curls, his forehead, though yet
+but slightly wrinkled, was completely bald at the temples; and by its
+unwonted height, increased the dignity and manliness of his aspect. The
+bloom of his complexion was faded, less by outward exposure than inward
+thought, into a bronzed and settled paleness; and his features seemed
+more marked and prominent, as the flesh had somewhat sunk from the
+contour of the cheek. Yet the change suited the change of age and
+circumstance; and if the Provencal now less realised the idea of
+the brave and fair knight-errant, he but looked the more what the
+knight-errant had become--the sagacious counsellor and the mighty
+leader.
+
+“You must be aware,” said Montreal, continuing a discourse which
+appeared to have made great impression on his companions, “that in this
+contest between yourselves and the Senator, I alone hold the balance.
+Rienzi is utterly in my power--my brothers, the leaders of his army;
+myself, his creditor. It rests with me to secure him on the throne, or
+to send him to the scaffold. I have but to give the order, and the Grand
+Company enter Rome; but without their agency, methinks if you keep faith
+with me, our purpose can be effected.”
+
+“In the meanwhile, Palestrina is besieged by your brothers!” said
+Stefanello, sharply.
+
+“But they have my orders to waste their time before its walls. Do you
+not see, that by this very siege, fruitless, as, if I will, it shall be,
+Rienzi loses fame abroad, and popularity in Rome.”
+
+“Sir Knight,” said Luca di Savelli, “you speak as a man versed in the
+profound policy of the times; and under all the circumstances which
+menace us, your proposal seems but fitting and reasonable. On the one
+hand, you undertake to restore us and the other Barons to Rome; and to
+give Rienzi to the Staircase of the Lion--”
+
+“Not so, not so,” replied Montreal, quickly. “I will consent either so
+to subdue and cripple his power, as to render him a puppet in our hands,
+a mere shadow of authority--or, if his proud spirit chafe at its cage,
+to give it once more liberty amongst the wilds of Germany. I would
+fetter or banish him, but not destroy; unless (added Montreal, after a
+moment’s pause) fate absolutely drives us to it. Power should not demand
+victims; but to secure it, victims may be necessary.”
+
+“I understand your refinements,” said Luca di Savelli, with his icy
+smile, “and am satisfied. The Barons once restored, our palaces once
+more manned, and I am willing to take the chance of the Senator’s
+longevity. This service you promise to effect?”
+
+“I do.”
+
+“And, in return, you demand our assent to your enjoying the rank of
+Podesta for five years?”
+
+“You say right.”
+
+“I, for one, accede to the terms,” said the Savelli: “there is my hand;
+I am wearied of these brawls, even amongst ourselves, and think that a
+Foreign Ruler may best enforce order: the more especially, if like
+you, Sir Knight, one whose birth and renown are such as to make him
+comprehend the difference between Barons and Plebeians.”
+
+“For my part,” said Stefanello, “I feel that we have but a choice of
+evils--I like not a foreign Podesta; but I like a plebeian Senator still
+less;--there too is my hand, Sir Knight.”
+
+“Noble Signors,” said Montreal, after a short pause, and turning his
+piercing gaze from one to the other with great deliberation, “our
+compact is sealed; one word by way of codicil. Walter de Montreal is no
+Count Pepin of Minorbino! Once before, little dreaming, I own, that the
+victory would be so facile, I intrusted your cause and mine to a deputy;
+your cause he promoted, mine he lost. He drove out the Tribune, and
+then suffered the Barons to banish himself. This time I see to my own
+affairs; and, mark you, I have learned in the Grand Company one lesson;
+viz. never to pardon spy or deserter, of whatever rank. Your forgiveness
+for the hint. Let us change the theme. So ye detain in your fortress my
+old friend the Baron di Castello?”
+
+“Ay,” said Luca di Savelli; for Stefanello, stung by Montreal’s threat,
+which he dared not openly resent, preserved a sullen silence; “Ay, he is
+one noble the less to the Senator’s council.”
+
+“You act wisely. I know his views and temper; at present dangerous to
+our interests. Yet use him well, I entreat you; he may hereafter serve
+us. And now, my Lords, my eyes are weary, suffer me to retire. Pleasant
+dreams of the New Revolution to us all!”
+
+“By your leave, noble Montreal, we will attend you to your couch,” said
+Luca di Savelli.
+
+“By my troth, and ye shall not. I am no Tribune to have great Signors
+for my pages; but a plain gentleman, and a hardy soldier: your
+attendants will conduct me to whatever chamber your hospitality assigns
+to one who could sleep soundly beneath the rudest hedge under your open
+skies.”
+
+Savelli, however, insisted on conducting the Podesta that was to be, to
+his apartment. He then returned to Stefanello, whom he found pacing the
+saloon with long and disordered strides.
+
+“What have we done, Savelli?” said he, quickly; “sold our city to a
+barbarian!”
+
+“Sold!” said Savelli; “to my mind it is the other part of the contract
+in which we have played our share. We have bought, Colonna, not
+sold--bought our lives from yon army; bought our power, our fortunes,
+our castles, from the Demagogue Senator; bought, what is better than
+all, triumph and revenge. Tush, Colonna, see you not that if we had
+balked this great warrior, we had perished? Leagued with the Senator,
+the Grand Company would have marched to Rome; and, whether Montreal
+assisted or murdered Rienzi, (for methinks he is a Romulus, who would
+brook no Remus), we had equally been undone. Now, we have made our own
+terms, and our shares are equal. Nay, the first steps to be taken are in
+our favour. Rienzi is to be snared, and we are to enter Rome.”
+
+“And then the Provencal is to be Despot of the city.”
+
+“Podesta, if you please. Podestas who offend the people are often
+banished, and sometimes stoned--Podestas who insult the nobles are often
+stilettoed, and sometimes poisoned,” said Savelli. “‘Sufficient for the
+day is the evil thereof.’ Meanwhile, say nothing to the bear, Orsini.
+Such men mar all wisdom. Come, cheer thee, Stefanello.”
+
+“Luca di Savelli, you have not such a stake in Rome as I have,” said
+the young Lord, haughtily; “no Podesta can take from you the rank of the
+first Signor of the Italian metropolis!”
+
+“An you had said so to the Orsini, there would have been drawing of
+swords,” said Savelli. “But cheer thee, I say; is not our first care to
+destroy Rienzi, and then, between the death of one foe and the rise of
+another, are there not such preventives as Ezzelino da Romano has taught
+to wary men? Cheer thee, I say; and, next year, if we but hold together,
+Stefanello Colonna and Luca di Savelli will be joint Senators of Rome,
+and these great men food for worms!”
+
+While thus conferred the Barons, Montreal, ere he retired to rest, stood
+gazing from the open lattice of his chamber over the landscape below,
+which slept in the autumnal moonlight, while at a distance gleamed, pale
+and steady, the lights round the encampment of the besiegers.
+
+“Wide plains and broad valleys,” thought the warrior, “soon shall ye
+repose in peace beneath a new sway, against which no petty tyrant
+shall dare rebel. And ye, white walls of canvass, even while I gaze--ye
+admonish me how realms are won. Even as, of old, from the Nomad tents
+was built up the stately Babylon, (Isaiah, c. xxii.) that ‘was not till
+the Assyrian founded it for them that dwell in the wilderness;’ so by
+the new Ishmaelites of Europe shall a race, undreamt of now, be founded;
+and the camp of yesterday, be the city of tomorrow. Verily, when, for
+one soft offence, the Pontiff thrust me from the bosom of the Church,
+little guessed he what enemy he raised to Rome! How solemn is the
+night!--how still the heavens and earth!--the very stars are as hushed,
+as if intent on the events that are to pass below! So solemn and so
+still feels mine own spirit, and an awe unknown till now warns me that I
+approach the crisis of my daring fate!”
+
+
+
+
+BOOK X. THE LION Of BASALT.
+
+     “Ora voglio contare la morte del Tribuno.”--(“Vita di Cola di
+     Rienzi”, lib. ii. cap. 24.)
+
+     “Now will I narrate the death of the Tribune.”--“Life of
+     Cola di Rienzi”.
+
+
+
+Chapter 10.I. The Conjunction of Hostile Planets in the House of Death.
+
+On the fourth day of the siege, and after beating back to those almost
+impregnable walls the soldiery of the Barons, headed by the Prince of
+the Orsini, the Senator returned to his tent, where despatches from Rome
+awaited him. He ran his eye hastily over them, till he came to the last;
+yet each contained news that might have longer delayed the eye of a man
+less inured to danger. From one he learned that Albornoz, whose blessing
+had confirmed to him the rank of Senator, had received with special
+favour the messengers of the Orsini and Colonna. He knew that the
+Cardinal, whose views connected him with the Roman Patricians, desired
+his downfall; but he feared not Albornoz: perhaps in his secret heart
+he wished that any open aggression from the Pontiff’s Legate might throw
+him wholly on the people.
+
+He learned further, that, short as had been his absence, Pandulfo di
+Guido had twice addressed the populace, not in favour of the Senator,
+but in artful regrets of the loss to the trade of Rome in the absence of
+her wealthiest nobles.
+
+“For this, then, he has deserted me,” said Rienzi to himself. “Let him
+beware!”
+
+The tidings contained in the next touched him home: Walter de Montreal
+had openly arrived in Rome. The grasping and lawless bandit, whose
+rapine filled with a robber’s booty every bank in Europe--whose
+Company was the army of a King--whose ambition, vast, unprincipled,
+and profound, he so well knew--whose brothers were in his camp--their
+treason already more than suspected;--Walter de Montreal was in Rome!
+
+The Senator remained perfectly aghast at this new peril; and then said,
+setting his teeth as in a vice,
+
+“Wild tiger, thou art in the Lion’s den!” Then pausing, he broke out
+again, “One false step, Walter de Montreal, and all the mailed hands of
+the Grand Company shall not pluck thee from the abyss! But what can I
+do? Return to Rome--the plans of Montreal unpenetrated--no accusation
+against him! On what pretence can I with honour raise the siege? To
+leave Palestrina, is to give a triumph to the Barons--to abandon Adrian,
+to degrade my cause. Yet, while away from Rome, every hour breeds
+treason and danger. Pandulfo, Albornoz, Montreal--all are at
+work against me. A keen and trusty spy, now;--ha, well thought
+of--Villani!--What, ho--Angelo Villani!”
+
+The young chamberlain appeared.
+
+“I think,” said Rienzi, “to have often heard, that thou art an orphan?”
+
+“True, my Lord; the old Augustine nun who reared my boyhood, has told me
+again and again that my parents are dead. Both noble, my Lord; but I am
+the child of shame. And I say it often, and think of it ever, in order
+to make Angelo Villani remember that he has a name to win.”
+
+“Young man, serve me as you have served, and if I live you shall have no
+need to call yourself an orphan. Mark me! I want a friend--the Senator
+of Rome wants a friend--only one friend--gentle Heaven! only one!”
+
+Angelo sank on his knee, and kissed the mantle of his Lord.
+
+“Say a follower. I am too mean to be Rienzi’s friend.”
+
+“Too mean!--go to!--there is nothing mean before God, unless it be a
+base soul under high titles. With me, boy, there is but one nobility,
+and Nature signs its charter. Listen: thou hearest daily of Walter de
+Montreal, brother to these Provencals--great captain of great robbers?”
+
+“Ay, and I have seen him, my Lord.”
+
+“Well, then, he is in Rome. Some daring thought--some well-supported and
+deep-schemed villany, could alone make that bandit venture openly into
+an Italian city, whose territories he ravaged by fire and sword a
+few months back. But his brothers have lent me money--assisted my
+return;--for their own ends, it is true: but the seeming obligation
+gives them real power. These Northern swordsmen would cut my throat if
+the Great Captain bade them. He counts on my supposed weakness. I know
+him of old. I suspect--nay I read, his projects; but I cannot prove
+them. Without proof, I cannot desert Palestrina in order to accuse
+and seize him. Thou art shrewd, thoughtful, acute;--couldst thou go to
+Rome?--watch day and night his movements--see if he receive messengers
+from Albornoz or the Barons--if he confer with Pandulfo di Guido;--watch
+his lodgment, I say, night and day. He affects no concealment; your task
+will be less difficult than it seems. Apprise the Signora of all you
+learn. Give me your news daily. Will you undertake this mission?”
+
+“I will, my Lord.”
+
+“To horse, then, quick!--and mind--save the wife of my bosom, I have no
+confidant in Rome.”
+
+
+
+Chapter 10.II. Montreal at Rome.--His Reception of Angelo Villani.
+
+The danger that threatened Rienzi by the arrival of Montreal was
+indeed formidable. The Knight of St. John, having marched his army into
+Lombardy, had placed it at the disposal of the Venetian State in its war
+with the Archbishop of Milan. For this service he received an immense
+sum; while he provided winter quarters for his troop, for whom he
+proposed ample work in the ensuing spring. Leaving Palestrina secretly
+and in disguise, with but a slender train, which met him at Tivoli,
+Montreal repaired to Rome. His ostensible object was, partly to
+congratulate the Senator on his return, partly to receive the monies
+lent to Rienzi by his brother.
+
+His secret object we have partly seen; but not contented with the
+support of the Barons, he trusted, by the corrupting means of his
+enormous wealth, to form a third party in support of his own ulterior
+designs. Wealth, indeed, in that age and in that land, was scarcely less
+the purchaser of diadems than it had been in the later days of the
+Roman Empire. And in many a city torn by hereditary feuds, the hatred of
+faction rose to that extent, that a foreign tyrant, willing and able to
+expel one party, might obtain at least the temporary submission of
+the other. His after-success was greatly in proportion to his power to
+maintain his state by a force which was independent of the citizens,
+and by a treasury which did not require the odious recruit of taxes. But
+more avaricious than ambitious, more cruel than firm, it was by griping
+exaction, or unnecessary bloodshed, that such usurpers usually fell.
+
+Montreal, who had scanned the frequent revolutions of the time with a
+calm and investigating eye, trusted that he should be enabled to avoid
+both these errors: and, as the reader has already seen, he had formed
+the profound and sagacious project of consolidating his usurpation by an
+utterly new race of nobles, who, serving him by the feudal tenure of the
+North, and ever ready to protect him, because in so doing they protected
+their own interests, should assist to erect, not the rotten and
+unsupported fabric of a single tyranny, but the strong fortress of a
+new, hardy, and compact Aristocratic State. Thus had the great dynasties
+of the North been founded; in which a King, though seemingly curbed
+by the Barons, was in reality supported by a common interest, whether
+against a subdued population or a foreign invasion.
+
+Such were the vast schemes--extending into yet wider fields of glory and
+conquest, bounded only by the Alps--with which the Captain of the Grand
+Company beheld the columns and arches of the Seven-hilled City.
+
+No fear disturbed the long current of his thoughts. His brothers were
+the leaders of Rienzi’s hireling army--that army were his creatures.
+Over Rienzi himself he assumed the right of a creditor. Thus against
+one party he deemed himself secure. For the friends of the Pope, he had
+supported himself with private, though cautious, letters from Albornoz,
+who desired only to make use of him for the return of the Roman
+Barons; and with the heads of the latter we have already witnessed his
+negotiations. Thus was he fitted, as he thought, to examine, to tamper
+with all parties, and to select from each the materials necessary for
+his own objects.
+
+The open appearance of Montreal excited in Rome no inconsiderable
+sensation. The friends of the Barons gave out that Rienzi was in league
+with the Grand Company; and that he was to sell the imperial city to
+the plunder and pillage of Barbarian robbers. The effrontery with which
+Montreal (against whom, more than once, the Pontiff had thundered his
+bulls) appeared in the Metropolitan City of the Church, was made yet
+more insolent by the recollection of that stern justice which had led
+the Tribune to declare open war against all the robbers of Italy: and
+this audacity was linked with the obvious reflection, that the brothers
+of the bold Provencal were the instruments of Rienzi’s return. So
+quickly spread suspicion through the city, that Montreal’s presence
+alone would in a few weeks have sufficed to ruin the Senator. Meanwhile,
+the natural boldness of Montreal silenced every whisper of prudence;
+and, blinded by the dazzle of his hopes, the Knight of St. John, as
+if to give double importance to his coming, took up his residence in a
+sumptuous palace, and his retinue rivalled, in the splendour of garb and
+pomp, the display of Rienzi himself in his earlier and more brilliant
+power.
+
+Amidst the growing excitement, Angelo Villani arrived at Rome.
+The character of this young man had been formed by his peculiar
+circumstances. He possessed qualities which often mark the Illegitimate
+as with a common stamp. He was insolent--like most of those who hold a
+doubtful rank; and while ashamed of his bastardy, was arrogant of the
+supposed nobility of his unknown parentage. The universal ferment and
+agitation of Italy at that day rendered ambition the most common of all
+the passions, and thus ambition, in all its many shades and varieties,
+forces itself into our delineations of character in this history. Though
+not for Angelo Villani were the dreams of the more lofty and generous
+order of that sublime infirmity, he was strongly incited by the desire
+and resolve to rise. He had warm affections and grateful impulses; and
+his fidelity to his patron had been carried to a virtue: but from his
+irregulated and desultory education, and the reckless profligacy of
+those with whom, in ante-chambers and guard-rooms, much of his youth had
+been passed, he had neither high principles nor an enlightened honour.
+Like most Italians, cunning and shrewd, he scrupled not at any deceit
+that served a purpose or a friend. His strong attachment to Rienzi had
+been unconsciously increased by the gratification of pride and vanity,
+flattered by the favour of so celebrated a man. Both self-interest and
+attachment urged him to every effort to promote the views and safety of
+one at once his benefactor and patron; and on undertaking his present
+mission, his only thought was to fulfil it with the most complete
+success. Far more brave and daring than was common with the Italians,
+something of the hardihood of an Ultra-Montane race gave nerve and
+vigour to his craft; and from what his art suggested, his courage never
+shrunk.
+
+When Rienzi had first detailed to him the objects of his present task,
+he instantly called to mind his adventure with the tall soldier in the
+crowd at Avignon. “If ever thou wantest a friend, seek him in Walter
+de Montreal,” were words that had often rung in his ear, and they now
+recurred to him with prophetic distinctness. He had no doubt that it
+was Montreal himself whom he had seen. Why the Great Captain should
+have taken this interest in him, Angelo little cared to conjecture. Most
+probably it was but a crafty pretence--one of the common means by which
+the Chief of the Grand Company attracted to himself the youths of Italy,
+as well as the warriors of the North. He only thought now how he could
+turn the Knight’s promise to account. What more easy than to present
+himself to Montreal--remind him of the words--enter his service--and
+thus effectually watch his conduct? The office of spy was not that which
+would have pleased every mind, but it shocked not the fastidiousness of
+Angelo Villani; and the fearful hatred with which his patron had often
+spoken of the avaricious and barbarian robber--the scourge of his native
+land,--had infected the young man, who had much of the arrogant and mock
+patriotism of the Romans, with a similar sentiment. More vindictive
+even than grateful, he bore, too, a secret grudge against Montreal’s
+brothers, whose rough address had often wounded his pride; and, above
+all, his early recollections of the fear and execration in which Ursula
+seemed ever to hold the terrible Fra Moreale, impressed him with a vague
+belief of some ancient wrong to himself or his race, perpetrated by the
+Provencal, which he was not ill-pleased to have the occasion to avenge.
+In truth, the words of Ursula, mystic and dark as they were in
+their denunciation, had left upon Villani’s boyish impressions an
+unaccountable feeling of antipathy and hatred to the man it was now his
+object to betray. For the rest, every device seemed to him decorous
+and justifiable, so that it saved his master, served his country, and
+advanced himself.
+
+Montreal was alone in his chamber when it was announced to him that
+a young Italian craved an audience. Professionally open to access, he
+forthwith gave admission to the applicant.
+
+The Knight of St. John instantly recognised the page he had encountered
+at Avignon; and when Angelo Villani said, with easy boldness, “I have
+come to remind Sir Walter de Montreal of a promise--”
+
+The Knight interrupted him with cordial frankness--“Thou needest not--I
+remember it. Dost thou now require my friendship?”
+
+“I do noble Signor!” answered Angelo; “I know not where else to seek a
+patron.”
+
+“Canst thou read and write? I fear me not.”
+
+“I have been taught those arts,” replied Villani.
+
+“It is well. Is thy birth gentle?”
+
+“It is.”
+
+“Better still;--thy name?”
+
+“Angelo Villani.”
+
+“I take thy blue eyes and low broad brow,” said Montreal, with a slight
+sigh, “in pledge of thy truth. Henceforth, Angelo Villani, thou art
+in the list of my secretaries. Another time thou shalt tell me more
+of thyself. Thy service dates from this day. For the rest, no man ever
+wanted wealth who served Walter de Montreal; nor advancement, if
+he served him faithfully. My closet, through yonder door, is thy
+waiting-room. Ask for, and send hither, Lusignan of Lyons; he is my
+chief scribe, and will see to thy comforts, and instruct thee in thy
+business.”
+
+Angelo withdrew--Montreal’s eye followed him.
+
+“A strange likeness!” said he, musingly and sadly; “my heart leaps to
+that boy!”
+
+
+
+Chapter 10.III. Montreal’s Banquet.
+
+Some few days after the date of the last chapter, Rienzi received
+news from Rome, which seemed to produce in him a joyous and elated
+excitement. His troops still lay before Palestrina, and still the
+banners of the Barons waved over its unconquered walls. In truth, the
+Italians employed half their time in brawls amongst themselves; the
+Velletritrani had feuds with the people of Tivoli, and the Romans were
+still afraid of conquering the Barons;--“The hornet,” said they, “stings
+worse after he is dead; and neither an Orsini, a Savelli, nor a Colonna,
+was ever known to forgive.”
+
+Again and again had the captains of his army assured the indignant
+Senator that the fortress was impregnable, and that time and money were
+idly wasted upon the siege. Rienzi knew better, but he concealed his
+thoughts.
+
+He now summoned to his tent the brothers of Provence, and announced
+to them his intention of returning instantly to Rome. “The mercenaries
+shall continue the siege under our Lieutenant, and you, with my Roman
+Legion, shall accompany me. Your brother, Sir Walter, and I, both want
+your presence; we have affairs to arrange between us. After a few days I
+shall raise recruits in the city, and return.”
+
+This was what the brothers desired; they approved, with evident joy, the
+Senator’s proposition.
+
+Rienzi next sent for the lieutenant of his bodyguard, the same Riccardo
+Annibaldi whom the reader will remember in the earlier part of this
+work, as the antagonist of Montreal’s lance. This young man--one of
+the few nobles who espoused the cause of the Senator--had evinced great
+courage and military ability, and promised fair (should Fate spare his
+life (It appears that this was the same Annibaldi who was afterwards
+slain in an affray:--Petrarch lauds his valour and laments his fate.))
+to become one of the best Captains of his time.
+
+“Dear Annibaldi,” said Rienzi; “at length I can fulfil the project
+on which we have privately conferred. I take with me to Rome the two
+Provencal Captains--I leave you chief of the army. Palestrina will yield
+now--eh!--ha, ha, ha!--Palestrina will yield now!”
+
+“By my right hand, I think so, Senator,” replied Annibaldi. “These
+foreigners have hitherto only stirred up quarrels amongst ourselves, and
+if not cowards are certainly traitors!”
+
+“Hush, hush, hush! Traitors! The learned Arimbaldo, the brave Brettone,
+traitors! Fie on it! No, no; they are very excellent, honourable men,
+but not lucky in the camp;--not lucky in the camp;--better speed to them
+in the city! And now to business.”
+
+The Senator then detailed to Annibaldi the plan he himself had formed
+for taking the town, and the military skill of Annibaldi at once
+recognised its feasibility.
+
+With his Roman troop, and Montreal’s brothers, one at either hand,
+Rienzi then departed to Rome.
+
+That night Montreal gave a banquet to Pandulfo di Guido, and to certain
+of the principal citizens, whom one by one he had already sounded, and
+found hollow at heart to the cause of the Senator.
+
+Pandulfo sate at the right hand of the Knight of St. John, and Montreal
+lavished upon him the most courteous attentions.
+
+“Pledge me in this--it is from the Vale of Chiana, near Monte Pulciano,”
+ said Montreal. “I think I have heard bookmen say (you know, Signor
+Pandulfo, we ought all to be bookmen now!) that the site was renowned of
+old. In truth, the wine hath a racy flavour.”
+
+“I hear,” said Bruttini, one of the lesser Barons, (a stanch friend
+to the Colonna,) “that in this respect the innkeeper’s son has put his
+book-learning to some use: he knows every place where the wine grows
+richest.”
+
+“What! the Senator is turned wine-bibber!” said Montreal, quaffing a
+vast goblet full; “that must unfit him for business--‘tis a pity.”
+
+“Verily, yes,” said Pandulfo; “a man at the head of a state should be
+temperate--I never drink wine unmixed.”
+
+“Ah,” whispered Montreal, “if your calm good sense ruled Rome,
+then, indeed, the metropolis of Italy might taste of peace. Signor
+Vivaldi,”--and the host turned towards a wealthy draper,--“these
+disturbances are bad for trade.”
+
+“Very, very!” groaned the draper.
+
+“The Barons are your best customers,” quoth the minor noble.
+
+“Much, much!” said the draper.
+
+“‘Tis a pity that they are thus roughly expelled,” said Montreal, in a
+melancholy tone. “Would it not be possible, if the Senator (I drink
+his health) were less rash--less zealous, rather,--to unite free
+institutions with the return of the Barons?--such should be the task of
+a truly wise statesman!”
+
+“It surely might be possible,” returned Vivaldi; “the Savelli alone
+spend more with me than all the rest of Rome.”
+
+“I know not if it be possible,” said Bruttini; “but I do know that it is
+an outrage to all decorum that an innkeeper’s son should be enabled to
+make a solitude of the palaces of Rome.”
+
+“It certainly seems to indicate too vulgar a desire of mob favour,” said
+Montreal. “However, I trust we shall harmonize all these differences.
+Rienzi, perhaps,--nay, doubtless, means well!”
+
+“I would,” said Vivaldi, who had received his cue, “that we might form
+a mixed constitution--Plebeians and Patricians, each in their separate
+order.”
+
+“But,” said Montreal, gravely, “so new an experiment would demand great
+physical force.”
+
+“Why, true; but we might call in an umpire--a foreigner who had no
+interest in either faction--who might protect the new Buono Stato; a
+Podesta, as we have done before--Brancaleone, for instance. How well
+and wisely he ruled! that was a golden age for Rome. A Podesta for
+ever!--that’s my theory.”
+
+“You need not seek far for the president of your council,” said
+Montreal, smiling at Pandulfo; “a citizen at once popular, well-born,
+and wealthy, may be found at my right hand.”
+
+Pandulfo hemmed, and coloured.
+
+Montreal proceeded. “A committee of trades might furnish an honourable
+employment to Signor Vivaldi; and the treatment of all foreign
+affairs--the employment of armies, &c., might be left to the Barons,
+with a more open competition, Signor di Bruttini, to the Barons of
+the second order than has hitherto been conceded to their birth and
+importance. Sirs, will you taste the Malvoisie?”
+
+“Still,” said Vivaldi, after a pause--(Vivaldi anticipated at least the
+supplying with cloth the whole of the Grand Company)--“still, such a
+moderate and well-digested constitution would never be acceded to by
+Rienzi.”
+
+“Why should it? what need of Rienzi?” exclaimed Bruttini. “Rienzi may
+take another trip to Bohemia.”
+
+“Gently, gently,” said Montreal; “I do not despair. All open violence
+against the Senator would strengthen his power. No, no, humble
+him--admit the Barons, and then insist on your own terms. Between the
+two factions you might then establish a fitting balance. And in order
+to keep your new constitution from the encroachment of either extreme,
+there are warriors and knights, too, who for a certain rank in the
+great city of Rome would maintain horse and foot at its service.
+We Ultra-Montanes are often harshly judged; we are wanderers and
+Ishmaelites, solely because we have no honourable place of rest. Now, if
+I--”
+
+“Ay, if you, noble Montreal!” said Vivaldi.
+
+The company remained hushed in breathless attention, when suddenly there
+was heard--deep, solemn, muffled,--the great bell of the Capitol!
+
+“Hark!” said Vivaldi, the bell: “It tolls for execution: an unwonted
+hour!”
+
+“Sure, the Senator has not returned!” exclaimed Pandulfo di Guido,
+turning pale.
+
+“No, no,” quoth Bruttini, “it is but a robber, caught two nights ago in
+Romagna. I heard that he was to die tonight.”
+
+At the word “robber,” Montreal changed countenance slightly. The wine
+circulated--the bell continued to toll--its suddenness over, it ceased
+to alarm. Conversation flowed again.
+
+“What were you saying, Sir Knight?” said Vivaldi.
+
+“Why, let me think on’t;--oh, speaking of the necessity of supporting a
+new state by force, I said that if I--”
+
+“Ah, that was it!” quoth Bruttini, thumping the table.
+
+“If I were summoned to your aid--summoned, mind ye, and absolved by the
+Pope’s Legate of my former sins--(they weigh heavily on me, gentles)--I
+would myself guard your city from foreign foe and civil disturbance,
+with my gallant swordsmen. Not a Roman citizen should contribute a
+‘danaro’ to the cost.”
+
+“Viva Fra Moreale!” cried Bruttini; and the shout was echoed by all the
+boon companions.
+
+“Enough for me,” continued Montreal, “to expiate my offences. Ye know,
+gentlemen, my order is vowed to God and the Church--a warrior-monk am I!
+Enough for me to expiate my offences, I say, in the defence of the Holy
+City. Yet I, too, have my private and more earthly views,--who is above
+them? I--the bell changes its note!”
+
+“It is but the change that preludes execution--the poor robber is about
+to die!”
+
+Montreal crossed himself, and resumed:--“I am a knight and a noble,”
+ said he, proudly; “the profession I have followed is that of arms;
+but--I will not disguise it--mine equals have regarded me as one who has
+stained his scutcheon by too reckless a pursuit of glory and of gain.
+I wish to reconcile myself with my order--to purchase a new name--to
+vindicate myself to the Grand Master and the Pontiff. I have had hints,
+gentles,--hints, that I might best promote my interest by restoring
+order to the Papal metropolis. The Legate Albornoz (here is his letter)
+recommends me to keep watch upon the Senator.”
+
+“Surely,” interrupted Pandulfo, “I hear steps below.”
+
+“The mob going to the robber’s execution,” said Bruttini; “proceed, Sir
+Knight!”
+
+“And,” continued Montreal, surveying his audience before he proceeded
+farther, “what think ye--(I do but ask your opinion, wiser than
+mine)--what think ye, as a fitting precaution against too arbitrary a
+power in the Senator--what think ye of the return of the Colonna, and
+the bold Barons of Palestrina?”
+
+“Here’s to their health!” cried Vivaldi, rising.
+
+As by a sudden impulse, the company rose. “To the health of the besieged
+Barons!” was shouted aloud.
+
+“Next, what if--(I do but humbly suggest)--what if you gave the Senator
+a colleague?--it is no affront to him. It was but as yesterday that
+one of the Colonna, who was Senator, received a colleague in Bertoldo
+Orsini.”
+
+“A most wise precaution,” cried Vivaldi. “And where a colleague like
+Pandulfo di Guido?”
+
+“Viva Pandulfo di Guido!” cried the guests, and again their goblets were
+drained to the bottom.
+
+“And if in this I can assist ye by fair words with the Senator, (ye
+know he owes me monies--my brothers have served him), command Walter de
+Montreal.”
+
+“And if fair words fail?” said Vivaldi.
+
+“The Grand Company--(heed me, ye are the counsellors)--the Grand Company
+is accustomed to forced marches!”
+
+“Viva Fra Moreale!” cried Bruttini and Vivaldi, simultaneously. “A
+health to all, my friends;” continued Bruttini; “a health to the Barons,
+Rome’s old friends; to Pandulfo di Guido, the Senator’s new colleague,
+and to Fra Moreale, Rome’s new Podesta.”
+
+“The bell has ceased,” said Vivaldi, putting down his goblet.
+
+“Heaven have mercy on the robber!” added Bruttini.
+
+Scarce had he spoken, ere three taps were heard at the door--the guests
+looked at each other in dumb amaze.
+
+“New guests!” said Montreal. “I asked some trusty friends to join us
+this evening. By my faith they are welcome! Enter!”
+
+The door opened slowly; three by three entered, in complete armour, the
+guards of the Senator. On they marched, regular and speechless. They
+surrounded the festive board--they filled the spacious hall, and the
+lights of the banquet were reflected upon their corselets as on a wall
+of steel.
+
+Not a syllable was uttered by the feasters, they were as if turned to
+stone. Presently the guards gave way, and Rienzi himself appeared. He
+approached the table, and folding his arms, turned his gaze deliberately
+from guest to guest, till at last, his eyes rested on Montreal, who had
+also risen, and who alone of the party had recovered the amaze of the
+moment.
+
+And there, as these two men, each so celebrated, so proud, able, and
+ambitious, stood, front to front--it was literally as if the rival
+Spirits of Force and Intellect, Order and Strife, of the Falchion and
+the Fasces--the Antagonist Principles by which empires are ruled and
+empires overthrown, had met together, incarnate and opposed. They
+stood, both silent,--as if fascinated by each other’s gaze,--loftier in
+stature, and nobler in presence than all around.
+
+Montreal spoke first, and with a forced smile.
+
+“Senator of Rome!--dare I believe that my poor banquet tempts thee, and
+may I trust that these armed men are a graceful compliment to one to
+whom arms have been a pastime?”
+
+Rienzi answered not, but waved his hand to his guards. Montreal was
+seized on the instant. Again he surveyed the guests--as a bird from the
+rattle-snake,--shrunk Pandulfo di Guido, trembling, motionless, aghast,
+from the glittering eye of the Senator. Slowly Rienzi raised his
+fatal hand towards the unhappy citizen--Pandulfo saw,--felt his
+doom,--shrieked,--and fell senseless in the arms of the soldiers.
+
+One other and rapid glance cast the Senator round the board, and then,
+with a disdainful smile, as if anxious for no meaner prey, turned away.
+Not a breath had hitherto passed his lips--all had been dumb
+show--and his grim silence had imparted a more freezing terror to his
+unguessed-for apparition. Only, when he reached the door, he turned
+back, gazed upon the Knight of St. John’s bold and undaunted face,
+and said, almost in a whisper, “Walter de Montreal!--you heard the
+death-knell!”
+
+
+
+Chapter 10.IV. The Sentence of Walter de Montreal.
+
+In silence the Captain of the Grand Company was borne to the prison of
+the Capitol. In the same building lodged the rivals for the government
+of Rome; the one occupied the prison, the other the palace. The guards
+forebore the ceremony of fetters, and leaving a lamp on the table,
+Montreal perceived he was not alone,--his brothers had preceded him.
+
+“Ye are happily met,” said the Knight of St. John; “we have passed
+together pleasanter nights than this is likely to be.”
+
+“Can you jest, Walter?” said Arimbaldo, half-weeping. “Know you not that
+our doom is fixed? Death scowls upon us.”
+
+“Death!” repeated Montreal, and for the first time his countenance
+changed; perhaps for the first time in his life he felt the thrill and
+agony of fear.
+
+“Death!” he repeated again. “Impossible! He dare not, Brettone; the
+soldiers, the Northmen!--they will mutiny, they will pluck us back from
+the grasp of the headsman!”
+
+“Cast from you so vain a hope,” said Brettone sullenly; “the soldiers
+are encamped at Palestrina.”
+
+“How! Dolt--fool! Came you then to Rome alone! Are we alone with this
+dread man?”
+
+“You are the dolt! Why came you hither?” answered the brother.
+
+“Why, indeed! but that I knew thou wast the Captain of the army;
+and--but thou said’st right--the folly is mine, to have played against
+the crafty Tribune so unequal a brain as thine. Enough! Reproaches are
+idle. When were ye arrested?”
+
+“At dusk--the instant we entered the gates of Rome. Rienzi entered
+privately.”
+
+“Humph! What can he know against me? Who can have betrayed me? My
+secretaries are tried--all trustworthy--except that youth, and he so
+seemingly zealous--that Angelo Villani!”
+
+“Villani! Angelo Villani!” cried the brothers in a breath. “Hast thou
+confided aught to him?”
+
+“Why, I fear he must have seen--at least in part--my correspondence with
+you, and with the Barons--he was among my scribes. Know you aught of
+him?”
+
+“Walter, Heaven hath demented you!” returned Brettone. “Angelo Villani
+is the favourite menial of the Senator.”
+
+“Those eyes deceived me, then,” muttered Montreal, solemnly and
+shuddering; “and, as if her ghost had returned to earth, God smites me
+from the grave!”
+
+There was a long silence. At length Montreal, whose bold and sanguine
+temper was never long clouded, spoke again.
+
+“Are the Senator’s coffers full?--But that is impossible.”
+
+“Bare as a Dominican’s.”
+
+“We are saved, then. He shall name his price for our heads. Money must
+be more useful to him than blood.”
+
+And as if with that thought all further meditation were rendered
+unnecessary, Montreal doffed his mantle, uttered a short prayer, and
+flung himself on a pallet in a corner of the cell.
+
+“I have slept on worse beds,” said the Knight, stretching himself; and
+in a few minutes he was fast asleep.
+
+The brothers listened to his deep-drawn, but regular breathing, with
+envy and wonder, but they were in no mood to converse. Still and
+speechless, they sate like statues beside the sleeper. Time passed
+on, and the first cold air of the hour that succeeds to midnight crept
+through the bars of their cell. The bolts crashed, the door opened,
+six men-at-arms entered, passed the brothers, and one of them touched
+Montreal.
+
+“Ha!” said he, still sleeping, but turning round. “Ha!” said he, in the
+soft Provencal tongue, “sweet Adeline, we will not rise yet--it is so
+long since we met!”
+
+“What says he?” muttered the guard, shaking Montreal roughly. The Knight
+sprang up at once, and his hand grasped the head of his bed as for his
+sword. He stared round bewildered, rubbed his eyes, and then gazing on
+the guard, became alive to the present.
+
+“Ye are early risers in the Capitol,” said he. “What want ye of me?”
+
+“It waits you!”
+
+“It! What?” said Montreal.
+
+“The rack!” replied the soldier, with a malignant scowl.
+
+The Great Captain said not a word. He looked for one moment at the six
+swordsmen, as if measuring his single strength against theirs. His eye
+then wandered round the room. The rudest bar of iron would have been
+dearer to him than he had ever yet found the proofest steel of Milan. He
+completed his survey with a sigh, threw his mantle over his shoulders,
+nodded at his brethren, and followed the guard.
+
+In a hall of the Capitol, hung with the ominous silk of white rays on a
+blood-red ground, sate Rienzi and his councillors. Across a recess was
+drawn a black curtain.
+
+“Walter de Montreal,” said a small man at the foot of the table, “Knight
+of the illustrious order of St. John of Jerusalem--”
+
+“And Captain of the Grand Company!” added the prisoner, in a firm voice.
+
+“You stand accused of divers counts: robbery and murder, in Tuscany,
+Romagna, and Apulia--”
+
+“For robbery and murder, brave men, and belted Knights,” said Montreal,
+drawing himself up, “would use the words ‘war and victory.’ To those
+charges I plead guilty! Proceed.”
+
+“You are next accused of treasonable conspiracy against the liberties
+of Rome for the restoration of the proscribed Barons--and of traitorous
+correspondence with Stefanello Colonna at Palestrina.”
+
+“My accuser?”
+
+“Step forth, Angelo Villani!”
+
+“You are my betrayer, then?” said Montreal steadily. “I deserved this.
+I beseech you, Senator of Rome, let this young man retire. I confess my
+correspondence with the Colonna, and my desire to restore the Barons.”
+
+Rienzi motioned to Villani, who bowed and withdrew.
+
+“There rests only then for you, Walter de Montreal, to relate, fully and
+faithfully, the details of your conspiracy.”
+
+“That is impossible,” replied Montreal, carelessly.
+
+“And why?”
+
+“Because, doing as I please with my own life, I will not betray the
+lives of others.”
+
+“Bethink thee--thou wouldst have betrayed the life of thy judge!”
+
+“Not betrayed--thou didst not trust me.”
+
+“The law, Walter de Montreal, hath sharp inquisitors--behold!”
+
+The black curtain was drawn aside, and the eye of Montreal rested on the
+executioner and the rack! His proud breast heaved indignantly.
+
+“Senator of Rome,” said he, “these instruments are for serfs and
+villeins. I have been a warrior and a leader; life and death have been
+in my hands--I have used them as I listed; but to mine equal and my foe,
+I never proffered the insult of the rack.”
+
+“Sir Walter de Montreal,” returned the Senator, gravely, but with some
+courteous respect, “your answer is that which rises naturally to the
+lips of brave men. But learn from me, whom fortune hath made thy judge,
+that no more for serf and villein, than for knight and noble, are such
+instruments the engines of law, or the tests of truth. I yielded but to
+the desire of these reverend councillors, to test thy nerves. But, wert
+thou the meanest peasant of the Campagna, before my judgment-seat
+thou needst not apprehend the torture. Walter de Montreal, amongst the
+Princes of Italy thou hast known, amongst the Roman Barons thou wouldst
+have aided, is there one who could make that boast?”
+
+“I desired only,” said Montreal, with some hesitation, “to unite the
+Barons with thee; nor did I intrigue against thy life!”
+
+Rienzi frowned--“Enough,” he said, hastily. “Knight of St. John, I know
+thy secret projects, subterfuge and evasion neither befit nor avail
+thee. If thou didst not intrigue against my life, thou didst intrigue
+against the life of Rome. Thou hast but one favour left to demand on
+earth, it is the manner of thy death.”
+
+Montreal’s lip worked convulsively.
+
+“Senator,” said he, in a low voice, “may I crave audience with thee
+alone for one minute?”
+
+The councillors looked up.
+
+“My Lord,” whispered the eldest of them, “doubtless he hath concealed
+weapons--trust him not.”
+
+“Prisoner,” returned Rienzi, after a moment’s pause; “if thou seekest
+for mercy thy request is idle, and before my coadjutors I have no
+secret; speak out what thou hast to say!”
+
+“Yet listen to me,” said the prisoner, folding his arms; “it concerns
+not my life, but Rome’s welfare.”
+
+“Then,” said Rienzi, in an altered tone, “thy request is granted. Thou
+mayst add to thy guilt the design of the assassin, but for Rome I would
+dare greater danger.”
+
+So saying, he motioned to the councillors, who slowly withdrew by
+the door which had admitted Villani, while the guards retired to the
+farthest extremity of the hall.
+
+“Now, Walter de Montreal, be brief, for thy time is short.”
+
+“Senator,” said Montreal, “my life can but little profit you; men will
+say that you destroyed your creditor in order to cancel your debt. Fix a
+sum upon my life, estimate it at the price of a monarch’s; every florin
+shall be paid to you, and your treasury will be filled for five years
+to come. If the ‘Buono Stato’ depends on your government, what I have
+asked, your solicitude for Rome will not permit you to refuse.”
+
+“You mistake me, bold robber,” said Rienzi, sternly; “your treason I
+could guard against, and therefore forgive; your ambition, never! Mark
+me, I know you! Place your hand on your heart and say whether, could
+we change places, you, as Rienzi, would suffer all the gold of earth
+to purchase the life of Walter de Montreal? For men’s reading of my
+conduct, that must I bear; for mine own reading, mine eyes must be
+purged from corruption. I am answerable to God for the trust of Rome.
+And Rome trembles while the head of the Grand Company lives in the
+plotting brain and the daring heart of Walter de Montreal. Man--wealthy,
+great, and subtle as you are, your hours are numbered; with the rise of
+the sun you die!”
+
+Montreal’s eyes, fixed upon the Senator’s face, saw hope was over; his
+pride and his fortitude returned to him.
+
+“We have wasted words,” said he. “I played for a great stake, I have
+lost, and must pay the forfeit! I am prepared. On the threshold of the
+Unknown World, the dark spirit of prophecy rushes into us. Lord Senator,
+I go before thee to announce--that in Heaven or in Hell--ere many days
+be over, room must be given to one mightier than I am!”
+
+As he spoke, his form dilated, his eye glared; and Rienzi, cowering as
+never had he cowered before, shrunk back, and shaded his face with his
+hand.
+
+“The manner of your death?” he asked, in a hollow voice.
+
+“The axe: it is that which befits knight and warrior. For thee, Senator,
+Fate hath a less noble death.”
+
+“Robber be dumb!” cried Rienzi, passionately; “Guards, bear back the
+prisoner. At sunrise, Montreal--”
+
+“Sets the sun of the scourge of Italy,” said the Knight, bitterly. “Be
+it so. One request more; the Knights of St. John claim affinity with the
+Augustine order; grant me an Augustine confessor.”
+
+“It is granted; and in return for thy denunciations, I, who can give
+thee no earthly mercy, will implore the Judge of all for pardon to thy
+soul!”
+
+“Senator, I have done with man’s mediation. My brethren? Their deaths
+are not necessary to thy safety or thy revenge!”
+
+Rienzi mused a moment: “No,” said he, “dangerous tools they were, but
+without the workman they may rust unharming. They served me once, too.
+Prisoner, their lives are spared.”
+
+
+
+Chapter 10.V. The Discovery.
+
+The Council was broken up--Rienzi hastened to his own apartments.
+Meeting Villani by the way, he pressed the youth’s hand affectionately.
+“You have saved Rome and me from great peril,” said he; “the saints
+reward you!” Without tarrying for Villani’s answer, he hurried on. Nina,
+anxious and perturbed, awaited him in their chamber.
+
+“Not a-bed yet?” said he: “fie, Nina, even thy beauty will not stand
+these vigils.”
+
+“I could not rest till I had seen thee. I hear (all Rome has heard it
+ere this) that thou hast seized Walter de Montreal, and that he will
+perish by the headsman.”
+
+“The first robber that ever died so brave a death,” returned Rienzi,
+slowly unrobing himself.
+
+“Cola, I have never crossed your schemes,--your policy, even by a
+suggestion. Enough for me to triumph in their success, to mourn for
+their failure. Now, I ask thee one request--spare me the life of this
+man.”
+
+“Nina--”
+
+“Hear me,--for thee I speak! Despite his crimes, his valour and his
+genius have gained him admirers, even amongst his foes. Many a prince,
+many a state that secretly rejoices at his fall, will affect horror
+against his judge. Hear me farther. His brothers aided your return;
+the world will term you ungrateful. His brothers lent you monies, the
+world--(out on it!)--will term you--”
+
+“Hold!” interrupted the Senator. “All that thou sayest, my mind
+forestalled. But thou knowest me--to thee I have no disguise. No compact
+can bind Montreal’s faith--no mercy win his gratitude. Before his red
+right hand truth and justice are swept away. If I condemn Montreal I
+incur disgrace and risk danger--granted. If I release him, ere the first
+showers of April, the chargers of the Northmen will neigh in the halls
+of the Capitol. Which shall I hazard in this alternative, myself or
+Rome? Ask me no more--to bed, to bed!”
+
+“Couldst thou read my forebodings, Cola, mystic--gloomy--unaccountable?”
+
+“Forebodings!--I have mine,” answered Rienzi, sadly, gazing on space,
+as if his thoughts peopled it with spectres. Then, raising his eyes to
+Heaven, he said with that fanatical energy which made much both of his
+strength and weakness--“Lord, mine at least not the sin of Saul! the
+Amalekite shall not be saved!”
+
+While Rienzi enjoyed a short, troubled, and restless sleep, over which
+Nina watched--unslumbering, anxious, tearful, and oppressed with dark
+and terrible forewarnings--the accuser was more happy than the judge.
+The last thoughts that floated before the young mind of Angelo Villani,
+ere wrapped in sleep, were bright and sanguine. He felt no honourable
+remorse that he had entrapped the confidence of another--he felt only
+that his scheme had prospered, that his mission had been fulfilled.
+The grateful words of Rienzi rang in his ear, and hopes of fortune and
+power, beneath the sway of the Roman Senator, lulled him into slumber,
+and coloured all his dreams.
+
+Scarce, however, had he been two hours asleep, ere he was wakened by one
+of the attendants of the palace, himself half awake. “Pardon me, Messere
+Villani,” said he, “but there is a messenger below from the good Sister
+Ursula; he bids thee haste instantly to the Convent--she is sick unto
+death, and has tidings that crave thy immediate presence.”
+
+Angelo, whose morbid susceptibility as to his parentage was ever excited
+by vague but ambitious hopes--started up, dressed hurriedly, and joining
+the messenger below, repaired to the Convent. In the Court of the
+Capitol, and by the Staircase of the Lion, was already heard the noise
+of the workmen, and looking back, Villani beheld the scaffold, hung with
+black--sleeping cloudlike in the grey light of dawn--at the same time,
+the bell of the Capitol tolled heavily. A pang shot athwart him. He
+hurried on;--despite the immature earliness of the hour, he met groups
+of either sex, hastening along the streets to witness the execution
+of the redoubted Captain of the Grand Company. The Convent of the
+Augustines was at the farthest extremity of that city, even then so
+extensive, and the red light upon the hilltops already heralded the
+rising sun, ere the young man reached the venerable porch. His name
+obtained him instant admittance.
+
+“Heaven grant,” said an old Nun, who conducted him through a long and
+winding passage, “that thou mayst bring comfort to the sick sister: she
+has pined for thee grievously since matins.”
+
+In a cell set apart for the reception of visitors (from the
+outward world), to such of the Sisterhood as received the necessary
+dispensation, sate the aged Nun. Angelo had only seen her once since his
+return to Rome, and since then disease had made rapid havoc on her form
+and features. And now, in her shroudlike garments and attenuated frame,
+she seemed by the morning light as a spectre whom day had surprised
+above the earth. She approached the youth, however, with a motion more
+elastic and rapid than seemed possible to her worn and ghastly form.
+“Thou art come,” she said. “Well, well! This morning after matins, my
+confessor, an Augustine, who alone knows the secrets of my life, took
+me aside, and told me that Walter de Montreal had been seized by the
+Senator--that he was adjudged to die, and that one of the Augustine
+brotherhood had been sent for to attend his last hours--is it so?”
+
+“Thou wert told aright,” said Angelo, wonderingly. “The man at whose
+name thou wert wont to shudder--against whom thou hast so often warned
+me--will die at sunrise.”
+
+“So soon!--so soon!--Oh, Mother of Mercy!--fly! thou art about the
+person of the Senator, thou hast high favour with him; fly! down on thy
+knees, and as thou hopest for God’s grace, rise not till thou hast won
+the Provencal’s life.”
+
+“She raves,” muttered Angelo, with white lips.
+
+“I do not rave,--boy!” screeched the Sister, wildly, “know that my
+daughter was his leman. He disgraced our house,--a house haughtier than
+his own. Sinner that I was, I vowed revenge. His boy--they had only
+one!--was brought up in a robber’s camp;--a life of bloodshed--a death
+of doom--a futurity of hell--were before him. I plucked the child from
+such a fate--I bore him away--I told the father he was dead--I placed
+him in the path to honourable fortunes. May my sin be forgiven me!
+Angelo Villani, thou art that child;--Walter de Montreal is thy father.
+But now, trembling on the verge of death, I shudder at the vindictive
+thoughts I once nourished. Perhaps--”
+
+“Sinner and accursed!” interrupted Villani, with a loud shout:--“sinner
+and accursed thou art indeed! Know that it was I who betrayed thy
+daughter’s lover!--by the son’s treason dies the father!”
+
+Not a moment more did he tarry: he waited not to witness the effect
+his words produced. As one frantic--as one whom a fiend possesses
+or pursues--he rushed from the Convent--he flew through the desolate
+streets. The death-bell came, first indistinct, then loud, upon his ear.
+Every sound seemed to him like the curse of God; on--on--he passed the
+more deserted quarter--crowds swept before him--he was mingled with
+the living stream, delayed, pushed back--thousands on thousands around,
+before him. Breathless, gasping, he still pressed on--he forced his
+way--he heard not--he saw not--all was like a dream. Up burst the sun
+over the distant hills!--the bell ceased! From right to left he pushed
+aside the crowd--his strength was as a giant’s. He neared the fatal
+spot. A dead hush lay like a heavy air over the multitude. He heard
+a voice, as he pressed along, deep and clear--it was the voice of his
+father!--it ceased--the audience breathed heavily--they murmured--they
+swayed to and fro. On, on, went Angelo Villani. The guards of the
+Senator stopped his way;--he dashed aside their pikes--he eluded their
+grasp--he pierced the armed barrier--he stood on the Place of the
+Capitol. “Hold, hold!” he would have cried--but horror struck him dumb.
+He beheld the gleaming axe--he saw the bended neck. Ere another breath
+passed his lips, a ghastly and trunkless face was raised on high--Walter
+de Montreal was no more!
+
+Villani saw--swooned not--shrunk not--breathed not!--but he turned his
+eyes from that lifted head, dropping gore, to the balcony, in which,
+according to custom, sate, in solemn pomp, the Senator of Rome--and the
+face of that young man was as the face of a demon!
+
+“Ha!” said he, muttering to himself, and recalling the words of Rienzi
+seven years before--“Blessed art thou who hast no blood of kindred to
+avenge!”
+
+
+
+Chapter 10.VI. The Suspense.
+
+Walter de Montreal was buried in the church of St. Maria dell’ Araceli.
+But the “evil that he did lived after him!” Although the vulgar
+had, until his apprehension, murmured against Rienzi for allowing so
+notorious a freebooter to be at large, he was scarcely dead ere they
+compassionated the object of their terror. With that singular species of
+piety which Montreal had always cultivated, as if a decorous and natural
+part of the character of a warrior, no sooner was his sentence fixed,
+than he had surrendered himself to the devout preparation for death.
+With the Augustine Friar he consumed the brief remainder of the night
+in prayer and confession, comforted his brothers, and passed to the
+scaffold with the step of a hero and the self-acquittal of a martyr. In
+the wonderful delusions of the human heart, far from feeling remorse at
+a life of professional rapine and slaughter, almost the last words
+of the brave warrior were in proud commendation of his own deeds. “Be
+valiant like me,” he said to his brothers, “and remember that ye are now
+the heirs to the Humbler of Apulia, Tuscany, and La Marca.”
+
+     (Pregovi che vi amiate e siate valorosi al mondo, come fui
+     io, che mi feci fare obbedienza a la Puglia, Toscana, e a La
+     Marca.”--“Vita di Cola di Rienzi”, lib. ii. cap. 22. “I pray
+     you love one another, and be valorous as was I, who made
+     Apulia, Tuscany and La Marca own obedience to me.”--“Life of
+     Cola di Rienzi”.)
+
+This confidence in himself continued at the scaffold. “I die,” he said,
+addressing the Romans--“I die contented, since my bones shall rest in
+the Holy City of St. Peter and St. Paul, and the Soldier of Christ shall
+have the burial-place of the Apostles. But I die unjustly. My wealth is
+my crime--the poverty of your state my accuser. Senator of Rome,
+thou mayst envy my last hour--men like Walter de Montreal perish not
+unavenged.” So saying, he turned to the East, murmured a brief prayer,
+knelt down deliberately, and said as to himself, “Rome guard my
+ashes!--Earth my memory--Fate my revenge;--and, now, Heaven receive my
+soul!--Strike!” At the first blow, the head was severed from the body.
+
+His treason but imperfectly known, the fear of him forgotten, all that
+remained of the recollection of Walter de Montreal (The military renown
+and bold exploits of Montreal are acknowledged by all the Italian
+authorities. One of them declares that since the time of Caesar, Italy
+had never known so great a Captain. The biographer of Rienzi, forgetting
+all the offences of the splendid and knightly robber, seems to feel only
+commiseration for his fate. He informs us, moreover, that at Tivoli
+one of his servants (perhaps our friend, Rodolf of Saxony), hearing his
+death, died of grief the following day.) in Rome, was admiration for
+his heroism, and compassion for his end. The fate of Pandulfo di Guido,
+which followed some days afterwards, excited a yet deeper, though more
+quiet, sentiment, against the Senator. “He was once Rienzi’s friend!”
+ said one man; “He was an honest, upright citizen!” muttered another;
+“He was an advocate of the people!” growled Cecco del Vecchio. But the
+Senator had wound himself up to a resolve to be inflexibly just, and to
+regard every peril to Rome as became a Roman. Rienzi remembered that he
+had never confided but he had been betrayed; he had never forgiven but
+to sharpen enmity. He was amidst a ferocious people, uncertain friends,
+wily enemies; and misplaced mercy would be but a premium to conspiracy.
+Yet the struggle he underwent was visible in the hysterical emotions he
+betrayed. He now wept bitterly, now laughed wildly. “Can I never again
+have the luxury to forgive?” said he. The coarse spectators of that
+passion deemed it,--some imbecility, some hypocrisy. But the execution
+produced the momentary effect intended. All sedition ceased, terror
+crept throughout the city, order and peace rose to the surface; but
+beneath, in the strong expression of a contemporaneous writer, “Lo
+mormorito quetamente suonava.” (“The murmur quietly sounded.”)
+
+On examining dispassionately the conduct of Rienzi at this awful period
+of his life, it is scarcely possible to condemn it of a single error
+in point of policy. Cured of his faults, he exhibited no unnecessary
+ostentation--he indulged in no exhibitions of intoxicated pride--that
+gorgeous imagination rather than vanity, which had led the Tribune into
+spectacle and pomp, was now lulled to rest, by the sober memory of grave
+vicissitudes, and the stern calmness of a maturer intellect. Frugal,
+provident, watchful, self-collected, ‘never was seen,’ observes no
+partial witness, ‘so extraordinary a man.’ (“Vita di Cola di Rienzi”,
+lib. ii. c. 23.) ‘In him was concentrated every thought for every want
+of Rome. Indefatigably occupied, he inspected, ordained, regulated all
+things; in the city, in the army, for peace, or for war. But he was
+feebly supported, and those he employed were lukewarm and lethargic.’
+Still his arms prospered. Place after place, fortress after fortress,
+yielded to the Lieutenant of the Senator: and the cession of Palestrina
+itself was hourly expected. His art and address were always strikingly
+exhibited in difficult situations, and the reader cannot fail to have
+noticed how conspicuously they were displayed in delivering himself from
+the iron tutelage of his foreign mercenaries. Montreal executed, his
+brothers imprisoned, (though their lives were spared,) a fear that
+induced respect was stricken into the breasts of those bandit soldiers.
+Removed from Rome, and, under Annibaldi, engaged against the Barons,
+constant action and constant success, withheld those necessary fiends
+from falling on their Master; while Rienzi, willing to yield to the
+natural antipathy of the Romans, thus kept the Northmen from all contact
+with the city; and as he boasted, was the only chief in Italy who
+reigned in his palace guarded only by his citizens.
+
+Despite his perilous situation--despite his suspicions, and his fears,
+no wanton cruelty stained his stern justice--Montreal and Pandulfo di
+Guido were the only state victims he demanded. If, according to the
+dark Machiavelism of Italian wisdom, the death of those enemies was
+impolitic, it was not in the act, but the mode of doing it. A prince
+of Bologna, or of Milan would have avoided the sympathy excited by
+the scaffold, and the drug or the dagger would have been the safer
+substitute for the axe. But with all his faults, real and imputed, no
+single act of that foul and murtherous policy, which made the science
+of the more fortunate princes of Italy, ever advanced the ambition or
+promoted the security of the Last of the Roman Tribunes. Whatever his
+errors, he lived and died as became a man, who dreamed the vain but
+glorious dream, that in a corrupt and dastard populace he could revive
+the genius of the old Republic.
+
+Of all who attended on the Senator, the most assiduous and the most
+honoured was still Angelo Villani. Promoted to a high civil station,
+Rienzi felt it as a return of youth, to find one person entitled to his
+gratitude;--he loved and confided in the youth as a son. Villani was
+never absent from his side, except in intercourse with the various
+popular leaders in the various quarters of the city; and in this
+intercourse his zeal was indefatigable--it seemed even to prey upon
+his health; and Rienzi chid him fondly, whenever starting from his own
+reveries, he beheld the abstracted eye and the livid paleness which had
+succeeded the sparkle and bloom of youth.
+
+Such chiding the young man answered only by the same unvarying words.
+
+“Senator, I have a great trust to fulfil;”--and at these words he
+smiled.
+
+One day Villani, while with the Senator, said rather abruptly, “Do you
+remember, my Lord, that before Viterbo, I acquitted myself so in arms,
+that even the Cardinal d’Albornoz was pleased to notice me?”
+
+“I remember your valour well, Angelo; but why the question?”
+
+“My Lord, Bellini, the Captain of the Guard of the Capitol is
+dangerously ill.”
+
+“I know it.”
+
+“Whom can my Lord trust at the post?”
+
+“Why, the Lieutenant.”
+
+“What!--a soldier that has served under the Orsini!”
+
+“True. Well! There is Tommaso Filangieri.”
+
+“An excellent man; but is he not kin by blood to Pandulfo di Guido?”
+
+“Ay--is he so? It must be thought of. Hast thou any friend to name?”
+ said the Senator, smiling, “Methinks thy cavils point that way.”
+
+“My Lord,” replied Villani, colouring; “I am too young perhaps; but the
+post is one that demands fidelity more than it does years. Shall I own
+it?--My tastes are rather to serve thee with my sword than with my pen.”
+
+“Wilt thou, indeed, accept the office? It is of less dignity and
+emolument than the one you hold; and you are full young to lead these
+stubborn spirits.”
+
+“Senator, I led taller men than they are to the assault at Viterbo. But,
+be it as seems best to your superior wisdom. Whatever you do, I pray you
+to be cautious. If you select a traitor to the command of the Capitol
+Guard!--I tremble at the thought!”
+
+“By my faith, thou dost turn pale at it, dear boy; thy affection is
+a sweet drop in a bitter draught. Whom can I choose better than
+thee?--thou shalt have the post, at least during Bellini’s illness. I
+will attend to it today. The business, too, will less fatigue thy young
+mind than that which now employs thee. Thou art over-laboured in our
+cause.”
+
+“Senator, I can but repeat my usual answer--I have a great trust to
+fulfil!”
+
+
+
+Chapter 10.VII. The Tax.
+
+These formidable conspiracies quelled, the Barons nearly subdued, and
+three parts of the Papal territory reunited to Rome, Rienzi now
+deemed he might safely execute one of his favourite projects for the
+preservation of the liberties of his native city; and this was to
+raise and organize in each quarter of Rome a Roman Legion. Armed in the
+defence of their own institutions, he thus trusted to establish amongst
+her own citizens the only soldiery requisite for Rome.
+
+But so base were the tools with which this great man was condemned to
+work out his noble schemes, that none could be found to serve their own
+country, without a pay equal to that demanded by foreign hirelings. With
+the insolence so peculiar to a race that has once been great, each Roman
+said, “Am I not better than a German?--Pay me, then, accordingly.”
+
+The Senator smothered his disgust--he had learned at last to know that
+the age of the Catos was no more. From a daring enthusiast, experience
+had converted him into a practical statesman. The Legions were necessary
+to Rome--they were formed--gallant their appearance and faultless
+their caparisons. How were they to be paid? There was but one means to
+maintain Rome--Rome must be taxed. A gabelle was put upon wine and salt.
+
+The Proclamation ran thus:--
+
+“Romans! raised to the rank of your Senator, my whole thought has been
+for your liberties and welfare; already treason defeated in the City,
+our banners triumphant without, attest the favour with which the Deity
+regards men who seek to unite liberty with law. Let us set an example
+to Italy and the World! Let us prove that the Roman sword can guard
+the Roman Forum! In each Rione of the City is provided a Legion of the
+Citizens, collected from the traders and artisans of the town; they
+allege that they cannot leave their callings without remuneration. Your
+senator calls upon you willingly to assist in your own defence. He has
+given you liberty; he has restored to you peace: your oppressors are
+scattered over the earth. He asks you now to preserve the treasures you
+have gained. To be free, you must sacrifice something; for freedom, what
+sacrifice too great? Confident of your support, I at length, for the
+first time, exert the right entrusted to me by office--and for Rome’s
+salvation I tax the Romans!”
+
+Then followed the announcement of the gabelle.
+
+The Proclamation was set up in the public thoroughfares. Round one
+of the placards a crowd assembled. Their gestures were vehement and
+unguarded--their eyes sparkled--they conversed low, but eagerly.
+
+“He dares to tax us, then! Why, the Barons or the Pope could not do more
+than that!”
+
+“Shame! shame!” cried a gaunt female; “we, who were his friends! How are
+our little ones to get bread?”
+
+“He should have seized the Pope’s money!” quoth an honest wine-vender.
+
+“Ah! Pandulfo di Guido would have maintained an army at his own cost. He
+was a rich man. What insolence in the innkeeper’s son to be a Senator!”
+
+“We are not Romans if we suffer this!” said a deserter from Palestrina.
+
+“Fellow-citizens!” exclaimed gruffly a tall man, who had hitherto been
+making a clerk read to him the particulars of the tax imposed, and
+whose heavy brain at length understood that wine was to be made
+dearer--“Fellow-citizens, we must have a new revolution! This is indeed
+gratitude! What have we benefited by restoring this man! Are we always
+to be ground to the dust? To pay--pay--pay! Is that all we are fit for?”
+
+“Hark to Cecco del Vecchio!”
+
+“No, no; not now,” growled the smith. “Tonight the artificers have a
+special meeting. We’ll see--we’ll see!”
+
+A young man, muffled in a cloak, who had not been before observed,
+touched the smith.
+
+“Whoever storms the Capitol the day after tomorrow at the dawn,” he
+whispered, “shall find the guards absent!”
+
+He was gone before the smith could look round.
+
+The same night Rienzi, retiring to rest, said to Angelo Villani--“A bold
+but necessary measure this of mine! How do the people take it?”
+
+“They murmur a little, but seem to recognise the necessity. Cecco del
+Vecchio was the loudest grumbler, but is now the loudest approver.”
+
+“The man is rough; he once deserted me;--but then that fatal
+excommunication! He and the Romans learned a bitter lesson in that
+desertion, and experience has, I trust, taught them to be honest. Well,
+if this tax be raised quietly, in two years Rome will be again the Queen
+of Italy;--her army manned--her Republic formed; and then--then--”
+
+“Then what, Senator?”
+
+“Why then, my Angelo, Cola di Rienzi may die in peace! There is a want
+which a profound experience of power and pomp brings at last to us--a
+want gnawing as that of hunger, wearing as that of sleep!--my Angelo, it
+is the want to die!”
+
+“My Lord, I would give this right hand,” cried Villani, earnestly, “to
+hear you say you were attached to life!”
+
+“You are a good youth, Angelo!” said Rienzi, as he passed to Nina’s
+chamber; and in her smile and wistful tenderness, forgot for a
+while--that he was a great man!
+
+
+
+Chapter 10.VIII. The Threshold of the Event.
+
+The next morning the Senator of Rome held high Court in the Capitol.
+From Florence, from Padua, from Pisa, even from Milan, (the dominion of
+the Visconti,) from Genoa, from Naples,--came Ambassadors to welcome his
+return, or to thank him for having freed Italy from the freebooter De
+Montreal. Venice alone, who held in her pay the Grand Company, stood
+aloof. Never had Rienzi seemed more prosperous and more powerful, and
+never had he exhibited a more easy and cheerful majesty of demeanour.
+
+Scarce was the audience over, when a messenger arrived from Palestrina.
+The town had surrendered, the Colonna had departed, and the standard
+of the Senator waved from the walls of the last hold of the rebellious
+Barons. Rome might now at length consider herself free, and not a foe
+seemed left to menace the repose of Rienzi.
+
+The Court dissolved. The Senator, elated and joyous, repaired
+towards his private apartments, previous to the banquet given to the
+Ambassadors. Villani met him with his wonted sombre aspect.
+
+“No sadness today, my Angelo,” said the Senator, gaily; “Palestrina is
+ours!”
+
+“I am glad to hear such news, and to see my Lord of so fair a mien,”
+ answered Angelo. “Does he not now desire life?”
+
+“Till Roman virtue revives, perhaps--yes! But thus are we fools of
+Fortune;--today glad--tomorrow dejected!”
+
+“Tomorrow,” repeated Villani, mechanically: “Ay--tomorrow perhaps
+dejected.”
+
+“Thou playest with my words, boy,” said Rienzi, half angrily, as he
+turned away.
+
+But Villani heeded not the displeasure of his Lord.
+
+The banquet was thronged and brilliant; and Rienzi that day, without an
+effort, played the courteous host.
+
+Milanese, Paduan, Pisan, Neapolitan, vied with each other in
+attracting the smiles of the potent Senator. Prodigal were their
+compliments--lavish their promises of support. No monarch in Italy
+seemed more securely throned.
+
+The banquet was over (as usual on state occasions) at an early hour;
+and Rienzi, somewhat heated with wine, strolled forth alone from the
+Capitol. Bending his solitary steps towards the Palatine, he saw the
+pale and veil-like mists that succeed the sunset, gather over the wild
+grass which waves above the Palace of the Caesars. On a mound of ruins
+(column and arch overthrown) he stood, with folded arms, musing and
+intent. In the distance lay the melancholy tombs of the Campagna, and
+the circling hills, crested with the purple hues soon to melt beneath
+the starlight. Not a breeze stirred the dark cypress and unwaving pine.
+There was something awful in the stillness of the skies, hushing the
+desolate grandeur of the earth below. Many and mingled were the thoughts
+that swept over Rienzi’s breast: memory was busy at his heart. How
+often, in his youth, had he trodden the same spot!--what visions had
+he nursed!--what hopes conceived! In the turbulence of his later life,
+Memory had long slept; but at that hour, she re-asserted her shadowy
+reign with a despotism that seemed prophetic. He was wandering--a boy,
+with his young brother, hand in hand, by the riverside at eve: anon he
+saw a pale face and gory side, and once more uttered his imprecations of
+revenge! His first successes, his virgin triumphs, his secret love, his
+fame, his power, his reverses, the hermitage of Maiella, the dungeon of
+Avignon, the triumphal return to Rome,--all swept across his breast with
+a distinctness as if he were living those scenes again!--and now!--he
+shrunk from the present, and descended the hill. The moon, already
+risen, shed her light over the Forum, as he passed through its mingled
+ruins. By the Temple of Jupiter, two figures suddenly emerged; the
+moonlight fell upon their faces, and Rienzi recognised Cecco del
+Vecchio and Angelo Villani. They saw him not; but, eagerly conversing,
+disappeared by the Arch of Trajan.
+
+“Villani! ever active in my service!” thought the Senator; “methinks
+this morning I spoke to him harshly--it was churlish in me!”
+
+He re-entered the Place of the Capitol--he stood by the staircase of
+the Lion; there was a red stain upon the pavement, unobliterated since
+Montreal’s execution, and the Senator drew himself aside with an inward
+shudder. Was it the ghastly and spectral light of the Moon, or did the
+face of that old Egyptian Monster wear an aspect that was as of life?
+The stony eyeballs seemed bent upon him with a malignant scowl; and as
+he passed on, and looked behind, they appeared almost preternaturally
+to follow his steps. A chill, he knew not why, sunk into his heart. He
+hastened to regain his palace. The sentinels made way for him.
+
+“Senator,” said one of them, doubtingly, “Messere Angelo Villani is our
+new captain--we are to obey his orders?”
+
+“Assuredly,” returned the Senator, passing on. The man lingered
+uneasily, as if he would have spoken, but Rienzi observed it not.
+Seeking his chamber, he found Nina and Irene waiting for him. His heart
+yearned to his wife. Care and toil had of late driven her from his
+thoughts, and he felt it remorsefully, as he gazed upon her noble face,
+softened by the solicitude of untiring and anxious love.
+
+“Sweetest,” said he, winding his arms around her tenderly; “thy lips
+never chide me, but thine eyes sometimes do! We have been apart too
+long. Brighter days dawn upon us, when I shall have leisure to thank
+thee for all thy care. And you, my fair sister, you smile on me!--ah,
+you have heard that your lover, ere this, is released by the cession of
+Palestrina, and tomorrow’s sun will see him at your feet. Despite all
+the cares of the day, I remembered thee, my Irene, and sent a messenger
+to bring back the blush to that pale cheek. Come, come, we shall be
+happy again!” And with that domestic fondness common to him, when
+harsher thoughts permitted, he sate himself beside the two persons
+dearest to his hearth and heart.
+
+“So happy--if we could have many hours like this!” murmured Nina,
+sinking on his breast. “Yet sometimes I wish--”
+
+“And I too,” interrupted Rienzi; “for I read thy woman’s thought--I too
+sometimes wish that fate had placed us in the lowlier valleys of
+life! But it may come yet! Irene wedded to Adrian--Rome married to
+Liberty--and then, Nina, methinks you and I would find some quiet
+hermitage, and talk over old gauds and triumphs, as of a summer’s dream.
+Beautiful, kiss me! Couldst thou resign these pomps?”
+
+“For a desert with thee, Cola!”
+
+“Let me reflect,” resumed Rienzi; “is not today the seventh of October?
+Yes! on the seventh, be it noted, my foes yielded to my power! Seven! my
+fated number, whether ominous of good or evil! Seven months did I reign
+as Tribune--seven (There was the lapse of one year between the release
+of Rienzi from Avignon, and his triumphal return to Rome: a year chiefly
+spent in the campaign of Albornoz.) years was I absent as an exile;
+tomorrow, that sees me without an enemy, completes my seventh week of
+return!”
+
+“And seven was the number of the crowns the Roman Convents and the Roman
+Council awarded thee, after the ceremony which gave thee the knighthood
+of the Santo Spirito!” (This superstition had an excuse in strange
+historical coincidences; and the number seven was indeed to Rienzi what
+the 3rd of September was to Cromwell. The ceremony of the seven
+crowns which he received after his knighthood, on the nature of which
+ridiculous ignorance has been shown by many recent writers, was, in
+fact, principally a religious and typical donation, (symbolical of the
+gifts of the Holy Spirit,) conferred by the heads of convents--and that
+part of the ceremony which was political, was republican, not regal.)
+said Nina, adding, with woman’s tender wit, “the brightest association
+of all!”
+
+“Follies seem these thoughts to others, and to philosophy, in truth, they
+are so,” said Rienzi; “but all my life long, omen and type and shadow
+have linked themselves to action and event: and the atmosphere of other
+men hath not been mine. Life itself a riddle, why should riddles amaze
+us? The Future!--what mystery in the very word! Had we lived all through
+the Past, since Time was, our profoundest experience of a thousand ages
+could not give us a guess of the events that wait the very moment we are
+about to enter! Thus deserted by Reason, what wonder that we recur to
+the Imagination, on which, by dream and symbol, God sometimes paints
+the likeness of things to come? Who can endure to leave the Future all
+unguessed, and sit tamely down to groan under the fardel of the Present?
+No, no! that which the foolish-wise call Fanaticism, belongs to the same
+part of us as Hope. Each but carries us onward--from a barren strand to
+a glorious, if unbounded sea. Each is the yearning for the GREAT BEYOND,
+which attests our immortality. Each has its visions and chimeras--some
+false, but some true! Verily, a man who becomes great is often but made
+so by a kind of sorcery in his own soul--a Pythia which prophesies that
+he shall be great--and so renders the life one effort to fulfil the
+warning! Is this folly?--it were so, if all things stopped at the grave!
+But perhaps the very sharpening, and exercising, and elevating the
+faculties here--though but for a bootless end on earth--may be designed
+to fit the soul, thus quickened and ennobled, to some high destiny
+beyond the earth! Who can tell? not I!--Let us pray!”
+
+While the Senator was thus employed, Rome in her various quarters
+presented less holy and quiet scenes.
+
+In the fortress of the Orsini lights flitted to and fro, through the
+gratings of the great court. Angelo Villani might be seen stealing from
+the postern-gate. Another hour, and the Moon was high in heaven; toward
+the ruins of the Colosseum, men, whose dress bespoke them of the lowest
+rank, were seen creeping from lanes and alleys, two by two; from these
+ruins glided again the form of the son of Montreal. Later yet--the Moon
+is sinking--a grey light breaking in the East--and the gates of Rome, by
+St. John of Lateran, are open! Villani is conversing with the sentries!
+The Moon has set--the mountains are dim with a mournful and chilling
+haze--Villani is before the palace of the Capitol--the only soldier
+there! Where are the Roman legions that were to guard alike the freedom
+and the deliverer of Rome?
+
+
+
+Chapter The Last. The Close of the Chase.
+
+It was the morning of the 8th of October, 1354. Rienzi, who rose
+betimes, stirred restlessly in his bed. “It is yet early,” he said to
+Nina, whose soft arm was round his neck; “none of my people seem to be
+astir. Howbeit, my day begins before theirs.”
+
+“Rest yet, my Cola; you want sleep.”
+
+“No; I feel feverish, and this old pain in the side torments me. I have
+letters to write.”
+
+“Let me be your secretary, dearest,” said Nina.
+
+Rienzi smiled affectionately as he rose; he repaired to his closet
+adjoining his sleeping apartment, and used the bath, as was his wont.
+Then dressing himself, he returned to Nina, who, already loosely robed,
+sate by the writing-table, ready for her office of love.
+
+“How still are all things!” said Rienzi. “What a cool and delicious
+prelude, in these early hours, to the toilsome day.”
+
+Leaning over his wife, he then dictated different letters, interrupting
+the task at times by such observations as crossed his mind.
+
+“So, now to Annibaldi! By the way, young Adrian should join us today;
+how I rejoice for Irene’s sake!”
+
+“Dear sister--yes! she loves,--if any, Cola, can so love,--as we do.”
+
+“Well, but to your task, my fair scribe. Ha! what noise is that? I hear
+an armed step--the stairs creak--some one shouts my name.”
+
+Rienzi flew to his sword! the door was thrown rudely open, and a figure
+in complete armour appeared within the chamber.
+
+“How! what means this?” said Rienzi, standing before Nina, with his
+drawn sword.
+
+The intruder lifted his visor--it was Adrian Colonna.
+
+“Fly, Rienzi!--hasten, Signora! Thank Heaven, I can save ye yet! Myself
+and train released by the capture of Palestrina, the pain of my wound
+detained me last night at Tivoli. The town was filled with armed
+men--not thine, Senator. I heard rumours that alarmed me. I resolved to
+proceed onward--I reached Rome, the gates of the city were wide open!”
+
+“How!”
+
+“Your guard gone. Presently I came upon a band of the retainers of the
+Savelli. My insignia, as a Colonna, misled them. I learned that this
+very hour some of your enemies are within the city, the rest are on
+their march--the people themselves arm against you. In the obscurer
+streets I passed through, the mob were already forming. They took me
+for thy foe, and shouted. I came hither--thy sentries have vanished. The
+private door below is unbarred and open. Not a soul seems left in thy
+palace. Haste--fly--save thyself!--Where is Irene?”
+
+“The Capitol deserted!--impossible!” cried Rienzi. He strode across the
+chambers to the ante-room, where his night-guard usually waited--it was
+empty! He passed hastily to Villani’s room--it was untenanted! He would
+have passed farther, but the doors were secured without. It was evident
+that all egress had been cut off, save by the private door below,--and
+that had been left open to admit his murtherers!
+
+He returned to his room--Nina had already gone to rouse and prepare
+Irene, whose chamber was on the other side, within one of their own.
+
+“Quick, Senator!” said Adrian. “Methinks there is yet time. We must make
+across to the Tiber. I have stationed my faithful squires and Northmen
+there. A boat waits us.”
+
+“Hark!” interrupted Rienzi, whose senses had of late been
+preternaturally quickened. “I hear a distant shout--a familiar shout,
+‘Viva ‘l Popolo!’ Why, so say I! These must be friends.”
+
+“Deceive not thyself; thou hast scarce a friend at Rome.”
+
+“Hist!” said Rienzi, in a whisper; “save Nina--save Irene. I cannot
+accompany thee.”
+
+“Art thou mad?”
+
+“No! but fearless. Besides, did I accompany, I might but destroy you
+all. Were I found with you, you would be massacred with me. Without me
+ye are safe. Yes, even the Senator’s wife and sister have provoked no
+revenge. Save them, noble Colonna! Cola di Rienzi puts his trust in God
+alone!”
+
+By this time Nina had returned; Irene with her. Afar was heard the
+tramp--steady--slow--gathering--of the fatal multitude.
+
+“Now, Cola,” said Nina, with a bold and cheerful air, and she took her
+husband’s arm, while Adrian had already found his charge in Irene.
+
+“Yes, now, Nina!” said Rienzi; “at length we part! If this is my last
+hour--in my last hour I pray God to bless and shield thee! for verily,
+thou hast been my exceeding solace--provident as a parent, tender as a
+child, the smile of my hearth, the--the--”
+
+Rienzi was almost unmanned. Emotions, deep, conflicting, unspeakably
+fond and grateful, literally choked his speech.
+
+“What!” cried Nina, clinging to his breast, and parting her hair from
+her eyes, as she sought his averted face. “Part!--never! This is my
+place--all Rome shall not tear me from it!”
+
+Adrian, in despair, seized her hand, and attempted to drag her thence.
+
+“Touch me not, sir!” said Nina, waving her arm with angry majesty, while
+her eyes sparkled as a lioness, whom the huntsmen would sever from her
+young. “I am the wife of Cola di Rienzi, the Great Senator of Rome, and
+by his side will I live and die!”
+
+“Take her hence: quick!--quick! I hear the crowd advancing.”
+
+Irene tore herself from Adrian, and fell at the feet of Rienzi--she
+clasped his knees.
+
+“Come, my brother, come! Why lose these precious moments? Rome forbids
+you to cast away a life in which her very self is bound up.”
+
+“Right, Irene; Rome is bound up with me, and we will rise or fall
+together!--no more!”
+
+“You destroy us all!” said Adrian, with generous and impatient warmth.
+“A few minutes more, and we are lost. Rash man! it is not to fall by an
+infuriate mob that you have been preserved from so many dangers.”
+
+“I believe it,” said the Senator, as his tall form seemed to dilate as
+with the greatness of his own soul. “I shall triumph yet! Never shall
+mine enemies--never shall posterity say that a second time Rienzi
+abandoned Rome! Hark! ‘Viva ‘l Popolo!’ still the cry of ‘THE PEOPLE.’
+That cry scares none but tyrants! I shall triumph and survive!”
+
+“And I with thee!” said Nina, firmly. Rienzi paused a moment, gazed on
+his wife, passionately clasped her to his heart, kissed her again and
+again, and then said, “Nina, I command thee,--Go!”
+
+“Never!”
+
+He paused. Irene’s face, drowned in tears, met his eyes.
+
+“We will all perish with you,” said his sister; “you only, Adrian, you
+leave us!”
+
+“Be it so,” said the Knight, sadly; “we will all remain,” and he
+desisted at once from further effort.
+
+There was a dead but short pause, broken but by a convulsive sob from
+Irene. The tramp of the raging thousands sounded fearfully distinct.
+Rienzi seemed lost in thought--then lifting his head, he said, calmly,
+“ye have triumphed--I join ye--I but collect these papers, and follow
+you. Quick, Adrian--save them!” and he pointed meaningly to Nina.
+
+Waiting no other hint, the young Colonna seized Nina in his strong
+grasp--with his left hand he supported Irene, who with terror and
+excitement was almost insensible. Rienzi relieved him of the lighter
+load--he took his sister in his arms, and descended the winding stairs.
+Nina remained passive--she heard her husband’s step behind, it was
+enough for her--she but turned once to thank him with her eyes. A tall
+Northman clad in armour stood at the open door. Rienzi placed Irene, now
+perfectly lifeless, in the soldier’s arms, and kissed her pale cheek in
+silence.
+
+“Quick, my Lord,” said the Northman, “on all sides they come!” So
+saying, he bounded down the descent with his burthen. Adrian followed
+with Nina; the Senator paused one moment, turned back, and was in his
+room ere Adrian was aware that he had vanished.
+
+Hastily he drew the coverlid from his bed, fastened it to the casement
+bars, and by its aid dropped (at a distance of several feet) into the
+balcony below. “I will not die like a rat,” said he, “in the trap they
+have set for me! The whole crowd shall, at least, see and hear me.”
+
+This was the work of a moment.
+
+Meanwhile, Nina had scarcely proceeded six paces, before she discovered
+that she was alone with Adrian.
+
+“Ha! Cola!” she cried, “where is he? he has gone!”
+
+“Take heart, Lady, he has returned but for some secret papers he has
+forgotten. He will follow us anon.”
+
+“Let us wait, then.”
+
+“Lady,” said Adrian, grinding his teeth, “hear you not the crowd?--on,
+on!” and he flew with a swifter step. Nina struggled in his grasp--Love
+gave her the strength of despair. With a wild laugh she broke from him.
+She flew back--the door was closed--but unbarred--her trembling hands
+lingered a moment round the spring. She opened it, drew the heavy bolt
+across the panels, and frustrated all attempt from Adrian to regain her.
+She was on the stairs,--she was in the room. Rienzi was gone! She fled,
+shrieking his name, through the State Chambers--all was desolate. She
+found the doors opening on the various passages that admitted to the
+rooms below barred without. Breathless and gasping, she returned to the
+chamber. She hurried to the casement--she perceived the method by
+which he had descended below--her brave heart told her of his brave
+design;--she saw they were separated,--“But the same roof holds us,” she
+cried, joyously, “and our fate shall be the same!” With that thought she
+sank in mute patience on the floor.
+
+Forming the generous resolve not to abandon the faithful and devoted
+pair without another effort, Adrian had followed Nina, but too late--the
+door was closed against his efforts. The crowd marched on--he heard
+their cry change on a sudden--it was no longer “LIVE THE PEOPLE!” but
+“DEATH TO THE TRAITOR!” His attendant had already disappeared, and
+waking now only to the danger of Irene, the Colonna in bitter grief
+turned away, lightly sped down the descent, and hastened to the
+riverside, where the boat and his band awaited him.
+
+The balcony on which Rienzi had alighted was that from which he had been
+accustomed to address the people--it communicated with a vast hall used
+on solemn occasions for State festivals--and on either side were square
+projecting towers, whose grated casements looked into the balcony.
+One of these towers was devoted to the armory, the other contained the
+prison of Brettone, the brother of Montreal. Beyond the latter tower was
+the general prison of the Capitol. For then the prison and the palace
+were in awful neighbourhood!
+
+The windows of the Hall were yet open--and Rienzi passed into it from
+the balcony--the witness of the yesterday’s banquet was still there--the
+wine, yet undried, crimsoned the floor, and goblets of gold and silver
+shone from the recesses. He proceeded at once to the armory, and
+selected from the various suits that which he himself had worn when,
+nearly eight years ago, he had chased the Barons from the gates of Rome.
+He arrayed himself in the mail, leaving only his head uncovered; and
+then taking, in his right hand, from the wall, the great Gonfalon of
+Rome, returned once more to the hall. Not a man encountered him. In that
+vast building, save the prisoners, and the faithful Nina, whose presence
+he knew not of--the Senator was alone.
+
+On they came, no longer in measured order, as stream after stream--from
+lane, from alley, from palace and from hovel--the raging sea
+received new additions. On they came--their passions excited by their
+numbers--women and men, children and malignant age--in all the awful
+array of aroused, released, unresisted physical strength and brutal
+wrath; “Death to the traitor--death to the tyrant--death to him who has
+taxed the people!”--“Mora l’ traditore che ha fatta la gabella!--Mora!”
+ Such was the cry of the people--such the crime of the Senator! They
+broke over the low palisades of the Capitol--they filled with one sudden
+rush the vast space;--a moment before so desolate,--now swarming with
+human beings athirst for blood!
+
+Suddenly came a dead silence, and on the balcony above stood Rienzi--his
+head was bared and the morning sun shone over that lordly brow, and
+the hair grown grey before its time, in the service of that maddening
+multitude. Pale and erect he stood--neither fear, nor anger, nor
+menace--but deep grief and high resolve--upon his features! A momentary
+shame--a momentary awe seized the crowd.
+
+He pointed to the Gonfalon, wrought with the Republican motto and arms
+of Rome, and thus he began:--
+
+“I too am a Roman and a Citizen; hear me!”
+
+“Hear him not! hear him not! his false tongue can charm away our
+senses!” cried a voice louder than his own; and Rienzi recognised Cecco
+del Vecchio.
+
+“Hear him not! down with the tyrant!” cried a more shrill and youthful
+tone; and by the side of the artisan stood Angelo Villani.
+
+“Hear him not! death to the death-giver!” cried a voice close at hand,
+and from the grating of the neighbouring prison glared near upon him, as
+the eye of a tiger, the vengeful gaze of the brother of Montreal.
+
+Then from Earth to Heaven rose the roar--“Down with the tyrant--down
+with him who taxed the people!”
+
+A shower of stones rattled on the mail of the Senator,--still he stirred
+not. No changing muscle betokened fear. His persuasion of his own
+wonderful powers of eloquence, if he could but be heard, inspired him
+yet with hope; he stood collected in his own indignant, but determined
+thoughts;--but the knowledge of that very eloquence was now his
+deadliest foe. The leaders of the multitude trembled lest he should be
+heard; “and doubtless,” says the contemporaneous biographer, “had he but
+spoken he would have changed them all, and the work been marred.”
+
+The soldiers of the Barons had already mixed themselves with the
+throng--more deadly weapons than stones aided the wrath of the
+multitude--darts and arrows darkened the air; and now a voice was heard
+shrieking, “Way for the torches!” And red in the sunlight the torches
+tossed and waved, and danced to and fro, above the heads of the crowd,
+as if the fiends were let loose amongst the mob! And what place in
+hell hath fiends like those a mad mob can furnish? Straw, and wood, and
+litter, were piled hastily round the great doors of the Capitol, and the
+smoke curled suddenly up, beating back the rush of the assailants.
+
+Rienzi was no longer visible, an arrow had pierced his hand--the right
+hand that supported the flag of Rome--the right hand that had given
+a constitution to the Republic. He retired from the storm into the
+desolate hall.
+
+He sat down;--and tears, springing from no weak and woman source, but
+tears from the loftiest fountain of emotion--tears that befit a warrior
+when his own troops desert him--a patriot when his countrymen rush
+to their own doom--a father when his children rebel against his
+love,--tears such as these forced themselves from his eyes and
+relieved,--but they changed, his heart!
+
+“Enough, enough!” he said, presently rising and dashing the drops
+scornfully away; “I have risked, dared, toiled enough for this dastard
+and degenerate race. I will yet baffle their malice--I renounce the
+thought of which they are so little worthy!--Let Rome perish!--I feel,
+at last, that I am nobler than my country!--she deserves not so high a
+sacrifice!”
+
+With that feeling, Death lost all the nobleness of aspect it had before
+presented to him; and he resolved, in very scorn of his ungrateful foes,
+in very defeat of their inhuman wrath, to make one effort for his life!
+He divested himself of his glittering arms; his address, his dexterity,
+his craft, returned to him. His active mind ran over the chances of
+disguise--of escape;--he left the hall--passed through the humbler
+rooms, devoted to the servitors and menials--found in one of them a
+coarse working garb--indued himself with it--placed upon his head some
+of the draperies and furniture of the palace, as if escaping with
+them; and said, with his old “fantastico riso” (“Fantastic smile or
+laugh.”)--“When all other friends desert me, I may well forsake myself!”
+ With that he awaited his occasion.
+
+Meanwhile the flames burnt fierce and fast; the outer door below was
+already consumed; from the apartment he had deserted the fire burst out
+in volleys of smoke--the wood crackled--the lead melted--with a crash
+fell the severed gates--the dreadful entrance was opened to all the
+multitude--the proud Capitol of the Caesars was already tottering to its
+fall!--Now was the time!--he passed the flaming door--the smouldering
+threshold;--he passed the outer gate unscathed--he was in the middle of
+the crowd. “Plenty of pillage within,” he said to the bystanders, in
+the Roman patois, his face concealed by his load--“Suso, suso a gliu
+traditore!” (Down, down with the traitor.) The mob rushed past him--he
+went on--he gained the last stair descending into the open streets--he
+was at the last gate--liberty and life were before him.
+
+A soldier (one of his own) seized him. “Pass not--whither goest thou?”
+
+“Beware, lest the Senator escape disguised!” cried a voice behind--it
+was Villani’s. The concealing load was torn from his head--Rienzi stood
+revealed!
+
+“I am the Senator!” he said in a loud voice. “Who dare touch the
+Representative of the People?”
+
+The multitude were round him in an instant. Not led, but rather hurried
+and whirled along, the Senator was borne to the Place of the Lion. With
+the intense glare of the bursting flames, the grey image reflected a
+lurid light, and glowed--(that grim and solemn monument!)--as if itself
+of fire!
+
+There arrived, the crowd gave way, terrified by the greatness of their
+victim. Silent he stood, and turned his face around; nor could the
+squalor of his garb, nor the terror of the hour, nor the proud grief of
+detection, abate the majesty of his mien, or reassure the courage of the
+thousands who gathered, gazing, round him. The whole Capitol wrapped
+in fire, lighted with ghastly pomp the immense multitude. Down the long
+vista of the streets extended the fiery light and the serried throng,
+till the crowd closed with the gleaming standards of the Colonna--the
+Orsini--the Savelli! Her true tyrants were marching into Rome! As the
+sound of their approaching horns and trumpets broke upon the burning
+air, the mob seemed to regain their courage. Rienzi prepared to speak;
+his first word was as the signal of his own death.
+
+“Die, tyrant!” cried Cecco del Vecchio: and he plunged his dagger in the
+Senator’s breast.
+
+“Die, executioner of Montreal!” muttered Villani: “thus the trust is
+fulfilled!” and his was the second stroke. Then as he drew back, and saw
+the artisan in all the drunken fury of his brute passion, tossing up his
+cap, shouting aloud, and spurning the fallen lion,--the young man gazed
+upon him with a look of withering and bitter scorn, and said, while he
+sheathed his blade, and slowly turned to quit the crowd,
+
+“Fool, miserable fool! thou and these at least had no blood of kindred
+to avenge!”
+
+They heeded not his words--they saw him not depart; for as Rienzi,
+without a word, without a groan, fell to the earth,--as the roaring
+waves of the multitude closed over him,--a voice, shrill, sharp, and
+wild, was heard above all the clamour. At the casement of the Palace,
+(the casement of her bridal chamber,) Nina stood!--through the flames
+that burst below and around, her face and outstretched arms alone
+visible! Ere yet the sound of that thrilling cry passed from the air,
+down with a mighty crash thundered that whole wing of the Capitol,--a
+blackened and smouldering mass.
+
+At that hour, a solitary boat was gliding swiftly along the Tiber. Rome
+was at a distance, but the lurid blow of the conflagration cast its
+reflection upon the placid and glassy stream: fair beyond description
+was the landscape; soft beyond all art of Painter and of Poet, the
+sunlight quivering over the autumnal herbage, and hushing into tender
+calm the waves of the golden River!
+
+Adrian’s eyes were strained towards the towers of the
+Capitol, distinguished by the flames from the spires and domes
+around;--senseless, and clasped to his guardian breast, Irene was
+happily unconscious of the horrors of the time.
+
+“They dare not--they dare not,” said the brave Colonna, “touch a hair of
+that sacred head!--if Rienzi fall, the liberties of Rome fall for ever!
+As those towers that surmount the flames, the pride and monument
+of Rome, he shall rise above the dangers of the hour. Behold, still
+unscathed amidst the raging element, the Capitol itself is his emblem!”
+
+Scarce had he spoken, when a vast volume of smoke obscured the fires
+afar off, a dull crash (deadened by the distance) travelled to his ear,
+and the next moment, the towers on which he gazed had vanished from
+the scene, and one intense and sullen glare seemed to settle over the
+atmosphere,--making all Rome itself the funeral pyre of THE LAST OF THE
+ROMAN TRIBUNES!
+
+
+The End
+
+
+
+
+Appendix I. Some Remarks on the Life and Character of Rienzi.
+
+The principal authority from which historians have taken their account
+of the life and times of Rienzi is a very curious biography, by some
+unknown contemporary; and this, which is in the Roman patois of the
+time, has been rendered not quite unfamiliar to the French and English
+reader by the work of Pere du Cerceau, called “Conjuration de Nicolas
+Gabrini, dit de Rienzi,” (See for a specimen of the singular blunders
+of the Frenchman’s work, Appendix II.) which has at once pillaged and
+deformed the Roman biographer. The biography I refer to was published
+(and the errors of the former editions revised) by Muratori in his great
+collection; and has lately been reprinted separately in an improved
+text, accompanied by notes of much discrimination and scholastic taste,
+and a comment upon that celebrated poem of Petrarch, “Spirito Gentil,”
+ which the majority of Italian critics have concurred in considering
+addressed to Rienzi, in spite of the ingenious arguments to the contrary
+by the Abbe de Sade.
+
+This biography has been generally lauded for its rare impartiality. And
+the author does, indeed, praise and blame alike with a most singular
+appearance of stolid candour. The work, in truth, is one of those not
+uncommon proofs, of which Boswell’s “Johnson” is the most striking, that
+a very valuable book may be written by a very silly man. The biographer
+of Rienzi appears more like the historian of Rienzi’s clothes, so minute
+is he on all details of their colour and quality--so silent is he upon
+everything that could throw light upon the motives of their wearer.
+In fact, granting the writer every desire to be impartial, he is too
+foolish to be so. It requires some cleverness to judge accurately of
+a very clever man in very difficult circumstances; and the worthy
+biographer is utterly incapable of giving us any clue to the actions
+of Rienzi--utterly unable to explain the conduct of the man by the
+circumstances of the time. The weakness of his vision causes him,
+therefore, often to squint. We must add to his want of wisdom a want
+of truth, which the Herodotus-like simplicity of his style frequently
+conceals. He describes things which had no witness as precisely and
+distinctly as those which he himself had seen. For instance, before
+the death of Rienzi, in those awful moments when the Senator was alone,
+unheard, unseen, he coolly informs us of each motion, and each thought
+of Rienzi’s, with as much detail as if Rienzi had returned from the
+grave to assist his narration. These obvious inventions have been
+adopted by Gibbon and others with more good faith than the laws of
+evidence would warrant. Still, however, to a patient and cautious reader
+the biography may furnish a much better notion of Rienzi’s character,
+than we can glean from the historians who have borrowed from it
+piecemeal. Such a reader will discard all the writer’s reasonings,
+will think little of his praise or blame, and regard only the facts he
+narrates, judging them true or doubtful, according as the writer had the
+opportunities of being himself the observer. Thus examining, the reader
+will find evidence sufficient of Rienzi’s genius and Rienzi’s failings:
+Carefully distinguishing between the period of his power as Tribune, and
+that of his power as Senator, he will find the Tribune vain, haughty,
+fond of display; but, despite the reasonings of the biographer, he will
+not recognise those faults in the Senator. On the other hand, he will
+notice the difference between youth and maturity--hope and experience;
+he will notice in the Tribune vast ambition, great schemes, enterprising
+activity--which sober into less gorgeous and more quiet colours in
+the portrait of the Senator. He will find that in neither instance did
+Rienzi fall from his own faults--he will find that the vulgar moral
+of ambition, blasted by its own excesses, is not the true moral of the
+Roman’s life; he will find that, both in his abdication as Tribune,
+and his death as Senator, Rienzi fell from the vices of the People. The
+Tribune was a victim to ignorant cowardice--the Senator, a victim to
+ferocious avarice. It is this which modern historians have failed to
+represent. Gibbon records rightly, that the Count of Minorbino entered
+Rome with one hundred and fifty soldiers, and barricadoed the quarter of
+the Colonna--that the bell of the Capitol sounded--that Rienzi addressed
+the People--that they were silent and inactive--and that Rienzi then
+abdicated the government. But for this he calls Rienzi “pusillanimous.”
+ Is not that epithet to be applied to the People? Rienzi invoked them to
+move against the Robber--the People refused to obey. Rienzi wished to
+fight--the People refused to stir. It was not the cause of Rienzi alone
+which demanded their exertions--it was the cause of the People--theirs,
+not his, the shame, if one hundred and fifty foreign soldiers mastered
+Rome, overthrew their liberties, and restored their tyrants! Whatever
+Rienzi’s sins, whatever his unpopularity, their freedom, their laws,
+their republic, were at stake; and these they surrendered to one hundred
+and fifty hirelings! This is the fact that damns them! But Rienzi was
+not unpopular when he addressed and conjured them: they found no fault
+with him. “The sighs and the groans of the People,” says Sismondi,
+justly, “replied to his,”--they could weep, but they would not fight.
+This strange apathy the modern historians have not accounted for, yet
+the principal cause was obvious--Rienzi was excommunicated! (And this
+curse I apprehend to have been the more effective in the instance of
+Rienzi, from a fact that it would be interesting and easy to establish:
+viz., that he owed his rise as much to religious as to civil causes. He
+aimed evidently to be a religious Reformer. All his devices, ceremonies,
+and watchwords, were of a religious character. The monks took part with
+his enterprise, and joined in the revolution. His letters are full of
+mystical fanaticism. His references to ancient heroes of Rome are always
+mingled with invocations to her Christian Saints. The Bible, at that
+time little read by the public civilians of Italy, is constantly in
+his hands, and his addresses studded with texts. His very garments were
+adorned with sacred and mysterious emblems. No doubt, the ceremony of
+his Knighthood, which Gibbon ridicules as an act of mere vanity, was but
+another of his religious extravagances; for he peculiarly dedicated his
+Knighthood to the service of the Santo Spirito; and his bathing in the
+vase of Constantine was quite of a piece, not with the vanity of the
+Tribune, but with the extravagance of the Fanatic. In fact, they tried
+hard to prove him a heretic; but he escaped a charge under the mild
+Innocent, which a century or two before, or a century or two afterwards,
+would have sufficed to have sent a dozen Rienzis to the stake. I have
+dwelt the more upon this point, because, if it be shown that religious
+causes operated with those of liberty, we throw a new light upon the
+whole of that most extraordinary revolution, and its suddenness is
+infinitely less striking. The deep impression Rienzi produced upon that
+populace was thus stamped with the spirit of the religious enthusiast
+more than that of the classical demagogue. And, as in the time of
+Cromwell, the desire for temporal liberty was warmed and coloured by
+the presence of a holier and more spiritual fervour:--“The Good Estate”
+ (Buono Stato) of Rienzi reminds us a little of the Good Cause of General
+Cromwell.) In stating the fact, these writers have seemed to think
+that excommunication in Rome, in the fourteenth century, produced no
+effect!--the effect it did produce I have endeavoured in these pages to
+convey.
+
+The causes of the second fall and final murder of Rienzi are equally
+misstated by modern narrators. It was from no fault of his--no
+injustice, no cruelty, no extravagance--it was not from the execution of
+Montreal, nor that of Pandulfo di Guido---it was from a gabelle on
+wine and salt that he fell. To preserve Rome from the tyrants it
+was necessary to maintain an armed force; to pay the force a tax was
+necessary; the tax was imposed--and the multitude joined with the
+tyrants, and their cry was, “Perish the traitor who has made the
+gabelle!” This was their only charge--this the only crime that their
+passions and their fury could cite against him.
+
+The faults of Rienzi are sufficiently visible, and I have not
+unsparingly shewn them; but we must judge men, not according as they
+approach perfection, but according as their good or bad qualities
+preponderate--their talents or their weaknesses--the benefits they
+effected, the evil they wrought. For a man who rose to so great a power,
+Rienzi’s faults were singularly few--crimes he committed none. He is
+almost the only man who ever rose from the rank of a citizen to a power
+equal to that of monarchs without a single act of violence or treachery.
+When in power, he was vain, ostentatious, and imprudent,--always an
+enthusiast--often a fanatic; but his very faults had greatness of soul,
+and his very fanaticism at once supported his enthusiastic daring, and
+proved his earnest honesty. It is evident that no heinous charge could
+be brought against him even by his enemies, for all the accusations to
+which he was subjected, when excommunicated, exiled, fallen, were for
+two offences which Petrarch rightly deemed the proofs of his virtue
+and his glory: first, for declaring Rome to be free; secondly, for
+pretending that the Romans had a right of choice in the election of
+the Roman Emperor. (The charge of heresy was dropped.) Stern, just, and
+inflexible, as he was when Tribune, his fault was never that of wanton
+cruelty. The accusation against him, made by the gentle Petrarch,
+indeed, was that he was not determined enough--that he did not
+consummate the revolution by exterminating the patrician tyrants. When
+Senator, he was, without sufficient ground, accused of avarice in
+the otherwise just and necessary execution of Montreal. (Gibbon, in
+mentioning the execution of Montreal, omits to state that Montreal was
+more than suspected of conspiracy and treason to restore the Colonna.
+Matthew Villani records it as a common belief that such truly was the
+offence of the Provencal. The biographer of Rienzi gives additional
+evidence of the fact. Gibbon’s knowledge of this time was superficial.
+As one instance of this, he strangely enough represents Montreal as the
+head of the first Free Company that desolated Italy: he took that error
+from the Pere du Cerceau.) It was natural enough that his enemies and
+the vulgar should suppose that he executed a creditor to get rid of a
+debt; but it was inexcusable in later, and wiser, and fairer writers
+to repeat so grave a calumny, without at least adding the obvious
+suggestion, that the avarice of Rienzi could have been much better
+gratified by sparing than by destroying the life of one of the richest
+subjects in Europe. Montreal, we may be quite sure, would have purchased
+his life at an immeasurably higher price than the paltry sum lent to
+Rienzi by his brothers. And this is not a probable hypothesis, but a
+certain fact, for we are expressly told that Montreal, “knowing the
+Tribune was in want of money, offered Rienzi, that if he would let
+him go, he, Montreal, would furnish him not only with twenty thousand
+florins, (four times the amount of Rienzi’s debt to him,) but with as
+many soldiers and as much money as he pleased.” This offer Rienzi did
+not attend to. Would he have rejected it had avarice been his motive?
+And what culpable injustice, to mention the vague calumny without citing
+the practical contradiction! When Gibbon tells us, also, that “the most
+virtuous citizen of Rome,” meaning Pandulfo, or Pandolficcio di Guido,
+(Matthew Villani speaks of him as a wise and good citizen, of great
+repute among the People--and this, it seems, he really was.) was
+sacrificed to his jealousy, he a little exaggerates the expression
+bestowed upon Pandulfo, which is that of “virtuoso assai;” and
+that expression, too, used by a man who styles the robber Montreal,
+“eccellente uomo--di quale fama suono per tutta la Italia di virtude”
+ (“An excellent man whose fame for valour resounded throughout all
+Italy.”)--(so good a moral critic was the writer!) but he also
+altogether waves all mention of the probabilities that are sufficiently
+apparent, of the scheming of Pandulfo to supplant Rienzi, and to obtain
+the “Signoria del Popolo.” Still, however, if the death of Pandulfo may
+be considered a blot on the memory of Rienzi, it does not appear that it
+was this which led to his own fate. The cry of the mob surrounding his
+palace was not, “Perish him who executed Pandulfo,” it was--and this
+again and again must be carefully noted--it was nothing more nor less
+than, “Perish him who has made the gabelle!”
+
+Gibbon sneers at the military skill and courage of Rienzi. For this
+sneer there is no cause. His first attempts, his first rise, attested
+sufficiently his daring and brave spirit; in every danger he was
+present--never shrinking from a foe so long as he was supported by
+the People. He distinguished himself at Viterbo when in the camp of
+Albornoz, in several feats of arms, (“Vita di Cola di Rienzi”, lib. ii.
+cap. 14.) and his end was that of a hero. So much for his courage; as to
+his military skill; it would be excusable enough if Rienzi--the eloquent
+and gifted student, called from the closet and the rostrum to assume the
+command of an army--should have been deficient in the art of war; yet,
+somehow or other, upon the whole, his arms prospered. He defeated the
+chivalry of Rome at her gates; and if he did not, after his victory,
+march to Marino, for which his biographer (In this the anonymous writer
+compares him gravely to Hannibal, who knew how to conquer, but not how
+to use his conquest.) and Gibbon blame him, the reason is sufficiently
+clear--“Volea pecunia per soldati”--he wanted money for the soldiers!
+On his return as Senator, it must be remembered that he had to besiege
+Palestrina, which was considered even by the ancient Romans almost
+impregnable by position; but during the few weeks he was in power,
+Palestrina yielded--all his open enemies were defeated--the tyrants
+expelled--Rome free; and this without support from any party, Papal
+or Popular, or, as Gibbon well expresses it, “suspected by the
+People--abandoned by the Prince.”
+
+On regarding what Rienzi did, we must look to his means, to the
+difficulties that surrounded him, to the scantiness of his resources. We
+see a man without rank, wealth, or friends, raising himself to the head
+of a popular government in the metropolis of the Church--in the City
+of the Empire. We see him reject any title save that of a popular
+magistrate--establish at one stroke a free constitution--a new code of
+law. We see him first expel, then subdue, the fiercest aristocracy in
+Europe--conquer the most stubborn banditti, rule impartially the most
+turbulent people, embruted by the violence, and sunk in the corruption
+of centuries. We see him restore trade--establish order--create
+civilization as by a miracle--receive from crowned heads homage and
+congratulation--outwit, conciliate, or awe, the wiliest priesthood of
+the Papal Diplomacy--and raise his native city at once to sudden yet
+acknowledged eminence over every other state, its superior in arts,
+wealth, and civilization;--we ask what errors we are to weigh in the
+opposite balance, and we find an unnecessary ostentation, a fanatical
+extravagance, and a certain insolent sternness. But what are such
+offences--what the splendour of a banquet, or the ceremony of
+Knighthood, or a few arrogant words, compared with the vices of
+almost every prince who was his contemporary? This is the way to judge
+character: we must compare men with men, and not with ideals of what
+men should be. We look to the amazing benefits Rienzi conferred upon his
+country. We ask his means, and see but his own abilities. His treasury
+becomes impoverished--his enemies revolt--the Church takes advantage of
+his weakness--he is excommunicated--the soldiers refuse to fight--the
+People refuse to assist--the Barons ravage the country--the ways are
+closed, the provisions are cut off from Rome. (“Allora le strade furo
+chiuse, li massari de la terre non portavano grano, ogni die nasceva
+nuovo rumore.”--“Vita di Cola di Rienzi”, lib. i. cap. 37.) A handful
+of banditti enter the city--Rienzi proposes to resist them--the People
+desert--he abdicates. Rapine, Famine, Massacre, ensue--they who deserted
+regret, repent--yet he is still unassisted, alone--now an exile, now a
+prisoner, his own genius saves him from every peril, and restores him
+to greatness. He returns, the Pope’s Legate refuses him arms--the People
+refuse him money. He re-establishes law and order, expels the tyrants,
+renounces his former faults (this, the second period of his power, has
+been represented by Gibbon and others as that of his principal faults,
+and he is evidently at this time no favourite with his contemporaneous
+biographer; but looking to what he did, we find amazing dexterity,
+prudence, and energy in the most difficult crisis, and none of his
+earlier faults. It is true, that he does not shew the same brilliant
+extravagance which, I suspect, dazzled his contemporaries, more than his
+sounder qualities; but we find that in a few weeks he had conquered
+all his powerful enemies--that his eloquence was as great as ever--his
+promptitude greater--his diligence indefatigable--his foresight
+unslumbering. “He alone,” says the biographer, “carried on the affairs
+of Rome, but his officials were slothful and cold.” This too, tortured
+by a painful disease--already--though yet young--broken and infirm. The
+only charges against him, as Senator, were the deaths of Montreal and
+Pandulfo di Guido, the imposition of the gabelle, and the renunciation
+of his former habits of rigid abstinence, for indulgence in wine and
+feasting. Of the first charges, the reader has already been enabled to
+form a judgment. To the last, alas! the reader must extend indulgence,
+and for it he may find excuse. We must compassionate even more than
+condemn the man to whom excitement has become nature, and who resorts
+to the physical stimulus or the momentary Lethe, when the mental
+exhilarations of hope, youth, and glory, begin to desert him. His
+alleged intemperance, however, which the Romans (a peculiarly sober
+people) might perhaps exaggerate, and for which he gave the excuse of
+a thirst produced by disease contracted in the dungeon of
+Avignon--evidently and confessedly did not in the least diminish his
+attention to business, which, according to his biographer, was at that
+time greater than ever.)--is prudent, wary, provident--reigns a few
+weeks--taxes the People, in support of the People, and is torn to
+pieces! One day of the rule that followed is sufficient to vindicate his
+reign and avenge his memory--and for centuries afterwards, whenever that
+wretched and degenerate populace dreamed of glory or sighed for justice,
+they recalled the bright vision of their own victim, and deplored the
+fate of Cola di Rienzi. That he was not a tyrant is clear in this--when
+he was dead, he was bitterly regretted. The People never regret a
+tyrant! From the unpopularity that springs from other faults there is
+often a re-action; but there is no re-action in the populace towards
+their betrayor or oppressor. A thousand biographies cannot decide upon
+the faults or merits of a ruler like the one fact, whether he is beloved
+or hated ten years after he is dead. But if the ruler has been murdered
+by the People, and is then regretted by them, their repentance is his
+acquittal.
+
+I have said that the moral of the Tribune’s life, and of this fiction,
+is not the stale and unprofitable moral that warns the ambition of
+an individual:--More vast, more solemn, and more useful, it addresses
+itself to nations. If I judge not erringly, it proclaims that, to
+be great and free, a People must trust not to individuals but
+themselves--that there is no sudden leap from servitude to liberty--that
+it is to institutions, not to men, for they must look for reforms that
+last beyond the hour--that their own passions are the real despots they
+should subdue, their own reason the true regenerator of abuses. With a
+calm and a noble people, the individual ambition of a citizen can
+never effect evil:--to be impatient of chains, is not to be worthy of
+freedom--to murder a magistrate is not to ameliorate the laws. (Rienzi
+was murdered because the Romans had been in the habit of murdering
+whenever they were displeased. They had, very shortly before, stoned one
+magistrate, and torn to pieces another. By the same causes and the same
+career a People may be made to resemble the bravo whose hand wanders to
+his knife at the smallest affront, and if today he poniards the enemy
+who assaults him, tomorrow he strikes the friend who would restrain.)
+The People write their own condemnation whenever they use characters
+of blood; and theirs alone the madness and the crime, if they crown a
+tyrant or butcher a victim.
+
+
+
+
+Appendix II. A Word Upon the Work by Pere du Cerceau and Pere Brumoy,
+
+Entitled “Conjuration de Nicolas Gabrini, Dit de Rienzi, Tyran de Rome.”
+
+Shortly after the Romance of “Rienzi” first appeared, a translation
+of the biography compiled by Cerceau and Brumoy was published by Mr.
+Whittaker. The translator, in a short and courteous advertisement,
+observes, “That it has always been considered as a work of authority;
+and even Gibbon appears to have relied on it without further research:
+(Here, however, he does injustice to Gibbon.)...that, “as a record of
+facts, therefore, the work will, it is presumed, be acceptable to the
+public.” The translator has fulfilled his duty with accuracy, elegance,
+and spirit,--and he must forgive me, if, in justice to History and
+Rienzi, I point out a very few from amongst a great many reasons, why
+the joint labour of the two worthy Jesuits cannot be considered either a
+work of authority, or a record of facts. The translator observes in his
+preface, “that the general outline (of Du Cerceau’s work) was probably
+furnished by an Italian life written by a contemporary of Rienzi.” The
+fact, however, is, that Du Cerceau’s book is little more than a wretched
+paraphrase of that very Italian life mentioned by the translator,--full
+of blunders, from ignorance of the peculiar and antiquated dialect in
+which the original is written, and of assumptions by the Jesuit himself,
+which rest upon no authority whatever. I will first shew, in support
+of this assertion, what the Italians themselves think of the work of
+Fathers Brumoy and Du Cerceau. The Signor Zefirino Re, who had proved
+himself singularly and minutely acquainted with the history of that
+time, and whose notes to the “Life of Rienzi” are characterized by
+acknowledged acuteness and research, thus describes the manner in which
+the two Jesuits compounded this valuable “record of facts.”
+
+“Father Du Cerceau for his work made use of a French translation of the
+life by the Italian contemporary printed in Bracciano, 1624, executed
+by Father Sanadon, another Jesuit, from whom he received the MS.
+This proves that Du Cerceau knew little of our ‘volgar lingua’ of the
+fourteenth century. But the errors into which he has run shew, that even
+that little was unknown to his guide, and still less to Father Brumoy,
+(however learned and reputed the latter might be in French literature,)
+who, after the death of Du Cerceau, supplied the deficiencies in the
+first pages of the author’s MS., which were, I know not how, lost; and
+in this part are found the more striking errors in the work, which
+shall be noticed in the proper place; in the meantime, one specimen will
+suffice. In the third chapter, book i., Cola, addressing the Romans,
+says, ‘Che lo giubileo si approssima, che se la gente, la quale verra
+al giubileo, li trova sproveduti di annona, le pietre (per metatesi sta
+scritto le preite) ne porteranno da Roma per rabbia di fame, e le pietre
+non basteranno a tanta moltitudine. Il francese traduce. Le
+jubile approche, et vous n’avez ni provisions, ni vivres; les
+etrangers...trouvent votre ville denue de tout. Ne comptez point sur les
+secours des gens d’Eglise; ils sortiront de la ville, s’ils n’y trouvent
+de quoi subsister: et d’ailleurs pourroient-ils suffire a la multitude
+innombrable, que se trouvera dans vos murs?’” (The English translator
+could not fail to adopt the Frenchman’s ludicrous mistake.) “Buon Dio!”
+ exclaims the learned Zefirino, “Buon Dio! le pietre prese per tanta
+gente di chiesa!” (See Preface to Zefirino Re’s edition of the “Life of
+Rienzi,” page 9, note on Du Cerceau.)
+
+Another blunder little less extraordinary occurs in Chapter vi., in
+which the ordinances of Rienzi’s Buono Stato are recited.
+
+It is set forth as the third ordinance:--“Che nulla case di Roma sia
+data per terra per alcuna cagione, ma vada in commune;” which simply
+means, that the houses of delinquents should in no instance be razed,
+but added to the community or confiscated. This law being intended
+partly to meet the barbarous violences with which the excesses and
+quarrels of the Barons had half dismantled Rome, and principally to
+repeal some old penal laws by which the houses of a certain class of
+offenders might be destroyed; but the French translator construes it,
+“Que nulle maison de Rome ne saroit donnee en propre, pour quelque
+raison que ce put etre; mais que les revenus en appartiendroient au
+public!” (The English translator makes this law unintelligible:--“That
+no family of Rome shall appropriate to their own use what they think
+fit, but that the revenues shall appertain to the public”!!!--the
+revenues of what?)
+
+But enough of the blunders arising from ignorance.--I must now be
+permitted to set before the reader a few of the graver offences of
+wilful assumption and preposterous invention.
+
+When Rienzi condemned some of the Barons to death, the Pere thus writes;
+I take the recent translation published by Mr. Whittaker:--
+
+“The next day the Tribune, resolving more than ever to rid himself of
+his prisoners, ordered tapestries of two colours, red and white, to be
+laid over the place whereon he held his councils, and which he had made
+choice of to be the theatre of this bloody tragedy, as the extraordinary
+tapestry seemed to declare. He afterwards sent a cordelier to every
+one of the prisoners to administer the sacraments, and then ordered
+the Capitol bell to be tolled. At that fatal sound and the sight of
+the confessors, the Lords no longer doubted of sentence of death being
+passed upon them. They all confessed except the old Colonna, and many
+received the communion. In the meanwhile the people, naturally prompt to
+attend, when their first impetuosity had time to calm, could not without
+pity behold the dismal preparations which were making. The sight of the
+bloody colour in the tapestry shocked them. On this first impression
+they joined in opinion in relation to so many illustrious heads now
+going to be sacrificed, and lamented more their unhappy catastrophe,
+as no crime had been proved upon them to render them worthy of such
+barbarous treatment. Above all, the unfortunate Stephen Colonna,
+whose birth, age, and affable behaviour, commanded respect, excited a
+particular compassion. An universal silence and sorrow reigned among
+them. Those who were nearest Rienzi discovered an alteration. They took
+the opportunity of imploring his mercy towards the prisoners in terms
+the most affecting and moving.”
+
+Will it be believed, that in the original from which the Pere Du Cerceau
+borrows or rather imagines this touching recital, there is not a single
+syllable about the pity of the people, nor their shock at the bloody
+colours of the tapestry, nor their particular compassion for the
+unfortunate Stephen Colonna?--in fine, the People are not even mentioned
+at all. All that is said is, “Some Roman citizens, (alcuni cittadini
+Romani,) considering the judgment Rienzi was about to make, interposed
+with soft and caressing words, and at last changed the opinion of the
+Tribune;” all the rest is the pure fiction of the ingenious Frenchman!
+Again, Du Cerceau, describing the appearance of the Barons at this fatal
+moment, says, “Notwithstanding the grief and despair visible in their
+countenances, they shewed a noble indignation, generally attendant on
+innocence in the hour of death.” What says the authority from which
+alone, except his own, the good Father could take his account? Why, not
+a word about this noble indignation, or this parade of innocence! The
+original says simply, that “the Barons were so frozen with terror
+that they were unable to speak,” (diventaso si gelati che non poteano
+favellare;) “that the greater part humbled themselves,” (e prese
+penitenza e comunione;) that when Rienzi addressed them “all the Barons
+(come dannati) stood in sadness.” (See “Vita di Cola di Rienzi”, lib. i.
+cap. 29.) Du Cerceau then proceeds to state, that “although he (Rienzi)
+was grieved at heart to behold his victims snatched from him, he
+endeavoured to make a merit of it in the eyes of the People.” There is
+not a word of this in the original!
+
+So when Rienzi, on a latter occasion, placed the Prefect John di Vico
+in prison, this Jesuit says, “To put a gloss upon this action before
+the eyes of the people, Rienzi gave out that the Governor, John di Vico,
+keeping a correspondence with the conspirators, came with no other view
+than to betray the Romans.” And if this scribbler, who pretends to have
+consulted the Vatican MSS., had looked at the most ordinary authorities,
+he would have seen that John di Vico did come with that view. (See for
+Di Vico’s secret correspondence with the Barons, La Cron. Bologn. page
+406; and La Cron. Est. page 444.)
+
+Again, in the battle between the Barons and the Romans at the gates, Du
+Cerceau thus describes the conduct of the Tribune:--“The Tribune, amidst
+his troops, knew so little of what had passed, that seeing at a distance
+one of his standards fall, he looked upon all as lost, and, casting up
+his eyes to heaven full of despair, cried out, ‘O God, will you then
+forsake me?’ But no sooner was he informed of the entire defeat of
+his enemies, than his dread and cowardice even turned to boldness and
+arrogance.”
+
+Now in the original all that is said of this is, “That it is true that
+the standard of the Tribune fell--the Tribune astonished, (or if you
+please, dismayed, sbigottio,) stood with his eyes raised to heaven, and
+could find no other words than, ‘O God hast thou betrayed me?’” This
+evinced, perhaps, alarm or consternation at the fall of his standard--a
+consternation natural, not to a coward, but a fanatic, at such an event.
+But not a word is said about Rienzi’s cowardice in the action itself;
+it is not stated when the accident happened--nothing bears out the
+implication that the Tribune was remote from the contest, and knew
+little of what passed. And if this ignorant Frenchman had consulted
+any other contemporaneous historian whatever, he would have found it
+asserted by them all, that the fight was conducted with great valour,
+both by the Roman populace and their leader on the one side, and the
+Barons on the other.--G. Vill. lib. xii. cap. 105; Cron. Sen. tom. xv.
+Murat. page 119; Cron. Est. page 444. Yet Gibbon rests his own sarcasm
+on the Tribune’s courage solely on the baseless exaggeration of this
+Pere Du Cerceau.
+
+So little, indeed, did this French pretender know of the history of the
+time and place he treats of, that he imagines the Stephen Colonna who
+was killed in the battle above-mentioned was the old Stephen Colonna,
+and is very pathetic about his “venerable appearance,” &c. This error,
+with regard to a man so eminent as Stephen Colonna the elder, is
+inexcusable: for, had the priest turned over the other pages of the very
+collection in which he found the biography he deforms, he would
+have learned that old Stephen Colonna was alive some time after that
+battle.--(Cron. Sen. Murat. tom. xv. page 121.)
+
+Again, just before Rienzi’s expulsion from the office of Tribune, Du
+Cerceau, translating in his headlong way the old biographer’s account of
+the causes of Rienzi’s loss of popularity, says, “He shut himself up in
+his palace, and his presence was known only by the rigorous punishments
+which he caused his agents to inflict upon the innocent.” Not a word of
+this in the original!
+
+Again, after the expulsion, Du Cerceau says, that the Barons seized upon
+the “immense riches” he had amassed,--the words in the original are,
+“grandi ornamenti,” which are very different things from immense riches.
+But the most remarkable sins of commission are in this person’s account
+of the second rise and fall of Rienzi under the title of Senator. Of
+this I shall give but one instance:--
+
+“The Senator, who perceived it, became only the more cruel. His
+jealousies produced only fresh murders. In the continual dread he was
+in, that the general discontent would terminate in some secret attempt
+upon his person, he determined to intimidate the most enterprising, by
+sacrificing sometimes one, sometimes another, and chiefly those whose
+riches rendered them the more guilty in his eyes. Numbers were sent
+every day to the Capitol prison. Happy were those who could get off with
+the confiscation of their estates.”
+
+Of these grave charges there is not a syllable in the original! And so
+much for the work of Pere Cerceau and Pere Brumoy, by virtue of which,
+historians have written of the life and times of Rienzi, and upon the
+figments of which, the most remarkable man in an age crowded with great
+characters is judged by the general reader!
+
+I must be pardoned for this criticism, which might not have been
+necessary, had not the work to which it relates, in the English
+translation quoted from, (a translation that has no faults but those
+of the French original,) been actually received as an historical and
+indisputable authority, and opposed with a triumphant air to some
+passages in my own narrative which were literally taken from the
+authentic records of the time.
+
+
+
+
+
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+
+<html xmlns="http://www.w3.org/1999/xhtml" lang="en">
+  <head>
+    <title>
+      Rienzi, by Edward Bulwer Lytton
+    </title>
+    <style type="text/css" xml:space="preserve">
+
+    body { margin:5%; background:#faebd7; text-align:justify}
+    P { text-indent: 1em; margin-top: .25em; margin-bottom: .25em; }
+    H1,H2,H3,H4,H5,H6 { text-align: center; margin-left: 15%; margin-right: 15%; }
+    hr  { width: 50%; text-align: center;}
+    .foot { margin-left: 20%; margin-right: 20%; text-align: justify; text-indent: -3em; font-size: 90%; }
+    blockquote {font-size: 97%; font-style: italic; margin-left: 10%; margin-right: 10%;}
+    .mynote    {background-color: #DDE; color: #000; padding: .5em; margin-left: 10%; margin-right: 10%; font-family: sans-serif; font-size: 95%;}
+    .toc       { margin-left: 10%; margin-bottom: .75em;}
+    .toc2      { margin-left: 20%;}
+    div.fig { display:block; margin:0 auto; text-align:center; }
+    .figleft   {float: left; margin-left: 0%; margin-right: 1%;}
+    .figright  {float: right; margin-right: 0%; margin-left: 1%;}
+    pre     { font-style: italic; font-size: 90%; margin-left: 10%;}
+
+</style>
+  </head>
+  <body>
+<pre xml:space="preserve">
+
+The Project Gutenberg EBook of Rienzi, by Edward Bulwer Lytton
+
+This eBook is for the use of anyone anywhere at no cost and with
+almost no restrictions whatsoever.  You may copy it, give it away or
+re-use it under the terms of the Project Gutenberg License included
+with this eBook or online at www.gutenberg.org
+
+
+Title: Rienzi
+
+Author: Edward Bulwer Lytton
+
+Release Date: February 15, 2006 [EBook #1396]
+Last Updated: August 29, 2016
+
+Language: English
+
+Character set encoding: UTF-8
+
+*** START OF THIS PROJECT GUTENBERG EBOOK RIENZI ***
+
+
+
+
+Produced by Sue Asscher and David Widger
+
+
+
+
+
+</pre>
+
+    <p>
+      <br /> <br />
+    </p>
+    <h1>
+      RIENZI,
+    </h1>
+    <h3>
+      The Last of the Roman Tribunes
+    </h3>
+    <p>
+      <br />
+    </p>
+    <h4>
+      by
+    </h4>
+    <h2>
+      Edward Bulwer Lytton
+    </h2>
+    <p>
+      <br /> <br />
+    </p>
+<pre xml:space="preserve">
+     Then turn we to her latest Tribune&rsquo;s name,
+     From her ten thousand tyrants turn to thee,
+     Redeemer of dark centuries of shame&mdash;
+     The friend of Petrarch&mdash;hope of Italy&mdash;
+     Rienzi, last of Romans!  While the tree
+     Of Freedom&rsquo;s wither&rsquo;d trunk puts forth a leaf,
+     Even for thy tomb a garland let it be&mdash;
+     The Forum&rsquo;s champion, and the People&rsquo;s chief&mdash;
+     Her new-born Numa thou!
+
+     Childe Harold, cant. iv. stanza 114.
+</pre>
+<pre xml:space="preserve">
+     Amidst the indulgence of enthusiasm and eloquence, Petrarch,
+     Italy, and Europe, were astonished by a revolution, which
+     realized for a moment his most splendid visions.&mdash;Gibbon,
+     chap. 1xx.
+</pre>
+    <p>
+      <br /> <br />
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      <big><b>Dedication of Rienzi.</b></big>
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      To Alessandro Manzoni, as to the Genius of the Place,
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      Are Dedicated These Fruits, gathered on The Soil of Italian Fiction.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      London, Dec. 1, 1835.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      <br /> <br />
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      <big><b>Dedication,</b></big>
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      Prefixed to the First Collected Edition of the Author&rsquo;s Works in 1840.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      My Dear Mother,
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      In inscribing with your beloved and honoured name this Collection of my
+      Works, I could wish that the fruits of my manhood were worthier of the
+      tender and anxious pains bestowed upon my education in youth.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      Left yet young, and with no ordinary accomplishments and gifts, the sole
+      guardian of your sons, to them you devoted the best years of your useful
+      and spotless life; and any success it be their fate to attain in the paths
+      they have severally chosen, would have its principal sweetness in the
+      thought that such success was the reward of one whose hand aided every
+      struggle, and whose heart sympathized in every care.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      From your graceful and accomplished taste, I early learned that affection
+      for literature which has exercised so large an influence over the pursuits
+      of my life; and you who were my first guide, were my earliest critic. Do
+      you remember the summer days, which seemed to me so short, when you
+      repeated to me those old ballads with which Percy revived the decaying
+      spirit of our national muse, or the smooth couplets of Pope, or those
+      gentle and polished verses with the composition of which you had beguiled
+      your own earlier leisure? It was those easy lessons, far more than the
+      harsher rudiments learned subsequently in schools, that taught me to
+      admire and to imitate; and in them I recognise the germ of the flowers,
+      however perishable they be, that I now bind up and lay upon a shrine
+      hallowed by a thousand memories of unspeakable affection. Happy, while I
+      borrowed from your taste, could I have found it not more difficult to
+      imitate your virtues&mdash;your spirit of active and extended benevolence,
+      your cheerful piety, your considerate justice, your kindly charity&mdash;and
+      all the qualities that brighten a nature more free from the thought of
+      self, than any it has been my lot to meet with. Never more than at this
+      moment did I wish that my writings were possessed of a merit which might
+      outlive my time, so that at least these lines might remain a record of the
+      excellence of the Mother, and the gratitude of the Son.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      E.L.B. London: January 6, 1840.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      <br /> <br />
+    </p>
+    <hr />
+    <p>
+      <br /> <br />
+    </p>
+    <blockquote>
+      <p class="toc">
+        <big><b>CONTENTS</b></big>
+      </p>
+      <p>
+        <br />
+      </p>
+      <p class="toc">
+        <a href="#link2H_PREF"> <b>Preface</b> </a>
+      </p>
+      <p>
+        <br />
+      </p>
+      <p class="toc">
+        <a href="#link2H_4_0003"> <b>RIENZI, The Last of the Tribunes.</b> </a>
+      </p>
+      <p>
+        <br /> <a href="#link2H_4_0004"> <b>BOOK I.</b> </a>&nbsp;&nbsp; <b>THE
+        TIME, THE PLACE, AND THE MEN.</b> <br /><br /> <a href="#link2HCH0001">
+        Chapter 1.I </a>&nbsp;&nbsp; The Brothers. <br /><br /> <a
+        href="#link2HCH0002"> Chapter 1.II </a>&nbsp;&nbsp; An Historical Survey&mdash;not
+        to Be Passed Over, Except by <br /><br /> <a href="#link2HCH0003"> Chapter
+        1.III </a>&nbsp;&nbsp; The Brawl. <br /><br /> <a href="#link2HCH0004">
+        Chapter 1.IV </a>&nbsp;&nbsp; An Adventure. <br /><br /> <a
+        href="#link2HCH0005"> Chapter 1.V </a>&nbsp;&nbsp; The Description of a
+        Conspirator, and the Dawn of the <br /><br /> <a href="#link2HCH0006">
+        Chapter 1.VI </a>&nbsp;&nbsp; Irene in the Palace of Adrian di Castello.
+        <br /><br /> <a href="#link2HCH0007"> Chapter 1.VII </a>&nbsp;&nbsp; Upon
+        Love and Lovers. <br /><br /> <a href="#link2HCH0008"> Chapter 1.VIII </a>&nbsp;&nbsp;
+        The Enthusiastic Man Judged by the Discreet Man. <br /><br /> <a
+        href="#link2HCH0009"> Chapter 1.IX </a>&nbsp;&nbsp; &ldquo;When the People Saw
+        this Picture, Every One Marvelled.&rdquo; <br /><br /> <a href="#link2HCH0010">
+        Chapter 1.X </a>&nbsp;&nbsp; A Rough Spirit Raised, Which May Hereafter
+        Rend the Wizard. <br /><br /> <a href="#link2HCH0011"> Chapter 1.XI </a>&nbsp;&nbsp;
+        Nina di Raselli. <br /><br /> <a href="#link2HCH0012"> Chapter 1.XII </a>&nbsp;&nbsp;
+        The Strange Adventures that Befel Walter de Montreal. <br /><br /><br /> <a
+        href="#link2H_4_0017"> <b>BOOK II</b> </a>&nbsp;&nbsp; <br /> <b>THE
+        REVOLUTION</b> <br /><br /> <a href="#link2HCH0013"> Chapter 2.I </a>&nbsp;&nbsp;
+        The Knight of Provence, and his Proposal. <br /><br /> <a
+        href="#link2HCH0014"> Chapter 2.II </a>&nbsp;&nbsp; The Interview, and
+        the Doubt. <br /><br /> <a href="#link2HCH0015"> Chapter 2.III </a>&nbsp;&nbsp;
+        The Situation of a Popular Patrician in Times of Popular <br /><br /> <a
+        href="#link2HCH0016"> Chapter 2.IV </a>&nbsp;&nbsp; The Ambitious
+        Citizen, and the Ambitious Soldier. <br /><br /> <a href="#link2HCH0017">
+        Chapter 2.V </a>&nbsp;&nbsp; The Procession of the Barons.&mdash;The
+        Beginning of the End. <br /><br /> <a href="#link2HCH0018"> Chapter 2.VI
+        </a>&nbsp;&nbsp; The Conspirator Becomes the Magistrate. <br /><br /> <a
+        href="#link2HCH0019"> Chapter 2.VII </a>&nbsp;&nbsp; Looking after the
+        Halter when the Mare is Stolen. <br /><br /> <a href="#link2HCH0020">
+        Chapter 2.VIII </a>&nbsp;&nbsp; The Attack&mdash;the Retreat&mdash;the
+        Election&mdash;and the Adhesion. <br /><br /><br /> <a href="#link2H_4_0026">
+        <b>BOOK III</b> </a>&nbsp;&nbsp; <br /> <b>THE FREEDOM WITHOUT LAW.</b>
+        <br /><br /> <a href="#link2HCH0021"> Chapter 3.I </a>&nbsp;&nbsp; The
+        Return of Walter de Montreal to his Fortress. <br /><br /> <a
+        href="#link2HCH0022"> Chapter 3.II </a>&nbsp;&nbsp; The Life of Love and
+        War&mdash;the Messenger of Peace&mdash;the <br /><br /> <a
+        href="#link2HCH0023"> Chapter 3.III </a>&nbsp;&nbsp; The Conversation
+        between the Roman and the <br /><br /><br /> <a href="#link2H_4_0030"> <b>BOOK
+        IV</b> </a>&nbsp;&nbsp;<br /> THE TRIUMPH AND THE POMP. <br /><br /> <a
+        href="#link2HCH0024"> Chapter 4.I </a>&nbsp;&nbsp; The Boy Angelo&mdash;the
+        Dream of Nina Fulfilled. <br /><br /> <a href="#link2HCH0025"> Chapter
+        4.II </a>&nbsp;&nbsp; The Blessing of A Councillor Whose Interests and
+        Heart Are <br /><br /> <a href="#link2HCH0026"> Chapter 4.III </a>&nbsp;&nbsp;
+        The Actor Unmasked. <br /><br /> <a href="#link2HCH0027"> Chapter 4.IV
+        </a>&nbsp;&nbsp; The Enemy&rsquo;s Camp. <br /><br /> <a href="#link2HCH0028">
+        Chapter 4.V </a>&nbsp;&nbsp; The Night and its Incidents. <br /><br /> <a
+        href="#link2HCH0029"> Chapter 4.VI </a>&nbsp;&nbsp; The Celebrated
+        Citation. <br /><br /> <a href="#link2HCH0030"> Chapter 4.VII </a>&nbsp;&nbsp;
+        The Festival. <br /><br /><br /> <a href="#link2H_4_0038"> <b>BOOK V</b>
+        </a>&nbsp;&nbsp; <br /> <b>THE CRISIS.</b> <br /><br /> <a
+        href="#link2HCH0031"> Chapter 5.I </a>&nbsp;&nbsp; The Judgment of the
+        Tribune. <br /><br /> <a href="#link2HCH0032"> Chapter 5.II </a>&nbsp;&nbsp;
+        The Flight. <br /><br /> <a href="#link2HCH0033"> Chapter 5.III </a>&nbsp;&nbsp;
+        The Battle. <br /><br /> <a href="#link2HCH0034"> Chapter 5.IV </a>&nbsp;&nbsp;
+        The Hollowness of the Base. <br /><br /> <a href="#link2HCH0035"> Chapter
+        5.V </a>&nbsp;&nbsp; The Rottenness of the Edifice. <br /><br /> <a
+        href="#link2HCH0036"> Chapter 5.VI </a>&nbsp;&nbsp; The Fall of the
+        Temple. <br /><br /> <a href="#link2HCH0037"> Chapter 5.VII </a>&nbsp;&nbsp;
+        The Successors of an Unsuccessful Revolution&mdash;Who is to <br /><br /><br />
+        <a href="#link2H_4_0046"> <b>BOOK VI</b> </a>&nbsp;&nbsp; <br /> <b>THE
+        PLAGUE.</b> <br /><br /> <a href="#link2HCH0038"> Chapter 6.1 </a>&nbsp;&nbsp;
+        The Retreat of the Lover. <br /><br /> <a href="#link2HCH0039"> Chapter
+        6.II </a>&nbsp;&nbsp; The Seeker. <br /><br /> <a href="#link2HCH0040">
+        Chapter 6.III </a>&nbsp;&nbsp; The Flowers Amidst the Tombs. <br /><br />
+        <a href="#link2HCH0041"> Chapter 6.IV </a>&nbsp;&nbsp; We Obtain What We
+        Seek, and Know it Not. <br /><br /> <a href="#link2HCH0042"> Chapter 6.V
+        </a>&nbsp;&nbsp; The Error. <br /><br /><br /> <a href="#link2H_4_0052"> <b>BOOK
+        VII</b> </a>&nbsp;&nbsp; <br /> <b>THE PRISON.</b> <br /><br /> <a
+        href="#link2HCH0043"> Chapter 7.I </a>&nbsp;&nbsp; Avignon.&mdash;The
+        Two Pages.&mdash;The Stranger Beauty. <br /><br /> <a href="#link2HCH0044">
+        Chapter 7.II </a>&nbsp;&nbsp; The Character of a Warrior Priest&mdash;an
+        Interview&mdash;the <br /><br /> <a href="#link2HCH0045"> Chapter 7.III
+        </a>&nbsp;&nbsp; Holy Men.&mdash;Sagacious Deliberations.&mdash;Just
+        Resolves.&mdash;And <br /><br /> <a href="#link2HCH0046"> Chapter 7.IV
+        </a>&nbsp;&nbsp; The Lady and the Page. <br /><br /> <a
+        href="#link2HCH0047"> Chapter 7.V </a>&nbsp;&nbsp; The Inmate of the
+        Tower. <br /><br /> <a href="#link2HCH0048"> Chapter 7.VI </a>&nbsp;&nbsp;
+        The Scent Does Not Lie.&mdash;The Priest and the Soldier. <br /><br /> <a
+        href="#link2HCH0049"> Chapter 7.VII </a>&nbsp;&nbsp; Vaucluse and its
+        Genius Loci.&mdash;Old Acquaintance Renewed. <br /><br /> <a
+        href="#link2HCH0050"> Chapter 7.VIII </a>&nbsp;&nbsp; The Crowd.&mdash;The
+        Trial.&mdash;The Verdict.&mdash;The Soldier and <br /><br /> <a
+        href="#link2HCH0051"> Chapter 7.IX </a>&nbsp;&nbsp; Albornoz and Nina.
+        <br /><br /><br /> <a href="#link2H_4_0062"> <b>BOOK VIII</b> </a>&nbsp;&nbsp;
+        <br /> <b>THE GRAND COMPANY.</b> <br /><br /> <a href="#link2HCH0052">
+        Chapter 8.I </a>&nbsp;&nbsp; The Encampment. <br /><br /> <a
+        href="#link2HCH0053"> Chapter 8.II </a>&nbsp;&nbsp; Adrian Once More the
+        Guest of Montreal. <br /><br /> <a href="#link2HCH0054"> Chapter 8.III
+        </a>&nbsp;&nbsp; Faithful and Ill-fated Love.&mdash;The Aspirations
+        Survive the <br /><br /><br /> <a href="#link2H_4_0066"> <b>BOOK IX</b>
+        </a>&nbsp;&nbsp; <br /> <b>THE RETURN.</b> <br /><br /> <a
+        href="#link2HCH0055"> Chapter 9.I </a>&nbsp;&nbsp; The Triumphal
+        Entrance. <br /><br /> <a href="#link2HCH0056"> Chapter 9.II </a>&nbsp;&nbsp;
+        The Masquerade. <br /><br /> <a href="#link2HCH0057"> Chapter 9.III </a>&nbsp;&nbsp;
+        Adrian&rsquo;s Adventures at Palestrina. <br /><br /> <a href="#link2HCH0058">
+        Chapter 9.IV </a>&nbsp;&nbsp; The Position of the Senator.&mdash;The
+        Work of Years.&mdash;The <br /><br /> <a href="#link2HCH0059"> Chapter 9.V
+        </a>&nbsp;&nbsp; The Biter Bit. <br /><br /> <a href="#link2HCH0060">
+        Chapter 9.VI </a>&nbsp;&nbsp; The Events Gather to the End. <br /><br /><br />
+        <a href="#link2H_4_0073"> <b>BOOK X</b> </a>&nbsp;&nbsp; <br /> <b>THE
+        LION Of BASALT.</b> <br /><br /> <a href="#link2HCH0061"> Chapter 10.I
+        </a>&nbsp;&nbsp; The Conjunction of Hostile Planets in the House of
+        Death. <br /><br /> <a href="#link2HCH0062"> Chapter 10.II </a>&nbsp;&nbsp;
+        Montreal at Rome.&mdash;His Reception of Angelo Villani. <br /><br /> <a
+        href="#link2HCH0063"> Chapter 10.III </a>&nbsp;&nbsp; Montreal&rsquo;s
+        Banquet. <br /><br /> <a href="#link2HCH0064"> Chapter 10.IV </a>&nbsp;&nbsp;
+        The Sentence of Walter de Montreal. <br /><br /> <a href="#link2HCH0065">
+        Chapter 10.V </a>&nbsp;&nbsp; The Discovery. <br /><br /> <a
+        href="#link2HCH0066"> Chapter 10.VI </a>&nbsp;&nbsp; The Suspense. <br /><br />
+        <a href="#link2HCH0067"> Chapter 10.VII </a>&nbsp;&nbsp; The Tax. <br /><br />
+        <a href="#link2HCH0068"> Chapter 10.VIII </a>&nbsp;&nbsp; The Threshold
+        of the Event. <br /><br /> <a href="#link2HCH0069"> Chapter The Last </a>&nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp;
+        The Close of the Chase. <br /><br /><br /> <a href="#link2H_APPE"> Appendix
+        I </a>&nbsp;&nbsp; <br /> Some Remarks on the Life and Character of
+        Rienzi. <br /><br /> <a href="#link2H_APPE2"> Appendix II </a>&nbsp;&nbsp;
+        A Word Upon the Work by Pere du Cerceau and Pere Brumoy,
+      </p>
+    </blockquote>
+    <p>
+      <br /> <br />
+    </p>
+    <hr />
+    <p>
+      <a name="link2H_PREF" id="link2H_PREF">
+      <!--  H2 anchor --> </a> <br /> <br />
+    </p>
+    <h2>
+      Preface
+    </h2>
+    <h3>
+      to
+    </h3>
+    <h3>
+      The First Edition of Rienzi.
+    </h3>
+    <p>
+      I began this tale two years ago at Rome. On removing to Naples, I threw it
+      aside for &ldquo;The Last Days of Pompeii,&rdquo; which required more than &ldquo;Rienzi&rdquo;
+       the advantage of residence within reach of the scenes described. The fate
+      of the Roman Tribune continued, however, to haunt and impress me, and,
+      some time after &ldquo;Pompeii&rdquo; was published, I renewed my earlier undertaking.
+      I regarded the completion of these volumes, indeed, as a kind of duty;&mdash;for
+      having had occasion to read the original authorities from which modern
+      historians have drawn their accounts of the life of Rienzi, I was led to
+      believe that a very remarkable man had been superficially judged, and a
+      very important period crudely examined. (See Appendix, Nos. I and II.) And
+      this belief was sufficiently strong to induce me at first to meditate a
+      more serious work upon the life and times of Rienzi. (I have adopted the
+      termination of Rienzi instead of Rienzo, as being more familiar to the
+      general reader.&mdash;But the latter is perhaps the more accurate reading,
+      since the name was a popular corruption from Lorenzo.) Various reasons
+      concurred against this project&mdash;and I renounced the biography to
+      commence the fiction. I have still, however, adhered, with a greater
+      fidelity than is customary in Romance, to all the leading events of the
+      public life of the Roman Tribune; and the Reader will perhaps find in
+      these pages a more full and detailed account of the rise and fall of
+      Rienzi, than in any English work of which I am aware. I have, it is true,
+      taken a view of his character different in some respects from that of
+      Gibbon or Sismondi. But it is a view, in all its main features, which I
+      believe (and think I could prove) myself to be warranted in taking, not
+      less by the facts of History than the laws of Fiction. In the meanwhile,
+      as I have given the facts from which I have drawn my interpretation of the
+      principal agent, the reader has sufficient data for his own judgment. In
+      the picture of the Roman Populace, as in that of the Roman Nobles of the
+      fourteenth century, I follow literally the descriptions left to us;&mdash;they
+      are not flattering, but they are faithful, likenesses.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      Preserving generally the real chronology of Rienzi&rsquo;s life, the plot of
+      this work extends over a space of some years, and embraces the variety of
+      characters necessary to a true delineation of events. The story,
+      therefore, cannot have precisely that order of interest found in fictions
+      strictly and genuinely dramatic, in which (to my judgment at least) the
+      time ought to be as limited as possible, and the characters as few;&mdash;no
+      new character of importance to the catastrophe being admissible towards
+      the end of the work. If I may use the word Epic in its most modest and
+      unassuming acceptation, this Fiction, in short, though indulging in
+      dramatic situations, belongs, as a whole, rather to the Epic than the
+      Dramatic school.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      I cannot conclude without rendering the tribute of my praise and homage to
+      the versatile and gifted Author of the beautiful Tragedy of Rienzi.
+      Considering that our hero be the same&mdash;considering that we had the
+      same materials from which to choose our several stories&mdash;I trust I
+      shall be found to have little, if at all, trespassed upon ground
+      previously occupied. With the single exception of a love-intrigue between
+      a relative of Rienzi and one of the antagonist party, which makes the plot
+      of Miss Mitford&rsquo;s Tragedy, and is little more than an episode in my
+      Romance, having slight effect on the conduct and none on the fate of the
+      hero, I am not aware of any resemblance between the two works; and even
+      this coincidence I could easily have removed, had I deemed it the least
+      advisable:&mdash;but it would be almost discreditable if I had nothing
+      that resembled a performance possessing so much it were an honour to
+      imitate.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      In fact, the prodigal materials of the story&mdash;the rich and exuberant
+      complexities of Rienzi&rsquo;s character&mdash;joined to the advantage possessed
+      by the Novelist of embracing all that the Dramatist must reject (Thus the
+      slender space permitted to the Dramatist does not allow Miss Mitford to be
+      very faithful to facts; to distinguish between Rienzi&rsquo;s earlier and his
+      later period of power; or to detail the true, but somewhat intricate
+      causes of his rise, his splendour, and his fall.)&mdash;are sufficient to
+      prevent Dramatist and Novelist from interfering with each other.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      London, December 1, 1835.
+    </p>
+    <div style="height: 4em;">
+      <br /><br /><br /><br />
+    </div>
+    <h2>
+      Preface to the Present Edition, 1848.
+    </h2>
+    <p>
+      From the time of its first appearance, &ldquo;Rienzi&rdquo; has had the good fortune
+      to rank high amongst my most popular works&mdash;though its interest is
+      rather drawn from a faithful narration of historical facts, than from the
+      inventions of fancy. And the success of this experiment confirms me in my
+      belief, that the true mode of employing history in the service of romance,
+      is to study diligently the materials as history; conform to such views of
+      the facts as the Author would adopt, if he related them in the dry
+      character of historian; and obtain that warmer interest which fiction
+      bestows, by tracing the causes of the facts in the characters and emotions
+      of the personages of the time. The events of his work are thus already
+      shaped to his hand&mdash;the characters already created&mdash;what remains
+      for him, is the inner, not outer, history of man&mdash;the chronicle of
+      the human heart; and it is by this that he introduces a new harmony
+      between character and event, and adds the completer solution of what is
+      actual and true, by those speculations of what is natural and probable,
+      which are out of the province of history, but belong especially to the
+      philosophy of romance. And&mdash;if it be permitted the tale-teller to
+      come reverently for instruction in his art to the mightiest teacher of
+      all, who, whether in the page or on the scene, would give to airy fancies
+      the breath and the form of life,&mdash;such, we may observe, is the lesson
+      the humblest craftsman in historical romance may glean from the Historical
+      Plays of Shakespeare. Necessarily, Shakespeare consulted history according
+      to the imperfect lights, and from the popular authorities, of his age; and
+      I do not say, therefore, that as an historian we can rely upon Shakespeare
+      as correct. But to that in which he believed he rigidly adhered; nor did
+      he seek, as lesser artists (such as Victor Hugo and his disciples) seek
+      now, to turn perforce the Historical into the Poetical, but leaving
+      history as he found it, to call forth from its arid prose the flower of
+      the latent poem. Nay, even in the more imaginative plays which he has
+      founded upon novels and legends popular in his time, it is curious and
+      instructive to see how little he has altered the original ground-work&mdash;taking
+      for granted the main materials of the story, and reserving all his
+      matchless resources of wisdom and invention, to illustrate from mental
+      analysis, the creations whose outline he was content to borrow. He
+      receives, as a literal fact not to be altered, the somewhat incredible
+      assertion of the novelist, that the pure and delicate and highborn
+      Venetian loves the swarthy Moor&mdash;and that Romeo fresh from his &ldquo;woes
+      for Rosaline,&rdquo; becomes suddenly enamoured of Juliet: He found the
+      Improbable, and employed his art to make it truthful.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      That &ldquo;Rienzi&rdquo; should have attracted peculiar attention in Italy, is of
+      course to be attributed to the choice of the subject rather than to the
+      skill of the Author. It has been translated into the Italian language by
+      eminent writers; and the authorities for the new view of Rienzi&rsquo;s times
+      and character which the Author deemed himself warranted to take, have been
+      compared with his text by careful critics and illustrious scholars, in
+      those states in which the work has been permitted to circulate. (In the
+      Papal States, I believe, it was neither, prudently nor effectually,
+      proscribed.) I may say, I trust without unworthy pride, that the result
+      has confirmed the accuracy of delineations which English readers relying
+      only on the brilliant but disparaging account in Gibbon deemed too
+      favourable; and has tended to restore the great Tribune to his long
+      forgotten claims to the love and reverence of the Italian land. Nor, if I
+      may trust to the assurances that have reached me from many now engaged in
+      the aim of political regeneration, has the effect of that revival of the
+      honours due to a national hero, leading to the ennobling study of great
+      examples, been wholly without its influence upon the rising generation of
+      Italian youth, and thereby upon those stirring events which have recently
+      drawn the eyes of Europe to the men and the lands beyond the Alps.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      In preparing for the Press this edition of a work illustrative of the
+      exertions of a Roman, in advance of his time, for the political freedom of
+      his country, and of those struggles between contending principles, of
+      which Italy was the most stirring field in the Middle Ages, it is not out
+      of place or season to add a few sober words, whether as a student of the
+      Italian Past, or as an observer, with some experience of the social
+      elements of Italy as it now exists, upon the state of affairs in that
+      country.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      It is nothing new to see the Papal Church in the capacity of a popular
+      reformer, and in contra-position to the despotic potentates of the several
+      states, as well as to the German Emperor, who nominally inherits the
+      sceptre of the Caesars. Such was its common character under its more
+      illustrious Pontiffs; and the old Republics of Italy grew up under the
+      shadow of the Papal throne, harbouring ever two factions&mdash;the one for
+      the Emperor, the one for the Pope&mdash;the latter the more naturally
+      allied to Italian independence. On the modern stage, we almost see the
+      repetition of many an ancient drama. But the past should teach us to doubt
+      the continuous and stedfast progress of any single line of policy under a
+      principality so constituted as that of the Papal Church&mdash;a
+      principality in which no race can be perpetuated, in which no objects can
+      be permanent; in which the successor is chosen by a select ecclesiastical
+      synod, under a variety of foreign as well as of national influences; in
+      which the chief usually ascends the throne at an age that ill adapts his
+      mind to the idea of human progress, and the active direction of mundane
+      affairs;&mdash;a principality in which the peculiar sanctity that wraps
+      the person of the Sovereign exonerates him from the healthful liabilities
+      of a power purely temporal, and directly accountable to Man. A reforming
+      Pope is a lucky accident, and dull indeed must be the brain which believes
+      in the possibility of a long succession of reforming Popes, or which can
+      regard as other than precarious and unstable the discordant combination of
+      a constitutional government with an infallible head.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      It is as true as it is trite that political freedom is not the growth of a
+      day&mdash;it is not a flower without a stalk, and it must gradually
+      develop itself from amidst the unfolding leaves of kindred institutions.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      In one respect, the Austrian domination, fairly considered, has been
+      beneficial to the States over which it has been directly exercised, and
+      may be even said to have unconsciously schooled them to the capacity for
+      freedom. In those States the personal rights which depend on impartial and
+      incorrupt administration of the law, are infinitely more secure than in
+      most of the Courts of Italy. Bribery, which shamefully predominates in the
+      judicature of certain Principalities, is as unknown in the juridical
+      courts of Austrian Italy as in England. The Emperor himself is often
+      involved in legal disputes with a subject, and justice is as free and as
+      firm for the humblest suitor, as if his antagonist were his equal.
+      Austria, indeed, but holds together the motley and inharmonious members of
+      its vast domain on either side the Alps, by a general character of
+      paternal mildness and forbearance in all that great circle of good
+      government which lies without the one principle of constitutional liberty.
+      It asks but of its subjects to submit to be well governed&mdash;without
+      agitating the question &ldquo;how and by what means that government is carried
+      on.&rdquo; For every man, except the politician, the innovator, Austria is no
+      harsh stepmother. But it is obviously clear that the better in other
+      respects the administration of a state it does but foster the more the
+      desire for that political security, which is only found in constitutional
+      freedom: the reverence paid to personal rights, but begets the passion for
+      political; and under a mild despotism are already half matured the germs
+      of a popular constitution. But it is still a grave question whether Italy
+      is ripe for self-government&mdash;and whether, were it possible that the
+      Austrian domination could be shaken off&mdash;the very passions so
+      excited, the very bloodshed so poured forth, would not ultimately place
+      the larger portion of Italy under auspices less favourable to the sure
+      growth of freedom, than those which silently brighten under the sway of
+      the German Caesar.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      The two kingdoms, at the opposite extremes of Italy, to which circumstance
+      and nature seem to assign the main ascendancy, are Naples and Sardinia.
+      Looking to the former, it is impossible to discover on the face of the
+      earth a country more adapted for commercial prosperity. Nature formed it
+      as the garden of Europe, and the mart of the Mediterranean. Its soil and
+      climate could unite the products of the East with those of the Western
+      hemisphere. The rich island of Sicily should be the great corn granary of
+      the modern nations as it was of the ancient; the figs, the olives, the
+      oranges, of both the Sicilies, under skilful cultivation, should equal the
+      produce of Spain and the Orient, and the harbours of the kingdom (the keys
+      to three-quarters of the globe) should be crowded with the sails and busy
+      with the life of commerce. But, in the character of its population, Naples
+      has been invariably in the rear of Italian progress; it caught but partial
+      inspiration from the free Republics, or even the wise Tyrannies, of the
+      Middle Ages; the theatre of frequent revolutions without fruit; and all
+      rational enthusiasm created by that insurrection, which has lately
+      bestowed on Naples the boon of a representative system, cannot but be
+      tempered by the conviction that of all the States in Italy, this is the
+      one which least warrants the belief of permanence to political freedom, or
+      of capacity to retain with vigour what may be seized by passion. (If the
+      Electoral Chamber in the new Neapolitan Constitution, give a fair share of
+      members to the Island of Sicily, it will be rich in the inevitable
+      elements of discord, and nothing save a wisdom and moderation, which
+      cannot soberly be anticipated, can prevent the ultimate separation of the
+      island from the dominion of Naples. Nature has set the ocean between the
+      two countries&mdash;but differences in character, and degree and quality
+      of civilisation&mdash;national jealousies, historical memories, have
+      trebled the space of the seas that roll between them.&mdash;More easy to
+      unite under one free Parliament, Spain with Flanders; or re-annex to
+      England its old domains of Aquitaine and Normandy&mdash;than to unite in
+      one Council Chamber truly popular, the passions, interests, and prejudices
+      of Sicily and Naples.&mdash;Time will show.)
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      Far otherwise is it, with Sardinia. Many years since, the writer of these
+      pages ventured to predict that the time must come when Sardinia would lead
+      the van of Italian civilisation, and take proud place amongst the greater
+      nations of Europe. In the great portion of this population there is
+      visible the new blood of a young race; it is not, as with other Italian
+      States, a worn-out stock; you do not see there a people fallen, proud of
+      the past, and lazy amidst ruins, but a people rising, practical,
+      industrious, active; there, in a word, is an eager youth to be formed to
+      mature development, not a decrepit age to be restored to bloom and muscle.
+      Progress is the great characteristic of the Sardinian state. Leave it for
+      five years; visit it again, and you behold improvement. When you enter the
+      kingdom and find, by the very skirts of its admirable roads, a raised
+      footpath for the passengers and travellers from town to town, you become
+      suddenly aware that you are in a land where close attention to the humbler
+      classes is within the duties of a government. As you pass on from the more
+      purely Italian part of the population,&mdash;from the Genoese country into
+      that of Piedmont,&mdash;the difference between a new people and an old, on
+      which I have dwelt, becomes visible in the improved cultivation of the
+      soil, the better habitations of the labourer, the neater aspect of the
+      towns, the greater activity in the thoroughfares. To the extraordinary
+      virtues of the King, as King, justice is scarcely done, whether in England
+      or abroad. Certainly, despite his recent concessions, Charles Albert is
+      not and cannot be at heart, much of a constitutional reformer; and his
+      strong religious tendencies, which, perhaps unjustly, have procured him in
+      philosophical quarters the character of a bigot, may link him more than
+      his political, with the cause of the Father of his Church. But he is nobly
+      and preeminently national, careful of the prosperity and jealous of the
+      honour of his own state, while conscientiously desirous of the
+      independence of Italy. His attention to business, is indefatigable.
+      Nothing escapes his vigilance. Over all departments of the kingdom is the
+      eye of a man ever anxious to improve. Already the silk manufactures of
+      Sardinia almost rival those of Lyons: in their own departments the
+      tradesmen of Turin exhibit an artistic elegance and elaborate finish,
+      scarcely exceeded in the wares of London and Paris. The King&rsquo;s internal
+      regulations are admirable; his laws, administered with the most impartial
+      justice&mdash;his forts and defences are in that order, without which, at
+      least on the Continent, no land is safe&mdash;his army is the most perfect
+      in Italy. His wise genius extends itself to the elegant as to the useful
+      arts&mdash;an encouragement that shames England, and even France, is
+      bestowed upon the School for Painters, which has become one of the
+      ornaments of his illustrious reign. The character of the main part of the
+      population, and the geographical position of his country, assist the
+      monarch and must force on himself, or his successors, in the career of
+      improvement so signally begun. In the character of the people, the vigour
+      of the Northman ennobles the ardour and fancy of the West. In the position
+      of the country, the public mind is brought into constant communication
+      with the new ideas in the free lands of Europe. Civilisation sets in
+      direct currents towards the streets and marts of Turin. Whatever the
+      result of the present crisis in Italy, no power and no chance which
+      statesmen can predict, can preclude Sardinia from ultimately heading all
+      that is best in Italy. The King may improve his present position, or
+      peculiar prejudices, inseparable perhaps from the heritage of absolute
+      monarchy, and which the raw and rude councils of an Electoral Chamber,
+      newly called into life, must often irritate and alarm, may check his own
+      progress towards the master throne of the Ausonian land. But the people
+      themselves, sooner or later, will do the work of the King. And in now
+      looking round Italy for a race worthy of Rienzi, and able to accomplish
+      his proud dreams, I see but one for which the time is ripe or ripening,
+      and I place the hopes of Italy in the men of Piedmont and Sardinia.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      London, February 14, 1848.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      <a name="link2H_4_0003" id="link2H_4_0003">
+      <!--  H2 anchor --> </a>
+    </p>
+    <div style="height: 4em;">
+      <br /><br /><br /><br />
+    </div>
+    <h2>
+      RIENZI, The Last of the Tribunes.
+    </h2>
+    <p>
+      <a name="link2H_4_0004" id="link2H_4_0004">
+      <!--  H2 anchor --> </a>
+    </p>
+    <div style="height: 4em;">
+      <br /><br /><br /><br />
+    </div>
+    <h2>
+      BOOK I. &mdash; THE TIME, THE PLACE, AND THE MEN.
+    </h2>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;<i>Fu da sua gioventudine nutricato di latte di eloquenza; buono
+      grammatico, megliore rettorico, autorista buono...Oh, come spesso diceva,
+      &lsquo;Dove sono questi buoni Romani? Dov&rsquo;e loro somma giustizia? Poterommi
+      trovare in tempo che questi fioriscano?&rsquo; Era bell &lsquo;omo...Accadde che uno
+      suo frate fu ucciso, e non ne fu fatta vendetta di sua morte: non lo poteo
+      aiutare; pensa lungo mano vendicare &lsquo;l sangue di suo frate; pensa lunga
+      mano dirizzare la cittate di Roma male guidata</i>.&rdquo;&mdash;&ldquo;Vita di Cola
+      di Rienzi&rdquo; Ed. 1828. Forli.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;From his youth he was nourished with the milk of eloquence; a good
+      grammarian, a better rhetorician, well versed in the writings of
+      authors...Oh, how often would he say, &lsquo;Where are those good Romans? Where
+      is their supreme justice? Shall I ever behold such times as those in which
+      they flourished?&rsquo; He was a handsome man...It happened that a brother of
+      his was slain, and no retribution was made for his death: he could not
+      help him; long did he ponder how to avenge his brother&rsquo;s blood; long did
+      he ponder how to direct the ill guided state of Rome.&rdquo;&mdash;&ldquo;Life of Cola
+      di Rienzi.&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      <a name="link2HCH0001" id="link2HCH0001">
+      <!--  H2 anchor --> </a>
+    </p>
+    <div style="height: 4em;">
+      <br /><br /><br /><br />
+    </div>
+    <h2>
+      Chapter 1.I. The Brothers.
+    </h2>
+    <p>
+      The celebrated name which forms the title to this work will sufficiently
+      apprise the reader that it is in the earlier half of the fourteenth
+      century that my story opens.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      It was on a summer evening that two youths might be seen walking beside
+      the banks of the Tiber, not far from that part of its winding course which
+      sweeps by the base of Mount Aventine. The path they had selected was
+      remote and tranquil. It was only at a distance that were seen the
+      scattered and squalid houses that bordered the river, from amidst which
+      rose, dark and frequent, the high roof and enormous towers which marked
+      the fortified mansion of some Roman baron. On one side of the river,
+      behind the cottages of the fishermen, soared Mount Janiculum, dark with
+      massive foliage, from which gleamed at frequent intervals, the grey walls
+      of many a castellated palace, and the spires and columns of a hundred
+      churches; on the other side, the deserted Aventine rose abrupt and steep,
+      covered with thick brushwood; while, on the height, from concealed but
+      numerous convents, rolled, not unmusically, along the quiet landscape and
+      the rippling waves, the sound of the holy bell.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      Of the young men introduced in this scene, the elder, who might have
+      somewhat passed his twentieth year, was of a tall and even commanding
+      stature; and there was that in his presence remarkable and almost noble,
+      despite the homeliness of his garb, which consisted of the long, loose
+      gown and the plain tunic, both of dark-grey serge, which distinguished, at
+      that time, the dress of the humbler scholars who frequented the
+      monasteries for such rude knowledge as then yielded a scanty return for
+      intense toil. His countenance was handsome, and would have been rather gay
+      than thoughtful in its expression, but for that vague and abstracted
+      dreaminess of eye which so usually denotes a propensity to revery and
+      contemplation, and betrays that the past or the future is more congenial
+      to the mind than the enjoyment and action of the present hour.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      The younger, who was yet a boy, had nothing striking in his appearance or
+      countenance, unless an expression of great sweetness and gentleness could
+      be so called; and there was something almost feminine in the tender
+      deference with which he appeared to listen to his companion. His dress was
+      that usually worn by the humbler classes, though somewhat neater, perhaps,
+      and newer; and the fond vanity of a mother might be detected in the care
+      with which the long and silky ringlets had been smoothed and parted as
+      they escaped from his cap and flowed midway down his shoulders.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      As they thus sauntered on, beside the whispering reeds of the river, each
+      with his arm round the form of his comrade, there was a grace in the
+      bearing, in the youth, and in the evident affection of the brothers&mdash;for
+      such their connexion&mdash;which elevated the lowliness of their apparent
+      condition.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;Dear brother,&rdquo; said the elder, &ldquo;I cannot express to thee how I enjoy
+      these evening hours. To you alone I feel as if I were not a mere visionary
+      and idler when I talk of the uncertain future, and build up my palaces of
+      the air. Our parents listen to me as if I were uttering fine things out of
+      a book; and my dear mother, Heaven bless her! wipes her eyes, and says,
+      &lsquo;Hark, what a scholar he is!&rsquo; As for the monks, if I ever dare look from
+      my Livy, and cry &lsquo;Thus should Rome be again!&rsquo; they stare, and gape, and
+      frown, as though I had broached an heresy. But you, sweet brother, though
+      you share not my studies, sympathize so kindly with all their results&mdash;you
+      seem so to approve my wild schemes, and to encourage my ambitious hopes&mdash;that
+      sometimes I forget our birth, our fortunes, and think and dare as if no
+      blood save that of the Teuton Emperor flowed through our veins.&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;Methinks, dear Cola,&rdquo; said the younger brother, &ldquo;that Nature played us an
+      unfair trick&mdash;to you she transmitted the royal soul, derived from our
+      father&rsquo;s parentage; and to me only the quiet and lowly spirit of my
+      mother&rsquo;s humble lineage.&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;Nay,&rdquo; answered Cola, quickly, &ldquo;you would then have the brighter share,&mdash;for
+      I should have but the Barbarian origin, and you the Roman. Time was, when
+      to be a simple Roman was to be nobler than a northern king.&mdash;Well,
+      well, we may live to see great changes!&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;I shall live to see thee a great man, and that will content me,&rdquo; said the
+      younger, smiling affectionately; &ldquo;a great scholar all confess you to be
+      already: our mother predicts your fortunes every time she hears of your
+      welcome visits to the Colonna.&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;The Colonna!&rdquo; said Cola, with a bitter smile; &ldquo;the Colonna&mdash;the
+      pedants!&mdash;They affect, dull souls, the knowledge of the past, play
+      the patron, and misquote Latin over their cups! They are pleased to
+      welcome me at their board, because the Roman doctors call me learned, and
+      because Nature gave me a wild wit, which to them is pleasanter than the
+      stale jests of a hired buffoon. Yes, they would advance my fortunes&mdash;but
+      how? by some place in the public offices, which would fill a dishonoured
+      coffer, by wringing, yet more sternly, the hard-earned coins from our
+      famishing citizens! If there be a vile thing in the world, it is a
+      plebeian, advanced by patricians, not for the purpose of righting his own
+      order, but for playing the pander to the worst interests of theirs. He who
+      is of the people but makes himself a traitor to his birth, if he furnishes
+      the excuse for these tyrant hypocrites to lift up their hands and cry&mdash;&lsquo;See
+      what liberty exists in Rome, when we, the patricians, thus elevate a
+      plebeian!&rsquo; Did they ever elevate a plebeian if he sympathized with
+      plebeians? No, brother; should I be lifted above our condition, I will be
+      raised by the arms of my countrymen, and not upon their necks.&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;All I hope, is, Cola, that you will not, in your zeal for your
+      fellow-citizens, forget how dear you are to us. No greatness could ever
+      reconcile me to the thought that it brought you danger.&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;And I could laugh at all danger, if it led to greatness. But greatness&mdash;greatness!
+      Vain dream! Let us keep it for our night sleep. Enough of my plans; now,
+      dearest brother, of yours.&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      And, with the sanguine and cheerful elasticity which belonged to him, the
+      young Cola, dismissing all wilder thoughts, bent his mind to listen, and
+      to enter into, the humbler projects of his brother. The new boat and the
+      holiday dress, and the cot removed to a quarter more secure from the
+      oppression of the barons, and such distant pictures of love as a dark eye
+      and a merry lip conjure up to the vague sentiments of a boy;&mdash;to
+      schemes and aspirations of which such objects made the limit, did the
+      scholar listen, with a relaxed brow and a tender smile; and often, in
+      later life, did that conversation occur to him, when he shrank from asking
+      his own heart which ambition was the wiser.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;And then,&rdquo; continued the younger brother, &ldquo;by degrees I might save enough
+      to purchase such a vessel as that which we now see, laden, doubtless, with
+      corn and merchandise, bringing&mdash;oh, such a good return&mdash;that I
+      could fill your room with books, and never hear you complain that you were
+      not rich enough to purchase some crumbling old monkish manuscript. Ah,
+      that would make me so happy!&rdquo; Cola smiled as he pressed his brother closer
+      to his breast.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;Dear boy,&rdquo; said he, &ldquo;may it rather be mine to provide for your wishes!
+      Yet methinks the masters of yon vessel have no enviable possession, see
+      how anxiously the men look round, and behind, and before: peaceful traders
+      though they be, they fear, it seems, even in this city (once the emporium
+      of the civilised world), some pirate in pursuit; and ere the voyage be
+      over, they may find that pirate in a Roman noble. Alas, to what are we
+      reduced!&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      The vessel thus referred to was speeding rapidly down the river, and some
+      three or four armed men on deck were indeed intently surveying the quiet
+      banks on either side, as if anticipating a foe. The bark soon, however,
+      glided out of sight, and the brothers fell back upon those themes which
+      require only the future for a text to become attractive to the young.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      At length, as the evening darkened, they remembered that it was past the
+      usual hour in which they returned home, and they began to retrace their
+      steps.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;Stay,&rdquo; said Cola, abruptly, &ldquo;how our talk has beguiled me! Father Uberto
+      promised me a rare manuscript, which the good friar confesses hath puzzled
+      the whole convent. I was to seek his cell for it this evening. Tarry here
+      a few minutes, it is but half-way up the Aventine. I shall soon return.&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;Can I not accompany you?&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;Nay,&rdquo; returned Cola, with considerate kindness, &ldquo;you have borne toil all
+      the day, and must be wearied; my labours of the body, at least, have been
+      light enough. You are delicate, too, and seem fatigued already; the rest
+      will refresh you. I shall not be long.&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      The boy acquiesced, though he rather wished to accompany his brother; but
+      he was of a meek and yielding temper, and seldom resisted the lightest
+      command of those he loved. He sat him down on a little bank by the
+      river-side, and the firm step and towering form of his brother were soon
+      hid from his gaze by the thick and melancholy foliage.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      At first he sat very quietly, enjoying the cool air, and thinking over all
+      the stories of ancient Rome that his brother had told him in their walk.
+      At length he recollected that his little sister, Irene, had begged him to
+      bring her home some flowers; and, gathering such as he could find at hand
+      (and many a flower grew, wild and clustering, over that desolate spot), he
+      again seated himself, and began weaving them into one of those garlands
+      for which the southern peasantry still retain their ancient affection, and
+      something of their classic skill.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      While the boy was thus engaged, the tramp of horses and the loud shouting
+      of men were heard at a distance. They came near, and nearer.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;Some baron&rsquo;s procession, perhaps, returning from a feast,&rdquo; thought the
+      boy. &ldquo;It will be a pretty sight&mdash;their white plumes and scarlet
+      mantles! I love to see such sights, but I will just move out of their
+      way.&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      So, still mechanically platting his garland, but with eyes turned towards
+      the quarter of the expected procession, the young Roman moved yet nearer
+      towards the river.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      Presently the train came in view,&mdash;a gallant company, in truth;
+      horsemen in front, riding two abreast, where the path permitted, their
+      steeds caparisoned superbly, their plumes waving gaily, and the gleam of
+      their corselets glittering through the shades of the dusky twilight. A
+      large and miscellaneous crowd, all armed, some with pikes and mail, others
+      with less warlike or worse fashioned weapons, followed the cavaliers; and
+      high above plume and pike floated the blood-red banner of the Orsini, with
+      the motto and device (in which was ostentatiously displayed the Guelfic
+      badge of the keys of St. Peter) wrought in burnished gold. A momentary
+      fear crossed the boy&rsquo;s mind, for at that time, and in that city, a
+      nobleman begirt with his swordsmen was more dreaded than a wild beast by
+      the plebeians; but it was already too late to fly&mdash;the train were
+      upon him.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;Ho, boy!&rdquo; cried the leader of the horsemen, Martino di Porto, one of the
+      great House of the Orsini; &ldquo;hast thou seen a boat pass up the river?&mdash;But
+      thou must have seen it&mdash;how long since?&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;I saw a large boat about half an hour ago,&rdquo; answered the boy, terrified
+      by the rough voice and imperious bearing of the cavalier.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;Sailing right a-head, with a green flag at the stern?&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;The same, noble sir.&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;On, then! we will stop her course ere the moon rise,&rdquo; said the baron.
+      &ldquo;On!&mdash;let the boy go with us, lest he prove traitor, and alarm the
+      Colonna.&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;An Orsini, an Orsini,&rdquo; shouted the multitude; &ldquo;on, on!&rdquo; and, despite the
+      prayers and remonstrances of the boy, he was placed in the thickest of the
+      crowd, and borne, or rather dragged along with the rest&mdash;frightened,
+      breathless, almost weeping, with his poor little garland still hanging on
+      his arm, while a sling was thrust into his unwilling hand. Still he felt,
+      through all his alarm, a kind of childish curiosity to see the result of
+      the pursuit.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      By the loud and eager conversation of those about him, he learned that the
+      vessel he had seen contained a supply of corn destined to a fortress up
+      the river held by the Colonna, then at deadly feud with the Orsini; and it
+      was the object of the expedition in which the boy had been thus lucklessly
+      entrained to intercept the provision, and divert it to the garrison of
+      Martino di Porto. This news somewhat increased his consternation, for the
+      boy belonged to a family that claimed the patronage of the Colonna.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      Anxiously and tearfully he looked with every moment up the steep ascent of
+      the Aventine; but his guardian, his protector, still delayed his
+      appearance.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      They had now proceeded some way, when a winding in the road brought
+      suddenly before them the object of their pursuit, as, seen by the light of
+      the earliest stars, it scudded rapidly down the stream.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;Now, the Saints be blest!&rdquo; quoth the chief; &ldquo;she is ours!&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;Hold!&rdquo; said a captain (a German) riding next to Martino, in a half
+      whisper; &ldquo;I hear sounds which I like not, by yonder trees&mdash;hark! The
+      neigh of a horse!&mdash;by my faith, too, there is the gleam of a
+      corselet.&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;Push on, my masters,&rdquo; cried Martino; &ldquo;the heron shall not balk the eagle&mdash;push
+      on!&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      With renewed shouts, those on foot pushed forward, till, as they had
+      nearly gained the copse referred to by the German, a small compact body of
+      horsemen, armed cap-a-pie, dashed from amidst the trees, and, with spears
+      in their rests, charged into the ranks of the pursuers.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;A Colonna! a Colonna!&rdquo; &ldquo;An Orsini! an Orsini!&rdquo; were shouts loudly and
+      fiercely interchanged. Martino di Porto, a man of great bulk and ferocity,
+      and his cavaliers, who were chiefly German Mercenaries, met the encounter
+      unshaken. &ldquo;Beware the bear&rsquo;s hug,&rdquo; cried the Orsini, as down went his
+      antagonist, rider and steed, before his lance.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      The contest was short and fierce; the complete armour of the horsemen
+      protected them on either side from wounds,&mdash;not so unscathed fared
+      the half-armed foot-followers of the Orsini, as they pressed, each pushed
+      on by the other, against the Colonna. After a shower of stones and darts,
+      which fell but as hailstones against the thick mail of the horsemen, they
+      closed in, and, by their number, obstructed the movements of the steeds,
+      while the spear, sword, and battle-axe of their opponents made ruthless
+      havoc amongst their undisciplined ranks. And Martino, who cared little how
+      many of his mere mob were butchered, seeing that his foes were for the
+      moment embarrassed by the wild rush and gathering circle of his foot train
+      (for the place of conflict, though wider than the previous road, was
+      confined and narrow), made a sign to some of his horsemen, and was about
+      to ride forward towards the boat, now nearly out of sight, when a bugle at
+      some distance was answered by one of his enemy at hand; and the shout of
+      &ldquo;Colonna to the rescue!&rdquo; was echoed afar off. A few moments brought in
+      view a numerous train of horse at full speed, with the banners of the
+      Colonna waving gallantly in the front.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;A plague on the wizards! who would have imagined they had divined us so
+      craftily!&rdquo; muttered Martino; &ldquo;we must not abide these odds;&rdquo; and the hand
+      he had first raised for advance, now gave the signal of retreat.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      Serried breast to breast and in complete order, the horsemen of Martino
+      turned to fly; the foot rabble who had come for spoil remained but for
+      slaughter. They endeavoured to imitate their leaders; but how could they
+      all elude the rushing chargers and sharp lances of their antagonists,
+      whose blood was heated by the affray, and who regarded the lives at their
+      mercy as a boy regards the wasp&rsquo;s nest he destroys. The crowd dispersing
+      in all directions,&mdash;some, indeed, escaped up the hills, where the
+      footing was impracticable to the horses; some plunged into the river and
+      swam across to the opposite bank&mdash;those less cool or experienced, who
+      fled right onwards, served, by clogging the way of their enemy, to
+      facilitate the flight of their leaders, but fell themselves, corpse upon
+      corpse, butchered in the unrelenting and unresisted pursuit.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;No quarter to the ruffians&mdash;every Orsini slain is a robber the less&mdash;strike
+      for God, the Emperor, and the Colonna!&rdquo; such were the shouts which rung
+      the knell of the dismayed and falling fugitives. Among those who fled
+      onward, in the very path most accessible to the cavalry, was the young
+      brother of Cola, so innocently mixed with the affray. Fast he fled, dizzy
+      with terror&mdash;poor boy, scarce before ever parted from his parents&rsquo; or
+      his brother&rsquo;s side!&mdash;the trees glided past him&mdash;the banks
+      receded:&mdash;on he sped, and fast behind came the tramp of the hoofs&mdash;the
+      shouts&mdash;the curses&mdash;the fierce laughter of the foe, as they
+      bounded over the dead and the dying in their path. He was now at the spot
+      in which his brother had left him; hastily he glanced behind, and saw the
+      couched lance and horrent crest of the horseman close at his rear;
+      despairingly he looked up, and behold! his brother bursting through the
+      tangled brakes that clothed the mountain, and bounding to his succour.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;Save me! save me, brother!&rdquo; he shrieked aloud, and the shriek reached
+      Cola&rsquo;s ear;&mdash;the snort of the fiery charger breathed hot upon him;&mdash;a
+      moment more, and with one wild shrill cry of &ldquo;Mercy, mercy&rdquo; he fell to the
+      ground&mdash;a corpse: the lance of the pursuer passing through and
+      through him, from back to breast, and nailing him on the very sod where he
+      had sate, full of young life and careless hope, not an hour ago.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      The horseman plucked forth his spear, and passed on in pursuit of new
+      victims; his comrades following. Cola had descended,&mdash;was on the
+      spot,&mdash;kneeling by his murdered brother. Presently, to the sound of
+      horn and trumpet, came by a nobler company than most of those hitherto
+      engaged; who had been, indeed, but the advanced-guard of the Colonna. At
+      their head rode a man in years, whose long white hair escaped from his
+      plumed cap and mingled with his venerable beard. &ldquo;How is this?&rdquo; said the
+      chief, reining in his steed, &ldquo;young Rienzi!&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      The youth looked up, as he heard that voice, and then flung himself before
+      the steed of the old noble, and, clasping his hands, cried out in a scarce
+      articulate tone: &ldquo;It is my brother, noble Stephen,&mdash;a boy, a mere
+      child!&mdash;the best&mdash;the mildest! See how his blood dabbles the
+      grass;&mdash;back, back&mdash;your horse&rsquo;s hoofs are in the stream!
+      Justice, my Lord, justice!&mdash;you are a great man.&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;Who slew him? an Orsini, doubtless; you shall have justice.&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;Thanks, thanks,&rdquo; murmured Rienzi, as he tottered once more to his
+      brother&rsquo;s side, turned the boy&rsquo;s face from the grass, and strove wildly to
+      feel the pulse of his heart; he drew back his hand hastily, for it was
+      crimsoned with blood, and lifting that hand on high, shrieked out again,
+      &ldquo;Justice! justice!&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      The group round the old Stephen Colonna, hardened as they were in such
+      scenes, were affected by the sight. A handsome boy, whose tears ran fast
+      down his cheeks, and who rode his palfrey close by the side of the
+      Colonna, drew forth his sword. &ldquo;My Lord,&rdquo; said he, half sobbing, &ldquo;an
+      Orsini only could have butchered a harmless lad like this; let us lose not
+      a moment,&mdash;let us on after the ruffians.&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;No, Adrian, no!&rdquo; cried Stephen, laying his hand on the boy&rsquo;s shoulder;
+      &ldquo;your zeal is to be lauded, but we must beware an ambush. Our men have
+      ventured too far&mdash;what, ho, there!&mdash;sound a return.&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      The bugles, in a few minutes, brought back the pursuers,&mdash;among them,
+      the horseman whose spear had been so fatally misused. He was the leader of
+      those engaged in the conflict with Martino di Porto; and the gold wrought
+      into his armour, with the gorgeous trappings of his charger, betokened his
+      rank.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;Thanks, my son, thanks,&rdquo; said the old Colonna to this cavalier, &ldquo;you have
+      done well and bravely. But tell me, knowest thou, for thou hast an eagle
+      eye, which of the Orsini slew this poor boy?&mdash;a foul deed; his
+      family, too, our clients!&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;Who? yon lad?&rdquo; replied the horseman, lifting the helmet from his head,
+      and wiping his heated brow; &ldquo;say you so! how came he, then, with Martino&rsquo;s
+      rascals? I fear me the mistake hath cost him dear. I could but suppose him
+      of the Orsini rabble, and so&mdash;and so&mdash;&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;You slew him!&rdquo; cried Rienzi, in a voice of thunder, starting from the
+      ground. &ldquo;Justice! then, my Lord Stephen, justice! you promised me justice,
+      and I will have it!&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;My poor youth,&rdquo; said the old man, compassionately, &ldquo;you should have had
+      justice against the Orsini; but see you not this has been an error? I do
+      not wonder you are too grieved to listen to reason now. We must make this
+      up to you.&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;And let this pay for masses for the boy&rsquo;s soul; I grieve me much for the
+      accident,&rdquo; said the younger Colonna, flinging down a purse of gold. &ldquo;Ay,
+      see us at the palace next week, young Cola&mdash;next week. My father, we
+      had best return towards the boat; its safeguard may require us yet.&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;Right, Gianni; stay, some two of you, and see to the poor lad&rsquo;s corpse;&mdash;a
+      grievous accident! how could it chance?&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      The company passed back the way they came, two of the common soldiers
+      alone remaining, except the boy Adrian, who lingered behind a few moments,
+      striving to console Rienzi, who, as one bereft of sense, remained
+      motionless, gazing on the proud array as it swept along, and muttering to
+      himself, &ldquo;Justice, justice! I will have it yet.&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      The loud voice of the elder Colonna summoned Adrian, reluctantly and
+      weeping, away. &ldquo;Let me be your brother,&rdquo; said the gallant boy,
+      affectionately pressing the scholar&rsquo;s hand to his heart; &ldquo;I want a brother
+      like you.&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      Rienzi made no reply; he did not heed or hear him&mdash;dark and stern
+      thoughts, thoughts in which were the germ of a mighty revolution, were at
+      his heart. He woke from them with a start, as the soldiers were now
+      arranging their bucklers so as to make a kind of bier for the corpse, and
+      then burst into tears as he fiercely motioned them away, and clasped the
+      clay to his breast till he was literally soaked with the oozing blood.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      The poor child&rsquo;s garland had not dropped from his arm even when he fell,
+      and, entangled by his dress, it still clung around him. It was a sight
+      that recalled to Cola all the gentleness, the kind heart, and winning
+      graces of his only brother&mdash;his only friend! It was a sight that
+      seemed to make yet more inhuman the untimely and unmerited fate of that
+      innocent boy. &ldquo;My brother! my brother!&rdquo; groaned the survivor; &ldquo;how shall I
+      meet our mother?&mdash;how shall I meet even night and solitude again?&mdash;so
+      young, so harmless! See ye, sirs, he was but too gentle. And they will not
+      give us justice, because his murderer was a noble and a Colonna. And this
+      gold, too&mdash;gold for a brother&rsquo;s blood! Will they not&rdquo;&mdash;and the
+      young man&rsquo;s eyes glared like fire&mdash;&ldquo;will they not give us justice?
+      Time shall show!&rdquo; so saying, he bent his head over the corpse; his lips
+      muttered, as with some prayer or invocation; and then rising, his face was
+      as pale as the dead beside him,&mdash;but it was no longer pale with
+      grief!
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      From that bloody clay, and that inward prayer, Cola di Rienzi rose a new
+      being. With his young brother died his own youth. But for that event, the
+      future liberator of Rome might have been but a dreamer, a scholar, a poet;
+      the peaceful rival of Petrarch; a man of thoughts, not deeds. But from
+      that time, all his faculties, energies, fancies, genius, became
+      concentrated into a single point; and patriotism, before a vision, leapt
+      into the life and vigour of a passion, lastingly kindled, stubbornly
+      hardened, and awfully consecrated,&mdash;by revenge!
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      <a name="link2HCH0002" id="link2HCH0002">
+      <!--  H2 anchor --> </a>
+    </p>
+    <div style="height: 4em;">
+      <br /><br /><br /><br />
+    </div>
+    <h2>
+      Chapter 1.II. An Historical Survey&mdash;not to Be Passed Over, Except by
+    </h2>
+    <p>
+      Those Who Dislike to Understand What They Read.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      Years had passed away, and the death of the Roman boy, amidst more noble
+      and less excusable slaughter, was soon forgotten,&mdash;forgotten almost
+      by the parents of the slain, in the growing fame and fortunes of their
+      eldest son,&mdash;forgotten and forgiven never by that son himself. But,
+      between that prologue of blood, and the political drama which ensues,&mdash;between
+      the fading interest, as it were, of a dream, and the more busy, actual,
+      and continuous excitements of sterner life,&mdash;this may be the most
+      fitting time to place before the reader a short and rapid outline of the
+      state and circumstances of that city in which the principal scenes of this
+      story are laid;&mdash;an outline necessary, perhaps, to many, for a full
+      comprehension of the motives of the actors, and the vicissitudes of the
+      plot.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      Despite the miscellaneous and mongrel tribes that had forced their
+      settlements in the City of the Caesars, the Roman population retained an
+      inordinate notion of their own supremacy over the rest of the world; and,
+      degenerated from the iron virtues of the Republic, possessed all the
+      insolent and unruly turbulence which characterised the Plebs of the
+      ancient Forum. Amongst a ferocious, yet not a brave populace, the nobles
+      supported themselves less as sagacious tyrants than as relentless
+      banditti. The popes had struggled in vain against these stubborn and stern
+      patricians. Their state derided, their command defied, their persons
+      publicly outraged, the pontiff-sovereigns of the rest of Europe resided,
+      at the Vatican, as prisoners under terror of execution. When, thirty-eight
+      years before the date of the events we are about to witness, a Frenchman,
+      under the name of Clement V., had ascended the chair of St. Peter, the new
+      pope, with more prudence than valour, had deserted Rome for the tranquil
+      retreat of Avignon; and the luxurious town of a foreign province became
+      the court of the Roman pontiff, and the throne of the Christian Church.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      Thus deprived of even the nominal check of the papal presence, the power
+      of the nobles might be said to have no limits, save their own caprice, or
+      their mutual jealousies and feuds. Though arrogating through fabulous
+      genealogies their descent from the ancient Romans, they were, in reality,
+      for the most part, the sons of the bolder barbarians of the North; and,
+      contaminated by the craft of Italy, rather than imbued with its national
+      affections, they retained the disdain of their foreign ancestors for a
+      conquered soil and a degenerate people. While the rest of Italy,
+      especially in Florence, in Venice, and in Milan, was fast and far
+      advancing beyond the other states of Europe in civilisation and in art,
+      the Romans appeared rather to recede than to improve;&mdash;unblest by
+      laws, unvisited by art, strangers at once to the chivalry of a warlike,
+      and the graces of a peaceful, people. But they still possessed the sense
+      and desire of liberty, and, by ferocious paroxysms and desperate
+      struggles, sought to vindicate for their city the title it still assumed
+      of &ldquo;the Metropolis of the World.&rdquo; For the last two centuries they had
+      known various revolutions&mdash;brief, often bloody, and always
+      unsuccessful. Still, there was the empty pageant of a popular form of
+      government. The thirteen quarters of the city named each a chief; and the
+      assembly of these magistrates, called Caporioni, by theory possessed an
+      authority they had neither the power nor the courage to exert. Still there
+      was the proud name of Senator; but, at the present time, the office was
+      confined to one or to two persons, sometimes elected by the pope,
+      sometimes by the nobles. The authority attached to the name seems to have
+      had no definite limit; it was that of a stern dictator, or an indolent
+      puppet, according as he who held it had the power to enforce the dignity
+      he assumed. It was never conceded but to nobles, and it was by the nobles
+      that all the outrages were committed. Private enmity alone was gratified
+      whenever public justice was invoked: and the vindication of order was but
+      the execution of revenge.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      Holding their palaces as the castles and fortresses of princes, each
+      asserting his own independency of all authority and law, and planting
+      fortifications, and claiming principalities in the patrimonial territories
+      of the Church, the barons of Rome made their state still more secure, and
+      still more odious, by the maintenance of troops of foreign (chiefly of
+      German) mercenaries, at once braver in disposition, more disciplined in
+      service, and more skilful in arms, than even the freest Italians of that
+      time. Thus they united the judicial and the military force, not for the
+      protection, but for the ruin of Rome. Of these barons, the most powerful
+      were the Orsini and Colonna; their feuds were hereditary and incessant,
+      and every day witnessed the fruits of their lawless warfare, in bloodshed,
+      in rape, and in conflagration. The flattery or the friendship of Petrarch,
+      too credulously believed by modern historians, has invested the Colonna,
+      especially of the date now entered upon, with an elegance and a dignity
+      not their own. Outrage, fraud, and assassination, a sordid avarice in
+      securing lucrative offices to themselves, an insolent oppression of their
+      citizens, and the most dastardly cringing to power superior to their own
+      (with but few exceptions), mark the character of the first family of Rome.
+      But, wealthier than the rest of the barons, they were, therefore, more
+      luxurious, and, perhaps, more intellectual; and their pride was flattered
+      in being patrons of those arts of which they could never have become the
+      professors. From these multiplied oppressors the Roman citizens turned
+      with fond and impatient regret to their ignorant and dark notions of
+      departed liberty and greatness. They confounded the times of the Empire
+      with those of the Republic; and often looked to the Teutonic king, who
+      obtained his election from beyond the Alps, but his title of emperor from
+      the Romans, as the deserter of his legitimate trust and proper home;
+      vainly imagining that, if both the Emperor and the Pontiff fixed their
+      residence in Rome, Liberty and Law would again seek their natural shelter
+      beneath the resuscitated majesty of the Roman people.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      The absence of the pope and the papal court served greatly to impoverish
+      the citizens; and they had suffered yet more visibly by the depredations
+      of hordes of robbers, numerous and unsparing, who infested Romagna,
+      obstructing all the public ways, and were, sometimes secretly, sometimes,
+      openly, protected by the barons, who often recruited their banditti
+      garrisons by banditti soldiers.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      But besides the lesser and ignobler robbers, there had risen in Italy a
+      far more formidable description of freebooters. A German, who assumed the
+      lofty title of the Duke Werner, had, a few years prior to the period we
+      approach, enlisted and organised a considerable force, styled &ldquo;The Great
+      Company,&rdquo; with which he besieged cities and invaded states, without any
+      object less shameless than that of pillage. His example was soon imitated:
+      numerous &ldquo;Companies,&rdquo; similarly constituted, devastated the distracted and
+      divided land. They appeared, suddenly raised, as if by magic, before the
+      walls of a city, and demanded immense sums as the purchase of peace.
+      Neither tyrant nor common wealth maintained a force sufficient to resist
+      them; and if other northern mercenaries were engaged to oppose them, it
+      was only to recruit the standards of the freebooters with deserters.
+      Mercenary fought not mercenary&mdash;nor German, German: and greater pay,
+      and more unbridled rapine, made the tents of the &ldquo;Companies&rdquo; far more
+      attractive than the regulated stipends of a city, or the dull fortress and
+      impoverished coffers of a chief. Werner, the most implacable and ferocious
+      of all these adventurers, and who had so openly gloried in his enormities
+      as to wear upon his breast a silver plate, engraved with the words, &ldquo;Enemy
+      to God, to Pity, and to Mercy,&rdquo; had not long since ravaged Romagna with
+      fire and sword. But, whether induced by money, or unable to control the
+      fierce spirits he had raised, he afterwards led the bulk of his company
+      back to Germany. Small detachments, however, remained, scattered
+      throughout the land, waiting only an able leader once more to re-unite
+      them: amongst those who appeared most fitted for that destiny was Walter
+      de Montreal, a Knight of St. John, and gentleman of Provence, whose valour
+      and military genius had already, though yet young, raised his name into
+      dreaded celebrity; and whose ambition, experience, and sagacity, relieved
+      by certain chivalric and noble qualities, were suited to enterprises far
+      greater and more important than the violent depredations of the atrocious
+      Werner. From these scourges, no state had suffered more grievously than
+      Rome. The patrimonial territories of the pope,&mdash;in part wrested from
+      him by petty tyrants, in part laid waste by these foreign robbers,&mdash;yielded
+      but a scanty supply to the necessities of Clement VI., the most
+      accomplished gentleman and the most graceful voluptuary of his time; and
+      the good father had devised a plan, whereby to enrich at once the Romans
+      and their pontiff.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      Nearly fifty years before the time we enter upon, in order both to
+      replenish the papal coffers and pacify the starving Romans, Boniface VIII.
+      had instituted the Festival of the Jubilee, or Holy Year; in fact, a
+      revival of a Pagan ceremonial. A plenary indulgence was promised to every
+      Catholic who, in that year, and in the first year of every succeeding
+      century, should visit the churches of St. Peter and St. Paul. An immense
+      concourse of pilgrims, from every part of Christendom, had attested the
+      wisdom of the invention; &ldquo;and two priests stood night and day, with rakes
+      in their hands, to collect without counting the heaps of gold and silver
+      that were poured on the altar of St. Paul.&rdquo; (Gibbon, vol. xii. c. 59.)
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      It is not to be wondered at that this most lucrative festival should, ere
+      the next century was half expired, appear to a discreet pontiff to be too
+      long postponed. And both pope and city agreed in thinking it might well
+      bear a less distant renewal. Accordingly, Clement VI. had proclaimed,
+      under the name of the Mosaic Jubilee, a second Holy Year for 1350&mdash;viz.,
+      three years distant from that date at which, in the next chapter, my
+      narrative will commence. This circumstance had a great effect in whetting
+      the popular indignation against the barons, and preparing the events I
+      shall relate; for the roads were, as I before said, infested by the
+      banditti, the creatures and allies of the barons. And if the roads were
+      not cleared, the pilgrims might not attend. It was the object of the
+      pope&rsquo;s vicar, Raimond, bishop of Orvietto (bad politician and good
+      canonist), to seek, by every means, to remove all impediment between the
+      offerings of devotion and the treasury of St. Peter.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      Such, in brief, was the state of Rome at the period we are about to
+      examine. Her ancient mantle of renown still, in the eyes of Italy and of
+      Europe, cloaked her ruins. In name, at least, she was still the queen of
+      the earth; and from her hands came the crown of the emperor of the north,
+      and the keys of the father of the church. Her situation was precisely that
+      which presented a vase and glittering triumph to bold ambition,&mdash;an
+      inspiring, if mournful, spectacle to determined patriotism,&mdash;and a
+      fitting stage for that more august tragedy which seeks its incidents,
+      selects its actors, and shapes its moral, amidst the vicissitudes and
+      crimes of nations.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      <a name="link2HCH0003" id="link2HCH0003">
+      <!--  H2 anchor --> </a>
+    </p>
+    <div style="height: 4em;">
+      <br /><br /><br /><br />
+    </div>
+    <h2>
+      Chapter 1.III. The Brawl.
+    </h2>
+    <p>
+      On an evening in April, 1347, and in one of those wide spaces in which
+      Modern and Ancient Rome seemed blent together&mdash;equally desolate and
+      equally in ruins&mdash;a miscellaneous and indignant populace were
+      assembled. That morning the house of a Roman jeweller had been forcibly
+      entered and pillaged by the soldiers of Martino di Porto, with a daring
+      effrontery which surpassed even the ordinary licence of the barons. The
+      sympathy and sensation throughout the city were deep and ominous.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;Never will I submit to this tyranny!&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;Nor I!&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;Nor I!&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;Nor by the bones of St. Peter, will I!&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;And what, my friends, is this tyranny to which you will not submit?&rdquo; said
+      a young nobleman, addressing himself to the crowd of citizens who, heated,
+      angry, half-armed, and with the vehement gestures of Italian passion, were
+      now sweeping down the long and narrow street that led to the gloomy
+      quarter occupied by the Orsini.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;Ah, my lord!&rdquo; cried two or three of the citizens in a breath, &ldquo;you will
+      right us&mdash;you will see justice done to us&mdash;you are a Colonna.&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;Ha, ha, ha!&rdquo; laughed scornfully one man of gigantic frame, and wielding
+      on high a huge hammer, indicative of his trade. &ldquo;Justice and Colonna! body
+      of God! those names are not often found together.&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;Down with him! down with him! he is an Orsinist&mdash;down with him!&rdquo;
+       cried at least ten of the throng: but no hand was raised against the
+      giant.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;He speaks the truth,&rdquo; said a second voice, firmly.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;Ay, that doth he,&rdquo; said a third, knitting his brows, and unsheathing his
+      knife, &ldquo;and we will abide by it. The Orsini are tyrants&mdash;and the
+      Colonnas are, at the best, as bad.&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;Thou liest in thy teeth, ruffian!&rdquo; cried the young noble, advancing into
+      the press and confronting the last asperser of the Colonna.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      Before the flashing eye and menacing gesture of the cavalier, the worthy
+      brawler retreated some steps, so as to leave an open space between the
+      towering form of the smith, and the small, slender, but vigorous frame of
+      the young noble.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      Taught from their birth to despise the courage of the plebeians, even
+      while careless of much reputation as to their own, the patricians of Rome
+      were not unaccustomed to the rude fellowship of these brawls; nor was it
+      unoften that the mere presence of a noble sufficed to scatter whole
+      crowds, that had the moment before been breathing vengeance against his
+      order and his house.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      Waving his hand, therefore, to the smith, and utterly unheeding either his
+      brandished weapon or his vast stature, the young Adrian di Castello, a
+      distant kinsman of the Colonna, haughtily bade him give way.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;To your homes, friends! and know,&rdquo; he added, with some dignity, &ldquo;that ye
+      wrong us much, if ye imagine we share the evil-doings of the Orsini, or
+      are pandering solely to our own passions in the feud between their house
+      and ours. May the Holy Mother so judge me,&rdquo; continued he, devoutly lifting
+      up his eyes, &ldquo;as I now with truth declare, that it is for your wrongs, and
+      for the wrongs of Rome, that I have drawn this sword against the Orsini.&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;So say all the tyrants,&rdquo; rejoined the smith, hardily, as he leant his
+      hammer against a fragment of stone&mdash;some remnant of ancient Rome&mdash;&ldquo;they
+      never fight against each other, but it is for our good. One Colonna cuts
+      me the throat of Orsini&rsquo;s baker&mdash;it is for our good! Another Colonna
+      seizes on the daughter of Orsini&rsquo;s tailor&mdash;it is for our good! our
+      good&mdash;yes, for the good of the people! the good of the bakers and
+      tailors, eh?&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;Fellow,&rdquo; said the young nobleman, gravely, &ldquo;if a Colonna did thus, he did
+      wrong; but the holiest cause may have bad supporters.&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;Yes, the holy Church itself is propped on very in different columns,&rdquo;
+       answered the smith, in a rude witticism on the affection of the pope for
+      the Colonna.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;He blasphemes! the smith blasphemes!&rdquo; cried the partisans of that
+      powerful house. &ldquo;A Colonna, a Colonna!&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;An Orsini, an Orsini!&rdquo; was no less promptly the counter cry.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;The People!&rdquo; shouted the smith, waving his formidable weapon far above
+      the heads of the group.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      In an instant the whole throng, who had at first united against the
+      aggression of one man, were divided by the hereditary wrath of faction. At
+      the cry of Orsini, several new partisans hurried to the spot; the friends
+      of the Colonna drew themselves on one side&mdash;the defenders of the
+      Orsini on the other&mdash;and the few who agreed with the smith that both
+      factions were equally odious, and the people was the sole legitimate cry
+      in a popular commotion, would have withdrawn themselves from the
+      approaching melee, if the smith himself, who was looked upon by them as an
+      authority of great influence, had not&mdash;whether from resentment at the
+      haughty bearing of the young Colonna, or from that appetite of contest not
+      uncommon in men of a bulk and force which assure them in all personal
+      affrays the lofty pleasure of superiority&mdash;if, I say, the smith
+      himself had not, after a pause of indecision, retired among the Orsini,
+      and entrained, by his example, the alliance of his friends with the
+      favourers of that faction.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      In popular commotions, each man is whirled along with the herd, often half
+      against his own approbation or assent. The few words of peace by which
+      Adrian di Castello commenced an address to his friends were drowned amidst
+      their shouts. Proud to find in their ranks one of the most beloved, and
+      one of the noblest of that name, the partisans of the Colonna placed him
+      in their front, and charged impetuously on their foes. Adrian, however,
+      who had acquired from circumstances something of that chivalrous code
+      which he certainly could not have owed to his Roman birth, disdained at
+      first to assault men among whom he recognised no equal, either in rank or
+      the practice of arms. He contented himself with putting aside the few
+      strokes that were aimed at him in the gathering confusion of the conflict&mdash;few;
+      for those who recognised him, even amidst the bitterest partisans of the
+      Orsini, were not willing to expose themselves to the danger and odium of
+      spilling the blood of a man, who, in addition to his great birth and the
+      terrible power of his connexions, was possessed of a personal popularity,
+      which he owed rather to a comparison with the vices of his relatives than
+      to any remarkable virtues hitherto displayed by himself. The smith alone,
+      who had as yet taken no active part in the fray, seemed to gather himself
+      up in determined opposition as the cavalier now advanced within a few
+      steps of him.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;Did we not tell thee,&rdquo; quoth the giant, frowning, &ldquo;that the Colonna were,
+      not less than the Orsini, the foes of the people? Look at thy followers
+      and clients: are they not cutting the throats of humble men by way of
+      vengeance for the crime of a great one? But that is the way one patrician
+      always scourges the insolence of another. He lays the rod on the backs of
+      the people, and then cries, &lsquo;See how just I am!&rsquo;&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;I do not answer thee now,&rdquo; answered Adrian; &ldquo;but if thou regrettest with
+      me this waste of blood, join with me in attempting to prevent it.&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;I&mdash;not I! let the blood of the slaves flow today: the time is fast
+      coming when it shall be washed away by the blood of the lords.&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;Away, ruffian!&rdquo; said Adrian, seeking no further parley, and touching the
+      smith with the flat side of his sword. In an instant the hammer of the
+      smith swung in the air, and, but for the active spring of the young noble,
+      would infallibly have crushed him to the earth. Ere the smith could gain
+      time for a second blow, Adrian&rsquo;s sword passed twice through his right arm,
+      and the weapon fell heavily to the ground.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;Slay him, slay him!&rdquo; cried several of the clients of the Colonna, now
+      pressing, dastard-like, round the disarmed and disabled smith.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;Ay, slay him!&rdquo; said, in tolerable Italian, but with a barbarous accent,
+      one man, half-clad in armour, who had but just joined the group, and who
+      was one of those wild German bandits whom the Colonna held in their pay;
+      &ldquo;he belongs to a horrible gang of miscreants sworn against all order and
+      peace. He is one of Rienzi&rsquo;s followers, and, bless the Three Kings! raves
+      about the People.&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;Thou sayest right, barbarian,&rdquo; said the sturdy smith, in a loud voice,
+      and tearing aside the vest from his breast with his left hand; &ldquo;come all&mdash;Colonna
+      and Orsini&mdash;dig to this heart with your sharp blades, and when you
+      have reached the centre, you will find there the object of your common
+      hatred&mdash;&lsquo;Rienzi and the People!&rsquo;&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      As he uttered these words, in language that would have seemed above his
+      station (if a certain glow and exaggeration of phrase and sentiment were
+      not common, when excited, to all the Romans), the loudness of his voice
+      rose above the noise immediately round him, and stilled, for an instant,
+      the general din; and when, at last, the words, &ldquo;Rienzi and the People&rdquo;
+       rang forth, they penetrated midway through the increasing crowd, and were
+      answered as by an echo, with a hundred voices&mdash;&ldquo;Rienzi and the
+      People!&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      But whatever impression the words of the mechanic made on others, it was
+      equally visible in the young Colonna. At the name of Rienzi the glow of
+      excitement vanished from his cheek; he started back, muttered to himself,
+      and for a moment seemed, even in the midst of that stirring commotion, to
+      be lost in a moody and distant revery. He recovered, as the shout died
+      away; and saying to the smith, in a low tone, &ldquo;Friend, I am sorry for thy
+      wound; but seek me on the morrow, and thou shalt find thou hast wronged
+      me;&rdquo; he beckoned to the German to follow him, and threaded his way through
+      the crowd, which generally gave back as he advanced. For the bitterest
+      hatred to the order of the nobles was at that time in Rome mingled with a
+      servile respect for their persons, and a mysterious awe of their
+      uncontrollable power.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      As Adrian passed through that part of the crowd in which the fray had not
+      yet commenced, the murmurs that followed him were not those which many of
+      his race could have heard.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;A Colonna,&rdquo; said one.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;Yet no ravisher,&rdquo; said another, laughing wildly.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;Nor murtherer,&rdquo; muttered a third, pressing his hand to his breast. &ldquo;&lsquo;Tis
+      not against him that my father&rsquo;s blood cries aloud.&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;Bless him,&rdquo; said a fourth, &ldquo;for as yet no man curses him!&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;Ah, God help us!&rdquo; said an old man, with a long grey beard, leaning on his
+      staff: &ldquo;The serpent&rsquo;s young yet; the fangs will show by and by.&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;For shame, father! he is a comely youth, and not proud in the least. What
+      a smile he hath!&rdquo; quoth a fair matron, who kept on the outskirt of the
+      melee.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;Farewell to a man&rsquo;s honour when a noble smiles on his wife!&rdquo; was the
+      answer.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;Nay,&rdquo; said Luigi, a jolly butcher, with a roguish eye, &ldquo;what a man can
+      win fairly from maid or wife, that let him do, whether plebeian or noble&mdash;that&rsquo;s
+      my morality; but when an ugly old patrician finds fair words will not win
+      fair looks, and carries me off a dame on the back of a German boar, with a
+      stab in the side for comfort to the spouse,&mdash;then, I say, he is a
+      wicked man, and an adulterer.&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      While such were the comments and the murmurs that followed the noble, very
+      different were the looks and words that attended the German soldier.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      Equally, nay, with even greater promptitude, did the crowd make way at his
+      armed and heavy tread; but not with looks of reverence:&mdash;the eye
+      glared as he approached; but the cheek grew pale&mdash;the head bowed&mdash;the
+      lip quivered; each man felt a shudder of hate and fear, as recognizing a
+      dread and mortal foe. And well and wrathfully did the fierce mercenary
+      note the signs of the general aversion. He pushed on rudely&mdash;half-smiling
+      in contempt, half-frowning in revenge, as he looked from side to side; and
+      his long, matted, light hair, tawny-coloured moustache, and brawny front,
+      contrasted strongly with the dark eyes, raven locks, and slender frames of
+      the Italians.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;May Lucifer double damn those German cut-throats!&rdquo; muttered, between his
+      grinded teeth, one of the citizens.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;Amen!&rdquo; answered, heartily, another.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;Hush!&rdquo; said a third, timorously looking round; &ldquo;if one of them hear thee,
+      thou art a lost man.&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;Oh, Rome! Rome! to what art thou fallen!&rdquo; said bitterly one citizen,
+      clothed in black, and of a higher seeming than the rest; &ldquo;when thou
+      shudderest in thy streets at the tread of a hired barbarian!&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;Hark to one of our learned men, and rich citizens!&rdquo; said the butcher,
+      reverently.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;&lsquo;Tis a friend of Rienzi&rsquo;s,&rdquo; quoth another of the group, lifting his cap.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      With downcast eyes, and a face in which grief, shame, and wrath, were
+      visibly expressed, Pandulfo di Guido, a citizen of birth and repute, swept
+      slowly through the crowd, and disappeared.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      Meanwhile, Adrian, having gained a street which, though in the
+      neighbourhood of the crowd, was empty and desolate, turned to his fierce
+      comrade. &ldquo;Rodolf!&rdquo; said he, &ldquo;mark!&mdash;no violence to the citizens.
+      Return to the crowd, collect the friends of our house, withdraw them from
+      the scene; let not the Colonna be blamed for this day&rsquo;s violence; and
+      assure our followers, in my name, that I swear, by the knighthood I
+      received at the Emperor&rsquo;s hands, that by my sword shall Martino di Porto
+      be punished for his outrage. Fain would I, in person, allay the tumult,
+      but my presence only seems to sanction it. Go&mdash;thou hast weight with
+      them all.&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;Ay, Signor, the weight of blows!&rdquo; answered the grim soldier. &ldquo;But the
+      command is hard; I would fain let their puddle-blood flow an hour or two
+      longer. Yet, pardon me; in obeying thy orders, do I obey those of my
+      master, thy kinsman? It is old Stephen Colonna&mdash;who seldom spares
+      blood or treasure, God bless him&mdash;(save his own!)&mdash;whose money I
+      hold, and to whose hests I am sworn.&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;Diavolo!&rdquo; muttered the cavalier, and the angry spot was on his cheek;
+      but, with the habitual self-control of the Italian nobles, he smothered
+      his rising choler, and said aloud, with calmness, but dignity&mdash;
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;Do as I bid thee; check this tumult&mdash;make us the forbearing party.
+      Let all be still within one hour hence, and call on me tomorrow for thy
+      reward; be this purse an earnest of my future thanks. As for my kinsman,
+      whom I command thee to name more reverently, &lsquo;tis in his name I speak.
+      Hark! the din increases&mdash;the contest swells&mdash;go&mdash;lose not
+      another moment.&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      Somewhat awed by the quiet firmness of the patrician, Rodolf nodded,
+      without answer, slid the money into his bosom, and stalked away into the
+      thickest of the throng. But, even ere he arrived, a sudden reaction had
+      taken place.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      The young cavalier, left alone in that spot, followed with his eyes the
+      receding form of the mercenary, as the sun, now setting, shone slant upon
+      his glittering casque, and said bitterly to himself&mdash;&ldquo;Unfortunate
+      city, fountain of all mighty memories&mdash;fallen queen of a thousand
+      nations&mdash;how art thou decrowned and spoiled by thy recreant and
+      apostate children! Thy nobles divided against themselves&mdash;thy people
+      cursing thy nobles&mdash;thy priests, who should sow peace, planting
+      discord&mdash;the father of thy church deserting thy stately walls, his
+      home a refuge, his mitre a fief, his court a Gallic village&mdash;and we!
+      we, of the haughtiest blood of Rome&mdash;we, the sons of Caesars, and of
+      the lineage of demigods, guarding an insolent and abhorred state by the
+      swords of hirelings, who mock our cowardice while they receive our pay&mdash;who
+      keep our citizens slaves, and lord it over their very masters in return!
+      Oh, that we, the hereditary chiefs of Rome, could but feel&mdash;oh, that
+      we could but find, our only legitimate safeguard in the grateful hearts of
+      our countrymen!&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      So deeply did the young Adrian feel the galling truth of all he uttered,
+      that the indignant tears rolled down his cheeks as he spoke. He felt no
+      shame as he dashed them away; for that weakness which weeps for a fallen
+      race, is the tenderness not of women but of angels.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      As he turned slowly to quit the spot, his steps were suddenly arrested by
+      a loud shout: &ldquo;Rienzi! Rienzi!&rdquo; smote the air. From the walls of the
+      Capitol to the bed of the glittering Tiber, that name echoed far and wide;
+      and, as the shout died away, it was swallowed up in a silence so profound,
+      so universal, so breathless, that you might have imagined that death
+      itself had fallen over the city. And now, at the extreme end of the crowd,
+      and elevated above their level, on vast fragments of stone which had been
+      dragged from the ruins of Rome in one of the late frequent tumults between
+      contending factions, to serve as a barricade for citizens against
+      citizens,&mdash;on these silent memorials of the past grandeur, the
+      present misery, of Rome, stood that extraordinary man, who, above all his
+      race, was the most penetrated with the glories of the one time, with the
+      degradation of the other.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      From the distance at which he stood from the scene, Adrian could only
+      distinguish the dark outline of Rienzi&rsquo;s form; he could only hear the
+      faint sound of his mighty voice; he could only perceive, in the subdued
+      yet waving sea of human beings that spread around, their heads bared in
+      the last rays of the sun, the unutterable effect which an eloquence,
+      described by contemporaries almost as miraculous,&mdash;but in reality
+      less so from the genius of the man than the sympathy of the audience,&mdash;created
+      in all, who drank into their hearts and souls the stream of its burning
+      thoughts.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      It was but for a short time that that form was visible to the earnest eye,
+      that that voice at intervals reached the straining ear, of Adrian di
+      Castello; but that time sufficed to produce all the effect which Adrian
+      himself had desired.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      Another shout, more earnest, more prolonged than the first&mdash;a shout,
+      in which spoke the release of swelling thoughts, of intense excitement&mdash;betokened
+      the close of the harangue; and then you might see, after a minute&rsquo;s pause,
+      the crowd breaking in all directions, and pouring down the avenues in
+      various knots and groups, each testifying the strong and lasting
+      impression made upon the multitude by that address. Every cheek was
+      flushed&mdash;every tongue spoke: the animation of the orator had passed,
+      like a living spirit, into the breasts of the audience. He had thundered
+      against the disorders of the patricians, yet, by a word, he had disarmed
+      the anger of the plebeians&mdash;he had preached freedom, yet he had
+      opposed licence. He had calmed the present, by a promise of the future. He
+      had chid their quarrels, yet had supported their cause. He had mastered
+      the revenge of today, by a solemn assurance that there should come justice
+      for the morrow. So great may be the power, so mighty the eloquence, so
+      formidable the genius, of one man,&mdash;without arms, without rank,
+      without sword or ermine, who addresses himself to a people that is
+      oppressed!
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      <a name="link2HCH0004" id="link2HCH0004">
+      <!--  H2 anchor --> </a>
+    </p>
+    <div style="height: 4em;">
+      <br /><br /><br /><br />
+    </div>
+    <h2>
+      Chapter 1.IV. An Adventure.
+    </h2>
+    <p>
+      Avoiding the broken streams of the dispersed crowd, Adrian Colonna strode
+      rapidly down one of the narrow streets leading to his palace, which was
+      situated at no inconsiderable distance from the place in which the late
+      contest had occurred. The education of his life made him feel a profound
+      interest, not only in the divisions and disputes of his country, but also
+      in the scene he had just witnessed, and the authority exercised by Rienzi.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      An orphan of a younger, but opulent branch of the Colonna, Adrian had been
+      brought up under the care and guardianship of his kinsman, that astute,
+      yet valiant Stephen Colonna, who, of all the nobles of Rome, was the most
+      powerful, alike from the favour of the pope, and the number of armed
+      hirelings whom his wealth enabled him to maintain. Adrian had early
+      manifested what in that age was considered an extraordinary disposition
+      towards intellectual pursuits, and had acquired much of the little that
+      was then known of the ancient language and the ancient history of his
+      country.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      Though Adrian was but a boy at the time in which, first presented to the
+      reader, he witnessed the emotions of Rienzi at the death of his brother,
+      his kind heart had been penetrated with sympathy for Cola&rsquo;s affliction,
+      and shame for the apathy of his kinsmen at the result of their own feuds.
+      He had earnestly sought the friendship of Rienzi, and, despite his years,
+      had become aware of the power and energy of his character. But though
+      Rienzi, after a short time, had appeared to think no more of his brother&rsquo;s
+      death&mdash;though he again entered the halls of the Colonna, and shared
+      their disdainful hospitalities, he maintained a certain distance and
+      reserve of manner, which even Adrian could only partially overcome. He
+      rejected every offer of service, favour, or promotion; and any unwonted
+      proof of kindness from Adrian seemed, instead of making him more familiar,
+      to offend him into colder distance. The easy humour and conversational
+      vivacity which had first rendered him a welcome guest with those who
+      passed their lives between fighting and feasting, had changed into a vein
+      ironical, cynical, and severe. But the dull barons were equally amused at
+      his wit, and Adrian was almost the only one who detected the serpent
+      couched beneath the smile.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      Often Rienzi sat at the feast, silent, but observant, as if watching every
+      look, weighing every word, taking gauge and measurement of the intellect,
+      policy, temperament, of every guest; and when he had seemed to satisfy
+      himself, his spirits would rise, his words flow, and while his dazzling
+      but bitter wit lit up the revel, none saw that the unmirthful flash was
+      the token of the coming storm. But all the while, he neglected no occasion
+      to mix with the humbler citizens, to stir up their minds, to inflame their
+      imaginations, to kindle their emulation, with pictures of the present and
+      with legends of the past. He grew in popularity and repute, and was yet
+      more in power with the herd, because in favour with the nobles. Perhaps it
+      was for that reason that he had continued the guest of the Colonna.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      When, six years before the present date, the Capitol of the Caesars
+      witnessed the triumph of Petrarch, the scholastic fame of the young Rienzi
+      had attracted the friendship of the poet,&mdash;a friendship that
+      continued, with slight interruption, to the last, through careers so
+      widely different; and afterwards, one among the Roman Deputies to Avignon,
+      he had been conjoined with Petrarch (According to the modern historians;
+      but it seems more probable that Rienzi&rsquo;s mission to Avignon was posterior
+      to that of Petrarch. However this be, it was at Avignon that Petrarch and
+      Rienzi became most intimate, as Petrarch himself observes in one of his
+      letters.) to supplicate Clement VI. to remove the Holy See from Avignon to
+      Rome. It was in this mission that, for the first time, he evinced his
+      extraordinary powers of eloquence and persuasion. The pontiff, indeed,
+      more desirous of ease than glory, was not convinced by the arguments, but
+      he was enchanted with the pleader; and Rienzi returned to Rome, loaded
+      with honours, and clothed with the dignity of high and responsible office.
+      No longer the inactive scholar, the gay companion, he rose at once to
+      pre-eminence above all his fellow-citizens. Never before had authority
+      been borne with so austere an integrity, so uncorrupt a zeal. He had
+      sought to impregnate his colleagues with the same loftiness of principle&mdash;he
+      had failed. Now secure in his footing, he had begun openly to appeal to
+      the people; and already a new spirit seemed to animate the populace of
+      Rome.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      While these were the fortunes of Rienzi, Adrian had been long separated
+      from him, and absent from Rome.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      The Colonna were staunch supporters of the imperial party, and Adrian di
+      Castello had received and obeyed an invitation to the Emperor&rsquo;s court.
+      Under that monarch he had initiated himself in arms, and, among the
+      knights of Germany, he had learned to temper the natural Italian
+      shrewdness with the chivalry of northern valour.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      In leaving Bavaria, he had sojourned a short time in the solitude of one
+      of his estates by the fairest lake of northern Italy; and thence, with a
+      mind improved alike by action and study, had visited many of the free
+      Italian states, imbibed sentiments less prejudiced than those of his
+      order, and acquired an early reputation for himself while inly marking the
+      characters and deeds of others. In him, the best qualities of the Italian
+      noble were united. Passionately addicted to the cultivation of letters,
+      subtle and profound in policy, gentle and bland of manner, dignifying a
+      love of pleasure with a certain elevation of taste, he yet possessed a
+      gallantry of conduct, and purity of honour, and an aversion from cruelty,
+      which were then very rarely found in the Italian temperament, and which
+      even the Chivalry of the North, while maintaining among themselves,
+      usually abandoned the moment they came into contact with the systematic
+      craft and disdain of honesty, which made the character of the ferocious,
+      yet wily, South. With these qualities he combined, indeed, the softer
+      passions of his countrymen,&mdash;he adored Beauty, and he made a deity of
+      Love.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      He had but a few weeks returned to his native city, whither his reputation
+      had already preceded him, and where his early affection for letters and
+      gentleness of bearing were still remembered. He returned to find the
+      position of Rienzi far more altered than his own. Adrian had not yet
+      sought the scholar. He wished first to judge with his own eyes, and at a
+      distance, of the motives and object of his conduct; for partly he caught
+      the suspicions which his own order entertained of Rienzi, and partly he
+      shared in the trustful enthusiasm of the people.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;Certainly,&rdquo; said he now to himself, as he walked musingly onward,
+      &ldquo;certainly, no man has it more in his power to reform our diseased state,
+      to heal our divisions, to awaken our citizens to the recollections of
+      ancestral virtue. But that very power, how dangerous is it! Have I not
+      seen, in the free states of Italy, men, called into authority for the sake
+      of preserving the people, honest themselves at first, and then, drunk with
+      the sudden rank, betraying the very cause which had exalted them? True,
+      those men were chiefs and nobles; but are plebeians less human? Howbeit I
+      have heard and seen enough from afar,&mdash;I will now approach, and
+      examine the man himself.&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      While thus soliloquizing, Adrian but little noted the various passengers,
+      who, more and more rarely as the evening waned, hastened homeward. Among
+      these were two females, who now alone shared with Adrian the long and
+      gloomy street into which he had entered. The moon was already bright in
+      the heavens, and, as the women passed the cavalier with a light and quick
+      step, the younger one turned back and regarded him by the clear light with
+      an eager, yet timid glance.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;Why dost thou tremble, my pretty one!&rdquo; said her companion, who might have
+      told some five-and-forty years, and whose garb and voice bespoke her of
+      inferior rank to the younger female. &ldquo;The streets seem quiet enough now,
+      and, the Virgin be praised! we are not so far from home either.&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;Oh, Benedetta, it is he! it is the young signor&mdash;it is Adrian!&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;That is fortunate,&rdquo; said the nurse, for such was her condition, &ldquo;since
+      they say he is as bold as a Northman: and as the Palazzo Colonna is not
+      very far from hence, we shall be within reach of his aid should we want
+      it: that is to say, sweet one, if you will walk a little slower than you
+      have yet done.&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      The young lady slackened her pace, and sighed.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;He is certainly very handsome,&rdquo; quoth the nurse: &ldquo;but thou must not think
+      more of him; he is too far above thee for marriage, and for aught else,
+      thou art too honest, and thy brother too proud&mdash;&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;And thou, Benedetta, art too quick with thy tongue. How canst thou talk
+      thus, when thou knowest he hath never, since, at least, I was a mere
+      child, even addressed me: nay, he scarce knows of my very existence. He,
+      the Lord Adrian di Castello, dream of the poor Irene! The mere thought is
+      madness!&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;Then why,&rdquo; said the nurse, briskly, &ldquo;dost thou dream of him?&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      Her companion sighed again more deeply than at first.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;Holy St. Catherine!&rdquo; continued Benedetta, &ldquo;if there were but one man in
+      the world, I would die single ere I would think of him, until, at least,
+      he had kissed my hand twice, and left it my own fault if it were not my
+      lips instead.&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      The young lady still replied not.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;But how didst thou contrive to love him?&rdquo; asked the nurse. &ldquo;Thou canst
+      not have seen him very often: it is but some four or five weeks since his
+      return to Rome.&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;Oh, how dull art thou?&rdquo; answered the fair Irene. &ldquo;Have I not told thee
+      again and again, that I loved him six years ago?&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;When thou hadst told but thy tenth year, and a doll would have been thy
+      most suitable lover! As I am a Christian, Signora, thou hast made good use
+      of thy time.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;And during his absence,&rdquo; continued the girl, fondly, yet sadly, &ldquo;did I
+      not hear him spoken of, and was not the mere sound of his name like a
+      love-gift that bade me remember? And when they praised him, have I not
+      rejoiced? and when they blamed him, have I not resented? and when they
+      said that his lance was victorious in the tourney, did I not weep with
+      pride? and when they whispered that his vows were welcome in the bower,
+      wept I not as fervently with grief? Have not the six years of his absence
+      been a dream, and was not his return a waking into light&mdash;a morning
+      of glory and the sun? and I see him now in the church when he wots not of
+      me; and on his happy steed as he passes by my lattice: and is not that
+      enough of happiness for love?&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;But if he loves not thee?&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;Fool! I ask not that;&mdash;nay, I know not if I wish it. Perhaps I would
+      rather dream of him, such as I would have him, than know him for what he
+      is. He might be unkind, or ungenerous, or love me but little; rather would
+      I not be loved at all, than loved coldly, and eat away my heart by
+      comparing it with his. I can love him now as something abstract, unreal,
+      and divine: but what would be my shame, my grief, if I were to find him
+      less than I have imagined! Then, indeed, my life would have been wasted;
+      then, indeed, the beauty of the earth would be gone!&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      The good nurse was not very capable of sympathizing with sentiments like
+      these. Even had their characters been more alike, their disparity of age
+      would have rendered such sympathy impossible. What but youth can echo back
+      the soul of youth&mdash;all the music of its wild vanities and romantic
+      follies? The good nurse did not sympathize with the sentiments of her
+      young lady, but she sympathised with the deep earnestness with which they
+      were expressed. She thought it wondrous silly, but wondrous moving; she
+      wiped her eyes with the corner of her veil, and hoped in her secret heart
+      that her young charge would soon get a real husband to put such
+      unsubstantial fantasies out of her head. There was a short pause in their
+      conversation, when, just where two streets crossed one another, there was
+      heard a loud noise of laughing voices and trampling feet. Torches were
+      seen on high affronting the pale light of the moon; and, at a very short
+      distance from the two females, in the cross street, advanced a company of
+      seven or eight men, bearing, as seen by the red light of the torches, the
+      formidable badge of the Orsini.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      Amidst the other disorders of the time, it was no unfrequent custom for
+      the younger or more dissolute of the nobles, in small and armed companies,
+      to parade the streets at night, seeking occasion for a licentious
+      gallantry among the cowering citizens, or a skirmish at arms with some
+      rival stragglers of their own order. Such a band had Irene and her
+      companion now chanced to encounter.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;Holy mother!&rdquo; cried Benedetta, turning pale, and half running, &ldquo;what
+      curse has befallen us? How could we have been so foolish as to tarry so
+      late at the lady Nina&rsquo;s! Run, Signora,&mdash;run, or we shall fall into
+      their hands!&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      But the advice of Benedetta came too late,&mdash;the fluttering garments
+      of the women had been already descried: in a moment more they were
+      surrounded by the marauders. A rude hand tore aside Benedetta&rsquo;s veil, and
+      at sight of features, which, if time had not spared, it could never very
+      materially injure, the rough aggressor cast the poor nurse against the
+      wall with a curse, which was echoed by a loud laugh from his comrades.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;Thou hast a fine fortune in faces Giuseppe!&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;Yes; it was but the other day that he seized on a girl of sixty.&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;And then, by way of improving her beauty, cut her across the face with
+      his dagger, because she was not sixteen!&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;Hush, fellows! whom have we here?&rdquo; said the chief of the party, a man
+      richly dressed, and who, though bordering upon middle age, had only the
+      more accustomed himself to the excesses of youth; as he spoke, he snatched
+      the trembling Irene from the grasp of his followers. &ldquo;Ho, there! the
+      torches! Oh che bella faccia! what blushes&mdash;what eyes!&mdash;nay,
+      look not down, pretty one; thou needst not be ashamed to win the love of
+      an Orsini&mdash;yes; know the triumph thou hast achieved&mdash;it is
+      Martino di Porto who bids thee smile upon him!&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;For the blest Mother&rsquo;s sake release me! Nay, sir, this must not be&mdash;I
+      am not unfriended&mdash;this insult shall not pass!&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;Hark to her silver chiding; it is better than my best hound&rsquo;s bay! This
+      adventure is worth a month&rsquo;s watching. What! will you not come?&mdash;restive&mdash;shrieks
+      too!&mdash;Francesco, Pietro, ye are the gentlest of the band. Wrap her
+      veil around her,&mdash;muffle this music;&mdash;so! bear her before me to
+      the palace, and tomorrow, sweet one, thou shalt go home with a basket of
+      florins which thou mayest say thou hast bought at market.&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      But Irene&rsquo;s shrieks, Irene&rsquo;s struggles, had already brought succour to her
+      side, and, as Adrian approached the spot, the nurse flung herself on her
+      knees before him.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;Oh, sweet signor, for Christ&rsquo;s grace save us! Deliver my young mistress&mdash;her
+      friends love you well! We are all for the Colonna, my lord; yes, indeed,
+      all for the Colonna! Save the kin of your own clients, gracious signor!&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;It is enough that she is a woman,&rdquo; answered Adrian, adding, between his
+      teeth, &ldquo;and that an Orsini is her assailant.&rdquo; He strode haughtily into the
+      thickest of the group; the servitors laid hands on their swords, but gave
+      way before him as they recognised his person; he reached the two men who
+      had already seized Irene; in one moment he struck the foremost to the
+      ground, in another, he had passed his left arm round the light and slender
+      form of the maiden, and stood confronting the Orsini with his drawn blade,
+      which, however, he pointed to the ground.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;For shame, my lord&mdash;for shame!&rdquo; said he, indignantly. &ldquo;Will you
+      force Rome to rise, to a man, against our order? Vex not too far the lion,
+      chained though he be; war against us if ye will! draw your blades upon
+      men, though they be of your own race, and speak your own tongue: but if ye
+      would sleep at nights, and not dread the avenger&rsquo;s gripe,&mdash;if ye
+      would walk the market-place secure,&mdash;wrong not a Roman woman! Yes,
+      the very walls around us preach to you the punishment of such a deed: for
+      that offence fell the Tarquins,&mdash;for that offence were swept away the
+      Decemvirs,&mdash;for that offence, if ye rush upon it, the blood of your
+      whole house may flow like water. Cease, then, my lord, from this mad
+      attempt, so unworthy your great name; cease, and thank even a Colonna that
+      he has come between you and a moment&rsquo;s frenzy!&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      So noble, so lofty were the air and gesture of Adrian, as he thus spoke,
+      that even the rude servitors felt a thrill of approbation and remorse&mdash;not
+      so Martino di Porto. He had been struck with the beauty of the prey thus
+      suddenly snatched from him; he had been accustomed to long outrage and to
+      long impunity; the very sight, the very voice of a Colonna, was a blight
+      to his eye and a discord to his ear: what, then, when a Colonna interfered
+      with his lusts, and rebuked his vices?
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;Pedant!&rdquo; he cried, with quivering lips, &ldquo;prate not to me of thy vain
+      legends and gossip&rsquo;s tales! think not to snatch from me my possession in
+      another, when thine own life is in my hands. Unhand the maiden! throw down
+      thy sword! return home without further parley, or, by my faith, and the
+      blades of my followers&mdash;(look at them well!)&mdash;thou diest!&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;Signor,&rdquo; said Adrian, calmly, yet while he spoke he retreated gradually
+      with his fair burthen towards the neighbouring wall, so as at least to
+      leave only his front exposed to those fearful odds: &ldquo;Thou will not so
+      misuse the present chances, and wrong thyself in men&rsquo;s mouths, as to
+      attack with eight swords even thy hereditary foe, thus cumbered, too, as
+      he is. But&mdash;nay hold!&mdash;if thou art so proposed, bethink thee
+      well, one cry of my voice would soon turn the odds against thee. Thou art
+      now in the quarter of my tribe; thou art surrounded by the habitations of
+      the Colonna: yon palace swarms with men who sleep not, save with harness
+      on their backs; men whom my voice can reach even now, but from whom, if
+      they once taste of blood, it could not save thee!&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;He speaks true, noble Lord,&rdquo; said one of the band: &ldquo;we have wandered too
+      far out of our beat; we are in their very den; the palace of old Stephen
+      Colonna is within call; and, to my knowledge,&rdquo; added he, in a whisper,
+      &ldquo;eighteen fresh men-of-arms&mdash;ay, and Northmen too&mdash;marched
+      through its gates this day.&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;Were there eight hundred men at arm&rsquo;s length,&rdquo; answered Martino
+      furiously, &ldquo;I would not be thus bearded amidst mine own train! Away with
+      yon woman! To the attack! to the attack!&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      Thus saying, he made a desperate lunge at Adrian, who, having kept his eye
+      cautiously on the movements of his enemy, was not unprepared for the
+      assault. As he put aside the blade with his own, he shouted with a loud
+      voice&mdash;&ldquo;Colonna! to the rescue, Colonna!&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      Nor had it been without an ulterior object that the acute and
+      self-controlling mind of Adrian had hitherto sought to prolong the parley.
+      Even as he first addressed Orsini, he had perceived, by the moonlight, the
+      glitter of armour upon two men advancing from the far end of the street,
+      and judged at once, by the neighbourhood, that they must be among the
+      mercenaries of the Colonna.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      Gently he suffered the form of Irene, which now, for she had swooned with
+      the terror, pressed too heavily upon him, to slide from his left arm, and
+      standing over her form, while sheltered from behind by the wall which he
+      had so warily gained, he contented himself with parrying the blows hastily
+      aimed at him, without attempting to retaliate. Few of the Romans, however
+      accustomed to such desultory warfare, were then well and dexterously
+      practised in the use of arms; and the science Adrian had acquired in the
+      schools of the martial north, befriended him now, even against such odds.
+      It is true, indeed, that the followers of Orsini did not share the fury of
+      their lord; partly afraid of the consequence to themselves should the
+      blood of so highborn a signor be spilt by their hands, partly embarrassed
+      with the apprehension that they should see themselves suddenly beset with
+      the ruthless hirelings so close within hearing, they struck but aimless
+      and random blows, looking every moment behind and aside, and rather
+      prepared for flight than slaughter. Echoing the cry of &ldquo;Colonna,&rdquo; poor
+      Benedetta fled at the first clash of swords. She ran down the dreary
+      street still shrieking that cry, and passed the very portals of Stephen&rsquo;s
+      palace (where some grim forms yet loitered) without arresting her steps
+      there, so great were her confusion and terror.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      Meanwhile, the two armed men, whom Adrian had descried, proceeded
+      leisurely up the street. The one was of a rude and common mould, his arms
+      and his complexion testified his calling and race; and by the great
+      respect he paid to his companion, it was evident that that companion was
+      no native of Italy. For the brigands of the north, while they served the
+      vices of the southern, scarce affected to disguise their contempt for his
+      cowardice.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      The companion of the brigand was a man of a martial, yet easy air. He wore
+      no helmet, but a cap of crimson velvet, set off with a white plume; on his
+      mantle, or surcoat, which was of scarlet, was wrought a broad white cross,
+      both at back and breast; and so brilliant was the polish of his corselet,
+      that, as from time to time the mantle waved aside and exposed it to the
+      moonbeams, it glittered like light itself.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;Nay, Rodolf,&rdquo; said he, &ldquo;if thou hast so good a lot of it here with that
+      hoary schemer, Heaven forbid that I should wish to draw thee back again to
+      our merry band. But tell me&mdash;this Rienzi&mdash;thinkest thou he has
+      any solid and formidable power?&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;Pshaw! noble chieftain, not a whit of it. He pleases the mob; but as for
+      the nobles, they laugh at him; and, as for the soldiers, he has no money!&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;He pleases the mob, then!&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;Ay, that doth he; and when he speaks aloud to them, all the roar of Rome
+      is hushed.&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;Humph!&mdash;when nobles are hated, and soldiers are bought, a mob may,
+      in any hour, become the master. An honest people and a weak mob,&mdash;a
+      corrupt people and a strong mob,&rdquo; said the other, rather to himself than
+      to his comrade, and scarce, perhaps, conscious of the eternal truth of his
+      aphorism. &ldquo;He is no mere brawler, this Rienzi, I suspect&mdash;I must see
+      to it. Hark! what noise is that? By the Holy Sepulchre, it is the ring of
+      our own metal!&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;And that cry&mdash;&lsquo;a Colonna!&rsquo;&rdquo; exclaimed Rodolf. &ldquo;Pardon me, master,&mdash;I
+      must away to the rescue!&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;Ay, it is the duty of thy hire; run;&mdash;yet stay, I will accompany
+      thee, gratis for once, and from pure passion for mischief. By this hand,
+      there is no music like clashing steel!&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      Still Adrian continued gallantly and unwounded to defend himself, though
+      his arm now grew tired, his breath well-nigh spent, and his eyes began to
+      wink and reel beneath the glare of the tossing torches. Orsini himself,
+      exhausted by his fury, had paused for an instant, fronting his foe with a
+      heaving breast and savage looks, when, suddenly, his followers exclaimed,
+      &ldquo;Fly! fly!&mdash;the bandits approach&mdash;we are surrounded!&rdquo;&mdash;and
+      two of the servitors, without further parley, took fairly to their heels.
+      The other five remained irresolute, and waiting but the command of their
+      master, when he of the white plume, whom I have just described, thrust
+      himself into the melee.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;What! gentles,&rdquo; said he, &ldquo;have ye finished already? Nay, let us not mar
+      the sport; begin again, I beseech you. What are the odds? Ho! six to one!&mdash;nay,
+      no wonder that ye have waited for fairer play. See, we two will take the
+      weaker side. Now then, let us begin again.&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;Insolent!&rdquo; cried the Orsini. &ldquo;Knowest thou him whom thou addressest thus
+      arrogantly?&mdash;I am Martino di Porto. Who art thou?&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;Walter de Montreal, gentleman of Provence, and Knight of St. John!&rdquo;
+       answered the other, carelessly.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      At that redoubted name&mdash;the name of one of the boldest warriors, and
+      of the most accomplished freebooter of his time&mdash;even Martino&rsquo;s cheek
+      grew pale, and his followers uttered a cry of terror.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;And this, my comrade,&rdquo; continued the Knight, &ldquo;for we may as well complete
+      the introduction, is probably better known to you than I am, gentles of
+      Rome; and you doubtless recognize in him Rodolf of Saxony, a brave man and
+      a true, where he is properly paid for his services.&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;Signor,&rdquo; said Adrian to his enemy, who, aghast and dumb, remained staring
+      vacantly at the two new-comers, &ldquo;you are now in my power. See, our own
+      people, too, are approaching.&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      And, indeed, from the palace of Stephen Colonna, torches began to blaze,
+      and armed men were seen rapidly advancing to the spot.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;Go home in peace, and if, tomorrow, or any day more suitable to thee,
+      thou wilt meet me alone, and lance to lance, as is the wont of the knights
+      of the empire; or with band to band, and man for man, as is rather the
+      Roman custom; I will not fail thee&mdash;there is my gage.&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;Nobly spoken,&rdquo; said Montreal; &ldquo;and, if ye choose the latter, by your
+      leave, I will be one of the party.&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      Martino answered not; he took up the glove, thrust it in his bosom, and
+      strode hastily away; only, when he had got some paces down the street, he
+      turned back, and, shaking his clenched hand at Adrian, exclaimed, in a
+      voice trembling with impotent rage&mdash;&ldquo;Faithful to death!&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      The words made one of the mottoes of the Orsini; and, whatever its earlier
+      signification, had long passed into a current proverb, to signify their
+      hatred to the Colonna.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      Adrian, now engaged in raising, and attempting to revive Irene, who was
+      still insensible, disdainfully left it to Montreal to reply.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;I doubt not, Signor,&rdquo; said the latter, coolly, &ldquo;that thou wilt be
+      faithful to Death: for Death, God wot, is the only contract which men,
+      however ingenious, are unable to break or evade.&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;Pardon me, gentle Knight,&rdquo; said Adrian, looking up from his charge, &ldquo;if I
+      do not yet give myself wholly to gratitude. I have learned enough of
+      knighthood to feel thou wilt acknowledge that my first duty is here&mdash;&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;Oh, a lady, then, was the cause of the quarrel! I need not ask who was in
+      the right, when a man brings to the rivalry such odds as yon caitiff.&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;Thou mistakest a little, Sir Knight,&mdash;it is but a lamb I have
+      rescued from the wolf.&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;For thy own table! Be it so!&rdquo; returned the Knight, gaily.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      Adrian smiled gravely, and shook his head in denial. In truth, he was
+      somewhat embarrassed by his situation. Though habitually gallant, he was
+      not willing to expose to misconstruction the disinterestedness of his late
+      conduct, and (for it was his policy to conciliate popularity) to sully the
+      credit which his bravery would give him among the citizens, by conveying
+      Irene (whose beauty, too, as yet, he had scarcely noted) to his own
+      dwelling; and yet, in her present situation, there was no alternative. She
+      evinced no sign of life. He knew not her home, nor parentage. Benedetta
+      had vanished. He could not leave her in the streets; he could not resign
+      her to the care of another; and, as she lay now upon his breast, he felt
+      her already endeared to him, by that sense of protection which is so
+      grateful to the human heart. He briefly, therefore, explained to those now
+      gathered round him, his present situation, and the cause of the past
+      conflict; and bade the torch-bearers precede him to his home.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;You, Sir Knight,&rdquo; added he, turning to Montreal, &ldquo;if not already more
+      pleasantly lodged, will, I trust, deign to be my guest?&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;Thanks, Signor,&rdquo; answered Montreal, maliciously, &ldquo;but I, also, perhaps,
+      have my own affairs to watch over. Adieu! I shall seek you at the earliest
+      occasion. Fair night, and gentle dreams!
+    </p>
+<pre xml:space="preserve">
+  &lsquo;Robers Bertrams qui estoit tors Mais a ceval estoit mult fors
+  Cil avoit o lui grans effors Multi ot &lsquo;homes per lui mors.&rsquo;&rdquo;
+ 
+     (&ldquo;An ill-favoured man, but a stout horseman, was Robert
+     Bertram. Great deeds were his, and many a man died by his
+     hand.&rdquo;)
+</pre>
+    <p>
+      And, muttering this rugged chant from the old &ldquo;Roman de Rou,&rdquo; the
+      Provencal, followed by Rodolf, pursued his way.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      The vast extent of Rome, and the thinness of its population, left many of
+      the streets utterly deserted. The principal nobles were thus enabled to
+      possess themselves of a wide range of buildings, which they fortified,
+      partly against each other, partly against the people; their numerous
+      relatives and clients lived around them, forming, as it were, petty courts
+      and cities in themselves.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      Almost opposite to the principal palace of the Colonna (occupied by his
+      powerful kinsman, Stephen) was the mansion of Adrian. Heavily swung back
+      the massive gates at his approach; he ascended the broad staircase, and
+      bore his charge into an apartment which his tastes had decorated in a
+      fashion not as yet common in that age. Ancient statues and busts were
+      arranged around; the pictured arras of Lombardy decorated the walls, and
+      covered the massive seats.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;What ho! Lights here, and wine!&rdquo; cried the Seneschal.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;Leave us alone,&rdquo; said Adrian, gazing passionately on the pale cheek of
+      Irene, as he now, by the clear light, beheld all its beauty; and a sweet
+      yet burning hope crept into his heart.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      <a name="link2HCH0005" id="link2HCH0005">
+      <!--  H2 anchor --> </a>
+    </p>
+    <div style="height: 4em;">
+      <br /><br /><br /><br />
+    </div>
+    <h2>
+      Chapter 1.V. The Description of a Conspirator, and the Dawn of the
+    </h2>
+    <p>
+      Conspiracy.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      Alone, by a table covered with various papers, sat a man in the prime of
+      life. The chamber was low and long; many antique and disfigured
+      bas-reliefs and torsos were placed around the wall, interspersed, here and
+      there, with the short sword and close casque, time-worn relics of the
+      prowess of ancient Rome. Right above the table at which he sate, the
+      moonlight streamed through a high and narrow casement, deep sunk in the
+      massy wall. In a niche to the right of this window, guarded by a sliding
+      door, which was now partially drawn aside&mdash;but which, by its solid
+      substance, and the sheet of iron with which it was plated, testified how
+      valuable, in the eyes of the owner, was the treasure it protected&mdash;were
+      ranged some thirty or forty volumes, then deemed no inconsiderable
+      library; and being, for the most part, the laborious copies in manuscript
+      by the hand of the owner, from immortal originals.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      Leaning his cheek on his hand, his brow somewhat knit, his lip slightly
+      compressed, that personage, indulged in meditations far other than the
+      indolent dreams of scholars. As the high and still moonlight shone upon
+      his countenance, it gave an additional and solemn dignity to features
+      which were naturally of a grave and majestic cast. Thick and auburn hair,
+      the colour of which, not common to the Romans, was ascribed to his descent
+      from the Teuton emperor, clustered in large curls above a high and
+      expansive forehead; and even the present thoughtful compression of the
+      brow could not mar the aspect of latent power, which it derived from that
+      great breadth between the eyes, in which the Grecian sculptors of old so
+      admirably conveyed the expression of authority, and the silent energy of
+      command. But his features were not cast in the Grecian, still less in the
+      Teuton mould. The iron jaw, the aquiline nose, the somewhat sunken cheek,
+      strikingly recalled the character of the hard Roman race, and might not
+      inaptly have suggested to a painter a model for the younger Brutus.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      The marked outline of the face, and the short, firm upper lip, were not
+      concealed by the beard and mustachios usually then worn; and, in the faded
+      portrait of the person now described, still extant at Rome, may be traced
+      a certain resemblance to the popular pictures of Napoleon; not indeed in
+      the features, which are more stern and prominent in the portrait of the
+      Roman, but in that peculiar expression of concentrated and tranquil power
+      which so nearly realizes the ideal of intellectual majesty. Though still
+      young, the personal advantages most peculiar to youth,&mdash;the bloom and
+      glow, the rounded cheek in which care has not yet ploughed its lines, the
+      full unsunken eye, and the slender delicacy of frame,&mdash;these were not
+      the characteristics of that solitary student. And, though considered by
+      his contemporaries as eminently handsome, the judgment was probably formed
+      less from the more vulgar claims to such distinction, than from the height
+      of the stature, an advantage at that time more esteemed than at present,
+      and that nobler order of beauty which cultivated genius and commanding
+      character usually stamp upon even homely features;&mdash;the more rare in
+      an age so rugged.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      The character of Rienzi (for the youth presented to the reader in the
+      first chapter of this history is now again before him in maturer years)
+      had acquired greater hardness and energy with each stepping-stone to
+      power. There was a circumstance attendant on his birth which had,
+      probably, exercised great and early influence on his ambition. Though his
+      parents were in humble circumstances, and of lowly calling, his father was
+      the natural son of the Emperor, Henry VII.; (De Sade supposes that the
+      mother of Rienzi was the daughter of an illegitimate son of Henry VII.,
+      supporting his opinion from a MS. in the Vatican. But, according to the
+      contemporaneous biographer, Rienzi, in addressing Charles, king of Bohemia
+      claims the relationship from his father &ldquo;Di vostro legnaggio sono&mdash;figlio
+      di bastardo d&rsquo;Enrico imperatore,&rdquo; &amp;c. A more recent writer, il Padre
+      Gabrini, cites an inscription in support of this descent: &ldquo;Nicolaus
+      Tribunus...Laurentii Teutonici Filius,&rdquo; &amp;c.) and it was the pride of
+      the parents that probably gave to Rienzi the unwonted advantages of
+      education. This pride transmitted to himself,&mdash;his descent from
+      royalty dinned into his ear, infused into his thoughts, from his cradle,&mdash;made
+      him, even in his earliest youth, deem himself the equal of the Roman
+      signors, and half unconsciously aspire to be their superior. But, as the
+      literature of Rome was unfolded to his eager eye and ambitious heart, he
+      became imbued with that pride of country which is nobler than the pride of
+      birth; and, save when stung by allusions to his origin, he unaffectedly
+      valued himself more on being a Roman plebeian than the descendant of a
+      Teuton king. His brother&rsquo;s death, and the vicissitudes he himself had
+      already undergone, deepened the earnest and solemn qualities of his
+      character; and, at length, all the faculties of a very uncommon intellect
+      were concentrated into one object&mdash;which borrowed from a mind
+      strongly and mystically religious, as well as patriotic, a sacred aspect,
+      and grew at once a duty and a passion.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;Yes,&rdquo; said Rienzi, breaking suddenly from his revery, &ldquo;yes, the day is at
+      hand when Rome shall rise again from her ashes; Justice shall dethrone
+      Oppression; men shall walk safe in their ancient Forum. We will rouse from
+      his forgotten tomb the indomitable soul of Cato! There shall be a people
+      once more in Rome! And I&mdash;I shall be the instrument of that triumph&mdash;the
+      restorer of my race! mine shall be the first voice to swell the battle-cry
+      of freedom&mdash;mine the first hand to rear her banner&mdash;yes, from
+      the height of my own soul as from a mountain, I see already rising the
+      liberties and the grandeur of the New Rome; and on the corner-stone of the
+      mighty fabric posterity shall read my name.&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      Uttering these lofty boasts, the whole person of the speaker seemed
+      instinct with his ambition. He strode the gloomy chamber with light and
+      rapid steps, as if on air; his breast heaved, his eyes glowed. He felt
+      that love itself can scarcely bestow a rapture equal to that which is
+      felt, in his first virgin enthusiasm, by a patriot who knows himself
+      sincere!
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      There was a slight knock at the door, and a servitor, in the rich liveries
+      worn by the pope&rsquo;s officials, (Not the present hideous habiliments, which
+      are said to have been the invention of Michael Angelo.) presented himself.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;Signor,&rdquo; said he, &ldquo;my Lord, the Bishop of Orvietto, is without.&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;Ha! that is fortunate. Lights there!&mdash;My Lord, this is an honour
+      which I can estimate better than express.&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;Tut, tut! my good friend,&rdquo; said the Bishop, entering, and seating himself
+      familiarly, &ldquo;no ceremonies between the servants of the Church; and never,
+      I ween well, had she greater need of true friends than now. These unholy
+      tumults, these licentious contentions, in the very shrines and city of St.
+      Peter, are sufficient to scandalize all Christendom.&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;And so will it be,&rdquo; said Rienzi, &ldquo;until his Holiness himself shall be
+      graciously persuaded to fix his residence in the seat of his predecessors,
+      and curb with a strong arm the excesses of the nobles.&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;Alas, man!&rdquo; said the Bishop, &ldquo;thou knowest that these words are but as
+      wind; for were the Pope to fulfil thy wishes, and remove from Avignon to
+      Rome, by the blood of St. Peter! he would not curb the nobles, but the
+      nobles would curb him. Thou knowest well that until his blessed
+      predecessor, of pious memory, conceived the wise design of escaping to
+      Avignon, the Father of the Christian world was but like many other fathers
+      in their old age, controlled and guarded by his rebellious children.
+      Recollectest thou not how the noble Boniface himself, a man of great
+      heart, and nerves of iron, was kept in thraldom by the ancestors of the
+      Orsini&mdash;his entrances and exits made but at their will&mdash;so that,
+      like a caged eagle, he beat himself against his bars and died? Verily,
+      thou talkest of the memories of Rome&mdash;these are not the memories that
+      are very attractive to popes.&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;Well,&rdquo; said Rienzi, laughing gently, and drawing his seat nearer to the
+      Bishop&rsquo;s, &ldquo;my Lord has certainly the best of the argument at present; and
+      I must own, that strong, licentious, and unhallowed as the order of
+      nobility was then, it is yet more so now.&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;Even I,&rdquo; rejoined Raimond, colouring as he spoke, &ldquo;though Vicar of the
+      Pope, and representative of his spiritual authority, was, but three days
+      ago, subjected to a coarse affront from that very Stephen Colonna, who has
+      ever received such favour and tenderness from the Holy See. His servitors
+      jostled mine in the open streets, and I myself,&mdash;I, the delegate of
+      the sire of kings&mdash;was forced to draw aside to the wall, and wait
+      until the hoary insolent swept by. Nor were blaspheming words wanting to
+      complete the insult. &lsquo;Pardon, Lord Bishop,&rsquo; said he, as he passed me; &lsquo;but
+      this world, thou knowest, must necessarily take precedence of the other.&rsquo;&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;Dared he so high?&rdquo; said Rienzi, shading his face with his hand, as a very
+      peculiar smile&mdash;scarcely itself joyous, though it made others gay,
+      and which completely changed the character of his face, naturally grave
+      even to sternness&mdash;played round his lips. &ldquo;Then it is time for thee,
+      holy father, as for us, to&mdash;&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;To what?&rdquo; interrupted the Bishop, quickly. &ldquo;Can we effect aught! Dismiss
+      thy enthusiastic dreamings&mdash;descend to the real earth&mdash;look
+      soberly round us. Against men so powerful, what can we do?&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;My Lord,&rdquo; answered Rienzi, gravely, &ldquo;it is the misfortune of signors of
+      your rank never to know the people, or the accurate signs of the time. As
+      those who pass over the heights of mountains see the clouds sweep below,
+      veiling the plains and valleys from their gaze, while they, only a little
+      above the level, survey the movements and the homes of men; even so from
+      your lofty eminence ye behold but the indistinct and sullen vapours&mdash;while
+      from my humbler station I see the preparations of the shepherds, to
+      shelter themselves and herds from the storm which those clouds betoken.
+      Despair not, my Lord; endurance goes but to a certain limit&mdash;to that
+      limit it is already stretched; Rome waits but the occasion (it will soon
+      come, but not suddenly) to rise simultaneously against her oppressors.&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      The great secret of eloquence is to be in earnest&mdash;the great secret
+      of Rienzi&rsquo;s eloquence was in the mightiness of his enthusiasm. He never
+      spoke as one who doubted of success. Perhaps, like most men who undertake
+      high and great actions, he himself was never thoroughly aware of the
+      obstacles in his way. He saw the end, bright and clear, and overleaped, in
+      the vision of his soul, the crosses and the length of the path; thus the
+      deep convictions of his own mind stamped themselves irresistibly upon
+      others. He seemed less to promise than to prophesy.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      The Bishop of Orvietto, not over wise, yet a man of cool temperament and
+      much worldly experience, was forcibly impressed by the energy of his
+      companion; perhaps, indeed, the more so, inasmuch as his own pride and his
+      own passions were also enlisted against the arrogance and licence of the
+      nobles. He paused ere he replied to Rienzi.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;But is it,&rdquo; he asked, at length, &ldquo;only the plebeians who will rise? Thou
+      knowest how they are caitiff and uncertain.&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;My Lord,&rdquo; answered Rienzi, &ldquo;judge, by one fact, how strongly I am
+      surrounded by friends of no common class: thou knowest how loudly I speak
+      against the nobles&mdash;I cite them by their name&mdash;I beard the
+      Savelli, the Orsini, the Colonna, in their very hearing. Thinkest thou
+      that they forgive me? thinkest thou that, were only the plebeians my
+      safeguard and my favourers, they would not seize me by open force,&mdash;that
+      I had not long ere this found a gag in their dungeons, or been swallowed
+      up in the eternal dumbness of the grave? Observe,&rdquo; continued he, as,
+      reading the Vicar&rsquo;s countenance, he perceived the impression he had made&mdash;&ldquo;observe,
+      that, throughout the whole world, a great revolution has begun. The
+      barbaric darkness of centuries has been broken; the Knowledge which made
+      men as demigods in the past time has been called from her urn; a Power,
+      subtler than brute force, and mightier than armed men, is at work; we have
+      begun once more to do homage to the Royalty of Mind. Yes, that same Power
+      which, a few years ago, crowned Petrarch in the Capitol, when it
+      witnessed, after the silence of twelve centuries, the glories of a
+      Triumph,&mdash;which heaped upon a man of obscure birth, and unknown in
+      arms, the same honours given of old to emperors and the vanquishers of
+      kings,&mdash;which united in one act of homage even the rival houses of
+      Colonna and Orsini,&mdash;which made the haughtiest patricians emulous to
+      bear the train, to touch but the purple robe, of the son of the Florentine
+      plebeian,&mdash;which still draws the eyes of Europe to the lowly cottage
+      of Vaucluse,&mdash;which gives to the humble student the all-acknowledged
+      licence to admonish tyrants, and approach, with haughty prayers, even the
+      Father of the Church;&mdash;yes, that same Power, which, working silently
+      throughout Italy, murmurs under the solid base of the Venetian oligarchy;
+      (It was about eight years afterwards that the long-smothered hate of the
+      Venetian people to that wisest and most vigilant of all oligarchies, the
+      Sparta of Italy, broke out in the conspiracy under Marino Faliero.) which,
+      beyond the Alps, has wakened into visible and sudden life in Spain, in
+      Germany, in Flanders; and which, even in that barbarous Isle, conquered by
+      the Norman sword, ruled by the bravest of living kings, (Edward III., in
+      whose reign opinions far more popular than those of the following century
+      began to work. The Civil Wars threw back the action into the blood. It was
+      indeed an age throughout the world which put forth abundant blossoms, but
+      crude and unripened fruit;&mdash;a singular leap, followed by as singular
+      a pause.) has roused a spirit Norman cannot break&mdash;kings to rule over
+      must rule by&mdash;yes, that same Power is everywhere abroad: it speaks,
+      it conquers in the voice even of him who is before you; it unites in his
+      cause all on whom but one glimmering of light has burst, all in whom one
+      generous desire can be kindled! Know, Lord Vicar, that there is not a man
+      in Rome, save our oppressors themselves&mdash;not a man who has learned
+      one syllable of our ancient tongue&mdash;whose heart and sword are not
+      with me. The peaceful cultivators of letters&mdash;the proud nobles of the
+      second order&mdash;the rising race, wiser than their slothful sires; above
+      all, my Lord, the humbler ministers of religion, priests and monks, whom
+      luxury hath not blinded, pomp hath not deafened, to the monstrous outrage
+      to Christianity daily and nightly perpetrated in the Christian Capital;
+      these,&mdash;all these,&mdash;are linked with the merchant and the artisan
+      in one indissoluble bond, waiting but the signal to fall or to conquer, to
+      live freemen, or to die martyrs, with Rienzi and their country!&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;Sayest thou so in truth?&rdquo; said the Bishop, startled, and half rising.
+      &ldquo;Prove but thy words, and thou shalt not find the ministers of God are
+      less eager than their lay brethren for the happiness of men.&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;What I say,&rdquo; rejoined Rienzi, in a cooler tone, &ldquo;that can I show; but I
+      may only prove it to those who will be with us.&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;Fear me not,&rdquo; answered Raimond: &ldquo;I know well the secret mind of his
+      Holiness, whose delegate and representative I am; and could he see but the
+      legitimate and natural limit set to the power of the patricians, who, in
+      their arrogance, have set at nought the authority of the Church itself, be
+      sure that he would smile on the hand that drew the line. Nay, so certain
+      of this am I, that if ye succeed, I, his responsible but unworthy vicar,
+      will myself sanction the success. But beware of crude attempts; the Church
+      must not be weakened by linking itself to failure.&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;Right, my Lord,&rdquo; answered Rienzi; &ldquo;and in this, the policy of religion is
+      that of freedom. Judge of my prudence by my long delay. He who can see all
+      around him impatient&mdash;himself not less so&mdash;and yet suppress the
+      signal, and bide the hour, is not likely to lose his cause by rashness.&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;More, then, of this anon,&rdquo; said the Bishop, resettling himself in his
+      seat. &ldquo;As thy plans mature, fear not to communicate with me. Believe that
+      Rome has no firmer friend then he who, ordained to preserve order, finds
+      himself impotent against aggression. Meanwhile, to the object of my
+      present visit, which links itself, in some measure, perhaps, with the
+      topics on which we have conversed...Thou knowest that when his Holiness
+      intrusted thee with thy present office, he bade thee also announce his
+      beneficent intention of granting a general Jubilee at Rome for the year
+      1350&mdash;a most admirable design for two reasons, sufficiently apparent
+      to thyself: first, that every Christian soul that may undertake the
+      pilgrimage to Rome on that occasion, may thus obtain a general remission
+      of sins; and secondly, because, to speak carnally, the concourse of
+      pilgrims so assembled, usually, by the donations and offerings their piety
+      suggests, very materially add to the revenues of the Holy See: at this
+      time, by the way, in no very flourishing condition. This thou knowest,
+      dear Rienzi.&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      Rienzi bowed his head in assent, and the prelate continued&mdash;
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;Well, it is with the greatest grief that his Holiness perceives that his
+      pious intentions are likely to be frustrated: for so fierce and numerous
+      are now the brigands in the public approaches to Rome, that, verily, the
+      boldest pilgrim may tremble a little to undertake the journey; and those
+      who do so venture will, probably, be composed of the poorest of the
+      Christian community,&mdash;men who, bringing with them neither gold, nor
+      silver, nor precious offerings, will have little to fear from the rapacity
+      of the brigands. Hence arise two consequences: on the one hand, the rich&mdash;whom,
+      Heaven knows, and the Gospel has, indeed, expressly declared, have the
+      most need of a remission of sins&mdash;will be deprived of this glorious
+      occasion for absolution; and, on the other hand, the coffers of the Church
+      will be impiously defrauded of that wealth which it would otherwise
+      doubtless obtain from the zeal of her children.&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;Nothing can be more logically manifest, my Lord,&rdquo; said Rienzi.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      The Vicar continued&mdash;&ldquo;Now, in letters received five days since from
+      his Holiness, he bade me expose these fearful consequences to Christianity
+      to the various patricians who are legitimately fiefs of the Church, and
+      command their resolute combination against the marauders of the road. With
+      these have I conferred, and vainly.&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;For by the aid, and from the troops, of those very brigands, these
+      patricians have fortified their palaces against each other,&rdquo; added Rienzi.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;Exactly for that reason,&rdquo; rejoined the Bishop. &ldquo;Nay, Stephen Colonna
+      himself had the audacity to confess it. Utterly unmoved by the loss to so
+      many precious souls, and, I may add, to the papal treasury, which ought to
+      be little less dear to right-discerning men, they refuse to advance a step
+      against the bandits. Now, then, hearken the second mandate of his
+      Holiness:&mdash;&lsquo;Failing the nobles,&rsquo; saith he, in his prophetic sagacity,
+      &lsquo;confer with Cola di Rienzi. He is a bold man, and a pious, and, thou
+      tellest me, of great weight with the people; and say to him, that if his
+      wit can devise the method for extirpating these sons of Belial, and
+      rendering a safe passage along the public ways, largely, indeed, will he
+      merit at our hands,&mdash;lasting will be the gratitude we shall owe to
+      him; and whatever succour thou, and the servants of our See, can render to
+      him, let it not be stinted.&rsquo;&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;Said his Holiness thus!&rdquo; exclaimed Rienzi. &ldquo;I ask no more&mdash;the
+      gratitude is mine that he hath thought thus of his servant, and intrusted
+      me with this charge; at once I accept it&mdash;at once I pledge myself to
+      success. Let us, my Lord, let us, then, clearly understand the limits
+      ordained to my discretion. To curb the brigands without the walls, I must
+      have authority over those within. If I undertake, at peril of my life, to
+      clear all the avenues to Rome of the robbers who now infest it, shall I
+      have full licence for conduct bold, peremptory, and severe?&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;Such conduct the very nature of the charge demands,&rdquo; replied Raimond.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;Ay,&mdash;even though it be exercised against the arch offenders&mdash;against
+      the supporters of the brigands&mdash;against the haughtiest of the nobles
+      themselves?&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      The Bishop paused, and looked hard in the face of the speaker. &ldquo;I repeat,&rdquo;
+       said he, at length, sinking his voice, and with a significant tone, &ldquo;in
+      these bold attempts, success is the sole sanction. Succeed, and we will
+      excuse thee all&mdash;even to the&mdash;&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;Death of a Colonna or an Orsini, should justice demand it; and provided
+      it be according to the law, and only incurred by the violation of the
+      law!&rdquo; added Rienzi, firmly.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      The Bishop did not reply in words, but a slight motion of his head was
+      sufficient answer to Rienzi.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;My Lord,&rdquo; said he, &ldquo;from this time, then, all is well; I date the
+      revolution&mdash;the restoration of order, of the state&mdash;from this
+      hour, this very conference. Till now, knowing that justice must never wink
+      upon great offenders, I had hesitated, through fear lest thou and his
+      Holiness might deem it severity, and blame him who replaces the law,
+      because he smites the violaters of law. Now I judge ye more rightly. Your
+      hand, my Lord.&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      The Bishop extended his hand; Rienzi grasped it firmly, and then raised it
+      respectfully to his lips. Both felt that the compact was sealed.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      This conference, so long in recital, was short in the reality; but its
+      object was already finished, and the Bishop rose to depart. The outer
+      portal of the house was opened, the numerous servitors of the Bishop held
+      on high their torches, and he had just termed from Rienzi, who had
+      attended him to the gate, when a female passed hastily through the
+      Prelate&rsquo;s train, and starting as she beheld Rienzi, flung herself at his
+      feet.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;Oh, hasten, Sir! hasten, for the love of God, hasten! or the young
+      Signora is lost for ever!&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;The Signora!&mdash;Heaven and earth, Benedetta, of whom do you speak?&mdash;of
+      my sister&mdash;of Irene? is she not within?&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;Oh, Sir&mdash;the Orsini&mdash;the Orsini!&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;What of them?&mdash;speak, woman!&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      Here, breathlessly, and with many a break, Benedetta recounted to Rienzi,
+      in whom the reader has already recognised the brother of Irene, so far of
+      the adventure with Martino di Porto as she had witnessed: of the
+      termination and result of the contest she knew nought.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      Rienzi listened in silence; but the deadly paleness of his countenance,
+      and the writhing of the nether lip, testified the emotions to which he
+      gave no audible vent.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;You hear, my Lord Bishop&mdash;you hear,&rdquo; said he, when Benedetta had
+      concluded; and turning to the Bishop, whose departure the narrative had
+      delayed&mdash;&ldquo;you hear to what outrage the citizens of Rome are
+      subjected. My hat and sword! instantly! My Lord, forgive my abruptness.&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;Whither art thou bent, then?&rdquo; asked Raimond.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;Whither&mdash;whither!&mdash;Ay, I forgot, my Lord, you have no sister.
+      Perhaps too, you had no brother?&mdash;No, no; one victim at least I will
+      live to save. Whither, you ask me?&mdash;to the palace of Martino di
+      Porto.&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;To an Orsini alone, and for justice?&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;Alone, and for justice!&mdash;No!&rdquo; shouted Rienzi, in a loud voice, as he
+      seized his sword, now brought to him by one of his servants, and rushed
+      from the house; &ldquo;but one man is sufficient for revenge!&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      The Bishop paused for a moment&rsquo;s deliberation. &ldquo;He must not be lost,&rdquo;
+       muttered he, &ldquo;as he well may be, if exposed thus solitary to the wolf&rsquo;s
+      rage. What, ho!&rdquo; he cried aloud; &ldquo;advance the torches!&mdash;quick, quick!
+      We ourself&mdash;we, the Vicar of the Pope&mdash;will see to this. Calm
+      yourselves, good people; your young Signora shall be restored. On! to the
+      palace of Martino di Porto!&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      <a name="link2HCH0006" id="link2HCH0006">
+      <!--  H2 anchor --> </a>
+    </p>
+    <div style="height: 4em;">
+      <br /><br /><br /><br />
+    </div>
+    <h2>
+      Chapter 1.VI. Irene in the Palace of Adrian di Castello.
+    </h2>
+    <p>
+      As the Cyprian gazed on the image in which he had embodied a youth of
+      dreams, what time the living hues flushed slowly beneath the marble,&mdash;so
+      gazed the young and passionate Adrian upon the form reclined before him,
+      re-awakening gradually to life. And, if the beauty of that face were not
+      of the loftiest or the most dazzling order, if its soft and quiet
+      character might be outshone by many, of loveliness less really perfect,
+      yet never was there a countenance that, to some eyes, would have seemed
+      more charming, and never one in which more eloquently was wrought that
+      ineffable and virgin expression which Italian art seeks for in its models,&mdash;in
+      which modesty is the outward, and tenderness the latent, expression; the
+      bloom of youth, both of form and heart, ere the first frail and delicate
+      freshness of either is brushed away: and when even love itself, the only
+      unquiet visitant that should be known at such an age, is but a sentiment,
+      and not a passion!
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;Benedetta!&rdquo; murmured Irene, at length opening her eyes, unconsciously,
+      upon him who knelt beside her,&mdash;eyes of that uncertain, that most
+      liquid hue, on which you might gaze for years and never learn the secret
+      of the colour, so changed it with the dilating pupil,&mdash;darkening in
+      the shade, and brightening into azure in the light:
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;Benedetta,&rdquo; said Irene, &ldquo;where art thou? Oh, Benedetta! I have had such a
+      dream.&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;And I, too, such a vision!&rdquo; thought Adrian.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;Where am I?&rdquo; cried Irene, rising from the couch. &ldquo;This room&mdash;these
+      hangings&mdash;Holy Virgin! do I dream still!&mdash;and you! Heavens!&mdash;it
+      is the Lord Adrian di Castello!&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;Is that a name thou hast been taught to fear?&rdquo; said Adrian; &ldquo;if so, I
+      will forswear it.&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      If Irene now blushed deeply, it was not in that wild delight with which
+      her romantic heart motive foretold that she would listen to the first
+      words of homage from Adrian di Castello. Bewildered and confused,&mdash;terrified
+      at the strangeness of the place and shrinking even from the thought of
+      finding herself alone with one who for years had been present to her
+      fancies,&mdash;alarm and distress were the emotions she felt the most, and
+      which most were impressed upon her speaking countenance; and as Adrian now
+      drew nearer to her, despite the gentleness of his voice and the respect of
+      his looks, her fears, not the less strong that they were vague, increased
+      upon her: she retreated to the further end of the room, looked wildly
+      round her, and then, covering her face with her hands, burst into a
+      paroxysm of tears.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      Moved himself by these tears, and divining her thoughts, Adrian forgot for
+      moment all the more daring wishes he had formed.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;Fear not, sweet lady,&rdquo; said he, earnestly: &ldquo;recollect thyself, I beseech
+      thee; no peril, no evil can reach thee here; it was this hand that saved
+      thee from the outrage of the Orsini&mdash;this roof is but the shelter of
+      a friend! Tell me, then, fair wonder, thy name and residence, and I will
+      summon my servitors, and guard thee to thy home at once.&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      Perhaps the relief of tears, even more than Adrian&rsquo;s words, restored Irene
+      to herself, and enabled her to comprehend her novel situation; and as her
+      senses, thus cleared, told her what she owed to him whom her dreams had so
+      long imaged as the ideal of all excellence, she recovered her
+      self-possession, and uttered her thanks with a grace not the less winning,
+      if it still partook of embarrassment.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;Thank me not,&rdquo; answered Adrian, passionately. &ldquo;I have touched thy hand&mdash;I
+      am repaid. Repaid! nay, all gratitude&mdash;all homage is for me to
+      render!&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      Blushing again, but with far different emotions than before, Irene, after
+      a momentary pause, replied, &ldquo;Yet, my Lord, I must consider it a debt the
+      more weighty that you speak of it so lightly. And now, complete the
+      obligation. I do not see my companion&mdash;suffer her to accompany me
+      home; it is but a short way hence.&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;Blessed, then, is the air that I have breathed so unconsciously!&rdquo; said
+      Adrian. &ldquo;But thy companion, dear lady, is not here. She fled, I imagine,
+      in the confusion of the conflict; and not knowing thy name, nor being
+      able, in thy then state, to learn it from thy lips, it was my happy
+      necessity to convey thee hither;&mdash;but I will be thy companion. Nay,
+      why that timid glance? my people, also, shall attend us.&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;My thanks, noble Lord, are of little worth; my brother, who is not
+      unknown to thee, will thank thee more fittingly. May I depart?&rdquo; and Irene,
+      as she spoke, was already at the door.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;Art thou so eager to leave me?&rdquo; answered Adrian, sadly. &ldquo;Alas! when thou
+      hast departed from my eyes, it will seem as if the moon had left the
+      night!&mdash;but it is happiness to obey thy wishes, even though they tear
+      thee from me.&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      A slight smile parted Irene&rsquo;s lips, and Adrian&rsquo;s heart beat audibly to
+      himself, as he drew from that smile, and those downcast eyes, no
+      unfavourable omen.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      Reluctantly and slowly he turned towards the door, and summoned his
+      attendants. &ldquo;But,&rdquo; said he, as they stood on the lofty staircase, &ldquo;thou
+      sayest, sweet lady, that thy brother&rsquo;s name is not unknown to me. Heaven
+      grant that he be, indeed, a friend of the Colonna!&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;His boast,&rdquo; answered Irene, evasively; &ldquo;the boast of Cola di Rienzi is,
+      to be a friend to the friends of Rome.&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;Holy Virgin of Ara Coeli!&mdash;is thy brother that extraordinary man?&rdquo;
+       exclaimed Adrian, as he foresaw, at the mention of that name, a barrier to
+      his sudden passion. &ldquo;Alas! in a Colonna, in a noble, he will see no merit;
+      even though thy fortunate deliverer, sweet maiden, sought to be his early
+      friend!&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;Thou wrongest him much, my Lord,&rdquo; returned Irene, warmly; &ldquo;he is a man
+      above all others to sympathize with thy generous valour, even had it been
+      exerted in defence of the humblest woman in Rome,&mdash;how much more,
+      then, when in protection of his sister!&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;The times are, indeed, diseased,&rdquo; answered Adrian, thoughtfully, as they
+      now found themselves in the open street, &ldquo;when men who alike mourn for the
+      woes of their country are yet suspicious of each other; when to be a
+      patrician is to be regarded as an enemy to the people; when to be termed
+      the friend of the people is to be considered a foe to the patricians: but
+      come what may, oh! let me hope, dear lady, that no doubts, no divisions,
+      shall banish from thy breast one gentle memory of me!&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;Ah! little, little do you know me!&rdquo; began Irene, and stopped suddenly
+      short.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;Speak! speak again!&mdash;of what music has this envious silence deprived
+      my soul! Thou wilt not, then, forget me? And,&rdquo; continued Adrian, &ldquo;we shall
+      meet again? It is to Rienzi&rsquo;s house we are bound now; tomorrow I shall
+      visit my old companion,&mdash;tomorrow I shall see thee. Will it not be
+      so?&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      In Irene&rsquo;s silence was her answer.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;And as thou hast told me thy brother&rsquo;s name, make it sweet to my ear, and
+      add to it thine own.&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;They call me Irene.&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;Irene, Irene!&mdash;let me repeat it. It is a soft name, and dwells upon
+      the lips as if loath to leave them&mdash;a fitting name for one like
+      thee.&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      Thus making his welcome court to Irene, in that flowered and glowing
+      language which, if more peculiar to that age and to the gallantry of the
+      south, is also the language in which the poetry of youthful passion would,
+      in all times and lands, utter its rich extravagance, could heart speak to
+      heart, Adrian conveyed homeward his beautiful charge, taking, however, the
+      most circuitous and lengthened route; an artifice which Irene either
+      perceived not, or silently forgave. They were now within sight of the
+      street in which Rienzi dwelt, when a party of men bearing torches, came
+      unexpectedly upon them. It was the train of the Bishop of Orvietto,
+      returning from the palace of Martino di Porto, and in their way
+      (accompanied by Rienzi) to that of Adrian. They had learned at the former,
+      without an interview with the Orsini, from the retainers in the court
+      below, the fortune of the conflict, and the name of Irene&rsquo;s champion; and,
+      despite Adrian&rsquo;s general reputation for gallantry, Rienzi knew enough of
+      his character, and the nobleness of his temper, to feel assured that Irene
+      was safe in his protection. Alas! in that very safety to the person is
+      often the most danger to the heart. Woman never so dangerously loves, as
+      when he who loves her, for her sake, subdues himself.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      Clasped to her brother&rsquo;s breast, Irene bade him thank her deliverer; and
+      Rienzi, with that fascinating frankness which sits so well on those
+      usually reserved, and which all who would rule the hearts of their
+      fellow-men must at times command, advanced to the young Colonna, and
+      poured forth his gratitude and praise.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;We have been severed too long,&mdash;we must know each other again,&rdquo;
+       replied Adrian. &ldquo;I shall seek thee, ere long, be assured.&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      Turning to take his leave of Irene, he conveyed her hand to his lips, and
+      pressing it, as it dropped from his clasp, was he deceived in thinking
+      that those delicate fingers lightly, involuntarily, returned the pressure?
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      <a name="link2HCH0007" id="link2HCH0007">
+      <!--  H2 anchor --> </a>
+    </p>
+    <div style="height: 4em;">
+      <br /><br /><br /><br />
+    </div>
+    <h2>
+      Chapter 1.VII. Upon Love and Lovers.
+    </h2>
+    <p>
+      If, in adopting the legendary love tale of Romeo and Juliet, Shakespeare
+      had changed the scene in which it is cast for a more northern clime, we
+      may doubt whether the art of Shakespeare himself could have reconciled us
+      at once to the suddenness and the strength of Juliet&rsquo;s passion. And, even
+      as it is, perhaps there are few of our rational and sober-minded islanders
+      who would not honestly confess, if fairly questioned, that they deem the
+      romance and fervour of those ill-starred lovers of Verona exaggerated and
+      over-drawn. Yet, in Italy, the picture of that affection born of a night&mdash;but
+      &ldquo;strong as death&rdquo;&mdash;is one to which the veriest commonplaces of life
+      would afford parallels without number. As in different ages, so in
+      different climes, love varies wonderfully in the shapes it takes. And even
+      at this day, beneath Italian skies, many a simple girl would feel as
+      Juliet, and many a homely gallant would rival the extravagance of Romeo.
+      Long suits in that sunny land, wherein, as whereof, I now write, are
+      unknown. In no other land, perhaps, is there found so commonly the love at
+      first sight, which in France is a jest, and in England a doubt; in no
+      other land, too, is love, though so suddenly conceived, more faithfully
+      preserved. That which is ripened in fancy comes at once to passion, yet is
+      embalmed through all time by sentiment. And this must be my and their
+      excuse, if the love of Adrian some too prematurely formed, and that of
+      Irene too romantically conceived;&mdash;it is the excuse which they take
+      from the air and sun, from the customs of their ancestors, from the soft
+      contagion of example. But while they yielded to the dictates of their
+      hearts, it was with a certain though secret sadness&mdash;a presentiment
+      that had, perhaps, its charm, though it was of cross and evil. Born of so
+      proud a race, Adrian could scarcely dream of marriage with the sister of a
+      plebeian; and Irene, unconscious of the future glory of her brother, could
+      hardly have cherished any hope, save that of being loved. Yet these
+      adverse circumstances, which, in the harder, the more prudent, the more
+      self-denying, perhaps the more virtuous minds, that are formed beneath the
+      northern skies, would have been an inducement to wrestle against love so
+      placed, only contributed to feed and to strengthen theirs by an opposition
+      which has ever its attraction for romance. They found frequent, though
+      short, opportunities of meeting&mdash;not quite alone, but only in the
+      conniving presence of Benedetta: sometimes in the public gardens,
+      sometimes amidst the vast and deserted ruins by which the house of Rienzi
+      was surrounded. They surrendered themselves, without much question of the
+      future, to the excitement&mdash;the elysium&mdash;of the hour: they lived
+      but from day to day; their future was the next time they should meet;
+      beyond that epoch, the very mists of their youthful love closed in
+      obscurity and shadow which they sought not to penetrate: and as yet they
+      had not arrived at that period of affection when there was danger of their
+      fall,&mdash;their love had not passed the golden portal where Heaven
+      ceases and Earth begins. Everything for them was the poetry, the
+      vagueness, the refinement,&mdash;not the power, the concentration, the
+      mortality,&mdash;of desire! The look&mdash;the whisper&mdash;the brief
+      pressure of the hand, at most, the first kisses of love, rare and few,&mdash;these
+      marked the human limits of that sentiment which filled them with a new
+      life, which elevated them as with a new soul.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      The roving tendencies of Adrian were at once fixed and centered; the
+      dreams of his tender mistress had awakened to a life dreaming still, but
+      &ldquo;rounded with a truth.&rdquo; All that earnestness, and energy, and fervour of
+      emotion, which, in her brother, broke forth in the schemes of patriotism
+      and the aspirations of power, were, in Irene, softened down into one
+      object of existence, one concentration of soul,&mdash;and that was love.
+      Yet, in this range of thought and action, so apparently limited, there
+      was, in reality, no less boundless a sphere than in the wide space of her
+      brother&rsquo;s many-pathed ambition. Not the less had she the power and scope
+      for all the loftiest capacities granted to our clay. Equal was her
+      enthusiasm for her idol; equal, had she been equally tried, would have
+      been her generosity, her devotion:&mdash;greater, be sure, her courage;
+      more inalienable her worship; more unsullied by selfish purposes and
+      sordid views. Time, change, misfortune, ingratitude, would have left her
+      the same! What state could fall, what liberty decay, if the zeal of man&rsquo;s
+      noisy patriotism were as pure as the silent loyalty of a woman&rsquo;s love?
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      In them everything was young!&mdash;the heart unchilled, unblighted,&mdash;that
+      fulness and luxuriance of life&rsquo;s life which has in it something of divine.
+      At that age, when it seems as if we could never die, how deathless, how
+      flushed and mighty as with the youngness of a god, is all that our hearts
+      create! Our own youth is like that of the earth itself, when it peopled
+      the woods and waters with divinities; when life ran riot, and yet only
+      gave birth to beauty;&mdash;all its shapes, of poetry,&mdash;all its airs,
+      the melodies of Arcady and Olympus! The Golden Age never leaves the world:
+      it exists still, and shall exist, till love, health, poetry, are no more;
+      but only for the young!
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      If I now dwell, though but for a moment, on this interlude in a drama
+      calling forth more masculine passions than that of love, it is because I
+      foresee that the occasion will but rarely recur. If I linger on the
+      description of Irene and her hidden affection, rather than wait for
+      circumstances to portray them better than the author&rsquo;s words can, it is
+      because I foresee that that loving and lovely image must continue to the
+      last rather a shadow than a portrait,&mdash;thrown in the background, as
+      is the real destiny of such natures, by bolder figures and more gorgeous
+      colours; a something whose presence is rather felt than seen, and whose
+      very harmony with the whole consists in its retiring and subdued repose.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      <a name="link2HCH0008" id="link2HCH0008">
+      <!--  H2 anchor --> </a>
+    </p>
+    <div style="height: 4em;">
+      <br /><br /><br /><br />
+    </div>
+    <h2>
+      Chapter 1.VIII. The Enthusiastic Man Judged by the Discreet Man.
+    </h2>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;Thou wrongest me,&rdquo; said Rienzi, warmly, to Adrian, as they sat alone,
+      towards the close of a long conference; &ldquo;I do not play the part of a mere
+      demagogue; I wish not to stir the great deeps in order that my lees of
+      fortune may rise to the surface. So long have I brooded over the past,
+      that it seems to me as if I had become a part of it&mdash;as if I had no
+      separate existence. I have coined my whole soul into one master passion,&mdash;and
+      its end is the restoration of Rome.&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;But by what means?&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;My Lord! my Lord! there is but one way to restore the greatness of a
+      people&mdash;it is an appeal to the people themselves. It is not in the
+      power of princes and barons to make a state permanently glorious; they
+      raise themselves, but they raise not the people with them. All great
+      regenerations are the universal movement of the mass.&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;Nay,&rdquo; answered Adrian, &ldquo;then have we read history differently. To me, all
+      great regenerations seem to have been the work of the few, and tacitly
+      accepted by the multitude. But let us not dispute after the manner of the
+      schools. Thou sayest loudly that a vast crisis is at hand; that the Good
+      Estate (buono stato) shall be established. How? where are your arms?&mdash;your
+      soldiers? Are the nobles less strong than heretofore? Is the mob more
+      bold, more constant? Heaven knows that I speak not with the prejudices of
+      my order&mdash;I weep for the debasement of my country! I am a Roman, and
+      in that name I forget that I am a noble. But I tremble at the storm you
+      would raise so hazardously. If your insurrection succeed, it will be
+      violent: it will be purchased by blood&mdash;by the blood of all the
+      loftiest names of Rome. You will aim at a second expulsion of the
+      Tarquins; but it will be more like a second proscription of Sylla.
+      Massacres and disorders never pave the way to peace. If, on the other
+      hand, you fail, the chains of Rome are riveted for ever: an ineffectual
+      struggle to escape is but an excuse for additional tortures to the slave.&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;And what, then, would the Lord Adrian have us do?&rdquo; said Rienzi, with that
+      peculiar and sarcastic smile which has before been noted. &ldquo;Shall we wait
+      till the Colonna and Orsini quarrel no more? shall we ask the Colonna for
+      liberty, and the Orsini for justice? My Lord, we cannot appeal to the
+      nobles against the nobles. We must not ask them to moderate their power;
+      we must restore to ourselves that power. There may be danger in the
+      attempt&mdash;but we attempt it amongst the monuments of the Forum: and if
+      we fall&mdash;we shall perish worthy of our sires! Ye have high descent,
+      and sounding titles, and wide lands, and you talk of your ancestral
+      honours! We, too,&mdash;we plebeians of Rome,&mdash;we have ours! Our
+      fathers were freemen! where is our heritage? not sold&mdash;not given
+      away: but stolen from us, now by fraud, now by force&mdash;filched from us
+      in our sleep; or wrung from us with fierce hands, amidst our cries and
+      struggles. My Lord, we but ask that lawful heritage to be restored to us:
+      to us&mdash;nay, to you it is the same; your liberty, alike, is gone. Can
+      you dwell in your father&rsquo;s house, without towers, and fortresses, and the
+      bought swords of bravos? can you walk in the streets at dark without arms
+      and followers? True, you, a noble, may retaliate; though we dare not. You,
+      in your turn, may terrify and outrage others; but does licence compensate
+      for liberty? They have given you pomp and power&mdash;but the safety of
+      equal laws were a better gift. Oh, were I you&mdash;were I Stephen Colonna
+      himself, I should pant, ay, thirstily as I do now, for that free air which
+      comes not through bars and bulwarks against my fellow-citizens, but in the
+      open space of Heaven&mdash;safe, because protected by the silent
+      Providence of Law, and not by the lean fears and hollow-eyed suspicions
+      which are the comrades of a hated power. The tyrant thinks he is free,
+      because he commands slaves: the meanest peasant in a free state is more
+      free than he is. Oh, my Lord, that you&mdash;the brave, the generous, the
+      enlightened&mdash;you, almost alone amidst your order, in the knowledge
+      that we had a country&mdash;oh, would that you who can sympathise with our
+      sufferings, would strike with us for their redress!&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;Thou wilt war against Stephen Colonna, my kinsman; and though I have seen
+      him but little, nor, truth to say, esteem him much, yet he is the boast of
+      our house,&mdash;how can I join thee?&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;His life will be safe, his possessions safe, his rank safe. What do we
+      war against? His power to do wrong to others.&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;Should he discover that thou hast force beyond words, he would be less
+      merciful to thee.&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;And has he not discovered that? Do not the shouts of the people tell him
+      that I am a man whom he should fear? Does he&mdash;the cautious, the wily,
+      the profound&mdash;does he build fortresses, and erect towers, and not see
+      from his battlements the mighty fabric that I, too, have erected?&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;You! where, Rienzi?&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;In the hearts of Rome! Does he not see?&rdquo; continued Rienzi. &ldquo;No, no; he&mdash;all,
+      all his tribe, are blind. Is it not so?&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;Of a certainty, my kinsman has no belief in your power, else he would
+      have crushed you long ere this. Nay, it was but three days ago that he
+      said, gravely, he would rather you addressed the populace than the best
+      priest in Christendom; for that other orators inflamed the crowd, and no
+      man so stilled and dispersed them as you did.&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;And I called him profound! Does not Heaven hush the air most when most it
+      prepares the storm? Ay, my Lord, I understand. Stephen Colonna despises
+      me. I have been&rdquo;&mdash;(here, as he continued, a deep blush mantled over
+      his cheek)&mdash;&ldquo;you remember it&mdash;at his palace in my younger days,
+      and pleased him with witty tales and light apophthegms. Nay&mdash;ha! ha!&mdash;he
+      would call me, I think, sometimes, in gay compliment, his jester&mdash;his
+      buffoon! I have brooked his insult; I have even bowed to his applause. I
+      would undergo the same penance, stoop to the same shame, for the same
+      motive, and in the same cause. What did I desire to effect? Can you tell
+      me? No! I will whisper it, then, to you: it was&mdash;the contempt of
+      Stephen Colonna. Under that contempt I was protected, till protection
+      became no longer necessary. I desired not to be thought formidable by the
+      patricians, in order that, quietly and unsuspected, I might make my way
+      amongst the people. I have done so; I now throw aside the mask. Face to
+      face with Stephen Colonna, I could tell him, this very hour, that I brave
+      his anger; that I laugh at his dungeons and armed men. But if he think me
+      the same Rienzi as of old, let him; I can wait my hour.&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;Yet,&rdquo; said Adrian, waiving an answer to the haughty language of his
+      companion, &ldquo;tell me, what dost thou ask for the people, in order to avoid
+      an appeal to their passions?&mdash;ignorant and capricious as they are,
+      thou canst not appeal to their reason.&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;I ask full justice and safety for all men. I will be contented with no
+      less a compromise. I ask the nobles to dismantle their fortresses; to
+      disband their armed retainers; to acknowledge no impunity for crime in
+      high lineage; to claim no protection save in the courts of the common
+      law.&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;Vain desire!&rdquo; said Adrian. &ldquo;Ask what may yet be granted.&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;Ha&mdash;ha!&rdquo; replied Rienzi, laughing bitterly, &ldquo;did I not tell you it
+      was a vain dream to ask for law and justice at the hands of the great? Can
+      you blame me, then, that I ask it elsewhere?&rdquo; Then, suddenly changing his
+      tone and manner, he added with great solemnity&mdash;&ldquo;Waking life hath
+      false and vain dreams; but sleep is sometimes a mighty prophet. By sleep
+      it is that Heaven mysteriously communes with its creatures, and guides and
+      sustains its earthly agents in the path to which its providence leads them
+      on.&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      Adrian made no reply. This was not the first time he had noted that
+      Rienzi&rsquo;s strong intellect was strangely conjoined with a deep and mystical
+      superstition. And this yet more inclined the young noble, who, though
+      sufficiently devout, yielded but little to the wilder credulities of the
+      time, to doubt the success of the schemer&rsquo;s projects. In this he erred
+      greatly, though his error was that of the worldly wise. For nothing ever
+      so inspires human daring, as the fond belief that it is the agent of a
+      Diviner Wisdom. Revenge and patriotism, united in one man of genius and
+      ambition&mdash;such are the Archimedian levers that find, in FANATICISM,
+      the spot out of the world by which to move the world. The prudent man may
+      direct a state; but it is the enthusiast who regenerates it,&mdash;or
+      ruins.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      <a name="link2HCH0009" id="link2HCH0009">
+      <!--  H2 anchor --> </a>
+    </p>
+    <div style="height: 4em;">
+      <br /><br /><br /><br />
+    </div>
+    <h2>
+      Chapter 1.IX. &ldquo;When the People Saw this Picture, Every One Marvelled.&rdquo;
+     </h2>
+    <p>
+      Before the market-place, and at the foot of the Capitol, an immense crowd
+      was assembled. Each man sought to push before his neighbour; each
+      struggled to gain access to one particular spot, round which the crowd was
+      wedged think and dense.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;Corpo di Dio!&rdquo; said a man of huge stature, pressing onward, like some
+      bulky ship, casting the noisy waves right and left from its prow, &ldquo;this is
+      hot work; but for what, in the holy Mother&rsquo;s name, do ye crowd so? See you
+      not, Sir Ribald, that my right arm is disabled, swathed, and bandaged, so
+      that I cannot help myself better than a baby? And yet you push against me
+      as if I were an old wall!&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;Ah, Cecco del Vecchio!&mdash;what, man! we must make way for you&mdash;you
+      are too small and tender to bustle through a crowd! Come, I will protect
+      you!&rdquo; said a dwarf of some four feet high, glancing up at the giant.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;Faith,&rdquo; said the grim smith, looking round on the mob, who laughed loud
+      at the dwarf&rsquo;s proffer, &ldquo;we all do want protection, big and small. What do
+      you laugh for, ye apes?&mdash;ay, you don&rsquo;t understand parables.&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;And yet it is a parable we are come to gaze upon,&rdquo; said one of the mob,
+      with a slight sneer.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;Pleasant day to you, Signor Baroncelli,&rdquo; answered Cecco del Vecchio; &ldquo;you
+      are a good man, and love the people; it makes one&rsquo;s heart smile to see
+      you. What&rsquo;s all this pother for?&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;Why the Pope&rsquo;s Notary hath set up a great picture in the marketplace, and
+      the gapers say it relates to Rome; so they are melting their brains out,
+      this hot day, to guess at the riddle.&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;Ho! ho!&rdquo; said the smith, pushing on so vigorously that he left the
+      speaker suddenly in the rear; &ldquo;if Cola di Rienzi hath aught in the matter,
+      I would break through stone rocks to get to it.&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;Much good will a dead daub do us,&rdquo; said Baroncelli, sourly, and turning
+      to his neighbours; but no man listened to him, and he, a would-be
+      demagogue, gnawed his lip in envy.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      Amidst half-awed groans and curses from the men whom he jostled aside, and
+      open objurgations and shrill cries from the women, to whose robes and
+      headgear he showed as little respect, the sturdy smith won his way to a
+      space fenced round by chains, in the centre of which was placed a huge
+      picture.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;How came it hither?&rdquo; cried one; &ldquo;I was first at the market.&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;We found it here at daybreak,&rdquo; said a vender of fruit: &ldquo;no one was by.&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;But why do you fancy Rienzi had a hand in it?&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;Why, who else could?&rdquo; answered twenty voices.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;True! Who else?&rdquo; echoed the gaunt smith. &ldquo;I dare be sworn the good man
+      spent the whole night in painting it himself. Blood of St. Peter! but it
+      is mighty fine! What is it about?&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;That&rsquo;s the riddle,&rdquo; said a meditative fish-woman; &ldquo;if I could make it
+      out, I should die happy.&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;It is something about liberty and taxes, no doubt,&rdquo; said Luigi, the
+      butcher, leaning over the chains. &ldquo;Ah, if Rienzi were minded, every poor
+      man would have his bit of meat in his pot.&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;And as much bread as he could eat,&rdquo; added a pale baker.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;Chut! bread and meat&mdash;everybody has that now!&mdash;but what wine
+      the poor folks drink! One has no encouragement to take pains with one&rsquo;s
+      vineyard,&rdquo; said a vine-dresser.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;Ho, hollo!&mdash;long life to Pandulfo di Guido! Make way for master
+      Pandulfo; he is a learned man; he is a friend of the great Notary&rsquo;s; he
+      will tell us all about the picture; make way, there&mdash;make way!&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      Slowly and modestly, Pandulfo di Guido, a quiet, wealthy, and honest man
+      of letters, whom nought save the violence of the times could have roused
+      from his tranquil home, or his studious closet, passed to the chains. He
+      looked long and hard at the picture, which was bright with new, and yet
+      moist colours, and exhibited somewhat of the reviving art, which, though
+      hard and harsh in its features, was about that time visible, and, carried
+      to a far higher degree, we yet gaze upon in the paintings of Perugino, who
+      flourished during the succeeding generation. The people pressed round the
+      learned man, with open mouths; now turning their eyes to the picture, now
+      to Pandulfo.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;Know you not,&rdquo; at length said Pandulfo, &ldquo;the easy and palpable meaning of
+      this design? Behold how the painter has presented to you a vast and stormy
+      sea&mdash;mark how its waves&mdash;&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;Speak louder&mdash;louder!&rdquo; shouted the impatient crowd.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;Hush!&rdquo; cried those in the immediate vicinity of Pandulfo, &ldquo;the worthy
+      Signor is perfectly audible!&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      Meanwhile, some of the more witty, pushing towards a stall in the
+      marketplace, bore from it a rough table, from which they besought Pandulfo
+      to address the people. The pale citizen, with some pain and shame, for he
+      was no practised spokesman, was obliged to assent; but when he cast his
+      eyes over the vast and breathless crowd, his own deep sympathy with their
+      cause inspired and emboldened him. A light broke from his eyes; his voice
+      swelled into power; and his head, usually buried in his breast, became
+      erect and commanding in its air.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;You see before you in the picture&rdquo; (he began again) &ldquo;a mighty and
+      tempestuous sea: upon its waves you behold five ships; four of them are
+      already wrecks,&mdash;their masts are broken, the waves are dashing
+      through the rent planks, they are past all aid and hope: on each of these
+      ships lies the corpse of a woman. See you not, in the wan face and livid
+      limbs, how faithfully the limner hath painted the hues and loathsomeness
+      of death? Below each of these ships is a word that applies the metaphor to
+      truth. Yonder, you see the name of Carthage; the other three are Troy,
+      Jerusalem, and Babylon. To these four is one common inscription. &lsquo;To
+      exhaustion were we brought by injustice!&rsquo; Turn now your eyes to the middle
+      of the sea,&mdash;there you behold the fifth ship, tossed amidst the
+      waves, her mast broken, her rudder gone, her sails shivered, but not yet a
+      wreck like the rest, though she soon may be. On her deck kneels a female,
+      clothed in mourning; mark the wo upon her countenance,&mdash;how cunningly
+      the artist has conveyed its depth and desolation; she stretches out her
+      arms in prayer, she implores your and Heaven&rsquo;s assistance. Mark now the
+      superscription&mdash;&lsquo;This is Rome!&rsquo;&mdash;Yes, it is your country that
+      addresses you in this emblem!&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      The crowd waved to and fro, and a deep murmur crept gathering over the
+      silence which they had hitherto kept.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;Now,&rdquo; continued Pandulfo, &ldquo;turn your gaze to the right of the picture,
+      and you will behold the cause of the tempest,&mdash;you will see why the
+      fifth vessel is thus perilled, and her sisters are thus wrecked. Mark,
+      four different kinds of animals, who, from their horrid jaws, send forth
+      the winds and storms which torture and rack the sea. The first are the
+      lions, the wolves, the bears. These, the inscription tells you, are the
+      lawless and savage signors of the state. The next are the dogs and swine,&mdash;these
+      are the evil counsellors and parasites. Thirdly, you behold the dragons
+      and the foxes,&mdash;and these are false judges and notaries, and they who
+      sell justice. Fourthly, in the hares, the goats, the apes, that assist in
+      creating the storm, you perceive, by the inscription, the emblems of the
+      popular thieves and homicides, ravishers and spoliators. Are ye bewildered
+      still, O Romans! or have ye mastered the riddle of the picture?&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      Far in their massive palaces the Savelli and Orsini heard the echo of the
+      shouts that answered the question of Pandulfo.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;Are ye, then, without hope!&rdquo; resumed the scholar, as the shout ceased,
+      and hushing, with the first sound of his voice, the ejaculations and
+      speeches which each man had turned to utter to his neighbour. &ldquo;Are ye
+      without hope? Doth the picture, which shows your tribulation, promise you
+      no redemption? Behold, above that angry sea, the heavens open, and the
+      majesty of God descends gloriously, as to judgment: and, from the rays
+      that surround the Spirit of God extend two flaming swords, and on those
+      swords stand, in wrath, but in deliverance, the two patron saints&mdash;the
+      two mighty guardians of your city! People of Rome, farewell! The parable
+      is finished.&rdquo; (M. Sismondi attributes to Rienzi a fine oration at the
+      showing of the picture, in which he thundered against the vices of the
+      patricians. The contemporary biographer of Rienzi says nothing of this
+      harangue. But, apparently (since history has its liberties as well as
+      fiction), M. Sismondi has thought it convenient to confound two occasions
+      very distinct in themselves.)
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      <a name="link2HCH0010" id="link2HCH0010">
+      <!--  H2 anchor --> </a>
+    </p>
+    <div style="height: 4em;">
+      <br /><br /><br /><br />
+    </div>
+    <h2>
+      Chapter 1.X. A Rough Spirit Raised, Which May Hereafter Rend the Wizard.
+    </h2>
+    <p>
+      While thus animated was the scene around the Capitol, within one of the
+      apartments of the palace sat the agent and prime cause of that excitement.
+      In the company of his quiet scribes, Rienzi appeared absorbed in the
+      patient details of his avocation. While the murmur and the hum, the shout
+      and the tramp, of multitudes, rolled to his chamber, he seemed not to heed
+      them, nor to rouse himself a moment from his task. With the unbroken
+      regularity of an automaton, he continued to enter in his large book, and
+      with the clear and beautiful characters of the period, those damning
+      figures which taught him, better than declamations, the frauds practised
+      on the people, and armed him with that weapon of plain fact which it is so
+      difficult for abuse to parry.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;Page 2, Vol. B.,&rdquo; said he, in the tranquil voice of business, to the
+      clerks; &ldquo;see there, the profits of the salt duty; department No.3&mdash;very
+      well. Page 9, Vol. D.&mdash;what is the account rendered by Vescobaldi,
+      the collector? What! twelve thousand florins?&mdash;no more?&mdash;unconscionable
+      rascal!&rdquo; (Here was a loud shout without of &lsquo;Pandulfo!&mdash;long live
+      Pandulfo!&rsquo;) &ldquo;Pastrucci, my friend, your head wanders; you are listening to
+      the noise without&mdash;please to amuse yourself with the calculation I
+      entrusted to you. Santi, what is the entry given in by Antonio Tralli?&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      A slight tap was heard at the door, and Pandulfo entered.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      The clerks continued their labour, though they looked up hastily at the
+      pale and respectable visitor, whose name, to their great astonishment, had
+      thus become a popular cry.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;Ah, my friend,&rdquo; said Rienzi, calmly enough in voice, but his hands
+      trembled with ill-suppressed emotion, &ldquo;you would speak to me alone, eh?
+      well, well&mdash;this way.&rdquo; Thus saying, he led the citizen into a small
+      cabinet in the rear of the room of office, carefully shut the door, and
+      then giving himself up to the natural impatience of his character, seized
+      Pandulfo by the hand: &ldquo;Speak!&rdquo; cried he: &ldquo;do they take the interpretation?&mdash;have
+      you made it plain and palpable enough?&mdash;has it sunk deep into their
+      souls?&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;Oh, by St. Peter! yes!&rdquo; returned the citizen, whose spirits were elevated
+      by his recent discovery that he, too, was an orator&mdash;a luxurious
+      pleasure for a timid man. &ldquo;They swallowed every word of the
+      interpretation; they are moved to the marrow&mdash;you might lead them
+      this very hour to battle, and find them heroes. As for the sturdy smith&mdash;&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;What! Cecco del Vecchio?&rdquo; interrupted Rienzi; &ldquo;ah, his heart is wrought
+      in bronze&mdash;what did he?&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;Why, he caught me by the hem of my robe as I descended my rostrum, (oh!
+      would you could have seen me!&mdash;per fede I had caught your mantle!&mdash;I
+      was a second you!) and said, weeping like a child, &lsquo;Ah, Signor, I am but a
+      poor man, and of little worth; but if every drop of blood in this body
+      were a life, I would give it for my country!&rsquo;&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;Brave soul,&rdquo; said Rienzi, with emotion; &ldquo;would Rome had but fifty such!
+      No man hath done us more good among his own class than Cecco del Vecchio.&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;They feel a protection in his very size,&rdquo; said Pandulfo. &ldquo;It is something
+      to hear such big words from such a big fellow.&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;Were there any voices lifted in disapprobation of the picture and its
+      sentiment?&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;None.&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;The time is nearly ripe, then&mdash;a few suns more, and the fruit must
+      be gathered. The Aventine,&mdash;the Lateran,&mdash;and then the solitary
+      trumpet!&rdquo; Thus saying, Rienzi, with folded arms and downcast eyes, seemed
+      sunk into a reverie.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;By the way,&rdquo; said Pandulfo, &ldquo;I had almost forgot to tell thee, that the
+      crowd would have poured themselves hither, so impatient were they to see
+      thee; but I bade Cecco del Vecchio mount the rostrum, and tell them, in
+      his blunt way, that it would be unseemly at the present time, when thou
+      wert engaged in the Capitol on civil and holy affairs, to rush in so great
+      a body into thy presence. Did I not right?&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;Most right, my Pandulfo.&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;But Cecco del Vecchio says he must come and kiss thy hand: and thou mayst
+      expect him here the moment he can escape unobserved from the crowd.&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;He is welcome!&rdquo; said Rienzi, half mechanically, for he was still absorbed
+      in thought.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;And, lo! here he is,&rdquo;&mdash;as one of the scribes announced the visit of
+      the smith.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;Let him be admitted!&rdquo; said Rienzi, seating himself composedly.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      When the huge smith found himself in the presence of Rienzi, it amused
+      Pandulfo to perceive the wonderful influences of mind over matter. That
+      fierce and sturdy giant, who, in all popular commotions, towered above his
+      tribe, with thews of stone, and nerves of iron, the rallying point and
+      bulwark of the rest,&mdash;stood now colouring and trembling before the
+      intellect, which (so had the eloquent spirit of Rienzi waked and fanned
+      the spark which, till then, had lain dormant in that rough bosom) might
+      almost be said to have created his own. And he, indeed, who first arouses
+      in the bondsman the sense and soul of freedom, comes as near as is
+      permitted to man, nearer than the philosopher, nearer even than the poet,
+      to the great creative attribute of God!&mdash;But, if the breast be
+      uneducated, the gift may curse the giver; and he who passes at once from
+      the slave to the freeman may pass as rapidly from the freeman to the
+      ruffian.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;Approach, my friend,&rdquo; said Rienzi, after a moment&rsquo;s pause; &ldquo;I know all
+      that thou hast done, and wouldst do, for Rome! Thou art worthy of her best
+      days, and thou art born to share in their return.&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      The smith dropped at the feet of Rienzi, who held out his hand to raise
+      him, which Cecco del Vecchio seized, and reverentially kissed.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;This kiss does not betray,&rdquo; said Rienzi, smiling; &ldquo;but rise, my friend,&mdash;this
+      posture is only due to God and his saints!&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;He is a saint who helps us at need!&rdquo; said the smith, bluntly, &ldquo;and that
+      no man has done as thou hast. But when,&rdquo; he added, sinking his voice, and
+      fixing his eyes hard on Rienzi, as one may do who waits a signal to strike
+      a blow, &ldquo;when&mdash;when shall we make the great effort?&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;Thou hast spoken to all the brave men in thy neighbourhood,&mdash;are
+      they well prepared?&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;To live or die, as Rienzi bids them!&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;I must have the list&mdash;the number&mdash;names&mdash;houses and
+      callings, this night.&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;Thou shalt.&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;Each man must sign his name or mark with his own hand.&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;It shall be done.&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;Then, harkye! attend Pandulfo di Guido at his house this evening, at
+      sunset. He shall instruct thee where to meet this night some brave hearts;&mdash;thou
+      art worthy to be ranked amongst them. Thou wilt not fail!&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;By the holy Stairs! I will count every minute till then,&rdquo; said the smith,
+      his swarthy face lighted with pride at the confidence shown him.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;Meanwhile, watch all your neighbours; let no man flag or grow
+      faint-hearted,&mdash;none of thy friends must be branded as a traitor!&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;I will cut his throat, were he my own mother&rsquo;s son, if I find one pledged
+      man flinch!&rdquo; said the fierce smith.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;Ha, ha!&rdquo; rejoined Rienzi, with that strange laugh which belonged to him;
+      &ldquo;a miracle! a miracle! The Picture speaks now!&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      It was already nearly dusk when Rienzi left the Capitol. The broad space
+      before its walls was empty and deserted, and wrapping his mantle closely
+      round him, he walked musingly on.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;I have almost climbed the height,&rdquo; thought he, &ldquo;and now the precipice
+      yawns before me. If I fail, what a fall! The last hope of my country falls
+      with me. Never will a noble rise against the nobles. Never will another
+      plebeian have the opportunities and the power that I have! Rome is bound
+      up with me&mdash;with a single life. The liberties of all time are fixed
+      to a reed that a wind may uproot. But oh, Providence! hast thou not
+      reserved and marked me for great deeds? How, step by step, have I been led
+      on to this solemn enterprise! How has each hour prepared its successor!
+      And yet what danger! If the inconstant people, made cowardly by long
+      thraldom, do but waver in the crisis, I am swept away!&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      As he spoke, he raised his eyes, and lo, before him, the first star of
+      twilight shone calmly down upon the crumbling remnants of the Tarpeian
+      Rock. It was no favouring omen, and Rienzi&rsquo;s heart beat quicker as that
+      dark and ruined mass frowned thus suddenly on his gaze.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;Dread monument,&rdquo; thought he, &ldquo;of what dark catastrophes, to what unknown
+      schemes, hast thou been the witness! To how many enterprises, on which
+      history is dumb, hast thou set the seal! How know we whether they were
+      criminal or just? How know we whether he, thus doomed as a traitor, would
+      not, if successful, have been immortalized as a deliverer? If I fall, who
+      will write my chronicle? One of the people? alas! blinded and ignorant,
+      they furnish forth no minds that can appeal to posterity. One of the
+      patricians? in what colours then shall I be painted! No tomb will rise for
+      me amidst the wrecks; no hand scatter flowers upon my grave!&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      Thus meditating on the verge of that mighty enterprise to which he had
+      devoted himself, Rienzi pursued his way. He gained the Tiber, and paused
+      for a few moments beside its legendary stream, over which the purple and
+      starlit heaven shone deeply down. He crossed the bridge which leads to the
+      quarter of the Trastevere, whose haughty inhabitants yet boast themselves
+      the sole true descendants of the ancient Romans. Here he step grew quicker
+      and more light; brighter, if less solemn, thoughts crowded upon his
+      breast; and ambition, lulled for a moment, left his strained and
+      over-laboured mind to the reign of a softer passion.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      <a name="link2HCH0011" id="link2HCH0011">
+      <!--  H2 anchor --> </a>
+    </p>
+    <div style="height: 4em;">
+      <br /><br /><br /><br />
+    </div>
+    <h2>
+      Chapter 1.XI. Nina di Raselli.
+    </h2>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;I tell you, Lucia, I do not love those stuffs; they do not become me. Saw
+      you ever so poor a dye?&mdash;this purple, indeed! that crimson! Why did
+      you let the man leave them? Let him take them elsewhere tomorrow. They may
+      suit the signoras on the other side the Tiber, who imagine everything
+      Venetian must be perfect; but I, Lucia, I see with my own eyes, and judge
+      from my own mind.&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;Ah, dear lady,&rdquo; said the serving-maid, &ldquo;if you were, as you doubtless
+      will be, some time or other, a grand signora, how worthily you would wear
+      the honours! Santa Cecilia! No other dame in Rome would be looked at while
+      the Lady Nina were by!&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;Would we not teach them what pomp was?&rdquo; answered Nina. &ldquo;Oh! what
+      festivals would we hold! Saw you not from the gallery the revels given
+      last week by the Lady Giulia Savelli?&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;Ay, signora; and when you walked up the hall in your silver and pearl
+      tissue, there ran such a murmur through the gallery; every one cried, &lsquo;The
+      Savelli have entertained an angel!&rsquo;&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;Pish! Lucia; no flattery, girl.&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;It is naked truth, lady. But that was a revel, was it not? There was
+      grandeur!&mdash;fifty servitors in scarlet and gold! and the music playing
+      all the while. The minstrels were sent for from Bergamo. Did not that
+      festival please you? Ah, I warrant many were the fine speeches made to you
+      that day!&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;Heigho!&mdash;no, there was one voice wanting, and all the music was
+      marred. But, girl, were I the Lady Giulia, I would not have been contented
+      with so poor a revel.&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;How, poor! Why all the nobles say it outdid the proudest marriage-feast
+      of the Colonna. Nay, a Neapolitan who sat next me, and who had served
+      under the young Queen Joanna, at her marriage, says, that even Naples was
+      outshone.&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;That may be. I know nought of Naples; but I know what my court should
+      have been, were I what&mdash;what I am not, and may never be! The banquet
+      vessels should have been of gold; the cups jewelled to the brim; not an
+      inch of the rude pavement should have been visible; all should have glowed
+      with cloth of gold. The fountain in the court should have showered up the
+      perfumes of the East; my pages should not have been rough youths, blushing
+      at their own uncouthness, but fair boys, who had not told their twelfth
+      year, culled from the daintiest palaces of Rome; and, as for the music,
+      oh, Lucia!&mdash;each musician should have worn a chaplet, and deserved
+      it; and he who played best should have had a reward, to inspire all the
+      rest&mdash;a rose from me. Saw you, too, the Lady Giulia&rsquo;s robe? What
+      colours! they might have put out the sun at noonday!&mdash;yellow, and
+      blue, and orange, and scarlet! Oh, sweet Saints!&mdash;but my eyes ached
+      all the next day!&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;Doubtless, the Lady Giulia lacks your skill in the mixture of colours,&rdquo;
+       said the complaisant waiting-woman.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;And then, too, what a mien!&mdash;no royalty in it! She moved along the
+      hall, so that her train well nigh tripped her every moment; and then she
+      said, with a foolish laugh, &lsquo;These holyday robes are but troublesome
+      luxuries.&rsquo; Troth, for the great there should be no holyday robes; &lsquo;tis for
+      myself, not for others, that I would attire! Every day should have its new
+      robe, more gorgeous than the last;&mdash;every day should be a holyday!&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;Methought,&rdquo; said Lucia, &ldquo;that the Lord Giovanni Orsini seemed very
+      devoted to my Lady.&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;He! the bear!&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;Bear, he may be! but he has a costly skin. His riches are untold.&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;And the fool knows not how to spend them.&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;Was not that the young Lord Adrian who spoke to you just by the columns,
+      where the music played?&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;It might be,&mdash;I forget.&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;Yet, I hear that few ladies forget when Lord Adrian di Castello woos
+      them.&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;There was but one man whose company seemed to me worth the recollection,&rdquo;
+       answered Nina, unheeding the insinuation of the artful handmaid.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;And who was he?&rdquo; asked Lucia.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;The old scholar from Avignon!&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;What! he with the gray beard? Oh, Signora!&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;Yes,&rdquo; said Nina, with a grave and sad voice; &ldquo;when he spoke, the whole
+      scene vanished from my eyes,&mdash;for he spoke to me of HIM!&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      As she said this, the Signora sighed deeply, and the tears gathered to her
+      eyes.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      The waiting-woman raised her lips in disdain, and her looks in wonder; but
+      she did not dare to venture a reply.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;Open the lattice,&rdquo; said Nina, after a pause, &ldquo;and give me yon paper. Not
+      that, girl&mdash;but the verses sent me yesterday. What! art thou Italian,
+      and dost thou not know, by instinct, that I spoke of the rhyme of
+      Petrarch?&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      Seated by the open casement, through which the moonlight stole soft and
+      sheen, with one lamp beside her, from which she seemed to shade her eyes,
+      though in reality she sought to hide her countenance from Lucia, the young
+      Signora appeared absorbed in one of those tender sonnets which then turned
+      the brains and inflamed the hearts of Italy. (Although it is true that the
+      love sonnets of Petrarch were not then, as now, the most esteemed of his
+      works, yet it has been a great, though a common error, to represent them
+      as little known and coldly admired. Their effect was, in reality,
+      prodigious and universal. Every ballad-singer sung them in the streets,
+      and (says Filippo Villani), &ldquo;Gravissimi nesciebant abstinere&rdquo;&mdash;&ldquo;Even
+      the gravest could not abstain from them.&rdquo;)
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      Born of an impoverished house, which, though boasting its descent from a
+      consular race of Rome, scarcely at that day maintained a rank amongst the
+      inferior order of nobility, Nina di Raselli was the spoiled child&mdash;the
+      idol and the tyrant&mdash;of her parents. The energetic and self-willed
+      character of her mind made her rule where she should have obeyed; and as
+      in all ages dispositions can conquer custom, she had, though in a clime
+      and land where the young and unmarried of her sex are usually chained and
+      fettered, assumed, and by assuming won, the prerogative of independence.
+      She possessed, it is true, more learning and more genius than generally
+      fell to the share of women in that day; and enough of both to be deemed a
+      miracle by her parents;&mdash;she had, also, what they valued more, a
+      surpassing beauty; and, what they feared more, an indomitable haughtiness;&mdash;a
+      haughtiness mixed with a thousand soft and endearing qualities where she
+      loved; and which, indeed, where she loved, seemed to vanish. At once vain
+      yet high-minded, resolute yet impassioned, there was a gorgeous
+      magnificence in her very vanity and splendour,&mdash;an ideality in her
+      waywardness: her defects made a part of her brilliancy; without them she
+      would have seemed less woman; and, knowing her, you would have compared
+      all women by her standard. Softer qualities beside her seemed not more
+      charming, but more insipid. She had no vulgar ambition, for she had
+      obstinately refused many alliances which the daughter of Raselli could
+      scarcely have hoped to form. The untutored minds and savage power of the
+      Roman nobles seemed to her imagination, which was full of the poetry of
+      rank, its luxury and its graces, as something barbarous and revolting, at
+      once to be dreaded and despised. She had, therefore, passed her twentieth
+      year unmarried, but not without love. The faults, themselves, of her
+      character, elevated that ideal of love which she had formed. She required
+      some being round whom all her vainer qualities could rally; she felt that
+      where she loved she must adore; she demanded no common idol before which
+      to humble so strong and imperious a mind. Unlike women of a gentler mould,
+      who desire, for a short period, to exercise the caprices of sweet empire,&mdash;when
+      she loved she must cease to command; and pride, at once, be humbled to
+      devotion. So rare were the qualities that could attract her; so
+      imperiously did her haughtiness require that those qualities should be
+      above her own, yet of the same order; that her love elevated its object
+      like a god. Accustomed to despise, she felt all the luxury it is to
+      venerate! And if it were her lot to be united with one thus loved, her
+      nature was that which might become elevated by the nature that it gazed
+      on. For her beauty&mdash;Reader, shouldst thou ever go to Rome, thou wilt
+      see in the Capitol the picture of the Cumaean Sibyl, which, often copied,
+      no copy can even faintly represent. I beseech thee, mistake not this sibyl
+      for another, for the Roman galleries abound in sibyls. (The sibyl referred
+      to is the well-known one by Domenichino. As a mere work of art, that by
+      Guercino, called the Persian sibyl, in the same collection, is perhaps
+      superior; but in beauty, in character, there is no comparison.) The sibyl
+      I speak of is dark, and the face has an Eastern cast; the robe and turban,
+      gorgeous though they be, grow dim before the rich, but transparent roses
+      of the cheek; the hair would be black, save for that golden glow which
+      mellows it to a hue and lustre never seen but in the south, and even in
+      the south most rare; the features, not Grecian, are yet faultless; the
+      mouth, the brow, the ripe and exquisite contour, all are human and
+      voluptuous; the expression, the aspect, is something more; the form is,
+      perhaps, too full for the perfection of loveliness, for the proportions of
+      sculpture, for the delicacy of Athenian models; but the luxuriant fault
+      has a majesty. Gaze long upon that picture: it charms, yet commands, the
+      eye. While you gaze, you call back five centuries. You see before you the
+      breathing image of Nina di Raselli!
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      But it was not those ingenious and elaborate conceits in which Petrarch,
+      great Poet though he be, has so often mistaken pedantry for passion, that
+      absorbed at that moment the attention of the beautiful Nina. Her eyes
+      rested not on the page, but on the garden that stretched below the
+      casement. Over the old fruit-trees and hanging vines fell the moonshine;
+      and in the centre of the green, but half-neglected sward, the waters of a
+      small and circular fountain, whose perfect proportions spoke of days long
+      past, played and sparkled in the starlight. The scene was still and
+      beautiful; but neither of its stillness nor its beauty thought Nina:
+      towards one, the gloomiest and most rugged, spot in the whole garden,
+      turned her gaze; there, the trees stood densely massed together, and shut
+      from view the low but heavy wall which encircled the mansion of Raselli.
+      The boughs on those trees stirred gently, but Nina saw them wave; and now
+      from the copse emerged, slowly and cautiously, a solitary figure, whose
+      shadow threw itself, long and dark, over the sward. It approached the
+      window, and a low voice breathed Nina&rsquo;s name.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;Quick, Lucia!&rdquo; cried she, breathlessly, turning to her handmaid: &ldquo;quick!
+      the rope-ladder! it is he! he is come! How slow you are! haste, girl,&mdash;he
+      may be discovered! There,&mdash;O joy,&mdash;O joy!&mdash;My lover! my
+      hero! my Rienzi!&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;It is you!&rdquo; said Rienzi, as, now entering the chamber, he wound his arms
+      around her half-averted form, &ldquo;and what is night to others is day to me!&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      The first sweet moments of welcome were over; and Rienzi was seated at the
+      feet of his mistress: his head rested on her knees&mdash;his face looking
+      up to hers&mdash;their hands clasped each in each.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;And for me thou bravest these dangers!&rdquo; said the lover; &ldquo;the shame of
+      discovery, the wrath of thy parents!&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;But what are my perils to thine? Oh, Heaven! if my father found thee here
+      thou wouldst die!&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;He would think it then so great a humiliation, that thou, beautiful Nina,
+      who mightst match with the haughtiest names of Rome, shouldst waste thy
+      love on a plebeian&mdash;even though the grandson of an emperor!&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      The proud heart of Nina could sympathize well with the wounded pride of
+      her lover: she detected the soreness which lurked beneath his answer,
+      carelessly as it was uttered.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;Hast thou not told me,&rdquo; she said, &ldquo;of that great Marius, who was no
+      noble, but from whom the loftiest Colonna would rejoice to claim his
+      descent? and do I not know in thee one who shall yet eclipse the power of
+      Marius, unsullied by his vices?&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;Delicious flattery! sweet prophet!&rdquo; said Rienzi, with a melancholy smile;
+      &ldquo;never were thy supporting promises of the future more welcome to me than
+      now; for to thee I will say what I would utter to none else&mdash;my soul
+      half sinks beneath the mighty burthen I have heaped upon it. I want new
+      courage as the dread hour approaches; and from thy words and looks I drink
+      it.&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;Oh!&rdquo; answered Nina, blushing as she spoke, &ldquo;glorious is indeed the lot
+      which I have bought by my love for thee: glorious to share thy schemes, to
+      cheer thee in doubt, to whisper hope to thee in danger.&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;And give grace to me in triumph!&rdquo; added Rienzi, passionately. &ldquo;Ah! should
+      the future ever place upon these brows the laurel-wreath due to one who
+      has saved his country, what joy, what recompence, to lay it at thy feet!
+      Perhaps, in those long and solitary hours of languor and exhaustion which
+      fill up the interstices of time,&mdash;the dull space for sober thought
+      between the epochs of exciting action,&mdash;perhaps I should have failed
+      and flagged, and renounced even my dreams for Rome, had they not been
+      linked also with my dreams for thee!&mdash;had I not pictured to myself
+      the hour when my fate should elevate me beyond my birth; when thy sire
+      would deem it no disgrace to give thee to my arms; when thou, too,
+      shouldst stand amidst the dames of Rome, more honoured, as more beautiful,
+      than all; and when I should see that pomp, which my own soul disdains,
+      (&lsquo;Quem semper abhorrui sicut cenum&rsquo; is the expression used by Rienzi, in
+      his letter to his friend at Avignon, and which was probably sincere. Men
+      rarely act according to the bias of their own tastes.) made dear and
+      grateful to me because associated with thee! Yes, it is these thoughts
+      that have inspired me, when sterner ones have shrunk back appalled from
+      the spectres that surround their goal. And oh! my Nina, sacred, strong,
+      enduring must be, indeed, the love which lives in the same pure and
+      elevated air as that which sustains my hopes of liberty and fame!&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      This was the language which, more even than the vows of fidelity and the
+      dear adulation which springs from the heart&rsquo;s exuberance, had bound the
+      proud and vain soul of Nina to the chains that it so willingly wore.
+      Perhaps, indeed, in the absence of Rienzi, her weaker nature pictured to
+      herself the triumph of humbling the highborn signoras, and eclipsing the
+      barbarous magnificence of the chiefs of Rome; but in his presence, and
+      listening to his more elevated and generous ambition, as yet all unsullied
+      by one private feeling save the hope of her, her higher sympathies were
+      enlisted with his schemes, her mind aspired to raise itself to the height
+      of his, and she thought less of her own rise than of his glory. It was
+      sweet to her pride to be the sole confidante of his most secret thoughts,
+      as of his most hardy undertakings; to see bared before her that intricate
+      and plotting spirit; to be admitted even to the knowledge of its doubts
+      and weakness, as of its heroism and power.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      Nothing could be more contrasted than the loves of Rienzi and Nina, and
+      those of Adrian and Irene: in the latter, all were the dreams, the
+      phantasies, the extravagance, of youth; they never talked of the future;
+      they mingled no other aspirations with those of love. Ambition, glory, the
+      world&rsquo;s high objects, were nothing to them when together; their love had
+      swallowed up the world, and left nothing visible beneath the sun, save
+      itself. But the passion of Nina and her lover was that of more complicated
+      natures and more mature years: it was made up of a thousand feelings, each
+      naturally severed from each, but compelled into one focus by the mighty
+      concentration of love; their talk was of the world; it was from the world
+      that they drew the aliment which sustained it; it was of the future they
+      spoke and thought; of its dreams and imagined glories they made themselves
+      a home and altar; their love had in it more of the Intellectual than that
+      of Adrian and Irene; it was more fitted for this hard earth; it had in it,
+      also, more of the leaven of the later and iron days, and less of poetry
+      and the first golden age.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;And must thou leave me now?&rdquo; said Nina, her cheek no more averted from
+      his lips, nor her form from his parting embrace. &ldquo;The moon is high yet; it
+      is but a little hour thou hast given me.&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;An hour! Alas!&rdquo; said Rienzi, &ldquo;it is near upon midnight&mdash;our friends
+      await me.&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;Go, then, my soul&rsquo;s best half! Go; Nina shall not detain thee one moment
+      from those higher objects which make thee so dear to Nina. When&mdash;when
+      shall we meet again!&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;Not,&rdquo; said Rienzi, proudly, and with all his soul upon his brow, &ldquo;not
+      thus, by stealth! no! nor as I thus have met thee, the obscure and
+      contemned bondsman! When next thou seest me, it shall be at the head of
+      the sons of Rome! her champion! her restorer! or&mdash;&rdquo; said he, sinking
+      his voice&mdash;
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;There is no or!&rdquo; interrupted Nina, weaving her arms round him, and
+      catching his enthusiasm; &ldquo;thou hast uttered thine own destiny!&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;One kiss more!&mdash;farewell!&mdash;the tenth day from the morrow shines
+      upon the restoration of Rome!&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      <a name="link2HCH0012" id="link2HCH0012">
+      <!--  H2 anchor --> </a>
+    </p>
+    <div style="height: 4em;">
+      <br /><br /><br /><br />
+    </div>
+    <h2>
+      Chapter 1.XII. The Strange Adventures that Befel Walter de Montreal.
+    </h2>
+    <p>
+      It was upon that same evening, and while the earlier stars yet shone over
+      the city, that Walter de Montreal, returning, alone, to the convent then
+      associated with the church of Santa Maria del Priorata (both of which
+      belonged to the Knights of the Hospital, and in the first of which
+      Montreal had taken his lodgment), paused amidst the ruins and desolation
+      which lay around his path. Thou little skilled in the classic memories and
+      associations of the spot, he could not but be impressed with the
+      surrounding witnesses of departed empire; the vast skeleton, as it were,
+      of the dead giantess.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;Now,&rdquo; thought he, as he gazed around upon the roofless columns and
+      shattered walls, everywhere visible, over which the starlight shone,
+      ghastly and transparent, backed by the frowning and embattled fortresses
+      of the Frangipani, half hid by the dark foliage that sprung up amidst the
+      very fanes and palaces of old&mdash;Nature exulting over the frailer Art;
+      &ldquo;now,&rdquo; thought he, &ldquo;bookmen would be inspired, by this scene, with
+      fantastic and dreaming visions of the past. But to me these monuments of
+      high ambition and royal splendour create only images of the future. Rome
+      may yet be, with her seven-hilled diadem, as Rome has been before, the
+      prize of the strongest hand and the boldest warrior,&mdash;revived, not by
+      her own degenerate sons, but the infused blood of a new race. William the
+      Bastard could scarce have found the hardy Englishers so easy a conquest as
+      Walter the Well-born may find these eunuch Romans. And which conquest were
+      the more glorious,&mdash;the barbarous Isle, or the Metropolis of the
+      World? Short step from the general to the podesta&mdash;shorter step from
+      the podesta to the king!&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      While thus revolving his wild, yet not altogether chimerical ambition, a
+      quick light step was heard amidst the long herbage, and, looking up,
+      Montreal perceived the figure of a tall female descending from that part
+      of the hill then covered by many convents, towards the base of the
+      Aventine. She supported her steps with a long staff, and moved with such
+      elasticity and erectness, that now, as her face became visible by the
+      starlight, it was surprising to perceive that it was the face of one
+      advanced in years,&mdash;a harsh, proud countenance, withered, and deeply
+      wrinkled, but not without a certain regularity of outline.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;Merciful Virgin!&rdquo; cried Montreal, starting back as that face gleamed upon
+      him: &ldquo;is it possible? It is she:&mdash;it is&mdash;&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      He sprung forward, and stood right before the old woman, who seemed
+      equally surprised, though more dismayed, at the sight of Montreal.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;I have sought thee for years,&rdquo; said the Knight, first breaking the
+      silence; &ldquo;years, long years,&mdash;thy conscience can tell thee why.&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;Mine, man of blood!&rdquo; cried the female, trembling with rage or fear;
+      &ldquo;darest thou talk of conscience? Thou, the dishonourer&mdash;the robber&mdash;the
+      professed homicide! Thou, disgrace to knighthood and to birth! Thou, with
+      the cross of chastity and of peace upon thy breast! Thou talk of
+      conscience, hypocrite!&mdash;thou?&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;Lady&mdash;lady!&rdquo; said Montreal, deprecatingly, and almost quailing
+      beneath the fiery passion of that feeble woman, &ldquo;I have sinned against
+      thee and thine. But remember all my excuses!&mdash;early love&mdash;fatal
+      obstacles&mdash;rash vow&mdash;irresistible temptation! Perhaps,&rdquo; he
+      added, in a more haughty tone, &ldquo;perhaps, yet, I may have the power to
+      atone my error, and wring, with mailed hand, from the successor of St
+      Peter, who hath power to loose as to bind&mdash;&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;Perjured and abandoned!&rdquo; interrupted the female; &ldquo;dost thou dream that
+      violence can purchase absolution, or that thou canst ever atone the past?&mdash;a
+      noble name disgraced, a father&rsquo;s broken heart and dying curse! Yes, that
+      curse, I hear it now! it rings upon me thrillingly, as when I watched the
+      expiring clay! it cleaves to thee&mdash;it pursues thee&mdash;it shall
+      pierce thee through thy corselet&mdash;it shall smite thee in the meridian
+      of thy power! Genius wasted&mdash;ambition blasted&mdash;penitence
+      deferred&mdash;a life of brawls, and a death of shame&mdash;thy
+      destruction the offspring of thy crime!&mdash;To this, to this, an old
+      man&rsquo;s curse hath doomed thee!&mdash;AND THOU ART DOOMED!&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      These words were rather shrieked than spoken: and the flashing eye, the
+      lifted hand, the dilated form of the speaker&mdash;the hour&mdash;the
+      solitude of the ruins around&mdash;all conspired to give to the fearful
+      execration the character of prophecy. The warrior, against whose undaunted
+      breast a hundred spears had shivered in vain, fell appalled and humbled to
+      the ground. He seized the hem of his fierce denouncer&rsquo;s robe, and cried,
+      in a choked and hollow voice, &ldquo;Spare me! spare me!&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;Spare thee!&rdquo; said the unrelenting crone; &ldquo;hast thou ever spared man in
+      thy hatred, or woman in thy lust? Ah, grovel in the dust!&mdash;crouch&mdash;crouch!&mdash;wild
+      beast as thou art! whose sleek skin and beautiful hues have taught the
+      unwary to be blind to the talons that rend, and the grinders that devour;&mdash;crouch,
+      that the foot of the old and impotent may spurn thee!&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;Hag!&rdquo; cried Montreal, in the reaction of sudden fury and maddened pride,
+      springing up to the full height of his stature. &ldquo;Hag! thou hast passed the
+      limits to which, remembering who thou art, my forbearance gave thee
+      licence. I had well-nigh forgot that thou hadst assumed my part&mdash;I am
+      the Accuser! Woman!&mdash;the boy!&mdash;shrink not! equivocate not! lie
+      not!&mdash;thou wert the thief!&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;I was. Thou taughtest me the lesson how to steal a&mdash;&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;Render&mdash;restore him!&rdquo; interrupted Montreal, stamping on the ground
+      with such force that the splinters of the marble fragments on which he
+      stood shivered under his armed heel.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      The woman little heeded a violence at which the fiercest warrior of Italy
+      might have trembled; but she did not make an immediate answer. The
+      character of her countenance altered from passion into an expression of
+      grave, intent, and melancholy thought. At length she replied to Montreal;
+      whose hand had wandered to his dagger-hilt, with the instinct of long
+      habit, whenever enraged or thwarted, rather than from any design of blood;
+      which, stern and vindictive as he was, he would have been incapable of
+      forming against any woman,&mdash;much less against the one then before
+      him.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;Walter de Montreal,&rdquo; said she, in a voice so calm that it almost sounded
+      like that of compassion, &ldquo;the boy, I think, has never known brother or
+      sister: the only child of a once haughty and lordly race, on both sides,
+      though now on both dishonoured&mdash;nay, why so impatient? thou wilt soon
+      learn the worst&mdash;the boy is dead!&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;Dead!&rdquo; repeated Montreal, recoiling and growing pale; &ldquo;dead!&mdash;no, no&mdash;say
+      not that! He has a mother,&mdash;you know he has!&mdash;a fond,
+      meekhearted, anxious, hoping mother!&mdash;no!&mdash;no, he is not dead!&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;Thou canst feel, then, for a mother?&rdquo; said the old woman, seemingly
+      touched by the tone of the Provencal. &ldquo;Yet, bethink thee; is it not better
+      that the grave should save him from a life of riot, of bloodshed, and of
+      crime? Better to sleep with God than to wake with the fiends!&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;Dead!&rdquo; echoed Montreal; &ldquo;dead!&mdash;the pretty one!&mdash;so young!&mdash;those
+      eyes&mdash;the mother&rsquo;s eyes&mdash;closed so soon?&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;Hast thou aught else to say? Thy sight scares my very womanhood from my
+      soul!&mdash;let me be gone.&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;Dead!&mdash;may I believe thee? or dost thou mock me? Thou hast uttered
+      thy curse, hearken to my warning:&mdash;If thou hast lied in this, thy
+      last hour shall dismay thee, and thy death-bed shall be the death-bed of
+      despair!&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;Thy lips,&rdquo; replied the female, with a scornful smile, &ldquo;are better adapted
+      for lewd vows to unhappy maidens, than for the denunciations which sound
+      solemn only when coming from the good. Farewell!&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;Stay! inexorable woman! stay!&mdash;where sleeps he? Masses shall be
+      sung! priests shall pray!&mdash;the sins of the father shall not be
+      visited on that young head!&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;At Florence!&rdquo; returned the woman, hastily. &ldquo;But no stone records the
+      departed one!&mdash;The dead boy had no name!&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      Waiting for no further questionings, the woman now passed on,&mdash;pursued
+      her way;&mdash;and the long herbage, and the winding descent, soon
+      snatched her ill-omened apparition from the desolate landscape.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      Montreal, thus alone, sunk with a deep and heavy sigh upon the ground,
+      covered his face with his hands, and burst into an agony of grief; his
+      chest heaved, his whole frame trembled, and he wept and sobbed aloud, with
+      all the fearful vehemence of a man whose passions are strong and fierce,
+      but to whom the violence of grief alone is novel and unfamiliar.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      He remained thus, prostrate and unmanned, for a considerable time, growing
+      slowly and gradually more calm as tears relieved his emotion; and, at
+      length, rather indulging a gloomy reverie than a passionate grief. The
+      moon was high and the hour late when he arose, and then few traces of the
+      past excitement remained upon his countenance; for Walter de Montreal was
+      not of that mould in which woe can force a settlement, or to which any
+      affliction can bring the continued and habitual melancholy that darkens
+      those who feel more enduringly, though with emotions less stormy. His were
+      the elements of the true Franc character, though carried to excess: his
+      sternest and his deepest qualities were mingled with fickleness and
+      caprice; his profound sagacity often frustrated by a whim; his towering
+      ambition deserted for some frivolous temptation; and his elastic,
+      sanguine, and high-spirited nature, faithful only to the desire of
+      military glory, to the poetry of a daring and stormy life, and to the
+      susceptibilities of that tender passion without whose colourings no
+      portrait of chivalry is complete, and in which he was capable of a
+      sentiment, a tenderness, and a loyal devotion, which could hardly have
+      been supposed compatible with his reckless levity and his undisciplined
+      career.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;Well,&rdquo; said he, as he rose slowly, folded his mantle round him, and
+      resumed his way, &ldquo;it was not for myself I grieved thus. But the pang is
+      past, and the worst is known. Now, then, back to those things that never
+      die&mdash;restless projects and daring schemes. That hag&rsquo;s curse keeps my
+      blood cold still, and this solitude has something in it weird and awful.
+      Ha!&mdash;what sudden light is that?&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      The light which caught Montreal&rsquo;s eye broke forth almost like a star,
+      scarcely larger, indeed, but more red and intense in its ray. Of itself it
+      was nothing uncommon, and might have shone either from convent or cottage.
+      But it streamed from a part of the Aventine which contained no habitations
+      of the living, but only the empty ruins and shattered porticoes, of which
+      even the names and memories of the ancient inhabitants were dead. Aware of
+      this, Montreal felt a slight awe (as the beam threw its steady light over
+      the dreary landscape); for he was not without the knightly superstitions
+      of the age, and it was now the witching hour consecrated to ghost and
+      spirit. But fear, whether of this world or the next, could not long daunt
+      the mind of the hardy freebooter; and, after a short hesitation, he
+      resolved to make a digression from his way, and ascertain the cause of the
+      phenomenon. Unconsciously, the martial tread of the barbarian passed over
+      the site of the famed, or infamous, Temple of Isis, which had once
+      witnessed those wildest orgies commemorated by Juvenal; and came at last
+      to a thick and dark copse, from an opening in the centre of which gleamed
+      the mysterious light. Penetrating the gloomy foliage, the Knight now found
+      himself before a large ruin, grey and roofless, from within which came,
+      indistinct and muffled, the sound of voices. Through a rent in the wall,
+      forming a kind of casement, and about ten feet from the ground, the light
+      now broke over the matted and rank soil, embedded, as it were, in vast
+      masses of shade, and streaming through a mouldering portico hard at hand.
+      The Provencal stood, though he knew it not, on the very place once
+      consecrated by the Temple: the Portico and the Library of Liberty (the
+      first public library instituted in Rome). The wall of the ruin was covered
+      with innumerable creepers and wild brushwood, and it required but little
+      agility on the part of Montreal, by the help of these, to raise himself to
+      the height of the aperture, and, concealed by the luxuriant foliage, to
+      gaze within. He saw a table, lighted with tapers, in the centre of which
+      was a crucifix; a dagger, unsheathed; an open scroll, which the event
+      proved to be of sacred character; and a brazen bowl. About a hundred men,
+      in cloaks, and with black vizards, stood motionless around; and one,
+      taller than the rest, without disguise or mask&mdash;whose pale brow and
+      stern features seemed by that light yet paler and yet more stern&mdash;appeared
+      to be concluding some address to his companions.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;Yes,&rdquo; said he, &ldquo;in the church of the Lateran I will make the last appeal
+      to the people. Supported by the Vicar of the Pope, myself an officer of
+      the Pontiff, it will be seen that Religion and Liberty&mdash;the heroes
+      and the martyrs&mdash;are united in one cause. After that time, words are
+      idle; action must begin. By this crucifix I pledge my faith, on this blade
+      I devote my life, to the regeneration of Rome! And you (then no need for
+      mask or mantle!), when the solitary trump is heard, when the solitary
+      horseman is seen,&mdash;you, swear to rally round the standard of the
+      Republic, and resist&mdash;with heart and hand, with life and soul, in
+      defiance of death, and in hope of redemption&mdash;the arms of the
+      oppressor!&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;We swear&mdash;we swear!&rdquo; exclaimed every voice: and, crowding toward
+      cross and weapon, the tapers were obscured by the intervening throng, and
+      Montreal could not perceive the ceremony, nor hear the muttered formula of
+      the oath: but he could guess that the rite then common to conspiracies&mdash;and
+      which required each conspirator to shed some drops of his own blood, in
+      token that life itself was devoted to the enterprise&mdash;had not been
+      omitted, when, the group again receding, the same figure as before had
+      addressed the meeting, holding on high the bowl with both hands,&mdash;while
+      from the left arm, which was bared, the blood weltered slowly, and
+      trickled, drop by drop, upon the ground,&mdash;said, in a solemn voice and
+      upturned eyes:
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;Amidst the ruins of thy temple, O Liberty! we, Romans, dedicate to thee
+      this libation! We, befriended and inspired by no unreal and fabled idols,
+      but by the Lord of Hosts, and Him who, descending to earth, appealed not
+      to emperors and to princes, but to the fisherman and the peasant,&mdash;giving
+      to the lowly and the poor the mission of Revelation.&rdquo; Then, turning
+      suddenly to his companions, as his features, singularly varying in their
+      character and expression, brightened, from solemn awe, into a martial and
+      kindling enthusiasm, he cried aloud, &ldquo;Death to the Tyranny! Life to the
+      Republic!&rdquo; The effect of the transition was startling. Each man, as by an
+      involuntary and irresistible impulse, laid his hand upon his sword, as he
+      echoed the sentiment; some, indeed, drew forth their blades, as if for
+      instant action.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;I have seen enow: they will break up anon,&rdquo; said Montreal to himself:
+      &ldquo;and I would rather face an army of thousands, than even half-a-dozen
+      enthusiasts, so inflamed,&mdash;and I thus detected.&rdquo; And, with this
+      thought, he dropped on the ground, and glided away, as, once again,
+      through the still midnight air, broke upon his ear the muffled shout&mdash;&ldquo;DEATH
+      TO THE TYRANNY!&mdash;LIFE TO THE REPUBLIC!&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      <a name="link2H_4_0017" id="link2H_4_0017">
+      <!--  H2 anchor --> </a>
+    </p>
+    <div style="height: 4em;">
+      <br /><br /><br /><br />
+    </div>
+    <h2>
+      BOOK II. THE REVOLUTION
+    </h2>
+<pre xml:space="preserve">
+     &ldquo;Ogni Lascivia, ogni male, nulla giustizia, nullo freno.
+     Non c&rsquo;era piu remedia, ogni persona periva.  Allora Cola di
+     Rienzi.&rdquo; &amp;c.&mdash;&ldquo;Vita di Cola di Rienzi&rdquo;, lib. i. chap. 2.
+
+     &ldquo;Every kind of lewdness, every form of evil; no justice, no
+     restraint. Remedy there was none; perdition fell on all.
+     Then Cola di Rienzi,&rdquo; &amp;c.&mdash;&ldquo;Life of Cola di Rienzi&rdquo;.
+</pre>
+    <p>
+      <a name="link2HCH0013" id="link2HCH0013">
+      <!--  H2 anchor --> </a>
+    </p>
+    <div style="height: 4em;">
+      <br /><br /><br /><br />
+    </div>
+    <h2>
+      Chapter 2.I. The Knight of Provence, and his Proposal.
+    </h2>
+    <p>
+      It was nearly noon as Adrian entered the gates of the palace of Stephen
+      Colonna. The palaces of the nobles were not then as we see them now,
+      receptacles for the immortal canvas of Italian, and the imperishable
+      sculpture of Grecian Art; but still to this day are retained the massive
+      walls, and barred windows, and spacious courts, which at that time
+      protected their rude retainers. High above the gates rose a lofty and
+      solid tower, whose height commanded a wide view of the mutilated remains
+      of Rome: the gate itself was adorned and strengthened on either side by
+      columns of granite, whose Doric capitals betrayed the sacrilege that had
+      torn them from one of the many temples that had formerly crowded the
+      sacred Forum. From the same spoils came, too, the vast fragments of
+      travertine which made the walls of the outer court. So common at that day
+      were these barbarous appropriations of the most precious monuments of art,
+      that the columns and domes of earlier Rome were regarded by all classes
+      but as quarries, from which every man was free to gather the materials,
+      whether for his castle or his cottage,&mdash;a wantonness of outrage far
+      greater than the Goths&rsquo;, to whom a later age would fain have attributed
+      all the disgrace, and which, more perhaps than even heavier offences,
+      excited the classical indignation of Petrarch, and made him sympathise
+      with Rienzi in his hopes of Rome. Still may you see the churches of that
+      or even earlier dates, of the most shapeless architecture, built on the
+      sites, and from the marbles, consecrating (rather than consecrated by) the
+      names of Venus, of Jupiter, of Minerva. The palace of the Prince of the
+      Orsini, duke of Gravina, is yet reared above the graceful arches (still
+      visible) of the theatre of Marcellus; then a fortress of the Savelli.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      As Adrian passed the court, a heavy waggon blocked up the way, laden with
+      huge marbles, dug from the unexhausted mine of the Golden House of Nero:
+      they were intended for an additional tower, by which Stephen Colonna
+      proposed yet more to strengthen the tasteless and barbarous edifice in
+      which the old noble maintained the dignity of outraging the law.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      The friend of Petrarch and the pupil of Rienzi sighed deeply as he passed
+      this vehicle of new spoliations, and as a pillar of fluted alabaster,
+      rolling carelessly from the waggon, fell with a loud crash upon the
+      pavement. At the foot of the stairs grouped some dozen of the bandits whom
+      the old Colonna entertained: they were playing at dice upon an ancient
+      tomb, the clear and deep inscription on which (so different from the
+      slovenly character of the later empire) bespoke it a memorial of the most
+      powerful age of Rome, and which, now empty even of ashes, and upset,
+      served for a table to these foreign savages, and was strewn, even at that
+      early hour, with fragments of meat and flasks of wine. They scarcely
+      stirred, they scarcely looked up, as the young noble passed them; and
+      their fierce oaths and loud ejaculations, uttered in a northern patois,
+      grated harsh upon his ear, as he mounted, with a slow step, the lofty and
+      unclean stairs. He came into a vast ante-chamber, which was half-filled
+      with the higher class of the patrician&rsquo;s retainers: some five or six
+      pages, chosen from the inferior noblesse, congregated by a narrow and
+      deep-sunk casement, were discussing the grave matters of gallantry and
+      intrigue; three petty chieftains of the band below, with their corselets
+      donned, and their swords and casques beside them, were sitting, stolid and
+      silent, at a table, in the middle of the room, and might have been taken
+      for automatons, save for the solemn regularity with which they ever and
+      anon lifted to their moustachioed lips their several goblets, and then,
+      with a complacent grunt, re-settled to their contemplations. Striking was
+      the contrast which their northern phlegm presented to a crowd of Italian
+      clients, and petitioners, and parasites, who walked restlessly to and fro,
+      talking loudly to each other, with all the vehement gestures and varying
+      physiognomy of southern vivacity. There was a general stir and sensation
+      as Adrian broke upon this miscellaneous company. The bandit captains
+      nodded their heads mechanically; the pages bowed, and admired the fashion
+      of his plume and hose; the clients, and petitioners, and parasites,
+      crowded round him, each with a separate request for interest with his
+      potent kinsman. Great need had Adrian of his wonted urbanity and address,
+      in extricating himself from their grasp; and painfully did he win, at
+      last, the low and narrow door, at which stood a tall servitor, who
+      admitted or rejected the applicants, according to his interest or caprice.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;Is the Baron alone?&rdquo; asked Adrian.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;Why, no, my Lord: a foreign signor is with him&mdash;but to you he is of
+      course visible.&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;Well, you may admit me. I would inquire of his health.&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      The servitor opened the door&mdash;through whose aperture peered many a
+      jealous and wistful eye&mdash;and consigned Adrian to the guidance of a
+      page, who, older and of greater esteem than the loiterers in the
+      ante-room, was the especial henchman of the Lord of the Castle. Passing
+      another, but empty chamber, vast and dreary, Adrian found himself in a
+      small cabinet, and in the presence of his kinsman.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      Before a table, bearing the implements of writing, sate the old Colonna: a
+      robe of rich furs and velvet hung loose upon his tall and stately frame;
+      from a round skull-cap, of comforting warmth and crimson hue, a few grey
+      locks descended, and mixed with a long and reverent beard. The countenance
+      of the aged noble, who had long passed his eightieth year, still retained
+      the traces of a comeliness for which in earlier manhood he was remarkable.
+      His eyes, if deep-sunken, were still keen and lively, and sparkled with
+      all the fire of youth; his mouth curved upward in a pleasant, though
+      half-satiric, smile; and his appearance on the whole was prepossessing and
+      commanding, indicating rather the high blood, the shrewd wit, and the
+      gallant valour of the patrician, than his craft, hypocrisy, and habitual
+      but disdainful spirit of oppression.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      Stephen Colonna, without being absolutely a hero, was indeed far braver
+      than most of the Romans, though he held fast to the Italian maxim&mdash;never
+      to fight an enemy while it is possible to cheat him. Two faults, however,
+      marred the effect of his sagacity: a supreme insolence of disposition, and
+      a profound belief in the lights of his experience. He was incapable of
+      analogy. What had never happened in his time, he was perfectly persuaded
+      never could happen. Thus, though generally esteemed an able diplomatist,
+      he had the cunning of the intriguant, and not the providence of a
+      statesman. If, however, pride made him arrogant in prosperity, it
+      supported him in misfortune. And in the earlier vicissitudes of a life
+      which had partly been consumed in exile, he had developed many noble
+      qualities of fortitude, endurance, and real greatness of soul; which
+      showed that his failings were rather acquired by circumstance than derived
+      from nature. His numerous and highborn race were proud of their chief; and
+      with justice; for he was the ablest and most honoured, not only of the
+      direct branch of the Colonna, but also, perhaps, of all the more powerful
+      barons.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      Seated at the same table with Stephen Colonna was a man of noble presence,
+      of about three or four and thirty years of age, in whom Adrian instantly
+      recognised Walter de Montreal. This celebrated knight was scarcely of the
+      personal appearance which might have corresponded with the terror his name
+      generally excited. His face was handsome, almost to the extreme of
+      womanish delicacy. His fair hair waved long and freely over a white and
+      unwrinkled forehead: the life of a camp and the suns of Italy had but
+      little embrowned his clear and healthful complexion, which retained much
+      of the bloom of youth. His features were aquiline and regular; his eyes,
+      of a light hazel, were large, bright, and penetrating; and a short, but
+      curled beard and moustachio, trimmed with soldier-like precision, and very
+      little darker than the hair, gave indeed a martial expression to his
+      comely countenance, but rather the expression which might have suited the
+      hero of courts and tournaments, than the chief of a brigand&rsquo;s camp. The
+      aspect, manner, and bearing, of the Provencal were those which captivate
+      rather than awe,&mdash;blending, as they did, a certain military frankness
+      with the easy and graceful dignity of one conscious of gentle birth, and
+      accustomed to mix, on equal terms, with the great and noble. His form
+      happily contrasted and elevated the character of a countenance which
+      required strength and stature to free its uncommon beauty from the charge
+      of effeminacy, being of great height and remarkable muscular power,
+      without the least approach to clumsy and unwieldy bulk: it erred, indeed,
+      rather to the side of leanness than flesh,&mdash;at once robust and
+      slender. But the chief personal distinction of this warrior, the most
+      redoubted lance of Italy, was an air and carriage of chivalric and heroic
+      grace, greatly set off at this time by his splendid dress, which was of
+      brown velvet sown with pearls, over which hung the surcoat worn by the
+      Knights of the Hospital, whereon was wrought, in white, the eight-pointed
+      cross that made the badge of his order. The Knight&rsquo;s attitude was that of
+      earnest conversation, bending slightly forward towards the Colonna, and
+      resting both his hands&mdash;which (according to the usual distinction of
+      the old Norman race, (Small hands and feet, however disproportioned to the
+      rest of the person, were at that time deemed no less a distinction of the
+      well-born, than they have been in a more refined age. Many readers will
+      remember the pain occasioned to Petrarch by his tight shoes. The supposed
+      beauty of this peculiarity is more derived from the feudal than the
+      classic time.) from whom, though born in Provence, Montreal boasted his
+      descent) were small and delicate, the fingers being covered with jewels,
+      as was the fashion of the day&mdash;upon the golden hilt of an enormous
+      sword, on the sheath of which was elaborately wrought the silver lilies
+      that made the device of the Provencal Brotherhood of Jerusalem.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;Good morrow, fair kinsman!&rdquo; said Stephen. &ldquo;Seat thyself, I pray; and know
+      in this knightly visitor the celebrated Sieur de Montreal.&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;Ah, my Lord,&rdquo; said Montreal, smiling, as he saluted Adrian; &ldquo;and how is
+      my lady at home?&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;You mistake, Sir Knight,&rdquo; quoth Stephen; &ldquo;my young kinsman is not yet
+      married: faith, as Pope Boniface remarked, when he lay stretched on a sick
+      bed, and his confessor talked to him about Abraham&rsquo;s bosom, &lsquo;that is a
+      pleasure the greater for being deferred.&rsquo;&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;The Signor will pardon my mistake,&rdquo; returned Montreal.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;But not,&rdquo; said Adrian, &ldquo;the neglect of Sir Walter in not ascertaining the
+      fact in person. My thanks to him, noble kinsman, are greater than you weet
+      of; and he promised to visit me, that he might receive them at leisure.&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;I assure you, Signor,&rdquo; answered Montreal, &ldquo;that I have not forgotten the
+      invitation; but so weighty hitherto have been my affairs at Rome, that I
+      have been obliged to parley with my impatience to better our
+      acquaintance.&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;Oh, ye knew each other before?&rdquo; said Stephen. &ldquo;And how?&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;My Lord, there is a damsel in the case!&rdquo; replied Montreal. &ldquo;Excuse my
+      silence.&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;Ah, Adrian, Adrian! when will you learn my continence!&rdquo; said Stephen,
+      solemnly stroking his grey beard. &ldquo;What an example I set you! But a truce
+      to this light conversation,&mdash;let us resume our theme. You must know,
+      Adrian, that it is to the brave band of my guest I am indebted for those
+      valiant gentlemen below, who keep Rome so quiet, though my poor habitation
+      so noisy. He has called to proffer more assistance, if need be; and to
+      advise me on the affairs of Northern Italy. Continue, I pray thee, Sir
+      Knight; I have no disguises from my kinsman.&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;Thou seest,&rdquo; said Montreal, fixing his penetrating eyes on Adrian, &ldquo;thou
+      seest, doubtless, my Lord, that Italy at this moment presents to us a
+      remarkable spectacle. It is a contest between two opposing powers, which
+      shall destroy the other. The one power is that of the unruly and turbulent
+      people&mdash;a power which they call &lsquo;Liberty;&rsquo; the other power is that of
+      the chiefs and princes&mdash;a power which they more appropriately call
+      &lsquo;Order.&rsquo; Between these parties the cities of Italy are divided. In
+      Florence, in Genoa, in Pisa, for instance, is established a Free State&mdash;a
+      Republic, God wot! and a more riotous, unhappy state of government, cannot
+      well be imagined.&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;That is perfectly true,&rdquo; quoth Stephen; &ldquo;they banished my own first
+      cousin from Genoa.&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;A perpetual strife, in short,&rdquo; continued Montreal, &ldquo;between the great
+      families; an alternation of prosecutions, and confiscations, and
+      banishments: today, the Guelfs proscribe the Ghibellines&mdash;tomorrow,
+      the Ghibellines drive out the Guelfs. This may be liberty, but it is the
+      liberty of the strong against the weak. In the other cities, as Milan, as
+      Verona, as Bologna, the people are under the rule of one man,&mdash;who
+      calls himself a prince, and whom his enemies call a tyrant. Having more
+      force than any other citizen, he preserves a firm government; having more
+      constant demand on his intellect and energies than the other citizens, he
+      also preserves a wise one. These two orders of government are enlisted
+      against each other: whenever the people in the one rebel against their
+      prince, the people of the other&mdash;that is, the Free States&mdash;send
+      arms and money to their assistance.&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;You hear, Adrian, how wicked those last are,&rdquo; quoth Stephen.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;Now it seems to me,&rdquo; continued Montreal, &ldquo;that this contest must end some
+      time or other. All Italy must become republican or monarchical. It is easy
+      to predict which will be the result.&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;Yes, Liberty must conquer in the end!&rdquo; said Adrian, warmly.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;Pardon me, young Lord; my opinion is entirely the reverse. You perceive
+      that these republics are commercial,&mdash;are traders; they esteem
+      wealth, they despise valour, they cultivate all trades save that of the
+      armourer. Accordingly, how do they maintain themselves in war: by their
+      own citizens? Not a whit of it! Either they send to some foreign chief,
+      and promise, if he grant them his protection, the principality of the city
+      for five or ten years in return; or else they borrow from some hardy
+      adventurer, like myself, as many troops as they can afford to pay for. Is
+      it not so, Lord Adrian?&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      Adrian nodded his reluctant assent.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;Well, then, it is the fault of the foreign chief if he do not make his
+      power permanent; as has been already done in States once free by the
+      Visconti and the Scala: or else it is the fault of the captain of the
+      mercenaries if he do not convert his brigands into senators, and himself
+      into a king. These are events so natural, that one day or other they will
+      occur throughout all Italy. And all Italy will then become monarchical.
+      Now it seems to me the interest of all the powerful families&mdash;your
+      own, at Rome, as that of the Visconti, at Milan&mdash;to expedite this
+      epoch, and to check, while you yet may with ease, that rebellious
+      contagion amongst the people which is now rapidly spreading, and which
+      ends in the fever of licence to them, but in the corruption of death to
+      you. In these free States, the nobles are the first to suffer: first your
+      privileges, then your property, are swept away. Nay, in Florence, as ye
+      well know, my Lords, no noble is even capable of holding the meanest
+      office in the State!&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;Villains!&rdquo; said Colonna, &ldquo;they violate the first law of nature!&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;At this moment,&rdquo; resumed Montreal, who, engrossed with his subject,
+      little heeded the interruptions he received from the holy indignation of
+      the Baron: &ldquo;at this moment, there are many&mdash;the wisest, perhaps, in
+      the free States&mdash;who desire to renew the old Lombard leagues, in
+      defence of their common freedom everywhere, and against whosoever shall
+      aspire to be prince. Fortunately, the deadly jealousies between these
+      merchant States&mdash;the base plebeian jealousies&mdash;more of trade
+      than of glory&mdash;interpose at present an irresistible obstacle to this
+      design; and Florence, the most stirring and the most esteemed of all, is
+      happily so reduced by reverses of commerce as to be utterly unable to
+      follow out so great an undertaking. Now, then, is the time for us, my
+      Lords; while these obstacles are so great for our foes, now is the time
+      for us to form and cement a counter-league between all the princes of
+      Italy. To you, noble Stephen, I have come, as your rank demands,&mdash;alone,
+      of all the barons of Rome,&mdash;to propose to you this honourable union.
+      Observe what advantages it proffers to your house. The popes have
+      abandoned Rome for ever; there is no counterpoise to your ambition,&mdash;there
+      need be none to your power. You see before you the examples of Visconti
+      and Taddeo di Pepoli. You may found in Rome, the first city of Italy, a
+      supreme and uncontrolled principality, subjugate utterly your weaker
+      rivals,&mdash;the Savelli, the Malatesta, the Orsini,&mdash;and leave to
+      your sons&rsquo; sons an hereditary kingdom that may aspire once more, perhaps,
+      to the empire of the world.&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      Stephen shaded his face with his hand as he answered: &ldquo;But this, noble
+      Montreal, requires means:&mdash;money and men.&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;Of the last, you can command from me enow&mdash;my small company, the
+      best disciplined, can (whenever I please) swell to the most numerous in
+      Italy: in the first, noble Baron, the rich House of Colonna cannot fail;
+      and even a mortgage on its vast estates may be well repaid when you have
+      possessed yourselves of the whole revenues of Rome. You see,&rdquo; continued
+      Montreal, turning to Adrian, in whose youth he expected a more warm ally
+      than in the his hoary kinsman: &ldquo;you see, at a glance, how feasible is this
+      project, and what a mighty field it opens to your House.&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;Sir Walter de Montreal,&rdquo; said Adrian, rising from his seat, and giving
+      vent to the indignation he had with difficulty suppressed, &ldquo;I grieve much
+      that, beneath the roof of the first citizen of Rome, a stranger should
+      attempt thus calmly, and without interruption, to excite the ambition of
+      emulating the execrated celebrity of a Visconti or a Pepoli. Speak, my
+      Lord! (turning to Stephen)&mdash;speak, noble kinsman! and tell this
+      Knight of Provence, that if by a Colonna the ancient grandeur of Rome
+      cannot be restored, it shall not be, at least, by a Colonna that her last
+      wrecks of liberty shall be swept away.&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;How now, Adrian!&mdash;how now, sweet kinsman!&rdquo; said Stephen, thus
+      suddenly appealed to, &ldquo;calm thyself, I pr&rsquo;ythee. Noble Sir Walter, he is
+      young&mdash;young, and hasty&mdash;he means not to offend thee.&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;Of that I am persuaded,&rdquo; returned Montreal, coldly, but with great and
+      courteous command of temper. &ldquo;He speaks from the impulse of the moment,&mdash;a
+      praiseworthy fault in youth. It was mine at his age, and many a time have
+      I nearly lost my life for the rashness. Nay, Signor, nay!&mdash;touch not
+      your sword so meaningly, as if you fancied I intimated a threat; far from
+      me such presumption. I have learned sufficient caution, believe me, in the
+      wars, not wantonly to draw against me a blade which I have seen wielded
+      against such odds.&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      Touched, despite himself, by the courtesy of the Knight, and the allusion
+      to a scene in which, perhaps, his life had been preserved by Montreal,
+      Adrian extended his hand to the latter.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;I was to blame for my haste,&rdquo; said he, frankly; &ldquo;but know, by my very
+      heat,&rdquo; he added more gravely, &ldquo;that your project will find no friends
+      among the Colonna. Nay, in the presence of my noble kinsman, I dare to
+      tell you, that could even his high sanction lend itself to such a scheme,
+      the best hearts of his house would desert him; and I myself, his kinsman,
+      would man yonder castle against so unnatural an ambition!&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      A slight and scarce perceptible cloud passed over Montreal&rsquo;s countenance
+      at these words; and he bit his lip ere he replied:
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;Yet if the Orsini be less scrupulous, their first exertion of power would
+      be heard in the crashing house of the Colonna.&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;Know you,&rdquo; returned Adrian, &ldquo;that one of our mottoes is this haughty
+      address to the Romans,&mdash;&lsquo;If we fall, ye fall also?&rsquo; And better that
+      fate, than a rise upon the wrecks of our native city.&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;Well, well, well!&rdquo; said Montreal, reseating himself, &ldquo;I see that I must
+      leave Rome to herself,&mdash;the League must thrive without her aid. I did
+      but jest, touching the Orsini, for they have not the power that would make
+      their efforts safe. Let us sweep, then, our past conference from our
+      recollection. It is the nineteenth, I think, Lord Colonna, on which you
+      propose to repair to Corneto, with your friends and retainers, and on
+      which you have invited my attendance?&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;It is on that day, Sir Knight,&rdquo; replied the Baron, evidently much
+      relieved by the turn the conversation had assumed. &ldquo;The fact is, that we
+      have been so charged with indifference to the interests of the good
+      people, that I strain a point in this expedition to contradict the
+      assertion; and we propose, therefore, to escort and protect, against the
+      robbers of the road, a convoy of corn to Corneto. In truth, I may add
+      another reason, besides fear of the robbers, that makes me desire as
+      numerous a train as possible. I wish to show my enemies, and the people
+      generally, the solid and growing power of my house; the display of such an
+      armed band as I hope to levy, will be a magnificent occasion to strike awe
+      into the riotous and refractory. Adrian, you will collect your servitors,
+      I trust, on that day; we would not be without you.&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;And as we ride along, fair Signor,&rdquo; said Montreal, inclining to Adrian,
+      &ldquo;we will find at least one subject on which we can agree: all brave men
+      and true knights have one common topic,&mdash;and its name is Woman. You
+      must make me acquainted with the names of the fairest dames of Rome; and
+      we will discuss old adventures in the Parliament of Love, and hope for
+      new. By the way, I suppose, Lord Adrian, you, with the rest of your
+      countrymen, are Petrarch-stricken?&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;Do you not share our enthusiasm? slur not so your gallantry, I pray you.&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;Come, we must not again disagree; but, by my halidame, I think one
+      troubadour roundel worth all that Petrarch ever wrote. He has but borrowed
+      from our knightly poesy, to disguise it, like a carpet coxcomb.&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;Well,&rdquo; said Adrian, gaily, &ldquo;for every line of the troubadours that you
+      quote, I will cite you another. I will forgive you for injustice to
+      Petrarch, if you are just to the troubadours.&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;Just!&rdquo; cried Montreal, with real enthusiasm: &ldquo;I am of the land, nay the
+      very blood of the troubadour! But we grow too light for your noble
+      kinsman; and it is time for me to bid you, for the present, farewell. My
+      Lord Colonna, peace be with you; farewell, Sir Adrian,&mdash;brother mine
+      in knighthood,&mdash;remember your challenge.&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      And with an easy and careless grace the Knight of St. John took his leave.
+      The old Baron, making a dumb sign of excuse to Adrian, followed Montreal
+      into the adjoining room.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;Sir Knight!&rdquo; said he, &ldquo;Sir Knight!&rdquo; as he closed the door upon Adrian,
+      and then drew Montreal to the recess of the casement,&mdash;&ldquo;a word in
+      your ear. Think not I slight your offer, but these young men must be
+      managed; the plot is great&mdash;noble,&mdash;grateful to my heart; but it
+      requires time and caution. I have many of my house, scrupulous as yon
+      hot-skull, to win over; the way is pleasant, but must be sounded well and
+      carefully; you understand?&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      From under his bent brows, Montreal darted one keen glance at Stephen, and
+      then answered:
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;My friendship for you dictated my offer. The League may stand without the
+      Colonna,&mdash;beware a time when the Colonna cannot stand without the
+      League. My Lord, look well around you; there are more freemen&mdash;ay,
+      bold and stirring ones, too&mdash;in Rome, than you imagine. Beware
+      Rienzi! Adieu, we meet soon again.&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      Thus saying, Montreal departed, soliloquising as he passed with his
+      careless step through the crowded ante-room:
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;I shall fail here!&mdash;these caitiff nobles have neither the courage to
+      be great, nor the wisdom to be honest. Let them fall!&mdash;I may find an
+      adventurer from the people, an adventurer like myself, worth them all.&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      No sooner had Stephen returned to Adrian than he flung his arms
+      affectionately round his ward, who was preparing his pride for some sharp
+      rebuke for his petulance.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;Nobly feigned,&mdash;admirable, admirable!&rdquo; cried the Baron; &ldquo;you have
+      learned the true art of a statesman at the Emperor&rsquo;s court. I always
+      thought you would&mdash;always said it. You saw the dilemma I was in, thus
+      taken by surprise by that barbarian&rsquo;s mad scheme; afraid to refuse,&mdash;more
+      afraid to accept. You extricated me with consummate address: that passion,&mdash;so
+      natural to your age,&mdash;was a famous feint; drew off the attack; gave
+      me time to breathe; allowed me to play with the savage. But we must not
+      offend him, you know: all my retainers would desert me, or sell me to the
+      Orsini, or cut my throat, if he but held up his finger. Oh! it was
+      admirably managed, Adrian&mdash;admirably!&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;Thank Heaven!&rdquo; said Adrian, with some difficulty recovering the breath
+      which his astonishment had taken away, &ldquo;you do not think of embracing that
+      black proposition?&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;Think of it! no, indeed!&rdquo; said Stephen, throwing himself back on his
+      chair. &ldquo;Why, do you not know my age, boy? Hard on my ninetieth year, I
+      should be a fool indeed to throw myself into such a whirl of turbulence
+      and agitation. I want to keep what I have, not risk it by grasping more.
+      Am I not the beloved of the pope? shall I hazard his excommunication? Am I
+      not the most powerful of the nobles? should I be more if I were king? At
+      my age, to talk to me of such stuff!&mdash;the man&rsquo;s an idiot. Besides,&rdquo;
+       added the old man, sinking his voice, and looking fearfully round, &ldquo;if I
+      were a king, my sons might poison me for the succession. They are good
+      lads, Adrian, very! But such a temptation!&mdash;I would not throw it in
+      their way; these grey hairs have experience! Tyrants don&rsquo;t die a natural
+      death; no, no! Plague on the Knight, say I; he has already cast me into a
+      cold sweat.&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      Adrian gazed on the working features of the old man, whose selfishness
+      thus preserved him from crime. He listened to his concluding words&mdash;full
+      of the dark truth of the times; and as the high and pure ambition of
+      Rienzi flashed upon him in contrast, he felt that he could not blame its
+      fervour, or wonder at its excess.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;And then, too,&rdquo; resumed the Baron, speaking more deliberately as he
+      recovered his self-possession, &ldquo;this man, by way of a warning, shows me,
+      at a glance, his whole ignorance of the state. What think you? he has
+      mingled with the mob, and taken their rank breath for power; yes, he
+      thinks words are soldiers, and bade me&mdash;me, Stephen Colonna&mdash;beware&mdash;of
+      whom, think you? No, you will never guess!&mdash;of that speech-maker,
+      Rienzi! my own old jesting guest! Ha! ha! ha!&mdash;the ignorance of these
+      barbarians! Ha! ha! ha! and the old man laughed till the tears ran down
+      his cheeks.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;Yet many of the nobles fear that same Rienzi,&rdquo; said Adrian, gravely.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;Ah! let them, let them!&mdash;they have not our experience&mdash;our
+      knowledge of the world, Adrian. Tut, man,&mdash;when did declamation ever
+      overthrow castles, and conquer soldiery? I like Rienzi to harangue the mob
+      about old Rome, and such stuff; it gives them something to think of and
+      prate about, and so all their fierceness evaporates in words; they might
+      burn a house if they did not hear a speech. But, now I am on that score, I
+      must own the pedant has grown impudent in his new office; here, here,&mdash;I
+      received this paper ere I rose today. I hear a similar insolence has been
+      shown to all the nobles. Read it, will you,&rdquo; and the Colonna put a scroll
+      into his kinsman&rsquo;s hand.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;I have received the like,&rdquo; said Adrian, glancing at it. &ldquo;It is a request
+      of Rienzi&rsquo;s to attend at the Church of St. John of Lateran, to hear
+      explained the inscription on a Table just discovered. It bears, he saith,
+      the most intimate connexion with the welfare and state of Rome.&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;Very entertaining, I dare to say, to professors and bookmen. Pardon me,
+      kinsman; I forgot your taste for these things; and my son, Gianni, too,
+      shares your fantasy. Well, well! it is innocent enough! Go&mdash;the man
+      talks well.&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;Will you not attend, too?&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;I&mdash;my dear boy&mdash;I!&rdquo; said the old Colonna, opening his eyes in
+      such astonishment that Adrian could not help laughing at the simplicity of
+      his own question.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      <a name="link2HCH0014" id="link2HCH0014">
+      <!--  H2 anchor --> </a>
+    </p>
+    <div style="height: 4em;">
+      <br /><br /><br /><br />
+    </div>
+    <h2>
+      Chapter 2.II. The Interview, and the Doubt.
+    </h2>
+    <p>
+      As Adrian turned from the palace of his guardian, and bent his way in the
+      direction of the Forum, he came somewhat unexpectedly upon Raimond, bishop
+      of Orvietto, who, mounted upon a low palfrey, and accompanied by some
+      three or four of his waiting-men, halted abruptly when he recognised the
+      young noble.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;Ah, my son! it is seldom that I see thee: how fares it with thee?&mdash;well?
+      So, so! I rejoice to hear it. Alas! what a state of society is ours, when
+      compared to the tranquil pleasures of Avignon! There, all men who, like
+      us, are fond of the same pursuits, the same studies, deliciae musarum,
+      hum! hum! (the Bishop was proud of an occasional quotation, right or
+      wrong), are brought easily and naturally together. But here we scarcely
+      dare stir out of our houses, save upon great occasions. But, talking of
+      great occasions, and the Muses, reminds me of our good Rienzi&rsquo;s invitation
+      to the Lateran: of course you will attend; &lsquo;tis a mighty knotty piece of
+      Latin he proposes to solve&mdash;so I hear, at least; very interesting to
+      us, my son,&mdash;very!&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;It is tomorrow,&rdquo; answered Adrian. &ldquo;Yes, assuredly; I will be there.&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;And, harkye, my son,&rdquo; said the Bishop, resting his hand affectionately on
+      Adrian&rsquo;s shoulder, &ldquo;I have reason to hope that he will remind our poor
+      citizens of the Jubilee for the year Fifty, and stir them towards clearing
+      the road of the brigands: a necessary injunction, and one to be heeded
+      timeously; for who will come here for absolution when he stands a chance
+      of rushing unannealed upon purgatory by the way? You have heard Rienzi,&mdash;ay?
+      quite a Cicero&mdash;quite! Well, Heaven bless you, my son! You will not
+      fail?&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;Nay, not I.&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;Yet, stay&mdash;a word with you: just suggest to all whom you may meet
+      the advisability of a full meeting; it looks well for the city to show
+      respect to letters.&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;To say nothing of the Jubilee,&rdquo; added Adrian, smiling.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;Ah, to say nothing of the Jubilee&mdash;very good! Adieu for the
+      present!&rdquo; And the Bishop, resettling himself on his saddle, ambled
+      solemnly on to visit his various friends, and press them to the meeting.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      Meanwhile, Adrian continued his course till he had passed the Capitol, the
+      Arch of Severus, the crumbling columns of the fane of Jupiter, and found
+      himself amidst the long grass, the whispering reeds, and the neglected
+      vines, that wave over the now-vanished pomp of the Golden House of Nero.
+      Seating himself on a fallen pillar&mdash;by that spot where the traveller
+      descends to the (so called) Baths of Livia&mdash;he looked impatiently to
+      the sun, as to blame it for the slowness of its march.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      Not long, however, had he to wait before a light step was heard crushing
+      the fragrant grass; and presently through the arching vines gleamed a face
+      that might well have seemed the nymph, the goddess of the scene.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;My beautiful! my Irene!&mdash;how shall I thank thee!&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      It was long before the delighted lover suffered himself to observe upon
+      Irene&rsquo;s face a sadness that did not usually cloud it in his presence. Her
+      voice, too, trembled; her words seemed constrained and cold.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;Have I offended thee?&rdquo; he asked; &ldquo;or what less misfortune hath occurred?&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      Irene raised her eyes to her lover&rsquo;s, and said, looking at him earnestly,
+      &ldquo;Tell me, my Lord, in sober and simple truth, tell me, would it grieve
+      thee much were this to be our last meeting?&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      Paler than the marble at his feet grew the dark cheek of Adrian. It was
+      some moments ere he could reply, and he did so then with a forced smile
+      and a quivering lip.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;Jest not so, Irene! Last!&mdash;that is not a word for us!&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;But hear me, my Lord&mdash;&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;Why so cold?&mdash;call me Adrian!&mdash;friend!&mdash;lover! or be
+      dumb!&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;Well, then, my soul&rsquo;s soul! my all of hope! my life&rsquo;s life!&rdquo; exclaimed
+      Irene, passionately, &ldquo;hear me! I fear that we stand at this moment upon
+      some gulf whose depth I see not, but which may divide us for ever! Thou
+      knowest the real nature of my brother, and dost not misread him as many
+      do. Long has he planned, and schemed, and communed with himself, and,
+      feeling his way amidst the people, prepared the path to some great design.
+      But now&mdash;(thou wilt not betray&mdash;thou wilt not injure him?&mdash;he
+      is thy friend!)&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;And thy brother! I would give my life for his! Say on!&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;But now, then,&rdquo; resumed Irene, &ldquo;the time for that enterprise, whatever it
+      be, is coming fast. I know not of its exact nature, but I know that it is
+      against the nobles&mdash;against thy order&mdash;against thy house itself!
+      If it succeed&mdash;oh, Adrian! thou thyself mayst not be free from
+      danger; and my name, at least, will be coupled with the name of thy foes.
+      If it fail,&mdash;my brother, my bold brother, is swept away! He will fall
+      a victim to revenge or justice, call it as you will. Your kinsman may be
+      his judge&mdash;his executioner; and I&mdash;even if I should yet live to
+      mourn over the boast and glory of my humble line&mdash;could I permit
+      myself to love, to see, one in whose veins flowed the blood of his
+      destroyer? Oh! I am wretched&mdash;wretched! these thoughts make me
+      well-nigh mad!&rdquo; and, wringing her hands bitterly, Irene sobbed aloud.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      Adrian himself was struck forcibly by the picture thus presented to him,
+      although the alternative it embraced had often before forced itself dimly
+      on his mind. It was true, however, that, not seeing the schemes of Rienzi
+      backed by any physical power, and never yet having witnessed the mighty
+      force of a moral revolution, he did not conceive that any rise to which he
+      might instigate the people could be permanently successful: and, as for
+      his punishment, in that city, where all justice was the slave of interest,
+      Adrian knew himself powerful enough to obtain forgiveness even for the
+      greatest of all crimes&mdash;armed insurrection against the nobles. As
+      these thoughts recurred to him, he gained the courage to console and cheer
+      Irene. But his efforts were only partially successful. Awakened by her
+      fears to that consideration of the future which hitherto she had
+      forgotten, Irene, for the first time, seemed deaf to the charmer&rsquo;s voice.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;Alas!&rdquo; said she, sadly, &ldquo;even at the best, what can this love, that we
+      have so blindly encouraged&mdash;what can it end in? Thou must not wed
+      with one like me; and I! how foolish I have been!&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;Recall thy senses then, Irene,&rdquo; said Adrian, proudly, partly perhaps in
+      anger, partly in his experience of the sex. &ldquo;Love another, and more
+      wisely, if thou wilt; cancel thy vows with me, and continue to think it a
+      crime to love, and a folly to be true!&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;Cruel!&rdquo; said Irene, falteringly, and in her turn alarmed. &ldquo;Dost thou
+      speak in earnest?&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;Tell me, ere I answer you, tell me this: come death, come anguish, come a
+      whole life of sorrow, as the end of this love, wouldst thou yet repent
+      that thou hast loved? If so, thou knowest not the love that I feel for
+      thee.&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;Never! never can I repent!&rdquo; said Irene, falling upon Adrian&rsquo;s neck;
+      &ldquo;forgive me!&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;But is there, in truth,&rdquo; said Adrian, a little while after this
+      lover-like quarrel and reconciliation, &ldquo;is there, in truth, so marked a
+      difference between thy brother&rsquo;s past and his present bearing? How knowest
+      thou that the time for action is so near?&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;Because now he sits closeted whole nights with all ranks of men; he shuts
+      up his books,&mdash;he reads no more,&mdash;but, when alone, walks to and
+      fro his chamber, muttering to himself. Sometimes he pauses before the
+      calendar, which of late he has fixed with his own hand against the wall,
+      and passes his finger over the letters, till he comes to some chosen date,
+      and then he plays with his sword and smiles. But two nights since, arms,
+      too, in great number were brought to the house; and I heard the chief of
+      the men who brought them, a grim giant, known well amongst the people,
+      say, as he wiped his brow,&mdash;&lsquo;These will see work soon!&rsquo;&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;Arms! Are you sure of that?&rdquo; said Adrian, anxiously. &ldquo;Nay, then, there is
+      more in these schemes than I imagined! But (observing Irene&rsquo;s gaze bent
+      fearfully on him as his voice changed, he added, more gaily)&mdash;but
+      come what may, believe me&mdash;my beautiful! my adored! that while I
+      live, thy brother shall not suffer from the wrath he may provoke,&mdash;nor
+      I, though he forget our ancient friendship, cease to love thee less.&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;Signora! Signora! child! it is time! we must go!&rdquo; said the shrill voice
+      of Benedetta, now peering through the foliage. &ldquo;The working men pass home
+      this way; I see them approaching.&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      The lovers parted; for the first time the serpent had penetrated into
+      their Eden,&mdash;they had conversed, they had thought, of other things
+      than Love.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      <a name="link2HCH0015" id="link2HCH0015">
+      <!--  H2 anchor --> </a>
+    </p>
+    <div style="height: 4em;">
+      <br /><br /><br /><br />
+    </div>
+    <h2>
+      Chapter 2.III. The Situation of a Popular Patrician in Times of Popular
+    </h2>
+    <p>
+      Discontent.&mdash;Scene of the Lateran.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      The situation of a Patrician who honestly loves the people is, in those
+      evil times, when power oppresses and freedom struggles,&mdash;when the two
+      divisions of men are wrestling against each other,&mdash;the most irksome
+      and perplexing that destiny can possibly contrive. Shall he take part with
+      the nobles?&mdash;he betrays his conscience! With the people?&mdash;he
+      deserts his friends! But that consequence of the last alternative is not
+      the sole&mdash;nor, perhaps, to a strong mind, the most severe. All men
+      are swayed and chained by public opinion&mdash;it is the public judge; but
+      public opinion is not the same for all ranks. The public opinion that
+      excites or deters the plebeian, is the opinion of the plebeians,&mdash;of
+      those whom he sees, and meets, and knows; of those with whom he is brought
+      in contact,&mdash;those with whom he has mixed from childhood,&mdash;those
+      whose praises are daily heard,&mdash;whose censure frowns upon him with
+      every hour. (It is the same in still smaller divisions. The public opinion
+      for lawyers is that of lawyers; of soldiers, that of the army; of
+      scholars, it is that of men of literature and science. And to the
+      susceptible amongst the latter, the hostile criticism of learning has been
+      more stinging than the severest moral censures of the vulgar. Many a man
+      has done a great act, or composed a great work, solely to please the two
+      or three persons constantly present to him. Their voice was his public
+      opinion. The public opinion that operated on Bishop, the murderer, was the
+      opinion of the Burkers, his comrades. Did that condemn him? No! He knew no
+      other public opinion till he came to be hanged, and caught the loathing
+      eyes, and heard the hissing execrations of the crowd below his gibbet.)
+      So, also, the public opinion of the great is the opinion of their equals,&mdash;of
+      those whom birth and accident cast for ever in their way. This distinction
+      is full of important practical deductions; it is one which, more than most
+      maxims, should never be forgotten by a politician who desires to be
+      profound. It is, then, an ordeal terrible to pass&mdash;which few
+      plebeians ever pass, which it is therefore unjust to expect patricians to
+      cross unfaulteringly&mdash;the ordeal of opposing the public opinion which
+      exists for them. They cannot help doubting their own judgment,&mdash;they
+      cannot help thinking the voice of wisdom or of virtue speaks in those
+      sounds which have been deemed oracles from their cradle. In the tribunal
+      of Sectarian Prejudice they imagine they recognise the court of the
+      Universal Conscience. Another powerful antidote to the activity of a
+      patrician so placed, is in the certainty that to the last the motives of
+      such activity will be alike misconstrued by the aristocracy he deserts and
+      the people he joins. It seems so unnatural in a man to fly in the face of
+      his own order, that the world is willing to suppose any clue to the
+      mystery save that of honest conviction or lofty patriotism. &ldquo;Ambition!&rdquo;
+       says one. &ldquo;Disappointment!&rdquo; cries another. &ldquo;Some private grudge!&rdquo; hints a
+      third. &ldquo;Mob-courting vanity!&rdquo; sneers a fourth. The people admire at first,
+      but suspect afterwards. The moment he thwarts a popular wish, there is no
+      redemption for him: he is accused of having acted the hypocrite,&mdash;of
+      having worn the sheep&rsquo;s fleece: and now, say they,&mdash;&ldquo;See! the wolf&rsquo;s
+      teeth peep out!&rdquo; Is he familiar with the people?&mdash;it is cajolery! Is
+      he distant?&mdash;it is pride! What, then, sustains a man in such a
+      situation, following his own conscience, with his eyes opened to all the
+      perils of the path? Away with the cant of public opinion,&mdash;away with
+      the poor delusion of posthumous justice; he will offend the first, he will
+      never obtain the last. What sustains him? HIS OWN SOUL! A man thoroughly
+      great has a certain contempt for his kind while he aids them: their weal
+      or woe are all; their applause&mdash;their blame&mdash;are nothing to him.
+      He walks forth from the circle of birth and habit; he is deaf to the
+      little motives of little men. High, through the widest space his orbit may
+      describe, he holds on his course to guide or to enlighten; but the noises
+      below reach him not! Until the wheel is broken,&mdash;until the dark void
+      swallow up the star,&mdash;it makes melody, night and day, to its own ear:
+      thirsting for no sound from the earth it illumines, anxious for no
+      companionship in the path through which it rolls, conscious of its own
+      glory, and contented, therefore, to be alone!
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      But minds of this order are rare. All ages cannot produce them. They are
+      exceptions to the ordinary and human virtue, which is influenced and
+      regulated by external circumstance. At a time when even to be merely
+      susceptible to the voice of fame was a great pre-eminence in moral
+      energies over the rest of mankind, it would be impossible that any one
+      should ever have formed the conception of that more refined and
+      metaphysical sentiment, that purer excitement to high deeds&mdash;that
+      glory in one&rsquo;s own heart, which is so immeasurably above the desire of a
+      renown that lackeys the heels of others. In fact, before we can dispense
+      with the world, we must, by a long and severe novitiate&mdash;by the
+      probation of much thought, and much sorrow&mdash;by deep and sad
+      conviction of the vanity of all that the world can give us, have raised
+      our selves&mdash;not in the fervour of an hour, but habitually&mdash;above
+      the world: an abstraction&mdash;an idealism&mdash;which, in our wiser age,
+      how few even of the wisest, can attain! Yet, till we are thus fortunate,
+      we know not the true divinity of contemplation, nor the all-sufficing
+      mightiness of conscience; nor can we retreat with solemn footsteps into
+      that Holy of Holies in our own souls, wherein we know, and feel, how much
+      our nature is capable of the self-existence of a God!
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      But to return to the things and thoughts of earth. Those considerations,
+      and those links of circumstance, which, in a similar situation have
+      changed so many honest and courageous minds, changed also the mind of
+      Adrian. He felt in a false position. His reason and conscience shared in
+      the schemes of Rienzi, and his natural hardihood and love of enterprise
+      would have led him actively to share the danger of their execution. But
+      this, all his associations, his friendships, his private and household
+      ties, loudly forbade. Against his order, against his house, against the
+      companions of his youth, how could he plot secretly, or act sternly? By
+      the goal to which he was impelled by patriotism, stood hypocrisy and
+      ingratitude. Who would believe him the honest champion of his country who
+      was a traitor to his friends? Thus, indeed,
+    </p>
+<pre xml:space="preserve">
+     &ldquo;The native hue of resolution
+     Was sicklied o&rsquo;er with the pale cast of thought!&rdquo;
+ </pre>
+    <p>
+      And he who should have been by nature a leader of the time became only its
+      spectator. Yet Adrian endeavoured to console himself for his present
+      passiveness in a conviction of the policy of his conduct. He who takes no
+      share in the commencement of civil revolutions, can often become, with the
+      most effect, a mediator between the passions and the parties subsequently
+      formed. Perhaps, under Adrian&rsquo;s circumstances, delay was really the part
+      of a prudent statesman; the very position which cripples at the first,
+      often gives authority before the end. Clear from the excesses, and saved
+      from the jealousies, of rival factions, all men are willing to look with
+      complaisance and respect to a new actor in a turbulent drama; his
+      moderation may make him trusted by the people; his rank enable him to be a
+      fitting mediator with the nobles; and thus the qualities that would have
+      rendered him a martyr at one period of the Revolution, raise him perhaps
+      into a saviour at another.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      Silent, therefore, and passive, Adrian waited the progress of events. If
+      the projects of Rienzi failed, he might, by that in activity, the better
+      preserve the people from new chains, and their champion from death. If
+      those projects succeeded, he might equally save his house from the popular
+      wrath&mdash;and, advocating liberty, check disorder. Such, at least, were
+      his hopes; and thus did the Italian sagacity and caution of his character
+      control and pacify the enthusiasm of youth and courage.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      The sun shone, calm and cloudless, upon the vast concourse gathered before
+      the broad space that surrounds the Church of St. John of Lateran. Partly
+      by curiosity&mdash;partly by the desire of the Bishop of Orvietto&mdash;partly
+      because it was an occasion in which they could display the pomp of their
+      retinues&mdash;many of the principal Barons of Rome had gathered to this
+      spot.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      On one of the steps ascending to the church, with his mantle folded round
+      him, stood Walter de Montreal, gazing on the various parties that, one
+      after another, swept through the lane which the soldiers of the Church
+      preserved unimpeded, in the middle of the crowd, for the access of the
+      principal nobles. He watched with interest, though with his usual
+      carelessness of air and roving glance, the different marks and looks of
+      welcome given by the populace to the different personages of note. Banners
+      and penons preceded each Signor, and, as they waved aloft, the witticisms
+      or nicknames&mdash;the brief words of praise or censure, that imply so
+      much&mdash;which passed to and fro among that lively crowd, were treasured
+      carefully in his recollection.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;Make way, there!&mdash;way for my Lord Martino Orsini&mdash;Baron di
+      Porto!&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;Peace, minion!&mdash;draw back! way for the Signor Adrian Colonna, Baron
+      di Castello, and Knight of the Empire.&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      And at those two rival shouts, you saw waving on high the golden bear of
+      the Orsini, with the motto&mdash;&ldquo;Beware my embrace!&rdquo; and the solitary
+      column on an azure ground, of the Colonna, with Adrian&rsquo;s especial device&mdash;&ldquo;Sad,
+      but strong.&rdquo; The train of Martino Orsini was much more numerous than that
+      of Adrian, which last consisted but of ten servitors. But Adrian&rsquo;s men
+      attracted far greater admiration amongst the crowd, and pleased more the
+      experienced eye of the warlike Knight of St. John. Their arms were
+      polished like mirrors; their height was to an inch the same; their march
+      was regular and sedate; their mien erect; they looked neither to the right
+      nor left; they betrayed that ineffable discipline&mdash;that harmony of
+      order&mdash;which Adrian had learned to impart to his men during his own
+      apprenticeship of arms. But the disorderly train of the Lord of Porto was
+      composed of men of all heights. Their arms were ill-polished and
+      ill-fashioned, and they pressed confusedly on each other; they laughed and
+      spoke aloud; and in their mien and bearing expressed all the insolence of
+      men who despised alike the master they served and the people they awed.
+      The two bands coming unexpectedly on each other through this narrow
+      defile, the jealousy of the two houses presently declared itself. Each
+      pressed forward for the precedence; and, as the quiet regularity of
+      Adrian&rsquo;s train, and even its compact paucity of numbers, enabled it to
+      pass before the servitors of his rival, the populace set up a loud shout&mdash;&ldquo;A
+      Colonna for ever!&rdquo;&mdash;&ldquo;Let the Bear dance after the Column!&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;On, ye knaves!&rdquo; said Orsini aloud to his men. &ldquo;How have ye suffered this
+      affront?&rdquo; And passing himself to the head of his men, he would have
+      advanced through the midst of his rival&rsquo;s train, had not a tall guard, in
+      the Pope&rsquo;s livery, placed his baton in the way.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;Pardon, my Lord! we have the Vicar&rsquo;s express commands to suffer no
+      struggling of the different trains one with another.&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;Knave! dost thou bandy words with me?&rdquo; said the fierce Orsini; and with
+      his sword he clove the baton in two.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;In the Vicar&rsquo;s name, I command you to fall back!&rdquo; said the sturdy guard,
+      now placing his huge bulk in the very front of the noble&rsquo;s path.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;It is Cecco del Vecchio!&rdquo; cried those of the populace, who were near
+      enough to perceive the interruption and its cause.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;Ay,&rdquo; said one, &ldquo;the good Vicar has put many of the stoutest fellows in
+      the Pope&rsquo;s livery, in order the better to keep peace. He could have chosen
+      none better than Cecco.&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;But he must not fall!&rdquo; cried another, as Orsini, glaring on the smith,
+      drew back his sword as if to plunge it through his bosom.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;Shame&mdash;shame! shall the Pope be thus insulted in his own city?&rdquo;
+       cried several voices. &ldquo;Down with the sacrilegious&mdash;down!&rdquo; And, as if
+      by a preconcerted plan, a whole body of the mob broke at once through the
+      lane, and swept like a torrent over Orsini and his jostled and
+      ill-assorted train. Orsini himself was thrown on the ground with violence,
+      and trampled upon by a hundred footsteps; his men, huddled and struggling
+      as much against themselves as against the mob, were scattered and overset;
+      and when, by a great effort of the guards, headed by the smith himself,
+      order was again restored, and the line reformed, Orsini, well nigh choked
+      with his rage and humiliation, and greatly bruised by the rude assaults he
+      had received, could scarcely stir from the ground. The officers of the
+      Pope raised him, and, when he was on his legs, he looked wildly around for
+      his sword, which, falling from his hand, had been kicked amongst the
+      crowd, and seeing it not, he said, between his ground teeth, to Cecco del
+      Vecchio&mdash;
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;Fellow, thy neck shall answer this outrage, or may God desert me!&rdquo; and
+      passed along through the space; while a half-suppressed and exultant hoot
+      from the bystanders followed his path.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;Way there!&rdquo; cried the smith, &ldquo;for the Lord Martino di Porto, and may all
+      the people know that he has threatened to take my life for the discharge
+      of my duty in obedience to the Pope&rsquo;s Vicar!&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;He dare not!&rdquo; shouted out a thousand voices; &ldquo;the people can protect
+      their own!&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      This scene had not been lost on the Provencal, who well knew how to
+      construe the wind by the direction of straws, and saw at once, by the
+      boldness of the populace, that they themselves were conscious of a coming
+      tempest. &ldquo;Par Dieu,&rdquo; said he, as he saluted Adrian, who, gravely, and
+      without looking behind, had now won the steps of the church, &ldquo;yon tall
+      fellow has a brave heart, and many friends, too. What think you,&rdquo; he
+      added, in a low whisper, &ldquo;is not this scene a proof that the nobles are
+      less safe than they wot of?&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;The beast begins to kick against the spur, Sir Knight,&rdquo; answered Adrian,
+      &ldquo;a wise horseman should, in such a case, take care how he pull the rein
+      too tight, lest the beast should rear, and he be overthrown&mdash;yet that
+      is the policy thou wouldst recommend.&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;You mistake,&rdquo; returned Montreal, &ldquo;my wish was to give Rome one sovereign
+      instead of many tyrants,&mdash;but hark! what means that bell?&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;The ceremony is about to begin,&rdquo; answered Adrian. &ldquo;Shall we enter the
+      church together?&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      Seldom had a temple consecrated to God witnessed so singular a spectacle
+      as that which now animated the solemn space of the Lateran.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      In the centre of the church, seats were raised in an amphitheatre, at the
+      far end of which was a scaffolding, a little higher than the rest; below
+      this spot, but high enough to be in sight of all the concourse, was placed
+      a vast table of iron, on which was graven an ancient inscription, and
+      bearing in its centre a clear and prominent device, presently to be
+      explained.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      The seats were covered with cloth and rich tapestry. In the rear of the
+      church was drawn a purple curtain. Around the amphitheatre were the
+      officers of the Church, in the party-coloured liveries of the Pope. To the
+      right of the scaffold sate Raimond, Bishop of Orvietto, in his robes of
+      state. On the benches round him you saw all the marked personages of Rome&mdash;the
+      judges, the men of letters, the nobles, from the lofty rank of the Savelli
+      to the inferior grade of a Raselli. The space beyond the amphitheatre was
+      filled with the people, who now poured fast in, stream after stream: all
+      the while rang, clear and loud, the great bell of the church.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      At length, as Adrian and Montreal seated themselves at a little distance
+      from Raimond, the bell suddenly ceased&mdash;the murmurs of the people
+      were stilled&mdash;the purple curtain was withdrawn, and Rienzi came forth
+      with slow and majestic steps. He came&mdash;but not in his usual sombre
+      and plain attire. Over his broad breast he wore a vest of dazzling
+      whiteness&mdash;a long robe, in the ample fashion of the toga, descended
+      to his feet and swept the floor. On his head he wore a fold of white
+      cloth, in the centre of which shone a golden crown. But the crown was
+      divided, or cloven, as it were, by the mystic ornament of a silver sword,
+      which, attracting the universal attention, testified at once that this
+      strange garb was worn, not from the vanity of display, but for the sake of
+      presenting to the concourse&mdash;in the person of the citizen&mdash;a
+      type and emblem of that state of the city on which he was about to
+      descant.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;Faith,&rdquo; whispered one of the old nobles to his neighbour, &ldquo;the plebeian
+      assumes it bravely.&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;It will be rare sport,&rdquo; said a second. &ldquo;I trust the good man will put
+      some jests in his discourse.&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;What showman&rsquo;s tricks are these?&rdquo; said a third.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;He is certainly crazed!&rdquo; said a fourth.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;How handsome he is!&rdquo; said the women, mixed with the populace.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;This is a man who has learned the people by heart,&rdquo; observed Montreal to
+      Adrian. &ldquo;He knows he must speak to the eye, in order to win the mind: a
+      knave,&mdash;a wise knave!&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      And now Rienzi had ascended the scaffold; and as he looked long and
+      steadfastly around the meeting, the high and thoughtful repose of his
+      majestic countenance, its deep and solemn gravity, hushed all the murmurs,
+      and made its effect equally felt by the sneering nobles as the impatient
+      populace.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;Signors of Rome,&rdquo; said he, at length, &ldquo;and ye, friends, and citizens, you
+      have heard why we are met together this day; and you, my Lord Bishop of
+      Orvietto,&mdash;and ye, fellow labourers with me in the field of letters,&mdash;ye,
+      too, are aware that it is upon some matter relative to that ancient Rome,
+      the rise and the decline of whose past power and glories we have spent our
+      youth in endeavouring to comprehend. But this, believe me, is no vain
+      enigma of erudition, useful but to the studious,&mdash;referring but to
+      the dead. Let the Past perish!&mdash;let darkness shroud it!&mdash;let it
+      sleep for ever over the crumbling temples and desolate tombs of its
+      forgotten sons,&mdash;if it cannot afford us, from its disburied secrets,
+      a guide for the Present and the Future. What, my Lords, ye have thought
+      that it was for the sake of antiquity alone that we have wasted our nights
+      and days in studying what antiquity can teach us! You are mistaken; it is
+      nothing to know what we have been, unless it is with the desire of knowing
+      that which we ought to be. Our ancestors are mere dust and ashes, save
+      when they speak to our posterity; and then their voices resound, not from
+      the earth below, but the heaven above. There is an eloquence in Memory,
+      because it is the nurse of Hope. There is a sanctity in the Past, but only
+      because of the chronicles it retains,&mdash;chronicles of the progress of
+      mankind,&mdash;stepping-stones in civilisation, in liberty, and in
+      knowledge. Our fathers forbid us to recede,&mdash;they teach us what is
+      our rightful heritage,&mdash;they bid us reclaim, they bid us augment,
+      that heritage,&mdash;preserve their virtues, and avoid their errors. These
+      are the true uses of the Past. Like the sacred edifice in which we are,&mdash;it
+      is a tomb upon which to rear a temple. I see that you marvel at this long
+      beginning; ye look to each other&mdash;ye ask to what it tends. Behold
+      this broad plate of iron; upon it is graven an inscription but lately
+      disinterred from the heaps of stone and ruin, which&mdash;O shame to Rome!&mdash;were
+      once the palaces of empire, and the arches of triumphant power. The device
+      in the centre of the table, which you behold, conveys the act of the Roman
+      Senators,&mdash;who are conferring upon Vespasian the imperial authority.
+      It is this inscription which I have invited you to hear read! It specifies
+      the very terms and limits of the authority thus conferred. To the Emperor
+      was confided the power of making laws and alliances with whatsoever
+      nation,&mdash;of increasing, or of diminishing the limits of towns and
+      districts,&mdash;of&mdash;mark this, my Lords!&mdash;exalting men to the
+      rank of dukes and kings,&mdash;ay, and of deposing and degrading them;&mdash;of
+      making cities, and of unmaking: in short, of all the attributes of
+      imperial power. Yes, to that Emperor was confided this vast authority;
+      but, by whom? Heed&mdash;listen, I pray you&mdash;let not a word be lost;&mdash;by
+      whom, I say? By the Roman Senate! What was the Roman Senate? The
+      Representative of the Roman People!&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;I knew he would come to that!&rdquo; said the smith, who stood at the door with
+      his fellows, but to whose ear, clear and distinct, rolled the silver voice
+      of Rienzi.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;Brave fellow! and this, too, in the hearing of the Lords!&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;Ay, you see what the people were! and we should never have known this but
+      for him.&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;Peace, fellows;&rdquo; said the officer to those of the crowd, from whom came
+      these whispered sentences.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      Rienzi continued.&mdash;&ldquo;Yes, it is the people who intrusted this power&mdash;to
+      the people, therefore, it belongs! Did the haughty Emperor arrogate the
+      crown? Could he assume the authority of himself? Was it born with him? Did
+      he derive it, my Lord Barons, from the possession of towered castles&mdash;of
+      lofty lineage? No! all-powerful as he was, he had no right to one atom of
+      that power, save from the voice and trust of the Roman people. Such, O my
+      countrymen! such was even that day, when Liberty was but the shadow of her
+      former self,&mdash;such was the acknowledged prerogative of your fathers!
+      All power was the gift of the people. What have ye to give now? Who, who,
+      I say,&mdash;what single person, what petty chief, asks you for the
+      authority he assumes? His senate is his sword; his chart of license is
+      written, not with ink, but blood. The people!&mdash;there is no people!
+      Oh! would to God that we might disentomb the spirit of the Past as easily
+      as her records!&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;If I were your kinsman,&rdquo; whispered Montreal to Adrian, &ldquo;I would give this
+      man short breathing-time between his peroration and confession.&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;What is your Emperor?&rdquo; continued Rienzi; &ldquo;a stranger! What the great head
+      of your Church?&mdash;an exile! Ye are without your lawful chiefs; and
+      why? Because ye are not without your law-defying tyrants! The licence of
+      your nobles, their discords, their dissensions, have driven our Holy
+      Father from the heritage of St. Peter;&mdash;they have bathed your streets
+      in your own blood; they have wasted the wealth of your labours on private
+      quarrels and the maintenance of hireling ruffians! Your forces are
+      exhausted against yourselves. You have made a mockery of your country,
+      once the mistress of the world. You have steeped her lips in gall&mdash;ye
+      have set a crown of thorns upon her head! What, my Lords!&rdquo; cried he,
+      turning sharply round towards the Savelli and Orsini, who, endeavouring to
+      shake off the thrill which the fiery eloquence of Rienzi had stricken to
+      their hearts, now, by contemptuous gestures and scornful smiles, testified
+      the displeasure they did not dare loudly to utter in the presence of the
+      Vicar and the people.&mdash;&ldquo;What! even while I speak&mdash;not the
+      sanctity of this place restrains you! I am an humble man&mdash;a citizen
+      of Rome;&mdash;but I have this distinction: I have raised against myself
+      many foes and scoffers for that which I have done for Rome. I am hated,
+      because I love my country; I am despised, because I would exalt her. I
+      retaliate&mdash;I shall be avenged. Three traitors in your own palaces
+      shall betray you: their names are&mdash;Luxury, Envy, and Dissension!&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;There he had them on the hip!&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;Ha, ha! by the Holy Cross, that was good!&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;I would go to the hangman for such another keen stroke as that!&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;It is a shame if we are cowards, when one man is thus brave,&rdquo; said the
+      smith.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;This is the man we have always wanted!&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;Silence!&rdquo; proclaimed the officer.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;O Romans!&rdquo; resumed Rienzi, passionately&mdash;&ldquo;awake! I conjure you! Let
+      this memorial of your former power&mdash;your ancient liberties&mdash;sink
+      deep into your souls. In a propitious hour, if ye seize it,&mdash;in an
+      evil one, if ye suffer the golden opportunity to escape,&mdash;has this
+      record of the past been unfolded to your eyes. Recollect that the Jubilee
+      approaches.&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      The Bishop of Orvietto smiled, and bowed approvingly; the people, the
+      citizens, the inferior nobles, noted well those signs of encouragement;
+      and, to their minds, the Pope himself, in the person of his Vicar, looked
+      benignly on the daring of Rienzi.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;The Jubilee approaches,&mdash;the eyes of all Christendom will be
+      directed hither. Here, where, from all quarters of the globe, men come for
+      peace, shall they find discord?&mdash;seeking absolution, shall they
+      perceive but crime? In the centre of God&rsquo;s dominion, shall they weep at
+      your weakness?&mdash;in the seat of the martyred saints, shall they
+      shudder at your vices?&mdash;in the fountain and source of Christ&rsquo;s law,
+      shall they find all law unknown? You were the glory of the world&mdash;will
+      you be its by-word? You were its example&mdash;will you be its warning?
+      Rise, while it is yet time!&mdash;clear your roads from the bandits that
+      infest them!&mdash;your walls from the hirelings that they harbour! Banish
+      these civil discords, or the men&mdash;how proud, how great, soever&mdash;who
+      maintain them! Pluck the scales from the hand of Fraud!&mdash;the sword
+      from the hand of Violence!&mdash;the balance and the sword are the ancient
+      attributes of Justice!&mdash;restore them to her again! This be your high
+      task,&mdash;these be your great ends! Deem any man who opposes them a
+      traitor to his country. Gain a victory greater than those of the Caesars&mdash;a
+      victory over yourselves! Let the pilgrims of the world behold the
+      resurrection of Rome! Make one epoch of the Jubilee of Religion and the
+      Restoration of Law! Lay the sacrifice of your vanquished passions&mdash;the
+      first-fruits of your renovated liberties&mdash;upon the very altar that
+      these walls contain! and never! oh, never! since the world began, shall
+      men have made a more grateful offering to their God!&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      So intense was the sensation these words created in the audience&mdash;so
+      breathless and overpowered did they leave the souls with they took by
+      storm&mdash;that Rienzi had descended the scaffold, and already
+      disappeared behind the curtain from which he had emerged, ere the crowd
+      were fully aware that he had ceased.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      The singularity of this sudden apparition&mdash;robed in mysterious
+      splendour, and vanishing the moment its errand was fulfilled&mdash;gave
+      additional effect to the words it had uttered. The whole character of that
+      bold address became invested with a something preternatural and inspired;
+      to the minds of the vulgar, the mortal was converted into the oracle; and,
+      marvelling at the unhesitating courage with which their idol had rebuked
+      and conjured the haughty barons,&mdash;each of whom they regarded in the
+      light of sanctioned executioners, whose anger could be made manifest at
+      once by the gibbet or the axe,&mdash;the people could not but
+      superstitiously imagine that nothing less than authority from above could
+      have gifted their leader with such hardihood, and preserved him from the
+      danger it incurred. In fact, it was in this very courage of Rienzi that
+      his safety consisted; he was placed in those circumstances where audacity
+      is prudence. Had he been less bold, the nobles would have been more
+      severe; but so great a license of speech in an officer of the Holy See,
+      they naturally imagined, was not unauthorised by the assent of the Pope,
+      as well as by the approbation of the people. Those who did not (like
+      Stephen Colonna) despise words as wind, shrank back from the task of
+      punishing one whose voice might be the mere echo of the wishes of the
+      pontiff. The dissensions of the nobles among each other, were no less
+      favourable to Rienzi. He attacked a body, the members of which had no
+      union.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;It is not my duty to slay him!&rdquo; said one.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;I am not the representative of the barons!&rdquo; said another.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;If Stephen Colonna heeds him not, it would be absurd, as well as
+      dangerous, in a meaner man to make himself the champion of the order!&rdquo;
+       said a third.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      The Colonna smiled approval, when Rienzi denounced an Orsini&mdash;an
+      Orsini laughed aloud, when the eloquence burst over a Colonna. The lesser
+      nobles were well pleased to hear attacks upon both: while, on the other
+      hand, the Bishop, by the long impunity of Rienzi, had taken courage to
+      sanction the conduct of his fellow-officer. He affected, indeed, at times,
+      to blame the excess of his fervour, but it was always accompanied by the
+      praises of his honesty; and the approbation of the Pope&rsquo;s Vicar confirmed
+      the impression of the nobles as to the approbation of the Pope. Thus, from
+      the very rashness of his enthusiasm had grown his security and success.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      Still, however, when the barons had a little recovered from the stupor
+      into which Rienzi had cast them, they looked round to each other; and
+      their looks confessed their sense of the insolence of the orator, and the
+      affront offered to themselves.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;Per fede!&rdquo; quoth Reginaldo di Orsini, &ldquo;this is past bearing,&mdash;the
+      plebeian has gone too far!&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;Look at the populace below! how they murmur and gape,&mdash;and how their
+      eyes sparkle&mdash;and what looks they bend at us!&rdquo; said Luca di Savelli
+      to his mortal enemy, Castruccio Malatesta: the sense of a common danger
+      united in one moment, but only for a moment, the enmity of years.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;Diavolo!&rdquo; muttered Raselli (Nina&rsquo;s father) to a baron, equally poor, &ldquo;but
+      the clerk has truth in his lips. &lsquo;Tis a pity he is not noble.&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;What a clever brain marred!&rdquo; said a Florentine merchant. &ldquo;That man might
+      be something, if he were sufficiently rich.&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      Adrian and Montreal were silent: the first seemed lost in thought,&mdash;the
+      last was watching the various effects produced upon the audience.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;Silence!&rdquo; proclaimed the officers. &ldquo;Silence, for my Lord Vicar.&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      At this announcement, every eye turned to Raimond, who, rising with much
+      clerical importance, thus addressed the assembly:&mdash;
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;Although, Barons and Citizens of Rome, my well-beloved flock, and
+      children,&mdash;I, no more than yourselves, anticipated the exact nature
+      of the address ye have just heard,&mdash;and, albeit, I cannot feel
+      unalloyed contentment at the manner, nor, I may say, at the whole matter
+      of that fervent exhortation&mdash;yet (laying great emphasis on the last
+      word), I cannot suffer you to depart without adding to the prayers of our
+      Holy Father&rsquo;s servant, those, also, of his Holiness&rsquo;s spiritual
+      representative. It is true! the Jubilee approaches! The Jubilee approaches&mdash;and
+      yet our roads, even to the gates of Rome, are infested with murderous and
+      godless ruffians! What pilgrim can venture across the Apennines to worship
+      at the altars of St. Peter? The Jubilee approaches: what scandal shall it
+      be to Rome if these shrines be without pilgrims&mdash;if the timid recoil
+      from, if the bold fall victims to, the dangers of the way! Wherefore, I
+      pray you all, citizens and chiefs alike,&mdash;I pray you all to lay aside
+      those unhappy dissensions which have so long consumed the strength of our
+      sacred city; and, uniting with each other in the ties of amity and
+      brotherhood, to form a blessed league against the marauders of the road. I
+      see amongst you, my Lords, many of the boasts and pillars of the state;
+      but, alas! I think with grief and dismay on the causeless and idle hatred
+      that has grown up between you!&mdash;a scandal to our city, and
+      reflecting, let me add, my Lords, no honour on your faith as Christians,
+      nor on your dignity as defenders of the Church.&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      Amongst the inferior nobles&mdash;along the seats of the judges and the
+      men of letters&mdash;through the vast concourse of the people&mdash;ran a
+      loud murmur of approbations at these words. The greater barons looked
+      proudly, but not contemptuously, at the countenance of the prelate, and
+      preserved a strict and unrevealing silence.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;In this holy spot,&rdquo; continued the Bishop, &ldquo;let me beseech you to bury
+      those fruitless animosities which have already cost enough of blood and
+      treasure; and let us quit these walls with one common determination to
+      evince our courage and display our chivalry only against our universal
+      foes;&mdash;those ruffians who lay waste our fields, and infest our public
+      ways,&mdash;the foes alike of the people we should protect, and the God
+      whom we should serve!&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      The Bishop resumed his seat; the nobles looked at each other without
+      reply; the people began to whisper loudly among themselves; when, after a
+      short pause, Adrian di Castello rose.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;Pardon me, my Lords, and you, reverend Father, if I, inexperienced in
+      years and of little mark or dignity amongst you, presume to be the first
+      to embrace the proposal we have just heard. Willingly do I renounce all
+      ancient cause of enmity with any of my compeers. Fortunately for me, my
+      long absence from Rome has swept from my remembrance the feuds and
+      rivalries familiar to my early youth; and in this noble conclave I see but
+      one man (glancing at Martino di Porto, who sat sullenly looking down)
+      against whom I have, at any time, deemed it a duty to draw my sword; the
+      gage that I once cast to that noble is yet, I rejoice to think,
+      unredeemed. I withdraw it. Henceforth my only foes shall be the foes of
+      Rome!&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;Nobly spoken!&rdquo; said the Bishop, aloud.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;And,&rdquo; continued Adrian, casting down his glove amongst the nobles, &ldquo;I
+      throw, my Lords, the gage, thus resumed, amongst you all, in challenge to
+      a wider rivalry, and a more noble field. I invite any man to vie with me
+      in the zeal that he shall show to restore tranquillity to our roads, and
+      order to our state. It is a contest in which, if I be vanquished with
+      reluctance, I will yield the prize without envy. In ten days from this
+      time, reverend Father, I will raise forty horsemen-at-arms, ready to obey
+      whatever orders shall be agreed upon for the security of the Roman state.
+      And you, O Romans, dismiss, I pray you, from your minds, those eloquent
+      invectives against your fellow-citizens which ye have lately heard. All of
+      us, of what rank soever, may have shared in the excesses of these unhappy
+      times; let us endeavour, not to avenge nor to imitate, but to reform and
+      to unite. And may the people hereafter find, that the true boast of a
+      patrician is, that his power the better enables him to serve his country.&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;Brave words!&rdquo; quoth the smith, sneeringly.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;If they were all like him!&rdquo; said the smith&rsquo;s neighbour.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;He has helped the nobles out of a dilemma,&rdquo; said Pandulfo.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;He has shown grey wit under young hairs,&rdquo; said an aged Malatesta.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;You have turned the tide, but not stemmed it, noble Adrian,&rdquo; whispered
+      the ever-boding Montreal, as, amidst the murmurs of the general
+      approbation, the young Colonna resumed his seat.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;How mean you?&rdquo; said Adrian.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;That your soft words, like all patrician conciliations, have come too
+      late.&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      Not another noble stirred, though they felt, perhaps, disposed to join in
+      the general feeling of amnesty, and appeared, by signs and whispers, to
+      applaud the speech of Adrian. They were too habituated to the
+      ungracefulness of an unlettered pride, to bow themselves to address
+      conciliating language either to the people or their foes. And Raimond,
+      glancing round, and not willing that their unseemly silence should be long
+      remarked, rose at once, to give it the best construction in his power.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;My son, thou hast spoken as a patriot and a Christian; by the approving
+      silence of your peers we all feel that they share your sentiments. Break
+      we up the meeting&mdash;its end is obtained. The manner of our proceeding
+      against the leagued robbers of the road requires maturer consideration
+      elsewhere. This day shall be an epoch in our history.&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;It shall,&rdquo; quoth Cecco del Vecchio, gruffly, between his teeth.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;Children, my blessing upon you all!&rdquo; concluded the Vicar, spreading his
+      arms.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      And in a few minutes more the crowd poured from the church. The different
+      servitors and flag-bearers ranged themselves on the steps without, each
+      train anxious for their master&rsquo;s precedence; and the nobles, gravely
+      collecting in small knots, in the which was no mixture of rival blood,
+      followed the crowd down the aisles. Soon rose again the din, and the
+      noise, and the wrangling, and the oaths, of the hostile bands, as, with
+      pain and labour, the Vicar&rsquo;s officers marshalled them in &ldquo;order most
+      disorderly.&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      But so true were Montreal&rsquo;s words to Adrian, that the populace already
+      half forgot the young noble&rsquo;s generous appeal, and were only bitterly
+      commenting on the ungracious silence of his brother Lords. What, too, to
+      them was this crusade against the robbers of the road? They blamed the
+      good Bishop for not saying boldly to the nobles&mdash;&ldquo;Ye are the first
+      robbers we must march against!&rdquo; The popular discontents had gone far
+      beyond palliatives; they had arrived at that point when the people longed
+      less for reform than change. There are times when a revolution cannot be
+      warded off; it must come&mdash;come alike by resistance or by concession.
+      Wo to that race in which a revolution produces no fruits!&mdash;in which
+      the thunderbolt smites the high place, but does not purify the air! To
+      suffer in vain is often the lot of the noblest individuals; but when a
+      People suffer in vain, let them curse themselves!
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      <a name="link2HCH0016" id="link2HCH0016">
+      <!--  H2 anchor --> </a>
+    </p>
+    <div style="height: 4em;">
+      <br /><br /><br /><br />
+    </div>
+    <h2>
+      Chapter 2.IV. The Ambitious Citizen, and the Ambitious Soldier.
+    </h2>
+    <p>
+      The Bishop of Orvietto lingered last, to confer with Rienzi, who awaited
+      him in the recesses of the Lateran. Raimond had the penetration not to be
+      seduced into believing that the late scene could effect any reformation
+      amongst the nobles, heal their divisions, or lead them actively against
+      the infestors of the Campagna. But, as he detailed to Rienzi all that had
+      occurred subsequent to the departure of that hero of the scene, he
+      concluded with saying:&mdash;
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;You will perceive from this, one good result will be produced: the first
+      armed dissension&mdash;the first fray among the nobles&mdash;will seem
+      like a breach of promise; and, to the people and to the Pope, a reasonable
+      excuse for despairing of all amendment amongst the Barons,&mdash;an excuse
+      which will sanction the efforts of the first, and the approval of the
+      last.&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;For such a fray we shall not long wait,&rdquo; answered Rienzi.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;I believe the prophecy,&rdquo; answered Raimond, smiling; &ldquo;at present all runs
+      well. Go you with us homeward?&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;Nay, I think it better to tarry here till the crowd is entirely
+      dispersed; for if they were to see me, in their present excitement, they
+      might insist on some rash and hasty enterprise. Besides, my Lord,&rdquo; added
+      Rienzi, &ldquo;with an ignorant people, however honest and enthusiastic, this
+      rule must be rigidly observed&mdash;stale not your presence by custom.
+      Never may men like me, who have no external rank, appear amongst the
+      crowd, save on those occasions when the mind is itself a rank.&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;That is true, as you have no train,&rdquo; answered Raimond, thinking of his
+      own well-liveried menials. &ldquo;Adieu, then! we shall meet soon.&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;Ay, at Philippi, my Lord. Reverend Father, your blessing!&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      It was some time subsequent to this conference that Rienzi quitted the
+      sacred edifice. As he stood on the steps of the church&mdash;now silent
+      and deserted&mdash;the hour that precedes the brief twilight of the South
+      lent its magic to the view. There he beheld the sweeping arches of the
+      mighty Aqueduct extending far along the scene, and backed by the distant
+      and purpled hills. Before&mdash;to the right&mdash;rose the gate which
+      took its Roman name from the Coelian Mount, at whose declivity it yet
+      stands. Beyond&mdash;from the height of the steps&mdash;he saw the
+      villages scattered through the grey Campagna, whitening in the sloped sun;
+      and in the furthest distance the mountain shadows began to darken over the
+      roofs of the ancient Tusculum, and the second Alban (The first Alba&mdash;the
+      Alba Longa&mdash;whose origin Fable ascribes to Ascanius, was destroyed by
+      Tullus Hostilius. The second Alba, or modern Albano, was erected on the
+      plain below the ancient town, a little before the time of Nero.) city,
+      which yet rises, in desolate neglect, above the vanished palaces of Pompey
+      and Domitian.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      The Roman stood absorbed and motionless for some moments, gazing on the
+      scene, and inhaling the sweet balm of the mellow air. It was the soft
+      springtime&mdash;the season of flowers, and green leaves, and whispering
+      winds&mdash;the pastoral May of Italia&rsquo;s poets: but hushed was the voice
+      of song on the banks of the Tiber&mdash;the reeds gave music no more. From
+      the sacred Mount in which Saturn held his home, the Dryad and the Nymph,
+      and Italy&rsquo;s native Sylvan, were gone for ever. Rienzi&rsquo;s original nature&mdash;its
+      enthusiasm&mdash;its veneration for the past&mdash;its love of the
+      beautiful and the great&mdash;that very attachment to the graces and pomp
+      which give so florid a character to the harsh realities of life, and which
+      power afterwards too luxuriantly developed; the exuberance of thoughts and
+      fancies, which poured itself from his lips in so brilliant and
+      inexhaustible a flood&mdash;all bespoke those intellectual and imaginative
+      biasses, which, in calmer times, might have raised him in literature to a
+      more indisputable eminence than that to which action can ever lead; and
+      something of such consciousness crossed his spirit at that moment.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;Happier had it been for me,&rdquo; thought he, &ldquo;had I never looked out from my
+      own heart upon the world. I had all within me that makes contentment of
+      the present, because I had that which can make me forget the present. I
+      had the power to re-people&mdash;to create: the legends and dreams of old&mdash;the
+      divine faculty of verse, in which the beautiful superfluities of the heart
+      can pour themselves&mdash;these were mine! Petrarch chose wisely for
+      himself! To address the world, but from without the world; to persuade&mdash;to
+      excite&mdash;to command,&mdash;for these are the aim and glory of
+      ambition;&mdash;but to shun its tumult, and its toil! His the quiet cell
+      which he fills with the shapes of beauty&mdash;the solitude, from which he
+      can banish the evil times whereon we are fallen, but in which he can dream
+      back the great hearts and the glorious epochs of the past. For me&mdash;to
+      what cares I am wedded! to what labours I am bound! what instruments I
+      must use! what disguises I must assume! to tricks and artifice I must bow
+      my pride! base are my enemies&mdash;uncertain my friends! and verily, in
+      this struggle with blinded and mean men, the soul itself becomes warped
+      and dwarfish. Patient and darkling, the Means creep through caves and the
+      soiling mire, to gain at last the light which is the End.&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      In these reflections there was a truth, the whole gloom and sadness of
+      which the Roman had not yet experienced. However august be the object we
+      propose to ourselves, every less worthy path we take to insure it distorts
+      the mental sight of our ambition; and the means, by degrees, abase the end
+      to their own standard. This is the true misfortune of a man nobler than
+      his age&mdash;that the instruments he must use soil himself: half he
+      reforms his times; but half, too, the times will corrupt the reformer. His
+      own craft undermines his safety;&mdash;the people, whom he himself
+      accustoms to a false excitement, perpetually crave it; and when their
+      ruler ceases to seduce their fancy, he falls their victim. The reform he
+      makes by these means is hollow and momentary&mdash;it is swept away with
+      himself: it was but the trick&mdash;the show&mdash;the wasted genius of a
+      conjuror: the curtain falls&mdash;the magic is over&mdash;the cup and
+      balls are kicked aside. Better one slow step in enlightenment,&mdash;which
+      being made by the reason of a whole people, cannot recede,&mdash;than
+      these sudden flashes in the depth of the general night, which the
+      darkness, by contrast doubly dark, swallows up everlastingly again!
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      As, slowly and musingly, Rienzi turned to quit the church, he felt a light
+      touch upon his shoulder.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;Fair evening to you, Sir Scholar,&rdquo; said a frank voice.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;To you, I return the courtesy,&rdquo; answered Rienzi, gazing upon the person
+      who thus suddenly accosted him, and in whose white cross and martial
+      bearing the reader recognises the Knight of St. John.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;You know me not, I think?&rdquo; said Montreal; &ldquo;but that matters little, we
+      may easily commence our acquaintance: for me, indeed, I am fortunate
+      enough to have made myself already acquainted with you.&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;Possibly we have met elsewhere, at the house of one of those nobles to
+      whose rank you seem to belong?&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;Belong! no, not exactly!&rdquo; returned Montreal, proudly. &ldquo;Highborn and great
+      as your magnates deem themselves, I would not, while the mountains can
+      yield one free spot for my footstep, change my place in the world&rsquo;s many
+      grades for theirs. To the brave, there is but one sort of plebeian, and
+      that is the coward. But you, sage Rienzi,&rdquo; continued the Knight, in a
+      gayer tone, &ldquo;I have seen in more stirring scenes than the hall of a Roman
+      Baron.&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      Rienzi glanced keenly at Montreal, who met his eye with an open brow.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;Yes!&rdquo; resumed the Knight&mdash;&ldquo;but let us walk on; suffer me for a few
+      moments to be your companion. Yes! I have listened to you&mdash;the other
+      eve, when you addressed the populace, and today, when you rebuked the
+      nobles; and at midnight, too, not long since, when (your ear, fair Sir!&mdash;lower,
+      it is a secret!)&mdash;at midnight, too, when you administered the oath of
+      brotherhood to the bold conspirators, on the ruined Aventine!&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      As he concluded, the Knight drew himself aside to watch, upon Rienzi&rsquo;s
+      countenance, the effect which his words might produce.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      A slight tremor passed over the frame of the conspirator&mdash;for so,
+      unless the conspiracy succeed, would Rienzi be termed, by others than
+      Montreal: he turned abruptly round to confront the Knight, and placed his
+      hand involuntarily on his sword, but presently relinquished the grasp.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;Ha!&rdquo; said the Roman, slowly, &ldquo;if this be true, fall Rome! There is
+      treason even among the free!&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;No treason, brave Sir!&rdquo; answered Montreal; &ldquo;I possess thy secret&mdash;but
+      none have betrayed it to me.&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;And is it as friend or foe that thou hast learned it?&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;That as it may be,&rdquo; returned Montreal, carelessly. &ldquo;Enough, at present,
+      that I could send thee to the gibbet, if I said but the word,&mdash;to
+      show my power to be thy foe; enough, that I have not done it, to prove my
+      disposition to be thy friend.&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;Thou mistakest, stranger! that man does not live who could shed my blood
+      in the streets of Rome! The gibbet! Little dost thou know of the power
+      which surrounds Rienzi.&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      These words were said with some scorn and bitterness; but, after a
+      moment&rsquo;s pause, Rienzi resumed, more calmly:&mdash;
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;By the cross on thy mantle, thou belongest to one of the proudest orders
+      of knighthood: thou art a foreigner, and a cavalier. What generous
+      sympathies can convert thee into a friend of the Roman people?&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;Cola di Rienzi,&rdquo; returned Montreal, &ldquo;the sympathies that unite us are
+      those which unite all men who, by their own efforts, rise above the herd.
+      True, I was born noble&mdash;but powerless and poor: at my beck now move,
+      from city to city, the armed instruments of authority: my breath is the
+      law of thousands. This empire I have not inherited; I won it by a cool
+      brain and a fearless arm. Know me for Walter de Montreal; is it not a name
+      that speaks a spirit kindred to thine own? Is not ambition a common
+      sentiment between us? I do not marshal soldiers for gain only, though men
+      have termed me avaricious&mdash;nor butcher peasants for the love of
+      blood, though men have called me cruel. Arms and wealth are the sinews of
+      power; it is power that I desire;&mdash;thou, bold Rienzi, strugglest thou
+      not for the same? Is it the rank breath of the garlic-chewing mob&mdash;is
+      it the whispered envy of schoolmen&mdash;is it the hollow mouthing of boys
+      who call thee patriot and freeman, words to trick the ear&mdash;that will
+      content thee? These are but thy instruments to power. Have I spoken
+      truly?&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      Whatever distaste Rienzi might conceive at this speech he masked
+      effectually. &ldquo;Certes,&rdquo; said he, &ldquo;it would be in vain, renowned Captain, to
+      deny that I seek but that power of which thou speakest. But what union can
+      there be between the ambition of a Roman citizen and the leader of paid
+      armies that take their cause only according to their hire&mdash;today,
+      fight for liberty in Florence&mdash;tomorrow, for tyranny in Bologna?
+      Pardon my frankness; for in this age that is deemed no disgrace which I
+      impute to thy armies. Valour and generalship are held to consecrate any
+      cause they distinguish; and he who is the master of princes, may be well
+      honoured by them as their equal.&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;We are entering into a less deserted quarter of the town,&rdquo; said the
+      Knight; &ldquo;is there no secret place&mdash;no Aventine&mdash;in this
+      direction, where we can confer?&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;Hush!&rdquo; replied Rienzi, cautiously looking round. &ldquo;I thank thee, noble
+      Montreal, for the hint; nor may it be well for us to be seen together.
+      Wilt thou deign to follow me to my home, by the Palatine Bridge? (The
+      picturesque ruins shown at this day as having once been the habitation of
+      the celebrated Cola di Rienzi, were long asserted by the antiquarians to
+      have belonged to another Cola or Nicola. I believe, however, that the
+      dispute has been lately decided: and, indeed, no one but an antiquary, and
+      that a Roman one, could suppose that there were two Colas to whom the
+      inscription on the house would apply.) there we can converse undisturbed
+      and secure.&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;Be it so,&rdquo; said Montreal, falling back.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      With a quick and hurried step, Rienzi passed through the town, in which,
+      wherever he was discovered, the scattered citizens saluted him with marked
+      respect; and, turning through a labyrinth of dark alleys, as if to shun
+      the more public thoroughfares, arrived at length at a broad space near the
+      river. The first stars of night shone down on the ancient temple of
+      Fortuna Virilis, which the chances of Time had already converted into the
+      Church of St. Mary of Egypt; and facing the twice-hallowed edifice stood
+      the house of Rienzi.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;It is a fair omen to have my mansion facing the ancient Temple of
+      Fortune,&rdquo; said Rienzi, smiling, as Montreal followed the Roman into the
+      chamber I have already described.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;Yet Valour need never pray to Fortune,&rdquo; said the Knight; &ldquo;the first
+      commands the last.&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      Long was the conference between these two men, the most enterprising of
+      their age. Meanwhile, let me make the reader somewhat better acquainted
+      with the character and designs of Montreal, than the hurry of events has
+      yet permitted him to become.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      Walter de Montreal, generally known in the chronicles of Italy by the
+      designation of Fra Moreale, had passed into Italy&mdash;a bold adventurer,
+      worthy to become a successor of those roving Normans (from one of the most
+      eminent of whom, by the mother&rsquo;s side, he claimed descent) who had
+      formerly played so strange a part in the chivalric errantry of Europe,&mdash;realizing
+      the fables of Amadis and Palmerin&mdash;(each knight, in himself a host),
+      winning territories and oversetting thrones; acknowledging no laws save
+      those of knighthood; never confounding themselves with the tribe amongst
+      which they settled; incapable of becoming citizens, and scarcely contented
+      with aspiring to be kings. At that time, Italy was the India of all those
+      well-born and penniless adventurers who, like Montreal, had inflamed their
+      imagination by the ballads and legends of the Roberts and the Godfreys of
+      old; who had trained themselves from youth to manage the barb, and bear,
+      through the heats of summer, the weight of arms; and who, passing into am
+      effeminate and distracted land, had only to exhibit bravery in order to
+      command wealth. It was considered no disgrace for some powerful chieftain
+      to collect together a band of these hardy aliens,&mdash;to subsist amidst
+      the mountains on booty and pillage,&mdash;to make war upon tyrant or
+      republic, as interest suggested, and to sell, at enormous stipends, the
+      immunities of peace. Sometimes they hired themselves to one state to
+      protect it against the other; and the next year beheld them in the field
+      against their former employers. These bands of Northern stipendiaries
+      assumed, therefore, a civil, as well as a military, importance; they were
+      as indispensable to the safety of one state as they were destructive to
+      the security of all. But five years before the present date, the
+      Florentine Republic had hired the services of a celebrated leader of these
+      foreign soldiers,&mdash;Gualtier, duke of Athens. By acclamation, the
+      people themselves had elected that warrior to the state of prince, or
+      tyrant, of their state; before the year was completed, they revolted
+      against his cruelties, or rather against his exactions,&mdash;for, despite
+      all the boasts of their historians, they felt an attack on their purses
+      more deeply than an assault on their liberties,&mdash;they had chased him
+      from their city, and once more proclaimed themselves a Republic. The
+      bravest, and most favoured of the soldiers of the Duke of Athens had been
+      Walter de Montreal; he had shared the rise and the downfall of his chief.
+      Amongst popular commotions, the acute and observant mind of the Knight of
+      St. John had learned no mean civil experience; he had learned to sound a
+      people&mdash;to know how far they would endure&mdash;to construe the signs
+      of revolution&mdash;to be a reader of the times. After the downfall of the
+      Duke of Athens, as a Free Companion, in other words a Freebooter, Montreal
+      had augmented under the fierce Werner his riches and his renown. At
+      present without employment worthy his spirit of enterprise and intrigue,
+      the disordered and chiefless state of Rome had attracted him thither. In
+      the league he had proposed to Colonna&mdash;in the suggestions he had made
+      to the vanity of that Signor&mdash;his own object was to render his
+      services indispensable&mdash;to constitute himself the head of the
+      soldiery whom his proposed designs would render necessary to the ambition
+      of the Colonna, could it be excited&mdash;and, in the vastness of his
+      hardy genius for enterprise, he probably foresaw that the command of such
+      a force would be, in reality, the command of Rome;&mdash;a
+      counter-revolution might easily unseat the Colonna and elect himself to
+      the principality. It had sometimes been the custom of Roman, as of other
+      Italian, States, to prefer for a chief magistrate, under the title of
+      Podesta, a foreigner to a native. And Montreal hoped that he might
+      possibly become to Rome what the Duke of Athens had been to Florence&mdash;an
+      ambition he knew well enough to be above the gentleman of Provence, but
+      not above the leader of an army. But, as we have already seen, his
+      sagacity perceived at once that he could not move the aged head of the
+      patricians to those hardy and perilous measures which were necessary to
+      the attainment of supreme power. Contented with his present station, and
+      taught moderation by his age and his past reverses, Stephen Colonna was
+      not the man to risk a scaffold from the hope to gain a throne. The
+      contempt which the old patrician professed for the people, and their idol,
+      also taught the deep-thinking Montreal that, if the Colonna possessed not
+      the ambition, neither did he possess the policy, requisite for empire. The
+      Knight found his caution against Rienzi in vain, and he turned to Rienzi
+      himself. Little cared the Knight of St. John which party were uppermost&mdash;prince
+      or people&mdash;so that his own objects were attained; in fact, he had
+      studied the humours of a people, not in order to serve, but to rule them;
+      and, believing all men actuated by a similar ambition, he imagined that,
+      whether a demagogue or a patrician reigned, the people were equally to be
+      victims, and that the cry of &ldquo;Order&rdquo; on the one hand, or of &ldquo;Liberty&rdquo; on
+      the other, was but the mere pretext by which the energy of one man sought
+      to justify his ambition over the herd. Deeming himself one of the most
+      honourable spirits of his age, he believed in no honour which he was
+      unable to feel; and, sceptic in virtue, was therefore credulous of vice.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      But the boldness of his own nature inclined him, perhaps, rather to the
+      adventurous Rienzi than to the self-complacent Colonna; and he considered
+      that to the safety of the first he and his armed minions might be even
+      more necessary than to that of the last. At present his main object was to
+      learn from Rienzi the exact strength which he possessed, and how far he
+      was prepared for any actual revolt.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      The acute Roman took care, on the one hand, how he betrayed to the Knight
+      more than he yet knew, or he disgusted him by apparent reserve on the
+      other. Crafty as Montreal was, he possessed not that wonderful art of
+      mastering others which was so preeminently the gift of the eloquent and
+      profound Rienzi, and the difference between the grades of their intellect
+      was visible in their present conference.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;I see,&rdquo; said Rienzi, &ldquo;that amidst all the events which have lately smiled
+      upon my ambition, none is so favourable as that which assures me of your
+      countenance and friendship. In truth, I require some armed alliance. Would
+      you believe it, our friends, so bold in private meetings, yet shrink from
+      a public explosion. They fear not the patricians, but the soldiery of the
+      patricians; for it is the remarkable feature in the Italian courage, that
+      they have no terror for each other, but the casque and sword of a foreign
+      hireling make them quail like deer.&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;They will welcome gladly, then, the assurance that such hirelings shall
+      be in their service&mdash;not against them; and as much as you desire for
+      the revolution, so many shall you receive.&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;But the pay and the conditions,&rdquo; said Rienzi, with his dry, sarcastic
+      smile. &ldquo;How shall we arrange the first, and what shall we hold to be the
+      second?&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;That is an affair easily concluded,&rdquo; replied Montreal. &ldquo;For me, to tell
+      you frankly, the glory and excitement of so great a revulsion would alone
+      suffice. I like to feel myself necessary to the completion of high events.
+      For my men it is otherwise. Your first act will be to seize the revenues
+      of the state. Well, whatever they amount to, the product of the first
+      year, great or small, shall be divided amongst us. You the one half, I and
+      my men the other half.&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;It is much,&rdquo; said Rienzi, gravely, and as if in calculation,&mdash;&ldquo;but
+      Rome cannot purchase her liberties too dearly. So be it then decided.&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;Amen!&mdash;and now, then, what is your force? for these eighty or a
+      hundred signors of the Aventine,&mdash;worthy men, doubtless,&mdash;scarce
+      suffice for a revolt!&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      Gazing cautiously round the room, the Roman placed his hand on Montreal&rsquo;s
+      arm&mdash;
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;Between you and me, it requires time to cement it. We shall be unable to
+      stir these five weeks. I have too rashly anticipated the period. The corn
+      is indeed cut, but I must now, by private adjuration and address, bind up
+      the scattered sheaves.&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;Five weeks,&rdquo; repeated Montreal; &ldquo;that is far longer than I anticipated.&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;What I desire,&rdquo; continued Rienzi, fixing his searching eyes upon
+      Montreal, &ldquo;is, that, in the meanwhile, we should preserve a profound calm,&mdash;we
+      should remove every suspicion. I shall bury myself in my studies, and
+      convoke no more meetings.&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;Well&mdash;&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;And for yourself, noble Knight, might I venture to dictate, I would pray
+      you to mix with the nobles&mdash;to profess for me and for the people the
+      profoundest contempt&mdash;and to contribute to rock them yet more in the
+      cradle of their false security. Meanwhile, you could quietly withdraw as
+      many of the armed mercenaries as you influence from Rome, and leave the
+      nobles without their only defenders. Collecting these hardy warriors in
+      the recesses of the mountains, a day&rsquo;s march from hence, we may be able to
+      summon them at need, and they shall appear at our gates, and in the midst
+      of our rising&mdash;hailed as deliverers by the nobles, but in reality
+      allies with the people. In the confusion and despair of our enemies at
+      discovering their mistake, they will fly from the city.&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;And its revenues and its empire will become the appanage of the hardy
+      soldier and the intriguing demagogue!&rdquo; cried Montreal, with a laugh.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;Sir Knight, the division shall be equal.&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;Agreed!&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;And now, noble Montreal, a flask of our best vintage!&rdquo; said Rienzi,
+      changing his tone.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;You know the Provencals,&rdquo; answered Montreal, gaily.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      The wine was brought, the conversation became free and familiar, and
+      Montreal, whose craft was acquired, and whose frankness was natural,
+      unwittingly committed his secret projects and ambition more nakedly to
+      Rienzi than he had designed to do. They parted apparently the best of
+      friends.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;By the way,&rdquo; said Rienzi, as they drained the last goblet. &ldquo;Stephen
+      Colonna betakes him to Corneto, with a convoy of corn, on the 19th. Will
+      it not be as well if you join him? You can take that opportunity to
+      whisper discontent to the mercenaries that accompany him on his mission,
+      and induce them to our plan.&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;I thought of that before,&rdquo; returned Montreal; &ldquo;it shall be done. For the
+      present, farewell!&rdquo;
+     </p>
+<pre xml:space="preserve">
+     &ldquo;&lsquo;His barb, and his sword,
+     And his lady, the peerless,
+     Are all that are prized
+     By Orlando the fearless.
+
+     &ldquo;&lsquo;Success to the Norman,
+     The darling of story;
+     His glory is pleasure&mdash;
+     His pleasure is glory.&rsquo;&rdquo;
+ </pre>
+    <p>
+      Chanting this rude ditty as he resumed his mantle, the Knight waved his
+      hand to Rienzi, and departed.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      Rienzi watched the receding form of his guest with an expression of hate
+      and fear upon his countenance. &ldquo;Give that man the power,&rdquo; he muttered,
+      &ldquo;and he may be a second Totila. (Innocent VI., some years afterwards,
+      proclaimed Montreal to be worse than Totila.) Methinks I see, in his
+      griping and ferocious nature,&mdash;through all the gloss of its gaiety
+      and knightly grace,&mdash;the very personification of our old Gothic foes.
+      I trust I have lulled him! Verily, two suns could no more blaze in one
+      hemisphere, than Walter de Montreal and Cola di Rienzi live in the same
+      city. The star-seers tell us that we feel a secret and uncontrollable
+      antipathy to those whose astral influences destine them to work us evil;
+      such antipathy do I feel for yon fair-faced homicide. Cross not my path,
+      Montreal!&mdash;cross not my path!&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      With this soliloquy Rienzi turned within, and, retiring to his apartment,
+      was seen no more that night.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      <a name="link2HCH0017" id="link2HCH0017">
+      <!--  H2 anchor --> </a>
+    </p>
+    <div style="height: 4em;">
+      <br /><br /><br /><br />
+    </div>
+    <h2>
+      Chapter 2.V. The Procession of the Barons.&mdash;The Beginning of the End.
+    </h2>
+    <p>
+      It was the morning of the 19th of May, the air was brisk and clear, and
+      the sun, which had just risen, shone cheerily upon the glittering casques
+      and spears of a gallant procession of armed horsemen, sweeping through the
+      long and principal street of Rome. The neighing of the horses, the ringing
+      of the hoofs, the dazzle of the armour, and the tossing to and fro of the
+      standards, adorned with the proud insignia of the Colonna, presented one
+      of the gay and brilliant spectacles peculiar to the middle ages.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      At the head of the troop, on a stout palfrey, rode Stephen Colonna. At his
+      right was the Knight of Provence, curbing, with an easy hand, a slight,
+      but fiery steed of the Arab race: behind him followed two squires, the one
+      leading his war-horse, the other bearing his lance and helmet. At the left
+      of Stephen Colonna rode Adrian, grave and silent, and replying only by
+      monosyllables to the gay bavardage of the Knight of Provence. A
+      considerable number of the flower of the Roman nobles followed the old
+      Baron; and the train was closed by a serried troop of foreign horsemen,
+      completely armed.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      There was no crowd in the street,&mdash;the citizens looked with seeming
+      apathy at the procession from their half-closed shops.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;Have these Romans no passion for shows?&rdquo; asked Montreal; &ldquo;if they could
+      be more easily amused they would be more easily governed.&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;Oh, Rienzi, and such buffoons, amuse them. We do better,&mdash;we
+      terrify!&rdquo; replied Stephen.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;What sings the troubadour, Lord Adrian?&rdquo; said Montreal.
+    </p>
+<pre xml:space="preserve">
+     &ldquo;&lsquo;Smiles, false smiles, should form the school
+     For those who rise, and those who rule:
+     The brave they trick, and fair subdue,
+     Kings deceive, the States undo.
+     Smiles, false smiles!
+
+     &ldquo;&lsquo;Frowns, true frowns, ourselves betray,
+     The brave arouse, the fair dismay,
+     Sting the pride, which blood must heal,
+     Mix the bowl, and point the steel.
+     Frowns, true frowns!&rsquo; 
+</pre>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;The lay is of France, Signor; yet methinks it brings its wisdom from
+      Italy;&mdash;for the serpent smile is your countrymen&rsquo;s proper
+      distinction, and the frown ill becomes them.&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;Sir Knight,&rdquo; replied Adrian, sharply, and incensed at the taunt, &ldquo;you
+      Foreigners have taught us how to frown:&mdash;a virtue sometimes.&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;But not wisdom, unless the hand could maintain what the brow menaced,&rdquo;
+       returned Montreal, with haughtiness; for he had much of the Franc vivacity
+      which often overcame his prudence; and he had conceived a secret pique
+      against Adrian since their interview at Stephen&rsquo;s palace.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;Sir Knight,&rdquo; answered Adrian, colouring, &ldquo;our conversation may lead to
+      warmer words than I would desire to have with one who has rendered me so
+      gallant a service.&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;Nay, then, let us go back to the troubadours,&rdquo; said Montreal,
+      indifferently. &ldquo;Forgive me if I do not think highly, in general, of
+      Italian honour, or Italian valour; your valour I acknowledge, for I have
+      witnessed it, and valour and honour go together,&mdash;let that suffice!&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      As Adrian was about to answer, his eye fell suddenly on the burly form of
+      Cecco del Vecchio, who was leaning his bare and brawny arms over his
+      anvil, and gazing, with a smile, upon the group. There was something in
+      that smile which turned the current of Adrian&rsquo;s thoughts, and which he
+      could not contemplate without an unaccountable misgiving.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;A strong villain, that,&rdquo; said Montreal, also eyeing the smith. &ldquo;I should
+      like to enlist him. Fellow!&rdquo; cried he, aloud, &ldquo;you have an arm that were
+      as fit to wield the sword as to fashion it. Desert your anvil, and follow
+      the fortunes of Fra Moreale!&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      The smith nodded his head. &ldquo;Signor Cavalier,&rdquo; said he, gravely, &ldquo;we poor
+      men have no passion for war; we want not to kill others&mdash;we desire
+      only ourselves to live,&mdash;if you will let us!&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;By the Holy Mother, a slavish answer! But you Romans&mdash;&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;Are slaves!&rdquo; interrupted the smith, turning away to the interior of his
+      forge.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;The dog is mutinous!&rdquo; said the old Colonna. And as the band swept on, the
+      rude foreigners, encouraged by their leaders, had each some taunt or jest,
+      uttered in a barbarous attempt at the southern patois, for the lazy giant,
+      as he again appeared in front of his forge, leaning on his anvil as
+      before, and betraying no sign of attention to his insultors, save by a
+      heightened glow of his swarthy visage;&mdash;and so the gallant procession
+      passed through the streets, and quitted the Eternal City.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      There was a long interval of deep silence&mdash;of general calm&mdash;throughout
+      the whole of Rome: the shops were still but half-opened; no man betook
+      himself to his business; it was like the commencement of some holyday,
+      when indolence precedes enjoyment.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      About noon, a few small knots of men might be seen scattered about the
+      streets, whispering to each other, but soon dispersing; and every now and
+      then, a single passenger, generally habited in the long robes used by the
+      men of letters, or in the more sombre garb of monks, passed hurriedly up
+      the street towards the Church of St. Mary of Egypt, once the Temple of
+      Fortune. Then, again, all was solitary and deserted. Suddenly, there was
+      heard the sound of a single trumpet! It swelled&mdash;it gathered on the
+      ear. Cecco del Vecchio looked up from his anvil! A solitary horseman paced
+      slowly by the forge, and wound a long loud blast of the trumpet suspended
+      round his neck, as he passed through the middle of the street. Then might
+      you see a crowd, suddenly, and as by magic, appear emerging from every
+      corner; the street became thronged with multitudes; but it was only by the
+      tramp of their feet, and an indistinct and low murmur, that they broke the
+      silence. Again the horseman wound his trump, and when the note ceased, he
+      cried aloud&mdash;&ldquo;Friends and Romans! tomorrow, at dawn of day, let each
+      man find himself unarmed before the Church of St. Angelo. Cola di Rienzi
+      convenes the Romans to provide for the good state of Rome.&rdquo; A shout, that
+      seemed to shake the bases of the seven hills, broke forth at the end of
+      this brief exhortation; the horseman rode slowly on, and the crowd
+      followed.&mdash;This was the commencement of the Revolution!
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      <a name="link2HCH0018" id="link2HCH0018">
+      <!--  H2 anchor --> </a>
+    </p>
+    <div style="height: 4em;">
+      <br /><br /><br /><br />
+    </div>
+    <h2>
+      Chapter 2.VI. The Conspirator Becomes the Magistrate.
+    </h2>
+    <p>
+      At midnight, when the rest of the city seemed hushed in rest, lights were
+      streaming from the windows of the Church of St. Angelo. Breaking from its
+      echoing aisles, the long and solemn notes of sacred music stole at
+      frequent intervals upon the air. Rienzi was praying within the church;
+      thirty masses consumed the hours from night till morn, and all the
+      sanction of religion was invoked to consecrate the enterprise of liberty.
+      (In fact, I apprehend that if ever the life of Cola di Rienzi shall be
+      written by a hand worthy of the task, it will be shown that a strong
+      religious feeling was blended with the political enthusiasm of the people,&mdash;the
+      religious feeling of a premature and crude reformation, the legacy of
+      Arnold of Brescia. It was not, however, one excited against the priests,
+      but favoured by them. The principal conventual orders declared for the
+      Revolution.) The sun had long risen, and the crowd had long been assembled
+      before the church door, and in vast streams along every street that led to
+      it,&mdash;when the bell of the church tolled out long and merrily; and as
+      it ceased, the voices of the choristers within chanted the following hymn,
+      in which were somewhat strikingly, though barbarously, blended, the spirit
+      of the classic patriotism with the fervour of religious zeal:&mdash;
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      The Roman Hymn of Liberty.
+    </p>
+<pre xml:space="preserve">
+     Let the mountains exult around!
+
+     (&ldquo;Exultent in circuito Vestro Montes,&rdquo; &amp;c.&mdash;Let the
+     mountains exult around!  So begins Rienzi&rsquo;s letter to the
+     Senate and Roman people: preserved by Hocsemius.)
+
+     On her seven-hill&rsquo;d throne renown&rsquo;d,
+     Once more old Rome is crown&rsquo;d!
+     Jubilate!
+
+     Sing out, O Vale and Wave!
+     Look up from each laurell&rsquo;d grave,
+     Bright dust of the deathless brave!
+     Jubilate!
+
+     Pale Vision, what art thou?&mdash;Lo,
+     From Time&rsquo;s dark deeps,
+     Like a Wind, It sweeps,
+     Like a Wind, when the tempests blow:
+
+     A shadowy form&mdash;as a giant ghost&mdash;
+     It stands in the midst of the armed host!
+     The dead man&rsquo;s shroud on Its awful limbs;
+     And the gloom of Its presence the daylight dims:
+     And the trembling world looks on aghast&mdash;
+     All hail to the SOUL OF THE MIGHTY PAST!
+     Hail! all hail!
+
+     As we speak&mdash;as we hallow&mdash;It moves, It breathes;
+     From its clouded crest bud the laurel wreaths&mdash;
+     As a Sun that leaps up from the arms of Night,
+     The shadow takes shape, and the gloom takes light.
+     Hail! all hail!
+
+     The Soul of the Past, again
+     To its ancient home,
+     In the hearts of Rome,
+     Hath come to resume its reign!
+
+     O Fame, with a prophet&rsquo;s voice,
+     Bid the ends of the Earth rejoice!
+     Wherever the Proud are Strong,
+     And Right is oppress&rsquo;d by Wrong;&mdash;
+     Wherever the day dim shines
+     Through the cell where the captive pines;&mdash;
+     Go forth, with a trumpet&rsquo;s sound!
+     And tell to the Nations round&mdash;
+     On the Hills which the Heroes trod&mdash;
+     In the shrines of the Saints of God&mdash;
+     In the Caesars&rsquo; hall, and the Martyrs&rsquo; prison&mdash;
+     That the slumber is broke, and the Sleeper arisen!
+     That the reign of the Goth and the Vandal is o&rsquo;er:
+     And Earth feels the tread of THE ROMAN once more!
+</pre>
+    <p>
+      As the hymn ended, the gate of the church opened; the crowd gave way on
+      either side, and, preceded by three of the young nobles of the inferior
+      order, bearing standards of allegorical design, depicting the triumph of
+      Liberty, Justice, and Concord, forth issued Rienzi, clad in complete
+      armour, the helmet alone excepted. His face was pale with watching and
+      intense excitement&mdash;but stern, grave, and solemnly composed; and its
+      expression so repelled any vociferous and vulgar burst of feeling, that
+      those who beheld it hushed the shout on their lips, and stilled, by a
+      simultaneous cry of reproof, the gratulations of the crowd behind. Side by
+      side with Rienzi moved Raimond, Bishop of Orvietto: and behind, marching
+      two by two, followed a hundred men-at-arms. In complete silence the
+      procession began its way, until, as it approached the Capitol, the awe of
+      the crowd gradually vanished, and thousands upon thousands of voices rent
+      the air with shouts of exultation and joy.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      Arrived at the foot of the great staircase, which then made the principal
+      ascent to the square of the Capitol, the procession halted; and as the
+      crowd filled up that vast space in front&mdash;adorned and hallowed by
+      many of the most majestic columns of the temples of old&mdash;Rienzi
+      addressed the Populace, whom he had suddenly elevated into a People.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      He depicted forcibly the servitude and misery of the citizens&mdash;the
+      utter absence of all law&mdash;the want even of common security to life
+      and property. He declared that, undaunted by the peril he incurred, he
+      devoted his life to the regeneration of their common country; and he
+      solemnly appealed to the people to assist the enterprise, and at once to
+      sanction and consolidate the Revolution by an established code of law and
+      a Constitutional Assembly. He then ordered the chart and outline of the
+      Constitution he proposed, to be read by the Herald to the multitude.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      It created,&mdash;or rather revived, with new privileges and powers,&mdash;a
+      Representative Assembly of Councillors. It proclaimed, as its first law,
+      one that seems simple enough to our happier times, but never hitherto
+      executed at Rome: Every wilful homicide, of whatever rank, was to be
+      punished by death. It enacted, that no private noble or citizen should be
+      suffered to maintain fortifications and garrisons in the city or the
+      country; that the gates and bridges of the State should be under the
+      control of whomsoever should be elected Chief Magistrate. It forbade all
+      harbour of brigands, mercenaries, and robbers, on payment of a thousand
+      marks of silver; and it made the Barons who possessed the neighbouring
+      territories responsible for the safety of the roads, and the transport of
+      merchandise. It took under the protection of the State the widow and the
+      orphan. It appointed, in each of the quarters of the city, an armed
+      militia, whom the tolling of the bell of the Capitol, at any hour, was to
+      assemble to the protection of the State. It ordained, that in each harbour
+      of the coast, a vessel should be stationed, for the safeguard of commerce.
+      It decreed the sum of one hundred florins to the heirs of every man who
+      died in the defence of Rome; and it devoted the public revenues to the
+      service and protection of the State.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      Such, moderate at once and effectual, was the outline of the New
+      Constitution; and it may amuse the reader to consider how great must have
+      been the previous disorders of the city, when the common and elementary
+      provisions of civilisation and security made the character of the code
+      proposed, and the limit of a popular revolution.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      The most rapturous shouts followed this sketch of the New Constitution:
+      and, amidst the clamour, up rose the huge form of Cecco del Vecchio.
+      Despite his condition, he was a man of great importance at the present
+      crisis: his zeal and his courage, and, perhaps, still more, his brute
+      passion and stubborn prejudice, had made him popular. The lower order of
+      mechanics looked to him as their head and representative; out, then, he
+      spake loud and fearlessly,&mdash;speaking well, because his mind was full
+      of what he had to say.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;Countrymen and Citizens!&mdash;This New Constitution meets with your
+      approbation&mdash;so it ought. But what are good laws, if we do not have
+      good men to execute them? Who can execute a law so well as the man who
+      designs it? If you ask me to give you a notion how to make a good shield,
+      and my notion pleases you, would you ask me, or another smith, to make it
+      for you? If you ask another, he may make a good shield, but it would not
+      be the same as that which I should have made, and the description of which
+      contented you. Cola di Rienzi has proposed a Code of Law that shall be our
+      shield. Who should see that the shield become what he proposes, but Cola
+      di Rienzi? Romans! I suggest that Cola di Rienzi be intrusted by the
+      people with the authority, by whatsoever name he pleases, of carrying the
+      New Constitution into effect;&mdash;and whatever be the means, we, the
+      People, will bear him harmless.&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;Long life to Rienzi!&mdash;long live Cecco del Vecchio! He hath spoken
+      well!&mdash;none but the Law-maker shall be the Governor!&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      Such were the acclamations which greeted the ambitious heart of the
+      Scholar. The voice of the people invested him with the supreme power. He
+      had created a Commonwealth&mdash;to become, if he desired it, a Despot!
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      <a name="link2HCH0019" id="link2HCH0019">
+      <!--  H2 anchor --> </a>
+    </p>
+    <div style="height: 4em;">
+      <br /><br /><br /><br />
+    </div>
+    <h2>
+      Chapter 2.VII. Looking after the Halter when the Mare is Stolen.
+    </h2>
+    <p>
+      While such were the events at Rome, a servitor of Stephen Colonna was
+      already on his way to Corneto. The astonishment with which the old Baron
+      received the intelligence may be easily imagined. He lost not a moment in
+      convening his troop; and, while in all the bustle of departure, the Knight
+      of St. John abruptly entered his presence. His mien had lost its usual
+      frank composure.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;How is this?&rdquo; said he, hastily; &ldquo;a revolt?&mdash;Rienzi sovereign of
+      Rome?&mdash;can the news be believed?&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;It is too true!&rdquo; said Colonna, with a bitter smile. &ldquo;Where shall we hang
+      him on our return?&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;Talk not so wildly, Sir Baron,&rdquo; replied Montreal, discourteously; &ldquo;Rienzi
+      is stronger than you think for. I know what men are, and you only know
+      what noblemen are! Where is your kinsman, Adrian?&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;He is here, noble Montreal,&rdquo; said Stephen, shrugging his shoulders, with
+      a half-disdainful smile at the rebuke, which he thought it more prudent
+      not to resent; &ldquo;he is here!&mdash;see him enter!&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;You have heard the news?&rdquo; exclaimed Montreal.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;I have.&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;And despise the revolution?&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;I fear it!&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;Then you have some sense in you. But this is none of my affair: I will
+      not interrupt your consultations. Adieu for the present!&rdquo; and, ere Stephen
+      could prevent him, the Knight had quitted the chamber.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;What means this demagogue?&rdquo; Montreal muttered to himself. &ldquo;Would he trick
+      me?&mdash;has he got rid of my presence in order to monopolise all the
+      profit of the enterprise? I fear me so!&mdash;the cunning Roman! We
+      northern warriors could never compete with the intellect of these Italians
+      but for their cowardice. But what shall be done? I have already bid Rodolf
+      communicate with the brigands, and they are on the eve of departure from
+      their present lord. Well! let it be so! Better that I should first break
+      the power of the Barons, and then make my own terms, sword in hand, with
+      the plebeian. And if I fail in this,&mdash;sweet Adeline! I shall see thee
+      again!&mdash;that is some comfort!&mdash;and Louis of Hungary will bid
+      high for the arm and brain of Walter de Montreal. What, ho! Rodolf!&rdquo; he
+      exclaimed aloud, as the sturdy form of the trooper, half-armed and
+      half-intoxicated, reeled along the courtyard. &ldquo;Knave! art thou drunk at
+      this hour?&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;Drunk or sober,&rdquo; answered Rodolf, bending low, &ldquo;I am at thy bidding.&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;Well said!&mdash;are thy friends ripe for the saddle?&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;Eighty of them already tired of idleness and the dull air of Rome, will
+      fly wherever Sir Walter de Montreal wishes.&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;Hasten, then,&mdash;bid them mount; we go not hence with the Colonna&mdash;we
+      leave while they are yet talking! Bid my squires attend me!&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      And when Stephen Colonna was settling himself on his palfrey, he heard,
+      for the first time, that the Knight of Provence, Rodolf the trooper, and
+      eighty of the stipendiaries, had already departed,&mdash;whither, none
+      knew.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;To precede us to Rome! gallant barbarian!&rdquo; said Colonna. &ldquo;Sirs, on!&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      <a name="link2HCH0020" id="link2HCH0020">
+      <!--  H2 anchor --> </a>
+    </p>
+    <div style="height: 4em;">
+      <br /><br /><br /><br />
+    </div>
+    <h2>
+      Chapter 2.VIII. The Attack&mdash;the Retreat&mdash;the Election&mdash;and
+      the Adhesion.
+    </h2>
+    <p>
+      Arriving at Rome, the company of the Colonna found the gates barred, and
+      the walls manned. Stephen bade advance his trumpeters, with one of his
+      captains, imperiously to demand admittance.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;We have orders,&rdquo; replied the chief of the town-guard, &ldquo;to admit none who
+      bear arms, flags, or trumpets. Let the Lords Colonna dismiss their train,
+      and they are welcome.&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;Whose are these insolent mandates?&rdquo; asked the captain.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;Those of the Lord Bishop of Orvietto and Cola di Rienzi, joint protectors
+      of the Buono Stato.&rdquo; (Good Estate.)
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      The captain of the Colonna returned to his chief with these tidings. The
+      rage of Stephen was indescribable. &ldquo;Go back,&rdquo; he cried, as soon as he
+      could summon voice, &ldquo;and say, that, if the gates are not forthwith opened
+      to me and mine, the blood of the plebeians be on their own head. As for
+      Raimond, Vicars of the Pope have high spiritual authority, none temporal.
+      Let him prescribe a fast, and he shall be obeyed; but, for the rash
+      Rienzi, say that Stephen Colonna will seek him in the Capitol tomorrow,
+      for the purpose of throwing him out of the highest window.&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      These messages the envoy failed not to deliver.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      The captain of the Romans was equally stern in his reply.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;Declare to your Lord,&rdquo; said he, &ldquo;that Rome holds him and his as rebels
+      and traitors; and that the moment you regain your troop, our archers
+      receive our command to draw their bows&mdash;in the name of the Pope, the
+      City, and the Liberator.&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      This threat was executed to the letter; and ere the old Baron had time to
+      draw up his men in the best array, the gates were thrown open, and a
+      well-armed, if undisciplined, multitude poured forth, with fierce shouts,
+      clashing their arms, and advancing the azure banners of the Roman State.
+      So desperate their charge, and so great their numbers, that the Barons,
+      after a short and tumultuous conflict, were driven back, and chased by
+      their pursuers for more than a mile from the walls of the city.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      As soon as the Barons recovered their disorder and dismay, a hasty council
+      was held, at which various and contradictory opinions were loudly urged.
+      Some were for departing on the instant to Palestrina, which belonged to
+      the Colonna, and possessed an almost inaccessible fortress. Others were
+      for dispersing, and entering peaceably, and in detached parties, through
+      the other gates. Stephen Colonna&mdash;himself incensed and disturbed from
+      his usual self-command&mdash;was unable to preserve his authority; Luca di
+      Savelli, (The more correct orthography were Luca di Savello, but the one
+      in the text is preserved as more familiar to the English reader.) a timid,
+      though treacherous and subtle man, already turned his horse&rsquo;s head, and
+      summoned his men to follow him to his castle in Romagna, when the old
+      Colonna bethought himself of a method by which to keep his band from a
+      disunion that he had the sense to perceive would prove fatal to the common
+      cause. He proposed that they should at once repair to Palestrina, and
+      there fortify themselves; while one of the chiefs should be selected to
+      enter Rome alone, and apparently submissive, to examine the strength of
+      Rienzi; and with the discretionary power to resist if possible,&mdash;or
+      to make the best terms he could for the admission of the rest.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;And who,&rdquo; asked Savelli, sneeringly, &ldquo;will undertake this dangerous
+      mission? Who, unarmed and alone, will expose himself to the rage of the
+      fiercest populace of Italy, and the caprice of a demagogue in the first
+      flush of his power?&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      The Barons and the Captains looked at each other in silence. Savelli
+      laughed.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      Hitherto Adrian had taken no part in the conference, and but little in the
+      previous contest. He now came to the support of his kinsman.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;Signors!&rdquo; said he, &ldquo;I will undertake this mission,&mdash;but on mine own
+      account, independently of yours;&mdash;free to act as I may think best,
+      for the dignity of a Roman noble, and the interests of a Roman citizen;
+      free to raise my standard on mine own tower, or to yield fealty to the new
+      estate.&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;Well said!&rdquo; cried the old Colonna, hastily. &ldquo;Heaven forbid we should
+      enter Rome as foes, if to enter it as friends be yet allowed us! What say
+      ye, gentles?&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;A more worthy choice could not be selected,&rdquo; said Savelli; &ldquo;but I should
+      scarce deem it possible that a Colonna could think there was an option
+      between resistance and fealty to this upstart revolution.&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;Of that, Signor, I will judge for myself; if you demand an agent for
+      yourselves, choose another. I announce to ye frankly, that I have seen
+      enough of other states to think the recent condition of Rome demanded some
+      redress. Whether Rienzi and Raimond be worthy of the task they have
+      assumed, I know not.&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      Savelli was silent. The old Colonna seized the word.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;To Palestrina, then!&mdash;are ye all agreed on this? At the worst, or at
+      the best, we should not be divided! On this condition alone I hazard the
+      safety of my kinsman!&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      The Barons murmured a little among themselves;&mdash;the expediency of
+      Stephen&rsquo;s proposition was evident, and they at length assented to it.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      Adrian saw them depart, and then, attended only by his squire, slowly rode
+      towards a more distant entrance into the city. On arriving at the gates,
+      his name was demanded&mdash;he gave it freely.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;Enter, my Lord,&rdquo; said the warder, &ldquo;our orders were to admit all that came
+      unarmed and unattended. But to the Lord Adrian di Castello, alone, we had
+      a special injunction to give the honours due to a citizen and a friend.&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      Adrian, a little touched by this implied recollection of friendship, now
+      rode through a long line of armed citizens, who saluted him respectfully
+      as he passed, and, as he returned the salutation with courtesy, a loud and
+      approving shout followed his horse&rsquo;s steps.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      So, save by one attendant, alone, and in peace, the young patrician
+      proceeded leisurely through the long streets, empty and deserted,&mdash;for
+      nearly one half of the inhabitants were assembled at the walls, and nearly
+      the other half were engaged in a more peaceful duty,&mdash;until,
+      penetrating the interior, the wide and elevated space of the Capitol broke
+      upon his sight. The sun was slowly setting over an immense multitude that
+      overspread the spot, and high above a scaffold raised in the centre,
+      shone, to the western ray, the great Gonfalon of Rome, studded with silver
+      stars.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      Adrian reined in his steed. &ldquo;This,&rdquo; thought he, &ldquo;is scarcely the hour thus
+      publicly to confer with Rienzi; yet fain would I, mingled with the crowd,
+      judge how far his power is supported, and in what manner it is borne.&rdquo;
+       Musing a little, he withdrew into one of the obscurer streets, then wholly
+      deserted, surrendered his horse to his squire, and, borrowing of the
+      latter his morion and long mantle, passed to one of the more private
+      entrances of the Capitol, and, enveloped in his cloak, stood&mdash;one of
+      the crowd&mdash;intent upon all that followed.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;And what,&rdquo; he asked of a plainly dressed citizen, &ldquo;is the cause of this
+      assembly?&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;Heard you not the proclamation?&rdquo; returned the other in some surprise. &ldquo;Do
+      you not know that the Council of the City and the Guilds of the Artisans
+      have passed a vote to proffer to Rienzi the title of king of Rome?&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      The Knight of the Emperor, to whom belonged that august dignity, drew back
+      in dismay.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;And,&rdquo; resumed the citizen, &ldquo;this assembly of all the lesser Barons,
+      Councillors, and Artificers, is convened to hear the answer.&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;Of course it will be assent?&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;I know not&mdash;there are strange rumours; hitherto the Liberator has
+      concealed his sentiments.&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      At that instant a loud flourish of martial music announced the approach of
+      Rienzi. The crowd tumultuously divided, and presently, from the Palace of
+      the Capitol to the scaffold, passed Rienzi, still in complete armour, save
+      the helmet, and with him, in all the pomp of his episcopal robes, Raimond
+      of Orvietto.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      As soon as Rienzi had ascended the platform, and was thus made visible to
+      the whole concourse, no words can suffice to paint the enthusiasm of the
+      scene&mdash;the shouts, the gestures, the tears, the sobs, the wild
+      laughter, in which the sympathy of those lively and susceptible children
+      of the South broke forth. The windows and balconies of the Palace were
+      thronged with the wives and daughters of the lesser Barons and more
+      opulent citizens; and Adrian, with a slight start, beheld amongst them,&mdash;pale&mdash;agitated&mdash;tearful,&mdash;the
+      lovely face of his Irene&mdash;a face that even thus would have outshone
+      all present, but for one by her side, whose beauty the emotion of the hour
+      only served to embellish. The dark, large, and flashing eyes of Nina di
+      Raselli, just bedewed, were fixed proudly on the hero of her choice: and
+      pride, even more than joy, gave a richer carnation to her cheek, and the
+      presence of a queen to her noble and rounded form. The setting sun poured
+      its full glory over the spot; the bared heads&mdash;the animated faces of
+      the crowd&mdash;the grey and vast mass of the Capitol; and, not far from
+      the side of Rienzi, it brought into a strange and startling light the
+      sculptured form of a colossal Lion of Basalt, (The existent Capitol is
+      very different from the building at the time of Rienzi; and the reader
+      must not suppose that the present staircase, designed by Michael Angelo,
+      at the base of which are two marble lions, removed by Pius IV. from the
+      Church of St. Stephen del Cacco, was the staircase of the Lion of Basalt,
+      which bears so stern a connexion with the history of Rienzi. That mute
+      witness of dark deeds is no more.) which gave its name to a staircase
+      leading to the Capitol. It was an old Egyptian relic,&mdash;vast, worn,
+      and grim; some symbol of a vanished creed, to whose face the sculptor had
+      imparted something of the aspect of the human countenance. And this
+      producing the effect probably sought, gave at all times a mystic,
+      preternatural, and fearful expression to the stern features, and to that
+      solemn and hushed repose, which is so peculiarly the secret of Egyptian
+      sculpture. The awe which this colossal and frowning image was calculated
+      to convey, was felt yet more deeply by the vulgar, because &ldquo;the Staircase
+      of the Lion&rdquo; was the wonted place of the state executions, as of the state
+      ceremonies. And seldom did the stoutest citizen forget to cross himself,
+      or feel unchilled with a certain terror, whenever, passing by the place,
+      he caught, suddenly fixed upon him, the stony gaze and ominous grin of
+      that old monster from the cities of the Nile.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      It was some minutes before the feelings of the assembly allowed Rienzi to
+      be heard. But when, at length, the last shout closed with a simultaneous
+      cry of &ldquo;Long live Rienzi! Deliverer and King of Rome!&rdquo; he raised his hand
+      impatiently, and the curiosity of the crowd procured a sudden silence.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;Deliverer of Rome, my countrymen!&rdquo; said he. &ldquo;Yes! change not that title&mdash;I
+      am too ambitious to be a King! Preserve your obedience to your Pontiff&mdash;your
+      allegiance to your Emperor&mdash;but be faithful to your own liberties. Ye
+      have a right to your ancient constitution; but that constitution needed
+      not a king. Emulous of the name of Brutus, I am above the titles of a
+      Tarquin! Romans, awake! awake! be inspired with a nobler love of liberty
+      than that which, if it dethrones the tyrant of today, would madly risk the
+      danger of tyranny for tomorrow! Rome wants still a liberator&mdash;never
+      an usurper!&mdash;Take away yon bauble!&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      There was a pause; the crowd were deeply affected&mdash;but they uttered
+      no shouts; they looked anxiously for a reply from their councillors, or
+      popular leaders.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;Signor,&rdquo; said Pandulfo di Guido, who was one of the Caporioni, &ldquo;your
+      answer is worthy of your fame. But, in order to enforce the law, Rome must
+      endow you with a legal title&mdash;if not that of King, deign to accept
+      that of Dictator or of Consul.&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;Long live the Consul Rienzi!&rdquo; cried several voices.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      Rienzi waved his hand for silence.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;Pandulfo di Guido! and you, honoured Councillors of Rome! such title is
+      at once too august for my merits, and too inapplicable to my functions. I
+      am one of the people&mdash;the people are my charge; the nobles can
+      protect themselves. Dictator and Consul are the appellations of
+      patricians. No,&rdquo; he continued after a short pause, &ldquo;if ye deem it
+      necessary, for the preservation of order, that your fellow-citizen should
+      be intrusted with a formal title and a recognised power, be it so: but let
+      it be such as may attest the nature of our new institutions, the wisdom of
+      the people, and the moderation of their leaders. Once, my countrymen, the
+      people elected, for the protectors of their rights and the guardians of
+      their freedom, certain officers responsible to the people,&mdash;chosen
+      from the people,&mdash;provident for the people. Their power was great,
+      but it was delegated: a dignity, but a trust. The name of these officers
+      with that of Tribune. Such is the title that conceded, not by clamour
+      alone, but in the full Parliament of the people, and accompanied by, such
+      Parliament, ruling with such Parliament,&mdash;such is the title I will
+      gratefully accept.&rdquo;
+     </p>
+<pre xml:space="preserve">
+     (Gibbon and Sismondi alike, (neither of whom appears to have
+     consulted with much attention the original documents
+     preserved by Hocsemius,) say nothing of the Representative
+     Parliament, which it was almost Rienzi&rsquo;s first public act to
+     institute or model. Six days from the memorable 19th of May,
+     he addressed the people of Viterbo in a letter yet extant.
+     He summons them to elect and send two syndics, or
+     ambassadors, to the general Parliament.)
+</pre>
+    <p>
+      The speech, the sentiments of Rienzi were rendered far more impressive by
+      a manner of earnest and deep sincerity; and some of the Romans, despite
+      their corruption, felt a momentary exultation in the forbearance of their
+      chief. &ldquo;Long live the Tribune of Rome!&rdquo; was shouted, but less loud than
+      the cry of &ldquo;Live the King!&rdquo; And the vulgar almost thought the revolution
+      was incomplete, because the loftier title was not assumed. To a degenerate
+      and embruted people, liberty seems too plain a thing, if unadorned by the
+      pomp of the very despotism they would dethrone. Revenge is their desire,
+      rather than Release; and the greater the new power they create, the
+      greater seems their revenge against the old. Still all that was most
+      respected, intelligent, and powerful amongst the assembly, were delighted
+      at a temperance which they foresaw would free Rome from a thousand
+      dangers, whether from the Emperor or the Pontiff. And their delight was
+      yet increased, when Rienzi added, so soon as returning silence permitted&mdash;&ldquo;And
+      since we have been equal labourers in the same cause, whatever honours be
+      awarded to me, should be extended also to the Vicar of the Pope, Raimond,
+      Lord Bishop of Orvietto. Remember, that both Church and State are properly
+      the rulers of the people, only because their benefactors.&mdash;Long live
+      the first Vicar of a Pope that was ever also the Liberator of a State!&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      Whether or not Rienzi was only actuated by patriotism in his moderation,
+      certain it is, that his sagacity was at least equal to his virtue; and
+      perhaps nothing could have cemented the revolution more strongly, than
+      thus obtaining for a colleague the Vicar, and Representative of the
+      Pontifical power: it borrowed, for the time, the sanction of the Pope
+      himself&mdash;thus made to share the responsibility of the revolution,
+      without monopolising the power of the State.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      While the crowd hailed the proposition of Rienzi; while their shouts yet
+      filled the air; while Raimond, somewhat taken by surprise, sought by signs
+      and gestures to convey at once his gratitude and his humility, the
+      Tribune-Elect, casting his eyes around, perceived many hitherto attracted
+      by curiosity, and whom, from their rank and weight, it was desirable to
+      secure in the first heat of the public enthusiasm. Accordingly, as soon as
+      Raimond had uttered a short and pompous harangue,&mdash;in which his eager
+      acceptance of the honour proposed him was ludicrously contrasted by his
+      embarrassed desire not to involve himself or the Pope in any untoward
+      consequences that might ensue,&mdash;Rienzi motioned to two heralds that
+      stood behind upon the platform, and one of these advancing, proclaimed&mdash;&ldquo;That
+      as it was desirable that all hitherto neuter should now profess themselves
+      friends or foes, so they were invited to take at once the oath of
+      obedience to the laws, and subscription to the Buono Stato.&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      So great was the popular fervour, and so much had it been refined and
+      deepened in its tone by the addresses of Rienzi, that even the most
+      indifferent had caught the contagion: and no man liked to be seen
+      shrinking from the rest: so that the most neutral, knowing themselves the
+      most marked, were the most entrapped into allegiance to the Buono Stato.
+      The first who advanced to the platform and took the oath was the Signor di
+      Raselli, the father of Nina.&mdash;Others of the lesser nobility followed
+      his example.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      The presence of the Pope&rsquo;s Vicar induced the aristocratic; the fear of the
+      people urged the selfish; the encouragement of shouts and gratulations
+      excited the vain. The space between Adrian and Rienzi was made clear. The
+      young noble suddenly felt the eyes of the Tribune were upon him; he felt
+      that those eyes recognised and called upon him&mdash;he coloured&mdash;he
+      breathed short. The noble forbearance of Rienzi had touched him to the
+      heart;&mdash;the applause&mdash;the pageant&mdash;the enthusiasm of the
+      scene, intoxicated&mdash;confused him.&mdash;He lifted his eyes and saw
+      before him the sister of the Tribune&mdash;the lady of his love! His
+      indecision&mdash;his pause&mdash;continued, when Raimond, observing him,
+      and obedient to a whisper from Rienzi, artfully cried aloud&mdash;&ldquo;Room
+      for the Lord Adrian di Castello! a Colonna! a Colonna!&rdquo; Retreat was cut
+      off. Mechanically, and as if in a dream, Adrian ascended to the platform:
+      and to complete the triumph of the Tribune, the sun&rsquo;s last ray beheld the
+      flower of the Colonna&mdash;the best and bravest of the Barons of Rome&mdash;confessing
+      his authority, and subscribing to his laws!
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      <a name="link2H_4_0026" id="link2H_4_0026">
+      <!--  H2 anchor --> </a>
+    </p>
+    <div style="height: 4em;">
+      <br /><br /><br /><br />
+    </div>
+    <h2>
+      BOOK III. THE FREEDOM WITHOUT LAW.
+    </h2>
+<pre xml:space="preserve">
+     &ldquo;Ben furo avventurosi i cavalieri
+     Ch&rsquo; erano a quella eta, che nei vallone,
+     Nelle scure spelonche e boschi fieri,
+     Tane di serpi, d&rsquo;orsi e di leoni,
+     Trovavan quel che nei palazzi altieri
+     Appena or trovar pon giudici buoni;
+     Donne che nella lor piu fresca etade
+     Sien degne di aver titol di beltade.&rdquo;
+ 
+     Ariosto, Orlando Furioso, can. xiii. 1.
+</pre>
+    <p>
+      <a name="link2HCH0021" id="link2HCH0021">
+      <!--  H2 anchor --> </a>
+    </p>
+    <div style="height: 4em;">
+      <br /><br /><br /><br />
+    </div>
+    <h2>
+      Chapter 3.I. The Return of Walter de Montreal to his Fortress.
+    </h2>
+    <p>
+      When Walter de Montreal and his mercenaries quitted Corneto, they made the
+      best of their way to Rome; arriving there, long before the Barons, they
+      met with a similar reception at the gates, but Montreal prudently forbore
+      all attack and menace, and contented himself with sending his trusty
+      Rodolf into the city to seek Rienzi, and to crave permission to enter with
+      his troop. Rodolf returned in a shorter time than was anticipated. &ldquo;Well,&rdquo;
+       said Montreal impatiently, &ldquo;you have the order I suppose. Shall we bid
+      them open the gates?&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;Bid them open our graves,&rdquo; replied the Saxon, bluntly. &ldquo;I trust my next
+      heraldry will be to a more friendly court.&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;How! what mean you?&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;Briefly this:&mdash;I found the new governor, or whatever his title, in
+      the palace of the Capitol, surrounded by guards and councillors, and in a
+      suit of the finest armour I ever saw out of Milan.&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;Pest on his armour! give us his answer.&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;&lsquo;Tell Walter de Montreal,&rsquo; said he, then, if you will have it, &lsquo;that Rome
+      is no longer a den of thieves; tell him, that if he enters, he must abide
+      a trial&mdash;&lsquo;&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;A trial!&rdquo; cried Montreal, grinding his teeth.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;&lsquo;For participation in the evil doings of Werner and his freebooters.&rsquo;&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;Ha!&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;&lsquo;Tell him, moreover, that Rome declares war against all robbers, whether
+      in tent or tower, and that we order him in forty-eight hours to quit the
+      territories of the Church.&rsquo;&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;He thinks, then, not only to deceive, but to menace me? Well, proceed.&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;That was all his reply to you; to me, however, he vouchsafed a caution
+      still more obliging. &lsquo;Hark ye, friend,&rsquo; said he, for every German bandit
+      found in Rome after tomorrow, our welcome will be cord and gibbet!
+      Begone.&rsquo;&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;Enough! enough!&rdquo; cried Montreal, colouring with rage and shame. &ldquo;Rodolf,
+      you have a skilful eye in these matters, how many Northmen would it take
+      to give that same gibbet to the upstart?&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      Rodolf scratched his huge head, and seemed awhile lost in calculation; at
+      length he said, &ldquo;You, Captain, must be the best judge, when I tell you,
+      that twenty thousand Romans are the least of his force, so I heard by the
+      way; and this evening he is to accept the crown, and depose the Emperor.&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;Ha, ha!&rdquo; laughed Montreal, &ldquo;is he so mad? then he will want not our aid
+      to hang himself. My friends, let us wait the result. At present neither
+      barons nor people seem likely to fill our coffers. Let us across the
+      country to Terracina. Thank the saints,&rdquo; and Montreal (who was not without
+      a strange kind of devotion,&mdash;indeed he deemed that virtue essential
+      to chivalry) crossed himself piously, &ldquo;the free companions are never long
+      without quarters!&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;Hurrah for the Knight of St. John!&rdquo; cried the mercenaries. &ldquo;And hurrah
+      for fair Provence and bold Germany!&rdquo; added the Knight, as he waved his
+      hand on high, struck spurs into his already wearied horse, and, breaking
+      out into his favourite song,
+    </p>
+<pre xml:space="preserve">
+     &ldquo;His steed and his sword,
+     And his lady the peerless,&rdquo; &amp;c.,
+</pre>
+    <p>
+      Montreal, with his troop, struck gallantly across the Campagna.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      The Knight of St. John soon, however, fell into an absorbed and moody
+      reverie; and his followers imitating the silence of their chief, in a few
+      minutes the clatter of their arms and the jingle of their spurs, alone
+      disturbed the stillness of the wide and gloomy plains across which they
+      made towards Terracina. Montreal was recalling with bitter resentment his
+      conference with Rienzi; and, proud of his own sagacity and talent for
+      scheming, he was humbled and vexed at the discovery that he had been duped
+      by a wilier intriguer. His ambitious designs on Rome, too, were crossed,
+      and even crushed for the moment, by the very means to which he had looked
+      for their execution. He had seen enough of the Barons to feel assured that
+      while Stephen Colonna lived, the head of the order, he was not likely to
+      obtain that mastery in the state which, if leagued with a more ambitious
+      or a less timid and less potent signor, might reward his aid in expelling
+      Rienzi. Under all circumstances, he deemed it advisable to remain aloof.
+      Should Rienzi grow strong, Montreal might make the advantageous terms he
+      desired with the Barons; should Rienzi&rsquo;s power decay, his pride,
+      necessarily humbled, might drive him to seek the assistance, and submit to
+      the proposals, of Montreal. The ambition of the Provencal, though vast and
+      daring, was not of a consistent and persevering nature. Action and
+      enterprise were dearer to him, as yet, than the rewards which they
+      proffered; and if baffled in one quarter, he turned himself, with the true
+      spirit of the knight-errant, to any other field for his achievements.
+      Louis, king of Hungary, stern, warlike, implacable, seeking vengeance for
+      the murder of his brother, the ill-fated husband of Joanna, (the beautiful
+      and guilty Queen of Naples&mdash;the Mary Stuart of Italy,) had already
+      prepared himself to subject the garden of Campania to the Hungarian yoke.
+      Already his bastard brother had entered Italy&mdash;already some of the
+      Neapolitan states had declared in his favour&mdash;already promises had
+      been held out by the northern monarch to the scattered Companies&mdash;and
+      already those fierce mercenaries gathered menacingly round the frontiers
+      of that Eden of Italy, attracted, as vultures to the carcass, by the
+      preparation of war and the hope of plunder. Such was the field to which
+      the bold mind of Montreal now turned its thoughts; and his soldiers had
+      joyfully conjectured his design when they had heard him fix Terracina as
+      their bourne. Provident of every resource, and refining his audacious and
+      unprincipled valour by a sagacity which promised, when years had more
+      matured and sobered his restless chivalry, to rank him among the most
+      dangerous enemies Italy had ever known, on the first sign of Louis&rsquo;s
+      warlike intentions, Montreal had seized and fortified a strong castle on
+      that delicious coast beyond Terracina, by which lies the celebrated pass
+      once held by Fabius against Hannibal, and which Nature has so favoured for
+      war as for peace, that a handful of armed men might stop the march of an
+      army. The possession of such a fortress on the very frontiers of Naples,
+      gave Montreal an importance of which he trusted to avail himself with the
+      Hungarian king: and now, thwarted in his more grand and aspiring projects
+      upon Rome, his sanguine, active, and elastic spirit congratulated itself
+      upon the resource it had secured.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      The band halted at nightfall on this side the Pontine Marshes, seizing
+      without scruple some huts and sheds, from which they ejected the miserable
+      tenants, and slaughtering with no greater ceremony the swine, cattle, and
+      poultry of a neighbouring farm. Shortly after sunrise they crossed those
+      fatal swamps which had already been partially drained by Boniface VIII.;
+      and Montreal, refreshed by sleep, reconciled to his late mortification by
+      the advantages opened to him in the approaching war with Naples, and
+      rejoicing as he approached a home which held one who alone divided his
+      heart with ambition, had resumed all the gaiety which belonged to his
+      Gallic birth and his reckless habits. And that deadly but consecrated
+      road, where yet may be seen the labours of Augustus, in the canal which
+      had witnessed the Voyage so humourously described by Horace, echoed with
+      the loud laughter and frequent snatches of wild song by which the
+      barbarian robbers enlivened their rapid march.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      It was noon when the company entered upon that romantic pass I have before
+      referred to&mdash;the ancient Lantulae. High to the left rose steep and
+      lofty rocks, then covered by the prodigal verdure, and the countless
+      flowers, of the closing May; while to the right the sea, gentle as a lake,
+      and blue as heaven, rippled musically at their feet. Montreal, who largely
+      possessed the poetry of his land, which is so eminently allied with a love
+      of nature, might at another time have enjoyed the beauty of the scene; but
+      at that moment less external and more household images were busy within
+      him.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      Abruptly ascending where a winding path up the mountain offered a rough
+      and painful road to their horses&rsquo; feet, the band at length arrived before
+      a strong fortress of grey stone, whose towers were concealed by the lofty
+      foliage, until they emerged sullenly and suddenly from the laughing
+      verdure. The sound of the bugle, the pennon of the knight, the rapid
+      watchword, produced a loud shout of welcome from a score or two of grim
+      soldiery on the walls; the portcullis was raised, and Montreal, throwing
+      himself hastily from his panting steed, sprung across the threshold of a
+      jutting porch, and traversed a huge hall, when a lady&mdash;young, fair,
+      and richly dressed&mdash;met him with a step equally swift, and fell
+      breathless and overjoyed into his arms.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;My Walter! my dear, dear Walter; welcome&mdash;ten thousand welcomes!&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;Adeline, my beautiful&mdash;my adored&mdash;I see thee again!&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      Such were the greetings interchanged as Montreal pressed his lady to his
+      heart, kissing away her tears, and lifting her face to his, while he gazed
+      on its delicate bloom with all the wistful anxiety of affection after
+      absence.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;Fairest,&rdquo; said he, tenderly, &ldquo;thou hast pined, thou hast lost roundness
+      and colour since we parted. Come, come, thou art too gentle, or too
+      foolish, for a soldier&rsquo;s love.&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;Ah, Walter!&rdquo; replied Adeline, clinging to him, &ldquo;now thou art returned,
+      and I shall be well. Thou wilt not leave me again a long, long time.&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;Sweet one, no;&rdquo; and flinging his arm round her waist, the lovers&mdash;for
+      alas! they were not wedded!&mdash;retired to the more private chambers of
+      the castle.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      <a name="link2HCH0022" id="link2HCH0022">
+      <!--  H2 anchor --> </a>
+    </p>
+    <div style="height: 4em;">
+      <br /><br /><br /><br />
+    </div>
+    <h2>
+      Chapter 3.II. The Life of Love and War&mdash;the Messenger of Peace&mdash;the
+    </h2>
+    <p>
+      Joust.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      Girt with his soldiery, secure in his feudal hold, enchanted with the
+      beauty of the earth, sky, and sea around, and passionately adoring his
+      Adeline, Montreal for awhile forgot all his more stirring projects and his
+      ruder occupations. His nature was capable of great tenderness, as of great
+      ferocity; and his heart smote him when he looked at the fair cheek of his
+      lady, and saw that even his presence did not suffice to bring back the
+      smile and the fresh hues of old. Often he cursed that fatal oath of his
+      knightly order which forbade him to wed, though with one more than his
+      equal; and remorse embittered his happiest hours. That gentle lady in that
+      robber hold, severed from all she had been taught most to prize&mdash;mother,
+      friends, and fair fame&mdash;only loved her seducer the more intensely;
+      only the more concentrated upon one object all the womanly and tender
+      feelings denied every other and less sinful vent. But she felt her shame,
+      though she sought to conceal it, and a yet more gnawing grief than even
+      that of shame contributed to prey upon her spirits and undermine her
+      health. Yet, withal, in Montreal&rsquo;s presence she was happy, even in regret;
+      and in her declining health she had at least a consolation in the hope to
+      die while his love was undiminished. Sometimes they made short excursions,
+      for the disturbed state of the country forbade them to wander far from the
+      castle, through the sunny woods, and along the glassy sea, which make the
+      charm of that delicious scenery; and that mixture of the savage with the
+      tender, the wild escort, the tent in some green glade in the woods at
+      noon, the lute and voice of Adeline, with the fierce soldiers grouped and
+      listening at the distance, might have well suited the verse of Ariosto,
+      and harmonised singularly with that strange, disordered, yet chivalric
+      time, in which the Classic South became the seat of the Northern Romance.
+      Still, however, Montreal maintained his secret intercourse with the
+      Hungarian king, and, plunged in new projects, willingly forsook for the
+      present all his designs on Rome. Yet deemed he that his more august
+      ambition was only delayed, and, bright in the more distant prospects of
+      his adventurous career, rose the Capitol of Rome and shone the sceptre of
+      the Caesars.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      One day, as Montreal, with a small troop in attendance, passed on
+      horseback near the walls of Terracina, the gates were suddenly thrown
+      open, and a numerous throng issued forth, preceded by a singular figure,
+      whose steps they followed bareheaded and with loud blessings; a train of
+      monks closed the procession, chanting a hymn, of which the concluding
+      words were as follows:&mdash;
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      Beauteous on the mountains&mdash;lo, The feet of him glad tidings gladly
+      bringing; The flowers along his pathway grow, And voices, heard aloft, to
+      angel harps are singing: And strife and slaughter cease Before thy blessed
+      way, Young Messenger of Peace! O&rsquo;er the mount, and through the moor, Glide
+      thy holy steps secure. Day and night no fear thou knowest, Lonely&mdash;but
+      with God thou goest. Where the Heathen rage the fiercest, Through the
+      armed throng thou piercest. For thy coat of mail, bedight In thy spotless
+      robe of white. For the sinful sword&mdash;thy hand Bearing bright the
+      silver wand: Through the camp and through the court, Through the bandit&rsquo;s
+      gloomy fort, On the mission of the dove, Speeds the minister of love; By a
+      word the wildest taming, And the world to Christ reclaiming: While, as
+      once the waters trod By the footsteps of thy God, War, and wrath, and
+      rapine cease, Hush&rsquo;d round thy charmed path, O Messenger of Peace!
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      The stranger to whom these honours were paid was a young, unbearded man,
+      clothed in white wrought with silver; he was unarmed and barefooted: in
+      his hand he held a tall silver wand. Montreal and his party halted in
+      astonishment and wonder, and the Knight, spurring his horse toward the
+      crowd, confronted the stranger.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;How, friend,&rdquo; quoth the Provencal, &ldquo;is thine a new order of pilgrims, or
+      what especial holiness has won thee this homage?&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;Back, back,&rdquo; cried some of the bolder of the crowd, &ldquo;let not the robber
+      dare arrest the Messenger of Peace.&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      Montreal waved his hand disdainfully.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;I speak not to you, good sirs, and the worthy friars in your rear know
+      full well that I never injured herald or palmer.&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      The monks, ceasing from their hymn, advanced hastily to the spot; and
+      indeed the devotion of Montreal had ever induced him to purchase the
+      goodwill of whatever monastery neighboured his wandering home.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;My son,&rdquo; said the eldest of the brethren, &ldquo;this is a strange spectacle,
+      and a sacred: and when thou learnest all, thou wilt rather give the
+      messenger a passport of safety from the unthinking courage of thy friends
+      than intercept his path of peace.&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;Ye puzzle still more my simple brain,&rdquo; said Montreal, impatiently, &ldquo;let
+      the youth speak for himself; I perceive that on his mantle are the arms of
+      Rome blended with other quarterings, which are a mystery to me,&mdash;though
+      sufficiently versed in heraldic art as befits a noble and a knight.&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;Signor,&rdquo; said the youth, gravely, &ldquo;know in me the messenger of Cola di
+      Rienzi, Tribune of Rome, charged with letters to many a baron and prince
+      in the ways between Rome and Naples. The arms wrought upon my mantle are
+      those of the Pontiff, the City, and the Tribune.&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;Umph; thou must have bold nerves to traverse the Campagna with no other
+      weapon than that stick of silver!&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;Thou art mistaken, Sir Knight,&rdquo; replied the youth, boldly, &ldquo;and judgest
+      of the present by the past; know that not a single robber now lurks within
+      the Campagna, the arms of the Tribune have rendered every road around the
+      city as secure as the broadest street of the city itself.&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;Thou tellest me wonders.&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;Through the forest&mdash;and in the fortress,&mdash;through the wildest
+      solitudes,&mdash;through the most populous towns,&mdash;have my comrades
+      borne this silver wand unmolested and unscathed; wherever we pass along,
+      thousands hail us, and tears of joy bless the messengers of him who hath
+      expelled the brigand from his hold, the tyrant from his castle, and
+      ensured the gains of the merchant and the hut of the peasant.&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;Pardieu,&rdquo; said Montreal, with a stern smile, &ldquo;I ought to be thankful for
+      the preference shown to me; I have not yet received the commands, nor felt
+      the vengeance, of the Tribune; yet, methinks, my humble castle lies just
+      within the patrimony of St. Peter.&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;Pardon me, Signor Cavalier,&rdquo; said the youth; &ldquo;but do I address the
+      renowned Knight of St. John, warrior of the Cross, yet leader of
+      banditti?&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;Boy, you are bold; I am Walter de Montreal.&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;I am bound, then, Sir Knight, to your castle.&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;Take care how thou reach it before me, or thou standest a fair chance of
+      a quick exit. How now, my friends!&rdquo; seeing that the crowd at these words
+      gathered closer round the messenger, &ldquo;Think ye that I, who have my mate in
+      kings, would find a victim in an unarmed boy? Fie! give way&mdash;give
+      way. Young man, follow me homeward; you are safe in my castle as in your
+      mother&rsquo;s arms.&rdquo; So saying, Montreal, with great dignity and deliberate
+      gravity, rode slowly towards his castle, his soldiers, wondering, at a
+      little distance, and the white-robed messenger following with the crowd,
+      who refused to depart; so great was their enthusiasm, that they even
+      ascended to the gates of the dreaded castle, and insisted on waiting
+      without until the return of the youth assured them of his safety.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      Montreal, who, however lawless elsewhere, strictly preserved the rights of
+      the meanest boor in his immediate neighbourhood, and rather affected
+      popularity with the poor, bade the crowd enter the courtyard, ordered his
+      servitors to provide them with wine and refreshment, regaled the good
+      monks in his great hall, and then led the way to a small room, where he
+      received the messenger.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;This,&rdquo; said the youth, &ldquo;will best explain my mission,&rdquo; as he placed a
+      letter before Montreal.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      The Knight cut the silk with his dagger, and read the epistle with great
+      composure.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;Your Tribune,&rdquo; said he, when he had finished it, &ldquo;has learned the laconic
+      style of power very soon. He orders me to render this castle, and vacate
+      the Papal Territory within ten days. He is obliging; I must have breathing
+      time to consider the proposal; be seated, I pray you, young sir. Forgive
+      me, but I should have imagined that your lord had enough upon his hands
+      with his Roman barons, to make him a little more indulgent to us foreign
+      visitors. Stephen Colonna&mdash;&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;Is returned to Rome, and has taken the oath of allegiance; the Savelli,
+      the Orsini, the Frangipani, have all subscribed their submission to the
+      Buono Stato.&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;How!&rdquo; cried Montreal, in great surprise.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;Not only have they returned, but they have submitted to the dispersion of
+      all their mercenaries, and the dismantling of all their fortifications.
+      The iron of the Orsini palace now barricades the Capitol, and the
+      stonework of the Colonna and the Savelli has added new battlements to the
+      gates of the Lateran and St. Laurence.&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;Wonderful man!&rdquo; said Montreal, with reluctant admiration. &ldquo;By what means
+      was this effected?&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;A stern command and a strong force to back it. At the first sound of the
+      great bell, twenty thousand Romans rise in arms. What to such an army are
+      the brigands of an Orsini or a Colonna?&mdash;Sir Knight, your valour and
+      renown make even Rome admire you; and I, a Roman, bid you beware.&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;Well, I thank thee&mdash;thy news, friend, robs me of breath. So the
+      Barons submit, then?&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;Yes: on the first day, one of the Colonna, the Lord Adrian, took the
+      oath; within a week, Stephen, assured of safe conduct, left Palestrina,
+      the Savelli in his train; the Orsini followed&mdash;even Martino di Porto
+      has silently succumbed.&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;The Tribune&mdash;but is that his dignity&mdash;methought he was to be
+      king&mdash;&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;He was offered, and he refused, the title. His present rank, which
+      arrogates no patrician honours, went far to conciliate the nobles.&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;A wise knave!&mdash;I beg pardon, a sagacious prince!&mdash;Well, then,
+      the Tribune lords it mightily, I suppose, over the great Roman names?&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;Pardon me&mdash;he enforces impartial justice from peasant or patrician;
+      but he preserves to the nobles all their just privileges and legal rank.&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;Ha!&mdash;and the vain puppets, so they keep the semblance, scarce miss
+      the substance&mdash;I understand. But this shows genius&mdash;the Tribune
+      is unwed, I think. Does he look among the Colonna for a wife?&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;Sir Knight, the Tribune is already married; within three days after his
+      ascension to power, he won and bore home the daughter of the Baron di
+      Raselli.&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;Raselli! no great name; he might have done better.&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;But it is said,&rdquo; resumed the youth, smiling, &ldquo;that the Tribune will
+      shortly be allied to the Colonna, through his fair sister the Signora
+      Irene. The Baron di Castello woos her.&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;What, Adrian Colonna! Enough! you have convinced me that a man who
+      contents the people and awes or conciliates the nobles is born for empire.
+      My answer to this letter I will send myself. For your news, Sir Messenger,
+      accept this jewel,&rdquo; and the knight took from his finger a gem of some
+      price. &ldquo;Nay, shrink not, it was as freely given to me as it is now to
+      thee.&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      The youth, who had been agreeably surprised, and impressed, by the manner
+      of the renowned freebooter, and who was not a little astonished himself
+      with the ease and familiarity with which he had been relating to Fra
+      Moreale, in his own fortress, the news of Rome, bowed low as he accepted
+      the gift.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      The astute Provencal, who saw the evident impression he had made,
+      perceived also that it might be of advantage in delaying the measures he
+      might deem it expedient to adopt. &ldquo;Assure the Tribune,&rdquo; said he, on
+      dismissing the messenger, &ldquo;shouldst thou return ere my letter arrive, that
+      I admire his genius, hail his power, and will not fail to consider as
+      favourably as I may of his demand.&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;Better,&rdquo; said the messenger, warmly (he was of good blood, and gentle
+      bearing),&mdash;&ldquo;better ten tyrants for our enemy, than one Montreal.&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;An enemy! believe me, sir, I seek no enmity with princes who know how to
+      govern, or a people that has the wisdom at once to rule and to obey.&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      The whole of that day, however, Montreal remained thoughtful and uneasy;
+      he despatched trusty messengers to the Governor of Aquila (who was then in
+      correspondence with Louis of Hungary), to Naples, and to Rome:&mdash;the
+      last charged with a letter to the Tribune, which, without absolutely
+      compromising himself, affected submission, and demanded only a longer
+      leisure for the preparations of departure. But, at the same time, fresh
+      fortifications were added to the castle, ample provisions were laid in,
+      and, night and day, spies and scouts were stationed along the pass, and in
+      the town of Terracina. Montreal was precisely the chief who prepared most
+      for war when most he pretended peace.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      One morning, the fifth from the appearance of the Roman messenger,
+      Montreal, after narrowly surveying his outworks and his stores, and
+      feeling satisfied that he could hold out at least a month&rsquo;s siege,
+      repaired, with a gayer countenance than he had lately worn, to the chamber
+      of Adeline.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      The lady was seated by the casement of the tower, from which might be seen
+      the glorious landscape of woods, and vales, and orange groves&mdash;a
+      strange garden for such a palace! As she leant her face upon her hand,
+      with her profile slightly turned to Montreal, there was something
+      ineffably graceful in the bend of her neck,&mdash;the small head so
+      expressive of gentle blood,&mdash;with the locks parted in front in that
+      simple fashion which modern times have so happily revived. But the
+      expression of the half-averted face, the abstracted intentness of the
+      gaze, and the profound stillness of the attitude, were so sad and
+      mournful, that Montreal&rsquo;s purposed greeting of gallantry and gladness died
+      upon his lips. He approached in silence, and laid his hand upon her
+      shoulder.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      Adeline turned, and taking the hand in hers, pressed it to her heart, and
+      smiled away all her sadness. &ldquo;Dearest,&rdquo; said Montreal, &ldquo;couldst thou know
+      how much any shadow of grief on thy bright face darkens my heart, thou
+      wouldst never grieve. But no wonder that in these rude walls&mdash;no
+      female of equal rank near thee, and such mirth as Montreal can summon to
+      his halls, grating to thy ear&mdash;no wonder that thou repentest thee of
+      thy choice.&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;Ah, no&mdash;no, Walter, I never repent. I did but think of our child as
+      you entered. Alas! he was our only child! How fair he was, Walter; how he
+      resembled thee!&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;Nay, he had thine eyes and brow,&rdquo; replied the Knight, with a faltering
+      voice, and turning away his head.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;Walter,&rdquo; resumed the lady, sighing, &ldquo;do you remember?&mdash;this is his
+      birthday. He is ten years old today. We have loved each other eleven
+      years, and thou hast not tired yet of thy poor Adeline.&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;As well might the saints weary of paradise,&rdquo; replied Montreal, with an
+      enamoured tenderness, which changed into softness the whole character of
+      his heroic countenance.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;Could I think so, I should indeed be blest!&rdquo; answered Adeline. &ldquo;But a
+      little while longer, and the few charms I yet possess must fade; and what
+      other claim have I on thee?&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;All claim;&mdash;the memory of thy first blushes&mdash;thy first kiss&mdash;of
+      thy devoted sacrifices&mdash;of thy patient wanderings&mdash;of thy
+      uncomplaining love! Ah, Adeline, we are of Provence, not of Italy; and
+      when did Knight of Provence avoid his foe, or forsake his love? But
+      enough, dearest, of home and melancholy for today. I come to bid thee
+      forth. I have sent on the servitors to pitch our tent beside the sea,&mdash;we
+      will enjoy the orange blossoms while we may. Ere another week pass over
+      us, we may have sterner pastime and closer confines.&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;How, dearest Walter! thou dost not apprehend danger?&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;Thou speakest, lady-bird,&rdquo; said Montreal, laughing, &ldquo;as if danger were
+      novelty; methinks by this time, thou shouldst know it as the atmosphere we
+      breathe.&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;Ah, Walter, is this to last for ever? Thou art now rich and renowned;
+      canst thou not abandon this career of strife?&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;Now, out on thee, Adeline! What are riches and renown but the means to
+      power! And for strife, the shield of warriors was my cradle&mdash;pray the
+      saints it be my bier! These wild and wizard extremes of life&mdash;from
+      the bower to the tent&mdash;from the cavern to the palace&mdash;today a
+      wandering exile, tomorrow the equal of kings&mdash;make the true element
+      of the chivalry of my Norman sires. Normandy taught me war, and sweet
+      Provence love. Kiss me, dear Adeline; and now let thy handmaids attire
+      thee. Forget not thy lute, sweet one. We will rouse the echoes with the
+      songs of Provence.&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      The ductile temper of Adeline yielded easily to the gaiety of her lord;
+      and the party soon sallied from the castle towards the spot in which
+      Montreal had designed their resting-place during the heats of day. But
+      already prepared for all surprise, the castle was left strictly guarded,
+      and besides the domestic servitors of the castle, a detachment of ten
+      soldiers, completely armed, accompanied the lovers. Montreal himself wore
+      his corselet, and his squires followed with his helmet and lance. Beyond
+      the narrow defile at the base of the castle, the road at that day opened
+      into a broad patch of verdure, circled on all sides, save that open to the
+      sea, by wood, interspersed with myrtle and orange, and a wilderness of
+      odorous shrubs. In this space, and sheltered by the broad-spreading and
+      classic fagus (so improperly translated into the English &ldquo;beech&rdquo;), a gay
+      pavilion was prepared, which commanded the view of the sparkling sea;&mdash;shaded
+      from the sun, but open to the gentle breeze. This was poor Adeline&rsquo;s
+      favourite recreation, if recreation it might be called. She rejoiced to
+      escape from the gloomy walls of her castellated prison, and to enjoy the
+      sunshine and the sweets of that voluptuous climate without the fatigue
+      which of late all exercise occasioned her. It was a gallantry on the part
+      of Montreal, who foresaw how short an interval might elapse before the
+      troops of Rienzi besieged his walls; and who was himself no less at home
+      in the bower than in the field.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      As they reclined within the pavilion&mdash;the lover and his lady,&mdash;of
+      the attendants without, some lounged idly on the beach; some prepared the
+      awning of a pleasure-boat against the decline of the sun; some, in a ruder
+      tent, out of sight in the wood, arranged the mid-day repast; while the
+      strings of the lute, touched by Montreal himself with a careless skill,
+      gave their music to the dreamy stillness of the noon.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      While thus employed, one of Montreal&rsquo;s scouts arrived breathless and
+      heated at the tent.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;Captain,&rdquo; said he, &ldquo;a company of thirty lances completely armed, with a
+      long retinue of squires and pages, have just quitted Terracina. Their
+      banners bear the two-fold insignia of Rome and the Colonna.&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;Ho!&rdquo; said Montreal, gaily, &ldquo;such a troop is a welcome addition to our
+      company; send our squire hither.&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      The squire appeared.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;Hie thee on thy steed towards the procession thou wilt meet with in the
+      pass, (nay, sweet lady mine, no forbiddal!) seek the chief, and say that
+      the good Knight Walter de Montreal sends him greeting, and prays him, in
+      passing our proper territory, to rest awhile with us a welcome guest; and&mdash;stay,&mdash;add,
+      that if to while an hour or so in gentle pastime be acceptable to him,
+      Walter de Montreal would rejoice to break a lance with him, or any knight
+      in his train, in honour of our respective ladies. Hie thee quick!&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;Walter, Walter,&rdquo; began Adeline, who had that keen and delicate
+      sensitiveness to her situation, which her reckless lord often wantonly
+      forgot; &ldquo;Walter, dear Walter, canst thou think it honour to&mdash;&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;Hush thee, sweet Fleur de lis! Thou hast not seen pastime this many a
+      day; I long to convince thee that thou art still the fairest lady in Italy&mdash;ay,
+      and of Christendom. But these Italians are craven knights, and thou needst
+      not fear that my proffer will be accepted. But in truth, lady mine, I
+      rejoice for graver objects, that chance throws a Roman noble, perhaps a
+      Colonna, in my way;&mdash;women understand not these matters; and aught
+      concerning Rome touches us home at this moment.&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      With that the Knight frowned, as was his wont in thought, and Adeline
+      ventured to say no more, but retired to the interior division of the
+      pavilion.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      Meanwhile the squire approached the procession that had now reached the
+      middle of the pass. And a stately and gallant company it was:&mdash;if the
+      complete harness of the soldiery seemed to attest a warlike purpose, it
+      was contradicted on the other hand by a numerous train of unarmed squires
+      and pages gorgeously attired, while the splendid blazon of two heralds
+      preceding the standard-bearers, proclaimed their object as peaceful, and
+      their path as sacred. It required but a glance at the company to tell the
+      leader. Arrayed in a breast-plate of steel, wrought profusely with gold
+      arabesques, over which was a mantle of dark green velvet, bordered with
+      pearls, while above his long dark locks waved a black ostrich plume in a
+      high Macedonian cap, such as, I believe, is now worn by the Grand Master
+      of the order of St. Constantine, rode in the front of the party, a young
+      cavalier, distinguished from his immediate comrades, partly by his
+      graceful presence and partly by his splendid dress.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      The squire approached respectfully, and dismounting, delivered himself of
+      his charge.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      The young cavalier smiled, as he answered, &ldquo;Bear back to Sir Walter de
+      Montreal the greeting of Adrian Colonna, Baron di Castello, and say, that
+      the solemn object of my present journey will scarce permit me to encounter
+      the formidable lance of so celebrated a knight; and I regret this the
+      more, inasmuch as I may not yield to any dame the palm of my liege lady&rsquo;s
+      beauty. I must live in hope of a happier occasion. For the rest, I will
+      cheerfully abide for some few hours the guest of so courteous a host.&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      The squire bowed low. &ldquo;My master,&rdquo; said he, hesitatingly, &ldquo;will grieve
+      much to miss so noble an opponent. But my message refers to all this
+      knightly and gallant train; and if the Lord Adrian di Castello deems
+      himself forbidden the joust by the object of his present journey, surely
+      one of his comrades will be his proxy with my master.&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      Out and quickly spoke a young noble by the side of Adrian, Riccardo
+      Annibaldi, who afterwards did good service both to the Tribune and to
+      Rome, and whose valour brought him, in later life, to an untimely end.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;By the Lord Adrian&rsquo;s permission,&rdquo; cried he, &ldquo;I will break a lance with&mdash;&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;Hush! Annibaldi,&rdquo; interrupted Adrian. &ldquo;And you, Sir Squire, know, that
+      Adrian di Castello permits no proxy in arms. Avise the Knight of St. John
+      that we accept his hospitality, and if, after some converse on graver
+      matters, he should still desire so light an entertainment, I will forget
+      that I am the ambassador to Naples, and remember only that I am a Knight
+      of the Empire. You have your answer.&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      The squire with much ceremony made his obeisance, remounted his steed, and
+      returned in a half-gallop to his master.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;Forgive me, dear Annibaldi,&rdquo; said Adrian, &ldquo;that I balked your valour; and
+      believe me that I never more longed to break a lance against any man than
+      I do against this boasting Frenchman. But bethink you, that though to us,
+      brought up in the dainty laws of chivalry, Walter de Montreal is the
+      famous Knight of Provence, to the Tribune of Rome, whose grave mission we
+      now fulfil, he is but the mercenary captain of a Free Company. Grievously
+      in his eyes should we sully our dignity by so wanton and irrelevant a
+      holiday conflict with a declared and professional brigand.&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;For all that,&rdquo; said Annibaldi, &ldquo;the brigand ought not to boast that a
+      Roman knight shunned a Provencal lance.&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;Cease, I pray thee!&rdquo; said Adrian, impatiently. In fact, the young
+      Colonna, already chafed bitterly against his discreet and dignified
+      rejection of Montreal&rsquo;s proffer, and recollecting with much pique the
+      disparaging manner in which the Provencal had spoken of the Roman
+      chivalry, as well as a certain tone of superiority, which in all warlike
+      matters Montreal had assumed over him,&mdash;he now felt his cheek burn,
+      and his lip quiver. Highly skilled in the martial accomplishments of his
+      time, he had a natural and excusable desire to prove that he was at least
+      no unworthy antagonist even of the best lance in Italy: and, added to
+      this, the gallantry of the age made him feel it a sort of treason to his
+      mistress to forego any means of asserting her perfections.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      It was, therefore, with considerable irritation that Adrian, as the
+      pavilion of Montreal became visible, perceived the squire returning to
+      him. And the reader will judge how much this was increased when the
+      latter, once more dismounting, accosted him thus:
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;My master, the Knight of St. John, on hearing the courteous answer of the
+      Lord Adrian di Castello, bids me say, that lest the graver converse the
+      Lord Adrian refers to should mar gentle and friendly sport, he ventures
+      respectfully to suggest, that the tilt should preface the converse. The
+      sod before the tent is so soft and smooth, that even a fall could be
+      attended with no danger to knight or steed.&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;By our Lady!&rdquo; cried Adrian and Annibaldi in a breath, &ldquo;but thy last words
+      are discourteous; and&rdquo; (proceeded Adrian, recovering himself) &ldquo;since thy
+      master will have it so, let him look to his horse&rsquo;s girths. I will not
+      gainsay his fancy.&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      Montreal, who had thus insisted upon the exhibition, partly, it may be,
+      from the gay and ruffling bravado, common still amongst his brave
+      countrymen; partly because he was curious of exhibiting before those who
+      might soon be his open foes his singular and unrivalled address in arms,
+      was yet more moved to it on learning the name of the leader of the Roman
+      Company; for his vain and haughty spirit, however it had disguised
+      resentment at the time, had by no means forgiven certain warm expressions
+      of Adrian in the palace of Stephen Colonna, and in the unfortunate journey
+      to Corneto. While Adrian, halting at the entrance of the defile, aided by
+      his squires, indignantly, but carefully, indued the rest of his armour,
+      and saw, himself, to the girths, stirrup-leathers, and various buckles in
+      the caparison of his noble charger, Montreal in great glee kissed his
+      lady, who, though too soft to be angry, was deeply vexed, (and yet her
+      vexation half forgotten in fear for his safety,) snatched up her scarf of
+      blue, which he threw over his breastplate, and completed his array with
+      the indifference of a man certain of victory. He was destined, however, to
+      one disadvantage, and that the greatest; his armour and lance had been
+      brought from the castle&mdash;not his warhorse. His palfrey was too slight
+      to bear the great weight of his armour, nor amongst his troop was there
+      one horse that for power and bone could match with Adrian&rsquo;s. He chose,
+      however, the strongest that was at hand, and a loud shout from his wild
+      followers testified their admiration when he sprung unaided from the
+      ground into the saddle&mdash;a rare and difficult feat of agility in a man
+      completely arrayed in the ponderous armour which issued at that day from
+      the forges of Milan, and was worn far more weighty in Italy than any other
+      part of Europe. While both companies grouped slowly, and mingled in a kind
+      of circle round the green turf, and the Roman heralds, with bustling
+      importance, attempted to marshal the spectators into order, Montreal rode
+      his charger round the sward, forcing it into various caracoles, and
+      exhibiting, with the vanity that belonged to him, his exquisite and
+      practised horsemanship.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      At length, Adrian, his visor down, rode slowly into the green space,
+      amidst the cheers of his party. The two Knights, at either end, gravely
+      fronted each other; they made the courtesies with their lances, which, in
+      friendly and sportive encounters, were customary; and, as they thus paused
+      for the signal of encounter, the Italians trembled for the honour of their
+      chief: Montreal&rsquo;s stately height and girth of chest forming a strong
+      contrast, even in armour, to the form of his opponent, which was rather
+      under the middle standard, and though firmly knit, slightly and slenderly
+      built. But to that perfection was skill in arms brought in those times,
+      that great strength and size were far from being either the absolute
+      requisites, or even the usual attributes, of the more celebrated knights;
+      in fact, so much was effected by the power and the management of the
+      steed, that a light weight in the rider was often rather to his advantage
+      than his prejudice: and, even at a later period, the most accomplished
+      victors in the tourney, the French Bayard and the English Sydney, were far
+      from remarkable either for bulk or stature.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      Whatever the superiority of Montreal in physical power, was, in much,
+      counterbalanced by the inferiority of his horse, which, though a
+      thick-built and strong Calabrian, had neither the blood, bone, nor
+      practised discipline of the northern charger of the Roman. The shining
+      coat of the latter, coal black, was set off by a scarlet cloth wrought in
+      gold; the neck and shoulders were clad in scales of mail; and from the
+      forehead projected a long point, like the horn of an unicorn, while on its
+      crest waved a tall plume of scarlet and white feathers. As the mission of
+      Adrian to Naples was that of pomp and ceremony to a court of great
+      splendour, so his array and retinue were befitting the occasion and the
+      passion for show that belonged to the time; and the very bridle of his
+      horse, which was three inches broad, was decorated with gold, and even
+      jewels. The Knight himself was clad in mail, which had tested the finest
+      art of the celebrated Ludovico of Milan; and, altogether, his appearance
+      was unusually gallant and splendid, and seemed still more so beside the
+      plain but brightly polished and artfully flexile armour of Montreal,
+      (adorned only with his lady&rsquo;s scarf,) and the common and rude mail of his
+      charger. This contrast, however, was not welcome to the Provencal, whose
+      vanity was especially indulged in warlike equipments; and who, had he
+      foreseen the &ldquo;pastime&rdquo; that awaited him, would have outshone even the
+      Colonna.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      The trumpeters of either party gave a short blast&mdash;the Knights
+      remained erect as statues of iron; a second, and each slightly bent over
+      his saddle-bow; a third, and with spears couched, slackened reins, and at
+      full speed, on they rushed, and fiercely they met midway. With the
+      reckless arrogance which belonged to him, Montreal had imagined, that at
+      the first touch of his lance Adrian would have been unhorsed; but to his
+      great surprise the young Roman remained firm, and amidst the shouts of his
+      party, passed on to the other end of the lists. Montreal himself was
+      rudely shaken, but lost neither seat nor stirrup.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;This can be no carpet knight,&rdquo; muttered Montreal between his teeth, as,
+      this time, he summoned all his skill for a second encounter; while Adrian,
+      aware of the great superiority of his charger, resolved to bring it to
+      bear against his opponent. Accordingly, when the Knights again rushed
+      forward, Adrian, covering himself well with his buckler, directed his care
+      less against the combatant, whom he felt no lance wielded by mortal hand
+      was likely to dislodge, than against the less noble animal he bestrode.
+      The shock of Montreal&rsquo;s charge was like an avalanche&mdash;his lance
+      shivered into a thousand pieces, Adrian lost both stirrups, and but for
+      the strong iron bows which guarded the saddle in front and rear, would
+      have been fairly unhorsed; as it was, he was almost doubled back by the
+      encounter, and his ears rung and his eyes reeled, so that for a moment or
+      two he almost lost all consciousness. But his steed had well repaid its
+      nurture and discipline. Just as the combatants closed, the animal, rearing
+      on high, pressed forward with its mighty crest against its opponent with a
+      force so irresistible as to drive back Montreal&rsquo;s horse several paces:
+      while Adrian&rsquo;s lance, poised with exquisite skill, striking against the
+      Provencal&rsquo;s helmet, somewhat rudely diverted the Knight&rsquo;s attention for
+      the moment from his rein. Montreal, drawing the curb too tightly in the
+      suddenness of his recovery, the horse reared on end; and, receiving at
+      that instant, full upon his breastplate, the sharp horn and mailed crest
+      of Adrian&rsquo;s charger&mdash;fell back over its rider upon the sward.
+      Montreal disencumbered himself in great rage and shame, as a faint cry
+      from his pavilion reached his ear, and redoubled his mortification. He
+      rose with a lightness which astonished the beholders; for so heavy was the
+      armour worn at that day, that few knights once stretched upon the ground
+      could rise without assistance; and drawing his sword, cried out fiercely&mdash;&ldquo;On
+      foot, on foot!&mdash;the fall was not mine, but this accursed beast&rsquo;s,
+      that I must needs for my sins raise to the rank of a charger. Come on&mdash;&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;Nay, Sir Knight,&rdquo; said Adrian, drawing off his gauntlets and unbuckling
+      his helmet, which he threw on the ground, &ldquo;I come to thee a guest and a
+      friend; but to fight on foot is the encounter of mortal foes. Did I accept
+      thy offer, my defeat would but stain thy knighthood.&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      Montreal, whose passion had beguiled him for the moment, sullenly
+      acquiesced in this reasoning. Adrian hastened to soothe his antagonist.
+      &ldquo;For the rest,&rdquo; said he, &ldquo;I cannot pretend to the prize. Your lance lost
+      me my stirrups&mdash;mine left you unshaken. You say right; the defeat, if
+      any, was that of your steed.&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;We may meet again when I am more equally horsed,&rdquo; said Montreal, still
+      chafing.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;Now, our Lady forbid!&rdquo; exclaimed Adrian, with so devout an earnestness
+      that the bystanders could not refrain from laughing; and even Montreal
+      grimly and half-reluctantly, joined in the merriment. The courtesy of his
+      foe, however, conciliated and touched the more frank and soldierly
+      qualities of his nature, and composing himself, he replied:&mdash;
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;Signor di Castello, I rest your debtor for a courtesy that I have but
+      little imitated. Howbeit, if thou wouldst bind me to thee for ever, thou
+      wilt suffer me to send for my own charger, and afford me a chance to
+      retrieve mine honour. With that steed, or with one equal to thine, which
+      seems to me of the English breed, I will gage all I possess, lands,
+      castle, and gold, sword and spurs, to maintain this pass, one by one,
+      against all thy train.&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      Fortunately, perhaps, for Adrian, ere he could reply, Riccardo Annibaldi
+      cried, with great warmth, &ldquo;Sir Knight, I have with me two steeds well
+      practised in the tourney; take thy choice, and accept in me a champion of
+      the Roman against the French chivalry;&mdash;there is my gage.&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;Signor,&rdquo; replied Montreal, with ill-suppressed delight, &ldquo;thy proffer
+      shows so gallant and free a spirit, that it were foul sin in me to balk
+      it. I accept thy gage, and whichever of thy steeds thou rejectest, in
+      God&rsquo;s name bring it hither, and let us waste no words before action.&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      Adrian, who felt that hitherto the Romans had been more favoured by
+      fortune than merit, vainly endeavoured to prevent this second hazard. But
+      Annibaldi was greatly chafed, and his high rank rendered it impolitic in
+      Adrian to offend him by peremptory prohibition; the Colonna reluctantly,
+      therefore, yielded his assent to the engagement. Annibaldi&rsquo;s steeds were
+      led to the spot, the one a noble roan, the other a bay, of somewhat less
+      breeding and bone, but still of great strength and price. Montreal finding
+      the choice pressed upon him, gallantly selected the latter and less
+      excellent.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      Annibaldi was soon arrayed for the encounter, and Adrian gave the word to
+      the trumpeters. The Roman was of a stature almost equal to that of
+      Montreal, and though some years younger, seemed, in his armour, nearly of
+      the same thews and girth, so that the present antagonists appeared at the
+      first glance more evenly matched than the last. But this time Montreal,
+      well horsed, inspired to the utmost by shame and pride, felt himself a
+      match for an army; and he met the young Baron with such prowess, that
+      while the very plume on his casque seemed scarcely stirred, the Italian
+      was thrown several paces from his steed, and it was not till some moments
+      after his visor was removed by his squires that he recovered his senses.
+      This event restored Montreal to all his natural gaiety of humour, and
+      effectually raised the spirits of his followers, who had felt much humbled
+      by the previous encounter.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      He himself assisted Annibaldi to rise with great courtesy, and a profusion
+      of compliments, which the proud Roman took in stern silence, and then led
+      the way to the pavilion, loudly ordering the banquet to be spread.
+      Annibaldi, however, loitered behind, and Adrian, who penetrated his
+      thoughts, and who saw that over their cups a quarrel between the Provencal
+      and his friend was likely to ensue, drawing him aside, said:&mdash;&ldquo;Methinks,
+      dear Annibaldi, it would be better if you, with the chief of our
+      following, were to proceed onward to Fondi, where I will join you at
+      sunset. My squires, and some eight lances, will suffice for my safeguard
+      here; and, to say truth, I desire a few private words with our strange
+      host, in the hope that he may be peaceably induced to withdraw from hence
+      without the help of our Roman troops, who have enough elsewhere to feed
+      their valour.&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      Annibaldi pressed his companion&rsquo;s hand: &ldquo;I understand thee,&rdquo; he replied
+      with a slight blush, &ldquo;and, indeed, I could but ill brook the complacent
+      triumph of the barbarian. I accept thy offer.&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      <a name="link2HCH0023" id="link2HCH0023">
+      <!--  H2 anchor --> </a>
+    </p>
+    <div style="height: 4em;">
+      <br /><br /><br /><br />
+    </div>
+    <h2>
+      Chapter 3.III. The Conversation between the Roman and the
+    </h2>
+    <p>
+      Provencal&mdash;Adeline&rsquo;s History&mdash;the Moonlit Sea&mdash;the Lute and
+      the Song.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      As soon as Annibaldi, with the greater part of the retinue, was gone,
+      Adrian, divesting himself of his heavy greaves, entered alone the pavilion
+      of the Knight of St. John. Montreal had already doffed all his armour,
+      save the breastplate, and he now stepped forward to welcome his guest with
+      the winning and easy grace which better suited his birth than his
+      profession. He received Adrian&rsquo;s excuses for the absence of Annibaldi and
+      the other knights of his train with a smile which seemed to prove how
+      readily he divined the cause, and conducted him to the other and more
+      private division of the pavilion in which the repast (rendered acceptable
+      by the late exercise of guest and host) was prepared; and here Adrian for
+      the first time discovered Adeline. Long inurement to the various and
+      roving life of her lover, joined to a certain pride which she derived from
+      conscious, though forfeited, rank, gave to the outward manner of that
+      beautiful lady an ease and freedom which often concealed, even from
+      Montreal, her sensitiveness to her unhappy situation. At times, indeed,
+      when alone with Montreal, whom she loved with all the devotion of romance,
+      she was sensible only to the charm of a presence which consoled her for
+      all things; but in his frequent absence, or on the admission of any
+      stranger, the illusion vanished&mdash;the reality returned. Poor lady!
+      Nature had not formed, education had not reared, habit had not reconciled,
+      her to the breath of shame!
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      The young Colonna was much struck by her beauty, and more by her gentle
+      and highborn grace. Like her lord she appeared younger than she was; time
+      seemed to spare a bloom which an experienced eye might have told was
+      destined to an early grave; and there was something almost girlish in the
+      lightness of her form&mdash;the braided luxuriance of her rich auburn
+      hair, and the colour that went and came, not only with every moment, but
+      almost with every word. The contrast between her and Montreal became them
+      both&mdash;it was the contrast of devoted reliance and protecting
+      strength: each looked fairer in the presence of the other: and as Adrian
+      sate down to the well-laden board, he thought he had never seen a pair
+      more formed for the poetic legends of their native Troubadours.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      Montreal conversed gaily upon a thousand matters&mdash;pressed the wine
+      flasks&mdash;and selected for his guest the most delicate portions of the
+      delicious spicola of the neighbouring sea, and the rich flesh of the wild
+      boar of the Pontine Marshes.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;Tell me,&rdquo; said Montreal, as their hunger was now appeased&mdash;&ldquo;tell me,
+      noble Adrian, how fares your kinsman, Signor Stephen? A brave old man for
+      his years.&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;He bears him as the youngest of us,&rdquo; answered Adrian.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;Late events must have shocked him a little,&rdquo; said Montreal, with an arch
+      smile. &ldquo;Ah, you look grave&mdash;yet commend my foresight;&mdash;I was the
+      first who prophesied to thy kinsman the rise of Cola di Rienzi; he seems a
+      great man&mdash;never more great than in conciliating the Colonna and the
+      Orsini.&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;The Tribune,&rdquo; returned Adrian, evasively, &ldquo;is certainly a man of
+      extraordinary genius. And now, seeing him command, my only wonder is how
+      he ever brooked to obey&mdash;majesty seems a very part of him.&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;Men who win power, easily put on its harness, dignity,&rdquo; answered
+      Montreal; &ldquo;and if I hear aright&mdash;(pledge me to your lady&rsquo;s health)&mdash;the
+      Tribune, if not himself nobly born will soon be nobly connected.&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;He is already married to a Raselli, an old Roman house,&rdquo; replied Adrian.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;You evade my pursuit,&mdash;Le doulx soupir! le doulx soupir! as the old
+      Cabestan has it&rdquo;&mdash;said Montreal, laughing. &ldquo;Well, you have pledged me
+      one cup to your lady, pledge another to the fair Irene, the Tribune&rsquo;s
+      sister&mdash;always provided they two are not one.&mdash;You smile and
+      shake your head.&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;I do not disguise from you, Sir Knight,&rdquo; answered Adrian, &ldquo;that when my
+      present embassy is over, I trust the alliance between the Tribune and a
+      Colonna will go far towards the benefit of both.&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;I have heard rightly, then,&rdquo; said Montreal, in a grave and thoughtful
+      tone. &ldquo;Rienzi&rsquo;s power must, indeed, be great.&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;Of that my mission is a proof. Are you aware, Signor de Montreal, that
+      Louis, King of Hungary&mdash;&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;How! what of him?&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;Has referred the decision of the feud between himself and Joanna of
+      Naples, respecting the death of her royal spouse, his brother, to the fiat
+      of the Tribune? This is the first time, methinks, since the death of
+      Constantine, that so great a confidence and so high a charge were ever
+      intrusted to a Roman!&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;By all the saints in the calendar,&rdquo; cried Montreal, crossing himself,
+      &ldquo;this news is indeed amazing! The fierce Louis of Hungary waive the right
+      of the sword, and choose other umpire than the field of battle!&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;And this,&rdquo; continued Adrian, in a significant tone, &ldquo;this it was which
+      induced me to obey your courteous summons. I know, brave Montreal, that
+      you hold intercourse with Louis. Louis has given to the Tribune the best
+      pledge of his amity and alliance; will you do wisely if you&mdash;&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;Wage war with the Hungarian&rsquo;s ally,&rdquo; interrupted Montreal. &ldquo;This you were
+      about to add; the same thought crossed myself. My Lord, pardon me&mdash;Italians
+      sometimes invent what they wish. On the honour of a knight of the Empire,
+      these tidings are the naked truth?&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;By my honour, and on the Cross,&rdquo; answered Adrian, drawing himself up;
+      &ldquo;and in proof thereof, I am now bound to Naples to settle with the Queen
+      the preliminaries of the appointed trial.&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;Two crowned heads before the tribunal of a plebeian, and one a defendant
+      against the charge of murther!&rdquo; muttered Montreal; &ldquo;the news might well
+      amaze me!&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      He remained musing and silent a little while, till looking up, he caught
+      Adeline&rsquo;s tender gaze fixed upon him with that deep solicitude with which
+      she watched the outward effect of schemes and projects she was too soft to
+      desire to know, and too innocent to share.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;Lady mine,&rdquo; said the Provencal, fondly, &ldquo;how sayest thou? must we abandon
+      our mountain castle, and these wild woodland scenes, for the dull walls of
+      a city? I fear me so.&mdash;The Lady Adeline,&rdquo; he continued, turning to
+      Adrian, &ldquo;is of a singular bias; she hates the gay crowds of streets and
+      thoroughfares, and esteems no palace like the solitary outlaw&rsquo;s hold. Yet,
+      methinks, she might outshine all the faces of Italy,&mdash;thy mistress,
+      Lord Adrian, of course, excepted.&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;It is an exception which only a lover, and that too a betrothed lover,
+      would dare to make,&rdquo; replied Adrian, gallantly.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;Nay,&rdquo; said Adeline, in a voice singularly sweet and clear, &ldquo;nay, I know
+      well at what price to value my lord&rsquo;s flattery, and Signor di Castello&rsquo;s
+      courtesy. But you are bound, Sir Knight, to a court, that, if fame speak
+      true, boasts in its Queen the very miracle and mould of beauty.&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;It is some years since I saw the Queen of Naples,&rdquo; answered Adrian; &ldquo;and
+      I little dreamed then, when I gazed upon that angel face, that I should
+      live to hear her accused of the foulest murther that ever stained even
+      Italian royalty.&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;And, as if resolved to prove her guilt,&rdquo; said Montreal, &ldquo;ere long be sure
+      she will marry the very man who did the deed. Of this I have certain
+      proof.&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      Thus conversing, the Knights wore away the daylight, and beheld from the
+      open tent the sun cast his setting glow over the purple sea. Adeline had
+      long retired from the board, and they now saw her seated with her
+      handmaids on a mound by the beach; while the sound of her lute faintly
+      reached their ears. As Montreal caught the air, he turned from the
+      converse, and sighing, half shaded his face with his hand. Somehow or
+      other the two Knights had worn away all the little jealousy or pique which
+      they had conceived against each other at Rome. Both imbued with the
+      soldier-like spirit of the age, their contest in the morning had served to
+      inspire them with that strange kind of respect, and even cordiality, which
+      one brave man even still (how much more at that day!) feels for another,
+      whose courage he has proved while vindicating his own. It is like the
+      discovery of a congenial sentiment hitherto latent; and, in a life of
+      camps, often establishes sudden and lasting friendship in the very lap of
+      enmity. This feeling had been ripened by their subsequent familiar
+      intercourse, and was increased on Adrian&rsquo;s side by the feeling, that in
+      convincing Montreal of the policy of withdrawing from the Roman
+      territories, he had obtained an advantage that well repaid whatever danger
+      and delay he had undergone.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      The sigh, and the altered manner of Montreal, did not escape Adrian, and
+      he naturally connected it with something relating to her whose music had
+      been its evident cause.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;Yon lovely dame,&rdquo; said he, gently, &ldquo;touches the lute with an exquisite
+      and fairy hand, and that plaintive air seems to my ear as of the
+      minstrelsy of Provence.&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;It is the air I taught her,&rdquo; said Montreal, sadly, &ldquo;married as it is to
+      indifferent words, with which I first wooed a heart that should never have
+      given itself to me! Ay, young Colonna, many a night has my boat been
+      moored beneath the starlit Sorgia that washes her proud father&rsquo;s halls,
+      and my voice awaked the stillness of the waving sedges with a soldier&rsquo;s
+      serenade. Sweet memories! bitter fruit!&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;Why bitter? ye love each other still.&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;But I am vowed to celibacy, and Adeline de Courval is leman where she
+      should be wedded dame. Methinks I fret at that thought even more than she,&mdash;dear
+      Adeline!&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;Your lady, as all would guess, is then nobly born?&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;She is,&rdquo; answered Montreal, with a deep and evident feeling which, save
+      in love, rarely, if ever, crossed his hardy breast. &ldquo;She is! our tale is a
+      brief one:&mdash;we loved each other as children: Her family was wealthier
+      than mine: We were separated. I was given to understand that she abandoned
+      me. I despaired, and in despair I took the cross of St. John. Chance threw
+      us again together. I learned that her love was undecayed. Poor child!&mdash;she
+      was even then, sir, but a child! I, wild,&mdash;reckless&mdash;and not
+      unskilled, perhaps, in the arts that woo and win. She could not resist my
+      suit or her own affection!&mdash;We fled. In those words you see the
+      thread of my after history. My sword and my Adeline were all my fortune.
+      Society frowned on us. The Church threatened my soul. The Grand Master my
+      life. I became a knight of fortune. Fate and my right hand favoured me. I
+      have made those who scorned me tremble at my name. That name shall yet
+      blaze, a star or a meteor, in the front of troubled nations, and I may yet
+      win by force from the Pontiff the dispensation refused to my prayers. On
+      the same day, I may offer Adeline the diadem and the ring.&mdash;Eno&rsquo; of
+      this;&mdash;you marked Adeline&rsquo;s cheek!&mdash;Seems it not delicate? I
+      like not that changeful flush,&mdash;and she moves languidly,&mdash;her
+      step that was so blithe!&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;Change of scene and the mild south will soon restore her health,&rdquo; said
+      Adrian; &ldquo;and in your peculiar life she is so little brought in contact
+      with others, especially of her own sex, that I trust she is but seldom
+      made aware of whatever is painful in her situation. And woman&rsquo;s love,
+      Montreal, as we both have learned, is a robe that wraps her from many a
+      storm!&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;You speak kindly,&rdquo; returned the Knight; &ldquo;but you know not all our cause
+      of grief. Adeline&rsquo;s father, a proud sieur, died,&mdash;they said of a
+      broken heart,&mdash;but old men die of many another disease than that! The
+      mother, a dame who boasted her descent from princes, bore the matter more
+      sternly than the sire; clamoured for revenge,&mdash;which was odd, for she
+      is as religious as a Dominican, and revenge is not Christian in a woman,
+      though it is knightly in a man!&mdash;Well, my Lord, we had one boy, our
+      only child; he was Adeline&rsquo;s solace in my absence,&mdash;his pretty ways
+      were worth the world to her! She loved him so, that, but he had her eyes
+      and looked like her when he slept, I should have been jealous! He grew up
+      in our wild life, strong and comely; the young rogue, he would have been a
+      brave knight! My evil stars led me to Milan, where I had business with the
+      Visconti. One bright morning in June, our boy was stolen; verily that June
+      was like a December to us!&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;Stolen!&mdash;how?&mdash;by whom?&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;The first question is answered easily,&mdash;the boy was with his nurse
+      in the courtyard, the idle wench left him for but a minute or two&mdash;so
+      she avers&mdash;fetch him some childish toy; when she returned he was
+      gone; not a trace left, save his pretty cap with the plume in it! Poor
+      Adeline, many a time have I found her kissing that relic till it was wet
+      with tears!&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;A strange fortune, in truth. But what interest could&mdash;&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;I will tell you,&rdquo; interrupted Montreal, &ldquo;the only conjecture I could
+      form;&mdash;Adeline&rsquo;s mother, on learning we had a son, sent to Adeline a
+      letter, that well nigh broke her heart, reproaching her for her love to
+      me, and so forth, as if that had made her the vilest of the sex. She bade
+      her take compassion on her child, and not bring him up to a robber&rsquo;s life,&mdash;so
+      was she pleased to style the bold career of Walter de Montreal. She
+      offered to rear the child in her own dull halls, and fit him, no doubt,
+      for a shaven pate and a monk&rsquo;s cowl. She chafed much that a mother would
+      not part with her treasure! She alone, partly in revenge, partly in silly
+      compassion for Adeline&rsquo;s child, partly, it may be, from some pious
+      fanaticism, could, it so seemed to me, have robbed us of our boy. On
+      inquiry, I learned from the nurse&mdash;who, but that she was of the same
+      sex as Adeline, should have tasted my dagger,&mdash;that in their walks, a
+      woman of advanced years, but seemingly of humble rank, (that might be
+      disguise!) had often stopped, and caressed and admired the child. I
+      repaired at once to France, sought the old Castle of De Courval;&mdash;it
+      had passed to the next heir, and the old widow was go on, none knew
+      whither, but, it was conjectured, to take the veil in some remote
+      convent.&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;And you never saw her since?&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;Yes, at Rome,&rdquo; answered Montreal, turning pale; &ldquo;when last there I
+      chanced suddenly upon her; and then at length I learned my boy&rsquo;s fate, and
+      the truth of my own surmise; she confessed to the theft&mdash;and my child
+      was dead! I have not dared to tell Adeline of this; it seems to me as if
+      it would be like plucking the shaft from the wounded side&mdash;and she
+      would die at once, bereft of the uncertainty that rankles within her. She
+      has still a hope&mdash;it comforts her; though my heart bleeds when I
+      think on its vanity. Let this pass, my Colonna.&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      And Montreal started to his feet as if he strove, by a strong effort, to
+      shake off the weakness that had crept over him in his narration.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;Think no more of it. Life is short&mdash;its thorns are many&mdash;let us
+      not neglect any of its flowers. This is piety and wisdom too; Nature that
+      meant me to struggle and to toil, gave me, happily, the sanguine heart and
+      the elastic soul of France; and I have lived long enough to own that to
+      die young is not an evil. Come, Lord Adrian, let us join my lady ere you
+      part, if part you must; the moon will be up soon, and Fondi is but a short
+      journey hence. You know that though I admire not your Petrarch, you with
+      more courtesy laud our Provencal ballads, and you must hear Adeline sing
+      one that you may prize them the more. The race of the Troubadours is dead,
+      but the minstrelsy survives the minstrel!&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      Adrian, who scarce knew what comfort to administer to the affliction of
+      his companion, was somewhat relieved by the change in his mood, though his
+      more grave and sensitive nature was a little startled at its suddenness.
+      But, as we have before seen, Montreal&rsquo;s spirit (and this made perhaps its
+      fascination) was as a varying and changeful sky; the gayest sunshine, and
+      the fiercest storm swept over it in rapid alternation; and elements of
+      singular might and grandeur, which, properly directed and concentrated,
+      would have made him the blessing and glory of his time, were wielded with
+      a boyish levity, roused into war and desolation, or lulled into repose and
+      smoothness, with all the suddenness of chance, and all the fickleness of
+      caprice.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      Sauntering down to the beach, the music of Adeline&rsquo;s lute sounded more
+      distinctly in their ears, and involuntarily they hushed their steps upon
+      the rich and odorous turf, as in a voice, though not powerful,
+      marvellously sweet and clear, and well adapted to the simple fashion of
+      the words and melody, she sang the following stanzas:&mdash;
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      Lay of the Lady of Provence.
+    </p>
+<pre xml:space="preserve">
+     1.
+
+     Ah, why art thou sad, my heart?  Why
+     Darksome and lonely?
+     Frowns the face of the happy sky
+     Over thee only?
+     Ah me, ah me!
+     Render to joy the earth!
+     Grief shuns, not envies, Mirth;
+     But leave one quiet spot,
+     Where Mirth may enter not,
+     To sigh, Ah, me!&mdash;
+     Ah me.
+
+     2.
+
+     As a bird, though the sky be clear,
+     Feels the storm lower;
+     My soul bodes the tempest near,
+     In the sunny hour;
+     Ah me, ah me!
+     Be glad while yet we may!
+     I bid thee, my heart, be gay;
+     And still I know not why,&mdash;
+     Thou answerest with a sigh,
+     (Fond heart!) Ah me!&mdash;
+     Ah me!
+
+     3.
+
+     As this twilight o&rsquo;er the skies,
+     Doubt brings the sorrow;
+     Who knows when the daylight dies,
+     What waits the morrow?
+     Ah me, ah me!
+     Be blithe, be blithe, my lute,
+     Thy strings will soon be mute;
+     Be blithe&mdash;hark! while it dies,
+     The note forewarning, sighs
+     Its last&mdash;Ah me!
+     Ah me!
+</pre>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;My own Adeline&mdash;my sweetest night-bird,&rdquo; half-whispered Montreal,
+      and softly approaching, he threw himself at his lady&rsquo;s feet&mdash;&ldquo;thy
+      song is too sad for this golden eve.&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;No sound ever went to the heart,&rdquo; said Adrian, &ldquo;whose arrow was not
+      feathered by sadness. True sentiment, Montreal, is twin with melancholy,
+      though not with gloom.&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      The lady looked softly and approvingly up at Adrian&rsquo;s face; she was
+      pleased with its expression; she was pleased yet more with words of which
+      women rather than men would acknowledge the truth. Adrian returned the
+      look with one of deep and eloquent sympathy and respect; in fact, the
+      short story he had heard from Montreal had interested him deeply in her;
+      and never to the brilliant queen, to whose court he was bound, did his
+      manner wear so chivalric and earnest a homage as it did to that lone and
+      ill-fated lady on the twilight shores of Terracina.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      Adeline blushed slightly and sighed; and then, to break the awkwardness of
+      a pause which had stolen over them, as Montreal, unheeding the last remark
+      of Adrian, was tuning the strings of the lute, she said&mdash;&ldquo;Of course
+      the Signor di Castello shares the universal enthusiasm for Petrarch?&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;Ay,&rdquo; cried Montreal; &ldquo;my lady is Petrarch mad, like the rest of them: but
+      all I know is, that never did belted knight and honest lover woo in such
+      fantastic and tortured strains.&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;In Italy,&rdquo; answered Adrian, &ldquo;common language is exaggeration;&mdash;but
+      even your own Troubadour poetry might tell you that love, ever seeking a
+      new language of its own, cannot but often run into what to all but lovers
+      seems distortion and conceit.&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;Come, dear Signor,&rdquo; said Montreal, placing the lute in Adrian&rsquo;s hands,
+      &ldquo;let Adeline be the umpire between us, which music&mdash;yours or mine&mdash;can
+      woo the more blandly.&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;Ah,&rdquo; said Adrian, laughing; &ldquo;I fear me, Sir Knight, you have already
+      bribed the umpire.&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      Montreal&rsquo;s eyes and Adeline&rsquo;s met; and in that gaze Adeline forgot all her
+      sorrows.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      With a practised and skilful hand, Adrian touched the strings; and
+      selecting a song which was less elaborate than those mostly in vogue
+      amongst his countrymen, though still conceived in the Italian spirit, and
+      in accordance with the sentiment he had previously expressed to Adeline,
+      he sang as follows:&mdash;
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      Love&rsquo;s Excuse for Sadness.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      Chide not, beloved, if oft with thee I feel not rapture wholly; For aye
+      the heart that&rsquo;s fill&rsquo;d with love, Runs o&rsquo;er in melancholy. To streams
+      that glide in noon, the shade From summer skies is given; So, if my breast
+      reflects the cloud, &lsquo;Tis but the cloud of heaven! Thine image glass&rsquo;d
+      within my soul So well the mirror keepeth; That, chide me not, if with the
+      light The shadow also sleepeth.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;And now,&rdquo; said Adrian, as he concluded, &ldquo;the lute is to you: I but
+      preclude your prize.&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      The Provencal laughed, and shook his head.&mdash;&ldquo;With any other umpire, I
+      had had my lute broken on my own head, for my conceit in provoking such a
+      rival; but I must not shrink from a contest I have myself provoked, even
+      though in one day twice defeated.&rdquo; And with that, in a deep and
+      exquisitely melodious voice, which wanted only more scientific culture to
+      have challenged any competition, the Knight of St. John poured forth:
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      The Lay of the Troubadour.
+    </p>
+<pre xml:space="preserve">
+     1.
+
+     Gentle river, the moonbeam is hush&rsquo;d on thy tide,
+     On thy pathway of light to my lady I glide.
+     My boat, where the stream laves the castle, I moor,&mdash;
+     All at rest save the maid and her young Troubadour!
+     As the stars to the waters that bore
+     My bark, to my spirit thou art;
+     Heaving yet, see it bound to the shore,
+     So moor&rsquo;d to thy beauty my heart,&mdash;
+     Bel&rsquo; amie, bel&rsquo; amie, bel&rsquo; amie!
+
+     2.
+
+     Wilt thou fly from the world?  It hath wealth for the vain;
+     But Love breaks his bond when there&rsquo;s gold in the chain;
+     Wilt thou fly from the world?  It hath courts for the proud;&mdash;
+     But Love, born in caves, pines to death in the crowd.
+     Were this bosom thy world, dearest one,
+     Thy world could not fail to be bright;
+     For thou shouldst thyself be its sun,
+     And what spot could be dim in thy light&mdash;
+     Bel&rsquo; amie, bel&rsquo; amie, bel&rsquo; amie?
+
+     3.
+
+     The rich and the great woo thee dearest; and poor,
+     Though his fathers were princes, thy young Troubadour!
+     But his heart never quail&rsquo;d save to thee, his adored,&mdash;
+     There&rsquo;s no guile in his lute, and no stain on his sword.
+     Ah, I reck not what sorrows I know,
+     Could I still on thy solace confide;
+     And I care not, though earth be my foe,
+     If thy soft heart be found by my side,&mdash;
+     Bel&rsquo; amie, bel&rsquo; amie, bel&rsquo; amie!
+
+     4.
+
+     The maiden she blush&rsquo;d, and the maiden she sighed,
+     Not a cloud in the sky, not a gale on the tide;
+     But though tempest had raged on the wave and the wind,
+     That castle, methinks, had been still left behind!
+     Sweet lily, though bow&rsquo;d by the blast,
+     (To this bosom transplanted) since then,
+     Wouldst thou change, could we call the past,
+     To the rock from thy garden again&mdash;
+     Bel&rsquo; amie, bel&rsquo; amie, bel&rsquo; amie?
+</pre>
+    <p>
+      Thus they alternated the time with converse and song, as the wooded hills
+      threw their sharp, long shadows over the sea; while from many a mound of
+      waking flowers, and many a copse of citron and orange, relieved by the
+      dark and solemn aloe, stole the summer breeze, laden with mingled odours;
+      and, over the seas, coloured by the slow-fading hues of purple and rose,
+      that the sun had long bequeathed to the twilight, flitted the gay
+      fireflies that sparkle along that enchanted coast. At length, the moon
+      slowly rose above the dark forest-steeps, gleaming on the gay pavilion and
+      glittering pennon of Montreal,&mdash;on the verdant sward,&mdash;the
+      polished mail of the soldiers, stretched on the grass in various groups,
+      half-shaded by oaks and cypress, and the war-steeds grazing peaceably
+      together&mdash;a wild mixture of the Pastoral and the Iron time.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      Adrian, reluctantly reminded of his journey, rose to depart.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;I fear,&rdquo; said he to Adeline, &ldquo;that I have already detained you too late
+      in the night air: but selfishness is little considerate.&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;Nay, you see we are prudent,&rdquo; said Adeline, pointing to Montreal&rsquo;s
+      mantle, which his provident hand had long since drawn around her form;
+      &ldquo;but if you must part, farewell, and success attend you!&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;We may meet again, I trust,&rdquo; said Adrian.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      Adeline sighed gently; and the Colonna, gazing on her face by the
+      moonlight, to which it was slightly raised, was painfully struck by its
+      almost transparent delicacy. Moved by his compassion, ere he mounted his
+      steed, he drew Montreal aside,&mdash;&ldquo;Forgive me if I seem presumptuous,&rdquo;
+       said he; &ldquo;but to one so noble this wild life is scarce a fitting career. I
+      know that, in our time, War consecrates all his children; but surely a
+      settled rank in the court of the Emperor, or an honourable reconciliation
+      with your knightly brethren, were better&mdash;&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;Than a Tartar camp, and a brigand&rsquo;s castle,&rdquo; interrupted Montreal, with
+      some impatience. &ldquo;This you were about to say&mdash;you are mistaken.
+      Society thrust me from her bosom; let society take the fruit it hath sown.
+      &lsquo;A fixed rank,&rsquo; say you? some subaltern office, to fight at other men&rsquo;s
+      command! You know me not: Walter de Montreal was not formed to obey. War
+      when I will, and rest when I list, is the motto of my escutcheon. Ambition
+      proffers me rewards you wot not of; and I am of the mould as of the race
+      of those whose swords have conquered thrones. For the rest, your news of
+      the alliance of Louis of Hungary with your Tribune makes it necessary for
+      the friend of Louis to withdraw from all feud with Rome. Ere the week
+      expire, the owl and the bat may seek refuge in yon grey turrets.&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;But your lady?&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;Is inured to change.&mdash;God help her, and temper the rough wind to the
+      lamb!&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;Enough, Sir Knight: but should you desire a sure refuge at Rome for one
+      so gentle and so highborn, by the right hand of a knight, I promise a safe
+      roof and an honoured home to the Lady Adeline.&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      Montreal pressed the offered hand to his heart; then plucking his own
+      hastily away, drew it across his eyes, and joined Adeline, in a silence
+      that showed he dared not trust himself to speak. In a few moments Adrian
+      and his train were on the march; but still the young Colonna turned back,
+      to gaze once more on his wild host and that lovely lady, as they
+      themselves lingered on the moonlit sward, while the sea rippled mournfully
+      on their ears.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      It was not many months after that date, that the name of Fra Monreale
+      scattered terror and dismay throughout the fair Campania. The right hand
+      of the Hungarian king, in his invasion of Naples, he was chosen afterwards
+      vicar (or vice-gerent) of Louis in Aversa; and fame and fate seemed to
+      lead him triumphantly along that ambitious career which he had elected,
+      whether bounded by the scaffold or the throne.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      <a name="link2H_4_0030" id="link2H_4_0030">
+      <!--  H2 anchor --> </a>
+    </p>
+    <div style="height: 4em;">
+      <br /><br /><br /><br />
+    </div>
+    <h2>
+      BOOK IV. THE TRIUMPH AND THE POMP.
+    </h2>
+<pre xml:space="preserve">
+     &ldquo;Allora fama e paura di si buono reggimento, passa in ogni
+     terra.&rdquo;&mdash;&ldquo;Vita di Cola di Rienzi&rdquo;, lib. i. cap. 21.
+
+     &ldquo;Then the fame and the fear of that so good government
+     passed into every land.&rdquo;&mdash;&ldquo;Life of Cola di Rienzi&rdquo;.
+</pre>
+    <p>
+      <a name="link2HCH0024" id="link2HCH0024">
+      <!--  H2 anchor --> </a>
+    </p>
+    <div style="height: 4em;">
+      <br /><br /><br /><br />
+    </div>
+    <h2>
+      Chapter 4.I. The Boy Angelo&mdash;the Dream of Nina Fulfilled.
+    </h2>
+    <p>
+      The thread of my story transports us back to Rome. It was in a small
+      chamber, in a ruinous mansion by the base of Mount Aventine, that a young
+      boy sate, one evening, with a woman of a tall and stately form, but
+      somewhat bowed both by infirmity and years. The boy was of a fair and
+      comely presence; and there was that in his bold, frank, undaunted
+      carriage, which made him appear older than he was.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      The old woman, seated in the recess of the deep window, was apparently
+      occupied with a Bible that lay open on her knees; but ever and anon she
+      lifted her eyes, and gazed on her young companion with a sad and anxious
+      expression.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;Dame,&rdquo; said the boy, who was busily employed in hewing out a sword of
+      wood, &ldquo;I would you had seen the show today. Why, every day is a show at
+      Rome now! It is show enough to see the Tribune himself on his white steed&mdash;(oh,
+      it is so beautiful!)&mdash;with his white robes all studded with jewels.
+      But today, as I have just been telling you, the Lady Nina took notice of
+      me, as I stood on the stairs of the Capitol: you know, dame, I had donned
+      my best blue velvet doublet.&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;And she called you a fair boy, and asked if you would be her little page;
+      and this has turned thy brain, silly urchin that thou art&mdash;&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;But the words are the least: if you saw the Lady Nina, you would own that
+      a smile from her might turn the wisest head in Italy. Oh, how I should
+      like to serve the Tribune! All the lads of my age are mad for him. How
+      they will stare, and envy me at school tomorrow! You know too, dame, that
+      though I was not always brought up at Rome, I am Roman. Every Roman loves
+      Rienzi.&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;Ay, for the hour: the cry will soon change. This vanity of thine, Angelo,
+      vexes my old heart. I would thou wert humbler.&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;Bastards have their own name to win,&rdquo; said the boy, colouring deeply.
+      &ldquo;They twit me in the teeth, because I cannot say who my father and mother
+      were.&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;They need not,&rdquo; returned the dame, hastily. &ldquo;Thou comest of noble blood
+      and long descent, though, as I have told thee often, I know not the exact
+      names of thy parents. But what art thou shaping that tough sapling of oak
+      into?&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;A sword, dame, to assist the Tribune against the robbers.&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;Alas! I fear me, like all those who seek power in Italy, he is more
+      likely to enlist robbers than to assail them.&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;Why, la you there, you live so shut up, that you know and hear nothing,
+      or you would have learned that even that fiercest of all the robbers, Fra
+      Moreale, has at length yielded to the Tribune, and fled from his castle,
+      like a rat from a falling house.&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;How, how!&rdquo; cried the dame; &ldquo;what say you? Has this plebeian, whom you
+      call the Tribune&mdash;has he boldly thrown the gage to that dread
+      warrior? and has Montreal left the Roman territory?&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;Ay, it is the talk of the town. But Fra Moreale seems as much a bugbear
+      to you as to e&rsquo;er a mother in Rome. Did he ever wrong you, dame?&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;Yes!&rdquo; exclaimed the old woman, with so abrupt a fierceness, that even
+      that hardy boy was startled.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;I wish I could meet him, then,&rdquo; said he, after a pause, as he flourished
+      his mimic weapon.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;Now Heaven forbid! He is a man ever to be shunned by thee, whether for
+      peace or war. Say again this good Tribune holds no terms with the Free
+      Lances.&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;Say it again&mdash;why all Rome knows it.&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;He is pious, too, I have heard; and they do bruit it that he sees
+      visions, and is comforted from above,&rdquo; said the woman, speaking to
+      herself. Then turning to Angelo, she continued,&mdash;&ldquo;Thou wouldst like
+      greatly to accept the Lady Nina&rsquo;s proffer?&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;Ah, that I should, dame, if you could spare me.&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;Child,&rdquo; replied the matron, solemnly, &ldquo;my sand is nearly run, and my wish
+      is to see thee placed with one who will nurture thy young years, and save
+      thee from a life of licence. That done, I may fulfil my vow, and devote
+      the desolate remnant of my years to God. I will think more of this, my
+      child. Not under such a plebeian&rsquo;s roof shouldst thou have lodged, nor
+      from a stranger&rsquo;s board been fed: but at Rome, my last relative worthy of
+      the trust is dead;&mdash;and at the worst, obscure honesty is better than
+      gaudy crime. Thy spirit troubles me already. Back, my child; I must to my
+      closet, and watch and pray.&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      Thus saying, the old woman, repelling the advance, and silencing the
+      muttered and confused words, of the boy&mdash;half affectionate as they
+      were, yet half tetchy and wayward&mdash;glided from the chamber.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      The boy looked abstractedly at the closing door, and then said to himself&mdash;&ldquo;The
+      dame is always talking riddles: I wonder if she know more of me than she
+      tells, or if she is any way akin to me. I hope not, for I don&rsquo;t love her
+      much; nor, for that matter, anything else. I wish she would place me with
+      the Tribune&rsquo;s lady, and then we&rsquo;ll see who among the lads will call Angelo
+      Villani bastard.&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      With that the boy fell to work again at his sword with redoubled vigour.
+      In fact, the cold manner of this female, his sole nurse, companion,
+      substitute for parent, had repelled his affections without subduing his
+      temper; and though not originally of evil disposition, Angelo Villani was
+      already insolent, cunning, and revengeful; but not, on the other hand,
+      without a quick susceptibility to kindness as to affront, a natural
+      acuteness of understanding, and a great indifference to fear. Brought up
+      in quiet affluence rather than luxury, and living much with his protector,
+      whom he knew but by the name of Ursula, his bearing was graceful, and his
+      air that of the well-born. And it was his carriage, perhaps, rather than
+      his countenance, which, though handsome, was more distinguished for
+      intelligence than beauty, which had attracted the notice of the Tribune&rsquo;s
+      bride. His education was that of one reared for some scholastic
+      profession. He was not only taught to read and write, but had been even
+      instructed in the rudiments of Latin. He did not, however, incline to
+      these studies half so fondly as to the games of his companions, or the
+      shows or riots in the street, into all of which he managed to thrust
+      himself, and from which he had always the happy dexterity to return safe
+      and unscathed.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      The next morning Ursula entered the young Angelo&rsquo;s chamber. &ldquo;Wear again
+      thy blue doublet today,&rdquo; said she; &ldquo;I would have thee look thy best. Thou
+      shalt go with me to the palace.&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;What, today?&rdquo; cried the boy joyfully, half leaping from his bed. &ldquo;Dear
+      dame Ursula, shall I really then belong to the train of the great
+      Tribune&rsquo;s lady?&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;Yes; and leave the old woman to die alone! Your joy becomes you,&mdash;but
+      ingratitude is in your blood. Ingratitude! Oh, it has burned my heart into
+      ashes&mdash;and yours, boy, can no longer find a fuel in the dry crumbling
+      cinders.&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;Dear dame, you are always so biting. You know you said you wished to
+      retire into a convent, and I was too troublesome a charge for you. But you
+      delight in rebuking me, justly or unjustly.&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;My task is over,&rdquo; said Ursula, with a deep-drawn sigh.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      The boy answered not; and the old woman retired with a heavy step, and, it
+      may be, a heavier heart. When he joined her in their common apartment, he
+      observed what his joy had previously blinded him to&mdash;that Ursula did
+      not wear her usual plain and sober dress. The gold chain, rarely assumed
+      then by women not of noble birth&mdash;though, in the other sex, affected
+      also by public functionaries and wealthy merchants&mdash;glittered upon a
+      robe of the rich flowered stuffs of Venice, and the clasps that confined
+      the vest at the throat and waist were adorned with jewels of no common
+      price.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      Angelo&rsquo;s eye was struck by the change, but he felt a more manly pride in
+      remarking that the old lady became it well. Her air and mien were indeed
+      those of one to whom such garments were habitual; and they seemed that day
+      more than usually austere and stately.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      She smoothed the boy&rsquo;s ringlets, drew his short mantle more gracefully
+      over his shoulder, and then placed in his belt a poniard whose handle was
+      richly studded, and a purse well filled with florins.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;Learn to use both discreetly,&rdquo; said she; &ldquo;and, whether I live or die, you
+      will never require to wield the poniard to procure the gold.&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;This, then,&rdquo; cried Angelo, enchanted, &ldquo;is a real poniard to fight the
+      robbers with! Ah, with this I should not fear Fra Moreale, who wronged
+      thee so. I trust I may yet avenge thee, though thou didst rate me so just
+      now for ingratitude.&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;I am avenged. Nourish not such thoughts, my son, they are sinful; at
+      least I fear so. Draw to the board and eat; we will go betimes, as
+      petitioners should do.&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      Angelo had soon finished his morning meal, and sallying with Ursula to the
+      porch, he saw, to his surprise, four of those servitors who then usually
+      attended persons of distinction, and who were to be hired in every city,
+      for the convenience of strangers or the holyday ostentation of the gayer
+      citizens.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;How grand we are today!&rdquo; said he, clapping his hands with an eagerness
+      which Ursula failed not to reprove.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;It is not for vain show,&rdquo; she added, &ldquo;which true nobility can well
+      dispense with, but that we may the more readily gain admittance to the
+      palace. These princes of yesterday are not easy of audience to the over
+      humble.&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;Oh! but you are wrong this time,&rdquo; said the boy. &ldquo;The Tribune gives
+      audience to all men, the poorest as the richest. Nay, there is not a
+      ragged boor, or a bare-footed friar, who does not win access to him sooner
+      than the proudest baron. That&rsquo;s why the people love him so. And he devotes
+      one day of the week to receiving the widows and the orphans;&mdash;and you
+      know, dame, I am an orphan.&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      Ursula, already occupied with her own thoughts, did not answer, and
+      scarcely heard, the boy; but leaning on his young arm, and preceded by the
+      footmen to clear the way, passed slowly towards the palace of the Capitol.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      A wonderful thing would it have been to a more observant eye, to note the
+      change which two or three short months of the stern but salutary and wise
+      rule of the Tribune had effected in the streets of Rome. You no longer
+      beheld the gaunt and mail-clad forms of foreign mercenaries stalking
+      through the vistas, or grouped in lazy insolence before the embattled
+      porches of some gloomy palace. The shops, that in many quarters had been
+      closed for years, were again open, glittering with wares and bustling with
+      trade. The thoroughfares, formerly either silent as death, or crossed by
+      some affrighted and solitary passenger with quick steps, and eyes that
+      searched every corner,&mdash;or resounding with the roar of a pauper
+      rabble, or the open feuds of savage nobles, now exhibited the regular, and
+      wholesome, and mingled streams of civilized life, whether bound to
+      pleasure or to commerce. Carts and waggons laden with goods which had
+      passed in safety by the dismantled holds of the robbers of the Campagna,
+      rattled cheerfully over the pathways. &ldquo;Never, perhaps,&rdquo;&mdash;to use the
+      translation adapted from the Italian authorities, by a modern and by no
+      means a partial historian (Gibbon.)&mdash;&ldquo;Never, perhaps, has the energy
+      and effect of a single mind been more remarkably felt than in the sudden
+      reformation of Rome by the Tribune Rienzi. A den of robbers was converted
+      to the discipline of a camp or convent. &lsquo;In this time,&rsquo; says the
+      historian, (&ldquo;Vita di Cola di Rienzi&rdquo;, lib. i. c. 9.) &lsquo;did the woods begin
+      to rejoice that they were no longer infested with robbers; the oxen began
+      to plough; the pilgrims visited the sanctuaries; (Gibbon: the words in the
+      original are &ldquo;li pellegrini cominciaro a fere la cerca per la santuaria.&rdquo;)
+      the roads and inns were replenished with travellers: trade, plenty, and
+      good faith, were restored in the markets; and a purse of gold might be
+      exposed without danger in the midst of the highways.&rsquo;&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      Amidst all these evidences of comfort and security to the people&mdash;some
+      dark and discontented countenances might be seen mingled in the crowd, and
+      whenever one who wore the livery of the Colonna or the Orsini felt himself
+      jostled by the throng, a fierce hand moved involuntarily to the
+      sword-belt, and a half-suppressed oath was ended with an indignant sigh.
+      Here and there too,&mdash;contrasting the redecorated, refurnished, and
+      smiling shops&mdash;heaps of rubbish before the gate of some haughty
+      mansion testified the abasement of fortifications which the owner
+      impotently resented as a sacrilege. Through such streets and such throngs
+      did the party we accompany wend their way, till they found themselves
+      amidst crowds assembled before the entrance of the Capitol. The officers
+      there stationed kept, however, so discreet and dexterous an order, that
+      they were not long detained; and now in the broad place or court of that
+      memorable building, they saw the open doors of the great justice-hall,
+      guarded but by a single sentinel, and in which, for six hours daily, did
+      the Tribune hold his court, for &ldquo;patient to hear, swift to redress,
+      inexorable to punish, his tribunal was always accessible to the poor and
+      stranger.&rdquo; (Gibbon.)
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      Not, however, to that hall did the party bend its way, but to the entrance
+      which admitted to the private apartments of the palace. And here the pomp,
+      the gaud, the more than regal magnificence, of the residence of the
+      Tribune, strongly contrasted the patriarchal simplicity which marked his
+      justice court.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      Even Ursula, not unaccustomed, of yore, to the luxurious state of Italian
+      and French principalities, seemed roused into surprise at the hall crowded
+      with retainers in costly liveries, the marble and gilded columns wreathed
+      with flowers, and the gorgeous banners wrought with the blended arms of
+      the Republican City and the Pontifical See, which blazed aloft and around.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      Scarce knowing whom to address in such an assemblage, Ursula was relieved
+      from her perplexity by an officer attired in a suit of crimson and gold,
+      who, with a grave and formal decorum, which indeed reigned throughout the
+      whole retinue, demanded, respectfully, whom she sought? &ldquo;The Signora
+      Nina!&rdquo; replied Ursula, drawing up her stately person, with a natural,
+      though somewhat antiquated, dignity. There was something foreign in the
+      accent, which influenced the officer&rsquo;s answer.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;Today, madam, I fear that the Signora receives only the Roman ladies.
+      Tomorrow is that appointed for all foreign dames of distinction.&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      Ursula, with a slight impatience of tone, replied&mdash;&ldquo;My business is of
+      that nature which is welcome on any day, at palaces. I come, Signor, to
+      lay certain presents at the Signora&rsquo;s feet, which I trust she will deign
+      to accept.&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;And say, Signor,&rdquo; added the boy, abruptly, &ldquo;that Angelo Villani, whom the
+      Lady Nina honoured yesterday with her notice, is no stranger but a Roman;
+      and comes, as she bade him, to proffer to the Signora his homage and
+      devotion.&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      The grave officer could not refrain a smile at the pert, yet not
+      ungraceful, boldness of the boy.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;I remember me, Master Angelo Villani,&rdquo; he replied, &ldquo;that the Lady Nina
+      spoke to you by the great staircase. Madam, I will do your errand. Please
+      to follow me to an apartment more fitting your sex and seeming.&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      With that the officer led the way across the hall to a broad staircase of
+      white marble, along the centre of which were laid those rich Eastern
+      carpets which at that day, when rushes strewed the chambers of an English
+      monarch, were already common to the greater luxury of Italian palaces.
+      Opening a door at the first flight, he ushered Ursula and her young charge
+      into a lofty ante-chamber, hung with arras of wrought velvets; while over
+      the opposite door, through which the officer now vanished, were blazoned
+      the armorial bearings which the Tribune so constantly introduced in all
+      his pomp, not more from the love of show, than from his politic desire to
+      mingle with the keys of the Pontiff the heraldic insignia of the Republic.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;Philip of Valois is not housed like this man!&rdquo; muttered Ursula. &ldquo;If this
+      last, I shall have done better for my charge than I recked of.&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      The officer soon returned, and led them across an apartment of vast
+      extent, which was indeed the great reception chamber of the palace.
+      Four-and-twenty columns of the Oriental alabaster which had attested the
+      spoils of the later emperors, and had been disinterred from forgotten
+      ruins, to grace the palace of the Reviver of the old Republic, supported
+      the light roof, which, half Gothic, half classic, in its architecture, was
+      inlaid with gilded and purple mosaics. The tesselated floor was covered in
+      the centre with cloth of gold, the walls were clothed, at intervals, with
+      the same gorgeous hangings, relieved by panels freshly painted in the most
+      glowing colours, with mystic and symbolical designs. At the upper end of
+      this royal chamber, two steps ascended to the place of the Tribune&rsquo;s
+      throne, above which was the canopy wrought with the eternal armorial
+      bearings of the Pontiff and the City.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      Traversing this apartment, the officer opened the door at its extremity,
+      which admitted to a small chamber, crowded with pages in rich dresses of
+      silver and blue velvet. There were few amongst them elder than Angelo;
+      and, from their general beauty, they seemed the very flower and blossom of
+      the city.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      Short time had Angelo to gaze on his comrades that were to be:&mdash;another
+      minute, and he and his protectress were in the presence of the Tribune&rsquo;s
+      bride.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      The chamber was not large&mdash;but it was large enough to prove that the
+      beautiful daughter of Raselli had realised her visions of vanity and
+      splendour.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      It was an apartment that mocked description&mdash;it seemed a cabinet for
+      the gems of the world. The daylight, shaded by high and deep-set casements
+      of stained glass, streamed in a purple and mellow hue over all that the
+      art of that day boasted most precious, or regal luxury held most dear. The
+      candelabras of the silver workmanship of Florence; the carpets and stuffs
+      of the East; the draperies of Venice and Genoa; paintings like the
+      illuminated missals, wrought in gold, and those lost colours of blue and
+      crimson; antique marbles, which spoke of the bright days of Athens; tables
+      of disinterred mosaics, their freshness preserved as by magic; censers of
+      gold that steamed with the odours of Araby, yet so subdued as not to
+      deaden the healthier scent of flowers, which blushed in every corner from
+      their marble and alabaster vases; a small and spirit-like fountain, which
+      seemed to gush from among wreaths of roses, diffusing in its diamond and
+      fairy spray, a scarce felt coolness to the air;&mdash;all these, and such
+      as these, which it were vain work to detail, congregated in the richest
+      luxuriance, harmonised with the most exquisite taste, uniting the ancient
+      arts with the modern, amazed and intoxicated the sense of the beholder. It
+      was not so much the cost, nor the luxury, that made the character of the
+      chamber; it was a certain gorgeous and almost sublime phantasy,&mdash;so
+      that it seemed rather the fabled retreat of an enchantress, at whose word
+      genii ransacked the earth, and fairies arranged the produce, than the
+      grosser splendour of an earthly queen. Behind the piled cushions upon
+      which Nina half reclined, stood four girls, beautiful as nymphs, with fans
+      of the rarest feathers, and at her feet lay one older than the rest, whose
+      lute, though now silent, attested her legitimate occupation.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      But, had the room in itself seemed somewhat too fantastic and overcharged
+      in its prodigal ornaments, the form and face of Nina would at once have
+      rendered all appropriate; so completely did she seem the natural Spirit of
+      the Place; so wonderfully did her beauty, elated as it now was with
+      contented love, gratified vanity, exultant hope, body forth the brightest
+      vision that ever floated before the eyes of Tasso, when he wrought into
+      one immortal shape the glory of the Enchantress with the allurements of
+      the Woman.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      Nina half rose as she saw Ursula, whose sedate and mournful features
+      involuntarily testified her surprise and admiration at a loveliness so
+      rare and striking, but who, undazzled by the splendour around, soon
+      recovered her wonted self-composure, and seated herself on the cushion to
+      which Nina pointed, while the young visitor remained standing, and
+      spell-bound by childish wonder, in the centre of the apartment. Nina
+      recognised him with a smile.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;Ah, my pretty boy, whose quick eye and bold air caught my fancy
+      yesterday! Have you come to accept my offer? Is it you, madam, who claim
+      this fair child?&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;Lady,&rdquo; replied Ursula, &ldquo;my business here is brief: by a train of events,
+      needless to weary you with narrating, this boy from his infancy fell to my
+      charge&mdash;a weighty and anxious trust to one whose thoughts are beyond
+      the barrier of life. I have reared him as became a youth of gentle blood;
+      for on both sides, lady, he is noble, though an orphan, motherless and
+      sireless.&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;Poor child!&rdquo; said Nina, compassionately.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;Growing now,&rdquo; continued Ursula, &ldquo;oppressed by years, and desirous only to
+      make my peace with Heaven, I journeyed hither some months since, in the
+      design to place the boy with a relation of mine; and, that trust
+      fulfilled, to take the vows in the City of the Apostle. Alas! I found my
+      kinsman dead, and a baron of wild and dissolute character was his heir.
+      Here remaining, perplexed and anxious, it seemed to me the voice of
+      Providence when, yester-evening, the child told me you had been pleased to
+      honour him with your notice. Like the rest of Rome, he has already learned
+      enthusiasm for the Tribune&mdash;devotion to the Tribune&rsquo;s bride. Will
+      you, in truth, admit him of your household? He will not dishonour your
+      protection by his blood, nor, I trust, by his bearing.&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;I would take his face for his guarantee, madam, even without so
+      distinguished a recommendation as your own. Is he Roman? His name then
+      must be known to me.&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;Pardon me, lady,&rdquo; replied Ursula: &ldquo;He bears the name of Angelo Villani&mdash;not
+      that of his sire or mother. The honour of a noble house for ever condemns
+      his parentage to rest unknown. He is the offspring of a love unsanctioned
+      by the church.&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;He is the more to be loved, then, and to be pitied&mdash;victim of sin
+      not his own!&rdquo; answered Nina, with moistened eyes, as she saw the deep and
+      burning blush that covered the boy&rsquo;s cheeks. &ldquo;With the Tribune&rsquo;s reign
+      commences a new era of nobility, when rank and knighthood shall be won by
+      a man&rsquo;s own merit&mdash;not that of his ancestors. Fear not, madam: in my
+      house he shall know no slight.&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      Ursula was moved from her pride by the kindness of Nina: she approached
+      with involuntary reverence, and kissed the Signora&rsquo;s hand&mdash;
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;May our Lady reward your noble heart!&rdquo; said she: &ldquo;and now my mission is
+      ended, and my earthly goal is won. Add only, lady, to your inestimable
+      favours one more. These jewels&rdquo;&mdash;and Ursula drew from her robe a
+      casket, touched the spring, and the lid flying back, discovered jewels of
+      great size and the most brilliant water,&mdash;&ldquo;these jewels,&rdquo; she
+      continued, laying the casket at Nina&rsquo;s feet, &ldquo;once belonging to the
+      princely house of Thoulouse, are valueless to me and mine. Suffer me to
+      think that they are transferred to one whose queenly brow will give them a
+      lustre it cannot borrow.&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;How!&rdquo; said Nina, colouring very deeply; &ldquo;think you, madam, my kindness
+      can be bought? What woman&rsquo;s kindness ever was? Nay, nay&mdash;take back
+      the gifts, or I shall pray you to take back your boy.&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      Ursula was astonished and confounded: to her experience such abstinence
+      was a novelty, and she scarcely knew how to meet it. Nina perceived her
+      embarrassment with a haughty and triumphant smile, and then, regaining her
+      former courtesy of demeanour, said, with a grave sweetness&mdash;
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;The Tribune&rsquo;s hands are clean,&mdash;the Tribune&rsquo;s wife must not be
+      suspected. Rather, madam, should I press upon you some token of exchange
+      for the fair charge you have committed to me. Your jewels hereafter may
+      profit the boy in his career: reserve them for one who needs them.&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;No, lady,&rdquo; said Ursula, rising and lifting her eyes to heaven;&mdash;&ldquo;they
+      shall buy masses for his mother&rsquo;s soul; for him I shall reserve a
+      competence when his years require it. Lady, accept the thanks of a
+      wretched and desolate heart. Fare you well!&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      She turned to quit the room, but with so faltering and weak a step, that
+      Nina, touched and affected, sprung up, and with her own hand guided the
+      old woman across the room, whispering comfort and soothing to her; while,
+      as they reached the door, the boy rushed forward, and, clasping Ursula&rsquo;s
+      robe, sobbed out&mdash;&ldquo;Dear dame, not one farewell for your little
+      Angelo! Forgive him all he has cost you! Now, for the first time, I feel
+      how wayward and thankless I have been.&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      The old woman caught him in her arms, and kissed him passionately; when
+      the boy, as if a thought suddenly struck him, drew forth the purse she had
+      given him and said, in a choked and scarce articulate voice,&mdash;&ldquo;And
+      let this, dearest dame, go in masses for my poor father&rsquo;s soul; for he is
+      dead, too, you know!&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      These words seemed to freeze at once all the tenderer emotions of Ursula.
+      She put back the boy with the same chilling and stern severity of aspect
+      and manner which had so often before repressed him: and recovering her
+      self-possession, at once quitted the apartment without saying another
+      word. Nina, surprised, but still pitying her sorrow and respecting her
+      age, followed her steps across the pages&rsquo; ante-room and the
+      reception-chamber, even to the foot of the stairs,&mdash;a condescension
+      the haughtiest princess of Rome could not have won from her; and
+      returning, saddened and thoughtful, she took the boy&rsquo;s hand, and
+      affectionately kissed his forehead.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;Poor boy!&rdquo; she said, &ldquo;it seems as if Providence had made me select thee
+      yesterday from the crowd, and thus conducted thee to thy proper refuge.
+      For to whom should come the friendless and the orphans of Rome, but to the
+      palace of Rome&rsquo;s first Magistrate?&rdquo; Turning then to her attendants, she
+      gave them instructions as to the personal comforts of her new charge,
+      which evinced that if power had ministered to her vanity, it had not
+      steeled her heart. Angelo Villani lived to repay her well!
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      She retained the boy in her presence, and conversing with him familiarly,
+      she was more and more pleased with his bold spirit and frank manner. Their
+      conversation was however interrupted, as the day advanced, by the arrival
+      of several ladies of the Roman nobility. And then it was that Nina&rsquo;s
+      virtues receded into shade, and her faults appeared. She could not resist
+      the woman&rsquo;s triumph over those arrogant signoras who now cringed in homage
+      where they had once slighted with disdain. She affected the manner of, she
+      demanded the respect due to, a queen. And by many of those dexterous arts
+      which the sex know so well, she contrived to render her very courtesy a
+      humiliation to her haughty guests. Her commanding beauty and her graceful
+      intellect saved her, indeed, from the vulgar insolence of the upstart; but
+      yet more keenly stung the pride, by forbidding to those she mortified the
+      retaliation of contempt. Hers were the covert taunt&mdash;the smiling
+      affront&mdash;the sarcasm in the mask of compliment&mdash;the careless
+      exaction of respect in trifles, which could not outwardly be resented, but
+      which could not inly be forgiven.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;Fair day to the Signora Colonna,&rdquo; said she to the proud wife of the proud
+      Stephen; &ldquo;we passed your palace yesterday. How fair it now seems, relieved
+      from those gloomy battlements which it must often have saddened you to
+      gaze upon. Signora, (turning to one of the Orsini), your lord has high
+      favour with the Tribune, who destines him to great command. His fortunes
+      are secured, and we rejoice at it; for no man more loyally serves the
+      state. Have you seen, fair Lady of Frangipani, the last verses of Petrarch
+      in honour of my lord?&mdash;they rest yonder. May we so far venture as to
+      request you to point out their beauties to the Signora di Savelli? We
+      rejoice, noble Lady of Malatesta, to observe that your eyesight is so well
+      restored. The last time we met, though we stood next to you in the revels
+      of the Lady Giulia, you seemed scarce to distinguish us from the pillar by
+      which we stood!&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;Must this insolence be endured!&rdquo; whispered the Signora Frangipani to the
+      Signora Malatesta.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;Hush, hush; if ever it be our day again!&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      <a name="link2HCH0025" id="link2HCH0025">
+      <!--  H2 anchor --> </a>
+    </p>
+    <div style="height: 4em;">
+      <br /><br /><br /><br />
+    </div>
+    <h2>
+      Chapter 4.II. The Blessing of A Councillor Whose Interests and Heart Are
+    </h2>
+    <p>
+      Our Own.&mdash;the Straws Thrown Upward,&mdash;Do They Portend A Storm.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      It was later that day than usual, when Rienzi returned from his tribunal
+      to the apartments of the palace. As he traversed the reception hall, his
+      countenance was much flushed; his teeth were set firmly, like a man who
+      has taken a strong resolution from which he will not be moved; and his
+      brow was dark with that settled and fearful frown which the describers of
+      his personal appearance have not failed to notice as the characteristic of
+      an anger the more deadly because invariably just. Close as his heels
+      followed the Bishop of Orvietto and the aged Stephen Colonna. &ldquo;I tell you,
+      my Lords,&rdquo; said Rienzi, &ldquo;that ye plead in vain. Rome knows no distinction
+      between ranks. The law is blind to the agent&mdash;lynx-eyed to the deed.&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;Yet,&rdquo; said Raimond, hesitatingly, &ldquo;bethink thee, Tribune; the nephew of
+      two cardinals, and himself once a senator.&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      Rienzi halted abruptly, and faced his companions. &ldquo;My Lord Bishop,&rdquo; said
+      he, &ldquo;does not this make the crime more inexcusable? Look you, thus it
+      reads:&mdash;A vessel from Avignon to Naples, charged with the revenues of
+      Provence to Queen Joanna, on whose cause, mark you, we now hold solemn
+      council, is wrecked at the mouth of the Tiber; with that, Martino di Porto&mdash;a
+      noble, as you say&mdash;the holder of that fortress whence he derives his
+      title,&mdash;doubly bound by gentle blood and by immediate neighbourhood
+      to succour the oppressed&mdash;falls upon the vessel with his troops (what
+      hath the rebel with armed troops?)&mdash;and pillages the vessel like a
+      common robber. He is apprehended&mdash;brought to my tribunal&mdash;receives
+      fair trial&mdash;is condemned to die. Such is the law;&mdash;what more
+      would ye have?&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;Mercy,&rdquo; said the Colonna.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      Rienzi folded his arms, and laughed disdainfully. &ldquo;I never heard my Lord
+      Colonna plead for mercy when a peasant had stolen the bread that was to
+      feed his famishing children.&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;Between a peasant and a prince, Tribune, I, for one, recognise a
+      distinction:&mdash;the bright blood of an Orsini is not to be shed like
+      that of a base plebeian&mdash;&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;Which, I remember me,&rdquo; said Rienzi, in a low voice, &ldquo;you deemed small
+      matter enough when my boy-brother fell beneath the wanton spear of your
+      proud son. Wake not that memory, I warn you; let it sleep.&mdash;For
+      shame, old Colonna&mdash;for shame; so near the grave, where the worm
+      levels all flesh, and preaching, with those gray hairs, the uncharitable
+      distinction between man and man. Is there not distinction enough at the
+      best? Does not one wear purple, and the other rags? Hath not one ease, and
+      the other toil? Doth not the one banquet while the other starves? Do I
+      nourish any mad scheme to level the ranks which society renders a
+      necessary evil? No. I war no more with Dives than with Lazarus. But before
+      Man&rsquo;s judgment-seat, as before God&rsquo;s, Lazarus and Dives are made equal. No
+      more.&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      Colonna drew his robe round him with great haughtiness, and bit his lip in
+      silence. Raimond interposed.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;All this is true, Tribune. But,&rdquo; and he drew Rienzi aside, &ldquo;you know we
+      must be politic as well as just. Nephew to two Cardinals, what enmity will
+      not this provoke at Avignon?&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;Vex not yourself, holy Raimond, I will answer it to the Pontiff.&rdquo; While
+      they spoke the bell tolled heavily and loudly.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      Colonna started.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;Great Tribune,&rdquo; said he, with a slight sneer, &ldquo;deign to pause ere it be
+      too late. I know not that I ever before bent to you a suppliant; and I ask
+      you now to spare mine own foe. Stephen Colonna prays Cola di Rienzi to
+      spare the life of an Orsini.&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;I understand thy taunt, old Lord,&rdquo; said Rienzi, calmly, &ldquo;but I resent it
+      not. You are foe to the Orsini, yet you plead for him&mdash;it sounds
+      generous; but hark you,&mdash;you are more a friend to your order than a
+      foe to your rival. You cannot bear that one, great enough to have
+      contended with you, should perish like a thief. I give full praise to such
+      noble forgiveness; but I am no noble, and I do not sympathize with it. One
+      word more;&mdash;if this were the sole act of fraud and violence that this
+      bandit baron had committed, your prayers should plead for him; but is not
+      his life notorious? Has he not been from boyhood the terror and disgrace
+      of Rome? How many matrons violated, merchants pillaged, peaceful men
+      stilettoed in the daylight, rise in dark witness against the prisoner? And
+      for such a man do I live to hear an aged prince and a pope&rsquo;s vicar plead
+      for mercy?&mdash;Fie, fie! But I will be even with ye. The next poor man
+      whom the law sentences to death, for your sake will I pardon.&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      Raimond again drew aside the Tribune, while Colonna struggled to suppress
+      his rage.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;My friend,&rdquo; said the Bishop, &ldquo;the nobles will feel this as an insult to
+      their whole order; the very pleading of Orsini&rsquo;s worst foe must convince
+      thee of this. Martino&rsquo;s blood will seal their reconciliation with each
+      other, and they will be as one man against thee.&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;Be it so: with God and the People on my side, I will dare, though a
+      Roman, to be just. The bell ceases&mdash;you are already too late.&rdquo; So
+      saying, Rienzi threw open the casement; and by the staircase of the Lion
+      rose a gibbet from which swung with a creaking sound, arrayed in his
+      patrician robes, the yet palpitating corpse of Martino di Porto.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;Behold!&rdquo; said the Tribune, sternly, &ldquo;thus die all robbers. For traitors,
+      the same law has the axe and the scaffold!&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      Raimond drew back and turned pale. Not so the veteran noble. Tears of
+      wounded pride started from his eyes; he approached, leaning on his staff,
+      to Rienzi, touched him on his shoulder, and said,&mdash;
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;Tribune, a judge has lived to envy his victim!&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      Rienzi turned with an equal pride to the Baron.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;We forgive idle words in the aged. My Lord, have you done with us?&mdash;we
+      would be alone.&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;Give me thy arm, Raimond,&rdquo; said Stephen. &ldquo;Tribune&mdash;farewell. Forget
+      that the Colonna sued thee,&mdash;an easy task, methinks; for, wise as you
+      are, you forget what every one else can remember.&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;Ay, my Lord, what?&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;Birth, Tribune, birth&mdash;that&rsquo;s all!&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;The Signor Colonna has taken up my old calling, and turned a wit,&rdquo;
+       returned Rienzi, with an indifferent and easy tone.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      Then following Raimond and Stephen with his eyes, till the door closed
+      upon them, he muttered, &ldquo;Insolent! were it not for Adrian, thy grey beard
+      should not bear thee harmless. Birth! what Colonna would not boast
+      himself, if he could, the grandson of an emperor?&mdash;Old man, there is
+      danger in thee which must be watched.&rdquo; With that he turned musingly
+      towards the casement, and again that griesly spectacle of death met his
+      eye. The people below, assembled in large concourse, rejoiced at the
+      execution of one whose whole life had been infamy and rapine&mdash;but who
+      had seemed beyond justice&mdash;with all the fierce clamour that marks the
+      exultation of the rabble over a crushed foe. And where Rienzi stood, he
+      heard heir shouts of &ldquo;Long live the Tribune, the just judge, Rome&rsquo;s
+      liberator!&rdquo; But at that time other thoughts deafened his senses to the
+      popular enthusiasm.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;My poor brother!&rdquo; he said, with tears in his eyes, &ldquo;it was owing to this
+      man&rsquo;s crimes&mdash;and to a crime almost similar to that for which he has
+      now suffered&mdash;that thou wert entrained to the slaughter; and they who
+      had no pity for the lamb, clamour for compassion to the wolf! Ah, wert
+      thou living now, how these proud heads would bend to thee; though dead,
+      thou wert not worthy of a thought. God rest thy gentle soul, and keep my
+      ambition pure as it was when we walked at twilight, side by side
+      together!&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      The Tribune shut the casement, and turning away, sought the chamber of
+      Nina. On hearing his step without, she had already risen from the couch,
+      her eyes sparkling, her bosom heaving; and as he entered, she threw
+      herself on his neck, and murmured as she nestled to his breast,&mdash;&ldquo;Ah,
+      the hours since we parted!&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      It was a singular thing to see that proud lady, proud of her beauty, her
+      station, her new honours;&mdash;whose gorgeous vanity was already the talk
+      of Rome, and the reproach to Rienzi,&mdash;how suddenly and miraculously
+      she seemed changed in his presence! Blushing and timid, all pride in
+      herself seemed merged in her proud love for him. No woman ever loved to
+      the full extent of the passion, who did not venerate where she loved, and
+      who did not feel humbled (delighted in that humility) by her exaggerated
+      and overweening estimate of the superiority of the object of her worship.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      And it might be the consciousness of this distinction between himself and
+      all other created things, which continued to increase the love of the
+      Tribune to his bride, to blind him to her failings towards others, and to
+      indulge her in a magnificence of parade, which, though to a certain point
+      politic to assume, was carried to an extent which if it did not conspire
+      to produce his downfall, has served the Romans with an excuse for their
+      own cowardice and desertion, and historians with a plausible explanation
+      of causes they had not the industry to fathom. Rienzi returned his wife&rsquo;s
+      caresses with an equal affection, and bending down to her beautiful face,
+      the sight was sufficient to chase from his brow the emotions, whether
+      severe or sad, which had lately darkened its broad expanse.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;Thou has not been abroad this morning, Nina!&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;No, the heat was oppressive. But nevertheless, Cola, I have not lacked
+      company&mdash;half the matronage of Rome has crowded the palace.&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;Ah, I warrant it.&mdash;But yon boy, is he not a new face?&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;Hush, Cola, speak to him kindly, I entreat: of his story anon. Angelo,
+      approach. You see your new master, the Tribune of Rome.&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      Angelo approached with a timidity not his wont, for an air of majesty was
+      at all times natural to Rienzi, and since his power it had naturally taken
+      a graver and austerer aspect, which impressed those who approached him,
+      even the ambassadors of princes, with a certain involuntary awe. The
+      Tribune smiled at the effect he saw he had produced, and being by temper
+      fond of children, and affable to all but the great, he hastened to dispel
+      it. He took the child affectionately in his arms, kissed him, and bade him
+      welcome.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;May we have a son as fair!&rdquo; he whispered to Nina, who blushed, and turned
+      away.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;Thy name, my little friend?&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;Angelo Villani.&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;A Tuscan name. There is a man of letters at Florence, doubtless writing
+      our annals from hearsay at this moment, called Villani. Perhaps akin to
+      thee?&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;I have no kin,&rdquo; said the boy, bluntly; &ldquo;and therefore I shall the better
+      love the Signora and honour you, if you will let me. I am Roman&mdash;all
+      the Roman boys honour Rienzi.&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;Do they, my brave lad?&rdquo; said the Tribune, colouring with pleasure; &ldquo;that
+      is a good omen of my continued prosperity.&rdquo; He put down the boy, and threw
+      himself on the cushions, while Nina placed herself on a kind of low stool
+      beside him.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;Let us be alone,&rdquo; said he; and Nina motioned to the attendant maidens to
+      withdraw.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;Take my new page with you,&rdquo; said she; &ldquo;he is yet, perhaps, too fresh from
+      home to enjoy the company of his giddy brethren.&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      When they were alone, Nina proceeded to narrate to Rienzi the adventure of
+      the morning; but though he seemed outwardly to listen, his gaze was on
+      vacancy, and he was evidently abstracted and self-absorbed. At length, as
+      she concluded, he said, &ldquo;Well, Nina, you have acted as ever, kindly and
+      nobly. Let us to other themes. I am in danger.&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;Danger!&rdquo; echoed Nina, turning pale.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;Why, the word must not appal you&mdash;you have a spirit like mine, that
+      scorns fear; and, for that reason, Nina, in all Rome you are my only
+      confidant. It was not only to glad me with thy beauty, but to cheer me
+      with thy counsel, to support me with thy valour, that Heaven gave me thee
+      as a helpmate.&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;Now, our Lady bless thee for those words!&rdquo; said Nina, kissing the hand
+      that hung over her shoulder; &ldquo;and if I started at the word danger, it was
+      but the woman&rsquo;s thought of thee,&mdash;an unworthy thought, my Cola, for
+      glory and danger go together. And I am as ready to share the last as the
+      first. If the hour of trial ever come, none of thy friends shall be so
+      faithful to thy side as this weak form but undaunted heart.&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;I know it, my own Nina; I know it,&rdquo; said Rienzi, rising, and pacing the
+      chamber with large and rapid strides. &ldquo;Now listen to me. Thou knowest that
+      to govern in safety, it is my policy as my pride to govern justly. To
+      govern justly is an awful thing, when mighty barons are the culprits.
+      Nina, for an open and audacious robbery, our court has sentenced Martin of
+      the Orsini, the Lord of Porto, to death. His corpse swings now on the
+      Staircase of the Lion.&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;A dreadful doom!&rdquo; said Nina, shuddering.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;True; but by his death thousands of poor and honest men may live in
+      peace. It is not that which troubles me: the Barons resent the deed, as an
+      insult to them that law should touch a noble. They will rise&mdash;they
+      will rebel. I foresee the storm&mdash;not the spell to allay it.&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      Nina paused a moment,&mdash;&ldquo;They have taken,&rdquo; she then said, &ldquo;a solemn
+      oath on the Eucharist not to bear arms against thee.&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;Perjury is a light addition to theft and murder,&rdquo; answered Rienzi, with
+      his sarcastic smile.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;But the people are faithful.&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;Yes, but in a civil war (which the saints forefend!) those combatants are
+      the stanchest who have no home but their armour, no calling but the sword.
+      The trader will not leave his trade at the toll of a bell every day; but
+      the Barons&rsquo; soldiery are ready at all hours.&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;To be strong,&rdquo; said Nina,&mdash;who, summoned to the councils of her
+      lord, shewed an intellect not unworthy of the honour,&mdash;&ldquo;to be strong
+      in dangerous times, authority must seem strong. By shewing no fear, you
+      may prevent the cause of fear.&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;My own thought!&rdquo; returned Rienzi, quickly. &ldquo;You know that half my power
+      with these Barons is drawn from the homage rendered to me by foreign
+      states. When from every city in Italy the ambassadors of crowned princes
+      seek the alliance of the Tribune, they must veil their resentment at the
+      rise of the Plebeian. On the other hand, to be strong abroad I must seem
+      strong at home: the vast design I have planned, and, as by a miracle,
+      begun to execute, will fail at once if it seem abroad to be intrusted to
+      an unsteady and fluctuating power. That design (continued Rienzi, pausing,
+      and placing his hand on a marble bust of the young Augustus) is greater
+      than his, whose profound yet icy soul united Italy in subjection,&mdash;for
+      it would unite Italy in freedom;&mdash;yes! could we but form one great
+      federative league of all the States of Italy, each governed by its own
+      laws, but united for mutual and common protection against the Attilas of
+      the North, with Rome for their Metropolis and their Mother, this age and
+      this brain would have wrought an enterprise which men should quote till
+      the sound of the last trump!&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;I know thy divine scheme,&rdquo; said Nina, catching his enthusiasm; &ldquo;and what
+      if there be danger in attaining it? Have we not mastered the greatest
+      danger in the first step?&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;Right, Nina, right! Heaven (and the Tribune, who ever recognised, in his
+      own fortunes, the agency of the hand above, crossed himself reverently)
+      will preserve him to whom it hath vouchsafed such lofty visions of the
+      future redemption of the Land of the true Church, and the liberty and
+      advancement of its children! This I trust: already many of the cities of
+      Tuscany have entered into treaties for the formation of this league; nor
+      from a single tyrant, save John di Vico, have I received aught but fair
+      words and flattering promises. The time seems ripe for the grand stroke of
+      all.&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;And what is that?&rdquo; demanded Nina, wonderingly.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;Defiance to all foreign interference. By what right does a synod of
+      stranger princes give Rome a king in some Teuton Emperor? Rome&rsquo;s people
+      alone should choose Rome&rsquo;s governor;&mdash;and shall we cross the Alps to
+      render the title of our master to the descendants of the Goth?&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      Nina was silent: the custom of choosing the sovereign by a diet beyond the
+      Rhine, reserving only the ceremony of his subsequent coronation for the
+      mock assent of the Romans, however degrading to that people, and however
+      hostile to all nations of substantial independence, was so unquestioned at
+      that time, that Rienzi&rsquo;s daring suggestion left her amazed and breathless,
+      prepared as she was for any scheme, however extravagantly bold.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;How!&rdquo; said she, after a long pause; &ldquo;do I understand aright? Can you mean
+      defiance to the Emperor?&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;Why, listen: at this moment there are two pretenders to the throne of
+      Rome&mdash;to the imperial crown of Italy&mdash;a Bohemian and a Bavarian.
+      To their election our assent&mdash;Rome&rsquo;s assent&mdash;is not requisite&mdash;not
+      asked. Can we be called free&mdash;can we boast ourselves republican&mdash;when
+      a stranger and a barbarian is thus thrust upon our necks? No, we will be
+      free in reality as in name. Besides, (continued the Tribune, in a calmer
+      tone,) this seems to me politic as well as daring. The people incessantly
+      demand wonders from me: how can I more nobly dazzle, more virtuously win
+      them, than by asserting their inalienable right to choose their own
+      rulers? The daring will awe the Barons, and foreigners themselves; it will
+      give a startling example to all Italy; it will be the first brand of an
+      universal blaze. It shall be done, and with a pomp that befits the deed!&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;Cola,&rdquo; said Nina, hesitatingly, &ldquo;your eagle spirit often ascends where
+      mine flags to follow; yet be not over bold.&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;Nay, did you not, a moment since, preach a different doctrine? To be
+      strong, was I not to seem strong?&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;May fate preserve you!&rdquo; said Nina, with a foreboding sigh.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;Fate!&rdquo; cried Rienzi; &ldquo;there is no fate! Between the thought and the
+      success, God is the only agent; and (he added with a voice of deep
+      solemnity) I shall not be deserted. Visions by night, even while thine
+      arms are around me; omens and impulses, stirring and divine, by day, even
+      in the midst of the living crowd&mdash;encourage my path, and point my
+      goal. Now, even now, a voice seems to whisper in my ear&mdash;&lsquo;Pause not;
+      tremble not; waver not;&mdash;for the eye of the All-Seeing is upon thee,
+      and the hand of the All-Powerful shall protect!&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      As Rienzi thus spoke, his face grew pale, his hair seemed to bristle, his
+      tall and proud form trembled visibly, and presently he sunk down on a
+      seat, and covered his face with his hands.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      An awe crept over Nina, though not unaccustomed to such strange and
+      preternatural emotions, which appeared yet the more singular in one who in
+      common life was so calm, stately, and self-possessed. But with every
+      increase of prosperity and power, those emotions seemed to increase in
+      their fervour, as if in such increase the devout and overwrought
+      superstition of the Tribune recognised additional proof of a mysterious
+      guardianship mightier than the valour or art of man.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      She approached fearfully, and threw her arms around him, but without
+      speaking.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      Ere yet the Tribune had well recovered himself, a slight tap at the door
+      was heard, and the sound seemed at once to recall his self-possession.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;Enter,&rdquo; he said, lifting his face, to which the wonted colour slowly
+      returned.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      An officer, half-opening the door, announced that the person he had sent
+      for waited his leisure.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;I come!&mdash;Core of my heart,&rdquo; (he whispered to Nina,) &ldquo;we will sup
+      alone tonight, and will converse more on these matters:&rdquo; so saying, with
+      somewhat less than his usual loftiness of mien, he left the room, and
+      sought his cabinet, which lay at the other side of the reception chamber.
+      Here he found Cecco del Vecchio.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;How, my bold fellow,&rdquo; said the Tribune, assuming with wonderful ease that
+      air of friendly equality which he always adopted with those of the lower
+      class, and which made a striking contrast with the majesty, no less
+      natural, which marked his manner to the great. &ldquo;How now, my Cecco! Thou
+      bearest thyself bravely, I see, during these sickly heats; we labourers&mdash;for
+      both of us labour, Cecco&mdash;are too busy to fall ill as the idle do, in
+      the summer, or the autumn, of Roman skies. I sent for thee, Cecco, because
+      I would know how thy fellow-craftsmen are like to take the Orsini&rsquo;s
+      execution.&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;Oh! Tribune,&rdquo; replied the artificer, who, now familiarized with Rienzi,
+      had lost much of his earlier awe of him, and who regarded the Tribune&rsquo;s
+      power as partly his own creation; &ldquo;they are already out of their honest
+      wits, at your courage in punishing the great men as you would the small.&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;So;&mdash;I am repaid! But hark you, Cecco, it will bring, perhaps, hot
+      work upon us. Every Baron will dread lest it be his turn next, and dread
+      will make them bold, like rats in despair. We may have to fight for the
+      Good Estate.&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;With all my heart, Tribune,&rdquo; answered Cecco, gruffly. &ldquo;I, for one, am no
+      craven.&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;Then keep the same spirit in all your meetings with the artificers. I
+      fight for the people. The people at a pinch must fight with me.&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;They will,&rdquo; replied Cecco; &ldquo;they will!&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;Cecco, this city is under the spiritual dominion of the Pontiff&mdash;so
+      be it&mdash;it is an honour, not a burthen. But the temporal dominion, my
+      friend, should be with Romans only. Is it not a disgrace to Republican
+      Rome, that while we now speak, certain barbarians, whom we never heard of,
+      should be deciding beyond the Alps on the merits of two sovereigns, whom
+      we never saw? Is not this a thing to be resisted? An Italian city,&mdash;what
+      hath it to do with a Bohemian Emperor?&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;Little eno&rsquo;, St. Paul knows!&rdquo; said Cecco.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;Should it not be a claim questioned?&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;I think so!&rdquo; replied the smith.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;And if found an outrage on our ancient laws, should it not be a claim
+      resisted?&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;Not a doubt of it.&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;Well, go to! The archives assure me that never was Emperor lawfully
+      crowned but by the free votes of the people. We never chose Bohemian or
+      Bavarian.&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;But, on the contrary, whenever these Northmen come hither to be crowned,
+      we try to drive them away with stones and curses,&mdash;for we are a
+      people, Tribune, that love our liberties.&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;Go back to your friends&mdash;see&mdash;address them, say that your
+      Tribune will demand of these pretenders to Rome the right to her throne.
+      Let them not be mazed or startled, but support me when the occasion
+      comes.&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;I am glad of this,&rdquo; quoth the huge smith; &ldquo;for our friends have grown a
+      little unruly of late, and say&mdash;&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;What do they say?&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;That it is true you have expelled the banditti, and curb the Barons, and
+      administer justice fairly;&mdash;&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;Is not that miracle enough for the space of some two or three short
+      months?&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;Why, they say it would have been more than enough in a noble; but you,
+      being raised from the people, and having such gifts and so forth, might do
+      yet more. It is now three weeks since they have had any new thing to talk
+      about; but Orsini&rsquo;s execution today will cheer them a bit.&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;Well, Cecco, well,&rdquo; said the Tribune, rising, &ldquo;they shall have more anon
+      to feed their mouths with. So you think they love me not quite so well as
+      they did some three weeks back?&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;I say not so,&rdquo; answered Cecco. &ldquo;But we Romans are an impatient people.&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;Alas, yes!&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;However, they will no doubt stick close enough to you; provided, Tribune,
+      you don&rsquo;t put any new tax upon them.&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;Ha! But if, in order to be free, it be necessary to fight&mdash;if to
+      fight, it be necessary to have soldiers, why then the soldiers must be
+      paid:&mdash;won&rsquo;t the people contribute something to their own liberties;&mdash;to
+      just laws, and safe lives?&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;I don&rsquo;t know,&rdquo; returned the smith, scratching his head as if a little
+      puzzled; &ldquo;but I know that poor men won&rsquo;t be overtaxed. They say they are
+      better off with you than with the Barons before, and therefore they love
+      you. But men in business, Tribune, poor men with families, must look to
+      their bellies. Only one man in ten goes to law&mdash;only one man in
+      twenty is butchered by a Baron&rsquo;s brigand; but every man eats, and drinks,
+      and feels a tax.&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;This cannot be your reasoning, Cecco!&rdquo; said Rienzi, gravely.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;Why, Tribune, I am an honest man, but I have a large family to rear.&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;Enough; enough!&rdquo; said the Tribune quickly; and then he added abstractedly
+      as to himself, but aloud,&mdash;&ldquo;Methinks we have been too lavish; these
+      shows and spectacles should cease.&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;What!&rdquo; cried Cecco; &ldquo;what, Tribune!&mdash;would you deny the poor fellows
+      a holiday. They work hard enough, and their only pleasure is seeing your
+      fine shows and processions; and then they go home and say,&mdash;&lsquo;See, our
+      man beats all the Barons! what state he keeps!&rsquo;&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;Ah! they blame not my splendour, then!&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;Blame it; no! Without it they would be ashamed of you, and think the
+      Buono Stato but a shabby concern.&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;You speak bluntly, Cecco, but perhaps wisely. The saints keep you! Fail
+      not to remember what I told you!&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;No, no. It is a shame to have an Emperor thrust upon us;&mdash;so it is.
+      Good evening, Tribune.&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      Left alone, the Tribune remained for some time plunged in gloomy and
+      foreboding thoughts.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;I am in the midst of a magician&rsquo;s spell,&rdquo; said he; &ldquo;if I desist, the
+      fiends tear me to pieces. What I have begun, that must I conclude. But
+      this rude man shews me too well with what tools I work. For me failure is
+      nothing, I have already climbed to a greatness which might render giddy
+      many a born prince&rsquo;s brain. But with my fall&mdash;Rome, Italy, Peace,
+      Justice, Civilization&mdash;all fall back into the abyss of ages!&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      He rose; and after once or twice pacing his apartment, in which from many
+      a column gleamed upon him the marble effigies of the great of old, he
+      opened the casement to inhale the air of the now declining day.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      The Place of the Capitol was deserted save by the tread of the single
+      sentinel. But still, dark and fearful, hung from the tall gibbet the clay
+      of the robber noble; and the colossal shape of the Egyptian lion rose hard
+      by, sharp and dark in the breathless atmosphere.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;Dread statue!&rdquo; thought Rienzi, &ldquo;how many unwhispered and solemn rites
+      hast thou witnessed by thy native Nile, ere the Roman&rsquo;s hand transferred
+      thee hither&mdash;the antique witness of Roman crimes! Strange! but when I
+      look upon thee I feel as if thou hadst some mystic influence over my own
+      fortunes. Beside thee was I hailed the republican Lord of Rome; beside
+      thee are my palace, my tribunal, the place of my justice, my triumphs, and
+      my pomp:&mdash;to thee my eyes turn from my bed of state: and if fated to
+      die in power and peace, thou mayst be the last object my eyes will mark!
+      Or if myself a victim&mdash;.&rdquo; He paused&mdash;shrank from the thought
+      presented to him&mdash;turned to a recess of the chamber&mdash;drew aside
+      a curtain, that veiled a crucifix and a small table, on which lay a Bible
+      and the monastic emblems of the skull and crossbones&mdash;emblems,
+      indeed, grave and irresistible, of the nothingness of power, and the
+      uncertainty of life. Before these sacred monitors, whether to humble or to
+      elevate, knelt that proud and aspiring man; and when he rose, it was with
+      a lighter step and more cheerful mien than he had worn that day.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      <a name="link2HCH0026" id="link2HCH0026">
+      <!--  H2 anchor --> </a>
+    </p>
+    <div style="height: 4em;">
+      <br /><br /><br /><br />
+    </div>
+    <h2>
+      Chapter 4.III. The Actor Unmasked.
+    </h2>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;In intoxication,&rdquo; says the proverb, &ldquo;men betray their real characters.&rdquo;
+       There is a no less honest and truth-revealing intoxication in prosperity,
+      than in wine. The varnish of power brings forth at once the defects and
+      the beauties of the human portrait.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      The unprecedented and almost miraculous rise of Rienzi from the rank of
+      the Pontiff&rsquo;s official to the Lord of Rome, would have been accompanied
+      with a yet greater miracle, if it had not somewhat dazzled and seduced the
+      object it elevated. When, as in well-ordered states and tranquil times,
+      men rise slowly, step by step, they accustom themselves to their growing
+      fortunes. But the leap of an hour from a citizen to a prince&mdash;from
+      the victim of oppression to the dispenser of justice&mdash;is a transition
+      so sudden as to render dizzy the most sober brain. And, perhaps, in
+      proportion to the imagination, the enthusiasm, the genius of the man, will
+      the suddenness be dangerous&mdash;excite too extravagant a hope&mdash;and
+      lead to too chimerical an ambition. The qualities that made him rise,
+      hurry him to his fall; and victory at the Marengo of his fortunes, urges
+      him to destruction at its Moscow.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      In his greatness Rienzi did not so much acquire new qualities, as develop
+      in brighter light and deeper shadow those which he had always exhibited.
+      On the one hand he was just&mdash;resolute&mdash;the friend of the
+      oppressed&mdash;the terror of the oppressor. His wonderful intellect
+      illumined everything it touched. By rooting out abuse, and by searching
+      examination and wise arrangement, he had trebled the revenues of the city
+      without imposing a single new tax. Faithful to his idol of liberty, he had
+      not been betrayed by the wish of the people into despotic authority; but
+      had, as we have seen, formally revived, and established with new powers,
+      the Parliamentary Council of the city. However extensive his own
+      authority, he referred its exercise to the people; in their name he alone
+      declared himself to govern, and he never executed any signal action
+      without submitting to them its reasons or its justification. No less
+      faithful to his desire to restore prosperity as well as freedom to Rome,
+      he had seized the first dazzling epoch of his power to propose that great
+      federative league with the Italian States which would, as he rightly said,
+      have raised Rome to the indisputable head of European nations. Under his
+      rule trade was secure, literature was welcome, art began to rise.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      On the other hand, the prosperity which made more apparent his justice,
+      his integrity, his patriotism, his virtues, and his genius, brought out no
+      less glaringly his arrogant consciousness of superiority, his love of
+      display, and the wild and daring insolence of his ambition. Though too
+      just to avenge himself by retaliating on the patricians their own
+      violence, though, in his troubled and stormy tribuneship, not one
+      unmerited or illegal execution of baron or citizen could be alleged
+      against him, even by his enemies; yet sharing, less excusably, the
+      weakness of Nina, he could not deny his proud heart the pleasure of
+      humiliating those who had ridiculed him as a buffoon, despised him as a
+      plebeian, and who, even now slaves to his face, were cynics behind his
+      back. &ldquo;They stood before him while he sate,&rdquo; says his biographer; &ldquo;all
+      these Barons, bareheaded; their hands crossed on their breasts; their
+      looks downcast;&mdash;oh, how frightened they were!&rdquo;&mdash;a picture more
+      disgraceful to the servile cowardice of the nobles than the haughty
+      sternness of the Tribune. It might be that he deemed it policy to break
+      the spirit of his foes, and to awe those whom it was a vain hope to
+      conciliate.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      For his pomp there was a greater excuse: it was the custom of the time; it
+      was the insignia and witness of power; and when the modern historian
+      taunts him with not imitating the simplicity of an ancient tribune, the
+      sneer betrays an ignorance of the spirit of the age, and the vain people
+      whom the chief magistrate was to govern. No doubt his gorgeous festivals,
+      his solemn processions, set off and ennobled&mdash;if parade can so be
+      ennobled&mdash;by a refined and magnificent richness of imagination,
+      associated always with popular emblems, and designed to convey the idea of
+      rejoicing for Liberty Restored, and to assert the state and majesty of
+      Rome Revived&mdash;no doubt these spectacles, however otherwise judged in
+      a more enlightened age and by closet sages, served greatly to augment the
+      importance of the Tribune abroad, and to dazzle the pride of a fickle and
+      ostentatious populace. And taste grew refined, luxury called labour into
+      requisition, and foreigners from all states were attracted by the
+      splendour of a court over which presided, under republican names, two
+      sovereigns, (Rienzi, speaking in one of his letters of his great
+      enterprise, refers it to the ardour of youth. The exact date of his birth
+      is unknown; but he was certainly a young man at the time now referred to.
+      His portrait in the Museo Barberino, from which his description has been
+      already taken in the first book of this work, represents him as beardless,
+      and, as far as one can judge, somewhere above thirty&mdash;old enough, to
+      be sure, to have a beard; and seven years afterwards he wore a long one,
+      which greatly displeased his naive biographer, who seems to consider it a
+      sort of crime. The head is very remarkable for its stern beauty, and
+      little, if at all, inferior to that of Napoleon; to which, as I before
+      remarked, it has some resemblance in expression, if not in feature.) young
+      and brilliant, the one renowned for his genius, the other eminent for her
+      beauty. It was, indeed, a dazzling and royal dream in the long night of
+      Rome, spoiled of her Pontiff and his voluptuous train&mdash;that holyday
+      reign of Cola di Rienzi! And often afterwards it was recalled with a sigh,
+      not only by the poor for its justice, the merchant for its security, but
+      the gallant for its splendour, and the poet for its ideal and intellectual
+      grace!
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      As if to show that it was not to gratify the more vulgar appetite and
+      desire, in the midst of all his pomp, when the board groaned with the
+      delicacies of every clime, when the wine most freely circled, the Tribune
+      himself preserved a temperate and even rigid abstinence. (&ldquo;Vita di Cola di
+      Rienzi&rdquo;.&mdash;The biographer praises the abstinence of the Tribune.)
+      While the apartments of state and the chamber of his bride were adorned
+      with a profuse luxury and cost, to his own private rooms he transported
+      precisely the same furniture which had been familiar to him in his
+      obscurer life. The books, the busts, the reliefs, the arms which had
+      inspired him heretofore with the visions of the past, were endeared by
+      associations which he did not care to forego.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      But that which constituted the most singular feature of his character, and
+      which still wraps all around him in a certain mystery, was his religious
+      enthusiasm. The daring but wild doctrines of Arnold of Brescia, who, two
+      centuries anterior, had preached reform, but inculcated mysticism, still
+      lingered in Rome, and had in earlier youth deeply coloured the mind of
+      Rienzi; and as I have before observed, his youthful propensity to dreamy
+      thought, the melancholy death of his brother, his own various but
+      successful fortunes, had all contributed to nurse the more zealous and
+      solemn aspirations of this remarkable man. Like Arnold of Brescia, his
+      faith bore a strong resemblance to the intense fanaticism of our own
+      Puritans of the Civil War, as if similar political circumstances conduced
+      to similar religious sentiments. He believed himself inspired by awful and
+      mighty commune with beings of the better world. Saints and angels
+      ministered to his dreams; and without this, the more profound and hallowed
+      enthusiasm, he might never have been sufficiently emboldened by mere human
+      patriotism, to his unprecedented enterprise: it was the secret of much of
+      his greatness,&mdash;many of his errors. Like all men who are thus
+      self-deluded by a vain but not inglorious superstition, united with, and
+      coloured by, earthly ambition, it is impossible to say how far he was the
+      visionary, and how far at times he dared to be the impostor. In the
+      ceremonies of his pageants, in the ornaments of his person, were
+      invariably introduced mystic and figurative emblems. In times of danger he
+      publicly professed to have been cheered and directed by divine dreams; and
+      on many occasions the prophetic warnings he announced having been
+      singularly verified by the event, his influence with the people was
+      strengthened by a belief in the favour and intercourse of Heaven. Thus,
+      delusion of self might tempt and conduce to imposition on others, and he
+      might not scruple to avail himself of the advantage of seeming what he
+      believed himself to be. Yet, no doubt this intoxicating credulity pushed
+      him into extravagance unworthy of, and strangely contrasted by, his
+      soberer intellect, and made him disproportion his vast ends to his
+      unsteady means, by the proud fallacy, that where man failed, God would
+      interpose. Cola di Rienzi was no faultless hero of romance. In him lay, in
+      conflicting prodigality, the richest and most opposite elements of
+      character; strong sense, visionary superstition, an eloquence and energy
+      that mastered all he approached, a blind enthusiasm that mastered himself;
+      luxury and abstinence, sternness and susceptibility, pride to the great,
+      humility to the low; the most devoted patriotism and the most avid desire
+      of personal power. As few men undertake great and desperate designs
+      without strong animal spirits, so it may be observed, that with most who
+      have risen to eminence over the herd, there is an aptness, at times, to a
+      wild mirth and an elasticity of humour which often astonish the more sober
+      and regulated minds, that are &ldquo;the commoners of life:&rdquo; And the theatrical
+      grandeur of Napoleon, the severe dignity of Cromwell, are strangely
+      contrasted by a frequent, nor always seasonable buffoonery, which it is
+      hard to reconcile with the ideal of their characters, or the gloomy and
+      portentous interest of their careers. And this, equally a trait in the
+      temperament of Rienzi, distinguished his hours of relaxation, and
+      contributed to that marvellous versatility with which his harder nature
+      accommodated itself to all humours and all men. Often from his austere
+      judgment-seat he passed to the social board an altered man; and even the
+      sullen Barons who reluctantly attended his feasts, forgot his public
+      greatness in his familiar wit; albeit this reckless humour could not
+      always refrain from seeking its subject in the mortification of his
+      crest-fallen foes&mdash;a pleasure it would have been wiser and more
+      generous to forego. And perhaps it was, in part, the prompting of this
+      sarcastic and unbridled humour that made him often love to astonish as
+      well as to awe. But even this gaiety, if so it may be called, taking an
+      appearance of familiar frankness, served much to ingratiate him with the
+      lower orders; and, if a fault in the prince, was a virtue in the
+      demagogue.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      To these various characteristics, now fully developed, the reader must add
+      a genius of designs so bold, of conceptions so gigantic and august,
+      conjoined with that more minute and ordinary ability which masters
+      details; that with a brave, noble, intelligent, devoted people to back his
+      projects, the accession of the Tribune would have been the close of the
+      thraldom of Italy, and the abrupt limit of the dark age of Europe. With
+      such a people, his faults would have been insensibly checked, his more
+      unwholesome power have received a sufficient curb. Experience
+      familiarizing him with power, would have gradually weaned him from
+      extravagance in its display; and the active and masculine energy of his
+      intellect would have found field for the more restless spirits, as his
+      justice gave shelter to the more tranquil. Faults he had, but whether
+      those faults or the faults of the people, were to prepare his downfall, is
+      yet to be seen.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      Meanwhile, amidst a discontented nobility and a fickle populace, urged on
+      by the danger of repose to the danger of enterprise; partly blinded by his
+      outward power, partly impelled by the fear of internal weakness; at once
+      made sanguine by his genius and his fanaticism, and uneasy by the
+      expectations of the crowd,&mdash;he threw himself headlong into the gulf
+      of the rushing Time, and surrendered his lofty spirit to no other guidance
+      than a conviction of its natural buoyancy and its heaven-directed haven.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      <a name="link2HCH0027" id="link2HCH0027">
+      <!--  H2 anchor --> </a>
+    </p>
+    <div style="height: 4em;">
+      <br /><br /><br /><br />
+    </div>
+    <h2>
+      Chapter 4.IV. The Enemy&rsquo;s Camp.
+    </h2>
+    <p>
+      While Rienzi was preparing, in concert, perhaps, with the ambassadors of
+      the brave Tuscan States, whose pride of country and love of liberty were
+      well fitted to comprehend, and even share them, his schemes for the
+      emancipation from all foreign yoke of the Ancient Queen, and the
+      Everlasting Garden, of the World; the Barons, in restless secrecy, were
+      revolving projects for the restoration of their own power.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      One morning, the heads of the Savelli, the Orsini, and the Frangipani, met
+      at the disfortified palace of Stephen Colonna. Their conference was warm
+      and earnest&mdash;now resolute, now wavering, in its object&mdash;as
+      indignation or fear prevailed.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;You have heard,&rdquo; said Luca di Savelli, in his usual soft and womanly
+      voice, &ldquo;that the Tribune has proclaimed, that, the day after tomorrow, he
+      will take the order of knighthood, and watch the night before in the
+      church of the Lateran: He has honoured me with a request to attend his
+      vigil.&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;Yes, yes, the knave. What means this new fantasy?&rdquo; said the brutal Prince
+      of the Orsini.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;Unless it be to have the cavalier&rsquo;s right to challenge a noble,&rdquo; said old
+      Colonna, &ldquo;I cannot conjecture. Will Rome never grow weary of this madman?&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;Rome is the more mad of the two,&rdquo; said Luca di Savelli; &ldquo;but methinks, in
+      his wildness, the Tribune hath committed one error of which we may well
+      avail ourselves at Avignon.&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;Ah,&rdquo; cried the old Colonna, &ldquo;that must be our game; passive here, let us
+      fight at Avignon.&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;In a word then, he hath ordered that his bath shall be prepared in the
+      holy porphyry vase in which once bathed the Emperor Constantine.&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;Profanation! profanation!&rdquo; cried Stephen. &ldquo;This is enough to excuse a
+      bull of excommunication. The Pope shall hear of it. I will despatch a
+      courier forthwith.&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;Better wait and see the ceremony,&rdquo; said the Savelli; &ldquo;some greater folly
+      will close the pomp, be assured.&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;Hark ye, my masters,&rdquo; said the grim Lord of the Orsini; &ldquo;ye are for delay
+      and caution; I for promptness and daring; my kinsman&rsquo;s blood calls aloud,
+      and brooks no parley.&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;And what do?&rdquo; said the soft-voiced Savelli; &ldquo;fight without soldiers,
+      against twenty thousand infuriated Romans? not I.&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      Orsini sunk his voice into a meaning whisper. &ldquo;In Venice,&rdquo; said he, &ldquo;this
+      upstart might be mastered without an army. Think you in Rome no man wears
+      a stiletto?&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;Hush,&rdquo; said Stephen, who was of far nobler and better nature than his
+      compeers, and who, justifying to himself all other resistance to the
+      Tribune, felt his conscience rise against assassination; &ldquo;this must not be&mdash;your
+      zeal transports you.&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;Besides, whom can we employ? scarce a German left in the city; and to
+      whisper this to a Roman were to exchange places with poor Martino&mdash;Heaven
+      take him, for he&rsquo;s nearer heaven than ever he was before,&rdquo; said the
+      Savelli.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;Jest me no jests,&rdquo; cried the Orsini, fiercely. &ldquo;Jests on such a subject!
+      By St. Francis I would, since thou lovest such wit, thou hadst it all to
+      thyself; and, methinks, at the Tribune&rsquo;s board I have seen thee laugh at
+      his rude humour, as if thou didst not require a cord to choke thee.&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;Better to laugh than to tremble,&rdquo; returned the Savelli.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;How! darest thou say I tremble?&rdquo; cried the Baron.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;Hush, hush,&rdquo; said the veteran Colonna, with impatient dignity. &ldquo;We are
+      not now in such holiday times as to quarrel amongst ourselves. Forbear, my
+      lords.&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;Your greater prudence, Signor,&rdquo; said the sarcastic Savelli, &ldquo;arises from
+      your greater safety. Your house is about to shelter itself under the
+      Tribune&rsquo;s; and when the Lord Adrian returns from Naples, the innkeeper&rsquo;s
+      son will be brother to your kinsman.&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;You might spare me that taunt,&rdquo; said the old noble, with some emotion.
+      &ldquo;Heaven knows how bitterly I have chafed at the thought; yet I would
+      Adrian were with us. His word goes far to moderate the Tribune, and to
+      guide my own course, for my passion beguiles my reason; and since his
+      departure methinks we have been the more sullen without being the more
+      strong. Let this pass. If my own son had wed the Tribune&rsquo;s sister, I would
+      yet strike a blow for the old constitution as becomes a noble, if I but
+      saw that the blow would not cut off my own head.&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      Savelli, who had been whispering apart with Rinaldo Frangipani, now said&mdash;
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;Noble Prince, listen to me. You are bound by your kinsman&rsquo;s approaching
+      connection, your venerable age, and your intimacy with the Pontiff, to a
+      greater caution than we are. Leave to us the management of the enterprise,
+      and be assured of our discretion.&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      A young boy, Stefanello, who afterwards succeeded to the representation of
+      the direct line of the Colonna, and whom the reader will once again
+      encounter ere our tale be closed, was playing by his grandsire&rsquo;s knees. He
+      looked sharply up at Savelli, and said, &ldquo;My grandfather is too wise, and
+      you are too timid. Frangipani is too yielding, and Orsini is too like a
+      vexed bull. I wish I were a year or two older.&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;And what would you do, my pretty censurer?&rdquo; said the smooth Savelli,
+      biting his smiling lip.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;Stab the Tribune with my own stiletto, and then hey for Palestrina!&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;The egg will hatch a brave serpent,&rdquo; quoth the Savelli. &ldquo;Yet why so
+      bitter against the Tribune, my cockatrice?&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;Because he allowed an insolent mercer to arrest my uncle Agapet for debt.
+      The debt had been owed these ten years; and though it is said that no
+      house in Rome has owed more money than the Colonna, this is the first time
+      I ever heard of a rascally creditor being allowed to claim his debt unless
+      with doffed cap and bended knee. And I say that I would not live to be a
+      Baron, if such upstart insolence is to be put upon me.&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;My child,&rdquo; said old Stephen, laughing heartily, &ldquo;I see our noble order
+      will be safe enough in your hands.&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;And,&rdquo; continued the child, emboldened by the applause he received, &ldquo;if I
+      had time after pricking the Tribune, I would fain have a second stroke at&mdash;&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;Whom?&rdquo; said the Savelli, observing the boy pause.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;My cousin Adrian. Shame on him, for dreaming to make one a wife whose
+      birth would scarce fit her for a Colonna&rsquo;s leman!&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;Go play, my child&mdash;go play,&rdquo; said the old Colonna, as he pushed the
+      boy from him.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;Enough of this babble,&rdquo; cried the Orsini, rudely. &ldquo;Tell me, old lord;
+      just as I entered, I saw an old friend (one of your former mercenaries)
+      quit the palace&mdash;may I crave his errand?&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;Ah, yes; a messenger from Fra Moreale. I wrote to the Knight, reproving
+      him for his desertion on our ill-starred return from Corneto, and
+      intimating that five hundred lances would be highly paid for just now.&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;Ah,&rdquo; said Savelli; &ldquo;and what is his answer!&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;Oh, wily and evasive: He is profuse in compliments and good wishes; but
+      says he is under fealty to the Hungarian king, whose cause is before
+      Rienzi&rsquo;s tribunal; that he cannot desert his present standard; that he
+      fears Rome is so evenly balanced between patricians and the people, that
+      whatever party would permanently be uppermost must call in a Podesta; and
+      this character alone the Provencal insinuates would suit him.&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;Montreal our Podesta?&rdquo; cried the Orsini.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;And why not?&rdquo; said Savelli; &ldquo;as good a well-born Podesta as a low-born
+      Tribune? But I trust we may do without either. Colonna, has this messenger
+      from Fra Moreale left the city?&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;I suppose so.&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;No,&rdquo; said Orsini; &ldquo;I met him at the gate, and knew him of old: it is
+      Rodolf, the Saxon (once a hireling of the Colonna), who has made some
+      widows among my clients in the good old day. He is a little disguised now;
+      however, I recognised and accosted him, for I thought he was one who might
+      yet become a friend, and I bade him await me at my palace.&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;You did well,&rdquo; said the Savelli, musing, and his eyes met those of
+      Orsini. Shortly afterwards a conference, in which much was said and
+      nothing settled, was broken up; but Luca di Savelli, loitering at the
+      porch, prayed the Frangipani, and the other Barons, to adjourn to the
+      Orsini&rsquo;s palace.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;The old Colonna,&rdquo; said he, &ldquo;is well-nigh in his dotage. We shall come to
+      a quick determination without him, and we can secure his proxy in his
+      son.&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      And this was a true prophecy, for half-an-hour&rsquo;s consultation with Rodolf
+      of Saxony sufficed to ripen thought into enterprise.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      <a name="link2HCH0028" id="link2HCH0028">
+      <!--  H2 anchor --> </a>
+    </p>
+    <div style="height: 4em;">
+      <br /><br /><br /><br />
+    </div>
+    <h2>
+      Chapter 4.V. The Night and its Incidents.
+    </h2>
+    <p>
+      With the following twilight, Rome was summoned to the commencement of the
+      most magnificent spectacle the Imperial City had witnessed since the fall
+      of the Caesars. It had been a singular privilege, arrogated by the people
+      of Rome, to confer upon their citizens the order of knighthood. Twenty
+      years before, a Colonna and an Orsini had received this popular honour.
+      Rienzi, who designed it as the prelude to a more important ceremony,
+      claimed from the Romans a similar distinction. From the Capitol to the
+      Lateran swept, in long procession, all that Rome boasted of noble, of
+      fair, and brave. First went horsemen without number, and from all the
+      neighbouring parts of Italy, in apparel that well befitted the occasion.
+      Trumpeters, and musicians of all kinds, followed, and the trumpets were of
+      silver; youths bearing the harness of the knightly war-steed, wrought with
+      gold, preceded the march of the loftiest matronage of Rome, whose love for
+      show, and it may be whose admiration for triumphant fame, (which to women
+      sanctions many offences,) made them forget the humbled greatness of their
+      lords: amidst them Nina and Irene, outshining all the rest; then came the
+      Tribune and the Pontiff&rsquo;s Vicar, surrounded by all the great Signors of
+      the city, smothering alike resentment, revenge, and scorn, and struggling
+      who should approach nearest to the monarch of the day. The high-hearted
+      old Colonna alone remained aloof, following at a little distance, and in a
+      garb studiously plain. But his age, his rank, his former renown in war and
+      state, did not suffice to draw to his grey locks and highborn mien a
+      single one of the shouts that attended the meanest lord on whom the great
+      Tribune smiled. Savelli followed nearest to Rienzi, the most obsequious of
+      the courtly band; immediately before the Tribune came two men; the one
+      bore a drawn sword, the other the pendone, or standard usually assigned to
+      royalty. The tribune himself was clothed in a long robe of white satin,
+      whose snowy dazzle (miri candoris) is peculiarly dwelt on by the
+      historian, richly decorated with gold; while on his breast were many of
+      those mystic symbols I have before alluded to, the exact meaning of which
+      was perhaps known only to the wearer. In his dark eye, and on that large
+      tranquil brow, in which thought seemed to sleep, as sleeps a storm, there
+      might be detected a mind abstracted from the pomp around; but ever and
+      anon he roused himself, and conversed partially with Raimond or Savelli.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;This is a quaint game,&rdquo; said the Orsini, falling back to the old Colonna:
+      &ldquo;but it may end tragically.&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;Methinks it may,&rdquo; said the old man, &ldquo;if the Tribune overhear thee.&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      Orsini grew pale. &ldquo;How&mdash;nay&mdash;nay, even if he did, he never
+      resents words, but professes to laugh at our spoken rage. It was but the
+      other day that some knave told him what one of the Annibaldi said of him&mdash;words
+      for which a true cavalier would have drawn the speaker&rsquo;s life&rsquo;s blood; and
+      he sent for the Annibaldi, and said, &lsquo;My friend, receive this purse of
+      gold,&mdash;court wits should be paid.&rsquo;&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;Did Annibaldi take the gold?&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;Why, no; the Tribune was pleased with his spirit, and made him sup with
+      him; and Annibaldi says he never spent a merrier evening, and no longer
+      wonders that his kinsman, Riccardo, loves the buffoon so.&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      Arrived now at the Lateran, Luca di Savelli fell also back, and whispered
+      to Orsini; the Frangipani, and some other of the nobles, exchanged meaning
+      looks; Rienzi, entering the sacred edifice in which, according to custom,
+      he was to pass the night watching his armour, bade the crowd farewell, and
+      summoned them the next morning, &ldquo;To hear things that might, he trusted, be
+      acceptable to heaven and earth.&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      The immense multitude received this intimation with curiosity and
+      gladness, while those who had been in some measure prepared by Cecco del
+      Vecchio, hailed it as an omen of their Tribune&rsquo;s unflagging resolution.
+      The concourse dispersed with singular order and quietness; it was recorded
+      as a remarkable fact, that in so great a crowd, composed of men of all
+      parties, none exhibited licence or indulged in quarrel. Some of the barons
+      and cavaliers, among whom was Luca di Savelli, whose sleek urbanity and
+      sarcastic humour found favour with the Tribune, and a few subordinate
+      pages and attendants, alone remained; and, save a single sentinel at the
+      porch, that broad space before the Palace, the Basilica and Fount of
+      Constantine, soon presented a silent and desolate void to the melancholy
+      moonlight. Within the church, according to the usage of the time and rite,
+      the descendant of the Teuton kings received the order of the Santo
+      Spirito. His pride, or some superstition equally weak, though more
+      excusable, led him to bathe in the porphyry vase which an absurd legend
+      consecrated to Constantine; and this, as Savelli predicted, cost him dear.
+      These appointed ceremonies concluded, his arms were placed in that part of
+      the church, within the columns of St. John. And here his state bed was
+      prepared. (In a more northern country, the eve of knighthood would have
+      been spent without sleeping. In Italy, the ceremony of watching the armour
+      does not appear to have been so rigidly observed.)
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      The attendant barons, pages, and chamberlains, retired out of sight to a
+      small side chapel in the edifice; and Rienzi was left alone. A single
+      lamp, placed beside his bed, contended with the mournful rays of the moon,
+      that cast through the long casements, over aisle and pillar, its &ldquo;dim
+      religious light.&rdquo; The sanctity of the place, the solemnity of the hour,
+      and the solitary silence round, were well calculated to deepen the
+      high-wrought and earnest mood of that son of fortune. Many and high
+      fancies swept over his mind&mdash;now of worldly aspirations, now of more
+      august but visionary belief, till at length, wearied with his own
+      reflections, he cast himself on the bed. It was an omen which graver
+      history has not neglected to record, that the moment he pressed the bed,
+      new prepared for the occasion, part of it sank under him: he himself was
+      affected by the accident, and sprung forth, turning pale and muttering;
+      but, as if ashamed of his weakness, after a moment&rsquo;s pause, again composed
+      himself to rest, and drew the drapery round him.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      The moonbeams grew fainter and more faint as the time proceeded, and the
+      sharp distinction between light and shade faded fast from the marble
+      floor; when from behind a column at the furthest verge of the building, a
+      strange shadow suddenly crossed the sickly light&mdash;it crept on&mdash;it
+      moved, but without an echo,&mdash;from pillar to pillar it flitted&mdash;it
+      rested at last behind the column nearest to the Tribune&rsquo;s bed&mdash;it
+      remained stationary.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      The shades gathered darker and darker round; the stillness seemed to
+      deepen; the moon was gone; and, save from the struggling ray of the lamp
+      beside Rienzi, the blackness of night closed over the solemn and ghostly
+      scene.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      In one of the side chapels, as I have before said, which, in the many
+      alterations the church has undergone, is probably long since destroyed,
+      were Savelli and the few attendants retained by the Tribune. Savelli alone
+      slept not; he remained sitting erect, breathless and listening, while the
+      tall lights in the chapel rendered yet more impressive the rapid changes
+      of his countenance.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;Now pray Heaven,&rdquo; said he, &ldquo;the knave miscarry not! Such an occasion may
+      never again occur! He has a strong arm and a dexterous hand, doubtless;
+      but the other is a powerful man. The deed once done, I care not whether
+      the doer escape or not; if not, why we must stab him! Dead men tell no
+      tales. At the worst, who can avenge Rienzi? There is no other Rienzi!
+      Ourselves and the Frangipani seize the Aventine, the Colonna and the
+      Orsini the other quarters of the city; and without the master-spirit, we
+      may laugh at the mad populace. But if discovered;&mdash;&rdquo; and Savelli,
+      who, fortunately for his foes, had not nerves equal to his will, covered
+      his face and shuddered;&mdash;&ldquo;I think I hear a noise!&mdash;no&mdash;is
+      it the wind?&mdash;tush, it must be old Vico de Scotto, turning in his
+      shell of mail!&mdash;silent&mdash;I like not that silence! No cry&mdash;no
+      sound! Can the ruffian have played us false? or could he not scale the
+      casement? It is but a child&rsquo;s effort;&mdash;or did the sentry spy him?&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      Time passed on: the first ray of daylight slowly gleamed, when he thought
+      he heard the door of the church close. Savelli&rsquo;s suspense became
+      intolerable: he stole from the chapel, and came in sight of the Tribune&rsquo;s
+      bed&mdash;all was silent.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;Perhaps the silence of death,&rdquo; said Savelli, as he crept back.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      Meanwhile the Tribune, vainly endeavouring to close his eyes, was rendered
+      yet more watchful by the uneasy position he was obliged to assume&mdash;for
+      the part of the bed towards the pillow having given way, while the rest
+      remained solid, he had inverted the legitimate order of lying, and drawn
+      himself up as he might best accommodate his limbs, towards the foot of the
+      bed. The light of the lamp, though shaded by the draperies, was thus
+      opposite to him. Impatient of his wakefulness, he at last thought it was
+      this dull and flickering light which scared away the slumber, and was
+      about to rise, to remove it further from him, when he saw the curtain at
+      the other end of the bed gently lifted: he remained quiet and alarmed;&mdash;ere
+      he could draw a second breath, a dark figure interposed between the light
+      and the bed; and he felt that a stroke was aimed against that part of the
+      couch, which, but for the accident that had seemed to him ominous, would
+      have given his breast to the knife. Rienzi waited not a second and
+      better-directed blow; as the assassin yet stooped, groping in the
+      uncertain light, he threw on him all the weight and power of his large and
+      muscular frame, wrenched the stiletto from the bravo&rsquo;s hand, and dashing
+      him on the bed, placed his knee on his breast.&mdash;The stiletto rose&mdash;gleamed&mdash;descended&mdash;the
+      murtherer swerved aside, and it pierced only his right arm. The Tribune
+      raised, for a deadlier blow, the revengeful blade.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      The assassin thus foiled was a man used to all form and shape of danger,
+      and he did not now lose his presence of mind.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;Hold!&rdquo; said he; &ldquo;if you kill me, you will die yourself. Spare me, and I
+      will save you.&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;Miscreant!&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;Hush&mdash;not so loud, or you will disturb your attendants, and some of
+      them may do what I have failed to execute. Spare me, I say, and I will
+      reveal that which were worth more than my life; but call not&mdash;speak
+      not aloud, I warn you!&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      The Tribune felt his heart stand still: in that lonely place, afar from
+      his idolizing people&mdash;his devoted guards&mdash;with but loathing
+      barons, or, it might be, faithless menials, within call, might not the
+      baffled murtherer give a wholesome warning?&mdash;and those words and that
+      doubt seemed suddenly to reverse their respective positions, and leave the
+      conqueror still in the assassin&rsquo;s power.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;Thou thinkest to deceive me,&rdquo; said he, but in a voice whispered and
+      uncertain, which shewed the ruffian the advantage he had gained: &ldquo;thou
+      wouldst that I might release thee without summoning my attendants, that
+      thou mightst a second time attempt my life.&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;Thou hast disabled my right arm, and disarmed me of my only weapon.&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;How camest thou hither?&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;By connivance.&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;Whence this attempt?&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;The dictation of others.&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;If I pardon thee&mdash;&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;Thou shalt know all!&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;Rise,&rdquo; said the Tribune, releasing his prisoner, but with great caution,
+      and still grasping his shoulder with one hand, while the other pointed the
+      dagger at his throat.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;Did my sentry admit thee? There is but one entrance to the church,
+      methinks.&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;He did not; follow me, and I will tell thee more.&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;Dog! thou hast accomplices?&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;If I have, thou hast the knife at my throat.&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;Wouldst thou escape?&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;I cannot, or I would.&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      Rienzi looked hard, by the dull light of the lamp, at the assassin. His
+      rugged and coarse countenance, rude garb, and barbarian speech, seemed to
+      him proof sufficient that he was but the hireling of others; and it might
+      be wise to brave one danger present and certain, to prevent much danger
+      future and unforeseen. Rienzi, too, was armed, strong, active, in the
+      prime of life;&mdash;and at the worst, there was no part of the building
+      whence his voice would not reach those within the chapel,&mdash;if they
+      could be depended upon.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;Shew me then thy place and means of entrance,&rdquo; said he; &ldquo;and if I but
+      suspect thee as we move&mdash;thou diest. Take up the lamp.&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      The ruffian nodded; with his left hand took up the lamp as he was ordered;
+      and with Rienzi&rsquo;s grasp on his shoulder, while the wound from his right
+      arm dropped gore as he passed, he moved noiselessly along the church&mdash;gained
+      the altar&mdash;to the left of which was a small room for the use or
+      retirement of the priest. To this he made his way. Rienzi&rsquo;s heart misgave
+      him a moment.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;Beware,&rdquo; he whispered, &ldquo;the least sign of fraud, and thou art the first
+      victim!&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      The assassin nodded again, and proceeded. They entered the room; and then
+      the Tribune&rsquo;s strange guide pointed to an open casement. &ldquo;Behold my
+      entrance,&rdquo; said he; &ldquo;and, if you permit me, my egress&mdash;&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;The frog gets not out of the well so easily as he came in, friend,&rdquo;
+       returned Rienzi, smiling. &ldquo;And now, if I am not to call my guards, what am
+      I to do with thee!&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;Let me go, and I will seek thee tomorrow; and if thou payest me
+      handsomely, and promisest not to harm limb or life, I will put thine
+      enemies and my employers in thy power.&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      Rienzi could not refrain from a slight laugh at the proposition, but
+      composing himself, replied&mdash;&ldquo;And what if I call my attendants, and
+      give thee to their charge?&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;Thou givest me to those very enemies and employers; and in despair lest I
+      betray them, ere the day dawn they cut my throat&mdash;or thine.&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;Methinks knave, I have seen thee before.&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;Thou hast. I blush not for name or country. I am Rodolf of Saxony!&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;I remember me:&mdash;servitor of Walter de Montreal. He, then, is thy
+      instigator!&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;Roman, no! That noble Knight scorns other weapon than the open sword, and
+      his own hand slays his own foes. Your pitiful, miserable, dastard
+      Italians, alone employ the courage, and hire the arm, of others.&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      Rienzi remained silent. He had released hold of his prisoner, and stood
+      facing him; every now and then regarding his countenance, and again
+      relapsing into thought. At length, casting his eyes round the small
+      chamber thus singularly tenanted, he observed a kind of closet, in which
+      the priests&rsquo; robes, and some articles used in the sacred service, were
+      contained. It suggested at once an escape from his dilemma: he pointed to
+      it&mdash;
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;There, Rodolf of Saxony, shalt thou pass some part of this night&mdash;a
+      small penance for thy meditated crime; and tomorrow, as thou lookest for
+      life, thou wilt reveal all.&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;Hark, ye, Tribune,&rdquo; returned the Saxon, doggedly; &ldquo;my liberty is in your
+      power, but neither my tongue nor my life. If I consent to be caged in that
+      hole, you must swear on the crossed hilt of the dagger that you now hold,
+      that, on confession of all I know, you pardon and set me free. My
+      employers are enough to glut your rage an&rsquo; you were a tiger. If you do not
+      swear this&mdash;&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;Ah, my modest friend!&mdash;the alternative?&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;I brain myself against the stone wall! Better such a death than the
+      rack!&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;Fool, I want not revenge against such as thou. Be honest, and I swear
+      that, twelve hours after thy confession, thou shalt stand safe and
+      unscathed without the walls of Rome. So help me our Lord and his saints.&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;I am content!&mdash;Donner und Hagel, I have lived long enough to care
+      only for my own life, and the great captain&rsquo;s next to it;&mdash;for the
+      rest, I reck not if ye southerns cut each other&rsquo;s throats, and make all
+      Italy one grave.&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      With this benevolent speech, Rodolf entered the closet; but ere Rienzi
+      could close the door, he stepped forth again&mdash;
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;Hold,&rdquo; said he: &ldquo;this blood flows fast. Help me to bandage it, or I shall
+      bleed to death ere my confession.&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;Per fede,&rdquo; said the Tribune, his strange humour enjoying the man&rsquo;s cool
+      audacity; &ldquo;but, considering the service thou wouldst have rendered me,
+      thou art the most pleasant, forbearing, unabashed, good fellow, I have
+      seen this many a year. Give us thine own belt. I little thought my first
+      eve of knighthood would have been so charitably spent!&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;Methinks these robes would make a better bandage,&rdquo; said Rodolf, pointing
+      to the priests&rsquo; gear suspended from the wall.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;Silence, knave,&rdquo; said the Tribune, frowning; &ldquo;no sacrilege! Yet, as thou
+      takest such dainty care of thyself, thou shalt have mine own scarf to
+      accommodate thee.&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      With that the Tribune, placing his dagger on the ground, while he
+      cautiously guarded it with his foot, bound up the wounded limb, for which
+      condescension Rodolf gave him short thanks; resumed his weapon and lamp;
+      closed the door; drew over it the long, heavy bolt without, and returned
+      to his couch, deeply and indignantly musing over the treason he had so
+      fortunately escaped.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      At the first grey streak of dawn he went out of the great door of the
+      church, called the sentry, who was one of his own guard, and bade him
+      privately, and now ere the world was astir, convey the prisoner to one of
+      the private dungeons of the Capitol. &ldquo;Be silent,&rdquo; said he: &ldquo;utter not a
+      word of this to any one; be obedient, and thou shalt be promoted. This
+      done, find out the councillor, Pandulfo di Guido, and bid him seek me here
+      ere the crowd assemble.&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      He then, making the sentinel doff his heavy shoes of iron, led him across
+      the church, resigned Rodolf to his care, saw them depart, and in a few
+      minutes afterwards his voice was heard by the inmates of the neighbouring
+      chapel; and he was soon surrounded by his train.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      He was already standing on the floor, wrapped in a large gown lined with
+      furs; and his piercing eye scanned carefully the face of each man that
+      approached. Two of the Barons of the Frangipani family exhibited some
+      tokens of confusion and embarrassment, from which they speedily recovered
+      at the frank salutation of the Tribune.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      But all the art of Savelli could not prevent his features from betraying
+      to the most indifferent eye the terror of his soul;&mdash;and, when he
+      felt the penetrating gaze of Rienzi upon him, he trembled in every joint.
+      Rienzi alone did not, however, seem to notice his disorder; and when Vico
+      di Scotto, an old knight, from whose hands he received his sword, asked
+      him how he had passed the night, he replied, cheerfully&mdash;
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;Well, well&mdash;my brave friend! Over a maiden knight some good angel
+      always watches. Signor Luca di Savelli, I fear you have slept but ill: you
+      seem pale. No matter!&mdash;our banquet today will soon brighten the
+      current of your gay blood.&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;Blood, Tribune!&rdquo; said di Scotto, who was innocent of the plot: &ldquo;Thou
+      sayest blood, and lo! on the floor are large gouts of it not yet dry.&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;Now, out on thee, old hero, for betraying my awkwardness! I pricked
+      myself with my own dagger in unrobing. Thank Heaven it hath no poison in
+      its blade!&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      The Frangipani exchanged looks,&mdash;Luca di Savelli clung to a column
+      for support,&mdash;and the rest of the attendants seemed grave and
+      surprised.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;Think not of it, my masters,&rdquo; said Rienzi: &ldquo;it is a good omen, and a true
+      prophecy. It implies that he who girds on his sword for the good of the
+      state, must be ready to spill his blood for it: that am I. No more of this&mdash;a
+      mere scratch: it gave more blood than I recked of from so slight a
+      puncture, and saves the leech the trouble of the lancet. How brightly
+      breaks the day! We must prepare to meet our fellow-citizens&mdash;they
+      will be here anon. Ha, my Pandulfo&mdash;welcome!&mdash;thou, my old
+      friend, shalt buckle on this mantle!&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      And while Pandulfo was engaged in the task, the Tribune whispered a few
+      words in his ear, which, by the smile on his countenance, seemed to the
+      attendants one of the familiar jests with which Rienzi distinguished his
+      intercourse with his more confidential intimates.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      <a name="link2HCH0029" id="link2HCH0029">
+      <!--  H2 anchor --> </a>
+    </p>
+    <div style="height: 4em;">
+      <br /><br /><br /><br />
+    </div>
+    <h2>
+      Chapter 4.VI. The Celebrated Citation.
+    </h2>
+    <p>
+      The bell of the great Lateran church sounded shrill and loud, as the
+      mighty multitude, greater even than that of the preceding night, swept on.
+      The appointed officers made way with difficulty for the barons and
+      ambassadors, and scarcely were those noble visitors admitted ere the crowd
+      closed in their ranks, poured headlong into the church, and took the way
+      to the chapel of Boniface VIII. There, filling every cranny, and blocking
+      up the entrance, the more fortunate of the press beheld the Tribune
+      surrounded by the splendid court his genius had collected, and his fortune
+      had subdued. At length, as the solemn and holy music began to swell
+      through the edifice, preluding the celebration of the mass, the Tribune
+      stepped forth, and the hush of the music was increased by the universal
+      and dead silence of the audience. His height, his air, his countenance,
+      were such as always command the attention of crowds; and at this time they
+      received every adjunct from the interest of the occasion, and that
+      peculiar look of intent yet suppressed fervour, which is, perhaps, the
+      sole gift of the eloquent that Nature alone can give.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;Be it known,&rdquo; said he, slowly and deliberately, &ldquo;in virtue of that
+      authority, power, and jurisdiction, which the Roman people, in general
+      parliament, have assigned to us, and which the Sovereign Pontiff hath
+      confirmed, that we, not ungrateful of the gift and grace of the Holy
+      Spirit&mdash;whose soldier we now are&mdash;nor of the favour of the Roman
+      people, declare, that Rome, capital of the world, and base of the
+      Christian church; and that every City, State, and People of Italy, are
+      henceforth free. By that freedom, and in the same consecrated authority,
+      we proclaim, that the election, jurisdiction, and monarchy of the Roman
+      empire appertain to Rome and Rome&rsquo;s people, and the whole of Italy. We
+      cite, then, and summon personally, the illustrious princes, Louis Duke of
+      Bavaria, and Charles king of Bohemia, who would style themselves Emperors
+      of Italy, to appear before us, or the other magistrates of Rome, to plead
+      and to prove their claim between this day and the Day of Pentecost. We
+      cite also, and within the same term, the Duke of Saxony, the Prince of
+      Brandenburg, and whosoever else, potentate, prince, or prelate, asserts
+      the right of Elector to the imperial throne&mdash;a right that, we find it
+      chronicled from ancient and immemorial time, appertaineth only to the
+      Roman people&mdash;and this in vindication of our civil liberties, without
+      derogation of the spiritual power of the Church, the Pontiff, and the
+      Sacred College. Herald, proclaim the citation, at the greater and more
+      formal length, as written and intrusted to your hands, without the
+      Lateran.&rdquo;
+     </p>
+<pre xml:space="preserve">
+     (&ldquo;Il tutto senza derogare all&rsquo; autorita della Chiesa, del
+     Papa e del Sacro Collegio.&rdquo; So concludes this extraordinary
+     citation, this bold and wonderful assertion of the classic
+     independence of Italy, in the most feudal time of the
+     fourteenth century. The anonymous biographer of Rienzi
+     declares that the Tribune cited also the Pope and the
+     Cardinals to reside in Rome. De Sade powerfully and
+     incontrovertibly refutes this addition to the daring or the
+     extravagance of Rienzi. Gibbon, however, who has rendered
+     the rest of the citation in terms more abrupt and
+     discourteous than he was warranted by any authority, copies
+     the biographer&rsquo;s blunder, and sneers at De Sade, as using
+     arguments &ldquo;rather of decency than of weight.&rdquo; Without
+     wearying the reader with all the arguments of the learned
+     Abbe, it may be sufficient to give the first two.
+
+     1st. All the other contemporaneous historians that have
+     treated of this event, G. Villani, Hocsemius, the Vatican
+     MSS. and other chroniclers, relating the citation of the
+     Emperor and Electors, say nothing of that of the Pope and
+     Cardinals; and the Pope (Clement VI.), in his subsequent
+     accusations of Rienzi, while very bitter against his
+     citation of the Emperor, is wholly silent on what would have
+     been to the Pontiff the much greater offence of citing
+     himself and the Cardinals.)
+
+     2. The literal act of this citation, as published formally
+     in the Lateran, is extant in Hocsemius, (whence is borrowed,
+     though not at all its length, the speech in the text of our
+     present tale;) and in this document the Pope and his
+     Cardinals are not named in the summons.
+
+     Gibbon&rsquo;s whole account of Rienzi is superficial and unfair.
+     To the cold and sneering scepticism, which so often deforms
+     the gigantic work of that great writer, allowing nothing for
+     that sincere and urgent enthusiasm which, whether of liberty
+     or religion, is the most common parent of daring action, the
+     great Roman seems but an ambitious and fantastic madman. In
+     Gibbon&rsquo;s hands what would Cromwell have been? what Vane?
+     what Hampden? The pedant, Julian, with his dirty person and
+     pompous affectation, was Gibbon&rsquo;s ideal of a great man.)
+</pre>
+    <p>
+      As Rienzi concluded this bold proclamation of the liberties of Italy, the
+      Tuscan ambassadors, and those of some other of the free states, murmured
+      low approbation. The ambassadors of those States that affected the party
+      of the Emperor looked at each other in silent amaze and consternation. The
+      Roman Barons remained with mute lips and downcast eyes; only over the aged
+      face of Stephen Colonna settled a smile, half of scorn, half of
+      exultation. But the great mass of the citizens were caught by words that
+      opened so grand a prospect as the emancipation of all Italy: and their
+      reverence of the Tribune&rsquo;s power and fortune was almost that due to a
+      supernatural being; so that they did not pause to calculate the means
+      which were to correspond with the boast.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      While his eye roved over the crowd, the gorgeous assemblage near him, the
+      devoted throng beyond;&mdash;as on his ear boomed the murmur of thousands
+      and ten thousands, in the space without, from before the Palace of
+      Constantine (Palace now his own!) sworn to devote life and fortune to his
+      cause; in the flush of prosperity that yet had known no check; in the
+      zenith of power, as yet unconscious of reverse, the heart of the Tribune
+      swelled proudly: visions of mighty fame and limitless dominion,&mdash;fame
+      and dominion, once his beloved Rome&rsquo;s and by him to be restored, rushed
+      before his intoxicated gaze; and in the delirious and passionate
+      aspirations of the moment, he turned his sword alternately to the three
+      quarters of the then known globe, and said, in an abstracted voice, as a
+      man in a dream, &ldquo;In the right of the Roman people this too is mine!&rdquo;
+       (&ldquo;Questo e mio.&rdquo;)
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      Low though the voice, the wild boast was heard by all around as distinctly
+      as if borne to them in thunder. And vain it were to describe the various
+      sensations it excited; the extravagance would have moved the derision of
+      his foes, the grief of his friends, but for the manner of the speaker,
+      which, solemn and commanding, hushed for the moment even reason and hatred
+      themselves in awe; afterwards remembered and repeated, void of the spell
+      they had borrowed from the utterer, the words met the cold condemnation of
+      the well-judging; but at that moment all things seemed possible to the
+      hero of the people. He spoke as one inspired&mdash;they trembled and
+      believed; and, as rapt from the spectacle, he stood a moment silent, his
+      arm still extended&mdash;his dark dilating eye fixed upon space&mdash;his
+      lip parted&mdash;his proud head towering and erect above the herd,&mdash;his
+      own enthusiasm kindled that of the more humble and distant spectators; and
+      there was a deep murmur begun by one, echoed by the rest, &ldquo;The Lord is
+      with Italy and Rienzi!&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      The Tribune turned, he saw the Pope&rsquo;s Vicar astonished, bewildered, rising
+      to speak. His sense and foresight returned to him at once, and, resolved
+      to drown the dangerous disavowal of the Papal authority for this
+      hardihood, which was ready to burst from Raimond&rsquo;s lips, he motioned
+      quickly to the musicians, and the solemn and ringing chant of the sacred
+      ceremony prevented the Bishop of Orvietto all occasion of self-exoneration
+      or reply.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      The moment the ceremony was over, Rienzi touched the Bishop, and
+      whispered, &ldquo;We will explain this to your liking. You feast with us at the
+      Lateran.&mdash;Your arm.&rdquo; Nor did he leave the good Bishop&rsquo;s arm, nor
+      trust him to other companionship, until to the stormy sound of horn and
+      trumpet, drum and cymbal, and amidst such a concourse as might have
+      hailed, on the same spot, the legendary baptism of Constantine, the
+      Tribune and his nobles entered the great gates of the Lateran, then the
+      Palace of the World.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      Thus ended that remarkable ceremony and that proud challenge of the
+      Northern Powers, in behalf of the Italian liberties, which, had it been
+      afterwards successful, would have been deemed a sublime daring; which,
+      unsuccessful, has been construed by the vulgar into a frantic insolence;
+      but which, calmly considering all the circumstances that urged on the
+      Tribune, and all the power that surrounded him, was not, perhaps,
+      altogether so imprudent as it seemed. And, even accepting that imprudence
+      in the extremest sense,&mdash;by the more penetrating judge of the higher
+      order of character, it will probably be considered as the magnificent
+      folly of a bold nature, excited at once by position and prosperity, by
+      religious credulities, by patriotic aspirings, by scholastic visions too
+      suddenly transferred from revery to action, beyond that wise and earthward
+      policy which sharpens the weapon ere it casts the gauntlet.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      <a name="link2HCH0030" id="link2HCH0030">
+      <!--  H2 anchor --> </a>
+    </p>
+    <div style="height: 4em;">
+      <br /><br /><br /><br />
+    </div>
+    <h2>
+      Chapter 4.VII. The Festival.
+    </h2>
+    <p>
+      The Festival of that day was far the most sumptuous hitherto known. The
+      hint of Cecco del Vecchio, which so well depicted the character of his
+      fellow-citizens, as yet it exists, though not to such excess, in their
+      love of holyday pomp and gorgeous show, was not lost upon Rienzi. One
+      instance of the universal banqueting (intended, indeed, rather for the
+      people than the higher ranks) may illustrate the more than royal profusion
+      that prevailed. From morn till eve, streams of wine flowed like a fountain
+      from the nostrils of the Horse of the great Equestrian Statue of
+      Constantine. The mighty halls of the Lateran palace, open to all ranks,
+      were prodigally spread; and the games, sports, and buffooneries of the
+      time, were in ample requisition. Apart, the Tribunessa, as Nina was rather
+      unclassically entitled, entertained the dames of Rome; while the Tribune
+      had so effectually silenced or conciliated Raimond, that the good Bishop
+      shared his peculiar table&mdash;the only one admitted to that honour. As
+      the eye ranged each saloon and hall&mdash;it beheld the space lined with
+      all the nobility and knighthood&mdash;the wealth and strength&mdash;the
+      learning and the beauty&mdash;of the Italian metropolis; mingled with
+      ambassadors and noble strangers, even from beyond the Alps; (The simple
+      and credulous briographer of Rienzi declares his fame to have reached the
+      ears of the Soldan of Babylon.)&mdash;envoys not only of the free states
+      that had welcomed the rise of the Tribune, but of the highborn and haughty
+      tyrants who had first derided his arrogance, and now cringed to his power.
+      There, were not only the ambassadors of Florence, of Sienna, of Arezzo
+      (which last subjected its government to the Tribune,) of Todi, of Spoleto,
+      and of countless other lesser towns and states, but of the dark and
+      terrible Visconti, prince of Milan; of Obizzo of Ferrara, and the tyrant
+      rulers of Verona and Bologna; even the proud and sagacious Malatesta, lord
+      of Rimini, whose arm afterwards broke for awhile the power of Montreal, at
+      the head of his Great Company, had deputed his representative in his most
+      honoured noble. John di Vico, the worst and most malignant despot of his
+      day, who had sternly defied the arms of the Tribune, now subdued and
+      humbled, was there in person; and the ambassadors of Hungary and of Naples
+      mingled with those of Bavaria and Bohemia, whose sovereigns that day had
+      been cited to the Roman Judgment Court. The nodding of plumes, the glitter
+      of jewels and cloth of gold, the rustling of silks and jingle of golden
+      spurs, the waving of banners from the roof, the sounds of minstrelsy from
+      the galleries above, all presented a picture of such power and state&mdash;a
+      court and chivalry of such show&mdash;as the greatest of the feudal kings
+      might have beheld with a sparkling eye and a swelling heart. But at that
+      moment the cause and lord of all that splendour, recovered from his late
+      exhilaration, sat moody and abstracted, remembering with a thoughtful brow
+      the adventure of the past night, and sensible that amongst his gaudiest
+      revellers lurked his intended murtherers. Amidst the swell of the
+      minstrelsy and the pomp of the crowd, he felt that treason scowled beside
+      him; and the image of the skeleton obtruding, as of old, its grim thought
+      of death upon the feast, darkened the ruby of the wine, and chilled the
+      glitter of the scene.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      It was while the feast was loudest that Rienzi&rsquo;s page was seen gliding
+      through the banquet, and whispering several of the nobles; each bowed low,
+      but changed colour as he received the message.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;My Lord Savelli,&rdquo; said Orsini, himself trembling, &ldquo;bear yourself more
+      bravely. This must be meant in honour, not revenge. I suppose your summons
+      corresponds with mine.&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;He&mdash;he&mdash;asks&mdash;asks&mdash;me to supper at the Capitol; a
+      fri-endly meeting&mdash;(pest on his friendship!)&mdash;after the noise of
+      the day.&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;The words addressed also to me!&rdquo; said Orsini, turning to one of the
+      Frangipani.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      Those who received the summons soon broke from the feast, and collected in
+      a group, eagerly conferring. Some were for flight, but flight was
+      confession; their number, rank, long and consecrated impunity, reassured
+      them, and they resolved to obey. The old Colonna, the sole innocent Baron
+      of the invited guests, was also the only one who refused the invitation.
+      &ldquo;Tush!&rdquo; said he, peevishly; &ldquo;here is feasting enough for one day! Tell the
+      Tribune that ere he sups I hope to be asleep. Grey hairs cannot encounter
+      all this fever of festivity.&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      As Rienzi rose to depart, which he did early, for the banquet took place
+      while yet morning, Raimond, eager to escape and confer with some of his
+      spiritual friends, as to the report he should make to the Pontiff, was
+      beginning his expressions of farewell, when the merciless Tribune said to
+      him gravely&mdash;
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;My Lord, we want you on urgent business at the Capitol. A prisoner&mdash;a
+      trial&mdash;perhaps (he added with his portentous and prophetic frown) an
+      execution waits us! Come.&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;Verily, Tribune,&rdquo; stammered the good Bishop, &ldquo;this is a strange time for
+      execution!&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;Last night was a time yet more strange.&mdash;Come.&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      There was something in the way in which the final word was pronounced,
+      that Raimond could not resist. He sighed, muttered, twitched his robes,
+      and followed the Tribune. As he passed through the halls, the company rose
+      on all sides. Rienzi repaid their salutations with smiles and whispers of
+      frank courtesy and winning address. Young as he yet was, and of a handsome
+      and noble presence, that took every advantage from splendid attire, and
+      yet more from an appearance of intellectual command in his brow and eye,
+      which the less cultivated signors of that dark age necessarily wanted&mdash;he
+      glittered through the court as one worthy to form, and fitted to preside
+      over, it; and his supposed descent from the Teuton Emperor, which, since
+      his greatness, was universally bruited and believed abroad, seemed
+      undeniably visible to the foreign lords in the majesty of his mien and the
+      easy blandness of his address.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;My Lord Prefect,&rdquo; said he to a dark and sullen personage in black velvet,
+      the powerful and arrogant John di Vico, prefect of Rome, &ldquo;we are rejoiced
+      to find so noble a guest at Rome: we must repay the courtesy by surprising
+      you in your own palace ere long;&mdash;nor will you, Signor (as he turned
+      to the envoy from Tivoli,) refuse us a shelter amidst your groves and
+      waterfalls ere the vintage be gathered. Methinks Rome, united with sweet
+      Tivoli, grows reconciled to the Muses. Your suit is carried, Master
+      Venoni: the council recognises its justice; but I reserved the news for
+      this holyday&mdash;you do not blame me, I trust.&rdquo; This was whispered, with
+      a half-affectionate frankness, to a worthy citizen, who, finding himself
+      amidst so many of the great, would have shrunk from the notice of the
+      Tribune; but it was the policy of Rienzi to pay an especial and marked
+      attention to those engaged in commercial pursuits. As, after tarrying a
+      moment or two with the merchant, he passed on, the tall person of the old
+      Colonna caught his eye&mdash;
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;Signor,&rdquo; said he, with a profound inclination of his head, but with a
+      slight emphasis of tone, &ldquo;you will not fail us this evening.&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;Tribune&mdash;&rdquo; began the Colonna.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;We receive no excuse,&rdquo; interrupted the Tribune, hastily, and passed on.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      He halted for a few moments before a small group of men plainly attired,
+      who were watching him with intense interest; for they, too, were scholars,
+      and in Rienzi&rsquo;s rise they saw another evidence of that wonderful and
+      sudden power which intellect had begun to assume over brute force. With
+      these, as if abruptly mingled with congenial spirits, the Tribune relaxed
+      all the gravity of his brow. Happier, perhaps, his living career&mdash;more
+      unequivocal his posthumous renown&mdash;had his objects as his tastes been
+      theirs!
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;Ah, carissime!&rdquo; said he to one, whose arm he drew within his own,&mdash;&ldquo;and
+      how proceeds thy interpretation of the old marbles?&mdash;half unravelled?
+      I rejoice to hear it! Confer with me as of old, I pray thee. Tomorrow&mdash;no,
+      nor the day after, but next week&mdash;we will have a tranquil evening.
+      Dear poet, your ode transported me to the days of Horace; yet, methinks,
+      we do wrong to reject the vernacular for the Latin. You shake your head?
+      Well, Petrarch thinks with you: his great epic moves with the stride of a
+      giant&mdash;so I hear from his friend and envoy,&mdash;and here he is. My
+      Laeluis, is that not your name with Petrarch? How shall I express my
+      delight at his comforting, his inspiring letter? Alas! he overrates not my
+      intentions, but my power. Of this hereafter.&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      A slight shade darkened the Tribune&rsquo;s brow at these words: but moving on,
+      a long line of nobles and princes on either side, he regained his
+      self-possession, and the dignity he had dropped with his former equals.
+      Thus he passed through the crowd, and gradually disappeared.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;He bears him bravely,&rdquo; said one, as the revellers reseated themselves.
+      &ldquo;Noticed you the &lsquo;we&rsquo;&mdash;the style royal?&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;But it must be owned that he lords it well,&rdquo; said the ambassador of the
+      Visconti: &ldquo;less pride would be cringing to his haughty court.&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;Why,&rdquo; said a professor of Bologna, &ldquo;why is the Tribune called proud? I
+      see no pride in him.&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;Nor I,&rdquo; said a wealthy jeweller.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      While these, and yet more contradictory, comments followed the exit of the
+      Tribune, he passed into the saloon, where Nina presided; and here his fair
+      person and silver tongue (&ldquo;Suavis colorataeque sententiae,&rdquo; according to
+      the description of Petrarch) won him a more general favour with the
+      matrons than he experienced with their lords, and not a little contrasted
+      the formal and nervous compliments of the good Bishop, who served him on
+      such occasions with an excellent foil.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      But as soon as these ceremonies were done, and Rienzi mounted his horse,
+      his manner changed at once into a stern and ominous severity.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;Vicar,&rdquo; said he, abruptly, to the Bishop, &ldquo;we might well need your
+      presence. Learn that at the Capitol now sits the Council in judgment upon
+      an assassin. Last night, but for Heaven&rsquo;s mercy, I should have fallen a
+      victim to a hireling&rsquo;s dagger, Knew you aught of this?&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      And he turned so sharply on the Bishop, that the poor canonist nearly
+      dropped from his horse in surprise and terror.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;I,&mdash;&rdquo; said he.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      Rienzi smiled&mdash;&ldquo;No, good my Lord Bishop! I see you are of no
+      murtherer&rsquo;s mould. But to continue:&mdash;that I might not appear to act
+      in mine own cause, I ordered the prisoner to be tried in my absence. In
+      his trial (you marked the letter brought me at our banquet?)&mdash;&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;Ay, and you changed colour.&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;Well I might: in his trial, I say, he has confessed that nine of the
+      loftiest lords of Rome were his instigators. They sup with me tonight!&mdash;Vicar,
+      forwards!&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      <a name="link2H_4_0038" id="link2H_4_0038">
+      <!--  H2 anchor --> </a>
+    </p>
+    <div style="height: 4em;">
+      <br /><br /><br /><br />
+    </div>
+    <h2>
+      BOOK V. THE CRISIS.
+    </h2>
+<pre xml:space="preserve">
+     &ldquo;Questo ha acceso &lsquo;i fuoco e la fiamma laquale non la par
+     spotegnere.&rdquo;&mdash;&ldquo;Vita di Cola di Rienzi&rdquo;, lib. i. cap. 29.
+
+     &ldquo;He has kindled fire and flames which he will not be able to
+     extinguish.&rdquo;&mdash;&ldquo;Life of Cola di Rienzi&rdquo;.
+</pre>
+    <p>
+      <a name="link2HCH0031" id="link2HCH0031">
+      <!--  H2 anchor --> </a>
+    </p>
+    <div style="height: 4em;">
+      <br /><br /><br /><br />
+    </div>
+    <h2>
+      Chapter 5.I. The Judgment of the Tribune.
+    </h2>
+    <p>
+      The brief words of the Tribune to Stephen Colonna, though they sharpened
+      the rage of the proud old noble, were such as he did not on reflection
+      deem it prudent to disobey. Accordingly, at the appointed hour, he found
+      himself in one of the halls of the Capitol, with a gallant party of his
+      peers. Rienzi received them with more than his usual graciousness.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      They sate down to the splendid board in secret uneasiness and alarm, as
+      they saw that, with the exception of Stephen Colonna, none, save the
+      conspirators, had been invited to the banquet. Rienzi, regardless of their
+      silence and abstraction, was more than usually gay&mdash;the old Colonna
+      more than usually sullen.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;We fear we have but ill pleased you, my Lord Colonna, by our summons.
+      Once, methinks, we might more easily provoke you to a smile.&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;Situations are changed, Tribune, since you were my guest.&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;Why, scarcely so. I have risen, but you have not fallen. Ye walk the
+      streets day and night in security and peace; your lives are safe from the
+      robber, and your palaces no longer need bars and battlements to shield you
+      from your fellow-citizens. I have risen, but we all have risen&mdash;from
+      barbarous disorder into civilized life! My Lord Gianni Colonna, whom we
+      have made Captain over Campagna, you will not refuse a cup to the Buono
+      Stato;&mdash;nor think we mistrust your valour, when we say, that we
+      rejoice Rome hath no enemies to attest your generalship.&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;Methinks,&rdquo; quoth the old Colonna, bluntly, &ldquo;we shall have enemies enough
+      from Bohemia and Bavaria, ere the next harvest be green.&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;And, if so,&rdquo; replied the Tribune, calmly, &ldquo;foreign foes are better than
+      civil strife.&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;Ay, if we have money in the treasury; which is but little likely, if we
+      have many more such holydays.&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;You are ungracious, my Lord,&rdquo; said the Tribune; &ldquo;and, besides, you are
+      more uncomplimentary to Rome than to ourselves. What citizen would not
+      part with gold to buy fame and liberty?&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;I know very few in Rome that would,&rdquo; answered the Baron. &ldquo;But tell me,
+      Tribune, you who are a notable casuist, which is the best for a state&mdash;that
+      its governor should be over-thrifty or over-lavish?&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;I refer the question to my friend, Luca di Savelli,&rdquo; replied Rienzi. &ldquo;He
+      is a grand philosopher, and I wot well could explain a much knottier
+      riddle, which we will presently submit to his acumen.&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      The Barons, who had been much embarrassed by the bold speech of the old
+      Colonna, all turned their eyes to Savelli, who answered with more
+      composure than was anticipated.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;The question admits a double reply. He who is born a ruler, and maintains
+      a foreign army, governing by fear, should be penurious. He who is made
+      ruler, who courts the people, and would reign by love, must win their
+      affection by generosity, and dazzle their fancies by pomp. Such, I
+      believe, is the usual maxim in Italy, which is rife in all experience of
+      state wisdom.&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      The Barons unanimously applauded the discreet reply of Savelli, excepting
+      only the old Colonna.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;Yet pardon me, Tribune,&rdquo; said Stephen, &ldquo;if I depart from the
+      courtier-like decision of our friend, and opine, though with all due
+      respect, that even a friar&rsquo;s coarse serge, (&lsquo;Vestimenta da Bizoco,&rsquo; was
+      the phrase used by Colonna; a phrase borrowed from certain heretics
+      (bizocchi) who affected extreme austerity; afterwards the word passed into
+      a proverb.&mdash;See the comments of Zerfirino Re, in &lsquo;Vita di Cola di
+      Rienzi&rsquo;.) the parade of humility, would better become thee, than this
+      gaudy pomp, the parade of pride!&rdquo; So saying, he touched the large loose
+      sleeve fringed with gold, of the Tribune&rsquo;s purple robe.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;Hush, father!&rdquo; said Gianni, Colonna&rsquo;s son, colouring at the unprovoked
+      rudeness and dangerous candour of the veteran.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;Nay, it matters not,&rdquo; said the Tribune, with affected indifference,
+      though his lip quivered, and his eye shot fire; and then, after a pause,
+      he resumed with an awful smile&mdash;&ldquo;If the Colonna love the serge of the
+      friar, he may see enough of it ere we part. And now, my Lord Savelli, for
+      my question, which I pray you listen to; it demands all your wit. Is it
+      best for a State&rsquo;s Ruler to be over-forgiving, or over-just? Take breath
+      to answer: you look faint&mdash;you grow pale&mdash;you tremble&mdash;you
+      cover your face! Traitor and assassin, your conscience betrays you! My
+      Lords, relieve your accomplice, and take up the answer.&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;Nay, if we are discovered,&rdquo; said the Orsini, rising in despair, &ldquo;we will
+      not fall unavenged&mdash;die, tyrant!&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      He rushed to the place where Rienzi stood&mdash;for the Tribune also rose,&mdash;and
+      made a thrust at his breast with his dagger; the steel pierced the purple
+      robe, yet glanced harmlessly away&mdash;and the Tribune regarded the
+      disappointed murtherer with a scornful smile.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;Till yesternight, I never dreamt that under the robe of state I should
+      need the secret corselet,&rdquo; said he. &ldquo;My Lords, you have taught me a dark
+      lesson, and I thank ye.&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      So saying, he clapped his hands, and suddenly the folding doors at the end
+      of the hall flew open, and discovered the saloon of the Council hung with
+      silk of a blood-red, relieved by rays of white,&mdash;the emblem of crime
+      and death. At a long table sate the councillors in their robes; at the bar
+      stood a ruffian form, which the banqueters too well recognised.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;Bid Rodolf of Saxony approach!&rdquo; said the Tribune.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      And led by two guards, the robber entered the hall.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;Wretch, you then betrayed us!&rdquo; said one of the Frangipani.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;Rodolph of Saxony goes ever to the highest bidder,&rdquo; returned the
+      miscreant, with a horrid grin. &ldquo;You gave me gold, and I would have slain
+      your foe; your foe defeated me; he gives me life, and life is a greater
+      boon than gold!&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;Ye confess your crime, my Lords! Silent! dumb! Where is your wit,
+      Savelli? Where your pride, Rinaldo di Orsini? Gianni Colonna, is your
+      chivalry come to this?&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;Oh!&rdquo; continued Rienzi, with deep and passionate bitterness; &ldquo;oh, my
+      Lords, will nothing conciliate you&mdash;not to me, but to Rome? What hath
+      been my sin against you and yours? Disbanded ruffians (such as your
+      accuser)&mdash;dismantled fortresses&mdash;impartial law&mdash;what man,
+      in all the wild revolutions of Italy, sprung from the people, ever yielded
+      less to their licence? Not a coin of your coffers touched by wanton power,&mdash;not
+      a hair of your heads harmed by private revenge. You, Gianni Colonna,
+      loaded with honours, intrusted with command&mdash;you, Alphonso di
+      Frangipani, endowed with new principalities,&mdash;did the Tribune
+      remember one insult he received from you as the Plebeian? You accuse my
+      pride;&mdash;was it my fault that ye cringed and fawned upon my power,&mdash;flattery
+      on your lips, poison at your hearts? No, I have not offended you; let the
+      world know, that in me you aimed at liberty, justice, law, order, the
+      restored grandeur, the renovated rights of Rome! At these, the Abstract
+      and the Immortal&mdash;not at this frail form, ye struck;&mdash;by the
+      divinity of these ye are defeated;&mdash;for the outraged majesty of
+      these,&mdash;criminals and victims,&mdash;ye must die!&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      With these words, uttered with the tone and air that would have become the
+      loftiest spirit of the ancient city, Rienzi, with a majestic step, swept
+      from the chamber into the Hall of Council. (The guilt of the Barons in
+      their designed assassination of Rienzi, though hastily slurred over by
+      Gibbon, and other modern writers, is clearly attested by Muratori, the
+      Bolognese Chronicle &amp;c.&mdash;They even confessed the crime. (See
+      Cron. Estens: Muratori, tom. xviii. page 442.))
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      All that night the conspirators remained within that room, the doors
+      locked and guarded; the banquet unremoved, and its splendour strangely
+      contrasting the mood of the guests.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      The utter prostration and despair of these dastard criminals&mdash;so
+      unlike the knightly nobles of France and England, has been painted by the
+      historian in odious and withering colours. The old Colonna alone sustained
+      his impetuous and imperious character. He strode to and fro the room like
+      a lion in his cage, uttering loud threats of resentment and defiance; and
+      beating at the door with his clenched hands, demanding egress, and
+      proclaiming the vengeance of the Pontiff.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      The dawn came, slow and grey upon that agonized assembly: and just as the
+      last star faded from the melancholy horizon, and by the wan and
+      comfortless heaven, they regarded each other&rsquo;s faces, almost spectral with
+      anxiety and fear, the great bell of the Capitol sounded the notes in which
+      they well recognised the chime of death! It was then that the door opened,
+      and a drear and gloomy procession of cordeliers, one to each Baron,
+      entered the apartment! At that spectacle, we are told, the terror of the
+      conspirators was so great, that it froze up the very power of speech.
+      (&ldquo;Diventarono si gelati, che non poteno favellare.&rdquo;) The greater part at
+      length, deeming all hope over, resigned themselves to their ghostly
+      confessors. But when the friar appointed to Stephen approached that
+      passionate old man, he waved his hand impatiently, and said&mdash;&ldquo;Tease
+      me not! Tease me not!&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;Nay, son, prepare for the awful hour.&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;Son, indeed!&rdquo; quoth the Baron. &ldquo;I am old enough to be thy grandsire; and
+      for the rest, tell him who sent thee, that I neither am prepared for
+      death, nor will prepare! I have made up my mind to live these twenty
+      years, and longer too;&mdash;if I catch not my death with the cold of this
+      accursed night.&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      Just at that moment a cry that almost seemed to rend the Capitol asunder
+      was heard, as, with one voice, the multitude below yelled forth&mdash;
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;Death to the conspirators!&mdash;death! death!&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      While this the scene in that hall, the Tribune issued from his chamber, in
+      which he had been closeted with his wife and sister. The noble spirit of
+      the one, the tears and grief of the other (who saw at one fell stroke
+      perish the house of her betrothed,) had not worked without effect upon a
+      temper, stern and just indeed, but naturally averse from blood; and a
+      heart capable of the loftiest species of revenge.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      He entered the Council, still sitting, with a calm brow, and even a
+      cheerful eye.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;Pandulfo di Guido,&rdquo; he said, turning to that citizen, &ldquo;you are right; you
+      spoke as a wise man and a patriot, when you said that to cut off with one
+      blow, however merited, the noblest heads of Rome would endanger the State,
+      sully our purple with an indelible stain, and unite the nobility of Italy
+      against us.&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;Such, Tribune, was my argument, though the Council have decided
+      otherwise.&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;Hearken to the shouts of the populace, you cannot appease their honest
+      warmth,&rdquo; said the demagogue Baroncelli.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      Many of the Council murmured applause.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;Friends,&rdquo; said the Tribune, with a solemn and earnest aspect, &ldquo;let not
+      Posterity say that Liberty loves blood; let us for once adopt the example
+      and imitate the mercy of our great Redeemer! We have triumphed&mdash;let
+      us forbear; we are saved&mdash;let us forgive!&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      The speech of the Tribune was supported by Pandulfo, and others of the
+      more mild and moderate policy; and for a short but animated discussion,
+      the influence of Rienzi prevailed, and the sentence of death was revoked,
+      but by a small majority.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;And now,&rdquo; said Rienzi, &ldquo;let us be more than just; let us be generous.
+      Speak&mdash;and boldly. Do any of ye think that I have been over-hard,
+      over-haughty with these stubborn spirits?&mdash;I read your answer in your
+      brows!&mdash;I have! Do any of ye think this error of mind may have
+      stirred them to their dark revenge? Do any of you deem that they partake,
+      as we do, of human nature,&mdash;that they are sensible to kindness, that
+      they are softened by generosity,&mdash;that they can be tamed and disarmed
+      by such vengeance as is dictated to noble foes by Christian laws?&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;I think,&rdquo; said Pandulfo, after a pause, &ldquo;that it will not be in human
+      nature, if the men you pardon, thus offending and thus convicted, again
+      attempt your life!&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;Methinks,&rdquo; said Rienzi, &ldquo;we must do even more than pardon. The first
+      great Caesar, when he did not crush a foe, strove to convert him to a
+      friend&mdash;&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;And perished by the attempt,&rdquo; said Baroncelli, abruptly.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      Rienzi started and changed colour.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;If you would save these wretched prisoners, better not wait till the fury
+      of the mob become ungovernable,&rdquo; whispered Pandulfo.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      The Tribune roused himself from his revery.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;Pandulfo,&rdquo; said he, in the same tone, &ldquo;my heart misgives me&mdash;the
+      brood of serpents are in my hand&mdash;I do not strangle them&mdash;they
+      may sting me to death, in return for my mercy&mdash;it is their instinct!
+      No matter: it shall not be said that the Roman Tribune bought with so many
+      lives his own safety: nor shall it be written upon my grave-stone, &lsquo;Here
+      lies the coward, who did not dare forgive.&rsquo; What, ho! there, officers,
+      unclose the doors! My masters, let us acquaint the prisoners with their
+      sentence.&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      With that, Rienzi seated himself on the chair of state, at the head of the
+      table, and the sun, now risen, cast its rays over the blood-red walls, in
+      which the Barons, marshalled in order into the chamber, thought to read
+      their fate.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;My Lords,&rdquo; said the Tribune, &ldquo;ye have offended the laws of God and man;
+      but God teaches man the quality of mercy. Learn at last, that I bear a
+      charmed life. Nor is he whom, for high purposes, Heaven hath raised from
+      the cottage to the popular throne, without invisible aid and spiritual
+      protection. If hereditary monarchs are deemed sacred, how much more one in
+      whose power the divine hand hath writ its witness! Yes, over him who lives
+      but for his country, whose greatness is his country&rsquo;s gift, whose life is
+      his country&rsquo;s liberty, watch the souls of the just, and the unsleeping
+      eyes of the sworded seraphim! Taught by your late failure and your present
+      peril, bid your anger against me cease; respect the laws, revere the
+      freedom of your city, and think that no state presents a nobler spectacle
+      than men born as ye are&mdash;a patrician and illustrious order&mdash;using
+      your power to protect your city, your wealth to nurture its arts, your
+      chivalry to protect its laws! Take back your swords&mdash;and the first
+      man who strikes against the liberties of Rome, let him be your victim;
+      even though that victim be the Tribune. Your cause has been tried&mdash;your
+      sentence is pronounced. Renew your oath to forbear all hostility, private
+      or public, against the government and the magistrates of Rome, and ye are
+      pardoned&mdash;ye are free!&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      Amazed, bewildered, the Barons mechanically bent the knee: the friars who
+      had received their confessions, administered the appointed oath; and
+      while, with white lips, they muttered the solemn words, they heard below
+      the roar of the multitude for their blood.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      This ceremony ended, the Tribune passed into the banquet-hall, which
+      conducted to a balcony, whence he was accustomed to address the people;
+      and never, perhaps, was his wonderful mastery over the passions of an
+      audience (ad persuadendum efficax dictator, quoque dulcis ac lepidus)
+      (Petrarch of Rienzi.) more greatly needed or more eminently shown, than on
+      that day; for the fury of the people was at its height, and it was long
+      ere he succeeded in turning it aside. Before he concluded, however, every
+      wave of the wild sea lay hushed.&mdash;The orator lived to stand on the
+      same spot, to plead for a life nobler than those he now saved,&mdash;and
+      to plead unheard and in vain!
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      As soon as the Tribune saw the favourable moment had arrived, the Barons
+      were admitted into the balcony:&mdash;in the presence of the breathless
+      thousands, they solemnly pledged themselves to protect the Good Estate.
+      And thus the morning which seemed to dawn upon their execution witnessed
+      their reconciliation with the people.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      The crowd dispersed, the majority soothed and pleased;&mdash;the more
+      sagacious, vexed and dissatisfied.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;He has but increased the smoke and the flame which he was not able to
+      extinguish,&rdquo; growled Cecco del Vecchio; and the smith&rsquo;s appropriate saying
+      passed into a proverb and a prophecy.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      Meanwhile, the Tribune, conscious at least that he had taken the more
+      generous course, broke up the Council, and retired to the chamber where
+      Nina and his sister waited him. These beautiful young women had conceived
+      for each other the tenderest affection. And their differing characters,
+      both of mind and feature, seemed by contrast to heighten the charms of
+      both; as in a skilful jewellery, the pearl and diamond borrow beauty from
+      each other.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      And as Irene now turned her pale countenance and streaming eyes from the
+      bosom to which she had clung for support, the timid sister, anxious,
+      doubtful, wistful;&mdash;the proud wife, sanguine and assured, as if never
+      diffident of the intentions nor of the power of her Rienzi:&mdash;the
+      contrast would have furnished to a painter no unworthy incarnation of the
+      Love that hopeth, and the Love that feareth, all things.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;Be cheered, my sweet sister,&rdquo; said the Tribune, first caught by Irene&rsquo;s
+      imploring look; &ldquo;not a hair on the heads of those who boast the name of
+      him thou lovest so well is injured.&mdash;Thank Heaven,&rdquo; as his sister,
+      with a low cry, rushed into his arms, &ldquo;that it was against my life they
+      conspired! Had it been another Roman&rsquo;s, mercy might have been a crime!
+      Dearest, may Adrian love thee half as well as I; and yet, my sister and my
+      child, none can know thy soft soul like he who watched over it since its
+      first blossom expanded to the sun. My poor brother! had he lived, your
+      counsel had been his; and methinks his gentle spirit often whispers away
+      the sternness which, otherwise, would harden over mine. Nina, my queen, my
+      inspirer, my monitor&mdash;ever thus let thy heart, masculine in my
+      distress, be woman&rsquo;s in my power; and be to me, with Irene, upon earth,
+      what my brother is in heaven!&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      The Tribune, exhausted by the trials of the night, retired for a few hours
+      to rest; and as Nina, encircling him within her arms, watched over his
+      noble countenance&mdash;care hushed, ambition laid at rest, its serenity
+      had something almost of sublime. And tears of that delicious pride, which
+      woman sheds for the hero of her dreams, stood heavy in the wife&rsquo;s eyes, as
+      she rejoiced more, in the deep stillness of her heart, at the prerogative,
+      alone hers, of sharing his solitary hours, than in all the rank to which
+      his destiny had raised her, and which her nature fitted her at once to
+      adorn and to enjoy. In that calm and lonely hour she beguiled her heart by
+      waking dreams, vainer than the sleeper&rsquo;s; and pictured to herself the long
+      career of glory, the august decline of peace, which were to await her
+      lord.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      And while she thus watched and thus dreamed, the cloud, as yet no bigger
+      than a man&rsquo;s hand, darkened the horizon of a fate whose sunshine was
+      well-nigh past!
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      <a name="link2HCH0032" id="link2HCH0032">
+      <!--  H2 anchor --> </a>
+    </p>
+    <div style="height: 4em;">
+      <br /><br /><br /><br />
+    </div>
+    <h2>
+      Chapter 5.II. The Flight.
+    </h2>
+    <p>
+      Fretting his proud heart, as a steed frets on the bit, old Colonna
+      regained his palace. To him, innocent of the proposed crime of his kin and
+      compeers, the whole scene of the night and morning presented but one
+      feature of insult and degradation. Scarce was he in his palace, ere he
+      ordered couriers, in whom he knew he could confide, to be in preparation
+      for his summons. &ldquo;This to Avignon,&rdquo; said he to himself, as he concluded an
+      epistle to the Pontiff.&mdash;&ldquo;We will see whether the friendship of the
+      great house of the Colonna will outweigh the frantic support of the
+      rabble&rsquo;s puppet.&mdash;This to Palestrina,&mdash;the rock is inaccessible!&mdash;This
+      to John di Vico, he may be relied upon, traitor though he be!&mdash;This
+      to Naples; the Colonna will disown the Tribune&rsquo;s ambassador, if he throw
+      not up the trust and hasten hither, not a lover but a soldier!&mdash;and
+      may this find Walter de Montreal! Ah, a precious messenger he sent us, but
+      I will forgive all&mdash;all, for a thousand lances.&rdquo; And as with
+      trembling hands he twined the silk round his letters, he bade his pages
+      invite to his board, next day, all the signors who had been implicated
+      with him on the previous night.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      The Barons came&mdash;far more enraged at the disgrace of pardon, than
+      grateful for the boon of mercy. Their fears combined with their pride; and
+      the shouts of the mob, the whine of the cordeliers, still ringing in their
+      ears, they deemed united resistance the only course left to protect their
+      lives, and avenge their affront.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      To them the public pardon of the Tribune seemed only a disguise to private
+      revenge. All they believed was, that Rienzi did not dare to destroy them
+      in the face of day; forgetfulness and forgiveness appeared to them as the
+      means designed to lull their vigilance, while abasing their pride: and the
+      knowledge of crime detected forbade them all hope of safety. The hand of
+      their own assassin might be armed against them, or they might be ruined
+      singly, one by one, as was the common tyrant-craft of that day. Singularly
+      enough, Luca di Savelli was the most urgent for immediate rebellion. The
+      fear of death made the coward brave.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      Unable even to conceive the romantic generosity of the Tribune, the Barons
+      were yet more alarmed when, the next day, Rienzi, summoning them one by
+      one to a private audience, presented them with gifts, and bade them forget
+      the past: excused himself rather than them, and augmented their offices
+      and honours.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      In the Quixotism of a heart to which royalty was natural, he thought that
+      there was no medium course; and that the enmity he would not silence by
+      death, he could crush by confidence and favours. Such conduct from a born
+      king to hereditary inferiors might have been successful; but the
+      generosity of one who has abruptly risen over his lords is but the
+      ostentation of insult. Rienzi in this, and, perhaps, in forgiveness
+      itself, committed a fatal error of policy, which the dark sagacity of a
+      Visconti, or, in later times, of a Borgia, would never have perpetrated.
+      But it was the error of a bright and a great mind.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      Nina was seated in the grand saloon of the palace&mdash;it was the day of
+      reception for the Roman ladies.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      The attendance was so much less numerous than usual that it startled her,
+      and she thought there was a coldness and restraint in the manner of the
+      visitors present, which somewhat stung her vanity.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;I trust we have not offended the Signora Colonna,&rdquo; she said to the Lady
+      of Gianni, Stephen&rsquo;s son. &ldquo;She was wont to grace our halls, and we miss
+      much her stately presence.&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;Madam, my Lord&rsquo;s mother is unwell!&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;Is she so? We will send for her more welcome news. Methinks we are
+      deserted today.&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      As she spoke, she carelessly dropped her handkerchief&mdash;the haughty
+      dame of the Colonna bent not&mdash;not a hand stirred; and the Tribunessa
+      looked for a moment surprised and disconcerted. Her eye roving over the
+      throng, she perceived several, whom she knew as the wives of Rienzi&rsquo;s
+      foes, whispering together with meaning glances, and more than one
+      malicious sneer at her mortification was apparent. She recovered herself
+      instantly, and said to the Signora Frangipani, with a smile, &ldquo;May we be a
+      partaker of your mirth? You seem to have chanced on some gay thought,
+      which it were a sin not to share freely.&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      The lady she addressed coloured slightly, and replied, &ldquo;We were thinking,
+      madam, that had the Tribune been present, his vow of knighthood would have
+      been called into requisition.&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;And how, Signora?&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;It would have been his pleasing duty, madam, to succour the distressed.&rdquo;
+       And the Signora glanced significantly on the kerchief still on the floor.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;You designed me, then, this slight, Signoras,&rdquo; said Nina, rising with
+      great majesty. &ldquo;I know not whether your Lords are equally bold to the
+      Tribune; but this I know, that the Tribune&rsquo;s wife can in future forgive
+      your absence. Four centuries ago, a Frangipani might well have stooped to
+      a Raselli; today, the dame of a Roman Baron might acknowledge a superior
+      in the wife of the first magistrate of Rome. I compel not your courtesy,
+      nor seek it.&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;We have gone too far,&rdquo; whispered one of the ladies to her neighbour.
+      &ldquo;Perhaps the enterprise may not succeed; and then&mdash;&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      Further remark was cut short by the sudden entrance of the Tribune. He
+      entered with great haste, and on his brow was that dark frown which none
+      ever saw unquailing.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;How, fair matrons!&rdquo; said he, looking round the room with a rapid glance,
+      &ldquo;ye have not deserted us yet? By the blessed cross, your Lords pay a
+      compliment to our honour, to leave us such lovely hostages, or else, God&rsquo;s
+      truth, they are ungrateful husbands. So, madam,&rdquo; turning sharp round to
+      the wife of Gianni Colonna, &ldquo;your husband is fled to Palestrina; yours,
+      Signora Orsini, to Marino; yours with him, fair bride of Frangipani,&mdash;ye
+      came hither to&mdash;. But ye are sacred even from a word!&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      The Tribune paused a moment, evidently striving to suppress his emotion,
+      as he observed the terror he had excited&mdash;his eye fell upon Nina,
+      who, forgetting her previous vexation, regarded him with anxious
+      amazement. &ldquo;Yes,&rdquo; said he to her, &ldquo;you alone, perhaps, of this fair
+      assemblage, know not that the nobles whom I lately released from the
+      headsman&rsquo;s gripe are a second time forsworn. They have left home in the
+      dead of the night, and already the Heralds proclaim them traitors and
+      rebels. Rienzi forgives no more!&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;Tribune,&rdquo; exclaimed the Signora Frangipani, who had more bold blood in
+      her veins than her whole house, &ldquo;were I of thine own sex, I would cast the
+      words, Traitor and Rebel, given to my Lord, in thine own teeth!&mdash;Proud
+      man, the Pontiff soon will fulfil that office!&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;Your Lord is blest with a dove, fair one,&rdquo; said the Tribune, scornfully.
+      &ldquo;Ladies, fear not, while Rienzi lives, the wife even of his worst foe is
+      safe and honoured. The crowd will be here anon; our guards shall attend ye
+      home in safety, or this palace may be your shelter&mdash;for, I warn ye,
+      that your Lords have rushed into a great peril. And ere many days be past,
+      the streets of Rome may be as rivers of blood.&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;We accept your offer, Tribune,&rdquo; said the Signora Frangipani, who was
+      touched, and, in spite of herself, awed by the Tribune&rsquo;s manner. And as
+      she spoke, she dropped on one knee, picked up the kerchief, and,
+      presenting it respectfully to Nina, said, &ldquo;Madam, forgive me. I alone of
+      these present respect you more in danger than in pride.&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;And I,&rdquo; returned Nina, as she leaned in graceful confidence on Rienzi&rsquo;s
+      arm, &ldquo;I reply, that if there be danger, the more need of pride.&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      All that day and all that night rang the great bell of the Capitol. But on
+      the following daybreak, the assemblage was thin and scattered; there was a
+      great fear stricken into the hearts of the people, by the flight of the
+      Barons, and they bitterly and loudly upbraided Rienzi for sparing them to
+      this opportunity of mischief. That day the rumours continued; the
+      murmurers for the most part remained within their houses, or assembled in
+      listless and discontented troops. The next day dawned; the same lethargy
+      prevailed. The Tribune summoned his Council, (which was a Representative
+      assembly.)
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;Shall we go forth as we are,&rdquo; said he, &ldquo;with such few as will follow the
+      Roman standard!&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;No,&rdquo; replied Pandulfo, who, by nature timid, was yet well acquainted with
+      the disposition of the people, and therefore a sagacious counsellor. &ldquo;Let
+      us hold back; let us wait till the rebels commit themselves by some odious
+      outrage, and then hatred will unite the waverers, and resentment lead
+      them.&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      This counsel prevailed; the event proved its wisdom. To give excuse and
+      dignity to the delay, messengers were sent to Marino, whither the chief
+      part of the Barons had fled, and which was strongly fortified, demanding
+      their immediate return.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      On the day on which the haughty refusal of the insurgents was brought to
+      Rienzi, came fugitives from all parts of the Campagna. Houses burned&mdash;convents
+      and vineyards pillaged&mdash;cattle and horses seized&mdash;attested the
+      warfare practised by the Barons, and animated the drooping Romans, by
+      showing the mercies they might expect for themselves. That evening, of
+      their own accord, the Romans rushed into the place of the Capitol:&mdash;Rinaldo
+      Orsini had seized a fortress in the immediate neighbourhood of Rome, and
+      had set fire to a tower, the flames of which were visible to the city. The
+      tenant of the tower, a noble lady, old and widowed, was burnt alive. Then
+      rose the wild clamour&mdash;the mighty wrath&mdash;the headlong fury. The
+      hour for action had arrived. (&ldquo;Ardea terre, arse la Castelluzza e case, e
+      uomini. Non si schifo di ardere una nobile donna Vedova, veterana, in una
+      torre. Per tale crudeltade li Romani furo piu irati,&rdquo; &amp;c.&mdash;&ldquo;Vita
+      di Cola di Rienzi&rdquo;, lib. i. cap. 20.)
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      <a name="link2HCH0033" id="link2HCH0033">
+      <!--  H2 anchor --> </a>
+    </p>
+    <div style="height: 4em;">
+      <br /><br /><br /><br />
+    </div>
+    <h2>
+      Chapter 5.III. The Battle.
+    </h2>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;I have dreamed a dream,&rdquo; cried Rienzi, leaping from his bed. &ldquo;The
+      lion-hearted Boniface, foe and victim of the Colonna, hath appeared to me,
+      and promised victory. (&ldquo;In questa notte mi e apparito Santo Bonifacio
+      Papa,&rdquo; &amp;c.&mdash;&ldquo;Vita di Cola di Rienzi&rdquo; cap. 32.) Nina, prepare the
+      laurel-wreath: this day victory shall be ours!&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;O, Rienzi! today?&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;Yes! hearken to the bell&mdash;hearken to the trumpet. Nay, I hear even
+      now the impatient hoofs of my white warsteed! One kiss, Nina, ere I arm
+      for victory,&mdash;stay&mdash;comfort poor Irene; let me not see her&mdash;she
+      weeps that my foes are akin to her betrothed; I cannot brook her tears; I
+      watched her in her cradle. Today, I must have no weakness on my soul!
+      Knaves, twice perjured!&mdash;wolves, never to be tamed!&mdash;shall I
+      meet ye at last sword to sword? Away, sweet Nina, to Irene, quick! Adrian
+      is at Naples, and were he in Rome, her lover is sacred, though fifty times
+      a Colonna.&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      With that, the Tribune passed into his wardrobe, where his pages and
+      gentlemen attended with his armour. &ldquo;I hear, by our spies,&rdquo; said he, &ldquo;that
+      they will be at our gates ere noon&mdash;four thousand foot, seven hundred
+      horsemen. We will give them a hearty welcome, my masters. How, Angelo
+      Villani, my pretty page, what do you out of your lady&rsquo;s service?&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;I would fain see a warrior arm for Rome,&rdquo; said the boy, with a boy&rsquo;s
+      energy.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;Bless thee, my child; there spoke one of Rome&rsquo;s true sons!&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;And the Signora has promised me that I shall go with her guard to the
+      gates, to hear the news&mdash;&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;And report the victory?&mdash;thou shalt. But they must not let thee come
+      within shaft-shot. What! my Pandulfo, thou in mail?&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;Rome requires every man,&rdquo; said the citizen, whose weak nerves were strung
+      by the contagion of the general enthusiasm.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;She doth&mdash;and once more I am proud to be a Roman. Now, gentles, the
+      Dalmaticum: (A robe or mantle of white, borne by Rienzi; at one time
+      belonging to the sacerdotal office, afterwards an emblem of empire.) I
+      would that every foe should know Rienzi; and, by the Lord of Hosts,
+      fighting at the head of the imperial people, I have a right to the
+      imperial robe. Are the friars prepared? Our march to the gates shall be
+      preceded by a solemn hymn&mdash;so fought our sires.&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;Tribune, John di Vico is arrived with a hundred horse to support the Good
+      Estate.&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;He hath!&mdash;The Lord has delivered us then of a foe, and given our
+      dungeons a traitor!&mdash;Bring hither yon casket, Angelo.&mdash;So&mdash;Hark
+      thee! Pandulfo, read this letter.&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      The citizens read, with surprise and consternation, the answer of the wily
+      Prefect to the Colonna&rsquo;s epistle.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;He promises the Baron to desert to him in the battle, with the Prefect&rsquo;s
+      banner,&rdquo; said Pandulfo. &ldquo;What is to be done?&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;What!&mdash;take my signet&mdash;here&mdash;see him lodged forthwith in
+      the prison of the Capitol. Bid his train leave Rome, and if found acting
+      with the Barons, warn them that their Lord dies. Go&mdash;see to it
+      without a moment&rsquo;s delay. Meanwhile, to the chapel&mdash;we will hear
+      mass.&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      Within an hour the Roman army&mdash;vast, miscellaneous&mdash;old men and
+      boys, mingled with the vigour of life, were on their march to the Gate of
+      San Lorenzo; of their number, which amounted to twenty thousand foot, not
+      one-sixth could be deemed men-at-arms; but the cavalry were well equipped,
+      and consisted of the lesser Barons and the more opulent citizens. At the
+      head of these rode the Tribune in complete armour, and wearing on his
+      casque a wreath of oak and olive leaves, wrought in silver. Before him
+      waved the great gonfalon of Rome, while in front of this multitudinous
+      array marched a procession of monks, of the order of St. Francis, (for the
+      ecclesiastical body of Rome went chiefly with the popular spirit, and its
+      enthusiastic leader,)&mdash;slowly chanting the following hymn, which was
+      made inexpressibly startling and imposing at the close of each stanza, by
+      the clash of arms, the blast of trumpets, and the deep roll of the drum;
+      which formed, as it were, a martial chorus to the song:&mdash;
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      Roman War-song.
+    </p>
+<pre xml:space="preserve">
+     1.
+
+     March, march for your hearths and your altars!
+     Cursed to all time be the dastard that falters,
+     Never on earth may his sins be forgiven
+     Death on his soul, shut the portals of heaven!
+     A curse on his heart, and a curse on his brain!&mdash;
+     Who strikes not for Rome, shall to Rome be her Cain!
+     Breeze fill our banners, sun gild our spears,
+     Spirito Santo, Cavaliers!
+
+     (Rienzi&rsquo;s word of battle was &ldquo;Spirito Santo Cavaliere&rdquo;, i.e.
+     Cavalier in the singular number.  The plural number has been
+     employed in the text, as somewhat more animated, and
+     therefore better adapted to the kind of poetry into the
+     service of which the watchword has been pressed.)
+
+     Blow, trumpets, blow,
+     Blow, trumpets, blow,
+     Gaily to glory we come;
+     Like a king in his pomp,
+     To the blast of the tromp,
+     And the roar of the mighty drum!
+     Breeze fill our banners, sun gild our spears,
+     Spirito Santo, Cavaliers!
+
+     2.
+
+     March, march for your Freedom and Laws!
+     Earth is your witness&mdash;all Earth&rsquo;s is your cause!
+     Seraph and saint from their glory shall heed ye,
+     The angel that smote the Assyrian shall lead ye;
+     To the Christ of the Cross man is never so holy
+     As in braving the proud in defence of the lowly!
+     Breeze fill our banners, sun gild our spears,
+     Spirito Santo, Cavaliers!
+     Blow, trumpets, blow,
+     Blow, trumpets, blow,
+     Gaily to glory we come;
+     Like a king in his pomp,
+     To the blast of the tromp,
+     And the roar of the mighty drum!
+     Breeze fill our banners, sun gild our spears,
+     Spirito Santo, Cavaliers!
+
+     3.
+
+     March, march! ye are sons of the Roman,
+     The sound of whose step was as fate to the foeman!
+     Whose realm, save the air and the wave, had no wall,
+     As he strode through the world like a lord in his hall;
+     Though your fame hath sunk down to the night of the grave,
+     It shall rise from the field like the sun from the wave.
+     Breeze fill our banners, sun gild our spears,
+     Spirito Santo, Cavaliers!
+     Blow, trumpets, blow,
+     Blow, trumpets, blow,
+     Gaily to glory we come;
+     Like a king in his pomp,
+     To the blast of the tromp,
+     And the roar of the mighty drum!
+     Breeze fill our banners, sun gild our spears,
+     Spirito Santo, Cavaliers!
+</pre>
+    <p>
+      In this order they reached the wide waste that ruin and devastation left
+      within the gates, and, marshalled in long lines on either side, extending
+      far down the vistaed streets, and leaving a broad space in the centre,
+      awaited the order of their leader.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;Throw open the gates, and admit the foe!&rdquo; cried Rienzi, with a loud
+      voice; as the trumpets of the Barons, announced their approach.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      Meanwhile the insurgent Patricians, who had marched that morning from a
+      place called the Monument, four miles distant, came gallantly and boldly
+      on.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      With old Stephen, whose great height, gaunt frame, and lordly air, shewed
+      well in his gorgeous mail, rode his sons,&mdash;the Frangipani and the
+      Savelli, and Giordano Orsini, brother to Rinaldo.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;Today the tyrant shall perish!&rdquo; said the proud Baron; &ldquo;and the flag of
+      the Colonna shall wave from the Capitol.&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;The flag of the Bear,&rdquo; said Giordano Orsini, angrily.&mdash;&ldquo;The victory
+      will not be yours alone, my Lord!&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;Our house ever took precedence in Rome,&rdquo; replied the Colonna, haughtily.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;Never, while one stone of the palaces of the Orsini stands upon another.&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;Hush!&rdquo; said Luca di Savelli; &ldquo;are ye dividing the skin while the lion
+      lives? We shall have fierce work today.&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;Not so,&rdquo; said the old Colonna; &ldquo;John di Vico will turn, with his Romans,
+      at the first onset, and some of the malcontents within have promised to
+      open the gates.&mdash;How, knave?&rdquo; as a scout rode up breathless to the
+      Baron. &ldquo;What tidings?&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;The gates are opened&mdash;not a spear gleams from the walls!&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;Did I not tell ye, Lords?&rdquo; said the Colonna, turning round triumphantly.
+      &ldquo;Methinks we shall win Rome without a single blow.&mdash;Grandson, where
+      now are thy silly forebodings?&rdquo; This was said to Pietro, one of his
+      grandsons&mdash;the first-born of Gianni&mdash;a comely youth, not two
+      weeks wedded, who made no reply. &ldquo;My little Pietro here,&rdquo; continued the
+      Baron, speaking to his comrades, &ldquo;is so new a bridegroom, that last night
+      he dreamed of his bride; and deems it, poor lad, a portent.&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;She was in deep mourning, and glided from my arms, uttering, &lsquo;Woe, woe,
+      to the Colonna!&rdquo; said the young man, solemnly.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;I have lived nearly ninety years,&rdquo; replied the old man, &ldquo;and I may have
+      dreamed, therefore, some forty thousand dreams; of which, two came true,
+      and the rest were false. Judge, then, what chances are in favour of the
+      science!&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      Thus conversing, they approached within bow-shot of the gates, which were
+      still open. All was silent as death. The army, which was composed chiefly
+      of foreign mercenaries, halted in deliberation&mdash;when, lo!&mdash;a
+      torch was suddenly cast on high over the walls; it gleamed a moment&mdash;and
+      then hissed in the miry pool below.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;It is the signal of our friends within, as agreed on,&rdquo; cried old Colonna.
+      &ldquo;Pietro, advance with your company!&rdquo; The young nobleman closed his visor,
+      put himself at the head of the band under his command; and, with his lance
+      in his rest, rode in a half gallop to the gates. The morning had been
+      clouded and overcast, and the sun, appearing only at intervals, now broke
+      out in a bright stream of light&mdash;as it glittered on the waving plume
+      and shining mail of the young horseman, disappearing under the gloomy
+      arch, several paces in advance of his troop. On swept his followers&mdash;forward
+      went the cavalry headed by Gianni Colonna, Pietro&rsquo;s father.&mdash;there
+      was a minute&rsquo;s silence, broken only by the clatter of the arms, and tramp
+      of hoofs,&mdash;when from within the walls rose the abrupt cry&mdash;&ldquo;Rome,
+      the Tribune, and the People! Spirito Santo, Cavaliers!&rdquo; The main body
+      halted aghast. Suddenly Gianni Colonna was seen flying backward from the
+      gate at full speed.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;My son, my son!&rdquo; he cried, &ldquo;they have murdered him;&rdquo;&mdash;he halted
+      abrupt and irresolute, then adding, &ldquo;But I will avenge!&rdquo; wheeled round,
+      and spurred again through the arch,&mdash;when a huge machine of iron,
+      shaped as a portcullis, suddenly descended upon the unhappy father, and
+      crushed man and horse to the ground&mdash;one blent, mangled, bloody mass.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      The old Colonna saw, and scarce believed his eyes; and ere his troop
+      recovered its stupor, the machine rose, and over the corpse dashed the
+      Popular Armament. Thousands upon thousands, they came on; a wild,
+      clamorous, roaring stream. They poured on all sides upon their enemies,
+      who drawn up in steady discipline, and clad in complete mail, received and
+      broke their charge.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;Revenge, and the Colonna!&rdquo;&mdash;&ldquo;The Bear and the Orsini!&rdquo;&mdash;&ldquo;Charity
+      and the Frangipani!&rdquo; (Who had taken their motto from some fabled ancestor
+      who had broke bread with a beggar in a time of famine.) &ldquo;Strike for the
+      Snake (The Lion was, however, the animal usually arrogated by the heraldic
+      vanity of the Savelli.) and the Savelli!&rdquo; were then heard on high, mingled
+      with the German and hoarse shout, &ldquo;Full purses, and the Three Kings of
+      Cologne.&rdquo; The Romans, rather ferocious than disciplined, fell butchered in
+      crowds round the ranks of the mercenaries: but as one fell, another
+      succeeded; and still burst with undiminished fervour the countercry of
+      &ldquo;Rome, the Tribune, and the People!&mdash;Spirito Santo, Cavaliers!&rdquo;
+       Exposed to every shaft and every sword by his emblematic diadem and his
+      imperial robe, the fierce Rienzi led on each assault, wielding an enormous
+      battle-axe, for the use of which the Italians were celebrated, and which
+      he regarded as a national weapon. Inspired by every darker and sterner
+      instinct of his nature, his blood heated, his passions aroused, fighting
+      as a citizen for liberty, as a monarch for his crown, his daring seemed to
+      the astonished foe as that of one frantic; his preservation that of one
+      inspired: now here, now there; wherever flagged his own, or failed the
+      opposing, force, glittered his white robe, and rose his bloody battle-axe;
+      but his fury seemed rather directed against the chiefs than the herd; and
+      still where his charger wheeled was heard his voice, &ldquo;Where is a Colonna?&rdquo;&mdash;&ldquo;Defiance
+      to the Orsini!&rdquo;&mdash;&ldquo;Spirito Santo, Cavaliers!&rdquo; Three times was the
+      sally led from the gate; three times were the Romans beaten back; and on
+      the third, the gonfalon, borne before the Tribune, was cloven to the
+      ground. Then, for the first time, he seemed amazed and alarmed, and,
+      raising his eyes to heaven, he exclaimed, &ldquo;O Lord, hast thou then forsaken
+      me?&rdquo; With that, taking heart, once more he waved his arm, and again led
+      forward his wild array.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      At eve the battle ceased. Of the Barons who had been the main object of
+      the Tribune&rsquo;s assault, the pride and boast was broken. Of the princely
+      line of the Colonna, three lay dead. Giordano Orsini was mortally wounded;
+      the fierce Rinaldo had not shared the conflict. Of the Frangipani, the
+      haughtiest signors were no more; and Luca, the dastard head of the
+      Savelli, had long since saved himself by flight. On the other hand, the
+      slaughter of the citizens had been prodigious;&mdash;the ground was
+      swamped with blood&mdash;and over heaps of slain, (steeds and riders,) the
+      twilight star beheld Rienzi and the Romans returning victors from the
+      pursuit. Shouts of rejoicing followed the Tribune&rsquo;s panting steed through
+      the arch; and just as he entered the space within, crowds of those whose
+      infirmities, sex, or years, had not allowed them to share the conflict,&mdash;women,
+      and children, and drivelling age, mingled with the bare feet and dark
+      robes of monks and friars, apprised of the victory, were prepared to hail
+      his triumph.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      Rienzi reined his steed by the corpse of the boy Colonna, which lay half
+      immersed in a pool of water, and close by it, removed from the arch where
+      he had fallen, lay that of Gianni Colonna,&mdash;(that Gianni Colonna
+      whose spear had dismissed his brother&rsquo;s gentle spirit.) He glanced over
+      the slain, as the melancholy Hesperus played upon the bloody pool and the
+      gory corselet, with a breast heaved with many emotions; and turning, he
+      saw the young Angelo, who, with some of Nina&rsquo;s guard, had repaired to the
+      spot, and had now approached the Tribune.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;Child,&rdquo; said Rienzi, pointing to the dead, &ldquo;blessed art thou who hast no
+      blood of kindred to avenge!&mdash;to him who hath, sooner or later comes
+      the hour; and an awful hour it is!&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      The words sank deep into Angelo&rsquo;s heart, and in after life became words of
+      fate to the speaker and the listener.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      Ere Rienzi had well recovered himself, and as were heard around him the
+      shrieks of the widows and mothers of the slain&mdash;the groans of the
+      dying&mdash;the exhortations of the friars&mdash;mingled with sounds of
+      joy and triumph&mdash;a cry was raised by the women and stragglers on the
+      battle-field without, of &ldquo;The foe!&mdash;the foe!&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;To your swords,&rdquo; cried the Tribune; &ldquo;fall back in order;&mdash;yet they
+      cannot be so bold!&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      The tramp of horses, the blast of a trumpet, were heard; and presently, at
+      full speed, some thirty horsemen dashed through the gate.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;Your bows,&rdquo; exclaimed the Tribune, advancing;&mdash;&ldquo;yet hold&mdash;the
+      leader is unarmed&mdash;it is our own banner. By our Lady, it is our
+      ambassador of Naples, the Lord Adrian di Castello!&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      Panting&mdash;breathless&mdash;covered with dust&mdash;Adrian halted at
+      the pool red with the blood of his kindred&mdash;and their pale faces, set
+      in death, glared upon him.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;Too late&mdash;alas! alas!&mdash;dread fate!&mdash;unhappy Rome!&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;They fell into the pit they themselves had digged,&rdquo; said the Tribune, in
+      a firm but hollow voice.&mdash;&ldquo;Noble Adrian, would thy counsels had
+      prevented this!&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;Away, proud man&mdash;away!&rdquo; said Adrian, impatiently waving his hand,&mdash;&ldquo;thou
+      shouldst protect the lives of Romans, and&mdash;oh, Gianni!&mdash;Pietro!&mdash;could
+      not birth, renown, and thy green years, poor boy&mdash;could not these
+      save ye?&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;Pardon him, my friends,&rdquo; said the Tribune to the crowd,&mdash;&ldquo;his grief
+      is natural, and he knows not all their guilt.&mdash;Back, I pray ye&mdash;leave
+      him to our ministering.&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      It might have fared ill for Adrian, but for the Tribune&rsquo;s brief speech.
+      And as the young Lord, dismounting, now bent over his kinsmen&mdash;the
+      Tribune also surrendering his charger to his squires, approached, and,
+      despite Adrian&rsquo;s reluctance and aversion, drew him aside,&mdash;
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;Young friend,&rdquo; said he, mournfully, &ldquo;my heart bleeds for you; yet bethink
+      thee, the wrath of the crowd is fresh upon them: be prudent.&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;Prudent!&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;Hush&mdash;by my honour, these men were not worthy of your name. Twice
+      perjured&mdash;once assassins&mdash;twice rebels&mdash;listen to me!&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;Tribune, I ask no other construing of what I see&mdash;they might have
+      died justly, or been butchered foully. But there is no peace between the
+      executioner of my race and me.&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;Will you, too, be forsworn? Thine oath!&mdash;Come, come, I hear not
+      these words. Be composed&mdash;retire&mdash;and if, three days hence, you
+      impute any other blame to me than that of unwise lenity, I absolve you
+      from your oath, and you are free to be my foe. The crowd gape and gaze
+      upon us&mdash;a minute more, and I may not avail to save you.&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      The feelings of the young patrician were such as utterly baffle
+      description. He had never been much amongst his house, nor ever received
+      more than common courtesy at their hands. But lineage is lineage still!
+      And there, in the fatal hazard of war, lay the tree and sapling, the prime
+      and hope of his race. He felt there was no answer to the Tribune, the very
+      place of their death proved they had fallen in an assault upon their
+      countrymen. He sympathised not with their cause, but their fate. And rage,
+      revenge alike forbidden&mdash;his heart was the more softened to the shock
+      and paralysis of grief. He did not therefore speak, but continued to gaze
+      upon the dead, while large and unheeded tears flowed down his cheeks, and
+      his attitude of dejection and sorrow was so moving, that the crowd, at
+      first indignant, now felt for his affliction. At length his mind seemed
+      made up. He turned to Rienzi, and said, falteringly, &ldquo;Tribune, I blame you
+      not, nor accuse. If you have been rash in this, God will have blood for
+      blood. I wage no war with you&mdash;you say right, my oath prevents me;
+      and if you govern well, I can still remember that I am Roman. But&mdash;but&mdash;look
+      to that bleeding clay&mdash;we meet no more!&mdash;your sister&mdash;God
+      be with her!&mdash;between her and me flows a dark gulf!&rdquo; The young noble
+      paused some moments, choked by his emotions, and then continued, &ldquo;These
+      papers discharge me of my mission. Standard-bearers, lay down the banner
+      of the Republic. Tribune, speak not&mdash;I would be calm&mdash;calm. And
+      so farewell to Rome.&rdquo; With a hurried glance towards the dead, he sprung
+      upon his steed, and, followed by his train, vanished through the arch.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      The Tribune had not attempted to detain him&mdash;had not interrupted him.
+      He felt that the young noble had thought&mdash;acted as became him best.
+      He followed him with his eyes.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;And thus,&rdquo; said he gloomily, &ldquo;Fate plucks from me my noblest friend and
+      my justest counsellor&mdash;better man Rome never lost!&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      Such is the eternal doom of disordered states. The mediator between rank
+      and rank,&mdash;the kindly noble&mdash;the dispassionate patriot&mdash;the
+      first to act&mdash;the most hailed in action&mdash;darkly vanishes from
+      the scene. Fiercer and more unscrupulous spirits alone stalk the field;
+      and no neutral and harmonizing link remains between hate and hate,&mdash;until
+      exhaustion, sick with horrors, succeeds to frenzy, and despotism is
+      welcomed as repose!
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      <a name="link2HCH0034" id="link2HCH0034">
+      <!--  H2 anchor --> </a>
+    </p>
+    <div style="height: 4em;">
+      <br /><br /><br /><br />
+    </div>
+    <h2>
+      Chapter 5.IV. The Hollowness of the Base.
+    </h2>
+    <p>
+      The rapid and busy march of state events has led us long away from the
+      sister of the Tribune and the betrothed of Adrian. And the sweet thoughts
+      and gentle day-dreams of that fair and enamoured girl, however full to her
+      of an interest beyond all the storms and perils of ambition, are not so
+      readily adapted to narration:&mdash;their soft monotony a few words can
+      paint. They knew but one image, they tended to but one prospect. Shrinking
+      from the glare of her brother&rsquo;s court, and eclipsed, when she forced
+      herself to appear, by the more matured and dazzling beauty, and
+      all-commanding presence, of Nina,&mdash;to her the pomp and crowd seemed
+      an unreal pageant, from which she retired to the truth of life,&mdash;the
+      hopes and musings of her own heart. Poor girl! with all the soft and
+      tender nature of her dead brother, and none of the stern genius and the
+      prodigal ambition,&mdash;the eye-fatiguing ostentation and fervour of the
+      living&mdash;she was but ill-fitted for the unquiet but splendid region to
+      which she was thus suddenly transferred.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      With all her affection for Rienzi, she could not conquer a certain fear
+      which, conjoined with the difference of sex and age, forbade her to be
+      communicative with him upon the subject most upon her heart.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      As the absence of Adrian at the Neapolitan Court passed the anticipated
+      date, (for at no Court then, with a throne fiercely disputed, did the
+      Tribune require a nobler or more intelligent representative,&mdash;and
+      intrigues and counter-intrigues delayed his departure from week to week),
+      she grew uneasy and alarmed. Like many, themselves unseen, inactive, the
+      spectators of the scene, she saw involuntarily further into the time than
+      the deeper intellect either of the Tribune or Nina; and the dangerous
+      discontent of the nobles was visible and audible to her in looks and
+      whispers, which reached not acuter or more suspected ears and eyes.
+      Anxiously, restlessly, did she long for the return of Adrian, not from
+      selfish motives alone, but from well-founded apprehensions for her
+      brother. With Adrian di Castello, alike a noble and a patriot, each party
+      had found a mediator, and his presence grew daily more needed, till at
+      length the conspiracy of the Barons had broken out. From that hour she
+      scarcely dared to hope; her calm sense, unblinded by the high-wrought
+      genius which, as too often happens, made the Tribune see harsh realities
+      through a false and brilliant light, perceived that the Rubicon was
+      passed; and through all the events that followed she could behold but two
+      images&mdash;danger to her brother, separation from her betrothed.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      With Nina alone could her full heart confer; for Nina, with all the
+      differences of character, was a woman who loved. And this united them. In
+      the earlier power of Rienzi, many of their happiest hours had been passed
+      together, remote from the gaudy crowd, alone and unrestrained, in the
+      summer nights, on the moonlit balconies, in that interchange of thought,
+      sympathy, and consolation, which to two impassioned and guileless women
+      makes the most interesting occupation and the most effectual solace. But
+      of late, this intercourse had been much marred. From the morning in which
+      the Barons had received their pardon, to that on which they had marched on
+      Rome, had been one succession of fierce excitements. Every face Irene saw
+      was clouded and overcast&mdash;all gaiety was suspended&mdash;bustling and
+      anxious councillors, or armed soldiers, had for days been the only
+      visitors of the palace. Rienzi had been seen but for short moments: his
+      brow wrapt in care. Nina had been more fond, more caressing than ever, but
+      in those caresses there seemed a mournful and ominous compassion. The
+      attempts at comfort and hope were succeeded by a sickly smile and broken
+      words; and Irene was prepared, by the presentiments of her own heart, for
+      the stroke that fell&mdash;victory was to her brother&mdash;his foe was
+      crushed&mdash;Rome was free&mdash;but the lofty house of the Colonnas had
+      lost its stateliest props, and Adrian was gone for ever!&mdash;She did not
+      blame him; she could not blame her brother; each had acted as became his
+      several station. She was the poor sacrifice of events and fate&mdash;the
+      Iphigenia to the Winds which were to bear the bark of Rome to the haven,
+      or, it might be, to whelm it in the abyss. She was stunned by the blow;
+      she did not even weep or complain; she bowed to the storm that swept over
+      her, and it passed. For two days she neither took food nor rest; she shut
+      herself up; she asked only the boon of solitude: but on the third morning
+      she recovered as by a miracle, for on the third morning, the following
+      letter was left at the palace:&mdash;
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;Irene,&mdash;Ere this you have learned my deep cause of grief; you feel
+      that to a Colonna Rome can no longer be a home, nor Rome&rsquo;s Tribune be a
+      brother. While I write these words honour but feebly supports me: all the
+      hopes I had formed, all the prospects I had pictured, all the love I bore
+      and bear thee, rush upon my heart, and I can only feel that I am wretched.
+      Irene, Irene, your sweet face rises before me, and in those beloved eyes I
+      read that I am forgiven,&mdash;I am understood; and dearly as I know thou
+      lovest me, thou wouldst rather I were lost to thee, rather I were in the
+      grave with my kinsmen, than know I lived the reproach of my order, the
+      recreant of my name. Ah! why was I a Colonna? why did Fortune make me
+      noble, and nature and circumstance attach me to the people? I am barred
+      alike from love and from revenge; all my revenge falls upon thee and me.
+      Adored! we are perhaps separated for ever; but, by all the happiness I
+      have known by thy side&mdash;by all the rapture of which I dreamed&mdash;by
+      that delicious hour which first gave thee to my gaze, when I watched the
+      soft soul returning to thine eyes and lip&mdash;by thy first blushing
+      confession of love&mdash;by our first kiss&mdash;by our last farewell&mdash;I
+      swear to be faithful to thee to the last. None other shall ever chase
+      thine image from my heart. And now, when Hope seems over, Faith becomes
+      doubly sacred; and thou, my beautiful, wilt thou not remember me? wilt
+      thou not feel as if we were the betrothed of Heaven? In the legends of the
+      North we are told of the knight who, returning from the Holy Land, found
+      his mistress (believing his death) the bride of Heaven, and he built a
+      hermitage by the convent where she dwelt; and, though they never saw each
+      other more, their souls were faithful unto death. Even so, Irene, be we to
+      each other&mdash;dead to all else&mdash;betrothed in memory&mdash;to be
+      wedded above! And yet, yet ere I close, one hope dawns upon me. Thy
+      brother&rsquo;s career, bright and lofty, may be but as a falling star; should
+      darkness swallow it, should his power cease, should his throne be broken,
+      and Rome know no more her Tribune; shouldst thou no longer have a brother
+      in the judge and destroyer of my house; shouldst thou be stricken from
+      pomp and state; shouldst thou be friendless, kindredless, alone&mdash;then,
+      without a stain on mine honour, without the shame and odium of receiving
+      power and happiness from hands yet red with the blood of my race, I may
+      claim thee as my own. Honour ceases to command when thou ceasest to be
+      great. I dare not too fondly indulge this dream, perchance it is a sin in
+      both. But it must be whispered, that thou mayest know all thy Adrian, all
+      his weakness and his strength. My own loved, my ever loved, loved more
+      fondly now when loved despairingly, farewell! May angels heal thy sorrow,
+      and guard me from sin, that hereafter at least we may meet again!&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;He loves me&mdash;he loves me still!&rdquo; said the maiden, weeping at last;
+      &ldquo;and I am blest once more!&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      With that letter pressed to her heart she recovered outwardly from the
+      depth of her affliction; she met her brother with a smile, and Nina with
+      embraces; and if still she pined and sorrowed, it was in that
+      &ldquo;concealment&rdquo; which is the &ldquo;worm i&rsquo; the bud.&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      Meanwhile, after the first flush of victory, lamentation succeeded to joy
+      in Rome; so great had been the slaughter that the private grief was large
+      enough to swallow up all public triumph; and many of the mourners blamed
+      even their defender for the swords of the assailant, &ldquo;Roma fu
+      terribilmente vedovata.&rdquo; (&ldquo;Rome was terribly widowed.&rdquo;) The numerous
+      funerals deeply affected the Tribune; and, in proportion to his sympathy
+      with his people, grew his stern indignation against the Barons. Like all
+      men whose religion is intense, passionate, and zealous, the Tribune had
+      little toleration for those crimes which went to the root of religion.
+      Perjury was to him the most base and inexpiable of offences, and the slain
+      Barons had been twice perjured: in the bitterness of his wrath he forbade
+      their families for some days to lament over their remains; and it was only
+      in private and in secret that he permitted them to be interred in their
+      ancestral vaults: an excess of vengeance which sullied his laurels, but
+      which was scarcely inconsistent with the stern patriotism of his
+      character. Impatient to finish what he had begun, anxious to march at once
+      to Marino, where the insurgents collected their shattered force, he
+      summoned his Council, and represented the certainty of victory, and its
+      result in the complete restoration of peace. But pay was due to the
+      soldiery; they already murmured; the treasury was emptied, it was
+      necessary to fill it by raising a new tax.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      Among the councillors were some whose families had suffered grievously in
+      the battle&mdash;they lent a lukewarm attention to propositions of
+      continued strife. Others, among whom was Pandulfo, timid but well-meaning,
+      aware that grief and terror even of their own triumph had produced
+      reaction amongst the people, declared that they would not venture to
+      propose a new tax. A third party, headed by Baroncelli&mdash;a demagogue
+      whose ambition was without principle&mdash;but who, by pandering to the
+      worst passions of the populace, by a sturdy coarseness of nature with
+      which they sympathised&mdash;and by that affectation of advancing what we
+      now term the &ldquo;movement,&rdquo; which often gives to the fiercest fool an
+      advantage over the most prudent statesman, had quietly acquired a great
+      influence with the lower ranks&mdash;offered a more bold opposition. They
+      dared even to blame the proud Tribune for the gorgeous extravagance they
+      had themselves been the first to recommend&mdash;and half insinuated
+      sinister and treacherous motives in his acquittal of the Barons from the
+      accusation of Rodolf. In the very Parliament which the Tribune had revived
+      and remodelled for the support of freedom&mdash;freedom was abandoned. His
+      fiery eloquence met with a gloomy silence, and finally, the votes were
+      against his propositions for the new tax and the march to Marino. Rienzi
+      broke up the Council in haste and disorder. As he left the hall, a letter
+      was put into his hands; he read it, and remained for some moments as one
+      thunderstruck. He then summoned the Captain of his Guards, and ordered a
+      band of fifty horsemen to be prepared for his commands; he repaired to
+      Nina&rsquo;s apartment, he found her alone, and stood for some moments gazing
+      upon her so intently that she was awed and chilled from all attempt at
+      speech. At length he said, abruptly&mdash;
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;We must part.&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;Part!&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;Yes, Nina&mdash;your guard is preparing; you have relations, I have
+      friends, at Florence. Florence must be your home.&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;Cola,&mdash;&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;Look not on me thus.&mdash;in power, in state, in safety&mdash;you were
+      my ornament and counsellor. Now you but embarrass me. And&mdash;&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;Oh, Cola, speak not thus! What hath chanced? Be not so cold&mdash;frown
+      not&mdash;turn not away! Am I not something more to thee, than the partner
+      of joyous hours&mdash;the minion of love? Am I not thy wife, Cola&mdash;not
+      thy leman?&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;Too dear&mdash;too dear to me,&rdquo; muttered the Tribune; &ldquo;with thee by my
+      side I shall be but half a Roman. Nina, the base slaves whom I myself made
+      free desert me.&mdash;Now, in the very hour in which I might sweep away
+      for ever all obstacles to the regeneration of Rome&mdash;now, when one
+      conquest points the path to complete success&mdash;now when the land is
+      visible, my fortune suddenly leaves me in the midst of the seas! There is
+      greater danger now than in the rage of the Barons&mdash;the Barons are
+      fled; it is the People who are becoming traitors to Rome and to me.&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;And wouldst thou have me traitor also! No, Cola; in death itself Nina
+      shall be beside thee. Life and honour are reflected but from thee, and the
+      stroke that slays the substance, shall destroy the humble shadow. I will
+      not part from thee.&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;Nina,&rdquo; said the Tribune, contending with strong and convulsive emotion&mdash;&ldquo;it
+      may be literally of death that you speak.&mdash;Go! leave one who can no
+      longer protect you or Rome!&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;Never&mdash;Never.&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;You are resolved?&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;I am.&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;Be it so,&rdquo; said the Tribune, with deep sadness in his tone. &ldquo;Arm thyself
+      for the worst.&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;There is no worst with thee, Cola!&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;Come to my arms, brave woman; thy words rebuke my weakness. But my
+      sister!&mdash;if I fall, you, Nina, will not survive&mdash;your beauty a
+      prey to the most lustful heart and the strongest hand. We will have the
+      same tomb on the wrecks of Roman liberty. But Irene is of weaker mould;
+      poor child, I have robbed her of a lover, and now&mdash;&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;You are right; let Irene go. And in truth we may well disguise from her
+      the real cause of her departure. Change of scene were best for her grief;
+      and under all circumstances would seem decorum to the curious. I will see
+      and prepare her.&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;Do so, sweetheart. I would gladly be a moment alone with thought. But
+      remember, she must part today&mdash;our sands run low.&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      As the door closed on Nina, the Tribune took out the letter and again read
+      it deliberately. &ldquo;So the Pope&rsquo;s Legate left Sienna:&mdash;prayed that
+      Republic to withdraw its auxiliary troops from Rome&mdash;proclaimed me a
+      rebel and a heretic;&mdash;thence repaired to Marino;&mdash;now in council
+      with the Barons. Why, have my dreams belied me, then&mdash;false as the
+      waking things that flatter and betray by day? In such peril will the
+      people forsake me and themselves? Army of saints and martyrs, shades of
+      heroes and patriots, have ye abandoned for ever your ancient home? No, no,
+      I was not raised to perish thus; I will defeat them yet&mdash;and leave my
+      name a legacy to Rome; a warning to the oppressor&mdash;an example to the
+      free!&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      <a name="link2HCH0035" id="link2HCH0035">
+      <!--  H2 anchor --> </a>
+    </p>
+    <div style="height: 4em;">
+      <br /><br /><br /><br />
+    </div>
+    <h2>
+      Chapter 5.V. The Rottenness of the Edifice.
+    </h2>
+    <p>
+      The kindly skill of Nina induced Irene to believe that it was but the
+      tender consideration of her brother to change a scene embittered by her
+      own thoughts, and in which the notoriety of her engagement with Adrian
+      exposed her to all that could mortify and embarrass, that led to the
+      proposition of her visit to Florence. Its suddenness was ascribed to the
+      occasion of an unexpected mission to Florence, (for a loan of arms and
+      money,) which thus gave her a safe and honoured escort.&mdash;Passively
+      she submitted to what she herself deemed a relief; and it was agreed that
+      she should for a while be the guest of a relation of Nina&rsquo;s, who was the
+      abbess of one of the wealthiest of the Florentine convents: the idea of
+      monastic seclusion was welcome to the bruised heart and wearied spirit.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      But though not apprised of the immediate peril of Rienzi, it was with deep
+      sadness and gloomy forebodings that she returned his embrace and parting
+      blessing; and when at length alone in her litter, and beyond the gates of
+      Rome, she repented a departure to which the chance of danger gave the
+      appearance of desertion.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      Meanwhile, as the declining day closed around the litter and its troop,
+      more turbulent actors in the drama demand our audience. The traders and
+      artisans of Rome at that time, and especially during the popular
+      government of Rienzi, held weekly meetings in each of the thirteen
+      quarters of the city. And in the most democratic of these, Cecco del
+      Vecchio was an oracle and leader. It was at that assembly, over which the
+      smith presided, that the murmurs that preceded the earthquake were heard.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;So,&rdquo; cried one of the company&mdash;Luigi, the goodly butcher,&mdash;&ldquo;they
+      say he wanted to put a new tax on us; and that is the reason he broke up
+      the Council today, because, good men, they were honest, and had bowels for
+      the people: it is a shame and a sin that the treasury should be empty.&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;I told him,&rdquo; said the smith, &ldquo;to beware how he taxed the people. Poor men
+      won&rsquo;t be taxed. But as he does not follow my advice, he must take the
+      consequence&mdash;the horse runs from one hand, the halter remains in the
+      other.&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;Take your advice, Cecco! I warrant me his stomach is too high for that
+      now. Why he is grown as proud as a pope.&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;For all that, he is a great man,&rdquo; said one of the party. &ldquo;He gave us laws&mdash;he
+      rid the Campagna of robbers&mdash;filled the streets with merchants, and
+      the shops with wares&mdash;defeated the boldest lords and fiercest
+      soldiery of Italy&mdash;&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;And now wants to tax the people!&mdash;that&rsquo;s all the thanks we get for
+      helping him,&rdquo; said the grumbling Cecco. &ldquo;What would he have been without
+      us?&mdash;we that make, can unmake.&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;But,&rdquo; continued the advocate, seeing that he had his supporters&mdash;&ldquo;but
+      then he taxes us for our own liberties.&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;Who strikes at them now?&rdquo; asked the butcher.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;Why the Barons are daily mustering new strength at Marino.&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;Marino is not Rome,&rdquo; said Luigi, the butcher. &ldquo;Let&rsquo;s wait till they come
+      to our gates again&mdash;we know how to receive them. Though, for the
+      matter of that, I think we have had enough fighting&mdash;my two poor
+      brothers had each a stab too much for them. Why won&rsquo;t the Tribune, if he
+      be a great man, let us have peace? All we want now is quiet.&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;Ah!&rdquo; said a seller of horse-harness. &ldquo;Let him make it up with the Barons.
+      They were good customers after all.&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;For my part,&rdquo; said a merry-looking fellow, who had been a gravedigger in
+      bad times, and had now opened a stall of wares for the living, &ldquo;I could
+      forgive him all, but bathing in the holy vase of porphyry.&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;Ah, that was a bad job,&rdquo; said several, shaking their heads.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;And the knighthood was but a silly show, an&rsquo; it were not for the wine
+      from the horse&rsquo;s nostrils&mdash;that had some sense in it.&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;My masters,&rdquo; said Cecco, &ldquo;the folly was in not beheading the Barons when
+      he had them all in the net; and so Messere Baroncelli says. (Ah,
+      Baroncelli is an honest man, and follows no half measures!) It was a sort
+      of treason to the people not to do so. Why, but for that, we should never
+      have lost so many tall fellows by the gate of San Lorenzo.&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;True, true, it was a shame; some say the Barons bought him.&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;And then,&rdquo; said another, &ldquo;those poor Lords Colonna&mdash;boy and man&mdash;they
+      were the best of the family, save the Castello. I vow I pitied them.&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;But to the point,&rdquo; said one of the crowd, the richest of the set; &ldquo;the
+      tax is the thing.&mdash;The ingratitude to tax us.&mdash;Let him dare to
+      do it!&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;Oh, he will not dare, for I hear that the Pope&rsquo;s bristles are up at last;
+      so he will only have us to depend upon!&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      The door was thrown open&mdash;a man rushed in open-mouthed&mdash;
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;Masters, masters, the Pope&rsquo;s legate has arrived at Rome, and sent for the
+      Tribune, who has just left his presence.&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      Ere his auditors had recovered their surprise, the sound of trumpets made
+      them rush forth; they saw Rienzi sweep by with his usual cavalcade, and in
+      his proud array. The twilight was advancing, and torch-bearers preceded
+      his way. Upon his countenance was deep calm but it was not the calm of
+      contentment. He passed on, and the street was again desolate. Meanwhile
+      Rienzi reached the Capitol in silence, and mounted to the apartments of
+      the palace, where Nina, pale and breathless, awaited his return.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;Well, well, thou smilest! No&mdash;it is that dread smile, worse than
+      frowns. Speak, beloved, speak! What said the Cardinal?&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;Little thou wilt love to hear. He spoke at first high and solemnly, about
+      the crime of declaring the Romans free; next about the treason of
+      asserting that the election of the King of Rome was in the hands of the
+      Romans.&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;Well&mdash;thy answer.&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;That which became Rome&rsquo;s Tribune: I re-asserted each right, and proved
+      it. The Cardinal passed to other charges.&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;What?&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;The blood of the Barons by San Lorenzo&mdash;blood only shed in our own
+      defence against perjured assailants; this is in reality the main crime.
+      The Colonna have the Pope&rsquo;s ear. Furthermore, the sacrilege&mdash;yes, the
+      sacrilege (come laugh, Nina, laugh!) of bathing in a vase of porphyry used
+      by Constantine while yet a heathen.&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;Can it be! What saidst thou?&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;I laughed. &lsquo;Cardinal,&rsquo; quoth I, &lsquo;what was not too good for a heathen is
+      not too good for a Christian Catholic!&rsquo; And verily the sour Frenchman
+      looked as if I had smote him on the hip. When he had done, I asked him, in
+      my turn, &lsquo;Is it alleged against me that I have wronged one man in my
+      judgment-court?&rsquo;&mdash;Silence. &lsquo;Is it said that I have broken one law of
+      the state?&rsquo;&mdash;Silence. &lsquo;Is it even whispered that trade does not
+      flourish&mdash;that life is not safe&mdash;that abroad or at home the
+      Roman name is not honoured, to that point which no former rule can
+      parallel?&rsquo;&mdash;Silence. &lsquo;Then,&rsquo; said I, &lsquo;Lord Cardinal, I demand thy
+      thanks, not thy censure.&rsquo; The Frenchman looked, and looked, and trembled,
+      and shrunk, and then out he spake. &lsquo;I have but one mission to fulfil, on
+      the part of the Pontiff&mdash;resign at once thy Tribuneship, or the
+      Church inflicts upon thee its solemn curse.&rsquo;&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;How&mdash;how?&rdquo; said Nina, turning very pale; &ldquo;what is it that awaits
+      thee?&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;Excommunication!&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      This awful sentence, by which the spiritual arm had so often stricken down
+      the fiercest foe, came to Nina&rsquo;s ear as a knell. She covered her face with
+      her hands. Rienzi paced the room with rapid strides. &ldquo;The curse!&rdquo; he
+      muttered; &ldquo;the Church&rsquo;s curse&mdash;for me&mdash;for ME!&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;Oh, Cola! didst thou not seek to pacify this stern&mdash;&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;Pacify! Death and dishonour! Pacify! &lsquo;Cardinal,&rsquo; I said, and I felt his
+      soul shrivel at my gaze, &lsquo;my power I received from the people&mdash;to the
+      people alone I render it. For my soul, man&rsquo;s word cannot scathe it. Thou,
+      haughty priest, thou thyself art the accursed, if, puppet and tool of low
+      cabals and exiled tyrants, thou breathest but a breath in the name of the
+      Lord of Justice, for the cause of the oppressor, and against the rights of
+      the oppressed.&rsquo; With that I left him, and now&mdash;&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;Ay, now&mdash;now what will happen? Excommunication! In the metropolis of
+      the Church, too&mdash;the superstition of the people! Oh, Cola!&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;If,&rdquo; muttered Rienzi, &ldquo;my conscience condemned me of one crime&mdash;if I
+      had stained my hands in one just man&rsquo;s blood&mdash;if I had broken one law
+      I myself had framed&mdash;if I had taken bribes, or wronged the poor, or
+      scorned the orphan, or shut my heart to the widow&mdash;then, then&mdash;but
+      no! Lord, thou wilt not desert me!&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;But man may!&rdquo; thought Nina mournfully, as she perceived that one of
+      Rienzi&rsquo;s dark fits of fanatical and mystical revery was growing over him&mdash;fits
+      which he suffered no living eye, not even Nina&rsquo;s, to witness when they
+      gathered to their height. And now, indeed, after a short interval of
+      muttered soliloquy, in which his face worked so that the veins on his
+      temples swelled like cords, he abruptly left the room, and sought the
+      private oratory connected with his closet. Over the emotions there
+      indulged let us draw the veil. Who shall describe those awful and
+      mysterious moments, when man, with all his fiery passions, turbulent
+      thoughts, wild hopes, and despondent fears, demands the solitary audience
+      of his Maker?
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      It was long after this conference with Nina, and the midnight bell had
+      long tolled, when Rienzi stood alone, upon one of the balconies of the
+      palace, to cool, in the starry air, the fever that yet lingered on his
+      exhausted frame. The night was exceedingly calm, the air clear, but chill,
+      for it was now December. He gazed intently upon those solemn orbs to which
+      our wild credulity has referred the prophecies of our doom.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;Vain science!&rdquo; thought the Tribune, &ldquo;and gloomy fantasy, that man&rsquo;s fate
+      is pre-ordained&mdash;irrevocable&mdash;unchangeable, from the moment of
+      his birth! Yet, were the dream not baseless, fain would I know which of
+      yon stately lights is my natal star,&mdash;which images&mdash;which
+      reflects&mdash;my career in life, and the memory I shall leave in death.&rdquo;
+       As this thought crossed him, and his gaze was still fixed above, he saw,
+      as if made suddenly more distinct than the stars around it, that rapid and
+      fiery comet which in the winter of 1347 dismayed the superstitions of
+      those who recognised in the stranger of the heavens the omen of disaster
+      and of woe. He recoiled as it met his eye, and muttered to himself, &ldquo;Is
+      such indeed my type! or, if the legendary lore speak true, and these
+      strange fires portend nations ruined and rulers overthrown, does it
+      foretell my fate? I will think no more.&rdquo; (Alas! if by the Romans
+      associated with the fall of Rienzi, that comet was by the rest of Europe
+      connected with the more dire calamity of the Great Plague that so soon
+      afterwards ensued.) As his eyes fell, they rested upon the colossal Lion
+      of Basalt in the place below, the starlight investing its grey and
+      towering form with a more ghostly whiteness; and then it was, that he
+      perceived two figures in black robes lingering by the pedestal which
+      supported the statue, and apparently engaged in some occupation which he
+      could not guess. A fear shot through his veins, for he had never been able
+      to divest himself of the vague idea that there was some solemn and
+      appointed connexion between his fate and that old Lion of Basalt. Somewhat
+      relieved, he heard his sentry challenge the intruders; and as they came
+      forward to the light, he perceived that they wore the garments of monks.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;Molest us not, son,&rdquo; said one of them to the sentry. &ldquo;By order of the
+      Legate of the Holy Father we affix to this public monument of justice and
+      of wrath, the bull of excommunication against a heretic and rebel. WOE TO
+      THE ACCURSED OF THE CHURCH!&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      <a name="link2HCH0036" id="link2HCH0036">
+      <!--  H2 anchor --> </a>
+    </p>
+    <div style="height: 4em;">
+      <br /><br /><br /><br />
+    </div>
+    <h2>
+      Chapter 5.VI. The Fall of the Temple.
+    </h2>
+    <p>
+      It was as a thunderbolt in a serene day&mdash;the reverse of the Tribune
+      in the zenith of his power, in the abasement of his foe; when, with but a
+      handful of brave Romans, determined to be free, he might have crushed for
+      ever the antagonist power to the Roman liberties&mdash;have secured the
+      rights of his country, and filled up the measure of his own renown. Such a
+      reverse was the very mockery of Fate, who bore him through disaster, to
+      abandon him in the sunniest noon of his prosperity.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      The next morning not a soul was to be seen in the streets; the shops were
+      shut&mdash;the churches closed; the city was as under an interdict. The
+      awful curse of the papal excommunication upon the chief magistrate of the
+      Pontifical City, seemed to freeze up all the arteries of life. The Legate
+      himself, affecting fear of his life, had fled to Monte Fiascone, where he
+      was joined by the Barons immediately after the publication of the edict.
+      The curse worked best in the absence of the execrator.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      Towards evening a few persons might be seen traversing the broad space of
+      the Capitol, crossing themselves, as the bull, placarded on the Lion, met
+      their eyes, and disappearing within the doors of the great palace. By and
+      by, a few anxious groups collected in the streets, but they soon
+      dispersed. It was a paralysis of all intercourse and commune. That
+      spiritual and unarmed authority, which, like the invisible hand of God,
+      desolated the market-place, and humbled the crowned head, no physical
+      force could rally against or resist. Yet, through the universal awe, one
+      conviction touched the multitude&mdash;it was for them that their Tribune
+      was thus blasted in the midst of his glories! The words of the Brand
+      recorded against him on wall and column detailed his offences:&mdash;rebellion
+      in asserting the liberties of Rome&mdash;heresy in purifying
+      ecclesiastical abuses;&mdash;and, to serve for a miserable covert to the
+      rest, it was sacrilege for bathing in the porphyry vase of Constantine!
+      They felt the conviction; they sighed&mdash;they shuddered&mdash;and, in
+      his vast palace, save a few attached and devoted hearts, the Tribune was
+      alone!
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      The staunchest of his Tuscan soldiery were gone with Irene. The rest of
+      his force, save a few remaining guards, was the paid Roman militia,
+      composed of citizens; who, long discontented by the delay of their
+      stipends, now seized on the excuse of the excommunication to remain
+      passive, but grumbling, in their homes.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      On the third day, a new incident broke upon the death-like lethargy of the
+      city; a hundred and fifty mercenaries, with Pepin of Minorbino, a
+      Neapolitan, half noble, half bandit, (a creature of Montreal&rsquo;s) at their
+      head, entered the city, seized upon the fortresses of the Colonna, and
+      sent a herald through the city, proclaiming in the name of the Cardinal
+      Legate, the reward of ten thousand florins for the head of Cola di Rienzi.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      Then, swelled on high, shrill but not inspiring as of old, the great bell
+      of the Capitol&mdash;the people, listless, disheartened, awed by the
+      spiritual fear of the papal authority, (yet greater, in such events, since
+      the removal of the see,) came unarmed to the Capitol; and there, by the
+      Place of the Lion, stood the Tribune. His squires, below the step, held
+      his war-horse, his helm, and the same battle-axe which had blazed in the
+      van of victorious war.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      Beside him were a few of his guard, his attendants, and two or three of
+      the principal citizens.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      He stood bareheaded and erect, gazing upon the abashed and unarmed crowd
+      with a look of bitter scorn, mingled with deep compassion; and, as the
+      bell ceased its toll, and the throng remained hushed and listening, he
+      thus spoke:&mdash;
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;Ye come, then, once again! Come ye as slaves or freemen? A handful of
+      armed men are in your walls: will ye who chased from your gates the
+      haughtiest knights&mdash;the most practised battle-men of Rome, succumb
+      now to one hundred and fifty hirelings and strangers? Will ye arm for your
+      Tribune? You are silent!&mdash;be it so. Will you arm for your own
+      liberties&mdash;your own Rome? Silent still! By the saints that reign on
+      the thrones of the heathen gods! are ye thus fallen from your birthright?
+      Have you no arms for your own defence? Romans, hear me! Have I wronged
+      you?&mdash;if so, by your hands let me die: and then, with knives yet
+      reeking with my blood, go forward against the robber who is but the herald
+      of your slavery; and I die honoured, grateful, and avenged. You weep!
+      Great God! you weep! Ay, and I could weep, too&mdash;that I should live to
+      speak of liberty in vain to Romans&mdash;Weep! is this an hour for tears?
+      Weep now, and your tears shall ripen harvests of crime, and licence, and
+      despotism, to come! Romans, arm! follow me at once to the Place of the
+      Colonna: expel this ruffian&mdash;expel your enemy (no matter what
+      afterwards you do to me):&rdquo; he paused; no ardour was kindled by his words&mdash;&ldquo;or,&rdquo;
+       he continued, &ldquo;I abandon you to your fate.&rdquo; There was a long, low, general
+      murmur; at length it became shaped into speech, and many voices cried
+      simultaneously: &ldquo;The Pope&rsquo;s bull!&mdash;Thou art a man accursed!&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;What!&rdquo; cried the Tribune; &ldquo;and is it ye who forsake me, ye for whose
+      cause alone man dares to hurl against me the thunders of his God? Is it
+      not for you that I am declared heretic and rebel! What are my imputed
+      crimes? That I have made Rome and asserted Italy to be free; that I have
+      subdued the proud Magnates, who were the scourge both of Pope and People.
+      And you&mdash;you upbraid me with what I have dared and done for you! Men,
+      with you I would have fought, for you I would have perished. You forsake
+      yourselves in forsaking me, and since I no longer rule over brave men, I
+      resign my power to the tyrant you prefer. Seven months I have ruled over
+      you, prosperous in commerce, stainless in justice&mdash;victorious in the
+      field:&mdash;I have shown you what Rome could be; and, since I abdicate
+      the government ye gave me, when I am gone, strike for your own freedom! It
+      matters nothing who is the chief of a brave and great people. Prove that
+      Rome hath many a Rienzi, but of brighter fortunes.&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;I would he had not sought to tax us,&rdquo; said Cecco del Vecchio, who was the
+      very personification of the vulgar feeling: &ldquo;and that he had beheaded the
+      Barons!&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;Ay!&rdquo; cried the ex-gravedigger; &ldquo;but that blessed porphyry vase!&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;And why should we get our throats cut,&rdquo; said Luigi, the butcher, &ldquo;like my
+      two brothers?&mdash;Heaven rest them!&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      On the face of the general multitude there was a common expression of
+      irresolution and shame, many wept and groaned, none (save the aforesaid
+      grumblers) accused; none upbraided, but none seemed disposed to arm. It
+      was one of those listless panics, those strange fits of indifference and
+      lethargy which often seize upon a people who make liberty a matter of
+      impulse and caprice, to whom it has become a catchword, who have not long
+      enjoyed all its rational, and sound, and practical, and blessed results;
+      who have been affrayed by the storms that herald its dawn;&mdash;a people
+      such as is common to the south: such as even the north has known; such as,
+      had Cromwell lived a year longer, even England might have seen; and,
+      indeed, in some measure, such a reaction from popular enthusiasm to
+      popular indifference England did see, when her children madly surrendered
+      the fruits of a bloody war, without reserve, without foresight, to the
+      lewd pensioner of Louis, and the royal murderer of Sydney. To such
+      prostration of soul, such blindness of intellect, even the noblest people
+      will be subjected, when liberty, which should be the growth of ages,
+      spreading its roots through the strata of a thousand customs, is raised,
+      the exotic of an hour, and (like the Tree and Dryad of ancient fable)
+      flourishes and withers with the single spirit that protects it.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;Oh, Heaven, that I were a man!&rdquo; exclaimed Angelo, who stood behind
+      Rienzi.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;Hear him, hear the boy,&rdquo; cried the Tribune; &ldquo;out of the mouths of babes
+      speaketh wisdom! He wishes that he were a man, as ye are men, that he
+      might do as ye should do. Mark me,&mdash;I ride with these faithful few
+      through the quarter of the Colonna, before the fortress of your foe. Three
+      times before that fortress shall my trumpets sound; if at the third blast
+      ye come not, armed as befits ye&mdash;I say not all, but three, but two,
+      but one hundred of ye&mdash;I break up my wand of office, and the world
+      shall say one hundred and fifty robbers quelled the soul of Rome, and
+      crushed her magistrate and her laws!&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      With those words he descended the stairs, and mounted his charger; the
+      populace gave way in silence, and their Tribune and his slender train
+      passed slowly on, and gradually vanished from the view of the increasing
+      crowd.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      The Romans remained on the place, and after a pause, the demagogue
+      Baroncelli, who saw an opening to his ambition, addressed them. Though not
+      an eloquent nor gifted man, he had the art of uttering the most popular
+      commonplaces. And he knew the weak side of his audience, in their vanity,
+      indolence, and arrogant pride.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;Look you, my masters,&rdquo; said he, leaping up to the Place of the Lion; &ldquo;the
+      Tribune talks bravely&mdash;he always did&mdash;but the monkey used the
+      cat for his chestnuts; he wants to thrust your paws into the fire; you
+      will not be so silly as to let him. The saints bless us! but the Tribune,
+      good man, gets a palace and has banquets, and bathes in a porphyry vase;
+      the more shame on him!&mdash;in which San Sylvester christened the Emperor
+      Constantine: all this is worth fighting for; but you, my masters, what do
+      you get except hard blows, and a stare at a holyday spectacle? Why, if you
+      beat these fellows, you will have another tax on the wine: that will be
+      your reward!&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;Hark!&rdquo; cried Cecco, &ldquo;there sounds the trumpet,&mdash;a pity he wanted to
+      tax us!&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;True,&rdquo; cried Baroncelli, &ldquo;there sounds the trumpet; a silver trumpet, by
+      the Lord! Next week, if you help him out of the scrape, he&rsquo;ll have a
+      golden one. But go&mdash;why don&rsquo;t you move, my friends?&mdash;&lsquo;tis but
+      one hundred and fifty mercenaries. True, they are devils to fight, clad in
+      armour from top to toe; but what then?&mdash;if they do cut some four or
+      five hundred throats you&rsquo;ll beat them at last, and the Tribune will sup
+      the merrier.&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;There sounds the second blast,&rdquo; said the butcher. &ldquo;If my old mother had
+      not lost two of us already, &lsquo;tis odds, but I&rsquo;d strike a blow for the bold
+      Tribune.&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;You had better put more quicksilver in you,&rdquo; continued Baroncelli, &ldquo;or
+      you will be too late. And what a pity that will be!&mdash;If you believe
+      the Tribune, he is the only man that can save Rome. What, you, the finest
+      people in the world&mdash;you, not able to save yourselves!&mdash;you,
+      bound up with one man&mdash;you, not able to dictate to the Colonna and
+      Orsini! Why, who beat the Barons at San Lorenzo? Was it not you? Ah! you
+      got the buffets, and the Tribune the moneta! Tush, my friends, let the man
+      go; I warrant there are plenty as good as he to be bought a cheaper
+      bargain. And, hark! there is the third blast; it is too late now!&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      As the trumpet from the distance sent forth its long and melancholy note,
+      it was as the last warning of the parting genius of the place; and when
+      silence swallowed up the sound, a gloom fell over the whole assembly. They
+      began to regret, to repent, when regret and repentance availed no more.
+      The buffoonery of Baroncelli became suddenly displeasing; and the orator
+      had the mortification of seeing his audience disperse in all directions,
+      just as he was about to inform them what great things he himself could do
+      in their behalf.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      Meanwhile the Tribune, passing unscathed through the dangerous quarter of
+      the enemy, who, dismayed at his approach, shrunk within their fortress,
+      proceeded to the Castle of St. Angelo, whither Nina had already preceded
+      him; and which he entered to find that proud lady with a smile for his
+      safety,&mdash;without a tear for his reverse.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      <a name="link2HCH0037" id="link2HCH0037">
+      <!--  H2 anchor --> </a>
+    </p>
+    <div style="height: 4em;">
+      <br /><br /><br /><br />
+    </div>
+    <h2>
+      Chapter 5.VII. The Successors of an Unsuccessful Revolution&mdash;Who is
+      to
+    </h2>
+    <p>
+      Blame&mdash;the Forsaken one or the Forsakers?
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      Cheerfully broke the winter sun over the streets of Rome, as the army of
+      the Barons swept along them. The Cardinal Legate at the head; the old
+      Colonna (no longer haughty and erect, but bowed, and broken-hearted at the
+      loss of his sons) at his right hand;&mdash;the sleek smile of Luca Savelli&mdash;the
+      black frown of Rinaldo Orsini, were seen close behind. A long but
+      barbarous array it was; made up chiefly of foreign hirelings; nor did the
+      procession resemble the return of exiled citizens, but the march of
+      invading foes.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;My Lord Colonna,&rdquo; said the Cardinal Legate, a small withered man, by
+      birth a Frenchman, and full of the bitterest prejudices against the
+      Romans, who had in a former mission very ill received him, as was their
+      wont with foreign ecclesiastics; &ldquo;this Pepin, whom Montreal has deputed at
+      your orders, hath done us indeed good service.&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      The old Lord bowed, but made no answer. His strong intellect was already
+      broken, and there was dotage in his glassy eye. The Cardinal muttered, &ldquo;He
+      hears me not; sorrow hath brought him to second childhood!&rdquo; and looking
+      back, motioned to Luca Savelli to approach.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;Luca,&rdquo; said the Legate, &ldquo;it was fortunate that the Hungarian&rsquo;s black
+      banner detained the Provencal at Aversa. Had he entered Rome, we might
+      have found Rienzi&rsquo;s successor worse than the Tribune himself. Montreal,&rdquo;
+       he added, with a slight emphasis and a curled lip, &ldquo;is a gentleman, and a
+      Frenchman. This Pepin, who is his delegate, we must bribe, or menace to
+      our will.&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;Assuredly,&rdquo; answered Savelli, &ldquo;it is not a difficult task: for Montreal
+      calculated on a more stubborn contest, which he himself would have found
+      leisure to close&mdash;&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;As Podesta, or Prince of Rome! the modest man! We Frenchmen have a due
+      sense of our own merits; but this sudden victory surprises him as it doth
+      us, Luca; and we shall wrest the prey from Pepin, ere Montreal can come to
+      his help! But Rienzi must die. He is still, I hear, shut up in St. Angelo.
+      The Orsini shall storm him there ere the day be much older. Today we
+      possess the Capitol&mdash;annul all the rebel&rsquo;s laws&mdash;break up his
+      ridiculous parliament, and put all the government of the city under three
+      senators&mdash;Rinaldo Orsini, Colonna, and myself; you, my Lord, I trust,
+      we shall fitly provide for.&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;Oh! I am rewarded enough by returning to my palace; and a descent on the
+      Jewellers&rsquo; quarter will soon build up its fortifications. Luca Savelli is
+      not an ambitious man. He wants but to live in peace.&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      The Cardinal smiled sourly, and took the turn towards the Capitol.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      In the front space the usual gapers were assembled. &ldquo;Make way! make way!
+      knaves!&rdquo; cried the guards, trampling on either side the crowd, who,
+      accustomed to the sedate and courteous order of Rienzi&rsquo;s guard, fell back
+      too slowly for many of them to escape severe injury from the pikes of the
+      soldiers and the hoofs of the horses. Our friend, Luigi, the butcher, was
+      one of these, and the surliness of the Roman blood was past boiling heat
+      when he received in his ample stomach the blunt end of a German&rsquo;s pike.
+      &ldquo;There, Roman,&rdquo; said the rude mercenary, in his barbarous attempt at
+      Italian, &ldquo;make way for your betters; you have had enough crowds and shows
+      of late, in all conscience.&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;Betters!&rdquo; gulped out the poor butcher; &ldquo;a Roman has no betters; and if I
+      had not lost two brothers by San Lorenzo, I would&mdash;&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;The dog is mutinous,&rdquo; said one of the followers of the Orsini, succeeding
+      the German who had passed on, &ldquo;and talks of San Lorenzo!&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;Oh!&rdquo; said another Orsinist, who rode abreast, &ldquo;I remember him of old. He
+      was one of Rienzi&rsquo;s gang.&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;Was he?&rdquo; said the other, sternly; &ldquo;then we cannot begin salutary examples
+      too soon;&rdquo; and, offended at something swaggering and insolent in the
+      butcher&rsquo;s look, the Orsinist coolly thrust him through the heart with his
+      pike, and rode on over his body.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;Shame! Shame!&rdquo; &ldquo;Murder! Murder!&rdquo; cried the crowd: and they began to
+      press, in the passion of the moment, round the fierce guards.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      The Legate heard the cry, and saw the rush: he turned pale. &ldquo;The rascals
+      rebel again!&rdquo; he faltered.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;No, your Eminence&mdash;no,&rdquo; said Luca; &ldquo;but it may be as well to infuse
+      a wholesome terror; they are all unarmed; let me bid the guards disperse
+      them. A word will do it.&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      The Cardinal assented; the word was given; and, in a few minutes, the
+      soldiery, who still smarted under the vindictive memory of defeat from an
+      undisciplined multitude, scattered the crowd down the streets without
+      scruple or mercy&mdash;riding over some, spearing others&mdash;filling the
+      air with shrieks and yells, and strewing the ground with almost as many
+      men as a few days before would have sufficed to have guarded Rome, and
+      preserved the constitution! Through this wild, tumultuous scene, and over
+      the bodies of its victims, rode the Legate and his train, to receive in
+      the Hall of the Capitol the allegiance of the citizens, and to proclaim
+      the return of the oppressors.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      As they dismounted at the stairs, a placard in large letters struck the
+      eye of the Legate. It was placed upon the pedestal of the Lion of Basalt,
+      covering the very place that had been occupied by the bull of
+      excommunication. The words were few, and ran thus:
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;TREMBLE! RIENZI SHALL RETURN!&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;How! what means this mummery!&rdquo; cried the Legate, trembling already, and
+      looking round to the nobles.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;Please your Eminence,&rdquo; said one of the councillors, who had come from the
+      Capitol to meet the Legate, &ldquo;we saw it at daybreak, the ink yet moist, as
+      we entered the Hall. We deemed it best to leave it for your Eminence to
+      deal with.&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;You deemed! Who are you, then?&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;One of the members of the Council, your Eminence, and a stanch opponent
+      of the Tribune, as is well known, when he wanted the new tax&mdash;&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;Council&mdash;trash! No more councils now! Order is restored at last. The
+      Orsini and the Colonna will look to you in future. Resist a tax, did you?
+      Well, that was right when proposed by a tyrant; but I warn you, friend, to
+      take care how you resist the tax we shall impose. Happy if your city can
+      buy its peace with the Church on any terms:&mdash;and his Holiness is
+      short of the florins.&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      The discomfited councillor shrank back.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;Tear off yon insolent placard. Nay, hold! fix over it our proclamation of
+      ten thousand florins for the heretic&rsquo;s head! Ten thousand? methinks that
+      is too much now&mdash;we will alter the cipher. Meanwhile Rinaldo Orsini,
+      Lord Senator, march thy soldiers to St. Angelo; let us see if the heretic
+      can stand a siege.&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;It needs not, your Eminence,&rdquo; said the councillor, again officiously
+      bustling up; &ldquo;St. Angelo is surrendered. The Tribune, his wife, and one
+      page, escaped last night, it is said, in disguise.&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;Ha!&rdquo; said the old Colonna, whose dulled sense had at length arrived at
+      the conclusion that something extraordinary arrested the progress of his
+      friends. &ldquo;What is the matter? What is that placard? Will no one tell me
+      the words? My old eyes are dim.&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      As he uttered the questions, in the shrill and piercing treble of age, a
+      voice replied in a loud and deep tone&mdash;none knew whence it came; the
+      crowd was reduced to a few stragglers, chiefly friars in cowl and serge,
+      whose curiosity nought could daunt, and whose garb ensured them safety&mdash;the
+      soldiers closed the rear: a voice, I say, came, startling the colour from
+      many a cheek&mdash;in answer to the Colonna, saying:
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;TREMBLE! RIENZI SHALL RETURN!&rdquo; <a name="link2H_4_0046" id="link2H_4_0046">
+      <!--  H2 anchor --> </a>
+    </p>
+    <div style="height: 4em;">
+      <br /><br /><br /><br />
+    </div>
+    <h2>
+      BOOK VI. THE PLAGUE.
+    </h2>
+<pre xml:space="preserve">
+     &ldquo;Erano gli anni della fruttifera Incarnazione del Figliuolo
+     di Dio al numero pervenuti di mille trecento quarant&rsquo;otto,
+     quando nell&rsquo; egregia citta di Fiorenza oltre ad ogni altra
+     Italica bellissima, pervenna la mortifera pestilenza.&rdquo;&mdash;
+     Boccaccio, &ldquo;Introduzione al Decamerone&rdquo;.
+
+     &ldquo;The years of the fructiferous incarnation of the Son of God
+     had reached the number of one thousand three hundred and
+     forty-eight, when into the illustrious city of Florence,
+     beautiful beyond every other in Italy, entered the death-
+     fraught pestilence.&rdquo;&mdash;&ldquo;Introduction to the Decameron&rdquo;.
+</pre>
+    <p>
+      <a name="link2HCH0038" id="link2HCH0038">
+      <!--  H2 anchor --> </a>
+    </p>
+    <div style="height: 4em;">
+      <br /><br /><br /><br />
+    </div>
+    <h2>
+      Chapter 6.1. The Retreat of the Lover.
+    </h2>
+    <p>
+      By the borders of one of the fairest lakes of Northern Italy stood the
+      favourite mansion of Adrian di Castello, to which in his softer and less
+      patriotic moments his imagination had often and fondly turned; and thither
+      the young nobleman, dismissing his more courtly and distinguished
+      companions in the Neapolitan embassy, retired after his ill-starred return
+      to Rome. Most of those thus dismissed joined the Barons; the young
+      Annibaldi, whose daring and ambitious nature had attached him strongly to
+      the Tribune, maintained a neutral ground; he betook himself to his castle
+      in the Campagna, and did not return to Rome till the expulsion of Rienzi.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      The retreat of Irene&rsquo;s lover was one well fitted to feed his melancholy
+      reveries. Without being absolutely a fortress, it was sufficiently strong
+      to resist any assault of the mountain robbers or petty tyrants in the
+      vicinity; while, built by some former lord from the materials of the
+      half-ruined villas of the ancient Romans, its marbled columns and
+      tesselated pavements relieved with a wild grace the grey stone walls and
+      massive towers of feudal masonry. Rising from a green eminence gently
+      sloping to the lake, the stately pile cast its shadow far and dark over
+      the beautiful waters; by its side, from the high and wooded mountains on
+      the background, broke a waterfall, in irregular and sinuous course&mdash;now
+      hid by the foliage, now gleaming in the light, and collecting itself at
+      last in a broad basin&mdash;beside which a little fountain, inscribed with
+      half-obliterated letters, attested the departed elegance of the classic
+      age&mdash;some memento of lord and poet whose very names were lost; thence
+      descending through mosses and lichen, and odorous herbs, a brief, sheeted
+      stream bore its surplus into the lake. And there, amidst the sturdier and
+      bolder foliage of the North, grew, wild and picturesque, many a tree
+      transplanted, in ages back, from the sunnier East; not blighted nor
+      stunted in that golden clime, which fosters almost every produce of nature
+      as with a mother&rsquo;s care. The place was remote and solitary. The roads that
+      conducted to it from the distant towns were tangled, intricate,
+      mountainous, and beset by robbers. A few cottages, and a small convent, a
+      quarter of a league up the verdant margin, were the nearest habitations;
+      and, save by some occasional pilgrim or some bewildered traveller, the
+      loneliness of the mansion was rarely invaded. It was precisely the spot
+      which proffered rest to a man weary of the world, and indulged the
+      memories which grow in rank luxuriance over the wrecks of passion. And he
+      whose mind, at once gentle and self-dependent, can endure solitude, might
+      have ransacked all earth for a more fair and undisturbed retreat.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      But not to such a solitude had the earlier dreams of Adrian dedicated the
+      place. Here had he thought&mdash;should one bright being have presided&mdash;here
+      should love have found its haven: and hither, when love at length admitted
+      of intrusion, hither might wealth and congenial culture have invited all
+      the gentler and better spirits which had begun to move over the troubled
+      face of Italy, promising a second and younger empire of poesy, and lore,
+      and art. To the graceful and romantic but somewhat pensive and inert,
+      temperament of the young noble, more adapted to calm and civilized than
+      stormy and barbarous times, ambition proffered no reward so grateful as
+      lettered leisure and intellectual repose. His youth coloured by the
+      influence of Petrarch, his manhood had dreamed of a happier Vaucluse not
+      untenanted by a Laura. The visions which had connected the scene with the
+      image of Irene made the place still haunted by her shade; and time and
+      absence only ministering to his impassioned meditations, deepened his
+      melancholy and increased his love.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      In this lone retreat&mdash;which even in describing from memory, for these
+      eyes have seen, these feet have trodden, this heart yet yearneth for, the
+      spot&mdash;which even, I say, in thus describing, seems to me (and haply
+      also to the gentle reader) a grateful and welcome transit from the storms
+      of action and the vicissitudes of ambition, so long engrossing the
+      narrative;&mdash;in this lone retreat Adrian passed the winter, which
+      visits with so mild a change that intoxicating clime. The roar of the
+      world without was borne but in faint and indistinct murmurings to his ear.
+      He learned only imperfectly, and with many contradictions, the news which
+      broke like a thunderbolt over Italy, that the singular and aspiring man&mdash;himself
+      a revolution&mdash;who had excited the interest of all Europe, the
+      brightest hopes of the enthusiastic, the profusest adulation of the great,
+      the deepest terror of the despot, the wildest aspirations of all free
+      spirits, had been suddenly stricken from his state, his name branded and
+      his head proscribed. This event, which happened at the end of December,
+      reached Adrian, through a wandering pilgrim, at the commencement of March,
+      somewhat more than two months after the date; the March of that awful year
+      1348, which saw Europe, and Italy especially, desolated by the direst
+      pestilence which history has recorded, accursed alike by the numbers and
+      the celebrity of its victims, and yet strangely connected with some not
+      unpleasing images by the grace of Boccaccio and the eloquence of Petrarch.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      The pilgrim who informed Adrian of the revolution at Rome was unable to
+      give him any clue to the present fate of Rienzi or his family. It was only
+      known that the Tribune and his wife had escaped, none knew whither; many
+      guessed that they were already dead, victims to the numerous robbers who
+      immediately on the fall of the Tribune settled back to their former
+      habits, sparing neither age nor sex, wealth nor poverty. As all relating
+      to the ex-Tribune was matter of eager interest, the pilgrim had also
+      learned that, previous to the fall of Rienzi, his sister had left Rome,
+      but it was not known to what place she had been conveyed.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      The news utterly roused Adrian from his dreaming life. Irene was then in
+      the condition his letter dared to picture&mdash;severed from her brother,
+      fallen from her rank, desolate and friendless. &ldquo;Now,&rdquo; said the generous
+      and high-hearted lover, &ldquo;she may be mine without a disgrace to my name.
+      Whatever Rienzi&rsquo;s faults, she is not implicated in them. Her hands are not
+      red with my kinsman&rsquo;s blood; nor can men say that Adrian di Castello
+      allies himself with a House whose power is built upon the ruins of the
+      Colonnas. The Colonna are restored&mdash;again triumphant&mdash;Rienzi is
+      nothing&mdash;distress and misfortune unite me at once to her on whom they
+      fall!&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      But how were these romantic resolutions to be executed&mdash;Irene&rsquo;s
+      dwelling-place unknown? He resolved himself to repair to Rome and make the
+      necessary inquiries: accordingly he summoned his retainers:&mdash;blithe
+      tidings to them, those of travel! The mail left the armoury&mdash;the
+      banner the hall&mdash;and after two days of animated bustle, the fountain
+      by which Adrian had passed so many hours of revery was haunted only by the
+      birds of the returning spring; and the nightly lamp no longer cast its
+      solitary ray from his turret chamber over the bosom of the deserted lake.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      <a name="link2HCH0039" id="link2HCH0039">
+      <!--  H2 anchor --> </a>
+    </p>
+    <div style="height: 4em;">
+      <br /><br /><br /><br />
+    </div>
+    <h2>
+      Chapter 6.II. The Seeker.
+    </h2>
+    <p>
+      It was a bright, oppressive, sultry morning, when a solitary horseman was
+      seen winding that unequalled road, from whose height, amidst figtrees,
+      vines, and olives, the traveller beholds gradually break upon his gaze the
+      enchanting valley of the Arno, and the spires and domes of Florence. But
+      not with the traveller&rsquo;s customary eye of admiration and delight passed
+      that solitary horseman, and not upon the usual activity, and mirth, and
+      animation of the Tuscan life, broke that noon-day sun. All was silent,
+      void, and hushed; and even in the light of heaven there seemed a sicklied
+      and ghastly glare. The cottages by the road-side were some shut up and
+      closed, some open, but seemingly inmateless. The plough stood still, the
+      distaff plied not: horse and man had a dreary holiday. There was a darker
+      curse upon the land than the curse of Cain! Now and then a single figure,
+      usually clad in the gloomy robe of a friar, crossed the road, lifting
+      towards the traveller a livid and amazed stare, and then hurried on, and
+      vanished beneath some roof, whence issued a faint and dying moan, which
+      but for the exceeding stillness around could scarcely have pierced the
+      threshold. As the traveller neared the city, the scene became less
+      solitary, yet more dread. There might be seen carts and litters, thick
+      awnings wrapped closely round them, containing those who sought safety in
+      flight, forgetful that the Plague was everywhere! And while these gloomy
+      vehicles, conducted by horses, gaunt, shadowy skeletons, crawling heavily
+      along, passed by, like hearses of the dead, sometimes a cry burst the
+      silence in which they moved, and the traveller&rsquo;s steed started aside, as
+      some wretch, on whom the disease had broke forth, was dropped from the
+      vehicle by the selfish inhumanity of his comrades, and left to perish by
+      the way. Hard by the gate a waggon paused, and a man with a mask threw out
+      its contents in a green slimy ditch that bordered the road. These were
+      garments and robes of all kind and value; the broidered mantle of the
+      gallant, the hood and veil of my lady, and the rags of the peasant. While
+      glancing at the labour of the masker, the cavalier beheld a herd of swine,
+      gaunt and half famished, run to the spot in the hopes of food, and the
+      traveller shuddered to think what food they might have anticipated! But
+      ere he reached the gate, those of the animals that had been busiest
+      rooting at the infectious heap, dropped down dead amongst their fellows.
+      (The same spectacle greeted, and is recorded by, Boccaccio.)
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;Ho, ho,&rdquo; said the masker, and his hollow voice sounded yet more hollow
+      through his vizard,&mdash;&ldquo;comest thou here to die, stranger? See, thy
+      brave mantle of triple-pile and golden broidery will not save thee from
+      the gavocciolo. (The tumour that made the fatal symptom.) Ride on, ride
+      on;&mdash;today fit morsel for thy lady&rsquo;s kiss, tomorrow too foul for the
+      rat and worm!&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      Replying not to this hideous welcome, Adrian, for it was he, pursued his
+      way. The gates stood wide open: this was the most appalling sign of all,
+      for, at first, the most jealous precaution had been taken against the
+      ingress of strangers. Now all care, all foresight, all vigilance, were
+      vain. And thrice nine warders had died at that single post, and the
+      officers to appoint their successors were dead too! Law and Police, and
+      the Tribunals of Health, and the Boards of Safety, Death had stopped them
+      all! And the Plague killed art itself, social union, the harmony and
+      mechanism of civilization, as if they had been bone and flesh!
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      So, mute and solitary, went on the lover, in his quest of love, resolved
+      to find and to save his betrothed, and guided (that faithful and loyal
+      knight!) through the Wilderness of Horror by the blessed hope of that
+      strange passion, noblest of all when noble, basest of all when base! He
+      came into a broad and spacious square lined with palaces, the usual haunt
+      of the best and most graceful nobility of Italy. The stranger was alone
+      now, and the tramp of his gallant steed sounded ghastly and fearful in his
+      own ears, when just as he turned the corner of one of the streets that led
+      from it, he saw a woman steal forth with a child in her arms, while
+      another, yet in infancy clung to her robe. She held a large bunch of
+      flowers to her nostrils, (the fancied and favourite mode to prevent
+      infection), and muttered to the children, who were moaning with hunger,&mdash;&ldquo;Yes,
+      yes, you shall have food! Plenty of food now for the stirring forth. But
+      oh, that stirring forth!&rdquo;&mdash;and she peered about and round, lest any
+      of the diseased might be near.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;My friend,&rdquo; said he, &ldquo;can you direct me to the convent of&mdash;&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;Away, man, away!&rdquo; shrieked the woman.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;Alas!&rdquo; said Adrian, with a mournful smile, &ldquo;can you not see that I am
+      not, as yet, one to spread contagion?&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      But the woman, unheeding him, fled on; when, after a few paces, she was
+      arrested by the child that clung to her.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;Mother, mother!&rdquo; it cried, &ldquo;I am sick&mdash;I cannot stir.&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      The woman halted, tore aside the child&rsquo;s robe, saw under the arm the fatal
+      tumour, and, deserting her own flesh, fled with a shriek along the square.
+      The shriek rang long in Adrian&rsquo;s ears, though not aware of the unnatural
+      cause;&mdash;the mother feared not for her infant, but herself. The voice
+      of Nature was no more heeded in that charnel city than it is in the tomb
+      itself! Adrian rode on at a brisker pace, and came at length before a
+      stately church; its doors were wide open, and he saw within a company of
+      monks (the church had no other worshippers, and they were masked) gathered
+      round the altar, and chanting the Miserere Domine;&mdash;the ministers of
+      God, in a city hitherto boasting the devoutest population in Italy,
+      without a flock!
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      The young Cavalier paused before the door, and waited till the service was
+      done, and the monks descended the steps into the street.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;Holy fathers,&rdquo; said he then, &ldquo;may I pray your goodness to tell me my
+      nearest way to the convent Santa Maria de&rsquo; Pazzi?&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;Son,&rdquo; said one of these featureless spectres, for so they seemed in their
+      shroud-like robes, and uncouth vizards,&mdash;&ldquo;son, pass on your way, and
+      God be with you. Robbers or revellers may now fill the holy cloisters you
+      speak of. The abbess is dead; and many a sister sleeps with her. And the
+      nuns have fled from the contagion.&rdquo;
+     </p>
+<pre xml:space="preserve">
+Adrian half fell from his horse, and, as he still remained rooted to the
+spot, the dark procession swept on, hymning in solemn dirge through the
+desolate street the monastic chaunt&mdash;
+
+     &ldquo;By the Mother and the Son,
+     Death endured and mercy won:
+     Spare us, sinners though we be;
+     Miserere Domine!&rdquo;
+ </pre>
+    <p>
+      Recovering from his stupor, Adrian regained the brethren, and, as they
+      closed the burthen of their song, again accosted them.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;Holy fathers, dismiss me not thus. Perchance the one I seek may yet be
+      heard of at the convent. Tell me which way to shape my course.&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;Disturb us not, son,&rdquo; said the monk who spoke before. &ldquo;It is an ill omen
+      for thee to break thus upon the invocations of the ministers of Heaven.&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;Pardon, pardon! I will do ample penance, pay many masses; but I seek a
+      dear friend&mdash;the way&mdash;the way&mdash;&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;To the right, till you gain the first bridge. Beyond the third bridge, on
+      the riverside, you will find the convent,&rdquo; said another monk, moved by the
+      earnestness of Adrian.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;Bless you, holy father,&rdquo; faltered forth the Cavalier, and spurred his
+      steed in the direction given. The friars heeded him not, but again resumed
+      their dirge. Mingled with the sound of his horse&rsquo;s hoofs on the clattering
+      pavement, came to the rider&rsquo;s ear the imploring line&mdash;
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;Miserere Domine!&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      Impatient, sick at heart, desperate, Adrian flew through the street at the
+      full speed of his horse. He passed the marketplace&mdash;it was empty as
+      the desert;&mdash;the gloomy and barricadoed streets, in which the
+      countercries of Guelf and Ghibeline had so often cheered on the Chivalry
+      and Rank of Florence. Now huddled together in vault and pit, lay Guelf and
+      Ghibeline, knightly spurs and beggar&rsquo;s crutch. To that silence the roar
+      even of civil strife would have been a blessing! The first bridge, the
+      riverside, the second, the third bridge, all were gained, and Adrian at
+      last reined his steed before the walls of the convent. He fastened his
+      steed to the porch, in which the door stood ajar, half torn from its
+      hinges, traversed the court, gained the opposite door that admitted to the
+      main building, came to the jealous grating, now no more a barrier from the
+      profane world, and as he there paused a moment to recover breath and
+      nerve, wild laughter and loud song, interrupted and mixed with oaths,
+      startled his ear. He pushed aside the grated door, entered, and, led by
+      the sounds, came to the refectory. In that meeting-place of the severe and
+      mortified maids of heaven, he now beheld gathered round the upper table,
+      used of yore by the abbess, a strange, disorderly, ruffian herd, who at
+      first glance seemed indeed of all ranks, for some wore serge, or even
+      rags, others were tricked out in all the bravery of satin and velvet,
+      plume and mantle. But a second glance sufficed to indicate that the
+      companions were much of the same degree, and that the finery of the more
+      showy was but the spoil rent from unguarded palaces or tenantless bazaars;
+      for under plumed hats, looped with jewels, were grim, unwashed, unshaven
+      faces, over which hung the long locks which the professed brethren of the
+      sharp knife and hireling arm had just begun to assume, serving them often
+      instead of a mask. Amidst these savage revellers were many women, young
+      and middle-aged, foul and fair, and Adrian piously shuddered to see
+      amongst the loose robes and uncovered necks of the professional harlots
+      the saintly habit and beaded rosary of nuns. Flasks of wine, ample viands,
+      gold and silver vessels, mostly consecrated to holy rites, strewed the
+      board. As the young Roman paused spellbound at the threshold, the man who
+      acted as president of the revel, a huge, swarthy ruffian, with a deep scar
+      over his face, which, traversing the whole of the left cheek and upper
+      lip, gave his large features an aspect preternaturally hideous, called out
+      to him&mdash;
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;Come in, man&mdash;come in! Why stand you there amazed and dumb? We are
+      hospitable revellers, and give all men welcome. Here are wine and women.
+      My Lord Bishop&rsquo;s wine and my Lady Abbess&rsquo;s women!
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;Sing hey, sing ho, for the royal DEATH, That scatters a host with a
+      single breath; That opens the prison to spoil the palace, And rids honest
+      necks from the hangman&rsquo;s malice. Here&rsquo;s a health to the Plague! Let the
+      mighty ones dread, The poor never lived till the wealthy were dead. A
+      health to the Plague! May She ever as now Loose the rogue from his chain
+      and the nun from her vow: To the gaoler a sword, to the captive a key,
+      Hurrah for Earth&rsquo;s Curse&mdash;&lsquo;tis a Blessing to me!&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      Ere this fearful stave was concluded, Adrian, sensible that in such orgies
+      there was no chance of prosecuting his inquiries, left the desecrated
+      chamber and fled, scarcely drawing breath, so great was the terror that
+      seized him, till he stood once more in the court amidst the hot, sickly,
+      stagnant sunlight, that seemed a fit atmosphere for the scenes on which it
+      fell. He resolved, however, not to desert the place without making another
+      effort at inquiry; and while he stood without the court, musing and
+      doubtful, he saw a small chapel hard by, through whose long casement
+      gleamed faintly, and dimmed by the noon-day, the light of tapers. He
+      turned towards its porch, entered, and saw beside the sanctuary a single
+      nun kneeling in prayer. In the narrow aisle, upon a long table, (at either
+      end of which burned the tall dismal tapers whose rays had attracted him,)
+      the drapery of several shrouds showed him the half-distinct outline of
+      human figures hushed in death. Adrian himself, impressed by the sadness
+      and sanctity of the place, and the touching sight of that solitary and
+      unselfish watcher of the dead, knelt down and intensely prayed.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      As he rose, somewhat relieved from the burthen at his heart, the nun rose
+      also, and started to perceive him.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;Unhappy man!&rdquo; said she, in a voice which, low, faint, and solemn, sounded
+      as a ghost&rsquo;s&mdash;&ldquo;what fatality brings thee hither? Seest thou not thou
+      art in the presence of clay which the Plague hath touched&mdash;thou
+      breathest the air which destroys! Hence! and search throughout all the
+      desolation for one spot where the Dark Visitor hath not come!&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;Holy maiden,&rdquo; answered Adrian, &ldquo;the danger you hazard does not appal me;&mdash;I
+      seek one whose life is dearer than my own.&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;Thou needest say no more to tell me thou art newly come to Florence! Here
+      son forsakes his father, and mother deserts her child. When life is most
+      hopeless, these worms of a day cling to it as if it were the salvation of
+      immortality! But for me alone, death has no horror. Long severed from the
+      world, I have seen my sisterhood perish&mdash;the house of God desecrated&mdash;its
+      altar overthrown, and I care not to survive,&mdash;the last whom the
+      Pestilence leaves at once unperjured and alive.&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      The nun paused a few moments, and then, looking earnestly at the healthful
+      countenance and unbroken frame of Adrian, sighed heavily&mdash;&ldquo;Stranger,
+      why fly you not?&rdquo; she said. &ldquo;Thou mightst as well search the crowded
+      vaults and rotten corruption of the dead, as search the city for one
+      living.&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;Sister, and bride of the blessed Redeemer!&rdquo; returned the Roman, clasping
+      his hands&mdash;&ldquo;one word I implore thee. Thou art, methinks, of the
+      sisterhood of yon dismantled convent; tell me, knowest thou if Irene di
+      Gabrini, (The family name of Rienzi was Gabrini.)&mdash;guest of the late
+      Abbess, sister of the fallen Tribune of Rome,&mdash;be yet amongst the
+      living?&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;Art thou her brother, then?&rdquo; said the nun. &ldquo;Art thou that fallen Sun of
+      the Morning?&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;I am her betrothed,&rdquo; replied Adrian, sadly. &ldquo;Speak.&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;Oh, flesh! flesh! how art thou victor to the last, even amidst the
+      triumphs and in the lazar-house of corruption!&rdquo; said the nun. &ldquo;Vain man!
+      Think not of such carnal ties; make thy peace with heaven, for thy days
+      are surely numbered!&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;Woman!&rdquo; cried Adrian, impatiently&mdash;&ldquo;talk not to me of myself, nor
+      rail against ties whose holiness thou canst not know. I ask thee again, as
+      thou thyself hopest for mercy and for pardon, is Irene living?&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      The nun was awed by the energy of the young lover, and after a moment,
+      which seemed to him an age of agonized suspense, she replied&mdash;
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;The maiden thou speakest of died not with the general death. In the
+      dispersion of the few remaining, she left the convent&mdash;I know not
+      whither; but she had friends in Florence&mdash;their names I cannot tell
+      thee.&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;Now bless thee, holy sister! bless thee! How long since she left the
+      convent?&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;Four days have passed since the robber and the harlot have seized the
+      house of Santa Maria,&rdquo; replied the nun, groaning: &ldquo;and they were quick
+      successors to the sisterhood.&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;Four days!&mdash;and thou canst give me no clue?&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;None&mdash;yet stay, young man!&rdquo;&mdash;and the nun, approaching, lowered
+      her voice to a hissing whisper&mdash;&ldquo;Ask the Becchini.&rdquo; (According to the
+      usual custom of Florence, the dead were borne to their resting-place on
+      biers, supported by citizens of equal rank; but a new trade was created by
+      the plague, and men of the lowest dregs of the populace, bribed by immense
+      payment, discharged the office of transporting the remains of the victims.
+      These were called Becchini.)
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      Adrian started aside, crossed himself hastily, and quitted the convent
+      without answer. He returned to his horse, and rode back into the silenced
+      heart of the city. Tavern and hotel there were no more; but the palaces of
+      dead princes were free to the living stranger. He entered one&mdash;a
+      spacious and splendid mansion. In the stables he found forage still in the
+      manger; but the horses, at that time in the Italian cities a proof of rank
+      as well as wealth, were gone with the hands that fed them. The highborn
+      Knight assumed the office of groom, took off the heavy harness, fastened
+      his steed to the rack, and as the wearied animal, unconscious of the
+      surrounding horrors, fell eagerly upon its meal, its young lord turned
+      away, and muttered, &ldquo;Faithful servant, and sole companion! may the
+      pestilence that spareth neither beast nor man, spare thee! and mayst thou
+      bear me hence with a lighter heart!&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      A spacious hall, hung with arms and banners&mdash;a wide flight of marble
+      stairs, whose walls were painted in the stiff outlines and gorgeous
+      colours of the day, conducted to vast chambers, hung with velvets and
+      cloth of gold, but silent as the tomb. He threw himself upon the cushions
+      which were piled in the centre of the room, for he had ridden far that
+      morning, and for many days before, and he was wearied and exhausted, body
+      and limb; but he could not rest. Impatience, anxiety, hope, and fear,
+      gnawed his heart and fevered his veins, and, after a brief and
+      unsatisfactory attempt to sober his own thoughts, and devise some plan of
+      search more certain than that which chance might afford him, he rose, and
+      traversed the apartments, in the unacknowledged hope which chance alone
+      could suggest.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      It was easy to see that he had made his resting-place in the home of one
+      of the princes of the land; and the splendour of all around him far
+      outshone the barbarous and rude magnificence of the less civilized and
+      wealthy Romans. Here, lay the lute as last touched&mdash;the gilded and
+      illumined volume as last conned; there, were seats drawn familiarly
+      together, as when lady and gallant had interchanged whispers last.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;And such,&rdquo; thought Adrian,&mdash;&ldquo;such desolation may soon swallow up the
+      vestige of the unwelcomed guest, as of the vanished lord!&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      At length he entered a saloon, in which was a table still spread with
+      wine-flasks, goblets of glass, and one of silver, withered flowers,
+      half-mouldy fruits, and viands. At one side the arras, folding-doors
+      opened to a broad flight of stairs, that descended to a little garden at
+      the back of the house, in which a fountain still played sparkling and
+      livingly&mdash;the only thing, save the stranger, living there! On the
+      steps lay a crimson mantle, and by it a lady&rsquo;s glove. The relics seemed to
+      speak to the lover&rsquo;s heart of a lover&rsquo;s last wooing and last farewell. He
+      groaned aloud, and feeling he should have need of all his strength, filled
+      one of the goblets from a half-emptied flask of Cyprus wine. He drained
+      the draught&mdash;it revived him. &ldquo;Now,&rdquo; he said, &ldquo;once more to my task!&mdash;I
+      will sally forth,&rdquo; when suddenly he heard heavy steps along the rooms he
+      had quitted&mdash;they approached&mdash;they entered; and Adrian beheld
+      two huge and ill-omened forms stalk into the chamber. They were wrapped in
+      black homely draperies, their arms were bare, and they wore large
+      shapeless masks, which descended to the breast, leaving only access to
+      sight and breath in three small and circular apertures. The Colonna half
+      drew his sword, for the forms and aspects of these visitors were not such
+      as men think to look upon in safety.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;Oh!&rdquo; said one, &ldquo;the palace has a new guest today. Fear us not, stranger;
+      there is room,&mdash;ay, and wealth enough for all men now in Florence!
+      Per Bacco! but there is still one goblet of silver left&mdash;how comes
+      that?&rdquo; So saying, the man seized the cup which Adrian had just drained,
+      and thrust it into his breast. He then turned to Adrian, whose hand was
+      still upon his hilt, and said, with a laugh which came choked and muffled
+      through his vizard&mdash;&ldquo;Oh, we cut no throats, Signor; the Invisible
+      spares us that trouble. We are honest men, state officers, and come but to
+      see if the cart should halt here tonight.&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;Ye are then&mdash;&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;Becchini!&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      Adrian&rsquo;s blood ran cold. The Becchino continued&mdash;&ldquo;And keep you this
+      house while you rest at Florence, Signor?&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;Yes, if the rightful lord claim it not.&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;Ha! ha! &lsquo;Rightful lord!&rsquo; The plague is Lord of all now! Why, I have known
+      three gallant companies tenant this palace the last week, and have buried
+      them all&mdash;all! It is a pleasant house enough, and gives good custom.
+      Are you alone?&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;At present, yes.&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;Shew us where you sleep, that we may know where to come for you. You
+      won&rsquo;t want us these three days, I see.&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;Ye are pleasant welcomers!&rdquo; said Adrian;&mdash;&ldquo;but listen to me. Can ye
+      find the living as well as bury the dead? I seek one in this city who, if
+      you discover her, shall be worth to you a year of burials!&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;No, no! that is out of our line. As well look for a dropped sand on the
+      beach, as for a living being amongst closed houses and yawning vaults; but
+      if you will pay the poor gravediggers beforehand, I promise you, you shall
+      have the first of a new charnel-house;&mdash;it will be finished just
+      about your time.&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;There!&rdquo; said Adrian, flinging the wretches a few pieces of gold&mdash;&ldquo;there!
+      and if you would do me a kinder service, leave me, at least while living;
+      or I may save you that trouble.&rdquo; And he turned from the room.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      The Becchino who had been spokesman followed him. &ldquo;You are generous,
+      Signor, stay; you will want fresher food than these filthy fragments. I
+      will supply thee of the best, while&mdash;while thou wantest it. And hark,&mdash;whom
+      wishest thou that I should seek?&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      This question arrested Adrian&rsquo;s departure. He detailed the name, and all
+      the particulars he could suggest of Irene; and, with sickened heart,
+      described the hair, features, and stature of that lovely and hallowed
+      image, which might furnish a theme to the poet, and now gave a clue to the
+      gravedigger.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      The unhallowed apparition shook his head when Adrian had concluded. &ldquo;Full
+      five hundred such descriptions did I hear in the first days of the Plague,
+      when there were still such things as mistress and lover; but it is a
+      dainty catalogue, Signor, and it will be a pride to the poor Becchino to
+      discover or even to bury so many charms! I will do my best; meanwhile, I
+      can recommend you, if in a hurry, to make the best use of your time, to
+      many a pretty face and comely shape&mdash;&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;Out, fiend!&rdquo; muttered Adrian: &ldquo;fool to waste time with such as thou!&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      The laugh of the gravedigger followed his steps.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      All that day did Adrian wander through the city, but search and question
+      were alike unavailing; all whom he encountered and interrogated seemed to
+      regard him as a madman, and these were indeed of no kind likely to advance
+      his object. Wild troops of disordered, drunken revellers, processions of
+      monks, or here and there, scattered individuals gliding rapidly along, and
+      shunning all approach or speech, made the only haunters of the dismal
+      streets, till the sun sunk, lurid and yellow, behind the hills, and
+      Darkness closed around the noiseless pathway of the Pestilence.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      <a name="link2HCH0040" id="link2HCH0040">
+      <!--  H2 anchor --> </a>
+    </p>
+    <div style="height: 4em;">
+      <br /><br /><br /><br />
+    </div>
+    <h2>
+      Chapter 6.III. The Flowers Amidst the Tombs.
+    </h2>
+    <p>
+      Adrian found that the Becchino had taken care that famine should not
+      forestall the plague; the banquet of the dead was removed, and fresh
+      viands and wines of all kinds,&mdash;for there was plenty then in
+      Florence!&mdash;spread the table. He partook of the refreshment, though
+      but sparingly, and shrinking from repose in beds beneath whose gorgeous
+      hangings Death had been so lately busy, carefully closed door and window,
+      wrapped himself in his mantle, and found his resting-place on the cushions
+      of the chamber in which he had supped. Fatigue cast him into an unquiet
+      slumber, from which he was suddenly awakened by the roll of a cart below,
+      and the jingle of bells. He listened, as the cart proceeded slowly from
+      door to door, and at length its sound died away in the distance.&mdash;He
+      slept no more that night!
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      The sun had not long risen ere he renewed his labours; and it was yet
+      early when, just as he passed a church, two ladies richly dressed came
+      from the porch, and seemed through their vizards to regard the young
+      Cavalier with earnest attention. The gaze arrested him also, when one of
+      the ladies said, &ldquo;Fair sir, you are overbold: you wear no mask; neither do
+      you smell to flowers.&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;Lady, I wear no mask, for I would be seen: I search these miserable
+      places for one in whose life I live.&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;He is young, comely, evidently noble, and the plague hath not touched
+      him: he will serve our purpose well,&rdquo; whispered one of the ladies to the
+      other.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;You echo my own thoughts,&rdquo; returned her companion; and then turning to
+      Adrian, she said, &ldquo;You seek one you are not wedded to, if you seek so
+      fondly?&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;It is true.&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;Young and fair, with dark hair and neck of snow; I will conduct you to
+      her.&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;Signor!&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;Follow us!&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;Know you who I am, and whom I seek?&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;Yes.&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;Can you in truth tell me aught of Irene?&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;I can: follow me.&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;To her?&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;Yes, yes: follow us!&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      The ladies moved on as if impatient of further parley. Amazed, doubtful,
+      and, as if in a dream, Adrian followed them. Their dress, manner, and the
+      pure Tuscan of the one who had addressed him, indicated them of birth and
+      station; but all else was a riddle which he could not solve.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      They arrived at one of the bridges, where a litter and a servant on
+      horseback holding a palfrey by the bridle were in attendance. The ladies
+      entered the litter, and she who had before spoken bade Adrian follow on
+      the palfrey.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;But tell me&mdash;&rdquo; he began.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;No questions, Cavalier,&rdquo; said she, impatiently; &ldquo;follow the living in
+      silence, or remain with the dead, as you list.&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      With that the litter proceeded, and Adrian mounted the palfrey
+      wonderingly, and followed his strange conductors, who moved on at a
+      tolerably brisk pace. They crossed the bridge, left the river on one side,
+      and, soon ascending a gentle acclivity, the trees and flowers of the
+      country began to succeed dull walls and empty streets. After proceeding
+      thus somewhat less than half an hour, they turned up a green lane remote
+      from the road, and came suddenly upon the porticoes of a fair and stately
+      palace. Here the ladies descended from their litter; and Adrian, who had
+      vainly sought to extract speech from the attendant, also dismounted, and
+      following them across a spacious court, filled on either side with vases
+      of flowers and orange-trees, and then through a wide hall in the farther
+      side of the quadrangle, found himself in one of the loveliest spots eye
+      ever saw or poet ever sung. It was a garden plot of the most emerald
+      verdure, bosquets of laurel and of myrtle opened on either side into
+      vistas half overhung with clematis and rose, through whose arcades the
+      prospect closed with statues and gushing fountains; in front, the lawn was
+      bounded by rows of vases on marble pedestals filled with flowers, and
+      broad and gradual flights of steps of the whitest marble led from terrace
+      to terrace, each adorned with statues and fountains, half way down a high
+      but softly sloping and verdant hill. Beyond, spread in wide, various, and
+      luxurious landscape, the vineyards and olive-groves, the villas and
+      villages, of the Vale of Arno, intersected by the silver river, while the
+      city, in all its calm, but without its horror, raised its roofs and spires
+      to the sun. Birds of every hue and song, some free, some in net-work of
+      golden wire, warbled round; and upon the centre of the sward reclined four
+      ladies unmasked and richly dressed, the eldest of whom seemed scarcely
+      more than twenty; and five cavaliers, young and handsome, whose jewelled
+      vests and golden chains attested their degree. Wines and fruits were on a
+      low table beside; and musical instruments, chess-boards, and
+      gammon-tables, lay scattered all about. So fair a group, and so graceful a
+      scene, Adrian never beheld but once, and that was in the midst of the
+      ghastly pestilence of Italy!&mdash;such group and such scene our closet
+      indolence may yet revive in the pages of the bright Boccaccio!
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      On seeing Adrian and his companions approach, the party rose instantly;
+      and one of the ladies, who wore upon her head a wreath of laurel-leaves,
+      stepping before the rest, exclaimed, &ldquo;well done, my Mariana! welcome back,
+      my fair subjects. And you, sir, welcome hither.&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      The two guides of the Colonna had by this time removed their masks; and
+      the one who had accosted him, shaking her long and raven ringlets over a
+      bright, laughing eye and a cheek to whose native olive now rose a slight
+      blush, turned to him ere he could reply to the welcome he had received.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;Signor Cavalier,&rdquo; said she, &ldquo;you now see to what I have decoyed you. Own
+      that this is pleasanter than the sights and sounds of the city we have
+      left. You gaze on me in surprise. See, my Queen, how speechless the marvel
+      of your court has made our new gallant; I assure you he could talk quickly
+      enough when he had only us to confer with: nay, I was forced to impose
+      silence on him.&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;Oh! then you have not yet informed him of the custom and origin of the
+      court he enters!&rdquo; quoth she of the laurel wreath.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;No, my Queen; I thought all description given in such a spot as our poor
+      Florence now is would fail of its object. My task is done, I resign him to
+      your Grace!&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      So saying the lady tripped lightly away, and began coquettishly sleeking
+      her locks in the smooth mirror of a marble basin, whose waters trickled
+      over the margin upon the grass below, ever and anon glancing archly
+      towards the stranger, and sufficiently at hand to overhear all that was
+      said.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;In the first place, Signor, permit us to inquire,&rdquo; said the lady who bore
+      the appellation of Queen, &ldquo;thy name, rank, and birth-place.&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;Madam,&rdquo; returned Adrian, &ldquo;I came hither little dreaming to answer
+      questions respecting myself; but what it pleases you to ask, it must
+      please me to reply to. My name is Adrian di Castello, one of the Roman
+      house of the Colonna.&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;A noble column of a noble house!&rdquo; answered the Queen. &ldquo;For us, respecting
+      whom your curiosity may perhaps be aroused, know that we six ladies of
+      Florence, deserted by or deprived of our kin and protectors, formed the
+      resolution to retire to this palace, where, if death comes, it comes
+      stripped of half its horrors; and as the learned tell us that sadness
+      engenders the awful malady, so you see us sworn foes to sadness. Six
+      cavaliers of our acquaintance agreed to join us. We pass our days, whether
+      many or few, in whatever diversions we can find or invent. Music and the
+      dance, merry tales and lively songs, with such slight change of scene as
+      from sward to shade, from alley to fountain, fill up our time, and prepare
+      us for peaceful sleep and happy dreams. Each lady is by turns Queen of our
+      fairy court, as is my lot this day. One law forms the code of our
+      constitution&mdash;that nothing sad shall be admitted. We would live as if
+      yonder city were not, and as if (added the fair Queen, with a slight sigh)
+      youth, grace, and beauty, could endure for ever. One of our knights madly
+      left us for a day, promising to return; we have seen him no more; we will
+      not guess what hath chanced to him. It became necessary to fill up his
+      place; we drew lots who should seek his substitute; it fell upon the
+      ladies who have&mdash;not, I trust, to your displeasure&mdash;brought you
+      hither. Fair sir, my explanation is made.&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;Alas, lovely Queen,&rdquo; said Adrian, wrestling strongly, but vainly, with
+      the bitter disappointment he felt&mdash;&ldquo;I cannot be one of your happy
+      circle; I am in myself a violation of your law. I am filled with but one
+      sad and anxious thought, to which all mirth would seem impiety. I am a
+      seeker amongst the living and the dead for one being of whose fate I am
+      uncertain; and it was only by the words that fell from my fair conductor,
+      that I have been decoyed hither from my mournful task. Suffer me, gracious
+      lady, to return to Florence.&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      The Queen looked in mute vexation towards the dark-eyed Mariana, who
+      returned the glance by one equally expressive, and then suddenly stepping
+      up to Adrian she said,&mdash;
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;But, Signor, if I should still keep my promise, if I should be able to
+      satisfy thee of the health and safety of&mdash;of Irene.&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;Irene!&rdquo; echoed Adrian in surprise, forgetful at the moment that he had
+      before revealed the name of her he sought&mdash;&ldquo;Irene&mdash;Irene di
+      Gabrini, sister of the once renowned Rienzi!&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;The same,&rdquo; replied Mariana, quickly; &ldquo;I know her, as I told you. Nay,
+      Signor, I do not deceive thee. It is true that I cannot bring thee to her;
+      but better as it is,&mdash;she went away many days ago to one of the towns
+      of Lombardy, which, they say, the Pestilence has not yet pierced. Now,
+      noble sir, is not your heart lightened? and will you so soon be a deserter
+      from the Court of Loveliness; and perhaps,&rdquo; she added, with a soft look
+      from her large dark eyes, &ldquo;of Love?&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;Dare I, in truth, believe you, Lady?&rdquo; said Adrian, all delighted, yet
+      still half doubting.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;Would I deceive a true lover, as methinks you are? Be assured. Nay,
+      Queen, receive your subject.&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      The Queen extended her hand to Adrian, and led him to the group that still
+      stood on the grass at a little distance. They welcomed him as a brother,
+      and soon forgave his abstracted courtesies, in compliment to his good mien
+      and illustrious name.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      The Queen clapped her hands, and the party again ranged themselves on the
+      sward. Each lady beside each gallant. &ldquo;You, Mariana, if not fatigued,&rdquo;
+       said the Queen, &ldquo;shall take the lute and silence these noisy grasshoppers,
+      which chirp about us with as much pretension as if they were nightingales.
+      Sing, sweet subject, sing; and let it be the song our dear friend, Signor
+      Visdomini, (I know not if this be the same Visdomini who, three years
+      afterwards, with one of the Medici, conducted so gallant a reinforcement
+      to Scarperia, then besieged by Visconti d&rsquo;Oleggio.) made for a kind of
+      inaugural anthem to such as we admitted to our court.&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      Mariana, who had reclined herself by the side of Adrian, took up the lute,
+      and, after a short prelude, sung the words thus imperfectly translated:&mdash;
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      The Song of the Florentine Lady.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      Enjoy the more the smiles of noon If doubtful be the morrow; And know the
+      Fort of Life is soon Betray&rsquo;d to Death by Sorrow!
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      Death claims us all&mdash;then, Grief, away! We&rsquo;ll own no meaner master;
+      The clouds that darken round the day But bring the night the faster.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      Love&mdash;feast&mdash;be merry while on earth, Such, Grave, should be thy
+      moral! Ev&rsquo;n Death himself is friends with Mirth, And veils the tomb with
+      laurel. (At that time, in Italy, the laurel was frequently planted over
+      the dead.)
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      While gazing on the eyes I love, New life to mine is given&mdash;If joy
+      the lot of saints above, Joy fits us best for Heaven.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      To this song, which was much applauded, succeeded those light and witty
+      tales in which the Italian novelists furnished Voltaire and Marmontel with
+      a model&mdash;each, in his or her turn, taking up the discourse, and with
+      an equal dexterity avoiding every lugubrious image or mournful reflection
+      that might remind those graceful idlers of the vicinity of Death. At any
+      other time the temper and accomplishments of the young Lord di Castello
+      would have fitted him to enjoy and to shine in that Arcadian court. But
+      now he in vain sought to dispel the gloom from his brow, and the anxious
+      thought from his heart. He revolved the intelligence he had received,
+      wondered, guessed, hoped, and dreaded still; and if for a moment his mind
+      returned to the scene about him, his nature, too truly poetical for the
+      false sentiment of the place, asked itself in what, save the polished
+      exterior and the graceful circumstance, the mirth that he now so
+      reluctantly witnessed differed from the brutal revels in the convent of
+      Santa Maria&mdash;each alike in its motive, though so differing in the
+      manner&mdash;equally callous and equally selfish, coining horror into
+      enjoyment. The fair Mariana, whose partner had been reft from her, as the
+      Queen had related, was in no mind to lose the new one she had gained. She
+      pressed upon him from time to time the wine-flask and the fruits; and in
+      those unmeaning courtesies her hand gently lingered upon his. At length,
+      the hour arrived when the companions retired to the Palace, during the
+      fiercer heats of noon&mdash;to come forth again in the declining sun, to
+      sup by the side of the fountain, to dance, to sing, and to make merry by
+      torchlight and the stars till the hour of rest. But Adrian, not willing to
+      continue the entertainment, no sooner found himself in the apartment to
+      which he was conducted, than he resolved to effect a silent escape, as
+      under all circumstances the shortest, and not perhaps the least courteous,
+      farewell left to him. Accordingly, when all seemed quiet and hushed in the
+      repose common to the inhabitants of the South during that hour, he left
+      his apartment, descended the stairs, passed the outer court, and was
+      already at the gate, when he heard himself called by a voice that spoke
+      vexation and alarm. He turned to behold Mariana.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;Why, how now, Signor di Castello, is our company so unpleasing, is our
+      music so jarring, or are our brows so wrinkled, that you should fly as the
+      traveller flies from the witches he surprises at Benevento? Nay, you
+      cannot mean to leave us yet?&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;Fair dame,&rdquo; returned the cavalier, somewhat disconcerted, &ldquo;it is in vain
+      that I seek to rally my mournful spirits, or to fit myself for the court
+      to which nothing sad should come. Your laws hang about me like a culprit&mdash;better
+      timely flight than harsh expulsion.&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      As he spoke he moved on, and would have passed the gate, but Mariana
+      caught his arm.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;Nay,&rdquo; said she, softly; &ldquo;are there no eyes of dark light, and no neck of
+      wintry snow, that can compensate to thee for the absent one? Tarry and
+      forget, as doubtless in absence even thou art forgotten!&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;Lady,&rdquo; answered Adrian, with great gravity, not unmixed with an
+      ill-suppressed disdain, &ldquo;I have not sojourned long enough amidst the
+      sights and sounds of woe, to blunt my heart and spirit into callousness to
+      all around. Enjoy, if thou canst, and gather the rank roses of the
+      sepulchre; but to me, haunted still by funeral images, Beauty fails to
+      bring delight, and Love,&mdash;even holy love&mdash;seems darkened by the
+      Shadow of Death. Pardon me, and farewell.&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;Go, then,&rdquo; said the Florentine, stung and enraged at his coldness; &ldquo;go
+      and find your mistress amidst the associations on which it pleases your
+      philosophy to dwell. I did but deceive thee, blind fool! as I had hoped
+      for thine own good, when I told thee Irene&mdash;(was that her name?)&mdash;was
+      gone from Florence. Of her I know nought, and heard nought, save from
+      thee. Go back and search the vault, and see whether thou lovest her
+      still!&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      <a name="link2HCH0041" id="link2HCH0041">
+      <!--  H2 anchor --> </a>
+    </p>
+    <div style="height: 4em;">
+      <br /><br /><br /><br />
+    </div>
+    <h2>
+      Chapter 6.IV. We Obtain What We Seek, and Know it Not.
+    </h2>
+    <p>
+      In the fiercest heat of the day, and on foot, Adrian returned to Florence.
+      As he approached the city, all that festive and gallant scene he had
+      quitted seemed to him like a dream; a vision of the gardens and bowers of
+      an enchantress, from which he woke abruptly as a criminal may wake on the
+      morning of his doom to see the scaffold and the deathsman;&mdash;so much
+      did each silent and lonely step into the funeral city bring back his
+      bewildered thoughts at once to life and to death. The parting words of
+      Mariana sounded like a knell at his heart. And now as he passed on&mdash;the
+      heat of the day, the lurid atmosphere, long fatigue, alternate exhaustion
+      and excitement, combining with the sickness of disappointment, the
+      fretting consciousness of precious moments irretrievably lost, and his
+      utter despair of forming any systematic mode of search&mdash;fever began
+      rapidly to burn through his veins. His temples felt oppressed as with the
+      weight of a mountain; his lips parched with intolerable thirst; his
+      strength seemed suddenly to desert him; and it was with pain and labour
+      that he dragged one languid limb after the other.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;I feel it,&rdquo; thought he, with the loathing nausea and shivering dread with
+      which nature struggles ever against death; &ldquo;I feel it upon me&mdash;the
+      Devouring and the Viewless&mdash;I shall perish, and without saving her;
+      nor shall even one grave contain us!&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      But these thoughts served rapidly to augment the disease which began to
+      prey upon him; and ere he reached the interior of the city, even thought
+      itself forsook him. The images of men and houses grew indistinct and
+      shadowy before his eyes; the burning pavement became unsteady and reeling
+      beneath his feet; delirium gathered over him, and he went on his way
+      muttering broken and incoherent words; the few who met fled from him in
+      dismay. Even the monks, still continuing their solemn and sad processions,
+      passed with a murmured bene vobis to the other side from that on which his
+      steps swerved and faltered. And from a booth at the corner of a street,
+      four Becchini, drinking together, fixed upon him from their black masks
+      the gaze that vultures fix upon some dying wanderer of the desert. Still
+      he crept on, stretching out his arms like a man in the dark, and seeking
+      with the vague sense that yet struggled against the gathering delirium, to
+      find out the mansion in which he had fixed his home; though many as fair
+      to live, and as meet to die in, stood with open portals before and beside
+      his path.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;Irene, Irene!&rdquo; he cried, sometimes in a muttered and low tone, sometimes
+      in a wild and piercing shriek, &ldquo;where art thou? Where? I come to snatch
+      thee from them; they shall not have thee, the foul and ugly fiends! Pah!
+      how the air smells of dead flesh! Irene, Irene! we will away to mine own
+      palace and the heavenly lake&mdash;Irene!&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      While thus benighted, and thus exclaiming, two females suddenly emerged
+      from a neighbouring house, masked and mantled.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;Vain wisdom!&rdquo; said the taller and slighter of the two, whose mantle, it
+      is here necessary to observe, was of a deep blue, richly broidered with
+      silver, of a shape and a colour not common in Florence, but usual in Rome,
+      where the dress of ladies of the higher rank was singularly bright in hue
+      and ample in fold&mdash;thus differing from the simpler and more slender
+      draperies of the Tuscan fashion&mdash;&ldquo;Vain wisdom, to fly a relentless
+      and certain doom!&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;Why, thou wouldst not have us hold the same home with three of the dead
+      in the next chamber&mdash;strangers too to us&mdash;when Florence has so
+      many empty halls? Trust me, we shall not walk far ere we suit ourselves
+      with a safer lodgment.&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;Hitherto, indeed, we have been miraculously preserved,&rdquo; sighed the other,
+      whose voice and shape were those of extreme youth; &ldquo;yet would that we knew
+      where to fly&mdash;what mount, what wood, what cavern, held my brother and
+      his faithful Nina! I am sick with horrors!&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;Irene, Irene! Well then, if thou art at Milan or some Lombard town, why
+      do I linger here? To horse, to horse! Oh, no! no!&mdash;not the horse with
+      the bells! not the death-cart.&rdquo; With a cry, a shriek, louder than the
+      loudest of the sick man&rsquo;s, broke that young female away from her
+      companion. It seemed as if a single step took her to the side of Adrian.
+      She caught his arm&mdash;she looked in his face&mdash;she met his
+      unconscious eyes bright with a fearful fire. &ldquo;It has seized him!&rdquo;&mdash;(she
+      then said in a deep but calm tone)&mdash;&ldquo;the Plague!&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;Away, away! are you mad?&rdquo; cried her companion; &ldquo;hence, hence,&mdash;touch
+      me not now thou hast touched him&mdash;go!&mdash;here we part!&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;Help me to bear him somewhere, see, he faints, he droops, he falls!&mdash;help
+      me, dear Signora, for pity, for the love of God!&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      But, wholly possessed by the selfish fear which overcame all humanity in
+      that miserable time, the elder woman, though naturally kind, pitiful, and
+      benevolent, fled rapidly away, and soon vanished. Thus left alone with
+      Adrian, who had now, in the fierceness of the fever that preyed within
+      him, fallen on the ground, the strength and nerve of that young girl did
+      not forsake her. She tore off the heavy mantle which encumbered her arms,
+      and cast it from her; and then, lifting up the face of her lover&mdash;for
+      who but Irene was that weak woman, thus shrinking not from the contagion
+      of death?&mdash;she supported him on her breast, and called aloud and
+      again for help. At length the Becchini, in the booth before noticed,
+      (hardened in their profession, and who, thus hardened, better than the
+      most cautious, escaped the pestilence,) lazily approached&mdash;&ldquo;Quicker,
+      quicker, for Christ&rsquo;s love!&rdquo; said Irene. &ldquo;I have much gold; I will reward
+      you well: help me to bear him under the nearest roof.&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;Leave him to us, young lady: we have had our eye upon him,&rdquo; said one of
+      the gravediggers. &ldquo;We&rsquo;ll do our duty by him, first and last.&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;No&mdash;no! touch not his head&mdash;that is my care. There, I will help
+      you; so,&mdash;now then,&mdash;but be gentle!&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      Assisted by these portentous officers, Irene, who would not release her
+      hold, but seemed to watch over the beloved eyes and lips, (set and closed
+      as they were,) as if to look back the soul from parting, bore Adrian into
+      a neighbouring house, and laid him on a bed; from which Irene (preserving
+      as only women do, in such times, the presence of mind and vigilant
+      providence which make so sublime a contrast with their keen
+      susceptibilities) caused them first to cast off the draperies and
+      clothing, which might retain additional infection. She then despatched
+      them for new furniture, and for whatsoever leech money might yet bribe to
+      a duty, now chiefly abandoned to those heroic Brotherhoods who, however
+      vilified in modern judgment by the crimes of some unworthy members, were
+      yet, in the dark times, the best, the bravest, and the holiest agents, to
+      whom God ever delegated the power to resist the oppressor&mdash;to feed
+      the hungry&mdash;to minister to woe; and who, alone, amidst that fiery
+      Pestilence, (loosed, as it were, a demon from the abyss, to shiver into
+      atoms all that binds the world to Virtue and to Law,) seemed to awaken, as
+      by the sound of an angel&rsquo;s trumpet, to that noblest Chivalry of the Cross&mdash;whose
+      faith is the scorn of self&mdash;whose hope is beyond the Lazar-house&mdash;whose
+      feet, already winded for immortality, trample, with a conqueror&rsquo;s march,
+      upon the graves of Death!
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      While this the ministry and the office of love,&mdash;along that street in
+      which Adrian and Irene had met at last&mdash;came singing, reeling,
+      roaring, the dissolute and abandoned crew who had fixed their quarters in
+      the Convent of Santa Maria de&rsquo; Pazzi, their bravo chief at their head, and
+      a nun (no longer in nun&rsquo;s garments) upon either arm. &ldquo;A health to the
+      Plague!&rdquo; shouted the ruffian: &ldquo;A health to the Plague!&rdquo; echoed his frantic
+      Bacchanals.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;A health to the Plague, may she ever, as now, Loose the rogue from his
+      chain, and the nun from her vow; To the gaoler a sword&mdash;to the
+      captive a key, Hurrah for Earth&rsquo;s Curse! &lsquo;tis a blessing to me.&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;Holla!&rdquo; cried the chief, stopping; &ldquo;here, Margherita; here&rsquo;s a brave
+      cloak for thee, my girl: silver enow on it to fill thy purse, if it ever
+      grow empty; which it may, if ever the Plague grow slack.&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;Nay,&rdquo; said the girl, who, amidst all the havoc of debauch, retained much
+      of youth and beauty in her form and face; &ldquo;nay, Guidotto; perhaps it has
+      infection.&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;Pooh, child, silver never infects. Clap it on, clap it on. Besides, fate
+      is fate, and when it is thine hour there will be other means besides the
+      gavocciolo.&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      So saying, he seized the mantle, threw it roughly over her shoulders, and
+      dragged her on as before, half pleased with the finery, half frightened
+      with the danger; while gradually died away, along the lurid air and the
+      mournful streets, the chant of that most miserable mirth.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      <a name="link2HCH0042" id="link2HCH0042">
+      <!--  H2 anchor --> </a>
+    </p>
+    <div style="height: 4em;">
+      <br /><br /><br /><br />
+    </div>
+    <h2>
+      Chapter 6.V. The Error.
+    </h2>
+    <p>
+      For three days, the fatal three days, did Adrian remain bereft of strength
+      and sense. But he was not smitten by the scourge which his devoted and
+      generous nurse had anticipated. It was a fierce and dangerous fever,
+      brought on by the great fatigue, restlessness, and terrible agitation he
+      had undergone.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      No professional mediciner could be found to attend him; but a good friar,
+      better perhaps skilled in the healing art than many who claimed its
+      monopoly, visited him daily. And in the long and frequent absences to
+      which his other and numerous duties compelled the monk, there was one ever
+      at hand to smooth the pillow, to wipe the brow, to listen to the moan, to
+      watch the sleep. And even in that dismal office, when, in the frenzy of
+      the sufferer, her name, coupled with terms of passionate endearment, broke
+      from his lips, a thrill of strange pleasure crossed the heart of the
+      betrothed, which she chid as if it were a crime. But even the most
+      unearthly love is selfish in the rapture of being loved! Words cannot
+      tell, heart cannot divine, the mingled emotions that broke over her when,
+      in some of these incoherent ravings, she dimly understood that for her the
+      city had been sought, the death dared, the danger incurred. And as then
+      bending passionately to kiss that burning brow, her tears fell fast over
+      the idol of her youth, the fountains from which they gushed were those,
+      fathomless and countless, which a life could not weep away. Not an impulse
+      of the human and the woman heart that was not stirred; the adoring
+      gratitude, the meek wonder thus to be loved, while deeming it so simple a
+      merit thus to love;&mdash;as if all sacrifice in her were a thing of
+      course,&mdash;to her, a virtue nature could not paragon, worlds could not
+      repay! And there he lay, the victim to his own fearless faith, helpless&mdash;dependent
+      upon her&mdash;a thing between life and death, to thank, to serve&mdash;to
+      be proud of, yet protect, to compassionate, yet revere&mdash;the saver, to
+      be saved! Never seemed one object to demand at once from a single heart so
+      many and so profound emotions; the romantic enthusiasm of the girl&mdash;the
+      fond idolatry of the bride&mdash;the watchful providence of the mother
+      over her child.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      And strange to say, with all the excitement of that lonely watch, scarcely
+      stirring from his side, taking food only that her strength might not fail
+      her,&mdash;unable to close her eyes,&mdash;though, from the same cause,
+      she would fain have taken rest, when slumber fell upon her charge&mdash;with
+      all such wear and tear of frame and heart, she seemed wonderfully
+      supported. And the holy man marvelled, in each visit, to see the cheek of
+      the nurse still fresh, and her eye still bright. In her own superstition
+      she thought and felt that Heaven gifted her with a preternatural power to
+      be true to so sacred a charge; and in this fancy she did not wholly err:&mdash;for
+      Heaven did gift her with that diviner power, when it planted in so soft a
+      heart the enduring might and energy of Affection! The friar had visited
+      the sick man late on the third night, and administered to him a strong
+      sedative. &ldquo;This night,&rdquo; said he to Irene, &ldquo;will be the crisis: should he
+      awaken, as I trust he may, with a returning consciousness, and a calm
+      pulse, he will live; if not, young daughter, prepare for the worst. But
+      should you note any turn in the disease, that may excite alarm, or require
+      my attendance, this scroll will inform you where I am, if God spare me
+      still, at each hour of the night and morning.&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      The monk retired, and Irene resumed her watch.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      The sleep of Adrian was at first broken and interrupted&mdash;his
+      features, his exclamations, his gestures, all evinced great agony, whether
+      mental or bodily: it seemed, as perhaps it was, a fierce and doubtful
+      struggle between life and death for the conquest of the sleeper. Patient,
+      silent, breathing but by long-drawn gasps, Irene sate at the bed-head. The
+      lamp was removed to the further end of the chamber, and its ray, shaded by
+      the draperies, did not suffice to give to her gaze more than the outline
+      of the countenance she watched. In that awful suspense, all the thoughts
+      that hitherto had stirred her mind lay hushed and mute. She was only
+      sensible to that unutterable fear which few of us have been happy enough
+      not to know. That crushing weight under which we can scarcely breathe or
+      move, the avalanche over us, freezing and suspended, which we cannot
+      escape from, beneath which, every moment, we may be buried and
+      overwhelmed. The whole destiny of life was in the chances of that single
+      night! It was just as Adrian at last seemed to glide into a deeper and
+      serener slumber, that the bells of the death-cart broke with their boding
+      knell the palpable silence of the streets. Now hushed, now revived, as the
+      cart stopped for its gloomy passengers, and coming nearer and nearer after
+      every pause. At length she heard the heavy wheels stop under the very
+      casement, and a voice deep and muffled calling aloud, &ldquo;Bring out the
+      dead!&rdquo; She rose, and with a noiseless step, passed to secure the door,
+      when the dull lamp gleamed upon the dark and shrouded forms of the
+      Becchini.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;You have not marked the door, nor set out the body,&rdquo; said one gruffly;
+      &ldquo;but this is the third night! He is ready for us.&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;Hush, he sleeps&mdash;away, quick, it is not the Plague that seized him.&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;Not the Plague?&rdquo; growled the Becchino in a disappointed tone; &ldquo;I thought
+      no other illness dared encroach upon the rights of the gavocciolo!&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;Go&mdash;here&rsquo;s money; leave us.&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      And the grisly carrier sullenly withdrew. The cart moved on, the bell
+      renewed its summons, till slowly and faintly the dreadful larum died in
+      the distance.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      Shading the lamp with her hand, Irene stole to the bed side, fearful that
+      the sound and the intrusion had disturbed the slumberer. But his face was
+      still locked, as in a vice, with that iron sleep. He stirred not&mdash;the
+      breath scarcely passed his lips&mdash;she felt his pulse, as the wan hand
+      lay on the coverlid&mdash;there was a slight beat&mdash;she was contented&mdash;removed
+      the light, and, retiring to a corner of the room, placed the little cross
+      suspended round her neck upon the table, and prayed, in her intense
+      suffering, to Him who had known death, and who&mdash;Son of Heaven though
+      he was, and Sovereign of the Seraphim&mdash;had also prayed, in his
+      earthly travail, that the cup might pass away.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      The Morning broke, not, as in the North, slowly and through shadow, but
+      with the sudden glory with which in those climates Day leaps upon earth&mdash;like
+      a giant from his sleep. A sudden smile&mdash;a burnished glow&mdash;and
+      night had vanished. Adrian still slept; not a muscle seemed to have
+      stirred; the sleep was even heavier than before; the silence became a
+      burthen upon the air. Now, in that exceeding torpor so like unto death,
+      the solitary watcher became alarmed and terrified. Time passed&mdash;morning
+      glided to noon&mdash;still not a sound nor motion. The sun was midway in
+      Heaven&mdash;the Friar came not. And now again touching Adrian&rsquo;s pulse,
+      she felt no flutter&mdash;she gazed on him, appalled and confounded;
+      surely nought living could be so still and pale. &ldquo;Was it indeed sleep,
+      might it not be&mdash;&rdquo; She turned away, sick and frozen; her tongue clove
+      to her lips. Why did the father tarry?&mdash;she would go to him&mdash;she
+      would learn the worst&mdash;she could forbear no longer. She glanced over
+      the scroll the Monk had left her: &ldquo;From sunrise,&rdquo; it said, &ldquo;I shall be at
+      the Convent of the Dominicans. Death has stricken many of the brethren.&rdquo;
+       The Convent was at some distance, but she knew the spot, and fear would
+      wing her steps. She gave one wistful look at the sleeper and rushed from
+      the house. &ldquo;I shall see thee again presently,&rdquo; she murmured. Alas! what
+      hope can calculate beyond the moment? And who shall claim the tenure of
+      &lsquo;The Again?&rsquo; 
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      It was not many minutes after Irene had left the room, ere, with a long
+      sigh, Adrian opened his eyes&mdash;an altered and another man; the fever
+      was gone, the reviving pulse beat low indeed, but calm. His mind was once
+      more master of his body, and, though weak and feeble, the danger was past,
+      and life and intellect regained.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;I have slept long,&rdquo; he muttered; &ldquo;and oh, such dreams! And methought I
+      saw Irene, but could not speak to her, and while I attempted to grasp her,
+      her face changed, her form dilated, and I was in the clutch of the foul
+      gravedigger. It is late&mdash;the sun is high&mdash;I must be up and
+      stirring. Irene is in Lombardy. No, no; that was a lie, a wicked lie; she
+      is at Florence, I must renew my search.&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      As this duty came to his remembrance, he rose from the bed&mdash;he was
+      amazed at his own debility: at first he could not stand without support
+      from the wall; by degrees, however, he so far regained the mastery of his
+      limbs as to walk, though with effort and pain. A ravening hunger preyed
+      upon him, he found some scanty and light food in the chamber, which he
+      devoured eagerly. And with scarce less eagerness laved his enfeebled form
+      and haggard face with the water that stood at hand. He now felt refreshed
+      and invigorated, and began to indue his garments, which he found thrown on
+      a heap beside the bed. He gazed with surprise and a kind of
+      self-compassion upon his emaciated hands and shrunken limbs, and began now
+      to comprehend that he must have had some severe but unconscious illness.
+      &ldquo;Alone, too,&rdquo; thought he; &ldquo;no one near to tend me! Nature my only nurse!
+      But alas! alas! how long a time may thus have been wasted, and my adored
+      Irene&mdash;quick, quick, not a moment more will I lose.&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      He soon found himself in the open street; the air revived him; and that
+      morning had sprung up the blessed breeze, the first known for weeks. He
+      wandered on very slowly and feebly till he came to a broad square, from
+      which, in the vista, might be seen one of the principal gates of Florence,
+      and the fig-trees and olive-groves beyond, it was then that a Pilgrim of
+      tall stature approached towards him as from the gate; his hood was thrown
+      back, and gave to view a countenance of great but sad command; a face, in
+      whose high features, massive brow, and proud, unshrinking gaze, shaded by
+      an expression of melancholy more stern than soft, Nature seemed to have
+      written majesty, and Fate disaster. As in that silent and dreary place,
+      these two, the only tenants of the street, now encountered, Adrian stopped
+      abruptly, and said in a startled and doubting voice: &ldquo;Do I dream still, or
+      do I behold Rienzi?&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      The Pilgrim paused also, as he heard the name, and gazing long on the
+      attenuated features of the young lord, said: &ldquo;I am he that was Rienzi! and
+      you, pale shadow, is it in this grave of Italy that I meet with the gay
+      and high Colonna? Alas, young friend,&rdquo; he added, in a more relaxed and
+      kindly voice, &ldquo;hath the Plague not spared the flower of the Roman nobles?
+      Come, I, the cruel and the harsh Tribune, I will be thy nurse: he who
+      might have been my brother, shall yet claim from me a brother&rsquo;s care.&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      With these words he wound his arm tenderly round Adrian; and the young
+      noble, touched by his compassion, and agitated by the surprise, leaned
+      upon Rienzi&rsquo;s breast in silence.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;Poor youth,&rdquo; resumed the Tribune, for so, since rather fallen than
+      deposed, he may yet be called; &ldquo;I ever loved the young, (my brother died
+      young;) and you more than most. What fatality brought thee hither?&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;Irene!&rdquo; replied Adrian, falteringly.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;Is it so, really? Art thou a Colonna, and yet prize the fallen? The same
+      duty has brought me also to the city of Death. From the furthest south&mdash;over
+      the mountains of the robber&mdash;through the fastnesses of my foes&mdash;through
+      towns in which the herald proclaimed in my ear the price of my head&mdash;I
+      have passed hither, on foot and alone, safe under the wings of the
+      Almighty One. Young man, thou shouldst have left this task to one who
+      bears a wizard&rsquo;s life, and whom Heaven and Earth yet reserve for an
+      appointed end!&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      The Tribune said this in a deep and inward voice; and in his raised eye
+      and solemn brow might be seen how much his reverses had deepened his
+      fanaticism, and added even to the sanguineness of his hopes.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;But,&rdquo; asked Adrian, withdrawing gently from Rienzi&rsquo;s arm, &ldquo;thou knowest,
+      then, where Irene is to be found; let us go together. Lose not a moment in
+      this talk; time is of inestimable value, and a moment in this city is
+      often but the border to eternity.&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;Right,&rdquo; said Rienzi, awakening to his object. &ldquo;But fear not, I have
+      dreamt that I shall save her, the gem and darling of my house. Fear not, I
+      have no fear.&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;Know you where to seek?&rdquo; said Adrian, impatiently; &ldquo;the Convent holds far
+      other guests.&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;Ha! so said my dream!&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;Talk not now of dreams,&rdquo; said the lover; &ldquo;but if you have no other guide,
+      let us part at once in quest of her. I will take yonder street, you take
+      the opposite, and at sunset let us meet in the same spot.&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;Rash man!&rdquo; said the Tribune, with great solemnity; &ldquo;scoff not at the
+      visions which Heaven makes a parable to its Chosen. Thou seekest counsel
+      of thy human wisdom; I, less presumptuous, follow the hand of the
+      mysterious Providence, moving even now before my gaze as a pillar of light
+      through the wilderness of dread. Ay, meet we here at sunset, and prove
+      whose guide is the most unerring. If my dream tell me true, I shall see my
+      sister living, ere the sun reach yonder hill, and by a church dedicated to
+      St. Mark.&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      The grave earnestness with which Rienzi spoke impressed Adrian with a hope
+      which his reason would not acknowledge. He saw him depart with that proud
+      and stately step to which his sweeping garments gave a yet more imposing
+      dignity, and then passed up the street to the right hand. He had not got
+      half way when he felt himself pulled by the mantle. He turned, and saw the
+      shapeless mask of a Becchino.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;I feared you were sped, and that another had cheated me of my office,&rdquo;
+       said the gravedigger, &ldquo;seeing that you returned not to the old Prince&rsquo;s
+      palace. You don&rsquo;t know me from the rest of us I see, but I am the one you
+      told to seek&mdash;&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;Irene!&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;Yes, Irene di Gabrini; you promised ample reward.&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;You shall have it.&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;Follow me.&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      The Becchino strode on, and soon arrived at a mansion. He knocked twice at
+      the porter&rsquo;s entrance, an old woman cautiously opened the door. &ldquo;Fear not,
+      good aunt,&rdquo; said the gravedigger; &ldquo;this is the young Lord I spoke to thee
+      of. Thou sayest thou hadst two ladies in the palace, who alone survived of
+      all the lodgers, and their names were Bianca de Medici, and&mdash;what was
+      the other?&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;Irene di Gabrini, a Roman lady. But I told thee this was the fourth day
+      they left the house, terrified by the deaths within it.&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;Thou didst so: and was there anything remarkable in the dress of the
+      Signora di Gabrini?&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;Yes, I have told thee: a blue mantle, such as I have rarely seen, wrought
+      with silver.&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;Was the broidery that of stars, silver stars,&rdquo; exclaimed Adrian, &ldquo;with a
+      sun in the centre?&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;It was.&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;Alas! alas! the arms of the Tribune&rsquo;s family! I remember how I praised
+      the mantle the first day she wore it&mdash;the day on which we were
+      betrothed!&rdquo; And the lover at once conjectured the secret sentiment which
+      had induced Irene to retain thus carefully a robe so endeared by
+      association.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;You know no more of your lodgers?&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;Nothing.&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;And is this all you have learned, knave?&rdquo; cried Adrian.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;Patience. I must bring you from proof to proof, and link to link, in
+      order to win my reward. Follow, Signor.&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      The Becchino then passing through the several lanes and streets, arrived
+      at another house of less magnificent size and architecture. Again he
+      tapped thrice at the parlour door, and this time came forth a man
+      withered, old, and palsied, whom death seemed to disdain to strike.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;Signor Astuccio,&rdquo; said the Becchino, &ldquo;pardon me; but I told thee I might
+      trouble thee again. This is the gentleman who wants to know, what is often
+      best unknown&mdash;but that&rsquo;s not my affair. Did a lady&mdash;young and
+      beautiful&mdash;with dark hair, and of a slender form, enter this house,
+      stricken with the first symptom of the Plague, three days since?&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;Ay, thou knowest that well enough; and thou knowest still better, that
+      she has departed these two days: it was quick work with her, quicker than
+      with most!&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;Did she wear anything remarkable?&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;Yes, troublesome man: a blue cloak, with stars of silver.&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;Couldst thou guess aught of her previous circumstances?&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;No, save that she raved much about the nunnery of Santa Maria de&rsquo; Pazzi,
+      and bravos, and sacrilege.&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;Are you satisfied, Signor?&rdquo; asked the gravedigger, with an air of
+      triumph, turning to Adrian. &ldquo;But no, I will satisfy thee better, if thou
+      hast courage. Wilt thou follow?&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;I comprehend thee; lead on. Courage! What is there on earth now to fear?&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      Muttering to himself, &ldquo;Ay, leave me alone. I have a head worth something;
+      I ask no gentleman to go by my word; I will make his own eyes the judge of
+      what my trouble is worth,&rdquo; the gravedigger now led the way through one of
+      the gates a little out of the city. And here, under a shed, sat six of his
+      ghastly and ill-omened brethren, with spades and pick-axes at their feet.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      His guide now turned round to Adrian, whose face was set, and resolute in
+      despair.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;Fair Signor,&rdquo; said he, with some touch of lingering compassion, &ldquo;wouldst
+      thou really convince thine own eyes and heart?&mdash;the sight may appal,
+      the contagion may destroy, thee,&mdash;if, indeed, as it seems to me,
+      Death has not already written &lsquo;mine&rsquo; upon thee.&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;Raven of bode and woe!&rdquo; answered Adrian, &ldquo;seest thou not that all I
+      shrink from is thy voice and aspect? Show me her I seek, living or dead.&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;I will show her to you, then,&rdquo; said the Becchino, sullenly, &ldquo;such as two
+      nights since she was committed to my charge. Line and lineament may
+      already be swept away, for the Plague hath a rapid besom; but I have left
+      that upon her by which you will know the Becchino is no liar. Bring hither
+      the torches, comrades, and lift the door. Never stare; it&rsquo;s the
+      gentleman&rsquo;s whim, and he&rsquo;ll pay it well.&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      Turning to the right while Adrian mechanically followed his conductors, a
+      spectacle whose dire philosophy crushes as with a wheel all the pride of
+      mortal man&mdash;the spectacle of that vault in which earth hides all that
+      on earth flourished, rejoiced, exulted&mdash;awaited his eye!
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      The Becchini lifted a ponderous grate, lowered their torches (scarcely
+      needed, for through the aperture rushed, with a hideous glare, the light
+      of the burning sun,) and motioned to Adrian to advance. He stood upon the
+      summit of the abyss and gazed below.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      It was a large deep and circular space, like the bottom of an exhausted
+      well. In niches cut into the walls of earth around, lay, duly coffined,
+      those who had been the earliest victims of the plague, when the Becchino&rsquo;s
+      market was not yet glutted, and priest followed, and friend mourned the
+      dead. But on the floor below, there was the loathsome horror! Huddled and
+      matted together&mdash;some naked, some in shrouds already black and rotten&mdash;lay
+      the later guests, the unshriven and unblest! The torches, the sun,
+      streamed broad and red over Corruption in all its stages, from the pale
+      blue tint and swollen shape, to the moistened undistinguishable mass, or
+      the riddled bones, where yet clung, in strips and tatters, the black and
+      mangled flesh. In many, the face remained almost perfect, while the rest
+      of the body was but bone; the long hair, the human face, surmounting the
+      grisly skeleton. There was the infant, still on the mother&rsquo;s breast; there
+      was the lover, stretched across the dainty limbs of his adored! The rats,
+      (for they clustered in numbers to that feast,) disturbed, not scared, sate
+      up from their horrid meal as the light glimmered over them, and thousands
+      of them lay round, stark, and dead, poisoned by that they fed on! There,
+      too, the wild satire of the gravediggers had cast, though stripped of
+      their gold and jewels, the emblems that spoke of departed rank;&mdash;the
+      broken wand of the Councillor; the General&rsquo;s baton; the Priestly Mitre!
+      The foul and livid exhalations gathered like flesh itself, fungous and
+      putrid, upon the walls, and the&mdash;
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      But who shall detail the ineffable and unimaginable horrors that reigned
+      over the Palace where the Great King received the prisoners whom the sword
+      of the Pestilence had subdued?
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      But through all that crowded court&mdash;crowded with beauty and with
+      birth, with the strength of the young and the honours of the old, and the
+      valour of the brave, and the wisdom of the learned, and the wit of the
+      scorner, and the piety of the faithful&mdash;one only figure attracted
+      Adrian&rsquo;s eye. Apart from the rest, a latecomer&mdash;the long locks
+      streaming far and dark over arm and breast&mdash;lay a female, the face
+      turned partially aside, the little seen not recognisable even by the
+      mother of the dead,&mdash;but wrapped round in that fatal mantle, on
+      which, though blackened and tarnished, was yet visible the starry heraldry
+      assumed by those who claimed the name of the proud Tribune of Rome. Adrian
+      saw no more&mdash;he fell back in the arms of the gravediggers: when he
+      recovered, he was still without the gates of Florence&mdash;reclined upon
+      a green mound&mdash;his guide stood beside him&mdash;holding his steed by
+      the bridle as it grazed patiently on the neglected grass. The other
+      brethren of the axe had resumed their seat under the shed.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;So, you have revived! Ah! I thought it was only the effluvia; few stand
+      it as we do. And so, as your search is over, deeming you would now be
+      quitting Florence if you have any sense left to you, I went for your good
+      horse. I have fed him since your departure from the palace. Indeed I
+      fancied he would be my perquisite, but there are plenty as good. Come,
+      young sir, mount. I feel a pity for you, I know not why, except that you
+      are the only one I have met for weeks who seem to care for another more
+      than for yourself. I hope you are satisfied now that I showed some brains,
+      eh! in your service; and as I have kept my promise, you&rsquo;ll keep yours.&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;Friend,&rdquo; said Adrian, &ldquo;here is gold enough to make thee rich; here, too,
+      is a jewel that merchants will tell thee princes might vie to purchase.
+      Thou seemest honest, despite thy calling, or thou mightest have robbed and
+      murdered me long since. Do me one favour more.&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;By my poor mother&rsquo;s soul, yes.&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;Take yon&mdash;yon clay from that fearful place. Inter it in some quiet
+      and remote spot&mdash;apart&mdash;alone! You promise me?&mdash;you swear
+      it?&mdash;it is well! And now help me on my horse. Farewell Italy, and if
+      I die not with this stroke, may I die as befits at once honour and despair&mdash;with
+      trumpet and banner round me&mdash;in a well-fought field against a worthy
+      foe!&mdash;Save a knightly death, nothing is left to live for!&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      <a name="link2H_4_0052" id="link2H_4_0052">
+      <!--  H2 anchor --> </a>
+    </p>
+    <div style="height: 4em;">
+      <br /><br /><br /><br />
+    </div>
+    <h2>
+      BOOK VII. THE PRISON.
+    </h2>
+<pre xml:space="preserve">
+     &ldquo;Fu rinchiuso in una torre grossa e larga; avea libri assai,
+     suo Tito Livio, sue storie di Roma, la Bibbia.&rdquo; &amp;c.&mdash;&ldquo;Vita
+     di Cola di Rienzi&rdquo;, lib. ii. c. 13.
+
+     &ldquo;He was immured in a high and spacious tower; he had books
+     enough, his Titus Livius, his histories of Rome, the Bible,&rdquo;
+      &amp;c.
+</pre>
+    <p>
+      <a name="link2HCH0043" id="link2HCH0043">
+      <!--  H2 anchor --> </a>
+    </p>
+    <div style="height: 4em;">
+      <br /><br /><br /><br />
+    </div>
+    <h2>
+      Chapter 7.I. Avignon.&mdash;The Two Pages.&mdash;The Stranger Beauty.
+    </h2>
+    <p>
+      There is this difference between the Drama of Shakspeare, and that of
+      almost every other master of the same art; that in the first, the
+      catastrophe is rarely produced by one single cause&mdash;one simple and
+      continuous chain of events. Various and complicated agencies work out the
+      final end. Unfettered by the rules of time and place, each time, each
+      place depicted, presents us with its appropriate change of action, or of
+      actors. Sometimes the interest seems to halt, to turn aside, to bring us
+      unawares upon objects hitherto unnoticed, or upon qualities of the
+      characters hitherto hinted at, not developed. But, in reality, the pause
+      in the action is but to collect, to gather up, and to grasp, all the
+      varieties of circumstance that conduce to the Great Result: and the art of
+      fiction is only deserted for the fidelity of history. Whoever seeks to
+      place before the world the true representation of a man&rsquo;s life and times,
+      and, enlarging the Dramatic into the Epic, extends his narrative over the
+      vicissitudes of years, will find himself unconsciously, in this, the
+      imitator of Shakspeare. New characters, each conducive to the end&mdash;new
+      scenes, each leading to the last, rise before him as he proceeds,
+      sometimes seeming to the reader to delay, even while they advance, the
+      dread catastrophe. The sacrificial procession sweeps along, swelled by new
+      comers, losing many that first joined it; before, at last, the same as a
+      whole, but differing in its components, the crowd reach the fated bourn of
+      the Altar and the Victim!
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      It is five years after the date of the events I have recorded, and my
+      story conveys us to the Papal Court at Avignon&mdash;that tranquil seat of
+      power, to which the successors of St. Peter had transplanted the luxury,
+      the pomp, and the vices, of the Imperial City. Secure from the fraud or
+      violence of a powerful and barbarous nobility, the courtiers of the See
+      surrendered themselves to a holyday of delight&mdash;their repose was
+      devoted to enjoyment, and Avignon presented, at that day, perhaps the
+      gayest and most voluptuous society of Europe. The elegance of Clement VI.
+      had diffused an air of literary refinement over the grosser pleasures of
+      the place, and the spirit of Petrarch still continued to work its way
+      through the councils of faction and the orgies of debauch.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      Innocent VI. had lately succeeded Clement, and whatever his own claims to
+      learning, (Matteo Villani (lib. iii. cap. 44) says, that Innocent VI. had
+      not much pretension to learning. He is reported, however, by other
+      authorities, cited by Zefirino Re, to have been &ldquo;eccellente canonista.&rdquo; He
+      had been a professor in the University of Toulouse.) he, at least,
+      appreciated knowledge and intellect in others; so that the graceful
+      pedantry of the time continued to mix itself with the pursuit of pleasure.
+      The corruption which reigned through the whole place was too confirmed to
+      yield to the example of Innocent, himself a man of simple habits and
+      exemplary life. Though, like his predecessor, obedient to the policy of
+      France, Innocent possessed a hard and an extended ambition. Deeply
+      concerned for the interests of the Church, he formed the project of
+      confirming and re-establishing her shaken dominion in Italy; and he
+      regarded the tyrants of the various states as the principal obstacles to
+      his ecclesiastical ambition. Nor was this the policy of Innocent VI.
+      alone. With such exceptions as peculiar circumstances necessarily
+      occasioned, the Papal See was, upon the whole, friendly to the political
+      liberties of Italy. The Republics of the Middle Ages grew up under the
+      shadow of the Church; and there, as elsewhere, it was found, contrary to a
+      vulgar opinion, that Religion, however prostituted and perverted, served
+      for the general protection of civil freedom,&mdash;raised the lowly, and
+      resisted the oppressor.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      At this period there appeared at Avignon a lady of singular and matchless
+      beauty. She had come with a slender but well appointed retinue from
+      Florence, but declared herself of Neapolitan birth; the widow of a noble
+      of the brilliant court of the unfortunate Jane. Her name was Cesarini.
+      Arrived at a place where, even in the citadel of Christianity, Venus
+      retained her ancient empire, where Love made the prime business of life,
+      and to be beautiful was to be of power; the Signora Cesarini had scarcely
+      appeared in public before she saw at her feet half the rank and gallantry
+      of Avignon. Her female attendants were beset with bribes and billets; and
+      nightly, beneath her lattice, was heard the plaintive serenade. She
+      entered largely into the gay dissipation of the town, and her charms
+      shared the celebrity of the hour with the verse of Petrarch. But though
+      she frowned on none, none could claim the monopoly of her smiles. Her fair
+      fame was as yet unblemished; but if any might presume beyond the rest, she
+      seemed to have selected rather from ambition than love, and Giles, the
+      warlike Cardinal d&rsquo;Albornoz, all powerful at the sacred court, already
+      foreboded the hour of his triumph.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      It was late noon, and in the ante-chamber of the fair Signora waited two
+      of that fraternity of pages, fair and richly clad, who, at that day,
+      furnished the favourite attendants to rank of either sex.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;By my troth,&rdquo; cried one of these young servitors, pushing from him the
+      dice with which himself and his companion had sought to beguile their
+      leisure, &ldquo;this is but dull work! and the best part of the day is gone. Our
+      lady is late.&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;And I have donned my new velvet mantle,&rdquo; replied the other,
+      compassionately eyeing his finery.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;Chut, Giacomo,&rdquo; said his comrade, yawning; &ldquo;a truce with thy conceit.&mdash;What
+      news abroad, I wonder? Has his Holiness come to his senses yet?&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;His senses! what, is he mad then?&rdquo; quoth Giacomo, in a serious and
+      astonished whisper.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;I think he is; if, being Pope, he does not discover that he may at length
+      lay aside mask and hood. &lsquo;Continent Cardinal&mdash;lewd Pope,&rsquo; is the old
+      motto, you know; something must be the matter with the good man&rsquo;s brain if
+      he continue to live like a hermit.&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;Oh, I have you! but faith, his Holiness has proxies eno&rsquo;. The bishops
+      take care to prevent women, Heaven bless them! going out of fashion; and
+      Albornoz does not maintain your proverb, touching the Cardinals.&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;True, but Giles is a warrior,&mdash;a cardinal in the church, but a
+      soldier in the city.&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;Will he carry the fort here, think you, Angelo?&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;Why, fort is female, but&mdash;&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;But what?&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;The Signora&rsquo;s brow is made for power, rather than love, fair as it is.
+      She sees in Albornoz the prince, and not the lover. With what a step she
+      sweeps the floor! it disdains even the cloth of gold!&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;Hark!&rdquo; cried Giacomo, hastening to the lattice, &ldquo;hear you the hoofs
+      below? Ah, a gallant company!&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;Returned from hawking,&rdquo; answered Angelo, regarding wistfully the
+      cavalcade, as it swept the narrow street. &ldquo;Plumes waving, steeds
+      curvetting&mdash;see how yon handsome cavalier presses close to that
+      dame!&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;His mantle is the colour of mine,&rdquo; sighed Giacomo.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      As the gay procession paced slowly on, till hidden by the winding street,
+      and as the sound of laughter and the tramp of horses was yet faintly
+      heard, there frowned right before the straining gaze of the pages, a dark
+      massive tower of the mighty masonry of the eleventh century: the sun
+      gleamed sadly on its vast and dismal surface, which was only here and
+      there relieved by loopholes and narrow slits, rather than casements. It
+      was a striking contrast to the gaiety around, the glittering shops, and
+      the gaudy train that had just filled the space below. This contrast the
+      young men seemed involuntarily to feel; they drew back, and looked at each
+      other.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;I know your thoughts, Giacomo,&rdquo; said Angelo, the handsomer and elder of
+      the two. &ldquo;You think yon tower affords but a gloomy lodgment?&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;And I thank my stars that made me not high enough to require so grand a
+      cage,&rdquo; rejoined Giacomo.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;Yet,&rdquo; observed Angelo, &ldquo;it holds one, who in birth was not our superior.&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;Do tell me something of that strange man,&rdquo; said Giacomo, regaining his
+      seat; &ldquo;you are Roman and should know.&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;Yes!&rdquo; answered Angelo, haughtily drawing himself up, &ldquo;I am Roman! and I
+      should be unworthy my birth, if I had not already learned what honour is
+      due to the name of Cola di Rienzi.&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;Yet your fellow-Romans merely stoned him, I fancy,&rdquo; muttered Giacomo.
+      &ldquo;Honour seems to lie more in kicks than money. Can you tell me,&rdquo; continued
+      the page in a louder key, &ldquo;can you tell me if it be true, that Rienzi
+      appeared at Prague before the Emperor, and prophesied that the late Pope
+      and all the Cardinals should be murdered, and a new Italian Pope elected,
+      who should endue the Emperor with a golden crown, as Sovereign of Sicilia,
+      Calabria, and Apulia, (An absurd fable, adopted by certain historians.)
+      and himself with a crown of silver, as King of Rome, and all Italy? And&mdash;&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;Hush!&rdquo; interrupted Angelo, impatiently. &ldquo;Listen to me, and you shall know
+      the exact story. On last leaving Rome (thou knowest that, after his fall,
+      he was present at the Jubilee in disguise) the Tribune&mdash;&rdquo; here
+      Angelo, pausing, looked round, and then with a flushed cheek and raised
+      voice resumed, &ldquo;Yes, the Tribune, that was and shall be&mdash;travelled in
+      disguise, as a pilgrim, over mountain and forest, night and day, exposed
+      to rain and storm, no shelter but the cave,&mdash;he who had been, they
+      say, the very spoilt one of Luxury. Arrived at length in Bohemia, he
+      disclosed himself to a Florentine in Prague, and through his aid obtained
+      audience of the Emperor Charles.&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;A prudent man, the Emperor!&rdquo; said Giacomo, &ldquo;close-fisted as a miser. He
+      makes conquests by bargain, and goes to market for laurels,&mdash;as I
+      have heard my brother say, who was under him.&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;True; but I have also heard that he likes bookmen and scholars&mdash;is
+      wise and temperate, and much is yet hoped from him in Italy! Before the
+      Emperor, I say, came Rienzi. &lsquo;Know, great Prince,&rsquo; said he, &lsquo;that I am
+      that Rienzi to whom God gave to govern Rome, in peace, with justice, and
+      to freedom. I curbed the nobles, I purged corruption, I amended law. The
+      powerful persecuted me&mdash;pride and envy have chased me from my
+      dominions. Great as you are, fallen as I am, I too have wielded the
+      sceptre and might have worn a crown. Know, too, that I am illegitimately
+      of your lineage; my father the son of Henry VII.; (Uncle to the Emperor
+      Charles.) the blood of the Teuton rolls in my veins; mean as were my
+      earlier fortunes and humble my earlier name! From you, O King, I seek
+      protection, and I demand justice.&rdquo; (See, for this speech, &ldquo;the Anonymous
+      Biographer,&rdquo; lib. ii. cap. 12.)
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;A bold speech, and one from equal to equal,&rdquo; said Giacomo; &ldquo;surely you
+      swell us out the words.&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;Not a whit; they were written down by the Emperor&rsquo;s scribe, and every
+      Roman who has once heard knows them by heart: once every Roman was the
+      equal to a king, and Rienzi maintained our dignity in asserting his own.&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      Giacomo, who discreetly avoided quarrels, knew the weak side of his
+      friend; and though in his heart he thought the Romans as good-for-nothing
+      a set of turbulent dastards as all Italy might furnish, he merely picked a
+      straw from his mantle, and said, in rather an impatient tone, &ldquo;Humph!
+      proceed! did the Emperor dismiss him?&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;Not so: Charles was struck with his bearing and his spirit, received him
+      graciously, and entertained him hospitably. He remained some time at
+      Prague, and astonished all the learned with his knowledge and eloquence.&rdquo;
+       (His Italian contemporary delights in representing this remarkable man as
+      another Crichton. &ldquo;Disputava,&rdquo; he says of him when at Prague, &ldquo;disputava
+      con Mastri di teologia; molto diceva, parlava cose meravigliose...abbair
+      fea ogni persona.&rdquo;&mdash;&ldquo;He disputed with Masters of theology&mdash;he
+      spoke much, he discoursed things wonderful&mdash;he astonished every
+      one.&rdquo;)
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;But if so honoured at Prague, how comes he a prisoner at Avignon?&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;Giacomo,&rdquo; said Angelo, thoughtfully, &ldquo;there are some men whom we, of
+      another mind and mould, can rarely comprehend, and never fathom. And of
+      such men I have observed that a supreme confidence in their own fortunes
+      or their own souls, is the most common feature. Thus impressed, and thus
+      buoyed, they rush into danger with a seeming madness, and from danger soar
+      to greatness, or sink to death. So with Rienzi; dissatisfied with empty
+      courtesies and weary of playing the pedant, since once he had played the
+      prince;&mdash;some say of his own accord, (though others relate that he
+      was surrendered to the Pope&rsquo;s legate by Charles,) he left the Emperor&rsquo;s
+      court, and without arms, without money, betook himself at once to
+      Avignon!&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;Madness indeed!&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;Yet, perhaps his only course, under all circumstances,&rdquo; resumed the elder
+      page. &ldquo;Once before his fall, and once during his absence from Rome, he had
+      been excommunicated by the Pope&rsquo;s legate. He was accused of heresy&mdash;the
+      ban was still on him. It was necessary that he should clear himself. How
+      was the poor exile to do so? No powerful friend stood up for the friend of
+      the people. No courtier vindicated one who had trampled on the neck of the
+      nobles. His own genius was his only friend; on that only could he rely. He
+      sought Avignon, to free himself from the accusations against him; and,
+      doubtless, he hoped that there was but one step from his acquittal to his
+      restoration. Besides, it is certain that the Emperor had been applied to,
+      formally to surrender Rienzi. He had the choice before him; for to that
+      sooner or later it must come&mdash;to go free, or to go in bonds&mdash;as
+      a criminal, or as a Roman. He chose the latter. Wherever he passed along,
+      the people rose in every town, in every hamlet. The name of the great
+      Tribune was honoured throughout all Italy. They besought him not to rush
+      into the very den of peril&mdash;they implored him to save himself for
+      that country which he had sought to raise. &lsquo;I go to vindicate myself, and
+      to triumph,&rsquo; was the Tribune&rsquo;s answer. Solemn honours were paid him in the
+      cities through which he passed; (&ldquo;Per tutto la via li furo fatti solenni
+      onori,&rdquo; &amp;c.&mdash;&ldquo;Vita di Cola di Rienzi&rdquo;, lib. ii. cap. 13.) and I
+      am told that never ambassador, prince, or baron, entered Avignon with so
+      long a train as that which followed into these very walls the steps of
+      Cola di Rienzi.&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;And on his arrival?&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;He demanded an audience, that he might refute the charges against him. He
+      flung down the gage to the proud cardinals who had excommunicated him. He
+      besought a trial.&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;And what said the Pope?&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;Nothing&mdash;by word. Yon tower was his answer!&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;A rough one!&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;But there have been longer roads than that from the prison to the palace,
+      and God made not men like Rienzi for the dungeon and the chain.&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      As Angelo said this with a loud voice, and with all the enthusiasm with
+      which the fame of the fallen Tribune had inspired the youth of Rome, he
+      heard a sigh behind him. He turned in some confusion, and at the door
+      which admitted to the chamber occupied by the Signora Cesarini, stood a
+      female of noble presence. Attired in the richest garments, gold and gems
+      were dull to the lustre of her dark eyes, and as she now stood, erect and
+      commanding, never seemed brow more made for the regal crown&mdash;never
+      did human beauty more fully consummate the ideal of a heroine and a queen.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;Pardon me, Signora,&rdquo; said Angelo, hesitatingly; &ldquo;I spoke loud, I
+      disturbed you; but I am Roman, and my theme was&mdash;&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;Rienzi!&rdquo; said the lady, approaching; &ldquo;a fit one to stir a Roman heart.
+      Nay&mdash;no excuses: they would sound ill on thy generous lips. Ah, if&mdash;&rdquo;
+       the Signora paused suddenly, and sighed again; then in an altered and
+      graver tone she resumed&mdash;&ldquo;If fate restore Rienzi to his proper
+      fortunes, he shall know what thou deemest of him.&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;If you, lady, who are of Naples,&rdquo; said Angelo, with meaning emphasis,
+      &ldquo;speak thus of a fallen exile, what must I have felt who acknowledge a
+      sovereign?&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;Rienzi is not of Rome alone&mdash;he is of Italy&mdash;of the world,&rdquo;
+       returned the Signora. &ldquo;And you, Angelo, who have had the boldness to speak
+      thus of one fallen, have proved with what loyalty you can serve those who
+      have the fortune to own you.&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      As she spoke, the Signora looked at the page&rsquo;s downcast and blushing face
+      long and wistfully, with the gaze of one accustomed to read the soul in
+      the countenance.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;Men are often deceived,&rdquo; said she sadly, yet with a half smile; &ldquo;but
+      women rarely,&mdash;save in love. Would that Rome were filled with such as
+      you! Enough! Hark! Is that the sound of hoofs in the court below?&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;Madam,&rdquo; said Giacomo, bringing his mantle gallantly over his shoulder, &ldquo;I
+      see the servitors of Monsignore the Cardinal d&rsquo;Albornoz.&mdash;It is the
+      Cardinal himself.&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;It is well!&rdquo; said the Signora, with a brightening eye; &ldquo;I await him!&rdquo;
+       With these words she withdrew by the door through which she had surprised
+      the Roman page.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      <a name="link2HCH0044" id="link2HCH0044">
+      <!--  H2 anchor --> </a>
+    </p>
+    <div style="height: 4em;">
+      <br /><br /><br /><br />
+    </div>
+    <h2>
+      Chapter 7.II. The Character of a Warrior Priest&mdash;an Interview&mdash;the
+    </h2>
+    <p>
+      Intrigue and Counter-intrigue of Courts.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      Giles, (or Egidio, (Egidio is the proper Italian equivalent to the French
+      name Gilles,&mdash;but the Cardinal is generally called, by the writers of
+      that day, Gilio d&rsquo;Albornoz.)) Cardinal d&rsquo;Albornoz, was one of the most
+      remarkable men of that remarkable time, so prodigal of genius. Boasting
+      his descent from the royal houses of Aragon and Leon, he had early entered
+      the church, and yet almost a youth, attained the archbishopric of Toledo.
+      But no peaceful career, however brilliant, sufficed to his ambition. He
+      could not content himself with the honours of the church, unless they were
+      the honours of a church militant. In the war against the Moors, no
+      Spaniard had more highly distinguished himself; and Alphonso XI. king of
+      Castile, had insisted on receiving from the hand of the martial priest the
+      badge of knighthood. After the death of Alphonso, who was strongly
+      attached to him, Albornoz repaired to Avignon, and obtained from Clement
+      VI. the cardinal&rsquo;s hat. With Innocent he continued in high favour, and
+      now, constantly in the councils of the Pope, rumours of warlike
+      preparation, under the banners of Albornoz, for the recovery of the papal
+      dominions from the various tyrants that usurped them, were already
+      circulated through the court. (It is a characteristic anecdote of this
+      bold Churchman, that Urban V. one day demanded an account of the sums
+      spent in his military expedition against the Italian tyrants. The Cardinal
+      presented to the Pope a wagon, filled with the keys of the cities and
+      fortresses he had taken. &ldquo;This is my account,&rdquo; said he; &ldquo;you perceive how
+      I have invested your money.&rdquo; The Pope embraced him, and gave him no
+      further trouble about his accounts.) Bold, sagacious, enterprising, and
+      cold-hearted,&mdash;with the valour of the knight, and the cunning of the
+      priest,&mdash;such was the character of Giles, Cardinal d&rsquo;Albornoz.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      Leaving his attendant gentlemen in the antechamber, Albornoz was ushered
+      into the apartment of the Signora Cesarini. In person, the Cardinal was
+      about the middle height; the dark complexion of Spain had faded by
+      thought, and the wear of ambitious schemes, into a sallow but hardy hue;
+      his brow was deeply furrowed, and though not yet passed the prime of life,
+      Albornoz might seem to have entered age, but for the firmness of his step,
+      the slender elasticity of his frame, and an eye which had acquired
+      calmness and depth from thought, without losing any of the brilliancy of
+      youth.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;Beautiful Signora,&rdquo; said the Cardinal, bending over the hand of the
+      Cesarini with a grace which betokened more of the prince than of the
+      priest; &ldquo;the commands of his Holiness have detained me, I fear, beyond the
+      hour in which you vouchsafed to appoint my homage, but my heart has been
+      with you since we parted.&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;The Cardinal d&rsquo;Albornoz,&rdquo; replied the Signora, gently withdrawing her
+      hand, and seating herself, &ldquo;has so many demands on his time, from the
+      duties of his rank and renown, that methinks to divert his attention for a
+      few moments to less noble thoughts is a kind of treason to his fame.&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;Ah, Lady,&rdquo; replied the Cardinal, &ldquo;never was my ambition so nobly directed
+      as it is now. And it were a prouder lot to be at thy feet than on the
+      throne of St. Peter.&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      A momentary blush passed over the cheek of the Signora, yet it seemed the
+      blush of indignation as much as of vanity; it was succeeded by an extreme
+      paleness. She paused before she replied; and then fixing her large and
+      haughty eyes on the enamoured Spaniard, she said, in a low voice,
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;My Lord Cardinal, I do not affect to misunderstand your words; neither do
+      I place them to the account of a general gallantry. I am vain enough to
+      believe you imagine you speak truly when you say you love me.&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;Imagine!&rdquo; echoed the Spaniard.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;Listen to me,&rdquo; continued the Signora. &ldquo;She whom the Cardinal Albornoz
+      honours with his love has a right to demand of him its proofs. In the
+      papal court, whose power like his?&mdash;I require you to exercise it for
+      me.&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;Speak, dearest Lady; have your estates been seized by the barbarians of
+      these lawless times? Hath any dared to injure you? Lands and titles, are
+      these thy wish?&mdash;my power is thy slave.&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;Cardinal, no! there is one thing dearer to an Italian and a woman than
+      wealth or station&mdash;it is revenge!&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      The Cardinal drew back from the flashing eye that was bent upon him, but
+      the spirit of her speech touched a congenial chord.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;There,&rdquo; said he, after a little hesitation, &ldquo;there spake high descent.
+      Revenge is the luxury of the well-born. Let serfs and churls forgive an
+      injury. Proceed, Lady.&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;Hast thou heard the last news from Rome?&rdquo; asked the Signora.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;Surely,&rdquo; replied the Cardinal, in some surprise, &ldquo;we were poor statesmen
+      to be ignorant of the condition of the capital of the papal dominions; and
+      my heart mourns for that unfortunate city. But wherefore wouldst thou
+      question me of Rome?&mdash;thou art&mdash;&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;Roman! Know, my Lord, that I have a purpose in calling myself of Naples.
+      To your discretion I intrust my secret&mdash;I am of Rome! Tell me of her
+      state.&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;Fairest one,&rdquo; returned the Cardinal, &ldquo;I should have known that that brow
+      and presence were not of the light Campania. My reason should have told me
+      that they bore the stamp of the Empress of the World. The state of Rome,&rdquo;
+       continued Albornoz, in a graver tone, &ldquo;is briefly told. Thou knowest that
+      after the fall of the able but insolent Rienzi, Pepin, count of Minorbino,
+      (a creature of Montreal&rsquo;s) who had assisted in expelling him, would have
+      betrayed Rome to Montreal,&mdash;but he was neither strong enough nor wise
+      enough, and the Barons chased him as he had chased the Tribune. Some time
+      afterwards a new demagogue, John Cerroni, was installed in the Capitol. He
+      once more expelled the nobles; new revolutions ensued&mdash;the Barons
+      were recalled. The weak successor of Rienzi summoned the people to arms&mdash;in
+      vain: in terror and despair he abdicated his power, and left the city a
+      prey to the interminable feuds of the Orsini, the Colonna, and the
+      Savelli.&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;Thus much I know, my Lord; but when his Holiness succeeded to the chair
+      of Clement VI.&mdash;&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;Then,&rdquo; said Albornoz, and a slight frown darkened his sallow brow, &ldquo;then
+      came the blacker part of the history. Two senators were elected in concert
+      by the Pope.&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;Their names?&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;Bertoldo Orsini, and one of the Colonna. A few weeks afterwards, the high
+      price of provisions stung the rascal stomachs of the mob&mdash;they rose,
+      they clamoured, they armed, they besieged the Capitol&mdash;&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;Well, well,&rdquo; cried the Signora, clasping her hands, and betokening in
+      every feature her interest in the narration.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;Colonna only escaped death by a vile disguise; Bertoldo Orsini was
+      stoned.&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;Stoned!&mdash;there fell one!&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;Yes, lady, one of a great house; the least drop of whose blood were worth
+      an ocean of plebeian puddle. At present, all is disorder, misrule,
+      anarchy, at Rome. The contests of the nobles shake the city to the centre;
+      and prince and people, wearied of so many experiments to establish a
+      government, have now no governor but the fear of the sword. Such, fair
+      madam, is the state of Rome. Sigh not, it occupies now our care. It shall
+      be remedied; and I, madam, may be the happy instrument of restoring peace
+      to your native city.&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;There is but one way of restoring peace to Rome,&rdquo; answered the Signora,
+      abruptly, &ldquo;and that is&mdash;The restoration of Rienzi!&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      The Cardinal started. &ldquo;Madam,&rdquo; said he, &ldquo;do I hear aright?&mdash;are you
+      not nobly born?&mdash;can you desire the rise of a plebeian? Did you not
+      speak of revenge, and now you ask for mercy?&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;Lord Cardinal,&rdquo; said the beautiful Signora, earnestly, &ldquo;I do not ask for
+      mercy: such a word is not for the lips of one who demands justice. Nobly
+      born I am&mdash;ay, and from a stock to whose long descent from the
+      patricians of ancient Rome the high line of Aragon itself would be of
+      yesterday. Nay, I would not offend you, Monsignore; your greatness is not
+      borrowed from pedigrees and tombstones&mdash;your greatness is your own
+      achieving: would you speak honestly, my Lord, you would own that you are
+      proud only of your own laurels, and that, in your heart, you laugh at the
+      stately fools who trick themselves out in the mouldering finery of the
+      dead!&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;Muse! prophetess! you speak aright,&rdquo; said the high-spirited Cardinal,
+      with unwonted energy; &ldquo;and your voice is like that of the Fame I dreamed
+      of in my youth. Speak on, speak ever!&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;Such,&rdquo; continued the Signora, &ldquo;such as your pride, is the just pride of
+      Rienzi. Proud that he is the workman of his own great renown. In such as
+      the Tribune of Rome we acknowledge the founders of noble lineage. Ancestry
+      makes not them&mdash;they make ancestry. Enough of this. I am of noble
+      race, it is true; but my house, and those of many, have been crushed and
+      broken beneath the yoke of the Orsini and Colonna&mdash;it is against them
+      I desire revenge. But I am better than an Italian lady&mdash;I am a Roman
+      woman&mdash;I weep tears of blood for the disorders of my unhappy country.
+      I mourn that even you, my Lord,&mdash;yes, that a barbarian, however
+      eminent and however great, should mourn for Rome. I desire to restore her
+      fortunes.&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;But Rienzi would only restore his own.&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;Not so, my Lord Cardinal; not so. Ambitious and proud he may be&mdash;great
+      souls are so&mdash;but he has never had one wish divorced from the welfare
+      of Rome. But put aside all thought of his interests&mdash;it is not of
+      these I speak. You desire to re-establish the papal power in Rome. Your
+      senators have failed to do it. Demagogues fail&mdash;Rienzi alone can
+      succeed; he alone can command the turbulent passions of the Barons&mdash;he
+      alone can sway the capricious and fickle mob. Release, restore Rienzi, and
+      through Rienzi the Pope regains Rome!&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      The Cardinal did not answer for some moments. Buried as in a revery, he
+      sate motionless, shading his face with his hand. Perhaps he secretly owned
+      there was a wiser policy in the suggestions of the Signora than he cared
+      openly to confess. Lifting his head, at length, from his bosom, he fixed
+      his eyes upon the Signora&rsquo;s watchful countenance, and, with a forced
+      smile, said,
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;Pardon me, madam; but while we play the politicians, forget not that I am
+      thy adorer. Sagacious may be thy counsels, yet wherefore are they urged?
+      Why this anxious interest for Rienzi? If by releasing him the Church may
+      gain an ally, am I sure that Giles d&rsquo;Albornoz will not raise a rival?&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;My Lord,&rdquo; said the Signora, half rising, &ldquo;you are my suitor; but your
+      rank does not tempt me&mdash;your gold cannot buy. If you love me, I have
+      a right to command your services to whatsoever task I would require&mdash;it
+      is the law of chivalry. If ever I yield to the addresses of mortal lover,
+      it will be to the man who restores to my native land her hero and her
+      saviour.&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;Fair patriot,&rdquo; said the Cardinal, &ldquo;your words encourage my hope, yet they
+      half damp my ambition; for fain would I desire that love and not service
+      should alone give me the treasure that I ask. But hear me, sweet lady; you
+      over-rate my power: I cannot deliver Rienzi&mdash;he is accused of
+      rebellion, he is excommunicated for heresy. His acquittal rests with
+      himself.&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;You can procure his trial?&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;Perhaps, Lady.&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;That is his acquittal. And a private audience of his Holiness?&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;Doubtless.&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;That is his restoration! Behold all I ask!&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;And then, sweet Roman, it will be mine to ask,&rdquo; said the Cardinal,
+      passionately, dropping on his knee, and taking the Signora&rsquo;s hand. For one
+      moment, that proud lady felt that she was woman&mdash;she blushed, she
+      trembled; but it was not (could the Cardinal have read that heart) with
+      passion or with weakness; it was with terror and with shame. Passively she
+      surrendered her hand to the Cardinal, who covered it with kisses.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;Thus inspired,&rdquo; said Albornoz, rising, &ldquo;I will not doubt of success.
+      Tomorrow I wait on thee again.&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      He pressed her hand to his heart&mdash;the lady felt it not. He sighed his
+      farewell&mdash;she did not hear it. Lingeringly he gazed; and slowly he
+      departed. But it was some moments before, recalled to herself, the Signora
+      felt that she was alone.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;Alone!&rdquo; she cried, half aloud, and with wild emphasis&mdash;&ldquo;alone! Oh,
+      what have I undergone&mdash;what have I said! Unfaithful, even in thought,
+      to him! Oh, never! never! I, that have felt the kiss of his hallowing lips&mdash;that
+      have slept on his kingly heart&mdash;I!&mdash;holy Mother, befriend and
+      strengthen me!&rdquo; she continued, as, weeping bitterly, she sunk upon her
+      knees; and for some moments she was lost in prayer. Then, rising composed,
+      but deadly pale, and with the tears rolling heavily down her cheeks, the
+      Signora passed slowly to the casement; she threw it open, and bent
+      forward; the air of the declining day came softly on her temples; it
+      cooled, it mitigated, the fever that preyed within. Dark and huge before
+      her frowned, in its gloomy shadow, the tower in which Rienzi was confined;
+      she gazed at it long and wistfully, and then, turning away, drew from the
+      folds of her robe a small and sharp dagger. &ldquo;Let me save him for glory!&rdquo;
+       she murmured; &ldquo;and this shall save me from dishonour!&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      <a name="link2HCH0045" id="link2HCH0045">
+      <!--  H2 anchor --> </a>
+    </p>
+    <div style="height: 4em;">
+      <br /><br /><br /><br />
+    </div>
+    <h2>
+      Chapter 7.III. Holy Men.&mdash;Sagacious Deliberations.&mdash;Just
+      Resolves.&mdash;And
+    </h2>
+    <p>
+      Sordid Motives to All.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      Enamoured of the beauty, and almost equally so of the lofty spirit, of the
+      Signora Cesarini, as was the warlike Cardinal of Spain, love with him was
+      not so master a passion as that ambition of complete success in all the
+      active designs of life, which had hitherto animated his character and
+      signalized his career. Musing, as he left the Signora, on her wish for the
+      restoration of the Roman Tribune, his experienced and profound intellect
+      ran swiftly through whatever advantages to his own political designs might
+      result from that restoration. We have seen that it was the intention of
+      the new Pontiff to attempt the recovery of the patrimonial territories,
+      now torn from him by the gripe of able and disaffected tyrants. With this
+      view, a military force was already in preparation, and the Cardinal was
+      already secretly nominated the chief. But the force was very inadequate to
+      the enterprise; and Albornoz depended much upon the moral strength of the
+      cause in bringing recruits to his standard in his progress through the
+      Italian states. The wonderful rise of Rienzi had excited an extraordinary
+      enthusiasm in his favour through all the free populations of Italy. And
+      this had been yet more kindled and inflamed by the influential eloquence
+      of Petrarch, who, at that time, possessed of a power greater than ever,
+      before or since, (not even excepting the Sage of Ferney,) wielded by a
+      single literary man, had put forth his boldest genius in behalf of the
+      Roman Tribune. Such a companion as Rienzi in the camp of the Cardinal
+      might be a magnet of attraction to the youth and enterprise of Italy. On
+      nearing Rome, he might himself judge how far it would be advisable to
+      reinstate Rienzi as a delegate of the papal power. And, in the meanwhile,
+      the Roman&rsquo;s influence might be serviceable, whether to awe the rebellious
+      nobles or conciliate the stubborn people. On the other hand, the Cardinal
+      was shrewd enough to perceive that no possible good could arise from
+      Rienzi&rsquo;s present confinement. With every month it excited deeper and more
+      universal sympathy. To his lonely dungeon turned half the hearts of
+      republican Italy. Literature had leagued its new and sudden, and therefore
+      mighty and even disproportioned, power with his cause; and the Pope,
+      without daring to be his judge, incurred the odium of being his gaoler. &ldquo;A
+      popular prisoner,&rdquo; said the sagacious Cardinal to himself, &ldquo;is the most
+      dangerous of guests. Restore him as your servant, or destroy him as your
+      foe! In this case I see no alternative but acquittal or the knife!&rdquo; In
+      these reflections that able plotter, deep in the Machiavelism of the age,
+      divorced the lover from the statesman.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      Recurring now to the former character, he felt some disagreeable and
+      uneasy forebodings at the earnest interest of his mistress. Fain would he
+      have attributed, either to some fantasy of patriotism or some purpose of
+      revenge, the anxiety of the Cesarini; and there was much in her stern and
+      haughty character which favoured that belief. But he was forced to
+      acknowledge to himself some jealous apprehension of a sinister and latent
+      motive, which touched his vanity and alarmed his love. &ldquo;Howbeit,&rdquo; he
+      thought, as he turned from his unwilling fear, &ldquo;I can play with her at her
+      own weapons; I can obtain the release of Rienzi, and claim my reward. If
+      denied, the hand that opened the dungeon can again rivet the chain. In her
+      anxiety is my power!&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      These thoughts the Cardinal was still revolving in his palace, when he was
+      suddenly summoned to attend the Pontiff.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      The pontifical palace no longer exhibited the gorgeous yet graceful luxury
+      of Clement VI., and the sarcastic Cardinal smiled to himself at the quiet
+      gloom of the ante-chambers. &ldquo;He thinks to set an example&mdash;this poor
+      native of Limoges!&rdquo; thought Albornoz; &ldquo;and has but the mortification of
+      finding himself eclipsed by the poorest bishop. He humbles himself, and
+      fancies that the humility will be contagious.&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      His Holiness was seated before a small and rude table bestrewed with
+      papers, his face buried in his hands; the room was simply furnished, and
+      in a small niche beside the casement was an ivory crucifix; below, the
+      death&rsquo;s head and cross-bones, which most monks then introduced with a
+      purpose similar to that of the ancients by the like ornaments,&mdash;mementos
+      of the shortness of life, and therefore admonitions to make the best of
+      it! On the ground lay a map of the Patrimonial Territory, with the
+      fortresses in especial, distinctly and prominently marked. The Pope gently
+      lifted up his head as the Cardinal was announced, and discovered a plain
+      but sensible and somewhat interesting countenance. &ldquo;My son!&rdquo; said he, with
+      a kindly courtesy to the lowly salutation of the proud Spaniard, &ldquo;scarcely
+      wouldst thou imagine, after our long conference this morning, that new
+      cares would so soon demand the assistance of thy counsels. Verily, the
+      wreath of thorns stings sharp under the triple crown; and I sometimes long
+      for the quiet abode of my old professor&rsquo;s chair in Toulouse: my station is
+      of pain and toil.&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;God tempers the wind to the shorn lamb,&rdquo; observed the Cardinal, with
+      pious and compassionate gravity.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      Innocent could scarcely refrain a smile as he replied, &ldquo;The lamb that
+      carries the cross must have the strength of the lion. Since we parted, my
+      son, I have had painful intelligence; our couriers have arrived from the
+      Campagna&mdash;the heathen rage furiously&mdash;the force of John di Vico
+      has augmented fearfully, and the most redoubted adventurer of Europe has
+      enlisted under his banner.&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;Does his Holiness,&rdquo; cried the Cardinal, anxiously, &ldquo;speak of Fra Moreale,
+      the Knight of St. John?&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;Of no less a warrior,&rdquo; returned the Pontiff. &ldquo;I dread the vast ambition
+      of that wild adventurer.&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;Your Holiness hath cause,&rdquo; said the Cardinal, drily.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;Some letters of his have fallen into the hands of the servants of the
+      Church; they are here: read them, my son.&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      Albornoz received and deliberately scanned the letters; this done, he
+      replaced them on the table, and remained for a few moments silent and
+      absorbed.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;What think you, my son?&rdquo; said the Pope, at length, with an impatient and
+      even peevish tone.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;I think that, with Montreal&rsquo;s hot genius and John di Vico&rsquo;s frigid
+      villany, your Holiness may live to envy, if not the quiet, at least the
+      revenue, of the Professor&rsquo;s chair.&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;How, Cardinal!&rdquo; said the Pope, hastily, and with an angry flush on his
+      pale brow. The Cardinal quietly proceeded.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;By these letters it seems that Montreal has written to all the commanders
+      of free lances throughout Italy, offering the highest pay of a soldier to
+      every man who will join his standard, combined with the richest plunder of
+      a brigand. He meditates great schemes then!&mdash;I know the man!&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;Well,&mdash;and our course?&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;Is plain,&rdquo; said the Cardinal, loftily, and with an eye that flashed with
+      a soldier&rsquo;s fire. &ldquo;Not a moment is to be lost! Thy son should at once take
+      the field. Up with the Banner of the Church!&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;But are we strong enough? our numbers are few. Zeal slackens! the piety
+      of the Baldwins is no more!&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;Your Holiness knows well,&rdquo; said the Cardinal, &ldquo;that for the multitude of
+      men there are two watchwords of war&mdash;Liberty and Religion. If
+      Religion begins to fail, we must employ the profaner word. &lsquo;Up with the
+      Banner of the Church&mdash;and down with the tyrants!&rsquo; We will proclaim
+      equal laws and free government; (In correcting the pages of this work, in
+      the year 1847...strange coincidences between the present policy of the
+      Roman Church and that by which in the 14th century it recovered both
+      spiritual and temporal power cannot fail to suggest themselves.) and, God
+      willing, our camp shall prosper better with those promises than the tents
+      of Montreal with the more vulgar shout of &lsquo;Pay and Rapine.&rsquo;&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;Giles d&rsquo;Albornoz,&rdquo; said the Pope, emphatically; and, warmed by the spirit
+      of the Cardinal, he dropped the wonted etiquette of phrase, &ldquo;I trust
+      implicitly to you. Now the right hand of the Church&mdash;hereafter,
+      perhaps, its head. Too well I feel that the lot has fallen on a lowly
+      place. My successor must requite my deficiencies.&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      No changing hue, no brightening glance, betrayed to the searching eye of
+      the Pope whatever emotion these words had called up in the breast of the
+      ambitious Cardinal. He bowed his proud head humbly as he answered, &ldquo;Pray
+      Heaven that Innocent VI. may long live to guide the Church to glory. For
+      Giles d&rsquo;Albornoz, less priest than soldier, the din of the camp, the
+      breath of the war-steed, suggest the only aspirations which he ever dares
+      indulge. But has your Holiness imparted to your servant all that&mdash;&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;Nay,&rdquo; interrupted Innocent, &ldquo;I have yet intelligence equally ominous.
+      This John di Vico,&mdash;pest go with him!&mdash;who still styles himself
+      (the excommunicated ruffian!) Prefect of Rome, has so filled that unhappy
+      city with his emissaries, that we have well-nigh lost the seat of the
+      Apostle. Rome, long in anarchy, seems now in open rebellion. The nobles&mdash;sons
+      of Belial!&mdash;it is true, are once more humbled; but how?&mdash;One
+      Baroncelli, a new demagogue, the fiercest&mdash;the most bloody that the
+      fiend ever helped&mdash;has arisen&mdash;is invested by the mob with
+      power, and uses it to butcher the people and insult the Pontiff. Wearied
+      of the crimes of this man, (which are not even decorated by ability,) the
+      shout of the people day and night along the streets is for &lsquo;Rienzi the
+      Tribune.&rsquo;&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;Ha!&rdquo; said the Cardinal, &ldquo;Rienzi&rsquo;s faults then are forgotten in Rome, and
+      there is felt for him the same enthusiasm in that city as in the rest of
+      Italy?&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;Alas! It is so.&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;It is well, I have thought of this: Rienzi can accompany my progress&mdash;&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;My son! the rebel, the heretic&mdash;&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;By your Holiness&rsquo;s absolution will become quiet subject and orthodox
+      Catholic,&rdquo; said Albornoz. &ldquo;Men are good or bad as they suit our purpose.
+      What matters a virtue that is useless, or a crime that is useful, to us?
+      The army of the Church proceeds against tyrants&mdash;it proclaims
+      everywhere to the Papal towns the restoration of their popular
+      constitutions. Sees not your Holiness that the acquittal of Rienzi, the
+      popular darling, will be hailed an earnest of your sincerity?&mdash;sees
+      not your Holiness that his name will fight for us?&mdash;sees not your
+      Holiness that the great demagogue Rienzi must be used to extinguish the
+      little demagogue Baroncelli? We must regain the Romans, whether of the
+      city or whether in the seven towns of John di Vico. When they hear Rienzi
+      is in our camp, trust me, we shall have a multitude of deserters from the
+      tyrants&mdash;trust me, we shall hear no more of Baroncelli.&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;Ever sagacious,&rdquo; said the Pope, musingly; &ldquo;it is true, we can use this
+      man: but with caution. His genius is formidable&mdash;&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;And therefore must be conciliated; if we acquit, we must make him ours.
+      My experience has taught me this, when you cannot slay a demagogue by law,
+      crush him with honours. He must be no longer Tribune of the People. Give
+      him the Patrician title of Senator, and he is then the Lieutenant of the
+      Pope!&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;I will see to this, my son&mdash;your suggestions please, but alarm me:
+      he shall at least be examined;&mdash;but if found a heretic&mdash;&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;Should, I humbly advise, be declared a saint.&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      The Pope bent his brow for a moment, but the effort was too much for him,
+      and after a moment&rsquo;s struggle, he fairly laughed aloud.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;Go to, my son,&rdquo; said he, affectionately patting the Cardinal&rsquo;s sallow
+      cheek. &ldquo;Go to.&mdash;If the world heard thee, what would it say?&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;That Giles d&rsquo;Albornoz had just enough religion to remember that the State
+      is a Church, but not too much to forget that the Church is a State.&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      With these words the conference ended. That very evening the Pope decreed
+      that Rienzi should be permitted the trial he had demanded.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      <a name="link2HCH0046" id="link2HCH0046">
+      <!--  H2 anchor --> </a>
+    </p>
+    <div style="height: 4em;">
+      <br /><br /><br /><br />
+    </div>
+    <h2>
+      Chapter 7.IV. The Lady and the Page.
+    </h2>
+    <p>
+      It wanted three hours of midnight, when Albornoz, resuming his character
+      of gallant, despatched to the Signora Cesarini the following billet.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;Your commands are obeyed. Rienzi will receive an examination on his
+      faith. It is well that he should be prepared. It may suit your purpose, as
+      to which I am so faintly enlightened, to appear to the prisoner what you
+      are&mdash;the obtainer of this grace. See how implicitly one noble heart
+      can trust another! I send by the bearer an order that will admit one of
+      your servitors to the prisoner&rsquo;s cell. Be it, if you will, your task to
+      announce to him the new crisis of his fate. Ah! madam, may fortune be as
+      favourable to me, and grant me the same intercessor&mdash;from thy lips my
+      sentence is to come.&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      As Albornoz finished this epistle, he summoned his confidential attendant,
+      a Spanish gentleman, who saw nothing in his noble birth that should
+      prevent his fulfilling the various hests of the Cardinal.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;Alvarez,&rdquo; said he, &ldquo;these to the Signora Cesarini by another hand; thou
+      art unknown to her household. Repair to the state tower; this to the
+      Governor admits thee. Mark who is admitted to the prisoner Cola di Rienzi:
+      Know his name, examine whence he comes. Be keen, Alvarez. Learn by what
+      motive the Cesarini interests herself in the prisoner&rsquo;s fate. All too of
+      herself, birth, fortunes, lineage, would be welcome intelligence. Thou
+      comprehendest me? It is well. One caution&mdash;thou hast no mission from,
+      no connexion with, me. Thou art an officer of the prison, or of the Pope,&mdash;what
+      thou wilt. Give me the rosary; light the lamp before the crucifix; place
+      yon hair-shirt beneath those arms. I would have it appear as if meant to
+      be hidden! Tell Gomez that the Dominican preacher is to be admitted.&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;Those friars have zeal,&rdquo; continued the Cardinal to himself, as, after
+      executing his orders, Alvarez withdrew. &ldquo;They would burn a man&mdash;but
+      only on the Bible? They are worth conciliating, if the triple crown be
+      really worth the winning; were it mine, I would add the eagle&rsquo;s plume to
+      it.&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      And plunged into the aspiring future, this bold man forgot even the object
+      of his passion. In real life, after a certain age, ambitious men love
+      indeed; but it is only as an interlude. And indeed with most men, life has
+      more absorbing though not more frequent concerns than those of love. Love
+      is the business of the idle, but the idleness of the busy.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      The Cesarini was alone when the Cardinal&rsquo;s messenger arrived, and he was
+      scarcely dismissed with a few lines, expressive of a gratitude which
+      seemed to bear down all those guards with which the coldness of the
+      Signora usually fenced her pride, before the page Angelo was summoned to
+      her presence.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      The room was dark with the shades of the gathering night when the youth
+      entered, and he discerned but dimly the outline of the Signora&rsquo;s stately
+      form; but by the tone of her voice, he perceived that she was deeply
+      agitated.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;Angelo,&rdquo; said she, as he approached, &ldquo;Angelo&mdash;&rdquo; and her voice failed
+      her. She paused as for breath and again proceeded. &ldquo;You alone have served
+      us faithfully; you alone shared our escape, our wanderings, our exile&mdash;you
+      alone know my secret&mdash;you of my train alone are Roman!&mdash;Roman!
+      it was once a great name. Angelo, the name has fallen; but it is only
+      because the nature of the Roman Race fell first. Haughty they are, but
+      fickle; fierce, but dastard; vehement in promise, but rotten in their
+      faith. You are a Roman, and though I have proved your truth, your very
+      birth makes me afraid of falsehood.&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;Madam,&rdquo; said the page; &ldquo;I was but a child when you admitted me of your
+      service, and I am yet only on the verge of manhood. But boy though I yet
+      be, I would brave the stoutest lance of knight, or freebooter, in defence
+      of the faith of Angelo Villani, to his liege Lady and his native land.&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;Alas! alas!&rdquo; said the Signora, bitterly, &ldquo;such have been the words of
+      thousands of thy race. What have been their deeds? But I will trust thee,
+      as I have trusted ever. I know that thou art covetous of honour, that thou
+      hast youth&rsquo;s comely and bright ambition.&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;I am an orphan and a bastard,&rdquo; said Angelo, bluntly! &ldquo;And circumstance
+      stings me sharply on to action; I would win my own name.&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;Thou shalt,&rdquo; said the Signora. &ldquo;We shall live yet to reward thee. And now
+      be quick. Bring hither one of thy page&rsquo;s suits,&mdash;mantle and
+      head-gear. Quick, I say, and whisper not to a soul what I have asked of
+      thee.&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      <a name="link2HCH0047" id="link2HCH0047">
+      <!--  H2 anchor --> </a>
+    </p>
+    <div style="height: 4em;">
+      <br /><br /><br /><br />
+    </div>
+    <h2>
+      Chapter 7.V. The Inmate of the Tower.
+    </h2>
+    <p>
+      The night slowly advanced, and in the highest chamber of that dark and
+      rugged tower which fronted the windows of the Cesarini&rsquo;s palace sate a
+      solitary prisoner. A single lamp burned before him on a table of stone,
+      and threw its rays over an open Bible; and those stern but fantastic
+      legends of the prowess of ancient Rome, which the genius of Livy has
+      dignified into history. (&ldquo;Avea libri assai, suo Tito Livio, sue storie di
+      Roma, la Bibbia et altri libri assai, non finava di studiare.&rdquo;&mdash;&ldquo;Vita
+      di Cola di Rienzi&rdquo;, lib. ii. cap. 13. See translation to motto to Book
+      VII. page 202.) A chain hung pendent from the vault of the tower, and
+      confined the captive; but so as to leave his limbs at sufficient liberty
+      to measure at will the greater part of the cell. Green and damp were the
+      mighty stones of the walls, and through a narrow aperture, high out of
+      reach, came the moonlight, and slept in long shadow over the rude floor. A
+      bed at one corner completed the furniture of the room. Such for months had
+      been the abode of the conqueror of the haughtiest Barons, and the
+      luxurious dictator of the stateliest city of the world!
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      Care, and travel, and time, and adversity, had wrought their change in the
+      person of Rienzi. The proportions of his frame had enlarged from the
+      compact strength of earlier manhood, the clear paleness of his cheek was
+      bespread with a hectic and deceitful glow. Even in his present studies,
+      intent as they seemed, and genial though the lecture to a mind
+      enthusiastic even to fanaticism, his eyes could not rivet themselves as of
+      yore steadily to the page. The charm was gone from the letters. Every now
+      and then he moved restlessly, started, re-settled himself, and muttered
+      broken exclamations like a man in an anxious dream. Anon, his gaze
+      impatiently turned upward, about, around, and there was a strange and
+      wandering fire in those large deep eyes, which might have thrilled the
+      beholder with a vague and unaccountable awe.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      Angelo had in the main correctly narrated the more recent adventures of
+      Rienzi after his fall. He had first with Nina and Angelo betaken himself
+      to Naples, and found a fallacious and brief favour with Louis, king of
+      Hungary; that harsh but honourable monarch had refused to yield his
+      illustrious guest to the demands of Clement, but had plainly declared his
+      inability to shelter him in safety. Maintaining secret intercourse with
+      his partisans at Rome, the fugitive then sought a refuge with the
+      Eremites, sequestered in the lone recesses of the Monte Maiella, where in
+      solitude and thought he had passed a whole year, save the time consumed in
+      his visit to and return from Florence. Taking advantage of the Jubilee in
+      Rome, he had then, disguised as a pilgrim, traversed the vales and
+      mountains still rich in the melancholy ruins of ancient Rome, and entering
+      the city, his restless and ambitious spirit indulged in new but vain
+      conspiracies! (Rainald, Ann. 1350, N. 4, E. 5.) Excommunicated a second
+      time by the Cardinal di Ceccano, and again a fugitive, he shook the dust
+      from his feet as he left the city, and raising his hands towards those
+      walls, in which are yet traced the witness of the Tarquins, cried aloud&mdash;&ldquo;Honoured
+      as thy prince&mdash;persecuted as thy victim&mdash;Rome, Rome, thou shalt
+      yet receive me as thy conqueror!&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      Still disguised as a pilgrim, he passed unmolested through Italy into the
+      Court of the Emperor Charles of Bohemia, where the page, who had probably
+      witnessed, had rightly narrated, his reception. It is doubtful, however,
+      whether the conduct of the Emperor had been as chivalrous as appears by
+      Angelo&rsquo;s relation, or whether he had not delivered Rienzi to the Pontiff&rsquo;s
+      emissaries. At all events it is certain, that from Prague to Avignon, the
+      path of the fallen Tribune had been as one triumph. His strange adventures&mdash;his
+      unbroken spirit&mdash;the new power that Intellect daily and wonderfully
+      excited over the minds of the rising generation&mdash;the eloquence of
+      Petrarch, and the common sympathy of the vulgar for fallen greatness,&mdash;all
+      conspired to make Rienzi the hero of the age. Not a town through which he
+      passed which would not have risked a siege for his protection&mdash;not a
+      house that would not have sheltered him&mdash;not a hand that would not
+      have struck in his defence. Refusing all offers of aid, disdaining all
+      occasion of escape, inspired by his indomitable hope, and his unalloyed
+      belief in the brightness of his own destinies, the Tribune sought Avignon&mdash;and
+      found a dungeon!
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      These, his external adventures, are briefly and easily told; but who shall
+      tell what passed within?&mdash;who narrate the fearful history of the
+      heart?&mdash;who paint the rapid changes of emotion and of thought&mdash;the
+      indignant grief&mdash;the stern dejection&mdash;the haughty disappointment
+      that saddened while it never destroyed the resolve of that great soul? Who
+      can say what must have been endured, what meditated, in the hermitage of
+      Maiella;&mdash;on the lonely hills of the perished empire it had been his
+      dream to restore;&mdash;in the Courts of Barbarian Kings;&mdash;and above
+      all, on returning obscure and disguised, amidst the crowds of the
+      Christian world, to the seat of his former power? What elements of memory,
+      and in what a wild and fiery brain! What reflections to be conned in the
+      dungeons of Avignon, by a man who had pushed into all the fervour of
+      fanaticism&mdash;four passions, a single one of which has, in excess,
+      sufficed to wreck the strongest reason&mdash;passions, which in themselves
+      it is most difficult to combine,&mdash;the dreamer&mdash;the aspirant&mdash;the
+      very nympholept of Freedom, yet of Power&mdash;of Knowledge, yet of
+      Religion!
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;Ay,&rdquo; muttered the prisoner, &ldquo;ay, these texts are comforting&mdash;comforting.
+      The righteous are not alway oppressed.&rdquo; With a long sigh he deliberately
+      put aside the Bible, kissed it with great reverence, remained silent, and
+      musing for some minutes; and then as a slight noise was heard at one
+      corner of the cell, said softly, &ldquo;Ah, my friends, my comrades, the rats!
+      it is their hour&mdash;I am glad I put aside the bread for them!&rdquo; His eye
+      brightened as it now detected those strange and unsocial animals venturing
+      forth through a hole in the wall, and, darkening the moonshine on the
+      floor, steal fearlessly towards him. He flung some fragments of bread to
+      them, and for some moments watched their gambols with a smile. &ldquo;Manchino,
+      the white-faced rascal! he beats all the rest&mdash;ha, ha! he is a
+      superior wretch&mdash;he commands the tribe, and will venture the first
+      into the trap. How will he bite against the steel, the fine fellow! while
+      all the ignobler herd will gaze at him afar off, and quake and fear, and
+      never help. Yet if united, they might gnaw the trap and release their
+      leader! Ah, ye are base vermin, ye eat my bread, yet if death came upon
+      me, ye would riot on my carcass. Away!&rdquo; and clapping his hands, the chain
+      round him clanked harshly, and the noisome co-mates of his dungeon
+      vanished in an instant.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      That singular and eccentric humour which marked Rienzi, and which had
+      seemed a buffoonery to the stolid sullenness of the Roman nobles, still
+      retained its old expression in his countenance, and he laughed loud as he
+      saw the vermin hurry back to their hiding-place.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;A little noise and the clank of a chain&mdash;fie, how ye imitate
+      mankind!&rdquo; Again he sank into silence, and then heavily and listlessly
+      drawing towards him the animated tales of Livy, said, &ldquo;An hour to
+      midnight!&mdash;waking dreams are better than sleep. Well, history tells
+      us how men have risen&mdash;ay, and nations too&mdash;after sadder falls
+      than that of Rienzi or of Rome!&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      In a few minutes, he was apparently absorbed in the lecture; so intent
+      indeed, was he in the task, that he did not hear the steps which wound the
+      spiral stairs that conducted to his cell, and it was not till the wards
+      harshly grated beneath the huge key, and the door creaked on its hinges,
+      that Rienzi, in amaze at intrusion at so unwonted an hour, lifted his
+      eyes. The door had reclosed on the dungeon, and by the lonely and pale
+      lamp he beheld a figure leaning, as for support, against the wall. The
+      figure was wrapped from head to foot in the long cloak of the day, which,
+      aided by a broad hat, shaded by plumes, concealed even the features of the
+      visitor.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      Rienzi gazed long and wistfully.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;Speak,&rdquo; he said at length, putting his hand to his brow. &ldquo;Methinks either
+      long solitude has bewildered me, or, sweet sir, your apparition dazzles. I
+      know you not&mdash;am I sure?&mdash;&rdquo; and Rienzi&rsquo;s hair bristled while he
+      slowly rose&mdash;&ldquo;Am I sure that it is living man who stands before me?
+      Angels have entered the prison-house before now. Alas! an angel&rsquo;s comfort
+      never was more needed.&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      The stranger answered not, but the captive saw that his heart heaved even
+      beneath his cloak; loud sobs choked his voice; at length, as by a violent
+      effort, he sprung forward, and sunk at the Tribune&rsquo;s feet. The disguising
+      hat, the long mantle fell to the ground&mdash;it was the face of a woman
+      that looked upward through passionate and glazing tears&mdash;the arms of
+      a woman that clasped the prisoner&rsquo;s knees! Rienzi gazed mute and
+      motionless as stone. &ldquo;Powers and Saints of Heaven!&rdquo; he murmured at last,
+      &ldquo;do ye tempt me further!&mdash;is it?&mdash;no, no&mdash;yet speak!&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;Beloved&mdash;adored!&mdash;do you not know me?&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;It is&mdash;it is!&rdquo; shrieked Rienzi wildly, &ldquo;it is my Nina&mdash;my wife&mdash;my&mdash;&rdquo;
+       His voice forsook him. Clasped in each other&rsquo;s arms, the unfortunates for
+      some moments seemed to have lost even the sense of delight at their
+      reunion. It was as an unconscious and deep trance, through which something
+      like a dream only faintly and indistinctively stirs.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      At length recovered&mdash;at length restored, the first broken
+      exclamations, the first wild caresses of joy over&mdash;Nina lifted her
+      head from her husband&rsquo;s bosom, and gazed sadly on his countenance&mdash;&ldquo;Oh,
+      what thou hast known since we parted!&mdash;what, since that hour when,
+      borne on by thy bold heart and wild destiny, thou didst leave me in the
+      Imperial Court, to seek again the diadem and find the chain! Ah! why did I
+      heed thy commands?&mdash;why suffer thee to depart alone? How often in thy
+      progress hitherward, in doubt, in danger, might this bosom have been thy
+      resting-place, and this voice have whispered comfort to thy soul? Thou art
+      well, my Lord&mdash;my Cola! Thy pulse beats quicker than of old&mdash;thy
+      brow is furrowed. Ah! tell me thou art well!&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;Well,&rdquo; said Rienzi, mechanically. &ldquo;Methinks so!&mdash;the mind diseased
+      blunts all sense of bodily decay. Well&mdash;yes! And thou&mdash;thou, at
+      least, art not changed, save to maturer beauty. The glory of the
+      laurel-wreath has not faded from thy brow. Thou shalt yet&mdash;&rdquo; then
+      breaking off abruptly&mdash;&ldquo;Rome&mdash;tell me of Rome! And thou&mdash;how
+      camest thou hither? Ah! perhaps my doom is sealed, and in their mercy they
+      have vouchsafed that I should see thee once more before the deathsman
+      blinds me. I remember, it is the grace vouchsafed to malefactors. When I
+      was a lord of life and death, I too permitted the meanest criminal to say
+      farewell to those he loved.&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;No&mdash;not so, Cola!&rdquo; exclaimed Nina, putting her hand before his
+      mouth. &ldquo;I bring thee more auspicious tidings. Tomorrow thou art to be
+      heard. The favour of the Court is propitiated. Thou wilt be acquitted.&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;Ha! speak again.&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;Thou wilt be heard, my Cola&mdash;thou must be acquitted!&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;And Rome be free!&mdash;Great God, I thank Thee!&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      The Tribune sank on his knees, and never had his heart, in his youngest
+      and purest hour, poured forth thanksgiving more fervent, yet less selfish.
+      When he rose again, the whole man seemed changed. His eye had resumed its
+      earlier expressions of deep and serene command. Majesty sate upon his
+      brow. The sorrows of the exile were forgotten. In his sanguine and rapid
+      thoughts, he stood once more the guardian of his country,&mdash;and its
+      sovereign!
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      Nina gazed upon him with that intense and devoted worship, which steeped
+      her vainer and her harder qualities in all the fondness of the softest
+      woman. &ldquo;Such,&rdquo; thought she, &ldquo;was his look eight years ago, when he left my
+      maiden chamber, full of the mighty schemes which liberated Rome&mdash;such
+      his look, when at the dawning sun he towered amidst the crouching Barons,
+      and the kneeling population of the city he had made his throne!&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;Yes, Nina!&rdquo; said Rienzi, as he turned and caught her eye. &ldquo;My soul tells
+      me that my hour is at hand. If they try me openly, they dare not convict&mdash;if
+      they acquit me, they dare not but restore. Tomorrow, saidst thou,
+      tomorrow?&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;Tomorrow, Rienzi; be prepared!&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;I am&mdash;for triumph! But tell me what happy chance brought thee to
+      Avignon?&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;Chance, Cola!&rdquo; said Nina, with reproachful tenderness. &ldquo;Could I know that
+      thou wert in the dungeons of the Pontiff, and linger in idle security at
+      Prague? Even at the Emperor&rsquo;s Court thou hadst thy partisans and
+      favourers. Gold was easily procured. I repaired to Florence&mdash;disguised
+      my name&mdash;and came hither to plot, to scheme, to win thy liberty, or
+      to die with thee. Ah! did not thy heart tell thee that morning and night
+      the eyes of thy faithful Nina gazed upon this gloomy tower; and that one
+      friend, humble though she be, never could forsake thee!&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;Sweet Nina! Yet&mdash;yet&mdash;at Avignon power yields not to beauty
+      without reward. Remember, there is a worse death than the pause of life.&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      Nina turned pale. &ldquo;Fear not,&rdquo; she said, with a low but determined voice;
+      &ldquo;fear not, that men&rsquo;s lips should say Rienzi&rsquo;s wife delivered him. None in
+      this corrupted Court know that I am thy wife.&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;Woman,&rdquo; said the Tribune, sternly; &ldquo;thy lips elude the answer I would
+      seek. In our degenerate time and land, thy sex and ours forget too basely
+      what foulness writes a leprosy in the smallest stain upon a matron&rsquo;s
+      honour. That thy heart would never wrong me, I believe; but if thy
+      weakness, thy fear of my death should wrong me, thou art a bitterer foe to
+      Rienzi than the swords of the Colonna. Nina, speak!&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;Oh, that my soul could speak,&rdquo; answered Nina. &ldquo;Thy words are music to me,
+      and not a thought of mine but echoes them. Could I touch this hand, could
+      I meet that eye, and not know that death were dearer to thee than shame?
+      Rienzi, when last we parted, in sadness, yet in hope, what were thy words
+      to me?&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;I remember them well,&rdquo; returned the Tribune: &ldquo;&lsquo;I leave thee,&rsquo; I said, &lsquo;to
+      keep alive at the Emperor&rsquo;s Court, by thy genius, the Great Cause. Thou
+      hast youth and beauty&mdash;and courts have lawless and ruffian suitors. I
+      give thee no caution; it were beneath thee and me. But I leave thee the
+      power of death.&rsquo; And with that, Nina&mdash;&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;Thy hands tremblingly placed in mine this dagger. I live&mdash;need I say
+      more?&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;My noble and beloved Nina, it is enough. Keep the dagger yet.&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;Yes; till we meet in the Capitol of Rome!&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      A slight tap was heard at the door; Nina regained, in an instant, her
+      disguise.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;It is on the stroke of midnight,&rdquo; said the gaoler, appearing at the
+      threshold.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;I come,&rdquo; said Nina.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;And thou hast to prepare thy thoughts,&rdquo; she whispered to Rienzi: &ldquo;arm all
+      thy glorious intellect. Alas! is it again we part? How my heart sinks!&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      The presence of the gaoler at the threshold broke the bitterness of
+      parting by abridging it. The false page pressed her lips on the prisoner&rsquo;s
+      hand, and left the cell.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      The gaoler, lingering behind for a moment, placed a parchment on the
+      table. It was the summons from the court appointed for the trial of the
+      Tribune.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      <a name="link2HCH0048" id="link2HCH0048">
+      <!--  H2 anchor --> </a>
+    </p>
+    <div style="height: 4em;">
+      <br /><br /><br /><br />
+    </div>
+    <h2>
+      Chapter 7.VI. The Scent Does Not Lie.&mdash;The Priest and the Soldier.
+    </h2>
+    <h3>
+      On descending the stairs, Nina was met by Alvarez.
+    </h3>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;Fair page,&rdquo; said the Spaniard, gaily, &ldquo;thy name, thou tellest me, is
+      Villani?&mdash;Angelo Villani&mdash;why I know thy kinsman, methinks.
+      Vouchsafe, young master, to enter this chamber, and drink a night-cup to
+      thy lady&rsquo;s health; I would fain learn tidings of my old friends.&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;At another time,&rdquo; answered the false Angelo, drawing the cloak closer
+      round her face; &ldquo;it is late&mdash;I am hurried.&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;Nay,&rdquo; said the Spaniard, &ldquo;you escape me not so easily;&rdquo; and he caught
+      firm hold of the page&rsquo;s shoulder.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;Unhand me, sir!&rdquo; said Nina, haughtily, and almost weeping, for her strong
+      nerves were yet unstrung. &ldquo;Gaoler, at thy peril&mdash;unbar the gates.&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;So hot,&rdquo; said Alvarez, surprised at so great a waste of dignity in a
+      page; &ldquo;nay, I meant not to offend thee. May I wait on thy pageship
+      tomorrow?&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;Ay, tomorrow,&rdquo; said Nina, eager to escape.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;And meanwhile,&rdquo; said Alvarez, &ldquo;I will accompany thee home&mdash;we can
+      confer by the way.&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      So saying, without regarding the protestations of the supposed page, he
+      passed with Nina into the open air. &ldquo;Your lady,&rdquo; said he, carelessly, &ldquo;is
+      wondrous fair; her lightest will is law to the greatest noble of Avignon.
+      Methinks she is of Naples&mdash;is it so? Art thou dumb, sweet youth?&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      The page did not answer, but with a step so rapid that it almost put the
+      slow Spaniard out of breath, hastened along the narrow space between the
+      tower and the palace of the Signora Cesarini, nor could all the efforts of
+      Alvarez draw forth a single syllable from his reluctant companion, till
+      they reached the gates of the palace, and he found himself discourteously
+      left without the walls.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;A plague on the boy!&rdquo; said he, biting his lips; &ldquo;if the Cardinal thrive
+      as well as his servant, by&rsquo;re Lady, Monsignore is a happy man!&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      By no means pleased with the prospect of an interview with Albornoz, who,
+      like most able men, valued the talents of those he employed exactly in
+      proportion to their success, the Spaniard slowly returned home. With the
+      licence accorded to him, he entered the Cardinal&rsquo;s chamber somewhat
+      abruptly, and perceived him in earnest conversation with a Cavalier, whose
+      long moustache, curled upward, and the bright cuirass worn underneath his
+      mantle, seemed to betoken him of martial profession. Pleased with the
+      respite, Alvarez hastily withdrew: and, in fact, the Cardinal&rsquo;s thoughts
+      at that moment, and for that night, were bent upon other subjects than
+      those of love.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      The interruption served, however, to shorten the conversation between
+      Albornoz and his guest. The latter rose.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;I think,&rdquo; said he, buckling on a short and broad rapier, which he laid
+      aside during the interview,&mdash;&ldquo;I think, my Lord Cardinal, you
+      encourage me to consider that our negotiation stands a fair chance of a
+      prosperous close. Ten thousand florins, and my brother quits Viterbo, and
+      launches the thunderbolt of the Company on the lands of Rimini. On your
+      part&mdash;&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;On my part it is agreed,&rdquo; said the Cardinal, &ldquo;that the army of the Church
+      interferes not with the course of your brother&rsquo;s arms&mdash;there is peace
+      between us. One warrior understands another!&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;And the word of Giles d&rsquo;Albornoz, son of the royal race of Arragon, is a
+      guarantee for the faith of a Cardinal,&rdquo; replied the Cavalier, with a
+      smile. &ldquo;It is, my Lord, in your former quality that we treat.&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;There is my right hand,&rdquo; answered Albornoz, too politic to heed the
+      insinuation. The Cavalier raised it respectfully to his lips, and his
+      armed tread was soon heard descending the stairs.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;Victory,&rdquo; cried Albornoz, tossing his arms aloof; &ldquo;Victory, now thou art
+      mine!&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      With that he rose hastily, deposited his papers in an iron chest, and
+      opening a concealed door behind the arras, entered a chamber that rather
+      resembled a monk&rsquo;s cell than the apartment of a prince. Over a mean pallet
+      hung a sword, a dagger, and a rude image of the Virgin. Without summoning
+      Alvarez, the Cardinal unrobed, and in a few moments was asleep.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      <a name="link2HCH0049" id="link2HCH0049">
+      <!--  H2 anchor --> </a>
+    </p>
+    <div style="height: 4em;">
+      <br /><br /><br /><br />
+    </div>
+    <h2>
+      Chapter 7.VII. Vaucluse and its Genius Loci.&mdash;Old Acquaintance
+      Renewed.
+    </h2>
+    <p>
+      The next day at early noon the Cavalier, whom our last chapter presented
+      to the reader, was seen mounted on a strong Norman horse, winding his way
+      slowly along a green and pleasant path some miles from Avignon. At length
+      he found himself in a wild and romantic valley, through which wandered
+      that delightful river whose name the verse of Petrarch has given to so
+      beloved a fame. Sheltered by rocks, and in this part winding through the
+      greenest banks, enamelled with a thousand wild flowers and water-weeds,
+      went the crystal Sorgia. Advancing farther, the landscape assumed a more
+      sombre and sterile aspect. The valley seemed enclosed or shut in by
+      fantastic rocks of a thousand shapes, down which dashed and glittered a
+      thousand rivulets. And, in the very wildest of the scene, the ground
+      suddenly opened into a quaint and cultivated garden, through which, amidst
+      a profusion of foliage, was seen a small and lonely mansion,&mdash;the
+      hermitage of the place. The horseman was in the valley of the Vaucluse;
+      and before his eye lay the garden and the house of PETRARCH! Carelessly,
+      however, his eye scanned the consecrated spot; and unconsciously it
+      rested, for a moment, upon a solitary figure seated musingly by the margin
+      of the river. A large dog at the side of the noonday idler barked at the
+      horseman as he rode on. &ldquo;A brave animal and a deep bay!&rdquo; thought the
+      traveller; to him the dog seemed an object much more interesting than its
+      master. And so,&mdash;as the crowd of little men pass unheeding and
+      unmoved, those in whom Posterity shall acknowledge the landmarks of their
+      age,&mdash;the horseman turned his glance from the Poet!
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      Thrice blessed name! Immortal Florentine! (I need scarcely say that it is
+      his origin, not his actual birth, which entitles us to term Petrarch a
+      Florentine.) not as the lover, nor even as the poet, do I bow before thy
+      consecrated memory&mdash;venerating thee as one it were sacrilege to
+      introduce in this unworthy page&mdash;save by name and as a shadow; but as
+      the first who ever asserted to people and to prince the august majesty of
+      Letters; who claimed to Genius the prerogative to influence states, to
+      control opinion, to hold an empire over the hearts of men, and prepare
+      events by animating passion, and guiding thought! What, (though but feebly
+      felt and dimly seen)&mdash;what do we yet owe to Thee if Knowledge be now
+      a Power; if MIND be a Prophet and a Fate, foretelling and foredooming the
+      things to come! From the greatest to the least of us, to whom the pen is
+      at once a sceptre and a sword, the low-born Florentine has been the
+      arch-messenger to smooth the way and prepare the welcome. Yes! even the
+      meanest of the aftercomers&mdash;even he who now vents his gratitude,&mdash;is
+      thine everlasting debtor! Thine, how largely is the honour, if his
+      labours, humble though they be, find an audience wherever literature is
+      known; preaching in remotest lands the moral of forgotten revolutions, and
+      scattering in the palace and the marketplace the seeds that shall ripen
+      into fruit when the hand of the sower shall be dust, and his very name,
+      perhaps, be lost! For few, alas! are they, whose names may outlive the
+      grave; but the thoughts of every man who writes, are made undying;&mdash;others
+      appropriate, advance, exalt them; and millions of minds unknown, undreamt
+      of, are required to produce the immortality of one!
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      Indulging meditations very different from those which the idea of Petrarch
+      awakens in a later time, the Cavalier pursued his path.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      The valley was long left behind, and the way grew more and more faintly
+      traced, until it terminated in a wood, through whose tangled boughs the
+      sunlight broke playfully. At length, the wood opened into a wide glade,
+      from which rose a precipitous ascent, crowned with the ruins of an old
+      castle. The traveller dismounted, led his horse up the ascent, and,
+      gaining the ruins, left his steed within one of the roofless chambers,
+      overgrown with the longest grass and a profusion of wild shrubs; thence
+      ascending, with some toil, a narrow and broken staircase, he found himself
+      in a small room, less decayed than the rest, of which the roof and floor
+      were yet whole.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      Stretched on the ground in his cloak, and leaning his head thoughtfully on
+      his hand, was a man of tall stature, and middle age. He lifted himself on
+      his arm with great alacrity as the Cavalier entered.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;Well, Brettone, I have counted the hours&mdash;what tidings?&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;Albornoz consents.&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;Glad news! Thou givest me new life. Pardieu, I shall breakfast all the
+      better for this, my brother. Hast thou remembered that I am famishing?&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      Brettone drew from beneath his cloak a sufficiently huge flask of wine,
+      and a small panier, tolerably well filled; the inmate of the tower threw
+      himself upon the provant with great devotion. And both the soldiers, for
+      such they were, stretched at length on the ground, regaled themselves with
+      considerable zest, talking hastily and familiarly between every mouthful.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;I say, Brettone, thou playest unfairly; thou hast already devoured more
+      than half the pasty: push it hitherward. And so the Cardinal consents!
+      What manner of man is he? Able as they say?&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;Quick, sharp, and earnest, with an eye of fire, few words, and comes to
+      the point.&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;Unlike a priest then;&mdash;a good brigand spoilt. What hast thou heard
+      of the force he heads? Ho, not so fast with the wine.&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;Scanty at present.&mdash;He relies on recruits throughout Italy.&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;What his designs for Rome? There, my brother, there tends my secret soul!
+      As for these petty towns and petty tyrants, I care not how they fall, or
+      by whom. But the Pope must not return to Rome. Rome must be mine. The city
+      of a new empire, the conquest of a new Attila! There, every circumstance
+      combines in my favour!&mdash;the absence of the Pope, the weakness of the
+      middle class, the poverty of the populace, the imbecile though ferocious
+      barbarism of the Barons, have long concurred to render Rome the most
+      facile, while the most glorious conquest!&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;My brother, pray Heaven your ambition do not wreck you at last; you are
+      ever losing sight of the land. Surely with the immense wealth we are
+      acquiring, we may&mdash;&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;Aspire to be something greater than Free Companions, generals today, and
+      adventurers tomorrow. Rememberest thou, how the Norman sword won Sicily,
+      and how the bastard William converted on the field of Hastings his baton
+      into a sceptre. I tell thee, Brettone, that this loose Italy has crowns on
+      the hedge that a dexterous hand may carry off at the point of the lance.
+      My course is taken, I will form the fairest army in Italy, and with it I
+      will win a throne in the Capitol. Fool that I was six years ago!&mdash;Instead
+      of deputing that mad dolt Pepin of Minorbino, had I myself deserted the
+      Hungarian, and repaired with my soldiery to Rome, the fall of Rienzi would
+      have been followed by the rise of Montreal. Pepin was outwitted, and threw
+      away the prey after he had hunted it down. The lion shall not again trust
+      the chase to the jackal!&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;Walter, thou speakest of the fate of Rienzi, let it warn thee!&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;Rienzi!&rdquo; replied Montreal; &ldquo;I know the man! In peaceful times or with an
+      honest people, he would have founded a great dynasty. But he dreamt of
+      laws and liberty for men who despise the first and will not protect the
+      last. We, of a harder race, know that a new throne must be built by the
+      feudal and not the civil system; and into the city we must transport the
+      camp. It is by the multitude that the proud Tribune gained power,&mdash;by
+      the multitude he lost it; it is by the sword that I will win it, and by
+      the sword will I keep it!&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;Rienzi was too cruel, he should not have incensed the Barons,&rdquo; said
+      Brettone, about to finish the flask, when the strong hand of his brother
+      plucked it from him, and anticipated the design.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;Pooh,&rdquo; said Montreal, finishing the draught with a long sigh, &ldquo;he was not
+      cruel enough. He sought only to be just, and not to distinguish between
+      noble and peasant. He should have distinguished! He should have
+      exterminated the nobles root and branch. But this no Italian can do. This
+      is reserved for me.&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;Thou wouldst not butcher all the best blood of Rome?&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;Butcher! No, but I would seize their lands, and endow with them a new
+      nobility, the hardy and fierce nobility of the North, who well know how to
+      guard their prince, and will guard him, as the fountain of their own
+      power. Enough of this now. And talking of Rienzi&mdash;rots he still in
+      his dungeon?&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;Why, this morning, ere I left, I heard strange news. The town was astir,
+      groups in every corner. They said that Rienzi&rsquo;s trial was to be today, and
+      from the names of the judges chosen, it is suspected that acquittal is
+      already determined on.&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;Ha! thou shouldst have told me of this before.&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;Should he be restored to Rome, would it militate against thy plans?&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;Humph! I know not&mdash;deep thought and dexterous management would be
+      needed. I would fain not leave this spot till I hear what is decided on.&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;Surely, Walter, it would have been wiser and safer to have stayed with
+      thy soldiery, and intrusted me with the absolute conduct of this affair.&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;Not so,&rdquo; answered Montreal; &ldquo;thou art a bold fellow enough, and a cunning&mdash;but
+      my head in these matters is better than thine. Besides,&rdquo; continued the
+      Knight, lowering his voice, and shading his face, &ldquo;I had vowed a
+      pilgrimage to the beloved river, and the old trysting-place. Ah me!&mdash;But
+      all this, Brettone, thou understandest not&mdash;let it pass. As for my
+      safety, since we have come to this amnesty with Albornoz, I fear but
+      little danger even if discovered: besides, I want the florins. There are
+      those in this country, Germans, who could eat an Italian army at a meal,
+      whom I would fain engage, and their leaders want earnest-money&mdash;the
+      griping knaves!&mdash;How are the Cardinal&rsquo;s florins to be paid?&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;Half now&mdash;half when thy troops are before Rimini!&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;Rimini! the thought whets my sword. Rememberest thou how that accursed
+      Malatesta drove me from Aversa, (This Malatesta, a signior of illustrious
+      family, was one of the most skilful warriors in Italy. He and his brother
+      Galeotto had been raised to the joint-tyranny of Rimini by the voice of
+      its citizens. After being long the foes of the Church, they were
+      ultimately named as its captains by the Cardinal Albornoz.) broke up my
+      camp, and made me render to him all my booty? There fell the work of
+      years! But for that, my banner now would be floating over St. Angelo. I
+      will pay back the debt with fire and sword, ere the summer has shed its
+      leaves.&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      The fair countenance of Montreal grew terrible as he uttered these words;
+      his hands griped the handle of his sword, and his strong frame heaved
+      visibly; tokens of the fierce and unsparing passions, by the aid of which
+      a life of rapine and revenge had corrupted a nature originally full no
+      less of the mercy than the courage of Provencal chivalry.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      Such was the fearful man who now (the wildness of his youth sobered, and
+      his ambition hardened and concentered) was the rival with Rienzi for the
+      mastery of Rome.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      <a name="link2HCH0050" id="link2HCH0050">
+      <!--  H2 anchor --> </a>
+    </p>
+    <div style="height: 4em;">
+      <br /><br /><br /><br />
+    </div>
+    <h2>
+      Chapter 7.VIII. The Crowd.&mdash;The Trial.&mdash;The Verdict.&mdash;The
+      Soldier and
+    </h2>
+    <p>
+      the Page.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      It was on the following evening that a considerable crowd had gathered in
+      the streets of Avignon. It was the second day of the examination of
+      Rienzi, and with every moment was expected the announcement of the
+      verdict. Amongst the foreigners of all countries assembled in that seat of
+      the Papal splendour, the interest was intense. The Italians, even of the
+      highest rank, were in favour of the Tribune, the French against him. As
+      for the good townspeople of Avignon themselves, they felt but little
+      excitement in any thing that did not bring money into their pockets; and
+      if it had been put to the secret vote, no doubt there would have been a
+      vast majority for burning the prisoner, as a marketable speculation!
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      Amongst the crowd was a tall man in a plain and rusty suit of armour, but
+      with an air of knightly bearing, which somewhat belied the coarseness of
+      his mail; he wore no helmet, but a small morion of black leather, with a
+      long projecting shade, much used by wayfarers in the hot climates of the
+      south. A black patch covered nearly the whole of one cheek, and altogether
+      he bore the appearance of a grim soldier, with whom war had dealt harshly,
+      both in purse and person.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      Many were the jests at the shabby swordsman&rsquo;s expense, with which that
+      lively population amused their impatience; and though the shade of the
+      morion concealed his eyes, an arch and merry smile about the corners of
+      his mouth shewed that he could take a jest at himself.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;Well,&rdquo; said one of the crowd, (a rich Milanese,) &ldquo;I am of a state that
+      was free, and I trust the People&rsquo;s man will have justice shewn him.&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;Amen,&rdquo; said a grave Florentine.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;They say,&rdquo; whispered a young student from Paris, to a learned doctor of
+      laws, with whom he abode, &ldquo;that his defence has been a masterpiece.&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;He hath taken no degrees,&rdquo; replied the doctor, doubtingly. &ldquo;Ho, friend,
+      why dost thou push me so? thou hast rent my robe.&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      This was said to a minstrel, or jongleur, who, with a small lute slung
+      round him, was making his way, with great earnestness, through the throng.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;I beg pardon, worthy sir,&rdquo; said the minstrel; &ldquo;but this is a scene to be
+      sung of! Centuries hence; ay, and in lands remote, legend and song will
+      tell the fortunes of Cola di Rienzi, the friend of Petrarch and the
+      Tribune of Rome!&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      The young French student turned quickly round to the minstrel, with a glow
+      on his pale face; not sharing the general sentiments of his countrymen
+      against Rienzi, he felt that it was an era in the world when a minstrel
+      spoke thus of the heroes of intellect&mdash;not of war.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      At this time the tall soldier was tapped impatiently on the back.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;I pray thee, great sir,&rdquo; said a sharp and imperious voice, &ldquo;to withdraw
+      that tall bulk of thine a little on one side&mdash;I cannot see through
+      thee; and I would fain my eyes were among the first to catch a glimpse of
+      Rienzi as he passes from the court.&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;Fair sir page,&rdquo; replied the soldier, good-humouredly, as he made way for
+      Angelo Villani, &ldquo;thou wilt not always find that way in the world is won by
+      commanding the strong. When thou art older thou wilt beard the weak, and
+      the strong thou wilt wheedle.&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;I must change my nature, then,&rdquo; answered Angelo, (who was of somewhat
+      small stature, and not yet come to his full growth,) trying still to raise
+      himself above the heads of the crowd.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      The soldier looked at him approvingly; and as he looked he sighed, and his
+      lips worked with some strange emotion.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;Thou speakest well,&rdquo; said he, after a pause. &ldquo;Pardon me the rudeness of
+      the question; but art thou of Italy?&mdash;thy tongue savours of the Roman
+      dialect; yet I have seen lineaments like thine on this side the Alps.&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;It may be, good fellow,&rdquo; said the page, haughtily; &ldquo;but I thank Heaven
+      that I am of Rome.&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      At this moment a loud shout burst from that part of the crowd nearest the
+      court. The sound of trumpets again hushed the throng into deep and
+      breathless silence, while the Pope&rsquo;s guards, ranged along the space
+      conducting from the court, drew themselves up more erect, and fell a step
+      or two back upon the crowd.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      As the trumpet ceased, the voice of a herald was heard, but it did not
+      penetrate within several yards of the spot where Angelo and the soldier
+      stood; and it was only by a mighty shout that in a moment circled through,
+      and was echoed back by, the wide multitude&mdash;by the waving of
+      kerchiefs from the windows&mdash;by broken ejaculations, which were caught
+      up from lip to lip, that the page knew that Rienzi was acquitted.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;I would I could see his face!&rdquo; sighed the page, querulously.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;And thou shalt,&rdquo; said the soldier; and he caught up the boy in his arms,
+      and pressed on with the strength of a giant, parting the living stream
+      from right to left, as he took his way to a place near the guards, and by
+      which Rienzi was sure to pass.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      The page, half-pleased, half-indignant, struggled a little, but finding it
+      in vain, consented tacitly to what he felt an outrage on his dignity.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;Never mind,&rdquo; said the soldier, &ldquo;thou art the first I ever willingly
+      raised above myself; and I do it now for the sake of thy fair face, which
+      reminds me of one I loved.&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      But these last words were spoken low, and the boy, in his anxiety to see
+      the hero of Rome, did not hear or heed them. Presently Rienzi came by; two
+      gentlemen, of the Pope&rsquo;s own following, walked by his side. He moved
+      slowly, amidst the greetings and clamour of the crowd, looking neither to
+      the right nor left. His bearing was firm and collected, and, save by the
+      flush of his cheek, there was no external sign of joy or excitement.
+      Flowers dropped from every balcony on his path; and just when he came to a
+      broader space, where the ground was somewhat higher, and where he was in
+      fuller view of the houses around, he paused&mdash;and, uncovering,
+      acknowledged the homage he had received, with a look&mdash;a gesture&mdash;which
+      each who beheld never forgot. It haunted even that gay and thoughtless
+      court, when the last tale of Rienzi&rsquo;s life reached their ears. And Angelo,
+      clinging then round that soldier&rsquo;s neck, recalled&mdash;but we must not
+      anticipate.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      It was not, however, to the dark tower that Rienzi returned. His home was
+      prepared at the palace of the Cardinal d&rsquo;Albornoz. The next day he was
+      admitted to the Pope&rsquo;s presence, and on the evening of that day he was
+      proclaimed Senator of Rome.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      Meanwhile the soldier had placed Angelo on the ground; and as the page
+      faltered out no courteous thanks, he interrupted him in a sad and kind
+      voice, the tone of which struck the page forcibly, so little did it suit
+      the rough and homely appearance of the man.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;We part,&rdquo; he said, &ldquo;as strangers, fair boy; and since thou sayest thou
+      art of Rome, there is no reason why my heart should have warmed to thee as
+      it has done; yet if ever thou wantest a friend,&mdash;seek him&rdquo;&mdash;and
+      the soldier&rsquo;s voice sunk into a whisper&mdash;&ldquo;in Walter de Montreal.&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      Ere the page recovered his surprise at that redoubted name, which his
+      earliest childhood had been taught to dread, the Knight of St. John had
+      vanished amongst the crowd.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      <a name="link2HCH0051" id="link2HCH0051">
+      <!--  H2 anchor --> </a>
+    </p>
+    <div style="height: 4em;">
+      <br /><br /><br /><br />
+    </div>
+    <h2>
+      Chapter 7.IX. Albornoz and Nina.
+    </h2>
+    <p>
+      But the eyes which, above all others, thirsted for a glimpse of the
+      released captive were forbidden that delight. Alone in her chamber, Nina
+      awaited the result of the trial. She heard the shouts, the exclamations,
+      the tramp of thousands along the street; she felt that the victory was
+      won; and, her heart long overcharged, she burst into passionate tears. The
+      return of Angelo soon acquainted her with all that had passed; but it
+      somewhat chilled her joy to find Rienzi was the guest of the dreaded
+      Cardinal. That shock, in which certainty, however happy, replaces
+      suspense, had so powerful an effect on her frame, joined to her loathing
+      fear of a visit from the Cardinal, that she became for three days
+      alarmingly ill; and it was only on the fifth day from that which saw
+      Rienzi endowed with the rank of Senator of Rome, that she was recovered
+      sufficiently to admit Albornoz to her presence.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      The Cardinal had sent daily to inquire after her health, and his
+      inquiries, to her alarmed mind, had appeared to insinuate a pretension to
+      the right to make them. Meanwhile Albornoz had had enough to divert and
+      occupy his thoughts. Having bought off the formidable Montreal from the
+      service of John de Vico, one of the ablest and fiercest enemies of the
+      Church, he resolved to march to the territories of that tyrant as
+      expeditiously as possible, and so not to allow him time to obtain the
+      assistance of any other band of the mercenary adventurers, who found Italy
+      the market for their valour. Occupied with raising troops, procuring
+      money, corresponding with the various free states, and establishing
+      alliances in aid of his ulterior and more ambitious projects at the court
+      of Avignon, the Cardinal waited with tolerable resignation the time when
+      he might claim from the Signora Cesarini the reward to which he deemed
+      himself entitled. Meanwhile he had held his first conversations with
+      Rienzi, and, under the semblance of courtesy to the acquitted Tribune,
+      Albornoz had received him as his guest, in order to make himself master of
+      the character and disposition of one in whom he sought a minister and a
+      tool. That miraculous and magic art, attested by the historians of the
+      time, which Rienzi possessed over every one with whom he came into
+      contact, however various in temper, station, or opinions, had not deserted
+      him in his interview with the Pontiff. So faithfully had he described the
+      true condition of Rome, so logically had he traced the causes and the
+      remedies of the evils she endured, so sanguinely had he spoken of his own
+      capacities for administering her affairs, and so brilliantly had he
+      painted the prospects which that administration opened to the weal of the
+      Church, and the interests of the Pope, that Innocent, though a keen and
+      shrewd, and somewhat sceptical calculator of human chances, was entirely
+      fascinated by the eloquence of the Roman.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;Is this the man,&rdquo; he is reported to have said, &ldquo;whom for twelve months we
+      have treated as a prisoner and a criminal? Would that it were on his
+      shoulders only that the Christian empire reposed!&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      At the close of the interview he had, with every mark of favour and
+      distinction, conferred upon Rienzi the rank of Senator, which, in fact,
+      was that of Viceroy of Rome, and had willingly acceded to all the projects
+      which the enterprising Rienzi had once more formed&mdash;not only for
+      recovering the territories of the Church, but for extending the
+      dictatorial sway of the Seven-hilled City, over the old dependencies of
+      Italy.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      Albornoz, to whom the Pope retailed this conversation, was somewhat
+      jealous of the favour the new Senator had so suddenly acquired, and
+      immediately on his return home sought an interview with his guest. In his
+      heart, the Lord Cardinal, emphatically a man of action and business,
+      regarded Rienzi as one rather cunning than wise&mdash;rather fortunate
+      than great&mdash;a mixture of the pedant and the demagogue. But after a
+      long and scrutinizing conversation with the new Senator, even he yielded
+      to the spell of his enchanting and master intellect. Reluctantly Albornoz
+      confessed to himself that Rienzi&rsquo;s rise was not the thing of chance; yet
+      more reluctantly he perceived that the Senator was one whom he might treat
+      with as an equal, but could not rule as a minion. And he entertained
+      serious doubts whether it would be wise to reinstate him in a power which
+      he evinced the capacity to wield and the genius to extend. Still, however,
+      he did not repent the share he had taken in Rienzi&rsquo;s acquittal. His
+      presence in a camp so thinly peopled was a matter greatly to be desired.
+      And through his influence, the Cardinal more than ever trusted to enlist
+      the Romans in favour of his enterprise for the recovery of the territory
+      of St. Peter!
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      Rienzi, who panted once more to behold his Nina, endeared to him by trial
+      and absence, as by fresh bridals, was not however able to discover the
+      name she had assumed at Avignon; and his residence with the Cardinal
+      closely but respectfully watched as he was, forbade Nina all opportunity
+      of corresponding with him. Some half bantering hints which Albornoz had
+      dropped upon the interest taken in his welfare by the most celebrated
+      beauty of Avignon, had filled him with a vague alarm which he trembled to
+      acknowledge even to himself. But the volto sciolto (Volto sciolto,
+      pensieri stretti&mdash;the countenance open, the thoughts restrained.)
+      which, in common with all Italian politicians, concealed whatever were his
+      pensieri stretti&mdash;enabled him to baffle completely the jealous and
+      lynxlike observation of the Cardinal. Nor had Alvarez been better enabled
+      to satisfy the curiosity of his master. He had indeed sought the page
+      Villani, but the imperious manner of that wayward and haughty boy had cut
+      short all attempts at cross-examination. And all he could ascertain was,
+      that the real Angelo Villani was not the Angelo Villani who had visited
+      Rienzi.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      Trusting at last that he should learn all, and inflamed by such passion
+      and such hope as he was capable of feeling, Albornoz now took his way to
+      the Cesarini&rsquo;s palace.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      He was ushered with due state into the apartment of the Signora. He found
+      her pale, and with the traces of illness upon her noble and statuelike
+      features. She rose as he entered; and when he approached, she half bent
+      her knee, and raised his hand to her lips. Surprised and delighted at a
+      reception so new, the Cardinal hastened to prevent the condescension;
+      retaining both her hands, he attempted gently to draw them to his heart.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;Fairest!&rdquo; he whispered, &ldquo;couldst thou know hear I have mourned thy
+      illness&mdash;and yet it has but left thee more lovely, as the rain only
+      brightens the flower. Ah! happy if I have promoted thy lightest wish, and
+      if in thine eyes I may henceforth seek at once an angel to guide me and a
+      paradise to reward.&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      Nina, releasing her hand, waved it gently, and motioned the Cardinal to a
+      seat. Seating herself at a little distance, she then spoke with great
+      gravity and downcast eyes.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;My Lord, it is your intercession, joined to his own innocence, that has
+      released from yonder tower the elected governor of the people of Rome. But
+      freedom is the least of the generous gifts you have conferred; there is a
+      greater in a fair name vindicated, and rightful honours re-bestowed. For
+      this, I rest ever your debtor; for this, if I bear children, they shall be
+      taught to bless your name; for this the historian who recalls the deeds of
+      this age, and the fortunes of Cola di Rienzi, shall add a new chaplet to
+      the wreaths you have already won. Lord Cardinal, I may have erred. I may
+      have offended you&mdash;you may accuse me of woman&rsquo;s artifice. Speak not,
+      wonder not, hear me out. I have but one excuse, when I say that I held
+      justified any means short of dishonour, to save the life and restore the
+      fortunes of Cola di Rienzi. Know, my Lord, that she who now addresses you
+      is his wife.&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      The Cardinal remained motionless and silent. But his sallow countenance
+      grew flushed from the brow to the neck, and his thin lips quivered for a
+      moment, and then broke into a withering and bitter smile. At length he
+      rose from his seat, very slowly, and said, in a voice trembling with
+      passion,
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;It is well, madam. Giles d&rsquo;Albornoz has been, then, a puppet in the
+      hands, a stepping-stone in the rise, of the plebeian demagogue of Rome.
+      You but played upon me for your own purposes; and nothing short of a
+      Cardinal of Spain, and a Prince of the royal blood of Aragon, was meet to
+      be the instrument of a mountebank&rsquo;s juggle! Madam, yourself and your
+      husband might justly be accused of ambition&mdash;&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;Cease, my Lord,&rdquo; said Nina, with unspeakable dignity; &ldquo;whatever offence
+      has been committed against you was mine alone. Till after our last
+      interview, Rienzi knew not even of my presence at Avignon.&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;At our last interview, Lady, (you do well to recall it!) methinks there
+      was a hinted and implied contract. I have fulfilled my part&mdash;I claim
+      yours. Mark me! I do not forego that claim. As easily as I rend this glove
+      can I rend the parchment which proclaims thy husband &lsquo;the Senator of
+      Rome.&rsquo; The dungeon is not death, and its door will open twice.&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;My Lord&mdash;my Lord!&rdquo; cried Nina, sick with terror, &ldquo;wrong not so your
+      noble nature, your great name, your sacred rank, your chivalric blood. You
+      are of the knightly race of Spain, yours not the sullen, low, and
+      inexorable vices that stain the petty tyrants of this unhappy land. You
+      are no Visconti&mdash;no Castracani&mdash;you cannot stain your laurels
+      with revenge upon a woman. Hear me,&rdquo; she continued, and she fell abruptly
+      at his feet; &ldquo;men dupe, deceive our sex&mdash;and for selfish purposes;
+      they are pardoned&mdash;even by their victims. Did I deceive you with a
+      false hope? Well&mdash;what my object?&mdash;what my excuse? My husband&rsquo;s
+      liberty&mdash;my land&rsquo;s salvation! Woman,&mdash;my Lord, alas, your sex
+      too rarely understand her weakness or her greatness! Erring&mdash;all
+      human as she is to others&mdash;God gifts her with a thousand virtues to
+      the one she loves! It is from that love that she alone drinks her nobler
+      nature. For the hero of her worship she has the meekness of the dove&mdash;the
+      devotion of the saint; for his safety in peril, for his rescue in
+      misfortune, her vain sense imbibes the sagacity of the serpent&mdash;her
+      weak heart, the courage of the lioness! It is this which, in absence, made
+      me mask my face in smiles, that the friends of the houseless exile might
+      not despair of his fate&mdash;it is this which brought me through forests
+      beset with robbers, to watch the stars upon yon solitary tower&mdash;it
+      was this which led my steps to the revels of your hated court&mdash;this
+      which made me seek a deliverer in the noblest of its chiefs&mdash;it is
+      this which has at last opened the dungeon door to the prisoner now within
+      your halls; and this, Lord Cardinal,&rdquo; added Nina, rising, and folding her
+      arms upon her heart&mdash;&ldquo;this, if your anger seeks a victim, will
+      inspire me to die without a groan,&mdash;but without dishonour!&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      Albornoz remained rooted to the ground. Amazement&mdash;emotion&mdash;admiration&mdash;all
+      busy at his heart. He gazed at Nina&rsquo;s flashing eyes and heaving bosom as a
+      warrior of old upon a prophetess inspired. His eyes were riveted to hers
+      as by a spell. He tried to speak, but his voice failed him. Nina
+      continued:
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;Yes, my Lord; these are no idle words! If you seek revenge, it is in your
+      power. Undo what you have done. Give Rienzi back to the dungeon, or to
+      disgrace, and you are avenged; but not on him. All the hearts of Italy
+      shall become to him a second Nina! I am the guilty one, and I the
+      sufferer. Hear me swear&mdash;in that instant which sees new wrong to
+      Rienzi, this hand is my executioner.&mdash;My Lord, I supplicate you no
+      longer!&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      Albornoz continued deeply moved. Nina but rightly judged him, when she
+      distinguished the aspiring Spaniard from the barbarous and unrelenting
+      voluptuaries of Italy. Despite the profligacy that stained his sacred robe&mdash;despite
+      all the acquired and increasing callousness of a hard, scheming, and
+      sceptical man, cast amidst the worst natures of the worst of times&mdash;there
+      lingered yet in his soul much of the knightly honour of his race and
+      country. High thoughts and daring spirits touched a congenial string in
+      his heart, and not the less, in that he had but rarely met them in his
+      experience of camps and courts. For the first time in his life, he felt
+      that he had seen the woman who could have contented him even with wedlock,
+      and taught him the proud and faithful love of which the minstrels of Spain
+      had sung. He sighed, and still gazing on Nina, approached her, almost
+      reverentially; he knelt and kissed the hem of her robe. &ldquo;Lady,&rdquo; he said,
+      &ldquo;I would I could believe that you have altogether read my nature aright,
+      but I were indeed lost to all honour, and unworthy of gentle birth, if I
+      still harboured a single thought against the peace and virtue of one like
+      thee. Sweet heroine,&rdquo;&mdash;he continued&mdash;&ldquo;so lovely, yet so pure&mdash;so
+      haughty, and yet so soft&mdash;thou hast opened to me the brightest page
+      these eyes have ever scanned in the blotted volume of mankind. Mayest thou
+      have such happiness as life can give; but souls such as thine make their
+      nest like the eagle, upon rocks and amidst the storms. Fear me no more&mdash;think
+      of me no more&mdash;unless hereafter, when thou hearest men speak of Giles
+      d&rsquo;Albornoz, thou mayest say in thine own heart,&rdquo;&mdash;and here the
+      Cardinal&rsquo;s lip curled with scorn&mdash;&ldquo;he did not renounce every feeling
+      worthy of a man, when Ambition and Fate endued him with the surplice of
+      the priest.&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      The Spaniard was gone before Nina could reply.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      <a name="link2H_4_0062" id="link2H_4_0062">
+      <!--  H2 anchor --> </a>
+    </p>
+    <div style="height: 4em;">
+      <br /><br /><br /><br />
+    </div>
+    <h2>
+      BOOK VIII. THE GRAND COMPANY.
+    </h2>
+<pre xml:space="preserve">
+     &ldquo;Montreal nourrissoit de plus vastes projets...il donnoit a
+     sa campagnie un gouvernement regulier...Par cette discipline
+     il faisoit regner l&rsquo;abondance dans son camp; les gens de
+     guerre ne parloient, en Italie, que des richesses qu&rsquo;on
+     acqueroit a son service.&rdquo;&mdash;Sismondi, &ldquo;Histoire des
+     Republiques Italiennes&rdquo;, tom. vi. c. 42.
+
+     &ldquo;Montreal cherished more vast designs...he subjected his
+     company to a regular system of government...By means of this
+     discipline he kept his camp abundantly supplied, and
+     military adventurers in Italy talked of nothing but the
+     wealth won in his service.&rdquo;&mdash;Sismondi&rsquo;s &ldquo;History of Italian
+     Republics&rdquo;.
+</pre>
+    <p>
+      <a name="link2HCH0052" id="link2HCH0052">
+      <!--  H2 anchor --> </a>
+    </p>
+    <div style="height: 4em;">
+      <br /><br /><br /><br />
+    </div>
+    <h2>
+      Chapter 8.I. The Encampment.
+    </h2>
+    <p>
+      It was a most lovely day, in the very glow and meridian of an Italian
+      summer, when a small band of horsemen were seen winding a hill which
+      commanded one of the fairest landscapes of Tuscany. At their head was a
+      cavalier in a complete suit of chain armour, the links of which were so
+      fine, that they resembled a delicate and curious network, but so strongly
+      compacted, that they would have resisted spear or sword no less
+      effectually than the heaviest corselet, while adapting themselves exactly
+      and with ease to every movement of the light and graceful shape of the
+      rider. He wore a hat of dark green velvet shaded by long plumes, while of
+      two squires behind, the one bore his helmet and lance, the other led a
+      strong warhorse, completely cased in plates of mail, which seemed,
+      however, scarcely to encumber its proud and agile paces. The countenance
+      of the cavalier was comely, but strongly marked, and darkened, by long
+      exposure to the suns of many climes, to a deep bronze hue: a few raven
+      ringlets escaped from beneath his hat down a cheek closely shaven. The
+      expression of his features was grave and composed even to sadness; nor
+      could all the loveliness of the unrivalled scene before him dispel the
+      quiet and settled melancholy of his eyes. Besides the squires, ten
+      horsemen, armed cap-a-pie, attended the knight; and the low and murmured
+      conversation they carried on at intervals, as well as their long fair
+      hair, large stature, thick short beards, and the studied and accurate
+      equipment of their arms and steeds, bespoke them of a hardier and more
+      warlike race than the children of the south. The cavalcade was closed with
+      a man almost of gigantic height, bearing a banner richly decorated,
+      wherein was wrought a column, with the inscription, &ldquo;ALONE AMIDST RUINS.&rdquo;
+       Fair indeed was the prospect which with every step expanded yet more
+      widely its various beauty. Right before stretched a long vale, now covered
+      with green woodlands glittering in the yellow sunlight, now opening into
+      narrow plains bordered by hillocks, from whose mosses of all hues grew
+      fantastic and odorous shrubs; while, winding amidst them, a broad and
+      silver stream broke into light at frequent intervals, snatched by wood and
+      hillock from the eye, only to steal upon it again, in sudden and bright
+      surprise. The opposite slope of gentle mountains, as well as that which
+      the horsemen now descended, was covered with vineyards, trained in alleys
+      and arcades: and the clustering grape laughed from every leafy and glossy
+      covert, as gaily as when the Fauns held a holiday in the shade. The eye of
+      the Cavalier roved listlessly over this enchanting prospect, sleeping in
+      the rosiest light of a Tuscan heaven, and then became fixed with a more
+      earnest attention on the grey and frowning walls of a distant castle,
+      which, high upon the steepest of the opposite mountains, overlooked the
+      valley.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;Behold,&rdquo; he muttered to himself, &ldquo;how every Eden in Italy hath its curse!
+      Wherever the land smiles fairest, be sure to find the brigand&rsquo;s tent and
+      the tyrant&rsquo;s castle!&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      Scarce had these thoughts passed his mind, ere the shrill and sudden blast
+      of a bugle that sounded close amongst the vineyards by the side of the
+      path startled the whole group. The cavalcade halted abruptly. The leader
+      made a gesture to the squire who led his war-horse. The noble and
+      practised animal remained perfectly still, save by champing its bit
+      restlessly, and moving its quick ear to and fro, as aware of a coming
+      danger,&mdash;while the squire, unencumbered by the heavy armour of the
+      Germans, plunged into the thicket and disappeared. He returned in a few
+      minutes, already heated and breathless.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;We must be on our guard,&rdquo; he whispered; &ldquo;I see the glimmer of steel
+      through the vine leaves.&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;Our ground is unhappily chosen,&rdquo; said the Knight, hastily bracing on his
+      helmet and leaping on his charger; and waving his hand towards a broader
+      space in the road, which would permit the horsemen more room to act in
+      union, with his small band he made hastily to the spot&mdash;the armour of
+      the soldiers rattling heavily as two by two they proceeded on.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      The space to which the Cavalier had pointed was a green semicircle of
+      several yards in extent, backed by tangled copses of brushwood sloping
+      down to the vale below. They reached it in safety; they drew up breast to
+      breast in the form of a crescent: every visor closed save that of the
+      Knight, who looked anxiously and keenly round the landscape.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;Hast thou heard, Giulio,&rdquo; he said, to his favourite squire, (the only
+      Italian of the band,) &ldquo;whether any brigands have been seen lately in these
+      parts?&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;No, my Lord; on the contrary, I am told that every lance hath left the
+      country to join the Grand Company of Fra Moreale. The love of his pay and
+      plunder has drawn away the mercenaries of every Tuscan Signor.&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      As he ceased speaking, the bugle sounded again from nearly the same spot
+      as before; it was answered by a brief and martial note from the very rear
+      of the horsemen. At the same moment, from the thickets behind, broke the
+      gleam of mail and spears. One after another, rank after rank, from the
+      copse behind them, emerged men-at-arms, while suddenly, from the vines in
+      front, still greater numbers poured forth with loud and fierce shouts.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;For God, for the Emperor, and for the Colonna!&rdquo; cried the Knight, closing
+      his visor; and the little band, closely serried, the lance in every rest,
+      broke upon the rush of the enemy in front. A score or so, borne to the
+      ground by the charge, cleared a path for the horsemen, and, without
+      waiting the assault of the rest, the Knight wheeled his charger and led
+      the way down the hill, almost at full gallop, despite the roughness of the
+      descent: a flight of arrows despatched after them fell idly on their iron
+      mail.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;If they have no horse,&rdquo; cried the Knight, &ldquo;we are saved!&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      And, indeed, the enemy seemed scarcely to think of pursuing them; but
+      (gathered on the brow of a hill) appeared contented to watch their flight.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      Suddenly a curve in the road brought them before a broad and wide patch of
+      waste land, which formed almost a level surface, interrupting the descent
+      of the mountain. On the commencement of this waste, drawn up in still
+      array, the sunlight broke on the breastplates of a long line of horsemen,
+      whom the sinuosities of the road had hitherto concealed from the Knight
+      and his party.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      The little troop halted abruptly&mdash;retreat&mdash;advance alike cut
+      off; gazing first at the foe before them, that remained still as a cloud,
+      every eye was then turned towards the Knight.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;An thou wouldst, my Lord,&rdquo; said the leader of the Northmen, perceiving
+      the irresolution of their chief, &ldquo;we will fight to the last. You are the
+      only Italian I ever knew whom I would willingly die for!&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      This rude profession was received with a sympathetic murmur from the rest,
+      and the soldiers drew closer around the Knight. &ldquo;Nay, my brave fellows,&rdquo;
+       said the Colonna, lifting his visor, &ldquo;it is not in so inglorious a field,
+      after such various fortunes, that we are doomed to perish. If these be
+      brigands, as we must suppose, we can yet purchase our way. If the troops
+      of some Signor, we are strangers to the feud in which he is engaged. Give
+      me yon banner&mdash;I will ride on to them.&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;Nay, my Lord,&rdquo; said Giulio; &ldquo;such marauders do not always spare a flag of
+      truce. There is danger&mdash;&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;For that reason your leader braves it. Quick!&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      The Knight took the banner, and rode deliberately up to the horsemen. On
+      approaching, his warlike eye could not but admire the perfect caparison of
+      their arms, the strength and beauty of their steeds, and the steady
+      discipline of their long and glittering line.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      As he rode up, and his gorgeous banner gleamed in the noonlight, the
+      soldiers saluted him. It was a good omen, and he hailed it as such. &ldquo;Fair
+      sirs,&rdquo; said the Knight, &ldquo;I come, at once herald and leader of the little
+      band who have just escaped the unlooked-for assault of armed men on yonder
+      hill&mdash;and, claiming aid, as knight from knight, and soldier from
+      soldier, I place my troop under the protection of your leader. Suffer me
+      to see him.&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;Sir Knight,&rdquo; answered one, who seemed the captain of the band, &ldquo;sorry am
+      I to detain one of your gallant bearing, and still more so, on recognising
+      the device of one of the most potent houses of Italy. But our orders are
+      strict, and we must bring all armed men to the camp of our General.&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;Long absent from my native land, I knew not,&rdquo; replied the Knight, &ldquo;that
+      there was war in Tuscany. Permit me to crave the name of the general whom
+      you speak of, and that of the foe against whom ye march.&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      The Captain smiled slightly.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;Walter de Montreal is the General of the Great Company, and Florence his
+      present foe.&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;We have fallen, then, into friendly, if fierce, hands,&rdquo; replied the
+      Knight, after a moment&rsquo;s pause. &ldquo;To Sir Walter de Montreal I am known of
+      old. Permit me to return to my companions, and acquaint them that if
+      accident has made us prisoners, it is, at least, only to the most skilful
+      warrior of his day that we are condemned to yield.&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      The Italian then turned his horse to join his comrades.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;A fair Knight and a bold presence,&rdquo; said the Captain of the Companions to
+      his neighbour, &ldquo;though I scarce think it is the party we are ordered to
+      intercept. Praised be the Virgin, however, his men seem from the North.
+      Them, perhaps, we may hope to enlist.&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      The Knight now, with his comrades, rejoined the troop. And, on receiving
+      their parole not to attempt escape, a detachment of thirty horsemen were
+      despatched to conduct the prisoners to the encampment of the Great
+      Company.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      Turning from the main road, the Knight found himself conducted into a
+      narrow defile between the hills, which, succeeded by a gloomy track of
+      wild forest-land, brought the party at length into a full and abrupt view
+      of a wide plain, covered with the tents of what, for Italian warfare, was
+      considered a mighty army. A stream, over which rude and hasty bridges had
+      been formed from the neighbouring timber, alone separated the horsemen
+      from the encampment.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;A noble sight!&rdquo; said the captive Cavalier, with enthusiasm, as he reined
+      in his steed, and gazed upon the wild and warlike streets of canvass,
+      traversing each other in vistas broad and regular.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      One of the captains of the Great Company who rode beside him, smiled
+      complacently.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;There are few masters of the martial art who equal Fra Moreale,&rdquo; said he;
+      &ldquo;and savage, reckless, and gathered from all parts and all countries&mdash;from
+      cavern and from marketplace, from prison and from palace, as are his
+      troops, he has reduced them already into a discipline which might shame
+      even the soldiery of the Empire.&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      The Knight made no reply; but, spurring his horse over one of the rugged
+      bridges, soon found himself amidst the encampment. But that part at which
+      he entered little merited the praises bestowed upon the discipline of the
+      army. A more unruly and disorderly array, the Cavalier, accustomed to the
+      stern regularity of English, French, and German discipline, thought he had
+      never beheld: here and there, fierce, unshaven, half-naked brigands might
+      be seen, driving before them the cattle which they had just collected by
+      predatory excursions. Sometimes a knot of dissolute women stood&mdash;chattering,
+      scolding, gesticulating&mdash;collected round groups of wild shagged
+      Northmen, who, despite the bright purity of the summer-noon, were already
+      engaged in deep potations. Oaths, and laughter, and drunken merriment, and
+      fierce brawl, rang from side to side; and ever and anon some hasty
+      conflict with drawn knives was begun and finished by the fiery and savage
+      bravoes of Calabria or the Apennines, before the very eyes and almost in
+      the very path of the troop. Tumblers, and mountebanks, and jugglers, and
+      Jew pedlers, were exhibiting their tricks or their wares at every
+      interval, apparently well inured to the lawless and turbulent market in
+      which they exercised their several callings. Despite the protection of the
+      horsemen who accompanied them, the prisoners were not allowed to pass
+      without molestation. Groups of urchins, squalid, fierce, and ragged,
+      seemed to start from the ground, and surrounded their horses like swarms
+      of bees, uttering the most discordant cries; and, with the gestures of
+      savages, rather demanding than beseeching money, which, when granted,
+      seemed only to render them more insatiable. While, sometimes mingled with
+      the rest, were seen the bright eyes and olive cheek, and half-pleading,
+      half-laughing smile of girls, whose extreme youth, scarce emerged from
+      childhood, rendered doubly striking their utter and unredeemed
+      abandonment.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;You did not exaggerate the decorum of the Grand Company!&rdquo; cried the
+      Knight, gravely, to his new acquaintance.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;Signor,&rdquo; replied the other, &ldquo;you must not judge of the kernel by the
+      shell. We are scarcely yet arrived at the camp. These are the outskirts,
+      occupied rather by the rabble than the soldiers. Twenty thousand men from
+      the sink, it must be owned, of every town in Italy, follow the camp, to
+      fight if necessary, but rather for plunder, and for forage:&mdash;such you
+      now behold. Presently you will see those of another stamp.&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      The Knight&rsquo;s heart swelled high. &ldquo;And to such men is Italy given up!&rdquo;
+       thought he. His revery was broken by a loud burst of applause from some
+      convivialists hard by. He turned, and under a long tent, and round a board
+      covered with wine and viands, sate some thirty or forty bravoes. A ragged
+      minstrel, or jongleur, with an immense beard and mustachios, was tuning,
+      with no inconsiderable skill, a lute which had accompanied him in all his
+      wanderings&mdash;and suddenly changing its notes into a wild and warlike
+      melody, he commenced in a loud and deep voice the following song:&mdash;
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      The Praise of the Grand Company.
+    </p>
+<pre xml:space="preserve">
+     1.
+
+     Ho, dark one from the golden South,&mdash;
+     Ho, fair one from the North;
+     Ho, coat of mail and spear of sheen&mdash;
+     Ho, wherefore ride ye forth?
+     &ldquo;We come from mount, we come from cave,
+     We come across the sea,
+     In long array, in bright array,
+     To Montreal&rsquo;s Companie.&rdquo;
+      Oh, the merry, merry band.
+     Light heart, and heavy hand&mdash;
+     Oh, the Lances of the Free!
+
+     2.
+
+     Ho, Princes of the castled height&mdash;
+     Ho, Burghers of the town;
+     Apulia&rsquo;s strength, Romagna&rsquo;s pride,
+     And Tusca&rsquo;s old renown!
+     Why quail ye thus? why pale ye thus?
+     What spectre do ye see?
+     &ldquo;The blood-red flag, and trampling march,
+     Of Montreal&rsquo;s Companie.&rdquo;
+      Oh, the sunshine of your life&mdash;
+     Oh, the thunders of your strife!
+     Wild Lances of the Free!
+
+     3.
+
+     Ho, scutcheons o&rsquo;er the vaulted tomb
+     Where Norman valour sleeps,
+     Why shake ye so? why quake ye so!
+     What wind the trophy sweeps?
+     &ldquo;We shake without a breath&mdash;below,
+     The dead are stirred to see,
+     The Norman&rsquo;s fame revived again
+     In Montreal&rsquo;s Companie.&rdquo;
+      Since Roger won his crown,
+     Who hath equalled your renown,
+     Brave Lances of the Free?
+
+     4.
+
+     Ho, ye who seek to win a name,
+     Where deeds are bravest done&mdash;
+     Ho, ye who wish to pile a heap,
+     Where gold is lightest won;
+     Ho, ye who loathe the stagnant life,
+     Or shun the law&rsquo;s decree,
+     Belt on the brand, and spur the steed,
+     To Montreal&rsquo;s Companie.
+     And the maid shall share her rest,
+     And the miser share his chest,
+     With the Lances of the Free!
+     The Free!
+     The Free!
+     Oh! the Lances of the Free!
+</pre>
+    <p>
+      Then suddenly, as if inspired to a wilder flight by his own minstrelsy,
+      the jongleur, sweeping his hand over the chords, broke forth into an air
+      admirably expressive of the picture which his words, running into a rude,
+      but lively and stirring doggerel, attempted to paint.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      The March of the Grand Company.
+    </p>
+<pre xml:space="preserve">
+     Tira, tirala&mdash;trumpet and drum&mdash;
+     Rising bright o&rsquo;er the height of the mountain they come!
+     German, and Hun, and the Islandrie,
+     Who routed the Frenchman at famed Cressie,
+     When the rose changed its hue with the fleur-de-lis;
+     With the Roman, and Lombard, and Piedmontese,
+     And the dark-haired son of the southern seas.
+     Tira, tirala&mdash;more near and near
+     Down the steep&mdash;see them sweep;&mdash;rank by rank they appear!
+     With the Cloud of the Crowd hanging dark at their rear&mdash;
+     Serried, and steadied, and orderlie,
+     Like the course&mdash;like the force&mdash;of a marching sea!
+     Open your gates, and out with your gold,
+     For the blood must be spilt, or the ransom be told!
+     Woe, Burghers, woe!  Behold them led
+     By the stoutest arm and the wisest head,
+     With the snow-white cross on the cloth of red;&mdash;
+     With the eagle eye, and the lion port,
+     His barb for a throne, and his camp for a court:
+     Sovereign and scourge of the land is he&mdash;
+     The kingly Knight of the Companie!
+     Hurrah&mdash;hurrah&mdash;hurrah!
+     Hurrah for the army&mdash;hurrah for its lord&mdash;
+     Hurrah for the gold that is got by the sword&mdash;
+     Hurrah&mdash;hurrah&mdash;hurrah!
+     For the Lances of the Free!
+</pre>
+    <p>
+      Shouted by the full chorus of those desperate boon-companions, and caught
+      up and re-echoed from side to side, near and far, as the familiar and
+      well-known words of the burthen reached the ears of more distant groups or
+      stragglers, the effect of this fierce and licentious minstrelsy was
+      indescribable. It was impossible not to feel the zest which that daring
+      life imparted to its daring followers, and even the gallant and stately
+      Knight who listened to it, reproved himself for an involuntary thrill of
+      sympathy and pleasure.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      He turned with some impatience and irritation to his companion, who had
+      taken a part in the chorus, and said, &ldquo;Sir, to the ears of an Italian
+      noble, conscious of the miseries of his country, this ditty is not
+      welcome. I pray you, let us proceed.&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;I humbly crave your pardon, Signor,&rdquo; said the Free Companion; &ldquo;but really
+      so attractive is the life led by Free Lances, under Fra Moreale, that
+      sometimes we forget the&mdash;; but pardon me&mdash;we will on.&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      A few moments more, and bounding over a narrow circumvallation, the party
+      found themselves in a quarter, animated indeed, but of a wholly different
+      character of animation. Long lines of armed men were drawn up on either
+      side of a path, conducting to a large marquee, placed upon a little
+      hillock, surmounted by a blue flag, and up this path armed soldiers were
+      passing to and fro with great order, but with a pleased and complacent
+      expression upon their swarthy features. Some that repaired to the marquee
+      were bearing packets and bales upon their shoulders&mdash;those that
+      returned seemed to have got rid of their burthens, but every now and then,
+      impatiently opening their hands, appeared counting and recounting to
+      themselves the coins contained therein.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      The Knight looked inquiringly at his companion.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;It is the marquee of the merchants,&rdquo; said the captain; &ldquo;they have free
+      admission to the camp, and their property and persons are rigidly
+      respected. They purchase each soldier&rsquo;s share of the plunder at fair
+      prices, and either party is contented with the bargain.&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;It seems, then, that there is some kind of rude justice observed amongst
+      you,&rdquo; said the Knight.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;Rude! Diavolo! Not a town in Italy but would be glad of such even
+      justice, and such impartial laws. Yonder lie the tents of the judges,
+      appointed to try all offences of soldier against soldier. To the right,
+      the tent with the golden ball contains the treasurer of the army. Fra
+      Moreale incurs no arrears with his soldiery.&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      It was, indeed, by these means that the Knight of St. John had collected
+      the best equipped and the best contented force in Italy. Every day brought
+      him recruits. Nothing was spoken of amongst the mercenaries of Italy but
+      the wealth acquired in his service, and every warrior in the pay of
+      Republic or of Tyrant sighed for the lawless standard of Fra Moreale.
+      Already had exaggerated tales of the fortunes to be made in the ranks of
+      the Great Company passed the Alps; and, even now, the Knight, penetrating
+      farther into the camp, beheld from many a tent the proud banners and
+      armorial blazon of German nobility and Gallic knighthood.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;You see,&rdquo; said the Free Companion, pointing to these insignia, &ldquo;we are
+      not without our different ranks in our wild city. And while we speak, many
+      a golden spur is speeding hitherward from the North!&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      All now in the quarter they had entered was still and solemn; only afar
+      came the mingled hum, or the sudden shout of the pandemonium in the rear,
+      mellowed by distance to a not unpleasing sound. An occasional soldier,
+      crossing their path, stalked silently and stealthily to some neighbouring
+      tent, and seemed scarcely to regard their approach.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;Behold! we are before the General&rsquo;s pavilion,&rdquo; said the Free Lance.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      Blazoned with purple and gold, the tent of Montreal lay a little apart
+      from the rest. A brooklet from the stream they had crossed murmured
+      gratefully on the ear, and a tall and wide-spreading beech cast its shadow
+      over the gorgeous canvass.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      While his troop waited without, the knight was conducted at once to the
+      presence of the formidable adventurer.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      <a name="link2HCH0053" id="link2HCH0053">
+      <!--  H2 anchor --> </a>
+    </p>
+    <div style="height: 4em;">
+      <br /><br /><br /><br />
+    </div>
+    <h2>
+      Chapter 8.II. Adrian Once More the Guest of Montreal.
+    </h2>
+    <p>
+      Montreal was sitting at the head of a table, surrounded by men, some
+      military, some civil, whom he called his councillors, and with whom he
+      apparently debated all his projects. These men, drawn from various cities,
+      were intimately acquainted with the internal affairs of the several states
+      to which they belonged. They could tell to a fraction the force of a
+      signor, the wealth of a merchant, the power of a mob. And thus, in his
+      lawless camp, Montreal presided, not more as a general than a statesman.
+      Such knowledge was invaluable to the chief of the Great Company. It
+      enabled him to calculate exactly the time to attack a foe, and the sum to
+      demand for a suppression of hostilities. He knew what parties to deal with&mdash;where
+      to importune&mdash;where to forbear. And it usually happened that, by some
+      secret intrigue, the appearance of Montreal&rsquo;s banner before the walls of a
+      city was the signal for some sedition or some broil within. It may be that
+      he thus also promoted an ulterior, as well as his present, policy.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      The divan were in full consultation when an officer entered, and whispered
+      a few words in Montreal&rsquo;s ear. His eyes brightened. &ldquo;Admit him,&rdquo; he said
+      hastily. &ldquo;Messires,&rdquo; he added to his councillors, rubbing his hands, &ldquo;I
+      think our net has caught our bird. Let us see.&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      At this moment the drapery was lifted and the Knight admitted.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;How!&rdquo; muttered Montreal, changing colour, and in evident disappointment.
+      &ldquo;Am I to be ever thus balked?&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;Sir Walter de Montreal,&rdquo; said the prisoner, &ldquo;I am once more your guest.
+      In these altered features you perhaps scarcely recognise Adrian di
+      Castello.&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;Pardon me, noble Signor,&rdquo; said Montreal, rising with great courtesy; &ldquo;the
+      mistake of my varlets disturbed my recollection for a moment.&mdash;I
+      rejoice once more to press a hand that has won so many laurels since last
+      we parted. Your renown has been grateful to my ears. Ho!&rdquo; continued the
+      chieftain, clapping his hands, &ldquo;see to the refreshment and repose of this
+      noble Cavalier and his attendants. Lord Adrian, I will join you
+      presently.&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      Adrian withdrew. Montreal, forgetful of his councillors, traversed his
+      tent with hasty strides; then summoning the officer who had admitted
+      Adrian, he said, &ldquo;Count Landau still keeps the pass?&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;Yes, General!&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;Hie thee fast back, then&mdash;the ambuscade must tarry till nightfall.
+      We have trapped the wrong fox.&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      The officer departed, and shortly afterwards Montreal broke up the divan.
+      He sought Adrian, who was lodged in a tent beside his own.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;My Lord,&rdquo; said Montreal, &ldquo;it is true that my men had orders to stop every
+      one on the roads towards Florence. I am at war with that city. Yet I
+      expected a very different prisoner from you. Need I add, that you and your
+      men are free?&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;I accept the courtesy, noble Montreal, as frankly as it is rendered. May
+      I hope hereafter to repay it? Meanwhile permit me, without any disrespect,
+      to say that had I learned the Grand Company was in this direction, I
+      should have altered my course. I had heard that your arms were bent
+      (somewhat to my mind more nobly) against Malatesta, the tyrant of Rimini!&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;They were so. He was my foe; he is my tributary. We conquered him. He
+      paid us the price of his liberty. We marched by Asciano upon Sienna. For
+      sixteen thousand florins we spared that city; and we now hang like a
+      thunderbolt over Florence, which dared to send her puny aid to the defence
+      of Rimini. Our marches are forced and rapid and our camp in this plain but
+      just pitched.&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;I hear that the Grand Company is allied with Albornoz, and that its
+      General is secretly the soldier of the Church. Is it so?&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;Ay&mdash;Albornoz and I understand one another,&rdquo; replied Montreal,
+      carelessly; &ldquo;and not the less so that we have a mutual foe; whom both are
+      sworn to crush, in Visconti, the archbishop of Milan.&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;Visconti! the most potent of the Italian princes. That he has justly
+      incurred the wrath of the Church I know&mdash;and I can readily understand
+      that Innocent has revoked the pardon which the intrigues of the Archbishop
+      purchased from Clement VI. But I do not see clearly why Montreal should
+      willingly provoke so dark and terrible a foe.&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      Montreal smiled sternly. &ldquo;Know you not,&rdquo; he said, &ldquo;the vast ambition of
+      that Visconti? By the Holy Sepulchre, he is precisely the enemy my soul
+      leaps to meet! He has a genius worthy to cope with Montreal&rsquo;s. I have made
+      myself master of his secret plans&mdash;they are gigantic! In a word, the
+      Archbishop designs the conquest of all Italy. His enormous wealth
+      purchases the corrupt&mdash;his dark sagacity ensnares the credulous&mdash;his
+      daring valour awes the weak. Every enemy he humbles&mdash;every ally he
+      enslaves. This is precisely the Prince whose progress Walter de Montreal
+      must arrest. For this (he said in a whisper as to himself) is precisely
+      the Prince who, if suffered to extend his power, will frustrate the plans
+      and break the force of Walter de Montreal.&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      Adrian was silent, and for the first time a suspicion of the real nature
+      of the Provencal&rsquo;s designs crossed his breast.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;But, noble Montreal,&rdquo; resumed the Colonna, &ldquo;give me, if your knowledge
+      serves, as no doubt it does,&mdash;give me the latest tidings of my native
+      city. I am Roman, and Rome is ever in my thoughts.&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;And well she may,&rdquo; replied Montreal, quickly. &ldquo;Thou knowest that
+      Albornoz, as Legate of the Pontiff, led the army of the Church into the
+      Papal Territories. He took with him Cola di Rienzi. Arrived at Monte
+      Fiascone, crowds of Romans of all ranks hastened thither to render homage
+      to the Tribune. The Legate was forgotten in the popularity of his
+      companion. Whether or not Albornoz grew jealous&mdash;for he is proud as
+      Lucifer&mdash;of the respect paid to the Tribune, or whether he feared the
+      restoration of his power, I cannot tell. But he detained him in his camp,
+      and refused to yield him to all the solicitations and all the deputations
+      of the Romans. Artfully, however, he fulfilled one of the real objects of
+      Rienzi&rsquo;s release. Through his means he formally regained the allegiance of
+      Rome to the Church, and by the attraction of his presence swelled his camp
+      with Roman recruits. Marching to Viterbo, Rienzi distinguished himself
+      greatly in deeds of arms against the tyrant (&ldquo;Vita di Cola di Rienzi&rdquo;.)
+      John di Vico. Nay, he fought as one worthy of belonging to the Grand
+      Company. This increased the zeal of the Romans; and the city disgorged
+      half its inhabitants to attend the person of the bold Tribune. To the
+      entreaties of these worthy citizens (perhaps the very men who had before
+      shut up their darling in St. Angelo) the crafty Legate merely replied,
+      &lsquo;Arm against John di Vico&mdash;conquer the tyrants of the Territory&mdash;re-establish
+      the patrimony of St. Peter, and Rienzi shall then be proclaimed Senator,
+      and return to Rome.&rsquo; 
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;These words inspired the Romans with so great a zeal, that they willingly
+      lent their aid to the Legate. Aquapendente, Bolzena yielded, John di Vico
+      was half reduced and half terrified into submission, and Gabrielli, the
+      tyrant of Agobbio, has since succumbed. The glory is to the Cardinal, but
+      the merit with Rienzi.&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;And now?&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;Albornoz continued to entertain the Senator-Tribune with great splendour
+      and fair words, but not a word about restoring him to Rome. Wearied with
+      this suspense, I have learned by secret intelligence that Rienzi has left
+      the camp, and betaken himself with few attendants to Florence, where he
+      has friends, who will provide him with arms and money to enter Rome.&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;Ah then! now I guess,&rdquo; said Adrian, with a half smile, &ldquo;for whom I was
+      mistaken!&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      Montreal blushed slightly. &ldquo;Fairly conjectured!&rdquo; said he.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;Meanwhile, at Rome,&rdquo; continued the Provencal&mdash;&ldquo;at Rome, your worthy
+      House, and that of the Orsini, being elected to the supreme power,
+      quarrelled among themselves, and could not keep the authority they had
+      won. Francesco Baroncelli, (This Baroncelli, who has been introduced to
+      the reader in a former portion of this work, is called by Matteo Villani
+      &ldquo;a man of vile birth and little learning&mdash;he had been a Notary of the
+      Capitol.&rdquo; In the midst of the armed dissensions between the Barons, which
+      followed the expulsion of Rienzi, Baroncelli contrived to make himself
+      Master of the Capitol, and of what was considered an auxiliary of no
+      common importance&mdash;viz. the Great Bell, by whose alarum Rienzi had so
+      often summoned to arms the Roman people. Baroncelli was crowned Tribune,
+      clothed in a robe of gold brocade, and invested with the crozier-sceptre
+      of Rienzi. At first, his cruelty against the great took the appearance of
+      protection to the humble; but the excesses of his sons (not exaggerated in
+      the text), and his own brutal but bold ferocity, soon made him execrated
+      by the people, to whom he owed his elevation. He had the folly to declare
+      against the Pope; and this it really was that mainly induced Innocent to
+      restore, and oppose to their New Demagogue, the former and more
+      illustrious Tribune. Baroncelli, like Rienzi, was excommunicated; and in
+      his instance, also, the curse of the Church was the immediate cause of his
+      downfall. In attempting flight he was massacred by the mob, December,
+      1353. Some, however, have maintained that he was slain in combat with
+      Rienzi; and others, by a confusion of dates, have made him succeed to
+      Rienzi on the death of the latter.&mdash;Matteo Villani, lib. iii. cap.
+      78. Osservaz. Stor. di Zefirino Re. MS. Vat. Rip. dal Bzovio, ann. 1353.
+      N. 2.) a new demagogue, a humble imitator of Rienzi, rose upon the ruins
+      of the peace broken by the nobles, obtained the title of Tribune, and
+      carried about the very insignia used by his predecessor. But less wise
+      than Rienzi, he took the antipapal party. And the Legate was thus enabled
+      to play the papal demagogue against the usurper. Baroncelli was a weak
+      man, his sons committed every excess in mimicry of the highborn tyrants of
+      Padua and Milan. Virgins violated and matrons dishonoured, somewhat
+      contrasted the solemn and majestic decorum of Rienzi&rsquo;s rule;&mdash;in
+      fine, Baroncelli fell massacred by the people. And now, if you ask what
+      rules Rome, I answer, &lsquo;It is the hope of Rienzi.&rsquo;&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;A strange man, and various fortunes. What will be the end of both!&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;Swift murder to the first, and eternal fame to the last,&rdquo; answered
+      Montreal, calmly. &ldquo;Rienzi will be restored; that brave phoenix will wing
+      its way through storm and cloud to its own funereal pyre: I foresee, I
+      compassionate, I admire.&mdash;And then,&rdquo; added Montreal, &ldquo;I look beyond!&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;But wherefore feel you so certain that, if restored, Rienzi must fall?&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;Is it not clear to every eye, save his, whom ambition blinds? How can
+      mortal genius, however great, rule that most depraved people by popular
+      means? The Barons&mdash;(you know their indomitable ferocity)&mdash;wedded
+      to abuse, and loathing every semblance to law; the Barons, humbled for a
+      moment, will watch their occasion, and rise. The people will again desert.
+      Or else, grown wise in one respect by experience, the new Senator will see
+      that popular favour has a loud voice, but a recreant arm. He will, like
+      the Barons, surround himself by foreign swords. A detachment from the
+      Grand Company will be his courtiers; they will be his masters! To pay them
+      the people must be taxed. Then the idol is execrated. No Italian hand can
+      govern these hardy demons of the north; they will mutiny and fall away. A
+      new demagogue will lead on the people, and Rienzi will be the victim. Mark
+      my prophecy!&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;And then the &lsquo;beyond&rsquo; to which you look?&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;Utter prostration of Rome, for new and long ages; God makes not two
+      Rienzis; or,&rdquo; said Montreal, proudly, &ldquo;the infusion of a new life into the
+      worn-out and diseased frame,&mdash;the foundation of a new dynasty.
+      Verily, when I look around me, I believe that the Ruler of nations designs
+      the restoration of the South by the irruptions of the North; and that out
+      of the old Franc and Germanic race will be built up the thrones of the
+      future world!&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      As Montreal thus spoke, leaning on his great war-sword, with his fair and
+      heroic features&mdash;so different, in their frank, bold, fearless
+      expression, from the dark and wily intellect that characterises the
+      lineaments of the South&mdash;eloquent at once with enthusiasm and thought&mdash;he
+      might have seemed no unfitting representative of the genius of that
+      northern chivalry of which he spake. And Adrian half fancied that he saw
+      before him one of the old Gothic scourges of the Western World.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      Their conversation was here interrupted by the sound of a trumpet, and
+      presently an officer entering, announced the arrival of ambassadors from
+      Florence.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;Again you must pardon me, noble Adrian,&rdquo; said Montreal, &ldquo;and let me claim
+      you as my guest at least for tonight. Here you may rest secure, and on
+      parting, my men shall attend you to the frontiers of whatsoever territory
+      you design to visit.&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      Adrian, not sorry to see more of a man so celebrated, accepted the
+      invitation.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      Left alone, he leaned his head upon his hand, and soon became lost in his
+      reflections.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      <a name="link2HCH0054" id="link2HCH0054">
+      <!--  H2 anchor --> </a>
+    </p>
+    <div style="height: 4em;">
+      <br /><br /><br /><br />
+    </div>
+    <h2>
+      Chapter 8.III. Faithful and Ill-fated Love.&mdash;The Aspirations Survive
+      the
+    </h2>
+    <p>
+      Affections.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      Since that fearful hour in which Adrian Colonna had gazed upon the
+      lifeless form of his adored Irene, the young Roman had undergone the usual
+      vicissitudes of a wandering and adventurous life in those exciting times.
+      His country seemed no longer dear to him. His very rank precluded him from
+      the post he once aspired to take in restoring the liberties of Rome; and
+      he felt that if ever such a revolution could be consummated, it was
+      reserved for one in whose birth and habits the people could feel sympathy
+      and kindred, and who could lift his hand in their behalf without becoming
+      the apostate of his order and the judge of his own House. He had travelled
+      through various courts, and served with renown in various fields. Beloved
+      and honoured wheresoever he fixed a temporary home, no change of scene had
+      removed his melancholy&mdash;no new ties had chased away the memory of the
+      Lost. In that era of passionate and poetical romance, which Petrarch
+      represented rather than created, Love had already begun to assume a more
+      tender and sacred character than it had hitherto known, it had gradually
+      imbibed the divine spirit which it derives from Christianity, and which
+      associates its sorrows on earth with the visions and hopes of heaven. To
+      him who relies upon immortality, fidelity to the dead is easy; because
+      death cannot extinguish hope, and the soul of the mourner is already half
+      in the world to come. It is an age that desponds of a future life&mdash;representing
+      death as an eternal separation&mdash;in which, if men grieve awhile for
+      the dead, they hasten to reconcile themselves to the living. For true is
+      the old aphorism, that love exists not without hope. And all that romantic
+      worship which the Hermit of Vaucluse felt, or feigned, for Laura, found
+      its temple in the desolate heart of Adrian Colonna. He was emphatically
+      the Lover of his time! Often as, in his pilgrimage from land to land, he
+      passed the walls of some quiet and lonely convent, he seriously meditated
+      the solemn vows, and internally resolved that the cloister should receive
+      his maturer age. The absence of years had, however, in some degree
+      restored the dimmed and shattered affection for his fatherland, and he
+      desired once more to visit the city in which he had first beheld Irene.
+      &ldquo;Perhaps,&rdquo; he thought, &ldquo;time may have wrought some unlooked-for change;
+      and I may yet assist to restore my country.&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      But with this lingering patriotism no ambition was mingled. In that heated
+      stage of action, in which the desire of power seemed to stir through every
+      breast, and Italy had become the El Dorado of wealth, or the Utopia of
+      empire, to thousands of valiant arms and plotting minds, there was at
+      least one breast that felt the true philosophy of the Hermit. Adrian&rsquo;s
+      nature, though gallant and masculine, was singularly imbued with that
+      elegance of temperament which recoils from rude contact, and to which a
+      lettered and cultivated indolence is the supremest luxury. His education,
+      his experience, and his intellect, had placed him far in advance of his
+      age, and he looked with a high contempt on the coarse villanies and base
+      tricks by which Italian ambition sought its road to power. The rise and
+      fall of Rienzi, who, whatever his failings, was at least the purest and
+      most honourable of the self-raised princes of the age, had conspired to
+      make him despond of the success of noble, as he recoiled from that of
+      selfish aspirations. And the dreamy melancholy which resulted from his
+      ill-starred love, yet more tended to wean him from the stale and hackneyed
+      pursuits of the world. His character was full of beauty and of poetry&mdash;not
+      the less so in that it found not a vent for its emotions in the actual
+      occupation of the poet! Pent within, those emotions diffused themselves
+      over all his thoughts and coloured his whole soul. Sometimes, in the
+      blessed abstraction of his visions, he pictured to himself the lot he
+      might have chosen had Irene lived, and fate united them&mdash;far from the
+      turbulent and vulgar roar of Rome&mdash;but amidst some yet unpolluted
+      solitude of the bright Italian soil. Before his eye there rose the lovely
+      landscape&mdash;the palace by the borders of the waveless lake&mdash;the
+      vineyards in the valley&mdash;the dark forests waving from the hill&mdash;and
+      that home, the resort and refuge of all the minstrelsy and love of Italy,
+      brightened by the &ldquo;Lampeggiar dell&rsquo; angelico riso,&rdquo; that makes a paradise
+      in the face we love. Often, seduced by such dreams to complete oblivion of
+      his loss, the young wanderer started from the ideal bliss, to behold
+      around him the solitary waste of way&mdash;or the moonlit tents of war&mdash;or,
+      worse than all, the crowds and revels of a foreign court.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      Whether or not such fancies now, for a moment, allured his meditations,
+      conjured up, perhaps, by the name of Irene&rsquo;s brother, which never sounded
+      in his ears but to awaken ten thousand associations, the Colonna remained
+      thoughtful and absorbed, until he was disturbed by his own squire, who,
+      accompanied by Montreal&rsquo;s servitors, ushered in his solitary but ample
+      repast. Flasks of the richest Florentine wines&mdash;viands prepared with
+      all the art which, alas, Italy has now lost!&mdash;goblets and salvers of
+      gold and silver, prodigally wrought with barbaric gems&mdash;attested the
+      princely luxury which reigned in the camp of the Grand Company. But Adrian
+      saw in all only the spoliation of his degraded country, and felt the
+      splendour almost as an insult. His lonely meal soon concluded, he became
+      impatient of the monotony of his tent; and, tempted by the cool air of the
+      descending eve, sauntered carelessly forth. He bent his steps by the side
+      of the brooklet that curved, snakelike and sparkling, by Montreal&rsquo;s tent;
+      and finding a spot somewhat solitary and apart from the warlike tenements
+      around, flung himself by the margin of the stream.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      The last rays of the sun quivered on the wave that danced musically over
+      its stony bed; and amidst a little copse on the opposite bank broke the
+      brief and momentary song of such of the bolder habitants of that purple
+      air as the din of the camp had not scared from their green retreat. The
+      clouds lay motionless to the west, in that sky so darkly and intensely
+      blue, never seen but over the landscapes that a Claude or a Rosa loved to
+      paint; and dim and delicious rose-hues gathered over the grey peaks of the
+      distant Apennines. From afar floated the hum of the camp, broken by the
+      neigh of returning steeds; the blast of an occasional bugle; and, at
+      regular intervals, by the armed tramp of the neighbouring sentry. And
+      opposite to the left of the copse&mdash;upon a rising ground, matted with
+      reeds, moss, and waving shrubs&mdash;were the ruins of some old Etruscan
+      building, whose name had perished, whose very uses were unknown.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      The scene was so calm and lovely, as Adrian gazed upon it, that it was
+      scarcely possible to imagine it at that very hour the haunt of fierce and
+      banded robbers, among most of whom the very soul of man was embruted, and
+      to all of whom murder or rapine made the habitual occupation of life.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      Still buried in his reveries, and carelessly dropping stones into the
+      noisy rivulet, Adrian was aroused by the sound of steps.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;A fair spot to listen to the lute and the ballads of Provence,&rdquo; said the
+      voice of Montreal, as the Knight of St. John threw himself on the turf
+      beside the young Colonna.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;You retain, then, your ancient love of your national melodies,&rdquo; said
+      Adrian.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;Ay, I have not yet survived all my youth,&rdquo; answered Montreal, with a
+      slight sigh. &ldquo;But somehow or other, the strains that once pleased my fancy
+      now go too directly to my heart. So, though I still welcome jongleur and
+      minstrel, I bid them sing their newest conceits. I cannot wish ever again
+      to hear the poetry I heard when I was young!&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;Pardon me,&rdquo; said Adrian, with great interest, &ldquo;but fain would I have
+      dared, though a secret apprehension prevented me hitherto,&mdash;fain
+      would I have dared to question you of that lovely lady, with whom, seven
+      years ago, we gazed at moonlight upon the odorous orange-groves and rosy
+      waters of Terracina.&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      Montreal turned away his face; he laid his hand on Adrian&rsquo;s arm, and
+      murmured, in a deep and hoarse tone, &ldquo;I am alone now!&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      Adrian pressed his hand in silence. He felt no light shock at thus
+      learning the death of one so gentle, so lovely, and so ill-fated.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;The vows of my knighthood,&rdquo; continued Montreal, &ldquo;which precluded Adeline
+      the rights of wedlock&mdash;the shame of her house&mdash;the angry grief
+      of her mother&mdash;the wild vicissitudes of my life, so exposed to peril&mdash;the
+      loss of her son&mdash;all preyed silently on her frame. She did not die
+      (die is too harsh a word!), but she drooped away, and glided into heaven.
+      Even as on a summer&rsquo;s morn some soft dream fleets across us, growing less
+      and less distinct, until it fades, as it were, into light, and we awaken&mdash;so
+      faded Adeline&rsquo;s parting spirit, till the daylight of God broke upon it.&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      Montreal paused a moment, and then resumed: &ldquo;These thoughts make the
+      boldest of us weak sometimes, and we Provencals are foolish in these
+      matters!&mdash;God wot, she was very dear to me!&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      The Knight bent down and crossed himself devoutly, his lips muttered a
+      prayer. Strange as it may seem to our more enlightened age, so martial a
+      garb did morality then wear, that this man, at whose word towns had blazed
+      and torrents of blood had flowed, neither adjudged himself, nor was
+      adjudged by the majority of his contemporaries, a criminal. His order,
+      half monastic, half warlike, was emblematic of himself. He trampled upon
+      man, yet humbled himself to God; nor had all his acquaintance with the
+      refining scepticism of Italy shaken the sturdy and simple faith of the
+      bold Provencal. So far from recognising any want of harmony between his
+      calling and his creed, he held that man no true chevalier who was not as
+      devout to the Cross as relentless with the sword.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;And you have no child save the one you lost?&rdquo; asked Adrian, when he
+      observed the wonted composure of Montreal once more returning.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;None!&rdquo; said Montreal, as his brow again darkened. &ldquo;No love-begotten heir
+      of mine will succeed to the fortunes I trust yet to build. Never on earth
+      shall I see upon the face of her child the likeness of Adeline! Yet, at
+      Avignon, I saw a boy I would have claimed; for methought she must have
+      looked her soul into his eyes, they were so like hers! Well, well! The
+      Provence tree hath other branches; and some unborn nephew must be&mdash;what?
+      The stars have not yet decided! But ambition is now the only thing in the
+      world left me to love.&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;So differently operates the same misfortune upon different characters,&rdquo;
+       thought the Colonna. &ldquo;To me, crowns became valueless when I could no
+      longer dream of placing them on Irene&rsquo;s brow!&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      The similarity of their fates, however, attracted Adrian strongly towards
+      his host; and the two Knights conversed together with more friendship and
+      unreserve than they had hitherto done. At length Montreal said, &ldquo;By the
+      way, I have not inquired your destination.&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;I am bound to Rome,&rdquo; said Adrian; &ldquo;and the intelligence I have learned
+      from you incites me thitherward yet more eagerly. If Rienzi return, I may
+      mediate successfully, perchance, between the Tribune-Senator and the
+      nobles; and if I find my cousin, young Stefanello, now the head of our
+      house, more tractable than his sires, I shall not despair of conciliating
+      the less powerful Barons. Rome wants repose; and whoever governs, if he
+      govern but with justice, ought to be supported both by prince and
+      plebeian!&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      Montreal listened with great attention, and then muttered to himself, &ldquo;No,
+      it cannot be!&rdquo; He mused a little while, shading his brow with his hand,
+      before he said aloud, &ldquo;To Rome you are bound. Well, we shall meet soon
+      amidst its ruins. Know, by the way, that my object here is already won:
+      these Florentine merchants have acceded to my terms; they have purchased a
+      two years&rsquo; peace; tomorrow the camp breaks up, and the Grand Company march
+      to Lombardy. There, if my schemes prosper, and the Venetians pay my price,
+      I league the rascals (under Landau, my Lieutenant) with the Sea-City, in
+      defiance of the Visconti, and shall pass my autumn in peace amidst the
+      pomps of Rome.&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;Sir Walter de Montreal,&rdquo; said Adrian, &ldquo;your frankness perhaps makes me
+      presumptuous; but when I hear you talk, like a huxtering trader, of
+      selling alike your friendship and your forbearance, I ask myself, &lsquo;Is this
+      the great Knight of St. John; and have men spoken of him fairly, when they
+      assert the sole stain on his laurels to be his avarice?&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      Montreal bit his lip; nevertheless, he answered calmly, &ldquo;My frankness has
+      brought its own penance, Lord Adrian. However, I cannot wholly leave so
+      honoured a guest under an impression which I feel to be plausible, but not
+      just. No, brave Colonna; report wrongs me. I value Gold, for Gold is the
+      Architect of Power! It fills the camp&mdash;it storms the city&mdash;it
+      buys the marketplace&mdash;it raises the palace&mdash;it founds the
+      throne. I value Gold,&mdash;it is the means necessary to my end!&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;And that end&mdash;&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;Is&mdash;no matter what,&rdquo; said the Knight coldly. &ldquo;Let us to our tents,
+      the dews fall heavily, and the malaria floats over these houseless
+      wastes.&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      The pair rose;&mdash;yet, fascinated by the beauty of the hour, they
+      lingered for a moment by the brook. The earliest stars shone over its
+      crisping wavelets, and a delicious breeze murmured gently amidst the
+      glossy herbage.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;Thus gazing,&rdquo; said Montreal, softly, &ldquo;we reverse the old Medusan fable
+      the poets tell us of, and look and muse ourselves out of stone. A little
+      while, and it was the sunlight that gilded the wave&mdash;it now shines as
+      brightly and glides as gaily beneath the stars; even so rolls the stream
+      of time: one luminary succeeds the other equally welcomed&mdash;equally
+      illumining&mdash;equally evanescent!&mdash;You see, the poetry of Provence
+      still lives beneath my mail!&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      Adrian early sought his couch; but his own thoughts and the sounds of loud
+      mirth that broke from Montreal&rsquo;s tent, where the chief feasted the
+      captains of his band, a revel from which he had the delicacy to excuse the
+      Roman noble, kept the Colonna long awake; and he had scarcely fallen into
+      an unquiet slumber, when yet more discordant sounds again invaded his
+      repose. At the earliest dawn the wide armament was astir&mdash;the
+      creaking of cordage&mdash;the tramp of men&mdash;loud orders and louder
+      oaths&mdash;the slow rolling of baggage-wains&mdash;and the clank of the
+      armourers, announced the removal of the camp, and the approaching
+      departure of the Grand Company.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      Ere Adrian was yet attired, Montreal entered his tent.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;I have appointed,&rdquo; he said, &ldquo;five score lances under a trusty leader, to
+      accompany you, noble Adrian, to the borders of Romagna; they wait your
+      leisure. In another hour I depart; the on-guard are already in motion.&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      Adrian would fain have declined the proffered escort; but he saw that it
+      would only offend the pride of the chief, who soon retired. Hastily Adrian
+      endued his arms&mdash;the air of the fresh morning, and the glad sun
+      rising gorgeously from the hills, revived his wearied spirit. He repaired
+      to Montreal&rsquo;s tent, and found him alone, with the implements of writing
+      before him, and a triumphant smile upon his countenance.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;Fortune showers new favours on me!&rdquo; he said, gaily. &ldquo;Yesterday the
+      Florentines spared me the trouble of a siege: and today (even since I last
+      saw you&mdash;a few minutes since) puts your new Senator of Rome into my
+      power.&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;How! Have your bands then arrested Rienzi?&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;Not so&mdash;better still! The Tribune changed his plan, and repaired to
+      Perugia, where my brothers now abide&mdash;sought them&mdash;they have
+      supplied him with money and soldiers enough to brave the perils of the
+      way, and to defy the swords of the Barons. So writes my good brother
+      Arimbaldo, a man of letters, whom the Tribune thinks rightly he has
+      decoyed with old tales of Roman greatness, and mighty promises of grateful
+      advancement. You find me hastily expressing my content at the arrangement.
+      My brothers themselves will accompany the Senator-Tribune to the walls of
+      the Capitol.&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;Still, I see not how this places Rienzi in your power.&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;No! His soldiers are my creatures&mdash;his comrades my brothers&mdash;his
+      creditor myself! Let him rule Rome then&mdash;the time soon comes when the
+      Vice-Regent must yield to&mdash;&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;The Chief of the Grand Company,&rdquo; interrupted Adrian, with a shudder,
+      which the bold Montreal was too engrossed with the unconcealed excitement
+      of his own thoughts to notice. &ldquo;No, Knight of Provence, basely have we
+      succumbed to domestic tyrants: but never, I trust, will Romans be so vile
+      as to wear the yoke of a foreign usurper.&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      Montreal looked hard at Adrian, and smiled sternly.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;You mistake me,&rdquo; said he; &ldquo;and it will be time enough for you to play the
+      Brutus when I assume the Caesar. Meanwhile we are but host and guest. Let
+      us change the theme.&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      Nevertheless this, their latter conference, threw a chill over both during
+      the short time the Knights remained together, and they parted with a
+      formality which was ill-suited to their friendly intercourse of the night
+      before. Montreal felt he had in cautiously revealed himself, but caution
+      was no part of his character, whenever he found himself at the head of an
+      army, and at the full tide of fortune; and at that moment, so confident
+      was he of the success of his wildest schemes, that he recked little whom
+      he offended, or whom alarmed.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      Slowly, with his strange and ferocious escort, Adrian renewed his way.
+      Winding up a steep ascent that led from the plain,&mdash;when he reached
+      the summit, the curve in the road shewed him the whole army on its march;&mdash;the
+      gonfalons waving&mdash;the armour flashing in the sun, line after line,
+      like a river of steel, and the whole plain bristling with the array of
+      that moving war;&mdash;while the solemn tread of the armed thousands fell
+      subdued and stifled at times by martial and exulting music. As they swept
+      on, Adrian descried at length the stately and towering form of Montreal
+      upon a black charger, distinguished even at that distance from the rest,
+      not more by his gorgeous armour than his lofty stature. So swept he on in
+      the pride of his array&mdash;in the flush of his hopes&mdash;the head of a
+      mighty armament&mdash;the terror of Italy&mdash;the hero that was&mdash;the
+      monarch that might be!
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      <a name="link2H_4_0066" id="link2H_4_0066">
+      <!--  H2 anchor --> </a>
+    </p>
+    <div style="height: 4em;">
+      <br /><br /><br /><br />
+    </div>
+    <h2>
+      BOOK IX. THE RETURN.
+    </h2>
+<pre xml:space="preserve">
+     &ldquo;Allora la sua venuta fu a Roma sentita; Romani si
+     apparecchiavano a riceverlo con letizia...furo fatti archi
+     trionfali,&rdquo; &amp;c. &amp;c.&mdash;&ldquo;Vita di Cola di Rienzi&rdquo;, lib. ii. c.
+     17.
+
+     &ldquo;Then the fame of his coming was felt at Rome; the Romans
+     made ready to receive him with gladness...triumphal arches
+     were erected,&rdquo; &amp;c., &amp;c.&mdash;&ldquo;Life of Cola di Rienzi&rdquo;.
+</pre>
+    <p>
+      <a name="link2HCH0055" id="link2HCH0055">
+      <!--  H2 anchor --> </a>
+    </p>
+    <div style="height: 4em;">
+      <br /><br /><br /><br />
+    </div>
+    <h2>
+      Chapter 9.I. The Triumphal Entrance.
+    </h2>
+    <p>
+      All Rome was astir!&mdash;from St. Angelo to the Capitol, windows,
+      balconies, roofs, were crowded with animated thousands. Only here and
+      there, in the sullen quarters of the Colonna, the Orsini, and the Savelli,
+      reigned a death-like solitude and a dreary gloom. In those fortifications,
+      rather than streets, not even the accustomed tread of the barbarian
+      sentinel was heard. The gates closed&mdash;the casements barred&mdash;the
+      grim silence around&mdash;attested the absence of the Barons. They had
+      left the city so soon as they had learned the certain approach of Rienzi.
+      In the villages and castles of the Campagna, surrounded by their
+      mercenaries, they awaited the hour when the people, weary of their idol,
+      should welcome back even those ferocious Iconoclasts.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      With these exceptions, all Rome was astir! Triumphal arches of drapery,
+      wrought with gold and silver, raised at every principal vista, were
+      inscribed with mottoes of welcome and rejoicing. At frequent intervals
+      stood youths and maidens, with baskets of flowers and laurels. High above
+      the assembled multitudes&mdash;from the proud tower of Hadrian&mdash;from
+      the turrets of the Capitol&mdash;from the spires of the sacred buildings
+      dedicated to Apostle and to Saint&mdash;floated banners as for a victory.
+      Rome once more opened her arms to receive her Tribune!
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      Mingled with the crowd&mdash;disguised by his large mantle&mdash;hidden by
+      the pressure of the throng&mdash;his person, indeed, forgotten by most&mdash;and,
+      in the confusion of the moment, heeded by none&mdash;stood Adrian Colonna!
+      He had not been able to conquer his interest for the brother of Irene.
+      Solitary amidst his fellow-citizens, he stood&mdash;the only one of the
+      proud race of Colonna who witnessed the triumph of the darling of the
+      people.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;They say he has grown large in his prison,&rdquo; said one of the bystanders;
+      &ldquo;he was lean enough when he came by daybreak out of the Church of St.
+      Angelo!&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;Ay,&rdquo; said another, a little man with a shrewd, restless eye, &ldquo;they say
+      truly; I saw him take leave of the Legate.&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      Every eye was turned to the last speaker; he became at once a personage of
+      importance. &ldquo;Yes,&rdquo; continued the little man with an elated and pompous
+      air, &ldquo;as soon, d&rsquo;ye see, as he had prevailed on Messere Brettone, and
+      Messere Arimbaldo, the brothers of Fra Moreale, to accompany him from
+      Perugia to Monte Fiascone, he went at once to the Legate d&rsquo;Albornoz, who
+      was standing in the open air conversing with his captains. A crowd
+      followed. I was one of them; and the Tribune nodded at me&mdash;ay, that
+      did he!&mdash;and so, with his scarlet cloak, and his scarlet cap, he
+      faced the proud Cardinal with a pride greater than his own. &lsquo;Monsignore,&rsquo; 
+      said he, &lsquo;though you accord me neither money nor arms, to meet the dangers
+      of the road and brave the ambush of the Barons, I am prepared to depart.
+      Senator of Rome, his Holiness hath made me: according to custom, I pray
+      you, Monsignore, forthwith to confirm the rank.&rsquo; I would you could have
+      seen how the proud Spaniard stared, and blushed, and frowned; but he bit
+      his lip, and said little.&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;And confirmed Rienzi Senator?&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;Yes; and blessed him, and bade him depart.&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;Senator!&rdquo; said a stalwart but grey-haired giant with folded arms; &ldquo;I like
+      not a title that has been borne by a patrician. I fear me, in the new
+      title he will forget the old.&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;Fie, Cecco del Vecchio, you were always a grumbler!&rdquo; said a merchant of
+      cloth, whose commodity the ceremonial had put in great request. &ldquo;Fie!&mdash;for
+      my part, I think Senator a less new-fangled title than Tribune. I hope
+      there will be feasting enow, at last. Rome has been long dull. A bad time
+      for trade, I warrant me!&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      The artisan grinned scornfully. He was one of those who distinguished
+      between the middle class and the working, and he loathed a merchant as
+      much as he did a noble. &ldquo;The day wears,&rdquo; said the little man; &ldquo;he must be
+      here anon. The Senator&rsquo;s lady, and all his train, have gone forth to meet
+      him these two hours.&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      Scarce were these words uttered, when the crowd to the right swayed
+      restlessly; and presently a horseman rode rapidly through the street. &ldquo;Way
+      there! Keep back! Way&mdash;make way for the Most Illustrious the Senator
+      of Rome!&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      The crowd became hushed&mdash;then murmuring&mdash;then hushed again. From
+      balcony and casement stretched the neck of every gazer. The tramp of
+      steeds was heard at a distance&mdash;the sound of clarion and trumpet;&mdash;then,
+      gleaming through the distant curve of the streets, was seen the wave of
+      the gonfalons&mdash;then, the glitter of spears&mdash;and then from the
+      whole multitude, as from one voice, arose the shout,&mdash;&ldquo;He comes! he
+      comes!&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      Adrian shrunk yet more backward amongst the throng; and, leaning against
+      the wall of one of the houses, contemplated the approaching pageant.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      First came, six abreast, the procession of Roman horsemen who had gone
+      forth to meet the Senator, bearing boughs of olive in their hands; each
+      hundred preceded by banners, inscribed with the words, &ldquo;Liberty and Peace
+      restored.&rdquo; As these passed the group by Adrian, each more popular citizen
+      of the cavalcade was recognised, and received with loud shouts. By the
+      garb and equipment of the horsemen, Adrian saw that they belonged chiefly
+      to the traders of Rome; a race who, he well knew, unless strangely
+      altered, valued liberty only as a commercial speculation. &ldquo;A vain support
+      these,&rdquo; thought the Colonna;&mdash;&ldquo;what next?&rdquo; on, then, came in
+      glittering armour the German mercenaries, hired by the gold of the
+      Brothers of Provence, in number two hundred and fifty, and previously in
+      the pay of Malatesta of Rimini;&mdash;tall, stern, sedate, disciplined,&mdash;eyeing
+      the crowd with a look, half of barbarian wonder, half of insolent disdain.
+      No shout of gratulation welcomed these sturdy strangers; it was evident
+      that their aspect cast a chill over the assembly.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;Shame!&rdquo; growled Cecco del Vecchio, audibly. &ldquo;Has the people&rsquo;s friend need
+      of the swords which guard an Orsini or a Malatesta?&mdash;shame!&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      No voice this time silenced the huge malcontent.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;His only real defence against the Barons,&rdquo; thought Adrian, &ldquo;if he pay
+      them well! But their number is not sufficient!&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      Next came two hundred fantassins, or foot-soldiers, of Tuscany, with the
+      corselets and arms of the heavy-armed soldiery&mdash;a gallant company,
+      and whose cheerful looks and familiar bearing appeared to sympathise with
+      the crowd. And in truth they did so,&mdash;for they were Tuscans, and
+      therefore lovers of freedom. In them, too, the Romans seemed to recognise
+      natural and legitimate allies,&mdash;and there was a general cry of
+      &ldquo;Vivano i bravi Toscani!&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;Poor defence!&rdquo; thought the more sagacious Colonna; &ldquo;the Barons can awe,
+      and the mob corrupt them.&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      Next came a file of trumpeters and standard-bearers;&mdash;and now the
+      sound of the music was drowned by shouts, which seemed to rise
+      simultaneously as from every quarter of the city;&mdash;&ldquo;Rienzi! Rienzi!&mdash;Welcome,
+      welcome!&mdash;Liberty and Rienzi! Rienzi and the Good Estate!&rdquo; Flowers
+      dropped on his path, kerchiefs and banners waved from every house;&mdash;tears
+      might be seen coursing, unheeded, down bearded cheeks;&mdash;youth and age
+      were kneeling together, with uplifted hands, invoking blessings on the
+      head of the Restored. On he came the Senator-Tribune&mdash;&ldquo;the Phoenix to
+      his pyre!&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      Robed in scarlet, that literally blazed with gold, his proud head bared in
+      the sun, and bending to the saddle bow, Rienzi passed slowly through the
+      throng. Not in the flush of that hour were visible, on his glorious
+      countenance, the signs of disease and care: the very enlargement of his
+      proportions gave a greater majesty to his mien. Hope sparkled in his eye&mdash;triumph
+      and empire sat upon his brow. The crowd could not contain themselves; they
+      pressed forward, each upon each, anxious to catch the glance of his eye,
+      to touch the hem of his robe. He himself was deeply affected by their joy.
+      He halted; with faltering and broken words, he attempted to address them.
+      &ldquo;I am repaid,&rdquo; he said,&mdash;&ldquo;repaid for all;&mdash;may I live to make
+      you happy!&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      The crowd parted again&mdash;the Senator moved on&mdash;again the crowd
+      closed in. Behind the Tribune, to their excited imagination, seemed to
+      move the very goddess of ancient Rome.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      Upon a steed, caparisoned with cloth of gold;&mdash;in snow-white robes,
+      studded with gems that flashed back the day,&mdash;came the beautiful and
+      regal Nina. The memory of her pride, her ostentation, all forgotten in
+      that moment, she was scarce less welcome, scarce less idolized, than her
+      lord. And her smile all radiant with joy&mdash;her lip quivering with
+      proud and elate emotion,&mdash;never had she seemed at once so born alike
+      for love and for command;&mdash;a Zenobia passing through the pomp of
+      Rome,&mdash;not a captive, but a queen.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      But not upon that stately form riveted the gaze of Adrian&mdash;pale,
+      breathless, trembling, he clung to the walls against which he leaned. Was
+      it a dream? Had the dead revived? Or was it his own&mdash;his living Irene&mdash;whose
+      soft and melancholy loveliness shone sadly by the side of Nina&mdash;a
+      star beside the moon? The pageant faded from his eyes&mdash;all grew dim
+      and dark. For a moment he was insensible. When he recovered, the crowd was
+      hurrying along, confused and blent with the mighty stream that followed
+      the procession. Through the moving multitude he caught the graceful form
+      of Irene, again snatched by the closing standards of the procession from
+      his view. His blood rushed back from his heart through every vein. He was
+      as a man who for years had been in a fearful trance, and who is suddenly
+      awakened to the light of heaven.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      One of that mighty throng remained motionless with Adrian. It was Cecco
+      del Vecchio.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;He did not see me,&rdquo; muttered the smith to himself; &ldquo;old friends are
+      forgotten now! Well, well, Cecco del Vecchio hates tyrants still&mdash;no
+      matter what their name, nor how smoothly they are disguised. He did not
+      see ME! Umph!&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      <a name="link2HCH0056" id="link2HCH0056">
+      <!--  H2 anchor --> </a>
+    </p>
+    <div style="height: 4em;">
+      <br /><br /><br /><br />
+    </div>
+    <h2>
+      Chapter 9.II. The Masquerade.
+    </h2>
+    <p>
+      The acuter reader has already learned, without the absolute intervention
+      of the author as narrator, the incidents occurring to Rienzi in the
+      interval between his acquittal at Avignon and his return to Rome. As the
+      impression made by Nina upon the softer and better nature of Albornoz died
+      away, he naturally began to consider his guest&mdash;as the profound
+      politicians of that day ever considered men&mdash;a piece upon the great
+      Chess-Board, to be moved, advanced, or sacrificed, as best suited the
+      scheme in view. His purpose accomplished, in the recovery of the
+      patrimonial territory, the submission of John di Vico, and the fall and
+      death of the Demagogue Baroncelli, the Cardinal deemed it far from
+      advisable to restore to Rome, and with so high a dignity, the able and
+      ambitious Rienzi. Before the daring Roman, even his own great spirit
+      quailed; and he was wholly unable to conceive or to calculate the policy
+      that might be adopted by the new Senator, when once more Lord of Rome.
+      Without affecting to detain, he therefore declined to assist in restoring
+      him. And Rienzi thus saw himself within an easy march of Rome, without one
+      soldier to protect him against the Barons by the way. But Heaven had
+      decreed that no single man, however gifted, or however powerful, should
+      long counteract or master the destinies of Rienzi: and perhaps in no more
+      glittering scene of his life did he ever evince so dexterous and subtle an
+      intellect as he now did in extricating himself from the wiles of the
+      Cardinal. Repairing to Perugia, he had, as we have seen, procured, through
+      the brothers of Montreal, men and money for his return. But the Knight of
+      St. John was greatly mistaken, if he imagined that Rienzi was not
+      thoroughly aware of the perilous and treacherous tenure of the support he
+      had received. His keen eye read at a glance the aims and the characters of
+      the brothers of Montreal&mdash;he knew that while affecting to serve him,
+      they designed to control&mdash;that, made the debtor of the grasping and
+      aspiring Montreal, and surrounded by the troops conducted by Montreal&rsquo;s
+      brethren, he was in the midst of a net which, if not broken, would soon
+      involve fortune and life itself in its fatal and deadly meshes. But,
+      confident in the resources and promptitude of his own genius, he yet
+      sanguinely trusted to make those his puppets, who dreamed that he was
+      their own; and, with empire for the stake, he cared not how crafty the
+      antagonists he was compelled to engage.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      Meanwhile, uniting to all his rasher and all his nobler qualities, a
+      profound dissimulation, he appeared to trust implicitly to his Provencal
+      companions; and his first act on entering the Capitol, after the triumphal
+      procession, was to reward with the highest dignities in his gift, Messere
+      Arimbaldo and Messere Brettone de Montreal!
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      High feasting was there that night in the halls of the Capitol; but dearer
+      to Rienzi than all the pomp of the day, were the smiles of Nina. Her proud
+      and admiring eyes, swimming with delicious tears, fixed upon his
+      countenance, she but felt that they were re-united, and that the hours,
+      however brilliantly illumined, were hastening to that moment, when, after
+      so desolate and dark an absence, they might once more be alone.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      Far other the thoughts of Adrian Colonna, as he sate alone in the dreary
+      palace in the yet more dreary quarter of his haughty race. Irene then was
+      alive,&mdash;he had been deceived by some strange error,&mdash;she had
+      escaped the devouring pestilence; and something in the pale sadness of her
+      gentle features, even in that day of triumph, told him he was still
+      remembered. But as his mind by degrees calmed itself from its first wild
+      and tumultuous rapture, he could not help asking himself the question
+      whether they were not still to be divided! Stefanello Colonna, the
+      grandson of the old Stephen, and (by the death of his sire and brother)
+      the youthful head of that powerful House, had already raised his standard
+      against the Senator. Fortifying himself in the almost impregnable fastness
+      of Palestrina, he had assembled around him all the retainers of his
+      family, and his lawless soldiery now ravaged the neighbouring plains far
+      and wide.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      Adrian foresaw that the lapse of a few days would suffice to bring the
+      Colonna and the Senator to open war. Could he take part against those of
+      his own blood? The very circumstance of his love for Irene would yet more
+      rob such a proceeding of all appearance of disinterested patriotism, and
+      yet more deeply and irremediably stain his knightly fame, wherever the
+      sympathy of his equals was enlisted with the cause of the Colonna. On the
+      other hand, not only his love for the Senator&rsquo;s sister, but his own secret
+      inclinations and honest convictions, were on the side of one who alone
+      seemed to him possessed of the desire and the genius to repress the
+      disorders of his fallen city. Long meditating, he feared no alternative
+      was left him but in the same cruel neutrality to which he had been before
+      condemned; but he resolved at least to make the attempt&mdash;rendered
+      favourable and dignified by his birth and reputation&mdash;to reconcile
+      the contending parties. To effect this, he saw that he must begin with his
+      haughty cousin. He was well aware that were it known that he had first
+      obtained an interview with Rienzi&mdash;did it appear as if he were
+      charged with overtures from the Senator&mdash;although Stefanello himself
+      might be inclined to yield to his representations, the insolent and
+      ferocious Barons who surrounded him would not deign to listen to the envoy
+      of the People&rsquo;s chosen one; and instead of being honoured as an
+      intercessor, he should be suspected as a traitor. He determined, then, to
+      depart for Palestrina; but (and his heart beat audibly) would it not be
+      possible first to obtain an interview with Irene? It was no easy
+      enterprise, surrounded as she was, but he resolved to adventure it. He
+      summoned Giulio.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;The Senator holds a festival this evening&mdash;think you that the
+      assemblage will be numerous?&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;I hear,&rdquo; answered Giulio, &ldquo;that the banquet given to the Ambassadors and
+      Signors today is to be followed tomorrow by a mask, to which all ranks are
+      admitted. By Bacchus, (Still a common Roman expletive.) if the Tribune
+      only invited nobles, the smallest closet in the Capitol would suffice to
+      receive his maskers. I suppose a mask has been resolved on in order to
+      disguise the quality of the visitors.&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      Adrian mused a moment; and the result of his revery was a determination to
+      delay for another sun his departure to Palestrina&mdash;to take advantage
+      of the nature of the revel, and to join the masquerade.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      That species of entertainment, though unusual at that season of the year,
+      had been preferred by Rienzi, partly and ostensibly because it was one in
+      which all his numerous and motley supporters could be best received; but
+      chiefly and secretly because it afforded himself and his confidential
+      friends the occasion to mix unsuspected amongst the throng, and learn more
+      of the real anticipations of the Romans with respect to his policy and his
+      strength, than could well be gathered from the enthusiasm of a public
+      spectacle.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      The following night was beautifully serene and clear. The better to
+      accommodate the numerous guests, and to take advantage of the warm and
+      moonlit freshness of the air, the open court of the Capitol, with the
+      Place of the Lion, (as well as the state apartments within,) was devoted
+      to the festival.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      As Adrian entered the festive court with the rush of the throng, it
+      chanced that in the eager impatience of some maskers, more vehement than
+      the rest, his vizard was deranged. He hastily replaced it; but not before
+      one of the guests had recognised his countenance.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      From courtesy, Rienzi and his family remained at first unmasked. They
+      stood at the head of the stairs to which the old Egyptian Lion gave the
+      name. The lights shone over that Colossal Monument&mdash;which, torn from
+      its antique home, had witnessed, in its grim repose, the rise and lapse of
+      countless generations, and the dark and stormy revolutions of avenging
+      fate. It was an ill omen, often afterwards remarked, that the place of
+      that state festival was the place also of the state executions. But at
+      that moment, as group after group pressed forward to win smile and word
+      from the celebrated man, whose fortunes had been the theme of Europe, or
+      to bend in homage to the lustrous loveliness of Nina, no omen and no
+      warning clouded the universal gladness.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      Behind Nina, well contented to shrink from the gaze of the throng, and to
+      feel her softer beauty eclipsed by the dazzling and gorgeous charms of her
+      brother&rsquo;s wife, stood Irene. Amidst the crowd on her alone Adrian fixed
+      his eyes. The years which had flown over the fair brow of the girl of
+      sixteen&mdash;then animated by, yet trembling beneath, the first wild
+      breath of Love;&mdash;youth in every vein&mdash;passion and childish
+      tenderness in every thought, had not marred, but they had changed, the
+      character of Irene&rsquo;s beauty. Her cheek, no longer varying with every
+      instant, was settled into a delicate and thoughtful paleness&mdash;her
+      form, more rounded to the proportions of Roman beauty, had assumed an air
+      of dignified and calm repose. No longer did the restless eye wander in
+      search of some imagined object; no longer did the lip quiver into smiles
+      at some untold hope or half-unconscious recollection. A grave and mournful
+      expression gave to her face (still how sweet!) a gravity beyond her years.
+      The bloom, the flush, the April of the heart, was gone; but yet neither
+      time, nor sorrow, nor blighted love, had stolen from her countenance its
+      rare and angelic softness&mdash;nor that inexpressible and virgin modesty
+      of form and aspect, which, contrasting the bolder beauties of Italy, had
+      more than aught else distinguished to Adrian, from all other women, the
+      idol of his heart. And feeding his gaze upon those dark deep eyes, which
+      spoke of thought far away and busy with the past, Adrian felt again and
+      again that he was not forgotten! Hovering near her, but suffering the
+      crowd to press one after another before him, he did not perceive that he
+      had attracted the eagle eye of the Senator.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      In fact, as one of the maskers passed Rienzi, he whispered, &ldquo;Beware, a
+      Colonna is among the masks! beneath the reveller&rsquo;s domino has often lurked
+      the assassin&rsquo;s dagger. Yonder stands your foe&mdash;mark him!&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      These words were the first sharp and thrilling intimation of the perils
+      into which he had rushed, that the Tribune-Senator had received since his
+      return. He changed colour slightly; and for some minutes the courtly smile
+      and ready greeting with which he had hitherto delighted every guest, gave
+      way to a moody abstraction.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;Why stands yon strange man so mute and motionless?&rdquo; whispered he to Nina.
+      &ldquo;He speaks to none&mdash;he approaches us not&mdash;a churl, a churl!&mdash;he
+      must be seen to.&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;Doubtless, some German or English barbarian,&rdquo; answered Nina. &ldquo;Let not, my
+      Lord, so slight a cloud dim your merriment.&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;You are right, dearest; we have friends here; we are well girt. And, by
+      my father&rsquo;s ashes, I feel that I must accustom myself to danger. Nina, let
+      us move on; methinks we might now mix among the maskers&mdash;masked
+      ourselves.&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      The music played loud and cheerily as the Senator and his party mingled
+      with the throng. But still his eye turned ever towards the grey domino of
+      Adrian, and he perceived that it followed his steps. Approaching the
+      private entrance of the Capitol, he for a few moments lost sight of his
+      unwelcome pursuer: but just as he entered, turning abruptly, Rienzi
+      perceived him close at his side&mdash;the next moment the stranger had
+      vanished amidst the throng. But that moment had sufficed to Adrian&mdash;he
+      had reached Irene. &ldquo;Adrian Colonna (he whispered) waits thee beside the
+      Lion.&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      In the absorption of his own reflections, Rienzi fortunately did not
+      notice the sudden paleness and agitation of his sister. Entered within his
+      palace, he called for wine&mdash;the draught revived his spirits&mdash;he
+      listened smilingly to the sparkling remarks of Nina; and enduing his mask
+      and disguise, said, with his wonted cheerfulness, &ldquo;Now for Truth&mdash;strange
+      that in festivals it should only speak behind a vizard! My sweet sister,
+      thou hast lost thine old smile, and I would rather see that than&mdash;Ha!
+      has Irene vanished?&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;Only, I suppose, to change her dress, my Cola, and mingle with the
+      revellers,&rdquo; answered Nina. &ldquo;Let my smile atone for hers.&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      Rienzi kissed the bright brow of his wife as she clung fondly to his
+      bosom. &ldquo;Thy smile is the sunlight,&rdquo; said he; &ldquo;but this girl disturbs me.
+      Methinks now, at least, she might wear a gladder aspect.&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;Is there nothing of love beneath my fair sister&rsquo;s gloom?&rdquo; answered Nina.
+      &ldquo;Do you not call to mind how she loved Adrian Colonna?&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;Does that fantasy hold still?&rdquo; returned Rienzi, musingly. &ldquo;Well, and she
+      is fit bride for a monarch.&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;Yet it were an alliance that would, better than one with monarchs,
+      strengthen thy power at Rome!&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;Ay, were it possible; but that haughty race!&mdash;Perchance this very
+      masker that so haunted our steps was but her lover. I will look to this.
+      Let us forth, my Nina. Am I well cloaked?&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;Excellently well&mdash;and I?&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;The sun behind a cloud.&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;Ah, let us not tarry long; what hour of revel like that when thy hand in
+      mine, this head upon thy bosom, we forget the sorrows we have known, and
+      even the triumphs we have shared?&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      Meanwhile, Irene, confused and lost amidst a transport of emotion, already
+      disguised and masked, was threading her way through the crowd back to the
+      staircase of the Lion. With the absence of the Senator that spot had
+      comparatively been deserted. Music and the dance attracted the maskers to
+      another quarter of the wide space. And Irene now approaching, beheld the
+      moonlight fall over the statue, and a solitary figure leaning against the
+      pedestal. She paused, the figure approached, and again she heard the voice
+      of her early love.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;Oh, Irene! recognised even in this disguise,&rdquo; said Adrian, seizing her
+      trembling hand; &ldquo;have I lived to gaze again upon that form&mdash;to touch
+      this hand? Did not these eyes behold thee lifeless in that fearful vault,
+      which I shudder to recall? By what miracle wert thou raised again? By what
+      means did Heaven spare to this earth one that it seemed already to have
+      placed amongst its angels?&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;Was this, indeed, thy belief?&rdquo; said Irene, falteringly, but with an
+      accent eloquent of joy. &ldquo;Thou didst not then willingly desert me? Unjust
+      that I was, I wronged thy noble nature, and deemed that my brother&rsquo;s fall,
+      my humble lineage, thy brilliant fate, had made thee renounce Irene.&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;Unjust indeed!&rdquo; answered the lover. &ldquo;But surely I saw thee amongst the
+      dead!&mdash;thy cloak, with the silver stars&mdash;who else wore the arms
+      of the Roman Tribune?&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;Was it but the cloak then, which, dropped in the streets, was probably
+      assumed by some more ill-fated victim; was it that sight alone, that made
+      thee so soon despair? Ah! Adrian,&rdquo; continued Irene, tenderly, but with
+      reproach; &ldquo;not even when I saw thee seemingly lifeless on the couch by
+      which I had watched three days and nights, not even then did I despair!&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;What, then, my vision did not deceive me! It was you who watched by my
+      bed in that grim hour, whose love guarded, whose care preserved me! And I,
+      wretch that I was!&mdash;&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;Nay,&rdquo; answered Irene, &ldquo;your thought was natural. Heaven seemed to endow
+      me with superhuman strength, whilst I was necessary to thee. But judge of
+      my dismay. I left thee to seek the good friar who attended thee as thy
+      leech; I returned, and found thee not. Heart-sick and terrified, I
+      searched the desolate city in vain. Strong as I was while hope supported
+      me, I sunk beneath fear.&mdash;And my brother found me senseless, and
+      stretched on the ground, by the church of St. Mark.&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;The church of St. Mark!&mdash;so foretold his dream!&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;He had told me he had met thee; we searched for thee in vain; at length
+      we heard that thou hadst left the city, and&mdash;and&mdash;I rejoiced,
+      Adrian, but I repined!&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      For some minutes the young lovers surrendered themselves to the delight of
+      reunion, while new explanations called forth new transports.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;And now,&rdquo; murmured Irene, &ldquo;now that we have met&mdash;&rdquo; she paused, and
+      her mask concealed her blushes.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;Now that we have met,&rdquo; said Adrian, filling up the silence, &ldquo;wouldst thou
+      say further, &lsquo;that we should not part?&rsquo; Trust me, dearest, that is the
+      hope that animates my heart. It was but to enjoy these brief bright
+      moments with thee, that I delayed my departure to Palestrina. Could I but
+      hope to bring my young cousin into amity with thy brother, no barrier
+      would prevent our union. Willingly I forget the past&mdash;the death of my
+      unhappy kinsmen, (victims, it is true, to their own faults;) and, perhaps,
+      amidst all the crowds that hailed his return, none more appreciated the
+      great and lofty qualities of Cola di Rienzi, than did Adrian Colonna.&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;If this be so,&rdquo; said Irene, &ldquo;let me hope the best; meanwhile, it is
+      enough of comfort and of happiness to know, that we love each other as of
+      old. Ah, Adrian, I am sadly changed; and often have I thought it a thing
+      beyond my dreams, that thou shouldst see me again and love me still.&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;Fairer art thou and lovelier than ever,&rdquo; answered Adrian, passionately;
+      &ldquo;and time, which has ripened thy bloom, has but taught me more deeply to
+      feel thy value. Farewell, Irene, I linger here no longer; thou wilt, I
+      trust, hear soon of my success with my House, and ere the week be over I
+      may return to claim thy hand in the face of day.&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      The lovers parted; Adrian lingered on the spot, and Irene hastened to bury
+      her emotion and her raptures in her own chamber.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      As her form vanished, and the young Colonna slowly turned away, a tall
+      mask strode abruptly towards him.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;Thou art a Colonna,&rdquo; it said, &ldquo;and in the power of the Senator. Dost thou
+      tremble?&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;If I be a Colonna, rude masker,&rdquo; answered Adrian, coldly, &ldquo;thou shouldst
+      know the old proverb, &lsquo;He who stirs the column, shall rue the fall.&rsquo;&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      The stranger laughed aloud, and then lifting his mask, Adrian saw that it
+      was the Senator who stood before him.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;My Lord Adrian di Castello,&rdquo; said Rienzi, resuming all his gravity, &ldquo;is
+      it as friend or foe that you have honoured our revels this night?&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;Senator of Rome,&rdquo; answered Adrian, with equal stateliness, &ldquo;I partake of
+      no man&rsquo;s hospitality but as a friend. A foe, at least to you, I trust
+      never justly to be esteemed.&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;I would,&rdquo; rejoined Rienzi, &ldquo;that I could apply to myself unreservedly
+      that most flattering speech. Are these friendly feelings entertained
+      towards me as the Governor of the Roman people, or as the brother of the
+      woman who has listened to your vows?&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      Adrian, who when the Senator had unmasked had followed his example, felt
+      at these words that his eye quailed beneath Rienzi&rsquo;s. However, he
+      recovered himself with the wonted readiness of an Italian, and replied
+      laconically,
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;As both.&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;Both!&rdquo; echoed Rienzi. &ldquo;Then, indeed, noble Adrian, you are welcome
+      hither. And yet, methinks, if you conceived there was no cause for enmity
+      between us, you would have wooed the sister of Cola di Rienzi in a guise
+      more worthy of your birth; and, permit me to add, of that station which
+      God, destiny, and my country, have accorded unto me. You dare not, young
+      Colonna, meditate dishonour to the sister of the Senator of Rome. Highborn
+      as you are, she is your equal.&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;Were I the Emperor, whose simple knight I but am, your sister were my
+      equal,&rdquo; answered Adrian, warmly. &ldquo;Rienzi, I grieve that I am discovered to
+      you yet. I had trusted that, as a mediator between the Barons and
+      yourself, I might first have won your confidence, and then claimed my
+      reward. Know that with tomorrow&rsquo;s dawn I depart for Palestrina, seeking to
+      reconcile my young cousin to the choice of the People and the Pontiff.
+      Various reasons, which I need not now detail, would have made me wish to
+      undertake this heraldry of peace without previous communication with you.
+      But since we have met, intrust me with any terms of conciliation, and I
+      pledge you the right hand, not of a Roman noble&mdash;alas! the prisca
+      fides has departed from that pledge!&mdash;but of a Knight of the Imperial
+      Court, that I will not betray your confidence.&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      Rienzi, accustomed to read the human countenance, had kept his eyes
+      intently fixed upon Adrian while he spoke; when the Colonna concluded, he
+      pressed the proffered hand, and said, with that familiar and winning
+      sweetness which at times was so peculiar to his manner,
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;I trust you, Adrian, from my soul. You were mine early friend in calmer,
+      perchance happier, years. And never did river reflect the stars more
+      clearly, than your heart then mirrored back the truth. I trust you!&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      While thus speaking, he had mechanically led back the Colonna to the
+      statue of the Lion; there pausing, he resumed:
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;Know that I have this morning despatched my delegate to your cousin
+      Stefanello. With all due courtesy, I have apprised him of my return to
+      Rome, and invited hither his honoured presence. Forgetting all ancient
+      feuds, mine own past exile, I have assured him, here, the station and
+      dignity due to the head of the Colonna. All that I ask in return is
+      obedience to the law. Years and reverses have abated my younger pride, and
+      though I may yet preserve the sternness of the Judge, none shall hereafter
+      complain of the insolence of the Tribune.&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;I would,&rdquo; answered Adrian, &ldquo;that your mission to Stefanello had been
+      delayed a day; I would fain have forestalled its purport. Howbeit, you
+      increase my desire of departure, should I yet succeed in obtaining an
+      honourable and peaceful reconciliation, it is not in disguise that I will
+      woo your sister.&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;And never did Colonna,&rdquo; replied Rienzi, loftily, &ldquo;bring to his House a
+      maiden whose alliance more gratified ambition. I still see, as I have seen
+      ever, in mine own projects, and mine own destinies, the chart of the new
+      Roman Empire!&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;Be not too sanguine yet, brave Rienzi,&rdquo; replied Adrian, laying his hand
+      on the Lion of Basalt: &ldquo;bethink thee on how many scheming brains this dumb
+      image of stone hath looked down from its pedestal&mdash;schemes of sand,
+      and schemers of dust. Thou hast enough, at present, for the employ of all
+      thine energy&mdash;not to extend thy power, but to preserve thyself. For,
+      trust me, never stood human greatness on so wild and dark a precipice!&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;Thou art honest,&rdquo; said the Senator; &ldquo;and these are the first words of
+      doubt, and yet of sympathy, I have heard in Rome. But the People love me,
+      the Barons have fled from Rome, the Pontiff approves, and the swords of
+      the Northmen guard the avenues of the Capitol. But these are nought; in
+      mine own honesty are my spear and buckler. Oh, never,&rdquo; continued Rienzi,
+      kindling with his enthusiasm, &ldquo;never since the days of the old Republic,
+      did Roman dream a purer and a brighter aspiration, than that which
+      animates and supports me now. Peace restored&mdash;law established&mdash;art,
+      letters, intellect, dawning upon the night of time; the Patricians, no
+      longer bandits of rapine, but the guard of order; the People ennobled from
+      a mob, brave to protect, enlightened to guide, themselves. Then, not by
+      the violence of arms, but by the majesty of her moral power, shall the
+      Mother of Nations claim the obedience of her children. Thus dreaming and
+      thus hoping, shall I tremble or despond? No, Adrian Colonna, come weal or
+      woe, I abide, unshrinking and unawed, by the chances of my doom!&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      So much did the manner and the tone of the Senator exalt his language,
+      that even the sober sense of Adrian was enchanted and subdued. He kissed
+      the hand he held, and said earnestly,
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;A doom that I will deem it my boast to share&mdash;a career that it will
+      be my glory to smooth. If I succeed in my present mission&mdash;&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;You are my brother!&rdquo; said Rienzi.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;If I fail?&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;You may equally claim that alliance. You pause&mdash;you change colour.&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;Can I desert my house?&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;Young Lord,&rdquo; said Rienzi, loftily, &ldquo;say rather can you desert your
+      country? If you doubt my honesty, if you fear my ambition, desist from
+      your task, rob me not of a single foe. But if you believe that I have the
+      will and the power to serve the State&mdash;if you recognise, even in the
+      reverses and calamities I have known and mastered, the protecting hand of
+      the Saviour of Nations&mdash;if those reverses were but the mercies of Him
+      who chasteneth&mdash;necessary, it may be, to correct my earlier daring
+      and sharpen yet more my intellect&mdash;if, in a word, thou believest me
+      one whom, whatever be his faults, God hath preserved for the sake of Rome,
+      forget that you are a Colonna&mdash;remember only that you are a Roman!&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;You have conquered me, strange and commanding spirit,&rdquo; said Adrian, in a
+      low voice, completely carried away; &ldquo;and whatever the conduct of my
+      kindred, I am yours and Rome&rsquo;s. Farewell.&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      <a name="link2HCH0057" id="link2HCH0057">
+      <!--  H2 anchor --> </a>
+    </p>
+    <div style="height: 4em;">
+      <br /><br /><br /><br />
+    </div>
+    <h2>
+      Chapter 9.III. Adrian&rsquo;s Adventures at Palestrina.
+    </h2>
+    <p>
+      It was yet noon when Adrian beheld before him the lofty mountains that
+      shelter Palestrina, the Praeneste of the ancient world. Back to a period
+      before Romulus existed, in the earliest ages of that mysterious
+      civilisation which in Italy preceded the birth of Rome, could be traced
+      the existence and the power of that rocky city. Eight dependent towns
+      owned its sway and its wealth; its position, and the strength of those
+      mighty walls, in whose ruins may yet be traced the masonry of the remote
+      Pelasgi, had long braved the ambition of the neighbouring Rome. From that
+      very citadel, the Mural Crown (Hence, apparently, its Greek name of
+      Stephane. Palestrina is yet one of the many proofs which the vicinity of
+      Rome affords of the old Greek civilization of Italy.) of the mountain, had
+      waved the standard of Marius; and up the road which Adrian&rsquo;s scanty troop
+      slowly wound, had echoed the march of the murtherous Sylla, on his return
+      from the Mithridatic war. Below, where the city spread towards the plain,
+      were yet seen the shattered and roofless columns of the once celebrated
+      Temple of Fortune; and still the immemorial olives clustered grey and
+      mournfully around the ruins.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      A more formidable hold the Barons of Rome could not have selected; and as
+      Adrian&rsquo;s military eye scanned the steep ascent and the rugged walls, he
+      felt that with ordinary skill it might defy for months all the power of
+      the Roman Senator. Below, in the fertile valley, dismantled cottages and
+      trampled harvests attested the violence and rapine of the insurgent
+      Barons; and at that very moment were seen, in the old plain of the warlike
+      Hernici, troops of armed men, driving before them herds of sheep and
+      cattle, collected in their lawless incursions. In sight of that Praeneste,
+      which had been the favourite retreat of the luxurious Lords of Rome in its
+      most polished day, the Age of Iron seemed renewed.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      The banner of the Colonna, borne by Adrian&rsquo;s troop, obtained ready
+      admittance at the Porta del Sole. As he passed up the irregular and narrow
+      streets that ascended to the citadel, groups of foreign mercenaries,&mdash;half-ragged,
+      half-tawdry knots of abandoned women,&mdash;mixed here and there with the
+      liveries of the Colonna, stood loitering amidst the ruins of ancient fanes
+      and palaces, or basked lazily in the sun, upon terraces, through which,
+      from amidst weeds and grass, glowed the imperishable hues of the rich
+      mosaics, which had made the pride of that lettered and graceful nobility,
+      of whom savage freebooters were now the heirs.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      The contrast between the Past and Present forcibly occurred to Adrian, as
+      he passed along; and, despite his order, he felt as if Civilization itself
+      were enlisted against his House upon the side of Rienzi.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      Leaving his train in the court of the citadel, Adrian demanded admission
+      to the presence of his cousin. He had left Stefanello a child on his
+      departure from Rome, and there could therefore be but a slight and
+      unfamiliar acquaintance betwixt them, despite their kindred.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      Peals of laughter came upon his ear, as he followed one of Stefanello&rsquo;s
+      gentlemen through a winding passage that led to the principal chamber. The
+      door was thrown open, and Adrian found himself in a rude hall, to which
+      some appearance of hasty state and attempted comfort had been given.
+      Costly arras imperfectly clothed the stone walls, and the rich seats and
+      decorated tables, which the growing civilization of the northern cities of
+      Italy had already introduced into the palaces of Italian nobles, strangely
+      contrasted the rough pavement, spread with heaps of armour negligently
+      piled around. At the farther end of the apartment, Adrian shudderingly
+      perceived, set in due and exact order, the implements of torture.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      Stefanello Colonna, with two other Barons, indolently reclined on seats
+      drawn around a table, in the recess of a deep casement, from which might
+      be still seen the same glorious landscape, bounded by the dim spires of
+      Rome, which Hannibal and Pyrrhus had ascended that very citadel to survey!
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      Stefanello himself, in the first bloom of youth, bore already on his
+      beardless countenance those traces usually the work of the passions and
+      vices of maturest manhood. His features were cast in the mould of the old
+      Stephen&rsquo;s; in their clear, sharp, high-bred outline might be noticed that
+      regular and graceful symmetry, which blood, in men as in animals, will
+      sometimes entail through generations; but the features were wasted and
+      meagre. His brows were knit in an eternal frown; his thin and bloodless
+      lips wore that insolent contempt which seems so peculiarly cold and
+      unlovely in early youth; and the deep and livid hollows round his eyes,
+      spoke of habitual excess and premature exhaustion. By him sat (reconciled
+      by hatred to one another) the hereditary foes of his race; the soft, but
+      cunning and astute features of Luca di Savelli, contrasted with the broad
+      frame and ferocious countenance of the Prince of the Orsini.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      The young head of the Colonna rose with some cordiality to receive his
+      cousin. &ldquo;Welcome,&rdquo; he said, &ldquo;dear Adrian; you are arrived in time to
+      assist us with your well-known military skill. Think you not we shall
+      stand a long siege, if the insolent plebeian dare adventure it? You know
+      our friends, the Orsini and the Savelli? Thanks to St. Peter, or Peter&rsquo;s
+      delegate, we have now happily meaner throats to cut than those of each
+      other!&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      Thus saying, Stefanello again threw himself listlessly on his seat, and
+      the shrill, woman&rsquo;s voice of Savelli took part in the dialogue.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;I would, noble Signor, that you had come a few hours earlier: we are
+      still making merry at the recollection&mdash;he, he, he!&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;Ah, excellent,&rdquo; cried Stefanello, joining in the laugh; &ldquo;our cousin has
+      had a loss. Know Adrian, that this base fellow, whom the Pope has had the
+      impudence to create Senator, dared but yesterday to send us a varlet, whom
+      he called&mdash;by our Lady!&mdash;his ambassador!&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;Would you could have seen his mantle, Signor Adrian!&rdquo; chimed in the
+      Savelli: &ldquo;purple velvet, as I live, decorated in gold, with the arms of
+      Rome: we soon spoiled his finery.&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;What!&rdquo; exclaimed Adrian, &ldquo;you did not break the laws of all nobility and
+      knighthood?&mdash;you offered no insult to a herald!&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;Herald, sayst thou?&rdquo; cried Stefanello, frowning till his eyes were scarce
+      visible. &ldquo;It is for Princes and Barons alone to employ heralds. An&rsquo; I had
+      had my will, I would have sent back the minion&rsquo;s head to the usurper.&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;What did ye then?&rdquo; asked Adrian, coldly.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;Bade our swineherds dip the fellow in the ditch, and gave him a night&rsquo;s
+      lodging in a dungeon to dry himself withal.&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;And this morning&mdash;he, he, he!&rdquo; added the Savelli, &ldquo;we had him before
+      us, and drew his teeth, one by one;&mdash;I would you could have heard the
+      fellow mumble out for mercy!&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      Adrian rose hastily, and struck the table fiercely with his gauntlet.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;Stefanello Colonna,&rdquo; said he, colouring with noble rage, &ldquo;answer me: did
+      you dare to inflict this indelible disgrace upon the name we jointly bear?
+      Tell me, at least, that you protested against this foul treason to all the
+      laws of civilization and of honour. You answer not. House of the Colonna,
+      can such be thy representative!&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;To me these words!&rdquo; said Stefanello, trembling with passion. &ldquo;Beware!
+      Methinks thou art the traitor, leagued perhaps with yon rascal mob. Well
+      do I remember that thou, the betrothed of the Demagogue&rsquo;s sister, didst
+      not join with my uncle and my father of old, but didst basely leave the
+      city to her plebeian tyrant.&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;That did he!&rdquo; said the fierce Orsini, approaching Adrian menacingly,
+      while the gentle cowardice of Savelli sought in vain to pluck him back by
+      the mantle&mdash;&ldquo;that did he! and but for thy presence, Stefanello&mdash;&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;Coward and blusterer!&rdquo; interrupted Adrian, fairly beside himself with
+      indignation and shame, and dashing his gauntlet in the very face of the
+      advancing Orsini&mdash;&ldquo;wouldst thou threaten one who has maintained, in
+      every list of Europe, and against the stoutest Chivalry of the North, the
+      honour of Rome, which thy deeds the while disgraced? By this gage, I spit
+      upon and defy thee. With lance and with brand, on horse and on foot, I
+      maintain against thee and all thy line, that thou art no knight to have
+      thus maltreated, in thy strongholds, a peaceful and unarmed herald. Yes,
+      even here, on the spot of thy disgrace, I challenge thee to arms!&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;To the court below! Follow me,&rdquo; said Orsini, sullenly, and striding
+      towards the threshold. &ldquo;What, ho there! my helmet and breast-plate!&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;Stay, noble Orsini,&rdquo; said Stefanello. &ldquo;The insult offered to thee is my
+      quarrel&mdash;mine was the deed&mdash;and against me speaks this
+      degenerate scion of our line. Adrian di Castello&mdash;sometime called
+      Colonna&mdash;surrender your sword: you are my prisoner!&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;Oh!&rdquo; said Adrian, grinding his teeth, &ldquo;that my ancestral blood did not
+      flow through thy veins&mdash;else&mdash;but enough! Me! your equal, and
+      the favoured Knight of the Emperor, whose advent now brightens the
+      frontiers of Italy!&mdash;me&mdash;you dare not detain. For your friends,
+      I shall meet them yet perhaps, ere many days are over, where none shall
+      separate our swords. Till then, remember, Orsini, that it is against no
+      unpractised arm that thou wilt have to redeem thine honour!&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      Adrian, his drawn sword in his hand, strode towards the door, and passed
+      the Orsini, who stood, lowering and irresolute, in the centre of the
+      apartment.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      Savelli whispered Stefanello. &ldquo;He says, &lsquo;Ere many days be past!&rsquo; Be sure,
+      dear Signor, that he goes to join Rienzi. Remember, the alliance he once
+      sought with the Tribune&rsquo;s sister may be renewed. Beware of him! Ought he
+      to leave the castle? The name of a Colonna, associated with the mob, would
+      distract and divide half our strength.&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;Fear me not,&rdquo; returned Stefanello, with a malignant smile. &ldquo;Ere you
+      spoke, I had determined!&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      The young Colonna lifted the arras from the wall, opened a door, and
+      passed into a low hall, in which sate twenty mercenaries.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;Quick!&rdquo; said he. &ldquo;Seize and disarm yon stranger in the green mantle&mdash;but
+      slay him not. Bid the guard below find dungeons for his train. Quick! ere
+      he reach the gate.&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      Adrian had gained the open hall below&mdash;his train and his steed were
+      in sight in the court&mdash;when suddenly the soldiery of the Colonna,
+      rushing through another passage than that which he had passed, surrounded
+      and intercepted his retreat.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;Yield thee, Adrian di Castello,&rdquo; cried Stefanello from the summit of the
+      stairs; &ldquo;or your blood be on your own head.&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      Three steps did Adrian make through the press, and three of his enemies
+      fell beneath his sword. &ldquo;To the rescue!&rdquo; he shouted to his band, and
+      already those bold and daring troopers had gained the hall. Presently the
+      alarum bell tolled loud&mdash;the court swarmed with soldiers. Oppressed
+      by numbers, beat down rather than subdued, Adrian&rsquo;s little train was soon
+      secured, and the flower of the Colonna, wounded, breathless, disarmed, but
+      still uttering loud defiance, was a prisoner in the fortress of his
+      kinsman.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      <a name="link2HCH0058" id="link2HCH0058">
+      <!--  H2 anchor --> </a>
+    </p>
+    <div style="height: 4em;">
+      <br /><br /><br /><br />
+    </div>
+    <h2>
+      Chapter 9.IV. The Position of the Senator.&mdash;The Work of Years.&mdash;The
+    </h2>
+    <p>
+      Rewards of Ambition.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      The indignation of Rienzi may readily be conceived, on the return of his
+      herald mutilated and dishonoured. His temper, so naturally stern, was
+      rendered yet more hard by the remembrance of his wrongs and trials; and
+      the result which attended his overtures of conciliation to Stefanello
+      Colonna stung him to the soul.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      The bell of the Capitol tolled to arms within ten minutes after the return
+      of the herald. The great gonfalon of Rome was unfurled on the highest
+      tower; and the very evening after Adrian&rsquo;s arrest, the forces of the
+      Senator, headed by Rienzi in person, were on the road to Palestrina. The
+      troopers of the Barons had, however, made incursions as far as Tivoli with
+      the supposed connivance of the inhabitants, and Rienzi halted at that
+      beautiful spot to raise recruits, and receive the allegiance of the
+      suspected, while his soldiers, with Arimbaldo and Brettone at their head,
+      went in search of the marauders. The brothers of Montreal returned late at
+      night with the intelligence, that the troopers of the Barons had secured
+      themselves amidst the recesses of the wood of Pantano.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      The red spot mounted to Rienzi&rsquo;s brow. He gazed hard at Brettone, who
+      stated the news to him, and a natural suspicion shot across his mind.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;How!&mdash;escaped!&rdquo; he said. &ldquo;Is it possible? Enough of such idle
+      skirmishes with these lordly robbers. Will the hour ever come when I shall
+      meet them hand to hand? Brettone,&rdquo; and the brother of Montreal felt the
+      dark eye of Rienzi pierce to his very heart; &ldquo;Brettone!&rdquo; said he, with an
+      abrupt change of voice, &ldquo;are your men to be trusted? Is there no
+      connivance with the Barons?&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;How!&rdquo; said Brettone, sullenly, but somewhat confused.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;How me no hows!&rdquo; quoth the Tribune-Senator, fiercely. &ldquo;I know that thou
+      art a valiant Captain of valiant men. Thou and thy brother Arimbaldo have
+      served me well, and I have rewarded ye well! Have I not? Speak!&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;Senator,&rdquo; answered Arimbaldo, taking up the word, &ldquo;you have kept your
+      word to us. You have raised us to the highest rank your power could
+      bestow, and this has amply atoned our humble services.&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;I am glad ye allow thus much,&rdquo; said the Tribune.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      Arimbaldo proceeded, somewhat more loftily, &ldquo;I trust, my Lord, you do not
+      doubt us?&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;Arimbaldo,&rdquo; replied Rienzi, in a voice of deep, but half-suppressed
+      emotion; &ldquo;you are a lettered man, and you have seemed to share my projects
+      for the regeneration of our common kind. You ought not to betray me. There
+      is something in unison between us. But, chide me not, I am surrounded by
+      treason, and the very air I breathe seems poison to my lips.&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      There was a pathos mingled with Rienzi&rsquo;s words which touched the milder
+      brother of Montreal. He bowed in silence. Rienzi surveyed him wistfully,
+      and sighed. Then, changing the conversation, he spoke of their intended
+      siege of Palestrina, and shortly afterwards retired to rest.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      Left alone, the brothers regarded each other for some moments in silence.
+      &ldquo;Brettone,&rdquo; said Arimbaldo at length, in a whispered voice, &ldquo;my heart
+      misgives me. I like not Walter&rsquo;s ambitious schemes. With our own
+      countrymen we are frank and loyal, why play the traitor with this
+      high-souled Roman?&rdquo; (The anonymous biographer of Rienzi makes the
+      following just remark: &ldquo;Sono li tedeschi, come discendon de la Alemagna,
+      semplici, puri, senza fraude, come si allocano tra&rsquo; taliani, diventano
+      mastri coduti, viziosi, che sentono ogni malizia.&rdquo;&mdash;&ldquo;Vita di Cola di
+      Rienzi&rdquo;, lib. ii. cap. 16.)
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;Tush!&rdquo; said Brettone. &ldquo;Our brother&rsquo;s hand of iron alone can sway this
+      turbulent people; and if Rienzi be betrayed, so also are his enemies, the
+      Barons. No more of this! I have tidings from Montreal; he will be in Rome
+      in a few days.&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;And then?&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;Rienzi, weakened by the Barons (for he must not conquer)&mdash;the
+      Barons, weakened by Rienzi&mdash;our Northmen seize the Capitol, and the
+      soldiery, now scattered throughout Italy, will fly to the standard of the
+      Great Captain. Montreal must be first Podesta, then King, of Rome.&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      Arimbaldo moved restlessly in his seat, and the brethren conferred no more
+      on their projects.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      The situation of Rienzi was precisely that which tends the most to sour
+      and to harden the fairest nature. With an intellect capable of the
+      grandest designs, a heart that beat with the loftiest emotions, elevated
+      to the sunny pinnacle of power and surrounded by loud-tongued adulators,
+      he knew not among men a single breast in which he could confide. He was as
+      one on a steep ascent, whose footing crumbles, while every bough at which
+      he grasps seems to rot at his touch. He found the people more than ever
+      eloquent in his favour, but while they shouted raptures as he passed, not
+      a man was capable of making a sacrifice for him! The liberty of a state is
+      never achieved by a single individual; if not the people&mdash;if not the
+      greater number&mdash;a zealous and fervent minority, at least must go hand
+      in hand with him. Rome demanded sacrifices in all who sought the Roman
+      regeneration&mdash;sacrifices of time, ease, and money. The crowd followed
+      the procession of the Senator, but not a single Roman devoted his life,
+      unpaid, to his standard; not a single coin was subscribed in the defence
+      of freedom. Against him were arrayed the most powerful and the most
+      ferocious Barons of Italy; each of whom could maintain, at his own cost, a
+      little army of practised warriors. With Rienzi were traders and
+      artificers, who were willing to enjoy the fruits of liberty, but not to
+      labour at the soil; who demanded, in return for empty shouts, peace and
+      riches; and who expected that one man was to effect in a day what would be
+      cheaply purchased by the struggle of a generation. All their dark and rude
+      notion of a reformed state was to live unbutchered by the Barons and
+      untaxed by their governors. Rome, I say, gave to her Senator not a free
+      arm, nor a voluntary florin. (This plain fact is thoroughly borne out by
+      every authority.) Well aware of the danger which surrounds the ruler who
+      defends his state by foreign swords, the fondest wish, and the most
+      visionary dream of Rienzi, was to revive amongst the Romans, in their
+      first enthusiasm at his return, an organised and voluntary force, who, in
+      protecting him, would protect themselves:&mdash;not, as before, in his
+      first power, a nominal force of twenty thousand men, who at any hour might
+      yield (as they did yield) to one hundred and fifty; but a regular, well
+      disciplined, and trusty body, numerous enough to resist aggression, not
+      numerous enough to become themselves the aggressors.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      Hitherto all his private endeavours, his public exhortations, had failed;
+      the crowd listened&mdash;shouted&mdash;saw him quit the city to meet their
+      tyrants, and returned to their shops, saying to each other, &ldquo;What a great
+      man!&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      The character of Rienzi has chiefly received for its judges men of the
+      closet, who speculate upon human beings as if they were machines; who
+      gauge the great, not by their merit, but their success; and who have
+      censured or sneered at the Tribune, where they should have condemned the
+      People! Had but one-half the spirit been found in Rome which ran through a
+      single vein of Cola di Rienzi, the august Republic, if not the majestic
+      empire, of Rome, might be existing now! Turning from the people, the
+      Senator saw his rude and savage troops, accustomed to the licence of a
+      tyrant&rsquo;s camp, and under commanders in whom it was ruin really to confide&mdash;whom
+      it was equal ruin openly to distrust. Hemmed in on every side by dangers,
+      his character daily grew more restless, vigilant, and stern; and still,
+      with all the aims of the patriot, he felt all the curses of the tyrant.
+      Without the rough and hardening career which, through a life of warfare,
+      had brought Cromwell to a similar power&mdash;with more of grace and
+      intellectual softness in his composition, he resembled that yet greater
+      man in some points of character&mdash;in his religious enthusiasm; his
+      rigid justice, often forced by circumstance into severity, but never
+      wantonly cruel or blood-thirsty; in his singular pride of country; and his
+      mysterious command over the minds of others. But he resembled the giant
+      Englishman far more in circumstance than original nature, and that
+      circumstance assimilated their characters at the close of their several
+      careers. Like Cromwell, beset by secret or open foes, the assassin&rsquo;s
+      dagger ever gleamed before his eyes; and his stout heart, unawed by real,
+      trembled at imagined, terrors. The countenance changing suddenly from red
+      to white&mdash;the bloodshot, restless eye, belying the composed majesty
+      of mien&mdash;the muttering lips&mdash;the broken slumber&mdash;the secret
+      corselet; these to both were the rewards of Power!
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      The elasticity of youth had left the Tribune! His frame, which had endured
+      so many shocks, had contracted a painful disease in the dungeon at Avignon
+      (&ldquo;Dicea che ne la prigione era stato ascarmato.&rdquo; &ldquo;Vita di Cola di Rienzi&rdquo;,
+      lib. ii. cap. 18.)&mdash;his high soul still supported him, but the nerves
+      gave way. Tears came readily into his eyes, and often, like Cromwell, he
+      was thought to weep from hypocrisy, when in truth it was the hysteric of
+      over-wrought and irritable emotion. In all his former life singularly
+      temperate, (&ldquo;Solea prima esser sobrio, temperato, astinente, or a e
+      diventato distemperatissimo bevitore,&rdquo; &amp;c.&mdash;Ibid.) he now fled
+      from his goading thoughts to the beguiling excitement of wine. He drank
+      deep, though its effects were never visible upon him except in a freer and
+      wilder mood, and the indulgence of that racy humour, half-mirthful,
+      half-bitter, for which his younger day had been distinguished. Now the
+      mirth had more loudness, but the bitterness more gall.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      Such were the characteristics of Rienzi at his return to power&mdash;made
+      more apparent with every day. Nina he still loved with the same
+      tenderness, and, if possible, she adored him more than ever: but, the zest
+      and freshness of triumphant ambition gone, somehow or other, their
+      intercourse together had not its old charm. Formerly they talked
+      constantly of the future&mdash;of the bright days in store for them. Now,
+      with a sharp and uneasy pang, Rienzi turned from all thought of that &ldquo;gay
+      tomorrow.&rdquo; There was no &ldquo;gay tomorrow&rdquo; for him! Dark and thorny as was the
+      present hour, all beyond seemed yet less cheering and more ominous. Still
+      he had some moments, brief but brilliant, when, forgetting the iron race
+      amongst whom he was thrown, he plunged into scholastic reveries of the
+      worshipped Past, and half-fancied that he was of a People worthy of his
+      genius and his devotion. Like most men who have been preserved through
+      great dangers, he continued with increasing fondness to nourish a
+      credulous belief in the grandeur of his own destiny. He could not imagine
+      that he had been so delivered, and for no end! He was the Elected, and
+      therefore the Instrument, of Heaven. And thus, that Bible which in his
+      loneliness, his wanderings, and his prison, had been his solace and
+      support, was more than ever needed in his greatness.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      It was another cause of sorrow and chagrin to one who, amidst such
+      circumstances of public danger, required so peculiarly the support and
+      sympathy of private friends,&mdash;that he found he had incurred amongst
+      his old coadjutors the common penalty of absence. A few were dead; others,
+      wearied with the storms of public life, and chilled in their ardour by the
+      turbulent revolutions to which, in every effort for her amelioration, Rome
+      had been subjected, had retired,&mdash;some altogether from the city, some
+      from all participation in political affairs. In his halls, the
+      Tribune-Senator was surrounded by unfamiliar faces, and a new generation.
+      Of the heads of the popular party, most were animated by a stern dislike
+      to the Pontifical domination, and looked with suspicion and repugnance
+      upon one who, if he governed for the People, had been trusted and honoured
+      by the Pope. Rienzi was not a man to forget former friends, however lowly,
+      and had already found time to seek an interview with Cecco del Vecchio.
+      But that stern Republican had received him with coldness. His foreign
+      mercenaries, and his title of Senator, were things that the artisan could
+      not digest. With his usual bluntness, he had said so to Rienzi.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;As for the last,&rdquo; answered the Tribune, affably, &ldquo;names do not alter
+      natures. When I forget that to be delegate to the Pontiff is to be the
+      guardian of his flock, forsake me. As for the first, let me but see five
+      hundred Romans sworn to stand armed day and night for the defence of Rome,
+      and I dismiss the Northmen.&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      Cecco del Vecchio was unsoftened; honest, but uneducated&mdash;impracticable,
+      and by nature a malcontent, he felt as if he were no longer necessary to
+      the Senator, and this offended his pride. Strange as it may seem, the
+      sullen artisan bore, too, a secret grudge against Rienzi, for not having
+      seen and selected him from a crowd of thousands on the day of his
+      triumphal entry. Such are the small offences which produce deep danger to
+      the great!
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      The artisans still held their meetings, and Cecco del Vecchio&rsquo;s voice was
+      heard loud in grumbling forebodings. But what wounded Rienzi yet more than
+      the alienation of the rest, was the confused and altered manner of his old
+      friend and familiar, Pandulfo di Guido. Missing that popular citizen among
+      those who daily offered their homage at the Capitol, he had sent for him,
+      and sought in vain to revive their ancient intimacy. Pandulfo affected
+      great respect, but not all the condescension of the Senator could conquer
+      his distance and his restraint. In fact, Pandulfo had learned to form
+      ambitious projects of his own; and but for the return of Rienzi, Pandulfo
+      di Guido felt that he might now, with greater safety, and indeed with some
+      connivance from the Barons, have been the Tribune of the People. The
+      facility to rise into popular eminence which a disordered and corrupt
+      state, unblest by a regular constitution, offers to ambition, breeds the
+      jealousy and the rivalship which destroy union, and rot away the ties of
+      party.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      Such was the situation of Rienzi, and yet, wonderful to say, he seemed to
+      be adored by the multitude; and law and liberty, life and death, were in
+      his hands!
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      Of all those who attended his person, Angelo Villani was the most
+      favoured; that youth who had accompanied Rienzi in his long exile, had
+      also, at the wish of Nina, attended him from Avignon, through his sojourn
+      in the camp of Albornoz. His zeal, intelligence, and frank and evident
+      affection, blinded the Senator to the faults of his character, and
+      established him more and more in the gratitude of Rienzi. He loved to feel
+      that one faithful heart beat near him, and the page, raised to the rank of
+      his chamberlain, always attended his person, and slept in his
+      ante-chamber.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      Retiring that night at Tivoli, to the apartment prepared for him, the
+      Senator sat down by the open casement, through which were seen, waving in
+      the starlight, the dark pines that crowned the hills, while the stillness
+      of the hour gave to his ear the dash of the waterfalls heard above the
+      regular and measured tread of the sentinels below. Leaning his cheek upon
+      his hand, Rienzi long surrendered himself to gloomy thought, and, when he
+      looked up, he saw the bright blue eye of Villani fixed in anxious sympathy
+      on his countenance.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;Is my Lord unwell?&rdquo; asked the young chamberlain, hesitating.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;Not so, my Angelo; but somewhat sick at heart. Methinks, for a September
+      night, the air is chill!&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;Angelo,&rdquo; resumed Rienzi, who had already acquired that uneasy curiosity
+      which belongs to an uncertain power,&mdash;&ldquo;Angelo, bring me hither yon
+      writing implements; hast thou heard aught what the men say of our probable
+      success against Palestrina?&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;Would my Lord wish to learn all their gossip, whether it please or not?&rdquo;
+       answered Villani.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;If I studied only to hear what pleased me, Angelo, I should never have
+      returned to Rome.&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;Why, then, I heard a constable of the Northmen say, meaningly, that the
+      place will not be carried.&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;Humph! And what said the captains of my Roman Legion?&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;My Lord, I have heard it whispered that they fear defeat less than they
+      do the revenge of the Barons, if they are successful.&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;And with such tools the living race of Europe and misjudging posterity
+      will deem that the workman is to shape out the Ideal and the Perfect!
+      Bring me yon Bible.&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      As Angelo reverently brought to Rienzi the sacred book, he said,
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;Just before I left my companions below, there was a rumour that the Lord
+      Adrian Colonna had been imprisoned by his kinsman.&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;I too heard, and I believe, as much,&rdquo; returned Rienzi: &ldquo;these Barons
+      would gibbet their own children in irons, if there were any chance of the
+      shackles growing rusty for want of prey. But the wicked shall be brought
+      low, and their strong places shall be made desolate.&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;I would, my Lord,&rdquo; said Villani, &ldquo;that our Northmen had other captains
+      than these Provencals.&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;Why?&rdquo; asked Rienzi, abruptly.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;Have the creatures of the Captain of the Grand Company ever held faith
+      with any man whom it suited the avarice or the ambition of Montreal to
+      betray? Was he not, a few months ago, the right arm of John di Vico, and
+      did he not sell his services to John di Vico&rsquo;s enemy, the Cardinal
+      Albornoz? These warriors barter men as cattle.&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;Thou describest Montreal rightly: a dangerous and an awful man. But
+      methinks his brothers are of a duller and meaner kind; they dare not the
+      crimes of the Robber Captain. Howbeit, Angelo, thou hast touched a string
+      that will make discord with sleep tonight. Fair youth, thy young eyes have
+      need of slumber; withdraw, and when thou hearest men envy Rienzi, think
+      that&mdash;&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;God never made Genius to be envied!&rdquo; interrupted Villani, with an energy
+      that overcame his respect. &ldquo;We envy not the sun, but rather the valleys
+      that ripen beneath his beams.&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;Verily, if I be the sun,&rdquo; said Rienzi, with a bitter and melancholy
+      smile, &ldquo;I long for night,&mdash;and come it will, to the human as to the
+      celestial Pilgrim!&mdash;Thank Heaven, at least, that our ambition cannot
+      make us immortal!&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      <a name="link2HCH0059" id="link2HCH0059">
+      <!--  H2 anchor --> </a>
+    </p>
+    <div style="height: 4em;">
+      <br /><br /><br /><br />
+    </div>
+    <h2>
+      Chapter 9.V. The Biter Bit.
+    </h2>
+    <p>
+      The next morning, when Rienzi descended to the room where his captains
+      awaited him, his quick eye perceived that a cloud still lowered upon the
+      brow of Messere Brettone. Arimbaldo, sheltered by the recess of the rude
+      casement, shunned his eye.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;A fair morning, gentles,&rdquo; said Rienzi; &ldquo;the Sun laughs upon our
+      enterprise. I have messengers from Rome betimes&mdash;fresh troops will
+      join us ere noon.&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;I am glad, Senator,&rdquo; answered Brettone, &ldquo;that you have tidings which will
+      counteract the ill of those I have to narrate to thee. The soldiers murmur
+      loudly&mdash;their pay is due to them; and, I fear me, that without money
+      they will not march to Palestrina.&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;As they will,&rdquo; returned Rienzi, carelessly. &ldquo;It is but a few days since
+      they entered Rome; pay did they receive in advance&mdash;if they demand
+      more, the Colonna and Orsini may outbid me. Draw off your soldiers, Sir
+      Knight, and farewell.&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      Brettone&rsquo;s countenance fell&mdash;it was his object to get Rienzi more and
+      more in his power, and he wished not to suffer him to gain that strength
+      which would accrue to him from the fall of Palestrina: the indifference of
+      the Senator foiled and entrapped him in his own net.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;That must not be,&rdquo; said the brother of Montreal, after a confused
+      silence; &ldquo;we cannot leave you thus to your enemies&mdash;the soldiers, it
+      is true, demand pay&mdash;&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;And should have it,&rdquo; said Rienzi. &ldquo;I know these mercenaries&mdash;it is
+      ever with them, mutiny or money. I will throw myself on my Romans, and
+      triumph&mdash;or fall, if so Heaven decrees, with them. Acquaint your
+      constables with my resolve.&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      Scarce were these words spoken, ere, as previously concerted with
+      Brettone, the chief constable of the mercenaries appeared at the door.
+      &ldquo;Senator,&rdquo; said he, with a rough semblance of aspect, &ldquo;your orders to
+      march have reached me, I have sought to marshal my men&mdash;but&mdash;&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;I know what thou wouldst say, friend,&rdquo; interrupted Rienzi, waving his
+      hand: &ldquo;Messere Brettone will give you my reply. Another time, Sir Captain,
+      more ceremony with the Senator of Rome&mdash;you may withdraw.&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      The unforeseen dignity of Rienzi rebuked and abashed the constable; he
+      looked at Brettone, who motioned him to depart. He closed the door and
+      withdrew.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;What is to be done?&rdquo; said Brettone.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;Sir Knight,&rdquo; replied Rienzi, gravely, &ldquo;let us understand each other.
+      Would you serve me or not? If the first, you are not my equal, but
+      subordinate&mdash;and you must obey and not dictate; if the last, my debt
+      to you shall be discharged, and the world is wide enough for both.&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;We have declared allegiance to you,&rdquo; answered Brettone, &ldquo;and it shall be
+      given.&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;One caution before I re-accept your fealty,&rdquo; replied Rienzi, very slowly.
+      &ldquo;For an open foe, I have my sword&mdash;for a traitor, mark me, Rome has
+      the axe; of the first I have no fear; for the last, no mercy.&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;These are not words that should pass between friends,&rdquo; said Brettone,
+      turning pale with suppressed emotion.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;Friends!&mdash;ye are my friends, then!&mdash;your hands! Friends, so ye
+      are!&mdash;and shall prove it! Dear Arimbaldo, thou, like myself, art
+      book-learned,&mdash;a clerkly soldier. Dost thou remember how in the Roman
+      history it is told that the Treasury lacked money for the soldiers? The
+      Consul convened the Nobles. &lsquo;Ye,&rsquo; said he, &lsquo;that have the offices and
+      dignity should be the first to pay for them.&rsquo; Ye heed me, my friends; the
+      nobles took the hint, they found the money&mdash;the army was paid. This
+      example is not lost on you. I have made you the leaders of my force, Rome
+      hath showered her honours on you. Your generosity shall commence the
+      example which the Romans shall thus learn of strangers. Ye gaze at me, my
+      friends! I read your noble souls&mdash;and thank ye beforehand. Ye have
+      the dignity and the office; ye have also the wealth!&mdash;pay the
+      hirelings, pay them!&rdquo; (See the anonymous biographer, lib. ii. cap. 19.)
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      Had a thunderbolt fallen at the feet of Brettone, he could not have been
+      more astounded than at this simple suggestion of Rienzi&rsquo;s. He lifted his
+      eyes to the Senator&rsquo;s face, and saw there that smile which he had already,
+      bold as he was, learned to dread. He felt himself fairly sunk in the pit
+      he had digged for another. There was that in the Senator-Tribune&rsquo;s brow
+      that told him to refuse was to declare open war, and the moment was not
+      ripe for that.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;Ye accede,&rdquo; said Rienzi; &ldquo;ye have done well.&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      The Senator clapped his hands&mdash;his guard appeared.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;Summon the head constables of the soldiery.&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      The brothers still remained dumb.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      The constables entered.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;My friends,&rdquo; said Rienzi, &ldquo;Messere Brettone and Messere Arimbaldo have my
+      directions to divide amongst your force a thousand florins. This evening
+      we encamp beneath Palestrina.&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      The constables withdrew in visible surprise. Rienzi gazed a moment on the
+      brothers, chuckling within himself&mdash;for his sarcastic humour enjoyed
+      his triumph. &ldquo;You lament not your devotion, my friends!&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;No,&rdquo; said Brettone, rousing himself; &ldquo;the sum but trivially swells our
+      debt.&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;Frankly said&mdash;your hands once more!&mdash;the good people of Tivoli
+      expect me in the Piazza&mdash;they require some admonitions. Adieu till
+      noon.&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      When the door closed on Rienzi, Brettone struck the handle of his sword
+      fiercely&mdash;&ldquo;The Roman laughs at us,&rdquo; said he. &ldquo;But let Walter de
+      Montreal once appear in Rome, and the proud jester shall pay us dearly for
+      this.&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;Hush!&rdquo; said Arimbaldo, &ldquo;walls have ears, and that imp of Satan, young
+      Villani, seems to me ever at our heels!&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;A thousand florins! I trust his heart hath as many drops,&rdquo; growled the
+      chafed Brettone, unheeding his brother.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      The soldiers were paid&mdash;the army marched&mdash;the eloquence of the
+      Senator had augmented his force by volunteers from Tivoli, and wild and
+      half armed peasantry joined his standard from the Campagna and the
+      neighbouring mountains.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      Palestrina was besieged: Rienzi continued dexterously to watch the
+      brothers of Montreal. Under pretext of imparting to the Italian volunteers
+      the advantage of their military science, he separated them from their
+      mercenaries, and assigned to them the command of the less disciplined
+      Italians, with whom, he believed, they could not venture to tamper. He
+      himself assumed the lead of the Northmen&mdash;and, despite themselves,
+      they were fascinated by his artful, yet dignified affability, and the
+      personal courage he displayed in some sallies of the besieged Barons. But
+      as the huntsmen upon all the subtlest windings of their prey,&mdash;so
+      pressed the relentless and speeding Fates upon Cola di Rienzi!
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      <a name="link2HCH0060" id="link2HCH0060">
+      <!--  H2 anchor --> </a>
+    </p>
+    <div style="height: 4em;">
+      <br /><br /><br /><br />
+    </div>
+    <h2>
+      Chapter 9.VI. The Events Gather to the End.
+    </h2>
+    <p>
+      While this the state of the camp of the besiegers, Luca di Savelli and
+      Stefanello Colonna were closeted with a stranger, who had privately
+      entered Palestrina on the night before the Romans pitched their tents
+      beneath its walls. This visitor, who might have somewhat passed his
+      fortieth year, yet retained, scarcely diminished, the uncommon beauty of
+      form and countenance for which his youth had been remarkable. But it was
+      no longer that character of beauty which has been described in his first
+      introduction to the reader. It was no longer the almost woman delicacy of
+      feature and complexion, or the highborn polish, and graceful suavity of
+      manner, which distinguished Walter de Montreal: a life of vicissitude and
+      war had at length done its work. His bearing was now abrupt and imperious,
+      as that of one accustomed to rule wild spirits, and he had exchanged the
+      grace of persuasion for the sternness of command. His athletic form had
+      grown more spare and sinewy, and instead of the brow half shaded by fair
+      and clustering curls, his forehead, though yet but slightly wrinkled, was
+      completely bald at the temples; and by its unwonted height, increased the
+      dignity and manliness of his aspect. The bloom of his complexion was
+      faded, less by outward exposure than inward thought, into a bronzed and
+      settled paleness; and his features seemed more marked and prominent, as
+      the flesh had somewhat sunk from the contour of the cheek. Yet the change
+      suited the change of age and circumstance; and if the Provencal now less
+      realised the idea of the brave and fair knight-errant, he but looked the
+      more what the knight-errant had become&mdash;the sagacious counsellor and
+      the mighty leader.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;You must be aware,&rdquo; said Montreal, continuing a discourse which appeared
+      to have made great impression on his companions, &ldquo;that in this contest
+      between yourselves and the Senator, I alone hold the balance. Rienzi is
+      utterly in my power&mdash;my brothers, the leaders of his army; myself,
+      his creditor. It rests with me to secure him on the throne, or to send him
+      to the scaffold. I have but to give the order, and the Grand Company enter
+      Rome; but without their agency, methinks if you keep faith with me, our
+      purpose can be effected.&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;In the meanwhile, Palestrina is besieged by your brothers!&rdquo; said
+      Stefanello, sharply.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;But they have my orders to waste their time before its walls. Do you not
+      see, that by this very siege, fruitless, as, if I will, it shall be,
+      Rienzi loses fame abroad, and popularity in Rome.&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;Sir Knight,&rdquo; said Luca di Savelli, &ldquo;you speak as a man versed in the
+      profound policy of the times; and under all the circumstances which menace
+      us, your proposal seems but fitting and reasonable. On the one hand, you
+      undertake to restore us and the other Barons to Rome; and to give Rienzi
+      to the Staircase of the Lion&mdash;&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;Not so, not so,&rdquo; replied Montreal, quickly. &ldquo;I will consent either so to
+      subdue and cripple his power, as to render him a puppet in our hands, a
+      mere shadow of authority&mdash;or, if his proud spirit chafe at its cage,
+      to give it once more liberty amongst the wilds of Germany. I would fetter
+      or banish him, but not destroy; unless (added Montreal, after a moment&rsquo;s
+      pause) fate absolutely drives us to it. Power should not demand victims;
+      but to secure it, victims may be necessary.&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;I understand your refinements,&rdquo; said Luca di Savelli, with his icy smile,
+      &ldquo;and am satisfied. The Barons once restored, our palaces once more manned,
+      and I am willing to take the chance of the Senator&rsquo;s longevity. This
+      service you promise to effect?&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;I do.&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;And, in return, you demand our assent to your enjoying the rank of
+      Podesta for five years?&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;You say right.&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;I, for one, accede to the terms,&rdquo; said the Savelli: &ldquo;there is my hand; I
+      am wearied of these brawls, even amongst ourselves, and think that a
+      Foreign Ruler may best enforce order: the more especially, if like you,
+      Sir Knight, one whose birth and renown are such as to make him comprehend
+      the difference between Barons and Plebeians.&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;For my part,&rdquo; said Stefanello, &ldquo;I feel that we have but a choice of evils&mdash;I
+      like not a foreign Podesta; but I like a plebeian Senator still less;&mdash;there
+      too is my hand, Sir Knight.&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;Noble Signors,&rdquo; said Montreal, after a short pause, and turning his
+      piercing gaze from one to the other with great deliberation, &ldquo;our compact
+      is sealed; one word by way of codicil. Walter de Montreal is no Count
+      Pepin of Minorbino! Once before, little dreaming, I own, that the victory
+      would be so facile, I intrusted your cause and mine to a deputy; your
+      cause he promoted, mine he lost. He drove out the Tribune, and then
+      suffered the Barons to banish himself. This time I see to my own affairs;
+      and, mark you, I have learned in the Grand Company one lesson; viz. never
+      to pardon spy or deserter, of whatever rank. Your forgiveness for the
+      hint. Let us change the theme. So ye detain in your fortress my old friend
+      the Baron di Castello?&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;Ay,&rdquo; said Luca di Savelli; for Stefanello, stung by Montreal&rsquo;s threat,
+      which he dared not openly resent, preserved a sullen silence; &ldquo;Ay, he is
+      one noble the less to the Senator&rsquo;s council.&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;You act wisely. I know his views and temper; at present dangerous to our
+      interests. Yet use him well, I entreat you; he may hereafter serve us. And
+      now, my Lords, my eyes are weary, suffer me to retire. Pleasant dreams of
+      the New Revolution to us all!&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;By your leave, noble Montreal, we will attend you to your couch,&rdquo; said
+      Luca di Savelli.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;By my troth, and ye shall not. I am no Tribune to have great Signors for
+      my pages; but a plain gentleman, and a hardy soldier: your attendants will
+      conduct me to whatever chamber your hospitality assigns to one who could
+      sleep soundly beneath the rudest hedge under your open skies.&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      Savelli, however, insisted on conducting the Podesta that was to be, to
+      his apartment. He then returned to Stefanello, whom he found pacing the
+      saloon with long and disordered strides.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;What have we done, Savelli?&rdquo; said he, quickly; &ldquo;sold our city to a
+      barbarian!&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;Sold!&rdquo; said Savelli; &ldquo;to my mind it is the other part of the contract in
+      which we have played our share. We have bought, Colonna, not sold&mdash;bought
+      our lives from yon army; bought our power, our fortunes, our castles, from
+      the Demagogue Senator; bought, what is better than all, triumph and
+      revenge. Tush, Colonna, see you not that if we had balked this great
+      warrior, we had perished? Leagued with the Senator, the Grand Company
+      would have marched to Rome; and, whether Montreal assisted or murdered
+      Rienzi, (for methinks he is a Romulus, who would brook no Remus), we had
+      equally been undone. Now, we have made our own terms, and our shares are
+      equal. Nay, the first steps to be taken are in our favour. Rienzi is to be
+      snared, and we are to enter Rome.&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;And then the Provencal is to be Despot of the city.&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;Podesta, if you please. Podestas who offend the people are often
+      banished, and sometimes stoned&mdash;Podestas who insult the nobles are
+      often stilettoed, and sometimes poisoned,&rdquo; said Savelli. &ldquo;&lsquo;Sufficient for
+      the day is the evil thereof.&rsquo; Meanwhile, say nothing to the bear, Orsini.
+      Such men mar all wisdom. Come, cheer thee, Stefanello.&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;Luca di Savelli, you have not such a stake in Rome as I have,&rdquo; said the
+      young Lord, haughtily; &ldquo;no Podesta can take from you the rank of the first
+      Signor of the Italian metropolis!&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;An you had said so to the Orsini, there would have been drawing of
+      swords,&rdquo; said Savelli. &ldquo;But cheer thee, I say; is not our first care to
+      destroy Rienzi, and then, between the death of one foe and the rise of
+      another, are there not such preventives as Ezzelino da Romano has taught
+      to wary men? Cheer thee, I say; and, next year, if we but hold together,
+      Stefanello Colonna and Luca di Savelli will be joint Senators of Rome, and
+      these great men food for worms!&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      While thus conferred the Barons, Montreal, ere he retired to rest, stood
+      gazing from the open lattice of his chamber over the landscape below,
+      which slept in the autumnal moonlight, while at a distance gleamed, pale
+      and steady, the lights round the encampment of the besiegers.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;Wide plains and broad valleys,&rdquo; thought the warrior, &ldquo;soon shall ye
+      repose in peace beneath a new sway, against which no petty tyrant shall
+      dare rebel. And ye, white walls of canvass, even while I gaze&mdash;ye
+      admonish me how realms are won. Even as, of old, from the Nomad tents was
+      built up the stately Babylon, (Isaiah, c. xxii.) that &lsquo;was not till the
+      Assyrian founded it for them that dwell in the wilderness;&rsquo; so by the new
+      Ishmaelites of Europe shall a race, undreamt of now, be founded; and the
+      camp of yesterday, be the city of tomorrow. Verily, when, for one soft
+      offence, the Pontiff thrust me from the bosom of the Church, little
+      guessed he what enemy he raised to Rome! How solemn is the night!&mdash;how
+      still the heavens and earth!&mdash;the very stars are as hushed, as if
+      intent on the events that are to pass below! So solemn and so still feels
+      mine own spirit, and an awe unknown till now warns me that I approach the
+      crisis of my daring fate!&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      <a name="link2H_4_0073" id="link2H_4_0073">
+      <!--  H2 anchor --> </a>
+    </p>
+    <div style="height: 4em;">
+      <br /><br /><br /><br />
+    </div>
+    <h2>
+      BOOK X. THE LION Of BASALT.
+    </h2>
+<pre xml:space="preserve">
+     &ldquo;Ora voglio contare la morte del Tribuno.&rdquo;&mdash;(&ldquo;Vita di Cola di
+     Rienzi&rdquo;, lib. ii. cap. 24.)
+
+     &ldquo;Now will I narrate the death of the Tribune.&rdquo;&mdash;&ldquo;Life of
+     Cola di Rienzi&rdquo;.
+</pre>
+    <p>
+      <a name="link2HCH0061" id="link2HCH0061">
+      <!--  H2 anchor --> </a>
+    </p>
+    <div style="height: 4em;">
+      <br /><br /><br /><br />
+    </div>
+    <h2>
+      Chapter 10.I. The Conjunction of Hostile Planets in the House of Death.
+    </h2>
+    <p>
+      On the fourth day of the siege, and after beating back to those almost
+      impregnable walls the soldiery of the Barons, headed by the Prince of the
+      Orsini, the Senator returned to his tent, where despatches from Rome
+      awaited him. He ran his eye hastily over them, till he came to the last;
+      yet each contained news that might have longer delayed the eye of a man
+      less inured to danger. From one he learned that Albornoz, whose blessing
+      had confirmed to him the rank of Senator, had received with special favour
+      the messengers of the Orsini and Colonna. He knew that the Cardinal, whose
+      views connected him with the Roman Patricians, desired his downfall; but
+      he feared not Albornoz: perhaps in his secret heart he wished that any
+      open aggression from the Pontiff&rsquo;s Legate might throw him wholly on the
+      people.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      He learned further, that, short as had been his absence, Pandulfo di Guido
+      had twice addressed the populace, not in favour of the Senator, but in
+      artful regrets of the loss to the trade of Rome in the absence of her
+      wealthiest nobles.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;For this, then, he has deserted me,&rdquo; said Rienzi to himself. &ldquo;Let him
+      beware!&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      The tidings contained in the next touched him home: Walter de Montreal had
+      openly arrived in Rome. The grasping and lawless bandit, whose rapine
+      filled with a robber&rsquo;s booty every bank in Europe&mdash;whose Company was
+      the army of a King&mdash;whose ambition, vast, unprincipled, and profound,
+      he so well knew&mdash;whose brothers were in his camp&mdash;their treason
+      already more than suspected;&mdash;Walter de Montreal was in Rome!
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      The Senator remained perfectly aghast at this new peril; and then said,
+      setting his teeth as in a vice,
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;Wild tiger, thou art in the Lion&rsquo;s den!&rdquo; Then pausing, he broke out
+      again, &ldquo;One false step, Walter de Montreal, and all the mailed hands of
+      the Grand Company shall not pluck thee from the abyss! But what can I do?
+      Return to Rome&mdash;the plans of Montreal unpenetrated&mdash;no
+      accusation against him! On what pretence can I with honour raise the
+      siege? To leave Palestrina, is to give a triumph to the Barons&mdash;to
+      abandon Adrian, to degrade my cause. Yet, while away from Rome, every hour
+      breeds treason and danger. Pandulfo, Albornoz, Montreal&mdash;all are at
+      work against me. A keen and trusty spy, now;&mdash;ha, well thought of&mdash;Villani!&mdash;What,
+      ho&mdash;Angelo Villani!&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      The young chamberlain appeared.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;I think,&rdquo; said Rienzi, &ldquo;to have often heard, that thou art an orphan?&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;True, my Lord; the old Augustine nun who reared my boyhood, has told me
+      again and again that my parents are dead. Both noble, my Lord; but I am
+      the child of shame. And I say it often, and think of it ever, in order to
+      make Angelo Villani remember that he has a name to win.&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;Young man, serve me as you have served, and if I live you shall have no
+      need to call yourself an orphan. Mark me! I want a friend&mdash;the
+      Senator of Rome wants a friend&mdash;only one friend&mdash;gentle Heaven!
+      only one!&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      Angelo sank on his knee, and kissed the mantle of his Lord.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;Say a follower. I am too mean to be Rienzi&rsquo;s friend.&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;Too mean!&mdash;go to!&mdash;there is nothing mean before God, unless it
+      be a base soul under high titles. With me, boy, there is but one nobility,
+      and Nature signs its charter. Listen: thou hearest daily of Walter de
+      Montreal, brother to these Provencals&mdash;great captain of great
+      robbers?&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;Ay, and I have seen him, my Lord.&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;Well, then, he is in Rome. Some daring thought&mdash;some well-supported
+      and deep-schemed villany, could alone make that bandit venture openly into
+      an Italian city, whose territories he ravaged by fire and sword a few
+      months back. But his brothers have lent me money&mdash;assisted my return;&mdash;for
+      their own ends, it is true: but the seeming obligation gives them real
+      power. These Northern swordsmen would cut my throat if the Great Captain
+      bade them. He counts on my supposed weakness. I know him of old. I suspect&mdash;nay
+      I read, his projects; but I cannot prove them. Without proof, I cannot
+      desert Palestrina in order to accuse and seize him. Thou art shrewd,
+      thoughtful, acute;&mdash;couldst thou go to Rome?&mdash;watch day and
+      night his movements&mdash;see if he receive messengers from Albornoz or
+      the Barons&mdash;if he confer with Pandulfo di Guido;&mdash;watch his
+      lodgment, I say, night and day. He affects no concealment; your task will
+      be less difficult than it seems. Apprise the Signora of all you learn.
+      Give me your news daily. Will you undertake this mission?&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;I will, my Lord.&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;To horse, then, quick!&mdash;and mind&mdash;save the wife of my bosom, I
+      have no confidant in Rome.&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      <a name="link2HCH0062" id="link2HCH0062">
+      <!--  H2 anchor --> </a>
+    </p>
+    <div style="height: 4em;">
+      <br /><br /><br /><br />
+    </div>
+    <h2>
+      Chapter 10.II. Montreal at Rome.&mdash;His Reception of Angelo Villani.
+    </h2>
+    <p>
+      The danger that threatened Rienzi by the arrival of Montreal was indeed
+      formidable. The Knight of St. John, having marched his army into Lombardy,
+      had placed it at the disposal of the Venetian State in its war with the
+      Archbishop of Milan. For this service he received an immense sum; while he
+      provided winter quarters for his troop, for whom he proposed ample work in
+      the ensuing spring. Leaving Palestrina secretly and in disguise, with but
+      a slender train, which met him at Tivoli, Montreal repaired to Rome. His
+      ostensible object was, partly to congratulate the Senator on his return,
+      partly to receive the monies lent to Rienzi by his brother.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      His secret object we have partly seen; but not contented with the support
+      of the Barons, he trusted, by the corrupting means of his enormous wealth,
+      to form a third party in support of his own ulterior designs. Wealth,
+      indeed, in that age and in that land, was scarcely less the purchaser of
+      diadems than it had been in the later days of the Roman Empire. And in
+      many a city torn by hereditary feuds, the hatred of faction rose to that
+      extent, that a foreign tyrant, willing and able to expel one party, might
+      obtain at least the temporary submission of the other. His after-success
+      was greatly in proportion to his power to maintain his state by a force
+      which was independent of the citizens, and by a treasury which did not
+      require the odious recruit of taxes. But more avaricious than ambitious,
+      more cruel than firm, it was by griping exaction, or unnecessary
+      bloodshed, that such usurpers usually fell.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      Montreal, who had scanned the frequent revolutions of the time with a calm
+      and investigating eye, trusted that he should be enabled to avoid both
+      these errors: and, as the reader has already seen, he had formed the
+      profound and sagacious project of consolidating his usurpation by an
+      utterly new race of nobles, who, serving him by the feudal tenure of the
+      North, and ever ready to protect him, because in so doing they protected
+      their own interests, should assist to erect, not the rotten and
+      unsupported fabric of a single tyranny, but the strong fortress of a new,
+      hardy, and compact Aristocratic State. Thus had the great dynasties of the
+      North been founded; in which a King, though seemingly curbed by the
+      Barons, was in reality supported by a common interest, whether against a
+      subdued population or a foreign invasion.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      Such were the vast schemes&mdash;extending into yet wider fields of glory
+      and conquest, bounded only by the Alps&mdash;with which the Captain of the
+      Grand Company beheld the columns and arches of the Seven-hilled City.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      No fear disturbed the long current of his thoughts. His brothers were the
+      leaders of Rienzi&rsquo;s hireling army&mdash;that army were his creatures. Over
+      Rienzi himself he assumed the right of a creditor. Thus against one party
+      he deemed himself secure. For the friends of the Pope, he had supported
+      himself with private, though cautious, letters from Albornoz, who desired
+      only to make use of him for the return of the Roman Barons; and with the
+      heads of the latter we have already witnessed his negotiations. Thus was
+      he fitted, as he thought, to examine, to tamper with all parties, and to
+      select from each the materials necessary for his own objects.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      The open appearance of Montreal excited in Rome no inconsiderable
+      sensation. The friends of the Barons gave out that Rienzi was in league
+      with the Grand Company; and that he was to sell the imperial city to the
+      plunder and pillage of Barbarian robbers. The effrontery with which
+      Montreal (against whom, more than once, the Pontiff had thundered his
+      bulls) appeared in the Metropolitan City of the Church, was made yet more
+      insolent by the recollection of that stern justice which had led the
+      Tribune to declare open war against all the robbers of Italy: and this
+      audacity was linked with the obvious reflection, that the brothers of the
+      bold Provencal were the instruments of Rienzi&rsquo;s return. So quickly spread
+      suspicion through the city, that Montreal&rsquo;s presence alone would in a few
+      weeks have sufficed to ruin the Senator. Meanwhile, the natural boldness
+      of Montreal silenced every whisper of prudence; and, blinded by the dazzle
+      of his hopes, the Knight of St. John, as if to give double importance to
+      his coming, took up his residence in a sumptuous palace, and his retinue
+      rivalled, in the splendour of garb and pomp, the display of Rienzi himself
+      in his earlier and more brilliant power.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      Amidst the growing excitement, Angelo Villani arrived at Rome. The
+      character of this young man had been formed by his peculiar circumstances.
+      He possessed qualities which often mark the Illegitimate as with a common
+      stamp. He was insolent&mdash;like most of those who hold a doubtful rank;
+      and while ashamed of his bastardy, was arrogant of the supposed nobility
+      of his unknown parentage. The universal ferment and agitation of Italy at
+      that day rendered ambition the most common of all the passions, and thus
+      ambition, in all its many shades and varieties, forces itself into our
+      delineations of character in this history. Though not for Angelo Villani
+      were the dreams of the more lofty and generous order of that sublime
+      infirmity, he was strongly incited by the desire and resolve to rise. He
+      had warm affections and grateful impulses; and his fidelity to his patron
+      had been carried to a virtue: but from his irregulated and desultory
+      education, and the reckless profligacy of those with whom, in
+      ante-chambers and guard-rooms, much of his youth had been passed, he had
+      neither high principles nor an enlightened honour. Like most Italians,
+      cunning and shrewd, he scrupled not at any deceit that served a purpose or
+      a friend. His strong attachment to Rienzi had been unconsciously increased
+      by the gratification of pride and vanity, flattered by the favour of so
+      celebrated a man. Both self-interest and attachment urged him to every
+      effort to promote the views and safety of one at once his benefactor and
+      patron; and on undertaking his present mission, his only thought was to
+      fulfil it with the most complete success. Far more brave and daring than
+      was common with the Italians, something of the hardihood of an
+      Ultra-Montane race gave nerve and vigour to his craft; and from what his
+      art suggested, his courage never shrunk.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      When Rienzi had first detailed to him the objects of his present task, he
+      instantly called to mind his adventure with the tall soldier in the crowd
+      at Avignon. &ldquo;If ever thou wantest a friend, seek him in Walter de
+      Montreal,&rdquo; were words that had often rung in his ear, and they now
+      recurred to him with prophetic distinctness. He had no doubt that it was
+      Montreal himself whom he had seen. Why the Great Captain should have taken
+      this interest in him, Angelo little cared to conjecture. Most probably it
+      was but a crafty pretence&mdash;one of the common means by which the Chief
+      of the Grand Company attracted to himself the youths of Italy, as well as
+      the warriors of the North. He only thought now how he could turn the
+      Knight&rsquo;s promise to account. What more easy than to present himself to
+      Montreal&mdash;remind him of the words&mdash;enter his service&mdash;and
+      thus effectually watch his conduct? The office of spy was not that which
+      would have pleased every mind, but it shocked not the fastidiousness of
+      Angelo Villani; and the fearful hatred with which his patron had often
+      spoken of the avaricious and barbarian robber&mdash;the scourge of his
+      native land,&mdash;had infected the young man, who had much of the
+      arrogant and mock patriotism of the Romans, with a similar sentiment. More
+      vindictive even than grateful, he bore, too, a secret grudge against
+      Montreal&rsquo;s brothers, whose rough address had often wounded his pride; and,
+      above all, his early recollections of the fear and execration in which
+      Ursula seemed ever to hold the terrible Fra Moreale, impressed him with a
+      vague belief of some ancient wrong to himself or his race, perpetrated by
+      the Provencal, which he was not ill-pleased to have the occasion to
+      avenge. In truth, the words of Ursula, mystic and dark as they were in
+      their denunciation, had left upon Villani&rsquo;s boyish impressions an
+      unaccountable feeling of antipathy and hatred to the man it was now his
+      object to betray. For the rest, every device seemed to him decorous and
+      justifiable, so that it saved his master, served his country, and advanced
+      himself.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      Montreal was alone in his chamber when it was announced to him that a
+      young Italian craved an audience. Professionally open to access, he
+      forthwith gave admission to the applicant.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      The Knight of St. John instantly recognised the page he had encountered at
+      Avignon; and when Angelo Villani said, with easy boldness, &ldquo;I have come to
+      remind Sir Walter de Montreal of a promise&mdash;&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      The Knight interrupted him with cordial frankness&mdash;&ldquo;Thou needest not&mdash;I
+      remember it. Dost thou now require my friendship?&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;I do noble Signor!&rdquo; answered Angelo; &ldquo;I know not where else to seek a
+      patron.&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;Canst thou read and write? I fear me not.&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;I have been taught those arts,&rdquo; replied Villani.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;It is well. Is thy birth gentle?&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;It is.&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;Better still;&mdash;thy name?&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;Angelo Villani.&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;I take thy blue eyes and low broad brow,&rdquo; said Montreal, with a slight
+      sigh, &ldquo;in pledge of thy truth. Henceforth, Angelo Villani, thou art in the
+      list of my secretaries. Another time thou shalt tell me more of thyself.
+      Thy service dates from this day. For the rest, no man ever wanted wealth
+      who served Walter de Montreal; nor advancement, if he served him
+      faithfully. My closet, through yonder door, is thy waiting-room. Ask for,
+      and send hither, Lusignan of Lyons; he is my chief scribe, and will see to
+      thy comforts, and instruct thee in thy business.&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      Angelo withdrew&mdash;Montreal&rsquo;s eye followed him.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;A strange likeness!&rdquo; said he, musingly and sadly; &ldquo;my heart leaps to that
+      boy!&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      <a name="link2HCH0063" id="link2HCH0063">
+      <!--  H2 anchor --> </a>
+    </p>
+    <div style="height: 4em;">
+      <br /><br /><br /><br />
+    </div>
+    <h2>
+      Chapter 10.III. Montreal&rsquo;s Banquet.
+    </h2>
+    <p>
+      Some few days after the date of the last chapter, Rienzi received news
+      from Rome, which seemed to produce in him a joyous and elated excitement.
+      His troops still lay before Palestrina, and still the banners of the
+      Barons waved over its unconquered walls. In truth, the Italians employed
+      half their time in brawls amongst themselves; the Velletritrani had feuds
+      with the people of Tivoli, and the Romans were still afraid of conquering
+      the Barons;&mdash;&ldquo;The hornet,&rdquo; said they, &ldquo;stings worse after he is dead;
+      and neither an Orsini, a Savelli, nor a Colonna, was ever known to
+      forgive.&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      Again and again had the captains of his army assured the indignant Senator
+      that the fortress was impregnable, and that time and money were idly
+      wasted upon the siege. Rienzi knew better, but he concealed his thoughts.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      He now summoned to his tent the brothers of Provence, and announced to
+      them his intention of returning instantly to Rome. &ldquo;The mercenaries shall
+      continue the siege under our Lieutenant, and you, with my Roman Legion,
+      shall accompany me. Your brother, Sir Walter, and I, both want your
+      presence; we have affairs to arrange between us. After a few days I shall
+      raise recruits in the city, and return.&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      This was what the brothers desired; they approved, with evident joy, the
+      Senator&rsquo;s proposition.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      Rienzi next sent for the lieutenant of his bodyguard, the same Riccardo
+      Annibaldi whom the reader will remember in the earlier part of this work,
+      as the antagonist of Montreal&rsquo;s lance. This young man&mdash;one of the few
+      nobles who espoused the cause of the Senator&mdash;had evinced great
+      courage and military ability, and promised fair (should Fate spare his
+      life (It appears that this was the same Annibaldi who was afterwards slain
+      in an affray:&mdash;Petrarch lauds his valour and laments his fate.)) to
+      become one of the best Captains of his time.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;Dear Annibaldi,&rdquo; said Rienzi; &ldquo;at length I can fulfil the project on
+      which we have privately conferred. I take with me to Rome the two
+      Provencal Captains&mdash;I leave you chief of the army. Palestrina will
+      yield now&mdash;eh!&mdash;ha, ha, ha!&mdash;Palestrina will yield now!&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;By my right hand, I think so, Senator,&rdquo; replied Annibaldi. &ldquo;These
+      foreigners have hitherto only stirred up quarrels amongst ourselves, and
+      if not cowards are certainly traitors!&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;Hush, hush, hush! Traitors! The learned Arimbaldo, the brave Brettone,
+      traitors! Fie on it! No, no; they are very excellent, honourable men, but
+      not lucky in the camp;&mdash;not lucky in the camp;&mdash;better speed to
+      them in the city! And now to business.&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      The Senator then detailed to Annibaldi the plan he himself had formed for
+      taking the town, and the military skill of Annibaldi at once recognised
+      its feasibility.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      With his Roman troop, and Montreal&rsquo;s brothers, one at either hand, Rienzi
+      then departed to Rome.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      That night Montreal gave a banquet to Pandulfo di Guido, and to certain of
+      the principal citizens, whom one by one he had already sounded, and found
+      hollow at heart to the cause of the Senator.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      Pandulfo sate at the right hand of the Knight of St. John, and Montreal
+      lavished upon him the most courteous attentions.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;Pledge me in this&mdash;it is from the Vale of Chiana, near Monte
+      Pulciano,&rdquo; said Montreal. &ldquo;I think I have heard bookmen say (you know,
+      Signor Pandulfo, we ought all to be bookmen now!) that the site was
+      renowned of old. In truth, the wine hath a racy flavour.&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;I hear,&rdquo; said Bruttini, one of the lesser Barons, (a stanch friend to the
+      Colonna,) &ldquo;that in this respect the innkeeper&rsquo;s son has put his
+      book-learning to some use: he knows every place where the wine grows
+      richest.&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;What! the Senator is turned wine-bibber!&rdquo; said Montreal, quaffing a vast
+      goblet full; &ldquo;that must unfit him for business&mdash;&lsquo;tis a pity.&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;Verily, yes,&rdquo; said Pandulfo; &ldquo;a man at the head of a state should be
+      temperate&mdash;I never drink wine unmixed.&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;Ah,&rdquo; whispered Montreal, &ldquo;if your calm good sense ruled Rome, then,
+      indeed, the metropolis of Italy might taste of peace. Signor Vivaldi,&rdquo;&mdash;and
+      the host turned towards a wealthy draper,&mdash;&ldquo;these disturbances are
+      bad for trade.&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;Very, very!&rdquo; groaned the draper.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;The Barons are your best customers,&rdquo; quoth the minor noble.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;Much, much!&rdquo; said the draper.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;&lsquo;Tis a pity that they are thus roughly expelled,&rdquo; said Montreal, in a
+      melancholy tone. &ldquo;Would it not be possible, if the Senator (I drink his
+      health) were less rash&mdash;less zealous, rather,&mdash;to unite free
+      institutions with the return of the Barons?&mdash;such should be the task
+      of a truly wise statesman!&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;It surely might be possible,&rdquo; returned Vivaldi; &ldquo;the Savelli alone spend
+      more with me than all the rest of Rome.&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;I know not if it be possible,&rdquo; said Bruttini; &ldquo;but I do know that it is
+      an outrage to all decorum that an innkeeper&rsquo;s son should be enabled to
+      make a solitude of the palaces of Rome.&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;It certainly seems to indicate too vulgar a desire of mob favour,&rdquo; said
+      Montreal. &ldquo;However, I trust we shall harmonize all these differences.
+      Rienzi, perhaps,&mdash;nay, doubtless, means well!&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;I would,&rdquo; said Vivaldi, who had received his cue, &ldquo;that we might form a
+      mixed constitution&mdash;Plebeians and Patricians, each in their separate
+      order.&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;But,&rdquo; said Montreal, gravely, &ldquo;so new an experiment would demand great
+      physical force.&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;Why, true; but we might call in an umpire&mdash;a foreigner who had no
+      interest in either faction&mdash;who might protect the new Buono Stato; a
+      Podesta, as we have done before&mdash;Brancaleone, for instance. How well
+      and wisely he ruled! that was a golden age for Rome. A Podesta for ever!&mdash;that&rsquo;s
+      my theory.&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;You need not seek far for the president of your council,&rdquo; said Montreal,
+      smiling at Pandulfo; &ldquo;a citizen at once popular, well-born, and wealthy,
+      may be found at my right hand.&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      Pandulfo hemmed, and coloured.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      Montreal proceeded. &ldquo;A committee of trades might furnish an honourable
+      employment to Signor Vivaldi; and the treatment of all foreign affairs&mdash;the
+      employment of armies, &amp;c., might be left to the Barons, with a more
+      open competition, Signor di Bruttini, to the Barons of the second order
+      than has hitherto been conceded to their birth and importance. Sirs, will
+      you taste the Malvoisie?&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;Still,&rdquo; said Vivaldi, after a pause&mdash;(Vivaldi anticipated at least
+      the supplying with cloth the whole of the Grand Company)&mdash;&ldquo;still,
+      such a moderate and well-digested constitution would never be acceded to
+      by Rienzi.&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;Why should it? what need of Rienzi?&rdquo; exclaimed Bruttini. &ldquo;Rienzi may take
+      another trip to Bohemia.&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;Gently, gently,&rdquo; said Montreal; &ldquo;I do not despair. All open violence
+      against the Senator would strengthen his power. No, no, humble him&mdash;admit
+      the Barons, and then insist on your own terms. Between the two factions
+      you might then establish a fitting balance. And in order to keep your new
+      constitution from the encroachment of either extreme, there are warriors
+      and knights, too, who for a certain rank in the great city of Rome would
+      maintain horse and foot at its service. We Ultra-Montanes are often
+      harshly judged; we are wanderers and Ishmaelites, solely because we have
+      no honourable place of rest. Now, if I&mdash;&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;Ay, if you, noble Montreal!&rdquo; said Vivaldi.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      The company remained hushed in breathless attention, when suddenly there
+      was heard&mdash;deep, solemn, muffled,&mdash;the great bell of the
+      Capitol!
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;Hark!&rdquo; said Vivaldi, the bell: &ldquo;It tolls for execution: an unwonted
+      hour!&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;Sure, the Senator has not returned!&rdquo; exclaimed Pandulfo di Guido, turning
+      pale.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;No, no,&rdquo; quoth Bruttini, &ldquo;it is but a robber, caught two nights ago in
+      Romagna. I heard that he was to die tonight.&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      At the word &ldquo;robber,&rdquo; Montreal changed countenance slightly. The wine
+      circulated&mdash;the bell continued to toll&mdash;its suddenness over, it
+      ceased to alarm. Conversation flowed again.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;What were you saying, Sir Knight?&rdquo; said Vivaldi.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;Why, let me think on&rsquo;t;&mdash;oh, speaking of the necessity of supporting
+      a new state by force, I said that if I&mdash;&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;Ah, that was it!&rdquo; quoth Bruttini, thumping the table.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;If I were summoned to your aid&mdash;summoned, mind ye, and absolved by
+      the Pope&rsquo;s Legate of my former sins&mdash;(they weigh heavily on me,
+      gentles)&mdash;I would myself guard your city from foreign foe and civil
+      disturbance, with my gallant swordsmen. Not a Roman citizen should
+      contribute a &lsquo;danaro&rsquo; to the cost.&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;Viva Fra Moreale!&rdquo; cried Bruttini; and the shout was echoed by all the
+      boon companions.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;Enough for me,&rdquo; continued Montreal, &ldquo;to expiate my offences. Ye know,
+      gentlemen, my order is vowed to God and the Church&mdash;a warrior-monk am
+      I! Enough for me to expiate my offences, I say, in the defence of the Holy
+      City. Yet I, too, have my private and more earthly views,&mdash;who is
+      above them? I&mdash;the bell changes its note!&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;It is but the change that preludes execution&mdash;the poor robber is
+      about to die!&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      Montreal crossed himself, and resumed:&mdash;&ldquo;I am a knight and a noble,&rdquo;
+       said he, proudly; &ldquo;the profession I have followed is that of arms; but&mdash;I
+      will not disguise it&mdash;mine equals have regarded me as one who has
+      stained his scutcheon by too reckless a pursuit of glory and of gain. I
+      wish to reconcile myself with my order&mdash;to purchase a new name&mdash;to
+      vindicate myself to the Grand Master and the Pontiff. I have had hints,
+      gentles,&mdash;hints, that I might best promote my interest by restoring
+      order to the Papal metropolis. The Legate Albornoz (here is his letter)
+      recommends me to keep watch upon the Senator.&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;Surely,&rdquo; interrupted Pandulfo, &ldquo;I hear steps below.&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;The mob going to the robber&rsquo;s execution,&rdquo; said Bruttini; &ldquo;proceed, Sir
+      Knight!&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;And,&rdquo; continued Montreal, surveying his audience before he proceeded
+      farther, &ldquo;what think ye&mdash;(I do but ask your opinion, wiser than mine)&mdash;what
+      think ye, as a fitting precaution against too arbitrary a power in the
+      Senator&mdash;what think ye of the return of the Colonna, and the bold
+      Barons of Palestrina?&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;Here&rsquo;s to their health!&rdquo; cried Vivaldi, rising.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      As by a sudden impulse, the company rose. &ldquo;To the health of the besieged
+      Barons!&rdquo; was shouted aloud.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;Next, what if&mdash;(I do but humbly suggest)&mdash;what if you gave the
+      Senator a colleague?&mdash;it is no affront to him. It was but as
+      yesterday that one of the Colonna, who was Senator, received a colleague
+      in Bertoldo Orsini.&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;A most wise precaution,&rdquo; cried Vivaldi. &ldquo;And where a colleague like
+      Pandulfo di Guido?&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;Viva Pandulfo di Guido!&rdquo; cried the guests, and again their goblets were
+      drained to the bottom.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;And if in this I can assist ye by fair words with the Senator, (ye know
+      he owes me monies&mdash;my brothers have served him), command Walter de
+      Montreal.&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;And if fair words fail?&rdquo; said Vivaldi.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;The Grand Company&mdash;(heed me, ye are the counsellors)&mdash;the Grand
+      Company is accustomed to forced marches!&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;Viva Fra Moreale!&rdquo; cried Bruttini and Vivaldi, simultaneously. &ldquo;A health
+      to all, my friends;&rdquo; continued Bruttini; &ldquo;a health to the Barons, Rome&rsquo;s
+      old friends; to Pandulfo di Guido, the Senator&rsquo;s new colleague, and to Fra
+      Moreale, Rome&rsquo;s new Podesta.&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;The bell has ceased,&rdquo; said Vivaldi, putting down his goblet.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;Heaven have mercy on the robber!&rdquo; added Bruttini.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      Scarce had he spoken, ere three taps were heard at the door&mdash;the
+      guests looked at each other in dumb amaze.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;New guests!&rdquo; said Montreal. &ldquo;I asked some trusty friends to join us this
+      evening. By my faith they are welcome! Enter!&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      The door opened slowly; three by three entered, in complete armour, the
+      guards of the Senator. On they marched, regular and speechless. They
+      surrounded the festive board&mdash;they filled the spacious hall, and the
+      lights of the banquet were reflected upon their corselets as on a wall of
+      steel.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      Not a syllable was uttered by the feasters, they were as if turned to
+      stone. Presently the guards gave way, and Rienzi himself appeared. He
+      approached the table, and folding his arms, turned his gaze deliberately
+      from guest to guest, till at last, his eyes rested on Montreal, who had
+      also risen, and who alone of the party had recovered the amaze of the
+      moment.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      And there, as these two men, each so celebrated, so proud, able, and
+      ambitious, stood, front to front&mdash;it was literally as if the rival
+      Spirits of Force and Intellect, Order and Strife, of the Falchion and the
+      Fasces&mdash;the Antagonist Principles by which empires are ruled and
+      empires overthrown, had met together, incarnate and opposed. They stood,
+      both silent,&mdash;as if fascinated by each other&rsquo;s gaze,&mdash;loftier in
+      stature, and nobler in presence than all around.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      Montreal spoke first, and with a forced smile.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;Senator of Rome!&mdash;dare I believe that my poor banquet tempts thee,
+      and may I trust that these armed men are a graceful compliment to one to
+      whom arms have been a pastime?&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      Rienzi answered not, but waved his hand to his guards. Montreal was seized
+      on the instant. Again he surveyed the guests&mdash;as a bird from the
+      rattle-snake,&mdash;shrunk Pandulfo di Guido, trembling, motionless,
+      aghast, from the glittering eye of the Senator. Slowly Rienzi raised his
+      fatal hand towards the unhappy citizen&mdash;Pandulfo saw,&mdash;felt his
+      doom,&mdash;shrieked,&mdash;and fell senseless in the arms of the
+      soldiers.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      One other and rapid glance cast the Senator round the board, and then,
+      with a disdainful smile, as if anxious for no meaner prey, turned away.
+      Not a breath had hitherto passed his lips&mdash;all had been dumb show&mdash;and
+      his grim silence had imparted a more freezing terror to his unguessed-for
+      apparition. Only, when he reached the door, he turned back, gazed upon the
+      Knight of St. John&rsquo;s bold and undaunted face, and said, almost in a
+      whisper, &ldquo;Walter de Montreal!&mdash;you heard the death-knell!&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      <a name="link2HCH0064" id="link2HCH0064">
+      <!--  H2 anchor --> </a>
+    </p>
+    <div style="height: 4em;">
+      <br /><br /><br /><br />
+    </div>
+    <h2>
+      Chapter 10.IV. The Sentence of Walter de Montreal.
+    </h2>
+    <p>
+      In silence the Captain of the Grand Company was borne to the prison of the
+      Capitol. In the same building lodged the rivals for the government of
+      Rome; the one occupied the prison, the other the palace. The guards
+      forebore the ceremony of fetters, and leaving a lamp on the table,
+      Montreal perceived he was not alone,&mdash;his brothers had preceded him.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;Ye are happily met,&rdquo; said the Knight of St. John; &ldquo;we have passed
+      together pleasanter nights than this is likely to be.&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;Can you jest, Walter?&rdquo; said Arimbaldo, half-weeping. &ldquo;Know you not that
+      our doom is fixed? Death scowls upon us.&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;Death!&rdquo; repeated Montreal, and for the first time his countenance
+      changed; perhaps for the first time in his life he felt the thrill and
+      agony of fear.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;Death!&rdquo; he repeated again. &ldquo;Impossible! He dare not, Brettone; the
+      soldiers, the Northmen!&mdash;they will mutiny, they will pluck us back
+      from the grasp of the headsman!&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;Cast from you so vain a hope,&rdquo; said Brettone sullenly; &ldquo;the soldiers are
+      encamped at Palestrina.&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;How! Dolt&mdash;fool! Came you then to Rome alone! Are we alone with this
+      dread man?&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;You are the dolt! Why came you hither?&rdquo; answered the brother.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;Why, indeed! but that I knew thou wast the Captain of the army; and&mdash;but
+      thou said&rsquo;st right&mdash;the folly is mine, to have played against the
+      crafty Tribune so unequal a brain as thine. Enough! Reproaches are idle.
+      When were ye arrested?&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;At dusk&mdash;the instant we entered the gates of Rome. Rienzi entered
+      privately.&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;Humph! What can he know against me? Who can have betrayed me? My
+      secretaries are tried&mdash;all trustworthy&mdash;except that youth, and
+      he so seemingly zealous&mdash;that Angelo Villani!&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;Villani! Angelo Villani!&rdquo; cried the brothers in a breath. &ldquo;Hast thou
+      confided aught to him?&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;Why, I fear he must have seen&mdash;at least in part&mdash;my
+      correspondence with you, and with the Barons&mdash;he was among my
+      scribes. Know you aught of him?&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;Walter, Heaven hath demented you!&rdquo; returned Brettone. &ldquo;Angelo Villani is
+      the favourite menial of the Senator.&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;Those eyes deceived me, then,&rdquo; muttered Montreal, solemnly and
+      shuddering; &ldquo;and, as if her ghost had returned to earth, God smites me
+      from the grave!&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      There was a long silence. At length Montreal, whose bold and sanguine
+      temper was never long clouded, spoke again.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;Are the Senator&rsquo;s coffers full?&mdash;But that is impossible.&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;Bare as a Dominican&rsquo;s.&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;We are saved, then. He shall name his price for our heads. Money must be
+      more useful to him than blood.&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      And as if with that thought all further meditation were rendered
+      unnecessary, Montreal doffed his mantle, uttered a short prayer, and flung
+      himself on a pallet in a corner of the cell.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;I have slept on worse beds,&rdquo; said the Knight, stretching himself; and in
+      a few minutes he was fast asleep.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      The brothers listened to his deep-drawn, but regular breathing, with envy
+      and wonder, but they were in no mood to converse. Still and speechless,
+      they sate like statues beside the sleeper. Time passed on, and the first
+      cold air of the hour that succeeds to midnight crept through the bars of
+      their cell. The bolts crashed, the door opened, six men-at-arms entered,
+      passed the brothers, and one of them touched Montreal.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;Ha!&rdquo; said he, still sleeping, but turning round. &ldquo;Ha!&rdquo; said he, in the
+      soft Provencal tongue, &ldquo;sweet Adeline, we will not rise yet&mdash;it is so
+      long since we met!&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;What says he?&rdquo; muttered the guard, shaking Montreal roughly. The Knight
+      sprang up at once, and his hand grasped the head of his bed as for his
+      sword. He stared round bewildered, rubbed his eyes, and then gazing on the
+      guard, became alive to the present.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;Ye are early risers in the Capitol,&rdquo; said he. &ldquo;What want ye of me?&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;It waits you!&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;It! What?&rdquo; said Montreal.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;The rack!&rdquo; replied the soldier, with a malignant scowl.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      The Great Captain said not a word. He looked for one moment at the six
+      swordsmen, as if measuring his single strength against theirs. His eye
+      then wandered round the room. The rudest bar of iron would have been
+      dearer to him than he had ever yet found the proofest steel of Milan. He
+      completed his survey with a sigh, threw his mantle over his shoulders,
+      nodded at his brethren, and followed the guard.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      In a hall of the Capitol, hung with the ominous silk of white rays on a
+      blood-red ground, sate Rienzi and his councillors. Across a recess was
+      drawn a black curtain.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;Walter de Montreal,&rdquo; said a small man at the foot of the table, &ldquo;Knight
+      of the illustrious order of St. John of Jerusalem&mdash;&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;And Captain of the Grand Company!&rdquo; added the prisoner, in a firm voice.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;You stand accused of divers counts: robbery and murder, in Tuscany,
+      Romagna, and Apulia&mdash;&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;For robbery and murder, brave men, and belted Knights,&rdquo; said Montreal,
+      drawing himself up, &ldquo;would use the words &lsquo;war and victory.&rsquo; To those
+      charges I plead guilty! Proceed.&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;You are next accused of treasonable conspiracy against the liberties of
+      Rome for the restoration of the proscribed Barons&mdash;and of traitorous
+      correspondence with Stefanello Colonna at Palestrina.&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;My accuser?&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;Step forth, Angelo Villani!&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;You are my betrayer, then?&rdquo; said Montreal steadily. &ldquo;I deserved this. I
+      beseech you, Senator of Rome, let this young man retire. I confess my
+      correspondence with the Colonna, and my desire to restore the Barons.&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      Rienzi motioned to Villani, who bowed and withdrew.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;There rests only then for you, Walter de Montreal, to relate, fully and
+      faithfully, the details of your conspiracy.&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;That is impossible,&rdquo; replied Montreal, carelessly.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;And why?&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;Because, doing as I please with my own life, I will not betray the lives
+      of others.&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;Bethink thee&mdash;thou wouldst have betrayed the life of thy judge!&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;Not betrayed&mdash;thou didst not trust me.&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;The law, Walter de Montreal, hath sharp inquisitors&mdash;behold!&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      The black curtain was drawn aside, and the eye of Montreal rested on the
+      executioner and the rack! His proud breast heaved indignantly.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;Senator of Rome,&rdquo; said he, &ldquo;these instruments are for serfs and villeins.
+      I have been a warrior and a leader; life and death have been in my hands&mdash;I
+      have used them as I listed; but to mine equal and my foe, I never
+      proffered the insult of the rack.&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;Sir Walter de Montreal,&rdquo; returned the Senator, gravely, but with some
+      courteous respect, &ldquo;your answer is that which rises naturally to the lips
+      of brave men. But learn from me, whom fortune hath made thy judge, that no
+      more for serf and villein, than for knight and noble, are such instruments
+      the engines of law, or the tests of truth. I yielded but to the desire of
+      these reverend councillors, to test thy nerves. But, wert thou the meanest
+      peasant of the Campagna, before my judgment-seat thou needst not apprehend
+      the torture. Walter de Montreal, amongst the Princes of Italy thou hast
+      known, amongst the Roman Barons thou wouldst have aided, is there one who
+      could make that boast?&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;I desired only,&rdquo; said Montreal, with some hesitation, &ldquo;to unite the
+      Barons with thee; nor did I intrigue against thy life!&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      Rienzi frowned&mdash;&ldquo;Enough,&rdquo; he said, hastily. &ldquo;Knight of St. John, I
+      know thy secret projects, subterfuge and evasion neither befit nor avail
+      thee. If thou didst not intrigue against my life, thou didst intrigue
+      against the life of Rome. Thou hast but one favour left to demand on
+      earth, it is the manner of thy death.&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      Montreal&rsquo;s lip worked convulsively.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;Senator,&rdquo; said he, in a low voice, &ldquo;may I crave audience with thee alone
+      for one minute?&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      The councillors looked up.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;My Lord,&rdquo; whispered the eldest of them, &ldquo;doubtless he hath concealed
+      weapons&mdash;trust him not.&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;Prisoner,&rdquo; returned Rienzi, after a moment&rsquo;s pause; &ldquo;if thou seekest for
+      mercy thy request is idle, and before my coadjutors I have no secret;
+      speak out what thou hast to say!&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;Yet listen to me,&rdquo; said the prisoner, folding his arms; &ldquo;it concerns not
+      my life, but Rome&rsquo;s welfare.&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;Then,&rdquo; said Rienzi, in an altered tone, &ldquo;thy request is granted. Thou
+      mayst add to thy guilt the design of the assassin, but for Rome I would
+      dare greater danger.&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      So saying, he motioned to the councillors, who slowly withdrew by the door
+      which had admitted Villani, while the guards retired to the farthest
+      extremity of the hall.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;Now, Walter de Montreal, be brief, for thy time is short.&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;Senator,&rdquo; said Montreal, &ldquo;my life can but little profit you; men will say
+      that you destroyed your creditor in order to cancel your debt. Fix a sum
+      upon my life, estimate it at the price of a monarch&rsquo;s; every florin shall
+      be paid to you, and your treasury will be filled for five years to come.
+      If the &lsquo;Buono Stato&rsquo; depends on your government, what I have asked, your
+      solicitude for Rome will not permit you to refuse.&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;You mistake me, bold robber,&rdquo; said Rienzi, sternly; &ldquo;your treason I could
+      guard against, and therefore forgive; your ambition, never! Mark me, I
+      know you! Place your hand on your heart and say whether, could we change
+      places, you, as Rienzi, would suffer all the gold of earth to purchase the
+      life of Walter de Montreal? For men&rsquo;s reading of my conduct, that must I
+      bear; for mine own reading, mine eyes must be purged from corruption. I am
+      answerable to God for the trust of Rome. And Rome trembles while the head
+      of the Grand Company lives in the plotting brain and the daring heart of
+      Walter de Montreal. Man&mdash;wealthy, great, and subtle as you are, your
+      hours are numbered; with the rise of the sun you die!&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      Montreal&rsquo;s eyes, fixed upon the Senator&rsquo;s face, saw hope was over; his
+      pride and his fortitude returned to him.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;We have wasted words,&rdquo; said he. &ldquo;I played for a great stake, I have lost,
+      and must pay the forfeit! I am prepared. On the threshold of the Unknown
+      World, the dark spirit of prophecy rushes into us. Lord Senator, I go
+      before thee to announce&mdash;that in Heaven or in Hell&mdash;ere many
+      days be over, room must be given to one mightier than I am!&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      As he spoke, his form dilated, his eye glared; and Rienzi, cowering as
+      never had he cowered before, shrunk back, and shaded his face with his
+      hand.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;The manner of your death?&rdquo; he asked, in a hollow voice.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;The axe: it is that which befits knight and warrior. For thee, Senator,
+      Fate hath a less noble death.&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;Robber be dumb!&rdquo; cried Rienzi, passionately; &ldquo;Guards, bear back the
+      prisoner. At sunrise, Montreal&mdash;&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;Sets the sun of the scourge of Italy,&rdquo; said the Knight, bitterly. &ldquo;Be it
+      so. One request more; the Knights of St. John claim affinity with the
+      Augustine order; grant me an Augustine confessor.&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;It is granted; and in return for thy denunciations, I, who can give thee
+      no earthly mercy, will implore the Judge of all for pardon to thy soul!&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;Senator, I have done with man&rsquo;s mediation. My brethren? Their deaths are
+      not necessary to thy safety or thy revenge!&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      Rienzi mused a moment: &ldquo;No,&rdquo; said he, &ldquo;dangerous tools they were, but
+      without the workman they may rust unharming. They served me once, too.
+      Prisoner, their lives are spared.&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      <a name="link2HCH0065" id="link2HCH0065">
+      <!--  H2 anchor --> </a>
+    </p>
+    <div style="height: 4em;">
+      <br /><br /><br /><br />
+    </div>
+    <h2>
+      Chapter 10.V. The Discovery.
+    </h2>
+    <p>
+      The Council was broken up&mdash;Rienzi hastened to his own apartments.
+      Meeting Villani by the way, he pressed the youth&rsquo;s hand affectionately.
+      &ldquo;You have saved Rome and me from great peril,&rdquo; said he; &ldquo;the saints reward
+      you!&rdquo; Without tarrying for Villani&rsquo;s answer, he hurried on. Nina, anxious
+      and perturbed, awaited him in their chamber.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;Not a-bed yet?&rdquo; said he: &ldquo;fie, Nina, even thy beauty will not stand these
+      vigils.&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;I could not rest till I had seen thee. I hear (all Rome has heard it ere
+      this) that thou hast seized Walter de Montreal, and that he will perish by
+      the headsman.&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;The first robber that ever died so brave a death,&rdquo; returned Rienzi,
+      slowly unrobing himself.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;Cola, I have never crossed your schemes,&mdash;your policy, even by a
+      suggestion. Enough for me to triumph in their success, to mourn for their
+      failure. Now, I ask thee one request&mdash;spare me the life of this man.&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;Nina&mdash;&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;Hear me,&mdash;for thee I speak! Despite his crimes, his valour and his
+      genius have gained him admirers, even amongst his foes. Many a prince,
+      many a state that secretly rejoices at his fall, will affect horror
+      against his judge. Hear me farther. His brothers aided your return; the
+      world will term you ungrateful. His brothers lent you monies, the world&mdash;(out
+      on it!)&mdash;will term you&mdash;&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;Hold!&rdquo; interrupted the Senator. &ldquo;All that thou sayest, my mind
+      forestalled. But thou knowest me&mdash;to thee I have no disguise. No
+      compact can bind Montreal&rsquo;s faith&mdash;no mercy win his gratitude. Before
+      his red right hand truth and justice are swept away. If I condemn Montreal
+      I incur disgrace and risk danger&mdash;granted. If I release him, ere the
+      first showers of April, the chargers of the Northmen will neigh in the
+      halls of the Capitol. Which shall I hazard in this alternative, myself or
+      Rome? Ask me no more&mdash;to bed, to bed!&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;Couldst thou read my forebodings, Cola, mystic&mdash;gloomy&mdash;unaccountable?&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;Forebodings!&mdash;I have mine,&rdquo; answered Rienzi, sadly, gazing on space,
+      as if his thoughts peopled it with spectres. Then, raising his eyes to
+      Heaven, he said with that fanatical energy which made much both of his
+      strength and weakness&mdash;&ldquo;Lord, mine at least not the sin of Saul! the
+      Amalekite shall not be saved!&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      While Rienzi enjoyed a short, troubled, and restless sleep, over which
+      Nina watched&mdash;unslumbering, anxious, tearful, and oppressed with dark
+      and terrible forewarnings&mdash;the accuser was more happy than the judge.
+      The last thoughts that floated before the young mind of Angelo Villani,
+      ere wrapped in sleep, were bright and sanguine. He felt no honourable
+      remorse that he had entrapped the confidence of another&mdash;he felt only
+      that his scheme had prospered, that his mission had been fulfilled. The
+      grateful words of Rienzi rang in his ear, and hopes of fortune and power,
+      beneath the sway of the Roman Senator, lulled him into slumber, and
+      coloured all his dreams.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      Scarce, however, had he been two hours asleep, ere he was wakened by one
+      of the attendants of the palace, himself half awake. &ldquo;Pardon me, Messere
+      Villani,&rdquo; said he, &ldquo;but there is a messenger below from the good Sister
+      Ursula; he bids thee haste instantly to the Convent&mdash;she is sick unto
+      death, and has tidings that crave thy immediate presence.&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      Angelo, whose morbid susceptibility as to his parentage was ever excited
+      by vague but ambitious hopes&mdash;started up, dressed hurriedly, and
+      joining the messenger below, repaired to the Convent. In the Court of the
+      Capitol, and by the Staircase of the Lion, was already heard the noise of
+      the workmen, and looking back, Villani beheld the scaffold, hung with
+      black&mdash;sleeping cloudlike in the grey light of dawn&mdash;at the same
+      time, the bell of the Capitol tolled heavily. A pang shot athwart him. He
+      hurried on;&mdash;despite the immature earliness of the hour, he met
+      groups of either sex, hastening along the streets to witness the execution
+      of the redoubted Captain of the Grand Company. The Convent of the
+      Augustines was at the farthest extremity of that city, even then so
+      extensive, and the red light upon the hilltops already heralded the rising
+      sun, ere the young man reached the venerable porch. His name obtained him
+      instant admittance.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;Heaven grant,&rdquo; said an old Nun, who conducted him through a long and
+      winding passage, &ldquo;that thou mayst bring comfort to the sick sister: she
+      has pined for thee grievously since matins.&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      In a cell set apart for the reception of visitors (from the outward
+      world), to such of the Sisterhood as received the necessary dispensation,
+      sate the aged Nun. Angelo had only seen her once since his return to Rome,
+      and since then disease had made rapid havoc on her form and features. And
+      now, in her shroudlike garments and attenuated frame, she seemed by the
+      morning light as a spectre whom day had surprised above the earth. She
+      approached the youth, however, with a motion more elastic and rapid than
+      seemed possible to her worn and ghastly form. &ldquo;Thou art come,&rdquo; she said.
+      &ldquo;Well, well! This morning after matins, my confessor, an Augustine, who
+      alone knows the secrets of my life, took me aside, and told me that Walter
+      de Montreal had been seized by the Senator&mdash;that he was adjudged to
+      die, and that one of the Augustine brotherhood had been sent for to attend
+      his last hours&mdash;is it so?&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;Thou wert told aright,&rdquo; said Angelo, wonderingly. &ldquo;The man at whose name
+      thou wert wont to shudder&mdash;against whom thou hast so often warned me&mdash;will
+      die at sunrise.&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;So soon!&mdash;so soon!&mdash;Oh, Mother of Mercy!&mdash;fly! thou art
+      about the person of the Senator, thou hast high favour with him; fly! down
+      on thy knees, and as thou hopest for God&rsquo;s grace, rise not till thou hast
+      won the Provencal&rsquo;s life.&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;She raves,&rdquo; muttered Angelo, with white lips.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;I do not rave,&mdash;boy!&rdquo; screeched the Sister, wildly, &ldquo;know that my
+      daughter was his leman. He disgraced our house,&mdash;a house haughtier
+      than his own. Sinner that I was, I vowed revenge. His boy&mdash;they had
+      only one!&mdash;was brought up in a robber&rsquo;s camp;&mdash;a life of
+      bloodshed&mdash;a death of doom&mdash;a futurity of hell&mdash;were before
+      him. I plucked the child from such a fate&mdash;I bore him away&mdash;I
+      told the father he was dead&mdash;I placed him in the path to honourable
+      fortunes. May my sin be forgiven me! Angelo Villani, thou art that child;&mdash;Walter
+      de Montreal is thy father. But now, trembling on the verge of death, I
+      shudder at the vindictive thoughts I once nourished. Perhaps&mdash;&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;Sinner and accursed!&rdquo; interrupted Villani, with a loud shout:&mdash;&ldquo;sinner
+      and accursed thou art indeed! Know that it was I who betrayed thy
+      daughter&rsquo;s lover!&mdash;by the son&rsquo;s treason dies the father!&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      Not a moment more did he tarry: he waited not to witness the effect his
+      words produced. As one frantic&mdash;as one whom a fiend possesses or
+      pursues&mdash;he rushed from the Convent&mdash;he flew through the
+      desolate streets. The death-bell came, first indistinct, then loud, upon
+      his ear. Every sound seemed to him like the curse of God; on&mdash;on&mdash;he
+      passed the more deserted quarter&mdash;crowds swept before him&mdash;he
+      was mingled with the living stream, delayed, pushed back&mdash;thousands
+      on thousands around, before him. Breathless, gasping, he still pressed on&mdash;he
+      forced his way&mdash;he heard not&mdash;he saw not&mdash;all was like a
+      dream. Up burst the sun over the distant hills!&mdash;the bell ceased!
+      From right to left he pushed aside the crowd&mdash;his strength was as a
+      giant&rsquo;s. He neared the fatal spot. A dead hush lay like a heavy air over
+      the multitude. He heard a voice, as he pressed along, deep and clear&mdash;it
+      was the voice of his father!&mdash;it ceased&mdash;the audience breathed
+      heavily&mdash;they murmured&mdash;they swayed to and fro. On, on, went
+      Angelo Villani. The guards of the Senator stopped his way;&mdash;he dashed
+      aside their pikes&mdash;he eluded their grasp&mdash;he pierced the armed
+      barrier&mdash;he stood on the Place of the Capitol. &ldquo;Hold, hold!&rdquo; he would
+      have cried&mdash;but horror struck him dumb. He beheld the gleaming axe&mdash;he
+      saw the bended neck. Ere another breath passed his lips, a ghastly and
+      trunkless face was raised on high&mdash;Walter de Montreal was no more!
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      Villani saw&mdash;swooned not&mdash;shrunk not&mdash;breathed not!&mdash;but
+      he turned his eyes from that lifted head, dropping gore, to the balcony,
+      in which, according to custom, sate, in solemn pomp, the Senator of Rome&mdash;and
+      the face of that young man was as the face of a demon!
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;Ha!&rdquo; said he, muttering to himself, and recalling the words of Rienzi
+      seven years before&mdash;&ldquo;Blessed art thou who hast no blood of kindred to
+      avenge!&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      <a name="link2HCH0066" id="link2HCH0066">
+      <!--  H2 anchor --> </a>
+    </p>
+    <div style="height: 4em;">
+      <br /><br /><br /><br />
+    </div>
+    <h2>
+      Chapter 10.VI. The Suspense.
+    </h2>
+    <p>
+      Walter de Montreal was buried in the church of St. Maria dell&rsquo; Araceli.
+      But the &ldquo;evil that he did lived after him!&rdquo; Although the vulgar had, until
+      his apprehension, murmured against Rienzi for allowing so notorious a
+      freebooter to be at large, he was scarcely dead ere they compassionated
+      the object of their terror. With that singular species of piety which
+      Montreal had always cultivated, as if a decorous and natural part of the
+      character of a warrior, no sooner was his sentence fixed, than he had
+      surrendered himself to the devout preparation for death. With the
+      Augustine Friar he consumed the brief remainder of the night in prayer and
+      confession, comforted his brothers, and passed to the scaffold with the
+      step of a hero and the self-acquittal of a martyr. In the wonderful
+      delusions of the human heart, far from feeling remorse at a life of
+      professional rapine and slaughter, almost the last words of the brave
+      warrior were in proud commendation of his own deeds. &ldquo;Be valiant like me,&rdquo;
+       he said to his brothers, &ldquo;and remember that ye are now the heirs to the
+      Humbler of Apulia, Tuscany, and La Marca.&rdquo;
+     </p>
+<pre xml:space="preserve">
+     (Pregovi che vi amiate e siate valorosi al mondo, come fui
+     io, che mi feci fare obbedienza a la Puglia, Toscana, e a La
+     Marca.&rdquo;&mdash;&ldquo;Vita di Cola di Rienzi&rdquo;, lib. ii. cap. 22. &ldquo;I pray
+     you love one another, and be valorous as was I, who made
+     Apulia, Tuscany and La Marca own obedience to me.&rdquo;&mdash;&ldquo;Life of
+     Cola di Rienzi&rdquo;.)
+</pre>
+    <p>
+      This confidence in himself continued at the scaffold. &ldquo;I die,&rdquo; he said,
+      addressing the Romans&mdash;&ldquo;I die contented, since my bones shall rest in
+      the Holy City of St. Peter and St. Paul, and the Soldier of Christ shall
+      have the burial-place of the Apostles. But I die unjustly. My wealth is my
+      crime&mdash;the poverty of your state my accuser. Senator of Rome, thou
+      mayst envy my last hour&mdash;men like Walter de Montreal perish not
+      unavenged.&rdquo; So saying, he turned to the East, murmured a brief prayer,
+      knelt down deliberately, and said as to himself, &ldquo;Rome guard my ashes!&mdash;Earth
+      my memory&mdash;Fate my revenge;&mdash;and, now, Heaven receive my soul!&mdash;Strike!&rdquo;
+       At the first blow, the head was severed from the body.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      His treason but imperfectly known, the fear of him forgotten, all that
+      remained of the recollection of Walter de Montreal (The military renown
+      and bold exploits of Montreal are acknowledged by all the Italian
+      authorities. One of them declares that since the time of Caesar, Italy had
+      never known so great a Captain. The biographer of Rienzi, forgetting all
+      the offences of the splendid and knightly robber, seems to feel only
+      commiseration for his fate. He informs us, moreover, that at Tivoli one of
+      his servants (perhaps our friend, Rodolf of Saxony), hearing his death,
+      died of grief the following day.) in Rome, was admiration for his heroism,
+      and compassion for his end. The fate of Pandulfo di Guido, which followed
+      some days afterwards, excited a yet deeper, though more quiet, sentiment,
+      against the Senator. &ldquo;He was once Rienzi&rsquo;s friend!&rdquo; said one man; &ldquo;He was
+      an honest, upright citizen!&rdquo; muttered another; &ldquo;He was an advocate of the
+      people!&rdquo; growled Cecco del Vecchio. But the Senator had wound himself up
+      to a resolve to be inflexibly just, and to regard every peril to Rome as
+      became a Roman. Rienzi remembered that he had never confided but he had
+      been betrayed; he had never forgiven but to sharpen enmity. He was amidst
+      a ferocious people, uncertain friends, wily enemies; and misplaced mercy
+      would be but a premium to conspiracy. Yet the struggle he underwent was
+      visible in the hysterical emotions he betrayed. He now wept bitterly, now
+      laughed wildly. &ldquo;Can I never again have the luxury to forgive?&rdquo; said he.
+      The coarse spectators of that passion deemed it,&mdash;some imbecility,
+      some hypocrisy. But the execution produced the momentary effect intended.
+      All sedition ceased, terror crept throughout the city, order and peace
+      rose to the surface; but beneath, in the strong expression of a
+      contemporaneous writer, &ldquo;Lo mormorito quetamente suonava.&rdquo; (&ldquo;The murmur
+      quietly sounded.&rdquo;)
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      On examining dispassionately the conduct of Rienzi at this awful period of
+      his life, it is scarcely possible to condemn it of a single error in point
+      of policy. Cured of his faults, he exhibited no unnecessary ostentation&mdash;he
+      indulged in no exhibitions of intoxicated pride&mdash;that gorgeous
+      imagination rather than vanity, which had led the Tribune into spectacle
+      and pomp, was now lulled to rest, by the sober memory of grave
+      vicissitudes, and the stern calmness of a maturer intellect. Frugal,
+      provident, watchful, self-collected, &lsquo;never was seen,&rsquo; observes no partial
+      witness, &lsquo;so extraordinary a man.&rsquo; (&ldquo;Vita di Cola di Rienzi&rdquo;, lib. ii. c.
+      23.) &lsquo;In him was concentrated every thought for every want of Rome.
+      Indefatigably occupied, he inspected, ordained, regulated all things; in
+      the city, in the army, for peace, or for war. But he was feebly supported,
+      and those he employed were lukewarm and lethargic.&rsquo; Still his arms
+      prospered. Place after place, fortress after fortress, yielded to the
+      Lieutenant of the Senator: and the cession of Palestrina itself was hourly
+      expected. His art and address were always strikingly exhibited in
+      difficult situations, and the reader cannot fail to have noticed how
+      conspicuously they were displayed in delivering himself from the iron
+      tutelage of his foreign mercenaries. Montreal executed, his brothers
+      imprisoned, (though their lives were spared,) a fear that induced respect
+      was stricken into the breasts of those bandit soldiers. Removed from Rome,
+      and, under Annibaldi, engaged against the Barons, constant action and
+      constant success, withheld those necessary fiends from falling on their
+      Master; while Rienzi, willing to yield to the natural antipathy of the
+      Romans, thus kept the Northmen from all contact with the city; and as he
+      boasted, was the only chief in Italy who reigned in his palace guarded
+      only by his citizens.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      Despite his perilous situation&mdash;despite his suspicions, and his
+      fears, no wanton cruelty stained his stern justice&mdash;Montreal and
+      Pandulfo di Guido were the only state victims he demanded. If, according
+      to the dark Machiavelism of Italian wisdom, the death of those enemies was
+      impolitic, it was not in the act, but the mode of doing it. A prince of
+      Bologna, or of Milan would have avoided the sympathy excited by the
+      scaffold, and the drug or the dagger would have been the safer substitute
+      for the axe. But with all his faults, real and imputed, no single act of
+      that foul and murtherous policy, which made the science of the more
+      fortunate princes of Italy, ever advanced the ambition or promoted the
+      security of the Last of the Roman Tribunes. Whatever his errors, he lived
+      and died as became a man, who dreamed the vain but glorious dream, that in
+      a corrupt and dastard populace he could revive the genius of the old
+      Republic.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      Of all who attended on the Senator, the most assiduous and the most
+      honoured was still Angelo Villani. Promoted to a high civil station,
+      Rienzi felt it as a return of youth, to find one person entitled to his
+      gratitude;&mdash;he loved and confided in the youth as a son. Villani was
+      never absent from his side, except in intercourse with the various popular
+      leaders in the various quarters of the city; and in this intercourse his
+      zeal was indefatigable&mdash;it seemed even to prey upon his health; and
+      Rienzi chid him fondly, whenever starting from his own reveries, he beheld
+      the abstracted eye and the livid paleness which had succeeded the sparkle
+      and bloom of youth.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      Such chiding the young man answered only by the same unvarying words.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;Senator, I have a great trust to fulfil;&rdquo;&mdash;and at these words he
+      smiled.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      One day Villani, while with the Senator, said rather abruptly, &ldquo;Do you
+      remember, my Lord, that before Viterbo, I acquitted myself so in arms,
+      that even the Cardinal d&rsquo;Albornoz was pleased to notice me?&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;I remember your valour well, Angelo; but why the question?&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;My Lord, Bellini, the Captain of the Guard of the Capitol is dangerously
+      ill.&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;I know it.&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;Whom can my Lord trust at the post?&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;Why, the Lieutenant.&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;What!&mdash;a soldier that has served under the Orsini!&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;True. Well! There is Tommaso Filangieri.&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;An excellent man; but is he not kin by blood to Pandulfo di Guido?&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;Ay&mdash;is he so? It must be thought of. Hast thou any friend to name?&rdquo;
+       said the Senator, smiling, &ldquo;Methinks thy cavils point that way.&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;My Lord,&rdquo; replied Villani, colouring; &ldquo;I am too young perhaps; but the
+      post is one that demands fidelity more than it does years. Shall I own it?&mdash;My
+      tastes are rather to serve thee with my sword than with my pen.&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;Wilt thou, indeed, accept the office? It is of less dignity and emolument
+      than the one you hold; and you are full young to lead these stubborn
+      spirits.&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;Senator, I led taller men than they are to the assault at Viterbo. But,
+      be it as seems best to your superior wisdom. Whatever you do, I pray you
+      to be cautious. If you select a traitor to the command of the Capitol
+      Guard!&mdash;I tremble at the thought!&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;By my faith, thou dost turn pale at it, dear boy; thy affection is a
+      sweet drop in a bitter draught. Whom can I choose better than thee?&mdash;thou
+      shalt have the post, at least during Bellini&rsquo;s illness. I will attend to
+      it today. The business, too, will less fatigue thy young mind than that
+      which now employs thee. Thou art over-laboured in our cause.&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;Senator, I can but repeat my usual answer&mdash;I have a great trust to
+      fulfil!&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      <a name="link2HCH0067" id="link2HCH0067">
+      <!--  H2 anchor --> </a>
+    </p>
+    <div style="height: 4em;">
+      <br /><br /><br /><br />
+    </div>
+    <h2>
+      Chapter 10.VII. The Tax.
+    </h2>
+    <p>
+      These formidable conspiracies quelled, the Barons nearly subdued, and
+      three parts of the Papal territory reunited to Rome, Rienzi now deemed he
+      might safely execute one of his favourite projects for the preservation of
+      the liberties of his native city; and this was to raise and organize in
+      each quarter of Rome a Roman Legion. Armed in the defence of their own
+      institutions, he thus trusted to establish amongst her own citizens the
+      only soldiery requisite for Rome.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      But so base were the tools with which this great man was condemned to work
+      out his noble schemes, that none could be found to serve their own
+      country, without a pay equal to that demanded by foreign hirelings. With
+      the insolence so peculiar to a race that has once been great, each Roman
+      said, &ldquo;Am I not better than a German?&mdash;Pay me, then, accordingly.&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      The Senator smothered his disgust&mdash;he had learned at last to know
+      that the age of the Catos was no more. From a daring enthusiast,
+      experience had converted him into a practical statesman. The Legions were
+      necessary to Rome&mdash;they were formed&mdash;gallant their appearance
+      and faultless their caparisons. How were they to be paid? There was but
+      one means to maintain Rome&mdash;Rome must be taxed. A gabelle was put
+      upon wine and salt.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      The Proclamation ran thus:&mdash;
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;Romans! raised to the rank of your Senator, my whole thought has been for
+      your liberties and welfare; already treason defeated in the City, our
+      banners triumphant without, attest the favour with which the Deity regards
+      men who seek to unite liberty with law. Let us set an example to Italy and
+      the World! Let us prove that the Roman sword can guard the Roman Forum! In
+      each Rione of the City is provided a Legion of the Citizens, collected
+      from the traders and artisans of the town; they allege that they cannot
+      leave their callings without remuneration. Your senator calls upon you
+      willingly to assist in your own defence. He has given you liberty; he has
+      restored to you peace: your oppressors are scattered over the earth. He
+      asks you now to preserve the treasures you have gained. To be free, you
+      must sacrifice something; for freedom, what sacrifice too great? Confident
+      of your support, I at length, for the first time, exert the right
+      entrusted to me by office&mdash;and for Rome&rsquo;s salvation I tax the
+      Romans!&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      Then followed the announcement of the gabelle.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      The Proclamation was set up in the public thoroughfares. Round one of the
+      placards a crowd assembled. Their gestures were vehement and unguarded&mdash;their
+      eyes sparkled&mdash;they conversed low, but eagerly.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;He dares to tax us, then! Why, the Barons or the Pope could not do more
+      than that!&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;Shame! shame!&rdquo; cried a gaunt female; &ldquo;we, who were his friends! How are
+      our little ones to get bread?&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;He should have seized the Pope&rsquo;s money!&rdquo; quoth an honest wine-vender.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;Ah! Pandulfo di Guido would have maintained an army at his own cost. He
+      was a rich man. What insolence in the innkeeper&rsquo;s son to be a Senator!&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;We are not Romans if we suffer this!&rdquo; said a deserter from Palestrina.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;Fellow-citizens!&rdquo; exclaimed gruffly a tall man, who had hitherto been
+      making a clerk read to him the particulars of the tax imposed, and whose
+      heavy brain at length understood that wine was to be made dearer&mdash;&ldquo;Fellow-citizens,
+      we must have a new revolution! This is indeed gratitude! What have we
+      benefited by restoring this man! Are we always to be ground to the dust?
+      To pay&mdash;pay&mdash;pay! Is that all we are fit for?&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;Hark to Cecco del Vecchio!&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;No, no; not now,&rdquo; growled the smith. &ldquo;Tonight the artificers have a
+      special meeting. We&rsquo;ll see&mdash;we&rsquo;ll see!&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      A young man, muffled in a cloak, who had not been before observed, touched
+      the smith.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;Whoever storms the Capitol the day after tomorrow at the dawn,&rdquo; he
+      whispered, &ldquo;shall find the guards absent!&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      He was gone before the smith could look round.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      The same night Rienzi, retiring to rest, said to Angelo Villani&mdash;&ldquo;A
+      bold but necessary measure this of mine! How do the people take it?&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;They murmur a little, but seem to recognise the necessity. Cecco del
+      Vecchio was the loudest grumbler, but is now the loudest approver.&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;The man is rough; he once deserted me;&mdash;but then that fatal
+      excommunication! He and the Romans learned a bitter lesson in that
+      desertion, and experience has, I trust, taught them to be honest. Well, if
+      this tax be raised quietly, in two years Rome will be again the Queen of
+      Italy;&mdash;her army manned&mdash;her Republic formed; and then&mdash;then&mdash;&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;Then what, Senator?&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;Why then, my Angelo, Cola di Rienzi may die in peace! There is a want
+      which a profound experience of power and pomp brings at last to us&mdash;a
+      want gnawing as that of hunger, wearing as that of sleep!&mdash;my Angelo,
+      it is the want to die!&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;My Lord, I would give this right hand,&rdquo; cried Villani, earnestly, &ldquo;to
+      hear you say you were attached to life!&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;You are a good youth, Angelo!&rdquo; said Rienzi, as he passed to Nina&rsquo;s
+      chamber; and in her smile and wistful tenderness, forgot for a while&mdash;that
+      he was a great man!
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      <a name="link2HCH0068" id="link2HCH0068">
+      <!--  H2 anchor --> </a>
+    </p>
+    <div style="height: 4em;">
+      <br /><br /><br /><br />
+    </div>
+    <h2>
+      Chapter 10.VIII. The Threshold of the Event.
+    </h2>
+    <p>
+      The next morning the Senator of Rome held high Court in the Capitol. From
+      Florence, from Padua, from Pisa, even from Milan, (the dominion of the
+      Visconti,) from Genoa, from Naples,&mdash;came Ambassadors to welcome his
+      return, or to thank him for having freed Italy from the freebooter De
+      Montreal. Venice alone, who held in her pay the Grand Company, stood
+      aloof. Never had Rienzi seemed more prosperous and more powerful, and
+      never had he exhibited a more easy and cheerful majesty of demeanour.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      Scarce was the audience over, when a messenger arrived from Palestrina.
+      The town had surrendered, the Colonna had departed, and the standard of
+      the Senator waved from the walls of the last hold of the rebellious
+      Barons. Rome might now at length consider herself free, and not a foe
+      seemed left to menace the repose of Rienzi.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      The Court dissolved. The Senator, elated and joyous, repaired towards his
+      private apartments, previous to the banquet given to the Ambassadors.
+      Villani met him with his wonted sombre aspect.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;No sadness today, my Angelo,&rdquo; said the Senator, gaily; &ldquo;Palestrina is
+      ours!&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;I am glad to hear such news, and to see my Lord of so fair a mien,&rdquo;
+       answered Angelo. &ldquo;Does he not now desire life?&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;Till Roman virtue revives, perhaps&mdash;yes! But thus are we fools of
+      Fortune;&mdash;today glad&mdash;tomorrow dejected!&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;Tomorrow,&rdquo; repeated Villani, mechanically: &ldquo;Ay&mdash;tomorrow perhaps
+      dejected.&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;Thou playest with my words, boy,&rdquo; said Rienzi, half angrily, as he turned
+      away.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      But Villani heeded not the displeasure of his Lord.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      The banquet was thronged and brilliant; and Rienzi that day, without an
+      effort, played the courteous host.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      Milanese, Paduan, Pisan, Neapolitan, vied with each other in attracting
+      the smiles of the potent Senator. Prodigal were their compliments&mdash;lavish
+      their promises of support. No monarch in Italy seemed more securely
+      throned.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      The banquet was over (as usual on state occasions) at an early hour; and
+      Rienzi, somewhat heated with wine, strolled forth alone from the Capitol.
+      Bending his solitary steps towards the Palatine, he saw the pale and
+      veil-like mists that succeed the sunset, gather over the wild grass which
+      waves above the Palace of the Caesars. On a mound of ruins (column and
+      arch overthrown) he stood, with folded arms, musing and intent. In the
+      distance lay the melancholy tombs of the Campagna, and the circling hills,
+      crested with the purple hues soon to melt beneath the starlight. Not a
+      breeze stirred the dark cypress and unwaving pine. There was something
+      awful in the stillness of the skies, hushing the desolate grandeur of the
+      earth below. Many and mingled were the thoughts that swept over Rienzi&rsquo;s
+      breast: memory was busy at his heart. How often, in his youth, had he
+      trodden the same spot!&mdash;what visions had he nursed!&mdash;what hopes
+      conceived! In the turbulence of his later life, Memory had long slept; but
+      at that hour, she re-asserted her shadowy reign with a despotism that
+      seemed prophetic. He was wandering&mdash;a boy, with his young brother,
+      hand in hand, by the riverside at eve: anon he saw a pale face and gory
+      side, and once more uttered his imprecations of revenge! His first
+      successes, his virgin triumphs, his secret love, his fame, his power, his
+      reverses, the hermitage of Maiella, the dungeon of Avignon, the triumphal
+      return to Rome,&mdash;all swept across his breast with a distinctness as
+      if he were living those scenes again!&mdash;and now!&mdash;he shrunk from
+      the present, and descended the hill. The moon, already risen, shed her
+      light over the Forum, as he passed through its mingled ruins. By the
+      Temple of Jupiter, two figures suddenly emerged; the moonlight fell upon
+      their faces, and Rienzi recognised Cecco del Vecchio and Angelo Villani.
+      They saw him not; but, eagerly conversing, disappeared by the Arch of
+      Trajan.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;Villani! ever active in my service!&rdquo; thought the Senator; &ldquo;methinks this
+      morning I spoke to him harshly&mdash;it was churlish in me!&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      He re-entered the Place of the Capitol&mdash;he stood by the staircase of
+      the Lion; there was a red stain upon the pavement, unobliterated since
+      Montreal&rsquo;s execution, and the Senator drew himself aside with an inward
+      shudder. Was it the ghastly and spectral light of the Moon, or did the
+      face of that old Egyptian Monster wear an aspect that was as of life? The
+      stony eyeballs seemed bent upon him with a malignant scowl; and as he
+      passed on, and looked behind, they appeared almost preternaturally to
+      follow his steps. A chill, he knew not why, sunk into his heart. He
+      hastened to regain his palace. The sentinels made way for him.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;Senator,&rdquo; said one of them, doubtingly, &ldquo;Messere Angelo Villani is our
+      new captain&mdash;we are to obey his orders?&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;Assuredly,&rdquo; returned the Senator, passing on. The man lingered uneasily,
+      as if he would have spoken, but Rienzi observed it not. Seeking his
+      chamber, he found Nina and Irene waiting for him. His heart yearned to his
+      wife. Care and toil had of late driven her from his thoughts, and he felt
+      it remorsefully, as he gazed upon her noble face, softened by the
+      solicitude of untiring and anxious love.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;Sweetest,&rdquo; said he, winding his arms around her tenderly; &ldquo;thy lips never
+      chide me, but thine eyes sometimes do! We have been apart too long.
+      Brighter days dawn upon us, when I shall have leisure to thank thee for
+      all thy care. And you, my fair sister, you smile on me!&mdash;ah, you have
+      heard that your lover, ere this, is released by the cession of Palestrina,
+      and tomorrow&rsquo;s sun will see him at your feet. Despite all the cares of the
+      day, I remembered thee, my Irene, and sent a messenger to bring back the
+      blush to that pale cheek. Come, come, we shall be happy again!&rdquo; And with
+      that domestic fondness common to him, when harsher thoughts permitted, he
+      sate himself beside the two persons dearest to his hearth and heart.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;So happy&mdash;if we could have many hours like this!&rdquo; murmured Nina,
+      sinking on his breast. &ldquo;Yet sometimes I wish&mdash;&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;And I too,&rdquo; interrupted Rienzi; &ldquo;for I read thy woman&rsquo;s thought&mdash;I
+      too sometimes wish that fate had placed us in the lowlier valleys of life!
+      But it may come yet! Irene wedded to Adrian&mdash;Rome married to Liberty&mdash;and
+      then, Nina, methinks you and I would find some quiet hermitage, and talk
+      over old gauds and triumphs, as of a summer&rsquo;s dream. Beautiful, kiss me!
+      Couldst thou resign these pomps?&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;For a desert with thee, Cola!&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;Let me reflect,&rdquo; resumed Rienzi; &ldquo;is not today the seventh of October?
+      Yes! on the seventh, be it noted, my foes yielded to my power! Seven! my
+      fated number, whether ominous of good or evil! Seven months did I reign as
+      Tribune&mdash;seven (There was the lapse of one year between the release
+      of Rienzi from Avignon, and his triumphal return to Rome: a year chiefly
+      spent in the campaign of Albornoz.) years was I absent as an exile;
+      tomorrow, that sees me without an enemy, completes my seventh week of
+      return!&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;And seven was the number of the crowns the Roman Convents and the Roman
+      Council awarded thee, after the ceremony which gave thee the knighthood of
+      the Santo Spirito!&rdquo; (This superstition had an excuse in strange historical
+      coincidences; and the number seven was indeed to Rienzi what the 3rd of
+      September was to Cromwell. The ceremony of the seven crowns which he
+      received after his knighthood, on the nature of which ridiculous ignorance
+      has been shown by many recent writers, was, in fact, principally a
+      religious and typical donation, (symbolical of the gifts of the Holy
+      Spirit,) conferred by the heads of convents&mdash;and that part of the
+      ceremony which was political, was republican, not regal.) said Nina,
+      adding, with woman&rsquo;s tender wit, &ldquo;the brightest association of all!&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;Follies seem these thoughts to others, and to philosophy, in truth, they
+      are so,&rdquo; said Rienzi; &ldquo;but all my life long, omen and type and shadow have
+      linked themselves to action and event: and the atmosphere of other men
+      hath not been mine. Life itself a riddle, why should riddles amaze us? The
+      Future!&mdash;what mystery in the very word! Had we lived all through the
+      Past, since Time was, our profoundest experience of a thousand ages could
+      not give us a guess of the events that wait the very moment we are about
+      to enter! Thus deserted by Reason, what wonder that we recur to the
+      Imagination, on which, by dream and symbol, God sometimes paints the
+      likeness of things to come? Who can endure to leave the Future all
+      unguessed, and sit tamely down to groan under the fardel of the Present?
+      No, no! that which the foolish-wise call Fanaticism, belongs to the same
+      part of us as Hope. Each but carries us onward&mdash;from a barren strand
+      to a glorious, if unbounded sea. Each is the yearning for the GREAT
+      BEYOND, which attests our immortality. Each has its visions and chimeras&mdash;some
+      false, but some true! Verily, a man who becomes great is often but made so
+      by a kind of sorcery in his own soul&mdash;a Pythia which prophesies that
+      he shall be great&mdash;and so renders the life one effort to fulfil the
+      warning! Is this folly?&mdash;it were so, if all things stopped at the
+      grave! But perhaps the very sharpening, and exercising, and elevating the
+      faculties here&mdash;though but for a bootless end on earth&mdash;may be
+      designed to fit the soul, thus quickened and ennobled, to some high
+      destiny beyond the earth! Who can tell? not I!&mdash;Let us pray!&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      While the Senator was thus employed, Rome in her various quarters
+      presented less holy and quiet scenes.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      In the fortress of the Orsini lights flitted to and fro, through the
+      gratings of the great court. Angelo Villani might be seen stealing from
+      the postern-gate. Another hour, and the Moon was high in heaven; toward
+      the ruins of the Colosseum, men, whose dress bespoke them of the lowest
+      rank, were seen creeping from lanes and alleys, two by two; from these
+      ruins glided again the form of the son of Montreal. Later yet&mdash;the
+      Moon is sinking&mdash;a grey light breaking in the East&mdash;and the
+      gates of Rome, by St. John of Lateran, are open! Villani is conversing
+      with the sentries! The Moon has set&mdash;the mountains are dim with a
+      mournful and chilling haze&mdash;Villani is before the palace of the
+      Capitol&mdash;the only soldier there! Where are the Roman legions that
+      were to guard alike the freedom and the deliverer of Rome?
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      <a name="link2HCH0069" id="link2HCH0069">
+      <!--  H2 anchor --> </a>
+    </p>
+    <div style="height: 4em;">
+      <br /><br /><br /><br />
+    </div>
+    <h2>
+      Chapter The Last. The Close of the Chase.
+    </h2>
+    <p>
+      It was the morning of the 8th of October, 1354. Rienzi, who rose betimes,
+      stirred restlessly in his bed. &ldquo;It is yet early,&rdquo; he said to Nina, whose
+      soft arm was round his neck; &ldquo;none of my people seem to be astir. Howbeit,
+      my day begins before theirs.&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;Rest yet, my Cola; you want sleep.&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;No; I feel feverish, and this old pain in the side torments me. I have
+      letters to write.&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;Let me be your secretary, dearest,&rdquo; said Nina.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      Rienzi smiled affectionately as he rose; he repaired to his closet
+      adjoining his sleeping apartment, and used the bath, as was his wont. Then
+      dressing himself, he returned to Nina, who, already loosely robed, sate by
+      the writing-table, ready for her office of love.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;How still are all things!&rdquo; said Rienzi. &ldquo;What a cool and delicious
+      prelude, in these early hours, to the toilsome day.&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      Leaning over his wife, he then dictated different letters, interrupting
+      the task at times by such observations as crossed his mind.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;So, now to Annibaldi! By the way, young Adrian should join us today; how
+      I rejoice for Irene&rsquo;s sake!&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;Dear sister&mdash;yes! she loves,&mdash;if any, Cola, can so love,&mdash;as
+      we do.&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;Well, but to your task, my fair scribe. Ha! what noise is that? I hear an
+      armed step&mdash;the stairs creak&mdash;some one shouts my name.&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      Rienzi flew to his sword! the door was thrown rudely open, and a figure in
+      complete armour appeared within the chamber.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;How! what means this?&rdquo; said Rienzi, standing before Nina, with his drawn
+      sword.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      The intruder lifted his visor&mdash;it was Adrian Colonna.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;Fly, Rienzi!&mdash;hasten, Signora! Thank Heaven, I can save ye yet!
+      Myself and train released by the capture of Palestrina, the pain of my
+      wound detained me last night at Tivoli. The town was filled with armed men&mdash;not
+      thine, Senator. I heard rumours that alarmed me. I resolved to proceed
+      onward&mdash;I reached Rome, the gates of the city were wide open!&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;How!&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;Your guard gone. Presently I came upon a band of the retainers of the
+      Savelli. My insignia, as a Colonna, misled them. I learned that this very
+      hour some of your enemies are within the city, the rest are on their march&mdash;the
+      people themselves arm against you. In the obscurer streets I passed
+      through, the mob were already forming. They took me for thy foe, and
+      shouted. I came hither&mdash;thy sentries have vanished. The private door
+      below is unbarred and open. Not a soul seems left in thy palace. Haste&mdash;fly&mdash;save
+      thyself!&mdash;Where is Irene?&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;The Capitol deserted!&mdash;impossible!&rdquo; cried Rienzi. He strode across
+      the chambers to the ante-room, where his night-guard usually waited&mdash;it
+      was empty! He passed hastily to Villani&rsquo;s room&mdash;it was untenanted! He
+      would have passed farther, but the doors were secured without. It was
+      evident that all egress had been cut off, save by the private door below,&mdash;and
+      that had been left open to admit his murtherers!
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      He returned to his room&mdash;Nina had already gone to rouse and prepare
+      Irene, whose chamber was on the other side, within one of their own.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;Quick, Senator!&rdquo; said Adrian. &ldquo;Methinks there is yet time. We must make
+      across to the Tiber. I have stationed my faithful squires and Northmen
+      there. A boat waits us.&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;Hark!&rdquo; interrupted Rienzi, whose senses had of late been preternaturally
+      quickened. &ldquo;I hear a distant shout&mdash;a familiar shout, &lsquo;Viva &lsquo;l
+      Popolo!&rsquo; Why, so say I! These must be friends.&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;Deceive not thyself; thou hast scarce a friend at Rome.&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;Hist!&rdquo; said Rienzi, in a whisper; &ldquo;save Nina&mdash;save Irene. I cannot
+      accompany thee.&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;Art thou mad?&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;No! but fearless. Besides, did I accompany, I might but destroy you all.
+      Were I found with you, you would be massacred with me. Without me ye are
+      safe. Yes, even the Senator&rsquo;s wife and sister have provoked no revenge.
+      Save them, noble Colonna! Cola di Rienzi puts his trust in God alone!&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      By this time Nina had returned; Irene with her. Afar was heard the tramp&mdash;steady&mdash;slow&mdash;gathering&mdash;of
+      the fatal multitude.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;Now, Cola,&rdquo; said Nina, with a bold and cheerful air, and she took her
+      husband&rsquo;s arm, while Adrian had already found his charge in Irene.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;Yes, now, Nina!&rdquo; said Rienzi; &ldquo;at length we part! If this is my last hour&mdash;in
+      my last hour I pray God to bless and shield thee! for verily, thou hast
+      been my exceeding solace&mdash;provident as a parent, tender as a child,
+      the smile of my hearth, the&mdash;the&mdash;&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      Rienzi was almost unmanned. Emotions, deep, conflicting, unspeakably fond
+      and grateful, literally choked his speech.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;What!&rdquo; cried Nina, clinging to his breast, and parting her hair from her
+      eyes, as she sought his averted face. &ldquo;Part!&mdash;never! This is my place&mdash;all
+      Rome shall not tear me from it!&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      Adrian, in despair, seized her hand, and attempted to drag her thence.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;Touch me not, sir!&rdquo; said Nina, waving her arm with angry majesty, while
+      her eyes sparkled as a lioness, whom the huntsmen would sever from her
+      young. &ldquo;I am the wife of Cola di Rienzi, the Great Senator of Rome, and by
+      his side will I live and die!&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;Take her hence: quick!&mdash;quick! I hear the crowd advancing.&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      Irene tore herself from Adrian, and fell at the feet of Rienzi&mdash;she
+      clasped his knees.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;Come, my brother, come! Why lose these precious moments? Rome forbids you
+      to cast away a life in which her very self is bound up.&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;Right, Irene; Rome is bound up with me, and we will rise or fall
+      together!&mdash;no more!&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;You destroy us all!&rdquo; said Adrian, with generous and impatient warmth. &ldquo;A
+      few minutes more, and we are lost. Rash man! it is not to fall by an
+      infuriate mob that you have been preserved from so many dangers.&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;I believe it,&rdquo; said the Senator, as his tall form seemed to dilate as
+      with the greatness of his own soul. &ldquo;I shall triumph yet! Never shall mine
+      enemies&mdash;never shall posterity say that a second time Rienzi
+      abandoned Rome! Hark! &lsquo;Viva &lsquo;l Popolo!&rsquo; still the cry of &lsquo;THE PEOPLE.&rsquo; 
+      That cry scares none but tyrants! I shall triumph and survive!&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;And I with thee!&rdquo; said Nina, firmly. Rienzi paused a moment, gazed on his
+      wife, passionately clasped her to his heart, kissed her again and again,
+      and then said, &ldquo;Nina, I command thee,&mdash;Go!&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;Never!&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      He paused. Irene&rsquo;s face, drowned in tears, met his eyes.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;We will all perish with you,&rdquo; said his sister; &ldquo;you only, Adrian, you
+      leave us!&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;Be it so,&rdquo; said the Knight, sadly; &ldquo;we will all remain,&rdquo; and he desisted
+      at once from further effort.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      There was a dead but short pause, broken but by a convulsive sob from
+      Irene. The tramp of the raging thousands sounded fearfully distinct.
+      Rienzi seemed lost in thought&mdash;then lifting his head, he said,
+      calmly, &ldquo;ye have triumphed&mdash;I join ye&mdash;I but collect these
+      papers, and follow you. Quick, Adrian&mdash;save them!&rdquo; and he pointed
+      meaningly to Nina.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      Waiting no other hint, the young Colonna seized Nina in his strong grasp&mdash;with
+      his left hand he supported Irene, who with terror and excitement was
+      almost insensible. Rienzi relieved him of the lighter load&mdash;he took
+      his sister in his arms, and descended the winding stairs. Nina remained
+      passive&mdash;she heard her husband&rsquo;s step behind, it was enough for her&mdash;she
+      but turned once to thank him with her eyes. A tall Northman clad in armour
+      stood at the open door. Rienzi placed Irene, now perfectly lifeless, in
+      the soldier&rsquo;s arms, and kissed her pale cheek in silence.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;Quick, my Lord,&rdquo; said the Northman, &ldquo;on all sides they come!&rdquo; So saying,
+      he bounded down the descent with his burthen. Adrian followed with Nina;
+      the Senator paused one moment, turned back, and was in his room ere Adrian
+      was aware that he had vanished.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      Hastily he drew the coverlid from his bed, fastened it to the casement
+      bars, and by its aid dropped (at a distance of several feet) into the
+      balcony below. &ldquo;I will not die like a rat,&rdquo; said he, &ldquo;in the trap they
+      have set for me! The whole crowd shall, at least, see and hear me.&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      This was the work of a moment.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      Meanwhile, Nina had scarcely proceeded six paces, before she discovered
+      that she was alone with Adrian.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;Ha! Cola!&rdquo; she cried, &ldquo;where is he? he has gone!&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;Take heart, Lady, he has returned but for some secret papers he has
+      forgotten. He will follow us anon.&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;Let us wait, then.&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;Lady,&rdquo; said Adrian, grinding his teeth, &ldquo;hear you not the crowd?&mdash;on,
+      on!&rdquo; and he flew with a swifter step. Nina struggled in his grasp&mdash;Love
+      gave her the strength of despair. With a wild laugh she broke from him.
+      She flew back&mdash;the door was closed&mdash;but unbarred&mdash;her
+      trembling hands lingered a moment round the spring. She opened it, drew
+      the heavy bolt across the panels, and frustrated all attempt from Adrian
+      to regain her. She was on the stairs,&mdash;she was in the room. Rienzi
+      was gone! She fled, shrieking his name, through the State Chambers&mdash;all
+      was desolate. She found the doors opening on the various passages that
+      admitted to the rooms below barred without. Breathless and gasping, she
+      returned to the chamber. She hurried to the casement&mdash;she perceived
+      the method by which he had descended below&mdash;her brave heart told her
+      of his brave design;&mdash;she saw they were separated,&mdash;&ldquo;But the
+      same roof holds us,&rdquo; she cried, joyously, &ldquo;and our fate shall be the
+      same!&rdquo; With that thought she sank in mute patience on the floor.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      Forming the generous resolve not to abandon the faithful and devoted pair
+      without another effort, Adrian had followed Nina, but too late&mdash;the
+      door was closed against his efforts. The crowd marched on&mdash;he heard
+      their cry change on a sudden&mdash;it was no longer &ldquo;LIVE THE PEOPLE!&rdquo; but
+      &ldquo;DEATH TO THE TRAITOR!&rdquo; His attendant had already disappeared, and waking
+      now only to the danger of Irene, the Colonna in bitter grief turned away,
+      lightly sped down the descent, and hastened to the riverside, where the
+      boat and his band awaited him.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      The balcony on which Rienzi had alighted was that from which he had been
+      accustomed to address the people&mdash;it communicated with a vast hall
+      used on solemn occasions for State festivals&mdash;and on either side were
+      square projecting towers, whose grated casements looked into the balcony.
+      One of these towers was devoted to the armory, the other contained the
+      prison of Brettone, the brother of Montreal. Beyond the latter tower was
+      the general prison of the Capitol. For then the prison and the palace were
+      in awful neighbourhood!
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      The windows of the Hall were yet open&mdash;and Rienzi passed into it from
+      the balcony&mdash;the witness of the yesterday&rsquo;s banquet was still there&mdash;the
+      wine, yet undried, crimsoned the floor, and goblets of gold and silver
+      shone from the recesses. He proceeded at once to the armory, and selected
+      from the various suits that which he himself had worn when, nearly eight
+      years ago, he had chased the Barons from the gates of Rome. He arrayed
+      himself in the mail, leaving only his head uncovered; and then taking, in
+      his right hand, from the wall, the great Gonfalon of Rome, returned once
+      more to the hall. Not a man encountered him. In that vast building, save
+      the prisoners, and the faithful Nina, whose presence he knew not of&mdash;the
+      Senator was alone.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      On they came, no longer in measured order, as stream after stream&mdash;from
+      lane, from alley, from palace and from hovel&mdash;the raging sea received
+      new additions. On they came&mdash;their passions excited by their numbers&mdash;women
+      and men, children and malignant age&mdash;in all the awful array of
+      aroused, released, unresisted physical strength and brutal wrath; &ldquo;Death
+      to the traitor&mdash;death to the tyrant&mdash;death to him who has taxed
+      the people!&rdquo;&mdash;&ldquo;Mora l&rsquo; traditore che ha fatta la gabella!&mdash;Mora!&rdquo;
+       Such was the cry of the people&mdash;such the crime of the Senator! They
+      broke over the low palisades of the Capitol&mdash;they filled with one
+      sudden rush the vast space;&mdash;a moment before so desolate,&mdash;now
+      swarming with human beings athirst for blood!
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      Suddenly came a dead silence, and on the balcony above stood Rienzi&mdash;his
+      head was bared and the morning sun shone over that lordly brow, and the
+      hair grown grey before its time, in the service of that maddening
+      multitude. Pale and erect he stood&mdash;neither fear, nor anger, nor
+      menace&mdash;but deep grief and high resolve&mdash;upon his features! A
+      momentary shame&mdash;a momentary awe seized the crowd.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      He pointed to the Gonfalon, wrought with the Republican motto and arms of
+      Rome, and thus he began:&mdash;
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;I too am a Roman and a Citizen; hear me!&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;Hear him not! hear him not! his false tongue can charm away our senses!&rdquo;
+       cried a voice louder than his own; and Rienzi recognised Cecco del
+      Vecchio.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;Hear him not! down with the tyrant!&rdquo; cried a more shrill and youthful
+      tone; and by the side of the artisan stood Angelo Villani.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;Hear him not! death to the death-giver!&rdquo; cried a voice close at hand, and
+      from the grating of the neighbouring prison glared near upon him, as the
+      eye of a tiger, the vengeful gaze of the brother of Montreal.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      Then from Earth to Heaven rose the roar&mdash;&ldquo;Down with the tyrant&mdash;down
+      with him who taxed the people!&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      A shower of stones rattled on the mail of the Senator,&mdash;still he
+      stirred not. No changing muscle betokened fear. His persuasion of his own
+      wonderful powers of eloquence, if he could but be heard, inspired him yet
+      with hope; he stood collected in his own indignant, but determined
+      thoughts;&mdash;but the knowledge of that very eloquence was now his
+      deadliest foe. The leaders of the multitude trembled lest he should be
+      heard; &ldquo;and doubtless,&rdquo; says the contemporaneous biographer, &ldquo;had he but
+      spoken he would have changed them all, and the work been marred.&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      The soldiers of the Barons had already mixed themselves with the throng&mdash;more
+      deadly weapons than stones aided the wrath of the multitude&mdash;darts
+      and arrows darkened the air; and now a voice was heard shrieking, &ldquo;Way for
+      the torches!&rdquo; And red in the sunlight the torches tossed and waved, and
+      danced to and fro, above the heads of the crowd, as if the fiends were let
+      loose amongst the mob! And what place in hell hath fiends like those a mad
+      mob can furnish? Straw, and wood, and litter, were piled hastily round the
+      great doors of the Capitol, and the smoke curled suddenly up, beating back
+      the rush of the assailants.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      Rienzi was no longer visible, an arrow had pierced his hand&mdash;the
+      right hand that supported the flag of Rome&mdash;the right hand that had
+      given a constitution to the Republic. He retired from the storm into the
+      desolate hall.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      He sat down;&mdash;and tears, springing from no weak and woman source, but
+      tears from the loftiest fountain of emotion&mdash;tears that befit a
+      warrior when his own troops desert him&mdash;a patriot when his countrymen
+      rush to their own doom&mdash;a father when his children rebel against his
+      love,&mdash;tears such as these forced themselves from his eyes and
+      relieved,&mdash;but they changed, his heart!
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;Enough, enough!&rdquo; he said, presently rising and dashing the drops
+      scornfully away; &ldquo;I have risked, dared, toiled enough for this dastard and
+      degenerate race. I will yet baffle their malice&mdash;I renounce the
+      thought of which they are so little worthy!&mdash;Let Rome perish!&mdash;I
+      feel, at last, that I am nobler than my country!&mdash;she deserves not so
+      high a sacrifice!&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      With that feeling, Death lost all the nobleness of aspect it had before
+      presented to him; and he resolved, in very scorn of his ungrateful foes,
+      in very defeat of their inhuman wrath, to make one effort for his life! He
+      divested himself of his glittering arms; his address, his dexterity, his
+      craft, returned to him. His active mind ran over the chances of disguise&mdash;of
+      escape;&mdash;he left the hall&mdash;passed through the humbler rooms,
+      devoted to the servitors and menials&mdash;found in one of them a coarse
+      working garb&mdash;indued himself with it&mdash;placed upon his head some
+      of the draperies and furniture of the palace, as if escaping with them;
+      and said, with his old &ldquo;fantastico riso&rdquo; (&ldquo;Fantastic smile or laugh.&rdquo;)&mdash;&ldquo;When
+      all other friends desert me, I may well forsake myself!&rdquo; With that he
+      awaited his occasion.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      Meanwhile the flames burnt fierce and fast; the outer door below was
+      already consumed; from the apartment he had deserted the fire burst out in
+      volleys of smoke&mdash;the wood crackled&mdash;the lead melted&mdash;with
+      a crash fell the severed gates&mdash;the dreadful entrance was opened to
+      all the multitude&mdash;the proud Capitol of the Caesars was already
+      tottering to its fall!&mdash;Now was the time!&mdash;he passed the flaming
+      door&mdash;the smouldering threshold;&mdash;he passed the outer gate
+      unscathed&mdash;he was in the middle of the crowd. &ldquo;Plenty of pillage
+      within,&rdquo; he said to the bystanders, in the Roman patois, his face
+      concealed by his load&mdash;&ldquo;Suso, suso a gliu traditore!&rdquo; (Down, down
+      with the traitor.) The mob rushed past him&mdash;he went on&mdash;he
+      gained the last stair descending into the open streets&mdash;he was at the
+      last gate&mdash;liberty and life were before him.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      A soldier (one of his own) seized him. &ldquo;Pass not&mdash;whither goest
+      thou?&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;Beware, lest the Senator escape disguised!&rdquo; cried a voice behind&mdash;it
+      was Villani&rsquo;s. The concealing load was torn from his head&mdash;Rienzi
+      stood revealed!
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;I am the Senator!&rdquo; he said in a loud voice. &ldquo;Who dare touch the
+      Representative of the People?&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      The multitude were round him in an instant. Not led, but rather hurried
+      and whirled along, the Senator was borne to the Place of the Lion. With
+      the intense glare of the bursting flames, the grey image reflected a lurid
+      light, and glowed&mdash;(that grim and solemn monument!)&mdash;as if
+      itself of fire!
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      There arrived, the crowd gave way, terrified by the greatness of their
+      victim. Silent he stood, and turned his face around; nor could the squalor
+      of his garb, nor the terror of the hour, nor the proud grief of detection,
+      abate the majesty of his mien, or reassure the courage of the thousands
+      who gathered, gazing, round him. The whole Capitol wrapped in fire,
+      lighted with ghastly pomp the immense multitude. Down the long vista of
+      the streets extended the fiery light and the serried throng, till the
+      crowd closed with the gleaming standards of the Colonna&mdash;the Orsini&mdash;the
+      Savelli! Her true tyrants were marching into Rome! As the sound of their
+      approaching horns and trumpets broke upon the burning air, the mob seemed
+      to regain their courage. Rienzi prepared to speak; his first word was as
+      the signal of his own death.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;Die, tyrant!&rdquo; cried Cecco del Vecchio: and he plunged his dagger in the
+      Senator&rsquo;s breast.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;Die, executioner of Montreal!&rdquo; muttered Villani: &ldquo;thus the trust is
+      fulfilled!&rdquo; and his was the second stroke. Then as he drew back, and saw
+      the artisan in all the drunken fury of his brute passion, tossing up his
+      cap, shouting aloud, and spurning the fallen lion,&mdash;the young man
+      gazed upon him with a look of withering and bitter scorn, and said, while
+      he sheathed his blade, and slowly turned to quit the crowd,
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;Fool, miserable fool! thou and these at least had no blood of kindred to
+      avenge!&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      They heeded not his words&mdash;they saw him not depart; for as Rienzi,
+      without a word, without a groan, fell to the earth,&mdash;as the roaring
+      waves of the multitude closed over him,&mdash;a voice, shrill, sharp, and
+      wild, was heard above all the clamour. At the casement of the Palace, (the
+      casement of her bridal chamber,) Nina stood!&mdash;through the flames that
+      burst below and around, her face and outstretched arms alone visible! Ere
+      yet the sound of that thrilling cry passed from the air, down with a
+      mighty crash thundered that whole wing of the Capitol,&mdash;a blackened
+      and smouldering mass.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      At that hour, a solitary boat was gliding swiftly along the Tiber. Rome
+      was at a distance, but the lurid blow of the conflagration cast its
+      reflection upon the placid and glassy stream: fair beyond description was
+      the landscape; soft beyond all art of Painter and of Poet, the sunlight
+      quivering over the autumnal herbage, and hushing into tender calm the
+      waves of the golden River!
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      Adrian&rsquo;s eyes were strained towards the towers of the Capitol,
+      distinguished by the flames from the spires and domes around;&mdash;senseless,
+      and clasped to his guardian breast, Irene was happily unconscious of the
+      horrors of the time.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;They dare not&mdash;they dare not,&rdquo; said the brave Colonna, &ldquo;touch a hair
+      of that sacred head!&mdash;if Rienzi fall, the liberties of Rome fall for
+      ever! As those towers that surmount the flames, the pride and monument of
+      Rome, he shall rise above the dangers of the hour. Behold, still unscathed
+      amidst the raging element, the Capitol itself is his emblem!&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      Scarce had he spoken, when a vast volume of smoke obscured the fires afar
+      off, a dull crash (deadened by the distance) travelled to his ear, and the
+      next moment, the towers on which he gazed had vanished from the scene, and
+      one intense and sullen glare seemed to settle over the atmosphere,&mdash;making
+      all Rome itself the funeral pyre of THE LAST OF THE ROMAN TRIBUNES!
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      The End
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      <a name="link2H_APPE" id="link2H_APPE">
+      <!--  H2 anchor --> </a>
+    </p>
+    <div style="height: 4em;">
+      <br /><br /><br /><br />
+    </div>
+    <h2>
+      Appendix I. Some Remarks on the Life and Character of Rienzi.
+    </h2>
+    <p>
+      The principal authority from which historians have taken their account of
+      the life and times of Rienzi is a very curious biography, by some unknown
+      contemporary; and this, which is in the Roman patois of the time, has been
+      rendered not quite unfamiliar to the French and English reader by the work
+      of Pere du Cerceau, called &ldquo;Conjuration de Nicolas Gabrini, dit de
+      Rienzi,&rdquo; (See for a specimen of the singular blunders of the Frenchman&rsquo;s
+      work, Appendix II.) which has at once pillaged and deformed the Roman
+      biographer. The biography I refer to was published (and the errors of the
+      former editions revised) by Muratori in his great collection; and has
+      lately been reprinted separately in an improved text, accompanied by notes
+      of much discrimination and scholastic taste, and a comment upon that
+      celebrated poem of Petrarch, &ldquo;Spirito Gentil,&rdquo; which the majority of
+      Italian critics have concurred in considering addressed to Rienzi, in
+      spite of the ingenious arguments to the contrary by the Abbe de Sade.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      This biography has been generally lauded for its rare impartiality. And
+      the author does, indeed, praise and blame alike with a most singular
+      appearance of stolid candour. The work, in truth, is one of those not
+      uncommon proofs, of which Boswell&rsquo;s &ldquo;Johnson&rdquo; is the most striking, that a
+      very valuable book may be written by a very silly man. The biographer of
+      Rienzi appears more like the historian of Rienzi&rsquo;s clothes, so minute is
+      he on all details of their colour and quality&mdash;so silent is he upon
+      everything that could throw light upon the motives of their wearer. In
+      fact, granting the writer every desire to be impartial, he is too foolish
+      to be so. It requires some cleverness to judge accurately of a very clever
+      man in very difficult circumstances; and the worthy biographer is utterly
+      incapable of giving us any clue to the actions of Rienzi&mdash;utterly
+      unable to explain the conduct of the man by the circumstances of the time.
+      The weakness of his vision causes him, therefore, often to squint. We must
+      add to his want of wisdom a want of truth, which the Herodotus-like
+      simplicity of his style frequently conceals. He describes things which had
+      no witness as precisely and distinctly as those which he himself had seen.
+      For instance, before the death of Rienzi, in those awful moments when the
+      Senator was alone, unheard, unseen, he coolly informs us of each motion,
+      and each thought of Rienzi&rsquo;s, with as much detail as if Rienzi had
+      returned from the grave to assist his narration. These obvious inventions
+      have been adopted by Gibbon and others with more good faith than the laws
+      of evidence would warrant. Still, however, to a patient and cautious
+      reader the biography may furnish a much better notion of Rienzi&rsquo;s
+      character, than we can glean from the historians who have borrowed from it
+      piecemeal. Such a reader will discard all the writer&rsquo;s reasonings, will
+      think little of his praise or blame, and regard only the facts he
+      narrates, judging them true or doubtful, according as the writer had the
+      opportunities of being himself the observer. Thus examining, the reader
+      will find evidence sufficient of Rienzi&rsquo;s genius and Rienzi&rsquo;s failings:
+      Carefully distinguishing between the period of his power as Tribune, and
+      that of his power as Senator, he will find the Tribune vain, haughty, fond
+      of display; but, despite the reasonings of the biographer, he will not
+      recognise those faults in the Senator. On the other hand, he will notice
+      the difference between youth and maturity&mdash;hope and experience; he
+      will notice in the Tribune vast ambition, great schemes, enterprising
+      activity&mdash;which sober into less gorgeous and more quiet colours in
+      the portrait of the Senator. He will find that in neither instance did
+      Rienzi fall from his own faults&mdash;he will find that the vulgar moral
+      of ambition, blasted by its own excesses, is not the true moral of the
+      Roman&rsquo;s life; he will find that, both in his abdication as Tribune, and
+      his death as Senator, Rienzi fell from the vices of the People. The
+      Tribune was a victim to ignorant cowardice&mdash;the Senator, a victim to
+      ferocious avarice. It is this which modern historians have failed to
+      represent. Gibbon records rightly, that the Count of Minorbino entered
+      Rome with one hundred and fifty soldiers, and barricadoed the quarter of
+      the Colonna&mdash;that the bell of the Capitol sounded&mdash;that Rienzi
+      addressed the People&mdash;that they were silent and inactive&mdash;and
+      that Rienzi then abdicated the government. But for this he calls Rienzi
+      &ldquo;pusillanimous.&rdquo; Is not that epithet to be applied to the People? Rienzi
+      invoked them to move against the Robber&mdash;the People refused to obey.
+      Rienzi wished to fight&mdash;the People refused to stir. It was not the
+      cause of Rienzi alone which demanded their exertions&mdash;it was the
+      cause of the People&mdash;theirs, not his, the shame, if one hundred and
+      fifty foreign soldiers mastered Rome, overthrew their liberties, and
+      restored their tyrants! Whatever Rienzi&rsquo;s sins, whatever his unpopularity,
+      their freedom, their laws, their republic, were at stake; and these they
+      surrendered to one hundred and fifty hirelings! This is the fact that
+      damns them! But Rienzi was not unpopular when he addressed and conjured
+      them: they found no fault with him. &ldquo;The sighs and the groans of the
+      People,&rdquo; says Sismondi, justly, &ldquo;replied to his,&rdquo;&mdash;they could weep,
+      but they would not fight. This strange apathy the modern historians have
+      not accounted for, yet the principal cause was obvious&mdash;Rienzi was
+      excommunicated! (And this curse I apprehend to have been the more
+      effective in the instance of Rienzi, from a fact that it would be
+      interesting and easy to establish: viz., that he owed his rise as much to
+      religious as to civil causes. He aimed evidently to be a religious
+      Reformer. All his devices, ceremonies, and watchwords, were of a religious
+      character. The monks took part with his enterprise, and joined in the
+      revolution. His letters are full of mystical fanaticism. His references to
+      ancient heroes of Rome are always mingled with invocations to her
+      Christian Saints. The Bible, at that time little read by the public
+      civilians of Italy, is constantly in his hands, and his addresses studded
+      with texts. His very garments were adorned with sacred and mysterious
+      emblems. No doubt, the ceremony of his Knighthood, which Gibbon ridicules
+      as an act of mere vanity, was but another of his religious extravagances;
+      for he peculiarly dedicated his Knighthood to the service of the Santo
+      Spirito; and his bathing in the vase of Constantine was quite of a piece,
+      not with the vanity of the Tribune, but with the extravagance of the
+      Fanatic. In fact, they tried hard to prove him a heretic; but he escaped a
+      charge under the mild Innocent, which a century or two before, or a
+      century or two afterwards, would have sufficed to have sent a dozen
+      Rienzis to the stake. I have dwelt the more upon this point, because, if
+      it be shown that religious causes operated with those of liberty, we throw
+      a new light upon the whole of that most extraordinary revolution, and its
+      suddenness is infinitely less striking. The deep impression Rienzi
+      produced upon that populace was thus stamped with the spirit of the
+      religious enthusiast more than that of the classical demagogue. And, as in
+      the time of Cromwell, the desire for temporal liberty was warmed and
+      coloured by the presence of a holier and more spiritual fervour:&mdash;&ldquo;The
+      Good Estate&rdquo; (Buono Stato) of Rienzi reminds us a little of the Good Cause
+      of General Cromwell.) In stating the fact, these writers have seemed to
+      think that excommunication in Rome, in the fourteenth century, produced no
+      effect!&mdash;the effect it did produce I have endeavoured in these pages
+      to convey.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      The causes of the second fall and final murder of Rienzi are equally
+      misstated by modern narrators. It was from no fault of his&mdash;no
+      injustice, no cruelty, no extravagance&mdash;it was not from the execution
+      of Montreal, nor that of Pandulfo di Guido&mdash;-it was from a gabelle on
+      wine and salt that he fell. To preserve Rome from the tyrants it was
+      necessary to maintain an armed force; to pay the force a tax was
+      necessary; the tax was imposed&mdash;and the multitude joined with the
+      tyrants, and their cry was, &ldquo;Perish the traitor who has made the gabelle!&rdquo;
+       This was their only charge&mdash;this the only crime that their passions
+      and their fury could cite against him.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      The faults of Rienzi are sufficiently visible, and I have not unsparingly
+      shewn them; but we must judge men, not according as they approach
+      perfection, but according as their good or bad qualities preponderate&mdash;their
+      talents or their weaknesses&mdash;the benefits they effected, the evil
+      they wrought. For a man who rose to so great a power, Rienzi&rsquo;s faults were
+      singularly few&mdash;crimes he committed none. He is almost the only man
+      who ever rose from the rank of a citizen to a power equal to that of
+      monarchs without a single act of violence or treachery. When in power, he
+      was vain, ostentatious, and imprudent,&mdash;always an enthusiast&mdash;often
+      a fanatic; but his very faults had greatness of soul, and his very
+      fanaticism at once supported his enthusiastic daring, and proved his
+      earnest honesty. It is evident that no heinous charge could be brought
+      against him even by his enemies, for all the accusations to which he was
+      subjected, when excommunicated, exiled, fallen, were for two offences
+      which Petrarch rightly deemed the proofs of his virtue and his glory:
+      first, for declaring Rome to be free; secondly, for pretending that the
+      Romans had a right of choice in the election of the Roman Emperor. (The
+      charge of heresy was dropped.) Stern, just, and inflexible, as he was when
+      Tribune, his fault was never that of wanton cruelty. The accusation
+      against him, made by the gentle Petrarch, indeed, was that he was not
+      determined enough&mdash;that he did not consummate the revolution by
+      exterminating the patrician tyrants. When Senator, he was, without
+      sufficient ground, accused of avarice in the otherwise just and necessary
+      execution of Montreal. (Gibbon, in mentioning the execution of Montreal,
+      omits to state that Montreal was more than suspected of conspiracy and
+      treason to restore the Colonna. Matthew Villani records it as a common
+      belief that such truly was the offence of the Provencal. The biographer of
+      Rienzi gives additional evidence of the fact. Gibbon&rsquo;s knowledge of this
+      time was superficial. As one instance of this, he strangely enough
+      represents Montreal as the head of the first Free Company that desolated
+      Italy: he took that error from the Pere du Cerceau.) It was natural enough
+      that his enemies and the vulgar should suppose that he executed a creditor
+      to get rid of a debt; but it was inexcusable in later, and wiser, and
+      fairer writers to repeat so grave a calumny, without at least adding the
+      obvious suggestion, that the avarice of Rienzi could have been much better
+      gratified by sparing than by destroying the life of one of the richest
+      subjects in Europe. Montreal, we may be quite sure, would have purchased
+      his life at an immeasurably higher price than the paltry sum lent to
+      Rienzi by his brothers. And this is not a probable hypothesis, but a
+      certain fact, for we are expressly told that Montreal, &ldquo;knowing the
+      Tribune was in want of money, offered Rienzi, that if he would let him go,
+      he, Montreal, would furnish him not only with twenty thousand florins,
+      (four times the amount of Rienzi&rsquo;s debt to him,) but with as many soldiers
+      and as much money as he pleased.&rdquo; This offer Rienzi did not attend to.
+      Would he have rejected it had avarice been his motive? And what culpable
+      injustice, to mention the vague calumny without citing the practical
+      contradiction! When Gibbon tells us, also, that &ldquo;the most virtuous citizen
+      of Rome,&rdquo; meaning Pandulfo, or Pandolficcio di Guido, (Matthew Villani
+      speaks of him as a wise and good citizen, of great repute among the People&mdash;and
+      this, it seems, he really was.) was sacrificed to his jealousy, he a
+      little exaggerates the expression bestowed upon Pandulfo, which is that of
+      &ldquo;virtuoso assai;&rdquo; and that expression, too, used by a man who styles the
+      robber Montreal, &ldquo;eccellente uomo&mdash;di quale fama suono per tutta la
+      Italia di virtude&rdquo; (&ldquo;An excellent man whose fame for valour resounded
+      throughout all Italy.&rdquo;)&mdash;(so good a moral critic was the writer!) but
+      he also altogether waves all mention of the probabilities that are
+      sufficiently apparent, of the scheming of Pandulfo to supplant Rienzi, and
+      to obtain the &ldquo;Signoria del Popolo.&rdquo; Still, however, if the death of
+      Pandulfo may be considered a blot on the memory of Rienzi, it does not
+      appear that it was this which led to his own fate. The cry of the mob
+      surrounding his palace was not, &ldquo;Perish him who executed Pandulfo,&rdquo; it was&mdash;and
+      this again and again must be carefully noted&mdash;it was nothing more nor
+      less than, &ldquo;Perish him who has made the gabelle!&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      Gibbon sneers at the military skill and courage of Rienzi. For this sneer
+      there is no cause. His first attempts, his first rise, attested
+      sufficiently his daring and brave spirit; in every danger he was present&mdash;never
+      shrinking from a foe so long as he was supported by the People. He
+      distinguished himself at Viterbo when in the camp of Albornoz, in several
+      feats of arms, (&ldquo;Vita di Cola di Rienzi&rdquo;, lib. ii. cap. 14.) and his end
+      was that of a hero. So much for his courage; as to his military skill; it
+      would be excusable enough if Rienzi&mdash;the eloquent and gifted student,
+      called from the closet and the rostrum to assume the command of an army&mdash;should
+      have been deficient in the art of war; yet, somehow or other, upon the
+      whole, his arms prospered. He defeated the chivalry of Rome at her gates;
+      and if he did not, after his victory, march to Marino, for which his
+      biographer (In this the anonymous writer compares him gravely to Hannibal,
+      who knew how to conquer, but not how to use his conquest.) and Gibbon
+      blame him, the reason is sufficiently clear&mdash;&ldquo;Volea pecunia per
+      soldati&rdquo;&mdash;he wanted money for the soldiers! On his return as Senator,
+      it must be remembered that he had to besiege Palestrina, which was
+      considered even by the ancient Romans almost impregnable by position; but
+      during the few weeks he was in power, Palestrina yielded&mdash;all his
+      open enemies were defeated&mdash;the tyrants expelled&mdash;Rome free; and
+      this without support from any party, Papal or Popular, or, as Gibbon well
+      expresses it, &ldquo;suspected by the People&mdash;abandoned by the Prince.&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      On regarding what Rienzi did, we must look to his means, to the
+      difficulties that surrounded him, to the scantiness of his resources. We
+      see a man without rank, wealth, or friends, raising himself to the head of
+      a popular government in the metropolis of the Church&mdash;in the City of
+      the Empire. We see him reject any title save that of a popular magistrate&mdash;establish
+      at one stroke a free constitution&mdash;a new code of law. We see him
+      first expel, then subdue, the fiercest aristocracy in Europe&mdash;conquer
+      the most stubborn banditti, rule impartially the most turbulent people,
+      embruted by the violence, and sunk in the corruption of centuries. We see
+      him restore trade&mdash;establish order&mdash;create civilization as by a
+      miracle&mdash;receive from crowned heads homage and congratulation&mdash;outwit,
+      conciliate, or awe, the wiliest priesthood of the Papal Diplomacy&mdash;and
+      raise his native city at once to sudden yet acknowledged eminence over
+      every other state, its superior in arts, wealth, and civilization;&mdash;we
+      ask what errors we are to weigh in the opposite balance, and we find an
+      unnecessary ostentation, a fanatical extravagance, and a certain insolent
+      sternness. But what are such offences&mdash;what the splendour of a
+      banquet, or the ceremony of Knighthood, or a few arrogant words, compared
+      with the vices of almost every prince who was his contemporary? This is
+      the way to judge character: we must compare men with men, and not with
+      ideals of what men should be. We look to the amazing benefits Rienzi
+      conferred upon his country. We ask his means, and see but his own
+      abilities. His treasury becomes impoverished&mdash;his enemies revolt&mdash;the
+      Church takes advantage of his weakness&mdash;he is excommunicated&mdash;the
+      soldiers refuse to fight&mdash;the People refuse to assist&mdash;the
+      Barons ravage the country&mdash;the ways are closed, the provisions are
+      cut off from Rome. (&ldquo;Allora le strade furo chiuse, li massari de la terre
+      non portavano grano, ogni die nasceva nuovo rumore.&rdquo;&mdash;&ldquo;Vita di Cola
+      di Rienzi&rdquo;, lib. i. cap. 37.) A handful of banditti enter the city&mdash;Rienzi
+      proposes to resist them&mdash;the People desert&mdash;he abdicates.
+      Rapine, Famine, Massacre, ensue&mdash;they who deserted regret, repent&mdash;yet
+      he is still unassisted, alone&mdash;now an exile, now a prisoner, his own
+      genius saves him from every peril, and restores him to greatness. He
+      returns, the Pope&rsquo;s Legate refuses him arms&mdash;the People refuse him
+      money. He re-establishes law and order, expels the tyrants, renounces his
+      former faults (this, the second period of his power, has been represented
+      by Gibbon and others as that of his principal faults, and he is evidently
+      at this time no favourite with his contemporaneous biographer; but looking
+      to what he did, we find amazing dexterity, prudence, and energy in the
+      most difficult crisis, and none of his earlier faults. It is true, that he
+      does not shew the same brilliant extravagance which, I suspect, dazzled
+      his contemporaries, more than his sounder qualities; but we find that in a
+      few weeks he had conquered all his powerful enemies&mdash;that his
+      eloquence was as great as ever&mdash;his promptitude greater&mdash;his
+      diligence indefatigable&mdash;his foresight unslumbering. &ldquo;He alone,&rdquo; says
+      the biographer, &ldquo;carried on the affairs of Rome, but his officials were
+      slothful and cold.&rdquo; This too, tortured by a painful disease&mdash;already&mdash;though
+      yet young&mdash;broken and infirm. The only charges against him, as
+      Senator, were the deaths of Montreal and Pandulfo di Guido, the imposition
+      of the gabelle, and the renunciation of his former habits of rigid
+      abstinence, for indulgence in wine and feasting. Of the first charges, the
+      reader has already been enabled to form a judgment. To the last, alas! the
+      reader must extend indulgence, and for it he may find excuse. We must
+      compassionate even more than condemn the man to whom excitement has become
+      nature, and who resorts to the physical stimulus or the momentary Lethe,
+      when the mental exhilarations of hope, youth, and glory, begin to desert
+      him. His alleged intemperance, however, which the Romans (a peculiarly
+      sober people) might perhaps exaggerate, and for which he gave the excuse
+      of a thirst produced by disease contracted in the dungeon of Avignon&mdash;evidently
+      and confessedly did not in the least diminish his attention to business,
+      which, according to his biographer, was at that time greater than ever.)&mdash;is
+      prudent, wary, provident&mdash;reigns a few weeks&mdash;taxes the People,
+      in support of the People, and is torn to pieces! One day of the rule that
+      followed is sufficient to vindicate his reign and avenge his memory&mdash;and
+      for centuries afterwards, whenever that wretched and degenerate populace
+      dreamed of glory or sighed for justice, they recalled the bright vision of
+      their own victim, and deplored the fate of Cola di Rienzi. That he was not
+      a tyrant is clear in this&mdash;when he was dead, he was bitterly
+      regretted. The People never regret a tyrant! From the unpopularity that
+      springs from other faults there is often a re-action; but there is no
+      re-action in the populace towards their betrayor or oppressor. A thousand
+      biographies cannot decide upon the faults or merits of a ruler like the
+      one fact, whether he is beloved or hated ten years after he is dead. But
+      if the ruler has been murdered by the People, and is then regretted by
+      them, their repentance is his acquittal.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      I have said that the moral of the Tribune&rsquo;s life, and of this fiction, is
+      not the stale and unprofitable moral that warns the ambition of an
+      individual:&mdash;More vast, more solemn, and more useful, it addresses
+      itself to nations. If I judge not erringly, it proclaims that, to be great
+      and free, a People must trust not to individuals but themselves&mdash;that
+      there is no sudden leap from servitude to liberty&mdash;that it is to
+      institutions, not to men, for they must look for reforms that last beyond
+      the hour&mdash;that their own passions are the real despots they should
+      subdue, their own reason the true regenerator of abuses. With a calm and a
+      noble people, the individual ambition of a citizen can never effect evil:&mdash;to
+      be impatient of chains, is not to be worthy of freedom&mdash;to murder a
+      magistrate is not to ameliorate the laws. (Rienzi was murdered because the
+      Romans had been in the habit of murdering whenever they were displeased.
+      They had, very shortly before, stoned one magistrate, and torn to pieces
+      another. By the same causes and the same career a People may be made to
+      resemble the bravo whose hand wanders to his knife at the smallest
+      affront, and if today he poniards the enemy who assaults him, tomorrow he
+      strikes the friend who would restrain.) The People write their own
+      condemnation whenever they use characters of blood; and theirs alone the
+      madness and the crime, if they crown a tyrant or butcher a victim.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      <a name="link2H_APPE2" id="link2H_APPE2">
+      <!--  H2 anchor --> </a>
+    </p>
+    <div style="height: 4em;">
+      <br /><br /><br /><br />
+    </div>
+    <h2>
+      Appendix II. A Word Upon the Work by Pere du Cerceau and Pere Brumoy,
+    </h2>
+    <h3>
+      Entitled &ldquo;Conjuration de Nicolas Gabrini, Dit de Rienzi, Tyran de Rome.&rdquo;
+     </h3>
+    <p>
+      Shortly after the Romance of &ldquo;Rienzi&rdquo; first appeared, a translation of the
+      biography compiled by Cerceau and Brumoy was published by Mr. Whittaker.
+      The translator, in a short and courteous advertisement, observes, &ldquo;That it
+      has always been considered as a work of authority; and even Gibbon appears
+      to have relied on it without further research: (Here, however, he does
+      injustice to Gibbon.)...that, &ldquo;as a record of facts, therefore, the work
+      will, it is presumed, be acceptable to the public.&rdquo; The translator has
+      fulfilled his duty with accuracy, elegance, and spirit,&mdash;and he must
+      forgive me, if, in justice to History and Rienzi, I point out a very few
+      from amongst a great many reasons, why the joint labour of the two worthy
+      Jesuits cannot be considered either a work of authority, or a record of
+      facts. The translator observes in his preface, &ldquo;that the general outline
+      (of Du Cerceau&rsquo;s work) was probably furnished by an Italian life written
+      by a contemporary of Rienzi.&rdquo; The fact, however, is, that Du Cerceau&rsquo;s
+      book is little more than a wretched paraphrase of that very Italian life
+      mentioned by the translator,&mdash;full of blunders, from ignorance of the
+      peculiar and antiquated dialect in which the original is written, and of
+      assumptions by the Jesuit himself, which rest upon no authority whatever.
+      I will first shew, in support of this assertion, what the Italians
+      themselves think of the work of Fathers Brumoy and Du Cerceau. The Signor
+      Zefirino Re, who had proved himself singularly and minutely acquainted
+      with the history of that time, and whose notes to the &ldquo;Life of Rienzi&rdquo; are
+      characterized by acknowledged acuteness and research, thus describes the
+      manner in which the two Jesuits compounded this valuable &ldquo;record of
+      facts.&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;Father Du Cerceau for his work made use of a French translation of the
+      life by the Italian contemporary printed in Bracciano, 1624, executed by
+      Father Sanadon, another Jesuit, from whom he received the MS. This proves
+      that Du Cerceau knew little of our &lsquo;volgar lingua&rsquo; of the fourteenth
+      century. But the errors into which he has run shew, that even that little
+      was unknown to his guide, and still less to Father Brumoy, (however
+      learned and reputed the latter might be in French literature,) who, after
+      the death of Du Cerceau, supplied the deficiencies in the first pages of
+      the author&rsquo;s MS., which were, I know not how, lost; and in this part are
+      found the more striking errors in the work, which shall be noticed in the
+      proper place; in the meantime, one specimen will suffice. In the third
+      chapter, book i., Cola, addressing the Romans, says, &lsquo;Che lo giubileo si
+      approssima, che se la gente, la quale verra al giubileo, li trova
+      sproveduti di annona, le pietre (per metatesi sta scritto le preite) ne
+      porteranno da Roma per rabbia di fame, e le pietre non basteranno a tanta
+      moltitudine. Il francese traduce. Le jubile approche, et vous n&rsquo;avez ni
+      provisions, ni vivres; les etrangers...trouvent votre ville denue de tout.
+      Ne comptez point sur les secours des gens d&rsquo;Eglise; ils sortiront de la
+      ville, s&rsquo;ils n&rsquo;y trouvent de quoi subsister: et d&rsquo;ailleurs pourroient-ils
+      suffire a la multitude innombrable, que se trouvera dans vos murs?&rsquo;&rdquo; (The
+      English translator could not fail to adopt the Frenchman&rsquo;s ludicrous
+      mistake.) &ldquo;Buon Dio!&rdquo; exclaims the learned Zefirino, &ldquo;Buon Dio! le pietre
+      prese per tanta gente di chiesa!&rdquo; (See Preface to Zefirino Re&rsquo;s edition of
+      the &ldquo;Life of Rienzi,&rdquo; page 9, note on Du Cerceau.)
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      Another blunder little less extraordinary occurs in Chapter vi., in which
+      the ordinances of Rienzi&rsquo;s Buono Stato are recited.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      It is set forth as the third ordinance:&mdash;&ldquo;Che nulla case di Roma sia
+      data per terra per alcuna cagione, ma vada in commune;&rdquo; which simply
+      means, that the houses of delinquents should in no instance be razed, but
+      added to the community or confiscated. This law being intended partly to
+      meet the barbarous violences with which the excesses and quarrels of the
+      Barons had half dismantled Rome, and principally to repeal some old penal
+      laws by which the houses of a certain class of offenders might be
+      destroyed; but the French translator construes it, &ldquo;Que nulle maison de
+      Rome ne saroit donnee en propre, pour quelque raison que ce put etre; mais
+      que les revenus en appartiendroient au public!&rdquo; (The English translator
+      makes this law unintelligible:&mdash;&ldquo;That no family of Rome shall
+      appropriate to their own use what they think fit, but that the revenues
+      shall appertain to the public&rdquo;!!!&mdash;the revenues of what?)
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      But enough of the blunders arising from ignorance.&mdash;I must now be
+      permitted to set before the reader a few of the graver offences of wilful
+      assumption and preposterous invention.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      When Rienzi condemned some of the Barons to death, the Pere thus writes; I
+      take the recent translation published by Mr. Whittaker:&mdash;
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;The next day the Tribune, resolving more than ever to rid himself of his
+      prisoners, ordered tapestries of two colours, red and white, to be laid
+      over the place whereon he held his councils, and which he had made choice
+      of to be the theatre of this bloody tragedy, as the extraordinary tapestry
+      seemed to declare. He afterwards sent a cordelier to every one of the
+      prisoners to administer the sacraments, and then ordered the Capitol bell
+      to be tolled. At that fatal sound and the sight of the confessors, the
+      Lords no longer doubted of sentence of death being passed upon them. They
+      all confessed except the old Colonna, and many received the communion. In
+      the meanwhile the people, naturally prompt to attend, when their first
+      impetuosity had time to calm, could not without pity behold the dismal
+      preparations which were making. The sight of the bloody colour in the
+      tapestry shocked them. On this first impression they joined in opinion in
+      relation to so many illustrious heads now going to be sacrificed, and
+      lamented more their unhappy catastrophe, as no crime had been proved upon
+      them to render them worthy of such barbarous treatment. Above all, the
+      unfortunate Stephen Colonna, whose birth, age, and affable behaviour,
+      commanded respect, excited a particular compassion. An universal silence
+      and sorrow reigned among them. Those who were nearest Rienzi discovered an
+      alteration. They took the opportunity of imploring his mercy towards the
+      prisoners in terms the most affecting and moving.&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      Will it be believed, that in the original from which the Pere Du Cerceau
+      borrows or rather imagines this touching recital, there is not a single
+      syllable about the pity of the people, nor their shock at the bloody
+      colours of the tapestry, nor their particular compassion for the
+      unfortunate Stephen Colonna?&mdash;in fine, the People are not even
+      mentioned at all. All that is said is, &ldquo;Some Roman citizens, (alcuni
+      cittadini Romani,) considering the judgment Rienzi was about to make,
+      interposed with soft and caressing words, and at last changed the opinion
+      of the Tribune;&rdquo; all the rest is the pure fiction of the ingenious
+      Frenchman! Again, Du Cerceau, describing the appearance of the Barons at
+      this fatal moment, says, &ldquo;Notwithstanding the grief and despair visible in
+      their countenances, they shewed a noble indignation, generally attendant
+      on innocence in the hour of death.&rdquo; What says the authority from which
+      alone, except his own, the good Father could take his account? Why, not a
+      word about this noble indignation, or this parade of innocence! The
+      original says simply, that &ldquo;the Barons were so frozen with terror that
+      they were unable to speak,&rdquo; (diventaso si gelati che non poteano
+      favellare;) &ldquo;that the greater part humbled themselves,&rdquo; (e prese penitenza
+      e comunione;) that when Rienzi addressed them &ldquo;all the Barons (come
+      dannati) stood in sadness.&rdquo; (See &ldquo;Vita di Cola di Rienzi&rdquo;, lib. i. cap.
+      29.) Du Cerceau then proceeds to state, that &ldquo;although he (Rienzi) was
+      grieved at heart to behold his victims snatched from him, he endeavoured
+      to make a merit of it in the eyes of the People.&rdquo; There is not a word of
+      this in the original!
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      So when Rienzi, on a latter occasion, placed the Prefect John di Vico in
+      prison, this Jesuit says, &ldquo;To put a gloss upon this action before the eyes
+      of the people, Rienzi gave out that the Governor, John di Vico, keeping a
+      correspondence with the conspirators, came with no other view than to
+      betray the Romans.&rdquo; And if this scribbler, who pretends to have consulted
+      the Vatican MSS., had looked at the most ordinary authorities, he would
+      have seen that John di Vico did come with that view. (See for Di Vico&rsquo;s
+      secret correspondence with the Barons, La Cron. Bologn. page 406; and La
+      Cron. Est. page 444.)
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      Again, in the battle between the Barons and the Romans at the gates, Du
+      Cerceau thus describes the conduct of the Tribune:&mdash;&ldquo;The Tribune,
+      amidst his troops, knew so little of what had passed, that seeing at a
+      distance one of his standards fall, he looked upon all as lost, and,
+      casting up his eyes to heaven full of despair, cried out, &lsquo;O God, will you
+      then forsake me?&rsquo; But no sooner was he informed of the entire defeat of
+      his enemies, than his dread and cowardice even turned to boldness and
+      arrogance.&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      Now in the original all that is said of this is, &ldquo;That it is true that the
+      standard of the Tribune fell&mdash;the Tribune astonished, (or if you
+      please, dismayed, sbigottio,) stood with his eyes raised to heaven, and
+      could find no other words than, &lsquo;O God hast thou betrayed me?&rsquo;&rdquo; This
+      evinced, perhaps, alarm or consternation at the fall of his standard&mdash;a
+      consternation natural, not to a coward, but a fanatic, at such an event.
+      But not a word is said about Rienzi&rsquo;s cowardice in the action itself; it
+      is not stated when the accident happened&mdash;nothing bears out the
+      implication that the Tribune was remote from the contest, and knew little
+      of what passed. And if this ignorant Frenchman had consulted any other
+      contemporaneous historian whatever, he would have found it asserted by
+      them all, that the fight was conducted with great valour, both by the
+      Roman populace and their leader on the one side, and the Barons on the
+      other.&mdash;G. Vill. lib. xii. cap. 105; Cron. Sen. tom. xv. Murat. page
+      119; Cron. Est. page 444. Yet Gibbon rests his own sarcasm on the
+      Tribune&rsquo;s courage solely on the baseless exaggeration of this Pere Du
+      Cerceau.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      So little, indeed, did this French pretender know of the history of the
+      time and place he treats of, that he imagines the Stephen Colonna who was
+      killed in the battle above-mentioned was the old Stephen Colonna, and is
+      very pathetic about his &ldquo;venerable appearance,&rdquo; &amp;c. This error, with
+      regard to a man so eminent as Stephen Colonna the elder, is inexcusable:
+      for, had the priest turned over the other pages of the very collection in
+      which he found the biography he deforms, he would have learned that old
+      Stephen Colonna was alive some time after that battle.&mdash;(Cron. Sen.
+      Murat. tom. xv. page 121.)
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      Again, just before Rienzi&rsquo;s expulsion from the office of Tribune, Du
+      Cerceau, translating in his headlong way the old biographer&rsquo;s account of
+      the causes of Rienzi&rsquo;s loss of popularity, says, &ldquo;He shut himself up in
+      his palace, and his presence was known only by the rigorous punishments
+      which he caused his agents to inflict upon the innocent.&rdquo; Not a word of
+      this in the original!
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      Again, after the expulsion, Du Cerceau says, that the Barons seized upon
+      the &ldquo;immense riches&rdquo; he had amassed,&mdash;the words in the original are,
+      &ldquo;grandi ornamenti,&rdquo; which are very different things from immense riches.
+      But the most remarkable sins of commission are in this person&rsquo;s account of
+      the second rise and fall of Rienzi under the title of Senator. Of this I
+      shall give but one instance:&mdash;
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;The Senator, who perceived it, became only the more cruel. His jealousies
+      produced only fresh murders. In the continual dread he was in, that the
+      general discontent would terminate in some secret attempt upon his person,
+      he determined to intimidate the most enterprising, by sacrificing
+      sometimes one, sometimes another, and chiefly those whose riches rendered
+      them the more guilty in his eyes. Numbers were sent every day to the
+      Capitol prison. Happy were those who could get off with the confiscation
+      of their estates.&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      Of these grave charges there is not a syllable in the original! And so
+      much for the work of Pere Cerceau and Pere Brumoy, by virtue of which,
+      historians have written of the life and times of Rienzi, and upon the
+      figments of which, the most remarkable man in an age crowded with great
+      characters is judged by the general reader!
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      I must be pardoned for this criticism, which might not have been
+      necessary, had not the work to which it relates, in the English
+      translation quoted from, (a translation that has no faults but those of
+      the French original,) been actually received as an historical and
+      indisputable authority, and opposed with a triumphant air to some passages
+      in my own narrative which were literally taken from the authentic records
+      of the time.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      <br /> <br />
+    </p>
+<pre xml:space="preserve">
+
+
+
+
+
+End of the Project Gutenberg EBook of Rienzi, by Edward Bulwer Lytton
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+</pre>
+  </body>
+</html>
diff --git a/old/1396.txt b/old/1396.txt
new file mode 100644
index 0000000..548554d
--- /dev/null
+++ b/old/1396.txt
@@ -0,0 +1,20167 @@
+The Project Gutenberg EBook of Rienzi, by Edward Bulwer Lytton
+
+This eBook is for the use of anyone anywhere at no cost and with
+almost no restrictions whatsoever.  You may copy it, give it away or
+re-use it under the terms of the Project Gutenberg License included
+with this eBook or online at www.gutenberg.org
+
+
+Title: Rienzi
+
+Author: Edward Bulwer Lytton
+
+Release Date: February 15, 2006 [EBook #1396]
+
+Language: English
+
+Character set encoding: ASCII
+
+*** START OF THIS PROJECT GUTENBERG EBOOK RIENZI ***
+
+
+
+
+Produced by Sue Asscher and David Widger
+
+
+
+
+
+RIENZI,
+
+The Last of the Roman Tribunes
+
+
+by
+
+Sir Edward Bulwer Lytton, Bart.
+
+     Then turn we to her latest Tribune's name,
+     From her ten thousand tyrants turn to thee,
+     Redeemer of dark centuries of shame--
+     The friend of Petrarch--hope of Italy--
+     Rienzi, last of Romans!  While the tree
+     Of Freedom's wither'd trunk puts forth a leaf,
+     Even for thy tomb a garland let it be--
+     The Forum's champion, and the People's chief--
+     Her new-born Numa thou!
+
+     Childe Harold, cant. iv. stanza 114.
+
+
+     Amidst the indulgence of enthusiasm and eloquence, Petrarch,
+     Italy, and Europe, were astonished by a revolution, which
+     realized for a moment his most splendid visions.--Gibbon,
+     chap. 1xx.
+
+
+Dedication of Rienzi.
+
+To Alessandro Manzoni, as to the Genius of the Place,
+
+Are Dedicated These Fruits, gathered on The Soil of Italian Fiction.
+
+London, Dec. 1, 1835.
+
+
+
+Dedication,
+
+Prefixed to the First Collected Edition of the Author's Works in 1840.
+
+My Dear Mother,
+
+In inscribing with your beloved and honoured name this Collection of my
+Works, I could wish that the fruits of my manhood were worthier of the
+tender and anxious pains bestowed upon my education in youth.
+
+Left yet young, and with no ordinary accomplishments and gifts, the sole
+guardian of your sons, to them you devoted the best years of your useful
+and spotless life; and any success it be their fate to attain in the
+paths they have severally chosen, would have its principal sweetness
+in the thought that such success was the reward of one whose hand aided
+every struggle, and whose heart sympathized in every care.
+
+From your graceful and accomplished taste, I early learned that
+affection for literature which has exercised so large an influence
+over the pursuits of my life; and you who were my first guide, were my
+earliest critic. Do you remember the summer days, which seemed to me
+so short, when you repeated to me those old ballads with which Percy
+revived the decaying spirit of our national muse, or the smooth couplets
+of Pope, or those gentle and polished verses with the composition of
+which you had beguiled your own earlier leisure? It was those easy
+lessons, far more than the harsher rudiments learned subsequently
+in schools, that taught me to admire and to imitate; and in them I
+recognise the germ of the flowers, however perishable they be, that I
+now bind up and lay upon a shrine hallowed by a thousand memories of
+unspeakable affection. Happy, while I borrowed from your taste, could I
+have found it not more difficult to imitate your virtues--your spirit of
+active and extended benevolence, your cheerful piety, your considerate
+justice, your kindly charity--and all the qualities that brighten a
+nature more free from the thought of self, than any it has been my lot
+to meet with. Never more than at this moment did I wish that my writings
+were possessed of a merit which might outlive my time, so that at least
+these lines might remain a record of the excellence of the Mother, and
+the gratitude of the Son.
+
+E.L.B. London: January 6, 1840.
+
+
+
+Preface
+
+to
+
+The First Edition of Rienzi.
+
+I began this tale two years ago at Rome. On removing to Naples, I
+threw it aside for "The Last Days of Pompeii," which required more
+than "Rienzi" the advantage of residence within reach of the scenes
+described. The fate of the Roman Tribune continued, however, to haunt
+and impress me, and, some time after "Pompeii" was published, I renewed
+my earlier undertaking. I regarded the completion of these volumes,
+indeed, as a kind of duty;--for having had occasion to read the original
+authorities from which modern historians have drawn their accounts of
+the life of Rienzi, I was led to believe that a very remarkable man had
+been superficially judged, and a very important period crudely examined.
+(See Appendix, Nos. I and II.) And this belief was sufficiently strong
+to induce me at first to meditate a more serious work upon the life and
+times of Rienzi. (I have adopted the termination of Rienzi instead of
+Rienzo, as being more familiar to the general reader.--But the latter
+is perhaps the more accurate reading, since the name was a popular
+corruption from Lorenzo.) Various reasons concurred against this
+project--and I renounced the biography to commence the fiction. I have
+still, however, adhered, with a greater fidelity than is customary
+in Romance, to all the leading events of the public life of the Roman
+Tribune; and the Reader will perhaps find in these pages a more full
+and detailed account of the rise and fall of Rienzi, than in any English
+work of which I am aware. I have, it is true, taken a view of his
+character different in some respects from that of Gibbon or Sismondi.
+But it is a view, in all its main features, which I believe (and think I
+could prove) myself to be warranted in taking, not less by the facts of
+History than the laws of Fiction. In the meanwhile, as I have given the
+facts from which I have drawn my interpretation of the principal agent,
+the reader has sufficient data for his own judgment. In the picture of
+the Roman Populace, as in that of the Roman Nobles of the fourteenth
+century, I follow literally the descriptions left to us;--they are not
+flattering, but they are faithful, likenesses.
+
+Preserving generally the real chronology of Rienzi's life, the plot of
+this work extends over a space of some years, and embraces the variety
+of characters necessary to a true delineation of events. The story,
+therefore, cannot have precisely that order of interest found in
+fictions strictly and genuinely dramatic, in which (to my judgment at
+least) the time ought to be as limited as possible, and the characters
+as few;--no new character of importance to the catastrophe being
+admissible towards the end of the work. If I may use the word Epic in
+its most modest and unassuming acceptation, this Fiction, in short,
+though indulging in dramatic situations, belongs, as a whole, rather to
+the Epic than the Dramatic school.
+
+I cannot conclude without rendering the tribute of my praise and homage
+to the versatile and gifted Author of the beautiful Tragedy of Rienzi.
+Considering that our hero be the same--considering that we had the same
+materials from which to choose our several stories--I trust I shall
+be found to have little, if at all, trespassed upon ground previously
+occupied. With the single exception of a love-intrigue between a
+relative of Rienzi and one of the antagonist party, which makes the
+plot of Miss Mitford's Tragedy, and is little more than an episode in my
+Romance, having slight effect on the conduct and none on the fate of the
+hero, I am not aware of any resemblance between the two works; and even
+this coincidence I could easily have removed, had I deemed it the least
+advisable:--but it would be almost discreditable if I had nothing that
+resembled a performance possessing so much it were an honour to imitate.
+
+In fact, the prodigal materials of the story--the rich and exuberant
+complexities of Rienzi's character--joined to the advantage possessed by
+the Novelist of embracing all that the Dramatist must reject (Thus the
+slender space permitted to the Dramatist does not allow Miss Mitford to
+be very faithful to facts; to distinguish between Rienzi's earlier and
+his later period of power; or to detail the true, but somewhat intricate
+causes of his rise, his splendour, and his fall.)--are sufficient to
+prevent Dramatist and Novelist from interfering with each other.
+
+London, December 1, 1835.
+
+
+Preface to the Present Edition, 1848.
+
+From the time of its first appearance, "Rienzi" has had the good fortune
+to rank high amongst my most popular works--though its interest is
+rather drawn from a faithful narration of historical facts, than from
+the inventions of fancy. And the success of this experiment confirms me
+in my belief, that the true mode of employing history in the service
+of romance, is to study diligently the materials as history; conform to
+such views of the facts as the Author would adopt, if he related them
+in the dry character of historian; and obtain that warmer interest which
+fiction bestows, by tracing the causes of the facts in the characters
+and emotions of the personages of the time. The events of his work are
+thus already shaped to his hand--the characters already created--what
+remains for him, is the inner, not outer, history of man--the chronicle
+of the human heart; and it is by this that he introduces a new harmony
+between character and event, and adds the completer solution of what is
+actual and true, by those speculations of what is natural and probable,
+which are out of the province of history, but belong especially to the
+philosophy of romance. And--if it be permitted the tale-teller to come
+reverently for instruction in his art to the mightiest teacher of all,
+who, whether in the page or on the scene, would give to airy fancies the
+breath and the form of life,--such, we may observe, is the lesson the
+humblest craftsman in historical romance may glean from the Historical
+Plays of Shakespeare. Necessarily, Shakespeare consulted history
+according to the imperfect lights, and from the popular authorities, of
+his age; and I do not say, therefore, that as an historian we can rely
+upon Shakespeare as correct. But to that in which he believed he rigidly
+adhered; nor did he seek, as lesser artists (such as Victor Hugo and his
+disciples) seek now, to turn perforce the Historical into the Poetical,
+but leaving history as he found it, to call forth from its arid prose
+the flower of the latent poem. Nay, even in the more imaginative plays
+which he has founded upon novels and legends popular in his time, it is
+curious and instructive to see how little he has altered the original
+ground-work--taking for granted the main materials of the story, and
+reserving all his matchless resources of wisdom and invention, to
+illustrate from mental analysis, the creations whose outline he was
+content to borrow. He receives, as a literal fact not to be altered,
+the somewhat incredible assertion of the novelist, that the pure and
+delicate and highborn Venetian loves the swarthy Moor--and that Romeo
+fresh from his "woes for Rosaline," becomes suddenly enamoured of
+Juliet: He found the Improbable, and employed his art to make it
+truthful.
+
+That "Rienzi" should have attracted peculiar attention in Italy, is of
+course to be attributed to the choice of the subject rather than to the
+skill of the Author. It has been translated into the Italian language by
+eminent writers; and the authorities for the new view of Rienzi's times
+and character which the Author deemed himself warranted to take, have
+been compared with his text by careful critics and illustrious scholars,
+in those states in which the work has been permitted to circulate. (In
+the Papal States, I believe, it was neither, prudently nor effectually,
+proscribed.) I may say, I trust without unworthy pride, that the result
+has confirmed the accuracy of delineations which English readers relying
+only on the brilliant but disparaging account in Gibbon deemed too
+favourable; and has tended to restore the great Tribune to his long
+forgotten claims to the love and reverence of the Italian land. Nor, if
+I may trust to the assurances that have reached me from many now engaged
+in the aim of political regeneration, has the effect of that revival of
+the honours due to a national hero, leading to the ennobling study
+of great examples, been wholly without its influence upon the rising
+generation of Italian youth, and thereby upon those stirring events
+which have recently drawn the eyes of Europe to the men and the lands
+beyond the Alps.
+
+In preparing for the Press this edition of a work illustrative of the
+exertions of a Roman, in advance of his time, for the political freedom
+of his country, and of those struggles between contending principles,
+of which Italy was the most stirring field in the Middle Ages, it is not
+out of place or season to add a few sober words, whether as a student of
+the Italian Past, or as an observer, with some experience of the social
+elements of Italy as it now exists, upon the state of affairs in that
+country.
+
+It is nothing new to see the Papal Church in the capacity of a popular
+reformer, and in contra-position to the despotic potentates of the
+several states, as well as to the German Emperor, who nominally inherits
+the sceptre of the Caesars. Such was its common character under its more
+illustrious Pontiffs; and the old Republics of Italy grew up under the
+shadow of the Papal throne, harbouring ever two factions--the one for
+the Emperor, the one for the Pope--the latter the more naturally
+allied to Italian independence. On the modern stage, we almost see the
+repetition of many an ancient drama. But the past should teach us to
+doubt the continuous and stedfast progress of any single line of policy
+under a principality so constituted as that of the Papal Church--a
+principality in which no race can be perpetuated, in which no objects
+can be permanent; in which the successor is chosen by a select
+ecclesiastical synod, under a variety of foreign as well as of national
+influences; in which the chief usually ascends the throne at an age
+that ill adapts his mind to the idea of human progress, and the active
+direction of mundane affairs;--a principality in which the peculiar
+sanctity that wraps the person of the Sovereign exonerates him from
+the healthful liabilities of a power purely temporal, and directly
+accountable to Man. A reforming Pope is a lucky accident, and dull
+indeed must be the brain which believes in the possibility of a long
+succession of reforming Popes, or which can regard as other than
+precarious and unstable the discordant combination of a constitutional
+government with an infallible head.
+
+It is as true as it is trite that political freedom is not the growth of
+a day--it is not a flower without a stalk, and it must gradually develop
+itself from amidst the unfolding leaves of kindred institutions.
+
+In one respect, the Austrian domination, fairly considered, has been
+beneficial to the States over which it has been directly exercised, and
+may be even said to have unconsciously schooled them to the capacity for
+freedom. In those States the personal rights which depend on impartial
+and incorrupt administration of the law, are infinitely more secure than
+in most of the Courts of Italy. Bribery, which shamefully predominates
+in the judicature of certain Principalities, is as unknown in the
+juridical courts of Austrian Italy as in England. The Emperor himself is
+often involved in legal disputes with a subject, and justice is as
+free and as firm for the humblest suitor, as if his antagonist were his
+equal. Austria, indeed, but holds together the motley and inharmonious
+members of its vast domain on either side the Alps, by a general
+character of paternal mildness and forbearance in all that great
+circle of good government which lies without the one principle of
+constitutional liberty. It asks but of its subjects to submit to be well
+governed--without agitating the question "how and by what means that
+government is carried on." For every man, except the politician, the
+innovator, Austria is no harsh stepmother. But it is obviously clear
+that the better in other respects the administration of a state it does
+but foster the more the desire for that political security, which is
+only found in constitutional freedom: the reverence paid to personal
+rights, but begets the passion for political; and under a mild despotism
+are already half matured the germs of a popular constitution. But it is
+still a grave question whether Italy is ripe for self-government--and
+whether, were it possible that the Austrian domination could be shaken
+off--the very passions so excited, the very bloodshed so poured forth,
+would not ultimately place the larger portion of Italy under auspices
+less favourable to the sure growth of freedom, than those which silently
+brighten under the sway of the German Caesar.
+
+The two kingdoms, at the opposite extremes of Italy, to which
+circumstance and nature seem to assign the main ascendancy, are Naples
+and Sardinia. Looking to the former, it is impossible to discover on
+the face of the earth a country more adapted for commercial prosperity.
+Nature formed it as the garden of Europe, and the mart of the
+Mediterranean. Its soil and climate could unite the products of the East
+with those of the Western hemisphere. The rich island of Sicily should
+be the great corn granary of the modern nations as it was of the
+ancient; the figs, the olives, the oranges, of both the Sicilies, under
+skilful cultivation, should equal the produce of Spain and the Orient,
+and the harbours of the kingdom (the keys to three-quarters of the
+globe) should be crowded with the sails and busy with the life of
+commerce. But, in the character of its population, Naples has been
+invariably in the rear of Italian progress; it caught but partial
+inspiration from the free Republics, or even the wise Tyrannies, of the
+Middle Ages; the theatre of frequent revolutions without fruit; and
+all rational enthusiasm created by that insurrection, which has lately
+bestowed on Naples the boon of a representative system, cannot but be
+tempered by the conviction that of all the States in Italy, this is the
+one which least warrants the belief of permanence to political freedom,
+or of capacity to retain with vigour what may be seized by passion. (If
+the Electoral Chamber in the new Neapolitan Constitution, give a
+fair share of members to the Island of Sicily, it will be rich in
+the inevitable elements of discord, and nothing save a wisdom and
+moderation, which cannot soberly be anticipated, can prevent the
+ultimate separation of the island from the dominion of Naples. Nature
+has set the ocean between the two countries--but differences in
+character, and degree and quality of civilisation--national jealousies,
+historical memories, have trebled the space of the seas that roll
+between them.--More easy to unite under one free Parliament, Spain
+with Flanders; or re-annex to England its old domains of Aquitaine
+and Normandy--than to unite in one Council Chamber truly popular, the
+passions, interests, and prejudices of Sicily and Naples.--Time will
+show.)
+
+Far otherwise is it, with Sardinia. Many years since, the writer of
+these pages ventured to predict that the time must come when Sardinia
+would lead the van of Italian civilisation, and take proud place amongst
+the greater nations of Europe. In the great portion of this population
+there is visible the new blood of a young race; it is not, as with other
+Italian States, a worn-out stock; you do not see there a people
+fallen, proud of the past, and lazy amidst ruins, but a people rising,
+practical, industrious, active; there, in a word, is an eager youth to
+be formed to mature development, not a decrepit age to be restored to
+bloom and muscle. Progress is the great characteristic of the Sardinian
+state. Leave it for five years; visit it again, and you behold
+improvement. When you enter the kingdom and find, by the very skirts of
+its admirable roads, a raised footpath for the passengers and travellers
+from town to town, you become suddenly aware that you are in a land
+where close attention to the humbler classes is within the duties of
+a government. As you pass on from the more purely Italian part of
+the population,--from the Genoese country into that of Piedmont,--the
+difference between a new people and an old, on which I have dwelt,
+becomes visible in the improved cultivation of the soil, the better
+habitations of the labourer, the neater aspect of the towns, the greater
+activity in the thoroughfares. To the extraordinary virtues of the
+King, as King, justice is scarcely done, whether in England or abroad.
+Certainly, despite his recent concessions, Charles Albert is not and
+cannot be at heart, much of a constitutional reformer; and his strong
+religious tendencies, which, perhaps unjustly, have procured him in
+philosophical quarters the character of a bigot, may link him more than
+his political, with the cause of the Father of his Church. But he is
+nobly and preeminently national, careful of the prosperity and jealous
+of the honour of his own state, while conscientiously desirous of the
+independence of Italy. His attention to business, is indefatigable.
+Nothing escapes his vigilance. Over all departments of the kingdom is
+the eye of a man ever anxious to improve. Already the silk manufactures
+of Sardinia almost rival those of Lyons: in their own departments the
+tradesmen of Turin exhibit an artistic elegance and elaborate finish,
+scarcely exceeded in the wares of London and Paris. The King's internal
+regulations are admirable; his laws, administered with the most
+impartial justice--his forts and defences are in that order, without
+which, at least on the Continent, no land is safe--his army is the most
+perfect in Italy. His wise genius extends itself to the elegant as to
+the useful arts--an encouragement that shames England, and even France,
+is bestowed upon the School for Painters, which has become one of the
+ornaments of his illustrious reign. The character of the main part of
+the population, and the geographical position of his country, assist the
+monarch and must force on himself, or his successors, in the career
+of improvement so signally begun. In the character of the people, the
+vigour of the Northman ennobles the ardour and fancy of the West. In
+the position of the country, the public mind is brought into constant
+communication with the new ideas in the free lands of Europe.
+Civilisation sets in direct currents towards the streets and marts of
+Turin. Whatever the result of the present crisis in Italy, no power
+and no chance which statesmen can predict, can preclude Sardinia from
+ultimately heading all that is best in Italy. The King may improve his
+present position, or peculiar prejudices, inseparable perhaps from the
+heritage of absolute monarchy, and which the raw and rude councils of
+an Electoral Chamber, newly called into life, must often irritate and
+alarm, may check his own progress towards the master throne of the
+Ausonian land. But the people themselves, sooner or later, will do the
+work of the King. And in now looking round Italy for a race worthy of
+Rienzi, and able to accomplish his proud dreams, I see but one for which
+the time is ripe or ripening, and I place the hopes of Italy in the men
+of Piedmont and Sardinia.
+
+London, February 14, 1848.
+
+
+
+
+RIENZI, The Last of the Tribunes.
+
+
+
+
+BOOK I. -- THE TIME, THE PLACE, AND THE MEN.
+
+"_Fu da sua gioventudine nutricato di latte di eloquenza; buono
+grammatico, megliore rettorico, autorista buono...Oh, come spesso
+diceva, 'Dove sono questi buoni Romani? Dov'e loro somma giustizia?
+Poterommi trovare in tempo che questi fioriscano?' Era bell
+'omo...Accadde che uno suo frate fu ucciso, e non ne fu fatta vendetta
+di sua morte: non lo poteo aiutare; pensa lungo mano vendicare 'l
+sangue di suo frate; pensa lunga mano dirizzare la cittate di Roma male
+guidata_."--"Vita di Cola di Rienzi" Ed. 1828. Forli.
+
+"From his youth he was nourished with the milk of eloquence; a good
+grammarian, a better rhetorician, well versed in the writings of
+authors...Oh, how often would he say, 'Where are those good Romans?
+Where is their supreme justice? Shall I ever behold such times as those
+in which they flourished?' He was a handsome man...It happened that a
+brother of his was slain, and no retribution was made for his death:
+he could not help him; long did he ponder how to avenge his brother's
+blood; long did he ponder how to direct the ill guided state of
+Rome."--"Life of Cola di Rienzi."
+
+
+
+Chapter 1.I. The Brothers.
+
+The celebrated name which forms the title to this work will sufficiently
+apprise the reader that it is in the earlier half of the fourteenth
+century that my story opens.
+
+It was on a summer evening that two youths might be seen walking beside
+the banks of the Tiber, not far from that part of its winding course
+which sweeps by the base of Mount Aventine. The path they had selected
+was remote and tranquil. It was only at a distance that were seen the
+scattered and squalid houses that bordered the river, from amidst which
+rose, dark and frequent, the high roof and enormous towers which marked
+the fortified mansion of some Roman baron. On one side of the river,
+behind the cottages of the fishermen, soared Mount Janiculum, dark with
+massive foliage, from which gleamed at frequent intervals, the grey
+walls of many a castellated palace, and the spires and columns of a
+hundred churches; on the other side, the deserted Aventine rose abrupt
+and steep, covered with thick brushwood; while, on the height, from
+concealed but numerous convents, rolled, not unmusically, along the
+quiet landscape and the rippling waves, the sound of the holy bell.
+
+Of the young men introduced in this scene, the elder, who might have
+somewhat passed his twentieth year, was of a tall and even commanding
+stature; and there was that in his presence remarkable and almost noble,
+despite the homeliness of his garb, which consisted of the long, loose
+gown and the plain tunic, both of dark-grey serge, which distinguished,
+at that time, the dress of the humbler scholars who frequented the
+monasteries for such rude knowledge as then yielded a scanty return for
+intense toil. His countenance was handsome, and would have been rather
+gay than thoughtful in its expression, but for that vague and abstracted
+dreaminess of eye which so usually denotes a propensity to revery and
+contemplation, and betrays that the past or the future is more congenial
+to the mind than the enjoyment and action of the present hour.
+
+The younger, who was yet a boy, had nothing striking in his appearance
+or countenance, unless an expression of great sweetness and gentleness
+could be so called; and there was something almost feminine in the
+tender deference with which he appeared to listen to his companion.
+His dress was that usually worn by the humbler classes, though somewhat
+neater, perhaps, and newer; and the fond vanity of a mother might be
+detected in the care with which the long and silky ringlets had been
+smoothed and parted as they escaped from his cap and flowed midway down
+his shoulders.
+
+As they thus sauntered on, beside the whispering reeds of the river,
+each with his arm round the form of his comrade, there was a grace
+in the bearing, in the youth, and in the evident affection of the
+brothers--for such their connexion--which elevated the lowliness of
+their apparent condition.
+
+"Dear brother," said the elder, "I cannot express to thee how I enjoy
+these evening hours. To you alone I feel as if I were not a mere
+visionary and idler when I talk of the uncertain future, and build up my
+palaces of the air. Our parents listen to me as if I were uttering fine
+things out of a book; and my dear mother, Heaven bless her! wipes her
+eyes, and says, 'Hark, what a scholar he is!' As for the monks, if I
+ever dare look from my Livy, and cry 'Thus should Rome be again!' they
+stare, and gape, and frown, as though I had broached an heresy. But you,
+sweet brother, though you share not my studies, sympathize so kindly
+with all their results--you seem so to approve my wild schemes, and to
+encourage my ambitious hopes--that sometimes I forget our birth, our
+fortunes, and think and dare as if no blood save that of the Teuton
+Emperor flowed through our veins."
+
+"Methinks, dear Cola," said the younger brother, "that Nature played us
+an unfair trick--to you she transmitted the royal soul, derived from
+our father's parentage; and to me only the quiet and lowly spirit of my
+mother's humble lineage."
+
+"Nay," answered Cola, quickly, "you would then have the brighter
+share,--for I should have but the Barbarian origin, and you the Roman.
+Time was, when to be a simple Roman was to be nobler than a northern
+king.--Well, well, we may live to see great changes!"
+
+"I shall live to see thee a great man, and that will content me," said
+the younger, smiling affectionately; "a great scholar all confess you
+to be already: our mother predicts your fortunes every time she hears of
+your welcome visits to the Colonna."
+
+"The Colonna!" said Cola, with a bitter smile; "the Colonna--the
+pedants!--They affect, dull souls, the knowledge of the past, play the
+patron, and misquote Latin over their cups! They are pleased to welcome
+me at their board, because the Roman doctors call me learned, and
+because Nature gave me a wild wit, which to them is pleasanter than the
+stale jests of a hired buffoon. Yes, they would advance my fortunes--but
+how? by some place in the public offices, which would fill a dishonoured
+coffer, by wringing, yet more sternly, the hard-earned coins from our
+famishing citizens! If there be a vile thing in the world, it is a
+plebeian, advanced by patricians, not for the purpose of righting his
+own order, but for playing the pander to the worst interests of theirs.
+He who is of the people but makes himself a traitor to his birth, if he
+furnishes the excuse for these tyrant hypocrites to lift up their hands
+and cry--'See what liberty exists in Rome, when we, the patricians, thus
+elevate a plebeian!' Did they ever elevate a plebeian if he sympathized
+with plebeians? No, brother; should I be lifted above our condition, I
+will be raised by the arms of my countrymen, and not upon their necks."
+
+"All I hope, is, Cola, that you will not, in your zeal for your
+fellow-citizens, forget how dear you are to us. No greatness could ever
+reconcile me to the thought that it brought you danger."
+
+"And I could laugh at all danger, if it led to greatness. But
+greatness--greatness! Vain dream! Let us keep it for our night sleep.
+Enough of my plans; now, dearest brother, of yours."
+
+And, with the sanguine and cheerful elasticity which belonged to him,
+the young Cola, dismissing all wilder thoughts, bent his mind to listen,
+and to enter into, the humbler projects of his brother. The new boat and
+the holiday dress, and the cot removed to a quarter more secure from the
+oppression of the barons, and such distant pictures of love as a dark
+eye and a merry lip conjure up to the vague sentiments of a boy;--to
+schemes and aspirations of which such objects made the limit, did the
+scholar listen, with a relaxed brow and a tender smile; and often, in
+later life, did that conversation occur to him, when he shrank from
+asking his own heart which ambition was the wiser.
+
+"And then," continued the younger brother, "by degrees I might save
+enough to purchase such a vessel as that which we now see, laden,
+doubtless, with corn and merchandise, bringing--oh, such a good
+return--that I could fill your room with books, and never hear you
+complain that you were not rich enough to purchase some crumbling old
+monkish manuscript. Ah, that would make me so happy!" Cola smiled as he
+pressed his brother closer to his breast.
+
+"Dear boy," said he, "may it rather be mine to provide for your wishes!
+Yet methinks the masters of yon vessel have no enviable possession,
+see how anxiously the men look round, and behind, and before: peaceful
+traders though they be, they fear, it seems, even in this city (once the
+emporium of the civilised world), some pirate in pursuit; and ere the
+voyage be over, they may find that pirate in a Roman noble. Alas, to
+what are we reduced!"
+
+The vessel thus referred to was speeding rapidly down the river, and
+some three or four armed men on deck were indeed intently surveying the
+quiet banks on either side, as if anticipating a foe. The bark soon,
+however, glided out of sight, and the brothers fell back upon those
+themes which require only the future for a text to become attractive to
+the young.
+
+At length, as the evening darkened, they remembered that it was past the
+usual hour in which they returned home, and they began to retrace their
+steps.
+
+"Stay," said Cola, abruptly, "how our talk has beguiled me! Father
+Uberto promised me a rare manuscript, which the good friar confesses
+hath puzzled the whole convent. I was to seek his cell for it this
+evening. Tarry here a few minutes, it is but half-way up the Aventine. I
+shall soon return."
+
+"Can I not accompany you?"
+
+"Nay," returned Cola, with considerate kindness, "you have borne toil
+all the day, and must be wearied; my labours of the body, at least, have
+been light enough. You are delicate, too, and seem fatigued already; the
+rest will refresh you. I shall not be long."
+
+The boy acquiesced, though he rather wished to accompany his brother;
+but he was of a meek and yielding temper, and seldom resisted the
+lightest command of those he loved. He sat him down on a little bank by
+the river-side, and the firm step and towering form of his brother were
+soon hid from his gaze by the thick and melancholy foliage.
+
+At first he sat very quietly, enjoying the cool air, and thinking over
+all the stories of ancient Rome that his brother had told him in their
+walk. At length he recollected that his little sister, Irene, had begged
+him to bring her home some flowers; and, gathering such as he could find
+at hand (and many a flower grew, wild and clustering, over that desolate
+spot), he again seated himself, and began weaving them into one of those
+garlands for which the southern peasantry still retain their ancient
+affection, and something of their classic skill.
+
+While the boy was thus engaged, the tramp of horses and the loud
+shouting of men were heard at a distance. They came near, and nearer.
+
+"Some baron's procession, perhaps, returning from a feast," thought the
+boy. "It will be a pretty sight--their white plumes and scarlet mantles!
+I love to see such sights, but I will just move out of their way."
+
+So, still mechanically platting his garland, but with eyes turned
+towards the quarter of the expected procession, the young Roman moved
+yet nearer towards the river.
+
+Presently the train came in view,--a gallant company, in truth; horsemen
+in front, riding two abreast, where the path permitted, their steeds
+caparisoned superbly, their plumes waving gaily, and the gleam of their
+corselets glittering through the shades of the dusky twilight. A large
+and miscellaneous crowd, all armed, some with pikes and mail, others
+with less warlike or worse fashioned weapons, followed the cavaliers;
+and high above plume and pike floated the blood-red banner of the
+Orsini, with the motto and device (in which was ostentatiously displayed
+the Guelfic badge of the keys of St. Peter) wrought in burnished gold.
+A momentary fear crossed the boy's mind, for at that time, and in that
+city, a nobleman begirt with his swordsmen was more dreaded than a wild
+beast by the plebeians; but it was already too late to fly--the train
+were upon him.
+
+"Ho, boy!" cried the leader of the horsemen, Martino di Porto, one of
+the great House of the Orsini; "hast thou seen a boat pass up the
+river?--But thou must have seen it--how long since?"
+
+"I saw a large boat about half an hour ago," answered the boy, terrified
+by the rough voice and imperious bearing of the cavalier.
+
+"Sailing right a-head, with a green flag at the stern?"
+
+"The same, noble sir."
+
+"On, then! we will stop her course ere the moon rise," said the baron.
+"On!--let the boy go with us, lest he prove traitor, and alarm the
+Colonna."
+
+"An Orsini, an Orsini," shouted the multitude; "on, on!" and, despite
+the prayers and remonstrances of the boy, he was placed in the
+thickest of the crowd, and borne, or rather dragged along with the
+rest--frightened, breathless, almost weeping, with his poor little
+garland still hanging on his arm, while a sling was thrust into his
+unwilling hand. Still he felt, through all his alarm, a kind of childish
+curiosity to see the result of the pursuit.
+
+By the loud and eager conversation of those about him, he learned that
+the vessel he had seen contained a supply of corn destined to a fortress
+up the river held by the Colonna, then at deadly feud with the Orsini;
+and it was the object of the expedition in which the boy had been thus
+lucklessly entrained to intercept the provision, and divert it to
+the garrison of Martino di Porto. This news somewhat increased his
+consternation, for the boy belonged to a family that claimed the
+patronage of the Colonna.
+
+Anxiously and tearfully he looked with every moment up the steep ascent
+of the Aventine; but his guardian, his protector, still delayed his
+appearance.
+
+They had now proceeded some way, when a winding in the road brought
+suddenly before them the object of their pursuit, as, seen by the light
+of the earliest stars, it scudded rapidly down the stream.
+
+"Now, the Saints be blest!" quoth the chief; "she is ours!"
+
+"Hold!" said a captain (a German) riding next to Martino, in a half
+whisper; "I hear sounds which I like not, by yonder trees--hark! The
+neigh of a horse!--by my faith, too, there is the gleam of a corselet."
+
+"Push on, my masters," cried Martino; "the heron shall not balk the
+eagle--push on!"
+
+With renewed shouts, those on foot pushed forward, till, as they had
+nearly gained the copse referred to by the German, a small compact body
+of horsemen, armed cap-a-pie, dashed from amidst the trees, and, with
+spears in their rests, charged into the ranks of the pursuers.
+
+"A Colonna! a Colonna!" "An Orsini! an Orsini!" were shouts loudly
+and fiercely interchanged. Martino di Porto, a man of great bulk and
+ferocity, and his cavaliers, who were chiefly German Mercenaries, met
+the encounter unshaken. "Beware the bear's hug," cried the Orsini, as
+down went his antagonist, rider and steed, before his lance.
+
+The contest was short and fierce; the complete armour of the horsemen
+protected them on either side from wounds,--not so unscathed fared the
+half-armed foot-followers of the Orsini, as they pressed, each pushed on
+by the other, against the Colonna. After a shower of stones and darts,
+which fell but as hailstones against the thick mail of the horsemen,
+they closed in, and, by their number, obstructed the movements of the
+steeds, while the spear, sword, and battle-axe of their opponents made
+ruthless havoc amongst their undisciplined ranks. And Martino, who cared
+little how many of his mere mob were butchered, seeing that his foes
+were for the moment embarrassed by the wild rush and gathering circle
+of his foot train (for the place of conflict, though wider than the
+previous road, was confined and narrow), made a sign to some of his
+horsemen, and was about to ride forward towards the boat, now nearly out
+of sight, when a bugle at some distance was answered by one of his enemy
+at hand; and the shout of "Colonna to the rescue!" was echoed afar off.
+A few moments brought in view a numerous train of horse at full speed,
+with the banners of the Colonna waving gallantly in the front.
+
+"A plague on the wizards! who would have imagined they had divined us
+so craftily!" muttered Martino; "we must not abide these odds;" and the
+hand he had first raised for advance, now gave the signal of retreat.
+
+Serried breast to breast and in complete order, the horsemen of Martino
+turned to fly; the foot rabble who had come for spoil remained but for
+slaughter. They endeavoured to imitate their leaders; but how could they
+all elude the rushing chargers and sharp lances of their antagonists,
+whose blood was heated by the affray, and who regarded the lives at
+their mercy as a boy regards the wasp's nest he destroys. The crowd
+dispersing in all directions,--some, indeed, escaped up the hills, where
+the footing was impracticable to the horses; some plunged into the river
+and swam across to the opposite bank--those less cool or experienced,
+who fled right onwards, served, by clogging the way of their enemy, to
+facilitate the flight of their leaders, but fell themselves, corpse upon
+corpse, butchered in the unrelenting and unresisted pursuit.
+
+"No quarter to the ruffians--every Orsini slain is a robber the
+less--strike for God, the Emperor, and the Colonna!" such were the
+shouts which rung the knell of the dismayed and falling fugitives. Among
+those who fled onward, in the very path most accessible to the cavalry,
+was the young brother of Cola, so innocently mixed with the affray. Fast
+he fled, dizzy with terror--poor boy, scarce before ever parted from his
+parents' or his brother's side!--the trees glided past him--the banks
+receded:--on he sped, and fast behind came the tramp of the hoofs--the
+shouts--the curses--the fierce laughter of the foe, as they bounded over
+the dead and the dying in their path. He was now at the spot in which
+his brother had left him; hastily he glanced behind, and saw the couched
+lance and horrent crest of the horseman close at his rear; despairingly
+he looked up, and behold! his brother bursting through the tangled
+brakes that clothed the mountain, and bounding to his succour.
+
+"Save me! save me, brother!" he shrieked aloud, and the shriek reached
+Cola's ear;--the snort of the fiery charger breathed hot upon him;--a
+moment more, and with one wild shrill cry of "Mercy, mercy" he fell
+to the ground--a corpse: the lance of the pursuer passing through and
+through him, from back to breast, and nailing him on the very sod where
+he had sate, full of young life and careless hope, not an hour ago.
+
+The horseman plucked forth his spear, and passed on in pursuit of
+new victims; his comrades following. Cola had descended,--was on the
+spot,--kneeling by his murdered brother. Presently, to the sound of
+horn and trumpet, came by a nobler company than most of those hitherto
+engaged; who had been, indeed, but the advanced-guard of the Colonna. At
+their head rode a man in years, whose long white hair escaped from his
+plumed cap and mingled with his venerable beard. "How is this?" said the
+chief, reining in his steed, "young Rienzi!"
+
+The youth looked up, as he heard that voice, and then flung himself
+before the steed of the old noble, and, clasping his hands, cried out
+in a scarce articulate tone: "It is my brother, noble Stephen,--a boy,
+a mere child!--the best--the mildest! See how his blood dabbles the
+grass;--back, back--your horse's hoofs are in the stream! Justice, my
+Lord, justice!--you are a great man."
+
+"Who slew him? an Orsini, doubtless; you shall have justice."
+
+"Thanks, thanks," murmured Rienzi, as he tottered once more to his
+brother's side, turned the boy's face from the grass, and strove wildly
+to feel the pulse of his heart; he drew back his hand hastily, for it
+was crimsoned with blood, and lifting that hand on high, shrieked out
+again, "Justice! justice!"
+
+The group round the old Stephen Colonna, hardened as they were in such
+scenes, were affected by the sight. A handsome boy, whose tears ran
+fast down his cheeks, and who rode his palfrey close by the side of the
+Colonna, drew forth his sword. "My Lord," said he, half sobbing, "an
+Orsini only could have butchered a harmless lad like this; let us lose
+not a moment,--let us on after the ruffians."
+
+"No, Adrian, no!" cried Stephen, laying his hand on the boy's shoulder;
+"your zeal is to be lauded, but we must beware an ambush. Our men have
+ventured too far--what, ho, there!--sound a return."
+
+The bugles, in a few minutes, brought back the pursuers,--among them,
+the horseman whose spear had been so fatally misused. He was the leader
+of those engaged in the conflict with Martino di Porto; and the gold
+wrought into his armour, with the gorgeous trappings of his charger,
+betokened his rank.
+
+"Thanks, my son, thanks," said the old Colonna to this cavalier, "you
+have done well and bravely. But tell me, knowest thou, for thou hast
+an eagle eye, which of the Orsini slew this poor boy?--a foul deed; his
+family, too, our clients!"
+
+"Who? yon lad?" replied the horseman, lifting the helmet from his
+head, and wiping his heated brow; "say you so! how came he, then, with
+Martino's rascals? I fear me the mistake hath cost him dear. I could but
+suppose him of the Orsini rabble, and so--and so--"
+
+"You slew him!" cried Rienzi, in a voice of thunder, starting from
+the ground. "Justice! then, my Lord Stephen, justice! you promised me
+justice, and I will have it!"
+
+"My poor youth," said the old man, compassionately, "you should have had
+justice against the Orsini; but see you not this has been an error? I
+do not wonder you are too grieved to listen to reason now. We must make
+this up to you."
+
+"And let this pay for masses for the boy's soul; I grieve me much for
+the accident," said the younger Colonna, flinging down a purse of gold.
+"Ay, see us at the palace next week, young Cola--next week. My father,
+we had best return towards the boat; its safeguard may require us yet."
+
+"Right, Gianni; stay, some two of you, and see to the poor lad's
+corpse;--a grievous accident! how could it chance?"
+
+The company passed back the way they came, two of the common soldiers
+alone remaining, except the boy Adrian, who lingered behind a few
+moments, striving to console Rienzi, who, as one bereft of sense,
+remained motionless, gazing on the proud array as it swept along, and
+muttering to himself, "Justice, justice! I will have it yet."
+
+The loud voice of the elder Colonna summoned Adrian, reluctantly
+and weeping, away. "Let me be your brother," said the gallant boy,
+affectionately pressing the scholar's hand to his heart; "I want a
+brother like you."
+
+Rienzi made no reply; he did not heed or hear him--dark and stern
+thoughts, thoughts in which were the germ of a mighty revolution, were
+at his heart. He woke from them with a start, as the soldiers were now
+arranging their bucklers so as to make a kind of bier for the corpse,
+and then burst into tears as he fiercely motioned them away, and clasped
+the clay to his breast till he was literally soaked with the oozing
+blood.
+
+The poor child's garland had not dropped from his arm even when he fell,
+and, entangled by his dress, it still clung around him. It was a sight
+that recalled to Cola all the gentleness, the kind heart, and winning
+graces of his only brother--his only friend! It was a sight that
+seemed to make yet more inhuman the untimely and unmerited fate of that
+innocent boy. "My brother! my brother!" groaned the survivor; "how shall
+I meet our mother?--how shall I meet even night and solitude again?--so
+young, so harmless! See ye, sirs, he was but too gentle. And they will
+not give us justice, because his murderer was a noble and a Colonna.
+And this gold, too--gold for a brother's blood! Will they not"--and the
+young man's eyes glared like fire--"will they not give us justice?
+Time shall show!" so saying, he bent his head over the corpse; his lips
+muttered, as with some prayer or invocation; and then rising, his face
+was as pale as the dead beside him,--but it was no longer pale with
+grief!
+
+From that bloody clay, and that inward prayer, Cola di Rienzi rose a new
+being. With his young brother died his own youth. But for that event,
+the future liberator of Rome might have been but a dreamer, a scholar, a
+poet; the peaceful rival of Petrarch; a man of thoughts, not deeds. But
+from that time, all his faculties, energies, fancies, genius, became
+concentrated into a single point; and patriotism, before a vision, leapt
+into the life and vigour of a passion, lastingly kindled, stubbornly
+hardened, and awfully consecrated,--by revenge!
+
+
+
+Chapter 1.II. An Historical Survey--not to Be Passed Over, Except by
+Those Who Dislike to Understand What They Read.
+
+Years had passed away, and the death of the Roman boy, amidst more noble
+and less excusable slaughter, was soon forgotten,--forgotten almost
+by the parents of the slain, in the growing fame and fortunes of their
+eldest son,--forgotten and forgiven never by that son himself.
+But, between that prologue of blood, and the political drama which
+ensues,--between the fading interest, as it were, of a dream, and the
+more busy, actual, and continuous excitements of sterner life,--this may
+be the most fitting time to place before the reader a short and rapid
+outline of the state and circumstances of that city in which the
+principal scenes of this story are laid;--an outline necessary, perhaps,
+to many, for a full comprehension of the motives of the actors, and the
+vicissitudes of the plot.
+
+Despite the miscellaneous and mongrel tribes that had forced their
+settlements in the City of the Caesars, the Roman population retained
+an inordinate notion of their own supremacy over the rest of the world;
+and, degenerated from the iron virtues of the Republic, possessed all
+the insolent and unruly turbulence which characterised the Plebs of the
+ancient Forum. Amongst a ferocious, yet not a brave populace, the
+nobles supported themselves less as sagacious tyrants than as relentless
+banditti. The popes had struggled in vain against these stubborn and
+stern patricians. Their state derided, their command defied, their
+persons publicly outraged, the pontiff-sovereigns of the rest of Europe
+resided, at the Vatican, as prisoners under terror of execution.
+When, thirty-eight years before the date of the events we are about to
+witness, a Frenchman, under the name of Clement V., had ascended the
+chair of St. Peter, the new pope, with more prudence than valour, had
+deserted Rome for the tranquil retreat of Avignon; and the luxurious
+town of a foreign province became the court of the Roman pontiff, and
+the throne of the Christian Church.
+
+Thus deprived of even the nominal check of the papal presence, the power
+of the nobles might be said to have no limits, save their own caprice,
+or their mutual jealousies and feuds. Though arrogating through fabulous
+genealogies their descent from the ancient Romans, they were, in
+reality, for the most part, the sons of the bolder barbarians of the
+North; and, contaminated by the craft of Italy, rather than imbued with
+its national affections, they retained the disdain of their foreign
+ancestors for a conquered soil and a degenerate people. While the rest
+of Italy, especially in Florence, in Venice, and in Milan, was fast and
+far advancing beyond the other states of Europe in civilisation and in
+art, the Romans appeared rather to recede than to improve;--unblest by
+laws, unvisited by art, strangers at once to the chivalry of a warlike,
+and the graces of a peaceful, people. But they still possessed the
+sense and desire of liberty, and, by ferocious paroxysms and desperate
+struggles, sought to vindicate for their city the title it still assumed
+of "the Metropolis of the World." For the last two centuries they had
+known various revolutions--brief, often bloody, and always unsuccessful.
+Still, there was the empty pageant of a popular form of government. The
+thirteen quarters of the city named each a chief; and the assembly of
+these magistrates, called Caporioni, by theory possessed an authority
+they had neither the power nor the courage to exert. Still there was the
+proud name of Senator; but, at the present time, the office was confined
+to one or to two persons, sometimes elected by the pope, sometimes by
+the nobles. The authority attached to the name seems to have had no
+definite limit; it was that of a stern dictator, or an indolent puppet,
+according as he who held it had the power to enforce the dignity he
+assumed. It was never conceded but to nobles, and it was by the nobles
+that all the outrages were committed. Private enmity alone was gratified
+whenever public justice was invoked: and the vindication of order was
+but the execution of revenge.
+
+Holding their palaces as the castles and fortresses of princes, each
+asserting his own independency of all authority and law, and planting
+fortifications, and claiming principalities in the patrimonial
+territories of the Church, the barons of Rome made their state still
+more secure, and still more odious, by the maintenance of troops of
+foreign (chiefly of German) mercenaries, at once braver in disposition,
+more disciplined in service, and more skilful in arms, than even the
+freest Italians of that time. Thus they united the judicial and the
+military force, not for the protection, but for the ruin of Rome. Of
+these barons, the most powerful were the Orsini and Colonna; their feuds
+were hereditary and incessant, and every day witnessed the fruits of
+their lawless warfare, in bloodshed, in rape, and in conflagration.
+The flattery or the friendship of Petrarch, too credulously believed by
+modern historians, has invested the Colonna, especially of the date now
+entered upon, with an elegance and a dignity not their own. Outrage,
+fraud, and assassination, a sordid avarice in securing lucrative offices
+to themselves, an insolent oppression of their citizens, and the
+most dastardly cringing to power superior to their own (with but few
+exceptions), mark the character of the first family of Rome. But,
+wealthier than the rest of the barons, they were, therefore, more
+luxurious, and, perhaps, more intellectual; and their pride was
+flattered in being patrons of those arts of which they could never
+have become the professors. From these multiplied oppressors the Roman
+citizens turned with fond and impatient regret to their ignorant and
+dark notions of departed liberty and greatness. They confounded the
+times of the Empire with those of the Republic; and often looked to the
+Teutonic king, who obtained his election from beyond the Alps, but his
+title of emperor from the Romans, as the deserter of his legitimate
+trust and proper home; vainly imagining that, if both the Emperor and
+the Pontiff fixed their residence in Rome, Liberty and Law would again
+seek their natural shelter beneath the resuscitated majesty of the Roman
+people.
+
+The absence of the pope and the papal court served greatly to impoverish
+the citizens; and they had suffered yet more visibly by the depredations
+of hordes of robbers, numerous and unsparing, who infested Romagna,
+obstructing all the public ways, and were, sometimes secretly,
+sometimes, openly, protected by the barons, who often recruited their
+banditti garrisons by banditti soldiers.
+
+But besides the lesser and ignobler robbers, there had risen in Italy
+a far more formidable description of freebooters. A German, who assumed
+the lofty title of the Duke Werner, had, a few years prior to the period
+we approach, enlisted and organised a considerable force, styled "The
+Great Company," with which he besieged cities and invaded states,
+without any object less shameless than that of pillage. His example was
+soon imitated: numerous "Companies," similarly constituted, devastated
+the distracted and divided land. They appeared, suddenly raised, as if
+by magic, before the walls of a city, and demanded immense sums as the
+purchase of peace. Neither tyrant nor common wealth maintained a force
+sufficient to resist them; and if other northern mercenaries were
+engaged to oppose them, it was only to recruit the standards of the
+freebooters with deserters. Mercenary fought not mercenary--nor German,
+German: and greater pay, and more unbridled rapine, made the tents of
+the "Companies" far more attractive than the regulated stipends of a
+city, or the dull fortress and impoverished coffers of a chief. Werner,
+the most implacable and ferocious of all these adventurers, and who had
+so openly gloried in his enormities as to wear upon his breast a silver
+plate, engraved with the words, "Enemy to God, to Pity, and to Mercy,"
+had not long since ravaged Romagna with fire and sword. But, whether
+induced by money, or unable to control the fierce spirits he had
+raised, he afterwards led the bulk of his company back to Germany. Small
+detachments, however, remained, scattered throughout the land, waiting
+only an able leader once more to re-unite them: amongst those who
+appeared most fitted for that destiny was Walter de Montreal, a Knight
+of St. John, and gentleman of Provence, whose valour and military genius
+had already, though yet young, raised his name into dreaded celebrity;
+and whose ambition, experience, and sagacity, relieved by certain
+chivalric and noble qualities, were suited to enterprises far greater
+and more important than the violent depredations of the atrocious
+Werner. From these scourges, no state had suffered more grievously than
+Rome. The patrimonial territories of the pope,--in part wrested from him
+by petty tyrants, in part laid waste by these foreign robbers,--yielded
+but a scanty supply to the necessities of Clement VI., the most
+accomplished gentleman and the most graceful voluptuary of his time; and
+the good father had devised a plan, whereby to enrich at once the Romans
+and their pontiff.
+
+Nearly fifty years before the time we enter upon, in order both to
+replenish the papal coffers and pacify the starving Romans, Boniface
+VIII. had instituted the Festival of the Jubilee, or Holy Year; in fact,
+a revival of a Pagan ceremonial. A plenary indulgence was promised
+to every Catholic who, in that year, and in the first year of every
+succeeding century, should visit the churches of St. Peter and St. Paul.
+An immense concourse of pilgrims, from every part of Christendom, had
+attested the wisdom of the invention; "and two priests stood night and
+day, with rakes in their hands, to collect without counting the heaps
+of gold and silver that were poured on the altar of St. Paul." (Gibbon,
+vol. xii. c. 59.)
+
+It is not to be wondered at that this most lucrative festival should,
+ere the next century was half expired, appear to a discreet pontiff
+to be too long postponed. And both pope and city agreed in thinking it
+might well bear a less distant renewal. Accordingly, Clement VI. had
+proclaimed, under the name of the Mosaic Jubilee, a second Holy Year
+for 1350--viz., three years distant from that date at which, in the
+next chapter, my narrative will commence. This circumstance had a great
+effect in whetting the popular indignation against the barons, and
+preparing the events I shall relate; for the roads were, as I before
+said, infested by the banditti, the creatures and allies of the barons.
+And if the roads were not cleared, the pilgrims might not attend. It
+was the object of the pope's vicar, Raimond, bishop of Orvietto (bad
+politician and good canonist), to seek, by every means, to remove all
+impediment between the offerings of devotion and the treasury of St.
+Peter.
+
+Such, in brief, was the state of Rome at the period we are about to
+examine. Her ancient mantle of renown still, in the eyes of Italy and of
+Europe, cloaked her ruins. In name, at least, she was still the queen
+of the earth; and from her hands came the crown of the emperor of the
+north, and the keys of the father of the church. Her situation was
+precisely that which presented a vase and glittering triumph to
+bold ambition,--an inspiring, if mournful, spectacle to determined
+patriotism,--and a fitting stage for that more august tragedy which
+seeks its incidents, selects its actors, and shapes its moral, amidst
+the vicissitudes and crimes of nations.
+
+
+
+Chapter 1.III. The Brawl.
+
+On an evening in April, 1347, and in one of those wide spaces in which
+Modern and Ancient Rome seemed blent together--equally desolate and
+equally in ruins--a miscellaneous and indignant populace were assembled.
+That morning the house of a Roman jeweller had been forcibly entered and
+pillaged by the soldiers of Martino di Porto, with a daring effrontery
+which surpassed even the ordinary licence of the barons. The sympathy
+and sensation throughout the city were deep and ominous.
+
+"Never will I submit to this tyranny!"
+
+"Nor I!"
+
+"Nor I!"
+
+"Nor by the bones of St. Peter, will I!"
+
+"And what, my friends, is this tyranny to which you will not submit?"
+said a young nobleman, addressing himself to the crowd of citizens who,
+heated, angry, half-armed, and with the vehement gestures of Italian
+passion, were now sweeping down the long and narrow street that led to
+the gloomy quarter occupied by the Orsini.
+
+"Ah, my lord!" cried two or three of the citizens in a breath, "you will
+right us--you will see justice done to us--you are a Colonna."
+
+"Ha, ha, ha!" laughed scornfully one man of gigantic frame, and wielding
+on high a huge hammer, indicative of his trade. "Justice and Colonna!
+body of God! those names are not often found together."
+
+"Down with him! down with him! he is an Orsinist--down with him!" cried
+at least ten of the throng: but no hand was raised against the giant.
+
+"He speaks the truth," said a second voice, firmly.
+
+"Ay, that doth he," said a third, knitting his brows, and unsheathing
+his knife, "and we will abide by it. The Orsini are tyrants--and the
+Colonnas are, at the best, as bad."
+
+"Thou liest in thy teeth, ruffian!" cried the young noble, advancing
+into the press and confronting the last asperser of the Colonna.
+
+Before the flashing eye and menacing gesture of the cavalier, the worthy
+brawler retreated some steps, so as to leave an open space between the
+towering form of the smith, and the small, slender, but vigorous frame
+of the young noble.
+
+Taught from their birth to despise the courage of the plebeians, even
+while careless of much reputation as to their own, the patricians of
+Rome were not unaccustomed to the rude fellowship of these brawls; nor
+was it unoften that the mere presence of a noble sufficed to scatter
+whole crowds, that had the moment before been breathing vengeance
+against his order and his house.
+
+Waving his hand, therefore, to the smith, and utterly unheeding either
+his brandished weapon or his vast stature, the young Adrian di Castello,
+a distant kinsman of the Colonna, haughtily bade him give way.
+
+"To your homes, friends! and know," he added, with some dignity, "that
+ye wrong us much, if ye imagine we share the evil-doings of the Orsini,
+or are pandering solely to our own passions in the feud between their
+house and ours. May the Holy Mother so judge me," continued he, devoutly
+lifting up his eyes, "as I now with truth declare, that it is for your
+wrongs, and for the wrongs of Rome, that I have drawn this sword against
+the Orsini."
+
+"So say all the tyrants," rejoined the smith, hardily, as he leant his
+hammer against a fragment of stone--some remnant of ancient Rome--"they
+never fight against each other, but it is for our good. One Colonna cuts
+me the throat of Orsini's baker--it is for our good! Another Colonna
+seizes on the daughter of Orsini's tailor--it is for our good! our
+good--yes, for the good of the people! the good of the bakers and
+tailors, eh?"
+
+"Fellow," said the young nobleman, gravely, "if a Colonna did thus, he
+did wrong; but the holiest cause may have bad supporters."
+
+"Yes, the holy Church itself is propped on very in different columns,"
+answered the smith, in a rude witticism on the affection of the pope for
+the Colonna.
+
+"He blasphemes! the smith blasphemes!" cried the partisans of that
+powerful house. "A Colonna, a Colonna!"
+
+"An Orsini, an Orsini!" was no less promptly the counter cry.
+
+"The People!" shouted the smith, waving his formidable weapon far above
+the heads of the group.
+
+In an instant the whole throng, who had at first united against the
+aggression of one man, were divided by the hereditary wrath of faction.
+At the cry of Orsini, several new partisans hurried to the spot; the
+friends of the Colonna drew themselves on one side--the defenders of
+the Orsini on the other--and the few who agreed with the smith that both
+factions were equally odious, and the people was the sole legitimate
+cry in a popular commotion, would have withdrawn themselves from the
+approaching melee, if the smith himself, who was looked upon by them as
+an authority of great influence, had not--whether from resentment at the
+haughty bearing of the young Colonna, or from that appetite of contest
+not uncommon in men of a bulk and force which assure them in all
+personal affrays the lofty pleasure of superiority--if, I say, the smith
+himself had not, after a pause of indecision, retired among the Orsini,
+and entrained, by his example, the alliance of his friends with the
+favourers of that faction.
+
+In popular commotions, each man is whirled along with the herd, often
+half against his own approbation or assent. The few words of peace
+by which Adrian di Castello commenced an address to his friends were
+drowned amidst their shouts. Proud to find in their ranks one of the
+most beloved, and one of the noblest of that name, the partisans of
+the Colonna placed him in their front, and charged impetuously on their
+foes. Adrian, however, who had acquired from circumstances something of
+that chivalrous code which he certainly could not have owed to his Roman
+birth, disdained at first to assault men among whom he recognised no
+equal, either in rank or the practice of arms. He contented himself with
+putting aside the few strokes that were aimed at him in the gathering
+confusion of the conflict--few; for those who recognised him, even
+amidst the bitterest partisans of the Orsini, were not willing to expose
+themselves to the danger and odium of spilling the blood of a man, who,
+in addition to his great birth and the terrible power of his connexions,
+was possessed of a personal popularity, which he owed rather to a
+comparison with the vices of his relatives than to any remarkable
+virtues hitherto displayed by himself. The smith alone, who had as
+yet taken no active part in the fray, seemed to gather himself up in
+determined opposition as the cavalier now advanced within a few steps of
+him.
+
+"Did we not tell thee," quoth the giant, frowning, "that the Colonna
+were, not less than the Orsini, the foes of the people? Look at thy
+followers and clients: are they not cutting the throats of humble men by
+way of vengeance for the crime of a great one? But that is the way one
+patrician always scourges the insolence of another. He lays the rod on
+the backs of the people, and then cries, 'See how just I am!'"
+
+"I do not answer thee now," answered Adrian; "but if thou regrettest
+with me this waste of blood, join with me in attempting to prevent it."
+
+"I--not I! let the blood of the slaves flow today: the time is fast
+coming when it shall be washed away by the blood of the lords."
+
+"Away, ruffian!" said Adrian, seeking no further parley, and touching
+the smith with the flat side of his sword. In an instant the hammer of
+the smith swung in the air, and, but for the active spring of the young
+noble, would infallibly have crushed him to the earth. Ere the smith
+could gain time for a second blow, Adrian's sword passed twice through
+his right arm, and the weapon fell heavily to the ground.
+
+"Slay him, slay him!" cried several of the clients of the Colonna, now
+pressing, dastard-like, round the disarmed and disabled smith.
+
+"Ay, slay him!" said, in tolerable Italian, but with a barbarous accent,
+one man, half-clad in armour, who had but just joined the group, and who
+was one of those wild German bandits whom the Colonna held in their pay;
+"he belongs to a horrible gang of miscreants sworn against all order
+and peace. He is one of Rienzi's followers, and, bless the Three Kings!
+raves about the People."
+
+"Thou sayest right, barbarian," said the sturdy smith, in a loud voice,
+and tearing aside the vest from his breast with his left hand; "come
+all--Colonna and Orsini--dig to this heart with your sharp blades, and
+when you have reached the centre, you will find there the object of your
+common hatred--'Rienzi and the People!'"
+
+As he uttered these words, in language that would have seemed above his
+station (if a certain glow and exaggeration of phrase and sentiment were
+not common, when excited, to all the Romans), the loudness of his voice
+rose above the noise immediately round him, and stilled, for an instant,
+the general din; and when, at last, the words, "Rienzi and the People"
+rang forth, they penetrated midway through the increasing crowd, and
+were answered as by an echo, with a hundred voices--"Rienzi and the
+People!"
+
+But whatever impression the words of the mechanic made on others, it was
+equally visible in the young Colonna. At the name of Rienzi the glow
+of excitement vanished from his cheek; he started back, muttered to
+himself, and for a moment seemed, even in the midst of that stirring
+commotion, to be lost in a moody and distant revery. He recovered, as
+the shout died away; and saying to the smith, in a low tone, "Friend, I
+am sorry for thy wound; but seek me on the morrow, and thou shalt find
+thou hast wronged me;" he beckoned to the German to follow him, and
+threaded his way through the crowd, which generally gave back as he
+advanced. For the bitterest hatred to the order of the nobles was at
+that time in Rome mingled with a servile respect for their persons, and
+a mysterious awe of their uncontrollable power.
+
+As Adrian passed through that part of the crowd in which the fray had
+not yet commenced, the murmurs that followed him were not those which
+many of his race could have heard.
+
+"A Colonna," said one.
+
+"Yet no ravisher," said another, laughing wildly.
+
+"Nor murtherer," muttered a third, pressing his hand to his breast.
+"'Tis not against him that my father's blood cries aloud."
+
+"Bless him," said a fourth, "for as yet no man curses him!"
+
+"Ah, God help us!" said an old man, with a long grey beard, leaning on
+his staff: "The serpent's young yet; the fangs will show by and by."
+
+"For shame, father! he is a comely youth, and not proud in the least.
+What a smile he hath!" quoth a fair matron, who kept on the outskirt of
+the melee.
+
+"Farewell to a man's honour when a noble smiles on his wife!" was the
+answer.
+
+"Nay," said Luigi, a jolly butcher, with a roguish eye, "what a man
+can win fairly from maid or wife, that let him do, whether plebeian or
+noble--that's my morality; but when an ugly old patrician finds fair
+words will not win fair looks, and carries me off a dame on the back of
+a German boar, with a stab in the side for comfort to the spouse,--then,
+I say, he is a wicked man, and an adulterer."
+
+While such were the comments and the murmurs that followed the noble,
+very different were the looks and words that attended the German
+soldier.
+
+Equally, nay, with even greater promptitude, did the crowd make way at
+his armed and heavy tread; but not with looks of reverence:--the eye
+glared as he approached; but the cheek grew pale--the head bowed--the
+lip quivered; each man felt a shudder of hate and fear, as recognizing
+a dread and mortal foe. And well and wrathfully did the fierce
+mercenary note the signs of the general aversion. He pushed on
+rudely--half-smiling in contempt, half-frowning in revenge, as he looked
+from side to side; and his long, matted, light hair, tawny-coloured
+moustache, and brawny front, contrasted strongly with the dark eyes,
+raven locks, and slender frames of the Italians.
+
+"May Lucifer double damn those German cut-throats!" muttered, between
+his grinded teeth, one of the citizens.
+
+"Amen!" answered, heartily, another.
+
+"Hush!" said a third, timorously looking round; "if one of them hear
+thee, thou art a lost man."
+
+"Oh, Rome! Rome! to what art thou fallen!" said bitterly one citizen,
+clothed in black, and of a higher seeming than the rest; "when thou
+shudderest in thy streets at the tread of a hired barbarian!"
+
+"Hark to one of our learned men, and rich citizens!" said the butcher,
+reverently.
+
+"'Tis a friend of Rienzi's," quoth another of the group, lifting his
+cap.
+
+With downcast eyes, and a face in which grief, shame, and wrath, were
+visibly expressed, Pandulfo di Guido, a citizen of birth and repute,
+swept slowly through the crowd, and disappeared.
+
+Meanwhile, Adrian, having gained a street which, though in the
+neighbourhood of the crowd, was empty and desolate, turned to his fierce
+comrade. "Rodolf!" said he, "mark!--no violence to the citizens. Return
+to the crowd, collect the friends of our house, withdraw them from the
+scene; let not the Colonna be blamed for this day's violence; and assure
+our followers, in my name, that I swear, by the knighthood I received at
+the Emperor's hands, that by my sword shall Martino di Porto be punished
+for his outrage. Fain would I, in person, allay the tumult, but my
+presence only seems to sanction it. Go--thou hast weight with them all."
+
+"Ay, Signor, the weight of blows!" answered the grim soldier. "But the
+command is hard; I would fain let their puddle-blood flow an hour or
+two longer. Yet, pardon me; in obeying thy orders, do I obey those of my
+master, thy kinsman? It is old Stephen Colonna--who seldom spares blood
+or treasure, God bless him--(save his own!)--whose money I hold, and to
+whose hests I am sworn."
+
+"Diavolo!" muttered the cavalier, and the angry spot was on his cheek;
+but, with the habitual self-control of the Italian nobles, he smothered
+his rising choler, and said aloud, with calmness, but dignity--
+
+"Do as I bid thee; check this tumult--make us the forbearing party.
+Let all be still within one hour hence, and call on me tomorrow for thy
+reward; be this purse an earnest of my future thanks. As for my kinsman,
+whom I command thee to name more reverently, 'tis in his name I speak.
+Hark! the din increases--the contest swells--go--lose not another
+moment."
+
+Somewhat awed by the quiet firmness of the patrician, Rodolf nodded,
+without answer, slid the money into his bosom, and stalked away into the
+thickest of the throng. But, even ere he arrived, a sudden reaction had
+taken place.
+
+The young cavalier, left alone in that spot, followed with his eyes the
+receding form of the mercenary, as the sun, now setting, shone slant
+upon his glittering casque, and said bitterly to himself--"Unfortunate
+city, fountain of all mighty memories--fallen queen of a thousand
+nations--how art thou decrowned and spoiled by thy recreant and apostate
+children! Thy nobles divided against themselves--thy people cursing thy
+nobles--thy priests, who should sow peace, planting discord--the father
+of thy church deserting thy stately walls, his home a refuge, his mitre
+a fief, his court a Gallic village--and we! we, of the haughtiest
+blood of Rome--we, the sons of Caesars, and of the lineage of demigods,
+guarding an insolent and abhorred state by the swords of hirelings, who
+mock our cowardice while they receive our pay--who keep our citizens
+slaves, and lord it over their very masters in return! Oh, that we, the
+hereditary chiefs of Rome, could but feel--oh, that we could but find,
+our only legitimate safeguard in the grateful hearts of our countrymen!"
+
+So deeply did the young Adrian feel the galling truth of all he uttered,
+that the indignant tears rolled down his cheeks as he spoke. He felt no
+shame as he dashed them away; for that weakness which weeps for a fallen
+race, is the tenderness not of women but of angels.
+
+As he turned slowly to quit the spot, his steps were suddenly arrested
+by a loud shout: "Rienzi! Rienzi!" smote the air. From the walls of the
+Capitol to the bed of the glittering Tiber, that name echoed far and
+wide; and, as the shout died away, it was swallowed up in a silence so
+profound, so universal, so breathless, that you might have imagined that
+death itself had fallen over the city. And now, at the extreme end of
+the crowd, and elevated above their level, on vast fragments of stone
+which had been dragged from the ruins of Rome in one of the late
+frequent tumults between contending factions, to serve as a barricade
+for citizens against citizens,--on these silent memorials of the past
+grandeur, the present misery, of Rome, stood that extraordinary man,
+who, above all his race, was the most penetrated with the glories of the
+one time, with the degradation of the other.
+
+From the distance at which he stood from the scene, Adrian could only
+distinguish the dark outline of Rienzi's form; he could only hear the
+faint sound of his mighty voice; he could only perceive, in the subdued
+yet waving sea of human beings that spread around, their heads bared
+in the last rays of the sun, the unutterable effect which an eloquence,
+described by contemporaries almost as miraculous,--but in reality
+less so from the genius of the man than the sympathy of the
+audience,--created in all, who drank into their hearts and souls the
+stream of its burning thoughts.
+
+It was but for a short time that that form was visible to the earnest
+eye, that that voice at intervals reached the straining ear, of Adrian
+di Castello; but that time sufficed to produce all the effect which
+Adrian himself had desired.
+
+Another shout, more earnest, more prolonged than the first--a shout,
+in which spoke the release of swelling thoughts, of intense
+excitement--betokened the close of the harangue; and then you might
+see, after a minute's pause, the crowd breaking in all directions, and
+pouring down the avenues in various knots and groups, each testifying
+the strong and lasting impression made upon the multitude by that
+address. Every cheek was flushed--every tongue spoke: the animation of
+the orator had passed, like a living spirit, into the breasts of the
+audience. He had thundered against the disorders of the patricians, yet,
+by a word, he had disarmed the anger of the plebeians--he had preached
+freedom, yet he had opposed licence. He had calmed the present, by a
+promise of the future. He had chid their quarrels, yet had supported
+their cause. He had mastered the revenge of today, by a solemn assurance
+that there should come justice for the morrow. So great may be the
+power, so mighty the eloquence, so formidable the genius, of one
+man,--without arms, without rank, without sword or ermine, who addresses
+himself to a people that is oppressed!
+
+
+
+Chapter 1.IV. An Adventure.
+
+Avoiding the broken streams of the dispersed crowd, Adrian Colonna
+strode rapidly down one of the narrow streets leading to his palace,
+which was situated at no inconsiderable distance from the place in which
+the late contest had occurred. The education of his life made him feel
+a profound interest, not only in the divisions and disputes of his
+country, but also in the scene he had just witnessed, and the authority
+exercised by Rienzi.
+
+An orphan of a younger, but opulent branch of the Colonna, Adrian had
+been brought up under the care and guardianship of his kinsman, that
+astute, yet valiant Stephen Colonna, who, of all the nobles of Rome, was
+the most powerful, alike from the favour of the pope, and the number
+of armed hirelings whom his wealth enabled him to maintain. Adrian
+had early manifested what in that age was considered an extraordinary
+disposition towards intellectual pursuits, and had acquired much of
+the little that was then known of the ancient language and the ancient
+history of his country.
+
+Though Adrian was but a boy at the time in which, first presented to the
+reader, he witnessed the emotions of Rienzi at the death of his brother,
+his kind heart had been penetrated with sympathy for Cola's affliction,
+and shame for the apathy of his kinsmen at the result of their own
+feuds. He had earnestly sought the friendship of Rienzi, and, despite
+his years, had become aware of the power and energy of his character.
+But though Rienzi, after a short time, had appeared to think no more of
+his brother's death--though he again entered the halls of the Colonna,
+and shared their disdainful hospitalities, he maintained a certain
+distance and reserve of manner, which even Adrian could only partially
+overcome. He rejected every offer of service, favour, or promotion; and
+any unwonted proof of kindness from Adrian seemed, instead of making him
+more familiar, to offend him into colder distance. The easy humour and
+conversational vivacity which had first rendered him a welcome guest
+with those who passed their lives between fighting and feasting, had
+changed into a vein ironical, cynical, and severe. But the dull barons
+were equally amused at his wit, and Adrian was almost the only one who
+detected the serpent couched beneath the smile.
+
+Often Rienzi sat at the feast, silent, but observant, as if watching
+every look, weighing every word, taking gauge and measurement of the
+intellect, policy, temperament, of every guest; and when he had seemed
+to satisfy himself, his spirits would rise, his words flow, and
+while his dazzling but bitter wit lit up the revel, none saw that the
+unmirthful flash was the token of the coming storm. But all the while,
+he neglected no occasion to mix with the humbler citizens, to stir up
+their minds, to inflame their imaginations, to kindle their emulation,
+with pictures of the present and with legends of the past. He grew in
+popularity and repute, and was yet more in power with the herd, because
+in favour with the nobles. Perhaps it was for that reason that he had
+continued the guest of the Colonna.
+
+When, six years before the present date, the Capitol of the Caesars
+witnessed the triumph of Petrarch, the scholastic fame of the young
+Rienzi had attracted the friendship of the poet,--a friendship that
+continued, with slight interruption, to the last, through careers
+so widely different; and afterwards, one among the Roman Deputies to
+Avignon, he had been conjoined with Petrarch (According to the modern
+historians; but it seems more probable that Rienzi's mission to Avignon
+was posterior to that of Petrarch. However this be, it was at Avignon
+that Petrarch and Rienzi became most intimate, as Petrarch himself
+observes in one of his letters.) to supplicate Clement VI. to remove
+the Holy See from Avignon to Rome. It was in this mission that, for
+the first time, he evinced his extraordinary powers of eloquence and
+persuasion. The pontiff, indeed, more desirous of ease than glory, was
+not convinced by the arguments, but he was enchanted with the pleader;
+and Rienzi returned to Rome, loaded with honours, and clothed with the
+dignity of high and responsible office. No longer the inactive scholar,
+the gay companion, he rose at once to pre-eminence above all his
+fellow-citizens. Never before had authority been borne with so austere
+an integrity, so uncorrupt a zeal. He had sought to impregnate his
+colleagues with the same loftiness of principle--he had failed. Now
+secure in his footing, he had begun openly to appeal to the people; and
+already a new spirit seemed to animate the populace of Rome.
+
+While these were the fortunes of Rienzi, Adrian had been long separated
+from him, and absent from Rome.
+
+The Colonna were staunch supporters of the imperial party, and Adrian di
+Castello had received and obeyed an invitation to the Emperor's court.
+Under that monarch he had initiated himself in arms, and, among the
+knights of Germany, he had learned to temper the natural Italian
+shrewdness with the chivalry of northern valour.
+
+In leaving Bavaria, he had sojourned a short time in the solitude of one
+of his estates by the fairest lake of northern Italy; and thence, with
+a mind improved alike by action and study, had visited many of the free
+Italian states, imbibed sentiments less prejudiced than those of his
+order, and acquired an early reputation for himself while inly marking
+the characters and deeds of others. In him, the best qualities of the
+Italian noble were united. Passionately addicted to the cultivation
+of letters, subtle and profound in policy, gentle and bland of manner,
+dignifying a love of pleasure with a certain elevation of taste, he yet
+possessed a gallantry of conduct, and purity of honour, and an
+aversion from cruelty, which were then very rarely found in the Italian
+temperament, and which even the Chivalry of the North, while maintaining
+among themselves, usually abandoned the moment they came into contact
+with the systematic craft and disdain of honesty, which made the
+character of the ferocious, yet wily, South. With these qualities he
+combined, indeed, the softer passions of his countrymen,--he adored
+Beauty, and he made a deity of Love.
+
+He had but a few weeks returned to his native city, whither his
+reputation had already preceded him, and where his early affection for
+letters and gentleness of bearing were still remembered. He returned to
+find the position of Rienzi far more altered than his own. Adrian had
+not yet sought the scholar. He wished first to judge with his own eyes,
+and at a distance, of the motives and object of his conduct; for partly
+he caught the suspicions which his own order entertained of Rienzi, and
+partly he shared in the trustful enthusiasm of the people.
+
+"Certainly," said he now to himself, as he walked musingly onward,
+"certainly, no man has it more in his power to reform our diseased
+state, to heal our divisions, to awaken our citizens to the
+recollections of ancestral virtue. But that very power, how dangerous
+is it! Have I not seen, in the free states of Italy, men, called into
+authority for the sake of preserving the people, honest themselves at
+first, and then, drunk with the sudden rank, betraying the very cause
+which had exalted them? True, those men were chiefs and nobles; but are
+plebeians less human? Howbeit I have heard and seen enough from afar,--I
+will now approach, and examine the man himself."
+
+While thus soliloquizing, Adrian but little noted the various
+passengers, who, more and more rarely as the evening waned, hastened
+homeward. Among these were two females, who now alone shared with Adrian
+the long and gloomy street into which he had entered. The moon was
+already bright in the heavens, and, as the women passed the cavalier
+with a light and quick step, the younger one turned back and regarded
+him by the clear light with an eager, yet timid glance.
+
+"Why dost thou tremble, my pretty one!" said her companion, who might
+have told some five-and-forty years, and whose garb and voice bespoke
+her of inferior rank to the younger female. "The streets seem quiet
+enough now, and, the Virgin be praised! we are not so far from home
+either."
+
+"Oh, Benedetta, it is he! it is the young signor--it is Adrian!"
+
+"That is fortunate," said the nurse, for such was her condition, "since
+they say he is as bold as a Northman: and as the Palazzo Colonna is not
+very far from hence, we shall be within reach of his aid should we want
+it: that is to say, sweet one, if you will walk a little slower than you
+have yet done."
+
+The young lady slackened her pace, and sighed.
+
+"He is certainly very handsome," quoth the nurse: "but thou must not
+think more of him; he is too far above thee for marriage, and for aught
+else, thou art too honest, and thy brother too proud--"
+
+"And thou, Benedetta, art too quick with thy tongue. How canst thou talk
+thus, when thou knowest he hath never, since, at least, I was a mere
+child, even addressed me: nay, he scarce knows of my very existence. He,
+the Lord Adrian di Castello, dream of the poor Irene! The mere thought
+is madness!"
+
+"Then why," said the nurse, briskly, "dost thou dream of him?"
+
+Her companion sighed again more deeply than at first.
+
+"Holy St. Catherine!" continued Benedetta, "if there were but one man in
+the world, I would die single ere I would think of him, until, at least,
+he had kissed my hand twice, and left it my own fault if it were not my
+lips instead."
+
+The young lady still replied not.
+
+"But how didst thou contrive to love him?" asked the nurse. "Thou canst
+not have seen him very often: it is but some four or five weeks since
+his return to Rome."
+
+"Oh, how dull art thou?" answered the fair Irene. "Have I not told thee
+again and again, that I loved him six years ago?"
+
+"When thou hadst told but thy tenth year, and a doll would have been thy
+most suitable lover! As I am a Christian, Signora, thou hast made good
+use of thy time.
+
+"And during his absence," continued the girl, fondly, yet sadly, "did
+I not hear him spoken of, and was not the mere sound of his name like a
+love-gift that bade me remember? And when they praised him, have I not
+rejoiced? and when they blamed him, have I not resented? and when they
+said that his lance was victorious in the tourney, did I not weep with
+pride? and when they whispered that his vows were welcome in the bower,
+wept I not as fervently with grief? Have not the six years of his
+absence been a dream, and was not his return a waking into light--a
+morning of glory and the sun? and I see him now in the church when he
+wots not of me; and on his happy steed as he passes by my lattice: and
+is not that enough of happiness for love?"
+
+"But if he loves not thee?"
+
+"Fool! I ask not that;--nay, I know not if I wish it. Perhaps I would
+rather dream of him, such as I would have him, than know him for what
+he is. He might be unkind, or ungenerous, or love me but little; rather
+would I not be loved at all, than loved coldly, and eat away my heart by
+comparing it with his. I can love him now as something abstract, unreal,
+and divine: but what would be my shame, my grief, if I were to find him
+less than I have imagined! Then, indeed, my life would have been wasted;
+then, indeed, the beauty of the earth would be gone!"
+
+The good nurse was not very capable of sympathizing with sentiments like
+these. Even had their characters been more alike, their disparity of age
+would have rendered such sympathy impossible. What but youth can echo
+back the soul of youth--all the music of its wild vanities and romantic
+follies? The good nurse did not sympathize with the sentiments of her
+young lady, but she sympathised with the deep earnestness with which
+they were expressed. She thought it wondrous silly, but wondrous moving;
+she wiped her eyes with the corner of her veil, and hoped in her secret
+heart that her young charge would soon get a real husband to put such
+unsubstantial fantasies out of her head. There was a short pause in
+their conversation, when, just where two streets crossed one another,
+there was heard a loud noise of laughing voices and trampling feet.
+Torches were seen on high affronting the pale light of the moon; and,
+at a very short distance from the two females, in the cross street,
+advanced a company of seven or eight men, bearing, as seen by the red
+light of the torches, the formidable badge of the Orsini.
+
+Amidst the other disorders of the time, it was no unfrequent custom
+for the younger or more dissolute of the nobles, in small and armed
+companies, to parade the streets at night, seeking occasion for a
+licentious gallantry among the cowering citizens, or a skirmish at arms
+with some rival stragglers of their own order. Such a band had Irene and
+her companion now chanced to encounter.
+
+"Holy mother!" cried Benedetta, turning pale, and half running, "what
+curse has befallen us? How could we have been so foolish as to tarry so
+late at the lady Nina's! Run, Signora,--run, or we shall fall into their
+hands!"
+
+But the advice of Benedetta came too late,--the fluttering garments
+of the women had been already descried: in a moment more they were
+surrounded by the marauders. A rude hand tore aside Benedetta's veil,
+and at sight of features, which, if time had not spared, it could never
+very materially injure, the rough aggressor cast the poor nurse against
+the wall with a curse, which was echoed by a loud laugh from his
+comrades.
+
+"Thou hast a fine fortune in faces Giuseppe!"
+
+"Yes; it was but the other day that he seized on a girl of sixty."
+
+"And then, by way of improving her beauty, cut her across the face with
+his dagger, because she was not sixteen!"
+
+"Hush, fellows! whom have we here?" said the chief of the party, a man
+richly dressed, and who, though bordering upon middle age, had only
+the more accustomed himself to the excesses of youth; as he spoke,
+he snatched the trembling Irene from the grasp of his followers. "Ho,
+there! the torches! Oh che bella faccia! what blushes--what eyes!--nay,
+look not down, pretty one; thou needst not be ashamed to win the love
+of an Orsini--yes; know the triumph thou hast achieved--it is Martino di
+Porto who bids thee smile upon him!"
+
+"For the blest Mother's sake release me! Nay, sir, this must not be--I
+am not unfriended--this insult shall not pass!"
+
+"Hark to her silver chiding; it is better than my best hound's bay!
+This adventure is worth a month's watching. What! will you not
+come?--restive--shrieks too!--Francesco, Pietro, ye are the gentlest of
+the band. Wrap her veil around her,--muffle this music;--so! bear her
+before me to the palace, and tomorrow, sweet one, thou shalt go home
+with a basket of florins which thou mayest say thou hast bought at
+market."
+
+But Irene's shrieks, Irene's struggles, had already brought succour to
+her side, and, as Adrian approached the spot, the nurse flung herself on
+her knees before him.
+
+"Oh, sweet signor, for Christ's grace save us! Deliver my young
+mistress--her friends love you well! We are all for the Colonna,
+my lord; yes, indeed, all for the Colonna! Save the kin of your own
+clients, gracious signor!"
+
+"It is enough that she is a woman," answered Adrian, adding, between his
+teeth, "and that an Orsini is her assailant." He strode haughtily into
+the thickest of the group; the servitors laid hands on their swords, but
+gave way before him as they recognised his person; he reached the two
+men who had already seized Irene; in one moment he struck the foremost
+to the ground, in another, he had passed his left arm round the light
+and slender form of the maiden, and stood confronting the Orsini with
+his drawn blade, which, however, he pointed to the ground.
+
+"For shame, my lord--for shame!" said he, indignantly. "Will you force
+Rome to rise, to a man, against our order? Vex not too far the lion,
+chained though he be; war against us if ye will! draw your blades upon
+men, though they be of your own race, and speak your own tongue: but
+if ye would sleep at nights, and not dread the avenger's gripe,--if ye
+would walk the market-place secure,--wrong not a Roman woman! Yes, the
+very walls around us preach to you the punishment of such a deed: for
+that offence fell the Tarquins,--for that offence were swept away the
+Decemvirs,--for that offence, if ye rush upon it, the blood of your
+whole house may flow like water. Cease, then, my lord, from this mad
+attempt, so unworthy your great name; cease, and thank even a Colonna
+that he has come between you and a moment's frenzy!"
+
+So noble, so lofty were the air and gesture of Adrian, as he thus
+spoke, that even the rude servitors felt a thrill of approbation and
+remorse--not so Martino di Porto. He had been struck with the beauty of
+the prey thus suddenly snatched from him; he had been accustomed to
+long outrage and to long impunity; the very sight, the very voice of a
+Colonna, was a blight to his eye and a discord to his ear: what, then,
+when a Colonna interfered with his lusts, and rebuked his vices?
+
+"Pedant!" he cried, with quivering lips, "prate not to me of thy vain
+legends and gossip's tales! think not to snatch from me my possession
+in another, when thine own life is in my hands. Unhand the maiden! throw
+down thy sword! return home without further parley, or, by my faith, and
+the blades of my followers--(look at them well!)--thou diest!"
+
+"Signor," said Adrian, calmly, yet while he spoke he retreated gradually
+with his fair burthen towards the neighbouring wall, so as at least to
+leave only his front exposed to those fearful odds: "Thou will not so
+misuse the present chances, and wrong thyself in men's mouths, as to
+attack with eight swords even thy hereditary foe, thus cumbered, too, as
+he is. But--nay hold!--if thou art so proposed, bethink thee well, one
+cry of my voice would soon turn the odds against thee. Thou art now in
+the quarter of my tribe; thou art surrounded by the habitations of the
+Colonna: yon palace swarms with men who sleep not, save with harness
+on their backs; men whom my voice can reach even now, but from whom, if
+they once taste of blood, it could not save thee!"
+
+"He speaks true, noble Lord," said one of the band: "we have wandered
+too far out of our beat; we are in their very den; the palace of old
+Stephen Colonna is within call; and, to my knowledge," added he, in
+a whisper, "eighteen fresh men-of-arms--ay, and Northmen too--marched
+through its gates this day."
+
+"Were there eight hundred men at arm's length," answered Martino
+furiously, "I would not be thus bearded amidst mine own train! Away with
+yon woman! To the attack! to the attack!"
+
+Thus saying, he made a desperate lunge at Adrian, who, having kept his
+eye cautiously on the movements of his enemy, was not unprepared for the
+assault. As he put aside the blade with his own, he shouted with a loud
+voice--"Colonna! to the rescue, Colonna!"
+
+Nor had it been without an ulterior object that the acute and
+self-controlling mind of Adrian had hitherto sought to prolong the
+parley. Even as he first addressed Orsini, he had perceived, by the
+moonlight, the glitter of armour upon two men advancing from the far end
+of the street, and judged at once, by the neighbourhood, that they must
+be among the mercenaries of the Colonna.
+
+Gently he suffered the form of Irene, which now, for she had swooned
+with the terror, pressed too heavily upon him, to slide from his left
+arm, and standing over her form, while sheltered from behind by the wall
+which he had so warily gained, he contented himself with parrying the
+blows hastily aimed at him, without attempting to retaliate. Few of the
+Romans, however accustomed to such desultory warfare, were then well
+and dexterously practised in the use of arms; and the science Adrian had
+acquired in the schools of the martial north, befriended him now, even
+against such odds. It is true, indeed, that the followers of Orsini did
+not share the fury of their lord; partly afraid of the consequence to
+themselves should the blood of so highborn a signor be spilt by their
+hands, partly embarrassed with the apprehension that they should see
+themselves suddenly beset with the ruthless hirelings so close within
+hearing, they struck but aimless and random blows, looking every moment
+behind and aside, and rather prepared for flight than slaughter. Echoing
+the cry of "Colonna," poor Benedetta fled at the first clash of swords.
+She ran down the dreary street still shrieking that cry, and passed the
+very portals of Stephen's palace (where some grim forms yet loitered)
+without arresting her steps there, so great were her confusion and
+terror.
+
+Meanwhile, the two armed men, whom Adrian had descried, proceeded
+leisurely up the street. The one was of a rude and common mould, his
+arms and his complexion testified his calling and race; and by the great
+respect he paid to his companion, it was evident that that companion was
+no native of Italy. For the brigands of the north, while they served the
+vices of the southern, scarce affected to disguise their contempt for
+his cowardice.
+
+The companion of the brigand was a man of a martial, yet easy air. He
+wore no helmet, but a cap of crimson velvet, set off with a white plume;
+on his mantle, or surcoat, which was of scarlet, was wrought a broad
+white cross, both at back and breast; and so brilliant was the polish
+of his corselet, that, as from time to time the mantle waved aside and
+exposed it to the moonbeams, it glittered like light itself.
+
+"Nay, Rodolf," said he, "if thou hast so good a lot of it here with that
+hoary schemer, Heaven forbid that I should wish to draw thee back again
+to our merry band. But tell me--this Rienzi--thinkest thou he has any
+solid and formidable power?"
+
+"Pshaw! noble chieftain, not a whit of it. He pleases the mob; but as
+for the nobles, they laugh at him; and, as for the soldiers, he has no
+money!"
+
+"He pleases the mob, then!"
+
+"Ay, that doth he; and when he speaks aloud to them, all the roar of
+Rome is hushed."
+
+"Humph!--when nobles are hated, and soldiers are bought, a mob may, in
+any hour, become the master. An honest people and a weak mob,--a corrupt
+people and a strong mob," said the other, rather to himself than to
+his comrade, and scarce, perhaps, conscious of the eternal truth of his
+aphorism. "He is no mere brawler, this Rienzi, I suspect--I must see to
+it. Hark! what noise is that? By the Holy Sepulchre, it is the ring of
+our own metal!"
+
+"And that cry--'a Colonna!'" exclaimed Rodolf. "Pardon me, master,--I
+must away to the rescue!"
+
+"Ay, it is the duty of thy hire; run;--yet stay, I will accompany thee,
+gratis for once, and from pure passion for mischief. By this hand, there
+is no music like clashing steel!"
+
+Still Adrian continued gallantly and unwounded to defend himself, though
+his arm now grew tired, his breath well-nigh spent, and his eyes began
+to wink and reel beneath the glare of the tossing torches. Orsini
+himself, exhausted by his fury, had paused for an instant, fronting
+his foe with a heaving breast and savage looks, when, suddenly,
+his followers exclaimed, "Fly! fly!--the bandits approach--we are
+surrounded!"--and two of the servitors, without further parley, took
+fairly to their heels. The other five remained irresolute, and waiting
+but the command of their master, when he of the white plume, whom I have
+just described, thrust himself into the melee.
+
+"What! gentles," said he, "have ye finished already? Nay, let us not
+mar the sport; begin again, I beseech you. What are the odds? Ho! six
+to one!--nay, no wonder that ye have waited for fairer play. See, we two
+will take the weaker side. Now then, let us begin again."
+
+"Insolent!" cried the Orsini. "Knowest thou him whom thou addressest
+thus arrogantly?--I am Martino di Porto. Who art thou?"
+
+"Walter de Montreal, gentleman of Provence, and Knight of St. John!"
+answered the other, carelessly.
+
+At that redoubted name--the name of one of the boldest warriors, and of
+the most accomplished freebooter of his time--even Martino's cheek grew
+pale, and his followers uttered a cry of terror.
+
+"And this, my comrade," continued the Knight, "for we may as well
+complete the introduction, is probably better known to you than I am,
+gentles of Rome; and you doubtless recognize in him Rodolf of Saxony, a
+brave man and a true, where he is properly paid for his services."
+
+"Signor," said Adrian to his enemy, who, aghast and dumb, remained
+staring vacantly at the two new-comers, "you are now in my power. See,
+our own people, too, are approaching."
+
+And, indeed, from the palace of Stephen Colonna, torches began to blaze,
+and armed men were seen rapidly advancing to the spot.
+
+"Go home in peace, and if, tomorrow, or any day more suitable to thee,
+thou wilt meet me alone, and lance to lance, as is the wont of the
+knights of the empire; or with band to band, and man for man, as is
+rather the Roman custom; I will not fail thee--there is my gage."
+
+"Nobly spoken," said Montreal; "and, if ye choose the latter, by your
+leave, I will be one of the party."
+
+Martino answered not; he took up the glove, thrust it in his bosom, and
+strode hastily away; only, when he had got some paces down the street,
+he turned back, and, shaking his clenched hand at Adrian, exclaimed, in
+a voice trembling with impotent rage--"Faithful to death!"
+
+The words made one of the mottoes of the Orsini; and, whatever its
+earlier signification, had long passed into a current proverb, to
+signify their hatred to the Colonna.
+
+Adrian, now engaged in raising, and attempting to revive Irene, who was
+still insensible, disdainfully left it to Montreal to reply.
+
+"I doubt not, Signor," said the latter, coolly, "that thou wilt be
+faithful to Death: for Death, God wot, is the only contract which men,
+however ingenious, are unable to break or evade."
+
+"Pardon me, gentle Knight," said Adrian, looking up from his charge, "if
+I do not yet give myself wholly to gratitude. I have learned enough of
+knighthood to feel thou wilt acknowledge that my first duty is here--"
+
+"Oh, a lady, then, was the cause of the quarrel! I need not ask who
+was in the right, when a man brings to the rivalry such odds as yon
+caitiff."
+
+"Thou mistakest a little, Sir Knight,--it is but a lamb I have rescued
+from the wolf."
+
+"For thy own table! Be it so!" returned the Knight, gaily.
+
+Adrian smiled gravely, and shook his head in denial. In truth, he was
+somewhat embarrassed by his situation. Though habitually gallant, he was
+not willing to expose to misconstruction the disinterestedness of his
+late conduct, and (for it was his policy to conciliate popularity) to
+sully the credit which his bravery would give him among the citizens,
+by conveying Irene (whose beauty, too, as yet, he had scarcely noted)
+to his own dwelling; and yet, in her present situation, there was no
+alternative. She evinced no sign of life. He knew not her home, nor
+parentage. Benedetta had vanished. He could not leave her in the
+streets; he could not resign her to the care of another; and, as she lay
+now upon his breast, he felt her already endeared to him, by that sense
+of protection which is so grateful to the human heart. He briefly,
+therefore, explained to those now gathered round him, his present
+situation, and the cause of the past conflict; and bade the
+torch-bearers precede him to his home.
+
+"You, Sir Knight," added he, turning to Montreal, "if not already more
+pleasantly lodged, will, I trust, deign to be my guest?"
+
+"Thanks, Signor," answered Montreal, maliciously, "but I, also, perhaps,
+have my own affairs to watch over. Adieu! I shall seek you at the
+earliest occasion. Fair night, and gentle dreams!
+
+
+  'Robers Bertrams qui estoit tors Mais a ceval estoit mult fors
+  Cil avoit o lui grans effors Multi ot 'homes per lui mors.'"
+
+     ("An ill-favoured man, but a stout horseman, was Robert
+     Bertram. Great deeds were his, and many a man died by his
+     hand.")
+
+
+And, muttering this rugged chant from the old "Roman de Rou," the
+Provencal, followed by Rodolf, pursued his way.
+
+The vast extent of Rome, and the thinness of its population, left many
+of the streets utterly deserted. The principal nobles were thus
+enabled to possess themselves of a wide range of buildings, which they
+fortified, partly against each other, partly against the people; their
+numerous relatives and clients lived around them, forming, as it were,
+petty courts and cities in themselves.
+
+Almost opposite to the principal palace of the Colonna (occupied by his
+powerful kinsman, Stephen) was the mansion of Adrian. Heavily swung back
+the massive gates at his approach; he ascended the broad staircase, and
+bore his charge into an apartment which his tastes had decorated in a
+fashion not as yet common in that age. Ancient statues and busts were
+arranged around; the pictured arras of Lombardy decorated the walls, and
+covered the massive seats.
+
+"What ho! Lights here, and wine!" cried the Seneschal.
+
+"Leave us alone," said Adrian, gazing passionately on the pale cheek of
+Irene, as he now, by the clear light, beheld all its beauty; and a sweet
+yet burning hope crept into his heart.
+
+
+
+Chapter 1.V. The Description of a Conspirator, and the Dawn of the
+Conspiracy.
+
+Alone, by a table covered with various papers, sat a man in the prime
+of life. The chamber was low and long; many antique and disfigured
+bas-reliefs and torsos were placed around the wall, interspersed, here
+and there, with the short sword and close casque, time-worn relics of
+the prowess of ancient Rome. Right above the table at which he sate, the
+moonlight streamed through a high and narrow casement, deep sunk in the
+massy wall. In a niche to the right of this window, guarded by a sliding
+door, which was now partially drawn aside--but which, by its solid
+substance, and the sheet of iron with which it was plated, testified how
+valuable, in the eyes of the owner, was the treasure it protected--were
+ranged some thirty or forty volumes, then deemed no inconsiderable
+library; and being, for the most part, the laborious copies in
+manuscript by the hand of the owner, from immortal originals.
+
+Leaning his cheek on his hand, his brow somewhat knit, his lip slightly
+compressed, that personage, indulged in meditations far other than the
+indolent dreams of scholars. As the high and still moonlight shone upon
+his countenance, it gave an additional and solemn dignity to features
+which were naturally of a grave and majestic cast. Thick and auburn
+hair, the colour of which, not common to the Romans, was ascribed to his
+descent from the Teuton emperor, clustered in large curls above a high
+and expansive forehead; and even the present thoughtful compression of
+the brow could not mar the aspect of latent power, which it derived from
+that great breadth between the eyes, in which the Grecian sculptors of
+old so admirably conveyed the expression of authority, and the silent
+energy of command. But his features were not cast in the Grecian, still
+less in the Teuton mould. The iron jaw, the aquiline nose, the somewhat
+sunken cheek, strikingly recalled the character of the hard Roman
+race, and might not inaptly have suggested to a painter a model for the
+younger Brutus.
+
+The marked outline of the face, and the short, firm upper lip, were not
+concealed by the beard and mustachios usually then worn; and, in the
+faded portrait of the person now described, still extant at Rome, may
+be traced a certain resemblance to the popular pictures of Napoleon;
+not indeed in the features, which are more stern and prominent in the
+portrait of the Roman, but in that peculiar expression of concentrated
+and tranquil power which so nearly realizes the ideal of intellectual
+majesty. Though still young, the personal advantages most peculiar to
+youth,--the bloom and glow, the rounded cheek in which care has not yet
+ploughed its lines, the full unsunken eye, and the slender delicacy of
+frame,--these were not the characteristics of that solitary student.
+And, though considered by his contemporaries as eminently handsome, the
+judgment was probably formed less from the more vulgar claims to such
+distinction, than from the height of the stature, an advantage at that
+time more esteemed than at present, and that nobler order of beauty
+which cultivated genius and commanding character usually stamp upon even
+homely features;--the more rare in an age so rugged.
+
+The character of Rienzi (for the youth presented to the reader in the
+first chapter of this history is now again before him in maturer years)
+had acquired greater hardness and energy with each stepping-stone
+to power. There was a circumstance attendant on his birth which had,
+probably, exercised great and early influence on his ambition. Though
+his parents were in humble circumstances, and of lowly calling, his
+father was the natural son of the Emperor, Henry VII.; (De Sade supposes
+that the mother of Rienzi was the daughter of an illegitimate son of
+Henry VII., supporting his opinion from a MS. in the Vatican. But,
+according to the contemporaneous biographer, Rienzi, in addressing
+Charles, king of Bohemia claims the relationship from his father "Di
+vostro legnaggio sono--figlio di bastardo d'Enrico imperatore," &c. A
+more recent writer, il Padre Gabrini, cites an inscription in support of
+this descent: "Nicolaus Tribunus...Laurentii Teutonici Filius," &c.)
+and it was the pride of the parents that probably gave to Rienzi
+the unwonted advantages of education. This pride transmitted to
+himself,--his descent from royalty dinned into his ear, infused into his
+thoughts, from his cradle,--made him, even in his earliest youth, deem
+himself the equal of the Roman signors, and half unconsciously aspire
+to be their superior. But, as the literature of Rome was unfolded to
+his eager eye and ambitious heart, he became imbued with that pride of
+country which is nobler than the pride of birth; and, save when stung by
+allusions to his origin, he unaffectedly valued himself more on being
+a Roman plebeian than the descendant of a Teuton king. His brother's
+death, and the vicissitudes he himself had already undergone, deepened
+the earnest and solemn qualities of his character; and, at length, all
+the faculties of a very uncommon intellect were concentrated into one
+object--which borrowed from a mind strongly and mystically religious,
+as well as patriotic, a sacred aspect, and grew at once a duty and a
+passion.
+
+"Yes," said Rienzi, breaking suddenly from his revery, "yes, the day
+is at hand when Rome shall rise again from her ashes; Justice shall
+dethrone Oppression; men shall walk safe in their ancient Forum. We will
+rouse from his forgotten tomb the indomitable soul of Cato! There shall
+be a people once more in Rome! And I--I shall be the instrument of that
+triumph--the restorer of my race! mine shall be the first voice to swell
+the battle-cry of freedom--mine the first hand to rear her banner--yes,
+from the height of my own soul as from a mountain, I see already rising
+the liberties and the grandeur of the New Rome; and on the corner-stone
+of the mighty fabric posterity shall read my name."
+
+Uttering these lofty boasts, the whole person of the speaker seemed
+instinct with his ambition. He strode the gloomy chamber with light and
+rapid steps, as if on air; his breast heaved, his eyes glowed. He felt
+that love itself can scarcely bestow a rapture equal to that which is
+felt, in his first virgin enthusiasm, by a patriot who knows himself
+sincere!
+
+There was a slight knock at the door, and a servitor, in the rich
+liveries worn by the pope's officials, (Not the present hideous
+habiliments, which are said to have been the invention of Michael
+Angelo.) presented himself.
+
+"Signor," said he, "my Lord, the Bishop of Orvietto, is without."
+
+"Ha! that is fortunate. Lights there!--My Lord, this is an honour which
+I can estimate better than express."
+
+"Tut, tut! my good friend," said the Bishop, entering, and seating
+himself familiarly, "no ceremonies between the servants of the Church;
+and never, I ween well, had she greater need of true friends than now.
+These unholy tumults, these licentious contentions, in the very shrines
+and city of St. Peter, are sufficient to scandalize all Christendom."
+
+"And so will it be," said Rienzi, "until his Holiness himself shall
+be graciously persuaded to fix his residence in the seat of his
+predecessors, and curb with a strong arm the excesses of the nobles."
+
+"Alas, man!" said the Bishop, "thou knowest that these words are but as
+wind; for were the Pope to fulfil thy wishes, and remove from Avignon to
+Rome, by the blood of St. Peter! he would not curb the nobles, but
+the nobles would curb him. Thou knowest well that until his blessed
+predecessor, of pious memory, conceived the wise design of escaping
+to Avignon, the Father of the Christian world was but like many other
+fathers in their old age, controlled and guarded by his rebellious
+children. Recollectest thou not how the noble Boniface himself, a man of
+great heart, and nerves of iron, was kept in thraldom by the ancestors
+of the Orsini--his entrances and exits made but at their will--so that,
+like a caged eagle, he beat himself against his bars and died? Verily,
+thou talkest of the memories of Rome--these are not the memories that
+are very attractive to popes."
+
+"Well," said Rienzi, laughing gently, and drawing his seat nearer to the
+Bishop's, "my Lord has certainly the best of the argument at present;
+and I must own, that strong, licentious, and unhallowed as the order of
+nobility was then, it is yet more so now."
+
+"Even I," rejoined Raimond, colouring as he spoke, "though Vicar of the
+Pope, and representative of his spiritual authority, was, but three days
+ago, subjected to a coarse affront from that very Stephen Colonna, who
+has ever received such favour and tenderness from the Holy See. His
+servitors jostled mine in the open streets, and I myself,--I, the
+delegate of the sire of kings--was forced to draw aside to the wall,
+and wait until the hoary insolent swept by. Nor were blaspheming words
+wanting to complete the insult. 'Pardon, Lord Bishop,' said he, as
+he passed me; 'but this world, thou knowest, must necessarily take
+precedence of the other.'"
+
+"Dared he so high?" said Rienzi, shading his face with his hand, as a
+very peculiar smile--scarcely itself joyous, though it made others gay,
+and which completely changed the character of his face, naturally grave
+even to sternness--played round his lips. "Then it is time for thee,
+holy father, as for us, to--"
+
+"To what?" interrupted the Bishop, quickly. "Can we effect aught!
+Dismiss thy enthusiastic dreamings--descend to the real earth--look
+soberly round us. Against men so powerful, what can we do?"
+
+"My Lord," answered Rienzi, gravely, "it is the misfortune of signors of
+your rank never to know the people, or the accurate signs of the time.
+As those who pass over the heights of mountains see the clouds sweep
+below, veiling the plains and valleys from their gaze, while they, only
+a little above the level, survey the movements and the homes of men;
+even so from your lofty eminence ye behold but the indistinct and sullen
+vapours--while from my humbler station I see the preparations of the
+shepherds, to shelter themselves and herds from the storm which those
+clouds betoken. Despair not, my Lord; endurance goes but to a certain
+limit--to that limit it is already stretched; Rome waits but the
+occasion (it will soon come, but not suddenly) to rise simultaneously
+against her oppressors."
+
+The great secret of eloquence is to be in earnest--the great secret of
+Rienzi's eloquence was in the mightiness of his enthusiasm. He never
+spoke as one who doubted of success. Perhaps, like most men who
+undertake high and great actions, he himself was never thoroughly aware
+of the obstacles in his way. He saw the end, bright and clear, and
+overleaped, in the vision of his soul, the crosses and the length of
+the path; thus the deep convictions of his own mind stamped themselves
+irresistibly upon others. He seemed less to promise than to prophesy.
+
+The Bishop of Orvietto, not over wise, yet a man of cool temperament
+and much worldly experience, was forcibly impressed by the energy of his
+companion; perhaps, indeed, the more so, inasmuch as his own pride and
+his own passions were also enlisted against the arrogance and licence of
+the nobles. He paused ere he replied to Rienzi.
+
+"But is it," he asked, at length, "only the plebeians who will rise?
+Thou knowest how they are caitiff and uncertain."
+
+"My Lord," answered Rienzi, "judge, by one fact, how strongly I am
+surrounded by friends of no common class: thou knowest how loudly
+I speak against the nobles--I cite them by their name--I beard the
+Savelli, the Orsini, the Colonna, in their very hearing. Thinkest thou
+that they forgive me? thinkest thou that, were only the plebeians my
+safeguard and my favourers, they would not seize me by open force,--that
+I had not long ere this found a gag in their dungeons, or been swallowed
+up in the eternal dumbness of the grave? Observe," continued he, as,
+reading the Vicar's countenance, he perceived the impression he had
+made--"observe, that, throughout the whole world, a great revolution has
+begun. The barbaric darkness of centuries has been broken; the Knowledge
+which made men as demigods in the past time has been called from her
+urn; a Power, subtler than brute force, and mightier than armed men, is
+at work; we have begun once more to do homage to the Royalty of Mind.
+Yes, that same Power which, a few years ago, crowned Petrarch in the
+Capitol, when it witnessed, after the silence of twelve centuries, the
+glories of a Triumph,--which heaped upon a man of obscure birth, and
+unknown in arms, the same honours given of old to emperors and the
+vanquishers of kings,--which united in one act of homage even the rival
+houses of Colonna and Orsini,--which made the haughtiest patricians
+emulous to bear the train, to touch but the purple robe, of the son of
+the Florentine plebeian,--which still draws the eyes of Europe to
+the lowly cottage of Vaucluse,--which gives to the humble student the
+all-acknowledged licence to admonish tyrants, and approach, with haughty
+prayers, even the Father of the Church;--yes, that same Power, which,
+working silently throughout Italy, murmurs under the solid base of
+the Venetian oligarchy; (It was about eight years afterwards that the
+long-smothered hate of the Venetian people to that wisest and most
+vigilant of all oligarchies, the Sparta of Italy, broke out in the
+conspiracy under Marino Faliero.) which, beyond the Alps, has wakened
+into visible and sudden life in Spain, in Germany, in Flanders; and
+which, even in that barbarous Isle, conquered by the Norman sword, ruled
+by the bravest of living kings, (Edward III., in whose reign opinions
+far more popular than those of the following century began to work. The
+Civil Wars threw back the action into the blood. It was indeed an age
+throughout the world which put forth abundant blossoms, but crude and
+unripened fruit;--a singular leap, followed by as singular a pause.)
+has roused a spirit Norman cannot break--kings to rule over must rule
+by--yes, that same Power is everywhere abroad: it speaks, it conquers in
+the voice even of him who is before you; it unites in his cause all on
+whom but one glimmering of light has burst, all in whom one generous
+desire can be kindled! Know, Lord Vicar, that there is not a man in
+Rome, save our oppressors themselves--not a man who has learned one
+syllable of our ancient tongue--whose heart and sword are not with me.
+The peaceful cultivators of letters--the proud nobles of the second
+order--the rising race, wiser than their slothful sires; above all, my
+Lord, the humbler ministers of religion, priests and monks, whom luxury
+hath not blinded, pomp hath not deafened, to the monstrous outrage to
+Christianity daily and nightly perpetrated in the Christian Capital;
+these,--all these,--are linked with the merchant and the artisan in one
+indissoluble bond, waiting but the signal to fall or to conquer, to live
+freemen, or to die martyrs, with Rienzi and their country!"
+
+"Sayest thou so in truth?" said the Bishop, startled, and half rising.
+"Prove but thy words, and thou shalt not find the ministers of God are
+less eager than their lay brethren for the happiness of men."
+
+"What I say," rejoined Rienzi, in a cooler tone, "that can I show; but I
+may only prove it to those who will be with us."
+
+"Fear me not," answered Raimond: "I know well the secret mind of his
+Holiness, whose delegate and representative I am; and could he see but
+the legitimate and natural limit set to the power of the patricians,
+who, in their arrogance, have set at nought the authority of the Church
+itself, be sure that he would smile on the hand that drew the line.
+Nay, so certain of this am I, that if ye succeed, I, his responsible but
+unworthy vicar, will myself sanction the success. But beware of crude
+attempts; the Church must not be weakened by linking itself to failure."
+
+"Right, my Lord," answered Rienzi; "and in this, the policy of religion
+is that of freedom. Judge of my prudence by my long delay. He who can
+see all around him impatient--himself not less so--and yet suppress the
+signal, and bide the hour, is not likely to lose his cause by rashness."
+
+"More, then, of this anon," said the Bishop, resettling himself in his
+seat. "As thy plans mature, fear not to communicate with me. Believe
+that Rome has no firmer friend then he who, ordained to preserve order,
+finds himself impotent against aggression. Meanwhile, to the object of
+my present visit, which links itself, in some measure, perhaps, with the
+topics on which we have conversed...Thou knowest that when his Holiness
+intrusted thee with thy present office, he bade thee also announce his
+beneficent intention of granting a general Jubilee at Rome for the year
+1350--a most admirable design for two reasons, sufficiently apparent
+to thyself: first, that every Christian soul that may undertake the
+pilgrimage to Rome on that occasion, may thus obtain a general remission
+of sins; and secondly, because, to speak carnally, the concourse of
+pilgrims so assembled, usually, by the donations and offerings their
+piety suggests, very materially add to the revenues of the Holy See:
+at this time, by the way, in no very flourishing condition. This thou
+knowest, dear Rienzi."
+
+Rienzi bowed his head in assent, and the prelate continued--
+
+"Well, it is with the greatest grief that his Holiness perceives that
+his pious intentions are likely to be frustrated: for so fierce and
+numerous are now the brigands in the public approaches to Rome, that,
+verily, the boldest pilgrim may tremble a little to undertake the
+journey; and those who do so venture will, probably, be composed of the
+poorest of the Christian community,--men who, bringing with them neither
+gold, nor silver, nor precious offerings, will have little to fear from
+the rapacity of the brigands. Hence arise two consequences: on the
+one hand, the rich--whom, Heaven knows, and the Gospel has, indeed,
+expressly declared, have the most need of a remission of sins--will be
+deprived of this glorious occasion for absolution; and, on the other
+hand, the coffers of the Church will be impiously defrauded of that
+wealth which it would otherwise doubtless obtain from the zeal of her
+children."
+
+"Nothing can be more logically manifest, my Lord," said Rienzi.
+
+The Vicar continued--"Now, in letters received five days since from his
+Holiness, he bade me expose these fearful consequences to Christianity
+to the various patricians who are legitimately fiefs of the Church, and
+command their resolute combination against the marauders of the road.
+With these have I conferred, and vainly."
+
+"For by the aid, and from the troops, of those very brigands, these
+patricians have fortified their palaces against each other," added
+Rienzi.
+
+"Exactly for that reason," rejoined the Bishop. "Nay, Stephen Colonna
+himself had the audacity to confess it. Utterly unmoved by the loss to
+so many precious souls, and, I may add, to the papal treasury, which
+ought to be little less dear to right-discerning men, they refuse
+to advance a step against the bandits. Now, then, hearken the second
+mandate of his Holiness:--'Failing the nobles,' saith he, in his
+prophetic sagacity, 'confer with Cola di Rienzi. He is a bold man, and a
+pious, and, thou tellest me, of great weight with the people; and say to
+him, that if his wit can devise the method for extirpating these sons
+of Belial, and rendering a safe passage along the public ways, largely,
+indeed, will he merit at our hands,--lasting will be the gratitude we
+shall owe to him; and whatever succour thou, and the servants of our
+See, can render to him, let it not be stinted.'"
+
+"Said his Holiness thus!" exclaimed Rienzi. "I ask no more--the
+gratitude is mine that he hath thought thus of his servant, and
+intrusted me with this charge; at once I accept it--at once I pledge
+myself to success. Let us, my Lord, let us, then, clearly understand
+the limits ordained to my discretion. To curb the brigands without the
+walls, I must have authority over those within. If I undertake, at peril
+of my life, to clear all the avenues to Rome of the robbers who now
+infest it, shall I have full licence for conduct bold, peremptory, and
+severe?"
+
+"Such conduct the very nature of the charge demands," replied Raimond.
+
+"Ay,--even though it be exercised against the arch offenders--against
+the supporters of the brigands--against the haughtiest of the nobles
+themselves?"
+
+The Bishop paused, and looked hard in the face of the speaker. "I
+repeat," said he, at length, sinking his voice, and with a significant
+tone, "in these bold attempts, success is the sole sanction. Succeed,
+and we will excuse thee all--even to the--"
+
+"Death of a Colonna or an Orsini, should justice demand it; and provided
+it be according to the law, and only incurred by the violation of the
+law!" added Rienzi, firmly.
+
+The Bishop did not reply in words, but a slight motion of his head was
+sufficient answer to Rienzi.
+
+"My Lord," said he, "from this time, then, all is well; I date the
+revolution--the restoration of order, of the state--from this hour, this
+very conference. Till now, knowing that justice must never wink upon
+great offenders, I had hesitated, through fear lest thou and his
+Holiness might deem it severity, and blame him who replaces the law,
+because he smites the violaters of law. Now I judge ye more rightly.
+Your hand, my Lord."
+
+The Bishop extended his hand; Rienzi grasped it firmly, and then raised
+it respectfully to his lips. Both felt that the compact was sealed.
+
+This conference, so long in recital, was short in the reality; but its
+object was already finished, and the Bishop rose to depart. The outer
+portal of the house was opened, the numerous servitors of the Bishop
+held on high their torches, and he had just termed from Rienzi, who
+had attended him to the gate, when a female passed hastily through the
+Prelate's train, and starting as she beheld Rienzi, flung herself at his
+feet.
+
+"Oh, hasten, Sir! hasten, for the love of God, hasten! or the young
+Signora is lost for ever!"
+
+"The Signora!--Heaven and earth, Benedetta, of whom do you speak?--of my
+sister--of Irene? is she not within?"
+
+"Oh, Sir--the Orsini--the Orsini!"
+
+"What of them?--speak, woman!"
+
+Here, breathlessly, and with many a break, Benedetta recounted to
+Rienzi, in whom the reader has already recognised the brother of Irene,
+so far of the adventure with Martino di Porto as she had witnessed: of
+the termination and result of the contest she knew nought.
+
+Rienzi listened in silence; but the deadly paleness of his countenance,
+and the writhing of the nether lip, testified the emotions to which he
+gave no audible vent.
+
+"You hear, my Lord Bishop--you hear," said he, when Benedetta had
+concluded; and turning to the Bishop, whose departure the narrative had
+delayed--"you hear to what outrage the citizens of Rome are subjected.
+My hat and sword! instantly! My Lord, forgive my abruptness."
+
+"Whither art thou bent, then?" asked Raimond.
+
+"Whither--whither!--Ay, I forgot, my Lord, you have no sister. Perhaps
+too, you had no brother?--No, no; one victim at least I will live to
+save. Whither, you ask me?--to the palace of Martino di Porto."
+
+"To an Orsini alone, and for justice?"
+
+"Alone, and for justice!--No!" shouted Rienzi, in a loud voice, as he
+seized his sword, now brought to him by one of his servants, and rushed
+from the house; "but one man is sufficient for revenge!"
+
+The Bishop paused for a moment's deliberation. "He must not be lost,"
+muttered he, "as he well may be, if exposed thus solitary to the wolf's
+rage. What, ho!" he cried aloud; "advance the torches!--quick, quick! We
+ourself--we, the Vicar of the Pope--will see to this. Calm yourselves,
+good people; your young Signora shall be restored. On! to the palace of
+Martino di Porto!"
+
+
+
+Chapter 1.VI. Irene in the Palace of Adrian di Castello.
+
+As the Cyprian gazed on the image in which he had embodied a youth of
+dreams, what time the living hues flushed slowly beneath the marble,--so
+gazed the young and passionate Adrian upon the form reclined before him,
+re-awakening gradually to life. And, if the beauty of that face were
+not of the loftiest or the most dazzling order, if its soft and quiet
+character might be outshone by many, of loveliness less really perfect,
+yet never was there a countenance that, to some eyes, would have seemed
+more charming, and never one in which more eloquently was wrought that
+ineffable and virgin expression which Italian art seeks for in its
+models,--in which modesty is the outward, and tenderness the latent,
+expression; the bloom of youth, both of form and heart, ere the first
+frail and delicate freshness of either is brushed away: and when even
+love itself, the only unquiet visitant that should be known at such an
+age, is but a sentiment, and not a passion!
+
+"Benedetta!" murmured Irene, at length opening her eyes, unconsciously,
+upon him who knelt beside her,--eyes of that uncertain, that most liquid
+hue, on which you might gaze for years and never learn the secret of the
+colour, so changed it with the dilating pupil,--darkening in the shade,
+and brightening into azure in the light:
+
+"Benedetta," said Irene, "where art thou? Oh, Benedetta! I have had such
+a dream."
+
+"And I, too, such a vision!" thought Adrian.
+
+"Where am I?" cried Irene, rising from the couch. "This room--these
+hangings--Holy Virgin! do I dream still!--and you! Heavens!--it is the
+Lord Adrian di Castello!"
+
+"Is that a name thou hast been taught to fear?" said Adrian; "if so, I
+will forswear it."
+
+If Irene now blushed deeply, it was not in that wild delight with which
+her romantic heart motive foretold that she would listen to the
+first words of homage from Adrian di Castello. Bewildered and
+confused,--terrified at the strangeness of the place and shrinking even
+from the thought of finding herself alone with one who for years had
+been present to her fancies,--alarm and distress were the emotions
+she felt the most, and which most were impressed upon her speaking
+countenance; and as Adrian now drew nearer to her, despite the
+gentleness of his voice and the respect of his looks, her fears, not the
+less strong that they were vague, increased upon her: she retreated to
+the further end of the room, looked wildly round her, and then, covering
+her face with her hands, burst into a paroxysm of tears.
+
+Moved himself by these tears, and divining her thoughts, Adrian forgot
+for moment all the more daring wishes he had formed.
+
+"Fear not, sweet lady," said he, earnestly: "recollect thyself, I
+beseech thee; no peril, no evil can reach thee here; it was this hand
+that saved thee from the outrage of the Orsini--this roof is but the
+shelter of a friend! Tell me, then, fair wonder, thy name and residence,
+and I will summon my servitors, and guard thee to thy home at once."
+
+Perhaps the relief of tears, even more than Adrian's words, restored
+Irene to herself, and enabled her to comprehend her novel situation;
+and as her senses, thus cleared, told her what she owed to him whom her
+dreams had so long imaged as the ideal of all excellence, she recovered
+her self-possession, and uttered her thanks with a grace not the less
+winning, if it still partook of embarrassment.
+
+"Thank me not," answered Adrian, passionately. "I have touched thy
+hand--I am repaid. Repaid! nay, all gratitude--all homage is for me to
+render!"
+
+Blushing again, but with far different emotions than before, Irene,
+after a momentary pause, replied, "Yet, my Lord, I must consider it a
+debt the more weighty that you speak of it so lightly. And now, complete
+the obligation. I do not see my companion--suffer her to accompany me
+home; it is but a short way hence."
+
+"Blessed, then, is the air that I have breathed so unconsciously!" said
+Adrian. "But thy companion, dear lady, is not here. She fled, I imagine,
+in the confusion of the conflict; and not knowing thy name, nor being
+able, in thy then state, to learn it from thy lips, it was my happy
+necessity to convey thee hither;--but I will be thy companion. Nay, why
+that timid glance? my people, also, shall attend us."
+
+"My thanks, noble Lord, are of little worth; my brother, who is not
+unknown to thee, will thank thee more fittingly. May I depart?" and
+Irene, as she spoke, was already at the door.
+
+"Art thou so eager to leave me?" answered Adrian, sadly. "Alas! when
+thou hast departed from my eyes, it will seem as if the moon had left
+the night!--but it is happiness to obey thy wishes, even though they
+tear thee from me."
+
+A slight smile parted Irene's lips, and Adrian's heart beat audibly
+to himself, as he drew from that smile, and those downcast eyes, no
+unfavourable omen.
+
+Reluctantly and slowly he turned towards the door, and summoned his
+attendants. "But," said he, as they stood on the lofty staircase, "thou
+sayest, sweet lady, that thy brother's name is not unknown to me. Heaven
+grant that he be, indeed, a friend of the Colonna!"
+
+"His boast," answered Irene, evasively; "the boast of Cola di Rienzi is,
+to be a friend to the friends of Rome."
+
+"Holy Virgin of Ara Coeli!--is thy brother that extraordinary man?"
+exclaimed Adrian, as he foresaw, at the mention of that name, a barrier
+to his sudden passion. "Alas! in a Colonna, in a noble, he will see no
+merit; even though thy fortunate deliverer, sweet maiden, sought to be
+his early friend!"
+
+"Thou wrongest him much, my Lord," returned Irene, warmly; "he is a man
+above all others to sympathize with thy generous valour, even had it
+been exerted in defence of the humblest woman in Rome,--how much more,
+then, when in protection of his sister!"
+
+"The times are, indeed, diseased," answered Adrian, thoughtfully, as
+they now found themselves in the open street, "when men who alike mourn
+for the woes of their country are yet suspicious of each other; when to
+be a patrician is to be regarded as an enemy to the people; when to
+be termed the friend of the people is to be considered a foe to the
+patricians: but come what may, oh! let me hope, dear lady, that no
+doubts, no divisions, shall banish from thy breast one gentle memory of
+me!"
+
+"Ah! little, little do you know me!" began Irene, and stopped suddenly
+short.
+
+"Speak! speak again!--of what music has this envious silence deprived my
+soul! Thou wilt not, then, forget me? And," continued Adrian, "we shall
+meet again? It is to Rienzi's house we are bound now; tomorrow I shall
+visit my old companion,--tomorrow I shall see thee. Will it not be so?"
+
+In Irene's silence was her answer.
+
+"And as thou hast told me thy brother's name, make it sweet to my ear,
+and add to it thine own."
+
+"They call me Irene."
+
+"Irene, Irene!--let me repeat it. It is a soft name, and dwells upon the
+lips as if loath to leave them--a fitting name for one like thee."
+
+Thus making his welcome court to Irene, in that flowered and glowing
+language which, if more peculiar to that age and to the gallantry of
+the south, is also the language in which the poetry of youthful passion
+would, in all times and lands, utter its rich extravagance, could heart
+speak to heart, Adrian conveyed homeward his beautiful charge, taking,
+however, the most circuitous and lengthened route; an artifice which
+Irene either perceived not, or silently forgave. They were now within
+sight of the street in which Rienzi dwelt, when a party of men bearing
+torches, came unexpectedly upon them. It was the train of the Bishop of
+Orvietto, returning from the palace of Martino di Porto, and in their
+way (accompanied by Rienzi) to that of Adrian. They had learned at the
+former, without an interview with the Orsini, from the retainers in
+the court below, the fortune of the conflict, and the name of Irene's
+champion; and, despite Adrian's general reputation for gallantry, Rienzi
+knew enough of his character, and the nobleness of his temper, to feel
+assured that Irene was safe in his protection. Alas! in that very safety
+to the person is often the most danger to the heart. Woman never so
+dangerously loves, as when he who loves her, for her sake, subdues
+himself.
+
+Clasped to her brother's breast, Irene bade him thank her deliverer;
+and Rienzi, with that fascinating frankness which sits so well on those
+usually reserved, and which all who would rule the hearts of their
+fellow-men must at times command, advanced to the young Colonna, and
+poured forth his gratitude and praise.
+
+"We have been severed too long,--we must know each other again," replied
+Adrian. "I shall seek thee, ere long, be assured."
+
+Turning to take his leave of Irene, he conveyed her hand to his lips,
+and pressing it, as it dropped from his clasp, was he deceived in
+thinking that those delicate fingers lightly, involuntarily, returned
+the pressure?
+
+
+
+Chapter 1.VII. Upon Love and Lovers.
+
+If, in adopting the legendary love tale of Romeo and Juliet, Shakespeare
+had changed the scene in which it is cast for a more northern clime, we
+may doubt whether the art of Shakespeare himself could have reconciled
+us at once to the suddenness and the strength of Juliet's passion. And,
+even as it is, perhaps there are few of our rational and sober-minded
+islanders who would not honestly confess, if fairly questioned, that
+they deem the romance and fervour of those ill-starred lovers of Verona
+exaggerated and over-drawn. Yet, in Italy, the picture of that affection
+born of a night--but "strong as death"--is one to which the veriest
+commonplaces of life would afford parallels without number. As in
+different ages, so in different climes, love varies wonderfully in the
+shapes it takes. And even at this day, beneath Italian skies, many a
+simple girl would feel as Juliet, and many a homely gallant would rival
+the extravagance of Romeo. Long suits in that sunny land, wherein, as
+whereof, I now write, are unknown. In no other land, perhaps, is there
+found so commonly the love at first sight, which in France is a jest,
+and in England a doubt; in no other land, too, is love, though so
+suddenly conceived, more faithfully preserved. That which is ripened
+in fancy comes at once to passion, yet is embalmed through all time by
+sentiment. And this must be my and their excuse, if the love of
+Adrian some too prematurely formed, and that of Irene too romantically
+conceived;--it is the excuse which they take from the air and sun, from
+the customs of their ancestors, from the soft contagion of example.
+But while they yielded to the dictates of their hearts, it was with a
+certain though secret sadness--a presentiment that had, perhaps, its
+charm, though it was of cross and evil. Born of so proud a race, Adrian
+could scarcely dream of marriage with the sister of a plebeian; and
+Irene, unconscious of the future glory of her brother, could hardly
+have cherished any hope, save that of being loved. Yet these adverse
+circumstances, which, in the harder, the more prudent, the more
+self-denying, perhaps the more virtuous minds, that are formed beneath
+the northern skies, would have been an inducement to wrestle against
+love so placed, only contributed to feed and to strengthen theirs by
+an opposition which has ever its attraction for romance. They found
+frequent, though short, opportunities of meeting--not quite alone, but
+only in the conniving presence of Benedetta: sometimes in the public
+gardens, sometimes amidst the vast and deserted ruins by which the house
+of Rienzi was surrounded. They surrendered themselves, without much
+question of the future, to the excitement--the elysium--of the hour:
+they lived but from day to day; their future was the next time they
+should meet; beyond that epoch, the very mists of their youthful love
+closed in obscurity and shadow which they sought not to penetrate: and
+as yet they had not arrived at that period of affection when there was
+danger of their fall,--their love had not passed the golden portal where
+Heaven ceases and Earth begins. Everything for them was the poetry,
+the vagueness, the refinement,--not the power, the concentration, the
+mortality,--of desire! The look--the whisper--the brief pressure of the
+hand, at most, the first kisses of love, rare and few,--these marked the
+human limits of that sentiment which filled them with a new life, which
+elevated them as with a new soul.
+
+The roving tendencies of Adrian were at once fixed and centered; the
+dreams of his tender mistress had awakened to a life dreaming still, but
+"rounded with a truth." All that earnestness, and energy, and fervour of
+emotion, which, in her brother, broke forth in the schemes of patriotism
+and the aspirations of power, were, in Irene, softened down into one
+object of existence, one concentration of soul,--and that was love. Yet,
+in this range of thought and action, so apparently limited, there was,
+in reality, no less boundless a sphere than in the wide space of her
+brother's many-pathed ambition. Not the less had she the power and
+scope for all the loftiest capacities granted to our clay. Equal was her
+enthusiasm for her idol; equal, had she been equally tried, would have
+been her generosity, her devotion:--greater, be sure, her courage; more
+inalienable her worship; more unsullied by selfish purposes and sordid
+views. Time, change, misfortune, ingratitude, would have left her the
+same! What state could fall, what liberty decay, if the zeal of man's
+noisy patriotism were as pure as the silent loyalty of a woman's love?
+
+In them everything was young!--the heart unchilled, unblighted,--that
+fulness and luxuriance of life's life which has in it something of
+divine. At that age, when it seems as if we could never die, how
+deathless, how flushed and mighty as with the youngness of a god, is all
+that our hearts create! Our own youth is like that of the earth itself,
+when it peopled the woods and waters with divinities; when life
+ran riot, and yet only gave birth to beauty;--all its shapes, of
+poetry,--all its airs, the melodies of Arcady and Olympus! The Golden
+Age never leaves the world: it exists still, and shall exist, till love,
+health, poetry, are no more; but only for the young!
+
+If I now dwell, though but for a moment, on this interlude in a drama
+calling forth more masculine passions than that of love, it is because
+I foresee that the occasion will but rarely recur. If I linger on the
+description of Irene and her hidden affection, rather than wait for
+circumstances to portray them better than the author's words can, it is
+because I foresee that that loving and lovely image must continue to the
+last rather a shadow than a portrait,--thrown in the background, as is
+the real destiny of such natures, by bolder figures and more gorgeous
+colours; a something whose presence is rather felt than seen, and whose
+very harmony with the whole consists in its retiring and subdued repose.
+
+
+
+Chapter 1.VIII. The Enthusiastic Man Judged by the Discreet Man.
+
+"Thou wrongest me," said Rienzi, warmly, to Adrian, as they sat alone,
+towards the close of a long conference; "I do not play the part of a
+mere demagogue; I wish not to stir the great deeps in order that my
+lees of fortune may rise to the surface. So long have I brooded over the
+past, that it seems to me as if I had become a part of it--as if I
+had no separate existence. I have coined my whole soul into one master
+passion,--and its end is the restoration of Rome."
+
+"But by what means?"
+
+"My Lord! my Lord! there is but one way to restore the greatness of a
+people--it is an appeal to the people themselves. It is not in the power
+of princes and barons to make a state permanently glorious; they
+raise themselves, but they raise not the people with them. All great
+regenerations are the universal movement of the mass."
+
+"Nay," answered Adrian, "then have we read history differently. To
+me, all great regenerations seem to have been the work of the few, and
+tacitly accepted by the multitude. But let us not dispute after the
+manner of the schools. Thou sayest loudly that a vast crisis is at hand;
+that the Good Estate (buono stato) shall be established. How? where are
+your arms?--your soldiers? Are the nobles less strong than heretofore?
+Is the mob more bold, more constant? Heaven knows that I speak not with
+the prejudices of my order--I weep for the debasement of my country! I
+am a Roman, and in that name I forget that I am a noble. But I tremble
+at the storm you would raise so hazardously. If your insurrection
+succeed, it will be violent: it will be purchased by blood--by the blood
+of all the loftiest names of Rome. You will aim at a second expulsion of
+the Tarquins; but it will be more like a second proscription of Sylla.
+Massacres and disorders never pave the way to peace. If, on the other
+hand, you fail, the chains of Rome are riveted for ever: an ineffectual
+struggle to escape is but an excuse for additional tortures to the
+slave."
+
+"And what, then, would the Lord Adrian have us do?" said Rienzi, with
+that peculiar and sarcastic smile which has before been noted. "Shall
+we wait till the Colonna and Orsini quarrel no more? shall we ask the
+Colonna for liberty, and the Orsini for justice? My Lord, we cannot
+appeal to the nobles against the nobles. We must not ask them to
+moderate their power; we must restore to ourselves that power. There may
+be danger in the attempt--but we attempt it amongst the monuments of the
+Forum: and if we fall--we shall perish worthy of our sires! Ye have
+high descent, and sounding titles, and wide lands, and you talk of your
+ancestral honours! We, too,--we plebeians of Rome,--we have ours! Our
+fathers were freemen! where is our heritage? not sold--not given away:
+but stolen from us, now by fraud, now by force--filched from us in
+our sleep; or wrung from us with fierce hands, amidst our cries and
+struggles. My Lord, we but ask that lawful heritage to be restored to
+us: to us--nay, to you it is the same; your liberty, alike, is gone. Can
+you dwell in your father's house, without towers, and fortresses, and
+the bought swords of bravos? can you walk in the streets at dark without
+arms and followers? True, you, a noble, may retaliate; though we dare
+not. You, in your turn, may terrify and outrage others; but does licence
+compensate for liberty? They have given you pomp and power--but the
+safety of equal laws were a better gift. Oh, were I you--were I Stephen
+Colonna himself, I should pant, ay, thirstily as I do now, for that
+free air which comes not through bars and bulwarks against my
+fellow-citizens, but in the open space of Heaven--safe, because
+protected by the silent Providence of Law, and not by the lean fears
+and hollow-eyed suspicions which are the comrades of a hated power.
+The tyrant thinks he is free, because he commands slaves: the meanest
+peasant in a free state is more free than he is. Oh, my Lord, that
+you--the brave, the generous, the enlightened--you, almost alone amidst
+your order, in the knowledge that we had a country--oh, would that you
+who can sympathise with our sufferings, would strike with us for their
+redress!"
+
+"Thou wilt war against Stephen Colonna, my kinsman; and though I have
+seen him but little, nor, truth to say, esteem him much, yet he is the
+boast of our house,--how can I join thee?"
+
+"His life will be safe, his possessions safe, his rank safe. What do we
+war against? His power to do wrong to others."
+
+"Should he discover that thou hast force beyond words, he would be less
+merciful to thee."
+
+"And has he not discovered that? Do not the shouts of the people tell
+him that I am a man whom he should fear? Does he--the cautious, the
+wily, the profound--does he build fortresses, and erect towers, and not
+see from his battlements the mighty fabric that I, too, have erected?"
+
+"You! where, Rienzi?"
+
+"In the hearts of Rome! Does he not see?" continued Rienzi. "No, no;
+he--all, all his tribe, are blind. Is it not so?"
+
+"Of a certainty, my kinsman has no belief in your power, else he would
+have crushed you long ere this. Nay, it was but three days ago that he
+said, gravely, he would rather you addressed the populace than the best
+priest in Christendom; for that other orators inflamed the crowd, and no
+man so stilled and dispersed them as you did."
+
+"And I called him profound! Does not Heaven hush the air most when
+most it prepares the storm? Ay, my Lord, I understand. Stephen Colonna
+despises me. I have been"--(here, as he continued, a deep blush mantled
+over his cheek)--"you remember it--at his palace in my younger days,
+and pleased him with witty tales and light apophthegms. Nay--ha! ha!--he
+would call me, I think, sometimes, in gay compliment, his jester--his
+buffoon! I have brooked his insult; I have even bowed to his applause.
+I would undergo the same penance, stoop to the same shame, for the same
+motive, and in the same cause. What did I desire to effect? Can you tell
+me? No! I will whisper it, then, to you: it was--the contempt of Stephen
+Colonna. Under that contempt I was protected, till protection became
+no longer necessary. I desired not to be thought formidable by the
+patricians, in order that, quietly and unsuspected, I might make my way
+amongst the people. I have done so; I now throw aside the mask. Face
+to face with Stephen Colonna, I could tell him, this very hour, that I
+brave his anger; that I laugh at his dungeons and armed men. But if he
+think me the same Rienzi as of old, let him; I can wait my hour."
+
+"Yet," said Adrian, waiving an answer to the haughty language of his
+companion, "tell me, what dost thou ask for the people, in order to
+avoid an appeal to their passions?--ignorant and capricious as they are,
+thou canst not appeal to their reason."
+
+"I ask full justice and safety for all men. I will be contented with no
+less a compromise. I ask the nobles to dismantle their fortresses; to
+disband their armed retainers; to acknowledge no impunity for crime in
+high lineage; to claim no protection save in the courts of the common
+law."
+
+"Vain desire!" said Adrian. "Ask what may yet be granted."
+
+"Ha--ha!" replied Rienzi, laughing bitterly, "did I not tell you it was
+a vain dream to ask for law and justice at the hands of the great? Can
+you blame me, then, that I ask it elsewhere?" Then, suddenly changing
+his tone and manner, he added with great solemnity--"Waking life hath
+false and vain dreams; but sleep is sometimes a mighty prophet. By sleep
+it is that Heaven mysteriously communes with its creatures, and guides
+and sustains its earthly agents in the path to which its providence
+leads them on."
+
+Adrian made no reply. This was not the first time he had noted that
+Rienzi's strong intellect was strangely conjoined with a deep and
+mystical superstition. And this yet more inclined the young noble, who,
+though sufficiently devout, yielded but little to the wilder credulities
+of the time, to doubt the success of the schemer's projects. In this
+he erred greatly, though his error was that of the worldly wise. For
+nothing ever so inspires human daring, as the fond belief that it is the
+agent of a Diviner Wisdom. Revenge and patriotism, united in one man
+of genius and ambition--such are the Archimedian levers that find, in
+FANATICISM, the spot out of the world by which to move the world. The
+prudent man may direct a state; but it is the enthusiast who regenerates
+it,--or ruins.
+
+
+
+Chapter 1.IX. "When the People Saw this Picture, Every One Marvelled."
+
+Before the market-place, and at the foot of the Capitol, an immense
+crowd was assembled. Each man sought to push before his neighbour; each
+struggled to gain access to one particular spot, round which the crowd
+was wedged think and dense.
+
+"Corpo di Dio!" said a man of huge stature, pressing onward, like some
+bulky ship, casting the noisy waves right and left from its prow, "this
+is hot work; but for what, in the holy Mother's name, do ye crowd so?
+See you not, Sir Ribald, that my right arm is disabled, swathed, and
+bandaged, so that I cannot help myself better than a baby? And yet you
+push against me as if I were an old wall!"
+
+"Ah, Cecco del Vecchio!--what, man! we must make way for you--you are
+too small and tender to bustle through a crowd! Come, I will protect
+you!" said a dwarf of some four feet high, glancing up at the giant.
+
+"Faith," said the grim smith, looking round on the mob, who laughed loud
+at the dwarf's proffer, "we all do want protection, big and small. What
+do you laugh for, ye apes?--ay, you don't understand parables."
+
+"And yet it is a parable we are come to gaze upon," said one of the mob,
+with a slight sneer.
+
+"Pleasant day to you, Signor Baroncelli," answered Cecco del Vecchio;
+"you are a good man, and love the people; it makes one's heart smile to
+see you. What's all this pother for?"
+
+"Why the Pope's Notary hath set up a great picture in the marketplace,
+and the gapers say it relates to Rome; so they are melting their brains
+out, this hot day, to guess at the riddle."
+
+"Ho! ho!" said the smith, pushing on so vigorously that he left the
+speaker suddenly in the rear; "if Cola di Rienzi hath aught in the
+matter, I would break through stone rocks to get to it."
+
+"Much good will a dead daub do us," said Baroncelli, sourly, and turning
+to his neighbours; but no man listened to him, and he, a would-be
+demagogue, gnawed his lip in envy.
+
+Amidst half-awed groans and curses from the men whom he jostled aside,
+and open objurgations and shrill cries from the women, to whose robes
+and headgear he showed as little respect, the sturdy smith won his way
+to a space fenced round by chains, in the centre of which was placed a
+huge picture.
+
+"How came it hither?" cried one; "I was first at the market."
+
+"We found it here at daybreak," said a vender of fruit: "no one was by."
+
+"But why do you fancy Rienzi had a hand in it?"
+
+"Why, who else could?" answered twenty voices.
+
+"True! Who else?" echoed the gaunt smith. "I dare be sworn the good man
+spent the whole night in painting it himself. Blood of St. Peter! but it
+is mighty fine! What is it about?"
+
+"That's the riddle," said a meditative fish-woman; "if I could make it
+out, I should die happy."
+
+"It is something about liberty and taxes, no doubt," said Luigi, the
+butcher, leaning over the chains. "Ah, if Rienzi were minded, every poor
+man would have his bit of meat in his pot."
+
+"And as much bread as he could eat," added a pale baker.
+
+"Chut! bread and meat--everybody has that now!--but what wine the
+poor folks drink! One has no encouragement to take pains with one's
+vineyard," said a vine-dresser.
+
+"Ho, hollo!--long life to Pandulfo di Guido! Make way for master
+Pandulfo; he is a learned man; he is a friend of the great Notary's; he
+will tell us all about the picture; make way, there--make way!"
+
+Slowly and modestly, Pandulfo di Guido, a quiet, wealthy, and honest man
+of letters, whom nought save the violence of the times could have roused
+from his tranquil home, or his studious closet, passed to the chains. He
+looked long and hard at the picture, which was bright with new, and yet
+moist colours, and exhibited somewhat of the reviving art, which,
+though hard and harsh in its features, was about that time visible, and,
+carried to a far higher degree, we yet gaze upon in the paintings of
+Perugino, who flourished during the succeeding generation. The people
+pressed round the learned man, with open mouths; now turning their eyes
+to the picture, now to Pandulfo.
+
+"Know you not," at length said Pandulfo, "the easy and palpable meaning
+of this design? Behold how the painter has presented to you a vast and
+stormy sea--mark how its waves--"
+
+"Speak louder--louder!" shouted the impatient crowd.
+
+"Hush!" cried those in the immediate vicinity of Pandulfo, "the worthy
+Signor is perfectly audible!"
+
+Meanwhile, some of the more witty, pushing towards a stall in the
+marketplace, bore from it a rough table, from which they besought
+Pandulfo to address the people. The pale citizen, with some pain and
+shame, for he was no practised spokesman, was obliged to assent; but
+when he cast his eyes over the vast and breathless crowd, his own deep
+sympathy with their cause inspired and emboldened him. A light broke
+from his eyes; his voice swelled into power; and his head, usually
+buried in his breast, became erect and commanding in its air.
+
+"You see before you in the picture" (he began again) "a mighty and
+tempestuous sea: upon its waves you behold five ships; four of them are
+already wrecks,--their masts are broken, the waves are dashing through
+the rent planks, they are past all aid and hope: on each of these ships
+lies the corpse of a woman. See you not, in the wan face and livid
+limbs, how faithfully the limner hath painted the hues and loathsomeness
+of death? Below each of these ships is a word that applies the metaphor
+to truth. Yonder, you see the name of Carthage; the other three are
+Troy, Jerusalem, and Babylon. To these four is one common inscription.
+'To exhaustion were we brought by injustice!' Turn now your eyes to the
+middle of the sea,--there you behold the fifth ship, tossed amidst the
+waves, her mast broken, her rudder gone, her sails shivered, but not
+yet a wreck like the rest, though she soon may be. On her deck kneels
+a female, clothed in mourning; mark the wo upon her countenance,--how
+cunningly the artist has conveyed its depth and desolation; she
+stretches out her arms in prayer, she implores your and Heaven's
+assistance. Mark now the superscription--'This is Rome!'--Yes, it is
+your country that addresses you in this emblem!"
+
+The crowd waved to and fro, and a deep murmur crept gathering over the
+silence which they had hitherto kept.
+
+"Now," continued Pandulfo, "turn your gaze to the right of the picture,
+and you will behold the cause of the tempest,--you will see why the
+fifth vessel is thus perilled, and her sisters are thus wrecked. Mark,
+four different kinds of animals, who, from their horrid jaws, send forth
+the winds and storms which torture and rack the sea. The first are the
+lions, the wolves, the bears. These, the inscription tells you, are
+the lawless and savage signors of the state. The next are the dogs
+and swine,--these are the evil counsellors and parasites. Thirdly,
+you behold the dragons and the foxes,--and these are false judges and
+notaries, and they who sell justice. Fourthly, in the hares, the goats,
+the apes, that assist in creating the storm, you perceive, by the
+inscription, the emblems of the popular thieves and homicides, ravishers
+and spoliators. Are ye bewildered still, O Romans! or have ye mastered
+the riddle of the picture?"
+
+Far in their massive palaces the Savelli and Orsini heard the echo of
+the shouts that answered the question of Pandulfo.
+
+"Are ye, then, without hope!" resumed the scholar, as the shout ceased,
+and hushing, with the first sound of his voice, the ejaculations and
+speeches which each man had turned to utter to his neighbour. "Are ye
+without hope? Doth the picture, which shows your tribulation, promise
+you no redemption? Behold, above that angry sea, the heavens open, and
+the majesty of God descends gloriously, as to judgment: and, from the
+rays that surround the Spirit of God extend two flaming swords, and
+on those swords stand, in wrath, but in deliverance, the two patron
+saints--the two mighty guardians of your city! People of Rome, farewell!
+The parable is finished." (M. Sismondi attributes to Rienzi a fine
+oration at the showing of the picture, in which he thundered against
+the vices of the patricians. The contemporary biographer of Rienzi
+says nothing of this harangue. But, apparently (since history has its
+liberties as well as fiction), M. Sismondi has thought it convenient to
+confound two occasions very distinct in themselves.)
+
+
+
+Chapter 1.X. A Rough Spirit Raised, Which May Hereafter Rend the Wizard.
+
+While thus animated was the scene around the Capitol, within one of
+the apartments of the palace sat the agent and prime cause of that
+excitement. In the company of his quiet scribes, Rienzi appeared
+absorbed in the patient details of his avocation. While the murmur and
+the hum, the shout and the tramp, of multitudes, rolled to his chamber,
+he seemed not to heed them, nor to rouse himself a moment from his task.
+With the unbroken regularity of an automaton, he continued to enter
+in his large book, and with the clear and beautiful characters of
+the period, those damning figures which taught him, better than
+declamations, the frauds practised on the people, and armed him with
+that weapon of plain fact which it is so difficult for abuse to parry.
+
+"Page 2, Vol. B.," said he, in the tranquil voice of business, to the
+clerks; "see there, the profits of the salt duty; department No.3--very
+well. Page 9, Vol. D.--what is the account rendered by Vescobaldi, the
+collector? What! twelve thousand florins?--no more?--unconscionable
+rascal!" (Here was a loud shout without of 'Pandulfo!--long live
+Pandulfo!') "Pastrucci, my friend, your head wanders; you are listening
+to the noise without--please to amuse yourself with the calculation I
+entrusted to you. Santi, what is the entry given in by Antonio Tralli?"
+
+A slight tap was heard at the door, and Pandulfo entered.
+
+The clerks continued their labour, though they looked up hastily at the
+pale and respectable visitor, whose name, to their great astonishment,
+had thus become a popular cry.
+
+"Ah, my friend," said Rienzi, calmly enough in voice, but his hands
+trembled with ill-suppressed emotion, "you would speak to me alone,
+eh? well, well--this way." Thus saying, he led the citizen into a small
+cabinet in the rear of the room of office, carefully shut the door,
+and then giving himself up to the natural impatience of his character,
+seized Pandulfo by the hand: "Speak!" cried he: "do they take the
+interpretation?--have you made it plain and palpable enough?--has it
+sunk deep into their souls?"
+
+"Oh, by St. Peter! yes!" returned the citizen, whose spirits were
+elevated by his recent discovery that he, too, was an orator--a
+luxurious pleasure for a timid man. "They swallowed every word of the
+interpretation; they are moved to the marrow--you might lead them this
+very hour to battle, and find them heroes. As for the sturdy smith--"
+
+"What! Cecco del Vecchio?" interrupted Rienzi; "ah, his heart is wrought
+in bronze--what did he?"
+
+"Why, he caught me by the hem of my robe as I descended my rostrum, (oh!
+would you could have seen me!--per fede I had caught your mantle!--I was
+a second you!) and said, weeping like a child, 'Ah, Signor, I am but a
+poor man, and of little worth; but if every drop of blood in this body
+were a life, I would give it for my country!'"
+
+"Brave soul," said Rienzi, with emotion; "would Rome had but fifty
+such! No man hath done us more good among his own class than Cecco del
+Vecchio."
+
+"They feel a protection in his very size," said Pandulfo. "It is
+something to hear such big words from such a big fellow."
+
+"Were there any voices lifted in disapprobation of the picture and its
+sentiment?"
+
+"None."
+
+"The time is nearly ripe, then--a few suns more, and the fruit must be
+gathered. The Aventine,--the Lateran,--and then the solitary trumpet!"
+Thus saying, Rienzi, with folded arms and downcast eyes, seemed sunk
+into a reverie.
+
+"By the way," said Pandulfo, "I had almost forgot to tell thee, that the
+crowd would have poured themselves hither, so impatient were they to see
+thee; but I bade Cecco del Vecchio mount the rostrum, and tell them, in
+his blunt way, that it would be unseemly at the present time, when thou
+wert engaged in the Capitol on civil and holy affairs, to rush in so
+great a body into thy presence. Did I not right?"
+
+"Most right, my Pandulfo."
+
+"But Cecco del Vecchio says he must come and kiss thy hand: and thou
+mayst expect him here the moment he can escape unobserved from the
+crowd."
+
+"He is welcome!" said Rienzi, half mechanically, for he was still
+absorbed in thought.
+
+"And, lo! here he is,"--as one of the scribes announced the visit of the
+smith.
+
+"Let him be admitted!" said Rienzi, seating himself composedly.
+
+When the huge smith found himself in the presence of Rienzi, it amused
+Pandulfo to perceive the wonderful influences of mind over matter. That
+fierce and sturdy giant, who, in all popular commotions, towered above
+his tribe, with thews of stone, and nerves of iron, the rallying point
+and bulwark of the rest,--stood now colouring and trembling before the
+intellect, which (so had the eloquent spirit of Rienzi waked and fanned
+the spark which, till then, had lain dormant in that rough bosom)
+might almost be said to have created his own. And he, indeed, who first
+arouses in the bondsman the sense and soul of freedom, comes as near as
+is permitted to man, nearer than the philosopher, nearer even than the
+poet, to the great creative attribute of God!--But, if the breast be
+uneducated, the gift may curse the giver; and he who passes at once from
+the slave to the freeman may pass as rapidly from the freeman to the
+ruffian.
+
+"Approach, my friend," said Rienzi, after a moment's pause; "I know all
+that thou hast done, and wouldst do, for Rome! Thou art worthy of her
+best days, and thou art born to share in their return."
+
+The smith dropped at the feet of Rienzi, who held out his hand to raise
+him, which Cecco del Vecchio seized, and reverentially kissed.
+
+"This kiss does not betray," said Rienzi, smiling; "but rise, my
+friend,--this posture is only due to God and his saints!"
+
+"He is a saint who helps us at need!" said the smith, bluntly, "and that
+no man has done as thou hast. But when," he added, sinking his voice,
+and fixing his eyes hard on Rienzi, as one may do who waits a signal to
+strike a blow, "when--when shall we make the great effort?"
+
+"Thou hast spoken to all the brave men in thy neighbourhood,--are they
+well prepared?"
+
+"To live or die, as Rienzi bids them!"
+
+"I must have the list--the number--names--houses and callings, this
+night."
+
+"Thou shalt."
+
+"Each man must sign his name or mark with his own hand."
+
+"It shall be done."
+
+"Then, harkye! attend Pandulfo di Guido at his house this evening,
+at sunset. He shall instruct thee where to meet this night some brave
+hearts;--thou art worthy to be ranked amongst them. Thou wilt not fail!"
+
+"By the holy Stairs! I will count every minute till then," said the
+smith, his swarthy face lighted with pride at the confidence shown him.
+
+"Meanwhile, watch all your neighbours; let no man flag or grow
+faint-hearted,--none of thy friends must be branded as a traitor!"
+
+"I will cut his throat, were he my own mother's son, if I find one
+pledged man flinch!" said the fierce smith.
+
+"Ha, ha!" rejoined Rienzi, with that strange laugh which belonged to
+him; "a miracle! a miracle! The Picture speaks now!"
+
+It was already nearly dusk when Rienzi left the Capitol. The broad space
+before its walls was empty and deserted, and wrapping his mantle closely
+round him, he walked musingly on.
+
+"I have almost climbed the height," thought he, "and now the precipice
+yawns before me. If I fail, what a fall! The last hope of my country
+falls with me. Never will a noble rise against the nobles. Never will
+another plebeian have the opportunities and the power that I have! Rome
+is bound up with me--with a single life. The liberties of all time are
+fixed to a reed that a wind may uproot. But oh, Providence! hast thou
+not reserved and marked me for great deeds? How, step by step, have I
+been led on to this solemn enterprise! How has each hour prepared its
+successor! And yet what danger! If the inconstant people, made cowardly
+by long thraldom, do but waver in the crisis, I am swept away!"
+
+As he spoke, he raised his eyes, and lo, before him, the first star of
+twilight shone calmly down upon the crumbling remnants of the Tarpeian
+Rock. It was no favouring omen, and Rienzi's heart beat quicker as that
+dark and ruined mass frowned thus suddenly on his gaze.
+
+"Dread monument," thought he, "of what dark catastrophes, to what
+unknown schemes, hast thou been the witness! To how many enterprises, on
+which history is dumb, hast thou set the seal! How know we whether they
+were criminal or just? How know we whether he, thus doomed as a traitor,
+would not, if successful, have been immortalized as a deliverer? If I
+fall, who will write my chronicle? One of the people? alas! blinded and
+ignorant, they furnish forth no minds that can appeal to posterity. One
+of the patricians? in what colours then shall I be painted! No tomb will
+rise for me amidst the wrecks; no hand scatter flowers upon my grave!"
+
+Thus meditating on the verge of that mighty enterprise to which he had
+devoted himself, Rienzi pursued his way. He gained the Tiber, and paused
+for a few moments beside its legendary stream, over which the purple and
+starlit heaven shone deeply down. He crossed the bridge which leads
+to the quarter of the Trastevere, whose haughty inhabitants yet boast
+themselves the sole true descendants of the ancient Romans. Here he step
+grew quicker and more light; brighter, if less solemn, thoughts crowded
+upon his breast; and ambition, lulled for a moment, left his strained
+and over-laboured mind to the reign of a softer passion.
+
+
+
+Chapter 1.XI. Nina di Raselli.
+
+"I tell you, Lucia, I do not love those stuffs; they do not become me.
+Saw you ever so poor a dye?--this purple, indeed! that crimson! Why did
+you let the man leave them? Let him take them elsewhere tomorrow.
+They may suit the signoras on the other side the Tiber, who imagine
+everything Venetian must be perfect; but I, Lucia, I see with my own
+eyes, and judge from my own mind."
+
+"Ah, dear lady," said the serving-maid, "if you were, as you doubtless
+will be, some time or other, a grand signora, how worthily you would
+wear the honours! Santa Cecilia! No other dame in Rome would be looked
+at while the Lady Nina were by!"
+
+"Would we not teach them what pomp was?" answered Nina. "Oh! what
+festivals would we hold! Saw you not from the gallery the revels given
+last week by the Lady Giulia Savelli?"
+
+"Ay, signora; and when you walked up the hall in your silver and pearl
+tissue, there ran such a murmur through the gallery; every one cried,
+'The Savelli have entertained an angel!'"
+
+"Pish! Lucia; no flattery, girl."
+
+"It is naked truth, lady. But that was a revel, was it not? There was
+grandeur!--fifty servitors in scarlet and gold! and the music playing
+all the while. The minstrels were sent for from Bergamo. Did not that
+festival please you? Ah, I warrant many were the fine speeches made to
+you that day!"
+
+"Heigho!--no, there was one voice wanting, and all the music was marred.
+But, girl, were I the Lady Giulia, I would not have been contented with
+so poor a revel."
+
+"How, poor! Why all the nobles say it outdid the proudest marriage-feast
+of the Colonna. Nay, a Neapolitan who sat next me, and who had served
+under the young Queen Joanna, at her marriage, says, that even Naples
+was outshone."
+
+"That may be. I know nought of Naples; but I know what my court should
+have been, were I what--what I am not, and may never be! The banquet
+vessels should have been of gold; the cups jewelled to the brim; not
+an inch of the rude pavement should have been visible; all should
+have glowed with cloth of gold. The fountain in the court should have
+showered up the perfumes of the East; my pages should not have been
+rough youths, blushing at their own uncouthness, but fair boys, who had
+not told their twelfth year, culled from the daintiest palaces of Rome;
+and, as for the music, oh, Lucia!--each musician should have worn a
+chaplet, and deserved it; and he who played best should have had a
+reward, to inspire all the rest--a rose from me. Saw you, too, the
+Lady Giulia's robe? What colours! they might have put out the sun
+at noonday!--yellow, and blue, and orange, and scarlet! Oh, sweet
+Saints!--but my eyes ached all the next day!"
+
+"Doubtless, the Lady Giulia lacks your skill in the mixture of colours,"
+said the complaisant waiting-woman.
+
+"And then, too, what a mien!--no royalty in it! She moved along the
+hall, so that her train well nigh tripped her every moment; and then
+she said, with a foolish laugh, 'These holyday robes are but troublesome
+luxuries.' Troth, for the great there should be no holyday robes; 'tis
+for myself, not for others, that I would attire! Every day should
+have its new robe, more gorgeous than the last;--every day should be a
+holyday!"
+
+"Methought," said Lucia, "that the Lord Giovanni Orsini seemed very
+devoted to my Lady."
+
+"He! the bear!"
+
+"Bear, he may be! but he has a costly skin. His riches are untold."
+
+"And the fool knows not how to spend them."
+
+"Was not that the young Lord Adrian who spoke to you just by the
+columns, where the music played?"
+
+"It might be,--I forget."
+
+"Yet, I hear that few ladies forget when Lord Adrian di Castello woos
+them."
+
+"There was but one man whose company seemed to me worth the
+recollection," answered Nina, unheeding the insinuation of the artful
+handmaid.
+
+"And who was he?" asked Lucia.
+
+"The old scholar from Avignon!"
+
+"What! he with the gray beard? Oh, Signora!"
+
+"Yes," said Nina, with a grave and sad voice; "when he spoke, the whole
+scene vanished from my eyes,--for he spoke to me of HIM!"
+
+As she said this, the Signora sighed deeply, and the tears gathered to
+her eyes.
+
+The waiting-woman raised her lips in disdain, and her looks in wonder;
+but she did not dare to venture a reply.
+
+"Open the lattice," said Nina, after a pause, "and give me yon paper.
+Not that, girl--but the verses sent me yesterday. What! art thou
+Italian, and dost thou not know, by instinct, that I spoke of the rhyme
+of Petrarch?"
+
+Seated by the open casement, through which the moonlight stole soft
+and sheen, with one lamp beside her, from which she seemed to shade her
+eyes, though in reality she sought to hide her countenance from Lucia,
+the young Signora appeared absorbed in one of those tender sonnets which
+then turned the brains and inflamed the hearts of Italy. (Although it is
+true that the love sonnets of Petrarch were not then, as now, the most
+esteemed of his works, yet it has been a great, though a common error,
+to represent them as little known and coldly admired. Their effect was,
+in reality, prodigious and universal. Every ballad-singer sung them
+in the streets, and (says Filippo Villani), "Gravissimi nesciebant
+abstinere"--"Even the gravest could not abstain from them.")
+
+Born of an impoverished house, which, though boasting its descent from
+a consular race of Rome, scarcely at that day maintained a rank
+amongst the inferior order of nobility, Nina di Raselli was the spoiled
+child--the idol and the tyrant--of her parents. The energetic and
+self-willed character of her mind made her rule where she should have
+obeyed; and as in all ages dispositions can conquer custom, she had,
+though in a clime and land where the young and unmarried of her sex
+are usually chained and fettered, assumed, and by assuming won, the
+prerogative of independence. She possessed, it is true, more learning
+and more genius than generally fell to the share of women in that day;
+and enough of both to be deemed a miracle by her parents;--she had,
+also, what they valued more, a surpassing beauty; and, what they feared
+more, an indomitable haughtiness;--a haughtiness mixed with a thousand
+soft and endearing qualities where she loved; and which, indeed, where
+she loved, seemed to vanish. At once vain yet high-minded, resolute yet
+impassioned, there was a gorgeous magnificence in her very vanity and
+splendour,--an ideality in her waywardness: her defects made a part
+of her brilliancy; without them she would have seemed less woman; and,
+knowing her, you would have compared all women by her standard. Softer
+qualities beside her seemed not more charming, but more insipid. She had
+no vulgar ambition, for she had obstinately refused many alliances which
+the daughter of Raselli could scarcely have hoped to form. The untutored
+minds and savage power of the Roman nobles seemed to her imagination,
+which was full of the poetry of rank, its luxury and its graces, as
+something barbarous and revolting, at once to be dreaded and despised.
+She had, therefore, passed her twentieth year unmarried, but not without
+love. The faults, themselves, of her character, elevated that ideal of
+love which she had formed. She required some being round whom all her
+vainer qualities could rally; she felt that where she loved she must
+adore; she demanded no common idol before which to humble so strong and
+imperious a mind. Unlike women of a gentler mould, who desire, for a
+short period, to exercise the caprices of sweet empire,--when she loved
+she must cease to command; and pride, at once, be humbled to devotion.
+So rare were the qualities that could attract her; so imperiously did
+her haughtiness require that those qualities should be above her own,
+yet of the same order; that her love elevated its object like a god.
+Accustomed to despise, she felt all the luxury it is to venerate! And
+if it were her lot to be united with one thus loved, her nature was
+that which might become elevated by the nature that it gazed on. For
+her beauty--Reader, shouldst thou ever go to Rome, thou wilt see in the
+Capitol the picture of the Cumaean Sibyl, which, often copied, no copy
+can even faintly represent. I beseech thee, mistake not this sibyl for
+another, for the Roman galleries abound in sibyls. (The sibyl referred
+to is the well-known one by Domenichino. As a mere work of art, that by
+Guercino, called the Persian sibyl, in the same collection, is perhaps
+superior; but in beauty, in character, there is no comparison.) The
+sibyl I speak of is dark, and the face has an Eastern cast; the robe
+and turban, gorgeous though they be, grow dim before the rich, but
+transparent roses of the cheek; the hair would be black, save for that
+golden glow which mellows it to a hue and lustre never seen but in the
+south, and even in the south most rare; the features, not Grecian, are
+yet faultless; the mouth, the brow, the ripe and exquisite contour, all
+are human and voluptuous; the expression, the aspect, is something more;
+the form is, perhaps, too full for the perfection of loveliness, for the
+proportions of sculpture, for the delicacy of Athenian models; but the
+luxuriant fault has a majesty. Gaze long upon that picture: it charms,
+yet commands, the eye. While you gaze, you call back five centuries. You
+see before you the breathing image of Nina di Raselli!
+
+But it was not those ingenious and elaborate conceits in which Petrarch,
+great Poet though he be, has so often mistaken pedantry for passion,
+that absorbed at that moment the attention of the beautiful Nina. Her
+eyes rested not on the page, but on the garden that stretched below the
+casement. Over the old fruit-trees and hanging vines fell the moonshine;
+and in the centre of the green, but half-neglected sward, the waters of
+a small and circular fountain, whose perfect proportions spoke of days
+long past, played and sparkled in the starlight. The scene was still
+and beautiful; but neither of its stillness nor its beauty thought Nina:
+towards one, the gloomiest and most rugged, spot in the whole garden,
+turned her gaze; there, the trees stood densely massed together, and
+shut from view the low but heavy wall which encircled the mansion of
+Raselli. The boughs on those trees stirred gently, but Nina saw them
+wave; and now from the copse emerged, slowly and cautiously, a solitary
+figure, whose shadow threw itself, long and dark, over the sward. It
+approached the window, and a low voice breathed Nina's name.
+
+"Quick, Lucia!" cried she, breathlessly, turning to her handmaid:
+"quick! the rope-ladder! it is he! he is come! How slow you are! haste,
+girl,--he may be discovered! There,--O joy,--O joy!--My lover! my hero!
+my Rienzi!"
+
+"It is you!" said Rienzi, as, now entering the chamber, he wound his
+arms around her half-averted form, "and what is night to others is day
+to me!"
+
+The first sweet moments of welcome were over; and Rienzi was seated at
+the feet of his mistress: his head rested on her knees--his face looking
+up to hers--their hands clasped each in each.
+
+"And for me thou bravest these dangers!" said the lover; "the shame of
+discovery, the wrath of thy parents!"
+
+"But what are my perils to thine? Oh, Heaven! if my father found thee
+here thou wouldst die!"
+
+"He would think it then so great a humiliation, that thou, beautiful
+Nina, who mightst match with the haughtiest names of Rome, shouldst
+waste thy love on a plebeian--even though the grandson of an emperor!"
+
+The proud heart of Nina could sympathize well with the wounded pride of
+her lover: she detected the soreness which lurked beneath his answer,
+carelessly as it was uttered.
+
+"Hast thou not told me," she said, "of that great Marius, who was no
+noble, but from whom the loftiest Colonna would rejoice to claim his
+descent? and do I not know in thee one who shall yet eclipse the power
+of Marius, unsullied by his vices?"
+
+"Delicious flattery! sweet prophet!" said Rienzi, with a melancholy
+smile; "never were thy supporting promises of the future more welcome to
+me than now; for to thee I will say what I would utter to none else--my
+soul half sinks beneath the mighty burthen I have heaped upon it. I want
+new courage as the dread hour approaches; and from thy words and looks I
+drink it."
+
+"Oh!" answered Nina, blushing as she spoke, "glorious is indeed the lot
+which I have bought by my love for thee: glorious to share thy schemes,
+to cheer thee in doubt, to whisper hope to thee in danger."
+
+"And give grace to me in triumph!" added Rienzi, passionately. "Ah!
+should the future ever place upon these brows the laurel-wreath due to
+one who has saved his country, what joy, what recompence, to lay it
+at thy feet! Perhaps, in those long and solitary hours of languor and
+exhaustion which fill up the interstices of time,--the dull space for
+sober thought between the epochs of exciting action,--perhaps I should
+have failed and flagged, and renounced even my dreams for Rome, had they
+not been linked also with my dreams for thee!--had I not pictured to
+myself the hour when my fate should elevate me beyond my birth; when thy
+sire would deem it no disgrace to give thee to my arms; when thou,
+too, shouldst stand amidst the dames of Rome, more honoured, as more
+beautiful, than all; and when I should see that pomp, which my own soul
+disdains, ('Quem semper abhorrui sicut cenum' is the expression used by
+Rienzi, in his letter to his friend at Avignon, and which was probably
+sincere. Men rarely act according to the bias of their own tastes.) made
+dear and grateful to me because associated with thee! Yes, it is these
+thoughts that have inspired me, when sterner ones have shrunk back
+appalled from the spectres that surround their goal. And oh! my Nina,
+sacred, strong, enduring must be, indeed, the love which lives in the
+same pure and elevated air as that which sustains my hopes of liberty
+and fame!"
+
+This was the language which, more even than the vows of fidelity and the
+dear adulation which springs from the heart's exuberance, had bound the
+proud and vain soul of Nina to the chains that it so willingly wore.
+Perhaps, indeed, in the absence of Rienzi, her weaker nature pictured to
+herself the triumph of humbling the highborn signoras, and eclipsing the
+barbarous magnificence of the chiefs of Rome; but in his presence,
+and listening to his more elevated and generous ambition, as yet all
+unsullied by one private feeling save the hope of her, her higher
+sympathies were enlisted with his schemes, her mind aspired to raise
+itself to the height of his, and she thought less of her own rise than
+of his glory. It was sweet to her pride to be the sole confidante of his
+most secret thoughts, as of his most hardy undertakings; to see bared
+before her that intricate and plotting spirit; to be admitted even to
+the knowledge of its doubts and weakness, as of its heroism and power.
+
+Nothing could be more contrasted than the loves of Rienzi and Nina,
+and those of Adrian and Irene: in the latter, all were the dreams, the
+phantasies, the extravagance, of youth; they never talked of the future;
+they mingled no other aspirations with those of love. Ambition, glory,
+the world's high objects, were nothing to them when together; their love
+had swallowed up the world, and left nothing visible beneath the sun,
+save itself. But the passion of Nina and her lover was that of more
+complicated natures and more mature years: it was made up of a thousand
+feelings, each naturally severed from each, but compelled into one focus
+by the mighty concentration of love; their talk was of the world; it was
+from the world that they drew the aliment which sustained it; it was of
+the future they spoke and thought; of its dreams and imagined glories
+they made themselves a home and altar; their love had in it more of the
+Intellectual than that of Adrian and Irene; it was more fitted for this
+hard earth; it had in it, also, more of the leaven of the later and iron
+days, and less of poetry and the first golden age.
+
+"And must thou leave me now?" said Nina, her cheek no more averted from
+his lips, nor her form from his parting embrace. "The moon is high yet;
+it is but a little hour thou hast given me."
+
+"An hour! Alas!" said Rienzi, "it is near upon midnight--our friends
+await me."
+
+"Go, then, my soul's best half! Go; Nina shall not detain thee one
+moment from those higher objects which make thee so dear to Nina.
+When--when shall we meet again!"
+
+"Not," said Rienzi, proudly, and with all his soul upon his brow, "not
+thus, by stealth! no! nor as I thus have met thee, the obscure and
+contemned bondsman! When next thou seest me, it shall be at the head of
+the sons of Rome! her champion! her restorer! or--" said he, sinking his
+voice--
+
+"There is no or!" interrupted Nina, weaving her arms round him, and
+catching his enthusiasm; "thou hast uttered thine own destiny!"
+
+"One kiss more!--farewell!--the tenth day from the morrow shines upon
+the restoration of Rome!"
+
+
+
+Chapter 1.XII. The Strange Adventures that Befel Walter de Montreal.
+
+It was upon that same evening, and while the earlier stars yet shone
+over the city, that Walter de Montreal, returning, alone, to the convent
+then associated with the church of Santa Maria del Priorata (both of
+which belonged to the Knights of the Hospital, and in the first of which
+Montreal had taken his lodgment), paused amidst the ruins and desolation
+which lay around his path. Thou little skilled in the classic memories
+and associations of the spot, he could not but be impressed with the
+surrounding witnesses of departed empire; the vast skeleton, as it were,
+of the dead giantess.
+
+"Now," thought he, as he gazed around upon the roofless columns and
+shattered walls, everywhere visible, over which the starlight shone,
+ghastly and transparent, backed by the frowning and embattled fortresses
+of the Frangipani, half hid by the dark foliage that sprung up amidst
+the very fanes and palaces of old--Nature exulting over the frailer
+Art; "now," thought he, "bookmen would be inspired, by this scene, with
+fantastic and dreaming visions of the past. But to me these monuments of
+high ambition and royal splendour create only images of the future. Rome
+may yet be, with her seven-hilled diadem, as Rome has been before, the
+prize of the strongest hand and the boldest warrior,--revived, not by
+her own degenerate sons, but the infused blood of a new race. William
+the Bastard could scarce have found the hardy Englishers so easy a
+conquest as Walter the Well-born may find these eunuch Romans. And which
+conquest were the more glorious,--the barbarous Isle, or the Metropolis
+of the World? Short step from the general to the podesta--shorter step
+from the podesta to the king!"
+
+While thus revolving his wild, yet not altogether chimerical ambition,
+a quick light step was heard amidst the long herbage, and, looking up,
+Montreal perceived the figure of a tall female descending from that
+part of the hill then covered by many convents, towards the base of the
+Aventine. She supported her steps with a long staff, and moved with such
+elasticity and erectness, that now, as her face became visible by the
+starlight, it was surprising to perceive that it was the face of one
+advanced in years,--a harsh, proud countenance, withered, and deeply
+wrinkled, but not without a certain regularity of outline.
+
+"Merciful Virgin!" cried Montreal, starting back as that face gleamed
+upon him: "is it possible? It is she:--it is--"
+
+He sprung forward, and stood right before the old woman, who seemed
+equally surprised, though more dismayed, at the sight of Montreal.
+
+"I have sought thee for years," said the Knight, first breaking the
+silence; "years, long years,--thy conscience can tell thee why."
+
+"Mine, man of blood!" cried the female, trembling with rage or fear;
+"darest thou talk of conscience? Thou, the dishonourer--the robber--the
+professed homicide! Thou, disgrace to knighthood and to birth! Thou,
+with the cross of chastity and of peace upon thy breast! Thou talk of
+conscience, hypocrite!--thou?"
+
+"Lady--lady!" said Montreal, deprecatingly, and almost quailing beneath
+the fiery passion of that feeble woman, "I have sinned against thee and
+thine. But remember all my excuses!--early love--fatal obstacles--rash
+vow--irresistible temptation! Perhaps," he added, in a more haughty
+tone, "perhaps, yet, I may have the power to atone my error, and wring,
+with mailed hand, from the successor of St Peter, who hath power to
+loose as to bind--"
+
+"Perjured and abandoned!" interrupted the female; "dost thou dream that
+violence can purchase absolution, or that thou canst ever atone the
+past?--a noble name disgraced, a father's broken heart and dying curse!
+Yes, that curse, I hear it now! it rings upon me thrillingly, as when I
+watched the expiring clay! it cleaves to thee--it pursues thee--it shall
+pierce thee through thy corselet--it shall smite thee in the meridian of
+thy power! Genius wasted--ambition blasted--penitence deferred--a life
+of brawls, and a death of shame--thy destruction the offspring of thy
+crime!--To this, to this, an old man's curse hath doomed thee!--AND THOU
+ART DOOMED!"
+
+These words were rather shrieked than spoken: and the flashing eye, the
+lifted hand, the dilated form of the speaker--the hour--the solitude of
+the ruins around--all conspired to give to the fearful execration the
+character of prophecy. The warrior, against whose undaunted breast a
+hundred spears had shivered in vain, fell appalled and humbled to the
+ground. He seized the hem of his fierce denouncer's robe, and cried, in
+a choked and hollow voice, "Spare me! spare me!"
+
+"Spare thee!" said the unrelenting crone; "hast thou ever spared
+man in thy hatred, or woman in thy lust? Ah, grovel in the
+dust!--crouch--crouch!--wild beast as thou art! whose sleek skin and
+beautiful hues have taught the unwary to be blind to the talons that
+rend, and the grinders that devour;--crouch, that the foot of the old
+and impotent may spurn thee!"
+
+"Hag!" cried Montreal, in the reaction of sudden fury and maddened
+pride, springing up to the full height of his stature. "Hag! thou hast
+passed the limits to which, remembering who thou art, my forbearance
+gave thee licence. I had well-nigh forgot that thou hadst assumed my
+part--I am the Accuser! Woman!--the boy!--shrink not! equivocate not!
+lie not!--thou wert the thief!"
+
+"I was. Thou taughtest me the lesson how to steal a--"
+
+"Render--restore him!" interrupted Montreal, stamping on the ground with
+such force that the splinters of the marble fragments on which he stood
+shivered under his armed heel.
+
+The woman little heeded a violence at which the fiercest warrior of
+Italy might have trembled; but she did not make an immediate answer. The
+character of her countenance altered from passion into an expression
+of grave, intent, and melancholy thought. At length she replied to
+Montreal; whose hand had wandered to his dagger-hilt, with the instinct
+of long habit, whenever enraged or thwarted, rather than from any design
+of blood; which, stern and vindictive as he was, he would have been
+incapable of forming against any woman,--much less against the one then
+before him.
+
+"Walter de Montreal," said she, in a voice so calm that it almost
+sounded like that of compassion, "the boy, I think, has never known
+brother or sister: the only child of a once haughty and lordly race, on
+both sides, though now on both dishonoured--nay, why so impatient? thou
+wilt soon learn the worst--the boy is dead!"
+
+"Dead!" repeated Montreal, recoiling and growing pale; "dead!--no,
+no--say not that! He has a mother,--you know he has!--a fond,
+meekhearted, anxious, hoping mother!--no!--no, he is not dead!"
+
+"Thou canst feel, then, for a mother?" said the old woman, seemingly
+touched by the tone of the Provencal. "Yet, bethink thee; is it not
+better that the grave should save him from a life of riot, of bloodshed,
+and of crime? Better to sleep with God than to wake with the fiends!"
+
+"Dead!" echoed Montreal; "dead!--the pretty one!--so young!--those
+eyes--the mother's eyes--closed so soon?"
+
+"Hast thou aught else to say? Thy sight scares my very womanhood from my
+soul!--let me be gone."
+
+"Dead!--may I believe thee? or dost thou mock me? Thou hast uttered thy
+curse, hearken to my warning:--If thou hast lied in this, thy last hour
+shall dismay thee, and thy death-bed shall be the death-bed of despair!"
+
+"Thy lips," replied the female, with a scornful smile, "are better
+adapted for lewd vows to unhappy maidens, than for the denunciations
+which sound solemn only when coming from the good. Farewell!"
+
+"Stay! inexorable woman! stay!--where sleeps he? Masses shall be sung!
+priests shall pray!--the sins of the father shall not be visited on that
+young head!"
+
+"At Florence!" returned the woman, hastily. "But no stone records the
+departed one!--The dead boy had no name!"
+
+Waiting for no further questionings, the woman now passed on,--pursued
+her way;--and the long herbage, and the winding descent, soon snatched
+her ill-omened apparition from the desolate landscape.
+
+Montreal, thus alone, sunk with a deep and heavy sigh upon the ground,
+covered his face with his hands, and burst into an agony of grief; his
+chest heaved, his whole frame trembled, and he wept and sobbed aloud,
+with all the fearful vehemence of a man whose passions are strong and
+fierce, but to whom the violence of grief alone is novel and unfamiliar.
+
+He remained thus, prostrate and unmanned, for a considerable time,
+growing slowly and gradually more calm as tears relieved his emotion;
+and, at length, rather indulging a gloomy reverie than a passionate
+grief. The moon was high and the hour late when he arose, and then few
+traces of the past excitement remained upon his countenance; for Walter
+de Montreal was not of that mould in which woe can force a settlement,
+or to which any affliction can bring the continued and habitual
+melancholy that darkens those who feel more enduringly, though with
+emotions less stormy. His were the elements of the true Franc character,
+though carried to excess: his sternest and his deepest qualities
+were mingled with fickleness and caprice; his profound sagacity often
+frustrated by a whim; his towering ambition deserted for some frivolous
+temptation; and his elastic, sanguine, and high-spirited nature,
+faithful only to the desire of military glory, to the poetry of a daring
+and stormy life, and to the susceptibilities of that tender passion
+without whose colourings no portrait of chivalry is complete, and in
+which he was capable of a sentiment, a tenderness, and a loyal devotion,
+which could hardly have been supposed compatible with his reckless
+levity and his undisciplined career.
+
+"Well," said he, as he rose slowly, folded his mantle round him, and
+resumed his way, "it was not for myself I grieved thus. But the pang is
+past, and the worst is known. Now, then, back to those things that never
+die--restless projects and daring schemes. That hag's curse keeps my
+blood cold still, and this solitude has something in it weird and awful.
+Ha!--what sudden light is that?"
+
+The light which caught Montreal's eye broke forth almost like a star,
+scarcely larger, indeed, but more red and intense in its ray. Of itself
+it was nothing uncommon, and might have shone either from convent or
+cottage. But it streamed from a part of the Aventine which contained
+no habitations of the living, but only the empty ruins and shattered
+porticoes, of which even the names and memories of the ancient
+inhabitants were dead. Aware of this, Montreal felt a slight awe (as the
+beam threw its steady light over the dreary landscape); for he was
+not without the knightly superstitions of the age, and it was now the
+witching hour consecrated to ghost and spirit. But fear, whether of
+this world or the next, could not long daunt the mind of the hardy
+freebooter; and, after a short hesitation, he resolved to make a
+digression from his way, and ascertain the cause of the phenomenon.
+Unconsciously, the martial tread of the barbarian passed over the site
+of the famed, or infamous, Temple of Isis, which had once witnessed
+those wildest orgies commemorated by Juvenal; and came at last to a
+thick and dark copse, from an opening in the centre of which gleamed the
+mysterious light. Penetrating the gloomy foliage, the Knight now found
+himself before a large ruin, grey and roofless, from within which came,
+indistinct and muffled, the sound of voices. Through a rent in the wall,
+forming a kind of casement, and about ten feet from the ground, the
+light now broke over the matted and rank soil, embedded, as it were, in
+vast masses of shade, and streaming through a mouldering portico hard at
+hand. The Provencal stood, though he knew it not, on the very place once
+consecrated by the Temple: the Portico and the Library of Liberty (the
+first public library instituted in Rome). The wall of the ruin was
+covered with innumerable creepers and wild brushwood, and it required
+but little agility on the part of Montreal, by the help of these, to
+raise himself to the height of the aperture, and, concealed by the
+luxuriant foliage, to gaze within. He saw a table, lighted with tapers,
+in the centre of which was a crucifix; a dagger, unsheathed; an open
+scroll, which the event proved to be of sacred character; and a brazen
+bowl. About a hundred men, in cloaks, and with black vizards, stood
+motionless around; and one, taller than the rest, without disguise or
+mask--whose pale brow and stern features seemed by that light yet
+paler and yet more stern--appeared to be concluding some address to his
+companions.
+
+"Yes," said he, "in the church of the Lateran I will make the last
+appeal to the people. Supported by the Vicar of the Pope, myself an
+officer of the Pontiff, it will be seen that Religion and Liberty--the
+heroes and the martyrs--are united in one cause. After that time, words
+are idle; action must begin. By this crucifix I pledge my faith, on this
+blade I devote my life, to the regeneration of Rome! And you (then no
+need for mask or mantle!), when the solitary trump is heard, when the
+solitary horseman is seen,--you, swear to rally round the standard of
+the Republic, and resist--with heart and hand, with life and soul,
+in defiance of death, and in hope of redemption--the arms of the
+oppressor!"
+
+"We swear--we swear!" exclaimed every voice: and, crowding toward cross
+and weapon, the tapers were obscured by the intervening throng, and
+Montreal could not perceive the ceremony, nor hear the muttered
+formula of the oath: but he could guess that the rite then common to
+conspiracies--and which required each conspirator to shed some drops
+of his own blood, in token that life itself was devoted to the
+enterprise--had not been omitted, when, the group again receding, the
+same figure as before had addressed the meeting, holding on high the
+bowl with both hands,--while from the left arm, which was bared,
+the blood weltered slowly, and trickled, drop by drop, upon the
+ground,--said, in a solemn voice and upturned eyes:
+
+"Amidst the ruins of thy temple, O Liberty! we, Romans, dedicate to
+thee this libation! We, befriended and inspired by no unreal and fabled
+idols, but by the Lord of Hosts, and Him who, descending to earth,
+appealed not to emperors and to princes, but to the fisherman and the
+peasant,--giving to the lowly and the poor the mission of Revelation."
+Then, turning suddenly to his companions, as his features, singularly
+varying in their character and expression, brightened, from solemn awe,
+into a martial and kindling enthusiasm, he cried aloud, "Death to
+the Tyranny! Life to the Republic!" The effect of the transition was
+startling. Each man, as by an involuntary and irresistible impulse, laid
+his hand upon his sword, as he echoed the sentiment; some, indeed, drew
+forth their blades, as if for instant action.
+
+"I have seen enow: they will break up anon," said Montreal to himself:
+"and I would rather face an army of thousands, than even half-a-dozen
+enthusiasts, so inflamed,--and I thus detected." And, with this thought,
+he dropped on the ground, and glided away, as, once again, through the
+still midnight air, broke upon his ear the muffled shout--"DEATH TO THE
+TYRANNY!--LIFE TO THE REPUBLIC!"
+
+
+
+
+BOOK II. THE REVOLUTION
+
+     "Ogni Lascivia, ogni male, nulla giustizia, nullo freno.
+     Non c'era piu remedia, ogni persona periva.  Allora Cola di
+     Rienzi." &c.--"Vita di Cola di Rienzi", lib. i. chap. 2.
+
+     "Every kind of lewdness, every form of evil; no justice, no
+     restraint. Remedy there was none; perdition fell on all.
+     Then Cola di Rienzi," &c.--"Life of Cola di Rienzi".
+
+
+
+Chapter 2.I. The Knight of Provence, and his Proposal.
+
+It was nearly noon as Adrian entered the gates of the palace of Stephen
+Colonna. The palaces of the nobles were not then as we see them now,
+receptacles for the immortal canvas of Italian, and the imperishable
+sculpture of Grecian Art; but still to this day are retained the massive
+walls, and barred windows, and spacious courts, which at that time
+protected their rude retainers. High above the gates rose a lofty and
+solid tower, whose height commanded a wide view of the mutilated remains
+of Rome: the gate itself was adorned and strengthened on either side by
+columns of granite, whose Doric capitals betrayed the sacrilege that
+had torn them from one of the many temples that had formerly crowded
+the sacred Forum. From the same spoils came, too, the vast fragments of
+travertine which made the walls of the outer court. So common at that
+day were these barbarous appropriations of the most precious monuments
+of art, that the columns and domes of earlier Rome were regarded by all
+classes but as quarries, from which every man was free to gather the
+materials, whether for his castle or his cottage,--a wantonness of
+outrage far greater than the Goths', to whom a later age would fain have
+attributed all the disgrace, and which, more perhaps than even heavier
+offences, excited the classical indignation of Petrarch, and made him
+sympathise with Rienzi in his hopes of Rome. Still may you see
+the churches of that or even earlier dates, of the most shapeless
+architecture, built on the sites, and from the marbles, consecrating
+(rather than consecrated by) the names of Venus, of Jupiter, of Minerva.
+The palace of the Prince of the Orsini, duke of Gravina, is yet reared
+above the graceful arches (still visible) of the theatre of Marcellus;
+then a fortress of the Savelli.
+
+As Adrian passed the court, a heavy waggon blocked up the way, laden
+with huge marbles, dug from the unexhausted mine of the Golden House
+of Nero: they were intended for an additional tower, by which Stephen
+Colonna proposed yet more to strengthen the tasteless and barbarous
+edifice in which the old noble maintained the dignity of outraging the
+law.
+
+The friend of Petrarch and the pupil of Rienzi sighed deeply as he
+passed this vehicle of new spoliations, and as a pillar of fluted
+alabaster, rolling carelessly from the waggon, fell with a loud crash
+upon the pavement. At the foot of the stairs grouped some dozen of the
+bandits whom the old Colonna entertained: they were playing at dice upon
+an ancient tomb, the clear and deep inscription on which (so different
+from the slovenly character of the later empire) bespoke it a memorial
+of the most powerful age of Rome, and which, now empty even of ashes,
+and upset, served for a table to these foreign savages, and was strewn,
+even at that early hour, with fragments of meat and flasks of wine. They
+scarcely stirred, they scarcely looked up, as the young noble passed
+them; and their fierce oaths and loud ejaculations, uttered in a
+northern patois, grated harsh upon his ear, as he mounted, with a slow
+step, the lofty and unclean stairs. He came into a vast ante-chamber,
+which was half-filled with the higher class of the patrician's
+retainers: some five or six pages, chosen from the inferior noblesse,
+congregated by a narrow and deep-sunk casement, were discussing the
+grave matters of gallantry and intrigue; three petty chieftains of the
+band below, with their corselets donned, and their swords and casques
+beside them, were sitting, stolid and silent, at a table, in the middle
+of the room, and might have been taken for automatons, save for
+the solemn regularity with which they ever and anon lifted to their
+moustachioed lips their several goblets, and then, with a complacent
+grunt, re-settled to their contemplations. Striking was the contrast
+which their northern phlegm presented to a crowd of Italian clients, and
+petitioners, and parasites, who walked restlessly to and fro, talking
+loudly to each other, with all the vehement gestures and varying
+physiognomy of southern vivacity. There was a general stir and sensation
+as Adrian broke upon this miscellaneous company. The bandit captains
+nodded their heads mechanically; the pages bowed, and admired the
+fashion of his plume and hose; the clients, and petitioners, and
+parasites, crowded round him, each with a separate request for interest
+with his potent kinsman. Great need had Adrian of his wonted urbanity
+and address, in extricating himself from their grasp; and painfully
+did he win, at last, the low and narrow door, at which stood a tall
+servitor, who admitted or rejected the applicants, according to his
+interest or caprice.
+
+"Is the Baron alone?" asked Adrian.
+
+"Why, no, my Lord: a foreign signor is with him--but to you he is of
+course visible."
+
+"Well, you may admit me. I would inquire of his health."
+
+The servitor opened the door--through whose aperture peered many a
+jealous and wistful eye--and consigned Adrian to the guidance of a page,
+who, older and of greater esteem than the loiterers in the ante-room,
+was the especial henchman of the Lord of the Castle. Passing another,
+but empty chamber, vast and dreary, Adrian found himself in a small
+cabinet, and in the presence of his kinsman.
+
+Before a table, bearing the implements of writing, sate the old Colonna:
+a robe of rich furs and velvet hung loose upon his tall and stately
+frame; from a round skull-cap, of comforting warmth and crimson hue, a
+few grey locks descended, and mixed with a long and reverent beard. The
+countenance of the aged noble, who had long passed his eightieth year,
+still retained the traces of a comeliness for which in earlier manhood
+he was remarkable. His eyes, if deep-sunken, were still keen and lively,
+and sparkled with all the fire of youth; his mouth curved upward in a
+pleasant, though half-satiric, smile; and his appearance on the whole
+was prepossessing and commanding, indicating rather the high blood, the
+shrewd wit, and the gallant valour of the patrician, than his craft,
+hypocrisy, and habitual but disdainful spirit of oppression.
+
+Stephen Colonna, without being absolutely a hero, was indeed far braver
+than most of the Romans, though he held fast to the Italian maxim--never
+to fight an enemy while it is possible to cheat him. Two faults,
+however, marred the effect of his sagacity: a supreme insolence of
+disposition, and a profound belief in the lights of his experience. He
+was incapable of analogy. What had never happened in his time, he was
+perfectly persuaded never could happen. Thus, though generally esteemed
+an able diplomatist, he had the cunning of the intriguant, and not
+the providence of a statesman. If, however, pride made him arrogant
+in prosperity, it supported him in misfortune. And in the earlier
+vicissitudes of a life which had partly been consumed in exile, he
+had developed many noble qualities of fortitude, endurance, and real
+greatness of soul; which showed that his failings were rather acquired
+by circumstance than derived from nature. His numerous and highborn race
+were proud of their chief; and with justice; for he was the ablest and
+most honoured, not only of the direct branch of the Colonna, but also,
+perhaps, of all the more powerful barons.
+
+Seated at the same table with Stephen Colonna was a man of noble
+presence, of about three or four and thirty years of age, in whom Adrian
+instantly recognised Walter de Montreal. This celebrated knight was
+scarcely of the personal appearance which might have corresponded with
+the terror his name generally excited. His face was handsome, almost to
+the extreme of womanish delicacy. His fair hair waved long and freely
+over a white and unwrinkled forehead: the life of a camp and the suns of
+Italy had but little embrowned his clear and healthful complexion, which
+retained much of the bloom of youth. His features were aquiline
+and regular; his eyes, of a light hazel, were large, bright, and
+penetrating; and a short, but curled beard and moustachio, trimmed
+with soldier-like precision, and very little darker than the hair, gave
+indeed a martial expression to his comely countenance, but rather the
+expression which might have suited the hero of courts and tournaments,
+than the chief of a brigand's camp. The aspect, manner, and bearing, of
+the Provencal were those which captivate rather than awe,--blending,
+as they did, a certain military frankness with the easy and graceful
+dignity of one conscious of gentle birth, and accustomed to mix, on
+equal terms, with the great and noble. His form happily contrasted and
+elevated the character of a countenance which required strength and
+stature to free its uncommon beauty from the charge of effeminacy,
+being of great height and remarkable muscular power, without the least
+approach to clumsy and unwieldy bulk: it erred, indeed, rather to the
+side of leanness than flesh,--at once robust and slender. But the chief
+personal distinction of this warrior, the most redoubted lance of Italy,
+was an air and carriage of chivalric and heroic grace, greatly set off
+at this time by his splendid dress, which was of brown velvet sown with
+pearls, over which hung the surcoat worn by the Knights of the Hospital,
+whereon was wrought, in white, the eight-pointed cross that made
+the badge of his order. The Knight's attitude was that of earnest
+conversation, bending slightly forward towards the Colonna, and resting
+both his hands--which (according to the usual distinction of the old
+Norman race, (Small hands and feet, however disproportioned to the rest
+of the person, were at that time deemed no less a distinction of the
+well-born, than they have been in a more refined age. Many readers
+will remember the pain occasioned to Petrarch by his tight shoes. The
+supposed beauty of this peculiarity is more derived from the feudal than
+the classic time.) from whom, though born in Provence, Montreal boasted
+his descent) were small and delicate, the fingers being covered with
+jewels, as was the fashion of the day--upon the golden hilt of an
+enormous sword, on the sheath of which was elaborately wrought the
+silver lilies that made the device of the Provencal Brotherhood of
+Jerusalem.
+
+"Good morrow, fair kinsman!" said Stephen. "Seat thyself, I pray; and
+know in this knightly visitor the celebrated Sieur de Montreal."
+
+"Ah, my Lord," said Montreal, smiling, as he saluted Adrian; "and how is
+my lady at home?"
+
+"You mistake, Sir Knight," quoth Stephen; "my young kinsman is not yet
+married: faith, as Pope Boniface remarked, when he lay stretched on a
+sick bed, and his confessor talked to him about Abraham's bosom, 'that
+is a pleasure the greater for being deferred.'"
+
+"The Signor will pardon my mistake," returned Montreal.
+
+"But not," said Adrian, "the neglect of Sir Walter in not ascertaining
+the fact in person. My thanks to him, noble kinsman, are greater than
+you weet of; and he promised to visit me, that he might receive them at
+leisure."
+
+"I assure you, Signor," answered Montreal, "that I have not forgotten
+the invitation; but so weighty hitherto have been my affairs at Rome,
+that I have been obliged to parley with my impatience to better our
+acquaintance."
+
+"Oh, ye knew each other before?" said Stephen. "And how?"
+
+"My Lord, there is a damsel in the case!" replied Montreal. "Excuse my
+silence."
+
+"Ah, Adrian, Adrian! when will you learn my continence!" said Stephen,
+solemnly stroking his grey beard. "What an example I set you! But a
+truce to this light conversation,--let us resume our theme. You must
+know, Adrian, that it is to the brave band of my guest I am indebted for
+those valiant gentlemen below, who keep Rome so quiet, though my poor
+habitation so noisy. He has called to proffer more assistance, if need
+be; and to advise me on the affairs of Northern Italy. Continue, I pray
+thee, Sir Knight; I have no disguises from my kinsman."
+
+"Thou seest," said Montreal, fixing his penetrating eyes on Adrian,
+"thou seest, doubtless, my Lord, that Italy at this moment presents to
+us a remarkable spectacle. It is a contest between two opposing powers,
+which shall destroy the other. The one power is that of the unruly and
+turbulent people--a power which they call 'Liberty;' the other power is
+that of the chiefs and princes--a power which they more appropriately
+call 'Order.' Between these parties the cities of Italy are divided.
+In Florence, in Genoa, in Pisa, for instance, is established a Free
+State--a Republic, God wot! and a more riotous, unhappy state of
+government, cannot well be imagined."
+
+"That is perfectly true," quoth Stephen; "they banished my own first
+cousin from Genoa."
+
+"A perpetual strife, in short," continued Montreal, "between the
+great families; an alternation of prosecutions, and confiscations, and
+banishments: today, the Guelfs proscribe the Ghibellines--tomorrow, the
+Ghibellines drive out the Guelfs. This may be liberty, but it is the
+liberty of the strong against the weak. In the other cities, as Milan,
+as Verona, as Bologna, the people are under the rule of one man,--who
+calls himself a prince, and whom his enemies call a tyrant. Having more
+force than any other citizen, he preserves a firm government; having
+more constant demand on his intellect and energies than the other
+citizens, he also preserves a wise one. These two orders of government
+are enlisted against each other: whenever the people in the one rebel
+against their prince, the people of the other--that is, the Free
+States--send arms and money to their assistance."
+
+"You hear, Adrian, how wicked those last are," quoth Stephen.
+
+"Now it seems to me," continued Montreal, "that this contest must end
+some time or other. All Italy must become republican or monarchical. It
+is easy to predict which will be the result."
+
+"Yes, Liberty must conquer in the end!" said Adrian, warmly.
+
+"Pardon me, young Lord; my opinion is entirely the reverse. You perceive
+that these republics are commercial,--are traders; they esteem wealth,
+they despise valour, they cultivate all trades save that of the
+armourer. Accordingly, how do they maintain themselves in war: by their
+own citizens? Not a whit of it! Either they send to some foreign chief,
+and promise, if he grant them his protection, the principality of the
+city for five or ten years in return; or else they borrow from some
+hardy adventurer, like myself, as many troops as they can afford to pay
+for. Is it not so, Lord Adrian?"
+
+Adrian nodded his reluctant assent.
+
+"Well, then, it is the fault of the foreign chief if he do not make his
+power permanent; as has been already done in States once free by the
+Visconti and the Scala: or else it is the fault of the captain of the
+mercenaries if he do not convert his brigands into senators, and himself
+into a king. These are events so natural, that one day or other
+they will occur throughout all Italy. And all Italy will then become
+monarchical. Now it seems to me the interest of all the powerful
+families--your own, at Rome, as that of the Visconti, at Milan--to
+expedite this epoch, and to check, while you yet may with ease, that
+rebellious contagion amongst the people which is now rapidly spreading,
+and which ends in the fever of licence to them, but in the corruption of
+death to you. In these free States, the nobles are the first to suffer:
+first your privileges, then your property, are swept away. Nay, in
+Florence, as ye well know, my Lords, no noble is even capable of holding
+the meanest office in the State!"
+
+"Villains!" said Colonna, "they violate the first law of nature!"
+
+"At this moment," resumed Montreal, who, engrossed with his subject,
+little heeded the interruptions he received from the holy indignation of
+the Baron: "at this moment, there are many--the wisest, perhaps, in the
+free States--who desire to renew the old Lombard leagues, in defence of
+their common freedom everywhere, and against whosoever shall aspire to
+be prince. Fortunately, the deadly jealousies between these
+merchant States--the base plebeian jealousies--more of trade than of
+glory--interpose at present an irresistible obstacle to this design; and
+Florence, the most stirring and the most esteemed of all, is happily so
+reduced by reverses of commerce as to be utterly unable to follow out
+so great an undertaking. Now, then, is the time for us, my Lords; while
+these obstacles are so great for our foes, now is the time for us to
+form and cement a counter-league between all the princes of Italy. To
+you, noble Stephen, I have come, as your rank demands,--alone, of all
+the barons of Rome,--to propose to you this honourable union. Observe
+what advantages it proffers to your house. The popes have abandoned Rome
+for ever; there is no counterpoise to your ambition,--there need be none
+to your power. You see before you the examples of Visconti and Taddeo
+di Pepoli. You may found in Rome, the first city of Italy, a supreme and
+uncontrolled principality, subjugate utterly your weaker rivals,--the
+Savelli, the Malatesta, the Orsini,--and leave to your sons' sons an
+hereditary kingdom that may aspire once more, perhaps, to the empire of
+the world."
+
+Stephen shaded his face with his hand as he answered: "But this, noble
+Montreal, requires means:--money and men."
+
+"Of the last, you can command from me enow--my small company, the best
+disciplined, can (whenever I please) swell to the most numerous in
+Italy: in the first, noble Baron, the rich House of Colonna cannot fail;
+and even a mortgage on its vast estates may be well repaid when you have
+possessed yourselves of the whole revenues of Rome. You see," continued
+Montreal, turning to Adrian, in whose youth he expected a more warm ally
+than in the his hoary kinsman: "you see, at a glance, how feasible is
+this project, and what a mighty field it opens to your House."
+
+"Sir Walter de Montreal," said Adrian, rising from his seat, and giving
+vent to the indignation he had with difficulty suppressed, "I grieve
+much that, beneath the roof of the first citizen of Rome, a stranger
+should attempt thus calmly, and without interruption, to excite the
+ambition of emulating the execrated celebrity of a Visconti or a Pepoli.
+Speak, my Lord! (turning to Stephen)--speak, noble kinsman! and tell
+this Knight of Provence, that if by a Colonna the ancient grandeur of
+Rome cannot be restored, it shall not be, at least, by a Colonna that
+her last wrecks of liberty shall be swept away."
+
+"How now, Adrian!--how now, sweet kinsman!" said Stephen, thus suddenly
+appealed to, "calm thyself, I pr'ythee. Noble Sir Walter, he is
+young--young, and hasty--he means not to offend thee."
+
+"Of that I am persuaded," returned Montreal, coldly, but with great
+and courteous command of temper. "He speaks from the impulse of the
+moment,--a praiseworthy fault in youth. It was mine at his age, and
+many a time have I nearly lost my life for the rashness. Nay, Signor,
+nay!--touch not your sword so meaningly, as if you fancied I intimated a
+threat; far from me such presumption. I have learned sufficient caution,
+believe me, in the wars, not wantonly to draw against me a blade which I
+have seen wielded against such odds."
+
+Touched, despite himself, by the courtesy of the Knight, and the
+allusion to a scene in which, perhaps, his life had been preserved by
+Montreal, Adrian extended his hand to the latter.
+
+"I was to blame for my haste," said he, frankly; "but know, by my very
+heat," he added more gravely, "that your project will find no friends
+among the Colonna. Nay, in the presence of my noble kinsman, I dare
+to tell you, that could even his high sanction lend itself to such a
+scheme, the best hearts of his house would desert him; and I myself, his
+kinsman, would man yonder castle against so unnatural an ambition!"
+
+A slight and scarce perceptible cloud passed over Montreal's countenance
+at these words; and he bit his lip ere he replied:
+
+"Yet if the Orsini be less scrupulous, their first exertion of power
+would be heard in the crashing house of the Colonna."
+
+"Know you," returned Adrian, "that one of our mottoes is this haughty
+address to the Romans,--'If we fall, ye fall also?' And better that
+fate, than a rise upon the wrecks of our native city."
+
+"Well, well, well!" said Montreal, reseating himself, "I see that I must
+leave Rome to herself,--the League must thrive without her aid. I did
+but jest, touching the Orsini, for they have not the power that would
+make their efforts safe. Let us sweep, then, our past conference from
+our recollection. It is the nineteenth, I think, Lord Colonna, on which
+you propose to repair to Corneto, with your friends and retainers, and
+on which you have invited my attendance?"
+
+"It is on that day, Sir Knight," replied the Baron, evidently much
+relieved by the turn the conversation had assumed. "The fact is, that
+we have been so charged with indifference to the interests of the good
+people, that I strain a point in this expedition to contradict the
+assertion; and we propose, therefore, to escort and protect, against the
+robbers of the road, a convoy of corn to Corneto. In truth, I may add
+another reason, besides fear of the robbers, that makes me desire as
+numerous a train as possible. I wish to show my enemies, and the people
+generally, the solid and growing power of my house; the display of
+such an armed band as I hope to levy, will be a magnificent occasion
+to strike awe into the riotous and refractory. Adrian, you will collect
+your servitors, I trust, on that day; we would not be without you."
+
+"And as we ride along, fair Signor," said Montreal, inclining to Adrian,
+"we will find at least one subject on which we can agree: all brave men
+and true knights have one common topic,--and its name is Woman. You must
+make me acquainted with the names of the fairest dames of Rome; and we
+will discuss old adventures in the Parliament of Love, and hope for
+new. By the way, I suppose, Lord Adrian, you, with the rest of your
+countrymen, are Petrarch-stricken?"
+
+"Do you not share our enthusiasm? slur not so your gallantry, I pray
+you."
+
+"Come, we must not again disagree; but, by my halidame, I think one
+troubadour roundel worth all that Petrarch ever wrote. He has but
+borrowed from our knightly poesy, to disguise it, like a carpet
+coxcomb."
+
+"Well," said Adrian, gaily, "for every line of the troubadours that
+you quote, I will cite you another. I will forgive you for injustice to
+Petrarch, if you are just to the troubadours."
+
+"Just!" cried Montreal, with real enthusiasm: "I am of the land, nay
+the very blood of the troubadour! But we grow too light for your noble
+kinsman; and it is time for me to bid you, for the present, farewell. My
+Lord Colonna, peace be with you; farewell, Sir Adrian,--brother mine in
+knighthood,--remember your challenge."
+
+And with an easy and careless grace the Knight of St. John took his
+leave. The old Baron, making a dumb sign of excuse to Adrian, followed
+Montreal into the adjoining room.
+
+"Sir Knight!" said he, "Sir Knight!" as he closed the door upon Adrian,
+and then drew Montreal to the recess of the casement,--"a word in your
+ear. Think not I slight your offer, but these young men must be managed;
+the plot is great--noble,--grateful to my heart; but it requires time
+and caution. I have many of my house, scrupulous as yon hot-skull, to
+win over; the way is pleasant, but must be sounded well and carefully;
+you understand?"
+
+From under his bent brows, Montreal darted one keen glance at Stephen,
+and then answered:
+
+"My friendship for you dictated my offer. The League may stand without
+the Colonna,--beware a time when the Colonna cannot stand without the
+League. My Lord, look well around you; there are more freemen--ay, bold
+and stirring ones, too--in Rome, than you imagine. Beware Rienzi! Adieu,
+we meet soon again."
+
+Thus saying, Montreal departed, soliloquising as he passed with his
+careless step through the crowded ante-room:
+
+"I shall fail here!--these caitiff nobles have neither the courage to
+be great, nor the wisdom to be honest. Let them fall!--I may find an
+adventurer from the people, an adventurer like myself, worth them all."
+
+No sooner had Stephen returned to Adrian than he flung his arms
+affectionately round his ward, who was preparing his pride for some
+sharp rebuke for his petulance.
+
+"Nobly feigned,--admirable, admirable!" cried the Baron; "you have
+learned the true art of a statesman at the Emperor's court. I always
+thought you would--always said it. You saw the dilemma I was in,
+thus taken by surprise by that barbarian's mad scheme; afraid to
+refuse,--more afraid to accept. You extricated me with consummate
+address: that passion,--so natural to your age,--was a famous feint;
+drew off the attack; gave me time to breathe; allowed me to play with
+the savage. But we must not offend him, you know: all my retainers would
+desert me, or sell me to the Orsini, or cut my throat, if he but held up
+his finger. Oh! it was admirably managed, Adrian--admirably!"
+
+"Thank Heaven!" said Adrian, with some difficulty recovering the breath
+which his astonishment had taken away, "you do not think of embracing
+that black proposition?"
+
+"Think of it! no, indeed!" said Stephen, throwing himself back on his
+chair. "Why, do you not know my age, boy? Hard on my ninetieth year, I
+should be a fool indeed to throw myself into such a whirl of turbulence
+and agitation. I want to keep what I have, not risk it by grasping more.
+Am I not the beloved of the pope? shall I hazard his excommunication? Am
+I not the most powerful of the nobles? should I be more if I were king?
+At my age, to talk to me of such stuff!--the man's an idiot. Besides,"
+added the old man, sinking his voice, and looking fearfully round, "if
+I were a king, my sons might poison me for the succession. They are
+good lads, Adrian, very! But such a temptation!--I would not throw it in
+their way; these grey hairs have experience! Tyrants don't die a natural
+death; no, no! Plague on the Knight, say I; he has already cast me into
+a cold sweat."
+
+Adrian gazed on the working features of the old man, whose selfishness
+thus preserved him from crime. He listened to his concluding words--full
+of the dark truth of the times; and as the high and pure ambition of
+Rienzi flashed upon him in contrast, he felt that he could not blame its
+fervour, or wonder at its excess.
+
+"And then, too," resumed the Baron, speaking more deliberately as he
+recovered his self-possession, "this man, by way of a warning, shows me,
+at a glance, his whole ignorance of the state. What think you? he has
+mingled with the mob, and taken their rank breath for power; yes, he
+thinks words are soldiers, and bade me--me, Stephen Colonna--beware--of
+whom, think you? No, you will never guess!--of that speech-maker,
+Rienzi! my own old jesting guest! Ha! ha! ha!--the ignorance of these
+barbarians! Ha! ha! ha! and the old man laughed till the tears ran down
+his cheeks.
+
+"Yet many of the nobles fear that same Rienzi," said Adrian, gravely.
+
+"Ah! let them, let them!--they have not our experience--our knowledge
+of the world, Adrian. Tut, man,--when did declamation ever overthrow
+castles, and conquer soldiery? I like Rienzi to harangue the mob about
+old Rome, and such stuff; it gives them something to think of and prate
+about, and so all their fierceness evaporates in words; they might burn
+a house if they did not hear a speech. But, now I am on that score, I
+must own the pedant has grown impudent in his new office; here, here,--I
+received this paper ere I rose today. I hear a similar insolence has
+been shown to all the nobles. Read it, will you," and the Colonna put a
+scroll into his kinsman's hand.
+
+"I have received the like," said Adrian, glancing at it. "It is a
+request of Rienzi's to attend at the Church of St. John of Lateran, to
+hear explained the inscription on a Table just discovered. It bears, he
+saith, the most intimate connexion with the welfare and state of Rome."
+
+"Very entertaining, I dare to say, to professors and bookmen. Pardon me,
+kinsman; I forgot your taste for these things; and my son, Gianni, too,
+shares your fantasy. Well, well! it is innocent enough! Go--the man
+talks well."
+
+"Will you not attend, too?"
+
+"I--my dear boy--I!" said the old Colonna, opening his eyes in such
+astonishment that Adrian could not help laughing at the simplicity of
+his own question.
+
+
+
+Chapter 2.II. The Interview, and the Doubt.
+
+As Adrian turned from the palace of his guardian, and bent his way in
+the direction of the Forum, he came somewhat unexpectedly upon Raimond,
+bishop of Orvietto, who, mounted upon a low palfrey, and accompanied
+by some three or four of his waiting-men, halted abruptly when he
+recognised the young noble.
+
+"Ah, my son! it is seldom that I see thee: how fares it with
+thee?--well? So, so! I rejoice to hear it. Alas! what a state of society
+is ours, when compared to the tranquil pleasures of Avignon! There,
+all men who, like us, are fond of the same pursuits, the same studies,
+deliciae musarum, hum! hum! (the Bishop was proud of an occasional
+quotation, right or wrong), are brought easily and naturally together.
+But here we scarcely dare stir out of our houses, save upon great
+occasions. But, talking of great occasions, and the Muses, reminds me of
+our good Rienzi's invitation to the Lateran: of course you will attend;
+'tis a mighty knotty piece of Latin he proposes to solve--so I hear, at
+least; very interesting to us, my son,--very!"
+
+"It is tomorrow," answered Adrian. "Yes, assuredly; I will be there."
+
+"And, harkye, my son," said the Bishop, resting his hand affectionately
+on Adrian's shoulder, "I have reason to hope that he will remind our
+poor citizens of the Jubilee for the year Fifty, and stir them towards
+clearing the road of the brigands: a necessary injunction, and one to be
+heeded timeously; for who will come here for absolution when he stands
+a chance of rushing unannealed upon purgatory by the way? You have heard
+Rienzi,--ay? quite a Cicero--quite! Well, Heaven bless you, my son! You
+will not fail?"
+
+"Nay, not I."
+
+"Yet, stay--a word with you: just suggest to all whom you may meet
+the advisability of a full meeting; it looks well for the city to show
+respect to letters."
+
+"To say nothing of the Jubilee," added Adrian, smiling.
+
+"Ah, to say nothing of the Jubilee--very good! Adieu for the present!"
+And the Bishop, resettling himself on his saddle, ambled solemnly on to
+visit his various friends, and press them to the meeting.
+
+Meanwhile, Adrian continued his course till he had passed the Capitol,
+the Arch of Severus, the crumbling columns of the fane of Jupiter,
+and found himself amidst the long grass, the whispering reeds, and the
+neglected vines, that wave over the now-vanished pomp of the Golden
+House of Nero. Seating himself on a fallen pillar--by that spot where
+the traveller descends to the (so called) Baths of Livia--he looked
+impatiently to the sun, as to blame it for the slowness of its march.
+
+Not long, however, had he to wait before a light step was heard crushing
+the fragrant grass; and presently through the arching vines gleamed a
+face that might well have seemed the nymph, the goddess of the scene.
+
+"My beautiful! my Irene!--how shall I thank thee!"
+
+It was long before the delighted lover suffered himself to observe upon
+Irene's face a sadness that did not usually cloud it in his presence.
+Her voice, too, trembled; her words seemed constrained and cold.
+
+"Have I offended thee?" he asked; "or what less misfortune hath
+occurred?"
+
+Irene raised her eyes to her lover's, and said, looking at him
+earnestly, "Tell me, my Lord, in sober and simple truth, tell me, would
+it grieve thee much were this to be our last meeting?"
+
+Paler than the marble at his feet grew the dark cheek of Adrian. It was
+some moments ere he could reply, and he did so then with a forced smile
+and a quivering lip.
+
+"Jest not so, Irene! Last!--that is not a word for us!"
+
+"But hear me, my Lord--"
+
+"Why so cold?--call me Adrian!--friend!--lover! or be dumb!"
+
+"Well, then, my soul's soul! my all of hope! my life's life!" exclaimed
+Irene, passionately, "hear me! I fear that we stand at this moment upon
+some gulf whose depth I see not, but which may divide us for ever! Thou
+knowest the real nature of my brother, and dost not misread him as many
+do. Long has he planned, and schemed, and communed with himself, and,
+feeling his way amidst the people, prepared the path to some great
+design. But now--(thou wilt not betray--thou wilt not injure him?--he is
+thy friend!)"
+
+"And thy brother! I would give my life for his! Say on!"
+
+"But now, then," resumed Irene, "the time for that enterprise, whatever
+it be, is coming fast. I know not of its exact nature, but I know that
+it is against the nobles--against thy order--against thy house itself!
+If it succeed--oh, Adrian! thou thyself mayst not be free from danger;
+and my name, at least, will be coupled with the name of thy foes. If it
+fail,--my brother, my bold brother, is swept away! He will fall a victim
+to revenge or justice, call it as you will. Your kinsman may be his
+judge--his executioner; and I--even if I should yet live to mourn over
+the boast and glory of my humble line--could I permit myself to love,
+to see, one in whose veins flowed the blood of his destroyer? Oh! I am
+wretched--wretched! these thoughts make me well-nigh mad!" and, wringing
+her hands bitterly, Irene sobbed aloud.
+
+Adrian himself was struck forcibly by the picture thus presented to
+him, although the alternative it embraced had often before forced itself
+dimly on his mind. It was true, however, that, not seeing the schemes of
+Rienzi backed by any physical power, and never yet having witnessed the
+mighty force of a moral revolution, he did not conceive that any rise
+to which he might instigate the people could be permanently successful:
+and, as for his punishment, in that city, where all justice was the
+slave of interest, Adrian knew himself powerful enough to obtain
+forgiveness even for the greatest of all crimes--armed insurrection
+against the nobles. As these thoughts recurred to him, he gained the
+courage to console and cheer Irene. But his efforts were only partially
+successful. Awakened by her fears to that consideration of the future
+which hitherto she had forgotten, Irene, for the first time, seemed deaf
+to the charmer's voice.
+
+"Alas!" said she, sadly, "even at the best, what can this love, that we
+have so blindly encouraged--what can it end in? Thou must not wed with
+one like me; and I! how foolish I have been!"
+
+"Recall thy senses then, Irene," said Adrian, proudly, partly perhaps
+in anger, partly in his experience of the sex. "Love another, and more
+wisely, if thou wilt; cancel thy vows with me, and continue to think it
+a crime to love, and a folly to be true!"
+
+"Cruel!" said Irene, falteringly, and in her turn alarmed. "Dost thou
+speak in earnest?"
+
+"Tell me, ere I answer you, tell me this: come death, come anguish, come
+a whole life of sorrow, as the end of this love, wouldst thou yet repent
+that thou hast loved? If so, thou knowest not the love that I feel for
+thee."
+
+"Never! never can I repent!" said Irene, falling upon Adrian's neck;
+"forgive me!"
+
+"But is there, in truth," said Adrian, a little while after this
+lover-like quarrel and reconciliation, "is there, in truth, so marked
+a difference between thy brother's past and his present bearing? How
+knowest thou that the time for action is so near?"
+
+"Because now he sits closeted whole nights with all ranks of men; he
+shuts up his books,--he reads no more,--but, when alone, walks to and
+fro his chamber, muttering to himself. Sometimes he pauses before the
+calendar, which of late he has fixed with his own hand against the wall,
+and passes his finger over the letters, till he comes to some chosen
+date, and then he plays with his sword and smiles. But two nights since,
+arms, too, in great number were brought to the house; and I heard the
+chief of the men who brought them, a grim giant, known well amongst the
+people, say, as he wiped his brow,--'These will see work soon!'"
+
+"Arms! Are you sure of that?" said Adrian, anxiously. "Nay, then, there
+is more in these schemes than I imagined! But (observing Irene's gaze
+bent fearfully on him as his voice changed, he added, more gaily)--but
+come what may, believe me--my beautiful! my adored! that while I live,
+thy brother shall not suffer from the wrath he may provoke,--nor I,
+though he forget our ancient friendship, cease to love thee less."
+
+"Signora! Signora! child! it is time! we must go!" said the shrill voice
+of Benedetta, now peering through the foliage. "The working men pass
+home this way; I see them approaching."
+
+The lovers parted; for the first time the serpent had penetrated into
+their Eden,--they had conversed, they had thought, of other things than
+Love.
+
+
+
+Chapter 2.III. The Situation of a Popular Patrician in Times of Popular
+Discontent.--Scene of the Lateran.
+
+The situation of a Patrician who honestly loves the people is, in those
+evil times, when power oppresses and freedom struggles,--when the two
+divisions of men are wrestling against each other,--the most irksome and
+perplexing that destiny can possibly contrive. Shall he take part with
+the nobles?--he betrays his conscience! With the people?--he deserts
+his friends! But that consequence of the last alternative is not the
+sole--nor, perhaps, to a strong mind, the most severe. All men are
+swayed and chained by public opinion--it is the public judge; but public
+opinion is not the same for all ranks. The public opinion that excites
+or deters the plebeian, is the opinion of the plebeians,--of those
+whom he sees, and meets, and knows; of those with whom he is brought
+in contact,--those with whom he has mixed from childhood,--those whose
+praises are daily heard,--whose censure frowns upon him with every
+hour. (It is the same in still smaller divisions. The public opinion for
+lawyers is that of lawyers; of soldiers, that of the army; of scholars,
+it is that of men of literature and science. And to the susceptible
+amongst the latter, the hostile criticism of learning has been more
+stinging than the severest moral censures of the vulgar. Many a man has
+done a great act, or composed a great work, solely to please the two
+or three persons constantly present to him. Their voice was his public
+opinion. The public opinion that operated on Bishop, the murderer, was
+the opinion of the Burkers, his comrades. Did that condemn him? No! He
+knew no other public opinion till he came to be hanged, and caught the
+loathing eyes, and heard the hissing execrations of the crowd below his
+gibbet.) So, also, the public opinion of the great is the opinion of
+their equals,--of those whom birth and accident cast for ever in their
+way. This distinction is full of important practical deductions; it
+is one which, more than most maxims, should never be forgotten by a
+politician who desires to be profound. It is, then, an ordeal terrible
+to pass--which few plebeians ever pass, which it is therefore unjust to
+expect patricians to cross unfaulteringly--the ordeal of opposing the
+public opinion which exists for them. They cannot help doubting their
+own judgment,--they cannot help thinking the voice of wisdom or of
+virtue speaks in those sounds which have been deemed oracles from
+their cradle. In the tribunal of Sectarian Prejudice they imagine
+they recognise the court of the Universal Conscience. Another powerful
+antidote to the activity of a patrician so placed, is in the certainty
+that to the last the motives of such activity will be alike misconstrued
+by the aristocracy he deserts and the people he joins. It seems so
+unnatural in a man to fly in the face of his own order, that the world
+is willing to suppose any clue to the mystery save that of honest
+conviction or lofty patriotism. "Ambition!" says one. "Disappointment!"
+cries another. "Some private grudge!" hints a third. "Mob-courting
+vanity!" sneers a fourth. The people admire at first, but suspect
+afterwards. The moment he thwarts a popular wish, there is no redemption
+for him: he is accused of having acted the hypocrite,--of having worn
+the sheep's fleece: and now, say they,--"See! the wolf's teeth
+peep out!" Is he familiar with the people?--it is cajolery! Is he
+distant?--it is pride! What, then, sustains a man in such a situation,
+following his own conscience, with his eyes opened to all the perils
+of the path? Away with the cant of public opinion,--away with the poor
+delusion of posthumous justice; he will offend the first, he will never
+obtain the last. What sustains him? HIS OWN SOUL! A man thoroughly great
+has a certain contempt for his kind while he aids them: their weal or
+woe are all; their applause--their blame--are nothing to him. He walks
+forth from the circle of birth and habit; he is deaf to the little
+motives of little men. High, through the widest space his orbit may
+describe, he holds on his course to guide or to enlighten; but the
+noises below reach him not! Until the wheel is broken,--until the dark
+void swallow up the star,--it makes melody, night and day, to its own
+ear: thirsting for no sound from the earth it illumines, anxious for no
+companionship in the path through which it rolls, conscious of its own
+glory, and contented, therefore, to be alone!
+
+But minds of this order are rare. All ages cannot produce them. They
+are exceptions to the ordinary and human virtue, which is influenced
+and regulated by external circumstance. At a time when even to be merely
+susceptible to the voice of fame was a great pre-eminence in moral
+energies over the rest of mankind, it would be impossible that any
+one should ever have formed the conception of that more refined and
+metaphysical sentiment, that purer excitement to high deeds--that glory
+in one's own heart, which is so immeasurably above the desire of a
+renown that lackeys the heels of others. In fact, before we can
+dispense with the world, we must, by a long and severe novitiate--by the
+probation of much thought, and much sorrow--by deep and sad conviction
+of the vanity of all that the world can give us, have raised our
+selves--not in the fervour of an hour, but habitually--above the world:
+an abstraction--an idealism--which, in our wiser age, how few even of
+the wisest, can attain! Yet, till we are thus fortunate, we know not
+the true divinity of contemplation, nor the all-sufficing mightiness of
+conscience; nor can we retreat with solemn footsteps into that Holy of
+Holies in our own souls, wherein we know, and feel, how much our nature
+is capable of the self-existence of a God!
+
+But to return to the things and thoughts of earth. Those considerations,
+and those links of circumstance, which, in a similar situation have
+changed so many honest and courageous minds, changed also the mind of
+Adrian. He felt in a false position. His reason and conscience shared in
+the schemes of Rienzi, and his natural hardihood and love of enterprise
+would have led him actively to share the danger of their execution. But
+this, all his associations, his friendships, his private and household
+ties, loudly forbade. Against his order, against his house, against the
+companions of his youth, how could he plot secretly, or act sternly?
+By the goal to which he was impelled by patriotism, stood hypocrisy and
+ingratitude. Who would believe him the honest champion of his country
+who was a traitor to his friends? Thus, indeed,
+
+     "The native hue of resolution
+     Was sicklied o'er with the pale cast of thought!"
+
+And he who should have been by nature a leader of the time became only
+its spectator. Yet Adrian endeavoured to console himself for his present
+passiveness in a conviction of the policy of his conduct. He who takes
+no share in the commencement of civil revolutions, can often become,
+with the most effect, a mediator between the passions and the parties
+subsequently formed. Perhaps, under Adrian's circumstances, delay was
+really the part of a prudent statesman; the very position which cripples
+at the first, often gives authority before the end. Clear from the
+excesses, and saved from the jealousies, of rival factions, all men
+are willing to look with complaisance and respect to a new actor in a
+turbulent drama; his moderation may make him trusted by the people; his
+rank enable him to be a fitting mediator with the nobles; and thus the
+qualities that would have rendered him a martyr at one period of the
+Revolution, raise him perhaps into a saviour at another.
+
+Silent, therefore, and passive, Adrian waited the progress of events. If
+the projects of Rienzi failed, he might, by that in activity, the better
+preserve the people from new chains, and their champion from death.
+If those projects succeeded, he might equally save his house from the
+popular wrath--and, advocating liberty, check disorder. Such, at least,
+were his hopes; and thus did the Italian sagacity and caution of his
+character control and pacify the enthusiasm of youth and courage.
+
+The sun shone, calm and cloudless, upon the vast concourse gathered
+before the broad space that surrounds the Church of St. John of
+Lateran. Partly by curiosity--partly by the desire of the Bishop of
+Orvietto--partly because it was an occasion in which they could display
+the pomp of their retinues--many of the principal Barons of Rome had
+gathered to this spot.
+
+On one of the steps ascending to the church, with his mantle folded
+round him, stood Walter de Montreal, gazing on the various parties that,
+one after another, swept through the lane which the soldiers of the
+Church preserved unimpeded, in the middle of the crowd, for the access
+of the principal nobles. He watched with interest, though with his usual
+carelessness of air and roving glance, the different marks and looks
+of welcome given by the populace to the different personages of note.
+Banners and penons preceded each Signor, and, as they waved aloft, the
+witticisms or nicknames--the brief words of praise or censure, that
+imply so much--which passed to and fro among that lively crowd, were
+treasured carefully in his recollection.
+
+"Make way, there!--way for my Lord Martino Orsini--Baron di Porto!"
+
+"Peace, minion!--draw back! way for the Signor Adrian Colonna, Baron di
+Castello, and Knight of the Empire."
+
+And at those two rival shouts, you saw waving on high the golden bear of
+the Orsini, with the motto--"Beware my embrace!" and the solitary column
+on an azure ground, of the Colonna, with Adrian's especial device--"Sad,
+but strong." The train of Martino Orsini was much more numerous than
+that of Adrian, which last consisted but of ten servitors. But Adrian's
+men attracted far greater admiration amongst the crowd, and pleased more
+the experienced eye of the warlike Knight of St. John. Their arms were
+polished like mirrors; their height was to an inch the same; their march
+was regular and sedate; their mien erect; they looked neither to the
+right nor left; they betrayed that ineffable discipline--that harmony
+of order--which Adrian had learned to impart to his men during his own
+apprenticeship of arms. But the disorderly train of the Lord of Porto
+was composed of men of all heights. Their arms were ill-polished and
+ill-fashioned, and they pressed confusedly on each other; they laughed
+and spoke aloud; and in their mien and bearing expressed all the
+insolence of men who despised alike the master they served and the
+people they awed. The two bands coming unexpectedly on each other
+through this narrow defile, the jealousy of the two houses presently
+declared itself. Each pressed forward for the precedence; and, as the
+quiet regularity of Adrian's train, and even its compact paucity of
+numbers, enabled it to pass before the servitors of his rival, the
+populace set up a loud shout--"A Colonna for ever!"--"Let the Bear dance
+after the Column!"
+
+"On, ye knaves!" said Orsini aloud to his men. "How have ye suffered
+this affront?" And passing himself to the head of his men, he would have
+advanced through the midst of his rival's train, had not a tall guard,
+in the Pope's livery, placed his baton in the way.
+
+"Pardon, my Lord! we have the Vicar's express commands to suffer no
+struggling of the different trains one with another."
+
+"Knave! dost thou bandy words with me?" said the fierce Orsini; and with
+his sword he clove the baton in two.
+
+"In the Vicar's name, I command you to fall back!" said the sturdy
+guard, now placing his huge bulk in the very front of the noble's path.
+
+"It is Cecco del Vecchio!" cried those of the populace, who were near
+enough to perceive the interruption and its cause.
+
+"Ay," said one, "the good Vicar has put many of the stoutest fellows
+in the Pope's livery, in order the better to keep peace. He could have
+chosen none better than Cecco."
+
+"But he must not fall!" cried another, as Orsini, glaring on the smith,
+drew back his sword as if to plunge it through his bosom.
+
+"Shame--shame! shall the Pope be thus insulted in his own city?" cried
+several voices. "Down with the sacrilegious--down!" And, as if by a
+preconcerted plan, a whole body of the mob broke at once through
+the lane, and swept like a torrent over Orsini and his jostled and
+ill-assorted train. Orsini himself was thrown on the ground with
+violence, and trampled upon by a hundred footsteps; his men, huddled and
+struggling as much against themselves as against the mob, were scattered
+and overset; and when, by a great effort of the guards, headed by the
+smith himself, order was again restored, and the line reformed, Orsini,
+well nigh choked with his rage and humiliation, and greatly bruised by
+the rude assaults he had received, could scarcely stir from the ground.
+The officers of the Pope raised him, and, when he was on his legs, he
+looked wildly around for his sword, which, falling from his hand, had
+been kicked amongst the crowd, and seeing it not, he said, between his
+ground teeth, to Cecco del Vecchio--
+
+"Fellow, thy neck shall answer this outrage, or may God desert me!" and
+passed along through the space; while a half-suppressed and exultant
+hoot from the bystanders followed his path.
+
+"Way there!" cried the smith, "for the Lord Martino di Porto, and may
+all the people know that he has threatened to take my life for the
+discharge of my duty in obedience to the Pope's Vicar!"
+
+"He dare not!" shouted out a thousand voices; "the people can protect
+their own!"
+
+This scene had not been lost on the Provencal, who well knew how to
+construe the wind by the direction of straws, and saw at once, by the
+boldness of the populace, that they themselves were conscious of a
+coming tempest. "Par Dieu," said he, as he saluted Adrian, who, gravely,
+and without looking behind, had now won the steps of the church, "yon
+tall fellow has a brave heart, and many friends, too. What think you,"
+he added, in a low whisper, "is not this scene a proof that the nobles
+are less safe than they wot of?"
+
+"The beast begins to kick against the spur, Sir Knight," answered
+Adrian, "a wise horseman should, in such a case, take care how he
+pull the rein too tight, lest the beast should rear, and he be
+overthrown--yet that is the policy thou wouldst recommend."
+
+"You mistake," returned Montreal, "my wish was to give Rome one
+sovereign instead of many tyrants,--but hark! what means that bell?"
+
+"The ceremony is about to begin," answered Adrian. "Shall we enter the
+church together?"
+
+Seldom had a temple consecrated to God witnessed so singular a spectacle
+as that which now animated the solemn space of the Lateran.
+
+In the centre of the church, seats were raised in an amphitheatre, at
+the far end of which was a scaffolding, a little higher than the rest;
+below this spot, but high enough to be in sight of all the concourse,
+was placed a vast table of iron, on which was graven an ancient
+inscription, and bearing in its centre a clear and prominent device,
+presently to be explained.
+
+The seats were covered with cloth and rich tapestry. In the rear of
+the church was drawn a purple curtain. Around the amphitheatre were the
+officers of the Church, in the party-coloured liveries of the Pope. To
+the right of the scaffold sate Raimond, Bishop of Orvietto, in his robes
+of state. On the benches round him you saw all the marked personages of
+Rome--the judges, the men of letters, the nobles, from the lofty rank
+of the Savelli to the inferior grade of a Raselli. The space beyond the
+amphitheatre was filled with the people, who now poured fast in, stream
+after stream: all the while rang, clear and loud, the great bell of the
+church.
+
+At length, as Adrian and Montreal seated themselves at a little distance
+from Raimond, the bell suddenly ceased--the murmurs of the people were
+stilled--the purple curtain was withdrawn, and Rienzi came forth with
+slow and majestic steps. He came--but not in his usual sombre and plain
+attire. Over his broad breast he wore a vest of dazzling whiteness--a
+long robe, in the ample fashion of the toga, descended to his feet
+and swept the floor. On his head he wore a fold of white cloth, in the
+centre of which shone a golden crown. But the crown was divided, or
+cloven, as it were, by the mystic ornament of a silver sword, which,
+attracting the universal attention, testified at once that this strange
+garb was worn, not from the vanity of display, but for the sake of
+presenting to the concourse--in the person of the citizen--a type and
+emblem of that state of the city on which he was about to descant.
+
+"Faith," whispered one of the old nobles to his neighbour, "the plebeian
+assumes it bravely."
+
+"It will be rare sport," said a second. "I trust the good man will put
+some jests in his discourse."
+
+"What showman's tricks are these?" said a third.
+
+"He is certainly crazed!" said a fourth.
+
+"How handsome he is!" said the women, mixed with the populace.
+
+"This is a man who has learned the people by heart," observed Montreal
+to Adrian. "He knows he must speak to the eye, in order to win the mind:
+a knave,--a wise knave!"
+
+And now Rienzi had ascended the scaffold; and as he looked long and
+steadfastly around the meeting, the high and thoughtful repose of
+his majestic countenance, its deep and solemn gravity, hushed all the
+murmurs, and made its effect equally felt by the sneering nobles as the
+impatient populace.
+
+"Signors of Rome," said he, at length, "and ye, friends, and citizens,
+you have heard why we are met together this day; and you, my Lord
+Bishop of Orvietto,--and ye, fellow labourers with me in the field of
+letters,--ye, too, are aware that it is upon some matter relative to
+that ancient Rome, the rise and the decline of whose past power and
+glories we have spent our youth in endeavouring to comprehend. But
+this, believe me, is no vain enigma of erudition, useful but to the
+studious,--referring but to the dead. Let the Past perish!--let darkness
+shroud it!--let it sleep for ever over the crumbling temples and
+desolate tombs of its forgotten sons,--if it cannot afford us, from
+its disburied secrets, a guide for the Present and the Future. What, my
+Lords, ye have thought that it was for the sake of antiquity alone that
+we have wasted our nights and days in studying what antiquity can teach
+us! You are mistaken; it is nothing to know what we have been, unless it
+is with the desire of knowing that which we ought to be. Our ancestors
+are mere dust and ashes, save when they speak to our posterity; and then
+their voices resound, not from the earth below, but the heaven above.
+There is an eloquence in Memory, because it is the nurse of Hope.
+There is a sanctity in the Past, but only because of the chronicles it
+retains,--chronicles of the progress of mankind,--stepping-stones in
+civilisation, in liberty, and in knowledge. Our fathers forbid us to
+recede,--they teach us what is our rightful heritage,--they bid us
+reclaim, they bid us augment, that heritage,--preserve their virtues,
+and avoid their errors. These are the true uses of the Past. Like the
+sacred edifice in which we are,--it is a tomb upon which to rear a
+temple. I see that you marvel at this long beginning; ye look to each
+other--ye ask to what it tends. Behold this broad plate of iron; upon it
+is graven an inscription but lately disinterred from the heaps of stone
+and ruin, which--O shame to Rome!--were once the palaces of empire, and
+the arches of triumphant power. The device in the centre of the table,
+which you behold, conveys the act of the Roman Senators,--who are
+conferring upon Vespasian the imperial authority. It is this inscription
+which I have invited you to hear read! It specifies the very terms and
+limits of the authority thus conferred. To the Emperor was
+confided the power of making laws and alliances with whatsoever
+nation,--of increasing, or of diminishing the limits of towns and
+districts,--of--mark this, my Lords!--exalting men to the rank of dukes
+and kings,--ay, and of deposing and degrading them;--of making cities,
+and of unmaking: in short, of all the attributes of imperial power.
+Yes, to that Emperor was confided this vast authority; but, by whom?
+Heed--listen, I pray you--let not a word be lost;--by whom, I say? By
+the Roman Senate! What was the Roman Senate? The Representative of the
+Roman People!"
+
+"I knew he would come to that!" said the smith, who stood at the door
+with his fellows, but to whose ear, clear and distinct, rolled the
+silver voice of Rienzi.
+
+"Brave fellow! and this, too, in the hearing of the Lords!"
+
+"Ay, you see what the people were! and we should never have known this
+but for him."
+
+"Peace, fellows;" said the officer to those of the crowd, from whom came
+these whispered sentences.
+
+Rienzi continued.--"Yes, it is the people who intrusted this power--to
+the people, therefore, it belongs! Did the haughty Emperor arrogate the
+crown? Could he assume the authority of himself? Was it born with
+him? Did he derive it, my Lord Barons, from the possession of towered
+castles--of lofty lineage? No! all-powerful as he was, he had no right
+to one atom of that power, save from the voice and trust of the Roman
+people. Such, O my countrymen! such was even that day, when Liberty
+was but the shadow of her former self,--such was the acknowledged
+prerogative of your fathers! All power was the gift of the people. What
+have ye to give now? Who, who, I say,--what single person, what petty
+chief, asks you for the authority he assumes? His senate is his
+sword; his chart of license is written, not with ink, but blood. The
+people!--there is no people! Oh! would to God that we might disentomb
+the spirit of the Past as easily as her records!"
+
+"If I were your kinsman," whispered Montreal to Adrian, "I would give
+this man short breathing-time between his peroration and confession."
+
+"What is your Emperor?" continued Rienzi; "a stranger! What the great
+head of your Church?--an exile! Ye are without your lawful chiefs; and
+why? Because ye are not without your law-defying tyrants! The licence
+of your nobles, their discords, their dissensions, have driven our Holy
+Father from the heritage of St. Peter;--they have bathed your streets in
+your own blood; they have wasted the wealth of your labours on private
+quarrels and the maintenance of hireling ruffians! Your forces are
+exhausted against yourselves. You have made a mockery of your country,
+once the mistress of the world. You have steeped her lips in gall--ye
+have set a crown of thorns upon her head! What, my Lords!" cried he,
+turning sharply round towards the Savelli and Orsini, who, endeavouring
+to shake off the thrill which the fiery eloquence of Rienzi had stricken
+to their hearts, now, by contemptuous gestures and scornful smiles,
+testified the displeasure they did not dare loudly to utter in the
+presence of the Vicar and the people.--"What! even while I speak--not
+the sanctity of this place restrains you! I am an humble man--a citizen
+of Rome;--but I have this distinction: I have raised against myself
+many foes and scoffers for that which I have done for Rome. I am hated,
+because I love my country; I am despised, because I would exalt her. I
+retaliate--I shall be avenged. Three traitors in your own palaces shall
+betray you: their names are--Luxury, Envy, and Dissension!"
+
+"There he had them on the hip!"
+
+"Ha, ha! by the Holy Cross, that was good!"
+
+"I would go to the hangman for such another keen stroke as that!"
+
+"It is a shame if we are cowards, when one man is thus brave," said the
+smith.
+
+"This is the man we have always wanted!"
+
+"Silence!" proclaimed the officer.
+
+"O Romans!" resumed Rienzi, passionately--"awake! I conjure you! Let
+this memorial of your former power--your ancient liberties--sink deep
+into your souls. In a propitious hour, if ye seize it,--in an evil one,
+if ye suffer the golden opportunity to escape,--has this record of the
+past been unfolded to your eyes. Recollect that the Jubilee approaches."
+
+The Bishop of Orvietto smiled, and bowed approvingly; the people, the
+citizens, the inferior nobles, noted well those signs of encouragement;
+and, to their minds, the Pope himself, in the person of his Vicar,
+looked benignly on the daring of Rienzi.
+
+"The Jubilee approaches,--the eyes of all Christendom will be directed
+hither. Here, where, from all quarters of the globe, men come for peace,
+shall they find discord?--seeking absolution, shall they perceive
+but crime? In the centre of God's dominion, shall they weep at your
+weakness?--in the seat of the martyred saints, shall they shudder at
+your vices?--in the fountain and source of Christ's law, shall they
+find all law unknown? You were the glory of the world--will you be its
+by-word? You were its example--will you be its warning? Rise, while it
+is yet time!--clear your roads from the bandits that infest them!--your
+walls from the hirelings that they harbour! Banish these civil discords,
+or the men--how proud, how great, soever--who maintain them! Pluck
+the scales from the hand of Fraud!--the sword from the hand of
+Violence!--the balance and the sword are the ancient attributes of
+Justice!--restore them to her again! This be your high task,--these be
+your great ends! Deem any man who opposes them a traitor to his country.
+Gain a victory greater than those of the Caesars--a victory over
+yourselves! Let the pilgrims of the world behold the resurrection of
+Rome! Make one epoch of the Jubilee of Religion and the Restoration of
+Law! Lay the sacrifice of your vanquished passions--the first-fruits of
+your renovated liberties--upon the very altar that these walls contain!
+and never! oh, never! since the world began, shall men have made a more
+grateful offering to their God!"
+
+So intense was the sensation these words created in the audience--so
+breathless and overpowered did they leave the souls with they took by
+storm--that Rienzi had descended the scaffold, and already disappeared
+behind the curtain from which he had emerged, ere the crowd were fully
+aware that he had ceased.
+
+The singularity of this sudden apparition--robed in mysterious
+splendour, and vanishing the moment its errand was fulfilled--gave
+additional effect to the words it had uttered. The whole character of
+that bold address became invested with a something preternatural and
+inspired; to the minds of the vulgar, the mortal was converted into the
+oracle; and, marvelling at the unhesitating courage with which their
+idol had rebuked and conjured the haughty barons,--each of whom they
+regarded in the light of sanctioned executioners, whose anger could be
+made manifest at once by the gibbet or the axe,--the people could not
+but superstitiously imagine that nothing less than authority from above
+could have gifted their leader with such hardihood, and preserved him
+from the danger it incurred. In fact, it was in this very courage of
+Rienzi that his safety consisted; he was placed in those circumstances
+where audacity is prudence. Had he been less bold, the nobles would have
+been more severe; but so great a license of speech in an officer of the
+Holy See, they naturally imagined, was not unauthorised by the assent of
+the Pope, as well as by the approbation of the people. Those who did not
+(like Stephen Colonna) despise words as wind, shrank back from the task
+of punishing one whose voice might be the mere echo of the wishes of the
+pontiff. The dissensions of the nobles among each other, were no less
+favourable to Rienzi. He attacked a body, the members of which had no
+union.
+
+"It is not my duty to slay him!" said one.
+
+"I am not the representative of the barons!" said another.
+
+"If Stephen Colonna heeds him not, it would be absurd, as well as
+dangerous, in a meaner man to make himself the champion of the order!"
+said a third.
+
+The Colonna smiled approval, when Rienzi denounced an Orsini--an Orsini
+laughed aloud, when the eloquence burst over a Colonna. The lesser
+nobles were well pleased to hear attacks upon both: while, on the other
+hand, the Bishop, by the long impunity of Rienzi, had taken courage
+to sanction the conduct of his fellow-officer. He affected, indeed, at
+times, to blame the excess of his fervour, but it was always accompanied
+by the praises of his honesty; and the approbation of the Pope's Vicar
+confirmed the impression of the nobles as to the approbation of the
+Pope. Thus, from the very rashness of his enthusiasm had grown his
+security and success.
+
+Still, however, when the barons had a little recovered from the stupor
+into which Rienzi had cast them, they looked round to each other; and
+their looks confessed their sense of the insolence of the orator, and
+the affront offered to themselves.
+
+"Per fede!" quoth Reginaldo di Orsini, "this is past bearing,--the
+plebeian has gone too far!"
+
+"Look at the populace below! how they murmur and gape,--and how their
+eyes sparkle--and what looks they bend at us!" said Luca di Savelli to
+his mortal enemy, Castruccio Malatesta: the sense of a common danger
+united in one moment, but only for a moment, the enmity of years.
+
+"Diavolo!" muttered Raselli (Nina's father) to a baron, equally poor,
+"but the clerk has truth in his lips. 'Tis a pity he is not noble."
+
+"What a clever brain marred!" said a Florentine merchant. "That man
+might be something, if he were sufficiently rich."
+
+Adrian and Montreal were silent: the first seemed lost in thought,--the
+last was watching the various effects produced upon the audience.
+
+"Silence!" proclaimed the officers. "Silence, for my Lord Vicar."
+
+At this announcement, every eye turned to Raimond, who, rising with much
+clerical importance, thus addressed the assembly:--
+
+"Although, Barons and Citizens of Rome, my well-beloved flock, and
+children,--I, no more than yourselves, anticipated the exact nature of
+the address ye have just heard,--and, albeit, I cannot feel unalloyed
+contentment at the manner, nor, I may say, at the whole matter of that
+fervent exhortation--yet (laying great emphasis on the last word), I
+cannot suffer you to depart without adding to the prayers of our
+Holy Father's servant, those, also, of his Holiness's spiritual
+representative. It is true! the Jubilee approaches! The Jubilee
+approaches--and yet our roads, even to the gates of Rome, are infested
+with murderous and godless ruffians! What pilgrim can venture across the
+Apennines to worship at the altars of St. Peter? The Jubilee
+approaches: what scandal shall it be to Rome if these shrines be without
+pilgrims--if the timid recoil from, if the bold fall victims to, the
+dangers of the way! Wherefore, I pray you all, citizens and chiefs
+alike,--I pray you all to lay aside those unhappy dissensions which have
+so long consumed the strength of our sacred city; and, uniting with each
+other in the ties of amity and brotherhood, to form a blessed league
+against the marauders of the road. I see amongst you, my Lords, many of
+the boasts and pillars of the state; but, alas! I think with grief
+and dismay on the causeless and idle hatred that has grown up between
+you!--a scandal to our city, and reflecting, let me add, my Lords, no
+honour on your faith as Christians, nor on your dignity as defenders of
+the Church."
+
+Amongst the inferior nobles--along the seats of the judges and the men
+of letters--through the vast concourse of the people--ran a loud murmur
+of approbations at these words. The greater barons looked proudly, but
+not contemptuously, at the countenance of the prelate, and preserved a
+strict and unrevealing silence.
+
+"In this holy spot," continued the Bishop, "let me beseech you to bury
+those fruitless animosities which have already cost enough of blood and
+treasure; and let us quit these walls with one common determination to
+evince our courage and display our chivalry only against our universal
+foes;--those ruffians who lay waste our fields, and infest our public
+ways,--the foes alike of the people we should protect, and the God whom
+we should serve!"
+
+The Bishop resumed his seat; the nobles looked at each other without
+reply; the people began to whisper loudly among themselves; when, after
+a short pause, Adrian di Castello rose.
+
+"Pardon me, my Lords, and you, reverend Father, if I, inexperienced in
+years and of little mark or dignity amongst you, presume to be the first
+to embrace the proposal we have just heard. Willingly do I renounce all
+ancient cause of enmity with any of my compeers. Fortunately for me,
+my long absence from Rome has swept from my remembrance the feuds and
+rivalries familiar to my early youth; and in this noble conclave I see
+but one man (glancing at Martino di Porto, who sat sullenly looking
+down) against whom I have, at any time, deemed it a duty to draw my
+sword; the gage that I once cast to that noble is yet, I rejoice to
+think, unredeemed. I withdraw it. Henceforth my only foes shall be the
+foes of Rome!"
+
+"Nobly spoken!" said the Bishop, aloud.
+
+"And," continued Adrian, casting down his glove amongst the nobles, "I
+throw, my Lords, the gage, thus resumed, amongst you all, in challenge
+to a wider rivalry, and a more noble field. I invite any man to vie with
+me in the zeal that he shall show to restore tranquillity to our roads,
+and order to our state. It is a contest in which, if I be vanquished
+with reluctance, I will yield the prize without envy. In ten days from
+this time, reverend Father, I will raise forty horsemen-at-arms, ready
+to obey whatever orders shall be agreed upon for the security of the
+Roman state. And you, O Romans, dismiss, I pray you, from your minds,
+those eloquent invectives against your fellow-citizens which ye have
+lately heard. All of us, of what rank soever, may have shared in the
+excesses of these unhappy times; let us endeavour, not to avenge nor to
+imitate, but to reform and to unite. And may the people hereafter find,
+that the true boast of a patrician is, that his power the better enables
+him to serve his country."
+
+"Brave words!" quoth the smith, sneeringly.
+
+"If they were all like him!" said the smith's neighbour.
+
+"He has helped the nobles out of a dilemma," said Pandulfo.
+
+"He has shown grey wit under young hairs," said an aged Malatesta.
+
+"You have turned the tide, but not stemmed it, noble Adrian," whispered
+the ever-boding Montreal, as, amidst the murmurs of the general
+approbation, the young Colonna resumed his seat.
+
+"How mean you?" said Adrian.
+
+"That your soft words, like all patrician conciliations, have come too
+late."
+
+Not another noble stirred, though they felt, perhaps, disposed to join
+in the general feeling of amnesty, and appeared, by signs and whispers,
+to applaud the speech of Adrian. They were too habituated to the
+ungracefulness of an unlettered pride, to bow themselves to address
+conciliating language either to the people or their foes. And Raimond,
+glancing round, and not willing that their unseemly silence should be
+long remarked, rose at once, to give it the best construction in his
+power.
+
+"My son, thou hast spoken as a patriot and a Christian; by the approving
+silence of your peers we all feel that they share your sentiments. Break
+we up the meeting--its end is obtained. The manner of our proceeding
+against the leagued robbers of the road requires maturer consideration
+elsewhere. This day shall be an epoch in our history."
+
+"It shall," quoth Cecco del Vecchio, gruffly, between his teeth.
+
+"Children, my blessing upon you all!" concluded the Vicar, spreading his
+arms.
+
+And in a few minutes more the crowd poured from the church. The
+different servitors and flag-bearers ranged themselves on the steps
+without, each train anxious for their master's precedence; and the
+nobles, gravely collecting in small knots, in the which was no mixture
+of rival blood, followed the crowd down the aisles. Soon rose again the
+din, and the noise, and the wrangling, and the oaths, of the hostile
+bands, as, with pain and labour, the Vicar's officers marshalled them in
+"order most disorderly."
+
+But so true were Montreal's words to Adrian, that the populace already
+half forgot the young noble's generous appeal, and were only bitterly
+commenting on the ungracious silence of his brother Lords. What, too, to
+them was this crusade against the robbers of the road? They blamed
+the good Bishop for not saying boldly to the nobles--"Ye are the first
+robbers we must march against!" The popular discontents had gone far
+beyond palliatives; they had arrived at that point when the people
+longed less for reform than change. There are times when a revolution
+cannot be warded off; it must come--come alike by resistance or
+by concession. Wo to that race in which a revolution produces no
+fruits!--in which the thunderbolt smites the high place, but does
+not purify the air! To suffer in vain is often the lot of the
+noblest individuals; but when a People suffer in vain, let them curse
+themselves!
+
+
+
+Chapter 2.IV. The Ambitious Citizen, and the Ambitious Soldier.
+
+The Bishop of Orvietto lingered last, to confer with Rienzi, who awaited
+him in the recesses of the Lateran. Raimond had the penetration not
+to be seduced into believing that the late scene could effect any
+reformation amongst the nobles, heal their divisions, or lead them
+actively against the infestors of the Campagna. But, as he detailed to
+Rienzi all that had occurred subsequent to the departure of that hero of
+the scene, he concluded with saying:--
+
+"You will perceive from this, one good result will be produced: the
+first armed dissension--the first fray among the nobles--will seem like
+a breach of promise; and, to the people and to the Pope, a reasonable
+excuse for despairing of all amendment amongst the Barons,--an excuse
+which will sanction the efforts of the first, and the approval of the
+last."
+
+"For such a fray we shall not long wait," answered Rienzi.
+
+"I believe the prophecy," answered Raimond, smiling; "at present all
+runs well. Go you with us homeward?"
+
+"Nay, I think it better to tarry here till the crowd is entirely
+dispersed; for if they were to see me, in their present excitement, they
+might insist on some rash and hasty enterprise. Besides, my Lord," added
+Rienzi, "with an ignorant people, however honest and enthusiastic, this
+rule must be rigidly observed--stale not your presence by custom. Never
+may men like me, who have no external rank, appear amongst the crowd,
+save on those occasions when the mind is itself a rank."
+
+"That is true, as you have no train," answered Raimond, thinking of his
+own well-liveried menials. "Adieu, then! we shall meet soon."
+
+"Ay, at Philippi, my Lord. Reverend Father, your blessing!"
+
+It was some time subsequent to this conference that Rienzi quitted the
+sacred edifice. As he stood on the steps of the church--now silent and
+deserted--the hour that precedes the brief twilight of the South lent
+its magic to the view. There he beheld the sweeping arches of the mighty
+Aqueduct extending far along the scene, and backed by the distant and
+purpled hills. Before--to the right--rose the gate which took its
+Roman name from the Coelian Mount, at whose declivity it yet stands.
+Beyond--from the height of the steps--he saw the villages scattered
+through the grey Campagna, whitening in the sloped sun; and in the
+furthest distance the mountain shadows began to darken over the roofs
+of the ancient Tusculum, and the second Alban (The first Alba--the Alba
+Longa--whose origin Fable ascribes to Ascanius, was destroyed by Tullus
+Hostilius. The second Alba, or modern Albano, was erected on the plain
+below the ancient town, a little before the time of Nero.) city, which
+yet rises, in desolate neglect, above the vanished palaces of Pompey and
+Domitian.
+
+The Roman stood absorbed and motionless for some moments, gazing on the
+scene, and inhaling the sweet balm of the mellow air. It was the soft
+springtime--the season of flowers, and green leaves, and whispering
+winds--the pastoral May of Italia's poets: but hushed was the voice of
+song on the banks of the Tiber--the reeds gave music no more. From the
+sacred Mount in which Saturn held his home, the Dryad and the Nymph, and
+Italy's native Sylvan, were gone for ever. Rienzi's original nature--its
+enthusiasm--its veneration for the past--its love of the beautiful and
+the great--that very attachment to the graces and pomp which give so
+florid a character to the harsh realities of life, and which power
+afterwards too luxuriantly developed; the exuberance of thoughts
+and fancies, which poured itself from his lips in so brilliant and
+inexhaustible a flood--all bespoke those intellectual and imaginative
+biasses, which, in calmer times, might have raised him in literature to
+a more indisputable eminence than that to which action can ever lead;
+and something of such consciousness crossed his spirit at that moment.
+
+"Happier had it been for me," thought he, "had I never looked out from
+my own heart upon the world. I had all within me that makes contentment
+of the present, because I had that which can make me forget the present.
+I had the power to re-people--to create: the legends and dreams of
+old--the divine faculty of verse, in which the beautiful superfluities
+of the heart can pour themselves--these were mine! Petrarch chose
+wisely for himself! To address the world, but from without the world;
+to persuade--to excite--to command,--for these are the aim and glory
+of ambition;--but to shun its tumult, and its toil! His the quiet cell
+which he fills with the shapes of beauty--the solitude, from which he
+can banish the evil times whereon we are fallen, but in which he can
+dream back the great hearts and the glorious epochs of the past.
+For me--to what cares I am wedded! to what labours I am bound! what
+instruments I must use! what disguises I must assume! to tricks and
+artifice I must bow my pride! base are my enemies--uncertain my friends!
+and verily, in this struggle with blinded and mean men, the soul itself
+becomes warped and dwarfish. Patient and darkling, the Means creep
+through caves and the soiling mire, to gain at last the light which is
+the End."
+
+In these reflections there was a truth, the whole gloom and sadness of
+which the Roman had not yet experienced. However august be the object
+we propose to ourselves, every less worthy path we take to insure it
+distorts the mental sight of our ambition; and the means, by degrees,
+abase the end to their own standard. This is the true misfortune of a
+man nobler than his age--that the instruments he must use soil himself:
+half he reforms his times; but half, too, the times will corrupt the
+reformer. His own craft undermines his safety;--the people, whom he
+himself accustoms to a false excitement, perpetually crave it; and when
+their ruler ceases to seduce their fancy, he falls their victim. The
+reform he makes by these means is hollow and momentary--it is swept away
+with himself: it was but the trick--the show--the wasted genius of a
+conjuror: the curtain falls--the magic is over--the cup and balls are
+kicked aside. Better one slow step in enlightenment,--which being made
+by the reason of a whole people, cannot recede,--than these sudden
+flashes in the depth of the general night, which the darkness, by
+contrast doubly dark, swallows up everlastingly again!
+
+As, slowly and musingly, Rienzi turned to quit the church, he felt a
+light touch upon his shoulder.
+
+"Fair evening to you, Sir Scholar," said a frank voice.
+
+"To you, I return the courtesy," answered Rienzi, gazing upon the person
+who thus suddenly accosted him, and in whose white cross and martial
+bearing the reader recognises the Knight of St. John.
+
+"You know me not, I think?" said Montreal; "but that matters little,
+we may easily commence our acquaintance: for me, indeed, I am fortunate
+enough to have made myself already acquainted with you."
+
+"Possibly we have met elsewhere, at the house of one of those nobles to
+whose rank you seem to belong?"
+
+"Belong! no, not exactly!" returned Montreal, proudly. "Highborn and
+great as your magnates deem themselves, I would not, while the mountains
+can yield one free spot for my footstep, change my place in the world's
+many grades for theirs. To the brave, there is but one sort of plebeian,
+and that is the coward. But you, sage Rienzi," continued the Knight, in
+a gayer tone, "I have seen in more stirring scenes than the hall of a
+Roman Baron."
+
+Rienzi glanced keenly at Montreal, who met his eye with an open brow.
+
+"Yes!" resumed the Knight--"but let us walk on; suffer me for a few
+moments to be your companion. Yes! I have listened to you--the other
+eve, when you addressed the populace, and today, when you rebuked the
+nobles; and at midnight, too, not long since, when (your ear, fair
+Sir!--lower, it is a secret!)--at midnight, too, when you administered
+the oath of brotherhood to the bold conspirators, on the ruined
+Aventine!"
+
+As he concluded, the Knight drew himself aside to watch, upon Rienzi's
+countenance, the effect which his words might produce.
+
+A slight tremor passed over the frame of the conspirator--for so, unless
+the conspiracy succeed, would Rienzi be termed, by others than Montreal:
+he turned abruptly round to confront the Knight, and placed his hand
+involuntarily on his sword, but presently relinquished the grasp.
+
+"Ha!" said the Roman, slowly, "if this be true, fall Rome! There is
+treason even among the free!"
+
+"No treason, brave Sir!" answered Montreal; "I possess thy secret--but
+none have betrayed it to me."
+
+"And is it as friend or foe that thou hast learned it?"
+
+"That as it may be," returned Montreal, carelessly. "Enough, at present,
+that I could send thee to the gibbet, if I said but the word,--to show
+my power to be thy foe; enough, that I have not done it, to prove my
+disposition to be thy friend."
+
+"Thou mistakest, stranger! that man does not live who could shed my
+blood in the streets of Rome! The gibbet! Little dost thou know of the
+power which surrounds Rienzi."
+
+These words were said with some scorn and bitterness; but, after a
+moment's pause, Rienzi resumed, more calmly:--
+
+"By the cross on thy mantle, thou belongest to one of the proudest
+orders of knighthood: thou art a foreigner, and a cavalier. What
+generous sympathies can convert thee into a friend of the Roman people?"
+
+"Cola di Rienzi," returned Montreal, "the sympathies that unite us are
+those which unite all men who, by their own efforts, rise above the
+herd. True, I was born noble--but powerless and poor: at my beck now
+move, from city to city, the armed instruments of authority: my breath
+is the law of thousands. This empire I have not inherited; I won it by a
+cool brain and a fearless arm. Know me for Walter de Montreal; is it
+not a name that speaks a spirit kindred to thine own? Is not ambition
+a common sentiment between us? I do not marshal soldiers for gain only,
+though men have termed me avaricious--nor butcher peasants for the
+love of blood, though men have called me cruel. Arms and wealth are
+the sinews of power; it is power that I desire;--thou, bold Rienzi,
+strugglest thou not for the same? Is it the rank breath of the
+garlic-chewing mob--is it the whispered envy of schoolmen--is it the
+hollow mouthing of boys who call thee patriot and freeman, words to
+trick the ear--that will content thee? These are but thy instruments to
+power. Have I spoken truly?"
+
+Whatever distaste Rienzi might conceive at this speech he masked
+effectually. "Certes," said he, "it would be in vain, renowned Captain,
+to deny that I seek but that power of which thou speakest. But what
+union can there be between the ambition of a Roman citizen and the
+leader of paid armies that take their cause only according to their
+hire--today, fight for liberty in Florence--tomorrow, for tyranny in
+Bologna? Pardon my frankness; for in this age that is deemed no disgrace
+which I impute to thy armies. Valour and generalship are held to
+consecrate any cause they distinguish; and he who is the master of
+princes, may be well honoured by them as their equal."
+
+"We are entering into a less deserted quarter of the town," said the
+Knight; "is there no secret place--no Aventine--in this direction, where
+we can confer?"
+
+"Hush!" replied Rienzi, cautiously looking round. "I thank thee, noble
+Montreal, for the hint; nor may it be well for us to be seen together.
+Wilt thou deign to follow me to my home, by the Palatine Bridge? (The
+picturesque ruins shown at this day as having once been the habitation
+of the celebrated Cola di Rienzi, were long asserted by the antiquarians
+to have belonged to another Cola or Nicola. I believe, however, that the
+dispute has been lately decided: and, indeed, no one but an antiquary,
+and that a Roman one, could suppose that there were two Colas to
+whom the inscription on the house would apply.) there we can converse
+undisturbed and secure."
+
+"Be it so," said Montreal, falling back.
+
+With a quick and hurried step, Rienzi passed through the town, in which,
+wherever he was discovered, the scattered citizens saluted him with
+marked respect; and, turning through a labyrinth of dark alleys, as
+if to shun the more public thoroughfares, arrived at length at a broad
+space near the river. The first stars of night shone down on the
+ancient temple of Fortuna Virilis, which the chances of Time had
+already converted into the Church of St. Mary of Egypt; and facing the
+twice-hallowed edifice stood the house of Rienzi.
+
+"It is a fair omen to have my mansion facing the ancient Temple of
+Fortune," said Rienzi, smiling, as Montreal followed the Roman into the
+chamber I have already described.
+
+"Yet Valour need never pray to Fortune," said the Knight; "the first
+commands the last."
+
+Long was the conference between these two men, the most enterprising of
+their age. Meanwhile, let me make the reader somewhat better acquainted
+with the character and designs of Montreal, than the hurry of events has
+yet permitted him to become.
+
+Walter de Montreal, generally known in the chronicles of Italy by the
+designation of Fra Moreale, had passed into Italy--a bold adventurer,
+worthy to become a successor of those roving Normans (from one of the
+most eminent of whom, by the mother's side, he claimed descent) who
+had formerly played so strange a part in the chivalric errantry of
+Europe,--realizing the fables of Amadis and Palmerin--(each knight,
+in himself a host), winning territories and oversetting thrones;
+acknowledging no laws save those of knighthood; never confounding
+themselves with the tribe amongst which they settled; incapable of
+becoming citizens, and scarcely contented with aspiring to be kings.
+At that time, Italy was the India of all those well-born and penniless
+adventurers who, like Montreal, had inflamed their imagination by the
+ballads and legends of the Roberts and the Godfreys of old; who had
+trained themselves from youth to manage the barb, and bear, through the
+heats of summer, the weight of arms; and who, passing into am effeminate
+and distracted land, had only to exhibit bravery in order to command
+wealth. It was considered no disgrace for some powerful chieftain to
+collect together a band of these hardy aliens,--to subsist amidst the
+mountains on booty and pillage,--to make war upon tyrant or republic, as
+interest suggested, and to sell, at enormous stipends, the immunities
+of peace. Sometimes they hired themselves to one state to protect it
+against the other; and the next year beheld them in the field against
+their former employers. These bands of Northern stipendiaries assumed,
+therefore, a civil, as well as a military, importance; they were as
+indispensable to the safety of one state as they were destructive to the
+security of all. But five years before the present date, the Florentine
+Republic had hired the services of a celebrated leader of these
+foreign soldiers,--Gualtier, duke of Athens. By acclamation, the people
+themselves had elected that warrior to the state of prince, or tyrant,
+of their state; before the year was completed, they revolted against his
+cruelties, or rather against his exactions,--for, despite all the boasts
+of their historians, they felt an attack on their purses more deeply
+than an assault on their liberties,--they had chased him from their
+city, and once more proclaimed themselves a Republic. The bravest, and
+most favoured of the soldiers of the Duke of Athens had been Walter de
+Montreal; he had shared the rise and the downfall of his chief. Amongst
+popular commotions, the acute and observant mind of the Knight of St.
+John had learned no mean civil experience; he had learned to sound a
+people--to know how far they would endure--to construe the signs of
+revolution--to be a reader of the times. After the downfall of the Duke
+of Athens, as a Free Companion, in other words a Freebooter, Montreal
+had augmented under the fierce Werner his riches and his renown. At
+present without employment worthy his spirit of enterprise and intrigue,
+the disordered and chiefless state of Rome had attracted him thither. In
+the league he had proposed to Colonna--in the suggestions he had made
+to the vanity of that Signor--his own object was to render his services
+indispensable--to constitute himself the head of the soldiery whom his
+proposed designs would render necessary to the ambition of the Colonna,
+could it be excited--and, in the vastness of his hardy genius for
+enterprise, he probably foresaw that the command of such a force would
+be, in reality, the command of Rome;--a counter-revolution might
+easily unseat the Colonna and elect himself to the principality. It
+had sometimes been the custom of Roman, as of other Italian, States, to
+prefer for a chief magistrate, under the title of Podesta, a foreigner
+to a native. And Montreal hoped that he might possibly become to Rome
+what the Duke of Athens had been to Florence--an ambition he knew well
+enough to be above the gentleman of Provence, but not above the leader
+of an army. But, as we have already seen, his sagacity perceived at once
+that he could not move the aged head of the patricians to those hardy
+and perilous measures which were necessary to the attainment of supreme
+power. Contented with his present station, and taught moderation by his
+age and his past reverses, Stephen Colonna was not the man to risk a
+scaffold from the hope to gain a throne. The contempt which the old
+patrician professed for the people, and their idol, also taught the
+deep-thinking Montreal that, if the Colonna possessed not the ambition,
+neither did he possess the policy, requisite for empire. The Knight
+found his caution against Rienzi in vain, and he turned to Rienzi
+himself. Little cared the Knight of St. John which party were
+uppermost--prince or people--so that his own objects were attained; in
+fact, he had studied the humours of a people, not in order to serve, but
+to rule them; and, believing all men actuated by a similar ambition, he
+imagined that, whether a demagogue or a patrician reigned, the people
+were equally to be victims, and that the cry of "Order" on the one hand,
+or of "Liberty" on the other, was but the mere pretext by which the
+energy of one man sought to justify his ambition over the herd. Deeming
+himself one of the most honourable spirits of his age, he believed in
+no honour which he was unable to feel; and, sceptic in virtue, was
+therefore credulous of vice.
+
+But the boldness of his own nature inclined him, perhaps, rather to
+the adventurous Rienzi than to the self-complacent Colonna; and he
+considered that to the safety of the first he and his armed minions
+might be even more necessary than to that of the last. At present
+his main object was to learn from Rienzi the exact strength which he
+possessed, and how far he was prepared for any actual revolt.
+
+The acute Roman took care, on the one hand, how he betrayed to the
+Knight more than he yet knew, or he disgusted him by apparent reserve on
+the other. Crafty as Montreal was, he possessed not that wonderful art
+of mastering others which was so preeminently the gift of the eloquent
+and profound Rienzi, and the difference between the grades of their
+intellect was visible in their present conference.
+
+"I see," said Rienzi, "that amidst all the events which have lately
+smiled upon my ambition, none is so favourable as that which assures
+me of your countenance and friendship. In truth, I require some
+armed alliance. Would you believe it, our friends, so bold in private
+meetings, yet shrink from a public explosion. They fear not the
+patricians, but the soldiery of the patricians; for it is the remarkable
+feature in the Italian courage, that they have no terror for each other,
+but the casque and sword of a foreign hireling make them quail like
+deer."
+
+"They will welcome gladly, then, the assurance that such hirelings shall
+be in their service--not against them; and as much as you desire for the
+revolution, so many shall you receive."
+
+"But the pay and the conditions," said Rienzi, with his dry, sarcastic
+smile. "How shall we arrange the first, and what shall we hold to be the
+second?"
+
+"That is an affair easily concluded," replied Montreal. "For me, to
+tell you frankly, the glory and excitement of so great a revulsion would
+alone suffice. I like to feel myself necessary to the completion of high
+events. For my men it is otherwise. Your first act will be to seize the
+revenues of the state. Well, whatever they amount to, the product of
+the first year, great or small, shall be divided amongst us. You the one
+half, I and my men the other half."
+
+"It is much," said Rienzi, gravely, and as if in calculation,--"but Rome
+cannot purchase her liberties too dearly. So be it then decided."
+
+"Amen!--and now, then, what is your force? for these eighty or a hundred
+signors of the Aventine,--worthy men, doubtless,--scarce suffice for a
+revolt!"
+
+Gazing cautiously round the room, the Roman placed his hand on
+Montreal's arm--
+
+"Between you and me, it requires time to cement it. We shall be unable
+to stir these five weeks. I have too rashly anticipated the period. The
+corn is indeed cut, but I must now, by private adjuration and address,
+bind up the scattered sheaves."
+
+"Five weeks," repeated Montreal; "that is far longer than I
+anticipated."
+
+"What I desire," continued Rienzi, fixing his searching eyes upon
+Montreal, "is, that, in the meanwhile, we should preserve a profound
+calm,--we should remove every suspicion. I shall bury myself in my
+studies, and convoke no more meetings."
+
+"Well--"
+
+"And for yourself, noble Knight, might I venture to dictate, I would
+pray you to mix with the nobles--to profess for me and for the people
+the profoundest contempt--and to contribute to rock them yet more in the
+cradle of their false security. Meanwhile, you could quietly withdraw as
+many of the armed mercenaries as you influence from Rome, and leave the
+nobles without their only defenders. Collecting these hardy warriors in
+the recesses of the mountains, a day's march from hence, we may be able
+to summon them at need, and they shall appear at our gates, and in the
+midst of our rising--hailed as deliverers by the nobles, but in reality
+allies with the people. In the confusion and despair of our enemies at
+discovering their mistake, they will fly from the city."
+
+"And its revenues and its empire will become the appanage of the hardy
+soldier and the intriguing demagogue!" cried Montreal, with a laugh.
+
+"Sir Knight, the division shall be equal."
+
+"Agreed!"
+
+"And now, noble Montreal, a flask of our best vintage!" said Rienzi,
+changing his tone.
+
+"You know the Provencals," answered Montreal, gaily.
+
+The wine was brought, the conversation became free and familiar, and
+Montreal, whose craft was acquired, and whose frankness was natural,
+unwittingly committed his secret projects and ambition more nakedly to
+Rienzi than he had designed to do. They parted apparently the best of
+friends.
+
+"By the way," said Rienzi, as they drained the last goblet. "Stephen
+Colonna betakes him to Corneto, with a convoy of corn, on the 19th.
+Will it not be as well if you join him? You can take that opportunity to
+whisper discontent to the mercenaries that accompany him on his mission,
+and induce them to our plan."
+
+"I thought of that before," returned Montreal; "it shall be done. For
+the present, farewell!"
+
+     "'His barb, and his sword,
+     And his lady, the peerless,
+     Are all that are prized
+     By Orlando the fearless.
+
+     "'Success to the Norman,
+     The darling of story;
+     His glory is pleasure--
+     His pleasure is glory.'"
+
+Chanting this rude ditty as he resumed his mantle, the Knight waved his
+hand to Rienzi, and departed.
+
+Rienzi watched the receding form of his guest with an expression of hate
+and fear upon his countenance. "Give that man the power," he muttered,
+"and he may be a second Totila. (Innocent VI., some years afterwards,
+proclaimed Montreal to be worse than Totila.) Methinks I see, in his
+griping and ferocious nature,--through all the gloss of its gaiety and
+knightly grace,--the very personification of our old Gothic foes. I
+trust I have lulled him! Verily, two suns could no more blaze in one
+hemisphere, than Walter de Montreal and Cola di Rienzi live in the same
+city. The star-seers tell us that we feel a secret and uncontrollable
+antipathy to those whose astral influences destine them to work us evil;
+such antipathy do I feel for yon fair-faced homicide. Cross not my path,
+Montreal!--cross not my path!"
+
+With this soliloquy Rienzi turned within, and, retiring to his
+apartment, was seen no more that night.
+
+
+
+Chapter 2.V. The Procession of the Barons.--The Beginning of the End.
+
+It was the morning of the 19th of May, the air was brisk and clear,
+and the sun, which had just risen, shone cheerily upon the glittering
+casques and spears of a gallant procession of armed horsemen, sweeping
+through the long and principal street of Rome. The neighing of the
+horses, the ringing of the hoofs, the dazzle of the armour, and the
+tossing to and fro of the standards, adorned with the proud insignia of
+the Colonna, presented one of the gay and brilliant spectacles peculiar
+to the middle ages.
+
+At the head of the troop, on a stout palfrey, rode Stephen Colonna.
+At his right was the Knight of Provence, curbing, with an easy hand,
+a slight, but fiery steed of the Arab race: behind him followed two
+squires, the one leading his war-horse, the other bearing his lance and
+helmet. At the left of Stephen Colonna rode Adrian, grave and silent,
+and replying only by monosyllables to the gay bavardage of the Knight
+of Provence. A considerable number of the flower of the Roman nobles
+followed the old Baron; and the train was closed by a serried troop of
+foreign horsemen, completely armed.
+
+There was no crowd in the street,--the citizens looked with seeming
+apathy at the procession from their half-closed shops.
+
+"Have these Romans no passion for shows?" asked Montreal; "if they could
+be more easily amused they would be more easily governed."
+
+"Oh, Rienzi, and such buffoons, amuse them. We do better,--we terrify!"
+replied Stephen.
+
+"What sings the troubadour, Lord Adrian?" said Montreal.
+
+     "'Smiles, false smiles, should form the school
+     For those who rise, and those who rule:
+     The brave they trick, and fair subdue,
+     Kings deceive, the States undo.
+     Smiles, false smiles!
+
+     "'Frowns, true frowns, ourselves betray,
+     The brave arouse, the fair dismay,
+     Sting the pride, which blood must heal,
+     Mix the bowl, and point the steel.
+     Frowns, true frowns!'
+
+"The lay is of France, Signor; yet methinks it brings its wisdom from
+Italy;--for the serpent smile is your countrymen's proper distinction,
+and the frown ill becomes them."
+
+"Sir Knight," replied Adrian, sharply, and incensed at the taunt, "you
+Foreigners have taught us how to frown:--a virtue sometimes."
+
+"But not wisdom, unless the hand could maintain what the brow menaced,"
+returned Montreal, with haughtiness; for he had much of the Franc
+vivacity which often overcame his prudence; and he had conceived a
+secret pique against Adrian since their interview at Stephen's palace.
+
+"Sir Knight," answered Adrian, colouring, "our conversation may lead to
+warmer words than I would desire to have with one who has rendered me so
+gallant a service."
+
+"Nay, then, let us go back to the troubadours," said Montreal,
+indifferently. "Forgive me if I do not think highly, in general, of
+Italian honour, or Italian valour; your valour I acknowledge, for I have
+witnessed it, and valour and honour go together,--let that suffice!"
+
+As Adrian was about to answer, his eye fell suddenly on the burly form
+of Cecco del Vecchio, who was leaning his bare and brawny arms over his
+anvil, and gazing, with a smile, upon the group. There was something in
+that smile which turned the current of Adrian's thoughts, and which he
+could not contemplate without an unaccountable misgiving.
+
+"A strong villain, that," said Montreal, also eyeing the smith. "I
+should like to enlist him. Fellow!" cried he, aloud, "you have an arm
+that were as fit to wield the sword as to fashion it. Desert your anvil,
+and follow the fortunes of Fra Moreale!"
+
+The smith nodded his head. "Signor Cavalier," said he, gravely, "we poor
+men have no passion for war; we want not to kill others--we desire only
+ourselves to live,--if you will let us!"
+
+"By the Holy Mother, a slavish answer! But you Romans--"
+
+"Are slaves!" interrupted the smith, turning away to the interior of his
+forge.
+
+"The dog is mutinous!" said the old Colonna. And as the band swept on,
+the rude foreigners, encouraged by their leaders, had each some taunt
+or jest, uttered in a barbarous attempt at the southern patois, for the
+lazy giant, as he again appeared in front of his forge, leaning on his
+anvil as before, and betraying no sign of attention to his insultors,
+save by a heightened glow of his swarthy visage;--and so the gallant
+procession passed through the streets, and quitted the Eternal City.
+
+There was a long interval of deep silence--of general calm--throughout
+the whole of Rome: the shops were still but half-opened; no man betook
+himself to his business; it was like the commencement of some holyday,
+when indolence precedes enjoyment.
+
+About noon, a few small knots of men might be seen scattered about the
+streets, whispering to each other, but soon dispersing; and every now
+and then, a single passenger, generally habited in the long robes used
+by the men of letters, or in the more sombre garb of monks, passed
+hurriedly up the street towards the Church of St. Mary of Egypt, once
+the Temple of Fortune. Then, again, all was solitary and deserted.
+Suddenly, there was heard the sound of a single trumpet! It swelled--it
+gathered on the ear. Cecco del Vecchio looked up from his anvil! A
+solitary horseman paced slowly by the forge, and wound a long loud blast
+of the trumpet suspended round his neck, as he passed through the middle
+of the street. Then might you see a crowd, suddenly, and as by magic,
+appear emerging from every corner; the street became thronged with
+multitudes; but it was only by the tramp of their feet, and an
+indistinct and low murmur, that they broke the silence. Again
+the horseman wound his trump, and when the note ceased, he cried
+aloud--"Friends and Romans! tomorrow, at dawn of day, let each man find
+himself unarmed before the Church of St. Angelo. Cola di Rienzi convenes
+the Romans to provide for the good state of Rome." A shout, that seemed
+to shake the bases of the seven hills, broke forth at the end of
+this brief exhortation; the horseman rode slowly on, and the crowd
+followed.--This was the commencement of the Revolution!
+
+
+
+Chapter 2.VI. The Conspirator Becomes the Magistrate.
+
+At midnight, when the rest of the city seemed hushed in rest, lights
+were streaming from the windows of the Church of St. Angelo. Breaking
+from its echoing aisles, the long and solemn notes of sacred music
+stole at frequent intervals upon the air. Rienzi was praying within the
+church; thirty masses consumed the hours from night till morn, and all
+the sanction of religion was invoked to consecrate the enterprise of
+liberty. (In fact, I apprehend that if ever the life of Cola di Rienzi
+shall be written by a hand worthy of the task, it will be shown that a
+strong religious feeling was blended with the political enthusiasm of
+the people,--the religious feeling of a premature and crude reformation,
+the legacy of Arnold of Brescia. It was not, however, one excited
+against the priests, but favoured by them. The principal conventual
+orders declared for the Revolution.) The sun had long risen, and the
+crowd had long been assembled before the church door, and in vast
+streams along every street that led to it,--when the bell of the
+church tolled out long and merrily; and as it ceased, the voices of the
+choristers within chanted the following hymn, in which were somewhat
+strikingly, though barbarously, blended, the spirit of the classic
+patriotism with the fervour of religious zeal:--
+
+The Roman Hymn of Liberty.
+
+     Let the mountains exult around!
+
+     ("Exultent in circuito Vestro Montes," &c.--Let the
+     mountains exult around!  So begins Rienzi's letter to the
+     Senate and Roman people: preserved by Hocsemius.)
+
+     On her seven-hill'd throne renown'd,
+     Once more old Rome is crown'd!
+     Jubilate!
+
+     Sing out, O Vale and Wave!
+     Look up from each laurell'd grave,
+     Bright dust of the deathless brave!
+     Jubilate!
+
+     Pale Vision, what art thou?--Lo,
+     From Time's dark deeps,
+     Like a Wind, It sweeps,
+     Like a Wind, when the tempests blow:
+
+     A shadowy form--as a giant ghost--
+     It stands in the midst of the armed host!
+     The dead man's shroud on Its awful limbs;
+     And the gloom of Its presence the daylight dims:
+     And the trembling world looks on aghast--
+     All hail to the SOUL OF THE MIGHTY PAST!
+     Hail! all hail!
+
+     As we speak--as we hallow--It moves, It breathes;
+     From its clouded crest bud the laurel wreaths--
+     As a Sun that leaps up from the arms of Night,
+     The shadow takes shape, and the gloom takes light.
+     Hail! all hail!
+
+     The Soul of the Past, again
+     To its ancient home,
+     In the hearts of Rome,
+     Hath come to resume its reign!
+
+     O Fame, with a prophet's voice,
+     Bid the ends of the Earth rejoice!
+     Wherever the Proud are Strong,
+     And Right is oppress'd by Wrong;--
+     Wherever the day dim shines
+     Through the cell where the captive pines;--
+     Go forth, with a trumpet's sound!
+     And tell to the Nations round--
+     On the Hills which the Heroes trod--
+     In the shrines of the Saints of God--
+     In the Caesars' hall, and the Martyrs' prison--
+     That the slumber is broke, and the Sleeper arisen!
+     That the reign of the Goth and the Vandal is o'er:
+     And Earth feels the tread of THE ROMAN once more!
+
+As the hymn ended, the gate of the church opened; the crowd gave way on
+either side, and, preceded by three of the young nobles of the inferior
+order, bearing standards of allegorical design, depicting the triumph
+of Liberty, Justice, and Concord, forth issued Rienzi, clad in complete
+armour, the helmet alone excepted. His face was pale with watching and
+intense excitement--but stern, grave, and solemnly composed; and its
+expression so repelled any vociferous and vulgar burst of feeling, that
+those who beheld it hushed the shout on their lips, and stilled, by a
+simultaneous cry of reproof, the gratulations of the crowd behind.
+Side by side with Rienzi moved Raimond, Bishop of Orvietto: and behind,
+marching two by two, followed a hundred men-at-arms. In complete silence
+the procession began its way, until, as it approached the Capitol, the
+awe of the crowd gradually vanished, and thousands upon thousands of
+voices rent the air with shouts of exultation and joy.
+
+Arrived at the foot of the great staircase, which then made the
+principal ascent to the square of the Capitol, the procession halted;
+and as the crowd filled up that vast space in front--adorned and
+hallowed by many of the most majestic columns of the temples of
+old--Rienzi addressed the Populace, whom he had suddenly elevated into a
+People.
+
+He depicted forcibly the servitude and misery of the citizens--the
+utter absence of all law--the want even of common security to life
+and property. He declared that, undaunted by the peril he incurred, he
+devoted his life to the regeneration of their common country; and he
+solemnly appealed to the people to assist the enterprise, and at once
+to sanction and consolidate the Revolution by an established code of law
+and a Constitutional Assembly. He then ordered the chart and outline of
+the Constitution he proposed, to be read by the Herald to the multitude.
+
+It created,--or rather revived, with new privileges and powers,--a
+Representative Assembly of Councillors. It proclaimed, as its first law,
+one that seems simple enough to our happier times, but never hitherto
+executed at Rome: Every wilful homicide, of whatever rank, was to be
+punished by death. It enacted, that no private noble or citizen should
+be suffered to maintain fortifications and garrisons in the city or the
+country; that the gates and bridges of the State should be under the
+control of whomsoever should be elected Chief Magistrate. It forbade all
+harbour of brigands, mercenaries, and robbers, on payment of a thousand
+marks of silver; and it made the Barons who possessed the neighbouring
+territories responsible for the safety of the roads, and the transport
+of merchandise. It took under the protection of the State the widow and
+the orphan. It appointed, in each of the quarters of the city, an armed
+militia, whom the tolling of the bell of the Capitol, at any hour, was
+to assemble to the protection of the State. It ordained, that in each
+harbour of the coast, a vessel should be stationed, for the safeguard
+of commerce. It decreed the sum of one hundred florins to the heirs of
+every man who died in the defence of Rome; and it devoted the public
+revenues to the service and protection of the State.
+
+Such, moderate at once and effectual, was the outline of the New
+Constitution; and it may amuse the reader to consider how great must
+have been the previous disorders of the city, when the common and
+elementary provisions of civilisation and security made the character of
+the code proposed, and the limit of a popular revolution.
+
+The most rapturous shouts followed this sketch of the New Constitution:
+and, amidst the clamour, up rose the huge form of Cecco del Vecchio.
+Despite his condition, he was a man of great importance at the present
+crisis: his zeal and his courage, and, perhaps, still more, his brute
+passion and stubborn prejudice, had made him popular. The lower order of
+mechanics looked to him as their head and representative; out, then, he
+spake loud and fearlessly,--speaking well, because his mind was full of
+what he had to say.
+
+"Countrymen and Citizens!--This New Constitution meets with your
+approbation--so it ought. But what are good laws, if we do not have
+good men to execute them? Who can execute a law so well as the man
+who designs it? If you ask me to give you a notion how to make a good
+shield, and my notion pleases you, would you ask me, or another smith,
+to make it for you? If you ask another, he may make a good shield,
+but it would not be the same as that which I should have made, and the
+description of which contented you. Cola di Rienzi has proposed a Code
+of Law that shall be our shield. Who should see that the shield become
+what he proposes, but Cola di Rienzi? Romans! I suggest that Cola di
+Rienzi be intrusted by the people with the authority, by whatsoever name
+he pleases, of carrying the New Constitution into effect;--and whatever
+be the means, we, the People, will bear him harmless."
+
+"Long life to Rienzi!--long live Cecco del Vecchio! He hath spoken
+well!--none but the Law-maker shall be the Governor!"
+
+Such were the acclamations which greeted the ambitious heart of the
+Scholar. The voice of the people invested him with the supreme power. He
+had created a Commonwealth--to become, if he desired it, a Despot!
+
+
+
+Chapter 2.VII. Looking after the Halter when the Mare is Stolen.
+
+While such were the events at Rome, a servitor of Stephen Colonna was
+already on his way to Corneto. The astonishment with which the old Baron
+received the intelligence may be easily imagined. He lost not a moment
+in convening his troop; and, while in all the bustle of departure, the
+Knight of St. John abruptly entered his presence. His mien had lost its
+usual frank composure.
+
+"How is this?" said he, hastily; "a revolt?--Rienzi sovereign of
+Rome?--can the news be believed?"
+
+"It is too true!" said Colonna, with a bitter smile. "Where shall we
+hang him on our return?"
+
+"Talk not so wildly, Sir Baron," replied Montreal, discourteously;
+"Rienzi is stronger than you think for. I know what men are, and you
+only know what noblemen are! Where is your kinsman, Adrian?"
+
+"He is here, noble Montreal," said Stephen, shrugging his shoulders,
+with a half-disdainful smile at the rebuke, which he thought it more
+prudent not to resent; "he is here!--see him enter!"
+
+"You have heard the news?" exclaimed Montreal.
+
+"I have."
+
+"And despise the revolution?"
+
+"I fear it!"
+
+"Then you have some sense in you. But this is none of my affair: I
+will not interrupt your consultations. Adieu for the present!" and, ere
+Stephen could prevent him, the Knight had quitted the chamber.
+
+"What means this demagogue?" Montreal muttered to himself. "Would he
+trick me?--has he got rid of my presence in order to monopolise all the
+profit of the enterprise? I fear me so!--the cunning Roman! We northern
+warriors could never compete with the intellect of these Italians but
+for their cowardice. But what shall be done? I have already bid Rodolf
+communicate with the brigands, and they are on the eve of departure from
+their present lord. Well! let it be so! Better that I should first break
+the power of the Barons, and then make my own terms, sword in hand, with
+the plebeian. And if I fail in this,--sweet Adeline! I shall see thee
+again!--that is some comfort!--and Louis of Hungary will bid high for
+the arm and brain of Walter de Montreal. What, ho! Rodolf!" he
+exclaimed aloud, as the sturdy form of the trooper, half-armed and
+half-intoxicated, reeled along the courtyard. "Knave! art thou drunk at
+this hour?"
+
+"Drunk or sober," answered Rodolf, bending low, "I am at thy bidding."
+
+"Well said!--are thy friends ripe for the saddle?"
+
+"Eighty of them already tired of idleness and the dull air of Rome, will
+fly wherever Sir Walter de Montreal wishes."
+
+"Hasten, then,--bid them mount; we go not hence with the Colonna--we
+leave while they are yet talking! Bid my squires attend me!"
+
+And when Stephen Colonna was settling himself on his palfrey, he heard,
+for the first time, that the Knight of Provence, Rodolf the trooper, and
+eighty of the stipendiaries, had already departed,--whither, none knew.
+
+"To precede us to Rome! gallant barbarian!" said Colonna. "Sirs, on!"
+
+
+
+Chapter 2.VIII. The Attack--the Retreat--the Election--and the Adhesion.
+
+Arriving at Rome, the company of the Colonna found the gates barred, and
+the walls manned. Stephen bade advance his trumpeters, with one of his
+captains, imperiously to demand admittance.
+
+"We have orders," replied the chief of the town-guard, "to admit none
+who bear arms, flags, or trumpets. Let the Lords Colonna dismiss their
+train, and they are welcome."
+
+"Whose are these insolent mandates?" asked the captain.
+
+"Those of the Lord Bishop of Orvietto and Cola di Rienzi, joint
+protectors of the Buono Stato." (Good Estate.)
+
+The captain of the Colonna returned to his chief with these tidings. The
+rage of Stephen was indescribable. "Go back," he cried, as soon as
+he could summon voice, "and say, that, if the gates are not forthwith
+opened to me and mine, the blood of the plebeians be on their own head.
+As for Raimond, Vicars of the Pope have high spiritual authority, none
+temporal. Let him prescribe a fast, and he shall be obeyed; but, for
+the rash Rienzi, say that Stephen Colonna will seek him in the Capitol
+tomorrow, for the purpose of throwing him out of the highest window."
+
+These messages the envoy failed not to deliver.
+
+The captain of the Romans was equally stern in his reply.
+
+"Declare to your Lord," said he, "that Rome holds him and his as rebels
+and traitors; and that the moment you regain your troop, our archers
+receive our command to draw their bows--in the name of the Pope, the
+City, and the Liberator."
+
+This threat was executed to the letter; and ere the old Baron had time
+to draw up his men in the best array, the gates were thrown open, and
+a well-armed, if undisciplined, multitude poured forth, with fierce
+shouts, clashing their arms, and advancing the azure banners of the
+Roman State. So desperate their charge, and so great their numbers, that
+the Barons, after a short and tumultuous conflict, were driven back,
+and chased by their pursuers for more than a mile from the walls of the
+city.
+
+As soon as the Barons recovered their disorder and dismay, a hasty
+council was held, at which various and contradictory opinions were
+loudly urged. Some were for departing on the instant to Palestrina,
+which belonged to the Colonna, and possessed an almost inaccessible
+fortress. Others were for dispersing, and entering peaceably, and in
+detached parties, through the other gates. Stephen Colonna--himself
+incensed and disturbed from his usual self-command--was unable to
+preserve his authority; Luca di Savelli, (The more correct orthography
+were Luca di Savello, but the one in the text is preserved as more
+familiar to the English reader.) a timid, though treacherous and subtle
+man, already turned his horse's head, and summoned his men to follow him
+to his castle in Romagna, when the old Colonna bethought himself of a
+method by which to keep his band from a disunion that he had the sense
+to perceive would prove fatal to the common cause. He proposed that they
+should at once repair to Palestrina, and there fortify themselves; while
+one of the chiefs should be selected to enter Rome alone, and
+apparently submissive, to examine the strength of Rienzi; and with the
+discretionary power to resist if possible,--or to make the best terms he
+could for the admission of the rest.
+
+"And who," asked Savelli, sneeringly, "will undertake this dangerous
+mission? Who, unarmed and alone, will expose himself to the rage of the
+fiercest populace of Italy, and the caprice of a demagogue in the first
+flush of his power?"
+
+The Barons and the Captains looked at each other in silence. Savelli
+laughed.
+
+Hitherto Adrian had taken no part in the conference, and but little in
+the previous contest. He now came to the support of his kinsman.
+
+"Signors!" said he, "I will undertake this mission,--but on mine own
+account, independently of yours;--free to act as I may think best, for
+the dignity of a Roman noble, and the interests of a Roman citizen; free
+to raise my standard on mine own tower, or to yield fealty to the new
+estate."
+
+"Well said!" cried the old Colonna, hastily. "Heaven forbid we should
+enter Rome as foes, if to enter it as friends be yet allowed us! What
+say ye, gentles?"
+
+"A more worthy choice could not be selected," said Savelli; "but I
+should scarce deem it possible that a Colonna could think there was an
+option between resistance and fealty to this upstart revolution."
+
+"Of that, Signor, I will judge for myself; if you demand an agent for
+yourselves, choose another. I announce to ye frankly, that I have seen
+enough of other states to think the recent condition of Rome demanded
+some redress. Whether Rienzi and Raimond be worthy of the task they have
+assumed, I know not."
+
+Savelli was silent. The old Colonna seized the word.
+
+"To Palestrina, then!--are ye all agreed on this? At the worst, or at
+the best, we should not be divided! On this condition alone I hazard the
+safety of my kinsman!"
+
+The Barons murmured a little among themselves;--the expediency of
+Stephen's proposition was evident, and they at length assented to it.
+
+Adrian saw them depart, and then, attended only by his squire, slowly
+rode towards a more distant entrance into the city. On arriving at the
+gates, his name was demanded--he gave it freely.
+
+"Enter, my Lord," said the warder, "our orders were to admit all that
+came unarmed and unattended. But to the Lord Adrian di Castello, alone,
+we had a special injunction to give the honours due to a citizen and a
+friend."
+
+Adrian, a little touched by this implied recollection of friendship, now
+rode through a long line of armed citizens, who saluted him respectfully
+as he passed, and, as he returned the salutation with courtesy, a loud
+and approving shout followed his horse's steps.
+
+So, save by one attendant, alone, and in peace, the young patrician
+proceeded leisurely through the long streets, empty and deserted,--for
+nearly one half of the inhabitants were assembled at the walls, and
+nearly the other half were engaged in a more peaceful duty,--until,
+penetrating the interior, the wide and elevated space of the Capitol
+broke upon his sight. The sun was slowly setting over an immense
+multitude that overspread the spot, and high above a scaffold raised
+in the centre, shone, to the western ray, the great Gonfalon of Rome,
+studded with silver stars.
+
+Adrian reined in his steed. "This," thought he, "is scarcely the hour
+thus publicly to confer with Rienzi; yet fain would I, mingled with the
+crowd, judge how far his power is supported, and in what manner it is
+borne." Musing a little, he withdrew into one of the obscurer streets,
+then wholly deserted, surrendered his horse to his squire, and,
+borrowing of the latter his morion and long mantle, passed to one of
+the more private entrances of the Capitol, and, enveloped in his cloak,
+stood--one of the crowd--intent upon all that followed.
+
+"And what," he asked of a plainly dressed citizen, "is the cause of this
+assembly?"
+
+"Heard you not the proclamation?" returned the other in some surprise.
+"Do you not know that the Council of the City and the Guilds of the
+Artisans have passed a vote to proffer to Rienzi the title of king of
+Rome?"
+
+The Knight of the Emperor, to whom belonged that august dignity, drew
+back in dismay.
+
+"And," resumed the citizen, "this assembly of all the lesser Barons,
+Councillors, and Artificers, is convened to hear the answer."
+
+"Of course it will be assent?"
+
+"I know not--there are strange rumours; hitherto the Liberator has
+concealed his sentiments."
+
+At that instant a loud flourish of martial music announced the approach
+of Rienzi. The crowd tumultuously divided, and presently, from the
+Palace of the Capitol to the scaffold, passed Rienzi, still in complete
+armour, save the helmet, and with him, in all the pomp of his episcopal
+robes, Raimond of Orvietto.
+
+As soon as Rienzi had ascended the platform, and was thus made visible
+to the whole concourse, no words can suffice to paint the enthusiasm
+of the scene--the shouts, the gestures, the tears, the sobs, the wild
+laughter, in which the sympathy of those lively and susceptible children
+of the South broke forth. The windows and balconies of the Palace were
+thronged with the wives and daughters of the lesser Barons and more
+opulent citizens; and Adrian, with a slight start, beheld amongst
+them,--pale--agitated--tearful,--the lovely face of his Irene--a face
+that even thus would have outshone all present, but for one by her side,
+whose beauty the emotion of the hour only served to embellish. The dark,
+large, and flashing eyes of Nina di Raselli, just bedewed, were fixed
+proudly on the hero of her choice: and pride, even more than joy, gave a
+richer carnation to her cheek, and the presence of a queen to her noble
+and rounded form. The setting sun poured its full glory over the spot;
+the bared heads--the animated faces of the crowd--the grey and vast mass
+of the Capitol; and, not far from the side of Rienzi, it brought into
+a strange and startling light the sculptured form of a colossal Lion of
+Basalt, (The existent Capitol is very different from the building at
+the time of Rienzi; and the reader must not suppose that the present
+staircase, designed by Michael Angelo, at the base of which are two
+marble lions, removed by Pius IV. from the Church of St. Stephen del
+Cacco, was the staircase of the Lion of Basalt, which bears so stern a
+connexion with the history of Rienzi. That mute witness of dark deeds is
+no more.) which gave its name to a staircase leading to the Capitol.
+It was an old Egyptian relic,--vast, worn, and grim; some symbol of a
+vanished creed, to whose face the sculptor had imparted something of the
+aspect of the human countenance. And this producing the effect
+probably sought, gave at all times a mystic, preternatural, and fearful
+expression to the stern features, and to that solemn and hushed repose,
+which is so peculiarly the secret of Egyptian sculpture. The awe which
+this colossal and frowning image was calculated to convey, was felt yet
+more deeply by the vulgar, because "the Staircase of the Lion" was the
+wonted place of the state executions, as of the state ceremonies.
+And seldom did the stoutest citizen forget to cross himself, or feel
+unchilled with a certain terror, whenever, passing by the place, he
+caught, suddenly fixed upon him, the stony gaze and ominous grin of that
+old monster from the cities of the Nile.
+
+It was some minutes before the feelings of the assembly allowed
+Rienzi to be heard. But when, at length, the last shout closed with a
+simultaneous cry of "Long live Rienzi! Deliverer and King of Rome!" he
+raised his hand impatiently, and the curiosity of the crowd procured a
+sudden silence.
+
+"Deliverer of Rome, my countrymen!" said he. "Yes! change not that
+title--I am too ambitious to be a King! Preserve your obedience to your
+Pontiff--your allegiance to your Emperor--but be faithful to your
+own liberties. Ye have a right to your ancient constitution; but that
+constitution needed not a king. Emulous of the name of Brutus, I am
+above the titles of a Tarquin! Romans, awake! awake! be inspired with
+a nobler love of liberty than that which, if it dethrones the tyrant of
+today, would madly risk the danger of tyranny for tomorrow! Rome wants
+still a liberator--never an usurper!--Take away yon bauble!"
+
+There was a pause; the crowd were deeply affected--but they uttered no
+shouts; they looked anxiously for a reply from their councillors, or
+popular leaders.
+
+"Signor," said Pandulfo di Guido, who was one of the Caporioni, "your
+answer is worthy of your fame. But, in order to enforce the law, Rome
+must endow you with a legal title--if not that of King, deign to accept
+that of Dictator or of Consul."
+
+"Long live the Consul Rienzi!" cried several voices.
+
+Rienzi waved his hand for silence.
+
+"Pandulfo di Guido! and you, honoured Councillors of Rome! such title is
+at once too august for my merits, and too inapplicable to my functions.
+I am one of the people--the people are my charge; the nobles can protect
+themselves. Dictator and Consul are the appellations of patricians.
+No," he continued after a short pause, "if ye deem it necessary, for
+the preservation of order, that your fellow-citizen should be intrusted
+with a formal title and a recognised power, be it so: but let it be
+such as may attest the nature of our new institutions, the wisdom of the
+people, and the moderation of their leaders. Once, my countrymen, the
+people elected, for the protectors of their rights and the guardians of
+their freedom, certain officers responsible to the people,--chosen from
+the people,--provident for the people. Their power was great, but it was
+delegated: a dignity, but a trust. The name of these officers with that
+of Tribune. Such is the title that conceded, not by clamour alone,
+but in the full Parliament of the people, and accompanied by, such
+Parliament, ruling with such Parliament,--such is the title I will
+gratefully accept."
+
+     (Gibbon and Sismondi alike, (neither of whom appears to have
+     consulted with much attention the original documents
+     preserved by Hocsemius,) say nothing of the Representative
+     Parliament, which it was almost Rienzi's first public act to
+     institute or model. Six days from the memorable 19th of May,
+     he addressed the people of Viterbo in a letter yet extant.
+     He summons them to elect and send two syndics, or
+     ambassadors, to the general Parliament.)
+
+The speech, the sentiments of Rienzi were rendered far more impressive
+by a manner of earnest and deep sincerity; and some of the Romans,
+despite their corruption, felt a momentary exultation in the forbearance
+of their chief. "Long live the Tribune of Rome!" was shouted, but less
+loud than the cry of "Live the King!" And the vulgar almost thought the
+revolution was incomplete, because the loftier title was not assumed.
+To a degenerate and embruted people, liberty seems too plain a thing, if
+unadorned by the pomp of the very despotism they would dethrone. Revenge
+is their desire, rather than Release; and the greater the new power they
+create, the greater seems their revenge against the old. Still all that
+was most respected, intelligent, and powerful amongst the assembly,
+were delighted at a temperance which they foresaw would free Rome from
+a thousand dangers, whether from the Emperor or the Pontiff. And their
+delight was yet increased, when Rienzi added, so soon as returning
+silence permitted--"And since we have been equal labourers in the same
+cause, whatever honours be awarded to me, should be extended also to the
+Vicar of the Pope, Raimond, Lord Bishop of Orvietto. Remember, that both
+Church and State are properly the rulers of the people, only because
+their benefactors.--Long live the first Vicar of a Pope that was ever
+also the Liberator of a State!"
+
+Whether or not Rienzi was only actuated by patriotism in his moderation,
+certain it is, that his sagacity was at least equal to his virtue; and
+perhaps nothing could have cemented the revolution more strongly, than
+thus obtaining for a colleague the Vicar, and Representative of the
+Pontifical power: it borrowed, for the time, the sanction of the Pope
+himself--thus made to share the responsibility of the revolution,
+without monopolising the power of the State.
+
+While the crowd hailed the proposition of Rienzi; while their shouts
+yet filled the air; while Raimond, somewhat taken by surprise, sought by
+signs and gestures to convey at once his gratitude and his humility,
+the Tribune-Elect, casting his eyes around, perceived many hitherto
+attracted by curiosity, and whom, from their rank and weight, it
+was desirable to secure in the first heat of the public enthusiasm.
+Accordingly, as soon as Raimond had uttered a short and pompous
+harangue,--in which his eager acceptance of the honour proposed him was
+ludicrously contrasted by his embarrassed desire not to involve himself
+or the Pope in any untoward consequences that might ensue,--Rienzi
+motioned to two heralds that stood behind upon the platform, and one of
+these advancing, proclaimed--"That as it was desirable that all hitherto
+neuter should now profess themselves friends or foes, so they were
+invited to take at once the oath of obedience to the laws, and
+subscription to the Buono Stato."
+
+So great was the popular fervour, and so much had it been refined and
+deepened in its tone by the addresses of Rienzi, that even the most
+indifferent had caught the contagion: and no man liked to be seen
+shrinking from the rest: so that the most neutral, knowing themselves
+the most marked, were the most entrapped into allegiance to the Buono
+Stato. The first who advanced to the platform and took the oath was the
+Signor di Raselli, the father of Nina.--Others of the lesser nobility
+followed his example.
+
+The presence of the Pope's Vicar induced the aristocratic; the fear
+of the people urged the selfish; the encouragement of shouts and
+gratulations excited the vain. The space between Adrian and Rienzi was
+made clear. The young noble suddenly felt the eyes of the Tribune were
+upon him; he felt that those eyes recognised and called upon him--he
+coloured--he breathed short. The noble forbearance of Rienzi had touched
+him to the heart;--the applause--the pageant--the enthusiasm of the
+scene, intoxicated--confused him.--He lifted his eyes and saw before
+him the sister of the Tribune--the lady of his love! His indecision--his
+pause--continued, when Raimond, observing him, and obedient to a
+whisper from Rienzi, artfully cried aloud--"Room for the Lord Adrian di
+Castello! a Colonna! a Colonna!" Retreat was cut off. Mechanically, and
+as if in a dream, Adrian ascended to the platform: and to complete the
+triumph of the Tribune, the sun's last ray beheld the flower of the
+Colonna--the best and bravest of the Barons of Rome--confessing his
+authority, and subscribing to his laws!
+
+
+
+
+BOOK III. THE FREEDOM WITHOUT LAW.
+
+     "Ben furo avventurosi i cavalieri
+     Ch' erano a quella eta, che nei vallone,
+     Nelle scure spelonche e boschi fieri,
+     Tane di serpi, d'orsi e di leoni,
+     Trovavan quel che nei palazzi altieri
+     Appena or trovar pon giudici buoni;
+     Donne che nella lor piu fresca etade
+     Sien degne di aver titol di beltade."
+
+     Ariosto, Orlando Furioso, can. xiii. 1.
+
+
+
+Chapter 3.I. The Return of Walter de Montreal to his Fortress.
+
+When Walter de Montreal and his mercenaries quitted Corneto, they made
+the best of their way to Rome; arriving there, long before the Barons,
+they met with a similar reception at the gates, but Montreal prudently
+forbore all attack and menace, and contented himself with sending his
+trusty Rodolf into the city to seek Rienzi, and to crave permission
+to enter with his troop. Rodolf returned in a shorter time than was
+anticipated. "Well," said Montreal impatiently, "you have the order I
+suppose. Shall we bid them open the gates?"
+
+"Bid them open our graves," replied the Saxon, bluntly. "I trust my next
+heraldry will be to a more friendly court."
+
+"How! what mean you?"
+
+"Briefly this:--I found the new governor, or whatever his title, in the
+palace of the Capitol, surrounded by guards and councillors, and in a
+suit of the finest armour I ever saw out of Milan."
+
+"Pest on his armour! give us his answer."
+
+"'Tell Walter de Montreal,' said he, then, if you will have it, 'that
+Rome is no longer a den of thieves; tell him, that if he enters, he must
+abide a trial--'"
+
+"A trial!" cried Montreal, grinding his teeth.
+
+"'For participation in the evil doings of Werner and his freebooters.'"
+
+"Ha!"
+
+"'Tell him, moreover, that Rome declares war against all robbers,
+whether in tent or tower, and that we order him in forty-eight hours to
+quit the territories of the Church.'"
+
+"He thinks, then, not only to deceive, but to menace me? Well, proceed."
+
+"That was all his reply to you; to me, however, he vouchsafed a caution
+still more obliging. 'Hark ye, friend,' said he, for every German bandit
+found in Rome after tomorrow, our welcome will be cord and gibbet!
+Begone.'"
+
+"Enough! enough!" cried Montreal, colouring with rage and shame.
+"Rodolf, you have a skilful eye in these matters, how many Northmen
+would it take to give that same gibbet to the upstart?"
+
+Rodolf scratched his huge head, and seemed awhile lost in calculation;
+at length he said, "You, Captain, must be the best judge, when I tell
+you, that twenty thousand Romans are the least of his force, so I heard
+by the way; and this evening he is to accept the crown, and depose the
+Emperor."
+
+"Ha, ha!" laughed Montreal, "is he so mad? then he will want not our aid
+to hang himself. My friends, let us wait the result. At present neither
+barons nor people seem likely to fill our coffers. Let us across the
+country to Terracina. Thank the saints," and Montreal (who was not
+without a strange kind of devotion,--indeed he deemed that virtue
+essential to chivalry) crossed himself piously, "the free companions are
+never long without quarters!"
+
+"Hurrah for the Knight of St. John!" cried the mercenaries. "And hurrah
+for fair Provence and bold Germany!" added the Knight, as he waved his
+hand on high, struck spurs into his already wearied horse, and, breaking
+out into his favourite song,
+
+     "His steed and his sword,
+     And his lady the peerless," &c.,
+
+Montreal, with his troop, struck gallantly across the Campagna.
+
+The Knight of St. John soon, however, fell into an absorbed and moody
+reverie; and his followers imitating the silence of their chief, in a
+few minutes the clatter of their arms and the jingle of their spurs,
+alone disturbed the stillness of the wide and gloomy plains across
+which they made towards Terracina. Montreal was recalling with bitter
+resentment his conference with Rienzi; and, proud of his own sagacity
+and talent for scheming, he was humbled and vexed at the discovery that
+he had been duped by a wilier intriguer. His ambitious designs on Rome,
+too, were crossed, and even crushed for the moment, by the very means
+to which he had looked for their execution. He had seen enough of the
+Barons to feel assured that while Stephen Colonna lived, the head of the
+order, he was not likely to obtain that mastery in the state which, if
+leagued with a more ambitious or a less timid and less potent signor,
+might reward his aid in expelling Rienzi. Under all circumstances, he
+deemed it advisable to remain aloof. Should Rienzi grow strong, Montreal
+might make the advantageous terms he desired with the Barons; should
+Rienzi's power decay, his pride, necessarily humbled, might drive him
+to seek the assistance, and submit to the proposals, of Montreal.
+The ambition of the Provencal, though vast and daring, was not of a
+consistent and persevering nature. Action and enterprise were dearer to
+him, as yet, than the rewards which they proffered; and if baffled
+in one quarter, he turned himself, with the true spirit of the
+knight-errant, to any other field for his achievements. Louis, king of
+Hungary, stern, warlike, implacable, seeking vengeance for the murder of
+his brother, the ill-fated husband of Joanna, (the beautiful and guilty
+Queen of Naples--the Mary Stuart of Italy,) had already prepared himself
+to subject the garden of Campania to the Hungarian yoke. Already his
+bastard brother had entered Italy--already some of the Neapolitan states
+had declared in his favour--already promises had been held out by the
+northern monarch to the scattered Companies--and already those fierce
+mercenaries gathered menacingly round the frontiers of that Eden of
+Italy, attracted, as vultures to the carcass, by the preparation of war
+and the hope of plunder. Such was the field to which the bold mind
+of Montreal now turned its thoughts; and his soldiers had joyfully
+conjectured his design when they had heard him fix Terracina as their
+bourne. Provident of every resource, and refining his audacious and
+unprincipled valour by a sagacity which promised, when years had more
+matured and sobered his restless chivalry, to rank him among the most
+dangerous enemies Italy had ever known, on the first sign of Louis's
+warlike intentions, Montreal had seized and fortified a strong castle on
+that delicious coast beyond Terracina, by which lies the celebrated pass
+once held by Fabius against Hannibal, and which Nature has so favoured
+for war as for peace, that a handful of armed men might stop the march
+of an army. The possession of such a fortress on the very frontiers of
+Naples, gave Montreal an importance of which he trusted to avail
+himself with the Hungarian king: and now, thwarted in his more grand and
+aspiring projects upon Rome, his sanguine, active, and elastic spirit
+congratulated itself upon the resource it had secured.
+
+The band halted at nightfall on this side the Pontine Marshes, seizing
+without scruple some huts and sheds, from which they ejected the
+miserable tenants, and slaughtering with no greater ceremony the swine,
+cattle, and poultry of a neighbouring farm. Shortly after sunrise they
+crossed those fatal swamps which had already been partially drained by
+Boniface VIII.; and Montreal, refreshed by sleep, reconciled to his late
+mortification by the advantages opened to him in the approaching war
+with Naples, and rejoicing as he approached a home which held one who
+alone divided his heart with ambition, had resumed all the gaiety which
+belonged to his Gallic birth and his reckless habits. And that deadly
+but consecrated road, where yet may be seen the labours of Augustus,
+in the canal which had witnessed the Voyage so humourously described by
+Horace, echoed with the loud laughter and frequent snatches of wild song
+by which the barbarian robbers enlivened their rapid march.
+
+It was noon when the company entered upon that romantic pass I have
+before referred to--the ancient Lantulae. High to the left rose steep
+and lofty rocks, then covered by the prodigal verdure, and the countless
+flowers, of the closing May; while to the right the sea, gentle as a
+lake, and blue as heaven, rippled musically at their feet. Montreal, who
+largely possessed the poetry of his land, which is so eminently allied
+with a love of nature, might at another time have enjoyed the beauty of
+the scene; but at that moment less external and more household images
+were busy within him.
+
+Abruptly ascending where a winding path up the mountain offered a rough
+and painful road to their horses' feet, the band at length arrived
+before a strong fortress of grey stone, whose towers were concealed by
+the lofty foliage, until they emerged sullenly and suddenly from the
+laughing verdure. The sound of the bugle, the pennon of the knight, the
+rapid watchword, produced a loud shout of welcome from a score or two
+of grim soldiery on the walls; the portcullis was raised, and Montreal,
+throwing himself hastily from his panting steed, sprung across the
+threshold of a jutting porch, and traversed a huge hall, when a
+lady--young, fair, and richly dressed--met him with a step equally
+swift, and fell breathless and overjoyed into his arms.
+
+"My Walter! my dear, dear Walter; welcome--ten thousand welcomes!"
+
+"Adeline, my beautiful--my adored--I see thee again!"
+
+Such were the greetings interchanged as Montreal pressed his lady to
+his heart, kissing away her tears, and lifting her face to his, while
+he gazed on its delicate bloom with all the wistful anxiety of affection
+after absence.
+
+"Fairest," said he, tenderly, "thou hast pined, thou hast lost roundness
+and colour since we parted. Come, come, thou art too gentle, or too
+foolish, for a soldier's love."
+
+"Ah, Walter!" replied Adeline, clinging to him, "now thou art returned,
+and I shall be well. Thou wilt not leave me again a long, long time."
+
+"Sweet one, no;" and flinging his arm round her waist, the lovers--for
+alas! they were not wedded!--retired to the more private chambers of the
+castle.
+
+
+
+Chapter 3.II. The Life of Love and War--the Messenger of Peace--the
+Joust.
+
+Girt with his soldiery, secure in his feudal hold, enchanted with the
+beauty of the earth, sky, and sea around, and passionately adoring his
+Adeline, Montreal for awhile forgot all his more stirring projects and
+his ruder occupations. His nature was capable of great tenderness, as of
+great ferocity; and his heart smote him when he looked at the fair cheek
+of his lady, and saw that even his presence did not suffice to bring
+back the smile and the fresh hues of old. Often he cursed that fatal
+oath of his knightly order which forbade him to wed, though with one
+more than his equal; and remorse embittered his happiest hours. That
+gentle lady in that robber hold, severed from all she had been taught
+most to prize--mother, friends, and fair fame--only loved her seducer
+the more intensely; only the more concentrated upon one object all the
+womanly and tender feelings denied every other and less sinful vent.
+But she felt her shame, though she sought to conceal it, and a yet
+more gnawing grief than even that of shame contributed to prey upon her
+spirits and undermine her health. Yet, withal, in Montreal's presence
+she was happy, even in regret; and in her declining health she had at
+least a consolation in the hope to die while his love was undiminished.
+Sometimes they made short excursions, for the disturbed state of the
+country forbade them to wander far from the castle, through the sunny
+woods, and along the glassy sea, which make the charm of that delicious
+scenery; and that mixture of the savage with the tender, the wild
+escort, the tent in some green glade in the woods at noon, the lute and
+voice of Adeline, with the fierce soldiers grouped and listening at the
+distance, might have well suited the verse of Ariosto, and harmonised
+singularly with that strange, disordered, yet chivalric time, in which
+the Classic South became the seat of the Northern Romance. Still,
+however, Montreal maintained his secret intercourse with the Hungarian
+king, and, plunged in new projects, willingly forsook for the present
+all his designs on Rome. Yet deemed he that his more august ambition
+was only delayed, and, bright in the more distant prospects of his
+adventurous career, rose the Capitol of Rome and shone the sceptre of
+the Caesars.
+
+One day, as Montreal, with a small troop in attendance, passed on
+horseback near the walls of Terracina, the gates were suddenly thrown
+open, and a numerous throng issued forth, preceded by a singular figure,
+whose steps they followed bareheaded and with loud blessings; a train
+of monks closed the procession, chanting a hymn, of which the concluding
+words were as follows:--
+
+Beauteous on the mountains--lo, The feet of him glad tidings gladly
+bringing; The flowers along his pathway grow, And voices, heard aloft,
+to angel harps are singing: And strife and slaughter cease Before thy
+blessed way, Young Messenger of Peace! O'er the mount, and through the
+moor, Glide thy holy steps secure. Day and night no fear thou knowest,
+Lonely--but with God thou goest. Where the Heathen rage the fiercest,
+Through the armed throng thou piercest. For thy coat of mail, bedight
+In thy spotless robe of white. For the sinful sword--thy hand Bearing
+bright the silver wand: Through the camp and through the court, Through
+the bandit's gloomy fort, On the mission of the dove, Speeds the
+minister of love; By a word the wildest taming, And the world to Christ
+reclaiming: While, as once the waters trod By the footsteps of thy
+God, War, and wrath, and rapine cease, Hush'd round thy charmed path, O
+Messenger of Peace!
+
+The stranger to whom these honours were paid was a young, unbearded man,
+clothed in white wrought with silver; he was unarmed and barefooted: in
+his hand he held a tall silver wand. Montreal and his party halted in
+astonishment and wonder, and the Knight, spurring his horse toward the
+crowd, confronted the stranger.
+
+"How, friend," quoth the Provencal, "is thine a new order of pilgrims,
+or what especial holiness has won thee this homage?"
+
+"Back, back," cried some of the bolder of the crowd, "let not the robber
+dare arrest the Messenger of Peace."
+
+Montreal waved his hand disdainfully.
+
+"I speak not to you, good sirs, and the worthy friars in your rear know
+full well that I never injured herald or palmer."
+
+The monks, ceasing from their hymn, advanced hastily to the spot; and
+indeed the devotion of Montreal had ever induced him to purchase the
+goodwill of whatever monastery neighboured his wandering home.
+
+"My son," said the eldest of the brethren, "this is a strange spectacle,
+and a sacred: and when thou learnest all, thou wilt rather give the
+messenger a passport of safety from the unthinking courage of thy
+friends than intercept his path of peace."
+
+"Ye puzzle still more my simple brain," said Montreal, impatiently, "let
+the youth speak for himself; I perceive that on his mantle are the
+arms of Rome blended with other quarterings, which are a mystery to
+me,--though sufficiently versed in heraldic art as befits a noble and a
+knight."
+
+"Signor," said the youth, gravely, "know in me the messenger of Cola di
+Rienzi, Tribune of Rome, charged with letters to many a baron and prince
+in the ways between Rome and Naples. The arms wrought upon my mantle are
+those of the Pontiff, the City, and the Tribune."
+
+"Umph; thou must have bold nerves to traverse the Campagna with no other
+weapon than that stick of silver!"
+
+"Thou art mistaken, Sir Knight," replied the youth, boldly, "and judgest
+of the present by the past; know that not a single robber now lurks
+within the Campagna, the arms of the Tribune have rendered every road
+around the city as secure as the broadest street of the city itself."
+
+"Thou tellest me wonders."
+
+"Through the forest--and in the fortress,--through the wildest
+solitudes,--through the most populous towns,--have my comrades borne
+this silver wand unmolested and unscathed; wherever we pass along,
+thousands hail us, and tears of joy bless the messengers of him who
+hath expelled the brigand from his hold, the tyrant from his castle, and
+ensured the gains of the merchant and the hut of the peasant."
+
+"Pardieu," said Montreal, with a stern smile, "I ought to be thankful
+for the preference shown to me; I have not yet received the commands,
+nor felt the vengeance, of the Tribune; yet, methinks, my humble castle
+lies just within the patrimony of St. Peter."
+
+"Pardon me, Signor Cavalier," said the youth; "but do I address the
+renowned Knight of St. John, warrior of the Cross, yet leader of
+banditti?"
+
+"Boy, you are bold; I am Walter de Montreal."
+
+"I am bound, then, Sir Knight, to your castle."
+
+"Take care how thou reach it before me, or thou standest a fair chance
+of a quick exit. How now, my friends!" seeing that the crowd at these
+words gathered closer round the messenger, "Think ye that I, who have
+my mate in kings, would find a victim in an unarmed boy? Fie! give
+way--give way. Young man, follow me homeward; you are safe in my castle
+as in your mother's arms." So saying, Montreal, with great dignity
+and deliberate gravity, rode slowly towards his castle, his soldiers,
+wondering, at a little distance, and the white-robed messenger following
+with the crowd, who refused to depart; so great was their enthusiasm,
+that they even ascended to the gates of the dreaded castle, and insisted
+on waiting without until the return of the youth assured them of his
+safety.
+
+Montreal, who, however lawless elsewhere, strictly preserved the rights
+of the meanest boor in his immediate neighbourhood, and rather affected
+popularity with the poor, bade the crowd enter the courtyard, ordered
+his servitors to provide them with wine and refreshment, regaled the
+good monks in his great hall, and then led the way to a small room,
+where he received the messenger.
+
+"This," said the youth, "will best explain my mission," as he placed a
+letter before Montreal.
+
+The Knight cut the silk with his dagger, and read the epistle with great
+composure.
+
+"Your Tribune," said he, when he had finished it, "has learned the
+laconic style of power very soon. He orders me to render this castle,
+and vacate the Papal Territory within ten days. He is obliging; I must
+have breathing time to consider the proposal; be seated, I pray you,
+young sir. Forgive me, but I should have imagined that your lord had
+enough upon his hands with his Roman barons, to make him a little more
+indulgent to us foreign visitors. Stephen Colonna--"
+
+"Is returned to Rome, and has taken the oath of allegiance; the Savelli,
+the Orsini, the Frangipani, have all subscribed their submission to the
+Buono Stato."
+
+"How!" cried Montreal, in great surprise.
+
+"Not only have they returned, but they have submitted to the
+dispersion of all their mercenaries, and the dismantling of all their
+fortifications. The iron of the Orsini palace now barricades the
+Capitol, and the stonework of the Colonna and the Savelli has added new
+battlements to the gates of the Lateran and St. Laurence."
+
+"Wonderful man!" said Montreal, with reluctant admiration. "By what
+means was this effected?"
+
+"A stern command and a strong force to back it. At the first sound of
+the great bell, twenty thousand Romans rise in arms. What to such an
+army are the brigands of an Orsini or a Colonna?--Sir Knight, your
+valour and renown make even Rome admire you; and I, a Roman, bid you
+beware."
+
+"Well, I thank thee--thy news, friend, robs me of breath. So the Barons
+submit, then?"
+
+"Yes: on the first day, one of the Colonna, the Lord Adrian, took the
+oath; within a week, Stephen, assured of safe conduct, left Palestrina,
+the Savelli in his train; the Orsini followed--even Martino di Porto has
+silently succumbed."
+
+"The Tribune--but is that his dignity--methought he was to be king--"
+
+"He was offered, and he refused, the title. His present rank, which
+arrogates no patrician honours, went far to conciliate the nobles."
+
+"A wise knave!--I beg pardon, a sagacious prince!--Well, then, the
+Tribune lords it mightily, I suppose, over the great Roman names?"
+
+"Pardon me--he enforces impartial justice from peasant or patrician; but
+he preserves to the nobles all their just privileges and legal rank."
+
+"Ha!--and the vain puppets, so they keep the semblance, scarce miss the
+substance--I understand. But this shows genius--the Tribune is unwed, I
+think. Does he look among the Colonna for a wife?"
+
+"Sir Knight, the Tribune is already married; within three days after his
+ascension to power, he won and bore home the daughter of the Baron di
+Raselli."
+
+"Raselli! no great name; he might have done better."
+
+"But it is said," resumed the youth, smiling, "that the Tribune will
+shortly be allied to the Colonna, through his fair sister the Signora
+Irene. The Baron di Castello woos her."
+
+"What, Adrian Colonna! Enough! you have convinced me that a man who
+contents the people and awes or conciliates the nobles is born for
+empire. My answer to this letter I will send myself. For your news, Sir
+Messenger, accept this jewel," and the knight took from his finger a gem
+of some price. "Nay, shrink not, it was as freely given to me as it is
+now to thee."
+
+The youth, who had been agreeably surprised, and impressed, by the
+manner of the renowned freebooter, and who was not a little astonished
+himself with the ease and familiarity with which he had been relating
+to Fra Moreale, in his own fortress, the news of Rome, bowed low as he
+accepted the gift.
+
+The astute Provencal, who saw the evident impression he had made,
+perceived also that it might be of advantage in delaying the measures
+he might deem it expedient to adopt. "Assure the Tribune," said he, on
+dismissing the messenger, "shouldst thou return ere my letter arrive,
+that I admire his genius, hail his power, and will not fail to consider
+as favourably as I may of his demand."
+
+"Better," said the messenger, warmly (he was of good blood, and gentle
+bearing),--"better ten tyrants for our enemy, than one Montreal."
+
+"An enemy! believe me, sir, I seek no enmity with princes who know how
+to govern, or a people that has the wisdom at once to rule and to obey."
+
+The whole of that day, however, Montreal remained thoughtful and uneasy;
+he despatched trusty messengers to the Governor of Aquila (who was then
+in correspondence with Louis of Hungary), to Naples, and to Rome:--the
+last charged with a letter to the Tribune, which, without absolutely
+compromising himself, affected submission, and demanded only a longer
+leisure for the preparations of departure. But, at the same time, fresh
+fortifications were added to the castle, ample provisions were laid in,
+and, night and day, spies and scouts were stationed along the pass, and
+in the town of Terracina. Montreal was precisely the chief who prepared
+most for war when most he pretended peace.
+
+One morning, the fifth from the appearance of the Roman messenger,
+Montreal, after narrowly surveying his outworks and his stores, and
+feeling satisfied that he could hold out at least a month's siege,
+repaired, with a gayer countenance than he had lately worn, to the
+chamber of Adeline.
+
+The lady was seated by the casement of the tower, from which might be
+seen the glorious landscape of woods, and vales, and orange groves--a
+strange garden for such a palace! As she leant her face upon her hand,
+with her profile slightly turned to Montreal, there was something
+ineffably graceful in the bend of her neck,--the small head so
+expressive of gentle blood,--with the locks parted in front in that
+simple fashion which modern times have so happily revived. But the
+expression of the half-averted face, the abstracted intentness of
+the gaze, and the profound stillness of the attitude, were so sad and
+mournful, that Montreal's purposed greeting of gallantry and gladness
+died upon his lips. He approached in silence, and laid his hand upon her
+shoulder.
+
+Adeline turned, and taking the hand in hers, pressed it to her heart,
+and smiled away all her sadness. "Dearest," said Montreal, "couldst thou
+know how much any shadow of grief on thy bright face darkens my heart,
+thou wouldst never grieve. But no wonder that in these rude walls--no
+female of equal rank near thee, and such mirth as Montreal can summon to
+his halls, grating to thy ear--no wonder that thou repentest thee of thy
+choice."
+
+"Ah, no--no, Walter, I never repent. I did but think of our child as you
+entered. Alas! he was our only child! How fair he was, Walter; how he
+resembled thee!"
+
+"Nay, he had thine eyes and brow," replied the Knight, with a faltering
+voice, and turning away his head.
+
+"Walter," resumed the lady, sighing, "do you remember?--this is his
+birthday. He is ten years old today. We have loved each other eleven
+years, and thou hast not tired yet of thy poor Adeline."
+
+"As well might the saints weary of paradise," replied Montreal, with an
+enamoured tenderness, which changed into softness the whole character of
+his heroic countenance.
+
+"Could I think so, I should indeed be blest!" answered Adeline. "But
+a little while longer, and the few charms I yet possess must fade; and
+what other claim have I on thee?"
+
+"All claim;--the memory of thy first blushes--thy first kiss--of thy
+devoted sacrifices--of thy patient wanderings--of thy uncomplaining
+love! Ah, Adeline, we are of Provence, not of Italy; and when did Knight
+of Provence avoid his foe, or forsake his love? But enough, dearest, of
+home and melancholy for today. I come to bid thee forth. I have sent
+on the servitors to pitch our tent beside the sea,--we will enjoy the
+orange blossoms while we may. Ere another week pass over us, we may have
+sterner pastime and closer confines."
+
+"How, dearest Walter! thou dost not apprehend danger?"
+
+"Thou speakest, lady-bird," said Montreal, laughing, "as if danger were
+novelty; methinks by this time, thou shouldst know it as the atmosphere
+we breathe."
+
+"Ah, Walter, is this to last for ever? Thou art now rich and renowned;
+canst thou not abandon this career of strife?"
+
+"Now, out on thee, Adeline! What are riches and renown but the means to
+power! And for strife, the shield of warriors was my cradle--pray the
+saints it be my bier! These wild and wizard extremes of life--from the
+bower to the tent--from the cavern to the palace--today a wandering
+exile, tomorrow the equal of kings--make the true element of the
+chivalry of my Norman sires. Normandy taught me war, and sweet Provence
+love. Kiss me, dear Adeline; and now let thy handmaids attire thee.
+Forget not thy lute, sweet one. We will rouse the echoes with the songs
+of Provence."
+
+The ductile temper of Adeline yielded easily to the gaiety of her lord;
+and the party soon sallied from the castle towards the spot in which
+Montreal had designed their resting-place during the heats of day. But
+already prepared for all surprise, the castle was left strictly guarded,
+and besides the domestic servitors of the castle, a detachment of ten
+soldiers, completely armed, accompanied the lovers. Montreal himself
+wore his corselet, and his squires followed with his helmet and lance.
+Beyond the narrow defile at the base of the castle, the road at that day
+opened into a broad patch of verdure, circled on all sides, save that
+open to the sea, by wood, interspersed with myrtle and orange, and
+a wilderness of odorous shrubs. In this space, and sheltered by the
+broad-spreading and classic fagus (so improperly translated into the
+English "beech"), a gay pavilion was prepared, which commanded the
+view of the sparkling sea;--shaded from the sun, but open to the gentle
+breeze. This was poor Adeline's favourite recreation, if recreation it
+might be called. She rejoiced to escape from the gloomy walls of her
+castellated prison, and to enjoy the sunshine and the sweets of that
+voluptuous climate without the fatigue which of late all exercise
+occasioned her. It was a gallantry on the part of Montreal, who foresaw
+how short an interval might elapse before the troops of Rienzi besieged
+his walls; and who was himself no less at home in the bower than in the
+field.
+
+As they reclined within the pavilion--the lover and his lady,--of the
+attendants without, some lounged idly on the beach; some prepared the
+awning of a pleasure-boat against the decline of the sun; some, in a
+ruder tent, out of sight in the wood, arranged the mid-day repast; while
+the strings of the lute, touched by Montreal himself with a careless
+skill, gave their music to the dreamy stillness of the noon.
+
+While thus employed, one of Montreal's scouts arrived breathless and
+heated at the tent.
+
+"Captain," said he, "a company of thirty lances completely armed, with
+a long retinue of squires and pages, have just quitted Terracina. Their
+banners bear the two-fold insignia of Rome and the Colonna."
+
+"Ho!" said Montreal, gaily, "such a troop is a welcome addition to our
+company; send our squire hither."
+
+The squire appeared.
+
+"Hie thee on thy steed towards the procession thou wilt meet with in the
+pass, (nay, sweet lady mine, no forbiddal!) seek the chief, and say that
+the good Knight Walter de Montreal sends him greeting, and prays him,
+in passing our proper territory, to rest awhile with us a welcome guest;
+and--stay,--add, that if to while an hour or so in gentle pastime be
+acceptable to him, Walter de Montreal would rejoice to break a lance
+with him, or any knight in his train, in honour of our respective
+ladies. Hie thee quick!"
+
+"Walter, Walter," began Adeline, who had that keen and delicate
+sensitiveness to her situation, which her reckless lord often wantonly
+forgot; "Walter, dear Walter, canst thou think it honour to--"
+
+"Hush thee, sweet Fleur de lis! Thou hast not seen pastime this many
+a day; I long to convince thee that thou art still the fairest lady in
+Italy--ay, and of Christendom. But these Italians are craven knights,
+and thou needst not fear that my proffer will be accepted. But in truth,
+lady mine, I rejoice for graver objects, that chance throws a Roman
+noble, perhaps a Colonna, in my way;--women understand not these
+matters; and aught concerning Rome touches us home at this moment."
+
+With that the Knight frowned, as was his wont in thought, and Adeline
+ventured to say no more, but retired to the interior division of the
+pavilion.
+
+Meanwhile the squire approached the procession that had now reached the
+middle of the pass. And a stately and gallant company it was:--if the
+complete harness of the soldiery seemed to attest a warlike purpose,
+it was contradicted on the other hand by a numerous train of unarmed
+squires and pages gorgeously attired, while the splendid blazon of
+two heralds preceding the standard-bearers, proclaimed their object
+as peaceful, and their path as sacred. It required but a glance at the
+company to tell the leader. Arrayed in a breast-plate of steel, wrought
+profusely with gold arabesques, over which was a mantle of dark green
+velvet, bordered with pearls, while above his long dark locks waved a
+black ostrich plume in a high Macedonian cap, such as, I believe, is now
+worn by the Grand Master of the order of St. Constantine, rode in the
+front of the party, a young cavalier, distinguished from his immediate
+comrades, partly by his graceful presence and partly by his splendid
+dress.
+
+The squire approached respectfully, and dismounting, delivered himself
+of his charge.
+
+The young cavalier smiled, as he answered, "Bear back to Sir Walter de
+Montreal the greeting of Adrian Colonna, Baron di Castello, and say,
+that the solemn object of my present journey will scarce permit me to
+encounter the formidable lance of so celebrated a knight; and I regret
+this the more, inasmuch as I may not yield to any dame the palm of my
+liege lady's beauty. I must live in hope of a happier occasion. For
+the rest, I will cheerfully abide for some few hours the guest of so
+courteous a host."
+
+The squire bowed low. "My master," said he, hesitatingly, "will grieve
+much to miss so noble an opponent. But my message refers to all this
+knightly and gallant train; and if the Lord Adrian di Castello deems
+himself forbidden the joust by the object of his present journey, surely
+one of his comrades will be his proxy with my master."
+
+Out and quickly spoke a young noble by the side of Adrian, Riccardo
+Annibaldi, who afterwards did good service both to the Tribune and to
+Rome, and whose valour brought him, in later life, to an untimely end.
+
+"By the Lord Adrian's permission," cried he, "I will break a lance
+with--"
+
+"Hush! Annibaldi," interrupted Adrian. "And you, Sir Squire, know, that
+Adrian di Castello permits no proxy in arms. Avise the Knight of St.
+John that we accept his hospitality, and if, after some converse on
+graver matters, he should still desire so light an entertainment, I will
+forget that I am the ambassador to Naples, and remember only that I am a
+Knight of the Empire. You have your answer."
+
+The squire with much ceremony made his obeisance, remounted his steed,
+and returned in a half-gallop to his master.
+
+"Forgive me, dear Annibaldi," said Adrian, "that I balked your valour;
+and believe me that I never more longed to break a lance against any man
+than I do against this boasting Frenchman. But bethink you, that though
+to us, brought up in the dainty laws of chivalry, Walter de Montreal
+is the famous Knight of Provence, to the Tribune of Rome, whose grave
+mission we now fulfil, he is but the mercenary captain of a Free
+Company. Grievously in his eyes should we sully our dignity by so wanton
+and irrelevant a holiday conflict with a declared and professional
+brigand."
+
+"For all that," said Annibaldi, "the brigand ought not to boast that a
+Roman knight shunned a Provencal lance."
+
+"Cease, I pray thee!" said Adrian, impatiently. In fact, the young
+Colonna, already chafed bitterly against his discreet and dignified
+rejection of Montreal's proffer, and recollecting with much pique
+the disparaging manner in which the Provencal had spoken of the Roman
+chivalry, as well as a certain tone of superiority, which in all warlike
+matters Montreal had assumed over him,--he now felt his cheek burn, and
+his lip quiver. Highly skilled in the martial accomplishments of his
+time, he had a natural and excusable desire to prove that he was at
+least no unworthy antagonist even of the best lance in Italy: and, added
+to this, the gallantry of the age made him feel it a sort of treason to
+his mistress to forego any means of asserting her perfections.
+
+It was, therefore, with considerable irritation that Adrian, as the
+pavilion of Montreal became visible, perceived the squire returning
+to him. And the reader will judge how much this was increased when the
+latter, once more dismounting, accosted him thus:
+
+"My master, the Knight of St. John, on hearing the courteous answer of
+the Lord Adrian di Castello, bids me say, that lest the graver converse
+the Lord Adrian refers to should mar gentle and friendly sport, he
+ventures respectfully to suggest, that the tilt should preface the
+converse. The sod before the tent is so soft and smooth, that even a
+fall could be attended with no danger to knight or steed."
+
+"By our Lady!" cried Adrian and Annibaldi in a breath, "but thy last
+words are discourteous; and" (proceeded Adrian, recovering himself)
+"since thy master will have it so, let him look to his horse's girths. I
+will not gainsay his fancy."
+
+Montreal, who had thus insisted upon the exhibition, partly, it may
+be, from the gay and ruffling bravado, common still amongst his brave
+countrymen; partly because he was curious of exhibiting before those who
+might soon be his open foes his singular and unrivalled address in arms,
+was yet more moved to it on learning the name of the leader of the
+Roman Company; for his vain and haughty spirit, however it had
+disguised resentment at the time, had by no means forgiven certain
+warm expressions of Adrian in the palace of Stephen Colonna, and in the
+unfortunate journey to Corneto. While Adrian, halting at the entrance of
+the defile, aided by his squires, indignantly, but carefully, indued the
+rest of his armour, and saw, himself, to the girths, stirrup-leathers,
+and various buckles in the caparison of his noble charger, Montreal in
+great glee kissed his lady, who, though too soft to be angry, was deeply
+vexed, (and yet her vexation half forgotten in fear for his safety,)
+snatched up her scarf of blue, which he threw over his breastplate, and
+completed his array with the indifference of a man certain of victory.
+He was destined, however, to one disadvantage, and that the greatest;
+his armour and lance had been brought from the castle--not his warhorse.
+His palfrey was too slight to bear the great weight of his armour, nor
+amongst his troop was there one horse that for power and bone could
+match with Adrian's. He chose, however, the strongest that was at hand,
+and a loud shout from his wild followers testified their admiration when
+he sprung unaided from the ground into the saddle--a rare and difficult
+feat of agility in a man completely arrayed in the ponderous armour
+which issued at that day from the forges of Milan, and was worn far more
+weighty in Italy than any other part of Europe. While both companies
+grouped slowly, and mingled in a kind of circle round the green turf,
+and the Roman heralds, with bustling importance, attempted to marshal
+the spectators into order, Montreal rode his charger round the sward,
+forcing it into various caracoles, and exhibiting, with the vanity that
+belonged to him, his exquisite and practised horsemanship.
+
+At length, Adrian, his visor down, rode slowly into the green space,
+amidst the cheers of his party. The two Knights, at either end, gravely
+fronted each other; they made the courtesies with their lances, which,
+in friendly and sportive encounters, were customary; and, as they thus
+paused for the signal of encounter, the Italians trembled for the honour
+of their chief: Montreal's stately height and girth of chest forming a
+strong contrast, even in armour, to the form of his opponent, which was
+rather under the middle standard, and though firmly knit, slightly and
+slenderly built. But to that perfection was skill in arms brought in
+those times, that great strength and size were far from being either
+the absolute requisites, or even the usual attributes, of the more
+celebrated knights; in fact, so much was effected by the power and the
+management of the steed, that a light weight in the rider was often
+rather to his advantage than his prejudice: and, even at a later period,
+the most accomplished victors in the tourney, the French Bayard and the
+English Sydney, were far from remarkable either for bulk or stature.
+
+Whatever the superiority of Montreal in physical power, was, in much,
+counterbalanced by the inferiority of his horse, which, though a
+thick-built and strong Calabrian, had neither the blood, bone, nor
+practised discipline of the northern charger of the Roman. The shining
+coat of the latter, coal black, was set off by a scarlet cloth wrought
+in gold; the neck and shoulders were clad in scales of mail; and from
+the forehead projected a long point, like the horn of an unicorn, while
+on its crest waved a tall plume of scarlet and white feathers. As the
+mission of Adrian to Naples was that of pomp and ceremony to a court of
+great splendour, so his array and retinue were befitting the occasion
+and the passion for show that belonged to the time; and the very bridle
+of his horse, which was three inches broad, was decorated with gold, and
+even jewels. The Knight himself was clad in mail, which had tested the
+finest art of the celebrated Ludovico of Milan; and, altogether, his
+appearance was unusually gallant and splendid, and seemed still more so
+beside the plain but brightly polished and artfully flexile armour of
+Montreal, (adorned only with his lady's scarf,) and the common and rude
+mail of his charger. This contrast, however, was not welcome to the
+Provencal, whose vanity was especially indulged in warlike equipments;
+and who, had he foreseen the "pastime" that awaited him, would have
+outshone even the Colonna.
+
+The trumpeters of either party gave a short blast--the Knights remained
+erect as statues of iron; a second, and each slightly bent over his
+saddle-bow; a third, and with spears couched, slackened reins, and
+at full speed, on they rushed, and fiercely they met midway. With the
+reckless arrogance which belonged to him, Montreal had imagined, that at
+the first touch of his lance Adrian would have been unhorsed; but to his
+great surprise the young Roman remained firm, and amidst the shouts of
+his party, passed on to the other end of the lists. Montreal himself was
+rudely shaken, but lost neither seat nor stirrup.
+
+"This can be no carpet knight," muttered Montreal between his teeth,
+as, this time, he summoned all his skill for a second encounter; while
+Adrian, aware of the great superiority of his charger, resolved to bring
+it to bear against his opponent. Accordingly, when the Knights again
+rushed forward, Adrian, covering himself well with his buckler, directed
+his care less against the combatant, whom he felt no lance wielded by
+mortal hand was likely to dislodge, than against the less noble animal
+he bestrode. The shock of Montreal's charge was like an avalanche--his
+lance shivered into a thousand pieces, Adrian lost both stirrups, and
+but for the strong iron bows which guarded the saddle in front and rear,
+would have been fairly unhorsed; as it was, he was almost doubled back
+by the encounter, and his ears rung and his eyes reeled, so that for a
+moment or two he almost lost all consciousness. But his steed had well
+repaid its nurture and discipline. Just as the combatants closed, the
+animal, rearing on high, pressed forward with its mighty crest against
+its opponent with a force so irresistible as to drive back Montreal's
+horse several paces: while Adrian's lance, poised with exquisite skill,
+striking against the Provencal's helmet, somewhat rudely diverted the
+Knight's attention for the moment from his rein. Montreal, drawing the
+curb too tightly in the suddenness of his recovery, the horse reared
+on end; and, receiving at that instant, full upon his breastplate, the
+sharp horn and mailed crest of Adrian's charger--fell back over its
+rider upon the sward. Montreal disencumbered himself in great rage and
+shame, as a faint cry from his pavilion reached his ear, and redoubled
+his mortification. He rose with a lightness which astonished the
+beholders; for so heavy was the armour worn at that day, that few
+knights once stretched upon the ground could rise without assistance;
+and drawing his sword, cried out fiercely--"On foot, on foot!--the fall
+was not mine, but this accursed beast's, that I must needs for my sins
+raise to the rank of a charger. Come on--"
+
+"Nay, Sir Knight," said Adrian, drawing off his gauntlets and unbuckling
+his helmet, which he threw on the ground, "I come to thee a guest and
+a friend; but to fight on foot is the encounter of mortal foes. Did I
+accept thy offer, my defeat would but stain thy knighthood."
+
+Montreal, whose passion had beguiled him for the moment, sullenly
+acquiesced in this reasoning. Adrian hastened to soothe his antagonist.
+"For the rest," said he, "I cannot pretend to the prize. Your lance lost
+me my stirrups--mine left you unshaken. You say right; the defeat, if
+any, was that of your steed."
+
+"We may meet again when I am more equally horsed," said Montreal, still
+chafing.
+
+"Now, our Lady forbid!" exclaimed Adrian, with so devout an earnestness
+that the bystanders could not refrain from laughing; and even Montreal
+grimly and half-reluctantly, joined in the merriment. The courtesy of
+his foe, however, conciliated and touched the more frank and soldierly
+qualities of his nature, and composing himself, he replied:--
+
+"Signor di Castello, I rest your debtor for a courtesy that I have but
+little imitated. Howbeit, if thou wouldst bind me to thee for ever, thou
+wilt suffer me to send for my own charger, and afford me a chance to
+retrieve mine honour. With that steed, or with one equal to thine, which
+seems to me of the English breed, I will gage all I possess, lands,
+castle, and gold, sword and spurs, to maintain this pass, one by one,
+against all thy train."
+
+Fortunately, perhaps, for Adrian, ere he could reply, Riccardo Annibaldi
+cried, with great warmth, "Sir Knight, I have with me two steeds well
+practised in the tourney; take thy choice, and accept in me a champion
+of the Roman against the French chivalry;--there is my gage."
+
+"Signor," replied Montreal, with ill-suppressed delight, "thy proffer
+shows so gallant and free a spirit, that it were foul sin in me to balk
+it. I accept thy gage, and whichever of thy steeds thou rejectest, in
+God's name bring it hither, and let us waste no words before action."
+
+Adrian, who felt that hitherto the Romans had been more favoured by
+fortune than merit, vainly endeavoured to prevent this second hazard.
+But Annibaldi was greatly chafed, and his high rank rendered it
+impolitic in Adrian to offend him by peremptory prohibition; the
+Colonna reluctantly, therefore, yielded his assent to the engagement.
+Annibaldi's steeds were led to the spot, the one a noble roan, the other
+a bay, of somewhat less breeding and bone, but still of great strength
+and price. Montreal finding the choice pressed upon him, gallantly
+selected the latter and less excellent.
+
+Annibaldi was soon arrayed for the encounter, and Adrian gave the word
+to the trumpeters. The Roman was of a stature almost equal to that of
+Montreal, and though some years younger, seemed, in his armour, nearly
+of the same thews and girth, so that the present antagonists appeared
+at the first glance more evenly matched than the last. But this time
+Montreal, well horsed, inspired to the utmost by shame and pride,
+felt himself a match for an army; and he met the young Baron with
+such prowess, that while the very plume on his casque seemed scarcely
+stirred, the Italian was thrown several paces from his steed, and it was
+not till some moments after his visor was removed by his squires that
+he recovered his senses. This event restored Montreal to all his natural
+gaiety of humour, and effectually raised the spirits of his followers,
+who had felt much humbled by the previous encounter.
+
+He himself assisted Annibaldi to rise with great courtesy, and a
+profusion of compliments, which the proud Roman took in stern silence,
+and then led the way to the pavilion, loudly ordering the banquet to be
+spread. Annibaldi, however, loitered behind, and Adrian, who penetrated
+his thoughts, and who saw that over their cups a quarrel between
+the Provencal and his friend was likely to ensue, drawing him aside,
+said:--"Methinks, dear Annibaldi, it would be better if you, with the
+chief of our following, were to proceed onward to Fondi, where I will
+join you at sunset. My squires, and some eight lances, will suffice for
+my safeguard here; and, to say truth, I desire a few private words
+with our strange host, in the hope that he may be peaceably induced
+to withdraw from hence without the help of our Roman troops, who have
+enough elsewhere to feed their valour."
+
+Annibaldi pressed his companion's hand: "I understand thee," he replied
+with a slight blush, "and, indeed, I could but ill brook the complacent
+triumph of the barbarian. I accept thy offer."
+
+
+
+Chapter 3.III. The Conversation between the Roman and the
+Provencal--Adeline's History--the Moonlit Sea--the Lute and the Song.
+
+As soon as Annibaldi, with the greater part of the retinue, was gone,
+Adrian, divesting himself of his heavy greaves, entered alone the
+pavilion of the Knight of St. John. Montreal had already doffed all his
+armour, save the breastplate, and he now stepped forward to welcome his
+guest with the winning and easy grace which better suited his birth
+than his profession. He received Adrian's excuses for the absence of
+Annibaldi and the other knights of his train with a smile which seemed
+to prove how readily he divined the cause, and conducted him to the
+other and more private division of the pavilion in which the repast
+(rendered acceptable by the late exercise of guest and host) was
+prepared; and here Adrian for the first time discovered Adeline. Long
+inurement to the various and roving life of her lover, joined to a
+certain pride which she derived from conscious, though forfeited, rank,
+gave to the outward manner of that beautiful lady an ease and freedom
+which often concealed, even from Montreal, her sensitiveness to her
+unhappy situation. At times, indeed, when alone with Montreal, whom she
+loved with all the devotion of romance, she was sensible only to the
+charm of a presence which consoled her for all things; but in his
+frequent absence, or on the admission of any stranger, the illusion
+vanished--the reality returned. Poor lady! Nature had not formed,
+education had not reared, habit had not reconciled, her to the breath of
+shame!
+
+The young Colonna was much struck by her beauty, and more by her gentle
+and highborn grace. Like her lord she appeared younger than she was;
+time seemed to spare a bloom which an experienced eye might have told
+was destined to an early grave; and there was something almost girlish
+in the lightness of her form--the braided luxuriance of her rich auburn
+hair, and the colour that went and came, not only with every moment,
+but almost with every word. The contrast between her and Montreal
+became them both--it was the contrast of devoted reliance and protecting
+strength: each looked fairer in the presence of the other: and as Adrian
+sate down to the well-laden board, he thought he had never seen a pair
+more formed for the poetic legends of their native Troubadours.
+
+Montreal conversed gaily upon a thousand matters--pressed the wine
+flasks--and selected for his guest the most delicate portions of the
+delicious spicola of the neighbouring sea, and the rich flesh of the
+wild boar of the Pontine Marshes.
+
+"Tell me," said Montreal, as their hunger was now appeased--"tell me,
+noble Adrian, how fares your kinsman, Signor Stephen? A brave old man
+for his years."
+
+"He bears him as the youngest of us," answered Adrian.
+
+"Late events must have shocked him a little," said Montreal, with an
+arch smile. "Ah, you look grave--yet commend my foresight;--I was the
+first who prophesied to thy kinsman the rise of Cola di Rienzi; he seems
+a great man--never more great than in conciliating the Colonna and the
+Orsini."
+
+"The Tribune," returned Adrian, evasively, "is certainly a man of
+extraordinary genius. And now, seeing him command, my only wonder is how
+he ever brooked to obey--majesty seems a very part of him."
+
+"Men who win power, easily put on its harness, dignity," answered
+Montreal; "and if I hear aright--(pledge me to your lady's health)--the
+Tribune, if not himself nobly born will soon be nobly connected."
+
+"He is already married to a Raselli, an old Roman house," replied
+Adrian.
+
+"You evade my pursuit,--Le doulx soupir! le doulx soupir! as the old
+Cabestan has it"--said Montreal, laughing. "Well, you have pledged me
+one cup to your lady, pledge another to the fair Irene, the Tribune's
+sister--always provided they two are not one.--You smile and shake your
+head."
+
+"I do not disguise from you, Sir Knight," answered Adrian, "that when my
+present embassy is over, I trust the alliance between the Tribune and a
+Colonna will go far towards the benefit of both."
+
+"I have heard rightly, then," said Montreal, in a grave and thoughtful
+tone. "Rienzi's power must, indeed, be great."
+
+"Of that my mission is a proof. Are you aware, Signor de Montreal, that
+Louis, King of Hungary--"
+
+"How! what of him?"
+
+"Has referred the decision of the feud between himself and Joanna of
+Naples, respecting the death of her royal spouse, his brother, to the
+fiat of the Tribune? This is the first time, methinks, since the death
+of Constantine, that so great a confidence and so high a charge were
+ever intrusted to a Roman!"
+
+"By all the saints in the calendar," cried Montreal, crossing himself,
+"this news is indeed amazing! The fierce Louis of Hungary waive the
+right of the sword, and choose other umpire than the field of battle!"
+
+"And this," continued Adrian, in a significant tone, "this it was which
+induced me to obey your courteous summons. I know, brave Montreal, that
+you hold intercourse with Louis. Louis has given to the Tribune the best
+pledge of his amity and alliance; will you do wisely if you--"
+
+"Wage war with the Hungarian's ally," interrupted Montreal. "This you
+were about to add; the same thought crossed myself. My Lord, pardon
+me--Italians sometimes invent what they wish. On the honour of a knight
+of the Empire, these tidings are the naked truth?"
+
+"By my honour, and on the Cross," answered Adrian, drawing himself up;
+"and in proof thereof, I am now bound to Naples to settle with the Queen
+the preliminaries of the appointed trial."
+
+"Two crowned heads before the tribunal of a plebeian, and one a
+defendant against the charge of murther!" muttered Montreal; "the news
+might well amaze me!"
+
+He remained musing and silent a little while, till looking up, he caught
+Adeline's tender gaze fixed upon him with that deep solicitude with
+which she watched the outward effect of schemes and projects she was too
+soft to desire to know, and too innocent to share.
+
+"Lady mine," said the Provencal, fondly, "how sayest thou? must we
+abandon our mountain castle, and these wild woodland scenes, for the
+dull walls of a city? I fear me so.--The Lady Adeline," he continued,
+turning to Adrian, "is of a singular bias; she hates the gay crowds
+of streets and thoroughfares, and esteems no palace like the solitary
+outlaw's hold. Yet, methinks, she might outshine all the faces of
+Italy,--thy mistress, Lord Adrian, of course, excepted."
+
+"It is an exception which only a lover, and that too a betrothed lover,
+would dare to make," replied Adrian, gallantly.
+
+"Nay," said Adeline, in a voice singularly sweet and clear, "nay, I know
+well at what price to value my lord's flattery, and Signor di Castello's
+courtesy. But you are bound, Sir Knight, to a court, that, if fame speak
+true, boasts in its Queen the very miracle and mould of beauty."
+
+"It is some years since I saw the Queen of Naples," answered Adrian;
+"and I little dreamed then, when I gazed upon that angel face, that I
+should live to hear her accused of the foulest murther that ever stained
+even Italian royalty."
+
+"And, as if resolved to prove her guilt," said Montreal, "ere long
+be sure she will marry the very man who did the deed. Of this I have
+certain proof."
+
+Thus conversing, the Knights wore away the daylight, and beheld from the
+open tent the sun cast his setting glow over the purple sea. Adeline
+had long retired from the board, and they now saw her seated with her
+handmaids on a mound by the beach; while the sound of her lute faintly
+reached their ears. As Montreal caught the air, he turned from the
+converse, and sighing, half shaded his face with his hand. Somehow or
+other the two Knights had worn away all the little jealousy or pique
+which they had conceived against each other at Rome. Both imbued with
+the soldier-like spirit of the age, their contest in the morning had
+served to inspire them with that strange kind of respect, and even
+cordiality, which one brave man even still (how much more at that day!)
+feels for another, whose courage he has proved while vindicating his
+own. It is like the discovery of a congenial sentiment hitherto latent;
+and, in a life of camps, often establishes sudden and lasting friendship
+in the very lap of enmity. This feeling had been ripened by their
+subsequent familiar intercourse, and was increased on Adrian's side by
+the feeling, that in convincing Montreal of the policy of withdrawing
+from the Roman territories, he had obtained an advantage that well
+repaid whatever danger and delay he had undergone.
+
+The sigh, and the altered manner of Montreal, did not escape Adrian, and
+he naturally connected it with something relating to her whose music had
+been its evident cause.
+
+"Yon lovely dame," said he, gently, "touches the lute with an exquisite
+and fairy hand, and that plaintive air seems to my ear as of the
+minstrelsy of Provence."
+
+"It is the air I taught her," said Montreal, sadly, "married as it is
+to indifferent words, with which I first wooed a heart that should never
+have given itself to me! Ay, young Colonna, many a night has my boat
+been moored beneath the starlit Sorgia that washes her proud father's
+halls, and my voice awaked the stillness of the waving sedges with a
+soldier's serenade. Sweet memories! bitter fruit!"
+
+"Why bitter? ye love each other still."
+
+"But I am vowed to celibacy, and Adeline de Courval is leman where she
+should be wedded dame. Methinks I fret at that thought even more than
+she,--dear Adeline!"
+
+"Your lady, as all would guess, is then nobly born?"
+
+"She is," answered Montreal, with a deep and evident feeling which, save
+in love, rarely, if ever, crossed his hardy breast. "She is! our tale is
+a brief one:--we loved each other as children: Her family was wealthier
+than mine: We were separated. I was given to understand that she
+abandoned me. I despaired, and in despair I took the cross of St. John.
+Chance threw us again together. I learned that her love was
+undecayed. Poor child!--she was even then, sir, but a child! I,
+wild,--reckless--and not unskilled, perhaps, in the arts that woo and
+win. She could not resist my suit or her own affection!--We fled. In
+those words you see the thread of my after history. My sword and
+my Adeline were all my fortune. Society frowned on us. The Church
+threatened my soul. The Grand Master my life. I became a knight of
+fortune. Fate and my right hand favoured me. I have made those who
+scorned me tremble at my name. That name shall yet blaze, a star or a
+meteor, in the front of troubled nations, and I may yet win by force
+from the Pontiff the dispensation refused to my prayers. On the same
+day, I may offer Adeline the diadem and the ring.--Eno' of this;--you
+marked Adeline's cheek!--Seems it not delicate? I like not that
+changeful flush,--and she moves languidly,--her step that was so
+blithe!"
+
+"Change of scene and the mild south will soon restore her health," said
+Adrian; "and in your peculiar life she is so little brought in contact
+with others, especially of her own sex, that I trust she is but seldom
+made aware of whatever is painful in her situation. And woman's love,
+Montreal, as we both have learned, is a robe that wraps her from many a
+storm!"
+
+"You speak kindly," returned the Knight; "but you know not all our cause
+of grief. Adeline's father, a proud sieur, died,--they said of a broken
+heart,--but old men die of many another disease than that! The mother, a
+dame who boasted her descent from princes, bore the matter more sternly
+than the sire; clamoured for revenge,--which was odd, for she is as
+religious as a Dominican, and revenge is not Christian in a woman,
+though it is knightly in a man!--Well, my Lord, we had one boy, our
+only child; he was Adeline's solace in my absence,--his pretty ways were
+worth the world to her! She loved him so, that, but he had her eyes and
+looked like her when he slept, I should have been jealous! He grew up in
+our wild life, strong and comely; the young rogue, he would have been a
+brave knight! My evil stars led me to Milan, where I had business with
+the Visconti. One bright morning in June, our boy was stolen; verily
+that June was like a December to us!"
+
+"Stolen!--how?--by whom?"
+
+"The first question is answered easily,--the boy was with his nurse in
+the courtyard, the idle wench left him for but a minute or two--so she
+avers--fetch him some childish toy; when she returned he was gone; not a
+trace left, save his pretty cap with the plume in it! Poor Adeline, many
+a time have I found her kissing that relic till it was wet with tears!"
+
+"A strange fortune, in truth. But what interest could--"
+
+"I will tell you," interrupted Montreal, "the only conjecture I could
+form;--Adeline's mother, on learning we had a son, sent to Adeline a
+letter, that well nigh broke her heart, reproaching her for her love
+to me, and so forth, as if that had made her the vilest of the sex.
+She bade her take compassion on her child, and not bring him up to a
+robber's life,--so was she pleased to style the bold career of Walter de
+Montreal. She offered to rear the child in her own dull halls, and fit
+him, no doubt, for a shaven pate and a monk's cowl. She chafed much that
+a mother would not part with her treasure! She alone, partly in revenge,
+partly in silly compassion for Adeline's child, partly, it may be, from
+some pious fanaticism, could, it so seemed to me, have robbed us of our
+boy. On inquiry, I learned from the nurse--who, but that she was of the
+same sex as Adeline, should have tasted my dagger,--that in their walks,
+a woman of advanced years, but seemingly of humble rank, (that might
+be disguise!) had often stopped, and caressed and admired the child. I
+repaired at once to France, sought the old Castle of De Courval;--it had
+passed to the next heir, and the old widow was go on, none knew whither,
+but, it was conjectured, to take the veil in some remote convent."
+
+"And you never saw her since?"
+
+"Yes, at Rome," answered Montreal, turning pale; "when last there I
+chanced suddenly upon her; and then at length I learned my boy's fate,
+and the truth of my own surmise; she confessed to the theft--and my
+child was dead! I have not dared to tell Adeline of this; it seems to me
+as if it would be like plucking the shaft from the wounded side--and she
+would die at once, bereft of the uncertainty that rankles within her.
+She has still a hope--it comforts her; though my heart bleeds when I
+think on its vanity. Let this pass, my Colonna."
+
+And Montreal started to his feet as if he strove, by a strong effort, to
+shake off the weakness that had crept over him in his narration.
+
+"Think no more of it. Life is short--its thorns are many--let us not
+neglect any of its flowers. This is piety and wisdom too; Nature that
+meant me to struggle and to toil, gave me, happily, the sanguine heart
+and the elastic soul of France; and I have lived long enough to own that
+to die young is not an evil. Come, Lord Adrian, let us join my lady ere
+you part, if part you must; the moon will be up soon, and Fondi is but
+a short journey hence. You know that though I admire not your Petrarch,
+you with more courtesy laud our Provencal ballads, and you must hear
+Adeline sing one that you may prize them the more. The race of the
+Troubadours is dead, but the minstrelsy survives the minstrel!"
+
+Adrian, who scarce knew what comfort to administer to the affliction of
+his companion, was somewhat relieved by the change in his mood, though
+his more grave and sensitive nature was a little startled at its
+suddenness. But, as we have before seen, Montreal's spirit (and this
+made perhaps its fascination) was as a varying and changeful sky;
+the gayest sunshine, and the fiercest storm swept over it in rapid
+alternation; and elements of singular might and grandeur, which,
+properly directed and concentrated, would have made him the blessing and
+glory of his time, were wielded with a boyish levity, roused into war
+and desolation, or lulled into repose and smoothness, with all the
+suddenness of chance, and all the fickleness of caprice.
+
+Sauntering down to the beach, the music of Adeline's lute sounded more
+distinctly in their ears, and involuntarily they hushed their steps
+upon the rich and odorous turf, as in a voice, though not powerful,
+marvellously sweet and clear, and well adapted to the simple fashion of
+the words and melody, she sang the following stanzas:--
+
+Lay of the Lady of Provence.
+
+     1.
+
+     Ah, why art thou sad, my heart?  Why
+     Darksome and lonely?
+     Frowns the face of the happy sky
+     Over thee only?
+     Ah me, ah me!
+     Render to joy the earth!
+     Grief shuns, not envies, Mirth;
+     But leave one quiet spot,
+     Where Mirth may enter not,
+     To sigh, Ah, me!--
+     Ah me.
+
+     2.
+
+     As a bird, though the sky be clear,
+     Feels the storm lower;
+     My soul bodes the tempest near,
+     In the sunny hour;
+     Ah me, ah me!
+     Be glad while yet we may!
+     I bid thee, my heart, be gay;
+     And still I know not why,--
+     Thou answerest with a sigh,
+     (Fond heart!) Ah me!--
+     Ah me!
+
+     3.
+
+     As this twilight o'er the skies,
+     Doubt brings the sorrow;
+     Who knows when the daylight dies,
+     What waits the morrow?
+     Ah me, ah me!
+     Be blithe, be blithe, my lute,
+     Thy strings will soon be mute;
+     Be blithe--hark! while it dies,
+     The note forewarning, sighs
+     Its last--Ah me!
+     Ah me!
+
+"My own Adeline--my sweetest night-bird," half-whispered Montreal, and
+softly approaching, he threw himself at his lady's feet--"thy song is
+too sad for this golden eve."
+
+"No sound ever went to the heart," said Adrian, "whose arrow was not
+feathered by sadness. True sentiment, Montreal, is twin with melancholy,
+though not with gloom."
+
+The lady looked softly and approvingly up at Adrian's face; she was
+pleased with its expression; she was pleased yet more with words of
+which women rather than men would acknowledge the truth. Adrian returned
+the look with one of deep and eloquent sympathy and respect; in fact,
+the short story he had heard from Montreal had interested him deeply in
+her; and never to the brilliant queen, to whose court he was bound, did
+his manner wear so chivalric and earnest a homage as it did to that lone
+and ill-fated lady on the twilight shores of Terracina.
+
+Adeline blushed slightly and sighed; and then, to break the awkwardness
+of a pause which had stolen over them, as Montreal, unheeding the last
+remark of Adrian, was tuning the strings of the lute, she said--"Of
+course the Signor di Castello shares the universal enthusiasm for
+Petrarch?"
+
+"Ay," cried Montreal; "my lady is Petrarch mad, like the rest of them:
+but all I know is, that never did belted knight and honest lover woo in
+such fantastic and tortured strains."
+
+"In Italy," answered Adrian, "common language is exaggeration;--but even
+your own Troubadour poetry might tell you that love, ever seeking a new
+language of its own, cannot but often run into what to all but lovers
+seems distortion and conceit."
+
+"Come, dear Signor," said Montreal, placing the lute in Adrian's hands,
+"let Adeline be the umpire between us, which music--yours or mine--can
+woo the more blandly."
+
+"Ah," said Adrian, laughing; "I fear me, Sir Knight, you have already
+bribed the umpire."
+
+Montreal's eyes and Adeline's met; and in that gaze Adeline forgot all
+her sorrows.
+
+With a practised and skilful hand, Adrian touched the strings; and
+selecting a song which was less elaborate than those mostly in vogue
+amongst his countrymen, though still conceived in the Italian spirit,
+and in accordance with the sentiment he had previously expressed to
+Adeline, he sang as follows:--
+
+Love's Excuse for Sadness.
+
+Chide not, beloved, if oft with thee I feel not rapture wholly; For aye
+the heart that's fill'd with love, Runs o'er in melancholy. To streams
+that glide in noon, the shade From summer skies is given; So, if my
+breast reflects the cloud, 'Tis but the cloud of heaven! Thine image
+glass'd within my soul So well the mirror keepeth; That, chide me not,
+if with the light The shadow also sleepeth.
+
+"And now," said Adrian, as he concluded, "the lute is to you: I but
+preclude your prize."
+
+The Provencal laughed, and shook his head.--"With any other umpire, I
+had had my lute broken on my own head, for my conceit in provoking such
+a rival; but I must not shrink from a contest I have myself provoked,
+even though in one day twice defeated." And with that, in a deep and
+exquisitely melodious voice, which wanted only more scientific culture
+to have challenged any competition, the Knight of St. John poured forth:
+
+The Lay of the Troubadour.
+
+     1.
+
+     Gentle river, the moonbeam is hush'd on thy tide,
+     On thy pathway of light to my lady I glide.
+     My boat, where the stream laves the castle, I moor,--
+     All at rest save the maid and her young Troubadour!
+     As the stars to the waters that bore
+     My bark, to my spirit thou art;
+     Heaving yet, see it bound to the shore,
+     So moor'd to thy beauty my heart,--
+     Bel' amie, bel' amie, bel' amie!
+
+     2.
+
+     Wilt thou fly from the world?  It hath wealth for the vain;
+     But Love breaks his bond when there's gold in the chain;
+     Wilt thou fly from the world?  It hath courts for the proud;--
+     But Love, born in caves, pines to death in the crowd.
+     Were this bosom thy world, dearest one,
+     Thy world could not fail to be bright;
+     For thou shouldst thyself be its sun,
+     And what spot could be dim in thy light--
+     Bel' amie, bel' amie, bel' amie?
+
+     3.
+
+     The rich and the great woo thee dearest; and poor,
+     Though his fathers were princes, thy young Troubadour!
+     But his heart never quail'd save to thee, his adored,--
+     There's no guile in his lute, and no stain on his sword.
+     Ah, I reck not what sorrows I know,
+     Could I still on thy solace confide;
+     And I care not, though earth be my foe,
+     If thy soft heart be found by my side,--
+     Bel' amie, bel' amie, bel' amie!
+
+     4.
+
+     The maiden she blush'd, and the maiden she sighed,
+     Not a cloud in the sky, not a gale on the tide;
+     But though tempest had raged on the wave and the wind,
+     That castle, methinks, had been still left behind!
+     Sweet lily, though bow'd by the blast,
+     (To this bosom transplanted) since then,
+     Wouldst thou change, could we call the past,
+     To the rock from thy garden again--
+     Bel' amie, bel' amie, bel' amie?
+
+Thus they alternated the time with converse and song, as the wooded
+hills threw their sharp, long shadows over the sea; while from many a
+mound of waking flowers, and many a copse of citron and orange, relieved
+by the dark and solemn aloe, stole the summer breeze, laden with mingled
+odours; and, over the seas, coloured by the slow-fading hues of purple
+and rose, that the sun had long bequeathed to the twilight, flitted the
+gay fireflies that sparkle along that enchanted coast. At length, the
+moon slowly rose above the dark forest-steeps, gleaming on the gay
+pavilion and glittering pennon of Montreal,--on the verdant sward,--the
+polished mail of the soldiers, stretched on the grass in various groups,
+half-shaded by oaks and cypress, and the war-steeds grazing peaceably
+together--a wild mixture of the Pastoral and the Iron time.
+
+Adrian, reluctantly reminded of his journey, rose to depart.
+
+"I fear," said he to Adeline, "that I have already detained you too late
+in the night air: but selfishness is little considerate."
+
+"Nay, you see we are prudent," said Adeline, pointing to Montreal's
+mantle, which his provident hand had long since drawn around her form;
+"but if you must part, farewell, and success attend you!"
+
+"We may meet again, I trust," said Adrian.
+
+Adeline sighed gently; and the Colonna, gazing on her face by the
+moonlight, to which it was slightly raised, was painfully struck by its
+almost transparent delicacy. Moved by his compassion, ere he mounted
+his steed, he drew Montreal aside,--"Forgive me if I seem presumptuous,"
+said he; "but to one so noble this wild life is scarce a fitting career.
+I know that, in our time, War consecrates all his children; but surely
+a settled rank in the court of the Emperor, or an honourable
+reconciliation with your knightly brethren, were better--"
+
+"Than a Tartar camp, and a brigand's castle," interrupted Montreal, with
+some impatience. "This you were about to say--you are mistaken. Society
+thrust me from her bosom; let society take the fruit it hath sown. 'A
+fixed rank,' say you? some subaltern office, to fight at other men's
+command! You know me not: Walter de Montreal was not formed to obey.
+War when I will, and rest when I list, is the motto of my escutcheon.
+Ambition proffers me rewards you wot not of; and I am of the mould as
+of the race of those whose swords have conquered thrones. For the rest,
+your news of the alliance of Louis of Hungary with your Tribune makes it
+necessary for the friend of Louis to withdraw from all feud with Rome.
+Ere the week expire, the owl and the bat may seek refuge in yon grey
+turrets."
+
+"But your lady?"
+
+"Is inured to change.--God help her, and temper the rough wind to the
+lamb!"
+
+"Enough, Sir Knight: but should you desire a sure refuge at Rome for one
+so gentle and so highborn, by the right hand of a knight, I promise a
+safe roof and an honoured home to the Lady Adeline."
+
+Montreal pressed the offered hand to his heart; then plucking his own
+hastily away, drew it across his eyes, and joined Adeline, in a silence
+that showed he dared not trust himself to speak. In a few moments Adrian
+and his train were on the march; but still the young Colonna turned
+back, to gaze once more on his wild host and that lovely lady, as
+they themselves lingered on the moonlit sward, while the sea rippled
+mournfully on their ears.
+
+It was not many months after that date, that the name of Fra Monreale
+scattered terror and dismay throughout the fair Campania. The right
+hand of the Hungarian king, in his invasion of Naples, he was chosen
+afterwards vicar (or vice-gerent) of Louis in Aversa; and fame and fate
+seemed to lead him triumphantly along that ambitious career which he had
+elected, whether bounded by the scaffold or the throne.
+
+
+
+
+BOOK IV. THE TRIUMPH AND THE POMP.
+
+     "Allora fama e paura di si buono reggimento, passa in ogni
+     terra."--"Vita di Cola di Rienzi", lib. i. cap. 21.
+
+     "Then the fame and the fear of that so good government
+     passed into every land."--"Life of Cola di Rienzi".
+
+
+
+Chapter 4.I. The Boy Angelo--the Dream of Nina Fulfilled.
+
+The thread of my story transports us back to Rome. It was in a small
+chamber, in a ruinous mansion by the base of Mount Aventine, that a
+young boy sate, one evening, with a woman of a tall and stately form,
+but somewhat bowed both by infirmity and years. The boy was of a fair
+and comely presence; and there was that in his bold, frank, undaunted
+carriage, which made him appear older than he was.
+
+The old woman, seated in the recess of the deep window, was apparently
+occupied with a Bible that lay open on her knees; but ever and anon she
+lifted her eyes, and gazed on her young companion with a sad and anxious
+expression.
+
+"Dame," said the boy, who was busily employed in hewing out a sword of
+wood, "I would you had seen the show today. Why, every day is a show
+at Rome now! It is show enough to see the Tribune himself on his white
+steed--(oh, it is so beautiful!)--with his white robes all studded with
+jewels. But today, as I have just been telling you, the Lady Nina took
+notice of me, as I stood on the stairs of the Capitol: you know, dame, I
+had donned my best blue velvet doublet."
+
+"And she called you a fair boy, and asked if you would be her little
+page; and this has turned thy brain, silly urchin that thou art--"
+
+"But the words are the least: if you saw the Lady Nina, you would own
+that a smile from her might turn the wisest head in Italy. Oh, how I
+should like to serve the Tribune! All the lads of my age are mad for
+him. How they will stare, and envy me at school tomorrow! You know too,
+dame, that though I was not always brought up at Rome, I am Roman. Every
+Roman loves Rienzi."
+
+"Ay, for the hour: the cry will soon change. This vanity of thine,
+Angelo, vexes my old heart. I would thou wert humbler."
+
+"Bastards have their own name to win," said the boy, colouring deeply.
+"They twit me in the teeth, because I cannot say who my father and
+mother were."
+
+"They need not," returned the dame, hastily. "Thou comest of noble blood
+and long descent, though, as I have told thee often, I know not the
+exact names of thy parents. But what art thou shaping that tough sapling
+of oak into?"
+
+"A sword, dame, to assist the Tribune against the robbers."
+
+"Alas! I fear me, like all those who seek power in Italy, he is more
+likely to enlist robbers than to assail them."
+
+"Why, la you there, you live so shut up, that you know and hear nothing,
+or you would have learned that even that fiercest of all the robbers,
+Fra Moreale, has at length yielded to the Tribune, and fled from his
+castle, like a rat from a falling house."
+
+"How, how!" cried the dame; "what say you? Has this plebeian, whom you
+call the Tribune--has he boldly thrown the gage to that dread warrior?
+and has Montreal left the Roman territory?"
+
+"Ay, it is the talk of the town. But Fra Moreale seems as much a bugbear
+to you as to e'er a mother in Rome. Did he ever wrong you, dame?"
+
+"Yes!" exclaimed the old woman, with so abrupt a fierceness, that even
+that hardy boy was startled.
+
+"I wish I could meet him, then," said he, after a pause, as he
+flourished his mimic weapon.
+
+"Now Heaven forbid! He is a man ever to be shunned by thee, whether for
+peace or war. Say again this good Tribune holds no terms with the Free
+Lances."
+
+"Say it again--why all Rome knows it."
+
+"He is pious, too, I have heard; and they do bruit it that he sees
+visions, and is comforted from above," said the woman, speaking to
+herself. Then turning to Angelo, she continued,--"Thou wouldst like
+greatly to accept the Lady Nina's proffer?"
+
+"Ah, that I should, dame, if you could spare me."
+
+"Child," replied the matron, solemnly, "my sand is nearly run, and my
+wish is to see thee placed with one who will nurture thy young years,
+and save thee from a life of licence. That done, I may fulfil my vow,
+and devote the desolate remnant of my years to God. I will think more
+of this, my child. Not under such a plebeian's roof shouldst thou have
+lodged, nor from a stranger's board been fed: but at Rome, my last
+relative worthy of the trust is dead;--and at the worst, obscure honesty
+is better than gaudy crime. Thy spirit troubles me already. Back, my
+child; I must to my closet, and watch and pray."
+
+Thus saying, the old woman, repelling the advance, and silencing the
+muttered and confused words, of the boy--half affectionate as they were,
+yet half tetchy and wayward--glided from the chamber.
+
+The boy looked abstractedly at the closing door, and then said to
+himself--"The dame is always talking riddles: I wonder if she know more
+of me than she tells, or if she is any way akin to me. I hope not, for
+I don't love her much; nor, for that matter, anything else. I wish she
+would place me with the Tribune's lady, and then we'll see who among the
+lads will call Angelo Villani bastard."
+
+With that the boy fell to work again at his sword with redoubled vigour.
+In fact, the cold manner of this female, his sole nurse, companion,
+substitute for parent, had repelled his affections without subduing his
+temper; and though not originally of evil disposition, Angelo Villani
+was already insolent, cunning, and revengeful; but not, on the other
+hand, without a quick susceptibility to kindness as to affront, a
+natural acuteness of understanding, and a great indifference to fear.
+Brought up in quiet affluence rather than luxury, and living much with
+his protector, whom he knew but by the name of Ursula, his bearing was
+graceful, and his air that of the well-born. And it was his carriage,
+perhaps, rather than his countenance, which, though handsome, was more
+distinguished for intelligence than beauty, which had attracted the
+notice of the Tribune's bride. His education was that of one reared for
+some scholastic profession. He was not only taught to read and write,
+but had been even instructed in the rudiments of Latin. He did not,
+however, incline to these studies half so fondly as to the games of his
+companions, or the shows or riots in the street, into all of which
+he managed to thrust himself, and from which he had always the happy
+dexterity to return safe and unscathed.
+
+The next morning Ursula entered the young Angelo's chamber. "Wear again
+thy blue doublet today," said she; "I would have thee look thy best.
+Thou shalt go with me to the palace."
+
+"What, today?" cried the boy joyfully, half leaping from his bed.
+"Dear dame Ursula, shall I really then belong to the train of the great
+Tribune's lady?"
+
+"Yes; and leave the old woman to die alone! Your joy becomes you,--but
+ingratitude is in your blood. Ingratitude! Oh, it has burned my heart
+into ashes--and yours, boy, can no longer find a fuel in the dry
+crumbling cinders."
+
+"Dear dame, you are always so biting. You know you said you wished to
+retire into a convent, and I was too troublesome a charge for you. But
+you delight in rebuking me, justly or unjustly."
+
+"My task is over," said Ursula, with a deep-drawn sigh.
+
+The boy answered not; and the old woman retired with a heavy step,
+and, it may be, a heavier heart. When he joined her in their common
+apartment, he observed what his joy had previously blinded him to--that
+Ursula did not wear her usual plain and sober dress. The gold chain,
+rarely assumed then by women not of noble birth--though, in the
+other sex, affected also by public functionaries and wealthy
+merchants--glittered upon a robe of the rich flowered stuffs of Venice,
+and the clasps that confined the vest at the throat and waist were
+adorned with jewels of no common price.
+
+Angelo's eye was struck by the change, but he felt a more manly pride in
+remarking that the old lady became it well. Her air and mien were indeed
+those of one to whom such garments were habitual; and they seemed that
+day more than usually austere and stately.
+
+She smoothed the boy's ringlets, drew his short mantle more gracefully
+over his shoulder, and then placed in his belt a poniard whose handle
+was richly studded, and a purse well filled with florins.
+
+"Learn to use both discreetly," said she; "and, whether I live or die,
+you will never require to wield the poniard to procure the gold."
+
+"This, then," cried Angelo, enchanted, "is a real poniard to fight the
+robbers with! Ah, with this I should not fear Fra Moreale, who wronged
+thee so. I trust I may yet avenge thee, though thou didst rate me so
+just now for ingratitude."
+
+"I am avenged. Nourish not such thoughts, my son, they are sinful;
+at least I fear so. Draw to the board and eat; we will go betimes, as
+petitioners should do."
+
+Angelo had soon finished his morning meal, and sallying with Ursula to
+the porch, he saw, to his surprise, four of those servitors who then
+usually attended persons of distinction, and who were to be hired in
+every city, for the convenience of strangers or the holyday ostentation
+of the gayer citizens.
+
+"How grand we are today!" said he, clapping his hands with an eagerness
+which Ursula failed not to reprove.
+
+"It is not for vain show," she added, "which true nobility can well
+dispense with, but that we may the more readily gain admittance to the
+palace. These princes of yesterday are not easy of audience to the over
+humble."
+
+"Oh! but you are wrong this time," said the boy. "The Tribune gives
+audience to all men, the poorest as the richest. Nay, there is not a
+ragged boor, or a bare-footed friar, who does not win access to him
+sooner than the proudest baron. That's why the people love him so.
+And he devotes one day of the week to receiving the widows and the
+orphans;--and you know, dame, I am an orphan."
+
+Ursula, already occupied with her own thoughts, did not answer, and
+scarcely heard, the boy; but leaning on his young arm, and preceded by
+the footmen to clear the way, passed slowly towards the palace of the
+Capitol.
+
+A wonderful thing would it have been to a more observant eye, to note
+the change which two or three short months of the stern but salutary
+and wise rule of the Tribune had effected in the streets of Rome. You
+no longer beheld the gaunt and mail-clad forms of foreign mercenaries
+stalking through the vistas, or grouped in lazy insolence before
+the embattled porches of some gloomy palace. The shops, that in many
+quarters had been closed for years, were again open, glittering with
+wares and bustling with trade. The thoroughfares, formerly either silent
+as death, or crossed by some affrighted and solitary passenger with
+quick steps, and eyes that searched every corner,--or resounding with
+the roar of a pauper rabble, or the open feuds of savage nobles, now
+exhibited the regular, and wholesome, and mingled streams of civilized
+life, whether bound to pleasure or to commerce. Carts and waggons laden
+with goods which had passed in safety by the dismantled holds of the
+robbers of the Campagna, rattled cheerfully over the pathways. "Never,
+perhaps,"--to use the translation adapted from the Italian authorities,
+by a modern and by no means a partial historian (Gibbon.)--"Never,
+perhaps, has the energy and effect of a single mind been more remarkably
+felt than in the sudden reformation of Rome by the Tribune Rienzi. A
+den of robbers was converted to the discipline of a camp or convent. 'In
+this time,' says the historian, ("Vita di Cola di Rienzi", lib. i. c.
+9.) 'did the woods begin to rejoice that they were no longer infested
+with robbers; the oxen began to plough; the pilgrims visited the
+sanctuaries; (Gibbon: the words in the original are "li pellegrini
+cominciaro a fere la cerca per la santuaria.") the roads and inns
+were replenished with travellers: trade, plenty, and good faith, were
+restored in the markets; and a purse of gold might be exposed without
+danger in the midst of the highways.'"
+
+Amidst all these evidences of comfort and security to the people--some
+dark and discontented countenances might be seen mingled in the crowd,
+and whenever one who wore the livery of the Colonna or the Orsini felt
+himself jostled by the throng, a fierce hand moved involuntarily to the
+sword-belt, and a half-suppressed oath was ended with an indignant
+sigh. Here and there too,--contrasting the redecorated, refurnished, and
+smiling shops--heaps of rubbish before the gate of some haughty mansion
+testified the abasement of fortifications which the owner impotently
+resented as a sacrilege. Through such streets and such throngs did the
+party we accompany wend their way, till they found themselves amidst
+crowds assembled before the entrance of the Capitol. The officers there
+stationed kept, however, so discreet and dexterous an order, that they
+were not long detained; and now in the broad place or court of that
+memorable building, they saw the open doors of the great justice-hall,
+guarded but by a single sentinel, and in which, for six hours daily,
+did the Tribune hold his court, for "patient to hear, swift to redress,
+inexorable to punish, his tribunal was always accessible to the poor and
+stranger." (Gibbon.)
+
+Not, however, to that hall did the party bend its way, but to the
+entrance which admitted to the private apartments of the palace. And
+here the pomp, the gaud, the more than regal magnificence, of the
+residence of the Tribune, strongly contrasted the patriarchal simplicity
+which marked his justice court.
+
+Even Ursula, not unaccustomed, of yore, to the luxurious state of
+Italian and French principalities, seemed roused into surprise at the
+hall crowded with retainers in costly liveries, the marble and gilded
+columns wreathed with flowers, and the gorgeous banners wrought with the
+blended arms of the Republican City and the Pontifical See, which blazed
+aloft and around.
+
+Scarce knowing whom to address in such an assemblage, Ursula was
+relieved from her perplexity by an officer attired in a suit of crimson
+and gold, who, with a grave and formal decorum, which indeed reigned
+throughout the whole retinue, demanded, respectfully, whom she sought?
+"The Signora Nina!" replied Ursula, drawing up her stately person, with
+a natural, though somewhat antiquated, dignity. There was something
+foreign in the accent, which influenced the officer's answer.
+
+"Today, madam, I fear that the Signora receives only the Roman ladies.
+Tomorrow is that appointed for all foreign dames of distinction."
+
+Ursula, with a slight impatience of tone, replied--"My business is of
+that nature which is welcome on any day, at palaces. I come, Signor, to
+lay certain presents at the Signora's feet, which I trust she will deign
+to accept."
+
+"And say, Signor," added the boy, abruptly, "that Angelo Villani, whom
+the Lady Nina honoured yesterday with her notice, is no stranger but a
+Roman; and comes, as she bade him, to proffer to the Signora his homage
+and devotion."
+
+The grave officer could not refrain a smile at the pert, yet not
+ungraceful, boldness of the boy.
+
+"I remember me, Master Angelo Villani," he replied, "that the Lady
+Nina spoke to you by the great staircase. Madam, I will do your errand.
+Please to follow me to an apartment more fitting your sex and seeming."
+
+With that the officer led the way across the hall to a broad staircase
+of white marble, along the centre of which were laid those rich Eastern
+carpets which at that day, when rushes strewed the chambers of an
+English monarch, were already common to the greater luxury of Italian
+palaces. Opening a door at the first flight, he ushered Ursula and
+her young charge into a lofty ante-chamber, hung with arras of wrought
+velvets; while over the opposite door, through which the officer now
+vanished, were blazoned the armorial bearings which the Tribune so
+constantly introduced in all his pomp, not more from the love of show,
+than from his politic desire to mingle with the keys of the Pontiff the
+heraldic insignia of the Republic.
+
+"Philip of Valois is not housed like this man!" muttered Ursula. "If
+this last, I shall have done better for my charge than I recked of."
+
+The officer soon returned, and led them across an apartment of vast
+extent, which was indeed the great reception chamber of the palace.
+Four-and-twenty columns of the Oriental alabaster which had attested the
+spoils of the later emperors, and had been disinterred from forgotten
+ruins, to grace the palace of the Reviver of the old Republic, supported
+the light roof, which, half Gothic, half classic, in its architecture,
+was inlaid with gilded and purple mosaics. The tesselated floor was
+covered in the centre with cloth of gold, the walls were clothed, at
+intervals, with the same gorgeous hangings, relieved by panels freshly
+painted in the most glowing colours, with mystic and symbolical designs.
+At the upper end of this royal chamber, two steps ascended to the place
+of the Tribune's throne, above which was the canopy wrought with the
+eternal armorial bearings of the Pontiff and the City.
+
+Traversing this apartment, the officer opened the door at its extremity,
+which admitted to a small chamber, crowded with pages in rich dresses of
+silver and blue velvet. There were few amongst them elder than Angelo;
+and, from their general beauty, they seemed the very flower and blossom
+of the city.
+
+Short time had Angelo to gaze on his comrades that were to be:--another
+minute, and he and his protectress were in the presence of the Tribune's
+bride.
+
+The chamber was not large--but it was large enough to prove that the
+beautiful daughter of Raselli had realised her visions of vanity and
+splendour.
+
+It was an apartment that mocked description--it seemed a cabinet for the
+gems of the world. The daylight, shaded by high and deep-set casements
+of stained glass, streamed in a purple and mellow hue over all that the
+art of that day boasted most precious, or regal luxury held most dear.
+The candelabras of the silver workmanship of Florence; the carpets and
+stuffs of the East; the draperies of Venice and Genoa; paintings like
+the illuminated missals, wrought in gold, and those lost colours of blue
+and crimson; antique marbles, which spoke of the bright days of Athens;
+tables of disinterred mosaics, their freshness preserved as by magic;
+censers of gold that steamed with the odours of Araby, yet so subdued
+as not to deaden the healthier scent of flowers, which blushed in every
+corner from their marble and alabaster vases; a small and spirit-like
+fountain, which seemed to gush from among wreaths of roses, diffusing
+in its diamond and fairy spray, a scarce felt coolness to the air;--all
+these, and such as these, which it were vain work to detail, congregated
+in the richest luxuriance, harmonised with the most exquisite taste,
+uniting the ancient arts with the modern, amazed and intoxicated the
+sense of the beholder. It was not so much the cost, nor the luxury, that
+made the character of the chamber; it was a certain gorgeous and almost
+sublime phantasy,--so that it seemed rather the fabled retreat of
+an enchantress, at whose word genii ransacked the earth, and fairies
+arranged the produce, than the grosser splendour of an earthly queen.
+Behind the piled cushions upon which Nina half reclined, stood four
+girls, beautiful as nymphs, with fans of the rarest feathers, and at
+her feet lay one older than the rest, whose lute, though now silent,
+attested her legitimate occupation.
+
+But, had the room in itself seemed somewhat too fantastic and
+overcharged in its prodigal ornaments, the form and face of Nina would
+at once have rendered all appropriate; so completely did she seem the
+natural Spirit of the Place; so wonderfully did her beauty, elated as it
+now was with contented love, gratified vanity, exultant hope, body forth
+the brightest vision that ever floated before the eyes of Tasso, when
+he wrought into one immortal shape the glory of the Enchantress with the
+allurements of the Woman.
+
+Nina half rose as she saw Ursula, whose sedate and mournful features
+involuntarily testified her surprise and admiration at a loveliness
+so rare and striking, but who, undazzled by the splendour around, soon
+recovered her wonted self-composure, and seated herself on the cushion
+to which Nina pointed, while the young visitor remained standing, and
+spell-bound by childish wonder, in the centre of the apartment. Nina
+recognised him with a smile.
+
+"Ah, my pretty boy, whose quick eye and bold air caught my fancy
+yesterday! Have you come to accept my offer? Is it you, madam, who claim
+this fair child?"
+
+"Lady," replied Ursula, "my business here is brief: by a train of
+events, needless to weary you with narrating, this boy from his infancy
+fell to my charge--a weighty and anxious trust to one whose thoughts
+are beyond the barrier of life. I have reared him as became a youth of
+gentle blood; for on both sides, lady, he is noble, though an orphan,
+motherless and sireless."
+
+"Poor child!" said Nina, compassionately.
+
+"Growing now," continued Ursula, "oppressed by years, and desirous only
+to make my peace with Heaven, I journeyed hither some months since, in
+the design to place the boy with a relation of mine; and, that trust
+fulfilled, to take the vows in the City of the Apostle. Alas! I found my
+kinsman dead, and a baron of wild and dissolute character was his heir.
+Here remaining, perplexed and anxious, it seemed to me the voice of
+Providence when, yester-evening, the child told me you had been pleased
+to honour him with your notice. Like the rest of Rome, he has already
+learned enthusiasm for the Tribune--devotion to the Tribune's bride.
+Will you, in truth, admit him of your household? He will not dishonour
+your protection by his blood, nor, I trust, by his bearing."
+
+"I would take his face for his guarantee, madam, even without so
+distinguished a recommendation as your own. Is he Roman? His name then
+must be known to me."
+
+"Pardon me, lady," replied Ursula: "He bears the name of Angelo
+Villani--not that of his sire or mother. The honour of a noble house for
+ever condemns his parentage to rest unknown. He is the offspring of a
+love unsanctioned by the church."
+
+"He is the more to be loved, then, and to be pitied--victim of sin not
+his own!" answered Nina, with moistened eyes, as she saw the deep and
+burning blush that covered the boy's cheeks. "With the Tribune's reign
+commences a new era of nobility, when rank and knighthood shall be won
+by a man's own merit--not that of his ancestors. Fear not, madam: in my
+house he shall know no slight."
+
+Ursula was moved from her pride by the kindness of Nina: she approached
+with involuntary reverence, and kissed the Signora's hand--
+
+"May our Lady reward your noble heart!" said she: "and now my mission is
+ended, and my earthly goal is won. Add only, lady, to your inestimable
+favours one more. These jewels"--and Ursula drew from her robe a casket,
+touched the spring, and the lid flying back, discovered jewels of great
+size and the most brilliant water,--"these jewels," she continued,
+laying the casket at Nina's feet, "once belonging to the princely house
+of Thoulouse, are valueless to me and mine. Suffer me to think that they
+are transferred to one whose queenly brow will give them a lustre it
+cannot borrow."
+
+"How!" said Nina, colouring very deeply; "think you, madam, my kindness
+can be bought? What woman's kindness ever was? Nay, nay--take back the
+gifts, or I shall pray you to take back your boy."
+
+Ursula was astonished and confounded: to her experience such abstinence
+was a novelty, and she scarcely knew how to meet it. Nina perceived her
+embarrassment with a haughty and triumphant smile, and then, regaining
+her former courtesy of demeanour, said, with a grave sweetness--
+
+"The Tribune's hands are clean,--the Tribune's wife must not be
+suspected. Rather, madam, should I press upon you some token of exchange
+for the fair charge you have committed to me. Your jewels hereafter may
+profit the boy in his career: reserve them for one who needs them."
+
+"No, lady," said Ursula, rising and lifting her eyes to heaven;--"they
+shall buy masses for his mother's soul; for him I shall reserve a
+competence when his years require it. Lady, accept the thanks of a
+wretched and desolate heart. Fare you well!"
+
+She turned to quit the room, but with so faltering and weak a step, that
+Nina, touched and affected, sprung up, and with her own hand guided
+the old woman across the room, whispering comfort and soothing to her;
+while, as they reached the door, the boy rushed forward, and, clasping
+Ursula's robe, sobbed out--"Dear dame, not one farewell for your little
+Angelo! Forgive him all he has cost you! Now, for the first time, I feel
+how wayward and thankless I have been."
+
+The old woman caught him in her arms, and kissed him passionately; when
+the boy, as if a thought suddenly struck him, drew forth the purse she
+had given him and said, in a choked and scarce articulate voice,--"And
+let this, dearest dame, go in masses for my poor father's soul; for he
+is dead, too, you know!"
+
+These words seemed to freeze at once all the tenderer emotions of
+Ursula. She put back the boy with the same chilling and stern severity
+of aspect and manner which had so often before repressed him: and
+recovering her self-possession, at once quitted the apartment without
+saying another word. Nina, surprised, but still pitying her sorrow and
+respecting her age, followed her steps across the pages' ante-room and
+the reception-chamber, even to the foot of the stairs,--a condescension
+the haughtiest princess of Rome could not have won from her; and
+returning, saddened and thoughtful, she took the boy's hand, and
+affectionately kissed his forehead.
+
+"Poor boy!" she said, "it seems as if Providence had made me select thee
+yesterday from the crowd, and thus conducted thee to thy proper refuge.
+For to whom should come the friendless and the orphans of Rome, but to
+the palace of Rome's first Magistrate?" Turning then to her attendants,
+she gave them instructions as to the personal comforts of her new
+charge, which evinced that if power had ministered to her vanity, it had
+not steeled her heart. Angelo Villani lived to repay her well!
+
+She retained the boy in her presence, and conversing with him
+familiarly, she was more and more pleased with his bold spirit and frank
+manner. Their conversation was however interrupted, as the day advanced,
+by the arrival of several ladies of the Roman nobility. And then it was
+that Nina's virtues receded into shade, and her faults appeared. She
+could not resist the woman's triumph over those arrogant signoras who
+now cringed in homage where they had once slighted with disdain. She
+affected the manner of, she demanded the respect due to, a queen. And by
+many of those dexterous arts which the sex know so well, she contrived
+to render her very courtesy a humiliation to her haughty guests. Her
+commanding beauty and her graceful intellect saved her, indeed, from the
+vulgar insolence of the upstart; but yet more keenly stung the pride, by
+forbidding to those she mortified the retaliation of contempt. Hers
+were the covert taunt--the smiling affront--the sarcasm in the mask of
+compliment--the careless exaction of respect in trifles, which could not
+outwardly be resented, but which could not inly be forgiven.
+
+"Fair day to the Signora Colonna," said she to the proud wife of the
+proud Stephen; "we passed your palace yesterday. How fair it now seems,
+relieved from those gloomy battlements which it must often have saddened
+you to gaze upon. Signora, (turning to one of the Orsini), your lord
+has high favour with the Tribune, who destines him to great command.
+His fortunes are secured, and we rejoice at it; for no man more loyally
+serves the state. Have you seen, fair Lady of Frangipani, the last
+verses of Petrarch in honour of my lord?--they rest yonder. May we so
+far venture as to request you to point out their beauties to the Signora
+di Savelli? We rejoice, noble Lady of Malatesta, to observe that your
+eyesight is so well restored. The last time we met, though we stood
+next to you in the revels of the Lady Giulia, you seemed scarce to
+distinguish us from the pillar by which we stood!"
+
+"Must this insolence be endured!" whispered the Signora Frangipani to
+the Signora Malatesta.
+
+"Hush, hush; if ever it be our day again!"
+
+
+
+Chapter 4.II. The Blessing of A Councillor Whose Interests and Heart Are
+Our Own.--the Straws Thrown Upward,--Do They Portend A Storm.
+
+It was later that day than usual, when Rienzi returned from his tribunal
+to the apartments of the palace. As he traversed the reception hall, his
+countenance was much flushed; his teeth were set firmly, like a man who
+has taken a strong resolution from which he will not be moved; and his
+brow was dark with that settled and fearful frown which the
+describers of his personal appearance have not failed to notice as the
+characteristic of an anger the more deadly because invariably just.
+Close as his heels followed the Bishop of Orvietto and the aged Stephen
+Colonna. "I tell you, my Lords," said Rienzi, "that ye plead in vain.
+Rome knows no distinction between ranks. The law is blind to the
+agent--lynx-eyed to the deed."
+
+"Yet," said Raimond, hesitatingly, "bethink thee, Tribune; the nephew of
+two cardinals, and himself once a senator."
+
+Rienzi halted abruptly, and faced his companions. "My Lord Bishop," said
+he, "does not this make the crime more inexcusable? Look you, thus it
+reads:--A vessel from Avignon to Naples, charged with the revenues of
+Provence to Queen Joanna, on whose cause, mark you, we now hold solemn
+council, is wrecked at the mouth of the Tiber; with that, Martino
+di Porto--a noble, as you say--the holder of that fortress whence
+he derives his title,--doubly bound by gentle blood and by immediate
+neighbourhood to succour the oppressed--falls upon the vessel with his
+troops (what hath the rebel with armed troops?)--and pillages the
+vessel like a common robber. He is apprehended--brought to my
+tribunal--receives fair trial--is condemned to die. Such is the
+law;--what more would ye have?"
+
+"Mercy," said the Colonna.
+
+Rienzi folded his arms, and laughed disdainfully. "I never heard my Lord
+Colonna plead for mercy when a peasant had stolen the bread that was to
+feed his famishing children."
+
+"Between a peasant and a prince, Tribune, I, for one, recognise a
+distinction:--the bright blood of an Orsini is not to be shed like that
+of a base plebeian--"
+
+"Which, I remember me," said Rienzi, in a low voice, "you deemed small
+matter enough when my boy-brother fell beneath the wanton spear of your
+proud son. Wake not that memory, I warn you; let it sleep.--For shame,
+old Colonna--for shame; so near the grave, where the worm levels
+all flesh, and preaching, with those gray hairs, the uncharitable
+distinction between man and man. Is there not distinction enough at the
+best? Does not one wear purple, and the other rags? Hath not one ease,
+and the other toil? Doth not the one banquet while the other starves?
+Do I nourish any mad scheme to level the ranks which society renders
+a necessary evil? No. I war no more with Dives than with Lazarus. But
+before Man's judgment-seat, as before God's, Lazarus and Dives are made
+equal. No more."
+
+Colonna drew his robe round him with great haughtiness, and bit his lip
+in silence. Raimond interposed.
+
+"All this is true, Tribune. But," and he drew Rienzi aside, "you know
+we must be politic as well as just. Nephew to two Cardinals, what enmity
+will not this provoke at Avignon?"
+
+"Vex not yourself, holy Raimond, I will answer it to the Pontiff." While
+they spoke the bell tolled heavily and loudly.
+
+Colonna started.
+
+"Great Tribune," said he, with a slight sneer, "deign to pause ere it be
+too late. I know not that I ever before bent to you a suppliant; and I
+ask you now to spare mine own foe. Stephen Colonna prays Cola di Rienzi
+to spare the life of an Orsini."
+
+"I understand thy taunt, old Lord," said Rienzi, calmly, "but I resent
+it not. You are foe to the Orsini, yet you plead for him--it sounds
+generous; but hark you,--you are more a friend to your order than a foe
+to your rival. You cannot bear that one, great enough to have contended
+with you, should perish like a thief. I give full praise to such noble
+forgiveness; but I am no noble, and I do not sympathize with it. One
+word more;--if this were the sole act of fraud and violence that this
+bandit baron had committed, your prayers should plead for him; but is
+not his life notorious? Has he not been from boyhood the terror and
+disgrace of Rome? How many matrons violated, merchants pillaged,
+peaceful men stilettoed in the daylight, rise in dark witness against
+the prisoner? And for such a man do I live to hear an aged prince and a
+pope's vicar plead for mercy?--Fie, fie! But I will be even with ye.
+The next poor man whom the law sentences to death, for your sake will I
+pardon."
+
+Raimond again drew aside the Tribune, while Colonna struggled to
+suppress his rage.
+
+"My friend," said the Bishop, "the nobles will feel this as an insult to
+their whole order; the very pleading of Orsini's worst foe must convince
+thee of this. Martino's blood will seal their reconciliation with each
+other, and they will be as one man against thee."
+
+"Be it so: with God and the People on my side, I will dare, though
+a Roman, to be just. The bell ceases--you are already too late." So
+saying, Rienzi threw open the casement; and by the staircase of the Lion
+rose a gibbet from which swung with a creaking sound, arrayed in his
+patrician robes, the yet palpitating corpse of Martino di Porto.
+
+"Behold!" said the Tribune, sternly, "thus die all robbers. For
+traitors, the same law has the axe and the scaffold!"
+
+Raimond drew back and turned pale. Not so the veteran noble. Tears
+of wounded pride started from his eyes; he approached, leaning on his
+staff, to Rienzi, touched him on his shoulder, and said,--
+
+"Tribune, a judge has lived to envy his victim!"
+
+Rienzi turned with an equal pride to the Baron.
+
+"We forgive idle words in the aged. My Lord, have you done with us?--we
+would be alone."
+
+"Give me thy arm, Raimond," said Stephen. "Tribune--farewell. Forget
+that the Colonna sued thee,--an easy task, methinks; for, wise as you
+are, you forget what every one else can remember."
+
+"Ay, my Lord, what?"
+
+"Birth, Tribune, birth--that's all!"
+
+"The Signor Colonna has taken up my old calling, and turned a wit,"
+returned Rienzi, with an indifferent and easy tone.
+
+Then following Raimond and Stephen with his eyes, till the door closed
+upon them, he muttered, "Insolent! were it not for Adrian, thy grey
+beard should not bear thee harmless. Birth! what Colonna would not boast
+himself, if he could, the grandson of an emperor?--Old man, there is
+danger in thee which must be watched." With that he turned musingly
+towards the casement, and again that griesly spectacle of death met his
+eye. The people below, assembled in large concourse, rejoiced at the
+execution of one whose whole life had been infamy and rapine--but who
+had seemed beyond justice--with all the fierce clamour that marks the
+exultation of the rabble over a crushed foe. And where Rienzi stood,
+he heard heir shouts of "Long live the Tribune, the just judge, Rome's
+liberator!" But at that time other thoughts deafened his senses to the
+popular enthusiasm.
+
+"My poor brother!" he said, with tears in his eyes, "it was owing to
+this man's crimes--and to a crime almost similar to that for which he
+has now suffered--that thou wert entrained to the slaughter; and they
+who had no pity for the lamb, clamour for compassion to the wolf! Ah,
+wert thou living now, how these proud heads would bend to thee; though
+dead, thou wert not worthy of a thought. God rest thy gentle soul, and
+keep my ambition pure as it was when we walked at twilight, side by side
+together!"
+
+The Tribune shut the casement, and turning away, sought the chamber of
+Nina. On hearing his step without, she had already risen from the couch,
+her eyes sparkling, her bosom heaving; and as he entered, she threw
+herself on his neck, and murmured as she nestled to his breast,--"Ah,
+the hours since we parted!"
+
+It was a singular thing to see that proud lady, proud of her beauty, her
+station, her new honours;--whose gorgeous vanity was already the talk
+of Rome, and the reproach to Rienzi,--how suddenly and miraculously she
+seemed changed in his presence! Blushing and timid, all pride in herself
+seemed merged in her proud love for him. No woman ever loved to the full
+extent of the passion, who did not venerate where she loved, and who
+did not feel humbled (delighted in that humility) by her exaggerated and
+overweening estimate of the superiority of the object of her worship.
+
+And it might be the consciousness of this distinction between himself
+and all other created things, which continued to increase the love of
+the Tribune to his bride, to blind him to her failings towards others,
+and to indulge her in a magnificence of parade, which, though to a
+certain point politic to assume, was carried to an extent which if it
+did not conspire to produce his downfall, has served the Romans with
+an excuse for their own cowardice and desertion, and historians with
+a plausible explanation of causes they had not the industry to fathom.
+Rienzi returned his wife's caresses with an equal affection, and bending
+down to her beautiful face, the sight was sufficient to chase from his
+brow the emotions, whether severe or sad, which had lately darkened its
+broad expanse.
+
+"Thou has not been abroad this morning, Nina!"
+
+"No, the heat was oppressive. But nevertheless, Cola, I have not lacked
+company--half the matronage of Rome has crowded the palace."
+
+"Ah, I warrant it.--But yon boy, is he not a new face?"
+
+"Hush, Cola, speak to him kindly, I entreat: of his story anon. Angelo,
+approach. You see your new master, the Tribune of Rome."
+
+Angelo approached with a timidity not his wont, for an air of majesty
+was at all times natural to Rienzi, and since his power it had naturally
+taken a graver and austerer aspect, which impressed those who approached
+him, even the ambassadors of princes, with a certain involuntary awe.
+The Tribune smiled at the effect he saw he had produced, and being by
+temper fond of children, and affable to all but the great, he hastened
+to dispel it. He took the child affectionately in his arms, kissed him,
+and bade him welcome.
+
+"May we have a son as fair!" he whispered to Nina, who blushed, and
+turned away.
+
+"Thy name, my little friend?"
+
+"Angelo Villani."
+
+"A Tuscan name. There is a man of letters at Florence, doubtless writing
+our annals from hearsay at this moment, called Villani. Perhaps akin to
+thee?"
+
+"I have no kin," said the boy, bluntly; "and therefore I shall the
+better love the Signora and honour you, if you will let me. I am
+Roman--all the Roman boys honour Rienzi."
+
+"Do they, my brave lad?" said the Tribune, colouring with pleasure;
+"that is a good omen of my continued prosperity." He put down the boy,
+and threw himself on the cushions, while Nina placed herself on a kind
+of low stool beside him.
+
+"Let us be alone," said he; and Nina motioned to the attendant maidens
+to withdraw.
+
+"Take my new page with you," said she; "he is yet, perhaps, too fresh
+from home to enjoy the company of his giddy brethren."
+
+When they were alone, Nina proceeded to narrate to Rienzi the adventure
+of the morning; but though he seemed outwardly to listen, his gaze
+was on vacancy, and he was evidently abstracted and self-absorbed. At
+length, as she concluded, he said, "Well, Nina, you have acted as ever,
+kindly and nobly. Let us to other themes. I am in danger."
+
+"Danger!" echoed Nina, turning pale.
+
+"Why, the word must not appal you--you have a spirit like mine, that
+scorns fear; and, for that reason, Nina, in all Rome you are my only
+confidant. It was not only to glad me with thy beauty, but to cheer me
+with thy counsel, to support me with thy valour, that Heaven gave me
+thee as a helpmate."
+
+"Now, our Lady bless thee for those words!" said Nina, kissing the hand
+that hung over her shoulder; "and if I started at the word danger, it
+was but the woman's thought of thee,--an unworthy thought, my Cola, for
+glory and danger go together. And I am as ready to share the last as the
+first. If the hour of trial ever come, none of thy friends shall be so
+faithful to thy side as this weak form but undaunted heart."
+
+"I know it, my own Nina; I know it," said Rienzi, rising, and pacing the
+chamber with large and rapid strides. "Now listen to me. Thou knowest
+that to govern in safety, it is my policy as my pride to govern justly.
+To govern justly is an awful thing, when mighty barons are the culprits.
+Nina, for an open and audacious robbery, our court has sentenced Martin
+of the Orsini, the Lord of Porto, to death. His corpse swings now on the
+Staircase of the Lion."
+
+"A dreadful doom!" said Nina, shuddering.
+
+"True; but by his death thousands of poor and honest men may live in
+peace. It is not that which troubles me: the Barons resent the deed, as
+an insult to them that law should touch a noble. They will rise--they
+will rebel. I foresee the storm--not the spell to allay it."
+
+Nina paused a moment,--"They have taken," she then said, "a solemn oath
+on the Eucharist not to bear arms against thee."
+
+"Perjury is a light addition to theft and murder," answered Rienzi, with
+his sarcastic smile.
+
+"But the people are faithful."
+
+"Yes, but in a civil war (which the saints forefend!) those combatants
+are the stanchest who have no home but their armour, no calling but the
+sword. The trader will not leave his trade at the toll of a bell every
+day; but the Barons' soldiery are ready at all hours."
+
+"To be strong," said Nina,--who, summoned to the councils of her lord,
+shewed an intellect not unworthy of the honour,--"to be strong in
+dangerous times, authority must seem strong. By shewing no fear, you may
+prevent the cause of fear."
+
+"My own thought!" returned Rienzi, quickly. "You know that half my power
+with these Barons is drawn from the homage rendered to me by foreign
+states. When from every city in Italy the ambassadors of crowned princes
+seek the alliance of the Tribune, they must veil their resentment at the
+rise of the Plebeian. On the other hand, to be strong abroad I must seem
+strong at home: the vast design I have planned, and, as by a miracle,
+begun to execute, will fail at once if it seem abroad to be intrusted
+to an unsteady and fluctuating power. That design (continued Rienzi,
+pausing, and placing his hand on a marble bust of the young Augustus)
+is greater than his, whose profound yet icy soul united Italy in
+subjection,--for it would unite Italy in freedom;--yes! could we but
+form one great federative league of all the States of Italy, each
+governed by its own laws, but united for mutual and common protection
+against the Attilas of the North, with Rome for their Metropolis and
+their Mother, this age and this brain would have wrought an enterprise
+which men should quote till the sound of the last trump!"
+
+"I know thy divine scheme," said Nina, catching his enthusiasm; "and
+what if there be danger in attaining it? Have we not mastered the
+greatest danger in the first step?"
+
+"Right, Nina, right! Heaven (and the Tribune, who ever recognised,
+in his own fortunes, the agency of the hand above, crossed himself
+reverently) will preserve him to whom it hath vouchsafed such lofty
+visions of the future redemption of the Land of the true Church, and the
+liberty and advancement of its children! This I trust: already many of
+the cities of Tuscany have entered into treaties for the formation
+of this league; nor from a single tyrant, save John di Vico, have I
+received aught but fair words and flattering promises. The time seems
+ripe for the grand stroke of all."
+
+"And what is that?" demanded Nina, wonderingly.
+
+"Defiance to all foreign interference. By what right does a synod of
+stranger princes give Rome a king in some Teuton Emperor? Rome's people
+alone should choose Rome's governor;--and shall we cross the Alps to
+render the title of our master to the descendants of the Goth?"
+
+Nina was silent: the custom of choosing the sovereign by a diet beyond
+the Rhine, reserving only the ceremony of his subsequent coronation for
+the mock assent of the Romans, however degrading to that people, and
+however hostile to all nations of substantial independence, was so
+unquestioned at that time, that Rienzi's daring suggestion left her
+amazed and breathless, prepared as she was for any scheme, however
+extravagantly bold.
+
+"How!" said she, after a long pause; "do I understand aright? Can you
+mean defiance to the Emperor?"
+
+"Why, listen: at this moment there are two pretenders to the throne
+of Rome--to the imperial crown of Italy--a Bohemian and a Bavarian. To
+their election our assent--Rome's assent--is not requisite--not asked.
+Can we be called free--can we boast ourselves republican--when a
+stranger and a barbarian is thus thrust upon our necks? No, we will be
+free in reality as in name. Besides, (continued the Tribune, in a
+calmer tone,) this seems to me politic as well as daring. The people
+incessantly demand wonders from me: how can I more nobly dazzle, more
+virtuously win them, than by asserting their inalienable right to
+choose their own rulers? The daring will awe the Barons, and foreigners
+themselves; it will give a startling example to all Italy; it will be
+the first brand of an universal blaze. It shall be done, and with a pomp
+that befits the deed!"
+
+"Cola," said Nina, hesitatingly, "your eagle spirit often ascends where
+mine flags to follow; yet be not over bold."
+
+"Nay, did you not, a moment since, preach a different doctrine? To be
+strong, was I not to seem strong?"
+
+"May fate preserve you!" said Nina, with a foreboding sigh.
+
+"Fate!" cried Rienzi; "there is no fate! Between the thought and the
+success, God is the only agent; and (he added with a voice of deep
+solemnity) I shall not be deserted. Visions by night, even while thine
+arms are around me; omens and impulses, stirring and divine, by day,
+even in the midst of the living crowd--encourage my path, and point my
+goal. Now, even now, a voice seems to whisper in my ear--'Pause not;
+tremble not; waver not;--for the eye of the All-Seeing is upon thee, and
+the hand of the All-Powerful shall protect!"
+
+As Rienzi thus spoke, his face grew pale, his hair seemed to bristle,
+his tall and proud form trembled visibly, and presently he sunk down on
+a seat, and covered his face with his hands.
+
+An awe crept over Nina, though not unaccustomed to such strange and
+preternatural emotions, which appeared yet the more singular in one who
+in common life was so calm, stately, and self-possessed. But with every
+increase of prosperity and power, those emotions seemed to increase
+in their fervour, as if in such increase the devout and overwrought
+superstition of the Tribune recognised additional proof of a mysterious
+guardianship mightier than the valour or art of man.
+
+She approached fearfully, and threw her arms around him, but without
+speaking.
+
+Ere yet the Tribune had well recovered himself, a slight tap at the door
+was heard, and the sound seemed at once to recall his self-possession.
+
+"Enter," he said, lifting his face, to which the wonted colour slowly
+returned.
+
+An officer, half-opening the door, announced that the person he had sent
+for waited his leisure.
+
+"I come!--Core of my heart," (he whispered to Nina,) "we will sup alone
+tonight, and will converse more on these matters:" so saying, with
+somewhat less than his usual loftiness of mien, he left the room,
+and sought his cabinet, which lay at the other side of the reception
+chamber. Here he found Cecco del Vecchio.
+
+"How, my bold fellow," said the Tribune, assuming with wonderful ease
+that air of friendly equality which he always adopted with those of the
+lower class, and which made a striking contrast with the majesty, no
+less natural, which marked his manner to the great. "How now, my Cecco!
+Thou bearest thyself bravely, I see, during these sickly heats; we
+labourers--for both of us labour, Cecco--are too busy to fall ill as the
+idle do, in the summer, or the autumn, of Roman skies. I sent for thee,
+Cecco, because I would know how thy fellow-craftsmen are like to take
+the Orsini's execution."
+
+"Oh! Tribune," replied the artificer, who, now familiarized with Rienzi,
+had lost much of his earlier awe of him, and who regarded the Tribune's
+power as partly his own creation; "they are already out of their honest
+wits, at your courage in punishing the great men as you would the
+small."
+
+"So;--I am repaid! But hark you, Cecco, it will bring, perhaps, hot work
+upon us. Every Baron will dread lest it be his turn next, and dread will
+make them bold, like rats in despair. We may have to fight for the Good
+Estate."
+
+"With all my heart, Tribune," answered Cecco, gruffly. "I, for one, am
+no craven."
+
+"Then keep the same spirit in all your meetings with the artificers. I
+fight for the people. The people at a pinch must fight with me."
+
+"They will," replied Cecco; "they will!"
+
+"Cecco, this city is under the spiritual dominion of the Pontiff--so
+be it--it is an honour, not a burthen. But the temporal dominion, my
+friend, should be with Romans only. Is it not a disgrace to Republican
+Rome, that while we now speak, certain barbarians, whom we never heard
+of, should be deciding beyond the Alps on the merits of two sovereigns,
+whom we never saw? Is not this a thing to be resisted? An Italian
+city,--what hath it to do with a Bohemian Emperor?"
+
+"Little eno', St. Paul knows!" said Cecco.
+
+"Should it not be a claim questioned?"
+
+"I think so!" replied the smith.
+
+"And if found an outrage on our ancient laws, should it not be a claim
+resisted?"
+
+"Not a doubt of it."
+
+"Well, go to! The archives assure me that never was Emperor lawfully
+crowned but by the free votes of the people. We never chose Bohemian or
+Bavarian."
+
+"But, on the contrary, whenever these Northmen come hither to be
+crowned, we try to drive them away with stones and curses,--for we are a
+people, Tribune, that love our liberties."
+
+"Go back to your friends--see--address them, say that your Tribune will
+demand of these pretenders to Rome the right to her throne. Let them not
+be mazed or startled, but support me when the occasion comes."
+
+"I am glad of this," quoth the huge smith; "for our friends have grown a
+little unruly of late, and say--"
+
+"What do they say?"
+
+"That it is true you have expelled the banditti, and curb the Barons,
+and administer justice fairly;--"
+
+"Is not that miracle enough for the space of some two or three short
+months?"
+
+"Why, they say it would have been more than enough in a noble; but you,
+being raised from the people, and having such gifts and so forth, might
+do yet more. It is now three weeks since they have had any new thing to
+talk about; but Orsini's execution today will cheer them a bit."
+
+"Well, Cecco, well," said the Tribune, rising, "they shall have more
+anon to feed their mouths with. So you think they love me not quite so
+well as they did some three weeks back?"
+
+"I say not so," answered Cecco. "But we Romans are an impatient people."
+
+"Alas, yes!"
+
+"However, they will no doubt stick close enough to you; provided,
+Tribune, you don't put any new tax upon them."
+
+"Ha! But if, in order to be free, it be necessary to fight--if to
+fight, it be necessary to have soldiers, why then the soldiers must be
+paid:--won't the people contribute something to their own liberties;--to
+just laws, and safe lives?"
+
+"I don't know," returned the smith, scratching his head as if a little
+puzzled; "but I know that poor men won't be overtaxed. They say they are
+better off with you than with the Barons before, and therefore they love
+you. But men in business, Tribune, poor men with families, must look to
+their bellies. Only one man in ten goes to law--only one man in twenty
+is butchered by a Baron's brigand; but every man eats, and drinks, and
+feels a tax."
+
+"This cannot be your reasoning, Cecco!" said Rienzi, gravely.
+
+"Why, Tribune, I am an honest man, but I have a large family to rear."
+
+"Enough; enough!" said the Tribune quickly; and then he added
+abstractedly as to himself, but aloud,--"Methinks we have been too
+lavish; these shows and spectacles should cease."
+
+"What!" cried Cecco; "what, Tribune!--would you deny the poor fellows a
+holiday. They work hard enough, and their only pleasure is seeing your
+fine shows and processions; and then they go home and say,--'See, our
+man beats all the Barons! what state he keeps!'"
+
+"Ah! they blame not my splendour, then!"
+
+"Blame it; no! Without it they would be ashamed of you, and think the
+Buono Stato but a shabby concern."
+
+"You speak bluntly, Cecco, but perhaps wisely. The saints keep you! Fail
+not to remember what I told you!"
+
+"No, no. It is a shame to have an Emperor thrust upon us;--so it is.
+Good evening, Tribune."
+
+Left alone, the Tribune remained for some time plunged in gloomy and
+foreboding thoughts.
+
+"I am in the midst of a magician's spell," said he; "if I desist, the
+fiends tear me to pieces. What I have begun, that must I conclude. But
+this rude man shews me too well with what tools I work. For me failure
+is nothing, I have already climbed to a greatness which might render
+giddy many a born prince's brain. But with my fall--Rome, Italy, Peace,
+Justice, Civilization--all fall back into the abyss of ages!"
+
+He rose; and after once or twice pacing his apartment, in which from
+many a column gleamed upon him the marble effigies of the great of old,
+he opened the casement to inhale the air of the now declining day.
+
+The Place of the Capitol was deserted save by the tread of the single
+sentinel. But still, dark and fearful, hung from the tall gibbet the
+clay of the robber noble; and the colossal shape of the Egyptian lion
+rose hard by, sharp and dark in the breathless atmosphere.
+
+"Dread statue!" thought Rienzi, "how many unwhispered and solemn rites
+hast thou witnessed by thy native Nile, ere the Roman's hand transferred
+thee hither--the antique witness of Roman crimes! Strange! but when I
+look upon thee I feel as if thou hadst some mystic influence over my own
+fortunes. Beside thee was I hailed the republican Lord of Rome; beside
+thee are my palace, my tribunal, the place of my justice, my triumphs,
+and my pomp:--to thee my eyes turn from my bed of state: and if fated to
+die in power and peace, thou mayst be the last object my eyes will mark!
+Or if myself a victim--." He paused--shrank from the thought presented
+to him--turned to a recess of the chamber--drew aside a curtain, that
+veiled a crucifix and a small table, on which lay a Bible and the
+monastic emblems of the skull and crossbones--emblems, indeed, grave and
+irresistible, of the nothingness of power, and the uncertainty of life.
+Before these sacred monitors, whether to humble or to elevate, knelt
+that proud and aspiring man; and when he rose, it was with a lighter
+step and more cheerful mien than he had worn that day.
+
+
+
+Chapter 4.III. The Actor Unmasked.
+
+"In intoxication," says the proverb, "men betray their real characters."
+There is a no less honest and truth-revealing intoxication in
+prosperity, than in wine. The varnish of power brings forth at once the
+defects and the beauties of the human portrait.
+
+The unprecedented and almost miraculous rise of Rienzi from the rank of
+the Pontiff's official to the Lord of Rome, would have been accompanied
+with a yet greater miracle, if it had not somewhat dazzled and seduced
+the object it elevated. When, as in well-ordered states and tranquil
+times, men rise slowly, step by step, they accustom themselves to
+their growing fortunes. But the leap of an hour from a citizen to a
+prince--from the victim of oppression to the dispenser of justice--is
+a transition so sudden as to render dizzy the most sober brain. And,
+perhaps, in proportion to the imagination, the enthusiasm, the genius
+of the man, will the suddenness be dangerous--excite too extravagant a
+hope--and lead to too chimerical an ambition. The qualities that made
+him rise, hurry him to his fall; and victory at the Marengo of his
+fortunes, urges him to destruction at its Moscow.
+
+In his greatness Rienzi did not so much acquire new qualities, as
+develop in brighter light and deeper shadow those which he had always
+exhibited. On the one hand he was just--resolute--the friend of
+the oppressed--the terror of the oppressor. His wonderful intellect
+illumined everything it touched. By rooting out abuse, and by searching
+examination and wise arrangement, he had trebled the revenues of the
+city without imposing a single new tax. Faithful to his idol of liberty,
+he had not been betrayed by the wish of the people into despotic
+authority; but had, as we have seen, formally revived, and established
+with new powers, the Parliamentary Council of the city. However
+extensive his own authority, he referred its exercise to the people; in
+their name he alone declared himself to govern, and he never executed
+any signal action without submitting to them its reasons or its
+justification. No less faithful to his desire to restore prosperity as
+well as freedom to Rome, he had seized the first dazzling epoch of his
+power to propose that great federative league with the Italian States
+which would, as he rightly said, have raised Rome to the indisputable
+head of European nations. Under his rule trade was secure, literature
+was welcome, art began to rise.
+
+On the other hand, the prosperity which made more apparent his justice,
+his integrity, his patriotism, his virtues, and his genius, brought out
+no less glaringly his arrogant consciousness of superiority, his love of
+display, and the wild and daring insolence of his ambition. Though
+too just to avenge himself by retaliating on the patricians their
+own violence, though, in his troubled and stormy tribuneship, not one
+unmerited or illegal execution of baron or citizen could be alleged
+against him, even by his enemies; yet sharing, less excusably, the
+weakness of Nina, he could not deny his proud heart the pleasure of
+humiliating those who had ridiculed him as a buffoon, despised him as a
+plebeian, and who, even now slaves to his face, were cynics behind his
+back. "They stood before him while he sate," says his biographer; "all
+these Barons, bareheaded; their hands crossed on their breasts;
+their looks downcast;--oh, how frightened they were!"--a picture more
+disgraceful to the servile cowardice of the nobles than the haughty
+sternness of the Tribune. It might be that he deemed it policy to break
+the spirit of his foes, and to awe those whom it was a vain hope to
+conciliate.
+
+For his pomp there was a greater excuse: it was the custom of the time;
+it was the insignia and witness of power; and when the modern historian
+taunts him with not imitating the simplicity of an ancient tribune, the
+sneer betrays an ignorance of the spirit of the age, and the vain
+people whom the chief magistrate was to govern. No doubt his gorgeous
+festivals, his solemn processions, set off and ennobled--if parade can
+so be ennobled--by a refined and magnificent richness of imagination,
+associated always with popular emblems, and designed to convey the idea
+of rejoicing for Liberty Restored, and to assert the state and majesty
+of Rome Revived--no doubt these spectacles, however otherwise judged in
+a more enlightened age and by closet sages, served greatly to augment
+the importance of the Tribune abroad, and to dazzle the pride of a
+fickle and ostentatious populace. And taste grew refined, luxury called
+labour into requisition, and foreigners from all states were attracted
+by the splendour of a court over which presided, under republican names,
+two sovereigns, (Rienzi, speaking in one of his letters of his great
+enterprise, refers it to the ardour of youth. The exact date of his
+birth is unknown; but he was certainly a young man at the time now
+referred to. His portrait in the Museo Barberino, from which his
+description has been already taken in the first book of this work,
+represents him as beardless, and, as far as one can judge, somewhere
+above thirty--old enough, to be sure, to have a beard; and seven years
+afterwards he wore a long one, which greatly displeased his naive
+biographer, who seems to consider it a sort of crime. The head is very
+remarkable for its stern beauty, and little, if at all, inferior to that
+of Napoleon; to which, as I before remarked, it has some resemblance in
+expression, if not in feature.) young and brilliant, the one renowned
+for his genius, the other eminent for her beauty. It was, indeed, a
+dazzling and royal dream in the long night of Rome, spoiled of her
+Pontiff and his voluptuous train--that holyday reign of Cola di Rienzi!
+And often afterwards it was recalled with a sigh, not only by the poor
+for its justice, the merchant for its security, but the gallant for its
+splendour, and the poet for its ideal and intellectual grace!
+
+As if to show that it was not to gratify the more vulgar appetite and
+desire, in the midst of all his pomp, when the board groaned with
+the delicacies of every clime, when the wine most freely circled, the
+Tribune himself preserved a temperate and even rigid abstinence. ("Vita
+di Cola di Rienzi".--The biographer praises the abstinence of the
+Tribune.) While the apartments of state and the chamber of his bride
+were adorned with a profuse luxury and cost, to his own private rooms he
+transported precisely the same furniture which had been familiar to him
+in his obscurer life. The books, the busts, the reliefs, the arms which
+had inspired him heretofore with the visions of the past, were endeared
+by associations which he did not care to forego.
+
+But that which constituted the most singular feature of his character,
+and which still wraps all around him in a certain mystery, was his
+religious enthusiasm. The daring but wild doctrines of Arnold of
+Brescia, who, two centuries anterior, had preached reform, but
+inculcated mysticism, still lingered in Rome, and had in earlier youth
+deeply coloured the mind of Rienzi; and as I have before observed,
+his youthful propensity to dreamy thought, the melancholy death of his
+brother, his own various but successful fortunes, had all contributed
+to nurse the more zealous and solemn aspirations of this remarkable
+man. Like Arnold of Brescia, his faith bore a strong resemblance to the
+intense fanaticism of our own Puritans of the Civil War, as if similar
+political circumstances conduced to similar religious sentiments. He
+believed himself inspired by awful and mighty commune with beings of the
+better world. Saints and angels ministered to his dreams; and without
+this, the more profound and hallowed enthusiasm, he might never
+have been sufficiently emboldened by mere human patriotism, to
+his unprecedented enterprise: it was the secret of much of his
+greatness,--many of his errors. Like all men who are thus self-deluded
+by a vain but not inglorious superstition, united with, and coloured by,
+earthly ambition, it is impossible to say how far he was the visionary,
+and how far at times he dared to be the impostor. In the ceremonies of
+his pageants, in the ornaments of his person, were invariably introduced
+mystic and figurative emblems. In times of danger he publicly professed
+to have been cheered and directed by divine dreams; and on many
+occasions the prophetic warnings he announced having been singularly
+verified by the event, his influence with the people was strengthened by
+a belief in the favour and intercourse of Heaven. Thus, delusion of
+self might tempt and conduce to imposition on others, and he might not
+scruple to avail himself of the advantage of seeming what he believed
+himself to be. Yet, no doubt this intoxicating credulity pushed him
+into extravagance unworthy of, and strangely contrasted by, his soberer
+intellect, and made him disproportion his vast ends to his unsteady
+means, by the proud fallacy, that where man failed, God would interpose.
+Cola di Rienzi was no faultless hero of romance. In him lay, in
+conflicting prodigality, the richest and most opposite elements of
+character; strong sense, visionary superstition, an eloquence and
+energy that mastered all he approached, a blind enthusiasm that mastered
+himself; luxury and abstinence, sternness and susceptibility, pride to
+the great, humility to the low; the most devoted patriotism and the most
+avid desire of personal power. As few men undertake great and desperate
+designs without strong animal spirits, so it may be observed, that with
+most who have risen to eminence over the herd, there is an aptness, at
+times, to a wild mirth and an elasticity of humour which often astonish
+the more sober and regulated minds, that are "the commoners of life:"
+And the theatrical grandeur of Napoleon, the severe dignity of
+Cromwell, are strangely contrasted by a frequent, nor always seasonable
+buffoonery, which it is hard to reconcile with the ideal of their
+characters, or the gloomy and portentous interest of their careers. And
+this, equally a trait in the temperament of Rienzi, distinguished his
+hours of relaxation, and contributed to that marvellous versatility with
+which his harder nature accommodated itself to all humours and all men.
+Often from his austere judgment-seat he passed to the social board an
+altered man; and even the sullen Barons who reluctantly attended his
+feasts, forgot his public greatness in his familiar wit; albeit this
+reckless humour could not always refrain from seeking its subject in the
+mortification of his crest-fallen foes--a pleasure it would have been
+wiser and more generous to forego. And perhaps it was, in part, the
+prompting of this sarcastic and unbridled humour that made him often
+love to astonish as well as to awe. But even this gaiety, if so it may
+be called, taking an appearance of familiar frankness, served much to
+ingratiate him with the lower orders; and, if a fault in the prince, was
+a virtue in the demagogue.
+
+To these various characteristics, now fully developed, the reader must
+add a genius of designs so bold, of conceptions so gigantic and august,
+conjoined with that more minute and ordinary ability which masters
+details; that with a brave, noble, intelligent, devoted people to back
+his projects, the accession of the Tribune would have been the close of
+the thraldom of Italy, and the abrupt limit of the dark age of Europe.
+With such a people, his faults would have been insensibly checked,
+his more unwholesome power have received a sufficient curb. Experience
+familiarizing him with power, would have gradually weaned him from
+extravagance in its display; and the active and masculine energy of his
+intellect would have found field for the more restless spirits, as his
+justice gave shelter to the more tranquil. Faults he had, but whether
+those faults or the faults of the people, were to prepare his downfall,
+is yet to be seen.
+
+Meanwhile, amidst a discontented nobility and a fickle populace, urged
+on by the danger of repose to the danger of enterprise; partly blinded
+by his outward power, partly impelled by the fear of internal weakness;
+at once made sanguine by his genius and his fanaticism, and uneasy by
+the expectations of the crowd,--he threw himself headlong into the
+gulf of the rushing Time, and surrendered his lofty spirit to no
+other guidance than a conviction of its natural buoyancy and its
+heaven-directed haven.
+
+
+
+Chapter 4.IV. The Enemy's Camp.
+
+While Rienzi was preparing, in concert, perhaps, with the ambassadors of
+the brave Tuscan States, whose pride of country and love of liberty
+were well fitted to comprehend, and even share them, his schemes for
+the emancipation from all foreign yoke of the Ancient Queen, and the
+Everlasting Garden, of the World; the Barons, in restless secrecy, were
+revolving projects for the restoration of their own power.
+
+One morning, the heads of the Savelli, the Orsini, and the Frangipani,
+met at the disfortified palace of Stephen Colonna. Their conference
+was warm and earnest--now resolute, now wavering, in its object--as
+indignation or fear prevailed.
+
+"You have heard," said Luca di Savelli, in his usual soft and womanly
+voice, "that the Tribune has proclaimed, that, the day after tomorrow,
+he will take the order of knighthood, and watch the night before in the
+church of the Lateran: He has honoured me with a request to attend his
+vigil."
+
+"Yes, yes, the knave. What means this new fantasy?" said the brutal
+Prince of the Orsini.
+
+"Unless it be to have the cavalier's right to challenge a noble," said
+old Colonna, "I cannot conjecture. Will Rome never grow weary of this
+madman?"
+
+"Rome is the more mad of the two," said Luca di Savelli; "but methinks,
+in his wildness, the Tribune hath committed one error of which we may
+well avail ourselves at Avignon."
+
+"Ah," cried the old Colonna, "that must be our game; passive here, let
+us fight at Avignon."
+
+"In a word then, he hath ordered that his bath shall be prepared in the
+holy porphyry vase in which once bathed the Emperor Constantine."
+
+"Profanation! profanation!" cried Stephen. "This is enough to excuse a
+bull of excommunication. The Pope shall hear of it. I will despatch a
+courier forthwith."
+
+"Better wait and see the ceremony," said the Savelli; "some greater
+folly will close the pomp, be assured."
+
+"Hark ye, my masters," said the grim Lord of the Orsini; "ye are for
+delay and caution; I for promptness and daring; my kinsman's blood calls
+aloud, and brooks no parley."
+
+"And what do?" said the soft-voiced Savelli; "fight without soldiers,
+against twenty thousand infuriated Romans? not I."
+
+Orsini sunk his voice into a meaning whisper. "In Venice," said he,
+"this upstart might be mastered without an army. Think you in Rome no
+man wears a stiletto?"
+
+"Hush," said Stephen, who was of far nobler and better nature than his
+compeers, and who, justifying to himself all other resistance to the
+Tribune, felt his conscience rise against assassination; "this must not
+be--your zeal transports you."
+
+"Besides, whom can we employ? scarce a German left in the city; and
+to whisper this to a Roman were to exchange places with poor
+Martino--Heaven take him, for he's nearer heaven than ever he was
+before," said the Savelli.
+
+"Jest me no jests," cried the Orsini, fiercely. "Jests on such a
+subject! By St. Francis I would, since thou lovest such wit, thou hadst
+it all to thyself; and, methinks, at the Tribune's board I have seen
+thee laugh at his rude humour, as if thou didst not require a cord to
+choke thee."
+
+"Better to laugh than to tremble," returned the Savelli.
+
+"How! darest thou say I tremble?" cried the Baron.
+
+"Hush, hush," said the veteran Colonna, with impatient dignity. "We are
+not now in such holiday times as to quarrel amongst ourselves. Forbear,
+my lords."
+
+"Your greater prudence, Signor," said the sarcastic Savelli, "arises
+from your greater safety. Your house is about to shelter itself under
+the Tribune's; and when the Lord Adrian returns from Naples, the
+innkeeper's son will be brother to your kinsman."
+
+"You might spare me that taunt," said the old noble, with some emotion.
+"Heaven knows how bitterly I have chafed at the thought; yet I would
+Adrian were with us. His word goes far to moderate the Tribune, and to
+guide my own course, for my passion beguiles my reason; and since his
+departure methinks we have been the more sullen without being the more
+strong. Let this pass. If my own son had wed the Tribune's sister, I
+would yet strike a blow for the old constitution as becomes a noble, if
+I but saw that the blow would not cut off my own head."
+
+Savelli, who had been whispering apart with Rinaldo Frangipani, now
+said--
+
+"Noble Prince, listen to me. You are bound by your kinsman's approaching
+connection, your venerable age, and your intimacy with the Pontiff, to
+a greater caution than we are. Leave to us the management of the
+enterprise, and be assured of our discretion."
+
+A young boy, Stefanello, who afterwards succeeded to the representation
+of the direct line of the Colonna, and whom the reader will once again
+encounter ere our tale be closed, was playing by his grandsire's knees.
+He looked sharply up at Savelli, and said, "My grandfather is too wise,
+and you are too timid. Frangipani is too yielding, and Orsini is too
+like a vexed bull. I wish I were a year or two older."
+
+"And what would you do, my pretty censurer?" said the smooth Savelli,
+biting his smiling lip.
+
+"Stab the Tribune with my own stiletto, and then hey for Palestrina!"
+
+"The egg will hatch a brave serpent," quoth the Savelli. "Yet why so
+bitter against the Tribune, my cockatrice?"
+
+"Because he allowed an insolent mercer to arrest my uncle Agapet for
+debt. The debt had been owed these ten years; and though it is said that
+no house in Rome has owed more money than the Colonna, this is the first
+time I ever heard of a rascally creditor being allowed to claim his debt
+unless with doffed cap and bended knee. And I say that I would not live
+to be a Baron, if such upstart insolence is to be put upon me."
+
+"My child," said old Stephen, laughing heartily, "I see our noble order
+will be safe enough in your hands."
+
+"And," continued the child, emboldened by the applause he received, "if
+I had time after pricking the Tribune, I would fain have a second stroke
+at--"
+
+"Whom?" said the Savelli, observing the boy pause.
+
+"My cousin Adrian. Shame on him, for dreaming to make one a wife whose
+birth would scarce fit her for a Colonna's leman!"
+
+"Go play, my child--go play," said the old Colonna, as he pushed the boy
+from him.
+
+"Enough of this babble," cried the Orsini, rudely. "Tell me, old lord;
+just as I entered, I saw an old friend (one of your former mercenaries)
+quit the palace--may I crave his errand?"
+
+"Ah, yes; a messenger from Fra Moreale. I wrote to the Knight, reproving
+him for his desertion on our ill-starred return from Corneto, and
+intimating that five hundred lances would be highly paid for just now."
+
+"Ah," said Savelli; "and what is his answer!"
+
+"Oh, wily and evasive: He is profuse in compliments and good wishes;
+but says he is under fealty to the Hungarian king, whose cause is before
+Rienzi's tribunal; that he cannot desert his present standard; that he
+fears Rome is so evenly balanced between patricians and the people, that
+whatever party would permanently be uppermost must call in a Podesta;
+and this character alone the Provencal insinuates would suit him."
+
+"Montreal our Podesta?" cried the Orsini.
+
+"And why not?" said Savelli; "as good a well-born Podesta as a low-born
+Tribune? But I trust we may do without either. Colonna, has this
+messenger from Fra Moreale left the city?"
+
+"I suppose so."
+
+"No," said Orsini; "I met him at the gate, and knew him of old: it is
+Rodolf, the Saxon (once a hireling of the Colonna), who has made some
+widows among my clients in the good old day. He is a little disguised
+now; however, I recognised and accosted him, for I thought he was one
+who might yet become a friend, and I bade him await me at my palace."
+
+"You did well," said the Savelli, musing, and his eyes met those of
+Orsini. Shortly afterwards a conference, in which much was said and
+nothing settled, was broken up; but Luca di Savelli, loitering at the
+porch, prayed the Frangipani, and the other Barons, to adjourn to the
+Orsini's palace.
+
+"The old Colonna," said he, "is well-nigh in his dotage. We shall come
+to a quick determination without him, and we can secure his proxy in his
+son."
+
+And this was a true prophecy, for half-an-hour's consultation with
+Rodolf of Saxony sufficed to ripen thought into enterprise.
+
+
+
+Chapter 4.V. The Night and its Incidents.
+
+With the following twilight, Rome was summoned to the commencement of
+the most magnificent spectacle the Imperial City had witnessed since the
+fall of the Caesars. It had been a singular privilege, arrogated by the
+people of Rome, to confer upon their citizens the order of knighthood.
+Twenty years before, a Colonna and an Orsini had received this popular
+honour. Rienzi, who designed it as the prelude to a more important
+ceremony, claimed from the Romans a similar distinction. From the
+Capitol to the Lateran swept, in long procession, all that Rome boasted
+of noble, of fair, and brave. First went horsemen without number, and
+from all the neighbouring parts of Italy, in apparel that well befitted
+the occasion. Trumpeters, and musicians of all kinds, followed, and
+the trumpets were of silver; youths bearing the harness of the knightly
+war-steed, wrought with gold, preceded the march of the loftiest
+matronage of Rome, whose love for show, and it may be whose admiration
+for triumphant fame, (which to women sanctions many offences,) made them
+forget the humbled greatness of their lords: amidst them Nina and Irene,
+outshining all the rest; then came the Tribune and the Pontiff's Vicar,
+surrounded by all the great Signors of the city, smothering alike
+resentment, revenge, and scorn, and struggling who should approach
+nearest to the monarch of the day. The high-hearted old Colonna alone
+remained aloof, following at a little distance, and in a garb studiously
+plain. But his age, his rank, his former renown in war and state, did
+not suffice to draw to his grey locks and highborn mien a single one
+of the shouts that attended the meanest lord on whom the great Tribune
+smiled. Savelli followed nearest to Rienzi, the most obsequious of the
+courtly band; immediately before the Tribune came two men; the one bore
+a drawn sword, the other the pendone, or standard usually assigned to
+royalty. The tribune himself was clothed in a long robe of white
+satin, whose snowy dazzle (miri candoris) is peculiarly dwelt on by the
+historian, richly decorated with gold; while on his breast were many
+of those mystic symbols I have before alluded to, the exact meaning of
+which was perhaps known only to the wearer. In his dark eye, and on
+that large tranquil brow, in which thought seemed to sleep, as sleeps a
+storm, there might be detected a mind abstracted from the pomp around;
+but ever and anon he roused himself, and conversed partially with
+Raimond or Savelli.
+
+"This is a quaint game," said the Orsini, falling back to the old
+Colonna: "but it may end tragically."
+
+"Methinks it may," said the old man, "if the Tribune overhear thee."
+
+Orsini grew pale. "How--nay--nay, even if he did, he never resents
+words, but professes to laugh at our spoken rage. It was but the
+other day that some knave told him what one of the Annibaldi said of
+him--words for which a true cavalier would have drawn the speaker's
+life's blood; and he sent for the Annibaldi, and said, 'My friend,
+receive this purse of gold,--court wits should be paid.'"
+
+"Did Annibaldi take the gold?"
+
+"Why, no; the Tribune was pleased with his spirit, and made him sup with
+him; and Annibaldi says he never spent a merrier evening, and no longer
+wonders that his kinsman, Riccardo, loves the buffoon so."
+
+Arrived now at the Lateran, Luca di Savelli fell also back, and
+whispered to Orsini; the Frangipani, and some other of the nobles,
+exchanged meaning looks; Rienzi, entering the sacred edifice in which,
+according to custom, he was to pass the night watching his armour, bade
+the crowd farewell, and summoned them the next morning, "To hear things
+that might, he trusted, be acceptable to heaven and earth."
+
+The immense multitude received this intimation with curiosity and
+gladness, while those who had been in some measure prepared by Cecco del
+Vecchio, hailed it as an omen of their Tribune's unflagging resolution.
+The concourse dispersed with singular order and quietness; it was
+recorded as a remarkable fact, that in so great a crowd, composed of men
+of all parties, none exhibited licence or indulged in quarrel. Some of
+the barons and cavaliers, among whom was Luca di Savelli, whose sleek
+urbanity and sarcastic humour found favour with the Tribune, and a few
+subordinate pages and attendants, alone remained; and, save a single
+sentinel at the porch, that broad space before the Palace, the Basilica
+and Fount of Constantine, soon presented a silent and desolate void to
+the melancholy moonlight. Within the church, according to the usage of
+the time and rite, the descendant of the Teuton kings received the order
+of the Santo Spirito. His pride, or some superstition equally weak,
+though more excusable, led him to bathe in the porphyry vase which
+an absurd legend consecrated to Constantine; and this, as Savelli
+predicted, cost him dear. These appointed ceremonies concluded, his arms
+were placed in that part of the church, within the columns of St. John.
+And here his state bed was prepared. (In a more northern country, the
+eve of knighthood would have been spent without sleeping. In Italy, the
+ceremony of watching the armour does not appear to have been so rigidly
+observed.)
+
+The attendant barons, pages, and chamberlains, retired out of sight to
+a small side chapel in the edifice; and Rienzi was left alone. A single
+lamp, placed beside his bed, contended with the mournful rays of the
+moon, that cast through the long casements, over aisle and pillar, its
+"dim religious light." The sanctity of the place, the solemnity of the
+hour, and the solitary silence round, were well calculated to deepen
+the high-wrought and earnest mood of that son of fortune. Many and high
+fancies swept over his mind--now of worldly aspirations, now of more
+august but visionary belief, till at length, wearied with his own
+reflections, he cast himself on the bed. It was an omen which graver
+history has not neglected to record, that the moment he pressed the bed,
+new prepared for the occasion, part of it sank under him: he himself was
+affected by the accident, and sprung forth, turning pale and muttering;
+but, as if ashamed of his weakness, after a moment's pause, again
+composed himself to rest, and drew the drapery round him.
+
+The moonbeams grew fainter and more faint as the time proceeded, and
+the sharp distinction between light and shade faded fast from the marble
+floor; when from behind a column at the furthest verge of the building,
+a strange shadow suddenly crossed the sickly light--it crept on--it
+moved, but without an echo,--from pillar to pillar it flitted--it rested
+at last behind the column nearest to the Tribune's bed--it remained
+stationary.
+
+The shades gathered darker and darker round; the stillness seemed to
+deepen; the moon was gone; and, save from the struggling ray of the lamp
+beside Rienzi, the blackness of night closed over the solemn and ghostly
+scene.
+
+In one of the side chapels, as I have before said, which, in the many
+alterations the church has undergone, is probably long since destroyed,
+were Savelli and the few attendants retained by the Tribune. Savelli
+alone slept not; he remained sitting erect, breathless and listening,
+while the tall lights in the chapel rendered yet more impressive the
+rapid changes of his countenance.
+
+"Now pray Heaven," said he, "the knave miscarry not! Such an occasion
+may never again occur! He has a strong arm and a dexterous hand,
+doubtless; but the other is a powerful man. The deed once done, I care
+not whether the doer escape or not; if not, why we must stab him! Dead
+men tell no tales. At the worst, who can avenge Rienzi? There is no
+other Rienzi! Ourselves and the Frangipani seize the Aventine, the
+Colonna and the Orsini the other quarters of the city; and without the
+master-spirit, we may laugh at the mad populace. But if discovered;--"
+and Savelli, who, fortunately for his foes, had not nerves equal to his
+will, covered his face and shuddered;--"I think I hear a noise!--no--is
+it the wind?--tush, it must be old Vico de Scotto, turning in his shell
+of mail!--silent--I like not that silence! No cry--no sound! Can the
+ruffian have played us false? or could he not scale the casement? It is
+but a child's effort;--or did the sentry spy him?"
+
+Time passed on: the first ray of daylight slowly gleamed, when he
+thought he heard the door of the church close. Savelli's suspense
+became intolerable: he stole from the chapel, and came in sight of the
+Tribune's bed--all was silent.
+
+"Perhaps the silence of death," said Savelli, as he crept back.
+
+Meanwhile the Tribune, vainly endeavouring to close his eyes, was
+rendered yet more watchful by the uneasy position he was obliged to
+assume--for the part of the bed towards the pillow having given way,
+while the rest remained solid, he had inverted the legitimate order
+of lying, and drawn himself up as he might best accommodate his limbs,
+towards the foot of the bed. The light of the lamp, though shaded by the
+draperies, was thus opposite to him. Impatient of his wakefulness, he at
+last thought it was this dull and flickering light which scared away the
+slumber, and was about to rise, to remove it further from him, when he
+saw the curtain at the other end of the bed gently lifted: he remained
+quiet and alarmed;--ere he could draw a second breath, a dark figure
+interposed between the light and the bed; and he felt that a stroke was
+aimed against that part of the couch, which, but for the accident that
+had seemed to him ominous, would have given his breast to the knife.
+Rienzi waited not a second and better-directed blow; as the assassin yet
+stooped, groping in the uncertain light, he threw on him all the weight
+and power of his large and muscular frame, wrenched the stiletto from
+the bravo's hand, and dashing him on the bed, placed his knee on his
+breast.--The stiletto rose--gleamed--descended--the murtherer swerved
+aside, and it pierced only his right arm. The Tribune raised, for a
+deadlier blow, the revengeful blade.
+
+The assassin thus foiled was a man used to all form and shape of danger,
+and he did not now lose his presence of mind.
+
+"Hold!" said he; "if you kill me, you will die yourself. Spare me, and I
+will save you."
+
+"Miscreant!"
+
+"Hush--not so loud, or you will disturb your attendants, and some of
+them may do what I have failed to execute. Spare me, I say, and I will
+reveal that which were worth more than my life; but call not--speak not
+aloud, I warn you!"
+
+The Tribune felt his heart stand still: in that lonely place, afar from
+his idolizing people--his devoted guards--with but loathing barons,
+or, it might be, faithless menials, within call, might not the baffled
+murtherer give a wholesome warning?--and those words and that doubt
+seemed suddenly to reverse their respective positions, and leave the
+conqueror still in the assassin's power.
+
+"Thou thinkest to deceive me," said he, but in a voice whispered and
+uncertain, which shewed the ruffian the advantage he had gained: "thou
+wouldst that I might release thee without summoning my attendants, that
+thou mightst a second time attempt my life."
+
+"Thou hast disabled my right arm, and disarmed me of my only weapon."
+
+"How camest thou hither?"
+
+"By connivance."
+
+"Whence this attempt?"
+
+"The dictation of others."
+
+"If I pardon thee--"
+
+"Thou shalt know all!"
+
+"Rise," said the Tribune, releasing his prisoner, but with great
+caution, and still grasping his shoulder with one hand, while the other
+pointed the dagger at his throat.
+
+"Did my sentry admit thee? There is but one entrance to the church,
+methinks."
+
+"He did not; follow me, and I will tell thee more."
+
+"Dog! thou hast accomplices?"
+
+"If I have, thou hast the knife at my throat."
+
+"Wouldst thou escape?"
+
+"I cannot, or I would."
+
+Rienzi looked hard, by the dull light of the lamp, at the assassin. His
+rugged and coarse countenance, rude garb, and barbarian speech, seemed
+to him proof sufficient that he was but the hireling of others; and it
+might be wise to brave one danger present and certain, to prevent much
+danger future and unforeseen. Rienzi, too, was armed, strong, active, in
+the prime of life;--and at the worst, there was no part of the building
+whence his voice would not reach those within the chapel,--if they could
+be depended upon.
+
+"Shew me then thy place and means of entrance," said he; "and if I but
+suspect thee as we move--thou diest. Take up the lamp."
+
+The ruffian nodded; with his left hand took up the lamp as he was
+ordered; and with Rienzi's grasp on his shoulder, while the wound from
+his right arm dropped gore as he passed, he moved noiselessly along the
+church--gained the altar--to the left of which was a small room for the
+use or retirement of the priest. To this he made his way. Rienzi's heart
+misgave him a moment.
+
+"Beware," he whispered, "the least sign of fraud, and thou art the first
+victim!"
+
+The assassin nodded again, and proceeded. They entered the room; and
+then the Tribune's strange guide pointed to an open casement. "Behold my
+entrance," said he; "and, if you permit me, my egress--"
+
+"The frog gets not out of the well so easily as he came in, friend,"
+returned Rienzi, smiling. "And now, if I am not to call my guards, what
+am I to do with thee!"
+
+"Let me go, and I will seek thee tomorrow; and if thou payest me
+handsomely, and promisest not to harm limb or life, I will put thine
+enemies and my employers in thy power."
+
+Rienzi could not refrain from a slight laugh at the proposition, but
+composing himself, replied--"And what if I call my attendants, and give
+thee to their charge?"
+
+"Thou givest me to those very enemies and employers; and in despair lest
+I betray them, ere the day dawn they cut my throat--or thine."
+
+"Methinks knave, I have seen thee before."
+
+"Thou hast. I blush not for name or country. I am Rodolf of Saxony!"
+
+"I remember me:--servitor of Walter de Montreal. He, then, is thy
+instigator!"
+
+"Roman, no! That noble Knight scorns other weapon than the open sword,
+and his own hand slays his own foes. Your pitiful, miserable, dastard
+Italians, alone employ the courage, and hire the arm, of others."
+
+Rienzi remained silent. He had released hold of his prisoner, and stood
+facing him; every now and then regarding his countenance, and again
+relapsing into thought. At length, casting his eyes round the small
+chamber thus singularly tenanted, he observed a kind of closet, in which
+the priests' robes, and some articles used in the sacred service, were
+contained. It suggested at once an escape from his dilemma: he pointed
+to it--
+
+"There, Rodolf of Saxony, shalt thou pass some part of this night--a
+small penance for thy meditated crime; and tomorrow, as thou lookest for
+life, thou wilt reveal all."
+
+"Hark, ye, Tribune," returned the Saxon, doggedly; "my liberty is in
+your power, but neither my tongue nor my life. If I consent to be caged
+in that hole, you must swear on the crossed hilt of the dagger that you
+now hold, that, on confession of all I know, you pardon and set me free.
+My employers are enough to glut your rage an' you were a tiger. If you
+do not swear this--"
+
+"Ah, my modest friend!--the alternative?"
+
+"I brain myself against the stone wall! Better such a death than the
+rack!"
+
+"Fool, I want not revenge against such as thou. Be honest, and I swear
+that, twelve hours after thy confession, thou shalt stand safe and
+unscathed without the walls of Rome. So help me our Lord and his
+saints."
+
+"I am content!--Donner und Hagel, I have lived long enough to care only
+for my own life, and the great captain's next to it;--for the rest, I
+reck not if ye southerns cut each other's throats, and make all Italy
+one grave."
+
+With this benevolent speech, Rodolf entered the closet; but ere Rienzi
+could close the door, he stepped forth again--
+
+"Hold," said he: "this blood flows fast. Help me to bandage it, or I
+shall bleed to death ere my confession."
+
+"Per fede," said the Tribune, his strange humour enjoying the man's cool
+audacity; "but, considering the service thou wouldst have rendered me,
+thou art the most pleasant, forbearing, unabashed, good fellow, I have
+seen this many a year. Give us thine own belt. I little thought my first
+eve of knighthood would have been so charitably spent!"
+
+"Methinks these robes would make a better bandage," said Rodolf,
+pointing to the priests' gear suspended from the wall.
+
+"Silence, knave," said the Tribune, frowning; "no sacrilege! Yet, as
+thou takest such dainty care of thyself, thou shalt have mine own scarf
+to accommodate thee."
+
+With that the Tribune, placing his dagger on the ground, while he
+cautiously guarded it with his foot, bound up the wounded limb, for
+which condescension Rodolf gave him short thanks; resumed his weapon and
+lamp; closed the door; drew over it the long, heavy bolt without, and
+returned to his couch, deeply and indignantly musing over the treason he
+had so fortunately escaped.
+
+At the first grey streak of dawn he went out of the great door of the
+church, called the sentry, who was one of his own guard, and bade him
+privately, and now ere the world was astir, convey the prisoner to one
+of the private dungeons of the Capitol. "Be silent," said he: "utter not
+a word of this to any one; be obedient, and thou shalt be promoted. This
+done, find out the councillor, Pandulfo di Guido, and bid him seek me
+here ere the crowd assemble."
+
+He then, making the sentinel doff his heavy shoes of iron, led him
+across the church, resigned Rodolf to his care, saw them depart, and
+in a few minutes afterwards his voice was heard by the inmates of the
+neighbouring chapel; and he was soon surrounded by his train.
+
+He was already standing on the floor, wrapped in a large gown lined with
+furs; and his piercing eye scanned carefully the face of each man that
+approached. Two of the Barons of the Frangipani family exhibited
+some tokens of confusion and embarrassment, from which they speedily
+recovered at the frank salutation of the Tribune.
+
+But all the art of Savelli could not prevent his features from betraying
+to the most indifferent eye the terror of his soul;--and, when he felt
+the penetrating gaze of Rienzi upon him, he trembled in every joint.
+Rienzi alone did not, however, seem to notice his disorder; and when
+Vico di Scotto, an old knight, from whose hands he received his sword,
+asked him how he had passed the night, he replied, cheerfully--
+
+"Well, well--my brave friend! Over a maiden knight some good angel
+always watches. Signor Luca di Savelli, I fear you have slept but ill:
+you seem pale. No matter!--our banquet today will soon brighten the
+current of your gay blood."
+
+"Blood, Tribune!" said di Scotto, who was innocent of the plot: "Thou
+sayest blood, and lo! on the floor are large gouts of it not yet dry."
+
+"Now, out on thee, old hero, for betraying my awkwardness! I pricked
+myself with my own dagger in unrobing. Thank Heaven it hath no poison in
+its blade!"
+
+The Frangipani exchanged looks,--Luca di Savelli clung to a column for
+support,--and the rest of the attendants seemed grave and surprised.
+
+"Think not of it, my masters," said Rienzi: "it is a good omen,
+and a true prophecy. It implies that he who girds on his sword
+for the good of the state, must be ready to spill his blood for it:
+that am I. No more of this--a mere scratch: it gave more
+blood than I recked of from so slight a puncture, and saves
+the leech the trouble of the lancet. How brightly breaks the day!
+We must prepare to meet our fellow-citizens--they will be here anon.
+Ha, my Pandulfo--welcome!--thou, my old friend, shalt buckle on this
+mantle!"
+
+And while Pandulfo was engaged in the task, the Tribune whispered a few
+words in his ear, which, by the smile on his countenance, seemed to the
+attendants one of the familiar jests with which Rienzi distinguished his
+intercourse with his more confidential intimates.
+
+
+
+Chapter 4.VI. The Celebrated Citation.
+
+The bell of the great Lateran church sounded shrill and loud, as the
+mighty multitude, greater even than that of the preceding night, swept
+on. The appointed officers made way with difficulty for the barons and
+ambassadors, and scarcely were those noble visitors admitted ere the
+crowd closed in their ranks, poured headlong into the church, and took
+the way to the chapel of Boniface VIII. There, filling every cranny,
+and blocking up the entrance, the more fortunate of the press beheld the
+Tribune surrounded by the splendid court his genius had collected, and
+his fortune had subdued. At length, as the solemn and holy music began
+to swell through the edifice, preluding the celebration of the mass, the
+Tribune stepped forth, and the hush of the music was increased by the
+universal and dead silence of the audience. His height, his air, his
+countenance, were such as always command the attention of crowds; and at
+this time they received every adjunct from the interest of the occasion,
+and that peculiar look of intent yet suppressed fervour, which is,
+perhaps, the sole gift of the eloquent that Nature alone can give.
+
+"Be it known," said he, slowly and deliberately, "in virtue of that
+authority, power, and jurisdiction, which the Roman people, in general
+parliament, have assigned to us, and which the Sovereign Pontiff hath
+confirmed, that we, not ungrateful of the gift and grace of the Holy
+Spirit--whose soldier we now are--nor of the favour of the Roman people,
+declare, that Rome, capital of the world, and base of the Christian
+church; and that every City, State, and People of Italy, are henceforth
+free. By that freedom, and in the same consecrated authority, we
+proclaim, that the election, jurisdiction, and monarchy of the Roman
+empire appertain to Rome and Rome's people, and the whole of Italy. We
+cite, then, and summon personally, the illustrious princes, Louis Duke
+of Bavaria, and Charles king of Bohemia, who would style themselves
+Emperors of Italy, to appear before us, or the other magistrates of
+Rome, to plead and to prove their claim between this day and the Day of
+Pentecost. We cite also, and within the same term, the Duke of Saxony,
+the Prince of Brandenburg, and whosoever else, potentate, prince, or
+prelate, asserts the right of Elector to the imperial throne--a
+right that, we find it chronicled from ancient and immemorial time,
+appertaineth only to the Roman people--and this in vindication of
+our civil liberties, without derogation of the spiritual power of
+the Church, the Pontiff, and the Sacred College. Herald, proclaim
+the citation, at the greater and more formal length, as written and
+intrusted to your hands, without the Lateran."
+
+     ("Il tutto senza derogare all' autorita della Chiesa, del
+     Papa e del Sacro Collegio." So concludes this extraordinary
+     citation, this bold and wonderful assertion of the classic
+     independence of Italy, in the most feudal time of the
+     fourteenth century. The anonymous biographer of Rienzi
+     declares that the Tribune cited also the Pope and the
+     Cardinals to reside in Rome. De Sade powerfully and
+     incontrovertibly refutes this addition to the daring or the
+     extravagance of Rienzi. Gibbon, however, who has rendered
+     the rest of the citation in terms more abrupt and
+     discourteous than he was warranted by any authority, copies
+     the biographer's blunder, and sneers at De Sade, as using
+     arguments "rather of decency than of weight." Without
+     wearying the reader with all the arguments of the learned
+     Abbe, it may be sufficient to give the first two.
+
+     1st. All the other contemporaneous historians that have
+     treated of this event, G. Villani, Hocsemius, the Vatican
+     MSS. and other chroniclers, relating the citation of the
+     Emperor and Electors, say nothing of that of the Pope and
+     Cardinals; and the Pope (Clement VI.), in his subsequent
+     accusations of Rienzi, while very bitter against his
+     citation of the Emperor, is wholly silent on what would have
+     been to the Pontiff the much greater offence of citing
+     himself and the Cardinals.)
+
+     2. The literal act of this citation, as published formally
+     in the Lateran, is extant in Hocsemius, (whence is borrowed,
+     though not at all its length, the speech in the text of our
+     present tale;) and in this document the Pope and his
+     Cardinals are not named in the summons.
+
+     Gibbon's whole account of Rienzi is superficial and unfair.
+     To the cold and sneering scepticism, which so often deforms
+     the gigantic work of that great writer, allowing nothing for
+     that sincere and urgent enthusiasm which, whether of liberty
+     or religion, is the most common parent of daring action, the
+     great Roman seems but an ambitious and fantastic madman. In
+     Gibbon's hands what would Cromwell have been? what Vane?
+     what Hampden? The pedant, Julian, with his dirty person and
+     pompous affectation, was Gibbon's ideal of a great man.)
+
+As Rienzi concluded this bold proclamation of the liberties of Italy,
+the Tuscan ambassadors, and those of some other of the free states,
+murmured low approbation. The ambassadors of those States that affected
+the party of the Emperor looked at each other in silent amaze and
+consternation. The Roman Barons remained with mute lips and downcast
+eyes; only over the aged face of Stephen Colonna settled a smile, half
+of scorn, half of exultation. But the great mass of the citizens were
+caught by words that opened so grand a prospect as the emancipation of
+all Italy: and their reverence of the Tribune's power and fortune was
+almost that due to a supernatural being; so that they did not pause to
+calculate the means which were to correspond with the boast.
+
+While his eye roved over the crowd, the gorgeous assemblage near him,
+the devoted throng beyond;--as on his ear boomed the murmur of thousands
+and ten thousands, in the space without, from before the Palace of
+Constantine (Palace now his own!) sworn to devote life and fortune to
+his cause; in the flush of prosperity that yet had known no check; in
+the zenith of power, as yet unconscious of reverse, the heart of
+the Tribune swelled proudly: visions of mighty fame and limitless
+dominion,--fame and dominion, once his beloved Rome's and by him to be
+restored, rushed before his intoxicated gaze; and in the delirious and
+passionate aspirations of the moment, he turned his sword alternately to
+the three quarters of the then known globe, and said, in an abstracted
+voice, as a man in a dream, "In the right of the Roman people this too
+is mine!" ("Questo e mio.")
+
+Low though the voice, the wild boast was heard by all around as
+distinctly as if borne to them in thunder. And vain it were to describe
+the various sensations it excited; the extravagance would have moved the
+derision of his foes, the grief of his friends, but for the manner of
+the speaker, which, solemn and commanding, hushed for the moment even
+reason and hatred themselves in awe; afterwards remembered and repeated,
+void of the spell they had borrowed from the utterer, the words met the
+cold condemnation of the well-judging; but at that moment all
+things seemed possible to the hero of the people. He spoke as one
+inspired--they trembled and believed; and, as rapt from the spectacle,
+he stood a moment silent, his arm still extended--his dark dilating
+eye fixed upon space--his lip parted--his proud head towering and erect
+above the herd,--his own enthusiasm kindled that of the more humble and
+distant spectators; and there was a deep murmur begun by one, echoed by
+the rest, "The Lord is with Italy and Rienzi!"
+
+The Tribune turned, he saw the Pope's Vicar astonished, bewildered,
+rising to speak. His sense and foresight returned to him at once, and,
+resolved to drown the dangerous disavowal of the Papal authority
+for this hardihood, which was ready to burst from Raimond's lips, he
+motioned quickly to the musicians, and the solemn and ringing chant of
+the sacred ceremony prevented the Bishop of Orvietto all occasion of
+self-exoneration or reply.
+
+The moment the ceremony was over, Rienzi touched the Bishop, and
+whispered, "We will explain this to your liking. You feast with us at
+the Lateran.--Your arm." Nor did he leave the good Bishop's arm, nor
+trust him to other companionship, until to the stormy sound of horn
+and trumpet, drum and cymbal, and amidst such a concourse as might have
+hailed, on the same spot, the legendary baptism of Constantine, the
+Tribune and his nobles entered the great gates of the Lateran, then the
+Palace of the World.
+
+Thus ended that remarkable ceremony and that proud challenge of the
+Northern Powers, in behalf of the Italian liberties, which, had it been
+afterwards successful, would have been deemed a sublime daring; which,
+unsuccessful, has been construed by the vulgar into a frantic insolence;
+but which, calmly considering all the circumstances that urged on
+the Tribune, and all the power that surrounded him, was not, perhaps,
+altogether so imprudent as it seemed. And, even accepting that
+imprudence in the extremest sense,--by the more penetrating judge of
+the higher order of character, it will probably be considered as the
+magnificent folly of a bold nature, excited at once by position and
+prosperity, by religious credulities, by patriotic aspirings, by
+scholastic visions too suddenly transferred from revery to action,
+beyond that wise and earthward policy which sharpens the weapon ere it
+casts the gauntlet.
+
+
+
+Chapter 4.VII. The Festival.
+
+The Festival of that day was far the most sumptuous hitherto known. The
+hint of Cecco del Vecchio, which so well depicted the character of his
+fellow-citizens, as yet it exists, though not to such excess, in their
+love of holyday pomp and gorgeous show, was not lost upon Rienzi. One
+instance of the universal banqueting (intended, indeed, rather for
+the people than the higher ranks) may illustrate the more than royal
+profusion that prevailed. From morn till eve, streams of wine flowed
+like a fountain from the nostrils of the Horse of the great Equestrian
+Statue of Constantine. The mighty halls of the Lateran palace, open
+to all ranks, were prodigally spread; and the games, sports, and
+buffooneries of the time, were in ample requisition. Apart, the
+Tribunessa, as Nina was rather unclassically entitled, entertained
+the dames of Rome; while the Tribune had so effectually silenced or
+conciliated Raimond, that the good Bishop shared his peculiar table--the
+only one admitted to that honour. As the eye ranged each saloon
+and hall--it beheld the space lined with all the nobility and
+knighthood--the wealth and strength--the learning and the beauty--of the
+Italian metropolis; mingled with ambassadors and noble strangers, even
+from beyond the Alps; (The simple and credulous briographer of
+Rienzi declares his fame to have reached the ears of the Soldan of
+Babylon.)--envoys not only of the free states that had welcomed the rise
+of the Tribune, but of the highborn and haughty tyrants who had first
+derided his arrogance, and now cringed to his power. There, were not
+only the ambassadors of Florence, of Sienna, of Arezzo (which last
+subjected its government to the Tribune,) of Todi, of Spoleto, and of
+countless other lesser towns and states, but of the dark and terrible
+Visconti, prince of Milan; of Obizzo of Ferrara, and the tyrant rulers
+of Verona and Bologna; even the proud and sagacious Malatesta, lord of
+Rimini, whose arm afterwards broke for awhile the power of Montreal,
+at the head of his Great Company, had deputed his representative in his
+most honoured noble. John di Vico, the worst and most malignant despot
+of his day, who had sternly defied the arms of the Tribune, now subdued
+and humbled, was there in person; and the ambassadors of Hungary and of
+Naples mingled with those of Bavaria and Bohemia, whose sovereigns that
+day had been cited to the Roman Judgment Court. The nodding of plumes,
+the glitter of jewels and cloth of gold, the rustling of silks and
+jingle of golden spurs, the waving of banners from the roof, the sounds
+of minstrelsy from the galleries above, all presented a picture of such
+power and state--a court and chivalry of such show--as the greatest of
+the feudal kings might have beheld with a sparkling eye and a swelling
+heart. But at that moment the cause and lord of all that splendour,
+recovered from his late exhilaration, sat moody and abstracted,
+remembering with a thoughtful brow the adventure of the past night,
+and sensible that amongst his gaudiest revellers lurked his intended
+murtherers. Amidst the swell of the minstrelsy and the pomp of the
+crowd, he felt that treason scowled beside him; and the image of the
+skeleton obtruding, as of old, its grim thought of death upon the feast,
+darkened the ruby of the wine, and chilled the glitter of the scene.
+
+It was while the feast was loudest that Rienzi's page was seen gliding
+through the banquet, and whispering several of the nobles; each bowed
+low, but changed colour as he received the message.
+
+"My Lord Savelli," said Orsini, himself trembling, "bear yourself more
+bravely. This must be meant in honour, not revenge. I suppose your
+summons corresponds with mine."
+
+"He--he--asks--asks--me to supper at the Capitol; a fri-endly
+meeting--(pest on his friendship!)--after the noise of the day."
+
+"The words addressed also to me!" said Orsini, turning to one of the
+Frangipani.
+
+Those who received the summons soon broke from the feast, and collected
+in a group, eagerly conferring. Some were for flight, but flight was
+confession; their number, rank, long and consecrated impunity, reassured
+them, and they resolved to obey. The old Colonna, the sole innocent
+Baron of the invited guests, was also the only one who refused the
+invitation. "Tush!" said he, peevishly; "here is feasting enough for one
+day! Tell the Tribune that ere he sups I hope to be asleep. Grey hairs
+cannot encounter all this fever of festivity."
+
+As Rienzi rose to depart, which he did early, for the banquet took place
+while yet morning, Raimond, eager to escape and confer with some of his
+spiritual friends, as to the report he should make to the Pontiff, was
+beginning his expressions of farewell, when the merciless Tribune said
+to him gravely--
+
+"My Lord, we want you on urgent business at the Capitol. A prisoner--a
+trial--perhaps (he added with his portentous and prophetic frown) an
+execution waits us! Come."
+
+"Verily, Tribune," stammered the good Bishop, "this is a strange time
+for execution!"
+
+"Last night was a time yet more strange.--Come."
+
+There was something in the way in which the final word was pronounced,
+that Raimond could not resist. He sighed, muttered, twitched his robes,
+and followed the Tribune. As he passed through the halls, the company
+rose on all sides. Rienzi repaid their salutations with smiles and
+whispers of frank courtesy and winning address. Young as he yet was,
+and of a handsome and noble presence, that took every advantage from
+splendid attire, and yet more from an appearance of intellectual command
+in his brow and eye, which the less cultivated signors of that dark
+age necessarily wanted--he glittered through the court as one worthy to
+form, and fitted to preside over, it; and his supposed descent from the
+Teuton Emperor, which, since his greatness, was universally bruited and
+believed abroad, seemed undeniably visible to the foreign lords in the
+majesty of his mien and the easy blandness of his address.
+
+"My Lord Prefect," said he to a dark and sullen personage in black
+velvet, the powerful and arrogant John di Vico, prefect of Rome, "we are
+rejoiced to find so noble a guest at Rome: we must repay the courtesy by
+surprising you in your own palace ere long;--nor will you, Signor (as he
+turned to the envoy from Tivoli,) refuse us a shelter amidst your groves
+and waterfalls ere the vintage be gathered. Methinks Rome, united with
+sweet Tivoli, grows reconciled to the Muses. Your suit is carried,
+Master Venoni: the council recognises its justice; but I reserved
+the news for this holyday--you do not blame me, I trust." This was
+whispered, with a half-affectionate frankness, to a worthy citizen, who,
+finding himself amidst so many of the great, would have shrunk from
+the notice of the Tribune; but it was the policy of Rienzi to pay an
+especial and marked attention to those engaged in commercial pursuits.
+As, after tarrying a moment or two with the merchant, he passed on, the
+tall person of the old Colonna caught his eye--
+
+"Signor," said he, with a profound inclination of his head, but with a
+slight emphasis of tone, "you will not fail us this evening."
+
+"Tribune--" began the Colonna.
+
+"We receive no excuse," interrupted the Tribune, hastily, and passed on.
+
+He halted for a few moments before a small group of men plainly attired,
+who were watching him with intense interest; for they, too, were
+scholars, and in Rienzi's rise they saw another evidence of that
+wonderful and sudden power which intellect had begun to assume over
+brute force. With these, as if abruptly mingled with congenial spirits,
+the Tribune relaxed all the gravity of his brow. Happier, perhaps, his
+living career--more unequivocal his posthumous renown--had his objects
+as his tastes been theirs!
+
+"Ah, carissime!" said he to one, whose arm he drew within his own,--"and
+how proceeds thy interpretation of the old marbles?--half unravelled? I
+rejoice to hear it! Confer with me as of old, I pray thee. Tomorrow--no,
+nor the day after, but next week--we will have a tranquil evening. Dear
+poet, your ode transported me to the days of Horace; yet, methinks, we
+do wrong to reject the vernacular for the Latin. You shake your head?
+Well, Petrarch thinks with you: his great epic moves with the stride
+of a giant--so I hear from his friend and envoy,--and here he is. My
+Laeluis, is that not your name with Petrarch? How shall I express my
+delight at his comforting, his inspiring letter? Alas! he overrates not
+my intentions, but my power. Of this hereafter."
+
+A slight shade darkened the Tribune's brow at these words: but moving
+on, a long line of nobles and princes on either side, he regained his
+self-possession, and the dignity he had dropped with his former equals.
+Thus he passed through the crowd, and gradually disappeared.
+
+"He bears him bravely," said one, as the revellers reseated themselves.
+"Noticed you the 'we'--the style royal?"
+
+"But it must be owned that he lords it well," said the ambassador of the
+Visconti: "less pride would be cringing to his haughty court."
+
+"Why," said a professor of Bologna, "why is the Tribune called proud? I
+see no pride in him."
+
+"Nor I," said a wealthy jeweller.
+
+While these, and yet more contradictory, comments followed the exit of
+the Tribune, he passed into the saloon, where Nina presided; and here
+his fair person and silver tongue ("Suavis colorataeque sententiae,"
+according to the description of Petrarch) won him a more general favour
+with the matrons than he experienced with their lords, and not a little
+contrasted the formal and nervous compliments of the good Bishop, who
+served him on such occasions with an excellent foil.
+
+But as soon as these ceremonies were done, and Rienzi mounted his horse,
+his manner changed at once into a stern and ominous severity.
+
+"Vicar," said he, abruptly, to the Bishop, "we might well need your
+presence. Learn that at the Capitol now sits the Council in judgment
+upon an assassin. Last night, but for Heaven's mercy, I should have
+fallen a victim to a hireling's dagger, Knew you aught of this?"
+
+And he turned so sharply on the Bishop, that the poor canonist nearly
+dropped from his horse in surprise and terror.
+
+"I,--" said he.
+
+Rienzi smiled--"No, good my Lord Bishop! I see you are of no murtherer's
+mould. But to continue:--that I might not appear to act in mine own
+cause, I ordered the prisoner to be tried in my absence. In his trial
+(you marked the letter brought me at our banquet?)--"
+
+"Ay, and you changed colour."
+
+"Well I might: in his trial, I say, he has confessed that nine of
+the loftiest lords of Rome were his instigators. They sup with me
+tonight!--Vicar, forwards!"
+
+
+
+
+BOOK V. THE CRISIS.
+
+     "Questo ha acceso 'i fuoco e la fiamma laquale non la par
+     spotegnere."--"Vita di Cola di Rienzi", lib. i. cap. 29.
+
+     "He has kindled fire and flames which he will not be able to
+     extinguish."--"Life of Cola di Rienzi".
+
+
+
+Chapter 5.I. The Judgment of the Tribune.
+
+The brief words of the Tribune to Stephen Colonna, though they sharpened
+the rage of the proud old noble, were such as he did not on reflection
+deem it prudent to disobey. Accordingly, at the appointed hour, he found
+himself in one of the halls of the Capitol, with a gallant party of his
+peers. Rienzi received them with more than his usual graciousness.
+
+They sate down to the splendid board in secret uneasiness and alarm,
+as they saw that, with the exception of Stephen Colonna, none, save the
+conspirators, had been invited to the banquet. Rienzi, regardless
+of their silence and abstraction, was more than usually gay--the old
+Colonna more than usually sullen.
+
+"We fear we have but ill pleased you, my Lord Colonna, by our summons.
+Once, methinks, we might more easily provoke you to a smile."
+
+"Situations are changed, Tribune, since you were my guest."
+
+"Why, scarcely so. I have risen, but you have not fallen. Ye walk the
+streets day and night in security and peace; your lives are safe from
+the robber, and your palaces no longer need bars and battlements to
+shield you from your fellow-citizens. I have risen, but we all have
+risen--from barbarous disorder into civilized life! My Lord Gianni
+Colonna, whom we have made Captain over Campagna, you will not refuse a
+cup to the Buono Stato;--nor think we mistrust your valour, when we say,
+that we rejoice Rome hath no enemies to attest your generalship."
+
+"Methinks," quoth the old Colonna, bluntly, "we shall have enemies
+enough from Bohemia and Bavaria, ere the next harvest be green."
+
+"And, if so," replied the Tribune, calmly, "foreign foes are better than
+civil strife."
+
+"Ay, if we have money in the treasury; which is but little likely, if we
+have many more such holydays."
+
+"You are ungracious, my Lord," said the Tribune; "and, besides, you are
+more uncomplimentary to Rome than to ourselves. What citizen would not
+part with gold to buy fame and liberty?"
+
+"I know very few in Rome that would," answered the Baron. "But tell
+me, Tribune, you who are a notable casuist, which is the best for a
+state--that its governor should be over-thrifty or over-lavish?"
+
+"I refer the question to my friend, Luca di Savelli," replied Rienzi.
+"He is a grand philosopher, and I wot well could explain a much knottier
+riddle, which we will presently submit to his acumen."
+
+The Barons, who had been much embarrassed by the bold speech of the
+old Colonna, all turned their eyes to Savelli, who answered with more
+composure than was anticipated.
+
+"The question admits a double reply. He who is born a ruler, and
+maintains a foreign army, governing by fear, should be penurious. He who
+is made ruler, who courts the people, and would reign by love, must win
+their affection by generosity, and dazzle their fancies by pomp. Such, I
+believe, is the usual maxim in Italy, which is rife in all experience of
+state wisdom."
+
+The Barons unanimously applauded the discreet reply of Savelli,
+excepting only the old Colonna.
+
+"Yet pardon me, Tribune," said Stephen, "if I depart from the
+courtier-like decision of our friend, and opine, though with all due
+respect, that even a friar's coarse serge, ('Vestimenta da Bizoco,'
+was the phrase used by Colonna; a phrase borrowed from certain heretics
+(bizocchi) who affected extreme austerity; afterwards the word passed
+into a proverb.--See the comments of Zerfirino Re, in 'Vita di Cola di
+Rienzi'.) the parade of humility, would better become thee, than this
+gaudy pomp, the parade of pride!" So saying, he touched the large loose
+sleeve fringed with gold, of the Tribune's purple robe.
+
+"Hush, father!" said Gianni, Colonna's son, colouring at the unprovoked
+rudeness and dangerous candour of the veteran.
+
+"Nay, it matters not," said the Tribune, with affected indifference,
+though his lip quivered, and his eye shot fire; and then, after a pause,
+he resumed with an awful smile--"If the Colonna love the serge of the
+friar, he may see enough of it ere we part. And now, my Lord Savelli,
+for my question, which I pray you listen to; it demands all your wit.
+Is it best for a State's Ruler to be over-forgiving, or over-just? Take
+breath to answer: you look faint--you grow pale--you tremble--you cover
+your face! Traitor and assassin, your conscience betrays you! My Lords,
+relieve your accomplice, and take up the answer."
+
+"Nay, if we are discovered," said the Orsini, rising in despair, "we
+will not fall unavenged--die, tyrant!"
+
+He rushed to the place where Rienzi stood--for the Tribune also
+rose,--and made a thrust at his breast with his dagger; the steel
+pierced the purple robe, yet glanced harmlessly away--and the Tribune
+regarded the disappointed murtherer with a scornful smile.
+
+"Till yesternight, I never dreamt that under the robe of state I should
+need the secret corselet," said he. "My Lords, you have taught me a dark
+lesson, and I thank ye."
+
+So saying, he clapped his hands, and suddenly the folding doors at the
+end of the hall flew open, and discovered the saloon of the Council
+hung with silk of a blood-red, relieved by rays of white,--the emblem of
+crime and death. At a long table sate the councillors in their robes; at
+the bar stood a ruffian form, which the banqueters too well recognised.
+
+"Bid Rodolf of Saxony approach!" said the Tribune.
+
+And led by two guards, the robber entered the hall.
+
+"Wretch, you then betrayed us!" said one of the Frangipani.
+
+"Rodolph of Saxony goes ever to the highest bidder," returned the
+miscreant, with a horrid grin. "You gave me gold, and I would have slain
+your foe; your foe defeated me; he gives me life, and life is a greater
+boon than gold!"
+
+"Ye confess your crime, my Lords! Silent! dumb! Where is your wit,
+Savelli? Where your pride, Rinaldo di Orsini? Gianni Colonna, is your
+chivalry come to this?"
+
+"Oh!" continued Rienzi, with deep and passionate bitterness; "oh, my
+Lords, will nothing conciliate you--not to me, but to Rome? What hath
+been my sin against you and yours? Disbanded ruffians (such as your
+accuser)--dismantled fortresses--impartial law--what man, in all the
+wild revolutions of Italy, sprung from the people, ever yielded less to
+their licence? Not a coin of your coffers touched by wanton power,--not
+a hair of your heads harmed by private revenge. You, Gianni Colonna,
+loaded with honours, intrusted with command--you, Alphonso di
+Frangipani, endowed with new principalities,--did the Tribune remember
+one insult he received from you as the Plebeian? You accuse
+my pride;--was it my fault that ye cringed and fawned upon my
+power,--flattery on your lips, poison at your hearts? No, I have not
+offended you; let the world know, that in me you aimed at liberty,
+justice, law, order, the restored grandeur, the renovated rights of
+Rome! At these, the Abstract and the Immortal--not at this frail form,
+ye struck;--by the divinity of these ye are defeated;--for the outraged
+majesty of these,--criminals and victims,--ye must die!"
+
+With these words, uttered with the tone and air that would have become
+the loftiest spirit of the ancient city, Rienzi, with a majestic step,
+swept from the chamber into the Hall of Council. (The guilt of the
+Barons in their designed assassination of Rienzi, though hastily
+slurred over by Gibbon, and other modern writers, is clearly attested
+by Muratori, the Bolognese Chronicle &c.--They even confessed the crime.
+(See Cron. Estens: Muratori, tom. xviii. page 442.))
+
+All that night the conspirators remained within that room, the doors
+locked and guarded; the banquet unremoved, and its splendour strangely
+contrasting the mood of the guests.
+
+The utter prostration and despair of these dastard criminals--so unlike
+the knightly nobles of France and England, has been painted by the
+historian in odious and withering colours. The old Colonna alone
+sustained his impetuous and imperious character. He strode to and fro
+the room like a lion in his cage, uttering loud threats of resentment
+and defiance; and beating at the door with his clenched hands, demanding
+egress, and proclaiming the vengeance of the Pontiff.
+
+The dawn came, slow and grey upon that agonized assembly: and just as
+the last star faded from the melancholy horizon, and by the wan and
+comfortless heaven, they regarded each other's faces, almost spectral
+with anxiety and fear, the great bell of the Capitol sounded the notes
+in which they well recognised the chime of death! It was then that the
+door opened, and a drear and gloomy procession of cordeliers, one to
+each Baron, entered the apartment! At that spectacle, we are told, the
+terror of the conspirators was so great, that it froze up the very power
+of speech. ("Diventarono si gelati, che non poteno favellare.") The
+greater part at length, deeming all hope over, resigned themselves
+to their ghostly confessors. But when the friar appointed to Stephen
+approached that passionate old man, he waved his hand impatiently, and
+said--"Tease me not! Tease me not!"
+
+"Nay, son, prepare for the awful hour."
+
+"Son, indeed!" quoth the Baron. "I am old enough to be thy grandsire;
+and for the rest, tell him who sent thee, that I neither am prepared
+for death, nor will prepare! I have made up my mind to live these twenty
+years, and longer too;--if I catch not my death with the cold of this
+accursed night."
+
+Just at that moment a cry that almost seemed to rend the Capitol asunder
+was heard, as, with one voice, the multitude below yelled forth--
+
+"Death to the conspirators!--death! death!"
+
+While this the scene in that hall, the Tribune issued from his chamber,
+in which he had been closeted with his wife and sister. The noble spirit
+of the one, the tears and grief of the other (who saw at one fell stroke
+perish the house of her betrothed,) had not worked without effect upon
+a temper, stern and just indeed, but naturally averse from blood; and a
+heart capable of the loftiest species of revenge.
+
+He entered the Council, still sitting, with a calm brow, and even a
+cheerful eye.
+
+"Pandulfo di Guido," he said, turning to that citizen, "you are right;
+you spoke as a wise man and a patriot, when you said that to cut off
+with one blow, however merited, the noblest heads of Rome would endanger
+the State, sully our purple with an indelible stain, and unite the
+nobility of Italy against us."
+
+"Such, Tribune, was my argument, though the Council have decided
+otherwise."
+
+"Hearken to the shouts of the populace, you cannot appease their honest
+warmth," said the demagogue Baroncelli.
+
+Many of the Council murmured applause.
+
+"Friends," said the Tribune, with a solemn and earnest aspect, "let
+not Posterity say that Liberty loves blood; let us for once adopt
+the example and imitate the mercy of our great Redeemer! We have
+triumphed--let us forbear; we are saved--let us forgive!"
+
+The speech of the Tribune was supported by Pandulfo, and others of the
+more mild and moderate policy; and for a short but animated discussion,
+the influence of Rienzi prevailed, and the sentence of death was
+revoked, but by a small majority.
+
+"And now," said Rienzi, "let us be more than just; let us be generous.
+Speak--and boldly. Do any of ye think that I have been over-hard,
+over-haughty with these stubborn spirits?--I read your answer in your
+brows!--I have! Do any of ye think this error of mind may have stirred
+them to their dark revenge? Do any of you deem that they partake, as we
+do, of human nature,--that they are sensible to kindness, that they are
+softened by generosity,--that they can be tamed and disarmed by such
+vengeance as is dictated to noble foes by Christian laws?"
+
+"I think," said Pandulfo, after a pause, "that it will not be in human
+nature, if the men you pardon, thus offending and thus convicted, again
+attempt your life!"
+
+"Methinks," said Rienzi, "we must do even more than pardon. The first
+great Caesar, when he did not crush a foe, strove to convert him to a
+friend--"
+
+"And perished by the attempt," said Baroncelli, abruptly.
+
+Rienzi started and changed colour.
+
+"If you would save these wretched prisoners, better not wait till the
+fury of the mob become ungovernable," whispered Pandulfo.
+
+The Tribune roused himself from his revery.
+
+"Pandulfo," said he, in the same tone, "my heart misgives me--the brood
+of serpents are in my hand--I do not strangle them--they may sting me to
+death, in return for my mercy--it is their instinct! No matter: it shall
+not be said that the Roman Tribune bought with so many lives his own
+safety: nor shall it be written upon my grave-stone, 'Here lies the
+coward, who did not dare forgive.' What, ho! there, officers, unclose
+the doors! My masters, let us acquaint the prisoners with their
+sentence."
+
+With that, Rienzi seated himself on the chair of state, at the head
+of the table, and the sun, now risen, cast its rays over the blood-red
+walls, in which the Barons, marshalled in order into the chamber,
+thought to read their fate.
+
+"My Lords," said the Tribune, "ye have offended the laws of God and man;
+but God teaches man the quality of mercy. Learn at last, that I bear a
+charmed life. Nor is he whom, for high purposes, Heaven hath raised from
+the cottage to the popular throne, without invisible aid and spiritual
+protection. If hereditary monarchs are deemed sacred, how much more one
+in whose power the divine hand hath writ its witness! Yes, over him who
+lives but for his country, whose greatness is his country's gift, whose
+life is his country's liberty, watch the souls of the just, and the
+unsleeping eyes of the sworded seraphim! Taught by your late failure and
+your present peril, bid your anger against me cease; respect the laws,
+revere the freedom of your city, and think that no state presents a
+nobler spectacle than men born as ye are--a patrician and illustrious
+order--using your power to protect your city, your wealth to nurture its
+arts, your chivalry to protect its laws! Take back your swords--and the
+first man who strikes against the liberties of Rome, let him be your
+victim; even though that victim be the Tribune. Your cause has been
+tried--your sentence is pronounced. Renew your oath to forbear all
+hostility, private or public, against the government and the magistrates
+of Rome, and ye are pardoned--ye are free!"
+
+Amazed, bewildered, the Barons mechanically bent the knee: the friars
+who had received their confessions, administered the appointed oath; and
+while, with white lips, they muttered the solemn words, they heard below
+the roar of the multitude for their blood.
+
+This ceremony ended, the Tribune passed into the banquet-hall, which
+conducted to a balcony, whence he was accustomed to address the people;
+and never, perhaps, was his wonderful mastery over the passions of an
+audience (ad persuadendum efficax dictator, quoque dulcis ac lepidus)
+(Petrarch of Rienzi.) more greatly needed or more eminently shown, than
+on that day; for the fury of the people was at its height, and it was
+long ere he succeeded in turning it aside. Before he concluded, however,
+every wave of the wild sea lay hushed.--The orator lived to stand on the
+same spot, to plead for a life nobler than those he now saved,--and to
+plead unheard and in vain!
+
+As soon as the Tribune saw the favourable moment had arrived, the Barons
+were admitted into the balcony:--in the presence of the breathless
+thousands, they solemnly pledged themselves to protect the Good Estate.
+And thus the morning which seemed to dawn upon their execution witnessed
+their reconciliation with the people.
+
+The crowd dispersed, the majority soothed and pleased;--the more
+sagacious, vexed and dissatisfied.
+
+"He has but increased the smoke and the flame which he was not able
+to extinguish," growled Cecco del Vecchio; and the smith's appropriate
+saying passed into a proverb and a prophecy.
+
+Meanwhile, the Tribune, conscious at least that he had taken the more
+generous course, broke up the Council, and retired to the chamber
+where Nina and his sister waited him. These beautiful young women had
+conceived for each other the tenderest affection. And their differing
+characters, both of mind and feature, seemed by contrast to heighten the
+charms of both; as in a skilful jewellery, the pearl and diamond borrow
+beauty from each other.
+
+And as Irene now turned her pale countenance and streaming eyes from
+the bosom to which she had clung for support, the timid sister, anxious,
+doubtful, wistful;--the proud wife, sanguine and assured, as if never
+diffident of the intentions nor of the power of her Rienzi:--the
+contrast would have furnished to a painter no unworthy incarnation of
+the Love that hopeth, and the Love that feareth, all things.
+
+"Be cheered, my sweet sister," said the Tribune, first caught by Irene's
+imploring look; "not a hair on the heads of those who boast the name of
+him thou lovest so well is injured.--Thank Heaven," as his sister,
+with a low cry, rushed into his arms, "that it was against my life they
+conspired! Had it been another Roman's, mercy might have been a crime!
+Dearest, may Adrian love thee half as well as I; and yet, my sister and
+my child, none can know thy soft soul like he who watched over it since
+its first blossom expanded to the sun. My poor brother! had he lived,
+your counsel had been his; and methinks his gentle spirit often whispers
+away the sternness which, otherwise, would harden over mine. Nina, my
+queen, my inspirer, my monitor--ever thus let thy heart, masculine in my
+distress, be woman's in my power; and be to me, with Irene, upon earth,
+what my brother is in heaven!"
+
+The Tribune, exhausted by the trials of the night, retired for a few
+hours to rest; and as Nina, encircling him within her arms, watched over
+his noble countenance--care hushed, ambition laid at rest, its serenity
+had something almost of sublime. And tears of that delicious pride,
+which woman sheds for the hero of her dreams, stood heavy in the wife's
+eyes, as she rejoiced more, in the deep stillness of her heart, at the
+prerogative, alone hers, of sharing his solitary hours, than in all the
+rank to which his destiny had raised her, and which her nature fitted
+her at once to adorn and to enjoy. In that calm and lonely hour she
+beguiled her heart by waking dreams, vainer than the sleeper's; and
+pictured to herself the long career of glory, the august decline of
+peace, which were to await her lord.
+
+And while she thus watched and thus dreamed, the cloud, as yet no bigger
+than a man's hand, darkened the horizon of a fate whose sunshine was
+well-nigh past!
+
+
+
+Chapter 5.II. The Flight.
+
+Fretting his proud heart, as a steed frets on the bit, old Colonna
+regained his palace. To him, innocent of the proposed crime of his kin
+and compeers, the whole scene of the night and morning presented but one
+feature of insult and degradation. Scarce was he in his palace, ere he
+ordered couriers, in whom he knew he could confide, to be in preparation
+for his summons. "This to Avignon," said he to himself, as he concluded
+an epistle to the Pontiff.--"We will see whether the friendship of the
+great house of the Colonna will outweigh the frantic support of the
+rabble's puppet.--This to Palestrina,--the rock is inaccessible!--This
+to John di Vico, he may be relied upon, traitor though he be!--This to
+Naples; the Colonna will disown the Tribune's ambassador, if he throw
+not up the trust and hasten hither, not a lover but a soldier!--and may
+this find Walter de Montreal! Ah, a precious messenger he sent us, but
+I will forgive all--all, for a thousand lances." And as with trembling
+hands he twined the silk round his letters, he bade his pages invite to
+his board, next day, all the signors who had been implicated with him on
+the previous night.
+
+The Barons came--far more enraged at the disgrace of pardon, than
+grateful for the boon of mercy. Their fears combined with their pride;
+and the shouts of the mob, the whine of the cordeliers, still ringing
+in their ears, they deemed united resistance the only course left to
+protect their lives, and avenge their affront.
+
+To them the public pardon of the Tribune seemed only a disguise to
+private revenge. All they believed was, that Rienzi did not dare to
+destroy them in the face of day; forgetfulness and forgiveness appeared
+to them as the means designed to lull their vigilance, while abasing
+their pride: and the knowledge of crime detected forbade them all hope
+of safety. The hand of their own assassin might be armed against
+them, or they might be ruined singly, one by one, as was the common
+tyrant-craft of that day. Singularly enough, Luca di Savelli was the
+most urgent for immediate rebellion. The fear of death made the coward
+brave.
+
+Unable even to conceive the romantic generosity of the Tribune, the
+Barons were yet more alarmed when, the next day, Rienzi, summoning them
+one by one to a private audience, presented them with gifts, and bade
+them forget the past: excused himself rather than them, and augmented
+their offices and honours.
+
+In the Quixotism of a heart to which royalty was natural, he thought
+that there was no medium course; and that the enmity he would not
+silence by death, he could crush by confidence and favours. Such conduct
+from a born king to hereditary inferiors might have been successful; but
+the generosity of one who has abruptly risen over his lords is but the
+ostentation of insult. Rienzi in this, and, perhaps, in forgiveness
+itself, committed a fatal error of policy, which the dark sagacity of a
+Visconti, or, in later times, of a Borgia, would never have perpetrated.
+But it was the error of a bright and a great mind.
+
+Nina was seated in the grand saloon of the palace--it was the day of
+reception for the Roman ladies.
+
+The attendance was so much less numerous than usual that it startled
+her, and she thought there was a coldness and restraint in the manner of
+the visitors present, which somewhat stung her vanity.
+
+"I trust we have not offended the Signora Colonna," she said to the Lady
+of Gianni, Stephen's son. "She was wont to grace our halls, and we miss
+much her stately presence."
+
+"Madam, my Lord's mother is unwell!"
+
+"Is she so? We will send for her more welcome news. Methinks we are
+deserted today."
+
+As she spoke, she carelessly dropped her handkerchief--the haughty dame
+of the Colonna bent not--not a hand stirred; and the Tribunessa looked
+for a moment surprised and disconcerted. Her eye roving over the throng,
+she perceived several, whom she knew as the wives of Rienzi's foes,
+whispering together with meaning glances, and more than one malicious
+sneer at her mortification was apparent. She recovered herself
+instantly, and said to the Signora Frangipani, with a smile, "May we be
+a partaker of your mirth? You seem to have chanced on some gay thought,
+which it were a sin not to share freely."
+
+The lady she addressed coloured slightly, and replied, "We were
+thinking, madam, that had the Tribune been present, his vow of
+knighthood would have been called into requisition."
+
+"And how, Signora?"
+
+"It would have been his pleasing duty, madam, to succour the
+distressed." And the Signora glanced significantly on the kerchief still
+on the floor.
+
+"You designed me, then, this slight, Signoras," said Nina, rising with
+great majesty. "I know not whether your Lords are equally bold to the
+Tribune; but this I know, that the Tribune's wife can in future forgive
+your absence. Four centuries ago, a Frangipani might well have stooped
+to a Raselli; today, the dame of a Roman Baron might acknowledge a
+superior in the wife of the first magistrate of Rome. I compel not your
+courtesy, nor seek it."
+
+"We have gone too far," whispered one of the ladies to her neighbour.
+"Perhaps the enterprise may not succeed; and then--"
+
+Further remark was cut short by the sudden entrance of the Tribune. He
+entered with great haste, and on his brow was that dark frown which none
+ever saw unquailing.
+
+"How, fair matrons!" said he, looking round the room with a rapid
+glance, "ye have not deserted us yet? By the blessed cross, your Lords
+pay a compliment to our honour, to leave us such lovely hostages, or
+else, God's truth, they are ungrateful husbands. So, madam," turning
+sharp round to the wife of Gianni Colonna, "your husband is fled to
+Palestrina; yours, Signora Orsini, to Marino; yours with him, fair
+bride of Frangipani,--ye came hither to--. But ye are sacred even from a
+word!"
+
+The Tribune paused a moment, evidently striving to suppress his emotion,
+as he observed the terror he had excited--his eye fell upon Nina, who,
+forgetting her previous vexation, regarded him with anxious amazement.
+"Yes," said he to her, "you alone, perhaps, of this fair assemblage,
+know not that the nobles whom I lately released from the headsman's
+gripe are a second time forsworn. They have left home in the dead of the
+night, and already the Heralds proclaim them traitors and rebels. Rienzi
+forgives no more!"
+
+"Tribune," exclaimed the Signora Frangipani, who had more bold blood in
+her veins than her whole house, "were I of thine own sex, I would
+cast the words, Traitor and Rebel, given to my Lord, in thine own
+teeth!--Proud man, the Pontiff soon will fulfil that office!"
+
+"Your Lord is blest with a dove, fair one," said the Tribune,
+scornfully. "Ladies, fear not, while Rienzi lives, the wife even of his
+worst foe is safe and honoured. The crowd will be here anon; our guards
+shall attend ye home in safety, or this palace may be your shelter--for,
+I warn ye, that your Lords have rushed into a great peril. And ere many
+days be past, the streets of Rome may be as rivers of blood."
+
+"We accept your offer, Tribune," said the Signora Frangipani, who was
+touched, and, in spite of herself, awed by the Tribune's manner. And
+as she spoke, she dropped on one knee, picked up the kerchief, and,
+presenting it respectfully to Nina, said, "Madam, forgive me. I alone of
+these present respect you more in danger than in pride."
+
+"And I," returned Nina, as she leaned in graceful confidence on Rienzi's
+arm, "I reply, that if there be danger, the more need of pride."
+
+All that day and all that night rang the great bell of the Capitol. But
+on the following daybreak, the assemblage was thin and scattered; there
+was a great fear stricken into the hearts of the people, by the flight
+of the Barons, and they bitterly and loudly upbraided Rienzi for sparing
+them to this opportunity of mischief. That day the rumours continued;
+the murmurers for the most part remained within their houses, or
+assembled in listless and discontented troops. The next day dawned; the
+same lethargy prevailed. The Tribune summoned his Council, (which was a
+Representative assembly.)
+
+"Shall we go forth as we are," said he, "with such few as will follow
+the Roman standard!"
+
+"No," replied Pandulfo, who, by nature timid, was yet well acquainted
+with the disposition of the people, and therefore a sagacious
+counsellor. "Let us hold back; let us wait till the rebels commit
+themselves by some odious outrage, and then hatred will unite the
+waverers, and resentment lead them."
+
+This counsel prevailed; the event proved its wisdom. To give excuse and
+dignity to the delay, messengers were sent to Marino, whither the chief
+part of the Barons had fled, and which was strongly fortified, demanding
+their immediate return.
+
+On the day on which the haughty refusal of the insurgents was brought
+to Rienzi, came fugitives from all parts of the Campagna. Houses
+burned--convents and vineyards pillaged--cattle and horses
+seized--attested the warfare practised by the Barons, and animated
+the drooping Romans, by showing the mercies they might expect for
+themselves. That evening, of their own accord, the Romans rushed into
+the place of the Capitol:--Rinaldo Orsini had seized a fortress in the
+immediate neighbourhood of Rome, and had set fire to a tower, the flames
+of which were visible to the city. The tenant of the tower, a noble
+lady, old and widowed, was burnt alive. Then rose the wild clamour--the
+mighty wrath--the headlong fury. The hour for action had arrived.
+("Ardea terre, arse la Castelluzza e case, e uomini. Non si schifo
+di ardere una nobile donna Vedova, veterana, in una torre. Per tale
+crudeltade li Romani furo piu irati," &c.--"Vita di Cola di Rienzi",
+lib. i. cap. 20.)
+
+
+
+Chapter 5.III. The Battle.
+
+"I have dreamed a dream," cried Rienzi, leaping from his bed. "The
+lion-hearted Boniface, foe and victim of the Colonna, hath appeared
+to me, and promised victory. ("In questa notte mi e apparito Santo
+Bonifacio Papa," &c.--"Vita di Cola di Rienzi" cap. 32.) Nina, prepare
+the laurel-wreath: this day victory shall be ours!"
+
+"O, Rienzi! today?"
+
+"Yes! hearken to the bell--hearken to the trumpet. Nay, I hear even now
+the impatient hoofs of my white warsteed! One kiss, Nina, ere I arm for
+victory,--stay--comfort poor Irene; let me not see her--she weeps that
+my foes are akin to her betrothed; I cannot brook her tears; I watched
+her in her cradle. Today, I must have no weakness on my soul! Knaves,
+twice perjured!--wolves, never to be tamed!--shall I meet ye at last
+sword to sword? Away, sweet Nina, to Irene, quick! Adrian is at Naples,
+and were he in Rome, her lover is sacred, though fifty times a Colonna."
+
+With that, the Tribune passed into his wardrobe, where his pages and
+gentlemen attended with his armour. "I hear, by our spies," said he,
+"that they will be at our gates ere noon--four thousand foot, seven
+hundred horsemen. We will give them a hearty welcome, my masters. How,
+Angelo Villani, my pretty page, what do you out of your lady's service?"
+
+"I would fain see a warrior arm for Rome," said the boy, with a boy's
+energy.
+
+"Bless thee, my child; there spoke one of Rome's true sons!"
+
+"And the Signora has promised me that I shall go with her guard to the
+gates, to hear the news--"
+
+"And report the victory?--thou shalt. But they must not let thee come
+within shaft-shot. What! my Pandulfo, thou in mail?"
+
+"Rome requires every man," said the citizen, whose weak nerves were
+strung by the contagion of the general enthusiasm.
+
+"She doth--and once more I am proud to be a Roman. Now, gentles, the
+Dalmaticum: (A robe or mantle of white, borne by Rienzi; at one time
+belonging to the sacerdotal office, afterwards an emblem of empire.)
+I would that every foe should know Rienzi; and, by the Lord of Hosts,
+fighting at the head of the imperial people, I have a right to the
+imperial robe. Are the friars prepared? Our march to the gates shall be
+preceded by a solemn hymn--so fought our sires."
+
+"Tribune, John di Vico is arrived with a hundred horse to support the
+Good Estate."
+
+"He hath!--The Lord has delivered us then of a foe, and given our
+dungeons a traitor!--Bring hither yon casket, Angelo.--So--Hark thee!
+Pandulfo, read this letter."
+
+The citizens read, with surprise and consternation, the answer of the
+wily Prefect to the Colonna's epistle.
+
+"He promises the Baron to desert to him in the battle, with the
+Prefect's banner," said Pandulfo. "What is to be done?"
+
+"What!--take my signet--here--see him lodged forthwith in the prison
+of the Capitol. Bid his train leave Rome, and if found acting with the
+Barons, warn them that their Lord dies. Go--see to it without a moment's
+delay. Meanwhile, to the chapel--we will hear mass."
+
+Within an hour the Roman army--vast, miscellaneous--old men and boys,
+mingled with the vigour of life, were on their march to the Gate of San
+Lorenzo; of their number, which amounted to twenty thousand foot,
+not one-sixth could be deemed men-at-arms; but the cavalry were well
+equipped, and consisted of the lesser Barons and the more opulent
+citizens. At the head of these rode the Tribune in complete armour,
+and wearing on his casque a wreath of oak and olive leaves, wrought in
+silver. Before him waved the great gonfalon of Rome, while in front of
+this multitudinous array marched a procession of monks, of the order of
+St. Francis, (for the ecclesiastical body of Rome went chiefly with
+the popular spirit, and its enthusiastic leader,)--slowly chanting the
+following hymn, which was made inexpressibly startling and imposing at
+the close of each stanza, by the clash of arms, the blast of trumpets,
+and the deep roll of the drum; which formed, as it were, a martial
+chorus to the song:--
+
+Roman War-song.
+
+     1.
+
+     March, march for your hearths and your altars!
+     Cursed to all time be the dastard that falters,
+     Never on earth may his sins be forgiven
+     Death on his soul, shut the portals of heaven!
+     A curse on his heart, and a curse on his brain!--
+     Who strikes not for Rome, shall to Rome be her Cain!
+     Breeze fill our banners, sun gild our spears,
+     Spirito Santo, Cavaliers!
+
+     (Rienzi's word of battle was "Spirito Santo Cavaliere", i.e.
+     Cavalier in the singular number.  The plural number has been
+     employed in the text, as somewhat more animated, and
+     therefore better adapted to the kind of poetry into the
+     service of which the watchword has been pressed.)
+
+     Blow, trumpets, blow,
+     Blow, trumpets, blow,
+     Gaily to glory we come;
+     Like a king in his pomp,
+     To the blast of the tromp,
+     And the roar of the mighty drum!
+     Breeze fill our banners, sun gild our spears,
+     Spirito Santo, Cavaliers!
+
+     2.
+
+     March, march for your Freedom and Laws!
+     Earth is your witness--all Earth's is your cause!
+     Seraph and saint from their glory shall heed ye,
+     The angel that smote the Assyrian shall lead ye;
+     To the Christ of the Cross man is never so holy
+     As in braving the proud in defence of the lowly!
+     Breeze fill our banners, sun gild our spears,
+     Spirito Santo, Cavaliers!
+     Blow, trumpets, blow,
+     Blow, trumpets, blow,
+     Gaily to glory we come;
+     Like a king in his pomp,
+     To the blast of the tromp,
+     And the roar of the mighty drum!
+     Breeze fill our banners, sun gild our spears,
+     Spirito Santo, Cavaliers!
+
+     3.
+
+     March, march! ye are sons of the Roman,
+     The sound of whose step was as fate to the foeman!
+     Whose realm, save the air and the wave, had no wall,
+     As he strode through the world like a lord in his hall;
+     Though your fame hath sunk down to the night of the grave,
+     It shall rise from the field like the sun from the wave.
+     Breeze fill our banners, sun gild our spears,
+     Spirito Santo, Cavaliers!
+     Blow, trumpets, blow,
+     Blow, trumpets, blow,
+     Gaily to glory we come;
+     Like a king in his pomp,
+     To the blast of the tromp,
+     And the roar of the mighty drum!
+     Breeze fill our banners, sun gild our spears,
+     Spirito Santo, Cavaliers!
+
+In this order they reached the wide waste that ruin and devastation
+left within the gates, and, marshalled in long lines on either side,
+extending far down the vistaed streets, and leaving a broad space in the
+centre, awaited the order of their leader.
+
+"Throw open the gates, and admit the foe!" cried Rienzi, with a loud
+voice; as the trumpets of the Barons, announced their approach.
+
+Meanwhile the insurgent Patricians, who had marched that morning from a
+place called the Monument, four miles distant, came gallantly and boldly
+on.
+
+With old Stephen, whose great height, gaunt frame, and lordly air,
+shewed well in his gorgeous mail, rode his sons,--the Frangipani and the
+Savelli, and Giordano Orsini, brother to Rinaldo.
+
+"Today the tyrant shall perish!" said the proud Baron; "and the flag of
+the Colonna shall wave from the Capitol."
+
+"The flag of the Bear," said Giordano Orsini, angrily.--"The victory
+will not be yours alone, my Lord!"
+
+"Our house ever took precedence in Rome," replied the Colonna,
+haughtily.
+
+"Never, while one stone of the palaces of the Orsini stands upon
+another."
+
+"Hush!" said Luca di Savelli; "are ye dividing the skin while the lion
+lives? We shall have fierce work today."
+
+"Not so," said the old Colonna; "John di Vico will turn, with his
+Romans, at the first onset, and some of the malcontents within have
+promised to open the gates.--How, knave?" as a scout rode up breathless
+to the Baron. "What tidings?"
+
+"The gates are opened--not a spear gleams from the walls!"
+
+"Did I not tell ye, Lords?" said the Colonna, turning round
+triumphantly. "Methinks we shall win Rome without a single
+blow.--Grandson, where now are thy silly forebodings?" This was said to
+Pietro, one of his grandsons--the first-born of Gianni--a comely youth,
+not two weeks wedded, who made no reply. "My little Pietro here,"
+continued the Baron, speaking to his comrades, "is so new a bridegroom,
+that last night he dreamed of his bride; and deems it, poor lad, a
+portent."
+
+"She was in deep mourning, and glided from my arms, uttering, 'Woe, woe,
+to the Colonna!" said the young man, solemnly.
+
+"I have lived nearly ninety years," replied the old man, "and I may have
+dreamed, therefore, some forty thousand dreams; of which, two came true,
+and the rest were false. Judge, then, what chances are in favour of the
+science!"
+
+Thus conversing, they approached within bow-shot of the gates, which
+were still open. All was silent as death. The army, which was composed
+chiefly of foreign mercenaries, halted in deliberation--when, lo!--a
+torch was suddenly cast on high over the walls; it gleamed a moment--and
+then hissed in the miry pool below.
+
+"It is the signal of our friends within, as agreed on," cried old
+Colonna. "Pietro, advance with your company!" The young nobleman closed
+his visor, put himself at the head of the band under his command; and,
+with his lance in his rest, rode in a half gallop to the gates. The
+morning had been clouded and overcast, and the sun, appearing only at
+intervals, now broke out in a bright stream of light--as it glittered
+on the waving plume and shining mail of the young horseman, disappearing
+under the gloomy arch, several paces in advance of his troop. On swept
+his followers--forward went the cavalry headed by Gianni Colonna,
+Pietro's father.--there was a minute's silence, broken only by the
+clatter of the arms, and tramp of hoofs,--when from within the walls
+rose the abrupt cry--"Rome, the Tribune, and the People! Spirito Santo,
+Cavaliers!" The main body halted aghast. Suddenly Gianni Colonna was
+seen flying backward from the gate at full speed.
+
+"My son, my son!" he cried, "they have murdered him;"--he halted abrupt
+and irresolute, then adding, "But I will avenge!" wheeled round, and
+spurred again through the arch,--when a huge machine of iron, shaped as
+a portcullis, suddenly descended upon the unhappy father, and crushed
+man and horse to the ground--one blent, mangled, bloody mass.
+
+The old Colonna saw, and scarce believed his eyes; and ere his troop
+recovered its stupor, the machine rose, and over the corpse dashed
+the Popular Armament. Thousands upon thousands, they came on; a wild,
+clamorous, roaring stream. They poured on all sides upon their enemies,
+who drawn up in steady discipline, and clad in complete mail, received
+and broke their charge.
+
+"Revenge, and the Colonna!"--"The Bear and the Orsini!"--"Charity and
+the Frangipani!" (Who had taken their motto from some fabled ancestor
+who had broke bread with a beggar in a time of famine.) "Strike for
+the Snake (The Lion was, however, the animal usually arrogated by the
+heraldic vanity of the Savelli.) and the Savelli!" were then heard on
+high, mingled with the German and hoarse shout, "Full purses, and the
+Three Kings of Cologne." The Romans, rather ferocious than disciplined,
+fell butchered in crowds round the ranks of the mercenaries: but as one
+fell, another succeeded; and still burst with undiminished fervour
+the countercry of "Rome, the Tribune, and the People!--Spirito Santo,
+Cavaliers!" Exposed to every shaft and every sword by his emblematic
+diadem and his imperial robe, the fierce Rienzi led on each assault,
+wielding an enormous battle-axe, for the use of which the Italians were
+celebrated, and which he regarded as a national weapon. Inspired by
+every darker and sterner instinct of his nature, his blood heated, his
+passions aroused, fighting as a citizen for liberty, as a monarch
+for his crown, his daring seemed to the astonished foe as that of one
+frantic; his preservation that of one inspired: now here, now there;
+wherever flagged his own, or failed the opposing, force, glittered his
+white robe, and rose his bloody battle-axe; but his fury seemed rather
+directed against the chiefs than the herd; and still where his charger
+wheeled was heard his voice, "Where is a Colonna?"--"Defiance to the
+Orsini!"--"Spirito Santo, Cavaliers!" Three times was the sally led from
+the gate; three times were the Romans beaten back; and on the third, the
+gonfalon, borne before the Tribune, was cloven to the ground. Then, for
+the first time, he seemed amazed and alarmed, and, raising his eyes to
+heaven, he exclaimed, "O Lord, hast thou then forsaken me?" With that,
+taking heart, once more he waved his arm, and again led forward his wild
+array.
+
+At eve the battle ceased. Of the Barons who had been the main object of
+the Tribune's assault, the pride and boast was broken. Of the princely
+line of the Colonna, three lay dead. Giordano Orsini was mortally
+wounded; the fierce Rinaldo had not shared the conflict. Of the
+Frangipani, the haughtiest signors were no more; and Luca, the dastard
+head of the Savelli, had long since saved himself by flight. On the
+other hand, the slaughter of the citizens had been prodigious;--the
+ground was swamped with blood--and over heaps of slain, (steeds and
+riders,) the twilight star beheld Rienzi and the Romans returning
+victors from the pursuit. Shouts of rejoicing followed the Tribune's
+panting steed through the arch; and just as he entered the space within,
+crowds of those whose infirmities, sex, or years, had not allowed them
+to share the conflict,--women, and children, and drivelling age, mingled
+with the bare feet and dark robes of monks and friars, apprised of the
+victory, were prepared to hail his triumph.
+
+Rienzi reined his steed by the corpse of the boy Colonna, which lay
+half immersed in a pool of water, and close by it, removed from the arch
+where he had fallen, lay that of Gianni Colonna,--(that Gianni Colonna
+whose spear had dismissed his brother's gentle spirit.) He glanced over
+the slain, as the melancholy Hesperus played upon the bloody pool and
+the gory corselet, with a breast heaved with many emotions; and turning,
+he saw the young Angelo, who, with some of Nina's guard, had repaired to
+the spot, and had now approached the Tribune.
+
+"Child," said Rienzi, pointing to the dead, "blessed art thou who hast
+no blood of kindred to avenge!--to him who hath, sooner or later comes
+the hour; and an awful hour it is!"
+
+The words sank deep into Angelo's heart, and in after life became words
+of fate to the speaker and the listener.
+
+Ere Rienzi had well recovered himself, and as were heard around him
+the shrieks of the widows and mothers of the slain--the groans of the
+dying--the exhortations of the friars--mingled with sounds of joy
+and triumph--a cry was raised by the women and stragglers on the
+battle-field without, of "The foe!--the foe!"
+
+"To your swords," cried the Tribune; "fall back in order;--yet they
+cannot be so bold!"
+
+The tramp of horses, the blast of a trumpet, were heard; and presently,
+at full speed, some thirty horsemen dashed through the gate.
+
+"Your bows," exclaimed the Tribune, advancing;--"yet hold--the leader
+is unarmed--it is our own banner. By our Lady, it is our ambassador of
+Naples, the Lord Adrian di Castello!"
+
+Panting--breathless--covered with dust--Adrian halted at the pool red
+with the blood of his kindred--and their pale faces, set in death,
+glared upon him.
+
+"Too late--alas! alas!--dread fate!--unhappy Rome!"
+
+"They fell into the pit they themselves had digged," said the Tribune,
+in a firm but hollow voice.--"Noble Adrian, would thy counsels had
+prevented this!"
+
+"Away, proud man--away!" said Adrian, impatiently waving his
+hand,--"thou shouldst protect the lives of Romans, and--oh,
+Gianni!--Pietro!--could not birth, renown, and thy green years, poor
+boy--could not these save ye?"
+
+"Pardon him, my friends," said the Tribune to the crowd,--"his grief is
+natural, and he knows not all their guilt.--Back, I pray ye--leave him
+to our ministering."
+
+It might have fared ill for Adrian, but for the Tribune's brief speech.
+And as the young Lord, dismounting, now bent over his kinsmen--the
+Tribune also surrendering his charger to his squires, approached, and,
+despite Adrian's reluctance and aversion, drew him aside,--
+
+"Young friend," said he, mournfully, "my heart bleeds for you; yet
+bethink thee, the wrath of the crowd is fresh upon them: be prudent."
+
+"Prudent!"
+
+"Hush--by my honour, these men were not worthy of your name. Twice
+perjured--once assassins--twice rebels--listen to me!"
+
+"Tribune, I ask no other construing of what I see--they might have died
+justly, or been butchered foully. But there is no peace between the
+executioner of my race and me."
+
+"Will you, too, be forsworn? Thine oath!--Come, come, I hear not these
+words. Be composed--retire--and if, three days hence, you impute any
+other blame to me than that of unwise lenity, I absolve you from your
+oath, and you are free to be my foe. The crowd gape and gaze upon us--a
+minute more, and I may not avail to save you."
+
+The feelings of the young patrician were such as utterly baffle
+description. He had never been much amongst his house, nor ever received
+more than common courtesy at their hands. But lineage is lineage still!
+And there, in the fatal hazard of war, lay the tree and sapling, the
+prime and hope of his race. He felt there was no answer to the Tribune,
+the very place of their death proved they had fallen in an assault upon
+their countrymen. He sympathised not with their cause, but their fate.
+And rage, revenge alike forbidden--his heart was the more softened
+to the shock and paralysis of grief. He did not therefore speak, but
+continued to gaze upon the dead, while large and unheeded tears flowed
+down his cheeks, and his attitude of dejection and sorrow was so moving,
+that the crowd, at first indignant, now felt for his affliction.
+At length his mind seemed made up. He turned to Rienzi, and said,
+falteringly, "Tribune, I blame you not, nor accuse. If you have been
+rash in this, God will have blood for blood. I wage no war with you--you
+say right, my oath prevents me; and if you govern well, I can still
+remember that I am Roman. But--but--look to that bleeding clay--we meet
+no more!--your sister--God be with her!--between her and me flows a dark
+gulf!" The young noble paused some moments, choked by his emotions,
+and then continued, "These papers discharge me of my mission.
+Standard-bearers, lay down the banner of the Republic. Tribune, speak
+not--I would be calm--calm. And so farewell to Rome." With a hurried
+glance towards the dead, he sprung upon his steed, and, followed by his
+train, vanished through the arch.
+
+The Tribune had not attempted to detain him--had not interrupted him.
+He felt that the young noble had thought--acted as became him best. He
+followed him with his eyes.
+
+"And thus," said he gloomily, "Fate plucks from me my noblest friend and
+my justest counsellor--better man Rome never lost!"
+
+Such is the eternal doom of disordered states. The mediator between rank
+and rank,--the kindly noble--the dispassionate patriot--the first to
+act--the most hailed in action--darkly vanishes from the scene. Fiercer
+and more unscrupulous spirits alone stalk the field; and no neutral and
+harmonizing link remains between hate and hate,--until exhaustion, sick
+with horrors, succeeds to frenzy, and despotism is welcomed as repose!
+
+
+
+Chapter 5.IV. The Hollowness of the Base.
+
+The rapid and busy march of state events has led us long away from
+the sister of the Tribune and the betrothed of Adrian. And the sweet
+thoughts and gentle day-dreams of that fair and enamoured girl, however
+full to her of an interest beyond all the storms and perils of ambition,
+are not so readily adapted to narration:--their soft monotony a few
+words can paint. They knew but one image, they tended to but one
+prospect. Shrinking from the glare of her brother's court, and eclipsed,
+when she forced herself to appear, by the more matured and dazzling
+beauty, and all-commanding presence, of Nina,--to her the pomp and
+crowd seemed an unreal pageant, from which she retired to the truth of
+life,--the hopes and musings of her own heart. Poor girl! with all the
+soft and tender nature of her dead brother, and none of the stern genius
+and the prodigal ambition,--the eye-fatiguing ostentation and fervour of
+the living--she was but ill-fitted for the unquiet but splendid region
+to which she was thus suddenly transferred.
+
+With all her affection for Rienzi, she could not conquer a certain fear
+which, conjoined with the difference of sex and age, forbade her to be
+communicative with him upon the subject most upon her heart.
+
+As the absence of Adrian at the Neapolitan Court passed the anticipated
+date, (for at no Court then, with a throne fiercely disputed, did
+the Tribune require a nobler or more intelligent representative,--and
+intrigues and counter-intrigues delayed his departure from week to
+week), she grew uneasy and alarmed. Like many, themselves unseen,
+inactive, the spectators of the scene, she saw involuntarily further
+into the time than the deeper intellect either of the Tribune or Nina;
+and the dangerous discontent of the nobles was visible and audible to
+her in looks and whispers, which reached not acuter or more suspected
+ears and eyes. Anxiously, restlessly, did she long for the return
+of Adrian, not from selfish motives alone, but from well-founded
+apprehensions for her brother. With Adrian di Castello, alike a noble
+and a patriot, each party had found a mediator, and his presence grew
+daily more needed, till at length the conspiracy of the Barons had
+broken out. From that hour she scarcely dared to hope; her calm sense,
+unblinded by the high-wrought genius which, as too often happens, made
+the Tribune see harsh realities through a false and brilliant light,
+perceived that the Rubicon was passed; and through all the events
+that followed she could behold but two images--danger to her brother,
+separation from her betrothed.
+
+With Nina alone could her full heart confer; for Nina, with all the
+differences of character, was a woman who loved. And this united them.
+In the earlier power of Rienzi, many of their happiest hours had been
+passed together, remote from the gaudy crowd, alone and unrestrained,
+in the summer nights, on the moonlit balconies, in that interchange
+of thought, sympathy, and consolation, which to two impassioned and
+guileless women makes the most interesting occupation and the most
+effectual solace. But of late, this intercourse had been much marred.
+From the morning in which the Barons had received their pardon, to that
+on which they had marched on Rome, had been one succession of fierce
+excitements. Every face Irene saw was clouded and overcast--all gaiety
+was suspended--bustling and anxious councillors, or armed soldiers, had
+for days been the only visitors of the palace. Rienzi had been seen but
+for short moments: his brow wrapt in care. Nina had been more fond, more
+caressing than ever, but in those caresses there seemed a mournful and
+ominous compassion. The attempts at comfort and hope were succeeded by
+a sickly smile and broken words; and Irene was prepared, by the
+presentiments of her own heart, for the stroke that fell--victory was to
+her brother--his foe was crushed--Rome was free--but the lofty house
+of the Colonnas had lost its stateliest props, and Adrian was gone for
+ever!--She did not blame him; she could not blame her brother; each
+had acted as became his several station. She was the poor sacrifice of
+events and fate--the Iphigenia to the Winds which were to bear the bark
+of Rome to the haven, or, it might be, to whelm it in the abyss. She was
+stunned by the blow; she did not even weep or complain; she bowed to the
+storm that swept over her, and it passed. For two days she neither took
+food nor rest; she shut herself up; she asked only the boon of solitude:
+but on the third morning she recovered as by a miracle, for on the third
+morning, the following letter was left at the palace:--
+
+"Irene,--Ere this you have learned my deep cause of grief; you feel
+that to a Colonna Rome can no longer be a home, nor Rome's Tribune be
+a brother. While I write these words honour but feebly supports me: all
+the hopes I had formed, all the prospects I had pictured, all the love
+I bore and bear thee, rush upon my heart, and I can only feel that I am
+wretched. Irene, Irene, your sweet face rises before me, and in those
+beloved eyes I read that I am forgiven,--I am understood; and dearly as
+I know thou lovest me, thou wouldst rather I were lost to thee, rather I
+were in the grave with my kinsmen, than know I lived the reproach of my
+order, the recreant of my name. Ah! why was I a Colonna? why did Fortune
+make me noble, and nature and circumstance attach me to the people? I am
+barred alike from love and from revenge; all my revenge falls upon
+thee and me. Adored! we are perhaps separated for ever; but, by all
+the happiness I have known by thy side--by all the rapture of which I
+dreamed--by that delicious hour which first gave thee to my gaze, when
+I watched the soft soul returning to thine eyes and lip--by thy first
+blushing confession of love--by our first kiss--by our last farewell--I
+swear to be faithful to thee to the last. None other shall ever chase
+thine image from my heart. And now, when Hope seems over, Faith becomes
+doubly sacred; and thou, my beautiful, wilt thou not remember me? wilt
+thou not feel as if we were the betrothed of Heaven? In the legends of
+the North we are told of the knight who, returning from the Holy Land,
+found his mistress (believing his death) the bride of Heaven, and he
+built a hermitage by the convent where she dwelt; and, though they never
+saw each other more, their souls were faithful unto death. Even so,
+Irene, be we to each other--dead to all else--betrothed in memory--to
+be wedded above! And yet, yet ere I close, one hope dawns upon me. Thy
+brother's career, bright and lofty, may be but as a falling star;
+should darkness swallow it, should his power cease, should his throne be
+broken, and Rome know no more her Tribune; shouldst thou no longer
+have a brother in the judge and destroyer of my house; shouldst thou be
+stricken from pomp and state; shouldst thou be friendless, kindredless,
+alone--then, without a stain on mine honour, without the shame and odium
+of receiving power and happiness from hands yet red with the blood of
+my race, I may claim thee as my own. Honour ceases to command when thou
+ceasest to be great. I dare not too fondly indulge this dream, perchance
+it is a sin in both. But it must be whispered, that thou mayest know
+all thy Adrian, all his weakness and his strength. My own loved, my
+ever loved, loved more fondly now when loved despairingly, farewell! May
+angels heal thy sorrow, and guard me from sin, that hereafter at least
+we may meet again!"
+
+"He loves me--he loves me still!" said the maiden, weeping at last; "and
+I am blest once more!"
+
+With that letter pressed to her heart she recovered outwardly from the
+depth of her affliction; she met her brother with a smile, and Nina
+with embraces; and if still she pined and sorrowed, it was in that
+"concealment" which is the "worm i' the bud."
+
+Meanwhile, after the first flush of victory, lamentation succeeded to
+joy in Rome; so great had been the slaughter that the private grief was
+large enough to swallow up all public triumph; and many of the mourners
+blamed even their defender for the swords of the assailant, "Roma fu
+terribilmente vedovata." ("Rome was terribly widowed.") The numerous
+funerals deeply affected the Tribune; and, in proportion to his sympathy
+with his people, grew his stern indignation against the Barons. Like all
+men whose religion is intense, passionate, and zealous, the Tribune had
+little toleration for those crimes which went to the root of religion.
+Perjury was to him the most base and inexpiable of offences, and the
+slain Barons had been twice perjured: in the bitterness of his wrath he
+forbade their families for some days to lament over their remains;
+and it was only in private and in secret that he permitted them to be
+interred in their ancestral vaults: an excess of vengeance which
+sullied his laurels, but which was scarcely inconsistent with the stern
+patriotism of his character. Impatient to finish what he had begun,
+anxious to march at once to Marino, where the insurgents collected their
+shattered force, he summoned his Council, and represented the certainty
+of victory, and its result in the complete restoration of peace. But
+pay was due to the soldiery; they already murmured; the treasury was
+emptied, it was necessary to fill it by raising a new tax.
+
+Among the councillors were some whose families had suffered grievously
+in the battle--they lent a lukewarm attention to propositions
+of continued strife. Others, among whom was Pandulfo, timid but
+well-meaning, aware that grief and terror even of their own triumph
+had produced reaction amongst the people, declared that they would not
+venture to propose a new tax. A third party, headed by Baroncelli--a
+demagogue whose ambition was without principle--but who, by pandering
+to the worst passions of the populace, by a sturdy coarseness of nature
+with which they sympathised--and by that affectation of advancing what
+we now term the "movement," which often gives to the fiercest fool an
+advantage over the most prudent statesman, had quietly acquired a great
+influence with the lower ranks--offered a more bold opposition. They
+dared even to blame the proud Tribune for the gorgeous extravagance they
+had themselves been the first to recommend--and half insinuated
+sinister and treacherous motives in his acquittal of the Barons from
+the accusation of Rodolf. In the very Parliament which the Tribune
+had revived and remodelled for the support of freedom--freedom was
+abandoned. His fiery eloquence met with a gloomy silence, and finally,
+the votes were against his propositions for the new tax and the march
+to Marino. Rienzi broke up the Council in haste and disorder. As he left
+the hall, a letter was put into his hands; he read it, and remained for
+some moments as one thunderstruck. He then summoned the Captain of his
+Guards, and ordered a band of fifty horsemen to be prepared for his
+commands; he repaired to Nina's apartment, he found her alone, and
+stood for some moments gazing upon her so intently that she was awed and
+chilled from all attempt at speech. At length he said, abruptly--
+
+"We must part."
+
+"Part!"
+
+"Yes, Nina--your guard is preparing; you have relations, I have friends,
+at Florence. Florence must be your home."
+
+"Cola,--"
+
+"Look not on me thus.--in power, in state, in safety--you were my
+ornament and counsellor. Now you but embarrass me. And--"
+
+"Oh, Cola, speak not thus! What hath chanced? Be not so cold--frown
+not--turn not away! Am I not something more to thee, than the partner
+of joyous hours--the minion of love? Am I not thy wife, Cola--not thy
+leman?"
+
+"Too dear--too dear to me," muttered the Tribune; "with thee by my side
+I shall be but half a Roman. Nina, the base slaves whom I myself made
+free desert me.--Now, in the very hour in which I might sweep away for
+ever all obstacles to the regeneration of Rome--now, when one conquest
+points the path to complete success--now when the land is visible, my
+fortune suddenly leaves me in the midst of the seas! There is greater
+danger now than in the rage of the Barons--the Barons are fled; it is
+the People who are becoming traitors to Rome and to me."
+
+"And wouldst thou have me traitor also! No, Cola; in death itself Nina
+shall be beside thee. Life and honour are reflected but from thee, and
+the stroke that slays the substance, shall destroy the humble shadow. I
+will not part from thee."
+
+"Nina," said the Tribune, contending with strong and convulsive
+emotion--"it may be literally of death that you speak.--Go! leave one
+who can no longer protect you or Rome!"
+
+"Never--Never."
+
+"You are resolved?"
+
+"I am."
+
+"Be it so," said the Tribune, with deep sadness in his tone. "Arm
+thyself for the worst."
+
+"There is no worst with thee, Cola!"
+
+"Come to my arms, brave woman; thy words rebuke my weakness. But my
+sister!--if I fall, you, Nina, will not survive--your beauty a prey to
+the most lustful heart and the strongest hand. We will have the same
+tomb on the wrecks of Roman liberty. But Irene is of weaker mould; poor
+child, I have robbed her of a lover, and now--"
+
+"You are right; let Irene go. And in truth we may well disguise from
+her the real cause of her departure. Change of scene were best for her
+grief; and under all circumstances would seem decorum to the curious. I
+will see and prepare her."
+
+"Do so, sweetheart. I would gladly be a moment alone with thought. But
+remember, she must part today--our sands run low."
+
+As the door closed on Nina, the Tribune took out the letter and again
+read it deliberately. "So the Pope's Legate left Sienna:--prayed that
+Republic to withdraw its auxiliary troops from Rome--proclaimed me a
+rebel and a heretic;--thence repaired to Marino;--now in council with
+the Barons. Why, have my dreams belied me, then--false as the waking
+things that flatter and betray by day? In such peril will the people
+forsake me and themselves? Army of saints and martyrs, shades of heroes
+and patriots, have ye abandoned for ever your ancient home? No, no, I
+was not raised to perish thus; I will defeat them yet--and leave my name
+a legacy to Rome; a warning to the oppressor--an example to the free!"
+
+
+
+Chapter 5.V. The Rottenness of the Edifice.
+
+The kindly skill of Nina induced Irene to believe that it was but the
+tender consideration of her brother to change a scene embittered by her
+own thoughts, and in which the notoriety of her engagement with Adrian
+exposed her to all that could mortify and embarrass, that led to the
+proposition of her visit to Florence. Its suddenness was ascribed to the
+occasion of an unexpected mission to Florence, (for a loan of arms and
+money,) which thus gave her a safe and honoured escort.--Passively she
+submitted to what she herself deemed a relief; and it was agreed that
+she should for a while be the guest of a relation of Nina's, who was the
+abbess of one of the wealthiest of the Florentine convents: the idea of
+monastic seclusion was welcome to the bruised heart and wearied spirit.
+
+But though not apprised of the immediate peril of Rienzi, it was with
+deep sadness and gloomy forebodings that she returned his embrace and
+parting blessing; and when at length alone in her litter, and beyond the
+gates of Rome, she repented a departure to which the chance of danger
+gave the appearance of desertion.
+
+Meanwhile, as the declining day closed around the litter and its troop,
+more turbulent actors in the drama demand our audience. The traders
+and artisans of Rome at that time, and especially during the popular
+government of Rienzi, held weekly meetings in each of the thirteen
+quarters of the city. And in the most democratic of these, Cecco del
+Vecchio was an oracle and leader. It was at that assembly, over which
+the smith presided, that the murmurs that preceded the earthquake were
+heard.
+
+"So," cried one of the company--Luigi, the goodly butcher,--"they say
+he wanted to put a new tax on us; and that is the reason he broke up the
+Council today, because, good men, they were honest, and had bowels for
+the people: it is a shame and a sin that the treasury should be empty."
+
+"I told him," said the smith, "to beware how he taxed the people. Poor
+men won't be taxed. But as he does not follow my advice, he must take
+the consequence--the horse runs from one hand, the halter remains in the
+other."
+
+"Take your advice, Cecco! I warrant me his stomach is too high for that
+now. Why he is grown as proud as a pope."
+
+"For all that, he is a great man," said one of the party. "He gave us
+laws--he rid the Campagna of robbers--filled the streets with merchants,
+and the shops with wares--defeated the boldest lords and fiercest
+soldiery of Italy--"
+
+"And now wants to tax the people!--that's all the thanks we get for
+helping him," said the grumbling Cecco. "What would he have been without
+us?--we that make, can unmake."
+
+"But," continued the advocate, seeing that he had his supporters--"but
+then he taxes us for our own liberties."
+
+"Who strikes at them now?" asked the butcher.
+
+"Why the Barons are daily mustering new strength at Marino."
+
+"Marino is not Rome," said Luigi, the butcher. "Let's wait till they
+come to our gates again--we know how to receive them. Though, for
+the matter of that, I think we have had enough fighting--my two poor
+brothers had each a stab too much for them. Why won't the Tribune, if he
+be a great man, let us have peace? All we want now is quiet."
+
+"Ah!" said a seller of horse-harness. "Let him make it up with the
+Barons. They were good customers after all."
+
+"For my part," said a merry-looking fellow, who had been a gravedigger
+in bad times, and had now opened a stall of wares for the living, "I
+could forgive him all, but bathing in the holy vase of porphyry."
+
+"Ah, that was a bad job," said several, shaking their heads.
+
+"And the knighthood was but a silly show, an' it were not for the wine
+from the horse's nostrils--that had some sense in it."
+
+"My masters," said Cecco, "the folly was in not beheading the Barons
+when he had them all in the net; and so Messere Baroncelli says. (Ah,
+Baroncelli is an honest man, and follows no half measures!) It was a
+sort of treason to the people not to do so. Why, but for that, we should
+never have lost so many tall fellows by the gate of San Lorenzo."
+
+"True, true, it was a shame; some say the Barons bought him."
+
+"And then," said another, "those poor Lords Colonna--boy and man--they
+were the best of the family, save the Castello. I vow I pitied them."
+
+"But to the point," said one of the crowd, the richest of the set; "the
+tax is the thing.--The ingratitude to tax us.--Let him dare to do it!"
+
+"Oh, he will not dare, for I hear that the Pope's bristles are up at
+last; so he will only have us to depend upon!"
+
+The door was thrown open--a man rushed in open-mouthed--
+
+"Masters, masters, the Pope's legate has arrived at Rome, and sent for
+the Tribune, who has just left his presence."
+
+Ere his auditors had recovered their surprise, the sound of trumpets
+made them rush forth; they saw Rienzi sweep by with his usual cavalcade,
+and in his proud array. The twilight was advancing, and torch-bearers
+preceded his way. Upon his countenance was deep calm but it was not the
+calm of contentment. He passed on, and the street was again desolate.
+Meanwhile Rienzi reached the Capitol in silence, and mounted to the
+apartments of the palace, where Nina, pale and breathless, awaited his
+return.
+
+"Well, well, thou smilest! No--it is that dread smile, worse than
+frowns. Speak, beloved, speak! What said the Cardinal?"
+
+"Little thou wilt love to hear. He spoke at first high and solemnly,
+about the crime of declaring the Romans free; next about the treason of
+asserting that the election of the King of Rome was in the hands of the
+Romans."
+
+"Well--thy answer."
+
+"That which became Rome's Tribune: I re-asserted each right, and proved
+it. The Cardinal passed to other charges."
+
+"What?"
+
+"The blood of the Barons by San Lorenzo--blood only shed in our own
+defence against perjured assailants; this is in reality the main crime.
+The Colonna have the Pope's ear. Furthermore, the sacrilege--yes, the
+sacrilege (come laugh, Nina, laugh!) of bathing in a vase of porphyry
+used by Constantine while yet a heathen."
+
+"Can it be! What saidst thou?"
+
+"I laughed. 'Cardinal,' quoth I, 'what was not too good for a heathen
+is not too good for a Christian Catholic!' And verily the sour Frenchman
+looked as if I had smote him on the hip. When he had done, I asked him,
+in my turn, 'Is it alleged against me that I have wronged one man in my
+judgment-court?'--Silence. 'Is it said that I have broken one law of
+the state?'--Silence. 'Is it even whispered that trade does not
+flourish--that life is not safe--that abroad or at home the Roman
+name is not honoured, to that point which no former rule can
+parallel?'--Silence. 'Then,' said I, 'Lord Cardinal, I demand thy
+thanks, not thy censure.' The Frenchman looked, and looked, and
+trembled, and shrunk, and then out he spake. 'I have but one mission to
+fulfil, on the part of the Pontiff--resign at once thy Tribuneship, or
+the Church inflicts upon thee its solemn curse.'"
+
+"How--how?" said Nina, turning very pale; "what is it that awaits thee?"
+
+"Excommunication!"
+
+This awful sentence, by which the spiritual arm had so often stricken
+down the fiercest foe, came to Nina's ear as a knell. She covered her
+face with her hands. Rienzi paced the room with rapid strides. "The
+curse!" he muttered; "the Church's curse--for me--for ME!"
+
+"Oh, Cola! didst thou not seek to pacify this stern--"
+
+"Pacify! Death and dishonour! Pacify! 'Cardinal,' I said, and I felt his
+soul shrivel at my gaze, 'my power I received from the people--to the
+people alone I render it. For my soul, man's word cannot scathe it.
+Thou, haughty priest, thou thyself art the accursed, if, puppet and tool
+of low cabals and exiled tyrants, thou breathest but a breath in the
+name of the Lord of Justice, for the cause of the oppressor, and against
+the rights of the oppressed.' With that I left him, and now--"
+
+"Ay, now--now what will happen? Excommunication! In the metropolis of
+the Church, too--the superstition of the people! Oh, Cola!"
+
+"If," muttered Rienzi, "my conscience condemned me of one crime--if I
+had stained my hands in one just man's blood--if I had broken one law
+I myself had framed--if I had taken bribes, or wronged the poor, or
+scorned the orphan, or shut my heart to the widow--then, then--but no!
+Lord, thou wilt not desert me!"
+
+"But man may!" thought Nina mournfully, as she perceived that one of
+Rienzi's dark fits of fanatical and mystical revery was growing over
+him--fits which he suffered no living eye, not even Nina's, to witness
+when they gathered to their height. And now, indeed, after a short
+interval of muttered soliloquy, in which his face worked so that the
+veins on his temples swelled like cords, he abruptly left the room, and
+sought the private oratory connected with his closet. Over the emotions
+there indulged let us draw the veil. Who shall describe those awful and
+mysterious moments, when man, with all his fiery passions, turbulent
+thoughts, wild hopes, and despondent fears, demands the solitary
+audience of his Maker?
+
+It was long after this conference with Nina, and the midnight bell had
+long tolled, when Rienzi stood alone, upon one of the balconies of the
+palace, to cool, in the starry air, the fever that yet lingered on his
+exhausted frame. The night was exceedingly calm, the air clear, but
+chill, for it was now December. He gazed intently upon those solemn orbs
+to which our wild credulity has referred the prophecies of our doom.
+
+"Vain science!" thought the Tribune, "and gloomy fantasy, that man's
+fate is pre-ordained--irrevocable--unchangeable, from the moment of his
+birth! Yet, were the dream not baseless, fain would I know which of
+yon stately lights is my natal star,--which images--which reflects--my
+career in life, and the memory I shall leave in death." As this thought
+crossed him, and his gaze was still fixed above, he saw, as if made
+suddenly more distinct than the stars around it, that rapid and fiery
+comet which in the winter of 1347 dismayed the superstitions of those
+who recognised in the stranger of the heavens the omen of disaster and
+of woe. He recoiled as it met his eye, and muttered to himself, "Is such
+indeed my type! or, if the legendary lore speak true, and these strange
+fires portend nations ruined and rulers overthrown, does it foretell my
+fate? I will think no more." (Alas! if by the Romans associated with the
+fall of Rienzi, that comet was by the rest of Europe connected with the
+more dire calamity of the Great Plague that so soon afterwards ensued.)
+As his eyes fell, they rested upon the colossal Lion of Basalt in the
+place below, the starlight investing its grey and towering form with a
+more ghostly whiteness; and then it was, that he perceived two figures
+in black robes lingering by the pedestal which supported the statue, and
+apparently engaged in some occupation which he could not guess. A fear
+shot through his veins, for he had never been able to divest himself
+of the vague idea that there was some solemn and appointed connexion
+between his fate and that old Lion of Basalt. Somewhat relieved, he
+heard his sentry challenge the intruders; and as they came forward to
+the light, he perceived that they wore the garments of monks.
+
+"Molest us not, son," said one of them to the sentry. "By order of the
+Legate of the Holy Father we affix to this public monument of justice
+and of wrath, the bull of excommunication against a heretic and rebel.
+WOE TO THE ACCURSED OF THE CHURCH!"
+
+
+
+Chapter 5.VI. The Fall of the Temple.
+
+It was as a thunderbolt in a serene day--the reverse of the Tribune in
+the zenith of his power, in the abasement of his foe; when, with but a
+handful of brave Romans, determined to be free, he might have crushed
+for ever the antagonist power to the Roman liberties--have secured the
+rights of his country, and filled up the measure of his own renown. Such
+a reverse was the very mockery of Fate, who bore him through disaster,
+to abandon him in the sunniest noon of his prosperity.
+
+The next morning not a soul was to be seen in the streets; the shops
+were shut--the churches closed; the city was as under an interdict. The
+awful curse of the papal excommunication upon the chief magistrate of
+the Pontifical City, seemed to freeze up all the arteries of life. The
+Legate himself, affecting fear of his life, had fled to Monte Fiascone,
+where he was joined by the Barons immediately after the publication of
+the edict. The curse worked best in the absence of the execrator.
+
+Towards evening a few persons might be seen traversing the broad space
+of the Capitol, crossing themselves, as the bull, placarded on the Lion,
+met their eyes, and disappearing within the doors of the great palace.
+By and by, a few anxious groups collected in the streets, but they
+soon dispersed. It was a paralysis of all intercourse and commune. That
+spiritual and unarmed authority, which, like the invisible hand of God,
+desolated the market-place, and humbled the crowned head, no physical
+force could rally against or resist. Yet, through the universal awe, one
+conviction touched the multitude--it was for them that their Tribune
+was thus blasted in the midst of his glories! The words of the
+Brand recorded against him on wall and column detailed his
+offences:--rebellion in asserting the liberties of Rome--heresy in
+purifying ecclesiastical abuses;--and, to serve for a miserable covert
+to the rest, it was sacrilege for bathing in the porphyry vase of
+Constantine! They felt the conviction; they sighed--they shuddered--and,
+in his vast palace, save a few attached and devoted hearts, the Tribune
+was alone!
+
+The staunchest of his Tuscan soldiery were gone with Irene. The rest
+of his force, save a few remaining guards, was the paid Roman militia,
+composed of citizens; who, long discontented by the delay of their
+stipends, now seized on the excuse of the excommunication to remain
+passive, but grumbling, in their homes.
+
+On the third day, a new incident broke upon the death-like lethargy of
+the city; a hundred and fifty mercenaries, with Pepin of Minorbino, a
+Neapolitan, half noble, half bandit, (a creature of Montreal's) at their
+head, entered the city, seized upon the fortresses of the Colonna, and
+sent a herald through the city, proclaiming in the name of the Cardinal
+Legate, the reward of ten thousand florins for the head of Cola di
+Rienzi.
+
+Then, swelled on high, shrill but not inspiring as of old, the great
+bell of the Capitol--the people, listless, disheartened, awed by the
+spiritual fear of the papal authority, (yet greater, in such events,
+since the removal of the see,) came unarmed to the Capitol; and there,
+by the Place of the Lion, stood the Tribune. His squires, below the
+step, held his war-horse, his helm, and the same battle-axe which had
+blazed in the van of victorious war.
+
+Beside him were a few of his guard, his attendants, and two or three of
+the principal citizens.
+
+He stood bareheaded and erect, gazing upon the abashed and unarmed crowd
+with a look of bitter scorn, mingled with deep compassion; and, as the
+bell ceased its toll, and the throng remained hushed and listening, he
+thus spoke:--
+
+"Ye come, then, once again! Come ye as slaves or freemen? A handful
+of armed men are in your walls: will ye who chased from your gates the
+haughtiest knights--the most practised battle-men of Rome, succumb now
+to one hundred and fifty hirelings and strangers? Will ye arm for
+your Tribune? You are silent!--be it so. Will you arm for your own
+liberties--your own Rome? Silent still! By the saints that reign on the
+thrones of the heathen gods! are ye thus fallen from your birthright?
+Have you no arms for your own defence? Romans, hear me! Have I wronged
+you?--if so, by your hands let me die: and then, with knives yet reeking
+with my blood, go forward against the robber who is but the herald of
+your slavery; and I die honoured, grateful, and avenged. You weep! Great
+God! you weep! Ay, and I could weep, too--that I should live to speak
+of liberty in vain to Romans--Weep! is this an hour for tears? Weep
+now, and your tears shall ripen harvests of crime, and licence, and
+despotism, to come! Romans, arm! follow me at once to the Place of the
+Colonna: expel this ruffian--expel your enemy (no matter what afterwards
+you do to me):" he paused; no ardour was kindled by his words--"or," he
+continued, "I abandon you to your fate." There was a long, low, general
+murmur; at length it became shaped into speech, and many voices cried
+simultaneously: "The Pope's bull!--Thou art a man accursed!"
+
+"What!" cried the Tribune; "and is it ye who forsake me, ye for whose
+cause alone man dares to hurl against me the thunders of his God? Is it
+not for you that I am declared heretic and rebel! What are my imputed
+crimes? That I have made Rome and asserted Italy to be free; that I
+have subdued the proud Magnates, who were the scourge both of Pope and
+People. And you--you upbraid me with what I have dared and done for you!
+Men, with you I would have fought, for you I would have perished. You
+forsake yourselves in forsaking me, and since I no longer rule over
+brave men, I resign my power to the tyrant you prefer. Seven months
+I have ruled over you, prosperous in commerce, stainless in
+justice--victorious in the field:--I have shown you what Rome could be;
+and, since I abdicate the government ye gave me, when I am gone, strike
+for your own freedom! It matters nothing who is the chief of a brave
+and great people. Prove that Rome hath many a Rienzi, but of brighter
+fortunes."
+
+"I would he had not sought to tax us," said Cecco del Vecchio, who
+was the very personification of the vulgar feeling: "and that he had
+beheaded the Barons!"
+
+"Ay!" cried the ex-gravedigger; "but that blessed porphyry vase!"
+
+"And why should we get our throats cut," said Luigi, the butcher, "like
+my two brothers?--Heaven rest them!"
+
+On the face of the general multitude there was a common expression of
+irresolution and shame, many wept and groaned, none (save the aforesaid
+grumblers) accused; none upbraided, but none seemed disposed to arm. It
+was one of those listless panics, those strange fits of indifference and
+lethargy which often seize upon a people who make liberty a matter of
+impulse and caprice, to whom it has become a catchword, who have not
+long enjoyed all its rational, and sound, and practical, and blessed
+results; who have been affrayed by the storms that herald its dawn;--a
+people such as is common to the south: such as even the north has known;
+such as, had Cromwell lived a year longer, even England might have seen;
+and, indeed, in some measure, such a reaction from popular enthusiasm
+to popular indifference England did see, when her children madly
+surrendered the fruits of a bloody war, without reserve, without
+foresight, to the lewd pensioner of Louis, and the royal murderer of
+Sydney. To such prostration of soul, such blindness of intellect, even
+the noblest people will be subjected, when liberty, which should be the
+growth of ages, spreading its roots through the strata of a thousand
+customs, is raised, the exotic of an hour, and (like the Tree and Dryad
+of ancient fable) flourishes and withers with the single spirit that
+protects it.
+
+"Oh, Heaven, that I were a man!" exclaimed Angelo, who stood behind
+Rienzi.
+
+"Hear him, hear the boy," cried the Tribune; "out of the mouths of babes
+speaketh wisdom! He wishes that he were a man, as ye are men, that
+he might do as ye should do. Mark me,--I ride with these faithful few
+through the quarter of the Colonna, before the fortress of your foe.
+Three times before that fortress shall my trumpets sound; if at the
+third blast ye come not, armed as befits ye--I say not all, but three,
+but two, but one hundred of ye--I break up my wand of office, and the
+world shall say one hundred and fifty robbers quelled the soul of Rome,
+and crushed her magistrate and her laws!"
+
+With those words he descended the stairs, and mounted his charger; the
+populace gave way in silence, and their Tribune and his slender train
+passed slowly on, and gradually vanished from the view of the increasing
+crowd.
+
+The Romans remained on the place, and after a pause, the demagogue
+Baroncelli, who saw an opening to his ambition, addressed them. Though
+not an eloquent nor gifted man, he had the art of uttering the most
+popular commonplaces. And he knew the weak side of his audience, in
+their vanity, indolence, and arrogant pride.
+
+"Look you, my masters," said he, leaping up to the Place of the Lion;
+"the Tribune talks bravely--he always did--but the monkey used the cat
+for his chestnuts; he wants to thrust your paws into the fire; you will
+not be so silly as to let him. The saints bless us! but the Tribune,
+good man, gets a palace and has banquets, and bathes in a porphyry vase;
+the more shame on him!--in which San Sylvester christened the Emperor
+Constantine: all this is worth fighting for; but you, my masters, what
+do you get except hard blows, and a stare at a holyday spectacle? Why,
+if you beat these fellows, you will have another tax on the wine: that
+will be your reward!"
+
+"Hark!" cried Cecco, "there sounds the trumpet,--a pity he wanted to tax
+us!"
+
+"True," cried Baroncelli, "there sounds the trumpet; a silver trumpet,
+by the Lord! Next week, if you help him out of the scrape, he'll have
+a golden one. But go--why don't you move, my friends?--'tis but one
+hundred and fifty mercenaries. True, they are devils to fight, clad in
+armour from top to toe; but what then?--if they do cut some four or five
+hundred throats you'll beat them at last, and the Tribune will sup the
+merrier."
+
+"There sounds the second blast," said the butcher. "If my old mother
+had not lost two of us already, 'tis odds, but I'd strike a blow for the
+bold Tribune."
+
+"You had better put more quicksilver in you," continued Baroncelli, "or
+you will be too late. And what a pity that will be!--If you believe the
+Tribune, he is the only man that can save Rome. What, you, the finest
+people in the world--you, not able to save yourselves!--you, bound up
+with one man--you, not able to dictate to the Colonna and Orsini! Why,
+who beat the Barons at San Lorenzo? Was it not you? Ah! you got the
+buffets, and the Tribune the moneta! Tush, my friends, let the man go;
+I warrant there are plenty as good as he to be bought a cheaper bargain.
+And, hark! there is the third blast; it is too late now!"
+
+As the trumpet from the distance sent forth its long and melancholy
+note, it was as the last warning of the parting genius of the place;
+and when silence swallowed up the sound, a gloom fell over the whole
+assembly. They began to regret, to repent, when regret and repentance
+availed no more. The buffoonery of Baroncelli became suddenly
+displeasing; and the orator had the mortification of seeing his audience
+disperse in all directions, just as he was about to inform them what
+great things he himself could do in their behalf.
+
+Meanwhile the Tribune, passing unscathed through the dangerous quarter
+of the enemy, who, dismayed at his approach, shrunk within their
+fortress, proceeded to the Castle of St. Angelo, whither Nina had
+already preceded him; and which he entered to find that proud lady with
+a smile for his safety,--without a tear for his reverse.
+
+
+
+Chapter 5.VII. The Successors of an Unsuccessful Revolution--Who is to
+Blame--the Forsaken one or the Forsakers?
+
+Cheerfully broke the winter sun over the streets of Rome, as the army
+of the Barons swept along them. The Cardinal Legate at the head; the old
+Colonna (no longer haughty and erect, but bowed, and broken-hearted
+at the loss of his sons) at his right hand;--the sleek smile of Luca
+Savelli--the black frown of Rinaldo Orsini, were seen close behind. A
+long but barbarous array it was; made up chiefly of foreign hirelings;
+nor did the procession resemble the return of exiled citizens, but the
+march of invading foes.
+
+"My Lord Colonna," said the Cardinal Legate, a small withered man, by
+birth a Frenchman, and full of the bitterest prejudices against the
+Romans, who had in a former mission very ill received him, as was their
+wont with foreign ecclesiastics; "this Pepin, whom Montreal has deputed
+at your orders, hath done us indeed good service."
+
+The old Lord bowed, but made no answer. His strong intellect was already
+broken, and there was dotage in his glassy eye. The Cardinal muttered,
+"He hears me not; sorrow hath brought him to second childhood!" and
+looking back, motioned to Luca Savelli to approach.
+
+"Luca," said the Legate, "it was fortunate that the Hungarian's black
+banner detained the Provencal at Aversa. Had he entered Rome, we might
+have found Rienzi's successor worse than the Tribune himself. Montreal,"
+he added, with a slight emphasis and a curled lip, "is a gentleman, and
+a Frenchman. This Pepin, who is his delegate, we must bribe, or menace
+to our will."
+
+"Assuredly," answered Savelli, "it is not a difficult task: for Montreal
+calculated on a more stubborn contest, which he himself would have found
+leisure to close--"
+
+"As Podesta, or Prince of Rome! the modest man! We Frenchmen have a due
+sense of our own merits; but this sudden victory surprises him as it
+doth us, Luca; and we shall wrest the prey from Pepin, ere Montreal can
+come to his help! But Rienzi must die. He is still, I hear, shut up in
+St. Angelo. The Orsini shall storm him there ere the day be much older.
+Today we possess the Capitol--annul all the rebel's laws--break up his
+ridiculous parliament, and put all the government of the city under
+three senators--Rinaldo Orsini, Colonna, and myself; you, my Lord, I
+trust, we shall fitly provide for."
+
+"Oh! I am rewarded enough by returning to my palace; and a descent
+on the Jewellers' quarter will soon build up its fortifications. Luca
+Savelli is not an ambitious man. He wants but to live in peace."
+
+The Cardinal smiled sourly, and took the turn towards the Capitol.
+
+In the front space the usual gapers were assembled. "Make way! make
+way! knaves!" cried the guards, trampling on either side the crowd, who,
+accustomed to the sedate and courteous order of Rienzi's guard, fell
+back too slowly for many of them to escape severe injury from the pikes
+of the soldiers and the hoofs of the horses. Our friend, Luigi, the
+butcher, was one of these, and the surliness of the Roman blood was past
+boiling heat when he received in his ample stomach the blunt end of a
+German's pike. "There, Roman," said the rude mercenary, in his barbarous
+attempt at Italian, "make way for your betters; you have had enough
+crowds and shows of late, in all conscience."
+
+"Betters!" gulped out the poor butcher; "a Roman has no betters; and if
+I had not lost two brothers by San Lorenzo, I would--"
+
+"The dog is mutinous," said one of the followers of the Orsini,
+succeeding the German who had passed on, "and talks of San Lorenzo!"
+
+"Oh!" said another Orsinist, who rode abreast, "I remember him of old.
+He was one of Rienzi's gang."
+
+"Was he?" said the other, sternly; "then we cannot begin salutary
+examples too soon;" and, offended at something swaggering and insolent
+in the butcher's look, the Orsinist coolly thrust him through the heart
+with his pike, and rode on over his body.
+
+"Shame! Shame!" "Murder! Murder!" cried the crowd: and they began to
+press, in the passion of the moment, round the fierce guards.
+
+The Legate heard the cry, and saw the rush: he turned pale. "The rascals
+rebel again!" he faltered.
+
+"No, your Eminence--no," said Luca; "but it may be as well to infuse a
+wholesome terror; they are all unarmed; let me bid the guards disperse
+them. A word will do it."
+
+The Cardinal assented; the word was given; and, in a few minutes, the
+soldiery, who still smarted under the vindictive memory of defeat from
+an undisciplined multitude, scattered the crowd down the streets without
+scruple or mercy--riding over some, spearing others--filling the air
+with shrieks and yells, and strewing the ground with almost as many
+men as a few days before would have sufficed to have guarded Rome, and
+preserved the constitution! Through this wild, tumultuous scene, and
+over the bodies of its victims, rode the Legate and his train, to
+receive in the Hall of the Capitol the allegiance of the citizens, and
+to proclaim the return of the oppressors.
+
+As they dismounted at the stairs, a placard in large letters struck
+the eye of the Legate. It was placed upon the pedestal of the Lion of
+Basalt, covering the very place that had been occupied by the bull of
+excommunication. The words were few, and ran thus:
+
+"TREMBLE! RIENZI SHALL RETURN!"
+
+"How! what means this mummery!" cried the Legate, trembling already, and
+looking round to the nobles.
+
+"Please your Eminence," said one of the councillors, who had come from
+the Capitol to meet the Legate, "we saw it at daybreak, the ink yet
+moist, as we entered the Hall. We deemed it best to leave it for your
+Eminence to deal with."
+
+"You deemed! Who are you, then?"
+
+"One of the members of the Council, your Eminence, and a stanch opponent
+of the Tribune, as is well known, when he wanted the new tax--"
+
+"Council--trash! No more councils now! Order is restored at last. The
+Orsini and the Colonna will look to you in future. Resist a tax, did
+you? Well, that was right when proposed by a tyrant; but I warn you,
+friend, to take care how you resist the tax we shall impose. Happy
+if your city can buy its peace with the Church on any terms:--and his
+Holiness is short of the florins."
+
+The discomfited councillor shrank back.
+
+"Tear off yon insolent placard. Nay, hold! fix over it our proclamation
+of ten thousand florins for the heretic's head! Ten thousand? methinks
+that is too much now--we will alter the cipher. Meanwhile Rinaldo
+Orsini, Lord Senator, march thy soldiers to St. Angelo; let us see if
+the heretic can stand a siege."
+
+"It needs not, your Eminence," said the councillor, again officiously
+bustling up; "St. Angelo is surrendered. The Tribune, his wife, and one
+page, escaped last night, it is said, in disguise."
+
+"Ha!" said the old Colonna, whose dulled sense had at length arrived at
+the conclusion that something extraordinary arrested the progress of his
+friends. "What is the matter? What is that placard? Will no one tell me
+the words? My old eyes are dim."
+
+As he uttered the questions, in the shrill and piercing treble of age,
+a voice replied in a loud and deep tone--none knew whence it came; the
+crowd was reduced to a few stragglers, chiefly friars in cowl and
+serge, whose curiosity nought could daunt, and whose garb ensured them
+safety--the soldiers closed the rear: a voice, I say, came, startling
+the colour from many a cheek--in answer to the Colonna, saying:
+
+"TREMBLE! RIENZI SHALL RETURN!"
+
+
+
+
+BOOK VI. THE PLAGUE.
+
+     "Erano gli anni della fruttifera Incarnazione del Figliuolo
+     di Dio al numero pervenuti di mille trecento quarant'otto,
+     quando nell' egregia citta di Fiorenza oltre ad ogni altra
+     Italica bellissima, pervenna la mortifera pestilenza."--
+     Boccaccio, "Introduzione al Decamerone".
+
+     "The years of the fructiferous incarnation of the Son of God
+     had reached the number of one thousand three hundred and
+     forty-eight, when into the illustrious city of Florence,
+     beautiful beyond every other in Italy, entered the death-
+     fraught pestilence."--"Introduction to the Decameron".
+
+
+
+
+Chapter 6.1. The Retreat of the Lover.
+
+By the borders of one of the fairest lakes of Northern Italy stood the
+favourite mansion of Adrian di Castello, to which in his softer and
+less patriotic moments his imagination had often and fondly turned;
+and thither the young nobleman, dismissing his more courtly and
+distinguished companions in the Neapolitan embassy, retired after his
+ill-starred return to Rome. Most of those thus dismissed joined the
+Barons; the young Annibaldi, whose daring and ambitious nature had
+attached him strongly to the Tribune, maintained a neutral ground; he
+betook himself to his castle in the Campagna, and did not return to Rome
+till the expulsion of Rienzi.
+
+The retreat of Irene's lover was one well fitted to feed his melancholy
+reveries. Without being absolutely a fortress, it was sufficiently
+strong to resist any assault of the mountain robbers or petty tyrants in
+the vicinity; while, built by some former lord from the materials of
+the half-ruined villas of the ancient Romans, its marbled columns and
+tesselated pavements relieved with a wild grace the grey stone walls and
+massive towers of feudal masonry. Rising from a green eminence gently
+sloping to the lake, the stately pile cast its shadow far and dark over
+the beautiful waters; by its side, from the high and wooded mountains on
+the background, broke a waterfall, in irregular and sinuous course--now
+hid by the foliage, now gleaming in the light, and collecting itself at
+last in a broad basin--beside which a little fountain, inscribed with
+half-obliterated letters, attested the departed elegance of the classic
+age--some memento of lord and poet whose very names were lost; thence
+descending through mosses and lichen, and odorous herbs, a brief,
+sheeted stream bore its surplus into the lake. And there, amidst the
+sturdier and bolder foliage of the North, grew, wild and picturesque,
+many a tree transplanted, in ages back, from the sunnier East; not
+blighted nor stunted in that golden clime, which fosters almost every
+produce of nature as with a mother's care. The place was remote and
+solitary. The roads that conducted to it from the distant towns were
+tangled, intricate, mountainous, and beset by robbers. A few cottages,
+and a small convent, a quarter of a league up the verdant margin, were
+the nearest habitations; and, save by some occasional pilgrim or some
+bewildered traveller, the loneliness of the mansion was rarely invaded.
+It was precisely the spot which proffered rest to a man weary of the
+world, and indulged the memories which grow in rank luxuriance over the
+wrecks of passion. And he whose mind, at once gentle and self-dependent,
+can endure solitude, might have ransacked all earth for a more fair and
+undisturbed retreat.
+
+But not to such a solitude had the earlier dreams of Adrian dedicated
+the place. Here had he thought--should one bright being have
+presided--here should love have found its haven: and hither, when love
+at length admitted of intrusion, hither might wealth and congenial
+culture have invited all the gentler and better spirits which had begun
+to move over the troubled face of Italy, promising a second and younger
+empire of poesy, and lore, and art. To the graceful and romantic but
+somewhat pensive and inert, temperament of the young noble, more
+adapted to calm and civilized than stormy and barbarous times, ambition
+proffered no reward so grateful as lettered leisure and intellectual
+repose. His youth coloured by the influence of Petrarch, his manhood
+had dreamed of a happier Vaucluse not untenanted by a Laura. The visions
+which had connected the scene with the image of Irene made the place
+still haunted by her shade; and time and absence only ministering to his
+impassioned meditations, deepened his melancholy and increased his love.
+
+In this lone retreat--which even in describing from memory, for these
+eyes have seen, these feet have trodden, this heart yet yearneth for,
+the spot--which even, I say, in thus describing, seems to me (and haply
+also to the gentle reader) a grateful and welcome transit from the
+storms of action and the vicissitudes of ambition, so long engrossing
+the narrative;--in this lone retreat Adrian passed the winter, which
+visits with so mild a change that intoxicating clime. The roar of the
+world without was borne but in faint and indistinct murmurings to his
+ear. He learned only imperfectly, and with many contradictions, the
+news which broke like a thunderbolt over Italy, that the singular and
+aspiring man--himself a revolution--who had excited the interest of all
+Europe, the brightest hopes of the enthusiastic, the profusest adulation
+of the great, the deepest terror of the despot, the wildest aspirations
+of all free spirits, had been suddenly stricken from his state, his name
+branded and his head proscribed. This event, which happened at the
+end of December, reached Adrian, through a wandering pilgrim, at the
+commencement of March, somewhat more than two months after the date; the
+March of that awful year 1348, which saw Europe, and Italy especially,
+desolated by the direst pestilence which history has recorded, accursed
+alike by the numbers and the celebrity of its victims, and yet strangely
+connected with some not unpleasing images by the grace of Boccaccio and
+the eloquence of Petrarch.
+
+The pilgrim who informed Adrian of the revolution at Rome was unable to
+give him any clue to the present fate of Rienzi or his family. It was
+only known that the Tribune and his wife had escaped, none knew whither;
+many guessed that they were already dead, victims to the numerous
+robbers who immediately on the fall of the Tribune settled back to their
+former habits, sparing neither age nor sex, wealth nor poverty. As all
+relating to the ex-Tribune was matter of eager interest, the pilgrim had
+also learned that, previous to the fall of Rienzi, his sister had left
+Rome, but it was not known to what place she had been conveyed.
+
+The news utterly roused Adrian from his dreaming life. Irene was then
+in the condition his letter dared to picture--severed from her brother,
+fallen from her rank, desolate and friendless. "Now," said the generous
+and high-hearted lover, "she may be mine without a disgrace to my name.
+Whatever Rienzi's faults, she is not implicated in them. Her hands are
+not red with my kinsman's blood; nor can men say that Adrian di Castello
+allies himself with a House whose power is built upon the ruins of
+the Colonnas. The Colonna are restored--again triumphant--Rienzi is
+nothing--distress and misfortune unite me at once to her on whom they
+fall!"
+
+But how were these romantic resolutions to be executed--Irene's
+dwelling-place unknown? He resolved himself to repair to Rome and make
+the necessary inquiries: accordingly he summoned his retainers:--blithe
+tidings to them, those of travel! The mail left the armoury--the banner
+the hall--and after two days of animated bustle, the fountain by which
+Adrian had passed so many hours of revery was haunted only by the
+birds of the returning spring; and the nightly lamp no longer cast its
+solitary ray from his turret chamber over the bosom of the deserted
+lake.
+
+
+
+Chapter 6.II. The Seeker.
+
+It was a bright, oppressive, sultry morning, when a solitary horseman
+was seen winding that unequalled road, from whose height, amidst
+figtrees, vines, and olives, the traveller beholds gradually break upon
+his gaze the enchanting valley of the Arno, and the spires and domes of
+Florence. But not with the traveller's customary eye of admiration and
+delight passed that solitary horseman, and not upon the usual activity,
+and mirth, and animation of the Tuscan life, broke that noon-day sun.
+All was silent, void, and hushed; and even in the light of heaven there
+seemed a sicklied and ghastly glare. The cottages by the road-side were
+some shut up and closed, some open, but seemingly inmateless. The plough
+stood still, the distaff plied not: horse and man had a dreary holiday.
+There was a darker curse upon the land than the curse of Cain! Now
+and then a single figure, usually clad in the gloomy robe of a friar,
+crossed the road, lifting towards the traveller a livid and amazed
+stare, and then hurried on, and vanished beneath some roof, whence
+issued a faint and dying moan, which but for the exceeding stillness
+around could scarcely have pierced the threshold. As the traveller
+neared the city, the scene became less solitary, yet more dread. There
+might be seen carts and litters, thick awnings wrapped closely round
+them, containing those who sought safety in flight, forgetful that the
+Plague was everywhere! And while these gloomy vehicles, conducted by
+horses, gaunt, shadowy skeletons, crawling heavily along, passed by,
+like hearses of the dead, sometimes a cry burst the silence in which
+they moved, and the traveller's steed started aside, as some wretch, on
+whom the disease had broke forth, was dropped from the vehicle by the
+selfish inhumanity of his comrades, and left to perish by the way.
+Hard by the gate a waggon paused, and a man with a mask threw out its
+contents in a green slimy ditch that bordered the road. These were
+garments and robes of all kind and value; the broidered mantle of the
+gallant, the hood and veil of my lady, and the rags of the peasant.
+While glancing at the labour of the masker, the cavalier beheld a herd
+of swine, gaunt and half famished, run to the spot in the hopes of
+food, and the traveller shuddered to think what food they might have
+anticipated! But ere he reached the gate, those of the animals that had
+been busiest rooting at the infectious heap, dropped down dead amongst
+their fellows. (The same spectacle greeted, and is recorded by,
+Boccaccio.)
+
+"Ho, ho," said the masker, and his hollow voice sounded yet more hollow
+through his vizard,--"comest thou here to die, stranger? See, thy brave
+mantle of triple-pile and golden broidery will not save thee from the
+gavocciolo. (The tumour that made the fatal symptom.) Ride on, ride
+on;--today fit morsel for thy lady's kiss, tomorrow too foul for the rat
+and worm!"
+
+Replying not to this hideous welcome, Adrian, for it was he, pursued his
+way. The gates stood wide open: this was the most appalling sign of all,
+for, at first, the most jealous precaution had been taken against the
+ingress of strangers. Now all care, all foresight, all vigilance, were
+vain. And thrice nine warders had died at that single post, and the
+officers to appoint their successors were dead too! Law and Police, and
+the Tribunals of Health, and the Boards of Safety, Death had stopped
+them all! And the Plague killed art itself, social union, the harmony
+and mechanism of civilization, as if they had been bone and flesh!
+
+So, mute and solitary, went on the lover, in his quest of love, resolved
+to find and to save his betrothed, and guided (that faithful and loyal
+knight!) through the Wilderness of Horror by the blessed hope of that
+strange passion, noblest of all when noble, basest of all when base!
+He came into a broad and spacious square lined with palaces, the usual
+haunt of the best and most graceful nobility of Italy. The stranger
+was alone now, and the tramp of his gallant steed sounded ghastly and
+fearful in his own ears, when just as he turned the corner of one of the
+streets that led from it, he saw a woman steal forth with a child in her
+arms, while another, yet in infancy clung to her robe. She held a large
+bunch of flowers to her nostrils, (the fancied and favourite mode to
+prevent infection), and muttered to the children, who were moaning with
+hunger,--"Yes, yes, you shall have food! Plenty of food now for the
+stirring forth. But oh, that stirring forth!"--and she peered about and
+round, lest any of the diseased might be near.
+
+"My friend," said he, "can you direct me to the convent of--"
+
+"Away, man, away!" shrieked the woman.
+
+"Alas!" said Adrian, with a mournful smile, "can you not see that I am
+not, as yet, one to spread contagion?"
+
+But the woman, unheeding him, fled on; when, after a few paces, she was
+arrested by the child that clung to her.
+
+"Mother, mother!" it cried, "I am sick--I cannot stir."
+
+The woman halted, tore aside the child's robe, saw under the arm the
+fatal tumour, and, deserting her own flesh, fled with a shriek along the
+square. The shriek rang long in Adrian's ears, though not aware of the
+unnatural cause;--the mother feared not for her infant, but herself. The
+voice of Nature was no more heeded in that charnel city than it is in
+the tomb itself! Adrian rode on at a brisker pace, and came at length
+before a stately church; its doors were wide open, and he saw within
+a company of monks (the church had no other worshippers, and they were
+masked) gathered round the altar, and chanting the Miserere Domine;--the
+ministers of God, in a city hitherto boasting the devoutest population
+in Italy, without a flock!
+
+The young Cavalier paused before the door, and waited till the service
+was done, and the monks descended the steps into the street.
+
+"Holy fathers," said he then, "may I pray your goodness to tell me my
+nearest way to the convent Santa Maria de' Pazzi?"
+
+"Son," said one of these featureless spectres, for so they seemed in
+their shroud-like robes, and uncouth vizards,--"son, pass on your
+way, and God be with you. Robbers or revellers may now fill the holy
+cloisters you speak of. The abbess is dead; and many a sister sleeps
+with her. And the nuns have fled from the contagion."
+
+Adrian half fell from his horse, and, as he still remained rooted to the
+spot, the dark procession swept on, hymning in solemn dirge through the
+desolate street the monastic chaunt--
+
+     "By the Mother and the Son,
+     Death endured and mercy won:
+     Spare us, sinners though we be;
+     Miserere Domine!"
+
+Recovering from his stupor, Adrian regained the brethren, and, as they
+closed the burthen of their song, again accosted them.
+
+"Holy fathers, dismiss me not thus. Perchance the one I seek may yet be
+heard of at the convent. Tell me which way to shape my course."
+
+"Disturb us not, son," said the monk who spoke before. "It is an ill
+omen for thee to break thus upon the invocations of the ministers of
+Heaven."
+
+"Pardon, pardon! I will do ample penance, pay many masses; but I seek a
+dear friend--the way--the way--"
+
+"To the right, till you gain the first bridge. Beyond the third bridge,
+on the riverside, you will find the convent," said another monk, moved
+by the earnestness of Adrian.
+
+"Bless you, holy father," faltered forth the Cavalier, and spurred
+his steed in the direction given. The friars heeded him not, but again
+resumed their dirge. Mingled with the sound of his horse's hoofs on the
+clattering pavement, came to the rider's ear the imploring line--
+
+"Miserere Domine!"
+
+Impatient, sick at heart, desperate, Adrian flew through the street at
+the full speed of his horse. He passed the marketplace--it was empty
+as the desert;--the gloomy and barricadoed streets, in which the
+countercries of Guelf and Ghibeline had so often cheered on the Chivalry
+and Rank of Florence. Now huddled together in vault and pit, lay Guelf
+and Ghibeline, knightly spurs and beggar's crutch. To that silence the
+roar even of civil strife would have been a blessing! The first bridge,
+the riverside, the second, the third bridge, all were gained, and Adrian
+at last reined his steed before the walls of the convent. He fastened
+his steed to the porch, in which the door stood ajar, half torn from its
+hinges, traversed the court, gained the opposite door that admitted to
+the main building, came to the jealous grating, now no more a barrier
+from the profane world, and as he there paused a moment to recover
+breath and nerve, wild laughter and loud song, interrupted and mixed
+with oaths, startled his ear. He pushed aside the grated door, entered,
+and, led by the sounds, came to the refectory. In that meeting-place of
+the severe and mortified maids of heaven, he now beheld gathered round
+the upper table, used of yore by the abbess, a strange, disorderly,
+ruffian herd, who at first glance seemed indeed of all ranks, for some
+wore serge, or even rags, others were tricked out in all the bravery
+of satin and velvet, plume and mantle. But a second glance sufficed to
+indicate that the companions were much of the same degree, and that the
+finery of the more showy was but the spoil rent from unguarded palaces
+or tenantless bazaars; for under plumed hats, looped with jewels, were
+grim, unwashed, unshaven faces, over which hung the long locks which the
+professed brethren of the sharp knife and hireling arm had just begun
+to assume, serving them often instead of a mask. Amidst these savage
+revellers were many women, young and middle-aged, foul and fair, and
+Adrian piously shuddered to see amongst the loose robes and uncovered
+necks of the professional harlots the saintly habit and beaded rosary
+of nuns. Flasks of wine, ample viands, gold and silver vessels, mostly
+consecrated to holy rites, strewed the board. As the young Roman paused
+spellbound at the threshold, the man who acted as president of the
+revel, a huge, swarthy ruffian, with a deep scar over his face, which,
+traversing the whole of the left cheek and upper lip, gave his large
+features an aspect preternaturally hideous, called out to him--
+
+"Come in, man--come in! Why stand you there amazed and dumb? We are
+hospitable revellers, and give all men welcome. Here are wine and women.
+My Lord Bishop's wine and my Lady Abbess's women!
+
+"Sing hey, sing ho, for the royal DEATH, That scatters a host with
+a single breath; That opens the prison to spoil the palace, And rids
+honest necks from the hangman's malice. Here's a health to the Plague!
+Let the mighty ones dread, The poor never lived till the wealthy were
+dead. A health to the Plague! May She ever as now Loose the rogue
+from his chain and the nun from her vow: To the gaoler a sword, to the
+captive a key, Hurrah for Earth's Curse--'tis a Blessing to me!"
+
+Ere this fearful stave was concluded, Adrian, sensible that in such
+orgies there was no chance of prosecuting his inquiries, left the
+desecrated chamber and fled, scarcely drawing breath, so great was the
+terror that seized him, till he stood once more in the court amidst the
+hot, sickly, stagnant sunlight, that seemed a fit atmosphere for the
+scenes on which it fell. He resolved, however, not to desert the place
+without making another effort at inquiry; and while he stood without the
+court, musing and doubtful, he saw a small chapel hard by, through whose
+long casement gleamed faintly, and dimmed by the noon-day, the light
+of tapers. He turned towards its porch, entered, and saw beside the
+sanctuary a single nun kneeling in prayer. In the narrow aisle, upon a
+long table, (at either end of which burned the tall dismal tapers whose
+rays had attracted him,) the drapery of several shrouds showed him the
+half-distinct outline of human figures hushed in death. Adrian himself,
+impressed by the sadness and sanctity of the place, and the touching
+sight of that solitary and unselfish watcher of the dead, knelt down and
+intensely prayed.
+
+As he rose, somewhat relieved from the burthen at his heart, the nun
+rose also, and started to perceive him.
+
+"Unhappy man!" said she, in a voice which, low, faint, and solemn,
+sounded as a ghost's--"what fatality brings thee hither? Seest thou not
+thou art in the presence of clay which the Plague hath touched--thou
+breathest the air which destroys! Hence! and search throughout all the
+desolation for one spot where the Dark Visitor hath not come!"
+
+"Holy maiden," answered Adrian, "the danger you hazard does not appal
+me;--I seek one whose life is dearer than my own."
+
+"Thou needest say no more to tell me thou art newly come to Florence!
+Here son forsakes his father, and mother deserts her child. When life
+is most hopeless, these worms of a day cling to it as if it were the
+salvation of immortality! But for me alone, death has no horror. Long
+severed from the world, I have seen my sisterhood perish--the house of
+God desecrated--its altar overthrown, and I care not to survive,--the
+last whom the Pestilence leaves at once unperjured and alive."
+
+The nun paused a few moments, and then, looking earnestly at
+the healthful countenance and unbroken frame of Adrian, sighed
+heavily--"Stranger, why fly you not?" she said. "Thou mightst as well
+search the crowded vaults and rotten corruption of the dead, as search
+the city for one living."
+
+"Sister, and bride of the blessed Redeemer!" returned the Roman,
+clasping his hands--"one word I implore thee. Thou art, methinks, of the
+sisterhood of yon dismantled convent; tell me, knowest thou if Irene
+di Gabrini, (The family name of Rienzi was Gabrini.)--guest of the
+late Abbess, sister of the fallen Tribune of Rome,--be yet amongst the
+living?"
+
+"Art thou her brother, then?" said the nun. "Art thou that fallen Sun of
+the Morning?"
+
+"I am her betrothed," replied Adrian, sadly. "Speak."
+
+"Oh, flesh! flesh! how art thou victor to the last, even amidst the
+triumphs and in the lazar-house of corruption!" said the nun. "Vain man!
+Think not of such carnal ties; make thy peace with heaven, for thy days
+are surely numbered!"
+
+"Woman!" cried Adrian, impatiently--"talk not to me of myself, nor rail
+against ties whose holiness thou canst not know. I ask thee again, as
+thou thyself hopest for mercy and for pardon, is Irene living?"
+
+The nun was awed by the energy of the young lover, and after a moment,
+which seemed to him an age of agonized suspense, she replied--
+
+"The maiden thou speakest of died not with the general death. In the
+dispersion of the few remaining, she left the convent--I know not
+whither; but she had friends in Florence--their names I cannot tell
+thee."
+
+"Now bless thee, holy sister! bless thee! How long since she left the
+convent?"
+
+"Four days have passed since the robber and the harlot have seized the
+house of Santa Maria," replied the nun, groaning: "and they were quick
+successors to the sisterhood."
+
+"Four days!--and thou canst give me no clue?"
+
+"None--yet stay, young man!"--and the nun, approaching, lowered her
+voice to a hissing whisper--"Ask the Becchini." (According to the usual
+custom of Florence, the dead were borne to their resting-place on biers,
+supported by citizens of equal rank; but a new trade was created by the
+plague, and men of the lowest dregs of the populace, bribed by immense
+payment, discharged the office of transporting the remains of the
+victims. These were called Becchini.)
+
+Adrian started aside, crossed himself hastily, and quitted the convent
+without answer. He returned to his horse, and rode back into the
+silenced heart of the city. Tavern and hotel there were no more; but
+the palaces of dead princes were free to the living stranger. He entered
+one--a spacious and splendid mansion. In the stables he found forage
+still in the manger; but the horses, at that time in the Italian cities
+a proof of rank as well as wealth, were gone with the hands that fed
+them. The highborn Knight assumed the office of groom, took off the
+heavy harness, fastened his steed to the rack, and as the wearied
+animal, unconscious of the surrounding horrors, fell eagerly upon its
+meal, its young lord turned away, and muttered, "Faithful servant, and
+sole companion! may the pestilence that spareth neither beast nor man,
+spare thee! and mayst thou bear me hence with a lighter heart!"
+
+A spacious hall, hung with arms and banners--a wide flight of marble
+stairs, whose walls were painted in the stiff outlines and gorgeous
+colours of the day, conducted to vast chambers, hung with velvets
+and cloth of gold, but silent as the tomb. He threw himself upon the
+cushions which were piled in the centre of the room, for he had ridden
+far that morning, and for many days before, and he was wearied and
+exhausted, body and limb; but he could not rest. Impatience, anxiety,
+hope, and fear, gnawed his heart and fevered his veins, and, after a
+brief and unsatisfactory attempt to sober his own thoughts, and devise
+some plan of search more certain than that which chance might afford
+him, he rose, and traversed the apartments, in the unacknowledged hope
+which chance alone could suggest.
+
+It was easy to see that he had made his resting-place in the home of
+one of the princes of the land; and the splendour of all around him far
+outshone the barbarous and rude magnificence of the less civilized
+and wealthy Romans. Here, lay the lute as last touched--the gilded and
+illumined volume as last conned; there, were seats drawn familiarly
+together, as when lady and gallant had interchanged whispers last.
+
+"And such," thought Adrian,--"such desolation may soon swallow up the
+vestige of the unwelcomed guest, as of the vanished lord!"
+
+At length he entered a saloon, in which was a table still spread with
+wine-flasks, goblets of glass, and one of silver, withered flowers,
+half-mouldy fruits, and viands. At one side the arras, folding-doors
+opened to a broad flight of stairs, that descended to a little garden
+at the back of the house, in which a fountain still played sparkling and
+livingly--the only thing, save the stranger, living there! On the steps
+lay a crimson mantle, and by it a lady's glove. The relics seemed to
+speak to the lover's heart of a lover's last wooing and last farewell.
+He groaned aloud, and feeling he should have need of all his strength,
+filled one of the goblets from a half-emptied flask of Cyprus wine. He
+drained the draught--it revived him. "Now," he said, "once more to my
+task!--I will sally forth," when suddenly he heard heavy steps along the
+rooms he had quitted--they approached--they entered; and Adrian beheld
+two huge and ill-omened forms stalk into the chamber. They were wrapped
+in black homely draperies, their arms were bare, and they wore large
+shapeless masks, which descended to the breast, leaving only access to
+sight and breath in three small and circular apertures. The Colonna half
+drew his sword, for the forms and aspects of these visitors were not
+such as men think to look upon in safety.
+
+"Oh!" said one, "the palace has a new guest today. Fear us not,
+stranger; there is room,--ay, and wealth enough for all men now in
+Florence! Per Bacco! but there is still one goblet of silver left--how
+comes that?" So saying, the man seized the cup which Adrian had just
+drained, and thrust it into his breast. He then turned to Adrian, whose
+hand was still upon his hilt, and said, with a laugh which came choked
+and muffled through his vizard--"Oh, we cut no throats, Signor; the
+Invisible spares us that trouble. We are honest men, state officers, and
+come but to see if the cart should halt here tonight."
+
+"Ye are then--"
+
+"Becchini!"
+
+Adrian's blood ran cold. The Becchino continued--"And keep you this
+house while you rest at Florence, Signor?"
+
+"Yes, if the rightful lord claim it not."
+
+"Ha! ha! 'Rightful lord!' The plague is Lord of all now! Why, I have
+known three gallant companies tenant this palace the last week, and
+have buried them all--all! It is a pleasant house enough, and gives good
+custom. Are you alone?"
+
+"At present, yes."
+
+"Shew us where you sleep, that we may know where to come for you. You
+won't want us these three days, I see."
+
+"Ye are pleasant welcomers!" said Adrian;--"but listen to me. Can ye
+find the living as well as bury the dead? I seek one in this city who,
+if you discover her, shall be worth to you a year of burials!"
+
+"No, no! that is out of our line. As well look for a dropped sand on the
+beach, as for a living being amongst closed houses and yawning vaults;
+but if you will pay the poor gravediggers beforehand, I promise you, you
+shall have the first of a new charnel-house;--it will be finished just
+about your time."
+
+"There!" said Adrian, flinging the wretches a few pieces of
+gold--"there! and if you would do me a kinder service, leave me, at
+least while living; or I may save you that trouble." And he turned from
+the room.
+
+The Becchino who had been spokesman followed him. "You are generous,
+Signor, stay; you will want fresher food than these filthy fragments.
+I will supply thee of the best, while--while thou wantest it. And
+hark,--whom wishest thou that I should seek?"
+
+This question arrested Adrian's departure. He detailed the name, and
+all the particulars he could suggest of Irene; and, with sickened heart,
+described the hair, features, and stature of that lovely and hallowed
+image, which might furnish a theme to the poet, and now gave a clue to
+the gravedigger.
+
+The unhallowed apparition shook his head when Adrian had concluded.
+"Full five hundred such descriptions did I hear in the first days of the
+Plague, when there were still such things as mistress and lover; but
+it is a dainty catalogue, Signor, and it will be a pride to the poor
+Becchino to discover or even to bury so many charms! I will do my best;
+meanwhile, I can recommend you, if in a hurry, to make the best use of
+your time, to many a pretty face and comely shape--"
+
+"Out, fiend!" muttered Adrian: "fool to waste time with such as thou!"
+
+The laugh of the gravedigger followed his steps.
+
+All that day did Adrian wander through the city, but search and question
+were alike unavailing; all whom he encountered and interrogated seemed
+to regard him as a madman, and these were indeed of no kind likely
+to advance his object. Wild troops of disordered, drunken revellers,
+processions of monks, or here and there, scattered individuals gliding
+rapidly along, and shunning all approach or speech, made the only
+haunters of the dismal streets, till the sun sunk, lurid and yellow,
+behind the hills, and Darkness closed around the noiseless pathway of
+the Pestilence.
+
+
+
+Chapter 6.III. The Flowers Amidst the Tombs.
+
+Adrian found that the Becchino had taken care that famine should not
+forestall the plague; the banquet of the dead was removed, and
+fresh viands and wines of all kinds,--for there was plenty then in
+Florence!--spread the table. He partook of the refreshment, though but
+sparingly, and shrinking from repose in beds beneath whose gorgeous
+hangings Death had been so lately busy, carefully closed door and
+window, wrapped himself in his mantle, and found his resting-place on
+the cushions of the chamber in which he had supped. Fatigue cast him
+into an unquiet slumber, from which he was suddenly awakened by the
+roll of a cart below, and the jingle of bells. He listened, as the cart
+proceeded slowly from door to door, and at length its sound died away in
+the distance.--He slept no more that night!
+
+The sun had not long risen ere he renewed his labours; and it was yet
+early when, just as he passed a church, two ladies richly dressed came
+from the porch, and seemed through their vizards to regard the young
+Cavalier with earnest attention. The gaze arrested him also, when one of
+the ladies said, "Fair sir, you are overbold: you wear no mask; neither
+do you smell to flowers."
+
+"Lady, I wear no mask, for I would be seen: I search these miserable
+places for one in whose life I live."
+
+"He is young, comely, evidently noble, and the plague hath not touched
+him: he will serve our purpose well," whispered one of the ladies to the
+other.
+
+"You echo my own thoughts," returned her companion; and then turning to
+Adrian, she said, "You seek one you are not wedded to, if you seek so
+fondly?"
+
+"It is true."
+
+"Young and fair, with dark hair and neck of snow; I will conduct you to
+her."
+
+"Signor!"
+
+"Follow us!"
+
+"Know you who I am, and whom I seek?"
+
+"Yes."
+
+"Can you in truth tell me aught of Irene?"
+
+"I can: follow me."
+
+"To her?"
+
+"Yes, yes: follow us!"
+
+The ladies moved on as if impatient of further parley. Amazed, doubtful,
+and, as if in a dream, Adrian followed them. Their dress, manner, and
+the pure Tuscan of the one who had addressed him, indicated them of
+birth and station; but all else was a riddle which he could not solve.
+
+They arrived at one of the bridges, where a litter and a servant on
+horseback holding a palfrey by the bridle were in attendance. The ladies
+entered the litter, and she who had before spoken bade Adrian follow on
+the palfrey.
+
+"But tell me--" he began.
+
+"No questions, Cavalier," said she, impatiently; "follow the living in
+silence, or remain with the dead, as you list."
+
+With that the litter proceeded, and Adrian mounted the palfrey
+wonderingly, and followed his strange conductors, who moved on at a
+tolerably brisk pace. They crossed the bridge, left the river on one
+side, and, soon ascending a gentle acclivity, the trees and flowers
+of the country began to succeed dull walls and empty streets. After
+proceeding thus somewhat less than half an hour, they turned up a green
+lane remote from the road, and came suddenly upon the porticoes of a
+fair and stately palace. Here the ladies descended from their litter;
+and Adrian, who had vainly sought to extract speech from the attendant,
+also dismounted, and following them across a spacious court, filled on
+either side with vases of flowers and orange-trees, and then through a
+wide hall in the farther side of the quadrangle, found himself in one of
+the loveliest spots eye ever saw or poet ever sung. It was a garden plot
+of the most emerald verdure, bosquets of laurel and of myrtle opened on
+either side into vistas half overhung with clematis and rose, through
+whose arcades the prospect closed with statues and gushing fountains; in
+front, the lawn was bounded by rows of vases on marble pedestals filled
+with flowers, and broad and gradual flights of steps of the whitest
+marble led from terrace to terrace, each adorned with statues and
+fountains, half way down a high but softly sloping and verdant hill.
+Beyond, spread in wide, various, and luxurious landscape, the vineyards
+and olive-groves, the villas and villages, of the Vale of Arno,
+intersected by the silver river, while the city, in all its calm, but
+without its horror, raised its roofs and spires to the sun. Birds of
+every hue and song, some free, some in net-work of golden wire, warbled
+round; and upon the centre of the sward reclined four ladies unmasked
+and richly dressed, the eldest of whom seemed scarcely more than twenty;
+and five cavaliers, young and handsome, whose jewelled vests and golden
+chains attested their degree. Wines and fruits were on a low table
+beside; and musical instruments, chess-boards, and gammon-tables, lay
+scattered all about. So fair a group, and so graceful a scene, Adrian
+never beheld but once, and that was in the midst of the ghastly
+pestilence of Italy!--such group and such scene our closet indolence may
+yet revive in the pages of the bright Boccaccio!
+
+On seeing Adrian and his companions approach, the party rose instantly;
+and one of the ladies, who wore upon her head a wreath of laurel-leaves,
+stepping before the rest, exclaimed, "well done, my Mariana! welcome
+back, my fair subjects. And you, sir, welcome hither."
+
+The two guides of the Colonna had by this time removed their masks; and
+the one who had accosted him, shaking her long and raven ringlets over a
+bright, laughing eye and a cheek to whose native olive now rose a slight
+blush, turned to him ere he could reply to the welcome he had received.
+
+"Signor Cavalier," said she, "you now see to what I have decoyed you.
+Own that this is pleasanter than the sights and sounds of the city we
+have left. You gaze on me in surprise. See, my Queen, how speechless
+the marvel of your court has made our new gallant; I assure you he
+could talk quickly enough when he had only us to confer with: nay, I was
+forced to impose silence on him."
+
+"Oh! then you have not yet informed him of the custom and origin of the
+court he enters!" quoth she of the laurel wreath.
+
+"No, my Queen; I thought all description given in such a spot as our
+poor Florence now is would fail of its object. My task is done, I resign
+him to your Grace!"
+
+So saying the lady tripped lightly away, and began coquettishly sleeking
+her locks in the smooth mirror of a marble basin, whose waters trickled
+over the margin upon the grass below, ever and anon glancing archly
+towards the stranger, and sufficiently at hand to overhear all that was
+said.
+
+"In the first place, Signor, permit us to inquire," said the lady who
+bore the appellation of Queen, "thy name, rank, and birth-place."
+
+"Madam," returned Adrian, "I came hither little dreaming to answer
+questions respecting myself; but what it pleases you to ask, it must
+please me to reply to. My name is Adrian di Castello, one of the Roman
+house of the Colonna."
+
+"A noble column of a noble house!" answered the Queen. "For us,
+respecting whom your curiosity may perhaps be aroused, know that we six
+ladies of Florence, deserted by or deprived of our kin and protectors,
+formed the resolution to retire to this palace, where, if death comes,
+it comes stripped of half its horrors; and as the learned tell us that
+sadness engenders the awful malady, so you see us sworn foes to sadness.
+Six cavaliers of our acquaintance agreed to join us. We pass our days,
+whether many or few, in whatever diversions we can find or invent. Music
+and the dance, merry tales and lively songs, with such slight change of
+scene as from sward to shade, from alley to fountain, fill up our time,
+and prepare us for peaceful sleep and happy dreams. Each lady is by
+turns Queen of our fairy court, as is my lot this day. One law forms the
+code of our constitution--that nothing sad shall be admitted. We would
+live as if yonder city were not, and as if (added the fair Queen, with a
+slight sigh) youth, grace, and beauty, could endure for ever. One of our
+knights madly left us for a day, promising to return; we have seen him
+no more; we will not guess what hath chanced to him. It became necessary
+to fill up his place; we drew lots who should seek his substitute;
+it fell upon the ladies who have--not, I trust, to your
+displeasure--brought you hither. Fair sir, my explanation is made."
+
+"Alas, lovely Queen," said Adrian, wrestling strongly, but vainly,
+with the bitter disappointment he felt--"I cannot be one of your happy
+circle; I am in myself a violation of your law. I am filled with but one
+sad and anxious thought, to which all mirth would seem impiety. I am a
+seeker amongst the living and the dead for one being of whose fate I
+am uncertain; and it was only by the words that fell from my fair
+conductor, that I have been decoyed hither from my mournful task. Suffer
+me, gracious lady, to return to Florence."
+
+The Queen looked in mute vexation towards the dark-eyed Mariana,
+who returned the glance by one equally expressive, and then suddenly
+stepping up to Adrian she said,--
+
+"But, Signor, if I should still keep my promise, if I should be able to
+satisfy thee of the health and safety of--of Irene."
+
+"Irene!" echoed Adrian in surprise, forgetful at the moment that he had
+before revealed the name of her he sought--"Irene--Irene di Gabrini,
+sister of the once renowned Rienzi!"
+
+"The same," replied Mariana, quickly; "I know her, as I told you. Nay,
+Signor, I do not deceive thee. It is true that I cannot bring thee to
+her; but better as it is,--she went away many days ago to one of the
+towns of Lombardy, which, they say, the Pestilence has not yet pierced.
+Now, noble sir, is not your heart lightened? and will you so soon be a
+deserter from the Court of Loveliness; and perhaps," she added, with a
+soft look from her large dark eyes, "of Love?"
+
+"Dare I, in truth, believe you, Lady?" said Adrian, all delighted, yet
+still half doubting.
+
+"Would I deceive a true lover, as methinks you are? Be assured. Nay,
+Queen, receive your subject."
+
+The Queen extended her hand to Adrian, and led him to the group that
+still stood on the grass at a little distance. They welcomed him as a
+brother, and soon forgave his abstracted courtesies, in compliment to
+his good mien and illustrious name.
+
+The Queen clapped her hands, and the party again ranged themselves
+on the sward. Each lady beside each gallant. "You, Mariana, if not
+fatigued," said the Queen, "shall take the lute and silence these noisy
+grasshoppers, which chirp about us with as much pretension as if they
+were nightingales. Sing, sweet subject, sing; and let it be the song our
+dear friend, Signor Visdomini, (I know not if this be the same Visdomini
+who, three years afterwards, with one of the Medici, conducted so
+gallant a reinforcement to Scarperia, then besieged by Visconti
+d'Oleggio.) made for a kind of inaugural anthem to such as we admitted
+to our court."
+
+Mariana, who had reclined herself by the side of Adrian, took up the
+lute, and, after a short prelude, sung the words thus imperfectly
+translated:--
+
+The Song of the Florentine Lady.
+
+Enjoy the more the smiles of noon If doubtful be the morrow; And know
+the Fort of Life is soon Betray'd to Death by Sorrow!
+
+Death claims us all--then, Grief, away! We'll own no meaner master; The
+clouds that darken round the day But bring the night the faster.
+
+Love--feast--be merry while on earth, Such, Grave, should be thy moral!
+Ev'n Death himself is friends with Mirth, And veils the tomb with
+laurel. (At that time, in Italy, the laurel was frequently planted over
+the dead.)
+
+While gazing on the eyes I love, New life to mine is given--If joy the
+lot of saints above, Joy fits us best for Heaven.
+
+To this song, which was much applauded, succeeded those light and witty
+tales in which the Italian novelists furnished Voltaire and Marmontel
+with a model--each, in his or her turn, taking up the discourse, and
+with an equal dexterity avoiding every lugubrious image or mournful
+reflection that might remind those graceful idlers of the vicinity of
+Death. At any other time the temper and accomplishments of the young
+Lord di Castello would have fitted him to enjoy and to shine in that
+Arcadian court. But now he in vain sought to dispel the gloom from
+his brow, and the anxious thought from his heart. He revolved the
+intelligence he had received, wondered, guessed, hoped, and dreaded
+still; and if for a moment his mind returned to the scene about him, his
+nature, too truly poetical for the false sentiment of the place,
+asked itself in what, save the polished exterior and the graceful
+circumstance, the mirth that he now so reluctantly witnessed differed
+from the brutal revels in the convent of Santa Maria--each alike in its
+motive, though so differing in the manner--equally callous and equally
+selfish, coining horror into enjoyment. The fair Mariana, whose partner
+had been reft from her, as the Queen had related, was in no mind to lose
+the new one she had gained. She pressed upon him from time to time the
+wine-flask and the fruits; and in those unmeaning courtesies her
+hand gently lingered upon his. At length, the hour arrived when the
+companions retired to the Palace, during the fiercer heats of noon--to
+come forth again in the declining sun, to sup by the side of the
+fountain, to dance, to sing, and to make merry by torchlight and the
+stars till the hour of rest. But Adrian, not willing to continue the
+entertainment, no sooner found himself in the apartment to which he
+was conducted, than he resolved to effect a silent escape, as under
+all circumstances the shortest, and not perhaps the least courteous,
+farewell left to him. Accordingly, when all seemed quiet and hushed in
+the repose common to the inhabitants of the South during that hour, he
+left his apartment, descended the stairs, passed the outer court, and
+was already at the gate, when he heard himself called by a voice that
+spoke vexation and alarm. He turned to behold Mariana.
+
+"Why, how now, Signor di Castello, is our company so unpleasing, is our
+music so jarring, or are our brows so wrinkled, that you should fly as
+the traveller flies from the witches he surprises at Benevento? Nay, you
+cannot mean to leave us yet?"
+
+"Fair dame," returned the cavalier, somewhat disconcerted, "it is in
+vain that I seek to rally my mournful spirits, or to fit myself for the
+court to which nothing sad should come. Your laws hang about me like a
+culprit--better timely flight than harsh expulsion."
+
+As he spoke he moved on, and would have passed the gate, but Mariana
+caught his arm.
+
+"Nay," said she, softly; "are there no eyes of dark light, and no neck
+of wintry snow, that can compensate to thee for the absent one? Tarry
+and forget, as doubtless in absence even thou art forgotten!"
+
+"Lady," answered Adrian, with great gravity, not unmixed with an
+ill-suppressed disdain, "I have not sojourned long enough amidst the
+sights and sounds of woe, to blunt my heart and spirit into callousness
+to all around. Enjoy, if thou canst, and gather the rank roses of the
+sepulchre; but to me, haunted still by funeral images, Beauty fails to
+bring delight, and Love,--even holy love--seems darkened by the Shadow
+of Death. Pardon me, and farewell."
+
+"Go, then," said the Florentine, stung and enraged at his coldness; "go
+and find your mistress amidst the associations on which it pleases your
+philosophy to dwell. I did but deceive thee, blind fool! as I had hoped
+for thine own good, when I told thee Irene--(was that her name?)--was
+gone from Florence. Of her I know nought, and heard nought, save from
+thee. Go back and search the vault, and see whether thou lovest her
+still!"
+
+
+
+Chapter 6.IV. We Obtain What We Seek, and Know it Not.
+
+In the fiercest heat of the day, and on foot, Adrian returned to
+Florence. As he approached the city, all that festive and gallant scene
+he had quitted seemed to him like a dream; a vision of the gardens and
+bowers of an enchantress, from which he woke abruptly as a criminal
+may wake on the morning of his doom to see the scaffold and the
+deathsman;--so much did each silent and lonely step into the funeral
+city bring back his bewildered thoughts at once to life and to death.
+The parting words of Mariana sounded like a knell at his heart. And
+now as he passed on--the heat of the day, the lurid atmosphere, long
+fatigue, alternate exhaustion and excitement, combining with the
+sickness of disappointment, the fretting consciousness of precious
+moments irretrievably lost, and his utter despair of forming any
+systematic mode of search--fever began rapidly to burn through his
+veins. His temples felt oppressed as with the weight of a mountain; his
+lips parched with intolerable thirst; his strength seemed suddenly to
+desert him; and it was with pain and labour that he dragged one languid
+limb after the other.
+
+"I feel it," thought he, with the loathing nausea and shivering dread
+with which nature struggles ever against death; "I feel it upon me--the
+Devouring and the Viewless--I shall perish, and without saving her; nor
+shall even one grave contain us!"
+
+But these thoughts served rapidly to augment the disease which began to
+prey upon him; and ere he reached the interior of the city, even thought
+itself forsook him. The images of men and houses grew indistinct and
+shadowy before his eyes; the burning pavement became unsteady and
+reeling beneath his feet; delirium gathered over him, and he went on his
+way muttering broken and incoherent words; the few who met fled from
+him in dismay. Even the monks, still continuing their solemn and sad
+processions, passed with a murmured bene vobis to the other side from
+that on which his steps swerved and faltered. And from a booth at the
+corner of a street, four Becchini, drinking together, fixed upon him
+from their black masks the gaze that vultures fix upon some dying
+wanderer of the desert. Still he crept on, stretching out his arms like
+a man in the dark, and seeking with the vague sense that yet struggled
+against the gathering delirium, to find out the mansion in which he
+had fixed his home; though many as fair to live, and as meet to die in,
+stood with open portals before and beside his path.
+
+"Irene, Irene!" he cried, sometimes in a muttered and low tone,
+sometimes in a wild and piercing shriek, "where art thou? Where? I come
+to snatch thee from them; they shall not have thee, the foul and ugly
+fiends! Pah! how the air smells of dead flesh! Irene, Irene! we will
+away to mine own palace and the heavenly lake--Irene!"
+
+While thus benighted, and thus exclaiming, two females suddenly emerged
+from a neighbouring house, masked and mantled.
+
+"Vain wisdom!" said the taller and slighter of the two, whose mantle, it
+is here necessary to observe, was of a deep blue, richly broidered with
+silver, of a shape and a colour not common in Florence, but usual in
+Rome, where the dress of ladies of the higher rank was singularly bright
+in hue and ample in fold--thus differing from the simpler and more
+slender draperies of the Tuscan fashion--"Vain wisdom, to fly a
+relentless and certain doom!"
+
+"Why, thou wouldst not have us hold the same home with three of the
+dead in the next chamber--strangers too to us--when Florence has so many
+empty halls? Trust me, we shall not walk far ere we suit ourselves with
+a safer lodgment."
+
+"Hitherto, indeed, we have been miraculously preserved," sighed the
+other, whose voice and shape were those of extreme youth; "yet would
+that we knew where to fly--what mount, what wood, what cavern, held my
+brother and his faithful Nina! I am sick with horrors!"
+
+"Irene, Irene! Well then, if thou art at Milan or some Lombard town, why
+do I linger here? To horse, to horse! Oh, no! no!--not the horse with
+the bells! not the death-cart." With a cry, a shriek, louder than
+the loudest of the sick man's, broke that young female away from her
+companion. It seemed as if a single step took her to the side of Adrian.
+She caught his arm--she looked in his face--she met his unconscious eyes
+bright with a fearful fire. "It has seized him!"--(she then said in a
+deep but calm tone)--"the Plague!"
+
+"Away, away! are you mad?" cried her companion; "hence, hence,--touch me
+not now thou hast touched him--go!--here we part!"
+
+"Help me to bear him somewhere, see, he faints, he droops, he
+falls!--help me, dear Signora, for pity, for the love of God!"
+
+But, wholly possessed by the selfish fear which overcame all humanity
+in that miserable time, the elder woman, though naturally kind, pitiful,
+and benevolent, fled rapidly away, and soon vanished. Thus left alone
+with Adrian, who had now, in the fierceness of the fever that preyed
+within him, fallen on the ground, the strength and nerve of that young
+girl did not forsake her. She tore off the heavy mantle which encumbered
+her arms, and cast it from her; and then, lifting up the face of her
+lover--for who but Irene was that weak woman, thus shrinking not from
+the contagion of death?--she supported him on her breast, and called
+aloud and again for help. At length the Becchini, in the booth before
+noticed, (hardened in their profession, and who, thus hardened,
+better than the most cautious, escaped the pestilence,) lazily
+approached--"Quicker, quicker, for Christ's love!" said Irene. "I have
+much gold; I will reward you well: help me to bear him under the nearest
+roof."
+
+"Leave him to us, young lady: we have had our eye upon him," said one of
+the gravediggers. "We'll do our duty by him, first and last."
+
+"No--no! touch not his head--that is my care. There, I will help you;
+so,--now then,--but be gentle!"
+
+Assisted by these portentous officers, Irene, who would not release
+her hold, but seemed to watch over the beloved eyes and lips, (set and
+closed as they were,) as if to look back the soul from parting, bore
+Adrian into a neighbouring house, and laid him on a bed; from which
+Irene (preserving as only women do, in such times, the presence of mind
+and vigilant providence which make so sublime a contrast with their
+keen susceptibilities) caused them first to cast off the draperies and
+clothing, which might retain additional infection. She then despatched
+them for new furniture, and for whatsoever leech money might yet bribe
+to a duty, now chiefly abandoned to those heroic Brotherhoods who,
+however vilified in modern judgment by the crimes of some unworthy
+members, were yet, in the dark times, the best, the bravest, and the
+holiest agents, to whom God ever delegated the power to resist the
+oppressor--to feed the hungry--to minister to woe; and who, alone,
+amidst that fiery Pestilence, (loosed, as it were, a demon from the
+abyss, to shiver into atoms all that binds the world to Virtue and to
+Law,) seemed to awaken, as by the sound of an angel's trumpet, to that
+noblest Chivalry of the Cross--whose faith is the scorn of self--whose
+hope is beyond the Lazar-house--whose feet, already winded for
+immortality, trample, with a conqueror's march, upon the graves of
+Death!
+
+While this the ministry and the office of love,--along that street in
+which Adrian and Irene had met at last--came singing, reeling, roaring,
+the dissolute and abandoned crew who had fixed their quarters in the
+Convent of Santa Maria de' Pazzi, their bravo chief at their head, and
+a nun (no longer in nun's garments) upon either arm. "A health to the
+Plague!" shouted the ruffian: "A health to the Plague!" echoed his
+frantic Bacchanals.
+
+"A health to the Plague, may she ever, as now, Loose the rogue from his
+chain, and the nun from her vow; To the gaoler a sword--to the captive a
+key, Hurrah for Earth's Curse! 'tis a blessing to me."
+
+"Holla!" cried the chief, stopping; "here, Margherita; here's a brave
+cloak for thee, my girl: silver enow on it to fill thy purse, if it ever
+grow empty; which it may, if ever the Plague grow slack."
+
+"Nay," said the girl, who, amidst all the havoc of debauch, retained
+much of youth and beauty in her form and face; "nay, Guidotto; perhaps it
+has infection."
+
+"Pooh, child, silver never infects. Clap it on, clap it on. Besides,
+fate is fate, and when it is thine hour there will be other means
+besides the gavocciolo."
+
+So saying, he seized the mantle, threw it roughly over her shoulders,
+and dragged her on as before, half pleased with the finery, half
+frightened with the danger; while gradually died away, along the lurid
+air and the mournful streets, the chant of that most miserable mirth.
+
+
+
+Chapter 6.V. The Error.
+
+For three days, the fatal three days, did Adrian remain bereft of
+strength and sense. But he was not smitten by the scourge which
+his devoted and generous nurse had anticipated. It was a fierce and
+dangerous fever, brought on by the great fatigue, restlessness, and
+terrible agitation he had undergone.
+
+No professional mediciner could be found to attend him; but a good
+friar, better perhaps skilled in the healing art than many who claimed
+its monopoly, visited him daily. And in the long and frequent absences
+to which his other and numerous duties compelled the monk, there was one
+ever at hand to smooth the pillow, to wipe the brow, to listen to the
+moan, to watch the sleep. And even in that dismal office, when, in
+the frenzy of the sufferer, her name, coupled with terms of passionate
+endearment, broke from his lips, a thrill of strange pleasure crossed
+the heart of the betrothed, which she chid as if it were a crime. But
+even the most unearthly love is selfish in the rapture of being loved!
+Words cannot tell, heart cannot divine, the mingled emotions that broke
+over her when, in some of these incoherent ravings, she dimly understood
+that for her the city had been sought, the death dared, the danger
+incurred. And as then bending passionately to kiss that burning brow,
+her tears fell fast over the idol of her youth, the fountains from which
+they gushed were those, fathomless and countless, which a life could not
+weep away. Not an impulse of the human and the woman heart that was not
+stirred; the adoring gratitude, the meek wonder thus to be loved, while
+deeming it so simple a merit thus to love;--as if all sacrifice in her
+were a thing of course,--to her, a virtue nature could not paragon,
+worlds could not repay! And there he lay, the victim to his own fearless
+faith, helpless--dependent upon her--a thing between life and death,
+to thank, to serve--to be proud of, yet protect, to compassionate, yet
+revere--the saver, to be saved! Never seemed one object to demand at
+once from a single heart so many and so profound emotions; the romantic
+enthusiasm of the girl--the fond idolatry of the bride--the watchful
+providence of the mother over her child.
+
+And strange to say, with all the excitement of that lonely watch,
+scarcely stirring from his side, taking food only that her strength
+might not fail her,--unable to close her eyes,--though, from the same
+cause, she would fain have taken rest, when slumber fell upon her
+charge--with all such wear and tear of frame and heart, she seemed
+wonderfully supported. And the holy man marvelled, in each visit, to see
+the cheek of the nurse still fresh, and her eye still bright. In her
+own superstition she thought and felt that Heaven gifted her with a
+preternatural power to be true to so sacred a charge; and in this fancy
+she did not wholly err:--for Heaven did gift her with that diviner
+power, when it planted in so soft a heart the enduring might and energy
+of Affection! The friar had visited the sick man late on the third
+night, and administered to him a strong sedative. "This night," said he
+to Irene, "will be the crisis: should he awaken, as I trust he may, with
+a returning consciousness, and a calm pulse, he will live; if not, young
+daughter, prepare for the worst. But should you note any turn in the
+disease, that may excite alarm, or require my attendance, this scroll
+will inform you where I am, if God spare me still, at each hour of the
+night and morning."
+
+The monk retired, and Irene resumed her watch.
+
+The sleep of Adrian was at first broken and interrupted--his features,
+his exclamations, his gestures, all evinced great agony, whether mental
+or bodily: it seemed, as perhaps it was, a fierce and doubtful struggle
+between life and death for the conquest of the sleeper. Patient, silent,
+breathing but by long-drawn gasps, Irene sate at the bed-head. The lamp
+was removed to the further end of the chamber, and its ray, shaded by
+the draperies, did not suffice to give to her gaze more than the outline
+of the countenance she watched. In that awful suspense, all the thoughts
+that hitherto had stirred her mind lay hushed and mute. She was only
+sensible to that unutterable fear which few of us have been happy enough
+not to know. That crushing weight under which we can scarcely breathe
+or move, the avalanche over us, freezing and suspended, which we
+cannot escape from, beneath which, every moment, we may be buried and
+overwhelmed. The whole destiny of life was in the chances of that single
+night! It was just as Adrian at last seemed to glide into a deeper
+and serener slumber, that the bells of the death-cart broke with their
+boding knell the palpable silence of the streets. Now hushed, now
+revived, as the cart stopped for its gloomy passengers, and coming
+nearer and nearer after every pause. At length she heard the heavy
+wheels stop under the very casement, and a voice deep and muffled
+calling aloud, "Bring out the dead!" She rose, and with a noiseless
+step, passed to secure the door, when the dull lamp gleamed upon the
+dark and shrouded forms of the Becchini.
+
+"You have not marked the door, nor set out the body," said one gruffly;
+"but this is the third night! He is ready for us."
+
+"Hush, he sleeps--away, quick, it is not the Plague that seized him."
+
+"Not the Plague?" growled the Becchino in a disappointed tone;
+"I thought no other illness dared encroach upon the rights of the
+gavocciolo!"
+
+"Go--here's money; leave us."
+
+And the grisly carrier sullenly withdrew. The cart moved on, the bell
+renewed its summons, till slowly and faintly the dreadful larum died in
+the distance.
+
+Shading the lamp with her hand, Irene stole to the bed side, fearful
+that the sound and the intrusion had disturbed the slumberer. But his
+face was still locked, as in a vice, with that iron sleep. He stirred
+not--the breath scarcely passed his lips--she felt his pulse, as the
+wan hand lay on the coverlid--there was a slight beat--she was
+contented--removed the light, and, retiring to a corner of the room,
+placed the little cross suspended round her neck upon the table, and
+prayed, in her intense suffering, to Him who had known death, and
+who--Son of Heaven though he was, and Sovereign of the Seraphim--had
+also prayed, in his earthly travail, that the cup might pass away.
+
+The Morning broke, not, as in the North, slowly and through shadow,
+but with the sudden glory with which in those climates Day leaps
+upon earth--like a giant from his sleep. A sudden smile--a burnished
+glow--and night had vanished. Adrian still slept; not a muscle seemed to
+have stirred; the sleep was even heavier than before; the silence became
+a burthen upon the air. Now, in that exceeding torpor so like unto
+death, the solitary watcher became alarmed and terrified. Time
+passed--morning glided to noon--still not a sound nor motion. The
+sun was midway in Heaven--the Friar came not. And now again touching
+Adrian's pulse, she felt no flutter--she gazed on him, appalled and
+confounded; surely nought living could be so still and pale. "Was it
+indeed sleep, might it not be--" She turned away, sick and frozen; her
+tongue clove to her lips. Why did the father tarry?--she would go to
+him--she would learn the worst--she could forbear no longer. She glanced
+over the scroll the Monk had left her: "From sunrise," it said, "I shall
+be at the Convent of the Dominicans. Death has stricken many of the
+brethren." The Convent was at some distance, but she knew the spot, and
+fear would wing her steps. She gave one wistful look at the sleeper and
+rushed from the house. "I shall see thee again presently," she murmured.
+Alas! what hope can calculate beyond the moment? And who shall claim the
+tenure of 'The Again?'
+
+It was not many minutes after Irene had left the room, ere, with a long
+sigh, Adrian opened his eyes--an altered and another man; the fever was
+gone, the reviving pulse beat low indeed, but calm. His mind was once
+more master of his body, and, though weak and feeble, the danger was
+past, and life and intellect regained.
+
+"I have slept long," he muttered; "and oh, such dreams! And methought
+I saw Irene, but could not speak to her, and while I attempted to grasp
+her, her face changed, her form dilated, and I was in the clutch of
+the foul gravedigger. It is late--the sun is high--I must be up and
+stirring. Irene is in Lombardy. No, no; that was a lie, a wicked lie;
+she is at Florence, I must renew my search."
+
+As this duty came to his remembrance, he rose from the bed--he was
+amazed at his own debility: at first he could not stand without support
+from the wall; by degrees, however, he so far regained the mastery of
+his limbs as to walk, though with effort and pain. A ravening hunger
+preyed upon him, he found some scanty and light food in the chamber,
+which he devoured eagerly. And with scarce less eagerness laved his
+enfeebled form and haggard face with the water that stood at hand. He
+now felt refreshed and invigorated, and began to indue his garments,
+which he found thrown on a heap beside the bed. He gazed with surprise
+and a kind of self-compassion upon his emaciated hands and shrunken
+limbs, and began now to comprehend that he must have had some severe but
+unconscious illness. "Alone, too," thought he; "no one near to tend me!
+Nature my only nurse! But alas! alas! how long a time may thus have
+been wasted, and my adored Irene--quick, quick, not a moment more will I
+lose."
+
+He soon found himself in the open street; the air revived him; and that
+morning had sprung up the blessed breeze, the first known for weeks. He
+wandered on very slowly and feebly till he came to a broad square,
+from which, in the vista, might be seen one of the principal gates of
+Florence, and the fig-trees and olive-groves beyond, it was then that
+a Pilgrim of tall stature approached towards him as from the gate; his
+hood was thrown back, and gave to view a countenance of great but
+sad command; a face, in whose high features, massive brow, and proud,
+unshrinking gaze, shaded by an expression of melancholy more stern than
+soft, Nature seemed to have written majesty, and Fate disaster. As in
+that silent and dreary place, these two, the only tenants of the street,
+now encountered, Adrian stopped abruptly, and said in a startled and
+doubting voice: "Do I dream still, or do I behold Rienzi?"
+
+The Pilgrim paused also, as he heard the name, and gazing long on the
+attenuated features of the young lord, said: "I am he that was Rienzi!
+and you, pale shadow, is it in this grave of Italy that I meet with the
+gay and high Colonna? Alas, young friend," he added, in a more relaxed
+and kindly voice, "hath the Plague not spared the flower of the Roman
+nobles? Come, I, the cruel and the harsh Tribune, I will be thy nurse:
+he who might have been my brother, shall yet claim from me a brother's
+care."
+
+With these words he wound his arm tenderly round Adrian; and the young
+noble, touched by his compassion, and agitated by the surprise, leaned
+upon Rienzi's breast in silence.
+
+"Poor youth," resumed the Tribune, for so, since rather fallen than
+deposed, he may yet be called; "I ever loved the young, (my brother died
+young;) and you more than most. What fatality brought thee hither?"
+
+"Irene!" replied Adrian, falteringly.
+
+"Is it so, really? Art thou a Colonna, and yet prize the fallen? The
+same duty has brought me also to the city of Death. From the furthest
+south--over the mountains of the robber--through the fastnesses of my
+foes--through towns in which the herald proclaimed in my ear the price
+of my head--I have passed hither, on foot and alone, safe under the
+wings of the Almighty One. Young man, thou shouldst have left this task
+to one who bears a wizard's life, and whom Heaven and Earth yet reserve
+for an appointed end!"
+
+The Tribune said this in a deep and inward voice; and in his raised eye
+and solemn brow might be seen how much his reverses had deepened his
+fanaticism, and added even to the sanguineness of his hopes.
+
+"But," asked Adrian, withdrawing gently from Rienzi's arm, "thou
+knowest, then, where Irene is to be found; let us go together. Lose not
+a moment in this talk; time is of inestimable value, and a moment in
+this city is often but the border to eternity."
+
+"Right," said Rienzi, awakening to his object. "But fear not, I have
+dreamt that I shall save her, the gem and darling of my house. Fear not,
+I have no fear."
+
+"Know you where to seek?" said Adrian, impatiently; "the Convent holds
+far other guests."
+
+"Ha! so said my dream!"
+
+"Talk not now of dreams," said the lover; "but if you have no other
+guide, let us part at once in quest of her. I will take yonder street,
+you take the opposite, and at sunset let us meet in the same spot."
+
+"Rash man!" said the Tribune, with great solemnity; "scoff not at the
+visions which Heaven makes a parable to its Chosen. Thou seekest counsel
+of thy human wisdom; I, less presumptuous, follow the hand of the
+mysterious Providence, moving even now before my gaze as a pillar of
+light through the wilderness of dread. Ay, meet we here at sunset, and
+prove whose guide is the most unerring. If my dream tell me true, I
+shall see my sister living, ere the sun reach yonder hill, and by a
+church dedicated to St. Mark."
+
+The grave earnestness with which Rienzi spoke impressed Adrian with a
+hope which his reason would not acknowledge. He saw him depart with that
+proud and stately step to which his sweeping garments gave a yet more
+imposing dignity, and then passed up the street to the right hand.
+He had not got half way when he felt himself pulled by the mantle. He
+turned, and saw the shapeless mask of a Becchino.
+
+"I feared you were sped, and that another had cheated me of my office,"
+said the gravedigger, "seeing that you returned not to the old Prince's
+palace. You don't know me from the rest of us I see, but I am the one
+you told to seek--"
+
+"Irene!"
+
+"Yes, Irene di Gabrini; you promised ample reward."
+
+"You shall have it."
+
+"Follow me."
+
+The Becchino strode on, and soon arrived at a mansion. He knocked twice
+at the porter's entrance, an old woman cautiously opened the door. "Fear
+not, good aunt," said the gravedigger; "this is the young Lord I spoke
+to thee of. Thou sayest thou hadst two ladies in the palace, who alone
+survived of all the lodgers, and their names were Bianca de Medici,
+and--what was the other?"
+
+"Irene di Gabrini, a Roman lady. But I told thee this was the fourth day
+they left the house, terrified by the deaths within it."
+
+"Thou didst so: and was there anything remarkable in the dress of the
+Signora di Gabrini?"
+
+"Yes, I have told thee: a blue mantle, such as I have rarely seen,
+wrought with silver."
+
+"Was the broidery that of stars, silver stars," exclaimed Adrian, "with
+a sun in the centre?"
+
+"It was."
+
+"Alas! alas! the arms of the Tribune's family! I remember how I
+praised the mantle the first day she wore it--the day on which we were
+betrothed!" And the lover at once conjectured the secret sentiment
+which had induced Irene to retain thus carefully a robe so endeared by
+association.
+
+"You know no more of your lodgers?"
+
+"Nothing."
+
+"And is this all you have learned, knave?" cried Adrian.
+
+"Patience. I must bring you from proof to proof, and link to link, in
+order to win my reward. Follow, Signor."
+
+The Becchino then passing through the several lanes and streets, arrived
+at another house of less magnificent size and architecture. Again
+he tapped thrice at the parlour door, and this time came forth a man
+withered, old, and palsied, whom death seemed to disdain to strike.
+
+"Signor Astuccio," said the Becchino, "pardon me; but I told thee I
+might trouble thee again. This is the gentleman who wants to know, what
+is often best unknown--but that's not my affair. Did a lady--young and
+beautiful--with dark hair, and of a slender form, enter this house,
+stricken with the first symptom of the Plague, three days since?"
+
+"Ay, thou knowest that well enough; and thou knowest still better, that
+she has departed these two days: it was quick work with her, quicker
+than with most!"
+
+"Did she wear anything remarkable?"
+
+"Yes, troublesome man: a blue cloak, with stars of silver."
+
+"Couldst thou guess aught of her previous circumstances?"
+
+"No, save that she raved much about the nunnery of Santa Maria de'
+Pazzi, and bravos, and sacrilege."
+
+"Are you satisfied, Signor?" asked the gravedigger, with an air of
+triumph, turning to Adrian. "But no, I will satisfy thee better, if thou
+hast courage. Wilt thou follow?"
+
+"I comprehend thee; lead on. Courage! What is there on earth now to
+fear?"
+
+Muttering to himself, "Ay, leave me alone. I have a head worth
+something; I ask no gentleman to go by my word; I will make his own eyes
+the judge of what my trouble is worth," the gravedigger now led the way
+through one of the gates a little out of the city. And here, under a
+shed, sat six of his ghastly and ill-omened brethren, with spades and
+pick-axes at their feet.
+
+His guide now turned round to Adrian, whose face was set, and resolute
+in despair.
+
+"Fair Signor," said he, with some touch of lingering compassion,
+"wouldst thou really convince thine own eyes and heart?--the sight may
+appal, the contagion may destroy, thee,--if, indeed, as it seems to me,
+Death has not already written 'mine' upon thee."
+
+"Raven of bode and woe!" answered Adrian, "seest thou not that all
+I shrink from is thy voice and aspect? Show me her I seek, living or
+dead."
+
+"I will show her to you, then," said the Becchino, sullenly, "such as
+two nights since she was committed to my charge. Line and lineament may
+already be swept away, for the Plague hath a rapid besom; but I have
+left that upon her by which you will know the Becchino is no liar. Bring
+hither the torches, comrades, and lift the door. Never stare; it's the
+gentleman's whim, and he'll pay it well."
+
+Turning to the right while Adrian mechanically followed his conductors,
+a spectacle whose dire philosophy crushes as with a wheel all the pride
+of mortal man--the spectacle of that vault in which earth hides all that
+on earth flourished, rejoiced, exulted--awaited his eye!
+
+The Becchini lifted a ponderous grate, lowered their torches (scarcely
+needed, for through the aperture rushed, with a hideous glare, the light
+of the burning sun,) and motioned to Adrian to advance. He stood upon
+the summit of the abyss and gazed below.
+
+It was a large deep and circular space, like the bottom of an exhausted
+well. In niches cut into the walls of earth around, lay, duly coffined,
+those who had been the earliest victims of the plague, when the
+Becchino's market was not yet glutted, and priest followed, and friend
+mourned the dead. But on the floor below, there was the loathsome
+horror! Huddled and matted together--some naked, some in shrouds already
+black and rotten--lay the later guests, the unshriven and unblest! The
+torches, the sun, streamed broad and red over Corruption in all its
+stages, from the pale blue tint and swollen shape, to the moistened
+undistinguishable mass, or the riddled bones, where yet clung, in strips
+and tatters, the black and mangled flesh. In many, the face remained
+almost perfect, while the rest of the body was but bone; the long hair,
+the human face, surmounting the grisly skeleton. There was the infant,
+still on the mother's breast; there was the lover, stretched across the
+dainty limbs of his adored! The rats, (for they clustered in numbers to
+that feast,) disturbed, not scared, sate up from their horrid meal as
+the light glimmered over them, and thousands of them lay round, stark,
+and dead, poisoned by that they fed on! There, too, the wild satire of
+the gravediggers had cast, though stripped of their gold and jewels, the
+emblems that spoke of departed rank;--the broken wand of the Councillor;
+the General's baton; the Priestly Mitre! The foul and livid exhalations
+gathered like flesh itself, fungous and putrid, upon the walls, and
+the--
+
+But who shall detail the ineffable and unimaginable horrors that reigned
+over the Palace where the Great King received the prisoners whom the
+sword of the Pestilence had subdued?
+
+But through all that crowded court--crowded with beauty and with birth,
+with the strength of the young and the honours of the old, and the
+valour of the brave, and the wisdom of the learned, and the wit of
+the scorner, and the piety of the faithful--one only figure attracted
+Adrian's eye. Apart from the rest, a latecomer--the long locks streaming
+far and dark over arm and breast--lay a female, the face turned
+partially aside, the little seen not recognisable even by the mother
+of the dead,--but wrapped round in that fatal mantle, on which, though
+blackened and tarnished, was yet visible the starry heraldry assumed by
+those who claimed the name of the proud Tribune of Rome. Adrian saw no
+more--he fell back in the arms of the gravediggers: when he recovered,
+he was still without the gates of Florence--reclined upon a green
+mound--his guide stood beside him--holding his steed by the bridle as it
+grazed patiently on the neglected grass. The other brethren of the axe
+had resumed their seat under the shed.
+
+"So, you have revived! Ah! I thought it was only the effluvia; few stand
+it as we do. And so, as your search is over, deeming you would now be
+quitting Florence if you have any sense left to you, I went for your
+good horse. I have fed him since your departure from the palace. Indeed
+I fancied he would be my perquisite, but there are plenty as good. Come,
+young sir, mount. I feel a pity for you, I know not why, except that you
+are the only one I have met for weeks who seem to care for another
+more than for yourself. I hope you are satisfied now that I showed some
+brains, eh! in your service; and as I have kept my promise, you'll keep
+yours."
+
+"Friend," said Adrian, "here is gold enough to make thee rich; here,
+too, is a jewel that merchants will tell thee princes might vie to
+purchase. Thou seemest honest, despite thy calling, or thou mightest
+have robbed and murdered me long since. Do me one favour more."
+
+"By my poor mother's soul, yes."
+
+"Take yon--yon clay from that fearful place. Inter it in some quiet and
+remote spot--apart--alone! You promise me?--you swear it?--it is well!
+And now help me on my horse. Farewell Italy, and if I die not with this
+stroke, may I die as befits at once honour and despair--with trumpet and
+banner round me--in a well-fought field against a worthy foe!--Save a
+knightly death, nothing is left to live for!"
+
+
+
+
+BOOK VII. THE PRISON.
+
+     "Fu rinchiuso in una torre grossa e larga; avea libri assai,
+     suo Tito Livio, sue storie di Roma, la Bibbia." &c.--"Vita
+     di Cola di Rienzi", lib. ii. c. 13.
+
+     "He was immured in a high and spacious tower; he had books
+     enough, his Titus Livius, his histories of Rome, the Bible,"
+     &c.
+
+
+
+Chapter 7.I. Avignon.--The Two Pages.--The Stranger Beauty.
+
+There is this difference between the Drama of Shakspeare, and that
+of almost every other master of the same art; that in the first, the
+catastrophe is rarely produced by one single cause--one simple and
+continuous chain of events. Various and complicated agencies work out
+the final end. Unfettered by the rules of time and place, each time,
+each place depicted, presents us with its appropriate change of action,
+or of actors. Sometimes the interest seems to halt, to turn aside, to
+bring us unawares upon objects hitherto unnoticed, or upon qualities of
+the characters hitherto hinted at, not developed. But, in reality, the
+pause in the action is but to collect, to gather up, and to grasp, all
+the varieties of circumstance that conduce to the Great Result: and the
+art of fiction is only deserted for the fidelity of history. Whoever
+seeks to place before the world the true representation of a man's
+life and times, and, enlarging the Dramatic into the Epic, extends
+his narrative over the vicissitudes of years, will find himself
+unconsciously, in this, the imitator of Shakspeare. New characters, each
+conducive to the end--new scenes, each leading to the last, rise before
+him as he proceeds, sometimes seeming to the reader to delay, even while
+they advance, the dread catastrophe. The sacrificial procession sweeps
+along, swelled by new comers, losing many that first joined it; before,
+at last, the same as a whole, but differing in its components, the crowd
+reach the fated bourn of the Altar and the Victim!
+
+It is five years after the date of the events I have recorded, and my
+story conveys us to the Papal Court at Avignon--that tranquil seat of
+power, to which the successors of St. Peter had transplanted the luxury,
+the pomp, and the vices, of the Imperial City. Secure from the fraud or
+violence of a powerful and barbarous nobility, the courtiers of the See
+surrendered themselves to a holyday of delight--their repose was devoted
+to enjoyment, and Avignon presented, at that day, perhaps the gayest
+and most voluptuous society of Europe. The elegance of Clement VI. had
+diffused an air of literary refinement over the grosser pleasures of
+the place, and the spirit of Petrarch still continued to work its way
+through the councils of faction and the orgies of debauch.
+
+Innocent VI. had lately succeeded Clement, and whatever his own claims
+to learning, (Matteo Villani (lib. iii. cap. 44) says, that Innocent VI.
+had not much pretension to learning. He is reported, however, by other
+authorities, cited by Zefirino Re, to have been "eccellente canonista."
+He had been a professor in the University of Toulouse.) he, at least,
+appreciated knowledge and intellect in others; so that the graceful
+pedantry of the time continued to mix itself with the pursuit of
+pleasure. The corruption which reigned through the whole place was too
+confirmed to yield to the example of Innocent, himself a man of simple
+habits and exemplary life. Though, like his predecessor, obedient to the
+policy of France, Innocent possessed a hard and an extended ambition.
+Deeply concerned for the interests of the Church, he formed the project
+of confirming and re-establishing her shaken dominion in Italy; and he
+regarded the tyrants of the various states as the principal obstacles
+to his ecclesiastical ambition. Nor was this the policy of Innocent
+VI. alone. With such exceptions as peculiar circumstances necessarily
+occasioned, the Papal See was, upon the whole, friendly to the political
+liberties of Italy. The Republics of the Middle Ages grew up under the
+shadow of the Church; and there, as elsewhere, it was found, contrary
+to a vulgar opinion, that Religion, however prostituted and perverted,
+served for the general protection of civil freedom,--raised the lowly,
+and resisted the oppressor.
+
+At this period there appeared at Avignon a lady of singular and
+matchless beauty. She had come with a slender but well appointed retinue
+from Florence, but declared herself of Neapolitan birth; the widow of
+a noble of the brilliant court of the unfortunate Jane. Her name was
+Cesarini. Arrived at a place where, even in the citadel of Christianity,
+Venus retained her ancient empire, where Love made the prime business of
+life, and to be beautiful was to be of power; the Signora Cesarini had
+scarcely appeared in public before she saw at her feet half the rank and
+gallantry of Avignon. Her female attendants were beset with bribes
+and billets; and nightly, beneath her lattice, was heard the plaintive
+serenade. She entered largely into the gay dissipation of the town, and
+her charms shared the celebrity of the hour with the verse of Petrarch.
+But though she frowned on none, none could claim the monopoly of her
+smiles. Her fair fame was as yet unblemished; but if any might presume
+beyond the rest, she seemed to have selected rather from ambition than
+love, and Giles, the warlike Cardinal d'Albornoz, all powerful at the
+sacred court, already foreboded the hour of his triumph.
+
+It was late noon, and in the ante-chamber of the fair Signora waited
+two of that fraternity of pages, fair and richly clad, who, at that day,
+furnished the favourite attendants to rank of either sex.
+
+"By my troth," cried one of these young servitors, pushing from him the
+dice with which himself and his companion had sought to beguile their
+leisure, "this is but dull work! and the best part of the day is gone.
+Our lady is late."
+
+"And I have donned my new velvet mantle," replied the other,
+compassionately eyeing his finery.
+
+"Chut, Giacomo," said his comrade, yawning; "a truce with thy
+conceit.--What news abroad, I wonder? Has his Holiness come to his
+senses yet?"
+
+"His senses! what, is he mad then?" quoth Giacomo, in a serious and
+astonished whisper.
+
+"I think he is; if, being Pope, he does not discover that he may at
+length lay aside mask and hood. 'Continent Cardinal--lewd Pope,' is the
+old motto, you know; something must be the matter with the good man's
+brain if he continue to live like a hermit."
+
+"Oh, I have you! but faith, his Holiness has proxies eno'. The bishops
+take care to prevent women, Heaven bless them! going out of fashion; and
+Albornoz does not maintain your proverb, touching the Cardinals."
+
+"True, but Giles is a warrior,--a cardinal in the church, but a soldier
+in the city."
+
+"Will he carry the fort here, think you, Angelo?"
+
+"Why, fort is female, but--"
+
+"But what?"
+
+"The Signora's brow is made for power, rather than love, fair as it is.
+She sees in Albornoz the prince, and not the lover. With what a step she
+sweeps the floor! it disdains even the cloth of gold!"
+
+"Hark!" cried Giacomo, hastening to the lattice, "hear you the hoofs
+below? Ah, a gallant company!"
+
+"Returned from hawking," answered Angelo, regarding wistfully the
+cavalcade, as it swept the narrow street. "Plumes waving, steeds
+curvetting--see how yon handsome cavalier presses close to that dame!"
+
+"His mantle is the colour of mine," sighed Giacomo.
+
+As the gay procession paced slowly on, till hidden by the winding
+street, and as the sound of laughter and the tramp of horses was yet
+faintly heard, there frowned right before the straining gaze of the
+pages, a dark massive tower of the mighty masonry of the eleventh
+century: the sun gleamed sadly on its vast and dismal surface, which was
+only here and there relieved by loopholes and narrow slits, rather
+than casements. It was a striking contrast to the gaiety around, the
+glittering shops, and the gaudy train that had just filled the space
+below. This contrast the young men seemed involuntarily to feel; they
+drew back, and looked at each other.
+
+"I know your thoughts, Giacomo," said Angelo, the handsomer and elder of
+the two. "You think yon tower affords but a gloomy lodgment?"
+
+"And I thank my stars that made me not high enough to require so grand a
+cage," rejoined Giacomo.
+
+"Yet," observed Angelo, "it holds one, who in birth was not our
+superior."
+
+"Do tell me something of that strange man," said Giacomo, regaining his
+seat; "you are Roman and should know."
+
+"Yes!" answered Angelo, haughtily drawing himself up, "I am Roman! and I
+should be unworthy my birth, if I had not already learned what honour is
+due to the name of Cola di Rienzi."
+
+"Yet your fellow-Romans merely stoned him, I fancy," muttered Giacomo.
+"Honour seems to lie more in kicks than money. Can you tell me,"
+continued the page in a louder key, "can you tell me if it be true, that
+Rienzi appeared at Prague before the Emperor, and prophesied that the
+late Pope and all the Cardinals should be murdered, and a new Italian
+Pope elected, who should endue the Emperor with a golden crown, as
+Sovereign of Sicilia, Calabria, and Apulia, (An absurd fable, adopted
+by certain historians.) and himself with a crown of silver, as King of
+Rome, and all Italy? And--"
+
+"Hush!" interrupted Angelo, impatiently. "Listen to me, and you shall
+know the exact story. On last leaving Rome (thou knowest that, after
+his fall, he was present at the Jubilee in disguise) the Tribune--" here
+Angelo, pausing, looked round, and then with a flushed cheek and raised
+voice resumed, "Yes, the Tribune, that was and shall be--travelled in
+disguise, as a pilgrim, over mountain and forest, night and day, exposed
+to rain and storm, no shelter but the cave,--he who had been, they
+say, the very spoilt one of Luxury. Arrived at length in Bohemia,
+he disclosed himself to a Florentine in Prague, and through his aid
+obtained audience of the Emperor Charles."
+
+"A prudent man, the Emperor!" said Giacomo, "close-fisted as a miser. He
+makes conquests by bargain, and goes to market for laurels,--as I have
+heard my brother say, who was under him."
+
+"True; but I have also heard that he likes bookmen and scholars--is
+wise and temperate, and much is yet hoped from him in Italy! Before the
+Emperor, I say, came Rienzi. 'Know, great Prince,' said he, 'that I am
+that Rienzi to whom God gave to govern Rome, in peace, with justice, and
+to freedom. I curbed the nobles, I purged corruption, I amended law. The
+powerful persecuted me--pride and envy have chased me from my dominions.
+Great as you are, fallen as I am, I too have wielded the sceptre and
+might have worn a crown. Know, too, that I am illegitimately of
+your lineage; my father the son of Henry VII.; (Uncle to the Emperor
+Charles.) the blood of the Teuton rolls in my veins; mean as were my
+earlier fortunes and humble my earlier name! From you, O King, I seek
+protection, and I demand justice." (See, for this speech, "the Anonymous
+Biographer," lib. ii. cap. 12.)
+
+"A bold speech, and one from equal to equal," said Giacomo; "surely you
+swell us out the words."
+
+"Not a whit; they were written down by the Emperor's scribe, and every
+Roman who has once heard knows them by heart: once every Roman was the
+equal to a king, and Rienzi maintained our dignity in asserting his
+own."
+
+Giacomo, who discreetly avoided quarrels, knew the weak side of
+his friend; and though in his heart he thought the Romans as
+good-for-nothing a set of turbulent dastards as all Italy might furnish,
+he merely picked a straw from his mantle, and said, in rather an
+impatient tone, "Humph! proceed! did the Emperor dismiss him?"
+
+"Not so: Charles was struck with his bearing and his spirit, received
+him graciously, and entertained him hospitably. He remained some time
+at Prague, and astonished all the learned with his knowledge and
+eloquence." (His Italian contemporary delights in representing this
+remarkable man as another Crichton. "Disputava," he says of him when at
+Prague, "disputava con Mastri di teologia; molto diceva, parlava cose
+meravigliose...abbair fea ogni persona."--"He disputed with Masters of
+theology--he spoke much, he discoursed things wonderful--he astonished
+every one.")
+
+"But if so honoured at Prague, how comes he a prisoner at Avignon?"
+
+"Giacomo," said Angelo, thoughtfully, "there are some men whom we, of
+another mind and mould, can rarely comprehend, and never fathom. And of
+such men I have observed that a supreme confidence in their own fortunes
+or their own souls, is the most common feature. Thus impressed, and thus
+buoyed, they rush into danger with a seeming madness, and from danger
+soar to greatness, or sink to death. So with Rienzi; dissatisfied with
+empty courtesies and weary of playing the pedant, since once he had
+played the prince;--some say of his own accord, (though others relate
+that he was surrendered to the Pope's legate by Charles,) he left the
+Emperor's court, and without arms, without money, betook himself at once
+to Avignon!"
+
+"Madness indeed!"
+
+"Yet, perhaps his only course, under all circumstances," resumed the
+elder page. "Once before his fall, and once during his absence from
+Rome, he had been excommunicated by the Pope's legate. He was accused of
+heresy--the ban was still on him. It was necessary that he should clear
+himself. How was the poor exile to do so? No powerful friend stood
+up for the friend of the people. No courtier vindicated one who had
+trampled on the neck of the nobles. His own genius was his only friend;
+on that only could he rely. He sought Avignon, to free himself from the
+accusations against him; and, doubtless, he hoped that there was but one
+step from his acquittal to his restoration. Besides, it is certain that
+the Emperor had been applied to, formally to surrender Rienzi. He had
+the choice before him; for to that sooner or later it must come--to
+go free, or to go in bonds--as a criminal, or as a Roman. He chose the
+latter. Wherever he passed along, the people rose in every town, in
+every hamlet. The name of the great Tribune was honoured throughout all
+Italy. They besought him not to rush into the very den of peril--they
+implored him to save himself for that country which he had sought to
+raise. 'I go to vindicate myself, and to triumph,' was the Tribune's
+answer. Solemn honours were paid him in the cities through which he
+passed; ("Per tutto la via li furo fatti solenni onori," &c.--"Vita di
+Cola di Rienzi", lib. ii. cap. 13.) and I am told that never ambassador,
+prince, or baron, entered Avignon with so long a train as that which
+followed into these very walls the steps of Cola di Rienzi."
+
+"And on his arrival?"
+
+"He demanded an audience, that he might refute the charges against him.
+He flung down the gage to the proud cardinals who had excommunicated
+him. He besought a trial."
+
+"And what said the Pope?"
+
+"Nothing--by word. Yon tower was his answer!"
+
+"A rough one!"
+
+"But there have been longer roads than that from the prison to the
+palace, and God made not men like Rienzi for the dungeon and the chain."
+
+As Angelo said this with a loud voice, and with all the enthusiasm with
+which the fame of the fallen Tribune had inspired the youth of Rome, he
+heard a sigh behind him. He turned in some confusion, and at the door
+which admitted to the chamber occupied by the Signora Cesarini, stood a
+female of noble presence. Attired in the richest garments, gold and gems
+were dull to the lustre of her dark eyes, and as she now stood, erect
+and commanding, never seemed brow more made for the regal crown--never
+did human beauty more fully consummate the ideal of a heroine and a
+queen.
+
+"Pardon me, Signora," said Angelo, hesitatingly; "I spoke loud, I
+disturbed you; but I am Roman, and my theme was--"
+
+"Rienzi!" said the lady, approaching; "a fit one to stir a Roman heart.
+Nay--no excuses: they would sound ill on thy generous lips. Ah, if--"
+the Signora paused suddenly, and sighed again; then in an altered and
+graver tone she resumed--"If fate restore Rienzi to his proper fortunes,
+he shall know what thou deemest of him."
+
+"If you, lady, who are of Naples," said Angelo, with meaning emphasis,
+"speak thus of a fallen exile, what must I have felt who acknowledge a
+sovereign?"
+
+"Rienzi is not of Rome alone--he is of Italy--of the world," returned
+the Signora. "And you, Angelo, who have had the boldness to speak thus
+of one fallen, have proved with what loyalty you can serve those who
+have the fortune to own you."
+
+As she spoke, the Signora looked at the page's downcast and blushing
+face long and wistfully, with the gaze of one accustomed to read the
+soul in the countenance.
+
+"Men are often deceived," said she sadly, yet with a half smile; "but
+women rarely,--save in love. Would that Rome were filled with such as
+you! Enough! Hark! Is that the sound of hoofs in the court below?"
+
+"Madam," said Giacomo, bringing his mantle gallantly over his shoulder,
+"I see the servitors of Monsignore the Cardinal d'Albornoz.--It is the
+Cardinal himself."
+
+"It is well!" said the Signora, with a brightening eye; "I await
+him!" With these words she withdrew by the door through which she had
+surprised the Roman page.
+
+
+
+Chapter 7.II. The Character of a Warrior Priest--an Interview--the
+Intrigue and Counter-intrigue of Courts.
+
+Giles, (or Egidio, (Egidio is the proper Italian equivalent to the
+French name Gilles,--but the Cardinal is generally called, by the
+writers of that day, Gilio d'Albornoz.)) Cardinal d'Albornoz, was one of
+the most remarkable men of that remarkable time, so prodigal of genius.
+Boasting his descent from the royal houses of Aragon and Leon, he
+had early entered the church, and yet almost a youth, attained the
+archbishopric of Toledo. But no peaceful career, however brilliant,
+sufficed to his ambition. He could not content himself with the honours
+of the church, unless they were the honours of a church militant. In
+the war against the Moors, no Spaniard had more highly distinguished
+himself; and Alphonso XI. king of Castile, had insisted on receiving
+from the hand of the martial priest the badge of knighthood. After the
+death of Alphonso, who was strongly attached to him, Albornoz repaired
+to Avignon, and obtained from Clement VI. the cardinal's hat. With
+Innocent he continued in high favour, and now, constantly in the
+councils of the Pope, rumours of warlike preparation, under the banners
+of Albornoz, for the recovery of the papal dominions from the various
+tyrants that usurped them, were already circulated through the court.
+(It is a characteristic anecdote of this bold Churchman, that Urban V.
+one day demanded an account of the sums spent in his military expedition
+against the Italian tyrants. The Cardinal presented to the Pope a wagon,
+filled with the keys of the cities and fortresses he had taken. "This is
+my account," said he; "you perceive how I have invested your money." The
+Pope embraced him, and gave him no further trouble about his accounts.)
+Bold, sagacious, enterprising, and cold-hearted,--with the valour of the
+knight, and the cunning of the priest,--such was the character of Giles,
+Cardinal d'Albornoz.
+
+Leaving his attendant gentlemen in the antechamber, Albornoz was ushered
+into the apartment of the Signora Cesarini. In person, the Cardinal
+was about the middle height; the dark complexion of Spain had faded by
+thought, and the wear of ambitious schemes, into a sallow but hardy hue;
+his brow was deeply furrowed, and though not yet passed the prime of
+life, Albornoz might seem to have entered age, but for the firmness
+of his step, the slender elasticity of his frame, and an eye which had
+acquired calmness and depth from thought, without losing any of the
+brilliancy of youth.
+
+"Beautiful Signora," said the Cardinal, bending over the hand of the
+Cesarini with a grace which betokened more of the prince than of the
+priest; "the commands of his Holiness have detained me, I fear, beyond
+the hour in which you vouchsafed to appoint my homage, but my heart has
+been with you since we parted."
+
+"The Cardinal d'Albornoz," replied the Signora, gently withdrawing her
+hand, and seating herself, "has so many demands on his time, from the
+duties of his rank and renown, that methinks to divert his attention for
+a few moments to less noble thoughts is a kind of treason to his fame."
+
+"Ah, Lady," replied the Cardinal, "never was my ambition so nobly
+directed as it is now. And it were a prouder lot to be at thy feet than
+on the throne of St. Peter."
+
+A momentary blush passed over the cheek of the Signora, yet it seemed
+the blush of indignation as much as of vanity; it was succeeded by an
+extreme paleness. She paused before she replied; and then fixing her
+large and haughty eyes on the enamoured Spaniard, she said, in a low
+voice,
+
+"My Lord Cardinal, I do not affect to misunderstand your words; neither
+do I place them to the account of a general gallantry. I am vain enough
+to believe you imagine you speak truly when you say you love me."
+
+"Imagine!" echoed the Spaniard.
+
+"Listen to me," continued the Signora. "She whom the Cardinal Albornoz
+honours with his love has a right to demand of him its proofs. In the
+papal court, whose power like his?--I require you to exercise it for
+me."
+
+"Speak, dearest Lady; have your estates been seized by the barbarians of
+these lawless times? Hath any dared to injure you? Lands and titles, are
+these thy wish?--my power is thy slave."
+
+"Cardinal, no! there is one thing dearer to an Italian and a woman than
+wealth or station--it is revenge!"
+
+The Cardinal drew back from the flashing eye that was bent upon him, but
+the spirit of her speech touched a congenial chord.
+
+"There," said he, after a little hesitation, "there spake high descent.
+Revenge is the luxury of the well-born. Let serfs and churls forgive an
+injury. Proceed, Lady."
+
+"Hast thou heard the last news from Rome?" asked the Signora.
+
+"Surely," replied the Cardinal, in some surprise, "we were poor
+statesmen to be ignorant of the condition of the capital of the papal
+dominions; and my heart mourns for that unfortunate city. But wherefore
+wouldst thou question me of Rome?--thou art--"
+
+"Roman! Know, my Lord, that I have a purpose in calling myself of
+Naples. To your discretion I intrust my secret--I am of Rome! Tell me of
+her state."
+
+"Fairest one," returned the Cardinal, "I should have known that that
+brow and presence were not of the light Campania. My reason should have
+told me that they bore the stamp of the Empress of the World. The state
+of Rome," continued Albornoz, in a graver tone, "is briefly told. Thou
+knowest that after the fall of the able but insolent Rienzi, Pepin,
+count of Minorbino, (a creature of Montreal's) who had assisted in
+expelling him, would have betrayed Rome to Montreal,--but he was neither
+strong enough nor wise enough, and the Barons chased him as he had
+chased the Tribune. Some time afterwards a new demagogue, John Cerroni,
+was installed in the Capitol. He once more expelled the nobles; new
+revolutions ensued--the Barons were recalled. The weak successor of
+Rienzi summoned the people to arms--in vain: in terror and despair he
+abdicated his power, and left the city a prey to the interminable feuds
+of the Orsini, the Colonna, and the Savelli."
+
+"Thus much I know, my Lord; but when his Holiness succeeded to the chair
+of Clement VI.--"
+
+"Then," said Albornoz, and a slight frown darkened his sallow brow,
+"then came the blacker part of the history. Two senators were elected in
+concert by the Pope."
+
+"Their names?"
+
+"Bertoldo Orsini, and one of the Colonna. A few weeks afterwards, the
+high price of provisions stung the rascal stomachs of the mob--they
+rose, they clamoured, they armed, they besieged the Capitol--"
+
+"Well, well," cried the Signora, clasping her hands, and betokening in
+every feature her interest in the narration.
+
+"Colonna only escaped death by a vile disguise; Bertoldo Orsini was
+stoned."
+
+"Stoned!--there fell one!"
+
+"Yes, lady, one of a great house; the least drop of whose blood were
+worth an ocean of plebeian puddle. At present, all is disorder, misrule,
+anarchy, at Rome. The contests of the nobles shake the city to the
+centre; and prince and people, wearied of so many experiments to
+establish a government, have now no governor but the fear of the sword.
+Such, fair madam, is the state of Rome. Sigh not, it occupies now our
+care. It shall be remedied; and I, madam, may be the happy instrument of
+restoring peace to your native city."
+
+"There is but one way of restoring peace to Rome," answered the Signora,
+abruptly, "and that is--The restoration of Rienzi!"
+
+The Cardinal started. "Madam," said he, "do I hear aright?--are you not
+nobly born?--can you desire the rise of a plebeian? Did you not speak of
+revenge, and now you ask for mercy?"
+
+"Lord Cardinal," said the beautiful Signora, earnestly, "I do not ask
+for mercy: such a word is not for the lips of one who demands justice.
+Nobly born I am--ay, and from a stock to whose long descent from the
+patricians of ancient Rome the high line of Aragon itself would be of
+yesterday. Nay, I would not offend you, Monsignore; your greatness is
+not borrowed from pedigrees and tombstones--your greatness is your own
+achieving: would you speak honestly, my Lord, you would own that you are
+proud only of your own laurels, and that, in your heart, you laugh at
+the stately fools who trick themselves out in the mouldering finery of
+the dead!"
+
+"Muse! prophetess! you speak aright," said the high-spirited Cardinal,
+with unwonted energy; "and your voice is like that of the Fame I dreamed
+of in my youth. Speak on, speak ever!"
+
+"Such," continued the Signora, "such as your pride, is the just pride of
+Rienzi. Proud that he is the workman of his own great renown. In such
+as the Tribune of Rome we acknowledge the founders of noble lineage.
+Ancestry makes not them--they make ancestry. Enough of this. I am of
+noble race, it is true; but my house, and those of many, have been
+crushed and broken beneath the yoke of the Orsini and Colonna--it is
+against them I desire revenge. But I am better than an Italian lady--I
+am a Roman woman--I weep tears of blood for the disorders of my unhappy
+country. I mourn that even you, my Lord,--yes, that a barbarian, however
+eminent and however great, should mourn for Rome. I desire to restore
+her fortunes."
+
+"But Rienzi would only restore his own."
+
+"Not so, my Lord Cardinal; not so. Ambitious and proud he may be--great
+souls are so--but he has never had one wish divorced from the welfare of
+Rome. But put aside all thought of his interests--it is not of these I
+speak. You desire to re-establish the papal power in Rome. Your senators
+have failed to do it. Demagogues fail--Rienzi alone can succeed; he
+alone can command the turbulent passions of the Barons--he alone can
+sway the capricious and fickle mob. Release, restore Rienzi, and through
+Rienzi the Pope regains Rome!"
+
+The Cardinal did not answer for some moments. Buried as in a revery,
+he sate motionless, shading his face with his hand. Perhaps he secretly
+owned there was a wiser policy in the suggestions of the Signora than he
+cared openly to confess. Lifting his head, at length, from his bosom,
+he fixed his eyes upon the Signora's watchful countenance, and, with a
+forced smile, said,
+
+"Pardon me, madam; but while we play the politicians, forget not that
+I am thy adorer. Sagacious may be thy counsels, yet wherefore are they
+urged? Why this anxious interest for Rienzi? If by releasing him the
+Church may gain an ally, am I sure that Giles d'Albornoz will not raise
+a rival?"
+
+"My Lord," said the Signora, half rising, "you are my suitor; but your
+rank does not tempt me--your gold cannot buy. If you love me, I have a
+right to command your services to whatsoever task I would require--it is
+the law of chivalry. If ever I yield to the addresses of mortal lover,
+it will be to the man who restores to my native land her hero and her
+saviour."
+
+"Fair patriot," said the Cardinal, "your words encourage my hope, yet
+they half damp my ambition; for fain would I desire that love and not
+service should alone give me the treasure that I ask. But hear me, sweet
+lady; you over-rate my power: I cannot deliver Rienzi--he is accused
+of rebellion, he is excommunicated for heresy. His acquittal rests with
+himself."
+
+"You can procure his trial?"
+
+"Perhaps, Lady."
+
+"That is his acquittal. And a private audience of his Holiness?"
+
+"Doubtless."
+
+"That is his restoration! Behold all I ask!"
+
+"And then, sweet Roman, it will be mine to ask," said the Cardinal,
+passionately, dropping on his knee, and taking the Signora's hand. For
+one moment, that proud lady felt that she was woman--she blushed, she
+trembled; but it was not (could the Cardinal have read that heart) with
+passion or with weakness; it was with terror and with shame. Passively
+she surrendered her hand to the Cardinal, who covered it with kisses.
+
+"Thus inspired," said Albornoz, rising, "I will not doubt of success.
+Tomorrow I wait on thee again."
+
+He pressed her hand to his heart--the lady felt it not. He sighed his
+farewell--she did not hear it. Lingeringly he gazed; and slowly he
+departed. But it was some moments before, recalled to herself, the
+Signora felt that she was alone.
+
+"Alone!" she cried, half aloud, and with wild emphasis--"alone! Oh, what
+have I undergone--what have I said! Unfaithful, even in thought, to him!
+Oh, never! never! I, that have felt the kiss of his hallowing lips--that
+have slept on his kingly heart--I!--holy Mother, befriend and strengthen
+me!" she continued, as, weeping bitterly, she sunk upon her knees; and
+for some moments she was lost in prayer. Then, rising composed, but
+deadly pale, and with the tears rolling heavily down her cheeks, the
+Signora passed slowly to the casement; she threw it open, and bent
+forward; the air of the declining day came softly on her temples; it
+cooled, it mitigated, the fever that preyed within. Dark and huge
+before her frowned, in its gloomy shadow, the tower in which Rienzi was
+confined; she gazed at it long and wistfully, and then, turning away,
+drew from the folds of her robe a small and sharp dagger. "Let me save
+him for glory!" she murmured; "and this shall save me from dishonour!"
+
+
+
+Chapter 7.III. Holy Men.--Sagacious Deliberations.--Just Resolves.--And
+Sordid Motives to All.
+
+Enamoured of the beauty, and almost equally so of the lofty spirit, of
+the Signora Cesarini, as was the warlike Cardinal of Spain, love with
+him was not so master a passion as that ambition of complete success
+in all the active designs of life, which had hitherto animated his
+character and signalized his career. Musing, as he left the Signora, on
+her wish for the restoration of the Roman Tribune, his experienced and
+profound intellect ran swiftly through whatever advantages to his own
+political designs might result from that restoration. We have seen that
+it was the intention of the new Pontiff to attempt the recovery of the
+patrimonial territories, now torn from him by the gripe of able and
+disaffected tyrants. With this view, a military force was already in
+preparation, and the Cardinal was already secretly nominated the chief.
+But the force was very inadequate to the enterprise; and Albornoz
+depended much upon the moral strength of the cause in bringing recruits
+to his standard in his progress through the Italian states. The
+wonderful rise of Rienzi had excited an extraordinary enthusiasm in his
+favour through all the free populations of Italy. And this had been yet
+more kindled and inflamed by the influential eloquence of Petrarch, who,
+at that time, possessed of a power greater than ever, before or since,
+(not even excepting the Sage of Ferney,) wielded by a single literary
+man, had put forth his boldest genius in behalf of the Roman Tribune.
+Such a companion as Rienzi in the camp of the Cardinal might be a magnet
+of attraction to the youth and enterprise of Italy. On nearing Rome, he
+might himself judge how far it would be advisable to reinstate Rienzi
+as a delegate of the papal power. And, in the meanwhile, the Roman's
+influence might be serviceable, whether to awe the rebellious nobles
+or conciliate the stubborn people. On the other hand, the Cardinal
+was shrewd enough to perceive that no possible good could arise from
+Rienzi's present confinement. With every month it excited deeper and
+more universal sympathy. To his lonely dungeon turned half the hearts
+of republican Italy. Literature had leagued its new and sudden, and
+therefore mighty and even disproportioned, power with his cause; and the
+Pope, without daring to be his judge, incurred the odium of being his
+gaoler. "A popular prisoner," said the sagacious Cardinal to himself,
+"is the most dangerous of guests. Restore him as your servant, or
+destroy him as your foe! In this case I see no alternative but acquittal
+or the knife!" In these reflections that able plotter, deep in the
+Machiavelism of the age, divorced the lover from the statesman.
+
+Recurring now to the former character, he felt some disagreeable and
+uneasy forebodings at the earnest interest of his mistress. Fain would
+he have attributed, either to some fantasy of patriotism or some purpose
+of revenge, the anxiety of the Cesarini; and there was much in her stern
+and haughty character which favoured that belief. But he was forced
+to acknowledge to himself some jealous apprehension of a sinister and
+latent motive, which touched his vanity and alarmed his love. "Howbeit,"
+he thought, as he turned from his unwilling fear, "I can play with her
+at her own weapons; I can obtain the release of Rienzi, and claim my
+reward. If denied, the hand that opened the dungeon can again rivet the
+chain. In her anxiety is my power!"
+
+These thoughts the Cardinal was still revolving in his palace, when he
+was suddenly summoned to attend the Pontiff.
+
+The pontifical palace no longer exhibited the gorgeous yet graceful
+luxury of Clement VI., and the sarcastic Cardinal smiled to himself at
+the quiet gloom of the ante-chambers. "He thinks to set an example--this
+poor native of Limoges!" thought Albornoz; "and has but the
+mortification of finding himself eclipsed by the poorest bishop. He
+humbles himself, and fancies that the humility will be contagious."
+
+His Holiness was seated before a small and rude table bestrewed with
+papers, his face buried in his hands; the room was simply furnished, and
+in a small niche beside the casement was an ivory crucifix; below, the
+death's head and cross-bones, which most monks then introduced with a
+purpose similar to that of the ancients by the like ornaments,--mementos
+of the shortness of life, and therefore admonitions to make the best
+of it! On the ground lay a map of the Patrimonial Territory, with the
+fortresses in especial, distinctly and prominently marked. The Pope
+gently lifted up his head as the Cardinal was announced, and discovered
+a plain but sensible and somewhat interesting countenance. "My son!"
+said he, with a kindly courtesy to the lowly salutation of the proud
+Spaniard, "scarcely wouldst thou imagine, after our long conference
+this morning, that new cares would so soon demand the assistance of thy
+counsels. Verily, the wreath of thorns stings sharp under the triple
+crown; and I sometimes long for the quiet abode of my old professor's
+chair in Toulouse: my station is of pain and toil."
+
+"God tempers the wind to the shorn lamb," observed the Cardinal, with
+pious and compassionate gravity.
+
+Innocent could scarcely refrain a smile as he replied, "The lamb that
+carries the cross must have the strength of the lion. Since we parted,
+my son, I have had painful intelligence; our couriers have arrived from
+the Campagna--the heathen rage furiously--the force of John di Vico has
+augmented fearfully, and the most redoubted adventurer of Europe has
+enlisted under his banner."
+
+"Does his Holiness," cried the Cardinal, anxiously, "speak of Fra
+Moreale, the Knight of St. John?"
+
+"Of no less a warrior," returned the Pontiff. "I dread the vast ambition
+of that wild adventurer."
+
+"Your Holiness hath cause," said the Cardinal, drily.
+
+"Some letters of his have fallen into the hands of the servants of the
+Church; they are here: read them, my son."
+
+Albornoz received and deliberately scanned the letters; this done, he
+replaced them on the table, and remained for a few moments silent and
+absorbed.
+
+"What think you, my son?" said the Pope, at length, with an impatient
+and even peevish tone.
+
+"I think that, with Montreal's hot genius and John di Vico's frigid
+villany, your Holiness may live to envy, if not the quiet, at least the
+revenue, of the Professor's chair."
+
+"How, Cardinal!" said the Pope, hastily, and with an angry flush on his
+pale brow. The Cardinal quietly proceeded.
+
+"By these letters it seems that Montreal has written to all the
+commanders of free lances throughout Italy, offering the highest pay
+of a soldier to every man who will join his standard, combined with the
+richest plunder of a brigand. He meditates great schemes then!--I know
+the man!"
+
+"Well,--and our course?"
+
+"Is plain," said the Cardinal, loftily, and with an eye that flashed
+with a soldier's fire. "Not a moment is to be lost! Thy son should at
+once take the field. Up with the Banner of the Church!"
+
+"But are we strong enough? our numbers are few. Zeal slackens! the piety
+of the Baldwins is no more!"
+
+"Your Holiness knows well," said the Cardinal, "that for the multitude
+of men there are two watchwords of war--Liberty and Religion. If
+Religion begins to fail, we must employ the profaner word. 'Up with the
+Banner of the Church--and down with the tyrants!' We will proclaim equal
+laws and free government; (In correcting the pages of this work, in the
+year 1847...strange coincidences between the present policy of the Roman
+Church and that by which in the 14th century it recovered both spiritual
+and temporal power cannot fail to suggest themselves.) and, God willing,
+our camp shall prosper better with those promises than the tents of
+Montreal with the more vulgar shout of 'Pay and Rapine.'"
+
+"Giles d'Albornoz," said the Pope, emphatically; and, warmed by the
+spirit of the Cardinal, he dropped the wonted etiquette of phrase, "I
+trust implicitly to you. Now the right hand of the Church--hereafter,
+perhaps, its head. Too well I feel that the lot has fallen on a lowly
+place. My successor must requite my deficiencies."
+
+No changing hue, no brightening glance, betrayed to the searching eye of
+the Pope whatever emotion these words had called up in the breast of the
+ambitious Cardinal. He bowed his proud head humbly as he answered, "Pray
+Heaven that Innocent VI. may long live to guide the Church to glory.
+For Giles d'Albornoz, less priest than soldier, the din of the camp,
+the breath of the war-steed, suggest the only aspirations which he
+ever dares indulge. But has your Holiness imparted to your servant all
+that--"
+
+"Nay," interrupted Innocent, "I have yet intelligence equally ominous.
+This John di Vico,--pest go with him!--who still styles himself (the
+excommunicated ruffian!) Prefect of Rome, has so filled that unhappy
+city with his emissaries, that we have well-nigh lost the seat of
+the Apostle. Rome, long in anarchy, seems now in open rebellion.
+The nobles--sons of Belial!--it is true, are once more humbled; but
+how?--One Baroncelli, a new demagogue, the fiercest--the most bloody
+that the fiend ever helped--has arisen--is invested by the mob with
+power, and uses it to butcher the people and insult the Pontiff. Wearied
+of the crimes of this man, (which are not even decorated by ability,)
+the shout of the people day and night along the streets is for 'Rienzi
+the Tribune.'"
+
+"Ha!" said the Cardinal, "Rienzi's faults then are forgotten in Rome,
+and there is felt for him the same enthusiasm in that city as in the
+rest of Italy?"
+
+"Alas! It is so."
+
+"It is well, I have thought of this: Rienzi can accompany my progress--"
+
+"My son! the rebel, the heretic--"
+
+"By your Holiness's absolution will become quiet subject and orthodox
+Catholic," said Albornoz. "Men are good or bad as they suit our purpose.
+What matters a virtue that is useless, or a crime that is useful, to us?
+The army of the Church proceeds against tyrants--it proclaims everywhere
+to the Papal towns the restoration of their popular constitutions. Sees
+not your Holiness that the acquittal of Rienzi, the popular darling,
+will be hailed an earnest of your sincerity?--sees not your Holiness
+that his name will fight for us?--sees not your Holiness that the
+great demagogue Rienzi must be used to extinguish the little demagogue
+Baroncelli? We must regain the Romans, whether of the city or whether in
+the seven towns of John di Vico. When they hear Rienzi is in our camp,
+trust me, we shall have a multitude of deserters from the tyrants--trust
+me, we shall hear no more of Baroncelli."
+
+"Ever sagacious," said the Pope, musingly; "it is true, we can use this
+man: but with caution. His genius is formidable--"
+
+"And therefore must be conciliated; if we acquit, we must make him ours.
+My experience has taught me this, when you cannot slay a demagogue by
+law, crush him with honours. He must be no longer Tribune of the People.
+Give him the Patrician title of Senator, and he is then the Lieutenant
+of the Pope!"
+
+"I will see to this, my son--your suggestions please, but alarm me: he
+shall at least be examined;--but if found a heretic--"
+
+"Should, I humbly advise, be declared a saint."
+
+The Pope bent his brow for a moment, but the effort was too much for
+him, and after a moment's struggle, he fairly laughed aloud.
+
+"Go to, my son," said he, affectionately patting the Cardinal's sallow
+cheek. "Go to.--If the world heard thee, what would it say?"
+
+"That Giles d'Albornoz had just enough religion to remember that the
+State is a Church, but not too much to forget that the Church is a
+State."
+
+With these words the conference ended. That very evening the Pope
+decreed that Rienzi should be permitted the trial he had demanded.
+
+
+
+Chapter 7.IV. The Lady and the Page.
+
+It wanted three hours of midnight, when Albornoz, resuming his character
+of gallant, despatched to the Signora Cesarini the following billet.
+
+"Your commands are obeyed. Rienzi will receive an examination on his
+faith. It is well that he should be prepared. It may suit your purpose,
+as to which I am so faintly enlightened, to appear to the prisoner what
+you are--the obtainer of this grace. See how implicitly one noble heart
+can trust another! I send by the bearer an order that will admit one of
+your servitors to the prisoner's cell. Be it, if you will, your task to
+announce to him the new crisis of his fate. Ah! madam, may fortune be
+as favourable to me, and grant me the same intercessor--from thy lips my
+sentence is to come."
+
+As Albornoz finished this epistle, he summoned his confidential
+attendant, a Spanish gentleman, who saw nothing in his noble birth that
+should prevent his fulfilling the various hests of the Cardinal.
+
+"Alvarez," said he, "these to the Signora Cesarini by another hand; thou
+art unknown to her household. Repair to the state tower; this to the
+Governor admits thee. Mark who is admitted to the prisoner Cola di
+Rienzi: Know his name, examine whence he comes. Be keen, Alvarez. Learn
+by what motive the Cesarini interests herself in the prisoner's
+fate. All too of herself, birth, fortunes, lineage, would be welcome
+intelligence. Thou comprehendest me? It is well. One caution--thou
+hast no mission from, no connexion with, me. Thou art an officer of the
+prison, or of the Pope,--what thou wilt. Give me the rosary; light the
+lamp before the crucifix; place yon hair-shirt beneath those arms.
+I would have it appear as if meant to be hidden! Tell Gomez that the
+Dominican preacher is to be admitted."
+
+"Those friars have zeal," continued the Cardinal to himself, as, after
+executing his orders, Alvarez withdrew. "They would burn a man--but only
+on the Bible? They are worth conciliating, if the triple crown be really
+worth the winning; were it mine, I would add the eagle's plume to it."
+
+And plunged into the aspiring future, this bold man forgot even the
+object of his passion. In real life, after a certain age, ambitious men
+love indeed; but it is only as an interlude. And indeed with most men,
+life has more absorbing though not more frequent concerns than those of
+love. Love is the business of the idle, but the idleness of the busy.
+
+The Cesarini was alone when the Cardinal's messenger arrived, and he
+was scarcely dismissed with a few lines, expressive of a gratitude which
+seemed to bear down all those guards with which the coldness of the
+Signora usually fenced her pride, before the page Angelo was summoned to
+her presence.
+
+The room was dark with the shades of the gathering night when the youth
+entered, and he discerned but dimly the outline of the Signora's stately
+form; but by the tone of her voice, he perceived that she was deeply
+agitated.
+
+"Angelo," said she, as he approached, "Angelo--" and her voice failed
+her. She paused as for breath and again proceeded. "You alone have
+served us faithfully; you alone shared our escape, our wanderings,
+our exile--you alone know my secret--you of my train alone are
+Roman!--Roman! it was once a great name. Angelo, the name has fallen;
+but it is only because the nature of the Roman Race fell first. Haughty
+they are, but fickle; fierce, but dastard; vehement in promise, but
+rotten in their faith. You are a Roman, and though I have proved your
+truth, your very birth makes me afraid of falsehood."
+
+"Madam," said the page; "I was but a child when you admitted me of your
+service, and I am yet only on the verge of manhood. But boy though I
+yet be, I would brave the stoutest lance of knight, or freebooter, in
+defence of the faith of Angelo Villani, to his liege Lady and his native
+land."
+
+"Alas! alas!" said the Signora, bitterly, "such have been the words
+of thousands of thy race. What have been their deeds? But I will trust
+thee, as I have trusted ever. I know that thou art covetous of honour,
+that thou hast youth's comely and bright ambition."
+
+"I am an orphan and a bastard," said Angelo, bluntly! "And circumstance
+stings me sharply on to action; I would win my own name."
+
+"Thou shalt," said the Signora. "We shall live yet to reward thee.
+And now be quick. Bring hither one of thy page's suits,--mantle and
+head-gear. Quick, I say, and whisper not to a soul what I have asked of
+thee."
+
+
+
+Chapter 7.V. The Inmate of the Tower.
+
+The night slowly advanced, and in the highest chamber of that dark and
+rugged tower which fronted the windows of the Cesarini's palace sate a
+solitary prisoner. A single lamp burned before him on a table of stone,
+and threw its rays over an open Bible; and those stern but fantastic
+legends of the prowess of ancient Rome, which the genius of Livy has
+dignified into history. ("Avea libri assai, suo Tito Livio, sue storie
+di Roma, la Bibbia et altri libri assai, non finava di studiare."--"Vita
+di Cola di Rienzi", lib. ii. cap. 13. See translation to motto to Book
+VII. page 202.) A chain hung pendent from the vault of the tower, and
+confined the captive; but so as to leave his limbs at sufficient liberty
+to measure at will the greater part of the cell. Green and damp were the
+mighty stones of the walls, and through a narrow aperture, high out of
+reach, came the moonlight, and slept in long shadow over the rude floor.
+A bed at one corner completed the furniture of the room. Such for months
+had been the abode of the conqueror of the haughtiest Barons, and the
+luxurious dictator of the stateliest city of the world!
+
+Care, and travel, and time, and adversity, had wrought their change in
+the person of Rienzi. The proportions of his frame had enlarged from the
+compact strength of earlier manhood, the clear paleness of his cheek was
+bespread with a hectic and deceitful glow. Even in his present
+studies, intent as they seemed, and genial though the lecture to a mind
+enthusiastic even to fanaticism, his eyes could not rivet themselves as
+of yore steadily to the page. The charm was gone from the letters.
+Every now and then he moved restlessly, started, re-settled himself, and
+muttered broken exclamations like a man in an anxious dream. Anon, his
+gaze impatiently turned upward, about, around, and there was a strange
+and wandering fire in those large deep eyes, which might have thrilled
+the beholder with a vague and unaccountable awe.
+
+Angelo had in the main correctly narrated the more recent adventures of
+Rienzi after his fall. He had first with Nina and Angelo betaken himself
+to Naples, and found a fallacious and brief favour with Louis, king
+of Hungary; that harsh but honourable monarch had refused to yield his
+illustrious guest to the demands of Clement, but had plainly declared
+his inability to shelter him in safety. Maintaining secret intercourse
+with his partisans at Rome, the fugitive then sought a refuge with the
+Eremites, sequestered in the lone recesses of the Monte Maiella, where
+in solitude and thought he had passed a whole year, save the time
+consumed in his visit to and return from Florence. Taking advantage of
+the Jubilee in Rome, he had then, disguised as a pilgrim, traversed the
+vales and mountains still rich in the melancholy ruins of ancient Rome,
+and entering the city, his restless and ambitious spirit indulged in new
+but vain conspiracies! (Rainald, Ann. 1350, N. 4, E. 5.) Excommunicated
+a second time by the Cardinal di Ceccano, and again a fugitive, he
+shook the dust from his feet as he left the city, and raising his
+hands towards those walls, in which are yet traced the witness of
+the Tarquins, cried aloud--"Honoured as thy prince--persecuted as thy
+victim--Rome, Rome, thou shalt yet receive me as thy conqueror!"
+
+Still disguised as a pilgrim, he passed unmolested through Italy into
+the Court of the Emperor Charles of Bohemia, where the page, who had
+probably witnessed, had rightly narrated, his reception. It is doubtful,
+however, whether the conduct of the Emperor had been as chivalrous as
+appears by Angelo's relation, or whether he had not delivered Rienzi to
+the Pontiff's emissaries. At all events it is certain, that from Prague
+to Avignon, the path of the fallen Tribune had been as one triumph. His
+strange adventures--his unbroken spirit--the new power that
+Intellect daily and wonderfully excited over the minds of the rising
+generation--the eloquence of Petrarch, and the common sympathy of the
+vulgar for fallen greatness,--all conspired to make Rienzi the hero of
+the age. Not a town through which he passed which would not have risked
+a siege for his protection--not a house that would not have sheltered
+him--not a hand that would not have struck in his defence. Refusing
+all offers of aid, disdaining all occasion of escape, inspired by his
+indomitable hope, and his unalloyed belief in the brightness of his own
+destinies, the Tribune sought Avignon--and found a dungeon!
+
+These, his external adventures, are briefly and easily told; but who
+shall tell what passed within?--who narrate the fearful history of
+the heart?--who paint the rapid changes of emotion and of thought--the
+indignant grief--the stern dejection--the haughty disappointment that
+saddened while it never destroyed the resolve of that great soul? Who
+can say what must have been endured, what meditated, in the hermitage
+of Maiella;--on the lonely hills of the perished empire it had been his
+dream to restore;--in the Courts of Barbarian Kings;--and above all,
+on returning obscure and disguised, amidst the crowds of the Christian
+world, to the seat of his former power? What elements of memory, and
+in what a wild and fiery brain! What reflections to be conned in the
+dungeons of Avignon, by a man who had pushed into all the fervour
+of fanaticism--four passions, a single one of which has, in excess,
+sufficed to wreck the strongest reason--passions, which in themselves
+it is most difficult to combine,--the dreamer--the aspirant--the very
+nympholept of Freedom, yet of Power--of Knowledge, yet of Religion!
+
+"Ay," muttered the prisoner, "ay, these texts are
+comforting--comforting. The righteous are not alway oppressed." With
+a long sigh he deliberately put aside the Bible, kissed it with great
+reverence, remained silent, and musing for some minutes; and then as a
+slight noise was heard at one corner of the cell, said softly, "Ah, my
+friends, my comrades, the rats! it is their hour--I am glad I put aside
+the bread for them!" His eye brightened as it now detected those strange
+and unsocial animals venturing forth through a hole in the wall, and,
+darkening the moonshine on the floor, steal fearlessly towards him.
+He flung some fragments of bread to them, and for some moments watched
+their gambols with a smile. "Manchino, the white-faced rascal! he beats
+all the rest--ha, ha! he is a superior wretch--he commands the tribe,
+and will venture the first into the trap. How will he bite against the
+steel, the fine fellow! while all the ignobler herd will gaze at him
+afar off, and quake and fear, and never help. Yet if united, they might
+gnaw the trap and release their leader! Ah, ye are base vermin, ye eat
+my bread, yet if death came upon me, ye would riot on my carcass. Away!"
+and clapping his hands, the chain round him clanked harshly, and the
+noisome co-mates of his dungeon vanished in an instant.
+
+That singular and eccentric humour which marked Rienzi, and which had
+seemed a buffoonery to the stolid sullenness of the Roman nobles, still
+retained its old expression in his countenance, and he laughed loud as
+he saw the vermin hurry back to their hiding-place.
+
+"A little noise and the clank of a chain--fie, how ye imitate mankind!"
+Again he sank into silence, and then heavily and listlessly
+drawing towards him the animated tales of Livy, said, "An hour to
+midnight!--waking dreams are better than sleep. Well, history tells us
+how men have risen--ay, and nations too--after sadder falls than that of
+Rienzi or of Rome!"
+
+In a few minutes, he was apparently absorbed in the lecture; so intent
+indeed, was he in the task, that he did not hear the steps which wound
+the spiral stairs that conducted to his cell, and it was not till the
+wards harshly grated beneath the huge key, and the door creaked on
+its hinges, that Rienzi, in amaze at intrusion at so unwonted an hour,
+lifted his eyes. The door had reclosed on the dungeon, and by the lonely
+and pale lamp he beheld a figure leaning, as for support, against the
+wall. The figure was wrapped from head to foot in the long cloak of the
+day, which, aided by a broad hat, shaded by plumes, concealed even the
+features of the visitor.
+
+Rienzi gazed long and wistfully.
+
+"Speak," he said at length, putting his hand to his brow. "Methinks
+either long solitude has bewildered me, or, sweet sir, your apparition
+dazzles. I know you not--am I sure?--" and Rienzi's hair bristled while
+he slowly rose--"Am I sure that it is living man who stands before
+me? Angels have entered the prison-house before now. Alas! an angel's
+comfort never was more needed."
+
+The stranger answered not, but the captive saw that his heart heaved
+even beneath his cloak; loud sobs choked his voice; at length, as by a
+violent effort, he sprung forward, and sunk at the Tribune's feet. The
+disguising hat, the long mantle fell to the ground--it was the face of a
+woman that looked upward through passionate and glazing tears--the arms
+of a woman that clasped the prisoner's knees! Rienzi gazed mute and
+motionless as stone. "Powers and Saints of Heaven!" he murmured at last,
+"do ye tempt me further!--is it?--no, no--yet speak!"
+
+"Beloved--adored!--do you not know me?"
+
+"It is--it is!" shrieked Rienzi wildly, "it is my Nina--my wife--my--"
+His voice forsook him. Clasped in each other's arms, the unfortunates
+for some moments seemed to have lost even the sense of delight at
+their reunion. It was as an unconscious and deep trance, through which
+something like a dream only faintly and indistinctively stirs.
+
+At length recovered--at length restored, the first broken exclamations,
+the first wild caresses of joy over--Nina lifted her head from her
+husband's bosom, and gazed sadly on his countenance--"Oh, what thou hast
+known since we parted!--what, since that hour when, borne on by thy bold
+heart and wild destiny, thou didst leave me in the Imperial Court,
+to seek again the diadem and find the chain! Ah! why did I heed thy
+commands?--why suffer thee to depart alone? How often in thy progress
+hitherward, in doubt, in danger, might this bosom have been thy
+resting-place, and this voice have whispered comfort to thy soul? Thou
+art well, my Lord--my Cola! Thy pulse beats quicker than of old--thy
+brow is furrowed. Ah! tell me thou art well!"
+
+"Well," said Rienzi, mechanically. "Methinks so!--the mind diseased
+blunts all sense of bodily decay. Well--yes! And thou--thou, at least,
+art not changed, save to maturer beauty. The glory of the laurel-wreath
+has not faded from thy brow. Thou shalt yet--" then breaking off
+abruptly--"Rome--tell me of Rome! And thou--how camest thou hither? Ah!
+perhaps my doom is sealed, and in their mercy they have vouchsafed that
+I should see thee once more before the deathsman blinds me. I remember,
+it is the grace vouchsafed to malefactors. When I was a lord of life and
+death, I too permitted the meanest criminal to say farewell to those he
+loved."
+
+"No--not so, Cola!" exclaimed Nina, putting her hand before his mouth.
+"I bring thee more auspicious tidings. Tomorrow thou art to be heard.
+The favour of the Court is propitiated. Thou wilt be acquitted."
+
+"Ha! speak again."
+
+"Thou wilt be heard, my Cola--thou must be acquitted!"
+
+"And Rome be free!--Great God, I thank Thee!"
+
+The Tribune sank on his knees, and never had his heart, in his youngest
+and purest hour, poured forth thanksgiving more fervent, yet less
+selfish. When he rose again, the whole man seemed changed. His eye had
+resumed its earlier expressions of deep and serene command. Majesty sate
+upon his brow. The sorrows of the exile were forgotten. In his sanguine
+and rapid thoughts, he stood once more the guardian of his country,--and
+its sovereign!
+
+Nina gazed upon him with that intense and devoted worship, which steeped
+her vainer and her harder qualities in all the fondness of the softest
+woman. "Such," thought she, "was his look eight years ago, when he left
+my maiden chamber, full of the mighty schemes which liberated Rome--such
+his look, when at the dawning sun he towered amidst the crouching
+Barons, and the kneeling population of the city he had made his throne!"
+
+"Yes, Nina!" said Rienzi, as he turned and caught her eye. "My soul
+tells me that my hour is at hand. If they try me openly, they dare not
+convict--if they acquit me, they dare not but restore. Tomorrow, saidst
+thou, tomorrow?"
+
+"Tomorrow, Rienzi; be prepared!"
+
+"I am--for triumph! But tell me what happy chance brought thee to
+Avignon?"
+
+"Chance, Cola!" said Nina, with reproachful tenderness. "Could I know
+that thou wert in the dungeons of the Pontiff, and linger in idle
+security at Prague? Even at the Emperor's Court thou hadst thy
+partisans and favourers. Gold was easily procured. I repaired to
+Florence--disguised my name--and came hither to plot, to scheme, to win
+thy liberty, or to die with thee. Ah! did not thy heart tell thee that
+morning and night the eyes of thy faithful Nina gazed upon this gloomy
+tower; and that one friend, humble though she be, never could forsake
+thee!"
+
+"Sweet Nina! Yet--yet--at Avignon power yields not to beauty without
+reward. Remember, there is a worse death than the pause of life."
+
+Nina turned pale. "Fear not," she said, with a low but determined voice;
+"fear not, that men's lips should say Rienzi's wife delivered him. None
+in this corrupted Court know that I am thy wife."
+
+"Woman," said the Tribune, sternly; "thy lips elude the answer I would
+seek. In our degenerate time and land, thy sex and ours forget too
+basely what foulness writes a leprosy in the smallest stain upon a
+matron's honour. That thy heart would never wrong me, I believe; but if
+thy weakness, thy fear of my death should wrong me, thou art a bitterer
+foe to Rienzi than the swords of the Colonna. Nina, speak!"
+
+"Oh, that my soul could speak," answered Nina. "Thy words are music to
+me, and not a thought of mine but echoes them. Could I touch this hand,
+could I meet that eye, and not know that death were dearer to thee than
+shame? Rienzi, when last we parted, in sadness, yet in hope, what were
+thy words to me?"
+
+"I remember them well," returned the Tribune: "'I leave thee,' I said,
+'to keep alive at the Emperor's Court, by thy genius, the Great Cause.
+Thou hast youth and beauty--and courts have lawless and ruffian suitors.
+I give thee no caution; it were beneath thee and me. But I leave thee
+the power of death.' And with that, Nina--"
+
+"Thy hands tremblingly placed in mine this dagger. I live--need I say
+more?"
+
+"My noble and beloved Nina, it is enough. Keep the dagger yet."
+
+"Yes; till we meet in the Capitol of Rome!"
+
+A slight tap was heard at the door; Nina regained, in an instant, her
+disguise.
+
+"It is on the stroke of midnight," said the gaoler, appearing at the
+threshold.
+
+"I come," said Nina.
+
+"And thou hast to prepare thy thoughts," she whispered to Rienzi: "arm
+all thy glorious intellect. Alas! is it again we part? How my heart
+sinks!"
+
+The presence of the gaoler at the threshold broke the bitterness
+of parting by abridging it. The false page pressed her lips on the
+prisoner's hand, and left the cell.
+
+The gaoler, lingering behind for a moment, placed a parchment on the
+table. It was the summons from the court appointed for the trial of the
+Tribune.
+
+
+
+Chapter 7.VI. The Scent Does Not Lie.--The Priest and the Soldier.
+
+On descending the stairs, Nina was met by Alvarez.
+
+"Fair page," said the Spaniard, gaily, "thy name, thou tellest me, is
+Villani?--Angelo Villani--why I know thy kinsman, methinks. Vouchsafe,
+young master, to enter this chamber, and drink a night-cup to thy lady's
+health; I would fain learn tidings of my old friends."
+
+"At another time," answered the false Angelo, drawing the cloak closer
+round her face; "it is late--I am hurried."
+
+"Nay," said the Spaniard, "you escape me not so easily;" and he caught
+firm hold of the page's shoulder.
+
+"Unhand me, sir!" said Nina, haughtily, and almost weeping, for her
+strong nerves were yet unstrung. "Gaoler, at thy peril--unbar the
+gates."
+
+"So hot," said Alvarez, surprised at so great a waste of dignity in
+a page; "nay, I meant not to offend thee. May I wait on thy pageship
+tomorrow?"
+
+"Ay, tomorrow," said Nina, eager to escape.
+
+"And meanwhile," said Alvarez, "I will accompany thee home--we can
+confer by the way."
+
+So saying, without regarding the protestations of the supposed page, he
+passed with Nina into the open air. "Your lady," said he, carelessly,
+"is wondrous fair; her lightest will is law to the greatest noble of
+Avignon. Methinks she is of Naples--is it so? Art thou dumb, sweet
+youth?"
+
+The page did not answer, but with a step so rapid that it almost put the
+slow Spaniard out of breath, hastened along the narrow space between the
+tower and the palace of the Signora Cesarini, nor could all the efforts
+of Alvarez draw forth a single syllable from his reluctant companion,
+till they reached the gates of the palace, and he found himself
+discourteously left without the walls.
+
+"A plague on the boy!" said he, biting his lips; "if the Cardinal thrive
+as well as his servant, by're Lady, Monsignore is a happy man!"
+
+By no means pleased with the prospect of an interview with Albornoz,
+who, like most able men, valued the talents of those he employed exactly
+in proportion to their success, the Spaniard slowly returned home. With
+the licence accorded to him, he entered the Cardinal's chamber somewhat
+abruptly, and perceived him in earnest conversation with a Cavalier,
+whose long moustache, curled upward, and the bright cuirass worn
+underneath his mantle, seemed to betoken him of martial profession.
+Pleased with the respite, Alvarez hastily withdrew: and, in fact, the
+Cardinal's thoughts at that moment, and for that night, were bent upon
+other subjects than those of love.
+
+The interruption served, however, to shorten the conversation between
+Albornoz and his guest. The latter rose.
+
+"I think," said he, buckling on a short and broad rapier, which he laid
+aside during the interview,--"I think, my Lord Cardinal, you encourage
+me to consider that our negotiation stands a fair chance of a prosperous
+close. Ten thousand florins, and my brother quits Viterbo, and launches
+the thunderbolt of the Company on the lands of Rimini. On your part--"
+
+"On my part it is agreed," said the Cardinal, "that the army of the
+Church interferes not with the course of your brother's arms--there is
+peace between us. One warrior understands another!"
+
+"And the word of Giles d'Albornoz, son of the royal race of Arragon, is
+a guarantee for the faith of a Cardinal," replied the Cavalier, with a
+smile. "It is, my Lord, in your former quality that we treat."
+
+"There is my right hand," answered Albornoz, too politic to heed the
+insinuation. The Cavalier raised it respectfully to his lips, and his
+armed tread was soon heard descending the stairs.
+
+"Victory," cried Albornoz, tossing his arms aloof; "Victory, now thou
+art mine!"
+
+With that he rose hastily, deposited his papers in an iron chest, and
+opening a concealed door behind the arras, entered a chamber that rather
+resembled a monk's cell than the apartment of a prince. Over a mean
+pallet hung a sword, a dagger, and a rude image of the Virgin. Without
+summoning Alvarez, the Cardinal unrobed, and in a few moments was
+asleep.
+
+
+
+Chapter 7.VII. Vaucluse and its Genius Loci.--Old Acquaintance Renewed.
+
+The next day at early noon the Cavalier, whom our last chapter presented
+to the reader, was seen mounted on a strong Norman horse, winding his
+way slowly along a green and pleasant path some miles from Avignon. At
+length he found himself in a wild and romantic valley, through which
+wandered that delightful river whose name the verse of Petrarch has
+given to so beloved a fame. Sheltered by rocks, and in this part winding
+through the greenest banks, enamelled with a thousand wild flowers and
+water-weeds, went the crystal Sorgia. Advancing farther, the landscape
+assumed a more sombre and sterile aspect. The valley seemed enclosed or
+shut in by fantastic rocks of a thousand shapes, down which dashed and
+glittered a thousand rivulets. And, in the very wildest of the scene,
+the ground suddenly opened into a quaint and cultivated garden, through
+which, amidst a profusion of foliage, was seen a small and lonely
+mansion,--the hermitage of the place. The horseman was in the valley
+of the Vaucluse; and before his eye lay the garden and the house of
+PETRARCH! Carelessly, however, his eye scanned the consecrated spot;
+and unconsciously it rested, for a moment, upon a solitary figure seated
+musingly by the margin of the river. A large dog at the side of the
+noonday idler barked at the horseman as he rode on. "A brave animal and
+a deep bay!" thought the traveller; to him the dog seemed an object much
+more interesting than its master. And so,--as the crowd of little men
+pass unheeding and unmoved, those in whom Posterity shall acknowledge
+the landmarks of their age,--the horseman turned his glance from the
+Poet!
+
+Thrice blessed name! Immortal Florentine! (I need scarcely say that it
+is his origin, not his actual birth, which entitles us to term Petrarch
+a Florentine.) not as the lover, nor even as the poet, do I bow before
+thy consecrated memory--venerating thee as one it were sacrilege to
+introduce in this unworthy page--save by name and as a shadow; but as
+the first who ever asserted to people and to prince the august majesty
+of Letters; who claimed to Genius the prerogative to influence states,
+to control opinion, to hold an empire over the hearts of men, and
+prepare events by animating passion, and guiding thought! What, (though
+but feebly felt and dimly seen)--what do we yet owe to Thee if Knowledge
+be now a Power; if MIND be a Prophet and a Fate, foretelling and
+foredooming the things to come! From the greatest to the least of us, to
+whom the pen is at once a sceptre and a sword, the low-born Florentine
+has been the arch-messenger to smooth the way and prepare the welcome.
+Yes! even the meanest of the aftercomers--even he who now vents his
+gratitude,--is thine everlasting debtor! Thine, how largely is the
+honour, if his labours, humble though they be, find an audience wherever
+literature is known; preaching in remotest lands the moral of forgotten
+revolutions, and scattering in the palace and the marketplace the seeds
+that shall ripen into fruit when the hand of the sower shall be dust,
+and his very name, perhaps, be lost! For few, alas! are they, whose
+names may outlive the grave; but the thoughts of every man who writes,
+are made undying;--others appropriate, advance, exalt them; and millions
+of minds unknown, undreamt of, are required to produce the immortality
+of one!
+
+Indulging meditations very different from those which the idea of
+Petrarch awakens in a later time, the Cavalier pursued his path.
+
+The valley was long left behind, and the way grew more and more faintly
+traced, until it terminated in a wood, through whose tangled boughs the
+sunlight broke playfully. At length, the wood opened into a wide glade,
+from which rose a precipitous ascent, crowned with the ruins of an old
+castle. The traveller dismounted, led his horse up the ascent, and,
+gaining the ruins, left his steed within one of the roofless chambers,
+overgrown with the longest grass and a profusion of wild shrubs; thence
+ascending, with some toil, a narrow and broken staircase, he found
+himself in a small room, less decayed than the rest, of which the roof
+and floor were yet whole.
+
+Stretched on the ground in his cloak, and leaning his head thoughtfully
+on his hand, was a man of tall stature, and middle age. He lifted
+himself on his arm with great alacrity as the Cavalier entered.
+
+"Well, Brettone, I have counted the hours--what tidings?"
+
+"Albornoz consents."
+
+"Glad news! Thou givest me new life. Pardieu, I shall breakfast all the
+better for this, my brother. Hast thou remembered that I am famishing?"
+
+Brettone drew from beneath his cloak a sufficiently huge flask of wine,
+and a small panier, tolerably well filled; the inmate of the tower threw
+himself upon the provant with great devotion. And both the soldiers, for
+such they were, stretched at length on the ground, regaled themselves
+with considerable zest, talking hastily and familiarly between every
+mouthful.
+
+"I say, Brettone, thou playest unfairly; thou hast already devoured more
+than half the pasty: push it hitherward. And so the Cardinal consents!
+What manner of man is he? Able as they say?"
+
+"Quick, sharp, and earnest, with an eye of fire, few words, and comes to
+the point."
+
+"Unlike a priest then;--a good brigand spoilt. What hast thou heard of
+the force he heads? Ho, not so fast with the wine."
+
+"Scanty at present.--He relies on recruits throughout Italy."
+
+"What his designs for Rome? There, my brother, there tends my secret
+soul! As for these petty towns and petty tyrants, I care not how they
+fall, or by whom. But the Pope must not return to Rome. Rome must be
+mine. The city of a new empire, the conquest of a new Attila! There,
+every circumstance combines in my favour!--the absence of the Pope, the
+weakness of the middle class, the poverty of the populace, the imbecile
+though ferocious barbarism of the Barons, have long concurred to render
+Rome the most facile, while the most glorious conquest!"
+
+"My brother, pray Heaven your ambition do not wreck you at last; you
+are ever losing sight of the land. Surely with the immense wealth we are
+acquiring, we may--"
+
+"Aspire to be something greater than Free Companions, generals today,
+and adventurers tomorrow. Rememberest thou, how the Norman sword won
+Sicily, and how the bastard William converted on the field of Hastings
+his baton into a sceptre. I tell thee, Brettone, that this loose Italy
+has crowns on the hedge that a dexterous hand may carry off at the point
+of the lance. My course is taken, I will form the fairest army in Italy,
+and with it I will win a throne in the Capitol. Fool that I was six
+years ago!--Instead of deputing that mad dolt Pepin of Minorbino, had
+I myself deserted the Hungarian, and repaired with my soldiery to Rome,
+the fall of Rienzi would have been followed by the rise of Montreal.
+Pepin was outwitted, and threw away the prey after he had hunted it
+down. The lion shall not again trust the chase to the jackal!"
+
+"Walter, thou speakest of the fate of Rienzi, let it warn thee!"
+
+"Rienzi!" replied Montreal; "I know the man! In peaceful times or with
+an honest people, he would have founded a great dynasty. But he dreamt
+of laws and liberty for men who despise the first and will not protect
+the last. We, of a harder race, know that a new throne must be built by
+the feudal and not the civil system; and into the city we must
+transport the camp. It is by the multitude that the proud Tribune gained
+power,--by the multitude he lost it; it is by the sword that I will win
+it, and by the sword will I keep it!"
+
+"Rienzi was too cruel, he should not have incensed the Barons," said
+Brettone, about to finish the flask, when the strong hand of his brother
+plucked it from him, and anticipated the design.
+
+"Pooh," said Montreal, finishing the draught with a long sigh, "he was
+not cruel enough. He sought only to be just, and not to distinguish
+between noble and peasant. He should have distinguished! He should have
+exterminated the nobles root and branch. But this no Italian can do.
+This is reserved for me."
+
+"Thou wouldst not butcher all the best blood of Rome?"
+
+"Butcher! No, but I would seize their lands, and endow with them a new
+nobility, the hardy and fierce nobility of the North, who well know how
+to guard their prince, and will guard him, as the fountain of their own
+power. Enough of this now. And talking of Rienzi--rots he still in his
+dungeon?"
+
+"Why, this morning, ere I left, I heard strange news. The town was
+astir, groups in every corner. They said that Rienzi's trial was to be
+today, and from the names of the judges chosen, it is suspected that
+acquittal is already determined on."
+
+"Ha! thou shouldst have told me of this before."
+
+"Should he be restored to Rome, would it militate against thy plans?"
+
+"Humph! I know not--deep thought and dexterous management would be
+needed. I would fain not leave this spot till I hear what is decided
+on."
+
+"Surely, Walter, it would have been wiser and safer to have stayed
+with thy soldiery, and intrusted me with the absolute conduct of this
+affair."
+
+"Not so," answered Montreal; "thou art a bold fellow enough, and a
+cunning--but my head in these matters is better than thine. Besides,"
+continued the Knight, lowering his voice, and shading his face, "I had
+vowed a pilgrimage to the beloved river, and the old trysting-place. Ah
+me!--But all this, Brettone, thou understandest not--let it pass. As for
+my safety, since we have come to this amnesty with Albornoz, I fear but
+little danger even if discovered: besides, I want the florins. There are
+those in this country, Germans, who could eat an Italian army at a meal,
+whom I would fain engage, and their leaders want earnest-money--the
+griping knaves!--How are the Cardinal's florins to be paid?"
+
+"Half now--half when thy troops are before Rimini!"
+
+"Rimini! the thought whets my sword. Rememberest thou how that
+accursed Malatesta drove me from Aversa, (This Malatesta, a signior of
+illustrious family, was one of the most skilful warriors in Italy. He
+and his brother Galeotto had been raised to the joint-tyranny of Rimini
+by the voice of its citizens. After being long the foes of the Church,
+they were ultimately named as its captains by the Cardinal Albornoz.)
+broke up my camp, and made me render to him all my booty? There fell the
+work of years! But for that, my banner now would be floating over St.
+Angelo. I will pay back the debt with fire and sword, ere the summer has
+shed its leaves."
+
+The fair countenance of Montreal grew terrible as he uttered these
+words; his hands griped the handle of his sword, and his strong frame
+heaved visibly; tokens of the fierce and unsparing passions, by the aid
+of which a life of rapine and revenge had corrupted a nature originally
+full no less of the mercy than the courage of Provencal chivalry.
+
+Such was the fearful man who now (the wildness of his youth sobered, and
+his ambition hardened and concentered) was the rival with Rienzi for the
+mastery of Rome.
+
+
+
+Chapter 7.VIII. The Crowd.--The Trial.--The Verdict.--The Soldier and
+the Page.
+
+It was on the following evening that a considerable crowd had gathered
+in the streets of Avignon. It was the second day of the examination
+of Rienzi, and with every moment was expected the announcement of the
+verdict. Amongst the foreigners of all countries assembled in that seat
+of the Papal splendour, the interest was intense. The Italians, even of
+the highest rank, were in favour of the Tribune, the French against him.
+As for the good townspeople of Avignon themselves, they felt but little
+excitement in any thing that did not bring money into their pockets; and
+if it had been put to the secret vote, no doubt there would have been a
+vast majority for burning the prisoner, as a marketable speculation!
+
+Amongst the crowd was a tall man in a plain and rusty suit of armour,
+but with an air of knightly bearing, which somewhat belied the
+coarseness of his mail; he wore no helmet, but a small morion of black
+leather, with a long projecting shade, much used by wayfarers in the
+hot climates of the south. A black patch covered nearly the whole of
+one cheek, and altogether he bore the appearance of a grim soldier, with
+whom war had dealt harshly, both in purse and person.
+
+Many were the jests at the shabby swordsman's expense, with which that
+lively population amused their impatience; and though the shade of the
+morion concealed his eyes, an arch and merry smile about the corners of
+his mouth shewed that he could take a jest at himself.
+
+"Well," said one of the crowd, (a rich Milanese,) "I am of a state that
+was free, and I trust the People's man will have justice shewn him."
+
+"Amen," said a grave Florentine.
+
+"They say," whispered a young student from Paris, to a learned doctor of
+laws, with whom he abode, "that his defence has been a masterpiece."
+
+"He hath taken no degrees," replied the doctor, doubtingly. "Ho, friend,
+why dost thou push me so? thou hast rent my robe."
+
+This was said to a minstrel, or jongleur, who, with a small lute slung
+round him, was making his way, with great earnestness, through the
+throng.
+
+"I beg pardon, worthy sir," said the minstrel; "but this is a scene to
+be sung of! Centuries hence; ay, and in lands remote, legend and song
+will tell the fortunes of Cola di Rienzi, the friend of Petrarch and the
+Tribune of Rome!"
+
+The young French student turned quickly round to the minstrel, with
+a glow on his pale face; not sharing the general sentiments of his
+countrymen against Rienzi, he felt that it was an era in the world when
+a minstrel spoke thus of the heroes of intellect--not of war.
+
+At this time the tall soldier was tapped impatiently on the back.
+
+"I pray thee, great sir," said a sharp and imperious voice, "to withdraw
+that tall bulk of thine a little on one side--I cannot see through thee;
+and I would fain my eyes were among the first to catch a glimpse of
+Rienzi as he passes from the court."
+
+"Fair sir page," replied the soldier, good-humouredly, as he made way
+for Angelo Villani, "thou wilt not always find that way in the world is
+won by commanding the strong. When thou art older thou wilt beard the
+weak, and the strong thou wilt wheedle."
+
+"I must change my nature, then," answered Angelo, (who was of somewhat
+small stature, and not yet come to his full growth,) trying still to
+raise himself above the heads of the crowd.
+
+The soldier looked at him approvingly; and as he looked he sighed, and
+his lips worked with some strange emotion.
+
+"Thou speakest well," said he, after a pause. "Pardon me the rudeness
+of the question; but art thou of Italy?--thy tongue savours of the Roman
+dialect; yet I have seen lineaments like thine on this side the Alps."
+
+"It may be, good fellow," said the page, haughtily; "but I thank Heaven
+that I am of Rome."
+
+At this moment a loud shout burst from that part of the crowd nearest
+the court. The sound of trumpets again hushed the throng into deep and
+breathless silence, while the Pope's guards, ranged along the space
+conducting from the court, drew themselves up more erect, and fell a
+step or two back upon the crowd.
+
+As the trumpet ceased, the voice of a herald was heard, but it did not
+penetrate within several yards of the spot where Angelo and the soldier
+stood; and it was only by a mighty shout that in a moment circled
+through, and was echoed back by, the wide multitude--by the waving of
+kerchiefs from the windows--by broken ejaculations, which were caught up
+from lip to lip, that the page knew that Rienzi was acquitted.
+
+"I would I could see his face!" sighed the page, querulously.
+
+"And thou shalt," said the soldier; and he caught up the boy in his
+arms, and pressed on with the strength of a giant, parting the living
+stream from right to left, as he took his way to a place near the
+guards, and by which Rienzi was sure to pass.
+
+The page, half-pleased, half-indignant, struggled a little, but finding
+it in vain, consented tacitly to what he felt an outrage on his dignity.
+
+"Never mind," said the soldier, "thou art the first I ever willingly
+raised above myself; and I do it now for the sake of thy fair face,
+which reminds me of one I loved."
+
+But these last words were spoken low, and the boy, in his anxiety to see
+the hero of Rome, did not hear or heed them. Presently Rienzi came by;
+two gentlemen, of the Pope's own following, walked by his side. He moved
+slowly, amidst the greetings and clamour of the crowd, looking neither
+to the right nor left. His bearing was firm and collected, and, save by
+the flush of his cheek, there was no external sign of joy or excitement.
+Flowers dropped from every balcony on his path; and just when he came to
+a broader space, where the ground was somewhat higher, and where he
+was in fuller view of the houses around, he paused--and, uncovering,
+acknowledged the homage he had received, with a look--a gesture--which
+each who beheld never forgot. It haunted even that gay and thoughtless
+court, when the last tale of Rienzi's life reached their ears. And
+Angelo, clinging then round that soldier's neck, recalled--but we must
+not anticipate.
+
+It was not, however, to the dark tower that Rienzi returned. His home
+was prepared at the palace of the Cardinal d'Albornoz. The next day he
+was admitted to the Pope's presence, and on the evening of that day he
+was proclaimed Senator of Rome.
+
+Meanwhile the soldier had placed Angelo on the ground; and as the page
+faltered out no courteous thanks, he interrupted him in a sad and kind
+voice, the tone of which struck the page forcibly, so little did it suit
+the rough and homely appearance of the man.
+
+"We part," he said, "as strangers, fair boy; and since thou sayest thou
+art of Rome, there is no reason why my heart should have warmed to thee
+as it has done; yet if ever thou wantest a friend,--seek him"--and the
+soldier's voice sunk into a whisper--"in Walter de Montreal."
+
+Ere the page recovered his surprise at that redoubted name, which his
+earliest childhood had been taught to dread, the Knight of St. John had
+vanished amongst the crowd.
+
+
+
+Chapter 7.IX. Albornoz and Nina.
+
+But the eyes which, above all others, thirsted for a glimpse of the
+released captive were forbidden that delight. Alone in her chamber, Nina
+awaited the result of the trial. She heard the shouts, the exclamations,
+the tramp of thousands along the street; she felt that the victory was
+won; and, her heart long overcharged, she burst into passionate tears.
+The return of Angelo soon acquainted her with all that had passed; but
+it somewhat chilled her joy to find Rienzi was the guest of the dreaded
+Cardinal. That shock, in which certainty, however happy, replaces
+suspense, had so powerful an effect on her frame, joined to her loathing
+fear of a visit from the Cardinal, that she became for three days
+alarmingly ill; and it was only on the fifth day from that which saw
+Rienzi endowed with the rank of Senator of Rome, that she was recovered
+sufficiently to admit Albornoz to her presence.
+
+The Cardinal had sent daily to inquire after her health, and his
+inquiries, to her alarmed mind, had appeared to insinuate a pretension
+to the right to make them. Meanwhile Albornoz had had enough to divert
+and occupy his thoughts. Having bought off the formidable Montreal from
+the service of John de Vico, one of the ablest and fiercest enemies of
+the Church, he resolved to march to the territories of that tyrant as
+expeditiously as possible, and so not to allow him time to obtain the
+assistance of any other band of the mercenary adventurers, who found
+Italy the market for their valour. Occupied with raising troops,
+procuring money, corresponding with the various free states, and
+establishing alliances in aid of his ulterior and more ambitious
+projects at the court of Avignon, the Cardinal waited with tolerable
+resignation the time when he might claim from the Signora Cesarini the
+reward to which he deemed himself entitled. Meanwhile he had held his
+first conversations with Rienzi, and, under the semblance of courtesy to
+the acquitted Tribune, Albornoz had received him as his guest, in order
+to make himself master of the character and disposition of one in whom
+he sought a minister and a tool. That miraculous and magic art, attested
+by the historians of the time, which Rienzi possessed over every one
+with whom he came into contact, however various in temper, station, or
+opinions, had not deserted him in his interview with the Pontiff. So
+faithfully had he described the true condition of Rome, so logically
+had he traced the causes and the remedies of the evils she endured, so
+sanguinely had he spoken of his own capacities for administering her
+affairs, and so brilliantly had he painted the prospects which that
+administration opened to the weal of the Church, and the interests
+of the Pope, that Innocent, though a keen and shrewd, and somewhat
+sceptical calculator of human chances, was entirely fascinated by the
+eloquence of the Roman.
+
+"Is this the man," he is reported to have said, "whom for twelve months
+we have treated as a prisoner and a criminal? Would that it were on his
+shoulders only that the Christian empire reposed!"
+
+At the close of the interview he had, with every mark of favour and
+distinction, conferred upon Rienzi the rank of Senator, which, in
+fact, was that of Viceroy of Rome, and had willingly acceded to all the
+projects which the enterprising Rienzi had once more formed--not only
+for recovering the territories of the Church, but for extending the
+dictatorial sway of the Seven-hilled City, over the old dependencies of
+Italy.
+
+Albornoz, to whom the Pope retailed this conversation, was somewhat
+jealous of the favour the new Senator had so suddenly acquired, and
+immediately on his return home sought an interview with his guest. In
+his heart, the Lord Cardinal, emphatically a man of action and business,
+regarded Rienzi as one rather cunning than wise--rather fortunate than
+great--a mixture of the pedant and the demagogue. But after a long and
+scrutinizing conversation with the new Senator, even he yielded to
+the spell of his enchanting and master intellect. Reluctantly Albornoz
+confessed to himself that Rienzi's rise was not the thing of chance;
+yet more reluctantly he perceived that the Senator was one whom he
+might treat with as an equal, but could not rule as a minion. And he
+entertained serious doubts whether it would be wise to reinstate him in
+a power which he evinced the capacity to wield and the genius to extend.
+Still, however, he did not repent the share he had taken in Rienzi's
+acquittal. His presence in a camp so thinly peopled was a matter greatly
+to be desired. And through his influence, the Cardinal more than
+ever trusted to enlist the Romans in favour of his enterprise for the
+recovery of the territory of St. Peter!
+
+Rienzi, who panted once more to behold his Nina, endeared to him by
+trial and absence, as by fresh bridals, was not however able to discover
+the name she had assumed at Avignon; and his residence with the Cardinal
+closely but respectfully watched as he was, forbade Nina all opportunity
+of corresponding with him. Some half bantering hints which Albornoz had
+dropped upon the interest taken in his welfare by the most celebrated
+beauty of Avignon, had filled him with a vague alarm which he trembled
+to acknowledge even to himself. But the volto sciolto (Volto sciolto,
+pensieri stretti--the countenance open, the thoughts restrained.) which,
+in common with all Italian politicians, concealed whatever were his
+pensieri stretti--enabled him to baffle completely the jealous and
+lynxlike observation of the Cardinal. Nor had Alvarez been better
+enabled to satisfy the curiosity of his master. He had indeed sought the
+page Villani, but the imperious manner of that wayward and haughty
+boy had cut short all attempts at cross-examination. And all he could
+ascertain was, that the real Angelo Villani was not the Angelo Villani
+who had visited Rienzi.
+
+Trusting at last that he should learn all, and inflamed by such passion
+and such hope as he was capable of feeling, Albornoz now took his way to
+the Cesarini's palace.
+
+He was ushered with due state into the apartment of the Signora. He
+found her pale, and with the traces of illness upon her noble and
+statuelike features. She rose as he entered; and when he approached,
+she half bent her knee, and raised his hand to her lips. Surprised and
+delighted at a reception so new, the Cardinal hastened to prevent the
+condescension; retaining both her hands, he attempted gently to draw
+them to his heart.
+
+"Fairest!" he whispered, "couldst thou know hear I have mourned thy
+illness--and yet it has but left thee more lovely, as the rain only
+brightens the flower. Ah! happy if I have promoted thy lightest wish,
+and if in thine eyes I may henceforth seek at once an angel to guide me
+and a paradise to reward."
+
+Nina, releasing her hand, waved it gently, and motioned the Cardinal to
+a seat. Seating herself at a little distance, she then spoke with great
+gravity and downcast eyes.
+
+"My Lord, it is your intercession, joined to his own innocence, that has
+released from yonder tower the elected governor of the people of Rome.
+But freedom is the least of the generous gifts you have conferred;
+there is a greater in a fair name vindicated, and rightful honours
+re-bestowed. For this, I rest ever your debtor; for this, if I bear
+children, they shall be taught to bless your name; for this the
+historian who recalls the deeds of this age, and the fortunes of Cola
+di Rienzi, shall add a new chaplet to the wreaths you have already won.
+Lord Cardinal, I may have erred. I may have offended you--you may accuse
+me of woman's artifice. Speak not, wonder not, hear me out. I have
+but one excuse, when I say that I held justified any means short of
+dishonour, to save the life and restore the fortunes of Cola di Rienzi.
+Know, my Lord, that she who now addresses you is his wife."
+
+The Cardinal remained motionless and silent. But his sallow countenance
+grew flushed from the brow to the neck, and his thin lips quivered for
+a moment, and then broke into a withering and bitter smile. At length
+he rose from his seat, very slowly, and said, in a voice trembling with
+passion,
+
+"It is well, madam. Giles d'Albornoz has been, then, a puppet in the
+hands, a stepping-stone in the rise, of the plebeian demagogue of Rome.
+You but played upon me for your own purposes; and nothing short of a
+Cardinal of Spain, and a Prince of the royal blood of Aragon, was meet
+to be the instrument of a mountebank's juggle! Madam, yourself and your
+husband might justly be accused of ambition--"
+
+"Cease, my Lord," said Nina, with unspeakable dignity; "whatever offence
+has been committed against you was mine alone. Till after our last
+interview, Rienzi knew not even of my presence at Avignon."
+
+"At our last interview, Lady, (you do well to recall it!) methinks there
+was a hinted and implied contract. I have fulfilled my part--I claim
+yours. Mark me! I do not forego that claim. As easily as I rend this
+glove can I rend the parchment which proclaims thy husband 'the Senator
+of Rome.' The dungeon is not death, and its door will open twice."
+
+"My Lord--my Lord!" cried Nina, sick with terror, "wrong not so your
+noble nature, your great name, your sacred rank, your chivalric blood.
+You are of the knightly race of Spain, yours not the sullen, low, and
+inexorable vices that stain the petty tyrants of this unhappy land.
+You are no Visconti--no Castracani--you cannot stain your laurels with
+revenge upon a woman. Hear me," she continued, and she fell abruptly at
+his feet; "men dupe, deceive our sex--and for selfish purposes; they are
+pardoned--even by their victims. Did I deceive you with a false hope?
+Well--what my object?--what my excuse? My husband's liberty--my land's
+salvation! Woman,--my Lord, alas, your sex too rarely understand her
+weakness or her greatness! Erring--all human as she is to others--God
+gifts her with a thousand virtues to the one she loves! It is from
+that love that she alone drinks her nobler nature. For the hero of her
+worship she has the meekness of the dove--the devotion of the saint;
+for his safety in peril, for his rescue in misfortune, her vain sense
+imbibes the sagacity of the serpent--her weak heart, the courage of the
+lioness! It is this which, in absence, made me mask my face in smiles,
+that the friends of the houseless exile might not despair of his
+fate--it is this which brought me through forests beset with robbers, to
+watch the stars upon yon solitary tower--it was this which led my steps
+to the revels of your hated court--this which made me seek a deliverer
+in the noblest of its chiefs--it is this which has at last opened the
+dungeon door to the prisoner now within your halls; and this,
+Lord Cardinal," added Nina, rising, and folding her arms upon her
+heart--"this, if your anger seeks a victim, will inspire me to die
+without a groan,--but without dishonour!"
+
+Albornoz remained rooted to the ground.
+Amazement--emotion--admiration--all busy at his heart. He gazed at
+Nina's flashing eyes and heaving bosom as a warrior of old upon a
+prophetess inspired. His eyes were riveted to hers as by a spell. He
+tried to speak, but his voice failed him. Nina continued:
+
+"Yes, my Lord; these are no idle words! If you seek revenge, it is in
+your power. Undo what you have done. Give Rienzi back to the dungeon,
+or to disgrace, and you are avenged; but not on him. All the hearts of
+Italy shall become to him a second Nina! I am the guilty one, and I the
+sufferer. Hear me swear--in that instant which sees new wrong to Rienzi,
+this hand is my executioner.--My Lord, I supplicate you no longer!"
+
+Albornoz continued deeply moved. Nina but rightly judged him, when she
+distinguished the aspiring Spaniard from the barbarous and unrelenting
+voluptuaries of Italy. Despite the profligacy that stained his sacred
+robe--despite all the acquired and increasing callousness of a hard,
+scheming, and sceptical man, cast amidst the worst natures of the worst
+of times--there lingered yet in his soul much of the knightly honour
+of his race and country. High thoughts and daring spirits touched a
+congenial string in his heart, and not the less, in that he had but
+rarely met them in his experience of camps and courts. For the first
+time in his life, he felt that he had seen the woman who could have
+contented him even with wedlock, and taught him the proud and faithful
+love of which the minstrels of Spain had sung. He sighed, and still
+gazing on Nina, approached her, almost reverentially; he knelt and
+kissed the hem of her robe. "Lady," he said, "I would I could believe
+that you have altogether read my nature aright, but I were indeed lost
+to all honour, and unworthy of gentle birth, if I still harboured a
+single thought against the peace and virtue of one like thee. Sweet
+heroine,"--he continued--"so lovely, yet so pure--so haughty, and yet
+so soft--thou hast opened to me the brightest page these eyes have
+ever scanned in the blotted volume of mankind. Mayest thou have such
+happiness as life can give; but souls such as thine make their nest like
+the eagle, upon rocks and amidst the storms. Fear me no more--think
+of me no more--unless hereafter, when thou hearest men speak of
+Giles d'Albornoz, thou mayest say in thine own heart,"--and here the
+Cardinal's lip curled with scorn--"he did not renounce every feeling
+worthy of a man, when Ambition and Fate endued him with the surplice of
+the priest."
+
+The Spaniard was gone before Nina could reply.
+
+
+
+
+BOOK VIII. THE GRAND COMPANY.
+
+     "Montreal nourrissoit de plus vastes projets...il donnoit a
+     sa campagnie un gouvernement regulier...Par cette discipline
+     il faisoit regner l'abondance dans son camp; les gens de
+     guerre ne parloient, en Italie, que des richesses qu'on
+     acqueroit a son service."--Sismondi, "Histoire des
+     Republiques Italiennes", tom. vi. c. 42.
+
+     "Montreal cherished more vast designs...he subjected his
+     company to a regular system of government...By means of this
+     discipline he kept his camp abundantly supplied, and
+     military adventurers in Italy talked of nothing but the
+     wealth won in his service."--Sismondi's "History of Italian
+     Republics".
+
+
+
+Chapter 8.I. The Encampment.
+
+It was a most lovely day, in the very glow and meridian of an Italian
+summer, when a small band of horsemen were seen winding a hill which
+commanded one of the fairest landscapes of Tuscany. At their head was a
+cavalier in a complete suit of chain armour, the links of which were
+so fine, that they resembled a delicate and curious network, but so
+strongly compacted, that they would have resisted spear or sword no
+less effectually than the heaviest corselet, while adapting themselves
+exactly and with ease to every movement of the light and graceful shape
+of the rider. He wore a hat of dark green velvet shaded by long plumes,
+while of two squires behind, the one bore his helmet and lance, the
+other led a strong warhorse, completely cased in plates of mail, which
+seemed, however, scarcely to encumber its proud and agile paces.
+The countenance of the cavalier was comely, but strongly marked, and
+darkened, by long exposure to the suns of many climes, to a deep bronze
+hue: a few raven ringlets escaped from beneath his hat down a cheek
+closely shaven. The expression of his features was grave and composed
+even to sadness; nor could all the loveliness of the unrivalled scene
+before him dispel the quiet and settled melancholy of his eyes. Besides
+the squires, ten horsemen, armed cap-a-pie, attended the knight; and the
+low and murmured conversation they carried on at intervals, as well as
+their long fair hair, large stature, thick short beards, and the studied
+and accurate equipment of their arms and steeds, bespoke them of a
+hardier and more warlike race than the children of the south. The
+cavalcade was closed with a man almost of gigantic height, bearing
+a banner richly decorated, wherein was wrought a column, with the
+inscription, "ALONE AMIDST RUINS." Fair indeed was the prospect which
+with every step expanded yet more widely its various beauty. Right
+before stretched a long vale, now covered with green woodlands
+glittering in the yellow sunlight, now opening into narrow plains
+bordered by hillocks, from whose mosses of all hues grew fantastic and
+odorous shrubs; while, winding amidst them, a broad and silver stream
+broke into light at frequent intervals, snatched by wood and hillock
+from the eye, only to steal upon it again, in sudden and bright
+surprise. The opposite slope of gentle mountains, as well as that which
+the horsemen now descended, was covered with vineyards, trained in
+alleys and arcades: and the clustering grape laughed from every leafy
+and glossy covert, as gaily as when the Fauns held a holiday in the
+shade. The eye of the Cavalier roved listlessly over this enchanting
+prospect, sleeping in the rosiest light of a Tuscan heaven, and then
+became fixed with a more earnest attention on the grey and frowning
+walls of a distant castle, which, high upon the steepest of the opposite
+mountains, overlooked the valley.
+
+"Behold," he muttered to himself, "how every Eden in Italy hath its
+curse! Wherever the land smiles fairest, be sure to find the brigand's
+tent and the tyrant's castle!"
+
+Scarce had these thoughts passed his mind, ere the shrill and sudden
+blast of a bugle that sounded close amongst the vineyards by the side
+of the path startled the whole group. The cavalcade halted abruptly. The
+leader made a gesture to the squire who led his war-horse. The noble
+and practised animal remained perfectly still, save by champing its bit
+restlessly, and moving its quick ear to and fro, as aware of a coming
+danger,--while the squire, unencumbered by the heavy armour of the
+Germans, plunged into the thicket and disappeared. He returned in a few
+minutes, already heated and breathless.
+
+"We must be on our guard," he whispered; "I see the glimmer of steel
+through the vine leaves."
+
+"Our ground is unhappily chosen," said the Knight, hastily bracing on
+his helmet and leaping on his charger; and waving his hand towards a
+broader space in the road, which would permit the horsemen more room
+to act in union, with his small band he made hastily to the spot--the
+armour of the soldiers rattling heavily as two by two they proceeded on.
+
+The space to which the Cavalier had pointed was a green semicircle of
+several yards in extent, backed by tangled copses of brushwood sloping
+down to the vale below. They reached it in safety; they drew up breast
+to breast in the form of a crescent: every visor closed save that of the
+Knight, who looked anxiously and keenly round the landscape.
+
+"Hast thou heard, Giulio," he said, to his favourite squire, (the only
+Italian of the band,) "whether any brigands have been seen lately in
+these parts?"
+
+"No, my Lord; on the contrary, I am told that every lance hath left the
+country to join the Grand Company of Fra Moreale. The love of his pay
+and plunder has drawn away the mercenaries of every Tuscan Signor."
+
+As he ceased speaking, the bugle sounded again from nearly the same spot
+as before; it was answered by a brief and martial note from the very
+rear of the horsemen. At the same moment, from the thickets behind,
+broke the gleam of mail and spears. One after another, rank after rank,
+from the copse behind them, emerged men-at-arms, while suddenly, from
+the vines in front, still greater numbers poured forth with loud and
+fierce shouts.
+
+"For God, for the Emperor, and for the Colonna!" cried the Knight,
+closing his visor; and the little band, closely serried, the lance in
+every rest, broke upon the rush of the enemy in front. A score or so,
+borne to the ground by the charge, cleared a path for the horsemen, and,
+without waiting the assault of the rest, the Knight wheeled his charger
+and led the way down the hill, almost at full gallop, despite the
+roughness of the descent: a flight of arrows despatched after them fell
+idly on their iron mail.
+
+"If they have no horse," cried the Knight, "we are saved!"
+
+And, indeed, the enemy seemed scarcely to think of pursuing them; but
+(gathered on the brow of a hill) appeared contented to watch their
+flight.
+
+Suddenly a curve in the road brought them before a broad and wide patch
+of waste land, which formed almost a level surface, interrupting the
+descent of the mountain. On the commencement of this waste, drawn up in
+still array, the sunlight broke on the breastplates of a long line of
+horsemen, whom the sinuosities of the road had hitherto concealed from
+the Knight and his party.
+
+The little troop halted abruptly--retreat--advance alike cut off; gazing
+first at the foe before them, that remained still as a cloud, every eye
+was then turned towards the Knight.
+
+"An thou wouldst, my Lord," said the leader of the Northmen, perceiving
+the irresolution of their chief, "we will fight to the last. You are the
+only Italian I ever knew whom I would willingly die for!"
+
+This rude profession was received with a sympathetic murmur from the
+rest, and the soldiers drew closer around the Knight. "Nay, my brave
+fellows," said the Colonna, lifting his visor, "it is not in so
+inglorious a field, after such various fortunes, that we are doomed to
+perish. If these be brigands, as we must suppose, we can yet purchase
+our way. If the troops of some Signor, we are strangers to the feud in
+which he is engaged. Give me yon banner--I will ride on to them."
+
+"Nay, my Lord," said Giulio; "such marauders do not always spare a flag
+of truce. There is danger--"
+
+"For that reason your leader braves it. Quick!"
+
+The Knight took the banner, and rode deliberately up to the horsemen. On
+approaching, his warlike eye could not but admire the perfect caparison
+of their arms, the strength and beauty of their steeds, and the steady
+discipline of their long and glittering line.
+
+As he rode up, and his gorgeous banner gleamed in the noonlight, the
+soldiers saluted him. It was a good omen, and he hailed it as such.
+"Fair sirs," said the Knight, "I come, at once herald and leader of the
+little band who have just escaped the unlooked-for assault of armed men
+on yonder hill--and, claiming aid, as knight from knight, and soldier
+from soldier, I place my troop under the protection of your leader.
+Suffer me to see him."
+
+"Sir Knight," answered one, who seemed the captain of the band, "sorry
+am I to detain one of your gallant bearing, and still more so, on
+recognising the device of one of the most potent houses of Italy. But
+our orders are strict, and we must bring all armed men to the camp of
+our General."
+
+"Long absent from my native land, I knew not," replied the Knight, "that
+there was war in Tuscany. Permit me to crave the name of the general
+whom you speak of, and that of the foe against whom ye march."
+
+The Captain smiled slightly.
+
+"Walter de Montreal is the General of the Great Company, and Florence
+his present foe."
+
+"We have fallen, then, into friendly, if fierce, hands," replied the
+Knight, after a moment's pause. "To Sir Walter de Montreal I am known
+of old. Permit me to return to my companions, and acquaint them that
+if accident has made us prisoners, it is, at least, only to the most
+skilful warrior of his day that we are condemned to yield."
+
+The Italian then turned his horse to join his comrades.
+
+"A fair Knight and a bold presence," said the Captain of the Companions
+to his neighbour, "though I scarce think it is the party we are ordered
+to intercept. Praised be the Virgin, however, his men seem from the
+North. Them, perhaps, we may hope to enlist."
+
+The Knight now, with his comrades, rejoined the troop. And, on receiving
+their parole not to attempt escape, a detachment of thirty horsemen
+were despatched to conduct the prisoners to the encampment of the Great
+Company.
+
+Turning from the main road, the Knight found himself conducted into a
+narrow defile between the hills, which, succeeded by a gloomy track of
+wild forest-land, brought the party at length into a full and abrupt
+view of a wide plain, covered with the tents of what, for Italian
+warfare, was considered a mighty army. A stream, over which rude and
+hasty bridges had been formed from the neighbouring timber, alone
+separated the horsemen from the encampment.
+
+"A noble sight!" said the captive Cavalier, with enthusiasm, as he
+reined in his steed, and gazed upon the wild and warlike streets of
+canvass, traversing each other in vistas broad and regular.
+
+One of the captains of the Great Company who rode beside him, smiled
+complacently.
+
+"There are few masters of the martial art who equal Fra Moreale,"
+said he; "and savage, reckless, and gathered from all parts and all
+countries--from cavern and from marketplace, from prison and from
+palace, as are his troops, he has reduced them already into a discipline
+which might shame even the soldiery of the Empire."
+
+The Knight made no reply; but, spurring his horse over one of the rugged
+bridges, soon found himself amidst the encampment. But that part at
+which he entered little merited the praises bestowed upon the discipline
+of the army. A more unruly and disorderly array, the Cavalier,
+accustomed to the stern regularity of English, French, and German
+discipline, thought he had never beheld: here and there, fierce,
+unshaven, half-naked brigands might be seen, driving before them the
+cattle which they had just collected by predatory excursions.
+Sometimes a knot of dissolute women stood--chattering, scolding,
+gesticulating--collected round groups of wild shagged Northmen, who,
+despite the bright purity of the summer-noon, were already engaged in
+deep potations. Oaths, and laughter, and drunken merriment, and fierce
+brawl, rang from side to side; and ever and anon some hasty conflict
+with drawn knives was begun and finished by the fiery and savage bravoes
+of Calabria or the Apennines, before the very eyes and almost in the
+very path of the troop. Tumblers, and mountebanks, and jugglers, and Jew
+pedlers, were exhibiting their tricks or their wares at every interval,
+apparently well inured to the lawless and turbulent market in which they
+exercised their several callings. Despite the protection of the horsemen
+who accompanied them, the prisoners were not allowed to pass without
+molestation. Groups of urchins, squalid, fierce, and ragged, seemed to
+start from the ground, and surrounded their horses like swarms of bees,
+uttering the most discordant cries; and, with the gestures of savages,
+rather demanding than beseeching money, which, when granted, seemed only
+to render them more insatiable. While, sometimes mingled with the
+rest, were seen the bright eyes and olive cheek, and half-pleading,
+half-laughing smile of girls, whose extreme youth, scarce emerged
+from childhood, rendered doubly striking their utter and unredeemed
+abandonment.
+
+"You did not exaggerate the decorum of the Grand Company!" cried the
+Knight, gravely, to his new acquaintance.
+
+"Signor," replied the other, "you must not judge of the kernel by the
+shell. We are scarcely yet arrived at the camp. These are the outskirts,
+occupied rather by the rabble than the soldiers. Twenty thousand men
+from the sink, it must be owned, of every town in Italy, follow
+the camp, to fight if necessary, but rather for plunder, and for
+forage:--such you now behold. Presently you will see those of another
+stamp."
+
+The Knight's heart swelled high. "And to such men is Italy given up!"
+thought he. His revery was broken by a loud burst of applause from some
+convivialists hard by. He turned, and under a long tent, and round a
+board covered with wine and viands, sate some thirty or forty bravoes. A
+ragged minstrel, or jongleur, with an immense beard and mustachios, was
+tuning, with no inconsiderable skill, a lute which had accompanied him
+in all his wanderings--and suddenly changing its notes into a wild and
+warlike melody, he commenced in a loud and deep voice the following
+song:--
+
+The Praise of the Grand Company.
+
+     1.
+
+     Ho, dark one from the golden South,--
+     Ho, fair one from the North;
+     Ho, coat of mail and spear of sheen--
+     Ho, wherefore ride ye forth?
+     "We come from mount, we come from cave,
+     We come across the sea,
+     In long array, in bright array,
+     To Montreal's Companie."
+     Oh, the merry, merry band.
+     Light heart, and heavy hand--
+     Oh, the Lances of the Free!
+
+     2.
+
+     Ho, Princes of the castled height--
+     Ho, Burghers of the town;
+     Apulia's strength, Romagna's pride,
+     And Tusca's old renown!
+     Why quail ye thus? why pale ye thus?
+     What spectre do ye see?
+     "The blood-red flag, and trampling march,
+     Of Montreal's Companie."
+     Oh, the sunshine of your life--
+     Oh, the thunders of your strife!
+     Wild Lances of the Free!
+
+     3.
+
+     Ho, scutcheons o'er the vaulted tomb
+     Where Norman valour sleeps,
+     Why shake ye so? why quake ye so!
+     What wind the trophy sweeps?
+     "We shake without a breath--below,
+     The dead are stirred to see,
+     The Norman's fame revived again
+     In Montreal's Companie."
+     Since Roger won his crown,
+     Who hath equalled your renown,
+     Brave Lances of the Free?
+
+     4.
+
+     Ho, ye who seek to win a name,
+     Where deeds are bravest done--
+     Ho, ye who wish to pile a heap,
+     Where gold is lightest won;
+     Ho, ye who loathe the stagnant life,
+     Or shun the law's decree,
+     Belt on the brand, and spur the steed,
+     To Montreal's Companie.
+     And the maid shall share her rest,
+     And the miser share his chest,
+     With the Lances of the Free!
+     The Free!
+     The Free!
+     Oh! the Lances of the Free!
+
+Then suddenly, as if inspired to a wilder flight by his own minstrelsy,
+the jongleur, sweeping his hand over the chords, broke forth into an
+air admirably expressive of the picture which his words, running into a
+rude, but lively and stirring doggerel, attempted to paint.
+
+The March of the Grand Company.
+
+     Tira, tirala--trumpet and drum--
+     Rising bright o'er the height of the mountain they come!
+     German, and Hun, and the Islandrie,
+     Who routed the Frenchman at famed Cressie,
+     When the rose changed its hue with the fleur-de-lis;
+     With the Roman, and Lombard, and Piedmontese,
+     And the dark-haired son of the southern seas.
+     Tira, tirala--more near and near
+     Down the steep--see them sweep;--rank by rank they appear!
+     With the Cloud of the Crowd hanging dark at their rear--
+     Serried, and steadied, and orderlie,
+     Like the course--like the force--of a marching sea!
+     Open your gates, and out with your gold,
+     For the blood must be spilt, or the ransom be told!
+     Woe, Burghers, woe!  Behold them led
+     By the stoutest arm and the wisest head,
+     With the snow-white cross on the cloth of red;--
+     With the eagle eye, and the lion port,
+     His barb for a throne, and his camp for a court:
+     Sovereign and scourge of the land is he--
+     The kingly Knight of the Companie!
+     Hurrah--hurrah--hurrah!
+     Hurrah for the army--hurrah for its lord--
+     Hurrah for the gold that is got by the sword--
+     Hurrah--hurrah--hurrah!
+     For the Lances of the Free!
+
+Shouted by the full chorus of those desperate boon-companions, and
+caught up and re-echoed from side to side, near and far, as the familiar
+and well-known words of the burthen reached the ears of more distant
+groups or stragglers, the effect of this fierce and licentious
+minstrelsy was indescribable. It was impossible not to feel the zest
+which that daring life imparted to its daring followers, and even the
+gallant and stately Knight who listened to it, reproved himself for an
+involuntary thrill of sympathy and pleasure.
+
+He turned with some impatience and irritation to his companion, who had
+taken a part in the chorus, and said, "Sir, to the ears of an Italian
+noble, conscious of the miseries of his country, this ditty is not
+welcome. I pray you, let us proceed."
+
+"I humbly crave your pardon, Signor," said the Free Companion; "but
+really so attractive is the life led by Free Lances, under Fra Moreale,
+that sometimes we forget the--; but pardon me--we will on."
+
+A few moments more, and bounding over a narrow circumvallation, the
+party found themselves in a quarter, animated indeed, but of a wholly
+different character of animation. Long lines of armed men were drawn up
+on either side of a path, conducting to a large marquee, placed upon
+a little hillock, surmounted by a blue flag, and up this path armed
+soldiers were passing to and fro with great order, but with a pleased
+and complacent expression upon their swarthy features. Some that
+repaired to the marquee were bearing packets and bales upon their
+shoulders--those that returned seemed to have got rid of their burthens,
+but every now and then, impatiently opening their hands, appeared
+counting and recounting to themselves the coins contained therein.
+
+The Knight looked inquiringly at his companion.
+
+"It is the marquee of the merchants," said the captain; "they have
+free admission to the camp, and their property and persons are rigidly
+respected. They purchase each soldier's share of the plunder at fair
+prices, and either party is contented with the bargain."
+
+"It seems, then, that there is some kind of rude justice observed
+amongst you," said the Knight.
+
+"Rude! Diavolo! Not a town in Italy but would be glad of such even
+justice, and such impartial laws. Yonder lie the tents of the judges,
+appointed to try all offences of soldier against soldier. To the right,
+the tent with the golden ball contains the treasurer of the army. Fra
+Moreale incurs no arrears with his soldiery."
+
+It was, indeed, by these means that the Knight of St. John had collected
+the best equipped and the best contented force in Italy. Every day
+brought him recruits. Nothing was spoken of amongst the mercenaries of
+Italy but the wealth acquired in his service, and every warrior in the
+pay of Republic or of Tyrant sighed for the lawless standard of Fra
+Moreale. Already had exaggerated tales of the fortunes to be made in the
+ranks of the Great Company passed the Alps; and, even now, the Knight,
+penetrating farther into the camp, beheld from many a tent the proud
+banners and armorial blazon of German nobility and Gallic knighthood.
+
+"You see," said the Free Companion, pointing to these insignia, "we are
+not without our different ranks in our wild city. And while we speak,
+many a golden spur is speeding hitherward from the North!"
+
+All now in the quarter they had entered was still and solemn; only afar
+came the mingled hum, or the sudden shout of the pandemonium in the
+rear, mellowed by distance to a not unpleasing sound. An occasional
+soldier, crossing their path, stalked silently and stealthily to some
+neighbouring tent, and seemed scarcely to regard their approach.
+
+"Behold! we are before the General's pavilion," said the Free Lance.
+
+Blazoned with purple and gold, the tent of Montreal lay a little apart
+from the rest. A brooklet from the stream they had crossed murmured
+gratefully on the ear, and a tall and wide-spreading beech cast its
+shadow over the gorgeous canvass.
+
+While his troop waited without, the knight was conducted at once to the
+presence of the formidable adventurer.
+
+
+
+Chapter 8.II. Adrian Once More the Guest of Montreal.
+
+Montreal was sitting at the head of a table, surrounded by men, some
+military, some civil, whom he called his councillors, and with whom
+he apparently debated all his projects. These men, drawn from various
+cities, were intimately acquainted with the internal affairs of the
+several states to which they belonged. They could tell to a fraction
+the force of a signor, the wealth of a merchant, the power of a mob. And
+thus, in his lawless camp, Montreal presided, not more as a general than
+a statesman. Such knowledge was invaluable to the chief of the Great
+Company. It enabled him to calculate exactly the time to attack a foe,
+and the sum to demand for a suppression of hostilities. He knew what
+parties to deal with--where to importune--where to forbear. And it
+usually happened that, by some secret intrigue, the appearance of
+Montreal's banner before the walls of a city was the signal for some
+sedition or some broil within. It may be that he thus also promoted an
+ulterior, as well as his present, policy.
+
+The divan were in full consultation when an officer entered, and
+whispered a few words in Montreal's ear. His eyes brightened. "Admit
+him," he said hastily. "Messires," he added to his councillors, rubbing
+his hands, "I think our net has caught our bird. Let us see."
+
+At this moment the drapery was lifted and the Knight admitted.
+
+"How!" muttered Montreal, changing colour, and in evident
+disappointment. "Am I to be ever thus balked?"
+
+"Sir Walter de Montreal," said the prisoner, "I am once more your guest.
+In these altered features you perhaps scarcely recognise Adrian di
+Castello."
+
+"Pardon me, noble Signor," said Montreal, rising with great courtesy;
+"the mistake of my varlets disturbed my recollection for a moment.--I
+rejoice once more to press a hand that has won so many laurels since
+last we parted. Your renown has been grateful to my ears. Ho!" continued
+the chieftain, clapping his hands, "see to the refreshment and repose
+of this noble Cavalier and his attendants. Lord Adrian, I will join you
+presently."
+
+Adrian withdrew. Montreal, forgetful of his councillors, traversed his
+tent with hasty strides; then summoning the officer who had admitted
+Adrian, he said, "Count Landau still keeps the pass?"
+
+"Yes, General!"
+
+"Hie thee fast back, then--the ambuscade must tarry till nightfall. We
+have trapped the wrong fox."
+
+The officer departed, and shortly afterwards Montreal broke up the
+divan. He sought Adrian, who was lodged in a tent beside his own.
+
+"My Lord," said Montreal, "it is true that my men had orders to stop
+every one on the roads towards Florence. I am at war with that city. Yet
+I expected a very different prisoner from you. Need I add, that you and
+your men are free?"
+
+"I accept the courtesy, noble Montreal, as frankly as it is rendered.
+May I hope hereafter to repay it? Meanwhile permit me, without any
+disrespect, to say that had I learned the Grand Company was in this
+direction, I should have altered my course. I had heard that your arms
+were bent (somewhat to my mind more nobly) against Malatesta, the tyrant
+of Rimini!"
+
+"They were so. He was my foe; he is my tributary. We conquered him. He
+paid us the price of his liberty. We marched by Asciano upon Sienna.
+For sixteen thousand florins we spared that city; and we now hang like
+a thunderbolt over Florence, which dared to send her puny aid to the
+defence of Rimini. Our marches are forced and rapid and our camp in this
+plain but just pitched."
+
+"I hear that the Grand Company is allied with Albornoz, and that its
+General is secretly the soldier of the Church. Is it so?"
+
+"Ay--Albornoz and I understand one another," replied Montreal,
+carelessly; "and not the less so that we have a mutual foe; whom both
+are sworn to crush, in Visconti, the archbishop of Milan."
+
+"Visconti! the most potent of the Italian princes. That he has justly
+incurred the wrath of the Church I know--and I can readily understand
+that Innocent has revoked the pardon which the intrigues of the
+Archbishop purchased from Clement VI. But I do not see clearly why
+Montreal should willingly provoke so dark and terrible a foe."
+
+Montreal smiled sternly. "Know you not," he said, "the vast ambition of
+that Visconti? By the Holy Sepulchre, he is precisely the enemy my soul
+leaps to meet! He has a genius worthy to cope with Montreal's. I have
+made myself master of his secret plans--they are gigantic! In a word,
+the Archbishop designs the conquest of all Italy. His enormous wealth
+purchases the corrupt--his dark sagacity ensnares the credulous--his
+daring valour awes the weak. Every enemy he humbles--every ally he
+enslaves. This is precisely the Prince whose progress Walter de Montreal
+must arrest. For this (he said in a whisper as to himself) is precisely
+the Prince who, if suffered to extend his power, will frustrate the
+plans and break the force of Walter de Montreal."
+
+Adrian was silent, and for the first time a suspicion of the real nature
+of the Provencal's designs crossed his breast.
+
+"But, noble Montreal," resumed the Colonna, "give me, if your knowledge
+serves, as no doubt it does,--give me the latest tidings of my native
+city. I am Roman, and Rome is ever in my thoughts."
+
+"And well she may," replied Montreal, quickly. "Thou knowest that
+Albornoz, as Legate of the Pontiff, led the army of the Church into the
+Papal Territories. He took with him Cola di Rienzi. Arrived at Monte
+Fiascone, crowds of Romans of all ranks hastened thither to render
+homage to the Tribune. The Legate was forgotten in the popularity of
+his companion. Whether or not Albornoz grew jealous--for he is proud as
+Lucifer--of the respect paid to the Tribune, or whether he feared the
+restoration of his power, I cannot tell. But he detained him in his
+camp, and refused to yield him to all the solicitations and all the
+deputations of the Romans. Artfully, however, he fulfilled one of the
+real objects of Rienzi's release. Through his means he formally regained
+the allegiance of Rome to the Church, and by the attraction of his
+presence swelled his camp with Roman recruits. Marching to Viterbo,
+Rienzi distinguished himself greatly in deeds of arms against the tyrant
+("Vita di Cola di Rienzi".) John di Vico. Nay, he fought as one worthy
+of belonging to the Grand Company. This increased the zeal of the
+Romans; and the city disgorged half its inhabitants to attend the person
+of the bold Tribune. To the entreaties of these worthy citizens (perhaps
+the very men who had before shut up their darling in St. Angelo) the
+crafty Legate merely replied, 'Arm against John di Vico--conquer the
+tyrants of the Territory--re-establish the patrimony of St. Peter, and
+Rienzi shall then be proclaimed Senator, and return to Rome.'
+
+"These words inspired the Romans with so great a zeal, that they
+willingly lent their aid to the Legate. Aquapendente, Bolzena yielded,
+John di Vico was half reduced and half terrified into submission, and
+Gabrielli, the tyrant of Agobbio, has since succumbed. The glory is to
+the Cardinal, but the merit with Rienzi."
+
+"And now?"
+
+"Albornoz continued to entertain the Senator-Tribune with great
+splendour and fair words, but not a word about restoring him to Rome.
+Wearied with this suspense, I have learned by secret intelligence that
+Rienzi has left the camp, and betaken himself with few attendants to
+Florence, where he has friends, who will provide him with arms and money
+to enter Rome."
+
+"Ah then! now I guess," said Adrian, with a half smile, "for whom I was
+mistaken!"
+
+Montreal blushed slightly. "Fairly conjectured!" said he.
+
+"Meanwhile, at Rome," continued the Provencal--"at Rome, your worthy
+House, and that of the Orsini, being elected to the supreme power,
+quarrelled among themselves, and could not keep the authority they had
+won. Francesco Baroncelli, (This Baroncelli, who has been introduced to
+the reader in a former portion of this work, is called by Matteo Villani
+"a man of vile birth and little learning--he had been a Notary of the
+Capitol." In the midst of the armed dissensions between the Barons,
+which followed the expulsion of Rienzi, Baroncelli contrived to make
+himself Master of the Capitol, and of what was considered an auxiliary
+of no common importance--viz. the Great Bell, by whose alarum Rienzi
+had so often summoned to arms the Roman people. Baroncelli was crowned
+Tribune, clothed in a robe of gold brocade, and invested with the
+crozier-sceptre of Rienzi. At first, his cruelty against the great took
+the appearance of protection to the humble; but the excesses of his sons
+(not exaggerated in the text), and his own brutal but bold ferocity,
+soon made him execrated by the people, to whom he owed his elevation. He
+had the folly to declare against the Pope; and this it really was that
+mainly induced Innocent to restore, and oppose to their New Demagogue,
+the former and more illustrious Tribune. Baroncelli, like Rienzi, was
+excommunicated; and in his instance, also, the curse of the Church
+was the immediate cause of his downfall. In attempting flight he was
+massacred by the mob, December, 1353. Some, however, have maintained
+that he was slain in combat with Rienzi; and others, by a confusion
+of dates, have made him succeed to Rienzi on the death of the
+latter.--Matteo Villani, lib. iii. cap. 78. Osservaz. Stor. di Zefirino
+Re. MS. Vat. Rip. dal Bzovio, ann. 1353. N. 2.) a new demagogue, a
+humble imitator of Rienzi, rose upon the ruins of the peace broken by
+the nobles, obtained the title of Tribune, and carried about the very
+insignia used by his predecessor. But less wise than Rienzi, he took
+the antipapal party. And the Legate was thus enabled to play the papal
+demagogue against the usurper. Baroncelli was a weak man, his sons
+committed every excess in mimicry of the highborn tyrants of Padua and
+Milan. Virgins violated and matrons dishonoured, somewhat contrasted the
+solemn and majestic decorum of Rienzi's rule;--in fine, Baroncelli fell
+massacred by the people. And now, if you ask what rules Rome, I answer,
+'It is the hope of Rienzi.'"
+
+"A strange man, and various fortunes. What will be the end of both!"
+
+"Swift murder to the first, and eternal fame to the last," answered
+Montreal, calmly. "Rienzi will be restored; that brave phoenix will wing
+its way through storm and cloud to its own funereal pyre: I foresee, I
+compassionate, I admire.--And then," added Montreal, "I look beyond!"
+
+"But wherefore feel you so certain that, if restored, Rienzi must fall?"
+
+"Is it not clear to every eye, save his, whom ambition blinds? How can
+mortal genius, however great, rule that most depraved people by popular
+means? The Barons--(you know their indomitable ferocity)--wedded to
+abuse, and loathing every semblance to law; the Barons, humbled for
+a moment, will watch their occasion, and rise. The people will again
+desert. Or else, grown wise in one respect by experience, the new
+Senator will see that popular favour has a loud voice, but a recreant
+arm. He will, like the Barons, surround himself by foreign swords. A
+detachment from the Grand Company will be his courtiers; they will be
+his masters! To pay them the people must be taxed. Then the idol is
+execrated. No Italian hand can govern these hardy demons of the north;
+they will mutiny and fall away. A new demagogue will lead on the people,
+and Rienzi will be the victim. Mark my prophecy!"
+
+"And then the 'beyond' to which you look?"
+
+"Utter prostration of Rome, for new and long ages; God makes not two
+Rienzis; or," said Montreal, proudly, "the infusion of a new life into
+the worn-out and diseased frame,--the foundation of a new dynasty.
+Verily, when I look around me, I believe that the Ruler of nations
+designs the restoration of the South by the irruptions of the North; and
+that out of the old Franc and Germanic race will be built up the thrones
+of the future world!"
+
+As Montreal thus spoke, leaning on his great war-sword, with his fair
+and heroic features--so different, in their frank, bold, fearless
+expression, from the dark and wily intellect that characterises
+the lineaments of the South--eloquent at once with enthusiasm and
+thought--he might have seemed no unfitting representative of the genius
+of that northern chivalry of which he spake. And Adrian half fancied
+that he saw before him one of the old Gothic scourges of the Western
+World.
+
+Their conversation was here interrupted by the sound of a trumpet, and
+presently an officer entering, announced the arrival of ambassadors from
+Florence.
+
+"Again you must pardon me, noble Adrian," said Montreal, "and let me
+claim you as my guest at least for tonight. Here you may rest secure,
+and on parting, my men shall attend you to the frontiers of whatsoever
+territory you design to visit."
+
+Adrian, not sorry to see more of a man so celebrated, accepted the
+invitation.
+
+Left alone, he leaned his head upon his hand, and soon became lost in
+his reflections.
+
+
+
+Chapter 8.III. Faithful and Ill-fated Love.--The Aspirations Survive the
+Affections.
+
+Since that fearful hour in which Adrian Colonna had gazed upon the
+lifeless form of his adored Irene, the young Roman had undergone the
+usual vicissitudes of a wandering and adventurous life in those exciting
+times. His country seemed no longer dear to him. His very rank precluded
+him from the post he once aspired to take in restoring the liberties of
+Rome; and he felt that if ever such a revolution could be consummated,
+it was reserved for one in whose birth and habits the people could
+feel sympathy and kindred, and who could lift his hand in their behalf
+without becoming the apostate of his order and the judge of his own
+House. He had travelled through various courts, and served with renown
+in various fields. Beloved and honoured wheresoever he fixed a temporary
+home, no change of scene had removed his melancholy--no new ties had
+chased away the memory of the Lost. In that era of passionate and
+poetical romance, which Petrarch represented rather than created, Love
+had already begun to assume a more tender and sacred character than it
+had hitherto known, it had gradually imbibed the divine spirit which
+it derives from Christianity, and which associates its sorrows on
+earth with the visions and hopes of heaven. To him who relies upon
+immortality, fidelity to the dead is easy; because death cannot
+extinguish hope, and the soul of the mourner is already half in the
+world to come. It is an age that desponds of a future life--representing
+death as an eternal separation--in which, if men grieve awhile for the
+dead, they hasten to reconcile themselves to the living. For true is the
+old aphorism, that love exists not without hope. And all that romantic
+worship which the Hermit of Vaucluse felt, or feigned, for Laura, found
+its temple in the desolate heart of Adrian Colonna. He was emphatically
+the Lover of his time! Often as, in his pilgrimage from land to land,
+he passed the walls of some quiet and lonely convent, he seriously
+meditated the solemn vows, and internally resolved that the cloister
+should receive his maturer age. The absence of years had, however,
+in some degree restored the dimmed and shattered affection for his
+fatherland, and he desired once more to visit the city in which he had
+first beheld Irene. "Perhaps," he thought, "time may have wrought some
+unlooked-for change; and I may yet assist to restore my country."
+
+But with this lingering patriotism no ambition was mingled. In that
+heated stage of action, in which the desire of power seemed to stir
+through every breast, and Italy had become the El Dorado of wealth, or
+the Utopia of empire, to thousands of valiant arms and plotting minds,
+there was at least one breast that felt the true philosophy of the
+Hermit. Adrian's nature, though gallant and masculine, was singularly
+imbued with that elegance of temperament which recoils from rude
+contact, and to which a lettered and cultivated indolence is the
+supremest luxury. His education, his experience, and his intellect, had
+placed him far in advance of his age, and he looked with a high contempt
+on the coarse villanies and base tricks by which Italian ambition
+sought its road to power. The rise and fall of Rienzi, who, whatever his
+failings, was at least the purest and most honourable of the self-raised
+princes of the age, had conspired to make him despond of the success of
+noble, as he recoiled from that of selfish aspirations. And the dreamy
+melancholy which resulted from his ill-starred love, yet more tended
+to wean him from the stale and hackneyed pursuits of the world. His
+character was full of beauty and of poetry--not the less so in that it
+found not a vent for its emotions in the actual occupation of the poet!
+Pent within, those emotions diffused themselves over all his thoughts
+and coloured his whole soul. Sometimes, in the blessed abstraction of
+his visions, he pictured to himself the lot he might have chosen had
+Irene lived, and fate united them--far from the turbulent and vulgar
+roar of Rome--but amidst some yet unpolluted solitude of the bright
+Italian soil. Before his eye there rose the lovely landscape--the palace
+by the borders of the waveless lake--the vineyards in the valley--the
+dark forests waving from the hill--and that home, the resort and refuge
+of all the minstrelsy and love of Italy, brightened by the "Lampeggiar
+dell' angelico riso," that makes a paradise in the face we love. Often,
+seduced by such dreams to complete oblivion of his loss, the young
+wanderer started from the ideal bliss, to behold around him the solitary
+waste of way--or the moonlit tents of war--or, worse than all, the
+crowds and revels of a foreign court.
+
+Whether or not such fancies now, for a moment, allured his meditations,
+conjured up, perhaps, by the name of Irene's brother, which never
+sounded in his ears but to awaken ten thousand associations, the Colonna
+remained thoughtful and absorbed, until he was disturbed by his own
+squire, who, accompanied by Montreal's servitors, ushered in
+his solitary but ample repast. Flasks of the richest Florentine
+wines--viands prepared with all the art which, alas, Italy has now
+lost!--goblets and salvers of gold and silver, prodigally wrought with
+barbaric gems--attested the princely luxury which reigned in the camp
+of the Grand Company. But Adrian saw in all only the spoliation of his
+degraded country, and felt the splendour almost as an insult. His lonely
+meal soon concluded, he became impatient of the monotony of his tent;
+and, tempted by the cool air of the descending eve, sauntered carelessly
+forth. He bent his steps by the side of the brooklet that curved,
+snakelike and sparkling, by Montreal's tent; and finding a spot somewhat
+solitary and apart from the warlike tenements around, flung himself by
+the margin of the stream.
+
+The last rays of the sun quivered on the wave that danced musically over
+its stony bed; and amidst a little copse on the opposite bank broke the
+brief and momentary song of such of the bolder habitants of that purple
+air as the din of the camp had not scared from their green retreat. The
+clouds lay motionless to the west, in that sky so darkly and intensely
+blue, never seen but over the landscapes that a Claude or a Rosa loved
+to paint; and dim and delicious rose-hues gathered over the grey peaks
+of the distant Apennines. From afar floated the hum of the camp, broken
+by the neigh of returning steeds; the blast of an occasional bugle; and,
+at regular intervals, by the armed tramp of the neighbouring sentry.
+And opposite to the left of the copse--upon a rising ground, matted
+with reeds, moss, and waving shrubs--were the ruins of some old Etruscan
+building, whose name had perished, whose very uses were unknown.
+
+The scene was so calm and lovely, as Adrian gazed upon it, that it was
+scarcely possible to imagine it at that very hour the haunt of fierce
+and banded robbers, among most of whom the very soul of man was
+embruted, and to all of whom murder or rapine made the habitual
+occupation of life.
+
+Still buried in his reveries, and carelessly dropping stones into the
+noisy rivulet, Adrian was aroused by the sound of steps.
+
+"A fair spot to listen to the lute and the ballads of Provence," said
+the voice of Montreal, as the Knight of St. John threw himself on the
+turf beside the young Colonna.
+
+"You retain, then, your ancient love of your national melodies," said
+Adrian.
+
+"Ay, I have not yet survived all my youth," answered Montreal, with a
+slight sigh. "But somehow or other, the strains that once pleased
+my fancy now go too directly to my heart. So, though I still welcome
+jongleur and minstrel, I bid them sing their newest conceits. I cannot
+wish ever again to hear the poetry I heard when I was young!"
+
+"Pardon me," said Adrian, with great interest, "but fain would I have
+dared, though a secret apprehension prevented me hitherto,--fain would
+I have dared to question you of that lovely lady, with whom, seven
+years ago, we gazed at moonlight upon the odorous orange-groves and rosy
+waters of Terracina."
+
+Montreal turned away his face; he laid his hand on Adrian's arm, and
+murmured, in a deep and hoarse tone, "I am alone now!"
+
+Adrian pressed his hand in silence. He felt no light shock at thus
+learning the death of one so gentle, so lovely, and so ill-fated.
+
+"The vows of my knighthood," continued Montreal, "which precluded
+Adeline the rights of wedlock--the shame of her house--the angry
+grief of her mother--the wild vicissitudes of my life, so exposed to
+peril--the loss of her son--all preyed silently on her frame. She did
+not die (die is too harsh a word!), but she drooped away, and glided
+into heaven. Even as on a summer's morn some soft dream fleets across
+us, growing less and less distinct, until it fades, as it were, into
+light, and we awaken--so faded Adeline's parting spirit, till the
+daylight of God broke upon it."
+
+Montreal paused a moment, and then resumed: "These thoughts make the
+boldest of us weak sometimes, and we Provencals are foolish in these
+matters!--God wot, she was very dear to me!"
+
+The Knight bent down and crossed himself devoutly, his lips muttered a
+prayer. Strange as it may seem to our more enlightened age, so martial
+a garb did morality then wear, that this man, at whose word towns had
+blazed and torrents of blood had flowed, neither adjudged himself, nor
+was adjudged by the majority of his contemporaries, a criminal. His
+order, half monastic, half warlike, was emblematic of himself.
+He trampled upon man, yet humbled himself to God; nor had all his
+acquaintance with the refining scepticism of Italy shaken the sturdy and
+simple faith of the bold Provencal. So far from recognising any want
+of harmony between his calling and his creed, he held that man no true
+chevalier who was not as devout to the Cross as relentless with the
+sword.
+
+"And you have no child save the one you lost?" asked Adrian, when he
+observed the wonted composure of Montreal once more returning.
+
+"None!" said Montreal, as his brow again darkened. "No love-begotten
+heir of mine will succeed to the fortunes I trust yet to build. Never
+on earth shall I see upon the face of her child the likeness of Adeline!
+Yet, at Avignon, I saw a boy I would have claimed; for methought she
+must have looked her soul into his eyes, they were so like hers! Well,
+well! The Provence tree hath other branches; and some unborn nephew must
+be--what? The stars have not yet decided! But ambition is now the only
+thing in the world left me to love."
+
+"So differently operates the same misfortune upon different characters,"
+thought the Colonna. "To me, crowns became valueless when I could no
+longer dream of placing them on Irene's brow!"
+
+The similarity of their fates, however, attracted Adrian strongly
+towards his host; and the two Knights conversed together with more
+friendship and unreserve than they had hitherto done. At length Montreal
+said, "By the way, I have not inquired your destination."
+
+"I am bound to Rome," said Adrian; "and the intelligence I have learned
+from you incites me thitherward yet more eagerly. If Rienzi return, I
+may mediate successfully, perchance, between the Tribune-Senator and the
+nobles; and if I find my cousin, young Stefanello, now the head of
+our house, more tractable than his sires, I shall not despair of
+conciliating the less powerful Barons. Rome wants repose; and whoever
+governs, if he govern but with justice, ought to be supported both by
+prince and plebeian!"
+
+Montreal listened with great attention, and then muttered to himself,
+"No, it cannot be!" He mused a little while, shading his brow with his
+hand, before he said aloud, "To Rome you are bound. Well, we shall meet
+soon amidst its ruins. Know, by the way, that my object here is already
+won: these Florentine merchants have acceded to my terms; they have
+purchased a two years' peace; tomorrow the camp breaks up, and the
+Grand Company march to Lombardy. There, if my schemes prosper, and
+the Venetians pay my price, I league the rascals (under Landau, my
+Lieutenant) with the Sea-City, in defiance of the Visconti, and shall
+pass my autumn in peace amidst the pomps of Rome."
+
+"Sir Walter de Montreal," said Adrian, "your frankness perhaps makes
+me presumptuous; but when I hear you talk, like a huxtering trader, of
+selling alike your friendship and your forbearance, I ask myself, 'Is
+this the great Knight of St. John; and have men spoken of him fairly,
+when they assert the sole stain on his laurels to be his avarice?"
+
+Montreal bit his lip; nevertheless, he answered calmly, "My frankness
+has brought its own penance, Lord Adrian. However, I cannot wholly leave
+so honoured a guest under an impression which I feel to be plausible,
+but not just. No, brave Colonna; report wrongs me. I value Gold,
+for Gold is the Architect of Power! It fills the camp--it storms the
+city--it buys the marketplace--it raises the palace--it founds the
+throne. I value Gold,--it is the means necessary to my end!"
+
+"And that end--"
+
+"Is--no matter what," said the Knight coldly. "Let us to our tents, the
+dews fall heavily, and the malaria floats over these houseless wastes."
+
+The pair rose;--yet, fascinated by the beauty of the hour, they lingered
+for a moment by the brook. The earliest stars shone over its crisping
+wavelets, and a delicious breeze murmured gently amidst the glossy
+herbage.
+
+"Thus gazing," said Montreal, softly, "we reverse the old Medusan fable
+the poets tell us of, and look and muse ourselves out of stone. A little
+while, and it was the sunlight that gilded the wave--it now shines as
+brightly and glides as gaily beneath the stars; even so rolls the stream
+of time: one luminary succeeds the other equally welcomed--equally
+illumining--equally evanescent!--You see, the poetry of Provence still
+lives beneath my mail!"
+
+Adrian early sought his couch; but his own thoughts and the sounds of
+loud mirth that broke from Montreal's tent, where the chief feasted the
+captains of his band, a revel from which he had the delicacy to excuse
+the Roman noble, kept the Colonna long awake; and he had scarcely fallen
+into an unquiet slumber, when yet more discordant sounds again invaded
+his repose. At the earliest dawn the wide armament was astir--the
+creaking of cordage--the tramp of men--loud orders and louder oaths--the
+slow rolling of baggage-wains--and the clank of the armourers, announced
+the removal of the camp, and the approaching departure of the Grand
+Company.
+
+Ere Adrian was yet attired, Montreal entered his tent.
+
+"I have appointed," he said, "five score lances under a trusty leader,
+to accompany you, noble Adrian, to the borders of Romagna; they wait
+your leisure. In another hour I depart; the on-guard are already in
+motion."
+
+Adrian would fain have declined the proffered escort; but he saw that
+it would only offend the pride of the chief, who soon retired. Hastily
+Adrian endued his arms--the air of the fresh morning, and the glad
+sun rising gorgeously from the hills, revived his wearied spirit. He
+repaired to Montreal's tent, and found him alone, with the implements of
+writing before him, and a triumphant smile upon his countenance.
+
+"Fortune showers new favours on me!" he said, gaily. "Yesterday the
+Florentines spared me the trouble of a siege: and today (even since I
+last saw you--a few minutes since) puts your new Senator of Rome into my
+power."
+
+"How! Have your bands then arrested Rienzi?"
+
+"Not so--better still! The Tribune changed his plan, and repaired to
+Perugia, where my brothers now abide--sought them--they have supplied
+him with money and soldiers enough to brave the perils of the way, and
+to defy the swords of the Barons. So writes my good brother Arimbaldo, a
+man of letters, whom the Tribune thinks rightly he has decoyed with old
+tales of Roman greatness, and mighty promises of grateful advancement.
+You find me hastily expressing my content at the arrangement. My
+brothers themselves will accompany the Senator-Tribune to the walls of
+the Capitol."
+
+"Still, I see not how this places Rienzi in your power."
+
+"No! His soldiers are my creatures--his comrades my brothers--his
+creditor myself! Let him rule Rome then--the time soon comes when the
+Vice-Regent must yield to--"
+
+"The Chief of the Grand Company," interrupted Adrian, with a shudder,
+which the bold Montreal was too engrossed with the unconcealed
+excitement of his own thoughts to notice. "No, Knight of Provence,
+basely have we succumbed to domestic tyrants: but never, I trust, will
+Romans be so vile as to wear the yoke of a foreign usurper."
+
+Montreal looked hard at Adrian, and smiled sternly.
+
+"You mistake me," said he; "and it will be time enough for you to play
+the Brutus when I assume the Caesar. Meanwhile we are but host and
+guest. Let us change the theme."
+
+Nevertheless this, their latter conference, threw a chill over both
+during the short time the Knights remained together, and they parted
+with a formality which was ill-suited to their friendly intercourse of
+the night before. Montreal felt he had in cautiously revealed himself,
+but caution was no part of his character, whenever he found himself
+at the head of an army, and at the full tide of fortune; and at that
+moment, so confident was he of the success of his wildest schemes, that
+he recked little whom he offended, or whom alarmed.
+
+Slowly, with his strange and ferocious escort, Adrian renewed his way.
+Winding up a steep ascent that led from the plain,--when he reached
+the summit, the curve in the road shewed him the whole army on its
+march;--the gonfalons waving--the armour flashing in the sun, line after
+line, like a river of steel, and the whole plain bristling with the
+array of that moving war;--while the solemn tread of the armed thousands
+fell subdued and stifled at times by martial and exulting music. As they
+swept on, Adrian descried at length the stately and towering form of
+Montreal upon a black charger, distinguished even at that distance from
+the rest, not more by his gorgeous armour than his lofty stature. So
+swept he on in the pride of his array--in the flush of his hopes--the
+head of a mighty armament--the terror of Italy--the hero that was--the
+monarch that might be!
+
+
+
+
+BOOK IX. THE RETURN.
+
+     "Allora la sua venuta fu a Roma sentita; Romani si
+     apparecchiavano a riceverlo con letizia...furo fatti archi
+     trionfali," &c. &c.--"Vita di Cola di Rienzi", lib. ii. c.
+     17.
+
+     "Then the fame of his coming was felt at Rome; the Romans
+     made ready to receive him with gladness...triumphal arches
+     were erected," &c., &c.--"Life of Cola di Rienzi".
+
+
+
+Chapter 9.I. The Triumphal Entrance.
+
+All Rome was astir!--from St. Angelo to the Capitol, windows, balconies,
+roofs, were crowded with animated thousands. Only here and there, in the
+sullen quarters of the Colonna, the Orsini, and the Savelli, reigned a
+death-like solitude and a dreary gloom. In those fortifications, rather
+than streets, not even the accustomed tread of the barbarian sentinel
+was heard. The gates closed--the casements barred--the grim silence
+around--attested the absence of the Barons. They had left the city so
+soon as they had learned the certain approach of Rienzi. In the villages
+and castles of the Campagna, surrounded by their mercenaries, they
+awaited the hour when the people, weary of their idol, should welcome
+back even those ferocious Iconoclasts.
+
+With these exceptions, all Rome was astir! Triumphal arches of drapery,
+wrought with gold and silver, raised at every principal vista, were
+inscribed with mottoes of welcome and rejoicing. At frequent intervals
+stood youths and maidens, with baskets of flowers and laurels. High
+above the assembled multitudes--from the proud tower of Hadrian--from
+the turrets of the Capitol--from the spires of the sacred buildings
+dedicated to Apostle and to Saint--floated banners as for a victory.
+Rome once more opened her arms to receive her Tribune!
+
+Mingled with the crowd--disguised by his large mantle--hidden by the
+pressure of the throng--his person, indeed, forgotten by most--and, in
+the confusion of the moment, heeded by none--stood Adrian Colonna! He
+had not been able to conquer his interest for the brother of Irene.
+Solitary amidst his fellow-citizens, he stood--the only one of the proud
+race of Colonna who witnessed the triumph of the darling of the people.
+
+"They say he has grown large in his prison," said one of the bystanders;
+"he was lean enough when he came by daybreak out of the Church of St.
+Angelo!"
+
+"Ay," said another, a little man with a shrewd, restless eye, "they say
+truly; I saw him take leave of the Legate."
+
+Every eye was turned to the last speaker; he became at once a personage
+of importance. "Yes," continued the little man with an elated and
+pompous air, "as soon, d'ye see, as he had prevailed on Messere
+Brettone, and Messere Arimbaldo, the brothers of Fra Moreale, to
+accompany him from Perugia to Monte Fiascone, he went at once to the
+Legate d'Albornoz, who was standing in the open air conversing with his
+captains. A crowd followed. I was one of them; and the Tribune nodded
+at me--ay, that did he!--and so, with his scarlet cloak, and his scarlet
+cap, he faced the proud Cardinal with a pride greater than his own.
+'Monsignore,' said he, 'though you accord me neither money nor arms, to
+meet the dangers of the road and brave the ambush of the Barons, I
+am prepared to depart. Senator of Rome, his Holiness hath made me:
+according to custom, I pray you, Monsignore, forthwith to confirm the
+rank.' I would you could have seen how the proud Spaniard stared, and
+blushed, and frowned; but he bit his lip, and said little."
+
+"And confirmed Rienzi Senator?"
+
+"Yes; and blessed him, and bade him depart."
+
+"Senator!" said a stalwart but grey-haired giant with folded arms; "I
+like not a title that has been borne by a patrician. I fear me, in the
+new title he will forget the old."
+
+"Fie, Cecco del Vecchio, you were always a grumbler!" said a merchant
+of cloth, whose commodity the ceremonial had put in great request.
+"Fie!--for my part, I think Senator a less new-fangled title than
+Tribune. I hope there will be feasting enow, at last. Rome has been long
+dull. A bad time for trade, I warrant me!"
+
+The artisan grinned scornfully. He was one of those who distinguished
+between the middle class and the working, and he loathed a merchant as
+much as he did a noble. "The day wears," said the little man; "he must
+be here anon. The Senator's lady, and all his train, have gone forth to
+meet him these two hours."
+
+Scarce were these words uttered, when the crowd to the right swayed
+restlessly; and presently a horseman rode rapidly through the street.
+"Way there! Keep back! Way--make way for the Most Illustrious the
+Senator of Rome!"
+
+The crowd became hushed--then murmuring--then hushed again. From balcony
+and casement stretched the neck of every gazer. The tramp of steeds was
+heard at a distance--the sound of clarion and trumpet;--then, gleaming
+through the distant curve of the streets, was seen the wave of the
+gonfalons--then, the glitter of spears--and then from the whole
+multitude, as from one voice, arose the shout,--"He comes! he comes!"
+
+Adrian shrunk yet more backward amongst the throng; and, leaning against
+the wall of one of the houses, contemplated the approaching pageant.
+
+First came, six abreast, the procession of Roman horsemen who had gone
+forth to meet the Senator, bearing boughs of olive in their hands; each
+hundred preceded by banners, inscribed with the words, "Liberty and
+Peace restored." As these passed the group by Adrian, each more popular
+citizen of the cavalcade was recognised, and received with loud shouts.
+By the garb and equipment of the horsemen, Adrian saw that they belonged
+chiefly to the traders of Rome; a race who, he well knew, unless
+strangely altered, valued liberty only as a commercial speculation. "A
+vain support these," thought the Colonna;--"what next?" on, then, came
+in glittering armour the German mercenaries, hired by the gold of the
+Brothers of Provence, in number two hundred and fifty, and previously
+in the pay of Malatesta of Rimini;--tall, stern, sedate,
+disciplined,--eyeing the crowd with a look, half of barbarian wonder,
+half of insolent disdain. No shout of gratulation welcomed these sturdy
+strangers; it was evident that their aspect cast a chill over the
+assembly.
+
+"Shame!" growled Cecco del Vecchio, audibly. "Has the people's friend
+need of the swords which guard an Orsini or a Malatesta?--shame!"
+
+No voice this time silenced the huge malcontent.
+
+"His only real defence against the Barons," thought Adrian, "if he pay
+them well! But their number is not sufficient!"
+
+Next came two hundred fantassins, or foot-soldiers, of Tuscany, with the
+corselets and arms of the heavy-armed soldiery--a gallant company, and
+whose cheerful looks and familiar bearing appeared to sympathise
+with the crowd. And in truth they did so,--for they were Tuscans,
+and therefore lovers of freedom. In them, too, the Romans seemed to
+recognise natural and legitimate allies,--and there was a general cry of
+"Vivano i bravi Toscani!"
+
+"Poor defence!" thought the more sagacious Colonna; "the Barons can awe,
+and the mob corrupt them."
+
+Next came a file of trumpeters and standard-bearers;--and now the sound
+of the music was drowned by shouts, which seemed to rise simultaneously
+as from every quarter of the city;--"Rienzi! Rienzi!--Welcome,
+welcome!--Liberty and Rienzi! Rienzi and the Good Estate!" Flowers
+dropped on his path, kerchiefs and banners waved from every
+house;--tears might be seen coursing, unheeded, down bearded
+cheeks;--youth and age were kneeling together, with uplifted hands,
+invoking blessings on the head of the Restored. On he came the
+Senator-Tribune--"the Phoenix to his pyre!"
+
+Robed in scarlet, that literally blazed with gold, his proud head bared
+in the sun, and bending to the saddle bow, Rienzi passed slowly through
+the throng. Not in the flush of that hour were visible, on his glorious
+countenance, the signs of disease and care: the very enlargement of his
+proportions gave a greater majesty to his mien. Hope sparkled in his
+eye--triumph and empire sat upon his brow. The crowd could not contain
+themselves; they pressed forward, each upon each, anxious to catch the
+glance of his eye, to touch the hem of his robe. He himself was deeply
+affected by their joy. He halted; with faltering and broken words,
+he attempted to address them. "I am repaid," he said,--"repaid for
+all;--may I live to make you happy!"
+
+The crowd parted again--the Senator moved on--again the crowd closed
+in. Behind the Tribune, to their excited imagination, seemed to move the
+very goddess of ancient Rome.
+
+Upon a steed, caparisoned with cloth of gold;--in snow-white robes,
+studded with gems that flashed back the day,--came the beautiful and
+regal Nina. The memory of her pride, her ostentation, all forgotten in
+that moment, she was scarce less welcome, scarce less idolized, than her
+lord. And her smile all radiant with joy--her lip quivering with proud
+and elate emotion,--never had she seemed at once so born alike for love
+and for command;--a Zenobia passing through the pomp of Rome,--not a
+captive, but a queen.
+
+But not upon that stately form riveted the gaze of Adrian--pale,
+breathless, trembling, he clung to the walls against which he leaned.
+Was it a dream? Had the dead revived? Or was it his own--his living
+Irene--whose soft and melancholy loveliness shone sadly by the side of
+Nina--a star beside the moon? The pageant faded from his eyes--all grew
+dim and dark. For a moment he was insensible. When he recovered, the
+crowd was hurrying along, confused and blent with the mighty stream
+that followed the procession. Through the moving multitude he caught the
+graceful form of Irene, again snatched by the closing standards of the
+procession from his view. His blood rushed back from his heart through
+every vein. He was as a man who for years had been in a fearful trance,
+and who is suddenly awakened to the light of heaven.
+
+One of that mighty throng remained motionless with Adrian. It was Cecco
+del Vecchio.
+
+"He did not see me," muttered the smith to himself; "old friends are
+forgotten now! Well, well, Cecco del Vecchio hates tyrants still--no
+matter what their name, nor how smoothly they are disguised. He did not
+see ME! Umph!"
+
+
+
+Chapter 9.II. The Masquerade.
+
+The acuter reader has already learned, without the absolute intervention
+of the author as narrator, the incidents occurring to Rienzi in the
+interval between his acquittal at Avignon and his return to Rome. As the
+impression made by Nina upon the softer and better nature of Albornoz
+died away, he naturally began to consider his guest--as the profound
+politicians of that day ever considered men--a piece upon the great
+Chess-Board, to be moved, advanced, or sacrificed, as best suited
+the scheme in view. His purpose accomplished, in the recovery of the
+patrimonial territory, the submission of John di Vico, and the fall
+and death of the Demagogue Baroncelli, the Cardinal deemed it far from
+advisable to restore to Rome, and with so high a dignity, the able and
+ambitious Rienzi. Before the daring Roman, even his own great spirit
+quailed; and he was wholly unable to conceive or to calculate the policy
+that might be adopted by the new Senator, when once more Lord of
+Rome. Without affecting to detain, he therefore declined to assist in
+restoring him. And Rienzi thus saw himself within an easy march of Rome,
+without one soldier to protect him against the Barons by the way.
+But Heaven had decreed that no single man, however gifted, or however
+powerful, should long counteract or master the destinies of Rienzi: and
+perhaps in no more glittering scene of his life did he ever evince so
+dexterous and subtle an intellect as he now did in extricating himself
+from the wiles of the Cardinal. Repairing to Perugia, he had, as we have
+seen, procured, through the brothers of Montreal, men and money for his
+return. But the Knight of St. John was greatly mistaken, if he imagined
+that Rienzi was not thoroughly aware of the perilous and treacherous
+tenure of the support he had received. His keen eye read at a glance the
+aims and the characters of the brothers of Montreal--he knew that while
+affecting to serve him, they designed to control--that, made the debtor
+of the grasping and aspiring Montreal, and surrounded by the troops
+conducted by Montreal's brethren, he was in the midst of a net which, if
+not broken, would soon involve fortune and life itself in its fatal and
+deadly meshes. But, confident in the resources and promptitude of his
+own genius, he yet sanguinely trusted to make those his puppets, who
+dreamed that he was their own; and, with empire for the stake, he cared
+not how crafty the antagonists he was compelled to engage.
+
+Meanwhile, uniting to all his rasher and all his nobler qualities, a
+profound dissimulation, he appeared to trust implicitly to his Provencal
+companions; and his first act on entering the Capitol, after the
+triumphal procession, was to reward with the highest dignities in his
+gift, Messere Arimbaldo and Messere Brettone de Montreal!
+
+High feasting was there that night in the halls of the Capitol; but
+dearer to Rienzi than all the pomp of the day, were the smiles of Nina.
+Her proud and admiring eyes, swimming with delicious tears, fixed upon
+his countenance, she but felt that they were re-united, and that the
+hours, however brilliantly illumined, were hastening to that moment,
+when, after so desolate and dark an absence, they might once more be
+alone.
+
+Far other the thoughts of Adrian Colonna, as he sate alone in the dreary
+palace in the yet more dreary quarter of his haughty race. Irene then
+was alive,--he had been deceived by some strange error,--she had escaped
+the devouring pestilence; and something in the pale sadness of her
+gentle features, even in that day of triumph, told him he was still
+remembered. But as his mind by degrees calmed itself from its first wild
+and tumultuous rapture, he could not help asking himself the question
+whether they were not still to be divided! Stefanello Colonna, the
+grandson of the old Stephen, and (by the death of his sire and brother)
+the youthful head of that powerful House, had already raised his
+standard against the Senator. Fortifying himself in the almost
+impregnable fastness of Palestrina, he had assembled around him all
+the retainers of his family, and his lawless soldiery now ravaged the
+neighbouring plains far and wide.
+
+Adrian foresaw that the lapse of a few days would suffice to bring the
+Colonna and the Senator to open war. Could he take part against those
+of his own blood? The very circumstance of his love for Irene would
+yet more rob such a proceeding of all appearance of disinterested
+patriotism, and yet more deeply and irremediably stain his knightly
+fame, wherever the sympathy of his equals was enlisted with the cause
+of the Colonna. On the other hand, not only his love for the Senator's
+sister, but his own secret inclinations and honest convictions, were on
+the side of one who alone seemed to him possessed of the desire and the
+genius to repress the disorders of his fallen city. Long meditating, he
+feared no alternative was left him but in the same cruel neutrality to
+which he had been before condemned; but he resolved at least to make
+the attempt--rendered favourable and dignified by his birth and
+reputation--to reconcile the contending parties. To effect this, he saw
+that he must begin with his haughty cousin. He was well aware that were
+it known that he had first obtained an interview with Rienzi--did it
+appear as if he were charged with overtures from the Senator--although
+Stefanello himself might be inclined to yield to his representations,
+the insolent and ferocious Barons who surrounded him would not deign
+to listen to the envoy of the People's chosen one; and instead of being
+honoured as an intercessor, he should be suspected as a traitor. He
+determined, then, to depart for Palestrina; but (and his heart beat
+audibly) would it not be possible first to obtain an interview with
+Irene? It was no easy enterprise, surrounded as she was, but he resolved
+to adventure it. He summoned Giulio.
+
+"The Senator holds a festival this evening--think you that the
+assemblage will be numerous?"
+
+"I hear," answered Giulio, "that the banquet given to the Ambassadors
+and Signors today is to be followed tomorrow by a mask, to which all
+ranks are admitted. By Bacchus, (Still a common Roman expletive.) if the
+Tribune only invited nobles, the smallest closet in the Capitol would
+suffice to receive his maskers. I suppose a mask has been resolved on in
+order to disguise the quality of the visitors."
+
+Adrian mused a moment; and the result of his revery was a determination
+to delay for another sun his departure to Palestrina--to take advantage
+of the nature of the revel, and to join the masquerade.
+
+That species of entertainment, though unusual at that season of the
+year, had been preferred by Rienzi, partly and ostensibly because it
+was one in which all his numerous and motley supporters could be best
+received; but chiefly and secretly because it afforded himself and his
+confidential friends the occasion to mix unsuspected amongst the throng,
+and learn more of the real anticipations of the Romans with respect
+to his policy and his strength, than could well be gathered from the
+enthusiasm of a public spectacle.
+
+The following night was beautifully serene and clear. The better to
+accommodate the numerous guests, and to take advantage of the warm and
+moonlit freshness of the air, the open court of the Capitol, with the
+Place of the Lion, (as well as the state apartments within,) was devoted
+to the festival.
+
+As Adrian entered the festive court with the rush of the throng, it
+chanced that in the eager impatience of some maskers, more vehement
+than the rest, his vizard was deranged. He hastily replaced it; but not
+before one of the guests had recognised his countenance.
+
+From courtesy, Rienzi and his family remained at first unmasked. They
+stood at the head of the stairs to which the old Egyptian Lion gave the
+name. The lights shone over that Colossal Monument--which, torn from its
+antique home, had witnessed, in its grim repose, the rise and lapse of
+countless generations, and the dark and stormy revolutions of avenging
+fate. It was an ill omen, often afterwards remarked, that the place of
+that state festival was the place also of the state executions. But at
+that moment, as group after group pressed forward to win smile and word
+from the celebrated man, whose fortunes had been the theme of Europe,
+or to bend in homage to the lustrous loveliness of Nina, no omen and no
+warning clouded the universal gladness.
+
+Behind Nina, well contented to shrink from the gaze of the throng, and
+to feel her softer beauty eclipsed by the dazzling and gorgeous charms
+of her brother's wife, stood Irene. Amidst the crowd on her alone Adrian
+fixed his eyes. The years which had flown over the fair brow of the
+girl of sixteen--then animated by, yet trembling beneath, the first wild
+breath of Love;--youth in every vein--passion and childish tenderness
+in every thought, had not marred, but they had changed, the character
+of Irene's beauty. Her cheek, no longer varying with every instant, was
+settled into a delicate and thoughtful paleness--her form, more rounded
+to the proportions of Roman beauty, had assumed an air of dignified and
+calm repose. No longer did the restless eye wander in search of some
+imagined object; no longer did the lip quiver into smiles at some untold
+hope or half-unconscious recollection. A grave and mournful expression
+gave to her face (still how sweet!) a gravity beyond her years. The
+bloom, the flush, the April of the heart, was gone; but yet neither
+time, nor sorrow, nor blighted love, had stolen from her countenance its
+rare and angelic softness--nor that inexpressible and virgin modesty of
+form and aspect, which, contrasting the bolder beauties of Italy, had
+more than aught else distinguished to Adrian, from all other women, the
+idol of his heart. And feeding his gaze upon those dark deep eyes, which
+spoke of thought far away and busy with the past, Adrian felt again and
+again that he was not forgotten! Hovering near her, but suffering the
+crowd to press one after another before him, he did not perceive that he
+had attracted the eagle eye of the Senator.
+
+In fact, as one of the maskers passed Rienzi, he whispered, "Beware,
+a Colonna is among the masks! beneath the reveller's domino has often
+lurked the assassin's dagger. Yonder stands your foe--mark him!"
+
+These words were the first sharp and thrilling intimation of the perils
+into which he had rushed, that the Tribune-Senator had received since
+his return. He changed colour slightly; and for some minutes the courtly
+smile and ready greeting with which he had hitherto delighted every
+guest, gave way to a moody abstraction.
+
+"Why stands yon strange man so mute and motionless?" whispered he to
+Nina. "He speaks to none--he approaches us not--a churl, a churl!--he
+must be seen to."
+
+"Doubtless, some German or English barbarian," answered Nina. "Let not,
+my Lord, so slight a cloud dim your merriment."
+
+"You are right, dearest; we have friends here; we are well girt. And, by
+my father's ashes, I feel that I must accustom myself to danger. Nina,
+let us move on; methinks we might now mix among the maskers--masked
+ourselves."
+
+The music played loud and cheerily as the Senator and his party mingled
+with the throng. But still his eye turned ever towards the grey domino
+of Adrian, and he perceived that it followed his steps. Approaching the
+private entrance of the Capitol, he for a few moments lost sight of
+his unwelcome pursuer: but just as he entered, turning abruptly, Rienzi
+perceived him close at his side--the next moment the stranger had
+vanished amidst the throng. But that moment had sufficed to Adrian--he
+had reached Irene. "Adrian Colonna (he whispered) waits thee beside the
+Lion."
+
+In the absorption of his own reflections, Rienzi fortunately did not
+notice the sudden paleness and agitation of his sister. Entered within
+his palace, he called for wine--the draught revived his spirits--he
+listened smilingly to the sparkling remarks of Nina; and enduing
+his mask and disguise, said, with his wonted cheerfulness, "Now for
+Truth--strange that in festivals it should only speak behind a vizard!
+My sweet sister, thou hast lost thine old smile, and I would rather see
+that than--Ha! has Irene vanished?"
+
+"Only, I suppose, to change her dress, my Cola, and mingle with the
+revellers," answered Nina. "Let my smile atone for hers."
+
+Rienzi kissed the bright brow of his wife as she clung fondly to his
+bosom. "Thy smile is the sunlight," said he; "but this girl disturbs me.
+Methinks now, at least, she might wear a gladder aspect."
+
+"Is there nothing of love beneath my fair sister's gloom?" answered
+Nina. "Do you not call to mind how she loved Adrian Colonna?"
+
+"Does that fantasy hold still?" returned Rienzi, musingly. "Well, and
+she is fit bride for a monarch."
+
+"Yet it were an alliance that would, better than one with monarchs,
+strengthen thy power at Rome!"
+
+"Ay, were it possible; but that haughty race!--Perchance this very
+masker that so haunted our steps was but her lover. I will look to this.
+Let us forth, my Nina. Am I well cloaked?"
+
+"Excellently well--and I?"
+
+"The sun behind a cloud."
+
+"Ah, let us not tarry long; what hour of revel like that when thy hand
+in mine, this head upon thy bosom, we forget the sorrows we have known,
+and even the triumphs we have shared?"
+
+Meanwhile, Irene, confused and lost amidst a transport of emotion,
+already disguised and masked, was threading her way through the crowd
+back to the staircase of the Lion. With the absence of the Senator that
+spot had comparatively been deserted. Music and the dance attracted the
+maskers to another quarter of the wide space. And Irene now approaching,
+beheld the moonlight fall over the statue, and a solitary figure leaning
+against the pedestal. She paused, the figure approached, and again she
+heard the voice of her early love.
+
+"Oh, Irene! recognised even in this disguise," said Adrian, seizing her
+trembling hand; "have I lived to gaze again upon that form--to touch
+this hand? Did not these eyes behold thee lifeless in that fearful
+vault, which I shudder to recall? By what miracle wert thou raised
+again? By what means did Heaven spare to this earth one that it seemed
+already to have placed amongst its angels?"
+
+"Was this, indeed, thy belief?" said Irene, falteringly, but with an
+accent eloquent of joy. "Thou didst not then willingly desert me? Unjust
+that I was, I wronged thy noble nature, and deemed that my brother's
+fall, my humble lineage, thy brilliant fate, had made thee renounce
+Irene."
+
+"Unjust indeed!" answered the lover. "But surely I saw thee amongst the
+dead!--thy cloak, with the silver stars--who else wore the arms of the
+Roman Tribune?"
+
+"Was it but the cloak then, which, dropped in the streets, was probably
+assumed by some more ill-fated victim; was it that sight alone, that
+made thee so soon despair? Ah! Adrian," continued Irene, tenderly, but
+with reproach; "not even when I saw thee seemingly lifeless on the
+couch by which I had watched three days and nights, not even then did I
+despair!"
+
+"What, then, my vision did not deceive me! It was you who watched by my
+bed in that grim hour, whose love guarded, whose care preserved me! And
+I, wretch that I was!--"
+
+"Nay," answered Irene, "your thought was natural. Heaven seemed to endow
+me with superhuman strength, whilst I was necessary to thee. But judge
+of my dismay. I left thee to seek the good friar who attended thee as
+thy leech; I returned, and found thee not. Heart-sick and terrified, I
+searched the desolate city in vain. Strong as I was while hope supported
+me, I sunk beneath fear.--And my brother found me senseless, and
+stretched on the ground, by the church of St. Mark."
+
+"The church of St. Mark!--so foretold his dream!"
+
+"He had told me he had met thee; we searched for thee in vain; at length
+we heard that thou hadst left the city, and--and--I rejoiced, Adrian,
+but I repined!"
+
+For some minutes the young lovers surrendered themselves to the delight
+of reunion, while new explanations called forth new transports.
+
+"And now," murmured Irene, "now that we have met--" she paused, and her
+mask concealed her blushes.
+
+"Now that we have met," said Adrian, filling up the silence, "wouldst
+thou say further, 'that we should not part?' Trust me, dearest, that is
+the hope that animates my heart. It was but to enjoy these brief bright
+moments with thee, that I delayed my departure to Palestrina. Could
+I but hope to bring my young cousin into amity with thy brother, no
+barrier would prevent our union. Willingly I forget the past--the death
+of my unhappy kinsmen, (victims, it is true, to their own faults;)
+and, perhaps, amidst all the crowds that hailed his return, none more
+appreciated the great and lofty qualities of Cola di Rienzi, than did
+Adrian Colonna."
+
+"If this be so," said Irene, "let me hope the best; meanwhile, it is
+enough of comfort and of happiness to know, that we love each other as
+of old. Ah, Adrian, I am sadly changed; and often have I thought it
+a thing beyond my dreams, that thou shouldst see me again and love me
+still."
+
+"Fairer art thou and lovelier than ever," answered Adrian, passionately;
+"and time, which has ripened thy bloom, has but taught me more deeply to
+feel thy value. Farewell, Irene, I linger here no longer; thou wilt, I
+trust, hear soon of my success with my House, and ere the week be over I
+may return to claim thy hand in the face of day."
+
+The lovers parted; Adrian lingered on the spot, and Irene hastened to
+bury her emotion and her raptures in her own chamber.
+
+As her form vanished, and the young Colonna slowly turned away, a tall
+mask strode abruptly towards him.
+
+"Thou art a Colonna," it said, "and in the power of the Senator. Dost
+thou tremble?"
+
+"If I be a Colonna, rude masker," answered Adrian, coldly, "thou
+shouldst know the old proverb, 'He who stirs the column, shall rue the
+fall.'"
+
+The stranger laughed aloud, and then lifting his mask, Adrian saw that
+it was the Senator who stood before him.
+
+"My Lord Adrian di Castello," said Rienzi, resuming all his gravity, "is
+it as friend or foe that you have honoured our revels this night?"
+
+"Senator of Rome," answered Adrian, with equal stateliness, "I partake
+of no man's hospitality but as a friend. A foe, at least to you, I trust
+never justly to be esteemed."
+
+"I would," rejoined Rienzi, "that I could apply to myself unreservedly
+that most flattering speech. Are these friendly feelings entertained
+towards me as the Governor of the Roman people, or as the brother of the
+woman who has listened to your vows?"
+
+Adrian, who when the Senator had unmasked had followed his example,
+felt at these words that his eye quailed beneath Rienzi's. However, he
+recovered himself with the wonted readiness of an Italian, and replied
+laconically,
+
+"As both."
+
+"Both!" echoed Rienzi. "Then, indeed, noble Adrian, you are welcome
+hither. And yet, methinks, if you conceived there was no cause for
+enmity between us, you would have wooed the sister of Cola di Rienzi
+in a guise more worthy of your birth; and, permit me to add, of that
+station which God, destiny, and my country, have accorded unto me. You
+dare not, young Colonna, meditate dishonour to the sister of the Senator
+of Rome. Highborn as you are, she is your equal."
+
+"Were I the Emperor, whose simple knight I but am, your sister were my
+equal," answered Adrian, warmly. "Rienzi, I grieve that I am discovered
+to you yet. I had trusted that, as a mediator between the Barons and
+yourself, I might first have won your confidence, and then claimed my
+reward. Know that with tomorrow's dawn I depart for Palestrina, seeking
+to reconcile my young cousin to the choice of the People and the
+Pontiff. Various reasons, which I need not now detail, would have
+made me wish to undertake this heraldry of peace without previous
+communication with you. But since we have met, intrust me with any
+terms of conciliation, and I pledge you the right hand, not of a Roman
+noble--alas! the prisca fides has departed from that pledge!--but of a
+Knight of the Imperial Court, that I will not betray your confidence."
+
+Rienzi, accustomed to read the human countenance, had kept his eyes
+intently fixed upon Adrian while he spoke; when the Colonna concluded,
+he pressed the proffered hand, and said, with that familiar and winning
+sweetness which at times was so peculiar to his manner,
+
+"I trust you, Adrian, from my soul. You were mine early friend in
+calmer, perchance happier, years. And never did river reflect the stars
+more clearly, than your heart then mirrored back the truth. I trust
+you!"
+
+While thus speaking, he had mechanically led back the Colonna to the
+statue of the Lion; there pausing, he resumed:
+
+"Know that I have this morning despatched my delegate to your cousin
+Stefanello. With all due courtesy, I have apprised him of my return to
+Rome, and invited hither his honoured presence. Forgetting all ancient
+feuds, mine own past exile, I have assured him, here, the station and
+dignity due to the head of the Colonna. All that I ask in return is
+obedience to the law. Years and reverses have abated my younger pride,
+and though I may yet preserve the sternness of the Judge, none shall
+hereafter complain of the insolence of the Tribune."
+
+"I would," answered Adrian, "that your mission to Stefanello had been
+delayed a day; I would fain have forestalled its purport. Howbeit, you
+increase my desire of departure, should I yet succeed in obtaining an
+honourable and peaceful reconciliation, it is not in disguise that I
+will woo your sister."
+
+"And never did Colonna," replied Rienzi, loftily, "bring to his House
+a maiden whose alliance more gratified ambition. I still see, as I have
+seen ever, in mine own projects, and mine own destinies, the chart of
+the new Roman Empire!"
+
+"Be not too sanguine yet, brave Rienzi," replied Adrian, laying his hand
+on the Lion of Basalt: "bethink thee on how many scheming brains this
+dumb image of stone hath looked down from its pedestal--schemes of sand,
+and schemers of dust. Thou hast enough, at present, for the employ of
+all thine energy--not to extend thy power, but to preserve thyself. For,
+trust me, never stood human greatness on so wild and dark a precipice!"
+
+"Thou art honest," said the Senator; "and these are the first words of
+doubt, and yet of sympathy, I have heard in Rome. But the People love
+me, the Barons have fled from Rome, the Pontiff approves, and the swords
+of the Northmen guard the avenues of the Capitol. But these are nought;
+in mine own honesty are my spear and buckler. Oh, never," continued
+Rienzi, kindling with his enthusiasm, "never since the days of the old
+Republic, did Roman dream a purer and a brighter aspiration, than
+that which animates and supports me now. Peace restored--law
+established--art, letters, intellect, dawning upon the night of time;
+the Patricians, no longer bandits of rapine, but the guard of order;
+the People ennobled from a mob, brave to protect, enlightened to guide,
+themselves. Then, not by the violence of arms, but by the majesty of
+her moral power, shall the Mother of Nations claim the obedience of her
+children. Thus dreaming and thus hoping, shall I tremble or despond? No,
+Adrian Colonna, come weal or woe, I abide, unshrinking and unawed, by
+the chances of my doom!"
+
+So much did the manner and the tone of the Senator exalt his language,
+that even the sober sense of Adrian was enchanted and subdued. He kissed
+the hand he held, and said earnestly,
+
+"A doom that I will deem it my boast to share--a career that it will be
+my glory to smooth. If I succeed in my present mission--"
+
+"You are my brother!" said Rienzi.
+
+"If I fail?"
+
+"You may equally claim that alliance. You pause--you change colour."
+
+"Can I desert my house?"
+
+"Young Lord," said Rienzi, loftily, "say rather can you desert your
+country? If you doubt my honesty, if you fear my ambition, desist from
+your task, rob me not of a single foe. But if you believe that I have
+the will and the power to serve the State--if you recognise, even in the
+reverses and calamities I have known and mastered, the protecting hand
+of the Saviour of Nations--if those reverses were but the mercies of Him
+who chasteneth--necessary, it may be, to correct my earlier daring and
+sharpen yet more my intellect--if, in a word, thou believest me one
+whom, whatever be his faults, God hath preserved for the sake of Rome,
+forget that you are a Colonna--remember only that you are a Roman!"
+
+"You have conquered me, strange and commanding spirit," said Adrian, in
+a low voice, completely carried away; "and whatever the conduct of my
+kindred, I am yours and Rome's. Farewell."
+
+
+
+Chapter 9.III. Adrian's Adventures at Palestrina.
+
+It was yet noon when Adrian beheld before him the lofty mountains that
+shelter Palestrina, the Praeneste of the ancient world. Back to a
+period before Romulus existed, in the earliest ages of that mysterious
+civilisation which in Italy preceded the birth of Rome, could be traced
+the existence and the power of that rocky city. Eight dependent towns
+owned its sway and its wealth; its position, and the strength of those
+mighty walls, in whose ruins may yet be traced the masonry of the remote
+Pelasgi, had long braved the ambition of the neighbouring Rome. From
+that very citadel, the Mural Crown (Hence, apparently, its Greek name of
+Stephane. Palestrina is yet one of the many proofs which the vicinity of
+Rome affords of the old Greek civilization of Italy.) of the mountain,
+had waved the standard of Marius; and up the road which Adrian's scanty
+troop slowly wound, had echoed the march of the murtherous Sylla, on his
+return from the Mithridatic war. Below, where the city spread towards
+the plain, were yet seen the shattered and roofless columns of the once
+celebrated Temple of Fortune; and still the immemorial olives clustered
+grey and mournfully around the ruins.
+
+A more formidable hold the Barons of Rome could not have selected; and
+as Adrian's military eye scanned the steep ascent and the rugged walls,
+he felt that with ordinary skill it might defy for months all the power
+of the Roman Senator. Below, in the fertile valley, dismantled cottages
+and trampled harvests attested the violence and rapine of the insurgent
+Barons; and at that very moment were seen, in the old plain of the
+warlike Hernici, troops of armed men, driving before them herds of sheep
+and cattle, collected in their lawless incursions. In sight of that
+Praeneste, which had been the favourite retreat of the luxurious Lords
+of Rome in its most polished day, the Age of Iron seemed renewed.
+
+The banner of the Colonna, borne by Adrian's troop, obtained ready
+admittance at the Porta del Sole. As he passed up the irregular
+and narrow streets that ascended to the citadel, groups of foreign
+mercenaries,--half-ragged, half-tawdry knots of abandoned women,--mixed
+here and there with the liveries of the Colonna, stood loitering amidst
+the ruins of ancient fanes and palaces, or basked lazily in the sun,
+upon terraces, through which, from amidst weeds and grass, glowed the
+imperishable hues of the rich mosaics, which had made the pride of that
+lettered and graceful nobility, of whom savage freebooters were now the
+heirs.
+
+The contrast between the Past and Present forcibly occurred to Adrian,
+as he passed along; and, despite his order, he felt as if Civilization
+itself were enlisted against his House upon the side of Rienzi.
+
+Leaving his train in the court of the citadel, Adrian demanded admission
+to the presence of his cousin. He had left Stefanello a child on his
+departure from Rome, and there could therefore be but a slight and
+unfamiliar acquaintance betwixt them, despite their kindred.
+
+Peals of laughter came upon his ear, as he followed one of Stefanello's
+gentlemen through a winding passage that led to the principal chamber.
+The door was thrown open, and Adrian found himself in a rude hall, to
+which some appearance of hasty state and attempted comfort had been
+given. Costly arras imperfectly clothed the stone walls, and the rich
+seats and decorated tables, which the growing civilization of the
+northern cities of Italy had already introduced into the palaces of
+Italian nobles, strangely contrasted the rough pavement, spread with
+heaps of armour negligently piled around. At the farther end of the
+apartment, Adrian shudderingly perceived, set in due and exact order,
+the implements of torture.
+
+Stefanello Colonna, with two other Barons, indolently reclined on seats
+drawn around a table, in the recess of a deep casement, from which might
+be still seen the same glorious landscape, bounded by the dim spires
+of Rome, which Hannibal and Pyrrhus had ascended that very citadel to
+survey!
+
+Stefanello himself, in the first bloom of youth, bore already on his
+beardless countenance those traces usually the work of the passions and
+vices of maturest manhood. His features were cast in the mould of the
+old Stephen's; in their clear, sharp, high-bred outline might be noticed
+that regular and graceful symmetry, which blood, in men as in animals,
+will sometimes entail through generations; but the features were wasted
+and meagre. His brows were knit in an eternal frown; his thin and
+bloodless lips wore that insolent contempt which seems so peculiarly
+cold and unlovely in early youth; and the deep and livid hollows round
+his eyes, spoke of habitual excess and premature exhaustion. By him sat
+(reconciled by hatred to one another) the hereditary foes of his race;
+the soft, but cunning and astute features of Luca di Savelli, contrasted
+with the broad frame and ferocious countenance of the Prince of the
+Orsini.
+
+The young head of the Colonna rose with some cordiality to receive his
+cousin. "Welcome," he said, "dear Adrian; you are arrived in time to
+assist us with your well-known military skill. Think you not we shall
+stand a long siege, if the insolent plebeian dare adventure it? You know
+our friends, the Orsini and the Savelli? Thanks to St. Peter, or Peter's
+delegate, we have now happily meaner throats to cut than those of each
+other!"
+
+Thus saying, Stefanello again threw himself listlessly on his seat, and
+the shrill, woman's voice of Savelli took part in the dialogue.
+
+"I would, noble Signor, that you had come a few hours earlier: we are
+still making merry at the recollection--he, he, he!"
+
+"Ah, excellent," cried Stefanello, joining in the laugh; "our cousin has
+had a loss. Know Adrian, that this base fellow, whom the Pope has
+had the impudence to create Senator, dared but yesterday to send us a
+varlet, whom he called--by our Lady!--his ambassador!"
+
+"Would you could have seen his mantle, Signor Adrian!" chimed in the
+Savelli: "purple velvet, as I live, decorated in gold, with the arms of
+Rome: we soon spoiled his finery."
+
+"What!" exclaimed Adrian, "you did not break the laws of all nobility
+and knighthood?--you offered no insult to a herald!"
+
+"Herald, sayst thou?" cried Stefanello, frowning till his eyes were
+scarce visible. "It is for Princes and Barons alone to employ heralds.
+An' I had had my will, I would have sent back the minion's head to the
+usurper."
+
+"What did ye then?" asked Adrian, coldly.
+
+"Bade our swineherds dip the fellow in the ditch, and gave him a night's
+lodging in a dungeon to dry himself withal."
+
+"And this morning--he, he, he!" added the Savelli, "we had him before
+us, and drew his teeth, one by one;--I would you could have heard the
+fellow mumble out for mercy!"
+
+Adrian rose hastily, and struck the table fiercely with his gauntlet.
+
+"Stefanello Colonna," said he, colouring with noble rage, "answer me:
+did you dare to inflict this indelible disgrace upon the name we jointly
+bear? Tell me, at least, that you protested against this foul treason to
+all the laws of civilization and of honour. You answer not. House of the
+Colonna, can such be thy representative!"
+
+"To me these words!" said Stefanello, trembling with passion. "Beware!
+Methinks thou art the traitor, leagued perhaps with yon rascal mob. Well
+do I remember that thou, the betrothed of the Demagogue's sister, didst
+not join with my uncle and my father of old, but didst basely leave the
+city to her plebeian tyrant."
+
+"That did he!" said the fierce Orsini, approaching Adrian menacingly,
+while the gentle cowardice of Savelli sought in vain to pluck him back
+by the mantle--"that did he! and but for thy presence, Stefanello--"
+
+"Coward and blusterer!" interrupted Adrian, fairly beside himself with
+indignation and shame, and dashing his gauntlet in the very face of
+the advancing Orsini--"wouldst thou threaten one who has maintained, in
+every list of Europe, and against the stoutest Chivalry of the North,
+the honour of Rome, which thy deeds the while disgraced? By this gage,
+I spit upon and defy thee. With lance and with brand, on horse and on
+foot, I maintain against thee and all thy line, that thou art no knight
+to have thus maltreated, in thy strongholds, a peaceful and unarmed
+herald. Yes, even here, on the spot of thy disgrace, I challenge thee to
+arms!"
+
+"To the court below! Follow me," said Orsini, sullenly, and striding
+towards the threshold. "What, ho there! my helmet and breast-plate!"
+
+"Stay, noble Orsini," said Stefanello. "The insult offered to thee is my
+quarrel--mine was the deed--and against me speaks this degenerate scion
+of our line. Adrian di Castello--sometime called Colonna--surrender your
+sword: you are my prisoner!"
+
+"Oh!" said Adrian, grinding his teeth, "that my ancestral blood did
+not flow through thy veins--else--but enough! Me! your equal, and the
+favoured Knight of the Emperor, whose advent now brightens the frontiers
+of Italy!--me--you dare not detain. For your friends, I shall meet
+them yet perhaps, ere many days are over, where none shall separate our
+swords. Till then, remember, Orsini, that it is against no unpractised
+arm that thou wilt have to redeem thine honour!"
+
+Adrian, his drawn sword in his hand, strode towards the door, and passed
+the Orsini, who stood, lowering and irresolute, in the centre of the
+apartment.
+
+Savelli whispered Stefanello. "He says, 'Ere many days be past!' Be
+sure, dear Signor, that he goes to join Rienzi. Remember, the alliance
+he once sought with the Tribune's sister may be renewed. Beware of him!
+Ought he to leave the castle? The name of a Colonna, associated with the
+mob, would distract and divide half our strength."
+
+"Fear me not," returned Stefanello, with a malignant smile. "Ere you
+spoke, I had determined!"
+
+The young Colonna lifted the arras from the wall, opened a door, and
+passed into a low hall, in which sate twenty mercenaries.
+
+"Quick!" said he. "Seize and disarm yon stranger in the green
+mantle--but slay him not. Bid the guard below find dungeons for his
+train. Quick! ere he reach the gate."
+
+Adrian had gained the open hall below--his train and his steed were in
+sight in the court--when suddenly the soldiery of the Colonna, rushing
+through another passage than that which he had passed, surrounded and
+intercepted his retreat.
+
+"Yield thee, Adrian di Castello," cried Stefanello from the summit of
+the stairs; "or your blood be on your own head."
+
+Three steps did Adrian make through the press, and three of his enemies
+fell beneath his sword. "To the rescue!" he shouted to his band, and
+already those bold and daring troopers had gained the hall. Presently
+the alarum bell tolled loud--the court swarmed with soldiers. Oppressed
+by numbers, beat down rather than subdued, Adrian's little train was
+soon secured, and the flower of the Colonna, wounded, breathless,
+disarmed, but still uttering loud defiance, was a prisoner in the
+fortress of his kinsman.
+
+
+
+Chapter 9.IV. The Position of the Senator.--The Work of Years.--The
+Rewards of Ambition.
+
+The indignation of Rienzi may readily be conceived, on the return of his
+herald mutilated and dishonoured. His temper, so naturally stern, was
+rendered yet more hard by the remembrance of his wrongs and trials; and
+the result which attended his overtures of conciliation to Stefanello
+Colonna stung him to the soul.
+
+The bell of the Capitol tolled to arms within ten minutes after the
+return of the herald. The great gonfalon of Rome was unfurled on the
+highest tower; and the very evening after Adrian's arrest, the forces of
+the Senator, headed by Rienzi in person, were on the road to Palestrina.
+The troopers of the Barons had, however, made incursions as far as
+Tivoli with the supposed connivance of the inhabitants, and Rienzi
+halted at that beautiful spot to raise recruits, and receive the
+allegiance of the suspected, while his soldiers, with Arimbaldo and
+Brettone at their head, went in search of the marauders. The brothers of
+Montreal returned late at night with the intelligence, that the troopers
+of the Barons had secured themselves amidst the recesses of the wood of
+Pantano.
+
+The red spot mounted to Rienzi's brow. He gazed hard at Brettone, who
+stated the news to him, and a natural suspicion shot across his mind.
+
+"How!--escaped!" he said. "Is it possible? Enough of such idle
+skirmishes with these lordly robbers. Will the hour ever come when I
+shall meet them hand to hand? Brettone," and the brother of Montreal
+felt the dark eye of Rienzi pierce to his very heart; "Brettone!" said
+he, with an abrupt change of voice, "are your men to be trusted? Is
+there no connivance with the Barons?"
+
+"How!" said Brettone, sullenly, but somewhat confused.
+
+"How me no hows!" quoth the Tribune-Senator, fiercely. "I know that thou
+art a valiant Captain of valiant men. Thou and thy brother Arimbaldo
+have served me well, and I have rewarded ye well! Have I not? Speak!"
+
+"Senator," answered Arimbaldo, taking up the word, "you have kept your
+word to us. You have raised us to the highest rank your power could
+bestow, and this has amply atoned our humble services."
+
+"I am glad ye allow thus much," said the Tribune.
+
+Arimbaldo proceeded, somewhat more loftily, "I trust, my Lord, you do
+not doubt us?"
+
+"Arimbaldo," replied Rienzi, in a voice of deep, but half-suppressed
+emotion; "you are a lettered man, and you have seemed to share my
+projects for the regeneration of our common kind. You ought not to
+betray me. There is something in unison between us. But, chide me not, I
+am surrounded by treason, and the very air I breathe seems poison to my
+lips."
+
+There was a pathos mingled with Rienzi's words which touched the milder
+brother of Montreal. He bowed in silence. Rienzi surveyed him wistfully,
+and sighed. Then, changing the conversation, he spoke of their intended
+siege of Palestrina, and shortly afterwards retired to rest.
+
+Left alone, the brothers regarded each other for some moments in
+silence. "Brettone," said Arimbaldo at length, in a whispered voice, "my
+heart misgives me. I like not Walter's ambitious schemes. With our
+own countrymen we are frank and loyal, why play the traitor with this
+high-souled Roman?" (The anonymous biographer of Rienzi makes the
+following just remark: "Sono li tedeschi, come discendon de la Alemagna,
+semplici, puri, senza fraude, come si allocano tra' taliani, diventano
+mastri coduti, viziosi, che sentono ogni malizia."--"Vita di Cola di
+Rienzi", lib. ii. cap. 16.)
+
+"Tush!" said Brettone. "Our brother's hand of iron alone can sway this
+turbulent people; and if Rienzi be betrayed, so also are his enemies,
+the Barons. No more of this! I have tidings from Montreal; he will be in
+Rome in a few days."
+
+"And then?"
+
+"Rienzi, weakened by the Barons (for he must not conquer)--the Barons,
+weakened by Rienzi--our Northmen seize the Capitol, and the soldiery,
+now scattered throughout Italy, will fly to the standard of the Great
+Captain. Montreal must be first Podesta, then King, of Rome."
+
+Arimbaldo moved restlessly in his seat, and the brethren conferred no
+more on their projects.
+
+The situation of Rienzi was precisely that which tends the most to
+sour and to harden the fairest nature. With an intellect capable of the
+grandest designs, a heart that beat with the loftiest emotions, elevated
+to the sunny pinnacle of power and surrounded by loud-tongued adulators,
+he knew not among men a single breast in which he could confide. He was
+as one on a steep ascent, whose footing crumbles, while every bough at
+which he grasps seems to rot at his touch. He found the people more
+than ever eloquent in his favour, but while they shouted raptures as he
+passed, not a man was capable of making a sacrifice for him! The
+liberty of a state is never achieved by a single individual; if not the
+people--if not the greater number--a zealous and fervent minority, at
+least must go hand in hand with him. Rome demanded sacrifices in all who
+sought the Roman regeneration--sacrifices of time, ease, and money. The
+crowd followed the procession of the Senator, but not a single Roman
+devoted his life, unpaid, to his standard; not a single coin was
+subscribed in the defence of freedom. Against him were arrayed the most
+powerful and the most ferocious Barons of Italy; each of whom could
+maintain, at his own cost, a little army of practised warriors. With
+Rienzi were traders and artificers, who were willing to enjoy the fruits
+of liberty, but not to labour at the soil; who demanded, in return for
+empty shouts, peace and riches; and who expected that one man was to
+effect in a day what would be cheaply purchased by the struggle of a
+generation. All their dark and rude notion of a reformed state was to
+live unbutchered by the Barons and untaxed by their governors. Rome, I
+say, gave to her Senator not a free arm, nor a voluntary florin. (This
+plain fact is thoroughly borne out by every authority.) Well aware of
+the danger which surrounds the ruler who defends his state by foreign
+swords, the fondest wish, and the most visionary dream of Rienzi, was to
+revive amongst the Romans, in their first enthusiasm at his return, an
+organised and voluntary force, who, in protecting him, would protect
+themselves:--not, as before, in his first power, a nominal force of
+twenty thousand men, who at any hour might yield (as they did yield) to
+one hundred and fifty; but a regular, well disciplined, and trusty body,
+numerous enough to resist aggression, not numerous enough to become
+themselves the aggressors.
+
+Hitherto all his private endeavours, his public exhortations, had
+failed; the crowd listened--shouted--saw him quit the city to meet their
+tyrants, and returned to their shops, saying to each other, "What a
+great man!"
+
+The character of Rienzi has chiefly received for its judges men of the
+closet, who speculate upon human beings as if they were machines; who
+gauge the great, not by their merit, but their success; and who have
+censured or sneered at the Tribune, where they should have condemned the
+People! Had but one-half the spirit been found in Rome which ran
+through a single vein of Cola di Rienzi, the august Republic, if not
+the majestic empire, of Rome, might be existing now! Turning from the
+people, the Senator saw his rude and savage troops, accustomed to the
+licence of a tyrant's camp, and under commanders in whom it was ruin
+really to confide--whom it was equal ruin openly to distrust. Hemmed
+in on every side by dangers, his character daily grew more restless,
+vigilant, and stern; and still, with all the aims of the patriot, he
+felt all the curses of the tyrant. Without the rough and hardening
+career which, through a life of warfare, had brought Cromwell to a
+similar power--with more of grace and intellectual softness in his
+composition, he resembled that yet greater man in some points of
+character--in his religious enthusiasm; his rigid justice, often
+forced by circumstance into severity, but never wantonly cruel or
+blood-thirsty; in his singular pride of country; and his mysterious
+command over the minds of others. But he resembled the giant Englishman
+far more in circumstance than original nature, and that circumstance
+assimilated their characters at the close of their several careers.
+Like Cromwell, beset by secret or open foes, the assassin's dagger ever
+gleamed before his eyes; and his stout heart, unawed by real, trembled
+at imagined, terrors. The countenance changing suddenly from red to
+white--the bloodshot, restless eye, belying the composed majesty of
+mien--the muttering lips--the broken slumber--the secret corselet; these
+to both were the rewards of Power!
+
+The elasticity of youth had left the Tribune! His frame, which had
+endured so many shocks, had contracted a painful disease in the dungeon
+at Avignon ("Dicea che ne la prigione era stato ascarmato." "Vita di
+Cola di Rienzi", lib. ii. cap. 18.)--his high soul still supported him,
+but the nerves gave way. Tears came readily into his eyes, and often,
+like Cromwell, he was thought to weep from hypocrisy, when in truth
+it was the hysteric of over-wrought and irritable emotion. In all his
+former life singularly temperate, ("Solea prima esser sobrio, temperato,
+astinente, or a e diventato distemperatissimo bevitore," &c.--Ibid.) he
+now fled from his goading thoughts to the beguiling excitement of wine.
+He drank deep, though its effects were never visible upon him except
+in a freer and wilder mood, and the indulgence of that racy humour,
+half-mirthful, half-bitter, for which his younger day had been
+distinguished. Now the mirth had more loudness, but the bitterness more
+gall.
+
+Such were the characteristics of Rienzi at his return to power--made
+more apparent with every day. Nina he still loved with the same
+tenderness, and, if possible, she adored him more than ever: but, the
+zest and freshness of triumphant ambition gone, somehow or other,
+their intercourse together had not its old charm. Formerly they talked
+constantly of the future--of the bright days in store for them. Now,
+with a sharp and uneasy pang, Rienzi turned from all thought of that
+"gay tomorrow." There was no "gay tomorrow" for him! Dark and thorny
+as was the present hour, all beyond seemed yet less cheering and
+more ominous. Still he had some moments, brief but brilliant, when,
+forgetting the iron race amongst whom he was thrown, he plunged into
+scholastic reveries of the worshipped Past, and half-fancied that he
+was of a People worthy of his genius and his devotion. Like most men who
+have been preserved through great dangers, he continued with increasing
+fondness to nourish a credulous belief in the grandeur of his own
+destiny. He could not imagine that he had been so delivered, and for no
+end! He was the Elected, and therefore the Instrument, of Heaven.
+And thus, that Bible which in his loneliness, his wanderings, and his
+prison, had been his solace and support, was more than ever needed in
+his greatness.
+
+It was another cause of sorrow and chagrin to one who, amidst such
+circumstances of public danger, required so peculiarly the support and
+sympathy of private friends,--that he found he had incurred amongst his
+old coadjutors the common penalty of absence. A few were dead; others,
+wearied with the storms of public life, and chilled in their ardour
+by the turbulent revolutions to which, in every effort for her
+amelioration, Rome had been subjected, had retired,--some altogether
+from the city, some from all participation in political affairs. In his
+halls, the Tribune-Senator was surrounded by unfamiliar faces, and a new
+generation. Of the heads of the popular party, most were animated by a
+stern dislike to the Pontifical domination, and looked with suspicion
+and repugnance upon one who, if he governed for the People, had been
+trusted and honoured by the Pope. Rienzi was not a man to forget former
+friends, however lowly, and had already found time to seek an interview
+with Cecco del Vecchio. But that stern Republican had received him with
+coldness. His foreign mercenaries, and his title of Senator, were things
+that the artisan could not digest. With his usual bluntness, he had said
+so to Rienzi.
+
+"As for the last," answered the Tribune, affably, "names do not alter
+natures. When I forget that to be delegate to the Pontiff is to be the
+guardian of his flock, forsake me. As for the first, let me but see five
+hundred Romans sworn to stand armed day and night for the defence of
+Rome, and I dismiss the Northmen."
+
+Cecco del Vecchio was unsoftened; honest, but uneducated--impracticable,
+and by nature a malcontent, he felt as if he were no longer necessary
+to the Senator, and this offended his pride. Strange as it may seem, the
+sullen artisan bore, too, a secret grudge against Rienzi, for not
+having seen and selected him from a crowd of thousands on the day of his
+triumphal entry. Such are the small offences which produce deep danger
+to the great!
+
+The artisans still held their meetings, and Cecco del Vecchio's voice
+was heard loud in grumbling forebodings. But what wounded Rienzi yet
+more than the alienation of the rest, was the confused and altered
+manner of his old friend and familiar, Pandulfo di Guido. Missing
+that popular citizen among those who daily offered their homage at the
+Capitol, he had sent for him, and sought in vain to revive their ancient
+intimacy. Pandulfo affected great respect, but not all the condescension
+of the Senator could conquer his distance and his restraint. In fact,
+Pandulfo had learned to form ambitious projects of his own; and but for
+the return of Rienzi, Pandulfo di Guido felt that he might now, with
+greater safety, and indeed with some connivance from the Barons, have
+been the Tribune of the People. The facility to rise into popular
+eminence which a disordered and corrupt state, unblest by a regular
+constitution, offers to ambition, breeds the jealousy and the rivalship
+which destroy union, and rot away the ties of party.
+
+Such was the situation of Rienzi, and yet, wonderful to say, he seemed
+to be adored by the multitude; and law and liberty, life and death, were
+in his hands!
+
+Of all those who attended his person, Angelo Villani was the most
+favoured; that youth who had accompanied Rienzi in his long exile,
+had also, at the wish of Nina, attended him from Avignon, through his
+sojourn in the camp of Albornoz. His zeal, intelligence, and frank and
+evident affection, blinded the Senator to the faults of his character,
+and established him more and more in the gratitude of Rienzi. He loved
+to feel that one faithful heart beat near him, and the page, raised to
+the rank of his chamberlain, always attended his person, and slept in
+his ante-chamber.
+
+Retiring that night at Tivoli, to the apartment prepared for him, the
+Senator sat down by the open casement, through which were seen, waving
+in the starlight, the dark pines that crowned the hills, while the
+stillness of the hour gave to his ear the dash of the waterfalls heard
+above the regular and measured tread of the sentinels below. Leaning his
+cheek upon his hand, Rienzi long surrendered himself to gloomy thought,
+and, when he looked up, he saw the bright blue eye of Villani fixed in
+anxious sympathy on his countenance.
+
+"Is my Lord unwell?" asked the young chamberlain, hesitating.
+
+"Not so, my Angelo; but somewhat sick at heart. Methinks, for a
+September night, the air is chill!"
+
+"Angelo," resumed Rienzi, who had already acquired that uneasy curiosity
+which belongs to an uncertain power,--"Angelo, bring me hither yon
+writing implements; hast thou heard aught what the men say of our
+probable success against Palestrina?"
+
+"Would my Lord wish to learn all their gossip, whether it please or
+not?" answered Villani.
+
+"If I studied only to hear what pleased me, Angelo, I should never have
+returned to Rome."
+
+"Why, then, I heard a constable of the Northmen say, meaningly, that the
+place will not be carried."
+
+"Humph! And what said the captains of my Roman Legion?"
+
+"My Lord, I have heard it whispered that they fear defeat less than they
+do the revenge of the Barons, if they are successful."
+
+"And with such tools the living race of Europe and misjudging posterity
+will deem that the workman is to shape out the Ideal and the Perfect!
+Bring me yon Bible."
+
+As Angelo reverently brought to Rienzi the sacred book, he said,
+
+"Just before I left my companions below, there was a rumour that the
+Lord Adrian Colonna had been imprisoned by his kinsman."
+
+"I too heard, and I believe, as much," returned Rienzi: "these Barons
+would gibbet their own children in irons, if there were any chance of
+the shackles growing rusty for want of prey. But the wicked shall be
+brought low, and their strong places shall be made desolate."
+
+"I would, my Lord," said Villani, "that our Northmen had other captains
+than these Provencals."
+
+"Why?" asked Rienzi, abruptly.
+
+"Have the creatures of the Captain of the Grand Company ever held faith
+with any man whom it suited the avarice or the ambition of Montreal to
+betray? Was he not, a few months ago, the right arm of John di Vico,
+and did he not sell his services to John di Vico's enemy, the Cardinal
+Albornoz? These warriors barter men as cattle."
+
+"Thou describest Montreal rightly: a dangerous and an awful man. But
+methinks his brothers are of a duller and meaner kind; they dare not
+the crimes of the Robber Captain. Howbeit, Angelo, thou hast touched a
+string that will make discord with sleep tonight. Fair youth, thy young
+eyes have need of slumber; withdraw, and when thou hearest men envy
+Rienzi, think that--"
+
+"God never made Genius to be envied!" interrupted Villani, with an
+energy that overcame his respect. "We envy not the sun, but rather the
+valleys that ripen beneath his beams."
+
+"Verily, if I be the sun," said Rienzi, with a bitter and melancholy
+smile, "I long for night,--and come it will, to the human as to the
+celestial Pilgrim!--Thank Heaven, at least, that our ambition cannot
+make us immortal!"
+
+
+
+Chapter 9.V. The Biter Bit.
+
+The next morning, when Rienzi descended to the room where his captains
+awaited him, his quick eye perceived that a cloud still lowered upon the
+brow of Messere Brettone. Arimbaldo, sheltered by the recess of the rude
+casement, shunned his eye.
+
+"A fair morning, gentles," said Rienzi; "the Sun laughs upon our
+enterprise. I have messengers from Rome betimes--fresh troops will join
+us ere noon."
+
+"I am glad, Senator," answered Brettone, "that you have tidings which
+will counteract the ill of those I have to narrate to thee. The soldiers
+murmur loudly--their pay is due to them; and, I fear me, that without
+money they will not march to Palestrina."
+
+"As they will," returned Rienzi, carelessly. "It is but a few days since
+they entered Rome; pay did they receive in advance--if they demand
+more, the Colonna and Orsini may outbid me. Draw off your soldiers, Sir
+Knight, and farewell."
+
+Brettone's countenance fell--it was his object to get Rienzi more and
+more in his power, and he wished not to suffer him to gain that strength
+which would accrue to him from the fall of Palestrina: the indifference
+of the Senator foiled and entrapped him in his own net.
+
+"That must not be," said the brother of Montreal, after a confused
+silence; "we cannot leave you thus to your enemies--the soldiers, it is
+true, demand pay--"
+
+"And should have it," said Rienzi. "I know these mercenaries--it is
+ever with them, mutiny or money. I will throw myself on my Romans,
+and triumph--or fall, if so Heaven decrees, with them. Acquaint your
+constables with my resolve."
+
+Scarce were these words spoken, ere, as previously concerted with
+Brettone, the chief constable of the mercenaries appeared at the door.
+"Senator," said he, with a rough semblance of aspect, "your orders to
+march have reached me, I have sought to marshal my men--but--"
+
+"I know what thou wouldst say, friend," interrupted Rienzi, waving
+his hand: "Messere Brettone will give you my reply. Another time, Sir
+Captain, more ceremony with the Senator of Rome--you may withdraw."
+
+The unforeseen dignity of Rienzi rebuked and abashed the constable; he
+looked at Brettone, who motioned him to depart. He closed the door and
+withdrew.
+
+"What is to be done?" said Brettone.
+
+"Sir Knight," replied Rienzi, gravely, "let us understand each other.
+Would you serve me or not? If the first, you are not my equal, but
+subordinate--and you must obey and not dictate; if the last, my debt to
+you shall be discharged, and the world is wide enough for both."
+
+"We have declared allegiance to you," answered Brettone, "and it shall
+be given."
+
+"One caution before I re-accept your fealty," replied Rienzi, very
+slowly. "For an open foe, I have my sword--for a traitor, mark me, Rome
+has the axe; of the first I have no fear; for the last, no mercy."
+
+"These are not words that should pass between friends," said Brettone,
+turning pale with suppressed emotion.
+
+"Friends!--ye are my friends, then!--your hands! Friends, so ye
+are!--and shall prove it! Dear Arimbaldo, thou, like myself, art
+book-learned,--a clerkly soldier. Dost thou remember how in the Roman
+history it is told that the Treasury lacked money for the soldiers? The
+Consul convened the Nobles. 'Ye,' said he, 'that have the offices and
+dignity should be the first to pay for them.' Ye heed me, my friends;
+the nobles took the hint, they found the money--the army was paid. This
+example is not lost on you. I have made you the leaders of my force,
+Rome hath showered her honours on you. Your generosity shall commence
+the example which the Romans shall thus learn of strangers. Ye gaze at
+me, my friends! I read your noble souls--and thank ye beforehand. Ye
+have the dignity and the office; ye have also the wealth!--pay the
+hirelings, pay them!" (See the anonymous biographer, lib. ii. cap. 19.)
+
+Had a thunderbolt fallen at the feet of Brettone, he could not have been
+more astounded than at this simple suggestion of Rienzi's. He lifted
+his eyes to the Senator's face, and saw there that smile which he had
+already, bold as he was, learned to dread. He felt himself fairly
+sunk in the pit he had digged for another. There was that in the
+Senator-Tribune's brow that told him to refuse was to declare open war,
+and the moment was not ripe for that.
+
+"Ye accede," said Rienzi; "ye have done well."
+
+The Senator clapped his hands--his guard appeared.
+
+"Summon the head constables of the soldiery."
+
+The brothers still remained dumb.
+
+The constables entered.
+
+"My friends," said Rienzi, "Messere Brettone and Messere Arimbaldo have
+my directions to divide amongst your force a thousand florins. This
+evening we encamp beneath Palestrina."
+
+The constables withdrew in visible surprise. Rienzi gazed a moment on
+the brothers, chuckling within himself--for his sarcastic humour enjoyed
+his triumph. "You lament not your devotion, my friends!"
+
+"No," said Brettone, rousing himself; "the sum but trivially swells our
+debt."
+
+"Frankly said--your hands once more!--the good people of Tivoli expect
+me in the Piazza--they require some admonitions. Adieu till noon."
+
+When the door closed on Rienzi, Brettone struck the handle of his sword
+fiercely--"The Roman laughs at us," said he. "But let Walter de Montreal
+once appear in Rome, and the proud jester shall pay us dearly for this."
+
+"Hush!" said Arimbaldo, "walls have ears, and that imp of Satan, young
+Villani, seems to me ever at our heels!"
+
+"A thousand florins! I trust his heart hath as many drops," growled the
+chafed Brettone, unheeding his brother.
+
+The soldiers were paid--the army marched--the eloquence of the Senator
+had augmented his force by volunteers from Tivoli, and wild and
+half armed peasantry joined his standard from the Campagna and the
+neighbouring mountains.
+
+Palestrina was besieged: Rienzi continued dexterously to watch the
+brothers of Montreal. Under pretext of imparting to the Italian
+volunteers the advantage of their military science, he separated them
+from their mercenaries, and assigned to them the command of the less
+disciplined Italians, with whom, he believed, they could not venture
+to tamper. He himself assumed the lead of the Northmen--and, despite
+themselves, they were fascinated by his artful, yet dignified
+affability, and the personal courage he displayed in some sallies of the
+besieged Barons. But as the huntsmen upon all the subtlest windings of
+their prey,--so pressed the relentless and speeding Fates upon Cola di
+Rienzi!
+
+
+
+Chapter 9.VI. The Events Gather to the End.
+
+While this the state of the camp of the besiegers, Luca di Savelli and
+Stefanello Colonna were closeted with a stranger, who had privately
+entered Palestrina on the night before the Romans pitched their tents
+beneath its walls. This visitor, who might have somewhat passed his
+fortieth year, yet retained, scarcely diminished, the uncommon beauty of
+form and countenance for which his youth had been remarkable. But it was
+no longer that character of beauty which has been described in his first
+introduction to the reader. It was no longer the almost woman delicacy
+of feature and complexion, or the highborn polish, and graceful suavity
+of manner, which distinguished Walter de Montreal: a life of vicissitude
+and war had at length done its work. His bearing was now abrupt and
+imperious, as that of one accustomed to rule wild spirits, and he had
+exchanged the grace of persuasion for the sternness of command. His
+athletic form had grown more spare and sinewy, and instead of the brow
+half shaded by fair and clustering curls, his forehead, though yet
+but slightly wrinkled, was completely bald at the temples; and by its
+unwonted height, increased the dignity and manliness of his aspect. The
+bloom of his complexion was faded, less by outward exposure than inward
+thought, into a bronzed and settled paleness; and his features seemed
+more marked and prominent, as the flesh had somewhat sunk from the
+contour of the cheek. Yet the change suited the change of age and
+circumstance; and if the Provencal now less realised the idea of
+the brave and fair knight-errant, he but looked the more what the
+knight-errant had become--the sagacious counsellor and the mighty
+leader.
+
+"You must be aware," said Montreal, continuing a discourse which
+appeared to have made great impression on his companions, "that in this
+contest between yourselves and the Senator, I alone hold the balance.
+Rienzi is utterly in my power--my brothers, the leaders of his army;
+myself, his creditor. It rests with me to secure him on the throne, or
+to send him to the scaffold. I have but to give the order, and the Grand
+Company enter Rome; but without their agency, methinks if you keep faith
+with me, our purpose can be effected."
+
+"In the meanwhile, Palestrina is besieged by your brothers!" said
+Stefanello, sharply.
+
+"But they have my orders to waste their time before its walls. Do you
+not see, that by this very siege, fruitless, as, if I will, it shall be,
+Rienzi loses fame abroad, and popularity in Rome."
+
+"Sir Knight," said Luca di Savelli, "you speak as a man versed in the
+profound policy of the times; and under all the circumstances which
+menace us, your proposal seems but fitting and reasonable. On the one
+hand, you undertake to restore us and the other Barons to Rome; and to
+give Rienzi to the Staircase of the Lion--"
+
+"Not so, not so," replied Montreal, quickly. "I will consent either so
+to subdue and cripple his power, as to render him a puppet in our hands,
+a mere shadow of authority--or, if his proud spirit chafe at its cage,
+to give it once more liberty amongst the wilds of Germany. I would
+fetter or banish him, but not destroy; unless (added Montreal, after a
+moment's pause) fate absolutely drives us to it. Power should not demand
+victims; but to secure it, victims may be necessary."
+
+"I understand your refinements," said Luca di Savelli, with his icy
+smile, "and am satisfied. The Barons once restored, our palaces once
+more manned, and I am willing to take the chance of the Senator's
+longevity. This service you promise to effect?"
+
+"I do."
+
+"And, in return, you demand our assent to your enjoying the rank of
+Podesta for five years?"
+
+"You say right."
+
+"I, for one, accede to the terms," said the Savelli: "there is my hand;
+I am wearied of these brawls, even amongst ourselves, and think that a
+Foreign Ruler may best enforce order: the more especially, if like
+you, Sir Knight, one whose birth and renown are such as to make him
+comprehend the difference between Barons and Plebeians."
+
+"For my part," said Stefanello, "I feel that we have but a choice of
+evils--I like not a foreign Podesta; but I like a plebeian Senator still
+less;--there too is my hand, Sir Knight."
+
+"Noble Signors," said Montreal, after a short pause, and turning his
+piercing gaze from one to the other with great deliberation, "our
+compact is sealed; one word by way of codicil. Walter de Montreal is no
+Count Pepin of Minorbino! Once before, little dreaming, I own, that the
+victory would be so facile, I intrusted your cause and mine to a deputy;
+your cause he promoted, mine he lost. He drove out the Tribune, and
+then suffered the Barons to banish himself. This time I see to my own
+affairs; and, mark you, I have learned in the Grand Company one lesson;
+viz. never to pardon spy or deserter, of whatever rank. Your forgiveness
+for the hint. Let us change the theme. So ye detain in your fortress my
+old friend the Baron di Castello?"
+
+"Ay," said Luca di Savelli; for Stefanello, stung by Montreal's threat,
+which he dared not openly resent, preserved a sullen silence; "Ay, he is
+one noble the less to the Senator's council."
+
+"You act wisely. I know his views and temper; at present dangerous to
+our interests. Yet use him well, I entreat you; he may hereafter serve
+us. And now, my Lords, my eyes are weary, suffer me to retire. Pleasant
+dreams of the New Revolution to us all!"
+
+"By your leave, noble Montreal, we will attend you to your couch," said
+Luca di Savelli.
+
+"By my troth, and ye shall not. I am no Tribune to have great Signors
+for my pages; but a plain gentleman, and a hardy soldier: your
+attendants will conduct me to whatever chamber your hospitality assigns
+to one who could sleep soundly beneath the rudest hedge under your open
+skies."
+
+Savelli, however, insisted on conducting the Podesta that was to be, to
+his apartment. He then returned to Stefanello, whom he found pacing the
+saloon with long and disordered strides.
+
+"What have we done, Savelli?" said he, quickly; "sold our city to a
+barbarian!"
+
+"Sold!" said Savelli; "to my mind it is the other part of the contract
+in which we have played our share. We have bought, Colonna, not
+sold--bought our lives from yon army; bought our power, our fortunes,
+our castles, from the Demagogue Senator; bought, what is better than
+all, triumph and revenge. Tush, Colonna, see you not that if we had
+balked this great warrior, we had perished? Leagued with the Senator,
+the Grand Company would have marched to Rome; and, whether Montreal
+assisted or murdered Rienzi, (for methinks he is a Romulus, who would
+brook no Remus), we had equally been undone. Now, we have made our own
+terms, and our shares are equal. Nay, the first steps to be taken are in
+our favour. Rienzi is to be snared, and we are to enter Rome."
+
+"And then the Provencal is to be Despot of the city."
+
+"Podesta, if you please. Podestas who offend the people are often
+banished, and sometimes stoned--Podestas who insult the nobles are often
+stilettoed, and sometimes poisoned," said Savelli. "'Sufficient for the
+day is the evil thereof.' Meanwhile, say nothing to the bear, Orsini.
+Such men mar all wisdom. Come, cheer thee, Stefanello."
+
+"Luca di Savelli, you have not such a stake in Rome as I have," said
+the young Lord, haughtily; "no Podesta can take from you the rank of the
+first Signor of the Italian metropolis!"
+
+"An you had said so to the Orsini, there would have been drawing of
+swords," said Savelli. "But cheer thee, I say; is not our first care to
+destroy Rienzi, and then, between the death of one foe and the rise of
+another, are there not such preventives as Ezzelino da Romano has taught
+to wary men? Cheer thee, I say; and, next year, if we but hold together,
+Stefanello Colonna and Luca di Savelli will be joint Senators of Rome,
+and these great men food for worms!"
+
+While thus conferred the Barons, Montreal, ere he retired to rest, stood
+gazing from the open lattice of his chamber over the landscape below,
+which slept in the autumnal moonlight, while at a distance gleamed, pale
+and steady, the lights round the encampment of the besiegers.
+
+"Wide plains and broad valleys," thought the warrior, "soon shall ye
+repose in peace beneath a new sway, against which no petty tyrant
+shall dare rebel. And ye, white walls of canvass, even while I gaze--ye
+admonish me how realms are won. Even as, of old, from the Nomad tents
+was built up the stately Babylon, (Isaiah, c. xxii.) that 'was not till
+the Assyrian founded it for them that dwell in the wilderness;' so by
+the new Ishmaelites of Europe shall a race, undreamt of now, be founded;
+and the camp of yesterday, be the city of tomorrow. Verily, when, for
+one soft offence, the Pontiff thrust me from the bosom of the Church,
+little guessed he what enemy he raised to Rome! How solemn is the
+night!--how still the heavens and earth!--the very stars are as hushed,
+as if intent on the events that are to pass below! So solemn and so
+still feels mine own spirit, and an awe unknown till now warns me that I
+approach the crisis of my daring fate!"
+
+
+
+
+BOOK X. THE LION Of BASALT.
+
+     "Ora voglio contare la morte del Tribuno."--("Vita di Cola di
+     Rienzi", lib. ii. cap. 24.)
+
+     "Now will I narrate the death of the Tribune."--"Life of
+     Cola di Rienzi".
+
+
+
+Chapter 10.I. The Conjunction of Hostile Planets in the House of Death.
+
+On the fourth day of the siege, and after beating back to those almost
+impregnable walls the soldiery of the Barons, headed by the Prince of
+the Orsini, the Senator returned to his tent, where despatches from Rome
+awaited him. He ran his eye hastily over them, till he came to the last;
+yet each contained news that might have longer delayed the eye of a man
+less inured to danger. From one he learned that Albornoz, whose blessing
+had confirmed to him the rank of Senator, had received with special
+favour the messengers of the Orsini and Colonna. He knew that the
+Cardinal, whose views connected him with the Roman Patricians, desired
+his downfall; but he feared not Albornoz: perhaps in his secret heart
+he wished that any open aggression from the Pontiff's Legate might throw
+him wholly on the people.
+
+He learned further, that, short as had been his absence, Pandulfo di
+Guido had twice addressed the populace, not in favour of the Senator,
+but in artful regrets of the loss to the trade of Rome in the absence of
+her wealthiest nobles.
+
+"For this, then, he has deserted me," said Rienzi to himself. "Let him
+beware!"
+
+The tidings contained in the next touched him home: Walter de Montreal
+had openly arrived in Rome. The grasping and lawless bandit, whose
+rapine filled with a robber's booty every bank in Europe--whose
+Company was the army of a King--whose ambition, vast, unprincipled,
+and profound, he so well knew--whose brothers were in his camp--their
+treason already more than suspected;--Walter de Montreal was in Rome!
+
+The Senator remained perfectly aghast at this new peril; and then said,
+setting his teeth as in a vice,
+
+"Wild tiger, thou art in the Lion's den!" Then pausing, he broke out
+again, "One false step, Walter de Montreal, and all the mailed hands of
+the Grand Company shall not pluck thee from the abyss! But what can I
+do? Return to Rome--the plans of Montreal unpenetrated--no accusation
+against him! On what pretence can I with honour raise the siege? To
+leave Palestrina, is to give a triumph to the Barons--to abandon Adrian,
+to degrade my cause. Yet, while away from Rome, every hour breeds
+treason and danger. Pandulfo, Albornoz, Montreal--all are at
+work against me. A keen and trusty spy, now;--ha, well thought
+of--Villani!--What, ho--Angelo Villani!"
+
+The young chamberlain appeared.
+
+"I think," said Rienzi, "to have often heard, that thou art an orphan?"
+
+"True, my Lord; the old Augustine nun who reared my boyhood, has told me
+again and again that my parents are dead. Both noble, my Lord; but I am
+the child of shame. And I say it often, and think of it ever, in order
+to make Angelo Villani remember that he has a name to win."
+
+"Young man, serve me as you have served, and if I live you shall have no
+need to call yourself an orphan. Mark me! I want a friend--the Senator
+of Rome wants a friend--only one friend--gentle Heaven! only one!"
+
+Angelo sank on his knee, and kissed the mantle of his Lord.
+
+"Say a follower. I am too mean to be Rienzi's friend."
+
+"Too mean!--go to!--there is nothing mean before God, unless it be a
+base soul under high titles. With me, boy, there is but one nobility,
+and Nature signs its charter. Listen: thou hearest daily of Walter de
+Montreal, brother to these Provencals--great captain of great robbers?"
+
+"Ay, and I have seen him, my Lord."
+
+"Well, then, he is in Rome. Some daring thought--some well-supported and
+deep-schemed villany, could alone make that bandit venture openly into
+an Italian city, whose territories he ravaged by fire and sword a
+few months back. But his brothers have lent me money--assisted my
+return;--for their own ends, it is true: but the seeming obligation
+gives them real power. These Northern swordsmen would cut my throat if
+the Great Captain bade them. He counts on my supposed weakness. I know
+him of old. I suspect--nay I read, his projects; but I cannot prove
+them. Without proof, I cannot desert Palestrina in order to accuse
+and seize him. Thou art shrewd, thoughtful, acute;--couldst thou go to
+Rome?--watch day and night his movements--see if he receive messengers
+from Albornoz or the Barons--if he confer with Pandulfo di Guido;--watch
+his lodgment, I say, night and day. He affects no concealment; your task
+will be less difficult than it seems. Apprise the Signora of all you
+learn. Give me your news daily. Will you undertake this mission?"
+
+"I will, my Lord."
+
+"To horse, then, quick!--and mind--save the wife of my bosom, I have no
+confidant in Rome."
+
+
+
+Chapter 10.II. Montreal at Rome.--His Reception of Angelo Villani.
+
+The danger that threatened Rienzi by the arrival of Montreal was
+indeed formidable. The Knight of St. John, having marched his army into
+Lombardy, had placed it at the disposal of the Venetian State in its war
+with the Archbishop of Milan. For this service he received an immense
+sum; while he provided winter quarters for his troop, for whom he
+proposed ample work in the ensuing spring. Leaving Palestrina secretly
+and in disguise, with but a slender train, which met him at Tivoli,
+Montreal repaired to Rome. His ostensible object was, partly to
+congratulate the Senator on his return, partly to receive the monies
+lent to Rienzi by his brother.
+
+His secret object we have partly seen; but not contented with the
+support of the Barons, he trusted, by the corrupting means of his
+enormous wealth, to form a third party in support of his own ulterior
+designs. Wealth, indeed, in that age and in that land, was scarcely less
+the purchaser of diadems than it had been in the later days of the
+Roman Empire. And in many a city torn by hereditary feuds, the hatred of
+faction rose to that extent, that a foreign tyrant, willing and able to
+expel one party, might obtain at least the temporary submission of
+the other. His after-success was greatly in proportion to his power to
+maintain his state by a force which was independent of the citizens,
+and by a treasury which did not require the odious recruit of taxes. But
+more avaricious than ambitious, more cruel than firm, it was by griping
+exaction, or unnecessary bloodshed, that such usurpers usually fell.
+
+Montreal, who had scanned the frequent revolutions of the time with a
+calm and investigating eye, trusted that he should be enabled to avoid
+both these errors: and, as the reader has already seen, he had formed
+the profound and sagacious project of consolidating his usurpation by an
+utterly new race of nobles, who, serving him by the feudal tenure of the
+North, and ever ready to protect him, because in so doing they protected
+their own interests, should assist to erect, not the rotten and
+unsupported fabric of a single tyranny, but the strong fortress of a
+new, hardy, and compact Aristocratic State. Thus had the great dynasties
+of the North been founded; in which a King, though seemingly curbed
+by the Barons, was in reality supported by a common interest, whether
+against a subdued population or a foreign invasion.
+
+Such were the vast schemes--extending into yet wider fields of glory and
+conquest, bounded only by the Alps--with which the Captain of the Grand
+Company beheld the columns and arches of the Seven-hilled City.
+
+No fear disturbed the long current of his thoughts. His brothers were
+the leaders of Rienzi's hireling army--that army were his creatures.
+Over Rienzi himself he assumed the right of a creditor. Thus against
+one party he deemed himself secure. For the friends of the Pope, he had
+supported himself with private, though cautious, letters from Albornoz,
+who desired only to make use of him for the return of the Roman
+Barons; and with the heads of the latter we have already witnessed his
+negotiations. Thus was he fitted, as he thought, to examine, to tamper
+with all parties, and to select from each the materials necessary for
+his own objects.
+
+The open appearance of Montreal excited in Rome no inconsiderable
+sensation. The friends of the Barons gave out that Rienzi was in league
+with the Grand Company; and that he was to sell the imperial city to
+the plunder and pillage of Barbarian robbers. The effrontery with which
+Montreal (against whom, more than once, the Pontiff had thundered his
+bulls) appeared in the Metropolitan City of the Church, was made yet
+more insolent by the recollection of that stern justice which had led
+the Tribune to declare open war against all the robbers of Italy: and
+this audacity was linked with the obvious reflection, that the brothers
+of the bold Provencal were the instruments of Rienzi's return. So
+quickly spread suspicion through the city, that Montreal's presence
+alone would in a few weeks have sufficed to ruin the Senator. Meanwhile,
+the natural boldness of Montreal silenced every whisper of prudence;
+and, blinded by the dazzle of his hopes, the Knight of St. John, as
+if to give double importance to his coming, took up his residence in a
+sumptuous palace, and his retinue rivalled, in the splendour of garb and
+pomp, the display of Rienzi himself in his earlier and more brilliant
+power.
+
+Amidst the growing excitement, Angelo Villani arrived at Rome.
+The character of this young man had been formed by his peculiar
+circumstances. He possessed qualities which often mark the Illegitimate
+as with a common stamp. He was insolent--like most of those who hold a
+doubtful rank; and while ashamed of his bastardy, was arrogant of the
+supposed nobility of his unknown parentage. The universal ferment and
+agitation of Italy at that day rendered ambition the most common of all
+the passions, and thus ambition, in all its many shades and varieties,
+forces itself into our delineations of character in this history. Though
+not for Angelo Villani were the dreams of the more lofty and generous
+order of that sublime infirmity, he was strongly incited by the desire
+and resolve to rise. He had warm affections and grateful impulses; and
+his fidelity to his patron had been carried to a virtue: but from his
+irregulated and desultory education, and the reckless profligacy of
+those with whom, in ante-chambers and guard-rooms, much of his youth had
+been passed, he had neither high principles nor an enlightened honour.
+Like most Italians, cunning and shrewd, he scrupled not at any deceit
+that served a purpose or a friend. His strong attachment to Rienzi had
+been unconsciously increased by the gratification of pride and vanity,
+flattered by the favour of so celebrated a man. Both self-interest and
+attachment urged him to every effort to promote the views and safety of
+one at once his benefactor and patron; and on undertaking his present
+mission, his only thought was to fulfil it with the most complete
+success. Far more brave and daring than was common with the Italians,
+something of the hardihood of an Ultra-Montane race gave nerve and
+vigour to his craft; and from what his art suggested, his courage never
+shrunk.
+
+When Rienzi had first detailed to him the objects of his present task,
+he instantly called to mind his adventure with the tall soldier in the
+crowd at Avignon. "If ever thou wantest a friend, seek him in Walter
+de Montreal," were words that had often rung in his ear, and they now
+recurred to him with prophetic distinctness. He had no doubt that it
+was Montreal himself whom he had seen. Why the Great Captain should
+have taken this interest in him, Angelo little cared to conjecture. Most
+probably it was but a crafty pretence--one of the common means by which
+the Chief of the Grand Company attracted to himself the youths of Italy,
+as well as the warriors of the North. He only thought now how he could
+turn the Knight's promise to account. What more easy than to present
+himself to Montreal--remind him of the words--enter his service--and
+thus effectually watch his conduct? The office of spy was not that which
+would have pleased every mind, but it shocked not the fastidiousness of
+Angelo Villani; and the fearful hatred with which his patron had often
+spoken of the avaricious and barbarian robber--the scourge of his native
+land,--had infected the young man, who had much of the arrogant and mock
+patriotism of the Romans, with a similar sentiment. More vindictive
+even than grateful, he bore, too, a secret grudge against Montreal's
+brothers, whose rough address had often wounded his pride; and, above
+all, his early recollections of the fear and execration in which Ursula
+seemed ever to hold the terrible Fra Moreale, impressed him with a vague
+belief of some ancient wrong to himself or his race, perpetrated by the
+Provencal, which he was not ill-pleased to have the occasion to avenge.
+In truth, the words of Ursula, mystic and dark as they were in
+their denunciation, had left upon Villani's boyish impressions an
+unaccountable feeling of antipathy and hatred to the man it was now his
+object to betray. For the rest, every device seemed to him decorous
+and justifiable, so that it saved his master, served his country, and
+advanced himself.
+
+Montreal was alone in his chamber when it was announced to him that
+a young Italian craved an audience. Professionally open to access, he
+forthwith gave admission to the applicant.
+
+The Knight of St. John instantly recognised the page he had encountered
+at Avignon; and when Angelo Villani said, with easy boldness, "I have
+come to remind Sir Walter de Montreal of a promise--"
+
+The Knight interrupted him with cordial frankness--"Thou needest not--I
+remember it. Dost thou now require my friendship?"
+
+"I do noble Signor!" answered Angelo; "I know not where else to seek a
+patron."
+
+"Canst thou read and write? I fear me not."
+
+"I have been taught those arts," replied Villani.
+
+"It is well. Is thy birth gentle?"
+
+"It is."
+
+"Better still;--thy name?"
+
+"Angelo Villani."
+
+"I take thy blue eyes and low broad brow," said Montreal, with a slight
+sigh, "in pledge of thy truth. Henceforth, Angelo Villani, thou art
+in the list of my secretaries. Another time thou shalt tell me more
+of thyself. Thy service dates from this day. For the rest, no man ever
+wanted wealth who served Walter de Montreal; nor advancement, if
+he served him faithfully. My closet, through yonder door, is thy
+waiting-room. Ask for, and send hither, Lusignan of Lyons; he is my
+chief scribe, and will see to thy comforts, and instruct thee in thy
+business."
+
+Angelo withdrew--Montreal's eye followed him.
+
+"A strange likeness!" said he, musingly and sadly; "my heart leaps to
+that boy!"
+
+
+
+Chapter 10.III. Montreal's Banquet.
+
+Some few days after the date of the last chapter, Rienzi received
+news from Rome, which seemed to produce in him a joyous and elated
+excitement. His troops still lay before Palestrina, and still the
+banners of the Barons waved over its unconquered walls. In truth, the
+Italians employed half their time in brawls amongst themselves; the
+Velletritrani had feuds with the people of Tivoli, and the Romans were
+still afraid of conquering the Barons;--"The hornet," said they, "stings
+worse after he is dead; and neither an Orsini, a Savelli, nor a Colonna,
+was ever known to forgive."
+
+Again and again had the captains of his army assured the indignant
+Senator that the fortress was impregnable, and that time and money were
+idly wasted upon the siege. Rienzi knew better, but he concealed his
+thoughts.
+
+He now summoned to his tent the brothers of Provence, and announced
+to them his intention of returning instantly to Rome. "The mercenaries
+shall continue the siege under our Lieutenant, and you, with my Roman
+Legion, shall accompany me. Your brother, Sir Walter, and I, both want
+your presence; we have affairs to arrange between us. After a few days I
+shall raise recruits in the city, and return."
+
+This was what the brothers desired; they approved, with evident joy, the
+Senator's proposition.
+
+Rienzi next sent for the lieutenant of his bodyguard, the same Riccardo
+Annibaldi whom the reader will remember in the earlier part of this
+work, as the antagonist of Montreal's lance. This young man--one of
+the few nobles who espoused the cause of the Senator--had evinced great
+courage and military ability, and promised fair (should Fate spare his
+life (It appears that this was the same Annibaldi who was afterwards
+slain in an affray:--Petrarch lauds his valour and laments his fate.))
+to become one of the best Captains of his time.
+
+"Dear Annibaldi," said Rienzi; "at length I can fulfil the project
+on which we have privately conferred. I take with me to Rome the two
+Provencal Captains--I leave you chief of the army. Palestrina will yield
+now--eh!--ha, ha, ha!--Palestrina will yield now!"
+
+"By my right hand, I think so, Senator," replied Annibaldi. "These
+foreigners have hitherto only stirred up quarrels amongst ourselves, and
+if not cowards are certainly traitors!"
+
+"Hush, hush, hush! Traitors! The learned Arimbaldo, the brave Brettone,
+traitors! Fie on it! No, no; they are very excellent, honourable men,
+but not lucky in the camp;--not lucky in the camp;--better speed to them
+in the city! And now to business."
+
+The Senator then detailed to Annibaldi the plan he himself had formed
+for taking the town, and the military skill of Annibaldi at once
+recognised its feasibility.
+
+With his Roman troop, and Montreal's brothers, one at either hand,
+Rienzi then departed to Rome.
+
+That night Montreal gave a banquet to Pandulfo di Guido, and to certain
+of the principal citizens, whom one by one he had already sounded, and
+found hollow at heart to the cause of the Senator.
+
+Pandulfo sate at the right hand of the Knight of St. John, and Montreal
+lavished upon him the most courteous attentions.
+
+"Pledge me in this--it is from the Vale of Chiana, near Monte Pulciano,"
+said Montreal. "I think I have heard bookmen say (you know, Signor
+Pandulfo, we ought all to be bookmen now!) that the site was renowned of
+old. In truth, the wine hath a racy flavour."
+
+"I hear," said Bruttini, one of the lesser Barons, (a stanch friend
+to the Colonna,) "that in this respect the innkeeper's son has put his
+book-learning to some use: he knows every place where the wine grows
+richest."
+
+"What! the Senator is turned wine-bibber!" said Montreal, quaffing a
+vast goblet full; "that must unfit him for business--'tis a pity."
+
+"Verily, yes," said Pandulfo; "a man at the head of a state should be
+temperate--I never drink wine unmixed."
+
+"Ah," whispered Montreal, "if your calm good sense ruled Rome,
+then, indeed, the metropolis of Italy might taste of peace. Signor
+Vivaldi,"--and the host turned towards a wealthy draper,--"these
+disturbances are bad for trade."
+
+"Very, very!" groaned the draper.
+
+"The Barons are your best customers," quoth the minor noble.
+
+"Much, much!" said the draper.
+
+"'Tis a pity that they are thus roughly expelled," said Montreal, in a
+melancholy tone. "Would it not be possible, if the Senator (I drink
+his health) were less rash--less zealous, rather,--to unite free
+institutions with the return of the Barons?--such should be the task of
+a truly wise statesman!"
+
+"It surely might be possible," returned Vivaldi; "the Savelli alone
+spend more with me than all the rest of Rome."
+
+"I know not if it be possible," said Bruttini; "but I do know that it is
+an outrage to all decorum that an innkeeper's son should be enabled to
+make a solitude of the palaces of Rome."
+
+"It certainly seems to indicate too vulgar a desire of mob favour," said
+Montreal. "However, I trust we shall harmonize all these differences.
+Rienzi, perhaps,--nay, doubtless, means well!"
+
+"I would," said Vivaldi, who had received his cue, "that we might form
+a mixed constitution--Plebeians and Patricians, each in their separate
+order."
+
+"But," said Montreal, gravely, "so new an experiment would demand great
+physical force."
+
+"Why, true; but we might call in an umpire--a foreigner who had no
+interest in either faction--who might protect the new Buono Stato; a
+Podesta, as we have done before--Brancaleone, for instance. How well
+and wisely he ruled! that was a golden age for Rome. A Podesta for
+ever!--that's my theory."
+
+"You need not seek far for the president of your council," said
+Montreal, smiling at Pandulfo; "a citizen at once popular, well-born,
+and wealthy, may be found at my right hand."
+
+Pandulfo hemmed, and coloured.
+
+Montreal proceeded. "A committee of trades might furnish an honourable
+employment to Signor Vivaldi; and the treatment of all foreign
+affairs--the employment of armies, &c., might be left to the Barons,
+with a more open competition, Signor di Bruttini, to the Barons of
+the second order than has hitherto been conceded to their birth and
+importance. Sirs, will you taste the Malvoisie?"
+
+"Still," said Vivaldi, after a pause--(Vivaldi anticipated at least the
+supplying with cloth the whole of the Grand Company)--"still, such a
+moderate and well-digested constitution would never be acceded to by
+Rienzi."
+
+"Why should it? what need of Rienzi?" exclaimed Bruttini. "Rienzi may
+take another trip to Bohemia."
+
+"Gently, gently," said Montreal; "I do not despair. All open violence
+against the Senator would strengthen his power. No, no, humble
+him--admit the Barons, and then insist on your own terms. Between the
+two factions you might then establish a fitting balance. And in order
+to keep your new constitution from the encroachment of either extreme,
+there are warriors and knights, too, who for a certain rank in the
+great city of Rome would maintain horse and foot at its service.
+We Ultra-Montanes are often harshly judged; we are wanderers and
+Ishmaelites, solely because we have no honourable place of rest. Now, if
+I--"
+
+"Ay, if you, noble Montreal!" said Vivaldi.
+
+The company remained hushed in breathless attention, when suddenly there
+was heard--deep, solemn, muffled,--the great bell of the Capitol!
+
+"Hark!" said Vivaldi, the bell: "It tolls for execution: an unwonted
+hour!"
+
+"Sure, the Senator has not returned!" exclaimed Pandulfo di Guido,
+turning pale.
+
+"No, no," quoth Bruttini, "it is but a robber, caught two nights ago in
+Romagna. I heard that he was to die tonight."
+
+At the word "robber," Montreal changed countenance slightly. The wine
+circulated--the bell continued to toll--its suddenness over, it ceased
+to alarm. Conversation flowed again.
+
+"What were you saying, Sir Knight?" said Vivaldi.
+
+"Why, let me think on't;--oh, speaking of the necessity of supporting a
+new state by force, I said that if I--"
+
+"Ah, that was it!" quoth Bruttini, thumping the table.
+
+"If I were summoned to your aid--summoned, mind ye, and absolved by the
+Pope's Legate of my former sins--(they weigh heavily on me, gentles)--I
+would myself guard your city from foreign foe and civil disturbance,
+with my gallant swordsmen. Not a Roman citizen should contribute a
+'danaro' to the cost."
+
+"Viva Fra Moreale!" cried Bruttini; and the shout was echoed by all the
+boon companions.
+
+"Enough for me," continued Montreal, "to expiate my offences. Ye know,
+gentlemen, my order is vowed to God and the Church--a warrior-monk am I!
+Enough for me to expiate my offences, I say, in the defence of the Holy
+City. Yet I, too, have my private and more earthly views,--who is above
+them? I--the bell changes its note!"
+
+"It is but the change that preludes execution--the poor robber is about
+to die!"
+
+Montreal crossed himself, and resumed:--"I am a knight and a noble,"
+said he, proudly; "the profession I have followed is that of arms;
+but--I will not disguise it--mine equals have regarded me as one who has
+stained his scutcheon by too reckless a pursuit of glory and of gain.
+I wish to reconcile myself with my order--to purchase a new name--to
+vindicate myself to the Grand Master and the Pontiff. I have had hints,
+gentles,--hints, that I might best promote my interest by restoring
+order to the Papal metropolis. The Legate Albornoz (here is his letter)
+recommends me to keep watch upon the Senator."
+
+"Surely," interrupted Pandulfo, "I hear steps below."
+
+"The mob going to the robber's execution," said Bruttini; "proceed, Sir
+Knight!"
+
+"And," continued Montreal, surveying his audience before he proceeded
+farther, "what think ye--(I do but ask your opinion, wiser than
+mine)--what think ye, as a fitting precaution against too arbitrary a
+power in the Senator--what think ye of the return of the Colonna, and
+the bold Barons of Palestrina?"
+
+"Here's to their health!" cried Vivaldi, rising.
+
+As by a sudden impulse, the company rose. "To the health of the besieged
+Barons!" was shouted aloud.
+
+"Next, what if--(I do but humbly suggest)--what if you gave the Senator
+a colleague?--it is no affront to him. It was but as yesterday that
+one of the Colonna, who was Senator, received a colleague in Bertoldo
+Orsini."
+
+"A most wise precaution," cried Vivaldi. "And where a colleague like
+Pandulfo di Guido?"
+
+"Viva Pandulfo di Guido!" cried the guests, and again their goblets were
+drained to the bottom.
+
+"And if in this I can assist ye by fair words with the Senator, (ye
+know he owes me monies--my brothers have served him), command Walter de
+Montreal."
+
+"And if fair words fail?" said Vivaldi.
+
+"The Grand Company--(heed me, ye are the counsellors)--the Grand Company
+is accustomed to forced marches!"
+
+"Viva Fra Moreale!" cried Bruttini and Vivaldi, simultaneously. "A
+health to all, my friends;" continued Bruttini; "a health to the Barons,
+Rome's old friends; to Pandulfo di Guido, the Senator's new colleague,
+and to Fra Moreale, Rome's new Podesta."
+
+"The bell has ceased," said Vivaldi, putting down his goblet.
+
+"Heaven have mercy on the robber!" added Bruttini.
+
+Scarce had he spoken, ere three taps were heard at the door--the guests
+looked at each other in dumb amaze.
+
+"New guests!" said Montreal. "I asked some trusty friends to join us
+this evening. By my faith they are welcome! Enter!"
+
+The door opened slowly; three by three entered, in complete armour, the
+guards of the Senator. On they marched, regular and speechless. They
+surrounded the festive board--they filled the spacious hall, and the
+lights of the banquet were reflected upon their corselets as on a wall
+of steel.
+
+Not a syllable was uttered by the feasters, they were as if turned to
+stone. Presently the guards gave way, and Rienzi himself appeared. He
+approached the table, and folding his arms, turned his gaze deliberately
+from guest to guest, till at last, his eyes rested on Montreal, who had
+also risen, and who alone of the party had recovered the amaze of the
+moment.
+
+And there, as these two men, each so celebrated, so proud, able, and
+ambitious, stood, front to front--it was literally as if the rival
+Spirits of Force and Intellect, Order and Strife, of the Falchion and
+the Fasces--the Antagonist Principles by which empires are ruled and
+empires overthrown, had met together, incarnate and opposed. They
+stood, both silent,--as if fascinated by each other's gaze,--loftier in
+stature, and nobler in presence than all around.
+
+Montreal spoke first, and with a forced smile.
+
+"Senator of Rome!--dare I believe that my poor banquet tempts thee, and
+may I trust that these armed men are a graceful compliment to one to
+whom arms have been a pastime?"
+
+Rienzi answered not, but waved his hand to his guards. Montreal was
+seized on the instant. Again he surveyed the guests--as a bird from the
+rattle-snake,--shrunk Pandulfo di Guido, trembling, motionless, aghast,
+from the glittering eye of the Senator. Slowly Rienzi raised his
+fatal hand towards the unhappy citizen--Pandulfo saw,--felt his
+doom,--shrieked,--and fell senseless in the arms of the soldiers.
+
+One other and rapid glance cast the Senator round the board, and then,
+with a disdainful smile, as if anxious for no meaner prey, turned away.
+Not a breath had hitherto passed his lips--all had been dumb
+show--and his grim silence had imparted a more freezing terror to his
+unguessed-for apparition. Only, when he reached the door, he turned
+back, gazed upon the Knight of St. John's bold and undaunted face,
+and said, almost in a whisper, "Walter de Montreal!--you heard the
+death-knell!"
+
+
+
+Chapter 10.IV. The Sentence of Walter de Montreal.
+
+In silence the Captain of the Grand Company was borne to the prison of
+the Capitol. In the same building lodged the rivals for the government
+of Rome; the one occupied the prison, the other the palace. The guards
+forebore the ceremony of fetters, and leaving a lamp on the table,
+Montreal perceived he was not alone,--his brothers had preceded him.
+
+"Ye are happily met," said the Knight of St. John; "we have passed
+together pleasanter nights than this is likely to be."
+
+"Can you jest, Walter?" said Arimbaldo, half-weeping. "Know you not that
+our doom is fixed? Death scowls upon us."
+
+"Death!" repeated Montreal, and for the first time his countenance
+changed; perhaps for the first time in his life he felt the thrill and
+agony of fear.
+
+"Death!" he repeated again. "Impossible! He dare not, Brettone; the
+soldiers, the Northmen!--they will mutiny, they will pluck us back from
+the grasp of the headsman!"
+
+"Cast from you so vain a hope," said Brettone sullenly; "the soldiers
+are encamped at Palestrina."
+
+"How! Dolt--fool! Came you then to Rome alone! Are we alone with this
+dread man?"
+
+"You are the dolt! Why came you hither?" answered the brother.
+
+"Why, indeed! but that I knew thou wast the Captain of the army;
+and--but thou said'st right--the folly is mine, to have played against
+the crafty Tribune so unequal a brain as thine. Enough! Reproaches are
+idle. When were ye arrested?"
+
+"At dusk--the instant we entered the gates of Rome. Rienzi entered
+privately."
+
+"Humph! What can he know against me? Who can have betrayed me? My
+secretaries are tried--all trustworthy--except that youth, and he so
+seemingly zealous--that Angelo Villani!"
+
+"Villani! Angelo Villani!" cried the brothers in a breath. "Hast thou
+confided aught to him?"
+
+"Why, I fear he must have seen--at least in part--my correspondence with
+you, and with the Barons--he was among my scribes. Know you aught of
+him?"
+
+"Walter, Heaven hath demented you!" returned Brettone. "Angelo Villani
+is the favourite menial of the Senator."
+
+"Those eyes deceived me, then," muttered Montreal, solemnly and
+shuddering; "and, as if her ghost had returned to earth, God smites me
+from the grave!"
+
+There was a long silence. At length Montreal, whose bold and sanguine
+temper was never long clouded, spoke again.
+
+"Are the Senator's coffers full?--But that is impossible."
+
+"Bare as a Dominican's."
+
+"We are saved, then. He shall name his price for our heads. Money must
+be more useful to him than blood."
+
+And as if with that thought all further meditation were rendered
+unnecessary, Montreal doffed his mantle, uttered a short prayer, and
+flung himself on a pallet in a corner of the cell.
+
+"I have slept on worse beds," said the Knight, stretching himself; and
+in a few minutes he was fast asleep.
+
+The brothers listened to his deep-drawn, but regular breathing, with
+envy and wonder, but they were in no mood to converse. Still and
+speechless, they sate like statues beside the sleeper. Time passed
+on, and the first cold air of the hour that succeeds to midnight crept
+through the bars of their cell. The bolts crashed, the door opened,
+six men-at-arms entered, passed the brothers, and one of them touched
+Montreal.
+
+"Ha!" said he, still sleeping, but turning round. "Ha!" said he, in the
+soft Provencal tongue, "sweet Adeline, we will not rise yet--it is so
+long since we met!"
+
+"What says he?" muttered the guard, shaking Montreal roughly. The Knight
+sprang up at once, and his hand grasped the head of his bed as for his
+sword. He stared round bewildered, rubbed his eyes, and then gazing on
+the guard, became alive to the present.
+
+"Ye are early risers in the Capitol," said he. "What want ye of me?"
+
+"It waits you!"
+
+"It! What?" said Montreal.
+
+"The rack!" replied the soldier, with a malignant scowl.
+
+The Great Captain said not a word. He looked for one moment at the six
+swordsmen, as if measuring his single strength against theirs. His eye
+then wandered round the room. The rudest bar of iron would have been
+dearer to him than he had ever yet found the proofest steel of Milan. He
+completed his survey with a sigh, threw his mantle over his shoulders,
+nodded at his brethren, and followed the guard.
+
+In a hall of the Capitol, hung with the ominous silk of white rays on a
+blood-red ground, sate Rienzi and his councillors. Across a recess was
+drawn a black curtain.
+
+"Walter de Montreal," said a small man at the foot of the table, "Knight
+of the illustrious order of St. John of Jerusalem--"
+
+"And Captain of the Grand Company!" added the prisoner, in a firm voice.
+
+"You stand accused of divers counts: robbery and murder, in Tuscany,
+Romagna, and Apulia--"
+
+"For robbery and murder, brave men, and belted Knights," said Montreal,
+drawing himself up, "would use the words 'war and victory.' To those
+charges I plead guilty! Proceed."
+
+"You are next accused of treasonable conspiracy against the liberties
+of Rome for the restoration of the proscribed Barons--and of traitorous
+correspondence with Stefanello Colonna at Palestrina."
+
+"My accuser?"
+
+"Step forth, Angelo Villani!"
+
+"You are my betrayer, then?" said Montreal steadily. "I deserved this.
+I beseech you, Senator of Rome, let this young man retire. I confess my
+correspondence with the Colonna, and my desire to restore the Barons."
+
+Rienzi motioned to Villani, who bowed and withdrew.
+
+"There rests only then for you, Walter de Montreal, to relate, fully and
+faithfully, the details of your conspiracy."
+
+"That is impossible," replied Montreal, carelessly.
+
+"And why?"
+
+"Because, doing as I please with my own life, I will not betray the
+lives of others."
+
+"Bethink thee--thou wouldst have betrayed the life of thy judge!"
+
+"Not betrayed--thou didst not trust me."
+
+"The law, Walter de Montreal, hath sharp inquisitors--behold!"
+
+The black curtain was drawn aside, and the eye of Montreal rested on the
+executioner and the rack! His proud breast heaved indignantly.
+
+"Senator of Rome," said he, "these instruments are for serfs and
+villeins. I have been a warrior and a leader; life and death have been
+in my hands--I have used them as I listed; but to mine equal and my foe,
+I never proffered the insult of the rack."
+
+"Sir Walter de Montreal," returned the Senator, gravely, but with some
+courteous respect, "your answer is that which rises naturally to the
+lips of brave men. But learn from me, whom fortune hath made thy judge,
+that no more for serf and villein, than for knight and noble, are such
+instruments the engines of law, or the tests of truth. I yielded but to
+the desire of these reverend councillors, to test thy nerves. But, wert
+thou the meanest peasant of the Campagna, before my judgment-seat
+thou needst not apprehend the torture. Walter de Montreal, amongst the
+Princes of Italy thou hast known, amongst the Roman Barons thou wouldst
+have aided, is there one who could make that boast?"
+
+"I desired only," said Montreal, with some hesitation, "to unite the
+Barons with thee; nor did I intrigue against thy life!"
+
+Rienzi frowned--"Enough," he said, hastily. "Knight of St. John, I know
+thy secret projects, subterfuge and evasion neither befit nor avail
+thee. If thou didst not intrigue against my life, thou didst intrigue
+against the life of Rome. Thou hast but one favour left to demand on
+earth, it is the manner of thy death."
+
+Montreal's lip worked convulsively.
+
+"Senator," said he, in a low voice, "may I crave audience with thee
+alone for one minute?"
+
+The councillors looked up.
+
+"My Lord," whispered the eldest of them, "doubtless he hath concealed
+weapons--trust him not."
+
+"Prisoner," returned Rienzi, after a moment's pause; "if thou seekest
+for mercy thy request is idle, and before my coadjutors I have no
+secret; speak out what thou hast to say!"
+
+"Yet listen to me," said the prisoner, folding his arms; "it concerns
+not my life, but Rome's welfare."
+
+"Then," said Rienzi, in an altered tone, "thy request is granted. Thou
+mayst add to thy guilt the design of the assassin, but for Rome I would
+dare greater danger."
+
+So saying, he motioned to the councillors, who slowly withdrew by
+the door which had admitted Villani, while the guards retired to the
+farthest extremity of the hall.
+
+"Now, Walter de Montreal, be brief, for thy time is short."
+
+"Senator," said Montreal, "my life can but little profit you; men will
+say that you destroyed your creditor in order to cancel your debt. Fix a
+sum upon my life, estimate it at the price of a monarch's; every florin
+shall be paid to you, and your treasury will be filled for five years
+to come. If the 'Buono Stato' depends on your government, what I have
+asked, your solicitude for Rome will not permit you to refuse."
+
+"You mistake me, bold robber," said Rienzi, sternly; "your treason I
+could guard against, and therefore forgive; your ambition, never! Mark
+me, I know you! Place your hand on your heart and say whether, could
+we change places, you, as Rienzi, would suffer all the gold of earth
+to purchase the life of Walter de Montreal? For men's reading of my
+conduct, that must I bear; for mine own reading, mine eyes must be
+purged from corruption. I am answerable to God for the trust of Rome.
+And Rome trembles while the head of the Grand Company lives in the
+plotting brain and the daring heart of Walter de Montreal. Man--wealthy,
+great, and subtle as you are, your hours are numbered; with the rise of
+the sun you die!"
+
+Montreal's eyes, fixed upon the Senator's face, saw hope was over; his
+pride and his fortitude returned to him.
+
+"We have wasted words," said he. "I played for a great stake, I have
+lost, and must pay the forfeit! I am prepared. On the threshold of the
+Unknown World, the dark spirit of prophecy rushes into us. Lord Senator,
+I go before thee to announce--that in Heaven or in Hell--ere many days
+be over, room must be given to one mightier than I am!"
+
+As he spoke, his form dilated, his eye glared; and Rienzi, cowering as
+never had he cowered before, shrunk back, and shaded his face with his
+hand.
+
+"The manner of your death?" he asked, in a hollow voice.
+
+"The axe: it is that which befits knight and warrior. For thee, Senator,
+Fate hath a less noble death."
+
+"Robber be dumb!" cried Rienzi, passionately; "Guards, bear back the
+prisoner. At sunrise, Montreal--"
+
+"Sets the sun of the scourge of Italy," said the Knight, bitterly. "Be
+it so. One request more; the Knights of St. John claim affinity with the
+Augustine order; grant me an Augustine confessor."
+
+"It is granted; and in return for thy denunciations, I, who can give
+thee no earthly mercy, will implore the Judge of all for pardon to thy
+soul!"
+
+"Senator, I have done with man's mediation. My brethren? Their deaths
+are not necessary to thy safety or thy revenge!"
+
+Rienzi mused a moment: "No," said he, "dangerous tools they were, but
+without the workman they may rust unharming. They served me once, too.
+Prisoner, their lives are spared."
+
+
+
+Chapter 10.V. The Discovery.
+
+The Council was broken up--Rienzi hastened to his own apartments.
+Meeting Villani by the way, he pressed the youth's hand affectionately.
+"You have saved Rome and me from great peril," said he; "the saints
+reward you!" Without tarrying for Villani's answer, he hurried on. Nina,
+anxious and perturbed, awaited him in their chamber.
+
+"Not a-bed yet?" said he: "fie, Nina, even thy beauty will not stand
+these vigils."
+
+"I could not rest till I had seen thee. I hear (all Rome has heard it
+ere this) that thou hast seized Walter de Montreal, and that he will
+perish by the headsman."
+
+"The first robber that ever died so brave a death," returned Rienzi,
+slowly unrobing himself.
+
+"Cola, I have never crossed your schemes,--your policy, even by a
+suggestion. Enough for me to triumph in their success, to mourn for
+their failure. Now, I ask thee one request--spare me the life of this
+man."
+
+"Nina--"
+
+"Hear me,--for thee I speak! Despite his crimes, his valour and his
+genius have gained him admirers, even amongst his foes. Many a prince,
+many a state that secretly rejoices at his fall, will affect horror
+against his judge. Hear me farther. His brothers aided your return;
+the world will term you ungrateful. His brothers lent you monies, the
+world--(out on it!)--will term you--"
+
+"Hold!" interrupted the Senator. "All that thou sayest, my mind
+forestalled. But thou knowest me--to thee I have no disguise. No compact
+can bind Montreal's faith--no mercy win his gratitude. Before his red
+right hand truth and justice are swept away. If I condemn Montreal I
+incur disgrace and risk danger--granted. If I release him, ere the first
+showers of April, the chargers of the Northmen will neigh in the halls
+of the Capitol. Which shall I hazard in this alternative, myself or
+Rome? Ask me no more--to bed, to bed!"
+
+"Couldst thou read my forebodings, Cola, mystic--gloomy--unaccountable?"
+
+"Forebodings!--I have mine," answered Rienzi, sadly, gazing on space,
+as if his thoughts peopled it with spectres. Then, raising his eyes to
+Heaven, he said with that fanatical energy which made much both of his
+strength and weakness--"Lord, mine at least not the sin of Saul! the
+Amalekite shall not be saved!"
+
+While Rienzi enjoyed a short, troubled, and restless sleep, over which
+Nina watched--unslumbering, anxious, tearful, and oppressed with dark
+and terrible forewarnings--the accuser was more happy than the judge.
+The last thoughts that floated before the young mind of Angelo Villani,
+ere wrapped in sleep, were bright and sanguine. He felt no honourable
+remorse that he had entrapped the confidence of another--he felt only
+that his scheme had prospered, that his mission had been fulfilled.
+The grateful words of Rienzi rang in his ear, and hopes of fortune and
+power, beneath the sway of the Roman Senator, lulled him into slumber,
+and coloured all his dreams.
+
+Scarce, however, had he been two hours asleep, ere he was wakened by one
+of the attendants of the palace, himself half awake. "Pardon me, Messere
+Villani," said he, "but there is a messenger below from the good Sister
+Ursula; he bids thee haste instantly to the Convent--she is sick unto
+death, and has tidings that crave thy immediate presence."
+
+Angelo, whose morbid susceptibility as to his parentage was ever excited
+by vague but ambitious hopes--started up, dressed hurriedly, and joining
+the messenger below, repaired to the Convent. In the Court of the
+Capitol, and by the Staircase of the Lion, was already heard the noise
+of the workmen, and looking back, Villani beheld the scaffold, hung with
+black--sleeping cloudlike in the grey light of dawn--at the same time,
+the bell of the Capitol tolled heavily. A pang shot athwart him. He
+hurried on;--despite the immature earliness of the hour, he met groups
+of either sex, hastening along the streets to witness the execution
+of the redoubted Captain of the Grand Company. The Convent of the
+Augustines was at the farthest extremity of that city, even then so
+extensive, and the red light upon the hilltops already heralded the
+rising sun, ere the young man reached the venerable porch. His name
+obtained him instant admittance.
+
+"Heaven grant," said an old Nun, who conducted him through a long and
+winding passage, "that thou mayst bring comfort to the sick sister: she
+has pined for thee grievously since matins."
+
+In a cell set apart for the reception of visitors (from the
+outward world), to such of the Sisterhood as received the necessary
+dispensation, sate the aged Nun. Angelo had only seen her once since his
+return to Rome, and since then disease had made rapid havoc on her form
+and features. And now, in her shroudlike garments and attenuated frame,
+she seemed by the morning light as a spectre whom day had surprised
+above the earth. She approached the youth, however, with a motion more
+elastic and rapid than seemed possible to her worn and ghastly form.
+"Thou art come," she said. "Well, well! This morning after matins, my
+confessor, an Augustine, who alone knows the secrets of my life, took
+me aside, and told me that Walter de Montreal had been seized by the
+Senator--that he was adjudged to die, and that one of the Augustine
+brotherhood had been sent for to attend his last hours--is it so?"
+
+"Thou wert told aright," said Angelo, wonderingly. "The man at whose
+name thou wert wont to shudder--against whom thou hast so often warned
+me--will die at sunrise."
+
+"So soon!--so soon!--Oh, Mother of Mercy!--fly! thou art about the
+person of the Senator, thou hast high favour with him; fly! down on thy
+knees, and as thou hopest for God's grace, rise not till thou hast won
+the Provencal's life."
+
+"She raves," muttered Angelo, with white lips.
+
+"I do not rave,--boy!" screeched the Sister, wildly, "know that my
+daughter was his leman. He disgraced our house,--a house haughtier than
+his own. Sinner that I was, I vowed revenge. His boy--they had only
+one!--was brought up in a robber's camp;--a life of bloodshed--a death
+of doom--a futurity of hell--were before him. I plucked the child from
+such a fate--I bore him away--I told the father he was dead--I placed
+him in the path to honourable fortunes. May my sin be forgiven me!
+Angelo Villani, thou art that child;--Walter de Montreal is thy father.
+But now, trembling on the verge of death, I shudder at the vindictive
+thoughts I once nourished. Perhaps--"
+
+"Sinner and accursed!" interrupted Villani, with a loud shout:--"sinner
+and accursed thou art indeed! Know that it was I who betrayed thy
+daughter's lover!--by the son's treason dies the father!"
+
+Not a moment more did he tarry: he waited not to witness the effect
+his words produced. As one frantic--as one whom a fiend possesses
+or pursues--he rushed from the Convent--he flew through the desolate
+streets. The death-bell came, first indistinct, then loud, upon his ear.
+Every sound seemed to him like the curse of God; on--on--he passed the
+more deserted quarter--crowds swept before him--he was mingled with
+the living stream, delayed, pushed back--thousands on thousands around,
+before him. Breathless, gasping, he still pressed on--he forced his
+way--he heard not--he saw not--all was like a dream. Up burst the sun
+over the distant hills!--the bell ceased! From right to left he pushed
+aside the crowd--his strength was as a giant's. He neared the fatal
+spot. A dead hush lay like a heavy air over the multitude. He heard
+a voice, as he pressed along, deep and clear--it was the voice of his
+father!--it ceased--the audience breathed heavily--they murmured--they
+swayed to and fro. On, on, went Angelo Villani. The guards of the
+Senator stopped his way;--he dashed aside their pikes--he eluded their
+grasp--he pierced the armed barrier--he stood on the Place of the
+Capitol. "Hold, hold!" he would have cried--but horror struck him dumb.
+He beheld the gleaming axe--he saw the bended neck. Ere another breath
+passed his lips, a ghastly and trunkless face was raised on high--Walter
+de Montreal was no more!
+
+Villani saw--swooned not--shrunk not--breathed not!--but he turned his
+eyes from that lifted head, dropping gore, to the balcony, in which,
+according to custom, sate, in solemn pomp, the Senator of Rome--and the
+face of that young man was as the face of a demon!
+
+"Ha!" said he, muttering to himself, and recalling the words of Rienzi
+seven years before--"Blessed art thou who hast no blood of kindred to
+avenge!"
+
+
+
+Chapter 10.VI. The Suspense.
+
+Walter de Montreal was buried in the church of St. Maria dell' Araceli.
+But the "evil that he did lived after him!" Although the vulgar
+had, until his apprehension, murmured against Rienzi for allowing so
+notorious a freebooter to be at large, he was scarcely dead ere they
+compassionated the object of their terror. With that singular species of
+piety which Montreal had always cultivated, as if a decorous and natural
+part of the character of a warrior, no sooner was his sentence fixed,
+than he had surrendered himself to the devout preparation for death.
+With the Augustine Friar he consumed the brief remainder of the night
+in prayer and confession, comforted his brothers, and passed to the
+scaffold with the step of a hero and the self-acquittal of a martyr. In
+the wonderful delusions of the human heart, far from feeling remorse at
+a life of professional rapine and slaughter, almost the last words
+of the brave warrior were in proud commendation of his own deeds. "Be
+valiant like me," he said to his brothers, "and remember that ye are now
+the heirs to the Humbler of Apulia, Tuscany, and La Marca."
+
+     (Pregovi che vi amiate e siate valorosi al mondo, come fui
+     io, che mi feci fare obbedienza a la Puglia, Toscana, e a La
+     Marca."--"Vita di Cola di Rienzi", lib. ii. cap. 22. "I pray
+     you love one another, and be valorous as was I, who made
+     Apulia, Tuscany and La Marca own obedience to me."--"Life of
+     Cola di Rienzi".)
+
+This confidence in himself continued at the scaffold. "I die," he said,
+addressing the Romans--"I die contented, since my bones shall rest in
+the Holy City of St. Peter and St. Paul, and the Soldier of Christ shall
+have the burial-place of the Apostles. But I die unjustly. My wealth is
+my crime--the poverty of your state my accuser. Senator of Rome,
+thou mayst envy my last hour--men like Walter de Montreal perish not
+unavenged." So saying, he turned to the East, murmured a brief prayer,
+knelt down deliberately, and said as to himself, "Rome guard my
+ashes!--Earth my memory--Fate my revenge;--and, now, Heaven receive my
+soul!--Strike!" At the first blow, the head was severed from the body.
+
+His treason but imperfectly known, the fear of him forgotten, all that
+remained of the recollection of Walter de Montreal (The military renown
+and bold exploits of Montreal are acknowledged by all the Italian
+authorities. One of them declares that since the time of Caesar, Italy
+had never known so great a Captain. The biographer of Rienzi, forgetting
+all the offences of the splendid and knightly robber, seems to feel only
+commiseration for his fate. He informs us, moreover, that at Tivoli
+one of his servants (perhaps our friend, Rodolf of Saxony), hearing his
+death, died of grief the following day.) in Rome, was admiration for
+his heroism, and compassion for his end. The fate of Pandulfo di Guido,
+which followed some days afterwards, excited a yet deeper, though more
+quiet, sentiment, against the Senator. "He was once Rienzi's friend!"
+said one man; "He was an honest, upright citizen!" muttered another;
+"He was an advocate of the people!" growled Cecco del Vecchio. But the
+Senator had wound himself up to a resolve to be inflexibly just, and to
+regard every peril to Rome as became a Roman. Rienzi remembered that he
+had never confided but he had been betrayed; he had never forgiven but
+to sharpen enmity. He was amidst a ferocious people, uncertain friends,
+wily enemies; and misplaced mercy would be but a premium to conspiracy.
+Yet the struggle he underwent was visible in the hysterical emotions he
+betrayed. He now wept bitterly, now laughed wildly. "Can I never again
+have the luxury to forgive?" said he. The coarse spectators of that
+passion deemed it,--some imbecility, some hypocrisy. But the execution
+produced the momentary effect intended. All sedition ceased, terror
+crept throughout the city, order and peace rose to the surface; but
+beneath, in the strong expression of a contemporaneous writer, "Lo
+mormorito quetamente suonava." ("The murmur quietly sounded.")
+
+On examining dispassionately the conduct of Rienzi at this awful period
+of his life, it is scarcely possible to condemn it of a single error
+in point of policy. Cured of his faults, he exhibited no unnecessary
+ostentation--he indulged in no exhibitions of intoxicated pride--that
+gorgeous imagination rather than vanity, which had led the Tribune into
+spectacle and pomp, was now lulled to rest, by the sober memory of grave
+vicissitudes, and the stern calmness of a maturer intellect. Frugal,
+provident, watchful, self-collected, 'never was seen,' observes no
+partial witness, 'so extraordinary a man.' ("Vita di Cola di Rienzi",
+lib. ii. c. 23.) 'In him was concentrated every thought for every want
+of Rome. Indefatigably occupied, he inspected, ordained, regulated all
+things; in the city, in the army, for peace, or for war. But he was
+feebly supported, and those he employed were lukewarm and lethargic.'
+Still his arms prospered. Place after place, fortress after fortress,
+yielded to the Lieutenant of the Senator: and the cession of Palestrina
+itself was hourly expected. His art and address were always strikingly
+exhibited in difficult situations, and the reader cannot fail to have
+noticed how conspicuously they were displayed in delivering himself from
+the iron tutelage of his foreign mercenaries. Montreal executed, his
+brothers imprisoned, (though their lives were spared,) a fear that
+induced respect was stricken into the breasts of those bandit soldiers.
+Removed from Rome, and, under Annibaldi, engaged against the Barons,
+constant action and constant success, withheld those necessary fiends
+from falling on their Master; while Rienzi, willing to yield to the
+natural antipathy of the Romans, thus kept the Northmen from all contact
+with the city; and as he boasted, was the only chief in Italy who
+reigned in his palace guarded only by his citizens.
+
+Despite his perilous situation--despite his suspicions, and his fears,
+no wanton cruelty stained his stern justice--Montreal and Pandulfo di
+Guido were the only state victims he demanded. If, according to the
+dark Machiavelism of Italian wisdom, the death of those enemies was
+impolitic, it was not in the act, but the mode of doing it. A prince
+of Bologna, or of Milan would have avoided the sympathy excited by
+the scaffold, and the drug or the dagger would have been the safer
+substitute for the axe. But with all his faults, real and imputed, no
+single act of that foul and murtherous policy, which made the science
+of the more fortunate princes of Italy, ever advanced the ambition or
+promoted the security of the Last of the Roman Tribunes. Whatever his
+errors, he lived and died as became a man, who dreamed the vain but
+glorious dream, that in a corrupt and dastard populace he could revive
+the genius of the old Republic.
+
+Of all who attended on the Senator, the most assiduous and the most
+honoured was still Angelo Villani. Promoted to a high civil station,
+Rienzi felt it as a return of youth, to find one person entitled to his
+gratitude;--he loved and confided in the youth as a son. Villani was
+never absent from his side, except in intercourse with the various
+popular leaders in the various quarters of the city; and in this
+intercourse his zeal was indefatigable--it seemed even to prey upon
+his health; and Rienzi chid him fondly, whenever starting from his own
+reveries, he beheld the abstracted eye and the livid paleness which had
+succeeded the sparkle and bloom of youth.
+
+Such chiding the young man answered only by the same unvarying words.
+
+"Senator, I have a great trust to fulfil;"--and at these words he
+smiled.
+
+One day Villani, while with the Senator, said rather abruptly, "Do you
+remember, my Lord, that before Viterbo, I acquitted myself so in arms,
+that even the Cardinal d'Albornoz was pleased to notice me?"
+
+"I remember your valour well, Angelo; but why the question?"
+
+"My Lord, Bellini, the Captain of the Guard of the Capitol is
+dangerously ill."
+
+"I know it."
+
+"Whom can my Lord trust at the post?"
+
+"Why, the Lieutenant."
+
+"What!--a soldier that has served under the Orsini!"
+
+"True. Well! There is Tommaso Filangieri."
+
+"An excellent man; but is he not kin by blood to Pandulfo di Guido?"
+
+"Ay--is he so? It must be thought of. Hast thou any friend to name?"
+said the Senator, smiling, "Methinks thy cavils point that way."
+
+"My Lord," replied Villani, colouring; "I am too young perhaps; but the
+post is one that demands fidelity more than it does years. Shall I own
+it?--My tastes are rather to serve thee with my sword than with my pen."
+
+"Wilt thou, indeed, accept the office? It is of less dignity and
+emolument than the one you hold; and you are full young to lead these
+stubborn spirits."
+
+"Senator, I led taller men than they are to the assault at Viterbo. But,
+be it as seems best to your superior wisdom. Whatever you do, I pray you
+to be cautious. If you select a traitor to the command of the Capitol
+Guard!--I tremble at the thought!"
+
+"By my faith, thou dost turn pale at it, dear boy; thy affection is
+a sweet drop in a bitter draught. Whom can I choose better than
+thee?--thou shalt have the post, at least during Bellini's illness. I
+will attend to it today. The business, too, will less fatigue thy young
+mind than that which now employs thee. Thou art over-laboured in our
+cause."
+
+"Senator, I can but repeat my usual answer--I have a great trust to
+fulfil!"
+
+
+
+Chapter 10.VII. The Tax.
+
+These formidable conspiracies quelled, the Barons nearly subdued, and
+three parts of the Papal territory reunited to Rome, Rienzi now
+deemed he might safely execute one of his favourite projects for the
+preservation of the liberties of his native city; and this was to
+raise and organize in each quarter of Rome a Roman Legion. Armed in the
+defence of their own institutions, he thus trusted to establish amongst
+her own citizens the only soldiery requisite for Rome.
+
+But so base were the tools with which this great man was condemned to
+work out his noble schemes, that none could be found to serve their own
+country, without a pay equal to that demanded by foreign hirelings. With
+the insolence so peculiar to a race that has once been great, each Roman
+said, "Am I not better than a German?--Pay me, then, accordingly."
+
+The Senator smothered his disgust--he had learned at last to know that
+the age of the Catos was no more. From a daring enthusiast, experience
+had converted him into a practical statesman. The Legions were necessary
+to Rome--they were formed--gallant their appearance and faultless
+their caparisons. How were they to be paid? There was but one means to
+maintain Rome--Rome must be taxed. A gabelle was put upon wine and salt.
+
+The Proclamation ran thus:--
+
+"Romans! raised to the rank of your Senator, my whole thought has been
+for your liberties and welfare; already treason defeated in the City,
+our banners triumphant without, attest the favour with which the Deity
+regards men who seek to unite liberty with law. Let us set an example
+to Italy and the World! Let us prove that the Roman sword can guard
+the Roman Forum! In each Rione of the City is provided a Legion of the
+Citizens, collected from the traders and artisans of the town; they
+allege that they cannot leave their callings without remuneration. Your
+senator calls upon you willingly to assist in your own defence. He has
+given you liberty; he has restored to you peace: your oppressors are
+scattered over the earth. He asks you now to preserve the treasures you
+have gained. To be free, you must sacrifice something; for freedom, what
+sacrifice too great? Confident of your support, I at length, for the
+first time, exert the right entrusted to me by office--and for Rome's
+salvation I tax the Romans!"
+
+Then followed the announcement of the gabelle.
+
+The Proclamation was set up in the public thoroughfares. Round one
+of the placards a crowd assembled. Their gestures were vehement and
+unguarded--their eyes sparkled--they conversed low, but eagerly.
+
+"He dares to tax us, then! Why, the Barons or the Pope could not do more
+than that!"
+
+"Shame! shame!" cried a gaunt female; "we, who were his friends! How are
+our little ones to get bread?"
+
+"He should have seized the Pope's money!" quoth an honest wine-vender.
+
+"Ah! Pandulfo di Guido would have maintained an army at his own cost. He
+was a rich man. What insolence in the innkeeper's son to be a Senator!"
+
+"We are not Romans if we suffer this!" said a deserter from Palestrina.
+
+"Fellow-citizens!" exclaimed gruffly a tall man, who had hitherto been
+making a clerk read to him the particulars of the tax imposed, and
+whose heavy brain at length understood that wine was to be made
+dearer--"Fellow-citizens, we must have a new revolution! This is indeed
+gratitude! What have we benefited by restoring this man! Are we always
+to be ground to the dust? To pay--pay--pay! Is that all we are fit for?"
+
+"Hark to Cecco del Vecchio!"
+
+"No, no; not now," growled the smith. "Tonight the artificers have a
+special meeting. We'll see--we'll see!"
+
+A young man, muffled in a cloak, who had not been before observed,
+touched the smith.
+
+"Whoever storms the Capitol the day after tomorrow at the dawn," he
+whispered, "shall find the guards absent!"
+
+He was gone before the smith could look round.
+
+The same night Rienzi, retiring to rest, said to Angelo Villani--"A bold
+but necessary measure this of mine! How do the people take it?"
+
+"They murmur a little, but seem to recognise the necessity. Cecco del
+Vecchio was the loudest grumbler, but is now the loudest approver."
+
+"The man is rough; he once deserted me;--but then that fatal
+excommunication! He and the Romans learned a bitter lesson in that
+desertion, and experience has, I trust, taught them to be honest. Well,
+if this tax be raised quietly, in two years Rome will be again the Queen
+of Italy;--her army manned--her Republic formed; and then--then--"
+
+"Then what, Senator?"
+
+"Why then, my Angelo, Cola di Rienzi may die in peace! There is a want
+which a profound experience of power and pomp brings at last to us--a
+want gnawing as that of hunger, wearing as that of sleep!--my Angelo, it
+is the want to die!"
+
+"My Lord, I would give this right hand," cried Villani, earnestly, "to
+hear you say you were attached to life!"
+
+"You are a good youth, Angelo!" said Rienzi, as he passed to Nina's
+chamber; and in her smile and wistful tenderness, forgot for a
+while--that he was a great man!
+
+
+
+Chapter 10.VIII. The Threshold of the Event.
+
+The next morning the Senator of Rome held high Court in the Capitol.
+From Florence, from Padua, from Pisa, even from Milan, (the dominion of
+the Visconti,) from Genoa, from Naples,--came Ambassadors to welcome his
+return, or to thank him for having freed Italy from the freebooter De
+Montreal. Venice alone, who held in her pay the Grand Company, stood
+aloof. Never had Rienzi seemed more prosperous and more powerful, and
+never had he exhibited a more easy and cheerful majesty of demeanour.
+
+Scarce was the audience over, when a messenger arrived from Palestrina.
+The town had surrendered, the Colonna had departed, and the standard
+of the Senator waved from the walls of the last hold of the rebellious
+Barons. Rome might now at length consider herself free, and not a foe
+seemed left to menace the repose of Rienzi.
+
+The Court dissolved. The Senator, elated and joyous, repaired
+towards his private apartments, previous to the banquet given to the
+Ambassadors. Villani met him with his wonted sombre aspect.
+
+"No sadness today, my Angelo," said the Senator, gaily; "Palestrina is
+ours!"
+
+"I am glad to hear such news, and to see my Lord of so fair a mien,"
+answered Angelo. "Does he not now desire life?"
+
+"Till Roman virtue revives, perhaps--yes! But thus are we fools of
+Fortune;--today glad--tomorrow dejected!"
+
+"Tomorrow," repeated Villani, mechanically: "Ay--tomorrow perhaps
+dejected."
+
+"Thou playest with my words, boy," said Rienzi, half angrily, as he
+turned away.
+
+But Villani heeded not the displeasure of his Lord.
+
+The banquet was thronged and brilliant; and Rienzi that day, without an
+effort, played the courteous host.
+
+Milanese, Paduan, Pisan, Neapolitan, vied with each other in
+attracting the smiles of the potent Senator. Prodigal were their
+compliments--lavish their promises of support. No monarch in Italy
+seemed more securely throned.
+
+The banquet was over (as usual on state occasions) at an early hour;
+and Rienzi, somewhat heated with wine, strolled forth alone from the
+Capitol. Bending his solitary steps towards the Palatine, he saw the
+pale and veil-like mists that succeed the sunset, gather over the wild
+grass which waves above the Palace of the Caesars. On a mound of ruins
+(column and arch overthrown) he stood, with folded arms, musing and
+intent. In the distance lay the melancholy tombs of the Campagna, and
+the circling hills, crested with the purple hues soon to melt beneath
+the starlight. Not a breeze stirred the dark cypress and unwaving pine.
+There was something awful in the stillness of the skies, hushing the
+desolate grandeur of the earth below. Many and mingled were the thoughts
+that swept over Rienzi's breast: memory was busy at his heart. How
+often, in his youth, had he trodden the same spot!--what visions had
+he nursed!--what hopes conceived! In the turbulence of his later life,
+Memory had long slept; but at that hour, she re-asserted her shadowy
+reign with a despotism that seemed prophetic. He was wandering--a boy,
+with his young brother, hand in hand, by the riverside at eve: anon he
+saw a pale face and gory side, and once more uttered his imprecations of
+revenge! His first successes, his virgin triumphs, his secret love, his
+fame, his power, his reverses, the hermitage of Maiella, the dungeon of
+Avignon, the triumphal return to Rome,--all swept across his breast with
+a distinctness as if he were living those scenes again!--and now!--he
+shrunk from the present, and descended the hill. The moon, already
+risen, shed her light over the Forum, as he passed through its mingled
+ruins. By the Temple of Jupiter, two figures suddenly emerged; the
+moonlight fell upon their faces, and Rienzi recognised Cecco del
+Vecchio and Angelo Villani. They saw him not; but, eagerly conversing,
+disappeared by the Arch of Trajan.
+
+"Villani! ever active in my service!" thought the Senator; "methinks
+this morning I spoke to him harshly--it was churlish in me!"
+
+He re-entered the Place of the Capitol--he stood by the staircase of
+the Lion; there was a red stain upon the pavement, unobliterated since
+Montreal's execution, and the Senator drew himself aside with an inward
+shudder. Was it the ghastly and spectral light of the Moon, or did the
+face of that old Egyptian Monster wear an aspect that was as of life?
+The stony eyeballs seemed bent upon him with a malignant scowl; and as
+he passed on, and looked behind, they appeared almost preternaturally
+to follow his steps. A chill, he knew not why, sunk into his heart. He
+hastened to regain his palace. The sentinels made way for him.
+
+"Senator," said one of them, doubtingly, "Messere Angelo Villani is our
+new captain--we are to obey his orders?"
+
+"Assuredly," returned the Senator, passing on. The man lingered
+uneasily, as if he would have spoken, but Rienzi observed it not.
+Seeking his chamber, he found Nina and Irene waiting for him. His heart
+yearned to his wife. Care and toil had of late driven her from his
+thoughts, and he felt it remorsefully, as he gazed upon her noble face,
+softened by the solicitude of untiring and anxious love.
+
+"Sweetest," said he, winding his arms around her tenderly; "thy lips
+never chide me, but thine eyes sometimes do! We have been apart too
+long. Brighter days dawn upon us, when I shall have leisure to thank
+thee for all thy care. And you, my fair sister, you smile on me!--ah,
+you have heard that your lover, ere this, is released by the cession of
+Palestrina, and tomorrow's sun will see him at your feet. Despite all
+the cares of the day, I remembered thee, my Irene, and sent a messenger
+to bring back the blush to that pale cheek. Come, come, we shall be
+happy again!" And with that domestic fondness common to him, when
+harsher thoughts permitted, he sate himself beside the two persons
+dearest to his hearth and heart.
+
+"So happy--if we could have many hours like this!" murmured Nina,
+sinking on his breast. "Yet sometimes I wish--"
+
+"And I too," interrupted Rienzi; "for I read thy woman's thought--I too
+sometimes wish that fate had placed us in the lowlier valleys of
+life! But it may come yet! Irene wedded to Adrian--Rome married to
+Liberty--and then, Nina, methinks you and I would find some quiet
+hermitage, and talk over old gauds and triumphs, as of a summer's dream.
+Beautiful, kiss me! Couldst thou resign these pomps?"
+
+"For a desert with thee, Cola!"
+
+"Let me reflect," resumed Rienzi; "is not today the seventh of October?
+Yes! on the seventh, be it noted, my foes yielded to my power! Seven! my
+fated number, whether ominous of good or evil! Seven months did I reign
+as Tribune--seven (There was the lapse of one year between the release
+of Rienzi from Avignon, and his triumphal return to Rome: a year chiefly
+spent in the campaign of Albornoz.) years was I absent as an exile;
+tomorrow, that sees me without an enemy, completes my seventh week of
+return!"
+
+"And seven was the number of the crowns the Roman Convents and the Roman
+Council awarded thee, after the ceremony which gave thee the knighthood
+of the Santo Spirito!" (This superstition had an excuse in strange
+historical coincidences; and the number seven was indeed to Rienzi what
+the 3rd of September was to Cromwell. The ceremony of the seven
+crowns which he received after his knighthood, on the nature of which
+ridiculous ignorance has been shown by many recent writers, was, in
+fact, principally a religious and typical donation, (symbolical of the
+gifts of the Holy Spirit,) conferred by the heads of convents--and that
+part of the ceremony which was political, was republican, not regal.)
+said Nina, adding, with woman's tender wit, "the brightest association
+of all!"
+
+"Follies seem these thoughts to others, and to philosophy, in truth, they
+are so," said Rienzi; "but all my life long, omen and type and shadow
+have linked themselves to action and event: and the atmosphere of other
+men hath not been mine. Life itself a riddle, why should riddles amaze
+us? The Future!--what mystery in the very word! Had we lived all through
+the Past, since Time was, our profoundest experience of a thousand ages
+could not give us a guess of the events that wait the very moment we are
+about to enter! Thus deserted by Reason, what wonder that we recur to
+the Imagination, on which, by dream and symbol, God sometimes paints
+the likeness of things to come? Who can endure to leave the Future all
+unguessed, and sit tamely down to groan under the fardel of the Present?
+No, no! that which the foolish-wise call Fanaticism, belongs to the same
+part of us as Hope. Each but carries us onward--from a barren strand to
+a glorious, if unbounded sea. Each is the yearning for the GREAT BEYOND,
+which attests our immortality. Each has its visions and chimeras--some
+false, but some true! Verily, a man who becomes great is often but made
+so by a kind of sorcery in his own soul--a Pythia which prophesies that
+he shall be great--and so renders the life one effort to fulfil the
+warning! Is this folly?--it were so, if all things stopped at the grave!
+But perhaps the very sharpening, and exercising, and elevating the
+faculties here--though but for a bootless end on earth--may be designed
+to fit the soul, thus quickened and ennobled, to some high destiny
+beyond the earth! Who can tell? not I!--Let us pray!"
+
+While the Senator was thus employed, Rome in her various quarters
+presented less holy and quiet scenes.
+
+In the fortress of the Orsini lights flitted to and fro, through the
+gratings of the great court. Angelo Villani might be seen stealing from
+the postern-gate. Another hour, and the Moon was high in heaven; toward
+the ruins of the Colosseum, men, whose dress bespoke them of the lowest
+rank, were seen creeping from lanes and alleys, two by two; from these
+ruins glided again the form of the son of Montreal. Later yet--the Moon
+is sinking--a grey light breaking in the East--and the gates of Rome, by
+St. John of Lateran, are open! Villani is conversing with the sentries!
+The Moon has set--the mountains are dim with a mournful and chilling
+haze--Villani is before the palace of the Capitol--the only soldier
+there! Where are the Roman legions that were to guard alike the freedom
+and the deliverer of Rome?
+
+
+
+Chapter The Last. The Close of the Chase.
+
+It was the morning of the 8th of October, 1354. Rienzi, who rose
+betimes, stirred restlessly in his bed. "It is yet early," he said to
+Nina, whose soft arm was round his neck; "none of my people seem to be
+astir. Howbeit, my day begins before theirs."
+
+"Rest yet, my Cola; you want sleep."
+
+"No; I feel feverish, and this old pain in the side torments me. I have
+letters to write."
+
+"Let me be your secretary, dearest," said Nina.
+
+Rienzi smiled affectionately as he rose; he repaired to his closet
+adjoining his sleeping apartment, and used the bath, as was his wont.
+Then dressing himself, he returned to Nina, who, already loosely robed,
+sate by the writing-table, ready for her office of love.
+
+"How still are all things!" said Rienzi. "What a cool and delicious
+prelude, in these early hours, to the toilsome day."
+
+Leaning over his wife, he then dictated different letters, interrupting
+the task at times by such observations as crossed his mind.
+
+"So, now to Annibaldi! By the way, young Adrian should join us today;
+how I rejoice for Irene's sake!"
+
+"Dear sister--yes! she loves,--if any, Cola, can so love,--as we do."
+
+"Well, but to your task, my fair scribe. Ha! what noise is that? I hear
+an armed step--the stairs creak--some one shouts my name."
+
+Rienzi flew to his sword! the door was thrown rudely open, and a figure
+in complete armour appeared within the chamber.
+
+"How! what means this?" said Rienzi, standing before Nina, with his
+drawn sword.
+
+The intruder lifted his visor--it was Adrian Colonna.
+
+"Fly, Rienzi!--hasten, Signora! Thank Heaven, I can save ye yet! Myself
+and train released by the capture of Palestrina, the pain of my wound
+detained me last night at Tivoli. The town was filled with armed
+men--not thine, Senator. I heard rumours that alarmed me. I resolved to
+proceed onward--I reached Rome, the gates of the city were wide open!"
+
+"How!"
+
+"Your guard gone. Presently I came upon a band of the retainers of the
+Savelli. My insignia, as a Colonna, misled them. I learned that this
+very hour some of your enemies are within the city, the rest are on
+their march--the people themselves arm against you. In the obscurer
+streets I passed through, the mob were already forming. They took me
+for thy foe, and shouted. I came hither--thy sentries have vanished. The
+private door below is unbarred and open. Not a soul seems left in thy
+palace. Haste--fly--save thyself!--Where is Irene?"
+
+"The Capitol deserted!--impossible!" cried Rienzi. He strode across the
+chambers to the ante-room, where his night-guard usually waited--it was
+empty! He passed hastily to Villani's room--it was untenanted! He would
+have passed farther, but the doors were secured without. It was evident
+that all egress had been cut off, save by the private door below,--and
+that had been left open to admit his murtherers!
+
+He returned to his room--Nina had already gone to rouse and prepare
+Irene, whose chamber was on the other side, within one of their own.
+
+"Quick, Senator!" said Adrian. "Methinks there is yet time. We must make
+across to the Tiber. I have stationed my faithful squires and Northmen
+there. A boat waits us."
+
+"Hark!" interrupted Rienzi, whose senses had of late been
+preternaturally quickened. "I hear a distant shout--a familiar shout,
+'Viva 'l Popolo!' Why, so say I! These must be friends."
+
+"Deceive not thyself; thou hast scarce a friend at Rome."
+
+"Hist!" said Rienzi, in a whisper; "save Nina--save Irene. I cannot
+accompany thee."
+
+"Art thou mad?"
+
+"No! but fearless. Besides, did I accompany, I might but destroy you
+all. Were I found with you, you would be massacred with me. Without me
+ye are safe. Yes, even the Senator's wife and sister have provoked no
+revenge. Save them, noble Colonna! Cola di Rienzi puts his trust in God
+alone!"
+
+By this time Nina had returned; Irene with her. Afar was heard the
+tramp--steady--slow--gathering--of the fatal multitude.
+
+"Now, Cola," said Nina, with a bold and cheerful air, and she took her
+husband's arm, while Adrian had already found his charge in Irene.
+
+"Yes, now, Nina!" said Rienzi; "at length we part! If this is my last
+hour--in my last hour I pray God to bless and shield thee! for verily,
+thou hast been my exceeding solace--provident as a parent, tender as a
+child, the smile of my hearth, the--the--"
+
+Rienzi was almost unmanned. Emotions, deep, conflicting, unspeakably
+fond and grateful, literally choked his speech.
+
+"What!" cried Nina, clinging to his breast, and parting her hair from
+her eyes, as she sought his averted face. "Part!--never! This is my
+place--all Rome shall not tear me from it!"
+
+Adrian, in despair, seized her hand, and attempted to drag her thence.
+
+"Touch me not, sir!" said Nina, waving her arm with angry majesty, while
+her eyes sparkled as a lioness, whom the huntsmen would sever from her
+young. "I am the wife of Cola di Rienzi, the Great Senator of Rome, and
+by his side will I live and die!"
+
+"Take her hence: quick!--quick! I hear the crowd advancing."
+
+Irene tore herself from Adrian, and fell at the feet of Rienzi--she
+clasped his knees.
+
+"Come, my brother, come! Why lose these precious moments? Rome forbids
+you to cast away a life in which her very self is bound up."
+
+"Right, Irene; Rome is bound up with me, and we will rise or fall
+together!--no more!"
+
+"You destroy us all!" said Adrian, with generous and impatient warmth.
+"A few minutes more, and we are lost. Rash man! it is not to fall by an
+infuriate mob that you have been preserved from so many dangers."
+
+"I believe it," said the Senator, as his tall form seemed to dilate as
+with the greatness of his own soul. "I shall triumph yet! Never shall
+mine enemies--never shall posterity say that a second time Rienzi
+abandoned Rome! Hark! 'Viva 'l Popolo!' still the cry of 'THE PEOPLE.'
+That cry scares none but tyrants! I shall triumph and survive!"
+
+"And I with thee!" said Nina, firmly. Rienzi paused a moment, gazed on
+his wife, passionately clasped her to his heart, kissed her again and
+again, and then said, "Nina, I command thee,--Go!"
+
+"Never!"
+
+He paused. Irene's face, drowned in tears, met his eyes.
+
+"We will all perish with you," said his sister; "you only, Adrian, you
+leave us!"
+
+"Be it so," said the Knight, sadly; "we will all remain," and he
+desisted at once from further effort.
+
+There was a dead but short pause, broken but by a convulsive sob from
+Irene. The tramp of the raging thousands sounded fearfully distinct.
+Rienzi seemed lost in thought--then lifting his head, he said, calmly,
+"ye have triumphed--I join ye--I but collect these papers, and follow
+you. Quick, Adrian--save them!" and he pointed meaningly to Nina.
+
+Waiting no other hint, the young Colonna seized Nina in his strong
+grasp--with his left hand he supported Irene, who with terror and
+excitement was almost insensible. Rienzi relieved him of the lighter
+load--he took his sister in his arms, and descended the winding stairs.
+Nina remained passive--she heard her husband's step behind, it was
+enough for her--she but turned once to thank him with her eyes. A tall
+Northman clad in armour stood at the open door. Rienzi placed Irene, now
+perfectly lifeless, in the soldier's arms, and kissed her pale cheek in
+silence.
+
+"Quick, my Lord," said the Northman, "on all sides they come!" So
+saying, he bounded down the descent with his burthen. Adrian followed
+with Nina; the Senator paused one moment, turned back, and was in his
+room ere Adrian was aware that he had vanished.
+
+Hastily he drew the coverlid from his bed, fastened it to the casement
+bars, and by its aid dropped (at a distance of several feet) into the
+balcony below. "I will not die like a rat," said he, "in the trap they
+have set for me! The whole crowd shall, at least, see and hear me."
+
+This was the work of a moment.
+
+Meanwhile, Nina had scarcely proceeded six paces, before she discovered
+that she was alone with Adrian.
+
+"Ha! Cola!" she cried, "where is he? he has gone!"
+
+"Take heart, Lady, he has returned but for some secret papers he has
+forgotten. He will follow us anon."
+
+"Let us wait, then."
+
+"Lady," said Adrian, grinding his teeth, "hear you not the crowd?--on,
+on!" and he flew with a swifter step. Nina struggled in his grasp--Love
+gave her the strength of despair. With a wild laugh she broke from him.
+She flew back--the door was closed--but unbarred--her trembling hands
+lingered a moment round the spring. She opened it, drew the heavy bolt
+across the panels, and frustrated all attempt from Adrian to regain her.
+She was on the stairs,--she was in the room. Rienzi was gone! She fled,
+shrieking his name, through the State Chambers--all was desolate. She
+found the doors opening on the various passages that admitted to the
+rooms below barred without. Breathless and gasping, she returned to the
+chamber. She hurried to the casement--she perceived the method by
+which he had descended below--her brave heart told her of his brave
+design;--she saw they were separated,--"But the same roof holds us," she
+cried, joyously, "and our fate shall be the same!" With that thought she
+sank in mute patience on the floor.
+
+Forming the generous resolve not to abandon the faithful and devoted
+pair without another effort, Adrian had followed Nina, but too late--the
+door was closed against his efforts. The crowd marched on--he heard
+their cry change on a sudden--it was no longer "LIVE THE PEOPLE!" but
+"DEATH TO THE TRAITOR!" His attendant had already disappeared, and
+waking now only to the danger of Irene, the Colonna in bitter grief
+turned away, lightly sped down the descent, and hastened to the
+riverside, where the boat and his band awaited him.
+
+The balcony on which Rienzi had alighted was that from which he had been
+accustomed to address the people--it communicated with a vast hall used
+on solemn occasions for State festivals--and on either side were square
+projecting towers, whose grated casements looked into the balcony.
+One of these towers was devoted to the armory, the other contained the
+prison of Brettone, the brother of Montreal. Beyond the latter tower was
+the general prison of the Capitol. For then the prison and the palace
+were in awful neighbourhood!
+
+The windows of the Hall were yet open--and Rienzi passed into it from
+the balcony--the witness of the yesterday's banquet was still there--the
+wine, yet undried, crimsoned the floor, and goblets of gold and silver
+shone from the recesses. He proceeded at once to the armory, and
+selected from the various suits that which he himself had worn when,
+nearly eight years ago, he had chased the Barons from the gates of Rome.
+He arrayed himself in the mail, leaving only his head uncovered; and
+then taking, in his right hand, from the wall, the great Gonfalon of
+Rome, returned once more to the hall. Not a man encountered him. In that
+vast building, save the prisoners, and the faithful Nina, whose presence
+he knew not of--the Senator was alone.
+
+On they came, no longer in measured order, as stream after stream--from
+lane, from alley, from palace and from hovel--the raging sea
+received new additions. On they came--their passions excited by their
+numbers--women and men, children and malignant age--in all the awful
+array of aroused, released, unresisted physical strength and brutal
+wrath; "Death to the traitor--death to the tyrant--death to him who has
+taxed the people!"--"Mora l' traditore che ha fatta la gabella!--Mora!"
+Such was the cry of the people--such the crime of the Senator! They
+broke over the low palisades of the Capitol--they filled with one sudden
+rush the vast space;--a moment before so desolate,--now swarming with
+human beings athirst for blood!
+
+Suddenly came a dead silence, and on the balcony above stood Rienzi--his
+head was bared and the morning sun shone over that lordly brow, and
+the hair grown grey before its time, in the service of that maddening
+multitude. Pale and erect he stood--neither fear, nor anger, nor
+menace--but deep grief and high resolve--upon his features! A momentary
+shame--a momentary awe seized the crowd.
+
+He pointed to the Gonfalon, wrought with the Republican motto and arms
+of Rome, and thus he began:--
+
+"I too am a Roman and a Citizen; hear me!"
+
+"Hear him not! hear him not! his false tongue can charm away our
+senses!" cried a voice louder than his own; and Rienzi recognised Cecco
+del Vecchio.
+
+"Hear him not! down with the tyrant!" cried a more shrill and youthful
+tone; and by the side of the artisan stood Angelo Villani.
+
+"Hear him not! death to the death-giver!" cried a voice close at hand,
+and from the grating of the neighbouring prison glared near upon him, as
+the eye of a tiger, the vengeful gaze of the brother of Montreal.
+
+Then from Earth to Heaven rose the roar--"Down with the tyrant--down
+with him who taxed the people!"
+
+A shower of stones rattled on the mail of the Senator,--still he stirred
+not. No changing muscle betokened fear. His persuasion of his own
+wonderful powers of eloquence, if he could but be heard, inspired him
+yet with hope; he stood collected in his own indignant, but determined
+thoughts;--but the knowledge of that very eloquence was now his
+deadliest foe. The leaders of the multitude trembled lest he should be
+heard; "and doubtless," says the contemporaneous biographer, "had he but
+spoken he would have changed them all, and the work been marred."
+
+The soldiers of the Barons had already mixed themselves with the
+throng--more deadly weapons than stones aided the wrath of the
+multitude--darts and arrows darkened the air; and now a voice was heard
+shrieking, "Way for the torches!" And red in the sunlight the torches
+tossed and waved, and danced to and fro, above the heads of the crowd,
+as if the fiends were let loose amongst the mob! And what place in
+hell hath fiends like those a mad mob can furnish? Straw, and wood, and
+litter, were piled hastily round the great doors of the Capitol, and the
+smoke curled suddenly up, beating back the rush of the assailants.
+
+Rienzi was no longer visible, an arrow had pierced his hand--the right
+hand that supported the flag of Rome--the right hand that had given
+a constitution to the Republic. He retired from the storm into the
+desolate hall.
+
+He sat down;--and tears, springing from no weak and woman source, but
+tears from the loftiest fountain of emotion--tears that befit a warrior
+when his own troops desert him--a patriot when his countrymen rush
+to their own doom--a father when his children rebel against his
+love,--tears such as these forced themselves from his eyes and
+relieved,--but they changed, his heart!
+
+"Enough, enough!" he said, presently rising and dashing the drops
+scornfully away; "I have risked, dared, toiled enough for this dastard
+and degenerate race. I will yet baffle their malice--I renounce the
+thought of which they are so little worthy!--Let Rome perish!--I feel,
+at last, that I am nobler than my country!--she deserves not so high a
+sacrifice!"
+
+With that feeling, Death lost all the nobleness of aspect it had before
+presented to him; and he resolved, in very scorn of his ungrateful foes,
+in very defeat of their inhuman wrath, to make one effort for his life!
+He divested himself of his glittering arms; his address, his dexterity,
+his craft, returned to him. His active mind ran over the chances of
+disguise--of escape;--he left the hall--passed through the humbler
+rooms, devoted to the servitors and menials--found in one of them a
+coarse working garb--indued himself with it--placed upon his head some
+of the draperies and furniture of the palace, as if escaping with
+them; and said, with his old "fantastico riso" ("Fantastic smile or
+laugh.")--"When all other friends desert me, I may well forsake myself!"
+With that he awaited his occasion.
+
+Meanwhile the flames burnt fierce and fast; the outer door below was
+already consumed; from the apartment he had deserted the fire burst out
+in volleys of smoke--the wood crackled--the lead melted--with a crash
+fell the severed gates--the dreadful entrance was opened to all the
+multitude--the proud Capitol of the Caesars was already tottering to its
+fall!--Now was the time!--he passed the flaming door--the smouldering
+threshold;--he passed the outer gate unscathed--he was in the middle of
+the crowd. "Plenty of pillage within," he said to the bystanders, in
+the Roman patois, his face concealed by his load--"Suso, suso a gliu
+traditore!" (Down, down with the traitor.) The mob rushed past him--he
+went on--he gained the last stair descending into the open streets--he
+was at the last gate--liberty and life were before him.
+
+A soldier (one of his own) seized him. "Pass not--whither goest thou?"
+
+"Beware, lest the Senator escape disguised!" cried a voice behind--it
+was Villani's. The concealing load was torn from his head--Rienzi stood
+revealed!
+
+"I am the Senator!" he said in a loud voice. "Who dare touch the
+Representative of the People?"
+
+The multitude were round him in an instant. Not led, but rather hurried
+and whirled along, the Senator was borne to the Place of the Lion. With
+the intense glare of the bursting flames, the grey image reflected a
+lurid light, and glowed--(that grim and solemn monument!)--as if itself
+of fire!
+
+There arrived, the crowd gave way, terrified by the greatness of their
+victim. Silent he stood, and turned his face around; nor could the
+squalor of his garb, nor the terror of the hour, nor the proud grief of
+detection, abate the majesty of his mien, or reassure the courage of the
+thousands who gathered, gazing, round him. The whole Capitol wrapped
+in fire, lighted with ghastly pomp the immense multitude. Down the long
+vista of the streets extended the fiery light and the serried throng,
+till the crowd closed with the gleaming standards of the Colonna--the
+Orsini--the Savelli! Her true tyrants were marching into Rome! As the
+sound of their approaching horns and trumpets broke upon the burning
+air, the mob seemed to regain their courage. Rienzi prepared to speak;
+his first word was as the signal of his own death.
+
+"Die, tyrant!" cried Cecco del Vecchio: and he plunged his dagger in the
+Senator's breast.
+
+"Die, executioner of Montreal!" muttered Villani: "thus the trust is
+fulfilled!" and his was the second stroke. Then as he drew back, and saw
+the artisan in all the drunken fury of his brute passion, tossing up his
+cap, shouting aloud, and spurning the fallen lion,--the young man gazed
+upon him with a look of withering and bitter scorn, and said, while he
+sheathed his blade, and slowly turned to quit the crowd,
+
+"Fool, miserable fool! thou and these at least had no blood of kindred
+to avenge!"
+
+They heeded not his words--they saw him not depart; for as Rienzi,
+without a word, without a groan, fell to the earth,--as the roaring
+waves of the multitude closed over him,--a voice, shrill, sharp, and
+wild, was heard above all the clamour. At the casement of the Palace,
+(the casement of her bridal chamber,) Nina stood!--through the flames
+that burst below and around, her face and outstretched arms alone
+visible! Ere yet the sound of that thrilling cry passed from the air,
+down with a mighty crash thundered that whole wing of the Capitol,--a
+blackened and smouldering mass.
+
+At that hour, a solitary boat was gliding swiftly along the Tiber. Rome
+was at a distance, but the lurid blow of the conflagration cast its
+reflection upon the placid and glassy stream: fair beyond description
+was the landscape; soft beyond all art of Painter and of Poet, the
+sunlight quivering over the autumnal herbage, and hushing into tender
+calm the waves of the golden River!
+
+Adrian's eyes were strained towards the towers of the
+Capitol, distinguished by the flames from the spires and domes
+around;--senseless, and clasped to his guardian breast, Irene was
+happily unconscious of the horrors of the time.
+
+"They dare not--they dare not," said the brave Colonna, "touch a hair of
+that sacred head!--if Rienzi fall, the liberties of Rome fall for ever!
+As those towers that surmount the flames, the pride and monument
+of Rome, he shall rise above the dangers of the hour. Behold, still
+unscathed amidst the raging element, the Capitol itself is his emblem!"
+
+Scarce had he spoken, when a vast volume of smoke obscured the fires
+afar off, a dull crash (deadened by the distance) travelled to his ear,
+and the next moment, the towers on which he gazed had vanished from
+the scene, and one intense and sullen glare seemed to settle over the
+atmosphere,--making all Rome itself the funeral pyre of THE LAST OF THE
+ROMAN TRIBUNES!
+
+
+The End
+
+
+
+
+Appendix I. Some Remarks on the Life and Character of Rienzi.
+
+The principal authority from which historians have taken their account
+of the life and times of Rienzi is a very curious biography, by some
+unknown contemporary; and this, which is in the Roman patois of the
+time, has been rendered not quite unfamiliar to the French and English
+reader by the work of Pere du Cerceau, called "Conjuration de Nicolas
+Gabrini, dit de Rienzi," (See for a specimen of the singular blunders
+of the Frenchman's work, Appendix II.) which has at once pillaged and
+deformed the Roman biographer. The biography I refer to was published
+(and the errors of the former editions revised) by Muratori in his great
+collection; and has lately been reprinted separately in an improved
+text, accompanied by notes of much discrimination and scholastic taste,
+and a comment upon that celebrated poem of Petrarch, "Spirito Gentil,"
+which the majority of Italian critics have concurred in considering
+addressed to Rienzi, in spite of the ingenious arguments to the contrary
+by the Abbe de Sade.
+
+This biography has been generally lauded for its rare impartiality. And
+the author does, indeed, praise and blame alike with a most singular
+appearance of stolid candour. The work, in truth, is one of those not
+uncommon proofs, of which Boswell's "Johnson" is the most striking, that
+a very valuable book may be written by a very silly man. The biographer
+of Rienzi appears more like the historian of Rienzi's clothes, so minute
+is he on all details of their colour and quality--so silent is he upon
+everything that could throw light upon the motives of their wearer.
+In fact, granting the writer every desire to be impartial, he is too
+foolish to be so. It requires some cleverness to judge accurately of
+a very clever man in very difficult circumstances; and the worthy
+biographer is utterly incapable of giving us any clue to the actions
+of Rienzi--utterly unable to explain the conduct of the man by the
+circumstances of the time. The weakness of his vision causes him,
+therefore, often to squint. We must add to his want of wisdom a want
+of truth, which the Herodotus-like simplicity of his style frequently
+conceals. He describes things which had no witness as precisely and
+distinctly as those which he himself had seen. For instance, before
+the death of Rienzi, in those awful moments when the Senator was alone,
+unheard, unseen, he coolly informs us of each motion, and each thought
+of Rienzi's, with as much detail as if Rienzi had returned from the
+grave to assist his narration. These obvious inventions have been
+adopted by Gibbon and others with more good faith than the laws of
+evidence would warrant. Still, however, to a patient and cautious reader
+the biography may furnish a much better notion of Rienzi's character,
+than we can glean from the historians who have borrowed from it
+piecemeal. Such a reader will discard all the writer's reasonings,
+will think little of his praise or blame, and regard only the facts he
+narrates, judging them true or doubtful, according as the writer had the
+opportunities of being himself the observer. Thus examining, the reader
+will find evidence sufficient of Rienzi's genius and Rienzi's failings:
+Carefully distinguishing between the period of his power as Tribune, and
+that of his power as Senator, he will find the Tribune vain, haughty,
+fond of display; but, despite the reasonings of the biographer, he will
+not recognise those faults in the Senator. On the other hand, he will
+notice the difference between youth and maturity--hope and experience;
+he will notice in the Tribune vast ambition, great schemes, enterprising
+activity--which sober into less gorgeous and more quiet colours in
+the portrait of the Senator. He will find that in neither instance did
+Rienzi fall from his own faults--he will find that the vulgar moral
+of ambition, blasted by its own excesses, is not the true moral of the
+Roman's life; he will find that, both in his abdication as Tribune,
+and his death as Senator, Rienzi fell from the vices of the People. The
+Tribune was a victim to ignorant cowardice--the Senator, a victim to
+ferocious avarice. It is this which modern historians have failed to
+represent. Gibbon records rightly, that the Count of Minorbino entered
+Rome with one hundred and fifty soldiers, and barricadoed the quarter of
+the Colonna--that the bell of the Capitol sounded--that Rienzi addressed
+the People--that they were silent and inactive--and that Rienzi then
+abdicated the government. But for this he calls Rienzi "pusillanimous."
+Is not that epithet to be applied to the People? Rienzi invoked them to
+move against the Robber--the People refused to obey. Rienzi wished to
+fight--the People refused to stir. It was not the cause of Rienzi alone
+which demanded their exertions--it was the cause of the People--theirs,
+not his, the shame, if one hundred and fifty foreign soldiers mastered
+Rome, overthrew their liberties, and restored their tyrants! Whatever
+Rienzi's sins, whatever his unpopularity, their freedom, their laws,
+their republic, were at stake; and these they surrendered to one hundred
+and fifty hirelings! This is the fact that damns them! But Rienzi was
+not unpopular when he addressed and conjured them: they found no fault
+with him. "The sighs and the groans of the People," says Sismondi,
+justly, "replied to his,"--they could weep, but they would not fight.
+This strange apathy the modern historians have not accounted for, yet
+the principal cause was obvious--Rienzi was excommunicated! (And this
+curse I apprehend to have been the more effective in the instance of
+Rienzi, from a fact that it would be interesting and easy to establish:
+viz., that he owed his rise as much to religious as to civil causes. He
+aimed evidently to be a religious Reformer. All his devices, ceremonies,
+and watchwords, were of a religious character. The monks took part with
+his enterprise, and joined in the revolution. His letters are full of
+mystical fanaticism. His references to ancient heroes of Rome are always
+mingled with invocations to her Christian Saints. The Bible, at that
+time little read by the public civilians of Italy, is constantly in
+his hands, and his addresses studded with texts. His very garments were
+adorned with sacred and mysterious emblems. No doubt, the ceremony of
+his Knighthood, which Gibbon ridicules as an act of mere vanity, was but
+another of his religious extravagances; for he peculiarly dedicated his
+Knighthood to the service of the Santo Spirito; and his bathing in the
+vase of Constantine was quite of a piece, not with the vanity of the
+Tribune, but with the extravagance of the Fanatic. In fact, they tried
+hard to prove him a heretic; but he escaped a charge under the mild
+Innocent, which a century or two before, or a century or two afterwards,
+would have sufficed to have sent a dozen Rienzis to the stake. I have
+dwelt the more upon this point, because, if it be shown that religious
+causes operated with those of liberty, we throw a new light upon the
+whole of that most extraordinary revolution, and its suddenness is
+infinitely less striking. The deep impression Rienzi produced upon that
+populace was thus stamped with the spirit of the religious enthusiast
+more than that of the classical demagogue. And, as in the time of
+Cromwell, the desire for temporal liberty was warmed and coloured by
+the presence of a holier and more spiritual fervour:--"The Good Estate"
+(Buono Stato) of Rienzi reminds us a little of the Good Cause of General
+Cromwell.) In stating the fact, these writers have seemed to think
+that excommunication in Rome, in the fourteenth century, produced no
+effect!--the effect it did produce I have endeavoured in these pages to
+convey.
+
+The causes of the second fall and final murder of Rienzi are equally
+misstated by modern narrators. It was from no fault of his--no
+injustice, no cruelty, no extravagance--it was not from the execution of
+Montreal, nor that of Pandulfo di Guido---it was from a gabelle on
+wine and salt that he fell. To preserve Rome from the tyrants it
+was necessary to maintain an armed force; to pay the force a tax was
+necessary; the tax was imposed--and the multitude joined with the
+tyrants, and their cry was, "Perish the traitor who has made the
+gabelle!" This was their only charge--this the only crime that their
+passions and their fury could cite against him.
+
+The faults of Rienzi are sufficiently visible, and I have not
+unsparingly shewn them; but we must judge men, not according as they
+approach perfection, but according as their good or bad qualities
+preponderate--their talents or their weaknesses--the benefits they
+effected, the evil they wrought. For a man who rose to so great a power,
+Rienzi's faults were singularly few--crimes he committed none. He is
+almost the only man who ever rose from the rank of a citizen to a power
+equal to that of monarchs without a single act of violence or treachery.
+When in power, he was vain, ostentatious, and imprudent,--always an
+enthusiast--often a fanatic; but his very faults had greatness of soul,
+and his very fanaticism at once supported his enthusiastic daring, and
+proved his earnest honesty. It is evident that no heinous charge could
+be brought against him even by his enemies, for all the accusations to
+which he was subjected, when excommunicated, exiled, fallen, were for
+two offences which Petrarch rightly deemed the proofs of his virtue
+and his glory: first, for declaring Rome to be free; secondly, for
+pretending that the Romans had a right of choice in the election of
+the Roman Emperor. (The charge of heresy was dropped.) Stern, just, and
+inflexible, as he was when Tribune, his fault was never that of wanton
+cruelty. The accusation against him, made by the gentle Petrarch,
+indeed, was that he was not determined enough--that he did not
+consummate the revolution by exterminating the patrician tyrants. When
+Senator, he was, without sufficient ground, accused of avarice in
+the otherwise just and necessary execution of Montreal. (Gibbon, in
+mentioning the execution of Montreal, omits to state that Montreal was
+more than suspected of conspiracy and treason to restore the Colonna.
+Matthew Villani records it as a common belief that such truly was the
+offence of the Provencal. The biographer of Rienzi gives additional
+evidence of the fact. Gibbon's knowledge of this time was superficial.
+As one instance of this, he strangely enough represents Montreal as the
+head of the first Free Company that desolated Italy: he took that error
+from the Pere du Cerceau.) It was natural enough that his enemies and
+the vulgar should suppose that he executed a creditor to get rid of a
+debt; but it was inexcusable in later, and wiser, and fairer writers
+to repeat so grave a calumny, without at least adding the obvious
+suggestion, that the avarice of Rienzi could have been much better
+gratified by sparing than by destroying the life of one of the richest
+subjects in Europe. Montreal, we may be quite sure, would have purchased
+his life at an immeasurably higher price than the paltry sum lent to
+Rienzi by his brothers. And this is not a probable hypothesis, but a
+certain fact, for we are expressly told that Montreal, "knowing the
+Tribune was in want of money, offered Rienzi, that if he would let
+him go, he, Montreal, would furnish him not only with twenty thousand
+florins, (four times the amount of Rienzi's debt to him,) but with as
+many soldiers and as much money as he pleased." This offer Rienzi did
+not attend to. Would he have rejected it had avarice been his motive?
+And what culpable injustice, to mention the vague calumny without citing
+the practical contradiction! When Gibbon tells us, also, that "the most
+virtuous citizen of Rome," meaning Pandulfo, or Pandolficcio di Guido,
+(Matthew Villani speaks of him as a wise and good citizen, of great
+repute among the People--and this, it seems, he really was.) was
+sacrificed to his jealousy, he a little exaggerates the expression
+bestowed upon Pandulfo, which is that of "virtuoso assai;" and
+that expression, too, used by a man who styles the robber Montreal,
+"eccellente uomo--di quale fama suono per tutta la Italia di virtude"
+("An excellent man whose fame for valour resounded throughout all
+Italy.")--(so good a moral critic was the writer!) but he also
+altogether waves all mention of the probabilities that are sufficiently
+apparent, of the scheming of Pandulfo to supplant Rienzi, and to obtain
+the "Signoria del Popolo." Still, however, if the death of Pandulfo may
+be considered a blot on the memory of Rienzi, it does not appear that it
+was this which led to his own fate. The cry of the mob surrounding his
+palace was not, "Perish him who executed Pandulfo," it was--and this
+again and again must be carefully noted--it was nothing more nor less
+than, "Perish him who has made the gabelle!"
+
+Gibbon sneers at the military skill and courage of Rienzi. For this
+sneer there is no cause. His first attempts, his first rise, attested
+sufficiently his daring and brave spirit; in every danger he was
+present--never shrinking from a foe so long as he was supported by
+the People. He distinguished himself at Viterbo when in the camp of
+Albornoz, in several feats of arms, ("Vita di Cola di Rienzi", lib. ii.
+cap. 14.) and his end was that of a hero. So much for his courage; as to
+his military skill; it would be excusable enough if Rienzi--the eloquent
+and gifted student, called from the closet and the rostrum to assume the
+command of an army--should have been deficient in the art of war; yet,
+somehow or other, upon the whole, his arms prospered. He defeated the
+chivalry of Rome at her gates; and if he did not, after his victory,
+march to Marino, for which his biographer (In this the anonymous writer
+compares him gravely to Hannibal, who knew how to conquer, but not how
+to use his conquest.) and Gibbon blame him, the reason is sufficiently
+clear--"Volea pecunia per soldati"--he wanted money for the soldiers!
+On his return as Senator, it must be remembered that he had to besiege
+Palestrina, which was considered even by the ancient Romans almost
+impregnable by position; but during the few weeks he was in power,
+Palestrina yielded--all his open enemies were defeated--the tyrants
+expelled--Rome free; and this without support from any party, Papal
+or Popular, or, as Gibbon well expresses it, "suspected by the
+People--abandoned by the Prince."
+
+On regarding what Rienzi did, we must look to his means, to the
+difficulties that surrounded him, to the scantiness of his resources. We
+see a man without rank, wealth, or friends, raising himself to the head
+of a popular government in the metropolis of the Church--in the City
+of the Empire. We see him reject any title save that of a popular
+magistrate--establish at one stroke a free constitution--a new code of
+law. We see him first expel, then subdue, the fiercest aristocracy in
+Europe--conquer the most stubborn banditti, rule impartially the most
+turbulent people, embruted by the violence, and sunk in the corruption
+of centuries. We see him restore trade--establish order--create
+civilization as by a miracle--receive from crowned heads homage and
+congratulation--outwit, conciliate, or awe, the wiliest priesthood of
+the Papal Diplomacy--and raise his native city at once to sudden yet
+acknowledged eminence over every other state, its superior in arts,
+wealth, and civilization;--we ask what errors we are to weigh in the
+opposite balance, and we find an unnecessary ostentation, a fanatical
+extravagance, and a certain insolent sternness. But what are such
+offences--what the splendour of a banquet, or the ceremony of
+Knighthood, or a few arrogant words, compared with the vices of
+almost every prince who was his contemporary? This is the way to judge
+character: we must compare men with men, and not with ideals of what
+men should be. We look to the amazing benefits Rienzi conferred upon his
+country. We ask his means, and see but his own abilities. His treasury
+becomes impoverished--his enemies revolt--the Church takes advantage of
+his weakness--he is excommunicated--the soldiers refuse to fight--the
+People refuse to assist--the Barons ravage the country--the ways are
+closed, the provisions are cut off from Rome. ("Allora le strade furo
+chiuse, li massari de la terre non portavano grano, ogni die nasceva
+nuovo rumore."--"Vita di Cola di Rienzi", lib. i. cap. 37.) A handful
+of banditti enter the city--Rienzi proposes to resist them--the People
+desert--he abdicates. Rapine, Famine, Massacre, ensue--they who deserted
+regret, repent--yet he is still unassisted, alone--now an exile, now a
+prisoner, his own genius saves him from every peril, and restores him
+to greatness. He returns, the Pope's Legate refuses him arms--the People
+refuse him money. He re-establishes law and order, expels the tyrants,
+renounces his former faults (this, the second period of his power, has
+been represented by Gibbon and others as that of his principal faults,
+and he is evidently at this time no favourite with his contemporaneous
+biographer; but looking to what he did, we find amazing dexterity,
+prudence, and energy in the most difficult crisis, and none of his
+earlier faults. It is true, that he does not shew the same brilliant
+extravagance which, I suspect, dazzled his contemporaries, more than his
+sounder qualities; but we find that in a few weeks he had conquered
+all his powerful enemies--that his eloquence was as great as ever--his
+promptitude greater--his diligence indefatigable--his foresight
+unslumbering. "He alone," says the biographer, "carried on the affairs
+of Rome, but his officials were slothful and cold." This too, tortured
+by a painful disease--already--though yet young--broken and infirm. The
+only charges against him, as Senator, were the deaths of Montreal and
+Pandulfo di Guido, the imposition of the gabelle, and the renunciation
+of his former habits of rigid abstinence, for indulgence in wine and
+feasting. Of the first charges, the reader has already been enabled to
+form a judgment. To the last, alas! the reader must extend indulgence,
+and for it he may find excuse. We must compassionate even more than
+condemn the man to whom excitement has become nature, and who resorts
+to the physical stimulus or the momentary Lethe, when the mental
+exhilarations of hope, youth, and glory, begin to desert him. His
+alleged intemperance, however, which the Romans (a peculiarly sober
+people) might perhaps exaggerate, and for which he gave the excuse of
+a thirst produced by disease contracted in the dungeon of
+Avignon--evidently and confessedly did not in the least diminish his
+attention to business, which, according to his biographer, was at that
+time greater than ever.)--is prudent, wary, provident--reigns a few
+weeks--taxes the People, in support of the People, and is torn to
+pieces! One day of the rule that followed is sufficient to vindicate his
+reign and avenge his memory--and for centuries afterwards, whenever that
+wretched and degenerate populace dreamed of glory or sighed for justice,
+they recalled the bright vision of their own victim, and deplored the
+fate of Cola di Rienzi. That he was not a tyrant is clear in this--when
+he was dead, he was bitterly regretted. The People never regret a
+tyrant! From the unpopularity that springs from other faults there is
+often a re-action; but there is no re-action in the populace towards
+their betrayor or oppressor. A thousand biographies cannot decide upon
+the faults or merits of a ruler like the one fact, whether he is beloved
+or hated ten years after he is dead. But if the ruler has been murdered
+by the People, and is then regretted by them, their repentance is his
+acquittal.
+
+I have said that the moral of the Tribune's life, and of this fiction,
+is not the stale and unprofitable moral that warns the ambition of
+an individual:--More vast, more solemn, and more useful, it addresses
+itself to nations. If I judge not erringly, it proclaims that, to
+be great and free, a People must trust not to individuals but
+themselves--that there is no sudden leap from servitude to liberty--that
+it is to institutions, not to men, for they must look for reforms that
+last beyond the hour--that their own passions are the real despots they
+should subdue, their own reason the true regenerator of abuses. With a
+calm and a noble people, the individual ambition of a citizen can
+never effect evil:--to be impatient of chains, is not to be worthy of
+freedom--to murder a magistrate is not to ameliorate the laws. (Rienzi
+was murdered because the Romans had been in the habit of murdering
+whenever they were displeased. They had, very shortly before, stoned one
+magistrate, and torn to pieces another. By the same causes and the same
+career a People may be made to resemble the bravo whose hand wanders to
+his knife at the smallest affront, and if today he poniards the enemy
+who assaults him, tomorrow he strikes the friend who would restrain.)
+The People write their own condemnation whenever they use characters
+of blood; and theirs alone the madness and the crime, if they crown a
+tyrant or butcher a victim.
+
+
+
+
+Appendix II. A Word Upon the Work by Pere du Cerceau and Pere Brumoy,
+
+Entitled "Conjuration de Nicolas Gabrini, Dit de Rienzi, Tyran de Rome."
+
+Shortly after the Romance of "Rienzi" first appeared, a translation
+of the biography compiled by Cerceau and Brumoy was published by Mr.
+Whittaker. The translator, in a short and courteous advertisement,
+observes, "That it has always been considered as a work of authority;
+and even Gibbon appears to have relied on it without further research:
+(Here, however, he does injustice to Gibbon.)...that, "as a record of
+facts, therefore, the work will, it is presumed, be acceptable to the
+public." The translator has fulfilled his duty with accuracy, elegance,
+and spirit,--and he must forgive me, if, in justice to History and
+Rienzi, I point out a very few from amongst a great many reasons, why
+the joint labour of the two worthy Jesuits cannot be considered either a
+work of authority, or a record of facts. The translator observes in his
+preface, "that the general outline (of Du Cerceau's work) was probably
+furnished by an Italian life written by a contemporary of Rienzi." The
+fact, however, is, that Du Cerceau's book is little more than a wretched
+paraphrase of that very Italian life mentioned by the translator,--full
+of blunders, from ignorance of the peculiar and antiquated dialect in
+which the original is written, and of assumptions by the Jesuit himself,
+which rest upon no authority whatever. I will first shew, in support
+of this assertion, what the Italians themselves think of the work of
+Fathers Brumoy and Du Cerceau. The Signor Zefirino Re, who had proved
+himself singularly and minutely acquainted with the history of that
+time, and whose notes to the "Life of Rienzi" are characterized by
+acknowledged acuteness and research, thus describes the manner in which
+the two Jesuits compounded this valuable "record of facts."
+
+"Father Du Cerceau for his work made use of a French translation of the
+life by the Italian contemporary printed in Bracciano, 1624, executed
+by Father Sanadon, another Jesuit, from whom he received the MS.
+This proves that Du Cerceau knew little of our 'volgar lingua' of the
+fourteenth century. But the errors into which he has run shew, that even
+that little was unknown to his guide, and still less to Father Brumoy,
+(however learned and reputed the latter might be in French literature,)
+who, after the death of Du Cerceau, supplied the deficiencies in the
+first pages of the author's MS., which were, I know not how, lost; and
+in this part are found the more striking errors in the work, which
+shall be noticed in the proper place; in the meantime, one specimen will
+suffice. In the third chapter, book i., Cola, addressing the Romans,
+says, 'Che lo giubileo si approssima, che se la gente, la quale verra
+al giubileo, li trova sproveduti di annona, le pietre (per metatesi sta
+scritto le preite) ne porteranno da Roma per rabbia di fame, e le pietre
+non basteranno a tanta moltitudine. Il francese traduce. Le
+jubile approche, et vous n'avez ni provisions, ni vivres; les
+etrangers...trouvent votre ville denue de tout. Ne comptez point sur les
+secours des gens d'Eglise; ils sortiront de la ville, s'ils n'y trouvent
+de quoi subsister: et d'ailleurs pourroient-ils suffire a la multitude
+innombrable, que se trouvera dans vos murs?'" (The English translator
+could not fail to adopt the Frenchman's ludicrous mistake.) "Buon Dio!"
+exclaims the learned Zefirino, "Buon Dio! le pietre prese per tanta
+gente di chiesa!" (See Preface to Zefirino Re's edition of the "Life of
+Rienzi," page 9, note on Du Cerceau.)
+
+Another blunder little less extraordinary occurs in Chapter vi., in
+which the ordinances of Rienzi's Buono Stato are recited.
+
+It is set forth as the third ordinance:--"Che nulla case di Roma sia
+data per terra per alcuna cagione, ma vada in commune;" which simply
+means, that the houses of delinquents should in no instance be razed,
+but added to the community or confiscated. This law being intended
+partly to meet the barbarous violences with which the excesses and
+quarrels of the Barons had half dismantled Rome, and principally to
+repeal some old penal laws by which the houses of a certain class of
+offenders might be destroyed; but the French translator construes it,
+"Que nulle maison de Rome ne saroit donnee en propre, pour quelque
+raison que ce put etre; mais que les revenus en appartiendroient au
+public!" (The English translator makes this law unintelligible:--"That
+no family of Rome shall appropriate to their own use what they think
+fit, but that the revenues shall appertain to the public"!!!--the
+revenues of what?)
+
+But enough of the blunders arising from ignorance.--I must now be
+permitted to set before the reader a few of the graver offences of
+wilful assumption and preposterous invention.
+
+When Rienzi condemned some of the Barons to death, the Pere thus writes;
+I take the recent translation published by Mr. Whittaker:--
+
+"The next day the Tribune, resolving more than ever to rid himself of
+his prisoners, ordered tapestries of two colours, red and white, to be
+laid over the place whereon he held his councils, and which he had made
+choice of to be the theatre of this bloody tragedy, as the extraordinary
+tapestry seemed to declare. He afterwards sent a cordelier to every
+one of the prisoners to administer the sacraments, and then ordered
+the Capitol bell to be tolled. At that fatal sound and the sight of
+the confessors, the Lords no longer doubted of sentence of death being
+passed upon them. They all confessed except the old Colonna, and many
+received the communion. In the meanwhile the people, naturally prompt to
+attend, when their first impetuosity had time to calm, could not without
+pity behold the dismal preparations which were making. The sight of the
+bloody colour in the tapestry shocked them. On this first impression
+they joined in opinion in relation to so many illustrious heads now
+going to be sacrificed, and lamented more their unhappy catastrophe,
+as no crime had been proved upon them to render them worthy of such
+barbarous treatment. Above all, the unfortunate Stephen Colonna,
+whose birth, age, and affable behaviour, commanded respect, excited a
+particular compassion. An universal silence and sorrow reigned among
+them. Those who were nearest Rienzi discovered an alteration. They took
+the opportunity of imploring his mercy towards the prisoners in terms
+the most affecting and moving."
+
+Will it be believed, that in the original from which the Pere Du Cerceau
+borrows or rather imagines this touching recital, there is not a single
+syllable about the pity of the people, nor their shock at the bloody
+colours of the tapestry, nor their particular compassion for the
+unfortunate Stephen Colonna?--in fine, the People are not even mentioned
+at all. All that is said is, "Some Roman citizens, (alcuni cittadini
+Romani,) considering the judgment Rienzi was about to make, interposed
+with soft and caressing words, and at last changed the opinion of the
+Tribune;" all the rest is the pure fiction of the ingenious Frenchman!
+Again, Du Cerceau, describing the appearance of the Barons at this fatal
+moment, says, "Notwithstanding the grief and despair visible in their
+countenances, they shewed a noble indignation, generally attendant on
+innocence in the hour of death." What says the authority from which
+alone, except his own, the good Father could take his account? Why, not
+a word about this noble indignation, or this parade of innocence! The
+original says simply, that "the Barons were so frozen with terror
+that they were unable to speak," (diventaso si gelati che non poteano
+favellare;) "that the greater part humbled themselves," (e prese
+penitenza e comunione;) that when Rienzi addressed them "all the Barons
+(come dannati) stood in sadness." (See "Vita di Cola di Rienzi", lib. i.
+cap. 29.) Du Cerceau then proceeds to state, that "although he (Rienzi)
+was grieved at heart to behold his victims snatched from him, he
+endeavoured to make a merit of it in the eyes of the People." There is
+not a word of this in the original!
+
+So when Rienzi, on a latter occasion, placed the Prefect John di Vico
+in prison, this Jesuit says, "To put a gloss upon this action before
+the eyes of the people, Rienzi gave out that the Governor, John di Vico,
+keeping a correspondence with the conspirators, came with no other view
+than to betray the Romans." And if this scribbler, who pretends to have
+consulted the Vatican MSS., had looked at the most ordinary authorities,
+he would have seen that John di Vico did come with that view. (See for
+Di Vico's secret correspondence with the Barons, La Cron. Bologn. page
+406; and La Cron. Est. page 444.)
+
+Again, in the battle between the Barons and the Romans at the gates, Du
+Cerceau thus describes the conduct of the Tribune:--"The Tribune, amidst
+his troops, knew so little of what had passed, that seeing at a distance
+one of his standards fall, he looked upon all as lost, and, casting up
+his eyes to heaven full of despair, cried out, 'O God, will you then
+forsake me?' But no sooner was he informed of the entire defeat of
+his enemies, than his dread and cowardice even turned to boldness and
+arrogance."
+
+Now in the original all that is said of this is, "That it is true that
+the standard of the Tribune fell--the Tribune astonished, (or if you
+please, dismayed, sbigottio,) stood with his eyes raised to heaven, and
+could find no other words than, 'O God hast thou betrayed me?'" This
+evinced, perhaps, alarm or consternation at the fall of his standard--a
+consternation natural, not to a coward, but a fanatic, at such an event.
+But not a word is said about Rienzi's cowardice in the action itself;
+it is not stated when the accident happened--nothing bears out the
+implication that the Tribune was remote from the contest, and knew
+little of what passed. And if this ignorant Frenchman had consulted
+any other contemporaneous historian whatever, he would have found it
+asserted by them all, that the fight was conducted with great valour,
+both by the Roman populace and their leader on the one side, and the
+Barons on the other.--G. Vill. lib. xii. cap. 105; Cron. Sen. tom. xv.
+Murat. page 119; Cron. Est. page 444. Yet Gibbon rests his own sarcasm
+on the Tribune's courage solely on the baseless exaggeration of this
+Pere Du Cerceau.
+
+So little, indeed, did this French pretender know of the history of the
+time and place he treats of, that he imagines the Stephen Colonna who
+was killed in the battle above-mentioned was the old Stephen Colonna,
+and is very pathetic about his "venerable appearance," &c. This error,
+with regard to a man so eminent as Stephen Colonna the elder, is
+inexcusable: for, had the priest turned over the other pages of the very
+collection in which he found the biography he deforms, he would
+have learned that old Stephen Colonna was alive some time after that
+battle.--(Cron. Sen. Murat. tom. xv. page 121.)
+
+Again, just before Rienzi's expulsion from the office of Tribune, Du
+Cerceau, translating in his headlong way the old biographer's account of
+the causes of Rienzi's loss of popularity, says, "He shut himself up in
+his palace, and his presence was known only by the rigorous punishments
+which he caused his agents to inflict upon the innocent." Not a word of
+this in the original!
+
+Again, after the expulsion, Du Cerceau says, that the Barons seized upon
+the "immense riches" he had amassed,--the words in the original are,
+"grandi ornamenti," which are very different things from immense riches.
+But the most remarkable sins of commission are in this person's account
+of the second rise and fall of Rienzi under the title of Senator. Of
+this I shall give but one instance:--
+
+"The Senator, who perceived it, became only the more cruel. His
+jealousies produced only fresh murders. In the continual dread he was
+in, that the general discontent would terminate in some secret attempt
+upon his person, he determined to intimidate the most enterprising, by
+sacrificing sometimes one, sometimes another, and chiefly those whose
+riches rendered them the more guilty in his eyes. Numbers were sent
+every day to the Capitol prison. Happy were those who could get off with
+the confiscation of their estates."
+
+Of these grave charges there is not a syllable in the original! And so
+much for the work of Pere Cerceau and Pere Brumoy, by virtue of which,
+historians have written of the life and times of Rienzi, and upon the
+figments of which, the most remarkable man in an age crowded with great
+characters is judged by the general reader!
+
+I must be pardoned for this criticism, which might not have been
+necessary, had not the work to which it relates, in the English
+translation quoted from, (a translation that has no faults but those
+of the French original,) been actually received as an historical and
+indisputable authority, and opposed with a triumphant air to some
+passages in my own narrative which were literally taken from the
+authentic records of the time.
+
+
+
+
+
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+Project Gutenberg Etext of Rienzi, the last of the Roman Tribunes
+by Edward Bulwer Lytton
+
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+Rienzi
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+by Edward Bulwer Lytton
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+1998  [Etext #1396]
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+
+Rienzi,
+
+The Last of the Roman Tribunes
+
+by
+
+Sir Edward Bulwer Lytton, Bart.
+
+
+Then turn we to her latest Tribune's name,
+From her ten thousand tyrants turn to thee,
+Redeemer of dark centuries of shame -
+The friend of Petrarch - hope of Italy - 
+Rienzi, last of Romans!  While the tree
+Of Freedom's wither'd trunk puts forth a leaf,
+Even for thy tomb a garland let it be - 
+The Forum's champion, and the People's chief - 
+Her new-born Numa thou!
+
+Childe Harold, cant. iv. stanza 114.
+
+Amidst the indulgence of enthusiasm and eloquence, Petrarch, Italy, and
+Europe, were astonished by a revolution, which realized for a moment his
+most splendid visions. - Gibbon, chap. 1xx.
+
+
+Dedication of Rienzi.
+
+To Alessandro Manzoni, as to the Genius of the Place,
+
+Are Dedicated These Fruits, gathered on The Soil of Italian Fiction.
+
+London, Dec. 1, 1835.
+
+
+Dedication,
+
+Prefixed to the First Collected Edition of the Author's Works in 1840.
+
+My Dear Mother,
+
+In inscribing with your beloved and honoured name this Collection of my
+Works, I could wish that the fruits of my manhood were worthier of the
+tender and anxious pains bestowed upon my education in youth.
+
+Left yet young, and with no ordinary accomplishments and gifts, the sole
+guardian of your sons, to them you devoted the best years of your useful
+and spotless life; and any success it be their fate to attain in the paths
+they have severally chosen, would have its principal sweetness in the
+thought that such success was the reward of one whose hand aided every
+struggle, and whose heart sympathized in every care.
+
+From your graceful and accomplished taste, I early learned that affection
+for literature which has exercised so large an influence over the pursuits
+of my life; and you who were my first guide, were my earliest critic.  Do
+you remember the summer days, which seemed to me so short, when you
+repeated to me those old ballads with which Percy revived the decaying
+spirit of our national muse, or the smooth couplets of Pope, or those
+gentle and polished verses with the composition of which you had beguiled
+your own earlier leisure?  It was those easy lessons, far more than the
+harsher rudiments learned subsequently in schools, that taught me to admire
+and to imitate; and in them I recognise the germ of the flowers, however
+perishable they be, that I now bind up and lay upon a shrine hallowed by a
+thousand memories of unspeakable affection.  Happy, while I borrowed from
+your taste, could I have found it not more difficult to imitate your
+virtues - your spirit of active and extended benevolence, your cheerful
+piety, your considerate justice, your kindly charity - and all the
+qualities that brighten a nature more free from the thought of self, than
+any it has been my lot to meet with.  Never more than at this moment did I
+wish that my writings were possessed of a merit which might outlive my
+time, so that at least these lines might remain a record of the excellence
+of the Mother, and the gratitude of the Son.
+
+E.L.B.  London:  January 6, 1840.
+
+
+Preface
+
+to
+
+The First Edition of Rienzi.
+
+I began this tale two years ago at Rome.  On removing to Naples, I threw it
+aside for "The Last Days of Pompeii," which required more than "Rienzi" the
+advantage of residence within reach of the scenes described.  The fate of
+the Roman Tribune continued, however, to haunt and impress me, and, some
+time after "Pompeii" was published, I renewed my earlier undertaking.  I
+regarded the completion of these volumes, indeed, as a kind of duty; - for
+having had occasion to read the original authorities from which modern
+historians have drawn their accounts of the life of Rienzi, I was led to
+believe that a very remarkable man had been superficially judged, and a
+very important period crudely examined.  (See Appendix, Nos. I and II.) 
+And this belief was sufficiently strong to induce me at first to meditate a
+more serious work upon the life and times of Rienzi.  (I have adopted the
+termination of Rienzi instead of Rienzo, as being more familiar to the
+general reader. - But the latter is perhaps the more accurate reading,
+since the name was a popular corruption from Lorenzo.)  Various reasons
+concurred against this project - and I renounced the biography to commence
+the fiction.  I have still, however, adhered, with a greater fidelity than
+is customary in Romance, to all the leading events of the public life of
+the Roman Tribune; and the Reader will perhaps find in these pages a more
+full and detailed account of the rise and fall of Rienzi, than in any
+English work of which I am aware.  I have, it is true, taken a view of his
+character different in some respects from that of Gibbon or Sismondi.  But
+it is a view, in all its main features, which I believe (and think I could
+prove) myself to be warranted in taking, not less by the facts of History
+than the laws of Fiction.  In the meanwhile, as I have given the facts from
+which I have drawn my interpretation of the principal agent, the reader has
+sufficient data for his own judgment.  In the picture of the Roman
+Populace, as in that of the Roman Nobles of the fourteenth century, I
+follow literally the descriptions left to us; - they are not flattering,
+but they are faithful, likenesses.
+
+Preserving generally the real chronology of Rienzi's life, the plot of this
+work extends over a space of some years, and embraces the variety of
+characters necessary to a true delineation of events.  The story,
+therefore, cannot have precisely that order of interest found in fictions
+strictly and genuinely dramatic, in which (to my judgment at least) the
+time ought to be as limited as possible, and the characters as few; - no
+new character of importance to the catastrophe being admissible towards the
+end of the work.  If I may use the word Epic in its most modest and
+unassuming acceptation, this Fiction, in short, though indulging in
+dramatic situations, belongs, as a whole, rather to the Epic than the
+Dramatic school.
+
+I cannot conclude without rendering the tribute of my praise and homage to
+the versatile and gifted Author of the beautiful Tragedy of Rienzi. 
+Considering that our hero be the same - considering that we had the same
+materials from which to choose our several stories - I trust I shall be
+found to have little, if at all, trespassed upon ground previously
+occupied.  With the single exception of a love-intrigue between a relative
+of Rienzi and one of the antagonist party, which makes the plot of Miss
+Mitford's Tragedy, and is little more than an episode in my Romance, having
+slight effect on the conduct and none on the fate of the hero, I am not
+aware of any resemblance between the two works; and even this coincidence I
+could easily have removed, had I deemed it the least advisable: - but it
+would be almost discreditable if I had nothing that resembled a performance
+possessing so much it were an honour to imitate.
+
+In fact, the prodigal materials of the story - the rich and exuberant
+complexities of Rienzi's character - joined to the advantage possessed by
+the Novelist of embracing all that the Dramatist must reject (Thus the
+slender space permitted to the Dramatist does not allow Miss Mitford to be
+very faithful to facts; to distinguish between Rienzi's earlier and his
+later period of power; or to detail the true, but somewhat intricate causes
+of his rise, his splendour, and his fall.) - are sufficient to prevent
+Dramatist and Novelist from interfering with each other.
+
+London, December 1, 1835.
+
+
+Preface to the Present Edition, 1848.
+
+From the time of its first appearance, "Rienzi" has had the good fortune to
+rank high amongst my most popular works - though its interest is rather
+drawn from a faithful narration of historical facts, than from the
+inventions of fancy.  And the success of this experiment confirms me in my
+belief, that the true mode of employing history in the service of romance,
+is to study diligently the materials as history; conform to such views of
+the facts as the Author would adopt, if he related them in the dry
+character of historian; and obtain that warmer interest which fiction
+bestows, by tracing the causes of the facts in the characters and emotions
+of the personages of the time.  The events of his work are thus already
+shaped to his hand - the characters already created - what remains for him,
+is the inner, not outer, history of man - the chronicle of the human heart;
+and it is by this that he introduces a new harmony between character and
+event, and adds the completer solution of what is actual and true, by those
+speculations of what is natural and probable, which are out of the province
+of history, but belong especially to the philosophy of romance.  And - if
+it be permitted the tale-teller to come reverently for instruction in his
+art to the mightiest teacher of all, who, whether in the page or on the
+scene, would give to airy fancies the breath and the form of life, - such,
+we may observe, is the lesson the humblest craftsman in historical romance
+may glean from the Historical Plays of Shakespeare.  Necessarily,
+Shakespeare consulted history according to the imperfect lights, and from
+the popular authorities, of his age; and I do not say, therefore, that as
+an historian we can rely upon Shakespeare as correct.  But to that in which
+he believed he rigidly adhered; nor did he seek, as lesser artists (such as
+Victor Hugo and his disciples) seek now, to turn perforce the Historical
+into the Poetical, but leaving history as he found it, to call forth from
+its arid prose the flower of the latent poem.  Nay, even in the more
+imaginative plays which he has founded upon novels and legends popular in
+his time, it is curious and instructive to see how little he has altered
+the original ground-work - taking for granted the main materials of the
+story, and reserving all his matchless resources of wisdom and invention,
+to illustrate from mental analysis, the creations whose outline he was
+content to borrow.  He receives, as a literal fact not to be altered, the
+somewhat incredible assertion of the novelist, that the pure and delicate
+and highborn Venetian loves the swarthy Moor - and that Romeo fresh from
+his "woes for Rosaline," becomes suddenly enamoured of Juliet:  He found
+the Improbable, and employed his art to make it truthful.
+
+That "Rienzi" should have attracted peculiar attention in Italy, is of
+course to be attributed to the choice of the subject rather than to the
+skill of the Author.  It has been translated into the Italian language by
+eminent writers; and the authorities for the new view of Rienzi's times and
+character which the Author deemed himself warranted to take, have been
+compared with his text by careful critics and illustrious scholars, in
+those states in which the work has been permitted to circulate.  (In the
+Papal States, I believe, it was neither, prudently nor effectually,
+proscribed.)  I may say, I trust without unworthy pride, that the result
+has confirmed the accuracy of delineations which English readers relying
+only on the brilliant but disparaging account in Gibbon deemed too
+favourable; and has tended to restore the great Tribune to his long
+forgotten claims to the love and reverence of the Italian land.  Nor, if I
+may trust to the assurances that have reached me from many now engaged in
+the aim of political regeneration, has the effect of that revival of the
+honours due to a national hero, leading to the ennobling study of great
+examples, been wholly without its influence upon the rising generation of
+Italian youth, and thereby upon those stirring events which have recently
+drawn the eyes of Europe to the men and the lands beyond the Alps.
+
+In preparing for the Press this edition of a work illustrative of the
+exertions of a Roman, in advance of his time, for the political freedom of
+his country, and of those struggles between contending principles, of which
+Italy was the most stirring field in the Middle Ages, it is not out of
+place or season to add a few sober words, whether as a student of the
+Italian Past, or as an observer, with some experience of the social
+elements of Italy as it now exists, upon the state of affairs in that
+country.
+
+It is nothing new to see the Papal Church in the capacity of a popular
+reformer, and in contra-position to the despotic potentates of the several
+states, as well as to the German Emperor, who nominally inherits the
+sceptre of the Caesars.  Such was its common character under its more
+illustrious Pontiffs; and the old Republics of Italy grew up under the
+shadow of the Papal throne, harbouring ever two factions - the one for the
+Emperor, the one for the Pope - the latter the more naturally allied to
+Italian independence.  On the modern stage, we almost see the repetition of
+many an ancient drama.  But the past should teach us to doubt the
+continuous and stedfast progress of any single line of policy under a
+principality so constituted as that of the Papal Church - a principality in
+which no race can be perpetuated, in which no objects can be permanent; in
+which the successor is chosen by a select ecclesiastical synod, under a
+variety of foreign as well as of national influences; in which the chief
+usually ascends the throne at an age that ill adapts his mind to the idea
+of human progress, and the active direction of mundane affairs; - a
+principality in which the peculiar sanctity that wraps the person of the
+Sovereign exonerates him from the healthful liabilities of a power purely
+temporal, and directly accountable to Man.  A reforming Pope is a lucky
+accident, and dull indeed must be the brain which believes in the
+possibility of a long succession of reforming Popes, or which can regard as
+other than precarious and unstable the discordant combination of a
+constitutional government with an infallible head.
+
+It is as true as it is trite that political freedom is not the growth of a
+day - it is not a flower without a stalk, and it must gradually develop
+itself from amidst the unfolding leaves of kindred institutions.
+
+In one respect, the Austrian domination, fairly considered, has been
+beneficial to the States over which it has been directly exercised, and may
+be even said to have unconsciously schooled them to the capacity for
+freedom.  In those States the personal rights which depend on impartial and
+incorrupt administration of the law, are infinitely more secure than in
+most of the Courts of Italy.  Bribery, which shamefully predominates in the
+judicature of certain Principalities, is as unknown in the juridical courts
+of Austrian Italy as in England.  The Emperor himself is often involved in
+legal disputes with a subject, and justice is as free and as firm for the
+humblest suitor, as if his antagonist were his equal.  Austria, indeed, but
+holds together the motley and inharmonious members of its vast domain on
+either side the Alps, by a general character of paternal mildness and
+forbearance in all that great circle of good government which lies without
+the one principle of constitutional liberty.  It asks but of its subjects
+to submit to be well governed - without agitating the question "how and by
+what means that government is carried on."  For every man, except the
+politician, the innovator, Austria is no harsh stepmother.  But it is
+obviously clear that the better in other respects the administration of a
+state it does but foster the more the desire for that political security,
+which is only found in constitutional freedom:  the reverence paid to
+personal rights, but begets the passion for political; and under a mild
+despotism are already half matured the germs of a popular constitution. 
+But it is still a grave question whether Italy is ripe for self-government
+- and whether, were it possible that the Austrian domination could be
+shaken off - the very passions so excited, the very bloodshed so poured
+forth, would not ultimately place the larger portion of Italy under
+auspices less favourable to the sure growth of freedom, than those which
+silently brighten under the sway of the German Caesar.
+
+The two kingdoms, at the opposite extremes of Italy, to which circumstance
+and nature seem to assign the main ascendancy, are Naples and Sardinia. 
+Looking to the former, it is impossible to discover on the face of the
+earth a country more adapted for commercial prosperity.  Nature formed it
+as the garden of Europe, and the mart of the Mediterranean.  Its soil and
+climate could unite the products of the East with those of the Western
+hemisphere.  The rich island of Sicily should be the great corn granary of
+the modern nations as it was of the ancient; the figs, the olives, the
+oranges, of both the Sicilies, under skilful cultivation, should equal the
+produce of Spain and the Orient, and the harbours of the kingdom (the keys
+to three-quarters of the globe) should be crowded with the sails and busy
+with the life of commerce.  But, in the character of its population, Naples
+has been invariably in the rear of Italian progress; it caught but partial
+inspiration from the free Republics, or even the wise Tyrannies, of the
+Middle Ages; the theatre of frequent revolutions without fruit; and all
+rational enthusiasm created by that insurrection, which has lately bestowed
+on Naples the boon of a representative system, cannot but be tempered by
+the conviction that of all the States in Italy, this is the one which least
+warrants the belief of permanence to political freedom, or of capacity to
+retain with vigour what may be seized by passion.  (If the Electoral
+Chamber in the new Neapolitan Constitution, give a fair share of members to
+the Island of Sicily, it will be rich in the inevitable elements of
+discord, and nothing save a wisdom and moderation, which cannot soberly be
+anticipated, can prevent the ultimate separation of the island from the
+dominion of Naples.  Nature has set the ocean between the two countries -
+but differences in character, and degree and quality of civilisation -
+national jealousies, historical memories, have trebled the space of the
+seas that roll between them. - More easy to unite under one free
+Parliament, Spain with Flanders; or re-annex to England its old domains of
+Aquitaine and Normandy - than to unite in one Council Chamber truly
+popular, the passions, interests, and prejudices of Sicily and Naples. -
+Time will show.)
+
+Far otherwise is it, with Sardinia.  Many years since, the writer of these
+pages ventured to predict that the time must come when Sardinia would lead
+the van of Italian civilisation, and take proud place amongst the greater
+nations of Europe.  In the great portion of this population there is
+visible the new blood of a young race; it is not, as with other Italian
+States, a worn-out stock; you do not see there a people fallen, proud of
+the past, and lazy amidst ruins, but a people rising, practical,
+industrious, active; there, in a word, is an eager youth to be formed to
+mature development, not a decrepit age to be restored to bloom and muscle. 
+Progress is the great characteristic of the Sardinian state.  Leave it for
+five years; visit it again, and you behold improvement.  When you enter the
+kingdom and find, by the very skirts of its admirable roads, a raised
+footpath for the passengers and travellers from town to town, you become
+suddenly aware that you are in a land where close attention to the humbler
+classes is within the duties of a government.  As you pass on from the more
+purely Italian part of the population, - from the Genoese country into that
+of Piedmont, - the difference between a new people and an old, on which I
+have dwelt, becomes visible in the improved cultivation of the soil, the
+better habitations of the labourer, the neater aspect of the towns, the
+greater activity in the thoroughfares.  To the extraordinary virtues of the
+King, as King, justice is scarcely done, whether in England or abroad.
+Certainly, despite his recent concessions, Charles Albert is not and cannot
+be at heart, much of a constitutional reformer; and his strong religious
+tendencies, which, perhaps unjustly, have procured him in philosophical
+quarters the character of a bigot, may link him more than his political,
+with the cause of the Father of his Church.  But he is nobly and
+preeminently national, careful of the prosperity and jealous of the honour
+of his own state, while conscientiously desirous of the independence of
+Italy.  His attention to business, is indefatigable.  Nothing escapes his
+vigilance.  Over all departments of the kingdom is the eye of a man ever
+anxious to improve.  Already the silk manufactures of Sardinia almost rival
+those of Lyons:  in their own departments the tradesmen of Turin exhibit an
+artistic elegance and elaborate finish, scarcely exceeded in the wares of
+London and Paris.  The King's internal regulations are admirable; his laws,
+administered with the most impartial justice - his forts and defences are
+in that order, without which, at least on the Continent, no land is safe -
+his army is the most perfect in Italy.  His wise genius extends itself to
+the elegant as to the useful arts - an encouragement that shames England,
+and even France, is bestowed upon the School for Painters, which has become
+one of the ornaments of his illustrious reign.  The character of the main
+part of the population, and the geographical position of his country,
+assist the monarch and must force on himself, or his successors, in the
+career of improvement so signally begun.  In the character of the people,
+the vigour of the Northman ennobles the ardour and fancy of the West.  In
+the position of the country, the public mind is brought into constant
+communication with the new ideas in the free lands of Europe.  Civilisation
+sets in direct currents towards the streets and marts of Turin.  Whatever
+the result of the present crisis in Italy, no power and no chance which
+statesmen can predict, can preclude Sardinia from ultimately heading all
+that is best in Italy.  The King may improve his present position, or
+peculiar prejudices, inseparable perhaps from the heritage of absolute
+monarchy, and which the raw and rude councils of an Electoral Chamber,
+newly called into life, must often irritate and alarm, may check his own
+progress towards the master throne of the Ausonian land.  But the people
+themselves, sooner or later, will do the work of the King.  And in now
+looking round Italy for a race worthy of Rienzi, and able to accomplish his
+proud dreams, I see but one for which the time is ripe or ripening, and I
+place the hopes of Italy in the men of Piedmont and Sardinia.
+
+London, February 14, 1848.
+
+
+RIENZI,  The Last of the Tribunes.
+
+
+BOOK I.  THE TIME, THE PLACE, AND THE MEN.
+
+"Fu da sua gioventudine nutricato di latte di eloquenza; buono grammatico,
+megliore rettorico, autorista buono...Oh, come spesso diceva, 'Dove sono
+questi buoni Romani?  Dov'e loro somma giustizia?  Poterommi trovare in
+tempo che questi fioriscano?'  Era bell 'omo...Accadde che uno suo frate fu
+ucciso, e non ne fu fatta vendetta di sua morte:  non lo poteo aiutare;
+pensa lungo mano vendicare 'l sangue di suo frate; pensa lunga mano
+dirizzare la cittate di Roma male guidata." - "Vita di Cola di Rienzi" Ed.
+1828. Forli.
+
+"From his youth he was nourished with the milk of eloquence; a good
+grammarian, a better rhetorician, well versed in the writings of
+authors...Oh, how often would he say, 'Where are those good Romans?  Where
+is their supreme justice?  Shall I ever behold such times as those in which
+they flourished?'  He was a handsome man...It happened that a brother of
+his was slain, and no retribution was made for his death:  he could not
+help him; long did he ponder how to avenge his brother's blood; long did he
+ponder how to direct the ill guided state of Rome." - "Life of Cola di
+Rienzi."
+
+
+Chapter 1.I.  The Brothers.
+
+The celebrated name which forms the title to this work will sufficiently
+apprise the reader that it is in the earlier half of the fourteenth century
+that my story opens.
+
+It was on a summer evening that two youths might be seen walking beside the
+banks of the Tiber, not far from that part of its winding course which
+sweeps by the base of Mount Aventine.  The path they had selected was
+remote and tranquil.  It was only at a distance that were seen the
+scattered and squalid houses that bordered the river, from amidst which
+rose, dark and frequent, the high roof and enormous towers which marked the
+fortified mansion of some Roman baron.  On one side of the river, behind
+the cottages of the fishermen, soared Mount Janiculum, dark with massive
+foliage, from which gleamed at frequent intervals, the grey walls of many a
+castellated palace, and the spires and columns of a hundred churches; on
+the other side, the deserted Aventine rose abrupt and steep, covered with
+thick brushwood; while, on the height, from concealed but numerous
+convents, rolled, not unmusically, along the quiet landscape and the
+rippling waves, the sound of the holy bell.
+
+Of the young men introduced in this scene, the elder, who might have
+somewhat passed his twentieth year, was of a tall and even commanding
+stature; and there was that in his presence remarkable and almost noble,
+despite the homeliness of his garb, which consisted of the long, loose gown
+and the plain tunic, both of dark-grey serge, which distinguished, at that
+time, the dress of the humbler scholars who frequented the monasteries for
+such rude knowledge as then yielded a scanty return for intense toil.  His
+countenance was handsome, and would have been rather gay than thoughtful in
+its expression, but for that vague and abstracted dreaminess of eye which
+so usually denotes a propensity to revery and contemplation, and betrays
+that the past or the future is more congenial to the mind than the
+enjoyment and action of the present hour.
+
+The younger, who was yet a boy, had nothing striking in his appearance or
+countenance, unless an expression of great sweetness and gentleness could
+be so called; and there was something almost feminine in the tender
+deference with which he appeared to listen to his companion.  His dress was
+that usually worn by the humbler classes, though somewhat neater, perhaps,
+and newer; and the fond vanity of a mother might be detected in the care
+with which the long and silky ringlets had been smoothed and parted as they
+escaped from his cap and flowed midway down his shoulders.
+
+As they thus sauntered on, beside the whispering reeds of the river, each
+with his arm round the form of his comrade, there was a grace in the
+bearing, in the youth, and in the evident affection of the brothers - for
+such their connexion - which elevated the lowliness of their apparent
+condition.
+
+"Dear brother," said the elder, "I cannot express to thee how I enjoy these
+evening hours.  To you alone I feel as if I were not a mere visionary and
+idler when I talk of the uncertain future, and build up my palaces of the
+air.  Our parents listen to me as if I were uttering fine things out of a
+book; and my dear mother, Heaven bless her! wipes her eyes, and says,
+'Hark, what a scholar he is!'  As for the monks, if I ever dare look from
+my Livy, and cry 'Thus should Rome be again!' they stare, and gape, and
+frown, as though I had broached an heresy.  But you, sweet brother, though
+you share not my studies, sympathize so kindly with all their results - you
+seem so to approve my wild schemes, and to encourage my ambitious hopes -
+that sometimes I forget our birth, our fortunes, and think and dare as if
+no blood save that of the Teuton Emperor flowed through our veins."
+
+"Methinks, dear Cola," said the younger brother, "that Nature played us an
+unfair trick - to you she transmitted the royal soul, derived from our
+father's parentage; and to me only the quiet and lowly spirit of my
+mother's humble lineage."
+
+"Nay," answered Cola, quickly, "you would then have the brighter share, -
+for I should have but the Barbarian origin, and you the Roman.  Time was,
+when to be a simple Roman was to be nobler than a northern king. - Well,
+well, we may live to see great changes!"
+
+"I shall live to see thee a great man, and that will content me," said the
+younger, smiling affectionately; "a great scholar all confess you to be
+already:  our mother predicts your fortunes every time she hears of your
+welcome visits to the Colonna."
+
+"The Colonna!" said Cola, with a bitter smile; "the Colonna - the pedants!
+- They affect, dull souls, the knowledge of the past, play the patron, and
+misquote Latin over their cups!  They are pleased to welcome me at their
+board, because the Roman doctors call me learned, and because Nature gave
+me a wild wit, which to them is pleasanter than the stale jests of a hired
+buffoon.  Yes, they would advance my fortunes - but how? by some place in
+the public offices, which would fill a dishonoured coffer, by wringing, yet
+more sternly, the hard-earned coins from our famishing citizens!  If there
+be a vile thing in the world, it is a plebeian, advanced by patricians, not
+for the purpose of righting his own order, but for playing the pander to
+the worst interests of theirs.  He who is of the people but makes himself a
+traitor to his birth, if he furnishes the excuse for these tyrant
+hypocrites to lift up their hands and cry - 'See what liberty exists in
+Rome, when we, the patricians, thus elevate a plebeian!'  Did they ever
+elevate a plebeian if he sympathized with plebeians?  No, brother; should I
+be lifted above our condition, I will be raised by the arms of my
+countrymen, and not upon their necks."
+
+"All I hope, is, Cola, that you will not, in your zeal for your fellow-
+citizens, forget how dear you are to us.  No greatness could ever reconcile
+me to the thought that it brought you danger."
+
+"And I could laugh at all danger, if it led to greatness.  But greatness -
+greatness!  Vain dream!  Let us keep it for our night sleep.  Enough of my
+plans; now, dearest brother, of yours."
+
+And, with the sanguine and cheerful elasticity which belonged to him, the
+young Cola, dismissing all wilder thoughts, bent his mind to listen, and to
+enter into, the humbler projects of his brother.  The new boat and the
+holiday dress, and the cot removed to a quarter more secure from the
+oppression of the barons, and such distant pictures of love as a dark eye
+and a merry lip conjure up to the vague sentiments of a boy; - to schemes
+and aspirations of which such objects made the limit, did the scholar
+listen, with a relaxed brow and a tender smile; and often, in later life,
+did that conversation occur to him, when he shrank from asking his own
+heart which ambition was the wiser.
+
+"And then," continued the younger brother, "by degrees I might save enough
+to purchase such a vessel as that which we now see, laden, doubtless, with
+corn and merchandise, bringing - oh, such a good return - that I could fill
+your room with books, and never hear you complain that you were not rich
+enough to purchase some crumbling old monkish manuscript.  Ah, that would
+make me so happy!"  Cola smiled as he pressed his brother closer to his
+breast.
+
+"Dear boy," said he, "may it rather be mine to provide for your wishes! 
+Yet methinks the masters of yon vessel have no enviable possession, see how
+anxiously the men look round, and behind, and before:  peaceful traders
+though they be, they fear, it seems, even in this city (once the emporium
+of the civilised world), some pirate in pursuit; and ere the voyage be
+over, they may find that pirate in a Roman noble.  Alas, to what are we
+reduced!"
+
+The vessel thus referred to was speeding rapidly down the river, and some
+three or four armed men on deck were indeed intently surveying the quiet
+banks on either side, as if anticipating a foe.  The bark soon, however,
+glided out of sight, and the brothers fell back upon those themes which
+require only the future for a text to become attractive to the young.
+
+At length, as the evening darkened, they remembered that it was past the
+usual hour in which they returned home, and they began to retrace their
+steps.
+
+"Stay," said Cola, abruptly, "how our talk has beguiled me!  Father Uberto
+promised me a rare manuscript, which the good friar confesses hath puzzled
+the whole convent.  I was to seek his cell for it this evening.  Tarry here
+a few minutes, it is but half-way up the Aventine.  I shall soon return."
+
+"Can I not accompany you?"
+
+"Nay," returned Cola, with considerate kindness, "you have borne toil all
+the day, and must be wearied; my labours of the body, at least, have been
+light enough.  You are delicate, too, and seem fatigued already; the rest
+will refresh you.  I shall not be long."
+
+The boy acquiesced, though he rather wished to accompany his brother; but
+he was of a meek and yielding temper, and seldom resisted the lightest
+command of those he loved.  He sat him down on a little bank by the river-
+side, and the firm step and towering form of his brother were soon hid from
+his gaze by the thick and melancholy foliage.
+
+At first he sat very quietly, enjoying the cool air, and thinking over all
+the stories of ancient Rome that his brother had told him in their walk. 
+At length he recollected that his little sister, Irene, had begged him to
+bring her home some flowers; and, gathering such as he could find at hand
+(and many a flower grew, wild and clustering, over that desolate spot), he
+again seated himself, and began weaving them into one of those garlands for
+which the southern peasantry still retain their ancient affection, and
+something of their classic skill.
+
+While the boy was thus engaged, the tramp of horses and the loud shouting
+of men were heard at a distance.  They came near, and nearer.
+
+"Some baron's procession, perhaps, returning from a feast," thought the
+boy.  "It will be a pretty sight - their white plumes and scarlet mantles! 
+I love to see such sights, but I will just move out of their way."
+
+So, still mechanically platting his garland, but with eyes turned towards
+the quarter of the expected procession, the young Roman moved yet nearer
+towards the river.
+
+Presently the train came in view, - a gallant company, in truth; horsemen
+in front, riding two abreast, where the path permitted, their steeds
+caparisoned superbly, their plumes waving gaily, and the gleam of their
+corselets glittering through the shades of the dusky twilight.  A large and
+miscellaneous crowd, all armed, some with pikes and mail, others with less
+warlike or worse fashioned weapons, followed the cavaliers; and high above
+plume and pike floated the blood-red banner of the Orsini, with the motto
+and device (in which was ostentatiously displayed the Guelfic badge of the
+keys of St. Peter) wrought in burnished gold.  A momentary fear crossed the
+boy's mind, for at that time, and in that city, a nobleman begirt with his
+swordsmen was more dreaded than a wild beast by the plebeians; but it was
+already too late to fly - the train were upon him.
+
+"Ho, boy! cried the leader of the horsemen, Martino di Porto, one of the
+great House of the Orsini; "hast thou seen a boat pass up the river? - But
+thou must have seen it - how long since?"
+
+"I saw a large boat about half an hour ago," answered the boy, terrified by
+the rough voice and imperious bearing of the cavalier.
+
+"Sailing right a-head, with a green flag at the stern?"
+
+"The same, noble sir."
+
+"On, then! we will stop her course ere the moon rise," said the baron. 
+"On! - let the boy go with us, lest he prove traitor, and alarm the
+Colonna."
+
+"An Orsini, an Orsini," shouted the multitude; "on, on!" and, despite the
+prayers and remonstrances of the boy, he was placed in the thickest of the
+crowd, and borne, or rather dragged along with the rest - frightened,
+breathless, almost weeping, with his poor little garland still hanging on
+his arm, while a sling was thrust into his unwilling hand.  Still he felt,
+through all his alarm, a kind of childish curiosity to see the result of
+the pursuit.
+
+By the loud and eager conversation of those about him, he learned that the
+vessel he had seen contained a supply of corn destined to a fortress up the
+river held by the Colonna, then at deadly feud with the Orsini; and it was
+the object of the expedition in which the boy had been thus lucklessly
+entrained to intercept the provision, and divert it to the garrison of
+Martino di Porto.  This news somewhat increased his consternation, for the
+boy belonged to a family that claimed the patronage of the Colonna.
+
+Anxiously and tearfully he looked with every moment up the steep ascent of
+the Aventine; but his guardian, his protector, still delayed his
+appearance.
+
+They had now proceeded some way, when a winding in the road brought
+suddenly before them the object of their pursuit, as, seen by the light of
+the earliest stars, it scudded rapidly down the stream.
+
+"Now, the Saints be blest!" quoth the chief; "she is ours!"
+
+"Hold!" said a captain (a German) riding next to Martino, in a half
+whisper; "I hear sounds which I like not, by yonder trees - hark!  The
+neigh of a horse! - by my faith, too, there is the gleam of a corselet."
+
+"Push on, my masters," cried Martino; "the heron shall not balk the eagle -
+push on!"
+
+With renewed shouts, those on foot pushed forward, till, as they had nearly
+gained the copse referred to by the German, a small compact body of
+horsemen, armed cap-a-pie, dashed from amidst the trees, and, with spears
+in their rests, charged into the ranks of the pursuers.
+
+"A Colonna! a Colonna!"  "An Orsini! an Orsini!" were shouts loudly and
+fiercely interchanged.  Martino di Porto, a man of great bulk and ferocity,
+and his cavaliers, who were chiefly German Mercenaries, met the encounter
+unshaken.  "Beware the bear's hug," cried the Orsini, as down went his
+antagonist, rider and steed, before his lance.
+
+The contest was short and fierce; the complete armour of the horsemen
+protected them on either side from wounds, - not so unscathed fared the
+half-armed foot-followers of the Orsini, as they pressed, each pushed on by
+the other, against the Colonna.  After a shower of stones and darts, which
+fell but as hailstones against the thick mail of the horsemen, they closed
+in, and, by their number, obstructed the movements of the steeds, while the
+spear, sword, and battle-axe of their opponents made ruthless havoc amongst
+their undisciplined ranks.  And Martino, who cared little how many of his
+mere mob were butchered, seeing that his foes were for the moment
+embarrassed by the wild rush and gathering circle of his foot train (for
+the place of conflict, though wider than the previous road, was confined
+and narrow), made a sign to some of his horsemen, and was about to ride
+forward towards the boat, now nearly out of sight, when a bugle at some
+distance was answered by one of his enemy at hand; and the shout of
+"Colonna to the rescue!" was echoed afar off.  A few moments brought in
+view a numerous train of horse at full speed, with the banners of the
+Colonna waving gallantly in the front.
+
+"A plague on the wizards! who would have imagined they had divined us so
+craftily!" muttered Martino; "we must not abide these odds;" and the hand
+he had first raised for advance, now gave the signal of retreat.
+
+Serried breast to breast and in complete order, the horsemen of Martino
+turned to fly; the foot rabble who had come for spoil remained but for
+slaughter.  They endeavoured to imitate their leaders; but how could they
+all elude the rushing chargers and sharp lances of their antagonists, whose
+blood was heated by the affray, and who regarded the lives at their mercy
+as a boy regards the wasp's nest he destroys.  The crowd dispersing in all
+directions, - some, indeed, escaped up the hills, where the footing was
+impracticable to the horses; some plunged into the river and swam across to
+the opposite bank - those less cool or experienced, who fled right onwards,
+served, by clogging the way of their enemy, to facilitate the flight of
+their leaders, but fell themselves, corpse upon corpse, butchered in the
+unrelenting and unresisted pursuit.
+
+"No quarter to the ruffians - every Orsini slain is a robber the less -
+strike for God, the Emperor, and the Colonna!" such were the shouts which
+rung the knell of the dismayed and falling fugitives.  Among those who fled
+onward, in the very path most accessible to the cavalry, was the young
+brother of Cola, so innocently mixed with the affray.  Fast he fled, dizzy
+with terror - poor boy, scarce before ever parted from his parents' or his
+brother's side! - the trees glided past him - the banks receded: - on he
+sped, and fast behind came the tramp of the hoofs - the shouts - the curses
+- the fierce laughter of the foe, as they bounded over the dead and the
+dying in their path.  He was now at the spot in which his brother had left
+him; hastily he glanced behind, and saw the couched lance and horrent crest
+of the horseman close at his rear; despairingly he looked up, and behold!
+his brother bursting through the tangled brakes that clothed the mountain,
+and bounding to his succour.
+
+"Save me! save me, brother!" he shrieked aloud, and the shriek reached
+Cola's ear; - the snort of the fiery charger breathed hot upon him; - a
+moment more, and with one wild shrill cry of "Mercy, mercy" he fell to the
+ground - a corpse:  the lance of the pursuer passing through and through
+him, from back to breast, and nailing him on the very sod where he had
+sate, full of young life and careless hope, not an hour ago.
+
+The horseman plucked forth his spear, and passed on in pursuit of new
+victims; his comrades following.  Cola had descended, - was on the spot, -
+kneeling by his murdered brother.  Presently, to the sound of horn and
+trumpet, came by a nobler company than most of those hitherto engaged; who
+had been, indeed, but the advanced-guard of the Colonna.  At their head
+rode a man in years, whose long white hair escaped from his plumed cap and
+mingled with his venerable beard.  "How is this?" said the chief, reining
+in his steed, "young Rienzi!"
+
+The youth looked up, as he heard that voice, and then flung himself before
+the steed of the old noble, and, clasping his hands, cried out in a scarce
+articulate tone:  "It is my brother, noble Stephen, - a boy, a mere child!
+- the best - the mildest!  See how his blood dabbles the grass; - back,
+back - your horse's hoofs are in the stream!  Justice, my Lord, justice! -
+you are a great man."
+
+"Who slew him? an Orsini, doubtless; you shall have justice."
+
+"Thanks, thanks," murmured Rienzi, as he tottered once more to his
+brother's side, turned the boy's face from the grass, and strove wildly to
+feel the pulse of his heart; he drew back his hand hastily, for it was
+crimsoned with blood, and lifting that hand on high, shrieked out again,
+"Justice! justice!"
+
+The group round the old Stephen Colonna, hardened as they were in such
+scenes, were affected by the sight.  A handsome boy, whose tears ran fast
+down his cheeks, and who rode his palfrey close by the side of the Colonna,
+drew forth his sword.  "My Lord," said he, half sobbing, "an Orsini only
+could have butchered a harmless lad like this; let us lose not a moment, -
+let us on after the ruffians."
+
+"No, Adrian, no!" cried Stephen, laying his hand on the boy's shoulder;
+"your zeal is to be lauded, but we must beware an ambush.  Our men have
+ventured too far - what, ho, there! - sound a return."
+
+The bugles, in a few minutes, brought back the pursuers, - among them, the
+horseman whose spear had been so fatally misused.  He was the leader of
+those engaged in the conflict with Martino di Porto; and the gold wrought
+into his armour, with the gorgeous trappings of his charger, betokened his
+rank.
+
+"Thanks, my son, thanks," said the old Colonna to this cavalier, "you have
+done well and bravely.  But tell me, knowest thou, for thou hast an eagle
+eye, which of the Orsini slew this poor boy? - a foul deed; his family,
+too, our clients!"
+
+"Who? yon lad?" replied the horseman, lifting the helmet from his head, and
+wiping his heated brow; "say you so! how came he, then, with Martino's
+rascals?  I fear me the mistake hath cost him dear.  I could but suppose
+him of the Orsini rabble, and so - and so - "
+
+"You slew him!" cried Rienzi, in a voice of thunder, starting from the
+ground.  "Justice!  then, my Lord Stephen, justice! you promised me
+justice, and I will have it!"
+
+"My poor youth," said the old man, compassionately, "you should have had
+justice against the Orsini; but see you not this has been an error?  I do
+not wonder you are too grieved to listen to reason now.  We must make this
+up to you."
+
+"And let this pay for masses for the boy's soul; I grieve me much for the
+accident," said the younger Colonna, flinging down a purse of gold.  "Ay,
+see us at the palace next week, young Cola - next week.  My father, we had
+best return towards the boat; its safeguard may require us yet."
+
+"Right, Gianni; stay, some two of you, and see to the poor lad's corpse; -
+a grievous accident! how could it chance?"
+
+The company passed back the way they came, two of the common soldiers alone
+remaining, except the boy Adrian, who lingered behind a few moments,
+striving to console Rienzi, who, as one bereft of sense, remained
+motionless, gazing on the proud array as it swept along, and muttering to
+himself, "Justice, justice!  I will have it yet."
+
+The loud voice of the elder Colonna summoned Adrian, reluctantly and
+weeping, away.  "Let me be your brother," said the gallant boy,
+affectionately pressing the scholar's hand to his heart; "I want a brother
+like you."
+
+Rienzi made no reply; he did not heed or hear him - dark and stern
+thoughts, thoughts in which were the germ of a mighty revolution, were at
+his heart. He woke from them with a start, as the soldiers were now
+arranging their bucklers so as to make a kind of bier for the corpse, and
+then burst into tears as he fiercely motioned them away, and clasped the
+clay to his breast till he was literally soaked with the oozing blood.
+
+The poor child's garland had not dropped from his arm even when he fell,
+and, entangled by his dress, it still clung around him.  It was a sight
+that recalled to Cola all the gentleness, the kind heart, and winning
+graces of his only brother - his only friend!  It was a sight that seemed
+to make yet more inhuman the untimely and unmerited fate of that innocent
+boy.  "My brother! my brother!" groaned the survivor; "how shall I meet our
+mother? - how shall I meet even night and solitude again? - so young, so
+harmless!  See ye, sirs, he was but too gentle.  And they will not give us
+justice, because his murderer was a noble and a Colonna.  And this gold,
+too - gold for a brother's blood!  Will they not" - and the young man's
+eyes glared like fire - "will they not give us justice?  Time shall show!"
+so saying, he bent his head over the corpse; his lips muttered, as with
+some prayer or invocation; and then rising, his face was as pale as the
+dead beside him, - but it was no longer pale with grief!
+
+From that bloody clay, and that inward prayer, Cola di Rienzi rose a new
+being.  With his young brother died his own youth.  But for that event, the
+future liberator of Rome might have been but a dreamer, a scholar, a poet;
+the peaceful rival of Petrarch; a man of thoughts, not deeds.  But from
+that time, all his faculties, energies, fancies, genius, became
+concentrated into a single point; and patriotism, before a vision, leapt
+into the life and vigour of a passion, lastingly kindled, stubbornly
+hardened, and awfully consecrated, - by revenge!
+
+
+Chapter 1.II.  An Historical Survey - not to Be Passed Over, Except by
+Those Who Dislike to Understand What They Read.
+
+Years had passed away, and the death of the Roman boy, amidst more noble
+and less excusable slaughter, was soon forgotten, - forgotten almost by the
+parents of the slain, in the growing fame and fortunes of their eldest son,
+- forgotten and forgiven never by that son himself.  But, between that
+prologue of blood, and the political drama which ensues, - between the
+fading interest, as it were, of a dream, and the more busy, actual, and
+continuous excitements of sterner life, - this may be the most fitting time
+to place before the reader a short and rapid outline of the state and
+circumstances of that city in which the principal scenes of this story are
+laid; - an outline necessary, perhaps, to many, for a full comprehension of
+the motives of the actors, and the vicissitudes of the plot.
+
+Despite the miscellaneous and mongrel tribes that had forced their
+settlements in the City of the Caesars, the Roman population retained an
+inordinate notion of their own supremacy over the rest of the world; and,
+degenerated from the iron virtues of the Republic, possessed all the
+insolent and unruly turbulence which characterised the Plebs of the ancient
+Forum.  Amongst a ferocious, yet not a brave populace, the nobles supported
+themselves less as sagacious tyrants than as relentless banditti.  The
+popes had struggled in vain against these stubborn and stern patricians. 
+Their state derided, their command defied, their persons publicly outraged,
+the pontiff-sovereigns of the rest of Europe resided, at the Vatican, as
+prisoners under terror of execution.  When, thirty-eight years before the
+date of the events we are about to witness, a Frenchman, under the name of
+Clement V., had ascended the chair of St. Peter, the new pope, with more
+prudence than valour, had deserted Rome for the tranquil retreat of
+Avignon; and the luxurious town of a foreign province became the court of
+the Roman pontiff, and the throne of the Christian Church.
+
+Thus deprived of even the nominal check of the papal presence, the power of
+the nobles might be said to have no limits, save their own caprice, or
+their mutual jealousies and feuds.  Though arrogating through fabulous
+genealogies their descent from the ancient Romans, they were, in reality,
+for the most part, the sons of the bolder barbarians of the North; and,
+contaminated by the craft of Italy, rather than imbued with its national
+affections, they retained the disdain of their foreign ancestors for a
+conquered soil and a degenerate people.  While the rest of Italy,
+especially in Florence, in Venice, and in Milan, was fast and far advancing
+beyond the other states of Europe in civilisation and in art, the Romans
+appeared rather to recede than to improve; - unblest by laws, unvisited by
+art, strangers at once to the chivalry of a warlike, and the graces of a 
+peaceful, people.  But they still possessed the sense and desire of
+liberty, and, by ferocious paroxysms and desperate struggles, sought to
+vindicate for their city the title it still assumed of "the Metropolis of
+the World."  For the last two centuries they had known various revolutions
+- brief, often bloody, and always unsuccessful.  Still, there was the empty
+pageant of a popular form of government.  The thirteen quarters of the city
+named each a chief; and the assembly of these magistrates, called
+Caporioni, by theory possessed an authority they had neither the power nor
+the courage to exert.  Still there was the proud name of Senator; but, at
+the present time, the office was confined to one or to two persons,
+sometimes elected by the pope, sometimes by the nobles.  The authority
+attached to the name seems to have had no definite limit; it was that of a
+stern dictator, or an indolent puppet, according as he who held it had the
+power to enforce the dignity he assumed.  It was never conceded but to
+nobles, and it was by the nobles that all the outrages were committed. 
+Private enmity alone was gratified whenever public justice was invoked: 
+and the vindication of order was but the execution of revenge.
+
+Holding their palaces as the castles and fortresses of princes, each
+asserting his own independency of all authority and law, and planting
+fortifications, and claiming principalities in the patrimonial territories
+of the Church, the barons of Rome made their state still more secure, and
+still more odious, by the maintenance of troops of foreign (chiefly of
+German) mercenaries, at once braver in disposition, more disciplined in
+service, and more skilful in arms, than even the freest Italians of that
+time.  Thus they united the judicial and the military force, not for the
+protection, but for the ruin of Rome.  Of these barons, the most powerful
+were the Orsini and Colonna; their feuds were hereditary and incessant, and
+every day witnessed the fruits of their lawless warfare, in bloodshed, in
+rape, and in conflagration.  The flattery or the friendship of Petrarch,
+too credulously believed by modern historians, has invested the Colonna,
+especially of the date now entered upon, with an elegance and a dignity not
+their own.  Outrage, fraud, and assassination, a sordid avarice in securing
+lucrative offices to themselves, an insolent oppression of their citizens,
+and the most dastardly cringing to power superior to their own (with but
+few exceptions), mark the character of the first family of Rome.  But,
+wealthier than the rest of the barons, they were, therefore, more
+luxurious, and, perhaps, more intellectual; and their pride was flattered
+in being patrons of those arts of which they could never have become the
+professors.  From these multiplied oppressors the Roman citizens turned
+with fond and impatient regret to their ignorant and dark notions of
+departed liberty and greatness.  They confounded the times of the Empire
+with those of the Republic; and often looked to the Teutonic king, who
+obtained his election from beyond the Alps, but his title of emperor from
+the Romans, as the deserter of his legitimate trust and proper home; vainly
+imagining that, if both the Emperor and the Pontiff fixed their residence
+in Rome, Liberty and Law would again seek their natural shelter beneath the
+resuscitated majesty of the Roman people.
+
+The absence of the pope and the papal court served greatly to impoverish
+the citizens; and they had suffered yet more visibly by the depredations of
+hordes of robbers, numerous and unsparing, who infested Romagna,
+obstructing all the public ways, and were, sometimes secretly, sometimes,
+openly, protected by the barons, who often recruited their banditti
+garrisons by banditti soldiers.
+
+But besides the lesser and ignobler robbers, there had risen in Italy a far
+more formidable description of freebooters.  A German, who assumed the
+lofty title of the Duke Werner, had, a few years prior to the period we
+approach, enlisted and organised a considerable force, styled "The Great
+Company," with which he besieged cities and invaded states, without any
+object less shameless than that of pillage.  His example was soon imitated: 
+numerous "Companies," similarly constituted, devastated the distracted and
+divided land.  They appeared, suddenly raised, as if by magic, before the
+walls of a city, and demanded immense sums as the purchase of peace. 
+Neither tyrant nor common wealth maintained a force sufficient to resist
+them; and if other northern mercenaries were engaged to oppose them, it was
+only to recruit the standards of the freebooters with deserters.  Mercenary
+fought not mercenary - nor German, German:  and greater pay, and more
+unbridled rapine, made the tents of the "Companies" far more attractive
+than the regulated stipends of a city, or the dull fortress and
+impoverished coffers of a chief.  Werner, the most implacable and ferocious
+of all these adventurers, and who had so openly gloried in his enormities
+as to wear upon his breast a silver plate, engraved with the words, "Enemy
+to God, to Pity, and to Mercy," had not long since ravaged Romagna with
+fire and sword.  But, whether induced by money, or unable to control the
+fierce spirits he had raised, he afterwards led the bulk of his company
+back to Germany.  Small detachments, however, remained, scattered
+throughout the land, waiting only an able leader once more to re-unite
+them:  amongst those who appeared most fitted for that destiny was Walter
+de Montreal, a Knight of St. John, and gentleman of Provence, whose valour
+and military genius had already, though yet young, raised his name into
+dreaded celebrity; and whose ambition, experience, and sagacity, relieved
+by certain chivalric and noble qualities, were suited to enterprises far
+greater and more important than the violent depredations of the atrocious
+Werner.  From these scourges, no state had suffered more grievously than
+Rome.  The patrimonial territories of the pope, - in part wrested from him
+by petty tyrants, in part laid waste by these foreign robbers, - yielded
+but a scanty supply to the necessities of Clement VI., the most
+accomplished gentleman and the most graceful voluptuary of his time; and
+the good father had devised a plan, whereby to enrich at once the Romans
+and their pontiff.
+
+Nearly fifty years before the time we enter upon, in order both to
+replenish the papal coffers and pacify the starving Romans, Boniface VIII.
+had instituted the Festival of the Jubilee, or Holy Year; in fact, a
+revival of a Pagan ceremonial.  A plenary indulgence was promised to every
+Catholic who, in that year, and in the first year of every succeeding
+century, should visit the churches of St. Peter and St. Paul.  An immense
+concourse of pilgrims, from every part of Christendom, had attested the
+wisdom of the invention; "and two priests stood night and day, with rakes
+in their hands, to collect without counting the heaps of gold and silver
+that were poured on the altar of St. Paul."  (Gibbon, vol. xii. c. 59.)
+
+It is not to be wondered at that this most lucrative festival should, ere
+the next century was half expired, appear to a discreet pontiff to be too
+long postponed.  And both pope and city agreed in thinking it might well
+bear a less distant renewal.  Accordingly, Clement VI. had proclaimed,
+under the name of the Mosaic Jubilee, a second Holy Year for 1350 - viz.,
+three years distant from that date at which, in the next chapter, my
+narrative will commence.  This circumstance had a great effect in whetting
+the popular indignation against the barons, and preparing the events I
+shall relate; for the roads were, as I before said, infested by the
+banditti, the creatures and allies of the barons.  And if the roads were
+not cleared, the pilgrims might not attend.  It was the object of the
+pope's vicar, Raimond, bishop of Orvietto (bad politician and good
+canonist), to seek, by every means, to remove all impediment between the
+offerings of devotion and the treasury of St. Peter.
+
+Such, in brief, was the state of Rome at the period we are about to
+examine.  Her ancient mantle of renown still, in the eyes of Italy and of
+Europe, cloaked her ruins.  In name, at least, she was still the queen of
+the earth; and from her hands came the crown of the emperor of the north,
+and the keys of the father of the church.  Her situation was precisely that
+which presented a vase and glittering triumph to bold ambition, - an
+inspiring, if mournful, spectacle to determined patriotism, - and a fitting
+stage for that more august tragedy which seeks its incidents, selects its
+actors, and shapes its moral, amidst the vicissitudes and crimes of
+nations.
+
+
+Chapter 1.III.  The Brawl.
+
+On an evening in April, 1347, and in one of those wide spaces in which
+Modern and Ancient Rome seemed blent together - equally desolate and
+equally in ruins - a miscellaneous and indignant populace were assembled. 
+That morning the house of a Roman jeweller had been forcibly entered and
+pillaged by the soldiers of Martino di Porto, with a daring effrontery
+which surpassed even the ordinary licence of the barons.  The sympathy and
+sensation throughout the city were deep and ominous.
+
+"Never will I submit to this tyranny!"
+
+"Nor I!"
+
+"Nor I!"
+
+"Nor by the bones of St. Peter, will I!"
+
+"And what, my friends, is this tyranny to which you will not submit?" said
+a young nobleman, addressing himself to the crowd of citizens who, heated,
+angry, half-armed, and with the vehement gestures of Italian passion, were
+now sweeping down the long and narrow street that led to the gloomy quarter
+occupied by the Orsini.
+
+"Ah, my lord!" cried two or three of the citizens in a breath, "you will
+right us - you will see justice done to us - you are a Colonna."
+
+"Ha, ha, ha!" laughed scornfully one man of gigantic frame, and wielding on
+high a huge hammer, indicative of his trade.  "Justice and Colonna! body of
+God! those names are not often found together."
+
+"Down with him! down with him! he is an Orsinist - down with him!" cried at
+least ten of the throng:  but no hand was raised against the giant.
+
+"He speaks the truth," said a second voice, firmly.
+
+"Ay, that doth he," said a third, knitting his brows, and unsheathing his
+knife, "and we will abide by it.  The Orsini are tyrants - and the Colonnas
+are, at the best, as bad."
+
+"Thou liest in thy teeth, ruffian!" cried the young noble, advancing into
+the press and confronting the last asperser of the Colonna.
+
+Before the flashing eye and menacing gesture of the cavalier, the worthy
+brawler retreated some steps, so as to leave an open space between the
+towering form of the smith, and the small, slender, but vigorous frame of
+the young noble.
+
+Taught from their birth to despise the courage of the plebeians, even while
+careless of much reputation as to their own, the patricians of Rome were
+not unaccustomed to the rude fellowship of these brawls; nor was it unoften
+that the mere presence of a noble sufficed to scatter whole crowds, that
+had the moment before been breathing vengeance against his order and his
+house.
+
+Waving his hand, therefore, to the smith, and utterly unheeding either his
+brandished weapon or his vast stature, the young Adrian di Castello, a
+distant kinsman of the Colonna, haughtily bade him give way.
+
+"To your homes, friends! and know," he added, with some dignity, "that ye
+wrong us much, if ye imagine we share the evil-doings of the Orsini, or are
+pandering solely to our own passions in the feud between their house and
+ours.  May the Holy Mother so judge me," continued he, devoutly lifting up
+his eyes, "as I now with truth declare, that it is for your wrongs, and for
+the wrongs of Rome, that I have drawn this sword against the Orsini."
+
+"So say all the tyrants," rejoined the smith, hardily, as he leant his
+hammer against a fragment of stone - some remnant of ancient Rome - "they
+never fight against each other, but it is for our good.  One Colonna cuts
+me the throat of Orsini's baker - it is for our good!  Another Colonna
+seizes on the daughter of Orsini's tailor - it is for our good! our good -
+yes, for the good of the people! the good of the bakers and tailors, eh?"
+
+"Fellow," said the young nobleman, gravely, "if a Colonna did thus, he did
+wrong; but the holiest cause may have bad supporters."
+
+"Yes, the holy Church itself is propped on very in different columns,"
+answered the smith, in a rude witticism on the affection of the pope for
+the Colonna.
+
+"He blasphemes! the smith blasphemes!" cried the partisans of that powerful
+house.  "A Colonna, a Colonna!"
+
+"An Orsini, an Orsini!" was no less promptly the counter cry.
+
+"The People!" shouted the smith, waving his formidable weapon far above the
+heads of the group.
+
+In an instant the whole throng, who had at first united against the
+aggression of one man, were divided by the hereditary wrath of faction.  At
+the cry of Orsini, several new partisans hurried to the spot; the friends
+of the Colonna drew themselves on one side - the defenders of the Orsini on
+the other - and the few who agreed with the smith that both factions were
+equally odious, and the people was the sole legitimate cry in a popular
+commotion, would have withdrawn themselves from the approaching melee, if
+the smith himself, who was looked upon by them as an authority of great
+influence, had not - whether from resentment at the haughty bearing of the
+young Colonna, or from that appetite of contest not uncommon in men of a
+bulk and force which assure them in all personal affrays the lofty pleasure
+of superiority - if, I say, the smith himself had not, after a pause of
+indecision, retired among the Orsini, and entrained, by his example, the
+alliance of his friends with the favourers of that faction.
+
+In popular commotions, each man is whirled along with the herd, often half
+against his own approbation or assent.  The few words of peace by which
+Adrian di Castello commenced an address to his friends were drowned amidst
+their shouts.  Proud to find in their ranks one of the most beloved, and
+one of the noblest of that name, the partisans of the Colonna placed him in
+their front, and charged impetuously on their foes.  Adrian, however, who
+had acquired from circumstances something of that chivalrous code which he
+certainly could not have owed to his Roman birth, disdained at first to
+assault men among whom he recognised no equal, either in rank or the
+practice of arms.  He contented himself with putting aside the few strokes
+that were aimed at him in the gathering confusion of the conflict - few;
+for those who recognised him, even amidst the bitterest partisans of the
+Orsini, were not willing to expose themselves to the danger and odium of
+spilling the blood of a man, who, in addition to his great birth and the
+terrible power of his connexions, was possessed of a personal popularity,
+which he owed rather to a comparison with the vices of his relatives than
+to any remarkable virtues hitherto displayed by himself.  The smith alone,
+who had as yet taken no active part in the fray, seemed to gather himself
+up in determined opposition as the cavalier now advanced within a few steps
+of him.
+
+"Did we not tell thee," quoth the giant, frowning, "that the Colonna were,
+not less than the Orsini, the foes of the people?  Look at thy followers
+and clients:  are they not cutting the throats of humble men by way of
+vengeance for the crime of a great one?  But that is the way one patrician
+always scourges the insolence of another.  He lays the rod on the backs of
+the people, and then cries, 'See how just I am!'"
+
+"I do not answer thee now," answered Adrian; "but if thou regrettest with
+me this waste of blood, join with me in attempting to prevent it."
+
+"I - not I! let the blood of the slaves flow today:  the time is fast
+coming when it shall be washed away by the blood of the lords."
+
+"Away, ruffian!" said Adrian, seeking no further parley, and touching the
+smith with the flat side of his sword.  In an instant the hammer of the
+smith swung in the air, and, but for the active spring of the young noble,
+would infallibly have crushed him to the earth.  Ere the smith could gain
+time for a second blow, Adrian's sword passed twice through his right arm,
+and the weapon fell heavily to the ground.
+
+"Slay him, slay him!" cried several of the clients of the Colonna, now
+pressing, dastard-like, round the disarmed and disabled smith.
+
+"Ay, slay him!" said, in tolerable Italian, but with a barbarous accent,
+one man, half-clad in armour, who had but just joined the group, and who
+was one of those wild German bandits whom the Colonna held in their pay;
+"he belongs to a horrible gang of miscreants sworn against all order and
+peace.  He is one of Rienzi's followers, and, bless the Three Kings! raves
+about the People."
+
+"Thou sayest right, barbarian," said the sturdy smith, in a loud voice, and
+tearing aside the vest from his breast with his left hand; "come all -
+Colonna and Orsini - dig to this heart with your sharp blades, and when you
+have reached the centre, you will find there the object of your common
+hatred - 'Rienzi and the People!'"
+
+As he uttered these words, in language that would have seemed above his
+station (if a certain glow and exaggeration of phrase and sentiment were
+not common, when excited, to all the Romans), the loudness of his voice
+rose above the noise immediately round him, and stilled, for an instant,
+the general din; and when, at last, the words, "Rienzi and the People" rang
+forth, they penetrated midway through the increasing crowd, and were
+answered as by an echo, with a hundred voices - "Rienzi and the People!"
+
+But whatever impression the words of the mechanic made on others, it was
+equally visible in the young Colonna.  At the name of Rienzi the glow of
+excitement vanished from his cheek; he started back, muttered to himself,
+and for a moment seemed, even in the midst of that stirring commotion, to
+be lost in a moody and distant revery.  He recovered, as the shout died
+away; and saying to the smith, in a low tone, "Friend, I am sorry for thy
+wound; but seek me on the morrow, and thou shalt find thou hast wronged
+me;" he beckoned to the German to follow him, and threaded his way through
+the crowd, which generally gave back as he advanced.  For the bitterest
+hatred to the order of the nobles was at that time in Rome mingled with a
+servile respect for their persons, and a mysterious awe of their
+uncontrollable power.
+
+As Adrian passed through that part of the crowd in which the fray had not
+yet commenced, the murmurs that followed him were not those which many of
+his race could have heard.
+
+"A Colonna," said one.
+
+"Yet no ravisher," said another, laughing wildly.
+
+"Nor murtherer," muttered a third, pressing his hand to his breast.  "'Tis
+not against him that my father's blood cries aloud."
+
+"Bless him," said a fourth, "for as yet no man curses him!"
+
+"Ah, God help us!" said an old man, with a long grey beard, leaning on his
+staff:  "The serpent's young yet; the fangs will show by and by."
+
+"For shame, father! he is a comely youth, and not proud in the least.  What
+a smile he hath!" quoth a fair matron, who kept on the outskirt of the
+melee.
+
+"Farewell to a man's honour when a noble smiles on his wife!" was the
+answer.
+
+"Nay," said Luigi, a jolly butcher, with a roguish eye, "what a man can win
+fairly from maid or wife, that let him do, whether plebeian or noble -
+that's my morality; but when an ugly old patrician finds fair words will
+not win fair looks, and carries me off a dame on the back of a German boar,
+with a stab in the side for comfort to the spouse, - then, I say, he is a
+wicked man, and an adulterer."
+
+While such were the comments and the murmurs that followed the noble, very
+different were the looks and words that attended the German soldier.
+
+Equally, nay, with even greater promptitude, did the crowd make way at his
+armed and heavy tread; but not with looks of reverence: - the eye glared as
+he approached; but the cheek grew pale - the head bowed - the lip quivered;
+each man felt a shudder of hate and fear, as recognizing a dread and mortal
+foe.  And well and wrathfully did the fierce mercenary note the signs of
+the general aversion.  He pushed on rudely - half-smiling in contempt,
+half-frowning in revenge, as he looked from side to side; and his long,
+matted, light hair, tawny-coloured moustache, and brawny front, contrasted
+strongly with the dark eyes, raven locks, and slender frames of the
+Italians.
+
+"May Lucifer double damn those German cut-throats!" muttered, between his
+grinded teeth, one of the citizens.
+
+"Amen!" answered, heartily, another.
+
+"Hush!" said a third, timorously looking round; "if one of them hear thee,
+thou art a lost man."
+
+"Oh, Rome!  Rome! to what art thou fallen!" said bitterly one citizen,
+clothed in black, and of a higher seeming than the rest; "when thou
+shudderest in thy streets at the tread of a hired barbarian!"
+
+"Hark to one of our learned men, and rich citizens!" said the butcher,
+reverently.
+
+"'Tis a friend of Rienzi's," quoth another of the group, lifting his cap.
+
+With downcast eyes, and a face in which grief, shame, and wrath, were
+visibly expressed, Pandulfo di Guido, a citizen of birth and repute, swept
+slowly through the crowd, and disappeared.
+
+Meanwhile, Adrian, having gained a street which, though in the
+neighbourhood of the crowd, was empty and desolate, turned to his fierce
+comrade.  "Rodolf!" said he, "mark! - no violence to the citizens.  Return
+to the crowd, collect the friends of our house, withdraw them from the
+scene; let not the Colonna be blamed for this day's violence; and assure
+our followers, in my name, that I swear, by the knighthood I received at
+the Emperor's hands, that by my sword shall Martino di Porto be punished
+for his outrage.  Fain would I, in person, allay the tumult, but my
+presence only seems to sanction it.  Go - thou hast weight with them all."
+
+"Ay, Signor, the weight of blows!" answered the grim soldier.  "But the
+command is hard; I would fain let their puddle-blood flow an hour or two
+longer.  Yet, pardon me; in obeying thy orders, do I obey those of my
+master, thy kinsman?  It is old Stephen Colonna - who seldom spares blood
+or treasure, God bless him - (save his own!) - whose money I hold, and to
+whose hests I am sworn."
+
+"Diavolo!" muttered the cavalier, and the angry spot was on his cheek; but,
+with the habitual self-control of the Italian nobles, he smothered his
+rising choler, and said aloud, with calmness, but dignity - 
+
+"Do as I bid thee; check this tumult - make us the forbearing party.  Let
+all be still within one hour hence, and call on me tomorrow for thy reward;
+be this purse an earnest of my future thanks.  As for my kinsman, whom I
+command thee to name more reverently, 'tis in his name I speak.  Hark! the
+din increases - the contest swells - go - lose not another moment."
+
+Somewhat awed by the quiet firmness of the patrician, Rodolf nodded,
+without answer, slid the money into his bosom, and stalked away into the
+thickest of the throng.  But, even ere he arrived, a sudden reaction had
+taken place.
+
+The young cavalier, left alone in that spot, followed with his eyes the
+receding form of the mercenary, as the sun, now setting, shone slant upon
+his glittering casque, and said bitterly to himself - "Unfortunate city,
+fountain of all mighty memories - fallen queen of a thousand nations - how
+art thou decrowned and spoiled by thy recreant and apostate children!  Thy
+nobles divided against themselves - thy people cursing thy nobles - thy
+priests, who should sow peace, planting discord - the father of thy church
+deserting thy stately walls, his home a refuge, his mitre a fief, his court
+a Gallic village - and we! we, of the haughtiest blood of Rome - we, the
+sons of Caesars, and of the lineage of demigods, guarding an insolent and
+abhorred state by the swords of hirelings, who mock our cowardice while
+they receive our pay - who keep our citizens slaves, and lord it over their
+very masters in return!  Oh, that we, the hereditary chiefs of Rome, could
+but feel - oh, that we could but find, our only legitimate safeguard in the
+grateful hearts of our countrymen!"
+
+So deeply did the young Adrian feel the galling truth of all he uttered,
+that the indignant tears rolled down his cheeks as he spoke.  He felt no
+shame as he dashed them away; for that weakness which weeps for a fallen
+race, is the tenderness not of women but of angels.
+
+As he turned slowly to quit the spot, his steps were suddenly arrested by a
+loud shout:  "Rienzi! Rienzi!" smote the air.  From the walls of the
+Capitol to the bed of the glittering Tiber, that name echoed far and wide;
+and, as the shout died away, it was swallowed up in a silence so profound,
+so universal, so breathless, that you might have imagined that death itself
+had fallen over the city.  And now, at the extreme end of the crowd, and
+elevated above their level, on vast fragments of stone which had been
+dragged from the ruins of Rome in one of the late frequent tumults between
+contending factions, to serve as a barricade for citizens against citizens,
+- on these silent memorials of the past grandeur, the present misery, of
+Rome, stood that extraordinary man, who, above all his race, was the most
+penetrated with the glories of the one time, with the degradation of the
+other.
+
+From the distance at which he stood from the scene, Adrian could only
+distinguish the dark outline of Rienzi's form; he could only hear the faint
+sound of his mighty voice; he could only perceive, in the subdued yet
+waving sea of human beings that spread around, their heads bared in the
+last rays of the sun, the unutterable effect which an eloquence, described
+by contemporaries almost as miraculous, - but in reality less so from the
+genius of the man than the sympathy of the audience, - created in all, who
+drank into their hearts and souls the stream of its burning thoughts.
+
+It was but for a short time that that form was visible to the earnest eye,
+that that voice at intervals reached the straining ear, of Adrian di
+Castello; but that time sufficed to produce all the effect which Adrian
+himself had desired.
+
+Another shout, more earnest, more prolonged than the first - a shout, in
+which spoke the release of swelling thoughts, of intense excitement -
+betokened the close of the harangue; and then you might see, after a
+minute's pause, the crowd breaking in all directions, and pouring down the
+avenues in various knots and groups, each testifying the strong and lasting
+impression made upon the multitude by that address.  Every cheek was
+flushed - every tongue spoke:  the animation of the orator had passed, like
+a living spirit, into the breasts of the audience.  He had thundered
+against the disorders of the patricians, yet, by a word, he had disarmed
+the anger of the plebeians - he had preached freedom, yet he had opposed
+licence.  He had calmed the present, by a promise of the future.  He had
+chid their quarrels, yet had supported their cause.  He had mastered the
+revenge of today, by a solemn assurance that there should come justice for
+the morrow.  So great may be the power, so mighty the eloquence, so
+formidable the genius, of one man, - without arms, without rank, without
+sword or ermine, who addresses himself to a people that is oppressed!
+
+
+Chapter 1.IV.  An Adventure.
+
+Avoiding the broken streams of the dispersed crowd, Adrian Colonna strode
+rapidly down one of the narrow streets leading to his palace, which was
+situated at no inconsiderable distance from the place in which the late
+contest had occurred.  The education of his life made him feel a profound
+interest, not only in the divisions and disputes of his country, but also
+in the scene he had just witnessed, and the authority exercised by Rienzi.
+
+An orphan of a younger, but opulent branch of the Colonna, Adrian had been
+brought up under the care and guardianship of his kinsman, that astute, yet
+valiant Stephen Colonna, who, of all the nobles of Rome, was the most
+powerful, alike from the favour of the pope, and the number of armed
+hirelings whom his wealth enabled him to maintain.  Adrian had early
+manifested what in that age was considered an extraordinary disposition
+towards intellectual pursuits, and had acquired much of the little that was
+then known of the ancient language and the ancient history of his country.
+
+Though Adrian was but a boy at the time in which, first presented to the
+reader, he witnessed the emotions of Rienzi at the death of his brother,
+his kind heart had been penetrated with sympathy for Cola's affliction, and
+shame for the apathy of his kinsmen at the result of their own feuds.  He
+had earnestly sought the friendship of Rienzi, and, despite his years, had
+become aware of the power and energy of his character.  But though Rienzi,
+after a short time, had appeared to think no more of his brother's death -
+though he again entered the halls of the Colonna, and shared their
+disdainful hospitalities, he maintained a certain distance and reserve of
+manner, which even Adrian could only partially overcome.  He rejected every
+offer of service, favour, or promotion; and any unwonted proof of kindness
+from Adrian seemed, instead of making him more familiar, to offend him into
+colder distance.  The easy humour and conversational vivacity which had
+first rendered him a welcome guest with those who passed their lives
+between fighting and feasting, had changed into a vein ironical, cynical,
+and severe.  But the dull barons were equally amused at his wit, and Adrian
+was almost the only one who detected the serpent couched beneath the smile.
+
+Often Rienzi sat at the feast, silent, but observant, as if watching every
+look, weighing every word, taking gauge and measurement of the intellect,
+policy, temperament, of every guest; and when he had seemed to satisfy
+himself, his spirits would rise, his words flow, and while his dazzling but
+bitter wit lit up the revel, none saw that the unmirthful flash was the
+token of the coming storm.  But all the while, he neglected no occasion to
+mix with the humbler citizens, to stir up their minds, to inflame their
+imaginations, to kindle their emulation, with pictures of the present and
+with legends of the past.  He grew in popularity and repute, and was yet
+more in power with the herd, because in favour with the nobles.  Perhaps it
+was for that reason that he had continued the guest of the Colonna.
+
+When, six years before the present date, the Capitol of the Caesars
+witnessed the triumph of Petrarch, the scholastic fame of the young Rienzi
+had attracted the friendship of the poet, - a friendship that continued,
+with slight interruption, to the last, through careers so widely different;
+and afterwards, one among the Roman Deputies to Avignon, he had been
+conjoined with Petrarch (According to the modern historians; but it seems
+more probable that Rienzi's mission to Avignon was posterior to that of
+Petrarch.  However this be, it was at Avignon that Petrarch and Rienzi
+became most intimate, as Petrarch himself observes in one of his letters.)
+to supplicate Clement VI. to remove the Holy See from Avignon to Rome.  It
+was in this mission that, for the first time, he evinced his extraordinary
+powers of eloquence and persuasion.  The pontiff, indeed, more desirous of
+ease than glory, was not convinced by the arguments, but he was enchanted
+with the pleader; and Rienzi returned to Rome, loaded with honours, and
+clothed with the dignity of high and responsible office.  No longer the
+inactive scholar, the gay companion, he rose at once to pre-eminence above
+all his fellow-citizens.  Never before had authority been borne with so
+austere an integrity, so uncorrupt a zeal.  He had sought to impregnate his
+colleagues with the same loftiness of principle - he had failed.  Now
+secure in his footing, he had begun openly to appeal to the people; and
+already a new spirit seemed to animate the populace of Rome.
+
+While these were the fortunes of Rienzi, Adrian had been long separated
+from him, and absent from Rome.
+
+The Colonna were staunch supporters of the imperial party, and Adrian di
+Castello had received and obeyed an invitation to the Emperor's court. 
+Under that monarch he had initiated himself in arms, and, among the knights
+of Germany, he had learned to temper the natural Italian shrewdness with
+the chivalry of northern valour.
+
+In leaving Bavaria, he had sojourned a short time in the solitude of one of
+his estates by the fairest lake of northern Italy; and thence, with a mind
+improved alike by action and study, had visited many of the free Italian
+states, imbibed sentiments less prejudiced than those of his order, and
+acquired an early reputation for himself while inly marking the characters
+and deeds of others.  In him, the best qualities of the Italian noble were
+united.  Passionately addicted to the cultivation of letters, subtle and
+profound in policy, gentle and bland of manner, dignifying a love of
+pleasure with a certain elevation of taste, he yet possessed a gallantry of
+conduct, and purity of honour, and an aversion from cruelty, which were
+then very rarely found in the Italian temperament, and which even the
+Chivalry of the North, while maintaining among themselves, usually
+abandoned the moment they came into contact with the systematic craft and
+disdain of honesty, which made the character of the ferocious, yet wily,
+South.  With these qualities he combined, indeed, the softer passions of
+his countrymen, - he adored Beauty, and he made a deity of Love.
+
+He had but a few weeks returned to his native city, whither his reputation
+had already preceded him, and where his early affection for letters and
+gentleness of bearing were still remembered.  He returned to find the
+position of Rienzi far more altered than his own.  Adrian had not yet
+sought the scholar.  He wished first to judge with his own eyes, and at a
+distance, of the motives and object of his conduct; for partly he caught
+the suspicions which his own order entertained of Rienzi, and partly he
+shared in the trustful enthusiasm of the people.
+
+"Certainly," said he now to himself, as he walked musingly onward,
+"certainly, no man has it more in his power to reform our diseased state,
+to heal our divisions, to awaken our citizens to the recollections of
+ancestral virtue.  But that very power, how dangerous is it!  Have I not
+seen, in the free states of Italy, men, called into authority for the sake
+of preserving the people, honest themselves at first, and then, drunk with
+the sudden rank, betraying the very cause which had exalted them?  True,
+those men were chiefs and nobles; but are plebeians less human?  Howbeit I
+have heard and seen enough from afar, - I will now approach, and examine
+the man himself."
+
+While thus soliloquizing, Adrian but little noted the various passengers,
+who, more and more rarely as the evening waned, hastened homeward.  Among
+these were two females, who now alone shared with Adrian the long and
+gloomy street into which he had entered.  The moon was already bright in
+the heavens, and, as the women passed the cavalier with a light and quick
+step, the younger one turned back and regarded him by the clear light with
+an eager, yet timid glance.
+
+"Why dost thou tremble, my pretty one!" said her companion, who might have
+told some five-and-forty years, and whose garb and voice bespoke her of
+inferior rank to the younger female.  "The streets seem quiet enough now,
+and, the Virgin be praised! we are not so far from home either."
+
+"Oh, Benedetta, it is he! it is the young signor - it is Adrian!"
+
+"That is fortunate," said the nurse, for such was her condition, "since
+they say he is as bold as a Northman:  and as the Palazzo Colonna is not
+very far from hence, we shall be within reach of his aid should we want it: 
+that is to say, sweet one, if you will walk a little slower than you have
+yet done."
+
+The young lady slackened her pace, and sighed.
+
+"He is certainly very handsome," quoth the nurse:  "but thou must not think
+more of him; he is too far above thee for marriage, and for aught else,
+thou art too honest, and thy brother too proud - "
+
+"And thou, Benedetta, art too quick with thy tongue.  How canst thou talk
+thus, when thou knowest he hath never, since, at least, I was a mere child,
+even addressed me:  nay, he scarce knows of my very existence.  He, the
+Lord Adrian di Castello, dream of the poor Irene!  The mere thought is
+madness!"
+
+"Then why," said the nurse, briskly, "dost thou dream of him?"
+
+Her companion sighed again more deeply than at first.
+
+"Holy St. Catherine!" continued Benedetta, "if there were but one man in
+the world, I would die single ere I would think of him, until, at least, he
+had kissed my hand twice, and left it my own fault if it were not my lips
+instead."
+
+The young lady still replied not.
+
+"But how didst thou contrive to love him?" asked the nurse.  "Thou canst
+not have seen him very often:  it is but some four or five weeks since his
+return to Rome."
+
+"Oh, how dull art thou?" answered the fair Irene.  "Have I not told thee
+again and again, that I loved him six years ago?"
+
+"When thou hadst told but thy tenth year, and a doll would have been thy
+most suitable lover!  As I am a Christian, Signora, thou hast made good use
+of thy time.
+
+"And during his absence," continued the girl, fondly, yet sadly, "did I not
+hear him spoken of, and was not the mere sound of his name like a love-gift
+that bade me remember?  And when they praised him, have I not rejoiced? and
+when they blamed him, have I not resented? and when they said that his
+lance was victorious in the tourney, did I not weep with pride? and when
+they whispered that his vows were welcome in the bower, wept I not as
+fervently with grief?  Have not the six years of his absence been a dream,
+and was not his return a waking into light - a morning of glory and the
+sun? and I see him now in the church when he wots not of me; and on his
+happy steed as he passes by my lattice:  and is not that enough of
+happiness for love?"
+
+"But if he loves not thee?"
+
+"Fool!  I ask not that; - nay, I know not if I wish it.  Perhaps I would
+rather dream of him, such as I would have him, than know him for what he
+is.  He might be unkind, or ungenerous, or love me but little; rather would
+I not be loved at all, than loved coldly, and eat away my heart by
+comparing it with his.  I can love him now as something abstract, unreal,
+and divine:  but what would be my shame, my grief, if I were to find him
+less than I have imagined!  Then, indeed, my life would have been wasted;
+then, indeed, the beauty of the earth would be gone!"
+
+The good nurse was not very capable of sympathizing with sentiments like
+these.  Even had their characters been more alike, their disparity of age
+would have rendered such sympathy impossible.  What but youth can echo back
+the soul of youth - all the music of its wild vanities and romantic
+follies?  The good nurse did not sympathize with the sentiments of her
+young lady, but she sympathised with the deep earnestness with which they
+were expressed.  She thought it wondrous silly, but wondrous moving; she
+wiped her eyes with the corner of her veil, and hoped in her secret heart
+that her young charge would soon get a real husband to put such
+unsubstantial fantasies out of her head.  There was a short pause in their
+conversation, when, just where two streets crossed one another, there was
+heard a loud noise of laughing voices and trampling feet.  Torches were
+seen on high affronting the pale light of the moon; and, at a very short
+distance from the two females, in the cross street, advanced a company of
+seven or eight men, bearing, as seen by the red light of the torches, the
+formidable badge of the Orsini.
+
+Amidst the other disorders of the time, it was no unfrequent custom for the
+younger or more dissolute of the nobles, in small and armed companies, to
+parade the streets at night, seeking occasion for a licentious gallantry
+among the cowering citizens, or a skirmish at arms with some rival
+stragglers of their own order.  Such a band had Irene and her companion now
+chanced to encounter.
+
+"Holy mother!" cried Benedetta, turning pale, and half running, "what curse
+has befallen us?  How could we have been so foolish as to tarry so late at
+the lady Nina's!  Run, Signora, - run, or we shall fall into their hands!"
+
+But the advice of Benedetta came too late, - the fluttering garments of the
+women had been already descried:  in a moment more they were surrounded by
+the marauders.  A rude hand tore aside Benedetta's veil, and at sight of
+features, which, if time had not spared, it could never very materially
+injure, the rough aggressor cast the poor nurse against the wall with a
+curse, which was echoed by a loud laugh from his comrades.
+
+"Thou hast a fine fortune in faces Giuseppe!"
+
+"Yes; it was but the other day that he seized on a girl of sixty."
+
+"And then, by way of improving her beauty, cut her across the face with his
+dagger, because she was not sixteen!"
+
+"Hush, fellows! whom have we here?" said the chief of the party, a man
+richly dressed, and who, though bordering upon middle age, had only the
+more accustomed himself to the excesses of youth; as he spoke, he snatched
+the trembling Irene from the grasp of his followers.  "Ho, there! the
+torches!  Oh che bella faccia! what blushes - what eyes! - nay, look not
+down, pretty one; thou needst not be ashamed to win the love of an Orsini -
+yes; know the triumph thou hast achieved - it is Martino di Porto who bids
+thee smile upon him!"
+
+"For the blest Mother's sake release me!  Nay, sir, this must not be - I am
+not unfriended - this insult shall not pass!"
+
+"Hark to her silver chiding; it is better than my best hound's bay!  This
+adventure is worth a month's watching.  What! will you not come? - restive
+- shrieks too! - Francesco, Pietro, ye are the gentlest of the band.  Wrap
+her veil around her, - muffle this music; - so! bear her before me to the
+palace, and tomorrow, sweet one, thou shalt go home with a basket of
+florins which thou mayest say thou hast bought at market."
+
+But Irene's shrieks, Irene's struggles, had already brought succour to her
+side, and, as Adrian approached the spot, the nurse flung herself on her
+knees before him.
+
+"Oh, sweet signor, for Christ's grace save us!  Deliver my young mistress -
+her friends love you well!  We are all for the Colonna, my lord; yes,
+indeed, all for the Colonna!  Save the kin of your own clients, gracious
+signor!"
+
+It is enough that she is a woman," answered Adrian, adding, between his
+teeth, "and that an Orsini is her assailant."  He strode haughtily into the
+thickest of the group; the servitors laid hands on their swords, but gave
+way before him as they recognised his person; he reached the two men who
+had already seized Irene; in one moment he struck the foremost to the
+ground, in another, he had passed his left arm round the light and slender
+form of the maiden, and stood confronting the Orsini with his drawn blade,
+which, however, he pointed to the ground.
+
+"For shame, my lord - for shame!" said he, indignantly.  "Will you force
+Rome to rise, to a man, against our order?  Vex not too far the lion,
+chained though he be; war against us if ye will! draw your blades upon men,
+though they be of your own race, and speak your own tongue:  but if ye
+would sleep at nights, and not dread the avenger's gripe, - if ye would
+walk the market-place secure, - wrong not a Roman woman!  Yes, the very
+walls around us preach to you the punishment of such a deed:  for that
+offence fell the Tarquins, - for that offence were swept away the
+Decemvirs, - for that offence, if ye rush upon it, the blood of your whole
+house may flow like water.  Cease, then, my lord, from this mad attempt, so
+unworthy your great name; cease, and thank even a Colonna that he has come
+between you and a moment's frenzy!"
+
+So noble, so lofty were the air and gesture of Adrian, as he thus spoke,
+that even the rude servitors felt a thrill of approbation and remorse - not
+so Martino di Porto.  He had been struck with the beauty of the prey thus
+suddenly snatched from him; he had been accustomed to long outrage and to
+long impunity; the very sight, the very voice of a Colonna, was a blight to
+his eye and a discord to his ear:  what, then, when a Colonna interfered
+with his lusts, and rebuked his vices?
+
+"Pedant!" he cried, with quivering lips, "prate not to me of thy vain
+legends and gossip's tales! think not to snatch from me my possession in
+another, when thine own life is in my hands.  Unhand the maiden! throw down
+thy sword! return home without further parley, or, by my faith, and the
+blades of my followers - (look at them well!) - thou diest!"
+
+"Signor," said Adrian, calmly, yet while he spoke he retreated gradually
+with his fair burthen towards the neighbouring wall, so as at least to
+leave only his front exposed to those fearful odds:  "Thou will not so
+misuse the present chances, and wrong thyself in men's mouths, as to attack
+with eight swords even thy hereditary foe, thus cumbered, too, as he is. 
+But - nay hold! - if thou art so proposed, bethink thee well, one cry of my
+voice would soon turn the odds against thee.  Thou art now in the quarter
+of my tribe; thou art surrounded by the habitations of the Colonna:  yon
+palace swarms with men who sleep not, save with harness on their backs; men
+whom my voice can reach even now, but from whom, if they once taste of
+blood, it could not save thee!"
+
+"He speaks true, noble Lord," said one of the band:  "we have wandered too
+far out of our beat; we are in their very den; the palace of old Stephen
+Colonna is within call; and, to my knowledge," added he, in a whisper,
+"eighteen fresh men-of-arms - ay, and Northmen too - marched through its
+gates this day."
+
+"Were there eight hundred men at arm's length," answered Martino furiously,
+"I would not be thus bearded amidst mine own train!  Away with yon woman! 
+To the attack! to the attack!"
+
+Thus saying, he made a desperate lunge at Adrian, who, having kept his eye
+cautiously on the movements of his enemy, was not unprepared for the
+assault.  As he put aside the blade with his own, he shouted with a loud
+voice - "Colonna! to the rescue, Colonna!"
+
+Nor had it been without an ulterior object that the acute and self-
+controlling mind of Adrian had hitherto sought to prolong the parley.  Even
+as he first addressed Orsini, he had perceived, by the moonlight, the
+glitter of armour upon two men advancing from the far end of the street,
+and judged at once, by the neighbourhood, that they must be among the
+mercenaries of the Colonna.
+
+Gently he suffered the form of Irene, which now, for she had swooned with
+the terror, pressed too heavily upon him, to slide from his left arm, and
+standing over her form, while sheltered from behind by the wall which he
+had so warily gained, he contented himself with parrying the blows hastily
+aimed at him, without attempting to retaliate.  Few of the Romans, however
+accustomed to such desultory warfare, were then well and dexterously
+practised in the use of arms; and the science Adrian had acquired in the
+schools of the martial north, befriended him now, even against such odds.
+It is true, indeed, that the followers of Orsini did not share the fury of
+their lord; partly afraid of the consequence to themselves should the blood
+of so highborn a signor be spilt by their hands, partly embarrassed with
+the apprehension that they should see themselves suddenly beset with the
+ruthless hirelings so close within hearing, they struck but aimless and
+random blows, looking every moment behind and aside, and rather prepared
+for flight than slaughter.  Echoing the cry of "Colonna," poor Benedetta
+fled at the first clash of swords.  She ran down the dreary street still
+shrieking that cry, and passed the very portals of Stephen's palace (where
+some grim forms yet loitered) without arresting her steps there, so great
+were her confusion and terror.
+
+Meanwhile, the two armed men, whom Adrian had descried, proceeded leisurely
+up the street.  The one was of a rude and common mould, his arms and his
+complexion testified his calling and race; and by the great respect he paid
+to his companion, it was evident that that companion was no native of
+Italy.  For the brigands of the north, while they served the vices of the
+southern, scarce affected to disguise their contempt for his cowardice.
+
+The companion of the brigand was a man of a martial, yet easy air.  He wore
+no helmet, but a cap of crimson velvet, set off with a white plume; on his
+mantle, or surcoat, which was of scarlet, was wrought a broad white cross,
+both at back and breast; and so brilliant was the polish of his corselet,
+that, as from time to time the mantle waved aside and exposed it to the
+moonbeams, it glittered like light itself.
+
+"Nay, Rodolf," said he, "if thou hast so good a lot of it here with that
+hoary schemer, Heaven forbid that I should wish to draw thee back again to
+our merry band.  But tell me - this Rienzi - thinkest thou he has any solid
+and formidable power?"
+
+"Pshaw! noble chieftain, not a whit of it.  He pleases the mob; but as for
+the nobles, they laugh at him; and, as for the soldiers, he has no money!"
+
+"He pleases the mob, then!"
+
+"Ay, that doth he; and when he speaks aloud to them, all the roar of Rome
+is hushed."
+
+"Humph! - when nobles are hated, and soldiers are bought, a mob may, in any
+hour, become the master.  An honest people and a weak mob, - a corrupt
+people and a strong mob," said the other, rather to himself than to his
+comrade, and scarce, perhaps, conscious of the eternal truth of his
+aphorism.  "He is no mere brawler, this Rienzi, I suspect - I must see to
+it.  Hark! what noise is that?  By the Holy Sepulchre, it is the ring of
+our own metal!"
+
+"And that cry - 'a Colonna!'" exclaimed Rodolf.  "Pardon me, master, - I
+must away to the rescue!"
+
+"Ay, it is the duty of thy hire; run; - yet stay, I will accompany thee,
+gratis for once, and from pure passion for mischief.  By this hand, there
+is no music like clashing steel!"
+
+Still Adrian continued gallantly and unwounded to defend himself, though
+his arm now grew tired, his breath well-nigh spent, and his eyes began to
+wink and reel beneath the glare of the tossing torches.  Orsini himself,
+exhausted by his fury, had paused for an instant, fronting his foe with a
+heaving breast and savage looks, when, suddenly, his followers exclaimed,
+"Fly! fly! - the bandits approach - we are surrounded!" - and two of the
+servitors, without further parley, took fairly to their heels.  The other
+five remained irresolute, and waiting but the command of their master, when
+he of the white plume, whom I have just described, thrust himself into the
+melee.
+
+"What! gentles," said he, "have ye finished already?  Nay, let us not mar
+the sport; begin again, I beseech you.  What are the odds?  Ho! six to one!
+- nay, no wonder that ye have waited for fairer play.  See, we two will
+take the weaker side.  Now then, let us begin again."
+
+"Insolent!" cried the Orsini.  "Knowest thou him whom thou addressest thus
+arrogantly? - I am Martino di Porto.  Who art thou?"
+
+"Walter de Montreal, gentleman of Provence, and Knight of St. John!"
+answered the other, carelessly.
+
+At that redoubted name - the name of one of the boldest warriors, and of
+the most accomplished freebooter of his time - even Martino's cheek grew
+pale, and his followers uttered a cry of terror.
+
+"And this, my comrade," continued the Knight, "for we may as well complete
+the introduction, is probably better known to you than I am, gentles of
+Rome; and you doubtless recognize in him Rodolf of Saxony, a brave man and
+a true, where he is properly paid for his services."
+
+"Signor," said Adrian to his enemy, who, aghast and dumb, remained staring
+vacantly at the two new-comers, "you are now in my power.  See, our own
+people, too, are approaching."
+
+And, indeed, from the palace of Stephen Colonna, torches began to blaze,
+and armed men were seen rapidly advancing to the spot.
+
+"Go home in peace, and if, tomorrow, or any day more suitable to thee, thou
+wilt meet me alone, and lance to lance, as is the wont of the knights of
+the empire; or with band to band, and man for man, as is rather the Roman
+custom; I will not fail thee - there is my gage."
+
+"Nobly spoken," said Montreal; "and, if ye choose the latter, by your
+leave, I will be one of the party."
+
+Martino answered not; he took up the glove, thrust it in his bosom, and
+strode hastily away; only, when he had got some paces down the street, he
+turned back, and, shaking his clenched hand at Adrian, exclaimed, in a
+voice trembling with impotent rage - "Faithful to death!"
+
+The words made one of the mottoes of the Orsini; and, whatever its earlier
+signification, had long passed into a current proverb, to signify their
+hatred to the Colonna.
+
+Adrian, now engaged in raising, and attempting to revive Irene, who was
+still insensible, disdainfully left it to Montreal to reply.
+
+"I doubt not, Signor," said the latter, coolly, "that thou wilt be faithful
+to Death:  for Death, God wot, is the only contract which men, however
+ingenious, are unable to break or evade."
+
+"Pardon me, gentle Knight," said Adrian, looking up from his charge, "if I
+do not yet give myself wholly to gratitude.  I have learned enough of
+knighthood to feel thou wilt acknowledge that my first duty is here - "
+
+"Oh, a lady, then, was the cause of the quarrel!  I need not ask who was in
+the right, when a man brings to the rivalry such odds as yon caitiff."
+
+"Thou mistakest a little, Sir Knight, - it is but a lamb I have rescued
+from the wolf."
+
+"For thy own table!  Be it so!" returned the Knight, gaily.
+
+Adrian smiled gravely, and shook his head in denial.  In truth, he was
+somewhat embarrassed by his situation.  Though habitually gallant, he was
+not willing to expose to misconstruction the disinterestedness of his late
+conduct, and (for it was his policy to conciliate popularity) to sully the
+credit which his bravery would give him among the citizens, by conveying
+Irene (whose beauty, too, as yet, he had scarcely noted) to his own
+dwelling; and yet, in her present situation, there was no alternative.  She
+evinced no sign of life.  He knew not her home, nor parentage.  Benedetta
+had vanished.  He could not leave her in the streets; he could not resign
+her to the care of another; and, as she lay now upon his breast, he felt
+her already endeared to him, by that sense of protection which is so
+grateful to the human heart.  He briefly, therefore, explained to those now
+gathered round him, his present situation, and the cause of the past
+conflict; and bade the torch-bearers precede him to his home.
+
+"You, Sir Knight," added he, turning to Montreal, "if not already more
+pleasantly lodged, will, I trust, deign to be my guest?"
+
+"Thanks, Signor," answered Montreal, maliciously, "but I, also, perhaps,
+have my own affairs to watch over.  Adieu!  I shall seek you at the
+earliest occasion.  Fair night, and gentle dreams!
+
+'Robers Bertrams qui estoit tors
+ Mais a ceval estoit mult fors
+ Cil avoit o lui grans effors
+ Multi ot 'homes per lui mors.'"
+
+("An ill-favoured man, but a stout horseman, was Robert Bertram.  Great
+deeds were his, and many a man died by his hand.")
+
+And, muttering this rugged chant from the old "Roman de Rou," the
+Provencal, followed by Rodolf, pursued his way.
+
+The vast extent of Rome, and the thinness of its population, left many of
+the streets utterly deserted.  The principal nobles were thus enabled to
+possess themselves of a wide range of buildings, which they fortified,
+partly against each other, partly against the people; their numerous
+relatives and clients lived around them, forming, as it were, petty courts
+and cities in themselves.
+
+Almost opposite to the principal palace of the Colonna (occupied by his
+powerful kinsman, Stephen) was the mansion of Adrian.  Heavily swung back
+the massive gates at his approach; he ascended the broad staircase, and
+bore his charge into an apartment which his tastes had decorated in a
+fashion not as yet common in that age.  Ancient statues and busts were
+arranged around; the pictured arras of Lombardy decorated the walls, and
+covered the massive seats.
+
+"What ho!  Lights here, and wine!" cried the Seneschal.
+
+"Leave us alone," said Adrian, gazing passionately on the pale cheek of
+Irene, as he now, by the clear light, beheld all its beauty; and a sweet
+yet burning hope crept into his heart.
+
+
+Chapter 1.V.  The Description of a Conspirator, and the Dawn of the
+Conspiracy.
+
+Alone, by a table covered with various papers, sat a man in the prime of
+life.  The chamber was low and long; many antique and disfigured bas-
+reliefs and torsos were placed around the wall, interspersed, here and
+there, with the short sword and close casque, time-worn relics of the
+prowess of ancient Rome.  Right above the table at which he sate, the
+moonlight streamed through a high and narrow casement, deep sunk in the
+massy wall.  In a niche to the right of this window, guarded by a sliding
+door, which was now partially drawn aside - but which, by its solid
+substance, and the sheet of iron with which it was plated, testified how
+valuable, in the eyes of the owner, was the treasure it protected - were
+ranged some thirty or forty volumes, then deemed no inconsiderable library;
+and being, for the most part, the laborious copies in manuscript by the
+hand of the owner, from immortal originals.
+
+Leaning his cheek on his hand, his brow somewhat knit, his lip slightly
+compressed, that personage, indulged in meditations far other than the
+indolent dreams of scholars.  As the high and still moonlight shone upon
+his countenance, it gave an additional and solemn dignity to features which
+were naturally of a grave and majestic cast.  Thick and auburn hair, the
+colour of which, not common to the Romans, was ascribed to his descent from
+the Teuton emperor, clustered in large curls above a high and expansive
+forehead; and even the present thoughtful compression of the brow could not
+mar the aspect of latent power, which it derived from that great breadth
+between the eyes, in which the Grecian sculptors of old so admirably
+conveyed the expression of authority, and the silent energy of command. 
+But his features were not cast in the Grecian, still less in the Teuton
+mould.  The iron jaw, the aquiline nose, the somewhat sunken cheek,
+strikingly recalled the character of the hard Roman race, and might not
+inaptly have suggested to a painter a model for the younger Brutus.
+
+The marked outline of the face, and the short, firm upper lip, were not
+concealed by the beard and mustachios usually then worn; and, in the faded
+portrait of the person now described, still extant at Rome, may be traced a
+certain resemblance to the popular pictures of Napoleon; not indeed in the
+features, which are more stern and prominent in the portrait of the Roman,
+but in that peculiar expression of concentrated and tranquil power which so
+nearly realizes the ideal of intellectual majesty.  Though still young, the
+personal advantages most peculiar to youth, - the bloom and glow, the
+rounded cheek in which care has not yet ploughed its lines, the full
+unsunken eye, and the slender delicacy of frame, - these were not the
+characteristics of that solitary student.  And, though considered by his
+contemporaries as eminently handsome, the judgment was probably formed less
+from the more vulgar claims to such distinction, than from the height of
+the stature, an advantage at that time more esteemed than at present, and
+that nobler order of beauty which cultivated genius and commanding
+character usually stamp upon even homely features; - the more rare in an
+age so rugged.
+
+The character of Rienzi (for the youth presented to the reader in the first
+chapter of this history is now again before him in maturer years) had
+acquired greater hardness and energy with each stepping-stone to power. 
+There was a circumstance attendant on his birth which had, probably,
+exercised great and early influence on his ambition.  Though his parents
+were in humble circumstances, and of lowly calling, his father was the
+natural son of the Emperor, Henry VII.; (De Sade supposes that the mother
+of Rienzi was the daughter of an illegitimate son of Henry VII., supporting
+his opinion from a MS. in the Vatican.  But, according to the
+contemporaneous biographer, Rienzi, in addressing Charles, king of Bohemia
+claims the relationship from his father "Di vostro legnaggio sono - figlio
+di bastardo d'Enrico imperatore," &c.  A more recent writer, il Padre
+Gabrini, cites an inscription in support of this descent:  "Nicolaus
+Tribunus...Laurentii Teutonici Filius," &c.) and it was the pride of the
+parents that probably gave to Rienzi the unwonted advantages of education. 
+This pride transmitted to himself, - his descent from royalty dinned into
+his ear, infused into his thoughts, from his cradle, - made him, even in
+his earliest youth, deem himself the equal of the Roman signors, and half
+unconsciously aspire to be their superior.  But, as the literature of Rome
+was unfolded to his eager eye and ambitious heart, he became imbued with
+that pride of country which is nobler than the pride of birth; and, save
+when stung by allusions to his origin, he unaffectedly valued himself more
+on being a Roman plebeian than the descendant of a Teuton king.  His
+brother's death, and the vicissitudes he himself had already undergone,
+deepened the earnest and solemn qualities of his character; and, at length,
+all the faculties of a very uncommon intellect were concentrated into one
+object - which borrowed from a mind strongly and mystically religious, as
+well as patriotic, a sacred aspect, and grew at once a duty and a passion.
+
+"Yes," said Rienzi, breaking suddenly from his revery, "yes, the day is at
+hand when Rome shall rise again from her ashes; Justice shall dethrone
+Oppression; men shall walk safe in their ancient Forum.  We will rouse from
+his forgotten tomb the indomitable soul of Cato!  There shall be a people
+once more in Rome!  And I - I shall be the instrument of that triumph - the
+restorer of my race! mine shall be the first voice to swell the battle-cry
+of freedom - mine the first hand to rear her banner - yes, from the height
+of my own soul as from a mountain, I see already rising the liberties and
+the grandeur of the New Rome; and on the corner-stone of the mighty fabric
+posterity shall read my name."
+
+Uttering these lofty boasts, the whole person of the speaker seemed
+instinct with his ambition.  He strode the gloomy chamber with light and
+rapid steps, as if on air; his breast heaved, his eyes glowed.  He felt
+that love itself can scarcely bestow a rapture equal to that which is felt,
+in his first virgin enthusiasm, by a patriot who knows himself sincere!
+
+There was a slight knock at the door, and a servitor, in the rich liveries
+worn by the pope's officials, (Not the present hideous habiliments, which
+are said to have been the invention of Michael Angelo.) presented himself.
+
+"Signor," said he, "my Lord, the Bishop of Orvietto, is without."
+
+"Ha! that is fortunate.  Lights there! - My Lord, this is an honour which I
+can estimate better than express."
+
+"Tut, tut! my good friend," said the Bishop, entering, and seating himself
+familiarly, "no ceremonies between the servants of the Church; and never, I
+ween well, had she greater need of true friends than now.  These unholy
+tumults, these licentious contentions, in the very shrines and city of St.
+Peter, are sufficient to scandalize all Christendom."
+
+"And so will it be," said Rienzi, "until his Holiness himself shall be
+graciously persuaded to fix his residence in the seat of his predecessors,
+and curb with a strong arm the excesses of the nobles."
+
+"Alas, man!" said the Bishop, "thou knowest that these words are but as
+wind; for were the Pope to fulfil thy wishes, and remove from Avignon to
+Rome, by the blood of St. Peter! he would not curb the nobles, but the
+nobles would curb him.  Thou knowest well that until his blessed
+predecessor, of pious memory, conceived the wise design of escaping to
+Avignon, the Father of the Christian world was but like many other fathers
+in their old age, controlled and guarded by his rebellious children. 
+Recollectest thou not how the noble Boniface himself, a man of great heart,
+and nerves of iron, was kept in thraldom by the ancestors of the Orsini -
+his entrances and exits made but at their will - so that, like a caged
+eagle, he beat himself against his bars and died?  Verily, thou talkest of
+the memories of Rome - these are not the memories that are very attractive
+to popes."
+
+"Well," said Rienzi, laughing gently, and drawing his seat nearer to the
+Bishop's, "my Lord has certainly the best of the argument at present; and I
+must own, that strong, licentious, and unhallowed as the order of nobility
+was then, it is yet more so now."
+
+"Even I," rejoined Raimond, colouring as he spoke, "though Vicar of the
+Pope, and representative of his spiritual authority, was, but three days
+ago, subjected to a coarse affront from that very Stephen Colonna, who has
+ever received such favour and tenderness from the Holy See.  His servitors
+jostled mine in the open streets, and I myself, - I, the delegate of the
+sire of kings - was forced to draw aside to the wall, and wait until the
+hoary insolent swept by.  Nor were blaspheming words wanting to complete
+the insult.  "'Pardon, Lord Bishop,' said he, as he passed me; 'but this
+world, thou knowest, must necessarily take precedence of the other.'"
+
+"Dared he so high?" said Rienzi, shading his face with his hand, as a very
+peculiar smile - scarcely itself joyous, though it made others gay, and
+which completely changed the character of his face, naturally grave even to
+sternness - played round his lips.  "Then it is time for thee, holy father,
+as for us, to - "
+
+"To what?" interrupted the Bishop, quickly.  "Can we effect aught!  Dismiss
+thy enthusiastic dreamings - descend to the real earth - look soberly round
+us.  Against men so powerful, what can we do?"
+
+"My Lord," answered Rienzi, gravely, "it is the misfortune of signors of
+your rank never to know the people, or the accurate signs of the time.  As
+those who pass over the heights of mountains see the clouds sweep below,
+veiling the plains and valleys from their gaze, while they, only a little
+above the level, survey the movements and the homes of men; even so from
+your lofty eminence ye behold but the indistinct and sullen vapours - while
+from my humbler station I see the preparations of the shepherds, to shelter
+themselves and herds from the storm which those clouds betoken.  Despair
+not, my Lord; endurance goes but to a certain limit - to that limit it is
+already stretched; Rome waits but the occasion (it will soon come, but not
+suddenly) to rise simultaneously against her oppressors."
+
+The great secret of eloquence is to be in earnest - the great secret of
+Rienzi's eloquence was in the mightiness of his enthusiasm.  He never spoke
+as one who doubted of success.  Perhaps, like most men who undertake high
+and great actions, he himself was never thoroughly aware of the obstacles
+in his way.  He saw the end, bright and clear, and overleaped, in the
+vision of his soul, the crosses and the length of the path; thus the deep
+convictions of his own mind stamped themselves irresistibly upon others. 
+He seemed less to promise than to prophesy.
+
+The Bishop of Orvietto, not over wise, yet a man of cool temperament and
+much worldly experience, was forcibly impressed by the energy of his
+companion; perhaps, indeed, the more so, inasmuch as his own pride and his
+own passions were also enlisted against the arrogance and licence of the
+nobles.  He paused ere he replied to Rienzi.
+
+"But is it," he asked, at length, "only the plebeians who will rise?  Thou
+knowest how they are caitiff and uncertain."
+
+"My Lord," answered Rienzi, "judge, by one fact, how strongly I am
+surrounded by friends of no common class:  thou knowest how loudly I speak
+against the nobles - I cite them by their name - I beard the Savelli, the
+Orsini, the Colonna, in their very hearing.  Thinkest thou that they
+forgive me? thinkest thou that, were only the plebeians my safeguard and my
+favourers, they would not seize me by open force, - that I had not long ere
+this found a gag in their dungeons, or been swallowed up in the eternal
+dumbness of the grave?  Observe," continued he, as, reading the Vicar's
+countenance, he perceived the impression he had made - "observe, that,
+throughout the whole world, a great revolution has begun.  The barbaric
+darkness of centuries has been broken; the Knowledge which made men as
+demigods in the past time has been called from her urn; a Power, subtler
+than brute force, and mightier than armed men, is at work; we have begun
+once more to do homage to the Royalty of Mind.  Yes, that same Power which,
+a few years ago, crowned Petrarch in the Capitol, when it witnessed, after
+the silence of twelve centuries, the glories of a Triumph, - which heaped
+upon a man of obscure birth, and unknown in arms, the same honours given of
+old to emperors and the vanquishers of kings, - which united in one act of
+homage even the rival houses of Colonna and Orsini, - which made the
+haughtiest patricians emulous to bear the train, to touch but the purple
+robe, of the son of the Florentine plebeian, - which still draws the eyes
+of Europe to the lowly cottage of Vaucluse, - which gives to the humble
+student the all-acknowledged licence to admonish tyrants, and approach,
+with haughty prayers, even the Father of the Church; - yes, that same
+Power, which, working silently throughout Italy, murmurs under the solid
+base of the Venetian oligarchy; (It was about eight years afterwards that
+the long-smothered hate of the Venetian people to that wisest and most
+vigilant of all oligarchies, the Sparta of Italy, broke out in the
+conspiracy under Marino Faliero.) which, beyond the Alps, has wakened into
+visible and sudden life in Spain, in Germany, in Flanders; and which, even
+in that barbarous Isle, conquered by the Norman sword, ruled by the bravest
+of living kings, (Edward III., in whose reign opinions far more popular
+than those of the following century began to work.  The Civil Wars threw
+back the action into the blood.  It was indeed an age throughout the world
+which put forth abundant blossoms, but crude and unripened fruit; - a
+singular leap, followed by as singular a pause.) has roused a spirit Norman
+cannot break - kings to rule over must rule by - yes, that same Power is
+everywhere abroad:  it speaks, it conquers in the voice even of him who is
+before you; it unites in his cause all on whom but one glimmering of light
+has burst, all in whom one generous desire can be kindled!  Know, Lord
+Vicar, that there is not a man in Rome, save our oppressors themselves -
+not a man who has learned one syllable of our ancient tongue - whose heart
+and sword are not with me.  The peaceful cultivators of letters - the proud
+nobles of the second order - the rising race, wiser than their slothful
+sires; above all, my Lord, the humbler ministers of religion, priests and
+monks, whom luxury hath not blinded, pomp hath not deafened, to the
+monstrous outrage to Christianity daily and nightly perpetrated in the
+Christian Capital; these, - all these, - are linked with the merchant and
+the artisan in one indissoluble bond, waiting but the signal to fall or to
+conquer, to live freemen, or to die martyrs, with Rienzi and their
+country!"
+
+"Sayest thou so in truth?" said the Bishop, startled, and half rising. 
+"Prove but thy words, and thou shalt not find the ministers of God are less
+eager than their lay brethren for the happiness of men."
+
+"What I say," rejoined Rienzi, in a cooler tone, "that can I show; but I
+may only prove it to those who will be with us."
+
+"Fear me not," answered Raimond:  "I know well the secret mind of his
+Holiness, whose delegate and representative I am; and could he see but the
+legitimate and natural limit set to the power of the patricians, who, in
+their arrogance, have set at nought the authority of the Church itself, be
+sure that he would smile on the hand that drew the line.  Nay, so certain
+of this am I, that if ye succeed, I, his responsible but unworthy vicar,
+will myself sanction the success.  But beware of crude attempts; the Church
+must not be weakened by linking itself to failure."
+
+"Right, my Lord," answered Rienzi; "and in this, the policy of religion is
+that of freedom.  Judge of my prudence by my long delay.  He who can see
+all around him impatient - himself not less so - and yet suppress the
+signal, and bide the hour, is not likely to lose his cause by rashness."
+
+"More, then, of this anon," said the Bishop, resettling himself in his
+seat.  "As thy plans mature, fear not to communicate with me.  Believe that
+Rome has no firmer friend then he who, ordained to preserve order, finds
+himself impotent against aggression.  Meanwhile, to the object of my
+present visit, which links itself, in some measure, perhaps, with the
+topics on which we have conversed...Thou knowest that when his Holiness
+intrusted thee with thy present office, he bade thee also announce his
+beneficent intention of granting a general Jubilee at Rome for the year
+1350 - a most admirable design for two reasons, sufficiently apparent to
+thyself:  first, that every Christian soul that may undertake the
+pilgrimage to Rome on that occasion, may thus obtain a general remission of
+sins; and secondly, because, to speak carnally, the concourse of pilgrims
+so assembled, usually, by the donations and offerings their piety suggests,
+very materially add to the revenues of the Holy See:  at this time, by the
+way, in no very flourishing condition.  This thou knowest, dear Rienzi."
+
+Rienzi bowed his head in assent, and the prelate continued - 
+
+"Well, it is with the greatest grief that his Holiness perceives that his
+pious intentions are likely to be frustrated:  for so fierce and numerous
+are now the brigands in the public approaches to Rome, that, verily, the
+boldest pilgrim may tremble a little to undertake the journey; and those
+who do so venture will, probably, be composed of the poorest of the
+Christian community, - men who, bringing with them neither gold, nor
+silver, nor precious offerings, will have little to fear from the rapacity
+of the brigands.  Hence arise two consequences:  on the one hand, the rich
+- whom, Heaven knows, and the Gospel has, indeed, expressly declared, have
+the most need of a remission of sins - will be deprived of this glorious
+occasion for absolution; and, on the other hand, the coffers of the Church
+will be impiously defrauded of that wealth which it would otherwise
+doubtless obtain from the zeal of her children."
+
+"Nothing can be more logically manifest, my Lord," said Rienzi.
+
+The Vicar continued - "Now, in letters received five days since from his
+Holiness, he bade me expose these fearful consequences to Christianity to
+the various patricians who are legitimately fiefs of the Church, and
+command their resolute combination against the marauders of the road.  With
+these have I conferred, and vainly."
+
+"For by the aid, and from the troops, of those very brigands, these
+patricians have fortified their palaces against each other," added Rienzi.
+
+"Exactly for that reason," rejoined the Bishop.  "Nay, Stephen Colonna
+himself had the audacity to confess it.  Utterly unmoved by the loss to so
+many precious souls, and, I may add, to the papal treasury, which ought to
+be little less dear to right-discerning men, they refuse to advance a step
+against the bandits.  Now, then, hearken the second mandate of his
+Holiness: - 'Failing the nobles,' saith he, in his prophetic sagacity,
+'confer with Cola di Rienzi.  He is a bold man, and a pious, and, thou
+tellest me, of great weight with the people; and say to him, that if his
+wit can devise the method for extirpating these sons of Belial, and
+rendering a safe passage along the public ways, largely, indeed, will he
+merit at our hands, - lasting will be the gratitude we shall owe to him;
+and whatever succour thou, and the servants of our See, can render to him,
+let it not be stinted.'"
+
+"Said his Holiness thus!" exclaimed Rienzi.  "I ask no more - the gratitude
+is mine that he hath thought thus of his servant, and intrusted me with
+this charge; at once I accept it - at once I pledge myself to success.  Let
+us, my Lord, let us, then, clearly understand the limits ordained to my
+discretion.  To curb the brigands without the walls, I must have authority
+over those within.  If I undertake, at peril of my life, to clear all the
+avenues to Rome of the robbers who now infest it, shall I have full licence
+for conduct bold, peremptory, and severe?"
+
+"Such conduct the very nature of the charge demands," replied Raimond.
+
+"Ay, - even though it be exercised against the arch offenders - against the
+supporters of the brigands - against the haughtiest of the nobles
+themselves?"
+
+The Bishop paused, and looked hard in the face of the speaker.  "I repeat,"
+said he, at length, sinking his voice, and with a significant tone, "in
+these bold attempts, success is the sole sanction.  Succeed, and we will
+excuse thee all - even to the - "
+
+"Death of a Colonna or an Orsini, should justice demand it; and provided it
+be according to the law, and only incurred by the violation of the law!"
+added Rienzi, firmly.
+
+The Bishop did not reply in words, but a slight motion of his head was
+sufficient answer to Rienzi.
+
+"My Lord," said he, "from this time, then, all is well; I date the
+revolution - the restoration of order, of the state - from this hour, this
+very conference.  Till now, knowing that justice must never wink upon great
+offenders, I had hesitated, through fear lest thou and his Holiness might
+deem it severity, and blame him who replaces the law, because he smites the
+violaters of law.  Now I judge ye more rightly.  Your hand, my Lord."
+
+The Bishop extended his hand; Rienzi grasped it firmly, and then raised it
+respectfully to his lips.  Both felt that the compact was sealed.
+
+This conference, so long in recital, was short in the reality; but its
+object was already finished, and the Bishop rose to depart.  The outer
+portal of the house was opened, the numerous servitors of the Bishop held
+on high their torches, and he had just termed from Rienzi, who had attended
+him to the gate, when a female passed hastily through the Prelate's train,
+and starting as she beheld Rienzi, flung herself at his feet.
+
+"Oh, hasten, Sir! hasten, for the love of God, hasten! or the young Signora
+is lost for ever!"
+
+"The Signora! - Heaven and earth, Benedetta, of whom do you speak? - of my
+sister - of Irene? is she not within?"
+
+"Oh, Sir - the Orsini - the Orsini!"
+
+"What of them? - speak, woman!"
+
+Here, breathlessly, and with many a break, Benedetta recounted to Rienzi,
+in whom the reader has already recognised the brother of Irene, so far of
+the adventure with Martino di Porto as she had witnessed:  of the
+termination and result of the contest she knew nought.
+
+Rienzi listened in silence; but the deadly paleness of his countenance, and
+the writhing of the nether lip, testified the emotions to which he gave no
+audible vent.
+
+"You hear, my Lord Bishop - you hear," said he, when Benedetta had
+concluded; and turning to the Bishop, whose departure the narrative had
+delayed - "you hear to what outrage the citizens of Rome are subjected.  My
+hat and sword! instantly!  My Lord, forgive my abruptness."
+
+"Whither art thou bent, then?" asked Raimond.
+
+"Whither - whither! - Ay, I forgot, my Lord, you have no sister.  Perhaps
+too, you had no brother? - No, no; one victim at least I will live to save. 
+Whither, you ask me? - to the palace of Martino di Porto."
+
+"To an Orsini alone, and for justice?"
+
+"Alone, and for justice! - No!" shouted Rienzi, in a loud voice, as he
+seized his sword, now brought to him by one of his servants, and rushed
+from the house; "but one man is sufficient for revenge!"
+
+The Bishop paused for a moment's deliberation.  "He must not be lost,"
+muttered he, "as he well may be, if exposed thus solitary to the wolf's
+rage.  What, ho!" he cried aloud; "advance the torches! - quick, quick!  We
+ourself - we, the Vicar of the Pope - will see to this.  Calm yourselves,
+good people; your young Signora shall be restored.  On! to the palace of
+Martino di Porto!"
+
+
+Chapter 1.VI.  Irene in the Palace of Adrian di Castello.
+
+As the Cyprian gazed on the image in which he had embodied a youth of
+dreams, what time the living hues flushed slowly beneath the marble, - so
+gazed the young and passionate Adrian upon the form reclined before him,
+re-awakening gradually to life.  And, if the beauty of that face were not
+of the loftiest or the most dazzling order, if its soft and quiet character
+might be outshone by many, of loveliness less really perfect, yet never was
+there a countenance that, to some eyes, would have seemed more charming,
+and never one in which more eloquently was wrought that ineffable and
+virgin expression which Italian art seeks for in its models, - in which
+modesty is the outward, and tenderness the latent, expression; the bloom of
+youth, both of form and heart, ere the first frail and delicate freshness
+of either is brushed away:  and when even love itself, the only unquiet
+visitant that should be known at such an age, is but a sentiment, and not a
+passion!
+
+"Benedetta!" murmured Irene, at length opening her eyes, unconsciously,
+upon him who knelt beside her, - eyes of that uncertain, that most liquid
+hue, on which you might gaze for years and never learn the secret of the
+colour, so changed it with the dilating pupil, - darkening in the shade,
+and brightening into azure in the light:
+
+"Benedetta," said Irene, "where art thou?  Oh, Benedetta!  I have had such
+a dream."
+
+"And I, too, such a vision!" thought Adrian.
+
+"Where am I?" cried Irene, rising from the couch.  "This room - these
+hangings - Holy Virgin! do I dream still! - and you!  Heavens! - it is the
+Lord Adrian di Castello!"
+
+"Is that a name thou hast been taught to fear?" said Adrian; "if so, I will
+forswear it."
+
+If Irene now blushed deeply, it was not in that wild delight with which her
+romantic heart motive foretold that she would listen to the first words of
+homage from Adrian di Castello.  Bewildered and confused, - terrified at
+the strangeness of the place and shrinking even from the thought of finding
+herself alone with one who for years had been present to her fancies, -
+alarm and distress were the emotions she felt the most, and which most were
+impressed upon her speaking countenance; and as Adrian now drew nearer to
+her, despite the gentleness of his voice and the respect of his looks, her
+fears, not the less strong that they were vague, increased upon her:  she
+retreated to the further end of the room, looked wildly round her, and
+then, covering her face with her hands, burst into a paroxysm of tears.
+
+Moved himself by these tears, and divining her thoughts, Adrian forgot for
+moment all the more daring wishes he had formed.
+
+"Fear not, sweet lady," said he, earnestly:  "recollect thyself, I beseech
+thee; no peril, no evil can reach thee here; it was this hand that saved
+thee from the outrage of the Orsini - this roof is but the shelter of a
+friend!  Tell me, then, fair wonder, thy name and residence, and I will
+summon my servitors, and guard thee to thy home at once."
+
+Perhaps the relief of tears, even more than Adrian's words, restored Irene
+to herself, and enabled her to comprehend her novel situation; and as her
+senses, thus cleared, told her what she owed to him whom her dreams had so
+long imaged as the ideal of all excellence, she recovered her self-
+possession, and uttered her thanks with a grace not the less winning, if it
+still partook of embarrassment.
+
+"Thank me not," answered Adrian, passionately.  "I have touched thy hand -
+I am repaid.  Repaid! nay, all gratitude - all homage is for me to render!"
+
+Blushing again, but with far different emotions than before, Irene, after a
+momentary pause, replied, "Yet, my Lord, I must consider it a debt the more
+weighty that you speak of it so lightly.  And now, complete the obligation.
+I do not see my companion - suffer her to accompany me home; it is but a
+short way hence."
+
+"Blessed, then, is the air that I have breathed so unconsciously!" said
+Adrian.  "But thy companion, dear lady, is not here.  She fled, I imagine,
+in the confusion of the conflict; and not knowing thy name, nor being able,
+in thy then state, to learn it from thy lips, it was my happy necessity to
+convey thee hither; - but I will be thy companion.  Nay, why that timid
+glance? my people, also, shall attend us."
+
+"My thanks, noble Lord, are of little worth; my brother, who is not unknown
+to thee, will thank thee more fittingly.  May I depart?" and Irene, as she
+spoke, was already at the door.
+
+"Art thou so eager to leave me?" answered Adrian, sadly.  "Alas! when thou
+hast departed from my eyes, it will seem as if the moon had left the night!
+- but it is happiness to obey thy wishes, even though they tear thee from
+me."
+
+A slight smile parted Irene's lips, and Adrian's heart beat audibly to
+himself, as he drew from that smile, and those downcast eyes, no
+unfavourable omen.
+
+Reluctantly and slowly he turned towards the door, and summoned his
+attendants.  "But," said he, as they stood on the lofty staircase, "thou
+sayest, sweet lady, that thy brother's name is not unknown to me.  Heaven
+grant that he be, indeed, a friend of the Colonna!"
+
+"His boast," answered Irene, evasively; "the boast of Cola di Rienzi is, to
+be a friend to the friends of Rome."
+
+"Holy Virgin of Ara Coeli! - is thy brother that extraordinary man?"
+exclaimed Adrian, as he foresaw, at the mention of that name, a barrier to
+his sudden passion.  "Alas! in a Colonna, in a noble, he will see no merit;
+even though thy fortunate deliverer, sweet maiden, sought to be his early
+friend!"
+
+Thou wrongest him much, my Lord," returned Irene, warmly; "he is a man
+above all others to sympathize with thy generous valour, even had it been
+exerted in defence of the humblest woman in Rome, - how much more, then,
+when in protection of his sister!"
+
+"The times are, indeed, diseased," answered Adrian, thoughtfully, as they
+now found themselves in the open street, "when men who alike mourn for the
+woes of their country are yet suspicious of each other; when to be a
+patrician is to be regarded as an enemy to the people; when to be termed
+the friend of the people is to be considered a foe to the patricians:  but
+come what may, oh! let me hope, dear lady, that no doubts, no divisions,
+shall banish from thy breast one gentle memory of me!"
+
+"Ah! little, little do you know me!" began Irene, and stopped suddenly
+short.
+
+"Speak! speak again! - of what music has this envious silence deprived my
+soul!  Thou wilt not, then, forget me?  And," continued Adrian, "we shall
+meet again?  It is to Rienzi's house we are bound now; tomorrow I shall
+visit my old companion, - tomorrow I shall see thee.  Will it not be so?"
+
+In Irene's silence was her answer.
+
+"And as thou hast told me thy brother's name, make it sweet to my ear, and
+add to it thine own."
+
+"They call me Irene."
+
+"Irene, Irene! - let me repeat it.  It is a soft name, and dwells upon the
+lips as if loath to leave them - a fitting name for one like thee."
+
+Thus making his welcome court to Irene, in that flowered and glowing
+language which, if more peculiar to that age and to the gallantry of the
+south, is also the language in which the poetry of youthful passion would,
+in all times and lands, utter its rich extravagance, could heart speak to
+heart, Adrian conveyed homeward his beautiful charge, taking, however, the
+most circuitous and lengthened route; an artifice which Irene either
+perceived not, or silently forgave.  They were now within sight of the
+street in which Rienzi dwelt, when a party of men bearing torches, came
+unexpectedly upon them.  It was the train of the Bishop of Orvietto,
+returning from the palace of Martino di Porto, and in their way
+(accompanied by Rienzi) to that of Adrian.  They had learned at the former,
+without an interview with the Orsini, from the retainers in the court
+below, the fortune of the conflict, and the name of Irene's champion; and,
+despite Adrian's general reputation for gallantry, Rienzi knew enough of
+his character, and the nobleness of his temper, to feel assured that Irene
+was safe in his protection.  Alas! in that very safety to the person is
+often the most danger to the heart.  Woman never so dangerously loves, as
+when he who loves her, for her sake, subdues himself.
+
+Clasped to her brother's breast, Irene bade him thank her deliverer; and
+Rienzi, with that fascinating frankness which sits so well on those usually
+reserved, and which all who would rule the hearts of their fellow-men must
+at times command, advanced to the young Colonna, and poured forth his
+gratitude and praise.
+
+"We have been severed too long, - we must know each other again," replied
+Adrian.  "I shall seek thee, ere long, be assured."
+
+Turning to take his leave of Irene, he conveyed her hand to his lips, and
+pressing it, as it dropped from his clasp, was he deceived in thinking that
+those delicate fingers lightly, involuntarily, returned the pressure?
+
+
+Chapter 1.VII.  Upon Love and Lovers.
+
+If, in adopting the legendary love tale of Romeo and Juliet, Shakespeare
+had changed the scene in which it is cast for a more northern clime, we may
+doubt whether the art of Shakespeare himself could have reconciled us at
+once to the suddenness and the strength of Juliet's passion.  And, even as
+it is, perhaps there are few of our rational and sober-minded islanders who
+would not honestly confess, if fairly questioned, that they deem the
+romance and fervour of those ill-starred lovers of Verona exaggerated and
+over-drawn.  Yet, in Italy, the picture of that affection born of a night -
+but "strong as death" - is one to which the veriest commonplaces of life
+would afford parallels without number.  As in different ages, so in
+different climes, love varies wonderfully in the shapes it takes.  And even
+at this day, beneath Italian skies, many a simple girl would feel as
+Juliet, and many a homely gallant would rival the extravagance of Romeo. 
+Long suits in that sunny land, wherein, as whereof, I now write, are
+unknown.  In no other land, perhaps, is there found so commonly the love at
+first sight, which in France is a jest, and in England a doubt; in no other
+land, too, is love, though so suddenly conceived, more faithfully
+preserved.  That which is ripened in fancy comes at once to passion, yet is
+embalmed through all time by sentiment.  And this must be my and their
+excuse, if the love of Adrian some too prematurely formed, and that of
+Irene too romantically conceived; - it is the excuse which they take from
+the air and sun, from the customs of their ancestors, from the soft
+contagion of example.  But while they yielded to the dictates of their
+hearts, it was with a certain though secret sadness - a presentiment that
+had, perhaps, its charm, though it was of cross and evil.  Born of so proud
+a race, Adrian could scarcely dream of marriage with the sister of a
+plebeian; and Irene, unconscious of the future glory of her brother, could
+hardly have cherished any hope, save that of being loved.  Yet these
+adverse circumstances, which, in the harder, the more prudent, the more
+self-denying, perhaps the more virtuous minds, that are formed beneath the
+northern skies, would have been an inducement to wrestle against love so
+placed, only contributed to feed and to strengthen theirs by an opposition
+which has ever its attraction for romance.  They found frequent, though
+short, opportunities of meeting - not quite alone, but only in the
+conniving presence of Benedetta:  sometimes in the public gardens,
+sometimes amidst the vast and deserted ruins by which the house of Rienzi
+was surrounded.  They surrendered themselves, without much question of the
+future, to the excitement - the elysium - of the hour:  they lived but from
+day to day; their future was the next time they should meet; beyond that
+epoch, the very mists of their youthful love closed in obscurity and shadow
+which they sought not to penetrate:  and as yet they had not arrived at
+that period of affection when there was danger of their fall, - their love
+had not passed the golden portal where Heaven ceases and Earth begins. 
+Everything for them was the poetry, the vagueness, the refinement, - not
+the power, the concentration, the mortality, - of desire!  The look - the
+whisper - the brief pressure of the hand, at most, the first kisses of
+love, rare and few, - these marked the human limits of that sentiment which
+filled them with a new life, which elevated them as with a new soul.
+
+The roving tendencies of Adrian were at once fixed and centered; the dreams
+of his tender mistress had awakened to a life dreaming still, but "rounded
+with a truth."  All that earnestness, and energy, and fervour of emotion,
+which, in her brother, broke forth in the schemes of patriotism and the
+aspirations of power, were, in Irene, softened down into one object of
+existence, one concentration of soul, - and that was love.  Yet, in this
+range of thought and action, so apparently limited, there was, in reality,
+no less boundless a sphere than in the wide space of her brother's many-
+pathed ambition.  Not the less had she the power and scope for all the
+loftiest capacities granted to our clay.  Equal was her enthusiasm for her
+idol; equal, had she been equally tried, would have been her generosity,
+her devotion: - greater, be sure, her courage; more inalienable her
+worship; more unsullied by selfish purposes and sordid views.  Time,
+change, misfortune, ingratitude, would have left her the same!  What state
+could fall, what liberty decay, if the zeal of man's noisy patriotism were
+as pure as the silent loyalty of a woman's love?
+
+In them everything was young! - the heart unchilled, unblighted, - that
+fulness and luxuriance of life's life which has in it something of divine.
+At that age, when it seems as if we could never die, how deathless, how
+flushed and mighty as with the youngness of a god, is all that our hearts
+create!  Our own youth is like that of the earth itself, when it peopled
+the woods and waters with divinities; when life ran riot, and yet only gave
+birth to beauty; - all its shapes, of poetry, - all its airs, the melodies
+of Arcady and Olympus!  The Golden Age never leaves the world:  it exists
+still, and shall exist, till love, health, poetry, are no more; but only
+for the young!
+
+If I now dwell, though but for a moment, on this interlude in a drama
+calling forth more masculine passions than that of love, it is because I
+foresee that the occasion will but rarely recur.  If I linger on the
+description of Irene and her hidden affection, rather than wait for
+circumstances to portray them better than the author's words can, it is
+because I foresee that that loving and lovely image must continue to the
+last rather a shadow than a portrait, - thrown in the background, as is the
+real destiny of such natures, by bolder figures and more gorgeous colours;
+a something whose presence is rather felt than seen, and whose very harmony
+with the whole consists in its retiring and subdued repose.
+
+
+Chapter 1.VIII.  The Enthusiastic Man Judged by the Discreet Man.
+
+"Thou wrongest me," said Rienzi, warmly, to Adrian, as they sat alone,
+towards the close of a long conference; "I do not play the part of a mere
+demagogue; I wish not to stir the great deeps in order that my lees of
+fortune may rise to the surface.  So long have I brooded over the past,
+that it seems to me as if I had become a part of it - as if I had no
+separate existence.  I have coined my whole soul into one master passion, -
+and its end is the restoration of Rome."
+
+"But by what means?"
+
+"My Lord! my Lord! there is but one way to restore the greatness of a
+people - it is an appeal to the people themselves.  It is not in the power
+of princes and barons to make a state permanently glorious; they raise
+themselves, but they raise not the people with them.  All great
+regenerations are the universal movement of the mass."
+
+"Nay," answered Adrian, "then have we read history differently.  To me, all
+great regenerations seem to have been the work of the few, and tacitly
+accepted by the multitude.  But let us not dispute after the manner of the
+schools.  Thou sayest loudly that a vast crisis is at hand; that the Good
+Estate (buono stato) shall be established.  How? where are your arms? -
+your soldiers?  Are the nobles less strong than heretofore?  Is the mob
+more bold, more constant?  Heaven knows that I speak not with the
+prejudices of my order - I weep for the debasement of my country!  I am a
+Roman, and in that name I forget that I am a noble.  But I tremble at the
+storm you would raise so hazardously.  If your insurrection succeed, it
+will be violent:  it will be purchased by blood - by the blood of all the
+loftiest names of Rome.  You will aim at a second expulsion of the
+Tarquins; but it will be more like a second proscription of Sylla. 
+Massacres and disorders never pave the way to peace.  If, on the other
+hand, you fail, the chains of Rome are riveted for ever:  an ineffectual
+struggle to escape is but an excuse for additional tortures to the slave."
+
+"And what, then, would the Lord Adrian have us do?" said Rienzi, with that
+peculiar and sarcastic smile which has before been noted.  "Shall we wait
+till the Colonna and Orsini quarrel no more? shall we ask the Colonna for
+liberty, and the Orsini for justice?  My Lord, we cannot appeal to the
+nobles against the nobles.  We must not ask them to moderate their power;
+we must restore to ourselves that power.  There may be danger in the
+attempt - but we attempt it amongst the monuments of the Forum:  and if we
+fall - we shall perish worthy of our sires!  Ye have high descent, and
+sounding titles, and wide lands, and you talk of your ancestral honours! 
+We, too, - we plebeians of Rome, - we have ours!  Our fathers were freemen!
+where is our heritage? not sold - not given away:  but stolen from us, now
+by fraud, now by force - filched from us in our sleep; or wrung from us
+with fierce hands, amidst our cries and struggles.  My Lord, we but ask
+that lawful heritage to be restored to us:  to us - nay, to you it is the
+same; your liberty, alike, is gone.  Can you dwell in your father's house,
+without towers, and fortresses, and the bought swords of bravos? can you
+walk in the streets at dark without arms and followers?  True, you, a
+noble, may retaliate; though we dare not.  You, in your turn, may terrify
+and outrage others; but does licence compensate for liberty?  They have
+given you pomp and power - but the safety of equal laws were a better gift. 
+Oh, were I you - were I Stephen Colonna himself, I should pant, ay,
+thirstily as I do now, for that free air which comes not through bars and
+bulwarks against my fellow-citizens, but in the open space of Heaven -
+safe, because protected by the silent Providence of Law, and not by the
+lean fears and hollow-eyed suspicions which are the comrades of a hated
+power.  The tyrant thinks he is free, because he commands slaves:  the
+meanest peasant in a free state is more free than he is.  Oh, my Lord, that
+you - the brave, the generous, the enlightened - you, almost alone amidst
+your order, in the knowledge that we had a country - oh, would that you who
+can sympathise with our sufferings, would strike with us for their
+redress!"
+
+"Thou wilt war against Stephen Colonna, my kinsman; and though I have seen
+him but little, nor, truth to say, esteem him much, yet he is the boast of
+our house, - how can I join thee?"
+
+"His life will be safe, his possessions safe, his rank safe.  What do we
+war against?  His power to do wrong to others."
+
+"Should he discover that thou hast force beyond words, he would be less
+merciful to thee."
+
+"And has he not discovered that?  Do not the shouts of the people tell him
+that I am a man whom he should fear?  Does he - the cautious, the wily, the
+profound - does he build fortresses, and erect towers, and not see from his
+battlements the mighty fabric that I, too, have erected?"
+
+"You! where, Rienzi?"
+
+"In the hearts of Rome!  Does he not see?" continued Rienzi. "No, no; he -
+all, all his tribe, are blind.  Is it not so?"
+
+"Of a certainty, my kinsman has no belief in your power, else he would have
+crushed you long ere this.  Nay, it was but three days ago that he said,
+gravely, he would rather you addressed the populace than the best priest in
+Christendom; for that other orators inflamed the crowd, and no man so
+stilled and dispersed them as you did."
+
+"And I called him profound!  Does not Heaven hush the air most when most it
+prepares the storm?  Ay, my Lord, I understand.  Stephen Colonna despises
+me.  I have been" - (here, as he continued, a deep blush mantled over his
+cheek) - "you remember it - at his palace in my younger days, and pleased
+him with witty tales and light apophthegms.  Nay - ha! ha! - he would call
+me, I think, sometimes, in gay compliment, his jester - his buffoon!  I
+have brooked his insult; I have even bowed to his applause.  I would
+undergo the same penance, stoop to the same shame, for the same motive, and
+in the same cause.  What did I desire to effect?  Can you tell me?  No!  I
+will whisper it, then, to you:  it was - the contempt of Stephen Colonna. 
+Under that contempt I was protected, till protection became no longer
+necessary.  I desired not to be thought formidable by the patricians, in
+order that, quietly and unsuspected, I might make my way amongst the
+people.  I have done so; I now throw aside the mask.  Face to face with
+Stephen Colonna, I could tell him, this very hour, that I brave his anger;
+that I laugh at his dungeons and armed men.  But if he think me the same
+Rienzi as of old, let him; I can wait my hour."
+
+"Yet," said Adrian, waiving an answer to the haughty language of his
+companion, "tell me, what dost thou ask for the people, in order to avoid
+an appeal to their passions? - ignorant and capricious as they are, thou
+canst not appeal to their reason."
+
+"I ask full justice and safety for all men.  I will be contented with no
+less a compromise.  I ask the nobles to dismantle their fortresses; to
+disband their armed retainers; to acknowledge no impunity for crime in high
+lineage; to claim no protection save in the courts of the common law."
+
+"Vain desire!" said Adrian.  "Ask what may yet be granted."
+
+"Ha - ha!" replied Rienzi, laughing bitterly, "did I not tell you it was a
+vain dream to ask for law and justice at the hands of the great?  Can you
+blame me, then, that I ask it elsewhere?"  Then, suddenly changing his tone
+and manner, he added with great solemnity - "Waking life hath false and
+vain dreams; but sleep is sometimes a mighty prophet.  By sleep it is that
+Heaven mysteriously communes with its creatures, and guides and sustains
+its earthly agents in the path to which its providence leads them on."
+
+Adrian made no reply.  This was not the first time he had noted that
+Rienzi's strong intellect was strangely conjoined with a deep and mystical
+superstition.  And this yet more inclined the young noble, who, though
+sufficiently devout, yielded but little to the wilder credulities of the
+time, to doubt the success of the schemer's projects.  In this he erred
+greatly, though his error was that of the worldly wise.  For nothing ever
+so inspires human daring, as the fond belief that it is the agent of a
+Diviner Wisdom.  Revenge and patriotism, united in one man of genius and
+ambition - such are the Archimedian levers that find, in FANATICISM, the
+spot out of the world by which to move the world.  The prudent man may
+direct a state; but it is the enthusiast who regenerates it, - or ruins.
+
+
+Chapter 1.IX.  "When the People Saw this Picture, Every One Marvelled."
+
+Before the market-place, and at the foot of the Capitol, an immense crowd
+was assembled.  Each man sought to push before his neighbour; each
+struggled to gain access to one particular spot, round which the crowd was
+wedged think and dense.
+
+"Corpo di Dio!" said a man of huge stature, pressing onward, like some
+bulky ship, casting the noisy waves right and left from its prow, "this is
+hot work; but for what, in the holy Mother's name, do ye crowd so?  See you
+not, Sir Ribald, that my right arm is disabled, swathed, and bandaged, so
+that I cannot help myself better than a baby?  And yet you push against me
+as if I were an old wall!"
+
+"Ah, Cecco del Vecchio! - what, man! we must make way for you - you are too
+small and tender to bustle through a crowd!  Come, I will protect you!"
+said a dwarf of some four feet high, glancing up at the giant.
+
+"Faith," said the grim smith, looking round on the mob, who laughed loud at
+the dwarf's proffer, "we all do want protection, big and small.  What do
+you laugh for, ye apes? - ay, you don't understand parables."
+
+"And yet it is a parable we are come to gaze upon," said one of the mob,
+with a slight sneer.
+
+"Pleasant day to you, Signor Baroncelli," answered Cecco del Vecchio; "you
+are a good man, and love the people; it makes one's heart smile to see you.
+What's all this pother for?"
+
+"Why the Pope's Notary hath set up a great picture in the marketplace, and
+the gapers say it relates to Rome; so they are melting their brains out,
+this hot day, to guess at the riddle."
+
+"Ho! ho!" said the smith, pushing on so vigorously that he left the speaker
+suddenly in the rear; "if Cola di Rienzi hath aught in the matter, I would
+break through stone rocks to get to it."
+
+"Much good will a dead daub do us," said Baroncelli, sourly, and turning to
+his neighbours; but no man listened to him, and he, a would-be demagogue,
+gnawed his lip in envy.
+
+Amidst half-awed groans and curses from the men whom he jostled aside, and
+open objurgations and shrill cries from the women, to whose robes and
+headgear he showed as little respect, the sturdy smith won his way to a
+space fenced round by chains, in the centre of which was placed a huge
+picture.
+
+"How came it hither?" cried one; "I was first at the market."
+
+"We found it here at daybreak," said a vender of fruit:  "no one was by."
+
+"But why do you fancy Rienzi had a hand in it?"
+
+"Why, who else could?" answered twenty voices.
+
+"True!  Who else?" echoed the gaunt smith.  "I dare be sworn the good man
+spent the whole night in painting it himself.  Blood of St. Peter! but it
+is mighty fine!  What is it about?"
+
+"That's the riddle," said a meditative fish-woman; "if I could make it out,
+I should die happy."
+
+"It is something about liberty and taxes, no doubt," said Luigi, the
+butcher, leaning over the chains.  "Ah, if Rienzi were minded, every poor
+man would have his bit of meat in his pot."
+
+"And as much bread as he could eat," added a pale baker.
+
+"Chut! bread and meat - everybody has that now! - but what wine the poor
+folks drink!  One has no encouragement to take pains with one's vineyard,"
+said a vine-dresser.
+
+"Ho, hollo! - long life to Pandulfo di Guido!  Make way for master
+Pandulfo; he is a learned man; he is a friend of the great Notary's; he
+will tell us all about the picture; make way, there - make way!"
+
+Slowly and modestly, Pandulfo di Guido, a quiet, wealthy, and honest man of
+letters, whom nought save the violence of the times could have roused from
+his tranquil home, or his studious closet, passed to the chains.  He looked
+long and hard at the picture, which was bright with new, and yet moist
+colours, and exhibited somewhat of the reviving art, which, though hard and
+harsh in its features, was about that time visible, and, carried to a far
+higher degree, we yet gaze upon in the paintings of Perugino, who
+flourished during the succeeding generation.  The people pressed round the
+learned man, with open mouths; now turning their eyes to the picture, now
+to Pandulfo.
+
+"Know you not," at length said Pandulfo, "the easy and palpable meaning of
+this design?  Behold how the painter has presented to you a vast and stormy
+sea - mark how its waves - "
+
+"Speak louder - louder!" shouted the impatient crowd.
+
+"Hush!" cried those in the immediate vicinity of Pandulfo, "the worthy
+Signor is perfectly audible!"
+
+Meanwhile, some of the more witty, pushing towards a stall in the
+marketplace, bore from it a rough table, from which they besought Pandulfo
+to address the people.  The pale citizen, with some pain and shame, for he
+was no practised spokesman, was obliged to assent; but when he cast his
+eyes over the vast and breathless crowd, his own deep sympathy with their
+cause inspired and emboldened him.  A light broke from his eyes; his voice
+swelled into power; and his head, usually buried in his breast, became
+erect and commanding in its air.
+
+"You see before you in the picture" (he began again) "a mighty and
+tempestuous sea:  upon its waves you behold five ships; four of them are
+already wrecks, - their masts are broken, the waves are dashing through the
+rent planks, they are past all aid and hope:  on each of these ships lies
+the corpse of a woman.  See you not, in the wan face and livid limbs, how
+faithfully the limner hath painted the hues and loathsomeness of death? 
+Below each of these ships is a word that applies the metaphor to truth. 
+Yonder, you see the name of Carthage; the other three are Troy, Jerusalem,
+and Babylon.  To these four is one common inscription.  'To exhaustion were
+we brought by injustice!'  Turn now your eyes to the middle of the sea, -
+there you behold the fifth ship, tossed amidst the waves, her mast broken,
+her rudder gone, her sails shivered, but not yet a wreck like the rest,
+though she soon may be.  On her deck kneels a female, clothed in mourning;
+mark the wo upon her countenance, - how cunningly the artist has conveyed
+its depth and desolation; she stretches out her arms in prayer, she
+implores your and Heaven's assistance.  Mark now the superscription - 'This
+is Rome!' - Yes, it is your country that addresses you in this emblem!"
+
+The crowd waved to and fro, and a deep murmur crept gathering over the
+silence which they had hitherto kept.
+
+"Now," continued Pandulfo, "turn your gaze to the right of the picture, and
+you will behold the cause of the tempest, - you will see why the fifth
+vessel is thus perilled, and her sisters are thus wrecked.  Mark, four
+different kinds of animals, who, from their horrid jaws, send forth the
+winds and storms which torture and rack the sea.  The first are the lions,
+the wolves, the bears.  These, the inscription tells you, are the lawless
+and savage signors of the state.  The next are the dogs and swine, - these
+are the evil counsellors and parasites.  Thirdly, you behold the dragons
+and the foxes, - and these are false judges and notaries, and they who sell
+justice.  Fourthly, in the hares, the goats, the apes, that assist in
+creating the storm, you perceive, by the inscription, the emblems of the
+popular thieves and homicides, ravishers and spoliators.  Are ye bewildered
+still, O Romans! or have ye mastered the riddle of the picture?"
+
+Far in their massive palaces the Savelli and Orsini heard the echo of the
+shouts that answered the question of Pandulfo.
+
+"Are ye, then, without hope!" resumed the scholar, as the shout ceased, and
+hushing, with the first sound of his voice, the ejaculations and speeches
+which each man had turned to utter to his neighbour.  "Are ye without hope?
+Doth the picture, which shows your tribulation, promise you no redemption?
+Behold, above that angry sea, the heavens open, and the majesty of God
+descends gloriously, as to judgment:  and, from the rays that surround the
+Spirit of God extend two flaming swords, and on those swords stand, in
+wrath, but in deliverance, the two patron saints - the two mighty guardians
+of your city!  People of Rome, farewell!  The parable is finished."  (M. 
+Sismondi attributes to Rienzi a fine oration at the showing of the picture,
+in which he thundered against the vices of the patricians.  The
+contemporary biographer of Rienzi says nothing of this harangue.  But,
+apparently (since history has its liberties as well as fiction), M.
+Sismondi has thought it convenient to confound two occasions very distinct
+in themselves.)
+
+
+Chapter 1.X.  A Rough Spirit Raised, Which May Hereafter Rend the Wizard.
+
+While thus animated was the scene around the Capitol, within one of the
+apartments of the palace sat the agent and prime cause of that excitement.
+In the company of his quiet scribes, Rienzi appeared absorbed in the
+patient details of his avocation.  While the murmur and the hum, the shout
+and the tramp, of multitudes, rolled to his chamber, he seemed not to heed
+them, nor to rouse himself a moment from his task.  With the unbroken
+regularity of an automaton, he continued to enter in his large book, and
+with the clear and beautiful characters of the period, those damning
+figures which taught him, better than declamations, the frauds practised on
+the people, and armed him with that weapon of plain fact which it is so
+difficult for abuse to parry.
+
+"Page 2, Vol. B.," said he, in the tranquil voice of business, to the
+clerks; "see there, the profits of the salt duty; department No.3 - very
+well.  Page 9, Vol. D. - what is the account rendered by Vescobaldi, the
+collector?  What! twelve thousand florins? - no more? - unconscionable
+rascal!"  (Here was a loud shout without of 'Pandulfo! - long live
+Pandulfo!')  "Pastrucci, my friend, your head wanders; you are listening to
+the noise without - please to amuse yourself with the calculation I
+entrusted to you.  Santi, what is the entry given in by Antonio Tralli?"
+
+A slight tap was heard at the door, and Pandulfo entered.
+
+The clerks continued their labour, though they looked up hastily at the
+pale and respectable visitor, whose name, to their great astonishment, had
+thus become a popular cry.
+
+"Ah, my friend," said Rienzi, calmly enough in voice, but his hands
+trembled with ill-suppressed emotion, "you would speak to me alone, eh? 
+well, well - this way."  Thus saying, he led the citizen into a small
+cabinet in the rear of the room of office, carefully shut the door, and
+then giving himself up to the natural impatience of his character, seized
+Pandulfo by the hand:  "Speak!" cried he:  "do they take the
+interpretation? - have you made it plain and palpable enough? - has it sunk
+deep into their souls?"
+
+"Oh, by St. Peter! yes!" returned the citizen, whose spirits were elevated
+by his recent discovery that he, too, was an orator - a luxurious pleasure
+for a timid man.  "They swallowed every word of the interpretation; they
+are moved to the marrow - you might lead them this very hour to battle, and
+find them heroes.  As for the sturdy smith - "
+
+"What!  Cecco del Vecchio?" interrupted Rienzi; "ah, his heart is wrought
+in bronze - what did he?"
+
+"Why, he caught me by the hem of my robe as I descended my rostrum, (oh!
+would you could have seen me! - per fede I had caught your mantle! - I was
+a second you!) and said, weeping like a child, 'Ah, Signor, I am but a poor
+man, and of little worth; but if every drop of blood in this body were a
+life, I would give it for my country!'"
+
+"Brave soul," said Rienzi, with emotion; "would Rome had but fifty such! 
+No man hath done us more good among his own class than Cecco del Vecchio."
+
+"They feel a protection in his very size," said Pandulfo.  "It is something
+to hear such big words from such a big fellow."
+
+"Were there any voices lifted in disapprobation of the picture and its
+sentiment?"
+
+"None."
+
+"The time is nearly ripe, then - a few suns more, and the fruit must be
+gathered.  The Aventine, - the Lateran, - and then the solitary trumpet!" 
+Thus saying, Rienzi, with folded arms and downcast eyes, seemed sunk into a
+reverie.
+
+"By the way," said Pandulfo, "I had almost forgot to tell thee, that the
+crowd would have poured themselves hither, so impatient were they to see
+thee; but I bade Cecco del Vecchio mount the rostrum, and tell them, in his
+blunt way, that it would be unseemly at the present time, when thou wert
+engaged in the Capitol on civil and holy affairs, to rush in so great a
+body into thy presence.  Did I not right?"
+
+"Most right, my Pandulfo."
+
+"But Cecco del Vecchio says he must come and kiss thy hand:  and thou mayst
+expect him here the moment he can escape unobserved from the crowd."
+
+"He is welcome!" said Rienzi, half mechanically, for he was still absorbed
+in thought.
+
+"And, lo! here he is," - as one of the scribes announced the visit of the
+smith.
+
+"Let him be admitted!" said Rienzi, seating himself composedly.
+
+When the huge smith found himself in the presence of Rienzi, it amused
+Pandulfo to perceive the wonderful influences of mind over matter.  That
+fierce and sturdy giant, who, in all popular commotions, towered above his
+tribe, with thews of stone, and nerves of iron, the rallying point and
+bulwark of the rest, - stood now colouring and trembling before the
+intellect, which (so had the eloquent spirit of Rienzi waked and fanned the
+spark which, till then, had lain dormant in that rough bosom) might almost
+be said to have created his own.  And he, indeed, who first arouses in the
+bondsman the sense and soul of freedom, comes as near as is permitted to
+man, nearer than the philosopher, nearer even than the poet, to the great
+creative attribute of God! - But, if the breast be uneducated, the gift may
+curse the giver; and he who passes at once from the slave to the freeman
+may pass as rapidly from the freeman to the ruffian.
+
+"Approach, my friend," said Rienzi, after a moment's pause; "I know all
+that thou hast done, and wouldst do, for Rome!  Thou art worthy of her best
+days, and thou art born to share in their return."
+
+The smith dropped at the feet of Rienzi, who held out his hand to raise
+him, which Cecco del Vecchio seized, and reverentially kissed.
+
+"This kiss does not betray," said Rienzi, smiling; "but rise, my friend, -
+this posture is only due to God and his saints!"
+
+"He is a saint who helps us at need!" said the smith, bluntly, "and that no
+man has done as thou hast.  But when," he added, sinking his voice, and
+fixing his eyes hard on Rienzi, as one may do who waits a signal to strike
+a blow, "when - when shall we make the great effort?"
+
+Thou hast spoken to all the brave men in thy neighbourhood, - are they well
+prepared?"
+
+"To live or die, as Rienzi bids them!"
+
+"I must have the list - the number - names - houses and callings, this
+night."
+
+"Thou shalt."
+
+"Each man must sign his name or mark with his own hand."
+
+"It shall be done."
+
+"Then, harkye! attend Pandulfo di Guido at his house this evening, at
+sunset.  He shall instruct thee where to meet this night some brave hearts;
+- thou art worthy to be ranked amongst them.  Thou wilt not fail!"
+
+"By the holy Stairs!  I will count every minute till then," said the smith,
+his swarthy face lighted with pride at the confidence shown him.
+
+"Meanwhile, watch all your neighbours; let no man flag or grow faint-
+hearted, - none of thy friends must be branded as a traitor!"
+
+"I will cut his throat, were he my own mother's son, if I find one pledged
+man flinch!" said the fierce smith.
+
+"Ha, ha!" rejoined Rienzi, with that strange laugh which belonged to him;
+"a miracle! a miracle!  The Picture speaks now!"
+
+It was already nearly dusk when Rienzi left the Capitol.  The broad space
+before its walls was empty and deserted, and wrapping his mantle closely
+round him, he walked musingly on.
+
+"I have almost climbed the height," thought he, "and now the precipice
+yawns before me.  If I fail, what a fall!  The last hope of my country
+falls with me.  Never will a noble rise against the nobles.  Never will
+another plebeian have the opportunities and the power that I have!  Rome is
+bound up with me - with a single life.  The liberties of all time are fixed
+to a reed that a wind may uproot.  But oh, Providence! hast thou not
+reserved and marked me for great deeds?  How, step by step, have I been led
+on to this solemn enterprise!  How has each hour prepared its successor! 
+And yet what danger!  If the inconstant people, made cowardly by long
+thraldom, do but waver in the crisis, I am swept away!"
+
+As he spoke, he raised his eyes, and lo, before him, the first star of
+twilight shone calmly down upon the crumbling remnants of the Tarpeian
+Rock.  It was no favouring omen, and Rienzi's heart beat quicker as that
+dark and ruined mass frowned thus suddenly on his gaze.
+
+"Dread monument," thought he, "of what dark catastrophes, to what unknown
+schemes, hast thou been the witness!  To how many enterprises, on which
+history is dumb, hast thou set the seal!  How know we whether they were
+criminal or just?  How know we whether he, thus doomed as a traitor, would
+not, if successful, have been immortalized as a deliverer?  If I fall, who
+will write my chronicle?  One of the people? alas! blinded and ignorant,
+they furnish forth no minds that can appeal to posterity.  One of the
+patricians? in what colours then shall I be painted!  No tomb will rise for
+me amidst the wrecks; no hand scatter flowers upon my grave!"
+
+Thus meditating on the verge of that mighty enterprise to which he had
+devoted himself, Rienzi pursued his way.  He gained the Tiber, and paused
+for a few moments beside its legendary stream, over which the purple and
+starlit heaven shone deeply down.  He crossed the bridge which leads to the
+quarter of the Trastevere, whose haughty inhabitants yet boast themselves
+the sole true descendants of the ancient Romans.  Here he step grew quicker
+and more light; brighter, if less solemn, thoughts crowded upon his breast;
+and ambition, lulled for a moment, left his strained and over-laboured mind
+to the reign of a softer passion.
+
+
+Chapter 1.XI.  Nina di Raselli.
+
+"I tell you, Lucia, I do not love those stuffs; they do not become me.  Saw
+you ever so poor a dye? - this purple, indeed! that crimson!  Why did you
+let the man leave them?  Let him take them elsewhere tomorrow.  They may
+suit the signoras on the other side the Tiber, who imagine everything
+Venetian must be perfect; but I, Lucia, I see with my own eyes, and judge
+from my own mind."
+
+"Ah, dear lady," said the serving-maid, "if you were, as you doubtless will
+be, some time or other, a grand signora, how worthily you would wear the
+honours!  Santa Cecilia!  No other dame in Rome would be looked at while
+the Lady Nina were by!"
+
+"Would we not teach them what pomp was?" answered Nina.  "Oh! what
+festivals would we hold!  Saw you not from the gallery the revels given
+last week by the Lady Giulia Savelli?"
+
+"Ay, signora; and when you walked up the hall in your silver and pearl
+tissue, there ran such a murmur through the gallery; every one cried, 'The
+Savelli have entertained an angel!'"
+
+"Pish!  Lucia; no flattery, girl."
+
+"It is naked truth, lady.  But that was a revel, was it not?  There was
+grandeur! - fifty servitors in scarlet and gold! and the music playing all
+the while.  The minstrels were sent for from Bergamo.  Did not that
+festival please you?  Ah, I warrant many were the fine speeches made to you
+that day!"
+
+"Heigho! - no, there was one voice wanting, and all the music was marred. 
+But, girl, were I the Lady Giulia, I would not have been contented with so
+poor a revel."
+
+"How, poor!  Why all the nobles say it outdid the proudest marriage-feast
+of the Colonna.  Nay, a Neapolitan who sat next me, and who had served
+under the young Queen Joanna, at her marriage, says, that even Naples was
+outshone."
+
+"That may be.  I know nought of Naples; but I know what my court should
+have been, were I what - what I am not, and may never be!  The banquet
+vessels should have been of gold; the cups jewelled to the brim; not an
+inch of the rude pavement should have been visible; all should have glowed
+with cloth of gold.  The fountain in the court should have showered up the
+perfumes of the East; my pages should not have been rough youths, blushing
+at their own uncouthness, but fair boys, who had not told their twelfth
+year, culled from the daintiest palaces of Rome; and, as for the music, oh,
+Lucia! - each musician should have worn a chaplet, and deserved it; and he
+who played best should have had a reward, to inspire all the rest - a rose
+from me.  Saw you, too, the Lady Giulia's robe?  What colours! they might
+have put out the sun at noonday! - yellow, and blue, and orange, and
+scarlet!  Oh, sweet Saints! - but my eyes ached all the next day!"
+
+"Doubtless, the Lady Giulia lacks your skill in the mixture of colours,"
+said the complaisant waiting-woman.
+
+"And then, too, what a mien! - no royalty in it!  She moved along the hall,
+so that her train well nigh tripped her every moment; and then she said,
+with a foolish laugh, 'These holyday robes are but troublesome luxuries.' 
+Troth, for the great there should be no holyday robes; 'tis for myself, not
+for others, that I would attire!  Every day should have its new robe, more
+gorgeous than the last; - every day should be a holyday!"
+
+"Methought," said Lucia, "that the Lord Giovanni Orsini seemed very devoted
+to my Lady."
+
+"He! the bear!"
+
+"Bear, he may be! but he has a costly skin.  His riches are untold."
+
+"And the fool knows not how to spend them."
+
+"Was not that the young Lord Adrian who spoke to you just by the columns,
+where the music played?"
+
+"It might be, - I forget."
+
+"Yet, I hear that few ladies forget when Lord Adrian di Castello woos
+them."
+
+"There was but one man whose company seemed to me worth the recollection,"
+answered Nina, unheeding the insinuation of the artful handmaid.
+
+"And who was he?" asked Lucia.
+
+"The old scholar from Avignon!"
+
+"What! he with the gray beard?  Oh, Signora!"
+
+"Yes," said Nina, with a grave and sad voice; "when he spoke, the whole
+scene vanished from my eyes, - for he spoke to me of HIM!"
+
+As she said this, the Signora sighed deeply, and the tears gathered to her
+eyes.
+
+The waiting-woman raised her lips in disdain, and her looks in wonder; but
+she did not dare to venture a reply.
+
+"Open the lattice," said Nina, after a pause, "and give me yon paper.  Not
+that, girl - but the verses sent me yesterday.  What! art thou Italian, and
+dost thou not know, by instinct, that I spoke of the rhyme of Petrarch?"
+
+Seated by the open casement, through which the moonlight stole soft and
+sheen, with one lamp beside her, from which she seemed to shade her eyes,
+though in reality she sought to hide her countenance from Lucia, the young
+Signora appeared absorbed in one of those tender sonnets which then turned
+the brains and inflamed the hearts of Italy.  (Although it is true that the
+love sonnets of Petrarch were not then, as now, the most esteemed of his
+works, yet it has been a great, though a common error, to represent them as
+little known and coldly admired.  Their effect was, in reality, prodigious
+and universal.  Every ballad-singer sung them in the streets, and (says
+Filippo Villani), "Gravissimi nesciebant abstinere" - "Even the gravest
+could not abstain from them.")
+
+Born of an impoverished house, which, though boasting its descent from a
+consular race of Rome, scarcely at that day maintained a rank amongst the
+inferior order of nobility, Nina di Raselli was the spoiled child - the
+idol and the tyrant - of her parents.  The energetic and self-willed
+character of her mind made her rule where she should have obeyed; and as in
+all ages dispositions can conquer custom, she had, though in a clime and
+land where the young and unmarried of her sex are usually chained and
+fettered, assumed, and by assuming won, the prerogative of independence. 
+She possessed, it is true, more learning and more genius than generally
+fell to the share of women in that day; and enough of both to be deemed a
+miracle by her parents; - she had, also, what they valued more, a
+surpassing beauty; and, what they feared more, an indomitable haughtiness;
+- a haughtiness mixed with a thousand soft and endearing qualities where
+she loved; and which, indeed, where she loved, seemed to vanish.  At once
+vain yet high-minded, resolute yet impassioned, there was a gorgeous
+magnificence in her very vanity and splendour, - an ideality in her
+waywardness:  her defects made a part of her brilliancy; without them she
+would have seemed less woman; and, knowing her, you would have compared all
+women by her standard.  Softer qualities beside her seemed not more
+charming, but more insipid.  She had no vulgar ambition, for she had
+obstinately refused many alliances which the daughter of Raselli could
+scarcely have hoped to form.  The untutored minds and savage power of the
+Roman nobles seemed to her imagination, which was full of the poetry of
+rank, its luxury and its graces, as something barbarous and revolting, at
+once to be dreaded and despised.  She had, therefore, passed her twentieth
+year unmarried, but not without love.  The faults, themselves, of her
+character, elevated that ideal of love which she had formed.  She required
+some being round whom all her vainer qualities could rally; she felt that
+where she loved she must adore; she demanded no common idol before which to
+humble so strong and imperious a mind.  Unlike women of a gentler mould,
+who desire, for a short period, to exercise the caprices of sweet empire, -
+when she loved she must cease to command; and pride, at once, be humbled to
+devotion.  So rare were the qualities that could attract her; so
+imperiously did her haughtiness require that those qualities should be
+above her own, yet of the same order; that her love elevated its object
+like a god.  Accustomed to despise, she felt all the luxury it is to
+venerate!  And if it were her lot to be united with one thus loved, her
+nature was that which might become elevated by the nature that it gazed on. 
+For her beauty - Reader, shouldst thou ever go to Rome, thou wilt see in
+the Capitol the picture of the Cumaean Sibyl, which, often copied, no copy
+can even faintly represent.  I beseech thee, mistake not this sibyl for
+another, for the Roman galleries abound in sibyls.  (The sibyl referred to
+is the well-known one by Domenichino.  As a mere work of art, that by
+Guercino, called the Persian sibyl, in the same collection, is perhaps
+superior; but in beauty, in character, there is no comparison.)  The sibyl
+I speak of is dark, and the face has an Eastern cast; the robe and turban,
+gorgeous though they be, grow dim before the rich, but transparent roses of
+the cheek; the hair would be black, save for that golden glow which mellows
+it to a hue and lustre never seen but in the south, and even in the south
+most rare; the features, not Grecian, are yet faultless; the mouth, the
+brow, the ripe and exquisite contour, all are human and voluptuous; the
+expression, the aspect, is something more; the form is, perhaps, too full
+for the perfection of loveliness, for the proportions of sculpture, for the
+delicacy of Athenian models; but the luxuriant fault has a majesty.  Gaze
+long upon that picture:  it charms, yet commands, the eye.  While you gaze,
+you call back five centuries.  You see before you the breathing image of
+Nina di Raselli!
+
+But it was not those ingenious and elaborate conceits in which Petrarch,
+great Poet though he be, has so often mistaken pedantry for passion, that
+absorbed at that moment the attention of the beautiful Nina.  Her eyes
+rested not on the page, but on the garden that stretched below the
+casement.  Over the old fruit-trees and hanging vines fell the moonshine;
+and in the centre of the green, but half-neglected sward, the waters of a
+small and circular fountain, whose perfect proportions spoke of days long
+past, played and sparkled in the starlight.  The scene was still and
+beautiful; but neither of its stillness nor its beauty thought Nina: 
+towards one, the gloomiest and most rugged, spot in the whole garden,
+turned her gaze; there, the trees stood densely massed together, and shut
+from view the low but heavy wall which encircled the mansion of Raselli. 
+The boughs on those trees stirred gently, but Nina saw them wave; and now
+from the copse emerged, slowly and cautiously, a solitary figure, whose
+shadow threw itself, long and dark, over the sward.  It approached the
+window, and a low voice breathed Nina's name.
+
+"Quick, Lucia!" cried she, breathlessly, turning to her handmaid:  "quick!
+the rope-ladder! it is he! he is come!  How slow you are! haste, girl, - he
+may be discovered!  There, - O joy, - O joy! - My lover! my hero! my
+Rienzi!"
+
+"It is you!" said Rienzi, as, now entering the chamber, he wound his arms
+around her half-averted form, "and what is night to others is day to me!"
+
+The first sweet moments of welcome were over; and Rienzi was seated at the
+feet of his mistress:  his head rested on her knees - his face looking up
+to hers - their hands clasped each in each.
+
+"And for me thou bravest these dangers!" said the lover; "the shame of
+discovery, the wrath of thy parents!"
+
+"But what are my perils to thine?  Oh, Heaven! if my father found thee here
+thou wouldst die!"
+
+"He would think it then so great a humiliation, that thou, beautiful Nina,
+who mightst match with the haughtiest names of Rome, shouldst waste thy
+love on a plebeian - even though the grandson of an emperor!"
+
+The proud heart of Nina could sympathize well with the wounded pride of her
+lover:  she detected the soreness which lurked beneath his answer,
+carelessly as it was uttered.
+
+"Hast thou not told me," she said, "of that great Marius, who was no noble,
+but from whom the loftiest Colonna would rejoice to claim his descent? and
+do I not know in thee one who shall yet eclipse the power of Marius,
+unsullied by his vices?"
+
+"Delicious flattery! sweet prophet!" said Rienzi, with a melancholy smile;
+"never were thy supporting promises of the future more welcome to me than
+now; for to thee I will say what I would utter to none else - my soul half
+sinks beneath the mighty burthen I have heaped upon it.  I want new courage
+as the dread hour approaches; and from thy words and looks I drink it."
+
+"Oh!" answered Nina, blushing as she spoke, "glorious is indeed the lot
+which I have bought by my love for thee:  glorious to share thy schemes, to
+cheer thee in doubt, to whisper hope to thee in danger."
+
+"And give grace to me in triumph!" added Rienzi, passionately.  "Ah! should
+the future ever place upon these brows the laurel-wreath due to one who has
+saved his country, what joy, what recompence, to lay it at thy feet! 
+Perhaps, in those long and solitary hours of languor and exhaustion which
+fill up the interstices of time, - the dull space for sober thought between
+the epochs of exciting action, - perhaps I should have failed and flagged,
+and renounced even my dreams for Rome, had they not been linked also with
+my dreams for thee! - had I not pictured to myself the hour when my fate
+should elevate me beyond my birth; when thy sire would deem it no disgrace
+to give thee to my arms; when thou, too, shouldst stand amidst the dames of
+Rome, more honoured, as more beautiful, than all; and when I should see
+that pomp, which my own soul disdains, ("Quem semper abhorrui sicut cenum"
+is the expression used by Rienzi, in his letter to his friend at Avignon,
+and which was probably sincere.  Men rarely act according to the bias of
+their own tastes.) made dear and grateful to me because associated with
+thee!  Yes, it is these thoughts that have inspired me, when sterner ones
+have shrunk back appalled from the spectres that surround their goal.  And
+oh! my Nina, sacred, strong, enduring must be, indeed, the love which lives
+in the same pure and elevated air as that which sustains my hopes of
+liberty and fame!"
+
+This was the language which, more even than the vows of fidelity and the
+dear adulation which springs from the heart's exuberance, had bound the
+proud and vain soul of Nina to the chains that it so willingly wore. 
+Perhaps, indeed, in the absence of Rienzi, her weaker nature pictured to
+herself the triumph of humbling the highborn signoras, and eclipsing the
+barbarous magnificence of the chiefs of Rome; but in his presence, and
+listening to his more elevated and generous ambition, as yet all unsullied
+by one private feeling save the hope of her, her higher sympathies were
+enlisted with his schemes, her mind aspired to raise itself to the height
+of his, and she thought less of her own rise than of his glory.  It was
+sweet to her pride to be the sole confidante of his most secret thoughts,
+as of his most hardy undertakings; to see bared before her that intricate
+and plotting spirit; to be admitted even to the knowledge of its doubts and
+weakness, as of its heroism and power.
+
+Nothing could be more contrasted than the loves of Rienzi and Nina, and
+those of Adrian and Irene:  in the latter, all were the dreams, the
+phantasies, the extravagance, of youth; they never talked of the future;
+they mingled no other aspirations with those of love.  Ambition, glory, the
+world's high objects, were nothing to them when together; their love had
+swallowed up the world, and left nothing visible beneath the sun, save
+itself.  But the passion of Nina and her lover was that of more complicated
+natures and more mature years:  it was made up of a thousand feelings, each
+naturally severed from each, but compelled into one focus by the mighty
+concentration of love; their talk was of the world; it was from the world
+that they drew the aliment which sustained it; it was of the future they
+spoke and thought; of its dreams and imagined glories they made themselves
+a home and altar; their love had in it more of the Intellectual than that
+of Adrian and Irene; it was more fitted for this hard earth; it had in it,
+also, more of the leaven of the later and iron days, and less of poetry and
+the first golden age.
+
+"And must thou leave me now?" said Nina, her cheek no more averted from his
+lips, nor her form from his parting embrace.  "The moon is high yet; it is
+but a little hour thou hast given me."
+
+"An hour!  Alas!" said Rienzi, "it is near upon midnight - our friends
+await me."
+
+"Go, then, my soul's best half!  Go; Nina shall not detain thee one moment
+from those higher objects which make thee so dear to Nina.  When - when
+shall we meet again!"
+
+"Not," said Rienzi, proudly, and with all his soul upon his brow, "not
+thus, by stealth! no! nor as I thus have met thee, the obscure and
+contemned bondsman!  When next thou seest me, it shall be at the head of
+the sons of Rome! her champion! her restorer! or - " said he, sinking his
+voice - 
+
+"There is no or!" interrupted Nina, weaving her arms round him, and
+catching his enthusiasm; "thou hast uttered thine own destiny!"
+
+"One kiss more! - farewell! - the tenth day from the morrow shines upon the
+restoration of Rome!"
+
+
+Chapter 1.XII.  The Strange Adventures that Befel Walter de Montreal.
+
+It was upon that same evening, and while the earlier stars yet shone over
+the city, that Walter de Montreal, returning, alone, to the convent then
+associated with the church of Santa Maria del Priorata (both of which
+belonged to the Knights of the Hospital, and in the first of which Montreal
+had taken his lodgment), paused amidst the ruins and desolation which lay
+around his path.  Thou little skilled in the classic memories and
+associations of the spot, he could not but be impressed with the
+surrounding witnesses of departed empire; the vast skeleton, as it were, of
+the dead giantess.
+
+"Now," thought he, as he gazed around upon the roofless columns and
+shattered walls, everywhere visible, over which the starlight shone,
+ghastly and transparent, backed by the frowning and embattled fortresses of
+the Frangipani, half hid by the dark foliage that sprung up amidst the very
+fanes and palaces of old - Nature exulting over the frailer Art; "now,"
+thought he, "bookmen would be inspired, by this scene, with fantastic and
+dreaming visions of the past.  But to me these monuments of high ambition
+and royal splendour create only images of the future.  Rome may yet be,
+with her seven-hilled diadem, as Rome has been before, the prize of the
+strongest hand and the boldest warrior, - revived, not by her own
+degenerate sons, but the infused blood of a new race.  William the Bastard
+could scarce have found the hardy Englishers so easy a conquest as Walter
+the Well-born may find these eunuch Romans.  And which conquest were the
+more glorious, - the barbarous Isle, or the Metropolis of the World?  Short
+step from the general to the podesta - shorter step from the podesta to the
+king!"
+
+While thus revolving his wild, yet not altogether chimerical ambition, a
+quick light step was heard amidst the long herbage, and, looking up,
+Montreal perceived the figure of a tall female descending from that part of
+the hill then covered by many convents, towards the base of the Aventine. 
+She supported her steps with a long staff, and moved with such elasticity
+and erectness, that now, as her face became visible by the starlight, it
+was surprising to perceive that it was the face of one advanced in years, -
+a harsh, proud countenance, withered, and deeply wrinkled, but not without
+a certain regularity of outline.
+
+"Merciful Virgin!" cried Montreal, starting back as that face gleamed upon
+him:  "is it possible?  It is she: - it is - "
+
+He sprung forward, and stood right before the old woman, who seemed equally
+surprised, though more dismayed, at the sight of Montreal.
+
+"I have sought thee for years," said the Knight, first breaking the
+silence; "years, long years, - thy conscience can tell thee why."
+
+"Mine, man of blood!" cried the female, trembling with rage or fear;
+"darest thou talk of conscience?  Thou, the dishonourer - the robber - the
+professed homicide!  Thou, disgrace to knighthood and to birth!  Thou, with
+the cross of chastity and of peace upon thy breast!  Thou talk of
+conscience, hypocrite! - thou?"
+
+"Lady - lady!" said Montreal, deprecatingly, and almost quailing beneath
+the fiery passion of that feeble woman, "I have sinned against thee and
+thine.  But remember all my excuses! - early love - fatal obstacles - rash
+vow - irresistible temptation!  Perhaps," he added, in a more haughty tone,
+"perhaps, yet, I may have the power to atone my error, and wring, with
+mailed hand, from the successor of St Peter, who hath power to loose as to
+bind - "
+
+"Perjured and abandoned!" interrupted the female; "dost thou dream that
+violence can purchase absolution, or that thou canst ever atone the past? -
+a noble name disgraced, a father's broken heart and dying curse!  Yes, that
+curse, I hear it now! it rings upon me thrillingly, as when I watched the
+expiring clay! it cleaves to thee - it pursues thee - it shall pierce thee
+through thy corselet - it shall smite thee in the meridian of thy power! 
+Genius wasted - ambition blasted - penitence deferred - a life of brawls,
+and a death of shame - thy destruction the offspring of thy crime! - To
+this, to this, an old man's curse hath doomed thee! - AND THOU ART DOOMED!"
+
+These words were rather shrieked than spoken:  and the flashing eye, the
+lifted hand, the dilated form of the speaker - the hour - the solitude of
+the ruins around - all conspired to give to the fearful execration the
+character of prophecy.  The warrior, against whose undaunted breast a
+hundred spears had shivered in vain, fell appalled and humbled to the
+ground.  He seized the hem of his fierce denouncer's robe, and cried, in a
+choked and hollow voice, "Spare me! spare me!"
+
+"Spare thee!" said the unrelenting crone; "hast thou ever spared man in thy
+hatred, or woman in thy lust?  Ah, grovel in the dust! - crouch - crouch! -
+wild beast as thou art! whose sleek skin and beautiful hues have taught the
+unwary to be blind to the talons that rend, and the grinders that devour; -
+crouch, that the foot of the old and impotent may spurn thee!"
+
+"Hag!" cried Montreal, in the reaction of sudden fury and maddened pride,
+springing up to the full height of his stature.  "Hag! thou hast passed the
+limits to which, remembering who thou art, my forbearance gave thee
+licence.  I had well-nigh forgot that thou hadst assumed my part - I am the
+Accuser!  Woman! - the boy! - shrink not! equivocate not! lie not! - thou
+wert the thief!"
+
+"I was.  Thou taughtest me the lesson how to steal a - "
+
+"Render - restore him!" interrupted Montreal, stamping on the ground with
+such force that the splinters of the marble fragments on which he stood
+shivered under his armed heel.
+
+The woman little heeded a violence at which the fiercest warrior of Italy
+might have trembled; but she did not make an immediate answer.  The
+character of her countenance altered from passion into an expression of
+grave, intent, and melancholy thought.  At length she replied to Montreal;
+whose hand had wandered to his dagger-hilt, with the instinct of long
+habit, whenever enraged or thwarted, rather than from any design of blood;
+which, stern and vindictive as he was, he would have been incapable of
+forming against any woman, - much less against the one then before him.
+
+"Walter de Montreal," said she, in a voice so calm that it almost sounded
+like that of compassion, "the boy, I think, has never known brother or
+sister:  the only child of a once haughty and lordly race, on both sides,
+though now on both dishonoured - nay, why so impatient? thou wilt soon
+learn the worst - the boy is dead!"
+
+"Dead!" repeated Montreal, recoiling and growing pale; "dead! - no, no -
+say not that!  He has a mother, - you know he has! - a fond, meekhearted,
+anxious, hoping mother! - no! - no, he is not dead!"
+
+"Thou canst feel, then, for a mother?" said the old woman, seemingly
+touched by the tone of the Provencal.  "Yet, bethink thee; is it not better
+that the grave should save him from a life of riot, of bloodshed, and of
+crime?  Better to sleep with God than to wake with the fiends!"
+
+"Dead!" echoed Montreal; "dead! - the pretty one! - so young! - those eyes
+- the mother's eyes - closed so soon?"
+
+"Hast thou aught else to say?  Thy sight scares my very womanhood from my
+soul! - let me be gone."
+
+"Dead! - may I believe thee? or dost thou mock me?  Thou hast uttered thy
+curse, hearken to my warning: - If thou hast lied in this, thy last hour
+shall dismay thee, and thy death-bed shall be the death-bed of despair!"
+
+"Thy lips," replied the female, with a scornful smile, "are better adapted
+for lewd vows to unhappy maidens, than for the denunciations which sound
+solemn only when coming from the good.  Farewell!"
+
+"Stay! inexorable woman! stay! - where sleeps he?  Masses shall be sung!
+priests shall pray! - the sins of the father shall not be visited on that
+young head!"
+
+"At Florence!" returned the woman, hastily.  "But no stone records the
+departed one! - The dead boy had no name!"
+
+Waiting for no further questionings, the woman now passed on, - pursued her
+way; - and the long herbage, and the winding descent, soon snatched her
+ill-omened apparition from the desolate landscape.
+
+Montreal, thus alone, sunk with a deep and heavy sigh upon the ground,
+covered his face with his hands, and burst into an agony of grief; his
+chest heaved, his whole frame trembled, and he wept and sobbed aloud, with
+all the fearful vehemence of a man whose passions are strong and fierce,
+but to whom the violence of grief alone is novel and unfamiliar.
+
+He remained thus, prostrate and unmanned, for a considerable time, growing
+slowly and gradually more calm as tears relieved his emotion; and, at
+length, rather indulging a gloomy reverie than a passionate grief.  The
+moon was high and the hour late when he arose, and then few traces of the
+past excitement remained upon his countenance; for Walter de Montreal was
+not of that mould in which woe can force a settlement, or to which any
+affliction can bring the continued and habitual melancholy that darkens
+those who feel more enduringly, though with emotions less stormy.  His were
+the elements of the true Franc character, though carried to excess:  his
+sternest and his deepest qualities were mingled with fickleness and
+caprice; his profound sagacity often frustrated by a whim; his towering
+ambition deserted for some frivolous temptation; and his elastic, sanguine,
+and high-spirited nature, faithful only to the desire of military glory, to
+the poetry of a daring and stormy life, and to the susceptibilities of that
+tender passion without whose colourings no portrait of chivalry is
+complete, and in which he was capable of a sentiment, a tenderness, and a
+loyal devotion, which could hardly have been supposed compatible with his
+reckless levity and his undisciplined career.
+
+"Well," said he, as he rose slowly, folded his mantle round him, and
+resumed his way, "it was not for myself I grieved thus.  But the pang is
+past, and the worst is known.  Now, then, back to those things that never
+die - restless projects and daring schemes.  That hag's curse keeps my
+blood cold still, and this solitude has something in it weird and awful. 
+Ha! - what sudden light is that?"
+
+The light which caught Montreal's eye broke forth almost like a star,
+scarcely larger, indeed, but more red and intense in its ray.  Of itself it
+was nothing uncommon, and might have shone either from convent or cottage.
+But it streamed from a part of the Aventine which contained no habitations
+of the living, but only the empty ruins and shattered porticoes, of which
+even the names and memories of the ancient inhabitants were dead.  Aware of
+this, Montreal felt a slight awe (as the beam threw its steady light over
+the dreary landscape); for he was not without the knightly superstitions of
+the age, and it was now the witching hour consecrated to ghost and spirit. 
+But fear, whether of this world or the next, could not long daunt the mind
+of the hardy freebooter; and, after a short hesitation, he resolved to make
+a digression from his way, and ascertain the cause of the phenomenon. 
+Unconsciously, the martial tread of the barbarian passed over the site of
+the famed, or infamous, Temple of Isis, which had once witnessed those
+wildest orgies commemorated by Juvenal; and came at last to a thick and
+dark copse, from an opening in the centre of which gleamed the mysterious
+light.  Penetrating the gloomy foliage, the Knight now found himself before
+a large ruin, grey and roofless, from within which came, indistinct and
+muffled, the sound of voices.  Through a rent in the wall, forming a kind
+of casement, and about ten feet from the ground, the light now broke over
+the matted and rank soil, embedded, as it were, in vast masses of shade,
+and streaming through a mouldering portico hard at hand.  The Provencal
+stood, though he knew it not, on the very place once consecrated by the
+Temple:  the Portico and the Library of Liberty (the first public library
+instituted in Rome).  The wall of the ruin was covered with innumerable
+creepers and wild brushwood, and it required but little agility on the part
+of Montreal, by the help of these, to raise himself to the height of the
+aperture, and, concealed by the luxuriant foliage, to gaze within.  He saw
+a table, lighted with tapers, in the centre of which was a crucifix; a
+dagger, unsheathed; an open scroll, which the event proved to be of sacred
+character; and a brazen bowl.  About a hundred men, in cloaks, and with
+black vizards, stood motionless around; and one, taller than the rest,
+without disguise or mask - whose pale brow and stern features seemed by
+that light yet paler and yet more stern - appeared to be concluding some
+address to his companions.
+
+"Yes," said he, "in the church of the Lateran I will make the last appeal
+to the people.  Supported by the Vicar of the Pope, myself an officer of
+the Pontiff, it will be seen that Religion and Liberty - the heroes and the
+martyrs - are united in one cause.  After that time, words are idle; action
+must begin.  By this crucifix I pledge my faith, on this blade I devote my
+life, to the regeneration of Rome!  And you (then no need for mask or
+mantle!), when the solitary trump is heard, when the solitary horseman is
+seen, - you, swear to rally round the standard of the Republic, and resist
+- with heart and hand, with life and soul, in defiance of death, and in
+hope of redemption - the arms of the oppressor!"
+
+"We swear - we swear!" exclaimed every voice:  and, crowding toward cross
+and weapon, the tapers were obscured by the intervening throng, and
+Montreal could not perceive the ceremony, nor hear the muttered formula of
+the oath:  but he could guess that the rite then common to conspiracies -
+and which required each conspirator to shed some drops of his own blood, in
+token that life itself was devoted to the enterprise - had not been
+omitted, when, the group again receding, the same figure as before had
+addressed the meeting, holding on high the bowl with both hands, - while
+from the left arm, which was bared, the blood weltered slowly, and
+trickled, drop by drop, upon the ground, - said, in a solemn voice and
+upturned eyes:
+
+"Amidst the ruins of thy temple, O Liberty! we, Romans, dedicate to thee
+this libation!  We, befriended and inspired by no unreal and fabled idols,
+but by the Lord of Hosts, and Him who, descending to earth, appealed not to
+emperors and to princes, but to the fisherman and the peasant, - giving to
+the lowly and the poor the mission of Revelation."  Then, turning suddenly
+to his companions, as his features, singularly varying in their character
+and expression, brightened, from solemn awe, into a martial and kindling
+enthusiasm, he cried aloud, "Death to the Tyranny!  Life to the Republic!" 
+The effect of the transition was startling.  Each man, as by an involuntary
+and irresistible impulse, laid his hand upon his sword, as he echoed the
+sentiment; some, indeed, drew forth their blades, as if for instant action.
+
+"I have seen enow:  they will break up anon," said Montreal to himself: 
+"and I would rather face an army of thousands, than even half-a-dozen
+enthusiasts, so inflamed, - and I thus detected."  And, with this thought,
+he dropped on the ground, and glided away, as, once again, through the
+still midnight air, broke upon his ear the muffled shout - "DEATH TO THE
+TYRANNY! - LIFE TO THE REPUBLIC!"
+
+
+
+BOOK II.  THE REVOLUTION
+
+"Ogni Lascivia, ogni male, nulla giustizia, nullo freno.  Non c'era piu
+remedia, ogni persona periva.  Allora Cola di Rienzi." &c. - "Vita di Cola
+di Rienzi", lib. i. chap. 2.
+
+"Every kind of lewdness, every form of evil; no justice, no restraint. 
+Remedy there was none; perdition fell on all.  Then Cola di Rienzi," &c. -
+"Life of Cola di Rienzi".
+
+
+Chapter 2.I.  The Knight of Provence, and his Proposal.
+
+It was nearly noon as Adrian entered the gates of the palace of Stephen
+Colonna.  The palaces of the nobles were not then as we see them now,
+receptacles for the immortal canvas of Italian, and the imperishable
+sculpture of Grecian Art; but still to this day are retained the massive
+walls, and barred windows, and spacious courts, which at that time
+protected their rude retainers.  High above the gates rose a lofty and
+solid tower, whose height commanded a wide view of the mutilated remains of
+Rome:  the gate itself was adorned and strengthened on either side by
+columns of granite, whose Doric capitals betrayed the sacrilege that had
+torn them from one of the many temples that had formerly crowded the sacred
+Forum.  From the same spoils came, too, the vast fragments of travertine
+which made the walls of the outer court.  So common at that day were these
+barbarous appropriations of the most precious monuments of art, that the
+columns and domes of earlier Rome were regarded by all classes but as
+quarries, from which every man was free to gather the materials, whether
+for his castle or his cottage, - a wantonness of outrage far greater than
+the Goths', to whom a later age would fain have attributed all the
+disgrace, and which, more perhaps than even heavier offences, excited the
+classical indignation of Petrarch, and made him sympathise with Rienzi in
+his hopes of Rome.  Still may you see the churches of that or even earlier
+dates, of the most shapeless architecture, built on the sites, and from the
+marbles, consecrating (rather than consecrated by) the names of Venus, of
+Jupiter, of Minerva.  The palace of the Prince of the Orsini, duke of
+Gravina, is yet reared above the graceful arches (still visible) of the
+theatre of Marcellus; then a fortress of the Savelli.
+
+As Adrian passed the court, a heavy waggon blocked up the way, laden with
+huge marbles, dug from the unexhausted mine of the Golden House of Nero: 
+they were intended for an additional tower, by which Stephen Colonna
+proposed yet more to strengthen the tasteless and barbarous edifice in
+which the old noble maintained the dignity of outraging the law.
+
+The friend of Petrarch and the pupil of Rienzi sighed deeply as he passed
+this vehicle of new spoliations, and as a pillar of fluted alabaster,
+rolling carelessly from the waggon, fell with a loud crash upon the
+pavement.  At the foot of the stairs grouped some dozen of the bandits whom
+the old Colonna entertained:  they were playing at dice upon an ancient
+tomb, the clear and deep inscription on which (so different from the
+slovenly character of the later empire) bespoke it a memorial of the most
+powerful age of Rome, and which, now empty even of ashes, and upset, served
+for a table to these foreign savages, and was strewn, even at that early
+hour, with fragments of meat and flasks of wine.  They scarcely stirred,
+they scarcely looked up, as the young noble passed them; and their fierce
+oaths and loud ejaculations, uttered in a northern patois, grated harsh
+upon his ear, as he mounted, with a slow step, the lofty and unclean
+stairs.  He came into a vast ante-chamber, which was half-filled with the
+higher class of the patrician's retainers:  some five or six pages, chosen
+from the inferior noblesse, congregated by a narrow and deep-sunk casement,
+were discussing the grave matters of gallantry and intrigue; three petty
+chieftains of the band below, with their corselets donned, and their swords
+and casques beside them, were sitting, stolid and silent, at a table, in
+the middle of the room, and might have been taken for automatons, save for
+the solemn regularity with which they ever and anon lifted to their
+moustachioed lips their several goblets, and then, with a complacent grunt,
+re-settled to their contemplations.  Striking was the contrast which their
+northern phlegm presented to a crowd of Italian clients, and petitioners,
+and parasites, who walked restlessly to and fro, talking loudly to each
+other, with all the vehement gestures and varying physiognomy of southern
+vivacity.  There was a general stir and sensation as Adrian broke upon this
+miscellaneous company.  The bandit captains nodded their heads
+mechanically; the pages bowed, and admired the fashion of his plume and
+hose; the clients, and petitioners, and parasites, crowded round him, each
+with a separate request for interest with his potent kinsman.  Great need
+had Adrian of his wonted urbanity and address, in extricating himself from
+their grasp; and painfully did he win, at last, the low and narrow door, at
+which stood a tall servitor, who admitted or rejected the applicants,
+according to his interest or caprice.
+
+"Is the Baron alone?" asked Adrian.
+
+"Why, no, my Lord:  a foreign signor is with him - but to you he is of
+course visible."
+
+"Well, you may admit me.  I would inquire of his health."
+
+The servitor opened the door - through whose aperture peered many a jealous
+and wistful eye - and consigned Adrian to the guidance of a page, who,
+older and of greater esteem than the loiterers in the ante-room, was the
+especial henchman of the Lord of the Castle.  Passing another, but empty
+chamber, vast and dreary, Adrian found himself in a small cabinet, and in
+the presence of his kinsman.
+
+Before a table, bearing the implements of writing, sate the old Colonna:  a
+robe of rich furs and velvet hung loose upon his tall and stately frame;
+from a round skull-cap, of comforting warmth and crimson hue, a few grey
+locks descended, and mixed with a long and reverent beard.  The countenance
+of the aged noble, who had long passed his eightieth year, still retained
+the traces of a comeliness for which in earlier manhood he was remarkable. 
+His eyes, if deep-sunken, were still keen and lively, and sparkled with all
+the fire of youth; his mouth curved upward in a pleasant, though half-
+satiric, smile; and his appearance on the whole was prepossessing and
+commanding, indicating rather the high blood, the shrewd wit, and the
+gallant valour of the patrician, than his craft, hypocrisy, and habitual
+but disdainful spirit of oppression.
+
+Stephen Colonna, without being absolutely a hero, was indeed far braver
+than most of the Romans, though he held fast to the Italian maxim - never
+to fight an enemy while it is possible to cheat him.  Two faults, however,
+marred the effect of his sagacity:  a supreme insolence of disposition, and
+a profound belief in the lights of his experience.  He was incapable of
+analogy.  What had never happened in his time, he was perfectly persuaded
+never could happen.  Thus, though generally esteemed an able diplomatist,
+he had the cunning of the intriguant, and not the providence of a
+statesman.  If, however, pride made him arrogant in prosperity, it
+supported him in misfortune.  And in the earlier vicissitudes of a life
+which had partly been consumed in exile, he had developed many noble
+qualities of fortitude, endurance, and real greatness of soul; which showed
+that his failings were rather acquired by circumstance than derived from
+nature.  His numerous and highborn race were proud of their chief; and with
+justice; for he was the ablest and most honoured, not only of the direct
+branch of the Colonna, but also, perhaps, of all the more powerful barons.
+
+Seated at the same table with Stephen Colonna was a man of noble presence,
+of about three or four and thirty years of age, in whom Adrian instantly
+recognised Walter de Montreal.  This celebrated knight was scarcely of the
+personal appearance which might have corresponded with the terror his name
+generally excited.  His face was handsome, almost to the extreme of
+womanish delicacy.  His fair hair waved long and freely over a white and
+unwrinkled forehead:  the life of a camp and the suns of Italy had but
+little embrowned his clear and healthful complexion, which retained much of
+the bloom of youth.  His features were aquiline and regular; his eyes, of a
+light hazel, were large, bright, and penetrating; and a short, but curled
+beard and moustachio, trimmed with soldier-like precision, and very little
+darker than the hair, gave indeed a martial expression to his comely
+countenance, but rather the expression which might have suited the hero of
+courts and tournaments, than the chief of a brigand's camp.  The aspect,
+manner, and bearing, of the Provencal were those which captivate rather
+than awe, - blending, as they did, a certain military frankness with the
+easy and graceful dignity of one conscious of gentle birth, and accustomed
+to mix, on equal terms, with the great and noble.  His form happily
+contrasted and elevated the character of a countenance which required
+strength and stature to free its uncommon beauty from the charge of
+effeminacy, being of great height and remarkable muscular power, without
+the least approach to clumsy and unwieldy bulk:  it erred, indeed, rather
+to the side of leanness than flesh, - at once robust and slender.  But the
+chief personal distinction of this warrior, the most redoubted lance of
+Italy, was an air and carriage of chivalric and heroic grace, greatly set
+off at this time by his splendid dress, which was of brown velvet sown with
+pearls, over which hung the surcoat worn by the Knights of the Hospital,
+whereon was wrought, in white, the eight-pointed cross that made the badge
+of his order.  The Knight's attitude was that of earnest conversation,
+bending slightly forward towards the Colonna, and resting both his hands -
+which (according to the usual distinction of the old Norman race, (Small
+hands and feet, however disproportioned to the rest of the person, were at
+that time deemed no less a distinction of the well-born, than they have
+been in a more refined age.  Many readers will remember the pain occasioned
+to Petrarch by his tight shoes.  The supposed beauty of this peculiarity is
+more derived from the feudal than the classic time.) from whom, though born
+in Provence, Montreal boasted his descent) were small and delicate, the
+fingers being covered with jewels, as was the fashion of the day - upon the
+golden hilt of an enormous sword, on the sheath of which was elaborately
+wrought the silver lilies that made the device of the Provencal Brotherhood
+of Jerusalem.
+
+"Good morrow, fair kinsman!" said Stephen.  "Seat thyself, I pray; and know
+in this knightly visitor the celebrated Sieur de Montreal."
+
+"Ah, my Lord," said Montreal, smiling, as he saluted Adrian; "and how is my
+lady at home?"
+
+"You mistake, Sir Knight," quoth Stephen; "my young kinsman is not yet
+married:  faith, as Pope Boniface remarked, when he lay stretched on a sick
+bed, and his confessor talked to him about Abraham's bosom, 'that is a
+pleasure the greater for being deferred.'"
+
+"The Signor will pardon my mistake," returned Montreal.
+
+"But not," said Adrian, "the neglect of Sir Walter in not ascertaining the
+fact in person.  My thanks to him, noble kinsman, are greater than you weet
+of; and he promised to visit me, that he might receive them at leisure."
+
+"I assure you, Signor," answered Montreal, "that I have not forgotten the
+invitation; but so weighty hitherto have been my affairs at Rome, that I
+have been obliged to parley with my impatience to better our acquaintance."
+
+"Oh, ye knew each other before?" said Stephen.  "And how?"
+
+"My Lord, there is a damsel in the case!" replied Montreal.  "Excuse my
+silence."
+
+"Ah, Adrian, Adrian! when will you learn my continence!" said Stephen,
+solemnly stroking his grey beard.  "What an example I set you!  But a truce
+to this light conversation, - let us resume our theme.  You must know,
+Adrian, that it is to the brave band of my guest I am indebted for those
+valiant gentlemen below, who keep Rome so quiet, though my poor habitation
+so noisy.  He has called to proffer more assistance, if need be; and to
+advise me on the affairs of Northern Italy.  Continue, I pray thee, Sir
+Knight; I have no disguises from my kinsman."
+
+"Thou seest," said Montreal, fixing his penetrating eyes on Adrian, "thou
+seest, doubtless, my Lord, that Italy at this moment presents to us a
+remarkable spectacle.  It is a contest between two opposing powers, which
+shall destroy the other.  The one power is that of the unruly and turbulent
+people - a power which they call 'Liberty;' the other power is that of the
+chiefs and princes - a power which they more appropriately call 'Order.' 
+Between these parties the cities of Italy are divided.  In Florence, in
+Genoa, in Pisa, for instance, is established a Free State - a Republic, God
+wot! and a more riotous, unhappy state of government, cannot well be
+imagined."
+
+"That is perfectly true," quoth Stephen; "they banished my own first cousin
+from Genoa."
+
+"A perpetual strife, in short," continued Montreal, "between the great
+families; an alternation of prosecutions, and confiscations, and
+banishments:  today, the Guelfs proscribe the Ghibellines - tomorrow, the
+Ghibellines drive out the Guelfs.  This may be liberty, but it is the
+liberty of the strong against the weak.  In the other cities, as Milan, as
+Verona, as Bologna, the people are under the rule of one man, - who calls
+himself a prince, and whom his enemies call a tyrant.  Having more force
+than any other citizen, he preserves a firm government; having more
+constant demand on his intellect and energies than the other citizens, he
+also preserves a wise one.  These two orders of government are enlisted
+against each other:  whenever the people in the one rebel against their
+prince, the people of the other - that is, the Free States - send arms and
+money to their assistance."
+
+"You hear, Adrian, how wicked those last are," quoth Stephen.
+
+"Now it seems to me," continued Montreal, "that this contest must end some
+time or other.  All Italy must become republican or monarchical.  It is
+easy to predict which will be the result."
+
+"Yes, Liberty must conquer in the end!" said Adrian, warmly.
+
+"Pardon me, young Lord; my opinion is entirely the reverse.  You perceive
+that these republics are commercial, - are traders; they esteem wealth,
+they despise valour, they cultivate all trades save that of the armourer. 
+Accordingly, how do they maintain themselves in war:  by their own
+citizens?  Not a whit of it!  Either they send to some foreign chief, and
+promise, if he grant them his protection, the principality of the city for
+five or ten years in return; or else they borrow from some hardy
+adventurer, like myself, as many troops as they can afford to pay for.  Is
+it not so, Lord Adrian?"
+
+Adrian nodded his reluctant assent.
+
+"Well, then, it is the fault of the foreign chief if he do not make his
+power permanent; as has been already done in States once free by the
+Visconti and the Scala:  or else it is the fault of the captain of the
+mercenaries if he do not convert his brigands into senators, and himself
+into a king.  These are events so natural, that one day or other they will
+occur throughout all Italy.  And all Italy will then become monarchical. 
+Now it seems to me the interest of all the powerful families - your own, at
+Rome, as that of the Visconti, at Milan - to expedite this epoch, and to
+check, while you yet may with ease, that rebellious contagion amongst the
+people which is now rapidly spreading, and which ends in the fever of
+licence to them, but in the corruption of death to you.  In these free
+States, the nobles are the first to suffer:  first your privileges, then
+your property, are swept away.  Nay, in Florence, as ye well know, my
+Lords, no noble is even capable of holding the meanest office in the
+State!"
+
+"Villains!" said Colonna, "they violate the first law of nature!"
+
+"At this moment," resumed Montreal, who, engrossed with his subject, little
+heeded the interruptions he received from the holy indignation of the
+Baron:  "at this moment, there are many - the wisest, perhaps, in the free
+States - who desire to renew the old Lombard leagues, in defence of their
+common freedom everywhere, and against whosoever shall aspire to be prince.
+Fortunately, the deadly jealousies between these merchant States - the base
+plebeian jealousies - more of trade than of glory - interpose at present an
+irresistible obstacle to this design; and Florence, the most stirring and
+the most esteemed of all, is happily so reduced by reverses of commerce as
+to be utterly unable to follow out so great an undertaking.  Now, then, is
+the time for us, my Lords; while these obstacles are so great for our foes,
+now is the time for us to form and cement a counter-league between all the
+princes of Italy.  To you, noble Stephen, I have come, as your rank
+demands, - alone, of all the barons of Rome, - to propose to you this
+honourable union.  Observe what advantages it proffers to your house.  The
+popes have abandoned Rome for ever; there is no counterpoise to your
+ambition, - there need be none to your power.  You see before you the
+examples of Visconti and Taddeo di Pepoli.  You may found in Rome, the
+first city of Italy, a supreme and uncontrolled principality, subjugate
+utterly your weaker rivals, - the Savelli, the Malatesta, the Orsini, - and
+leave to your sons' sons an hereditary kingdom that may aspire once more,
+perhaps, to the empire of the world."
+
+Stephen shaded his face with his hand as he answered:  "But this, noble
+Montreal, requires means: - money and men."
+
+"Of the last, you can command from me enow - my small company, the best
+disciplined, can (whenever I please) swell to the most numerous in Italy: 
+in the first, noble Baron, the rich House of Colonna cannot fail; and even
+a mortgage on its vast estates may be well repaid when you have possessed
+yourselves of the whole revenues of Rome.  You see," continued Montreal,
+turning to Adrian, in whose youth he expected a more warm ally than in the
+his hoary kinsman:  "you see, at a glance, how feasible is this project,
+and what a mighty field it opens to your House."
+
+"Sir Walter de Montreal," said Adrian, rising from his seat, and giving
+vent to the indignation he had with difficulty suppressed, "I grieve much
+that, beneath the roof of the first citizen of Rome, a stranger should
+attempt thus calmly, and without interruption, to excite the ambition of
+emulating the execrated celebrity of a Visconti or a Pepoli.  Speak, my
+Lord! (turning to Stephen) - speak, noble kinsman! and tell this Knight of
+Provence, that if by a Colonna the ancient grandeur of Rome cannot be
+restored, it shall not be, at least, by a Colonna that her last wrecks of
+liberty shall be swept away."
+
+"How now, Adrian! - how now, sweet kinsman!" said Stephen, thus suddenly
+appealed to, "calm thyself, I pr'ythee.  Noble Sir Walter, he is young -
+young, and hasty - he means not to offend thee."
+
+Of that I am persuaded," returned Montreal, coldly, but with great and
+courteous command of temper.  "He speaks from the impulse of the moment, -
+a praiseworthy fault in youth.  It was mine at his age, and many a time
+have I nearly lost my life for the rashness.  Nay, Signor, nay! - touch not
+your sword so meaningly, as if you fancied I intimated a threat; far from
+me such presumption.  I have learned sufficient caution, believe me, in the
+wars, not wantonly to draw against me a blade which I have seen wielded
+against such odds."
+
+Touched, despite himself, by the courtesy of the Knight, and the allusion
+to a scene in which, perhaps, his life had been preserved by Montreal,
+Adrian extended his hand to the latter.
+
+"I was to blame for my haste," said he, frankly; "but know, by my very
+heat," he added more gravely, "that your project will find no friends among
+the Colonna.  Nay, in the presence of my noble kinsman, I dare to tell you,
+that could even his high sanction lend itself to such a scheme, the best
+hearts of his house would desert him; and I myself, his kinsman, would man
+yonder castle against so unnatural an ambition!"
+
+A slight and scarce perceptible cloud passed over Montreal's countenance at
+these words; and he bit his lip ere he replied:
+
+"Yet if the Orsini be less scrupulous, their first exertion of power would
+be heard in the crashing house of the Colonna."
+
+Know you," returned Adrian, "that one of our mottoes is this haughty
+address to the Romans, - 'If we fall, ye fall also?'  And better that fate,
+than a rise upon the wrecks of our native city."
+
+"Well, well, well!" said Montreal, reseating himself, "I see that I must
+leave Rome to herself, - the League must thrive without her aid.  I did but
+jest, touching the Orsini, for they have not the power that would make
+their efforts safe.  Let us sweep, then, our past conference from our
+recollection.  It is the nineteenth, I think, Lord Colonna, on which you
+propose to repair to Corneto, with your friends and retainers, and on which
+you have invited my attendance?"
+
+"It is on that day, Sir Knight," replied the Baron, evidently much relieved
+by the turn the conversation had assumed.  "The fact is, that we have been
+so charged with indifference to the interests of the good people, that I
+strain a point in this expedition to contradict the assertion; and we
+propose, therefore, to escort and protect, against the robbers of the road,
+a convoy of corn to Corneto.  In truth, I may add another reason, besides
+fear of the robbers, that makes me desire as numerous a train as possible.
+I wish to show my enemies, and the people generally, the solid and growing
+power of my house; the display of such an armed band as I hope to levy,
+will be a magnificent occasion to strike awe into the riotous and
+refractory.  Adrian, you will collect your servitors, I trust, on that day;
+we would not be without you."
+
+"And as we ride along, fair Signor," said Montreal, inclining to Adrian,
+"we will find at least one subject on which we can agree:  all brave men
+and true knights have one common topic, - and its name is Woman.  You must
+make me acquainted with the names of the fairest dames of Rome; and we will
+discuss old adventures in the Parliament of Love, and hope for new.  By the
+way, I suppose, Lord Adrian, you, with the rest of your countrymen, are
+Petrarch-stricken?"
+
+"Do you not share our enthusiasm? slur not so your gallantry, I pray you."
+
+"Come, we must not again disagree; but, by my halidame, I think one
+troubadour roundel worth all that Petrarch ever wrote.  He has but borrowed
+from our knightly poesy, to disguise it, like a carpet coxcomb."
+
+"Well," said Adrian, gaily, "for every line of the troubadours that you
+quote, I will cite you another.  I will forgive you for injustice to
+Petrarch, if you are just to the troubadours."
+
+"Just!" cried Montreal, with real enthusiasm:  "I am of the land, nay the
+very blood of the troubadour!  But we grow too light for your noble
+kinsman; and it is time for me to bid you, for the present, farewell.  My
+Lord Colonna, peace be with you; farewell, Sir Adrian, - brother mine in
+knighthood, - remember your challenge."
+
+And with an easy and careless grace the Knight of St. John took his leave. 
+The old Baron, making a dumb sign of excuse to Adrian, followed Montreal
+into the adjoining room.
+
+"Sir Knight!" said he, "Sir Knight!" as he closed the door upon Adrian, and
+then drew Montreal to the recess of the casement, - "a word in your ear. 
+Think not I slight your offer, but these young men must be managed; the
+plot is great - noble, - grateful to my heart; but it requires time and
+caution.  I have many of my house, scrupulous as yon hot-skull, to win
+over; the way is pleasant, but must be sounded well and carefully; you
+understand?"
+
+From under his bent brows, Montreal darted one keen glance at Stephen, and
+then answered:
+
+"My friendship for you dictated my offer.  The League may stand without the
+Colonna, - beware a time when the Colonna cannot stand without the League.
+My Lord, look well around you; there are more freemen - ay, bold and
+stirring ones, too - in Rome, than you imagine.  Beware Rienzi!  Adieu, we
+meet soon again."
+
+Thus saying, Montreal departed, soliloquising as he passed with his
+careless step through the crowded ante-room:
+
+"I shall fail here! - these caitiff nobles have neither the courage to be
+great, nor the wisdom to be honest.  Let them fall! - I may find an
+adventurer from the people, an adventurer like myself, worth them all."
+
+No sooner had Stephen returned to Adrian than he flung his arms
+affectionately round his ward, who was preparing his pride for some sharp
+rebuke for his petulance.
+
+"Nobly feigned, - admirable, admirable!" cried the Baron; "you have learned
+the true art of a statesman at the Emperor's court.  I always thought you
+would - always said it.  You saw the dilemma I was in, thus taken by
+surprise by that barbarian's mad scheme; afraid to refuse, - more afraid to
+accept.  You extricated me with consummate address:  that passion, - so
+natural to your age, - was a famous feint; drew off the attack; gave me
+time to breathe; allowed me to play with the savage.  But we must not
+offend him, you know:  all my retainers would desert me, or sell me to the
+Orsini, or cut my throat, if he but held up his finger.  Oh! it was
+admirably managed, Adrian - admirably!"
+
+"Thank Heaven!" said Adrian, with some difficulty recovering the breath
+which his astonishment had taken away, "you do not think of embracing that
+black proposition?"
+
+"Think of it! no, indeed!" said Stephen, throwing himself back on his
+chair.  "Why, do you not know my age, boy?  Hard on my ninetieth year, I
+should be a fool indeed to throw myself into such a whirl of turbulence and
+agitation.  I want to keep what I have, not risk it by grasping more.  Am I
+not the beloved of the pope? shall I hazard his excommunication?  Am I not
+the most powerful of the nobles? should I be more if I were king?  At my
+age, to talk to me of such stuff! - the man's an idiot.  Besides," added
+the old man, sinking his voice, and looking fearfully round, "if I were a
+king, my sons might poison me for the succession.  They are good lads,
+Adrian, very!  But such a temptation! - I would not throw it in their way;
+these grey hairs have experience!  Tyrants don't die a natural death; no,
+no!  Plague on the Knight, say I; he has already cast me into a cold
+sweat."
+
+Adrian gazed on the working features of the old man, whose selfishness thus
+preserved him from crime.  He listened to his concluding words - full of
+the dark truth of the times; and as the high and pure ambition of Rienzi
+flashed upon him in contrast, he felt that he could not blame its fervour,
+or wonder at its excess.
+
+"And then, too," resumed the Baron, speaking more deliberately as he
+recovered his self-possession, "this man, by way of a warning, shows me, at
+a glance, his whole ignorance of the state.  What think you? he has mingled
+with the mob, and taken their rank breath for power; yes, he thinks words
+are soldiers, and bade me - me, Stephen Colonna - beware - of whom, think
+you?  No, you will never guess! - of that speech-maker, Rienzi! my own old
+jesting guest!  Ha! ha! ha! - the ignorance of these barbarians!  Ha! ha!
+ha! and the old man laughed till the tears ran down his cheeks.
+
+"Yet many of the nobles fear that same Rienzi," said Adrian, gravely.
+
+"Ah! let them, let them! - they have not our experience - our knowledge of
+the world, Adrian.  Tut, man, - when did declamation ever overthrow
+castles, and conquer soldiery?  I like Rienzi to harangue the mob about old
+Rome, and such stuff; it gives them something to think of and prate about,
+and so all their fierceness evaporates in words; they might burn a house if
+they did not hear a speech.  But, now I am on that score, I must own the
+pedant has grown impudent in his new office; here, here, - I received this
+paper ere I rose today.  I hear a similar insolence has been shown to all
+the nobles.  Read it, will you," and the Colonna put a scroll into his
+kinsman's hand.
+
+"I have received the like," said Adrian, glancing at it.  "It is a request
+of Rienzi's to attend at the Church of St. John of Lateran, to hear
+explained the inscription on a Table just discovered.  It bears, he saith,
+the most intimate connexion with the welfare and state of Rome."
+
+"Very entertaining, I dare to say, to professors and bookmen.  Pardon me,
+kinsman; I forgot your taste for these things; and my son, Gianni, too,
+shares your fantasy.  Well, well! it is innocent enough!  Go - the man
+talks well."
+
+"Will you not attend, too?"
+
+"I - my dear boy - I!" said the old Colonna, opening his eyes in such
+astonishment that Adrian could not help laughing at the simplicity of his
+own question.
+
+
+Chapter 2.II.  The Interview, and the Doubt.
+
+As Adrian turned from the palace of his guardian, and bent his way in the
+direction of the Forum, he came somewhat unexpectedly upon Raimond, bishop
+of Orvietto, who, mounted upon a low palfrey, and accompanied by some three
+or four of his waiting-men, halted abruptly when he recognised the young
+noble.
+
+"Ah, my son! it is seldom that I see thee:  how fares it with thee? - well? 
+So, so!  I rejoice to hear it.  Alas! what a state of society is ours, when
+compared to the tranquil pleasures of Avignon!  There, all men who, like
+us, are fond of the same pursuits, the same studies, deliciae musarum, hum!
+hum! (the Bishop was proud of an occasional quotation, right or wrong), are
+brought easily and naturally together.  But here we scarcely dare stir out
+of our houses, save upon great occasions.  But, talking of great occasions,
+and the Muses, reminds me of our good Rienzi's invitation to the Lateran: 
+of course you will attend; 'tis a mighty knotty piece of Latin he proposes
+to solve - so I hear, at least; very interesting to us, my son, - very!"
+
+"It is tomorrow," answered Adrian.  "Yes, assuredly; I will be there."
+
+"And, harkye, my son," said the Bishop, resting his hand affectionately on
+Adrian's shoulder, "I have reason to hope that he will remind our poor
+citizens of the Jubilee for the year Fifty, and stir them towards clearing
+the road of the brigands:  a necessary injunction, and one to be heeded
+timeously; for who will come here for absolution when he stands a chance of
+rushing unannealed upon purgatory by the way?  You have heard Rienzi, - ay?
+quite a Cicero - quite!  Well, Heaven bless you, my son!  You will not
+fail?"
+
+"Nay, not I."
+
+"Yet, stay - a word with you:  just suggest to all whom you may meet the
+advisability of a full meeting; it looks well for the city to show respect
+to letters."
+
+"To say nothing of the Jubilee," added Adrian, smiling.
+
+"Ah, to say nothing of the Jubilee - very good!  Adieu for the present!" 
+And the Bishop, resettling himself on his saddle, ambled solemnly on to
+visit his various friends, and press them to the meeting.
+
+Meanwhile, Adrian continued his course till he had passed the Capitol, the
+Arch of Severus, the crumbling columns of the fane of Jupiter, and found
+himself amidst the long grass, the whispering reeds, and the neglected
+vines, that wave over the now-vanished pomp of the Golden House of Nero. 
+Seating himself on a fallen pillar - by that spot where the traveller
+descends to the (so called) Baths of Livia - he looked impatiently to the
+sun, as to blame it for the slowness of its march.
+
+Not long, however, had he to wait before a light step was heard crushing
+the fragrant grass; and presently through the arching vines gleamed a face
+that might well have seemed the nymph, the goddess of the scene.
+
+"My beautiful! my Irene! - how shall I thank thee!"
+
+It was long before the delighted lover suffered himself to observe upon
+Irene's face a sadness that did not usually cloud it in his presence.  Her
+voice, too, trembled; her words seemed constrained and cold.
+
+"Have I offended thee?" he asked; "or what less misfortune hath occurred?"
+
+Irene raised her eyes to her lover's, and said, looking at him earnestly,
+"Tell me, my Lord, in sober and simple truth, tell me, would it grieve thee
+much were this to be our last meeting?"
+
+Paler than the marble at his feet grew the dark cheek of Adrian.  It was
+some moments ere he could reply, and he did so then with a forced smile and
+a quivering lip.
+
+"Jest not so, Irene!  Last! - that is not a word for us!"
+
+"But hear me, my Lord - "
+
+"Why so cold? - call me Adrian! - friend! - lover! or be dumb!"
+
+"Well, then, my soul's soul! my all of hope! my life's life!" exclaimed
+Irene, passionately, "hear me!  I fear that we stand at this moment upon
+some gulf whose depth I see not, but which may divide us for ever!  Thou
+knowest the real nature of my brother, and dost not misread him as many do.
+Long has he planned, and schemed, and communed with himself, and, feeling
+his way amidst the people, prepared the path to some great design.  But now
+- (thou wilt not betray - thou wilt not injure him? - he is thy friend!)"
+
+"And thy brother!  I would give my life for his!  Say on!"
+
+"But now, then," resumed Irene, "the time for that enterprise, whatever it
+be, is coming fast.  I know not of its exact nature, but I know that it is
+against the nobles - against thy order - against thy house itself!  If it
+succeed - oh, Adrian! thou thyself mayst not be free from danger; and my
+name, at least, will be coupled with the name of thy foes.  If it fail, -
+my brother, my bold brother, is swept away!  He will fall a victim to
+revenge or justice, call it as you will.  Your kinsman may be his judge -
+his executioner; and I - even if I should yet live to mourn over the boast
+and glory of my humble line - could I permit myself to love, to see, one in
+whose veins flowed the blood of his destroyer?  Oh!  I am wretched -
+wretched! these thoughts make me well-nigh mad!" and, wringing her hands
+bitterly, Irene sobbed aloud.
+
+Adrian himself was struck forcibly by the picture thus presented to him,
+although the alternative it embraced had often before forced itself dimly
+on his mind.  It was true, however, that, not seeing the schemes of Rienzi
+backed by any physical power, and never yet having witnessed the mighty
+force of a moral revolution, he did not conceive that any rise to which he
+might instigate the people could be permanently successful:  and, as for
+his punishment, in that city, where all justice was the slave of interest,
+Adrian knew himself powerful enough to obtain forgiveness even for the
+greatest of all crimes - armed insurrection against the nobles.  As these
+thoughts recurred to him, he gained the courage to console and cheer Irene. 
+But his efforts were only partially successful.  Awakened by her fears to
+that consideration of the future which hitherto she had forgotten, Irene,
+for the first time, seemed deaf to the charmer's voice.
+
+"Alas!" said she, sadly, "even at the best, what can this love, that we
+have so blindly encouraged - what can it end in?  Thou must not wed with
+one like me; and I! how foolish I have been!"
+
+"Recall thy senses then, Irene," said Adrian, proudly, partly perhaps in
+anger, partly in his experience of the sex.  "Love another, and more
+wisely, if thou wilt; cancel thy vows with me, and continue to think it a
+crime to love, and a folly to be true!"
+
+"Cruel!" said Irene, falteringly, and in her turn alarmed.  "Dost thou
+speak in earnest?"
+
+"Tell me, ere I answer you, tell me this:  come death, come anguish, come a
+whole life of sorrow, as the end of this love, wouldst thou yet repent that
+thou hast loved?  If so, thou knowest not the love that I feel for thee."
+
+"Never! never can I repent!" said Irene, falling upon Adrian's neck;
+"forgive me!"
+
+"But is there, in truth," said Adrian, a little while after this lover-like
+quarrel and reconciliation, "is there, in truth, so marked a difference
+between thy brother's past and his present bearing?  How knowest thou that
+the time for action is so near?"
+
+"Because now he sits closeted whole nights with all ranks of men; he shuts
+up his books, - he reads no more, - but, when alone, walks to and fro his
+chamber, muttering to himself.  Sometimes he pauses before the calendar,
+which of late he has fixed with his own hand against the wall, and passes
+his finger over the letters, till he comes to some chosen date, and then he
+plays with his sword and smiles.  But two nights since, arms, too, in great
+number were brought to the house; and I heard the chief of the men who
+brought them, a grim giant, known well amongst the people, say, as he wiped
+his brow, - 'These will see work soon!'"
+
+"Arms!  Are you sure of that?" said Adrian, anxiously.  "Nay, then, there
+is more in these schemes than I imagined!  But (observing Irene's gaze bent
+fearfully on him as his voice changed, he added, more gaily) - but come
+what may, believe me - my beautiful! my adored! that while I live, thy
+brother shall not suffer from the wrath he may provoke, - nor I, though he
+forget our ancient friendship, cease to love thee less."
+
+"Signora! Signora! child! it is time! we must go!" said the shrill voice of
+Benedetta, now peering through the foliage.  "The working men pass home
+this way; I see them approaching."
+
+The lovers parted; for the first time the serpent had penetrated into their
+Eden, - they had conversed, they had thought, of other things than Love.
+
+
+Chapter 2.III.  The Situation of a Popular Patrician in Times of Popular
+Discontent. - Scene of the Lateran.
+
+The situation of a Patrician who honestly loves the people is, in those
+evil times, when power oppresses and freedom struggles, - when the two
+divisions of men are wrestling against each other, - the most irksome and
+perplexing that destiny can possibly contrive.  Shall he take part with the
+nobles? - he betrays his conscience!  With the people? - he deserts his
+friends!  But that consequence of the last alternative is not the sole -
+nor, perhaps, to a strong mind, the most severe.  All men are swayed and
+chained by public opinion - it is the public judge; but public opinion is
+not the same for all ranks.  The public opinion that excites or deters the
+plebeian, is the opinion of the plebeians, - of those whom he sees, and
+meets, and knows; of those with whom he is brought in contact, - those with
+whom he has mixed from childhood, - those whose praises are daily heard, -
+whose censure frowns upon him with every hour.  (It is the same in still
+smaller divisions. The public opinion for lawyers is that of lawyers; of
+soldiers, that of the army; of scholars, it is that of men of literature
+and science.  And to the susceptible amongst the latter, the hostile
+criticism of learning has been more stinging than the severest moral
+censures of the vulgar.  Many a man has done a great act, or composed a
+great work, solely to please the two or three persons constantly present to
+him.  Their voice was his public opinion.  The public opinion that operated
+on Bishop, the murderer, was the opinion of the Burkers, his comrades.  Did
+that condemn him?  No!  He knew no other public opinion till he came to be
+hanged, and caught the loathing eyes, and heard the hissing execrations of
+the crowd below his gibbet.)  So, also, the public opinion of the great is
+the opinion of their equals, - of those whom birth and accident cast for
+ever in their way.  This distinction is full of important practical
+deductions; it is one which, more than most maxims, should never be
+forgotten by a politician who desires to be profound.  It is, then, an
+ordeal terrible to pass - which few plebeians ever pass, which it is
+therefore unjust to expect patricians to cross unfaulteringly - the ordeal
+of opposing the public opinion which exists for them.  They cannot help
+doubting their own judgment, - they cannot help thinking the voice of
+wisdom or of virtue speaks in those sounds which have been deemed oracles
+from their cradle.  In the tribunal of Sectarian Prejudice they imagine
+they recognise the court of the Universal Conscience.  Another powerful
+antidote to the activity of a patrician so placed, is in the certainty that
+to the last the motives of such activity will be alike misconstrued by the
+aristocracy he deserts and the people he joins.  It seems so unnatural in a
+man to fly in the face of his own order, that the world is willing to
+suppose any clue to the mystery save that of honest conviction or lofty
+patriotism.  "Ambition!" says one.  "Disappointment!" cries another.  "Some
+private grudge!" hints a third.  "Mob-courting vanity!" sneers a fourth. 
+The people admire at first, but suspect afterwards.  The moment he thwarts
+a popular wish, there is no redemption for him:  he is accused of having
+acted the hypocrite, - of having worn the sheep's fleece:  and now, say
+they, - "See! the wolf's teeth peep out!"  Is he familiar with the people?
+- it is cajolery!  Is he distant? - it is pride!  What, then, sustains a
+man in such a situation, following his own conscience, with his eyes opened
+to all the perils of the path?  Away with the cant of public opinion, -
+away with the poor delusion of posthumous justice; he will offend the
+first, he will never obtain the last.  What sustains him?  HIS OWN SOUL!  A
+man thoroughly great has a certain contempt for his kind while he aids
+them:  their weal or woe are all; their applause - their blame - are
+nothing to him.  He walks forth from the circle of birth and habit; he is
+deaf to the little motives of little men.  High, through the widest space
+his orbit may describe, he holds on his course to guide or to enlighten;
+but the noises below reach him not!  Until the wheel is broken, - until the
+dark void swallow up the star, - it makes melody, night and day, to its own
+ear:  thirsting for no sound from the earth it illumines, anxious for no
+companionship in the path through which it rolls, conscious of its own
+glory, and contented, therefore, to be alone!
+
+But minds of this order are rare.  All ages cannot produce them.  They are
+exceptions to the ordinary and human virtue, which is influenced and
+regulated by external circumstance.  At a time when even to be merely
+susceptible to the voice of fame was a great pre-eminence in moral energies
+over the rest of mankind, it would be impossible that any one should ever
+have formed the conception of that more refined and metaphysical sentiment,
+that purer excitement to high deeds - that glory in one's own heart, which
+is so immeasurably above the desire of a renown that lackeys the heels of
+others.  In fact, before we can dispense with the world, we must, by a long
+and severe novitiate - by the probation of much thought, and much sorrow -
+by deep and sad conviction of the vanity of all that the world can give us,
+have raised our selves - not in the fervour of an hour, but habitually -
+above the world:  an abstraction - an idealism - which, in our wiser age,
+how few even of the wisest, can attain!  Yet, till we are thus fortunate,
+we know not the true divinity of contemplation, nor the all-sufficing
+mightiness of conscience; nor can we retreat with solemn footsteps into
+that Holy of Holies in our own souls, wherein we know, and feel, how much
+our nature is capable of the self-existence of a God!
+
+But to return to the things and thoughts of earth.  Those considerations,
+and those links of circumstance, which, in a similar situation have changed
+so many honest and courageous minds, changed also the mind of Adrian.  He
+felt in a false position.  His reason and conscience shared in the schemes
+of Rienzi, and his natural hardihood and love of enterprise would have led
+him actively to share the danger of their execution.  But this, all his
+associations, his friendships, his private and household ties, loudly
+forbade.  Against his order, against his house, against the companions of
+his youth, how could he plot secretly, or act sternly?  By the goal to
+which he was impelled by patriotism, stood hypocrisy and ingratitude.  Who
+would believe him the honest champion of his country who was a traitor to
+his friends?  Thus, indeed, 
+
+"The native hue of resolution
+ Was sicklied o'er with the pale cast of thought!"
+
+And he who should have been by nature a leader of the time became only its
+spectator.  Yet Adrian endeavoured to console himself for his present
+passiveness in a conviction of the policy of his conduct.  He who takes no
+share in the commencement of civil revolutions, can often become, with the
+most effect, a mediator between the passions and the parties subsequently
+formed.  Perhaps, under Adrian's circumstances, delay was really the part
+of a prudent statesman; the very position which cripples at the first,
+often gives authority before the end.  Clear from the excesses, and saved
+from the jealousies, of rival factions, all men are willing to look with
+complaisance and respect to a new actor in a turbulent drama; his
+moderation may make him trusted by the people; his rank enable him to be a
+fitting mediator with the nobles; and thus the qualities that would have
+rendered him a martyr at one period of the Revolution, raise him perhaps
+into a saviour at another.
+
+Silent, therefore, and passive, Adrian waited the progress of events.  If
+the projects of Rienzi failed, he might, by that in activity, the better
+preserve the people from new chains, and their champion from death.  If
+those projects succeeded, he might equally save his house from the popular
+wrath - and, advocating liberty, check disorder.  Such, at least, were his
+hopes; and thus did the Italian sagacity and caution of his character
+control and pacify the enthusiasm of youth and courage.
+
+The sun shone, calm and cloudless, upon the vast concourse gathered before
+the broad space that surrounds the Church of St. John of Lateran.  Partly
+by curiosity - partly by the desire of the Bishop of Orvietto - partly
+because it was an occasion in which they could display the pomp of their
+retinues - many of the principal Barons of Rome had gathered to this spot.
+
+On one of the steps ascending to the church, with his mantle folded round
+him, stood Walter de Montreal, gazing on the various parties that, one
+after another, swept through the lane which the soldiers of the Church
+preserved unimpeded, in the middle of the crowd, for the access of the
+principal nobles.  He watched with interest, though with his usual
+carelessness of air and roving glance, the different marks and looks of
+welcome given by the populace to the different personages of note.  Banners
+and penons preceded each Signor, and, as they waved aloft, the witticisms
+or nicknames - the brief words of praise or censure, that imply so much -
+which passed to and fro among that lively crowd, were treasured carefully
+in his recollection.
+
+"Make way, there! - way for my Lord Martino Orsini - Baron di Porto!"
+
+"Peace, minion! - draw back! way for the Signor Adrian Colonna, Baron di
+Castello, and Knight of the Empire."
+
+And at those two rival shouts, you saw waving on high the golden bear of
+the Orsini, with the motto - "Beware my embrace!" and the solitary column
+on an azure ground, of the Colonna, with Adrian's especial device - "Sad,
+but strong."  The train of Martino Orsini was much more numerous than that
+of Adrian, which last consisted but of ten servitors.  But Adrian's men
+attracted far greater admiration amongst the crowd, and pleased more the
+experienced eye of the warlike Knight of St. John.  Their arms were
+polished like mirrors; their height was to an inch the same; their march
+was regular and sedate; their mien erect; they looked neither to the right
+nor left; they betrayed that ineffable discipline - that harmony of order -
+which Adrian had learned to impart to his men during his own apprenticeship
+of arms.  But the disorderly train of the Lord of Porto was composed of men
+of all heights.  Their arms were ill-polished and ill-fashioned, and they
+pressed confusedly on each other; they laughed and spoke aloud; and in
+their mien and bearing expressed all the insolence of men who despised
+alike the master they served and the people they awed.  The two bands
+coming unexpectedly on each other through this narrow defile, the jealousy
+of the two houses presently declared itself.  Each pressed forward for the
+precedence; and, as the quiet regularity of Adrian's train, and even its
+compact paucity of numbers, enabled it to pass before the servitors of his
+rival, the populace set up a loud shout - "A Colonna for ever!" - "Let the
+Bear dance after the Column!"
+
+"On, ye knaves!" said Orsini aloud to his men.  "How have ye suffered this
+affront?"  And passing himself to the head of his men, he would have
+advanced through the midst of his rival's train, had not a tall guard, in
+the Pope's livery, placed his baton in the way.
+
+"Pardon, my Lord! we have the Vicar's express commands to suffer no
+struggling of the different trains one with another."
+
+"Knave! dost thou bandy words with me?" said the fierce Orsini; and with
+his sword he clove the baton in two.
+
+"In the Vicar's name, I command you to fall back!" said the sturdy guard,
+now placing his huge bulk in the very front of the noble's path.
+
+"It is Cecco del Vecchio!" cried those of the populace, who were near
+enough to perceive the interruption and its cause.
+
+"Ay," said one, "the good Vicar has put many of the stoutest fellows in the
+Pope's livery, in order the better to keep peace.  He could have chosen
+none better than Cecco."
+
+"But he must not fall!" cried another, as Orsini, glaring on the smith,
+drew back his sword as if to plunge it through his bosom.
+
+"Shame - shame! shall the Pope be thus insulted in his own city?" cried
+several voices.  "Down with the sacrilegious - down!"  And, as if by a
+preconcerted plan, a whole body of the mob broke at once through the lane,
+and swept like a torrent over Orsini and his jostled and ill-assorted
+train.  Orsini himself was thrown on the ground with violence, and trampled
+upon by a hundred footsteps; his men, huddled and struggling as much
+against themselves as against the mob, were scattered and overset; and
+when, by a great effort of the guards, headed by the smith himself, order
+was again restored, and the line reformed, Orsini, well nigh choked with
+his rage and humiliation, and greatly bruised by the rude assaults he had
+received, could scarcely stir from the ground.  The officers of the Pope
+raised him, and, when he was on his legs, he looked wildly around for his
+sword, which, falling from his hand, had been kicked amongst the crowd, and
+seeing it not, he said, between his ground teeth, to Cecco del Vecchio -
+
+"Fellow, thy neck shall answer this outrage, or may God desert me!" and
+passed along through the space; while a half-suppressed and exultant hoot
+from the bystanders followed his path.
+
+"Way there!" cried the smith, "for the Lord Martino di Porto, and may all
+the people know that he has threatened to take my life for the discharge of
+my duty in obedience to the Pope's Vicar!"
+
+"He dare not!" shouted out a thousand voices; "the people can protect their
+own!"
+
+This scene had not been lost on the Provencal, who well knew how to
+construe the wind by the direction of straws, and saw at once, by the
+boldness of the populace, that they themselves were conscious of a coming
+tempest.  "Par Dieu," said he, as he saluted Adrian, who, gravely, and
+without looking behind, had now won the steps of the church, "yon tall
+fellow has a brave heart, and many friends, too.  What think you," he
+added, in a low whisper, "is not this scene a proof that the nobles are
+less safe than they wot of?"
+
+"The beast begins to kick against the spur, Sir Knight," answered Adrian, "
+a wise horseman should, in such a case, take care how he pull the rein too
+tight, lest the beast should rear, and he be overthrown - yet that is the
+policy thou wouldst recommend."
+
+"You mistake," returned Montreal, "my wish was to give Rome one sovereign
+instead of many tyrants, - but hark! what means that bell?"
+
+"The ceremony is about to begin," answered Adrian.  "Shall we enter the
+church together?"
+
+Seldom had a temple consecrated to God witnessed so singular a spectacle as
+that which now animated the solemn space of the Lateran.
+
+In the centre of the church, seats were raised in an amphitheatre, at the
+far end of which was a scaffolding, a little higher than the rest; below
+this spot, but high enough to be in sight of all the concourse, was placed
+a vast table of iron, on which was graven an ancient inscription, and
+bearing in its centre a clear and prominent device, presently to be
+explained.
+
+The seats were covered with cloth and rich tapestry.  In the rear of the
+church was drawn a purple curtain.  Around the amphitheatre were the
+officers of the Church, in the party-coloured liveries of the Pope.  To the
+right of the scaffold sate Raimond, Bishop of Orvietto, in his robes of
+state.  On the benches round him you saw all the marked personages of Rome
+- the judges, the men of letters, the nobles, from the lofty rank of the
+Savelli to the inferior grade of a Raselli.  The space beyond the
+amphitheatre was filled with the people, who now poured fast in, stream
+after stream:  all the while rang, clear and loud, the great bell of the
+church.
+
+At length, as Adrian and Montreal seated themselves at a little distance
+from Raimond, the bell suddenly ceased - the murmurs of the people were
+stilled - the purple curtain was withdrawn, and Rienzi came forth with slow
+and majestic steps.  He came - but not in his usual sombre and plain
+attire.  Over his broad breast he wore a vest of dazzling whiteness - a
+long robe, in the ample fashion of the toga, descended to his feet and
+swept the floor.  On his head he wore a fold of white cloth, in the centre
+of which shone a golden crown.  But the crown was divided, or cloven, as it
+were, by the mystic ornament of a silver sword, which, attracting the
+universal attention, testified at once that this strange garb was worn, not
+from the vanity of display, but for the sake of presenting to the concourse
+- in the person of the citizen - a type and emblem of that state of the
+city on which he was about to descant.
+
+"Faith," whispered one of the old nobles to his neighbour, "the plebeian
+assumes it bravely."
+
+"It will be rare sport," said a second.  "I trust the good man will put
+some jests in his discourse."
+
+"What showman's tricks are these?" said a third.
+
+"He is certainly crazed!" said a fourth.
+
+"How handsome he is!" said the women, mixed with the populace.
+
+"This is a man who has learned the people by heart," observed Montreal to
+Adrian.  "He knows he must speak to the eye, in order to win the mind:  a
+knave, - a wise knave!"
+
+And now Rienzi had ascended the scaffold; and as he looked long and
+steadfastly around the meeting, the high and thoughtful repose of his
+majestic countenance, its deep and solemn gravity, hushed all the murmurs,
+and made its effect equally felt by the sneering nobles as the impatient
+populace.
+
+"Signors of Rome," said he, at length, "and ye, friends, and citizens, you
+have heard why we are met together this day; and you, my Lord Bishop of
+Orvietto, - and ye, fellow labourers with me in the field of letters, - ye,
+too, are aware that it is upon some matter relative to that ancient Rome,
+the rise and the decline of whose past power and glories we have spent our
+youth in endeavouring to comprehend.  But this, believe me, is no vain
+enigma of erudition, useful but to the studious, - referring but to the
+dead.  Let the Past perish! - let darkness shroud it! - let it sleep for
+ever over the crumbling temples and desolate tombs of its forgotten sons, -
+if it cannot afford us, from its disburied secrets, a guide for the Present
+and the Future.  What, my Lords, ye have thought that it was for the sake
+of antiquity alone that we have wasted our nights and days in studying what
+antiquity can teach us!  You are mistaken; it is nothing to know what we
+have been, unless it is with the desire of knowing that which we ought to
+be.  Our ancestors are mere dust and ashes, save when they speak to our
+posterity; and then their voices resound, not from the earth below, but the
+heaven above.  There is an eloquence in Memory, because it is the nurse of
+Hope.  There is a sanctity in the Past, but only because of the chronicles
+it retains, - chronicles of the progress of mankind, - stepping-stones in
+civilisation, in liberty, and in knowledge.  Our fathers forbid us to
+recede, - they teach us what is our rightful heritage, - they bid us
+reclaim, they bid us augment, that heritage, - preserve their virtues, and
+avoid their errors.  These are the true uses of the Past.  Like the sacred
+edifice in which we are, - it is a tomb upon which to rear a temple.  I see
+that you marvel at this long beginning; ye look to each other - ye ask to
+what it tends.  Behold this broad plate of iron; upon it is graven an
+inscription but lately disinterred from the heaps of stone and ruin, which
+- O shame to Rome! - were once the palaces of empire, and the arches of
+triumphant power.  The device in the centre of the table, which you behold,
+conveys the act of the Roman Senators, - who are conferring upon Vespasian
+the imperial authority.  It is this inscription which I have invited you to
+hear read!  It specifies the very terms and limits of the authority thus
+conferred.  To the Emperor was confided the power of making laws and
+alliances with whatsoever nation, - of increasing, or of diminishing the
+limits of towns and districts, - of - mark this, my Lords! - exalting men
+to the rank of dukes and kings, - ay, and of deposing and degrading them; -
+of making cities, and of unmaking:  in short, of all the attributes of
+imperial power.  Yes, to that Emperor was confided this vast authority;
+but, by whom?  Heed - listen, I pray you - let not a word be lost; - by
+whom, I say?  By the Roman Senate!  What was the Roman Senate?  The
+Representative of the Roman People!"
+
+"I knew he would come to that!" said the smith, who stood at the door with
+his fellows, but to whose ear, clear and distinct, rolled the silver voice
+of Rienzi.
+
+"Brave fellow! and this, too, in the hearing of the Lords!"
+
+"Ay, you see what the people were! and we should never have known this but
+for him."
+
+"Peace, fellows;" said the officer to those of the crowd, from whom came
+these whispered sentences.
+
+Rienzi continued. - "Yes, it is the people who intrusted this power - to
+the people, therefore, it belongs!  Did the haughty Emperor arrogate the
+crown?  Could he assume the authority of himself?  Was it born with him? 
+Did he derive it, my Lord Barons, from the possession of towered castles -
+of lofty lineage?  No! all-powerful as he was, he had no right to one atom
+of that power, save from the voice and trust of the Roman people.  Such, O
+my countrymen! such was even that day, when Liberty was but the shadow of
+her former self, - such was the acknowledged prerogative of your fathers! 
+All power was the gift of the people.  What have ye to give now?  Who, who,
+I say, - what single person, what petty chief, asks you for the authority
+he assumes?  His senate is his sword; his chart of license is written, not
+with ink, but blood.  The people! - there is no people!  Oh! would to God
+that we might disentomb the spirit of the Past as easily as her records!"
+
+"If I were your kinsman," whispered Montreal to Adrian, "I would give this
+man short breathing-time between his peroration and confession."
+
+"What is your Emperor?" continued Rienzi; "a stranger!  What the great head
+of your Church? - an exile!  Ye are without your lawful chiefs; and why? 
+Because ye are not without your law-defying tyrants!  The licence of your
+nobles, their discords, their dissensions, have driven our Holy Father from
+the heritage of St. Peter; - they have bathed your streets in your own
+blood; they have wasted the wealth of your labours on private quarrels and
+the maintenance of hireling ruffians!  Your forces are exhausted against
+yourselves.  You have made a mockery of your country, once the mistress of
+the world.  You have steeped her lips in gall - ye have set a crown of
+thorns upon her head!  What, my Lords!" cried he, turning sharply round
+towards the Savelli and Orsini, who, endeavouring to shake off the thrill
+which the fiery eloquence of Rienzi had stricken to their hearts, now, by
+contemptuous gestures and scornful smiles, testified the displeasure they
+did not dare loudly to utter in the presence of the Vicar and the people. -
+"What! even while I speak - not the sanctity of this place restrains you! 
+I am an humble man - a citizen of Rome; - but I have this distinction:  I
+have raised against myself many foes and scoffers for that which I have
+done for Rome.  I am hated, because I love my country; I am despised,
+because I would exalt her.  I retaliate - I shall be avenged.  Three
+traitors in your own palaces shall betray you:  their names are - Luxury,
+Envy, and Dissension!"
+
+"There he had them on the hip!"
+
+"Ha, ha! by the Holy Cross, that was good!"
+
+"I would go to the hangman for such another keen stroke as that!"
+
+"It is a shame if we are cowards, when one man is thus brave," said the
+smith.
+
+"This is the man we have always wanted!"
+
+"Silence!" proclaimed the officer.
+
+"O Romans!" resumed Rienzi, passionately - "awake!  I conjure you!  Let
+this memorial of your former power - your ancient liberties - sink deep
+into your souls.  In a propitious hour, if ye seize it, - in an evil one,
+if ye suffer the golden opportunity to escape, - has this record of the
+past been unfolded to your eyes.  Recollect that the Jubilee approaches."
+
+The Bishop of Orvietto smiled, and bowed approvingly; the people, the
+citizens, the inferior nobles, noted well those signs of encouragement;
+and, to their minds, the Pope himself, in the person of his Vicar, looked
+benignly on the daring of Rienzi.
+
+"The Jubilee approaches, - the eyes of all Christendom will be directed
+hither.  Here, where, from all quarters of the globe, men come for peace,
+shall they find discord? - seeking absolution, shall they perceive but
+crime?  In the centre of God's dominion, shall they weep at your weakness?
+- in the seat of the martyred saints, shall they shudder at your vices? -
+in the fountain and source of Christ's law, shall they find all law
+unknown?  You were the glory of the world - will you be its by-word?  You
+were its example - will you be its warning?  Rise, while it is yet time! -
+clear your roads from the bandits that infest them! - your walls from the
+hirelings that they harbour!  Banish these civil discords, or the men - how
+proud, how great, soever - who maintain them!  Pluck the scales from the
+hand of Fraud! - the sword from the hand of Violence! - the balance and the
+sword are the ancient attributes of Justice! - restore them to her again! 
+This be your high task, - these be your great ends!  Deem any man who
+opposes them a traitor to his country.  Gain a victory greater than those
+of the Caesars - a victory over yourselves!  Let the pilgrims of the world
+behold the resurrection of Rome!  Make one epoch of the Jubilee of Religion
+and the Restoration of Law!  Lay the sacrifice of your vanquished passions
+- the first-fruits of your renovated liberties - upon the very altar that
+these walls contain! and never! oh, never! since the world began, shall men
+have made a more grateful offering to their God!"
+
+So intense was the sensation these words created in the audience - so
+breathless and overpowered did they leave the souls with they took by storm
+- that Rienzi had descended the scaffold, and already disappeared behind
+the curtain from which he had emerged, ere the crowd were fully aware that
+he had ceased. 
+
+The singularity of this sudden apparition - robed in mysterious splendour,
+and vanishing the moment its errand was fulfilled - gave additional effect
+to the words it had uttered.  The whole character of that bold address
+became invested with a something preternatural and inspired; to the minds
+of the vulgar, the mortal was converted into the oracle; and, marvelling at
+the unhesitating courage with which their idol had rebuked and conjured the
+haughty barons, - each of whom they regarded in the light of sanctioned
+executioners, whose anger could be made manifest at once by the gibbet or
+the axe, - the people could not but superstitiously imagine that nothing
+less than authority from above could have gifted their leader with such
+hardihood, and preserved him from the danger it incurred.  In fact, it was
+in this very courage of Rienzi that his safety consisted; he was placed in
+those circumstances where audacity is prudence.  Had he been less bold, the
+nobles would have been more severe; but so great a license of speech in an
+officer of the Holy See, they naturally imagined, was not unauthorised by
+the assent of the Pope, as well as by the approbation of the people.  Those
+who did not (like Stephen Colonna) despise words as wind, shrank back from
+the task of punishing one whose voice might be the mere echo of the wishes
+of the pontiff.  The dissensions of the nobles among each other, were no
+less favourable to Rienzi.  He attacked a body, the members of which had no
+union.
+
+"It is not my duty to slay him!" said one.
+
+"I am not the representative of the barons!" said another.
+
+"If Stephen Colonna heeds him not, it would be absurd, as well as
+dangerous, in a meaner man to make himself the champion of the order!" said
+a third.
+
+The Colonna smiled approval, when Rienzi denounced an Orsini - an Orsini
+laughed aloud, when the eloquence burst over a Colonna.  The lesser nobles
+were well pleased to hear attacks upon both:  while, on the other hand, the
+Bishop, by the long impunity of Rienzi, had taken courage to sanction the
+conduct of his fellow-officer.  He affected, indeed, at times, to blame the
+excess of his fervour, but it was always accompanied by the praises of his
+honesty; and the approbation of the Pope's Vicar confirmed the impression
+of the nobles as to the approbation of the Pope.  Thus, from the very
+rashness of his enthusiasm had grown his security and success.
+
+Still, however, when the barons had a little recovered from the stupor into
+which Rienzi had cast them, they looked round to each other; and their
+looks confessed their sense of the insolence of the orator, and the affront
+offered to themselves.
+
+"Per fede!" quoth Reginaldo di Orsini, "this is past bearing, - the
+plebeian has gone too far!"
+
+"Look at the populace below! how they murmur and gape, - and how their eyes
+sparkle - and what looks they bend at us!" said Luca di Savelli to his
+mortal enemy, Castruccio Malatesta:  the sense of a common danger united in
+one moment, but only for a moment, the enmity of years.
+
+"Diavolo!" muttered Raselli (Nina's father) to a baron, equally poor, "but
+the clerk has truth in his lips.  'Tis a pity he is not noble."
+
+"What a clever brain marred!" said a Florentine merchant.  "That man might
+be something, if he were sufficiently rich."
+
+Adrian and Montreal were silent:  the first seemed lost in thought, - the
+last was watching the various effects produced upon the audience.
+
+"Silence!" proclaimed the officers.  "Silence, for my Lord Vicar."
+
+At this announcement, every eye turned to Raimond, who, rising with much
+clerical importance, thus addressed the assembly: -
+
+"Although, Barons and Citizens of Rome, my well-beloved flock, and
+children, - I, no more than yourselves, anticipated the exact nature of the
+address ye have just heard, - and, albeit, I cannot feel unalloyed
+contentment at the manner, nor, I may say, at the whole matter of that
+fervent exhortation - yet (laying great emphasis on the last word), I
+cannot suffer you to depart without adding to the prayers of our Holy
+Father's servant, those, also, of his Holiness's spiritual representative. 
+It is true! the Jubilee approaches!  The Jubilee approaches - and yet our
+roads, even to the gates of Rome, are infested with murderous and godless
+ruffians!  What pilgrim can venture across the Apennines to worship at the
+altars of St. Peter?  The Jubilee approaches:  what scandal shall it be to
+Rome if these shrines be without pilgrims - if the timid recoil from, if
+the bold fall victims to, the dangers of the way!  Wherefore, I pray you
+all, citizens and chiefs alike, - I pray you all to lay aside those unhappy
+dissensions which have so long consumed the strength of our sacred city;
+and, uniting with each other in the ties of amity and brotherhood, to form
+a blessed league against the marauders of the road.  I see amongst you, my
+Lords, many of the boasts and pillars of the state; but, alas! I think with
+grief and dismay on the causeless and idle hatred that has grown up between
+you! - a scandal to our city, and reflecting, let me add, my Lords, no
+honour on your faith as Christians, nor on your dignity as defenders of the
+Church."
+
+Amongst the inferior nobles - along the seats of the judges and the men of
+letters - through the vast concourse of the people - ran a loud murmur of
+approbations at these words.  The greater barons looked proudly, but not
+contemptuously, at the countenance of the prelate, and preserved a strict
+and unrevealing silence.
+
+"In this holy spot," continued the Bishop, "let me beseech you to bury
+those fruitless animosities which have already cost enough of blood and
+treasure; and let us quit these walls with one common determination to
+evince our courage and display our chivalry only against our universal
+foes; - those ruffians who lay waste our fields, and infest our public
+ways, - the foes alike of the people we should protect, and the God whom we
+should serve!"
+
+The Bishop resumed his seat; the nobles looked at each other without reply;
+the people began to whisper loudly among themselves; when, after a short
+pause, Adrian di Castello rose.
+
+"Pardon me, my Lords, and you, reverend Father, if I, inexperienced in
+years and of little mark or dignity amongst you, presume to be the first to
+embrace the proposal we have just heard.  Willingly do I renounce all
+ancient cause of enmity with any of my compeers.  Fortunately for me, my
+long absence from Rome has swept from my remembrance the feuds and
+rivalries familiar to my early youth; and in this noble conclave I see but
+one man (glancing at Martino di Porto, who sat sullenly looking down)
+against whom I have, at any time, deemed it a duty to draw my sword; the
+gage that I once cast to that noble is yet, I rejoice to think, unredeemed.
+I withdraw it.  Henceforth my only foes shall be the foes of Rome!"
+
+"Nobly spoken!" said the Bishop, aloud.
+
+"And," continued Adrian, casting down his glove amongst the nobles, "I
+throw, my Lords, the gage, thus resumed, amongst you all, in challenge to a
+wider rivalry, and a more noble field.  I invite any man to vie with me in
+the zeal that he shall show to restore tranquillity to our roads, and order
+to our state.  It is a contest in which, if I be vanquished with
+reluctance, I will yield the prize without envy.  In ten days from this
+time, reverend Father, I will raise forty horsemen-at-arms, ready to obey
+whatever orders shall be agreed upon for the security of the Roman state. 
+And you, O Romans, dismiss, I pray you, from your minds, those eloquent
+invectives against your fellow-citizens which ye have lately heard.  All of
+us, of what rank soever, may have shared in the excesses of these unhappy
+times; let us endeavour, not to avenge nor to imitate, but to reform and to
+unite.  And may the people hereafter find, that the true boast of a
+patrician is, that his power the better enables him to serve his country."
+
+"Brave words!" quoth the smith, sneeringly.
+
+"If they were all like him!" said the smith's neighbour.
+
+"He has helped the nobles out of a dilemma," said Pandulfo.
+
+"He has shown grey wit under young hairs," said an aged Malatesta.
+
+"You have turned the tide, but not stemmed it, noble Adrian," whispered the
+ever-boding Montreal, as, amidst the murmurs of the general approbation,
+the young Colonna resumed his seat.
+
+"How mean you?" said Adrian.
+
+"That your soft words, like all patrician conciliations, have come too
+late."
+
+Not another noble stirred, though they felt, perhaps, disposed to join in
+the general feeling of amnesty, and appeared, by signs and whispers, to
+applaud the speech of Adrian.  They were too habituated to the
+ungracefulness of an unlettered pride, to bow themselves to address
+conciliating language either to the people or their foes.  And Raimond,
+glancing round, and not willing that their unseemly silence should be long
+remarked, rose at once, to give it the best construction in his power.
+
+"My son, thou hast spoken as a patriot and a Christian; by the approving
+silence of your peers we all feel that they share your sentiments.  Break
+we up the meeting - its end is obtained.  The manner of our proceeding
+against the leagued robbers of the road requires maturer consideration
+elsewhere.  This day shall be an epoch in our history."
+
+"It shall," quoth Cecco del Vecchio, gruffly, between his teeth.
+
+"Children, my blessing upon you all!" concluded the Vicar, spreading his
+arms.
+
+And in a few minutes more the crowd poured from the church.  The different
+servitors and flag-bearers ranged themselves on the steps without, each
+train anxious for their master's precedence; and the nobles, gravely
+collecting in small knots, in the which was no mixture of rival blood,
+followed the crowd down the aisles.  Soon rose again the din, and the
+noise, and the wrangling, and the oaths, of the hostile bands, as, with
+pain and labour, the Vicar's officers marshalled them in "order most
+disorderly."
+
+But so true were Montreal's words to Adrian, that the populace already half
+forgot the young noble's generous appeal, and were only bitterly commenting
+on the ungracious silence of his brother Lords.  What, too, to them was
+this crusade against the robbers of the road?  They blamed the good Bishop
+for not saying boldly to the nobles - "Ye are the first robbers we must
+march against!"  The popular discontents had gone far beyond palliatives;
+they had arrived at that point when the people longed less for reform than
+change.  There are times when a revolution cannot be warded off; it must
+come - come alike by resistance or by concession.  Wo to that race in which
+a revolution produces no fruits! - in which the thunderbolt smites the high
+place, but does not purify the air!  To suffer in vain is often the lot of
+the noblest individuals; but when a People suffer in vain, let them curse
+themselves!
+
+
+Chapter 2.IV.  The Ambitious Citizen, and the Ambitious Soldier.
+
+The Bishop of Orvietto lingered last, to confer with Rienzi, who awaited
+him in the recesses of the Lateran.  Raimond had the penetration not to be
+seduced into believing that the late scene could effect any reformation
+amongst the nobles, heal their divisions, or lead them actively against the
+infestors of the Campagna.  But, as he detailed to Rienzi all that had
+occurred subsequent to the departure of that hero of the scene, he
+concluded with saying: -
+
+"You will perceive from this, one good result will be produced:  the first
+armed dissension - the first fray among the nobles - will seem like a
+breach of promise; and, to the people and to the Pope, a reasonable excuse
+for despairing of all amendment amongst the Barons, - an excuse which will
+sanction the efforts of the first, and the approval of the last."
+
+"For such a fray we shall not long wait," answered Rienzi.
+
+"I believe the prophecy," answered Raimond, smiling; "at present all runs
+well.  Go you with us homeward?"
+
+"Nay, I think it better to tarry here till the crowd is entirely dispersed;
+for if they were to see me, in their present excitement, they might insist
+on some rash and hasty enterprise.  Besides, my Lord," added Rienzi, "with
+an ignorant people, however honest and enthusiastic, this rule must be
+rigidly observed - stale not your presence by custom.  Never may men like
+me, who have no external rank, appear amongst the crowd, save on those
+occasions when the mind is itself a rank."
+
+"That is true, as you have no train," answered Raimond, thinking of his own
+well-liveried menials.  "Adieu, then! we shall meet soon."
+
+"Ay, at Philippi, my Lord.  Reverend Father, your blessing!"
+
+It was some time subsequent to this conference that Rienzi quitted the
+sacred edifice.  As he stood on the steps of the church - now silent and
+deserted - the hour that precedes the brief twilight of the South lent its
+magic to the view.  There he beheld the sweeping arches of the mighty
+Aqueduct extending far along the scene, and backed by the distant and
+purpled hills.  Before - to the right - rose the gate which took its Roman
+name from the Coelian Mount, at whose declivity it yet stands.  Beyond -
+from the height of the steps - he saw the villages scattered through the
+grey Campagna, whitening in the sloped sun; and in the furthest distance
+the mountain shadows began to darken over the roofs of the ancient
+Tusculum, and the second Alban (The first Alba - the Alba Longa - whose
+origin Fable ascribes to Ascanius, was destroyed by Tullus Hostilius.  The
+second Alba, or modern Albano, was erected on the plain below the ancient
+town, a little before the time of Nero.) city, which yet rises, in desolate
+neglect, above the vanished palaces of Pompey and Domitian.
+
+The Roman stood absorbed and motionless for some moments, gazing on the
+scene, and inhaling the sweet balm of the mellow air.  It was the soft
+springtime - the season of flowers, and green leaves, and whispering winds
+- the pastoral May of Italia's poets:  but hushed was the voice of song on
+the banks of the Tiber - the reeds gave music no more.  From the sacred
+Mount in which Saturn held his home, the Dryad and the Nymph, and Italy's
+native Sylvan, were gone for ever.  Rienzi's original nature - its
+enthusiasm - its veneration for the past - its love of the beautiful and
+the great - that very attachment to the graces and pomp which give so
+florid a character to the harsh realities of life, and which power
+afterwards too luxuriantly developed; the exuberance of thoughts and
+fancies, which poured itself from his lips in so brilliant and
+inexhaustible a flood - all bespoke those intellectual and imaginative
+biasses, which, in calmer times, might have raised him in literature to a
+more indisputable eminence than that to which action can ever lead; and
+something of such consciousness crossed his spirit at that moment.
+
+"Happier had it been for me," thought he, "had I never looked out from my
+own heart upon the world.  I had all within me that makes contentment of
+the present, because I had that which can make me forget the present.  I
+had the power to re-people - to create:  the legends and dreams of old -
+the divine faculty of verse, in which the beautiful superfluities of the
+heart can pour themselves - these were mine!  Petrarch chose wisely for
+himself!  To address the world, but from without the world; to persuade -
+to excite - to command, - for these are the aim and glory of ambition; -
+but to shun its tumult, and its toil!  His the quiet cell which he fills
+with the shapes of beauty - the solitude, from which he can banish the evil
+times whereon we are fallen, but in which he can dream back the great
+hearts and the glorious epochs of the past.  For me - to what cares I am
+wedded! to what labours I am bound! what instruments I must use! what
+disguises I must assume! to tricks and artifice I must bow my pride! base
+are my enemies - uncertain my friends! and verily, in this struggle with
+blinded and mean men, the soul itself becomes warped and dwarfish.  Patient
+and darkling, the Means creep through caves and the soiling mire, to gain
+at last the light which is the End."
+
+In these reflections there was a truth, the whole gloom and sadness of
+which the Roman had not yet experienced.  However august be the object we
+propose to ourselves, every less worthy path we take to insure it distorts
+the mental sight of our ambition; and the means, by degrees, abase the end
+to their own standard.  This is the true misfortune of a man nobler than
+his age - that the instruments he must use soil himself:  half he reforms
+his times; but half, too, the times will corrupt the reformer.  His own
+craft undermines his safety; - the people, whom he himself accustoms to a
+false excitement, perpetually crave it; and when their ruler ceases to
+seduce their fancy, he falls their victim.  The reform he makes by these
+means is hollow and momentary - it is swept away with himself:  it was but
+the trick - the show - the wasted genius of a conjuror:  the curtain falls
+- the magic is over - the cup and balls are kicked aside.  Better one slow
+step in enlightenment, - which being made by the reason of a whole people,
+cannot recede, - than these sudden flashes in the depth of the general
+night, which the darkness, by contrast doubly dark, swallows up
+everlastingly again!
+
+As, slowly and musingly, Rienzi turned to quit the church, he felt a light
+touch upon his shoulder.
+
+"Fair evening to you, Sir Scholar," said a frank voice.
+
+"To you, I return the courtesy," answered Rienzi, gazing upon the person
+who thus suddenly accosted him, and in whose white cross and martial
+bearing the reader recognises the Knight of St. John.
+
+"You know me not, I think?" said Montreal; "but that matters little, we may
+easily commence our acquaintance:  for me, indeed, I am fortunate enough to
+have made myself already acquainted with you."
+
+"Possibly we have met elsewhere, at the house of one of those nobles to
+whose rank you seem to belong?"
+
+"Belong! no, not exactly!" returned Montreal, proudly.  "Highborn and great
+as your magnates deem themselves, I would not, while the mountains can
+yield one free spot for my footstep, change my place in the world's many
+grades for theirs.  To the brave, there is but one sort of plebeian, and
+that is the coward.  But you, sage Rienzi," continued the Knight, in a
+gayer tone, "I have seen in more stirring scenes than the hall of a Roman
+Baron."
+
+Rienzi glanced keenly at Montreal, who met his eye with an open brow.
+
+"Yes!" resumed the Knight - "but let us walk on; suffer me for a few
+moments to be your companion.  Yes! I have listened to you - the other eve,
+when you addressed the populace, and today, when you rebuked the nobles;
+and at midnight, too, not long since, when (your ear, fair Sir! - lower, it
+is a secret!) - at midnight, too, when you administered the oath of
+brotherhood to the bold conspirators, on the ruined Aventine!"
+
+As he concluded, the Knight drew himself aside to watch, upon Rienzi's
+countenance, the effect which his words might produce.
+
+A slight tremor passed over the frame of the conspirator - for so, unless
+the conspiracy succeed, would Rienzi be termed, by others than Montreal: 
+he turned abruptly round to confront the Knight, and placed his hand
+involuntarily on his sword, but presently relinquished the grasp.
+
+"Ha!" said the Roman, slowly, "if this be true, fall Rome!  There is
+treason even among the free!"
+
+"No treason, brave Sir!" answered Montreal; "I possess thy secret - but
+none have betrayed it to me."
+
+"And is it as friend or foe that thou hast learned it?"
+
+"That as it may be," returned Montreal, carelessly.  "Enough, at present,
+that I could send thee to the gibbet, if I said but the word, - to show my
+power to be thy foe; enough, that I have not done it, to prove my
+disposition to be thy friend."
+
+"Thou mistakest, stranger! that man does not live who could shed my blood
+in the streets of Rome!  The gibbet!  Little dost thou know of the power
+which surrounds Rienzi."
+
+These words were said with some scorn and bitterness; but, after a moment's
+pause, Rienzi resumed, more calmly: -
+
+"By the cross on thy mantle, thou belongest to one of the proudest orders
+of knighthood:  thou art a foreigner, and a cavalier.  What generous
+sympathies can convert thee into a friend of the Roman people?"
+
+"Cola di Rienzi," returned Montreal, "the sympathies that unite us are
+those which unite all men who, by their own efforts, rise above the herd. 
+True, I was born noble - but powerless and poor:  at my beck now move, from
+city to city, the armed instruments of authority:  my breath is the law of
+thousands.  This empire I have not inherited; I won it by a cool brain and
+a fearless arm.  Know me for Walter de Montreal; is it not a name that
+speaks a spirit kindred to thine own?  Is not ambition a common sentiment
+between us?  I do not marshal soldiers for gain only, though men have
+termed me avaricious - nor butcher peasants for the love of blood, though
+men have called me cruel.  Arms and wealth are the sinews of power; it is
+power that I desire; - thou, bold Rienzi, strugglest thou not for the same? 
+Is it the rank breath of the garlic-chewing mob - is it the whispered envy
+of schoolmen - is it the hollow mouthing of boys who call thee patriot and
+freeman, words to trick the ear - that will content thee?  These are but
+thy instruments to power.  Have I spoken truly?"
+
+Whatever distaste Rienzi might conceive at this speech he masked
+effectually.  "Certes," said he, "it would be in vain, renowned Captain, to
+deny that I seek but that power of which thou speakest.  But what union can
+there be between the ambition of a Roman citizen and the leader of paid
+armies that take their cause only according to their hire - today, fight
+for liberty in Florence - tomorrow, for tyranny in Bologna?  Pardon my
+frankness; for in this age that is deemed no disgrace which I impute to thy
+armies.  Valour and generalship are held to consecrate any cause they
+distinguish; and he who is the master of princes, may be well honoured by
+them as their equal."
+
+"We are entering into a less deserted quarter of the town," said the
+Knight; "is there no secret place - no Aventine - in this direction, where
+we can confer?"
+
+"Hush!" replied Rienzi, cautiously looking round.  "I thank thee, noble
+Montreal, for the hint; nor may it be well for us to be seen together. 
+Wilt thou deign to follow me to my home, by the Palatine Bridge?  (The
+picturesque ruins shown at this day as having once been the habitation of
+the celebrated Cola di Rienzi, were long asserted by the antiquarians to
+have belonged to another Cola or Nicola.  I believe, however, that the
+dispute has been lately decided:  and, indeed, no one but an antiquary, and
+that a Roman one, could suppose that there were two Colas to whom the
+inscription on the house would apply.) there we can converse undisturbed
+and secure."
+
+"Be it so," said Montreal, falling back.
+
+With a quick and hurried step, Rienzi passed through the town, in which,
+wherever he was discovered, the scattered citizens saluted him with marked
+respect; and, turning through a labyrinth of dark alleys, as if to shun the
+more public thoroughfares, arrived at length at a broad space near the
+river.  The first stars of night shone down on the ancient temple of
+Fortuna Virilis, which the chances of Time had already converted into the
+Church of St. Mary of Egypt; and facing the twice-hallowed edifice stood
+the house of Rienzi.
+
+"It is a fair omen to have my mansion facing the ancient Temple of
+Fortune," said Rienzi, smiling, as Montreal followed the Roman into the
+chamber I have already described.
+
+"Yet Valour need never pray to Fortune," said the Knight; "the first
+commands the last."
+
+Long was the conference between these two men, the most enterprising of
+their age.  Meanwhile, let me make the reader somewhat better acquainted
+with the character and designs of Montreal, than the hurry of events has
+yet permitted him to become.
+
+Walter de Montreal, generally known in the chronicles of Italy by the
+designation of Fra Moreale, had passed into Italy - a bold adventurer,
+worthy to become a successor of those roving Normans (from one of the most
+eminent of whom, by the mother's side, he claimed descent) who had formerly
+played so strange a part in the chivalric errantry of Europe, - realizing
+the fables of Amadis and Palmerin - (each knight, in himself a host),
+winning territories and oversetting thrones; acknowledging no laws save
+those of knighthood; never confounding themselves with the tribe amongst
+which they settled; incapable of becoming citizens, and scarcely contented
+with aspiring to be kings.  At that time, Italy was the India of all those
+well-born and penniless adventurers who, like Montreal, had inflamed their
+imagination by the ballads and legends of the Roberts and the Godfreys of
+old; who had trained themselves from youth to manage the barb, and bear,
+through the heats of summer, the weight of arms; and who, passing into am
+effeminate and distracted land, had only to exhibit bravery in order to
+command wealth.  It was considered no disgrace for some powerful chieftain
+to collect together a band of these hardy aliens, - to subsist amidst the
+mountains on booty and pillage, - to make war upon tyrant or republic, as
+interest suggested, and to sell, at enormous stipends, the immunities of
+peace.  Sometimes they hired themselves to one state to protect it against
+the other; and the next year beheld them in the field against their former
+employers.  These bands of Northern stipendiaries assumed, therefore, a
+civil, as well as a military, importance; they were as indispensable to the
+safety of one state as they were destructive to the security of all.  But
+five years before the present date, the Florentine Republic had hired the
+services of a celebrated leader of these foreign soldiers, - Gualtier, duke
+of Athens.  By acclamation, the people themselves had elected that warrior
+to the state of prince, or tyrant, of their state; before the year was
+completed, they revolted against his cruelties, or rather against his
+exactions, - for, despite all the boasts of their historians, they felt an
+attack on their purses more deeply than an assault on their liberties, -
+they had chased him from their city, and once more proclaimed themselves a
+Republic.  The bravest, and most favoured of the soldiers of the Duke of
+Athens had been Walter de Montreal; he had shared the rise and the downfall
+of his chief.  Amongst popular commotions, the acute and observant mind of
+the Knight of St. John had learned no mean civil experience; he had learned
+to sound a people - to know how far they would endure - to construe the
+signs of revolution - to be a reader of the times.  After the downfall of
+the Duke of Athens, as a Free Companion, in other words a Freebooter,
+Montreal had augmented under the fierce Werner his riches and his renown. 
+At present without employment worthy his spirit of enterprise and intrigue,
+the disordered and chiefless state of Rome had attracted him thither.  In
+the league he had proposed to Colonna - in the suggestions he had made to
+the vanity of that Signor - his own object was to render his services
+indispensable - to constitute himself the head of the soldiery whom his
+proposed designs would render necessary to the ambition of the Colonna,
+could it be excited - and, in the vastness of his hardy genius for
+enterprise, he probably foresaw that the command of such a force would be,
+in reality, the command of Rome; - a counter-revolution might easily unseat
+the Colonna and elect himself to the principality.  It had sometimes been
+the custom of Roman, as of other Italian, States, to prefer for a chief
+magistrate, under the title of Podesta, a foreigner to a native.  And
+Montreal hoped that he might possibly become to Rome what the Duke of
+Athens had been to Florence - an ambition he knew well enough to be above
+the gentleman of Provence, but not above the leader of an army.  But, as we
+have already seen, his sagacity perceived at once that he could not move
+the aged head of the patricians to those hardy and perilous measures which
+were necessary to the attainment of supreme power.  Contented with his
+present station, and taught moderation by his age and his past reverses,
+Stephen Colonna was not the man to risk a scaffold from the hope to gain a
+throne.  The contempt which the old patrician professed for the people, and
+their idol, also taught the deep-thinking Montreal that, if the Colonna
+possessed not the ambition, neither did he possess the policy, requisite
+for empire.  The Knight found his caution against Rienzi in vain, and he
+turned to Rienzi himself.  Little cared the Knight of St. John which party
+were uppermost - prince or people - so that his own objects were attained;
+in fact, he had studied the humours of a people, not in order to serve, but
+to rule them; and, believing all men actuated by a similar ambition, he
+imagined that, whether a demagogue or a patrician reigned, the people were
+equally to be victims, and that the cry of "Order" on the one hand, or of
+"Liberty" on the other, was but the mere pretext by which the energy of one
+man sought to justify his ambition over the herd.  Deeming himself one of
+the most honourable spirits of his age, he believed in no honour which he
+was unable to feel; and, sceptic in virtue, was therefore credulous of
+vice.
+
+But the boldness of his own nature inclined him, perhaps, rather to the
+adventurous Rienzi than to the self-complacent Colonna; and he considered
+that to the safety of the first he and his armed minions might be even more
+necessary than to that of the last.  At present his main object was to
+learn from Rienzi the exact strength which he possessed, and how far he was
+prepared for any actual revolt.
+
+The acute Roman took care, on the one hand, how he betrayed to the Knight
+more than he yet knew, or he disgusted him by apparent reserve on the
+other.  Crafty as Montreal was, he possessed not that wonderful art of
+mastering others which was so preeminently the gift of the eloquent and
+profound Rienzi, and the difference between the grades of their intellect
+was visible in their present conference.
+
+"I see," said Rienzi, "that amidst all the events which have lately smiled
+upon my ambition, none is so favourable as that which assures me of your
+countenance and friendship.  In truth, I require some armed alliance. 
+Would you believe it, our friends, so bold in private meetings, yet shrink
+from a public explosion.  They fear not the patricians, but the soldiery of
+the patricians; for it is the remarkable feature in the Italian courage,
+that they have no terror for each other, but the casque and sword of a
+foreign hireling make them quail like deer."
+
+"They will welcome gladly, then, the assurance that such hirelings shall be
+in their service - not against them; and as much as you desire for the
+revolution, so many shall you receive."
+
+"But the pay and the conditions," said Rienzi, with his dry, sarcastic
+smile.  "How shall we arrange the first, and what shall we hold to be the
+second?"
+
+"That is an affair easily concluded," replied Montreal.  "For me, to tell
+you frankly, the glory and excitement of so great a revulsion would alone
+suffice.  I like to feel myself necessary to the completion of high events.
+For my men it is otherwise.  Your first act will be to seize the revenues
+of the state.  Well, whatever they amount to, the product of the first
+year, great or small, shall be divided amongst us.  You the one half, I and
+my men the other half."
+
+"It is much," said Rienzi, gravely, and as if in calculation, - "but Rome
+cannot purchase her liberties too dearly.  So be it then decided."
+
+"Amen! - and now, then, what is your force? for these eighty or a hundred
+signors of the Aventine, - worthy men, doubtless, - scarce suffice for a
+revolt!"
+
+Gazing cautiously round the room, the Roman placed his hand on Montreal's
+arm -
+
+"Between you and me, it requires time to cement it.  We shall be unable to
+stir these five weeks.  I have too rashly anticipated the period.  The corn
+is indeed cut, but I must now, by private adjuration and address, bind up
+the scattered sheaves."
+
+"Five weeks," repeated Montreal; "that is far longer than I anticipated."
+
+"What I desire," continued Rienzi, fixing his searching eyes upon Montreal,
+"is, that, in the meanwhile, we should preserve a profound calm, - we
+should remove every suspicion.  I shall bury myself in my studies, and
+convoke no more meetings."
+
+"Well - "
+
+"And for yourself, noble Knight, might I venture to dictate, I would pray
+you to mix with the nobles - to profess for me and for the people the
+profoundest contempt - and to contribute to rock them yet more in the
+cradle of their false security.  Meanwhile, you could quietly withdraw as
+many of the armed mercenaries as you influence from Rome, and leave the
+nobles without their only defenders.  Collecting these hardy warriors in
+the recesses of the mountains, a day's march from hence, we may be able to
+summon them at need, and they shall appear at our gates, and in the midst
+of our rising - hailed as deliverers by the nobles, but in reality allies
+with the people.  In the confusion and despair of our enemies at
+discovering their mistake, they will fly from the city."
+
+"And its revenues and its empire will become the appanage of the hardy
+soldier and the intriguing demagogue!" cried Montreal, with a laugh.
+
+"Sir Knight, the division shall be equal."
+
+"Agreed!"
+
+"And now, noble Montreal, a flask of our best vintage!" said Rienzi,
+changing his tone.
+
+"You know the Provencals," answered Montreal, gaily.
+
+The wine was brought, the conversation became free and familiar, and
+Montreal, whose craft was acquired, and whose frankness was natural,
+unwittingly committed his secret projects and ambition more nakedly to
+Rienzi than he had designed to do.  They parted apparently the best of
+friends.
+
+"By the way," said Rienzi, as they drained the last goblet.  "Stephen
+Colonna betakes him to Corneto, with a convoy of corn, on the 19th.  Will
+it not be as well if you join him?  You can take that opportunity to
+whisper discontent to the mercenaries that accompany him on his mission,
+and induce them to our plan."
+
+"I thought of that before," returned Montreal; "it shall be done.  For the
+present, farewell!"
+
+"'His barb, and his sword,
+    And his lady, the peerless,
+  Are all that are prized
+    By Orlando the fearless.
+
+"'Success to the Norman,
+    The darling of story;
+  His glory is pleasure -
+    His pleasure is glory.'"
+
+Chanting this rude ditty as he resumed his mantle, the Knight waved his
+hand to Rienzi, and departed.
+
+Rienzi watched the receding form of his guest with an expression of hate
+and fear upon his countenance.  "Give that man the power," he muttered,
+"and he may be a second Totila.  (Innocent VI., some years afterwards,
+proclaimed Montreal to be worse than Totila.)  Methinks I see, in his
+griping and ferocious nature, - through all the gloss of its gaiety and
+knightly grace, - the very personification of our old Gothic foes.  I trust
+I have lulled him!  Verily, two suns could no more blaze in one hemisphere,
+than Walter de Montreal and Cola di Rienzi live in the same city.  The
+star-seers tell us that we feel a secret and uncontrollable antipathy to
+those whose astral influences destine them to work us evil; such antipathy
+do I feel for yon fair-faced homicide.  Cross not my path, Montreal! -
+cross not my path!"
+
+With this soliloquy Rienzi turned within, and, retiring to his apartment,
+was seen no more that night.
+
+
+Chapter 2.V.  The Procession of the Barons. - The Beginning of the End.
+
+It was the morning of the 19th of May, the air was brisk and clear, and the
+sun, which had just risen, shone cheerily upon the glittering casques and
+spears of a gallant procession of armed horsemen, sweeping through the long
+and principal street of Rome.  The neighing of the horses, the ringing of
+the hoofs, the dazzle of the armour, and the tossing to and fro of the
+standards, adorned with the proud insignia of the Colonna, presented one of
+the gay and brilliant spectacles peculiar to the middle ages.
+
+At the head of the troop, on a stout palfrey, rode Stephen Colonna.  At his
+right was the Knight of Provence, curbing, with an easy hand, a slight, but
+fiery steed of the Arab race:  behind him followed two squires, the one
+leading his war-horse, the other bearing his lance and helmet.  At the left
+of Stephen Colonna rode Adrian, grave and silent, and replying only by
+monosyllables to the gay bavardage of the Knight of Provence.  A
+considerable number of the flower of the Roman nobles followed the old
+Baron; and the train was closed by a serried troop of foreign horsemen,
+completely armed.
+
+There was no crowd in the street, - the citizens looked with seeming apathy
+at the procession from their half-closed shops.
+
+"Have these Romans no passion for shows?" asked Montreal; "if they could be
+more easily amused they would be more easily governed."
+
+"Oh, Rienzi, and such buffoons, amuse them.  We do better, - we terrify!"
+replied Stephen.
+
+"What sings the troubadour, Lord Adrian?" said Montreal.
+
+"'Smiles, false smiles, should form the school
+  For those who rise, and those who rule:
+    The brave they trick, and fair subdue,
+    Kings deceive, the States undo.
+      Smiles, false smiles!
+
+"'Frowns, true frowns, ourselves betray,
+  The brave arouse, the fair dismay,
+    Sting the pride, which blood must heal,
+    Mix the bowl, and point the steel.
+      Frowns, true frowns!'
+
+"The lay is of France, Signor; yet methinks it brings its wisdom from
+Italy; - for the serpent smile is your countrymen's proper distinction, and
+the frown ill becomes them."
+
+"Sir Knight," replied Adrian, sharply, and incensed at the taunt, "you
+Foreigners have taught us how to frown: - a virtue sometimes."
+
+"But not wisdom, unless the hand could maintain what the brow menaced,"
+returned Montreal, with haughtiness; for he had much of the Franc vivacity
+which often overcame his prudence; and he had conceived a secret pique
+against Adrian since their interview at Stephen's palace.
+
+"Sir Knight," answered Adrian, colouring, "our conversation may lead to
+warmer words than I would desire to have with one who has rendered me so
+gallant a service."
+
+"Nay, then, let us go back to the troubadours," said Montreal,
+indifferently.  "Forgive me if I do not think highly, in general, of
+Italian honour, or Italian valour; your valour I acknowledge, for I have
+witnessed it, and valour and honour go together, - let that suffice!"
+
+As Adrian was about to answer, his eye fell suddenly on the burly form of
+Cecco del Vecchio, who was leaning his bare and brawny arms over his anvil,
+and gazing, with a smile, upon the group.  There was something in that
+smile which turned the current of Adrian's thoughts, and which he could not
+contemplate without an unaccountable misgiving.
+
+"A strong villain, that," said Montreal, also eyeing the smith.  "I should
+like to enlist him.  Fellow!" cried he, aloud, "you have an arm that were
+as fit to wield the sword as to fashion it.  Desert your anvil, and follow
+the fortunes of Fra Moreale!"
+
+The smith nodded his head.  "Signor Cavalier," said he, gravely, "we poor
+men have no passion for war; we want not to kill others - we desire only
+ourselves to live, - if you will let us!"
+
+"By the Holy Mother, a slavish answer!  But you Romans - "
+
+"Are slaves!" interrupted the smith, turning away to the interior of his
+forge.
+
+"The dog is mutinous!" said the old Colonna.  And as the band swept on, the
+rude foreigners, encouraged by their leaders, had each some taunt or jest,
+uttered in a barbarous attempt at the southern patois, for the lazy giant,
+as he again appeared in front of his forge, leaning on his anvil as before,
+and betraying no sign of attention to his insultors, save by a heightened
+glow of his swarthy visage; - and so the gallant procession passed through
+the streets, and quitted the Eternal City.
+
+There was a long interval of deep silence - of general calm - throughout
+the whole of Rome:  the shops were still but half-opened; no man betook
+himself to his business; it was like the commencement of some holyday, when
+indolence precedes enjoyment.
+
+About noon, a few small knots of men might be seen scattered about the
+streets, whispering to each other, but soon dispersing; and every now and
+then, a single passenger, generally habited in the long robes used by the
+men of letters, or in the more sombre garb of monks, passed hurriedly up
+the street towards the Church of St. Mary of Egypt, once the Temple of
+Fortune.  Then, again, all was solitary and deserted.  Suddenly, there was
+heard the sound of a single trumpet!  It swelled - it gathered on the ear. 
+Cecco del Vecchio looked up from his anvil!  A solitary horseman paced
+slowly by the forge, and wound a long loud blast of the trumpet suspended
+round his neck, as he passed through the middle of the street.  Then might
+you see a crowd, suddenly, and as by magic, appear emerging from every
+corner; the street became thronged with multitudes; but it was only by the
+tramp of their feet, and an indistinct and low murmur, that they broke the
+silence.  Again the horseman wound his trump, and when the note ceased, he
+cried aloud - "Friends and Romans! tomorrow, at dawn of day, let each man
+find himself unarmed before the Church of St. Angelo.  Cola di Rienzi
+convenes the Romans to provide for the good state of Rome."  A shout, that
+seemed to shake the bases of the seven hills, broke forth at the end of
+this brief exhortation; the horseman rode slowly on, and the crowd
+followed. - This was the commencement of the Revolution!
+
+
+Chapter 2.VI.  The Conspirator Becomes the Magistrate.
+
+At midnight, when the rest of the city seemed hushed in rest, lights were
+streaming from the windows of the Church of St. Angelo.  Breaking from its
+echoing aisles, the long and solemn notes of sacred music stole at frequent
+intervals upon the air.  Rienzi was praying within the church; thirty
+masses consumed the hours from night till morn, and all the sanction of
+religion was invoked to consecrate the enterprise of liberty.  (In fact, I
+apprehend that if ever the life of Cola di Rienzi shall be written by a
+hand worthy of the task, it will be shown that a strong religious feeling
+was blended with the political enthusiasm of the people, - the religious
+feeling of a premature and crude reformation, the legacy of Arnold of
+Brescia.  It was not, however, one excited against the priests, but
+favoured by them.  The principal conventual orders declared for the
+Revolution.)  The sun had long risen, and the crowd had long been assembled
+before the church door, and in vast streams along every street that led to
+it, - when the bell of the church tolled out long and merrily; and as it
+ceased, the voices of the choristers within chanted the following hymn, in
+which were somewhat strikingly, though barbarously, blended, the spirit of
+the classic patriotism with the fervour of religious zeal: -
+
+The Roman Hymn of Liberty.
+
+  Let the mountains exult around!
+("Exultent in circuito Vestro Montes," &c. - Let the mountains exult
+around!  So begins Rienzi's letter to the Senate and Roman people: 
+preserved by Hocsemius.)
+  On her seven-hill'd throne renown'd,
+  Once more old Rome is crown'd!
+    Jubilate!
+
+  Sing out, O Vale and Wave!
+  Look up from each laurell'd grave,
+  Bright dust of the deathless brave!
+    Jubilate!
+
+  Pale Vision, what art thou? - Lo,
+    From Time's dark deeps,
+    Like a Wind, It sweeps,
+      Like a Wind, when the tempests blow:
+
+  A shadowy form - as a giant ghost -
+  It stands in the midst of the armed host!
+
+  The dead man's shroud on Its awful limbs;
+  And the gloom of Its presence the daylight dims:
+  And the trembling world looks on aghast -
+  All hail to the SOUL OF THE MIGHTY PAST!
+    Hail! all hail!
+
+  As we speak - as we hallow - It moves, It breathes;
+  From its clouded crest bud the laurel wreaths -
+  As a Sun that leaps up from the arms of Night,
+  The shadow takes shape, and the gloom takes light.
+    Hail! all hail!
+
+  The Soul of the Past, again
+    To its ancient home,
+    In the hearts of Rome,
+  Hath come to resume its reign!
+
+  O Fame, with a prophet's voice,
+  Bid the ends of the Earth rejoice!
+  Wherever the Proud are Strong,
+  And Right is oppress'd by Wrong; -
+  Wherever the day dim shines
+  Through the cell where the captive pines; -
+  Go forth, with a trumpet's sound!
+  And tell to the Nations round -
+  On the Hills which the Heroes trod -
+  In the shrines of the Saints of God -
+  In the Caesars' hall, and the Martyrs' prison -
+  That the slumber is broke, and the Sleeper arisen!
+  That the reign of the Goth and the Vandal is o'er:
+  And Earth feels the tread of THE ROMAN once more!
+
+As the hymn ended, the gate of the church opened; the crowd gave way on
+either side, and, preceded by three of the young nobles of the inferior
+order, bearing standards of allegorical design, depicting the triumph of
+Liberty, Justice, and Concord, forth issued Rienzi, clad in complete
+armour, the helmet alone excepted.  His face was pale with watching and
+intense excitement - but stern, grave, and solemnly composed; and its
+expression so repelled any vociferous and vulgar burst of feeling, that
+those who beheld it hushed the shout on their lips, and stilled, by a
+simultaneous cry of reproof, the gratulations of the crowd behind.  Side by
+side with Rienzi moved Raimond, Bishop of Orvietto:  and behind, marching
+two by two, followed a hundred men-at-arms.  In complete silence the
+procession began its way, until, as it approached the Capitol, the awe of
+the crowd gradually vanished, and thousands upon thousands of voices rent
+the air with shouts of exultation and joy.
+
+Arrived at the foot of the great staircase, which then made the principal
+ascent to the square of the Capitol, the procession halted; and as the
+crowd filled up that vast space in front - adorned and hallowed by many of
+the most majestic columns of the temples of old - Rienzi addressed the
+Populace, whom he had suddenly elevated into a People.
+
+He depicted forcibly the servitude and misery of the citizens - the utter
+absence of all law - the want even of common security to life and property.
+He declared that, undaunted by the peril he incurred, he devoted his life
+to the regeneration of their common country; and he solemnly appealed to
+the people to assist the enterprise, and at once to sanction and
+consolidate the Revolution by an established code of law and a
+Constitutional Assembly.  He then ordered the chart and outline of the
+Constitution he proposed, to be read by the Herald to the multitude.
+
+It created, - or rather revived, with new privileges and powers, - a
+Representative Assembly of Councillors.  It proclaimed, as its first law,
+one that seems simple enough to our happier times, but never hitherto
+executed at Rome:  Every wilful homicide, of whatever rank, was to be
+punished by death.  It enacted, that no private noble or citizen should be
+suffered to maintain fortifications and garrisons in the city or the
+country; that the gates and bridges of the State should be under the
+control of whomsoever should be elected Chief Magistrate.  It forbade all
+harbour of brigands, mercenaries, and robbers, on payment of a thousand
+marks of silver; and it made the Barons who possessed the neighbouring
+territories responsible for the safety of the roads, and the transport of
+merchandise.  It took under the protection of the State the widow and the
+orphan.  It appointed, in each of the quarters of the city, an armed
+militia, whom the tolling of the bell of the Capitol, at any hour, was to
+assemble to the protection of the State.  It ordained, that in each harbour
+of the coast, a vessel should be stationed, for the safeguard of commerce. 
+It decreed the sum of one hundred florins to the heirs of every man who
+died in the defence of Rome; and it devoted the public revenues to the
+service and protection of the State.
+
+Such, moderate at once and effectual, was the outline of the New
+Constitution; and it may amuse the reader to consider how great must have
+been the previous disorders of the city, when the common and elementary
+provisions of civilisation and security made the character of the code
+proposed, and the limit of a popular revolution.
+
+The most rapturous shouts followed this sketch of the New Constitution: 
+and, amidst the clamour, up rose the huge form of Cecco del Vecchio. 
+Despite his condition, he was a man of great importance at the present
+crisis:  his zeal and his courage, and, perhaps, still more, his brute
+passion and stubborn prejudice, had made him popular.  The lower order of
+mechanics looked to him as their head and representative; out, then, he
+spake loud and fearlessly, - speaking well, because his mind was full of
+what he had to say.
+
+"Countrymen and Citizens! - This New Constitution meets with your
+approbation - so it ought.  But what are good laws, if we do not have good
+men to execute them?  Who can execute a law so well as the man who designs
+it?  If you ask me to give you a notion how to make a good shield, and my
+notion pleases you, would you ask me, or another smith, to make it for you?
+If you ask another, he may make a good shield, but it would not be the same
+as that which I should have made, and the description of which contented
+you.  Cola di Rienzi has proposed a Code of Law that shall be our shield. 
+Who should see that the shield become what he proposes, but Cola di Rienzi? 
+Romans! I suggest that Cola di Rienzi be intrusted by the people with the
+authority, by whatsoever name he pleases, of carrying the New Constitution
+into effect; - and whatever be the means, we, the People, will bear him
+harmless."
+
+"Long life to Rienzi! - long live Cecco del Vecchio!  He hath spoken well!
+- none but the Law-maker shall be the Governor!"
+
+Such were the acclamations which greeted the ambitious heart of the
+Scholar.  The voice of the people invested him with the supreme power.  He
+had created a Commonwealth - to become, if he desired it, a Despot!
+
+
+Chapter 2.VII.  Looking after the Halter when the Mare is Stolen.
+
+While such were the events at Rome, a servitor of Stephen Colonna was
+already on his way to Corneto.  The astonishment with which the old Baron
+received the intelligence may be easily imagined.  He lost not a moment in
+convening his troop; and, while in all the bustle of departure, the Knight
+of St. John abruptly entered his presence.  His mien had lost its usual
+frank composure.
+
+"How is this?" said he, hastily; "a revolt? - Rienzi sovereign of Rome? -
+can the news be believed?"
+
+"It is too true!" said Colonna, with a bitter smile.  "Where shall we hang
+him on our return?"
+
+"Talk not so wildly, Sir Baron," replied Montreal, discourteously; "Rienzi
+is stronger than you think for.  I know what men are, and you only know
+what noblemen are!  Where is your kinsman, Adrian?"
+
+"He is here, noble Montreal," said Stephen, shrugging his shoulders, with a
+half-disdainful smile at the rebuke, which he thought it more prudent not
+to resent; "he is here! - see him enter!"
+
+"You have heard the news?" exclaimed Montreal.
+
+"I have."
+
+"And despise the revolution?"
+
+"I fear it!"
+
+"Then you have some sense in you.  But this is none of my affair:  I will
+not interrupt your consultations.  Adieu for the present!" and, ere Stephen
+could prevent him, the Knight had quitted the chamber.
+
+"What means this demagogue?" Montreal muttered to himself.  "Would he trick
+me? - has he got rid of my presence in order to monopolise all the profit
+of the enterprise?  I fear me so! - the cunning Roman!  We northern
+warriors could never compete with the intellect of these Italians but for
+their cowardice.  But what shall be done?  I have already bid Rodolf
+communicate with the brigands, and they are on the eve of departure from
+their present lord.  Well! let it be so!  Better that I should first break
+the power of the Barons, and then make my own terms, sword in hand, with
+the plebeian.  And if I fail in this, - sweet Adeline!  I shall see thee
+again! - that is some comfort! - and Louis of Hungary will bid high for the
+arm and brain of Walter de Montreal.  What, ho! Rodolf!" he exclaimed
+aloud, as the sturdy form of the trooper, half-armed and half-intoxicated,
+reeled along the courtyard.  "Knave! art thou drunk at this hour?"
+
+"Drunk or sober," answered Rodolf, bending low, "I am at thy bidding."
+
+"Well said! - are thy friends ripe for the saddle?"
+
+"Eighty of them already tired of idleness and the dull air of Rome, will
+fly wherever Sir Walter de Montreal wishes."
+
+"Hasten, then, - bid them mount; we go not hence with the Colonna - we
+leave while they are yet talking!  Bid my squires attend me!"
+
+And when Stephen Colonna was settling himself on his palfrey, he heard, for
+the first time, that the Knight of Provence, Rodolf the trooper, and eighty
+of the stipendiaries, had already departed, - whither, none knew.
+
+"To precede us to Rome! gallant barbarian! said Colonna.  "Sirs, on!"
+
+
+Chapter 2.VIII.  The Attack - the Retreat - the Election - and the
+Adhesion.
+
+Arriving at Rome, the company of the Colonna found the gates barred, and
+the walls manned.  Stephen bade advance his trumpeters, with one of his
+captains, imperiously to demand admittance.
+
+"We have orders," replied the chief of the town-guard, "to admit none who
+bear arms, flags, or trumpets.  Let the Lords Colonna dismiss their train,
+and they are welcome."
+
+"Whose are these insolent mandates?" asked the captain.
+
+"Those of the Lord Bishop of Orvietto and Cola di Rienzi, joint protectors
+of the Buono Stato."  (Good Estate.)
+
+The captain of the Colonna returned to his chief with these tidings.  The
+rage of Stephen was indescribable.  "Go back," he cried, as soon as he
+could summon voice, "and say, that, if the gates are not forthwith opened
+to me and mine, the blood of the plebeians be on their own head.  As for
+Raimond, Vicars of the Pope have high spiritual authority, none temporal. 
+Let him prescribe a fast, and he shall be obeyed; but, for the rash Rienzi,
+say that Stephen Colonna will seek him in the Capitol tomorrow, for the
+purpose of throwing him out of the highest window."
+
+These messages the envoy failed not to deliver.
+
+The captain of the Romans was equally stern in his reply.
+
+"Declare to your Lord," said he, "that Rome holds him and his as rebels and
+traitors; and that the moment you regain your troop, our archers receive
+our command to draw their bows - in the name of the Pope, the City, and the
+Liberator."
+
+This threat was executed to the letter; and ere the old Baron had time to
+draw up his men in the best array, the gates were thrown open, and a well-
+armed, if undisciplined, multitude poured forth, with fierce shouts,
+clashing their arms, and advancing the azure banners of the Roman State. 
+So desperate their charge, and so great their numbers, that the Barons,
+after a short and tumultuous conflict, were driven back, and chased by
+their pursuers for more than a mile from the walls of the city.
+
+As soon as the Barons recovered their disorder and dismay, a hasty council
+was held, at which various and contradictory opinions were loudly urged. 
+Some were for departing on the instant to Palestrina, which belonged to the
+Colonna, and possessed an almost inaccessible fortress.  Others were for
+dispersing, and entering peaceably, and in detached parties, through the
+other gates.  Stephen Colonna - himself incensed and disturbed from his
+usual self-command - was unable to preserve his authority; Luca di Savelli,
+(The more correct orthography were Luca di Savello, but the one in the text
+is preserved as more familiar to the English reader.) a timid, though
+treacherous and subtle man, already turned his horse's head, and summoned
+his men to follow him to his castle in Romagna, when the old Colonna
+bethought himself of a method by which to keep his band from a disunion
+that he had the sense to perceive would prove fatal to the common cause. 
+He proposed that they should at once repair to Palestrina, and there
+fortify themselves; while one of the chiefs should be selected to enter
+Rome alone, and apparently submissive, to examine the strength of Rienzi;
+and with the discretionary power to resist if possible, - or to make the
+best terms he could for the admission of the rest.
+
+"And who," asked Savelli, sneeringly, "will undertake this dangerous
+mission?  Who, unarmed and alone, will expose himself to the rage of the
+fiercest populace of Italy, and the caprice of a demagogue in the first
+flush of his power?"
+
+The Barons and the Captains looked at each other in silence.  Savelli
+laughed.
+
+Hitherto Adrian had taken no part in the conference, and but little in the
+previous contest.  He now came to the support of his kinsman.
+
+"Signors!" said he, "I will undertake this mission, - but on mine own
+account, independently of yours; - free to act as I may think best, for the
+dignity of a Roman noble, and the interests of a Roman citizen; free to
+raise my standard on mine own tower, or to yield fealty to the new estate."
+
+"Well said!" cried the old Colonna, hastily.  "Heaven forbid we should
+enter Rome as foes, if to enter it as friends be yet allowed us!  What say
+ye, gentles?"
+
+"A more worthy choice could not be selected," said Savelli; "but I should
+scarce deem it possible that a Colonna could think there was an option
+between resistance and fealty to this upstart revolution."
+
+"Of that, Signor, I will judge for myself; if you demand an agent for
+yourselves, choose another.  I announce to ye frankly, that I have seen
+enough of other states to think the recent condition of Rome demanded some
+redress.  Whether Rienzi and Raimond be worthy of the task they have
+assumed, I know not."
+
+Savelli was silent.  The old Colonna seized the word.
+
+"To Palestrina, then! - are ye all agreed on this?  At the worst, or at the
+best, we should not be divided!  On this condition alone I hazard the
+safety of my kinsman!"
+
+The Barons murmured a little among themselves; - the expediency of
+Stephen's proposition was evident, and they at length assented to it.
+
+Adrian saw them depart, and then, attended only by his squire, slowly rode
+towards a more distant entrance into the city.  On arriving at the gates,
+his name was demanded - he gave it freely.
+
+"Enter, my Lord," said the warder, "our orders were to admit all that came
+unarmed and unattended.  But to the Lord Adrian di Castello, alone, we had
+a special injunction to give the honours due to a citizen and a friend."
+
+Adrian, a little touched by this implied recollection of friendship, now
+rode through a long line of armed citizens, who saluted him respectfully as
+he passed, and, as he returned the salutation with courtesy, a loud and
+approving shout followed his horse's steps.
+
+So, save by one attendant, alone, and in peace, the young patrician
+proceeded leisurely through the long streets, empty and deserted, - for
+nearly one half of the inhabitants were assembled at the walls, and nearly
+the other half were engaged in a more peaceful duty, - until, penetrating
+the interior, the wide and elevated space of the Capitol broke upon his
+sight.  The sun was slowly setting over an immense multitude that
+overspread the spot, and high above a scaffold raised in the centre, shone,
+to the western ray, the great Gonfalon of Rome, studded with silver stars.
+
+Adrian reined in his steed.  "This," thought he, is scarcely the hour thus
+publicly to confer with Rienzi; yet fain would I, mingled with the crowd,
+judge how far his power is supported, and in what manner it is borne." 
+Musing a little, he withdrew into one of the obscurer streets, then wholly
+deserted, surrendered his horse to his squire, and, borrowing of the latter
+his morion and long mantle, passed to one of the more private entrances of
+the Capitol, and, enveloped in his cloak, stood - one of the crowd - intent
+upon all that followed.
+
+"And what," he asked of a plainly dressed citizen, "is the cause of this
+assembly?"
+
+"Heard you not the proclamation?" returned the other in some surprise.  "Do
+you not know that the Council of the City and the Guilds of the Artisans
+have passed a vote to proffer to Rienzi the title of king of Rome?"
+
+The Knight of the Emperor, to whom belonged that august dignity, drew back
+in dismay.
+
+"And," resumed the citizen, "this assembly of all the lesser Barons,
+Councillors, and Artificers, is convened to hear the answer."
+
+"Of course it will be assent?"
+
+"I know not - there are strange rumours; hitherto the Liberator has
+concealed his sentiments."
+
+At that instant a loud flourish of martial music announced the approach of
+Rienzi.  The crowd tumultuously divided, and presently, from the Palace of
+the Capitol to the scaffold, passed Rienzi, still in complete armour, save
+the helmet, and with him, in all the pomp of his episcopal robes, Raimond
+of Orvietto.
+
+As soon as Rienzi had ascended the platform, and was thus made visible to
+the whole concourse, no words can suffice to paint the enthusiasm of the
+scene - the shouts, the gestures, the tears, the sobs, the wild laughter,
+in which the sympathy of those lively and susceptible children of the South
+broke forth.  The windows and balconies of the Palace were thronged with
+the wives and daughters of the lesser Barons and more opulent citizens; and
+Adrian, with a slight start, beheld amongst them, - pale - agitated -
+tearful, - the lovely face of his Irene - a face that even thus would have
+outshone all present, but for one by her side, whose beauty the emotion of
+the hour only served to embellish.  The dark, large, and flashing eyes of
+Nina di Raselli, just bedewed, were fixed proudly on the hero of her
+choice:  and pride, even more than joy, gave a richer carnation to her
+cheek, and the presence of a queen to her noble and rounded form.  The
+setting sun poured its full glory over the spot; the bared heads - the
+animated faces of the crowd - the grey and vast mass of the Capitol; and,
+not far from the side of Rienzi, it brought into a strange and startling
+light the sculptured form of a colossal Lion of Basalt, (The existent
+Capitol is very different from the building at the time of Rienzi; and the
+reader must not suppose that the present staircase, designed by Michael
+Angelo, at the base of which are two marble lions, removed by Pius IV. from
+the Church of St. Stephen del Cacco, was the staircase of the Lion of
+Basalt, which bears so stern a connexion with the history of Rienzi.  That
+mute witness of dark deeds is no more.) which gave its name to a staircase
+leading to the Capitol.  It was an old Egyptian relic, - vast, worn, and
+grim; some symbol of a vanished creed, to whose face the sculptor had
+imparted something of the aspect of the human countenance.  And this
+producing the effect probably sought, gave at all times a mystic,
+preternatural, and fearful expression to the stern features, and to that
+solemn and hushed repose, which is so peculiarly the secret of Egyptian
+sculpture.  The awe which this colossal and frowning image was calculated
+to convey, was felt yet more deeply by the vulgar, because "the Staircase
+of the Lion" was the wonted place of the state executions, as of the state
+ceremonies.  And seldom did the stoutest citizen forget to cross himself,
+or feel unchilled with a certain terror, whenever, passing by the place, he
+caught, suddenly fixed upon him, the stony gaze and ominous grin of that
+old monster from the cities of the Nile.
+
+It was some minutes before the feelings of the assembly allowed Rienzi to
+be heard.  But when, at length, the last shout closed with a simultaneous
+cry of "Long live Rienzi!  Deliverer and King of Rome!" he raised his hand
+impatiently, and the curiosity of the crowd procured a sudden silence.
+
+"Deliverer of Rome, my countrymen!" said he.  "Yes! change not that title -
+I am too ambitious to be a King!  Preserve your obedience to your Pontiff -
+your allegiance to your Emperor - but be faithful to your own liberties. 
+Ye have a right to your ancient constitution; but that constitution needed
+not a king.  Emulous of the name of Brutus, I am above the titles of a
+Tarquin!  Romans, awake! awake! be inspired with a nobler love of liberty
+than that which, if it dethrones the tyrant of today, would madly risk the
+danger of tyranny for tomorrow!  Rome wants still a liberator - never an
+usurper! - Take away yon bauble!"
+
+There was a pause; the crowd were deeply affected - but they uttered no
+shouts; they looked anxiously for a reply from their councillors, or
+popular leaders.
+
+"Signor," said Pandulfo di Guido, who was one of the Caporioni, "your
+answer is worthy of your fame.  But, in order to enforce the law, Rome must
+endow you with a legal title - if not that of King, deign to accept that of
+Dictator or of Consul."
+
+"Long live the Consul Rienzi!" cried several voices.
+
+Rienzi waved his hand for silence.
+
+"Pandulfo di Guido! and you, honoured Councillors of Rome! such title is at
+once too august for my merits, and too inapplicable to my functions.  I am
+one of the people - the people are my charge; the nobles can protect
+themselves.  Dictator and Consul are the appellations of patricians.  "No,"
+he continued after a short pause, "if ye deem it necessary, for the
+preservation of order, that your fellow-citizen should be intrusted with a
+formal title and a recognised power, be it so:  but let it be such as may
+attest the nature of our new institutions, the wisdom of the people, and
+the moderation of their leaders.  Once, my countrymen, the people elected,
+for the protectors of their rights and the guardians of their freedom,
+certain officers responsible to the people, - chosen from the people, -
+provident for the people.  Their power was great, but it was delegated:  a
+dignity, but a trust.  The name of these officers with that of Tribune. 
+Such is the title that conceded, not by clamour alone, but in the full
+Parliament of the people, and accompanied by, such Parliament, ruling with
+such Parliament, - such is the title I will gratefully accept."  (Gibbon
+and Sismondi alike, (neither of whom appears to have consulted with much
+attention the original documents preserved by Hocsemius,) say nothing of
+the Representative Parliament, which it was almost Rienzi's first public
+act to institute or model.  Six days from the memorable 19th of May, he
+addressed the people of Viterbo in a letter yet extant.  He summons them to
+elect and send two syndics, or ambassadors, to the general Parliament.)
+
+The speech, the sentiments of Rienzi were rendered far more impressive by a
+manner of earnest and deep sincerity; and some of the Romans, despite their
+corruption, felt a momentary exultation in the forbearance of their chief. 
+"Long live the Tribune of Rome!" was shouted, but less loud than the cry of
+"Live the King!"  And the vulgar almost thought the revolution was
+incomplete, because the loftier title was not assumed.  To a degenerate and
+embruted people, liberty seems too plain a thing, if unadorned by the pomp
+of the very despotism they would dethrone.  Revenge is their desire, rather
+than Release; and the greater the new power they create, the greater seems
+their revenge against the old.  Still all that was most respected,
+intelligent, and powerful amongst the assembly, were delighted at a
+temperance which they foresaw would free Rome from a thousand dangers,
+whether from the Emperor or the Pontiff.  And their delight was yet
+increased, when Rienzi added, so soon as returning silence permitted - "And
+since we have been equal labourers in the same cause, whatever honours be
+awarded to me, should be extended also to the Vicar of the Pope, Raimond,
+Lord Bishop of Orvietto.  Remember, that both Church and State are properly
+the rulers of the people, only because their benefactors. - Long live the
+first Vicar of a Pope that was ever also the Liberator of a State!"
+
+Whether or not Rienzi was only actuated by patriotism in his moderation,
+certain it is, that his sagacity was at least equal to his virtue; and
+perhaps nothing could have cemented the revolution more strongly, than thus
+obtaining for a colleague the Vicar, and Representative of the Pontifical
+power:  it borrowed, for the time, the sanction of the Pope himself - thus
+made to share the responsibility of the revolution, without monopolising
+the power of the State.
+
+While the crowd hailed the proposition of Rienzi; while their shouts yet
+filled the air; while Raimond, somewhat taken by surprise, sought by signs
+and gestures to convey at once his gratitude and his humility, the Tribune-
+Elect, casting his eyes around, perceived many hitherto attracted by
+curiosity, and whom, from their rank and weight, it was desirable to secure
+in the first heat of the public enthusiasm.  Accordingly, as soon as
+Raimond had uttered a short and pompous harangue, - in which his eager
+acceptance of the honour proposed him was ludicrously contrasted by his
+embarrassed desire not to involve himself or the Pope in any untoward
+consequences that might ensue, - Rienzi motioned to two heralds that stood
+behind upon the platform, and one of these advancing, proclaimed - "That as
+it was desirable that all hitherto neuter should now profess themselves
+friends or foes, so they were invited to take at once the oath of obedience
+to the laws, and subscription to the Buono Stato."
+
+So great was the popular fervour, and so much had it been refined and
+deepened in its tone by the addresses of Rienzi, that even the most
+indifferent had caught the contagion:  and no man liked to be seen
+shrinking from the rest:  so that the most neutral, knowing themselves the
+most marked, were the most entrapped into allegiance to the Buono Stato. 
+The first who advanced to the platform and took the oath was the Signor di
+Raselli, the father of Nina. - Others of the lesser nobility followed his
+example.
+
+The presence of the Pope's Vicar induced the aristocratic; the fear of the
+people urged the selfish; the encouragement of shouts and gratulations
+excited the vain.  The space between Adrian and Rienzi was made clear.  The
+young noble suddenly felt the eyes of the Tribune were upon him; he felt
+that those eyes recognised and called upon him - he coloured - he breathed
+short.  The noble forbearance of Rienzi had touched him to the heart; - the
+applause - the pageant - the enthusiasm of the scene, intoxicated -
+confused him. - He lifted his eyes and saw before him the sister of the
+Tribune - the lady of his love!  His indecision - his pause - continued,
+when Raimond, observing him, and obedient to a whisper from Rienzi,
+artfully cried aloud - "Room for the Lord Adrian di Castello! a Colonna! a
+Colonna! "   Retreat was cut off.  Mechanically, and as if in a dream,
+Adrian ascended to the platform:  and to complete the triumph of the
+Tribune, the sun's last ray beheld the flower of the Colonna - the best and
+bravest of the Barons of Rome - confessing his authority, and subscribing
+to his laws!
+
+
+
+BOOK III.  THE FREEDOM WITHOUT LAW.
+
+"Ben furo avventurosi i cavalieri
+ Ch' erano a quella eta, che nei vallone,
+ Nelle scure spelonche e boschi fieri,
+ Tane di serpi, d'orsi e di leoni,
+ Trovavan quel che nei palazzi altieri
+ Appena or trovar pon giudici buoni;
+ Donne che nella lor piu fresca etade
+ Sien degne di aver titol di beltade."
+
+    Ariosto, Orlando Furioso, can. xiii. 1.
+
+
+Chapter 3.I.  The Return of Walter de Montreal to his Fortress.
+
+When Walter de Montreal and his mercenaries quitted Corneto, they made the
+best of their way to Rome; arriving there, long before the Barons, they met
+with a similar reception at the gates, but Montreal prudently forbore all
+attack and menace, and contented himself with sending his trusty Rodolf
+into the city to seek Rienzi, and to crave permission to enter with his
+troop.  Rodolf returned in a shorter time than was anticipated.  "Well,"
+said Montreal impatiently, "you have the order I suppose.  Shall we bid
+them open the gates?"
+
+"Bid them open our graves," replied the Saxon, bluntly.  "I trust my next
+heraldry will be to a more friendly court."
+
+"How! what mean you?"
+
+"Briefly this: - I found the new governor, or whatever his title, in the
+palace of the Capitol, surrounded by guards and councillors, and in a suit
+of the finest armour I ever saw out of Milan."
+
+"Pest on his armour! give us his answer."
+
+"'Tell Walter de Montreal,' said he, then, if you will have it, 'that Rome
+is no longer a den of thieves; tell him, that if he enters, he must abide a
+trial - '"
+
+"A trial!" cried Montreal, grinding his teeth.
+
+"'For participation in the evil doings of Werner and his freebooters.'"
+
+"Ha!"
+
+"'Tell him, moreover, that Rome declares war against all robbers, whether
+in tent or tower, and that we order him in forty-eight hours to quit the
+territories of the Church.'"
+
+"He thinks, then, not only to deceive, but to menace me?  Well, proceed."
+
+"That was all his reply to you; to me, however, he vouchsafed a caution
+still more obliging.  'Hark ye, friend,' said he, for every German bandit
+found in Rome after tomorrow, our welcome will be cord and gibbet! 
+Begone.'"
+
+"Enough! enough!" cried Montreal, colouring with rage and shame.  "Rodolf,
+you have a skilful eye in these matters, how many Northmen would it take to
+give that same gibbet to the upstart?"
+
+Rodolf scratched his huge head, and seemed awhile lost in calculation; at
+length he said, "You, Captain, must be the best judge, when I tell you,
+that twenty thousand Romans are the least of his force, so I heard by the
+way; and this evening he is to accept the crown, and depose the Emperor."
+
+"Ha, ha!" laughed Montreal, "is he so mad? then he will want not our aid to
+hang himself.  My friends, let us wait the result.  At present neither
+barons nor people seem likely to fill our coffers.  Let us across the
+country to Terracina.  Thank the saints," and Montreal (who was not without
+a strange kind of devotion, - indeed he deemed that virtue essential to
+chivalry) crossed himself piously, "the free companions are never long
+without quarters!"
+
+"Hurrah for the Knight of St. John!" cried the mercenaries.  "And hurrah
+for fair Provence and bold Germany!" added the Knight, as he waved his hand
+on high, struck spurs into his already wearied horse, and, breaking out
+into his favourite song,
+
+  "His steed and his sword,
+   And his lady the peerless," &c.,
+
+Montreal, with his troop, struck gallantly across the Campagna.
+
+The Knight of St. John soon, however, fell into an absorbed and moody
+reverie; and his followers imitating the silence of their chief, in a few
+minutes the clatter of their arms and the jingle of their spurs, alone
+disturbed the stillness of the wide and gloomy plains across which they
+made towards Terracina.  Montreal was recalling with bitter resentment his
+conference with Rienzi; and, proud of his own sagacity and talent for
+scheming, he was humbled and vexed at the discovery that he had been duped
+by a wilier intriguer.  His ambitious designs on Rome, too, were crossed,
+and even crushed for the moment, by the very means to which he had looked
+for their execution.  He had seen enough of the Barons to feel assured that
+while Stephen Colonna lived, the head of the order, he was not likely to
+obtain that mastery in the state which, if leagued with a more ambitious or
+a less timid and less potent signor, might reward his aid in expelling
+Rienzi.  Under all circumstances, he deemed it advisable to remain aloof. 
+Should Rienzi grow strong, Montreal might make the advantageous terms he
+desired with the Barons; should Rienzi's power decay, his pride,
+necessarily humbled, might drive him to seek the assistance, and submit to
+the proposals, of Montreal.  The ambition of the Provencal, though vast and
+daring, was not of a consistent and persevering nature.  Action and
+enterprise were dearer to him, as yet, than the rewards which they
+proffered; and if baffled in one quarter, he turned himself, with the true
+spirit of the knight-errant, to any other field for his achievements. 
+Louis, king of Hungary, stern, warlike, implacable, seeking vengeance for
+the murder of his brother, the ill-fated husband of Joanna, (the beautiful
+and guilty Queen of Naples - the Mary Stuart of Italy,) had already
+prepared himself to subject the garden of Campania to the Hungarian yoke. 
+Already his bastard brother had entered Italy - already some of the
+Neapolitan states had declared in his favour - already promises had been
+held out by the northern monarch to the scattered Companies - and already
+those fierce mercenaries gathered menacingly round the frontiers of that
+Eden of Italy, attracted, as vultures to the carcass, by the preparation of
+war and the hope of plunder.  Such was the field to which the bold mind of
+Montreal now turned its thoughts; and his soldiers had joyfully conjectured
+his design when they had heard him fix Terracina as their bourne. 
+Provident of every resource, and refining his audacious and unprincipled
+valour by a sagacity which promised, when years had more matured and
+sobered his restless chivalry, to rank him among the most dangerous enemies
+Italy had ever known, on the first sign of Louis's warlike intentions,
+Montreal had seized and fortified a strong castle on that delicious coast
+beyond Terracina, by which lies the celebrated pass once held by Fabius
+against Hannibal, and which Nature has so favoured for war as for peace,
+that a handful of armed men might stop the march of an army.  The
+possession of such a fortress on the very frontiers of Naples, gave
+Montreal an importance of which he trusted to avail himself with the
+Hungarian king:  and now, thwarted in his more grand and aspiring projects
+upon Rome, his sanguine, active, and elastic spirit congratulated itself
+upon the resource it had secured.
+
+The band halted at nightfall on this side the Pontine Marshes, seizing
+without scruple some huts and sheds, from which they ejected the miserable
+tenants, and slaughtering with no greater ceremony the swine, cattle, and
+poultry of a neighbouring farm.  Shortly after sunrise they crossed those
+fatal swamps which had already been partially drained by Boniface VIII.;
+and Montreal, refreshed by sleep, reconciled to his late mortification by
+the advantages opened to him in the approaching war with Naples, and
+rejoicing as he approached a home which held one who alone divided his
+heart with ambition, had resumed all the gaiety which belonged to his
+Gallic birth and his reckless habits.  And that deadly but consecrated
+road, where yet may be seen the labours of Augustus, in the canal which had
+witnessed the Voyage so humourously described by Horace, echoed with the
+loud laughter and frequent snatches of wild song by which the barbarian
+robbers enlivened their rapid march.
+
+It was noon when the company entered upon that romantic pass I have before
+referred to - the ancient Lantulae.  High to the left rose steep and lofty
+rocks, then covered by the prodigal verdure, and the countless flowers, of
+the closing May; while to the right the sea, gentle as a lake, and blue as
+heaven, rippled musically at their feet.  Montreal, who largely possessed
+the poetry of his land, which is so eminently allied with a love of nature,
+might at another time have enjoyed the beauty of the scene; but at that
+moment less external and more household images were busy within him.
+
+Abruptly ascending where a winding path up the mountain offered a rough and
+painful road to their horses' feet, the band at length arrived before a
+strong fortress of grey stone, whose towers were concealed by the lofty
+foliage, until they emerged sullenly and suddenly from the laughing
+verdure.  The sound of the bugle, the pennon of the knight, the rapid
+watchword, produced a loud shout of welcome from a score or two of grim
+soldiery on the walls; the portcullis was raised, and Montreal, throwing
+himself hastily from his panting steed, sprung across the threshold of a
+jutting porch, and traversed a huge hall, when a lady - young, fair, and
+richly dressed - met him with a step equally swift, and fell breathless and
+overjoyed into his arms.
+
+"My Walter! my dear, dear Walter; welcome - ten thousand welcomes!"
+
+"Adeline, my beautiful - my adored - I see thee again!"
+
+Such were the greetings interchanged as Montreal pressed his lady to his
+heart, kissing away her tears, and lifting her face to his, while he gazed
+on its delicate bloom with all the wistful anxiety of affection after
+absence.
+
+"Fairest," said he, tenderly, "thou hast pined, thou hast lost roundness
+and colour since we parted.  Come, come, thou art too gentle, or too
+foolish, for a soldier's love."
+
+"Ah, Walter!" replied Adeline, clinging to him, "now thou art returned, and
+I shall be well.  Thou wilt not leave me again a long, long time."
+
+"Sweet one, no;" and flinging his arm round her waist, the lovers - for
+alas! they were not wedded! - retired to the more private chambers of the
+castle.
+
+
+Chapter 3.II.  The Life of Love and War - the Messenger of Peace - the
+Joust.
+
+Girt with his soldiery, secure in his feudal hold, enchanted with the
+beauty of the earth, sky, and sea around, and passionately adoring his
+Adeline, Montreal for awhile forgot all his more stirring projects and his
+ruder occupations.  His nature was capable of great tenderness, as of great
+ferocity; and his heart smote him when he looked at the fair cheek of his
+lady, and saw that even his presence did not suffice to bring back the
+smile and the fresh hues of old.  Often he cursed that fatal oath of his
+knightly order which forbade him to wed, though with one more than his
+equal; and remorse embittered his happiest hours.  That gentle lady in that
+robber hold, severed from all she had been taught most to prize - mother,
+friends, and fair fame - only loved her seducer the more intensely; only
+the more concentrated upon one object all the womanly and tender feelings
+denied every other and less sinful vent.  But she felt her shame, though
+she sought to conceal it, and a yet more gnawing grief than even that of
+shame contributed to prey upon her spirits and undermine her health.  Yet,
+withal, in Montreal's presence she was happy, even in regret; and in her
+declining health she had at least a consolation in the hope to die while
+his love was undiminished.  Sometimes they made short excursions, for the
+disturbed state of the country forbade them to wander far from the castle,
+through the sunny woods, and along the glassy sea, which make the charm of
+that delicious scenery; and that mixture of the savage with the tender, the
+wild escort, the tent in some green glade in the woods at noon, the lute
+and voice of Adeline, with the fierce soldiers grouped and listening at the
+distance, might have well suited the verse of Ariosto, and harmonised
+singularly with that strange, disordered, yet chivalric time, in which the
+Classic South became the seat of the Northern Romance.  Still, however,
+Montreal maintained his secret intercourse with the Hungarian king, and,
+plunged in new projects, willingly forsook for the present all his designs
+on Rome.  Yet deemed he that his more august ambition was only delayed,
+and, bright in the more distant prospects of his adventurous career, rose
+the Capitol of Rome and shone the sceptre of the Caesars.
+
+One day, as Montreal, with a small troop in attendance, passed on horseback
+near the walls of Terracina, the gates were suddenly thrown open, and a
+numerous throng issued forth, preceded by a singular figure, whose steps
+they followed bareheaded and with loud blessings; a train of monks closed
+the procession, chanting a hymn, of which the concluding words were as
+follows: -
+
+Beauteous on the mountains - lo,
+  The feet of him glad tidings gladly bringing;
+The flowers along his pathway grow,
+  And voices, heard aloft, to angel harps are singing:
+And strife and slaughter cease
+Before thy blessed way, Young Messenger of Peace!
+  O'er the mount, and through the moor,
+  Glide thy holy steps secure.
+  Day and night no fear thou knowest,
+  Lonely - but with God thou goest.
+  Where the Heathen rage the fiercest,
+  Through the armed throng thou piercest.
+  For thy coat of mail, bedight
+  In thy spotless robe of white.
+  For the sinful sword - thy hand
+  Bearing bright the silver wand:
+  Through the camp and through the court,
+  Through the bandit's gloomy fort,
+  On the mission of the dove,
+  Speeds the minister of love;
+  By a word the wildest taming,
+  And the world to Christ reclaiming:
+  While, as once the waters trod
+  By the footsteps of thy God,
+  War, and wrath, and rapine cease,
+Hush'd round thy charmed path, O Messenger of Peace!
+
+The stranger to whom these honours were paid was a young, unbearded man,
+clothed in white wrought with silver; he was unarmed and barefooted:  in
+his hand he held a tall silver wand.  Montreal and his party halted in
+astonishment and wonder, and the Knight, spurring his horse toward the
+crowd, confronted the stranger.
+
+"How, friend," quoth the Provencal, "is thine a new order of pilgrims, or
+what especial holiness has won thee this homage?"
+
+"Back, back," cried some of the bolder of the crowd, "let not the robber
+dare arrest the Messenger of Peace."
+
+Montreal waved his hand disdainfully.
+
+"I speak not to you, good sirs, and the worthy friars in your rear know
+full well that I never injured herald or palmer."
+
+The monks, ceasing from their hymn, advanced hastily to the spot; and
+indeed the devotion of Montreal had ever induced him to purchase the
+goodwill of whatever monastery neighboured his wandering home.
+
+"My son," said the eldest of the brethren, "this is a strange spectacle,
+and a sacred:  and when thou learnest all, thou wilt rather give the
+messenger a passport of safety from the unthinking courage of thy friends
+than intercept his path of peace."
+
+"Ye puzzle still more my simple brain," said Montreal, impatiently, "let
+the youth speak for himself; I perceive that on his mantle are the arms of
+Rome blended with other quarterings, which are a mystery to me, - though
+sufficiently versed in heraldic art as befits a noble and a knight."
+
+"Signor," said the youth, gravely, "know in me the messenger of Cola di
+Rienzi, Tribune of Rome, charged with letters to many a baron and prince in
+the ways between Rome and Naples.  The arms wrought upon my mantle are
+those of the Pontiff, the City, and the Tribune."
+
+"Umph; thou must have bold nerves to traverse the Campagna with no other
+weapon than that stick of silver!"
+
+"Thou art mistaken, Sir Knight," replied the youth, boldly, "and judgest of
+the present by the past; know that not a single robber now lurks within the
+Campagna, the arms of the Tribune have rendered every road around the city
+as secure as the broadest street of the city itself."
+
+"Thou tellest me wonders."
+
+"Through the forest - and in the fortress, - through the wildest solitudes,
+- through the most populous towns, - have my comrades borne this silver
+wand unmolested and unscathed; wherever we pass along, thousands hail us,
+and tears of joy bless the messengers of him who hath expelled the brigand
+from his hold, the tyrant from his castle, and ensured the gains of the
+merchant and the hut of the peasant."
+
+"Pardieu," said Montreal, with a stern smile, "I ought to be thankful for
+the preference shown to me; I have not yet received the commands, nor felt
+the vengeance, of the Tribune; yet, methinks, my humble castle lies just
+within the patrimony of St. Peter."
+
+"Pardon me, Signor Cavalier," said the youth; "but do I address the
+renowned Knight of St. John, warrior of the Cross, yet leader of banditti?"
+
+"Boy, you are bold; I am Walter de Montreal."
+
+"I am bound, then, Sir Knight, to your castle."
+
+"Take care how thou reach it before me, or thou standest a fair chance of a
+quick exit.  How now, my friends!" seeing that the crowd at these words
+gathered closer round the messenger, "Think ye that I, who have my mate in
+kings, would find a victim in an unarmed boy?  Fie! give way - give way. 
+Young man, follow me homeward; you are safe in my castle as in your
+mother's arms."  So saying, Montreal, with great dignity and deliberate
+gravity, rode slowly towards his castle, his soldiers, wondering, at a
+little distance, and the white-robed messenger following with the crowd,
+who refused to depart; so great was their enthusiasm, that they even
+ascended to the gates of the dreaded castle, and insisted on waiting
+without until the return of the youth assured them of his safety.
+
+Montreal, who, however lawless elsewhere, strictly preserved the rights of
+the meanest boor in his immediate neighbourhood, and rather affected
+popularity with the poor, bade the crowd enter the courtyard, ordered his
+servitors to provide them with wine and refreshment, regaled the good monks
+in his great hall, and then led the way to a small room, where he received
+the messenger.
+
+"This," said the youth, "will best explain my mission," as he placed a
+letter before Montreal.
+
+The Knight cut the silk with his dagger, and read the epistle with great
+composure.
+
+"Your Tribune," said he, when he had finished it, "has learned the laconic
+style of power very soon.  He orders me to render this castle, and vacate
+the Papal Territory within ten days.  He is obliging; I must have breathing
+time to consider the proposal; be seated, I pray you, young sir.  Forgive
+me, but I should have imagined that your lord had enough upon his hands
+with his Roman barons, to make him a little more indulgent to us foreign
+visitors.  Stephen Colonna - "
+
+"Is returned to Rome, and has taken the oath of allegiance; the Savelli,
+the Orsini, the Frangipani, have all subscribed their submission to the
+Buono Stato."
+
+"How!" cried Montreal, in great surprise.
+
+"Not only have they returned, but they have submitted to the dispersion of
+all their mercenaries, and the dismantling of all their fortifications. 
+The iron of the Orsini palace now barricades the Capitol, and the stonework
+of the Colonna and the Savelli has added new battlements to the gates of
+the Lateran and St. Laurence."
+
+"Wonderful man!" said Montreal, with reluctant admiration.  "By what means
+was this effected?"
+
+"A stern command and a strong force to back it.  At the first sound of the
+great bell, twenty thousand Romans rise in arms.  What to such an army are
+the brigands of an Orsini or a Colonna? - Sir Knight, your valour and
+renown make even Rome admire you; and I, a Roman, bid you beware."
+
+"Well, I thank thee - thy news, friend, robs me of breath.  So the Barons
+submit, then?"
+
+"Yes:  on the first day, one of the Colonna, the Lord Adrian, took the
+oath; within a week, Stephen, assured of safe conduct, left Palestrina, the
+Savelli in his train; the Orsini followed - even Martino di Porto has
+silently succumbed."
+
+"The Tribune - but is that his dignity - methought he was to be king - "
+
+"He was offered, and he refused, the title.  His present rank, which
+arrogates no patrician honours, went far to conciliate the nobles."
+
+"A wise knave! - I beg pardon, a sagacious prince! - Well, then, the
+Tribune lords it mightily, I suppose, over the great Roman names?"
+
+"Pardon me - he enforces impartial justice from peasant or patrician; but
+he preserves to the nobles all their just privileges and legal rank."
+
+"Ha! - and the vain puppets, so they keep the semblance, scarce miss the
+substance - I understand.  But this shows genius - the Tribune is unwed, I
+think.  Does he look among the Colonna for a wife?"
+
+"Sir Knight, the Tribune is already married; within three days after his
+ascension to power, he won and bore home the daughter of the Baron di
+Raselli."
+
+"Raselli! no great name; he might have done better."
+
+"But it is said," resumed the youth, smiling, "that the Tribune will
+shortly be allied to the Colonna, through his fair sister the Signora
+Irene.  The Baron di Castello woos her."
+
+"What, Adrian Colonna!  Enough! you have convinced me that a man who
+contents the people and awes or conciliates the nobles is born for empire.
+My answer to this letter I will send myself.  For your news, Sir Messenger,
+accept this jewel," and the knight took from his finger a gem of some
+price.  "Nay, shrink not, it was as freely given to me as it is now to
+thee."
+
+The youth, who had been agreeably surprised, and impressed, by the manner
+of the renowned freebooter, and who was not a little astonished himself
+with the ease and familiarity with which he had been relating to Fra
+Moreale, in his own fortress, the news of Rome, bowed low as he accepted
+the gift.
+
+The astute Provencal, who saw the evident impression he had made, perceived
+also that it might be of advantage in delaying the measures he might deem
+it expedient to adopt.  "Assure the Tribune," said he, on dismissing the
+messenger, "shouldst thou return ere my letter arrive, that I admire his
+genius, hail his power, and will not fail to consider as favourably as I
+may of his demand."
+
+"Better," said the messenger, warmly (he was of good blood, and gentle
+bearing), - "better ten tyrants for our enemy, than one Montreal."
+
+"An enemy! believe me, sir, I seek no enmity with princes who know how to
+govern, or a people that has the wisdom at once to rule and to obey."
+
+The whole of that day, however, Montreal remained thoughtful and uneasy; he
+despatched trusty messengers to the Governor of Aquila (who was then in
+correspondence with Louis of Hungary), to Naples, and to Rome: - the last
+charged with a letter to the Tribune, which, without absolutely
+compromising himself, affected submission, and demanded only a longer
+leisure for the preparations of departure.  But, at the same time, fresh
+fortifications were added to the castle, ample provisions were laid in,
+and, night and day, spies and scouts were stationed along the pass, and in
+the town of Terracina.  Montreal was precisely the chief who prepared most
+for war when most he pretended peace.
+
+One morning, the fifth from the appearance of the Roman messenger,
+Montreal, after narrowly surveying his outworks and his stores, and feeling
+satisfied that he could hold out at least a month's siege, repaired, with a
+gayer countenance than he had lately worn, to the chamber of Adeline.
+
+The lady was seated by the casement of the tower, from which might be seen
+the glorious landscape of woods, and vales, and orange groves - a strange
+garden for such a palace!  As she leant her face upon her hand, with her
+profile slightly turned to Montreal, there was something ineffably graceful
+in the bend of her neck, - the small head so expressive of gentle blood, -
+with the locks parted in front in that simple fashion which modern times
+have so happily revived.  But the expression of the half-averted face, the
+abstracted intentness of the gaze, and the profound stillness of the
+attitude, were so sad and mournful, that Montreal's purposed greeting of
+gallantry and gladness died upon his lips.  He approached in silence, and
+laid his hand upon her shoulder.
+
+Adeline turned, and taking the hand in hers, pressed it to her heart, and
+smiled away all her sadness.  "Dearest," said Montreal, "couldst thou know
+how much any shadow of grief on thy bright face darkens my heart, thou
+wouldst never grieve.  But no wonder that in these rude walls - no female
+of equal rank near thee, and such mirth as Montreal can summon to his
+halls, grating to thy ear - no wonder that thou repentest thee of thy
+choice."
+
+"Ah, no - no, Walter, I never repent.  I did but think of our child as you
+entered.  Alas! he was our only child!  How fair he was, Walter; how he
+resembled thee!"
+
+"Nay, he had thine eyes and brow," replied the Knight, with a faltering
+voice, and turning away his head.
+
+"Walter," resumed the lady, sighing, "do you remember? - this is his
+birthday.  He is ten years old today.  We have loved each other eleven
+years, and thou hast not tired yet of thy poor Adeline."
+
+"As well might the saints weary of paradise," replied Montreal, with an
+enamoured tenderness, which changed into softness the whole character of
+his heroic countenance.
+
+"Could I think so, I should indeed be blest!" answered Adeline.  "But a
+little while longer, and the few charms I yet possess must fade; and what
+other claim have I on thee?"
+
+"All claim; - the memory of thy first blushes - thy first kiss - of thy
+devoted sacrifices - of thy patient wanderings - of thy uncomplaining love! 
+Ah, Adeline, we are of Provence, not of Italy; and when did Knight of
+Provence avoid his foe, or forsake his love?  But enough, dearest, of home
+and melancholy for today.  I come to bid thee forth.  I have sent on the
+servitors to pitch our tent beside the sea, - we will enjoy the orange
+blossoms while we may.  Ere another week pass over us, we may have sterner
+pastime and closer confines."
+
+"How, dearest Walter! thou dost not apprehend danger?"
+
+"Thou speakest, lady-bird," said Montreal, laughing, "as if danger were
+novelty; methinks by this time, thou shouldst know it as the atmosphere we
+breathe."
+
+"Ah, Walter, is this to last for ever?  Thou art now rich and renowned;
+canst thou not abandon this career of strife?"
+
+"Now, out on thee, Adeline!  What are riches and renown but the means to
+power!  And for strife, the shield of warriors was my cradle - pray the
+saints it be my bier!  These wild and wizard extremes of life - from the
+bower to the tent - from the cavern to the palace - today a wandering
+exile, tomorrow the equal of kings - make the true element of the chivalry
+of my Norman sires.  Normandy taught me war, and sweet Provence love.  Kiss
+me, dear Adeline; and now let thy handmaids attire thee.  Forget not thy
+lute, sweet one.  We will rouse the echoes with the songs of Provence."
+
+The ductile temper of Adeline yielded easily to the gaiety of her lord; and
+the party soon sallied from the castle towards the spot in which Montreal
+had designed their resting-place during the heats of day.  But already
+prepared for all surprise, the castle was left strictly guarded, and
+besides the domestic servitors of the castle, a detachment of ten soldiers,
+completely armed, accompanied the lovers.  Montreal himself wore his
+corselet, and his squires followed with his helmet and lance.  Beyond the
+narrow defile at the base of the castle, the road at that day opened into a
+broad patch of verdure, circled on all sides, save that open to the sea, by
+wood, interspersed with myrtle and orange, and a wilderness of odorous
+shrubs.  In this space, and sheltered by the broad-spreading and classic
+fagus (so improperly translated into the English "beech"), a gay pavilion
+was prepared, which commanded the view of the sparkling sea; - shaded from
+the sun, but open to the gentle breeze.  This was poor Adeline's favourite
+recreation, if recreation it might be called.  She rejoiced to escape from
+the gloomy walls of her castellated prison, and to enjoy the sunshine and
+the sweets of that voluptuous climate without the fatigue which of late all
+exercise occasioned her.  It was a gallantry on the part of Montreal, who
+foresaw how short an interval might elapse before the troops of Rienzi
+besieged his walls; and who was himself no less at home in the bower than
+in the field.
+
+As they reclined within the pavilion - the lover and his lady, - of the
+attendants without, some lounged idly on the beach; some prepared the
+awning of a pleasure-boat against the decline of the sun; some, in a ruder
+tent, out of sight in the wood, arranged the mid-day repast; while the
+strings of the lute, touched by Montreal himself with a careless skill,
+gave their music to the dreamy stillness of the noon.
+
+While thus employed, one of Montreal's scouts arrived breathless and heated
+at the tent.
+
+"Captain," said he, "a company of thirty lances completely armed, with a
+long retinue of squires and pages, have just quitted Terracina.  Their
+banners bear the two-fold insignia of Rome and the Colonna."
+
+"Ho!" said Montreal, gaily, "such a troop is a welcome addition to our
+company; send our squire hither."
+
+The squire appeared.
+
+"Hie thee on thy steed towards the procession thou wilt meet with in the
+pass, (nay, sweet lady mine, no forbiddal!) seek the chief, and say that
+the good Knight Walter de Montreal sends him greeting, and prays him, in
+passing our proper territory, to rest awhile with us a welcome guest; and -
+stay, - add, that if to while an hour or so in gentle pastime be acceptable
+to him, Walter de Montreal would rejoice to break a lance with him, or any
+knight in his train, in honour of our respective ladies.  Hie thee quick!"
+
+"Walter, Walter," began Adeline, who had that keen and delicate
+sensitiveness to her situation, which her reckless lord often wantonly
+forgot; "Walter, dear Walter, canst thou think it honour to - "
+
+"Hush thee, sweet Fleur de lis!  Thou hast not seen pastime this many a
+day; I long to convince thee that thou art still the fairest lady in Italy
+- ay, and of Christendom.  But these Italians are craven knights, and thou
+needst not fear that my proffer will be accepted.  But in truth, lady mine,
+I rejoice for graver objects, that chance throws a Roman noble, perhaps a
+Colonna, in my way; - women understand not these matters; and aught
+concerning Rome touches us home at this moment."
+
+With that the Knight frowned, as was his wont in thought, and Adeline
+ventured to say no more, but retired to the interior division of the
+pavilion.
+
+Meanwhile the squire approached the procession that had now reached the
+middle of the pass.  And a stately and gallant company it was: - if the
+complete harness of the soldiery seemed to attest a warlike purpose, it was
+contradicted on the other hand by a numerous train of unarmed squires and
+pages gorgeously attired, while the splendid blazon of two heralds
+preceding the standard-bearers, proclaimed their object as peaceful, and
+their path as sacred.  It required but a glance at the company to tell the
+leader.  Arrayed in a breast-plate of steel, wrought profusely with gold
+arabesques, over which was a mantle of dark green velvet, bordered with
+pearls, while above his long dark locks waved a black ostrich plume in a
+high Macedonian cap, such as, I believe, is now worn by the Grand Master of
+the order of St. Constantine, rode in the front of the party, a young
+cavalier, distinguished from his immediate comrades, partly by his graceful
+presence and partly by his splendid dress.
+
+The squire approached respectfully, and dismounting, delivered himself of
+his charge.
+
+The young cavalier smiled, as he answered, "Bear back to Sir Walter de
+Montreal the greeting of Adrian Colonna, Baron di Castello, and say, that
+the solemn object of my present journey will scarce permit me to encounter
+the formidable lance of so celebrated a knight; and I regret this the more,
+inasmuch as I may not yield to any dame the palm of my liege lady's beauty.
+I must live in hope of a happier occasion.  For the rest, I will cheerfully
+abide for some few hours the guest of so courteous a host."
+
+The squire bowed low.  "My master," said he, hesitatingly, "will grieve
+much to miss so noble an opponent.  But my message refers to all this
+knightly and gallant train; and if the Lord Adrian di Castello deems
+himself forbidden the joust by the object of his present journey, surely
+one of his comrades will be his proxy with my master."
+
+Out and quickly spoke a young noble by the side of Adrian, Riccardo
+Annibaldi, who afterwards did good service both to the Tribune and to Rome,
+and whose valour brought him, in later life, to an untimely end.
+
+"By the Lord Adrian's permission," cried he, "I will break a lance with - "
+
+"Hush! Annibaldi," interrupted Adrian.  "And you, Sir Squire, know, that
+Adrian di Castello permits no proxy in arms.  Avise the Knight of St. John
+that we accept his hospitality, and if, after some converse on graver
+matters, he should still desire so light an entertainment, I will forget
+that I am the ambassador to Naples, and remember only that I am a Knight of
+the Empire.  You have your answer."
+
+The squire with much ceremony made his obeisance, remounted his steed, and
+returned in a half-gallop to his master.
+
+"Forgive me, dear Annibaldi," said Adrian, "that I balked your valour; and
+believe me that I never more longed to break a lance against any man than I
+do against this boasting Frenchman.  But bethink you, that though to us,
+brought up in the dainty laws of chivalry, Walter de Montreal is the famous
+Knight of Provence, to the Tribune of Rome, whose grave mission we now
+fulfil, he is but the mercenary captain of a Free Company.  Grievously in
+his eyes should we sully our dignity by so wanton and irrelevant a holiday
+conflict with a declared and professional brigand."
+
+"For all that," said Annibaldi, "the brigand ought not to boast that a
+Roman knight shunned a Provencal lance."
+
+"Cease, I pray thee!" said Adrian, impatiently.  In fact, the young
+Colonna, already chafed bitterly against his discreet and dignified
+rejection of Montreal's proffer, and recollecting with much pique the
+disparaging manner in which the Provencal had spoken of the Roman chivalry,
+as well as a certain tone of superiority, which in all warlike matters
+Montreal had assumed over him, - he now felt his cheek burn, and his lip
+quiver.  Highly skilled in the martial accomplishments of his time, he had
+a natural and excusable desire to prove that he was at least no unworthy
+antagonist even of the best lance in Italy:  and, added to this, the
+gallantry of the age made him feel it a sort of treason to his mistress to
+forego any means of asserting her perfections.
+
+It was, therefore, with considerable irritation that Adrian, as the
+pavilion of Montreal became visible, perceived the squire returning to him.
+And the reader will judge how much this was increased when the latter, once
+more dismounting, accosted him thus:
+
+"My master, the Knight of St. John, on hearing the courteous answer of the
+Lord Adrian di Castello, bids me say, that lest the graver converse the
+Lord Adrian refers to should mar gentle and friendly sport, he ventures
+respectfully to suggest, that the tilt should preface the converse.  The
+sod before the tent is so soft and smooth, that even a fall could be
+attended with no danger to knight or steed."
+
+"By our Lady!" cried Adrian and Annibaldi in a breath, "but thy last words
+are discourteous; and" (proceeded Adrian, recovering himself) "since thy
+master will have it so, let him look to his horse's girths.  I will not
+gainsay his fancy."
+
+Montreal, who had thus insisted upon the exhibition, partly, it may be,
+from the gay and ruffling bravado, common still amongst his brave
+countrymen; partly because he was curious of exhibiting before those who
+might soon be his open foes his singular and unrivalled address in arms,
+was yet more moved to it on learning the name of the leader of the Roman
+Company; for his vain and haughty spirit, however it had disguised
+resentment at the time, had by no means forgiven certain warm expressions
+of Adrian in the palace of Stephen Colonna, and in the unfortunate journey
+to Corneto.  While Adrian, halting at the entrance of the defile, aided by
+his squires, indignantly, but carefully, indued the rest of his armour, and
+saw, himself, to the girths, stirrup-leathers, and various buckles in the
+caparison of his noble charger, Montreal in great glee kissed his lady,
+who, though too soft to be angry, was deeply vexed, (and yet her vexation
+half forgotten in fear for his safety,) snatched up her scarf of blue,
+which he threw over his breastplate, and completed his array with the
+indifference of a man certain of victory.  He was destined, however, to one
+disadvantage, and that the greatest; his armour and lance had been brought
+from the castle - not his warhorse.  His palfrey was too slight to bear the
+great weight of his armour, nor amongst his troop was there one horse that
+for power and bone could match with Adrian's.  He chose, however, the
+strongest that was at hand, and a loud shout from his wild followers
+testified their admiration when he sprung unaided from the ground into the
+saddle - a rare and difficult feat of agility in a man completely arrayed
+in the ponderous armour which issued at that day from the forges of Milan,
+and was worn far more weighty in Italy than any other part of Europe. 
+While both companies grouped slowly, and mingled in a kind of circle round
+the green turf, and the Roman heralds, with bustling importance, attempted
+to marshal the spectators into order, Montreal rode his charger round the
+sward, forcing it into various caracoles, and exhibiting, with the vanity
+that belonged to him, his exquisite and practised horsemanship.
+
+At length, Adrian, his visor down, rode slowly into the green space, amidst
+the cheers of his party.  The two Knights, at either end, gravely fronted
+each other; they made the courtesies with their lances, which, in friendly
+and sportive encounters, were customary; and, as they thus paused for the
+signal of encounter, the Italians trembled for the honour of their chief: 
+Montreal's stately height and girth of chest forming a strong contrast,
+even in armour, to the form of his opponent, which was rather under the
+middle standard, and though firmly knit, slightly and slenderly built.  But
+to that perfection was skill in arms brought in those times, that great
+strength and size were far from being either the absolute requisites, or
+even the usual attributes, of the more celebrated knights; in fact, so much
+was effected by the power and the management of the steed, that a light
+weight in the rider was often rather to his advantage than his prejudice: 
+and, even at a later period, the most accomplished victors in the tourney,
+the French Bayard and the English Sydney, were far from remarkable either
+for bulk or stature.
+
+Whatever the superiority of Montreal in physical power, was, in much,
+counterbalanced by the inferiority of his horse, which, though a thick-
+built and strong Calabrian, had neither the blood, bone, nor practised
+discipline of the northern charger of the Roman.  The shining coat of the
+latter, coal black, was set off by a scarlet cloth wrought in gold; the
+neck and shoulders were clad in scales of mail; and from the forehead
+projected a long point, like the horn of an unicorn, while on its crest
+waved a tall plume of scarlet and white feathers.  As the mission of Adrian
+to Naples was that of pomp and ceremony to a court of great splendour, so
+his array and retinue were befitting the occasion and the passion for show
+that belonged to the time; and the very bridle of his horse, which was
+three inches broad, was decorated with gold, and even jewels.  The Knight
+himself was clad in mail, which had tested the finest art of the celebrated
+Ludovico of Milan; and, altogether, his appearance was unusually gallant
+and splendid, and seemed still more so beside the plain but brightly
+polished and artfully flexile armour of Montreal, (adorned only with his
+lady's scarf,) and the common and rude mail of his charger.  This contrast,
+however, was not welcome to the Provencal, whose vanity was especially
+indulged in warlike equipments; and who, had he foreseen the "pastime" that
+awaited him, would have outshone even the Colonna.
+
+The trumpeters of either party gave a short blast - the Knights remained
+erect as statues of iron; a second, and each slightly bent over his saddle-
+bow; a third, and with spears couched, slackened reins, and at full speed,
+on they rushed, and fiercely they met midway.  With the reckless arrogance
+which belonged to him, Montreal had imagined, that at the first touch of
+his lance Adrian would have been unhorsed; but to his great surprise the
+young Roman remained firm, and amidst the shouts of his party, passed on to
+the other end of the lists.  Montreal himself was rudely shaken, but lost
+neither seat nor stirrup.
+
+"This can be no carpet knight," muttered Montreal between his teeth, as,
+this time, he summoned all his skill for a second encounter; while Adrian,
+aware of the great superiority of his charger, resolved to bring it to bear
+against his opponent.  Accordingly, when the Knights again rushed forward,
+Adrian, covering himself well with his buckler, directed his care less
+against the combatant, whom he felt no lance wielded by mortal hand was
+likely to dislodge, than against the less noble animal he bestrode.  The
+shock of Montreal's charge was like an avalanche - his lance shivered into
+a thousand pieces, Adrian lost both stirrups, and but for the strong iron
+bows which guarded the saddle in front and rear, would have been fairly
+unhorsed; as it was, he was almost doubled back by the encounter, and his
+ears rung and his eyes reeled, so that for a moment or two he almost lost
+all consciousness.  But his steed had well repaid its nurture and
+discipline.  Just as the combatants closed, the animal, rearing on high,
+pressed forward with its mighty crest against its opponent with a force so
+irresistible as to drive back Montreal's horse several paces:  while
+Adrian's lance, poised with exquisite skill, striking against the
+Provencal's helmet, somewhat rudely diverted the Knight's attention for the
+moment from his rein.  Montreal, drawing the curb too tightly in the
+suddenness of his recovery, the horse reared on end; and, receiving at that
+instant, full upon his breastplate, the sharp horn and mailed crest of
+Adrian's charger - fell back over its rider upon the sward.  Montreal
+disencumbered himself in great rage and shame, as a faint cry from his
+pavilion reached his ear, and redoubled his mortification.  He rose with a
+lightness which astonished the beholders; for so heavy was the armour worn
+at that day, that few knights once stretched upon the ground could rise
+without assistance; and drawing his sword, cried out fiercely - "On foot,
+on foot! - the fall was not mine, but this accursed beast's, that I must
+needs for my sins raise to the rank of a charger.  Come on - "
+
+"Nay, Sir Knight," said Adrian, drawing off his gauntlets and unbuckling
+his helmet, which he threw on the ground, "I come to thee a guest and a
+friend; but to fight on foot is the encounter of mortal foes.  Did I accept
+thy offer, my defeat would but stain thy knighthood."
+
+Montreal, whose passion had beguiled him for the moment, sullenly
+acquiesced in this reasoning.  Adrian hastened to soothe his antagonist. 
+"For the rest," said he, "I cannot pretend to the prize.  Your lance lost
+me my stirrups - mine left you unshaken.  You say right; the defeat, if
+any, was that of your steed."
+
+"We may meet again when I am more equally horsed," said Montreal, still
+chafing.
+
+"Now, our Lady forbid!" exclaimed Adrian, with so devout an earnestness
+that the bystanders could not refrain from laughing; and even Montreal
+grimly and half-reluctantly, joined in the merriment.  The courtesy of his
+foe, however, conciliated and touched the more frank and soldierly
+qualities of his nature, and composing himself, he replied: - 
+
+"Signor di Castello, I rest your debtor for a courtesy that I have but
+little imitated.  Howbeit, if thou wouldst bind me to thee for ever, thou
+wilt suffer me to send for my own charger, and afford me a chance to
+retrieve mine honour.  With that steed, or with one equal to thine, which
+seems to me of the English breed, I will gage all I possess, lands, castle,
+and gold, sword and spurs, to maintain this pass, one by one, against all
+thy train."
+
+Fortunately, perhaps, for Adrian, ere he could reply, Riccardo Annibaldi
+cried, with great warmth, "Sir Knight, I have with me two steeds well
+practised in the tourney; take thy choice, and accept in me a champion of
+the Roman against the French chivalry; - there is my gage."
+
+"Signor," replied Montreal, with ill-suppressed delight, "thy proffer shows
+so gallant and free a spirit, that it were foul sin in me to balk it.  I
+accept thy gage, and whichever of thy steeds thou rejectest, in God's name
+bring it hither, and let us waste no words before action."
+
+Adrian, who felt that hitherto the Romans had been more favoured by fortune
+than merit, vainly endeavoured to prevent this second hazard.  But
+Annibaldi was greatly chafed, and his high rank rendered it impolitic in
+Adrian to offend him by peremptory prohibition; the Colonna reluctantly,
+therefore, yielded his assent to the engagement.  Annibaldi's steeds were
+led to the spot, the one a noble roan, the other a bay, of somewhat less
+breeding and bone, but still of great strength and price.  Montreal finding
+the choice pressed upon him, gallantly selected the latter and less
+excellent.
+
+Annibaldi was soon arrayed for the encounter, and Adrian gave the word to
+the trumpeters.  The Roman was of a stature almost equal to that of
+Montreal, and though some years younger, seemed, in his armour, nearly of
+the same thews and girth, so that the present antagonists appeared at the
+first glance more evenly matched than the last.  But this time Montreal,
+well horsed, inspired to the utmost by shame and pride, felt himself a
+match for an army; and he met the young Baron with such prowess, that while
+the very plume on his casque seemed scarcely stirred, the Italian was
+thrown several paces from his steed, and it was not till some moments after
+his visor was removed by his squires that he recovered his senses.  This
+event restored Montreal to all his natural gaiety of humour, and
+effectually raised the spirits of his followers, who had felt much humbled
+by the previous encounter.
+
+He himself assisted Annibaldi to rise with great courtesy, and a profusion
+of compliments, which the proud Roman took in stern silence, and then led
+the way to the pavilion, loudly ordering the banquet to be spread. 
+Annibaldi, however, loitered behind, and Adrian, who penetrated his
+thoughts, and who saw that over their cups a quarrel between the Provencal
+and his friend was likely to ensue, drawing him aside, said: - "Methinks,
+dear Annibaldi, it would be better if you, with the chief of our following,
+were to proceed onward to Fondi, where I will join you at sunset.  My
+squires, and some eight lances, will suffice for my safeguard here; and, to
+say truth, I desire a few private words with our strange host, in the hope
+that he may be peaceably induced to withdraw from hence without the help of
+our Roman troops, who have enough elsewhere to feed their valour."
+
+Annibaldi pressed his companion's hand:  "I understand thee," he replied
+with a slight blush, "and, indeed, I could but ill brook the complacent
+triumph of the barbarian.  I accept thy offer."
+
+
+Chapter 3.III.  The Conversation between the Roman and the Provencal -
+Adeline's History - the Moonlit Sea - the Lute and the Song.
+
+As soon as Annibaldi, with the greater part of the retinue, was gone,
+Adrian, divesting himself of his heavy greaves, entered alone the pavilion
+of the Knight of St. John.  Montreal had already doffed all his armour,
+save the breastplate, and he now stepped forward to welcome his guest with
+the winning and easy grace which better suited his birth than his
+profession.  He received Adrian's excuses for the absence of Annibaldi and
+the other knights of his train with a smile which seemed to prove how
+readily he divined the cause, and conducted him to the other and more
+private division of the pavilion in which the repast (rendered acceptable
+by the late exercise of guest and host) was prepared; and here Adrian for
+the first time discovered Adeline.  Long inurement to the various and
+roving life of her lover, joined to a certain pride which she derived from
+conscious, though forfeited, rank, gave to the outward manner of that
+beautiful lady an ease and freedom which often concealed, even from
+Montreal, her sensitiveness to her unhappy situation.  At times, indeed,
+when alone with Montreal, whom she loved with all the devotion of romance,
+she was sensible only to the charm of a presence which consoled her for all
+things; but in his frequent absence, or on the admission of any stranger,
+the illusion vanished - the reality returned.  Poor lady!  Nature had not
+formed, education had not reared, habit had not reconciled, her to the
+breath of shame!
+
+The young Colonna was much struck by her beauty, and more by her gentle and
+highborn grace.  Like her lord she appeared younger than she was; time
+seemed to spare a bloom which an experienced eye might have told was
+destined to an early grave; and there was something almost girlish in the
+lightness of her form - the braided luxuriance of her rich auburn hair, and
+the colour that went and came, not only with every moment, but almost with
+every word.  The contrast between her and Montreal became them both - it
+was the contrast of devoted reliance and protecting strength:  each looked
+fairer in the presence of the other:  and as Adrian sate down to the well-
+laden board, he thought he had never seen a pair more formed for the poetic
+legends of their native Troubadours.
+
+Montreal conversed gaily upon a thousand matters - pressed the wine flasks
+- and selected for his guest the most delicate portions of the delicious
+spicola of the neighbouring sea, and the rich flesh of the wild boar of the
+Pontine Marshes.
+
+"Tell me," said Montreal, as their hunger was now appeased - "tell me,
+noble Adrian, how fares your kinsman, Signor Stephen?  A brave old man for
+his years."
+
+"He bears him as the youngest of us," answered Adrian.
+
+"Late events must have shocked him a little," said Montreal, with an arch
+smile.  "Ah, you look grave - yet commend my foresight; - I was the first
+who prophesied to thy kinsman the rise of Cola di Rienzi; he seems a great
+man - never more great than in conciliating the Colonna and the Orsini."
+
+"The Tribune," returned Adrian, evasively, "is certainly a man of
+extraordinary genius.  And now, seeing him command, my only wonder is how
+he ever brooked to obey - majesty seems a very part of him."
+
+"Men who win power, easily put on its harness, dignity," answered Montreal;
+"and if I hear aright - (pledge me to your lady's health) - the Tribune, if
+not himself nobly born will soon be nobly connected."
+
+"He is already married to a Raselli, an old Roman house," replied Adrian.
+
+"You evade my pursuit, - Le doulx soupir! le doulx soupir! as the old
+Cabestan has it" - said Montreal, laughing.  "Well, you have pledged me one
+cup to your lady, pledge another to the fair Irene, the Tribune's sister -
+always provided they two are not one. - You smile and shake your head."
+
+"I do not disguise from you, Sir Knight," answered Adrian, "that when my
+present embassy is over, I trust the alliance between the Tribune and a
+Colonna will go far towards the benefit of both."
+
+"I have heard rightly, then," said Montreal, in a grave and thoughtful
+tone.  "Rienzi's power must, indeed, be great."
+
+"Of that my mission is a proof.  Are you aware, Signor de Montreal, that
+Louis, King of Hungary - "
+
+"How! what of him?"
+
+"Has referred the decision of the feud between himself and Joanna of
+Naples, respecting the death of her royal spouse, his brother, to the fiat
+of the Tribune?  This is the first time, methinks, since the death of
+Constantine, that so great a confidence and so high a charge were ever
+intrusted to a Roman!"
+
+"By all the saints in the calendar," cried Montreal, crossing himself,
+"this news is indeed amazing!  The fierce Louis of Hungary waive the right
+of the sword, and choose other umpire than the field of battle!"
+
+"And this," continued Adrian, in a significant tone, "this it was which
+induced me to obey your courteous summons.  I know, brave Montreal, that
+you hold intercourse with Louis.  Louis has given to the Tribune the best
+pledge of his amity and alliance; will you do wisely if you - "
+
+"Wage war with the Hungarian's ally," interrupted Montreal.  "This you were
+about to add; the same thought crossed myself.  My Lord, pardon me -
+Italians sometimes invent what they wish.  On the honour of a knight of the
+Empire, these tidings are the naked truth?"
+
+"By my honour, and on the Cross," answered Adrian, drawing himself up; "and
+in proof thereof, I am now bound to Naples to settle with the Queen the
+preliminaries of the appointed trial."
+
+"Two crowned heads before the tribunal of a plebeian, and one a defendant
+against the charge of murther!" muttered Montreal; "the news might well
+amaze me!"
+
+He remained musing and silent a little while, till looking up, he caught
+Adeline's tender gaze fixed upon him with that deep solicitude with which
+she watched the outward effect of schemes and projects she was too soft to
+desire to know, and too innocent to share.
+
+"Lady mine," said the Provencal, fondly, "how sayest thou? must we abandon
+our mountain castle, and these wild woodland scenes, for the dull walls of
+a city?  I fear me so. - The Lady Adeline," he continued, turning to
+Adrian, "is of a singular bias; she hates the gay crowds of streets and
+thoroughfares, and esteems no palace like the solitary outlaw's hold.  Yet,
+methinks, she might outshine all the faces of Italy, - thy mistress, Lord
+Adrian, of course, excepted."
+
+"It is an exception which only a lover, and that too a betrothed lover,
+would dare to make," replied Adrian, gallantly.
+
+"Nay," said Adeline, in a voice singularly sweet and clear, "nay, I know
+well at what price to value my lord's flattery, and Signor di Castello's
+courtesy.  But you are bound, Sir Knight, to a court, that, if fame speak
+true, boasts in its Queen the very miracle and mould of beauty."
+
+"It is some years since I saw the Queen of Naples," answered Adrian; "and I
+little dreamed then, when I gazed upon that angel face, that I should live
+to hear her accused of the foulest murther that ever stained even Italian
+royalty."
+
+"And, as if resolved to prove her guilt," said Montreal, "ere long be sure
+she will marry the very man who did the deed.  Of this I have certain
+proof."
+
+Thus conversing, the Knights wore away the daylight, and beheld from the
+open tent the sun cast his setting glow over the purple sea.  Adeline had
+long retired from the board, and they now saw her seated with her handmaids
+on a mound by the beach; while the sound of her lute faintly reached their
+ears.  As Montreal caught the air, he turned from the converse, and
+sighing, half shaded his face with his hand.  Somehow or other the two
+Knights had worn away all the little jealousy or pique which they had
+conceived against each other at Rome.  Both imbued with the soldier-like
+spirit of the age, their contest in the morning had served to inspire them
+with that strange kind of respect, and even cordiality, which one brave man
+even still (how much more at that day!) feels for another, whose courage he
+has proved while vindicating his own.  It is like the discovery of a
+congenial sentiment hitherto latent; and, in a life of camps, often
+establishes sudden and lasting friendship in the very lap of enmity.  This
+feeling had been ripened by their subsequent familiar intercourse, and was
+increased on Adrian's side by the feeling, that in convincing Montreal of
+the policy of withdrawing from the Roman territories, he had obtained an
+advantage that well repaid whatever danger and delay he had undergone.
+
+The sigh, and the altered manner of Montreal, did not escape Adrian, and he
+naturally connected it with something relating to her whose music had been
+its evident cause.
+
+"Yon lovely dame," said he, gently, "touches the lute with an exquisite and
+fairy hand, and that plaintive air seems to my ear as of the minstrelsy of
+Provence."
+
+"It is the air I taught her," said Montreal, sadly, "married as it is to
+indifferent words, with which I first wooed a heart that should never have
+given itself to me!  Ay, young Colonna, many a night has my boat been
+moored beneath the starlit Sorgia that washes her proud father's halls, and
+my voice awaked the stillness of the waving sedges with a soldier's
+serenade.  Sweet memories! bitter fruit!"
+
+"Why bitter? ye love each other still."
+
+"But I am vowed to celibacy, and Adeline de Courval is leman where she
+should be wedded dame.  Methinks I fret at that thought even more than she,
+- dear Adeline!"
+
+"Your lady, as all would guess, is then nobly born?"
+
+"She is," answered Montreal, with a deep and evident feeling which, save in
+love, rarely, if ever, crossed his hardy breast.  "She is! our tale is a
+brief one: - we loved each other as children:  Her family was wealthier
+than mine:  We were separated.  I was given to understand that she
+abandoned me.  I despaired, and in despair I took the cross of St. John. 
+Chance threw us again together.  I learned that her love was undecayed. 
+Poor child! - she was even then, sir, but a child!  I, wild, - reckless -
+and not unskilled, perhaps, in the arts that woo and win.  She could not
+resist my suit or her own affection! - We fled.  In those words you see the
+thread of my after history.  My sword and my Adeline were all my fortune. 
+Society frowned on us.  The Church threatened my soul.  The Grand Master my
+life.  I became a knight of fortune.  Fate and my right hand favoured me. 
+I have made those who scorned me tremble at my name.  That name shall yet
+blaze, a star or a meteor, in the front of troubled nations, and I may yet
+win by force from the Pontiff the dispensation refused to my prayers.  On
+the same day, I may offer Adeline the diadem and the ring. - Eno' of this;
+- you marked Adeline's cheek! - Seems it not delicate?  I like not that
+changeful flush, - and she moves languidly, - her step that was so blithe!"
+
+"Change of scene and the mild south will soon restore her health," said
+Adrian; "and in your peculiar life she is so little brought in contact with
+others, especially of her own sex, that I trust she is but seldom made
+aware of whatever is painful in her situation.  And woman's love, Montreal,
+as we both have learned, is a robe that wraps her from many a storm!"
+
+"You speak kindly," returned the Knight; "but you know not all our cause of
+grief.  Adeline's father, a proud sieur, died, - they said of a broken
+heart, - but old men die of many another disease than that!  The mother, a
+dame who boasted her descent from princes, bore the matter more sternly
+than the sire; clamoured for revenge, - which was odd, for she is as
+religious as a Dominican, and revenge is not Christian in a woman, though
+it is knightly in a man! - Well, my Lord, we had one boy, our only child;
+he was Adeline's solace in my absence, - his pretty ways were worth the
+world to her!  She loved him so, that, but he had her eyes and looked like
+her when he slept, I should have been jealous!  He grew up in our wild
+life, strong and comely; the young rogue, he would have been a brave
+knight!  My evil stars led me to Milan, where I had business with the
+Visconti.  One bright morning in June, our boy was stolen; verily that June
+was like a December to us!"
+
+"Stolen! - how? - by whom?"
+
+"The first question is answered easily, - the boy was with his nurse in the
+courtyard, the idle wench left him for but a minute or two - so she avers -
+fetch him some childish toy; when she returned he was gone; not a trace
+left, save his pretty cap with the plume in it!  Poor Adeline, many a time
+have I found her kissing that relic till it was wet with tears!"
+
+"A strange fortune, in truth.  But what interest could - "
+
+"I will tell you," interrupted Montreal, "the only conjecture I could form;
+- Adeline's mother, on learning we had a son, sent to Adeline a letter,
+that well nigh broke her heart, reproaching her for her love to me, and so
+forth, as if that had made her the vilest of the sex.  She bade her take
+compassion on her child, and not bring him up to a robber's life, - so was
+she pleased to style the bold career of Walter de Montreal.  She offered to
+rear the child in her own dull halls, and fit him, no doubt, for a shaven
+pate and a monk's cowl.  She chafed much that a mother would not part with
+her treasure!  She alone, partly in revenge, partly in silly compassion for
+Adeline's child, partly, it may be, from some pious fanaticism, could, it
+so seemed to me, have robbed us of our boy.  On inquiry, I learned from the
+nurse - who, but that she was of the same sex as Adeline, should have
+tasted my dagger, - that in their walks, a woman of advanced years, but
+seemingly of humble rank, (that might be disguise!) had often stopped, and
+caressed and admired the child.  I repaired at once to France, sought the
+old Castle of De Courval; - it had passed to the next heir, and the old
+widow was go on, none knew whither, but, it was conjectured, to take the
+veil in some remote convent."
+
+"And you never saw her since?"
+
+"Yes, at Rome," answered Montreal, turning pale; "when last there I chanced
+suddenly upon her; and then at length I learned my boy's fate, and the
+truth of my own surmise; she confessed to the theft - and my child was
+dead!  I have not dared to tell Adeline of this; it seems to me as if it
+would be like plucking the shaft from the wounded side - and she would die
+at once, bereft of the uncertainty that rankles within her.  She has still
+a hope - it comforts her; though my heart bleeds when I think on its
+vanity.  Let this pass, my Colonna."
+
+And Montreal started to his feet as if he strove, by a strong effort, to
+shake off the weakness that had crept over him in his narration.
+
+"Think no more of it.  Life is short - its thorns are many - let us not
+neglect any of its flowers.  This is piety and wisdom too; Nature that
+meant me to struggle and to toil, gave me, happily, the sanguine heart and
+the elastic soul of France; and I have lived long enough to own that to die
+young is not an evil.  Come, Lord Adrian, let us join my lady ere you part,
+if part you must; the moon will be up soon, and Fondi is but a short
+journey hence.  You know that though I admire not your Petrarch, you with
+more courtesy laud our Provencal ballads, and you must hear Adeline sing
+one that you may prize them the more.  The race of the Troubadours is dead,
+but the minstrelsy survives the minstrel!"
+
+Adrian, who scarce knew what comfort to administer to the affliction of his
+companion, was somewhat relieved by the change in his mood, though his more
+grave and sensitive nature was a little startled at its suddenness.  But,
+as we have before seen, Montreal's spirit (and this made perhaps its
+fascination) was as a varying and changeful sky; the gayest sunshine, and
+the fiercest storm swept over it in rapid alternation; and elements of
+singular might and grandeur, which, properly directed and concentrated,
+would have made him the blessing and glory of his time, were wielded with a
+boyish levity, roused into war and desolation, or lulled into repose and
+smoothness, with all the suddenness of chance, and all the fickleness of
+caprice.
+
+Sauntering down to the beach, the music of Adeline's lute sounded more
+distinctly in their ears, and involuntarily they hushed their steps upon
+the rich and odorous turf, as in a voice, though not powerful, marvellously
+sweet and clear, and well adapted to the simple fashion of the words and
+melody, she sang the following stanzas: -
+
+Lay of the Lady of Provence.
+
+1.
+
+Ah, why art thou sad, my heart?  Why
+  Darksome and lonely?
+Frowns the face of the happy sky
+  Over thee only?
+    Ah me, ah me!
+  Render to joy the earth!
+  Grief shuns, not envies, Mirth;
+  But leave one quiet spot,
+  Where Mirth may enter not,
+    To sigh, Ah, me! -
+      Ah me.
+
+2.
+
+As a bird, though the sky be clear,
+  Feels the storm lower;
+My soul bodes the tempest near,
+  In the sunny hour;
+    Ah me, ah me!
+  Be glad while yet we may!
+  I bid thee, my heart, be gay;
+  And still I know not why, -
+  Thou answerest with a sigh,
+    (Fond heart!) Ah me! -
+      Ah me!
+
+3.
+
+As this twilight o'er the skies,
+  Doubt brings the sorrow;
+Who knows when the daylight dies,
+  What waits the morrow?
+    Ah me, ah me!
+  Be blithe, be blithe, my lute,
+  Thy strings will soon be mute;
+  Be blithe - hark! while it dies,
+  The note forewarning, sighs
+    Its last - Ah me!
+      Ah me!
+
+"My own Adeline - my sweetest night-bird," half-whispered Montreal, and
+softly approaching, he threw himself at his lady's feet - "thy song is too
+sad for this golden eve."
+
+"No sound ever went to the heart," said Adrian, "whose arrow was not
+feathered by sadness.  True sentiment, Montreal, is twin with melancholy,
+though not with gloom."
+
+The lady looked softly and approvingly up at Adrian's face; she was pleased
+with its expression; she was pleased yet more with words of which women
+rather than men would acknowledge the truth.  Adrian returned the look with
+one of deep and eloquent sympathy and respect; in fact, the short story he
+had heard from Montreal had interested him deeply in her; and never to the
+brilliant queen, to whose court he was bound, did his manner wear so
+chivalric and earnest a homage as it did to that lone and ill-fated lady on
+the twilight shores of Terracina.
+
+Adeline blushed slightly and sighed; and then, to break the awkwardness of
+a pause which had stolen over them, as Montreal, unheeding the last remark
+of Adrian, was tuning the strings of the lute, she said - "Of course the
+Signor di Castello shares the universal enthusiasm for Petrarch?"
+
+"Ay," cried Montreal; "my lady is Petrarch mad, like the rest of them:  but
+all I know is, that never did belted knight and honest lover woo in such
+fantastic and tortured strains."
+
+"In Italy," answered Adrian, "common language is exaggeration; - but even
+your own Troubadour poetry might tell you that love, ever seeking a new
+language of its own, cannot but often run into what to all but lovers seems
+distortion and conceit."
+
+"Come, dear Signor," said Montreal, placing the lute in Adrian's hands,
+"let Adeline be the umpire between us, which music - yours or mine - can
+woo the more blandly."
+
+"Ah," said Adrian, laughing; "I fear me, Sir Knight, you have already
+bribed the umpire."
+
+Montreal's eyes and Adeline's met; and in that gaze Adeline forgot all her
+sorrows.
+
+With a practised and skilful hand, Adrian touched the strings; and
+selecting a song which was less elaborate than those mostly in vogue
+amongst his countrymen, though still conceived in the Italian spirit, and
+in accordance with the sentiment he had previously expressed to Adeline, he
+sang as follows: -
+
+Love's Excuse for Sadness.
+
+Chide not, beloved, if oft with thee
+  I feel not rapture wholly;
+For aye the heart that's fill'd with love,
+  Runs o'er in melancholy.
+To streams that glide in noon, the shade
+  From summer skies is given;
+So, if my breast reflects the cloud,
+  'Tis but the cloud of heaven!
+Thine image glass'd within my soul
+  So well the mirror keepeth;
+That, chide me not, if with the light
+  The shadow also sleepeth.
+
+"And now," said Adrian, as he concluded, "the lute is to you:  I but
+preclude your prize."
+
+The Provencal laughed, and shook his head. - "With any other umpire, I had
+had my lute broken on my own head, for my conceit in provoking such a
+rival; but I must not shrink from a contest I have myself provoked, even
+though in one day twice defeated."  And with that, in a deep and
+exquisitely melodious voice, which wanted only more scientific culture to
+have challenged any competition, the Knight of St. John poured forth
+
+The Lay of the Troubadour.
+
+1.
+
+Gentle river, the moonbeam is hush'd on thy tide,
+On thy pathway of light to my lady I glide.
+My boat, where the stream laves the castle, I moor, -
+All at rest save the maid and her young Troubadour!
+  As the stars to the waters that bore
+    My bark, to my spirit thou art;
+  Heaving yet, see it bound to the shore,
+    So moor'd to thy beauty my heart, -
+      Bel' amie, bel' amie, bel' amie!
+
+2.
+
+Wilt thou fly from the world?  It hath wealth for the vain;
+But Love breaks his bond when there's gold in the chain;
+Wilt thou fly from the world?  It hath courts for the proud; -
+But Love, born in caves, pines to death in the crowd.
+  Were this bosom thy world, dearest one,
+    Thy world could not fail to be bright;
+  For thou shouldst thyself be its sun,
+    And what spot could be dim in thy light -
+      Bel' amie, bel' amie, bel' amie?
+
+3.
+
+The rich and the great woo thee dearest; and poor,
+Though his fathers were princes, thy young Troubadour!
+But his heart never quail'd save to thee, his adored, -
+There's no guile in his lute, and no stain on his sword.
+  Ah, I reck not what sorrows I know,
+    Could I still on thy solace confide;
+  And I care not, though earth be my foe,
+    If thy soft heart be found by my side, -
+      Bel' amie, bel' amie, bel' amie!
+
+4.
+
+The maiden she blush'd, and the maiden she sighed,
+Not a cloud in the sky, not a gale on the tide;
+But though tempest had raged on the wave and the wind,
+That castle, methinks, had been still left behind!
+  Sweet lily, though bow'd by the blast,
+    (To this bosom transplanted) since then,
+  Wouldst thou change, could we call the past,
+    To the rock from thy garden again -
+      Bel' amie, bel' amie, bel' amie?
+
+Thus they alternated the time with converse and song, as the wooded hills
+threw their sharp, long shadows over the sea; while from many a mound of
+waking flowers, and many a copse of citron and orange, relieved by the dark
+and solemn aloe, stole the summer breeze, laden with mingled odours; and,
+over the seas, coloured by the slow-fading hues of purple and rose, that
+the sun had long bequeathed to the twilight, flitted the gay fireflies that
+sparkle along that enchanted coast.  At length, the moon slowly rose above
+the dark forest-steeps, gleaming on the gay pavilion and glittering pennon
+of Montreal, - on the verdant sward, - the polished mail of the soldiers,
+stretched on the grass in various groups, half-shaded by oaks and cypress,
+and the war-steeds grazing peaceably together - a wild mixture of the
+Pastoral and the Iron time.
+
+Adrian, reluctantly reminded of his journey, rose to depart.
+
+"I fear," said he to Adeline, "that I have already detained you too late in
+the night air:  but selfishness is little considerate."
+
+"Nay, you see we are prudent," said Adeline, pointing to Montreal's mantle,
+which his provident hand had long since drawn around her form; "but if you
+must part, farewell, and success attend you!"
+
+"We may meet again, I trust," said Adrian.
+
+Adeline sighed gently; and the Colonna, gazing on her face by the
+moonlight, to which it was slightly raised, was painfully struck by its
+almost transparent delicacy.  Moved by his compassion, ere he mounted his
+steed, he drew Montreal aside, - "Forgive me if I seem presumptuous," said
+he; "but to one so noble this wild life is scarce a fitting career.  I know
+that, in our time, War consecrates all his children; but surely a settled
+rank in the court of the Emperor, or an honourable reconciliation with your
+knightly brethren, were better - "
+
+"Than a Tartar camp, and a brigand's castle," interrupted Montreal, with
+some impatience.  "This you were about to say - you are mistaken.  Society
+thrust me from her bosom; let society take the fruit it hath sown.  'A
+fixed rank,' say you? some subaltern office, to fight at other men's
+command!  You know me not:  Walter de Montreal was not formed to obey.  War
+when I will, and rest when I list, is the motto of my escutcheon.  Ambition
+proffers me rewards you wot not of; and I am of the mould as of the race of
+those whose swords have conquered thrones.  For the rest, your news of the
+alliance of Louis of Hungary with your Tribune makes it necessary for the
+friend of Louis to withdraw from all feud with Rome.  Ere the week expire,
+the owl and the bat may seek refuge in yon grey turrets."
+
+"But your lady?"
+
+"Is inured to change. - God help her, and temper the rough wind to the
+lamb!"
+
+"Enough, Sir Knight:  but should you desire a sure refuge at Rome for one
+so gentle and so highborn, by the right hand of a knight, I promise a safe
+roof and an honoured home to the Lady Adeline."
+
+Montreal pressed the offered hand to his heart; then plucking his own
+hastily away, drew it across his eyes, and joined Adeline, in a silence
+that showed he dared not trust himself to speak.  In a few moments Adrian
+and his train were on the march; but still the young Colonna turned back,
+to gaze once more on his wild host and that lovely lady, as they themselves
+lingered on the moonlit sward, while the sea rippled mournfully on their
+ears.
+
+It was not many months after that date, that the name of Fra Monreale
+scattered terror and dismay throughout the fair Campania.  The right hand
+of the Hungarian king, in his invasion of Naples, he was chosen afterwards
+vicar (or vice-gerent) of Louis in Aversa; and fame and fate seemed to lead
+him triumphantly along that ambitious career which he had elected, whether
+bounded by the scaffold or the throne.
+
+
+
+BOOK IV.  THE TRIUMPH AND THE POMP.
+
+"Allora fama e paura di si buono reggimento, passa in ogni terra." - "Vita
+di Cola di Rienzi", lib. i. cap. 21.
+
+"Then the fame and the fear of that so good government passed into every
+land." - "Life of Cola di Rienzi". 
+
+
+Chapter 4.I.  The Boy Angelo - the Dream of Nina Fulfilled.
+
+The thread of my story transports us back to Rome.  It was in a small
+chamber, in a ruinous mansion by the base of Mount Aventine, that a young
+boy sate, one evening, with a woman of a tall and stately form, but
+somewhat bowed both by infirmity and years.  The boy was of a fair and
+comely presence; and there was that in his bold, frank, undaunted carriage,
+which made him appear older than he was.
+
+The old woman, seated in the recess of the deep window, was apparently
+occupied with a Bible that lay open on her knees; but ever and anon she
+lifted her eyes, and gazed on her young companion with a sad and anxious
+expression.
+
+"Dame," said the boy, who was busily employed in hewing out a sword of
+wood, "I would you had seen the show today.  Why, every day is a show at
+Rome now!  It is show enough to see the Tribune himself on his white steed
+- (oh, it is so beautiful!) - with his white robes all studded with jewels. 
+But today, as I have just been telling you, the Lady Nina took notice of
+me, as I stood on the stairs of the Capitol:  you know, dame, I had donned
+my best blue velvet doublet."
+
+"And she called you a fair boy, and asked if you would be her little page;
+and this has turned thy brain, silly urchin that thou art - "
+
+"But the words are the least:  if you saw the Lady Nina, you would own that
+a smile from her might turn the wisest head in Italy.  Oh, how I should
+like to serve the Tribune!  All the lads of my age are mad for him.  How
+they will stare, and envy me at school tomorrow!  You know too, dame, that
+though I was not always brought up at Rome, I am Roman.  Every Roman loves
+Rienzi."
+
+"Ay, for the hour:  the cry will soon change.  This vanity of thine,
+Angelo, vexes my old heart.  I would thou wert humbler."
+
+"Bastards have their own name to win," said the boy, colouring deeply. 
+"They twit me in the teeth, because I cannot say who my father and mother
+were."
+
+"They need not," returned the dame, hastily.  "Thou comest of noble blood
+and long descent, though, as I have told thee often, I know not the exact
+names of thy parents.  But what art thou shaping that tough sapling of oak
+into?"
+
+"A sword, dame, to assist the Tribune against the robbers."
+
+"Alas!  I fear me, like all those who seek power in Italy, he is more
+likely to enlist robbers than to assail them."
+
+"Why, la you there, you live so shut up, that you know and hear nothing, or
+you would have learned that even that fiercest of all the robbers, Fra
+Moreale, has at length yielded to the Tribune, and fled from his castle,
+like a rat from a falling house."
+
+"How, how!" cried the dame; "what say you?  Has this plebeian, whom you
+call the Tribune - has he boldly thrown the gage to that dread warrior? and
+has Montreal left the Roman territory?"
+
+"Ay, it is the talk of the town.  But Fra Moreale seems as much a bugbear
+to you as to e'er a mother in Rome.  Did he ever wrong you, dame?"
+
+"Yes!" exclaimed the old woman, with so abrupt a fierceness, that even that
+hardy boy was startled.
+
+"I wish I could meet him, then," said he, after a pause, as he flourished
+his mimic weapon.
+
+"Now Heaven forbid!  He is a man ever to be shunned by thee, whether for
+peace or war.  Say again this good Tribune holds no terms with the Free
+Lances."
+
+"Say it again - why all Rome knows it."
+
+"He is pious, too, I have heard; and they do bruit it that he sees visions,
+and is comforted from above," said the woman, speaking to herself.  Then
+turning to Angelo, she continued, - "Thou wouldst like greatly to accept
+the Lady Nina's proffer?"
+
+"Ah, that I should, dame, if you could spare me."
+
+"Child," replied the matron, solemnly, "my sand is nearly run, and my wish
+is to see thee placed with one who will nurture thy young years, and save
+thee from a life of licence.  That done, I may fulfil my vow, and devote
+the desolate remnant of my years to God.  I will think more of this, my
+child.  Not under such a plebeian's roof shouldst thou have lodged, nor
+from a stranger's board been fed:  but at Rome, my last relative worthy of
+the trust is dead; - and at the worst, obscure honesty is better than gaudy
+crime.  Thy spirit troubles me already.  Back, my child; I must to my
+closet, and watch and pray."
+
+Thus saying, the old woman, repelling the advance, and silencing the
+muttered and confused words, of the boy - half affectionate as they were,
+yet half tetchy and wayward - glided from the chamber.
+
+The boy looked abstractedly at the closing door, and then said to himself -
+"The dame is always talking riddles:  I wonder if she know more of me than
+she tells, or if she is any way akin to me.  I hope not, for I don't love
+her much; nor, for that matter, anything else.  I wish she would place me
+with the Tribune's lady, and then we'll see who among the lads will call
+Angelo Villani bastard."
+
+With that the boy fell to work again at his sword with redoubled vigour. 
+In fact, the cold manner of this female, his sole nurse, companion,
+substitute for parent, had repelled his affections without subduing his
+temper; and though not originally of evil disposition, Angelo Villani was
+already insolent, cunning, and revengeful; but not, on the other hand,
+without a quick susceptibility to kindness as to affront, a natural
+acuteness of understanding, and a great indifference to fear.  Brought up
+in quiet affluence rather than luxury, and living much with his protector,
+whom he knew but by the name of Ursula, his bearing was graceful, and his
+air that of the well-born.  And it was his carriage, perhaps, rather than
+his countenance, which, though handsome, was more distinguished for
+intelligence than beauty, which had attracted the notice of the Tribune's
+bride.  His education was that of one reared for some scholastic
+profession.  He was not only taught to read and write, but had been even
+instructed in the rudiments of Latin.  He did not, however, incline to
+these studies half so fondly as to the games of his companions, or the
+shows or riots in the street, into all of which he managed to thrust
+himself, and from which he had always the happy dexterity to return safe
+and unscathed.
+
+The next morning Ursula entered the young Angelo's chamber.  "Wear again
+thy blue doublet today," said she; "I would have thee look thy best.  Thou
+shalt go with me to the palace."
+
+"What, today?" cried the boy joyfully, half leaping from his bed.  "Dear
+dame Ursula, shall I really then belong to the train of the great Tribune's
+lady?"
+
+"Yes; and leave the old woman to die alone!  Your joy becomes you, - but
+ingratitude is in your blood.  Ingratitude!  Oh, it has burned my heart
+into ashes - and yours, boy, can no longer find a fuel in the dry crumbling
+cinders."
+
+"Dear dame, you are always so biting.  You know you said you wished to
+retire into a convent, and I was too troublesome a charge for you.  But you
+delight in rebuking me, justly or unjustly."
+
+"My task is over," said Ursula, with a deep-drawn sigh.
+
+The boy answered not; and the old woman retired with a heavy step, and, it
+may be, a heavier heart.  When he joined her in their common apartment, he
+observed what his joy had previously blinded him to - that Ursula did not
+wear her usual plain and sober dress.  The gold chain, rarely assumed then
+by women not of noble birth - though, in the other sex, affected also by
+public functionaries and wealthy merchants - glittered upon a robe of the
+rich flowered stuffs of Venice, and the clasps that confined the vest at
+the throat and waist were adorned with jewels of no common price.
+
+Angelo's eye was struck by the change, but he felt a more manly pride in
+remarking that the old lady became it well.  Her air and mien were indeed
+those of one to whom such garments were habitual; and they seemed that day
+more than usually austere and stately.
+
+She smoothed the boy's ringlets, drew his short mantle more gracefully over
+his shoulder, and then placed in his belt a poniard whose handle was richly
+studded, and a purse well filled with florins.
+
+"Learn to use both discreetly," said she; "and, whether I live or die, you
+will never require to wield the poniard to procure the gold."
+
+"This, then," cried Angelo, enchanted, "is a real poniard to fight the
+robbers with!  Ah, with this I should not fear Fra Moreale, who wronged
+thee so.  I trust I may yet avenge thee, though thou didst rate me so just
+now for ingratitude."
+
+"I am avenged.  Nourish not such thoughts, my son, they are sinful; at
+least I fear so.  Draw to the board and eat; we will go betimes, as
+petitioners should do."
+
+Angelo had soon finished his morning meal, and sallying with Ursula to the
+porch, he saw, to his surprise, four of those servitors who then usually
+attended persons of distinction, and who were to be hired in every city,
+for the convenience of strangers or the holyday ostentation of the gayer
+citizens.
+
+"How grand we are today!" said he, clapping his hands with an eagerness
+which Ursula failed not to reprove.
+
+"It is not for vain show," she added, "which true nobility can well
+dispense with, but that we may the more readily gain admittance to the
+palace.  These princes of yesterday are not easy of audience to the over
+humble."
+
+"Oh! but you are wrong this time," said the boy.  "The Tribune gives
+audience to all men, the poorest as the richest.  Nay, there is not a
+ragged boor, or a bare-footed friar, who does not win access to him sooner
+than the proudest baron.  That's why the people love him so.  And he
+devotes one day of the week to receiving the widows and the orphans; - and
+you know, dame, I am an orphan."
+
+Ursula, already occupied with her own thoughts, did not answer, and
+scarcely heard, the boy; but leaning on his young arm, and preceded by the
+footmen to clear the way, passed slowly towards the palace of the Capitol.
+
+A wonderful thing would it have been to a more observant eye, to note the
+change which two or three short months of the stern but salutary and wise
+rule of the Tribune had effected in the streets of Rome.  You no longer
+beheld the gaunt and mail-clad forms of foreign mercenaries stalking
+through the vistas, or grouped in lazy insolence before the embattled
+porches of some gloomy palace.  The shops, that in many quarters had been
+closed for years, were again open, glittering with wares and bustling with
+trade.  The thoroughfares, formerly either silent as death, or crossed by
+some affrighted and solitary passenger with quick steps, and eyes that
+searched every corner, - or resounding with the roar of a pauper rabble, or
+the open feuds of savage nobles, now exhibited the regular, and wholesome,
+and mingled streams of civilized life, whether bound to pleasure or to
+commerce.  Carts and waggons laden with goods which had passed in safety by
+the dismantled holds of the robbers of the Campagna, rattled cheerfully
+over the pathways.  "Never, perhaps," - to use the translation adapted from
+the Italian authorities, by a modern and by no means a partial historian
+(Gibbon.) - "Never, perhaps, has the energy and effect of a single mind
+been more remarkably felt than in the sudden reformation of Rome by the
+Tribune Rienzi.  A den of robbers was converted to the discipline of a camp
+or convent.  'In this time,' says the historian, ("Vita di Cola di Rienzi",
+lib. i. c. 9.) 'did the woods begin to rejoice that they were no longer
+infested with robbers; the oxen began to plough; the pilgrims visited the
+sanctuaries; (Gibbon:  the words in the original are "li pellegrini
+cominciaro a fere la cerca per la santuaria.") the roads and inns were
+replenished with travellers:  trade, plenty, and good faith, were restored
+in the markets; and a purse of gold might be exposed without danger in the
+midst of the highways.'"
+
+Amidst all these evidences of comfort and security to the people - some
+dark and discontented countenances might be seen mingled in the crowd, and
+whenever one who wore the livery of the Colonna or the Orsini felt himself
+jostled by the throng, a fierce hand moved involuntarily to the sword-belt,
+and a half-suppressed oath was ended with an indignant sigh.  Here and
+there too, - contrasting the redecorated, refurnished, and smiling shops -
+heaps of rubbish before the gate of some haughty mansion testified the
+abasement of fortifications which the owner impotently resented as a
+sacrilege.  Through such streets and such throngs did the party we
+accompany wend their way, till they found themselves amidst crowds
+assembled before the entrance of the Capitol.  The officers there stationed
+kept, however, so discreet and dexterous an order, that they were not long
+detained; and now in the broad place or court of that memorable building,
+they saw the open doors of the great justice-hall, guarded but by a single
+sentinel, and in which, for six hours daily, did the Tribune hold his
+court, for "patient to hear, swift to redress, inexorable to punish, his
+tribunal was always accessible to the poor and stranger."  (Gibbon.)
+
+Not, however, to that hall did the party bend its way, but to the entrance
+which admitted to the private apartments of the palace.  And here the pomp,
+the gaud, the more than regal magnificence, of the residence of the
+Tribune, strongly contrasted the patriarchal simplicity which marked his
+justice court.
+
+Even Ursula, not unaccustomed, of yore, to the luxurious state of Italian
+and French principalities, seemed roused into surprise at the hall crowded
+with retainers in costly liveries, the marble and gilded columns wreathed
+with flowers, and the gorgeous banners wrought with the blended arms of the
+Republican City and the Pontifical See, which blazed aloft and around.
+
+Scarce knowing whom to address in such an assemblage, Ursula was relieved
+from her perplexity by an officer attired in a suit of crimson and gold,
+who, with a grave and formal decorum, which indeed reigned throughout the
+whole retinue, demanded, respectfully, whom she sought?  "The Signora
+Nina!" replied Ursula, drawing up her stately person, with a natural,
+though somewhat antiquated, dignity.  There was something foreign in the
+accent, which influenced the officer's answer.
+
+"Today, madam, I fear that the Signora receives only the Roman ladies. 
+Tomorrow is that appointed for all foreign dames of distinction."
+
+Ursula, with a slight impatience of tone, replied -
+
+"My business is of that nature which is welcome on any day, at palaces.  I
+come, Signor, to lay certain presents at the Signora's feet, which I trust
+she will deign to accept."
+
+"And say, Signor," added the boy, abruptly, "that Angelo Villani, whom the
+Lady Nina honoured yesterday with her notice, is no stranger but a Roman;
+and comes, as she bade him, to proffer to the Signora his homage and
+devotion."
+
+The grave officer could not refrain a smile at the pert, yet not
+ungraceful, boldness of the boy.
+
+"I remember me, Master Angelo Villani," he replied, "that the Lady Nina
+spoke to you by the great staircase.  Madam, I will do your errand.  Please
+to follow me to an apartment more fitting your sex and seeming."
+
+With that the officer led the way across the hall to a broad staircase of
+white marble, along the centre of which were laid those rich Eastern
+carpets which at that day, when rushes strewed the chambers of an English
+monarch, were already common to the greater luxury of Italian palaces. 
+Opening a door at the first flight, he ushered Ursula and her young charge
+into a lofty ante-chamber, hung with arras of wrought velvets; while over
+the opposite door, through which the officer now vanished, were blazoned
+the armorial bearings which the Tribune so constantly introduced in all his
+pomp, not more from the love of show, than from his politic desire to
+mingle with the keys of the Pontiff the heraldic insignia of the Republic.
+
+"Philip of Valois is not housed like this man!" muttered Ursula.  "If this
+last, I shall have done better for my charge than I recked of."
+
+The officer soon returned, and led them across an apartment of vast extent,
+which was indeed the great reception chamber of the palace.  Four-and-
+twenty columns of the Oriental alabaster which had attested the spoils of
+the later emperors, and had been disinterred from forgotten ruins, to grace
+the palace of the Reviver of the old Republic, supported the light roof,
+which, half Gothic, half classic, in its architecture, was inlaid with
+gilded and purple mosaics.  The tesselated floor was covered in the centre
+with cloth of gold, the walls were clothed, at intervals, with the same
+gorgeous hangings, relieved by panels freshly painted in the most glowing
+colours, with mystic and symbolical designs.  At the upper end of this
+royal chamber, two steps ascended to the place of the Tribune's throne,
+above which was the canopy wrought with the eternal armorial bearings of
+the Pontiff and the City.
+
+Traversing this apartment, the officer opened the door at its extremity,
+which admitted to a small chamber, crowded with pages in rich dresses of
+silver and blue velvet.  There were few amongst them elder than Angelo;
+and, from their general beauty, they seemed the very flower and blossom of
+the city.
+
+Short time had Angelo to gaze on his comrades that were to be: - another
+minute, and he and his protectress were in the presence of the Tribune's
+bride.
+
+The chamber was not large - but it was large enough to prove that the
+beautiful daughter of Raselli had realised her visions of vanity and
+splendour.
+
+It was an apartment that mocked description - it seemed a cabinet for the
+gems of the world.  The daylight, shaded by high and deep-set casements of
+stained glass, streamed in a purple and mellow hue over all that the art of
+that day boasted most precious, or regal luxury held most dear.  The
+candelabras of the silver workmanship of Florence; the carpets and stuffs
+of the East; the draperies of Venice and Genoa; paintings like the
+illuminated missals, wrought in gold, and those lost colours of blue and
+crimson; antique marbles, which spoke of the bright days of Athens; tables
+of disinterred mosaics, their freshness preserved as by magic; censers of
+gold that steamed with the odours of Araby, yet so subdued as not to deaden
+the healthier scent of flowers, which blushed in every corner from their
+marble and alabaster vases; a small and spirit-like fountain, which seemed
+to gush from among wreaths of roses, diffusing in its diamond and fairy
+spray, a scarce felt coolness to the air; - all these, and such as these,
+which it were vain work to detail, congregated in the richest luxuriance,
+harmonised with the most exquisite taste, uniting the ancient arts with the
+modern, amazed and intoxicated the sense of the beholder.  It was not so
+much the cost, nor the luxury, that made the character of the chamber; it
+was a certain gorgeous and almost sublime phantasy, - so that it seemed
+rather the fabled retreat of an enchantress, at whose word genii ransacked
+the earth, and fairies arranged the produce, than the grosser splendour of
+an earthly queen.  Behind the piled cushions upon which Nina half reclined,
+stood four girls, beautiful as nymphs, with fans of the rarest feathers,
+and at her feet lay one older than the rest, whose lute, though now silent,
+attested her legitimate occupation.
+
+But, had the room in itself seemed somewhat too fantastic and overcharged
+in its prodigal ornaments, the form and face of Nina would at once have
+rendered all appropriate; so completely did she seem the natural Spirit of
+the Place; so wonderfully did her beauty, elated as it now was with
+contented love, gratified vanity, exultant hope, body forth the brightest
+vision that ever floated before the eyes of Tasso, when he wrought into one
+immortal shape the glory of the Enchantress with the allurements of the
+Woman.
+
+Nina half rose as she saw Ursula, whose sedate and mournful features
+involuntarily testified her surprise and admiration at a loveliness so rare
+and striking, but who, undazzled by the splendour around, soon recovered
+her wonted self-composure, and seated herself on the cushion to which Nina
+pointed, while the young visitor remained standing, and spell-bound by
+childish wonder, in the centre of the apartment.  Nina recognised him with
+a smile.
+
+"Ah, my pretty boy, whose quick eye and bold air caught my fancy yesterday! 
+Have you come to accept my offer?  Is it you, madam, who claim this fair
+child?"
+
+"Lady," replied Ursula, "my business here is brief:  by a train of events,
+needless to weary you with narrating, this boy from his infancy fell to my
+charge - a weighty and anxious trust to one whose thoughts are beyond the
+barrier of life.  I have reared him as became a youth of gentle blood; for
+on both sides, lady, he is noble, though an orphan, motherless and
+sireless."
+
+"Poor child!" said Nina, compassionately.
+
+"Growing now," continued Ursula, "oppressed by years, and desirous only to
+make my peace with Heaven, I journeyed hither some months since, in the
+design to place the boy with a relation of mine; and, that trust fulfilled,
+to take the vows in the City of the Apostle.  Alas! I found my kinsman
+dead, and a baron of wild and dissolute character was his heir.  Here
+remaining, perplexed and anxious, it seemed to me the voice of Providence
+when, yester-evening, the child told me you had been pleased to honour him
+with your notice.  Like the rest of Rome, he has already learned enthusiasm
+for the Tribune - devotion to the Tribune's bride.  Will you, in truth,
+admit him of your household?  He will not dishonour your protection by his
+blood, nor, I trust, by his bearing."
+
+"I would take his face for his guarantee, madam, even without so
+distinguished a recommendation as your own.  Is he Roman?  His name then
+must be known to me."
+
+"Pardon me, lady," replied Ursula:  "He bears the name of Angelo Villani -
+not that of his sire or mother.  The honour of a noble house for ever
+condemns his parentage to rest unknown.  He is the offspring of a love
+unsanctioned by the church."
+
+"He is the more to be loved, then, and to be pitied - victim of sin not his
+own!" answered Nina, with moistened eyes, as she saw the deep and burning
+blush that covered the boy's cheeks.  "With the Tribune's reign commences a
+new era of nobility, when rank and knighthood shall be won by a man's own
+merit - not that of his ancestors.  Fear not, madam:  in my house he shall
+know no slight."
+
+Ursula was moved from her pride by the kindness of Nina:  she approached
+with involuntary reverence, and kissed the Signora's hand -
+
+"May our Lady reward your noble heart!" said she:  "and now my mission is
+ended, and my earthly goal is won.  Add only, lady, to your inestimable
+favours one more.  These jewels" - and Ursula drew from her robe a casket,
+touched the spring, and the lid flying back, discovered jewels of great
+size and the most brilliant water, - "these jewels," she continued, laying
+the casket at Nina's feet, "once belonging to the princely house of
+Thoulouse, are valueless to me and mine.  Suffer me to think that they are
+transferred to one whose queenly brow will give them a lustre it cannot
+borrow."
+
+"How!" said Nina, colouring very deeply; "think you, madam, my kindness can
+be bought?  What woman's kindness ever was?  Nay, nay - take back the
+gifts, or I shall pray you to take back your boy."
+
+Ursula was astonished and confounded:  to her experience such abstinence
+was a novelty, and she scarcely knew how to meet it.  Nina perceived her
+embarrassment with a haughty and triumphant smile, and then, regaining her
+former courtesy of demeanour, said, with a grave sweetness -
+
+"The Tribune's hands are clean, - the Tribune's wife must not be suspected.
+Rather, madam, should I press upon you some token of exchange for the fair
+charge you have committed to me.  Your jewels hereafter may profit the boy
+in his career:  reserve them for one who needs them."
+
+"No, lady," said Ursula, rising and lifting her eyes to heaven; - "they
+shall buy masses for his mother's soul; for him I shall reserve a
+competence when his years require it.  Lady, accept the thanks of a
+wretched and desolate heart.  Fare you well!"
+
+She turned to quit the room, but with so faltering and weak a step, that
+Nina, touched and affected, sprung up, and with her own hand guided the old
+woman across the room, whispering comfort and soothing to her; while, as
+they reached the door, the boy rushed forward, and, clasping Ursula's robe,
+sobbed out - "Dear dame, not one farewell for your little Angelo!  Forgive
+him all he has cost you!  Now, for the first time, I feel how wayward and
+thankless I have been."
+
+The old woman caught him in her arms, and kissed him passionately; when the
+boy, as if a thought suddenly struck him, drew forth the purse she had
+given him and said, in a choked and scarce articulate voice, - "And let
+this, dearest dame, go in masses for my poor father's soul; for he is dead,
+too, you know!"
+
+These words seemed to freeze at once all the tenderer emotions of Ursula. 
+She put back the boy with the same chilling and stern severity of aspect
+and manner which had so often before repressed him:  and recovering her
+self-possession, at once quitted the apartment without saying another word. 
+Nina, surprised, but still pitying her sorrow and respecting her age,
+followed her steps across the pages' ante-room and the reception-chamber,
+even to the foot of the stairs, - a condescension the haughtiest princess
+of Rome could not have won from her; and returning, saddened and
+thoughtful, she took the boy's hand, and affectionately kissed his
+forehead.
+
+"Poor boy!" she said, "it seems as if Providence had made me select thee
+yesterday from the crowd, and thus conducted thee to thy proper refuge. 
+For to whom should come the friendless and the orphans of Rome, but to the
+palace of Rome's first Magistrate?"  Turning then to her attendants, she
+gave them instructions as to the personal comforts of her new charge, which
+evinced that if power had ministered to her vanity, it had not steeled her
+heart.  Angelo Villani lived to repay her well!
+
+She retained the boy in her presence, and conversing with him familiarly,
+she was more and more pleased with his bold spirit and frank manner.  Their
+conversation was however interrupted, as the day advanced, by the arrival
+of several ladies of the Roman nobility.  And then it was that Nina's
+virtues receded into shade, and her faults appeared.  She could not resist
+the woman's triumph over those arrogant signoras who now cringed in homage
+where they had once slighted with disdain.  She affected the manner of, she
+demanded the respect due to, a queen.  And by many of those dexterous arts
+which the sex know so well, she contrived to render her very courtesy a
+humiliation to her haughty guests.  Her commanding beauty and her graceful
+intellect saved her, indeed, from the vulgar insolence of the upstart; but
+yet more keenly stung the pride, by forbidding to those she mortified the
+retaliation of contempt.  Hers were the covert taunt - the smiling affront
+- the sarcasm in the mask of compliment - the careless exaction of respect
+in trifles, which could not outwardly be resented, but which could not inly
+be forgiven.
+
+"Fair day to the Signora Colonna," said she to the proud wife of the proud
+Stephen; "we passed your palace yesterday.  How fair it now seems, relieved
+from those gloomy battlements which it must often have saddened you to gaze
+upon.  Signora, (turning to one of the Orsini), your lord has high favour
+with the Tribune, who destines him to great command.  His fortunes are
+secured, and we rejoice at it; for no man more loyally serves the state. 
+Have you seen, fair Lady of Frangipani, the last verses of Petrarch in
+honour of my lord? - they rest yonder.  May we so far venture as to request
+you to point out their beauties to the Signora di Savelli?  We rejoice,
+noble Lady of Malatesta, to observe that your eyesight is so well restored. 
+The last time we met, though we stood next to you in the revels of the Lady
+Giulia, you seemed scarce to distinguish us from the pillar by which we
+stood!"
+
+"Must this insolence be endured!" whispered the Signora Frangipani to the
+Signora Malatesta.
+
+"Hush, hush; if ever it be our day again!"
+
+
+Chapter 4.II.  The Blessing of A Councillor Whose Interests and Heart Are
+Our Own. - the Straws Thrown Upward, - Do They Portend A Storm.
+
+It was later that day than usual, when Rienzi returned from his tribunal to
+the apartments of the palace.  As he traversed the reception hall, his
+countenance was much flushed; his teeth were set firmly, like a man who has
+taken a strong resolution from which he will not be moved; and his brow was
+dark with that settled and fearful frown which the describers of his
+personal appearance have not failed to notice as the characteristic of an
+anger the more deadly because invariably just.  Close as his heels followed
+the Bishop of Orvietto and the aged Stephen Colonna.  "I tell you, my
+Lords," said Rienzi, "that ye plead in vain.  Rome knows no distinction
+between ranks.  The law is blind to the agent - lynx-eyed to the deed."
+
+"Yet," said Raimond, hesitatingly, "bethink thee, Tribune; the nephew of
+two cardinals, and himself once a senator."
+
+Rienzi halted abruptly, and faced his companions.  "My Lord Bishop," said
+he, "does not this make the crime more inexcusable?  Look you, thus it
+reads: - A vessel from Avignon to Naples, charged with the revenues of
+Provence to Queen Joanna, on whose cause, mark you, we now hold solemn
+council, is wrecked at the mouth of the Tiber; with that, Martino di Porto
+- a noble, as you say - the holder of that fortress whence he derives his
+title, - doubly bound by gentle blood and by immediate neighbourhood to
+succour the oppressed - falls upon the vessel with his troops (what hath
+the rebel with armed troops?) - and pillages the vessel like a common
+robber.  He is apprehended - brought to my tribunal - receives fair trial -
+is condemned to die.  Such is the law; - what more would ye have?"
+
+"Mercy," said the Colonna.
+
+Rienzi folded his arms, and laughed disdainfully.  "I never heard my Lord
+Colonna plead for mercy when a peasant had stolen the bread that was to
+feed his famishing children."
+
+"Between a peasant and a prince, Tribune, I, for one, recognise a
+distinction: - the bright blood of an Orsini is not to be shed like that of
+a base plebeian - "
+
+"Which, I remember me," said Rienzi, in a low voice, "you deemed small
+matter enough when my boy-brother fell beneath the wanton spear of your
+proud son.  Wake not that memory, I warn you; let it sleep. - For shame,
+old Colonna - for shame; so near the grave, where the worm levels all
+flesh, and preaching, with those gray hairs, the uncharitable distinction
+between man and man.  Is there not distinction enough at the best?  Does
+not one wear purple, and the other rags?  Hath not one ease, and the other
+toil?  Doth not the one banquet while the other starves?  Do I nourish any
+mad scheme to level the ranks which society renders a necessary evil?  No.
+I war no more with Dives than with Lazarus.  But before Man's judgment-
+seat, as before God's, Lazarus and Dives are made equal.  No more."
+
+Colonna drew his robe round him with great haughtiness, and bit his lip in
+silence.  Raimond interposed.
+
+"All this is true, Tribune.  But," and he drew Rienzi aside, "you know we
+must be politic as well as just.  Nephew to two Cardinals, what enmity will
+not this provoke at Avignon?"
+
+"Vex not yourself, holy Raimond, I will answer it to the Pontiff."  While
+they spoke the bell tolled heavily and loudly.
+
+Colonna started.
+
+"Great Tribune," said he, with a slight sneer, "deign to pause ere it be
+too late.  I know not that I ever before bent to you a suppliant; and I ask
+you now to spare mine own foe.  Stephen Colonna prays Cola di Rienzi to
+spare the life of an Orsini."
+
+"I understand thy taunt, old Lord," said Rienzi, calmly, "but I resent it
+not.  You are foe to the Orsini, yet you plead for him - it sounds
+generous; but hark you, - you are more a friend to your order than a foe to
+your rival.  You cannot bear that one, great enough to have contended with
+you, should perish like a thief.  I give full praise to such noble
+forgiveness; but I am no noble, and I do not sympathize with it.  One word
+more; - if this were the sole act of fraud and violence that this bandit
+baron had committed, your prayers should plead for him; but is not his life
+notorious?  Has he not been from boyhood the terror and disgrace of Rome? 
+How many matrons violated, merchants pillaged, peaceful men stilettoed in
+the daylight, rise in dark witness against the prisoner?  And for such a
+man do I live to hear an aged prince and a pope's vicar plead for mercy? -
+Fie, fie!  But I will be even with ye.  The next poor man whom the law
+sentences to death, for your sake will I pardon."
+
+Raimond again drew aside the Tribune, while Colonna struggled to suppress
+his rage.
+
+"My friend," said the Bishop, "the nobles will feel this as an insult to
+their whole order; the very pleading of Orsini's worst foe must convince
+thee of this.  Martino's blood will seal their reconciliation with each
+other, and they will be as one man against thee."
+
+"Be it so:  with God and the People on my side, I will dare, though a
+Roman, to be just.  The bell ceases - you are already too late."  So
+saying, Rienzi threw open the casement; and by the staircase of the Lion
+rose a gibbet from which swung with a creaking sound, arrayed in his
+patrician robes, the yet palpitating corpse of Martino di Porto.
+
+"Behold!" said the Tribune, sternly, "thus die all robbers.  For traitors,
+the same law has the axe and the scaffold!"
+
+Raimond drew back and turned pale.  Not so the veteran noble.  Tears of
+wounded pride started from his eyes; he approached, leaning on his staff,
+to Rienzi, touched him on his shoulder, and said, -
+
+"Tribune, a judge has lived to envy his victim!"
+
+Rienzi turned with an equal pride to the Baron.
+
+"We forgive idle words in the aged.  My Lord, have you done with us? - we
+would be alone."
+
+"Give me thy arm, Raimond," said Stephen.  "Tribune - farewell.  Forget
+that the Colonna sued thee, - an easy task, methinks; for, wise as you are,
+you forget what every one else can remember."
+
+"Ay, my Lord, what?"
+
+"Birth, Tribune, birth - that's all!"
+
+"The Signor Colonna has taken up my old calling, and turned a wit,"
+returned Rienzi, with an indifferent and easy tone.
+
+Then following Raimond and Stephen with his eyes, till the door closed upon
+them, he muttered, "Insolent! were it not for Adrian, thy grey beard should
+not bear thee harmless.  Birth! what Colonna would not boast himself, if he
+could, the grandson of an emperor? - Old man, there is danger in thee which
+must be watched."  With that he turned musingly towards the casement, and
+again that griesly spectacle of death met his eye.  The people below,
+assembled in large concourse, rejoiced at the execution of one whose whole
+life had been infamy and rapine - but who had seemed beyond justice - with
+all the fierce clamour that marks the exultation of the rabble over a
+crushed foe.  And where Rienzi stood, he heard heir shouts of "Long live
+the Tribune, the just judge, Rome's liberator!"  But at that time other
+thoughts deafened his senses to the popular enthusiasm.
+
+"My poor brother!" he said, with tears in his eyes, "it was owing to this
+man's crimes - and to a crime almost similar to that for which he has now
+suffered - that thou wert entrained to the slaughter; and they who had no
+pity for the lamb, clamour for compassion to the wolf!  Ah, wert thou
+living now, how these proud heads would bend to thee; though dead, thou
+wert not worthy of a thought.  God rest thy gentle soul, and keep my
+ambition pure as it was when we walked at twilight, side by side together!"
+
+The Tribune shut the casement, and turning away, sought the chamber of
+Nina.  On hearing his step without, she had already risen from the couch,
+her eyes sparkling, her bosom heaving; and as he entered, she threw herself
+on his neck, and murmured as she nestled to his breast, - "Ah, the hours
+since we parted!"
+
+It was a singular thing to see that proud lady, proud of her beauty, her
+station, her new honours; - whose gorgeous vanity was already the talk of
+Rome, and the reproach to Rienzi, - how suddenly and miraculously she
+seemed changed in his presence!  Blushing and timid, all pride in herself
+seemed merged in her proud love for him.  No woman ever loved to the full
+extent of the passion, who did not venerate where she loved, and who did
+not feel humbled (delighted in that humility) by her exaggerated and
+overweening estimate of the superiority of the object of her worship.
+
+And it might be the consciousness of this distinction between himself and
+all other created things, which continued to increase the love of the
+Tribune to his bride, to blind him to her failings towards others, and to
+indulge her in a magnificence of parade, which, though to a certain point
+politic to assume, was carried to an extent which if it did not conspire to
+produce his downfall, has served the Romans with an excuse for their own
+cowardice and desertion, and historians with a plausible explanation of
+causes they had not the industry to fathom.  Rienzi returned his wife's
+caresses with an equal affection, and bending down to her beautiful face,
+the sight was sufficient to chase from his brow the emotions, whether
+severe or sad, which had lately darkened its broad expanse.
+
+"Thou has not been abroad this morning, Nina!"
+
+"No, the heat was oppressive.  But nevertheless, Cola, I have not lacked
+company - half the matronage of Rome has crowded the palace."
+
+"Ah, I warrant it. - But yon boy, is he not a new face?"
+
+"Hush, Cola, speak to him kindly, I entreat:  of his story anon.  Angelo,
+approach.  You see your new master, the Tribune of Rome."
+
+Angelo approached with a timidity not his wont, for an air of majesty was
+at all times natural to Rienzi, and since his power it had naturally taken
+a graver and austerer aspect, which impressed those who approached him,
+even the ambassadors of princes, with a certain involuntary awe.  The
+Tribune smiled at the effect he saw he had produced, and being by temper
+fond of children, and affable to all but the great, he hastened to dispel
+it.  He took the child affectionately in his arms, kissed him, and bade him
+welcome.
+
+"May we have a son as fair!" he whispered to Nina, who blushed, and turned
+away.
+
+"Thy name, my little friend?"
+
+"Angelo Villani."
+
+"A Tuscan name.  There is a man of letters at Florence, doubtless writing
+our annals from hearsay at this moment, called Villani.  Perhaps akin to
+thee?"
+
+"I have no kin," said the boy, bluntly; "and therefore I shall the better
+love the Signora and honour you, if you will let me.  I am Roman - all the
+Roman boys honour Rienzi."
+
+"Do they, my brave lad?" said the Tribune, colouring with pleasure; "that
+is a good omen of my continued prosperity."  He put down the boy, and threw
+himself on the cushions, while Nina placed herself on a kind of low stool
+beside him.
+
+"Let us be alone," said he; and Nina motioned to the attendant maidens to
+withdraw.
+
+"Take my new page with you," said she; "he is yet, perhaps, too fresh from
+home to enjoy the company of his giddy brethren."
+
+When they were alone, Nina proceeded to narrate to Rienzi the adventure of
+the morning; but though he seemed outwardly to listen, his gaze was on
+vacancy, and he was evidently abstracted and self-absorbed.  At length, as
+she concluded, he said, "Well, Nina, you have acted as ever, kindly and
+nobly.  Let us to other themes.  I am in danger."
+
+"Danger!" echoed Nina, turning pale.
+
+"Why, the word must not appal you - you have a spirit like mine, that
+scorns fear; and, for that reason, Nina, in all Rome you are my only
+confidant.  It was not only to glad me with thy beauty, but to cheer me
+with thy counsel, to support me with thy valour, that Heaven gave me thee
+as a helpmate."
+
+"Now, our Lady bless thee for those words!" said Nina, kissing the hand
+that hung over her shoulder; "and if I started at the word danger, it was
+but the woman's thought of thee, - an unworthy thought, my Cola, for glory
+and danger go together.  And I am as ready to share the last as the first.
+If the hour of trial ever come, none of thy friends shall be so faithful to
+thy side as this weak form but undaunted heart."
+
+"I know it, my own Nina; I know it," said Rienzi, rising, and pacing the
+chamber with large and rapid strides.  "Now listen to me.  Thou knowest
+that to govern in safety, it is my policy as my pride to govern justly.  To
+govern justly is an awful thing, when mighty barons are the culprits. 
+Nina, for an open and audacious robbery, our court has sentenced Martin of
+the Orsini, the Lord of Porto, to death.  His corpse swings now on the
+Staircase of the Lion."
+
+"A dreadful doom!" said Nina, shuddering.
+
+"True; but by his death thousands of poor and honest men may live in peace.
+It is not that which troubles me:  the Barons resent the deed, as an insult
+to them that law should touch a noble.  They will rise - they will rebel. 
+I foresee the storm - not the spell to allay it."
+
+Nina paused a moment, - "They have taken," she then said, "a solemn oath on
+the Eucharist not to bear arms against thee."
+
+"Perjury is a light addition to theft and murder," answered Rienzi, with
+his sarcastic smile.
+
+"But the people are faithful."
+
+"Yes, but in a civil war (which the saints forefend!) those combatants are
+the stanchest who have no home but their armour, no calling but the sword.
+The trader will not leave his trade at the toll of a bell every day; but
+the Barons' soldiery are ready at all hours."
+
+"To be strong," said Nina, - who, summoned to the councils of her lord,
+shewed an intellect not unworthy of the honour, - "to be strong in
+dangerous times, authority must seem strong.  By shewing no fear, you may
+prevent the cause of fear."
+
+"My own thought!" returned Rienzi, quickly.  "You know that half my power
+with these Barons is drawn from the homage rendered to me by foreign
+states.  When from every city in Italy the ambassadors of crowned princes
+seek the alliance of the Tribune, they must veil their resentment at the
+rise of the Plebeian.  On the other hand, to be strong abroad I must seem
+strong at home:  the vast design I have planned, and, as by a miracle,
+begun to execute, will fail at once if it seem abroad to be intrusted to an
+unsteady and fluctuating power.  That design (continued Rienzi, pausing,
+and placing his hand on a marble bust of the young Augustus) is greater
+than his, whose profound yet icy soul united Italy in subjection, - for it
+would unite Italy in freedom; - yes! could we but form one great federative
+league of all the States of Italy, each governed by its own laws, but
+united for mutual and common protection against the Attilas of the North,
+with Rome for their Metropolis and their Mother, this age and this brain
+would have wrought an enterprise which men should quote till the sound of
+the last trump!"
+
+"I know thy divine scheme," said Nina, catching his enthusiasm; "and what
+if there be danger in attaining it?  Have we not mastered the greatest
+danger in the first step?"
+
+"Right, Nina, right!  Heaven (and the Tribune, who ever recognised, in his
+own fortunes, the agency of the hand above, crossed himself reverently)
+will preserve him to whom it hath vouchsafed such lofty visions of the
+future redemption of the Land of the true Church, and the liberty and
+advancement of its children!  This I trust:  already many of the cities of
+Tuscany have entered into treaties for the formation of this league; nor
+from a single tyrant, save John di Vico, have I received aught but fair
+words and flattering promises.  The time seems ripe for the grand stroke of
+all."
+
+"And what is that?" demanded Nina, wonderingly.
+
+"Defiance to all foreign interference.  By what right does a synod of
+stranger princes give Rome a king in some Teuton Emperor?  Rome's people
+alone should choose Rome's governor; - and shall we cross the Alps to
+render the title of our master to the descendants of the Goth?"
+
+Nina was silent:  the custom of choosing the sovereign by a diet beyond the
+Rhine, reserving only the ceremony of his subsequent coronation for the
+mock assent of the Romans, however degrading to that people, and however
+hostile to all nations of substantial independence, was so unquestioned at
+that time, that Rienzi's daring suggestion left her amazed and breathless,
+prepared as she was for any scheme, however extravagantly bold.
+
+"How!" said she, after a long pause; "do I understand aright?  Can you mean
+defiance to the Emperor?"
+
+"Why, listen:  at this moment there are two pretenders to the throne of
+Rome - to the imperial crown of Italy - a Bohemian and a Bavarian.  To
+their election our assent - Rome's assent - is not requisite - not asked. 
+Can we be called free - can we boast ourselves republican - when a stranger
+and a barbarian is thus thrust upon our necks?  No, we will be free in
+reality as in name.  Besides, (continued the Tribune, in a calmer tone,)
+this seems to me politic as well as daring.  The people incessantly demand
+wonders from me:  how can I more nobly dazzle, more virtuously win them,
+than by asserting their inalienable right to choose their own rulers?  The
+daring will awe the Barons, and foreigners themselves; it will give a
+startling example to all Italy; it will be the first brand of an universal
+blaze.  It shall be done, and with a pomp that befits the deed!"
+
+"Cola," said Nina, hesitatingly, "your eagle spirit often ascends where
+mine flags to follow; yet be not over bold."
+
+"Nay, did you not, a moment since, preach a different doctrine?  To be
+strong, was I not to seem strong?"
+
+"May fate preserve you!" said Nina, with a foreboding sigh.
+
+"Fate!" cried Rienzi; "there is no fate!  Between the thought and the
+success, God is the only agent; and (he added with a voice of deep
+solemnity) I shall not be deserted.  Visions by night, even while thine
+arms are around me; omens and impulses, stirring and divine, by day, even
+in the midst of the living crowd - encourage my path, and point my goal. 
+Now, even now, a voice seems to whisper in my ear - 'Pause not; tremble
+not; waver not; - for the eye of the All-Seeing is upon thee, and the hand
+of the All-Powerful shall protect!"
+
+As Rienzi thus spoke, his face grew pale, his hair seemed to bristle, his
+tall and proud form trembled visibly, and presently he sunk down on a seat,
+and covered his face with his hands.
+
+An awe crept over Nina, though not unaccustomed to such strange and
+preternatural emotions, which appeared yet the more singular in one who in
+common life was so calm, stately, and self-possessed.  But with every
+increase of prosperity and power, those emotions seemed to increase in
+their fervour, as if in such increase the devout and overwrought
+superstition of the Tribune recognised additional proof of a mysterious
+guardianship mightier than the valour or art of man.
+
+She approached fearfully, and threw her arms around him, but without
+speaking.
+
+Ere yet the Tribune had well recovered himself, a slight tap at the door
+was heard, and the sound seemed at once to recall his self-possession.
+
+"Enter," he said, lifting his face, to which the wonted colour slowly
+returned.
+
+An officer, half-opening the door, announced that the person he had sent
+for waited his leisure.
+
+"I come! - Core of my heart," (he whispered to Nina,) "we will sup alone
+tonight, and will converse more on these matters:"  so saying, with
+somewhat less than his usual loftiness of mien, he left the room, and
+sought his cabinet, which lay at the other side of the reception chamber. 
+Here he found Cecco del Vecchio.
+
+"How, my bold fellow," said the Tribune, assuming with wonderful ease that
+air of friendly equality which he always adopted with those of the lower
+class, and which made a striking contrast with the majesty, no less
+natural, which marked his manner to the great.  "How now, my Cecco!  Thou
+bearest thyself bravely, I see, during these sickly heats; we labourers -
+for both of us labour, Cecco - are too busy to fall ill as the idle do, in
+the summer, or the autumn, of Roman skies.  I sent for thee, Cecco, because
+I would know how thy fellow-craftsmen are like to take the Orsini's
+execution."
+
+"Oh!  Tribune," replied the artificer, who, now familiarized with Rienzi,
+had lost much of his earlier awe of him, and who regarded the Tribune's
+power as partly his own creation; "they are already out of their honest
+wits, at your courage in punishing the great men as you would the small."
+
+"So; - I am repaid!  But hark you, Cecco, it will bring, perhaps, hot work
+upon us.  Every Baron will dread lest it be his turn next, and dread will
+make them bold, like rats in despair.  We may have to fight for the Good
+Estate."
+
+"With all my heart, Tribune," answered Cecco, gruffly.  "I, for one, am no
+craven."
+
+"Then keep the same spirit in all your meetings with the artificers.  I
+fight for the people.  The people at a pinch must fight with me."
+
+"They will," replied Cecco; "they will!"
+
+"Cecco, this city is under the spiritual dominion of the Pontiff - so be it
+- it is an honour, not a burthen.  But the temporal dominion, my friend,
+should be with Romans only.  Is it not a disgrace to Republican Rome, that
+while we now speak, certain barbarians, whom we never heard of, should be
+deciding beyond the Alps on the merits of two sovereigns, whom we never
+saw?  Is not this a thing to be resisted?  An Italian city, - what hath it
+to do with a Bohemian Emperor?"
+
+"Little eno', St. Paul knows!" said Cecco.
+
+"Should it not be a claim questioned?"
+
+"I think so!" replied the smith.
+
+"And if found an outrage on our ancient laws, should it not be a claim
+resisted?"
+
+"Not a doubt of it."
+
+"Well, go to!  The archives assure me that never was Emperor lawfully
+crowned but by the free votes of the people.  We never chose Bohemian or
+Bavarian."
+
+"But, on the contrary, whenever these Northmen come hither to be crowned,
+we try to drive them away with stones and curses, - for we are a people,
+Tribune, that love our liberties."
+
+"Go back to your friends - see - address them, say that your Tribune will
+demand of these pretenders to Rome the right to her throne.  Let them not
+be mazed or startled, but support me when the occasion comes."
+
+"I am glad of this," quoth the huge smith; "for our friends have grown a
+little unruly of late, and say - "
+
+"What do they say?"
+
+"That it is true you have expelled the banditti, and curb the Barons, and
+administer justice fairly; - "
+
+"Is not that miracle enough for the space of some two or three short
+months?"
+
+"Why, they say it would have been more than enough in a noble; but you,
+being raised from the people, and having such gifts and so forth, might do
+yet more.  It is now three weeks since they have had any new thing to talk
+about; but Orsini's execution today will cheer them a bit."
+
+"Well, Cecco, well," said the Tribune, rising, "they shall have more anon
+to feed their mouths with.  So you think they love me not quite so well as
+they did some three weeks back?"
+
+"I say not so," answered Cecco.  "But we Romans are an impatient people."
+
+"Alas, yes!"
+
+"However, they will no doubt stick close enough to you; provided, Tribune,
+you don't put any new tax upon them."
+
+"Ha!  But if, in order to be free, it be necessary to fight - if to fight,
+it be necessary to have soldiers, why then the soldiers must be paid: -
+won't the people contribute something to their own liberties; - to just
+laws, and safe lives?"
+
+"I don't know," returned the smith, scratching his head as if a little
+puzzled; "but I know that poor men won't be overtaxed.  They say they are
+better off with you than with the Barons before, and therefore they love
+you.  But men in business, Tribune, poor men with families, must look to
+their bellies.  Only one man in ten goes to law - only one man in twenty is
+butchered by a Baron's brigand; but every man eats, and drinks, and feels a
+tax."
+
+"This cannot be your reasoning, Cecco!" said Rienzi, gravely.
+
+"Why, Tribune, I am an honest man, but I have a large family to rear."
+
+"Enough; enough!" said the Tribune quickly; and then he added abstractedly
+as to himself, but aloud, - "Methinks we have been too lavish; these shows
+and spectacles should cease."
+
+"What!" cried Cecco; "what, Tribune! - would you deny the poor fellows a
+holiday.  They work hard enough, and their only pleasure is seeing your
+fine shows and processions; and then they go home and say, - 'See, our man
+beats all the Barons! what state he keeps!'"
+
+"Ah! they blame not my splendour, then!"
+
+"Blame it; no!  Without it they would be ashamed of you, and think the
+Buono Stato but a shabby concern."
+
+"You speak bluntly, Cecco, but perhaps wisely.  The saints keep you!  Fail
+not to remember what I told you!"
+
+"No, no.  It is a shame to have an Emperor thrust upon us; - so it is. 
+Good evening, Tribune."
+
+Left alone, the Tribune remained for some time plunged in gloomy and
+foreboding thoughts.
+
+"I am in the midst of a magician's spell," said he; "if I desist, the
+fiends tear me to pieces.  What I have begun, that must I conclude.  But
+this rude man shews me too well with what tools I work.  For me failure is
+nothing, I have already climbed to a greatness which might render giddy
+many a born prince's brain.  But with my fall - Rome, Italy, Peace,
+Justice, Civilization - all fall back into the abyss of ages!"
+
+He rose; and after once or twice pacing his apartment, in which from many a
+column gleamed upon him the marble effigies of the great of old, he opened
+the casement to inhale the air of the now declining day.
+
+The Place of the Capitol was deserted save by the tread of the single
+sentinel.  But still, dark and fearful, hung from the tall gibbet the clay
+of the robber noble; and the colossal shape of the Egyptian lion rose hard
+by, sharp and dark in the breathless atmosphere.
+
+"Dread statue!" thought Rienzi, "how many unwhispered and solemn rites hast
+thou witnessed by thy native Nile, ere the Roman's hand transferred thee
+hither - the antique witness of Roman crimes!  Strange! but when I look
+upon thee I feel as if thou hadst some mystic influence over my own
+fortunes.  Beside thee was I hailed the republican Lord of Rome; beside
+thee are my palace, my tribunal, the place of my justice, my triumphs, and
+my pomp: - to thee my eyes turn from my bed of state:  and if fated to die
+in power and peace, thou mayst be the last object my eyes will mark!  Or if
+myself a victim - ."  He paused - shrank from the thought presented to him
+- turned to a recess of the chamber - drew aside a curtain, that veiled a
+crucifix and a small table, on which lay a Bible and the monastic emblems
+of the skull and crossbones - emblems, indeed, grave and irresistible, of
+the nothingness of power, and the uncertainty of life.  Before these sacred
+monitors, whether to humble or to elevate, knelt that proud and aspiring
+man; and when he rose, it was with a lighter step and more cheerful mien
+than he had worn that day.
+
+
+Chapter 4.III.  The Actor Unmasked.
+
+"In intoxication," says the proverb, "men betray their real characters." 
+There is a no less honest and truth-revealing intoxication in prosperity,
+than in wine.  The varnish of power brings forth at once the defects and
+the beauties of the human portrait.
+
+The unprecedented and almost miraculous rise of Rienzi from the rank of the
+Pontiff's official to the Lord of Rome, would have been accompanied with a
+yet greater miracle, if it had not somewhat dazzled and seduced the object
+it elevated.  When, as in well-ordered states and tranquil times, men rise
+slowly, step by step, they accustom themselves to their growing fortunes. 
+But the leap of an hour from a citizen to a prince - from the victim of
+oppression to the dispenser of justice - is a transition so sudden as to
+render dizzy the most sober brain.  And, perhaps, in proportion to the
+imagination, the enthusiasm, the genius of the man, will the suddenness be
+dangerous - excite too extravagant a hope - and lead to too chimerical an
+ambition.  The qualities that made him rise, hurry him to his fall; and
+victory at the Marengo of his fortunes, urges him to destruction at its
+Moscow.
+
+In his greatness Rienzi did not so much acquire new qualities, as develop
+in brighter light and deeper shadow those which he had always exhibited. 
+On the one hand he was just - resolute - the friend of the oppressed - the
+terror of the oppressor.  His wonderful intellect illumined everything it
+touched.  By rooting out abuse, and by searching examination and wise
+arrangement, he had trebled the revenues of the city without imposing a
+single new tax.  Faithful to his idol of liberty, he had not been betrayed
+by the wish of the people into despotic authority; but had, as we have
+seen, formally revived, and established with new powers, the Parliamentary
+Council of the city.  However extensive his own authority, he referred its
+exercise to the people; in their name he alone declared himself to govern,
+and he never executed any signal action without submitting to them its
+reasons or its justification.  No less faithful to his desire to restore
+prosperity as well as freedom to Rome, he had seized the first dazzling
+epoch of his power to propose that great federative league with the Italian
+States which would, as he rightly said, have raised Rome to the
+indisputable head of European nations.  Under his rule trade was secure,
+literature was welcome, art began to rise.
+
+On the other hand, the prosperity which made more apparent his justice, his
+integrity, his patriotism, his virtues, and his genius, brought out no less
+glaringly his arrogant consciousness of superiority, his love of display,
+and the wild and daring insolence of his ambition.  Though too just to
+avenge himself by retaliating on the patricians their own violence, though,
+in his troubled and stormy tribuneship, not one unmerited or illegal
+execution of baron or citizen could be alleged against him, even by his
+enemies; yet sharing, less excusably, the weakness of Nina, he could not
+deny his proud heart the pleasure of humiliating those who had ridiculed
+him as a buffoon, despised him as a plebeian, and who, even now slaves to
+his face, were cynics behind his back.  "They stood before him while he
+sate," says his biographer; "all these Barons, bareheaded; their hands
+crossed on their breasts; their looks downcast; - oh, how frightened they
+were!" - a picture more disgraceful to the servile cowardice of the nobles
+than the haughty sternness of the Tribune.  It might be that he deemed it
+policy to break the spirit of his foes, and to awe those whom it was a vain
+hope to conciliate.
+
+For his pomp there was a greater excuse:  it was the custom of the time; it
+was the insignia and witness of power; and when the modern historian taunts
+him with not imitating the simplicity of an ancient tribune, the sneer
+betrays an ignorance of the spirit of the age, and the vain people whom the
+chief magistrate was to govern.  No doubt his gorgeous festivals, his
+solemn processions, set off and ennobled - if parade can so be ennobled -
+by a refined and magnificent richness of imagination, associated always
+with popular emblems, and designed to convey the idea of rejoicing for
+Liberty Restored, and to assert the state and majesty of Rome Revived - no
+doubt these spectacles, however otherwise judged in a more enlightened age
+and by closet sages, served greatly to augment the importance of the
+Tribune abroad, and to dazzle the pride of a fickle and ostentatious
+populace.  And taste grew refined, luxury called labour into requisition,
+and foreigners from all states were attracted by the splendour of a court
+over which presided, under republican names, two sovereigns, (Rienzi,
+speaking in one of his letters of his great enterprise, refers it to the
+ardour of youth.  The exact date of his birth is unknown; but he was
+certainly a young man at the time now referred to.  His portrait in the
+Museo Barberino, from which his description has been already taken in the
+first book of this work, represents him as beardless, and, as far as one
+can judge, somewhere above thirty - old enough, to be sure, to have a
+beard; and seven years afterwards he wore a long one, which greatly
+displeased his naive biographer, who seems to consider it a sort of crime. 
+The head is very remarkable for its stern beauty, and little, if at all,
+inferior to that of Napoleon; to which, as I before remarked, it has some
+resemblance in expression, if not in feature.) young and brilliant, the one
+renowned for his genius, the other eminent for her beauty.  It was, indeed,
+a dazzling and royal dream in the long night of Rome, spoiled of her
+Pontiff and his voluptuous train - that holyday reign of Cola di Rienzi! 
+And often afterwards it was recalled with a sigh, not only by the poor for
+its justice, the merchant for its security, but the gallant for its
+splendour, and the poet for its ideal and intellectual grace!
+
+As if to show that it was not to gratify the more vulgar appetite and
+desire, in the midst of all his pomp, when the board groaned with the
+delicacies of every clime, when the wine most freely circled, the Tribune
+himself preserved a temperate and even rigid abstinence.  ("Vita di Cola di
+Rienzi". - The biographer praises the abstinence of the Tribune.)  While
+the apartments of state and the chamber of his bride were adorned with a
+profuse luxury and cost, to his own private rooms he transported precisely
+the same furniture which had been familiar to him in his obscurer life. 
+The books, the busts, the reliefs, the arms which had inspired him
+heretofore with the visions of the past, were endeared by associations
+which he did not care to forego.
+
+But that which constituted the most singular feature of his character, and
+which still wraps all around him in a certain mystery, was his religious
+enthusiasm.  The daring but wild doctrines of Arnold of Brescia, who, two
+centuries anterior, had preached reform, but inculcated mysticism, still
+lingered in Rome, and had in earlier youth deeply coloured the mind of
+Rienzi; and as I have before observed, his youthful propensity to dreamy
+thought, the melancholy death of his brother, his own various but
+successful fortunes, had all contributed to nurse the more zealous and
+solemn aspirations of this remarkable man.  Like Arnold of Brescia, his
+faith bore a strong resemblance to the intense fanaticism of our own
+Puritans of the Civil War, as if similar political circumstances conduced
+to similar religious sentiments.  He believed himself inspired by awful and
+mighty commune with beings of the better world.  Saints and angels
+ministered to his dreams; and without this, the more profound and hallowed
+enthusiasm, he might never have been sufficiently emboldened by mere human
+patriotism, to his unprecedented enterprise:  it was the secret of much of
+his greatness, - many of his errors.  Like all men who are thus self-
+deluded by a vain but not inglorious superstition, united with, and
+coloured by, earthly ambition, it is impossible to say how far he was the
+visionary, and how far at times he dared to be the impostor.  In the
+ceremonies of his pageants, in the ornaments of his person, were invariably
+introduced mystic and figurative emblems.  In times of danger he publicly
+professed to have been cheered and directed by divine dreams; and on many
+occasions the prophetic warnings he announced having been singularly
+verified by the event, his influence with the people was strengthened by a
+belief in the favour and intercourse of Heaven.  Thus, delusion of self
+might tempt and conduce to imposition on others, and he might not scruple
+to avail himself of the advantage of seeming what he believed himself to
+be.  Yet, no doubt this intoxicating credulity pushed him into extravagance
+unworthy of, and strangely contrasted by, his soberer intellect, and made
+him disproportion his vast ends to his unsteady means, by the proud
+fallacy, that where man failed, God would interpose.  Cola di Rienzi was no
+faultless hero of romance.  In him lay, in conflicting prodigality, the
+richest and most opposite elements of character; strong sense, visionary
+superstition, an eloquence and energy that mastered all he approached, a
+blind enthusiasm that mastered himself; luxury and abstinence, sternness
+and susceptibility, pride to the great, humility to the low; the most
+devoted patriotism and the most avid desire of personal power.  As few men
+undertake great and desperate designs without strong animal spirits, so it
+may be observed, that with most who have risen to eminence over the herd,
+there is an aptness, at times, to a wild mirth and an elasticity of humour
+which often astonish the more sober and regulated minds, that are "the
+commoners of life:"  And the theatrical grandeur of Napoleon, the severe
+dignity of Cromwell, are strangely contrasted by a frequent, nor always
+seasonable buffoonery, which it is hard to reconcile with the ideal of
+their characters, or the gloomy and portentous interest of their careers.
+And this, equally a trait in the temperament of Rienzi, distinguished his
+hours of relaxation, and contributed to that marvellous versatility with
+which his harder nature accommodated itself to all humours and all men. 
+Often from his austere judgment-seat he passed to the social board an
+altered man; and even the sullen Barons who reluctantly attended his
+feasts, forgot his public greatness in his familiar wit; albeit this
+reckless humour could not always refrain from seeking its subject in the
+mortification of his crest-fallen foes - a pleasure it would have been
+wiser and more generous to forego.  And perhaps it was, in part, the
+prompting of this sarcastic and unbridled humour that made him often love
+to astonish as well as to awe.  But even this gaiety, if so it may be
+called, taking an appearance of familiar frankness, served much to
+ingratiate him with the lower orders; and, if a fault in the prince, was a
+virtue in the demagogue.
+
+To these various characteristics, now fully developed, the reader must add
+a genius of designs so bold, of conceptions so gigantic and august,
+conjoined with that more minute and ordinary ability which masters details;
+that with a brave, noble, intelligent, devoted people to back his projects,
+the accession of the Tribune would have been the close of the thraldom of
+Italy, and the abrupt limit of the dark age of Europe.  With such a people,
+his faults would have been insensibly checked, his more unwholesome power
+have received a sufficient curb.  Experience familiarizing him with power,
+would have gradually weaned him from extravagance in its display; and the
+active and masculine energy of his intellect would have found field for the
+more restless spirits, as his justice gave shelter to the more tranquil. 
+Faults he had, but whether those faults or the faults of the people, were
+to prepare his downfall, is yet to be seen.
+
+Meanwhile, amidst a discontented nobility and a fickle populace, urged on
+by the danger of repose to the danger of enterprise; partly blinded by his
+outward power, partly impelled by the fear of internal weakness; at once
+made sanguine by his genius and his fanaticism, and uneasy by the
+expectations of the crowd, - he threw himself headlong into the gulf of the
+rushing Time, and surrendered his lofty spirit to no other guidance than a
+conviction of its natural buoyancy and its heaven-directed haven.
+
+
+Chapter 4.IV.  The Enemy's Camp.
+
+While Rienzi was preparing, in concert, perhaps, with the ambassadors of
+the brave Tuscan States, whose pride of country and love of liberty were
+well fitted to comprehend, and even share them, his schemes for the
+emancipation from all foreign yoke of the Ancient Queen, and the
+Everlasting Garden, of the World; the Barons, in restless secrecy, were
+revolving projects for the restoration of their own power.
+
+One morning, the heads of the Savelli, the Orsini, and the Frangipani, met
+at the disfortified palace of Stephen Colonna.  Their conference was warm
+and earnest - now resolute, now wavering, in its object - as indignation or
+fear prevailed.
+
+"You have heard," said Luca di Savelli, in his usual soft and womanly
+voice, "that the Tribune has proclaimed, that, the day after tomorrow, he
+will take the order of knighthood, and watch the night before in the church
+of the Lateran:  He has honoured me with a request to attend his vigil."
+
+"Yes, yes, the knave.  What means this new fantasy?" said the brutal Prince
+of the Orsini.
+
+"Unless it be to have the cavalier's right to challenge a noble," said old
+Colonna, "I cannot conjecture.  Will Rome never grow weary of this madman?"
+
+"Rome is the more mad of the two," said Luca di Savelli; "but methinks, in
+his wildness, the Tribune hath committed one error of which we may well
+avail ourselves at Avignon."
+
+"Ah," cried the old Colonna, "that must be our game; passive here, let us
+fight at Avignon."
+
+"In a word then, he hath ordered that his bath shall be prepared in the
+holy porphyry vase in which once bathed the Emperor Constantine."
+
+"Profanation! profanation!" cried Stephen.  "This is enough to excuse a
+bull of excommunication.  The Pope shall hear of it.  I will despatch a
+courier forthwith."
+
+"Better wait and see the ceremony," said the Savelli; "some greater folly
+will close the pomp, be assured."
+
+"Hark ye, my masters," said the grim Lord of the Orsini; "ye are for delay
+and caution; I for promptness and daring; my kinsman's blood calls aloud,
+and brooks no parley."
+
+"And what do?" said the soft-voiced Savelli; "fight without soldiers,
+against twenty thousand infuriated Romans? not I."
+
+Orsini sunk his voice into a meaning whisper.  "In Venice," said he, "this
+upstart might be mastered without an army.  Think you in Rome no man wears
+a stiletto?"
+
+"Hush," said Stephen, who was of far nobler and better nature than his
+compeers, and who, justifying to himself all other resistance to the
+Tribune, felt his conscience rise against assassination; "this must not be
+- your zeal transports you."
+
+"Besides, whom can we employ? scarce a German left in the city; and to
+whisper this to a Roman were to exchange places with poor Martino - Heaven
+take him, for he's nearer heaven than ever he was before," said the
+Savelli.
+
+"Jest me no jests," cried the Orsini, fiercely.  "Jests on such a subject!
+By St. Francis I would, since thou lovest such wit, thou hadst it all to
+thyself; and, methinks, at the Tribune's board I have seen thee laugh at
+his rude humour, as if thou didst not require a cord to choke thee."
+
+"Better to laugh than to tremble," returned the Savelli.
+
+"How! darest thou say I tremble?" cried the Baron.
+
+"Hush, hush," said the veteran Colonna, with impatient dignity.  "We are
+not now in such holiday times as to quarrel amongst ourselves.  Forbear, my
+lords."
+
+"Your greater prudence, Signor," said the sarcastic Savelli, "arises from
+your greater safety.  Your house is about to shelter itself under the
+Tribune's; and when the Lord Adrian returns from Naples, the innkeeper's
+son will be brother to your kinsman."
+
+"You might spare me that taunt," said the old noble, with some emotion. 
+"Heaven knows how bitterly I have chafed at the thought; yet I would Adrian
+were with us.  His word goes far to moderate the Tribune, and to guide my
+own course, for my passion beguiles my reason; and since his departure
+methinks we have been the more sullen without being the more strong.  Let
+this pass.  If my own son had wed the Tribune's sister, I would yet strike
+a blow for the old constitution as becomes a noble, if I but saw that the
+blow would not cut off my own head."
+
+Savelli, who had been whispering apart with Rinaldo Frangipani, now said -
+
+"Noble Prince, listen to me.  You are bound by your kinsman's approaching
+connection, your venerable age, and your intimacy with the Pontiff, to a
+greater caution than we are.  Leave to us the management of the enterprise,
+and be assured of our discretion."
+
+A young boy, Stefanello, who afterwards succeeded to the representation of
+the direct line of the Colonna, and whom the reader will once again
+encounter ere our tale be closed, was playing by his grandsire's knees.  He
+looked sharply up at Savelli, and said, "My grandfather is too wise, and
+you are too timid.  Frangipani is too yielding, and Orsini is too like a
+vexed bull.  I wish I were a year or two older."
+
+"And what would you do, my pretty censurer?" said the smooth Savelli,
+biting his smiling lip.
+
+"Stab the Tribune with my own stiletto, and then hey for Palestrina!"
+
+"The egg will hatch a brave serpent," quoth the Savelli.  "Yet why so
+bitter against the Tribune, my cockatrice?"
+
+"Because he allowed an insolent mercer to arrest my uncle Agapet for debt.
+The debt had been owed these ten years; and though it is said that no house
+in Rome has owed more money than the Colonna, this is the first time I ever
+heard of a rascally creditor being allowed to claim his debt unless with
+doffed cap and bended knee.  And I say that I would not live to be a Baron,
+if such upstart insolence is to be put upon me."
+
+"My child," said old Stephen, laughing heartily, "I see our noble order
+will be safe enough in your hands."
+
+"And," continued the child, emboldened by the applause he received, "if I
+had time after pricking the Tribune, I would fain have a second stroke 
+at - "
+
+"Whom?" said the Savelli, observing the boy pause;
+
+"My cousin Adrian.  Shame on him, for dreaming to make one a wife whose
+birth would scarce fit her for a Colonna's leman!"
+
+"Go play, my child - go play," said the old Colonna, as he pushed the boy
+from him.
+
+"Enough of this babble," cried the Orsini, rudely.  "Tell me, old lord;
+just as I entered, I saw an old friend (one of your former mercenaries)
+quit the palace - may I crave his errand?"
+
+"Ah, yes; a messenger from Fra Moreale.  I wrote to the Knight, reproving
+him for his desertion on our ill-starred return from Corneto, and
+intimating that five hundred lances would be highly paid for just now."
+
+"Ah," said Savelli; "and what is his answer!"
+
+"Oh, wily and evasive:  He is profuse in compliments and good wishes; but
+says he is under fealty to the Hungarian king, whose cause is before
+Rienzi's tribunal; that he cannot desert his present standard; that he
+fears Rome is so evenly balanced between patricians and the people, that
+whatever party would permanently be uppermost must call in a Podesta; and
+this character alone the Provencal insinuates would suit him."
+
+"Montreal our Podesta?" cried the Orsini.
+
+"And why not?" said Savelli; "as good a well-born Podesta as a low-born
+Tribune?  But I trust we may do without either.  Colonna, has this
+messenger from Fra Moreale left the city?"
+
+"I suppose so."
+
+"No," said Orsini; "I met him at the gate, and knew him of old:  it is
+Rodolf, the Saxon (once a hireling of the Colonna), who has made some
+widows among my clients in the good old day.  He is a little disguised now;
+however, I recognised and accosted him, for I thought he was one who might
+yet become a friend, and I bade him await me at my palace."
+
+"You did well," said the Savelli, musing, and his eyes met those of Orsini.
+Shortly afterwards a conference, in which much was said and nothing
+settled, was broken up; but Luca di Savelli, loitering at the porch, prayed
+the Frangipani, and the other Barons, to adjourn to the Orsini's palace.
+
+"The old Colonna," said he, "is well-nigh in his dotage.  We shall come to
+a quick determination without him, and we can secure his proxy in his son."
+
+And this was a true prophecy, for half-an-hour's consultation with Rodolf
+of Saxony sufficed to ripen thought into enterprise.
+
+
+Chapter 4.V.  The Night and its Incidents.
+
+With the following twilight, Rome was summoned to the commencement of the
+most magnificent spectacle the Imperial City had witnessed since the fall
+of the Caesars.  It had been a singular privilege, arrogated by the people
+of Rome, to confer upon their citizens the order of knighthood.  Twenty
+years before, a Colonna and an Orsini had received this popular honour. 
+Rienzi, who designed it as the prelude to a more important ceremony,
+claimed from the Romans a similar distinction.  From the Capitol to the
+Lateran swept, in long procession, all that Rome boasted of noble, of fair,
+and brave.  First went horsemen without number, and from all the
+neighbouring parts of Italy, in apparel that well befitted the occasion. 
+Trumpeters, and musicians of all kinds, followed, and the trumpets were of
+silver; youths bearing the harness of the knightly war-steed, wrought with
+gold, preceded the march of the loftiest matronage of Rome, whose love for
+show, and it may be whose admiration for triumphant fame, (which to women
+sanctions many offences,) made them forget the humbled greatness of their
+lords:  amidst them Nina and Irene, outshining all the rest; then came the
+Tribune and the Pontiff's Vicar, surrounded by all the great Signors of the
+city, smothering alike resentment, revenge, and scorn, and struggling who
+should approach nearest to the monarch of the day.  The high-hearted old
+Colonna alone remained aloof, following at a little distance, and in a garb
+studiously plain.  But his age, his rank, his former renown in war and
+state, did not suffice to draw to his grey locks and highborn mien a single
+one of the shouts that attended the meanest lord on whom the great Tribune
+smiled.  Savelli followed nearest to Rienzi, the most obsequious of the
+courtly band; immediately before the Tribune came two men; the one bore a
+drawn sword, the other the pendone, or standard usually assigned to
+royalty.  The tribune himself was clothed in a long robe of white satin,
+whose snowy dazzle (miri candoris) is peculiarly dwelt on by the historian,
+richly decorated with gold; while on his breast were many of those mystic
+symbols I have before alluded to, the exact meaning of which was perhaps
+known only to the wearer.  In his dark eye, and on that large tranquil
+brow, in which thought seemed to sleep, as sleeps a storm, there might be
+detected a mind abstracted from the pomp around; but ever and anon he
+roused himself, and conversed partially with Raimond or Savelli.
+
+"This is a quaint game," said the Orsini, falling back to the old Colonna: 
+"but it may end tragically."  
+
+"Methinks it may," said the old man, "if the Tribune overhear thee."
+
+Orsini grew pale.  "How - nay - nay, even if he did, he never resents
+words, but professes to laugh at our spoken rage.  It was but the other day
+that some knave told him what one of the Annibaldi said of him - words for
+which a true cavalier would have drawn the speaker's life's blood; and he
+sent for the Annibaldi, and said, 'My friend, receive this purse of gold, -
+court wits should be paid.'"
+
+"Did Annibaldi take the gold?"
+
+"Why, no; the Tribune was pleased with his spirit, and made him sup with
+him; and Annibaldi says he never spent a merrier evening, and no longer
+wonders that his kinsman, Riccardo, loves the buffoon so."
+
+Arrived now at the Lateran, Luca di Savelli fell also back, and whispered
+to Orsini; the Frangipani, and some other of the nobles, exchanged meaning
+looks; Rienzi, entering the sacred edifice in which, according to custom,
+he was to pass the night watching his armour, bade the crowd farewell, and
+summoned them the next morning, "To hear things that might, he trusted, be
+acceptable to heaven and earth."
+
+The immense multitude received this intimation with curiosity and gladness,
+while those who had been in some measure prepared by Cecco del Vecchio,
+hailed it as an omen of their Tribune's unflagging resolution.  The
+concourse dispersed with singular order and quietness; it was recorded as a
+remarkable fact, that in so great a crowd, composed of men of all parties,
+none exhibited licence or indulged in quarrel.  Some of the barons and
+cavaliers, among whom was Luca di Savelli, whose sleek urbanity and
+sarcastic humour found favour with the Tribune, and a few subordinate pages
+and attendants, alone remained; and, save a single sentinel at the porch,
+that broad space before the Palace, the Basilica and Fount of Constantine,
+soon presented a silent and desolate void to the melancholy moonlight. 
+Within the church, according to the usage of the time and rite, the
+descendant of the Teuton kings received the order of the Santo Spirito. 
+His pride, or some superstition equally weak, though more excusable, led
+him to bathe in the porphyry vase which an absurd legend consecrated to
+Constantine; and this, as Savelli predicted, cost him dear.  These
+appointed ceremonies concluded, his arms were placed in that part of the
+church, within the columns of St. John.  And here his state bed was
+prepared.  (In a more northern country, the eve of knighthood would have
+been spent without sleeping.  In Italy, the ceremony of watching the armour
+does not appear to have been so rigidly observed.)
+
+The attendant barons, pages, and chamberlains, retired out of sight to a
+small side chapel in the edifice; and Rienzi was left alone.  A single
+lamp, placed beside his bed, contended with the mournful rays of the moon,
+that cast through the long casements, over aisle and pillar, its "dim
+religious light."  The sanctity of the place, the solemnity of the hour,
+and the solitary silence round, were well calculated to deepen the high-
+wrought and earnest mood of that son of fortune.  Many and high fancies
+swept over his mind - now of worldly aspirations, now of more august but
+visionary belief, till at length, wearied with his own reflections, he cast
+himself on the bed.  It was an omen which graver history has not neglected
+to record, that the moment he pressed the bed, new prepared for the
+occasion, part of it sank under him:  he himself was affected by the
+accident, and sprung forth, turning pale and muttering; but, as if ashamed
+of his weakness, after a moment's pause, again composed himself to rest,
+and drew the drapery round him.
+
+The moonbeams grew fainter and more faint as the time proceeded, and the
+sharp distinction between light and shade faded fast from the marble floor;
+when from behind a column at the furthest verge of the building, a strange
+shadow suddenly crossed the sickly light - it crept on - it moved, but
+without an echo, - from pillar to pillar it flitted - it rested at last
+behind the column nearest to the Tribune's bed - it remained stationary.
+
+The shades gathered darker and darker round; the stillness seemed to
+deepen; the moon was gone; and, save from the struggling ray of the lamp
+beside Rienzi, the blackness of night closed over the solemn and ghostly
+scene.
+
+In one of the side chapels, as I have before said, which, in the many
+alterations the church has undergone, is probably long since destroyed,
+were Savelli and the few attendants retained by the Tribune.  Savelli alone
+slept not; he remained sitting erect, breathless and listening, while the
+tall lights in the chapel rendered yet more impressive the rapid changes of
+his countenance.
+
+"Now pray Heaven," said he, "the knave miscarry not!  Such an occasion may
+never again occur!  He has a strong arm and a dexterous hand, doubtless;
+but the other is a powerful man.  The deed once done, I care not whether
+the doer escape or not; if not, why we must stab him!  Dead men tell no
+tales.  At the worst, who can avenge Rienzi?  There is no other Rienzi! 
+Ourselves and the Frangipani seize the Aventine, the Colonna and the Orsini
+the other quarters of the city; and without the master-spirit, we may laugh
+at the mad populace.  But if discovered; - " and Savelli, who, fortunately
+for his foes, had not nerves equal to his will, covered his face and
+shuddered; - "I think I hear a noise! - no - is it the wind? - tush, it
+must be old Vico de Scotto, turning in his shell of mail! - silent - I like
+not that silence!  No cry - no sound!  Can the ruffian have played us
+false? or could he not scale the casement?  It is but a child's effort; -
+or did the sentry spy him?"
+
+Time passed on:  the first ray of daylight slowly gleamed, when he thought
+he heard the door of the church close.  Savelli's suspense became
+intolerable:  he stole from the chapel, and came in sight of the Tribune's
+bed - all was silent.
+
+"Perhaps the silence of death," said Savelli, as he crept back.
+
+Meanwhile the Tribune, vainly endeavouring to close his eyes, was rendered
+yet more watchful by the uneasy position he was obliged to assume - for the
+part of the bed towards the pillow having given way, while the rest
+remained solid, he had inverted the legitimate order of lying, and drawn
+himself up as he might best accommodate his limbs, towards the foot of the
+bed.  The light of the lamp, though shaded by the draperies, was thus
+opposite to him.  Impatient of his wakefulness, he at last thought it was
+this dull and flickering light which scared away the slumber, and was about
+to rise, to remove it further from him, when he saw the curtain at the
+other end of the bed gently lifted:  he remained quiet and alarmed; - ere
+he could draw a second breath, a dark figure interposed between the light
+and the bed; and he felt that a stroke was aimed against that part of the
+couch, which, but for the accident that had seemed to him ominous, would
+have given  his breast to the knife.  Rienzi waited not a second and
+better-directed blow; as the assassin yet stooped, groping in the uncertain
+light, he threw on him all the weight and power of his large and muscular
+frame, wrenched the stiletto from the bravo's hand, and dashing him on the
+bed, placed his knee on his breast. - The stiletto rose - gleamed -
+descended - the murtherer swerved aside, and it pierced only his right arm. 
+The Tribune raised, for a deadlier blow, the revengeful blade.
+
+The assassin thus foiled was a man used to all form and shape of danger,
+and he did not now lose his presence of mind.
+
+"Hold!" said he; "if you kill me, you will die yourself.  Spare me, and I
+will save you."
+
+"Miscreant!"
+
+"Hush - not so loud, or you will disturb your attendants, and some of them
+may do what I have failed to execute.  Spare me, I say, and I will reveal
+that which were worth more than my life; but call not - speak not aloud, I
+warn you!"
+
+The Tribune felt his heart stand still:  in that lonely place, afar from
+his idolizing people - his devoted guards - with but loathing barons, or,
+it might be, faithless menials, within call, might not the baffled
+murtherer give a wholesome warning? - and those words and that doubt seemed
+suddenly to reverse their respective positions, and leave the conqueror
+still in the assassin's power.
+
+"Thou thinkest to deceive me," said he, but in a voice whispered and
+uncertain, which shewed the ruffian the advantage he had gained:  "thou
+wouldst that I might release thee without summoning my attendants, that
+thou mightst a second time attempt my life."
+
+"Thou hast disabled my right arm, and disarmed me of my only weapon."
+
+"How camest thou hither?"
+
+"By connivance."
+
+"Whence this attempt?"
+
+"The dictation of others."
+
+"If I pardon thee - "
+
+"Thou shalt know all!"
+
+"Rise," said the Tribune, releasing his prisoner, but with great caution,
+and still grasping his shoulder with one hand, while the other pointed the
+dagger at his throat.
+
+"Did my sentry admit thee?  There is but one entrance to the church,
+methinks."
+
+"He did not; follow me, and I will tell thee more."
+
+"Dog! thou hast accomplices?"
+
+"If I have, thou hast the knife at my throat."
+
+"Wouldst thou escape?"
+
+"I cannot, or I would."
+
+Rienzi looked hard, by the dull light of the lamp, at the assassin.  His
+rugged and coarse countenance, rude garb, and barbarian speech, seemed to
+him proof sufficient that he was but the hireling of others; and it might
+be wise to brave one danger present and certain, to prevent much danger
+future and unforeseen.  Rienzi, too, was armed, strong, active, in the
+prime of life; - and at the worst, there was no part of the building whence
+his voice would not reach those within the chapel, - if they could be
+depended upon.
+
+"Shew me then thy place and means of entrance," said he; "and if I but
+suspect thee as we move - thou diest.  Take up the lamp."
+
+The ruffian nodded; with his left hand took up the lamp as he was ordered;
+and with Rienzi's grasp on his shoulder, while the wound from his right arm
+dropped gore as he passed, he moved noiselessly along the church - gained
+the altar - to the left of which was a small room for the use or retirement
+of the priest.  To this he made his way.  Rienzi's heart misgave him a
+moment.
+
+"Beware," he whispered, "the least sign of fraud, and thou art the first
+victim!"
+
+The assassin nodded again, and proceeded.  They entered the room; and then
+the Tribune's strange guide pointed to an open casement.  "Behold my
+entrance," said he; "and, if you permit me, my egress - "
+
+"The frog gets not out of the well so easily as he came in, friend,"
+returned Rienzi, smiling.  "And now, if I am not to call my guards, what am
+I to do with thee!"
+
+"Let me go, and I will seek thee tomorrow; and if thou payest me
+handsomely, and promisest not to harm limb or life, I will put thine
+enemies and my employers in thy power."
+
+Rienzi could not refrain from a slight laugh at the proposition, but
+composing himself, replied - "And what if I call my attendants, and give
+thee to their charge?"
+
+"Thou givest me to those very enemies and employers; and in despair lest I
+betray them, ere the day dawn they cut my throat - or thine."
+
+"Methinks knave, I have seen thee before."
+
+"Thou hast.  I blush not for name or country.  I am Rodolf of Saxony!"
+
+"I remember me: - servitor of Walter de Montreal.  He, then, is thy
+instigator!"
+
+"Roman, no!  That noble Knight scorns other weapon than the open sword, and
+his own hand slays his own foes.  Your pitiful, miserable, dastard
+Italians, alone employ the courage, and hire the arm, of others."
+
+Rienzi remained silent.  He had released hold of his prisoner, and stood
+facing him; every now and then regarding his countenance, and again
+relapsing into thought.  At length, casting his eyes round the small
+chamber thus singularly tenanted, he observed a kind of closet, in which
+the priests' robes, and some articles used in the sacred service, were
+contained.  It suggested at once an escape from his dilemma:  he pointed to
+it -
+
+"There, Rodolf of Saxony, shalt thou pass some part of this night - a small
+penance for thy meditated crime; and tomorrow, as thou lookest for life,
+thou wilt reveal all."
+
+"Hark, ye, Tribune," returned the Saxon, doggedly; "my liberty is in your
+power, but neither my tongue nor my life.  If I consent to be caged in that
+hole, you must swear on the crossed hilt of the dagger that you now hold,
+that, on confession of all I know, you pardon and set me free.  My
+employers are enough to glut your rage an' you were a tiger.  If you do not
+swear this - "
+
+"Ah, my modest friend! - the alternative?"
+
+"I brain myself against the stone wall!  Better such a death than the
+rack!"
+
+"Fool, I want not revenge against such as thou.  Be honest, and I swear
+that, twelve hours after thy confession, thou shalt stand safe and
+unscathed without the walls of Rome.  So help me our Lord and his saints."
+
+"I am content! - Donner und Hagel, I have lived long enough to care only
+for my own life, and the great captain's next to it; - for the rest, I reck
+not if ye southerns cut each other's throats, and make all Italy one
+grave."
+
+With this benevolent speech, Rodolf entered the closet; but ere Rienzi
+could close the door, he stepped forth again -
+
+"Hold," said he:  "this blood flows fast.  Help me to bandage it, or I
+shall bleed to death ere my confession."
+
+"Per fede," said the Tribune, his strange humour enjoying the man's cool
+audacity; "but, considering the service thou wouldst have rendered me, thou
+art the most pleasant, forbearing, unabashed, good fellow, I have seen this
+many a year.  Give us thine own belt.  I little thought my first eve of
+knighthood would have been so charitably spent!"
+
+"Methinks these robes would make a better bandage," said Rodolf, pointing
+to the priests' gear suspended from the wall.
+
+"Silence, knave," said the Tribune, frowning; "no sacrilege!  Yet, as thou
+takest such dainty care of thyself, thou shalt have mine own scarf to
+accommodate thee."
+
+With that the Tribune, placing his dagger on the ground, while he
+cautiously guarded it with his foot, bound up the wounded limb, for which
+condescension Rodolf gave him short thanks; resumed his weapon and lamp;
+closed the door; drew over it the long, heavy bolt without, and returned to
+his couch, deeply and indignantly musing over the treason he had so
+fortunately escaped.
+
+At the first grey streak of dawn he went out of the great door of the
+church, called the sentry, who was one of his own guard, and bade him
+privately, and now ere the world was astir, convey the prisoner to one of
+the private dungeons of the Capitol.  "Be silent," said he:  "utter not a
+word of this to any one; be obedient, and thou shalt be promoted.  This
+done, find out the councillor, Pandulfo di Guido, and bid him seek me here
+ere the crowd assemble."
+
+He then, making the sentinel doff his heavy shoes of iron, led him across
+the church, resigned Rodolf to his care, saw them depart, and in a few
+minutes afterwards his voice was heard by the inmates of the neighbouring
+chapel; and he was soon surrounded by his train.
+
+He was already standing on the floor, wrapped in a large gown lined with
+furs; and his piercing eye scanned carefully the face of each man that
+approached.  Two of the Barons of the Frangipani family exhibited some
+tokens of confusion and embarrassment, from which they speedily recovered
+at the frank salutation of the Tribune.
+
+But all the art of Savelli could not prevent his features from betraying to
+the most indifferent eye the terror of his soul; - and, when he felt the
+penetrating gaze of Rienzi upon him, he trembled in every joint.  Rienzi
+alone did not, however, seem to notice his disorder; and when Vico di
+Scotto, an old knight, from whose hands he received his sword, asked him
+how he had passed the night, he replied, cheerfully -
+
+"Well, well - my brave friend!  Over a maiden knight some good angel always
+watches.  Signor Luca di Savelli, I fear you have slept but ill:  you seem
+pale.  No matter! - our banquet today will soon brighten the current of
+your gay blood."
+
+"Blood, Tribune!" said di Scotto, who was innocent of the plot:  "Thou
+sayest blood, and lo! on the floor are large gouts of it not yet dry."
+
+"Now, out on thee, old hero, for betraying my awkwardness!  I pricked
+myself with my own dagger in unrobing.  Thank Heaven it hath no poison in
+its blade!"
+
+The Frangipani exchanged looks, - Luca di Savelli clung to a column for
+support, - and the rest of the attendants seemed grave and surprised.
+
+"Think not of it, my masters," said Rienzi:  "it is a good omen, and a true
+prophecy.  It implies that he who girds on his sword for the good of the
+state, must be ready to spill his blood for it:  that am I.  No more of
+this - a mere scratch:  it gave more blood than I recked of from so slight
+a puncture, and saves the leech the trouble of the lancet.  How brightly
+breaks the day!  We must prepare to meet our fellow-citizens - they will be
+here anon.  Ha, my Pandulfo - welcome! - thou, my old friend, shalt buckle
+on this mantle!"
+
+And while Pandulfo was engaged in the task, the Tribune whispered a few
+words in his ear, which, by the smile on his countenance, seemed to the
+attendants one of the familiar jests with which Rienzi distinguished his
+intercourse with his more confidential intimates.
+
+
+Chapter 4.VI.  The Celebrated Citation.
+
+The bell of the great Lateran church sounded shrill and loud, as the mighty
+multitude, greater even than that of the preceding night, swept on.  The
+appointed officers made way with difficulty for the barons and ambassadors,
+and scarcely were those noble visitors admitted ere the crowd closed in
+their ranks, poured headlong into the church, and took the way to the
+chapel of Boniface VIII.  There, filling every cranny, and blocking up the
+entrance, the more fortunate of the press beheld the Tribune surrounded by
+the splendid court his genius had collected, and his fortune had subdued. 
+At length, as the solemn and holy music began to swell through the edifice,
+preluding the celebration of the mass, the Tribune stepped forth, and the
+hush of the music was increased by the universal and dead silence of the
+audience.  His height, his air, his countenance, were such as always
+command the attention of crowds; and at this time they received every
+adjunct from the interest of the occasion, and that peculiar look of intent
+yet suppressed fervour, which is, perhaps, the sole gift of the eloquent
+that Nature alone can give.
+
+"Be it known," said he, slowly and deliberately, "in virtue of that
+authority, power, and jurisdiction, which the Roman people, in general
+parliament, have assigned to us, and which the Sovereign Pontiff hath
+confirmed, that we, not ungrateful of the gift and grace of the Holy Spirit
+- whose soldier we now are - nor of the favour of the Roman people,
+declare, that Rome, capital of the world, and base of the Christian church;
+and that every City, State, and People of Italy, are henceforth free.  By
+that freedom, and in the same consecrated authority, we proclaim, that the
+election, jurisdiction, and monarchy of the Roman empire appertain to Rome
+and Rome's people, and the whole of Italy.  We cite, then, and summon
+personally, the illustrious princes, Louis Duke of Bavaria, and Charles
+king of Bohemia, who would style themselves Emperors of Italy, to appear
+before us, or the other magistrates of Rome, to plead and to prove their
+claim between this day and the Day of Pentecost.  We cite also, and within
+the same term, the Duke of Saxony, the Prince of Brandenburg, and whosoever
+else, potentate, prince, or prelate, asserts the right of Elector to the
+imperial throne - a right that, we find it chronicled from ancient and
+immemorial time, appertaineth only to the Roman people - and this in
+vindication of our civil liberties, without derogation of the spiritual
+power of the Church, the Pontiff, and the Sacred College.  Herald, proclaim
+the citation, at the greater and more formal length, as written and
+intrusted to your hands, without the Lateran."
+
+("Il tutto senza derogare all' autorita della Chiesa, del Papa e del Sacro
+Collegio."  So concludes this extraordinary citation, this bold and
+wonderful assertion of the classic independence of Italy, in the most
+feudal time of the fourteenth century.  The anonymous biographer of Rienzi
+declares that the Tribune cited also the Pope and the Cardinals to reside
+in Rome.  De Sade powerfully and incontrovertibly refutes this addition to
+the daring or the extravagance of Rienzi.  Gibbon, however, who has
+rendered the rest of the citation in terms more abrupt and discourteous
+than he was warranted by any authority, copies the biographer's blunder,
+and sneers at De Sade, as using arguments "rather of decency than of
+weight."  Without wearying the reader with all the arguments of the learned
+Abbe, it may be sufficient to give the first two.
+
+1st.  All the other contemporaneous historians that have treated of this
+event, G. Villani, Hocsemius, the Vatican MSS. and other chroniclers,
+relating the citation of the Emperor and Electors, say nothing of that of
+the Pope and Cardinals; and the Pope (Clement VI.), in his subsequent
+accusations of Rienzi, while very bitter against his citation of the
+Emperor, is wholly silent on what would have been to the Pontiff the much
+greater offence of citing himself and the Cardinals.)
+
+2.  The literal act of this citation, as published formally in the Lateran,
+is extant in Hocsemius, (whence is borrowed, though not at all its length,
+the speech in the text of our present tale;) and in this document the Pope
+and his Cardinals are not named in the summons.
+
+Gibbon's whole account of Rienzi is superficial and unfair.  To the cold
+and sneering scepticism, which so often deforms the gigantic work of that
+great writer, allowing nothing for that sincere and urgent enthusiasm
+which, whether of liberty or religion, is the most common parent of daring
+action, the great Roman seems but an ambitious and fantastic madman.  In
+Gibbon's hands what would Cromwell have been? what Vane? what Hampden?  The
+pedant, Julian, with his dirty person and pompous affectation, was Gibbon's
+ideal of a great man.)
+
+As Rienzi concluded this bold proclamation of the liberties of Italy, the
+Tuscan ambassadors, and those of some other of the free states, murmured
+low approbation.  The ambassadors of those States that affected the party
+of the Emperor looked at each other in silent amaze and consternation.  The
+Roman Barons remained with mute lips and downcast eyes; only over the aged
+face of Stephen Colonna settled a smile, half of scorn, half of exultation. 
+But the great mass of the citizens were caught by words that opened so
+grand a prospect as the emancipation of all Italy:  and their reverence of
+the Tribune's power and fortune was almost that due to a supernatural
+being; so that they did not pause to calculate the means which were to
+correspond with the boast.
+
+While his eye roved over the crowd, the gorgeous assemblage near him, the
+devoted throng beyond; - as on his ear boomed the murmur of thousands and
+ten thousands, in the space without, from before the Palace of Constantine
+(Palace now his own!) sworn to devote life and fortune to his cause; in the
+flush of prosperity that yet had known no check; in the zenith of power, as
+yet unconscious of reverse, the heart of the Tribune swelled proudly: 
+visions of mighty fame and limitless dominion, - fame and dominion, once
+his beloved Rome's and by him to be restored, rushed before his intoxicated
+gaze; and in the delirious and passionate aspirations of the moment, he
+turned his sword alternately to the three quarters of the then known globe,
+and said, in an abstracted voice, as a man in a dream, "In the right of the
+Roman people this too is mine!"  ("Questo e mio.")
+
+Low though the voice, the wild boast was heard by all around as distinctly
+as if borne to them in thunder.  And vain it were to describe the various
+sensations it excited; the extravagance would have moved the derision of
+his foes, the grief of his friends, but for the manner of the speaker,
+which, solemn and commanding, hushed for the moment even reason and hatred
+themselves in awe; afterwards remembered and repeated, void of the spell
+they had borrowed from the utterer, the words met the cold condemnation of
+the well-judging; but at that moment all things seemed possible to the hero
+of the people.  He spoke as one inspired - they trembled and believed; and,
+as rapt from the spectacle, he stood a moment silent, his arm still
+extended - his dark dilating eye fixed upon space - his lip parted - his
+proud head towering and erect above the herd, - his own enthusiasm kindled
+that of the more humble and distant spectators; and there was a deep murmur
+begun by one, echoed by the rest, "The Lord is with Italy and Rienzi!"
+
+The Tribune turned, he saw the Pope's Vicar astonished, bewildered, rising
+to speak.  His sense and foresight returned to him at once, and, resolved
+to drown the dangerous disavowal of the Papal authority for this hardihood,
+which was ready to burst from Raimond's lips, he motioned quickly to the
+musicians, and the solemn and ringing chant of the sacred ceremony
+prevented the Bishop of Orvietto all occasion of self-exoneration or reply.
+
+The moment the ceremony was over, Rienzi touched the Bishop, and whispered,
+"We will explain this to your liking.  You feast with us at the Lateran. -
+Your arm."  Nor did he leave the good Bishop's arm, nor trust him to other
+companionship, until to the stormy sound of horn and trumpet, drum and
+cymbal, and amidst such a concourse as might have hailed, on the same spot,
+the legendary baptism of Constantine, the Tribune and his nobles entered
+the great gates of the Lateran, then the Palace of the World.
+
+Thus ended that remarkable ceremony and that proud challenge of the
+Northern Powers, in behalf of the Italian liberties, which, had it been
+afterwards successful, would have been deemed a sublime daring; which,
+unsuccessful, has been construed by the vulgar into a frantic insolence;
+but which, calmly considering all the circumstances that urged on the
+Tribune, and all the power that surrounded him, was not, perhaps,
+altogether so imprudent as it seemed.  And, even accepting that imprudence
+in the extremest sense, - by the more penetrating judge of the higher order
+of character, it will probably be considered as the magnificent folly of a
+bold nature, excited at once by position and prosperity, by religious
+credulities, by patriotic aspirings, by scholastic visions too suddenly
+transferred from revery to action, beyond that wise and earthward policy
+which sharpens the weapon ere it casts the gauntlet.
+
+
+Chapter 4.VII.  The Festival.
+
+The Festival of that day was far the most sumptuous hitherto known.  The
+hint of Cecco del Vecchio, which so well depicted the character of his
+fellow-citizens, as yet it exists, though not to such excess, in their love
+of holyday pomp and gorgeous show, was not lost upon Rienzi.  One instance
+of the universal banqueting (intended, indeed, rather for the people than
+the higher ranks) may illustrate the more than royal profusion that
+prevailed.  From morn till eve, streams of wine flowed like a fountain from
+the nostrils of the Horse of the great Equestrian Statue of Constantine. 
+The mighty halls of the Lateran palace, open to all ranks, were prodigally
+spread; and the games, sports, and buffooneries of the time, were in ample
+requisition.  Apart, the Tribunessa, as Nina was rather unclassically
+entitled, entertained the dames of Rome; while the Tribune had so
+effectually silenced or conciliated Raimond, that the good Bishop shared
+his peculiar table - the only one admitted to that honour.  As the eye
+ranged each saloon and hall - it beheld the space lined with all the
+nobility and knighthood - the wealth and strength - the learning and the
+beauty - of the Italian metropolis; mingled with ambassadors and noble
+strangers, even from beyond the Alps; (The simple and credulous briographer
+of Rienzi declares his fame to have reached the ears of the Soldan of
+Babylon.) - envoys not only of the free states that had welcomed the rise
+of the Tribune, but of the highborn and haughty tyrants who had first
+derided his arrogance, and now cringed to his power.  There, were not only
+the ambassadors of Florence, of Sienna, of Arezzo (which last subjected its
+government to the Tribune,) of Todi, of Spoleto, and of countless other
+lesser towns and states, but of the dark and terrible Visconti, prince of
+Milan; of Obizzo of Ferrara, and the tyrant rulers of Verona and Bologna;
+even the proud and sagacious Malatesta, lord of Rimini, whose arm
+afterwards broke for awhile the power of Montreal, at the head of his Great
+Company, had deputed his representative in his most honoured noble.  John
+di Vico, the worst and most malignant despot of his day, who had sternly
+defied the arms of the Tribune, now subdued and humbled, was there in
+person; and the ambassadors of Hungary and of Naples mingled with those of
+Bavaria and Bohemia, whose sovereigns that day had been cited to the Roman
+Judgment Court.  The nodding of plumes, the glitter of jewels and cloth of
+gold, the rustling of silks and jingle of golden spurs, the waving of
+banners from the roof, the sounds of minstrelsy from the galleries above,
+all presented a picture of such power and state - a court and chivalry of
+such show - as the greatest of the feudal kings might have beheld with a
+sparkling eye and a swelling heart.  But at that moment the cause and lord
+of all that splendour, recovered from his late exhilaration, sat moody and
+abstracted, remembering with a thoughtful brow the adventure of the past
+night, and sensible that amongst his gaudiest revellers lurked his intended
+murtherers.  Amidst the swell of the minstrelsy and the pomp of the crowd,
+he felt that treason scowled beside him; and the image of the skeleton
+obtruding, as of old, its grim thought of death upon the feast, darkened
+the ruby of the wine, and chilled the glitter of the scene.
+
+It was while the feast was loudest that Rienzi's page was seen gliding
+through the banquet, and whispering several of the nobles; each bowed low,
+but changed colour as he received the message.
+
+"My Lord Savelli," said Orsini, himself trembling, "bear yourself more
+bravely.  This must be meant in honour, not revenge.  I suppose your
+summons corresponds with mine."
+
+"He - he - asks - asks - me to supper at the Capitol; a fri-endly meeting -
+(pest on his friendship!) - after the noise of the day."
+
+"The words addressed also to me!" said Orsini, turning to one of the
+Frangipani.
+
+Those who received the summons soon broke from the feast, and collected in
+a group, eagerly conferring.  Some were for flight, but flight was
+confession; their number, rank, long and consecrated impunity, reassured
+them, and they resolved to obey.  The old Colonna, the sole innocent Baron
+of the invited guests, was also the only one who refused the invitation. 
+"Tush!" said he, peevishly; here is feasting enough for one day!  Tell the
+Tribune that ere he sups I hope to be asleep.  Grey hairs cannot encounter
+all this fever of festivity."
+
+As Rienzi rose to depart, which he did early, for the banquet took place
+while yet morning, Raimond, eager to escape and confer with some of his
+spiritual friends, as to the report he should make to the Pontiff, was
+beginning his expressions of farewell, when the merciless Tribune said to
+him gravely -
+
+"My Lord, we want you on urgent business at the Capitol.  A prisoner - a
+trial - perhaps (he added with his portentous and prophetic frown) an
+execution waits us!  Come."
+
+"Verily, Tribune," stammered the good Bishop, "this is a strange time for
+execution!"
+
+"Last night was a time yet more strange. - Come."
+
+There was something in the way in which the final word was pronounced, that
+Raimond could not resist.  He sighed, muttered, twitched his robes, and
+followed the Tribune.  As he passed through the halls, the company rose on
+all sides.  Rienzi repaid their salutations with smiles and whispers of
+frank courtesy and winning address.  Young as he yet was, and of a handsome
+and noble presence, that took every advantage from splendid attire, and yet
+more from an appearance of intellectual command in his brow and eye, which
+the less cultivated signors of that dark age necessarily wanted - he
+glittered through the court as one worthy to form, and fitted to preside
+over, it; and his supposed descent from the Teuton Emperor, which, since
+his greatness, was universally bruited and believed abroad, seemed
+undeniably visible to the foreign lords in the majesty of his mien and the
+easy blandness of his address.
+
+"My Lord Prefect," said he to a dark and sullen personage in black velvet,
+the powerful and arrogant John di Vico, prefect of Rome, "we are rejoiced
+to find so noble a guest at Rome:  we must repay the courtesy by surprising
+you in your own palace ere long; - nor will you, Signor (as he turned to
+the envoy from Tivoli,) refuse us a shelter amidst your groves and
+waterfalls ere the vintage be gathered.  Methinks Rome, united with sweet
+Tivoli, grows reconciled to the Muses.  Your suit is carried, Master
+Venoni:  the council recognises its justice; but I reserved the news for
+this holyday - you do not blame me, I trust."  This was whispered, with a
+half-affectionate frankness, to a worthy citizen, who, finding himself
+amidst so many of the great, would have shrunk from the notice of the
+Tribune; but it was the policy of Rienzi to pay an especial and marked
+attention to those engaged in commercial pursuits.  As, after tarrying a
+moment or two with the merchant, he passed on, the tall person of the old
+Colonna caught his eye -
+
+"Signor," said he, with a profound inclination of his head, but with a
+slight emphasis of tone, "you will not fail us this evening."
+
+"Tribune - " began the Colonna.
+
+"We receive no excuse," interrupted the Tribune, hastily, and passed on.
+
+He halted for a few moments before a small group of men plainly attired,
+who were watching him with intense interest; for they, too, were scholars,
+and in Rienzi's rise they saw another evidence of that wonderful and sudden
+power which intellect had begun to assume over brute force.  With these, as
+if abruptly mingled with congenial spirits, the Tribune relaxed all the
+gravity of his brow.  Happier, perhaps, his living career - more
+unequivocal his posthumous renown - had his objects as his tastes been
+theirs!
+
+"Ah, carissime!" said he to one, whose arm he drew within his own, - "and
+how proceeds thy interpretation of the old marbles? - half unravelled?  I
+rejoice to hear it!  Confer with me as of old, I pray thee.  Tomorrow - no,
+nor the day after, but next week - we will have a tranquil evening.  Dear
+poet, your ode transported me to the days of Horace; yet, methinks, we do
+wrong to reject the vernacular for the Latin.  You shake your head?  Well,
+Petrarch thinks with you:  his great epic moves with the stride of a giant
+- so I hear from his friend and envoy, - and here he is.  My Laeluis, is
+that not your name with Petrarch?  How shall I express my delight at his
+comforting, his inspiring letter?  Alas! he overrates not my intentions,
+but my power.  Of this hereafter."
+
+A slight shade darkened the Tribune's brow at these words:  but moving on,
+a long line of nobles and princes on either side, he regained his self-
+possession, and the dignity he had dropped with his former equals.  Thus he
+passed through the crowd, and gradually disappeared.
+
+"He bears him bravely," said one, as the revellers reseated themselves. 
+"Noticed you the 'we' - the style royal?"
+
+"But it must be owned that he lords it well," said the ambassador of the
+Visconti:  "less pride would be cringing to his haughty court."
+
+"Why," said a professor of Bologna, "why is the Tribune called proud?  I
+see no pride in him."
+
+"Nor I," said a wealthy jeweller.
+
+While these, and yet more contradictory, comments followed the exit of the
+Tribune, he passed into the saloon, where Nina presided; and here his fair
+person and silver tongue ("Suavis colorataeque sententiae," according to
+the description of Petrarch) won him a more general favour with the matrons
+than he experienced with their lords, and not a little contrasted the
+formal and nervous compliments of the good Bishop, who served him on such
+occasions with an excellent foil.
+
+But as soon as these ceremonies were done, and Rienzi mounted his horse,
+his manner changed at once into a stern and ominous severity.
+
+"Vicar," said he, abruptly, to the Bishop, "we might well need your
+presence.  Learn that at the Capitol now sits the Council in judgment upon
+an assassin.  Last night, but for Heaven's mercy, I should have fallen a
+victim to a hireling's dagger, Knew you aught of this?"
+
+And he turned so sharply on the Bishop, that the poor canonist nearly
+dropped from his horse in surprise and terror.
+
+"I, - " said he.
+
+Rienzi smiled - "No, good my Lord Bishop!  I see you are of no murtherer's
+mould.  But to continue: - that I might not appear to act in mine own
+cause, I ordered the prisoner to be tried in my absence.  In his trial (you
+marked the letter brought me at our banquet?) - "
+
+"Ay, and you changed colour."
+
+"Well I might:  in his trial, I say, he has confessed that nine of the
+loftiest lords of Rome were his instigators.  They sup with me tonight! -
+Vicar, forwards!"
+
+
+
+BOOK V.  THE CRISIS.
+
+"Questo ha acceso 'i fuoco e la fiamma laquale non la par spotegnere." -
+"Vita di Cola di Rienzi", lib. i. cap. 29.
+
+"He has kindled fire and flames which he will not be able to extinguish." -
+"Life of Cola di Rienzi".
+
+
+Chapter 5.I.  The Judgment of the Tribune.
+
+The brief words of the Tribune to Stephen Colonna, though they sharpened
+the rage of the proud old noble, were such as he did not on reflection deem
+it prudent to disobey.  Accordingly, at the appointed hour, he found
+himself in one of the halls of the Capitol, with a gallant party of his
+peers.  Rienzi received them with more than his usual graciousness.
+
+They sate down to the splendid board in secret uneasiness and alarm, as
+they saw that, with the exception of Stephen Colonna, none, save the
+conspirators, had been invited to the banquet.  Rienzi, regardless of their
+silence and abstraction, was more than usually gay - the old Colonna more
+than usually sullen.
+
+"We fear we have but ill pleased you, my Lord Colonna, by our summons. 
+Once, methinks, we might more easily provoke you to a smile."
+
+"Situations are changed, Tribune, since you were my guest."
+
+"Why, scarcely so.  I have risen, but you have not fallen.  Ye walk the
+streets day and night in security and peace; your lives are safe from the
+robber, and your palaces no longer need bars and battlements to shield you
+from your fellow-citizens.  I have risen, but we all have risen - from
+barbarous disorder into civilized life!  My Lord Gianni Colonna, whom we
+have made Captain over Campagna, you will not refuse a cup to the Buono
+Stato; - nor think we mistrust your valour, when we say, that we rejoice
+Rome hath no enemies to attest your generalship."
+
+"Methinks," quoth the old Colonna, bluntly, "we shall have enemies enough
+from Bohemia and Bavaria, ere the next harvest be green."
+
+"And, if so," replied the Tribune, calmly, "foreign foes are better than
+civil strife."
+
+"Ay, if we have money in the treasury; which is but little likely, if we
+have many more such holydays."
+
+"You are ungracious, my Lord," said the Tribune; "and, besides, you are
+more uncomplimentary to Rome than to ourselves.  What citizen would not
+part with gold to buy fame and liberty?"
+
+"I know very few in Rome that would," answered the Baron.  "But tell me,
+Tribune, you who are a notable casuist, which is the best for a state -
+that its governor should be over-thrifty or over-lavish?"
+
+"I refer the question to my friend, Luca di Savelli," replied Rienzi.  "He
+is a grand philosopher, and I wot well could explain a much knottier
+riddle, which we will presently submit to his acumen."
+
+The Barons, who had been much embarrassed by the bold speech of the old
+Colonna, all turned their eyes to Savelli, who answered with more composure
+than was anticipated.
+
+"The question admits a double reply.  He who is born a ruler, and maintains
+a foreign army, governing by fear, should be penurious.  He who is made
+ruler, who courts the people, and would reign by love, must win their
+affection by generosity, and dazzle their fancies by pomp.  Such, I
+believe, is the usual maxim in Italy, which is rife in all experience of
+state wisdom."
+
+The Barons unanimously applauded the discreet reply of Savelli, excepting
+only the old Colonna.
+
+"Yet pardon me, Tribune," said Stephen, "if I depart from the courtier-like
+decision of our friend, and opine, though with all due respect, that even a
+friar's coarse serge, ("Vestimenta da Bizoco," was the phrase used by
+Colonna; a phrase borrowed from certain heretics (bizocchi) who affected
+extreme austerity; afterwards the word passed into a proverb. - See the
+comments of Zerfirino Re, in "Vita di Cola di Rienzi".) the parade of
+humility, would better become thee, than this gaudy pomp, the parade of
+pride!"  So saying, he touched the large loose sleeve fringed with gold, of
+the Tribune's purple robe.
+
+"Hush, father!" said Gianni, Colonna's son, colouring at the unprovoked
+rudeness and dangerous candour of the veteran.
+
+"Nay, it matters not," said the Tribune, with affected indifference, though
+his lip quivered, and his eye shot fire; and then, after a pause, he
+resumed with an awful smile - "If the Colonna love the serge of the friar,
+he may see enough of it ere we part.  And now, my Lord Savelli, for my
+question, which I pray you listen to; it demands all your wit.  Is it best
+for a State's Ruler to be over-forgiving, or over-just?  Take breath to
+answer:  you look faint - you grow pale - you tremble - you cover your
+face!  Traitor and assassin, your conscience betrays you!  My Lords,
+relieve your accomplice, and take up the answer."
+
+"Nay, if we are discovered," said the Orsini, rising in despair, "we will
+not fall unavenged - die, tyrant!"
+
+He rushed to the place where Rienzi stood - for the Tribune also rose, -
+and made a thrust at his breast with his dagger; the steel pierced the
+purple robe, yet glanced harmlessly away - and the Tribune regarded the
+disappointed murtherer with a scornful smile.
+
+"Till yesternight, I never dreamt that under the robe of state I should
+need the secret corselet," said he.  "My Lords, you have taught me a dark
+lesson, and I thank ye."
+
+So saying, he clapped his hands, and suddenly the folding doors at the end
+of the hall flew open, and discovered the saloon of the Council hung with
+silk of a blood-red, relieved by rays of white, - the emblem of crime and
+death.  At a long table sate the councillors in their robes; at the bar
+stood a ruffian form, which the banqueters too well recognised.
+
+"Bid Rodolf of Saxony approach!" said the Tribune.
+
+And led by two guards, the robber entered the hall.
+
+"Wretch, you then betrayed us!" said one of the Frangipani.
+
+"Rodolph of Saxony goes ever to the highest bidder," returned the
+miscreant, with a horrid grin.  "You gave me gold, and I would have slain
+your foe; your foe defeated me; he gives me life, and life is a greater
+boon than gold!"
+
+"Ye confess your crime, my Lords!  Silent! dumb!  Where is your wit,
+Savelli?  Where your pride, Rinaldo di Orsini?  Gianni Colonna, is your
+chivalry come to this?"
+
+"Oh!" continued Rienzi, with deep and passionate bitterness; "oh, my Lords,
+will nothing conciliate you - not to me, but to Rome?  What hath been my
+sin against you and yours?  Disbanded ruffians (such as your accuser) -
+dismantled fortresses - impartial law - what man, in all the wild
+revolutions of Italy, sprung from the people, ever yielded less to their
+licence?  Not a coin of your coffers touched by wanton power, - not a hair
+of your heads harmed by private revenge.  You, Gianni Colonna, loaded with
+honours, intrusted with command - you, Alphonso di Frangipani, endowed with
+new principalities, - did the Tribune remember one insult he received from
+you as the Plebeian?  You accuse my pride; - was it my fault that ye
+cringed and fawned upon my power, - flattery on your lips, poison at your
+hearts?  No, I have not offended you; let the world know, that in me you
+aimed at liberty, justice, law, order, the restored grandeur, the renovated
+rights of Rome!  At these, the Abstract and the Immortal - not at this
+frail form, ye struck; - by the divinity of these ye are defeated; - for
+the outraged majesty of these, - criminals and victims, - ye must die!"
+
+With these words, uttered with the tone and air that would have become the
+loftiest spirit of the ancient city, Rienzi, with a majestic step, swept
+from the chamber into the Hall of Council.  (The guilt of the Barons in
+their designed assassination of Rienzi, though hastily slurred over by
+Gibbon, and other modern writers, is clearly attested by Muratori, the
+Bolognese Chronicle &c. - They even confessed the crime.  (See Cron. 
+Estens:  Muratori, tom. xviii. page 442.))
+
+All that night the conspirators remained within that room, the doors locked
+and guarded; the banquet unremoved, and its splendour strangely contrasting
+the mood of the guests.
+
+The utter prostration and despair of these dastard criminals - so unlike
+the knightly nobles of France and England, has been painted by the
+historian in odious and withering colours.  The old Colonna alone sustained
+his impetuous and imperious character.  He strode to and fro the room like
+a lion in his cage, uttering loud threats of resentment and defiance; and
+beating at the door with his clenched hands, demanding egress, and
+proclaiming the vengeance of the Pontiff.
+
+The dawn came, slow and grey upon that agonized assembly:  and just as the
+last star faded from the melancholy horizon, and by the wan and comfortless
+heaven, they regarded each other's faces, almost spectral with anxiety and
+fear, the great bell of the Capitol sounded the notes in which they well
+recognised the chime of death!  It was then that the door opened, and a
+drear and gloomy procession of cordeliers, one to each Baron, entered the
+apartment!  At that spectacle, we are told, the terror of the conspirators
+was so great, that it froze up the very power of speech.  ("Diventarono si
+gelati, che non poteno favellare.")  The greater part at length, deeming
+all hope over, resigned themselves to their ghostly confessors.  But when
+the friar appointed to Stephen approached that passionate old man, he waved
+his hand impatiently, and said - "Tease me not!  Tease me not!"
+
+"Nay, son, prepare for the awful hour."
+
+"Son, indeed!" quoth the Baron.  "I am old enough to be thy grandsire; and
+for the rest, tell him who sent thee, that I neither am prepared for death,
+nor will prepare!  I have made up my mind to live these twenty years, and
+longer too; - if I catch not my death with the cold of this accursed
+night."
+
+Just at that moment a cry that almost seemed to rend the Capitol asunder
+was heard, as, with one voice, the multitude below yelled forth -
+
+"Death to the conspirators! - death! death!"
+
+While this the scene in that hall, the Tribune issued from his chamber, in
+which he had been closeted with his wife and sister.  The noble spirit of
+the one, the tears and grief of the other (who saw at one fell stroke
+perish the house of her betrothed,) had not worked without effect upon a
+temper, stern and just indeed, but naturally averse from blood; and a heart
+capable of the loftiest species of revenge.
+
+He entered the Council, still sitting, with a calm brow, and even a
+cheerful eye.
+
+"Pandulfo di Guido," he said, turning to that citizen, "you are right; you
+spoke as a wise man and a patriot, when you said that to cut off with one
+blow, however merited, the noblest heads of Rome would endanger the State,
+sully our purple with an indelible stain, and unite the nobility of Italy
+against us."
+
+"Such, Tribune, was my argument, though the Council have decided
+otherwise."
+
+"Hearken to the shouts of the populace, you cannot appease their honest
+warmth," said the demagogue Baroncelli.
+
+Many of the Council murmured applause.
+
+"Friends," said the Tribune, with a solemn and earnest aspect, "let not
+Posterity say that Liberty loves blood; let us for once adopt the example
+and imitate the mercy of our great Redeemer!  We have triumphed - let us
+forbear; we are saved - let us forgive!"
+
+The speech of the Tribune was supported by Pandulfo, and others of the more
+mild and moderate policy; and for a short but animated discussion, the
+influence of Rienzi prevailed, and the sentence of death was revoked, but
+by a small majority.
+
+"And now," said Rienzi, "let us be more than just; let us be generous. 
+Speak - and boldly.  Do any of ye think that I have been over-hard, over-
+haughty with these stubborn spirits? - I read your answer in your brows! -
+I have!  Do any of ye think this error of mind may have stirred them to
+their dark revenge?  Do any of you deem that they partake, as we do, of
+human nature, - that they are sensible to kindness, that they are softened
+by generosity, - that they can be tamed and disarmed by such vengeance as
+is dictated to noble foes by Christian laws?"
+
+"I think," said Pandulfo, after a pause, "that it will not be in human
+nature, if the men you pardon, thus offending and thus convicted, again
+attempt your life!"
+
+"Methinks," said Rienzi, "we must do even more than pardon.  The first
+great Caesar, when he did not crush a foe, strove to convert him to a
+friend - "
+
+"And perished by the attempt," said Baroncelli, abruptly.
+
+Rienzi started and changed colour.
+
+"If you would save these wretched prisoners, better not wait till the fury
+of the mob become ungovernable," whispered Pandulfo.
+
+The Tribune roused himself from his revery.
+
+"Pandulfo," said he, in the same tone, "my heart misgives me - the brood of
+serpents are in my hand - I do not strangle them - they may sting me to
+death, in return for my mercy - it is their instinct!  No matter:  it shall
+not be said that the Roman Tribune bought with so many lives his own
+safety:  nor shall it be written upon my grave-stone, 'Here lies the
+coward, who did not dare forgive.'  What, ho! there, officers, unclose the
+doors!  My masters, let us acquaint the prisoners with their sentence."
+
+With that, Rienzi seated himself on the chair of state, at the head of the
+table, and the sun, now risen, cast its rays over the blood-red walls, in
+which the Barons, marshalled in order into the chamber, thought to read
+their fate.
+
+"My Lords," said the Tribune, "ye have offended the laws of God and man;
+but God teaches man the quality of mercy.  Learn at last, that I bear a
+charmed life.  Nor is he whom, for high purposes, Heaven hath raised from
+the cottage to the popular throne, without invisible aid and spiritual
+protection.  If hereditary monarchs are deemed sacred, how much more one in
+whose power the divine hand hath writ its witness!  Yes, over him who lives
+but for his country, whose greatness is his country's gift, whose life is
+his country's liberty, watch the souls of the just, and the unsleeping eyes
+of the sworded seraphim!  Taught by your late failure and your present
+peril, bid your anger against me cease; respect the laws, revere the
+freedom of your city, and think that no state presents a nobler spectacle
+than men born as ye are - a patrician and illustrious order - using your
+power to protect your city, your wealth to nurture its arts, your chivalry
+to protect its laws!  Take back your swords - and the first man who strikes
+against the liberties of Rome, let him be your victim; even though that
+victim be the Tribune.  Your cause has been tried - your sentence is
+pronounced.  Renew your oath to forbear all hostility, private or public,
+against the government and the magistrates of Rome, and ye are pardoned -
+ye are free!"
+
+Amazed, bewildered, the Barons mechanically bent the knee:  the friars who
+had received their confessions, administered the appointed oath; and while,
+with white lips, they muttered the solemn words, they heard below the roar
+of the multitude for their blood.
+
+This ceremony ended, the Tribune passed into the banquet-hall, which
+conducted to a balcony, whence he was accustomed to address the people; and
+never, perhaps, was his wonderful mastery over the passions of an audience
+(ad persuadendum efficax dictator, quoque dulcis ac lepidus) (Petrarch of
+Rienzi.) more greatly needed or more eminently shown, than on that day; for
+the fury of the people was at its height, and it was long ere he succeeded
+in turning it aside.  Before he concluded, however, every wave of the wild
+sea lay hushed. - The orator lived to stand on the same spot, to plead for
+a life nobler than those he now saved, - and to plead unheard and in vain!
+
+As soon as the Tribune saw the favourable moment had arrived, the Barons
+were admitted into the balcony: - in the presence of the breathless
+thousands, they solemnly pledged themselves to protect the Good Estate. 
+And thus the morning which seemed to dawn upon their execution witnessed
+their reconciliation with the people.
+
+The crowd dispersed, the majority soothed and pleased; - the more
+sagacious, vexed and dissatisfied.
+
+"He has but increased the smoke and the flame which he was not able to
+extinguish," growled Cecco del Vecchio; and the smith's appropriate saying
+passed into a proverb and a prophecy.
+
+Meanwhile, the Tribune, conscious at least that he had taken the more
+generous course, broke up the Council, and retired to the chamber where
+Nina and his sister waited him.  These beautiful young women had conceived
+for each other the tenderest affection.  And their differing characters,
+both of mind and feature, seemed by contrast to heighten the charms of
+both; as in a skilful jewellery, the pearl and diamond borrow beauty from
+each other.
+
+And as Irene now turned her pale countenance and streaming eyes from the
+bosom to which she had clung for support, the timid sister, anxious,
+doubtful, wistful; - the proud wife, sanguine and assured, as if never
+diffident of the intentions nor of the power of her Rienzi: - the contrast
+would have furnished to a painter no unworthy incarnation of the Love that
+hopeth, and the Love that feareth, all things.
+
+"Be cheered, my sweet sister," said the Tribune, first caught by Irene's
+imploring look; "not a hair on the heads of those who boast the name of him
+thou lovest so well is injured. - Thank Heaven," as his sister, with a low
+cry, rushed into his arms, "that it was against my life they conspired! 
+Had it been another Roman's, mercy might have been a crime!  Dearest, may
+Adrian love thee half as well as I; and yet, my sister and my child, none
+can know thy soft soul like he who watched over it since its first blossom
+expanded to the sun.  My poor brother! had he lived, your counsel had been
+his; and methinks his gentle spirit often whispers away the sternness
+which, otherwise, would harden over mine.  Nina, my queen, my inspirer, my
+monitor - ever thus let thy heart, masculine in my distress, be woman's in
+my power; and be to me, with Irene, upon earth, what my brother is in
+heaven!"
+
+The Tribune, exhausted by the trials of the night, retired for a few hours
+to rest; and as Nina, encircling him within her arms, watched over his
+noble countenance - care hushed, ambition laid at rest, its serenity had
+something almost of sublime.  And tears of that delicious pride, which
+woman sheds for the hero of her dreams, stood heavy in the wife's eyes, as
+she rejoiced more, in the deep stillness of her heart, at the prerogative,
+alone hers, of sharing his solitary hours, than in all the rank to which
+his destiny had raised her, and which her nature fitted her at once to
+adorn and to enjoy.  In that calm and lonely hour she beguiled her heart by
+waking dreams, vainer than the sleeper's; and pictured to herself the long
+career of glory, the august decline of peace, which were to await her lord.
+
+And while she thus watched and thus dreamed, the cloud, as yet no bigger
+than a man's hand, darkened the horizon of a fate whose sunshine was well-
+nigh past!
+
+
+Chapter 5.II.  The Flight.
+
+Fretting his proud heart, as a steed frets on the bit, old Colonna regained
+his palace.  To him, innocent of the proposed crime of his kin and
+compeers, the whole scene of the night and morning presented but one
+feature of insult and degradation.  Scarce was he in his palace, ere he
+ordered couriers, in whom he knew he could confide, to be in preparation
+for his summons.  "This to Avignon," said he to himself, as he concluded an
+epistle to the Pontiff. - "We will see whether the friendship of the great
+house of the Colonna will outweigh the frantic support of the rabble's
+puppet. - This to Palestrina, - the rock is inaccessible! - This to John di
+Vico, he may be relied upon, traitor though he be! - This to Naples; the
+Colonna will disown the Tribune's ambassador, if he throw not up the trust
+and hasten hither, not a lover but a soldier! - and may this find Walter de
+Montreal!  Ah, a precious messenger he sent us, but I will forgive all -
+all, for a thousand lances."  And as with trembling hands he twined the
+silk round his letters, he bade his pages invite to his board, next day,
+all the signors who had been implicated with him on the previous night.
+
+The Barons came - far more enraged at the disgrace of pardon, than grateful
+for the boon of mercy.  Their fears combined with their pride; and the
+shouts of the mob, the whine of the cordeliers, still ringing in their
+ears, they deemed united resistance the only course left to protect their
+lives, and avenge their affront.
+
+To them the public pardon of the Tribune seemed only a disguise to private
+revenge.  All they believed was, that Rienzi did not dare to destroy them
+in the face of day; forgetfulness and forgiveness appeared to them as the
+means designed to lull their vigilance, while abasing their pride:  and the
+knowledge of crime detected forbade them all hope of safety.  The hand of
+their own assassin might be armed against them, or they might be ruined
+singly, one by one, as was the common tyrant-craft of that day.  Singularly
+enough, Luca di Savelli was the most urgent for immediate rebellion.  The
+fear of death made the coward brave.
+
+Unable even to conceive the romantic generosity of the Tribune, the Barons
+were yet more alarmed when, the next day, Rienzi, summoning them one by one
+to a private audience, presented them with gifts, and bade them forget the
+past:  excused himself rather than them, and augmented their offices and
+honours.
+
+In the Quixotism of a heart to which royalty was natural, he thought that
+there was no medium course; and that the enmity he would not silence by
+death, he could crush by confidence and favours.  Such conduct from a born
+king to hereditary inferiors might have been successful; but the generosity
+of one who has abruptly risen over his lords is but the ostentation of
+insult.  Rienzi in this, and, perhaps, in forgiveness itself, committed a
+fatal error of policy, which the dark sagacity of a Visconti, or, in later
+times, of a Borgia, would never have perpetrated.  But it was the error of
+a bright and a great mind.
+
+Nina was seated in the grand saloon of the palace - it was the day of
+reception for the Roman ladies.
+
+The attendance was so much less numerous than usual that it startled her,
+and she thought there was a coldness and restraint in the manner of the
+visitors present, which somewhat stung her vanity.
+
+"I trust we have not offended the Signora Colonna," she said to the Lady of
+Gianni, Stephen's son.  "She was wont to grace our halls, and we miss much
+her stately presence."
+
+"Madam, my Lord's mother is unwell!"
+
+"Is she so?  We will send for her more welcome news.  Methinks we are
+deserted today."
+
+As she spoke, she carelessly dropped her handkerchief - the haughty dame of
+the Colonna bent not - not a hand stirred; and the Tribunessa looked for a
+moment surprised and disconcerted.  Her eye roving over the throng, she
+perceived several, whom she knew as the wives of Rienzi's foes, whispering
+together with meaning glances, and more than one malicious sneer at her
+mortification was apparent.  She recovered herself instantly, and said to
+the Signora Frangipani, with a smile, "May we be a partaker of your mirth?
+You seem to have chanced on some gay thought, which it were a sin not to
+share freely."
+
+The lady she addressed coloured slightly, and replied, "We were thinking,
+madam, that had the Tribune been present, his vow of knighthood would have
+been called into requisition."
+
+"And how, Signora?"
+
+"It would have been his pleasing duty, madam, to succour the distressed." 
+And the Signora glanced significantly on the kerchief still on the floor.
+
+"You designed me, then, this slight, Signoras," said Nina, rising with
+great majesty.  "I know not whether your Lords are equally bold to the
+Tribune; but this I know, that the Tribune's wife can in future forgive
+your absence.  Four centuries ago, a Frangipani might well have stooped to
+a Raselli; today, the dame of a Roman Baron might acknowledge a superior in
+the wife of the first magistrate of Rome.  I compel not your courtesy, nor
+seek it."
+
+"We have gone too far," whispered one of the ladies to her neighbour. 
+"Perhaps the enterprise may not succeed; and then - "
+
+Further remark was cut short by the sudden entrance of the Tribune.  He
+entered with great haste, and on his brow was that dark frown which none
+ever saw unquailing.
+
+"How, fair matrons!" said he, looking round the room with a rapid glance,
+"ye have not deserted us yet?  By the blessed cross, your Lords pay a
+compliment to our honour, to leave us such lovely hostages, or else, God's
+truth, they are ungrateful husbands.  So, madam," turning sharp round to
+the wife of Gianni Colonna, "your husband is fled to Palestrina; yours,
+Signora Orsini, to Marino; yours with him, fair bride of Frangipani, - ye
+came hither to - .  But ye are sacred even from a word!"
+
+The Tribune paused a moment, evidently striving to suppress his emotion, as
+he observed the terror he had excited - his eye fell upon Nina, who,
+forgetting her previous vexation, regarded him with anxious amazement. 
+"Yes," said he to her, "you alone, perhaps, of this fair assemblage, know
+not that the nobles whom I lately released from the headsman's gripe are a
+second time forsworn.  They have left home in the dead of the night, and
+already the Heralds proclaim them traitors and rebels.  Rienzi forgives no
+more!"
+
+"Tribune," exclaimed the Signora Frangipani, who had more bold blood in her
+veins than her whole house, "were I of thine own sex, I would cast the
+words, Traitor and Rebel, given to my Lord, in thine own teeth! - Proud
+man, the Pontiff soon will fulfil that office!"
+
+"Your Lord is blest with a dove, fair one," said the Tribune, scornfully.
+"Ladies, fear not, while Rienzi lives, the wife even of his worst foe is
+safe and honoured.  The crowd will be here anon; our guards shall attend ye
+home in safety, or this palace may be your shelter - for, I warn ye, that
+your Lords have rushed into a great peril.  And ere many days be past, the
+streets of Rome may be as rivers of blood."
+
+"We accept your offer, Tribune," said the Signora Frangipani, who was
+touched, and, in spite of herself, awed by the Tribune's manner.  And as
+she spoke, she dropped on one knee, picked up the kerchief, and, presenting
+it respectfully to Nina, said, "Madam, forgive me.  I alone of these
+present respect you more in danger than in pride."
+
+"And I," returned Nina, as she leaned in graceful confidence on Rienzi's
+arm, "I reply, that if there be danger, the more need of pride."
+
+All that day and all that night rang the great bell of the Capitol.  But on
+the following daybreak, the assemblage was thin and scattered; there was a
+great fear stricken into the hearts of the people, by the flight of the
+Barons, and they bitterly and loudly upbraided Rienzi for sparing them to
+this opportunity of mischief.  That day the rumours continued; the
+murmurers for the most part remained within their houses, or assembled in
+listless and discontented troops.  The next day dawned; the same lethargy
+prevailed.  The Tribune summoned his Council, (which was a Representative
+assembly.)
+
+"Shall we go forth as we are," said he, "with such few as will follow the
+Roman standard!"
+
+"No," replied Pandulfo, who, by nature timid, was yet well acquainted with
+the disposition of the people, and therefore a sagacious counsellor.  "Let
+us hold back; let us wait till the rebels commit themselves by some odious
+outrage, and then hatred will unite the waverers, and resentment lead
+them."
+
+This counsel prevailed; the event proved its wisdom.  To give excuse and
+dignity to the delay, messengers were sent to Marino, whither the chief
+part of the Barons had fled, and which was strongly fortified, demanding
+their immediate return.
+
+On the day on which the haughty refusal of the insurgents was brought to
+Rienzi, came fugitives from all parts of the Campagna.  Houses burned -
+convents and vineyards pillaged - cattle and horses seized - attested the
+warfare practised by the Barons, and animated the drooping Romans, by
+showing the mercies they might expect for themselves.  That evening, of
+their own accord, the Romans rushed into the place of the Capitol: -
+Rinaldo Orsini had seized a fortress in the immediate neighbourhood of
+Rome, and had set fire to a tower, the flames of which were visible to the
+city.  The tenant of the tower, a noble lady, old and widowed, was burnt
+alive.  Then rose the wild clamour - the mighty wrath - the headlong fury. 
+The hour for action had arrived.  ("Ardea terre, arse la Castelluzza e
+case, e uomini.  Non si schifo di ardere una nobile donna Vedova, veterana,
+in una torre.  Per tale crudeltade li Romani furo piu irati," &c. - "Vita
+di Cola di Rienzi", lib. i. cap. 20.)
+
+
+Chapter 5.III.  The Battle.
+
+"I have dreamed a dream," cried Rienzi, leaping from his bed.  "The lion-
+hearted Boniface, foe and victim of the Colonna, hath appeared to me, and
+promised victory.  ("In questa notte mi e apparito Santo Bonifacio Papa,"
+&c. - "Vita di Cola di Rienzi" cap. 32.)  Nina, prepare the laurel-wreath: 
+this day victory shall be ours!"
+
+"O, Rienzi! today?"
+
+"Yes! hearken to the bell - hearken to the trumpet.  Nay, I hear even now
+the impatient hoofs of my white warsteed!  One kiss, Nina, ere I arm for
+victory, - stay - comfort poor Irene; let me not see her - she weeps that
+my foes are akin to her betrothed; I cannot brook her tears; I watched her
+in her cradle.  Today, I must have no weakness on my soul!  Knaves, twice
+perjured! - wolves, never to be tamed! - shall I meet ye at last sword to
+sword?  Away, sweet Nina, to Irene, quick!  Adrian is at Naples, and were
+he in Rome, her lover is sacred, though fifty times a Colonna."
+
+With that, the Tribune passed into his wardrobe, where his pages and
+gentlemen attended with his armour.  "I hear, by our spies," said he, "that
+they will be at our gates ere noon - four thousand foot, seven hundred
+horsemen.  We will give them a hearty welcome, my masters.  How, Angelo
+Villani, my pretty page, what do you out of your lady's service?"
+
+"I would fain see a warrior arm for Rome," said the boy, with a boy's
+energy.
+
+"Bless thee, my child; there spoke one of Rome's true sons!"
+
+"And the Signora has promised me that I shall go with her guard to the
+gates, to hear the news - "
+
+"And report the victory? - thou shalt.  But they must not let thee come
+within shaft-shot.  What! my Pandulfo, thou in mail?"
+
+"Rome requires every man," said the citizen, whose weak nerves were strung
+by the contagion of the general enthusiasm.
+
+"She doth - and once more I am proud to be a Roman.  Now, gentles, the
+Dalmaticum:  (A robe or mantle of white, borne by Rienzi; at one time
+belonging to the sacerdotal office, afterwards an emblem of empire.)  I
+would that every foe should know Rienzi; and, by the Lord of Hosts,
+fighting at the head of the imperial people, I have a right to the imperial
+robe.  Are the friars prepared?  Our march to the gates shall be preceded
+by a solemn hymn - so fought our sires."
+
+"Tribune, John di Vico is arrived with a hundred horse to support the Good
+Estate."
+
+"He hath! - The Lord has delivered us then of a foe, and given our dungeons
+a traitor! - Bring hither yon casket, Angelo. - So - Hark thee! Pandulfo,
+read this letter."
+
+The citizens read, with surprise and consternation, the answer of the wily
+Prefect to the Colonna's epistle.
+
+"He promises the Baron to desert to him in the battle, with the Prefect's
+banner," said Pandulfo.  "What is to be done?"
+
+"What! - take my signet - here - see him lodged forthwith in the prison of
+the Capitol.  Bid his train leave Rome, and if found acting with the
+Barons, warn them that their Lord dies.  Go - see to it without a moment's
+delay.  Meanwhile, to the chapel - we will hear mass."
+
+Within an hour the Roman army - vast, miscellaneous - old men and boys,
+mingled with the vigour of life, were on their march to the Gate of San
+Lorenzo; of their number, which amounted to twenty thousand foot, not one-
+sixth could be deemed men-at-arms; but the cavalry were well equipped, and
+consisted of the lesser Barons and the more opulent citizens.  At the head
+of these rode the Tribune in complete armour, and wearing on his casque a
+wreath of oak and olive leaves, wrought in silver.  Before him waved the
+great gonfalon of Rome, while in front of this multitudinous array marched
+a procession of monks, of the order of St. Francis, (for the ecclesiastical
+body of Rome went chiefly with the popular spirit, and its enthusiastic
+leader,) - slowly chanting the following hymn, which was made inexpressibly
+startling and imposing at the close of each stanza, by the clash of arms,
+the blast of trumpets, and the deep roll of the drum; which formed, as it
+were, a martial chorus to the song: -
+
+Roman War-song.
+
+1.
+
+March, march for your hearths and your altars!
+Cursed to all time be the dastard that falters,
+Never on earth may his sins be forgiven
+Death on his soul, shut the portals of heaven!
+A curse on his heart, and a curse on his brain! -
+Who strikes not for Rome, shall to Rome be her Cain!
+Breeze fill our banners, sun gild our spears,
+Spirito Santo, Cavaliers!  (Rienzi's word of battle was "Spirito Santo
+Cavaliere", i.e. Cavalier in the singular number.  The plural number has
+been employed in the text, as somewhat more animated, and therefore better
+adapted to the kind of poetry into the service of which the watchword has
+been pressed.)
+    Blow, trumpets, blow,
+    Blow, trumpets, blow,
+      Gaily to glory we come;
+    Like a king in his pomp,
+    To the blast of the tromp,
+      And the roar of the mighty drum!
+  Breeze fill our banners, sun gild our spears,
+  Spirito Santo, Cavaliers!
+
+2.
+
+March, march for your Freedom and Laws!
+Earth is your witness - all Earth's is your cause!
+Seraph and saint from their glory shall heed ye,
+The angel that smote the Assyrian shall lead ye;
+To the Christ of the Cross man is never so holy
+As in braving the proud in defence of the lowly!
+  Breeze fill our banners, sun gild our spears,
+  Spirito Santo, Cavaliers!
+    Blow, trumpets, blow,
+    Blow, trumpets, blow,
+      Gaily to glory we come;
+    Like a king in his pomp,
+    To the blast of the tromp,
+      And the roar of the mighty drum!
+  Breeze fill our banners, sun gild our spears,
+  Spirito Santo, Cavaliers!
+
+3.
+
+March, march! ye are sons of the Roman,
+The sound of whose step was as fate to the foeman!
+Whose realm, save the air and the wave, had no wall,
+As he strode through the world like a lord in his hall;
+Though your fame hath sunk down to the night of the grave,
+It shall rise from the field like the sun from the wave.
+  Breeze fill our banners, sun gild our spears,
+  Spirito Santo, Cavaliers!
+    Blow, trumpets, blow,
+    Blow, trumpets, blow,
+      Gaily to glory we come;
+    Like a king in his pomp,
+    To the blast of the tromp,
+      And the roar of the mighty drum!
+  Breeze fill our banners, sun gild our spears,
+  Spirito Santo, Cavaliers!
+
+In this order they reached the wide waste that ruin and devastation left
+within the gates, and, marshalled in long lines on either side, extending
+far down the vistaed streets, and leaving a broad space in the centre,
+awaited the order of their leader.
+
+"Throw open the gates, and admit the foe!" cried Rienzi, with a loud voice;
+as the trumpets of the Barons, announced their approach.
+
+Meanwhile the insurgent Patricians, who had marched that morning from a
+place called the Monument, four miles distant, came gallantly and boldly
+on.
+
+With old Stephen, whose great height, gaunt frame, and lordly air, shewed
+well in his gorgeous mail, rode his sons, - the Frangipani and the Savelli,
+and Giordano Orsini, brother to Rinaldo.
+
+"Today the tyrant shall perish!" said the proud Baron; "and the flag of the
+Colonna shall wave from the Capitol."
+
+"The flag of the Bear," said Giordano Orsini, angrily. - "The victory will
+not be yours alone, my Lord!"
+
+"Our house ever took precedence in Rome," replied the Colonna, haughtily.
+
+"Never, while one stone of the palaces of the Orsini stands upon another."
+
+"Hush!" said Luca di Savelli; "are ye dividing the skin while the lion
+lives?  We shall have fierce work today."
+
+"Not so," said the old Colonna; "John di Vico will turn, with his Romans,
+at the first onset, and some of the malcontents within have promised to
+open the gates. - How, knave?" as a scout rode up breathless to the Baron. 
+"What tidings?"
+
+"The gates are opened - not a spear gleams from the walls!"
+
+"Did I not tell ye, Lords?" said the Colonna, turning round triumphantly. 
+"Methinks we shall win Rome without a single blow. - Grandson, where now
+are thy silly forebodings?"  This was said to Pietro, one of his grandsons
+- the first-born of Gianni - a comely youth, not two weeks wedded, who made
+no reply.  "My little Pietro here," continued the Baron, speaking to his
+comrades, "is so new a bridegroom, that last night he dreamed of his bride;
+and deems it, poor lad, a portent."
+
+"She was in deep mourning, and glided from my arms, uttering, 'Woe, woe, to
+the Colonna!" said the young man, solemnly.
+
+"I have lived nearly ninety years," replied the old man, "and I may have
+dreamed, therefore, some forty thousand dreams; of which, two came true,
+and the rest were false.  Judge, then, what chances are in favour of the
+science!"
+
+Thus conversing, they approached within bow-shot of the gates, which were
+still open.  All was silent as death.  The army, which was composed chiefly
+of foreign mercenaries, halted in deliberation - when, lo! - a torch was
+suddenly cast on high over the walls; it gleamed a moment - and then hissed
+in the miry pool below.
+
+"It is the signal of our friends within, as agreed on," cried old Colonna.
+"Pietro, advance with your company!"  The young nobleman closed his visor,
+put himself at the head of the band under his command; and, with his lance
+in his rest, rode in a half gallop to the gates.  The morning had been
+clouded and overcast, and the sun, appearing only at intervals, now broke
+out in a bright stream of light - as it glittered on the waving plume and
+shining mail of the young horseman, disappearing under the gloomy arch,
+several paces in advance of his troop.  On swept his followers - forward
+went the cavalry headed by Gianni Colonna, Pietro's father. - there was a
+minute's silence, broken only by the clatter of the arms, and tramp of
+hoofs, - when from within the walls rose the abrupt cry - "Rome, the
+Tribune, and the People!  Spirito Santo, Cavaliers!"  The main body halted
+aghast.  Suddenly Gianni Colonna was seen flying backward from the gate at
+full speed.
+
+"My son, my son!" he cried, "they have murdered him;" - he halted abrupt
+and irresolute, then adding, "But I will avenge!" wheeled round, and
+spurred again through the arch, - when a huge machine of iron, shaped as a
+portcullis, suddenly descended upon the unhappy father, and crushed man and
+horse to the ground - one blent, mangled, bloody mass.
+
+The old Colonna saw, and scarce believed his eyes; and ere his troop
+recovered its stupor, the machine rose, and over the corpse dashed the
+Popular Armament.  Thousands upon thousands, they came on; a wild,
+clamorous, roaring stream.  They poured on all sides upon their enemies,
+who drawn up in steady discipline, and clad in complete mail, received and
+broke their charge.
+
+"Revenge, and the Colonna!" - "The Bear and the Orsini!" - "Charity and the
+Frangipani!"  (Who had taken their motto from some fabled ancestor who had
+broke bread with a beggar in a time of famine.)  "Strike for the Snake (The
+Lion was, however, the animal usually arrogated by the heraldic vanity of
+the Savelli.) and the Savelli!" were then heard on high, mingled with the
+German and hoarse shout, "Full purses, and the Three Kings of Cologne." 
+The Romans, rather ferocious than disciplined, fell butchered in crowds
+round the ranks of the mercenaries:  but as one fell, another succeeded;
+and still burst with undiminished fervour the countercry of "Rome, the
+Tribune, and the People! - Spirito Santo, Cavaliers!"  Exposed to every
+shaft and every sword by his emblematic diadem and his imperial robe, the
+fierce Rienzi led on each assault, wielding an enormous battle-axe, for the
+use of which the Italians were celebrated, and which he regarded as a
+national weapon.  Inspired by every darker and sterner instinct of his
+nature, his blood heated, his passions aroused, fighting as a citizen for
+liberty, as a monarch for his crown, his daring seemed to the astonished
+foe as that of one frantic; his preservation that of one inspired:  now
+here, now there; wherever flagged his own, or failed the opposing, force,
+glittered his white robe, and rose his bloody battle-axe; but his fury
+seemed rather directed against the chiefs than the herd; and still where
+his charger wheeled was heard his voice, "Where is a Colonna?" - "Defiance
+to the Orsini!" - "Spirito Santo, Cavaliers!"  Three times was the sally
+led from the gate; three times were the Romans beaten back; and on the
+third, the gonfalon, borne before the Tribune, was cloven to the ground. 
+Then, for the first time, he seemed amazed and alarmed, and, raising his
+eyes to heaven, he exclaimed, "O Lord, hast thou then forsaken me?"  With
+that, taking heart, once more he waved his arm, and again led forward his
+wild array.
+
+At eve the battle ceased.  Of the Barons who had been the main object of
+the Tribune's assault, the pride and boast was broken.  Of the princely
+line of the Colonna, three lay dead.  Giordano Orsini was mortally wounded;
+the fierce Rinaldo had not shared the conflict.  Of the Frangipani, the
+haughtiest signors were no more; and Luca, the dastard head of the Savelli,
+had long since saved himself by flight.  On the other hand, the slaughter
+of the citizens had been prodigious; - the ground was swamped with blood -
+and over heaps of slain, (steeds and riders,) the twilight star beheld
+Rienzi and the Romans returning victors from the pursuit.  Shouts of
+rejoicing followed the Tribune's panting steed through the arch; and just
+as he entered the space within, crowds of those whose infirmities, sex, or
+years, had not allowed them to share the conflict, - women, and children,
+and drivelling age, mingled with the bare feet and dark robes of monks and
+friars, apprised of the victory, were prepared to hail his triumph.
+
+Rienzi reined his steed by the corpse of the boy Colonna, which lay half
+immersed in a pool of water, and close by it, removed from the arch where
+he had fallen, lay that of Gianni Colonna, - (that Gianni Colonna whose
+spear had dismissed his brother's gentle spirit.)  He glanced over the
+slain, as the melancholy Hesperus played upon the bloody pool and the gory
+corselet, with a breast heaved with many emotions; and turning, he saw the
+young Angelo, who, with some of Nina's guard, had repaired to the spot, and
+had now approached the Tribune.
+
+"Child," said Rienzi, pointing to the dead, "blessed art thou who hast no
+blood of kindred to avenge! - to him who hath, sooner or later comes the
+hour; and an awful hour it is!"
+
+The words sank deep into Angelo's heart, and in after life became words of
+fate to the speaker and the listener.
+
+Ere Rienzi had well recovered himself, and as were heard around him the
+shrieks of the widows and mothers of the slain - the groans of the dying -
+the exhortations of the friars - mingled with sounds of joy and triumph - a
+cry was raised by the women and stragglers on the battle-field without, of
+"The foe! - the foe!"
+
+"To your swords," cried the Tribune; "fall back in order; - yet they cannot
+be so bold!"
+
+The tramp of horses, the blast of a trumpet, were heard; and presently, at
+full speed, some thirty horsemen dashed through the gate.
+
+"Your bows," exclaimed the Tribune, advancing; - "yet hold - the leader is
+unarmed - it is our own banner.  By our Lady, it is our ambassador of
+Naples, the Lord Adrian di Castello!"
+
+Panting - breathless - covered with dust - Adrian halted at the pool red
+with the blood of his kindred - and their pale faces, set in death, glared
+upon him.
+
+"Too late - alas! alas! - dread fate! - unhappy Rome!"
+
+"They fell into the pit they themselves had digged," said the Tribune, in a
+firm but hollow voice. - "Noble Adrian, would thy counsels had prevented
+this!"
+
+"Away, proud man - away!" said Adrian, impatiently waving his hand, - "thou
+shouldst protect the lives of Romans, and - oh, Gianni! - Pietro! - could
+not birth, renown, and thy green years, poor boy - could not these save
+ye?"
+
+"Pardon him, my friends," said the Tribune to the crowd, - "his grief is
+natural, and he knows not all their guilt. - Back, I pray ye - leave him to
+our ministering."
+
+It might have fared ill for Adrian, but for the Tribune's brief speech. 
+And as the young Lord, dismounting, now bent over his kinsmen - the Tribune
+also surrendering his charger to his squires, approached, and, despite
+Adrian's reluctance and aversion, drew him aside, -
+
+"Young friend," said he, mournfully, "my heart bleeds for you; yet bethink
+thee, the wrath of the crowd is fresh upon them: be prudent."
+
+"Prudent!"
+
+"Hush - by my honour, these men were not worthy of your name.  Twice
+perjured - once assassins - twice rebels - listen to me!"
+
+"Tribune, I ask no other construing of what I see - they might have died
+justly, or been butchered foully.  But there is no peace between the
+executioner of my race and me."
+
+"Will you, too, be forsworn?  Thine oath! - Come, come, I hear not these
+words.  Be composed - retire - and if, three days hence, you impute any
+other blame to me than that of unwise lenity, I absolve you from your oath,
+and you are free to be my foe.  The crowd gape and gaze upon us - a minute
+more, and I may not avail to save you."
+
+The feelings of the young patrician were such as utterly baffle
+description.  He had never been much amongst his house, nor ever received
+more than common courtesy at their hands.  But lineage is lineage still! 
+And there, in the fatal hazard of war, lay the tree and sapling, the prime
+and hope of his race.  He felt there was no answer to the Tribune, the very
+place of their death proved they had fallen in an assault upon their
+countrymen.  He sympathised not with their cause, but their fate.  And
+rage, revenge alike forbidden - his heart was the more softened to the
+shock and paralysis of grief.  He did not therefore speak, but continued to
+gaze upon the dead, while large and unheeded tears flowed down his cheeks,
+and his attitude of dejection and sorrow was so moving, that the crowd, at
+first indignant, now felt for his affliction.  At length his mind seemed
+made up.  He turned to Rienzi, and said, falteringly, "Tribune, I blame you
+not, nor accuse.  If you have been rash in this, God will have blood for
+blood.  I wage no war with you - you say right, my oath prevents me; and if
+you govern well, I can still remember that I am Roman.  But - but - look to
+that bleeding clay - we meet no more! - your sister - God be with her! -
+between her and me flows a dark gulf!"  The young noble paused some
+moments, choked by his emotions, and then continued, "These papers
+discharge me of my mission.  Standard-bearers, lay down the banner of the
+Republic.  Tribune, speak not - I would be calm - calm.  And so farewell to
+Rome."  With a hurried glance towards the dead, he sprung upon his steed,
+and, followed by his train, vanished through the arch.
+
+The Tribune had not attempted to detain him - had not interrupted him.  He
+felt that the young noble had thought - acted as became him best.  He
+followed him with his eyes.
+
+"And thus," said he gloomily, "Fate plucks from me my noblest friend and my
+justest counsellor - better man Rome never lost!"
+
+Such is the eternal doom of disordered states.  The mediator between rank
+and rank, - the kindly noble - the dispassionate patriot - the first to act
+- the most hailed in action - darkly vanishes from the scene.  Fiercer and
+more unscrupulous spirits alone stalk the field; and no neutral and
+harmonizing link remains between hate and hate, - until exhaustion, sick
+with horrors, succeeds to frenzy, and despotism is welcomed as repose!
+
+
+Chapter 5.IV.  The Hollowness of the Base.
+
+The rapid and busy march of state events has led us long away from the
+sister of the Tribune and the betrothed of Adrian.  And the sweet thoughts
+and gentle day-dreams of that fair and enamoured girl, however full to her
+of an interest beyond all the storms and perils of ambition, are not so
+readily adapted to narration: - their soft monotony a few words can paint. 
+They knew but one image, they tended to but one prospect.  Shrinking from
+the glare of her brother's court, and eclipsed, when she forced herself to
+appear, by the more matured and dazzling beauty, and all-commanding
+presence, of Nina, - to her the pomp and crowd seemed an unreal pageant,
+from which she retired to the truth of life, - the hopes and musings of her
+own heart.  Poor girl! with all the soft and tender nature of her dead
+brother, and none of the stern genius and the prodigal ambition, - the eye-
+fatiguing ostentation and fervour of the living - she was but ill-fitted
+for the unquiet but splendid region to which she was thus suddenly
+transferred.
+
+With all her affection for Rienzi, she could not conquer a certain fear
+which, conjoined with the difference of sex and age, forbade her to be
+communicative with him upon the subject most upon her heart.
+
+As the absence of Adrian at the Neapolitan Court passed the anticipated
+date, (for at no Court then, with a throne fiercely disputed, did the
+Tribune require a nobler or more intelligent representative, - and
+intrigues and counter-intrigues delayed his departure from week to week),
+she grew uneasy and alarmed.  Like many, themselves unseen, inactive, the
+spectators of the scene, she saw involuntarily further into the time than
+the deeper intellect either of the Tribune or Nina; and the dangerous
+discontent of the nobles was visible and audible to her in looks and
+whispers, which reached not acuter or more suspected ears and eyes. 
+Anxiously, restlessly, did she long for the return of Adrian, not from
+selfish motives alone, but from well-founded apprehensions for her brother. 
+With Adrian di Castello, alike a noble and a patriot, each party had found
+a mediator, and his presence grew daily more needed, till at length the
+conspiracy of the Barons had broken out.  From that hour she scarcely dared
+to hope; her calm sense, unblinded by the high-wrought genius which, as too
+often happens, made the Tribune see harsh realities through a false and
+brilliant light, perceived that the Rubicon was passed; and through all the
+events that followed she could behold but two images - danger to her
+brother, separation from her betrothed.
+
+With Nina alone could her full heart confer; for Nina, with all the
+differences of character, was a woman who loved.  And this united them.  In
+the earlier power of Rienzi, many of their happiest hours had been passed
+together, remote from the gaudy crowd, alone and unrestrained, in the
+summer nights, on the moonlit balconies, in that interchange of thought,
+sympathy, and consolation, which to two impassioned and guileless women
+makes the most interesting occupation and the most effectual solace.  But
+of late, this intercourse had been much marred.  From the morning in which
+the Barons had received their pardon, to that on which they had marched on
+Rome, had been one succession of fierce excitements.  Every face Irene saw
+was clouded and overcast - all gaiety was suspended - bustling and anxious
+councillors, or armed soldiers, had for days been the only visitors of the
+palace.  Rienzi had been seen but for short moments:  his brow wrapt in
+care.  Nina had been more fond, more caressing than ever, but in those
+caresses there seemed a mournful and ominous compassion.  The attempts at
+comfort and hope were succeeded by a sickly smile and broken words; and
+Irene was prepared, by the presentiments of her own heart, for the stroke
+that fell - victory was to her brother - his foe was crushed - Rome was
+free - but the lofty house of the Colonnas had lost its stateliest props,
+and Adrian was gone for ever! - She did not blame him; she could not blame
+her brother; each had acted as became his several station.  She was the
+poor sacrifice of events and fate - the Iphigenia to the Winds which were
+to bear the bark of Rome to the haven, or, it might be, to whelm it in the
+abyss.  She was stunned by the blow; she did not even weep or complain; she
+bowed to the storm that swept over her, and it passed.  For two days she
+neither took food nor rest; she shut herself up; she asked only the boon of
+solitude:  but on the third morning she recovered as by a miracle, for on
+the third morning, the following letter was left at the palace: -
+
+"Irene, - Ere this you have learned my deep cause of grief; you feel that
+to a Colonna Rome can no longer be a home, nor Rome's Tribune be a brother.
+While I write these words honour but feebly supports me:  all the hopes I
+had formed, all the prospects I had pictured, all the love I bore and bear
+thee, rush upon my heart, and I can only feel that I am wretched.  Irene,
+Irene, your sweet face rises before me, and in those beloved eyes I read
+that I am forgiven, - I am understood; and dearly as I know thou lovest me,
+thou wouldst rather I were lost to thee, rather I were in the grave with my
+kinsmen, than know I lived the reproach of my order, the recreant of my
+name.  Ah! why was I a Colonna? why did Fortune make me noble, and nature
+and circumstance attach me to the people?  I am barred alike from love and
+from revenge; all my revenge falls upon thee and me.  Adored! we are
+perhaps separated for ever; but, by all the happiness I have known by thy
+side - by all the rapture of which I dreamed - by that delicious hour which
+first gave thee to my gaze, when I watched the soft soul returning to thine
+eyes and lip - by thy first blushing confession of love - by our first kiss
+- by our last farewell - I swear to be faithful to thee to the last.  None
+other shall ever chase thine image from my heart.  And now, when Hope seems
+over, Faith becomes doubly sacred; and thou, my beautiful, wilt thou not
+remember me? wilt thou not feel as if we were the betrothed of Heaven?  In
+the legends of the North we are told of the knight who, returning from the
+Holy Land, found his mistress (believing his death) the bride of Heaven,
+and he built a hermitage by the convent where she dwelt; and, though they
+never saw each other more, their souls were faithful unto death.  Even so,
+Irene, be we to each other - dead to all else - betrothed in memory - to be
+wedded above!  And yet, yet ere I close, one hope dawns upon me.  Thy
+brother's career, bright and lofty, may be but as a falling star; should
+darkness swallow it, should his power cease, should his throne be broken,
+and Rome know no more her Tribune; shouldst thou no longer have a brother
+in the judge and destroyer of my house; shouldst thou be stricken from pomp
+and state; shouldst thou be friendless, kindredless, alone - then, without
+a stain on mine honour, without the shame and odium of receiving power and
+happiness from hands yet red with the blood of my race, I may claim thee as
+my own.  Honour ceases to command when thou ceasest to be great.  I dare
+not too fondly indulge this dream, perchance it is a sin in both.  But it
+must be whispered, that thou mayest know all thy Adrian, all his weakness
+and his strength.  My own loved, my ever loved, loved more fondly now when
+loved despairingly, farewell!  May angels heal thy sorrow, and guard me
+from sin, that hereafter at least we may meet again!"
+
+"He loves me - he loves me still!" said the maiden, weeping at last; "and I
+am blest once more!"
+
+With that letter pressed to her heart she recovered outwardly from the
+depth of her affliction; she met her brother with a smile, and Nina with
+embraces; and if still she pined and sorrowed, it was in that "concealment"
+which is the "worm i' the bud."
+
+Meanwhile, after the first flush of victory, lamentation succeeded to joy
+in Rome; so great had been the slaughter that the private grief was large
+enough to swallow up all public triumph; and many of the mourners blamed
+even their defender for the swords of the assailant, "Roma fu terribilmente
+vedovata."  ("Rome was terribly widowed.")  The numerous funerals deeply
+affected the Tribune; and, in proportion to his sympathy with his people,
+grew his stern indignation against the Barons.  Like all men whose religion
+is intense, passionate, and zealous, the Tribune had little toleration for
+those crimes which went to the root of religion.  Perjury was to him the
+most base and inexpiable of offences, and the slain Barons had been twice
+perjured:  in the bitterness of his wrath he forbade their families for
+some days to lament over their remains; and it was only in private and in
+secret that he permitted them to be interred in their ancestral vaults:  an
+excess of vengeance which sullied his laurels, but which was scarcely
+inconsistent with the stern patriotism of his character.  Impatient to
+finish what he had begun, anxious to march at once to Marino, where the
+insurgents collected their shattered force, he summoned his Council, and
+represented the certainty of victory, and its result in the complete
+restoration of peace.  But pay was due to the soldiery; they already
+murmured; the treasury was emptied, it was necessary to fill it by raising
+a new tax.
+
+Among the councillors were some whose families had suffered grievously in
+the battle - they lent a lukewarm attention to propositions of continued
+strife.  Others, among whom was Pandulfo, timid but well-meaning, aware
+that grief and terror even of their own triumph had produced reaction
+amongst the people, declared that they would not venture to propose a new
+tax.  A third party, headed by Baroncelli - a demagogue whose ambition was
+without principle - but who, by pandering to the worst passions of the
+populace, by a sturdy coarseness of nature with which they sympathised -
+and by that affectation of advancing what we now term the "movement," which
+often gives to the fiercest fool an advantage over the most prudent
+statesman, had quietly acquired a great influence with the lower ranks -
+offered a more bold opposition.  They dared even to blame the proud Tribune
+for the gorgeous extravagance they had themselves been the first to
+recommend - and half insinuated sinister and treacherous motives in his
+acquittal of the Barons from the accusation of Rodolf.  In the very
+Parliament which the Tribune had revived and remodelled for the support of
+freedom - freedom was abandoned.  His fiery eloquence met with a gloomy
+silence, and finally, the votes were against his propositions for the new
+tax and the march to Marino.  Rienzi broke up the Council in haste and
+disorder.  As he left the hall, a letter was put into his hands; he read
+it, and remained for some moments as one thunderstruck.  He then summoned
+the Captain of his Guards, and ordered a band of fifty horsemen to be
+prepared for his commands; he repaired to Nina's apartment, he found her
+alone, and stood for some moments gazing upon her so intently that she was
+awed and chilled from all attempt at speech.  At length he said, abruptly -
+
+"We must part."
+
+"Part!"
+
+"Yes, Nina - your guard is preparing; you have relations, I have friends,
+at Florence.  Florence must be your home."
+
+"Cola, - "
+
+"Look not on me thus. - in power, in state, in safety - you were my
+ornament and counsellor.  Now you but embarrass me.  And -"
+
+"Oh, Cola, speak not thus!  What hath chanced?  Be not so cold - frown not
+- turn not away!  Am I not something more to thee, than the partner of
+joyous hours - the minion of love?  Am I not thy wife, Cola - not thy
+leman?"
+
+"Too dear - too dear to me," muttered the Tribune; "with thee by my side I
+shall be but half a Roman.  Nina, the base slaves whom I myself made free
+desert me. - Now, in the very hour in which I might sweep away for ever all
+obstacles to the regeneration of Rome - now, when one conquest points the
+path to complete success - now when the land is visible, my fortune
+suddenly leaves me in the midst of the seas!  There is greater danger now
+than in the rage of the Barons - the Barons are fled; it is the People who
+are becoming traitors to Rome and to me."
+
+"And wouldst thou have me traitor also!  No, Cola; in death itself Nina
+shall be beside thee.  Life and honour are reflected but from thee, and the
+stroke that slays the substance, shall destroy the humble shadow.  I will
+not part from thee."
+
+"Nina," said the Tribune, contending with strong and convulsive emotion -
+"it may be literally of death that you speak. - Go! leave one who can no
+longer protect you or Rome!"
+
+"Never - Never."
+
+"You are resolved?"
+
+"I am."
+
+"Be it so," said the Tribune, with deep sadness in his tone.  "Arm thyself
+for the worst."
+
+"There is no worst with thee, Cola!"
+
+"Come to my arms, brave woman; thy words rebuke my weakness.  But my
+sister! - if I fall, you, Nina, will not survive - your beauty a prey to
+the most lustful heart and the strongest hand.  We will have the same tomb
+on the wrecks of Roman liberty.  But Irene is of weaker mould; poor child,
+I have robbed her of a lover, and now - "
+
+"You are right; let Irene go.  And in truth we may well disguise from her
+the real cause of her departure.  Change of scene were best for her grief;
+and under all circumstances would seem decorum to the curious.  I will see
+and prepare her."
+
+"Do so, sweetheart.  I would gladly be a moment alone with thought.  But
+remember, she must part today - our sands run low."
+
+As the door closed on Nina, the Tribune took out the letter and again read
+it deliberately.  "So the Pope's Legate left Sienna: - prayed that Republic
+to withdraw its auxiliary troops from Rome - proclaimed me a rebel and a
+heretic; - thence repaired to Marino; - now in council with the Barons. 
+Why, have my dreams belied me, then - false as the waking things that
+flatter and betray by day?  In such peril will the people forsake me and
+themselves?  Army of saints and martyrs, shades of heroes and patriots,
+have ye abandoned for ever your ancient home?  No, no, I was not raised to
+perish thus; I will defeat them yet - and leave my name a legacy to Rome; a
+warning to the oppressor - an example to the free!"
+
+
+Chapter 5.V.  The Rottenness of the Edifice.
+
+The kindly skill of Nina induced Irene to believe that it was but the
+tender consideration of her brother to change a scene embittered by her own
+thoughts, and in which the notoriety of her engagement with Adrian exposed
+her to all that could mortify and embarrass, that led to the proposition of
+her visit to Florence.  Its suddenness was ascribed to the occasion of an
+unexpected mission to Florence, (for a loan of arms and money,) which thus
+gave her a safe and honoured escort. - Passively she submitted to what she
+herself deemed a relief; and it was agreed that she should for a while be
+the guest of a relation of Nina's, who was the abbess of one of the
+wealthiest of the Florentine convents:  the idea of monastic seclusion was
+welcome to the bruised heart and wearied spirit.
+
+But though not apprised of the immediate peril of Rienzi, it was with deep
+sadness and gloomy forebodings that she returned his embrace and parting
+blessing; and when at length alone in her litter, and beyond the gates of
+Rome, she repented a departure to which the chance of danger gave the
+appearance of desertion.
+
+Meanwhile, as the declining day closed around the litter and its troop,
+more turbulent actors in the drama demand our audience.  The traders and
+artisans of Rome at that time, and especially during the popular government
+of Rienzi, held weekly meetings in each of the thirteen quarters of the
+city.  And in the most democratic of these, Cecco del Vecchio was an oracle
+and leader.  It was at that assembly, over which the smith presided, that
+the murmurs that preceded the earthquake were heard.
+
+"So," cried one of the company - Luigi, the goodly butcher, - "they say he
+wanted to put a new tax on us; and that is the reason he broke up the
+Council today, because, good men, they were honest, and had bowels for the
+people:  it is a shame and a sin that the treasury should be empty."
+
+"I told him," said the smith, "to beware how he taxed the people.  Poor men
+won't be taxed.  But as he does not follow my advice, he must take the
+consequence - the horse runs from one hand, the halter remains in the
+other."
+
+"Take your advice, Cecco!  I warrant me his stomach is too high for that
+now.  Why he is grown as proud as a pope."
+
+"For all that, he is a great man," said one of the party.  "He gave us laws
+- he rid the Campagna of robbers - filled the streets with merchants, and
+the shops with wares - defeated the boldest lords and fiercest soldiery of
+Italy - "
+
+"And now wants to tax the people! - that's all the thanks we get for
+helping him," said the grumbling Cecco.  "What would he have been without
+us? - we that make, can unmake."
+
+"But," continued the advocate, seeing that he had his supporters - "but
+then he taxes us for our own liberties."
+
+"Who strikes at them now?" asked the butcher.
+
+"Why the Barons are daily mustering new strength at Marino."
+
+"Marino is not Rome," said Luigi, the butcher.  "Let's wait till they come
+to our gates again - we know how to receive them.  Though, for the matter
+of that, I think we have had enough fighting - my two poor brothers had
+each a stab too much for them.  Why won't the Tribune, if he be a great
+man, let us have peace?  All we want now is quiet."
+
+"Ah!" said a seller of horse-harness.  "Let him make it up with the Barons. 
+They were good customers after all."
+
+"For my part," said a merry-looking fellow, who had been a gravedigger in
+bad times, and had now opened a stall of wares for the living, "I could
+forgive him all, but bathing in the holy vase of porphyry."
+
+"Ah, that was a bad job," said several, shaking their heads.
+
+"And the knighthood was but a silly show, an' it were not for the wine from
+the horse's nostrils - that had some sense in it."
+
+"My masters," said Cecco, "the folly was in not beheading the Barons when
+he had them all in the net; and so Messere Baroncelli says.  (Ah,
+Baroncelli is an honest man, and follows no half measures!")  It was a sort
+of treason to the people not to do so.  Why, but for that, we should never
+have lost so many tall fellows by the gate of San Lorenzo."
+
+"True, true, it was a shame; some say the Barons bought him."
+
+"And then," said another, "those poor Lords Colonna - boy and man - they
+were the best of the family, save the Castello.  I vow I pitied them."
+
+"But to the point," said one of the crowd, the richest of the set; "the tax
+is the thing. - The ingratitude to tax us. - Let him dare to do it!"
+
+"Oh, he will not dare, for I hear that the Pope's bristles are up at last;
+so he will only have us to depend upon!"
+
+The door was thrown open - a man rushed in open-mouthed -
+
+"Masters, masters, the Pope's legate has arrived at Rome, and sent for the
+Tribune, who has just left his presence."
+
+Ere his auditors had recovered their surprise, the sound of trumpets made
+them rush forth; they saw Rienzi sweep by with his usual cavalcade, and in
+his proud array.  The twilight was advancing, and torch-bearers preceded
+his way.  Upon his countenance was deep calm but it was not the calm of
+contentment.  He passed on, and the street was again desolate.  Meanwhile
+Rienzi reached the Capitol in silence, and mounted to the apartments of the
+palace, where Nina, pale and breathless, awaited his return.
+
+"Well, well, thou smilest!  No - it is that dread smile, worse than frowns.
+Speak, beloved, speak!  What said the Cardinal?"
+
+"Little thou wilt love to hear.  He spoke at first high and solemnly, about
+the crime of declaring the Romans free; next about the treason of asserting
+that the election of the King of Rome was in the hands of the Romans."
+
+"Well - thy answer."
+
+"That which became Rome's Tribune:  I re-asserted each right, and proved
+it.  The Cardinal passed to other charges."
+
+"What?"
+
+"The blood of the Barons by San Lorenzo - blood only shed in our own
+defence against perjured assailants; this is in reality the main crime. 
+The Colonna have the Pope's ear.  Furthermore, the sacrilege - yes, the
+sacrilege (come laugh, Nina, laugh!) of bathing in a vase of porphyry used
+by Constantine while yet a heathen."
+
+"Can it be!  What saidst thou?"
+
+"I laughed.  'Cardinal,' quoth I, 'what was not too good for a heathen is
+not too good for a Christian Catholic!'  And verily the sour Frenchman
+looked as if I had smote him on the hip.  When he had done, I asked him, in
+my turn, 'Is it alleged against me that I have wronged one man in my
+judgment-court?" - Silence.  'Is it said that I have broken one law of the
+state?' - Silence.  'Is it even whispered that trade does not flourish -
+that life is not safe - that abroad or at home the Roman name is not
+honoured, to that point which no former rule can parallel?' - Silence. 
+'Then,' said I, 'Lord Cardinal, I demand thy thanks, not thy censure.'  The
+Frenchman looked, and looked, and trembled, and shrunk, and then out he
+spake.  'I have but one mission to fulfil, on the part of the Pontiff -
+resign at once thy Tribuneship, or the Church inflicts upon thee its solemn
+curse.'"
+
+"How - how?" said Nina, turning very pale; "what is it that awaits thee?"
+
+"Excommunication!"
+
+This awful sentence, by which the spiritual arm had so often stricken down
+the fiercest foe, came to Nina's ear as a knell.  She covered her face with
+her hands.  Rienzi paced the room with rapid strides.  "The curse!" he
+muttered; "the Church's curse - for me - for ME!"
+
+"Oh, Cola! didst thou not seek to pacify this stern - "
+
+"Pacify!  Death and dishonour!  Pacify!  'Cardinal,' I said, and I felt his
+soul shrivel at my gaze, 'my power I received from the people - to the
+people alone I render it.  For my soul, man's word cannot scathe it.  Thou,
+haughty priest, thou thyself art the accursed, if, puppet and tool of low
+cabals and exiled tyrants, thou breathest but a breath in the name of the
+Lord of Justice, for the cause of the oppressor, and against the rights of
+the oppressed.'  With that I left him, and now - "
+
+"Ay, now - now what will happen?  Excommunication!  In the metropolis of
+the Church, too - the superstition of the people!  Oh, Cola!"
+
+"If," muttered Rienzi, "my conscience condemned me of one crime - if I had
+stained my hands in one just man's blood - if I had broken one law I myself
+had framed - if I had taken bribes, or wronged the poor, or scorned the
+orphan, or shut my heart to the widow - then, then - but no!  Lord, thou
+wilt not desert me!"
+
+"But man may!" thought Nina mournfully, as she perceived that one of
+Rienzi's dark fits of fanatical and mystical revery was growing over him -
+fits which he suffered no living eye, not even Nina's, to witness when they
+gathered to their height.  And now, indeed, after a short interval of
+muttered soliloquy, in which his face worked so that the veins on his
+temples swelled like cords, he abruptly left the room, and sought the
+private oratory connected with his closet.  Over the emotions there
+indulged let us draw the veil.  Who shall describe those awful and
+mysterious moments, when man, with all his fiery passions, turbulent
+thoughts, wild hopes, and despondent fears, demands the solitary audience
+of his Maker?
+
+It was long after this conference with Nina, and the midnight bell had long
+tolled, when Rienzi stood alone, upon one of the balconies of the palace,
+to cool, in the starry air, the fever that yet lingered on his exhausted
+frame.  The night was exceedingly calm, the air clear, but chill, for it
+was now December.  He gazed intently upon those solemn orbs to which our
+wild credulity has referred the prophecies of our doom.
+
+"Vain science!" thought the Tribune, "and gloomy fantasy, that man's fate
+is pre-ordained - irrevocable - unchangeable, from the moment of his birth! 
+Yet, were the dream not baseless, fain would I know which of yon stately
+lights is my natal star, - which images - which reflects - my career in
+life, and the memory I shall leave in death."  As this thought crossed him,
+and his gaze was still fixed above, he saw, as if made suddenly more
+distinct than the stars around it, that rapid and fiery comet which in the
+winter of 1347 dismayed the superstitions of those who recognised in the
+stranger of the heavens the omen of disaster and of woe.  He recoiled as it
+met his eye, and muttered to himself, "Is such indeed my type! or, if the
+legendary lore speak true, and these strange fires portend nations ruined
+and rulers overthrown, does it foretell my fate?  I will think no more." 
+(Alas! if by the Romans associated with the fall of Rienzi, that comet was
+by the rest of Europe connected with the more dire calamity of the Great
+Plague that so soon afterwards ensued.)  As his eyes fell, they rested upon
+the colossal Lion of Basalt in the place below, the starlight investing its
+grey and towering form with a more ghostly whiteness; and then it was, that
+he perceived two figures in black robes lingering by the pedestal which
+supported the statue, and apparently engaged in some occupation which he
+could not guess.  A fear shot through his veins, for he had never been able
+to divest himself of the vague idea that there was some solemn and
+appointed connexion between his fate and that old Lion of Basalt.  Somewhat
+relieved, he heard his sentry challenge the intruders; and as they came
+forward to the light, he perceived that they wore the garments of monks.
+
+"Molest us not, son," said one of them to the sentry.  "By order of the
+Legate of the Holy Father we affix to this public monument of justice and
+of wrath, the bull of excommunication against a heretic and rebel.  WOE TO
+THE ACCURSED OF THE CHURCH!"
+
+
+Chapter 5.VI.  The Fall of the Temple.
+
+It was as a thunderbolt in a serene day - the reverse of the Tribune in the
+zenith of his power, in the abasement of his foe; when, with but a handful
+of brave Romans, determined to be free, he might have crushed for ever the
+antagonist power to the Roman liberties - have secured the rights of his
+country, and filled up the measure of his own renown.  Such a reverse was
+the very mockery of Fate, who bore him through disaster, to abandon him in
+the sunniest noon of his prosperity.
+
+The next morning not a soul was to be seen in the streets; the shops were
+shut - the churches closed; the city was as under an interdict.  The awful
+curse of the papal excommunication upon the chief magistrate of the
+Pontifical City, seemed to freeze up all the arteries of life.  The Legate
+himself, affecting fear of his life, had fled to Monte Fiascone, where he
+was joined by the Barons immediately after the publication of the edict. 
+The curse worked best in the absence of the execrator.
+
+Towards evening a few persons might be seen traversing the broad space of
+the Capitol, crossing themselves, as the bull, placarded on the Lion, met
+their eyes, and disappearing within the doors of the great palace.  By and
+by, a few anxious groups collected in the streets, but they soon dispersed.
+It was a paralysis of all intercourse and commune.  That spiritual and
+unarmed authority, which, like the invisible hand of God, desolated the
+market-place, and humbled the crowned head, no physical force could rally
+against or resist.  Yet, through the universal awe, one conviction touched
+the multitude - it was for them that their Tribune was thus blasted in the
+midst of his glories!  The words of the Brand recorded against him on wall
+and column detailed his offences: - rebellion in asserting the liberties of
+Rome - heresy in purifying ecclesiastical abuses; - and, to serve for a
+miserable covert to the rest, it was sacrilege for bathing in the porphyry
+vase of Constantine!  They felt the conviction; they sighed - they
+shuddered - and, in his vast palace, save a few attached and devoted
+hearts, the Tribune was alone!
+
+The staunchest of his Tuscan soldiery were gone with Irene.  The rest of
+his force, save a few remaining guards, was the paid Roman militia,
+composed of citizens; who, long discontented by the delay of their
+stipends, now seized on the excuse of the excommunication to remain
+passive, but grumbling, in their homes.
+
+On the third day, a new incident broke upon the death-like lethargy of the
+city; a hundred and fifty mercenaries, with Pepin of Minorbino, a
+Neapolitan, half noble, half bandit, (a creature of Montreal's) at their
+head, entered the city, seized upon the fortresses of the Colonna, and sent
+a herald through the city, proclaiming in the name of the Cardinal Legate,
+the reward of ten thousand florins for the head of Cola di Rienzi.
+
+Then, swelled on high, shrill but not inspiring as of old, the great bell
+of the Capitol - the people, listless, disheartened, awed by the spiritual
+fear of the papal authority, (yet greater, in such events, since the
+removal of the see,) came unarmed to the Capitol; and there, by the Place
+of the Lion, stood the Tribune.  His squires, below the step, held his war-
+horse, his helm, and the same battle-axe which had blazed in the van of
+victorious war.
+
+Beside him were a few of his guard, his attendants, and two or three of the
+principal citizens.
+
+He stood bareheaded and erect, gazing upon the abashed and unarmed crowd
+with a look of bitter scorn, mingled with deep compassion; and, as the bell
+ceased its toll, and the throng remained hushed and listening, he thus
+spoke: -
+
+"Ye come, then, once again!  Come ye as slaves or freemen?  A handful of
+armed men are in your walls:  will ye who chased from your gates the
+haughtiest knights - the most practised battle-men of Rome, succumb now to
+one hundred and fifty hirelings and strangers?  Will ye arm for your
+Tribune?  You are silent! - be it so.  Will you arm for your own liberties
+- your own Rome?  Silent still!  By the saints that reign on the thrones of
+the heathen gods! are ye thus fallen from your birthright?  Have you no
+arms for your own defence?  Romans, hear me!  Have I wronged you? - if so,
+by your hands let me die:  and then, with knives yet reeking with my blood,
+go forward against the robber who is but the herald of your slavery; and I
+die honoured, grateful, and avenged.  You weep!  Great God! you weep!  Ay,
+and I could weep, too - that I should live to speak of liberty in vain to
+Romans - Weep! is this an hour for tears?  Weep now, and your tears shall
+ripen harvests of crime, and licence, and despotism, to come!  Romans, arm!
+follow me at once to the Place of the Colonna:  expel this ruffian - expel
+your enemy (no matter what afterwards you do to me):"  he paused; no ardour
+was kindled by his words - "or," he continued, "I abandon you to your
+fate."  There was a long, low, general murmur; at length it became shaped
+into speech, and many voices cried simultaneously:  "The Pope's bull! -
+Thou art a man accursed!"
+
+"What!" cried the Tribune; "and is it ye who forsake me, ye for whose cause
+alone man dares to hurl against me the thunders of his God?  Is it not for
+you that I am declared heretic and rebel!  What are my imputed crimes? 
+That I have made Rome and asserted Italy to be free; that I have subdued
+the proud Magnates, who were the scourge both of Pope and People.  And you
+- you upbraid me with what I have dared and done for you!  Men, with you I
+would have fought, for you I would have perished.  You forsake yourselves
+in forsaking me, and since I no longer rule over brave men, I resign my
+power to the tyrant you prefer.  Seven months I have ruled over you,
+prosperous in commerce, stainless in justice - victorious in the field: - I
+have shown you what Rome could be; and, since I abdicate the government ye
+gave me, when I am gone, strike for your own freedom!  It matters nothing
+who is the chief of a brave and great people.  Prove that Rome hath many a
+Rienzi, but of brighter fortunes."
+
+"I would he had not sought to tax us," said Cecco del Vecchio, who was the
+very personification of the vulgar feeling:  "and that he had beheaded the
+Barons!"
+
+"Ay!" cried the ex-gravedigger; "but that blessed porphyry vase!"
+
+"And why should we get our throats cut," said Luigi, the butcher, "like my
+two brothers? - Heaven rest them!"
+
+On the face of the general multitude there was a common expression of
+irresolution and shame, many wept and groaned, none (save the aforesaid
+grumblers) accused; none upbraided, but none seemed disposed to arm.  It
+was one of those listless panics, those strange fits of indifference and
+lethargy which often seize upon a people who make liberty a matter of
+impulse and caprice, to whom it has become a catchword, who have not long
+enjoyed all its rational, and sound, and practical, and blessed results;
+who have been affrayed by the storms that herald its dawn; - a people such
+as is common to the south:  such as even the north has known; such as, had
+Cromwell lived a year longer, even England might have seen; and, indeed, in
+some measure, such a reaction from popular enthusiasm to popular
+indifference England did see, when her children madly surrendered the
+fruits of a bloody war, without reserve, without foresight, to the lewd
+pensioner of Louis, and the royal murderer of Sydney.  To such prostration
+of soul, such blindness of intellect, even the noblest people will be
+subjected, when liberty, which should be the growth of ages, spreading its
+roots through the strata of a thousand customs, is raised, the exotic of an
+hour, and (like the Tree and Dryad of ancient fable) flourishes and withers
+with the single spirit that protects it.
+
+"Oh, Heaven, that I were a man!" exclaimed Angelo, who stood behind Rienzi.
+
+"Hear him, hear the boy," cried the Tribune; "out of the mouths of babes
+speaketh wisdom!  He wishes that he were a man, as ye are men, that he
+might do as ye should do.  Mark me, - I ride with these faithful few
+through the quarter of the Colonna, before the fortress of your foe.  Three
+times before that fortress shall my trumpets sound; if at the third blast
+ye come not, armed as befits ye - I say not all, but three, but two, but
+one hundred of ye - I break up my wand of office, and the world shall say
+one hundred and fifty robbers quelled the soul of Rome, and crushed her
+magistrate and her laws!"
+
+With those words he descended the stairs, and mounted his charger; the
+populace gave way in silence, and their Tribune and his slender train
+passed slowly on, and gradually vanished from the view of the increasing
+crowd.
+
+The Romans remained on the place, and after a pause, the demagogue
+Baroncelli, who saw an opening to his ambition, addressed them.  Though not
+an eloquent nor gifted man, he had the art of uttering the most popular
+commonplaces.  And he knew the weak side of his audience, in their vanity,
+indolence, and arrogant pride.
+
+"Look you, my masters," said he, leaping up to the Place of the Lion; "the
+Tribune talks bravely - he always did - but the monkey used the cat for his
+chestnuts; he wants to thrust your paws into the fire; you will not be so
+silly as to let him.  The saints bless us! but the Tribune, good man, gets
+a palace and has banquets, and bathes in a porphyry vase; the more shame on
+him! - in which San Sylvester christened the Emperor Constantine:  all this
+is worth fighting for; but you, my masters, what do you get except hard
+blows, and a stare at a holyday spectacle?  Why, if you beat these fellows,
+you will have another tax on the wine:  that will be your reward!"
+
+"Hark!" cried Cecco, "there sounds the trumpet, - a pity he wanted to tax
+us!"
+
+"True," cried Baroncelli, "there sounds the trumpet; a silver trumpet, by
+the Lord!  Next week, if you help him out of the scrape, he'll have a
+golden one.  But go - why don't you move, my friends? - 'tis but one
+hundred and fifty mercenaries.  True, they are devils to fight, clad in
+armour from top to toe; but what then? - if they do cut some four or five
+hundred throats you'll beat them at last, and the Tribune will sup the
+merrier."
+
+"There sounds the second blast," said the butcher.  "If my old mother had
+not lost two of us already, 'tis odds, but I'd strike a blow for the bold
+Tribune."
+
+"You had better put more quicksilver in you," continued Baroncelli, "or you
+will be too late.  And what a pity that will be! - If you believe the
+Tribune, he is the only man that can save Rome.  What, you, the finest
+people in the world - you, not able to save yourselves! - you, bound up
+with one man - you, not able to dictate to the Colonna and Orsini!  Why,
+who beat the Barons at San Lorenzo?  Was it not you?  Ah! you got the
+buffets, and the Tribune the moneta!  Tush, my friends, let the man go; I
+warrant there are plenty as good as he to be bought a cheaper bargain. 
+And, hark! there is the third blast; it is too late now!"
+
+As the trumpet from the distance sent forth its long and melancholy note,
+it was as the last warning of the parting genius of the place; and when
+silence swallowed up the sound, a gloom fell over the whole assembly.  They
+began to regret, to repent, when regret and repentance availed no more. 
+The buffoonery of Baroncelli became suddenly displeasing; and the orator
+had the mortification of seeing his audience disperse in all directions,
+just as he was about to inform them what great things he himself could do
+in their behalf.
+
+Meanwhile the Tribune, passing unscathed through the dangerous quarter of
+the enemy, who, dismayed at his approach, shrunk within their fortress,
+proceeded to the Castle of St. Angelo, whither Nina had already preceded
+him; and which he entered to find that proud lady with a smile for his
+safety, - without a tear for his reverse.
+
+
+Chapter 5.VII.  The Successors of an Unsuccessful Revolution - Who is to
+Blame - the Forsaken one or the Forsakers?
+
+Cheerfully broke the winter sun over the streets of Rome, as the army of
+the Barons swept along them.  The Cardinal Legate at the head; the old
+Colonna (no longer haughty and erect, but bowed, and broken-hearted at the
+loss of his sons) at his right hand; - the sleek smile of Luca Savelli -
+the black frown of Rinaldo Orsini, were seen close behind.  A long but
+barbarous array it was; made up chiefly of foreign hirelings; nor did the
+procession resemble the return of exiled citizens, but the march of
+invading foes.
+
+"My Lord Colonna," said the Cardinal Legate, a small withered man, by birth
+a Frenchman, and full of the bitterest prejudices against the Romans, who
+had in a former mission very ill received him, as was their wont with
+foreign ecclesiastics; "this Pepin, whom Montreal has deputed at your
+orders, hath done us indeed good service."
+
+The old Lord bowed, but made no answer.  His strong intellect was already
+broken, and there was dotage in his glassy eye.  The Cardinal muttered, "He
+hears me not; sorrow hath brought him to second childhood!" and looking
+back, motioned to Luca Savelli to approach.
+
+"Luca," said the Legate, "it was fortunate that the Hungarian's black
+banner detained the Provencal at Aversa.  Had he entered Rome, we might
+have found Rienzi's successor worse than the Tribune himself.  Montreal,"
+he added, with a slight emphasis and a curled lip, "is a gentleman, and a
+Frenchman.  This Pepin, who is his delegate, we must bribe, or menace to
+our will."
+
+"Assuredly," answered Savelli, "it is not a difficult task:  for Montreal
+calculated on a more stubborn contest, which he himself would have found
+leisure to close - "
+
+"As Podesta, or Prince of Rome! the modest man!  We Frenchmen have a due
+sense of our own merits; but this sudden victory surprises him as it doth
+us, Luca; and we shall wrest the prey from Pepin, ere Montreal can come to
+his help!  But Rienzi must die.  He is still, I hear, shut up in St.
+Angelo.  The Orsini shall storm him there ere the day be much older.  Today
+we possess the Capitol - annul all the rebel's laws - break up his
+ridiculous parliament, and put all the government of the city under three
+senators - Rinaldo Orsini, Colonna, and myself; you, my Lord, I trust, we
+shall fitly provide for."
+
+"Oh! I am rewarded enough by returning to my palace; and a descent on the
+Jewellers' quarter will soon build up its fortifications.  Luca Savelli is
+not an ambitious man.  He wants but to live in peace."
+
+The Cardinal smiled sourly, and took the turn towards the Capitol.
+
+In the front space the usual gapers were assembled.  "Make way! make way!
+knaves!" cried the guards, trampling on either side the crowd, who,
+accustomed to the sedate and courteous order of Rienzi's guard, fell back
+too slowly for many of them to escape severe injury from the pikes of the
+soldiers and the hoofs of the horses.  Our friend, Luigi, the butcher, was
+one of these, and the surliness of the Roman blood was past boiling heat
+when he received in his ample stomach the blunt end of a German's pike. 
+"There, Roman," said the rude mercenary, in his barbarous attempt at
+Italian, "make way for your betters; you have had enough crowds and shows
+of late, in all conscience."
+
+"Betters!" gulped out the poor butcher; "a Roman has no betters; and if I
+had not lost two brothers by San Lorenzo, I would - "
+
+"The dog is mutinous," said one of the followers of the Orsini, succeeding
+the German who had passed on, "and talks of San Lorenzo!"
+
+"Oh!" said another Orsinist, who rode abreast, "I remember him of old.  He
+was one of Rienzi's gang."
+
+"Was he?" said the other, sternly; "then we cannot begin salutary examples
+too soon;" and, offended at something swaggering and insolent in the
+butcher's look, the Orsinist coolly thrust him through the heart with his
+pike, and rode on over his body.
+
+"Shame!  Shame!"  "Murder!  Murder!" cried the crowd:  and they began to
+press, in the passion of the moment, round the fierce guards.
+
+The Legate heard the cry, and saw the rush:  he turned pale.  "The rascals
+rebel again!" he faltered.
+
+"No, your Eminence - no," said Luca; "but it may be as well to infuse a
+wholesome terror; they are all unarmed; let me bid the guards disperse
+them.  A word will do it."
+
+The Cardinal assented; the word was given; and, in a few minutes, the
+soldiery, who still smarted under the vindictive memory of defeat from an
+undisciplined multitude, scattered the crowd down the streets without
+scruple or mercy - riding over some, spearing others - filling the air with
+shrieks and yells, and strewing the ground with almost as many men as a few
+days before would have sufficed to have guarded Rome, and preserved the
+constitution!  Through this wild, tumultuous scene, and over the bodies of
+its victims, rode the Legate and his train, to receive in the Hall of the
+Capitol the allegiance of the citizens, and to proclaim the return of the
+oppressors.
+
+As they dismounted at the stairs, a placard in large letters struck the eye
+of the Legate.  It was placed upon the pedestal of the Lion of Basalt,
+covering the very place that had been occupied by the bull of
+excommunication.  The words were few, and ran thus:
+
+"TREMBLE!  RIENZI SHALL RETURN!"
+
+"How! what means this mummery!" cried the Legate, trembling already, and
+looking round to the nobles.
+
+"Please your Eminence," said one of the councillors, who had come from the
+Capitol to meet the Legate, "we saw it at daybreak, the ink yet moist, as
+we entered the Hall.  We deemed it best to leave it for your Eminence to
+deal with."
+
+"You deemed!  Who are you, then?"
+
+"One of the members of the Council, your Eminence, and a stanch opponent of
+the Tribune, as is well known, when he wanted the new tax - "
+
+"Council - trash!  No more councils now!  Order is restored at last.  The
+Orsini and the Colonna will look to you in future.  Resist a tax, did you? 
+Well, that was right when proposed by a tyrant; but I warn you, friend, to
+take care how you resist the tax we shall impose.  Happy if your city can
+buy its peace with the Church on any terms: - and his Holiness is short of
+the florins."
+
+The discomfited councillor shrank back.
+
+"Tear off yon insolent placard.  Nay, hold! fix over it our proclamation of
+ten thousand florins for the heretic's head!  Ten thousand? methinks that
+is too much now - we will alter the cipher.  Meanwhile Rinaldo Orsini, Lord
+Senator, march thy soldiers to St. Angelo; let us see if the heretic can
+stand a siege."
+
+"It needs not, your Eminence," said the councillor, again officiously
+bustling up; "St. Angelo is surrendered.  The Tribune, his wife, and one
+page, escaped last night, it is said, in disguise."
+
+"Ha!" said the old Colonna, whose dulled sense had at length arrived at the
+conclusion that something extraordinary arrested the progress of his
+friends.  "What is the matter?  What is that placard?  Will no one tell me
+the words?  My old eyes are dim."
+
+As he uttered the questions, in the shrill and piercing treble of age, a
+voice replied in a loud and deep tone - none knew whence it came; the crowd
+was reduced to a few stragglers, chiefly friars in cowl and serge, whose
+curiosity nought could daunt, and whose garb ensured them safety - the
+soldiers closed the rear:  a voice, I say, came, startling the colour from
+many a cheek - in answer to the Colonna, saying:
+
+"TREMBLE!  RIENZI SHALL RETURN!"
+
+
+
+BOOK VI.  THE PLAGUE.
+
+"Erano gli anni della fruttifera Incarnazione del Figliuolo di Dio al
+numero pervenuti di mille trecento quarant'otto, quando nell' egregia citta
+di Fiorenza oltre ad ogni altra Italica bellissima, pervenna la mortifera
+pestilenza." - Boccaccio, "Introduzione al Decamerone".
+
+"The years of the fructiferous incarnation of the Son of God had reached
+the number of one thousand three hundred and forty-eight, when into the
+illustrious city of Florence, beautiful beyond every other in Italy,
+entered the death-fraught pestilence." - "Introduction to the Decameron".
+
+
+Chapter 6.1.  The Retreat of the Lover.
+
+By the borders of one of the fairest lakes of Northern Italy stood the
+favourite mansion of Adrian di Castello, to which in his softer and less
+patriotic moments his imagination had often and fondly turned; and thither
+the young nobleman, dismissing his more courtly and distinguished
+companions in the Neapolitan embassy, retired after his ill-starred return
+to Rome.  Most of those thus dismissed joined the Barons; the young
+Annibaldi, whose daring and ambitious nature had attached him strongly to
+the Tribune, maintained a neutral ground; he betook himself to his castle
+in the Campagna, and did not return to Rome till the expulsion of Rienzi.
+
+The retreat of Irene's lover was one well fitted to feed his melancholy
+reveries.  Without being absolutely a fortress, it was sufficiently strong
+to resist any assault of the mountain robbers or petty tyrants in the
+vicinity; while, built by some former lord from the materials of the half-
+ruined villas of the ancient Romans, its marbled columns and tesselated
+pavements relieved with a wild grace the grey stone walls and massive
+towers of feudal masonry.  Rising from a green eminence gently sloping to
+the lake, the stately pile cast its shadow far and dark over the beautiful
+waters; by its side, from the high and wooded mountains on the background,
+broke a waterfall, in irregular and sinuous course - now hid by the
+foliage, now gleaming in the light, and collecting itself at last in a
+broad basin - beside which a little fountain, inscribed with half-
+obliterated letters, attested the departed elegance of the classic age -
+some memento of lord and poet whose very names were lost; thence descending
+through mosses and lichen, and odorous herbs, a brief, sheeted stream bore
+its surplus into the lake.  And there, amidst the sturdier and bolder
+foliage of the North, grew, wild and picturesque, many a tree transplanted,
+in ages back, from the sunnier East; not blighted nor stunted in that
+golden clime, which fosters almost every produce of nature as with a
+mother's care.  The place was remote and solitary.  The roads that
+conducted to it from the distant towns were tangled, intricate,
+mountainous, and beset by robbers.  A few cottages, and a small convent, a
+quarter of a league up the verdant margin, were the nearest habitations;
+and, save by some occasional pilgrim or some bewildered traveller, the
+loneliness of the mansion was rarely invaded.  It was precisely the spot
+which proffered rest to a man weary of the world, and indulged the memories
+which grow in rank luxuriance over the wrecks of passion.  And he whose
+mind, at once gentle and self-dependent, can endure solitude, might have
+ransacked all earth for a more fair and undisturbed retreat.
+
+But not to such a solitude had the earlier dreams of Adrian dedicated the
+place.  Here had he thought - should one bright being have presided - here
+should love have found its haven:  and hither, when love at length admitted
+of intrusion, hither might wealth and congenial culture have invited all
+the gentler and better spirits which had begun to move over the troubled
+face of Italy, promising a second and younger empire of poesy, and lore,
+and art.  To the graceful and romantic but somewhat pensive and inert,
+temperament of the young noble, more adapted to calm and civilized than
+stormy and barbarous times, ambition proffered no reward so grateful as
+lettered leisure and intellectual repose.  His youth coloured by the
+influence of Petrarch, his manhood had dreamed of a happier Vaucluse not
+untenanted by a Laura.  The visions which had connected the scene with the
+image of Irene made the place still haunted by her shade; and time and
+absence only ministering to his impassioned meditations, deepened his
+melancholy and increased his love.
+
+In this lone retreat - which even in describing from memory, for these eyes
+have seen, these feet have trodden, this heart yet yearneth for, the spot -
+which even, I say, in thus describing, seems to me (and haply also to the
+gentle reader) a grateful and welcome transit from the storms of action and
+the vicissitudes of ambition, so long engrossing the narrative; - in this
+lone retreat Adrian passed the winter, which visits with so mild a change
+that intoxicating clime.  The roar of the world without was borne but in
+faint and indistinct murmurings to his ear.  He learned only imperfectly,
+and with many contradictions, the news which broke like a thunderbolt over
+Italy, that the singular and aspiring man - himself a revolution - who had
+excited the interest of all Europe, the brightest hopes of the
+enthusiastic, the profusest adulation of the great, the deepest terror of
+the despot, the wildest aspirations of all free spirits, had been suddenly
+stricken from his state, his name branded and his head proscribed.  This
+event, which happened at the end of December, reached Adrian, through a
+wandering pilgrim, at the commencement of March, somewhat more than two
+months after the date; the March of that awful year 1348, which saw Europe,
+and Italy especially, desolated by the direst pestilence which history has
+recorded, accursed alike by the numbers and the celebrity of its victims,
+and yet strangely connected with some not unpleasing images by the grace of
+Boccaccio and the eloquence of Petrarch.
+
+The pilgrim who informed Adrian of the revolution at Rome was unable to
+give him any clue to the present fate of Rienzi or his family.  It was only
+known that the Tribune and his wife had escaped, none knew whither; many
+guessed that they were already dead, victims to the numerous robbers who
+immediately on the fall of the Tribune settled back to their former habits,
+sparing neither age nor sex, wealth nor poverty.  As all relating to the
+ex-Tribune was matter of eager interest, the pilgrim had also learned that,
+previous to the fall of Rienzi, his sister had left Rome, but it was not
+known to what place she had been conveyed.
+
+The news utterly roused Adrian from his dreaming life.  Irene was then in
+the condition his letter dared to picture - severed from her brother,
+fallen from her rank, desolate and friendless.  "Now," said the generous
+and high-hearted lover, "she may be mine without a disgrace to my name. 
+Whatever Rienzi's faults, she is not implicated in them.  Her hands are not
+red with my kinsman's blood; nor can men say that Adrian di Castello allies
+himself with a House whose power is built upon the ruins of the Colonnas. 
+The Colonna are restored - again triumphant - Rienzi is nothing - distress
+and misfortune unite me at once to her on whom they fall!"
+
+But how were these romantic resolutions to be executed - Irene's dwelling-
+place unknown?  He resolved himself to repair to Rome and make the
+necessary inquiries:  accordingly he summoned his retainers: - blithe
+tidings to them, those of travel!  The mail left the armoury - the banner
+the hall - and after two days of animated bustle, the fountain by which
+Adrian had passed so many hours of revery was haunted only by the birds of
+the returning spring; and the nightly lamp no longer cast its solitary ray
+from his turret chamber over the bosom of the deserted lake.
+
+
+Chapter 6.II.  The Seeker.
+
+It was a bright, oppressive, sultry morning, when a solitary horseman was
+seen winding that unequalled road, from whose height, amidst figtrees,
+vines, and olives, the traveller beholds gradually break upon his gaze the
+enchanting valley of the Arno, and the spires and domes of Florence.  But
+not with the traveller's customary eye of admiration and delight passed
+that solitary horseman, and not upon the usual activity, and mirth, and
+animation of the Tuscan life, broke that noon-day sun.  All was silent,
+void, and hushed; and even in the light of heaven there seemed a sicklied
+and ghastly glare.  The cottages by the road-side were some shut up and
+closed, some open, but seemingly inmateless.  The plough stood still, the
+distaff plied not:  horse and man had a dreary holiday.  There was a darker
+curse upon the land than the curse of Cain!  Now and then a single figure,
+usually clad in the gloomy robe of a friar, crossed the road, lifting
+towards the traveller a livid and amazed stare, and then hurried on, and
+vanished beneath some roof, whence issued a faint and dying moan, which but
+for the exceeding stillness around could scarcely have pierced the
+threshold.  As the traveller neared the city, the scene became less
+solitary, yet more dread.  There might be seen carts and litters, thick
+awnings wrapped closely round them, containing those who sought safety in
+flight, forgetful that the Plague was everywhere!  And while these gloomy
+vehicles, conducted by horses, gaunt, shadowy skeletons, crawling heavily
+along, passed by, like hearses of the dead, sometimes a cry burst the
+silence in which they moved, and the traveller's steed started aside, as
+some wretch, on whom the disease had broke forth, was dropped from the
+vehicle by the selfish inhumanity of his comrades, and left to perish by
+the way.  Hard by the gate a waggon paused, and a man with a mask threw out
+its contents in a green slimy ditch that bordered the road.  These were
+garments and robes of all kind and value; the broidered mantle of the
+gallant, the hood and veil of my lady, and the rags of the peasant.  While
+glancing at the labour of the masker, the cavalier beheld a herd of swine,
+gaunt and half famished, run to the spot in the hopes of food, and the
+traveller shuddered to think what food they might have anticipated!  But
+ere he reached the gate, those of the animals that had been busiest rooting
+at the infectious heap, dropped down dead amongst their fellows.  (The same
+spectacle greeted, and is recorded by, Boccaccio.)
+
+"Ho, ho," said the masker, and his hollow voice sounded yet more hollow
+through his vizard, - "comest thou here to die, stranger?  See, thy brave
+mantle of triple-pile and golden broidery will not save thee from the
+gavocciolo.  (The tumour that made the fatal symptom.)  Ride on, ride on; -
+today fit morsel for thy lady's kiss, tomorrow too foul for the rat and
+worm!"
+
+Replying not to this hideous welcome, Adrian, for it was he, pursued his
+way.  The gates stood wide open:  this was the most appalling sign of all,
+for, at first, the most jealous precaution had been taken against the
+ingress of strangers.  Now all care, all foresight, all vigilance, were
+vain.  And thrice nine warders had died at that single post, and the
+officers to appoint their successors were dead too!  Law and Police, and
+the Tribunals of Health, and the Boards of Safety, Death had stopped them
+all!  And the Plague killed art itself, social union, the harmony and
+mechanism of civilization, as if they had been bone and flesh!
+
+So, mute and solitary, went on the lover, in his quest of love, resolved to
+find and to save his betrothed, and guided (that faithful and loyal
+knight!) through the Wilderness of Horror by the blessed hope of that
+strange passion, noblest of all when noble, basest of all when base!  He
+came into a broad and spacious square lined with palaces, the usual haunt
+of the best and most graceful nobility of Italy.  The stranger was alone
+now, and the tramp of his gallant steed sounded ghastly and fearful in his
+own ears, when just as he turned the corner of one of the streets that led
+from it, he saw a woman steal forth with a child in her arms, while
+another, yet in infancy clung to her robe.  She held a large bunch of
+flowers to her nostrils, (the fancied and favourite mode to prevent
+infection), and muttered to the children, who were moaning with hunger, -
+"Yes, yes, you shall have food!  Plenty of food now for the stirring forth. 
+But oh, that stirring forth!" - and she peered about and round, lest any of
+the diseased might be near.
+
+"My friend," said he, "can you direct me to the convent of - "
+
+"Away, man, away!" shrieked the woman.
+
+"Alas!" said Adrian, with a mournful smile, "can you not see that I am not,
+as yet, one to spread contagion?"
+
+But the woman, unheeding him, fled on; when, after a few paces, she was
+arrested by the child that clung to her.
+
+"Mother, mother!" it cried, "I am sick - I cannot stir."
+
+The woman halted, tore aside the child's robe, saw under the arm the fatal
+tumour, and, deserting her own flesh, fled with a shriek along the square. 
+The shriek rang long in Adrian's ears, though not aware of the unnatural
+cause; - the mother feared not for her infant, but herself.  The voice of
+Nature was no more heeded in that charnel city than it is in the tomb
+itself!  Adrian rode on at a brisker pace, and came at length before a
+stately church; its doors were wide open, and he saw within a company of
+monks (the church had no other worshippers, and they were masked) gathered
+round the altar, and chanting the Miserere Domine; - the ministers of God,
+in a city hitherto boasting the devoutest population in Italy, without a
+flock!
+
+The young Cavalier paused before the door, and waited till the service was
+done, and the monks descended the steps into the street.
+
+"Holy fathers," said he then, "may I pray your goodness to tell me my
+nearest way to the convent Santa Maria de' Pazzi?"
+
+"Son," said one of these featureless spectres, for so they seemed in their
+shroud-like robes, and uncouth vizards, - "son, pass on your way, and God
+be with you.  Robbers or revellers may now fill the holy cloisters you
+speak of.  The abbess is dead; and many a sister sleeps with her.  And the
+nuns have fled from the contagion."
+
+Adrian half fell from his horse, and, as he still remained rooted to the
+spot, the dark procession swept on, hymning in solemn dirge through the
+desolate street the monastic chaunt -
+
+"By the Mother and the Son,
+ Death endured and mercy won:
+ Spare us, sinners though we be;
+ Miserere Domine!"
+
+Recovering from his stupor, Adrian regained the brethren, and, as they
+closed the burthen of their song, again accosted them.
+
+"Holy fathers, dismiss me not thus.  Perchance the one I seek may yet be
+heard of at the convent.  Tell me which way to shape my course."
+
+"Disturb us not, son," said the monk who spoke before.  "It is an ill omen
+for thee to break thus upon the invocations of the ministers of Heaven."
+
+"Pardon, pardon!  I will do ample penance, pay many masses; but I seek a
+dear friend - the way - the way - "
+
+"To the right, till you gain the first bridge.  Beyond the third bridge, on
+the riverside, you will find the convent," said another monk, moved by the
+earnestness of Adrian.
+
+"Bless you, holy father," faltered forth the Cavalier, and spurred his
+steed in the direction given.  The friars heeded him not, but again resumed
+their dirge.  Mingled with the sound of his horse's hoofs on the clattering
+pavement, came to the rider's ear the imploring line -
+
+"Miserere Domine!"
+
+Impatient, sick at heart, desperate, Adrian flew through the street at the
+full speed of his horse.  He passed the marketplace - it was empty as the
+desert; - the gloomy and barricadoed streets, in which the countercries of
+Guelf and Ghibeline had so often cheered on the Chivalry and Rank of
+Florence.  Now huddled together in vault and pit, lay Guelf and Ghibeline,
+knightly spurs and beggar's crutch.  To that silence the roar even of civil
+strife would have been a blessing!  The first bridge, the riverside, the
+second, the third bridge, all were gained, and Adrian at last reined his
+steed before the walls of the convent.  He fastened his steed to the porch,
+in which the door stood ajar, half torn from its hinges, traversed the
+court, gained the opposite door that admitted to the main building, came to
+the jealous grating, now no more a barrier from the profane world, and as
+he there paused a moment to recover breath and nerve, wild laughter and
+loud song, interrupted and mixed with oaths, startled his ear.  He pushed
+aside the grated door, entered, and, led by the sounds, came to the
+refectory.  In that meeting-place of the severe and mortified maids of
+heaven, he now beheld gathered round the upper table, used of yore by the
+abbess, a strange, disorderly, ruffian herd, who at first glance seemed
+indeed of all ranks, for some wore serge, or even rags, others were tricked
+out in all the bravery of satin and velvet, plume and mantle.  But a second
+glance sufficed to indicate that the companions were much of the same
+degree, and that the finery of the more showy was but the spoil rent from
+unguarded palaces or tenantless bazaars; for under plumed hats, looped with
+jewels, were grim, unwashed, unshaven faces, over which hung the long locks
+which the professed brethren of the sharp knife and hireling arm had just
+begun to assume, serving them often instead of a mask.  Amidst these savage
+revellers were many women, young and middle-aged, foul and fair, and Adrian
+piously shuddered to see amongst the loose robes and uncovered necks of the
+professional harlots the saintly habit and beaded rosary of nuns.  Flasks
+of wine, ample viands, gold and silver vessels, mostly consecrated to holy
+rites, strewed the board.  As the young Roman paused spellbound at the
+threshold, the man who acted as president of the revel, a huge, swarthy
+ruffian, with a deep scar over his face, which, traversing the whole of the
+left cheek and upper lip, gave his large features an aspect preternaturally
+hideous, called out to him -
+
+"Come in, man - come in!  Why stand you there amazed and dumb?  We are
+hospitable revellers, and give all men welcome.  Here are wine and women. 
+My Lord Bishop's wine and my Lady Abbess's women!
+
+"Sing hey, sing ho, for the royal DEATH,
+ That scatters a host with a single breath;
+ That opens the prison to spoil the palace,
+ And rids honest necks from the hangman's malice.
+  Here's a health to the Plague!  Let the mighty ones dread,
+ The poor never lived till the wealthy were dead.
+  A health to the Plague!  May She ever as now
+ Loose the rogue from his chain and the nun from her vow:
+ To the gaoler a sword, to the captive a key,
+ Hurrah for Earth's Curse - 'tis a Blessing to me!"
+
+Ere this fearful stave was concluded, Adrian, sensible that in such orgies
+there was no chance of prosecuting his inquiries, left the desecrated
+chamber and fled, scarcely drawing breath, so great was the terror that
+seized him, till he stood once more in the court amidst the hot, sickly,
+stagnant sunlight, that seemed a fit atmosphere for the scenes on which it
+fell.  He resolved, however, not to desert the place without making another
+effort at inquiry; and while he stood without the court, musing and
+doubtful, he saw a small chapel hard by, through whose long casement
+gleamed faintly, and dimmed by the noon-day, the light of tapers.  He
+turned towards its porch, entered, and saw beside the sanctuary a single
+nun kneeling in prayer.  In the narrow aisle, upon a long table, (at either
+end of which burned the tall dismal tapers whose rays had attracted him,)
+the drapery of several shrouds showed him the half-distinct outline of
+human figures hushed in death.  Adrian himself, impressed by the sadness
+and sanctity of the place, and the touching sight of that solitary and
+unselfish watcher of the dead, knelt down and intensely prayed.
+
+As he rose, somewhat relieved from the burthen at his heart, the nun rose
+also, and started to perceive him.
+
+"Unhappy man!" said she, in a voice which, low, faint, and solemn, sounded
+as a ghost's - "what fatality brings thee hither?  Seest thou not thou art
+in the presence of clay which the Plague hath touched - thou breathest the
+air which destroys!  Hence! and search throughout all the desolation for
+one spot where the Dark Visitor hath not come!"
+
+"Holy maiden," answered Adrian, "the danger you hazard does not appal me; -
+I seek one whose life is dearer than my own."
+
+"Thou needest say no more to tell me thou art newly come to Florence!  Here
+son forsakes his father, and mother deserts her child.  When life is most
+hopeless, these worms of a day cling to it as if it were the salvation of
+immortality!  But for me alone, death has no horror.  Long severed from the
+world, I have seen my sisterhood perish - the house of God desecrated - its
+altar overthrown, and I care not to survive, - the last whom the Pestilence
+leaves at once unperjured and alive."
+
+The nun paused a few moments, and then, looking earnestly at the healthful
+countenance and unbroken frame of Adrian, sighed heavily - "Stranger, why
+fly you not?" she said.  "Thou mightst as well search the crowded vaults
+and rotten corruption of the dead, as search the city for one living."
+
+"Sister, and bride of the blessed Redeemer!" returned the Roman, clasping
+his hands - "one word I implore thee.  Thou art, methinks, of the
+sisterhood of yon dismantled convent; tell me, knowest thou if Irene di
+Gabrini, (The family name of Rienzi was Gabrini.) - guest of the late
+Abbess, sister of the fallen Tribune of Rome, - be yet amongst the living?"
+
+"Art thou her brother, then?" said the nun.  "Art thou that fallen Sun of
+the Morning?"
+
+"I am her betrothed," replied Adrian, sadly.  "Speak."
+
+"Oh, flesh! flesh! how art thou victor to the last, even amidst the
+triumphs and in the lazar-house of corruption!" said the nun.  "Vain man! 
+Think not of such carnal ties; make thy peace with heaven, for thy days are
+surely numbered!"
+
+"Woman!" cried Adrian, impatiently - "talk not to me of myself, nor rail
+against ties whose holiness thou canst not know.  I ask thee again, as thou
+thyself hopest for mercy and for pardon, is Irene living?"
+
+The nun was awed by the energy of the young lover, and after a moment,
+which seemed to him an age of agonized suspense, she replied -
+
+"The maiden thou speakest of died not with the general death.  In the
+dispersion of the few remaining, she left the convent - I know not whither;
+but she had friends in Florence - their names I cannot tell thee."
+
+"Now bless thee, holy sister! bless thee!  How long since she left the
+convent?"
+
+"Four days have passed since the robber and the harlot have seized the
+house of Santa Maria," replied the nun, groaning:  "and they were quick
+successors to the sisterhood."
+
+"Four days! - and thou canst give me no clue?"
+
+"None - yet stay, young man!" - and the nun, approaching, lowered her voice
+to a hissing whisper - "Ask the Becchini."  (According to the usual custom
+of Florence, the dead were borne to their resting-place on biers, supported
+by citizens of equal rank; but a new trade was created by the plague, and
+men of the lowest dregs of the populace, bribed by immense payment,
+discharged the office of transporting the remains of the victims.  These
+were called Becchini.)
+
+Adrian started aside, crossed himself hastily, and quitted the convent
+without answer.  He returned to his horse, and rode back into the silenced
+heart of the city.  Tavern and hotel there were no more; but the palaces of
+dead princes were free to the living stranger.  He entered one - a spacious
+and splendid mansion.  In the stables he found forage still in the manger;
+but the horses, at that time in the Italian cities a proof of rank as well
+as wealth, were gone with the hands that fed them.  The highborn Knight
+assumed the office of groom, took off the heavy harness, fastened his steed
+to the rack, and as the wearied animal, unconscious of the surrounding
+horrors, fell eagerly upon its meal, its young lord turned away, and
+muttered, "Faithful servant, and sole companion! may the pestilence that
+spareth neither beast nor man, spare thee! and mayst thou bear me hence
+with a lighter heart!"
+
+A spacious hall, hung with arms and banners - a wide flight of marble
+stairs, whose walls were painted in the stiff outlines and gorgeous colours
+of the day, conducted to vast chambers, hung with velvets and cloth of
+gold, but silent as the tomb.  He threw himself upon the cushions which
+were piled in the centre of the room, for he had ridden far that morning,
+and for many days before, and he was wearied and exhausted, body and limb;
+but he could not rest.  Impatience, anxiety, hope, and fear, gnawed his
+heart and fevered his veins, and, after a brief and unsatisfactory attempt
+to sober his own thoughts, and devise some plan of search more certain than
+that which chance might afford him, he rose, and traversed the apartments,
+in the unacknowledged hope which chance alone could suggest.
+
+It was easy to see that he had made his resting-place in the home of one of
+the princes of the land; and the splendour of all around him far outshone
+the barbarous and rude magnificence of the less civilized and wealthy
+Romans.  Here, lay the lute as last touched - the gilded and illumined
+volume as last conned; there, were seats drawn familiarly together, as when
+lady and gallant had interchanged whispers last.
+
+"And such," thought Adrian, - "such desolation may soon swallow up the
+vestige of the unwelcomed guest, as of the vanished lord!"
+
+At length he entered a saloon, in which was a table still spread with wine-
+flasks, goblets of glass, and one of silver, withered flowers, half-mouldy
+fruits, and viands.  At one side the arras, folding-doors opened to a broad
+flight of stairs, that descended to a little garden at the back of the
+house, in which a fountain still played sparkling and livingly - the only
+thing, save the stranger, living there!  On the steps lay a crimson mantle,
+and by it a lady's glove.  The relics seemed to speak to the lover's heart
+of a lover's last wooing and last farewell.  He groaned aloud, and feeling
+he should have need of all his strength, filled one of the goblets from a
+half-emptied flask of Cyprus wine.  He drained the draught - it revived
+him.  "Now," he said, "once more to my task! - I will sally forth," when
+suddenly he heard heavy steps along the rooms he had quitted - they
+approached - they entered; and Adrian beheld two huge and ill-omened forms
+stalk into the chamber.  They were wrapped in black homely draperies, their
+arms were bare, and they wore large shapeless masks, which descended to the
+breast, leaving only access to sight and breath in three small and circular
+apertures.  The Colonna half drew his sword, for the forms and aspects of
+these visitors were not such as men think to look upon in safety.
+
+"Oh!" said one, "the palace has a new guest today.  Fear us not, stranger;
+there is room, - ay, and wealth enough for all men now in Florence!  Per
+Bacco! but there is still one goblet of silver left - how comes that?"  So
+saying, the man seized the cup which Adrian had just drained, and thrust it
+into his breast.  He then turned to Adrian, whose hand was still upon his
+hilt, and said, with a laugh which came choked and muffled through his
+vizard - "Oh, we cut no throats, Signor; the Invisible spares us that
+trouble.  We are honest men, state officers, and come but to see if the
+cart should halt here tonight."
+
+"Ye are then - "
+
+"Becchini!"
+
+Adrian's blood ran cold.  The Becchino continued - "And keep you this house
+while you rest at Florence, Signor?"
+
+"Yes, if the rightful lord claim it not."
+
+"Ha! ha!  'Rightful lord!'  The plague is Lord of all now!  Why, I have
+known three gallant companies tenant this palace the last week, and have
+buried them all - all!  It is a pleasant house enough, and gives good
+custom.  Are you alone?"
+
+"At present, yes."
+
+"Shew us where you sleep, that we may know where to come for you.  You
+won't want us these three days, I see."
+
+"Ye are pleasant welcomers!" said Adrian; - "but listen to me.  Can ye find
+the living as well as bury the dead?  I seek one in this city who, if you
+discover her, shall be worth to you a year of burials!"
+
+"No, no! that is out of our line.  As well look for a dropped sand on the
+beach, as for a living being amongst closed houses and yawning vaults; but
+if you will pay the poor gravediggers beforehand, I promise you, you shall
+have the first of a new charnel-house; - it will be finished just about
+your time."
+
+"There!" said Adrian, flinging the wretches a few pieces of gold - "there!
+and if you would do me a kinder service, leave me, at least while living;
+or I may save you that trouble."  And he turned from the room.
+
+The Becchino who had been spokesman followed him.  "You are generous,
+Signor, stay; you will want fresher food than these filthy fragments.  I
+will supply thee of the best, while - while thou wantest it.  And hark, -
+whom wishest thou that I should seek?"
+
+This question arrested Adrian's departure.  He detailed the name, and all
+the particulars he could suggest of Irene; and, with sickened heart,
+described the hair, features, and stature of that lovely and hallowed
+image, which might furnish a theme to the poet, and now gave a clue to the
+gravedigger.
+
+The unhallowed apparition shook his head when Adrian had concluded.  "Full
+five hundred such descriptions did I hear in the first days of the Plague,
+when there were still such things as mistress and lover; but it is a dainty
+catalogue, Signor, and it will be a pride to the poor Becchino to discover
+or even to bury so many charms!  I will do my best; meanwhile, I can
+recommend you, if in a hurry, to make the best use of your time, to many a
+pretty face and comely shape - "
+
+"Out, fiend!" muttered Adrian:  "fool to waste time with such as thou!"
+
+The laugh of the gravedigger followed his steps.
+
+All that day did Adrian wander through the city, but search and question
+were alike unavailing; all whom he encountered and interrogated seemed to
+regard him as a madman, and these were indeed of no kind likely to advance
+his object.  Wild troops of disordered, drunken revellers, processions of
+monks, or here and there, scattered individuals gliding rapidly along, and
+shunning all approach or speech, made the only haunters of the dismal
+streets, till the sun sunk, lurid and yellow, behind the hills, and
+Darkness closed around the noiseless pathway of the Pestilence.
+
+
+Chapter 6.III.  The Flowers Amidst the Tombs.
+
+Adrian found that the Becchino had taken care that famine should not
+forestall the plague; the banquet of the dead was removed, and fresh viands
+and wines of all kinds, - for there was plenty then in Florence! - spread
+the table.  He partook of the refreshment, though but sparingly, and
+shrinking from repose in beds beneath whose gorgeous hangings Death had
+been so lately busy, carefully closed door and window, wrapped himself in
+his mantle, and found his resting-place on the cushions of the chamber in
+which he had supped.  Fatigue cast him into an unquiet slumber, from which
+he was suddenly awakened by the roll of a cart below, and the jingle of
+bells.  He listened, as the cart proceeded slowly from door to door, and at
+length its sound died away in the distance. - He slept no more that night!
+
+The sun had not long risen ere he renewed his labours; and it was yet early
+when, just as he passed a church, two ladies richly dressed came from the
+porch, and seemed through their vizards to regard the young Cavalier with
+earnest attention.  The gaze arrested him also, when one of the ladies
+said, "Fair sir, you are overbold:  you wear no mask; neither do you smell
+to flowers."
+
+"Lady, I wear no mask, for I would be seen:  I search these miserable
+places for one in whose life I live."
+
+"He is young, comely, evidently noble, and the plague hath not touched him: 
+he will serve our purpose well," whispered one of the ladies to the other.
+
+"You echo my own thoughts," returned her companion; and then turning to
+Adrian, she said, "You seek one you are not wedded to, if you seek so
+fondly?"
+
+"It is true."
+
+"Young and fair, with dark hair and neck of snow; I will conduct you to
+her."
+
+"Signor!"
+
+"Follow us!"
+
+"Know you who I am, and whom I seek?"
+
+"Yes."
+
+"Can you in truth tell me aught of Irene?"
+
+"I can:  follow me."
+
+"To her?"
+
+"Yes, yes:  follow us!"
+
+The ladies moved on as if impatient of further parley.  Amazed, doubtful,
+and, as if in a dream, Adrian followed them.  Their dress, manner, and the
+pure Tuscan of the one who had addressed him, indicated them of birth and
+station; but all else was a riddle which he could not solve.
+
+They arrived at one of the bridges, where a litter and a servant on
+horseback holding a palfrey by the bridle were in attendance.  The ladies
+entered the litter, and she who had before spoken bade Adrian follow on the
+palfrey.
+
+"But tell me - " he began.
+
+"No questions, Cavalier," said she, impatiently; "follow the living in
+silence, or remain with the dead, as you list."
+
+With that the litter proceeded, and Adrian mounted the palfrey wonderingly,
+and followed his strange conductors, who moved on at a tolerably brisk
+pace.  They crossed the bridge, left the river on one side, and, soon
+ascending a gentle acclivity, the trees and flowers of the country began to
+succeed dull walls and empty streets.  After proceeding thus somewhat less
+than half an hour, they turned up a green lane remote from the road, and
+came suddenly upon the porticoes of a fair and stately palace.  Here the
+ladies descended from their litter; and Adrian, who had vainly sought to
+extract speech from the attendant, also dismounted, and following them
+across a spacious court, filled on either side with vases of flowers and
+orange-trees, and then through a wide hall in the farther side of the
+quadrangle, found himself in one of the loveliest spots eye ever saw or
+poet ever sung.  It was a garden plot of the most emerald verdure, bosquets
+of laurel and of myrtle opened on either side into vistas half overhung
+with clematis and rose, through whose arcades the prospect closed with
+statues and gushing fountains; in front, the lawn was bounded by rows of
+vases on marble pedestals filled with flowers, and broad and gradual
+flights of steps of the whitest marble led from terrace to terrace, each
+adorned with statues and fountains, half way down a high but softly sloping
+and verdant hill.  Beyond, spread in wide, various, and luxurious
+landscape, the vineyards and olive-groves, the villas and villages, of the
+Vale of Arno, intersected by the silver river, while the city, in all its
+calm, but without its horror, raised its roofs and spires to the sun. 
+Birds of every hue and song, some free, some in net-work of golden wire,
+warbled round; and upon the centre of the sward reclined four ladies
+unmasked and richly dressed, the eldest of whom seemed scarcely more than
+twenty; and five cavaliers, young and handsome, whose jewelled vests and
+golden chains attested their degree.  Wines and fruits were on a low table
+beside; and musical instruments, chess-boards, and gammon-tables, lay
+scattered all about.  So fair a group, and so graceful a scene, Adrian
+never beheld but once, and that was in the midst of the ghastly pestilence
+of Italy! - such group and such scene our closet indolence may yet revive
+in the pages of the bright Boccaccio!
+
+On seeing Adrian and his companions approach, the party rose instantly; and
+one of the ladies, who wore upon her head a wreath of laurel-leaves,
+stepping before the rest, exclaimed, "well done, my Mariana! welcome back,
+my fair subjects.  And you, sir, welcome hither."
+
+The two guides of the Colonna had by this time removed their masks; and the
+one who had accosted him, shaking her long and raven ringlets over a
+bright, laughing eye and a cheek to whose native olive now rose a slight
+blush, turned to him ere he could reply to the welcome he had received.
+
+"Signor Cavalier," said she, "you now see to what I have decoyed you.  Own
+that this is pleasanter than the sights and sounds of the city we have
+left.  You gaze on me in surprise.  See, my Queen, how speechless the
+marvel of your court has made our new gallant; I assure you he could talk
+quickly enough when he had only us to confer with:  nay, I was forced to
+impose silence on him."
+
+"Oh! then you have not yet informed him of the custom and origin of the
+court he enters!" quoth she of the laurel wreath.
+
+"No, my Queen; I thought all description given in such a spot as our poor
+Florence now is would fail of its object.  My task is done, I resign him to
+your Grace!"
+
+So saying the lady tripped lightly away, and began coquettishly sleeking
+her locks in the smooth mirror of a marble basin, whose waters trickled
+over the margin upon the grass below, ever and anon glancing archly towards
+the stranger, and sufficiently at hand to overhear all that was said.
+
+"In the first place, Signor, permit us to inquire," said the lady who bore
+the appellation of Queen, "thy name, rank, and birth-place."
+
+"Madam," returned Adrian, "I came hither little dreaming to answer
+questions respecting myself; but what it pleases you to ask, it must please
+me to reply to.  My name is Adrian di Castello, one of the Roman house of
+the Colonna."
+
+"A noble column of a noble house!" answered the Queen.  "For us, respecting
+whom your curiosity may perhaps be aroused, know that we six ladies of
+Florence, deserted by or deprived of our kin and protectors, formed the
+resolution to retire to this palace, where, if death comes, it comes
+stripped of half its horrors; and as the learned tell us that sadness
+engenders the awful malady, so you see us sworn foes to sadness.  Six
+cavaliers of our acquaintance agreed to join us.  We pass our days, whether
+many or few, in whatever diversions we can find or invent.  Music and the
+dance, merry tales and lively songs, with such slight change of scene as
+from sward to shade, from alley to fountain, fill up our time, and prepare
+us for peaceful sleep and happy dreams.  Each lady is by turns Queen of our
+fairy court, as is my lot this day.  One law forms the code of our
+constitution - that nothing sad shall be admitted.  We would live as if
+yonder city were not, and as if (added the fair Queen, with a slight sigh)
+youth, grace, and beauty, could endure for ever.  One of our knights madly
+left us for a day, promising to return; we have seen him no more; we will
+not guess what hath chanced to him.  It became necessary to fill up his
+place; we drew lots who should seek his substitute; it fell upon the ladies
+who have - not, I trust, to your displeasure - brought you hither.  Fair
+sir, my explanation is made."
+
+"Alas, lovely Queen," said Adrian, wrestling strongly, but vainly, with the
+bitter disappointment he felt - "I cannot be one of your happy circle; I am
+in myself a violation of your law.  I am filled with but one sad and
+anxious thought, to which all mirth would seem impiety.  I am a seeker
+amongst the living and the dead for one being of whose fate I am uncertain;
+and it was only by the words that fell from my fair conductor, that I have
+been decoyed hither from my mournful task.  Suffer me, gracious lady, to
+return to Florence."
+
+The Queen looked in mute vexation towards the dark-eyed Mariana, who
+returned the glance by one equally expressive, and then suddenly stepping
+up to Adrian she said, - 
+
+"But, Signor, if I should still keep my promise, if I should be able to
+satisfy thee of the health and safety of - of Irene."
+
+"Irene!" echoed Adrian in surprise, forgetful at the moment that he had
+before revealed the name of her he sought - "Irene - Irene di Gabrini,
+sister of the once renowned Rienzi!"
+
+"The same," replied Mariana, quickly; "I know her, as I told you.  Nay,
+Signor, I do not deceive thee.  It is true that I cannot bring thee to her;
+but better as it is, - she went away many days ago to one of the towns of
+Lombardy, which, they say, the Pestilence has not yet pierced.  Now, noble
+sir, is not your heart lightened? and will you so soon be a deserter from
+the Court of Loveliness; and perhaps," she added, with a soft look from her
+large dark eyes, "of Love?"
+
+"Dare I, in truth, believe you, Lady?" said Adrian, all delighted, yet
+still half doubting.
+
+"Would I deceive a true lover, as methinks you are?  Be assured.  Nay,
+Queen, receive your subject."
+
+The Queen extended her hand to Adrian, and led him to the group that still
+stood on the grass at a little distance.  They welcomed him as a brother,
+and soon forgave his abstracted courtesies, in compliment to his good mien
+and illustrious name.
+
+The Queen clapped her hands, and the party again ranged themselves on the
+sward.  Each lady beside each gallant.  "You, Mariana, if not fatigued,"
+said the Queen, "shall take the lute and silence these noisy grasshoppers,
+which chirp about us with as much pretension as if they were nightingales. 
+Sing, sweet subject, sing; and let it be the song our dear friend, Signor
+Visdomini, (I know not if this be the same Visdomini who, three years
+afterwards, with one of the Medici, conducted so gallant a reinforcement to
+Scarperia, then besieged by Visconti d'Oleggio.) made for a kind of
+inaugural anthem to such as we admitted to our court."
+
+Mariana, who had reclined herself by the side of Adrian, took up the lute,
+and, after a short prelude, sung the words thus imperfectly translated: -
+
+The Song of the Florentine Lady.
+
+Enjoy the more the smiles of noon
+  If doubtful be the morrow;
+And know the Fort of Life is soon
+  Betray'd to Death by Sorrow!
+
+Death claims us all - then, Grief, away!
+  We'll own no meaner master;
+The clouds that darken round the day
+  But bring the night the faster.
+
+Love - feast - be merry while on earth,
+  Such, Grave, should be thy moral!
+Ev'n Death himself is friends with Mirth,
+  And veils the tomb with laurel. 
+(At that time, in Italy, the laurel was frequently planted over the dead.)
+
+While gazing on the eyes I love,
+  New life to mine is given -
+If joy the lot of saints above,
+  Joy fits us best for Heaven.
+
+To this song, which was much applauded, succeeded those light and witty
+tales in which the Italian novelists furnished Voltaire and Marmontel with
+a model - each, in his or her turn, taking up the discourse, and with an
+equal dexterity avoiding every lugubrious image or mournful reflection that
+might remind those graceful idlers of the vicinity of Death.  At any other
+time the temper and accomplishments of the young Lord di Castello would
+have fitted him to enjoy and to shine in that Arcadian court.  But now he
+in vain sought to dispel the gloom from his brow, and the anxious thought
+from his heart.  He revolved the intelligence he had received, wondered,
+guessed, hoped, and dreaded still; and if for a moment his mind returned to
+the scene about him, his nature, too truly poetical for the false sentiment
+of the place, asked itself in what, save the polished exterior and the
+graceful circumstance, the mirth that he now so reluctantly witnessed
+differed from the brutal revels in the convent of Santa Maria - each alike
+in its motive, though so differing in the manner - equally callous and
+equally selfish, coining horror into enjoyment.  The fair Mariana, whose
+partner had been reft from her, as the Queen had related, was in no mind to
+lose the new one she had gained.  She pressed upon him from time to time
+the wine-flask and the fruits; and in those unmeaning courtesies her hand
+gently lingered upon his.  At length, the hour arrived when the companions
+retired to the Palace, during the fiercer heats of noon - to come forth
+again in the declining sun, to sup by the side of the fountain, to dance,
+to sing, and to make merry by torchlight and the stars till the hour of
+rest.  But Adrian, not willing to continue the entertainment, no sooner
+found himself in the apartment to which he was conducted, than he resolved
+to effect a silent escape, as under all circumstances the shortest, and not
+perhaps the least courteous, farewell left to him.  Accordingly, when all
+seemed quiet and hushed in the repose common to the inhabitants of the
+South during that hour, he left his apartment, descended the stairs, passed
+the outer court, and was already at the gate, when he heard himself called
+by a voice that spoke vexation and alarm.  He turned to behold Mariana.
+
+"Why, how now, Signor di Castello, is our company so unpleasing, is our
+music so jarring, or are our brows so wrinkled, that you should fly as the
+traveller flies from the witches he surprises at Benevento?  Nay, you
+cannot mean to leave us yet?"
+
+"Fair dame," returned the cavalier, somewhat disconcerted, "it is in vain
+that I seek to rally my mournful spirits, or to fit myself for the court to
+which nothing sad should come.  Your laws hang about me like a culprit -
+better timely flight than harsh expulsion."
+
+As he spoke he moved on, and would have passed the gate, but Mariana caught
+his arm.
+
+"Nay," said she, softly; "are there no eyes of dark light, and no neck of
+wintry snow, that can compensate to thee for the absent one?  Tarry and
+forget, as doubtless in absence even thou art forgotten!"
+
+"Lady," answered Adrian, with great gravity, not unmixed with an ill-
+suppressed disdain, "I have not sojourned long enough amidst the sights and
+sounds of woe, to blunt my heart and spirit into callousness to all around.
+Enjoy, if thou canst, and gather the rank roses of the sepulchre; but to
+me, haunted still by funeral images, Beauty fails to bring delight, and
+Love, - even holy love - seems darkened by the Shadow of Death.  Pardon me,
+and farewell."
+
+"Go, then," said the Florentine, stung and enraged at his coldness; "go and
+find your mistress amidst the associations on which it pleases your
+philosophy to dwell.  I did but deceive thee, blind fool! as I had hoped
+for thine own good, when I told thee Irene - (was that her name?) - was
+gone from Florence.  Of her I know nought, and heard nought, save from
+thee.  Go back and search the vault, and see whether thou lovest her
+still!"
+
+
+Chapter 6.IV.  We Obtain What We Seek, and Know it Not.
+
+In the fiercest heat of the day, and on foot, Adrian returned to Florence. 
+As he approached the city, all that festive and gallant scene he had
+quitted seemed to him like a dream; a vision of the gardens and bowers of
+an enchantress, from which he woke abruptly as a criminal may wake on the
+morning of his doom to see the scaffold and the deathsman; - so much did
+each silent and lonely step into the funeral city bring back his bewildered
+thoughts at once to life and to death.  The parting words of Mariana
+sounded like a knell at his heart.  And now as he passed on - the heat of
+the day, the lurid atmosphere, long fatigue, alternate exhaustion and
+excitement, combining with the sickness of disappointment, the fretting
+consciousness of precious moments irretrievably lost, and his utter despair
+of forming any systematic mode of search - fever began rapidly to burn
+through his veins.  His temples felt oppressed as with the weight of a
+mountain; his lips parched with intolerable thirst; his strength seemed
+suddenly to desert him; and it was with pain and labour that he dragged one
+languid limb after the other.
+
+"I feel it," thought he, with the loathing nausea and shivering dread with
+which nature struggles ever against death; "I feel it upon me - the
+Devouring and the Viewless - I shall perish, and without saving her; nor
+shall even one grave contain us!"
+
+But these thoughts served rapidly to augment the disease which began to
+prey upon him; and ere he reached the interior of the city, even thought
+itself forsook him.  The images of men and houses grew indistinct and
+shadowy before his eyes; the burning pavement became unsteady and reeling
+beneath his feet; delirium gathered over him, and he went on his way
+muttering broken and incoherent words; the few who met fled from him in
+dismay.  Even the monks, still continuing their solemn and sad processions,
+passed with a murmured bene vobis to the other side from that on which his
+steps swerved and faltered.  And from a booth at the corner of a street,
+four Becchini, drinking together, fixed upon him from their black masks the
+gaze that vultures fix upon some dying wanderer of the desert.  Still he
+crept on, stretching out his arms like a man in the dark, and seeking with
+the vague sense that yet struggled against the gathering delirium, to find
+out the mansion in which he had fixed his home; though many as fair to
+live, and as meet to die in, stood with open portals before and beside his
+path.
+
+"Irene, Irene!" he cried, sometimes in a muttered and low tone, sometimes
+in a wild and piercing shriek, "where art thou?  Where?  I come to snatch
+thee from them; they shall not have thee, the foul and ugly fiends!  Pah!
+how the air smells of dead flesh!  Irene, Irene! we will away to mine own
+palace and the heavenly lake - Irene!"
+
+While thus benighted, and thus exclaiming, two females suddenly emerged
+from a neighbouring house, masked and mantled.
+
+"Vain wisdom!" said the taller and slighter of the two, whose mantle, it is
+here necessary to observe, was of a deep blue, richly broidered with
+silver, of a shape and a colour not common in Florence, but usual in Rome,
+where the dress of ladies of the higher rank was singularly bright in hue
+and ample in fold - thus differing from the simpler and more slender
+draperies of the Tuscan fashion - "Vain wisdom, to fly a relentless and
+certain doom!"
+
+"Why, thou wouldst not have us hold the same home with three of the dead in
+the next chamber - strangers too to us - when Florence has so many empty
+halls?  Trust me, we shall not walk far ere we suit ourselves with a safer
+lodgment."
+
+"Hitherto, indeed, we have been miraculously preserved," sighed the other,
+whose voice and shape were those of extreme youth; "yet would that we knew
+where to fly - what mount, what wood, what cavern, held my brother and his
+faithful Nina!  I am sick with horrors!"
+
+"Irene, Irene!  Well then, if thou art at Milan or some Lombard town, why
+do I linger here?  To horse, to horse!  Oh, no! no! - not the horse with
+the bells! not the death-cart."  With a cry, a shriek, louder than the
+loudest of the sick man's, broke that young female away from her companion. 
+It seemed as if a single step took her to the side of Adrian.  She caught
+his arm - she looked in his face - she met his unconscious eyes bright with
+a fearful fire.  "It has seized him!" - (she then said in a deep but calm
+tone) - "the Plague!"
+
+"Away, away! are you mad?" cried her companion; "hence, hence, - touch me
+not now thou hast touched him - go! - here we part!"
+
+"Help me to bear him somewhere, see, he faints, he droops, he falls! - help
+me, dear Signora, for pity, for the love of God!"
+
+But, wholly possessed by the selfish fear which overcame all humanity in
+that miserable time, the elder woman, though naturally kind, pitiful, and
+benevolent, fled rapidly away, and soon vanished.  Thus left alone with
+Adrian, who had now, in the fierceness of the fever that preyed within him,
+fallen on the ground, the strength and nerve of that young girl did not
+forsake her.  She tore off the heavy mantle which encumbered her arms, and
+cast it from her; and then, lifting up the face of her lover - for who but
+Irene was that weak woman, thus shrinking not from the contagion of death?
+- she supported him on her breast, and called aloud and again for help.  At
+length the Becchini, in the booth before noticed, (hardened in their
+profession, and who, thus hardened, better than the most cautious, escaped
+the pestilence,) lazily approached - "Quicker, quicker, for Christ's love!"
+said Irene.  "I have much gold; I will reward you well:  help me to bear
+him under the nearest roof."
+
+"Leave him to us, young lady:  we have had our eye upon him," said one of
+the gravediggers.  "We'll do our duty by him, first and last."
+
+"No - no! touch not his head - that is my care.  There, I will help you;
+so, - now then, - but be gentle!"
+
+Assisted by these portentous officers, Irene, who would not release her
+hold, but seemed to watch over the beloved eyes and lips, (set and closed
+as they were,) as if to look back the soul from parting, bore Adrian into a
+neighbouring house, and laid him on a bed; from which Irene (preserving as
+only women do, in such times, the presence of mind and vigilant providence
+which make so sublime a contrast with their keen susceptibilities) caused
+them first to cast off the draperies and clothing, which might retain
+additional infection.  She then despatched them for new furniture, and for
+whatsoever leech money might yet bribe to a duty, now chiefly abandoned to
+those heroic Brotherhoods who, however vilified in modern judgment by the
+crimes of some unworthy members, were yet, in the dark times, the best, the
+bravest, and the holiest agents, to whom God ever delegated the power to
+resist the oppressor - to feed the hungry - to minister to woe; and who,
+alone, amidst that fiery Pestilence, (loosed, as it were, a demon from the
+abyss, to shiver into atoms all that binds the world to Virtue and to Law,)
+seemed to awaken, as by the sound of an angel's trumpet, to that noblest
+Chivalry of the Cross - whose faith is the scorn of self - whose hope is
+beyond the Lazar-house - whose feet, already winded for immortality,
+trample, with a conqueror's march, upon the graves of Death!
+
+While this the ministry and the office of love, - along that street in
+which Adrian and Irene had met at last - came singing, reeling, roaring,
+the dissolute and abandoned crew who had fixed their quarters in the
+Convent of Santa Maria de' Pazzi, their bravo chief at their head, and a
+nun (no longer in nun's garments) upon either arm.  "A health to the
+Plague!" shouted the ruffian:  "A health to the Plague!" echoed his frantic
+Bacchanals.
+
+"A health to the Plague, may she ever, as now,
+ Loose the rogue from his chain, and the nun from her vow;
+ To the gaoler a sword - to the captive a key,
+ Hurrah for Earth's Curse! 'tis a blessing to me."
+
+"Holla!" cried the chief, stopping; "here, Margherita; here's a brave cloak
+for thee, my girl:  silver enow on it to fill thy purse, if it ever grow
+empty; which it may, if ever the Plague grow slack."
+
+"Nay," said the girl, who, amidst all the havoc of debauch, retained much
+of youth and beauty in her form and face; nay, Guidotto; perhaps it has
+infection."
+
+"Pooh, child, silver never infects.  Clap it on, clap it on.  Besides, fate
+is fate, and when it is thine hour there will be other means besides the
+gavocciolo."
+
+So saying, he seized the mantle, threw it roughly over her shoulders, and
+dragged her on as before, half pleased with the finery, half frightened
+with the danger; while gradually died away, along the lurid air and the
+mournful streets, the chant of that most miserable mirth.
+
+
+Chapter 6.V.  The Error.
+
+For three days, the fatal three days, did Adrian remain bereft of strength
+and sense.  But he was not smitten by the scourge which his devoted and
+generous nurse had anticipated.  It was a fierce and dangerous fever,
+brought on by the great fatigue, restlessness, and terrible agitation he
+had undergone.
+
+No professional mediciner could be found to attend him; but a good friar,
+better perhaps skilled in the healing art than many who claimed its
+monopoly, visited him daily.  And in the long and frequent absences to
+which his other and numerous duties compelled the monk, there was one ever
+at hand to smooth the pillow, to wipe the brow, to listen to the moan, to
+watch the sleep.  And even in that dismal office, when, in the frenzy of
+the sufferer, her name, coupled with terms of passionate endearment, broke
+from his lips, a thrill of strange pleasure crossed the heart of the
+betrothed, which she chid as if it were a crime.  But even the most
+unearthly love is selfish in the rapture of being loved!  Words cannot
+tell, heart cannot divine, the mingled emotions that broke over her when,
+in some of these incoherent ravings, she dimly understood that for her the
+city had been sought, the death dared, the danger incurred.  And as then
+bending passionately to kiss that burning brow, her tears fell fast over
+the idol of her youth, the fountains from which they gushed were those,
+fathomless and countless, which a life could not weep away.  Not an impulse
+of the human and the woman heart that was not stirred; the adoring
+gratitude, the meek wonder thus to be loved, while deeming it so simple a
+merit thus to love; - as if all sacrifice in her were a thing of course, -
+to her, a virtue nature could not paragon, worlds could not repay!  And
+there he lay, the victim to his own fearless faith, helpless - dependent
+upon her - a thing between life and death, to thank, to serve - to be proud
+of, yet protect, to compassionate, yet revere - the saver, to be saved! 
+Never seemed one object to demand at once from a single heart so many and
+so profound emotions; the romantic enthusiasm of the girl - the fond
+idolatry of the bride - the watchful providence of the mother over her
+child.
+
+And strange to say, with all the excitement of that lonely watch, scarcely
+stirring from his side, taking food only that her strength might not fail
+her, - unable to close her eyes, - though, from the same cause, she would
+fain have taken rest, when slumber fell upon her charge - with all such
+wear and tear of frame and heart, she seemed wonderfully supported.  And
+the holy man marvelled, in each visit, to see the cheek of the nurse still
+fresh, and her eye still bright.  In her own superstition she thought and
+felt that Heaven gifted her with a preternatural power to be true to so
+sacred a charge; and in this fancy she did not wholly err: - for Heaven did
+gift her with that diviner power, when it planted in so soft a heart the
+enduring might and energy of Affection!  The friar had visited the sick man
+late on the third night, and administered to him a strong sedative.  "This
+night," said he to Irene, "will be the crisis:  should he awaken, as I
+trust he may, with a returning consciousness, and a calm pulse, he will
+live; if not, young daughter, prepare for the worst.  But should you note
+any turn in the disease, that may excite alarm, or require my attendance,
+this scroll will inform you where I am, if God spare me still, at each hour
+of the night and morning."
+
+The monk retired, and Irene resumed her watch.
+
+The sleep of Adrian was at first broken and interrupted - his features, his
+exclamations, his gestures, all evinced great agony, whether mental or
+bodily:  it seemed, as perhaps it was, a fierce and doubtful struggle
+between life and death for the conquest of the sleeper.  Patient, silent,
+breathing but by long-drawn gasps, Irene sate at the bed-head.  The lamp
+was removed to the further end of the chamber, and its ray, shaded by the
+draperies, did not suffice to give to her gaze more than the outline of the
+countenance she watched.  In that awful suspense, all the thoughts that
+hitherto had stirred her mind lay hushed and mute.  She was only sensible
+to that unutterable fear which few of us have been happy enough not to
+know.  That crushing weight under which we can scarcely breathe or move,
+the avalanche over us, freezing and suspended, which we cannot escape from,
+beneath which, every moment, we may be buried and overwhelmed.  The whole
+destiny of life was in the chances of that single night!  It was just as
+Adrian at last seemed to glide into a deeper and serener slumber, that the
+bells of the death-cart broke with their boding knell the palpable silence
+of the streets.  Now hushed, now revived, as the cart stopped for its
+gloomy passengers, and coming nearer and nearer after every pause.  At
+length she heard the heavy wheels stop under the very casement, and a voice
+deep and muffled calling aloud, "Bring out the dead!"  She rose, and with a
+noiseless step, passed to secure the door, when the dull lamp gleamed upon
+the dark and shrouded forms of the Becchini.
+
+"You have not marked the door, nor set out the body," said one gruffly;
+"but this is the third night!  He is ready for us."
+
+"Hush, he sleeps - away, quick, it is not the Plague that seized him."
+
+"Not the Plague?" growled the Becchino in a disappointed tone; "I thought
+no other illness dared encroach upon the rights of the gavocciolo!"
+
+"Go - here's money; leave us."
+
+And the grisly carrier sullenly withdrew.  The cart moved on, the bell
+renewed its summons, till slowly and faintly the dreadful larum died in the
+distance.
+
+Shading the lamp with her hand, Irene stole to the bed side, fearful that
+the sound and the intrusion had disturbed the slumberer.  But his face was
+still locked, as in a vice, with that iron sleep.  He stirred not - the
+breath scarcely passed his lips - she felt his pulse, as the wan hand lay
+on the coverlid - there was a slight beat - she was contented - removed the
+light, and, retiring to a corner of the room, placed the little cross
+suspended round her neck upon the table, and prayed, in her intense
+suffering, to Him who had known death, and who - Son of Heaven though he
+was, and Sovereign of the Seraphim - had also prayed, in his earthly
+travail, that the cup might pass away.
+
+The Morning broke, not, as in the North, slowly and through shadow, but
+with the sudden glory with which in those climates Day leaps upon earth -
+like a giant from his sleep.  A sudden smile - a burnished glow - and night
+had vanished.  Adrian still slept; not a muscle seemed to have stirred; the
+sleep was even heavier than before; the silence became a burthen upon the
+air.  Now, in that exceeding torpor so like unto death, the solitary
+watcher became alarmed and terrified.  Time passed - morning glided to noon
+- still not a sound nor motion.  The sun was midway in Heaven - the Friar
+came not.  And now again touching Adrian's pulse, she felt no flutter - she
+gazed on him, appalled and confounded; surely nought living could be so
+still and pale.  "Was it indeed sleep, might it not be - "  She turned
+away, sick and frozen; her tongue clove to her lips.  Why did the father
+tarry? - she would go to him - she would learn the worst - she could
+forbear no longer.  She glanced over the scroll the Monk had left her: 
+"From sunrise," it said, "I shall be at the Convent of the Dominicans. 
+Death has stricken many of the brethren."  The Convent was at some
+distance, but she knew the spot, and fear would wing her steps.  She gave
+one wistful look at the sleeper and rushed from the house.  "I shall see
+thee again presently," she murmured.  Alas! what hope can calculate beyond
+the moment?  And who shall claim the tenure of 'The Again?'
+
+It was not many minutes after Irene had left the room, ere, with a long
+sigh, Adrian opened his eyes - an altered and another man; the fever was
+gone, the reviving pulse beat low indeed, but calm.  His mind was once more
+master of his body, and, though weak and feeble, the danger was past, and
+life and intellect regained.
+
+"I have slept long," he muttered; "and oh, such dreams!  And methought I
+saw Irene, but could not speak to her, and while I attempted to grasp her,
+her face changed, her form dilated, and I was in the clutch of the foul
+gravedigger.  It is late - the sun is high - I must be up and stirring. 
+Irene is in Lombardy.  No, no; that was a lie, a wicked lie; she is at
+Florence, I must renew my search."
+
+As this duty came to his remembrance, he rose from the bed - he was amazed
+at his own debility:  at first he could not stand without support from the
+wall; by degrees, however, he so far regained the mastery of his limbs as
+to walk, though with effort and pain.  A ravening hunger preyed upon him,
+he found some scanty and light food in the chamber, which he devoured
+eagerly.  And with scarce less eagerness laved his enfeebled form and
+haggard face with the water that stood at hand.  He now felt refreshed and
+invigorated, and began to indue his garments, which he found thrown on a
+heap beside the bed.  He gazed with surprise and a kind of self-compassion
+upon his emaciated hands and shrunken limbs, and began now to comprehend
+that he must have had some severe but unconscious illness.  "Alone, too,"
+thought he; "no one near to tend me!  Nature my only nurse!  But alas!
+alas! how long a time may thus have been wasted, and my adored Irene -
+quick, quick, not a moment more will I lose."
+
+He soon found himself in the open street; the air revived him; and that
+morning had sprung up the blessed breeze, the first known for weeks.  He
+wandered on very slowly and feebly till he came to a broad square, from
+which, in the vista, might be seen one of the principal gates of Florence,
+and the fig-trees and olive-groves beyond, it was then that a Pilgrim of
+tall stature approached towards him as from the gate; his hood was thrown
+back, and gave to view a countenance of great but sad command; a face, in
+whose high features, massive brow, and proud, unshrinking gaze, shaded by
+an expression of melancholy more stern than soft, Nature seemed to have
+written majesty, and Fate disaster.  As in that silent and dreary place,
+these two, the only tenants of the street, now encountered, Adrian stopped
+abruptly, and said in a startled and doubting voice:  "Do I dream still, or
+do I behold Rienzi?"
+
+The Pilgrim paused also, as he heard the name, and gazing long on the
+attenuated features of the young lord, said:  I am he that was Rienzi! and
+you, pale shadow, is it in this grave of Italy that I meet with the gay and
+high Colonna?  Alas, young friend," he added, in a more relaxed and kindly
+voice, "hath the Plague not spared the flower of the Roman nobles?  Come,
+I, the cruel and the harsh Tribune, I will be thy nurse:  he who might have
+been my brother, shall yet claim from me a brother's care."
+
+With these words he wound his arm tenderly round Adrian; and the young
+noble, touched by his compassion, and agitated by the surprise, leaned upon
+Rienzi's breast in silence.
+
+"Poor youth," resumed the Tribune, for so, since rather fallen than
+deposed, he may yet be called; "I ever loved the young, (my brother died
+young;) and you more than most.  What fatality brought thee hither?"
+
+"Irene!" replied Adrian, falteringly.
+
+"Is it so, really?  Art thou a Colonna, and yet prize the fallen?  The same
+duty has brought me also to the city of Death.  From the furthest south -
+over the mountains of the robber - through the fastnesses of my foes -
+through towns in which the herald proclaimed in my ear the price of my head
+- I have passed hither, on foot and alone, safe under the wings of the
+Almighty One.  Young man, thou shouldst have left this task to one who
+bears a wizard's life, and whom Heaven and Earth yet reserve for an
+appointed end!"
+
+The Tribune said this in a deep and inward voice; and in his raised eye and
+solemn brow might be seen how much his reverses had deepened his
+fanaticism, and added even to the sanguineness of his hopes.
+
+"But," asked Adrian, withdrawing gently from Rienzi's arm, "thou knowest,
+then, where Irene is to be found; let us go together.  Lose not a moment in
+this talk; time is of inestimable value, and a moment in this city is often
+but the border to eternity."
+
+"Right," said Rienzi, awakening to his object.  "But fear not, I have
+dreamt that I shall save her, the gem and darling of my house.  Fear not, I
+have no fear."
+
+"Know you where to seek?" said Adrian, impatiently; "the Convent holds far
+other guests."
+
+"Ha! so said my dream!"
+
+"Talk not now of dreams," said the lover; "but if you have no other guide,
+let us part at once in quest of her.  I will take yonder street, you take
+the opposite, and at sunset let us meet in the same spot."
+
+"Rash man!" said the Tribune, with great solemnity; "scoff not at the
+visions which Heaven makes a parable to its Chosen.  Thou seekest counsel
+of thy human wisdom; I, less presumptuous, follow the hand of the
+mysterious Providence, moving even now before my gaze as a pillar of light
+through the wilderness of dread.  Ay, meet we here at sunset, and prove
+whose guide is the most unerring.  If my dream tell me true, I shall see my
+sister living, ere the sun reach yonder hill, and by a church dedicated to
+St. Mark."
+
+The grave earnestness with which Rienzi spoke impressed Adrian with a hope
+which his reason would not acknowledge.  He saw him depart with that proud
+and stately step to which his sweeping garments gave a yet more imposing
+dignity, and then passed up the street to the right hand.  He had not got
+half way when he felt himself pulled by the mantle.  He turned, and saw the
+shapeless mask of a Becchino.
+
+"I feared you were sped, and that another had cheated me of my office,"
+said the gravedigger, "seeing that you returned not to the old Prince's
+palace.  You don't know me from the rest of us I see, but I am the one you
+told to seek - "
+
+"Irene!"
+
+"Yes, Irene di Gabrini; you promised ample reward."
+
+"You shall have it."
+
+"Follow me."
+
+The Becchino strode on, and soon arrived at a mansion.  He knocked twice at
+the porter's entrance, an old woman cautiously opened the door.  "Fear not,
+good aunt," said the gravedigger; "this is the young Lord I spoke to thee
+of.  Thou sayest thou hadst two ladies in the palace, who alone survived of
+all the lodgers, and their names were Bianca de Medici, and - what was the
+other?"
+
+"Irene di Gabrini, a Roman lady.  But I told thee this was the fourth day
+they left the house, terrified by the deaths within it."
+
+"Thou didst so:  and was there anything remarkable in the dress of the
+Signora di Gabrini?"
+
+"Yes, I have told thee:  a blue mantle, such as I have rarely seen, wrought
+with silver."
+
+"Was the broidery that of stars, silver stars," exclaimed Adrian, "with a
+sun in the centre?"
+
+"It was."
+
+"Alas! alas! the arms of the Tribune's family!  I remember how I praised
+the mantle the first day she wore it - the day on which we were betrothed!" 
+And the lover at once conjectured the secret sentiment which had induced
+Irene to retain thus carefully a robe so endeared by association.
+
+"You know no more of your lodgers?"
+
+"Nothing."
+
+"And is this all you have learned, knave?" cried Adrian.
+
+"Patience.  I must bring you from proof to proof, and link to link, in
+order to win my reward.  Follow, Signor."
+
+The Becchino then passing through the several lanes and streets, arrived at
+another house of less magnificent size and architecture.  Again he tapped
+thrice at the parlour door, and this time came forth a man withered, old,
+and palsied, whom death seemed to disdain to strike.
+
+"Signor Astuccio," said the Becchino, "pardon me; but I told thee I might
+trouble thee again.  This is the gentleman who wants to know, what is often
+best unknown - but that's not my affair.  Did a lady - young and beautiful
+- with dark hair, and of a slender form, enter this house, stricken with
+the first symptom of the Plague, three days since?"
+
+"Ay, thou knowest that well enough; and thou knowest still better, that she
+has departed these two days:  it was quick work with her, quicker than with
+most!"
+
+"Did she wear anything remarkable?"
+
+"Yes, troublesome man:  a blue cloak, with stars of silver."
+
+"Couldst thou guess aught of her previous circumstances?"
+
+"No, save that she raved much about the nunnery of Santa Maria de' Pazzi,
+and bravos, and sacrilege."
+
+"Are you satisfied, Signor?" asked the gravedigger, with an air of triumph,
+turning to Adrian.  "But no, I will satisfy thee better, if thou hast
+courage.  Wilt thou follow?"
+
+"I comprehend thee; lead on.  Courage!  What is there on earth now to
+fear?"
+
+Muttering to himself, "Ay, leave me alone.  I have a head worth something;
+I ask no gentleman to go by my word; I will make his own eyes the judge of
+what my trouble is worth," the gravedigger now led the way through one of
+the gates a little out of the city.  And here, under a shed, sat six of his
+ghastly and ill-omened brethren, with spades and pick-axes at their feet.
+
+His guide now turned round to Adrian, whose face was set, and resolute in
+despair.
+
+"Fair Signor," said he, with some touch of lingering compassion, "wouldst
+thou really convince thine own eyes and heart? - the sight may appal, the
+contagion may destroy, thee, - if, indeed, as it seems to me, Death has not
+already written 'mine' upon thee."
+
+"Raven of bode and woe!" answered Adrian, "seest thou not that all I shrink
+from is thy voice and aspect?  Show me her I seek, living or dead."
+
+"I will show her to you, then," said the Becchino, sullenly, "such as two
+nights since she was committed to my charge.  Line and lineament may
+already be swept away, for the Plague hath a rapid besom; but I have left
+that upon her by which you will know the Becchino is no liar.  Bring hither
+the torches, comrades, and lift the door.  Never stare; it's the
+gentleman's whim, and he'll pay it well."
+
+Turning to the right while Adrian mechanically followed his conductors, a
+spectacle whose dire philosophy crushes as with a wheel all the pride of
+mortal man - the spectacle of that vault in which earth hides all that on
+earth flourished, rejoiced, exulted - awaited his eye!
+
+The Becchini lifted a ponderous grate, lowered their torches (scarcely
+needed, for through the aperture rushed, with a hideous glare, the light of
+the burning sun,) and motioned to Adrian to advance.  He stood upon the
+summit of the abyss and gazed below.
+
+It was a large deep and circular space, like the bottom of an exhausted
+well.  In niches cut into the walls of earth around, lay, duly coffined,
+those who had been the earliest victims of the plague, when the Becchino's
+market was not yet glutted, and priest followed, and friend mourned the
+dead.  But on the floor below, there was the loathsome horror!  Huddled and
+matted together - some naked, some in shrouds already black and rotten -
+lay the later guests, the unshriven and unblest!  The torches, the sun,
+streamed broad and red over Corruption in all its stages, from the pale
+blue tint and swollen shape, to the moistened undistinguishable mass, or
+the riddled bones, where yet clung, in strips and tatters, the black and
+mangled flesh.  In many, the face remained almost perfect, while the rest
+of the body was but bone; the long hair, the human face, surmounting the
+grisly skeleton.  There was the infant, still on the mother's breast; there
+was the lover, stretched across the dainty limbs of his adored!  The rats,
+(for they clustered in numbers to that feast,) disturbed, not scared, sate
+up from their horrid meal as the light glimmered over them, and thousands
+of them lay round, stark, and dead, poisoned by that they fed on!  There,
+too, the wild satire of the gravediggers had cast, though stripped of their
+gold and jewels, the emblems that spoke of departed rank; - the broken wand
+of the Councillor; the General's baton; the Priestly Mitre!  The foul and
+livid exhalations gathered like flesh itself, fungous and putrid, upon the
+walls, and the -
+
+But who shall detail the ineffable and unimaginable horrors that reigned
+over the Palace where the Great King received the prisoners whom the sword
+of the Pestilence had subdued?
+
+But through all that crowded court - crowded with beauty and with birth,
+with the strength of the young and the honours of the old, and the valour
+of the brave, and the wisdom of the learned, and the wit of the scorner,
+and the piety of the faithful - one only figure attracted Adrian's eye. 
+Apart from the rest, a latecomer - the long locks streaming far and dark
+over arm and breast - lay a female, the face turned partially aside, the
+little seen not recognisable even by the mother of the dead, - but wrapped
+round in that fatal mantle, on which, though blackened and tarnished, was
+yet visible the starry heraldry assumed by those who claimed the name of
+the proud Tribune of Rome.  Adrian saw no more - he fell back in the arms
+of the gravediggers:  when he recovered, he was still without the gates of
+Florence - reclined upon a green mound - his guide stood beside him -
+holding his steed by the bridle as it grazed patiently on the neglected
+grass.  The other brethren of the axe had resumed their seat under the
+shed.
+
+"So, you have revived!  Ah! I thought it was only the effluvia; few stand
+it as we do.  And so, as your search is over, deeming you would now be
+quitting Florence if you have any sense left to you, I went for your good
+horse.  I have fed him since your departure from the palace.  Indeed I
+fancied he would be my perquisite, but there are plenty as good.  Come,
+young sir, mount.  I feel a pity for you, I know not why, except that you
+are the only one I have met for weeks who seem to care for another more
+than for yourself.  I hope you are satisfied now that I showed some brains,
+eh! in your service; and as I have kept my promise, you'll keep yours."
+
+"Friend," said Adrian, "here is gold enough to make thee rich; here, too,
+is a jewel that merchants will tell thee princes might vie to purchase. 
+Thou seemest honest, despite thy calling, or thou mightest have robbed and
+murdered me long since.  Do me one favour more."
+
+"By my poor mother's soul, yes."
+
+"Take yon - yon clay from that fearful place.  Inter it in some quiet and
+remote spot - apart - alone!  You promise me? - you swear it? - it is well! 
+And now help me on my horse.  Farewell Italy, and if I die not with this
+stroke, may I die as befits at once honour and despair - with trumpet and
+banner round me - in a well-fought field against a worthy foe! - Save a
+knightly death, nothing is left to live for!"
+
+
+
+BOOK VII.  THE PRISON.
+
+"Fu rinchiuso in una torre grossa e larga; avea libri assai, suo Tito
+Livio, sue storie di Roma, la Bibbia." &c. - "Vita di Cola di Rienzi", lib.
+ii. c. 13.
+
+"He was immured in a high and spacious tower; he had books enough, his
+Titus Livius, his histories of Rome, the Bible," &c.
+
+
+Chapter 7.I.  Avignon. - The Two Pages. - The Stranger Beauty.
+
+There is this difference between the Drama of Shakspeare, and that of
+almost every other master of the same art; that in the first, the
+catastrophe is rarely produced by one single cause - one simple and
+continuous chain of events.  Various and complicated agencies work out the
+final end.  Unfettered by the rules of time and place, each time, each
+place depicted, presents us with its appropriate change of action, or of
+actors.  Sometimes the interest seems to halt, to turn aside, to bring us
+unawares upon objects hitherto unnoticed, or upon qualities of the
+characters hitherto hinted at, not developed.  But, in reality, the pause
+in the action is but to collect, to gather up, and to grasp, all the
+varieties of circumstance that conduce to the Great Result:  and the art of
+fiction is only deserted for the fidelity of history.  Whoever seeks to
+place before the world the true representation of a man's life and times,
+and, enlarging the Dramatic into the Epic, extends his narrative over the
+vicissitudes of years, will find himself unconsciously, in this, the
+imitator of Shakspeare.  New characters, each conducive to the end - new
+scenes, each leading to the last, rise before him as he proceeds, sometimes
+seeming to the reader to delay, even while they advance, the dread
+catastrophe.  The sacrificial procession sweeps along, swelled by new
+comers, losing many that first joined it; before, at last, the same as a
+whole, but differing in its components, the crowd reach the fated bourn of
+the Altar and the Victim!
+
+It is five years after the date of the events I have recorded, and my story
+conveys us to the Papal Court at Avignon - that tranquil seat of power, to
+which the successors of St. Peter had transplanted the luxury, the pomp,
+and the vices, of the Imperial City.  Secure from the fraud or violence of
+a powerful and barbarous nobility, the courtiers of the See surrendered
+themselves to a holyday of delight - their repose was devoted to enjoyment,
+and Avignon presented, at that day, perhaps the gayest and most voluptuous
+society of Europe.  The elegance of Clement VI. had diffused an air of
+literary refinement over the grosser pleasures of the place, and the spirit
+of Petrarch still continued to work its way through the councils of faction
+and the orgies of debauch.
+
+Innocent VI. had lately succeeded Clement, and whatever his own claims to
+learning, (Matteo Villani (lib. iii. cap. 44) says, that Innocent VI. had
+not much pretension to learning.  He is reported, however, by other
+authorities, cited by Zefirino Re, to have been "eccellente canonista."  He
+had been a professor in the University of Toulouse.) he, at least,
+appreciated knowledge and intellect in others; so that the graceful
+pedantry of the time continued to mix itself with the pursuit of pleasure. 
+The corruption which reigned through the whole place was too confirmed to
+yield to the example of Innocent, himself a man of simple habits and
+exemplary life.  Though, like his predecessor, obedient to the policy of
+France, Innocent possessed a hard and an extended ambition.  Deeply
+concerned for the interests of the Church, he formed the project of
+confirming and re-establishing her shaken dominion in Italy; and he
+regarded the tyrants of the various states as the principal obstacles to
+his ecclesiastical ambition.  Nor was this the policy of Innocent VI.
+alone.  With such exceptions as peculiar circumstances necessarily
+occasioned, the Papal See was, upon the whole, friendly to the political
+liberties of Italy.  The Republics of the Middle Ages grew up under the
+shadow of the Church; and there, as elsewhere, it was found, contrary to a
+vulgar opinion, that Religion, however prostituted and perverted, served
+for the general protection of civil freedom, - raised the lowly, and
+resisted the oppressor.
+
+At this period there appeared at Avignon a lady of singular and matchless
+beauty.  She had come with a slender but well appointed retinue from
+Florence, but declared herself of Neapolitan birth; the widow of a noble of
+the brilliant court of the unfortunate Jane.  Her name was Cesarini. 
+Arrived at a place where, even in the citadel of Christianity, Venus
+retained her ancient empire, where Love made the prime business of life,
+and to be beautiful was to be of power; the Signora Cesarini had scarcely
+appeared in public before she saw at her feet half the rank and gallantry
+of Avignon.  Her female attendants were beset with bribes and billets; and
+nightly, beneath her lattice, was heard the plaintive serenade.  She
+entered largely into the gay dissipation of the town, and her charms shared
+the celebrity of the hour with the verse of Petrarch.  But though she
+frowned on none, none could claim the monopoly of her smiles.  Her fair
+fame was as yet unblemished; but if any might presume beyond the rest, she
+seemed to have selected rather from ambition than love, and Giles, the
+warlike Cardinal d'Albornoz, all powerful at the sacred court, already
+foreboded the hour of his triumph.
+
+It was late noon, and in the ante-chamber of the fair Signora waited two of
+that fraternity of pages, fair and richly clad, who, at that day, furnished
+the favourite attendants to rank of either sex.
+
+"By my troth," cried one of these young servitors, pushing from him the
+dice with which himself and his companion had sought to beguile their
+leisure, "this is but dull work! and the best part of the day is gone.  Our
+lady is late."
+
+"And I have donned my new velvet mantle," replied the other,
+compassionately eyeing his finery.
+
+"Chut, Giacomo," said his comrade, yawning; "a truce with thy conceit. -
+What news abroad, I wonder?  Has his Holiness come to his senses yet?"
+
+"His senses! what, is he mad then?" quoth Giacomo, in a serious and
+astonished whisper.
+
+"I think he is; if, being Pope, he does not discover that he may at length
+lay aside mask and hood.  'Continent Cardinal - lewd Pope,' is the old
+motto, you know; something must be the matter with the good man's brain if
+he continue to live like a hermit."
+
+"Oh, I have you! but faith, his Holiness has proxies eno'.  The bishops
+take care to prevent women, Heaven bless them! going out of fashion; and
+Albornoz does not maintain your proverb, touching the Cardinals."
+
+"True, but Giles is a warrior, - a cardinal in the church, but a soldier in
+the city."
+
+"Will he carry the fort here, think you, Angelo?"
+
+"Why, fort is female, but - "
+
+"But what?"
+
+"The Signora's brow is made for power, rather than love, fair as it is. 
+She sees in Albornoz the prince, and not the lover.  With what a step she
+sweeps the floor! it disdains even the cloth of gold!"
+
+"Hark!" cried Giacomo, hastening to the lattice, "hear you the hoofs below? 
+Ah, a gallant company!"
+
+"Returned from hawking," answered Angelo, regarding wistfully the
+cavalcade, as it swept the narrow street.  "Plumes waving, steeds
+curvetting - see how yon handsome cavalier presses close to that dame!"
+
+"His mantle is the colour of mine," sighed Giacomo.
+
+As the gay procession paced slowly on, till hidden by the winding street,
+and as the sound of laughter and the tramp of horses was yet faintly heard,
+there frowned right before the straining gaze of the pages, a dark massive
+tower of the mighty masonry of the eleventh century:  the sun gleamed sadly
+on its vast and dismal surface, which was only here and there relieved by
+loopholes and narrow slits, rather than casements.  It was a striking
+contrast to the gaiety around, the glittering shops, and the gaudy train
+that had just filled the space below.  This contrast the young men seemed
+involuntarily to feel; they drew back, and looked at each other.
+
+"I know your thoughts, Giacomo," said Angelo, the handsomer and elder of
+the two.  "You think yon tower affords but a gloomy lodgment?"
+
+"And I thank my stars that made me not high enough to require so grand a
+cage," rejoined Giacomo.
+
+"Yet," observed Angelo, "it holds one, who in birth was not our superior."
+
+"Do tell me something of that strange man," said Giacomo, regaining his
+seat; "you are Roman and should know."
+
+"Yes!" answered Angelo, haughtily drawing himself up, "I am Roman! and I
+should be unworthy my birth, if I had not already learned what honour is
+due to the name of Cola di Rienzi."
+
+"Yet your fellow-Romans merely stoned him, I fancy," muttered Giacomo. 
+"Honour seems to lie more in kicks than money.  Can you tell me," continued
+the page in a louder key, "can you tell me if it be true, that Rienzi
+appeared at Prague before the Emperor, and prophesied that the late Pope
+and all the Cardinals should be murdered, and a new Italian Pope elected,
+who should endue the Emperor with a golden crown, as Sovereign of Sicilia,
+Calabria, and Apulia, (An absurd fable, adopted by certain historians.) and
+himself with a crown of silver, as King of Rome, and all Italy?  And - "
+
+"Hush!" interrupted Angelo, impatiently.  "Listen to me, and you shall know
+the exact story.  On last leaving Rome (thou knowest that, after his fall,
+he was present at the Jubilee in disguise) the Tribune - " here Angelo,
+pausing, looked round, and then with a flushed cheek and raised voice
+resumed, "Yes, the Tribune, that was and shall be - travelled in disguise,
+as a pilgrim, over mountain and forest, night and day, exposed to rain and
+storm, no shelter but the cave, - he who had been, they say, the very
+spoilt one of Luxury.  Arrived at length in Bohemia, he disclosed himself
+to a Florentine in Prague, and through his aid obtained audience of the
+Emperor Charles."
+
+"A prudent man, the Emperor!" said Giacomo, "close-fisted as a miser.  He
+makes conquests by bargain, and goes to market for laurels, - as I have
+heard my brother say, who was under him."
+
+"True; but I have also heard that he likes bookmen and scholars - is wise
+and temperate, and much is yet hoped from him in Italy!  Before the
+Emperor, I say, came Rienzi.  'Know, great Prince,' said he, 'that I am
+that Rienzi to whom God gave to govern Rome, in peace, with justice, and to
+freedom.  I curbed the nobles, I purged corruption, I amended law.  The
+powerful persecuted me - pride and envy have chased me from my dominions. 
+Great as you are, fallen as I am, I too have wielded the sceptre and might
+have worn a crown.  Know, too, that I am illegitimately of your lineage; my
+father the son of Henry VII.; (Uncle to the Emperor Charles.) the blood of
+the Teuton rolls in my veins; mean as were my earlier fortunes and humble
+my earlier name!  From you, O King, I seek protection, and I demand
+justice."  (See, for this speech, "the Anonymous Biographer," lib. ii. cap.
+12.)
+
+"A bold speech, and one from equal to equal," said Giacomo; "surely you
+swell us out the words."
+
+"Not a whit; they were written down by the Emperor's scribe, and every
+Roman who has once heard knows them by heart:  once every Roman was the
+equal to a king, and Rienzi maintained our dignity in asserting his own."
+
+Giacomo, who discreetly avoided quarrels, knew the weak side of his friend;
+and though in his heart he thought the Romans as good-for-nothing a set of
+turbulent dastards as all Italy might furnish, he merely picked a straw
+from his mantle, and said, in rather an impatient tone, "Humph! proceed!
+did the Emperor dismiss him?"
+
+"Not so:  Charles was struck with his bearing and his spirit, received him
+graciously, and entertained him hospitably.  He remained some time at
+Prague, and astonished all the learned with his knowledge and eloquence." 
+(His Italian contemporary delights in representing this remarkable man as
+another Crichton.  "Disputava," he says of him when at Prague, "disputava
+con Mastri di teologia; molto diceva, parlava cose meravigliose...abbair
+fea ogni persona." - "He disputed with Masters of theology - he spoke much,
+he discoursed things wonderful - he astonished every one.")
+
+"But if so honoured at Prague, how comes he a prisoner at Avignon?"
+
+"Giacomo," said Angelo, thoughtfully, "there are some men whom we, of
+another mind and mould, can rarely comprehend, and never fathom.  And of
+such men I have observed that a supreme confidence in their own fortunes or
+their own souls, is the most common feature.  Thus impressed, and thus
+buoyed, they rush into danger with a seeming madness, and from danger soar
+to greatness, or sink to death.  So with Rienzi; dissatisfied with empty
+courtesies and weary of playing the pedant, since once he had played the
+prince; - some say of his own accord, (though others relate that he was
+surrendered to the Pope's legate by Charles,) he left the Emperor's court,
+and without arms, without money, betook himself at once to Avignon!"
+
+"Madness indeed!"
+
+"Yet, perhaps his only course, under all circumstances," resumed the elder
+page.  "Once before his fall, and once during his absence from Rome, he had
+been excommunicated by the Pope's legate.  He was accused of heresy - the
+ban was still on him.  It was necessary that he should clear himself.  How
+was the poor exile to do so?  No powerful friend stood up for the friend of
+the people.  No courtier vindicated one who had trampled on the neck of the
+nobles.  His own genius was his only friend; on that only could he rely. 
+He sought Avignon, to free himself from the accusations against him; and,
+doubtless, he hoped that there was but one step from his acquittal to his
+restoration.  Besides, it is certain that the Emperor had been applied to,
+formally to surrender Rienzi.  He had the choice before him; for to that
+sooner or later it must come - to go free, or to go in bonds - as a
+criminal, or as a Roman.  He chose the latter.  Wherever he passed along,
+the people rose in every town, in every hamlet.  The name of the great
+Tribune was honoured throughout all Italy.  They besought him not to rush
+into the very den of peril - they implored him to save himself for that
+country which he had sought to raise.  'I go to vindicate myself, and to
+triumph,' was the Tribune's answer.  Solemn honours were paid him in the
+cities through which he passed; ("Per tutto la via li furo fatti solenni
+onori," &c. - "Vita di Cola di Rienzi", lib. ii. cap. 13.) and I am told
+that never ambassador, prince, or baron, entered Avignon with so long a
+train as that which followed into these very walls the steps of Cola di
+Rienzi."
+
+"And on his arrival?"
+
+"He demanded an audience, that he might refute the charges against him.  He
+flung down the gage to the proud cardinals who had excommunicated him.  He
+besought a trial."
+
+"And what said the Pope?"
+
+"Nothing - by word.  Yon tower was his answer!"
+
+"A rough one!"
+
+"But there have been longer roads than that from the prison to the palace,
+and God made not men like Rienzi for the dungeon and the chain."
+
+As Angelo said this with a loud voice, and with all the enthusiasm with
+which the fame of the fallen Tribune had inspired the youth of Rome, he
+heard a sigh behind him.  He turned in some confusion, and at the door
+which admitted to the chamber occupied by the Signora Cesarini, stood a
+female of noble presence.  Attired in the richest garments, gold and gems
+were dull to the lustre of her dark eyes, and as she now stood, erect and
+commanding, never seemed brow more made for the regal crown - never did
+human beauty more fully consummate the ideal of a heroine and a queen.
+
+"Pardon me, Signora," said Angelo, hesitatingly; "I spoke loud, I disturbed
+you; but I am Roman, and my theme was - "
+
+"Rienzi!" said the lady, approaching; "a fit one to stir a Roman heart. 
+Nay - no excuses:  they would sound ill on thy generous lips.  Ah, if - "
+the Signora paused suddenly, and sighed again; then in an altered and
+graver tone she resumed - "If fate restore Rienzi to his proper fortunes,
+he shall know what thou deemest of him."
+
+"If you, lady, who are of Naples," said Angelo, with meaning emphasis,
+"speak thus of a fallen exile, what must I have felt who acknowledge a
+sovereign?"
+
+"Rienzi is not of Rome alone - he is of Italy - of the world," returned the
+Signora.  "And you, Angelo, who have had the boldness to speak thus of one
+fallen, have proved with what loyalty you can serve those who have the
+fortune to own you."
+
+As she spoke, the Signora looked at the page's downcast and blushing face
+long and wistfully, with the gaze of one accustomed to read the soul in the
+countenance.
+
+"Men are often deceived," said she sadly, yet with a half smile; "but women
+rarely, - save in love.  Would that Rome were filled with such as you! 
+Enough!  Hark!  Is that the sound of hoofs in the court below?"
+
+"Madam," said Giacomo, bringing his mantle gallantly over his shoulder, "I
+see the servitors of Monsignore the Cardinal d'Albornoz. - It is the
+Cardinal himself."
+
+"It is well!" said the Signora, with a brightening eye; "I await him!" 
+With these words she withdrew by the door through which she had surprised
+the Roman page.
+
+
+Chapter 7.II.  The Character of a Warrior Priest - an Interview - the
+Intrigue and Counter-intrigue of Courts.
+
+Giles, (or Egidio, (Egidio is the proper Italian equivalent to the French
+name Gilles, - but the Cardinal is generally called, by the writers of that
+day, Gilio d'Albornoz.)) Cardinal d'Albornoz, was one of the most
+remarkable men of that remarkable time, so prodigal of genius.  Boasting
+his descent from the royal houses of Aragon and Leon, he had early entered
+the church, and yet almost a youth, attained the archbishopric of Toledo. 
+But no peaceful career, however brilliant, sufficed to his ambition.  He
+could not content himself with the honours of the church, unless they were
+the honours of a church militant.  In the war against the Moors, no
+Spaniard had more highly distinguished himself; and Alphonso XI. king of
+Castile, had insisted on receiving from the hand of the martial priest the
+badge of knighthood.  After the death of Alphonso, who was strongly
+attached to him, Albornoz repaired to Avignon, and obtained from Clement
+VI. the cardinal's hat.  With Innocent he continued in high favour, and
+now, constantly in the councils of the Pope, rumours of warlike
+preparation, under the banners of Albornoz, for the recovery of the papal
+dominions from the various tyrants that usurped them, were already
+circulated through the court.  (It is a characteristic anecdote of this
+bold Churchman, that Urban V. one day demanded an account of the sums spent
+in his military expedition against the Italian tyrants.  The Cardinal
+presented to the Pope a wagon, filled with the keys of the cities and
+fortresses he had taken.  "This is my account," said he; "you perceive how
+I have invested your money."  The Pope embraced him, and gave him no
+further trouble about his accounts.)  Bold, sagacious, enterprising, and
+cold-hearted, - with the valour of the knight, and the cunning of the
+priest, - such was the character of Giles, Cardinal d'Albornoz.
+
+Leaving his attendant gentlemen in the antechamber, Albornoz was ushered
+into the apartment of the Signora Cesarini.  In person, the Cardinal was
+about the middle height; the dark complexion of Spain had faded by thought,
+and the wear of ambitious schemes, into a sallow but hardy hue; his brow
+was deeply furrowed, and though not yet passed the prime of life, Albornoz
+might seem to have entered age, but for the firmness of his step, the
+slender elasticity of his frame, and an eye which had acquired calmness and
+depth from thought, without losing any of the brilliancy of youth.
+
+"Beautiful Signora," said the Cardinal, bending over the hand of the
+Cesarini with a grace which betokened more of the prince than of the
+priest; "the commands of his Holiness have detained me, I fear, beyond the
+hour in which you vouchsafed to appoint my homage, but my heart has been
+with you since we parted."
+
+"The Cardinal d'Albornoz," replied the Signora, gently withdrawing her
+hand, and seating herself, "has so many demands on his time, from the
+duties of his rank and renown, that methinks to divert his attention for a
+few moments to less noble thoughts is a kind of treason to his fame."
+
+"Ah, Lady," replied the Cardinal, "never was my ambition so nobly directed
+as it is now.  And it were a prouder lot to be at thy feet than on the
+throne of St. Peter."
+
+A momentary blush passed over the cheek of the Signora, yet it seemed the
+blush of indignation as much as of vanity; it was succeeded by an extreme
+paleness.  She paused before she replied; and then fixing her large and
+haughty eyes on the enamoured Spaniard, she said, in a low voice,
+
+"My Lord Cardinal, I do not affect to misunderstand your words; neither do
+I place them to the account of a general gallantry.  I am vain enough to
+believe you imagine you speak truly when you say you love me."
+
+"Imagine!" echoed the Spaniard.
+
+"Listen to me," continued the Signora.  "She whom the Cardinal Albornoz
+honours with his love has a right to demand of him its proofs.  In the
+papal court, whose power like his? - I require you to exercise it for me."
+
+"Speak, dearest Lady; have your estates been seized by the barbarians of
+these lawless times?  Hath any dared to injure you?  Lands and titles, are
+these thy wish? - my power is thy slave."
+
+"Cardinal, no! there is one thing dearer to an Italian and a woman than
+wealth or station - it is revenge!"
+
+The Cardinal drew back from the flashing eye that was bent upon him, but
+the spirit of her speech touched a congenial chord.
+
+"There," said he, after a little hesitation, "there spake high descent. 
+Revenge is the luxury of the well-born.  Let serfs and churls forgive an
+injury.  Proceed, Lady."
+
+"Hast thou heard the last news from Rome?" asked the Signora.
+
+"Surely," replied the Cardinal, in some surprise, "we were poor statesmen
+to be ignorant of the condition of the capital of the papal dominions; and
+my heart mourns for that unfortunate city.  But wherefore wouldst thou
+question me of Rome? - thou art - "
+
+"Roman!  Know, my Lord, that I have a purpose in calling myself of Naples.
+To your discretion I intrust my secret - I am of Rome!  Tell me of her
+state."
+
+"Fairest one," returned the Cardinal, "I should have known that that brow
+and presence were not of the light Campania.  My reason should have told me
+that they bore the stamp of the Empress of the World.  The state of Rome,"
+continued Albornoz, in a graver tone, "is briefly told.  Thou knowest that
+after the fall of the able but insolent Rienzi, Pepin, count of Minorbino,
+(a creature of Montreal's) who had assisted in expelling him, would have
+betrayed Rome to Montreal, - but he was neither strong enough nor wise
+enough, and the Barons chased him as he had chased the Tribune.  Some time
+afterwards a new demagogue, John Cerroni, was installed in the Capitol.  He
+once more expelled the nobles; new revolutions ensued - the Barons were
+recalled.  The weak successor of Rienzi summoned the people to arms - in
+vain:  in terror and despair he abdicated his power, and left the city a
+prey to the interminable feuds of the Orsini, the Colonna, and the
+Savelli."
+
+"Thus much I know, my Lord; but when his Holiness succeeded to the chair of
+Clement VI. - "
+
+"Then," said Albornoz, and a slight frown darkened his sallow brow, "then
+came the blacker part of the history.  Two senators were elected in concert
+by the Pope."
+
+"Their names?"
+
+"Bertoldo Orsini, and one of the Colonna.  A few weeks afterwards, the high
+price of provisions stung the rascal stomachs of the mob - they rose, they
+clamoured, they armed, they besieged the Capitol - "
+
+"Well, well," cried the Signora, clasping her hands, and betokening in
+every feature her interest in the narration.
+
+"Colonna only escaped death by a vile disguise; Bertoldo Orsini was
+stoned."
+
+"Stoned! - there fell one!"
+
+"Yes, lady, one of a great house; the least drop of whose blood were worth
+an ocean of plebeian puddle.  At present, all is disorder, misrule,
+anarchy, at Rome.  The contests of the nobles shake the city to the centre;
+and prince and people, wearied of so many experiments to establish a
+government, have now no governor but the fear of the sword.  Such, fair
+madam, is the state of Rome.  Sigh not, it occupies now our care.  It shall
+be remedied; and I, madam, may be the happy instrument of restoring peace
+to your native city."
+
+"There is but one way of restoring peace to Rome," answered the Signora,
+abruptly, "and that is - The restoration of Rienzi!"
+
+The Cardinal started.  "Madam," said he, "do I hear aright? - are you not
+nobly born? - can you desire the rise of a plebeian?  Did you not speak of
+revenge, and now you ask for mercy?"
+
+"Lord Cardinal," said the beautiful Signora, earnestly, "I do not ask for
+mercy:  such a word is not for the lips of one who demands justice.  Nobly
+born I am - ay, and from a stock to whose long descent from the patricians
+of ancient Rome the high line of Aragon itself would be of yesterday.  Nay,
+I would not offend you, Monsignore; your greatness is not borrowed from
+pedigrees and tombstones - your greatness is your own achieving:  would you
+speak honestly, my Lord, you would own that you are proud only of your own
+laurels, and that, in your heart, you laugh at the stately fools who trick
+themselves out in the mouldering finery of the dead!"
+
+"Muse! prophetess! you speak aright," said the high-spirited Cardinal, with
+unwonted energy; "and your voice is like that of the Fame I dreamed of in
+my youth.  Speak on, speak ever!"
+
+"Such," continued the Signora, "such as your pride, is the just pride of
+Rienzi.  Proud that he is the workman of his own great renown.  In such as
+the Tribune of Rome we acknowledge the founders of noble lineage.  Ancestry
+makes not them - they make ancestry.  Enough of this.  I am of noble race,
+it is true; but my house, and those of many, have been crushed and broken
+beneath the yoke of the Orsini and Colonna - it is against them I desire
+revenge.  But I am better than an Italian lady - I am a Roman woman - I
+weep tears of blood for the disorders of my unhappy country.  I mourn that
+even you, my Lord, - yes, that a barbarian, however eminent and however
+great, should mourn for Rome.  I desire to restore her fortunes."
+
+"But Rienzi would only restore his own."
+
+"Not so, my Lord Cardinal; not so.  Ambitious and proud he may be - great
+souls are so - but he has never had one wish divorced from the welfare of
+Rome.  But put aside all thought of his interests - it is not of these I
+speak.  You desire to re-establish the papal power in Rome.  Your senators
+have failed to do it.  Demagogues fail - Rienzi alone can succeed; he alone
+can command the turbulent passions of the Barons - he alone can sway the
+capricious and fickle mob.  Release, restore Rienzi, and through Rienzi the
+Pope regains Rome!"
+
+The Cardinal did not answer for some moments.  Buried as in a revery, he
+sate motionless, shading his face with his hand.  Perhaps he secretly owned
+there was a wiser policy in the suggestions of the Signora than he cared
+openly to confess.  Lifting his head, at length, from his bosom, he fixed
+his eyes upon the Signora's watchful countenance, and, with a forced smile,
+said,
+
+"Pardon me, madam; but while we play the politicians, forget not that I am
+thy adorer.  Sagacious may be thy counsels, yet wherefore are they urged? 
+Why this anxious interest for Rienzi?  If by releasing him the Church may
+gain an ally, am I sure that Giles d'Albornoz will not raise a rival?"
+
+"My Lord, said the Signora, half rising, "you are my suitor; but your rank
+does not tempt me - your gold cannot buy.  If you love me, I have a right
+to command your services to whatsoever task I would require - it is the law
+of chivalry.  If ever I yield to the addresses of mortal lover, it will be
+to the man who restores to my native land her hero and her saviour."
+
+"Fair patriot," said the Cardinal, "your words encourage my hope, yet they
+half damp my ambition; for fain would I desire that love and not service
+should alone give me the treasure that I ask.  But hear me, sweet lady; you
+over-rate my power:  I cannot deliver Rienzi - he is accused of rebellion,
+he is excommunicated for heresy.  His acquittal rests with himself."
+
+"You can procure his trial?"
+
+"Perhaps, Lady."
+
+"That is his acquittal.  And a private audience of his Holiness?"
+
+"Doubtless."
+
+"That is his restoration!  Behold all I ask!"
+
+"And then, sweet Roman, it will be mine to ask," said the Cardinal,
+passionately, dropping on his knee, and taking the Signora's hand.  For one
+moment, that proud lady felt that she was woman - she blushed, she
+trembled; but it was not (could the Cardinal have read that heart) with
+passion or with weakness; it was with terror and with shame.  Passively she
+surrendered her hand to the Cardinal, who covered it with kisses.
+
+"Thus inspired," said Albornoz, rising, "I will not doubt of success. 
+Tomorrow I wait on thee again."
+
+He pressed her hand to his heart - the lady felt it not.  He sighed his
+farewell - she did not hear it.  Lingeringly he gazed; and slowly he
+departed.  But it was some moments before, recalled to herself, the Signora
+felt that she was alone.
+
+"Alone!" she cried, half aloud, and with wild emphasis - "alone!  Oh, what
+have I undergone - what have I said!  Unfaithful, even in thought, to him! 
+Oh, never! never!  I, that have felt the kiss of his hallowing lips - that
+have slept on his kingly heart - I! - holy Mother, befriend and strengthen
+me!" she continued, as, weeping bitterly, she sunk upon her knees; and for
+some moments she was lost in prayer.  Then, rising composed, but deadly
+pale, and with the tears rolling heavily down her cheeks, the Signora
+passed slowly to the casement; she threw it open, and bent forward; the air
+of the declining day came softly on her temples; it cooled, it mitigated,
+the fever that preyed within.  Dark and huge before her frowned, in its
+gloomy shadow, the tower in which Rienzi was confined; she gazed at it long
+and wistfully, and then, turning away, drew from the folds of her robe a
+small and sharp dagger.  "Let me save him for glory!" she murmured; "and
+this shall save me from dishonour!"
+
+
+Chapter 7.III.  Holy Men. - Sagacious Deliberations. - Just Resolves. - And
+Sordid Motives to All.
+
+Enamoured of the beauty, and almost equally so of the lofty spirit, of the
+Signora Cesarini, as was the warlike Cardinal of Spain, love with him was
+not so master a passion as that ambition of complete success in all the
+active designs of life, which had hitherto animated his character and
+signalized his career.  Musing, as he left the Signora, on her wish for the
+restoration of the Roman Tribune, his experienced and profound intellect
+ran swiftly through whatever advantages to his own political designs might
+result from that restoration.  We have seen that it was the intention of
+the new Pontiff to attempt the recovery of the patrimonial territories, now
+torn from him by the gripe of able and disaffected tyrants.  With this
+view, a military force was already in preparation, and the Cardinal was
+already secretly nominated the chief.  But the force was very inadequate to
+the enterprise; and Albornoz depended much upon the moral strength of the
+cause in bringing recruits to his standard in his progress through the
+Italian states.  The wonderful rise of Rienzi had excited an extraordinary
+enthusiasm in his favour through all the free populations of Italy.  And
+this had been yet more kindled and inflamed by the influential eloquence of
+Petrarch, who, at that time, possessed of a power greater than ever, before
+or since, (not even excepting the Sage of Ferney,) wielded by a single
+literary man, had put forth his boldest genius in behalf of the Roman
+Tribune.  Such a companion as Rienzi in the camp of the Cardinal might be a
+magnet of attraction to the youth and enterprise of Italy.  On nearing
+Rome, he might himself judge how far it would be advisable to reinstate
+Rienzi as a delegate of the papal power.  And, in the meanwhile, the
+Roman's influence might be serviceable, whether to awe the rebellious
+nobles or conciliate the stubborn people.  On the other hand, the Cardinal
+was shrewd enough to perceive that no possible good could arise from
+Rienzi's present confinement.  With every month it excited deeper and more
+universal sympathy.  To his lonely dungeon turned half the hearts of
+republican Italy.  Literature had leagued its new and sudden, and therefore
+mighty and even disproportioned, power with his cause; and the Pope,
+without daring to be his judge, incurred the odium of being his gaoler.  "A
+popular prisoner," said the sagacious Cardinal to himself, "is the most
+dangerous of guests.  Restore him as your servant, or destroy him as your
+foe!  In this case I see no alternative but acquittal or the knife!"  In
+these reflections that able plotter, deep in the Machiavelism of the age,
+divorced the lover from the statesman.
+
+Recurring now to the former character, he felt some disagreeable and uneasy
+forebodings at the earnest interest of his mistress.  Fain would he have
+attributed, either to some fantasy of patriotism or some purpose of
+revenge, the anxiety of the Cesarini; and there was much in her stern and
+haughty character which favoured that belief.  But he was forced to
+acknowledge to himself some jealous apprehension of a sinister and latent
+motive, which touched his vanity and alarmed his love.  "Howbeit," he
+thought, as he turned from his unwilling fear, "I can play with her at her
+own weapons; I can obtain the release of Rienzi, and claim my reward.  If
+denied, the hand that opened the dungeon can again rivet the chain.  In her
+anxiety is my power!"
+
+These thoughts the Cardinal was still revolving in his palace, when he was
+suddenly summoned to attend the Pontiff.
+
+The pontifical palace no longer exhibited the gorgeous yet graceful luxury
+of Clement VI., and the sarcastic Cardinal smiled to himself at the quiet
+gloom of the ante-chambers.  "He thinks to set an example - this poor
+native of Limoges!" thought Albornoz; "and has but the mortification of
+finding himself eclipsed by the poorest bishop.  He humbles himself, and
+fancies that the humility will be contagious."
+
+His Holiness was seated before a small and rude table bestrewed with
+papers, his face buried in his hands; the room was simply furnished, and in
+a small niche beside the casement was an ivory crucifix; below, the death's
+head and cross-bones, which most monks then introduced with a purpose
+similar to that of the ancients by the like ornaments, - mementos of the
+shortness of life, and therefore admonitions to make the best of it!  On
+the ground lay a map of the Patrimonial Territory, with the fortresses in
+especial, distinctly and prominently marked.  The Pope gently lifted up his
+head as the Cardinal was announced, and discovered a plain but sensible and
+somewhat interesting countenance.  "My son!" said he, with a kindly
+courtesy to the lowly salutation of the proud Spaniard, "scarcely wouldst
+thou imagine, after our long conference this morning, that new cares would
+so soon demand the assistance of thy counsels.  Verily, the wreath of
+thorns stings sharp under the triple crown; and I sometimes long for the
+quiet abode of my old professor's chair in Toulouse:  my station is of pain
+and toil."
+
+"God tempers the wind to the shorn lamb," observed the Cardinal, with pious
+and compassionate gravity.
+
+Innocent could scarcely refrain a smile as he replied, "The lamb that
+carries the cross must have the strength of the lion.  Since we parted, my
+son, I have had painful intelligence; our couriers have arrived from the
+Campagna - the heathen rage furiously - the force of John di Vico has
+augmented fearfully, and the most redoubted adventurer of Europe has
+enlisted under his banner."
+
+"Does his Holiness," cried the Cardinal, anxiously, "speak of Fra Moreale,
+the Knight of St. John?"
+
+"Of no less a warrior," returned the Pontiff.  "I dread the vast ambition
+of that wild adventurer."
+
+"Your Holiness hath cause," said the Cardinal, drily.
+
+"Some letters of his have fallen into the hands of the servants of the
+Church; they are here:  read them, my son."
+
+Albornoz received and deliberately scanned the letters; this done, he
+replaced them on the table, and remained for a few moments silent and
+absorbed.
+
+"What think you, my son?" said the Pope, at length, with an impatient and
+even peevish tone.
+
+"I think that, with Montreal's hot genius and John di Vico's frigid
+villany, your Holiness may live to envy, if not the quiet, at least the
+revenue, of the Professor's chair."
+
+"How, Cardinal!" said the Pope, hastily, and with an angry flush on his
+pale brow.  The Cardinal quietly proceeded.
+
+"By these letters it seems that Montreal has written to all the commanders
+of free lances throughout Italy, offering the highest pay of a soldier to
+every man who will join his standard, combined with the richest plunder of
+a brigand.  He meditates great schemes then! - I know the man!"
+
+"Well, - and our course?"
+
+"Is plain," said the Cardinal, loftily, and with an eye that flashed with a
+soldier's fire.  "Not a moment is to be lost!  Thy son should at once take
+the field.  Up with the Banner of the Church!"
+
+"But are we strong enough? our numbers are few.  Zeal slackens! the piety
+of the Baldwins is no more!"
+
+"Your Holiness knows well," said the Cardinal, "that for the multitude of
+men there are two watchwords of war - Liberty and Religion.  If Religion
+begins to fail, we must employ the profaner word.  'Up with the Banner of
+the Church - and down with the tyrants!'  We will proclaim equal laws and
+free government; (In correcting the pages of this work, in the year
+1847...strange coincidences between the present policy of the Roman Church
+and that by which in the 14th century it recovered both spiritual and
+temporal power cannot fail to suggest themselves.) and, God willing, our
+camp shall prosper better with those promises than the tents of Montreal
+with the more vulgar shout of 'Pay and Rapine.'"
+
+"Giles d'Albornoz," said the Pope, emphatically; and, warmed by the spirit
+of the Cardinal, he dropped the wonted etiquette of phrase, "I trust
+implicitly to you.  Now the right hand of the Church - hereafter, perhaps,
+its head.  Too well I feel that the lot has fallen on a lowly place.  My
+successor must requite my deficiencies."
+
+No changing hue, no brightening glance, betrayed to the searching eye of
+the Pope whatever emotion these words had called up in the breast of the
+ambitious Cardinal.  He bowed his proud head humbly as he answered, "Pray
+Heaven that Innocent VI. may long live to guide the Church to glory.  For
+Giles d'Albornoz, less priest than soldier, the din of the camp, the breath
+of the war-steed, suggest the only aspirations which he ever dares indulge. 
+But has your Holiness imparted to your servant all that - "
+
+"Nay," interrupted Innocent, "I have yet intelligence equally ominous. 
+This John di Vico, - pest go with him! - who still styles himself (the
+excommunicated ruffian!) Prefect of Rome, has so filled that unhappy city
+with his emissaries, that we have well-nigh lost the seat of the Apostle. 
+Rome, long in anarchy, seems now in open rebellion.  The nobles - sons of
+Belial! - it is true, are once more humbled; but how? - One Baroncelli, a
+new demagogue, the fiercest - the most bloody that the fiend ever helped -
+has arisen - is invested by the mob with power, and uses it to butcher the
+people and insult the Pontiff.  Wearied of the crimes of this man, (which
+are not even decorated by ability,) the shout of the people day and night
+along the streets is for 'Rienzi the Tribune.'"
+
+"Ha!" said the Cardinal, "Rienzi's faults then are forgotten in Rome, and
+there is felt for him the same enthusiasm in that city as in the rest of
+Italy?"
+
+"Alas!  It is so."
+
+"It is well, I have thought of this:  Rienzi can accompany my progress - "
+
+"My son! the rebel, the heretic - "
+
+"By your Holiness's absolution will become quiet subject and orthodox
+Catholic," said Albornoz.  "Men are good or bad as they suit our purpose. 
+What matters a virtue that is useless, or a crime that is useful, to us? 
+The army of the Church proceeds against tyrants - it proclaims everywhere
+to the Papal towns the restoration of their popular constitutions.  Sees
+not your Holiness that the acquittal of Rienzi, the popular darling, will
+be hailed an earnest of your sincerity? - sees not your Holiness that his
+name will fight for us? - sees not your Holiness that the great demagogue
+Rienzi must be used to extinguish the little demagogue Baroncelli?  We must
+regain the Romans, whether of the city or whether in the seven towns of
+John di Vico.  When they hear Rienzi is in our camp, trust me, we shall
+have a multitude of deserters from the tyrants - trust me, we shall hear no
+more of Baroncelli."
+
+"Ever sagacious," said the Pope, musingly; "it is true, we can use this
+man:  but with caution.  His genius is formidable - "
+
+"And therefore must be conciliated; if we acquit, we must make him ours. 
+My experience has taught me this, when you cannot slay a demagogue by law,
+crush him with honours.  He must be no longer Tribune of the People.  Give
+him the Patrician title of Senator, and he is then the Lieutenant of the
+Pope!"
+
+"I will see to this, my son - your suggestions please, but alarm me:  he
+shall at least be examined; - but if found a heretic - "
+
+"Should, I humbly advise, be declared a saint."
+
+The Pope bent his brow for a moment, but the effort was too much for him,
+and after a moment's struggle, he fairly laughed aloud.
+
+"Go to, my son," said he, affectionately patting the Cardinal's sallow
+cheek.  "Go to. - If the world heard thee, what would it say?"
+
+"That Giles d'Albornoz had just enough religion to remember that the State
+is a Church, but not too much to forget that the Church is a State."
+
+With these words the conference ended.  That very evening the Pope decreed
+that Rienzi should be permitted the trial he had demanded.
+
+
+Chapter 7.IV.  The Lady and the Page.
+
+It wanted three hours of midnight, when Albornoz, resuming his character of
+gallant, despatched to the Signora Cesarini the following billet.
+
+"Your commands are obeyed.  Rienzi will receive an examination on his
+faith.  It is well that he should be prepared.  It may suit your purpose,
+as to which I am so faintly enlightened, to appear to the prisoner what you
+are - the obtainer of this grace.  See how implicitly one noble heart can
+trust another!  I send by the bearer an order that will admit one of your
+servitors to the prisoner's cell.  Be it, if you will, your task to
+announce to him the new crisis of his fate.  Ah! madam, may fortune be as
+favourable to me, and grant me the same intercessor - from thy lips my
+sentence is to come."
+
+As Albornoz finished this epistle, he summoned his confidential attendant,
+a Spanish gentleman, who saw nothing in his noble birth that should prevent
+his fulfilling the various hests of the Cardinal.
+
+"Alvarez," said he, "these to the Signora Cesarini by another hand; thou
+art unknown to her household.  Repair to the state tower; this to the
+Governor admits thee.  Mark who is admitted to the prisoner Cola di Rienzi: 
+Know his name, examine whence he comes.  Be keen, Alvarez.  Learn by what
+motive the Cesarini interests herself in the prisoner's fate.  All too of
+herself, birth, fortunes, lineage, would be welcome intelligence.  Thou
+comprehendest me?  It is well.  One caution - thou hast no mission from, no
+connexion with, me.  Thou art an officer of the prison, or of the Pope, -
+what thou wilt.  Give me the rosary; light the lamp before the crucifix;
+place yon hair-shirt beneath those arms.  I would have it appear as if
+meant to be hidden!  Tell Gomez that the Dominican preacher is to be
+admitted."
+
+"Those friars have zeal," continued the Cardinal to himself, as, after
+executing his orders, Alvarez withdrew.  "They would burn a man - but only
+on the Bible?  They are worth conciliating, if the triple crown be really
+worth the winning; were it mine, I would add the eagle's plume to it."
+
+And plunged into the aspiring future, this bold man forgot even the object
+of his passion.  In real life, after a certain age, ambitious men love
+indeed; but it is only as an interlude.  And indeed with most men, life has
+more absorbing though not more frequent concerns than those of love.  Love
+is the business of the idle, but the idleness of the busy.
+
+The Cesarini was alone when the Cardinal's messenger arrived, and he was
+scarcely dismissed with a few lines, expressive of a gratitude which seemed
+to bear down all those guards with which the coldness of the Signora
+usually fenced her pride, before the page Angelo was summoned to her
+presence.
+
+The room was dark with the shades of the gathering night when the youth
+entered, and he discerned but dimly the outline of the Signora's stately
+form; but by the tone of her voice, he perceived that she was deeply
+agitated.
+
+"Angelo," said she, as he approached, "Angelo - " and her voice failed her. 
+She paused as for breath and again proceeded.  "You alone have served us
+faithfully; you alone shared our escape, our wanderings, our exile - you
+alone know my secret - you of my train alone are Roman! - Roman! it was
+once a great name.  Angelo, the name has fallen; but it is only because the
+nature of the Roman Race fell first.  Haughty they are, but fickle; fierce,
+but dastard; vehement in promise, but rotten in their faith.  You are a
+Roman, and though I have proved your truth, your very birth makes me afraid
+of falsehood."
+
+"Madam," said the page; "I was but a child when you admitted me of your
+service, and I am yet only on the verge of manhood.  But boy though I yet
+be, I would brave the stoutest lance of knight, or freebooter, in defence
+of the faith of Angelo Villani, to his liege Lady and his native land."
+
+"Alas! alas!" said the Signora, bitterly, "such have been the words of
+thousands of thy race.  What have been their deeds?  But I will trust thee,
+as I have trusted ever.  I know that thou art covetous of honour, that thou
+hast youth's comely and bright ambition."
+
+"I am an orphan and a bastard," said Angelo, bluntly!  "And circumstance
+stings me sharply on to action; I would win my own name."
+
+"Thou shalt," said the Signora.  "We shall live yet to reward thee.  And
+now be quick.  Bring hither one of thy page's suits, - mantle and head-
+gear.  Quick, I say, and whisper not to a soul what I have asked of thee."
+
+
+Chapter 7.V.  The Inmate of the Tower.
+
+The night slowly advanced, and in the highest chamber of that dark and
+rugged tower which fronted the windows of the Cesarini's palace sate a
+solitary prisoner.  A single lamp burned before him on a table of stone,
+and threw its rays over an open Bible; and those stern but fantastic
+legends of the prowess of ancient Rome, which the genius of Livy has
+dignified into history.  ("Avea libri assai, suo Tito Livio, sue storie di
+Roma, la Bibbia et altri libri assai, non finava di studiare." - "Vita di
+Cola di Rienzi", lib. ii. cap. 13.  See translation to motto to Book VII.
+page 202.)  A chain hung pendent from the vault of the tower, and confined
+the captive; but so as to leave his limbs at sufficient liberty to measure
+at will the greater part of the cell.  Green and damp were the mighty
+stones of the walls, and through a narrow aperture, high out of reach, came
+the moonlight, and slept in long shadow over the rude floor.  A bed at one
+corner completed the furniture of the room.  Such for months had been the
+abode of the conqueror of the haughtiest Barons, and the luxurious dictator
+of the stateliest city of the world!
+
+Care, and travel, and time, and adversity, had wrought their change in the
+person of Rienzi.  The proportions of his frame had enlarged from the
+compact strength of earlier manhood, the clear paleness of his cheek was
+bespread with a hectic and deceitful glow.  Even in his present studies,
+intent as they seemed, and genial though the lecture to a mind enthusiastic
+even to fanaticism, his eyes could not rivet themselves as of yore steadily
+to the page.  The charm was gone from the letters.  Every now and then he
+moved restlessly, started, re-settled himself, and muttered broken
+exclamations like a man in an anxious dream.  Anon, his gaze impatiently
+turned upward, about, around, and there was a strange and wandering fire in
+those large deep eyes, which might have thrilled the beholder with a vague
+and unaccountable awe.
+
+Angelo had in the main correctly narrated the more recent adventures of
+Rienzi after his fall.  He had first with Nina and Angelo betaken himself
+to Naples, and found a fallacious and brief favour with Louis, king of
+Hungary; that harsh but honourable monarch had refused to yield his
+illustrious guest to the demands of Clement, but had plainly declared his
+inability to shelter him in safety.  Maintaining secret intercourse with
+his partisans at Rome, the fugitive then sought a refuge with the Eremites,
+sequestered in the lone recesses of the Monte Maiella, where in solitude
+and thought he had passed a whole year, save the time consumed in his visit
+to and return from Florence.  Taking advantage of the Jubilee in Rome, he
+had then, disguised as a pilgrim, traversed the vales and mountains still
+rich in the melancholy ruins of ancient Rome, and entering the city, his
+restless and ambitious spirit indulged in new but vain conspiracies! 
+(Rainald, Ann. 1350, N. 4, E. 5.)  Excommunicated a second time by the
+Cardinal di Ceccano, and again a fugitive, he shook the dust from his feet
+as he left the city, and raising his hands towards those walls, in which
+are yet traced the witness of the Tarquins, cried aloud - "Honoured as thy
+prince - persecuted as thy victim - Rome, Rome, thou shalt yet receive me
+as thy conqueror!"
+
+Still disguised as a pilgrim, he passed unmolested through Italy into the
+Court of the Emperor Charles of Bohemia, where the page, who had probably
+witnessed, had rightly narrated, his reception.  It is doubtful, however,
+whether the conduct of the Emperor had been as chivalrous as appears by
+Angelo's relation, or whether he had not delivered Rienzi to the Pontiff's
+emissaries.  At all events it is certain, that from Prague to Avignon, the
+path of the fallen Tribune had been as one triumph.  His strange adventures
+- his unbroken spirit - the new power that Intellect daily and wonderfully
+excited over the minds of the rising generation - the eloquence of
+Petrarch, and the common sympathy of the vulgar for fallen greatness, - all
+conspired to make Rienzi the hero of the age.  Not a town through which he
+passed which would not have risked a siege for his protection - not a house
+that would not have sheltered him - not a hand that would not have struck
+in his defence.  Refusing all offers of aid, disdaining all occasion of
+escape, inspired by his indomitable hope, and his unalloyed belief in the
+brightness of his own destinies, the Tribune sought Avignon - and found a
+dungeon!
+
+These, his external adventures, are briefly and easily told; but who shall
+tell what passed within? - who narrate the fearful history of the heart? -
+who paint the rapid changes of emotion and of thought - the indignant grief
+- the stern dejection - the haughty disappointment that saddened while it
+never destroyed the resolve of that great soul?  Who can say what must have
+been endured, what meditated, in the hermitage of Maiella; - on the lonely
+hills of the perished empire it had been his dream to restore; - in the
+Courts of Barbarian Kings; - and above all, on returning obscure and
+disguised, amidst the crowds of the Christian world, to the seat of his
+former power?  What elements of memory, and in what a wild and fiery brain! 
+What reflections to be conned in the dungeons of Avignon, by a man who had
+pushed into all the fervour of fanaticism - four passions, a single one of
+which has, in excess, sufficed to wreck the strongest reason - passions,
+which in themselves it is most difficult to combine, - the dreamer - the
+aspirant - the very nympholept of Freedom, yet of Power - of Knowledge, yet
+of Religion!
+
+"Ay," muttered the prisoner, "ay, these texts are comforting - comforting. 
+The righteous are not alway oppressed."  With a long sigh he deliberately
+put aside the Bible, kissed it with great reverence, remained silent, and
+musing for some minutes; and then as a slight noise was heard at one corner
+of the cell, said softly, "Ah, my friends, my comrades, the rats! it is
+their hour - I am glad I put aside the bread for them!"  His eye brightened
+as it now detected those strange and unsocial animals venturing forth
+through a hole in the wall, and, darkening the moonshine on the floor,
+steal fearlessly towards him.  He flung some fragments of bread to them,
+and for some moments watched their gambols with a smile.  "Manchino, the
+white-faced rascal! he beats all the rest - ha, ha! he is a superior wretch
+- he commands the tribe, and will venture the first into the trap.  How
+will he bite against the steel, the fine fellow! while all the ignobler
+herd will gaze at him afar off, and quake and fear, and never help.  Yet if
+united, they might gnaw the trap and release their leader!  Ah, ye are base
+vermin, ye eat my bread, yet if death came upon me, ye would riot on my
+carcass.  Away!" and clapping his hands, the chain round him clanked
+harshly, and the noisome co-mates of his dungeon vanished in an instant.
+
+That singular and eccentric humour which marked Rienzi, and which had
+seemed a buffoonery to the stolid sullenness of the Roman nobles, still
+retained its old expression in his countenance, and he laughed loud as he
+saw the vermin hurry back to their hiding-place.
+
+"A little noise and the clank of a chain - fie, how ye imitate mankind!" 
+Again he sank into silence, and then heavily and listlessly drawing towards
+him the animated tales of Livy, said, "An hour to midnight! - waking dreams
+are better than sleep.  Well, history tells us how men have risen - ay, and
+nations too - after sadder falls than that of Rienzi or of Rome!"
+
+In a few minutes, he was apparently absorbed in the lecture; so intent
+indeed, was he in the task, that he did not hear the steps which wound the
+spiral stairs that conducted to his cell, and it was not till the wards
+harshly grated beneath the huge key, and the door creaked on its hinges,
+that Rienzi, in amaze at intrusion at so unwonted an hour, lifted his eyes. 
+The door had reclosed on the dungeon, and by the lonely and pale lamp he
+beheld a figure leaning, as for support, against the wall.  The figure was
+wrapped from head to foot in the long cloak of the day, which, aided by a
+broad hat, shaded by plumes, concealed even the features of the visitor.
+
+Rienzi gazed long and wistfully.
+
+"Speak," he said at length, putting his hand to his brow.  "Methinks either
+long solitude has bewildered me, or, sweet sir, your apparition dazzles.  I
+know you not - am I sure? - " and Rienzi's hair bristled while he slowly
+rose - "Am I sure that it is living man who stands before me?  Angels have
+entered the prison-house before now.  Alas! an angel's comfort never was
+more needed."
+
+The stranger answered not, but the captive saw that his heart heaved even
+beneath his cloak; loud sobs choked his voice; at length, as by a violent
+effort, he sprung forward, and sunk at the Tribune's feet.  The disguising
+hat, the long mantle fell to the ground - it was the face of a woman that
+looked upward through passionate and glazing tears - the arms of a woman
+that clasped the prisoner's knees!  Rienzi gazed mute and motionless as
+stone.  "Powers and Saints of Heaven!" he murmured at last, "do ye tempt me
+further! - is it? - no, no - yet speak!"
+
+"Beloved - adored! - do you not know me?"
+
+"It is - it is!" shrieked Rienzi wildly, "it is my Nina - my wife - my - "
+His voice forsook him.  Clasped in each other's arms, the unfortunates for
+some moments seemed to have lost even the sense of delight at their
+reunion.  It was as an unconscious and deep trance, through which something
+like a dream only faintly and indistinctively stirs.
+
+At length recovered - at length restored, the first broken exclamations,
+the first wild caresses of joy over - Nina lifted her head from her
+husband's bosom, and gazed sadly on his countenance - "Oh, what thou hast
+known since we parted! - what, since that hour when, borne on by thy bold
+heart and wild destiny, thou didst leave me in the Imperial Court, to seek
+again the diadem and find the chain!  Ah! why did I heed thy commands? -
+why suffer thee to depart alone?  How often in thy progress hitherward, in
+doubt, in danger, might this bosom have been thy resting-place, and this
+voice have whispered comfort to thy soul?  Thou art well, my Lord - my
+Cola!  Thy pulse beats quicker than of old - thy brow is furrowed.  Ah!
+tell me thou art well!"
+
+"Well,' said Rienzi, mechanically.  "Methinks so! - the mind diseased
+blunts all sense of bodily decay.  Well - yes!  And thou - thou, at least,
+art not changed, save to maturer beauty.  The glory of the laurel-wreath
+has not faded from thy brow.  Thou shalt yet - " then breaking off abruptly
+- "Rome - tell me of Rome!  And thou - how camest thou hither?  Ah! perhaps
+my doom is sealed, and in their mercy they have vouchsafed that I should
+see thee once more before the deathsman blinds me.  I remember, it is the
+grace vouchsafed to malefactors.  When I was a lord of life and death, I
+too permitted the meanest criminal to say farewell to those he loved."
+
+"No - not so, Cola!" exclaimed Nina, putting her hand before his mouth.  "I
+bring thee more auspicious tidings.  Tomorrow thou art to be heard.  The
+favour of the Court is propitiated.  Thou wilt be acquitted."
+
+"Ha! speak again."
+
+"Thou wilt be heard, my Cola - thou must be acquitted!"
+
+"And Rome be free! - Great God, I thank Thee!"
+
+The Tribune sank on his knees, and never had his heart, in his youngest and
+purest hour, poured forth thanksgiving more fervent, yet less selfish. 
+When he rose again, the whole man seemed changed.  His eye had resumed its
+earlier expressions of deep and serene command.  Majesty sate upon his
+brow.  The sorrows of the exile were forgotten.  In his sanguine and rapid
+thoughts, he stood once more the guardian of his country, - and its
+sovereign!
+
+Nina gazed upon him with that intense and devoted worship, which steeped
+her vainer and her harder qualities in all the fondness of the softest
+woman.  "Such," thought she, "was his look eight years ago, when he left my
+maiden chamber, full of the mighty schemes which liberated  Rome - such his
+look, when at the dawning sun he towered amidst the crouching Barons, and
+the kneeling population of the city he had made his throne!"
+
+"Yes, Nina!" said Rienzi, as he turned and caught her eye.  "My soul tells
+me that my hour is at hand.  If they try me openly, they dare not convict -
+if they acquit me, they dare not but restore.  Tomorrow, saidst thou,
+tomorrow?"
+
+"Tomorrow, Rienzi; be prepared!"
+
+"I am - for triumph!  But tell me what happy chance brought thee to
+Avignon?"
+
+"Chance, Cola!" said Nina, with reproachful tenderness.  "Could I know that
+thou wert in the dungeons of the Pontiff, and linger in idle security at
+Prague?  Even at the Emperor's Court thou hadst thy partisans and
+favourers.  Gold was easily procured.  I repaired to Florence - disguised
+my name - and came hither to plot, to scheme, to win thy liberty, or to die
+with thee.  Ah! did not thy heart tell thee that morning and night the eyes
+of thy faithful Nina gazed upon this gloomy tower; and that one friend,
+humble though she be, never could forsake thee!"
+
+"Sweet Nina!  Yet - yet - at Avignon power yields not to beauty without
+reward.  Remember, there is a worse death than the pause of life."
+
+Nina turned pale.  "Fear not," she said, with a low but determined voice;
+"fear not, that men's lips should say Rienzi's wife delivered him.  None in
+this corrupted Court know that I am thy wife."
+
+"Woman," said the Tribune, sternly; "thy lips elude the answer I would
+seek.  In our degenerate time and land, thy sex and ours forget too basely
+what foulness writes a leprosy in the smallest stain upon a matron's
+honour.  That thy heart would never wrong me, I believe; but if thy
+weakness, thy fear of my death should wrong me, thou art a bitterer foe to
+Rienzi than the swords of the Colonna.  Nina, speak!"
+
+"Oh, that my soul could speak," answered Nina.  "Thy words are music to me,
+and not a thought of mine but echoes them.  Could I touch this hand, could
+I meet that eye, and not know that death were dearer to thee than shame? 
+Rienzi, when last we parted, in sadness, yet in hope, what were thy words
+to me?"
+
+"I remember them well," returned the Tribune:  "'I leave thee,' I said, 'to
+keep alive at the Emperor's Court, by thy genius, the Great Cause.  Thou
+hast youth and beauty - and courts have lawless and ruffian suitors.  I
+give thee no caution; it were beneath thee and me.  But I leave thee the
+power of death.'  And with that, Nina - "
+
+"Thy hands tremblingly placed in mine this dagger.  I live - need I say
+more?"
+
+"My noble and beloved Nina, it is enough.  Keep the dagger yet."
+
+"Yes; till we meet in the Capitol of Rome!"
+
+A slight tap was heard at the door; Nina regained, in an instant, her
+disguise.
+
+"It is on the stroke of midnight," said the gaoler, appearing at the
+threshold.
+
+"I come," said Nina.
+
+"And thou hast to prepare thy thoughts," she whispered to Rienzi:  "arm all
+thy glorious intellect.  Alas! is it again we part?  How my heart sinks!"
+
+The presence of the gaoler at the threshold broke the bitterness of parting
+by abridging it.  The false page pressed her lips on the prisoner's hand,
+and left the cell.
+
+The gaoler, lingering behind for a moment, placed a parchment on the table.
+It was the summons from the court appointed for the trial of the Tribune.
+
+
+Chapter 7.VI.  The Scent Does Not Lie. - The Priest and the Soldier.
+
+On descending the stairs, Nina was met by Alvarez.
+
+"Fair page," said the Spaniard, gaily, "thy name, thou tellest me, is
+Villani? - Angelo Villani - why I know thy kinsman, methinks.  Vouchsafe,
+young master, to enter this chamber, and drink a night-cup to thy lady's
+health; I would fain learn tidings of my old friends."
+
+"At another time," answered the false Angelo, drawing the cloak closer
+round her face; it is late - I am hurried."
+
+"Nay," said the Spaniard, "you escape me not so easily;" and he caught firm
+hold of the page's shoulder.
+
+"Unhand me, sir!" said Nina, haughtily, and almost weeping, for her strong
+nerves were yet unstrung.  "Gaoler, at thy peril - unbar the gates."
+
+"So hot," said Alvarez, surprised at so great a waste of dignity in a page;
+"nay, I meant not to offend thee.  May I wait on thy pageship tomorrow?"
+
+"Ay, tomorrow," said Nina, eager to escape.
+
+"And meanwhile," said Alvarez, "I will accompany thee home - we can confer
+by the way."
+
+So saying, without regarding the protestations of the supposed page, he
+passed with Nina into the open air.  "Your lady," said he, carelessly, "is
+wondrous fair; her lightest will is law to the greatest noble of Avignon. 
+Methinks she is of Naples - is it so?  Art thou dumb, sweet youth?"
+
+The page did not answer, but with a step so rapid that it almost put the
+slow Spaniard out of breath, hastened along the narrow space between the
+tower and the palace of the Signora Cesarini, nor could all the efforts of
+Alvarez draw forth a single syllable from his reluctant companion, till
+they reached the gates of the palace, and he found himself discourteously
+left without the walls.
+
+"A plague on the boy!" said he, biting his lips; "if the Cardinal thrive as
+well as his servant, by're Lady, Monsignore is a happy man!"
+
+By no means pleased with the prospect of an interview with Albornoz, who,
+like most able men, valued the talents of those he employed exactly in
+proportion to their success, the Spaniard slowly returned home.  With the
+licence accorded to him, he entered the Cardinal's chamber somewhat
+abruptly, and perceived him in earnest conversation with a Cavalier, whose
+long moustache, curled upward, and the bright cuirass worn underneath his
+mantle, seemed to betoken him of martial profession.  Pleased with the
+respite, Alvarez hastily withdrew:  and, in fact, the Cardinal's thoughts
+at that moment, and for that night, were bent upon other subjects than
+those of love.
+
+The interruption served, however, to shorten the conversation between
+Albornoz and his guest.  The latter rose.
+
+"I think," said he, buckling on a short and broad rapier, which he laid
+aside during the interview, - "I think, my Lord Cardinal, you encourage me
+to consider that our negotiation stands a fair chance of a prosperous
+close.  Ten thousand florins, and my brother quits Viterbo, and launches
+the thunderbolt of the Company on the lands of Rimini.  On your part - "
+
+"On my part it is agreed," said the Cardinal, "that the army of the Church
+interferes not with the course of your brother's arms - there is peace
+between us.  One warrior understands another!"
+
+"And the word of Giles d'Albornoz, son of the royal race of Arragon, is a
+guarantee for the faith of a Cardinal," replied the Cavalier, with a smile. 
+"It is, my Lord, in your former quality that we treat."
+
+"There is my right hand," answered Albornoz, too politic to heed the
+insinuation.  The Cavalier raised it respectfully to his lips, and his
+armed tread was soon heard descending the stairs.
+
+"Victory," cried Albornoz, tossing his arms aloof; "Victory, now thou art
+mine!"
+
+With that he rose hastily, deposited his papers in an iron chest, and
+opening a concealed door behind the arras, entered a chamber that rather
+resembled a monk's cell than the apartment of a prince.  Over a mean pallet
+hung a sword, a dagger, and a rude image of the Virgin.  Without summoning
+Alvarez, the Cardinal unrobed, and in a few moments was asleep.
+
+
+Chapter 7.VII.  Vaucluse and its Genius Loci. - Old Acquaintance Renewed.
+
+The next day at early noon the Cavalier, whom our last chapter presented to
+the reader, was seen mounted on a strong Norman horse, winding his way
+slowly along a green and pleasant path some miles from Avignon.  At length
+he found himself in a wild and romantic valley, through which wandered that
+delightful river whose name the verse of Petrarch has given to so beloved a
+fame.  Sheltered by rocks, and in this part winding through the greenest
+banks, enamelled with a thousand wild flowers and water-weeds, went the
+crystal Sorgia.  Advancing farther, the landscape assumed a more sombre and
+sterile aspect.  The valley seemed enclosed or shut in by fantastic rocks
+of a thousand shapes, down which dashed and glittered a thousand rivulets. 
+And, in the very wildest of the scene, the ground suddenly opened into a
+quaint and cultivated garden, through which, amidst a profusion of foliage,
+was seen a small and lonely mansion, - the hermitage of the place.  The
+horseman was in the valley of the Vaucluse; and before his eye lay the
+garden and the house of PETRARCH!  Carelessly, however, his eye scanned the
+consecrated spot; and unconsciously it rested, for a moment, upon a
+solitary figure seated musingly by the margin of the river.  A large dog at
+the side of the noonday idler barked at the horseman as he rode on.  "A
+brave animal and a deep bay!" thought the traveller; to him the dog seemed
+an object much more interesting than its master.  And so, - as the crowd of
+little men pass unheeding and unmoved, those in whom Posterity shall
+acknowledge the landmarks of their age, - the horseman turned his glance
+from the Poet!
+
+Thrice blessed name!  Immortal Florentine!  (I need scarcely say that it is
+his origin, not his actual birth, which entitles us to term Petrarch a
+Florentine.) not as the lover, nor even as the poet, do I bow before thy
+consecrated memory - venerating thee as one it were sacrilege to introduce
+in this unworthy page - save by name and as a shadow; but as the first who
+ever asserted to people and to prince the august majesty of Letters; who
+claimed to Genius the prerogative to influence states, to control opinion,
+to hold an empire over the hearts of men, and prepare events by animating
+passion, and guiding thought!  What, (though but feebly felt and dimly
+seen) - what do we yet owe to Thee if Knowledge be now a Power; if MIND be
+a Prophet and a Fate, foretelling and foredooming the things to come!  From
+the greatest to the least of us, to whom the pen is at once a sceptre and a
+sword, the low-born Florentine has been the arch-messenger to smooth the
+way and prepare the welcome.  Yes! even the meanest of the aftercomers -
+even he who now vents his gratitude, - is thine everlasting debtor!  Thine,
+how largely is the honour, if his labours, humble though they be, find an
+audience wherever literature is known; preaching in remotest lands the
+moral of forgotten revolutions, and scattering in the palace and the
+marketplace the seeds that shall ripen into fruit when the hand of the
+sower shall be dust, and his very name, perhaps, be lost!  For few, alas!
+are they, whose names may outlive the grave; but the thoughts of every man
+who writes, are made undying; - others appropriate, advance, exalt them;
+and millions of minds unknown, undreamt of, are required to produce the
+immortality of one!
+
+Indulging meditations very different from those which the idea of Petrarch
+awakens in a later time, the Cavalier pursued his path.
+
+The valley was long left behind, and the way grew more and more faintly
+traced, until it terminated in a wood, through whose tangled boughs the
+sunlight broke playfully.  At length, the wood opened into a wide glade,
+from which rose a precipitous ascent, crowned with the ruins of an old
+castle.  The traveller dismounted, led his horse up the ascent, and,
+gaining the ruins, left his steed within one of the roofless chambers,
+overgrown with the longest grass and a profusion of wild shrubs; thence
+ascending, with some toil, a narrow and broken staircase, he found himself
+in a small room, less decayed than the rest, of which the roof and floor
+were yet whole.
+
+Stretched on the ground in his cloak, and leaning his head thoughtfully on
+his hand, was a man of tall stature, and middle age.  He lifted himself on
+his arm with great alacrity as the Cavalier entered.
+
+"Well, Brettone, I have counted the hours - what tidings?"
+
+"Albornoz consents."
+
+"Glad news!  Thou givest me new life.  Pardieu, I shall breakfast all the
+better for this, my brother.  Hast thou remembered that I am famishing?"
+
+Brettone drew from beneath his cloak a sufficiently huge flask of wine, and
+a small panier, tolerably well filled; the inmate of the tower threw
+himself upon the provant with great devotion.  And both the soldiers, for
+such they were, stretched at length on the ground, regaled themselves with
+considerable zest, talking hastily and familiarly between every mouthful.
+
+"I say, Brettone, thou playest unfairly; thou hast already devoured more
+than half the pasty:  push it hitherward.  And so the Cardinal consents! 
+What manner of man is he?  Able as they say?"
+
+"Quick, sharp, and earnest, with an eye of fire, few words, and comes to
+the point."
+
+"Unlike a priest then; - a good brigand spoilt.  What hast thou heard of
+the force he heads?  Ho, not so fast with the wine."
+
+"Scanty at present. - He relies on recruits throughout Italy."
+
+"What his designs for Rome?  There, my brother, there tends my secret soul! 
+As for these petty towns and petty tyrants, I care not how they fall, or by
+whom.  But the Pope must not return to Rome.  Rome must be mine.  The city
+of a new empire, the conquest of a new Attila!  There, every circumstance
+combines in my favour! - the absence of the Pope, the weakness of the
+middle class, the poverty of the populace, the imbecile though ferocious
+barbarism of the Barons, have long concurred to render Rome the most
+facile, while the most glorious conquest!"
+
+"My brother, pray Heaven your ambition do not wreck you at last; you are
+ever losing sight of the land.  Surely with the immense wealth we are
+acquiring, we may - "
+
+"Aspire to be something greater than Free Companions, generals today, and
+adventurers tomorrow.  Rememberest thou, how the Norman sword won Sicily,
+and how the bastard William converted on the field of Hastings his baton
+into a sceptre.  I tell thee, Brettone, that this loose Italy has crowns on
+the hedge that a dexterous hand may carry off at the point of the lance. 
+My course is taken, I will form the fairest army in Italy, and with it I
+will win a throne in the Capitol.  Fool that I was six years ago! - Instead
+of deputing that mad dolt Pepin of Minorbino, had I myself deserted the
+Hungarian, and repaired with my soldiery to Rome, the fall of Rienzi would
+have been followed by the rise of Montreal.  Pepin was outwitted, and threw
+away the prey after he had hunted it down.  The lion shall not again trust
+the chase to the jackal!"
+
+"Walter, thou speakest of the fate of Rienzi, let it warn thee!"
+
+"Rienzi!" replied Montreal; "I know the man!  In peaceful times or with an
+honest people, he would have founded a great dynasty.  But he dreamt of
+laws and liberty for men who despise the first and will not protect the
+last.  We, of a harder race, know that a new throne must be built by the
+feudal and not the civil system; and into the city we must transport the
+camp.  It is by the multitude that the proud Tribune gained power, - by the
+multitude he lost it; it is by the sword that I will win it, and by the
+sword will I keep it!"
+
+"Rienzi was too cruel, he should not have incensed the Barons," said
+Brettone, about to finish the flask, when the strong hand of his brother
+plucked it from him, and anticipated the design.
+
+"Pooh," said Montreal, finishing the draught with a long sigh, "he was not
+cruel enough.  He sought only to be just, and not to distinguish between
+noble and peasant.  He should have distinguished!  He should have
+exterminated the nobles root and branch.  But this no Italian can do.  This
+is reserved for me."
+
+"Thou wouldst not butcher all the best blood of Rome?"
+
+"Butcher!  No, but I would seize their lands, and endow with them a new
+nobility, the hardy and fierce nobility of the North, who well know how to
+guard their prince, and will guard him, as the fountain of their own power. 
+Enough of this now.  And talking of Rienzi - rots he still in his dungeon?"
+
+"Why, this morning, ere I left, I heard strange news.  The town was astir,
+groups in every corner.  They said that Rienzi's trial was to be today, and
+from the names of the judges chosen, it is suspected that acquittal is
+already determined on."
+
+"Ha! thou shouldst have told me of this before."
+
+"Should he be restored to Rome, would it militate against thy plans?"
+
+"Humph!  I know not - deep thought and dexterous management would be
+needed.  I would fain not leave this spot till I hear what is decided on."
+
+"Surely, Walter, it would have been wiser and safer to have stayed with thy
+soldiery, and intrusted me with the absolute conduct of this affair."
+
+"Not so," answered Montreal; "thou art a bold fellow enough, and a cunning
+- but my head in these matters is better than thine.  Besides," continued
+the Knight, lowering his voice, and shading his face, "I had vowed a
+pilgrimage to the beloved river, and the old trysting-place.  Ah me! - But
+all this, Brettone, thou understandest not - let it pass.  As for my
+safety, since we have come to this amnesty with Albornoz, I fear but little
+danger even if discovered:  besides, I want the florins.  There are those
+in this country, Germans, who could eat an Italian army at a meal, whom I
+would fain engage, and their leaders want earnest-money - the griping
+knaves! - How are the Cardinal's florins to be paid?"
+
+"Half now - half when thy troops are before Rimini!"
+
+"Rimini! the thought whets my sword.  Rememberest thou how that accursed
+Malatesta drove me from Aversa, (This Malatesta, a signior of illustrious
+family, was one of the most skilful warriors in Italy.  He and his brother
+Galeotto had been raised to the joint-tyranny of Rimini by the voice of its
+citizens.  After being long the foes of the Church, they were ultimately
+named as its captains by the Cardinal Albornoz.) broke up my camp, and made
+me render to him all my booty?  There fell the work of years!  But for
+that, my banner now would be floating over St. Angelo.  I will pay back the
+debt with fire and sword, ere the summer has shed its leaves."
+
+The fair countenance of Montreal grew terrible as he uttered these words;
+his hands griped the handle of his sword, and his strong frame heaved
+visibly; tokens of the fierce and unsparing passions, by the aid of which a
+life of rapine and revenge had corrupted a nature originally full no less
+of the mercy than the courage of Provencal chivalry.
+
+Such was the fearful man who now (the wildness of his youth sobered, and
+his ambition hardened and concentered) was the rival with Rienzi for the
+mastery of Rome.
+
+
+Chapter 7.VIII.  The Crowd. - The Trial. - The Verdict. - The Soldier and
+the Page.
+
+It was on the following evening that a considerable crowd had gathered in
+the streets of Avignon.  It was the second day of the examination of
+Rienzi, and with every moment was expected the announcement of the verdict. 
+Amongst the foreigners of all countries assembled in that seat of the Papal
+splendour, the interest was intense.  The Italians, even of the highest
+rank, were in favour of the Tribune, the French against him.  As for the
+good townspeople of Avignon themselves, they felt but little excitement in
+any thing that did not bring money into their pockets; and if it had been
+put to the secret vote, no doubt there would have been a vast majority for
+burning the prisoner, as a marketable speculation!
+
+Amongst the crowd was a tall man in a plain and rusty suit of armour, but
+with an air of knightly bearing, which somewhat belied the coarseness of
+his mail; he wore no helmet, but a small morion of black leather, with a
+long projecting shade, much used by wayfarers in the hot climates of the
+south.  A black patch covered nearly the whole of one cheek, and altogether
+he bore the appearance of a grim soldier, with whom war had dealt harshly,
+both in purse and person.
+
+Many were the jests at the shabby swordsman's expense, with which that
+lively population amused their impatience; and though the shade of the
+morion concealed his eyes, an arch and merry smile about the corners of his
+mouth shewed that he could take a jest at himself.
+
+"Well," said one of the crowd, (a rich Milanese,) "I am of a state that was
+free, and I trust the People's man will have justice shewn him."
+
+"Amen," said a grave Florentine.
+
+"They say," whispered a young student from Paris, to a learned doctor of
+laws, with whom he abode, "that his defence has been a masterpiece."
+
+"He hath taken no degrees," replied the doctor, doubtingly.  "Ho, friend,
+why dost thou push me so? thou hast rent my robe."
+
+This was said to a minstrel, or jongleur, who, with a small lute slung
+round him, was making his way, with great earnestness, through the throng.
+
+"I beg pardon, worthy sir," said the minstrel; "but this is a scene to be
+sung of!  Centuries hence; ay, and in lands remote, legend and song will
+tell the fortunes of Cola di Rienzi, the friend of Petrarch and the Tribune
+of Rome!"
+
+The young French student turned quickly round to the minstrel, with a glow
+on his pale face; not sharing the general sentiments of his countrymen
+against Rienzi, he felt that it was an era in the world when a minstrel
+spoke thus of the heroes of intellect - not of war.
+
+At this time the tall soldier was tapped impatiently on the back.
+
+"I pray thee, great sir," said a sharp and imperious voice, "to withdraw
+that tall bulk of thine a little on one side - I cannot see through thee;
+and I would fain my eyes were among the first to catch a glimpse of Rienzi
+as he passes from the court."
+
+"Fair sir page," replied the soldier, good-humouredly, as he made way for
+Angelo Villani, "thou wilt not always find that way in the world is won by
+commanding the strong.  When thou art older thou wilt beard the weak, and
+the strong thou wilt wheedle."
+
+"I must change my nature, then," answered Angelo, (who was of somewhat
+small stature, and not yet come to his full growth,) trying still to raise
+himself above the heads of the crowd.
+
+The soldier looked at him approvingly; and as he looked he sighed, and his
+lips worked with some strange emotion.
+
+"Thou speakest well," said he, after a pause.  "Pardon me the rudeness of
+the question; but art thou of Italy? - thy tongue savours of the Roman
+dialect; yet I have seen lineaments like thine on this side the Alps."
+
+"It may be, good fellow," said the page, haughtily; "but I thank Heaven
+that I am of Rome."
+
+At this moment a loud shout burst from that part of the crowd nearest the
+court.  The sound of trumpets again hushed the throng into deep and
+breathless silence, while the Pope's guards, ranged along the space
+conducting from the court, drew themselves up more erect, and fell a step
+or two back upon the crowd.
+
+As the trumpet ceased, the voice of a herald was heard, but it did not
+penetrate within several yards of the spot where Angelo and the soldier
+stood; and it was only by a mighty shout that in a moment circled through,
+and was echoed back by, the wide multitude - by the waving of kerchiefs
+from the windows - by broken ejaculations, which were caught up from lip to
+lip, that the page knew that Rienzi was acquitted.
+
+"I would I could see his face!" sighed the page, querulously.
+
+"And thou shalt," said the soldier; and he caught up the boy in his arms,
+and pressed on with the strength of a giant, parting the living stream from
+right to left, as he took his way to a place near the guards, and by which
+Rienzi was sure to pass.
+
+The page, half-pleased, half-indignant, struggled a little, but finding it
+in vain, consented tacitly to what he felt an outrage on his dignity.
+
+"Never mind," said the soldier, "thou art the first I ever willingly raised
+above myself; and I do it now for the sake of thy fair face, which reminds
+me of one I loved."
+
+But these last words were spoken low, and the boy, in his anxiety to see
+the hero of Rome, did not hear or heed them.  Presently Rienzi came by; two
+gentlemen, of the Pope's own following, walked by his side.  He moved
+slowly, amidst the greetings and clamour of the crowd, looking neither to
+the right nor left.  His bearing was firm and collected, and, save by the
+flush of his cheek, there was no external sign of joy or excitement. 
+Flowers dropped from every balcony on his path; and just when he came to a
+broader space, where the ground was somewhat higher, and where he was in
+fuller view of the houses around, he paused - and, uncovering, acknowledged
+the homage he had received, with a look - a gesture - which each who beheld
+never forgot.  It haunted even that gay and thoughtless court, when the
+last tale of Rienzi's life reached their ears.  And Angelo, clinging then
+round that soldier's neck, recalled - but we must not anticipate.
+
+It was not, however, to the dark tower that Rienzi returned.  His home was
+prepared at the palace of the Cardinal d'Albornoz.  The next day he was
+admitted to the Pope's presence, and on the evening of that day he was
+proclaimed Senator of Rome.
+
+Meanwhile the soldier had placed Angelo on the ground; and as the page
+faltered out no courteous thanks, he interrupted him in a sad and kind
+voice, the tone of which struck the page forcibly, so little did it suit
+the rough and homely appearance of the man.
+
+"We part," he said, "as strangers, fair boy; and since thou sayest thou art
+of Rome, there is no reason why my heart should have warmed to thee as it
+has done; yet if ever thou wantest a friend, - seek him" - and the
+soldier's voice sunk into a whisper - "in Walter de Montreal."
+
+Ere the page recovered his surprise at that redoubted name, which his
+earliest childhood had been taught to dread, the Knight of St. John had
+vanished amongst the crowd.
+
+
+Chapter 7.IX.  Albornoz and Nina.
+
+But the eyes which, above all others, thirsted for a glimpse of the
+released captive were forbidden that delight.  Alone in her chamber, Nina
+awaited the result of the trial.  She heard the shouts, the exclamations,
+the tramp of thousands along the street; she felt that the victory was won;
+and, her heart long overcharged, she burst into passionate tears.  The
+return of Angelo soon acquainted her with all that had passed; but it
+somewhat chilled her joy to find Rienzi was the guest of the dreaded
+Cardinal.  That shock, in which certainty, however happy, replaces
+suspense, had so powerful an effect on her frame, joined to her loathing
+fear of a visit from the Cardinal, that she became for three days
+alarmingly ill; and it was only on the fifth day from that which saw Rienzi
+endowed with the rank of Senator of Rome, that she was recovered
+sufficiently to admit Albornoz to her presence.
+
+The Cardinal had sent daily to inquire after her health, and his inquiries,
+to her alarmed mind, had appeared to insinuate a pretension to the right to
+make them.  Meanwhile Albornoz had had enough to divert and occupy his
+thoughts.  Having bought off the formidable Montreal from the service of
+John de Vico, one of the ablest and fiercest enemies of the Church, he
+resolved to march to the territories of that tyrant as expeditiously as
+possible, and so not to allow him time to obtain the assistance of any
+other band of the mercenary adventurers, who found Italy the market for
+their valour.  Occupied with raising troops, procuring money, corresponding
+with the various free states, and establishing alliances in aid of his
+ulterior and more ambitious projects at the court of Avignon, the Cardinal
+waited with tolerable resignation the time when he might claim from the
+Signora Cesarini the reward to which he deemed himself entitled.  Meanwhile
+he had held his first conversations with Rienzi, and, under the semblance
+of courtesy to the acquitted Tribune, Albornoz had received him as his
+guest, in order to make himself master of the character and disposition of
+one in whom he sought a minister and a tool.  That miraculous and magic
+art, attested by the historians of the time, which Rienzi possessed over
+every one with whom he came into contact, however various in temper,
+station, or opinions, had not deserted him in his interview with the
+Pontiff.  So faithfully had he described the true condition of Rome, so
+logically had he traced the causes and the remedies of the evils she
+endured, so sanguinely had he spoken of his own capacities for
+administering her affairs, and so brilliantly had he painted the prospects
+which that administration opened to the weal of the Church, and the
+interests of the Pope, that Innocent, though a keen and shrewd, and
+somewhat sceptical calculator of human chances, was entirely fascinated by
+the eloquence of the Roman.
+
+"Is this the man," he is reported to have said, "whom for twelve months we
+have treated as a prisoner and a criminal?  Would that it were on his
+shoulders only that the Christian empire reposed!"
+
+At the close of the interview he had, with every mark of favour and
+distinction, conferred upon Rienzi the rank of Senator, which, in fact, was
+that of Viceroy of Rome, and had willingly acceded to all the projects
+which the enterprising Rienzi had once more formed - not only for
+recovering the territories of the Church, but for extending the dictatorial
+sway of the Seven-hilled City, over the old dependencies of Italy.
+
+Albornoz, to whom the Pope retailed this conversation, was somewhat jealous
+of the favour the new Senator had so suddenly acquired, and immediately on
+his return home sought an interview with his guest.  In his heart, the Lord
+Cardinal, emphatically a man of action and business, regarded Rienzi as one
+rather cunning than wise - rather fortunate than great - a mixture of the
+pedant and the demagogue.  But after a long and scrutinizing conversation
+with the new Senator, even he yielded to the spell of his enchanting and
+master intellect.  Reluctantly Albornoz confessed to himself that Rienzi's
+rise was not the thing of chance; yet more reluctantly he perceived that
+the Senator was one whom he might treat with as an equal, but could not
+rule as a minion.  And he entertained serious doubts whether it would be
+wise to reinstate him in a power which he evinced the capacity to wield and
+the genius to extend.  Still, however, he did not repent the share he had
+taken in Rienzi's acquittal.  His presence in a camp so thinly peopled was
+a matter greatly to be desired.  And through his influence, the Cardinal
+more than ever trusted to enlist the Romans in favour of his enterprise for
+the recovery of the territory of St. Peter!
+
+Rienzi, who panted once more to behold his Nina, endeared to him by trial
+and absence, as by fresh bridals, was not however able to discover the name
+she had assumed at Avignon; and his residence with the Cardinal closely but
+respectfully watched as he was, forbade Nina all opportunity of
+corresponding with him.  Some half bantering hints which Albornoz had
+dropped upon the interest taken in his welfare by the most celebrated
+beauty of Avignon, had filled him with a vague alarm which he trembled to
+acknowledge even to himself.  But the volto sciolto (Volto sciolto,
+pensieri stretti - the countenance open, the thoughts restrained.) which,
+in common with all Italian politicians, concealed whatever were his
+pensieri stretti - enabled him to baffle completely the jealous and
+lynxlike observation of the Cardinal.  Nor had Alvarez been better enabled
+to satisfy the curiosity of his master.  He had indeed sought the page
+Villani, but the imperious manner of that wayward and haughty boy had cut
+short all attempts at cross-examination.  And all he could ascertain was,
+that the real Angelo Villani was not the Angelo Villani who had visited
+Rienzi.
+
+Trusting at last that he should learn all, and inflamed by such passion and
+such hope as he was capable of feeling, Albornoz now took his way to the
+Cesarini's palace.
+
+He was ushered with due state into the apartment of the Signora.  He found
+her pale, and with the traces of illness upon her noble and statuelike
+features.  She rose as he entered; and when he approached, she half bent
+her knee, and raised his hand to her lips.  Surprised and delighted at a
+reception so new, the Cardinal hastened to prevent the condescension;
+retaining both her hands, he attempted gently to draw them to his heart.
+
+"Fairest!" he whispered, "couldst thou know hear I have mourned thy illness
+- and yet it has but left thee more lovely, as the rain only brightens the
+flower.  Ah! happy if I have promoted thy lightest wish, and if in thine
+eyes I may henceforth seek at once an angel to guide me and a paradise to
+reward."
+
+Nina, releasing her hand, waved it gently, and motioned the Cardinal to a
+seat.  Seating herself at a little distance, she then spoke with great
+gravity and downcast eyes.
+
+"My Lord, it is your intercession, joined to his own innocence, that has
+released from yonder tower the elected governor of the people of Rome.  But
+freedom is the least of the generous gifts you have conferred; there is a
+greater in a fair name vindicated, and rightful honours re-bestowed.  For
+this, I rest ever your debtor; for this, if I bear children, they shall be
+taught to bless your name; for this the historian who recalls the deeds of
+this age, and the fortunes of Cola di Rienzi, shall add a new chaplet to
+the wreaths you have already won.  Lord Cardinal, I may have erred.  I may
+have offended you - you may accuse me of woman's artifice.  Speak not,
+wonder not, hear me out.  I have but one excuse, when I say that I held
+justified any means short of dishonour, to save the life and restore the
+fortunes of Cola di Rienzi.  Know, my Lord, that she who now addresses you
+is his wife."
+
+The Cardinal remained motionless and silent.  But his sallow countenance
+grew flushed from the brow to the neck, and his thin lips quivered for a
+moment, and then broke into a withering and bitter smile.  At length he
+rose from his seat, very slowly, and said, in a voice trembling with
+passion,
+
+"It is well, madam.  Giles d'Albornoz has been, then, a puppet in the
+hands, a stepping-stone in the rise, of the plebeian demagogue of Rome. 
+You but played upon me for your own purposes; and nothing short of a
+Cardinal of Spain, and a Prince of the royal blood of Aragon, was meet to
+be the instrument of a mountebank's juggle!  Madam, yourself and your
+husband might justly be accused of ambition - "
+
+"Cease, my Lord," said Nina, with unspeakable dignity; "whatever offence
+has been committed against you was mine alone.  Till after our last
+interview, Rienzi knew not even of my presence at Avignon."
+
+"At our last interview, Lady, (you do well to recall it!) methinks there
+was a hinted and implied contract.  I have fulfilled my part - I claim
+yours.  Mark me!  I do not forego that claim.  As easily as I rend this
+glove can I rend the parchment which proclaims thy husband 'the Senator of
+Rome.'  The dungeon is not death, and its door will open twice."
+
+"My Lord - my Lord!" cried Nina, sick with terror, "wrong not so your noble
+nature, your great name, your sacred rank, your chivalric blood.  You are
+of the knightly race of Spain, yours not the sullen, low, and inexorable
+vices that stain the petty tyrants of this unhappy land.  You are no
+Visconti - no Castracani - you cannot stain your laurels with revenge upon
+a woman.  Hear me," she continued, and she fell abruptly at his feet; "men
+dupe, deceive our sex - and for selfish purposes; they are pardoned - even
+by their victims.  Did I deceive you with a false hope?  Well - what my
+object? - what my excuse?  My husband's liberty - my land's salvation! 
+Woman, - my Lord, alas, your sex too rarely understand her weakness or her
+greatness!  Erring - all human as she is to others - God gifts her with a
+thousand virtues to the one she loves!  It is from that love that she alone
+drinks her nobler nature.  For the hero of her worship she has the meekness
+of the dove - the devotion of the saint; for his safety in peril, for his
+rescue in misfortune, her vain sense imbibes the sagacity of the serpent -
+her weak heart, the courage of the lioness!  It is this which, in absence,
+made me mask my face in smiles, that the friends of the houseless exile
+might not despair of his fate - it is this which brought me through forests
+beset with robbers, to watch the stars upon yon solitary tower - it was
+this which led my steps to the revels of your hated court - this which made
+me seek a deliverer in the noblest of its chiefs - it is this which has at
+last opened the dungeon door to the prisoner now within your halls; and
+this, Lord Cardinal," added Nina, rising, and folding her arms upon her
+heart - "this, if your anger seeks a victim, will inspire me to die without
+a groan, - but without dishonour!"
+
+Albornoz remained rooted to the ground.  Amazement - emotion - admiration -
+all busy at his heart.  He gazed at Nina's flashing eyes and heaving bosom
+as a warrior of old upon a prophetess inspired.  His eyes were riveted to
+hers as by a spell.  He tried to speak, but his voice failed him.  Nina
+continued:
+
+"Yes, my Lord; these are no idle words!  If you seek revenge, it is in your
+power.  Undo what you have done.  Give Rienzi back to the dungeon, or to
+disgrace, and you are avenged; but not on him.  All the hearts of Italy
+shall become to him a second Nina!  I am the guilty one, and I the
+sufferer.  Hear me swear - in that instant which sees new wrong to Rienzi,
+this hand is my executioner. - My Lord, I supplicate you no longer!"
+
+Albornoz continued deeply moved.  Nina but rightly judged him, when she
+distinguished the aspiring Spaniard from the barbarous and unrelenting
+voluptuaries of Italy.  Despite the profligacy that stained his sacred robe
+- despite all the acquired and increasing callousness of a hard, scheming,
+and sceptical man, cast amidst the worst natures of the worst of times -
+there lingered yet in his soul much of the knightly honour of his race and
+country.  High thoughts and daring spirits touched a congenial string in
+his heart, and not the less, in that he had but rarely met them in his
+experience of camps and courts.  For the first time in his life, he felt
+that he had seen the woman who could have contented him even with wedlock,
+and taught him the proud and faithful love of which the minstrels of Spain
+had sung.  He sighed, and still gazing on Nina, approached her, almost
+reverentially; he knelt and kissed the hem of her robe.  "Lady," he said,
+"I would I could believe that you have altogether read my nature aright,
+but I were indeed lost to all honour, and unworthy of gentle birth, if I
+still harboured a single thought against the peace and virtue of one like
+thee.  Sweet heroine," - he continued - "so lovely, yet so pure - so
+haughty, and yet so soft - thou hast opened to me the brightest page these
+eyes have ever scanned in the blotted volume of mankind.  Mayest thou have
+such happiness as life can give; but souls such as thine make their nest
+like the eagle, upon rocks and amidst the storms.  Fear me no more - think
+of me no more - unless hereafter, when thou hearest men speak of Giles
+d'Albornoz, thou mayest say in thine own heart," - and here the Cardinal's
+lip curled with scorn - "he did not renounce every feeling worthy of a man,
+when Ambition and Fate endued him with the surplice of the priest."
+
+The Spaniard was gone before Nina could reply.
+
+
+
+BOOK VIII.  THE GRAND COMPANY.
+
+"Montreal nourrissoit de plus vastes projets...il donnoit a sa campagnie un
+gouvernement regulier...Par cette discipline il faisoit regner l'abondance
+dans son camp; les gens de guerre ne parloient, en Italie, que des
+richesses qu'on acqueroit a son service." - Sismondi, "Histoire des
+Republiques Italiennes", tom. vi. c. 42.
+
+"Montreal cherished more vast designs...he subjected his company to a
+regular system of government...By means of this discipline he kept his camp
+abundantly supplied, and military adventurers in Italy talked of nothing
+but the wealth won in his service." - Sismondi's "History of Italian
+Republics".
+
+
+Chapter 8.I.  The Encampment.
+
+It was a most lovely day, in the very glow and meridian of an Italian
+summer, when a small band of horsemen were seen winding a hill which
+commanded one of the fairest landscapes of Tuscany.  At their head was a
+cavalier in a complete suit of chain armour, the links of which were so
+fine, that they resembled a delicate and curious network, but so strongly
+compacted, that they would have resisted spear or sword no less effectually
+than the heaviest corselet, while adapting themselves exactly and with ease
+to every movement of the light and graceful shape of the rider.  He wore a
+hat of dark green velvet shaded by long plumes, while of two squires
+behind, the one bore his helmet and lance, the other led a strong warhorse,
+completely cased in plates of mail, which seemed, however, scarcely to
+encumber its proud and agile paces.  The countenance of the cavalier was
+comely, but strongly marked, and darkened, by long exposure to the suns of
+many climes, to a deep bronze hue:  a few raven ringlets escaped from
+beneath his hat down a cheek closely shaven.  The expression of his
+features was grave and composed even to sadness; nor could all the
+loveliness of the unrivalled scene before him dispel the quiet and settled
+melancholy of his eyes.  Besides the squires, ten horsemen, armed cap-a-
+pie, attended the knight; and the low and murmured conversation they
+carried on at intervals, as well as their long fair hair, large stature,
+thick short beards, and the studied and accurate equipment of their arms
+and steeds, bespoke them of a hardier and more warlike race than the
+children of the south.  The cavalcade was closed with a man almost of
+gigantic height, bearing a banner richly decorated, wherein was wrought a
+column, with the inscription, "ALONE AMIDST RUINS."  Fair indeed was the
+prospect which with every step expanded yet more widely its various beauty. 
+Right before stretched a long vale, now covered with green woodlands
+glittering in the yellow sunlight, now opening into narrow plains bordered
+by hillocks, from whose mosses of all hues grew fantastic and odorous
+shrubs; while, winding amidst them, a broad and silver stream broke into
+light at frequent intervals, snatched by wood and hillock from the eye,
+only to steal upon it again, in sudden and bright surprise.  The opposite
+slope of gentle mountains, as well as that which the horsemen now
+descended, was covered with vineyards, trained in alleys and arcades:  and
+the clustering grape laughed from every leafy and glossy covert, as gaily
+as when the Fauns held a holiday in the shade.  The eye of the Cavalier
+roved listlessly over this enchanting prospect, sleeping in the rosiest
+light of a Tuscan heaven, and then became fixed with a more earnest
+attention on the grey and frowning walls of a distant castle, which, high
+upon the steepest of the opposite mountains, overlooked the valley.
+
+"Behold," he muttered to himself, "how every Eden in Italy hath its curse! 
+Wherever the land smiles fairest, be sure to find the brigand's tent and
+the tyrant's castle!"
+
+Scarce had these thoughts passed his mind, ere the shrill and sudden blast
+of a bugle that sounded close amongst the vineyards by the side of the path
+startled the whole group.  The cavalcade halted abruptly.  The leader made
+a gesture to the squire who led his war-horse.  The noble and practised
+animal remained perfectly still, save by champing its bit restlessly, and
+moving its quick ear to and fro, as aware of a coming danger, - while the
+squire, unencumbered by the heavy armour of the Germans, plunged into the
+thicket and disappeared.  He returned in a few minutes, already heated and
+breathless.
+
+"We must be on our guard," he whispered; "I see the glimmer of steel
+through the vine leaves."
+
+"Our ground is unhappily chosen," said the Knight, hastily bracing on his
+helmet and leaping on his charger; and waving his hand towards a broader
+space in the road, which would permit the horsemen more room to act in
+union, with his small band he made hastily to the spot - the armour of the
+soldiers rattling heavily as two by two they proceeded on.
+
+The space to which the Cavalier had pointed was a green semicircle of
+several yards in extent, backed by tangled copses of brushwood sloping down
+to the vale below.  They reached it in safety; they drew up breast to
+breast in the form of a crescent:  every visor closed save that of the
+Knight, who looked anxiously and keenly round the landscape.
+
+"Hast thou heard, Giulio," he said, to his favourite squire, (the only
+Italian of the band,) "whether any brigands have been seen lately in these
+parts?"
+
+"No, my Lord; on the contrary, I am told that every lance hath left the
+country to join the Grand Company of Fra Moreale.  The love of his pay and
+plunder has drawn away the mercenaries of every Tuscan Signor."
+
+As he ceased speaking, the bugle sounded again from nearly the same spot as
+before; it was answered by a brief and martial note from the very rear of
+the horsemen.  At the same moment, from the thickets behind, broke the
+gleam of mail and spears.  One after another, rank after rank, from the
+copse behind them, emerged men-at-arms, while suddenly, from the vines in
+front, still greater numbers poured forth with loud and fierce shouts.
+
+"For God, for the Emperor, and for the Colonna!" cried the Knight, closing
+his visor; and the little band, closely serried, the lance in every rest,
+broke upon the rush of the enemy in front.  A score or so, borne to the
+ground by the charge, cleared a path for the horsemen, and, without waiting
+the assault of the rest, the Knight wheeled his charger and led the way
+down the hill, almost at full gallop, despite the roughness of the descent: 
+a flight of arrows despatched after them fell idly on their iron mail.
+
+"If they have no horse," cried the Knight, "we are saved!"
+
+And, indeed, the enemy seemed scarcely to think of pursuing them; but
+(gathered on the brow of a hill) appeared contented to watch their flight.
+
+Suddenly a curve in the road brought them before a broad and wide patch of
+waste land, which formed almost a level surface, interrupting the descent
+of the mountain.  On the commencement of this waste, drawn up in still
+array, the sunlight broke on the breastplates of a long line of horsemen,
+whom the sinuosities of the road had hitherto concealed from the Knight and
+his party.
+
+The little troop halted abruptly - retreat - advance alike cut off; gazing
+first at the foe before them, that remained still as a cloud, every eye was
+then turned towards the Knight.
+
+"An thou wouldst, my Lord," said the leader of the Northmen, perceiving the
+irresolution of their chief, "we will fight to the last.  You are the only
+Italian I ever knew whom I would willingly die for!"
+
+This rude profession was received with a sympathetic murmur from the rest,
+and the soldiers drew closer around the Knight.  "Nay, my brave fellows,"
+said the Colonna, lifting his visor, "it is not in so inglorious a field,
+after such various fortunes, that we are doomed to perish.  If these be
+brigands, as we must suppose, we can yet purchase our way.  If the troops
+of some Signor, we are strangers to the feud in which he is engaged.  Give
+me yon banner - I will ride on to them."
+
+"Nay, my Lord," said Giulio; "such marauders do not always spare a flag of
+truce.  There is danger - "
+
+"For that reason your leader braves it.  Quick!"
+
+The Knight took the banner, and rode deliberately up to the horsemen.  On
+approaching, his warlike eye could not but admire the perfect caparison of
+their arms, the strength and beauty of their steeds, and the steady
+discipline of their long and glittering line.
+
+As he rode up, and his gorgeous banner gleamed in the noonlight, the
+soldiers saluted him.  It was a good omen, and he hailed it as such.  "Fair
+sirs," said the Knight, "I come, at once herald and leader of the little
+band who have just escaped the unlooked-for assault of armed men on yonder
+hill - and, claiming aid, as knight from knight, and soldier from soldier,
+I place my troop under the protection of your leader.  Suffer me to see
+him."
+
+"Sir Knight," answered one, who seemed the captain of the band, "sorry am I
+to detain one of your gallant bearing, and still more so, on recognising 
+the device of one of the most potent houses of Italy.  But our orders are
+strict, and we must bring all armed men to the camp of our General."
+
+"Long absent from my native land, I knew not," replied the Knight, "that
+there was war in Tuscany.  Permit me to crave the name of the general whom
+you speak of, and that of the foe against whom ye march."
+
+The Captain smiled slightly.
+
+"Walter de Montreal is the General of the Great Company, and Florence his
+present foe."
+
+"We have fallen, then, into friendly, if fierce, hands," replied the
+Knight, after a moment's pause.  "To Sir Walter de Montreal I am known of
+old.  Permit me to return to my companions, and acquaint them that if
+accident has made us prisoners, it is, at least, only to the most skilful
+warrior of his day that we are condemned to yield."
+
+The Italian then turned his horse to join his comrades.
+
+"A fair Knight and a bold presence," said the Captain of the Companions to
+his neighbour, "though I scarce think it is the party we are ordered to
+intercept.  Praised be the Virgin, however, his men seem from the North. 
+Them, perhaps, we may hope to enlist."
+
+The Knight now, with his comrades, rejoined the troop.  And, on receiving
+their parole not to attempt escape, a detachment of thirty horsemen were
+despatched to conduct the prisoners to the encampment of the Great Company.
+
+Turning from the main road, the Knight found himself conducted into a
+narrow defile between the hills, which, succeeded by a gloomy track of wild
+forest-land, brought the party at length into a full and abrupt view of a
+wide plain, covered with the tents of what, for Italian warfare, was
+considered a mighty army.  A stream, over which rude and hasty bridges had
+been formed from the neighbouring timber, alone separated the horsemen from
+the encampment.
+
+"A noble sight!" said the captive Cavalier, with enthusiasm, as he reined
+in his steed, and gazed upon the wild and warlike streets of canvass,
+traversing each other in vistas broad and regular.
+
+One of the captains of the Great Company who rode beside him, smiled
+complacently.
+
+"There are few masters of the martial art who equal Fra Moreale," said he;
+"and savage, reckless, and gathered from all parts and all countries - from
+cavern and from marketplace, from prison and from palace, as are his
+troops, he has reduced them already into a discipline which might shame
+even the soldiery of the Empire."
+
+The Knight made no reply; but, spurring his horse over one of the rugged
+bridges, soon found himself amidst the encampment.  But that part at which
+he entered little merited the praises bestowed upon the discipline of the
+army.  A more unruly and disorderly array, the Cavalier, accustomed to the
+stern regularity of English, French, and German discipline, thought he had
+never beheld:  here and there, fierce, unshaven, half-naked brigands might
+be seen, driving before them the cattle which they had just collected by
+predatory excursions.  Sometimes a knot of dissolute women stood -
+chattering, scolding, gesticulating - collected round groups of wild
+shagged Northmen, who, despite the bright purity of the summer-noon, were
+already engaged in deep potations.  Oaths, and laughter, and drunken
+merriment, and fierce brawl, rang from side to side; and ever and anon some
+hasty conflict with drawn knives was begun and finished by the fiery and
+savage bravoes of Calabria or the Apennines, before the very eyes and
+almost in the very path of the troop.  Tumblers, and mountebanks, and
+jugglers, and Jew pedlers, were exhibiting their tricks or their wares at
+every interval, apparently well inured to the lawless and turbulent market
+in which they exercised their several callings.  Despite the protection of
+the horsemen who accompanied them, the prisoners were not allowed to pass
+without molestation.  Groups of urchins, squalid, fierce, and ragged,
+seemed to start from the ground, and surrounded their horses like swarms of
+bees, uttering the most discordant cries; and, with the gestures of
+savages, rather demanding than beseeching money, which, when granted,
+seemed only to render them more insatiable.  While, sometimes mingled with
+the rest, were seen the bright eyes and olive cheek, and half-pleading,
+half-laughing smile of girls, whose extreme youth, scarce emerged from
+childhood, rendered doubly striking their utter and unredeemed abandonment.
+
+"You did not exaggerate the decorum of the Grand Company!" cried the
+Knight, gravely, to his new acquaintance.
+
+"Signor," replied the other, "you must not judge of the kernel by the
+shell.  We are scarcely yet arrived at the camp.  These are the outskirts,
+occupied rather by the rabble than the soldiers.  Twenty thousand men from
+the sink, it must be owned, of every town in Italy, follow the camp, to
+fight if necessary, but rather for plunder, and for forage: - such you now
+behold.  Presently you will see those of another stamp."
+
+The Knight's heart swelled high.  "And to such men is Italy given up!"
+thought he.  His revery was broken by a loud burst of applause from some
+convivialists hard by.  He turned, and under a long tent, and round a board
+covered with wine and viands, sate some thirty or forty bravoes.  A ragged
+minstrel, or jongleur, with an immense beard and mustachios, was tuning,
+with no inconsiderable skill, a lute which had accompanied him in all his
+wanderings - and suddenly changing its notes into a wild and warlike
+melody, he commenced in a loud and deep voice the following song: -
+
+The Praise of the Grand Company.
+
+1.
+
+Ho, dark one from the golden South, -
+  Ho, fair one from the North;
+Ho, coat of mail and spear of sheen -
+  Ho, wherefore ride ye forth?
+"We come from mount, we come from cave,
+  We come across the sea,
+In long array, in bright array,
+  To Montreal's Companie."
+    Oh, the merry, merry band.
+    Light heart, and heavy hand -
+      Oh, the Lances of the Free!
+
+2.
+
+Ho, Princes of the castled height -
+  Ho, Burghers of the town;
+Apulia's strength, Romagna's pride,
+  And Tusca's old renown!
+Why quail ye thus? why pale ye thus?
+  What spectre do ye see?
+"The blood-red flag, and trampling march,
+  Of Montreal's Companie."
+    Oh, the sunshine of your life -
+    Oh, the thunders of your strife!
+      Wild Lances of the Free!
+
+3.
+
+Ho, scutcheons o'er the vaulted tomb
+  Where Norman valour sleeps,
+Why shake ye so? why quake ye so!
+  What wind the trophy sweeps?
+"We shake without a breath - below,
+  The dead are stirred to see,
+The Norman's fame revived again
+  In Montreal's Companie."
+    Since Roger won his crown,
+    Who hath equalled your renown,
+      Brave Lances of the Free?
+
+4.
+
+Ho, ye who seek to win a name,
+  Where deeds are bravest done -
+Ho, ye who wish to pile a heap,
+  Where gold is lightest won;
+Ho, ye who loathe the stagnant life,
+  Or shun the law's decree,
+Belt on the brand, and spur the steed,
+  To Montreal's Companie.
+    And the maid shall share her rest,
+    And the miser share his chest,
+      With the Lances of the Free!
+        The Free!
+        The Free!
+    Oh! the Lances of the Free!
+
+Then suddenly, as if inspired to a wilder flight by his own minstrelsy, the
+jongleur, sweeping his hand over the chords, broke forth into an air
+admirably expressive of the picture which his words, running into a rude,
+but lively and stirring doggerel, attempted to paint.
+
+The March of the Grand Company.
+
+Tira, tirala - trumpet and drum -
+Rising bright o'er the height of the mountain they come!
+German, and Hun, and the Islandrie,
+Who routed the Frenchman at famed Cressie,
+When the rose changed its hue with the fleur-de-lis;
+With the Roman, and Lombard, and Piedmontese,
+And the dark-haired son of the southern seas.
+Tira, tirala - more near and near
+Down the steep - see them sweep; - rank by rank they appear!
+With the Cloud of the Crowd hanging dark at their rear -
+Serried, and steadied, and orderlie,
+Like the course - like the force - of a marching sea!
+Open your gates, and out with your gold,
+For the blood must be spilt, or the ransom be told!
+Woe, Burghers, woe!  Behold them led
+By the stoutest arm and the wisest head,
+With the snow-white cross on the cloth of red; -
+With the eagle eye, and the lion port,
+His barb for a throne, and his camp for a court:
+Sovereign and scourge of the land is he -
+The kingly Knight of the Companie!
+  Hurrah - hurrah - hurrah!
+Hurrah for the army - hurrah for its lord -
+Hurrah for the gold that is got by the sword -
+  Hurrah - hurrah - hurrah!
+    For the Lances of the Free!
+
+Shouted by the full chorus of those desperate boon-companions, and caught
+up and re-echoed from side to side, near and far, as the familiar and well-
+known words of the burthen reached the ears of more distant groups or
+stragglers, the effect of this fierce and licentious minstrelsy was
+indescribable.  It was impossible not to feel the zest which that daring
+life imparted to its daring followers, and even the gallant and stately
+Knight who listened to it, reproved himself for an involuntary thrill of
+sympathy and pleasure.
+
+He turned with some impatience and irritation to his companion, who had
+taken a part in the chorus, and said, "Sir, to the ears of an Italian
+noble, conscious of the miseries of his country, this ditty is not welcome. 
+I pray you, let us proceed."
+
+"I humbly crave your pardon, Signor," said the Free Companion; "but really
+so attractive is the life led by Free Lances, under Fra Moreale, that
+sometimes we forget the - ; but pardon me - we will on."
+
+A few moments more, and bounding over a narrow circumvallation, the party
+found themselves in a quarter, animated indeed, but of a wholly different
+character of animation.  Long lines of armed men were drawn up on either
+side of a path, conducting to a large marquee, placed upon a little
+hillock, surmounted by a blue flag, and up this path armed soldiers were
+passing to and fro with great order, but with a pleased and complacent
+expression upon their swarthy features.  Some that repaired to the marquee
+were bearing packets and bales upon their shoulders - those that returned
+seemed to have got rid of their burthens, but every now and then,
+impatiently opening their hands, appeared counting and recounting to
+themselves the coins contained therein.
+
+The Knight looked inquiringly at his companion.
+
+"It is the marquee of the merchants," said the captain; "they have free
+admission to the camp, and their property and persons are rigidly
+respected.  They purchase each soldier's share of the plunder at fair
+prices, and either party is contented with the bargain."
+
+"It seems, then, that there is some kind of rude justice observed amongst
+you," said the Knight.
+
+"Rude!  Diavolo!  Not a town in Italy but would be glad of such even
+justice, and such impartial laws.  Yonder lie the tents of the judges,
+appointed to try all offences of soldier against soldier.  To the right,
+the tent with the golden ball contains the treasurer of the army.  Fra
+Moreale incurs no arrears with his soldiery."
+
+It was, indeed, by these means that the Knight of St. John had collected
+the best equipped and the best contented force in Italy.  Every day brought
+him recruits.  Nothing was spoken of amongst the mercenaries of Italy but
+the wealth acquired in his service, and every warrior in the pay of
+Republic or of Tyrant sighed for the lawless standard of Fra Moreale. 
+Already had exaggerated tales of the fortunes to be made in the ranks of
+the Great Company passed the Alps; and, even now, the Knight, penetrating
+farther into the camp, beheld from many a tent the proud banners and
+armorial blazon of German nobility and Gallic knighthood.
+
+"You see," said the Free Companion, pointing to these insignia, "we are not
+without our different ranks in our wild city.  And while we speak, many a
+golden spur is speeding hitherward from the North!"
+
+All now in the quarter they had entered was still and solemn; only afar
+came the mingled hum, or the sudden shout of the pandemonium in the rear,
+mellowed by distance to a not unpleasing sound.  An occasional soldier,
+crossing their path, stalked silently and stealthily to some neighbouring
+tent, and seemed scarcely to regard their approach.
+
+"Behold! we are before the General's pavilion," said the Free Lance.
+
+Blazoned with purple and gold, the tent of Montreal lay a little apart from
+the rest.  A brooklet from the stream they had crossed murmured gratefully
+on the ear, and a tall and wide-spreading beech cast its shadow over the
+gorgeous canvass.
+
+While his troop waited without, the knight was conducted at once to the
+presence of the formidable adventurer.
+
+
+Chapter 8.II.  Adrian Once More the Guest of Montreal.
+
+Montreal was sitting at the head of a table, surrounded by men, some
+military, some civil, whom he called his councillors, and with whom he
+apparently debated all his projects.  These men, drawn from various cities,
+were intimately acquainted with the internal affairs of the several states
+to which they belonged.  They could tell to a fraction the force of a
+signor, the wealth of a merchant, the power of a mob.  And thus, in his
+lawless camp, Montreal presided, not more as a general than a statesman. 
+Such knowledge was invaluable to the chief of the Great Company.  It
+enabled him to calculate exactly the time to attack a foe, and the sum to
+demand for a suppression of hostilities.  He knew what parties to deal with
+- where to importune - where to forbear.  And it usually happened that, by
+some secret intrigue, the appearance of Montreal's banner before the walls
+of a city was the signal for some sedition or some broil within.  It may be
+that he thus also promoted an ulterior, as well as his present, policy.
+
+The divan were in full consultation when an officer entered, and whispered
+a few words in Montreal's ear.  His eyes brightened.  "Admit him," he said
+hastily.  "Messires," he added to his councillors, rubbing his hands, "I
+think our net has caught our bird.  Let us see."
+
+At this moment the drapery was lifted and the Knight admitted.
+
+"How!" muttered Montreal, changing colour, and in evident disappointment. 
+"Am I to be ever thus balked?"
+
+"Sir Walter de Montreal," said the prisoner, "I am once more your guest. 
+In these altered features you perhaps scarcely recognise Adrian di
+Castello."
+
+"Pardon me, noble Signor," said Montreal, rising with great courtesy; "the
+mistake of my varlets disturbed my recollection for a moment. - I rejoice
+once more to press a hand that has won so many laurels since last we
+parted.  Your renown has been grateful to my ears.  Ho!" continued the
+chieftain, clapping his hands, "see to the refreshment and repose of this
+noble Cavalier and his attendants.  Lord Adrian, I will join you
+presently."
+
+Adrian withdrew.  Montreal, forgetful of his councillors, traversed his
+tent with hasty strides; then summoning the officer who had admitted
+Adrian, he said, "Count Landau still keeps the pass?"
+
+"Yes, General!"
+
+"Hie thee fast back, then - the ambuscade must tarry till nightfall.  We
+have trapped the wrong fox."
+
+The officer departed, and shortly afterwards Montreal broke up the divan. 
+He sought Adrian, who was lodged in a tent beside his own.
+
+"My Lord," said Montreal, "it is true that my men had orders to stop every
+one on the roads towards Florence.  I am at war with that city.  Yet I
+expected a very different prisoner from you.  Need I add, that you and your
+men are free?"
+
+"I accept the courtesy, noble Montreal, as frankly as it is rendered.  May
+I hope hereafter to repay it?  Meanwhile permit me, without any disrespect,
+to say that had I learned the Grand Company was in this direction, I should
+have altered my course.  I had heard that your arms were bent (somewhat to
+my mind more nobly) against Malatesta, the tyrant of Rimini!"
+
+"They were so.  He was my foe; he is my tributary.  We conquered him.  He
+paid us the price of his liberty.  We marched by Asciano upon Sienna.  For
+sixteen thousand florins we spared that city; and we now hang like a
+thunderbolt over Florence, which dared to send her puny aid to the defence
+of Rimini.  Our marches are forced and rapid and our camp in this plain but
+just pitched."
+
+"I hear that the Grand Company is allied with Albornoz, and that its
+General is secretly the soldier of the Church.  Is it so?"
+
+"Ay - Albornoz and I understand one another," replied Montreal, carelessly;
+"and not the less so that we have a mutual foe; whom both are sworn to
+crush, in Visconti, the archbishop of Milan."
+
+"Visconti! the most potent of the Italian princes.  That he has justly
+incurred the wrath of the Church I know - and I can readily understand that
+Innocent has revoked the pardon which the intrigues of the Archbishop
+purchased from Clement VI.  But I do not see clearly why Montreal should
+willingly provoke so dark and terrible a foe."
+
+Montreal smiled sternly.  "Know you not," he said, "the vast ambition of
+that Visconti?  By the Holy Sepulchre, he is precisely the enemy my soul
+leaps to meet!  He has a genius worthy to cope with Montreal's.  I have
+made myself master of his secret plans - they are gigantic!  In a word, the
+Archbishop designs the conquest of all Italy.  His enormous wealth
+purchases the corrupt - his dark sagacity ensnares the credulous - his
+daring valour awes the weak.  Every enemy he humbles - every ally he
+enslaves.  This is precisely the Prince whose progress Walter de Montreal
+must arrest.  For this (he said in a whisper as to himself) is precisely
+the Prince who, if suffered to extend his power, will frustrate the plans
+and break the force of Walter de Montreal."
+
+Adrian was silent, and for the first time a suspicion of the real nature of
+the Provencal's designs crossed his breast.
+
+"But, noble Montreal," resumed the Colonna, "give me, if your knowledge
+serves, as no doubt it does, - give me the latest tidings of my native
+city.  I am Roman, and Rome is ever in my thoughts."
+
+"And well she may," replied Montreal, quickly.  "Thou knowest that
+Albornoz, as Legate of the Pontiff, led the army of the Church into the
+Papal Territories.  He took with him Cola di Rienzi.  Arrived at Monte
+Fiascone, crowds of Romans of all ranks hastened thither to render homage
+to the Tribune.  The Legate was forgotten in the popularity of his
+companion.  Whether or not Albornoz grew jealous - for he is proud as
+Lucifer - of the respect paid to the Tribune, or whether he feared the
+restoration of his power, I cannot tell.  But he detained him in his camp,
+and refused to yield him to all the solicitations and all the deputations
+of the Romans.  Artfully, however, he fulfilled one of the real objects of
+Rienzi's release.  Through his means he formally regained the allegiance of
+Rome to the Church, and by the attraction of his presence swelled his camp
+with Roman recruits.  Marching to Viterbo, Rienzi distinguished himself
+greatly in deeds of arms against the tyrant ("Vita di Cola di Rienzi".)
+John di Vico.  Nay, he fought as one worthy of belonging to the Grand
+Company.  This increased the zeal of the Romans; and the city disgorged
+half its inhabitants to attend the person of the bold Tribune.  To the
+entreaties of these worthy citizens (perhaps the very men who had before
+shut up their darling in St. Angelo) the crafty Legate merely replied, 'Arm
+against John di Vico - conquer the tyrants of the Territory - re-establish
+the patrimony of St. Peter, and Rienzi shall then be proclaimed Senator,
+and return to Rome.'
+
+"These words inspired the Romans with so great a zeal, that they willingly
+lent their aid to the Legate.  Aquapendente, Bolzena yielded, John di Vico
+was half reduced and half terrified into submission, and Gabrielli, the
+tyrant of Agobbio, has since succumbed.  The glory is to the Cardinal, but
+the merit with Rienzi."
+
+"And now?"
+
+"Albornoz continued to entertain the Senator-Tribune with great splendour
+and fair words, but not a word about restoring him to Rome.  Wearied with
+this suspense, I have learned by secret intelligence that Rienzi has left
+the camp, and betaken himself with few attendants to Florence, where he has
+friends, who will provide him with arms and money to enter Rome."
+
+"Ah then! now I guess," said Adrian, with a half smile, "for whom I was
+mistaken!"
+
+Montreal blushed slightly.  "Fairly conjectured!" said he.
+
+"Meanwhile, at Rome," continued the Provencal - "at Rome, your worthy
+House, and that of the Orsini, being elected to the supreme power,
+quarrelled among themselves, and could not keep the authority they had won. 
+Francesco Baroncelli, (This Baroncelli, who has been introduced to the
+reader in a former portion of this work, is called by Matteo Villani "a man
+of vile birth and little learning - he had been a Notary of the Capitol." 
+In the midst of the armed dissensions between the Barons, which followed
+the expulsion of Rienzi, Baroncelli contrived to make himself Master of the
+Capitol, and of what was considered an auxiliary of no common importance -
+viz. the Great Bell, by whose alarum Rienzi had so often summoned to arms
+the Roman people.  Baroncelli was crowned Tribune, clothed in a robe of
+gold brocade, and invested with the crozier-sceptre of Rienzi.  At first,
+his cruelty against the great took the appearance of protection to the
+humble; but the excesses of his sons (not exaggerated in the text), and his
+own brutal but bold ferocity, soon made him execrated by the people, to
+whom he owed his elevation.  He had the folly to declare against the Pope;
+and this it really was that mainly induced Innocent to restore, and oppose
+to their New Demagogue, the former and more illustrious Tribune. 
+Baroncelli, like Rienzi, was excommunicated; and in his instance, also, the
+curse of the Church was the immediate cause of his downfall.  In attempting
+flight he was massacred by the mob, December, 1353.  Some, however, have
+maintained that he was slain in combat with Rienzi; and others, by a
+confusion of dates, have made him succeed to Rienzi on the death of the
+latter. - Matteo Villani, lib. iii. cap. 78.  Osservaz. Stor. di Zefirino
+Re. MS. Vat. Rip. dal Bzovio, ann. 1353. N. 2.) a new demagogue, a humble
+imitator of Rienzi, rose upon the ruins of the peace broken by the nobles,
+obtained the title of Tribune, and carried about the very insignia used by
+his predecessor.  But less wise than Rienzi, he took the antipapal party. 
+And the Legate was thus enabled to play the papal demagogue against the
+usurper.  Baroncelli was a weak man, his sons committed every excess in
+mimicry of the highborn tyrants of Padua and Milan.  Virgins violated and
+matrons dishonoured, somewhat contrasted the solemn and majestic decorum of
+Rienzi's rule; - in fine, Baroncelli fell massacred by the people.  And
+now, if you ask what rules Rome, I answer, 'It is the hope of Rienzi.'"
+
+"A strange man, and various fortunes.  What will be the end of both!"
+
+"Swift murder to the first, and eternal fame to the last," answered
+Montreal, calmly.  "Rienzi will be restored; that brave phoenix will wing
+its way through storm and cloud to its own funereal pyre:  I foresee, I
+compassionate, I admire. - And then," added Montreal, "I look beyond!"
+
+"But wherefore feel you so certain that, if restored, Rienzi must fall?"
+
+"Is it not clear to every eye, save his, whom ambition blinds?  How can
+mortal genius, however great, rule that most depraved people by popular
+means?  The Barons - (you know their indomitable ferocity) - wedded to
+abuse, and loathing every semblance to law; the Barons, humbled for a
+moment, will watch their occasion, and rise.  The people will again desert. 
+Or else, grown wise in one respect by experience, the new Senator will see
+that popular favour has a loud voice, but a recreant arm.  He will, like
+the Barons, surround himself by foreign swords.  A detachment from the
+Grand Company will be his courtiers; they will be his masters!  To pay them
+the people must be taxed.  Then the idol is execrated.  No Italian hand can
+govern these hardy demons of the north; they will mutiny and fall away.  A
+new demagogue will lead on the people, and Rienzi will be the victim.  Mark
+my prophecy!"
+
+"And then the 'beyond' to which you look?"
+
+"Utter prostration of Rome, for new and long ages; God makes not two
+Rienzis; or," said Montreal, proudly, "the infusion of a new life into the
+worn-out and diseased frame, - the foundation of a new dynasty.  Verily,
+when I look around me, I believe that the Ruler of nations designs the
+restoration of the South by the irruptions of the North; and that out of
+the old Franc and Germanic race will be built up the thrones of the future
+world!"
+
+As Montreal thus spoke, leaning on his great war-sword, with his fair and
+heroic features - so different, in their frank, bold, fearless expression,
+from the dark and wily intellect that characterises the lineaments of the
+South - eloquent at once with enthusiasm and thought - he might have seemed
+no unfitting representative of the genius of that northern chivalry of
+which he spake.  And Adrian half fancied that he saw before him one of the
+old Gothic scourges of the Western World.
+
+Their conversation was here interrupted by the sound of a trumpet, and
+presently an officer entering, announced the arrival of ambassadors from
+Florence.
+
+"Again you must pardon me, noble Adrian," said Montreal, "and let me claim
+you as my guest at least for tonight.  Here you may rest secure, and on
+parting, my men shall attend you to the frontiers of whatsoever territory
+you design to visit."
+
+Adrian, not sorry to see more of a man so celebrated, accepted the
+invitation.
+
+Left alone, he leaned his head upon his hand, and soon became lost in his
+reflections.
+
+
+Chapter 8.III.  Faithful and Ill-fated Love. - The Aspirations Survive the
+Affections.
+
+Since that fearful hour in which Adrian Colonna had gazed upon the lifeless
+form of his adored Irene, the young Roman had undergone the usual
+vicissitudes of a wandering and adventurous life in those exciting times. 
+His country seemed no longer dear to him.  His very rank precluded him from
+the post he once aspired to take in restoring the liberties of Rome; and he
+felt that if ever such a revolution could be consummated, it was reserved
+for one in whose birth and habits the people could feel sympathy and
+kindred, and who could lift his hand in their behalf without becoming the
+apostate of his order and the judge of his own House.  He had travelled
+through various courts, and served with renown in various fields.  Beloved
+and honoured wheresoever he fixed a temporary home, no change of scene had
+removed his melancholy - no new ties had chased away the memory of the
+Lost.  In that era of passionate and poetical romance, which Petrarch
+represented rather than created, Love had already begun to assume a more
+tender and sacred character than it had hitherto known, it had gradually
+imbibed the divine spirit which it derives from Christianity, and which
+associates its sorrows on earth with the visions and hopes of heaven.  To
+him who relies upon immortality, fidelity to the dead is easy; because
+death cannot extinguish hope, and the soul of the mourner is already half
+in the world to come.  It is an age that desponds of a future life -
+representing death as an eternal separation - in which, if men grieve
+awhile for the dead, they hasten to reconcile themselves to the living. 
+For true is the old aphorism, that love exists not without hope.  And all
+that romantic worship which the Hermit of Vaucluse felt, or feigned, for
+Laura, found its temple in the desolate heart of Adrian Colonna.  He was
+emphatically the Lover of his time!  Often as, in his pilgrimage from land
+to land, he passed the walls of some quiet and lonely convent, he seriously
+meditated the solemn vows, and internally resolved that the cloister should
+receive his maturer age.  The absence of years had, however, in some degree
+restored the dimmed and shattered affection for his fatherland, and he
+desired once more to visit the city in which he had first beheld Irene. 
+"Perhaps," he thought, "time may have wrought some unlooked-for change; and
+I may yet assist to restore my country."
+
+But with this lingering patriotism no ambition was mingled.  In that heated
+stage of action, in which the desire of power seemed to stir through every
+breast, and Italy had become the El Dorado of wealth, or the Utopia of
+empire, to thousands of valiant arms and plotting minds, there was at least
+one breast that felt the true philosophy of the Hermit.  Adrian's nature,
+though gallant and masculine, was singularly imbued with that elegance of
+temperament which recoils from rude contact, and to which a lettered and
+cultivated indolence is the supremest luxury.  His education, his
+experience, and his intellect, had placed him far in advance of his age,
+and he looked with a high contempt on the coarse villanies and base tricks
+by which Italian ambition sought its road to power.  The rise and fall of
+Rienzi, who, whatever his failings, was at least the purest and most
+honourable of the self-raised princes of the age, had conspired to make him
+despond of the success of noble, as he recoiled from that of selfish
+aspirations.  And the dreamy melancholy which resulted from his ill-starred
+love, yet more tended to wean him from the stale and hackneyed pursuits of
+the world.  His character was full of beauty and of poetry - not the less
+so in that it found not a vent for its emotions in the actual occupation of
+the poet!  Pent within, those emotions diffused themselves over all his
+thoughts and coloured his whole soul.  Sometimes, in the blessed
+abstraction of his visions, he pictured to himself the lot he might have
+chosen had Irene lived, and fate united them - far from the turbulent and
+vulgar roar of Rome - but amidst some yet unpolluted solitude of the bright
+Italian soil.  Before his eye there rose the lovely landscape - the palace
+by the borders of the waveless lake - the vineyards in the valley - the
+dark forests waving from the hill - and that home, the resort and refuge of
+all the minstrelsy and love of Italy, brightened by the "Lampeggiar dell'
+angelico riso," that makes a paradise in the face we love.  Often, seduced
+by such dreams to complete oblivion of his loss, the young wanderer started
+from the ideal bliss, to behold around him the solitary waste of way - or
+the moonlit tents of war - or, worse than all, the crowds and revels of a
+foreign court.
+
+Whether or not such fancies now, for a moment, allured his meditations,
+conjured up, perhaps, by the name of Irene's brother, which never sounded
+in his ears but to awaken ten thousand associations, the Colonna remained
+thoughtful and absorbed, until he was disturbed by his own squire, who,
+accompanied by Montreal's servitors, ushered in his solitary but ample
+repast.  Flasks of the richest Florentine wines - viands prepared with all
+the art which, alas, Italy has now lost! - goblets and salvers of gold and
+silver, prodigally wrought with barbaric gems - attested the princely
+luxury which reigned in the camp of the Grand Company.  But Adrian saw in
+all only the spoliation of his degraded country, and felt the splendour
+almost as an insult.  His lonely meal soon concluded, he became impatient
+of the monotony of his tent; and, tempted by the cool air of the descending
+eve, sauntered carelessly forth.  He bent his steps by the side of the
+brooklet that curved, snakelike and sparkling, by Montreal's tent; and
+finding a spot somewhat solitary and apart from the warlike tenements
+around, flung himself by the margin of the stream.
+
+The last rays of the sun quivered on the wave that danced musically over
+its stony bed; and amidst a little copse on the opposite bank broke the
+brief and momentary song of such of the bolder habitants of that purple air
+as the din of the camp had not scared from their green retreat.  The clouds
+lay motionless to the west, in that sky so darkly and intensely blue, never
+seen but over the landscapes that a Claude or a Rosa loved to paint; and
+dim and delicious rose-hues gathered over the grey peaks of the distant
+Apennines.  From afar floated the hum of the camp, broken by the neigh of
+returning steeds; the blast of an occasional bugle; and, at regular
+intervals, by the armed tramp of the neighbouring sentry.  And opposite to
+the left of the copse - upon a rising ground, matted with reeds, moss, and
+waving shrubs - were the ruins of some old Etruscan building, whose name
+had perished, whose very uses were unknown.
+
+The scene was so calm and lovely, as Adrian gazed upon it, that it was
+scarcely possible to imagine it at that very hour the haunt of fierce and
+banded robbers, among most of whom the very soul of man was embruted, and
+to all of whom murder or rapine made the habitual occupation of life.
+
+Still buried in his reveries, and carelessly dropping stones into the noisy
+rivulet, Adrian was aroused by the sound of steps.
+
+"A fair spot to listen to the lute and the ballads of Provence," said the
+voice of Montreal, as the Knight of St. John threw himself on the turf
+beside the young Colonna.
+
+"You retain, then, your ancient love of your national melodies," said
+Adrian.
+
+"Ay, I have not yet survived all my youth," answered Montreal, with a
+slight sigh.  "But somehow or other, the strains that once pleased my fancy
+now go too directly to my heart.  So, though I still welcome jongleur and
+minstrel, I bid them sing their newest conceits.  I cannot wish ever again
+to hear the poetry I heard when I was young!"
+
+"Pardon me," said Adrian, with great interest, "but fain would I have
+dared, though a secret apprehension prevented me hitherto, - fain would I
+have dared to question you of that lovely lady, with whom, seven years ago,
+we gazed at moonlight upon the odorous orange-groves and rosy waters of
+Terracina."
+
+Montreal turned away his face; he laid his hand on Adrian's arm, and
+murmured, in a deep and hoarse tone, "I am alone now!"
+
+Adrian pressed his hand in silence.  He felt no light shock at thus
+learning the death of one so gentle, so lovely, and so ill-fated.
+
+"The vows of my knighthood," continued Montreal, "which precluded Adeline
+the rights of wedlock - the shame of her house - the angry grief of her
+mother - the wild vicissitudes of my life, so exposed to peril - the loss
+of her son - all preyed silently on her frame.  She did not die (die is too
+harsh a word!), but she drooped away, and glided into heaven.  Even as on a
+summer's morn some soft dream fleets across us, growing less and less
+distinct, until it fades, as it were, into light, and we awaken - so faded
+Adeline's parting spirit, till the daylight of God broke upon it."
+
+Montreal paused a moment, and then resumed:  "These thoughts make the
+boldest of us weak sometimes, and we Provencals are foolish in these
+matters! - God wot, she was very dear to me!"
+
+The Knight bent down and crossed himself devoutly, his lips muttered a
+prayer.  Strange as it may seem to our more enlightened age, so martial a
+garb did morality then wear, that this man, at whose word towns had blazed
+and torrents of blood had flowed, neither adjudged himself, nor was
+adjudged by the majority of his contemporaries, a criminal.  His order,
+half monastic, half warlike, was emblematic of himself.  He trampled upon
+man, yet humbled himself to God; nor had all his acquaintance with the
+refining scepticism of Italy shaken the sturdy and simple faith of the bold
+Provencal.  So far from recognising any want of harmony between his calling
+and his creed, he held that man no true chevalier who was not as devout to
+the Cross as relentless with the sword.
+
+"And you have no child save the one you lost?" asked Adrian, when he
+observed the wonted composure of Montreal once more returning.
+
+"None!" said Montreal, as his brow again darkened.  "No love-begotten heir
+of mine will succeed to the fortunes I trust yet to build.  Never on earth
+shall I see upon the face of her child the likeness of Adeline!  Yet, at
+Avignon, I saw a boy I would have claimed; for methought she must have
+looked her soul into his eyes, they were so like hers!  Well, well!  The
+Provence tree hath other branches; and some unborn nephew must be - what? 
+The stars have not yet decided!  But ambition is now the only thing in the
+world left me to love."
+
+"So differently operates the same misfortune upon different characters,"
+thought the Colonna.  "To me, crowns became valueless when I could no
+longer dream of placing them on Irene's brow!"
+
+The similarity of their fates, however, attracted Adrian strongly towards
+his host; and the two Knights conversed together with more friendship and
+unreserve than they had hitherto done.  At length Montreal said, "By the
+way, I have not inquired your destination."
+
+"I am bound to Rome," said Adrian; "and the intelligence I have learned
+from you incites me thitherward yet more eagerly.  If Rienzi return, I may
+mediate successfully, perchance, between the Tribune-Senator and the
+nobles; and if I find my cousin, young Stefanello, now the head of our
+house, more tractable than his sires, I shall not despair of conciliating
+the less powerful Barons. Rome wants repose; and whoever governs, if he
+govern but with justice, ought to be supported both by prince and
+plebeian!"
+
+Montreal listened with great attention, and then muttered to himself, "No,
+it cannot be!"  He mused a little while, shading his brow with his hand,
+before he said aloud, "To Rome you are bound.  Well, we shall meet soon
+amidst its ruins.  Know, by the way, that my object here is already won: 
+these Florentine merchants have acceded to my terms; they have purchased a
+two years' peace; tomorrow the camp breaks up, and the Grand Company march
+to Lombardy.  There, if my schemes prosper, and the Venetians pay my price,
+I league the rascals (under Landau, my Lieutenant) with the Sea-City, in
+defiance of the Visconti, and shall pass my autumn in peace amidst the
+pomps of Rome."
+
+"Sir Walter de Montreal," said Adrian, "your frankness perhaps makes me
+presumptuous; but when I hear you talk, like a huxtering trader, of selling
+alike your friendship and your forbearance, I ask myself, 'Is this the
+great Knight of St. John; and have men spoken of him fairly, when they
+assert the sole stain on his laurels to be his avarice?"
+
+Montreal bit his lip; nevertheless, he answered calmly, "My frankness has
+brought its own penance, Lord Adrian.  However, I cannot wholly leave so
+honoured a guest under an impression which I feel to be plausible, but not
+just.  No, brave Colonna; report wrongs me.  I value Gold, for Gold is the
+Architect of Power!  It fills the camp - it storms the city - it buys the
+marketplace - it raises the palace - it founds the throne.  I value Gold, -
+it is the means necessary to my end!"
+
+"And that end - "
+
+"Is - no matter what," said the Knight coldly.  "Let us to our tents, the
+dews fall heavily, and the malaria floats over these houseless wastes."
+
+The pair rose; - yet, fascinated by the beauty of the hour, they lingered
+for a moment by the brook.  The earliest stars shone over its crisping
+wavelets, and a delicious breeze murmured gently amidst the glossy
+herbage."
+
+"Thus gazing," said Montreal, softly, "we reverse the old Medusan fable the
+poets tell us of, and look and muse ourselves out of stone.  A little
+while, and it was the sunlight that gilded the wave - it now shines as
+brightly and glides as gaily beneath the stars; even so rolls the stream of
+time:  one luminary succeeds the other equally welcomed - equally
+illumining - equally evanescent! - You see, the poetry of Provence still
+lives beneath my mail!"
+
+Adrian early sought his couch; but his own thoughts and the sounds of loud
+mirth that broke from Montreal's tent, where the chief feasted the captains
+of his band, a revel from which he had the delicacy to excuse the Roman
+noble, kept the Colonna long awake; and he had scarcely fallen into an
+unquiet slumber, when yet more discordant sounds again invaded his repose. 
+At the earliest dawn the wide armament was astir - the creaking of cordage
+- the tramp of men - loud orders and louder oaths - the slow rolling of
+baggage-wains - and the clank of the armourers, announced the removal of
+the camp, and the approaching departure of the Grand Company.
+
+Ere Adrian was yet attired, Montreal entered his tent.
+
+"I have appointed," he said, "five score lances under a trusty leader, to
+accompany you, noble Adrian, to the borders of Romagna; they wait your
+leisure.  In another hour I depart; the on-guard are already in motion."
+
+Adrian would fain have declined the proffered escort; but he saw that it
+would only offend the pride of the chief, who soon retired.  Hastily Adrian
+endued his arms - the air of the fresh morning, and the glad sun rising
+gorgeously from the hills, revived his wearied spirit.  He repaired to
+Montreal's tent, and found him alone, with the implements of writing before
+him, and a triumphant smile upon his countenance.
+
+"Fortune showers new favours on me!" he said, gaily.  "Yesterday the
+Florentines spared me the trouble of a siege:  and today (even since I last
+saw you - a few minutes since) puts your new Senator of Rome into my
+power."
+
+"How!  Have your bands then arrested Rienzi?"
+
+"Not so - better still!  The Tribune changed his plan, and repaired to
+Perugia, where my brothers now abide - sought them - they have supplied him
+with money and soldiers enough to brave the perils of the way, and to defy
+the swords of the Barons.  So writes my good brother Arimbaldo, a man of
+letters, whom the Tribune thinks rightly he has decoyed with old tales of
+Roman greatness, and mighty promises of grateful advancement.  You find me
+hastily expressing my content at the arrangement.  My brothers themselves
+will accompany the Senator-Tribune to the walls of the Capitol."
+
+"Still, I see not how this places Rienzi in your power."
+
+"No!  His soldiers are my creatures - his comrades my brothers - his
+creditor myself!  Let him rule Rome then - the time soon comes when the
+Vice-Regent must yield to - "
+
+"The Chief of the Grand Company," interrupted Adrian, with a shudder, which
+the bold Montreal was too engrossed with the unconcealed excitement of his
+own thoughts to notice.  "No, Knight of Provence, basely have we succumbed
+to domestic tyrants:  but never, I trust, will Romans be so vile as to wear
+the yoke of a foreign usurper."
+
+Montreal looked hard at Adrian, and smiled sternly.
+
+"You mistake me," said he; "and it will be time enough for you to play the
+Brutus when I assume the Caesar.  Meanwhile we are but host and guest.  Let
+us change the theme."
+
+Nevertheless this, their latter conference, threw a chill over both during
+the short time the Knights remained together, and they parted with a
+formality which was ill-suited to their friendly intercourse of the night
+before.  Montreal felt he had in cautiously revealed himself, but caution
+was no part of his character, whenever he found himself at the head of an
+army, and at the full tide of fortune; and at that moment, so confident was
+he of the success of his wildest schemes, that he recked little whom he
+offended, or whom alarmed.
+
+Slowly, with his strange and ferocious escort, Adrian renewed his way. 
+Winding up a steep ascent that led from the plain, - when he reached the
+summit, the curve in the road shewed him the whole army on its march; - the
+gonfalons waving - the armour flashing in the sun, line after line, like a
+river of steel, and the whole plain bristling with the array of that moving
+war; - while the solemn tread of the armed thousands fell subdued and
+stifled at times by martial and exulting music.  As they swept on, Adrian
+descried at length the stately and towering form of Montreal upon a black
+charger, distinguished even at that distance from the rest, not more by his
+gorgeous armour than his lofty stature.  So swept he on in the pride of his
+array - in the flush of his hopes - the head of a mighty armament - the
+terror of Italy - the hero that was - the monarch that might be!
+
+
+
+BOOK IX.  THE RETURN.
+
+"Allora la sua venuta fu a Roma sentita; Romani si apparecchiavano a
+riceverlo con letizia...furo fatti archi trionfali," &c. &c. - "Vita di
+Cola di Rienzi", lib. ii. c. 17.
+
+"Then the fame of his coming was felt at Rome; the Romans made ready to
+receive him with gladness...triumphal arches were erected," &c., &c. -
+"Life of Cola di Rienzi".
+
+
+Chapter 9.I.  The Triumphal Entrance.
+
+All Rome was astir! - from St. Angelo to the Capitol, windows, balconies,
+roofs, were crowded with animated thousands.  Only here and there, in the
+sullen quarters of the Colonna, the Orsini, and the Savelli, reigned a
+death-like solitude and a dreary gloom.  In those fortifications, rather
+than streets, not even the accustomed tread of the barbarian sentinel was
+heard.  The gates closed - the casements barred - the grim silence around -
+attested the absence of the Barons.  They had left the city so soon as they
+had learned the certain approach of Rienzi.  In the villages and castles of
+the Campagna, surrounded by their mercenaries, they awaited the hour when
+the people, weary of their idol, should welcome back even those ferocious
+Iconoclasts.
+
+With these exceptions, all Rome was astir!  Triumphal arches of drapery,
+wrought with gold and silver, raised at every principal vista, were
+inscribed with mottoes of welcome and rejoicing.  At frequent intervals
+stood youths and maidens, with baskets of flowers and laurels.  High above
+the assembled multitudes - from the proud tower of Hadrian - from the
+turrets of the Capitol - from the spires of the sacred buildings dedicated
+to Apostle and to Saint - floated banners as for a victory.  Rome once more
+opened her arms to receive her Tribune!
+
+Mingled with the crowd - disguised by his large mantle - hidden by the
+pressure of the throng - his person, indeed, forgotten by most - and, in
+the confusion of the moment, heeded by none - stood Adrian Colonna!  He had
+not been able to conquer his interest for the brother of Irene.  Solitary
+amidst his fellow-citizens, he stood - the only one of the proud race of
+Colonna who witnessed the triumph of the darling of the people.
+
+"They say he has grown large in his prison," said one of the bystanders;
+"he was lean enough when he came by daybreak out of the Church of St.
+Angelo!"
+
+"Ay," said another, a little man with a shrewd, restless eye, "they say
+truly; I saw him take leave of the Legate."
+
+Every eye was turned to the last speaker; he became at once a personage of
+importance.  "Yes," continued the little man with an elated and pompous
+air, "as soon, d'ye see, as he had prevailed on Messere Brettone, and
+Messere Arimbaldo, the brothers of Fra Moreale, to accompany him from
+Perugia to Monte Fiascone, he went at once to the Legate d'Albornoz, who
+was standing in the open air conversing with his captains.  A crowd
+followed.  I was one of them; and the Tribune nodded at me - ay, that did
+he! - and so, with his scarlet cloak, and his scarlet cap, he faced the
+proud Cardinal with a pride greater than his own.  'Monsignore,' said he,
+'though you accord me neither money nor arms, to meet the dangers of the
+road and brave the ambush of the Barons, I am prepared to depart.  Senator
+of Rome, his Holiness hath made me:  according to custom, I pray you,
+Monsignore, forthwith to confirm the rank.'  I would you could have seen
+how the proud Spaniard stared, and blushed, and frowned; but he bit his
+lip, and said little."
+
+"And confirmed Rienzi Senator?"
+
+"Yes; and blessed him, and bade him depart."
+
+"Senator!" said a stalwart but grey-haired giant with folded arms; "I like
+not a title that has been borne by a patrician.  I fear me, in the new
+title he will forget the old."
+
+"Fie, Cecco del Vecchio, you were always a grumbler!" said a merchant of
+cloth, whose commodity the ceremonial had put in great request.  "Fie! -
+for my part, I think Senator a less new-fangled title than Tribune.  I hope
+there will be feasting enow, at last.  Rome has been long dull.  A bad time
+for trade, I warrant me!"
+
+The artisan grinned scornfully.  He was one of those who distinguished
+between the middle class and the working, and he loathed a merchant as much
+as he did a noble.  "The day wears," said the little man; "he must be here
+anon.  The Senator's lady, and all his train, have gone forth to meet him
+these two hours."
+
+Scarce were these words uttered, when the crowd to the right swayed
+restlessly; and presently a horseman rode rapidly through the street.  "Way
+there!  Keep back!  Way - make way for the Most Illustrious the Senator of
+Rome!"
+
+The crowd became hushed - then murmuring - then hushed again.  From balcony
+and casement stretched the neck of every gazer.  The tramp of steeds was
+heard at a distance - the sound of clarion and trumpet; - then, gleaming
+through the distant curve of the streets, was seen the wave of the
+gonfalons - then, the glitter of spears - and then from the whole
+multitude, as from one voice, arose the shout, - "He comes! he comes!"
+
+Adrian shrunk yet more backward amongst the throng; and, leaning against
+the wall of one of the houses, contemplated the approaching pageant.
+
+First came, six abreast, the procession of Roman horsemen who had gone
+forth to meet the Senator, bearing boughs of olive in their hands; each
+hundred preceded by banners, inscribed with the words, "Liberty and Peace
+restored."  As these passed the group by Adrian, each more popular citizen
+of the cavalcade was recognised, and received with loud shouts.  By the
+garb and equipment of the horsemen, Adrian saw that they belonged chiefly
+to the traders of Rome; a race who, he well knew, unless strangely altered,
+valued liberty only as a commercial speculation.  "A vain support these,"
+thought the Colonna; - "what next?" on, then, came in glittering armour the
+German mercenaries, hired by the gold of the Brothers of Provence, in
+number two hundred and fifty, and previously in the pay of Malatesta of
+Rimini; - tall, stern, sedate, disciplined, - eyeing the crowd with a look,
+half of barbarian wonder, half of insolent disdain.  No shout of
+gratulation welcomed these sturdy strangers; it was evident that their
+aspect cast a chill over the assembly.
+
+"Shame!" growled Cecco del Vecchio, audibly.  "Has the people's friend need
+of the swords which guard an Orsini or a Malatesta? - shame!"
+
+No voice this time silenced the huge malcontent.
+
+"His only real defence against the Barons," thought Adrian, "if he pay them
+well!  But their number is not sufficient!"
+
+Next came two hundred fantassins, or foot-soldiers, of Tuscany, with the
+corselets and arms of the heavy-armed soldiery - a gallant company, and
+whose cheerful looks and familiar bearing appeared to sympathise with the
+crowd.  And in truth they did so, - for they were Tuscans, and therefore
+lovers of freedom.  In them, too, the Romans seemed to recognise natural
+and legitimate allies, - and there was a general cry of "Vivano i bravi
+Toscani!"
+
+"Poor defence!" thought the more sagacious Colonna; "the Barons can awe,
+and the mob corrupt them."
+
+Next came a file of trumpeters and standard-bearers; - and now the sound of
+the music was drowned by shouts, which seemed to rise simultaneously as
+from every quarter of the city; - "Rienzi!  Rienzi! - Welcome, welcome! -
+Liberty and Rienzi!  Rienzi and the Good Estate!"  Flowers dropped on his
+path, kerchiefs and banners waved from every house; - tears might be seen
+coursing, unheeded, down bearded cheeks; - youth and age were kneeling
+together, with uplifted hands, invoking blessings on the head of the
+Restored.  On he came the Senator-Tribune - "the Phoenix to his pyre!"
+
+Robed in scarlet, that literally blazed with gold, his proud head bared in
+the sun, and bending to the saddle bow, Rienzi passed slowly through the
+throng.  Not in the flush of that hour were visible, on his glorious
+countenance, the signs of disease and care:  the very enlargement of his
+proportions gave a greater majesty to his mien.  Hope sparkled in his eye -
+triumph and empire sat upon his brow.  The crowd could not contain
+themselves; they pressed forward, each upon each, anxious to catch the
+glance of his eye, to touch the hem of his robe.  He himself was deeply
+affected by their joy.  He halted; with faltering and broken words, he
+attempted to address them.  "I am repaid," he said, - "repaid for all; -
+may I live to make you happy!"
+
+The crowd parted again - the Senator moved on - again the crowd closed in. 
+Behind the Tribune, to their excited imagination, seemed to move the very
+goddess of ancient Rome.
+
+Upon a steed, caparisoned with cloth of gold; - in snow-white robes,
+studded with gems that flashed back the day, - came the beautiful and regal
+Nina.  The memory of her pride, her ostentation, all forgotten in that
+moment, she was scarce less welcome, scarce less idolized, than her lord. 
+And her smile all radiant with joy - her lip quivering with proud and elate
+emotion, - never had she seemed at once so born alike for love and for
+command; - a Zenobia passing through the pomp of Rome, - not a captive, but
+a queen.
+
+But not upon that stately form riveted the gaze of Adrian - pale,
+breathless, trembling, he clung to the walls against which he leaned.  Was
+it a dream?  Had the dead revived?  Or was it his own - his living Irene -
+whose soft and melancholy loveliness shone sadly by the side of Nina - a
+star beside the moon?  The pageant faded from his eyes - all grew dim and
+dark.  For a moment he was insensible.  When he recovered, the crowd was
+hurrying along, confused and blent with the mighty stream that followed the
+procession.  Through the moving multitude he caught the graceful form of
+Irene, again snatched by the closing standards of the procession from his
+view.  His blood rushed back from his heart through every vein.  He was as
+a man who for years had been in a fearful trance, and who is suddenly
+awakened to the light of heaven.
+
+One of that mighty throng remained motionless with Adrian.  It was Cecco
+del Vecchio.
+
+"He did not see me," muttered the smith to himself; "old friends are
+forgotten now!  Well, well, Cecco del Vecchio hates tyrants still - no
+matter what their name, nor how smoothly they are disguised.  He did not
+see ME!  Umph!"
+
+
+Chapter 9.II.  The Masquerade.
+
+The acuter reader has already learned, without the absolute intervention of
+the author as narrator, the incidents occurring to Rienzi in the interval
+between his acquittal at Avignon and his return to Rome.  As the impression
+made by Nina upon the softer and better nature of Albornoz died away, he
+naturally began to consider his guest - as the profound politicians of that
+day ever considered men - a piece upon the great Chess-Board, to be moved,
+advanced, or sacrificed, as best suited the scheme in view.  His purpose
+accomplished, in the recovery of the patrimonial territory, the submission
+of John di Vico, and the fall and death of the Demagogue Baroncelli, the
+Cardinal deemed it far from advisable to restore to Rome, and with so high
+a dignity, the able and ambitious Rienzi.  Before the daring Roman, even
+his own great spirit quailed; and he was wholly unable to conceive or to
+calculate the policy that might be adopted by the new Senator, when once
+more Lord of Rome.  Without affecting to detain, he therefore declined to
+assist in restoring him.  And Rienzi thus saw himself within an easy march
+of Rome, without one soldier to protect him against the Barons by the way. 
+But Heaven had decreed that no single man, however gifted, or however
+powerful, should long counteract or master the destinies of Rienzi:  and
+perhaps in no more glittering scene of his life did he ever evince so
+dexterous and subtle an intellect as he now did in extricating himself from
+the wiles of the Cardinal.  Repairing to Perugia, he had, as we have seen,
+procured, through the brothers of Montreal, men and money for his return. 
+But the Knight of St. John was greatly mistaken, if he imagined that Rienzi
+was not thoroughly aware of the perilous and treacherous tenure of the
+support he had received.  His keen eye read at a glance the aims and the
+characters of the brothers of Montreal - he knew that while affecting to
+serve him, they designed to control - that, made the debtor of the grasping
+and aspiring Montreal, and surrounded by the troops conducted by Montreal's
+brethren, he was in the midst of a net which, if not broken, would soon
+involve fortune and life itself in its fatal and deadly meshes.  But,
+confident in the resources and promptitude of his own genius, he yet
+sanguinely trusted to make those his puppets, who dreamed that he was their
+own; and, with empire for the stake, he cared not how crafty the
+antagonists he was compelled to engage.
+
+Meanwhile, uniting to all his rasher and all his nobler qualities, a
+profound dissimulation, he appeared to trust implicitly to his Provencal
+companions; and his first act on entering the Capitol, after the triumphal
+procession, was to reward with the highest dignities in his gift, Messere
+Arimbaldo and Messere Brettone de Montreal!
+
+High feasting was there that night in the halls of the Capitol; but dearer
+to Rienzi than all the pomp of the day, were the smiles of Nina.  Her proud
+and admiring eyes, swimming with delicious tears, fixed upon his
+countenance, she but felt that they were re-united, and that the hours,
+however brilliantly illumined, were hastening to that moment, when, after
+so desolate and dark an absence, they might once more be alone.
+
+Far other the thoughts of Adrian Colonna, as he sate alone in the dreary
+palace in the yet more dreary quarter of his haughty race.  Irene then was
+alive, - he had been deceived by some strange error, - she had escaped the
+devouring pestilence; and something in the pale sadness of her gentle
+features, even in that day of triumph, told him he was still remembered. 
+But as his mind by degrees calmed itself from its first wild and tumultuous
+rapture, he could not help asking himself the question whether they were
+not still to be divided!  Stefanello Colonna, the grandson of the old
+Stephen, and (by the death of his sire and brother) the youthful head of
+that powerful House, had already raised his standard against the Senator. 
+Fortifying himself in the almost impregnable fastness of Palestrina, he had
+assembled around him all the retainers of his family, and his lawless
+soldiery now ravaged the neighbouring plains far and wide.
+
+Adrian foresaw that the lapse of a few days would suffice to bring the
+Colonna and the Senator to open war.  Could he take part against those of
+his own blood?  The very circumstance of his love for Irene would yet more
+rob such a proceeding of all appearance of disinterested patriotism, and
+yet more deeply and irremediably stain his knightly fame, wherever the
+sympathy of his equals was enlisted with the cause of the Colonna.  On the
+other hand, not only his love for the Senator's sister, but his own secret
+inclinations and honest convictions, were on the side of one who alone
+seemed to him possessed of the desire and the genius to repress the
+disorders of his fallen city.  Long meditating, he feared no alternative
+was left him but in the same cruel neutrality to which he had been before
+condemned; but he resolved at least to make the attempt - rendered
+favourable and dignified by his birth and reputation - to reconcile the
+contending parties.  To effect this, he saw that he must begin with his
+haughty cousin.  He was well aware that were it known that he had first
+obtained an interview with Rienzi - did it appear as if he were charged
+with overtures from the Senator - although Stefanello himself might be
+inclined to yield to his representations, the insolent and ferocious Barons
+who surrounded him would not deign to listen to the envoy of the People's
+chosen one; and instead of being honoured as an intercessor, he should be
+suspected as a traitor.  He determined, then, to depart for Palestrina; but
+(and his heart beat audibly) would it not be possible first to obtain an
+interview with Irene?  It was no easy enterprise, surrounded as she was,
+but he resolved to adventure it.  He summoned Giulio.
+
+"The Senator holds a festival this evening - think you that the assemblage
+will be numerous?"
+
+"I hear," answered Giulio, "that the banquet given to the Ambassadors and
+Signors today is to be followed tomorrow by a mask, to which all ranks are
+admitted.  By Bacchus, (Still a common Roman expletive.) if the Tribune
+only invited nobles, the smallest closet in the Capitol would suffice to
+receive his maskers.  I suppose a mask has been resolved on in order to
+disguise the quality of the visitors."
+
+Adrian mused a moment; and the result of his revery was a determination to
+delay for another sun his departure to Palestrina - to take advantage of
+the nature of the revel, and to join the masquerade.
+
+That species of entertainment, though unusual at that season of the year,
+had been preferred by Rienzi, partly and ostensibly because it was one in
+which all his numerous and motley supporters could be best received; but
+chiefly and secretly because it afforded himself and his confidential
+friends the occasion to mix unsuspected amongst the throng, and learn more
+of the real anticipations of the Romans with respect to his policy and his
+strength, than could well be gathered from the enthusiasm of a public
+spectacle.
+
+The following night was beautifully serene and clear.  The better to
+accommodate the numerous guests, and to take advantage of the warm and
+moonlit freshness of the air, the open court of the Capitol, with the Place
+of the Lion, (as well as the state apartments within,) was devoted to the
+festival.
+
+As Adrian entered the festive court with the rush of the throng, it chanced
+that in the eager impatience of some maskers, more vehement than the rest,
+his vizard was deranged.  He hastily replaced it; but not before one of the
+guests had recognised his countenance.
+
+From courtesy, Rienzi and his family remained at first unmasked.  They
+stood at the head of the stairs to which the old Egyptian Lion gave the
+name.  The lights shone over that Colossal Monument - which, torn from its
+antique home, had witnessed, in its grim repose, the rise and lapse of
+countless generations, and the dark and stormy revolutions of avenging
+fate.  It was an ill omen, often afterwards remarked, that the place of
+that state festival was the place also of the state executions.  But at
+that moment, as group after group pressed forward to win smile and word
+from the celebrated man, whose fortunes had been the theme of Europe, or to
+bend in homage to the lustrous loveliness of Nina, no omen and no warning
+clouded the universal gladness.
+
+Behind Nina, well contented to shrink from the gaze of the throng, and to
+feel her softer beauty eclipsed by the dazzling and gorgeous charms of her
+brother's wife, stood Irene.  Amidst the crowd on her alone Adrian fixed
+his eyes.  The years which had flown over the fair brow of the girl of
+sixteen - then animated by, yet trembling beneath, the first wild breath of
+Love; - youth in every vein - passion and childish tenderness in every
+thought, had not marred, but they had changed, the character of Irene's
+beauty.  Her cheek, no longer varying with every instant, was settled into
+a delicate and thoughtful paleness - her form, more rounded to the
+proportions of Roman beauty, had assumed an air of dignified and calm
+repose.  No longer did the restless eye wander in search of some imagined
+object; no longer did the lip quiver into smiles at some untold hope or
+half-unconscious recollection.  A grave and mournful expression gave to her
+face (still how sweet!) a gravity beyond her years.  The bloom, the flush,
+the April of the heart, was gone; but yet neither time, nor sorrow, nor
+blighted love, had stolen from her countenance its rare and angelic
+softness - nor that inexpressible and virgin modesty of form and aspect,
+which, contrasting the bolder beauties of Italy, had more than aught else
+distinguished to Adrian, from all other women, the idol of his heart.  And
+feeding his gaze upon those dark deep eyes, which spoke of thought far away
+and busy with the past, Adrian felt again and again that he was not
+forgotten!  Hovering near her, but suffering the crowd to press one after
+another before him, he did not perceive that he had attracted the eagle eye
+of the Senator.
+
+In fact, as one of the maskers passed Rienzi, he whispered, "Beware, a
+Colonna is among the masks! beneath the reveller's domino has often lurked
+the assassin's dagger.  Yonder stands your foe - mark him!"
+
+These words were the first sharp and thrilling intimation of the perils
+into which he had rushed, that the Tribune-Senator had received since his
+return.  He changed colour slightly; and for some minutes the courtly smile
+and ready greeting with which he had hitherto delighted every guest, gave
+way to a moody abstraction.
+
+"Why stands yon strange man so mute and motionless?" whispered he to Nina. 
+"He speaks to none - he approaches us not - a churl, a churl! - he must be
+seen to."
+
+"Doubtless, some German or English barbarian," answered Nina.  "Let not, my
+Lord, so slight a cloud dim your merriment."
+
+"You are right, dearest; we have friends here; we are well girt.  And, by
+my father's ashes, I feel that I must accustom myself to danger.  Nina, let
+us move on; methinks we might now mix among the maskers - masked
+ourselves."
+
+The music played loud and cheerily as the Senator and his party mingled
+with the throng.  But still his eye turned ever towards the grey domino of
+Adrian, and he perceived that it followed his steps.  Approaching the
+private entrance of the Capitol, he for a few moments lost sight of his
+unwelcome pursuer:  but just as he entered, turning abruptly, Rienzi
+perceived him close at his side - the next moment the stranger had vanished
+amidst the throng.  But that moment had sufficed to Adrian - he had reached
+Irene.  "Adrian Colonna (he whispered) waits thee beside the Lion."
+
+In the absorption of his own reflections, Rienzi fortunately did not notice
+the sudden paleness and agitation of his sister.  Entered within his
+palace, he called for wine - the draught revived his spirits - he listened
+smilingly to the sparkling remarks of Nina; and enduing his mask and
+disguise, said, with his wonted cheerfulness, "Now for Truth - strange that
+in festivals it should only speak behind a vizard!  My sweet sister, thou
+hast lost thine old smile, and I would rather see that than - Ha! has Irene
+vanished?"
+
+"Only, I suppose, to change her dress, my Cola, and mingle with the
+revellers," answered Nina.  "Let my smile atone for hers."
+
+Rienzi kissed the bright brow of his wife as she clung fondly to his bosom. 
+"Thy smile is the sunlight," said he; "but this girl disturbs me.  Methinks
+now, at least, she might wear a gladder aspect."
+
+"Is there nothing of love beneath my fair sister's gloom?" answered Nina. 
+"Do you not call to mind how she loved Adrian Colonna?"
+
+"Does that fantasy hold still?" returned Rienzi, musingly.  "Well, and she
+is fit bride for a monarch."
+
+"Yet it were an alliance that would, better than one with monarchs,
+strengthen thy power at Rome!"
+
+"Ay, were it possible; but that haughty race! - Perchance this very masker
+that so haunted our steps was but her lover.  I will look to this.  Let us
+forth, my Nina.  Am I well cloaked?"
+
+"Excellently well - and I?"
+
+"The sun behind a cloud."
+
+"Ah, let us not tarry long; what hour of revel like that when thy hand in
+mine, this head upon thy bosom, we forget the sorrows we have known, and
+even the triumphs we have shared?"
+
+Meanwhile, Irene, confused and lost amidst a transport of emotion, already
+disguised and masked, was threading her way through the crowd back to the
+staircase of the Lion.  With the absence of the Senator that spot had
+comparatively been deserted.  Music and the dance attracted the maskers to
+another quarter of the wide space.  And Irene now approaching, beheld the
+moonlight fall over the statue, and a solitary figure leaning against the
+pedestal.  She paused, the figure approached, and again she heard the voice
+of her early love.
+
+"Oh, Irene! recognised even in this disguise," said Adrian, seizing her
+trembling hand; "have I lived to gaze again upon that form - to touch this
+hand?  Did not these eyes behold thee lifeless in that fearful vault, which
+I shudder to recall?  By what miracle wert thou raised again?  By what
+means did Heaven spare to this earth one that it seemed already to have
+placed amongst its angels?"
+
+"Was this, indeed, thy belief?" said Irene, falteringly, but with an accent
+eloquent of joy.  "Thou didst not then willingly desert me?  Unjust that I
+was, I wronged thy noble nature, and deemed that my brother's fall, my
+humble lineage, thy brilliant fate, had made thee renounce Irene."
+
+"Unjust indeed!" answered the lover.  "But surely I saw thee amongst the
+dead! - thy cloak, with the silver stars - who else wore the arms of the
+Roman Tribune?"
+
+"Was it but the cloak then, which, dropped in the streets, was probably
+assumed by some more ill-fated victim; was it that sight alone, that made
+thee so soon despair?  Ah! Adrian," continued Irene, tenderly, but with
+reproach; "not even when I saw thee seemingly lifeless on the couch by
+which I had watched three days and nights, not even then did I despair!"
+
+"What, then, my vision did not deceive me!  It was you who watched by my
+bed in that grim hour, whose love guarded, whose care preserved me!  And I,
+wretch that I was! - "
+
+"Nay," answered Irene, "your thought was natural.  Heaven seemed to endow
+me with superhuman strength, whilst I was necessary to thee.  But judge of
+my dismay.  I left thee to seek the good friar who attended thee as thy
+leech; I returned, and found thee not.  Heart-sick and terrified, I
+searched the desolate city in vain.  Strong as I was while hope supported
+me, I sunk beneath fear. - And my brother found me senseless, and stretched
+on the ground, by the church of St. Mark."
+
+"The church of St. Mark! - so foretold his dream!"
+
+"He had told me he had met thee; we searched for thee in vain; at length we
+heard that thou hadst left the city, and - and - I rejoiced, Adrian, but I
+repined!"
+
+For some minutes the young lovers surrendered themselves to the delight of
+reunion, while new explanations called forth new transports.
+
+"And now," murmured Irene, "now that we have met - " she paused, and her
+mask concealed her blushes.
+
+"Now that we have met," said Adrian, filling up the silence, "wouldst thou
+say further, 'that we should not part?'  Trust me, dearest, that is the
+hope that animates my heart.  It was but to enjoy these brief bright
+moments with thee, that I delayed my departure to Palestrina.  Could I but
+hope to bring my young cousin into amity with thy brother, no barrier would
+prevent our union.  Willingly I forget the past - the death of my unhappy
+kinsmen, (victims, it is true, to their own faults;) and, perhaps, amidst
+all the crowds that hailed his return, none more appreciated the great and
+lofty qualities of Cola di Rienzi, than did Adrian Colonna."
+
+"If this be so," said Irene, "let me hope the best; meanwhile, it is enough
+of comfort and of happiness to know, that we love each other as of old. 
+Ah, Adrian, I am sadly changed; and often have I thought it a thing beyond
+my dreams, that thou shouldst see me again and love me still."
+
+"Fairer art thou and lovelier than ever," answered Adrian, passionately;
+"and time, which has ripened thy bloom, has but taught me more deeply to
+feel thy value.  Farewell, Irene, I linger here no longer; thou wilt, I
+trust, hear soon of my success with my House, and ere the week be over I
+may return to claim thy hand in the face of day."
+
+The lovers parted; Adrian lingered on the spot, and Irene hastened to bury
+her emotion and her raptures in her own chamber.
+
+As her form vanished, and the young Colonna slowly turned away, a tall mask
+strode abruptly towards him.
+
+"Thou art a Colonna," it said, "and in the power of the Senator.  Dost thou
+tremble?"
+
+"If I be a Colonna, rude masker," answered Adrian, coldly, "thou shouldst
+know the old proverb, 'He who stirs the column, shall rue the fall.'"
+
+The stranger laughed aloud, and then lifting his mask, Adrian saw that it
+was the Senator who stood before him.
+
+"My Lord Adrian di Castello," said Rienzi, resuming all his gravity, "is it
+as friend or foe that you have honoured our revels this night?"
+
+"Senator of Rome," answered Adrian, with equal stateliness, "I partake of
+no man's hospitality but as a friend.  A foe, at least to you, I trust
+never justly to be esteemed."
+
+"I would," rejoined Rienzi, "that I could apply to myself unreservedly that
+most flattering speech.  Are these friendly feelings entertained towards me
+as the Governor of the Roman people, or as the brother of the woman who has
+listened to your vows?"
+
+Adrian, who when the Senator had unmasked had followed his example, felt at
+these words that his eye quailed beneath Rienzi's.  However, he recovered
+himself with the wonted readiness of an Italian, and replied laconically,
+
+"As both."
+
+"Both!" echoed Rienzi.  "Then, indeed, noble Adrian, you are welcome
+hither.  And yet, methinks, if you conceived there was no cause for enmity
+between us, you would have wooed the sister of Cola di Rienzi in a guise
+more worthy of your birth; and, permit me to add, of that station which
+God, destiny, and my country, have accorded unto me.  You dare not, young
+Colonna, meditate dishonour to the sister of the Senator of Rome.  Highborn
+as you are, she is your equal."
+
+"Were I the Emperor, whose simple knight I but am, your sister were my
+equal," answered Adrian, warmly.  "Rienzi, I grieve that I am discovered to
+you yet.  I had trusted that, as a mediator between the Barons and
+yourself, I might first have won your confidence, and then claimed my
+reward.  Know that with tomorrow's dawn I depart for Palestrina, seeking to
+reconcile my young cousin to the choice of the People and the Pontiff. 
+Various reasons, which I need not now detail, would have made me wish to
+undertake this heraldry of peace without previous communication with you. 
+But since we have met, intrust me with any terms of conciliation, and I
+pledge you the right hand, not of a Roman noble - alas! the prisca fides
+has departed from that pledge! - but of a Knight of the Imperial Court,
+that I will not betray your confidence."
+
+Rienzi, accustomed to read the human countenance, had kept his eyes
+intently fixed upon Adrian while he spoke; when the Colonna concluded, he
+pressed the proffered hand, and said, with that familiar and winning
+sweetness which at times was so peculiar to his manner,
+
+"I trust you, Adrian, from my soul.  You were mine early friend in calmer,
+perchance happier, years.  And never did river reflect the stars more
+clearly, than your heart then mirrored back the truth.  I trust you!"
+
+While thus speaking, he had mechanically led back the Colonna to the statue
+of the Lion; there pausing, he resumed:
+
+"Know that I have this morning despatched my delegate to your cousin
+Stefanello.  With all due courtesy, I have apprised him of my return to
+Rome, and invited hither his honoured presence.  Forgetting all ancient
+feuds, mine own past exile, I have assured him, here, the station and
+dignity due to the head of the Colonna.  All that I ask in return is
+obedience to the law.  Years and reverses have abated my younger pride, and
+though I may yet preserve the sternness of the Judge, none shall hereafter
+complain of the insolence of the Tribune."
+
+"I would," answered Adrian, "that your mission to Stefanello had been
+delayed a day; I would fain have forestalled its purport.  Howbeit, you
+increase my desire of departure, should I yet succeed in obtaining an
+honourable and peaceful reconciliation, it is not in disguise that I will
+woo your sister."
+
+"And never did Colonna," replied Rienzi, loftily, "bring to his House a
+maiden whose alliance more gratified ambition.  I still see, as I have seen
+ever, in mine own projects, and mine own destinies, the chart of the new
+Roman Empire!"
+
+"Be not too sanguine yet, brave Rienzi," replied Adrian, laying his hand on
+the Lion of Basalt:  "bethink thee on how many scheming brains this dumb
+image of stone hath looked down from its pedestal - schemes of sand, and
+schemers of dust.  Thou hast enough, at present, for the employ of all
+thine energy - not to extend thy power, but to preserve thyself.  For,
+trust me, never stood human greatness on so wild and dark a precipice!"
+
+"Thou art honest," said the Senator; "and these are the first words of
+doubt, and yet of sympathy, I have heard in Rome.  But the People love me,
+the Barons have fled from Rome, the Pontiff approves, and the swords of the
+Northmen guard the avenues of the Capitol.  But these are nought; in mine
+own honesty are my spear and buckler.  Oh, never," continued Rienzi,
+kindling with his enthusiasm, "never since the days of the old Republic,
+did Roman dream a purer and a brighter aspiration, than that which animates
+and supports me now.  Peace restored - law established - art, letters,
+intellect, dawning upon the night of time; the Patricians, no longer
+bandits of rapine, but the guard of order; the People ennobled from a mob,
+brave to protect, enlightened to guide, themselves.  Then, not by the
+violence of arms, but by the majesty of her moral power, shall the Mother
+of Nations claim the obedience of her children.  Thus dreaming and thus
+hoping, shall I tremble or despond?  No, Adrian Colonna, come weal or woe,
+I abide, unshrinking and unawed, by the chances of my doom!"
+
+So much did the manner and the tone of the Senator exalt his language, that
+even the sober sense of Adrian was enchanted and subdued.  He kissed the
+hand he held, and said earnestly,
+
+"A doom that I will deem it my boast to share - a career that it will be my
+glory to smooth.  If I succeed in my present mission - "
+
+"You are my brother!" said Rienzi.
+
+"If I fail?"
+
+"You may equally claim that alliance.  You pause - you change colour."
+
+"Can I desert my house?"
+
+"Young Lord," said Rienzi, loftily, "say rather can you desert your
+country?  If you doubt my honesty, if you fear my ambition, desist from
+your task, rob me not of a single foe.  But if you believe that I have the
+will and the power to serve the State - if you recognise, even in the
+reverses and calamities I have known and mastered, the protecting hand of
+the Saviour of Nations - if those reverses were but the mercies of Him who
+chasteneth - necessary, it may be, to correct my earlier daring and sharpen
+yet more my intellect - if, in a word, thou believest me one whom, whatever
+be his faults, God hath preserved for the sake of Rome, forget that you are
+a Colonna - remember only that you are a Roman!"
+
+"You have conquered me, strange and commanding spirit," said Adrian, in a
+low voice, completely carried away; "and whatever the conduct of my
+kindred, I am yours and Rome's.  Farewell."
+
+
+Chapter 9.III.  Adrian's Adventures at Palestrina.
+
+It was yet noon when Adrian beheld before him the lofty mountains that
+shelter Palestrina, the Praeneste of the ancient world.  Back to a period
+before Romulus existed, in the earliest ages of that mysterious
+civilisation which in Italy preceded the birth of Rome, could be traced the
+existence and the power of that rocky city.  Eight dependent towns owned
+its sway and its wealth; its position, and the strength of those mighty
+walls, in whose ruins may yet be traced the masonry of the remote Pelasgi,
+had long braved the ambition of the neighbouring Rome.  From that very
+citadel, the Mural Crown (Hence, apparently, its Greek name of Stephane. 
+Palestrina is yet one of the many proofs which the vicinity of Rome affords
+of the old Greek civilization of Italy.) of the mountain, had waved the
+standard of Marius; and up the road which Adrian's scanty troop slowly
+wound, had echoed the march of the murtherous Sylla, on his return from the
+Mithridatic war.  Below, where the city spread towards the plain, were yet
+seen the shattered and roofless columns of the once celebrated Temple of
+Fortune; and still the immemorial olives clustered grey and mournfully
+around the ruins.
+
+A more formidable hold the Barons of Rome could not have selected; and as
+Adrian's military eye scanned the steep ascent and the rugged walls, he
+felt that with ordinary skill it might defy for months all the power of the
+Roman Senator.  Below, in the fertile valley, dismantled cottages and
+trampled harvests attested the violence and rapine of the insurgent Barons;
+and at that very moment were seen, in the old plain of the warlike Hernici,
+troops of armed men, driving before them herds of sheep and cattle,
+collected in their lawless incursions.  In sight of that Praeneste, which
+had been the favourite retreat of the luxurious Lords of Rome in its most
+polished day, the Age of Iron seemed renewed.
+
+The banner of the Colonna, borne by Adrian's troop, obtained ready
+admittance at the Porta del Sole.  As he passed up the irregular and narrow
+streets that ascended to the citadel, groups of foreign mercenaries, -
+half-ragged, half-tawdry knots of abandoned women, - mixed here and there
+with the liveries of the Colonna, stood loitering amidst the ruins of
+ancient fanes and palaces, or basked lazily in the sun, upon terraces,
+through which, from amidst weeds and grass, glowed the imperishable hues of
+the rich mosaics, which had made the pride of that lettered and graceful
+nobility, of whom savage freebooters were now the heirs.
+
+The contrast between the Past and Present forcibly occurred to Adrian, as
+he passed along; and, despite his order, he felt as if Civilization itself
+were enlisted against his House upon the side of Rienzi.
+
+Leaving his train in the court of the citadel, Adrian demanded admission to
+the presence of his cousin.  He had left Stefanello a child on his
+departure from Rome, and there could therefore be but a slight and
+unfamiliar acquaintance betwixt them, despite their kindred.
+
+Peals of laughter came upon his ear, as he followed one of Stefanello's
+gentlemen through a winding passage that led to the principal chamber.  The
+door was thrown open, and Adrian found himself in a rude hall, to which
+some appearance of hasty state and attempted comfort had been given. 
+Costly arras imperfectly clothed the stone walls, and the rich seats and
+decorated tables, which the growing civilization of the northern cities of
+Italy had already introduced into the palaces of Italian nobles, strangely
+contrasted the rough pavement, spread with heaps of armour negligently
+piled around.  At the farther end of the apartment, Adrian shudderingly
+perceived, set in due and exact order, the implements of torture.
+
+Stefanello Colonna, with two other Barons, indolently reclined on seats
+drawn around a table, in the recess of a deep casement, from which might be
+still seen the same glorious landscape, bounded by the dim spires of Rome,
+which Hannibal and Pyrrhus had ascended that very citadel to survey!
+
+Stefanello himself, in the first bloom of youth, bore already on his
+beardless countenance those traces usually the work of the passions and
+vices of maturest manhood.  His features were cast in the mould of the old
+Stephen's; in their clear, sharp, high-bred outline might be noticed that
+regular and graceful symmetry, which blood, in men as in animals, will
+sometimes entail through generations; but the features were wasted and
+meagre.  His brows were knit in an eternal frown; his thin and bloodless
+lips wore that insolent contempt which seems so peculiarly cold and
+unlovely in early youth; and the deep and livid hollows round his eyes,
+spoke of habitual excess and premature exhaustion.  By him sat (reconciled
+by hatred to one another) the hereditary foes of his race; the soft, but
+cunning and astute features of Luca di Savelli, contrasted with the broad
+frame and ferocious countenance of the Prince of the Orsini.
+
+The young head of the Colonna rose with some cordiality to receive his
+cousin.  "Welcome," he said, "dear Adrian; you are arrived in time to
+assist us with your well-known military skill.  Think you not we shall
+stand a long siege, if the insolent plebeian dare adventure it?  You know
+our friends, the Orsini and the Savelli?  Thanks to St. Peter, or Peter's
+delegate, we have now happily meaner throats to cut than those of each
+other!"
+
+Thus saying, Stefanello again threw himself listlessly on his seat, and the
+shrill, woman's voice of Savelli took part in the dialogue.
+
+"I would, noble Signor, that you had come a few hours earlier:  we are
+still making merry at the recollection - he, he, he!"
+
+"Ah, excellent," cried Stefanello, joining in the laugh; "our cousin has
+had a loss.  Know Adrian, that this base fellow, whom the Pope has had the
+impudence to create Senator, dared but yesterday to send us a varlet, whom
+he called - by our Lady! - his ambassador!"
+
+"Would you could have seen his mantle, Signor Adrian!" chimed in the
+Savelli:  "purple velvet, as I live, decorated in gold, with the arms of
+Rome:  we soon spoiled his finery."
+
+"What!" exclaimed Adrian, "you did not break the laws of all nobility and
+knighthood? - you offered no insult to a herald!"
+
+"Herald, sayst thou?" cried Stefanello, frowning till his eyes were scarce
+visible.  "It is for Princes and Barons alone to employ heralds.  An' I had
+had my will, I would have sent back the minion's head to the usurper."
+
+"What did ye then?" asked Adrian, coldly.
+
+"Bade our swineherds dip the fellow in the ditch, and gave him a night's
+lodging in a dungeon to dry himself withal."
+
+"And this morning - he, he, he!" added the Savelli, "we had him before us,
+and drew his teeth, one by one; - I would you could have heard the fellow
+mumble out for mercy!"
+
+Adrian rose hastily, and struck the table fiercely with his gauntlet.
+
+"Stefanello Colonna," said he, colouring with noble rage, "answer me:  did
+you dare to inflict this indelible disgrace upon the name we jointly bear? 
+Tell me, at least, that you protested against this foul treason to all the
+laws of civilization and of honour.  You answer not.  House of the Colonna,
+can such be thy representative!"
+
+"To me these words!" said Stefanello, trembling with passion.  "Beware! 
+Methinks thou art the traitor, leagued perhaps with yon rascal mob.  Well
+do I remember that thou, the betrothed of the Demagogue's sister, didst not
+join with my uncle and my father of old, but didst basely leave the city to
+her plebeian tyrant."
+
+"That did he!" said the fierce Orsini, approaching Adrian menacingly, while
+the gentle cowardice of Savelli sought in vain to pluck him back by the
+mantle - "that did he! and but for thy presence, Stefanello - "
+
+"Coward and blusterer!" interrupted Adrian, fairly beside himself with
+indignation and shame, and dashing his gauntlet in the very face of the
+advancing Orsini - "wouldst thou threaten one who has maintained, in every
+list of Europe, and against the stoutest Chivalry of the North, the honour
+of Rome, which thy deeds the while disgraced?  By this gage, I spit upon
+and defy thee.  With lance and with brand, on horse and on foot, I maintain
+against thee and all thy line, that thou art no knight to have thus
+maltreated, in thy strongholds, a peaceful and unarmed herald.  Yes, even
+here, on the spot of thy disgrace, I challenge thee to arms!"
+
+"To the court below!  Follow me," said Orsini, sullenly, and striding
+towards the threshold.  "What, ho there! my helmet and breast-plate!"
+
+"Stay, noble Orsini," said Stefanello.  "The insult offered to thee is my
+quarrel - mine was the deed - and against me speaks this degenerate scion
+of our line.  Adrian di Castello - sometime called Colonna - surrender your
+sword:  you are my prisoner!"
+
+"Oh!" said Adrian, grinding his teeth, "that my ancestral blood did not
+flow through thy veins - else - but enough!  Me! your equal, and the
+favoured Knight of the Emperor, whose advent now brightens the frontiers of
+Italy! - me - you dare not detain.  For your friends, I shall meet them yet
+perhaps, ere many days are over, where none shall separate our swords. 
+Till then, remember, Orsini, that it is against no unpractised arm that
+thou wilt have to redeem thine honour!"
+
+Adrian, his drawn sword in his hand, strode towards the door, and passed
+the Orsini, who stood, lowering and irresolute, in the centre of the
+apartment.
+
+Savelli whispered Stefanello.  "He says, 'Ere many days be past!'  Be sure,
+dear Signor, that he goes to join Rienzi.  Remember, the alliance he once
+sought with the Tribune's sister may be renewed.  Beware of him!  Ought he
+to leave the castle?  The name of a Colonna, associated with the mob, would
+distract and divide half our strength."
+
+"Fear me not," returned Stefanello, with a malignant smile.  "Ere you
+spoke, I had determined!"
+
+The young Colonna lifted the arras from the wall, opened a door, and passed
+into a low hall, in which sate twenty mercenaries.
+
+"Quick!" said he.  "Seize and disarm yon stranger in the green mantle - but
+slay him not.  Bid the guard below find dungeons for his train.  Quick! ere
+he reach the gate."
+
+Adrian had gained the open hall below - his train and his steed were in
+sight in the court - when suddenly the soldiery of the Colonna, rushing
+through another passage than that which he had passed, surrounded and
+intercepted his retreat.
+
+"Yield thee, Adrian di Castello," cried Stefanello from the summit of the
+stairs; "or your blood be on your own head."
+
+Three steps did Adrian make through the press, and three of his enemies
+fell beneath his sword.  "To the rescue!" he shouted to his band, and
+already those bold and daring troopers had gained the hall.  Presently the
+alarum bell tolled loud - the court swarmed with soldiers.  Oppressed by
+numbers, beat down rather than subdued, Adrian's little train was soon
+secured, and the flower of the Colonna, wounded, breathless, disarmed, but
+still uttering loud defiance, was a prisoner in the fortress of his
+kinsman.
+
+
+Chapter 9.IV.  The Position of the Senator. - The Work of Years. - The
+Rewards of Ambition.
+
+The indignation of Rienzi may readily be conceived, on the return of his
+herald mutilated and dishonoured.  His temper, so naturally stern, was
+rendered yet more hard by the remembrance of his wrongs and trials; and the
+result which attended his overtures of conciliation to Stefanello Colonna
+stung him to the soul.
+
+The bell of the Capitol tolled to arms within ten minutes after the return
+of the herald.  The great gonfalon of Rome was unfurled on the highest
+tower; and the very evening after Adrian's arrest, the forces of the
+Senator, headed by Rienzi in person, were on the road to Palestrina.  The
+troopers of the Barons had, however, made incursions as far as Tivoli with
+the supposed connivance of the inhabitants, and Rienzi halted at that
+beautiful spot to raise recruits, and receive the allegiance of the
+suspected, while his soldiers, with Arimbaldo and Brettone at their head,
+went in search of the marauders.  The brothers of Montreal returned late at
+night with the intelligence, that the troopers of the Barons had secured
+themselves amidst the recesses of the wood of Pantano.
+
+The red spot mounted to Rienzi's brow.  He gazed hard at Brettone, who
+stated the news to him, and a natural suspicion shot across his mind.
+
+"How! - escaped!" he said.  "Is it possible?  Enough of such idle
+skirmishes with these lordly robbers.  Will the hour ever come when I shall
+meet them hand to hand?  Brettone," and the brother of Montreal felt the
+dark eye of Rienzi pierce to his very heart; "Brettone!" said he, with an
+abrupt change of voice, "are your men to be trusted?  Is there no
+connivance with the Barons?"
+
+"How!" said Brettone, sullenly, but somewhat confused.
+
+"How me no hows!" quoth the Tribune-Senator, fiercely.  "I know that thou
+art a valiant Captain of valiant men.  Thou and thy brother Arimbaldo have
+served me well, and I have rewarded ye well!  Have I not?  Speak!"
+
+"Senator," answered Arimbaldo, taking up the word, "you have kept your word
+to us.  You have raised us to the highest rank your power could bestow, and
+this has amply atoned our humble services."
+
+"I am glad ye allow thus much," said the Tribune.
+
+Arimbaldo proceeded, somewhat more loftily, "I trust, my Lord, you do not
+doubt us?"
+
+"Arimbaldo," replied Rienzi, in a voice of deep, but half-suppressed
+emotion; "you are a lettered man, and you have seemed to share my projects
+for the regeneration of our common kind.  You ought not to betray me. 
+There is something in unison between us.  But, chide me not, I am
+surrounded by treason, and the very air I breathe seems poison to my lips."
+
+There was a pathos mingled with Rienzi's words which touched the milder
+brother of Montreal.  He bowed in silence.  Rienzi surveyed him wistfully,
+and sighed.  Then, changing the conversation, he spoke of their intended
+siege of Palestrina, and shortly afterwards retired to rest.
+
+Left alone, the brothers regarded each other for some moments in silence. 
+"Brettone," said Arimbaldo at length, in a whispered voice, "my heart
+misgives me.  I like not Walter's ambitious schemes.  With our own
+countrymen we are frank and loyal, why play the traitor with this high-
+souled Roman?"  (The anonymous biographer of Rienzi makes the following
+just remark:  "Sono li tedeschi, come discendon de la Alemagna, semplici,
+puri, senza fraude, come si allocano tra' taliani, diventano mastri coduti,
+viziosi, che sentono ogni malizia." - "Vita di Cola di Rienzi", lib. ii.
+cap. 16.)
+
+"Tush!" said Brettone.  "Our brother's hand of iron alone can sway this
+turbulent people; and if Rienzi be betrayed, so also are his enemies, the
+Barons.  No more of this!  I have tidings from Montreal; he will be in Rome
+in a few days."
+
+"And then?"
+
+"Rienzi, weakened by the Barons (for he must not conquer) - the Barons,
+weakened by Rienzi - our Northmen seize the Capitol, and the soldiery, now
+scattered throughout Italy, will fly to the standard of the Great Captain. 
+Montreal must be first Podesta, then King, of Rome."
+
+Arimbaldo moved restlessly in his seat, and the brethren conferred no more
+on their projects.
+
+The situation of Rienzi was precisely that which tends the most to sour and
+to harden the fairest nature.  With an intellect capable of the grandest
+designs, a heart that beat with the loftiest emotions, elevated to the
+sunny pinnacle of power and surrounded by loud-tongued adulators, he knew
+not among men a single breast in which he could confide.  He was as one on
+a steep ascent, whose footing crumbles, while every bough at which he
+grasps seems to rot at his touch.  He found the people more than ever
+eloquent in his favour, but while they shouted raptures as he passed, not a
+man was capable of making a sacrifice for him!  The liberty of a state is
+never achieved by a single individual; if not the people - if not the
+greater number - a zealous and fervent minority, at least must go hand in
+hand with him.  Rome demanded sacrifices in all who sought the Roman
+regeneration - sacrifices of time, ease, and money.  The crowd followed the
+procession of the Senator, but not a single Roman devoted his life, unpaid,
+to his standard; not a single coin was subscribed in the defence of
+freedom.  Against him were arrayed the most powerful and the most ferocious
+Barons of Italy; each of whom could maintain, at his own cost, a little
+army of practised warriors.  With Rienzi were traders and artificers, who
+were willing to enjoy the fruits of liberty, but not to labour at the soil;
+who demanded, in return for empty shouts, peace and riches; and who
+expected that one man was to effect in a day what would be cheaply
+purchased by the struggle of a generation.  All their dark and rude notion
+of a reformed state was to live unbutchered by the Barons and untaxed by
+their governors.  Rome, I say, gave to her Senator not a free arm, nor a
+voluntary florin.  (This plain fact is thoroughly borne out by every
+authority.)  Well aware of the danger which surrounds the ruler who defends
+his state by foreign swords, the fondest wish, and the most visionary dream
+of Rienzi, was to revive amongst the Romans, in their first enthusiasm at
+his return, an organised and voluntary force, who, in protecting him, would
+protect themselves: - not, as before, in his first power, a nominal force
+of twenty thousand men, who at any hour might yield (as they did yield) to
+one hundred and fifty; but a regular, well disciplined, and trusty body,
+numerous enough to resist aggression, not numerous enough to become
+themselves the aggressors.
+
+Hitherto all his private endeavours, his public exhortations, had failed;
+the crowd listened - shouted - saw him quit the city to meet their tyrants,
+and returned to their shops, saying to each other, "What a great man!"
+
+The character of Rienzi has chiefly received for its judges men of the
+closet, who speculate upon human beings as if they were machines; who gauge
+the great, not by their merit, but their success; and who have censured or
+sneered at the Tribune, where they should have condemned the People!  Had
+but one-half the spirit been found in Rome which ran through a single vein
+of Cola di Rienzi, the august Republic, if not the majestic empire, of
+Rome, might be existing now!  Turning from the people, the Senator saw his
+rude and savage troops, accustomed to the licence of a tyrant's camp, and
+under commanders in whom it was ruin really to confide - whom it was equal
+ruin openly to distrust.  Hemmed in on every side by dangers, his character
+daily grew more restless, vigilant, and stern; and still, with all the aims
+of the patriot, he felt all the curses of the tyrant.  Without the rough
+and hardening career which, through a life of warfare, had brought Cromwell
+to a similar power - with more of grace and intellectual softness in his
+composition, he resembled that yet greater man in some points of character
+- in his religious enthusiasm; his rigid justice, often forced by
+circumstance into severity, but never wantonly cruel or blood-thirsty; in
+his singular pride of country; and his mysterious command over the minds of
+others.  But he resembled the giant Englishman far more in circumstance
+than original nature, and that circumstance assimilated their characters at
+the close of their several careers.  Like Cromwell, beset by secret or open
+foes, the assassin's dagger ever gleamed before his eyes; and his stout
+heart, unawed by real, trembled at imagined, terrors.  The countenance
+changing suddenly from red to white - the bloodshot, restless eye, belying
+the composed majesty of mien - the muttering lips - the broken slumber -
+the secret corselet; these to both were the rewards of Power!
+
+The elasticity of youth had left the Tribune!  His frame, which had endured
+so many shocks, had contracted a painful disease in the dungeon at Avignon
+("Dicea che ne la prigione era stato ascarmato."  "Vita di Cola di Rienzi",
+lib. ii. cap. 18.) - his high soul still supported him, but the nerves gave
+way.  Tears came readily into his eyes, and often, like Cromwell, he was
+thought to weep from hypocrisy, when in truth it was the hysteric of over-
+wrought and irritable emotion.  In all his former life singularly
+temperate, ("Solea prima esser sobrio, temperato, astinente, or a e
+diventato distemperatissimo bevitore," &c. - Ibid.) he now fled from his
+goading thoughts to the beguiling excitement of wine.  He drank deep,
+though its effects were never visible upon him except in a freer and wilder
+mood, and the indulgence of that racy humour, half-mirthful, half-bitter,
+for which his younger day had been distinguished.  Now the mirth had more
+loudness, but the bitterness more gall.
+
+Such were the characteristics of Rienzi at his return to power - made more
+apparent with every day.  Nina he still loved with the same tenderness,
+and, if possible, she adored him more than ever:  but, the zest and
+freshness of triumphant ambition gone, somehow or other, their intercourse
+together had not its old charm.  Formerly they talked constantly of the
+future - of the bright days in store for them.  Now, with a sharp and
+uneasy pang, Rienzi turned from all thought of that "gay tomorrow."  There
+was no "gay tomorrow" for him!  Dark and thorny as was the present hour,
+all beyond seemed yet less cheering and more ominous.  Still he had some
+moments, brief but brilliant, when, forgetting the iron race amongst whom
+he was thrown, he plunged into scholastic reveries of the worshipped Past,
+and half-fancied that he was of a People worthy of his genius and his
+devotion.  Like most men who have been preserved through great dangers, he
+continued with increasing fondness to nourish a credulous belief in the
+grandeur of his own destiny.  He could not imagine that he had been so
+delivered, and for no end!  He was the Elected, and therefore the
+Instrument, of Heaven.  And thus, that Bible which in his loneliness, his
+wanderings, and his prison, had been his solace and support, was more than
+ever needed in his greatness.
+
+It was another cause of sorrow and chagrin to one who, amidst such
+circumstances of public danger, required so peculiarly the support and
+sympathy of private friends, - that he found he had incurred amongst his
+old coadjutors the common penalty of absence.  A few were dead; others,
+wearied with the storms of public life, and chilled in their ardour by the
+turbulent revolutions to which, in every effort for her amelioration, Rome
+had been subjected, had retired, - some altogether from the city, some from
+all participation in political affairs.  In his halls, the Tribune-Senator
+was surrounded by unfamiliar faces, and a new generation.  Of the heads of
+the popular party, most were animated by a stern dislike to the Pontifical
+domination, and looked with suspicion and repugnance upon one who, if he
+governed for the People, had been trusted and honoured by the Pope.  Rienzi
+was not a man to forget former friends, however lowly, and had already
+found time to seek an interview with Cecco del Vecchio.  But that stern
+Republican had received him with coldness.  His foreign mercenaries, and
+his title of Senator, were things that the artisan could not digest.  With
+his usual bluntness, he had said so to Rienzi.
+
+"As for the last," answered the Tribune, affably, "names do not alter
+natures.  When I forget that to be delegate to the Pontiff is to be the
+guardian of his flock, forsake me.  As for the first, let me but see five
+hundred Romans sworn to stand armed day and night for the defence of Rome,
+and I dismiss the Northmen."
+
+Cecco del Vecchio was unsoftened; honest, but uneducated - impracticable,
+and by nature a malcontent, he felt as if he were no longer necessary to
+the Senator, and this offended his pride.  Strange as it may seem, the
+sullen artisan bore, too, a secret grudge against Rienzi, for not having
+seen and selected him from a crowd of thousands on the day of his triumphal
+entry.  Such are the small offences which produce deep danger to the great!
+
+The artisans still held their meetings, and Cecco del Vecchio's voice was
+heard loud in grumbling forebodings.  But what wounded Rienzi yet more than
+the alienation of the rest, was the confused and altered manner of his old
+friend and familiar, Pandulfo di Guido.  Missing that popular citizen among
+those who daily offered their homage at the Capitol, he had sent for him,
+and sought in vain to revive their ancient intimacy.  Pandulfo affected
+great respect, but not all the condescension of the Senator could conquer
+his distance and his restraint.  In fact, Pandulfo had learned to form
+ambitious projects of his own; and but for the return of Rienzi, Pandulfo
+di Guido felt that he might now, with greater safety, and indeed with some
+connivance from the Barons, have been the Tribune of the People.  The
+facility to rise into popular eminence which a disordered and corrupt
+state, unblest by a regular constitution, offers to ambition, breeds the
+jealousy and the rivalship which destroy union, and rot away the ties of
+party.
+
+Such was the situation of Rienzi, and yet, wonderful to say, he seemed to
+be adored by the multitude; and law and liberty, life and death, were in
+his hands!
+
+Of all those who attended his person, Angelo Villani was the most favoured;
+that youth who had accompanied Rienzi in his long exile, had also, at the
+wish of Nina, attended him from Avignon, through his sojourn in the camp of
+Albornoz.  His zeal, intelligence, and frank and evident affection, blinded
+the Senator to the faults of his character, and established him more and
+more in the gratitude of Rienzi.  He loved to feel that one faithful heart
+beat near him, and the page, raised to the rank of his chamberlain, always
+attended his person, and slept in his ante-chamber.
+
+Retiring that night at Tivoli, to the apartment prepared for him, the
+Senator sat down by the open casement, through which were seen, waving in
+the starlight, the dark pines that crowned the hills, while the stillness
+of the hour gave to his ear the dash of the waterfalls heard above the
+regular and measured tread of the sentinels below.  Leaning his cheek upon
+his hand, Rienzi long surrendered himself to gloomy thought, and, when he
+looked up, he saw the bright blue eye of Villani fixed in anxious sympathy
+on his countenance.
+
+"Is my Lord unwell?" asked the young chamberlain, hesitating.
+
+"Not so, my Angelo; but somewhat sick at heart.  Methinks, for a September
+night, the air is chill!"
+
+"Angelo," resumed Rienzi, who had already acquired that uneasy curiosity
+which belongs to an uncertain power, - "Angelo, bring me hither yon writing
+implements; hast thou heard aught what the men say of our probable success
+against Palestrina?"
+
+"Would my Lord wish to learn all their gossip, whether it please or not?"
+answered Villani.
+
+"If I studied only to hear what pleased me, Angelo, I should never have
+returned to Rome."
+
+"Why, then, I heard a constable of the Northmen say, meaningly, that the
+place will not be carried."
+
+"Humph!  And what said the captains of my Roman Legion?"
+
+"My Lord, I have heard it whispered that they fear defeat less than they do
+the revenge of the Barons, if they are successful."
+
+"And with such tools the living race of Europe and misjudging posterity
+will deem that the workman is to shape out the Ideal and the Perfect! 
+Bring me yon Bible."
+
+As Angelo reverently brought to Rienzi the sacred book, he said,
+
+"Just before I left my companions below, there was a rumour that the Lord
+Adrian Colonna had been imprisoned by his kinsman."
+
+"I too heard, and I believe, as much," returned Rienzi:  "these Barons
+would gibbet their own children in irons, if there were any chance of the
+shackles growing rusty for want of prey.  But the wicked shall be brought
+low, and their strong places shall be made desolate."
+
+"I would, my Lord," said Villani, "that our Northmen had other captains
+than these Provencals."
+
+"Why?" asked Rienzi, abruptly.
+
+"Have the creatures of the Captain of the Grand Company ever held faith
+with any man whom it suited the avarice or the ambition of Montreal to
+betray?  Was he not, a few months ago, the right arm of John di Vico, and
+did he not sell his services to John di Vico's enemy, the Cardinal
+Albornoz?  These warriors barter men as cattle."
+
+"Thou describest Montreal rightly:  a dangerous and an awful man.  But
+methinks his brothers are of a duller and meaner kind; they dare not the
+crimes of the Robber Captain.  Howbeit, Angelo, thou hast touched a string
+that will make discord with sleep tonight.  Fair youth, thy young eyes have
+need of slumber; withdraw, and when thou hearest men envy Rienzi, think
+that - "
+
+"God never made Genius to be envied!" interrupted Villani, with an energy
+that overcame his respect.  "We envy not the sun, but rather the valleys
+that ripen beneath his beams."
+
+"Verily, if I be the sun," said Rienzi, with a bitter and melancholy smile,
+"I long for night, - and come it will, to the human as to the celestial
+Pilgrim! - Thank Heaven, at least, that our ambition cannot make us
+immortal!"
+
+
+Chapter 9.V.  The Biter Bit.
+
+The next morning, when Rienzi descended to the room where his captains
+awaited him, his quick eye perceived that a cloud still lowered upon the
+brow of Messere Brettone.  Arimbaldo, sheltered by the recess of the rude
+casement, shunned his eye.
+
+"A fair morning, gentles," said Rienzi; "the Sun laughs upon our
+enterprise.  I have messengers from Rome betimes - fresh troops will join
+us ere noon."
+
+"I am glad, Senator," answered Brettone, "that you have tidings which will
+counteract the ill of those I have to narrate to thee.  The soldiers murmur
+loudly - their pay is due to them; and, I fear me, that without money they
+will not march to Palestrina."
+
+"As they will," returned Rienzi, carelessly.  "It is but a few days since
+they entered Rome; pay did they receive in advance - if they demand more,
+the Colonna and Orsini may outbid me.  Draw off your soldiers, Sir Knight,
+and farewell."
+
+Brettone's countenance fell - it was his object to get Rienzi more and more
+in his power, and he wished not to suffer him to gain that strength which
+would accrue to him from the fall of Palestrina:  the indifference of the
+Senator foiled and entrapped him in his own net.
+
+"That must not be," said the brother of Montreal, after a confused silence;
+"we cannot leave you thus to your enemies - the soldiers, it is true,
+demand pay - "
+
+"And should have it," said Rienzi.  "I know these mercenaries - it is ever
+with them, mutiny or money.  I will throw myself on my Romans, and triumph
+- or fall, if so Heaven decrees, with them.  Acquaint your constables with
+my resolve."
+
+Scarce were these words spoken, ere, as previously concerted with Brettone,
+the chief constable of the mercenaries appeared at the door.  "Senator,"
+said he, with a rough semblance of aspect, "your orders to march have
+reached me, I have sought to marshal my men - but - "
+
+"I know what thou wouldst say, friend," interrupted Rienzi, waving his
+hand:  "Messere Brettone will give you my reply.  Another time, Sir
+Captain, more ceremony with the Senator of Rome - you may withdraw."
+
+The unforeseen dignity of Rienzi rebuked and abashed the constable; he
+looked at Brettone, who motioned him to depart.  He closed the door and
+withdrew.
+
+"What is to be done?" said Brettone.
+
+"Sir Knight," replied Rienzi, gravely, "let us understand each other. 
+Would you serve me or not?  If the first, you are not my equal, but
+subordinate - and you must obey and not dictate; if the last, my debt to
+you shall be discharged, and the world is wide enough for both."
+
+"We have declared allegiance to you," answered Brettone, "and it shall be
+given."
+
+"One caution before I re-accept your fealty," replied Rienzi, very slowly. 
+"For an open foe, I have my sword - for a traitor, mark me, Rome has the
+axe; of the first I have no fear; for the last, no mercy."
+
+"These are not words that should pass between friends," said Brettone,
+turning pale with suppressed emotion.
+
+"Friends! - ye are my friends, then! - your hands!  Friends, so ye are! -
+and shall prove it!  Dear Arimbaldo, thou, like myself, art book-learned, -
+a clerkly soldier.  Dost thou remember how in the Roman history it is told
+that the Treasury lacked money for the soldiers?  The Consul convened the
+Nobles.  'Ye,' said he, 'that have the offices and dignity should be the
+first to pay for them.'  Ye heed me, my friends; the nobles took the hint,
+they found the money - the army was paid.  This example is not lost on you. 
+I have made you the leaders of my force, Rome hath showered her honours on
+you.  Your generosity shall commence the example which the Romans shall
+thus learn of strangers.  Ye gaze at me, my friends!  I read your noble
+souls - and thank ye beforehand.  Ye have the dignity and the office; ye
+have also the wealth! - pay the hirelings, pay them!"  (See the anonymous
+biographer, lib. ii. cap. 19.)
+
+Had a thunderbolt fallen at the feet of Brettone, he could not have been
+more astounded than at this simple suggestion of Rienzi's.  He lifted his
+eyes to the Senator's face, and saw there that smile which he had already,
+bold as he was, learned to dread.  He felt himself fairly sunk in the pit
+he had digged for another.  There was that in the Senator-Tribune's brow
+that told him to refuse was to declare open war, and the moment was not
+ripe for that.
+
+"Ye accede," said Rienzi; "ye have done well."
+
+The Senator clapped his hands - his guard appeared.
+
+"Summon the head constables of the soldiery."
+
+The brothers still remained dumb.
+
+The constables entered.
+
+"My friends," said Rienzi, "Messere Brettone and Messere Arimbaldo have my
+directions to divide amongst your force a thousand florins.  This evening
+we encamp beneath Palestrina."
+
+The constables withdrew in visible surprise.  Rienzi gazed a moment on the
+brothers, chuckling within himself - for his sarcastic humour enjoyed his
+triumph.  "You lament not your devotion, my friends!"
+
+"No," said Brettone, rousing himself; "the sum but trivially swells our
+debt."
+
+"Frankly said - your hands once more! - the good people of Tivoli expect me
+in the Piazza - they require some admonitions.  Adieu till noon."
+
+When the door closed on Rienzi, Brettone struck the handle of his sword
+fiercely - "The Roman laughs at us," said he.  "But let Walter de Montreal
+once appear in Rome, and the proud jester shall pay us dearly for this."
+
+"Hush!" said Arimbaldo, "walls have ears, and that imp of Satan, young
+Villani, seems to me ever at our heels!"
+
+"A thousand florins!  I trust his heart hath as many drops," growled the
+chafed Brettone, unheeding his brother.
+
+The soldiers were paid - the army marched - the eloquence of the Senator
+had augmented his force by volunteers from Tivoli, and wild and half armed
+peasantry joined his standard from the Campagna and the neighbouring
+mountains.
+
+Palestrina was besieged:  Rienzi continued dexterously to watch the
+brothers of Montreal.  Under pretext of imparting to the Italian volunteers
+the advantage of their military science, he separated them from their
+mercenaries, and assigned to them the command of the less disciplined
+Italians, with whom, he believed, they could not venture to tamper.  He
+himself assumed the lead of the Northmen - and, despite themselves, they
+were fascinated by his artful, yet dignified affability, and the personal
+courage he displayed in some sallies of the besieged Barons.  But as the
+huntsmen upon all the subtlest windings of their prey, - so pressed the
+relentless and speeding Fates upon Cola di Rienzi!
+
+
+Chapter 9.VI.  The Events Gather to the End.
+
+While this the state of the camp of the besiegers, Luca di Savelli and
+Stefanello Colonna were closeted with a stranger, who had privately entered
+Palestrina on the night before the Romans pitched their tents beneath its
+walls.  This visitor, who might have somewhat passed his fortieth year, yet
+retained, scarcely diminished, the uncommon beauty of form and countenance
+for which his youth had been remarkable.  But it was no longer that
+character of beauty which has been described in his first introduction to
+the reader.  It was no longer the almost woman delicacy of feature and
+complexion, or the highborn polish, and graceful suavity of manner, which
+distinguished Walter de Montreal:  a life of vicissitude and war had at
+length done its work.  His bearing was now abrupt and imperious, as that of
+one accustomed to rule wild spirits, and he had exchanged the grace of
+persuasion for the sternness of command.  His athletic form had grown more
+spare and sinewy, and instead of the brow half shaded by fair and
+clustering curls, his forehead, though yet but slightly wrinkled, was
+completely bald at the temples; and by its unwonted height, increased the
+dignity and manliness of his aspect.  The bloom of his complexion was
+faded, less by outward exposure than inward thought, into a bronzed and
+settled paleness; and his features seemed more marked and prominent, as the
+flesh had somewhat sunk from the contour of the cheek.  Yet the change
+suited the change of age and circumstance; and if the Provencal now less
+realised the idea of the brave and fair knight-errant, he but looked the
+more what the knight-errant had become - the sagacious counsellor and the
+mighty leader.
+
+"You must be aware," said Montreal, continuing a discourse which appeared
+to have made great impression on his companions, "that in this contest
+between yourselves and the Senator, I alone hold the balance.  Rienzi is
+utterly in my power - my brothers, the leaders of his army; myself, his
+creditor.  It rests with me to secure him on the throne, or to send him to
+the scaffold.  I have but to give the order, and the Grand Company enter
+Rome; but without their agency, methinks if you keep faith with me, our
+purpose can be effected."
+
+"In the meanwhile, Palestrina is besieged by your brothers!" said
+Stefanello, sharply.
+
+"But they have my orders to waste their time before its walls.  Do you not
+see, that by this very siege, fruitless, as, if I will, it shall be, Rienzi
+loses fame abroad, and popularity in Rome."
+
+"Sir Knight," said Luca di Savelli, "you speak as a man versed in the
+profound policy of the times; and under all the circumstances which menace
+us, your proposal seems but fitting and reasonable.  On the one hand, you
+undertake to restore us and the other Barons to Rome; and to give Rienzi to
+the Staircase of the Lion - "
+
+"Not so, not so," replied Montreal, quickly.  "I will consent either so to
+subdue and cripple his power, as to render him a puppet in our hands, a
+mere shadow of authority - or, if his proud spirit chafe at its cage, to
+give it once more liberty amongst the wilds of Germany.  I would fetter or
+banish him, but not destroy; unless (added Montreal, after a moment's
+pause) fate absolutely drives us to it.  Power should not demand victims;
+but to secure it, victims may be necessary."
+
+"I understand your refinements," said Luca di Savelli, with his icy smile,
+"and am satisfied.  The Barons once restored, our palaces once more manned,
+and I am willing to take the chance of the Senator's longevity.  This
+service you promise to effect?"
+
+"I do."
+
+"And, in return, you demand our assent to your enjoying the rank of Podesta
+for five years?"
+
+"You say right."
+
+"I, for one, accede to the terms," said the Savelli:  "there is my hand; I
+am wearied of these brawls, even amongst ourselves, and think that a
+Foreign Ruler may best enforce order:  the more especially, if like you,
+Sir Knight, one whose birth and renown are such as to make him comprehend
+the difference between Barons and Plebeians."
+
+"For my part," said Stefanello, "I feel that we have but a choice of evils
+- I like not a foreign Podesta; but I like a plebeian Senator still less; -
+there too is my hand, Sir Knight."
+
+"Noble Signors," said Montreal, after a short pause, and turning his
+piercing gaze from one to the other with great deliberation, "our compact
+is sealed; one word by way of codicil.  Walter de Montreal is no Count
+Pepin of Minorbino!  Once before, little dreaming, I own, that the victory
+would be so facile, I intrusted your cause and mine to a deputy; your cause
+he promoted, mine he lost.  He drove out the Tribune, and then suffered the
+Barons to banish himself.  This time I see to my own affairs; and, mark
+you, I have learned in the Grand Company one lesson; viz. never to pardon
+spy or deserter, of whatever rank.  Your forgiveness for the hint.  Let us
+change the theme.  So ye detain in your fortress my old friend the Baron di
+Castello?"
+
+"Ay," said Luca di Savelli; for Stefanello, stung by Montreal's threat,
+which he dared not openly resent, preserved a sullen silence; "Ay, he is
+one noble the less to the Senator's council."
+
+"You act wisely.  I know his views and temper; at present dangerous to our
+interests.  Yet use him well, I entreat you; he may hereafter serve us. 
+And now, my Lords, my eyes are weary, suffer me to retire.  Pleasant dreams
+of the New Revolution to us all!"
+
+"By your leave, noble Montreal, we will attend you to your couch," said
+Luca di Savelli.
+
+"By my troth, and ye shall not.  I am no Tribune to have great Signors for
+my pages; but a plain gentleman, and a hardy soldier:  your attendants will
+conduct me to whatever chamber your hospitality assigns to one who could
+sleep soundly beneath the rudest hedge under your open skies."
+
+Savelli, however, insisted on conducting the Podesta that was to be, to his
+apartment.  He then returned to Stefanello, whom he found pacing the saloon
+with long and disordered strides.
+
+"What have we done, Savelli?" said he, quickly; "sold our city to a
+barbarian!"
+
+"Sold!" said Savelli; "to my mind it is the other part of the contract in
+which we have played our share.  We have bought, Colonna, not sold - bought
+our lives from yon army; bought our power, our fortunes, our castles, from
+the Demagogue Senator; bought, what is better than all, triumph and
+revenge.  Tush, Colonna, see you not that if we had balked this great
+warrior, we had perished?  Leagued with the Senator, the Grand Company
+would have marched to Rome; and, whether Montreal assisted or murdered
+Rienzi, (for methinks he is a Romulus, who would brook no Remus), we had
+equally been undone.  Now, we have made our own terms, and our shares are
+equal.  Nay, the first steps to be taken are in our favour.  Rienzi is to
+be snared, and we are to enter Rome."
+
+"And then the Provencal is to be Despot of the city."
+
+"Podesta, if you please.  Podestas who offend the people are often
+banished, and sometimes stoned - Podestas who insult the nobles are often
+stilettoed, and sometimes poisoned," said Savelli.  "'Sufficient for the
+day is the evil thereof.'  Meanwhile, say nothing to the bear, Orsini. 
+Such men mar all wisdom.  Come, cheer thee, Stefanello."
+
+"Luca di Savelli, you have not such a stake in Rome as I have," said the
+young Lord, haughtily; "no Podesta can take from you the rank of the first
+Signor of the Italian metropolis!"
+
+"An you had said so to the Orsini, there would have been drawing of
+swords," said Savelli.  "But cheer thee, I say; is not our first care to
+destroy Rienzi, and then, between the death of one foe and the rise of
+another, are there not such preventives as Ezzelino da Romano has taught to
+wary men?  Cheer thee, I say; and, next year, if we but hold together,
+Stefanello Colonna and Luca di Savelli will be joint Senators of Rome, and
+these great men food for worms!"
+
+While thus conferred the Barons, Montreal, ere he retired to rest, stood
+gazing from the open lattice of his chamber over the landscape below, which
+slept in the autumnal moonlight, while at a distance gleamed, pale and
+steady, the lights round the encampment of the besiegers.
+
+"Wide plains and broad valleys," thought the warrior, "soon shall ye repose
+in peace beneath a new sway, against which no petty tyrant shall dare
+rebel.  And ye, white walls of canvass, even while I gaze - ye admonish me
+how realms are won.  Even as, of old, from the Nomad tents was built up the
+stately Babylon, (Isaiah, c. xxii.) that 'was not till the Assyrian founded
+it for them that dwell in the wilderness;' so by the new Ishmaelites of
+Europe shall a race, undreamt of now, be founded; and the camp of
+yesterday, be the city of tomorrow.  Verily, when, for one soft offence,
+the Pontiff thrust me from the bosom of the Church, little guessed he what
+enemy he raised to Rome!  How solemn is the night! - how still the heavens
+and earth! - the very stars are as hushed, as if intent on the events that
+are to pass below!  So solemn and so still feels mine own spirit, and an
+awe unknown till now warns me that I approach the crisis of my daring
+fate!"
+
+
+
+BOOK X.  THE LION Of BASALT.
+
+"Ora voglio contare la morte del Tribuno." - "Vita di Cola di Rienzi", lib.
+ii. cap. 24.)
+
+"Now will I narrate the death of the Tribune." - "Life of Cola di Rienzi".
+
+
+Chapter 10.I.  The Conjunction of Hostile Planets in the House of Death.
+
+On the fourth day of the siege, and after beating back to those almost
+impregnable walls the soldiery of the Barons, headed by the Prince of the
+Orsini, the Senator returned to his tent, where despatches from Rome
+awaited him.  He ran his eye hastily over them, till he came to the last;
+yet each contained news that might have longer delayed the eye of a man
+less inured to danger.  From one he learned that Albornoz, whose blessing
+had confirmed to him the rank of Senator, had received with special favour
+the messengers of the Orsini and Colonna.  He knew that the Cardinal, whose
+views connected him with the Roman Patricians, desired his downfall; but he
+feared not Albornoz:  perhaps in his secret heart he wished that any open
+aggression from the Pontiff's Legate might throw him wholly on the people.
+
+He learned further, that, short as had been his absence, Pandulfo di Guido
+had twice addressed the populace, not in favour of the Senator, but in
+artful regrets of the loss to the trade of Rome in the absence of her
+wealthiest nobles.
+
+"For this, then, he has deserted me," said Rienzi to himself.  "Let him
+beware!"
+
+The tidings contained in the next touched him home:  Walter de Montreal had
+openly arrived in Rome.  The grasping and lawless bandit, whose rapine
+filled with a robber's booty every bank in Europe - whose Company was the
+army of a King - whose ambition, vast, unprincipled, and profound, he so
+well knew - whose brothers were in his camp - their treason already more
+than suspected; - Walter de Montreal was in Rome!
+
+The Senator remained perfectly aghast at this new peril; and then said,
+setting his teeth as in a vice,
+
+"Wild tiger, thou art in the Lion's den!"  Then pausing, he broke out
+again, "One false step, Walter de Montreal, and all the mailed hands of the
+Grand Company shall not pluck thee from the abyss!  But what can I do? 
+Return to Rome - the plans of Montreal unpenetrated - no accusation against
+him!  On what pretence can I with honour raise the siege?  To leave
+Palestrina, is to give a triumph to the Barons - to abandon Adrian, to
+degrade my cause.  Yet, while away from Rome, every hour breeds treason and
+danger.  Pandulfo, Albornoz, Montreal - all are at work against me.  A keen
+and trusty spy, now; - ha, well thought of - Villani! - What, ho - Angelo
+Villani!"
+
+The young chamberlain appeared.
+
+"I think," said Rienzi, "to have often heard, that thou art an orphan?"
+
+"True, my Lord; the old Augustine nun who reared my boyhood, has told me
+again and again that my parents are dead.  Both noble, my Lord; but I am
+the child of shame.  And I say it often, and think of it ever, in order to
+make Angelo Villani remember that he has a name to win."
+
+"Young man, serve me as you have served, and if I live you shall have no
+need to call yourself an orphan.  Mark me!  I want a friend - the Senator
+of Rome wants a friend - only one friend - gentle Heaven! only one!"
+
+Angelo sank on his knee, and kissed the mantle of his Lord.
+
+"Say a follower.  I am too mean to be Rienzi's friend."
+
+"Too mean! - go to! - there is nothing mean before God, unless it be a base
+soul under high titles.  With me, boy, there is but one nobility, and
+Nature signs its charter.  Listen:  thou hearest daily of Walter de
+Montreal, brother to these Provencals - great captain of great robbers?"
+
+"Ay, and I have seen him, my Lord."
+
+"Well, then, he is in Rome.  Some daring thought - some well-supported and
+deep-schemed villany, could alone make that bandit venture openly into an
+Italian city, whose territories he ravaged by fire and sword a few months
+back.  But his brothers have lent me money - assisted my return; - for
+their own ends, it is true:  but the seeming obligation gives them real
+power.  These Northern swordsmen would cut my throat if the Great Captain
+bade them.  He counts on my supposed weakness.  I know him of old.  I
+suspect - nay I read, his projects; but I cannot prove them.  Without
+proof, I cannot desert Palestrina in order to accuse and seize him.  Thou
+art shrewd, thoughtful, acute; - couldst thou go to Rome? - watch day and
+night his movements - see if he receive messengers from Albornoz or the
+Barons - if he confer with Pandulfo di Guido; - watch his lodgment, I say,
+night and day.  He affects no concealment; your task will be less difficult
+than it seems.  Apprise the Signora of all you learn.  Give me your news
+daily.  Will you undertake this mission?"
+
+"I will, my Lord."
+
+"To horse, then, quick! - and mind - save the wife of my bosom, I have no
+confidant in Rome."
+
+
+Chapter 10.II.  Montreal at Rome. - His Reception of Angelo Villani.
+
+The danger that threatened Rienzi by the arrival of Montreal was indeed
+formidable.  The Knight of St. John, having marched his army into Lombardy,
+had placed it at the disposal of the Venetian State in its war with the
+Archbishop of Milan.  For this service he received an immense sum; while he
+provided winter quarters for his troop, for whom he proposed ample work in
+the ensuing spring.  Leaving Palestrina secretly and in disguise, with but
+a slender train, which met him at Tivoli, Montreal repaired to Rome.  His
+ostensible object was, partly to congratulate the Senator on his return,
+partly to receive the monies lent to Rienzi by his brother.
+
+His secret object we have partly seen; but not contented with the support
+of the Barons, he trusted, by the corrupting means of his enormous wealth,
+to form a third party in support of his own ulterior designs.  Wealth,
+indeed, in that age and in that land, was scarcely less the purchaser of
+diadems than it had been in the later days of the Roman Empire.  And in
+many a city torn by hereditary feuds, the hatred of faction rose to that
+extent, that a foreign tyrant, willing and able to expel one party, might
+obtain at least the temporary submission of the other.  His after-success
+was greatly in proportion to his power to maintain his state by a force
+which was independent of the citizens, and by a treasury which did not
+require the odious recruit of taxes.  But more avaricious than ambitious,
+more cruel than firm, it was by griping exaction, or unnecessary bloodshed,
+that such usurpers usually fell.
+
+Montreal, who had scanned the frequent revolutions of the time with a calm
+and investigating eye, trusted that he should be enabled to avoid both
+these errors:  and, as the reader has already seen, he had formed the
+profound and sagacious project of consolidating his usurpation by an
+utterly new race of nobles, who, serving him by the feudal tenure of the
+North, and ever ready to protect him, because in so doing they protected
+their own interests, should assist to erect, not the rotten and unsupported
+fabric of a single tyranny, but the strong fortress of a new, hardy, and
+compact Aristocratic State.  Thus had the great dynasties of the North been
+founded; in which a King, though seemingly curbed by the Barons, was in
+reality supported by a common interest, whether against a subdued
+population or a foreign invasion.
+
+Such were the vast schemes - extending into yet wider fields of glory and
+conquest, bounded only by the Alps - with which the Captain of the Grand
+Company beheld the columns and arches of the Seven-hilled City.
+
+No fear disturbed the long current of his thoughts.  His brothers were the
+leaders of Rienzi's hireling army - that army were his creatures.  Over
+Rienzi himself he assumed the right of a creditor.  Thus against one party
+he deemed himself secure.  For the friends of the Pope, he had supported
+himself with private, though cautious, letters from Albornoz, who desired
+only to make use of him for the return of the Roman Barons; and with the
+heads of the latter we have already witnessed his negotiations.  Thus was
+he fitted, as he thought, to examine, to tamper with all parties, and to
+select from each the materials necessary for his own objects.
+
+The open appearance of Montreal excited in Rome no inconsiderable
+sensation.  The friends of the Barons gave out that Rienzi was in league
+with the Grand Company; and that he was to sell the imperial city to the
+plunder and pillage of Barbarian robbers.  The effrontery with which
+Montreal (against whom, more than once, the Pontiff had thundered his
+bulls) appeared in the Metropolitan City of the Church, was made yet more
+insolent by the recollection of that stern justice which had led the
+Tribune to declare open war against all the robbers of Italy:  and this
+audacity was linked with the obvious reflection, that the brothers of the
+bold Provencal were the instruments of Rienzi's return.  So quickly spread
+suspicion through the city, that Montreal's presence alone would in a few
+weeks have sufficed to ruin the Senator.  Meanwhile, the natural boldness
+of Montreal silenced every whisper of prudence; and, blinded by the dazzle
+of his hopes, the Knight of St. John, as if to give double importance to
+his coming, took up his residence in a sumptuous palace, and his retinue
+rivalled, in the splendour of garb and pomp, the display of Rienzi himself
+in his earlier and more brilliant power.
+
+Amidst the growing excitement, Angelo Villani arrived at Rome.  The
+character of this young man had been formed by his peculiar circumstances. 
+He possessed qualities which often mark the Illegitimate as with a common
+stamp.  He was insolent - like most of those who hold a doubtful rank; and
+while ashamed of his bastardy, was arrogant of the supposed nobility of his
+unknown parentage.  The universal ferment and agitation of Italy at that
+day rendered ambition the most common of all the passions, and thus
+ambition, in all its many shades and varieties, forces itself into our
+delineations of character in this history.  Though not for Angelo Villani
+were the dreams of the more lofty and generous order of that sublime
+infirmity, he was strongly incited by the desire and resolve to rise.  He
+had warm affections and grateful impulses; and his fidelity to his patron
+had been carried to a virtue:  but from his irregulated and desultory
+education, and the reckless profligacy of those with whom, in ante-chambers
+and guard-rooms, much of his youth had been passed, he had neither high
+principles nor an enlightened honour.  Like most Italians, cunning and
+shrewd, he scrupled not at any deceit that served a purpose or a friend. 
+His strong attachment to Rienzi had been unconsciously increased by the
+gratification of pride and vanity, flattered by the favour of so celebrated
+a man.  Both self-interest and attachment urged him to every effort to
+promote the views and safety of one at once his benefactor and patron; and
+on undertaking his present mission, his only thought was to fulfil it with
+the most complete success.  Far more brave and daring than was common with
+the Italians, something of the hardihood of an Ultra-Montane race gave
+nerve and vigour to his craft; and from what his art suggested, his courage
+never shrunk.
+
+When Rienzi had first detailed to him the objects of his present task, he
+instantly called to mind his adventure with the tall soldier in the crowd
+at Avignon.  "If ever thou wantest a friend, seek him in Walter de
+Montreal," were words that had often rung in his ear, and they now recurred
+to him with prophetic distinctness.  He had no doubt that it was Montreal
+himself whom he had seen.  Why the Great Captain should have taken this
+interest in him, Angelo little cared to conjecture.  Most probably it was
+but a crafty pretence - one of the common means by which the Chief of the
+Grand Company attracted to himself the youths of Italy, as well as the
+warriors of the North.  He only thought now how he could turn the Knight's
+promise to account.  What more easy than to present himself to Montreal -
+remind him of the words - enter his service - and thus effectually watch
+his conduct?  The office of spy was not that which would have pleased every
+mind, but it shocked not the fastidiousness of Angelo Villani; and the
+fearful hatred with which his patron had often spoken of the avaricious and
+barbarian robber - the scourge of his native land, - had infected the young
+man, who had much of the arrogant and mock patriotism of the Romans, with a
+similar sentiment.  More vindictive even than grateful, he bore, too, a
+secret grudge against Montreal's brothers, whose rough address had often
+wounded his pride; and, above all, his early recollections of the fear and
+execration in which Ursula seemed ever to hold the terrible Fra Moreale,
+impressed him with a vague belief of some ancient wrong to himself or his
+race, perpetrated by the Provencal, which he was not ill-pleased to have
+the occasion to avenge.  In truth, the words of Ursula, mystic and dark as
+they were in their denunciation, had left upon Villani's boyish impressions
+an unaccountable feeling of antipathy and hatred to the man it was now his
+object to betray.  For the rest, every device seemed to him decorous and
+justifiable, so that it saved his master, served his country, and advanced
+himself.
+
+Montreal was alone in his chamber when it was announced to him that a young
+Italian craved an audience.  Professionally open to access, he forthwith
+gave admission to the applicant.
+
+The Knight of St. John instantly recognised the page he had encountered at
+Avignon; and when Angelo Villani said, with easy boldness, "I have come to
+remind Sir Walter de Montreal of a promise - "
+
+The Knight interrupted him with cordial frankness - "Thou needest not - I
+remember it.  Dost thou now require my friendship?"
+
+"I do noble Signor!" answered Angelo; "I know not where else to seek a
+patron."
+
+"Canst thou read and write?  I fear me not."
+
+"I have been taught those arts," replied Villani.
+
+"It is well.  Is thy birth gentle?"
+
+"It is."
+
+"Better still; - thy name?"
+
+"Angelo Villani."
+
+"I take thy blue eyes and low broad brow," said Montreal, with a slight
+sigh, "in pledge of thy truth.  Henceforth, Angelo Villani, thou art in the
+list of my secretaries.  Another time thou shalt tell me more of thyself. 
+Thy service dates from this day.  For the rest, no man ever wanted wealth
+who served Walter de Montreal; nor advancement, if he served him
+faithfully.  My closet, through yonder door, is thy waiting-room.  Ask for,
+and send hither, Lusignan of Lyons; he is my chief scribe, and will see to
+thy comforts, and instruct thee in thy business."
+
+Angelo withdrew - Montreal's eye followed him.
+
+"A strange likeness!" said he, musingly and sadly; "my heart leaps to that
+boy!"
+
+
+Chapter 10.III.  Montreal's Banquet.
+
+Some few days after the date of the last chapter, Rienzi received news from
+Rome, which seemed to produce in him a joyous and elated excitement.  His
+troops still lay before Palestrina, and still the banners of the Barons
+waved over its unconquered walls.  In truth, the Italians employed half
+their time in brawls amongst themselves; the Velletritrani had feuds with
+the people of Tivoli, and the Romans were still afraid of conquering the
+Barons; - "The hornet," said they, "stings worse after he is dead; and
+neither an Orsini, a Savelli, nor a Colonna, was ever known to forgive."
+
+Again and again had the captains of his army assured the indignant Senator
+that the fortress was impregnable, and that time and money were idly wasted
+upon the siege.  Rienzi knew better, but he concealed his thoughts.
+
+He now summoned to his tent the brothers of Provence, and announced to them
+his intention of returning instantly to Rome.  "The mercenaries shall
+continue the siege under our Lieutenant, and you, with my Roman Legion,
+shall accompany me.  Your brother, Sir Walter, and I, both want your
+presence; we have affairs to arrange between us.  After a few days I shall
+raise recruits in the city, and return."
+
+This was what the brothers desired; they approved, with evident joy, the
+Senator's proposition.
+
+Rienzi next sent for the lieutenant of his bodyguard, the same Riccardo
+Annibaldi whom the reader will remember in the earlier part of this work,
+as the antagonist of Montreal's lance.  This young man - one of the few
+nobles who espoused the cause of the Senator - had evinced great courage
+and military ability, and promised fair (should Fate spare his life (It
+appears that this was the same Annibaldi who was afterwards slain in an
+affray: - Petrarch lauds his valour and laments his fate.)) to become one
+of the best Captains of his time.
+
+"Dear Annibaldi," said Rienzi; "at length I can fulfil the project on which
+we have privately conferred.  I take with me to Rome the two Provencal
+Captains - I leave you chief of the army.  Palestrina will yield now - eh!
+- ha, ha, ha! - Palestrina will yield now!"
+
+"By my right hand, I think so, Senator," replied Annibaldi.  "These
+foreigners have hitherto only stirred up quarrels amongst ourselves, and if
+not cowards are certainly traitors!"
+
+"Hush, hush, hush!  Traitors!  The learned Arimbaldo, the brave Brettone,
+traitors!  Fie on it!  No, no; they are very excellent, honourable men, but
+not lucky in the camp; - not lucky in the camp; - better speed to them in
+the city!  And now to business."
+
+The Senator then detailed to Annibaldi the plan he himself had formed for
+taking the town, and the military skill of Annibaldi at once recognised its
+feasibility.
+
+With his Roman troop, and Montreal's brothers, one at either hand, Rienzi
+then departed to Rome.
+
+That night Montreal gave a banquet to Pandulfo di Guido, and to certain of
+the principal citizens, whom one by one he had already sounded, and found
+hollow at heart to the cause of the Senator.
+
+Pandulfo sate at the right hand of the Knight of St. John, and Montreal
+lavished upon him the most courteous attentions.
+
+"Pledge me in this - it is from the Vale of Chiana, near Monte Pulciano,"
+said Montreal.  "I think I have heard bookmen say (you know, Signor
+Pandulfo, we ought all to be bookmen now!) that the site was renowned of
+old.  In truth, the wine hath a racy flavour."
+
+"I hear," said Bruttini, one of the lesser Barons, (a stanch friend to the
+Colonna,) "that in this respect the innkeeper's son has put his book-
+learning to some use:  he knows every place where the wine grows richest."
+
+"What! the Senator is turned wine-bibber!" said Montreal, quaffing a vast
+goblet full; "that must unfit him for business - 'tis a pity."
+
+"Verily, yes," said Pandulfo; "a man at the head of a state should be
+temperate - I never drink wine unmixed."
+
+"Ah," whispered Montreal, "if your calm good sense ruled Rome, then,
+indeed, the metropolis of Italy might taste of peace.  Signor Vivaldi," -
+and the host turned towards a wealthy draper, - "these disturbances are bad
+for trade."
+
+"Very, very!" groaned the draper.
+
+"The Barons are your best customers," quoth the minor noble.
+
+"Much, much!" said the draper.
+
+"'Tis a pity that they are thus roughly expelled," said Montreal, in a
+melancholy tone.  "Would it not be possible, if the Senator (I drink his
+health) were less rash - less zealous, rather, - to unite free institutions
+with the return of the Barons? - such should be the task of a truly wise
+statesman!"
+
+"It surely might be possible," returned Vivaldi; "the Savelli alone spend
+more with me than all the rest of Rome."
+
+"I know not if it be possible," said Bruttini; "but I do know that it is an
+outrage to all decorum that an innkeeper's son should be enabled to make a
+solitude of the palaces of Rome."
+
+"It certainly seems to indicate too vulgar a desire of mob favour," said
+Montreal.  "However, I trust we shall harmonize all these differences. 
+Rienzi, perhaps, - nay, doubtless, means well!"
+
+"I would," said Vivaldi, who had received his cue, "that we might form a
+mixed constitution - Plebeians and Patricians, each in their separate
+order."
+
+"But," said Montreal, gravely, "so new an experiment would demand great
+physical force."
+
+"Why, true; but we might call in an umpire - a foreigner who had no
+interest in either faction - who might protect the new Buono Stato; a
+Podesta, as we have done before - Brancaleone, for instance.  How well and
+wisely he ruled! that was a golden age for Rome.  A Podesta for ever! -
+that's my theory."
+
+"You need not seek far for the president of your council," said Montreal,
+smiling at Pandulfo; "a citizen at once popular, well-born, and wealthy,
+may be found at my right hand."
+
+Pandulfo hemmed, and coloured.
+
+Montreal proceeded.  "A committee of trades might furnish an honourable
+employment to Signor Vivaldi; and the treatment of all foreign affairs -
+the employment of armies, &c., might be left to the Barons, with a more
+open competition, Signor di Bruttini, to the Barons of the second order
+than has hitherto been conceded to their birth and importance.  Sirs, will
+you taste the Malvoisie?"
+
+"Still," said Vivaldi, after a pause - (Vivaldi anticipated at least the
+supplying with cloth the whole of the Grand Company) - "still, such a
+moderate and well-digested constitution would never be acceded to by
+Rienzi."
+
+"Why should it? what need of Rienzi?" exclaimed Bruttini.  "Rienzi may take
+another trip to Bohemia."
+
+"Gently, gently," said Montreal; "I do not despair.  All open violence
+against the Senator would strengthen his power.  No, no, humble him - admit
+the Barons, and then insist on your own terms.  Between the two factions
+you might then establish a fitting balance.  And in order to keep your new
+constitution from the encroachment of either extreme, there are warriors
+and knights, too, who for a certain rank in the great city of Rome would
+maintain horse and foot at its service.  We Ultra-Montanes are often
+harshly judged; we are wanderers and Ishmaelites, solely because we have no
+honourable place of rest.  Now, if I - "
+
+"Ay, if you, noble Montreal!" said Vivaldi.
+
+The company remained hushed in breathless attention, when suddenly there
+was heard - deep, solemn, muffled, - the great bell of the Capitol!
+
+"Hark!" said Vivaldi, the bell:  "It tolls for execution:  an unwonted
+hour!"
+
+"Sure, the Senator has not returned!" exclaimed Pandulfo di Guido, turning
+pale.
+
+"No, no," quoth Bruttini, "it is but a robber, caught two nights ago in
+Romagna.  I heard that he was to die tonight."
+
+At the word "robber," Montreal changed countenance slightly.  The wine
+circulated - the bell continued to toll - its suddenness over, it ceased to
+alarm.  Conversation flowed again.
+
+"What were you saying, Sir Knight?" said Vivaldi.
+
+"Why, let me think on't; - oh, speaking of the necessity of supporting a
+new state by force, I said that if I - "
+
+"Ah, that was it!" quoth Bruttini, thumping the table.
+
+"If I were summoned to your aid - summoned, mind ye, and absolved by the
+Pope's Legate of my former sins - (they weigh heavily on me, gentles) - I
+would myself guard your city from foreign foe and civil disturbance, with
+my gallant swordsmen.  Not a Roman citizen should contribute a 'danaro' to
+the cost."
+
+"Viva Fra Moreale!" cried Bruttini; and the shout was echoed by all the
+boon companions.
+
+"Enough for me," continued Montreal, "to expiate my offences.  Ye know,
+gentlemen, my order is vowed to God and the Church - a warrior-monk am I! 
+Enough for me to expiate my offences, I say, in the defence of the Holy
+City.  Yet I, too, have my private and more earthly views, - who is above
+them?  I - the bell changes its note!"
+
+"It is but the change that preludes execution - the poor robber is about to
+die!"
+
+Montreal crossed himself, and resumed: - "I am a knight and a noble," said
+he, proudly; "the profession I have followed is that of arms; but - I will
+not disguise it - mine equals have regarded me as one who has stained his
+scutcheon by too reckless a pursuit of glory and of gain.  I wish to
+reconcile myself with my order - to purchase a new name - to vindicate
+myself to the Grand Master and the Pontiff.  I have had hints, gentles, -
+hints, that I might best promote my interest by restoring order to the
+Papal metropolis.  The Legate Albornoz (here is his letter) recommends me
+to keep watch upon the Senator."
+
+"Surely," interrupted Pandulfo, "I hear steps below."
+
+"The mob going to the robber's execution," said Bruttini; "proceed, Sir
+Knight!"
+
+"And," continued Montreal, surveying his audience before he proceeded
+farther, "what think ye - (I do but ask your opinion, wiser than mine) -
+what think ye, as a fitting precaution against too arbitrary a power in the
+Senator - what think ye of the return of the Colonna, and the bold Barons
+of Palestrina?"
+
+"Here's to their health!" cried Vivaldi, rising.
+
+As by a sudden impulse, the company rose.  "To the health of the besieged
+Barons!" was shouted aloud.
+
+"Next, what if - (I do but humbly suggest) - what if you gave the Senator a
+colleague? - it is no affront to him.  It was but as yesterday that one of
+the Colonna, who was Senator, received a colleague in Bertoldo Orsini."
+
+"A most wise precaution," cried Vivaldi.  "And where a colleague like
+Pandulfo di Guido?"
+
+"Viva Pandulfo di Guido!" cried the guests, and again their goblets were
+drained to the bottom.
+
+"And if in this I can assist ye by fair words with the Senator, (ye know he
+owes me monies - my brothers have served him), command Walter de Montreal."
+
+"And if fair words fail?" said Vivaldi.
+
+"The Grand Company - (heed me, ye are the counsellors) - the Grand Company
+is accustomed to forced marches!"
+
+"Viva Fra Moreale!" cried Bruttini and Vivaldi, simultaneously.  "A health
+to all, my friends;" continued Bruttini; "a health to the Barons, Rome's
+old friends; to Pandulfo di Guido, the Senator's new colleague, and to Fra
+Moreale, Rome's new Podesta."
+
+"The bell has ceased," said Vivaldi, putting down his goblet.
+
+"Heaven have mercy on the robber!" added Bruttini.
+
+Scarce had he spoken, ere three taps were heard at the door - the guests
+looked at each other in dumb amaze.
+
+"New guests!" said Montreal.  "I asked some trusty friends to join us this
+evening.  By my faith they are welcome!  Enter!"
+
+The door opened slowly; three by three entered, in complete armour, the
+guards of the Senator.  On they marched, regular and speechless.  They
+surrounded the festive board - they filled the spacious hall, and the
+lights of the banquet were reflected upon their corselets as on a wall of
+steel.
+
+Not a syllable was uttered by the feasters, they were as if turned to
+stone.  Presently the guards gave way, and Rienzi himself appeared.  He
+approached the table, and folding his arms, turned his gaze deliberately
+from guest to guest, till at last, his eyes rested on Montreal, who had
+also risen, and who alone of the party had recovered the amaze of the
+moment.
+
+And there, as these two men, each so celebrated, so proud, able, and
+ambitious, stood, front to front - it was literally as if the rival Spirits
+of Force and Intellect, Order and Strife, of the Falchion and the Fasces -
+the Antagonist Principles by which empires are ruled and empires
+overthrown, had met together, incarnate and opposed.  They stood, both
+silent, - as if fascinated by each other's gaze, - loftier in stature, and
+nobler in presence than all around.
+
+Montreal spoke first, and with a forced smile.
+
+"Senator of Rome! - dare I believe that my poor banquet tempts thee, and
+may I trust that these armed men are a graceful compliment to one to whom
+arms have been a pastime?"
+
+Rienzi answered not, but waved his hand to his guards.  Montreal was seized
+on the instant.  Again he surveyed the guests - as a bird from the rattle-
+snake, - shrunk Pandulfo di Guido, trembling, motionless, aghast, from the
+glittering eye of the Senator.  Slowly Rienzi raised his fatal hand towards
+the unhappy citizen - Pandulfo saw, - felt his doom, - shrieked, - and fell
+senseless in the arms of the soldiers.
+
+One other and rapid glance cast the Senator round the board, and then, with
+a disdainful smile, as if anxious for no meaner prey, turned away.  Not a
+breath had hitherto passed his lips - all had been dumb show - and his grim
+silence had imparted a more freezing terror to his unguessed-for
+apparition.  Only, when he reached the door, he turned back, gazed upon the
+Knight of St. John's bold and undaunted face, and said, almost in a
+whisper, "Walter de Montreal! - you heard the death-knell!"
+
+
+Chapter 10.IV.  The Sentence of Walter de Montreal.
+
+In silence the Captain of the Grand Company was borne to the prison of the
+Capitol.  In the same building lodged the rivals for the government of
+Rome; the one occupied the prison, the other the palace.  The guards
+forebore the ceremony of fetters, and leaving a lamp on the table, Montreal
+perceived he was not alone, - his brothers had preceded him.
+
+"Ye are happily met," said the Knight of St. John; we have passed together
+pleasanter nights than this is likely to be."
+
+"Can you jest, Walter?" said Arimbaldo, half-weeping.  "Know you not that
+our doom is fixed?  Death scowls upon us."
+
+"Death!" repeated Montreal, and for the first time his countenance changed;
+perhaps for the first time in his life he felt the thrill and agony of
+fear.
+
+"Death!" he repeated again.  "Impossible!  He dare not, Brettone; the
+soldiers, the Northmen! - they will mutiny, they will pluck us back from
+the grasp of the headsman!"
+
+"Cast from you so vain a hope," said Brettone sullenly; "the soldiers are
+encamped at Palestrina."
+
+"How!  Dolt - fool!  Came you then to Rome alone!  Are we alone with this
+dread man?"
+
+"You are the dolt!  Why came you hither?" answered the brother.
+
+"Why, indeed! but that I knew thou wast the Captain of the army; and - but
+thou said'st right - the folly is mine, to have played against the crafty
+Tribune so unequal a brain as thine.  Enough!  Reproaches are idle.  When
+were ye arrested?"
+
+"At dusk - the instant we entered the gates of Rome.  Rienzi entered
+privately."
+
+"Humph!  What can he know against me?  Who can have betrayed me?  My
+secretaries are tried - all trustworthy - except that youth, and he so
+seemingly zealous - that Angelo Villani!"
+
+"Villani!  Angelo Villani!" cried the brothers in a breath.  "Hast thou
+confided aught to him?"
+
+"Why, I fear he must have seen - at least in part - my correspondence with
+you, and with the Barons - he was among my scribes.  Know you aught of
+him?"
+
+"Walter, Heaven hath demented you!" returned Brettone.  "Angelo Villani is
+the favourite menial of the Senator."
+
+"Those eyes deceived me, then," muttered Montreal, solemnly and shuddering;
+"and, as if her ghost had returned to earth, God smites me from the grave!"
+
+There was a long silence.  At length Montreal, whose bold and sanguine
+temper was never long clouded, spoke again.
+
+"Are the Senator's coffers full? - But that is impossible."
+
+"Bare as a Dominican's."
+
+"We are saved, then.  He shall name his price for our heads.  Money must be
+more useful to him than blood."
+
+And as if with that thought all further meditation were rendered
+unnecessary, Montreal doffed his mantle, uttered a short prayer, and flung
+himself on a pallet in a corner of the cell.
+
+"I have slept on worse beds," said the Knight, stretching himself; and in a
+few minutes he was fast asleep.
+
+The brothers listened to his deep-drawn, but regular breathing, with envy
+and wonder, but they were in no mood to converse.  Still and speechless,
+they sate like statues beside the sleeper.  Time passed on, and the first
+cold air of the hour that succeeds to midnight crept through the bars of
+their cell.  The bolts crashed, the door opened, six men-at-arms entered,
+passed the brothers, and one of them touched Montreal.
+
+"Ha!" said he, still sleeping, but turning round.  "Ha!" said he, in the
+soft Provencal tongue, "sweet Adeline, we will not rise yet - it is so long
+since we met!"
+
+"What says he?" muttered the guard, shaking Montreal roughly.  The Knight
+sprang up at once, and his hand grasped the head of his bed as for his
+sword.  He stared round bewildered, rubbed his eyes, and then gazing on the
+guard, became alive to the present.
+
+"Ye are early risers in the Capitol," said he.  "What want ye of me?"
+
+"It waits you!"
+
+"It!  What?" said Montreal.
+
+"The rack!" replied the soldier, with a malignant scowl.
+
+The Great Captain said not a word.  He looked for one moment at the six
+swordsmen, as if measuring his single strength against theirs.  His eye
+then wandered round the room.  The rudest bar of iron would have been
+dearer to him than he had ever yet found the proofest steel of Milan.  He
+completed his survey with a sigh, threw his mantle over his shoulders,
+nodded at his brethren, and followed the guard.
+
+In a hall of the Capitol, hung with the ominous silk of white rays on a
+blood-red ground, sate Rienzi and his councillors.  Across a recess was
+drawn a black curtain.
+
+"Walter de Montreal," said a small man at the foot of the table, "Knight of
+the illustrious order of St. John of Jerusalem - "
+
+"And Captain of the Grand Company!" added the prisoner, in a firm voice.
+
+"You stand accused of divers counts:  robbery and murder, in Tuscany,
+Romagna, and Apulia - "
+
+"For robbery and murder, brave men, and belted Knights," said Montreal,
+drawing himself up, "would use the words 'war and victory.'  To those
+charges I plead guilty!  Proceed."
+
+"You are next accused of treasonable conspiracy against the liberties of
+Rome for the restoration of the proscribed Barons - and of traitorous
+correspondence with Stefanello Colonna at Palestrina."
+
+"My accuser?"
+
+"Step forth, Angelo Villani!"
+
+"You are my betrayer, then?" said Montreal steadily.  "I deserved this.  I
+beseech you, Senator of Rome, let this young man retire.  I confess my
+correspondence with the Colonna, and my desire to restore the Barons."
+
+Rienzi motioned to Villani, who bowed and withdrew.
+
+"There rests only then for you, Walter de Montreal, to relate, fully and
+faithfully, the details of your conspiracy."
+
+"That is impossible," replied Montreal, carelessly.
+
+"And why?"
+
+"Because, doing as I please with my own life, I will not betray the lives
+of others."
+
+"Bethink thee - thou wouldst have betrayed the life of thy judge!"
+
+"Not betrayed - thou didst not trust me."
+
+"The law, Walter de Montreal, hath sharp inquisitors - behold!"
+
+The black curtain was drawn aside, and the eye of Montreal rested on the
+executioner and the rack!  His proud breast heaved indignantly.
+
+"Senator of Rome," said he, "these instruments are for serfs and villeins. 
+I have been a warrior and a leader; life and death have been in my hands -
+I have used them as I listed; but to mine equal and my foe, I never
+proffered the insult of the rack."
+
+"Sir Walter de Montreal," returned the Senator, gravely, but with some
+courteous respect, "your answer is that which rises naturally to the lips
+of brave men.  But learn from me, whom fortune hath made thy judge, that no
+more for serf and villein, than for knight and noble, are such instruments
+the engines of law, or the tests of truth.  I yielded but to the desire of
+these reverend councillors, to test thy nerves.  But, wert thou the meanest
+peasant of the Campagna, before my judgment-seat thou needst not apprehend
+the torture.  Walter de Montreal, amongst the Princes of Italy thou hast
+known, amongst the Roman Barons thou wouldst have aided, is there one who
+could make that boast?"
+
+"I desired only," said Montreal, with some hesitation, "to unite the Barons
+with thee; nor did I intrigue against thy life!"
+
+Rienzi frowned - "Enough," he said, hastily.  "Knight of St. John, I know
+thy secret projects, subterfuge and evasion neither befit nor avail thee. 
+If thou didst not intrigue against my life, thou didst intrigue against the
+life of Rome.  Thou hast but one favour left to demand on earth, it is the
+manner of thy death."
+
+Montreal's lip worked convulsively.
+
+"Senator," said he, in a low voice, "may I crave audience with thee alone
+for one minute?"
+
+The councillors looked up.
+
+"My Lord," whispered the eldest of them, "doubtless he hath concealed
+weapons - trust him not."
+
+"Prisoner," returned Rienzi, after a moment's pause; "if thou seekest for
+mercy thy request is idle, and before my coadjutors I have no secret; speak
+out what thou hast to say!"
+
+"Yet listen to me," said the prisoner, folding his arms; "it concerns not
+my life, but Rome's welfare."
+
+"Then," said Rienzi, in an altered tone, "thy request is granted.  Thou
+mayst add to thy guilt the design of the assassin, but for Rome I would
+dare greater danger."
+
+So saying, he motioned to the councillors, who slowly withdrew by the door
+which had admitted Villani, while the guards retired to the farthest
+extremity of the hall.
+
+"Now, Walter de Montreal, be brief, for thy time is short."
+
+"Senator," said Montreal, "my life can but little profit you; men will say
+that you destroyed your creditor in order to cancel your debt.  Fix a sum
+upon my life, estimate it at the price of a monarch's; every florin shall
+be paid to you, and your treasury will be filled for five years to come. 
+If the 'Buono Stato' depends on your government, what I have asked, your
+solicitude for Rome will not permit you to refuse."
+
+"You mistake me, bold robber," said Rienzi, sternly; "your treason I could
+guard against, and therefore forgive; your ambition, never!  Mark me, I
+know you!  Place your hand on your heart and say whether, could we change
+places, you, as Rienzi, would suffer all the gold of earth to purchase the
+life of Walter de Montreal?  For men's reading of my conduct, that must I
+bear; for mine own reading, mine eyes must be purged from corruption.  I am
+answerable to God for the trust of Rome.  And Rome trembles while the head
+of the Grand Company lives in the plotting brain and the daring heart of
+Walter de Montreal.  Man - wealthy, great, and subtle as you are, your
+hours are numbered; with the rise of the sun you die!"
+
+Montreal's eyes, fixed upon the Senator's face, saw hope was over; his
+pride and his fortitude returned to him.
+
+"We have wasted words," said he.  "I played for a great stake, I have lost,
+and must pay the forfeit!  I am prepared.  On the threshold of the Unknown
+World, the dark spirit of prophecy rushes into us.  Lord Senator, I go
+before thee to announce - that in Heaven or in Hell - ere many days be
+over, room must be given to one mightier than I am!"
+
+As he spoke, his form dilated, his eye glared; and Rienzi, cowering as
+never had he cowered before, shrunk back, and shaded his face with his
+hand.
+
+"The manner of your death?" he asked, in a hollow voice.
+
+"The axe:  it is that which befits knight and warrior.  For thee, Senator,
+Fate hath a less noble death."
+
+"Robber be dumb!" cried Rienzi, passionately; "Guards, bear back the
+prisoner.  At sunrise, Montreal - "
+
+"Sets the sun of the scourge of Italy," said the Knight, bitterly.  "Be it
+so.  One request more; the Knights of St. John claim affinity with the
+Augustine order; grant me an Augustine confessor."
+
+"It is granted; and in return for thy denunciations, I, who can give thee
+no earthly mercy, will implore the Judge of all for pardon to thy soul!"
+
+"Senator, I have done with man's mediation.  My brethren?  Their deaths are
+not necessary to thy safety or thy revenge!"
+
+Rienzi mused a moment:  "No," said he, "dangerous tools they were, but
+without the workman they may rust unharming.  They served me once, too. 
+Prisoner, their lives are spared."
+
+
+Chapter 10.V.  The Discovery.
+
+The Council was broken up - Rienzi hastened to his own apartments.  Meeting
+Villani by the way, he pressed the youth's hand affectionately.  "You have
+saved Rome and me from great peril," said he; "the saints reward you!" 
+Without tarrying for Villani's answer, he hurried on.  Nina, anxious and
+perturbed, awaited him in their chamber.
+
+"Not a-bed yet?" said he:  "fie, Nina, even thy beauty will not stand these
+vigils."
+
+"I could not rest till I had seen thee.  I hear (all Rome has heard it ere
+this) that thou hast seized Walter de Montreal, and that he will perish by
+the headsman."
+
+"The first robber that ever died so brave a death," returned Rienzi, slowly
+unrobing himself.
+
+"Cola, I have never crossed your schemes, - your policy, even by a
+suggestion.  Enough for me to triumph in their success, to mourn for their
+failure.  Now, I ask thee one request - spare me the life of this man."
+
+"Nina - "
+
+"Hear me, - for thee I speak!  Despite his crimes, his valour and his
+genius have gained him admirers, even amongst his foes.  Many a prince,
+many a state that secretly rejoices at his fall, will affect horror against
+his judge.  Hear me farther.  His brothers aided your return; the world
+will term you ungrateful.  His brothers lent you monies, the world - (out
+on it!) - will term you - "
+
+"Hold!" interrupted the Senator.  "All that thou sayest, my mind
+forestalled.  But thou knowest me - to thee I have no disguise.  No compact
+can bind Montreal's faith - no mercy win his gratitude.  Before his red
+right hand truth and justice are swept away.  If I condemn Montreal I incur
+disgrace and risk danger - granted.  If I release him, ere the first
+showers of April, the chargers of the Northmen will neigh in the halls of
+the Capitol.  Which shall I hazard in this alternative, myself or Rome? 
+Ask me no more - to bed, to bed!"
+
+"Couldst thou read my forebodings, Cola, mystic - gloomy - unaccountable?"
+
+"Forebodings! - I have mine," answered Rienzi, sadly, gazing on space, as
+if his thoughts peopled it with spectres.  Then, raising his eyes to
+Heaven, he said with that fanatical energy which made much both of his
+strength and weakness - "Lord, mine at least not the sin of Saul! the
+Amalekite shall not be saved!"
+
+While Rienzi enjoyed a short, troubled, and restless sleep, over which Nina
+watched - unslumbering, anxious, tearful, and oppressed with dark and
+terrible forewarnings - the accuser was more happy than the judge.  The
+last thoughts that floated before the young mind of Angelo Villani, ere
+wrapped in sleep, were bright and sanguine.  He felt no honourable remorse
+that he had entrapped the confidence of another - he felt only that his
+scheme had prospered, that his mission had been fulfilled.  The grateful
+words of Rienzi rang in his ear, and hopes of fortune and power, beneath
+the sway of the Roman Senator, lulled him into slumber, and coloured all
+his dreams.
+
+Scarce, however, had he been two hours asleep, ere he was wakened by one of
+the attendants of the palace, himself half awake.  "Pardon me, Messere
+Villani," said he, "but there is a messenger below from the good Sister
+Ursula; he bids thee haste instantly to the Convent - she is sick unto
+death, and has tidings that crave thy immediate presence."
+
+Angelo, whose morbid susceptibility as to his parentage was ever excited by
+vague but ambitious hopes - started up, dressed hurriedly, and joining the
+messenger below, repaired to the Convent.  In the Court of the Capitol, and
+by the Staircase of the Lion, was already heard the noise of the workmen,
+and looking back, Villani beheld the scaffold, hung with black - sleeping
+cloudlike in the grey light of dawn - at the same time, the bell of the
+Capitol tolled heavily.  A pang shot athwart him.  He hurried on; - despite
+the immature earliness of the hour, he met groups of either sex, hastening
+along the streets to witness the execution of the redoubted Captain of the
+Grand Company.  The Convent of the Augustines was at the farthest extremity
+of that city, even then so extensive, and the red light upon the hilltops
+already heralded the rising sun, ere the young man reached the venerable
+porch.  His name obtained him instant admittance.
+
+"Heaven grant," said an old Nun, who conducted him through a long and
+winding passage, "that thou mayst bring comfort to the sick sister:  she
+has pined for thee grievously since matins."
+
+In a cell set apart for the reception of visitors (from the outward world),
+to such of the Sisterhood as received the necessary dispensation, sate the
+aged Nun.  Angelo had only seen her once since his return to Rome, and
+since then disease had made rapid havoc on her form and features.  And now,
+in her shroudlike garments and attenuated frame, she seemed by the morning
+light as a spectre whom day had surprised above the earth.  She approached
+the youth, however, with a motion more elastic and rapid than seemed
+possible to her worn and ghastly form.  "Thou art come," she said.  "Well,
+well!  This morning after matins, my confessor, an Augustine, who alone
+knows the secrets of my life, took me aside, and told me that Walter de
+Montreal had been seized by the Senator - that he was adjudged to die, and
+that one of the Augustine brotherhood had been sent for to attend his last
+hours - is it so?"
+
+"Thou wert told aright," said Angelo, wonderingly.  "The man at whose name
+thou wert wont to shudder - against whom thou hast so often warned me -
+will die at sunrise."
+
+"So soon! - so soon! - Oh, Mother of Mercy! - fly! thou art about the
+person of the Senator, thou hast high favour with him; fly! down on thy
+knees, and as thou hopest for God's grace, rise not till thou hast won the
+Provencal's life."
+
+"She raves," muttered Angelo, with white lips.
+
+"I do not rave, - boy!" screeched the Sister, wildly, "know that my
+daughter was his leman.  He disgraced our house, - a house haughtier than
+his own.  Sinner that I was, I vowed revenge.  His boy - they had only one!
+- was brought up in a robber's camp; - a life of bloodshed - a death of
+doom - a futurity of hell - were before him.  I plucked the child from such
+a fate - I bore him away - I told the father he was dead - I placed him in
+the path to honourable fortunes.  May my sin be forgiven me!  Angelo
+Villani, thou art that child; - Walter de Montreal is thy father.  But now,
+trembling on the verge of death, I shudder at the vindictive thoughts I
+once nourished.  Perhaps - "
+
+"Sinner and accursed!" interrupted Villani, with a loud shout: - "sinner
+and accursed thou art indeed!  Know that it was I who betrayed thy
+daughter's lover! - by the son's treason dies the father!"
+
+Not a moment more did he tarry:  he waited not to witness the effect his
+words produced.  As one frantic - as one whom a fiend possesses or pursues
+- he rushed from the Convent - he flew through the desolate streets.  The
+death-bell came, first indistinct, then loud, upon his ear.  Every sound
+seemed to him like the curse of God; on - on - he passed the more deserted
+quarter - crowds swept before him - he was mingled with the living stream,
+delayed, pushed back - thousands on thousands around, before him. 
+Breathless, gasping, he still pressed on - he forced his way - he heard not
+- he saw not - all was like a dream.  Up burst the sun over the distant
+hills! - the bell ceased!  From right to left he pushed aside the crowd -
+his strength was as a giant's.  He neared the fatal spot.  A dead hush lay
+like a heavy air over the multitude.  He heard a voice, as he pressed
+along, deep and clear - it was the voice of his father! - it ceased - the
+audience breathed heavily - they murmured - they swayed to and fro.  On,
+on, went Angelo Villani.  The guards of the Senator stopped his way; - he
+dashed aside their pikes - he eluded their grasp - he pierced the armed
+barrier - he stood on the Place of the Capitol.  "Hold, hold!" he would
+have cried - but horror struck him dumb.  He beheld the gleaming axe - he
+saw the bended neck.  Ere another breath passed his lips, a ghastly and
+trunkless face was raised on high - Walter de Montreal was no more!
+
+Villani saw - swooned not - shrunk not - breathed not! - but he turned his
+eyes from that lifted head, dropping gore, to the balcony, in which,
+according to custom, sate, in solemn pomp, the Senator of Rome - and the
+face of that young man was as the face of a demon!
+
+"Ha!" said he, muttering to himself, and recalling the words of Rienzi
+seven years before - "Blessed art thou who hast no blood of kindred to
+avenge!"
+
+
+Chapter 10.VI.  The Suspense.
+
+Walter de Montreal was buried in the church of St. Maria dell' Araceli. 
+But the "evil that he did lived after him!"  Although the vulgar had, until
+his apprehension, murmured against Rienzi for allowing so notorious a
+freebooter to be at large, he was scarcely dead ere they compassionated the
+object of their terror.  With that singular species of piety which Montreal
+had always cultivated, as if a decorous and natural part of the character
+of a warrior, no sooner was his sentence fixed, than he had surrendered
+himself to the devout preparation for death.  With the Augustine Friar he
+consumed the brief remainder of the night in prayer and confession,
+comforted his brothers, and passed to the scaffold with the step of a hero
+and the self-acquittal of a martyr.  In the wonderful delusions of the
+human heart, far from feeling remorse at a life of professional rapine and
+slaughter, almost the last words of the brave warrior were in proud
+commendation of his own deeds.  "Be valiant like me," he said to his
+brothers, "and remember that ye are now the heirs to the Humbler of Apulia,
+Tuscany, and La Marca."  (Pregovi che vi amiate e siate valorosi al mondo,
+come fui io, che mi feci fare obbedienza a la Puglia, Toscana, e a La
+Marca." - "Vita di Cola di Rienzi", lib. ii. cap. 22.  "I pray you love one
+another, and be valorous as was I, who made Apulia, Tuscany and La Marca
+own obedience to me." - "Life of Cola di Rienzi".)
+
+This confidence in himself continued at the scaffold.  "I die," he said,
+addressing the Romans - "I die contented, since my bones shall rest in the
+Holy City of St. Peter and St. Paul, and the Soldier of Christ shall have
+the burial-place of the Apostles.  But I die unjustly.  My wealth is my
+crime - the poverty of your state my accuser.  Senator of Rome, thou mayst
+envy my last hour - men like Walter de Montreal perish not unavenged."  So
+saying, he turned to the East, murmured a brief prayer, knelt down
+deliberately, and said as to himself, "Rome guard my ashes! - Earth my
+memory - Fate my revenge; - and, now, Heaven receive my soul! - Strike!" 
+At the first blow, the head was severed from the body.
+
+His treason but imperfectly known, the fear of him forgotten, all that
+remained of the recollection of Walter de Montreal (The military renown and
+bold exploits of Montreal are acknowledged by all the Italian authorities. 
+One of them declares that since the time of Caesar, Italy had never known
+so great a Captain.  The biographer of Rienzi, forgetting all the offences
+of the splendid and knightly robber, seems to feel only commiseration for
+his fate.  He informs us, moreover, that at Tivoli one of his servants
+(perhaps our friend, Rodolf of Saxony), hearing his death, died of grief
+the following day.) in Rome, was admiration for his heroism, and compassion
+for his end.  The fate of Pandulfo di Guido, which followed some days
+afterwards, excited a yet deeper, though more quiet, sentiment, against the
+Senator.  "He was once Rienzi's friend!" said one man; "He was an honest,
+upright citizen!" muttered another; "He was an advocate of the people!"
+growled Cecco del Vecchio.  But the Senator had wound himself up to a
+resolve to be inflexibly just, and to regard every peril to Rome as became
+a Roman.  Rienzi remembered that he had never confided but he had been
+betrayed; he had never forgiven but to sharpen enmity.  He was amidst a
+ferocious people, uncertain friends, wily enemies; and misplaced mercy
+would be but a premium to conspiracy.  Yet the struggle he underwent was
+visible in the hysterical emotions he betrayed.  He now wept bitterly, now
+laughed wildly.  "Can I never again have the luxury to forgive?" said he. 
+The coarse spectators of that passion deemed it, - some imbecility, some
+hypocrisy.  But the execution produced the momentary effect intended.  All
+sedition ceased, terror crept throughout the city, order and peace rose to
+the surface; but beneath, in the strong expression of a contemporaneous
+writer, "Lo mormorito quetamente suonava."  ("The murmur quietly sounded.")
+
+On examining dispassionately the conduct of Rienzi at this awful period of
+his life, it is scarcely possible to condemn it of a single error in point
+of policy.  Cured of his faults, he exhibited no unnecessary ostentation -
+he indulged in no exhibitions of intoxicated pride - that gorgeous
+imagination rather than vanity, which had led the Tribune into spectacle
+and pomp, was now lulled to rest, by the sober memory of grave
+vicissitudes, and the stern calmness of a maturer intellect.  Frugal,
+provident, watchful, self-collected, 'never was seen,' observes no partial
+witness, 'so extraordinary a man.'  ("Vita di Cola di Rienzi", lib. ii. c.
+23.)  'In him was concentrated every thought for every want of Rome. 
+Indefatigably occupied, he inspected, ordained, regulated all things; in
+the city, in the army, for peace, or for war.  But he was feebly supported,
+and those he employed were lukewarm and lethargic.'  Still his arms
+prospered.  Place after place, fortress after fortress, yielded to the
+Lieutenant of the Senator:  and the cession of Palestrina itself was hourly
+expected.  His art and address were always strikingly exhibited in
+difficult situations, and the reader cannot fail to have noticed how
+conspicuously they were displayed in delivering himself from the iron
+tutelage of his foreign mercenaries.  Montreal executed, his brothers
+imprisoned, (though their lives were spared,) a fear that induced respect
+was stricken into the breasts of those bandit soldiers.  Removed from Rome,
+and, under Annibaldi, engaged against the Barons, constant action and
+constant success, withheld those necessary fiends from falling on their
+Master; while Rienzi, willing to yield to the natural antipathy of the
+Romans, thus kept the Northmen from all contact with the city; and as he
+boasted, was the only chief in Italy who reigned in his palace guarded only
+by his citizens.
+
+Despite his perilous situation - despite his suspicions, and his fears, no
+wanton cruelty stained his stern justice - Montreal and Pandulfo di Guido
+were the only state victims he demanded.  If, according to the dark
+Machiavelism of Italian wisdom, the death of those enemies was impolitic,
+it was not in the act, but the mode of doing it.  A prince of Bologna, or
+of Milan would have avoided the sympathy excited by the scaffold, and the
+drug or the dagger would have been the safer substitute for the axe.  But
+with all his faults, real and imputed, no single act of that foul and
+murtherous policy, which made the science of the more fortunate princes of
+Italy, ever advanced the ambition or promoted the security of the Last of
+the Roman Tribunes.  Whatever his errors, he lived and died as became a
+man, who dreamed the vain but glorious dream, that in a corrupt and dastard
+populace he could revive the genius of the old Republic.
+
+Of all who attended on the Senator, the most assiduous and the most
+honoured was still Angelo Villani.  Promoted to a high civil station,
+Rienzi felt it as a return of youth, to find one person entitled to his
+gratitude; - he loved and confided in the youth as a son.  Villani was
+never absent from his side, except in intercourse with the various popular
+leaders in the various quarters of the city; and in this intercourse his
+zeal was indefatigable - it seemed even to prey upon his health; and Rienzi
+chid him fondly, whenever starting from his own reveries, he beheld the
+abstracted eye and the livid paleness which had succeeded the sparkle and
+bloom of youth.
+
+Such chiding the young man answered only by the same unvarying words.
+
+"Senator, I have a great trust to fulfil;" - and at these words he smiled.
+
+One day Villani, while with the Senator, said rather abruptly, "Do you
+remember, my Lord, that before Viterbo, I acquitted myself so in arms, that
+even the Cardinal d'Albornoz was pleased to notice me?"
+
+"I remember your valour well, Angelo; but why the question?"
+
+"My Lord, Bellini, the Captain of the Guard of the Capitol is dangerously
+ill."
+
+"I know it."
+
+"Whom can my Lord trust at the post?"
+
+"Why, the Lieutenant."
+
+"What! - a soldier that has served under the Orsini!"
+
+"True.  Well!  There is Tommaso Filangieri."
+
+"An excellent man; but is he not kin by blood to Pandulfo di Guido?"
+
+"Ay - is he so?  It must be thought of.  Hast thou any friend to name?"
+said the Senator, smiling, "Methinks thy cavils point that way."
+
+"My Lord," replied Villani, colouring; "I am too young perhaps; but the
+post is one that demands fidelity more than it does years.  Shall I own it?
+- My tastes are rather to serve thee with my sword than with my pen."
+
+"Wilt thou, indeed, accept the office?  It is of less dignity and emolument
+than the one you hold; and you are full young to lead these stubborn
+spirits."
+
+"Senator, I led taller men than they are to the assault at Viterbo.  But,
+be it as seems best to your superior wisdom.  Whatever you do, I pray you
+to be cautious.  If you select a traitor to the command of the Capitol
+Guard! - I tremble at the thought!"
+
+"By my faith, thou dost turn pale at it, dear boy; thy affection is a sweet
+drop in a bitter draught.  Whom can I choose better than thee? - thou shalt
+have the post, at least during Bellini's illness.  I will attend to it
+today.  The business, too, will less fatigue thy young mind than that which
+now employs thee.  Thou art over-laboured in our cause."
+
+"Senator, I can but repeat my usual answer - I have a great trust to
+fulfil!"
+
+
+Chapter 10.VII.  The Tax.
+
+These formidable conspiracies quelled, the Barons nearly subdued, and three
+parts of the Papal territory reunited to Rome, Rienzi now deemed he might
+safely execute one of his favourite projects for the preservation of the
+liberties of his native city; and this was to raise and organize in each
+quarter of Rome a Roman Legion.  Armed in the defence of their own
+institutions, he thus trusted to establish amongst her own citizens the
+only soldiery requisite for Rome.
+
+But so base were the tools with which this great man was condemned to work
+out his noble schemes, that none could be found to serve their own country,
+without a pay equal to that demanded by foreign hirelings.  With the
+insolence so peculiar to a race that has once been great, each Roman said,
+"Am I not better than a German? - Pay me, then, accordingly."
+
+The Senator smothered his disgust - he had learned at last to know that the
+age of the Catos was no more.  From a daring enthusiast, experience had
+converted him into a practical statesman.  The Legions were necessary to
+Rome - they were formed - gallant their appearance and faultless their
+caparisons.  How were they to be paid?  There was but one means to maintain
+Rome - Rome must be taxed.  A gabelle was put upon wine and salt.
+
+The Proclamation ran thus:- 
+
+"Romans! raised to the rank of your Senator, my whole thought has been for
+your liberties and welfare; already treason defeated in the City, our
+banners triumphant without, attest the favour with which the Deity regards
+men who seek to unite liberty with law.  Let us set an example to Italy and
+the World!  Let us prove that the Roman sword can guard the Roman Forum! 
+In each Rione of the City is provided a Legion of the Citizens, collected
+from the traders and artisans of the town; they allege that they cannot
+leave their callings without remuneration.  Your senator calls upon you
+willingly to assist in your own defence.  He has given you liberty; he has
+restored to you peace:  your oppressors are scattered over the earth.  He
+asks you now to preserve the treasures you have gained.  To be free, you
+must sacrifice something; for freedom, what sacrifice too great?  Confident
+of your support, I at length, for the first time, exert the right entrusted
+to me by office - and for Rome's salvation I tax the Romans!"
+
+Then followed the announcement of the gabelle.
+
+The Proclamation was set up in the public thoroughfares.  Round one of the
+placards a crowd assembled.  Their gestures were vehement and unguarded -
+their eyes sparkled - they conversed low, but eagerly.
+
+"He dares to tax us, then!  Why, the Barons or the Pope could not do more
+than that!"
+
+"Shame! shame!" cried a gaunt female; "we, who were his friends!  How are
+our little ones to get bread?"
+
+"He should have seized the Pope's money!" quoth an honest wine-vender.
+
+"Ah! Pandulfo di Guido would have maintained an army at his own cost.  He
+was a rich man.  What insolence in the innkeeper's son to be a Senator!"
+
+"We are not Romans if we suffer this!" said a deserter from Palestrina.
+
+"Fellow-citizens!" exclaimed gruffly a tall man, who had hitherto been
+making a clerk read to him the particulars of the tax imposed, and whose
+heavy brain at length understood that wine was to be made dearer - "Fellow-
+citizens, we must have a new revolution!  This is indeed gratitude!  What
+have we benefited by restoring this man!  Are we always to be ground to the
+dust?  To pay - pay - pay!  Is that all we are fit for?"
+
+"Hark to Cecco del Vecchio!"
+
+"No, no; not now," growled the smith.  "Tonight the artificers have a
+special meeting.  We'll see - we'll see!"
+
+A young man, muffled in a cloak, who had not been before observed, touched
+the smith.
+
+"Whoever storms the Capitol the day after tomorrow at the dawn," he
+whispered, "shall find the guards absent!"
+
+He was gone before the smith could look round.
+
+The same night Rienzi, retiring to rest, said to Angelo Villani - "A bold
+but necessary measure this of mine!  How do the people take it?"
+
+"They murmur a little, but seem to recognise the necessity.  Cecco del
+Vecchio was the loudest grumbler, but is now the loudest approver."
+
+"The man is rough; he once deserted me; - but then that fatal
+excommunication!  He and the Romans learned a bitter lesson in that
+desertion, and experience has, I trust, taught them to be honest.  Well, if
+this tax be raised quietly, in two years Rome will be again the Queen of
+Italy; - her army manned - her Republic formed; and then - then - "
+
+"Then what, Senator?"
+
+"Why then, my Angelo, Cola di Rienzi may die in peace!  There is a want
+which a profound experience of power and pomp brings at last to us - a want
+gnawing as that of hunger, wearing as that of sleep! - my Angelo, it is the
+want to die!"
+
+"My Lord, I would give this right hand," cried Villani, earnestly, "to hear
+you say you were attached to life!"
+
+"You are a good youth, Angelo!" said Rienzi, as he passed to Nina's
+chamber; and in her smile and wistful tenderness, forgot for a while - that
+he was a great man!
+
+
+Chapter 10.VIII.  The Threshold of the Event.
+
+The next morning the Senator of Rome held high Court in the Capitol.  From
+Florence, from Padua, from Pisa, even from Milan, (the dominion of the
+Visconti,) from Genoa, from Naples, - came Ambassadors to welcome his
+return, or to thank him for having freed Italy from the freebooter De
+Montreal.  Venice alone, who held in her pay the Grand Company, stood
+aloof.  Never had Rienzi seemed more prosperous and more powerful, and
+never had he exhibited a more easy and cheerful majesty of demeanour.
+
+Scarce was the audience over, when a messenger arrived from Palestrina. 
+The town had surrendered, the Colonna had departed, and the standard of the
+Senator waved from the walls of the last hold of the rebellious Barons. 
+Rome might now at length consider herself free, and not a foe seemed left
+to menace the repose of Rienzi.
+
+The Court dissolved.  The Senator, elated and joyous, repaired towards his
+private apartments, previous to the banquet given to the Ambassadors. 
+Villani met him with his wonted sombre aspect.
+
+"No sadness today, my Angelo," said the Senator, gaily; "Palestrina is
+ours!"
+
+"I am glad to hear such news, and to see my Lord of so fair a mien,"
+answered Angelo.  "Does he not now desire life?"
+
+"Till Roman virtue revives, perhaps - yes!  But thus are we fools of
+Fortune; - today glad - tomorrow dejected!"
+
+"Tomorrow," repeated Villani, mechanically:  "Ay - tomorrow perhaps
+dejected."
+
+"Thou playest with my words, boy," said Rienzi, half angrily, as he turned
+away.
+
+But Villani heeded not the displeasure of his Lord.
+
+The banquet was thronged and brilliant; and Rienzi that day, without an
+effort, played the courteous host.
+
+Milanese, Paduan, Pisan, Neapolitan, vied with each other in attracting the
+smiles of the potent Senator.  Prodigal were their compliments - lavish
+their promises of support.  No monarch in Italy seemed more securely
+throned.
+
+The banquet was over (as usual on state occasions) at an early hour; and
+Rienzi, somewhat heated with wine, strolled forth alone from the Capitol. 
+Bending his solitary steps towards the Palatine, he saw the pale and veil-
+like mists that succeed the sunset, gather over the wild grass which waves
+above the Palace of the Caesars.  On a mound of ruins (column and arch
+overthrown) he stood, with folded arms, musing and intent.  In the distance
+lay the melancholy tombs of the Campagna, and the circling hills, crested
+with the purple hues soon to melt beneath the starlight.  Not a breeze
+stirred the dark cypress and unwaving pine.  There was something awful in
+the stillness of the skies, hushing the desolate grandeur of the earth
+below.  Many and mingled were the thoughts that swept over Rienzi's breast: 
+memory was busy at his heart.  How often, in his youth, had he trodden the
+same spot! - what visions had he nursed! - what hopes conceived!  In the
+turbulence of his later life, Memory had long slept; but at that hour, she
+re-asserted her shadowy reign with a despotism that seemed prophetic.  He
+was wandering - a boy, with his young brother, hand in hand, by the
+riverside at eve:  anon he saw a pale face and gory side, and once more
+uttered his imprecations of revenge!  His first successes, his virgin
+triumphs, his secret love, his fame, his power, his reverses, the hermitage
+of Maiella, the dungeon of Avignon, the triumphal return to Rome, - all
+swept across his breast with a distinctness as if he were living those
+scenes again! - and now! - he shrunk from the present, and descended the
+hill.  The moon, already risen, shed her light over the Forum, as he passed
+through its mingled ruins.  By the Temple of Jupiter, two figures suddenly
+emerged; the moonlight fell upon their faces, and Rienzi recognised Cecco
+del Vecchio and Angelo Villani.  They saw him not; but, eagerly conversing,
+disappeared by the Arch of Trajan.
+
+"Villani! ever active in my service!" thought the Senator; "methinks this
+morning I spoke to him harshly - it was churlish in me!"
+
+He re-entered the Place of the Capitol - he stood by the staircase of the
+Lion; there was a red stain upon the pavement, unobliterated since
+Montreal's execution, and the Senator drew himself aside with an inward
+shudder.  Was it the ghastly and spectral light of the Moon, or did the
+face of that old Egyptian Monster wear an aspect that was as of life?  The
+stony eyeballs seemed bent upon him with a malignant scowl; and as he
+passed on, and looked behind, they appeared almost preternaturally to
+follow his steps. A chill, he knew not why, sunk into his heart.  He
+hastened to regain his palace.  The sentinels made way for him.
+
+"Senator," said one of them, doubtingly, "Messere Angelo Villani is our new
+captain - we are to obey his orders?"
+
+"Assuredly," returned the Senator, passing on.  The man lingered uneasily,
+as if he would have spoken, but Rienzi observed it not.  Seeking his
+chamber, he found Nina and Irene waiting for him.  His heart yearned to his
+wife.  Care and toil had of late driven her from his thoughts, and he felt
+it remorsefully, as he gazed upon her noble face, softened by the
+solicitude of untiring and anxious love.
+
+"Sweetest," said he, winding his arms around her tenderly; "thy lips never
+chide me, but thine eyes sometimes do!  We have been apart too long. 
+Brighter days dawn upon us, when I shall have leisure to thank thee for all
+thy care.  And you, my fair sister, you smile on me! - ah, you have heard
+that your lover, ere this, is released by the cession of Palestrina, and
+tomorrow's sun will see him at your feet.  Despite all the cares of the
+day, I remembered thee, my Irene, and sent a messenger to bring back the
+blush to that pale cheek.  Come, come, we shall be happy again!"  And with
+that domestic fondness common to him, when harsher thoughts permitted, he
+sate himself beside the two persons dearest to his hearth and heart.
+
+"So happy - if we could have many hours like this!" murmured Nina, sinking
+on his breast.  "Yet sometimes I wish - "
+
+"And I too," interrupted Rienzi; "for I read thy woman's thought - I too
+sometimes wish that fate had placed us in the lowlier valleys of life!  But
+it may come yet!  Irene wedded to Adrian - Rome married to Liberty - and
+then, Nina, methinks you and I would find some quiet hermitage, and talk
+over old gauds and triumphs, as of a summer's dream.  Beautiful, kiss me! 
+Couldst thou resign these pomps?"
+
+"For a desert with thee, Cola!"
+
+"Let me reflect," resumed Rienzi; "is not today the seventh of October? 
+Yes! on the seventh, be it noted, my foes yielded to my power!  Seven! my
+fated number, whether ominous of good or evil!  Seven months did I reign as
+Tribune - seven (There was the lapse of one year between the release of
+Rienzi from Avignon, and his triumphal return to Rome:  a year chiefly
+spent in the campaign of Albornoz.) years was I absent as an exile;
+tomorrow, that sees me without an enemy, completes my seventh week of
+return!"
+
+"And seven was the number of the crowns the Roman Convents and the Roman
+Council awarded thee, after the ceremony which gave thee the knighthood of
+the Santo Spirito!"  (This superstition had an excuse in strange historical
+coincidences; and the number seven was indeed to Rienzi what the 3rd of
+September was to Cromwell.  The ceremony of the seven crowns which he
+received after his knighthood, on the nature of which ridiculous ignorance
+has been shown by many recent writers, was, in fact, principally a
+religious and typical donation, (symbolical of the gifts of the Holy
+Spirit,) conferred by the heads of convents - and that part of the ceremony
+which was political, was republican, not regal.) said Nina, adding, with
+woman's tender wit, "the brightest association of all!"
+
+Follies seem these thoughts to others, and to philosophy, in truth, they
+are so," said Rienzi; "but all my life long, omen and type and shadow have
+linked themselves to action and event:  and the atmosphere of other men
+hath not been mine.  Life itself a riddle, why should riddles amaze us? 
+The Future! - what mystery in the very word!  Had we lived all through the
+Past, since Time was, our profoundest experience of a thousand ages could
+not give us a guess of the events that wait the very moment we are about to
+enter!  Thus deserted by Reason, what wonder that we recur to the
+Imagination, on which, by dream and symbol, God sometimes paints the
+likeness of things to come?  Who can endure to leave the Future all
+unguessed, and sit tamely down to groan under the fardel of the Present? 
+No, no! that which the foolish-wise call Fanaticism, belongs to the same
+part of us as Hope.  Each but carries us onward - from a barren strand to a
+glorious, if unbounded sea.  Each is the yearning for the GREAT BEYOND,
+which attests our immortality.  Each has its visions and chimeras - some
+false, but some true!  Verily, a man who becomes great is often but made so
+by a kind of sorcery in his own soul - a Pythia which prophesies that he
+shall be great - and so renders the life one effort to fulfil the warning! 
+Is this folly? - it were so, if all things stopped at the grave!  But
+perhaps the very sharpening, and exercising, and elevating the faculties
+here - though but for a bootless end on earth - may be designed to fit the
+soul, thus quickened and ennobled, to some high destiny beyond the earth! 
+Who can tell? not I! - Let us pray!"
+
+While the Senator was thus employed, Rome in her various quarters presented
+less holy and quiet scenes.
+
+In the fortress of the Orsini lights flitted to and fro, through the
+gratings of the great court.  Angelo Villani might be seen stealing from
+the postern-gate.  Another hour, and the Moon was high in heaven; toward
+the ruins of the Colosseum, men, whose dress bespoke them of the lowest
+rank, were seen creeping from lanes and alleys, two by two; from these
+ruins glided again the form of the son of Montreal.  Later yet - the Moon
+is sinking - a grey light breaking in the East - and the gates of Rome, by
+St. John of Lateran, are open!  Villani is conversing with the sentries! 
+The Moon has set - the mountains are dim with a mournful and chilling haze
+- Villani is before the palace of the Capitol - the only soldier there! 
+Where are the Roman legions that were to guard alike the freedom and the
+deliverer of Rome?
+
+
+Chapter The Last.  The Close of the Chase.
+
+It was the morning of the 8th of October, 1354.  Rienzi, who rose betimes,
+stirred restlessly in his bed.  "It is yet early," he said to Nina, whose
+soft arm was round his neck; "none of my people seem to be astir.  Howbeit,
+my day begins before theirs."
+
+"Rest yet, my Cola; you want sleep."
+
+"No; I feel feverish, and this old pain in the side torments me.  I have
+letters to write."
+
+"Let me be your secretary, dearest," said Nina.
+
+Rienzi smiled affectionately as he rose; he repaired to his closet
+adjoining his sleeping apartment, and used the bath, as was his wont.  Then
+dressing himself, he returned to Nina, who, already loosely robed, sate by
+the writing-table, ready for her office of love.
+
+"How still are all things!" said Rienzi.  "What a cool and delicious
+prelude, in these early hours, to the toilsome day."
+
+Leaning over his wife, he then dictated different letters, interrupting the
+task at times by such observations as crossed his mind.
+
+"So, now to Annibaldi!  By the way, young Adrian should join us today; how
+I rejoice for Irene's sake!"
+
+"Dear sister - yes! she loves, - if any, Cola, can so love, - as we do."
+
+"Well, but to your task, my fair scribe.  Ha! what noise is that?  I hear
+an armed step - the stairs creak - some one shouts my name."
+
+Rienzi flew to his sword! the door was thrown rudely open, and a figure in
+complete armour appeared within the chamber.
+
+"How! what means this?" said Rienzi, standing before Nina, with his drawn
+sword.
+
+The intruder lifted his visor - it was Adrian Colonna.
+
+"Fly, Rienzi! - hasten, Signora!  Thank Heaven, I can save ye yet!  Myself
+and train released by the capture of Palestrina, the pain of my wound
+detained me last night at Tivoli.  The town was filled with armed men - not
+thine, Senator.  I heard rumours that alarmed me.  I resolved to proceed
+onward - I reached Rome, the gates of the city were wide open!"
+
+"How!"
+
+"Your guard gone.  Presently I came upon a band of the retainers of the
+Savelli.  My insignia, as a Colonna, misled them.  I learned that this very
+hour some of your enemies are within the city, the rest are on their march
+- the people themselves arm against you.  In the obscurer streets I passed
+through, the mob were already forming.  They took me for thy foe, and
+shouted.  I came hither - thy sentries have vanished.  The private door
+below is unbarred and open.  Not a soul seems left in thy palace.  Haste -
+fly - save thyself! - Where is Irene?"
+
+"The Capitol deserted! - impossible!" cried Rienzi.  He strode across the
+chambers to the ante-room, where his night-guard usually waited - it was
+empty!  He passed hastily to Villani's room - it was untenanted!  He would
+have passed farther, but the doors were secured without.  It was evident
+that all egress had been cut off, save by the private door below, - and
+that had been left open to admit his murtherers!
+
+He returned to his room - Nina had already gone to rouse and prepare Irene,
+whose chamber was on the other side, within one of their own.
+
+"Quick, Senator!" said Adrian.  "Methinks there is yet time.  We must make
+across to the Tiber.  I have stationed my faithful squires and Northmen
+there.  A boat waits us."
+
+"Hark!" interrupted Rienzi, whose senses had of late been preternaturally
+quickened.  "I hear a distant shout - a familiar shout, 'Viva 'l Popolo!' 
+Why, so say I!  These must be friends."
+
+"Deceive not thyself; thou hast scarce a friend at Rome."
+
+"Hist!" said Rienzi, in a whisper; "save Nina - save Irene.  I cannot
+accompany thee."
+
+"Art thou mad?"
+
+"No! but fearless.  Besides, did I accompany, I might but destroy you all.
+Were I found with you, you would be massacred with me.  Without me ye are
+safe.  Yes, even the Senator's wife and sister have provoked no revenge. 
+Save them, noble Colonna!  Cola di Rienzi puts his trust in God alone!"
+
+By this time Nina had returned; Irene with her.  Afar was heard the tramp -
+steady - slow - gathering - of the fatal multitude.
+
+"Now, Cola," said Nina, with a bold and cheerful air, and she took her
+husband's arm, while Adrian had already found his charge in Irene.
+
+"Yes, now, Nina!" said Rienzi; "at length we part!  If this is my last hour
+- in my last hour I pray God to bless and shield thee! for verily, thou
+hast been my exceeding solace - provident as a parent, tender as a child,
+the smile of my hearth, the - the - "
+
+Rienzi was almost unmanned.  Emotions, deep, conflicting, unspeakably fond
+and grateful, literally choked his speech.
+
+"What!" cried Nina, clinging to his breast, and parting her hair from her
+eyes, as she sought his averted face.  "Part! - never!  This is my place -
+all Rome shall not tear me from it!"
+
+Adrian, in despair, seized her hand, and attempted to drag her thence.
+
+"Touch me not, sir!" said Nina, waving her arm with angry majesty, while
+her eyes sparkled as a lioness, whom the huntsmen would sever from her
+young.  "I am the wife of Cola di Rienzi, the Great Senator of Rome, and by
+his side will I live and die!"
+
+"Take her hence:  quick! - quick!  I hear the crowd advancing."
+
+Irene tore herself from Adrian, and fell at the feet of Rienzi - she
+clasped his knees.
+
+"Come, my brother, come!  Why lose these precious moments?  Rome forbids
+you to cast away a life in which her very self is bound up."
+
+"Right, Irene; Rome is bound up with me, and we will rise or fall together!
+- no more!"
+
+"You destroy us all!" said Adrian, with generous and impatient warmth.  "A
+few minutes more, and we are lost.  Rash man! it is not to fall by an
+infuriate mob that you have been preserved from so many dangers."
+
+"I believe it," said the Senator, as his tall form seemed to dilate as with
+the greatness of his own soul.  "I shall triumph yet!  Never shall mine
+enemies - never shall posterity say that a second time Rienzi abandoned
+Rome!  Hark! 'Viva 'l Popolo!' still the cry of 'THE PEOPLE.'  That cry
+scares none but tyrants!  I shall triumph and survive!"
+
+"And I with thee!" said Nina, firmly.  Rienzi paused a moment, gazed on his
+wife, passionately clasped her to his heart, kissed her again and again,
+and then said, "Nina, I command thee, - Go!"
+
+"Never!"
+
+He paused.  Irene's face, drowned in tears, met his eyes.
+
+"We will all perish with you," said his sister; "you only, Adrian, you
+leave us!"
+
+"Be it so," said the Knight, sadly; "we will all remain," and he desisted
+at once from further effort.
+
+There was a dead but short pause, broken but by a convulsive sob from
+Irene.  The tramp of the raging thousands sounded fearfully distinct. 
+Rienzi seemed lost in thought - then lifting his head, he said, calmly, "ye
+have triumphed - I join ye - I but collect these papers, and follow you. 
+Quick, Adrian - save them!" and he pointed meaningly to Nina.
+
+Waiting no other hint, the young Colonna seized Nina in his strong grasp -
+with his left hand he supported Irene, who with terror and excitement was
+almost insensible.  Rienzi relieved him of the lighter load - he took his
+sister in his arms, and descended the winding stairs.  Nina remained
+passive - she heard her husband's step behind, it was enough for her - she
+but turned once to thank him with her eyes.  A tall Northman clad in armour
+stood at the open door.  Rienzi placed Irene, now perfectly lifeless, in
+the soldier's arms, and kissed her pale cheek in silence.
+
+"Quick, my Lord," said the Northman, "on all sides they come!"  So saying,
+he bounded down the descent with his burthen.  Adrian followed with Nina;
+the Senator paused one moment, turned back, and was in his room ere Adrian
+was aware that he had vanished.
+
+Hastily he drew the coverlid from his bed, fastened it to the casement
+bars, and by its aid dropped (at a distance of several feet) into the
+balcony below.  "I will not die like a rat," said he, "in the trap they
+have set for me!  The whole crowd shall, at least, see and hear me."
+
+This was the work of a moment.
+
+Meanwhile, Nina had scarcely proceeded six paces, before she discovered
+that she was alone with Adrian.
+
+"Ha! Cola!" she cried, "where is he? he has gone!"
+
+"Take heart, Lady, he has returned but for some secret papers he has
+forgotten.  He will follow us anon."
+
+"Let us wait, then."
+
+"Lady," said Adrian, grinding his teeth, "hear you not the crowd? - on,
+on!" and he flew with a swifter step.  Nina struggled in his grasp - Love
+gave her the strength of despair.  With a wild laugh she broke from him. 
+She flew back - the door was closed - but unbarred - her trembling hands
+lingered a moment round the spring.  She opened it, drew the heavy bolt
+across the panels, and frustrated all attempt from Adrian to regain her. 
+She was on the stairs, - she was in the room.  Rienzi was gone!  She fled,
+shrieking his name, through the State Chambers - all was desolate.  She
+found the doors opening on the various passages that admitted to the rooms
+below barred without.  Breathless and gasping, she returned to the chamber. 
+She hurried to the casement - she perceived the method by which he had
+descended below - her brave heart told her of his brave design; - she saw
+they were separated, - "But the same roof holds us," she cried, joyously,
+"and our fate shall be the same!"  With that thought she sank in mute
+patience on the floor.
+
+Forming the generous resolve not to abandon the faithful and devoted pair
+without another effort, Adrian had followed Nina, but too late - the door
+was closed against his efforts.  The crowd marched on - he heard their cry
+change on a sudden - it was no longer "LIVE THE PEOPLE!" but "DEATH TO THE
+TRAITOR!"  His attendant had already disappeared, and waking now only to
+the danger of Irene, the Colonna in bitter grief turned away, lightly sped
+down the descent, and hastened to the riverside, where the boat and his
+band awaited him.
+
+The balcony on which Rienzi had alighted was that from which he had been
+accustomed to address the people - it communicated with a vast hall used on
+solemn occasions for State festivals - and on either side were square
+projecting towers, whose grated casements looked into the balcony.  One of
+these towers was devoted to the armory, the other contained the prison of
+Brettone, the brother of Montreal.  Beyond the latter tower was the general
+prison of the Capitol.  For then the prison and the palace were in awful
+neighbourhood!
+
+The windows of the Hall were yet open - and Rienzi passed into it from the
+balcony - the witness of the yesterday's banquet was still there - the
+wine, yet undried, crimsoned the floor, and goblets of gold and silver
+shone from the recesses.  He proceeded at once to the armory, and selected
+from the various suits that which he himself had worn when, nearly eight
+years ago, he had chased the Barons from the gates of Rome.  He arrayed
+himself in the mail, leaving only his head uncovered; and then taking, in
+his right hand, from the wall, the great Gonfalon of Rome, returned once
+more to the hall.  Not a man encountered him.  In that vast building, save
+the prisoners, and the faithful Nina, whose presence he knew not of - the
+Senator was alone.
+
+On they came, no longer in measured order, as stream after stream - from
+lane, from alley, from palace and from hovel - the raging sea received new
+additions.  On they came - their passions excited by their numbers - women
+and men, children and malignant age - in all the awful array of aroused,
+released, unresisted physical strength and brutal wrath; "Death to the
+traitor - death to the tyrant - death to him who has taxed the people!" -
+"Mora l' traditore che ha fatta la gabella! - Mora!"  Such was the cry of
+the people - such the crime of the Senator!  They broke over the low
+palisades of the Capitol - they filled with one sudden rush the vast space;
+- a moment before so desolate, - now swarming with human beings athirst for
+blood!
+
+Suddenly came a dead silence, and on the balcony above stood Rienzi - his
+head was bared and the morning sun shone over that lordly brow, and the
+hair grown grey before its time, in the service of that maddening
+multitude.  Pale and erect he stood - neither fear, nor anger, nor menace -
+but deep grief and high resolve - upon his features!  A momentary shame - a
+momentary awe seized the crowd.
+
+He pointed to the Gonfalon, wrought with the Republican motto and arms of
+Rome, and thus he began: -
+
+"I too am a Roman and a Citizen; hear me!"
+
+"Hear him not! hear him not! his false tongue can charm away our senses!"
+cried a voice louder than his own; and Rienzi recognised Cecco del Vecchio.
+
+"Hear him not! down with the tyrant!" cried a more shrill and youthful
+tone; and by the side of the artisan stood Angelo Villani.
+
+"Hear him not! death to the death-giver!" cried a voice close at hand, and
+from the grating of the neighbouring prison glared near upon him, as the
+eye of a tiger, the vengeful gaze of the brother of Montreal.
+
+Then from Earth to Heaven rose the roar - "Down with the tyrant - down with
+him who taxed the people!"
+
+A shower of stones rattled on the mail of the Senator, - still he stirred
+not.  No changing muscle betokened fear.  His persuasion of his own
+wonderful powers of eloquence, if he could but be heard, inspired him yet
+with hope; he stood collected in his own indignant, but determined
+thoughts; - but the knowledge of that very eloquence was now his deadliest
+foe.  The leaders of the multitude trembled lest he should be heard; "and
+doubtless," says the contemporaneous biographer, "had he but spoken he
+would have changed them all, and the work been marred."
+
+The soldiers of the Barons had already mixed themselves with the throng -
+more deadly weapons than stones aided the wrath of the multitude - darts
+and arrows darkened the air; and now a voice was heard shrieking, "Way for
+the torches!"  And red in the sunlight the torches tossed and waved, and
+danced to and fro, above the heads of the crowd, as if the fiends were let
+loose amongst the mob!  And what place in hell hath fiends like those a mad
+mob can furnish?  Straw, and wood, and litter, were piled hastily round the
+great doors of the Capitol, and the smoke curled suddenly up, beating back
+the rush of the assailants.
+
+Rienzi was no longer visible, an arrow had pierced his hand - the right
+hand that supported the flag of Rome - the right hand that had given a
+constitution to the Republic.  He retired from the storm into the desolate
+hall.
+
+He sat down; - and tears, springing from no weak and woman source, but
+tears from the loftiest fountain of emotion - tears that befit a warrior
+when his own troops desert him - a patriot when his countrymen rush to
+their own doom - a father when his children rebel against his love, - tears
+such as these forced themselves from his eyes and relieved, - but they
+changed, his heart!
+
+"Enough, enough!" he said, presently rising and dashing the drops
+scornfully away; "I have risked, dared, toiled enough for this dastard and
+degenerate race.  I will yet baffle their malice - I renounce the thought
+of which they are so little worthy! - Let Rome perish! - I feel, at last,
+that I am nobler than my country! - she deserves not so high a sacrifice!"
+
+With that feeling, Death lost all the nobleness of aspect it had before
+presented to him; and he resolved, in very scorn of his ungrateful foes, in
+very defeat of their inhuman wrath, to make one effort for his life!  He
+divested himself of his glittering arms; his address, his dexterity, his
+craft, returned to him.  His active mind ran over the chances of disguise -
+of escape; - he left the hall - passed through the humbler rooms, devoted
+to the servitors and menials - found in one of them a coarse working garb -
+indued himself with it - placed upon his head some of the draperies and
+furniture of the palace, as if escaping with them; and said, with his old
+"fantastico riso" ("Fantastic smile or laugh.") - "When all other friends
+desert me, I may well forsake myself!"  With that he awaited his occasion.
+
+Meanwhile the flames burnt fierce and fast; the outer door below was
+already consumed; from the apartment he had deserted the fire burst out in
+volleys of smoke - the wood crackled - the lead melted - with a crash fell
+the severed gates - the dreadful entrance was opened to all the multitude -
+the proud Capitol of the Caesars was already tottering to its fall! - Now
+was the time! - he passed the flaming door - the smouldering threshold; -
+he passed the outer gate unscathed - he was in the middle of the crowd. 
+"Plenty of pillage within," he said to the bystanders, in the Roman patois,
+his face concealed by his load - "Suso, suso a gliu traditore!"  (Down,
+down with the traitor.")  The mob rushed past him - he went on - he gained
+the last stair descending into the open streets - he was at the last gate -
+liberty and life were before him.
+
+A soldier (one of his own) seized him.  "Pass not - whither goest thou?"
+
+"Beware, lest the Senator escape disguised!" cried a voice behind - it was
+Villani's.  The concealing load was torn from his head - Rienzi stood
+revealed!
+
+"I am the Senator!" he said in a loud voice.  "Who dare touch the
+Representative of the People?"
+
+The multitude were round him in an instant.  Not led, but rather hurried
+and whirled along, the Senator was borne to the Place of the Lion.  With
+the intense glare of the bursting flames, the grey image reflected a lurid
+light, and glowed - (that grim and solemn monument!) - as if itself of
+fire!
+
+There arrived, the crowd gave way, terrified by the greatness of their
+victim.  Silent he stood, and turned his face around; nor could the squalor
+of his garb, nor the terror of the hour, nor the proud grief of detection,
+abate the majesty of his mien, or reassure the courage of the thousands who
+gathered, gazing, round him.  The whole Capitol wrapped in fire, lighted
+with ghastly pomp the immense multitude.  Down the long vista of the
+streets extended the fiery light and the serried throng, till the crowd
+closed with the gleaming standards of the Colonna - the Orsini - the
+Savelli!  Her true tyrants were marching into Rome!  As the sound of their
+approaching horns and trumpets broke upon the burning air, the mob seemed
+to regain their courage.  Rienzi prepared to speak; his first word was as
+the signal of his own death.
+
+"Die, tyrant!" cried Cecco del Vecchio:  and he plunged his dagger in the
+Senator's breast.
+
+"Die, executioner of Montreal!" muttered Villani:  "thus the trust is
+fulfilled!" and his was the second stroke.  Then as he drew back, and saw
+the artisan in all the drunken fury of his brute passion, tossing up his
+cap, shouting aloud, and spurning the fallen lion, - the young man gazed
+upon him with a look of withering and bitter scorn, and said, while he
+sheathed his blade, and slowly turned to quit the crowd,
+
+"Fool, miserable fool! thou and these at least had no blood of kindred to
+avenge!"
+
+They heeded not his words - they saw him not depart; for as Rienzi, without
+a word, without a groan, fell to the earth, - as the roaring waves of the
+multitude closed over him, - a voice, shrill, sharp, and wild, was heard
+above all the clamour.  At the casement of the Palace, (the casement of her
+bridal chamber,) Nina stood! - through the flames that burst below and
+around, her face and outstretched arms alone visible!  Ere yet the sound of
+that thrilling cry passed from the air, down with a mighty crash thundered
+that whole wing of the Capitol, - a blackened and smouldering mass.
+
+At that hour, a solitary boat was gliding swiftly along the Tiber.  Rome
+was at a distance, but the lurid blow of the conflagration cast its
+reflection upon the placid and glassy stream:  fair beyond description was
+the landscape; soft beyond all art of Painter and of Poet, the sunlight
+quivering over the autumnal herbage, and hushing into tender calm the waves
+of the golden River!
+
+Adrian's eyes were strained towards the towers of the Capitol,
+distinguished by the flames from the spires and domes around; - senseless,
+and clasped to his guardian breast, Irene was happily unconscious of the
+horrors of the time.
+
+"They dare not - they dare not," said the brave Colonna, "touch a hair of
+that sacred head! - if Rienzi fall, the liberties of Rome fall for ever! 
+As those towers that surmount the flames, the pride and monument of Rome,
+he shall rise above the dangers of the hour.  Behold, still unscathed
+amidst the raging element, the Capitol itself is his emblem!"
+
+Scarce had he spoken, when a vast volume of smoke obscured the fires afar
+off, a dull crash (deadened by the distance) travelled to his ear, and the
+next moment, the towers on which he gazed had vanished from the scene, and
+one intense and sullen glare seemed to settle over the atmosphere, - making
+all Rome itself the funeral pyre of THE LAST OF THE ROMAN TRIBUNES!
+
+
+The End
+
+
+Appendix I.  Some Remarks on the Life and Character of Rienzi.
+
+The principal authority from which historians have taken their account of
+the life and times of Rienzi is a very curious biography, by some unknown
+contemporary; and this, which is in the Roman patois of the time, has been
+rendered not quite unfamiliar to the French and English reader by the work
+of Pere du Cerceau, called "Conjuration de Nicolas Gabrini, dit de Rienzi,"
+(See for a specimen of the singular blunders of the Frenchman's work,
+Appendix II.) which has at once pillaged and deformed the Roman biographer. 
+The biography I refer to was published (and the errors of the former
+editions revised) by Muratori in his great collection; and has lately been
+reprinted separately in an improved text, accompanied by notes of much
+discrimination and scholastic taste, and a comment upon that celebrated
+poem of Petrarch, "Spirito Gentil," which the majority of Italian critics
+have concurred in considering addressed to Rienzi, in spite of the
+ingenious arguments to the contrary by the Abbe de Sade.
+
+This biography has been generally lauded for its rare impartiality.  And
+the author does, indeed, praise and blame alike with a most singular
+appearance of stolid candour.  The work, in truth, is one of those not
+uncommon proofs, of which Boswell's "Johnson" is the most striking, that a
+very valuable book may be written by a very silly man.  The biographer of
+Rienzi appears more like the historian of Rienzi's clothes, so minute is he
+on all details of their colour and quality - so silent is he upon
+everything that could throw light upon the motives of their wearer.  In
+fact, granting the writer every desire to be impartial, he is too foolish
+to be so.  It requires some cleverness to judge accurately of a very clever
+man in very difficult circumstances; and the worthy biographer is utterly
+incapable of giving us any clue to the actions of Rienzi - utterly unable
+to explain the conduct of the man by the circumstances of the time.  The
+weakness of his vision causes him, therefore, often to squint.  We must add
+to his want of wisdom a want of truth, which the Herodotus-like simplicity
+of his style frequently conceals.  He describes things which had no witness
+as precisely and distinctly as those which he himself had seen.  For
+instance, before the death of Rienzi, in those awful moments when the
+Senator was alone, unheard, unseen, he coolly informs us of each motion,
+and each thought of Rienzi's, with as much detail as if Rienzi had returned
+from the grave to assist his narration.  These obvious inventions have been
+adopted by Gibbon and others with more good faith than the laws of evidence
+would warrant.  Still, however, to a patient and cautious reader the
+biography may furnish a much better notion of Rienzi's character, than we
+can glean from the historians who have borrowed from it piecemeal.  Such a
+reader will discard all the writer's reasonings, will think little of his
+praise or blame, and regard only the facts he narrates, judging them true
+or doubtful, according as the writer had the opportunities of being himself
+the observer.  Thus examining, the reader will find evidence sufficient of
+Rienzi's genius and Rienzi's failings:  Carefully distinguishing between
+the period of his power as Tribune, and that of his power as Senator, he
+will find the Tribune vain, haughty, fond of display; but, despite the
+reasonings of the biographer, he will not recognise those faults in the
+Senator.  On the other hand, he will notice the difference between youth
+and maturity - hope and experience; he will notice in the Tribune vast
+ambition, great schemes, enterprising activity - which sober into less
+gorgeous and more quiet colours in the portrait of the Senator.  He will
+find that in neither instance did Rienzi fall from his own faults - he will
+find that the vulgar moral of ambition, blasted by its own excesses, is not
+the true moral of the Roman's life; he will find that, both in his
+abdication as Tribune, and his death as Senator, Rienzi fell from the vices
+of the People.  The Tribune was a victim to ignorant cowardice - the
+Senator, a victim to ferocious avarice.  It is this which modern historians
+have failed to represent.  Gibbon records rightly, that the Count of
+Minorbino entered Rome with one hundred and fifty soldiers, and barricadoed
+the quarter of the Colonna - that the bell of the Capitol sounded - that
+Rienzi addressed the People - that they were silent and inactive - and that
+Rienzi then abdicated the government.  But for this he calls Rienzi
+"pusillanimous."  Is not that epithet to be applied to the People?  Rienzi
+invoked them to move against the Robber - the People refused to obey. 
+Rienzi wished to fight - the People refused to stir.  It was not the cause
+of Rienzi alone which demanded their exertions - it was the cause of the
+People - theirs, not his, the shame, if one hundred and fifty foreign
+soldiers mastered Rome, overthrew their liberties, and restored their
+tyrants!  Whatever Rienzi's sins, whatever his unpopularity, their freedom,
+their laws, their republic, were at stake; and these they surrendered to
+one hundred and fifty hirelings!  This is the fact that damns them!  But
+Rienzi was not unpopular when he addressed and conjured them:  they found
+no fault with him.  "The sighs and the groans of the People," says
+Sismondi, justly, "replied to his," - they could weep, but they would not
+fight.  This strange apathy the modern historians have not accounted for,
+yet the principal cause was obvious - Rienzi was excommunicated!  (And this
+curse I apprehend to have been the more effective in the instance of
+Rienzi, from a fact that it would be interesting and easy to establish: 
+viz., that he owed his rise as much to religious as to civil causes.  He
+aimed evidently to be a religious Reformer.  All his devices, ceremonies,
+and watchwords, were of a religious character.  The monks took part with
+his enterprise, and joined in the revolution.  His letters are full of
+mystical fanaticism.  His references to ancient heroes of Rome are always
+mingled with invocations to her Christian Saints.  The Bible, at that time
+little read by the public civilians of Italy, is constantly in his hands,
+and his addresses studded with texts.  His very garments were adorned with
+sacred and mysterious emblems.  No doubt, the ceremony of his Knighthood,
+which Gibbon ridicules as an act of mere vanity, was but another of his
+religious extravagances; for he peculiarly dedicated his Knighthood to the
+service of the Santo Spirito; and his bathing in the vase of Constantine
+was quite of a piece, not with the vanity of the Tribune, but with the
+extravagance of the Fanatic.  In fact, they tried hard to prove him a
+heretic; but he escaped a charge under the mild Innocent, which a century
+or two before, or a century or two afterwards, would have sufficed to have
+sent a dozen Rienzis to the stake.  I have dwelt the more upon this point,
+because, if it be shown that religious causes operated with those of
+liberty, we throw a new light upon the whole of that most extraordinary
+revolution, and its suddenness is infinitely less striking.  The deep
+impression Rienzi produced upon that populace was thus stamped with the
+spirit of the religious enthusiast more than that of the classical
+demagogue.  And, as in the time of Cromwell, the desire for temporal
+liberty was warmed and coloured by the presence of a holier and more
+spiritual fervour: - "The Good Estate" (Buono Stato) of Rienzi reminds us a
+little of the Good Cause of General Cromwell.)  In stating the fact, these
+writers have seemed to think that excommunication in Rome, in the
+fourteenth century, produced no effect! - the effect it did produce I have
+endeavoured in these pages to convey.
+
+The causes of the second fall and final murder of Rienzi are equally
+misstated by modern narrators.  It was from no fault of his - no injustice,
+no cruelty, no extravagance - it was not from the execution of Montreal,
+nor that of Pandulfo di Guido -  it was from a gabelle on wine and salt
+that he fell.  To preserve Rome from the tyrants it was necessary to
+maintain an armed force; to pay the force a tax was necessary; the tax was
+imposed - and the multitude joined with the tyrants, and their cry was,
+"Perish the traitor who has made the gabelle!"  This was their only charge
+- this the only crime that their passions and their fury could cite against
+him.
+
+The faults of Rienzi are sufficiently visible, and I have not unsparingly
+shewn them; but we must judge men, not according as they approach
+perfection, but according as their good or bad qualities preponderate -
+their talents or their weaknesses - the benefits they effected, the evil
+they wrought.  For a man who rose to so great a power, Rienzi's faults were
+singularly few - crimes he committed none.  He is almost the only man who
+ever rose from the rank of a citizen to a power equal to that of monarchs
+without a single act of violence or treachery.  When in power, he was vain,
+ostentatious, and imprudent, - always an enthusiast - often a fanatic; but
+his very faults had greatness of soul, and his very fanaticism at once
+supported his enthusiastic daring, and proved his earnest honesty.  It is
+evident that no heinous charge could be brought against him even by his
+enemies, for all the accusations to which he was subjected, when
+excommunicated, exiled, fallen, were for two offences which Petrarch
+rightly deemed the proofs of his virtue and his glory:  first, for
+declaring Rome to be free; secondly, for pretending that the Romans had a
+right of choice in the election of the Roman Emperor.  (The charge of
+heresy was dropped.)  Stern, just, and inflexible, as he was when Tribune,
+his fault was never that of wanton cruelty.  The accusation against him,
+made by the gentle Petrarch, indeed, was that he was not determined enough
+- that he did not consummate the revolution by exterminating the patrician
+tyrants.  When Senator, he was, without sufficient ground, accused of
+avarice in the otherwise just and necessary execution of Montreal. 
+(Gibbon, in mentioning the execution of Montreal, omits to state that
+Montreal was more than suspected of conspiracy and treason to restore the
+Colonna.  Matthew Villani records it as a common belief that such truly was
+the offence of the Provencal.  The biographer of Rienzi gives additional
+evidence of the fact.  Gibbon's knowledge of this time was superficial.  As
+one instance of this, he strangely enough represents Montreal as the head
+of the first Free Company that desolated Italy:  he took that error from
+the Pere du Cerceau.)  It was natural enough that his enemies and the
+vulgar should suppose that he executed a creditor to get rid of a debt; but
+it was inexcusable in later, and wiser, and fairer writers to repeat so
+grave a calumny, without at least adding the obvious suggestion, that the
+avarice of Rienzi could have been much better gratified by sparing than by
+destroying the life of one of the richest subjects in Europe.  Montreal, we
+may be quite sure, would have purchased his life at an immeasurably higher
+price than the paltry sum lent to Rienzi by his brothers.  And this is not
+a probable hypothesis, but a certain fact, for we are expressly told that
+Montreal, "knowing the Tribune was in want of money, offered Rienzi, that
+if he would let him go, he, Montreal, would furnish him not only with
+twenty thousand florins, (four times the amount of Rienzi's debt to him,)
+but with as many soldiers and as much money as he pleased."  This offer
+Rienzi did not attend to.  Would he have rejected it had avarice been his
+motive?  And what culpable injustice, to mention the vague calumny without
+citing the practical contradiction!  When Gibbon tells us, also, that "the
+most virtuous citizen of Rome, meaning Pandulfo, or Pandolficcio di Guido,
+(Matthew Villani speaks of him as a wise and good citizen, of great repute
+among the People - and this, it seems, he really was.) was sacrificed to
+his jealousy, he a little exaggerates the expression bestowed upon
+Pandulfo, which is that of "virtuoso assai;" and that expression, too, used
+by a man who styles the robber Montreal, "eccellente uomo - di quale fama
+suono per tutta la Italia di virtude" ("An excellent man whose fame for
+valour resounded throughout all Italy.") - (so good a moral critic was the
+writer!) but he also altogether waves all mention of the probabilities that
+are sufficiently apparent, of the scheming of Pandulfo to supplant Rienzi,
+and to obtain the "Signoria del Popolo."  Still, however, if the death of
+Pandulfo may be considered a blot on the memory of Rienzi, it does not
+appear that it was this which led to his own fate.  The cry of the mob
+surrounding his palace was not, "Perish him who executed Pandulfo," it was
+- and this again and again must be carefully noted - it was nothing more
+nor less than, "Perish him who has made the gabelle!"
+
+Gibbon sneers at the military skill and courage of Rienzi.  For this sneer
+there is no cause.  His first attempts, his first rise, attested
+sufficiently his daring and brave spirit; in every danger he was present -
+never shrinking from a foe so long as he was supported by the People.  He
+distinguished himself at Viterbo when in the camp of Albornoz, in several
+feats of arms, ("Vita di Cola di Rienzi", lib. ii. cap. 14.) and his end
+was that of a hero.  So much for his courage; as to his military skill; it
+would be excusable enough if Rienzi - the eloquent and gifted student,
+called from the closet and the rostrum to assume the command of an army -
+should have been deficient in the art of war; yet, somehow or other, upon
+the whole, his arms prospered.  He defeated the chivalry of Rome at her
+gates; and if he did not, after his victory, march to Marino, for which his
+biographer (In this the anonymous writer compares him gravely to Hannibal,
+who knew how to conquer, but not how to use his conquest.) and Gibbon blame
+him, the reason is sufficiently clear - "Volea pecunia per soldati" - he
+wanted money for the soldiers!  On his return as Senator, it must be
+remembered that he had to besiege Palestrina, which was considered even by
+the ancient Romans almost impregnable by position; but during the few weeks
+he was in power, Palestrina yielded - all his open enemies were defeated -
+the tyrants expelled - Rome free; and this without support from any party,
+Papal or Popular, or, as Gibbon well expresses it, "suspected by the People
+- abandoned by the Prince."
+
+On regarding what Rienzi did, we must look to his means, to the
+difficulties that surrounded him, to the scantiness of his resources.  We
+see a man without rank, wealth, or friends, raising himself to the head of
+a popular government in the metropolis of the Church - in the City of the
+Empire.  We see him reject any title save that of a popular magistrate -
+establish at one stroke a free constitution - a new code of law.  We see
+him first expel, then subdue, the fiercest aristocracy in Europe - conquer
+the most stubborn banditti, rule impartially the most turbulent people,
+embruted by the violence, and sunk in the corruption of centuries.  We see
+him restore trade - establish order - create civilization as by a miracle -
+receive from crowned heads homage and congratulation - outwit, conciliate,
+or awe, the wiliest priesthood of the Papal Diplomacy - and raise his
+native city at once to sudden yet acknowledged eminence over every other
+state, its superior in arts, wealth, and civilization; - we ask what errors
+we are to weigh in the opposite balance, and we find an unnecessary
+ostentation, a fanatical extravagance, and a certain insolent sternness. 
+But what are such offences - what the splendour of a banquet, or the
+ceremony of Knighthood, or a few arrogant words, compared with the vices of
+almost every prince who was his contemporary?  This is the way to judge
+character:  we must compare men with men, and not with ideals of what men
+should be.  We look to the amazing benefits Rienzi conferred upon his
+country.  We ask his means, and see but his own abilities.  His treasury
+becomes impoverished - his enemies revolt - the Church takes advantage of
+his weakness - he is excommunicated - the soldiers refuse to fight - the
+People refuse to assist - the Barons ravage the country - the ways are
+closed, the provisions are cut off from Rome.  ("Allora le strade furo
+chiuse, li massari de la terre non portavano grano, ogni die nasceva nuovo
+rumore." - "Vita di Cola di Rienzi", lib. i. cap. 37.)  A handful of
+banditti enter the city - Rienzi proposes to resist them - the People
+desert - he abdicates.  Rapine, Famine, Massacre, ensue - they who deserted
+regret, repent - yet he is still unassisted, alone - now an exile, now a
+prisoner, his own genius saves him from every peril, and restores him to
+greatness.  He returns, the Pope's Legate refuses him arms - the People
+refuse him money.  He re-establishes law and order, expels the tyrants,
+renounces his former faults (this, the second period of his power, has been
+represented by Gibbon and others as that of his principal faults, and he is
+evidently at this time no favourite with his contemporaneous biographer;
+but looking to what he did, we find amazing dexterity, prudence, and energy
+in the most difficult crisis, and none of his earlier faults.  It is true,
+that he does not shew the same brilliant extravagance which, I suspect,
+dazzled his contemporaries, more than his sounder qualities; but we find
+that in a few weeks he had conquered all his powerful enemies - that his
+eloquence was as great as ever - his promptitude greater - his diligence
+indefatigable - his foresight unslumbering.  "He alone," says the
+biographer, "carried on the affairs of Rome, but his officials were
+slothful and cold."  This too, tortured by a painful disease - already -
+though yet young - broken and infirm.  The only charges against him, as
+Senator, were the deaths of Montreal and Pandulfo di Guido, the imposition
+of the gabelle, and the renunciation of his former habits of rigid
+abstinence, for indulgence in wine and feasting.  Of the first charges, the
+reader has already been enabled to form a judgment.  To the last, alas! the
+reader must extend indulgence, and for it he may find excuse.  We must
+compassionate even more than condemn the man to whom excitement has become
+nature, and who resorts to the physical stimulus or the momentary Lethe,
+when the mental exhilarations of hope, youth, and glory, begin to desert
+him.  His alleged intemperance, however, which the Romans (a peculiarly
+sober people) might perhaps exaggerate, and for which he gave the excuse of
+a thirst produced by disease contracted in the dungeon of Avignon -
+evidently and confessedly did not in the least diminish his attention to
+business, which, according to his biographer, was at that time greater than
+ever.) - is prudent, wary, provident - reigns a few weeks - taxes the
+People, in support of the People, and is torn to pieces!  One day of the
+rule that followed is sufficient to vindicate his reign and avenge his
+memory - and for centuries afterwards, whenever that wretched and
+degenerate populace dreamed of glory or sighed for justice, they recalled
+the bright vision of their own victim, and deplored the fate of Cola di
+Rienzi.  That he was not a tyrant is clear in this - when he was dead, he
+was bitterly regretted.  The People never regret a tyrant!  From the
+unpopularity that springs from other faults there is often a re-action; but
+there is no re-action in the populace towards their betrayor or oppressor. 
+A thousand biographies cannot decide upon the faults or merits of a ruler
+like the one fact, whether he is beloved or hated ten years after he is
+dead.  But if the ruler has been murdered by the People, and is then
+regretted by them, their repentance is his acquittal.
+
+I have said that the moral of the Tribune's life, and of this fiction, is
+not the stale and unprofitable moral that warns the ambition of an
+individual: - More vast, more solemn, and more useful, it addresses itself
+to nations.  If I judge not erringly, it proclaims that, to be great and
+free, a People must trust not to individuals but themselves - that there is
+no sudden leap from servitude to liberty - that it is to institutions, not
+to men, for they must look for reforms that last beyond the hour - that
+their own passions are the real despots they should subdue, their own
+reason the true regenerator of abuses.  With a calm and a noble people, the
+individual ambition of a citizen can never effect evil: - to be impatient
+of chains, is not to be worthy of freedom - to murder a magistrate is not
+to ameliorate the laws.  (Rienzi was murdered because the Romans had been
+in the habit of murdering whenever they were displeased.  They had, very
+shortly before, stoned one magistrate, and torn to pieces another.  By the
+same causes and the same career a People may be made to resemble the bravo
+whose hand wanders to his knife at the smallest affront, and if today he
+poniards the enemy who assaults him, tomorrow he strikes the friend who
+would restrain.)  The People write their own condemnation whenever they use
+characters of blood; and theirs alone the madness and the crime, if they
+crown a tyrant or butcher a victim.
+
+
+Appendix II.
+
+A Word Upon the Work by Pere du Cerceau and Pere Brumoy, Entitled
+"Conjuration de Nicolas Gabrini, Dit de Rienzi, Tyran de Rome."
+
+Shortly after the Romance of "Rienzi" first appeared, a translation of the
+biography compiled by Cerceau and Brumoy was published by Mr. Whittaker. 
+The translator, in a short and courteous advertisement, observes, "That it
+has always been considered as a work of authority; and even Gibbon appears
+to have relied on it without further research:  (Here, however, he does
+injustice to Gibbon.)...that, "as a record of facts, therefore, the work
+will, it is presumed, be acceptable to the public."  The translator has
+fulfilled his duty with accuracy, elegance, and spirit, - and he must
+forgive me, if, in justice to History and Rienzi, I point out a very few
+from amongst a great many reasons, why the joint labour of the two worthy
+Jesuits cannot be considered either a work of authority, or a record of
+facts.  The translator observes in his preface, "that the general outline
+(of Du Cerceau's work) was probably furnished by an Italian life written by
+a contemporary of Rienzi."  The fact, however, is, that Du Cerceau's book
+is little more than a wretched paraphrase of that very Italian life
+mentioned by the translator, - full of blunders, from ignorance of the
+peculiar and antiquated dialect in which the original is written, and of
+assumptions by the Jesuit himself, which rest upon no authority whatever. 
+I will first shew, in support of this assertion, what the Italians
+themselves think of the work of Fathers Brumoy and Du Cerceau.  The Signor
+Zefirino Re, who had proved himself singularly and minutely acquainted with
+the history of that time, and whose notes to the "Life of Rienzi" are
+characterized by acknowledged acuteness and research, thus describes the
+manner in which the two Jesuits compounded this valuable "record of facts."
+
+"Father Du Cerceau for his work made use of a French translation of the
+life by the Italian contemporary printed in Bracciano, 1624, executed by
+Father Sanadon, another Jesuit, from whom he received the MS.  This proves
+that Du Cerceau knew little of our 'volgar lingua' of the fourteenth
+century.  But the errors into which he has run shew, that even that little
+was unknown to his guide, and still less to Father Brumoy, (however learned
+and reputed the latter might be in French literature,) who, after the death
+of Du Cerceau, supplied the deficiencies in the first pages of the author's
+MS., which were, I know not how, lost; and in this part are found the more
+striking errors in the work, which shall be noticed in the proper place; in
+the meantime, one specimen will suffice.  In the third chapter, book i.,
+Cola, addressing the Romans, says, 'Che lo giubileo si approssima, che se
+la gente, la quale verra al giubileo, li trova sproveduti di annona, le
+pietre (per metatesi sta scritto le preite) ne porteranno da Roma per
+rabbia di fame, e le pietre non basteranno a tanta moltitudine.  Il
+francese traduce.  Le jubile approche, et vous n'avez ni provisions, ni
+vivres; les etrangers...trouvent votre ville denue de tout.  Ne comptez
+point sur les secours des gens d'Eglise; ils sortiront de la ville, s'ils
+n'y trouvent de quoi subsister:  et d'ailleurs pourroient-ils suffire a la
+multitude innombrable, que se trouvera dans vos murs?'" (The English
+translator could not fail to adopt the Frenchman's ludicrous mistake.) 
+"Buon Dio!" exclaims the learned Zefirino, "Buon Dio! le pietre prese per
+tanta gente di chiesa!"  (See Preface to Zefirino Re's edition of the "Life
+of Rienzi," page 9, note on Du Cerceau.)
+
+Another blunder little less extraordinary occurs in Chapter vi., in which
+the ordinances of Rienzi's Buono Stato are recited.
+
+It is set forth as the third ordinance: - "Che nulla case di Roma sia data
+per terra per alcuna cagione, ma vada in commune;" which simply means, that
+the houses of delinquents should in no instance be razed, but added to the
+community or confiscated.  This law being intended partly to meet the
+barbarous violences with which the excesses and quarrels of the Barons had
+half dismantled Rome, and principally to repeal some old penal laws by
+which the houses of a certain class of offenders might be destroyed; but
+the French translator construes it, "Que nulle maison de Rome ne saroit
+donnee en propre, pour quelque raison que ce put etre; mais que les revenus
+en appartiendroient au public!"  (The English translator makes this law
+unintelligible: - "That no family of Rome shall appropriate to their own
+use what they think fit, but that the revenues shall appertain to the
+public"!!! - the revenues of what?)
+
+But enough of the blunders arising from ignorance. - I must now be
+permitted to set before the reader a few of the graver offences of wilful
+assumption and preposterous invention.
+
+When Rienzi condemned some of the Barons to death, the Pere thus writes; I
+take the recent translation published by Mr. Whittaker: -
+
+"The next day the Tribune, resolving more than ever to rid himself of his
+prisoners, ordered tapestries of two colours, red and white, to be laid
+over the place whereon he held his councils, and which he had made choice
+of to be the theatre of this bloody tragedy, as the extraordinary tapestry
+seemed to declare.  He afterwards sent a cordelier to every one of the
+prisoners to administer the sacraments, and then ordered the Capitol bell
+to be tolled.  At that fatal sound and the sight of the confessors, the
+Lords no longer doubted of sentence of death being passed upon them. They
+all confessed except the old Colonna, and many received the communion.  In
+the meanwhile the people, naturally prompt to attend, when their first
+impetuosity had time to calm, could not without pity behold the dismal
+preparations which were making.  The sight of the bloody colour in the
+tapestry shocked them.  On this first impression they joined in opinion in
+relation to so many illustrious heads now going to be sacrificed, and
+lamented more their unhappy catastrophe, as no crime had been proved upon
+them to render them worthy of such barbarous treatment.  Above all, the
+unfortunate Stephen Colonna, whose birth, age, and affable behaviour,
+commanded respect, excited a particular compassion.  An universal silence
+and sorrow reigned among them.  Those who were nearest Rienzi discovered an
+alteration.  They took the opportunity of imploring his mercy towards the
+prisoners in terms the most affecting and moving."
+
+Will it be believed, that in the original from which the Pere Du Cerceau
+borrows or rather imagines this touching recital, there is not a single
+syllable about the pity of the people, nor their shock at the bloody
+colours of the tapestry, nor their particular compassion for the
+unfortunate Stephen Colonna? - in fine, the People are not even mentioned
+at all.  All that is said is, "Some Roman citizens, (alcuni cittadini
+Romani,) considering the judgment Rienzi was about to make, interposed with
+soft and caressing words, and at last changed the opinion of the Tribune;"
+all the rest is the pure fiction of the ingenious Frenchman!  Again, Du
+Cerceau, describing the appearance of the Barons at this fatal moment,
+says, "Notwithstanding the grief and despair visible in their countenances,
+they shewed a noble indignation, generally attendant on innocence in the
+hour of death."  What says the authority from which alone, except his own,
+the good Father could take his account?  Why, not a word about this noble
+indignation, or this parade of innocence!  The original says simply, that
+"the Barons were so frozen with terror that they were unable to speak,"
+(diventaso si gelati che non poteano favellare;) "that the greater part
+humbled themselves," (e prese penitenza e comunione;) that when Rienzi
+addressed them "all the Barons (come dannati) stood in sadness."  (See
+"Vita di Cola di Rienzi", lib. i. cap. 29.)  Du Cerceau then proceeds to
+state, that "although he (Rienzi) was grieved at heart to behold his
+victims snatched from him, he endeavoured to make a merit of it in the eyes
+of the People."  There is not a word of this in the original!
+
+So when Rienzi, on a latter occasion, placed the Prefect John di Vico in
+prison, this Jesuit says, "To put a gloss upon this action before the eyes
+of the people, Rienzi gave out that the Governor, John di Vico, keeping a
+correspondence with the conspirators, came with no other view than to
+betray the Romans."  And if this scribbler, who pretends to have consulted
+the Vatican MSS., had looked at the most ordinary authorities, he would
+have seen that John di Vico did come with that view.  (See for Di Vico's
+secret correspondence with the Barons, La Cron. Bologn. page 406; and La
+Cron. Est. page 444.)
+
+Again, in the battle between the Barons and the Romans at the gates, Du
+Cerceau thus describes the conduct of the Tribune: - "The Tribune, amidst
+his troops, knew so little of what had passed, that seeing at a distance
+one of his standards fall, he looked upon all as lost, and, casting up his
+eyes to heaven full of despair, cried out, "O God, will you then forsake
+me?'  But no sooner was he informed of the entire defeat of his enemies,
+than his dread and cowardice even turned to boldness and arrogance."
+
+Now in the original all that is said of this is, "That it is true that the
+standard of the Tribune fell - the Tribune astonished, (or if you please,
+dismayed, sbigottio,) stood with his eyes raised to heaven, and could find
+no other words than, "O God hast thou betrayed me?'"  This evinced,
+perhaps, alarm or consternation at the fall of his standard - a
+consternation natural, not to a coward, but a fanatic, at such an event. 
+But not a word is said about Rienzi's cowardice in the action itself; it is
+not stated when the accident happened - nothing bears out the implication
+that the Tribune was remote from the contest, and knew little of what
+passed.  And if this ignorant Frenchman had consulted any other
+contemporaneous historian whatever, he would have found it asserted by them
+all, that the fight was conducted with great valour, both by the Roman
+populace and their leader on the one side, and the Barons on the other. -
+G. Vill. lib. xii. cap. 105; Cron. Sen. tom. xv. Murat. page 119; Cron.
+Est. page 444.  Yet Gibbon rests his own sarcasm on the Tribune's courage
+solely on the baseless exaggeration of this Pere Du Cerceau.
+
+So little, indeed, did this French pretender know of the history of the
+time and place he treats of, that he imagines the Stephen Colonna who was
+killed in the battle above-mentioned was the old Stephen Colonna, and is
+very pathetic about his "venerable appearance," &c.  This error, with
+regard to a man so eminent as Stephen Colonna the elder, is inexcusable: 
+for, had the priest turned over the other pages of the very collection in
+which he found the biography he deforms, he would have learned that old
+Stephen Colonna was alive some time after that battle. - (Cron. Sen. Murat.
+tom. xv. page 121.)
+
+Again, just before Rienzi's expulsion from the office of Tribune, Du
+Cerceau, translating in his headlong way the old biographer's account of
+the causes of Rienzi's loss of popularity, says, "He shut himself up in his
+palace, and his presence was known only by the rigorous punishments which
+he caused his agents to inflict upon the innocent."  Not a word of this in
+the original!
+
+Again, after the expulsion, Du Cerceau says, that the Barons seized upon
+the "immense riches" he had amassed, - the words in the original are,
+"grandi ornamenti," which are very different things from immense riches.
+But the most remarkable sins of commission are in this person's account of
+the second rise and fall of Rienzi under the title of Senator.  Of this I
+shall give but one instance: -
+
+"The Senator, who perceived it, became only the more cruel.  His jealousies
+produced only fresh murders.  In the continual dread he was in, that the
+general discontent would terminate in some secret attempt upon his person,
+he determined to intimidate the most enterprising, by sacrificing sometimes
+one, sometimes another, and chiefly those whose riches rendered them the
+more guilty in his eyes.  Numbers were sent every day to the Capitol
+prison.  Happy were those who could get off with the confiscation of their
+estates."
+
+Of these grave charges there is not a syllable in the original!  And so
+much for the work of Pere Cerceau and Pere Brumoy, by virtue of which,
+historians have written of the life and times of Rienzi, and upon the
+figments of which, the most remarkable man in an age crowded with great
+characters is judged by the general reader!
+
+I must be pardoned for this criticism, which might not have been necessary,
+had not the work to which it relates, in the English translation quoted
+from, (a translation that has no faults but those of the French original,)
+been actually received as an historical and indisputable authority, and
+opposed with a triumphant air to some passages in my own narrative which
+were literally taken from the authentic records of the time.
+
+
+
+
+
+End of Project Gutenberg Etext of Rienzi, the last of the Roman Tribunes
+
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