PREPARATIONS.
Character of the Fieschi family--Gianluigi acquires the friendship of
the silk operatives and other plebeians--The Duke of Piacenza selects
the count to arbitrate his differences with the Pallavicini--Secret
understandings between the count and the duke--Gianluigi puts
his castles in a condition for war--Gianettino Doria, to pave
the way to supreme power, gives Captain Lercaro an order to kill
Fieschi--Industry of Verrina--The decisions of history on the merits
of Fieschi should be made in view of the political doctrines of the
sixteenth century.
IN monarchical states great families usually derive their importance
from the head of the nation, who overshadows them all; but in cities
ruled by the people, every house has its peculiar position and
character. In Genoa, families had features and qualities which had
characterized them and given them a distinct history for centuries.
The Adorni and Fregosi always loved authority; the Durazzi were
distinguished for munificence; the Serra for legal learning; the
Pinelli for indomitable energy; the Lomellini for liberality; the Doria
and Spinola for military genius. The Fieschi had always maintained and
guarded, though with a partisan spirit, the popular franchises.
We find in the annals of this illustrious race a Nicolò and a
Percivale, who, as imperial vicars, granted liberty to the Florentines
and Luchesi. We find in the long history of their political power in
Genoa that the Fieschi never struggled for supreme position as did the
Adorni, Fregosi, Spinola, and Doria. Carlo Fieschi, as the chief of
the Guelphs, was, in 1318, placed at the head of the government, with
Gasparo Grimaldi for colleague, but he never attempted any legislative
or constitutional charges for the sake of remaining in office. Bonfadio
himself, though their enemy, declares that, though the Fieschi
surpassed in power all other families, they never laid hands on popular
rights.[39] They were in Genoa what the Capponi were in Florence.
This reputation of the counts of Lavagna rendered it easy for Gianluigi
to obtain followers. To cover his true designs, he made no change
in his manners or life, carried an open and jovial countenance, and
studied more than ever to promote domestic tranquility. His palace was
open to all; he was generous with his friends, affable and courteous
to every one. He courted the rich with flattery and blandishments, the
poor with gifts. His table, spread with regal profusion, was free; and
he seemed to have no other cares besides races, the chase and the dance.
He cultivated friendship with the old nobles, but had greater intimacy
with the new. The Dorias did not complain of the count’s relations
with the new nobility; for, though his house was old and illustrious,
its traditions were Guelph, and the new patricians and the leading
popular families belonged to that party. In his intercourse with
these persons, on whom he relied for assistance, he spoke sneeringly
of the reforms of 1528, which had advanced the Portico of San Luca to
the highest power, created deep-rooted antipathies, and weakened the
Republic. Sometimes he showed a profound passion, and his broken and
threatening tone conveyed a meaning beyond the import of his words.
Having won the favour of the rich and distinguished popular families,
he cultivated the love of the plebeians. In this, his pleasant and
familiar manner secured him great success. He treated them as his
equals, and, the true Alcibiades of his time, he adapted himself to
their personal characteristics and prejudices. Chronicles tell us
that he watched from his towers to see if the chimneys of the poorer
classes smoked regularly at the hour for preparing food, and sent
provisions whenever this token of a meal was missed on any roof. Such
wise generosity acquired him the affection of the people. The foreign
wars and the stagnation of trade had impoverished a great part of the
citizens, especially the spinners and the silk operatives, then called
Tuscans, of whom there were fifteen thousand in Genoa.
The history of the manufacture of silk, through which so many Italian
families acquired wealth and rank, has not yet been adequately treated.
The history of trades and crafts in the Peninsula would be a useful
work, and would show that even in the midst of the fiercest contests of
faction, commerce was always held in merited honour and was regulated
by few and simple restrictions;--that merchants and artisans had their
art-unions or corporations with their own laws, arms and masters, that
the trades were thus united in associations as a means of perfecting
their products and as a security against fraud. The historian of our
manufactures would tell us that in Genoa, before 1432, the trade of
silk-weaving had its _capitudini_, or officers, consisting of two
consuls and six councillors, who inspected the quality of the fabrics,
provided for their sale, took charge of the profits and decided
upon the complaints of the operatives. The government issued many
proclamations and made numerous laws to promote the woollen trade;
among which those of Doge Pietro Fregoso are remarkable. He forbade the
operatives, who lived in the quarter still called _Borgo del Lanieri_,
to leave the walls of the city, or carry elsewhere their tools and
skill, under penalty of confiscation of goods and other pains. Some
illustrious men were enrolled and matriculated in the art of silk,
among them Doge Paolo da Novi; and Gianettino Doria himself, when his
father Tomaso fell into poverty, spent his youth among the silk-weavers
of our city. The silk operatives venerated the _Volto Santo_ of San
Cipriano, a circumstance which explains the extraordinary number of
these images which are to be found in Genoa and along the eastern
Riviera.
Not less prosperous than the silk manufactures were the corders and
beaters of wool, also united into associations. They gave a great
impulse to traffic and navigation. The beginnings of our civilization
were born of industrial arts. The marines artisans, and tradesmen
formed the only army of the Republic when it made war on feudatories
and compelled them to swear allegiance to the commune. These brave
plebeians--to-day operatives, to-morrow soldiers, not more masters of
the shuttle and the oar than of the sword, tempestuous in character
but fervent in faith--created in Genoa fruitful industries and immense
social power; and though in the fury of faction they sometimes shed
blood in the streets of Genoa, they atoned it by giving her, through
formidable fleets, the dominion of the seas.
Guglielmo Embriaco, the hero of the first crusade, is the
representative of this Genoese thrift and courage. Our armies were
nothing more than associations. Such companies subdued the Euxine.
The Giustiniani captured Scio, Samos, and other islands, and divided
their gains _pro rata_ per man in proportion to the expense which each
had borne; the Cattaneo at Phocis, the Gattilusio at Mytilene, and
the Zaccaria in Negroponte. Elis and Achaia adopted the same rule.
It rarely happened that one who was not inscribed in a trade and
to the commune obtained any position as a master-workman. The very
nobleman who was a Ghibeline outside the walls became a Guelph when he
established his residence in the city; and though from his castles in
the passes of the Apennines he might have once plotted to invade us,
he had no sooner recorded himself as a citizen than he counted it an
honour to guide our fleets and overthrow our enemies. There was at one
time a law which forbade the nobles to command even a ship; and many
great nobles enrolled themselves with the people to open the path to
naval and military authority.
The mark of these Guelph institutions on the people of Genoa was
deep and enduring. The Genoese of our day are living proof of their
lasting influence. Labour and banking produced immense wealth. The
Genoese became the bankers of Europe. In the year 1200 they drew the
first bill of exchange.[40] It was drawn on Palermo. They diffused the
Arabic system of notation. In 1148 they created, for the conquest of
Tortosa, the first public debts which they afterwards consolidated,
appropriating the city and port customs to pay the interest. They
founded the Bank of St. George, on whose model those of England and
Holland were constructed, and they planted colonies everywhere. Along
the inhospitable coasts of the Caspian and Aral, in Turchestan and
Thibet, the pilgrim was safe in person and property who declared, “I am
a Genoese.”
We return from this digression to the thread of our narrative. The
long wars had lessened the gains of our trades-people; even the silk
operatives were by the want of markets reduced to extremities. In that
year, too, food was dear throughout Italy; and the merchants who held
grain kept it back from sale in order to raise the price. Gianluigi,
wishing to provide for the pressing wants of so many operatives,
called to him Sebastiano Granara, consul of the weavers, obtained
a list of the most distressed families, and sent them sums of money
with a request to keep secret the name of the donor, and to inform him
whenever they were again in urgent need.
He frequently requested the artisans and mechanics who were natives of
his lands (they were more than two hundred) to come to him in Vialata,
where he opened to them his granaries, and otherwise succoured them. By
such acts of generosity he acquired the favour of the people, who were
ready, as a proverb has it, “to carry water for him in their ears,” and
to defend his person at their own peril.
Having by such practices obtained the sympathy of the new nobles and
the humble classes who lived by their daily labour, the count began
to provide the arms and soldiers which he should need, and, with
great tact, availed himself in the exigency of the discords among the
neighbouring governments.
Pierluigi Farnese, after having obtained from Paul III. the investiture
of Parma and Piacenza, soon found that he had not sufficient forces to
maintain his power in these provinces. Gerolamo Pallavicini, marquis
of Cortemaggiore, and others of that family to whom the duke had
prohibited the trade in salt, raised an armed rebellion. The Rossi,
Sanseverino, Pusterla of Milan, and other feudatories, were supporting
the insurrection. It was also encouraged by Giovanni del Verme, lord of
the Romagna, a personal enemy of the duke, and by Beatrice Trivulzio,
who being incensed against Paul III. for conceding the port of the Po
in Piacenza to Michelangelo Bonaroti, excavated a new harbour, and
deprived the divine architect of his reward.
The duke collected an army, and, as soon as he felt able to contest
the field, demanded from some of his enemies the restitution of his
dominions in their possession, claiming that these lands and feuds had
been ceded to them by his predecessors to the prejudice of the ducal
rights. The Pallavicini, who were particularly included in this demand,
made such preparations as were possible to secure their own rights and
repel all the duke’s attempts at aggression.
The estates of the Pallavicini and Fieschi were separated only by a
little stream; and the count seeing a war cloud on the horizon, so
near to his own fields, visited his feuds in the summer of 1546, under
pretence of watching over his property. He spent some time at Lavagna,
Montobbio, and Pontremoli. Here he collected his dependents, formed
them into companies, and held musters and reviews. He would have gone
farther, if the emperor, fearing that the Pallavicini dispute with
Pierluigi would excite a general Italian war, and so distract his
attention from his campaign against the Smacalda league in Germany, had
not sent peremptory orders to Don Ferrante Gonzaga, who had succeeded
to Marquis Vasto in the government of Milan, to pacify the quarrel,
threatening the whole weight of the imperial displeasure against any
who should refuse his mediation.
The duke was induced to lay down his arms by the shrewd Pontiff, who
did not wish an open rupture with Cæsar, and Count Fieschi was chosen
by Farnese as arbiter of the rival claims. These two--Farnese and
Fieschi--had been on intimate terms some years before, at the time
when the former came to Genoa, (1542), in company with Annibal Caro
and Appollonio Filareto, his secretaries, to pay homage to the emperor
and to ask a congress in the name of the Pope--the congress which took
place in Busseto.
Fieschi, mindful of old ties, conducted the negociation with so much
dexterity that he obtained from Pallavicini more than the duke had
dared to hope. A friendly and familiar correspondence always continued
between them, as several letters we have had in our hands prove. Among
them there is one of the 3rd of February, 1546--now preserved among the
Farnesian papers in Parma--in which the count recommends to the duke
a master-workman, Giacomo Merello, “a maker of cannon of rare skill
in his profession,” who had a law-suit with another master workman in
Parma. In these letters the count acknowledges that he has received
many favours from the duke.
In their many interviews in Piacenza, Farnese, who knew what had been
said and done at Rome, spoke freely of his hatred towards Cæsar, who
had openly favoured the Pallavicini, and who was a constant enemy of
the advancement of the Farnese family. He avowed that he was ready to
throw himself into any undertaking which should promise him revenge.
The count in his turn, enlarged on the enmity between himself and the
Dorias, the oppressors of his country, on the plots of Gianettino,
already known to him, and finally asked the assistance and support of
the duke in his contemplated insurrection. It is needless to say that
the duke gave liberal promises of aid in a work which would take away
the influence of the Dorias, his hereditary enemies, and doubtless add
something to his personal importance and wealth.
Meantime Gianluigi, who could ill tolerate delay, enlisted in his
service a large number of men, then just discharged from the ducal
army, and distributed them among his most remote castles. Having
returned to the city, he kept Farnese advised, by frequent messengers
and letters of all his movements and successes. Some of these letters
are now passing through the press. In one of these, dated the 17th of
April, he complains to the duke that Gianettino had given him an order
from Cæsar to send his fourth galley to cruise for pirates; he speaks
of plots woven for him by the young admiral, and asks the advice of
Farnese.
The Duke advised that his plans be hurried forward, and mentioned, as
a special inducement, that Renèe, of France, duchess of Ferrara, had
again offered French aid through Pierluigi. But it is certain that the
count made no more use of this offer than he had made of others like it.
We find in ancient chronicles a statement which would be greatly to
the credit of both Farnese and Fieschi. They had, according to these
writers, laid the foundations of a league common to all the Italian
princes, the object of which was to remove from the Peninsula every
vestige of foreign power; but historical fidelity compels us to say
that we have found no document which clearly proves the fact. In July,
the count went to Montobbio, drilled his vassals in military exercises,
and put his castles in such a state of defence as to be able to resist
a long siege. He then went through, one after another, his principal
feuds. It is worth our while to touch in passing upon the condition of
some of them at the time of which we write.
Passing along the Eastern Riviera from Genoa, the count would first
enter into Recco. It was then a large borough with three hundred and
seventy-four fires, and he had built in it a superb palace called the
Astrego. He drew from this feud select mariners, to man his galleys. He
visited Roccatagliata and Cariseto, castles of considerable strength.
He added to their defences and supplied them with provisions. We find
that he spent some time at the castle of Varzi, on the slope of Penice,
formerly one of the principal fortresses of the Malaspini, near Bobbio.
He remained longer still in Lavagna. This region, though not then so
prosperous as it was before Frederick II., reduced it to a desert,
(1245) and levelled the fourteen castles which the counts had built
there, was yet a feud of considerable importance, on account of its
slate quarries.
The Lavagna property included, to say truth, only a little group of a
hundred and thirty-six houses, but the surrounding country was adorned
with many burghs, as Centurion, San Salvatore, the earliest seat of
the Fieschi family, Cogorno and Brecanecca, forming in all five hundred
and seventeen fires and six churches. Besides the valley of Lavagna
was full of little estates and burghs, such as Torre, Vignale, Villa
Fronte, Aveglio, Cortemiglio, Rimaglio, Pregio, Bausalo and Oneto.
Lavagna was the heart of the Fieschi dominion. From this point it was
easy to lay hands on the Lombard provinces or to draw thence men and
arms. In those days the burgh of Sestri, close by, was one of the
most busy points of transit, and was the best station from which to
send goods into Lombardy. Merchandise was transported from Sestri to
Castiglione, and ten miles only remained to Varese, also the property
of the Fieschi. It counted two hundred fires, and was prosperous with
the trade of Lombardy. Then, crossing the Apennines, twelve miles of
travel brought the merchant to Val di Taro, a burgh of one hundred and
fifty houses, which overlooked forty-two villages, subject to Count
Fieschi.
Having examined his resources and put his castles in a state of
defence, constructing strong outer walls, for those which seemed to him
to be weak, under pretence of “fortifying himself against the Duke of
Piacenza, who was too fond of his neighbour’s property,” he passed over
to Pontremoli.
Leandro Alberti, who visited this noble and luxurious castle about that
period, says that it stood near the mouth of the Magra, and at the foot
of the Apennines. It was fortified by three fortresses, and numbered
eight hundred houses, while its jurisdiction embraced forty-eight
contiguous burghs, not to mention the valleys of Volpedo, Rosano,
Zeiri, and the hamlets along the banks of the Crania, which counted one
thousand and eight hundred fires. Giustiniani says that the lord of
Pontremoli could easily put under arms two thousand men.
Gianluigi spent some time here, having conferences with Count Galeotto
Mirandola, the Pusterla and Cybo, the marquises of Valdimagra, the
Bentivoglio, the Strozzi and others, who were restless under the
imperial yoke; and in these negociations he was ably seconded by
Catando d’Arimini and by Giulio Pojano, to whom he had assigned the
command of his galleys.
The count did not return into the city until the end of autumn.
Pierluigi Farnese, to remove all suspicions of the plot, wrote many
letters to the Genoese government, and took great care to show his
anxiety to render every service or favour in his power. The object of
these letters, which may be said to contain little political wisdom,
was much more grave and serious than their tone implied. The golden
style of Caro, who dictated them, gives them a certain charm; but their
highest value lies in showing how skilfully Pierluigi and Fieschi
planned and worked to elevate their friends to office under the Doria
government, to get the control of public affairs out of the hands of
Andrea, and so pave the way to the success of their great insurrection.
One fact is very important. The doctors of the law and the magistrates
of the _Ruota_ always possessed large powers in the Republic, and
the practical operations of the government depended almost entirely
on their counsels. When Fieschi had made such military preparation as
seemed sufficient for a revolution, he naturally sought to get the
lawyers on his side, as the only class who could organize and maintain
the new government. By the aid of the Duke of Piacenza, he contrived
to place in the principal offices of the _Ruota_, and even in the
vicarate of the city, men who shared his own political views, and were
distinguished for political sagacity and administrative ability. On the
25th of May, 1486, duke Pierluigi wrote to the Doge and Governors that
M. Hettore Lusiardo, a gentleman and doctor of Piacenza and a person of
great learning, desired to obtain an appointment in the _Ruota_ of the
Republic. And he adds, “I am greatly pleased to see my vassals honoured
according to their merits, and I cheerfully use my influence to advance
them to such positions as they desire. On this occasion I hope your
highnesses may lend a favourable ear to my intercession on behalf of
Messer Hettore, since in employing this person you will at once gratify
me and secure the services of a man worthy of your esteem, as he will
show when put to the proof.”
In another letter of December 17th, he renewed the same request:
“Writing on another occasion, I have asked your favour for Messer
Hettore Lusiardo, one of my Piacentine gentlemen and doctors, and a
person of rare personal qualities, who desires a place in the _Ruota_
of your city. Wishing much that he may obtain his request, I repeat my
recommendations in the strongest possible terms; and if you can give
him such a place as he desires, you will not only serve a person worthy
of your confidence and the favour he asks, but also do me a great
pleasure.”
In another letter of the 24th of November, we read: “M. Bernardo
Alberghetti da Rimini, at whose request I write, is a doctor in law of
much learning, long practice, and strict integrity--qualities which
I know him to possess, both from the reports of others and from my
personal experience, having employed him for many months. He would
still be in my service but that I have no employment of moment for
him, and he deserves something better than a subordinate position. He
wishes to enter into the _Ruota_ of your most noble city as a means of
advancement, and hopes that my recommendation may have some value with
your Excellencies. I esteem him to be, as I have said, a person of most
excellent qualifications, and I doubt not I shall have well served your
interests in sending him to you, and I therefore the more boldly pray
you for love of me to give him your approval.”
In the same year the official term of the vicar of the city expired,
and the office was of such importance that the conspirators exerted
themselves to fill it with a person entirely devoted to their
interests. On the 13th of September, Farnese wrote: “When Count Fieschi
was last in Piacenza, I warmly recommended to him Mr. Camillo Villa, a
Piacentine doctor in law, and urged him to ask from your Excellencies
in my name the office of vicar in your city for this person. Though
I am certain that the count would not fail in doing me this service,
and believe that I may rely much upon your courtesy to me, and though
I have recently by letter renewed my request to the count, yet I deem
it not discourteous, as the time for filling this post draws near, to
recommend Mr. Camillo directly to your excellencies. Should you grant
my request, you will both secure to your city an officer who will
always serve you well and do me a personal kindness.”
It is hardly necessary to say that Farnese obtained from the Senate
all these appointments. Secret as were these intrigues, they did not
escape the acute eyes of Panza, who inferred that the count was engaged
in some conspiracy. He therefore took opportunities for watching his
movements and his manners; and finding that the count withdrew from
his former familiarity with his old tutor, he was led by his affection
to admonish him of the dangers before him. But Gianluigi broke off his
reproofs with ill-concealed impatience and answered him with the words
of Cato: “If I believed that the shirt I wear knew the secrets of my
heart, I would tear it off and give it to the flames.” Then checking
his impetuous speech, he added that he would do nothing that should not
be worthy of his own fame and that of his ancestry.
Panza was not the only person to suspect the count of some conspiracy
against the power of Cæsar. John Vega, ambassador of Spain at Rome,
conceived doubts of his fidelity, and set Ferrante Gonzaga to watch his
movements.
Gonzaga sent to Prince Andrea his secretary, Maone, with the letters of
Vega and other documents which referred to a conspiracy, believed to be
forming by Gianluigi.
Andrea rejected the tale as the work of some malignant slanderers, and
replied that he knew Fieschi was not a man to conspire against the
empire.
Though the purchase of the pontifical galleys was a sharp thorn in the
side of Gianettino, who aspired to an exclusive dominion of the seas,
yet it was not an act sufficiently singular to awaken the suspicions of
the Dorias.
The most wealthy families were accustomed to arm galleys; and the Sauli
had negociated for the purchase of these same triremes, intending to
use them in their maritime enterprises.
The behaviour of Fieschi contributed still more to remove from the
minds of Gianettino and the prince every shadow of suspicion. He
frequently visited Andrea and congratulated him that, though more
than eighty years of age, he enjoyed vigorous health; and he was so
affectionate and obsequious to Gianettino that the young admiral tried
to obtain for him a suitable rank in the imperial army. It should not
be forgotten, however, that one motive of Gianettino was, to remove
Fieschi from Genoa, as the only one likely to make an effective
opposition in his personal ambition. It is certain that from the time
Vega declared Gianluigi to be engaged in machinations against the
empire, Gianettino conspired to remove from his path the only person
who could be an obstacle to his own advancement. He only awaited
Andrea’s death to put off the slight mask which he had hitherto worn;
and in expectation of that event he had entrusted to Captain Lercaro
the business of assassinating the count. This was proved by letters
of Gianettino which fell into the hands of Fieschi, and were by him
shown to many persons; though the writers in the interest of the empire
asserted that these documents had been forged by Gianluigi.
About this time a messenger in the confidence of Cæsar brought word
to the count that Andrea’s solicitations on behalf of his nephew were
about to be successful, and that Gianettino would soon be invested
with absolute power, on the same conditions as those by which Casimo
II. had ten years before been raised to the government of Florence.
This report, whether true or false, was circulated among the friends
of the count, and doubly inflamed their resentment. They resolved, in
their indignation, not to procrastinate longer the deliverance of the
Republic, and to strike down with one blow the ambitious youth who was
conspiring for supreme power.
The count’s first step was to recall from Civita-Vecchia the fourth
galley under the command of Giacobbe Conte, on pretence of arming it as
a privateer, and sending it to cruise against the Barbary commerce in
the east. He had two other ships ready to sail in neighbouring ports.
With these vessels he was able without exciting suspicion, to bring
into the city the troops concealed in his castles. He placed some of
them on board his triremes; others were concealed in his own house and
those of his fellow-conspirators.
Verrina was the soul of every movement. He knew all the arts of
ingratiating himself with the plebeians, and winning their sympathies
to the cause of his master. He began to allude in guarded phrases to
the necessity of a revolution in the interest of popular government;
and at the same time contrived to have many vassals of the count
enrolled in the permanent militia of the Republic. Many artisans and
mechanics to whom he gave presents, promised him the service of their
arms to rescue by force a castle of the count from some Florentine
merchants, who, he said, had seized it for debts. He was a man capable
of inventing traps and lures for all sorts of birds, and he enrolled no
one, whom he believed fitted for the work of the conspiracy, until he
had sounded the note best adapted to charm his recruit.
Calcagno, though he had dissuaded the count from drawing the sword,
was so overcome by his love for his young master, that he was the
most ardent worker in the conspiracy. He was assigned the office of
providing arms and provisions for the troops gradually being collected
and introduced into the city. Sacco was appointed to maintain order
and discipline among these soldiers. Ottobuono, brother of Gianluigi,
was sent to the court of France to secure the sympathy of the French
monarch for the cause of the approaching revolution.
The Republic was at this moment without a Doge, Giovanni Battista di
Fornari having retired from the magistracy. The galleys were idle and
without crews, because the season was unpropitious for navigation.
There were few of the permanent militia in the city, and these for the
most part were devoted to Gianluigi. Giulio Cybo and other marquises
of Valdimagra, had a considerable force ready to break into the city
at the first opportune moment. The plebeians were ripe for revolution;
the Dorias and nobility without the least suspicion. All things seemed
propitious.
Such was the condition of Genoa on the eve of the conspiracy.
“Strange,” says Cardinal de Retz, “ten thousand persons in Italy were
awaiting the outbreak of the insurrection, and there was not one to
betray the plot.”[41]
We ought not, in my judgment, to decide upon the merits of this
conspiracy according to the views of our own time, in which political
movements are discussed on principles of justice, but rather to give
the conspirators the benefit of the opinions and politics of their
own age. The doctrines of Macchiavelli, on which Gianluigi had formed
his principles, aim at the immediate interests of states and derive
principles from facts. The theory of Guicciardini is the same. Whoever
undertakes to philosophise on the political ideas of the sixteenth
century will find that State policy never professed any higher creed
than utility, and that those who were ambitious of repute as statesmen
were not bound by a public moral sentiment to show the justice of
their methods for obtaining desirable ends. Whoever had introduced on
the scenes of state craft abstract maxims of morality would have been
hissed off as a fool. The creed ran thus:--“Do you wish to free your
country? Caress the tyrant and then kill him. Your dagger is sharper
than the eyes of his satellites. Audacity and courage are everything.
He who falters for an instant is undone. Every means is just which
leads to success.”
Gianluigi held these maxims and he could not lay them aside without
freeing himself from the age in which he lived. It was natural,
therefore, that with his noble intention of destroying the empire of
the Dorias he should use every instrument which seemed adapted to
his purpose. His heart was bursting with suppressed rage; but his
serene look and urbane manners proclaimed him a peaceable and loyal
citizen. His nerves were strung with the spirit of revenge, but his
frank countenance, affable speech and good humour were those of a
mild-mannered and unruffled gentleman. Once only he broke out against
his rival with fierce invectives; but ever after he feigned content
and put to sleep his adversary’s vigilance while meditating his blow.
He knew no other paths to his end than those pointed out by the state
craft of his time. Why should he awaken suspicion in the Dorias when
all his interests said, “Deceive them”? It is folly to arm an enemy who
is delivering himself unarmed into your power. Such, we have said, was
the political morality of the speculative minds of that day.
In other respects Fieschi was counted virtuous and honourable and
uncorrupted in the bosom of a corrupt society; so that it is very
doubtful whether he had a natural son named Paolo Emilio who was
afterwards a captain in the pay of France, of which fact we find
mention in some memoirs. Fame said of him that he had never punished,
even in the slightest manner, any person in his service or vassalage.
He deceived the Dorias and betrayed them against faith; but only for a
political object. The high design of overthrowing one who had attempted
his assassination and of liberating his country ought, if it cannot
absolve him, to moderate the condemnation of posterity. Brutus, too,
was a deceiver and he is reputed great.
Whatever be the ideas of those who read in the nineteenth century,
it is clear that the statesmen of the sixteenth heartily approved of
Fieschi’s work. He was what these times made him. A stranger to the
spirit of the classic revolutions of the earlier part of his century,
to the ascetic revolts of Savonarola, to the paralytic ardours of
Soderini, he drank in with his Guelph principles the dissimulation of
Rome. An Italian and a disciple of Macchiavelli, he wished to liberate
his country without the aid of foreign arms.
A more favourable time could not have been desired. The outbreak of
the conspiracy would terrify Charles who was deep in the German wars;
Fieschi would be able to form close alliances with France, England,
Denmark and Turkey; he would stir the languid pulses of the Italians
and unite together Rome, Venice, Genoa, Parma and Ferrara; Lucca and
Siena, yet free, were ready to join the Italian confederacy; Naples and
Milan would raise their heads.
Three centuries more of abject servitude were reserved for Italy.