Catherine's marriage.—"Petit Courrier des dames" for 1476.—Four
years of prosperity.—Life in Rome in the fifteenth century.—A
hunting party in the Campagna.—Guilty or not guilty?—Catherine and
her husband leave Rome.
If the death of the Cardinal Riario had seemed, during a few anxious
days, to throw a doubt on the succesful termination of the matrimonial
schemes projected for Catherine, much greater was the danger to which
they were exposed by the untimely death of the Duke. "Catherine
herself," says Burriel, "considering the circumstances of her birth,
thought that it was now all over with her fortune." And, in truth,
it was hardly to be hoped that the Duchess Bona, now Regent, would
consent to prejudice her own children by giving up Imola as the
dower of a stranger to her blood, obtruded under such circumstances
into her family. Meanwhile, the bridegroom Girolamo, and his august,
"high-spirited" uncle, had, on their side, been struck by similar
misgivings on receiving the news of Maria Galeazzo's death; and they
were by no means disposed to relinquish the principality, whose title
Girolamo had already assumed.
Sixtus, therefore, well aware, remarks Burriel, of the truth of the
proverb which teaches that "this world is given to the active,"[69]
lost no time in sending Cardinal Mellini to Milan, with orders to
claim the prompt execution of the marriage contract, and to hurry on
the performance of the ceremony by every possible means. This active
churchman arrived while the Duchess and all Milan were still in the
midst of the confusion, anxieties, and uncertainties resulting from
the sudden demise of the Crown. The position of the Duchess as Regent
and guardian of her son, still in his minority, was precarious and
difficult. Subsequent events at Milan abundantly show how difficult
a task it was to maintain her own and her son's rights against the
pretensions and encroachments of his uncles. The friendship or
hostility of the royal-minded and high-handed _Servus servorum_ might
be of infinite importance to her and to Milan. The good Bona, too,
was inclined to make it a point of honour to carry out the intentions
of her murdered husband. The Cardinal, acting up zealously to his
instructions, urged unceasingly that "if 'twere done, 'twere well
it were done quickly." And thus it was brought about that, without
any alteration in the articles previously agreed upon, Catherine was
married to Girolamo Riario acting by proxy, in the latter part of May,
1477.
As the mourning for the Duke was not yet over, the ceremony was
performed in a comparatively private manner in the presence of the
Cardinal and the Duchess. And as no festivities and rejoicings were
under the circumstances permissible in Milan, it was determined that
the bride should depart immediately for Rome, and that all such
celebration should take place there under the auspices of the young
couple's magnificent uncle. No record is found of the exact date of the
marriage; but Catherine arrived in Rome about the end of May.
[Sidenote: HER PERSONAL APPEARANCE.]
The "sensation" produced in Rome by the young bride's arrival is dwelt
on by the historians, and may be readily believed. All the contemporary
chroniclers agree in describing her as eminently beautiful.[70] A
modern historian[71] of Forlì cites in proof of the truth of these
assertions two likenesses of her still existing, when he wrote, in the
church of St. Jerome in that city. And a Forlì coin and two medals,
engraved for the work of Burriel, fully confirm the praises of the old
writers. All three of these portraits appear to have been made after
the death of Girolamo Riario. The face is hard and even stern, but full
of vigour and intelligence. The features are somewhat large, but of
beautiful outline and perfect regularity: a face to be admired rather
than to be loved.
When at fifteen she rode through the Porta del Popolo into Rome, in
the midst of the brilliant cavalcade composed of all that was noblest
in the eternal city, those finely-cut features were doubtless softer
in their expression, more delicate in their beauty, and more fitted
to win all hearts in the manner we are assured they did. It was about
a generation later that a jovial prelate,[72] writing to his friend
from Rome, protested that nothing was wanting to the pleasures of a
residence there save "a court with ladies." But no doubt the same
want was a frequent one among the tonsured epicureans of a court in
which every high office was held by a priestly incumbent. And now the
lamentable deficiency was about to be supplied by the young and lovely
bride of the most powerful, most magnificent, and wealthiest prince
in Rome. For all this was Girolamo, the survivor of the two favoured
brothers, who had divided between them all that Papal affection and
munificence could bestow.
Doubtless nothing was left undone which could add brilliancy to the gay
cavalcade amid which Girolamo brought his wife to her new home. The
period was especially favourable to the display of personal splendour;
and the fashion of dress, especially of female costume, had recently
assumed an elegance and costly gorgeousness unknown to the previous
generation. If we would figure to ourselves our fifteen-year-old
heroine as she appeared on her richly-caparisoned "dappled palfrey"
to the admiring eyes of the Roman citizens, we must picture her clad
in one of those then recently-introduced dresses called "Cyprians,"
of which we hear so much in the records of the time, and which were
the favourite mode of the young and beautiful towards the end of the
fifteenth century.
Like other innovations in similar matters, this new costume, we are
told, gave much offence to the more austere among those who never in
their own day had enjoyed any such opportunity of displaying their
charms, and who were now too old to profit by it.[73] For, instead of
being made to fit close round the throat, the "Cyprian" was contrived
to show the entire neck. These dresses were cut square on the bust,
were extremely full around the feet, close-fitting from the waist
upwards, and had very long and large sleeves. Some ladies would have
even three of these celebrated robes: one of blue, one of crimson, and
one of watered camblet—"zambellotto undato"—lined with silk or with
mixed furs. Beautifully thin and fine veils of white cotton were worn;
and the hair was drawn back over hair-cushions, and tied with strings
of silk ornamented with gold or with pearls. A girdle of silver gilt or
of pearls confined the dress at the waist.
[Sidenote: HER ROMAN RESIDENCE.]
We may be perfectly sure, that the daughter of Sforza and bride
of Riario displayed whatever was most costly and most superb, as
she passed from the Porta del Popolo to the princely residence of
her husband on the Lungara, that long street which runs along the
farther bank of the river from St. Peter's to the Porta Settimana.
There the Riarii inhabited the spot now marked on the maps as the
Palazzo Corsini. Two hundred and fifty years further down on the
roll of pontiffs the latter name is met with;[74] the place of the
magnificent Riarii knows them no more; and the change of masters,
which those delicious terraces, looking down on the Farnese palaces
and gardens,—the creations of another Papal[75] family intermediate
in time between the Riarii and the Corsini—have undergone, is a quite
normal illustration of the working of a system, which is the leading
fact of Rome's modern history.
In this magnificent home on the banks of the Tiber, Catherine spent
four happy, prosperous, and brilliant years;—probably the most
happy, the most prosperous, and the most brilliant of her career.
Never, perhaps, since the old times of a Marozia and a Theodora,
whose boundless and shameless power in the eternal city had given
rise to the fable of a female Pope, had a woman occupied a position
of so much power and pre-eminence in Rome. She very shortly became
an all-powerful favourite with her uncle (or father-in-law) Sixtus.
All Rome was absolutely at her feet. Courtiers in search of favour,
litigants in search of justice—(or injustice)—officials in search
of promotion, brought their petitions and applications to her.
The most important employments were often given according to the
recommendations of this girl in her teens, as Burriel[76] assures us,
without manifesting the shadow of an idea, that there was anything
objectionable in such a mode of administering the Papal power. At this
period of her life, writes another[77] chronicler, she was so great a
favourite with the Pope, that most of the princes of Italy, who had
any request to make of the Apostolic see, availed themselves of the
intercession of Catherine for the attainment of their desires.
Though apparently totally unaware, that all this was in any way
otherwise than it should have been, the old writers tell us much
of Catherine's prudence, discretion and moderation in wielding and
managing the great power so strangely entrusted to such hands. We
have no recorded facts adducible in direct proof of the justice of
this high praise. But we may find some evidence in support of it from
the observation of our heroine under adversity; for which some later
portions of her career will afford abundant opportunity. Assuredly
there must have been materials of high and noble quality in a nature
not wholly corrupted and spoiled by such an education and such
environment in childhood and in youth, as that which fell to the lot of
this young princess.
[Sidenote: THE ORDELAFFI.]
Dark days were not far distant; but all as yet in her life had been
rose-colour:—or purple-tinted rather; for the more modest hue seems
hardly gorgeous enough to typify the blaze of prosperous sunshine which
had hitherto illumined her path. And now, during these years at Rome,
though they had been sufficiently marked already as the minions of
fortune, the star of the young couple was still ever rising.
On the 15th of December of the year in which Catherine arrived in Rome,
her husband was with much ceremony and speechifying made a citizen of
the eternal city.[78]
On the 4th of September 1480, the same fortunate youth received from
the Pope investiture of the city and county of Forlì;[79] of which the
Duke of Urbino, general of the forces of the Church, took possession
in his name. This city, now the capital of a delegation, and one of
the most important towns of Romagna, was conveniently situated with
regard to the principality of Imola, already acquired by Girolamo
in right of his wife. Forlì is some sixteen miles to the south-east
of the latter town, in the same rich and highly productive alluvial
district, which lies between the Apennines and the Adriatic. It had
long been under the dominion of its native lords, of the family of the
Ordelaffi. The story of their ousting, with its episodes of poisoning,
fighting, love-making, and plotting, though curious enough, would lead
us too far away from our more immediate subject. Suffice it that the
upshot was the same, as it was in so many other similar cases. The Pope
declared that the old family had forfeited their rights, that the fief
had devolved to the Holy See; and, accordingly, handed it over to his
nephew-son.
On the 8th of September in the same year Count Girolamo was solemnly
made generalissimo of the Papal forces. The diarist Jacopo of
Volterra[80] tells us how on that day, being the celebration of the
nativity of the blessed Virgin, the Pope and all the College of
Cardinals attended a solemn mass, in the course of which the Count
in full armour knelt at the feet of the Pope, seated in front of the
altar, and then and there received the staff of command, and the
standard; and took the prescribed oaths, reading, says the historian,
the whole formula at length himself;—truly the most arduous part
of the matter in all probability to this "non literatus" _preux_
chevalier. All Rome, both clerical and lay, was there, says gossiping
Jacobus Volaterranus, as much to see the Count go through his part in
the play, as to perform their devotions.
The picture of life in Rome at this period, obtainable from the
inartistic matter-of-fact narrations of these diarists, the Jacopo just
cited, Stefano Infessura, and one or two others of the same class, is a
strange and striking one. Their ever-recurring accounts of solemnities,
celebrations, and festivals, are chequered with notices almost equally
frequent, and as calmly chronicled of such deeds and occurrences, as
we are accustomed to hear reported from Sacramento, or San Francisco,
and to consider as the product of a new and half-organised state of
society. A noble patrician is stabbed to death, while sitting at the
door of his own palace enjoying the evening air after supper. The
name of the murderer and his motive are briefly told, and no further
remark is made about the matter. A raid is made by one family against
another and many men are killed; but none worth mentioning save one
or two nobles. Of such matters nobody dreams of complaining. But when
once on Ascension-day a great mass of people had assembled as usual
in expectation of receiving the papal benediction, and Sixtus for
some unassigned reason did not come forth to give it, there was great
murmuring, and the multitude heaped bitter curses, we are told, on the
Pontiff, who had defrauded them of his blessing.
[Sidenote: A DEATH-BED SCENE.]
The figures of the recently-married couple, however, with whose
fortunes our story is more immediately concerned, appear most
frequently, as might be expected, during those years of their
prosperity on the bright squares of the chequered board. The Count,
indeed, is found figuring in one strange and unpleasant scene a few
days previous to his installation as commander-in-chief.
One of the Pope's nephews, Antonio Bassi, is lying grievously ill on
his death-bed. His cousin Girolamo visits him the day before his death,
and tries to comfort him "with fraternal words," and assurances that he
will soon get well. But the dying man, either from the peevishness of
suffering, says the chronicler,[81] or because he knew that he could
now speak out with impunity what he had long felt, abused his powerful
cousin in the most violent manner, "mentioning certain deeds of the
Count universally condemned, and certain conduct of his reprobated by
all men; on account of which, he said, the judgment of God, from which
no human power could avail to protect him, would shortly fall on him.
And in speaking of these things, he used a degree of vehemence which
none of those who knew him best had ever heard him speak with when
in health." The Count, it seems, took it very quietly; but "we all
standing round the bed blushed for shame at the scene, and several
of us slunk away out of hearing." It would have been satisfactory to
have been told what these so universally reprobated deeds and conduct
were. Perhaps nephew Bassi would have liked some of the good things
that were heaped on nephew Riario. There _was_, indeed, one dark topic,
of which we shall have to speak presently, the indiscreet handling
of which might well make discreet courtiers slink out of hearing,
lest their ears should become the unwilling depositories of truths so
carefully concealed that history, after nearly four hundred years of
investigation, has failed in obtaining satisfactory evidence of them.
Could it have been that the dying man felt himself so safe from earthly
vengeance, and so beyond all considerations of worldly prudence, as to
have dared to speak aloud in such a tone of the black Pazzi tragedy?
If so, we know how dangerous it might have been to hear him. If so,
could Girolamo Riario have been so unmoved by his upbraiding? Be it as
it may, the above few hints, so fortuitously, as it seems, floating on
the surface of the vast, black, all-devouring pool of oblivion, are all
that we have to speculate on in the matter. Antonio Bassi died, and no
"judgment" followed—yet awhile.
On the contrary, all sorts of festivities, mingling themselves with the
more serious business of prosperous ambition, seem to have made up the
life of the young Count and Countess. One constantly recurring cause of
pomp and festival at Rome in those days, was the arrival in the eternal
city of strangers of note from almost every part of Europe. English,
German, French, Spanish, Italian, Greek ambassadors, cardinals, or
prelates, arrived in the great capital of Christianity to ask favours
of Heaven's vicegerent; to plead their international or ecclesiastical
causes and quarrels before him; to bring him gifts and compliments from
distant potentates; to beg for assistance in money or money's worth;
to obtain absolution for national sins committed against the Papal
interest; or to secure aid and connivance for such as could be shown to
square with it.
[Sidenote: GALA DOINGS AT ROME.]
On the occasion of such arrivals, cardinals, with their numerous
retinues of attendants, lay and clerical, used to go out to meet the
strangers at the gate, and bring them in pomp to the lodgings prepared
for them. Then followed grand ceremonial services in the basilicas,
in which modern Circenses the Roman populace shared with delight, and
vast banquets, shared only by the privileged of the earth. Now and then
occur descriptions of gay doings of a less exclusive character, in
which all classes of that strangely-variegated society are seen mingled
in a more pleasing and more picturesque fashion.
On Wednesday,[82] the 22nd of March, 1480, for instance, Ernest,
Duke of Saxony, arrives at Rome for the performance of a vow. He is
accompanied by the Duke of Brunswick and other German nobles. All are
clothed in black, with a staff embroidered in white across the breast,
as a symbol of pilgrimage. The Pope and all the Sacred College go out
to the Porta del Popolo to meet him; and fortunately we have among us
two cardinals who can talk German. These ride one on each side of his
Serene Highness, and thus the cortège of some two hundred horses of
the Duke's retinue, together with all the trains of Pope and cardinals,
sweep on through the streets of Rome towards St. Peter's. Sovereign
princes coming to Rome in discharge of vows of pilgrimage are worthy
of every encouragement. So Sixtus treats the noble stranger with all
possible honour—even to the extent of allowing him to sit at mass and
vespers on the bench of the cardinals, and in the stall next below the
junior of those dignitaries, an honour rarely granted. Then, as is the
case with those whom Rome delighteth to honour, he was presented in
St. Peter's with the consecrated golden rose. But on this occasion,
strangely enough, the golden rose was not a rose, but a golden
oak-bough,[83] which Sixtus, contrary to all custom and precedent, had
chosen to consecrate instead of the immemorially accustomed emblem.
The substitution of this golden bough, the well-known heraldic bearing
of the Della Rovere family, is a curious manifestation of the family
feeling, which was so intense in Sixtus, and was the ever-present
motive of all his crimes.
[Sidenote: A HUNTING PARTY.]
But the most pleasing of the doings in honour of the Elector recorded
by the old diarist, is a grand hunting party given him by our Count
Girolamo. It took place on the 10th of April, 1480, a day remembered by
the people of Rome long afterwards, says Jacopo of Volterra. For the
hunting took place only eight miles from the city, in the neighbourhood
of the Fonte Malliane, to the south-west of Rome, and all classes of
the citizens made holiday. Even the boys were able to join and enjoy
the sport. The foreign princes themselves, with their retinue, all
mounted on splendid horses, holding the hounds in leash, and shining,
says the diarist, with gold and jewels, were the most interesting part
of the sight to the populace. A very great quantity of stags and deer
were taken, "and some beasts were captured by the hands of the princes
themselves, _as if the creatures suffered themselves to be caught from
the wish to contribute to the happiness of so great an occasion_"—a
somewhat left-handed compliment to a sportsman, friend Jacopo, and
savouring more of the antechamber than the greenwood. A more joyous
scene, adds the diarist, cannot be imagined than that afforded by those
hill-sides and woods thronged with eager sportsmen, and resounding
far and near with the notes of the horns, the halloes of the hunters,
the barking of the dogs, and the voices of singing and rejoicing.
Then at the Fonte Malliane a magnificent banquet was prepared under
the ilex woods of a shady hill-side, not for the invited guests only,
but for all present. The Roman dames, with Catherine mistress of the
revel, mingling in their brilliant and gorgeous-coloured[84] costume
among the carousing knights, amid the dark-green verdure that shaded
the hill-side, give what was wanted in colour to make the gay scene
perfect. At respectful distance amid the surrounding woods, the Roman
citizens are making the most of the rare opportunity; not less loud in
their mirth, or less jovial over the good things provided at the cost
of taxes drawn by the good Count from faraway provinces, than their
masters. Their stalwart forms, clad in russet jerkin or hempen frock,
mingled with hounds in leash, and richly-caparisoned horses, group well
as seen among the trunks of the trees against the dark background of
the ilex woods. "It is not to be told," says Jacopo, thus winding up
his unusually detailed description, "how much those German chiefs,
rejoicing after their own fashion, enjoyed themselves on that memorable
day!" Is it intended, good Jacopo, by those words of yours, "_Germani
illi proceres lætantes more suo_," that we should catch a glimpse of
our Teuton friends riding back the eight miles into Rome rather less
steadily than they sat on those tall horses of theirs in the morning?
Four days afterwards, at any rate, the Elector and his company are
ready to start on their homeward journey; and the Pope, as a parting
gift, presents them with wax candles blessed by his own holy fingers:
"so that, accompanied by such holy things, they might reach their own
country in safety without any ill encounters by the way."
Thus, amid honours, pleasures, and the agreeable business arising out
of her large share in the administion of Papal favour, passed four
brilliant years of the heyday prime of Catherine's life. Was there no
darker woof to chequer the bright web—no shading to so much sunlight?
That terrible death-bed scene, when Girolamo's cousin, Antonio Bassi,
lay a-dying, has led us already to the mention of the dark story of the
Pazzi murders. This celebrated episode of Florentine history, which
has been made again and again the novelist's and poet's as well as
the historian's subject, is too well known for it to be necessary to
do more here than briefly recapitulate the familiar facts, especially
as the present story is only concerned with the question, how far the
Riarii were implicated in them.
[Sidenote: THE PAZZI CONSPIRACY.]
On Easter day, the 26th of April, 1478, Lorenzo de Medici, afterwards
"the Magnificent," and his brother Giuliano were, while at worship
before the high altar of the Cathedral, stabbed by the daggers of
assassins—Lorenzo inefficiently, Giuliano mortally. Francesco de Pazzi
and his adherents were the murderers. A Salviati, Archbishop of Pisa,
was also one of the conspirators, to whom had been assigned the part
of seizing the Palazzo Pubblico while the others did the murder. The
daggers of the assassins, however, having done only half their work,
and the populace of Florence showing themselves in no wise inclined to
rise against the Medici, or make any demonstration in favour of the
conspirators, the game was lost. Francesco and the numerous family of
the Pazzi were almost wholly exterminated; and the stout republicans
of Florence, having no fear of the Church before their eyes, hung the
Archbishop Salviati out of a window of the Palazzo Pubblico in a very
summary manner.
Now, that the great Florentine family of the Pazzi should hate, worry,
and conspire against the great Florentine family of the Medici, was as
intelligible, as much according to the habitudes of the place and time,
and as natural, as that one butcher's mastiff should fly at the throat
of another. And if the deed of that Easter Sunday had involved no other
persons in its causes and consequences, than the Medici and the Pazzi,
the destruction of the losing party would have been the natural ending
and completion of the story. But, in the first place, an Archbishop
had been publicly hung in Florence;—a deed more difficult to be wiped
out, than the blood of scores of laymen, whether Medici or Pazzi. And,
in the second place, the municipal and commercial rivalry and hatred
of those two families had been exasperated and put into fatal action
by being involved with the yet more culpable hatred of the Riarii for
the rival parvenu princes of the Medicean race. Both Medici and Pazzi
were bankers in Rome. The former had held the lucrative appointment of
treasurers to the Apostolic chamber. Sixtus IV. took this from them,
and gave it to the Pazzi. These were friends and allies of the Riarii.
And there seems no reason to doubt the assertion of the Florentine
writers, that Girolamo was one of the conspirators, if not the original
contriver of the whole scheme.
The Pope launched his interdict against Florence, in punishment for
the execution of the Archbishop; and followed up this spiritual
attack by a less formidable secular one. The republicans were able to
defend themselves against the latter; but were obliged by the former
tremendous weapon to humiliate themselves before the Papal throne. It
is clear enough, in short, that all the sympathies of the Pope after
the deed were with the perpetrators of it. Was he a consenting and
abetting party to it before the fact? This is a question, which has
occupied the attention and investigations of historians, anxious to
decide the matter according to their respective prepossessions, more
perhaps than its importance deserves. One more crime, however dark,
added to the list of those which history has heaped up at the door of
the _Servi servorum_, can effect but little any of the vexed questions
raised between the defenders and the accusers of Popes and Papacy.
A synod of the Tuscan prelates, which met in July of the year 1478,
solemnly accused Sixtus of having instigated the murder. The Florentine
historians are nearly unanimous in making the same accusation. And most
of the arguments on the point have been based on consideration of this
testimony. But we have less suspected evidence to the same purpose in
the direct assertion of Stefano Infessura, the Roman diarist. Having
briefly told the circumstances and upshot of the attempt, he adds:[85]
"These things were ordered by Pope Sixtus, together with the Count
Girolamo, and others, to take away the dominion [of Florence] from
Lorenzo de Medici, and give it to the Count Girolamo." A moment's
consideration of the mode in which Sixtus and his son, or nephew,
Girolamo, worked in concert and pulled together during the whole of
his papacy for the founding and advancement of the family greatness,
and a little reflection on the perfect confidence and community of
aims and wishes existing between them, will add all the weight which
extreme probability can give to the opinion that the Pope was one of
the conspirators.
[Sidenote: POPE PROBABLY IMPLICATED.]
But then arises the question more nearly touching the subject of these
pages; What guilty knowledge may Catherine have had of her husband's
crime? Did the young bridegroom, within the first year of his married
life, take counsel with his girl-wife, at that time within a few weeks
of having become for the first time a mother at sixteen years of age,
respecting this deed of blood to be done for the furthering of their
mutual greatness? Did he seek to gratify her ambition,—certainly no
less worldly, less gross in quality, or less a ruling passion than his
own,—and obtain her admiring smiles by laying at the proud beauty's
feet these high hopes to be realised at the price of a daring deed?
Or, when returning from dark plottings with priests and desperate men
in the most secret council closet of the Papal palace to the brilliant
home of his young wife, did he mutter Macbeth-like, "Be innocent of
the knowledge, dearest chuck, till thou applaud the deed"? No written
word survives to throw the least light on this question. And each
reader must judge of the probabilities of the case according to his
knowledge and theories of human character. It was certainly Riario's
practice, as we shall see, to take counsel of his wife in state
matters of less unlawful kind. And thoroughly does she seem to have
been capable of seconding and aiding in all the rough business that
might fall to the hand of a stirring and ambitious prince in those
unquiet times;—truly a help-meet for one who had to hold his own by
craft in the council-chamber, as well as by energy and valour in the
field. Certainly, bearing in mind the character of the times, and the
character of the women, there can be small doubt, that had Catherine
found herself called to queen it in fair Florence, she would have
"applauded the deed," that placed her there.... Yet ... at sixteen,
and at this period of her life at all events, (however much we may at
a later time find her wholly busied in virile struggles for power and
supreme rule), occupied with the more womanly and more holy cares of
wife and mother-hood, it may be fairly hoped that she was innocent of
this black guilt, despite the nearness of her connection with Heaven's
vicegerent!
During these four years in Rome, Catherine presented her husband
with three children. The first was a disappointment to the ambitious
pair. Bianca, a daughter, born in March, 1478, was greeted, we may
be sure, with scant welcome. But on the 1st of September, 1479, the
long-sighted—yet so short-seeing—hopes of the parents and of the
Pontiff were gratified by the birth of a son, christened Ottaviano. And
on the 24th of August, 1480, a second son, named Cesare, was born to
them.
[Sidenote: A JOURNEY.]
At length, in the summer of 1481, some brief pause in the business of
sharing the Papal councils, making and breaking of leagues, persecuting
the Colonnas, and entertaining ambassadors, made it possible for
Girolamo and his wife to visit for the first time their dominions of
Forlì and Imola. There were to be grand doings in Rome on the 30th of
June, 1481. The Pope in grand gala, and with much ceremony and great
rejoicings, was to bless the fleet, now coming up from Ostia to the
city. There were to be feasts, candles, processions, and other such
like "divine services," with "Florentine ambassador washing the Pope's
hands at the beginning of the sacred rites; Venetian ambassadors
washing them in the middle, and the Prefect of Rome at the end of the
same;"[86] and drink and Papal blessings distributed to all comers.
But, despite all these attractions, Girolamo and Catherine with their
retinue left Rome at daybreak on that day. It caused great surprise,
says the chronicler, that they should not have chosen, at the cost of
one day's delay, to be present at all these gay doings. But it was
understood that that special day and hour had been indicated to him as
fortunate for his journey, by the planets.