Catherine in trouble.—"Libertà e Chiesà!" in Forlì.—The Cardinal
Savelli.—The Countess and her Castellano perform a comedy before the
lieges.—A veteran revolutionist.—No help coming from Rome.—Cardinal
Legate in an awkward position.—All over with the Orsi.—Their
last night in Forlì.—Catherine herself again.—Retribution.—An
octogenarian conspirator's last day.
The corpse of the murdered man lay tranquilly on the pavement of that
vast "Hall of the Nymphs," surrounded by the hangings of arras, and
sideboards of plate "ten feet high," the produce of many a deed of
rapine, oppression, and wrong; tranquilly and free, for some five
minutes past now, from troublous thoughts of meat-taxes, empty coffers,
Ordelaffi conspiracies, and revolutions, for the first time these
four years! It lay near the great window, and the thick blood flowed
slowly over the painted brick floor, making a dark stain, which Forlì
tradition could still point out to curious strangers towards the end of
the last century. The affrighted servant, who it seems was one Ludovico
Ercolani, a butler, long in the service of the Riarii, had run from
the hall, to carry the terrible tidings to the distant chamber of the
Countess. And for a few short minutes the murderers, Checco d'Orsi and
his accomplices, Giacomo Ronchi and Ludovico Pansecco, stood alone over
their victim, with pallid faces and starting eyeballs, taking rapid
counsel as to what was next to be done.[119]
[Sidenote: LIBERTY! LIBERTY!]
This ruffian Pansecco, one of the historians quietly remarks, had been
employed by the Count on occasion of the Pazzi murders.
Those moments were anxious ones to the doers of the desperate deed, for
all depended on the feeling, with which the populace might at the first
blush regard it. Their anxiety was not of long duration, however. From
the open window the three assassins cried to the people in the Piazza
"Liberty! Liberty! The tyrant is dead! Forlì is its own mistress!" It
was the evening hour at which every Italian, then as now, is out of
doors enjoying the fresh air, and chatting with neighbours, sitting in
groups in front of the druggists' shops—(a curiously universal and
time-honoured habit in the provincial cities of Italy), or walking to
and fro in the principal square; and the news, therefore, ran through
the city with the quickness of lightning. In an instant the Piazza was
crowded with citizens, crying, "An Orso! an Orso! Liberty! Liberty!"
and the conspirators were safe—for the present.
The palace guard lost no time in providing for their own safety, by
separating and mingling with the people. Ludovico d'Orsi, Checco's
brother, a doctor of law and whilome senator at Rome, who had been
guarding the stair leading to Catherine's apartments, went out into
the Piazza to excite and direct the mob. But the Chancellor, who had
been with the Count at the time of the murder, had meanwhile reached
Catherine's room by another passage. Her younger children and their
nurses, and a young sister of hers, named Stella, whom she was about to
marry advantageously to a certain Andrea Ricci, were with her. And the
confusion in that room, full of women and children, on the abrupt and
breathless telling of such news may be easily imagined. But Catherine,
with infinite promptitude of thought, ordered Ludovico to hasten,
without losing a moment by lingering with them, to the castle; and to
tell Feo, the governor, from her, to send off instant couriers to her
brother, the Duke, at Milan, and to her husband's friend and ally,
Bentivoglio, Lord of Bologna.
Catherine, and the women with her, barred the door behind him as
best they might with heavy furniture and so forth. But he had hardly
had time to get clear of the palace before Checco with half-a-dozen
ruffians were thundering at the Countess's room, and in a very few
minutes had forced an entrance. The chroniclers have noted that Orsi
could not bring himself at that moment to face Catherine. He remained
at the door, while the men he had brought with him made the women
understand that they must come with them.
And thus the family of the murdered sovereign were marched through the
crowded streets of the city to the Orsi palace, and there locked up as
prisoners.
That done, the conspirators hastily called together the leading men in
the city, to decide on the steps to be taken for the government of it
henceforth. For the Orsi, wealthy, numerous, influential, and violent
as they were, had no hope of being permitted to make themselves lords
of Forlì. They proposed, therefore, the step which promised the next
best chances for their own greatness and power,—to lay Forlì at the
feet of the Pontiff. This was frequently a measure adopted in those
days in similar circumstances. The crime committed would be thus wiped
out; the family of the murdered prince, and the neighbouring princes,
who might be disposed to profit by the occasion, would be kept at
bay; and, since the Church could only hold and govern and tax distant
dependencies by means of governors and lieutenants, who so likely to
step into such profitable places, as the powerful citizen who had
gained the new state for the Holy Father?
[Sidenote: THE CARDINAL SAVELLI.]
The frightened council at once assented to the proposal, and sent off
that same night messengers to the Cardinal Savelli, who was residing
as governor for the Church at Cesena, a city about twelve miles to the
south of Forlì.
Meanwhile some of the partisans of the Orsi had thrown the body of
Girolamo from the window into the Piazza; and while the citizens were
busied in displaying everywhere the papal flag, amid cries of "Chiesà!
Chiesà!" the mob having torn every rag of clothing from the corpse,
dragged it through the streets of the city, till certain friars took it
from them, and placed it in the sacristy of their church.
The Cardinal Savelli did not at all like the proposal made to him; and
lost some important time, before, "being unwilling to have it said that
the Church had lost a chance through his cowardice," he at last made
up his mind to accept it. On arriving at Forlì, his first step was to
visit Catherine in the Orsi Palace. An historical novelist would have
little difficulty, and better historical warranty than often suffices
for such purposes, in presenting his readers with a sufficiently
striking and picturesque account of that interview. Catherine, the
historians tell us, was, as we might expect from our knowledge of
her, haughty, unbroken, and unbending; the Cardinal, as we might also
expect from our knowledge of his kind, smooth-tongued, courteous, full
of regrets and talk about his sacred duty to Holy Mother Church. This
is all history tells us. But it is enough. The imagination has no
difficulty in filling up the sketch.
But at the conclusion of his courteous talking, the Cardinal intimated,
that it would be better, that the Countess and her family should for
the present find a safe shelter in a small but strong building over the
St. Peter's gateway, under the care of trusty citizens, to be named by
his Eminence. And Catherine was far from unwilling to acquiesce in the
change. For though the accommodation proposed to her was materially of
the most wretched, yet she naturally preferred any prison to the home
of her husband's murderer; and the Cardinal's hint, that the gateway
prison might be a safer asylum for her and her children than the palace
of the Orsi, was, she felt, more than a mere pretext.
That night, accordingly, the 15th of April, Catherine and her family
were marched through the city, escorted by a troop of guards, bearing
torches, from the Orsi palace to her new prison. The little procession
of prisoners consisted of twelve persons; the Countess herself, her
mother (who is now mentioned for the first time since her daughter's
birth, and who may in all probability be supposed to have become
Catherine's inmate at the time of her settling permanently in Forlì
after the death of Sixtus), her sister Stella, her six children, a
natural son of the Count, named Scipio, and two nurses. They were
received with all courtesy by the three citizens to whose keeping the
Cardinal had consigned them; but suffered much from the insufficiency
of the small room to hold them.
[Sidenote: BEFORE THE FORTRESS.]
The next day Cardinal Savelli and the conspirators summoned Feo, the
Governor of Ravaldino, to deliver up the fortress; and on his refusal,
they brought Catherine from her prison to the foot of the walls,
and there compelled her to give her own orders _viva voce_ to the
_Castellano_ to do so. On his showing himself on the ramparts, she
not only commanded, but implored him with every possible appearance
of earnestness, to save her life by delivering up the fort. In all
probability the Countess and her _Castellano_ perfectly understood each
other. In any case he knew Catherine's character, and had, moreover,
the orders which had reached him by Ercolani for his guidance. At all
events, he replied to her commands and entreaties by a steady refusal;
and the baffled conspirators had to take her back to the gate-house.
"Ah, Madame Catherine," said Giacomo Ronchi, one of three who had
murdered the Count, and who stood by her side as she parleyed with Feo,
"if you were really in earnest, he would yield. But it is you, who do
not wish him to obey your words; and it makes me long to lay you dead
where you stand with a thrust of this partizan through the body!"
This, writes Cobelli, the ballet-master historian, I heard, who was
there, listening and seeing everything in order to record it faithfully.
That night the faithful Ercolani contrived to gain admittance to
his mistress in her prison; and it was then concerted, that if, as
she anticipated, she were again taken to the fort on the morrow, to
repeat the scheme which had that day failed, she should attempt to
obtain permission to enter the fortress. To this end, Ercolani was
to communicate with Feo with the utmost secrecy, and give him the
necessary instructions for playing into Catherine's hands. He was to
seek an interview with the Cardinal also, and endeavour to persuade
him by feigning anxiety on account of the danger to Catherine from the
governor's obstinacy, that the surest means of inducing him to yield
would be to allow her to speak to him within the castle. He knew both
parties well enough, he assured his Eminence, to feel certain, that Feo
would not be able to resist his mistress, when brought face to face
with her.
The Cardinal had lately had that honour, and was inclined to think the
statement probable enough.
The following day, Catherine, as she had expected, was again taken
to the foot of the ramparts of the fortress by the conspirators,
accompanied this time by Savelli; and the _Castellano_ was again called
to parley.
The comedy of yesterday having been again performed between them, the
Cardinal demanded of the governor, whether he would obey his lady, if
she were to enter the fortress, and there give him the same orders, so
that he could have no pretext for supposing that she was acting under
constraint. To this Feo replied, that he could not say what he might do
under such circumstances, but should endeavour to act up to what should
then seem to be his duty. On her part, Catherine declared, that she was
sure she could induce him to yield, if only she could be permitted to
speak to him privately.
The Orsi and their friends were strongly against letting her out of
their hands, although she reminded them that she left her children as
hostages in their power. Cardinal Savelli, however, was for allowing
her to go in, and his counsel prevailed.
[Sidenote: WHAT WILL SHE DO?]
Catherine was permitted to enter the fortress alone, on the agreed
understanding, that, successful or not in prevailing upon the governor,
she was to come forth again in three hours.
Very exciting was the interest which kept all parties in the city on
the tip-toe of expectation during these important three hours. Both
among the well-wishers of the Countess, and among her enemies, opposite
opinions prevailed as to the probabilities of the issue. Money to a
great extent would have changed hands on the event, had the scene been
enacted among our bet-loving countrymen. The Forlìvesi passed the time
in ceaseless debate as to the course which the lady might, could,
would, or should adopt. The space before the ramparts of the castle
remained crowded with anxious groups of talking citizens during the
whole of the appointed interval. And the Orsi, and their more immediate
allies, consoled their shrewd misgivings, that their victim had escaped
them, by dark threats as to the fate of her children.
At length, the great bell on the Piazza told all Forlì that the three
hours were over. All rushed towards the castle to witness the variously
expected event. The sitting groups sprang to their feet; and a sudden
silence succeeded to the roar of a whole city's chatter, when, in
obedience to a summons from a trumpet, Feo appeared on the battlements.
And it is easy to imagine the burst of varied passions, which again
broke forth into a storm of voices, when that officer, with most
untroubled coolness, told them, that:—
"His liege lady was much fatigued by what she had gone through; that
immediately on her entry into the fort, he had counselled her to seek
repose; and that she was now, in fact, enjoying a sound sleep, from
which he could not think of disturbing her. That, as to her quitting
the fortress of Ravaldino in the present state of her city of Forlì,
he, governor of that fortress, judged it safer for her not to do so;
and, therefore, be her own intentions what they might, when she should
awake from her slumbers, he should in no wise permit her to go forth."
And so saying, the _Castellano_, calm, in the secure consciousness of
the perfect strength of his walls, retreated into their shelter.
His Eminence the Cardinal Savelli was angry enough at the dupery which
had been practised on him. But the Orsi, to whom the matter in hand was
a question of life, station, and property, were transported with fury.
Some of them hastened off to the gate-house prison, and soon returned
with Catherine's children. The imperturbable _Castellano_ was again
summoned to his ramparts, and ordered to inform the Countess[120] that
the lives of her children depended on the instant performance of her
compact.
Again he replied, that he would do nothing of the kind. As to the
children, who were there below in the hands of their father's
assassins, in mortal terror enough, poor things, and naturally urging
the governor with very earnest and sincere entreaties to give up the
fort and save their lives, he would merely advise the citizens of Forlì
to reflect a little before they suffered a hair of their heads to be
hurt. He reminded them, that these children were the nephews of the
powerful and neighbouring Duke of Milan, that the Lord of Bologna,
still nearer at hand, was their ally and connection; and told them to
ask of themselves whether, in the case of their cold-blooded murder, it
was not likely that the fate of Sodom and Gomorrah might be tolerable
compared with that, which would fall on Forlì.
[Sidenote: A VETERAN REVOLUTIONIST.]
The Cardinal Savelli, angry and provoked as he was, had certainly no
intention of really staining his hands with these children's blood.
The body of the citizens felt the truth of what Feo had said; and
eventually the boys and their sister were carried back to their prison
unhurt, though the Orsi and their accomplices were, says Burriel,
gnashing their teeth with baffled fury.
On the evening of that day, the 16th, while the Orsi and their friends
were at supper, and engaged in anxious discussion as to the next
steps to be taken, their father, who had retired from the city to his
country house a little before the murder of the Count, returned to
the Orsi palace. He was eighty-five years old, and in revolutionary
matters certainly might well be deemed a high authority, for this was
the seventh insurrection in which he had been engaged in Forlì. In all
the troubles, which had preceded the expulsion of the Ordelaffi, as
well as in all those which had succeeded the usurpation of the Riarii,
this turbulent old noble had always taken a leading part. Now, drawing
various examples from the treasures of his long experience, the old man
severely blamed his sons for leaving their work half done. Either they
ought to have never ventured on such a step as putting the Count to
death, or they ought to have extinguished his entire family. As it was,
he augured ill of the future, and feared that the having let Catherine
escape into a fortress perfectly impregnable by any means at their
command, would prove an irremediable and fatal error.
It was determined among them to send off messengers to Rome that night,
to lay the obedience of the city at the feet of the Pontiff, and urge
him to send immediate assistance in troops and munitions.
The 17th was occupied in hostilities, which caused much mischief and
suffering in the city, without the least advancing any solution of the
position. The Cardinal Legate brought up from Cesena all the troops he
could collect under the pontifical banner; but they had no efficient
means of attacking Ravaldino. On the other hand, Feo bombarded the
town, and left marks still pointed out centuries afterwards; and caused
many catastrophes, the subject of Forlì traditional talk for many a
year. But still nothing decisive was accomplished.
On the 18th, a herald from Bentivoglio, Prince of Bologna, arrived in
Forlì, and was received by Savelli and the heads of the revolutionary
party in the town hall. He came, he said, in the first place, to
warn the citizens on the part of his master, on pain of certain and
entire destruction of their city, to do no harm to the children of the
murdered Count; and secondly, to demand that Catherine should be placed
in liberty, and Octavian, the eldest son of Girolamo, proclaimed Count
of Forlì.
To these demands Savelli replied, that for the children there was
nothing to be feared: they were in perfect safety. As to the Countess,
she was in perfect liberty as far as the city authorities were
concerned; and all that was asked of her was to give up the citadel
and depart in peace. But as for proclaiming the late Count's heir,
sovereign of Forlì, that was wholly out of the question, even if the
city wished to do so; inasmuch as they had already declared themselves
the Pope's subjects, and had sent an embassy to Rome to lay their city
and their fealty at the feet of his Holiness. With which answer the
herald retired.
[Sidenote: THE ORSI AFFAIR LOOKS BLUE.]
But the mere appearance of this messenger from the Lord of Bologna had
produced an effect upon several of the citizens, which must have warned
the conspirators how little they could depend upon the steadiness or
support of the people. Many began to murmur against those who, they
already surmised, might be ultimately on the losing side; and Savelli
and the Orsi had to send many suspected of adhering to the Riarii out
of the city.
Catherine's sister Stella was taken from the Gatehouse prison to the
bedside of her betrothed husband Ricci, who was laid up by wounds
he had received in the fighting that had occurred in the palace
immediately after the murder; and having been there married to him, was
permitted to depart to Cesena in company with her mother Lucretia.
During this day, too, the Orsi, becoming more and more painfully
anxious about the issue of their enterprise, sent a letter to Lorenzo
de' Medici, asking his support against the family of his old enemy. But
on the 19th, the messenger came back, bringing only a verbal answer
from Lorenzo, to the effect that he had no surviving resentment on
account of by-gone matters to gratify—that he had no inclination to
meddle in such an affair as that proposed to him; and that he hoped and
purposed to pass the remainder of his days in quiet.
On the 20th, arrived two letters from the Duke of Milan, one to
Savelli, and one to the Comunità of Forlì. In the first the Duke
expressed his astonishment that the Cardinal should have ventured
to take possession of Forlì, not merely without any commission from
his Holiness, but, as there was every reason to believe, before
any knowledge of the recent events had reached the Papal court. He
admonished his Eminence, that he was acting in open disregard of all
law and every principle of justice; and concluded by very pointedly
advising him, as he would avoid further misfortunes, to return
forthwith to his own affairs at Cesena. The letter to the Comunità
in much the same terms advised the citizens, as the only means of
confining the consequences of the late excesses to the immediate
authors of them, to send away the Cardinal, and return at once to their
allegiance.
Savelli began to find himself in a difficult and disagreeable position,
and resolved on taking a strong, and what would appear to our ideas
a dangerous step. Since nothing came from Rome, neither troops,
nor authority of any kind for what he had done in the Pope's name,
his Eminence determined to forge the letter so urgently needed. He
accordingly produced a bull, which he declared had just reached him
from Rome, by which his Holiness thanked the Forlìvesi for their
affection towards the Church, accepted the allegiance of the city, and
promised to send troops with speed to support them in the course they
had taken. The fraud was, however, but partially successful for the
moment; for many, we are told, doubted of the authenticity of this bull
from the first.
[Sidenote: HOPES AND FEARS.]
The next day things looked still worse for the conspirators and their
ecclesiastical patron. Two heralds from Bentivoglio, and the Duke of
Milan, rode into the great square of Forlì, and publicly before the
people demanded, in the name of the Duke of Milan, that the children
of the late Count should be immediately brought to him; announcing
further, that a strong force was then on its march, and already within
a short distance of the city. Checco d'Orsi, who received them, replied
with the utmost insolence and audacity, that the children had already
been put to death, and that Forlì feared neither Bentivoglio nor
the Duke of Milan, as the Pope's troops would be there to help them
before the Milanese could reach the city. How much of this was mere
bravado, and how much inspired by real hope of succour from Rome, it
is difficult to say. But it became clear afterwards, that Innocent
VIII., who was a very different man from the aggressive Franciscan his
predecessor, had turned a completely deaf ear to the proposals of the
Forlìvesi, and the communications of his own legate; being determined,
as it should seem, in no wise to interfere in the matter. Indeed, when
the over-zealous legate Savelli was afterwards within an inch of being
hung by Catherine for his share in the revolution, Innocent abstained
from all interference even by remonstrance in his favour.
Thus matters went on till the 29th, the Milanese and Bolognese troops
gradually drawing near to the city, and Savelli and the Orsi becoming
daily more discouraged and alarmed at the non-appearance of the
expected assistance from the Pope. Once the sentine on the top of the
tower of the Palazzo Pubblico declared, that he saw troops coming
towards the city from the southward; and the news in an instant put the
declining cause of the conspirators once again in the ascendant with
the fickle populace. The whole city was ringing with cries of "Orso!
Orso! Chiesà! Chiesà!" when it was discovered that the supposed Papal
army was a body of fifty horsemen coming to the assistance of the
Countess; and the affections of the Forlì lieges again began to lean
towards their old masters accordingly.
Meantime Savelli battered the citadel with cannon brought from Cesena
and Forlimpopoli, and Feo battered the city from his rampart, but
without much mischief being done on either side.
On the 29th, the army of the Duke of Milan and the Bolognese were
before the walls of Forlì. A duly accredited envoy from the Duke
entered the town, and had a long secret interview with Savelli.
Communications passed also between Catherine in the fortress and her
friends outside the city. The fort of Ravaldino seems during the whole
time of the rebellion to have had free means of communication, for
ingress and egress, with the open country beyond the walls of the
city; so that Catherine might at any time have escaped had she not
preferred to hold the citadel. The preservation of her dominions,
and very possibly her life, were entirely due to the possession of
this stronghold. And the incidents of this rebellion in Forlì, which
may be taken as a very perfect type of hundreds of similar events
of constant recurrence in the history of the petty principalities
and municipalities of Italy in those centuries, throw a very
sufficient light on the paramount importance attached by the rulers
of those cities to the possession of such a place of refuge, and the
proportionably vast sums they expended in erecting and maintaining
them. The great difficulty in the matter always was to find some
_Castellano_ sufficiently trustworthy for it to be safe to confide the
fortress to his keeping. The great power arising from the absolute
command of a building so strong as to be impregnable to any means of
attack that citizens could bring against it, and from which the inmates
might do much damage to the city with very little danger of suffering
any injury themselves, was so great and so tempting, that the governors
of these fortresses were rarely to be depended on. It might be almost
said, that in cases of difficulty and temptation treachery was the
rule, and fidelity to the lord the exception. And it not unfrequently
occurred, that the _Castellano_ within his walls felt himself to be
more than a match for his master and sovereign outside them: a state of
things of which some of the episodes in the history of Forlì narrated
in these pages have shown us a few symptoms.
[Sidenote: THE ORSI ARE OFF.]
By the evening of the 29th, it was sufficiently evident that it was
all up with the hopes of the insurgents in Forlì. The game was clearly
played out and lost. To make their situation still more desperate, a
great number of written papers signed by Catherine were found scattered
about the great square and streets of the town soon after dusk that
evening. These contained strong exhortations from the Countess to her
faithful subjects of Forlì, to put summarily to death all the leaders
of the conspiracy before they could escape from the city; and promises
of favour and rewards to any man whose dagger should be the means of
making an end of any one of them.
The Orsi and their associates felt that the city was rapidly becoming
too hot to hold them. That night, in hurried council, they determined
on leaving Forlì secretly, before morning.
But there was one thing,—and the incident is strikingly illustrative
of the character of the country and the epoch, and of the undying
ferocity of Italian party hatred,—one thing to be done, even before
providing for their personal safety, fearfully endangered as it was by
every hour of delay. They determined that Catherine, on coming forth
triumphant from her fortress, should find herself childless; and feel,
in the moment of consummating her success, that it was worthless to her.
The six children were still at the gate-house in the care of the three
citizens to whom Savelli had entrusted them. In the early part of
the night, therefore, Checco d'Orso, Ronchi, and Pansecchi presented
themselves at the prison, with a fictitious order from Savelli that
the children should be given up to them to be conducted to a place of
safety out of the city. Fortunately for the little ones, Capoferri
conceived suspicions of the truth of the representations made to him,
and steadily refused to give up the children, despite the urgent
persuasions and threats of Orsi. The cautious triumvirate of the
gate-house had declined to admit within their walls more than him alone
of the party at the door. Checco, therefore, on finding himself thus
baffled, made a sign from a window to his comrades outside to force
an entrance at the moment of his passing out. Ronchi, seizing an axe,
approached the door for this purpose. But a sentinel on the wall above,
observing this hostile movement, fired down upon him and a servant, who
was with him, and killed the latter. Ronchi retired from the wall, and
at the same moment Orsi came out, and the gate was safely shut behind
him.
There remained nothing for the baulked desperadoes but to hurry, with
rage and despair in their hearts, to join the small body of relatives
and adherents, who had prepared to quit the city with them. They went
out, a party of seventeen, at two o'clock in the morning of the 30th
of April: and thus the revolution was at an end.
[Sidenote: HER ABLE CONDUCT.]
According to all medieval law, right, and custom, Forlì deserved to be
sacked in punishment for its rebellion; and it was not altogether easy
for Catherine to save it from the horrors of such a fate. For it might
be difficult to get rid of the troops who had come to her aid, if they
were baulked of their anticipated prey. The Countess announced to the
citizens that if she spared them this merited chastisement, she did so
solely for the sake of the women of Forlì; for the men had not deserved
mercy from her: and eventually, by prudence and caution, and permitting
only a very few of the soldiers to enter the walls, Forlì was saved
from sack.
One of the historians somewhat maliciously observes, that though he has
no doubt of Madama Caterina's merciful consideration for the women of
Forlì, still it was a fact, that all the vast quantity of plunder taken
from the palace after the murder of the Count, was scattered through
the city, and was subsequently nearly all recovered by the Countess;
whereas, if Forlì had been sacked, no fragment of all this wealth would
ever have been seen again.
And now, once again, we have pomps and processions, and complimentary
speeches, and smiles, and oaths of fealty, and gracious condescension.
The magistrates go in procession to Catherine in the fortress, with the
key of the city, and excuses, and compliments, and loud detestation of
the recent crime. And Catherine, on horseback between the generals of
the forces sent to support her, makes a triumphant entry into the city;
and there is an affecting meeting, with embracings and tears, between
the Countess and her children; and Ottaviano is proclaimed Count,
and "Madama," his mother, named regent; poor Girolamo is buried with
much pomp in Imola; every tongue has something now to tell in favour
of the lady regent:—did she not, when, surrounded by the Milanese and
Bolognese officers, she was taking formal re-possession in great state
of a fort outside the city, and when a man-at-arms rushed up to her in
the middle of the ceremony, to say with panting breath, "Madonna! all
the cellars of the Orsi are being plundered by the people! but I have
secured some of the largest butts of wine for your ladyship, and have
set a guard over them!"—did she not then and there, in the midst of
the stranger generals, graciously reply, that she preferred that the
poor people should share the wine among them, for that neither she
nor her children wished to possess anything that had belonged to the
Orsi!... and, in a word, all is sunshine once again, ... except in one
small cell of the Palazzo Pubblico, where a few of those who have made
themselves noted by their violence during the insurrection, and have
failed to escape in time from the city, are reserved for vengeance.
It is but just to Catherine's fair fame to note, that they were very
few; and further to remember, if their punishment excites our loathing,
that mercy was hardly recognised as a virtue, or known as a sentiment
in those "ages of faith." There were among them the man who had
thrown the Count's body from the window, and he who had been chiefly
prominent in dragging it through the city. There was also the veteran
revolutionist, Orsi, with his eighty-five years, long-flowing silver
locks, and noble patrician bearing. The unfortunate old man had been
left behind, when his sons and the others of the family had left the
city, probably because his great age made it impossible for him to join
in their hurried flight.
[Sidenote: VENGEANCE.]
On the 1st of May three of these prisoners were hung at the windows
of the Palazzo Pubblico, and then thrown thence into the square,
where they were literally torn to pieces, and the shocking fragments
left exposed till sunset, when they were collected and buried. The
brutalising effects of such spectacles on the entire mass of the
population is sufficiently indicated by the fact, that contemporary
public opinion considered the Countess to have used much and unusual
moderation in her dealings with such of the conspirators as fell into
her hands.
On the evening of that day an ominous decree was posted in all quarters
of the city, requiring that one able-bodied man from every family in
Forlì should attend on the morrow with pickaxe and crowbar in front of
the vast and magnificent palace of the Orsi. At daybreak on the 2nd of
May a great crowd, armed as had been ordered, were assembled. At the
same hour the venerable-looking head of the great Orsi clan was seen
coming forth from his prison on the piazza, bare-headed, with his long
silver locks glancing in the sunshine of that bright May morning, with
hands bound behind his back, and led by the hangman, holding the end
of a halter passed round the old man's neck. Thus led into the midst
of the crowd of his fellow-citizens, he was placed in front of his
ancestral home. And then the work of demolition was commenced.
"Have you well marked the spectacle, O Orso!" said the hangman to his
prisoner, when the work was done; and then led him by the halter back
to the piazza.
A cruel death awaited him there; but that which he had already endured,
was probably the bitterest part of his punishment to the old patrician.
That razing of the family mansion was infinitely more to a medieval
Italian noble, than the mere destruction of so much property; and
carried with it a bitterness of misery hardly appreciable to our less
clannish feelings, and less localised attachments. The old Italian
noble would have seen an equal amount of property destroyed at his
villa in the country, or at a residence in a foreign city, had he
possessed such, with comparative indifference. But the turreted family
"palazzo" in his native city, his fortress in time of civil broil, the
patriarchal home of several branches and generations of his race, the
manifestation and evidence of the rank and importance of his clan, was
more in his eyes than mere stone and timber. His strongest passion, his
family pride, saw in the old ancestral walls the corporeal presentment
of the family name. And the levelling of the massive building with the
soil, was the extremest ignominy an enemy could inflict, and was felt
by the doomed race as a symbol of the extinction of their name and
stock for ever.
These were the feelings in that old man's heart, when the hangman asked
if he had well observed the spectacle before him, as he led him away
to the one other scene that remained for him. In the piazza it was the
nerves of the old man's _body_ that were to be tortured.
A powerful horse was there ready prepared with a stout plank attached
to its tail. To this plank the Orso was bound in such a manner that the
feet were nearest to the horse, and the head passing beyond the length
of the board, fell back upon the stones. In this manner he was dragged
twice round the piazza; and then, though by that time nearly, if not
quite dead, his side was opened, the heart torn from the quivering
carcase, and rent to pieces before the people.
[Sidenote: THE MORROW AFTER EXECUTION.]
But it is probable, that all unpleasant traces of these things were
properly wiped away and removed, the next morning, when the Countess,
in procession, passed over those same flagstones, on her way to the
cathedral to "celebrate Te Deum," and do other appropriate "Divine
Service."