Leaving Milan—La Bicocca—Francis the First—Francis Sforza—Black Bands of Giovanni de’ Medici—Lautrec—An intrigue—Samblançay—The king prisoner—Samblançay falsely accused—Condemned to be hanged at Montfaucon—His death deferred till dark, in expectation of the king’s relenting—His last words resembling Wolsey’s—Lodi—The Austrians—Imprecations—The serenade—Doubts as to the road—Piacenza—A thirsty douanier—The cathedral—Alberoni—A bell-ringer—The Farnese—Pier Luigi’s murder—Statues on the piazza—Alessandro—His son Ranuccio—His danger in youth—His escape—His cruelty—His treatment of his son—Borgo St. Donnino—Maria Louisa—Castel Guelfo—Origin of names of Guelph and Gibelline—Parma—Madonna in the stable—A lamp serving two purposes—A procession seeking a criminal—Cambacérès—Ariosto—A robber’s love of poetry—Correggio—Modena—The countess Matilda—The Emperor Henry the Fourth—Canossa—Three days unsheltered in the court-yard—Rubiera—Modena

[CHAPTER VIII.]

243

Pic de la Mirandole—Castel Franco—Bologna—A bad inn left for La Pace—Its mistress—Statue of Pope Julius the Second—St. Petronio—Mistake of a learned man—Charles the Fifth—Here crowned King of Lombardy—King Enzio—His peasant-love—His twenty years’ captivity—The origin of a name—The towers—Accademmia—St. Cecilia—The cathedral—Temple dedicated to Isis—Papal troops—A capitulation—Cholera—An Italian hospital—French soldiers—The procession barefoot—The well-attested miracle—The Appennines—Lojano—The Pellegrino—Filigare—Pietra Mala—Strange properties of its fire and cold spring—Fruit—Montecarelli—St. Antonio’s grapes—Palazzo Borghese—Hôtel du Nord—Jerome Bonaparte’s cook—Piazza della Santa Trinità—Spot occupied by the Palazzo degl’ Uberti left vacant—Recording escutcheons—The Saviour, king of Florence—The Loggia—Galleria de’ Medici—Piazza del Duomo—The Baptistery—Work of Ghiberti at twenty years old—Chains of the gates of Pisa—A funeral

[CHAPTER IX.]

274

The Duomo—Its interior—Michael Angelo’s farewell—Vasari—Congress of artists convoked—A dome of pumice stone—Brunelleschi turned out as a madman—The egg—His colleague Ghiberti—His feigned illness—The difficulties divided—Height of the dome—Giotto—The Campanile—Pietro Farnese—His gilded mule—Dante—Condemned to be burned at the stake—Peter of Toledo-Conrad the traitor—The sacristy—The Pazzi—Julian murdered—Salviati hanged in his cardinal’s robes—Seventy executions—The artist nicknamed Andrea of the Hanged—The baptistery—The withered elm restored—The story of Joseph—John the Twenty-third from pirate become pope—Palazzo Riccardi—Gardens of Lorenzo—Michael Angelo—The Strada del Traditore—Lorenzino—The duke Alessandro—Made unpopular through his vices—The plot—Anecdote told by Benvenuto Cellini—The rendezvous—The murder—Lorenzino assassinated in turn—The Galleria—The Palazzo Pitti—Cosmo—His sons’ quarrel—The eldest killed by his brother—The father’s revenge—His wife poisoned—Duke Francesco and Bianca Capello—Her story and death

[CHAPTER X.]

311

Boboli Gardens—Buondelmonte—Ponte Vecchio—Santa Croce—Palazzo Borgo—Tombs—Michael Angelo’s monument—Died the year Galileo was born—Machiavelli—Alfieri—Galileo dying the year in which Newton was born—Chapel of the Pazzi—San Lorenzo—Monument of Cosmo, Pater Patriæ—Michael Angelo’s Day and Night—Contradictory employments—His reply to a verse addressed to his statue—Cappella dei Principi—Santa Maria Novella—Cimabue’s Virgin—Cappella de’ Spagnuoli—Portraits of Petrarch and Laura—Turned out by a friar—Pietre Dure—Our guide again—Sarcophagus of the Gran Duchessa—Shut up in a private oratory—Let out by a priest—Cascine—Palazzo Vecchio—Small tower-chamber prison of Cosmo—Savonarola—His prediction of Lorenzo’s death—The confession—The anathema—Trial by fire—The heavy rain—Savonarola executed—The Appennines—Birthplace of the Maréchale d’Ancre—Tre Maschere—Fog—Rain—Lojano—Crosses—Bologna—Grizzle’s attack on the kitchen—Miss Kemble—Modena—The ducal stable—The stuffed charger—Parma—The five saints canonized in May—Their claims to canonization