“Why, Tribune, I am an honest man, but I have a large family to rear.”
“Enough; enough!” said the Tribune quickly; and then he added abstractedly as to himself, but aloud,—“Methinks we have been too lavish; these shows and spectacles should cease.”
“What!” cried Cecco; “what, Tribune!—would you deny the poor fellows a holiday. They work hard enough, and their only pleasure is seeing your fine shows and processions; and then they go home and say,—‘See, our man beats all the Barons! what state he keeps!’”
“Ah! they blame not my splendour, then!”
“Blame it; no! Without it they would be ashamed of you, and think the Buono Stato but a shabby concern.”
“You speak bluntly, Cecco, but perhaps wisely. The saints keep you! Fail not to remember what I told you!”
“No, no. It is a shame to have an Emperor thrust upon us;—so it is. Good evening, Tribune.”
Left alone, the Tribune remained for some time plunged in gloomy and foreboding thoughts.
“I am in the midst of a magician’s spell,” said he; “if I desist, the fiends tear me to pieces. What I have begun, that must I conclude. But this rude man shews me too well with what tools I work. For me failure is nothing, I have already climbed to a greatness which might render giddy many a born prince’s brain. But with my fall—Rome, Italy, Peace, Justice, Civilization—all fall back into the abyss of ages!”
He rose; and after once or twice pacing his apartment, in which from many a column gleamed upon him the marble effigies of the great of old, he opened the casement to inhale the air of the now declining day.