Isabella Orsini: A Historical Novel of the Fifteenth Century

by Francesco Domenico Guerrazzi

And the Duke:

"Why did you save us? Who told you to? Who asked you to? We should all have sunk to the bottomless pit without noticing it."

Troilo and the others looked askance at him as they passed. The honest man stood confounded. Last of all came Don Inigo, so very dark, with his pallid face and fierce glance. If to the eyes of the ferryman the others had appeared demons, this man seemed Satan himself; in his heart he gave up all hope of the expected buona mano; nevertheless, according to his custom, he moved forward to ask it, but his voice died away on his lips. Don Inigo fixed upon him two such eyes that the frightened boatman retreated two or three steps, and as Don Inigo continued to advance, without changing a muscle of his face, he still retreated. Don Inigo thrust his hand into his doublet, and the other, fearing that he was about to draw his dagger or poniard, gave himself up for lost: but instead, he drew forth two bright pistoles and held them out to him. The ferryman hardly dared to trust himself, but the love of money overcame his fear: he approached tremblingly, and stretched forth his open hand. Don Inigo dropped the pistoles into it without speaking; the other received them holding his breath; then, each turning away from the other, the ferryman set off at a full run, and did not consider himself safe until he was actually in his boat. When there he opened his hand, suspecting that the money had turned to lead, which generally happens, according to popular superstition, with money coined in the infernal mint; but they still seemed of gold, as they had done at first: at any rate, he put them carefully away in his purse, exclaiming:

"I will have them blessed, for if it was not the devil and all his imps that I have just ferried over, I am not the ferryman of Petroio!"

At last they have reached Cerreto-Guidi; at last they have reached the foot of the steep flight of steps by which they wearily mount to the country-seat at the top.

Country-seat! Yes, certainly, for thus that block of buildings was then called, and always will be called, which was once the property of Isabella Orsini at Cerreto-Guidi. There nature smiles most brightly, and shows herself most joyful, and notwithstanding, man, placing his fatal hand upon it, has succeeded in rendering it the abode of terror: a hill, which, if left untouched, would have been a most beautiful and charming sight, has been bound with brick and stone, and converted into a fortress. Four very steep staircases, two on each side, lead to the top; the two first form an angle at the foot of the hill, and then part, the one to the right, the other to the left; the two second begin where these end, and reunite in an angle before the lawn in front of the palace. The walls come down perpendicularly, built of brick of so bright a tint that even now they appear as if stained with blood; the bosses, the stairs, and the copings of the parapets are of Gonfalina stone; the two first staircases have forty-two steps, each of which is more than a foot broad; the second, forty-three; the cliff beneath is excavated, with tortuous, subterranean passages winding through it. In the centre of the wall rests an immense escutcheon, also of stone; but the Medicean balls,[53] either the effect of time or "the work of men's hands," have fallen, as the family of the Medici has fallen, as their power has fallen, as all the great ones of the earth will fall, into the sepulchre. To some sooner, to some later, but to all fatally, will the Autumn come, for we are leaves attached to the tree of time, and time itself is a perishing leaf of eternity. But when men have fallen and their age has passed away, fame remains, which, although it may grow old and infirm, never dies; and even if sometimes late, always reaches posterity, to recount the vices and virtues of those who have passed from earth. Despotic potentates have lived, who have torn out its tongue, and thought thus to silence it, but the tongue of fame springs again like the head of the Hydra, and God does not permit a Hercules to rise against it, for He has sent it upon earth as a precursor of His own delayed but inevitable justice.

The palace contains a vast hall on the ground-floor; at the further end of it there is an arch, at the right of which a broad stone staircase leads to the first story.

Just on the right hand of the entrance is a suite of apartments. Enter, cross it, and you will find a corner room; one side looks to the south, that opposite to the door to the west. There is now but one window to the room; at the time of our history there were two; the second opened to the west. There are two doors; one large and in full view, the other small and secret, and formerly covered by tapestry of green damask. The room is ten feet by seven. In the wall is a large press, which is not readily perceived by the careless observer: looking up to the entablature, we find that there are sixteen small joists resting upon one principal beam. But it is not to count beams and joists that I turn your attention to the ceiling: indeed no; look carefully, and there, under the principal beam, by the third cross-beam from the western side, you will observe a small round hole.

Remember this room and this hole. Two hundred and seventy-eight years have now passed since that hole appeared there.

Cerreto (an oak grove) received its name from the abundance of green oaks (Cerri) that shaded the hill and the surrounding country for a long distance, as Frassineto (an ash grove) from the ash trees (Frassini), and Suvereto (a wood of cork trees) from the corks (Sugheri), and Rovereto (a male oak grove) from the male oaks (Roveri). Where are the oak trees now? The eye of the passer-by seeks in vain for a tree beneath whose shade to shelter his burning head from the sun's scorching glare; and not at Cerreto alone, but throughout all Tuscany, and even upon the lofty peaks of the Apennine range, trees are to the present day but seldom seen. Oh! sad is the necessity which compels us to deprive the earth of so noble an ornament! The forests have disappeared, and with them the Dryads, the Hamadryads, the Fauns, the Oreads, and the other lovely families with which the fancy of the poets peopled them; the forests have disappeared, and with them the Knights Errant, the tournaments, the chivalrous enterprises, the fairies, the dwarfs, and the Queens of Beauty, with whom the imaginations of the romancers gladdened their sylvan haunts. The nymphs of the woods followed mourning to see the beloved trees, and recommended them to the care of the ocean goddesses, as if they had been best beloved children; and the ocean goddesses cared for them, fashioned them into ships, adorned them with sails as purely white as the wings of the swan, gave them the swiftness of the albatross, and the shining beauty of the halcyon; then with their hands and shining shoulders they pushed the stern, and the favoring winds, vieing with the nymphs, swelled the sails, and took pleasure in spreading to the azure sky the banner of our land.