did not consider himself exempted from all concern in the welfare of his subjects. We accordingly find, in a collection of his letters made by his secretary Babucci,[116] a very long remonstrance addressed to Cardinal Gessi regarding certain malversations in the management of public affairs. His complaints were directed against abuses of patronage, by conferring places of trust upon young and inexperienced persons, especially in the army, where many officers were rather children than soldiers; against a laxity of manners and conversation among the women, extending even to the nunneries; against the indiscriminate bearing of arms, which had already led to numerous homicides, and to the extirpation of game in the preserves. To Campeggi, the next governor, he complains, in 1628, of an increasing expenditure with impaired revenues.
[CHAPTER XLVIII]
The Duke’s monkish seclusion—His Death and Character—His Portraits and Letters—Notices of Princess Vittoria and her Inheritance—Fate of the Ducal Libraries—The Duchy Incorporated with the Papal States—Results of the Devolution.
AFTER his release from the cares of state, and from all anxiety as to the fate of his subjects and of his granddaughter, Francesco Maria was left to employ his unimpaired powers of mind on more congenial topics. His few remaining years were passed in the society of those monks of the order of Minims,[*117] whom he had brought to the new convent, and who had been selected for their literary acquirements. He made them the companions and aids of his studies, and discussed with them such subjects as his reading suggested. Though ever respectful of the doctrines and observances of religion, fanaticism had no part in his character; and it is clear from his last will, and other evidence, that, in circumstances peculiarly favourable to an undue exercise of priestly influence, he kept himself free from its thraldom. Yet was he exemplary in pious preparation for the change which his sinking frame, as well as his philosophy, taught him to regard as at hand. To blighted hopes, parental anguish, and a desolate old age, were added great bodily sufferings. Gout, to which he had been subject from his thirty-fourth year, had by degrees so twisted his limbs that he was fed like a child, and a fresh paralytic seizure at length completed his decrepitude. Still, amid
"The waste and injury of time and tide,"
his mind continued unclouded. To the end his letters maintained their clear and graceful style; and the frequent correspondence he kept up with his granddaughter, a child in years rather than in ideas, formed the latest link that connected his thoughts and hopes with mundane objects. Of this correspondence, so creditable to the hearts of the writers, a few specimens will be found at p. [220].
The registers of the Roman convent of Minims of S. Lorenzo[*118] enable us to trace the closing scenes of the old man's feeble existence. During the autumn of 1630 a change took place, and he was chiefly confined to bed during the subsequent winter. The rapid decay of his digestive organs was accelerated by rigid fastings during Lent, in which he persisted despite of his confessor's remonstrances. From the debilitating effects of this discipline, exhausted nature could not rally; but life ebbed so slowly, that four days elapsed after extreme unction had been administered, ere his flickering pulse was still. At length, on the 28th of April, 1631, he passed away, bewailed by his subjects, regretted by all Italy. To the citizens of Castel Durante his death was an especial bereavement. "They wept for a beloved father, the chastener of the bad, the rewarder of the good, the stay and advocate of the poor, the protector of the orphan, the support of the weak and oppressed, the consoler of the afflicted, the benefactor of all."[119] Thus deprived of the glorious and desired shade and shelter of their goodly OAK, which, transplanted from the Ligurian shores, had branched out so boldly in their mountain soil, his people saw their independence extinguished, and their position in provincial insignificance riveted for ever.
He lay in state during two days, arrayed in the ducal mantle of silver tissue lined with purple taffetas; on his head a coronet of gold surmounted the velvet cap of maintenance; the collar of the Fleece was on his neck, the ring on his finger, the sceptre in his hand. In these trappings of sovereignty, a last tribute to the station which he had quitted for ever, and which none remained to fill, he was by his own desire interred. Seven years before, he had prepared for himself an unornamented tomb under the holy-water vase in the church of the Crucifixion, at Castel Durante. There he chose his final resting-place, amid sites endeared as the scene of his youthful sports, the relaxation of his busy manhood, the retreat of his chastened age. Thither he was escorted by a procession of five hundred gentlemen, besides a numerous attendance of priests and monks. Each of the latter received a scudo and a pound of wax; and by one of them, Padre Ludovico Munaxho, the funeral oration was pronounced. At his own desire, this prayer, from the liturgy of his church, was inscribed under the front, in lieu of epitaph:—"O Lord, incline thine ear to our prayers, wherein we supplicate thy mercy, and that thou wouldst establish in peace, and in the realms of the elect, the soul of thy servant Francesco Maria II., Duke of Urbino, which thou hast summoned from this life, and that thou wouldst ordain it to be received into the company of thy saints, through Christ our Saviour. Amen. He died in the year of God MDCXXXI., and of his age LXXXIII."