The corrupt condition of life in the convents throughout Italy at this time is not a matter of mere conjecture, for the facts are known in many cases and are of such a nature as almost to pass belief. One reason for this state of affairs is to be found in the character of the women who composed these conventual orders. It is natural to think of them as holy maidens of deep religious instincts, who had taken the veil to satisfy some spiritual necessity of their being; unfortunately, the picture is untrue. In many of these convents, and particularly in those where vice was known to flourish, the membership was largely recruited from the ranks of the nobility, it being the custom to send unmarried, unmarriageable, and unmanageable daughters to the shelter of a cloister, simply to get them out of the way. Women who had transgressed, to their own disgrace, the commonly accepted social laws, whether married or unmarried, found ready protection here; a professed nun was under the care of the Church and had nothing to fear from the state, and this fact was not unknown. To show how clearly this condition was understood at the time, it is interesting to note that when the scandal concerning the convent of Santa Chiara was first made public, an easy-going priest, who had acted as a go-between in many of these intrigues of the cloister, said that he could not see why people in general should create so much confusion about it, as these were only "affairs of the gentlefolk [cosi di gentilhuomini]"!
The public disgrace of Santa Chiara was due to the evil ways of one of its members, Sister Umilia, a woman who had had some experience in worldly things before she turned her back upon them. Her name was Lucrezia Malpigli, and, as a young girl, she had loved and desired to marry Massimiliano Arnolfini; but her parents objected, and she was affianced to the three Buonvisi brothers in consecutive order before she finally found a husband, the two older brothers dying each time before the wedding ceremony. After her marriage, to her misfortune, she met, at Lucca, Arnolfini, the man whom she had loved as a girl at Ferrara, and it soon appeared that the old love was not dead. Within a short time her husband was stabbed, by Arnolfini's bravo, as he was returning with her from the church, and rumors were at once afloat implicating her in the murder. Guilty or not, she was frightened, and before four days had passed she had taken refuge in the convent of Santa Chiara. Safe from all pursuit, she endowed the convent most liberally, cut her hair, and became the Sister Umilia, who was described as a "young woman, tall and pale, dressed in a nun's habit, with a crown upon her head." For thirteen years little was heard of her, and then a telltale rope ladder hanging from the convent wall led to disclosures of a most revolting nature. It was discovered that the supposedly pious nuns were profligates, the convent was a veritable den of iniquity, and Sister Umilia was found to have several lovers who were disputing her favors. Poisons had been sent to her by a young nobleman, Tommaso Samminiati, that she might dispose of a certain Sister Calidonia, who had become repentant and was threatening to reveal the secrets of their life; and the poisons were so deadly, so the letter ran, that when once Calidonia had swallowed a certain white powder, "if the devil does not help her, she will pass from this life in half a night's time, and without the slightest sign of violence." Penalties were inflicted upon all of these offending nuns, and Umilia was imprisoned for nine years before she was restored to liberty and allowed to wear again the convent dress.
However black this picture may appear, it is passing fair when compared with the career of the notorious Lady of Monza. Virginia Maria de Leyva was a lady of noble birth who had entered the convent of Santa Margherita, at Monza, where she had taken the veil, being induced to take this step because her cousin had in some way deprived her of her inheritance, and without a dowry she had not found marriage easy. In the convent, because she was well born and well connected, she became a person of much influence and received many callers. Adjoining the convent was the residence of young Gianpaolo Osio, a reckless, amorous dare-devil, who was beau comme le jour, as the French fairy tales say. So much of the story having been told, it is not difficult to guess what is to come. It was a case of love at first sight, and Osio was aided in his conquest by a number of the older and more corrupt nuns and several other people about the convent, not excepting the father confessor, who wrote some of Osio's love letters and seemed to smile upon the affair and wish it all success. Virginia yielded, as might have been expected under such circumstances; and the amour ran along smoothly for several years, until Virginia and Osio, with the help of four obliging nuns, felt constrained to take the life of a disgruntled serving-maid who was threatening to reveal all to Monsignor Barca, the inspector of the convent, at the time of his approaching visit. When once the deed was done, the corpse was dismembered for purposes of better concealment; but suspicion was aroused by this sudden disappearance of the maid, and Osio took Virginia from the place, to shield her as much as possible. Next, he offered to help her two most active accomplices, Ottavia and Benedetta, to escape and seek refuge in a Bergamasque convent, where they would be safe; but on the way thither he treacherously assaulted them and left them both for dead. One crime rarely covers up another, however; the facts soon came to light, and all concerned were fitly punished. Virginia was sentenced to perpetual imprisonment in the convent of Santa Valeria, at Milan; and there she remained for many years, in a dark cell, until she was finally given better quarters through the interposition of Cardinal Borromeo, who had been impressed by her growing reputation for sanctity. How old she grew to be, deponent saith not, but she must have lived for many years, as the following description will attest: "a bent old woman, tall of stature, dried and fleshless, but venerable in her aspect, whom no one could believe to have been once a charming and immodest beauty."
What an awful century it was! Vice and corruption in all quarters, the pope an acknowledged sinner, the nobility tainted, and even the holy daughters of the Church virgins in name only! And this was the century in which the most beautiful Madonnas were painted!
CHAPTER IX
THE BRIGHTER SIDE OF THE SIXTEENTH CENTURY
The tales of crime and sensuality which fill the annals of the sixteenth century are so repulsive that it is with a feeling of relief that we turn our attention to other pictures of the same time which are altogether pleasing in their outlines. The court of the Duke of Urbino is the most conspicuous example of this better side of life, and his talented and accomplished wife, Elizabetta Gonzaga, a daughter of the reigning house of Mantua, presided over a literary salon which was thronged with all the wit and wisdom of the land. Urbino was but a rocky, desolate bit of mountainous country, not more than forty miles square, in the Marches of Ancona, on a spur of the Tuscan Apennines, about twenty miles from the Adriatic and not far from historic Rimini, but here was a most splendid principality with a glittering court. Federigo, Count of Montefeltro, had been created Duke of Urbino by Pope Sixtus IV. in 1474, and he it was who laid the foundations for that prosperous state which at his death passed into the hands of his son Guidobaldo, the husband of Elizabetta. Federigo's immense wealth was not gained by burdening his subjects with heavy taxes, but rather from the money which he was able to earn as a military leader, for he was a noble soldier of fortune. Vespasiano tells us, with regard to his military science, that he was excelled by no general of his time, and his good faith was never questioned. He was also a man of singularly religious nature, and no morning passed without his hearing mass upon his knees. In his lifetime he served no less than three pontiffs, two kings of Naples, and two dukes of Milan; the republic of Florence and several Italian leagues had appointed him their general in the field, and in this long life of warfare the sums of money paid him for his services were immense. Dennistoun relates that in the year 1453 "his war-pay from Alfonso of Naples exceeded eight thousand ducats a month, and for many years he had from him and his son an annual peace-pension of six thousand ducats in the name of past services. At the close of his life, when general of the Italian league, he drew, in war, one hundred and sixty-five thousand ducats of annual stipend, forty-five thousand being his own share." With this wealth he caused his desert-like domain to rejoice and blossom as the rose. His magnificent fortified palace was most elaborately decorated with rare marbles and priceless carvings, frescos, panel pictures, tapestries, tarsia work, stucco reliefs, and works of art of all kinds; here, according to his biographer Muzio, he maintained a suite so numerous and distinguished as to rival that of any royal household. So famed indeed did Urbino become, that all the chivalry of Italy crowded the palace to learn manners and the art of war from its courteous duke.
Further details are furnished by Vespasiano, who says that "his household, which consisted of five hundred mouths entertained at his own cost, was governed less like a company of soldiers than a strict religious community. There was no gaming or swearing, but the men conversed with the utmost sobriety." It is interesting to know that among his court officers were included forty-five counts of the duchy and of other states, seventeen gentlemen, five secretaries, four teachers of grammar, logic, and philosophy, fourteen clerks in public offices, five architects and engineers, five readers during meals, and four transcribers of manuscripts. Federigo had ever shown himself a liberal and enlightened monarch, and he had early acquired a solid culture which enabled him, when he grew to manhood, to bestow his patronage in an intelligent manner. Scholars and artists were clustered about him in great numbers; Urbino was widely known as the Italian Athens, and as one of the foremost centres of art and literature in all Europe, when Elizabetta Gonzaga was wedded to Guidobaldo and became the chatelaine of the palace. The young duke and his wife began their life together under the most auspicious circumstances. From what his tutor, Odasio of Padua, says about his boyhood, it is evident that if he were alive to-day he could easily obtain one of the Cecil Rhodes Oxford fellowships, for we are told that he cared only for study and for manly sports, and that he was of an upright character. His memory was so retentive that he could repeat whole books, word for word, after many years, and in more ways than one he had displayed a wonderful precocity. Elizabetta, too, had been given a most liberal and careful education, and her ready intelligence was equalled only by her careful tact and her perfect savoir faire. Indeed, on account of her many attainments, personal charm, and her refining influence, which was far-reaching, she may be likened to that celebrated Frenchwoman Catherine de Vivonne, Madame de Rambouillet, whose hôtel was, a century later, such a rendezvous for the gentler spirits of France in that hurly-burly period which followed the religious wars. Endowed as she was by nature, it was by most fortuitous circumstance that she was called to preside over the court of Urbino, for at that time there was no other woman in Italy who was so fitted for such a distinguished position. It was in the last decade of the quattrocento that Elizabetta was married, and she found clustered about her from the very start illustrious artists and men of letters. Melozzo da Forli and Giovanni Santi--Raphael's father--were there, and there the early youth of Raphael was spent; Jan van Eyck and Justus of Ghent, the great Flemish painters, were also there, and the palace was adorned with many monuments to their skill. Here it was that Piero della Francesca had written his celebrated work on the science of perspective, Francesco di Giorgio his Trattato d'Architettura, and Giovanni Santi his poetical account of the artists of his time; and here it was in the first days of the sixteenth century that Elizabetta was the centre of a group which was all sweetness and light when compared with the prevailing habits of life.
In this circle were to be found, among others, Bernardo Bibbiena, the patron of Berni, of whom Raphael has left us a portrait which is now in the Pitti Palace; Giuliano de' Medici, whose marble statue by Michael Angelo may still be seen in San Lorenzo at Florence; Cardinal Pietro Bembo, who had in his youth fallen a victim to the charms of Lucrezia Borgia when she first went to Ferrara; Emilia Pia, the wife of Antonio da Montefeltro, who is described as "a lady of so lively wit and judgment, that she seems to govern the whole company"; and last, but far from least, Baldassare Castiglione, that model courtier and fine wit, who has left a picture of Urbino in his celebrated book Il Cortegiano, which was long known in Italy as Il Libro d'Oro. This volume is an elaborate discussion of the question, What constitutes a perfect courtier; and it was for a long time a most comprehensive and final compendium, handbook, and guide for all who wished to perfect themselves in courtly grace. What interests us most in the book, however, is the fact that Castiglione has put this discussion of polite manners into the form of a conversation which he supposes to have taken place in the drawing room of the Countess of Urbino, that being the most likely spot in all Europe for such a discussion at such a time, for Guidobaldo's court was "confessedly the purest and most elevated in all Italy." Castiglione was one of Elizabetta's most ardent admirers, and he says of her that no one "approached but was immediately affected with secret pleasure, and it seemed as if her presence had some powerful majesty, for surely never were stricter ties of love and cordial friendship between brothers than with us."