Like other innovations in similar matters, this new costume, we are told, gave much offence to the more austere among those who never in their own day had enjoyed any such opportunity of displaying their charms, and who were now too old to profit by it.[73] For, instead of being made to fit close round the throat, the "Cyprian" was contrived to show the entire neck. These dresses were cut square on the bust, were extremely full around the feet, close-fitting from the waist upwards, and had very long and large sleeves. Some ladies would have even three of these celebrated robes: one of blue, one of crimson, and one of watered camblet—"zambellotto undato"—lined with silk or with mixed furs. Beautifully thin and fine veils of white cotton were worn; and the hair was drawn back over hair-cushions, and tied with strings of silk ornamented with gold or with pearls. A girdle of silver gilt or of pearls confined the dress at the waist.
HER ROMAN RESIDENCE.
We may be perfectly sure, that the daughter of Sforza and bride of Riario displayed whatever was most costly and most superb, as she passed from the Porta del Popolo to the princely residence of her husband on the Lungara, that long street which runs along the farther bank of the river from St. Peter's to the Porta Settimana. There the Riarii inhabited the spot now marked on the maps as the Palazzo Corsini. Two hundred and fifty years further down on the roll of pontiffs the latter name is met with;[74] the place of the magnificent Riarii knows them no more; and the change of masters, which those delicious terraces, looking down on the Farnese palaces and gardens,—the creations of another Papal[75] family intermediate in time between the Riarii and the Corsini—have undergone, is a quite normal illustration of the working of a system, which is the leading fact of Rome's modern history.
In this magnificent home on the banks of the Tiber, Catherine spent four happy, prosperous, and brilliant years;—probably the most happy, the most prosperous, and the most brilliant of her career. Never, perhaps, since the old times of a Marozia and a Theodora, whose boundless and shameless power in the eternal city had given rise to the fable of a female Pope, had a woman occupied a position of so much power and pre-eminence in Rome. She very shortly became an all-powerful favourite with her uncle (or father-in-law) Sixtus. All Rome was absolutely at her feet. Courtiers in search of favour, litigants in search of justice—(or injustice)—officials in search of promotion, brought their petitions and applications to her. The most important employments were often given according to the recommendations of this girl in her teens, as Burriel[76] assures us, without manifesting the shadow of an idea, that there was anything objectionable in such a mode of administering the Papal power. At this period of her life, writes another[77] chronicler, she was so great a favourite with the Pope, that most of the princes of Italy, who had any request to make of the Apostolic see, availed themselves of the intercession of Catherine for the attainment of their desires.
Though apparently totally unaware, that all this was in any way otherwise than it should have been, the old writers tell us much of Catherine's prudence, discretion and moderation in wielding and managing the great power so strangely entrusted to such hands. We have no recorded facts adducible in direct proof of the justice of this high praise. But we may find some evidence in support of it from the observation of our heroine under adversity; for which some later portions of her career will afford abundant opportunity. Assuredly there must have been materials of high and noble quality in a nature not wholly corrupted and spoiled by such an education and such environment in childhood and in youth, as that which fell to the lot of this young princess.
THE ORDELAFFI.
Dark days were not far distant; but all as yet in her life had been rose-colour:—or purple-tinted rather; for the more modest hue seems hardly gorgeous enough to typify the blaze of prosperous sunshine which had hitherto illumined her path. And now, during these years at Rome, though they had been sufficiently marked already as the minions of fortune, the star of the young couple was still ever rising.
On the 15th of December of the year in which Catherine arrived in Rome, her husband was with much ceremony and speechifying made a citizen of the eternal city.[78]
On the 4th of September 1480, the same fortunate youth received from the Pope investiture of the city and county of Forlì;[79] of which the Duke of Urbino, general of the forces of the Church, took possession in his name. This city, now the capital of a delegation, and one of the most important towns of Romagna, was conveniently situated with regard to the principality of Imola, already acquired by Girolamo in right of his wife. Forlì is some sixteen miles to the south-east of the latter town, in the same rich and highly productive alluvial district, which lies between the Apennines and the Adriatic. It had long been under the dominion of its native lords, of the family of the Ordelaffi. The story of their ousting, with its episodes of poisoning, fighting, love-making, and plotting, though curious enough, would lead us too far away from our more immediate subject. Suffice it that the upshot was the same, as it was in so many other similar cases. The Pope declared that the old family had forfeited their rights, that the fief had devolved to the Holy See; and, accordingly, handed it over to his nephew-son.