A Decade of Italian Women, vol. 1 (of 2)

by Thomas Adolphus Trollope

This wicked will was not, however, so completely vanquished as to prevent the accused, though not convicted, Countess from being immediately transferred from the Belvidere to the castle of St. Angelo; to the prisons of which ill-omened fortress she was consigned on the 26th of June.

And all the probabilities of the case seem to indicate that the accusation was trumped up merely to justify this change in the Countess' place of confinement. Catherine, while she lived, was likely to be ever as tormenting a thorn in the side of Cæsare Borgia, as the ousted Ordelaffi pretenders had been in hers, even during the Pontiff's life. And after that, when the new sovereign of Romagna would have to maintain himself in his position unaided by Apostolic influence, she would be a far more dangerous enemy. Yet the rank and connections of Catherine, and her own reputation and character and standing among the princes of Italy were such, that it was requisite to proceed warily in any attempt to get rid of her. A good pretext was necessary to justify even the rigour of imprisoning her in St. Angelo. But that step taken, the rest would not be so difficult. Those once hidden in the dreadful vaults of that huge mass of old Roman masonry, were too completely cut off from all communication with the outer world, for there to be any possibility of marking their passage from the living tomb, to the veritable grave within its walls. Papal dungeons reveal no secrets; and there can be little doubt that, but for the interposition of an arm more powerful than that of the Pontiff, Catherine would never have recrossed that threshold passed by so many unreturning feet.

HER RESPECT FOR THE POPE.

As to the real guilt of our heroine in this matter, it must be admitted that the presumption in her favour rests more on the improbability of the means said to have been selected by her, and on the incredibility of Alexander's having suppressed all mention of the crime for four months, rather than on any conviction that she would have been incapable of any such atrocity. That Catherine would without hesitation or scruple take human life—nay, many human lives—on the provocation of wrong much lighter than that received by her from the Pontiff, is clear enough; but it is true, that many, most probably, of her contemporaries, who would have never thought twice of sending burgher or peasant to the rack or gallows in a fit of passing passion, would have shrunk from poisoning a Pope. The atrocity of the deed, in the estimation of the contemporary writers, is derived from the sacred character and high rank of its object. And these are considerations which, it may be fairly supposed from what we have seen of Catherine, would be likely to influence her less than they might have done others. It is difficult to believe that Popes were very sacred personages in her eyes. She had been too much behind the scenes to be much under the influence of stage illusion. And, in a word, it will be felt, if the foregoing pages have at all succeeded in picturing this masterful woman to the reader as she appears to the writer, that she was not likely to have turned away from any means that presented themselves to her of removing out of her path any individual, be he who he might, whose existence seemed fatal to the objects for which she had lived and struggled.

Nevertheless, for the reasons above stated, it seems more probable that the accusation in question was trumped up for the sake of furnishing an opportunity to the Pope of taking her life, which was almost as dangerous to his aims, as his life was to her. And had it not been for the powerful interference of the French king, doubtless Catherine would never have come out alive from the dungeons of St. Angelo. One of the historians[145] simply says that she owed her life to the protection of France. Things were not in a position to render it possible that Alexander should act in defiance of the remonstrances of Louis XII.; and Catherine was liberated on the 30th of June, 1501.

Having remained at Rome a few days among her relatives and connections of the house of Riario, she left it for the last time on the 27th of July, and went to Florence. All her children by her three husbands had already found an asylum there; where, in consideration of her third marriage, rights of citizenship had, by an instrument bearing date the 27th of July, 1498, been conferred on all of them.

It is not without a certain feeling of surprise that one remembers that Catherine, after a career so full of incident, comprising three married lives and three widowhoods, was now only thirty-nine years of age. The active and useful portion of many an existence begins at as late a period. But Catherine seems to have felt that she had lived her life, and that the active portion of her career was over. Almost immediately on arriving in Florence, she selected the convent of the Murate as the place of her retirement; and she never afterwards quitted it.

More than one change in the political world occurred during the years she passed there, which seemed calculated to make a place for her once again upon the great scene of Europe, and perhaps to open a path for her return to sovereign place and power. Alexander VI. died in 1503; and, after a few months' occupation of the Papal throne by Pius III., Giuliano della Rovere, first cousin of Girolamo Riario, was elected and became Pope under the name of Julius II. It is true that this warrior Pope did not subsequently appear disposed to lend any helping hand to his Riari cousins for the recovery of their dominions; but the elevation of a cousin to the chair of St. Peter might well call forth from the cloister one who had any wish remaining to play a part in the world.

AT THE MURATE.

But Catherine remained quiet in the monotonous repose of her cell in the Via Ghibellina, and did not disturb herself to make even the smallest attempt at obtaining the favour of the new Pontiff. It must be concluded that she had in truth abandoned the world, with an earnestness of purpose more durable than is usually the case with such votaries of seclusion.