In the realms of death, we look for solitude and silence; on the battle-field, when the fight is done, and in the lone churchyard; but not within the beat and haunts of men. The foremost horseman halted his speed one moment as he advanced deeper into the cheerless scene. With every point in that prospect his eye had been familiar! it could not be all death—all darkness—all ruin—in a few short weeks? Here and afar—at hand and in the distance—it could not be that all were gone! There was surprise and impatience in the stranger’s look, rather than sadness:—alarm and incredulity, rather than woe or grief.
“Jacopo!” he exclaimed, turning hastily to his attendant—and speaking rather as a man who makes a comment than asks a question—“I see no light in the palace or gardens of the Orsini?”
The individual to whom this question was addressed followed his master’s eye slowly, as he raised himself from the pommel of his saddle. “Nevertheless, my lord,” he said, “they should be here, for they have not fled, although they retired beyond the walls of the city.”
“But the Vitrani too—their villa is all gloom?”
The reply was given in a more subdued tone. “It is too true, my lord! The Marchioness and both her daughters were among the first victims of the disease.”
“But it cannot surely be with all thus?” pursued Di Vasari, with increasing agitation. “This house—Cinthio da Pontelli’s?”
“There are weeds, my lord, in its garden; and the pedestals of its statues are grown green with moss.”
“But the Counts Di Bruno—Lord Vincent, and his brothers?” continued the alarmed inquirer.
“May be here, my lord; or may have fled; or may have perished,” returned the party questioned, “the last of them. They were living and safe two days since, when I set out for Arezzo; but half that time has made strange havoc in many a noble house, since your lordship quitted Florence.”
The stranger started as the last words fell upon his ear, from his own inward thought, as though an asp had stung him! Striking his strong horse on both sides with the spur, as one who had already paused too long, and suddenly recollected himself, involuntarily at the same instant he curbed the fierce animal with the rein, until it stood erect—striking at the air, and reared almost beyond the perpendicular. Then stooping low, with slackened bit, and signing to his companion to follow, the rider once more plied both scourge and steel, with the strong impulse of a man who strives by mere motion to escape from his own sensations. With hoof of speed, he scattered into foam the shallow brawling stream of the Mugnone: dashed onwards, and looked neither to the right nor left, through the picturesque villages of La Loggia and Benevento. At the convent of St Giovanni, the evening prayer was saying; but he bent on his steed’s neck as he passed; crossed himself; and again rode forward. The nuns of Spirito Santo sang a requiem for a departed sister: but though the lights beamed on his path through the stained windows of their chapel, he still kept on his way. By the shrine of Our Lady of Florence he pressed; and he saw it not, for he uttered no vow. He crossed the “Giustiziere,” or area of public execution; but had no time even to breathe an Ave for the souls of the thousands who had suffered upon it. Nor checked he in his long gallop, until entering the “Via di Querci”—the wide, fair avenue of trees, by which Florence is approached on the road which leads from Arezzo. This point at length being won, he held in his well-breathed horse, who still obeyed the rein with difficulty; and soothed the gallant brute with voice and hand, as they turned more slowly towards the Porta alla Croce, or eastern gate of the city.