will await that day when the deep shall yield up all
that is therein.

Some authorities state that a reward of ten thousand gold florins was
offered for his head, that his effigy was burnt with every mark of
opprobrium in the Piazza della Signoria, and that the rabble pulled his
house down and burnt out the site.

CHAPTER III

MARIA, GIOVANNI, AND GARZIA.

_A Father's Vengeance_

"I will have no Cain in my family!" roared out Cosimo de' Medici--"_Il
Giovane_," Duke of Florence, in the forest of Rosignano.

"A Medico of the Medici," prompt in action and suave in repose, his hand
flew to his sword hilt, and the cruel, cold steel of a father's wrath
flashed in the face of Heaven! Duchess Eleanora made one swift step
forward, intent upon shielding her child, but she stood there transfixed
with horror--her arms and hands outstretched to the wide horizon in
silent supplication, her tongue paralysed!

The kneeling boy grasped his father's knees, weeping piteously, and
crying aloud in vain for mercy. Thrusting him from him, and spurning him
with his heavy hunting-boot, he plunged furiously his gleaming blade
into his son's breast, until the point came out between his
shoulderblades!

With one expiring yell of agony and terror, Garzia de' Medici yielded up
his fair young life, the victim of inexorable fate. It was high moon,
and the watchful stars, of course, could not behold the gruesome deed,
but over the autumn sun was drawn a grey purple mist, and gloom settled
upon the Maremma. And as the elements paled and were silent, a hush
overspread wild nature, not a beast in the thicket, not a bird on the
bough, stirred. Sighs siffled through the bracken and the heather, and
the roar of the distant sea died away in moaning at the bar.

With a suffocating sob, as though stabbed to death herself, the Duchess
swooned upon the ground, and, whilst the courtiers in the company
hastened to her assistance, the huntsmen reverently covered the still
quivering body of the young prince with their embroidered livery cloaks.

Not much more than a mile away another corpse was being gently borne by
tender loving hands--it was Giovanni's, Garzia's elder brother, the
young Cardinal.

Giovanni de' Medici was dead--Garzia was dead; and two virgin souls were
winging their flight to join their murdered sister Maria in the Paradise
of Peace.

* * * * *

Cosimo, Duke of Florence, was the son of Giova