objects. Possessed of great self-command and reticence, he never
betrayed himself in any way; passionate he was beyond the ordinary, but
never revengeful. He loved one woman, and only one, and to her he proved
himself faithful until death took them away together; but she was not
Giovanna, his political wife, she was Bianca, the wife of his heart and
mind.

Next to his love of Bianca was his love of money: no prince of his house
was ever half so wealthy or so sparing. Avarice came to him through the
rapacity of Giovanna's German followers and through her own
extravagance.

The year after his marriage, Bianca Buonaventuri was introduced at Court
as Bianca Cappello. The young Duchess of course was furious, and
pointedly refused all intercourse with her rival. Bianca, on the other
hand, laid herself out to propitiate the dour Austrian princess and to
stifle slander. Still a mere girl, she was in full command of all the
moves in woman's strategy. There was no school like that of Venice for
the display of tact and fascination. To be sure, she was living in a
crystal palace, but she was perfectly ready to repair all damages.
Bianca was severely upon her guard, and her conduct was perfectly
correct in every way.

Very rarely did young Cardinal Ferdinando visit Florence, but in 1569,
Cosimo, his father, sent for him, that he might embrace him before he
died, being, as he thought, on the point of death. At the magnificently
immoral Court of the Vatican he had heard the gossip about the lovely
Venetian girl who had so completely captured his brother Francesco.
Quite naturally, the by no means ascetic young ecclesiastic desired
greatly to see for himself the Venetian charmer, and he journeyed to
Florence, bent upon judging for himself.

Francesco greeted Ferdinando quite affectionately--there was no reason
why he should not--and unhesitatingly introduced him to Bianca. At the
impressionable age of twenty, the young Prince fell at once under the
spell of those bewitching eyes. Who could resist her? In the fulness of
her womanhood Bianca Buonaventuri was without rival among the fair women
of Florence, and the boy-Cardinal made, like all the rest, impassioned
love to her.

Back again in Rome and busy with his plans for the great Medici Palace
in the Eternal City he lost none of his admiration for his brother's
"Flora," till evil tongues began to wag around him. Was not he,
Ferdinando, Don Francesco's heir-presumptive? Duchess