them to besiege Sarzana; but the place being very strong, before he
could carry it, he was obliged to build a fortress as near it as he
could. This new fort in two months' time rendered him master of the
whole country, and is the same fort that at this day is called
Sarzanella, repaired since and much enlarged by the Florentines.
Supported by the credit of so glorious an exploit, he reduced Massa,
Carrara, and Lavenza very easily: he seized likewise upon the whole
country of Lunigiana ... so that, full of glory, he returned to Lucca,
where the people thronged to meet him, and received him with all
possible demonstrations of joy.

It is, however, rather as the home of Nicholas V, I think, that Sarzana
appeals to us to-day, than as the stronghold of Castruccio. The tyrant
held so many places, as we shall see, his prowess is everywhere, but
Tommaso Parentucelli is like to be forgotten, for his glory is not
written in sword-cuts or in any violated city, but in the forgotten
pages of the humanists, the beautiful life of Vespasiano da Bisticci.
And was not Nicholas V. the first of the Renaissance Popes, the
librarian of Cosimo de' Medici, the tutor of the sons of Rinaldo degli
Albizzi and of Palla Strozzi? Certainly his great glory was the care he
had of learning and the arts: he made Rome once more the capital of the
world, he began the Vatican, and the basilica of S. Pietro, yet he was
not content till he should have transformed the whole city into order
and beauty. In him the enthusiasm and impulse of the Renaissance are
simple and full of freshness. Finding Rome still the city of the
Emperors and their superstition, he made it the city of man. He was the
friend of Alberti, the Patron of all men of learning and poets. "Greece
has not fallen," said Filelfo, in remembering him, "but seems to have
migrated to Italy, which of old was called Magna Graecia." Yet Tommaso
Parentucelli[11] was sprung of poor parent and even though they may have
been _nobili_ as Manetti tells us, _De nobili Parentucellorum
progenie_,[12] that certainly was of but little assistance to him in his
youth.

"Maestro Tomaso da Serezano," says Vespasiano the serene bookseller of
Florence, with something of Walton's charm--"Maestro Tomaso da Serezano,
who was afterwards Pope Nicholas V, was born at Pisa of humble parents.
Later on account of discord in that city, his father was imprisoned, so
that he went to Sarzana, and there gave to his little son in his