early spring of 1494. The young leafage shimmered like a veil of golden
gauze, the poplar buds were pink and brown, the chestnuts had all their
candles afire; larks by dozens were abroad in the clear sky. Below the
old Rocca del Capitan Vecchio--a grizzled and blind block of masonry on
a spur of limestone, which held not a few of Ezzelin's secrets--two
miles from Nona, stood a company of boys and girls in white garments,
their laps full of flowers. Their shrill song of welcome hailed the
riders, and to the same hopeful music they went on. The towers were all
standing in those days, the battlements intact; at every gate stood a
guard. The Cathedral of the Santi Apostoli had no Apostles; its great
front was a cube of unfinished brick; but colonnades ran in all the
streets, row after row of beautifully ordered arches; over them were
jutting cornices enriched with dancing children, sea monsters, tritons,
dolphins, nymphs blowing conches, Nereus, Thetis, and all their sleek
familiars, moulded in red clay. The fountain shone, the displayed Graces
jetted their crystal store; from every window hung carpets, on every
tower a gonfalon, from every church belfry came the riot of bells. The
people were massed at the gates, at the windows, on roofs and loggias
and balconies--a motley of orange and blue, crimson and green. Soldiers
lined the ways, priests with banners were on the steps of their
churches. "Evviva, Amilcare! Evviva, Madonna Inglese!" ran like a river
of sound from the gates about the streets, until, in the Piazza Grande,
where the Signoria waited in the solemn estate of brocade and ermine,
the volume of it had the throbbing roll of breakers on a cliff. Thud
upon thud came "Evviva!" each with a shock which made pale Molly catch
her breath; more than once or twice her eyes swam, and she felt herself
wag helpless in the saddle. But Amilcare, snuffing wine, was in his
glory, idol of a crowd he despised and meant to rule. Proud he looked
and very greatly a ruler, firm-lipped, with a high head, and a flush on
his dark cheeks.

At the steps of the Palazzo della Ragione he halted, cap in hand. The
trumpeters shrilled for silence, the Secretary of the Republic read a
Latin speech; everybody applauded what nobody understood. Amilcare, at
the end of it, swung off his horse and ran up the steps. He embraced the
orator, embraced the signori one after another; greetings flashed about,
tears, laughter, clappings on the back. But he kep