cloaked her ruins. In name, at least, she was still the queen
of the earth; and from her hands came the crown of the emperor of the
north, and the keys of the father of the church. Her situation was
precisely that which presented a vase and glittering triumph to
bold ambition,--an inspiring, if mournful, spectacle to determined
patriotism,--and a fitting stage for that more august tragedy which
seeks its incidents, selects its actors, and shapes its moral, amidst
the vicissitudes and crimes of nations.

Chapter 1.III. The Brawl.

On an evening in April, 1347, and in one of those wide spaces in which
Modern and Ancient Rome seemed blent together--equally desolate and
equally in ruins--a miscellaneous and indignant populace were assembled.
That morning the house of a Roman jeweller had been forcibly entered and
pillaged by the soldiers of Martino di Porto, with a daring effrontery
which surpassed even the ordinary licence of the barons. The sympathy
and sensation throughout the city were deep and ominous.

"Never will I submit to this tyranny!"

"Nor I!"

"Nor I!"

"Nor by the bones of St. Peter, will I!"

"And what, my friends, is this tyranny to which you will not submit?"
said a young nobleman, addressing himself to the crowd of citizens who,
heated, angry, half-armed, and with the vehement gestures of Italian
passion, were now sweeping down the long and narrow street that led to
the gloomy quarter occupied by the Orsini.

"Ah, my lord!" cried two or three of the citizens in a breath, "you will
right us--you will see justice done to us--you are a Colonna."

"Ha, ha, ha!" laughed scornfully one man of gigantic frame, and wielding
on high a huge hammer, indicative of his trade. "Justice and Colonna!
body of God! those names are not often found together."

"Down with him! down with him! he is an Orsinist--down with him!" cried
at least ten of the throng: but no hand was raised against the giant.

"He speaks the truth," said a second voice, firmly.

"Ay, that doth he," said a third, knitting his brows, and unsheathing
his knife, "and we will abide by it. The Orsini are tyrants--and the
Colonnas are, at the best, as bad."

"Thou liest in thy teeth, ruffian!" cried the young noble, advancing
into the press and confronting the last asperser of the Colonna.

Before the flashing eye and menacing gesture of the cavalier, the worthy
brawler retreated some steps, so as to leave an open space between the
toweri