otion or family relationship,
into her convent; to receive no servant or emissary of a soldier; to
forbid special services being performed in the chapel at the instance of
a soldier; and, finally, to institute a more rigorous system of watch
and ward than had been formerly practiced.]

[Footnote 187: In Venice, for example, they were called _Monachini_. But
the name varied in various provinces.]

[Footnote 188: The following abstract of the history of Virginia Maria
de Leyva is based on Dandolo's _Signora di Monza_ (Milano, 1855).
Readers of Manzoni's _I Promessi Sposi_, and of Rosini's tiresome novel,
_La Signora di Monza_, will be already familiar with her in romance
under the name of Gertrude.]

For his military service he was rewarded with the principality of
Ascoli, the federal lordship of the town of Monza, and the life-tenure
of the city of Pavia. Virginia's father was named Martino, and upon his
death her cousin succeeded to the titles of the house. She, for family
reasons, entered the convent of S. Margherita at Monza, about the year
1595. Here she occupied a place of considerable importance, being the
daughter of the Lord of Monza, of princely blood, wealthy, and allied to
the great houses of the Milanese. S. Margherita was a convent of the
Umiliate, dedicated to the education of noble girls, in which,
therefore, considerable laxity of discipline prevailed.[189]

[Footnote 189: Carlo Borromeo found it necessary to suppress the
Umiliati. But he left the female establishment of S. Margherita
untouched.]

Sister Virginia dwelt at ease within its walls, holding a kind of little
court, and exercising an undefined authority in petty affairs which was
conceded to her rank. Among her favorite companions at the time of the
events I am about to narrate, were numbered the Sisters Ottavia Ricci,
Benedetta Homata, Candida Brancolina, and Silvia Casata; she was waited
on by a converse sister, Caterina da Meda. Adjoining the convent stood
the house and garden of a certain Gianpaolo Osio, who plays the
principal part in Virginia's tragedy. He must have been a young man of
distinguished appearance; for when Virginia first set eyes upon him
from a window overlooking his grounds, she exclaimed: 'Is it possible
that one could ever gaze on anything more beautiful?' He attracted her
notice as early as the year 1599 or 1600, under circumstances not very
favorable to the plan he had in view. His hands were red with the blood
of