of which shall be walled up with stones and mortar, so that the
said Virginia Maria shall abide there for the term of her natural life,
immured both day and night, never to issue thence, but shall receive
food and other necessaries through a small hole in the wall of the said
chamber, and light and air through an aperture or other opening.' This
sentence was carried into effect. But at the expiration of many years,
her behavior justified some mitigation of the penalty. She was set at
large, and allowed to occupy a more wholesome apartment, where the
charity of Cardinal Borromeo supplied her with comforts befitting her
station, and the reputation she acquired for sanctity. Her own family
cherished implacable sentiments of resentment against the woman who had
brought disgrace upon them. Ripamonte, the historian of Milan, says that
in his own time she was still alive: 'a bent old woman, tall of stature,
dried and fleshless, but venerable in her aspect, whom no one could
believe to have been once a charming and immodest beauty.' Her
associates in guilt, the nuns of S. Margherita, were consigned to
punishments resembling hers. Sisters Benedetta, Silvia and Candida
suffered the same close incarceration.

_Lucrezia Buonvisi_.

The tale of Lucrezia Buonvisi presents some points of similarity to that
of the Signora di Monza.[191]

[Footnote 191: _Storia di Lucrezia Buonvisi_, by Salvatore Bonghi,
Lucca, 1864. This is an admirably written historical monograph, based on
accurate studies and wide researches, containing a mine of valuable
information for a student of those times.]

Her father was a Lucchese gentleman, named Vincenzo Malpigli, who passed
the better portion of his life at Ferrara, as treasurer to Duke Afonsono
II. He had four children; one son, Giovan Lorenzo, and three daughters,
of whom Lucrezia, born at Lucca in 1572, was probably the youngest.
Vincenzo's wife sprang from the noble Lucchese family of Buonvisi, at
that time by their wealth and alliances the most powerful house of the
Republic. Lucrezia spent some years of her girlhood at Ferrara, where
she formed a romantic friendship for a nobleman of Lucca named
Massimiliano Arnolfini. This early attachment was not countenanced by
her parents. They destined her to be the wife of one of Paolo Buonvisi's
numerous sons, her relatives upon the mother's side. In consequence of
this determination, she was first affianced to an heir of that house,
who died; again t