ht surely have obliged him to demand some more
than ordinary favor from a brother. Francesco immediately made himself
ready to start out, armed only with his sword and attended by a single
servant. It was in vain that his wife and his mother reminded him of the
dangers of the night, the loneliness of Monte Cavallo, its ruinous
palaces and robber-haunted caves. He was resolved to undertake the
adventure, and went forth, never to return. As he ascended the hill, he
fell to earth, shot with three harquebusses. His body was afterwards
found on Monte Cavallo, stabbed through and through, without a trace
that could identify the murderers. Only, in the course of subsequent
investigations, Il Mancino (February 24, 1582) made the following
statements:--That Vittoria's mother, assisted by the waiting woman, had
planned the trap; that Marchionne of Gubbio and Paolo Barca of
Bracciano, two of the Duke's men, had despatched the victim. Marcello
himself, it seems, had come from Bracciano to conduct the whole affair.
Suspicion fell immediately upon Vittoria and her kindred, together with
the Duke of Bracciano; nor was this diminished when the Accoramboni,
fearing the pursuit of justice, took refuge in a villa of the Duke's at
Magnanapoli a few days after the murder.

A cardinal's nephew, even in those troublous times, was not killed
without some noise being made about the matter. Accordingly, Pope
Gregory XIII. began to take measures for discovering the authors of the
crime. Strange to say, however, the Cardinal Montalto, notwithstanding
the great love he was known to bear his nephew, begged that the
investigation might be dropped. The coolness with which he first
received the news of Francesco Peretti's death, the dissimulation with
which he met the Pope's expression of sympathy in a full consistory, his
reserve while greeting friends on ceremonial visits of condolence, and,
more than all, the self-restraint he showed in the presence of the Duke
of Bracciano, impressed the society of Rome with the belief that he was
of a singularly moderate and patient temper. It was thought that the man
who could so tamely submit to his nephew's murder, and suspend the arm
of justice when already raised for vengeance, must prove a mild and
indulgent ruler. When, therefore, in the fifth year after this event,
Montalto was elected Pope, men ascribed his elevation in no small
measure to his conduct at the present crisis. Some, indeed, attributed
his ex