e application of raw meat
to open sores. Such details are only excusable in the present narrative
on the ground that Bracciano's disease considerably affects our moral
judgment of the woman who could marry a man thus physically tainted, and
with her husband's blood upon his hands. At any rate, the Duke's _lupa_
justified his trying what change of air, together with the sulphur
waters of Abano, would do for him.

The Duke and Duchess arrived in safety at Venice, where they had engaged
the Dandolo palace on the Zueca. There they only stayed a few days,
removing to Padua, where they had hired palaces of the Foscari in the
Arena and a house called De'Cavalli. At Salo, also, on the Lake of
Garda, they provided themselves with fit dwellings for their princely
state and their large retinues, intending to divide their time between
the pleasures which the capital of luxury afforded and the simpler
enjoyments of the most beautiful of the Italian lakes. But _la gioia dei
profani e un fumo passaggier_. Paolo Giordano Orsini, Duke of Bracciano,
died suddenly at Salo on November 10, 1585, leaving the young and
beautiful Vittoria helpless among enemies. What was the cause of his
death? It is not possible to give a clear and certain answer. We have
seen that he suffered from a horrible and voracious disease, which after
his removal from Rome seems to have made progress. Yet though this
malady may well have cut his life short, suspicion of poison was not, in
the circumstances, quite unreasonable. The Grand Duke of Tuscany, the
Pope, and the Orsini family were all interested in his death. Anyhow, he
had time to make a will in Vittoria's favor, leaving her large sums of
money, jewels, goods, and houses--enough, in fact, to support her ducal
dignity with splendor. His hereditary fiefs and honors passed by right
to his only son, Virginio.

Vittoria, accompanied by her brother, Marcello, and the whole court of
Bracciano, repaired at once to Padua, where she was soon after joined by
Flaminio, and by the Prince Lodovico Orsini. Lodovico Orsini assumed the
duty of settling Vittoria's affairs under her dead husband's will. In
life he had been the duke's ally as well as relative. His family pride
was deeply wounded by what seemed to him an ignoble, as it was certainly
an unequal, marriage. He now showed himself the relentless enemy of the
Duchess. Disputes arose between them as to certain details, which seem
to have been legally decided in the w