erubino would be useful, if any matter of grave moment were resolved
on; nor did he reject the assistance of other discreet persons. Giacomo,
on his side, produced a Fra Domenico; and the four accomplices set at
work to destroy the reigning Pope by means of sorcery. They caused a
knife to be forged, after the model of the Key of Solomon, and had it
inscribed with Cabalistic symbols. A clean virgin was employed to spin
hemp into a thread. Then they resorted to a distant room in Giacomo's
palace, where a circle was drawn with the mystic thread, a fire was
lighted in the center, and upon it was placed an image of Pope Urban
formed of purest wax. The devil was invoked to appear and answer whether
Urban had deceased this life after the melting of the image. No infernal
visitor responded to the call; and the hermit accounted for this failure
by suggesting that some murder had been committed in the palace. As
things went at that period, this excuse was by no means feeble, if only
the audience, bent on unholy invocation of the power of evil, would
accept it as sufficient. Probably more than one murder had taken place
there, of which the owner was dimly conscious. The psychological
curiosity to note is that avowed malefactors reckoned purity an
essential element in their nefarious practice. They tried once more in a
vineyard, under the open heavens at night. But no demon issued from the
darkness, and the hermit laid this second mischance to the score of bad
weather. Giacomo was incapable of holding his tongue. He talked about
his undertaking to the neighbors, and promised to make them all
Cardinals when he should become the Papal nephew. Meanwhile he pressed
the hermit forward on the path of folly; and this man, driven to his
wits' end for a device, said that they must find seven priests together,
one of whom should be assassinated to enforce the spell. It was natural,
while the countryside was being raked for seven convenient priests by
such a tattler as Giacomo, that suspicions should be generated in the
people. Information reached Rome, in consequence of which the persons
implicated in this idiotic plot were conveyed thither and given over to
the mercies of the Holy Office. The upshot of their trial was that
Giacomo lost his head, while the hermit and Fra Cherubino were burned
alive, and Fra Domenico went to the galleys for life. Several other men
involved in the process received punishments of considerable severity.
It must be