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That such statues were known in Italy is proved not only by their presence in this museum, but by the ivory Madonna of Giovanni Pisano in the sacristy of the Duomo at Pisa. The Marzocco which stood of old on the Ringhiera before the Palazzo Vecchio might seem to be a work of this period, for it is only saved by a kind of good fortune from failure.
There were to be fireworks and illuminations of the streets for the people, and a Trecento costume ball at the Palazzo Vecchio for those who had influence to procure tickets and money to pay for them. Mamie, greatly daring, proclaimed her intention of wearing the "umile ed onesto sanguigno" of Beatrice. "You will be my Dante, Don Filippo? Momma is going in cloth of gold as Giovanna degli Albizzi."
The river, I should judge, may be a hundred or a hundred and fifty yards wide in its course between the Ponte alle Grazie and the Ponte Vecchio; that is, the width between strand and strand is at least so much. The river, however, leaves a broad margin of mud and gravel on its right bank, on which water-weeds grow pretty abundantly, and creep even into the stream.
Jean had to lift his master into the saddle, which office the wiry Susini had performed for him at St. Florent fourteen hours earlier. There is a good inn at Cauro where de Vasselot procured a cup of coffee and some bread without dismounting. Jean had given him a list of names, and the route to Porto Vecchio was not a difficult one, though it led through a deserted country.
In the meantime the Senate, with the magistrates, had closed the doors of Palazzo Vecchio without appearing for either side, though the whole city was in tumult. After much discussion, they agreed, since Piero could not be present, for he was sick, to go to him in his palace, but Soderini would not.
There is always a courtyard, a street, or a spire against the sky; and at the Uffizi there are the river and bridges and mountains. From the loggia of the Palazzo Vecchio I once saw a woman with some twenty or thirty city pigeons on the table of her little room, feeding them with maize.
And he knew, he knew quite well he was only in possession of a tithe of his natural faculties. And in his male spirit he felt himself hating her: hating her deeply, damnably. But he said to himself: "No, I won't hate her. I won't hate her." So he went on, over the Ponte Vecchio, where the jeweller's windows on the bridge were already blazing with light, on into the town.
"It is Cecco del Vecchio!" cried those of the populace, who were near enough to perceive the interruption and its cause. "Ay," said one, "the good Vicar has put many of the stoutest fellows in the Pope's livery, in order the better to keep peace. He could have chosen none better than Cecco."
"I would he had not sought to tax us," said Cecco del Vecchio, who was the very personification of the vulgar feeling: "and that he had beheaded the Barons!" "Ay!" cried the ex-gravedigger; "but that blessed porphyry vase!" "And why should we get our throats cut," said Luigi, the butcher, "like my two brothers? Heaven rest them!"
The summons arrived on April 8th, 1497, when Savonarola was at S. Marco. The monks, who adored him, refused to let him go, and for a whole day the convent was under siege. But might, of course, prevailed, and Savonarola was dragged from the church to the Palazzo Vecchio and prosecuted for the offence of claiming to have supernatural power and fomenting political disturbance.
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