Vietnam or Thailand ? Vote for the TOP Country of the Week !
Updated: May 4, 2025
"You need a condottiero, my lord; and you may come to need one even more than you do now." "I have the Lord of Mondolfo," said the Duke. Galeotto stared at him with round eyes. "The Lord of Mondolfo?" quoth he, intentionally uncomprehending. "You have not heard? Why, here he stands." And he waved a jewelled hand towards Cosimo, a handsome figure in green and blue, standing nearest to Farnese.
He saw the act, and if possible his fears were increased, for he knew that the wrongs he had done me were personal matters between us for which it was not likely I should prove forgiving. "Mercy!" he gasped, and held out supplicating hands to Galeotto. "Mercy?" I echoed, and laughed fiercely.
Coldly he returned the salutation, his prominent eyes regarding me from out of that florid, crafty countenance. On my left, but high up the room and immediately at right angles to the judges' tables, sat Galeotto, full-armed. He was flanked on the one side by Fra Gervasio, who greeted me with a melancholy smile, and on the other by Falcone, who sat rigid.
We were received in the courtyard of that mighty fortress by that sturdy, hawk-faced man who had recognized me in the hermitage on Monte Orsaro. But he was no longer in armour. He wore a surcoat of yellow velvet, and his eyes were very kindly and affectionate when they rested on Galeotto and from Galeotto passed on to take survey of me.
And as this creation itself is poetry, so its creators were poets; and language was the instrument of their art: 'Galeotto fu il libro, e chi lo scrisse. The Provencal Trouveurs, or inventors, preceded Petrarch, whose verses are as spells, which unseal the inmost enchanted fountains of the delight which is in the grief of love.
She is no longer safe with me." It was so. The fierce tension which had banished sleep from me whilst these things were doing, being now relaxed, left me exhausted as Galeotto had been at Bologna. And Galeotto had urged me to halt and rest there! He had begged for twelve hours!
Meanwhile, the good priest of Casi and Leocadia had departed, bearing with them a princely reward from the silent, kindly eyed Galeotto. To tend me there remained only the boy Beppo; and after my long six months of lenten fare there followed now a period of feasting that began to trouble me as my strength returned.
He brought a parchment, to which was appended a great seal bearing the Pontifical arms. He thrust it into Galeotto's hand. "There," he said, "is the discharge of the debt which through my weakness and folly I have incurred." Galeotto looked at the parchment, then at Cavalcanti, and then at the parchment once more. It was a papal bull of plenary pardon and indemnity to me.
"Do you see aught in me that you can read?" inquired the Duke in all seriousness. Galeotto considered him a moment without any trace in his eyes of the wicked mockery that filled his soul. "Why," he answered slowly, "not in your own person, magnificent leastways, not upon so brief a glance. But since you ask me, I have lately been considering the new coinage of your highness."
Our destination was the castle; and in a splendid ante-chamber, packed with rustling, silken courtiers and clanking captains in steel, a sprinkling of prelates and handsome, insolent-eyed women, more than one of whom reminded me of Giuliana, and every one of whom I disparaged by comparing her with Bianca, Galeotto and I stood waiting.
Word Of The Day
Others Looking