Leonora D'Orco: A Historical Romance

I am about to quote from another who knew well the facts he recorded. His name matters not, but the whole is a translation, upon my word. "The king had remaining nine hundred me...

Again let us change the scene. There is another whose course we must trace, from the fatal, the terrible moment when she parted from Lorenzo Visconti in Tuscany, to the death of...

There was a little monticule by the road-side just on the Tuscan frontier. At the distance of about three quarters of a mile in front was the small fortified town of Vivizano wi...

"See, De Vitry, that a force of twenty lances be sent from Pavia to our young cousin ere night," said the king; "that will be enough for his protection, my lord regent, I presume?"

A few hours earlier on the day of which we have just been speaking, a gallant band of men-at-arms rode forward on the highway between Milan and Pavia. It consisted of nearly fou...

Rome, still grand even in her ruin, was in the hands of Charles of France. He had never in his life seen a stroke stricken in actual warfare, except at the insignificant town of...

All was bustle and the hurry of preparation in the Villa Rovera. Leonora's two young maids had as much trouble in packing up her wardrobe as a modern lady's maid in arranging he...

Under a wide-spreading and drooping fig-tree in the lower part of the gardens of the villa on the hill was seated a man who kept his eyes steadily fixed upon a certain spot at t...

"Conduct is fate," "Knowledge is power," are the favourite doctrines of those who believe they have conduct, or presume they have knowledge. Carried to the infinite, both axioms...

In a small but richly-decorated room in Naples sat three gentlemen in the picturesque, the beautiful costume of the times. Two were mere youths compared with the other, and yet...

Lorenzo Visconti rode along but slenderly accompanied. A few attendants and one or two pack-horses formed all the train which followed him. A carelessness had come over him, not...

On what a miserable thing it must be to return to a home, and to find that the heart has none, the fond, true welcome wanting--the welcome of the soul, not the lips. Oh, where i...

"Prefect of Romagna!" said Ramiro d'Orco to himself, walking up and down his private cabinet in the castle of Imola; "that may create a conflict of jurisdictions with the vicars...

"Bring lights," said Lorenzo to a girl who appeared as the song concluded; and he sighed as if some sweet dream had been broken and passed away. "Oh! music--music such as that i...

From the rejoicing gates of Pisa--set free by the King of France from the burdensome yoke of Florence--the royal army took its way to the daughter of Fiesole. Steadily, though s...

It was early in the month of September. The grapes were already purple with the draughts of sunshine which they had drunk in through a long, ardent summer, and the trees had alr...

It was in the king's tent, on the night after the fall of Vivizano--for so rapid had been the capture of the place that time for a short march towards Sarzana still remained aft...

Days flew; the wife of the prefect arrived at Imola; Ramiro d'Orco went out to meet her at a league's distance from the city; no honour, no attention did he neglect; the guards...

"That is her father, Ramiro d'Orco," answered Bianca Maria; "he has just returned from Romagna, I suppose; he has not been here for a year, and I heard he was there."

The servants bore Buondoni into the great hall; but it was in vain they attempted for a moment or two to rouse him into consciousness again. There was no waking from the sleep t...

In change lies all our joy; in change lies all our pain. Change is the true Janus whose two faces are always looking different ways. I know not whether it may please the reader,...

There is a mountain pass, not far from the shores of the Lago Maggiore, which has been famous of late years for anything but _fêtes_ and festivals. There, many an unfortunate tr...

When Lorenzo awoke--and his sleep was not of such long duration as fully to outlive the darkness--he found more than one person watching him. Close by his side sat Ramiro d'Orco...

It was a bright and sunshiny morning--considering the season of the year, more summer-like and warm than usual--and Leonora d'Orco sat in her beautiful little garden without cov...

In those days, as in the present, there was situated, somewhere or other in the garden, farm, or podere of every Italian villa, sometimes hid among the fig-trees, olives, or mul...

The air was balmy, the breeze was fresh and strong, the large masses of clouds, like spirit thrones, floated buoyant over the sky, followed by the dancing sunshine. The manes of...

By the side of a small bed, in a small room next to the larger one of which I have already spoken in noticing the usual arrangements of a contadino's house, sat our friend Anton...

Milan had its attractions even for the gay court of France. It was a devout and dissolute city; and we know how jovially, in some countries and at some times, dissoluteness and...

Nothing can be more evanescent than the impressions of reason on a small mind. That of Charles VIII. might almost be compared to a looking-glass; it reflected only that which wa...

"From this, sire, I am of opinion," continued the Cardinal Bishop of St. Malo, after having given a long exposition of his views in regard to the state of Italy, "that it would...

"What is it, dear girl?--Let me think?" said Leonora to her young cousin. They sat in a small ante-room between their sleeping chambers, which gave entrance from the corridor to...

Lorenzo had mounted the many steps leading to the top of the belfry of the church, and there, with the old monk who was keeping watch, he gazed over the beautiful valley of the...

On, those days of happiness, how soon they come to an end! Poets and philosophers have attempted in vain to convey to the mind by figures and by argument the brevity of enjoymen...

I have heard it said that the world is weary of the picturesque in writing, tired of landscape painters, eager only for the tale or for the characters--the pepper and salt of fi...

The most successful men in life are usually those who, by experience or by instinct, have learned to calculate other people's actions. It is not invariably so, although, at firs...

Ramiro d'Orco sat in his own splendid room while rumours of the death of the unfortunate Duke of Gandia spread consternation through the city; but he had before him a parchment...

General conversation between the two courts of France and Milan was somewhat difficult; for, to say sooth, there were many there who could not speak the language of their neighb...

If the world be a stage, as the greatest of earth's poets has said, and all the men and women in it merely players, human life divides itself not only into acts, but scenes. The...

"Who times gallops withal!" Alas! dear Rosalind, you might have found a sweeter illustration than that which you give. Doubtless "he gallops with a thief to the gallows," but I...

Two years had passed, and Leonora d'Orco had changed with everything around her. Alliances had been formed and broken; great commanders had won victories, and yielded to the str...

While the conversation which I have narrated in the preceding chapter was going on in the rooms above, one of a very different character, though relating to the same topic, took...

The young King of France sat in a small room dressed in a gown of black velvet, with a bonnet or toque upon his head, for the winters were now cold, and, to tell the truth, Roma...

In the court-yard of the castle of Imola were many horses and attendants, and in the great hall various personages of high and low degree. A scene very frequent in ancient and m...

This is a cold age of a cold world. Not more than one man or woman, in many, many thousands can sympathise with--nay, can conceive the warm, the ardent love which existed betwee...

that have never entered into my mind. I beseech you remove them. A messenger has been waiting for you at Florence to explain to you that my father has become Lord of Imola, and...

"It has come--it has come! Oh, yes, it has come at length. Dear Lorenzo, my own Lorenzo, forgive me if I am wild with joy. How I have longed, how I have looked for this letter!...