CHAPTER VIII

_The Last Days of the Republic_

Fabio di Pandolfo Petrucci had been expelled from Siena in September 1524, by a temporary alliance of all factions in the State. Of the three chief leaders in the revolution, Giovanni Martinozzi belonged to the Monte de' Nove, Giovanni Battista Piccolomini to the Gentiluomini, while Mario Bandini was a grandson of Andrea Todeschini Piccolomini and therefore associated to the Monte del Popolo. Mario, who was a young man of about twenty-three, was at the head of the _Libertini_, an association of the most ardent republicans in Siena, who had sworn relentless and perpetual enmity to all who should attempt anything against the liberties of the Republic.

There were solemn religious processions, with the "Madonna delle Grazie" carried through the city in thanksgiving for the liberation of Siena from tyranny. But the Noveschi were by no means prepared to relinquish their prepotency. They rallied round Alessandro Bichi, who, with the favour of Pope Clement VII. and the Florentines, backed by the authority of the French who, under the Duke of Albany, were marching through Tuscany against the imperial forces in Naples, assumed the position from which the Petrucci had fallen. The three Monti were reduced to one, the _Monte de' Nobili Reggenti_, and the power of the Balìa was vested in a select committee of sixteen, of which Alessandro was the recognised head. By common consent of contemporary writers, he was an able and high-minded man, with no blot upon his character--save this fatal usurpation of his country's liberties. At the suggestion of the Medicean rulers of Florence and with financial aid from them, he was beginning to build a fortress or citadel on the hill of San Domenico to secure his hold, when the Battle of Pavia (February 1525) overthrew the power of France and made the Emperor, Charles V., arbiter of the destinies of Italy. The Libertini, headed by Mario Bandini and Girolamo Severini, saw that the time had come to deliver the Republic. Both parties entered into negotiations with the Emperor, through his vicar in Lombardy and his ambassador in Rome; Charles took Siena under his protection for the sum of 15,000 ducats. The appearance of the imperial commissaries in Siena gave the occasion for the rising. On April 6th, 1525, while Alessandro Bichi was counting out the money to them in the palace of the Archbishop, a band of Libertini headed by Giovanni Battista Fantozzo burst in and stabbed him to death. In the meanwhile the populace had risen throughout the city at the call of Mario Bandini, while the Mangia Tower rang out the alarm. The mercenaries of the guard of the Piazza held the openings to the Terzo di San Martino for the Noveschi, with artillery, but appear to have made little real resistance; comparatively few persons had been killed on either side, when evening saw the Libertini masters of the situation. The body of Alessandro was quietly conveyed to Sant' Agostino and buried there.

The next day, the General Council of the Campana annulled all that had been done in Siena since the passage of the Duke of Albany, dissolved the _Monte de' Nobili Reggenti_, created a new Collegio di Balìa, divided the government equally between the three Monti (the Dodicini, who had by this time lost all importance, being included in the Monte del Popolo), and appointed a magistracy of fifteen, afterwards twenty-one, _Conservatori di Libertà_. Alessandro's son Antonio Maria Bichi, Giovanni Martinozzi, Lattanzio Petrucci and a number of other Noveschi left the city, and were put under bounds. Siena was once more a free Republic under the protection of the Emperor.

It was not hard for these Noveschi to gain the ear of Clement VII. and the aid of the Florentines. The Medicean Pontiff looked with jealous eyes upon the fair dominion of the Republic, and early in 1526 he declared war against Siena, with the professed object of restoring these exiled citizens to their country. The Balìa hired soldiers under Giulio Colonna and others, and prepared for a stout resistance. Two conspiracies were discovered to betray Siena to the Pope, and for his share in one of them Luzio Aringhieri--bastard son of that Messer Alberto whose glory is writ large upon the Duomo--was beheaded in front of the Palazzo. Then Andrea Doria with the papal fleet seized Talamone, while the Sienese contado was simultaneously invaded by the pontifical army under Count Virginio dell' Anguillara and Count Lodovico of Pitigliano, and the Florentine army under their commissary, Roberto Pucci. Attempts to capture Montalcino and Montereggioni having failed, the two armies united before the walls of Siena itself, their main force taking up its position outside the Porta Camollia. Realising too late that the Pope had not made all these warlike preparations for their benefit, but was meditating the complete subjugation of the Republic, the leaders of the _fuorusciti_--Aldello Placidi and Giovanni Martinozzi--left the pontifical camp and went back, one to Rome, the other to Florence, rather then witness the ruin of their native land.

While the papal artillery thundered away unceasingly from the side of Camollia, the Balìa elected seven deputies to direct solemn processions with prayers and litanies, and decreed the renewal of the donation of Siena to the Madonna. A devout lady whom the citizens held to be endowed with prophetic spirit, Margherita Bichi, the widow of Francesco Buonsignori, declared that it was the Blessed Virgin's will that the feast of her Immaculate Conception--which, it may be remembered, had not yet been proclaimed an article of faith--should ever after be solemnly celebrated in this her chosen city, "and further that Mary Immaculate willed that next Sunday all the Magistrates in whose hands was the lordship of the city should go to the Cathedral, having confessed and communicated, to that Image to which at other times they had presented themselves, and there they should have the Mass of the Immaculate Conception celebrated and then should confirm and renew the donation of the city to its true Patroness."[112] On the day appointed the Priors and Captain of the People, followed by the members of the Balìa and the Nine of the Guard with all the other officials, assembled at the Palazzo and, preceded by a great banner upon which was depicted the Assumption, moved in procession to the Duomo. There--after the votive Mass of the Immaculate Conception had been sung--the Prior of the Concistoro, stepping up to the altar, solemnly, in the name of the Republic, renewed the donation and surrendered the keys of the gates to the officiating priest, the canon Giovanni Pecci, who formally accepted and then gave them back.

Meanwhile the papal bombardment continued day after day, answered back by the artillery of the Sienese. The Portone beyond the gate of Camollia was a heap of ruins, but the guns had been badly placed and did little further harm to the walls; the Sienese, under Enea Sacchini, had made a number of successful sorties, and the pontifical generals were not prepared to venture upon a general assault. An attempt at intervention by an imperial agent, Don Hugo de Moncada, failed. Then on July 25th, the feast of St James and St Christopher, the forces of the Republic, under Giulio Colonna and Giovanni Maria Pini, suddenly issued out of the Porta Camollia and fell upon the enemy, while a smaller body of horse and foot sallied out of the Porta Fontebranda, drove the irregular cavalry of the Conte dell' Anguillara in headlong flight before them and took the "blind Papal Florentines," _quei Papal Fiorentini ciechi_ (as the people sang of them), in the flank. Seized by a sudden panic, the whole army broke and fled in hopeless confusion, leaving their camp and artillery--the latter captured by Mario Bandini at the head of a band of young Libertini. Anguillara, the pontifical general, "a very fat man and with little foresight in war," as a contemporary calls him, led the rout half dressed; while the Florentine commissary, Roberto Pucci, after some better show of valour, made the best of his way to Poggibonsi. As for the rank and file, pursued for only one mile, they ran for ten. The Sienese re-entered the city in triumph, with the captured guns and banners; three days of thanksgiving and festivity followed, and votive pictures in San Martino and the little oratory in Salicotto still tell the tale. "You know," wrote Francesco Vettori to Machiavelli, "that I unwillingly allow myself to believe anything supernatural; but this defeat seems to me to have been as extraordinary--I will not say miraculous--as anything that has happened in war from 1494 to now; and it seems to me like certain histories that I have read in the Bible, when a terror entered into men so that they fled and knew not from whom."[113]

With the imperialists ravening like hell-hounds in Rome and Florence in revolt against the Medici, Pope Clement soon had his hands too full of more deadly business to interfere with Siena. But the Sienese returned to their mad factions. Some of the _fuorusciti_ under Giovanni Martinozzi harried the Valdichiana, and Francesco Petrucci made a temporary reappearance upon the scenes, threatening Massa. Within the city the Popolani, led by the Libertini, were attempting to keep down the Noveschi. In July 1527--practically on the anniversary of the great victory of the past year--there was a sanguinary tumult, in which the populace sacked the houses of the leading Noveschi, murdered the younger Pietro Borghesi and a number of others in cold blood. The Monte de' Nove was deprived of any share in the government and annulled, the old Monte de' Riformatori being revived in its stead, and the government was divided between the three Monti--Popolani, Gentiluomini (with Dodicini), Riformatori. Some of the Noveschi were incorporated into the two latter Monti, but the greater part--the Petrucci, Borghesi, Bichi, Placidi, Bellanti, Bulgarini, and the like--was "for ever" admonished and excluded. A number of them were declared rebels and their goods confiscated. Thus permanently ended the supremacy of the Monte de' Nove in the Republic of Siena, the State remaining in the hands of the Popolani and Riformatori. Several of the leaders of the Noveschi were given offices in the Papal States, Aldello Placidi being made Senator of Rome and Fabio Petrucci Governor of Spoleto.

Alfonso Piccolomini d'Aragona, Duke of Amalfi, a grand-nephew of Pius III., who was a _persona gratissima_ with the people, was now appointed Captain-General of the forces of the Republic. Siena threw herself into the arms of the Caesarian Majesty of the Emperor and the Catholic Majesty of Spain, combined in the person of Charles V. The Emperor--to whom Siena was the key of Tuscany--sent a garrison of Spanish soldiers, with a series of vicars or governors, beginning with Don Lopez de Soria, who reformed the government again and readmitted the Noveschi, headed by Francesco Petrucci. These, however, no longer held their old position, and were only allowed a fourth part of the Balìa. There were furious tumults again in 1530, when Francesco Petrucci and Giovanni Maria Pini (the hero of the victory at the Porta Camollia) led the Noveschi, and Mario Bandini, as usual, headed the popular opposition, which readily got the upper hand. In one of these Giovanni Martinozzi was killed. An imperial army under the command of the overbearing young Ferrante Gonzaga threatened the city in consequence; Ferrante arrested Mario Bandini, who had come out to confer with him on behalf of the Popolani and Riformatori, but he was unable to reform the government in the favour of the Noveschi. His successor, the popular Marchese del Vasto, succeeded in effecting a compromise.

Trouble of another kind arose in 1535. A number of artisans and small shopkeepers, butchers, tailors, and the like, with other restless spirits among the lower orders, formed themselves into an association known as the Bardotti. There were a few more or less educated men among them, who fired their imaginations by reading Livy and Machiavelli, and at last they attempted a revolution, demanding tribunes after the old Roman model. The thing was a ludicrous failure, and Mario Bandini, upon whose support they relied, told them plainly to go back to their shops, and let affairs of State alone. It was on this occasion that the painter Pacchiarotti, who had posed as one of their leaders in the secret conventicles of the wine cellars, was so terrified that he hid himself in the vaults under the Osservanza, and even climbed into a tomb and lay by a corpse for security.

In April 1536 the Emperor himself came to Siena for a few days, and had a superb reception from the city, whose babes unborn were said to lisp the name of Caesar. These babes were destined to be disillusioned before they grew up to manhood. There were more tumults in 1539 between the Noveschi and the democratic orders, and Francesco Petrucci was again declared a rebel. The Duke of Amalfi was dismissed in 1541, and the Emperor sent two ministers, Monsignor Perrenot de Granvelle and Francesco Sfondrato of Cremona (both of them afterwards cardinals) to rule the city in his name. They reduced the Balìa to forty, dividing it equally between the four Monti, and reformed the State thoroughly and equitably, so that "for about two years the city lived better and more peacefully than it had done in any time past."[114] Then a change came. They were succeeded by Don Juan de Luna, a Spaniard, in 1543, who openly favoured the Noveschi, with whose aid, he imagined, he might rule Siena for himself under the Crown of Spain. He attempted to make a matrimonial alliance with the Piccolomini by offering one of his daughters to Giacomo di Antonio Maria; but his overtures were scornfully rejected. The Noveschi plotted to fall upon the people, to butcher their leaders at a bull-fight. That failing, in February 1546, trusting in Don Juan and his soldiers, they rose in arms, headed by Bartolommeo Petrucci, shouting "Imperio e Nove! Imperio e Nove!" But all the orders united against them, and they were repulsed, a number of them being slaughtered by the infuriated populace. Don Juan and his Spaniards evacuated the city, and the few Noveschi who had not fled were again deprived of the government, which was placed for three months in the hands of a committee of ten--three from each of the other Monti and the Captain of the People--to have the authority of the Balìa. The Archbishop Francesco Bandini, who was as much a peacemaker as his brother Mario was a firebrand, and Marcantonio Amerighi, were sent as ambassadors to explain to the Emperor what had happened. In this and the following year there were processions and festivities of all kinds in the Campo and throughout Siena, "the city being all joyous, thinking that they had conquered, and imagining that never again would any one molest it."[115]

But in 1548, at the instigation of the exiled Noveschi, a famous personage came to represent the Emperor in Siena: Diego Hurtado de Mendoza, scholar, soldier, politician, the future author of the _Guerra de Granada_. He restored the Noveschi, reorganised the Balìa and the Signoria, and quartered Spanish soldiers in San Domenico, San Francesco, Sant'Agostino, and the Servi. He ruled the Republic in the most despotic fashion; he had brought with him a number of blank sheets of paper with the Emperor's signature, and whenever he wanted anything from the Balìa or the Senate, he simply filled up one of these, and declared it was the will of Caesar. By his orders all the arms and weapons in Siena, both public and private, were collected in San Domenico, and all the artillery placed in its piazza by the side of the Campanile. The Balìa trembled before him, and instantly granted all that he demanded. He was, wrote a satirical poet of the epoch, "a foe to all Italy, to Heaven and to the World, and thought to make himself in Siena second to God."[116] A certain Tommaso Politi sent a letter to the Balìa, warning them that they were throwing away the liberties of their country; the servile Collegio handed over the letter to Don Diego, and the unfortunate writer was beheaded.

At last Don Diego announced that the Catholic Majesty intended to build a citadel at the walls of Siena, and that the Sienese themselves would have to supply what was necessary. At this, the unmistakable death-note to their liberties, even the servile Balìa was terrified, while a cry of dismay and horror rose from all the people, high and low; certain of the Noveschi alone were secretly favouring the project. The Concistoro decided to appeal simultaneously to Caesar and to the Blessed Virgin. Girolamo di Lattanzio Tolomei, and after him the historian Orlando Malavolti (the latter with a petition signed by more than a thousand citizens), were sent to the Emperor; while in Siena itself, Lelio Tolomei (Girolamo's brother) delivered a passionate harangue to the Senate, and a solemn vow was made to the Madonna to marry every year, so long as the liberty of the Republic lasted, fifty poor maidens at the expense of the State, with a dowry of twenty-five gold florins each, and it was decided once more to renew the donation of Siena to her. This was in November 1550. On the Sunday after the decision had been taken, the Signori, headed by the Captain of the People, went in procession to the Duomo with the fifty maidens and the keys of the city. A solemn Mass of the Holy Spirit was sung, the Signori and others communicated, and then the Captain, Claudio Zuccantini, made "a most beauteous prayer," in this wise:--

"If ever in times past, Immaculate Mother of God, our Patroness and Advocate, with compassionate prayers thou hast moved the mercy of thine only-begotten Son towards this thy most devout city, may it please thee to-day, more than ever before, to do so. For albeit thou hast saved it many times from various accidents and fearful wars, as from that of Montaperti and this other last of Camollia, never has there hung over it an affliction equal to this of to-day, when its only benefactor and protector, Charles V., desires to make in it a Castle. We cannot--and would not--resist him with any other means, save by thy welcome intercession with thy beloved Son, that He may infuse into him a more benign spirit towards this his most devoted city, especially as it has never sinned against his Majesty nor against the Sacred Empire.

"Take from him, in pity, such a thought, which befits not our sincere faith, and which brings with it the destruction of our honour, our dignity, our dear liberty, preserved until to-day under thy great guardianship and loving protection.

"Behold, most sacred Virgin, present before thee the hearts, the souls of thy Sienese people, repentant for all their past errors, kneeling and prostrate before thy throne to beg mercy and deliverance from the projected Castle. And I, as the least of all and thy servant, in the name of the Republic, by decree of the most ample Senate, make to thee a perpetual vow that--so long as, by thy intercession, our dear and sweet liberty shall last--fifty poor little maidens shall every year be married at the public expense, with a dowry for each of twenty-five florins, to thy greater glory and honour. Further, I consecrate to thee the city: I present to thee anew the keys, which were restored to us before, as to Her who is the safest and the most potent to guard them.

"Open with them the heart of Caesar, removing from it his unnecessary design. Dispose him rather to preserve us for those devout and faithful subjects that we have been and ever shall be, to his Caesarian Majesty and to the Sacred Empire. Lastly, take away from this most devoted People every memory of private injuries, and unite it with eternal peace and concord; to the end that, thus pacific and united, it may be able to serve God and thyself and his Caesarian Majesty, and to rejoice without end in our cherished liberty."[117]

But the Emperor, to whom the possession of Siena was invaluable and who (since the fortresses of Livorno and Florence had been consigned to Duke Cosimo) had no other strong place in Tuscany, was resolute. He answered Malavolti graciously, assuring him that it was not to take away, but to maintain the liberty of Siena and to secure good government, that he was having this fortress built; but when, a little later on, more ambassadors arrived, "in mourning robes, as though in anticipation of the loss of their liberty," he answered shortly that his imperial orders had been given, and refused to listen to any further representations on the subject. "We must drink this bitter chalice," wrote Girolamo Tolomei, "and swallow this red-hot trivet."

In the meanwhile, the foundations of the citadel had

been laid on the Poggio di San Prospero, the site of the present Lizza, though the architect Peloro had, according to Sozzini, "made the design of such greatness for the benefit of his city, that his Catholic Majesty would not finish it in thirty years." Dressed in red cloth, Don Diego came every day that he was in Siena to hurry on the work. But a weird figure rose up in the midst of it. The hermit Brandano had wandered through Italy preaching repentance, clothed in sackcloth with a halter round his neck, a Crucifix in one hand and a death's-head in the other. On the eve of the sack of Rome he had appeared in the Eternal City, foretelling the scourge, denouncing Pope Clement and his cardinals. Beaten and imprisoned, he had next gone as a pilgrim to our Lady's shrines in Spain, where he had been thrown into the dungeons of the Inquisition. Now he suddenly stood out on the hill-side, watching the builders at their work, chanting aloud in weird wailing tones the text of the psalm: _Nisi Dominus aedificaverit domum_, "Except the Lord build the house, they labour in vain that build it"; and then, when men stopped to listen, he cried again in a louder tone: _Nisi Dominus custodierit civitatem_, "Except the Lord keep the city, the watchman waketh but in vain." Driven off the works, he returned again and again, declaring that he spoke by the will of God. Diego sent him to the galleys, but the Spanish commander at Port'Ercole found no cause in him and sent him back to Siena. Here he designed what Sozzini calls _un bellissimo e notabil colpo_, and hurled two huge stones at the head of a red-coated Spaniard, fondly imagining that he was the hated Diego. Arrested and brought before the governor, he calmly avowed his attempt to kill him for the sake of his fellow-citizens. Either an unwonted access of magnanimity or superstitious fear made the Spaniard spare his life, and he was merely banished from Siena on pain of death, the guards at the gates being bidden never to let him enter the city again.

But other aids than supernatural were preparing. A number of Sienese gentlemen and artisans alike left the city and their business, staying in their villas or in the contado rather than see this hideous monument of servitude rising higher day by day. Two of these, Girolamo and Lelio Tolomei, died suddenly--men whispered Spanish poison. An extensive conspiracy was concocted--in Rome, Ferrara, and Venice--for the liberation of Siena. A certain Giovanni Maria Benedetti, a man of humble birth in the service of the Cardinal de Tournon, and Amerigo Amerighi, a member of the Balìa, were the connecting links between the Sienese, on the one hand, and the agents of the Most Christian King and the cardinals of the French faction, on the other. But so many persons, Sienese and foreigners, were implicated that it was held a special miracle of the Madonna's that the plot was not discovered long before the time came to put it into effect.

Don Diego was absent from Siena, and a certain Don Franzese de Avila--a very gracious young man who, alone of his nation, had ingratiated himself with the Sienese by what Sozzini calls his young-lady-like manners, _chè veramente era come una donzella_, ruled in his place; when, on the evening of July 26th, 1552, a force of French and Italians, led by Enea Piccolomini delle Papesse,[118] arrived at a little distance from the Porta Romana. Some warning had reached the Spaniards and some sort of preparation been made; but it was not until the following morning that the alarm was shouted from the Mangia Tower. When evening came, the people rose in mass, shouting for France and Liberty; the very women hurled stones upon the heads of the Spaniards, as they sullenly retreated towards San Domenico and the Citadel, leaving the Campo in the charge of the Florentine soldiers that Duke Cosimo had sent to their aid. Such was the flaming of the torches and the glow of lights in the windows, that "through all the city one walked as though the sun had risen." While the Sienese within threw open the Porta Tufi, the rest of the French, led by Enea Piccolomini, fired the Porta Romana; "and they entered into Siena with such great impetus and with such great noise, that it was heard many miles away. All that night they fought together; for the Spaniards, with the support of the Florentines, had fortified themselves in San Domenico and in Camollia, having the Citadel at their shoulders. This combat lasted all the night and till the twentieth hour of the following day, which was Thursday the 28th of July; in which hour those of the city, making every effort, captured San Domenico, where the Spaniards thought themselves right strong and safe. And by reason of this loss, the latter abandoned also that part of the city which they held, and they all retreated to the fortress. In which retreat many Spaniards and Florentines were killed; and so, by the grace of God, all the city was free."[119]

Two Sienese, Giovanni Andrea Bonizzelli and Giovanni Battista Cappanna, who had served the Spaniards as commissaries, attempted to escape from the city; they were brutally done to death, the one by the contadini into whose hands he had fallen, the other brought back as a prisoner to be hurled out of a window of the Sala di Balìa. At the beginning of August, at the intervention of the Duke of Florence, the Citadel capitulated; the Spaniards and Florentines were allowed to march out with their arms and baggage, and retire unmolested to Florence. The young-lady-like _maestro di campo_, Don Franzese, shed tears when he found Messer Ottavio Sozzini and a number of young Sienese gentlemen waiting in the Prato di Camollia to bid him farewell. "You brave Sienese," he said, "have made a most beautiful stroke; but for the future be wise, for you have offended too great a man."

Lansac, the French representative, at once entered the Citadel and summoned the Signoria. They came in procession with a banner of Our Lady in front of them, with all the other magistrates and officials following, crowned with garlands of olive, while all the clergy and a multitude of people came after, with men bearing spades, pickaxes and the like: "it seemed that each one was going to a wedding." In the name of the Most Christian King, Lansac formally made over the Citadel to the Republic--the notary of the Concistoro, Ser Luca Salvini, drawing up the instrument in strict legal form. Let Sozzini, who was present, describe the scene: "When the deed had been drawn up in valid form, the Captain of the People first and then the most illustrious Signori, with pickaxes and other instruments began to destroy the said Citadel; and all the people shouted, with tears of joy in their eyes: 'Liberty, Liberty!' 'France, France!' 'Victory, Victory!' Now whoso had seen the great multitude of gentlemen and shopkeepers, who raced to come first to the destruction of the Citadel, certainly would have been astounded; seeing that, in the space of one hour, more was destroyed facing the city than would have been built in four months. When the Signoria and the procession departed to return to the Palace, many gentlemen and shopkeepers remained to continue the destruction, and continually fresh folk arrived there."[120]

Siena was now under the protection of France, with a French garrison. The people were in a fever of delight. Sonnet after sonnet, abusing the Spaniards and extolling the French, satirising the Catholic Majesty and praising the Most Christian, appeared on the Loggia di Mercanzia. With no thought or talk of war, the Sienese gave themselves up to sport and pleasure. The Balìa was abolished, or rather combined with the Concistoro in one chief magistracy composed of the Signoria and twenty others elected by the Senate; the two councils (the General Council of the Campana, or Senate, and the Council of the People) were reduced to one; the Monti were nominally annulled, or united in one body of the "Cittadini Reggenti della Città di Siena." In November the Cardinal of Ferrara, Ippolito d'Este the younger, with a goodly guard of Swiss, came as lieutenant of the King of France, received by the government with the utmost honour, and welcomed by the people, says Malavolti, _con incredibile allegrezza_. Hearing that the Emperor was massing troops in the Kingdom of Naples to come against Siena, the Cardinal had new forts built outside the Porta Camollia. The men of the contrade came to work upon them, "always gladly to the sound of drums and trumpets," while one of the Cardinal's guard played on the flute, so sweetly "that every one stayed to listen to it as a thing most rare." But wiser folk shook their heads, noticing that the forts were being designed in such a way that they would serve equally to bombard the city, "from which thing many took a right sinister impression."[121] And again the strange weird figure of Brandano appeared, wandering up and down the streets, gazing upon the new fortifications, singing in a quaint doggerel of his own: "Little good, O Cardinal, may'st thou bring us! Siena, Siena, the physician will come who will cure thee of thy madness."[122]

The first attempt of the powers of Spain and the Empire to avenge their discomfiture failed signally. At the beginning of 1553, a great army of Germans, Spaniards and Italians under Don Garcia de Toledo (the brother-in-law of Duke Cosimo) invaded the dominion of the Republic, occupied the Valdichiana, took Pienza, and captured Monticchiello after a heroic defence in which the garrison of the little castle, commanded by Adriano Baglioni, only surrendered when all the powder for the arquebuses was spent and they were reduced to fighting with stones. In the Maremma, Cornelio Bentivoglio sallied out of Grosseto and routed the imperial reinforcements that had landed at Piombino from Sicily. In the latter part of March the invading army laid siege to Montalcino, which Giordano Orsini

at the head of two thousand infantry defended for the Republic, with the utmost valour and heroically supported by the inhabitants, for more than two months. On the night of the 14th of June, the Sienese saw great fires blazing round Montalcino, and on the morning of the 15th heavy clouds of smoke still hung over it. The appearance of the French and Turkish fleets off the shores of Italy had forced Don Garcia to raise the siege; he had burned his lodgings, and was about to hurry southwards for the defence of Naples. "Now," writes the diarist of Montalcino, "whoso this morning had seen our afflicted city in such great gladness and triumph, would have made the hardest heart grow tender. When the bells had ceased ringing, Masses have been celebrated and there has been a devout procession around the piazza, with such great contrition; all injuries have been forgiven, men have gone to embrace one another and to give the kiss of peace; always thanking God and the Most Holy Virgin, our protectress, that in their pity and mercy they have deigned to deliver us from so great a disaster."[123]

In the meanwhile, through the intrigues of Cosimo, who was only biding his time for the Marzocco and the Lupa to be bound together in his golden chain, a conspiracy had been formed in Siena, to admit the Florentines through the Porta Ovile and expel the French. It was discovered; the three principal conspirators, Giulio Salvi, Captain of the People, his brother Ottaviano, Proposto of the Duomo, and the canon Gismondo Vignali, were beheaded in the cortile of the Captain of Justice--the two priests having been degraded in the Sala del Consiglio on the previous day. But the Sienese factions continued, even in the face of the imminent danger. The French agents themselves were divided, Monsieur de Termes taking one side, the Cardinal of Ferrara the other. "And always as many of them as were sent to us from the King, up to the last, behaved in this fashion, as though the discords of the city of Siena were like to a contagious illness, so that whoever came near them was obliged to take part in them."[124]

The breathing space was but short. With the new year, 1554, the tempest burst upon Siena. Piero Strozzi, the deadliest enemy of the Duke of Florence, came to the city as vicar-general of the Most Christian King--in spite of Orlando Malavolti, then one of the Eight of War, who urged that he should not be received without an express order from France, as it would give an excuse to the Duke to declare war, being a breach of one of the conditions, which stipulated that the Sienese should not shelter Florentine _fuorusciti_. In his history, Malavolti remarks upon the analogies between this last war of Siena and that ancient one of Montaperti, both begun by the Florentines on the pretext that the Sienese had broken treaties by receiving their exiles; and he declares bitterly that Strozzi, unlike Giordano, "had intentions quite other than the defence and salvation of the city of Siena," that he had sent away a number of the soldiers, and left unprotected the forts outside Porta Camollia. Similarly, Sozzini declares that Piero's coming was held to be the ruin of Siena, since it brought the Duke of Florence into the field, without whom the Caesarian Majesty could have done them little harm.[125] But these are mere words; Strozzi or no Strozzi, Cosimo and Charles were equally bent upon the subjugation, complete and final, of Siena.

The armies of the Emperor and the Duke of Florence entered the dominions of the Republic, under the command of the last and most formidable of the condottieri, Gian Giacomo de' Medici, Marchese di Marignano. The sudden capture, on the night of January 26th, 1554, of the forts outside the Porta Camollia began that last tremendous war of the Sienese, that siege--no less heroic and more prolonged than that of Florence twenty-four years before--in which the last great Republic of the Middle Ages died a giant's death. The war lasted till the April of the following year, both round the city and in the contado, and was most ruthless in its character. For ten miles around, the once smiling country became a desolate, fire-stained and blood-soaked wilderness--a few trees being left standing, merely that the Spaniards might hang the hapless contadini who attempted to bring supplies through their lines to the starving people in the beleaguered city. The earlier engagements mostly resulted in favour of the Sienese with their French allies and German mercenaries. At first they had so many prisoners in their hands that, when the Marchese di Marignano raised a gallows on the captured forts, they raised another on the citadel, and threatened to hang ten of their prisoners for every one that the imperialists executed--a threat averted by the intervention of the Spanish soldiers themselves, who sent a message to Strozzi that they would force their own general to act _a buona guerra_; which, alas! was held only to apply to combatants, and not always even to them.

At the beginning of June the Cardinal of Ferrara, tardily obeying the summons of the King, left the city, and went home with a safe conduct; French and Swiss reinforcements arrived under the command of Blaise de Montluc, afterwards Marshal of France, who came to take charge of the city that Strozzi might have a free hand elsewhere. There had been some question as to the safety of sending this dashing Gascon to Siena; his enemies assured the king that he was (to use his own phrase) _un des plus coleres hommes du monde, et le plus bisarre_, and that, "considered the humours of the Sienese, it would be fire against fire." As it turned out, his dauntless heroism, his never failing high spirits (even when he lay at the point of death), his amazing harangues (for he prided himself upon his Italian, and had got up some Sienese history to serve his need), chimed in precisely with the temper of the people, and the name of the gallant Gascon general is ever to be linked with that of the glorious Italian republic, whose liberties he was to defend. The third book of his _Commentaires_, taken with the _Diario_ of Alessandro Sozzini, lets us follow every phase of the siege. He found, he tells us, that "the Sienese were stark mad of fighting, and I do believe, fighting for their liberty, would have played the devils." The heroic devotion of the ladies of the city--to whose prayers he professed to owe his recovery from sickness--especially moved his enthusiasm:--

"It shall never be, you Ladies of Siena, that I will not immortalise your names so long as the Book of Montluc shall live; for in truth you are worthy of immortal praise, if ever women were. At the beginning of the noble resolution these people took to defend their liberty, all the ladies of Siena divided themselves into three squadrons; the first led by Signora Forteguerra, who was herself clad in violet, as also those of her train, her attire being cut in the fashion of a Nymph, short, and discovering her buskins; the second was the Signora Piccolomini, attired in carnation satin, and her troop in the same livery; the third was the Signora Livia Fausta, apparelled all in white, as also her train, with her white ensign. In their ensigns they had very fine devices, which I would give a good deal I could remember. These three squadrons consisted of three thousand ladies, gentlewomen and citizens; their arms were picks, shovels, baskets and bavins; and in this equipage they made their muster, and went to begin the fortifications. Monsieur de Termes, who has often told me this story (for I was not then arrived at Siena), has assured me that in his life he never saw so fine a sight. I have since seen their ensigns, and they had composed a song to the honour of France, for which I wish I had given the best horse I have that I might insert it here."[126]

This first comparatively bright and hopeful phase of the struggle ended with the summer. Piero Strozzi with the flower of the French army retreated from the city, hoping to make a diversion, to unite with reinforcements that he expected, to carry the war into Florentine territory. At the beginning of August he came to a pitched battle with Marignano's forces, on the hills of Scannagalli near Marciano in the Valdichiana. Over his army, together with the golden lilies of France, there floated a green banner with the Dantesque text: _Libertà vo cercando_, "I go seeking Liberty." Under a blazing sun, Swiss and Frenchmen, Spaniards, Germans and Italians, dashed together in a terrible melée; but the victory on the part of Spain and the Empire was complete and crushing. Four thousand men of Strozzi's army are said to have been killed. The hospitals of Siena were filled to overflowing with the wounded, who made their way in from the scene of disaster; while the rest limped slowly along the streets or lay about in the squares, utterly broken in spirit, wailing for aid. No one who beheld this piteous spectacle, says Sozzini, "could have possibly kept back his tears, even if he had had a heart of hardest stone." It was said that the defeat had been caused by the treachery of a French ancient--though Montluc will not assert this--and Strozzi, while he lay helpless with his wounds at Montalcino, got the man into his hands, extorted a confession by torture, and executed him together with one of his own officers to whom he ascribed his overthrow.

The doom of Siena was now sealed. The imperialists drew their lines closer and closer round the city, while the heroism of Montluc and of the Sienese themselves prolonged the resistance for eight months. There were the usual attempts to storm Heaven on behalf of the Republic. The "Madonna delle Grazie" was carried through the city preceded by three hundred little girls, white-robed and barefooted, crying: _Christe audi nos!_ And then procession was made with the wooden Crucifix of the Duomo, said to have been that carried by the victors of Montaperti, with all the children of the Spedale and a thousand young maidens of the city walking in front, followed by the Disciplinati of Our Lady, all the friars and clergy, and, after the Crucifix, a great multitude of men and women. Then it was decreed that the "useless mouths," _le bocche disutili_, should be expelled from the city; and these sweet voices of the children grew silent. Four officials specially appointed, the _Quattro sopra le bocche disutili_, on September 22nd at nightfall, drove out more than a thousand men, women and children, weeping with sorrow and terror. Then Piero Strozzi, who had temporarily returned to Siena with the Archbishop and others, bade the Rector of the Spedale expel 700 more, in order that the soldiers might make use of the supply of grain that the Spedale possessed, an escort being promised to guard them out of danger. On October 5th, 250 little children, from six to ten years old, mostly in litters, with a number of men and women, passed out of the Porta Fontebranda, escorted by four companies of soldiers. They fell into an ambuscade, a number of them were slaughtered and the rest driven back towards the city. "And next morning they were all outside Porta Fontebranda (at the place where the annual market of the pigs is held), all lying on the ground with the greatest cries and lamentations. It was the most pitiful sight to see these little despoiled children, wounded and beaten, lying on the ground, and would

have made a Nero weep. And I would have payed twenty-five scudi not to have seen them; for, for three days, I could neither eat nor drink anything that did me good."[127] The Rector of the Spedale resigned his post, rather than be a party to any further cruelty of this kind. A few weeks later, a number of the elder children, from ten to fifteen years old, were sent out openly in the daytime without any escort, under the impression that the enemy would let them pass. They went out by the Porta Pispini, _tutti piangendo_, and came back at midday, stripped to their shirts, "and returning to the Spedale two and two, as in procession, they moved the folk to such compassion that many wept."[128] Presently they were reduced to wandering through the city, knocking at the doors of those who had been wealthy, begging for a morsel of bread. But all this was mercy itself, compared to the fate of the _bocche disutili_ later, and compared to what was done elsewhere. At Turrita, in the contado, a band of Germans in the Florentine pay crucified an old woman, under circumstances of appalling atrocity, for cursing the Duke of Florence and for crying _Lupa, Lupa_, when they bade her shout _Duca_.

Piero Strozzi now left Siena to its fate, in a vain hope of collecting reinforcements elsewhere. The Archbishop Francesco Bandini, Enea Piccolomini and others broke through the Spanish lines, and escaped to Montalcino. Montluc was made Dictator. Too long would it take to tell here in full detail the whole story of protracted heroism; the incessant bombardment; the assaults repulsed time after time; the gallant sallies of the besieged; the games that they still played at intervals in the Campo--interrupted by the sudden call to arms--at one of which, a vigorous _giuoco delle pugna_, Montluc wept for mingled joy and pity at their valour. The ladies of Siena--now laying aside the sportive spirit and gay dresses in which they had at first worked--laboured again on the fortifications, and in destroying the buildings, where these encumbered the movements of the soldiers; especially at the Porta Ovile, which had become the most dangerous place in the city, since the Marchese had planted artillery upon the hill between it and the Osservanza. At last the brave German mercenaries of France grew impatient at the lack of bread and wine, and Montluc sent them out of the city, to join the flying army that Strozzi was supposed to be raising. Once more all the _bocche disutili_ were expelled--but this time there was no mercy shown them by friend or foe.

"The list of these useless mouths," writes Montluc, "I do assure you amounted to four thousand and four hundred people, or more, which of all the miseries and desolations that I have ever seen was the greatest my eyes ever yet beheld, or that I believe I shall ever see again; for the master was thereby necessitated to part with his servant, who had served him long, the mistress with her maid, besides an infinite number of poor people, who only lived by the sweat of their brows; which weeping and desolation continued for three days together; and these poor wretches were to go through the Enemy, who still beat them back again towards the City, the whole camp continuing night and day in arms to that only end; so that they drove them up to the very foot of the walls, that they might the sooner consume the little bread we had left, and to see if the City out of compassion to those miserable creatures would revolt. But that prevailed nothing, though they lay eight days in this condition, where they had nothing to eat but herbs and grass, and above the one half of them perished, for the Enemy killed them, and very few escaped away. There were a great many maids and handsome women, indeed, who found means to escape, the Spaniards by night stealing them into their quarters, for their own provision; but it was unknown to the Marquis, for it had otherwise been death; and some strong and vigorous men also forced their way, and escaped by night. But all those did not amount to the fourth part, and all the rest miserably perished."

Even more horrible is the description given by Scipione Bargagli of the fate of these hapless victims, inclosed between the walls of their countrymen and the trenches of the foe, their bodies devoured by the birds and starving dogs, who frequently returned to the city with the skulls or bones.[129]

Treachery failed to induce a surrender, but the agony of the city had become unendurable. When March came, there was not a drop of wine left in Siena; all the horses but two, all the mules and asses and rats, had been eaten; it was necessary to make costly sallies in order that the women and children might pick grass and herbs outside the walls. The ladies could no longer be recognised by their features. People fell dead in the streets, and the trenches were brought up to the very gates. But the imperial army had begun to suffer too, and there was nothing on the ground for the horses to eat, from Montalcino to Siena and from Siena to Florence.

An appeal to the Pope failed. Although Julius III. was Sienese on his mother's side, he coldly recommended an unconditional surrender to the Caesarian Majesty. Once more the city was solemnly offered up to the Madonna; there were wild, useless appeals to Venice and the Duke of Ferrara to interpose. Then, no help being forthcoming from heaven or earth, the starving Sienese capitulated to the Emperor through the Duke of Florence, in April 1555. On April 21st the French marched out of the Porta Romana, Montluc receiving a well-deserved ovation from the enemy. With them went a number of Florentine exiles and others, "exiles and rebels to the State of the Emperor, the King of England (who was King Philip) and the Duke of Florence"; for Montluc had insisted upon a clause in their favour being inserted into the capitulation, and the Marchese di Marignano himself had no desire of glutting the Medicean headsman with more blood. With them went a number of Sienese headed by Mario Bandini (the last Captain of the People in free Siena), Fabio Spannocchi, who was one of the Priors, and Giulio Vieri, one of the three Gonfalonieri. These were about 800 in all, men, women and children; the old women and some of the children went on carriage mules, which Marignano had provided at Montluc's request, the rest tramping wearily on foot. The Spaniards had some pity, and succoured them with food on the way. "I had seen a sad parting," writes Montluc, "at the turning out the useless mouths; but I saw as sad a one at the separation of those who went out with us and those who remained behind. In my life I never saw so sad a farewell; so that although our soldiers had in their own persons suffered to the last extremes, yet did they infinitely regret this woful parting, and that they had not the power to defend the liberty of these people, and I more than all the rest, who could not without tears behold this misery and desolation of a people, who had manifested themselves so devout for the conservation of their liberty and honour."

Then, suddenly, all the bells of the churches and towers began to ring. The imperialists--Spaniards, Italians, Germans--marched in by the same gate. They entered quietly and in an orderly fashion, but made a great shouting and uproar when they reached the Campo. Surrounded by a splendidly equipped guard of German halberdiers, the Marchese di Marignano rode to the Duomo and had the Mass of the Holy Spirit solemnly sung. But the choristers broke down in sobs and tears, and the lamentations of the people drowned the music. Vast supplies of provisions, brought from Florence, appeared in the Campo; white bread and wine, grain, fresh and salt meat, and eggs. The starving Sienese, rushing to buy, instantly swept the piazza clear of these provisions, like the advent of a sudden whirlwind.

For some while the ultimate fate of the once mighty Republic hung in doubt. Cosimo had conquered as the lieutenant of the Emperor, and the latter first invested his own son, Philip II. of Spain, with Siena and its dominion as a vacant fief of the Empire. Philip ruled it for two years by means of the tyrannical Cardinal of Burgos, who, in defiance of the articles of the capitulation, began to build a fortress and filled the prisons with suspected persons. There was even some talk of ceding the Sienese State to Pope Paul IV., that he might invest his nephews, the Caraffa, with it. But at length Cosimo de' Medici had his will, and in July 1557, he obtained from Philip the investiture of Siena, its city and dominion, to be held as a fief from the King of Spain. But the Spanish monarch reserved to himself the seaboard of the late Republic--including Talamone, Orbetello, Port' Ercole and Porto Santo Stefano--which henceforth, until the eighteenth century, formed what were known as the Spanish Praesidia.[130]

But Montalcino still held out under French protection. Mario Bandini had carried off the public seals; and, although he sent these back after he had copied them, the Sienese in Montalcino, declaring that _ubi cives, ibi patria_, still represented the old Republic of Siena, coined money, and for some time kept a large portion of the Sienese State in obedience to them and France. Mario Bandini died there in 1558; that other hero of the last days of the Republic, Enea Piccolomini, had died a month before the capitulation of Siena itself. At length, the treaty of Câteau Cambresis, which decided the fate of Italy, decided the destinies of Montalcino as well. The heroic little Republic sent two ambassadors to Cambresis, Bernardino Buoninsegni and Annibale Buonsignori, pleading either for liberty or for the rule of France. That failing, they capitulated in August 1559, to Spain and Cosimo upon honourable terms, and the Republic of Siena was a thing of the past.

In 1561 Cosimo, Duke of Florence and Siena (he did not become Grand Duke until 1570), made his triumphant entry into Siena. Henceforth he ruled the city by means of a lieutenant-general and a Balìa appointed by himself; the other forms of republican government were preserved, as the Duke was anxious to attract back to Siena those whom Spanish brutality had driven away, but with hardly the shadow of any political authority. The great grand-ducal citadel of Santa Barbara, now that most pleasant of lounging-places at sunset, tells its own story.

Deprived of liberty and independence, without even the showy compensation of the presence of a Court, Siena became a kind of glorified provincial city. The energies of nobles and people alike manifested themselves in the numerous academies for which the Sienese were always famous, in the wild sports of the contrade, in the social and literary gatherings, _veglie_ and _trattenimenti_, which became proverbial throughout Italy.

For the rest, Siena followed the fortunes of the Grand Duchy of Tuscany, and shared in the great national awakening of Italy that our own days have seen.