Piccolomini

“ The example which had been set at Lintz, was universally followed; imprecations were showered on the traitor, and he was forsaken by all the armies. At last, when even Piccolomini returned no more, the mist fell from Wallenstein's eyes, and in consternation he awoke from his dream. Yet his faith in the truth of astrology, and in the fidelity of the army was unshaken. Immediately after the intelligence of Piccolomini's defection, he issued orders, that in future no commands were to be obeyed, which did not proceed directly from himself, or from Terzky, or Illo. ”

“ While his name is not attached to any great discovery in the science of anatomy, he is generally acknowledged to have been one of the great teachers of his time and one who was needed just then in order to make people realize how the old and the new in anatomy must be coordinated. Piccolomini's successor in the chair of anatomy at Rome was another original genius and investigator whose name, however, and fame has never been as great among English-speaking people as in Italy, or among the Latin races generally. ”

“ TIEFENBACH and GOETZ (call out from the second and third tables) . Count Piccolomini! TERZKY. Stop, ye shall have him in an instant. Read This oath here, whether as 'tis here set forth, The wording satisfies you. They've all read it, Each in his turn, and each one will subscribe His individual signature. MAX. (reads) . "Ingratis servire nefas." ISOLANI. That sounds to my ears very much like Latin, And being interpreted, pray what may it mean? TERZKY. No honest man will serve a thankless master. ”

“ Before we parted, Esther and her father made me promise to dine with them every day, and to let them know if anything prevented my coming.
Next morning, about eight o'clock, while I was still dressing, I suddenly saw Piccolomini standing before me, and as he had not sent in his name I began to feel suspicious. I rang the bell for my faithful Spaniard, who came in directly.
"I want to speak to you privately," said he, "tell that fellow to go out."
"He can stay," I answered, "he does not know a word of Italian." Le Duc, of course, knew Italian perfectly well. ”

“ He surpassed all the noblemen of that age in prowess and courage. In the bloody quarrels of the barons, for which the streets of Rome were then notorious, he was always the first to commence and the last to retreat. Naturally strong, he fought with strength, although treason was the height of his ambition; and his favorite hero, the famous Alphonso Piccolomini, a celebrated highwayman whom Ferdinand dei Medici, as Cardinal, once saved from the gallows, but afterwards, as Grand Duke, hung. ”

“ Butler in return assured the duke that he would serve him rather than any other mortal. On the same day Eger was reached, and Butler was assigned quarters in the town, while his regiment remained outside the gates. Meanwhile on the 23rd Butler had contrived to despatch his chaplain to Piccolomini, now at Pilsen, assuring him that he would be true to the emperor, and adding that perchance God's providence designed to force him to do some heroic deed. Piccolomini bade the chaplain tell Butler that if he desired the imperial favour and promotion, he must deliver up Wallenstein dead or alive. ”

“ That morning we paid another visit to the famous Library of the Duomo, which Francesco Piccolomini commissioned Pinturicchio to paint in honour of his uncle Aeneas Sylvius, for we could think of no better preparation for the Palio than studying this Quattrocento pageantry. We are told that in his contract Cardinal Francesco inserted a special clause, insisting that the Umbrian artist should use a certain quantity of gold and ultramarine and crimson in his decorations. ”

“ Compare the beautiful letter of Æneas Sylvius Piccolomini to his nephew (Ep. Lib. i. 4) . He reminds the young man that fair as youth is, and delightful as are the pleasures of the May of life, learning is more fair and knowledge more delightful. 'Non enim Lucifer aut Hesperus tam pulcher est quam sapientia quæ studiis acquiritur litterarum.'
[10] It is enough to refer to Luther's Table Talk upon the state of Rome in Leo's reign.
[11] Poliziano, Pontano, Sannazzaro, and Bembo divided their powers between scholarship and poetry, to the injury of the latter. ”

“ The inferior, he advises, should never permit himself to jest upon his patron; but, if he is himself stung by any unpleasing wit or sharp word, ought to receive it with a smiling countenance, and to answer so as to conceal his resentment. It is probable that this art was understood in an Italian palace without the help of books.
[1068] For these books see Tiraboschi, Corniani, and Ginguéné. Niceron, vol. xxiii., observes of Piccolomini, that he was the first who employed the Italian language in moral philosophy. ”

“ They are hard to be pleased, when they have been once red hot with offence; but they will not meet revenge in the face, and field; and they will rather hire it, than take it. In fine, they affect very much compounded names, as Piccolomini, Capilupo, Bentivoglio, Malespina, Boncompagno, Malvezzi, Riccobono, Malatesta, Homodei, and such like married Names. ”

“ The false Piccinino, whose real name was Massari, and who was called Verbum Caro because he was a native of the village of that name, was endowed with a brute courage that nothing could daunt, but was as stupid as a buffalo in a frenzy. Carmelo went to the seashore with him, and tried to find a boat to take him to Sardinia. But, despite the precautions with which he surrounded that step, the owner of the boat betrayed them as smugglers to the revenue officers on the coast. Verbum Caro fought like a lion, and was half dead when he finally fell into the hands of his enemies. ”

“ The young, inexperienced fly was disposed to take Piccolissima, the dictionary, and the barley sugar for a chain of mountains. However, when the little girl turned her gentle, child-like face towards him, the insect felt the pleasant warmth of her breath; it reanimated him, and gave him courage, and with one bound he flew upon the arm of Piccolissima. With a sudden familiarity he murmured in a low voice, "Art thou, perhaps, an elder sister of mine? Thou warmest me. Art thou placed in the sun to strengthen thy wings? ”

“ Six months ago, no one dared to leave a drawer in the house open; now every thing remains quiet in its place; she is neither more nor less than a reasonable being; she is a waxen image, I tell you."
"Did I say any thing else, Madam Scold?" answered the school boy; "she is a real Liliputian statue, fit for nothing but to watch the flies fly. Ah! come, Piccola, Piccolissima!" ”

“ Her mind grew, and she learned that, small as she was, she was superior to the best informed fly. She studied the habits and doings of the ants, and learned a great deal about their different tribes and nations. Sometimes her brother would take his sister's toilet cushion and put it on the table before him, and seating Piccolissima upon it, say to her, "Now, Piccola, dear, listen with both of your little ears to my big words, and I will read some wonderful stories to you." ”

“ Doubtless Abbé Ninfo's disappearance will soon be noticed, and the name of the Piccinino will occur at once to the popular imagination as well as to the crafty brains of the police authorities. Result, fresh investigations on the heels of those of which my humble personality is already the object, and which I have escaped thus far only by a miracle. I have accepted the risks of this affair; I have the monster in my power. Your highness's mind is at rest concerning the safety of your friends and your own freedom of action. You are in possession of the document that entitles you to great wealth. ”

“ Tell me, my boy, have you never heard of the Piccinino and his band since you have been in Sicily?"
"It seems to me that I have. Yes, yes, uncle, my sister Mila has some fantastic stories about this Piccinino, who is the principal subject of conversation among the young silk-weavers of Catania. He is a redoubtable brigand, they say, who kidnaps women and kills men at the very gates of the city. I have never believed these fables."
"There is some truth at the bottom of all the popular legends," rejoined the monk. "The Piccinino exists and plies his trade. ”

“ Piccolissima, who once had only frisked and frolicked around her brother, and in whose eyes she had been hitherto a sort of amusing plaything, listened to him now with an air of intelligence and satisfaction, with which he was secretly flattered. "Besides the herculean borer," he continued, "there is another ant in the forests, much larger than your enemy, and who builds mountains. ”

“ The old fly, satiated with sugar, turned half round to the right, and with one spring placed himself opposite the little girl, and stared at her with such a stupefied look, that Piccolissima, although her good sense refused to believe it, thought for a moment that the ten or twelve thousand eyes were all fixed on her, forgetting, in her confusion at being thus stared at, that though each eye had thousands of faces to mirror all surrounding objects, still there was behind them all only one power of seeing, only one fly. ”

“ Do I not want eyes to see at a distance, and eyes to see near? And do you not know that my head is better put on than yours, which cannot turn to all points of the compass?"
"What! can you look behind you without turning your head?" replied Piccolissima, with an air which probably appeared to the fly not very sensible; for, shrugging up his right wing disdainfully, he returned to his sugar candy. ”

“ The Piccinino had an impressionable brain and a fickle humor. His whole life was a constant alternation of meditation and curiosity. The simple and graceful conversation of Mila, her kindly thoughts, the generous outflow of her affections, and an indefinable touch of grandeur of soul, courage, and cheeriness of temperament, which she inherited from her father and uncle, gradually fascinated the brigand. ”

“ Tom Thumb, who loved to complete a remark by a proverb, instead of exclaiming, "It is not strange that she does not grow,—a rolling stone gathers no moss," murmured, rubbing his hands, "Whoever lives will see what I have always said: It is only weeds that grow fast."
In order to employ the activity of Piccolissima, her father had at one time given her some pots of flowers; for a long time, nothing came of them, for she turned over the earth incessantly, and kept looking at the roots to see if they began to sprout. ”

“ Delighted at the discovery of companions in her solitude, companions, too, whose language she could understand, Piccolissima was eager to make their acquaintance; so she offered them her stick of candy. One of the flies—it was the elder—having fixed upon the little prodigy one of the thousand faces of his brown, sparkling eyes, surrounded with golden eyelashes, he then placed, one by one, his little black feet upon the stick of sugar candy, stretched forth his trunk, and began to suck with eagerness. ”

“ The Piccinino turned slowly toward Michel, and stared at him as if he had not previously seen him; then, taking from his belt a richly-mounted stiletto, he presented it to him with an almost imperceptible smile of irony and contempt, as if to say: "You are old enough and strong enough to defend yourself."
Michel, annoyed at being placed in such a position, was about to make a sharp retort, when Fra Angelo cut him short, placing his iron hand on his shoulder. ”

“ Do not think that the Piccinino is worse than other men. He was born calm and long-suffering; but there are virtues which would become vices in us Sicilians, if we should cling to them. Reason and a sense of justice taught him to be a scourge at need. But you see that his heart is sound at bottom. He is very angry with your mother, you told me, and you dreaded his vengeance. You see that he absolves her from the crime which certainly never occurred to that saint-like woman's mind; you see that he does homage to truth, even in the heat of his anger ”

“ In all times, alas! the sparrow has yielded to the fascination of the vulture.
In all this the Piccinino gave way to an inborn passion for increasing the difficulties of an adventure to his profit, or simply for amusement. To be sure, he had no better way of enticing Abbé Ninfo to his house than by offering a bait to his lust. But he might well have chosen some other woman than the innocent Mila to play, with the aid of some slight resemblance or of a similar costume, the part of the person who was to appear in his garden. ”

“ Lord God! you will die of the heat. Our roads are so rough! Come to the house; I will pour the first glass for you, and then I will go, as your lordship kindly permits me to do so."
"My cousin will not go away until you are in the house," said Mila, in obedience to a meaning glance from the Piccinino.
The abbé, seeing that he could not get rid of his obsequious host except by complying with his wish, passed through the arbor without an opportunity to address a word or a glance to Mila; for the Piccinino, still playing the part of a respectful peasant and zealous host, walked between them. ”

“ Her brother, in jumping out of the window, had broken off some ripe strawberries, which the little girl had cherished for her mother, and Piccolissima went sorrowfully to examine the havoc, and pick up the fruit.
She no longer supported herself upon the flexible stalks of the nasturtiums and the convolvulus, which Mr. Tom Thumb cultivated, and who more than once had complained at finding them broken. She no longer seated herself on the branches of the mignonette, and then let the wind blow her at its will, backwards and forwards, a dangerous and monotonous amusement, which soon wearied. ”