very moment was
precious. In vain did Don Carlo Caracciolo try once more to appease the
people: a blow from an iron staff wounded him in the arm, and he was hit
by two stones. The doors of the first saloon fell with a loud crash to
the ground. Now the crowd saw no further impediment. Everything
remaining in the palace was torn asunder. The Viceroy, causing the
various doors to be bolted behind him, hastened to the gallery, that he
might reach the spiral staircase leading into the court-yard. Now he
repented that he had not followed Caracciolo's advice, who had desired
him to make his escape to the castle. Andrea Naclerio concealed himself
in the apartments of the Vice-queen, let himself down by a rope into the
garden, and fortunately reached the fortress. But the mob broke
everything that they found in the royal apartments, the panes of the
high windows clattered upon the ground, and in the midst of wild
rejoicings and laughter all the valuable household furniture was flung
down from the balconies into the streets, including the chairs, the
great parasol of the governor of the Collateral Council, and the mangled
papers of the secretary. Even the balustrades of the balconies did not
escape the vandal fury of the populace, and with heavy iron poles and
hammers they dashed in pieces the beautifully polished works of
sculpture.

The Duke of Arcos had descended the spiral staircase, when he perceived
that the bridges of the castle were already drawn up, the portcullis let
down. He believed that he could save himself by crossing the square to
the opposite convent of the Minimi, as he imagined that the rebels were
too much occupied with plundering the palace to attend to him. But he
miscalculated. Scarcely had he reached the square when he was recognized
and surrounded. A knight of St. Jago, Don Antonio Taboada, was
accidentally passing by; he succeeded in penetrating through the crowd
to the Viceroy and lifted him into his carriage. The rescue of the Duke
of Arcos turned upon a hair. One of the people, it is said Masaniello
himself, wanted to thrust his sword into him, but the blow was parried
by Don Emanuel Vaez. A runaway Augustinian monk seized him by the hair
and screamed, "Abolish the taxes!" The carriage could not go on. The
horses pranced; some of the people seized the reins; the coachman was on
the ground. Then many of the nobles pressed through the crowd, making
themselves a passage partly by violence, partly by fair