rogress of the evil, and perhaps prolong
my life for a few weeks!

"Lorenzo, it is my duty to struggle every day with death. I have yet
much to complete before I die, yet much labor before I go to my eternal
rest, and, as far as I can, I must bring to an end what I have commenced
for the welfare of my people! Come, Lorenzo, let us return to the
Vatican; set pans of coals in my room, procure me furs and a glowing hot
sun! I would yet live some weeks!"

With feverish impetuosity Ganganelli grasped Lorenzo's arm and drew him
away. Then, suddenly stopping, he turned toward his favorite place.

"Lorenzo," he said in a low tone, and with deep sadness, "it was yet
very pleasant in the Franciscan cloister. Why did we not remain there?
Only see, my friend, how beautifully the sun glitters there among the
pines, and how delightfully this air fans us! Ah, Lorenzo, this world is
so beautiful, so very beautiful! Why must I leave it so soon?"

Lorenzo made no answer; he could not speak for tears.

Ganganelli cast a long and silent glance around him, greeting with his
eyes the trees and flowers, the green earth and the blue sky.

"Farewell, farewell, thou beautiful Nature!" he whispered low. "We take
our leave of each other. I shall never again see these trees or this
grassy seat. But you, Lorenzo, will I establish as the guardian of this
place, and when you sometimes sit here in the still evening hour, then
will you think of me! Now come, we must away. Feel you not this cool and
gentle air? Oh, how refreshingly it fans and cools, but I dare not enjoy
it--not I! This cooling cuts off a day from my life!"

And with the haste of a youth, Ganganelli ran down the alley. Bathed
with perspiration, breathless with heat, he arrived at the palace.

"Now give me furs, bring pans of coals, Lorenzo, shut all the doors and
windows. Procure me a heat that will shut out death--!"

But death nevertheless came; the furs and coverings, the steaming
coal-pans with which the pope surrounded himself, the glowing atmosphere
he day and night inhaled, and which quite prostrated his friends and
servants, all that could only keep off death for some few weeks, not
drive it away. More dreadful yet than this blasting heat with which
Ganganelli surrounded himself, yet more horrible, was the fire that
consumed his entrails and burned in his blood.

Finally, withered and consumed by these external and internal fires, the
pope greeted Death as a deliverer,