he gazed; and slowly he
departed. But it was some moments before, recalled to herself, the
Signora felt that she was alone.

"Alone!" she cried, half aloud, and with wild emphasis--"alone! Oh, what
have I undergone--what have I said! Unfaithful, even in thought, to him!
Oh, never! never! I, that have felt the kiss of his hallowing lips--that
have slept on his kingly heart--I!--holy Mother, befriend and strengthen
me!" she continued, as, weeping bitterly, she sunk upon her knees; and
for some moments she was lost in prayer. Then, rising composed, but
deadly pale, and with the tears rolling heavily down her cheeks, the
Signora passed slowly to the casement; she threw it open, and bent
forward; the air of the declining day came softly on her temples; it
cooled, it mitigated, the fever that preyed within. Dark and huge
before her frowned, in its gloomy shadow, the tower in which Rienzi was
confined; she gazed at it long and wistfully, and then, turning away,
drew from the folds of her robe a small and sharp dagger. "Let me save
him for glory!" she murmured; "and this shall save me from dishonour!"

Chapter 7.III. Holy Men.--Sagacious Deliberations.--Just Resolves.--And
Sordid Motives to All.

Enamoured of the beauty, and almost equally so of the lofty spirit, of
the Signora Cesarini, as was the warlike Cardinal of Spain, love with
him was not so master a passion as that ambition of complete success
in all the active designs of life, which had hitherto animated his
character and signalized his career. Musing, as he left the Signora, on
her wish for the restoration of the Roman Tribune, his experienced and
profound intellect ran swiftly through whatever advantages to his own
political designs might result from that restoration. We have seen that
it was the intention of the new Pontiff to attempt the recovery of the
patrimonial territories, now torn from him by the gripe of able and
disaffected tyrants. With this view, a military force was already in
preparation, and the Cardinal was already secretly nominated the chief.
But the force was very inadequate to the enterprise; and Albornoz
depended much upon the moral strength of the cause in bringing recruits
to his standard in his progress through the Italian states. The
wonderful rise of Rienzi had excited an extraordinary enthusiasm in his
favour through all the free populations of Italy. And this had been yet
more kindled and inflamed by the influential eloquence of Pet