mory for dates, and as I am interested
in Siena, I have not forgotten that Matteo died before 1500. I did not
go to college with Machiavelli," continued he, with some brusqueness,
"but I will tell you that which the Cardinal would have told you if you
had not deceived him by your finesse, as you tried to deceive me just
now. Look at this partly effaced signature, which you have not been able
to read. I will decipher it for you. Blaise de Mo, and then a c, with
several letters missing, just three, and that makes Montluc in the
orthography of the time, and the b is in a handwriting which you might
have examined in the archives of that same Siena, since you come from
there. Now, with regard to this coat-of-arms," and he closed the book to
detail to his stupefied companion the arms hardly visible on the cover,
"do you see a wolf, which was originally of gold, and turtles of gales?
Those are the arms which Montluc has borne since the year 1554, when he
was made a citizen of Siena for having defended it so bravely against
the terrible Marquis de Marignan. As for the box," he took it in its
turn to study it, "these are really the half-moons of the Piccolominis.
But what does that prove? That after the siege, and just as it was
necessary to retire to Montalcino, Montluc gave his prayer-book, as a
souvenir, to some of that family. The volume was either lost or stolen,
and finally reduced to the state in which it now is. This book, too, is
proof that a little French blood was shed in the service of Italy. But
those who have sold it have forgotten that, like Magenta and Solferino,
you have only memory for hatred. Now that you know why I want your
prayer-book, will you sell it to me for five hundred francs?"

The bookseller listened to that discourse with twenty contradictory
expressions upon his face. From force of habit he felt for Montfanon a
sort of respect mingled with animosity, which evidently rendered it very
painful for him to have been surprised in the act of telling an untruth.
It is necessary, to be just, to add that in speaking of the great
painter Matteo and of Pope Pius II in connection with that unfortunate
volume, he had not thought that the Marquis, ordinarily very economical
and who limited his purchases to the strict domain of ecclesiastical
history, would have the least desire for that prayer-book. He had
magnified the subject with a view to forming a legend and to taking
advantage of some rich, unversed amateur