more
assiduously than ever the regard of this party, by showing subtle
evidence that his political convictions were entirely on their side; and
all the while, instead of withdrawing his agency from the Mediceans, he
had sought to be more actively employed and exclusively trusted by them.
It was easy to him to keep up this triple game. The principle of
duplicity admitted by the Mediceans on their own behalf deprived them of
any standard by which they could measure the trustworthiness of a
colleague who had not, like themselves, hereditary interests, alliances,
and prejudices, which were intensely Medicean. In their minds, to
deceive the opposite party was fair stratagem; to deceive their own
party was a baseness to which they felt no temptation; and, in using
Tito's facile ability, they were not keenly awake to the fact that the
absence of traditional attachments which made him a convenient agent was
also the absence of what among themselves was the chief guarantee of
mutual honour. Again, the Roman and Milanese friends of the
aristocratic party, or Arrabbiati, who were the bitterest enemies of
Savonarola, carried on a system of underhand correspondence and
espionage, in which the deepest hypocrisy was the best service, and
demanded the heaviest pay; so that to suspect an agent because he played
a part strongly would have been an absurd want of logic. On the other
hand, the Piagnoni of the popular party, who had the directness that
belongs to energetic conviction, were the more inclined to credit Tito
with sincerity in his political adhesion to them, because he affected no
religious sympathies.

By virtue of these conditions, the last three months had been a time of
flattering success to Tito. The result he most cared for was the
securing of a future position for himself at Rome or at Milan; for he
had a growing determination, when the favourable moment should come, to
quit Florence for one of those great capitals where life was easier, and
the rewards of talent and learning were more splendid. At present, the
scale dipped in favour of Milan; and if within the year he could render
certain services to Duke Ludovico Sforza, he had the prospect of a place
at the Milanese court which outweighed the advantages of Rome.

The revelation of the Medicean conspiracy, then, had been a subject of
forethought to Tito; but he had not been able to foresee the mode in
which it would be brought about. The arrest of Lamberto dell