resima, either in Rome or at Florence,
but has put a new seal on the Frate's words--that the harvest of sin is
ripe, and that God will reap it with a sword."

"I hope he has had a new vision, however," said Francesco Cei,
sneeringly. "The old ones are somewhat stale. Can't your Frate get a
poet to help out his imagination for him?"

"He has no lack of poets about him," said Cronaca, with quiet contempt,
"but they are great poets and not little ones; so they are contented to
be taught by him, and no more think the truth stale which God has given
him to utter, than they think the light of the moon is stale. But
perhaps certain high prelates and princes who dislike the Frate's
denunciations might be pleased to hear that, though Giovanni Pico, and
Poliziano, and Marsilio Ficino, and most other men of mark in Florence,
reverence Fra Girolamo, Messer Francesco Cei despises him."

"Poliziano?" said Cei, with a scornful laugh. "Yes, doubtless he
believes in your new Jonah; witness the fine orations he wrote for the
envoys of Sienna, to tell Alexander the Sixth that the world and the
Church were never so well off as since he became Pope."

"Nay, Francesco," said Macchiavelli, smiling, "a various scholar must
have various opinions. And as for the Frate, whatever we may think of
his saintliness, you judge his preaching too narrowly. The secret of
oratory lies, not in saying new things, but in saying things with a
certain power that moves the hearers--without which, as old Filelfo has
said, your speaker deserves to be called, `non oratorem, sed aratorem.'
And, according to that test, Fra Girolamo is a great orator."

"That is true, Niccolo," said Cennini, speaking from the shaving-chair,
"but part of the secret lies in the prophetic visions. Our people--no
offence to you, Cronaca--will run after anything in the shape of a
prophet, especially if he prophesies terrors and tribulations."

"Rather say, Cennini," answered Cronaca, "that the chief secret lies in
the Frate's pure life and strong faith, which stamp him as a messenger
of God."

"I admit it--I admit it," said Cennini, opening his palms, as he rose
from the chair. "His life is spotless: no man has impeached it."

"He is satisfied with the pleasant lust of arrogance," Cei burst out,
bitterly. "I can see it in that proud lip and satisfied eye of his. He
hears the air filled with his own name--Fra Girolamo Savonarola, of
Ferrara; the prophet, the saint, the mig