be hallowed by the
murder of a monster odious to God and man. It was on the morning of
December 26, 1476, that the duke entered San Stefano. At one and the
same moment the daggers of the three conspirators struck him--Olgiati's
in the breast, Visconti's in the back, Lampugnani's in the belly. He
cried 'Ah, Dio!' and fell dead upon the pavement. The friends were
unable to make their escape; Visconti and Lampugnani were killed on the
spot; Olgiati was seized, tortured, and torn to death.

[1] Allegretto Allegretti, Diari Sanesi, in Muratori, xxiii. p. 777,
and Corio, p. 425, should be read for the details of his pleasures.
See too his character by Machiavelli, 1st. Fior. lib. 7, vol. ii. p.
316. Yet Giovio calls him a just and firm ruler, stained only with
the vice of unbridled sensuality.

[2] The study of the classics, especially of Plutarch, at this
time, as also during the French Revolution, fired the
imagination of patriots. Lorenzino de' Medici appealed to the
example of Timoleon in 1537, and Pietro Paolo Boscoli to that
of Brutus in 1513.

[3] 'Le ingiurie conviene che siano nella roba, nel sangue, o
nell' onore.... La roba e l'onore sono quelle due cose che
offendono piu gli uomini che alcun' altra offesa, e dalle quali
il principe si debbe guardare: perche e' non puo mai spogliare
uno tanto che non gli resti un coltello da vendicarsi; non puo
tanto disonorare uno che non gli resti un animo ostinato alla
vendetta.' Mach. Disc. iii. 6.

[4] See Olgiati's prayer to Saint Ambrose in Sismondi, vii. 87,
and in Mach. Ist. Fior. lib. 7.

[5] Giovanni Sanzi's chronicle, quoted by Dennistoun, vol. i.
p. 223, describes the conspirators rehearsing on a wooden
puppet.

In the interval which elapsed between the rack and the pincers, Olgiati
had time to address this memorable speech to the priest who urged him to
repent: 'As for the noble action for which I am about to die, it is this
which gives my conscience peace; to this I trust for pardon from the
Judge of all. Far from repenting, if I had to come ten times to life in
order ten times to die by these same torments, I should not hesitate to
dedicate my blood and all my powers to an object so sublime.' When the
hangman stood above him, ready to begin the work of mutilation, he is
said to have exclaimed: Mors acerba, fama perpetua, stabit vetus memora
facti--my death is untimely, m