sed to surrender, they obtained a
promise from Madonna Caterina, for so the Countess was named, that on
their permitting her to enter the citadel she would cause it to be
given up to them, her children in the mean time remaining with them as
hostages. On which undertaking they suffered her to enter the citadel.
But no sooner had she got inside than she fell to upbraid them from the
walls with the murder of her husband, and to threaten them with every
kind of vengeance; and to show them how little store she set upon her
children, told them scoffingly that she knew how others could be got. In
the end, the rebels having no leader to advise them, and perceiving too
late the error into which they had been betrayed, had to pay the penalty
of their rashness by perpetual banishment.

But of all the dangers which may follow on the execution of a plot, none
is so much or so justly to be feared as that the people should be well
affected to the prince whom you have put to death. For against this
danger conspirators have no resource which can ensure their safety. Of
this we have example in the case of Caesar, who as he had the love of the
Roman people was by them avenged; for they it was who, by driving
out the conspirators from Rome, were the cause that all of them, at
different times and in different places, came to violent ends.

Conspiracies against their country are less danger for those who take
part in them than conspiracies against princes; since there is less risk
beforehand, and though there be the same danger in their execution,
there is none afterwards. Beforehand, the risks are few, because a
citizen may use means for obtaining power without betraying his wishes
or designs to any; and unless his course be arrested, his designs are
likely enough to succeed; nay, though laws be passed to restrain him, he
may strike out a new path. This is to be understood of a commonwealth
which has to some degree become corrupted; for in one wherein there is
no taint of corruption, there being no soil in which evil seed can grow,
such designs will never suggest themselves to any citizen.

In a commonwealth, therefore, a citizen may by many means and in many
ways aspire to the princedom without risking destruction, both because
republics are slower than princes are to take alarm, are less suspicious
and consequently less cautious, and because they look with greater
reverence upon their great citizens, who are in this way rendered bolder