More than three centuries have gone since Florence made merry over the death of her Grand Duchess, Bianca. It was an occasion for rejoicing; her name was bandied from lips to lips--"La Pessima Bianca"; jeers and laughter followed her to her unmarked grave in the Church of San Lorenzo. But through the ages her picture has come down to us as she strutted on the world's stage in al her pride and beauty, with a vividness which few better women of her time retain.
It was in the year 1548, when our boy-King, the sixth Edward, was fresh to his crown, that Bianca Capel o was cradled in the palace of her father, one of the greatest men of Venice, Senator and Privy Councillor.
As a child she was as beautiful as she was wilful; the pride of her father, the despair of his wife, her stepmother--her little head full of romance, her heart full of rebel ion against any kind of discipline or restraint.
Before she had left the schoolroom Capello's daughter was, by common consent, the fairest girl in her native city, with a beauty riper than her years. Tall, and with a well-developed figure of singular grace, she carried her head as proudly as any Queen. Her fair hair fell in a rippling cascade far below her waist; her face, hands, and throat, we are told, were "white as lilies," save for the delicate rose-colour that tinted her cheeks. Her eyes were large and dark, and of an almost dazzling brilliance; and her full, pouting lips were red and fragrant as a rose.
Such was Bianca Capel o on the threshold of womanhood, as you may see her pictured to-day in Bronzino's miniature at the British Museum, with a loveliness which set the hearts of the Venetian gal ants a-flutter before our Shakespeare was in his cradle. She might, if she would, have mated with almost any noble in Tuscany, had not her foolish, wayward fancy fallen on Pietro Bonaventuri, a handsome young clerk in Salviati's bank, whose eyes had often strayed from his ledgers to follow her as, in the company of her maid, the Senator's daughter took her daily walk past his office window.
At sight of so fair a vision Pietro was undone; he fel violently in love with her long before he exchanged a word with her, and although no one knew better than he the gulf that separated the daughter of a nobleman and a Senator from the drudge of the quill, he determined to win her. Youth and good-looks such as his, with plenty of assurance to support them, had done as much for others, and they should do it for him. How they first met we know not, but we know that shortly after this momentous meeting Bianca had completely lost her heart to the knight of the quill, with the handsome face, the dark, flashing eyes, and the courtly manner.
Other meetings fol owed--secret rendezvous arranged by the duenna herself in return for liberal bribes--to keep which Bianca would steal out of her father's palace at dead of night, leaving the door open behind her to ensure safe return before dawn. On one such occasion, so the story runs, Bianca returned to find the door closed against her by a too officious hand. She dared not wake the sleepers to gain admittance--that would be to expose her secret and to cover herself with disgrace--and in her fears and alarm she fled back to her lover.
However this may be, we know that, for some urgent reason or other, the young lovers disappeared one night together from Venice and made their way to Florence to find a refuge under the roof of Pietro's parents.
Here a terrible disillusion met Bianca at the threshold. Her husband--for, on the runaway journey, Pietro had secured the friendly services of a village priest to marry them--had told her that he was the son of noble parents, kin to his employers, the Salviatis. The home to which he now introduced her was little better than a hovel, with poverty looking out of its windows.
Here indeed was a sorry home-coming for the new-made bride, daughter of the great Capello! There was not even a drudge to do the housework, which Bianca was compel ed to share with her bucolic mother-in-law. It is even said that she was compelled to do laundry-work in order to keep the domestic purse supplied. Her husband had forfeited his meagre salary; she had equal y sacrificed the fortune left to her by her mother. Sordid, grinding poverty stared both in the face.
To return to her own home in Venice was impossible. So furious were her father and stepmother at her escapade that a large reward was advertised for the capture of her husband, "alive or dead," and a sentence of death had been procured from the Council of Ten in the event of his arrest.
More than this, a sentence of banishment was pronounced against Pietro and Bianca; the maid who had connived at their illicit wooing and flight paid for her treachery with her life; and Pietro's uncle ended his days in a loathsome dungeon.
Such was the vengeance taken by Bartolomeo Capel o. As for the runaways, they spent a long honeymoon in concealment and hourly dread of the fate that hung over them. It was wel known, however, in Florence where they were in hiding; and curious crowds were drawn to the Bonaventuri hovel to catch a glimpse of the heroes of a scandal with which al Italy was ringing. Thus it was that Francesco de Medici first set eyes on the woman who was to play so great a part in his life.
There could be no greater contrast than that between Francesco de Medici, heir to the Tuscan Grand Dukedom, and the beautiful young wife of the bank-clerk, now playing the role of maid-of-al -work and charwoman. It is said that Francesco was a madman; and indeed what we know of him makes this description quite plausible. He was a man of black brow and violent temper, repel ing alike in appearance and manner. He was, we are told, "more of a savage than a civilised human being." His food was deluged with ginger and pepper; his favourite fare was raw eggs filled with red pepper, and raw onions, of which he ate enormous quantities. He drank iced water by the gal on, and slept between frozen sheets. He was a man, moreover, of evil life, familiar with every form of vicious indulgence. His only redeeming feature was a love of art, which enriched the galleries of Florence.
Such was the Medici--half-ogre, half-madman, who, riding one day through a Florence slum, saw at the window of a mean dwel ing the beautiful face of Bianca Bonaventuri, and rode on leaving his heart behind. Here indeed was a dainty dish to set before his jaded appetite. The owner of that fair face, with the crimson lips and the black, flashing eyes, must be his. On the fol owing day a great Court lady, the Marchesa Mondragone, presents herself at the Bonaventuri door, with smiles and gracious words, bearing an invitation to Court for the lady of the window.
"Impossible," bluntly answers Signora Bonaventuri; her daughter-in-law has no clothes fit to be seen at Court. "But," persists the Marchesa,
"that is a matter that can easily be arranged. It will be a pleasure to me to supply the necessary outfit, if the Signora and her daughter-in-law will but come to-morrow to the Mondragone Palace." The bride, when consulted, is not unwilling; and the fol owing day, in company with her mother-in-law, she is effusively received by the Marchesa, and is feasting her eyes on exquisite robes and the glitter of rare gems, among which she is invited to make her choice. A moment later Francesco enters, and with courtly grace is kissing the hand of his new divinity....
Then followed secret meetings such as marked Bianca's first unhappy wooing in Venice--hours of rapture for the Tuscan Duke, of flattered submission by the runaway bride; and within a few weeks we find Bianca instal ed in a palace of her own with Francesco's guards and equipage ever at its door, while his newly made bride, Giovanna, Archduchess of Austria, kept her lonely vigil in the apartments which so seldom saw her husband.
Francesco, indeed, had no eyes or thought for any but the lovely woman who had so completely enslaved him. As for her, condemn her as we must, much can be pleaded in extenuation of her conduct. She had been basely deceived and betrayed. On the one side was a life of sordid poverty and drudgery, with a husband for whom she had now nothing but dislike and contempt; on the other was the ardent homage of the future ruler of Tuscany, with its accompaniment of splendour, luxury, and power. A fig for love! ambition should now rule her life. She would drain the cup of pleasure, though the dregs might be bitter to the taste.
She was now in the very prime of her beauty, and a Queen in all but the name. Between her and her full Queendom were but two obstacles--her lover's plain, unattractive wife, and her own worthless husband; and of these obstacles one was soon to be removed from her path.
Pietro, who had been made chamberlain to the Tuscan Court, was more than content that his wife should go her own way, so long as he was allowed to go his. He was kept very agreeably occupied with love affairs of his own. The richest widow in Florence, Cassandra Borgianni, was eager to lavish her smiles and favours on him; and the knowledge that two of his predecessors in her affection had fal en under the assassin's knife only lent zest to a love adventure which was after his heart.
Warnings of the fate that might await him in turn fel on deaf ears.
When his wife ventured to point out the danger he retorted, "If you say another word I will cut your throat." The fol owing night as he was returning from a visit to the widow, a dagger was sheathed in his heart, and Pietro's amorous race was run.
Such was the end of the bank-clerk and his eleventh-hour glories and love adventures. Now only Giovanna remained to block the way to the pinnacle of Bianca's ambition; and her health was so frail that the waiting might not be long. Giovanna had provided no successor to her husband (who had now succeeded to his Grand Dukedom); if Bianca could succeed where the Grand Duchess had failed, she could at least ensure that a son of hers would one day rule over Tuscany.
Thus one August day in 1576 the news flashed round Florence that a male child had been born in the palace on the Via Maggiore. Francesco was in the "seventh heaven" of delight. Here at last was the long-looked-for inheritor of his honours--the son who was to perpetuate the glories of the Medici and to thwart his brother, the Cardinal, who had so confidently counted on the succession for himself. And Madame Bianca professed herself equally delighted, although her pleasure was qualified by fear.
She had played her part with consummate cleverness; but there were two women who knew the true story of the birth of the child, which had been smuggled into the palace from a Florence slum. One was the changeling's mother, a woman of the people, whom a substantial bribe had induced to part with her new-born infant; the other was Bianca's waiting woman.
These witnesses to the imposture must be silenced effectual y.
Hired assassins made short work of the mother. The waiting-maid was
"left for dead" in a mountain-pass, to which she had been lured; but she survived long enough at least to communicate her secret to the Grand Duke's brother, the Cardinal Ferdinand de Medici.
Bianca was now in a parlous plight. At any moment her enemy, the Cardinal, might betray her to her lover, and bring the carefully planned edifice of her fortunes tumbling about her ears. But she proved equal even to this emergency. Taking her courage in both hands, she herself confessed the fraud to the Grand Duke, who not only forgave her (so completely was he under the spel of her beauty) but insisted on cal ing the gutter-child his son.
The tables, however, were soon to be turned on her, for Giovanna, who had long despaired of providing an heir to her husband, gave birth a few months later to a male child. Florence was jubilant, for the Grand Duchess was as beloved as her rival was detested; and the christening of the heir was made the occasion of festivities and rejoicing. Bianca's day of triumph seemed at last to be over. For a time she left Florence to hide her humiliation; but within a year she was back again, to be received with open arms of welcome by the Duke. During her absence she had made peace with her family, and when her father and brother came to Florence to visit her, they were received by Francesco with regal entertainments, and sent away loaded with presents and honours.
Bianca had now reached the zenith of her power and splendour. Before she had been back many months the Grand Duchess died, to the undisguised relief of her husband, who hastened from her funeral to the arms of her rival. Her position was now secure, unassailable; and before Giovanna had been two months in the family vault, Bianca was secretly married to her Grand ducal lover.
Florence was furious. But what mattered that? The Venetian Senate had recognised Bianca as a true daughter of the Republic. She was the legal wife of the ruler of Tuscany. She was Grand Duchess at last, and she meant al the world to know it. That she was cordial y hated by her husband's subjects, that the air was full of stories of her extravagance, her intemperance, and her cruelty, gave her no moment's unhappiness. For eight years she reigned as Queen, wielding the sceptre her husband's hands were too weak or indifferent to hold. Giovanna's son had fol owed his mother to the grave; and the child of the slums, who had been so fruitlessly smuggled into her palace, had been legitimated.
The only thorn now left in her bed of roses was the enmity of the Grand Duke's brother, the Cardinal; and her greatest ambition was to win him to her side. In the autumn of 1787 he was invited to Florence, and as the culmination of a series of festivities, a grand banquet was given, at which he had the place of honour, at her right hand. The feast was drawing near to its end. Bianca, with sparkling eyes and flushed face, looking lovelier than she had ever looked before, was at her happiest, for the Cardinal had at last succumbed to her bright eyes and honeyed words. It was the crowning moment of her many triumphs, when life left nothing more to desire.
Then it was, at the supreme moment, that tragedy in its most terrible form fell on the scene of festivity and mirth. While Bianca was smiling her sweetest on the Cardinal she was seized by violent pains, "her mouth foams, her face is distorted by agony; she shrieks aloud that she is dying. Francesco tries to go to her aid, but his steps are suddenly arrested. He too is seized by the same terrible anguish. A few hours later both she and he breathe their last breath."
"Poison" was the word which ran through the palace and soon through Florence from blanched lips to blanched lips. Some said it was the Cardinal who had done the deed; others whispered stories of a poisoned tart designed by Bianca for the Cardinal, who refused to be tempted.
Whereupon the Grand Duke had eaten of it, and Bianca, "seeing that her plot had so tragically miscarried, seized the tart from her husband's hand and ate what was left of it."
The truth will never be known. What we do know is that within a few hours of the last joke and the last drained glass of that fatal banquet the bodies of Francesco and Bianca were lying in death side by side in an adjacent room, the door of which was locked against the eyes of the curious--even against the physicians.
In the solemn lying-in-state that fol owed Bianca had no place.
Francesco alone, by his brother's orders, wore his crown in death. As for Bianca, her body was hurried away and flung into the common vault of San Lorenzo, with the light of two yel ow wax torches to bear it company, and the jibes and jeers of Florence for its only requiem.