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was our right; we had captured the city.'
    'A lie. You did not capture the city. It capitulated.'
    By the rules of Italian warfare at the time, if a city was taken by storm the soldiers were allowed to loot and keep everything they could lay hands on, but if it had capitulated, though the citizens were called upon to pay a large sum to defray the expense to which the condittieri had been put to gain possession of their city, they saved their lives and their property. The rule was useful, for it made the citizens willing enough to surrender; it was not often that devotion to their prince induced them to fight to the death.
    The Duke pronounced sentence.
    'My orders were that the troops were to remain without the walls and that any harm done to the persons or property of the citizens should be punished by death.' He turned to the officer. 'Hang them in the square at dawn. Let it be published in the camp what their crime and its punishment were. Have two soldiers stand guard over the bodies till noon and let the town crier inform the population at proper intervals that they can rely on the justice of their prince.'
    'What does he say?' asked the terrified boy of his companion, for the Duke had spoken to the two Gascons in French and to the officer in Italian.
    The man did not answer, but looked at the Duke with sullen hatred. The Duke, having heard, repeated the sentence in French.
    'You will be hanged at dawn as a warning to others.'
    The boy gave a great cry of anguish and fell to his knees.
    'Mercy, mercy,' he screamed. 'I'm too young to die. I don't want to die. I'm afraid.'
    'Take them away,' said the Duke.
    The boy was dragged to his feet, screaming incoherently, tears running from his eyes; but the other, his face distorted with rage, gathered the spittle in his mouth and spat in his face. The pair were hustled from the room. The Duke turned to Agapito da Amalia.
    'See that they are provided with the consolations of religion. It would weigh on my conscience if they faced their Maker without having had the opportunity to repent of their sins.'
    A faint smile on his lips, the secretary slid out of the room. The Duke, apparently in high good humour, addressed himself to the Cardinal his cousin and together to Machiavelli.
    'They were fools as well as knaves. It was an unpardonable stupidity to sell the articles they had stolen in the very town they had been stolen in. They should have hidden them till they came to a much larger city, Bologna or Florence for instance, where they could have disposed of them in safety.'
    But he noticed that the silversmith was lingering by the door and seemed to wish to say something.
    'What are you doing there?'
    'Who is to going to give me back my money, Excellency? I am a poor man.'
    'Did you pay a fair price for the articles?' Il Valentino asked suavely.
    'I paid what they were worth, The sum the scoundrels asked was ridiculous. I had to make my profit.'
    'Let it be a lesson to you. Another time don't buy anything unless you are sure it has been honestly come by.'
    'I can't afford to lose so much money, Excellency.'
    'Go,' cried the Duke in a tone so savage that the man with a cry scuttled out of the room like a frightened rabbit.
    Il Valentino threw himself back in his chair and roared with laughter. Then he turned courteously to Machia-velli.
    'I must ask you to pardon the interruption; I think it important that justice should be administered promptly, and I wish the people of the territories under my rule to know that they can come to me if they have been ill-used and be sure to find in me an impartial judge.'
    'It is the wisest policy for a prince who wishes to assure his hold on dominions that he has recently acquired,' said the Cardinal.
    'Men will always forgive the loss of their political liberty if their private liberty is left undisturbed,' said the Duke casually. 'So long as their women are not molested and their property is safe, they will be reasonably contented with their