onded haughtily to
their questions, and demanded free passage for his courier to Virginio
Orsini, then at Florence. To this demand the court acceded; but the
precaution of way-laying the courier and searching his person was
very wisely taken. Besides some formal dispatches which announced
Vittoria's assassination, they found in this man's boot a compromising
letter, declaring Virginio a party to the crime, and asserting that
Lodovico had with his own poignard killed their victim. Padua placed
itself in a state of defence, and prepared to besiege the palace of
Prince Lodovico, who also got himself in readiness for battle.
Engines, culverins, and firebrands were directed against the
barricades which he had raised. The militia was called out and the
Brenta was strongly guarded. Meanwhile the Senate of S. Mark had
dispatched the Avogadore, Aloisio Bragadin, with full power to the
scene of action. Lodovico Orsini, it may be mentioned, was in their
service; and had not this affair intervened, he would in a few weeks
have entered on his duties as Governor for Venice of Corfu.

The bombardment of Orsini's palace began on Christmas Day. Three of
the Prince's men were killed in the first assault; and since the
artillery brought to bear upon him threatened speedy ruin to the house
and its inhabitants, he made up his mind to surrender. 'The Prince
Luigi,' writes one-chronicler of these events, 'walked attired in
brown, his poignard at his side, and his cloak slung elegantly under
his arm. The weapon being taken from him, he leaned upon a balustrade,
and began to trim his nails with a little pair of scissors he happened
to find there.' On the 27th he was strangled in prison by order of the
Venetian Republic. His body was carried to be buried, according to his
own will, in the church of S. Maria dell' Orto at Venice. Two of his
followers were hung next day. Fifteen were executed on the following
Monday; two of these were quartered alive; one of them, the Conte
Paganello, who confessed to having s