Page:The Life of Benvenuto Cellini Vol 2.djvu/447



ELLINI'S autobiography breaks off abruptly just at the point when it was acquiring considerable importance to the historian. Students of Florentine annals will hardly need to be reminded that in the autumn of 1562 the Cardinal de' Medici died suddenly and somewhat mysteriously upon a hunting expedition in the Pisan marshes, while Don Garzia de' Medici followed him to the grave after the interval of a few days at Pisa. Popular rumour asserted that the Cardinal had been mortally wounded in a quarrel by his brother Garzia, and that their father, the Grand Duke, had stabbed the latter in a fit of murderous rage. The death of the Grand Duchess Leonora, which took place shortly afterwards, was ascribed, not to her natural sorrow and to her own physical infirmities, but to the horror inspired in her by these domestic crimes.

There is little doubt that all three deaths were natural; and Cellini's interrupted account of the occurrences very materially confirms this view. It must, however, be regretted that we have lost the narrative of his visit to Pisa. The intimate relations which up to this time he maintained with the Grand Ducal family, gave him abundant opportunities for discerning the truth in matters which concerned them privately; nor can it be doubted that the picture he would probably have drawn of their domestic affliction must have been dramatically impressive.

Cellini died upon the 13th of February 1570, according to the old Florentine style, or in 1571, according to our modern reckoning. Therefore somewhat more than seven years of life remained for him after the termination of his Memoirs. The events of those years may be to a certain extent recovered from his private memoranda or Ricordi, his