“Poor boy!” she said, “it seems as if Providence had made me select thee yesterday from the crowd, and thus conducted thee to thy proper refuge.  For to whom should come the friendless and the orphans of Rome, but to the palace of Rome’s first Magistrate?” Turning then to her attendants, she gave them instructions as to the personal comforts of her new charge, which evinced that if power had ministered to her vanity, it had not steeled her heart.  Angelo Villani lived to repay her well!

She retained the boy in her presence, and conversing with him familiarly, she was more and more pleased with his bold spirit and frank manner.  Their conversation was however interrupted, as the day advanced, by the arrival of several ladies of the Roman nobility.  And then it was that Nina’s virtues receded into shade, and her faults appeared.  She could not resist the woman’s triumph over those arrogant signoras who now cringed in homage where they had once slighted with disdain.  She affected the manner of, she demanded the respect due to, a queen.  And by many of those dexterous arts which the sex know so well, she contrived to render her very courtesy a humiliation to her haughty guests.  Her commanding beauty and her graceful intellect saved her, indeed, from the vulgar insolence of the upstart; but yet more keenly stung the pride, by forbidding to those she mortified the retaliation of contempt.  Hers were the covert taunt—­the smiling affront—­the sarcasm in the mask of compliment—­the careless exaction of respect in trifles, which could not outwardly be resented, but which could not inly be forgiven.

“Fair day to the Signora Colonna,” said she to the proud wife of the proud Stephen; “we passed your palace yesterday.  How fair it now seems, relieved from those gloomy battlements which it must often have saddened you to gaze upon.  Signora, (turning to one of the Orsini), your lord has high favour with the Tribune, who destines him to great command.  His fortunes are secured, and we rejoice at it; for no man more loyally serves the state.  Have you seen, fair Lady of Frangipani, the last verses of Petrarch in honour of my lord?—­they rest yonder.  May we so far venture as to request you to point out their beauties to the Signora di Savelli?  We rejoice, noble Lady of Malatesta, to observe that your eyesight is so well restored.  The last time we met, though we stood next to you in the revels of the Lady Giulia, you seemed scarce to distinguish us from the pillar by which we stood!”

“Must this insolence be endured!” whispered the Signora Frangipani to the Signora Malatesta.

“Hush, hush; if ever it be our day again!”

Chapter 4.II.  The Blessing of A Councillor Whose Interests and Heart Are Our Own.—­the Straws Thrown Upward,—­Do They Portend A Storm.