The marked outline of the face, and the short, firm upper lip, were not concealed by the beard and mustachios usually then worn; and, in the faded portrait of the person now described, still extant at Rome, may be traced a certain resemblance to the popular pictures of Napoleon; not indeed in the features, which are more stern and prominent in the portrait of the Roman, but in that peculiar expression of concentrated and tranquil power which so nearly realizes the ideal of intellectual majesty.  Though still young, the personal advantages most peculiar to youth,—­the bloom and glow, the rounded cheek in which care has not yet ploughed its lines, the full unsunken eye, and the slender delicacy of frame,—­these were not the characteristics of that solitary student.  And, though considered by his contemporaries as eminently handsome, the judgment was probably formed less from the more vulgar claims to such distinction, than from the height of the stature, an advantage at that time more esteemed than at present, and that nobler order of beauty which cultivated genius and commanding character usually stamp upon even homely features;—­the more rare in an age so rugged.

The character of Rienzi (for the youth presented to the reader in the first chapter of this history is now again before him in maturer years) had acquired greater hardness and energy with each stepping-stone to power.  There was a circumstance attendant on his birth which had, probably, exercised great and early influence on his ambition.  Though his parents were in humble circumstances, and of lowly calling, his father was the natural son of the Emperor, Henry VII.; (De Sade supposes that the mother of Rienzi was the daughter of an illegitimate son of Henry VII., supporting his opinion from a Ms. in the Vatican.  But, according to the contemporaneous biographer, Rienzi, in addressing Charles, king of Bohemia claims the relationship from his father “Di vostro legnaggio sono—­figlio di bastardo d’Enrico imperatore,” &c.  A more recent writer, il Padre Gabrini, cites an inscription in support of this descent:  “Nicolaus Tribunus...Laurentii Teutonici Filius,” &c.) and it was the pride of the parents that probably gave to Rienzi the unwonted advantages of education.  This pride transmitted to himself,—­his descent from royalty dinned into his ear, infused into his thoughts, from his cradle,—­made him, even in his earliest youth, deem himself the equal of the Roman signors, and half unconsciously aspire to be their superior.  But, as the literature of Rome was unfolded to his eager eye and ambitious heart, he became imbued with that pride of country which is nobler than the pride of birth; and, save when stung by allusions to his origin, he unaffectedly valued himself more on being a Roman plebeian than the descendant of a Teuton king.  His brother’s death, and the vicissitudes he himself had already undergone, deepened the earnest and solemn qualities of his character; and, at length, all the faculties of a very uncommon intellect were concentrated into one object—­which borrowed from a mind strongly and mystically religious, as well as patriotic, a sacred aspect, and grew at once a duty and a passion.