Death takes a stronger hold on us than bygone life.  Therefore, returning to the vast Throne-room, we animate it with one scene it witnessed on an April night in 1508.  Duke Guidobaldo had died at Fossombrone, repeating to his friends around his bed these lines of Virgil: 

     Me circum limus niger et deformis arundo Cocyti tardaque
     palus inamabilis unda Alligat, et novies Styx interfusa
     coercet.

His body had been carried on the shoulders of servants through those mountain ways at night, amid the lamentations of gathering multitudes and the baying of dogs from hill-set farms alarmed by flaring flambeaux.  Now it is laid in state in the great hall.  The dais and the throne are draped in black.  The arms and batons of his father hang about the doorways.  His own ensigns are displayed in groups and trophies, with the banners of S. Mark, the Montefeltrian eagle, and the cross keys of S. Peter.  The hall itself is vacant, save for the high-reared catafalque of sable velvet and gold damask, surrounded with wax candles burning steadily.  Round it passes a ceaseless stream of people, coming and going, gazing at their Duke.  He is attired in crimson hose and doublet of black damask.  Black velvet slippers are on his feet, and his ducal cap is of black velvet.  The mantle of the Garter, made of dark-blue Alexandrine velvet, hooded with crimson, lined with white silk damask, and embroidered with the badge, drapes the stiff sleeping form.

It is easier to conjure up the past of this great palace, strolling round it in free air and twilight; perhaps because the landscape and the life still moving on the city streets bring its exterior into harmony with real existence.  The southern facade, with its vaulted balconies and flanking towers, takes the fancy, fascinates the eye, and lends itself as a fit stage for puppets of the musing mind.  Once more imagination plants trim orange-trees in giant jars of Gubbio ware upon the pavement where the garden of the Duchess lay—­the pavement paced in these bad days by convicts in grey canvas jackets—­that pavement where Monsignor Bombo courted ‘dear dead women’ with Platonic phrase, smothering the Menta of his natural man in lettuce culled from Academe and thyme of Mount Hymettus.  In yonder loggia, lifted above the garden and the court, two lovers are in earnest converse.  They lean beneath the coffered arch, against the marble of the balustrade, he fingering his dagger under the dark velvet doublet, she playing with a clove carnation, deep as her own shame.  The man is Giannandrea, broad-shouldered bravo of Verona, Duke Guidobaldo’s favourite and carpet-count.  The lady is Madonna Maria, daughter of Rome’s Prefect, widow of Venanzio Varano, whom the Borgia strangled.  On their discourse a tale will hang of woman’s frailty and man’s boldness—­Camerino’s Duchess yielding to a low-born suitor’s stalwart charms.  And more will follow, when that lady’s brother, furious Francesco Maria della Rovere, shall stab the