The congregation of Sante-Piaghe conveyed Bernardino back to his prison, where, during four days, he remained in dreadful convulsions; and for a long time after both his reason and his life were despaired of. The bodies of Beatrice and Lucrezia, together with the severed quarters of Giacomo, were exposed till the evening, at the foot of Saint Paul's statue, on the Ponte St. Angelo. The congregations then took them away. The body of Beatrice was received by venerable matrons, who, after washing and perfuming it, clothed it in white, and surrounded it with flowers, consecrated candles, and vases of incense. It was ultimately placed in a magnificent coffin, conveyed to the church of San Pietro in Montorio, by the light of more than five hundred torches, and there buried, at the foot of the great altar, under the celebrated transfiguration by Raphael. Bernardino was the only survivor of this unhappy family, and the last male heir of his race. He married a Bologuetti, and left an only daughter, who changed the name of the Cenci palace; and from this marriage, the building came into the possession of the Bologuetti family, to whom it still belongs. The old Cenci palace is in the most gloomy and obscure quarter of Rome. Its massive and sullen architecture, and its neglected and deserted appearance, accord perfectly with the tragical associations connected with it. One window, which is fronted with an open-work balcony, may have belonged to the very chamber of Beatrice; and a dark and lofty archway, built of immense stones, may have been that through which she went out to the prison which she left only for the scaffold. In the old Barberini palace is Guido's portrait of Beatrice, taken, according to the family tradition, on the night before her execution. Shelly's tragedy has made her sad story familiar to English readers, and his description of this picture leaves nothing to be added; though no words, nor even copies, can give any idea of her touching loveliness, her expression of patient suffering, her quivering, half-parted lips, and tender hazel eyes of a beauty unattained on any other canvas in the world; but her half-turned head, with its golden locks escaping from the folds of its white drapery, haunts your memory, as if you, too, like Guido, had caught a last glimpse of her as she mounted the scaffold. ANN BOLEYN. WHEN the sister of Henry VIII., a young and blooming girl of sixteen, arrived in France to wed Louis XII., a monarch old enough to be her grandfather, she was attended by several young ladies belonging to the noblest families of England. Among them was Ann Boleyn, celebrated not only by her misfortunes and untimely end, but on account of her being the immediate cause of the reformation, or establishment of the Protestant religion in England. Hers is an eventful history. Ann was the daughter of Sir Thomas Boleyn, a gentleman allied to the noblest houses in the kingdom. His mother was of the house of Ormond, and his grandfather, when mayor of London, had married one of the daughters of Lord Hastings. Lady Boleyn, Ann's mother, was a daughter of the Duke of Norfolk. Sir Thomas Boleyn being a man of talent, had been employed by the king in several diplomatic missions, which he had successfully executed. When the Princess Mary left England to wear, for three short months, the crown of Queen Consort of France, Ann was very young; she therefore finished her education at the French Court, where her beauty and accomplishments were highly valued. After the death of Louis XII., his young widow having married Brandon, Duke of Suffolk, and returned to England, Ann entered the service of Claude, wife of Francis I. On the death of this queen, she had an appointment in the household of the Duchess of Alen |