Brancatalini, in his Diarium, wrote: “This day XXII February 1503, Cardinal Orsini left the Castle of Santangelo dead, at a half-hour of the night; (5.30–6 P.M.) and Mariano di Stefano with many other Romans accompanied him; and he was borne to San Salvatore _in Lauro_.” Soderini, Orator of the Signoria of Florence, in a dispatch dated the twenty-third of February 1503 wrote to his government: “Cardinal Orsini died yesterday: and was buried at the twenty-fourth hour (5–5.30 P.M.) at San Salvatore the church of the House of Orsini; and, by order of the Pope, the body was escorted by his relations, and by the cardinals of the Curia, uncovered and resting on a bier draped with cloth-of-gold, vested in a red chasuble brocaded with golden flowers, on the head was a white mitre, and at the feet were two hats in token of his cardinalitial rank. The monks performed the funeral service; and there were about sixty or seventy lighted torches. May he rest in peace.” Obviously, the Orators of the Powers had no suspicion of venom. Giustiniani gladly would have reported such a rumour had he found himself in a position to do so which would have been consistent with his dignity and duty to the Venetian Senate. When He heard what His enemies were saying, the Lord Alexander P.P. VI took prompt action. On the day after the obsequies He convoked the physicians who had attended the dead Cardinal during his illness and agony; and required them to certify that death was owed to natural causes without any violence due to venom or other means; He made them swear on the Sacrament to the truth of their depositions, which were recorded with the facts of the case in the usual form. It was customary to consider certain signs as indicating venom; _e.g._, the spots, the colour, the odour of the corpse. There is no mention made of these. The Pope’s Holiness ordered a public funeral, the body was uncovered; and carried openly through Rome. Every one might see it; and, had the Orsini faction discovered any signs which pointed to an unnatural death, they surely would have proclaimed their suspicions. The interment on the day after death was, and is, the wholesome Roman custom. The hour, after sunset, was, and is, the hour of burial.