took three boys of the age of ten years, giving to them a ducat a-piece, saying that he wished to restore the Pope’s health, and that he required for that purpose a certain quantity of human blood, which must be young; that he drew all the blood out of those three boys; that the said boys incontinently died; that, when the Lord Innocent P.P. VIII knew, He execrated the crime of the Jew and gave order for his arrest; that the Jew had taken himself by flight out of the reach of the torturers; and that the Pope received no cure. This, Dr. Mandell Creighton and Mr. John Addington Symonds call transfusion of blood. They appear to be unaware of the fifteenth century passion for sublimation and distillation: and they appear to have missed this sentence of Raynaldus, _ut ex eo_ (the young blood) _pharmacum stillicidium chimica arte paratum propinandum Pontifici conficeret_; which plainly shows that it was a draught, a drink,[21] the quintessence of the boys’ blood, prepared by his alchymical art, with which the Hebrew physician was going to fail to save the life of the Pope. * * * * * These were the times, and the men, which the Vicechancellor-Cardinal Rodrigo de Lançol y Borja had to deal. * * * * * =Book the Second= The Roaring Blaze “_A fire that is kindled begins with smoke and hissing, while it lays hold upon the faggots; bursts into a roaring blaze with raging tongues of flame, devouring all in reach_; The subject of this book has furnished occasion for liars of all ages—reckless liars, venal liars, raving liars, careless liars, clever liars, and futile liars, to perform their functions. The Lord Innocent P.P. VIII died on the twenty-fifth of July 1492. The Lord Rafaele Galeotti Sansoni-Riarjo, Cardinal-Deacon of San Giorgio _in Velum Aureum_, Cardinal-Chamberlain of the Holy Roman Church, sent guards to seize and hold the gates of Rome. _Caporioni_, priors of the fourteen Regions, patrolled the city to deal with seditions and disorders. Patarina, the great bell on Capitol, that only tolls when the Pope is dead, knelled unceasingly. At this time the Sacred College consisted of seven and twenty cardinals. Four of these were absent in distant sees, and were unable to reach the Eternal City in the nine days at their disposal. They were:— (α) The Lord Luis Juan de Mila y Borja, Cardinal-Prior-Presbyter of the Title of Santi Quattro Coronati; (β) The Lord Pedro Gonsalvo de Mendoza, Cardinal-Presbyter of the Title of Santa Croce _in Gerusalemme_; (γ) The Lord André Spinay, Cardinal-Presbyter of the Title of San Martino _in Monte t.t. Equitii_; (δ) Frère Pierre d’Aubusson, Grand Master of the Knights of Rhodes, Cardinal-Deacon of Sant’ Adriano. Twenty-one cardinals entered the Conclave. They were:—