[Footnote *1: The army would not hear of a truce. Bourbon, really at their mercy, as he knew before he crossed the Apennines, asked them what they wished to do. "To march on," replied the Spaniards, "even without pay." The Germans after a time, though hungry for their wage, made common cause with them. "To march on," became almost a war-cry, and Bourbon was compelled to consent. He sent word to the Pope before he got into Val d'Arno that his men "were determined to push on, not only to Florence but to Rome, and dragged him with them as a prisoner." He asked for 150,000 ducats by April 15th to pay them with, that he might lead them back. The Pope, however, who had no faith in his power or honesty, sent nothing, trusting in Lannoy and that broken reed the Duke of Urbino.] At this juncture there appeared in Rome one of those strange fanatics whose mysterious aspect and unearthly character, taking strong hold of the popular imagination at particular crises, impart a supernatural character to their wild and dismal vaticinations. He was an aged anchorite, who, fancying himself another Jonah, had long attracted street audiences by vague declamations of coming convulsions, and, as the peril became imminent, warned the anxious people that a total revolution in church and state, and the ruin of the priesthood, were at hand. Rushing along the thoroughfares, he preached, with piercing voice and excited gesticulation, a general penitence and humble reliance on the offended Deity, as the only shelter from the impending storm. He even forced his way to the presence of his Holiness, and, in the midst of the court, repeated gloomy warnings and stern denunciations in harsh words seldom heard in such high places. "But," in the words of an old writer, "repentance is an irksome sound to the ears of hardened sinners," and "more is required to make a saint than sackcloth raiment, a crucifix, and philippics against vice"; so the prophet was committed to prison, to continue his preaching to a more limited audience. Yet it needed no stretch of superstition to regard the sack of Rome, with its accumulated horrors, as a Divine judgment. The gross vices which disgraced the papacy towards the close of the preceding century had, indeed, been considerably modified; but, as the reformation was rather in decency than in morals, it had not greatly influenced the people of Rome: the poison, though counteracted at the core, continued to circulate through the branches. In truth, the hearts of all were so indurated, and their judgment so blinded by pleasures, debaucheries, avarice, and ambition, that the forebodings of enthusiasts, and the many portentous omens of evil that occurred about the same time, were equally disregarded. Among these were, of course, blood-red suns and fiery meteors; but it was afterwards remembered that two aged men with long beards had been observed to stride solemnly along the chief thoroughfares of the city, bearing a