[36] [_Gov._ "_The father softens--but the governor is fixed_." _Dingle_. "Aye that antithesis of persons is a most established figure."--_Critic_, act ii. sc. 2. Byron may have guessed that this passage would be quoted against him, and, by taking it as a motto, hoped to anticipate or disarm ridicule; or he may have selected it out of bravado, as though, forsooth, the public were too stupid to find him out.] [at] ----_too soon repeated_.--[MS. erased.] [37] {121}[It is a moot point whether Jacopo Foscari was placed on the rack on the occasion of his third trial. The original document of the X. (July 23, 1456) runs thus: "Si videtur vobis per ea quæ dicta et lecta sunt, quod _procedatur_ contra Ser Jacobum Foscari;" and it is argued (see F. Berlan, _I due Foscari, etc._, 1852, p. 57), (1) that the word _procedatur_ is not a euphemism for "tortured," but should be rendered "judgment be given against;" (2) that if the X had decreed torture, torture would have been expressly enjoined; and (3) that as the decrees of the Council were not divulged, there was no motive for ambiguity. S. Romanin (_Storia Documentata, etc._, 1853, iv. 284) and R. Senger (_Die beiden Foscari_, 1878, p. 116) take the same view. On the other hand, Miss A. Wiel (_Two Doges of Venice_, 1891, p. 107) points out that, according to the _Dolfin Cronaca_, which Berlan did not consult, Jacopo was in a "mutilated" condition when the trial was over, and he was permitted to take a last farewell of his wife and children in Torricella. Goethe (_Conversations_, 1874, pp. 264, 265) did not share Eckermann's astonishment that Byron "could dwell so long on this torturing subject." "He was always a self-tormentor, and hence such subjects were his darling theme."] [38] {122}[It is extremely improbable that Francesco Foscari was present in person at the third or two preceding trials of his son. As may be gathered from the _parte_ of the Council of Ten relating to the first trial, there was a law which prescribed the contrary: "In ipsius Domini Ducis præsentiâ de rebus ad ipsum, vel ad filios suos tangentibus non tractetur, loquatur vel consulatur, sicut non potest (_fieri_) quando tractatur de rebus tangentibus ad attinentes Domini Ducis." The fact that "Nos Franciscus Foscari," etc., stood at the commencement of the decree of exile may have given rise to the tradition that the Doge, like a Roman father, tried and condemned his son. (See Berlan's _I due Foscari_, p. 13.)]