There was now no overt opposition to the Medici in Florence.  How to govern the city from Rome, and how to advance the fortunes of his brother Giuliano and his nephew Lorenzo (Piero’s son, a young man of twenty-one), occupied the Pope’s most serious attention.  For Lorenzo Leo obtained the Duchy of Urbino and the hand of a French princess.  Giuliano was named Gonfalonier of the Church.  He also received the French title of Duke of Nemours and the hand of Filiberta, Princess of Savoy.  Leo entertained a further project of acquiring the crown of Southern Italy for his brother, and thus of uniting Rome, Florence, and Naples under the headship of his house.  Nor were the Medicean interests neglected in the Church.  Giulio, the Pope’s bastard cousin, was made cardinal.  He remained in Rome, acting as vice-chancellor and doing the hard work of the Papal Government for the pleasure-loving pontiff.

To Lorenzo, Duke of Urbino, the titular head of the family, was committed the government of Florence.  During their exile, wandering from court to court in Italy, the Medici had forgotten what it was to be burghers, and had acquired the manners of princes.  Leo alone retained enough of caution to warn his nephew that the Florentines must still be treated as free people.  He confirmed the constitution of the Signory and the Privy Council of seventy established by his father, bidding Lorenzo, while he ruled this sham republic, to avoid the outer signs of tyranny.  The young duke at first behaved with moderation, but he could not cast aside his habits of a great lord.  Florence now for the first time saw a regular court established in her midst, with a prince, who, though he bore a foreign title, was in fact her master.  The joyous days of Lorenzo the Magnificent returned.  Masquerades and triumphs filled the public squares.  Two clubs of pleasure, called the Diamond and the Branch—­badges adopted by the Medici to signify their firmness in disaster and their power of self-recovery—­were formed to lead the revels.  The best sculptors and painters devoted their genius to the invention of costumes and cars.  The city affected to believe that the age of gold had come again.

XXIII

Fortune had been very favourable to the Medici.  They had returned as princes to Florence.  Giovanni was Pope.  Giuliano was Gonfalonier of the Church.  Giulio was Cardinal and Archbishop of Florence.  Lorenzo ruled the city like a sovereign.  But this prosperity was no less brief than it was brilliant.  A few years sufficed to sweep off all the chiefs of the great house.  Giuliano died in 1516, leaving only a bastard son Ippolito.  Lorenzo died in 1519, leaving a bastard son Alessandro, and a daughter, six days old, who lived to be the Queen of France.  Leo died in 1521.  There remained now no legitimate male descendants from the stock of Cosimo.  The honours and pretensions of the Medici devolved upon three bastards—­on the Cardinal Giulio, and