Secret Societies Of The Middle Ages.—Iv.

What he saw there shall be briefly described . The room which the intruder had entered was spacious and handsome , but contained little furniture . On a table stood two or three glass jars , containing a kind of white meal and labelled " Cautarella , " aud four or five phials , filled with a white liquid , labelled "Aqua Cantarelhe . " In one corner of the room a dead bear was suspended by the hind feet to the ceiling ,

and on the floor beneath it was a silver dish , containing a quantity of the same land of foaming liquid which was contained in the phials , which had evidently been discharged from the bear ' s throat , as drops were still falling from its open mouth , But this room contained another object equally remarkable . Fastened by the legs to four posts , which were erected in the apartment a dead bull lay upon his back .

An incision , about two feet in length , had been made in its stomach , whence the intestines had been taken : the floor in the immediate vicinity of the animal was marked with the blood-stained imprints of . naked human feet , and these footmarks were continued to the side of a bed , in another corner of the apartment , tho sheets of which were also saturated with blood .

The discharge of white foam from the throat of the bear was the work of poison ; a strong dose of arsenic had first been administered to the animal , and the liquid thus obtained formed a powerful liquid poison . The explanation of the latter mystery will be found in the supposed efficacy of a bath of bull ' s blood as an antidote against poison . It is

said that Alexander VI ., and his son Cresar Borgia , were both poisoned by drinking in mistake some wine prepared by them treacherously to slay some guests invited b y them to a banquet . The Pope died after a few days' torture , but Ctesar recovered ( probably through the great strength of his constitution ) , attributing his preservation to the use of the disgusting bath mentioned . No sooner did Caesar learn the death

of the Pope , than he took measures with his usual promptitude to secure a vast amount of plate and treasure before the news was known outside the Vatican . The two following Popes , Pius III . and Julius II ., owed their election to his influence with the college of cardinals , but yet no honourable end awaited him . He died in an insignificant contest on March 10 , 1507 , with the vassals of a petty prince , and

upon a battlefield whose very name is scarcely known in the page of history ,

OUT OP EVIL , GOOD . -Kevolutiouavy disturbances and disturbers have their use . In times of public corruption ( to borrow the beautiful simile of lord Erskine ) , they act like the winds , lashing the lazy elements , which , without the tempest , would stagnate into pestilence ; in times of fastidious excitement and unhealthy craving ( to borrow the equally beautiful illustration of Lord Mansfield ) , the shock may serve to rouse the better part of the nation out of their lethargy , and bring the mad part back to their senses , as men intoxicated are sometimes shamed into sobriety , — Quarterly Review .