THE DECLINE AND FALL

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chap, metropolis, and imposing the best security ofLXX ' oaths 1 and treaties, Nicholas received with asmiling countenance the faithful advocate andvassal of the church. So tame were the times,so feeble was the Austrian, that the pomp of hiscoronation was accomplished with order andharmony: but the superfluous honour was sodisgraceful to an independent nation, that hissuccessors have excused themselves from thetoilsome pilgrimage to the Vatican ; and resttheir imperial title oil the choice of the electorsof Germany .

The sta-^ A citizen has remarked, with pride and plea-govern- sure, that the king of the Romans, after passing

Kome° f vvith a slight salute the cardinals and prelateswho met him at the gate, distinguished the dressand person of the senator of Rome ; and in thislast farewell, the pageants of the empire and therepublic were clasped in a friendly embrace ." 1According to the laws of Rome, " her first ma-gistrate was required to be a doctor of laws, an

1 The oath of fidelity imposed on the emperor by the pope, is record-ed and sanctified in the Clementines (1. ii, lit. ix); and Eneas Syl-vius, who objects to this new demand, could not foresee, that in a fewyears he should ascend the throne, and imbibe the maxims, of Booi-face VIII.

m Lo senatore di Koma, vestito di brocarto con quella beretta, econ quelle maniche, et ornamenti di pelle, co’ quali va alle feste diTestaccio e Nagone, might escape the eye of .Eneas Sylvius, but heis viewed with admiration and complacency by the Homan citizen(Diario di Stephano Infessura, p. 1133).

” See in the statutes of Rome , the senator and three judges (I. i, c. 3-14), the conservators (1. i, c. 15, 16, 17, 1. iii, c. 4), the caporiori (1. i, c.18, 1. iii, c. 8), the secret council (1. iii, c. 2), the common council (I. iii,c. 3). The title of feuds, defiances, acts qf violence, &c. is spread throughmany a chapter (c. 14 40) of the second book.