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In the olden time in Florence, if an assassin could contrive to eat a sop of bread and wine at the grave of the murdered man, within nine days after the murder, he was free from the vengeance of the family; and to prevent this they kept watch at the tomb. There is no evading the vengeance of God in this way. Such is the interpretation of this passage by all the old commentators. ↩

The Roman Empire shall not always be without an Emperor, as it was then in the eyes of Dante, who counted the “German Albert,” Alberto tedesco , as no Emperor, because he never came into Italy. See the appeal to him. Canto VI 96, and the malediction, because he suffered

“The garden of the empire to be waste.”