ABSTRACT
A Man getting on for sixty, his head bent, his face marked with the labours of the mind and the spirit, the poor face of a tired and unhappy man, is what is shown us by that Florentine bust of painted terracotta which is said to represent Niccolò Machiavelli. 1 Beneath the weariness and the bitterness on that face the pathetic remains of a clever and subtle smile is what is most characteristic of him. If that portrait is his, no page of writing can better tell the story of Machiavelli’s tragedy. If it is not Machiavelli, it is exactly as I imagine him at this stage of his life and of this present biography.
