office, and overexertion in his performance of the pontifical functions of the Holy Week and Easter. He quickly fell ill. He was bled, and appeared to begin to recover. In an audience he gave to the cardinals, who wanted him to sign the Electoral Capitulations from the conclave and to guarantee that he would make no more cardinals than those agreements allowed, he refused to sign, stating that he would show his intent by deeds not words. In his first audience with the ambassadors of France and Spain, he warned the ambassadors that their monarchs should keep the peace that had been agreed upon, and that if they did not, not only would they be sent nuncios and legates, but that the pope himself would come and admonish them. He wrote letters to Emperor Charles V, to Queen Mary I of England, and to Cardinal Reginald Pole (in which he confirmed Pole as legate in England). When the Spanish ambassador asked for pardon for having killed a man, Marcellus replied that he did not want to start his reign with such auspices as absolution from homicide, and ordered the appropriate tribunals to observe the law. He did not want his relatives descending on Rome, nor did he want them to be enriched beyond the station of a member of the nobility, and he did not allow his two nephews, Riccardo and Herennius (sons of his half-brother Alexander), who lived in Rome under his care, to have formal visits. He instituted immediate economies in the expenditure of the Holy See. On 28 April, he was able to receive the Duke of Urbino in audience, and on 29 April, the Duke of Ferrara. He also gave audience to four cardinals, Farnese, D'Este, Louis de Guise and Ascanio Sforza, the leaders of the French faction in the recent conclave. That night he had difficulty sleeping. On the morning of the 30th he suffered a stroke (hora XII apoplexi correptus) and slipped into a coma. That night he died, on the 22nd day after his election. Legacy Palestrina's Missa Papae Marcelli (dating from 1565 or before), one of the glories of polyphonic sacred choral music, is traditionally believed to have been composed in his memory, ca. 1562. Having reigned for just 22 calendar days, Pope Marcellus II ranks sixth on the list of 10 shortest-reigning popes. His successor was Giampietro Carafa, Dean of the