[*235] The league of Cambrai is one of the great crimes of history. The man who devised it and urged it upon Europe was the head of European Christianity, Pope Julius II. Beside this, the sensualities and murders of the Borgia go for nothing. His policy, created by hate, succeeded in so far as it established the States of the Church and murdered Italy. Yet looking back now, we may judge of the price that has been required of the Church for that treason. Beggared of her possessions, at the mercy of the new Italian kingdom, he who sits in the seat of Julius is a prisoner in the Vatican—the prisoner of history.
[*236] On the 25th of August, Francesco Maria had paid a visit to Mantua to see his betrothed. "Come," said Leonora's uncle to him, "and when you have seen Madonna Leonora and the Marchese's horses you will have seen the two finest things in the world." Francesco Maria spent two days there travelling incognito with but four persons. Cf. Julia Cartwright, op. cit., vol. I., p. 310. An amusing letter from Federico Cattaneo to Isabella d'Este, who was absent, describes the meeting of Francesco Maria and his future bride. Leonora was fourteen, and they were married at Christmas.
[*237] Cf. Luzio e Renier, op. cit.; p. 195, for the entry of the Duchess into Urbino.
[238] It is difficult to reconcile with these details of an eye-witness the statement of Leoni, followed by Riposati and others, that the marriage was privately performed at Mantua in February, 1509. In May of that year the Duke was unanimously chosen a Knight of the Garter at a chapter of that order, but for reasons which it is now too late to investigate, the nomination was not confirmed by Henry VIII. At next election he had but one vote out of ten, and his name does not again occur in the record preserved by Anstis.
[239] Vat. Urb. MSS. No. 489. This is but a fragment of the life of Francesco Maria by Urbano Urbani, who was his secretary at this time. Our account of the League of Cambray has been taken from it, collated with many published authorities. Urbani's full work, which I have not discovered, has been largely drawn upon by Leoni, Baldi, and other biographers.
[*240] Little is known of the steps which led to the Council of Pisa. See some interesting letters printed in Creighton, op. cit., vol. V., p. 329 et seq.
[*241] Cf. Sanuto, Diario, vol. XI., p. 721 et seq. It was the Pope who threatened pillage. Creighton, op. cit., vol. V., p. 143.
[*242] She was the widow of the Count Ludovico of Mirandola.
[243] So say the Urbino writers. Guicciardini characterises the escape of the army as a panic-rout, in which the whole camp-equipage and colours, including the ducal standard, fell into the enemy's hands. Sanuto says that 200 men-at-arms were slain.
[244] Not only Leoni and Reposati, but the MSS. in the Urbino library, which refer to these transactions, must be so regarded. We have compared all of these, especially Baldi's life of this Duke, and the defence of him against Guicciardini, which he left prepared for the press in No. 906 of the Vat. Urb. MSS. No. 924 contains the pleading of the younger Beroaldo in favour of the Duke, when charged with the Cardinal of Pavia's murder. No. 1023, art. v., and No. 819, fol. 335, the former by Monsignor Paolo Maria Bishop of Cagli, the latter anonymous, have supplied us with some new facts. Guicciardini, admitting in other passages the Legate's bad faith and his antipathy to Francesco Maria, blames his deficiency of courage or judgment in the Bologna affair, and lashes the aggravated vices of his character. Roscoe has not here exercised his usual acumen.