When the coronation fêtes were over, he returned home to enjoy one of those brief intervals of repose which rarely fell to his lot. His almost continual absence on military service had indeed been greatly felt in his capital, and most of the distinguished men who frequented it under Duke Guidobaldo were now dispersed. Some of them, however, had continued towards his nephew their friendship and services, either under his own banner or in diplomacy. Among these was Baldassare Castiglione, to whose good offices the reconciliation of Francesco Maria with Julius has been partly attributed. In the affair of the Cardinal of Pavia, the Count warmly espoused his part, and invented for him, as a deprecatory device, a lion rampant proper on a field gules, holding a rapier, and a scroll inscribed, Non deest generoso in pectore virtus, "Worth is never wanting in a generous breast"; but this emblem was seldom used, being odious to the college of cardinals, as approving a sacrilegious precedent. Castiglione's elegant endowments were especially qualified to gain him the ear of a prince whose pride it was to emulate his predecessors, as much in the grace of their court as in the fame of their arms; and the preference for so small a state shown by him whom monarchs would have delighted to honour, was fit subject for gratitude, independent of the real services which the Duke derived from the friendship of one so well versed in business. It is stated, although on doubtful authority, that he went upon a mission from Urbino, to urge on Henry VIII. a descent upon Calais,[*255] in the hope of such a diversion recalling Louis from Italy. If so, it was probably in arranging the treaty of Malines on the 5th of April of this year. In the prospect of adding Pesaro to his dominions, Francesco Maria had promised to Castiglione a fief in his dependencies, and in September, 1513, a charter was granted to him of Novillara, erected into a countship. The letter of donation specially mentions the faithful, sincere, and acceptable services of Baldassare; his elegance in the Latin and Italian languages; his skill in military and civil affairs; and confers upon him this favour rather in earnest of future and more ample benefits, than as a reward of the fatigues, perils, and anxieties which he had already undergone for the Duke.[*256] Of this grant he received a willing confirmation from Leo X., to whom, on his elevation, he had borne Francesco Maria's first congratulations. The brief to this effect dwells on the peculiar satisfaction with which the Pope thus testified, from long acquaintance, his high merits, his distinguished birth, his literary acquirements, his military fame, and his exemplary devotion to the Holy See.
The estate thus associated with Castiglione is generally said to owe its name to its "noble air"; and certainly upon the Italian principle that a healthful atmosphere must be sought in high places, that of Novillara ought to possess unusual virtues. But the learned Olivieri has corrected this vulgar error, and has derived its denomination from the Latin nubilare, which he renders as an open shed for the housing of grain,—a grange, as it might be called. He has traced it back to the twelfth century, and to the fourteenth ascribes an imposing tower of three commodious stories built here by the Malatesta. Hither was conducted, on her first arrival, Camilla of Aragon, bride of Costanzo Sforza Lord of Pesaro; and its inaccessible situation did not prevent a splendid manifestation of the general joy, in fêtes and pageants, commemorated in a volume of excessive rarity, which seem more proportioned to the affectionate gallantry of her husband and subjects, than to the resources of their state, or to the conveniences of this palace. Representations of the community of Pesaro induced Francesco Maria to obtain from Castiglione a restitution to them of this Castle, in 1522, under promise of replacing it by an equivalent, which was never redeemed. Years passed away, notwithstanding repeated remonstrances on the part of Camillo, son of the Count, in which he even induced the Emperor to join. At length, in 1573, Guidobaldo II. conferred a tardy compensation, by granting to Count Camillo the Castel del Isola del Piano. This Duke had previously built an addition to the palace of Novillara, with elaborate decorations never completed. At his son's marriage with Lucretia d'Este, this fief, then worth 500 scudi a year, was settled upon her, but rarely occupied. It subsequently caught the young prince Federigo's fancy, who had planned for its beautiful gardens and frescoes, when untimely death cut short his schemes, and brought the nationality of Urbino and Pesaro to a close.
In the present day Novillara consists of about a hundred houses, huddled together, threaded by narrow alleys, and walled in by terraces. It overlooks Pesaro and Fano, the valleys of the Isauro and Metauro, with the hilly land which separates them. Northward the eye rests on Monte Bartolo, but southward it roams as far as Loreto, and in clear weather the Dalmatian coast may be discerned. The tower of the Malatesta, which formed a landmark to the whole surrounding country, fell in 1723, and the dilapidated fabric of the della Rovere now harbours a few squalid families, adding another to the melancholy wrecks of departed grandeur too frequent in this fair land. Yet Novillara will pass down the stream of Italian literary history as the title of its courtly lord, and its magnificent panorama may well repay the traveller who has leisure and strength to scramble to its summit.
The early policy of Leo was entirely pacific. The leading aim of his diplomacy was to soothe those irritations which his predecessors had fomented throughout Europe, and to heal the wounds thence resulting to Italy. His only aggressive measures during 1513 had been directed against the French, with the patriotic view of thwarting renewed attempts upon the Peninsula, in which they were seconded by Spain and Venice. In this object he was successful, but as the various and complicated transactions by which it was effected are foreign to our immediate purpose, we refer the reader for details to the tenth, twelfth, and thirteenth chapters of Roscoe's delightful work, although naturally representing them in the lights more favourable to the Pontiff's motives than we are prepared fully to approve. Power is, however, a dangerous draught, often exciting the thirst it seeks to slake. Before the Keys had been many months in Leo's possession, the establishment of his own family in the two fairest sovereignties of Italy became the object for which he was to
"Cry havock, and let slip the dogs of war."
Anticipating changes which might occur upon the death of Ferdinand II. of Spain, he conceived hopes of throwing off foreign domination in Naples, and providing for it a king of Italian birth, in his own brother Giuliano the Magnificent. With this ulterior advancement in fancied perspective, he removed him from the management of affairs at Florence, and substituted his nephew Lorenzo, intending ere long to assert for the latter a titular as well as a virtual sovereignty, and to extend his sway over all Tuscany, Urbino, and Ferrara. These ambitious and revolutionary projects required powerful aid, which could be most readily secured by finding a sharer in the adventure. Such a one readily occurred in Louis XII., whose consent to copartnery could scarcely be doubted, when his long-cherished acquisition of the Milanese was offered as his share of its gains. It was no serious objection to this scheme that it inferred a total subversion of Leo's anti-gallican policy; and, intent only upon his new views, he secretly negotiated with the French King to bring once more into Lombardy those troops which, but the year before, he had been the chief means of ignominiously chasing beyond the Alps. Should this move place the great powers in general collision, there was all the fairer chance for papal ambition in the scramble; and it mattered little that Italy should again be laid in ashes, and saturated with blood, so that the Medici became arbiters of her destiny.
With a view to these arrangements, Giuliano was betrothed in the following year to Filiberta of Savoy, maternal aunt of Francis, heir to the French crown. But a fatality seems to have attended most papal diplomacy: based upon nepotism or personal ambition, it was generally thwarted by its own fickleness or imbecility. Doubtful of the success of his scheme upon the crown of Naples (which Louis was little disposed to gratify, although prepared to concede to Giuliano the principality of Tarento), or impatient perhaps of waiting for its becoming vacant, the Pontiff turned his views upon Parma and Piacenza, as a convenient interim state for his brother, to be aggrandised by the purchase of Modena from the Emperor for 40,000 golden ducats. But here he was met by a difficulty of his own recent creation, for the establishment of Louis at Milan must have proved dangerous to the proposed principality of Giuliano; so, once more shuffling the cards, he prepared some new combinations for preventing the French expedition into Italy. One of these was an intrigue to detach the Venetian republic from the party of Louis, for which purpose he sent thither his adroit secretary Bembo, whose memorial to the senate has been printed by Roscoe. This attempt, however, entirely failed, and the King's death, on the 1st of January, alone prevented the detection of his faithless ally.[257]
In returning from Venice, Bembo paid one more visit to the Feltrian court, now at Pesaro, rejoicing in the recent birth of an heir to the Dukedom. There he found many changes. The gay and accomplished circle, in whose lighter or more pedantic pastimes he had borne a willing part, was scattered, many of its members like himself to hold appointments of trust and dignity. But it was a sincere satisfaction to him again to meet the Duchess Elisabetta, now recovered from the deep despondency he has so touchingly described, and enjoying the society of her accomplished niece and successor, as well as of her former mistress of the revels, the merry Emilia Pia. In company of these ladies, the diplomatist forgot during a brief interval the cares of state, and lingered for two days on the excuse of indisposition, until he thought it necessary to explain his delay in a letter to Cardinal Bibbiena of the 1st of January, 1515.[258] The fatigues of riding post a hundred and forty miles from Chioggia in two days and a half required this repose, and induced him to continue his journey in less hot haste. Yet Bembo, with all his accomplishments, was but a sunshine courtier, as we shall see some fifteen months later.
It would seem that, at the time of Giuliano's marriage, the idea of providing for him large additions in Romagna to his Lombard principality was the leading motive of his brother's policy, and that the Dukes of Urbino and Ferrara were already viewed as stepping-stones to his exaltation. The command of the pontifical troops was accordingly bestowed upon him as Gonfaloniere, on the 24th of June, 1515, at once an injustice and an insult to Francesco Maria, in whose hands its baton remained unsullied.[*259] The fair professions with which the Duke was superseded were vague and unsatisfactory, and he received warning from various quarters of the sinister designs whereof he was the destined victim. These, however, being as yet immature, the Pontiff maintained professions of unwavering favour, and, in a brief dated on the 16th of August, he assures the Duke that he will readily regard certain services as entitled to the largest and most liberal remuneration in his power.