While Charles VIII. was leading his victorious army against Naples, and striking terror into all hearts throughout the length and breadth of Italy, Duchess Beatrice Sforza, as the wife of Lodovico now styled herself, was joyfully expecting the birth of a second child. Once more great preparations were made in the Rocchetta for the happy event. On the 10th of December her sister Isabella sent her the size and pattern of a cradle which her father had given her before the birth of her little daughter, Leonora, the year before, excusing herself for not writing a longer letter because she was engaged with her sister-in-law, the Duchess of Montpensier. Duke Lodovico himself, immediately on his return to Vigevano in November, had written begging the Marchesa to come to Milan in January, and on the 15th she left Mantua. On the day after her arrival she paid a visit of condolence to the widowed duchess, whose sorrowful condition filled her with compassion.
"I found her in the large room," writes Isabella to her husband, on the 20th of January, "all hung with black, with only just light and air enough to save one from suffocation. Her Highness wore a cloth cloak, and a black veil on her head, and her deep mourning filled me with so much compassion that I could not keep back my tears. I condoled with her in your name and my own, and she gratefully accepted my sympathy, and sent for her children, the sight of whom increased my emotion."
On the 4th of February, Beatrice gave birth to a second son, a fine boy, who received no less than fifteen names, including those of Francesco Sforza, after his illustrious grandfather. As a child he was called Sforza, but became afterwards known as Francesco, under which name he reigned during the last years of his short life over the duchy of Milan. Isabella d'Este held the infant prince at the baptismal font, and remained at Milan till the end of the Carnival, at the urgent entreaty of her brother-in-law, who himself wrote to beg the marquis for permission to keep his wife a few weeks longer.
Alfonso d'Este and his wife, Anna Sforza, always a favourite at the court of Milan, now joined the ducal party, and took part in the brilliant series of festivities which celebrated Beatrice's recovery and the christening of the infant prince.
"Every third day," wrote Isabella to an absent Milanese friend of hers, Anton Maria de' Collis, "we have triumphal and magnificent festivities, one of which lasted till two in the morning, another was not over till four o'clock. We spend the intervening days in riding and driving in the park or else through the streets of Milan, which has been made so beautiful that if you were to come back here to-day, you would no longer know the place."
In another letter Isabella describes a splendid festa at the house of Messer Niccolo da Correggio, at which a representation of the fable of Hippolyte and Theseus, as told in the "Innamoramento di Orlando" was beautifully given. And in answer to a letter from her brother-in-law, Giovanni Gonzaga, telling her of an allegorical representation in which the famous Serafino of Aquila had taken part, she writes—
"Here too we are enjoying feasts and pleasures of every description, which afford us the greatest possible delight, and I hope to tell you many things that will excite your Highness's envy. For this is the school of the master of those who know."[57]
Such phrases as these were no small praise on the lips of so accomplished and critical a woman as Isabella d'Este. Another contemporary, the Florentine Guicciardini, who visited the capital of Lombardy, was filled with amazement at the sight, and describes Milan during Lodovico's reign as famous for the wealth of its citizens; the infinite number of its shops; the abundance and delicacy of all things pertaining to human life; the superb pomp and sumptuous ornaments of its inhabitants, both men and women; the skill and talent of its artists, mechanics, embroiderers, goldsmiths, and armourers; and the innumerable quantity of new and stately buildings which adorn its streets. "Not only," he adds, "is the city full of joy and pleasure, of feasting and delight, but so wonderfully is it increased in riches, magnificence, and glory, that it may certainly be called the most flourishing and happiest of all the cities in Italy."
The stranger from Florence and Venice might well admire the duke's knowledge and taste, and wonder at the splendid results which his enlightened patronage of art and learning had produced. For they saw his great city of Milan as it has never been seen again, before the savage invader had spoiled its charm and defaced its loveliness; when Bramante's churches and porticoes rose in perfect symmetry against the sky, and the glowing tints of Leonardo's frescoes were yet fresh upon the walls. They saw the Ruga bella, or Beautiful Way, with its long line of palaces on either side, its painted walls and richly carved portals. They saw the lovely cupola of S. Maria delle Grazie, and the marble cloisters of S. Ambrogio, and the graceful Baptistery of S. Satiro, which Caradosso had lately adorned with his elegant frieze of cherubs and medallions. They saw the stately arcades of the Spedale Grande, and the deep-red brick and terra-cotta pile of the vast Lazzaretto, and the wide streets and piazzas which the duke had laid out "to give the people more light and air." Above all, they saw the great Castello which was the pride of Lodovico's court. These vaulted ceilings and painted halls, these beautiful gardens with their temples and labyrinths, their fountains and statues, these splendid stables with columned aisles and walls adorned with frescoes of horses, which the French invaders admired more than anything else in Milan, were well-nigh complete. But still Lodovico was always planning some new improvements to add to the charm and pleasantness of the ducal residence. Isabella's friend Leonardo, we know from one of the duke's letters, was engaged at this moment in painting the vaults of the newly built Camerini, while he was still putting the last touches to the famous equestrian statue which the Marchesa now saw for the first time, and which the duke promised should be soon cast in bronze. But the great master's thoughts were taking a new direction, and he was already preparing designs for the mural painting of the Cenacolo, with which Lodovico had ordered him to decorate the refectory of the Dominicans in his favourite convent of S. Maria della Grazie. It was a work after Leonardo's own heart, and he determined to frame an altogether new and original composition, a Last Supper which should be unlike all others in Italy. This time at least the duke's fastidious taste should be satisfied, and the Lombards should be made to own that Leonardo the Florentine was an artist who had no equal.
Another of Isabella's favourite artists, Maestro Lorenzo, the gifted organ-maker, was absent from court, and had left his old home at Pavia to take up his abode at Venice near his friend Aldo Manuzio, the printer. But during this visit the Marchesa saw "the beautiful and perfect clavichord" which he had made for Beatrice, and vowed to leave no stone unturned until she had obtained a similar one. Unfortunately, when she wrote to inform Messer Lorenzo of her wishes, he was engaged in making a viol for the Duchess of Milan, and had also promised Messer Antonio Visconti a clavichord, so that he was unable to satisfy the impatient Marchesa as quickly as she would have liked. Nothing daunted, however, Isabella returned to the charge, and addressed a letter in her sweetest and most persuasive strain to Count Antonio Visconti, begging him, since her desires were so ardent and she had already waited so long, of his courtesy to allow Messer Lorenzo to begin her clavichord as soon as Duchess Beatrice's viol should be finished. The count naturally enough was unable to refuse the request of so charming a princess, and as usual Isabella got her own way. On Christmas Day, 1496, she wrote joyously to tell her Venetian agent, Brognolo, that Messer Lorenzo had just arrived at Mantua, bringing the precious clavichord, which was as beautiful and perfect as it could possibly be. But the saddest part of the story has yet to be told. After the death of Beatrice, and Lodovico's final ruin, Isabella d'Este remembered the matchless organ which Lorenzo de Pavia had made for her sister, and wrote immediately to the Pallavicini brothers who had joined in the betrayal of the Castello, begging them, if possible, to let her have the instrument. A considerable time elapsed before her wish was gratified, but in the end her perseverance triumphed over all difficulties, and on the last day of July, 1501, she wrote to tell Messer Lorenzo that the beautiful clavichord which he had made for the Duchess of Milan had been given her by Galeazzo Pallavicino, the husband of Niccolo da Correggio's half-sister, Elizabeth Sforza, and would be doubly precious to her as his work and because of its rare excellence.[58] By a strange fate, the fragments of this precious clavichord, which was so highly esteemed in its day, have of late years found their way to the ancient palace of the dukes of Ferrara in Venice. The instrument which the gifted Pavian made for Beatrice, inscribed with the Greek and Latin mottoes chosen by Lorenzo, may still be seen under the roof of her father's old house, in those halls where the young duchess once spent that joyous May-time long ago.