Pescara was not unrewarded for the infamy with which he covered himself in the service of his master. He obtained the rank of Generalissimo of the imperial forces in Italy. But he enjoyed the gratification for a very little while. In the latter end of that year, he fell into a state of health which seems to have been not well accounted for by the medical science of that day. The wounds he had received at Pavia in the previous February are specially described by Passeri as having been very slight. Some writers have supposed that either shame for the part he had acted in the Morone affair, or, with greater probability, misgiving as to the possibility of the emperor's discovering the real truth of the facts (for the fate of Gismondo Santi and his papers was not known yet), was the real cause of his illness. It seems clearly to have been of the nature of a sudden and premature decay of all the vital forces.
PESCARA'S DEATH.
Towards the end of the year he abandoned all hope of recovery, and sent to his wife to desire her to come to him with all speed. He was then at Milan. She set out instantly on her painful journey, and had reached Viterbo on her way northwards, when she was met by the news of his death.
It took place on the 25th of November, 1525. He was buried on the 30th of that month, says Giovio, at Milan; but the body was shortly afterwards transported with great pomp and magnificence to Naples.
CHAPTER V.
Vittoria, a Widow, with the Nuns of San Silvestro.—Returns to Ischia.—Her Poetry divisible into two classes.—Specimens of her Sonnets.—They rapidly attain celebrity throughout Italy.—Vittoria's sentiments towards her Husband.—Her unblemished Character.—Platonic Love.—The Love Poetry of the Sixteenth Century.
Vittoria became thus a widow in the thirty-sixth year of her age. She was still in the full pride of her beauty, as contemporary writers assert, and as two extant medals, struck at Milan shortly before her husband's death, attest. One of them presents the bust of Pescara on the obverse, and that of Vittoria on the reverse; the other has the same portrait of her on the obverse, and a military trophy on the reverse. The face represented is a very beautiful one, and seen thus in profile is perhaps more pleasing than the portrait, which has been spoken of in a previous chapter. She was moreover even now probably the most celebrated woman in Italy, although she had done little as yet to achieve that immense reputation which awaited her a few years later. Very few probably of her sonnets were written before the death of her husband.