eturn to Milan in
1499, employed Leonardo to paint his portrait and design his tomb.
Although a Guelph by birth, Trivulzio, up to this time, had been one of
Lodovico's most active supporters. But when he saw a younger rival
preferred to him, he left Milan in disgust and retired to Naples, where
he entered King Ferrante's service, and became from that time a bitter
enemy of the Sforza's. Meanwhile the Moro loaded his favourite Galeazzo
with honours and rewards. He gave him the fine estate of Castelnuovo in
the Tortonese, which had once belonged to his father, the great
Condottiere Roberto, as well as a house in Pavia near the church of San
Francesco and a palace in Milan, near the Porta Vercellina, and allowed
him to build a villa and extensive stables in the park of the Castello.
As a last and crowning honour, he bestowed upon this fortunate youth the
hand of his illegitimate daughter Bianca, a beautiful and attractive
child to whom he was fondly attached. Of her mother we have no certain
knowledge, but she is generally supposed to have been some mistress of
low origin, and Bianca herself is described by a contemporary writer as
"_figlia ex pellice nata_." The wedding was solemnized with great
splendour in the chapel of the Castello di Pavia, on the last day of the
year 1489, but the young princess was still a child, and Galeazzo had to
wait five years before he took home his bride. After his marriage he
adopted the name of Sforza Visconti, and was treated by Lodovico as a
member of his family.

Another wedding which took place about this time was that of the young
duke, Gian Galeazzo. He had already entered his twentieth year, and the
Princess Isabella of Aragon, to whom he had been betrothed in his
father's lifetime, was turned eighteen, so that the marriage could no
longer be delayed. In November, 1488, his brother Ermes was sent to
Naples with a suite of four hundred persons, who entered King Ferrante's
capital sumptuously arrayed in silk brocade, and amazed even his
luxurious courtiers by the splendour of their gold chains and jewelled
plumes. At least Isabella's father, Alfonso, who had little love for his
brother-in-law, and had already found Lodovico more than a match for his
own cunning, could not complain that his daughter had not been
honourably treated. After a rough passage in the depth of winter, which
sorely tried the patience of the court poet Bellincioni, who was a
member of the Milanese suite, the brid