of the Po
for several days and nights. The fleet which conveyed Isabella and her
escort from Naples to Leghorn, narrowly escaped shipwreck off the coast
of Tuscany. Bianca Sforza had to ride in December over the roughest
roads across the Alps of the Valtellina, to join her Imperial lord at
Innsbruck. And now Leonora and her daughters were called upon to brave
the terrors of an Arctic winter on their way to Milan.

"On the 29th of December, 1490," writes the diarist of Ferrara,
"Madonna Beatrice, daughter of Duke Ercole, went to Milan to marry
Signor Lodovico Sforza, accompanied by her mother, Leonora Duchess of
Ferrara; and also by Messer Sigismondo, her uncle"--the duke's younger
brother, Cardinal d'Este--"and her brother, Don Alfonso, who went to
bring home his bride, Madonna Anna, sister of the Duke of Milan and
daughter of Galeazzo, and he rode in a sledge because the Po was
frozen."[4]

The ladies of the party travelled in rude country carts--"_carrette_"--as
far as Brescello, where the Po was navigable, and they were able to
continue their journey by water to Pavia. Here Messer Galeazzo Visconti
was awaiting them with a fleet of boats and three bucentaurs, by which
pompous name the rude barges in which these high-born personages travelled
were glorified. The many discomforts and the actual cold and hunger which
the Este ladies endured during the five days which they spent on board
these vessels are graphically described in a letter addressed to Isabella's
husband by her Ferrarese lady-in-waiting, Beatrice de' Contrari, after the
travellers had reached Pavia. The boat which bore the provisions for the
party was delayed by stress of weather, so that the travellers were left
with but scanty breakfast and no dinner. When at length they anchored near
the shore of Toresella at three o'clock at night, the Marchesana and her
ladies were in a starving condition. "If it had not been for the timely
help of Madonna Camilla, who sent us part of her supper from her barge, I
for one," writes the lively lady-in-waiting, "should have certainly been
by this time a saint in Paradise." As for going to bed, all wish for
sleep was put out of their heads by the rocking of the ship and the
uncomfortable berths, and the poor Marchesana was so cold and wretched
without a fire that she wished herself dead, and her lady-in-waiting
could not keep back her tears. However, at length these miseries were
ended, Piacenza was safely reached, on th