and the Chant de Roland, and the
rare Greek and Latin manuscripts which he had been at such infinite
pains to collect; the _codici_ brought from Bobbio by Giorgio Merula,
and the manuscripts which Erasmo Brasca had discovered when _Il Moro_
sent him to search for missing texts in the convents of the South of
France. For Lodovico himself spared no expense and grudged no time or
trouble in order to enrich what he felt to be a great national
institution. Two years before he had addressed a letter to the son of
Matthias Corvinus, King of Hungary--the prince who was to have wedded
Bianca Sforza--begging him to have a rare manuscript by Festus Pompeius
copied for him, and deploring the "decay of the knowledge of the Latin
tongue in Italy, and the loss of so many priceless classical works which
the barbarians have carried away."

The sight of these precious and varied treasures were fully appreciated
by the cultivated Duchess Leonora, who had grown up among the scholars
of her royal father's academy at Naples, and by her daughter, the
accomplished Marchesana Isabella, ever eager, as she says in one of her
letters, to see and learn some new thing, "_desiderosa di cosa nova_."
And Signor Lodovico proved himself the most courteous and pleasant of
hosts, conversing with graceful ease on a thousand subjects, and
gratifying his new sister-in-law by the marked attention and courtesy
with which he treated her.

"I find myself highly honoured and caressed by Signor Lodovico," she
wrote to her husband from Pavia; and the discerning eyes of the
Ferrarese ambassador, Giacomo Trotti, noticed how much pleasure His
Excellency already took in the company of Madonna Beatrice and the
Marchesana. On that first day which they spent together at the Castello,
Trotti wrote to Duke Ercole, "Signor Lodovico is always at his wife's
side, speaking to her and watching her most attentively. And he tells me
that it would be impossible for her to give him greater pleasure or
satisfaction than she does, and never ceases to praise her."

The first impression which the youthful bride made on her husband was
evidently favourable. By all accounts, Beatrice was a singularly lovely
and fascinating child. Without the regular features and distinguished
air of her sister Isabella, there was a distinct charm in her sparkling
dark eyes and jet-black hair, her bright colouring and gay smile. The
contemporary chronicler Muralti describes her in his Annals as "of
youth