fused his request to
see him during the fortnight that he remained in the fortress at Lyons.
He received visits, however, from several of the king's ministers, who
all remarked that if he had been guilty of some foolish actions his
words were remarkably wise--"_toutefois moult sagement parloit_." Anger
gave place to pity at the sight of this victim who had suffered so
terrible a reverse of fortune, and the Benedictine chronicler, Jean
d'Auton, deplores the sad fate of this unfortunate prince, who, after
many golden days of wealth and prosperity, was doomed to end his life in
weary and lonely captivity far from house and friends: "_Somme, si le
pauvre Seigneur captif, de deuil inconsolable avoit le coeur serre a nul
devoit sembler merveilles_." The sorrowful destiny of the "_infelice
Duca_," who had once boasted himself to be the favourite of
fortune--"_Il Figlio della Fortuna_"--became the burden of popular
poetry, alike in France and Italy. Jean d'Auton himself gives vent to
his feelings in an elegy on the vanity of earthly glories--

"Si Ludovic, qui jadys pleine cacque
Heut de ducatz et pouvoir magnifique,
Est en exil, sans targe, escu ne placque,
Captif, afflict, plus mausain que cung heticque,
Et que, de main hostile et inimique,
Malheur le fiere rudement et estocque--
Gloire mondaine est fragile et caducque."

The grief of the Milanese bards for their duke's cruel fate found
utterance in the following lament:

Son quel duca in Milano
Che compianto sto in dolore ...
Io diceva che un sel Dio
Era in cielo e un Moro in terra--
E secondo il mio disio
Io faveva pace e guerra
Son quel duca di Milano," etc.

Fausto Andrelino wrote a Latin poem beginning with the lines--

"Ille ego sum Maurus, franco qui captus ab hoste
Exemplum instabilis non leve sortis eo;"

and Jean Marot found inspiration in a Venetian song--"Ogni fumo viene al
basso"--which he rendered in the following lines, alluding to the legend
of the Moro's fresco in the Castello of Milan:--

"Jadiz fist paindre une dame, embellie
Par sur sa robe, des villes d'Ytalie
Et luy au pres tenant des epoussetes,
Voullant dire, par superbe follie,
Que l'Ytalie estoit toute sonillie
Et qu'il voulloit faire les villes nettes.
Le roi Loys, voulant ravoir ses mettes,
Par bonne guerre luy a fait tel ennuy
Que l'Ytalie est nettoye de lui!
Chose usurpee legie