and resembled, in much, his
sister's. He rode a cream-coloured horse, which seemed to have been
steeped in musk, so strongly was it scented. But of all his affectations
the one with which I as taken most was to see one of his grooms approach
him when he dismounted, to dust his wondrous clothes down to his shoes,
which he wore in the splayed fashion set by the late King of France who
was blessed with twelve toes on each of his deformed feet.

The Lord Giovanni, himself not lacking in effeminacy, was greatly taken
by the wondrous raiment, the studied lisp and the hundred affectations
of this peerless gallant. Had he not been overburdened at the time by
the Papal business that impended, he might there and then have cemented
the intimacy which was later to spring up between them. As it was, he
made him very welcome, and placed at his and his sister's disposal
the beautiful palace that his father had begun, and he, himself, had
completed, which was known as the Palazza Sforza. On the morrow Giovanni
left Pesaro with but a small retinue, in which I was thankful not to be
included.

Two days later Madonna Lucrezia followed her husband, the fact that they
journeyed not together, seeming to wear an ominous significance. Her
eyes had a swollen look, such as attends much weeping, which afterwards
I took as proof that she knew for what purpose she was going, and was
moved to bitter grief at the act to which her ambitious family was
constraining her.

After their departure things moved sluggishly at Pesaro. The nobles
of the Lord Giovanni's Court repaired to their several houses in the
neighboring country, and save for the officers of the household the
place became deserted.

Madonna Paola remained at the Sforza Palace, and I saw her only once
during the two mouths that followed, and then it was about the streets,
and she had little more than a greeting for me as she passed. At her
side rode her brother, a splendid blaze of finery, falcon on wrist.

My days were spent in reading and reflection, for there was naught else
to do. I might have gone my ways, had I so wished it, but something kept
me there at Pesaro, curious to see the events with which the time was
growing big.

We grew sadly stagnant during Lent, and what with the uneventful course
of things, and the lean fare proscribed by Mother Church, it was a very
dispirited Boccadoro that wandered aimlessly whither his dulling fancy
took him. But in Holy Week, at last, we