risis which was to
change all this. One more pope, that magnificent patron of art, Julius
II., creator of the Vatican Museum, with the recently found Apollo
Belvedere, and the Laocooen as a splendid nucleus, and projector and
builder of St. Peter's. And then Leo X. (Medicean Pope) and Luther!

The year 1492 contained three important events: the discovery of a new
world, the expulsion of the Moors from Spain, and the death of Lorenzo
de' Medici. Spain's crusade of seven hundred years was over. We must
search in vain for any struggle to match this in singleness and
persistence of purpose. Commencing one hundred years before
Charlemagne created a Holy Roman Empire, it ended triumphantly under a
king and queen who were to play a leading part in the _Reformation_.

The stage was making ready, and the characters were assembling for the
great modern drama, in a century even more significant than the one
then closing.

The reign of Charles VIII. ended in 1498. And as he left no son, the
succession once more passed to a collateral branch: Louis XII., of the
House of Orleans, wore the crown of France. It is interesting to
recall that these two kings, Charles and Louis, were respectively
grandsons of those two ambitious dukes whose personal feud brought
France to the verge of ruin a few decades earlier: Louis XII. being the
descendant of that Duke of Orleans, brother of Charles VI., the
reigning king, who was murdered in the streets of Paris; while Charles
VIII. was the descendant of his slayer, the terrible Duke of Burgundy,
evil genius of France at that time.

The principal event in the reign of the new king was the reopening of
the Italian War by the combined and successful action of Spain and
France. But this proved a barren triumph for Louis, who, when all was
done, found that he had been simply aiding that artful diplomatist,
Ferdinand, in securing the whole prize for Spain. The disagreement
growing out of the distribution of the spoil resulted in a war between
the late allies; and it was in this wretched conflict that Bayard,
_chevalier sans peur et sans reproche_, was sacrificed.

Louis died in 1515, also without an heir; and so the crown passed to
still another collateral branch of the main Capetian line. The Count
of Angouleme, cousin of the dead king, was proclaimed Francis I.

The fall of Constantinople in the East, and the discovery of a new
world in the West, were changing the whole aspect of Europe.