a treatment for the pudendagra which the French had left in
Italy, and who had dedicated to Cesare his learned treatise upon that
disease.

As a body-guard, or escort of honour, Cesare took with him thirty
gentlemen, mostly Romans, among whom were Giangiordano Orsini, Pietro
Santa Croce, Mario di Mariano, Domenico Sanguigna, Giulio Alberini,
Bartolomeo Capranica, and Gianbattista Mancini--all young, and all
members of those patrician families which Alexander VI had skilfully
attached to his own interest.

The latest of these was the Orsini family, with which an alliance was
established by the marriage celebrated at the Vatican on September 28 of
that same year between Fabio Orsini and Girolama Borgia, a niece of the
Pope's.

Cesare's departure took place on October 1, in the early morning, when
he rode out with his princely retinue, and followed the Tiber along
Trastevere, without crossing the city. He was mounted on a handsome
charger, caparisoned in red silk and gold brocade--the colours of
France, in which he had also dressed his lacqueys. He wore a doublet
of white damask laced with gold, and carried a mantle of black velvet
swinging from his shoulders. Of black velvet, too, was the cap on his
auburn head, its sable colour an effective background for the ruddy
effulgence of the great rubies--"as large as beans"--with which it was
adorned.

Of the gentlemen who followed him, the Romans were dressed in the French
mode, like himself, whilst the Spaniards adhered to the fashions of
their native Spain.

He was escorted as far as the end of the Banchi by four cardinals, and
from a window of the Vatican the Pope watched the imposing cavalcade
and followed it with his eyes until it was lost to view, weeping, we
are told, for very joy at the contemplation of the splendour and
magnificence which it had been his to bestow upon his beloved son--"the
very heart of him," as he wrote to the King of France in that letter of
which Cesare was the bearer.

On October 12 the Duke of Valentinois landed at Marseilles, where he was
received by the Bishop of Dijon, whom the king had sent to meet him, and
who now accompanied the illustrious visitor to Avignon. There Cesare
was awaited by the Cardinal Giuliano della Rovere. This prelate was now
anxious to make his peace with Alexander--and presently we shall look
into the motives that probably inspired him, a matter which has so far,
we fancy, escaped criticism for reasons that we s