It may well be that it was about this time that Cesare, his ambition
spreading--as men's ambition will spread with being gratified--was
considering the consolidation of Central Italy into a kingdom of which
he would assume the crown.

It was a scheme in the contemplation of which he was encouraged by
Vitellozzo Vitelli, who no doubt conceived that in its fulfilment the
ruin of Florence would be entailed--which was all that Vitelli cared
about. What to Cesare would have been no more than the means, would have
been to Vitelli a most satisfactory end.

Before, however, going so far there was still the work of subjugating
the States of the Church to be completed, as this could not be so
considered until Urbino, Camerino, and Sinigaglia should be under the
Borgia dominion.

For this, no doubt, Cesare was disposing during that Easter of 1502
which he spent in Rome, and during which there were heard from the south
the first rumblings of the storm of war whereof ill-starred Naples was
once more--for the third time within ten years--to be the scene. The
allies of yesterday were become the antagonists of to-day, and France
and Spain were ready to fly at each other's throats over the division of
the spoil, as a consequence of certain ill-definitions of the matter
in the treaty of Granada. The French Viceroy, Louis d'Armagnac, and the
great Spanish Captain, Gonzalo de Cordoba, were on the point of coming
to blows.

Nor was the menace of disturbance confined to Naples. In Florence, too,
the torch of war was alight, and if--as he afterwards swore--Cesare
Borgia had no hand in kindling it, it is at least undeniable that he
complacently watched the conflagration, conscious that it would make
for the fulfilment of his own ends. Besides, there was still that little
matter of the treaty of Forno dei Campi between Cesare and Florence,
a treaty which the Signory had never fulfilled and never intended to
fulfil, and Cesare was not the man to forget how he had been fooled.

But for the protection of France which she enjoyed, Florence must long
ere this have been called to account by him, and crushed out of
all shape under the weight of his mailed hand. As it was she was to
experience the hurt of his passive resentment, and find this rather more
than she could bear.

Vitellozzo Vitelli, that vindictive firebrand whose original motive in
allying himself with Cesare had been the hope that the duke might help
him to make Florence expi