d in Cesena a
wild tumult ensued, and the people ran through the streets clamouring
angrily for their duke.

It was very plain what short work would have been made of such men as
the Ordelaffi and the Malatesta had Cesare gone north. But Cesare was
fast at the Vatican, treated by the Pope with all outward friendliness
and consideration, but virtually a prisoner none the less. Julius
continued to press for the surrender of the Romagna strongholds,
which Remolino had promised in his master's name; but Cesare persisted
obstinately to refuse, until the news reached him that Michele da
Corella and della Volpe, who had gone north with seven hundred horse to
support his Romagnuoli, had been cut to pieces in Tuscany by the army of
Gianpaolo Baglioni.

Cesare bore his burning grievance to the Pope. The Pope sympathized with
him most deeply; then went to write a letter to the Florentines to
thank them for what had befallen and to beg them to send him Michele
da Corella under a strong escort--that redoubtable captain having been
taken prisoner together with della Volpe.

Corella was known to be fully in the duke's confidence, and there were
rumours that he was accused of many things perpetrated on the duke's
behalf. Julius, bent now on Cesare's ruin, desired to possess himself
of this man in the hope of being able to put him upon his trial under
charges which should reflect discredit upon Cesare.

At last the duke realized that he was betrayed, and that all was
lost, and so he submitted to the inevitable, and gave the Pope the
countersigns he craved. With these Julius at once dispatched an envoy
into the Romagna, and, knowing the temper of Cesare's captains, he
insisted that this envoy should be accompanied by Piero d'Orvieto, as
Cesare's own commissioner, to demand that surrender.

But the intrepid Pedro Ramires, who held Cesena, knowing the true facts
of the case, and conceiving how his duke had been constrained, instead
of making ready to yield, proceeded further to fortify for resistance.
When the commissioners appeared before his gates he ordered the
admission of Piero d'Orvieto. That done, he declared that he desired to
see his duke at liberty before he would surrender the citadel which he
held for him, and, taking d'Orvieto, he hanged him from the battlements
as a traitor and a bad servant who did a thing which the duke, had he
been at liberty, would never have had him do.

Moncalieri, the papal envoy, returned to Ro