d from New Year's Day to Ash
Wednesday. Duchess Renata never loved her husband nor his people. Until
she fell under the influence of Calvin she was discontented, passionate,
and bigoted. The Duke scouted her ill-humour and treated her cruelly.

"_Peu d'amys, qui conques est loing d'eulx_" was said of unhappy Renata.
She gave her disposition to her son, but he did not follow her religious
predilections. He enclosed her in a convent--the sanctuary of princely
widows and orphans--where she died in 1597.

Duke Alfonso sent to Florence for his consort early in 1560, but, true
to her determination, Duchess Eleanora required him to come for Lucrezia
in person! With perhaps less frigidity than he had exhibited the year
before, but with very little more friendliness, Alfonso made his second
appearance in Florence. He was accompanied by Cardinal de' Medici, his
brother-in-law--so soon to come to a tragical and untimely end in the
Maremma--and a princely escort of two thousand five hundred horsemen.
The young Duchess, not yet sixteen, mounted upon a cream-white palfrey,
rode out of the Porta San Gallo, by the side of her husband. The day was
gloomy and the purple and white crocuses, which children scattered
before her, betokened, so it was said, disaster.

Anyhow, it was a sorrowful parting with her parents, and with Florence.
Never again was she destined to see them or it. The days of her
childhood, spent happily enough with her brothers and sisters, were
over: the fatigues and intrigues of a hostile Court were before her,
and, already, trouble had marked her young life with scars--more were to
follow.

The Duke and Duchess entered Ferrara in full State, on 21st February,
but their reception was as cold as was the weather. The dynastic
dispute, whilst ostensibly healed at its head, still affected the limbs
of the Duchy. The people were, to a man, and perhaps to a woman,
anti-Medicean, and showed their disapproval of their Sovereign's
consort, by abstaining from taking their share in the festivities.

One's heart bleeds for this child-bride of seven months introduced
unguarded to the gayest, maddest, and most corrupt Court in Italy. Of
the Ferrarese it has been justly said: "By nature they are inclined only
for pleasure and revenge." True enough, happiness and tragedy are close
partners in life's story. No one loved Lucrezia de' Medici in
Ferrara--least of all her husband.

Perhaps the position may be succinctly stated--"the