elf, for the conquest and partition of the kingdom of
Naples, with Ferdinand the Catholic, he was bringing upon himself first
of all hidden opposition in the very midst of joint action, and
afterwards open treason and defection. He forgot, moreover, that
Ferdinand had at the head of his armies a tried chieftain, Gonzalvo of
Cordova, already known throughout Europe as the great captain, who had
won that name in campaigns against the Moors, the Turks, and the
Portuguese, and who had the character of being as free from scruple as
from fear. Lastly the supporters who, at the very commencement of his
enterprises in Italy, had been sought and gained by Louis XII., Pope
Alexander VI. and his son Caesar Borgia, were as little to be depended
upon in the future as they were compromising at the present by reason of
their reputation for unbridled ambition, perfidy, and crime. The King of
France, whatever sacrifices he might already have made and might still
make in order to insure their co-operation, could no more count upon it
than upon the loyalty of the King of Spain in the conquest they were
entering upon together.

The outset of the campaign was attended with easy success. The French
army, under the command of Stuart d'Aubigny, a valiant Scot, arrived on
the 25th of June, 1501, before Rome, and there received a communication
in the form of a bull of the pope which removed the crown of Naples from
the head of Frederick III., and partitioned that fief of the Holy See
between the Kings of France and Spain. Fortified with this authority,
the army continued its march, and arrived before Capua on the 6th of
July. Gonzalvo of Cordova was already upon Neapolitan territory with a
Spanish army, which Ferdinand the Catholic had hastily sent thither at
the request of Frederick III. himself, who had counted upon the
assistance of his cousin the King of Arragon against the French invasion.
Great was his consternation when he heard that the ambassadors of France
and Spain had proclaimed at Rome the alliance between their masters. At
the first rumor of this news, Gonzalvo of Cordova, whether sincerely or
not, treated it as a calumny; but, so soon as its certainty was made
public, he accepted it without hesitation, and took, equally with the
French, the offensive against the king, already dethroned by the pope,
and very near being so by the two sovereigns who had made alliance for
the purpose of sharing between them the spoil they should