dovico Sforza and his
father-in-law, Hercules d'Este, Duke of Ferrara. They brought with them
not only the promised troops and money, but also a court composed of the
loveliest women in Italy.

The balls, fetes, and tourneys began with a magnificence surpassing
anything that Italy had ever seen before. But suddenly they were
interrupted by the king's illness. This was the first example in Italy
of the disease brought by Christopher Columbus from the New World, and
was called by Italians the French, by Frenchmen the Italian disease. The
probability is that some of Columbus's crew who were at Genoa or
thereabouts had already brought over this strange and cruel complaint
that counter balanced the gains of the American gold-mines.

The king's indisposition, however, did not prove so grave as was at first
supposed. He was cured by the end of a few weeks, and proceeded on his
way towards Pavia, where the young Duke John Galeazzo lay dying. He and
the King of France were first cousins, sons of two sisters of the house
of Savoy. So Charles VIII was obliged to see him, and went to visit him
in the castle where he lived more like prisoner than lord. He found him
half reclining on a couch, pale and emaciated, some said in consequence
of luxurious living, others from the effects of a slow but deadly poison.
But whether or not the poor young man was desirous of pouring out a
complaint to Charles, he did not dare say a word; for his uncle, Ludovico
Sforza, never left the King of France for an instant. But at the very
moment when Charles VIII was getting up to go, the door opened, and a
young woman appeared and threw herself at the king's feet; she was the
wife of the unlucky John Galeazzo, and came to entreat his cousin to do
nothing against her father Alfonso, nor against her brother Ferdinand.
At sight of her; Sforza scowled with an anxious and threatening aspect,
far he knew not what impression might be produced on his ally by this
scene. But he was soon reassured; far Charles replied that he had
advanced too far to draw back now, and that the glory of his name was at
stake as well as the interests of his kingdom, and that these two motives
were far too important to be sacrificed to any sentiment of pity he might
feel, however real and deep it might be and was. The poor young woman,
who had based her last hope an this appeal, then rose from her knees and
threw herself sobbing into her husband's arms. Charles VIII and L