man, but Alexander God."

As to the new pope, scarcely had he completed the formalities of
etiquette which his exaltation imposed upon him, and paid to each man the
price of his simony, when from the height of the Vatican he cast his eyes
upon Europe, a vast political game of chess, which he cherished the hope
of directing at the will of his own genius.

CHAPTER II

The world had now arrived at one of those supreme moments of history when
every thing is transformed between the end of one period and the
beginning of another: in the East Turkey, in the South Spain, in the West
France, and in the North German, all were going to assume, together with
the title of great Powers, that influence which they were destined to
exert in the future over the secondary States. Accordingly we too, with
Alexander VI, will cast a rapid glance over them, and see what were their
respective situations in regard to Italy, which they all coveted as a
prize.

Constantine, Palaeologos Dragozes, besieged by three hundred thousand
Turks, after having appealed in vain for aid to the whole of Christendom,
had not been willing to survive the loss of his empire, and had been
found in the midst of the dead, close to the Tophana Gate; and on the
30th of May, 1453, Mahomet II had made his entry into Constantinople,
where, after a reign which had earned for him the surname of 'Fatile', or
the Conqueror, he had died leaving two sons, the elder of whom had
ascended the throne under the name of Bajazet II.

The accession of the new sultan, however, had not taken place with the
tranquillity which his right as elder brother and his father's choice of
him should have promised. His younger brother, D'jem, better known under
the name of Zizimeh, had argued that whereas he was born in the
purple--that is, born during the reign of Mahomet--Bajazet was born
prior to his epoch, and was therefore the son of a private individual.
This was rather a poor trick; but where force is all and right is naught,
it was good enough to stir up a war. The two brothers, each at the head
of an army, met accordingly in Asia in 1482. D'jem was defeated after a
seven hours' fight, and pursued by his brother, who gave him no time to
rally his army: he was obliged to embark from Cilicia, and took refuge in
Rhodes, where he implored the protection of the Knights of St. John.
They, not daring to give him an asylum in their island so near to Asia,
sent him to France, where the