He came attended by a group of officers. He was tall and soldierly of bearing, in full armour, save for his helm, which was borne after him by a page, and his escort, from the brawny, bearded Koenigshofen to the fierce-eyed, ferrety Giasone, was calculated to inspire dread in peaceful citizens. But his manner was gentle, and his words were fair. 'Sirs, your city of Casale has nothing to fear from this occupation, for it is not upon its citizens that we make war, and so that they give no provocation, they will find my followers orderly. We invite your alliance with ourselves in the cause of right and justice. But if you withhold this alliance we shall not visit it against you, provided that you do not go the length of actively opposing us. 'The High and Mighty Lord Filippo Maria Visconti, Duke of Milan, weary of the encroachments upon his dominions resulting from the turbulent ambition of your Prince-Regent, the Marquis Theodore, has resolved to make an end of a regency which in itself has already become an usurpation, and to place in the authority to which his majority entitles him your rightful Prince, the Marquis Gian Giacomo Paleologo. I invite you, sirs, to perform your duty as representatives of the people by swearing upon my hands fealty to that same Marquis Gian Giacomo in the cathedral at the hour of vespers this evening.' That invitation was a command, and it was punctually obeyed by men who had not the strength to resist. Meanwhile a measure of reassurance had been afforded the city by Bellarion's proclamation enjoining order upon his troops. The proclamation was in no equivocal terms. It reminded the men that they were in occupation of a friendly city which they were sent to guard and defend, and that any act of pillage or violence would be punished by death. They were housed, some in the citadel, and the remainder in the fortress-palace of the Montferrine princes, where Bellarion himself took up his quarters. In Theodore's own closet, occupying the very chair in which Theodore had sat and so contemptuously received the unknown Bellarion on that day when the young student had first entered those august walls, Bellarion that night penned a letter to the Princess Valeria, wherein he gave her news of the day's events. That letter, of a calligraphy so perfect that it might be mistaken for a page from some monkish manuscript of those days, is one of the few fragments that have survived from the hand of this remarkable man who was adventurer, statesman, soldier, and humanist. 'Most honoured and most dear lady,' he addresses her--'Riveritissima et Carissima Madonna.' The exordium is all that need concern us now.