Another poet of even greater fame, the limpid Ariosto, praised Madonna Lucrezia as “a second Lucrece, brighter for her virtues than the star of regal Rome.” And even a modern writer of the eminence of John Addington Symonds, (who, in his “Renascence” habitually credits calumnies against Borgia in his text, half-heartedly refuting the same in footnotes,)—even he says, “Were they (the calumnies) true, or were they a malevolent lie? Physiological speculation will help but little. _Lucrezia shewed all signs of a clear conscience._” Precisely. Then it is right and reasonable to presume that this much-maligned lady had a clear conscience; and to surcease from shouting any longer in the ordure which has been cast upon, and falls from, her fair memory. Let the fact that Herr Gregorovius, brilliant writer, painstaking scholar, German Protestant, fierce and unscrupulous foe of the papacy and of the House of Borgia, has destroyed all accusations against Madonna Lucrezia, silence all suspicion. In his huge work,[47] devoted entirely to her history he has shewn her to be the victim of inventions due to the paid pens of her Father’s enemies. * * * * * It would be contrary to human nature, had Colonna and Savelli meekly submitted to the confiscation of their fiefs. Armed resistance was out of the question. The heads of those Houses only saved their lives by flight into exile in discontented Germany: but they were not left without one weapon, the last refuge of the unscrupulous. The anonymous libellous pamphlet or epigram lay to their hands. [Illustration: _Lucrezia Borgia Duchess of Ferrara_]