The pope, however, had not yet learnt wholly to despise the force of promises and oaths. Borgia was brought back to the Vatican, and treated honourably. It was supposed at one time that he would be proceeded against legally: and Machiavelli several times pressed his government to send him the papers necessary to institute any accusation on their part. At length, the duke gave the order to his castellans to surrender the fortresses in question to the pope, and was set at liberty. He instantly repaired to Naples, possessed of nothing more than a sum of money which he had deposited with the Genoese bankers, but happy in having recovered his personal freedom. His ambitious mind quickly conceived new schemes; and he tried to persuade the Spanish general at Naples, Consalvo, to assist him in his project of throwing himself into Pisa, and of defending it against Florence. Consalvo listened and temporised, till he received the directions of his sovereign, which he immediately obeyed. In conformity with these, Borgia was arrested and sent on board a galley, which conveyed him to Spain. On his arrival, he was confined in the fortress of Medina del Campo, there to remain during his life. He continued a prisoner, however, for two years only. In 1506, with great audacity and labour, he let himself down from the castle by a rope, and fled to the court of John king of Navarre, who was his wife's brother; where he lived for some years in a humble state, the king of France having confiscated his duchy of Valence, and forbidding him to enter France. Finally, having gone out with the forces of the king of Navarre to attack Viana, an insignificant castle of that kingdom, he was surprised by an ambush, and killed. We have anticipated a little, to conclude the history of this man, who figures so prominently in Machiavelli's writings, and now return to the secretary himself. We have not space to dilate with the same minuteness on his succeeding embassies; and there is nothing in them of peculiar interest. His letters are always full of keen observation; and show him to have been sagacious, faithful, and diligent. The republic kept him actively employed; and the end of one legation was the beginning of another. [Sidenote: 1504. Ætat. 35.] He left Rome, after Borgia's arrest, in December; and, in the January following, went to France, to ask the protection of Louis against the dangers which Florence imagined to threaten them from the Spanish army at Naples. [Sidenote: 1505. Ætat. 36.] A peace, concluded between France and Spain, dissipated these fears; and the secretary, after a month's residence at Lyons, returned to his own country. After this, he was sent on four insignificant mission to Piombino, Perugia, Mantua, and Siena. His next employment was to raise troops in the Florentine territories. [Sidenote: 1506. Ætat. 37.]