Attacks upon the new-Christians were now so frequent that they suggested to the cunning and ambitious minister, Pacheco, the means of carrying out a _coup d'état_. This unscrupulous intriguer, who for two decades had kept Castile in constant confusion, saw with secret chagrin that the reconciliation of Don Henry with his sister and successor bade fair to completely annul his influence. To bring about new complications he determined to gain possession of the citadel (Alcazar) of Segovia, at that time occupied by the king. With this end in view, he instigated, through his dependents, another assault upon the baptized Jews, during the confusion of which his accomplices were to seize Cabrera, the governor of the castle, and, if possible, the king himself. The conspiracy was betrayed only a few hours before it was to be carried into action; but the attack upon the new-Christians was perpetrated. Armed bands perambulated the streets of Segovia, broke into the houses of the Marranos, and slew every man, woman and child that fell into their hands (May 16th, 1474). The crowning misfortune of the Jewish race in Spain came in the death of Don Henry in the following December. The rulers of the united kingdoms of Aragon and Castile now were his sister, the bigoted Isabella, who was led by advisers hostile to the Jews, and Ferdinand, her unscrupulous husband, who pretended to be excessively pious. Sad and terrible was the fate that impended over the sons of Jacob throughout the length and breadth of the Pyrenean Peninsula. CHAPTER IX. THE JEWS IN ITALY AND GERMANY BEFORE THE EXPULSION FROM SPAIN. Position of the Jews of Italy--The Jewish Bankers--Yechiel of Pisa--His Relations with Don Isaac Abrabanel--Jewish Physicians, Guglielmo di Portaleone--Revival of Learning among Italian Jews--Messer Leon and Elias del Medigo--Pico di Mirandola, the Disciple of Medigo--Predilection of Christians for the Kabbala--Jochanan Aleman--Religious Views of Del Medigo--German Rabbis immigrate into Italy--Joseph Kolon, his Character and his Feud with Messer Leon--Judah Menz an Antagonist of Del Medigo--Bernardinus of Feltre--Jews banished from Trent on a False Charge of Child-Murder--The Doge of Venice and Pope Sixtus IV befriend the Jews--Sufferings of the Jews of Ratisbon--Israel Bruna--Synod at Nuremberg--Emperor Frederick III. 1474-1492 C.E. The Spanish Jews would have belied their native penetration and the wisdom born of bitter experience had they not foreseen that their position would ere long become unbearable.