The third event was the sum of many small events. Georg and his friend Johannes, in their jealousy, had spread much gossip about Leonardo in court circles. They now took advantage of Giuliano’s death to circulate stories about Leonardo’s dissections of bodies in the hospital. These were added to vicious gossip that Leonardo was pro-French. This news eventually reached Pope Leo X. The Pope himself was perfectly aware of the practice of dissection and, personally, he had turned his eyes the other way. However, as dissection was contrary to Church doctrine, an official complaint to the head of the Church could not be ignored. The Pope used it as an excuse to be rid of this tiresome old man whom he had tolerated only for his brother’s sake. Leonardo was abandoned. The year 1516 was drawing to a close. Leonardo had decided to seek the patronage offered him by Francis I. So he and Francesco de’ Melzi, his loyal young friend, left Rome for the long journey into France. As he left his native land for the last time, Leonardo looked back over his years—from the silver lute that had sent him to Milan, to the death of Giuliano, to the final rejection of Pope Leo X. Remembering how Lorenzo de’ Medici had sent him to Ludovico so many years before, Leonardo thought to himself with great sadness, “The Medici created and destroyed me.” 13 _The Last Years_ Leonardo looked around from where he was leaning on the parapet of the Chateau d’Amboise to watch a group of young lords and ladies playing croquet on the emerald-green lawn. The click of the mallets and balls was mingled with the shouts and laughter of the young people. It was late afternoon in May and although the sun was warm the breeze from the west was chilly. Leonardo looked down again from the sheer height of the castle wall across the wide sweep of the Loire river and the valley extending as far as the eye could see. Swallows were swooping low over the banks below and the wind carried their shrilling cries up to him. The forested islands and sandbars interrupted the steady flow of the river and Leonardo could see the reflections sway in the current. He had been studying the river but he realized that his aging eyes were not up to the task of concentrating for long. The wind made them water, so he turned away and started back to his home.