I have written all this, full of despair and anger, to others besides yourself. The bad health of Madonna Maddalena and the thoughtless behaviour of my Lord in keeping her up, for all this winter he has gambled every night, supping at six or seven and coming to bed at daylight, and she will not, and cannot, eat or sleep without him. Thus she has lost sleep and appetite and has become as thin as a lizard, as I told you. To the ambassador and Noferi and Ser Niccolò and to Christ, I have told this every day and kept them informed. The ambassador replies: “It is your business to write to Lorenzo, what can I do in the matter? Write, and let me act.” And Noferi says: “I fear this girl will not live long, and my Lord says and does &c., and they ought to be warned at Florence, &c.” Ser Niccolò, whom I asked about either summoning Maestro Piero Leoni or describing her symptoms to him and sending him the prescriptions of the doctors here, for the girl has great faith in Maestro Leoni as he treated her mother and herself and knows her constitution, made me copy out all the recipes of the doctors and said it would be well to write and that he would do so. Then he got immersed in grand doings and all has come to nought. Poor Franco runs here and runs there angered inside and out, and his heart is bursting. The worst is that he has not enough authority or brains to set things right. Madonna’s illness is caused by sitting up too late at night, eating at hours she is not used to, and remaining shut up in the house all day without taking any exercise; then, like her mother, she is melancholy, thin, and pensive, and takes every caprice and folly of her husband’s to heart. She thinks and dreams of nought else, so great is her love of him. She is slowly pining away and this seems to me the most alarming symptom, for nothing she eats or drinks does her any good or gives her any pleasure.... Ser Piero, I beg you as earnestly as I can to excuse me and with clasped hands I entreat you to get me away from here. First because, as I have told you several times, I cannot bear it any longer, and then because I get small honour and less gain. I know what I say. Madonna can do little for me and I can do even less for her in the state to which they have reduced her. I always told you none but a Franco would have endured this life. No more at present. Let us study to find a remedy for what is more important, and see that this girl should be served rather like the daughter of her father than the wife of him she has married. Let the rest go as it will. I commend myself to you.--Rome, January 16, 1492. Your Franco.[394]