The news from Faenza caused great excitement in Florence. There was a suspicion abroad that the Milanese and Bolognese intrigues were at the bottom of the whole affair, and it was at once resolved to grant the desired protection both to the people of Faenza and to the young Manfredi, and to send the desired troops; measures which, in consideration of the old protecting relation of Florence to Faenza, could not justly be taken amiss by anyone. Faenza was occupied; Bentivoglio taken prisoner and transported to Modigliana, the neighbouring capital of Tuscan Romagna; Madonna Francesca was sent to her mother at Bologna; and a regency was established consisting of certain inhabitants of Faenza and of the Lamone valley. Bentivoglio, who had only the Florentines to thank for not having escaped unhurt from the mountaineers, thought it hard that he was kept in confinement on Florentine ground. Lodovico Sforza, King Ferrante, and Ercole d’Este all interceded for his release; his wife was loud in her lamentations, Bolognese troops assembled on the frontier, and the city of Bologna sent an embassy to Florence. But Lorenzo, knowing that the frontiers were sufficiently secured, replied that Messer Giovanni must have patience till things were settled in Faenza. At last the commissioner at Modigliana, Dionigi Pucci, received orders to release the prisoner and send him to Cafaggiuolo, where Lorenzo awaited him; this was on June 14. Lorenzo declared himself perfectly satisfied with his interview with Giovanni, and appeared to believe in a re-establishment of their former good understanding. But after a while the lord of Bologna sought to obtain the consent of Florence for his daughter’s return to Faenza, and at the same time offered the hand of another daughter for Giuliano de’ Medici. Both propositions were decisively refused, at which Bentivoglio was so angry that the Florentines began to consider Lorenzo’s residence at Poggio a Cajano unsafe, as the villa lay exposed to a raid from Bologna. Lorenzo himself was uneasy though he tried to hide it. When Giovanni appealed to him to procure the Pope’s absolution for Madonna Francesca that she might either marry again or enter a convent, he fulfilled the request in the hope of making friends again. His letter to Innocent VIII.[354] reminding him of the willingness he had displayed, proves that he was anxious about the matter. He ‘most earnestly besought,’ he said, ‘these tokens of favour.’