But the reaction in his favour was not long postponed. Ferdinand continued his commission as captain-general, with a pension of 6000 ducats assigned to him by Alfonso three years before; and fully aware of the importance of conciliating papal sanction to his own questionable sovereignty, commanded Giacopo to quit the ecclesiastical territory and return to the banner of Montefeltro. A miserable contest of sacked villages and barbarous reprisals was continued during autumn and winter, and though the advantage preponderated on the Count's side, these successes were at his people's cost. Meanwhile the repose of Italy was exposed to more serious interruption. Alfonso V. of Aragon and Sicily had maintained his very doubtful title to the crown of Naples[96] by a happy union of energy and judgment. Devoting his life to Italy, he first established his reputation by a series of victories over his Angevine competitor, and then cemented his popularity by an easy and accessible address, by lavish profusion of treasure and honours, by a zealous pursuit and patronage of learning. The epithet of Magnanimous, which graces his name, was merited by his testamentary disposition as well as by his character. Having no legitimate issue, he left to his brother John his hereditary dominions in Spain and the islands, but conceived himself at liberty to bestow the crown of Naples, received at first as a gift and retained by the sword, upon his natural son Ferdinand, whose substitution to it had been sanctioned by two popes, recognised in various treaties, and formally voted by a native parliament. His chief confidant and agent in these arrangements had been his countryman Cardinal Alfonso Borgia, who at his death filled the papal throne with the title of Calixtus III., and who, anticipating that bad faith and unscrupulous nepotism which, under Alexander VI., consigned to enduring infamy their subsequently canonised name, used his authority to supplant Ferdinand by his own nephew Pierluigi Borgia. With this view he, as suzerain of Naples, declared its sovereignty lapsed on the King's death without a legitimate son, and although he published a notice calling upon all claimants to appear for their interests, his real object was divulged by an offer to Francesco Sforza of his father's fiefs in the Abruzzi and Apulia, on condition of his enabling him to place the crown on Pierluigi's head. These intrigues were, however, frustrated by this Pope's death on the 8th of August; and his successor Pius II., a man in all respects his opposite, hastened to recognise Ferdinand, maintenance of peace in the Peninsula being the first requisite towards his grand project of a crusade against the Turks. [Footnote 96: See above, p. 68, and afterwards ch. XIV.]