the premature honours of boyish command, were blighted by the early development of constitutional infirmities, which in a few years disabled him from service in the field. Fortunately for himself and his reputation, nature had endowed him with other resources, the cultivation of which not only consoled his own privations, but greatly contributed to humanise the age. Nor did the result of their policy disappoint the confederates, or expose Guidobaldo's military fame to premature risks. The wayward and fickle character of Sixtus IV. solved all difficulties, by suddenly changing his side. Upon pretended compunction for the miseries produced by the war, but in reality from finding the Venetians likely to reap the exclusive advantage of successes to which he had in no way contributed, he reconciled himself with Ferdinand of Naples, and in a treaty to this effect, signed on the 6th of January, 1483, he left to the Signory an option of adherence to its terms. The publication of this new alliance was inaugurated at Siena by a triumphal procession, during which the Pontiff's sudden amity with the two Tuscan republics was celebrated in a chorus to this effect:-- "Whate'er on earth by thee is bound shall be Bound in the heavens, freed what thou settest free: So spake the Lord, when in St. Peter's hands He left the sovereignty of Christian lands; And such the League, now destined to unite Our state with God's own Vicar in the fight. Pray that the Virgin and her Son uphold The Oak, the Lily, and the Lion bold."[221] [Footnote 221: These being the insignia of the Pope, Florence, and Siena. See DELLA VALLE, _Lettere Sanese_, II., 47.] The abandonment by Sixtus of his design upon Ferrara, although no doubt promoted by the confederates' threat of a general council, was probably induced by a calculation that the condotta with 10,000 ducats of pay, and the vague promise of other fiefs in Romagna, which were offered by Naples and Spain to Girolamo Riario, would prove to him a more substantial boon than his stipulated share of the Ferrarese territories, exposed to the chances of an obstinate and expensive struggle, and coupled with the condition of handing over the larger portion of that dukedom to the already dangerously powerful republic of Venice. Thus was dissolved the League against the d'Este, and with it expired Guidobaldo's commission, his position being at the same time strengthened by a reconciliation with the Church.