In the present day Novillara consists of about a hundred houses, huddled together, threaded by narrow alleys, and walled in by terraces. It overlooks Pesaro and Fano, the valleys of the Isauro and Metauro, with the hilly land which separates them. Northward the eye rests on Monte Bartolo, but southward it roams as far as Loreto, and in clear weather the Dalmatian coast may be discerned. The tower of the Malatesta, which formed a landmark to the whole surrounding country, fell in 1723, and the dilapidated fabric of the della Rovere now harbours a few squalid families, adding another to the melancholy wrecks of departed grandeur too frequent in this fair land. Yet Novillara will pass down the stream of Italian literary history as the title of its courtly lord, and its magnificent panorama may well repay the traveller who has leisure and strength to scramble to its summit. The early policy of Leo was entirely pacific. The leading aim of his diplomacy was to soothe those irritations which his predecessors had fomented throughout Europe, and to heal the wounds thence resulting to Italy. His only aggressive measures during 1513 had been directed against the French, with the patriotic view of thwarting renewed attempts upon the Peninsula, in which they were seconded by Spain and Venice. In this object he was successful, but as the various and complicated transactions by which it was effected are foreign to our immediate purpose, we refer the reader for details to the tenth, twelfth, and thirteenth chapters of Roscoe's delightful work, although naturally representing them in the lights more favourable to the Pontiff's motives than we are prepared fully to approve. Power is, however, a dangerous draught, often exciting the thirst it seeks to slake. Before the Keys had been many months in Leo's possession, the establishment of his own family in the two fairest sovereignties of Italy became the object for which he was to "Cry havock, and let slip the dogs of war."