mild and equitable sway whereby the Duchess maintained his state in peace and tranquillity, and concludes with an apostolic blessing on him, his consort, and his son. [Footnote *27: Cf. LUZIO E RENIER, _Mantova e Urbino_ (Torino, 1893) and JULIA CARTWRIGHT, _Isabella d'Este_ (Murray, 1904).] [Footnote 28: Cf. Appendix XII.] Returned to his state after so long a separation, Francesco Maria found, during the next two years, ample leisure to attend to its internal administration, and to watch the progress of his promising family. The eldest of these seems to have been Donna Ippolita, for whom he soon received, through the Marquis del Vasto, an offer of marriage from Don Antonio d'Aragona, son of the Duke of Montalto. At the nuptials, which were celebrated with suitable splendour, he had a very unlooked-for guest in Ascanio Colonna, whose intrigues to supplant him in the duchy we have lately noticed, but who, finding these hopelessly foiled by the Duke's establishment in the good graces of the Emperor, sought a reconciliation through the bridegroom, his cousin, whom he accompanied to Urbino. This frankness was met in a kindred spirit by his host, and their amity was cemented by a generous hospitality. * * * * * It was now, perhaps, that Francesco Maria took opportunity to dictate the results of his long experience of war, in a series of Military Discourses, which were published fifty years later, but which, being evidently printed from loose and unrevised notes, are not fairly amenable to literary criticism.[29] They are but desultory and disjointed observations, carelessly jotted down, with little attention to order or style, and edited without emendation, or even intelligible punctuation. The matter abounds in truisms and common-places, displaying neither enlarged views nor knowledge of mankind: the style is garrulous, diffuse, and redundant. Yet, as on matters of military skill the Duke was considered a high authority, it may not be improper here to record some of his opinions. [Footnote 29: Discorsi Militari dell'eccellentissimo Signor Francesco Maria I. della Rovere, Duca di Urbino, nei quali si discorrano molti avantaggi et disadvantaggi della guerra, utilissimi ad ogni soldato. Ferrara, 1583. It was edited by Domenico Mammarelli, and dedicated to Signor Ippolito Bentivoglio. There is a transcript in the library at Newbattle Abbey, a. 3, 2, and a fragment of it in the Vat. Ottobon. MSS. No. 2447, f. 135. *Cf. also _I discorsi di F.M.I. della Rovere sopra le fortificazioni di Venezia_ (Mantova, 1902). These were written 1537-38.]