The funeral took place the next day with a ceremony not unbecoming in
itself, though, unsuited to his high rank. Dan Francesca Borgia ,
Archbishop of Cosenza, acted as chief mourner at St. Peter’s, where the
body was buried in the chapel of Santa Maria delle Febbre.
Lucrezia arrived the same evening: she knew her father and brother too
well to be put on the wrong scent; and although, immediately after
Alfonso’s death, the Duke of Valentinois had arrested the doctors, the
surgeons, and a poor deformed wretch who had been acting as valet, she
knew perfectly well from what quarter the blow had proceeded. In fear,
therefore, that the manifestation of a grief she felt this time too well
might alienate the confidence of her father and brother, she retired to
Nepi with her whole household, her whole court, and more than six
hundred cavaliers, there to spend the period of her mourning.
This important family business was now settled, and Lucrezia was again a
widow, and in consequence ready to be utilized in the pope’s new
political machinations. Caesar only stayed at Rome to receive the
ambassadors from France and Venice; but as their arrival was somewhat
delayed, and considerable inroads had been made upon the pope’s treasury
by the recent festivities, the creation of twelve new cardinals was
arranged: this scheme was to have two effects, viz., to bring 600,000
ducats into the pontifical chest, each hat having been priced at 50,000
ducats, and to assure the pope of a constant majority in the sacred
council.
The ambassadors at last arrived: the first was M. de Villeneuve, the
same who had come before to see the Duke of Valentinois in the name of
France. Just as he entered Rome, he met on the road a masked man, who,
without removing his domino, expressed the joy he felt at his arrival.
This man was Caesar himself, who did not wish to be recognised, and who
took his departure after a short conference without uncovering his face.
M. de Villeneuve then entered the city after him, and at the Porta del
Populo found the ambassadors of the various Powers, and among them those
of Spain and Naples, whose sovereigns were not yet, it is true, in
declared hostility to France, though there was already some coolness.
The last-named, fearing to compromise themselves, merely said to their
colleague of France, by way of complimentary address, "Sir, you are
welcome"; whereupon the master of the ceremonies, surprised at the
brevity of the greeting, asked if they had nothing else to say. When
they replied that they had not, M. de Villeneuve turned his back upon
them, remarking that those who had nothing to say required no answer; he
then took his place between the Archbishop of Reggia, governor of Rome,
and the Archbishop of Ragusa, and made his way to the palace of the Holy
Apostles, which had been, got ready for his reception.
Public-domain text, read in full here on John Shaqi.
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