But in that relative’s behalf Ferdinand soon ceased to be interested. For his progressive coolness towards that prince, various reasons have been assigned; the chief one has been omitted--the king’s all-grasping ambition, which sometimes took no counsel from justice. On hearing that Louis XII, the successor of Charles, was preparing to arm for the recovery of Naples, he besought that monarch to desist from the undertaking; and when he found that solicitations were useless, he was unprincipled enough to propose a division of the whole kingdom. Louis eagerly seized the proposal, and the royal robbers immediately entered into negotiations for adjusting their respective share of the spoils. At first the city and kingdom of Naples were adjudged to Louis; the two Calabrias and the Abruzzi to Ferdinand; the revenue arising from the pasturage of Apulia was to be divided between them. But a dispute arising, a new division was effected; the latter assigned the two Calabrias and Apulia to the Spanish king; Naples and the Abruzzo to the Frenchman. To preserve harmony in other quarters, Louis agreed at the same time to relinquish his claims over Roussillon and Cerdagne, and Ferdinand over Montpellier. Both sovereigns sent powerful armaments to execute this iniquitous compact. No sooner did it reach the ears of the unfortunate Frederick than he complained to the Spanish monarch of the monstrous injustice. Ferdinand replied--no doubt with truth--that he had done his utmost to prevent the French king from the enterprise; that when entreaties failed, he had even offered a considerable sum to the same effect; and that it was only when he found Louis bent on the undertaking, and leagued with the Italian powers to insure its success, that he had consented to the division; he added, that, as such a division was inevitable, it was better that France should have a part than the whole. In private life such reasoning would be characterised as it ought; but kings have too often pleaded their sovereign exception from obligations which they have been ready enough to enforce on the rest of mankind. [Sidenote: [1501-1510 A.D.]] While the French troops on one side, and the great captain on the other, were seizing his provinces, it was impossible for Frederick, with a people so disaffected as the Neapolitans, to make head against them. As Louis promised to allow him a pension suitable to his rank, he sought an asylum in France. Scarcely were the armies in possession of the country, when their leaders began to quarrel about the precise extent of their respective territories. A bloody war followed, the details of which may be found in the Italian history of the period. It exhibits little beyond a continued succession of victories for the great captain, who triumphed over the veteran general and armies of France; it ended, in 1504, in the entire subjugation of the kingdom by the Spaniards.