Whilst Charles prolonged his sojourn at Rome, Alphonso II., abandoned to his own resources, a prey to terror and remorse, and pursued by the complaints of the Neapolitans, descended from his throne, and went to bury himself in a monastery of Sicily. His son Ferdinand, who succeeded him, although he had driven the Turks out of the city of Otranto, and had been proclaimed liberator of Italy, could neither revive the courage of his army nor the fidelity of his subjects. From the moment the arrival of the French was announced, the yoke of the house of Arragon appeared to become every day more insupportable. When Charles quitted the Roman states, instead of encountering the armies of an enemy, he only met on his road with deputations which came to offer him the crown of Naples. The capital soon received him in triumph, and the whole kingdom placed itself under his subjection. Fame was not long in carrying into Greece the news of the marvellous conquests of Charles VIII. The Turks of Epirus, struck with terror, dreaded every instant to see the French arrive. Nicolas Vignier adds, that Bajazet was possessed by such fear, that he caused all his navy to come to the Straits of St. George, to enable him to escape into Asia. The presence of Zizim in the Christian army particularly excited the alarms of the Mussulmans; but fortune had exhausted all her prodigies in favour of the French. _Jem-Jem_, whom the king of France hoped to exhibit to the enemies of the faith, died almost suddenly on arriving in the kingdom of Naples. Alexander VI. was accused of bringing about this death; Bajazet having promised him three hundred thousand gold ducats, _if he would aid his brother in escaping from the miseries of this life_. Turkish historians relate this event after a different manner: they say that a barber of Constantinople, named Mustapha, was sent to poison Zizim; and, what paints with a single stroke the spirit and the character of the Ottoman despotism, when the barber returned to announce that the brother of the sultan was dead, Bajazet raised him to the post of vizier; so important did the service appear, and so worthy of reward was the crime.