The conquests of Charles VIII., which gave the Turks so much alarm, began to create lively inquietudes in several Christian states. A league was formed against the French, into which entered the pope, the emperor Maximilian, the king of Spain, and the principal states of Italy. After the example of Charles VIII., this league assumed as a pretext a war against the Turks; but its real design did not remain long concealed; for it solicited the approbation and the assistance of Bajazet. Policy, on this occasion, did not hesitate to sacrifice Christian victims, to cement an alliance with the disciples of the Koran. As the Greeks of Epirus and the Peloponnesus were eager to profit by the enterprise of the king of France to shake off the yoke of the Ottomans, they sent deputies into Italy. The senate of Venice caused these deputies to be arrested, and gave up their papers to the envoys of the sultan. Fifty thousand of the inhabitants of Greece perished victims to this base act of treachery. On another side, the inconstancy of the people, who had at first been favourable to the arms of the king of France, and the discontent which is always inspired by the presence of a victorious army, all at once changed the state of things in the kingdom of Naples. The French, who had been received with so much enthusiasm, became odious, and the hopes of all were directed towards the family of Arragon, so recently abandoned. Charles, instead of directing his looks towards Greece, turned them towards France. Whilst he was in the act of causing himself to be crowned emperor of Byzantium and king of Sicily, his thoughts were fixed upon the abandonment of his conquests. It was a singular contrast which the spectacle presented, of preparations for a retreat, and a triumphal ceremony, going on at the same time. Whilst the nobility, the clergy, and all the public bodies of the state, came to congratulate the victorious prince, the people were invoking the protection of Heaven against him, and the French awaited in silence the order and signal for its departure. On the day following his coronation, and as if he had only come to Naples for the sake of this vain ceremony, Charles VIII. set out, accompanied by the most distinguished of his knights, and resumed sorrowfully the road to his own kingdom. On his arrival in Italy, he had heard nothing in his march but benedictions and songs of triumph. On his return, he heard only the maledictions of the people and the threats of his enemies. In the first place he had crossed Italy without opposition; in order to leave it, he was forced to give battle; and considered as a victory the liberty which was left to him to drag back the wreck of his army over the Alps.