At Naples only of the Italian cities they were not permitted to find a home. In the first instance, as the reader has learned, a considerable number of the Spanish exiles had found refuge in that city, where they had been received in a friendly manner. But the invasion of Charles VIII. of France exposed them to fresh persecution. Wearied out by their endless trials, they lost heart at last, and consented to embrace the Christian faith. But, as in the other instances, the conversion was only nominal, and the danger had no sooner passed than the pseudo-converts returned to their former profession. A few years subsequently Gonsalvo de Cordova took possession of Naples in the name of the King of Spain. He raised the question as to whether they ought not to be driven out of the country, which had now become part of the Spanish dominions. But the idea had now got possession of most people’s minds, that to expel the Jews from any country was to do it serious injury. He therefore proposed to introduce the Inquisition, which would retain the Jews in the land, but compel them to keep to their newly made profession. This, however, did not please the Neapolitans, who rose in insurrection, and the government were fain to compromise the matter by expelling the Jews; though it is affirmed by some of the Jewish writers (as, for example, Orobio de Castro) that these stern measures were adopted only so far as the Sephardim (or Spanish Jews) were concerned. In this century great numbers of Hebrew printing-presses were set up in Italy, which were under the management of learned Jews. Among these was the celebrated Abraham Usque, by whom the well-known Bible of Ferrara, a Spanish version of the Old Testament, was printed. Hebrew presses were also erected at Cremona, Leghorn, Padua, Genoa, Rimini, and Verona, as well as the central city of Rome. The renowned Daniel Bomberg of Antwerp established himself at Venice in 1516, and his works attained great celebrity. He also published the first complete edition of the Talmud, and the first Rabbinical Bible. To this age also belongs Rabbi Joseph, the historian of the French Crusades and the sufferings of the Jews in Castile, Asarja de Rossi, and Abraham Portaleone. FOOTNOTES: [164] It would, however, be a mistake to suppose that they were not to be met with in those countries. Even in England, though the law forbade any settlement, Jews were occasionally to be found, whose presence was tolerated. This was still more the case in France and Germany; while in Spain and Portugal great numbers remained, whose profession of Christianity was very widely known to be a mere pretence. Of them we shall speak in the next chapter. [165] Sultan Bajazet was shrewd enough to apprehend this. When he heard of the banishment of the Jews by Ferdinand, he exclaimed: ‘A wise king this, who impoverishes his own kingdom to enrich mine!’