In a Latin letter to his friend Vadianus in Vienna, Zwingli himself has thus narrated the events of this campaign: "Since an evil report about the Confederates has been spread far and wide, and since even that, which the result proves to have been just and innocent, is abused and misrepresented, I have undertaken to give you a picture, short indeed, but true, of the actual condition of our affairs. Passing over the terms of a treaty of alliance, concluded between the Most Holy Vicegerent of Christ, Julius II, and the Confederates, I would only state, that the King of the French (to whom, even while attacking the Church of Christ, some one gave the flattering title, 'Most Christian') wearied out the Venetians by protracted war, conquered in several hard-fought battles, and captured or laid waste their towns; and also that he took up arms against the anointed Head of the Church; set up, under the guidance of a wicked demon, an antipope, as he is styled, and robbed the Holy See of many large cities, among which was Bologna, mother of the sciences and nurse of the common law. When, at the close of the Easter festival, the august King of Spain beheld the ship of Peter tossing in danger on the threatening waves, the condition of the Church filled him with sorrow. As quick as possible he gathered an army and sent it to the aid of the Papal troops, who since winter had lingered in Middle Italy. Full of valor and skilled in military science, they approached Ravenna by forced marches. But the French tyrant also sent out a strong force to meet the Spaniards and their allies, the Venetians."