Burchard’s entries in his diary relating to the assault upon Alfonso of Aragon can no more escape the criticism of the thoughtful than can Capello’s relation. His forty horsemen, for instance, need explaining. Apart from the fact that this employment of forty horsemen would be an altogether amazing and incredible way to set about the murder of a single man, it is to be considered that such a troop, drawn up in the square before St. Peter’s, must of necessity have attracted some attention. It was the first hour of the night, remember--according to Burchard--that is to say, at dusk. Presumably, too, those horsemen were waiting when the prince arrived. How then, did he--and why was he allowed--to pass them, only to be assailed in ascending the steps? Burchard, presumably, did not himself see these horsemen; certainly he cannot have seen them escorting the murderers to the Pertusa Gate. Therefore he must have had the matter reported to him. Naturally enough, had the horsemen existed, they must have been seen. How, then, does it happen that Capello did not hear of them? nor the Florentine ambassador, who says that the murderers were four, nor any one else apparently? To turn for a moment to the Florentine ambassador’s letters upon the subject, we find in this other Capello--Francesco Capello was his name--accounts which differ alike from Paolo Capello’s and from Burchard’ stories. But he is careful to say that he is simply repeating the rumours that are abroad, and cites several different versions that are current, adding that the truth of the affair is not known to anybody. His conclusions, however, particularly those given in cipher, point to Cesare Borgia as the perpetrator of the deed, and hint at some such motive of retaliation for an attempt upon his own life as that which is given by the ambassador of Venice. There is much mystery in the matter, despite Gregorovius’s assertion to the contrary--mystery which mere assertion will not dissipate. This conclusion, however, it is fair to draw: if, on Capello’s evidence, we are to accept it that Cesare Borgia is responsible for the death of Alfonso of Aragon, then, on the same evidence, we must accept the motive as well as the deed. We must accept as equally exact his thrice-repeated statement in letters to the Senate that the prince had planned Cesare’s death by posting crossbow-men to shoot him.(1) 1 It is extremely significant that Capello’s Relazione contains no mention of Alfonso’s plot against Cesare’s life, a matter which, as we have seen, had figured so repeatedly in that ambassador’s dispatches from Rome at the time of the event. This omission is yet another proof of the malicious spirit by which the “relation” was inspired. The suppression of anything that might justify a deed attributed to Cesare reveals how much defamation and detraction were the aims of this Venetian.