In spite of him, however, destiny had raised up in a rustic race hailing from Cotignola, in the Romagna, a regenerator for the worn-out tyranny of the Visconti. Muzio Attendolo, the founder of the Sforza family, is pictured by legend as a peasant boy, who, when twelve years old, flung his woodman’s axe into a tree, and ran away to the wars. He appears to have been really the son of a small landowner, rich only in the possession of a progeny mighty in number and in strength. The name of Sforza is said to have attached itself to him, in consequence of some signal effort of his extraordinary strength and will. These qualities, joined to his great energy, raised him to the highest military fame. His life was chiefly spent in the wars of Naples and the Church, but he had just accepted service with the Duke of Milan, when one day he plunged into a swollen river, under the arrows of the enemy, to save a drowning boy, and sank beneath the weight of his armour (1424). His son, Francesco, though only twenty-two, took command of his army, and soon showed equal valour and much greater ability. Engaged, in 1425, by Duke Filippo, he rapidly became a power in Milan, where he struggled with the rival Condottiere, Niccolò Piccinino, for supremacy in the councils of the Prince, and in the favour of the people. In 1432, Filippo gave him the highest mark of favour by promising him the hand of Bianca Maria, and with all solemnity the little girl of eight years old was betrothed to the great general. But no sooner had the Duke thus exalted Sforza, than he hastened to depress and humiliate him in every way. Niccolò Piccinino was given the chief command of the Visconte’s forces, and Francesco was fain at the time to abandon Milan, and his hopes of eventually possessing the Dukedom in his promised wife’s right, and to accept the standard of Pope Eugenius IV., Filippo’s bitter enemy. For many years the brilliant genius of Piccinino and the subtlety of the Duke were victorious over all enemies, and baffled every effort of Sforza to obtain his little princess and regain his footing in Milan. The climax of Filippo’s success came in 1435, when his Genoese fleet defeated the Neapolitans at Gaeta, and brought back captive the Kings of Naples and Navarre and a great company of lords and gentlemen. The Duke on this occasion completely belied his usual character and astonished the whole world by his kingly spirit. He received the two monarchs with the utmost honour, and immediately granted them their freedom. Moreover, he entertained them and their trains for a whole month, with great splendour and a joyous festivity, rare indeed in Milan during his reign. His generosity was doubtless calculated; in Alfonso of Naples he disarmed an enemy and made a lasting friend, and by cunningly rousing in that monarch a hope of succeeding to the Milanese state, he raised up an aspirant who might be useful as a weapon against the conflicting pretensions of Piccinino and Sforza.