In Galeazzo Maria Sforza the characters of a Renaissance tyrant appear in an exaggerated light. A strain of the bizarre, inherited from his Visconte ancestors, working in the strong new blood of the Sforza, produced in him an extravagance of temperament which ruled all his thoughts and acts. He had been instructed in the new learning by Filelfo and other humanists of repute; but from the classic example and precept thus set before him by men who themselves often abused the ideals which they taught his unbalanced nature had learnt only licence. His hot passions, romantically shown in youth by his love for Lucrezia Landriani, and his adoration of the child she bore him, that famous Caterina, afterwards Lady of Forlì, developed rapidly into unbridled lust. His vanity was nothing less than preposterous, and his care for his tall and splendid person, and in especial for his beautiful white hands, was a sort of idolatry. His insatiable appetite for gorgeous surroundings and rich display glutted itself with an orgy of colour and ornamentation, rioted in costly fabrics and priceless gems and gaudy equipages. Never before in Italy had such pomp been seen as accompanied his journey, in 1471, to visit Lorenzo de’ Medici, who, as head of the Florentine Republic, had been entertained a short time before in Milan. With him went his consort, the beautiful Bona of Savoy, the princess who was to have married Edward IV. of England, had not her fickle suitor fallen in love with Elisabeth Woodville instead. Bona became Galeazzo’s wife in 1467. Besides his Duchess, all the great feudatories and ministers of State, arrayed in cloth of gold and silver, accompanied the Duke, himself a magnificent figure in royal crimson. The courtiers wore velvet and finest silk, the dresses of the chamberlains and pages were exquisite with needlework, the lackeys were in silk and cloth of silver, and the very cooks and scullions in velvet and satin. An immense train of horses, with trappings of silver and gold, carried grooms in silken liveries of the Sforza colours, purple and white. Mules, with housings of white and purple damask embroidered with the devices of the Sforza in silver, bore litters hung with gorgeous stuffs, and containing beds of cloth of gold. Huntsmen leading five hundred couple of dogs, falconers with highly trained hawks upon their wrists followed, and a host of trumpeters, pipers, musicians and jesters played their lively part in the procession. The description of this gallant train, winding out in all its fresh new bravery into the green Lombard plain from the serrated walls and gates of the mediæval city, in the radiance of a May morning, suggests something of what Milan once was and of the lost beauty of Renaissance pageantry. The luxury and extravagance of the Milanese visitors greatly impressed the Florentines, and, according to Macchiavelli, helped to corrupt them and induce them to abandon their sober habits for pleasures and vanities.