The court of Ferrara was full of unscrupulous intriguers.  Tasso’s wonderful success could not be forgiven by some of the petty aspirants after literary fame who haunted the ducal precincts.  Pigna, whose place as secretary he had usurped, stirred up the jealousy of the other courtiers into open persecution.  Leonardo Salvinati, the leader of the Della Cruscan Academy, wishing to ingratiate himself with the court, joined in the hostility.  Tasso’s papers were stolen, and his letters intercepted and read, and a false construction was put upon everything he did.  At first the duke refused to hear the various accusations that were brought against him, and continued to show him every mark of esteem.  He had the privilege, in that ceremonious age a very high one, of dining daily with the prince at his own private table.  He accompanied the princesses to their country retreats at Urbino, Belriguarda, or Consandoli, where in healthy country pursuits he forgot for a time his troubles.  At Urbino he wrote the unfinished canzone to the river Metauro, one of the most touching of his compositions, in which he laments the wounds which fortune had inflicted upon him through the whole of his hapless life.

But the tenure of princely favour at Italian courts, amid so many ambitious patrons and anxious suitors, was very precarious.  It was uncommonly so at Ferrara.  After a while a sudden change passed over the mind of the duke towards Tasso.  Whether tired of the poet’s incessant complaints, irritated at his incautious conduct—­going the length on two occasions of drawing his sword, when provoked, upon members of the ducal household,—­or whether his suspicions were aroused regarding the relations between him and his sister Leonora, is not known, but from this time he began to treat Tasso as if he were a madman.  He was placed under the charge of the ducal physicians and servants, who reported to their employer every careless word.  Removed from Belriguarda, he was ordered to be confined in the Ferrarese convent of San Francisco; and two friars were appointed to watch over him continually.  Such a life was unendurable to the proud poet, who disliked the nauseous medicines of the convent as much as its restraint; and taking advantage of a festa, when his keepers were unusually negligent, he made his escape by a window.  In the disguise of a shepherd he travelled on foot over the mountains of the Abruzzi, getting a morsel of bread and a lodging from the peasants by the way, to his sister’s house at Sorrento, now the Vigna Sersale.  There he remained during the whole summer, soothed by his sister’s affectionate kindness.  The monotony of the life, however, began to pall upon him, and he longed to get back to his old scenes of excitement.  Undeterred by an evasive reply which the duke sent to an urgent letter of his, he set out for Ferrara; and on his arrival, meeting with a cold reception, he was obliged again to leave the place where he had once been so happy.  For a year and a half he