of the House of Denmark, he died childless in the autumn of 1535.  It was therefore determined, in compliance with the Pope’s request, that Sforza should be confirmed in the Duchy of Milan.  Pavia, however, was detached and given to the terrible Antonio de Leyva for his lifetime.  The garrisons of Milan and Como were left in Spanish hands; and the duke promised to wring 400,000 ducats as the price of his investiture, with an additional sum of 500,000 ducats to be paid in ten yearly instalments, from his already blood-sucked people.  It will be observed that money figured largely in all these high political transactions.  Charles, though lord of many lands, was, even at this early stage of his career, distressed for want of cash.  He rarely paid his troops, but commissioned the captains in his service to levy contributions on the provinces they occupied.  The funds thus raised did not always reach the pockets of the soldiers, who subsisted as best they could by marauding.  Having made these terms, Francesco Maria Sforza was received into the Imperial favor.  He returned to Milan, in no sense less a prisoner than he had previously been, and with the heart-rending necessity of extorting money from his subjects at the point of Spanish swords.  In exchange for the ducal title, he thus had made himself a tax-collector for his natural enemies.  Secluded in the dreary chambers of his castle, assailed by the execrations of the Milanese, he may well have groaned, like Marlowe’s Edward—­

    But what are Kings, when regiment is gone,
    But perfect shadows in a sunshine day? 
    My foemen rule; I bear the name of King;
    I wear the crown; but am controlled by them.

When he died he bequeathed his duchy to the crown of Spain.  It was detached from the Empire, and became the private property of Charles and of his son, Philip II.

During the month of December negotiations for the terms of peace in Italy went briskly forward.  On the part of Venice, two men of the highest distinction arrived as orators.  These were Pietro Bembo and Gasparo Contarini, both of whom received the honors of the Cardinalate from Paul III. on his accession.  Of Bembo’s place in Italian society, as the dictator of literature at this epoch, I have already sufficiently spoken in another part of my work on the Renaissance.  Contarini will more than once arrest our notice in the course of this volume.  Of all the Italians of the time, he was perhaps the greatest, wisest, and most sympathetic.  Had it been possible to avert the breach between Catholicism and Protestantism, to curb the intolerance of Inquisitors and the ambition of Jesuits, and to guide the reform of the Church by principles of moderation and liberal piety, Contarini was the man who might have restored unity to the Church in Europe.  Once, indeed, at Regensburg in 1541, he seemed upon the very point of effecting a reconciliation between the parties that were tearing Christendom asunder.  But his failure