humiliation of a Medicean Pontiff caused him to withhold his forces from attacking the tumultuary troops of Bourbon.  Francesco Maria was a man of violent temper; nineteen years before, he had murdered the Pope’s Legate, Cardinal Francesco Alidosi, with his dagger, in the open streets of Bologna.  His wife, Eleanora Ippolita Gonzaga, presided with grace over that brilliant and cultivated Court which Castiglione made famous by his Cortegiano.  The Duke and Duchess survive to posterity in two masterpieces of portraiture by the hand of Titian which now adorn the Gallery of the Uffizzi.

February 24, which was the anniversary of Charles’s birthday, had been fixed for his coronation as Emperor in San Petronio.  This church is one of the largest Gothic buildings in Italy.  Its facade occupies the southern side of the piazza.  The western side, on the left of the church, is taken up by the Palazzo Pubblico.  In order to facilitate the passage of the Pope and Emperor with their Courts and train of princes from the palace to the cathedral, a wooden bridge wide enough to take six men abreast was constructed from an opening in the Hall of the Ancients.  The bridge descended by a gradual line to the piazza, broadened out into a platform before the front of San Petronio, and then again ascended through the nave to the high altar.  It was covered with blue draperies, and so arranged that the vast multitudes assembled in the square and church to see the ceremony had free access to it on all sides.  On the morning of the 24th, the solemn procession issued from the palace, and defiled in order down the gangway.  Clement was borne aloft by Pontifical grooms in their red liveries.  He wore the tiara and a cope of state fastened by Cellini’s famous stud, in which blazed the Burgundian diamond of Charles the Bold.  Charles walked in royal robes attended by the Count of Nassau and Don Pietro di Toledo, the Viceroy of Naples, who afterwards gave his name to the chief street in that city.  Before him went the Marquis of Montferrat, bearing the scepter; Philip, Duke of Bavaria, carrying the golden orb; the Duke of Urbino, with the sword; and the Duke of Savoy, holding the imperial diadem.  This Duke of Savoy was uncle to Francis I. and brother-in-law to Charles—–­ his wife, Beatrice, being a sister of the Empress, and his sister, Louise, mother of the French king.  This double relationship made his position during the late wars a difficult one.  Yet his territory had been regarded as neutral, and in the pacification of Italy he judged it wise to adhere without reserve to the victorious King of Spain.  It was noticed that Ferrante di Sanseverino, Prince of Salerno, though known to be in Bologna, occupied no post of distinction in the imperial train.  He was closely related to the Emperor by his mother, Maria of Aragon, and had done good service in the recent campaigns against Lautrec.  The reason for this neglect does not appear.  But it may be mentioned that some years later he espoused the French cause, and was deprived of his vast hereditary fiefs.  In his ruin the poet Bernardo, father of Torquato Tasso, was involved.