Queens of the Renaissance. M. Beresford Ryley

      BEATRICE D’ESTE

       BUST IN THE LOUVRE

      The Ferrarese representative at the court of Milan wrote that Ludovico was incessantly singing his wife’s praises, and a few days later added that he was brimming over with admiration both for his wife and his sister-in-law, and that he reiterated incessantly the extreme delight their society gave him. Then, some time after the last of Beatrice’s people had left, Trotti once more repeated that Ludovico appeared to have no thought but how to captivate and amuse his wife, and that every day he repeated how much he loved her.

      Not only Trotti, but Palissena D’Este, a cousin, and one of Beatrice’s elder ladies-in-waiting, wrote enthusiastic accounts of the Milanese ménage at the commencement. Palissena’s letter was to Isabella, and not to Beatrice’s parents. She wrote that Beatrice was unceasingly made much of by her husband, and that every possible tender attention was paid to her by him. According to her accounts the two were delightful to see together, the man being evidently as delighted to spoil the pretty child, as the child was to be spoilt by him. And since Beatrice had been the plain member of the family, with uncertain prospects of future beauty, the writer mentions, with an evident sense of conveying good news, that in the new climate the girl had grown not only very much stronger, but very much better looking.

       Beatrice was certainly very happy at this time—nothing in life compares with the first days of the first love affair—and Ludovico as a lover has already been insisted upon. Muratori, writing of her after the shyness of her arrival had worn off—she is mentioned as being timid at first—describes her as young and always occupied in dancing, singing, or in some kind of amusement. Muratori also touches upon one of Beatrice’s weaknesses. Truly never was a woman more intelligently fond of dress. She came to Milan a child, but within a year she knew her woman’s business like her alphabet, and of that, one of the serious items is to understand that a woman is most frequently rendered attractive by her clothes. In dress, Beatrice had one peculiar predilection—she loved ribbons. She liked to have her sleeves tied with them; she liked them, in fact, almost everywhere. In the Altar-piece portrait her gown is extremely ugly, but little superfluous-looking ribbons are tied all over it. She also grew certainly to be extravagant. On one occasion, when her mother went over her country house, she was shown the Duchess of Bari’s wardrobe. There were eighty-four gowns, pelisses, and mantles, besides many more that had been left in Milan. There is no doubt that eighty-four gowns and mantles were too many at one period. Beatrice grew over-rich for the finer qualities of character to keep exercised. To desire a thing, if only in passing, was to have it.

      During the first months after her arrival in Milan, however, she was a child, and too much cossetted to realize more than a very limited responsibility. Her life for some time was little more than a perfect example of the winning freshness belonging to the Renaissance conception of happiness. Open-air pleasures were a large part of its delight. Every man who was rich enough had a country residence with shady places and pools of water. Beatrice constantly went picnics into the country. A certain Messer Galeazzo Sanseverino, who later married Ludovico’s illegitimate daughter Beatrice, wrote a description of one of them. He said—it was in a letter to Isabella—that they started early in the morning, and as they drove—he, Beatrice, and another lady—they sang part-songs arranged for three voices. Having arrived at their destination—Ludovico’s country house at Cussago—they immediately commenced fishing in the river, and caught so many fish that they were obliged to fling some back into the water. A portion of the rest was cooked for their midday meal, and afterwards, the writer says, for the sake of their digestions, they played a vigorous game of ball. This finished, they made a tour over the beautiful palace, and after that once more started fishing. This might well have been occupation enough for one day, but when fishing had grown wearisome horses were saddled, and they first flew falcons by the river-side, and then started hunting the stags on the duke’s estate. It was not until an hour after dark that the indefatigable and cheerful party got back to Milan.

      When Rabelais wrote his description of a day in Pantagruel’s life, he might well have had this pleasure outing in remembrance.

      Ludovico took no part in these outings; affairs of state, he said, absorbed his time. To have instantly suspected these affairs of state would have needed the sharpened wits of worldly knowledge. But presently, since everybody but the bride knew or guessed from the beginning how the duke really occupied himself, comments began to circulate. In the end Beatrice realized the truth. There are no letters showing how she first grasped the fact that Ludovico still gave tenderness to another woman; but she knew at last that Cecilia Gallerani was not only shortly expecting to be confined, but was also still lodged in apartments at one end of the Castello. The last fact in itself must have sufficed to be insufferable. Whether Beatrice made a scene or not, she could only have felt burnt up with anger as well as with sickness of heart. A crisis became inevitable. The particular motives were trivial, but the triviality occurred when anything would have been too much for her. Ludovico gave his wife a gown of woven gold. The moment she wore it curious expressions flickered over the faces of her household—Cecilia Gallerani was going about in its counterpart. Only one inference presented itself. Beatrice soon knew, and by this time had borne as much as the unseasoned endurance of her years was able. What followed is summarized in a letter by Trotti to the Duke of Ferrara—a letter which he begs the duke to burn immediately. Trotti speaks of the garment as a vest, showing that it was only part of a dress, and he says that Madonna Beatrice had refused to wear hers again if Madonna Cecilia was allowed to appear in another similar. The attitude was a bold one for a child of fifteen, and Beatrice must have made it with the most unhindered courage. For immediately afterwards Ludovico himself went to interview Trotti, and so make sure that something more soothing than a mere statement of Beatrice’s grievance went to Ferrara. He gave an actual promise that the liaison should come to a conclusion. He would either find a husband for the lady or send her into a nunnery.

      Beatrice won, and, indeed, won handsomely. Political expediency was on her side, but the girl’s own likeableness must be counted for something in the matter. Ludovico was among the most cunning men of Italy, yet upon this occasion he did exactly what he promised. As soon as Cecilia had recovered from the birth of a son the two alternatives were considered. Her tastes were not for convents, and she married a Count Ludovico Bergamini. With this, as far as Il Moro was concerned, the episode closed. Beatrice would probably have preferred the convent, for, as things remained, Cecilia was not in any sense removed out of society. She continued to receive all the notable men of that part of the world at the beautiful palace a little way out of Milan which Ludovico had given her as an inheritance for his son, and at all court functions she appeared as usual.

      Beatrice’s triumph may have come to her a little through her courage. It was a quality Ludovico admired above all things, though his own was not to be relied upon. Commines says of him, “Ludovico was very wise, but extremely timid, and very slippery when he was afraid. I speak as one well acquainted with him, and who has arranged much diplomatic business with him.”

      Few characters of the Italian Renaissance are more difficult to get at than Ludovico’s. Like Cæsar Borgia, he had much of the magnificent adventurer in his blood, and though he never cut the figure in Italy that Cæsar Borgia did, he was in many ways the more interesting of the two. Cæsar Borgia outshines him easily as a schemer, as a fighter, as a man nothing stopped and nothing staggered; but Cæsar Borgia was known as a being more eager to conquer towns than to