marched some miles before they met, and after fighting for six or eight hours (some say sixteen) without apparent advantage to either side, Colleoni sent a trumpet to Federigo, suggesting that, as it was now high time to seek repose, they had better be done for the day. The staff warmly seconded this proposal, being three miles from their intended quarters; so by common consent the troops were recalled, and whilst the soldiery lit torches and fires, as substitutes for the now deepened twilight, the leaders mutually advanced to shake hands and congratulate each other on their escapes. This singular conclusion of what is generally represented as a well-fought field was quite in accordance with the received rules of military procedure; but it tempted Machiavelli, the enemy of stipendiary armies, to sneer at this affair of La Molinella as a pitched battle, lasting half a day, wherein neither side wavered, and no one fell, a few prisoners and wounded horses being the only result of the fray. This is certainly an exaggeration, but though all characterise the conflict as sanguinary, our authorities differ widely as to the loss, which probably did not exceed a few hundred men killed, including, however, several captains of note.144
The peculiar feature of the day was the employment of flying artillery, gunnery having, till now, been limited to clumsy battering-pieces, adapted only for sieges and fortifications. The new weapons called spingards and invented by Colleoni were long swivels, measuring three cubits,145 mounted upon carriages, and discharging balls somewhat larger than a walnut or plum. Although the advantage has been claimed for the confederates, the battle was a drawn one; indeed, Colleoni remained upon the field, whilst Federigo led his exhausted troops to the encampment he had previously resolved on. Yet the results became equivalent to a victory as regarded the Medici, for their outlawed opponents, no longer possessing money or credit, were overlooked in the arrangements for peace which followed early next year. Galeazzo Sforza having withdrawn most of his troops for protection of his frontier on the side of Savoy, the autumn was passed by the armies beating over their former ground about Faenza and Imola, Federigo vainly anxious, as we are assured, to bring on another engagement. Finally, sickness and winter terminated a campaign quite unworthy of the space that has been allowed it by most annalists.
In one respect, however, it was not unimportant to the Count of Urbino, for it gave him opportunities of improving an acquaintance with the youthful Duke of Milan, and of cementing his tried friendship for the house of Sforza. So long as Colleoni kept the field, he was watched by the Count, who rightly guessed that, under pretext of the descent upon Florence, he was ready enough to carry the banner of St. Mark into the Milanese, should a favourable opportunity offer. Even after peace was concluded, Federigo remained in Lombardy, and was employed by Galeazzo Maria on the honourable mission of receiving at Genoa his bride, Bona of Savoy, on her arrival from the French court, over which her sister presided. Having conducted her to Milan, the marriage was celebrated in July, 1468, after which he at length contrived to repair home. From thence, however, he was speedily summoned to return, and, as the Duke's captain-general, to take the field against the Savoyards, and afterwards to reduce Brisella on the Po, whose inhabitants had attempted to stir up new strife among the rival powers of Italy. The autumn was well advanced ere these matters were arranged. Galeazzo presented him with a palace at Milan, and relying upon his judgment and experience, detained him there during the winter to assist in organising his state. The arrival of Frederick III. at Venice early in the year appeared to impose on the Duke, as his principal feudatory, the duty of a special mission, and Federigo was selected for that distinction. His object was, however, misrepresented to the Emperor, who consequently altered his route and proceeded to Rome for his coronation. On the 1st of March, 1469, the Count returned to Urbino. Ricotti mentions, as a startling proof of the low estate to which the imperial authority had now been reduced in Italy, that the King of the Romans on this occasion asked of Colleoni a safe conduct for himself and suite, on their way to the nominal capital of his empire!
During his absence, the detested Lord of Rimini closed his wayward career. No Italian prince of this century fills so picturesque a niche in mediæval history; none has more fully realised its worse vices, or so narrowly escaped its noblest qualities. Bred as a soldier of fortune, and numbering among his subjects the most martial population of the Peninsula, his bravery when tested became mere bravado, his duplicity rendered him a dangerous adherent to any cause. Unbounded ambition was in him so marked by selfishness, ready talent so clogged by overweening conceit, that all his efforts and aspirations resulted in failure, and with the means and opportunities of establishing an important sovereignty, he left behind him but a shadow of departed power. His domestic morals were scandalous in an age of notorious laxity. Not only were his three wives sacrificed to jealousy or vengeance, but their murders are boastfully alluded to on his monument in the miserable jest, that although the horns he wore were visible enough, he had found means to curtail them.146
His progeny were all illegitimate, and several of them came to violent ends. The sole redeeming trait of human kindness that seems to have softened his harsh and treacherous nature was his affection for Isotta, whom he raised from obscurity to participate in his affections, or as some say his rank. However that may have been, she shares such celebrity as has been conferred on him by the creations of art and literature which he sedulously patronised, and in which chiefly his name survives, although their humanising influences left no impress on his haughty and cruel nature. Mariotti remarks, that "an Italian prince in those days durst not be a barbarian. A murderer, perhaps, stained with the most flagitious crimes, he might be; but he must seek his absolution in works of munificence, he must atone for his outrages against public morality by his devotion to the cause of learning and homage to the public taste." So was it with Sigismondo.*147 Valturio tells us that he read a great deal, and often took part in discussions and disputations upon philosophy, letters, and arts, with a patience of contradiction which honourably contrasted with his usual outbreaks of temper. At his court were entertained Porcellio, Basinio, Trebanio, and other Latinist poetasters, who repaid such hospitality by a meed of fulsome and long-forgotten doggerel, and celebrated the beauty and accomplishments of his mistress. Italy could boast of no architect superior to Leon Alberti, no military engineer more skilful than Valturio: he employed the former on the church of S. Francesco at Rimini, which marks an era in the revival of art; the latter, under his auspices, wrote on the science of war, and exemplified its practice in constructing the castle of that town: both of these buildings enshrine the name and munificence of Sigismondo Pandolfo. But the most pleasing memorials of a prince by name and by nature chief of the wrong-heads (if we may be pardoned a pun upon Malatesta) are the medallions in bronze struck for him by Pisani, Di Pastis, and other celebrated medalists, one of which we here introduce. Zanetti's publication on the mint of Rimini gives twelve of these without exhausting their number; they preserve his manly bust and Isotta's matronly features, whilst the sculptures of S. Francesco familiarise us with the elephant and negro-heads borne as their respective cognisances.
It is remarkable how entirely his virtues and vices, his talents and tastes, were formed upon the standards of paganism, and one circumstance alone was wanting to place him on a level with the heroes of classic times—that he had been born a heathen. Thus, his selfish daring, his reckless waste of human life and welfare, needed but the name of Mars to sanctify them; his unscrupulous and insatiable lust had been welcome incense at the shrine of Venus; the murder of his wives and the deification of his paramour found orthodox precedents in many demigods. So too was it with his encouragement of letters and art. The verses of his laureates were modelled after the most approved classical adulation. His architects were employed in the art of war, his sculptors upon heroic medals and devices commemorative of himself and his favourite mistress; the church which he built as a monument of his magnificence is covered with ornaments, emblems, and tombs so profane in character, that but for its dedication to St. Francis, it might scarcely have been taken for a Christian shrine.
The latter scenes of his life have a touch of romantic interest altogether wanting to its more prosperous days. When deprived of substantial sovereignty, he left the scene of his humiliation, and turning against the Crescent those arms which had often been arrayed against the Keys, as a captain of adventure he led the Venetian troops to encounter the Infidel in the Morea. There he distinguished himself in 1464–5, and then returned to Italy, bringing, it is said, the dry bones of Themistios, a Byzantine philosopher, to a court no longer open for living celebrities of literature. His haughty spirit spurned all overtures from the Pontiff, who