iterbo another messenger
met her with the tidings of the death of the Marchese, which had
occurred on Nov. 25, 1525. Overcome with grief, Vittoria was carried
back to Rome and for the solace of entire seclusion she sought the
cloistered silence of the convent of San Silvestre, which lay at the
foot of the Monte Cavallo in Rome, almost adjoining the gardens of the
Colonna palace. To the Marchese di Pescara, who had the military rank of
general, was given a funeral of great pomp and splendor in Milan, and
his body was brought to the famous Naples church of Santa Domenica
Maggiore, where it was entombed with the princes and nobles of his
house.

Before the death of the Marchese there had been a political plot to join
the Papal, Venetian, and Milanese forces and rescue Italy from the
Emperor's rule, and the Pope himself had sent a messenger to Pescara
asking him to unite with the league. The Marchese, Spanish by ancestry
and by sympathies, used this knowledge to frustrate the Italian designs
and to warn Spain. The Italian historians have execrated him for this
act, which they regard as that of a traitor. Vittoria, however, did not
take this view apparently, as in a letter to her husband she wrote:--

"Titles and kingdoms do not add to true honor.... I do not desire
to be the wife of a king, but I glory in being the wife of that
great general who shows his bravery in war and, still more, by
magnanimity in peace, surpasses the greatest kings."

The inducement of the throne of Naples had been held out to Marchese di
Pescara. He evidently regarded this in the nature of a dishonorable
bribe, and it is this view which the Marchesa plainly shared.

After his death her first impulse was to take the vows of a cloistered
nun. The Pope himself intervened to dissuade her, and she consented to
enter, only temporarily, the convent of San Silvestre on the Monte
Cavallo.

In the will of the Marchese di Pescara there was a clause directing that
anything in his estate unlawfully acquired should be restored to the
owner; and under this, Vittoria gave back to the monastery of Monte
Cassino the Monte San Magno that had formerly been its property.

From the cloistered shades of the convent Vittoria removed to the family
castle of the Colonna at Marino, where, on the shore of this beautiful
lake (which was the scenery of Virgil's AEneid), she passed some months,
engaged in writing sonnets. Of one of these a translation r