ip the
battle of Pavia was won in 1525, and King Francis became his master's
prisoner. So far, nothing but honour, success, and glory waited on the
youthful hero. But now the tide turned. Pescara, when he again settled
down at Milan, began to plot with Girolamo Morone, Grand Chancellor of
Francesco Sforza's duchy. Morone had conceived a plan for reinstating
his former lord in Milan by the help of an Italian coalition. He
offered Pescara the crown of Naples if he would turn against the
Emperor. The Marquis seems at first to have lent a not unwilling ear
to these proposals, but seeing reason to doubt the success of the
scheme, he finally resolved to betray Morone to Charles V., and did
this with cold-blooded ingenuity. A few months afterwards, on November
25, 1525, he died, branded as a traitor, accused of double treachery,
both to his sovereign and his friend.

If suspicions of her husband's guilt crossed Vittoria's mind, as we
have some reason to believe they did, these were not able to destroy
her loyalty and love. Though left so young a widow and childless, she
determined to consecrate her whole life to his memory and to religion.
His nephew and heir, the Marchese del Vasto, became her adopted son.
The Marchioness survived Pescara two-and-twenty years, which were
spent partly in retirement at Ischia, partly in journeys, partly in
convents at Orvieto and Viterbo, and finally in a semi-monastic
seclusion at Rome. The time spared from pious exercises she devoted to
study, the composition of poetry, correspondence with illustrious men
of letters, and the society of learned persons. Her chief friends
belonged to that group of earnest thinkers who felt the influences of
the Reformation without ceasing to be loyal children of the Church.
With Vittoria's name are inseparably connected those of Gasparo
Contarini, Reginald Pole, Giovanni Morone, Jacopo Sadoleto,
Marcantonio Flaminio, Pietro Carnesecchi, and Fra Bernardino Ochino.
The last of these avowed his Lutheran principles, and was severely
criticised by Vittoria Colonna for doing so. Carnesecchi was burned
for heresy. Vittoria never adopted Protestantism, and died an orthodox
Catholic. Yet her intimacy with men of liberal opinions exposed her to
mistrust and censure in old age. The movement of the
Counter-Reformation had begun, and any kind of speculative freedom
aroused suspicion. This saintly princess was accordingly placed under
the supervision of the Holy Office, and