oul of him rest at least, for men--Christian men--have
refused to vouchsafe that privilege to his poor ashes.

Nearly two hundred years later--at the close of the seventeenth century,
a priest of God and a bishop, one who preached a gospel of love and
mercy so infinite that he dared believe by its lights no man to have
been damned, came to disturb the dust of Cesare Borgia. This Bishop
of Calahorra--lineal descendant in soul of that Pharisee who exalted
himself in God's House, thrilled with titillations of delicious horror
at the desecrating presence of the base publican--had his pietist's eyes
offended by the slab that marked Cesare Borgia's resting-place.(1)

1 It bore the following legend:

AQUI YACE EN POCA TIERRA
AL QUE TODO LE TEMIA
EL QUE LA PAZ Y LA GUERRA
EN LA SUA MANO TENIA.
OH TU QUE VAS A BUSCAR
COSAS DIGNAS DE LOAR
SI TU LOAS LO MAS DIGNO
AQUI PARE TU CAMINO
NO CURES DE MAS ANDAR.

which, more or less literally may be Englished as follows: "Here in a
little earth, lies one whom all did fear; one whose hands dispensed both
peace and war. Oh, you that go in search of things deserving praise,
if you would praise the worthiest, then let your journey end here, nor
trouble to go farther."

The pious, Christian bishop had read of this man--perhaps that life
of him published by the apostate Gregorio Leti under the pen-name of
Tommaso Tommasi, which had lately seen the light--and he ordered the
tomb's removal from that holy place. And thus it befell that the ashes
of Cesare Borgia were scattered and lost.

Charlotte d'Albret was bereft of her one friend, Queen Jeanne, in that
same year of Cesare's death. The Duchess of Valentinois withdrew to La
Motte-Feuilly, and for the seven years remaining of her life was never
seen other than in mourning; her very house was equipped with sombre,
funereal furniture, and so maintained until her end, which supports the
view that she had conceived affection and respect for the husband of
whom she had seen so little.

On March 14, 1514, that poor lady passed from a life which appears to
have offered her few joys.

Louise de Valentinois--a handsome damsel of the age of
fourteen--remained for three years under the tutelage of the Duchess of
Angouleme--the mother of King Francis I--to whom Charlotte d'Albret had
entrusted her child. Louise married, at the age of seventeen, Louis de
la Tremouille, Prince de Talmont and Vic