s, and chiefly for the putting an end to the
protracted contest for precedence between the two families, which every
now and again threatened to plunge all Italy into war.

Alfonso d'Este was the heir of his father, Ercole II.--of his titles and
wealth, but not of his good looks and polished manners: besides, his
reputation for chastity and sobriety was not of the best. Directly Maria
was told of the arrangement she expressed her disgust and her
determination not to submit to parental dictation. Her reception of the
Prince was cold in the extreme, she declined to see him apart from her
sisters and attendants, and he returned to Ferrara in no amiable frame
of mind.

Meanwhile love, true love, had peeped through the jalousies of Princess
Maria's window, and his arrows had fled their dangerous course unseen by
any but herself, and him whose heart was hers. No one suspected that a
life so guarded could, by any means, be filched from its restraints; but
so it was, and the first gossip sprang out of the mouth of a venerable
Spanish retainer of the Duchess, the faithful _custode_, Mandriano, who
guarded his mistress's door almost night and day.

Traversing one day an unfrequented part of the gardens of the Palace on
the Hill, the old fellow thought he heard voices, and, approaching a
grove of laurels, he descried the young Princess in the arms of
Malatesta de' Malatesti!

The Duchess was furious when Mandriano told her, and immediately
conveyed the portentous news to her husband. Cosimo reflected long and
acted warily, for he made no move for many days. Stealthily he tracked
the unsuspecting lovers to their trysting-place. Mandriano's story was
quite correct.

He summoned the two young people to his private closet, he acquainted
them with the fact that the _liaison_ could not continue, and ordered
Malatesta to prepare for immediate imprisonment--with the loss of all
his honours and the confidence of his Sovereign. The boy pleaded in
vain, and testified to the innocence of the love-making without effect,
except to raise the Duke's anger to a dangerous pitch. Maria threw
herself at her father's feet and appealed for mercy for her lover,
asking that the parental vengeance should fall on her and not on
Malatesta.

"That you shall have, base child of mine," Cosimo cried in a fierce
tone; "see, you shall have the justice of a Roman father!" Then,
plucking out his poignard from its hidden sheath, he stabbed his child
to the h