DOI Page / Citation link:
https://doi.org/10.11588/diglit.42861#0146
112 THE MARQUIS AND HIS DAUGHTER
have good news of my illustrious consort, from
whom I hear constantly.” And in a postscript she
adds: “ I have made Giovanni’s assistant search
everywhere, but he says that he can find nothing.”1
Meanwhile Isabella travelled northward through
Romagna to Bologna, where she was hospitably
entertained by Annibale Bentivoglio and her sister
Lucrezia; and after paying a short visit to her
father and brother at Ferrara, reached Mantua
towards the middle of May. During her absence
from home she received daily accounts of her
little daughter’s well-being from Violante de’ Preti,
and the Marquis himself gave her constant news
of the child, to whom he was tenderly attached.
“ Yesterday we went into our little daughter’s
room,” he writes in one letter to Urbino, “ and
were glad to see her so well and lively. We had
her dressed before us, as you desired, in her white
damask robe, which suits her charmingly, and of
which she was very proud. This morning we have
been to see her again, but finding her asleep, would
not wake her.” 2 Neither did Francesco fail to give
his wife private information of the important political
events which had been happening at Milan and
Mantua in the last few weeks. In a long letter
to Bologna, intended for her eyes alone, he told
her that Monseigneur de Migni, as he called
D’Aubigny, and three other French ambassadors
had arrived at Mantua on the 22nd of April, with
eighty-five horsemen, to ask a free passage through
his dominion for the Most Christian King’s troops
on the way to Naples. More than this, they had
1 Campori, Notizie di Giovanni Santi, Modena, 1870.
2 Luzio e Renier, Mantova e Urbino, pp. 75-77.
have good news of my illustrious consort, from
whom I hear constantly.” And in a postscript she
adds: “ I have made Giovanni’s assistant search
everywhere, but he says that he can find nothing.”1
Meanwhile Isabella travelled northward through
Romagna to Bologna, where she was hospitably
entertained by Annibale Bentivoglio and her sister
Lucrezia; and after paying a short visit to her
father and brother at Ferrara, reached Mantua
towards the middle of May. During her absence
from home she received daily accounts of her
little daughter’s well-being from Violante de’ Preti,
and the Marquis himself gave her constant news
of the child, to whom he was tenderly attached.
“ Yesterday we went into our little daughter’s
room,” he writes in one letter to Urbino, “ and
were glad to see her so well and lively. We had
her dressed before us, as you desired, in her white
damask robe, which suits her charmingly, and of
which she was very proud. This morning we have
been to see her again, but finding her asleep, would
not wake her.” 2 Neither did Francesco fail to give
his wife private information of the important political
events which had been happening at Milan and
Mantua in the last few weeks. In a long letter
to Bologna, intended for her eyes alone, he told
her that Monseigneur de Migni, as he called
D’Aubigny, and three other French ambassadors
had arrived at Mantua on the 22nd of April, with
eighty-five horsemen, to ask a free passage through
his dominion for the Most Christian King’s troops
on the way to Naples. More than this, they had
1 Campori, Notizie di Giovanni Santi, Modena, 1870.
2 Luzio e Renier, Mantova e Urbino, pp. 75-77.