DOI Page / Citation link:
https://doi.org/10.11588/diglit.36838#0322
DEBTS AND DIFFICULTIES
258
After much difficulty he obtained the necessary passes
from the authorities at Mantua and Ferrara, and
from the Signory of Venice, which held sway over the
cities of Romagna, and the goods were safely landed
at Rimini early in January. By this time the roads
over the Apennines were so bad that Castiglione
found it impossible to send for them, and, hearing
that Rimini was full of thieving soldiers, ordered the
greater part to be sold on the spot. But when the
servant Giovanni Martino, whom he sent on horse-
back from Urbino to take charge of his property,
reached Rimini, he found that most of the goods had
already been stolen by a Mantuan servant, who turned
out both a thief and a liar. ' This time I really think/
he wrote home, ' I am cured of having things sent
from Lombardy !'
All these domestic worries were a source of per-
petual vexation to Castiglione s soul, and he fretted
over them, as poets will. But what troubled him far
more than any of these minor annoyances were the
debts that he could not pay, and which, as he told his
mother, were like a ' worm gnawing continually at his
heart.Ducats were still more scarce under Fran-
cesco Maria s sway than during the last Duke s reign.
Castiglione's salary was generally in arrear, and his
expenses, as he often told his mother, were always
increasing. In spite of his efforts, he had been unable
to pay his debt to Cardinal Ippolito d' Este, and still
owed him 150 ducats. His letters during this winter
contain repeated requests for help in this matter.
' I still owe that debt to Monsignor di Ferrara/
he wrote from Fossombrone during Guidobaldo's last
illness, ' which oppresses me beyond measure for a
i Cod. Vat. Lat.j 8210.
258
After much difficulty he obtained the necessary passes
from the authorities at Mantua and Ferrara, and
from the Signory of Venice, which held sway over the
cities of Romagna, and the goods were safely landed
at Rimini early in January. By this time the roads
over the Apennines were so bad that Castiglione
found it impossible to send for them, and, hearing
that Rimini was full of thieving soldiers, ordered the
greater part to be sold on the spot. But when the
servant Giovanni Martino, whom he sent on horse-
back from Urbino to take charge of his property,
reached Rimini, he found that most of the goods had
already been stolen by a Mantuan servant, who turned
out both a thief and a liar. ' This time I really think/
he wrote home, ' I am cured of having things sent
from Lombardy !'
All these domestic worries were a source of per-
petual vexation to Castiglione s soul, and he fretted
over them, as poets will. But what troubled him far
more than any of these minor annoyances were the
debts that he could not pay, and which, as he told his
mother, were like a ' worm gnawing continually at his
heart.Ducats were still more scarce under Fran-
cesco Maria s sway than during the last Duke s reign.
Castiglione's salary was generally in arrear, and his
expenses, as he often told his mother, were always
increasing. In spite of his efforts, he had been unable
to pay his debt to Cardinal Ippolito d' Este, and still
owed him 150 ducats. His letters during this winter
contain repeated requests for help in this matter.
' I still owe that debt to Monsignor di Ferrara/
he wrote from Fossombrone during Guidobaldo's last
illness, ' which oppresses me beyond measure for a
i Cod. Vat. Lat.j 8210.