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That most faithful of all Cesare's officers and sharer of the odium that has been heaped upon Cesare's name entered the service of the Signory of Florence.
It would not be wise to join in the chorus of those who appear to have taken Cesare's altruism for granted.
Astorre, now seeing the citadel in ruins and the possibility of further resistance utterly exhausted, assembled the Council of Faenza to determine upon their course of action, and, as a result of their deliberations, the young tyrant sent his ambassadors to the duke to propose terms of surrender. It was a belated proposal, for there was no longer on Cesare's part the necessity to make terms.
On the evening of his arrival Cesare supped in private with Filippo and the members of Filippo's household that is to say, with Madonna Paola and two of her ladies, and three gentlemen attached to the person of the Lord Filippo. Cesare's only attendants were two cavaliers of his retinue, Bartolomeo da Capranica, his Field-Marshal, and Dorio Savelli, a nobleman of Rome.
It was Cesare's Spanish captain, one whose name was as well known and as well-dreaded in Italy as Cesare's own. The Duke held out to him the paper that he had produced. "You heard the question that I asked Messer del' Orca?" he inquired. "I heard, Illustrious," answered Miguel, with a bow.
On the face of it, that edict of Valentinois' seems to argue vexation at what had happened, and the desire to provide against its repetition a provision hardly likely to be made by the man who had organized the assault, unless he sought, by this edict, to throw dust into the eyes of the world; and one cannot associate after the event and the fear of criticism with such a nature as Cesare's or with such a character as is given him by those who are satisfied that it was he who murdered Biselli.
But Giovanni, with all semblance of friendliness, treacherously lured him back to cast him into prison and have him strangled a little matter which those who, to the detriment of the Borgia, seek to make a hero of this Giovanni Sforza, would do well not to suppress. A proof of the splendid discipline prevailing in Cesare's army is afforded during his brief sojourn in Pesaro.
They prepared a second attack against Cesare's capital, and with an army of considerable strength they advanced to the very walls of the stronghold, laying the aqueduct in ruins and dismantling what other buildings they found in their way. But in Cesena the gallant Pedro Ramires lay in wait for them.
Growing uneasy at their position, and finding it impossible either to advance or to retreat, being threatened on the one side by the Baglioni and on the other by the Orsini, these troops had steadily deserted; whilst most of Cesare's Spanish captains and their followers had gone to the aid of their compatriots under Gonzalo de Cordoba in response to that captain's summons of every Spaniard in the peninsula.
During the past months, however, and notwithstanding the presence of the Borgia troops in the territory, the people of Faenza had been able to increase their fortifications by the erection of out-works and a stout bastion in the neighbourhood of the Osservanza Hospital, well beyond the walls. This bastion claimed Cesare's first attention, and it was carried by assault on April 12.
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