of England, who,
for a suitable consideration, had been induced to join Venice and the
pope. At the end of this long campaign of diplomacy, perfidy and blood,
in which misery had rioted through ten thousand cottages, whose
inhabitants the warriors regarded no more than the occupants of the
ant-hills they trampled beneath their feet, it was found that no one had
gained any thing but toil and disappointment.
On the 21st of February, 1513, Pope Julius II. died, and the cardinals,
rejecting all the overtures of the emperor, elected John of Medici pope,
who assumed the name of Leo X. The new pontiff was but thirty-six years
of age, a man of brilliant talents, and devoted to the pursuit of
letters. Inspired by boundless ambition, he wished to signalize his
reign by the magnificence of his court and the grandeur of his
achievements.
Thus far nothing but disaster seemed to attend the enterprises of
Maximilian; but now the tide suddenly turned and rolled in upon him
billows of prosperity. It will be remembered that Maximilian married,
for his first wife, Mary, the daughter of the Duke of Burgundy. Their
son Philip married Joanna, daughter of Ferdinand and Isabella, whose
marriage, uniting the kingdoms of Castile and Arragon, created the
splendid kingdom of Spain.
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