"When he was at Rome, a year ago in the service of the Pope, I was at my studies in the convent.

His father was my father's cousin, so that my kinship is none so near.

Why do you ask ?" "Because my story deals with him, Madonna, and it is no pretty tale.

Not such a narrative as I should choose wherewith to entertain you.

Still, since you have asked for it, you shall hear it.
"It was in the year that Giovanni Sforza, Lord of Pesaro, celebrated his nuptials with the Lady Lucrezia Borgia--three years ago, therefore--that one morning there rode into the courtyard of his castle of Pesazo a tall and lean young man on a tall and lean old horse.