In those miserable days of violence and blood, almost any prince was ready to embark in war under anybody's banner, where there was the least prospect of personal aggrandizement.

The question of right or wrong, seemed seldom to enter any one's mind.

Louis fixed his eyes upon the duchy of Milan as the richest and most available prize within his grasp.

Conscious that he would meet with much opposition, he looked around for allies.
"If you will aid me," he said to Pope Alexander VI., "I will assist you in your war against the Duke of Romagna.

I will give your son, Caesar Borgia,[1] a pension of two thousand dollars a year, will confer upon him an important command in my army, and will procure for him a marriage with a princess of the royal house of Navarre." [Footnote 1: Caesar Borgia, who has filled the world with the renown of his infamy, was the illegitimate son of Alexander VI., and of a Roman lady named Yanozza.] The holy father could not resist this bribe, and eagerly joined the robber king in his foray.