Penelope, for her Ulisses sake, Deviz'd a web her wooers to deceave; In which the worke that she all day did make, The same at night she did againe unreave.

CHAPTER V True and False LoversFrancesco, "Il Virtuoso"Bianca Cappello, "La Figlia di Venezia"Pietro BuonaventuriCassandra de' BorghianiPellegrina Buonaventuri, wife of Ulisse BentivoglioAntonio Riario.

She had married, shortly after the public nuptials of the Grand Duke and Grand Duchess, Count Ulisse Bentivoglio di Magiola of Bolognaa by no means happy marriage as it turned out.

The match was broken off, but within a year of Pietro's renunciation another aspirant for Pellegrina's hand and dowry appeared in the person of a distinguished young foreignerConte Ulisse Bentivoglio de' Magioli da Bologna.

Which of the two was Conte Ulisse's father mattered far less, from a matrimonial point of view, than the fact that the prospective bridegroom was unusually wealthy and well-placed.

Conte Ulisse, twenty years of age, went to Florence along with the Bologna deputation to greet Grand Duke Francesco upon his marriage with Bianca Buonaventuri.

The intimacy grew until news of it reached Count Ulisse's ears in the boudoir of his sweetheart!

Like a "bolt from the blue" fell the blowor blowswhich, if not delivered by Count Ulisse in person, were his de jure.

The dark deed was done on 21st September 1589, and Count Ulisse lived on with his evil conscience and his new wife till 1618, when he, too, fell in Bologna by an assassin's bladejust retribution for the foul murder of lovely Pellegrina Buonaventuri.

heere stand[s] thy Ulisses, ile tarry with thee still, thou shall want for no cost.