B O R 



T23 



BOH 



Borgja. As Charlotta, acquainted with his infamous cha- 

 v' racter, shrunk with horror from his addresses, he 

 sued for and obtained the hand of the daughter of 

 the King of Navarre, and was honoured by Louis 

 with the order of St Michael. Prosperity, like sun- 

 shine to a serpent, seemed only to rouse the invete- 

 rate malignity of his nature. Incredible numbers of 

 victims were sacrificed to his revenge or his ambition ; 

 and not only in Rome, but in every part of the eccle- 

 siastical dominions, he had assassins in his pay, rea- 

 dy, on the slightest hint, to execute his cruel designs. 

 His father instigated or assisted him in his villanies ; 

 and having determined to reduce Romagna into sub- 

 jection to the holy see, they dispatched a number of 

 the richest cardinals, and seized their property, to 

 enable them to carry on the iniquitous war which 

 they had undertaken. As duke of Valentinois, 

 Borgia was able to levy a considerable force in Fiance, 

 with which he proceeded to Romagna. He com- 

 menced his campaign with the siege of Imola and 

 Forli, which soon surrendered. He next reduced 

 Pesaro, Rimini, and Faenza ; and, in the year 1.301, 

 was honoured, by his father, with the title of Dake 

 of Romagna. Unheard of atrocities were committed 

 by Borgia in the course of this war ; which he pur- 

 sued with such vigour and success, that the Italian 

 powers, alarmed for their common safety, formed a 

 combination to oppose him. He contrived, however, 

 to defeat this confederacy by his usual arts of 

 treaenery and cruelty. He invited three of the lead- 

 ing men to Senigaglia, under a pretence of negecia- 

 ting peace, and caused them all to be strangled. 

 Thus Borgia and his father proceeded in their usur- 

 pations, alternately courting the friendship of the 

 monarchs of France and Spain, as the influence of ei- 

 ther appeared to prevail or decline in Italy. Such 

 was Borgia in his prosperity : a man whom Machia- 

 vel proposes as a model of imitation to all succeeding 

 princes, who, like him, might acquire dominions by 

 their valour or address ; a man whose talents enabled 

 him to form the most extensive schemes of aggran- 

 dizement, and whom no motives of justice, honour, 

 or humanity, could ever move from his purpose. 



Providence, as if to counteract the influence of 

 such a pernicious example, condemned him to outlive 

 the greatness which he had so foully acquired ; to 

 see his fortune dispersed, and his dominions wrested 

 from him ; to see his enemies prosperous and exalted, 

 and himself sunk in the lowest poverty, and the most 

 abject dependance. Poison, which Borgia and his fa- 

 ther had prepared for nine wealthy prelates, on whose 

 possessions they wished to seize, was drunk, through 

 mistake, by themselves. The Pope died next day ; 

 but the youth and vigorous constitution of Borgia 

 enabled him to recover, though he long experienced 

 the pernicious effects of the poison. He escaped be- 

 ing massacred by the partizans of Pope Pius III., 

 his father's successor, only through the protection 

 of the king of France, whose party he afterwards 

 ungratefully abandoned. Only four of the places 

 which he had usurped now remained in his posses- 

 sion ; and these, to secure his personal safety, he of- 

 fered to resign to Pope Julius II., the successor of 

 Pius III. Julius, though he at first refused them, 

 afterwards ordered Borgia to be seized at Ostia, and 



ed to 

 He now sought refuge in Naples ; 



confined in close custody till he had again 

 resign them all. 



where he was treated at first with some respect by 

 the Spanish general Gonsalvo de Cordova, but was 

 afterwards sent to Spain, in consequence of an order 

 from the king, and doomed to perpetual imprison- 

 ment in the castle of Medina del Campo. Here he 

 was closely confined for two years, when, escaping 

 out of a window by means of a rope, he fled to Na- 

 varre, where he was received in a very friendly man- 

 ner by his brother-in-law King John. He intended 

 to have gone from Navarre to France, with the view 

 of engaging Louis to assist him in retrieving his for- 

 tune. Louis, however, instead of listening to his 

 proposals, refused to receive him into his territories, 

 confiscated his duchy of Valentinois, and withdrew 

 his pension. 



Thus degraded and destitute, he, whose ambition- 

 once knew no bounds, was forced to depend for sub- 

 sistence upon his brother-in-law, who was then at 

 war with his subjects. Ccesar engaged as a volunteer 

 in his service, and was killed in a skirmish before the 

 walls of Viana in the year 1507. His body was 

 stripped by the victors, but was recognised by his 

 servants, who carried it off the field on a horse, and 

 interred it ill the cathedral of Pamplona, of which he 

 had formerly been bishop. " Hated in prosperity," 

 says one of his biographers, " scorned in adversity, 

 stripped of all his honours and possessions, even such 

 as he might fairly have claimed, and leaving behind 

 him a name consigned to universal detestation, it would 

 seem that he gained little by being a villain." 



He assumed as his motto, Aut Ccesar, aut nihil,. 

 which gave occasion to many epigrams ; with two of 

 which we shall conclude this sketch of his life. The, 

 first is written by Sannazarius : 



Aut nihil, av.t Ctssar vult dici Borgia ; quidni? 

 Cum simul tt Ctesar possit, tt esse nihil. 



The other is by an unknown author : 



Borgia Ctesar eratfuclis, et nomine Ctesar. 

 Aut nihil, aut Cresar, dixit; ulrumqut j'tttt. 



See General liiograplit). General Dictionary. Gor< 

 don's Lives of Pope Alexander VI. and his son Co;- 

 sar. Machiavel's Principe, cap. 7. ; and Mod. Univ. 

 Hist, vols- xxiv. and xxvi. () 



BORING Machine may be defined to be, any 

 machine for working a borer, or tool, which, by a 

 rotatoiy motion on an axis, cuts out a hollow cylin- 

 der in any substance subjected to its action. 



The carpenter's whimble or crank, the drill; 

 pulley, and bow, are, in this sense, boring machines; 

 but custom has confined the term to signify, the ap- 

 paratus which is used for boring out larger cylinders 

 more quickly and aocurately than can be performed 

 by manual labour, but which require? the power of 

 a water wheel, steam engine, or horse wheel, to give 

 it motion. These machines are principally employed 

 for two purposes ; for boring wooden pipes for the 

 conveyance of water, and for boring out the metal- 

 line cylinders used in hydraulics and in pneumatic en- 

 gines. In the first case, the whole cavity is removed 

 by the machine, which will be described under the 

 article Pji-e Boring ; but in the latter, the machine 



Borgia, 



Boring 



Mechins. 



