TWO GREAT RIVALS <&
FRANCOIS I. AND CHARLES V.
T
WO GREAT RIVALS
(FRANCOIS I. AND CHARLES V.) AND
THE WOMEN WHO INFLUENCED THEM
By
LIEUT.-COL. ANDREW C. P. HAGGARD
D.S.O.
Author of "Sidelights on the Court of France,"
"Louis XVI. and Marie Antoinette," etc., etc.
WITH TWENTY-ONE ILLUSTRATIONS
INCLUDING A PHOTOGRAVURE PLATE
LONDON *> HUTCHINSON & CO.
PATERNOSTER ROW <+> *+> *+> 1910
IX
H3
TO
THE BARON ALBERT D'ANETHAN
ENVOY EXTRAORDINARY AND MINISTER PLENIPOTENTIARY OF HIS
MAJESTY THE KING OF THE BELGIANS AT THE COURT OF TOKIO, JAPAN,
AS A MEMBER OF THE OLD NOBILITY OF THE MIGHTY EMPIRE
FORMERLY SUBJECT TO THE SWAY OF THE GREAT
EMPEROR CHARLES V.,
AS A DIPLOMATIST SPRUNG FROM THE SOIL WHICH
GAVE BIRTH TO THE HIGHEST TRADITIONS OF MODERN DIPLOMACY,
THIS WORK IS DEDICATED
BY HIS AFFECTIONATE BROTHER-IN-LAW
ANDREW HAGGARD
CONTENTS
INTRODUCTION
PAGE
SOME NOTABLE WOMEN I
BIRTH AND CHILDHOOD OF THE RIVALS .... 8
THE BORGIAS, JULIUS II., AND MARGUERITE . . . 1 8
. , .
GASTON DE FOIX AND THE BATTLE OF RAVENNA . 26
CHAPTER I
THE AMOURS OF FRANCOIS AND FRANCOISE .... 35
CHAPTER II
FRANCOIS LIEGE LORD, CHARLES VASSAL .... 42
CHAPTER III
FRAN9OIS, CHARLES, AND MARGUERITE DE VALOIS . . 49
CHAPTER IV
BAYARD, SANS PEUR ET SANS REPROCHE . . • • 59
CHAPTER V
BAYARD AND THE PRELUDES TO MARIGNANO . -67
vii
viii Contents
CHAPTER VI
PAOC
THE BATTLE OF MARIGNANO 78
CHAPTER VII
A CLEAR SKY, BUT A CLOUDED HORIZON (1516-1517) . . 87
CHAPTER VIII
THE CHAMPIONS OF REFORM (1517 AND LATER) ... 98
CHAPTER IX
THE LOVE AFFAIR OF ELEONORE .... .107
CHAPTER X
MAX AND MARGUERITE LAY THEIR PLANS (1516-1519) . . 113
CHAPTER XI
TURKISH DANGERS AND TROUBLES AHEAD (1519-1520). . 123
CHAPTER XII
THE FIELD OF THE CLOTH OF GOLD (jUNE 1520) . . . 130
CHAPTER XIII
ANNE BOLEYN AND HER EFFECT ON HENRY (iJ^fjV) AND LATER) 14!
CHAPTER XIV
TWO DISAPPOINTMENTS FOR THE BUTCHER'S SON (1521-1523) 148
Contents ix
CHAPTER XV
PAOE
BAYARD TO THE RESCUE (1521) . . . 'V :. . 156
CHAPTER XVI
HOW MARGUERITE D'ANGOULEME INFLUENCED FRA^OIS I.
(1517 AND LATER) 163
CHAPTER XVII
THE LUCK OF CHARLES V. . . 7" . .170
CHAPTER XVIII
UNHOLY LOVE OF FRANCOIS FOR MARGUERITE . . . I?9
CHAPTER XIX
MADAME'S LAWSUIT (1522) . . . . . . . 186
CHAPTER XX
THE CONSTABLE'S CONSPIRACY (1523) 195
CHAPTER XXI
SAINT-VALLIER AND DIANE DE POITIERS .... 207
CHAPTER XXII
THE DEATH OF BAYARD (APRIL 1524) . . . . .213
CHAPTER XXIII
THE USELESS BRAVERY OF BOURBON (1524). « . . 219
Contents
CHAPTER XXIV
PAGE
THE PRELUDES TO PAVIA (1524-1525) . . . 229
CHAPTER XXV
THE BATTLE OF PAVIA (1525) .... . 235
CHAPTER XXVI
HOW CHARLES V. TOOK THE NEWS 246
CHAPTER XXVII
CHARLES TRIES TO JOCKEY FRANCOIS (1525). . . . 253
CHAPTER XXVIII
FRAN9O1S GETS A SURPRISE (1525) 262
CHAPTER XXIX
MARGUERITE DE VALOIS VISITS SPAIN (SEPTEMBER 1525) . 270
CHAPTER XXX
THE PLOT OF PESCARA (1525) . . . . . . 279
CHAPTER XXXI
MARGUERITE AND HENRI D*ALBRET 287
CHAPTER XXXII
FRAN90IS COMMITS PERJURY 295
CHAPTER XXXIII
LIBERTY AND A NEW MISTRESS (1526) 30 1
Contents xi
CHAPTER XXXIV
PAGE
THE HOLY LEAGUE OF COGNAC (1526) . . . . 308
CHAPTER XXXV
CHARLES AT TWENTY-SIX, MENTALLY AND PHYSICALLY (1526) 316
CHAPTER XXXVI
BOURBON'S DASH ON ROME (1527). ^ . 321
CHAPTER XXXVII
THE AWFUL SACK OF ROME (MAY 1527) . . . . 330
CHAPTER XXXVIII
FRANCOIS BUILDS AND THE POPE ESCAPES (1527-1528). . 338
CHAPTER XXXIX
PROPOSED DUEL BETWEEN CHARLES AND FRA^OIS (1528) . 346
CHAPTER XL
PRIDE COMES BEFORE A FALL (1528-1529) .... 356
CHAPTER XLI
MARGUERITE OF AUSTRIA MAKES A PEACE (1529) . . . 365
CHAPTER XLII
THE EMPEROR IS CROWNED GLORIOUSLY (1530) . . . 373
xii Contents
CHAPTER XLIII
PAGE
THE PRINCES RELEASED — MARGUERITE OF AUSTRIA DIES —
ANNE BOLEYN (l^° AND LATER) 379
CHAPTER XLIV
THE EMPEROR INVADES TUNIS AND FRANCE (1535-1536) . 390
CHAPTER XLV
THE INFLUENCE OF THE WOMEN (1536-1547) . . . 398
CHAPTER XLVI
THE FORCED MARRIAGE OF JEANNE D'ALBRET (1541) . . 408
CHAPTER XLVII
THE END OF THE STRUGGLE (1547) ..... 419
CHAPTER XLVIII
LOVE MATCH OF JEANNE AND DEATH OF CHARLES V. (1548
AND 1558) . .....'.. 429
INDEX . 435
ILLUSTRATIONS
I Photogravure Frontispiece
After the painting by F. Clouet.
FACING PAGE
KING FERDINAND OF ARAGON . . A . . .12
Photo by J. Lacoste after the carved wooden statue in the Cathedral, Malaga.
POPE JULIUS II . . .18
Photo by Anderson, Rome, after the painting by Raphael at Florence.
CHARLES V. ... 50
From the painting in the Louvre.
MARGUERITE DE VALOIS, SISTER OF FRA^OIS I. . . 56
From a lithograph by N. H. Jacob.
MARTIN LUTHER . . . .' . . ' . . IO4
Tamme, photo after the painting by Lucas Cranach.
QUEEN JOANNA OF CASTILE, MOTHER OF CHARLES V. . . Io8
Photo by J. Laurent & Co. after the painting in the Prado, Madrid.
MAXIMILIAN I., ARCHDUKE OF AUSTRIA, EMPEROR OF GERMANY Il8
F. Hanfstaengl, photo after the painting by Albert Durer,
THOMAS WOLSEY, CARDINAL OF YORK 130
From an engraving by F. Holt after the painting by Holbein at Christ
Church, Oxford.
CATHERINE OF ARAGON, FIRST QUEEN OF HENRY VIII. . . '142
From a photograph after the painting by an unknown artist in the National
Gallery.
LEO X. RIDING IN STATE 152
From the painting at the Vatican, Rome, Photo by Alinari.
MARGUERITE, ARCHDUCHESS OF AUSTRIA .... 162
From a photo by W. A. Mansell of a lithograph after the stained-glass window
in the church of Notre Dame de Brou (Bourg-en-Bresse).
xiii
xiv Illustrations
FACING PAGE
FRANCOIS I. AND HIS SISTER MARGUERITE . . . .182
From an engraving by Charles Heath after a painting by R. P. Bonnington.
PIERRE DE TERRAIL, CHEVALIER DE BAYARD . . . 2l6
After the engraving from Thevel.
ISABELLA OF PORTUGAL, WIFE OF CHARLES V. ... 300
Photo by Anderson, Rome, from the picture in the Prado by Titian.
CHARLES DE MONTPENSIER, DUC DE BOURBON . . . 330
From a contemporary engraving.
CLEMENT VII. AND CHARLES V 376
Photo by G. Brogi after the painting in the Palazzo Vecchio, Florence.
CLEMENT VII. AND FRANCOIS 1 384
Photo by Brogi after the painting in the Palazzo Vecchio, Florence.
DIANE DE POITIERS (STATUE) 404
KING FRAN9OIS I. AND THE EMPEROR CHARLES V. . .410
From an engraving after a picture by G. P. Harding.
HENRY VIII. . . . ' 428
After the picture by Holbein.
INTRODUCTION
Some Notable Women
<c /^HERCHEZ la femme ! " is a familiar saying when
V_> troubles occur in the lives of even humble
individuals, and how much more does it become applicable
in the case of the continual jealous strivings of Great
Powers !
ERRATUM
Page 1 8. For Duke of Brandon, read Duke of Suffolk.
H.I.U/.LIWUO ^iuci sister oi me young v^naries VJ11. ot
France, the youthful Anne of Brittany, who succeeded her
father, Duke Francois II., as ruler of the great Duchy
in 1488, and the childish Archduchess Marguerite of
Austria, daughter of the Archduke Maximilian, who
became Emperor of Germany, were all three early factors
in the great game of politics about to be played in
Europe. Louise de Savoie, sister of Philibert II., Duke
of Savoy, and niece of Anne de Beaujeu's husband, who
became Due de Bourbon, was another little girl present
at the Court of France in 1490, and one who was,
later on, to take a leading part in the struggle for mastery
in Europe.
To all the preceding young women there was soon
to be added another girl of the name of Marguerite.
xiv Illustrations
FACING PAGE
FRANCOIS I. AND HIS SISTER MARGUERITE . . . .182
From an engraving by Charles Heath after a painting by R. P. Bonnington.
PIERRE DE TERRAIL, CHEVALIER DE BAYARD . . . 2l6
After the engraving from Thevel.
ISABELLA OF PORTUGAL, WIFE OF CHARLES V. ... 300
Photo by Anderson, Rome, from the picture in the Prmdo by Titian.
CHARLES DE MONTPENS1ER, DUC DE BOURBON . . . 330
From a contemporary engraving.
CLEMENT VII. AND CHARLES V 376
Photo by G. Brogi after the painting in the Palazzo Vecchio, Florence.
CLEMENT VII. AND FRA^OIS 1 384
Photo by Brogi after the painting in the Palazzo Vecchio, Florence.
DIANE DE POITIERS (STATUE) 404
INTRODUCTION
Some Notable Women
" /^HERCHEZ la femme ! " is a familiar saying when
V_> troubles occur in the lives of even humble
individuals, and how much more does it become applicable
in the case of the continual jealous strivings of Great
Powers !
If it had not been for the influence and heart-burnings
of several women, which commenced to affect Europe
before the birth of the showy and frivolous Francois I.,
and the calculating and courtly Charles V., it seems
more than likely that the world would never have been
turned topsy-turvy by the incessant rivalries of these
two potentates.
The Duchesse Anne de Beaujeu, the capable and
ambitious elder sister of the young Charles VIII. of
France, the youthful Anne of Brittany, who succeeded her
father, Duke Francois II., as ruler of the great Duchy
in 1488, and the childish Archduchess Marguerite of
Austria, daughter of the Archduke Maximilian, who
became Emperor of Germany, were all three early factors
in the great game of politics about to be played in
Europe. Louise de Savoie, sister of Philibert II., Duke
of Savoy, and niece of Anne de Beaujeu's husband, who
became Due de Bourbon, was another little girl present
at the Court of France in 1490, and one who was,
later on, to take a leading part in the struggle for mastery
in Europe.
To all the preceding young women there was soon
to be added another girl of the name of Marguerite.
2 Introduction
She was the daughter of Louise de Savoie, who was
herself married at the age of eleven to Charles d'Orleans,
Comte d'Angouleme. The only other child of Louise
de Savoie was Francois. He was born in 1494, two
and a half years after his sister Marguerite, and was,
twenty years later, to become the King of France.
To the ambitions, intrigues, betrothals, marriages,
affections, and disappointments of these five women are
directly attributable nearly all of the stirring episodes
of war and policy which kept the continent of Europe
in a ferment for the last ten years of the fifteenth and
first fifty years of the sixteenth century ; and the actions
of Francois I. and the Emperor Charles V. came but
as a natural sequence to the plottings and plannings
of the four first-mentioned Princesses. As for the
fifth, Marguerite d'Angouleme, during the earlier years
of her brother's reign she may be looked upon as having
been the actual Queen of France, so entirely was her
brilliant and pleasure-loving brother guided by her policy,
in which she worked solely for his advantage, no matter
how much she might suffer herself. She was later to
become Queen of Navarre, when Francois I. repaid
this devoted sister with nothing but neglect of her
interests.
The capable and designing daughter of the Valois
line, Anne de France, Duchesse de Bourbon-Beaujeu,
may be said to have started all the trouble. By a
series of lucky chances, aided by great energy, her father,
Louis XL, had contrived to become the first ruler of a
politically united France. When his great rival, Charles
the Bold, Duke of Burgundy, was killed in battle at
Nancy by the Duke of Lorraine, his widow was despoiled
of Picardy and the Duchy of Burgundy by Louis XI.
He had also taken and annexed Franche-Comte and
Artois. By - the extinction of the house of Anjou
Louis XI. had also been able to incorporate the feudal
appanages of Anjou, Maine, and the county of Provence
with his own dominions.
The weak Charles VIII. succeeded his father in 1483,
Some Notable Women 3
and thus came under the Regency of his strong-minded
sister, Anne de Beaujeu, who continued to rule him
after he had attained his majority. She was not able to
prevent her brother from returning Franche-Comte and
Artois to the last heiress of the House of Burgundy,
in the person of Marie, the daughter of Charles the Bold,
married to the Emperor Maximilian I., but she deter-
mined to increase the dominions of France in another
direction at the expense of that potentate. The Emperor's
wife, Marie de Bourgogne, died of a fall from her
horse at the age of twenty-five in 1482, and left two
children, the Archduke Philippe, born 1478, and the
Archduchess Marguerite, born in 1480. When Mar-
guerite was but three years old she had been brought
to Paris as the betrothed of Charles VIII., then Dauphin,
who was nine years the little girl's senior. A regular
form of marriage was gone through, with the result that
the Emperor's daughter, two months later, had become
Queen of France.
This little baby-Queen was brought up and carefully
educated by the Regent, Anne de Beaujeu ; but, after
nine years at the French Court her protectress and
governess played her false, and allowed her to become
the victim of the base desertion of her husband,
Charles VIII., now twenty-one years of age. The then
ruling Duchess Anne of Brittany, although but a child only
about four years older than the young Queen of France,
became affianced to the widowed Emperor Maximilian.
The celebration of marriage was gone through by proxy,
the Emperor's envoy scandalising the good people of
Brittany by placing his bare leg in bed with Anne so
as to symbolise actual consummation of the nuptials.
The daughter of Louis XI. did not, however, propose
to allow the Duchy of Brittany to be annexed to the
Flemish States and Holland, which Maximilian had
inherited from Burgundy with his first wife. She sent
her brother Charles VIII. to invade Brittany, and,
although Charles was already married to Maximilian's
young daughter, instructed him to the effect that he
4 Introduction
should now marry, instead, the Emperor's newly wedded
wife.
After a certain amount of warfare had taken place
in Brittany, the Duchesse Anne, now aged fifteen, was
induced to consent of her own free will to this bigamous
marriage with the King of France, whose marriage with
the daughter of Maximilian had never been consummated.
The nuptials between Charles VIII. and Anne de
Bretagne accordingly took place, and the marriage was
consummated, the Duchy of Brittany being joined to
France. The wilful young Anne, however, had made
one stipulation in her marriage contract to which she
ever after jealously adhered. This was to the effect that
she should alone, during her lifetime, enjoy the administra-
tion of her own dominions of Brittany.
There were now two Queens in France, one of twelve
and one of nearly sixteen years of age ; but the Pope
having been induced to nullify the first marriage of Anne
of Brittany and the first marriage of Charles VIII., the
youthful Marguerite, daughter of Maximilian I., was
deprived of her Royal title and reverted to her original
rank as Archduchess of Austria. She was, nevertheless,
retained for a year or so longer in France, in a state of
semi-imprisonment, before she was allowed to depart for
her paternal home in the Low Countries. She eventually
joined her only brother Philippe, who was two years
her senior, and the Princess Margaret of York, who had
been the third wife of her maternal grandfather, Charles
the Bold, at their Court at Malines. Although she left
France on friendly terms with Anne of Brittany, who
showed great kindness to the girl whom she had sup-
planted, Marguerite of Austria for ever after regarded
with hatred the country of which she had been Queen,
and which was the scene of her bitter humiliation.
As her girlish companion Louise de Savoie, Comtesse
d'Angouleme, was to be in future years Regent of France
in the absences of her son Francois I., while Marguerite
was to become aunt and instructress of the as yet unborn
Emperor Charles V., and likewise Regent of the Nether-
Some Notable Women 5
lands, including Holland, this talented representative of
the Houses of Burgundy and Austria was to have plenty
of opportunities of repaying humiliation for humiliation
to the Court of France.
After his marriage with Anne of Brittany, Charles VIII.,
who had claims to the Kingdom of Naples and Sicily as
the successor of the house of Anjou, commenced the
series of Italian wars which were continued by his
successors Louis XII. and Francois I. for half a century.
From the time that the Norman adventurers, wresting
the lower parts of Italy and Sicily from the Saracens, had
established a Neapolitan Kingdom, and obtained Papal
recognition for their tenure, the Popes had continuously
claimed to be the Suzerains of Naples, and maintained
that, whoever held that country, did so as a vassal of the
Holy See.
After the Normans various Sovereigns of the House
of Suabia, including the brilliant Emperor Frederick II.,
ruled Naples ; the jealous Popes, however, offered the
Crown of Naples to England and to Anjou in turn.
Henry III. of England accepted the throne- for his son
Edmund of Lancaster, who never went to wrest its
occupancy. Charles of Anjou, brother of Louis IX. of
France, came, however, to Naples in person, and in
1267 took prisoner and beheaded the youthful Conradin,
the last male of the Suabian dynasty. A female of the
line of Suabia had, however, married into the House of
Aragon, Sovereigns of which country claimed Naples and
Sicily in consequence. The free-and-easy ways of the
Frenchmen with the black-eyed beauties of Sicily brought
about the downfall of the first Angevin dynasty in that
island by the massacre known as the " Sicilian Vespers,"
in 1282, after which Aragonese Sovereigns ruled in
Sicily. On the mainland various branches of the Angevin
dynasty ruled, and when there were rival Popes existing at
Avignon and Rome each Pope supported a rival branch
of the family. Finally Alfonso, King of Aragon, sup-
porting one of these branches, Queen Giovanna II. first
declared Alfonso and then Rene, Comte of Provence
6 Introduction
and Anjou, as her heir. Rene, who called himself King
of Naples, but never reigned, transmitted his claims,
through his nephew Charles of Maine, to Louis XI.,
and although Pope Pius II. granted the throne to
John II. of Aragon and his illegitimate son Ferdinand,
or Ferrante, Charles VIII. of France asserted his right
to the Kingdom on the death of his father, Louis XL
In the year 1494, aided by Ludovico Sforza, the
usurping Duke of Milan, who hated King Ferdinand of
Naples, Charles VIII. conducted in person the first Italian
invasion at the head of 60,000 men, French and Swiss.
He traversed Tuscany with ease, took and sacked the
place of Fivizzano, belonging to Florence and ruled by
the unpopular Piero de' Medici, and, obedient to the call
of Savonarola, he entered Florence, and afterwards Rome,
in which places he was received as a friend. The in-
famous Spaniard, Roderigo Borgia, was then on the Papal
throne as Alexander VI., and, as Suzerain, had just
conferred the investiture of the Kingdom of Naples on
Alfonso II. of Aragon, in the place of his father,
Ferdinand I. For fear of the young French King, the
Pope Borgia shut himself up in the castle of Sant' Angelo,
but, after a month's negotiations, he promised not to
oppose Charles VIII.
Charles then advanced on Naples, when Alfonso II.
abdicated and fled, his son assuming possession of the
throne under the title of Ferdinand II., but taking flight,
like his father, as Charles drew nearer with his army.
After an enthusiastic reception by the people of Naples,
who were sick of the Aragonese oppression, Charles VIII.
was crowned King of the Two Sicilies at Naples on
February 22nd, 1495, and, with exception of two castles
which he reduced with his artillery, all the cities and all
the provinces acknowledged his rights and submitted
without opposition. The defenders of the two castles
were mercilessly butchered. Naples had been occupied
with ease, and, had it not been for the folly of the French
in treating a friendly people as a conquered foe, it could
easily have been retained. The vice of Charles VIII.
Some Notable Women 7
and his troops, however, knew no bounds. No woman's
virtue was respected ; unrestrained licentiousness was the
password of the army. The greed of the invaders was,
moreover, unparalleled ; there was no limit to their
exactions. The result was that the Emperor Maximilian
joined a league of all the Italian States, including the
Duchy of Milan and Republic of Venice. A large army
under Gonzaga, Marquis of Mantua, was found by the
French posted in their rear, and it was only after a furious
battle at Fornovo, on the banks of the Taro, on July 6th,
1495, m which Charles VIII. displayed great personal
courage, that he contrived to make good his retreat
through the Milanese and back into France.
This feather-brained young monarch had left behind
him in Italy a large part of his army, under Gilbert
de Montpensier and the Grand Connetable d'Aubigny.
The league, however, being reinforced by Spaniards,
sent from Spain by Ferdinand the Catholic, of Aragon,
under the famous Gonsalvo da Cordova, and by the
Venetian fleets, proved too much for the French com-
manders, who, however, struggled on bravely for awhile
and gained some successes at first. Eventually the
Comte Gilbert de Montpensier fell, and d'Aubigny was
obliged to evacuate the kingdom of Naples with such
troops as he had left to him. The Aragonese dynasty
was then re-established in the Two Sicilies ; and thus,
within four years of her ignominious dismissal from the
French Court, had the youthful Archduchess Marguerite
and her father, the Emperor, already the satisfaction of
witnessing the humiliation of those by whom they had
been so shabbily treated. And since, moreover, from
her earliest years the counsels of Marguerite were ever
listened to by her rough-and-ready soldier of a father,
who loved her dearly, it is more than probable that the
advice of this young Princess had not been for nothing
in the formation of the league which had acted so
disastrously for the fortunes of her first husband,
Charles VIII. He, after vaguely talking for a couple
of years of another expedition to recover his Kingdom
8 Introduction
of Naples, came to an almost sudden end on April yth,
1498. While playing at tennis he struck his head
violently against a door, with the result that he died
soon after. Although Anne of Brittany, who was about
twenty-two when her husband died, had borne him
children, there were none living at the time that she
was left a widow.
In default of male heirs, Charles was succeeded, there-
fore, by an old friend of Marguerite, one who throughout
his life always testified to her an excess of affection,
which she, probably merely from motives of policy, in
her letters, at all events, made a semblance of returning.
This was Louis, Due d'Orleans, the third cousin, once
removed, of Charles VIII. He ascended the throne
with the title of Louis XII.
Birth and Childhood of the Rivals
THE best that can be said of Louis XII. is that he
was a good sort of a fellow, and a brave soldier ;
his intentions were good, his talents mediocre, and his
appearance of the bourgeois German type. It is doubtful
if he was really the son of his supposed father, the poet-
Duke, Charles d'Orleans, who, himself seventy years of
age, had been married to Anne of Cleves for twenty-two
years before the youthful Louis arrived to astonish the
household in the year 1462.
The Maitre d'H6tel Rabodanges, whom Anne of
Cleves married at her husband's death, was popularly
supposed to be the actual father of the Due d'Orleans who
became Louis XII. in 1498 at the age of thirty-six.
Be that as it may — and there were many of the Valois
and the Bourbons whose origin would not stand too close
an investigation — Louis ranked as a Valois, and as the
first flower of the nobility of France before, by the lucky
chance of his cousin's childless marriage, he succeeded
him on the throne. He had as wife Jeanne de Valois, the
sister of the late King Charles VIII. ; but, as she was not
Birth and Childhood of the Rivals 9
prepossessing in appearance, Louis proceeded to get rid of
her. He had already, before his accession, a youthful friend
and servitor in the shape of Georges d'Amboise, a Bishop
with ambition. This Bishop, who practically shared the
throne with Louis from the outset, wished to become first
Cardinal, then Pope. That accomplished villain, Caesar
Borgia, son of Pope Alexander VI., was himself Cardinal
of Valencia in Spain. He made a bargain with Amboise
by which, while making him a Cardinal, France in return
was to aid Cassar Borgia in establishing for himself an
independent Monarchy of a large part of Italy. Caesar
came to France, bringing in his pocket the Papal dis-
pensation which enabled the new King to get rid of his
first wife, whereupon Louis XII. promptly married Anne
of Brittany, his predecessor's brilliant young widow.
Thus was Brittany preserved for France, although the
handsome Anne, who had always had a great admiration
for that shiftless, out-of-pocket, sportsman and fighting
man Maximilian, her nominal first husband, proved but
an unwilling bride. She only acceded to Louis' proposals
on the distinct understanding that, where her Duchy was
concerned, she was, as in the time of Charles VIII., to
remain absolutely supreme.
With the aid of Georges d'Amboise, Anne de Bretagne
likewise remained supreme in France — she was very self-
willed.
Caesar Borgia, who now flung away his Cardinal's hat
and caused his father, the Pope, to unfrock him, was re-
warded by being made Due de Valentinois, in France, and
promised all the assistance that he might require in Italy.
He was likewise given a wife from the princely House of
Albret.
Louis XII., who had already taken part in the warlike
expedition of Charles VIII. to Naples, had reasons for
making a new invasion of Italy on his own account, and
was therefore perfectly ready to run in double harness
with such an useful ally as Borgia, the Pope's son. His
grandfather, Louis, Due d'Orleans, the son of Charles V.
pf France, had married Valentina Visconti, daughter of
io Introduction
the reigning Duke Gian Galeazzo of Milan. Through
his grandmother Louis accordingly claimed the sovereignty
of Lombardy, now held by the Sforzas, and, on his
accession to the throne of France, he took likewise the
titles of King of the Two Sicilies and Duke of Milan.
Ludovico Sforza, called The Moor, had helped
Charles VIII. to take Naples and then turned against
him. Louis XII., having already gained the Pope, now
made friends with Venice also to aid him to dispossess
Sforza of Milan, the King and the Venetian Republic
agreeing to divide Lombardy between them.
Before invading Italy it was necessary for Louis XII.
to make sure of the Emperor Maximilian, whose old
rancour against France was by no means forgotten.
Indeed, throughout his life he kept a certain Red Book,
in which, from time to time, he was wont to make entries
of anything calculated to increase his hatred of France,
just for fear lest he might be induced to forget old
grudges. The worthy Max happened, however, to be
engaged in doing a little hunting and a bit of fighting on
his own account in Switzerland, whereupon Louis arranged
matters with his son, the Archduke Philippe, the ruler of
the Netherlands, who had no objection to making a treaty
of peace behind his father's back and against his views.
Having secured the neutrality of the Empire, the
descent into Italy was made by Louis XII. and, with the
aid of Venice, short work was made of Ludovico Sforza.
Only one city resisted the French, and all its inhabitants
were put to the sword. The fickle inhabitants of Milan
abandoned their Duke, and received Louis XII. with
every expression of joy. The country of Lombardy was
divided, according to agreement, with Venice, and all went
well for France in September and October 1499, while
Ludovico fled to Germany to endeavour to raise an army.
Many of the Italian principalities were, however, badly
treated ; among them Ferrara, Bologna, and Florence were
heavily ransomed to pay the expenses of the French army.
Caesar Borgia, moreover, who had taken the ambitious
tide of Caesar Borgia de France, was, with French soldiers
Birth and Childhood of the Rivals n
and Papal Swiss, allowed to ravage all Romagna. His
cruelties caused a thrill of horror throughout Italy, with
the result that a revulsion of feeling was aroused against
his allies the French, and that when Ludovico Sforza
reappeared with eight thousand Swiss he was received
everywhere with acclamation. Unfortunately for this
capable Prince, who had, as the usurper of the dominions
of his weak nephew Galeazzo Sforza, deserved his troubles,
his Swiss troops proved unreliable. They fraternised
with the Swiss mercenaries of Louis XII., and gave the
Duke and his brothers up to the King of France. All
the captured members of the Sforza family, including the
innocent children of Galeazzo, the rightful Duke, were
dragged off into France, and, after being shown on the
road like wild animals, thrust into various damp dungeons,
to die for want of sunshine and air after years of im-
prisonment. Ludovico lived, with unbroken spirit, for
eight years in the prison of Loches, and died at length,
still unsubdued in heart.
By these successes Louis XII. was, in the year 1 500,
left in the position of arbiter of the fate of all Italy, and
the reigning Dukes and Marquises of the various States
hastened to place themselves under his protection.
Among these were Gonzaga, Marquis of Mantua, Alfonso
d' Este, Duke of Ferrara, and Giovanni Bentivoglio, the
Tyrant of Bologna ; while the popular party in Florence,
where the powerful Medici were for the time in exile, also
humbled themselves before the King of France.
Now it was that Louis XII. committed the crowning
error of his reign, and made a mistake whereby France
was for all time to come to lose the advantage of being
the paramount Power in Italy. He allowed himself to be
beguiled into an alliance with the crafty Ferdinand V.
the Catholic, husband of Isabella of Castile. With such
tricky allies already as the bloodstained Borgias Louis
surely might have been content. But no ; he must needs
now enter into an alliance with the subtle King who had
made and broken more treaties than any other Prince in
Christendom,
1 2 Introduction
Already two Royal marriages had taken place which
should have put Louis on his guard, since by each King
Ferdinand or Aragon, himself the old rival of France,
had become closely connected with the Houses of Austria
and Burgundy, which France had so outrageously offended.
In the autumn of 1496 the Infanta Joanna, the second
daughter of Ferdinand and Isabella, had been united to
the Archduke Philippe, surnamed Le Beau, the only son
of Maximilian and ruler of the Netherlands, while in
March 1497 the Archduchess Marguerite, his sister, had
proceeded to Spain to espouse the Infante Juan, Prince of
the Asturias, the heir to the Spanish dominions. Un-
deterred by these events Louis XII., in the year 1500,
entered into a most perfidious secret treaty, which was
the offspring of the brain of Ferdinand of Aragon.
Frederic III. of Aragon, who after Charles VIII. had
been driven out of Naples, had, with the sanction of the
Pope, succeeded to the Crown of that country, was to be
the victim of the unholy alliance. As he did not suspect
the treachery of his cousin, the Catholic King, for the
sake of his own protection against France, he opened his
ports and strong places to the Spanish troops. But in
the meanwhile, by the terms of the treaty between Fer-
dinand and Louis, " to maintain peace, to prevent blas-
phemy, to protect the honour of virgins, to defend the
Church against the Turks, and against the friend of the
Turks, Dom Frederic of Naples," France and Spain
were to invade Naples and divide Frederic's dominions.
The Kingdom of Naples was, in accordance with this
treaty, promptly conquered, and divided between the two
ambitious kings ; but, unfortunately for Louis XII., the
friendship which preceded the conquest did not long
survive the division of the spoils. War broke out between
Ferdinand the Catholic and Louis XII. in 1503, with the
result that the brilliant General Gonsalvo da Cordova
expelled the French from Southern Italy.
It was entirely owing to his own negligence that Louis
lost Naples in this manner, since, when hostilities were
declared between him and Ferdinand, he had at first
Photo by J. Lacoste after the carved wooden statue in the Cathedral, Malaga.
KING FERDINAND OF ARAGON.
Birth and Childhood of the Rivals 13
taken, with exception of one or two towns, the whole of
the Catholic King's share of the partition of Naples.
Then, certain of success, he had returned to France,
whence he carelessly neglected to send to his lieutenants
in Naples the necessary reinforcements. When it was
too late Louis made a violent effort, and assembled three
armies, two of them to make diversions on the side of
the Pyrenees, the third to recover Naples. But Gon-
salvo, while himself safely entrenched on the frontiers of
the Kingdom, allowed this third army to waste itself away
for want of provisions and from sickness before he finally
attacked and overthrew it on December 28th, 1503. And
thus, for the second time within a few years, had the
French taken and been driven from Naples, and a couple
of years later Louis, by treaty, resigned his share of that
kingdom to the Catholic King.
This was when the King's niece, Germaine de Foix,
daughter of his sister, Marie d'Orleans and Jean de Foix,
Vicomte de Narbonne, became the second wife of Fer-
dinand of Aragon. The bridegroom was fifty-four and
the beautiful bride eighteen when she took as her dower
the French rights in Naples to her Spanish husband.
Louis remained, however, the Sovereign of Milan, and
treacherously attempted to despoil his allies, the Venetians,
of their share of Lombardy. At the same time Alex-
ander VI. invested Caesar Borgia with the Duchy of
Romagna, whose lords he had dispossessed with such
cruelty and treachery.
While, for nearly a dozen years, the French troops had
been gaily overrunning Italy, and, with unrestrained
French gallantry, making love to the seductive, dark-
eyed beauties of the peninsula, the birth had taken place
of the two boys who, as the natural sequence of the
above series of events, were to be life-long rivals.
Charles d'Orleans, Comte d'Angouleme, was twenty
years the senior of Louise de Savoie, daughter of Duke
Philippe II., whom he married before she was twelve
years old. Charles was the first cousin of Louis XII.,
and, like him, great-grandson of Charles V. of France.
1 4 Introduction
Louise de Savoie presented him with a daughter at a
very early age — the famous Marguerite d'Angouleme, the
"Pearl of the Valois," who was born in April 1492. A
couple of years later, on September I2th, 1494, Louise
gave birth to a son at the Chateau of Cognac. He was
named Francois, and his father, the Comte d'Angouleme,
dying a couple of years after his birth, the boy was
made Due de Valois by his cousin, Louis XII.
As Anne of Brittany gave birth to only one son, still-
born, and her other two surviving children were girls,
furious jealousy existed between her and Louise de Savoie.
Louis XII., however, made the best of a bad job ; as
his young cousin increased in years he invited him to the
Court, became thoroughly attached to him, and recognised
him as his probable heir.
The future Francois I. grew up a brilliant lad. Hand-
some and strong, well trained in knightly and athletic
exercises, he was likewise, under the influence of his
sister and his mother, from an early age of an artistic
temperament, fond of learning, and devoted to poetry —
being himself, like his sister, no mean poet.
The young Due de Valois, under whose influence the
French Renaissance was later to become an accomplished
fact, was indeed from an early age the most brilliant
figure of the French Court. Hot-headed and daring, he
especially distinguished himself in the chase, no wolf or
wild boar being too savage for him to attack single-handed
with his sword. Full of boyish tricks, the story is told
of him that he once had a huge wild boar let loose in
the courtyard of the castle at Amboise, where he was living
with his mother, and when the furious animal broke
through a doorway and ran upstairs into the apartments,
he himself attacked and killed the great tusked beast as
it charged him on the staircase. Feats such as these,
and the wild snow-balling fights and practical joking in
which he indulged with his gay and warlike comrades,
Bonnivet, Montmorency, and Charles de Montpensier,
later Due de Bourbon, endeared the showy young Prince
to the rough spirits of the age, even if to his mother
Birth and Childhood of the Rivals 15
and sister a wild boar in the salons may have seemed
about as much in place as a bull in a china-shop. At
an early age Louis XII. married his boy-cousin to Claude
de Valois, his elder daughter by Anne de Bretagne, to
which amiable Princess during her short life Francois
neglected no opportunity of being openly and glaringly
unfaithful. For, in spite of his great personal courage, and
supposed chivalrous nature, that Francois was unreliable
and equally devoid of heart and of honour was before long
to be equally apparent to his friends and his enemies.
Five and a half years later than the birth of Francois,
on February 24th, 1500, was born, in the Flemish
city of Ghent, the heir to the great dominions of the
Archdukes of Austria and the now extinct line of
the Dukes of Burgundy. Although deprived of the
Duchy of Burgundy by Louis XL, Marie de Bourgogne,
the first wife of the Emperor Maximilian, had retained
as her dower the old County of Burgundy and all its
possessions — a goodly heritage, which had been reunited
to the Duchy by the marriage of her ancestor, Due
Philippe le Temeraire (the Bold) to Marguerite, daughter
of Comte Louis III. de Male.
The baby Charles, later to be known to the world as
the Emperor Charles V., was the elder son of the Arch-
duke Philippe le Beau, the son of the Habsburg Maxi-
milian, and his mother was the Infanta Joanna of Castile,
second daughter of Ferdinand of Aragon and Isabella of
Castile. Joanna had had an elder brother Juan, who
had been married to Marguerite of Austria, sister of
Philippe, and had living a sister, Catherine of Aragon, the
wife of Henry VIII of England. In the veins of the
new-born infant Charles there ran the blood of all the ruling
families of Europe. He represented, accordingly, in his
little body the monstrous mixture of the French, English,
Dutch, Flemish, Spanish, Portuguese, and other races.
Such were the strange results of the constant inter-
marriages of the Royal and Ducal families, from the time
of the first Duke of Burgundy, Robert I. (1032-1075),
who was himself the son of Robert, King of France.
1 6 Introduction
What was the world to expect from a child of such a
strange, mixed descent ? one who was, moreover, before
long to become the sole heir to the vast possessions of
Spain, who was to lay claim to Southern Italy and Sicily
as the acquired spoils of his maternal grandfather Ferdinand,
and to Northern Italy on the mixed grounds of the old
claims of the Empire, and as the heir to the Emperor
Maximilian, who took Bianca Sforza of Milan as a second
wife ?
The young Archduke Charles, however, was not, like
Francois, an only son, nor the only prospective heir to
these vast domains. His father, the Archduke Philippe,
had five other children — four daughters and a second son,
Ferdinand ; and, moreover, himself aspired to all the
honours which were only to descend to his elder boy.
When Queen Isabella the Catholic died, Philippe pro-
ceeded to Spain, and early in 1503 he succeeded in
having himself recognised as King of Castile in the right
of his wife Joanna, her mother's heiress, although his
father-in-law, Ferdinand of Aragon, strove to retain the
government of that country in his own hands.
Philippe then returned to the Low Countries, where
he continued the rule of Flanders and Holland until, in
January 1506, he proceeded again in Spain, taking Joanna
with him by sea with a powerful fleet. The Royal couple
were duly crowned in Castile, but a month or two later
Philippe died, presumably from poison, at Burgos (Sep-
tember 1506).
The widowed Queen Joanna, who from the date of her
husband's death commenced to show slight signs of insanity
caused by melancholy, remained in Spain with her infant
children, the Archduke Ferdinand and the Archduchess
Catherine of Austria.
The boy Charles, however, had remained to be educated
in Flanders under the care of his Aunt Marguerite, who,
having lost her husband, the Prince of Asturias, and her
only son, born dead, had returned from Spain in 1499,
the year after the death of her first husband, Charles VIII.
The widowed Marguerite had, on returning from Spain,
Birth and Childhood of the Rivals 17
gone to join her father Maximilian at his German Court,
which he was constantly changing from Strasburg or
Augsburg to Spires, and sometimes to Vienna ; but when
she learned, in February 1 500, of the birth of a son and
heir to her brother, she proceeded to his palace at Ghent
in order to be able to attend the christening of the baby,
as his godmother, in March. He was called Charles,
after his great grandfather Charles le Temeraire (the
Bold) of Burgundy, and his father, the Archduke Philippe,
proclaimed the baby as Duke of Luxemburg at the same
time.
Another of the infant's godmothers was the Princess
Margaret of York, the sister of Edward IV. of England,
who had been the last wife of the great Duke Charles the
Bold.
After spending a couple of years at the Imperial Court
and being frequently besought in marriage by Kings and
Princes, Marguerite went to the altar for the third time
in December 1501 with the handsome young reigning
Duke Philibert II. of Savoy. As well as being a very
good woman of affairs, and having a long head for
political combinations to the advancement of her House,
this young widow of twenty was remarkably handsome,
with lovely golden hair. She seems to have fallen deeply
in love with the brother of Louise de Savoie, who was of
her own age, and whom she had already met in France,
in the days when she had been the young Queen of that
country.
Marguerite was, upon her arrival at the Chateau de
Pont d' Ain, in Savoy, not, however, at all pleased to find
that, owing to her husband's indolence, his illegitimate
brother, Rene, the Bastard of Savoy, was practically ruling
the country. Although she had been on friendly terms
with the Bastard, who had, indeed, married her in proxy
for Philibert, and, as a strange token of his allegiance,
gone to bed with her in full armour ! the Duchess of
Savoy soon showed that she intended to administer the
affairs of Savoy herself. She brought about a quarrel
between the brothers, caused her father, the Emperor, to
1 8 Introduction
cancel an act whereby Rene had been declared legitimate,
and made Philibert drive him from the Duchy, on pain
of death if he should return. Having settled matters
thus to her entire satisfaction, Marguerite ruled Savoy
for her husband until he suddenly died of pleurisy at the
age of twenty-four, in the autumn of 1 504.
Her father, the Emperor, now endeavoured to persuade
her to accept the proposals which the widowed Henry VII.
of England repeatedly made to her. But Marguerite, at
the age of twenty-four, declared that she was perfectly
content with having had three husbands, and, although
she was subsequently involved in a love-affair with the
dashing Charles, Viscount Lisle, who became Duke of
Brandon, the reputation of which brought her some
discredit, she stuck to her resolution. She repaired to
the Low Countries, where she established her Court at
Malines, and from the year 1 506, when her brother King
Philippe of Castile died, she occupied herself with ad-
ministering the dominions of her nephew Charles, of
which her father appointed her Regent, and with super-
intending the little boy's education, initiating him, from
his earliest years, into the mysteries of diplomacy and
statecraft.
It was from this year, 1 506, that the grandeur of Charles
commenced, as he was declared the Sovereign Count of
Flanders as soon as ever the news of his father's death
arrived from Spain.
The Borgias, Julius II., and Marguerite
AT about the time when Gonsalvo da Cordova was
giving the French troops of Louis XII. such a
trouncing in Naples, the Borgia Pope Alexander VI.
was, fortunately for Christendom, removed from this
world by being served with a cup of poison which he had
kindly prepared for one of his Cardinals. Caesar Borgia,
who also received a portion of the dose, was likewise
incapacitated from doing any further mischief in Italy.
Photo by Anderson, Rome, after the painting by Raphael at Flore
POPE JULIUS II.
frrt]
The Borgias, Julius IL, and Marguerite 19
By the time that he recovered, and after Pope Pius III.
had reigned for only four weeks, the fiery old Cardinal,
the enemy of the Borgias, Giuliano Delia Rovere, had
been elected Pope, under the name of Julius II. Before
long Caesar was seized and deported to Spain, where,
although himself married to Charlotte d'Albret, he
was eventually killed fighting against Jean d'Albret and
Catherine de Foix, the King and Queen of Navarre.
Of all the Popes who have ever occupied the Papal Chair
none was of such an ambitious and warlike disposition as
the aged Julius. Determined from the first to increase
the temporal possessions of Rome, he claimed all the
cities and territories of Romagna of which the rightful
owners had repossessed themselves on the downfall of the
Borgias. He promptly excommunicated these Sovereign
Seigneurs, declared them illegitimate occupants of their
thrones, and mounted his warhorse against them with
eminent success. Finding himself vigorously resisted by
Bentivoglio, the Tyrant of Bologna, Julius ordered in
his resentment that when the city should fall it should be
burned to the ground and neither man, woman, nor child
be spared.
The terrified inhabitants of Bologna deserted their
chief and yielded up the city at once to the victorious
Pontiff.
At the end of his successful campaign Julius made
a triumphal entry into Rome, marching in to the sound
of the cannons of Sant' Angelo under arches covered with
inscriptions in celebration of his glorious and warlike
exploits. He was not, however, as yet content with his
spoils, and four years later, finding that he had need of
the King of France to aid him in despoiling the
Venetians, Julius II. sought the good offices of Marguerite
of Austria in helping him to form a league of the various
European Powers, to attack and divide the territories of
the Republic. This nefarious scheme was successfully
carried through by the young Princess in December
1508, under the name of the League of Cambray.
Marguerite had already, for upwards of two years before
2Q Introduction
this, possessed all the powers of a ruling Sovereign as
Regent and Governess of the Low Countries.
Some of the States and countries which had descended
to Charles on his father's death were Flemish and some
Dutch ; some were feudally subject to the Empire and
others, descended from Burgundy, were held as fiefs under
the French Crown. The child Charles was therefore not
only the vassal of his grandfather Maximilian, but also of
Louis XII., and later of his rival Francois I.
Various languages were spoken throughout this divided
agglomeration of States and countries, but French was
the language which Charles was brought up to speak, as
it was likewise that of his aunt ; although her father the
Emperor, as ruling Archduke of Austria, habitually used
the German tongue, he wrote to his daughter in French.
The Dutch and Flemish provinces were in those days
closely akin to one another, and their respective dialects
very similar, but the Counties of Artois and Franche-
Comte, which have long since formed a part of France,
used only French. So also did Western Flanders,
Luxembourg, and likewise Hainault. These various
countries had hastened to offer the Regency to the
Emperor as soon as the King-Archduke Philippe died,
and Maximilian, while accepting it, had, on the grounds
that the Empire required the whole of his time, invested
his daughter Marguerite, in whom he had such absolute
confidence, in his place, and at the same time appointed
her Governess to his grandchildren. She established
herself with her Court and some wisely chosen Ministers
in the Palace at Malines, although she likewise retained
her own Savoyard Castle at Pont d' Ain, to which place
she occasionally proceeded when she wished to superintend
the work of the building of the magnificent cathedral
which she erected to the memory of her husband Philibert
at Brou, near Bourg-en-Bresse, which belonged to Savoy,
and wherein her own bones now lie buried. The
Duchy which she had ruled for a time continued to
pay her a very handsome revenue, and when her young
brother-in-law Charles III. succeeded to the Ducal Crown
The Borgias, Julius II., and Marguerite 21
of Savoy he was obliged to leave Bourg-en-Bresse in
her hands as part payment of her dowry. As she did
not find that Charles handed over the balance due with
sufficient regularity, she repaired to her father's Court at
Strasburg to complain of him, when the Emperor com-
pelled the Duke of Savoy to hand over several more
Counties of his dominions to this exigeante sister-in-law,
who had no intention of being done out of her rights.
As Marguerite was likewise still in receipt of a very
large dowry as widow of the Infante of Spain, she was
the most wealthy Princess in Europe. Possessing also
great personal charms and talents of a very high order, it
is no wonder if all the unattached Princes of Europe
were constantly pressing her to consider entering the
married estate for the fourth time.
In spite of her wealth, that she was by no means
selfish was proved, over and over again during her career,
by the way in which she put everything that she possessed
at the disposal of her nephew Charles. For she was
always ready to make every sacrifice for the aggrandise-
ment of the head of the House of Austria, a House
which may be said to have commenced its real grandeur
and power entirely owing to her devotion and good
management.
A good deal has been written of the talent of
Marguerite as a poetess, and, as her attainments were
varied, of her skill in sewing. She certainly wrote
passably good verses, and also delighted the Emperor by
helping to make his shirts for him with her own hands,
but it is upon her ability as a diplomat, and not as a poet
or a cunning sempstress, that her real fame rests to the
present day. She was the founder of diplomacy in
Europe, and all her diplomatic efforts were devoted to
the advancement of Austria and the humiliation of
France.
The results of this diplomacy were very nearly fatal
to Francois d'Angouleme at a very early age. We have
already mentioned that when Marguerite left France she
remained on good terms with her supplanter, Anne of
22 Introduction
Brittany, while Anne on her side, after she had in turn
married Louis XII., remained furiously jealous of Louise
de Savoie, the mother of the boy Francois. Anne had,
while twice married to France, yet remained a foreigner
at heart, and she continued far more attached to the
romantic Emperor Maximilian, whom she had only
married by proxy, than to the second French King of
whom she had become the unwilling bride. Having
failed herself to become the second wife of Max, she
lent willing ear to the suggestions of Marguerite that
she should induce Louis XII. to disinherit Fra^ois,
cause her elder daughter Claude to be declared the heiress
of France and Brittany, and marry her to the Emperor's
grandson, the infant Charles, thus handing over the
possessions of France to the probable future ruler of
nearly all the rest of Europe. Had this proposed marriage
been carried out, it would truly have been a monstrous
Empire over which Charles would in due course have
become supreme. And yet by the wiles of the two
women this union, which would have annihilated the
separate existence of France and made of her but an extra
appanage of the Habsburg, almost became un fait accompli.
When Louis XII. was very ill Anne obtained from
him the necessary powers for arranging the marriage of
her daughter, and agreed, by a stroke of the pen, to give
back all the old possessions of Burgundy. Blois, Arras,
and Auxerre were to be surrendered ; Venice was at the
same time to be wiped off the map, its vast possessions
to be divided between France, the Emperor, and the Pope.
When Louis XII. again fell ill, the better to carry out
this iniquitous arrangement, Anne endeavoured to carry
her daughter off, to be brought up in safety in Brittany,
and at the same time to have the person of the young
Francois seized. The Queen was only thwarted in this
design in 1505 by the seizure by the Marechal de Gie,
the Governor of the male heir to the throne, of the
passages of the Loire, and by his showing boldly his
design to arrest the Queen herself if she attempted to
carry out her intention. This Marshal was himself a
The Borgias, Julius IL, and Marguerite 23
Breton, Pierre, Vicomte de Rohan, and Anne contrived
to have him imprisoned for five years. The King upon
his recovery thought better of the matter, and contrived
by assembling the Estates of the Kingdom, to cause himself
to be requested to cancel the treaty by which he had
agreed to hand over his daughter and his country to the
House of Austria.
The treaty of Cambray of 1 508 was arranged between
Marguerite and Cardinal d'Amboise (who, like his mistress
Anne, was anxious to keep in with Rome), on behalf of
France. All the countries of Europe, big and little, in-
cluding England, whose ambassador was present, Hungary,
Spain, Savoy, Ferrara, and Mantua, were convoked by
Marguerite to the conference, in which she represented the
Empire. At this it was agreed that it would be an eminently
pious work to help that good Pope Julius II. to recover
a few of the towns now possessed by Venice on the main-
land of Italy ! An equally pious work, for all those who
helped the good Pope, to help themselves to the other
possessions of the maritime Republic !
Marguerite declared that " the war was sacred, as the
Venetians were the thieves of the Church." All agreed,
but Marguerite, who acted for the Pope, clearly foresaw
that, when the fiery Pontiff should have been satisfied
with the few cities he claimed, it would be an easy matter
to arrange that the other despoilers of Venice — the Pope,
Spain, and the Empire — should turn round and despoil
the despoiler, Louis XII., and endeavour to kick him
neck and crop out of Italy.
That was the way that matters worked out in the end,
but in the meantime Venice made a very good fight of
it against all the combined Powers of Europe. France,
under Louis XII. in person, gained the greatest successes,
before the other allies were ready to begin, and the
French troops were guilty of the most horrible cruelties
whenever a garrison surrendered — the commanders were
hanged, the defenders butchered in cold blood.
The Venice which the Leaguers of Cambray attacked
in such an unprovoked manner was the last rampart of
24 Introduction
Europe against the aggression of the Turk. It had
during the preceding century become more and more
powerful in the Mediterranean, where it owned the
Ionian Islands and had taken Cyprus from its King in
1489. As the Ottoman power increased, the Republic
found its eastern expansion becoming restricted and had
therefore gradually extended its dominion over a great
portion of the mainland of Italy. At the commencement
of the sixteenth century Venice flourished in wealth and
power, in art and science, and its people were the most
educated in Christendom. It still traded with India by
way of the Isthmus of Suez, but the discovery of the
maritime route to India round the Cape of Good Hope
by the Portuguese Vasco da Gama in 1498 was already
commencing to threaten its trade with the Orient. The
Republic was, however, still prosperous and well governed,
the spirit of its rule was liberal in all matters where the
freedom of thought was concerned, it gave shelter to the
great thinkers — such as Erasmus, the Voltaire of the
sixteenth century — and it shared with Bale the honour of
encouraging the art of printing and the dissemination of
literature.
This was the country, the ally which, in the interests
of Europe if for no other reason, France should have
supported, but which, stirred up by the wiles of Marguerite
and the Pope, she on the other hand so ruthlessly
attacked.
At the battle of Agnadello the brave bastard of the
Orsini family, Bartolomeo Alviano, who had just driven
back the Germans of the Empire, was defeated by the
French. He had refused to comply with the prudent
orders of the aged Pitigliano, another Orsini, who had
retreated with the main body of the Venetians, and while
his gallant force was crushed he was himself taken
prisoner, covered with wounds. One of the most
horrible incidents of the war took place at Vicenza, where
six thousand persons, including very many ladies of high
degree, who with justice feared outrage, had taken
refuge in an enormous cave. All, with the exception of
The Borgias, Julius IL, and Marguerite 25
one boy, were suffocated by means of fires kindled in
the entrance to the cavern. Many new-born babes were
found among the dead. The celebrated Pierre de Terrail,
better known as the Chevalier Bayard, sans peur et sans
reproche, coming upon the scene too late to prevent
the horror, hanged some of its perpetrators on the spot.
It has never been rightly known whether it was by the
orders of the officers of Louis XII. or by those of the
Prince of Anhalt, a General commanding some troops
of the Empire, that this atrocity was committed.
In order to save her subject cities from further cruelties
of this description, and the horrors of being sacked,
Venice now absolved all her towns on the peninsula from
their allegiance ; they were given free permission by their
Government to surrender to the Emperor. It is a
proof, however, of the esteem in which the rule of the
Republic was held that none but the nobles declared for
Maximilian, while these subject cities hoisted the banner
of Saint Mark and fought against the allies with fury in
its defence — and many paid the penalty.
The warlike Emperor of Germany in person com-
manded a mixed force of a hundred thousand fighting men.
He had under him Germans, French, and Spaniards,
and the Italians of the lately victorious papal army of
Julius II. Yet when with this mighty force Maximilian
laid siege to Padua, such was the determination and fury
of the besieged that the city could not be captured. The
various units of the immense body of men before the
walls of Padua eventually quarrelled with one another
and the siege was raised. In the end, the result of the
League of Cambray was that Ferdinand of Aragon re-
took his towns which Venice held on the Neapolitan
coasts. Julius II. and Louis XII. took also shares of the
spoils which they had marked out for themselves. Only
the heroic Emperor was not quite so successful. Treviso
and Padua, which he claimed, were both lost to him. As
usual with this debonair and improvident Monarch, his
want of money prevented him from keeping a sufficient
number of men in the field.
26 Introduction
The alliance of Cambray now came to an end, while
the policy of Marguerite, of her father-in-law Ferdinand
of Aragon, and of the fiery Julius II. brought about a new
combination, frankly directed against their recent ally
Louis XII., whom it was decided should be turned out
of Italy. This was called The Holy League, and the
Pope, whose anger against Venice was appeased with the
capture of the cities he had claimed, found no difficulty
in persuading the Republic to join in the league for the
humiliation of France in Milan. Then, mounting his
warhorse once more, the warrior-Pope proceeded to in-
vade the dominions of the Duke of Ferrara, the close ally
of the French King.
Gaston de Foix and the Battle of Ravenna
WHILE the world viewed with astonishment the spectacle
of a seventy-year-old Pope conducting a campaign in the
midst of the snows of a bitter winter, storming the
city of Mirandola and himself entering by the breach,
Louis XII. prepared to defend himself as best he could
against the Holy League, of which Marguerite, in the
interests of her nephew Charles, had persuaded her late
Spanish husband's brother-in-law, Henry VIII., to become
an active member.
The clever young Governess of the Low Countries
was not at first able to detach her father from the
alliance with Louis XII., as Max was continuing assidu-
ously to borrow money from him. That treachery was,
nevertheless, to come. While, however, she had enrolled
her father-in-law, Ferdinand of Aragon, so recently
married to the King's lovely niece, Germaine de Foix,
in the Holy League, Louis was engaging Germaine's
brother, Gaston de Foix, to fight at the head of his
armies against the forces of Spain.
There was no more brilliant family in France than
that of the but recently Sovereign Counts of Foix in the
Pyrenees, which was also, in the person of Germaine's
Gaston de Foix and the Battle of Ravenna 27
cousin, Catherine de Foix, the ruling family of the
Kingdom of Navarre, lying both in Spain and in France.
By Catherine's marriage to Jean d'Albret, the French
independent Principalities of Albret and Beam were
also incorporated with Navarre. The mother of Anne
of Brittany was Marguerite de Foix.
Gaston de Foix, a brilliant young Prince twenty-two
years of age, had every reason for being ambitious and
for doing all that lay within his power to gratify his
maternal uncle the King of France. For his father,
Jean de Foix, Vicomte de Narbonne, had previously
sought the aid of his brother-in-law, Louis XII., in
dispossessing in his favour his niece Catherine from the
throne of Navarre. Louis had already invested young
Gaston with the Duchy of Nemours in France, and the
youth hoped, should he but be successful in Italy, that
the King would allow him to make use of the arms of
France to decide the quarrel for a Kingdom with his
cousin Catherine. Family ties went for but little with
the Princely Gascon families of Foix and Albret, alike
remarkable for the energy of their character and the
violence of their crimes. Whether by war or by intrigue,
they destroyed themselves or destroyed each other with
the utmost impartiality. Their bravery in battle was
renowned, while, as an example of their bloodthirstiness,
one of the recent Comtes de Foix had slain his own son.
Born in the mountains of the Pyrenees, they passed
their time hunting the wolf, bear, and chamois, and
Gaston, brought up to climb the slippery rocks merely
sandal-shod or barefooted, could vie in agility with the
Basque peasants or the hunters of Beam.
Owing to an unfortunate misunderstanding between
Louis XII. and the Swiss Cantons, while the Alpine
mountaineers upon whom France had been accustomed
to rely for her infantry now engaged themselves willingly
for his enemies, they refused any longer to enroll them-
selves under the banner of France. Thereupon, while
the Marechal de la Palice was reorganising the army for
Italy, he was obliged, in addition to the usual supply
28 Introduction
of the mounted men-at-arms, to obtain for the first
time French foot-soldiers also. He procured eight
thousand Picards from the north, while from the south
Gaston de Foix brought a hardy band of five thousand
Gascons. There were five thousand German mercenaries,
infantry termed by the French lansquenets, from the
German landsknecht, and commanded by an ancient
warrior named Jacob von Empser ; six thousand French
cavalry, sixteen hundred of whom were nobles under the
brave Dumolard, the great friend of the celebrated Bayard,
and also some Italians who had enlisted among the
footmen of France. Gaston de Foix, who was Com-
mander-in-Chief, at once surprised the assembled enemies
by the wonderful celerity with which he moved this force.
In spite of blizzards of snow, causing his infantry to
travel as fast as his mounted men-at-arms, this gallant
young soldier passed by the Spanish army before its
commanders had any idea that he was within miles of
them, and threw himself into the beleaguered city of
Bologna, which he re- victualled. Leaving reinforcements
here, he dashed off again and surprised Brescia, which
had gone over from France to Venice. Brescia was
stormed, Gaston himself pulling off his shoes and
mounting the slippery slope of the breach barefooted,
like the greater part of his infantry.
The carnage at Brescia was horrible — fifteen thousand
people had their throats cut. Bayard, who was wounded,
had great difficulty in saving the lives of a lady and her
two daughters into whose house he had been carried.
The soldiers of Gaston's army took so much booty
at the sack of Brescia that many of them refused to
fight longer, and recrossed the Alps into France with
their riches. Thus was Gaston de Foix's army greatly
weakened, but urgent letters arrived at this moment from
the King of France informing his nephew that an instant
and successful battle was necessary, or all would be lost.
Louis had just been surprised with the news that the
young Henry VIII., with whom he imagined himself
on terms of amity, was preparing warlike expeditions to
Gaston de Foix and the Battle of Ravenna 29
descend into France in conjunction with Ferdinand in
the south, and in the north with troops to be sent from
Flanders by his supposed old friend Marguerite.
No doubt but that Anne of Brittany informed her
husband that he had only himself to blame for this
projected invasion — that it was caused by Marguerite's
pique at the rupture of the proposed marriage of their
daughter Claude to Charles, whereby France was lost
to the Empire. Beginning to see through Marguerite's
handiwork, Louis now trembled lest he should lose also
his one remaining ally, Marguerite's father, Maximilian,
who had but recently made a fresh loan while saying
nothing about breaking off his friendship.
Anxious to win the desired battle without delay, the
brilliant Gaston de Foix now hurried forward to the
city of Ravenna, the capital of Romagna, which was
held for the Pope by Prospero Colonna with a Roman
army. Gaston had with him some useful reinforcements
under Alfonso d' Este, Duke of Ferrara, especially some
of the excellent artillery upon which that Prince prided
himself. At about three miles from Ravenna Gaston
found posted a large Papal army composed of Spanish
troops under the famous Pedro Navarro and Raymond
de Cardona, who was Ferdinand's Viceroy of Naples,
while Fabrizio Colonna, a sturdy cavalry commander, was
in command of a large mounted force of Italians.
Gaston, undismayed by the presence of this redoubtable
force, attempted to carry Ravenna by storm under their
very eyes. Without waiting to make a proper breach,
five or six furious assaults were made on the walls,
which were successively repulsed by the determination
of the force of Prospero Colonna within the city.
While Gaston was forced to retire, and rest his weary
troops before attacking in turn the Papal army close at
hand, strongly entrenched behind the rushing river Ronco,
he was threatened with a calamity which was likely to
prove his ruin and that of France. Maximilian had
turned against Louis XII. at last, and had sent a letter
to Jacob von Empser, the commander of the five thousand
3° Introduction
German lansquenets, ordering him and all his captains
to desert the^French camp at once upon the peril of their
lives.
The loss of these five thousand trained and veteran
spearmen, at such a critical moment, could only have
meant the destruction of Gaston's army. It was the
roth of April, 1512, and, to regain the Alps, he would be
compelled to retire through a country now all up in arms
against him, and have to cross a number of rivers swollen
by the spring rains and melting snows.
The worthy Jacob, however, was a true-hearted soldier,
and one not at all inclined to desert his old comrades
in arms at the moment of their greatest danger. He
was devoted to the Chevalier de Bayard, although, with
the exception of the words f£ Bonjour, Monseigneur,"
he was unable to converse with him save through an
interpreter. Taking his interpreter, the gallant German
secretly repaired to Bayard. He told him what had
happened ; said that for long he and his men had received
the pay of the King of France, and that he would not con-
sider himself worthy of his salt should he now obey the
Emperor. But what was he to do ? other letters would
surely follow at once, and his captains would learn what
none as yet knew but himself.
Bayard thanked his brother soldier for his chivalry,
and begged him to put the letter of Maximilian in his
pocket and keep it there until after the battle. To this
Jacob agreed, but Gaston de Foix realised that he must
attack the army of the allies early on the morrow without
fail, although to do so he must place himself between the
forces of the Colonna in Ravenna and of the united
Spaniards and Italians in their palisaded entrenchments
across the swiftly flowing Ronco.
On the morning of April nth, while the German
lansquenets crossed by a bridge, Dumolard and his men
forded the stream, which was up to their armpits. Gaston
had attired himself magnificently for the battle. Over
his armour, richly inlaid with gold, he had thrown a
splendid mantle bearing the escutcheon of Navarre—
Gaston de Foix and the Battle of Ravenna 31
Gules, portcullis chains Or — and had, he said, for the
honour of his lady-love, bared his right arm to the elbow,
in order that he might dye it crimson with the blood of
his foes. He kept his vows nobly during the ensuing
conflict, which was of the bloodiest description.
The artillery on both sides wrought terrible carnage.
The newly raised French infantry suffered unnecessarily
owing to the mistaken bravery of their commanders in
ordering them to remain standing, for honour's sake.
Most of the leaders were shot down. The Spanish
infantry, already ensconced behind strong palisades, lay
down to escape the murderous fire of the Duke of
Ferrara's artillery. The Italian horsemen of the allies
could not, however, escape in this manner, and underwent
terrible losses. One cannon-ball is said to have killed
thirty-three cavaliers.
The lansquenets under Jacob vied in courage with the
French infantry, who made a furious attempt to take
the Spanish guns. In this they were foiled, owing to
the fact that the foreseeing Pedro Navarro had protected
them with a kind of movable screen, beyond which the
foot-soldiers could not advance. They fell back in dis-
order while being charged by the Spanish infantry ; but
the German lansquenets, coming to their assistance, drove
the Spaniards back again with heavy loss. At this
period the gallant Dumolard thought it time to publicly
drink the health of the brave Jacob von Empser. Wine
was brought on the battle-field, they sat down and drank
it. Presently, as they were pledging each other, glass in
hand, a cannon-ball came along and killed them both !
There now ensued a splendid charge of Colonna and
his exasperated cavalry upon the French guns. It was
met by a magnificent counter-charge, headed by the
veteran Yves d'Allegre, who had lost two sons in the
battle. Yves was killed, but his adversary, Fabrizio
Colonna, was wounded and captured after a tremendous
resistance. His followers were cut to pieces ; the horses
of the French men-at-arms being heavier than those of
the Italians, the latter could not stand the shock.
3 2 Introduction
By this time the lances of the Germans were to be seen
hurling themselves against the Spanish infantry once
more. But these, armed with a long pointed sword and
a dagger, stood close together in a cuirassed phalanx
behind their entrenchments, and fearlessly faced the spears
of the Germans. Moreover, although the lansquenets
were protected from the sword-points by the armour they
wore on their bodies, the active Spaniards threw them-
selves on the ground between the long lances and struck
upwards with their poignards, inflicting terrible wounds.
The French Gendarmerie, with Gaston himself at their
head, now hurled itself on the flanks and rear of this
Spanish infantry. As the heavy horsemen fell upon them
with a terrible shock, the Spaniards went down like
ninepins before their onslaught. The Viceroy Cardona
had already withdrawn, and this charge settled the battle ;
the greater number of the Spaniards were slain, the re-
mainder retired in as good order as they could.
The amenities of war were never more apparent than
when Bayard was, with a few gens (farmcs, about to
charge one of these retiring bands, retreating in good
order.
" Be content with your victory, Senor ! " they cried
out. " You have not enough men to charge us, and if
God has allowed us to escape from the battle you had
better likewise leave us alone." The Chevalier sans
peur et sans reproche saw the force of this advice,
especially as his horse was about done up. He ac-
cordingly left the retreating Spaniards alone ; indeed, they
courteously opened their ranks and allowed Bayard to
pass through.
Gaston had likewise been returning from the pursuit,
all covered with blood and brains, when he had met the
same body of men and before they had come face to face
with the Chevalier Bayard.
" What is that band ? " he demanded of a Gascon
soldier.
" Some Spaniards who have beaten us," replied the
Gascon.
Gaston de Foix and the Battle of Ravenna 33
Enraged at this reply, Gaston de Foix, at the head of
but a few knights, charged the Spaniards. He was fired
upon, and fell wounded into the water by the side of the
causeway along which he had charged.
It was in vain that Gaston's cousin Lautrec, hoping
to have him held for ransom, cried out to the Spaniards
that he was the brother of their Queen. They slew the
gallant young General, who fought furiously with his
sword to the last, with a hundred wounds. The vic-
tory of France was none the less complete, and among
the prisoners made was the young Cardinal Giovanni
de' Medici, the Papal Legate, who was shortly himself
to succeed to the Papacy, as Leo X.
After the brilliant victory of Ravenna the Pope, in a
state of alarm, took refuge in the Castle of Sant' Angelo.
He daily expected to see the French army appear at the
gates of Rome. He had no cause for alarm, however,
as, it is supposed, acting on secret orders from Anne of
Brittany, who was devoted to the Papacy, the treasurer
of Louis XII. in Milan disbanded the greater part of
the French army in Lombardy.
After this act of folly Italy was soon lost to France.
The Emperor gave free passage to fresh armies of Swiss,
who soon re-established a Sforza, the vassal of the Empire,
in Milan.
While the family of Medici was restored to the rule
of Florence, the French, under La Tremouille, were
utterly defeated at Novara. A little later Henry VIII.
made a descent into the north of France, and, aided by
troops sent by Marguerite from Flanders, overran the
country and defeated the French at the Battle of Guine-
gate, known derisively as the " Battle of the Spurs," from
the speed with which the French ran away. Louis XII.
now hastened to make a truce for a year with the Catholic
King. He made peace with Henry VIII., to whom he
ceded Tournay and promised a subsidy of 100,000 livres
yearly, and at the same time he promised his younger
daughter Ren6e to Maximilian's younger grandson, the
Archduke Ferdinand, in marriage.
3
34 Introduction
Peace was signed in August 1514, and as the warlike
Pope Julius II. had already died, while vowing vengeance
on France and Ferrara, there seemed a real prospect of
peace and quiet for a time in Italy.
Almost the last act of Louis XII., who had become
a widower, was to marry Mary Tudor, the sixteen-year-
old sister of Henry VIII. This lively young Princess
led the elderly King of France such a life of dissipation,
compelling him to pass his nights in balls and feasting,
that he died in three months. Almost before her husband
was cold in his coffin, and without leaving France, Mary
married Charles Brandon, Duke of Suffolk, while
Fran£ois I. ascended the throne of France.
ANDREW HAGGARD.
END OF INTRODUCTION
TWO GREAT RIVALS
FRANCOIS I. AND CHARLES V.
CHAPTER I
The Amours of Francois and Franqoise
FRANCOIS I., who ascended the throne of France on
January I, 1515, in the full vigour of youth at
twenty years of age, was a king who divided his time
between three occupations — making love, the chase,
and making war. We have named his pursuits in the
order of their importance. He never ceased from being
a victim to the attraction of the sex, and lost no oppor-
tunity of making a victim of any woman upon whom
he had set his desires — therefore love came first and
last in the career of this monarch. The chase he rarely
neglected, even to his last moments, for more important
occupations, while in war he distinguished himself at
the outset of his career only, but then greatly.
No sooner had he stepped into the shoes of his
cousin, Louis XII., than he sought to provide himself with
the finest horses, the best of arms, and, for mistress,
the most attractive and handsome young lady to be pro-
cured in France.
The first two were easy for a king to obtain, but not
so the third, even when, by diligent inquiry, he had
learned where the lady was to be found.
35
3 6 Two Great Rivals
Having plenty of young and very noble companions
quite as vicious as himself, some of these did not fail
to inform the young King that, according to rumour, the
handsomest young lady in France was one belonging to
the quasi-Royal family de Foix. She happened to be
married — had, in fact, been married from the age of
twelve — and although, as a rule, marriage proved no
obstacle in these matters, upon this occasion it caused all
the difficulty. Franchise de Foix, daughter of the famous
Phebus de Foix, Vicomte de Lautrec, was twenty years
old and the wife of Jean de Laval, Comte de Chateau-
briand, who was the most jealous husband in France.
He kept his beautiful young wife carefully concealed in
his ancient castle on the Chere, which had been built by
his ancestor Briant L, Comte de Penthievre, as long ago
as in the eleventh century.
In the meantime the modern Comte de Chateaubriand
amused himself elsewhere, as every French nobleman
of his time was expected to do.
When the handsome young Francois took the first
opportunity of inquiring of the Sieur de Laval why he
did not bring his wife, whose beauty had been spoken
of, to the Court, he replied :
" Sire, she is too stupid. That woman has no more
brains than a snipe ; she could never amuse or interest
anybody of intelligence at the Court. A mere piece of
marble statuary, Sire — nothing more ; she is not worth
while talking about."
" None the less, we should like to see her, Comte ;
moveover, it might brighten her wits to bring her up
from the dull neighbourhood of Nantes. When will you
send for her ? "
" Ah, she loves the country, Sire, and could never
endure the town — she would pine away. I could not
think of it, for, stupid as she is, I do not want to injure
the poor creature's health."
Leaving the Court, the Comte de Chateaubriand
posted off to his castle, and gave to the fair Franchise
the strictest instructions that, except upon receipt of a
The Amours of Francois and Franchise 37
certain secret sign, agreed upon between them, she
was never to leave the feudal chateau, which was
originally named Chateau-Briant in the year 1015.
Unfortunately for the Comte's happiness, a certain
official of the household having been offended by his
Seigneur, was not above selling the secret sign, which
he had probably learned from some waiting-women of
the Comtesse, to a noble of the Court. Some gay
young nobles soon arrived in the Comte's absence, and,
giving the secret sign, to which Franchise de Foix
replied with alacrity, carried the young lady off to the
Court of Francois I. There she met with a most
flattering welcome from all, with the exception of her
husband. Francois I. lost no time in impressing upon
the beautiful girl the deep effect that her freshness and
charms had made upon his heart, while she very soon
began to lose her timidity, and to make the King les
doux yeux in return.
The Comte now took the most foolish step possible.
Instead of remaining at the Court to look after the
preservation of his wife's morals, he went off in a huff,
declaring that he washed his hands of her. The de-
nouement was not long in arriving. Within a week
of the Comte's hasty departure, Franchise de Foix gave
herself up, body and soul, to the handsome young
Monarch. Moreover, when once she had become the
King's mistress, that this remarkable beauty was no fool
was to be seen from the way in which she contrived
to assert herself, and make friends with the greatest
ladies of the Court.
Although the jealous and sharp-witted Louise de Savoie,
now Duchesse d'Angouleme, and called " Madame," had
attained the position of Queen-mother, she was obliged
to put up with the rivalry of Franchise in her son's
counsels. As for the retiring Queen Claude, and the
King's sister, the clever Marguerite d'Angouleme, the
" perle des perles des Marguerites," they treated Fran-
$oise as though she were on an equality with themselves.
Nay, more, to please her brother, Marguerite made all
38 Two Great Rivals
kinds of elegant designs and cunning mottoes, which
were carried out in beautiful articles of jewellery, to be
given to the brilliant young Comtesse de Chateaubriand,
who soon enjoyed herself thoroughly at the Court, over
which she shared the influence of Marguerite.
Whether or no the Comte objected, Francois now
adorned for the Comtesse her sleeping apartment at
Chateau-Briant. From an early age Francois exhibited
that taste in art which made him the founder of the
Renaissance in France, and the decorations of the bed-
room of the fair Franchise became renowned. It was
indeed a wonderful place, with voluptuous half-lights
and splendidly sculptured chimney-pieces, held up by
elegant caryatides. Her bed was a magnificent affair,
surrounded by balustrades of carved wood, with mirrors,
velvet hangings, and ebony seats.
When in this luxurious retreat, with a gallant young
King for the companion of her pleasures, Franchise posed
as a demi-reine. Without rising, she received all the
greatest nobles of France by her bedside, according to
the custom of the age for great ladies, and she was
courted and flattered by all in a Court where the will
of the reigning favourite was the will of the King.
She was to exercise her power over her devoted but
by no means too faithful royal lover for some years,
and during that period she contrived to supply him
with her own three brothers as his principal Generals,
by no means to the ultimate advantage of France.
These were the Comte Odet de Foix, Seigneur de
Lautrec, Andre de Foix, Seigneur de Lesparre, and
Thomas de Foix, Seigneur de Lescun. During her
career as maitresse en litre it would appear that Fran-
$01 se did not hesitate to reward the King for his
infidelities by certain little lapses of her own.
There was no greater rake at the Court of France
than his boon companion, the splendid Bonnivet, upon
whom was conferred the title of Admiral of France.
To all the frivolous great ladies of the Court but one,
the dashing attractions of Bonnivet made him irresistible.
The Amours of Francois and Franchise 39
The one exception was not, however, Franchise de Foix,
for she deceived the King with the young " Amiral "
to the top of her bent.
The sole exception to the list of his victims was
one who, throughout her lifetime, always showed that
she had one side of her character no less frivolous than
the other ladies of the noblesse. This was the author
of the indecent series of stories known as the " Hepta-
meron," written as a sequel to Boccaccio's " Decameron,"
which work she was herself the means of introducing
to the Court at the dawn of the Renaissance, as a
rare classic worthy of the careful perusal of gallant
Knights and gay ladies.
Marguerite d'Angouleme, the author in question, does
not hesitate to tell the world gaily in her " Heptameron "
full details of the manner in which, when she would
not yield to the ardent desires of Guillaume Gouffier,
Seigneur de Bonnivet, he almost succeeded in accom-
plishing his designs upon her by trickery and force.
" He took the handsomest and best-perfumed shirt he
had, and a night-cap of the choicest kind, then looking
at himself in the glass, he was so satisfied with his
own appearance that he thought no lady could possibly
withstand his good looks. Promising himself marvels,
therefore, from his enterprise, he lay down on his bed,
where he did not think he should stay long, for he
expected to exchange it for one more honourable ! "
Then Marguerite relates in detail how, by the agency
of a trap-door in the ceiling, the audacious Admiral
succeeded in introducing himself, " without, in the first
instance, obtaining her consent," into the bed of the
supposed Princess of Flanders, and how the first in-
timation of his arrival was to find herself in his arms.
Likewise, although " he endeavoured to stuff the quilt
into her mouth for fear she should cry out," Marguerite
relates, with gusto, how she repulsed the gay spark, and
then proceeds humorously to describe Bonnivet's appear-
ance when, having retreated through his trap-door, he
found himself once more in his own room.
40 Two Great Rivals*
" The candle was still burning on the table before
his mirror, which showed his face all scratched and
bitten, and the blood streaming from it over his fine
shirt."
" Thou art rightly served, pernicious beauty ! " he
said, apostrophising his own lacerated visage. " Thy
vain promises set upon an impossible enterprise, and
one which, far from increasing my good fortune, will
perhaps bring upon me a world of trouble."
No trouble, however, came to the gay Bonnivet over
this fredaine, for which the virtuous Princess Marguerite
appears to have borne him no ill-will, being content with
her victory.
She relates many other notorious love-affairs of this
lady-killer in the course of her " Heptameron," and
historians inform us that her brother Francois only
laughed at the whole affair as a good joke. Indeed,
how little he cared for his sister's honour is evident
from the fact that Marguerite was herself at one time
compelled to retire from the Court owing to her brother's
improper solicitations.
Louise de Savoie, the King's mother, having been
married at eleven, was still quite young when Francois
came to the throne. Her temperament is described as
having been ardently passionate, and it was, later, owing
to her thwarted desires when she sought to make the
Due de Bourbon marry her that, in revenge upon him,
she behaved so as to bring the greatest misfortunes upon
her son and his kingdom.
She contrived, however, to have her own way in the
end, to the discomfiture of Franchise de Foix, when
she presented a still more attractive young lady, Anne
d'Heilly de Pisselieu, one of her own ladies of honour,
to the King's notice.
A good story is told by Brantome showing the wit
displayed by the Comtesse de Chateaubriand, when she
found herself at length supplanted.
The new mistress, become Duchesse d'Etampes, was
desirous to possess the numerous jewels of her prede-
The Amours of Francois and Franchise 41
cessor, especially on account of the designs and mottoes
with which they were adorned by the skill of " the
Pearl of the Valois."
Francois accordingly sent a messenger to his former
lady-love, to demand his presents back. The Comtesse
kept the messenger waiting while she had them all
melted down into ingots. Then she returned them to
the King, saying that every word that they had borne
was engraved upon her heart, so she could spare them —
but that no one else should enjoy the love-tokens which
she had solely valued as coming from him.
Francois could but laughingly observe that the wits
of the Comtesse had proved too much for him, and
he sent back the shapeless ingots of gold and jewels
to their rightful owner.
Various stories are told about the fate of the Comtesse
de Chateaubriand at the hands of her jealous husband.
One of these, told by Varillas, is to the effect that he
shut her up in a room hung with black for a time,
and then had her held down by four men while she
was bled to death by two surgeons. Another story is
that he starved her to death. Whatever the truth, the
Comte placed a fine Latin inscription over the grave
of Franchise, in which, ironically, he praised her many
virtues.
CHAPTER II
Francois Liege Lord, Charles Vassal
1*15
FJ RANGE had lost all Italy ; and in 1512 all of Spanish
L Navarre, the gate of France, was ravished from
Queen Catherine de Foix and her husband, Jean d'Albret,
by Ferdinand of Aragon.
Accordingly, when Francois I. came to the throne he
held no territory outside his French dominions, while he
felt himself threatened on all sides — by the power of Spain,
the might of the Empire, and the rivalry of England.
The young King was not, however, anxious on the
subject of any possibly warlike views of his neighbours,
except in so far as they might interfere in the great object
of his ambition, the reconquest of the Duchy of Milan.
As great-grandson of Valentina Visconti, Francois shared
the claims of his late cousin, Louis XII., in Lombardy,
and, burning with martial ardour, he determined to make
them good in person on the first opportunity. But in
spite of his inordinate love of pleasure, which made him
throughout his life far too much the slave of the fair
sex, Francois possessed various princely qualities, and was
sufficiently long-headed not to dash into perilous adven-
tures without first taking ordinary precautions concerning
the security of his frontiers. Before, therefore, under-
taking any warlike exploits, he set to work with a certain
amount of skill to establish friendly terms with his neigh-
bours, to provide for the proper government of his
dominions, and to give the most responsible commands in
his army to nobles of tried valour and skill.
42
Francois Liege Lord, Charles Vassal 43
In person Francois was very tall, and he united great
bodily strength to extreme skill in the handling of
weapons such as the sword, the lance, and the crossbow.
He possessed, likewise, a taste for letters and art, and had
high ambitions, which seemed to have the more proba-
bility of attainment owing to his quick intelligence, to
which was joined an unscrupulous vein of cunning. His
features in youth were handsome ; even the long nose,
which as the years rolled on became such a prominent
feature of his face, seemed in the noonday of his life but
to impart an additional air of distinction.
For his Chancellor he proceeded to appoint Antoine
Du Prat, whom he also made the Keeper of the Seals,
and Du Prat remained his principal Minister for upwards
of twenty years. Of the Treasurer of the three preceding
Kings, Florimond Robertet, Francois made his Minister
of Finance, at the same time that he gave the post of
Grand Master to Arthus Gouffier de Boisy, who had been
his Governor.
In the matter of the Army, he appointed to the supreme
rank, that of Constable of France, the first Prince of the
Blood, Charles de Montpensier, Due de Bourbon, who
was half an Italian, his mother having been a Gonzaga of
the ruling family of Mantua. This great Prince, who
was later driven to rebellion owing to the excess of love,
followed by the excess of hate, of Louise de Savoie, was
godson of Anne de France, or de Beaujeu, the sister of
Charles VIII., and his marriage with her young daughter,
Suzanne de Bourbon-Beaujeu, had brought him the pos-
session of no less than seven provinces of France. The
father of Suzanne had been Pierre, Due de Bourbon, who
had also been the uncle of Louise de Savoie, whose mother
was Marguerite de Bourbon. It was owing to the fact
of Louise being thus the first cousin of Suzanne, who
died at an early age, that she was able later on to
behave in such a scandalous manner to her more distant
cousin, Charles de Montpensier, after he had succeeded
to all the honours and appanages of both the elder and
younger branches of Bourbon.
44 Two Great Rivals
The Connetable de France was but five and a half
years the senior of Francois, and yet he had already dis-
tinguished himself greatly in Italy under Louis XII. In
fact, it was not only for his personal bravery that he was
already renowned at the age of twenty-five, but for his
grasp of tactics and strategy in warfare. It is, perhaps,
scarcely correct to say that Francois did more than to
confirm Charles de Montpensier, of whose power and
reputation he could not but be jealous, in the rank of
Constable, since the late Louis XII. had promised him
this post two years before his death, being, he said,
anxious to preserve "as his shield and buckler a Prince
so renowned for his powers and virtues."
Francois, attaining to the throne at such an early age,
could not well afford to disregard the late King's wishes
in the matter, although there have been many who,
judging by the light of later events, have considered that
the young Monarch was unwise ever to confer upon his
cousin such great dignity and power that the army of
France was practically his to deal with as he liked. It
must not, however, be forgotten that the passionate
Louise was, at the time of her son's accession, so deeply
in love with the haughty Bourbon that Francois could
not well have gone against his mother's wishes.
There was only one Marechal de France at this period,
and he was an Italian, Jean-Jacques Trivulzi, a bold
warrior who was the head of the French party in
Lombardy.
The influence of the young Comtesse de Chateaubriand
was, however, at once apparent when her brother, Odet
de Foix, Seigneur de Lautrec, was appointed Marechal.
He was the first cousin of the brilliant Gaston, the
scourge of Italy, who fell at Ravenna. A third noble
upon whom the dignity of a Field-Marshal was bestowed
was Jacques de Chabannes, Seigneur de la Palice, an
experienced officer whose name is chiefly famous from
the fact of his having raised that first body of really
French infantry which behaved with such desperate
courage under Gaston de Foix at the battle of Ravenna.
Francois Liege Lord, Charles Vassal 45
Having got the affairs of the Kingdom in order, and
having been duly crowned and anointed at Rheims,
Francois had leisure to think about entering into a state
of alliance with such of his neighbours as seemed to be
inclined to become on friendly terms with him.
Of these the young Archduke Charles had just begun
to become important — the future Emperor Charles V.
commenced, in fact, to be an actually reigning Prince
only a month later than Francois himself, whose junior
he was by almost six years.
In February 1515, when Charles had just attained his
fifteenth year, the Emperor Maximilian, without con-
sulting his daughter Marguerite, the boy's aunt and the
Regent of the Low Countries, suddenly declared the lad
as of age and capable of ruling his countries himself.
Marguerite of Austria was greatly chagrined at this
unexpected slight being put upon her, one which she
attributed to the influence of the Burgundian Guillaume
de Croy, Seigneur de Chievres, to whom during the
eight years of her rule she had confided her nephew for
the purpose of being instructed in statecraft and other
matters fit for a ruler to learn. It had been a task which
Chievres had fulfilled with conscientiousness amounting
to severity, and which Charles, who was naturally an idle
boy, averse to study, and excessively gluttonous, had
endeavoured to elude. He was fond of outdoor sports,
and at an early age much preferred to ride and shoot than
to study either statecraft or languages. In his shooting
lessons, like one of the young Dauphins of France a
couple of hundred years later, he had the bad luck, with
either arquebus or crossbow, to kill a man. While the
Dauphin in question never again could handle firearms,
Charles, who had a firmer disposition, was, although
grieved at the event, not to be deterred by a trifle like
that from the continuance of the sporting exercises so
dear to his grandfather Max, in spite of which he was
never allowed to neglect his studies under Adrien of
Utrecht.
Although Marguerite at first mounted a very high
46 Two Great Rivals
horse, and insisted upon publicly rendering an account
of her stewardship, the coolness between her and her
nephew was of but short duration. The good-natured
Emperor wrote to the boy whom he had emancipated,
telling him that he was not on that account to forget
what he owed to his aunt, and enjoining him to continue
to consult her on all important matters. Charles, on his
side, could not but acknowledge that Marguerite had
made great sacrifices both of her own money and her
jewels on his behalf, in the wars which she had waged
with their troublesome neighbour, the Due de Gueldre,
who was the close ally of France. Accordingly, although
he was now the master, he very plainly showed the
world that she was to continue to enjoy his closest
confidence, although her allowance was frequently left
unpaid. Having been proclaimed Comte de Flandre and
Due de Brabant, the young ruler began to preside over
his own Council with a very firm hand, M. de Chievres,
who continued to be his principal adviser, insisting from
the first that he should open all his own despatches and
read them himself ; moreover, never sign a paper of
which he did not thoroughly understand the contents.
While Frangois was anxious to make friends with Charles
in order that he might have a free hand in Italy, the
Archduke on his side was, for his own reasons, more
than willing to be on good terms with his good cousin of
France.
These reasons were that, as his now Grand Chamber-
lain de Chievres explained, to ensure the repose of the
Low Countries and to render easy his future accession
to the combined Crowns of Aragon and Castile, it would
be well to be at peace with his French neighbour, who
could so easily attack Belgium or Holland at any time
when their ruler might happen to be employed elsewhere.
This peace with Francois was the more desirable as
Charles' maternal grandfather, Ferdinand, King of Aragon,
had plainly shown an intention of leaving that country
to the Archduke Ferdinand of Austria, Charles' younger
brother.
Francois Liege Lord, Charles Vassal 47
An embassy, of which the astute Franche-Comtois,
originally from Savoy, Mercurin de Gattinara, was the
chief, was accordingly despatched to do homage to
Fran£ois for the fiefs of Flanders and other feudal
appanages held under the suzerainty of the French Crown.
At the same time the request was made for the hand
of Francois' young cousin and sister-in-law, Renee de
France, daughter of Louis XII., then only some three
or four years of age.
When Francois received the embassy he did not fail,
as between liege lord and vassal, to assert his superiority
in a somewhat haughty, if affable, manner.
When, however, he learned the proposed terms of the
dowry for Renee he opened his eyes and flatly refused
them. These were, in addition to a large money pay-
ment, no less than the restitution of the Duchy of Bur-
gundy, taken by Louis XI. from Marie of Burgundy,
Maximilian's first wife and Charles' grandmother — and
likewise the cession of the Duchy of Milan.
" My cousin, the Prince of Spain, is going a bit too
far," remarked Francois. u As his Suzerain, he will find
me as reasonable as possible where his duties to me as
my vassal are concerned, and I wish him all happiness
now that he has become a man able to manage his own
affairs ; but no Prince, big or little, shall interfere with
me where my grandeur is concerned in either Burgundy
or Milan."
Since, however, both the Suzerain and the vassal had
their own interests to serve, the marriage was arranged to
take place, with a money dowry only, when Renee should
reach the age of twelve, and a peace treaty was arranged,
which included the Due de Gueldre, that thorn in the
side of Marguerite for so long past. The odd part of
this treaty was that Charles was unable to persuade either
of his grandfathers, Ferdinand or Maximilian, to become
partners to it — a fact which plainly shows the diversity
of interests between those potentates and those of the
grandson who was to succeed them both. Charles, for
his part, agreed not to help Ferdinand of Aragon unless
4 8 Two Great Rivals
within six months he should have returned Navarre
to Queen Catherine de Foix and her husband, Jean
d'Albret.
Thus Francois I. was likely to be left in a state of
war with the Emperor, and the more so since the recent
enemies of France, the Venetians, now came to the young
King to ask his assistance in taking from Maximilian
the possessions of the Republic which he still kept by
force in Lombardy. Frangois was delighted to accede
to the request of the Venetians, since it fell in exactly
with his own views of proceeding with an army into
Italy, where he would be only too glad to find such
a powerful ally as the Republic of the Adriatic. Nor
would Charles be likely to interfere. On the contrary,
in a second treaty, a little later, he approves of Francois
making war on his grandfather the Emperor " for the
good cause of the defence of Venice."
CHAPTER III
Francois, Charles, and Marguerite de Valois
character of Francois I. is easy to understand: it
1 was so frankly sensual, yet at the same time refined
and artistic. While pretending, owing to his undoubted
courage, to be chivalrous, he was in other respects such
a cur that one can readily realise in him his absolute
humanity with all its faults. His very unreliability
stamps him as a man of the race to which he belonged.
Frivolous in love, dashing in war, not without generous
impulses, at times affectionate, courteous, even if his
courteous bearing were nothing but a blind, Francois was
a very Frenchman. He was the result of no system of
education, but the mere product of a line of Valois fore-
fathers, gay, unrestrained, careless, ofttimes cruel ; with
no fixed ideas, no continuity of purpose.
But Charles V. ! how shall we understand the man ?
The only way to do so is to consider, not so much his
forbears as his early environment, his actions being
distinctly the result of education and example. His
relentless obstinacy was rather the result of training than
spontaneity ; his important deeds seem to have been
prompted by fixed principles, to have sprung from cold
calculation and hard self-interest rather than from any
noble or even any frivolous, impulse.
Charles V. never loved anyone but himself ; his sensu-
ality was merely the effect of whim, a matter of temporary
amusement. Not even the beautiful young Flemish lady,
Marguerite Van Gest, by whom at an early age he became
the father of a daughter, afterwards Duchess of Parma,
49 4
50 Two Great Rivals
even stirred his feelings for more than a moment. He
was likewise the father of another illegitimate child, the
famous Don Juan of Austria. There has always been
great mystery as to who was this son's mother. It is,
however, evident how dead to all the ordinary feelings of
nature was Charles V. that his contemporaries did not
scruple to ascribe the motherhood of Don Juan to one
of the Emperor's own sisters.
From his instructor, Guillaume de Croy, he acquired,
with a certain slowness of accomplishment, a peculiar
tenacity, never relinquishing an object that he had in
view. From his aunt, who had never forgiven the
France that she both regretted and hated, although her
hatred was hidden under smiles, Charles became imbued
with the determination to lose no opportunity of humi-
liating his Gallic neighbour.
Neither to the counsels of Charles, when he became
King of Spain and Emperor of Germany, nor to those of
Marguerite, as ruler of the Low Countries, were there
admitted either Spaniards or Germans. The advisers of both
aunt and nephew were chiefly level-headed and grasping
Flemings or Burgundians, who looked upon Spain merely
as a foreign country to be fleeced for their own benefit
and advantage.
Probably the one of these who displayed the firmest
character was the clever Mercurin de Gattinara, a man
who did not at any time fear to speak his mind outright.
He told Marguerite at one time that, if she mistrusted
him, she did not deserve to possess a servitor like himself.
His boldness of speech in pointing out to his master what
was right and wrong caused his disgrace later under
Charles V., when he was supplanted by the cunning
Granvelle.
Of the education, the formation of character and
personal appearance of the young Charles, one gains a
good insight from the talented historian, Michelet.
" Behold ! " he exclaims, " the people of Marguerite,
the Kings of the day. Let us glance to one side at those
of the morrow, who hold in their hand, who form and
From the painting in the Louvre.
CHARLES V.
Francois, Charles, and Marguerite de Valois 51
make in their image, who prepare to their profit, this
child, this Prince, this King, this Emperor, upon whom
already hovers the destiny of Europe. In that hall at
Malines, where sits to one side, in disfavour with and
neglected by his pupil, the pedant Adrien d'Utrecht,
watch at the lamp that pale child in black velvet, his cold
and intelligent face in which the lower lip proclaims the
blood of Austria, whose crocodile's jaw recalls the strong
race of England. There appears the hard worker, greedy,
absorbing, insatiable for work, intrigue, and affairs. A
devouring person, of exigeant stomach (this is no figure
of speech). Where may one find to satisfy him enough
of either foods or of Kingdoms ? Piles of despatches and
State papers are before him. All that comes, even by
night, arrives here and passes under his eyes ; his Gov-
ernor, de Chievres, insists that the Prince shall read, in
order to read himself, and that he may be able to report
to the Council. In this way the education becomes, little
by little, the Government. The power insensibly will slip
away from Marguerite and pass into the hands of the
Governor."
While from Marguerite Charles received lessons in
policy and diplomacy, in this manner Guillaume de Croy
brought him up with all the ambitions of his great-grand-
father, Charles the Bold. But the visions of an universal
Monarchy were by no means likely to become unrealisable
for one in whom the result of so many political marriages
had united the various Kingdoms of Spain with Lower
Italy, the Austrian States, and the Low Countries. What
could seem more probable than that the reversion to the
Empire should fall to the grandson of Maximilian, the
youth already lord of so many States ? Why should not
the sceptre of Charlemagne wave again in the hands of
this later Charles, and be stretched with increased power
and dominion over Europe ? To obtain this universal
might and power, however, two things were necessary :
firstly to study, secondly to crush France. Accordingly,
while the harum-scarum bold hunter, Maximilian, was
constantly insisting that the lad should be given more
52 Two Great Rivals
instruction in the bodily open-air exercises to which he
was inclined, de Chievres kept his pupil, on the other
hand, grinding away eternally in the mill of public affairs
and diplomacy. He taught him to assume a cold and dry
demeanour — to let his heart be for nothing in his policies
— to laugh to scorn the word gratitude.
These were the lessons of the school in which the
family of Croy had been itself brought up in Burgundy.
It was by a long course of ingratitude to Duke Philippe
le Bon that the two brothers, Antoine de Croy and Jean
de Chimay, had become great, and even married into the
Ducal House of Lorraine, whose ruler slew Charles the
Bold at Nancy.
The first results of the lesson became plainly apparent
when Charles succeeded to his majority, and neglected to
pay her allowances to the woman who had been as his
nurse and mother combined, she who had made every
sacrifice on his behalf — his aunt, the Archduchess
Marguerite.
The coldness of demeanour, the Flemish stolidity,
affected by the youthful Charles was not in any way
relieved by grace of person. His face was pale as the
result of such close application ; he was not tall, and
when he sought to make an harangue he spoke with
laboured effort. In spite of his constant instruction,
moreover, he never became a finished scholar. He never
learned to write his own language, French, well ; he was
not fluent in German, and when he first went to take
possession of Spain, the Spaniards of Castile were dis-
gusted to find that he could not speak his own mother's
tongue, Spanish, so as to be understood. Although at
the last the Catholic King revoked by a codicil the will
by which he had left Castile to Charles' younger brother,
the disappointed Spaniards loudly declared that the Arch-
duke Ferdinand, who had been brought up among them
and spoke their tongue, was the only King whom they
would have.
The contrast between Francois I. and his Flemish rival
was indeed remarkable, so much had nature done for the
Francois, Charles, and Marguerite de Valois 53
Frenchman. Francois was not only grace personified,
but a fluent and elegant speaker ; indeed, his flow of
well-turned phrases was far too easy, since his facile
verbiage was often merely a cloak for insincerity. In
stature he was a head taller than any other King who ever
sat on the French throne, while his shoulders were broad
and athletic. That he had inherited quite a taste for
verse from his grandfather, the poet Charles d'Orleans,
was, moreover, evident from the stanzas which, from an
early age, he composed to his various lady-loves, or
scratched with a diamond upon the window-panes at
Chambord. When, later, he became a captive in a
Spanish prison, Francois found in his talent for versifying
almost his sole relief from the weary monotony of close
imprisonment. In his Governor, Arthus de Gouffier,
father of the lively Bonnivet, Francois found an instructor
cast in an entirely different mould to the cold and
calculating de Chievres.
By Gouffier, who had been present in the Italian cam-
paigns of both Charles VIII. and Louis XII., all the
ravishing charms of the dark-eyed beauties who had so
greatly beguiled the Frenchmen were warmly depicted.
Vivid likewise were the descriptions of the noble feats of
arms which Arthus had witnessed and shared in, when
Charles VIII. was gallantly fighting for his very life at
Fornovo, or when Gaston de Foix was dyeing his bared
arm crimson in the blood of the Spaniards at Ravenna.
Filled up with these tales of love and war, instead of the
dry instruction in statecraft imparted to the young Charles,
the mind of Francois d'Angouleme was from an early age
filled with emulation of the deeds of love and war wrought
by the Paladins of old.
He longed to emulate the feats of Amadis de Gaule,
the hero of chivalrous romance, surnamed, from his coat
of arms, " le Chevalier du lion." Like this most ardent
lover, he longed to rescue beautiful princesses, and tear
them, at the point of the sword, from the arms of a
successful rival. Again he dreamed of out-doing the
glorious deeds of the noble Roland at Roncevaux, the
54 Two Great Rivals
Paladin who only sounded his ivory horn to summon
back Charlemagne to his assistance, when, after having
surrounded himself with heaps of slain, his good blade
Durandal was at length shivered in his grasp.
Such, then, was the early training of the Royal rivals,
and their subsequent career showed that by neither was it
forgotten. While one Marguerite, she of Austria, was exer-
cising such an influence upon, and giving a political bent
to the mind of the heir to so many kingdoms, the other
Marguerite — she who was to become later the Queen of
Navarre and grandmother of the gallant Henri IV. — was
devoting herself, body and soul, to the worship of the
high-spirited young French King.
The cult of "la perle des Valois" for the brother
whom she idolised partook indeed more of the ardent
passion of a lover than the calm affection of a sister.
This devotion was shared by Louise de Savoie, although
the other passions and interests by which this self-seeking
Princess was agitated, from the time when, at the early
age of eighteen, she became a widow with two children,
did not permit to her nature the continuous, absorbing,
self-abnegation of Marguerite. Indeed, on at least two
occasions this selfish mother ruined her son's prospects
by diverting to her own personal use money which should
have been remitted to pay his armies.
In his youth, however, the mother's affection for her
son was ardently directed towards securing his future
grandeur. She was, therefore, furiously jealous of Anne
of Brittany, from whom she kept herself as much as
possible apart, in her castle of Amboise, where she lived
with her two children.
Upon each occasion that the hated Anne was enceinte,
Louise, as her diary shows, trembled ; while, when only
a girl or a boy still-born proved to be the result of the
accouchement of the Queen of Louis XII., Louise openly
rejoiced. Anne, who knew her ill-wishes, suspected
Louise of possessing the evil eye, and of being, by her
spells, the cause of all her misfortunes.
How Anne de Bretagne retaliated, by endeavouring to
Francois, Charles, and Marguerite de Valois 55
marry her daughter Claude to the child-Archduke Charles,
when she knew how greatly Louise desired to unite the
girl to Francois, we have seen. Although she was like-
wise foiled in the attempt to deprive the son of Louise of
the succession to the French Crown, Anne was able to
have her revenge in a matter affecting the sister of
Francois.
In the year 1508 an Embassy was sent from the eight-
year-old Charles to demand the hand of Marguerite de
Valois, then aged sixteen, when, greatly to the chagrin
of Louise de Savoie, Anne of Brittany caused her husband,
Louis XII., to refuse the alliance. She selected, instead
of this great Prince, as a husband for Marguerite, a
Duke of the Blood Royal, in the shape of Charles, Due
d'Alenc.on, to whom, whether she wished it or no, Louise
was compelled to give her daughter.
As far as the respective ages of the couple to be married
were concerned, the Due was a far more suitable parti
than the young Archduke for Marguerite, since he was
just twenty. But although he reigned over his own
appanage with Royal authority, and signed himself
"Charles, by the Grace of God," the marriage was a
great disappointment, especially as Henry VII. of England
had likewise demanded the hand of Marguerite for the
Prince who became Henry VIII. only a few months
later.
The future Henry VIII. was not, however, Prince of
Wales at the time that this offer was made, as his elder
brother Arthur, who married Catherine of Aragon before
he did so himself, was still alive. The married life of
that Prince lasted, however, but a short time, and Henry,
disappointed at not being accorded the hand of the fair
French Marguerite, had to put up with his brothers
Spanish widow as a substitute.
One feels inclined to wonder how the state of affairs in
Europe would have been affected had Henry married the
sister of the King of France instead of the youngest
sister of the mother of Charles V. One thing, at all
events, seems certain, which is that, had not the jealousy
56 Two Great Rivals
of Anne de Bretagne prevented this very suitable match,
Henry would not have been found for ever playing a low,
underhand game, plotting with Charles against Francois
at the very time when he pretended to be feeling most
cordially towards him.
When Marguerite d'Angouleme was married to her
first husband she was a very pretty girl, with blue eyes,
highly arched eyebrows, a pronounced but well-shaped
nose, and a tender smiling mouth. Like her brother,
she was tall and her figure remarkably graceful.
Although of a very lively disposition, and always very
free in her manners and conversation, as also in her
writings, from her childhood Marguerite was a student
who studied all the books that she could obtain and
learned various languages.
Her early companion and instructress was the accom-
plished Duchesse de Chatillon, a lady whose career, we
are told, was u not without adventures." One of these
was to remarry in secret the Cardinal Jean du Bellay.
Under this somewhat erudite lady, Marguerite was
prepared for the role which she afterwards played as much
as she dared in the face of Francois, who was hard towards
her. This was to protect all the free spirits of the day,
all those who were struggling for enlightenment and
Reform, for freedom from the old abuses of the Church.
Although more inclined to write mystic nonsense to that
past master of nonsense-writing, Bric.onnet, Bishop of
Meaux, than to wish herself to make any change in her
religion, Marguerite always hated a monk, and never had
much respect for a priest. This is very evident from the
pages of the " Heptameron," wherein she makes priests,
Carmelites, and Grey Friars the heroes of numberless
grotesquely indecent adventures, in which they invariably
attain their nefarious ends with maid, wife, or widow, by
practising the grossest fraud and deception.
Marguerite takes care to let us know in her lubricous
pages that, although she was a Princess of " moult joyeuse
vie," nevertheless was she " toutefois femme de bien"
Although she seems generally to have been taken at
From a lithograph by N. H. Jacob.
MARGUERITE DE VALOIS, SISTER OF FRANCOIS I.
P- 56]
Francois, Charles, and Marguerite de Valois 57
her word, it is difficult for the modern reader of such
scandalous tales not to wonder at times. One asks, if the
highly born author of such frankly lewd stories concerning
many great lords and ladies personally known to herself
did not perchance protest just a little bit too much where
her own immaculate virtue was concerned ?
It may, of course, have been that, while imbued with
the gross impurity of mind common to those among whom
she lived, Marguerite nevertheless remained a singular ex-
ample of personal purity in the midst of impure surround-
ings. If it was so, let us honour her for her self-restraint,
by which she remained virtuous in spite of having two
unsatisfactory husbands.
In her strangely constituted mind, apparently inclined
towards Protestantism, she mixed up religion, love, and
mysticism. The Reformed religion, in the days of its
infancy, undoubtedly owed much to the protection of the
amiable Queen of Navarre, whose Court at Nerac or Pau
was the refuge alike of the humanists and poets, such as
Erasmus or Marot, and Lefebvre d'fitaples and Gerard
Roussel, followers of the doctrines of Luther. It was
indeed the home of liberty of every description, Fay ce
que vouldras being the motto of the Court of Navarre,
where freedom from moral restraint and religious freedom
walked hand in hand. Marguerite's second husband, Henri
d'Albret, King of Navarre, who was eleven years younger
than herself, was a notable offender against the moral
code, and, while his wife was exerting herself to protect
Calvin, Louis Berquin, Lefebvre and other heretics,
this gallant soldier passed the greater part of his time
in prosecuting various foolish love-affairs. He did
not, however, neglect to improve the condition of his
dominions.
The Due d'Alenc.on, the first husband of the Princess
Marguerite, was found by her very unsatisfactory from
an intellectual point of view ; but as all her interests,
hopes, and aspirations were, during his lifetime, entirely
centred in her brother Francois I., and as she was con-
stantly present at the Court, of which she formed the
58 Two Great Rivals
most brilliant ornament, she was able to console herself
for this lack of sympathy in her home.
How far, indeed, she carried her adulation for her
brother, how much she admired him more than any other
human being, is evident from the extravagant praise which
she showers upon Francois in her poems. In these she
proclaims that, " Heaven, earth, and sea contemplate his
unparalleled beauty, while God has endowed him with
perfect knowledge — in short, that he alone is worthy to be
King."
CHAPTER IV
Bayard, Sans Peur et Sans Reproche
THERE is no story of the days of which we write
more interesting than that of u Le Bon Chevalier
Sans Paour Et Sans Reprouche," as the gallant Pierre de
Terrail, Seigneur de Bayard, is termed by the honest
chronicler who witnessed many of his noble feats.
Bayard was really a most remarkable man, one whose
generosity of heart was only equalled by his extraordinary
courage and prowess as a fighting man.
Although the " Gentil Seigneur " was but once en-
trusted with the command of an army, and seems to have
been usually a mere free-lance, going wherever he was
likely to be most useful, his very presence in a place — his
name alone — was worth an army.
Upon one occasion a leader of the Imperial forces,
hearing that the Knight had thrown himself into a city
which he was besieging, exclaimed regretfully that his arrival
alone increased the garrison by two thousand men.
One of the remarkable points about this true soldier
was his possession of great military cunning, and likewise
prompt decision. Thus, by long-headed ness, he some-
times succeeded in overreaching a foe when force would
not suffice ; and on other occasions, by his rapid grasp of
the situation, with only a few men he swiftly seized an im-
portant point, from whence he was able to prevent the
advance of an army.
Born at the Chateau de Bayard in Dauphine in 1489,
at the age of thirteen Pierre de Terrail entered, as page,
the service of the Duke Charles II. of Savoy, father of
59
60 Two Great Rivals
Philibert, the second husband of Marguerite of Austria.
The King of France, Charles VIII., saw the boy in the
following year, and asked him to perform some evolutions
on horseback ; when so wonderful was his skill that the
King begged from the Duke his page and his horse also.
Three years later the seventeen-year-old lad was ap-
pointed by the Comte de Ligny an homme d'armes in the
Compagnie d" Ordonnance de gens d'armes that he commanded.
The companies of gens aarmes were then each composed
of fifteen mounted lances, furnished. That is to say, that
each furnished lance represented six men on horseback :
the homme d'armes, or master, the page or varlet, three
archers, and a coutillier, or knife-bearer, and the "men-
at-arms " were always of gentle blood.
Until after the formation of the brave French infantry,
which, under Gaston de Foix, performed such gallant
deeds before Ravenna, no Frenchman would serve in any
but these mounted corps. Not long after Pierre de
Terrail became a man-at-arms the companies of gens
d'armes were gradually augmented, until they reached
sixty and eighty lances, furnished. Bayard himself com-
manded, later, a company of one hundred lances, which
represented six hundred mounted men. The young man
made his first mark in the world by entering the lists
against the Comte de Vaudrey, a noble Burgundian who
had given a tourney to amuse the King. To the astonish-
ment of all, fighting both on horseback and on foot, the
stripling vanquished the doughty giver of the entertain-
ment in the presence of the whole Court.
Shortly after this brilliant opening of his career Bayard
gave a tourney himself, at Aire in Picardy, where the
company of the Comte de Ligny was quartered. He
invited all comers to take part in three jousts, in which
they were to fight with lances without buttons on the
points, and to give twelve sword-blows apiece with sharp
swords — all on horseback — and offered a prize of a
bracelet engraved with his arms. On the morrow the
fighting was to be continued, the matches being on foot,
with lances, swords, and hatchets — the prize to be a
Bayard, Sans Peur et Sans Reproche 61
diamond. At the lists Bayard and other Knights gave
and received many rude strokes, but, in spite of the
sharpened weapons, no one seems to have been seriously
damaged. When the lords and ladies were all assembled
at a supper given by Bayard at the end of the second
day, both the men who had fought in the tourney and
the women voted unanimously that he himself was the
conqueror in both days' jousting, and should keep his
own prizes. The modest young host, however, refused
to accept this decision, and therefore gave the prize for
the first day to the Seigneur de Bellabre, while that for
the second day of the tournament he awarded to the
Scotch captain, David de Fougas.
Bayard's first experience of war was during the invasion
of Italy by Charles VIII. When, at the battle of For-
novo, the retreating King, with vastly inferior forces, was
endeavouring to cut his way through thirty thousand of
the enemy under Gonzaga, Charles very narrowly escaped
capture. Mounted on his splendid black horse, Savoy,
given him by the Duke, he was at one time completely
separated from all his followers. He fought bravely,
however, and, aided by the splendid qualities of his
charger, which had but one eye, managed to maintain
himself until assistance came. Bayard at this time was
likewise in the thick of the battle, and covered himself
with glory. He had two horses killed under him, but
captured one of the enemy's standards, which he pre-
sented to the King. Thereupon Charles VIII. ordered
the sum of five hundred crowns to be given to the
young Knight.
During the succeeding campaign under Louis XII.
the first exploit of Bayard, who was then aged twenty-
four, was positively unique. After a furious four-hours'
running combat on horseback with some of the cavaliers
of Ludovico, surnamed " The Moor," Duke of Milan, the
enemy, who were commanded by the Captain Cazzachio,
fled towards the city. Carried away by the ardour of
the pursuit, and, although his comrades shouted to him to
return, Bayard, while still cutting and thrusting, followed
62 Two Great Rivals
the fugitives through the city gates into Milan. Alone
he pursued the foe through the streets, until they arrived
under the windows of the Duke's Palace. There the
people cried out that he was a Frenchman, knowing him
by the distinguishing sign of a white cross, which the
French wore over their armour, whereby they should
know one another, for there was very little uniformity
among troops in those days.
Bayard was surrounded by people of the town shouting
" Kill ! Kill ! " whereupon the hunted Captain Caz-
zachio made him a prisoner, and, having disarmed him,
took him to his quarters and treated him kindly, having
been surprised at such valour in one so young — for his
fury had been extreme. Ludovico sending for the young
Frenchman, Cazzachio lent him some of his own clothing
to appear in before the Duke, who asked him, " What
on earth are you doing in the city of Milan ? "
Bayard answered calmly that his comrades had been
wiser than he had, or he would not have been there
alone to become a prisoner. Not, he added, that he
could be in better hands than those of the worthy
Captain Cazzachio. After some conversation the generous
Ludovico, being pleased with Bayard, ordered him to be
set at liberty.
Thereupon Cazzachio sent for his armour, his arms
and horse, and he was armed in the actual presence of
the Duke ; after which he was sent, with a safe-conduct,
back to the town where he had been in garrison, a
considerable distance from Milan. As we have already
mentioned, it was soon the turn of the unhappy Ludovico
to become a prisoner near Novara, when the Duke did
not find in Louis XII. a gaoler to treat him as generously
as he had treated Bayard, but one who left him to rot
in prison until he died.
In the following campaign, when Louis XII. sent an
army to conquer Naples in combination with the troops
of Ferdinand of Aragon, Bayard served under the
Captain Louis d'Ars, the lieutenant of his old protector,
the Comte de Ligny. The French army was com-
Bayard, Sans Peur ct Sans Reproche 63
manded by Robert Stewart, Seigneur d'Aubigny, who
soon fell out with the Spanish Commander, Gonsalvo
da Cordova. Bayard, tired of garrisoning a small place,
one day led out a party of his friends in search of
adventures, when he met Gonsalvo's cousin, the Count
of Soto Mayor, on a similar quest. After a vigorous
combat the victory rested with Bayard. He pursued
Soto Mayor, most of whose companions were dead,
shouting : " Turn ! man-at-arms, turn ! Do not die
disgracefully by a blow from behind."
The Count turned and charged Bayard, and the pair
had exchanged fifty blows when the horse of the
Spaniard fell.
" Yield, or you are a dead man," cried the Chevalier.
" To whom shall I yield ? "
"To the Captain Bayard."
The Count gave up his sword.
In spite of being put upon his parole, Soto Mayor
escaped before paying his ransom, but, being recaptured,
Bayard reproached him with his breach of faith, but did
not ill-treat his prisoner. When, after a fortnight, the
Count's ransom arrived, the Chevalier distributed it all
to the soldiers of the garrison, then, with every courtesy,
he set Soto Mayor at liberty.
Shortly afterwards word came that the Count was
complaining of the hardships with which he had been
treated by Bayard. The result was a courteous challenge
to single combat, which was accepted. The cunning
Soto Mayor, however, requested to be allowed the choice
of arms, which being granted he selected, instead of the
lance on horseback, with which Bayard was known to
be invincible, daggers and swords on foot — the vizors
of the combatants to remain open.
The Knights met, surrounded by their witnesses, when,
after a furious encounter, during which the armour-
clad duellists grappled body to body, Bayard, who had
already driven his sword-point right through the Count's
armour, finished his adversary off by a dagger-blow in
the face.
64 Two Great Rivals
" Yield, or you are a dead man, Don Alfonso ! " cried
the French Knight.
But when the " Gentil Seigneur " found that his
adversary was dead he joined his lamentations to those
of the Spanish friends of the man whom he had slain in
this, their second, personal encounter.
In a subsequent combat, when thirteen Spaniards,
thirsting to avenge Soto Mayor, challenged thirteen
Frenchmen to fight on horseback, Bayard and his friend,
named d'Oroze, alone remained alive on the French side.
The Spaniards having commenced the combat by
killing the horses of their foes, Bayard and his friend
made a rampart of the horses and corpses and fought for
four hours, until night put an end to the combat.
Towards the end of this campaign the French were
defeated by Gonsalvo, first at Seminara and then at
Cerignola.
Eventually the " Great Captain " made a furious attack
upon the dtbris of the French endeavouring to escape
over the river Garigliano, to take refuge in Gaeta, forty
miles north-west of Naples. During this most unhappy
day for France the feats of the Bon Chevalier sans peur
et sans reproche shone out with their wonted radiance.
Single-handed, he defended a bridge against a whole
Spanish troop, and thereby saved a part or the retreating
army. His chronicler, who published his relation, in
1527, three years after the death of Pierre de Terrail,
says : " Bayard, with lance at rest, posted himself at the
side of a bridge, and, like a furious lion, dealt such
terrible blows, that at the start he overthrew four men-
at-arms, of whom two fell into the river and were seen
no more. The Spaniards, animated by the loss of their
comrades, surround Bayard, and attack him with fury.
But he, sword in hand, keeps them all off, and retreating,
on horseback as he was, against the barrier of the bridge,
gave them so much to do that they thought they had
the devil to fight with and not a man."
In this manner Bayard held the bridge by himself until
some of his comrades returned to his assistance, and he
Bayard, Sans Peur et Sans Reproche 65
and his commander and friend, Louis d'Ars, were even-
tually the last men to leave Neapolitan territory.
With a few men-at-arms, whom they inspired with
their own valour, these gallant cavaliers shut themselves
up in Venosa, the town where the poet Horace was
born.
They refused to quit this vantage-point until formal
orders arrived from the King to return to France, when
they left proudly, with their ensigns flying and with
lances at rest. Not long after this retreat Bayard was
again in Italy, and attacked the city of Genoa, which
had revolted against the French King. Here, taking a
hundred and twenty of his chosen friends, he scaled
a mountain, and, after driving back the advance-guard
of the Genoese, stormed a fort from which he drove
three hundred men. Genoa then surrendered, when the
Doge, Paul de Novi, was decapitated by order of Louis XII.,
and Genoa became once more French territory. At the
neighbouring town of Savona, Ferdinand the Catholic,
meeting the King of France, made a great deal of both
the renowned Louis d'Ars and Bayard. " My brother,"
he said to Louis XII., " he is indeed a lucky Prince who
possesses two such Knights."
It is impossible to relate in a few pages one hundredth
part of the gallant exploits of Bayard, a Knight the
purity of whose morals was only equalled by his daring
and resource. In Navarre, at the battle of Agnadello, at
the sieges of Padua and at Brescia, in the Duchy of
Ferrara and at Ravenna, he was ever to the fore ; and
although he received some terrible wounds, was always
to be seen again in the saddle before he had half recovered
from their effects. We must not, moreover, forget to
relate that when Henry VIII. descended into Artois, in
the year 1513, he nearly fell into the hands of the bold
Chevalier.
Bayard saw the young English King surrounded, near
Therouanne, by a large number of foot-soldiers, about
twelve thousand, without a single horseman. Bayard
was about to charge them with his fine force of trained
5
66 Two Great Rivals
men-at-arms, but the Seigneur de Piennes refused to
accompany him. " Do as you choose," said de Piennes,
"but it will be without my consent. The King has
ordered me only to hold the country, but to risk
nothing." As Bayard was not in sufficient force to
charge alone, Henry VIII. escaped, to join forty thousand
men from Flanders, sent by Marguerite with the impe-
cunious Emperor Maximilian, who had engaged himself
as a volunteer under Henry at a wage of one hundred
crowns a day.
CHAPTER V
Bayard and the Preludes to Marignano
HAD Bayard but succeeded in capturing Henry VIII.
at Therouanne, as he probably would have done
if he had charged the footmen who surrounded the King,
France would have been spared one of the worst blots
which ever disfigured her escutcheon.
The encounter at Guinegate, the shameful Battle of
the Spurs, took place but a few days later. In this affair
all the mounted chivalry of France were seized with a
sudden panic upon finding themselves unexpectedly con-
fronted by a body of English infantry and artillery.
The Due de Longueville, the brave Chabannes, Marechal
de la Palice, and Bayard, being unable to rally the flying
men-at-arms, were compelled to follow them as they tore
away headlong in a tumultuous rout.
The cavalry which fled in this disgraceful manner had
been engaged in making a feint and skirmishing for
awhile upon one side of the town of Therouanne, while
eight hundred Albanian horsemen in the service of
France had gallantly cut their way into the beleaguered
city, each carrying a sack of provisions on his saddle
before him.
Bayard, however, could not be induced to run far.
Coming to a halt by a small bridge over a deep stream,
he resolved to hold it, but not alone, as he had done at
the river Garigliano.
" My friends," he cried, " let us stop here and hold
this bridge. I will promise you that the enemy will not
take it from us in an hour."
67
68 Two Great Rivals
Fifteen of his comrades, who had already been holding
back with him in the face of the pursuing cavalry,
occupied the post, and gallantly they kept back the men
of Burgundy and Hainault who repeatedly charged them,
until at last they were left alone by the wearied foe, who
halted to rest in front of the bridge after having lost
many of their number at the hands of Bayard.
Two hundred fresh troops, however, having crossed
the river at a mill some distance down stream, suddenly
came and took the Chevalier and his brave companions
in rear.
" Comrades," said the Knight prudently, " I think it
would be as well if we were to give ourselves up separ-
ately to any of the decent-looking men-at-arms whom we
can see in front, who will hold us for ransom, for we are
a little bit outnumbered, and none of our own people
seem inclined to return and help us. If those rascally
English archers get hold of us they will certainly cut
our throats, and, above all, our horses have not a kick
left in them."
"Agreed," cried his companions, and each rode forward
to deliver himself into the custody of one of their late
antagonists. Bayard, however, who had his wits about
him, spurred his tired horse to where he saw, at some
distance, a wearied gentleman who had divested himself
of his armour and was taking a sandwich under a
tree.
" Yield, man-at-arms ! " he cried, " or I will kill you."
And he placed his lance at the astonished warrior's
throat.
This gentleman replied : " Certainly I yield, since I
must, but to whom have I the honour to give up my
sword ?"
" To the Captain Bayard, who in his turn now sur-
renders himself to you. Here is his sword — he now
becomes your prisoner."
The puzzled officer, a Burgundian, had some difficulty
in understanding the situation. Bayard explained how
matters stood, and stipulated further that his arms should
Bayard and the Preludes to Marignano 69
be returned to him as they retired together, to defend
himself from the English cut-throats, camp-followers,
and other robbers who killed and plundered the wounded.
To this the gentleman agreed, and in fact they had
both to defend themselves as they left the field, side by
side, from several bands of plundering rascals.
Having arrived in the camp of Henry VIII., the
gentleman lodged the Chevalier in his own tent with him,
and treated him with every courtesy.
A morning or two later, the Chevalier remarked
casually to his host : u My good friend, I am beginning
to be very much bored remaining here doing nothing ;
I shall be much obliged if you will kindly conduct me to
the camp of the King, my master."
The Burgundian gentleman stared : " But you have
not said a word about paying your ransom ! "
" Nor you of yours," responded Bayard. " Are not
you my prisoner ? was not your life at my mercy, and
did I not spare you ? You gave me your parole, and, if
you do not keep it, you will have to fight me."
The astonished gentleman, not at all anxious for a
personal combat with the great Bayard, suggested that
they had better refer the matter to higher authority. As
it happened, the old Emperor Maximilian, who knew
how the whole army was rejoicing at the capture of the
Chevalier, sent for him and received him with the greatest
courtesy.
" Would to Heaven, my good friend Captain Bayard,
that we had a few warriors of your stamp ! " observed
Max ; u we should not be long before we were able to
pay back the King, your master, for a few of the dirty
tricks with which he has served us. But how is it that
you are here ? If memory does not fail us, we have met
before ; and we seem to have heard that the Chevalier
Bayard was never known to fly."
" Sire, if I had fled I should not be here now, and
we have certainly met before on various occasions, which
I will have the honour to recall to your memory."
While they were chatting together, King Henry VIII.
70 Two Great Rivals
happened to drop in to the Emperor's tent, and, after first
expressing his delight at meeting Bayard, the young
English Monarch began to make fun of the Chevalier
with reference to the rout of Guinegate. The honest
Max likewise joined in the badinage, but Bayard, without
losing his temper, replied that it was not fair to jeer
at the French men-at-arms, as not only were they without
either infantry or artillery to support them, but that they
had been distinctly ordered only to make a feint, and not
to fight.
u Will it please your Majesties to remember," he
added, " that, although I do not consider myself worthy
to share it, the reputation of the French noblesse does
not date from yesterday."
" You ! " replied Henry. " If only the rest of the
French gentlemen were like you, Chevalier, we might
have packed up, bag and baggage, and left the siege of
Therouanne long since. But never mind that matter,
now we have the good luck to be able to keep you out
of mischief, since you are our prisoner."
" With all respect to both your Majesties," rejoined
Bayard, " I think that you are mistaken, and that, accord-
ing to all the rules of the game of war, I am the prisoner
of neither of you."
" How's that ? " asked Henry VIII., laughing. « Will
you kindly explain ? "
When Bayard related the circumstances of his capture,
the Burgundian officer confirmed them as being exact.
The Emperor and Henry looked at each other, when
Max remarked decisively : " It seems to us that the
Chevalier is in the right, and, if there is any one here
who is a prisoner, it is this Burgundian gentleman.
Looking at the matter all round, though, we think that
each ought to release the other from his parole, and the
Captain Bayard must be allowed to leave us, much as we
shall regret to see him depart."
" Oh, if you say so, Emperor," remarked Henry VIII.
sulkily, " I suppose there is nothing for it for a young
King like us but to defer to your superior years and
Bayard and the Preludes to Marignano 71
experience of the rules of war. It seems to us, however,
if we let our good friend Bayard go like this we shall not
have long in which to regret him — we shall behold his
face again only too soon for our own comfort."
" We will arrange that matter," replied Max good-
humouredly.
" Captain Bayard, my friend, if our brother the King
of England and ourselves agree to allow you to deprive
us of the pleasure of your society in this way, do you
think that you could be content not to seek us again
except in the way of friendship for — let us say six weeks ?
Of course time will hang a little heavily on your hands,
but what would you say to a safe-conduct to visit all the
neighbouring cities of our grandson, the Archduke
Charles's possessions of Flanders ? No doubt our good
daughter, the Regent Marguerite, will be pleased to see
you, and likewise many others."
Bayard threw himself on his knee, kissed the hands of
both the Monarchs, and quitted their presence with
regret, to go off and pass a six-weeks' holiday in the Low
Countries.
He did not leave, however, without having first re-
ceived brilliant offers from Henry to induce him to enter
his service. It was in vain, however, for the English
King to represent that, by old claims from the time of
Henry V., his right to the throne of France was every
bit as good as that of Louis XII., and that since, more-
over, Bayard belonged to Dauphine, a country which had
not long been French, there would be no treason in his
changing masters.
The Gentil Seigneur refused to see matters in that
light, and courteously declined to transfer his allegiance,
in the same way as, after the battle of the Garigliano at
the end of 1503, he had already refused to accept the
magnificent proposals of Pope Julius II. to become the
Captain-General of the forces of the Church.
When, by the latter part of the summer of 1515,
Francois had arranged matters at home and on his
frontiers to his satisfaction, he got together at Lyon a
72 Two Great Rivals
large army for the invasion and recapture of Milan.
Italy, the country of his thoughts, beckoned to him with
irresistible force. His dreams of new loves, of languish-
ing dark-eyed beauties falling fainting into his arms,
were mixed with ideas of conquest, while the artistic side
of his nature was appealed to by the tales he had heard of
the lovely marble palaces and gardens, the statues and the
paintings. From the beginning to the end of his career,
thoughts of Milan never left his head, and, time and time
again, Frangois I. sacrificed more important and practical
interests lying close to his hand for the sake of this
eternal chimera of Italy in the distance.
Before proceeding to cross the Alps in person, Francois
sent ahead the Marechal de la Palice and Bayard, who
arrived, by a mountain-path never previously traversed
by cavalry, safely into the country of Piedmont, in the
Marquisate of Saluzzo.
The Republic of Genoa, after undergoing various
vicissitudes and changes of masters, had recently been
threatened by Maximilian Sforza, the reigning Duke of
Milan. It accordingly offered itself to France, and
Francois I. thereupon became the ruling Seigneur of
this useful maritime city, whose Doge made all pre-
parations to give shelter and support to any French
troops landed there by French flotillas.
Other useful allies Francois had, in the shape of those two
warlike Princelings of the German frontier and Flanders,
the Due de Gueldre and the Due Robert de la Marck,
Seigneur of Sedan and Bouillon, who was known by the
soubriquet of the Wild Boar of the Ardennes. The Due
de Lorraine, another frontier Prince, had likewise thrown
in his lot with France. With these three allies there came
a splendid body of twenty thousand German lansquenets,
who were armed similarly to the Swiss who were about to
fight, under Maximilian Sforza, against France. Owing
to an old quarrel with Louis XII., who had refused to
pay the accustomed subsidies to the Helvetian Cantons
at a moment when he thought that he had no further
need for their services, the hardy mountaineers had flatly
Bayard and the Preludes to Marignano 73
refused to reply to the friendly overtures made to them
by Francois on the very day after he had succeeded to
the throne. Not content with informing the French
King that his envoys would not be respected if they
set foot on Swiss territory, the Diet of Zurich gave him
formal notice to resign his pretensions to the Ducal
Crown upon which he had set all his ambitions in
Milan.
It was the antagonism of this race of hardy mount-
aineers which was likely to prove a terrible stumbling-
block to the advance into Italy, as their forces were
found to be posted in great numbers on the passes of
Mont Cenis and Mont Genevre. By these routes alone
it was thought that the French army of sixty thousand
men could possibly cross the Alps, especially as it had
with it seventy-two large cannons of great weight, and
a great quantity of small pieces carried on the backs of
mules. Among his troops Francois had also two thousand
five hundred heavily armed gens d'armes, furnished in
the proportion of eight men to a lance, and the difficulty
of conducting these twenty thousand mounted men
across the Alps would, to all ordinary commanders, have
appeared insurmountable. Not so, however, to the in-
experienced and light-hearted Francois, who, with the
insouciance of youth, merrily embarked upon an ex-
pedition which might have appalled a Hannibal.
Emulating the feats of the great Carthaginian commander,
who upwards of two thousand years earlier had traversed
the same snow-clad mountains with twenty-seven ele-
phants, the young French King attempted this all but
impossible feat, and, like Hannibal, succeeded.
Very luckily for him, after the Spanish defeat at
Ravenna in 1512 the clever captain, Pietro Navarro, had
remained a prisoner in the hands of the French. Owing
to the meanness of Ferdinand of Aragon, Navarro's
ransom had never been paid, and he accordingly offered
his valuable services to Francois I., who gladly employed
him.
He got together twenty thousand infantry from
74 Two Great Rivals
various parts of France, as far separated as Picardy,
Brittany, and Gascony, and likewise organised a splendid
corps of three thousand pionniers and sappers. Having
learned from an Alpine chamois hunter of a mountain-
track well to the south of the passes held by the Swiss,
the ingenious Pietro Navarro set to work to clear a road
for the army.
For the first time in warfare blasting operations were
put into practice ; huge rocks which barred the way
were destroyed, and tunnels were pierced by the com-
bined use of gunpowder and the crowbar. In addition,
long wooden galleries of doubtful security were erected
along the sheer faces of precipices, while bridges were
thrown over the most awful ravines, at the bottom of
whose darksome recesses could be heard the rushing
of wild mountain torrents.
Across all of these obstacles were conveyed the seventy-
two great bronze cannons, while, save for a few accidents
by which armoured men and horses were dashed to pieces
down frozen slopes, or carried into eternity by roaring
avalanches, the rest of the forces crossed likewise in
safety. On the fifth day from the start on the French
side the triple chain of the Alps had been traversed,
and the great army had descended the lower slopes on
the Italian side and reached the plains in the Marquisate
of Saluzzo, which lay at the gates of Lombardy.
It had taken five days to cross, and the allied army had
passed the eternal mountains with but three days' pro-
visions ! Who shall say that the army of the twenty-
year-old Francois I., the son of the Valois, is not as
worthy of lasting renown as that of Hannibal, the valiant
son of Hamilcar Barca ?
To the rapidity of the feat, and the utter surprise
of the Swiss by the brilliant action of Bayard with the
advanced guard, is to be attributed the fact that the
execution of this wonderful undertaking was not accom-
panied by some fearful disaster. For, had but the Swiss
blocked the way at the exit, the whole long-drawn-out
force, without food or room to fight, would have been
Bayard and the Preludes to Marignano 75
penned up in those mountain gorges, or on those freezing
peaks, and been starved to death or crushed by rocks
hurled down upon them from the heights.
Bayard, however, prevented any such a disaster by the
promptitude with which he seized those who were on
their way to warn the Swiss. When he and La Palice
suddenly descended with their men-at-arms, like goats
from the mountains, into the Marquisate of Saluzzo, he
learned at once that the gallant Roman, Prospero Colonna,
the Lieu tenant-General of Pope Leo X., was occupying the
district, and was about to repair to join the Swiss forces
of Maximilian Sforza, watching the passes at Susa and
Pignerolo. The former Cardinal, Giovanni de' Medici,
who had become Pope at the age of thirty-eight, had
recently joined a league with Maximilian Sforza and the
Catholic King, against the French, and had Colonna reached
the Swiss unmolested with the news that the first cavaliers
of Francois were appearing in Piedmont, the rest of the
French army would never have escaped from the recesses
of the Alps. Bayard was, however, too quick for Colonna,
of whom he learned that he had, for the moment, only
seven or eight hundred horsemen with him.
The gallant Chevalier immediately determined to follow
up and attack the celebrated Roman captain, who, although
he was informed of the sudden arrival of the French
men-at-arms, never dreamed of such an eventuality, and
started on his march to Pignerolo in most leisurely
fashion.
Bayard and his companions, Humbercourt, La Palice,
and d'Aubigny, just missed Prospero at the Castle of
Carmagnola, when the others, being disappointed, advised
a halt to rest their horses ; but Bayard persuaded them
all to push on at once. They soon came in contact with
twenty cavaliers, sent back by Colonna to observe their
movements while he halted with his main force at Villa-
franca to dine.
Pushing on rapidly after the flying Italians, the French
men-at-arms entered the town of Villafranca with them
before the gates could be closed. After a hurried and
7 6 Two Great Rivals
sanguinary combat with those in the place, they took the
gallant Colonna prisoner, before a force of four thousand
Swiss, only about two miles away, had time to march to
his assistance, although they had been warned by mounted
men of the danger.
Taking with them Colonna and three other well-
known captains as prisoners, and fifty thousand ducats'
worth of booty, capturing also seven hundred splendid
Spanish horses, the French retired from the town of
Villafranca by one gate as the four thousand Swiss, some
on horse and some on foot, marched in by another.
The Swiss, struck with^ stupefaction at this sudden
onslaught, and discouraged by the loss of Colonna, instead
of advancing to resist the approach of Francois and his
army, retired upon Milan and Novara. The greater
number of them, not having received the pay promised
to them by the Pope and the King of Spain, then
mutinied and wished to retire at once to their native
country. Francois, made aware of this fact, thought
that it would be wiser to buy the Swiss than to fight
them. Some of his nobles resisted this determination,
but the young King answered them : " I will not buy
with the blood of my subjects that which I can have
just as easily for money."
Negotiations were at once opened with the men of the
Confederation, who, having among them some leaders
from the Cantons of Berne and Valais who were favour-
able to France, for whom they had formerly fought, were
ready enough to accept the French King's fine new
gold pieces. They argued : " What is the use of our
getting ourselves killed, or killing the Frenchmen, our old
friends ? If we do so, who will profit but our enemies
the Germans? Moreover, neither the Pope nor Ferdi-
nand of Aragon will give us a ducat, while, as for the
Duke Maximilian Sforza, he is drained dry, there is not
a coin left in his coffers. Now, the French have got
plenty of gold with them, which we can have without
even fighting and risking our lives for it, so by all means
let us take it."
Bayard and the Preludes to Marignano 77
Both sides being agreed, Francois I. generously offered
to give the Swiss far more than they asked for, and made
a bargain also to buy Bellinzona and Lugano from them,
places which they held at the foot of the Alps.
Unfortunately, just when everything had been so beauti-
fully arranged to the mutual satisfaction of Francois I.
and the Swiss, an incident occurred which upset the apple-
cart completely.
CHAPTER VI
The Battle of Marignano
SEPTEMBER 13™, 1515
GIOVANNI DE' MEDICI was at the same time a
literary and artistic man and one wedded to field-
sports, magnificent banquets, buffoonery, and stage-plays
of the very grossest description.
While brilliant and cultured in the highest degree, he
was cunning and unreliable, and his extravagance was
unbounded. In the year of the accession of Francois,
and his first invasion of Italy, Leo X. showed his usual
trickiness of character by trimming, until he should see
who should become the master.
While, therefore he joined the league against the young
French Monarch, and got a large force together which he
did not pay, he secretly gave instructions to the com-
manders of his army to hold themselves aloof until they
should see who was likely to obtain the upper hand. He
happened, however, to be to a considerable extent under
the influence of the rabid Mathieu Shiner, the Cardinal
of Sion, in Switzerland, a priest who hated everything
French worse than poison. Just after Francois had
made such a satisfactory arrangement by which, instead
of fighting them, he had agreed to pay off the Swiss
army of Milan, this rancorous Cardinal arrived, by
way of the Saint Gothard Pass, with twenty thousand
fresh Swiss who had been no parties to the proposed
amicable arrangement, of which he determined to prevent
the execution.
78
The Battle of Marignano 79
The Spanish troops from Naples, who saw themselves
menaced by the Venetian allies of Francois, under the
great General, Bartolomeo Alviano, were not inclined
to pay any attention to the furious exhortations of
Cardinal Shiner, but, like the Papal army, preferred to
remain in a state of observation. The newly arrived
Swiss were, however, of another way of thinking.
These, greedy for their share of the booty of France
and of Italy, cried out loudly that to give up Bellinzona
and Lugano, to yield the passes of the Ticino, by which
they were accustomed to have access to the so often
despoiled plains of Lombardy, was worse than shameful.
" Since the French have so much money with them,
let us attack them and take it all, every ducat of it,"
they cried to the partisans of peace.
Mathieu Shiner likewise mounted a pulpit, and, in the
most furious manner, exhorted all of the Swiss of both
parties to fight. He cried out loudly for blood, shriek-
ing, with wild gesticulations : " Would that I might wash
my hands in, would that I might satisfy my thirst with
the blood of the French ! "
He ended up this strange discourse for a churchman
by a falsehood : " The French are even now advancing
upon us — we are all in danger of our lives."
This settled the matter ; the Swiss of both parties rushed
to arms — and their united numbers exceeded thirty thou-
sand men.
Francois was then in position at Marignano, some
ten miles from Milan. The Swiss were in front of
him, the Spanish and Pontifical armies behind him.
The banner of Saint Mark, in the hands of Alviano
close at hand, threatened, it is true, these two hostile
forces, but the Spanish foot-soldiers were brave, disci-
plined, and mostly veterans of many a bloody field ; it
was more than doubtful, therefore, whether the Venetians
could stand up against them should they be attacked.
The French army, with half a dozen commanders, can
scarcely have been said to have had any Commander-in-
Chief.
8o Two Great Rivals
There was Francois I., with no experience, and the
Connetable de Bourbon with plenty. There was the
Marechal Trivulzi and Pedro Navarro, likewise La
Tremouille, a General who had seen many a battle-field.
Bayard and La Palice were also present, but not so that
hardy veteran the Due de Gueldre, who, by the cunning
action of Marguerite of Austria and Maximilian, had,
despite the amicable arrangement made by Francois with
his frontier neighbours, been suddenly recalled to defend
his own dominions. All of his German lansquenets were
therefore, at the last moment, left under the command
of the Lorraine Due, Claude de Guise,1 a nephew of
the Due de Gueldre. The lansquenets, finding themselves
left under the orders of a chief who could not speak their
language, cried out bitterly that they were being betrayed,
and were about to be handed over to the Swiss to be
butchered, so that the King of France should be absolved
from paying them the sums of money which he owed
them. The Germans showed accordingly a strong dis-
inclination to fight, and they being the heavy infantry
and alone armed in a similar manner to the Swiss, left
Francois I. to rely upon the light-armed French infantry
under Pedro Navarro. Fortunately the Due de Gueldre,
in departing, had left behind him the Seigneur de
Fleurange, the oft-times wounded son of his neighbour,
the Wild Boar of the Ardennes, a young knight who
was a celebrated leader of the German " Black Bands."
To employ to proper advantage his magnificent
mounted force of Gendarmerie, in which served all the
nobility of France, the young King required a level
plain in which they could manoeuvre. Instead of which
there was only a causeway in the midst of marshes
along which the men-at-arms would be able to charge.
The Commander of the King's artillery posted, however,
a great number of his heavy guns to his right, while
1 Claude, son of Ren6 II., Sovereign Due de Lorraine, was the first Due
de Guise. He was father of the warlike Due Fran9ois, and grandfather of
Mary, Queen of Scots, and of the famous Henri de Guise, murdered by
King Henri III. at Blois in December 1588.
The Battle of Marignano
81
Pietro Navarro threw up entrenchments around the
cannon, behind which he placed his light-armed Basques,
Gascons, and the men from Picardy. So convinced was
the twenty-year-old Francois that his arrangement to
buy off the Swiss would hold good, that he could not
believe that there would be any battle until he had been
warned several times that the Alpine mountaineers were
actually approaching.
It was only upon the third announcement, made to
him by Fleurange in person, that the King deigned to
take the matter seriously. The son of Robert de la
Marck found the Constable de Bourbon just sitting
down to eat his dinner, while Francois was admiring
himself in a magnificent suit of German armour which
he was trying on. The plucky young King, all armour-
clad as he was, embraced Fleurange for the good news
that he brought, then said that, before entering into
the conflict he must be dubbed a Knight.1 At the same
time he begged Alviano, who happened to be present
in the camp, to hurry off and bring up his Venetian
troops, which were at some distance. For the .ceremony
of being received into the order of Knighthood it was
imagined that Francois I. would send for one of the
greatest Princes of the realm. On the contrary, he
declared that he would only receive that dignity from
the hands of one beloved by all, the Chevalier sans peur
et sans reproche.
The modest Bayard made many objections before,
making the King kneel before him, he struck him on
the shoulder with his sword, and concluded the ceremony
by observing, " May God will it, Sire, that never may
you fly before your enemies in war ! "
Very shortly afterwards the Swiss were seen advancing.
They halted at a little distance, and, under the Papal
banner, received absolution from the Cardinal de Sion.
Immediately after this they were charged by the mounted
cavaliers of France, who, in spite of all their desperate
1 Some chronicles mention the fact of King Fran9ois being knighted,
not before, but after the battle of Marignano.
82 Two Great Rivals
courage, were driven back by the enormous mass of
heavily armed footmen to whom they found themselves
opposed. This check could only have been expected
owing to the narrow front of the charging Gendarmerie.
The Swiss struck the horses with their lances and pulled
the riders down with the crooks of their halberds, then,
dashing furiously forward, threw themselves upon the
hated German infantry standing sullenly under their
black banners. The light-armed French infantry rushed
impetuously to help the Germans, who were getting the
worst of it, while the King, at the head of two hundred
men-at-arms, created a diversion by falling upon the
Swiss in flank. The details of the battle of Marignano
are excessively conflicting, especially as Francois I., in
his letter describing the furious conflict to his mother,
boastingly made out that most of the execution was done
by the mounted men, whereas there is ample proof to
the contrary.
The battle lasted for two days, and one of the most
notable incidents of the first day's fighting was the
terrible charge made by the Swiss, by moonlight, on the
murderous guns of Pietro Navarro. Around these guns
attackers and attacked were piled up in heaps, until the
cannons could no longer be fired on account of the
mountain of dead and dying lying in front of their
muzzles. Under the clear rays of the moon the carnage
continued, until the King, mistaking an immense body
of the Swiss for his own men, suddenly found himself
surrounded.
Three hundred horsemen and several thousand lans-
quenets came to his assistance, when Francois contrived
to fall back on his guns as the Constable de Bourbon
made a determined onslaught with the French infantry
and some fresh men-at-arms, and, so said Francois, cut
five or six thousand of the Swiss in pieces. This ended
the first day's fighting, which left the Swiss in possession
of a part of the French camp. They had at one time
occupied the whole of it, but the greater number were
killed or driven out again, before, upon the moon sinking,
The Battle of Marignano 83
the wearied warriors on each side drew apart to rest
until daybreak before recommencing the struggle.
It seems highly probable that, had it not been for
the action of Cardinal Shiner in bringing up large
quantities of wine and provisions, this first conflict would
have ended by the capture of the King, whom a body
of the Swiss could observe, with but a small following,
among a battery of artillery. When the news spread
among them, however, that some barrels of wine and
food had arrived from Milan, the unconquered Swiss fell
back to feast themselves upon the welcome provisions.
The French, on the other hand, had neither wine nor
food. For prudence' sake, their camp-fires were ex-
tinguished, and the King had to drink only water so
mixed with blood that it made him vomit. During the
night his gallant captains, instead of resting, made new
dispositions of their troops, and especially of their artillery,
with the result that when the dawn broke the Swiss
found the mouths of cannon, big and little, facing them
everywhere.
The Cardinal of Sion had vainly imagined, at the end
of the first day's struggle, that the battle had been won
by the Swiss. He, accordingly, wrote off this news to
the Pope in Rome, where it was received by Leo X.
with the greatest signs of delight, and he gave orders
for general rejoicing and the illumination of the city. It
was not long, however, before the Venetian Ambassador,
Marino Giorgi, had the pleasure of being able to announce
to the Pope that his rejoicings had been a little bit pre-
mature. The battle had commenced on September I3th,
1515, and on the morrow it was continued with desperate
determination. On this second day of the great fight
the lansquenets of Fleurange, to the number of twenty
thousand, showed an unbroken front and the Swiss could
not force their ranks.
The French cavalry seem, from all accounts, to have
been more successful also in their charges than on the
preceding afternoon, while so perfect was the armour of
both men and horses of many of the nobles that, in spite
84 Two Great Rivals
of receiving many blows, they frequently sustained no
damage. An example of this difficulty in slaying a foe
was seen in the case of the son of La Tremouille, Prince
de Talmont. When this young man had fallen it took
no less than sixty-two blows on the part of the Swiss
to despatch him. Whole battalions are also said to have
passed over the fallen Claude de Guise, who was never-
theless rescued in the end. The brother of the Constable
de Bourbon remained, however, like the son of La
Tremouille and many other nobles, among the slain.
In the end, the discomfiture of the gallant Swiss was
accomplished by the advance of a troop of Venetian
cavalry. Bartolomeo Alviano had marched all night with
his men-at-arms in order to join in the conflict. When
his waving banners were seen and his horsemen advanced,
shouting, " Marco ! Marco ! " the Swiss, who had lost
fifteen thousand men, at last lost courage and fled to
Milan. The Milanese cavaliers of Maximilian Sforza
retired also, while the warlike Cardinal de Sion, who
had presided throughout the conflict on a large Spanish
jennet, preceded by a crucifix, was likewise compelled
to beat a retreat, which he did while cursing the French
to the last.
The retirement of the Swiss in no way resembled a
rout. The survivors of the battle, in which they had
lost half of their numbers, reached Milan in good order,
from which city, after demanding from the Duke
Maximilian Sforza their pay, which they did not receive,
they marched off" to the Alps, vowing to return and take
vengeance upon the French.
Francois I. lost no time in following up the defeated
foe to Milan, which place opened its gates to his forces,
consisting of the advance guard under the Constable
de Bourbon. He immediately imposed a fine of three
hundred thousand ducats upon its inhabitants ; but, as the
citadel still held out, Pietro Navarro was ordered to
besiege it. When, after a three-weeks' siege, the citadel
at length fell, Maximilian Sforza, who declared himself
to be utterly wearied of a sovereignty which cost him
The Battle of Marignano 85
so much trouble and all his money to maintain, made
terms with Francois I., who had posted himself at Pavia.
He told the young Monarch that, " being tired of the
inconstancy of the Emperor, the trickeries of the Catholic
King, the shiftiness of the Pope, and the very expensive
and turbulent aid of the Swiss," he willingly resigned
to him the Ducal crown of Milan.
Francois I. treated his fallen adversary well. He
promised to obtain for him a Cardinal's hat, but this
was a promise that was never fulfilled. He gave him,
however, a yearly pension of thirty-six thousand livres,
with which Maximilian Sforza retired gracefully to France,
where he lived perfectly contentedly for the rest of his
days, never regretting his fallen grandeur. The Spanish
Viceroy of Naples, Don Ramon da Cardona, having
hurriedly retired from the neighbourhood of Pavia
before Francois, that Monarch made a triumphal entry
into Milan with all his forces on October i4th, 1515.
The joyful expression on the well-fed countenance
of the Medici Pope, Leo X., changed to one of pallid
and terrified alarm when Marino Giorgi imparted the
intelligence of the utter overthrow of the Swiss at
Marignano. " What will become of us ? " he inquired.
He had, indeed, cause for alarm at the result of his
duplicity. After having united himself by marriage to
Frangois I., by causing his brother, Giuliano de' Medici,
to marry Filiberta of Savoy, the King's aunt, and having
promised his neutrality, he had turned against him, with
the result of his own utter discomfiture.
In spite of the Spaniards, who had hurried off without
daring to show fight ; in spite, too, of the trickery of
the Emperor, the Swiss, the only good infantry in Europe
except the German allies of France, had been defeated,
and there were no forces now left available to coerce the
triumphant young Francois — the Most Christian King —
the eldest son of the Church ! What steps might not
the conqueror now take to make himself supreme in
Italy ? Why, indeed, should he not forestall the coming
supremacy of Charles V. in Europe ?
86 Two Great Rivals
Nor was the Pope the only one to take alarm.
Henry VIII. had his jealousy aroused, while the Emperor
Maximilian was terrified lest he should find himself pre-
sently deprived of his remaining possessions in Lombardy.
The Pope made up his mind to hurry off to meet
Francois at Bologna, to try and make terms. Upon
his arrival he was greatly chagrined to find that the
Most Christian King had likewise made up his mind
to make him restore the territories of Placentia and
Parma, which had been ravished from the Duchy of
Milan by Pope Julius II. It was in vain for Leo to
beg and pray ; Francois would take no denial. However,
he considerately promised to take the Pope's natal city,
Florence, under his protection ; moreover, to protect as its
rulers the Pope's easy-going brother, Guiliano de' Medici,
and his nephew, the dissipated young Lorenzo. The
former was made by Francois Due de Nemours, in
France, while Lorenzo, three years later, married the
King's cousin, Madeleine de la Tour d'Auvergne, and
became by her the father of Catherine de' Medici, the
mother of three Kings of France.
Not content with Parma and Placentia, Francois next
demanded that the Pope, as Suzerain, should invest him
with the Crown of Naples. This request was met, how-
ever, by dissimulation, as Leo promised to comply upon
the death of Ferdinand of Aragon — an event, he said,
that was to be expected to occur very shortly.
CHAPTER VII
A Clear Sky, but a Clouded Horizon
1516-17
FRANCOIS, while having allowed himself to be
jockeyed by the Pope out of the investiture of the
Kingdom of Naples, under the understanding that he was
to receive it on the death of the Catholic King, imagined
that he had gained the real friendship of Leo X. The
astute Pontiff, while taking pains to confirm him in this
fallacy, suggested to the young Monarch a scheme whereby
they should, between them, fleece the rich clergy of
France. To this proposition Francois proved in no wise
loth to agree. Accordingly, the Most Christian King
and the Pontiff arranged a cunning Concordat, by the
terms of which, while the King would in future have
in his own hands the direct nomination to all French
Bishoprics and Abbeys, the Pope would extract as his
fee the first year's revenue from all the dignitaries of the
French Church whom the King should appoint. The
Gallican Church had, since the year 1438, been practically
confirmed in its ancient independence of both the State
and the supreme Pontiff; it now found itself muzzled,
while Francois could, if he so chose, pile up various fat
benefices in the hands of the same favoured Prince or
noble.
This little matter being arranged to their mutual
satisfaction, the French King and the Pope said good-
bye to one another with every appearance of cordiality ;
and Francois returned to France, to receive the acclama,-=
87
88 Two Great Rivals
tions of the Court and the people as a conquering hero
who had performed prodigies of valour. He left behind
him in Milan the Due de Bourbon as his Lieutenant-
General. He was supported by an army, with which,
in conjunction with the Venetians, the warlike Constable
set forth at once to be revenged upon the Emperor for
his recent trickiness in the matter of the attack on the
dominions of the Due de Gueldre. Before long, there-
fore, Max found that his misgivings had not been
unfounded, as the combined forces of Bourbon and Venice
soon deprived him of all the places which he held in
Lombardy, with the exception of the important city of
Brescia.
During the time that Francois had been away from
France he had left his mother, the Duchesse d'Angouleme,
Regent of the kingdom, and during her tenure of office
Louise had contrived to keep on good terms with her
young English neighbour across the Channel and at
Calais.
No sooner, however, had Francois returned than
Henry VIII., who held Calais, Guines, Tournay, and
other places, began to conceive schemes for the reconquest
of the greater part of France. Being only some two
years older than Francois, it was chiefly from jealousy
at the brilliancy of the French King's feats that Henry
sought to outdo him, or undo him. He commenced,
accordingly, to stir up the Catholic King and Maximilian
to revenge, and supplied the latter freely with money
wherewith to raise an army.
The envoys of Henry, Ferdinand of Aragon, and Maxi-
milian found themselves well backed up by the fiery
Cardinal de Sion, when they sought to raise an army in
Switzerland. The hundred thousand golden crowns
advanced by the English King likewise had their weight,
with the result that five of the Swiss Cantons placed all
their armed men at the disposal of the Emperor, who
took the command in person of a mixed force of thirty
thousand men. Francois, however, had also money to
spend, and spent it in Switzerland most royally. The
A Clear Sky, but a Clouded Horizon 89
result was that, by the time that the worthy but pro-
crastinating Max had got himself ready to descend into
Lombardy, the men of eight other Swiss Cantons were
on the line of march also in the same direction, and
going as fast as they could to join the Due de Bourbon
in Milan. Owing to the foolish delay of the Emperor,
in besieging a place called Asola, by the time that he
found himself in front of Milan Bourbon had received
his Swiss reinforcements, and shortly afterwards Maxi-
milian was got rid of by a clever ruse on the part of
the Marechal Trivulzi, who was with Bourbon in Milan.
A letter was written, which purported to be from the
Swiss within the city to the Swiss of the Imperial army
outside. When, as was intended, this letter reached the
hands of the Emperor, he took alarm. The superstitious
Max had repeatedly suffered from bad dreams, in which
he saw himself lying dead, like his father-in-law Charles
the Bold, who had been slain by the Swiss under the
Due de Lorraine at Nancy. He recalled likewise the
treachery of the Swiss to the Duke Ludovico Sforza,
whom they had sold to Louis XII., and therefore
determined that his person was not safe anywhere in the
neighbourhood of such an unreliable and treacherous race.
The Emperor accordingly decamped, and left his army
without a commander and without being paid. The
Imperial army, which consisted not only of Swiss, but
Spanish and German infantry and Tyrolese cavalry, at once
determined that, instead of waiting to fight and possibly be
killed by Bourbon before Milan, it would be wiser to be
off and see if they could not find their pay for themselves.
The force decamped accordingly, like its master, and,
after devastating the country and brutally sacking the
town of Lodi, its units separated, the Swiss returning
to their country well laden with booty.
Brescia was now taken by the French and Venetians,
while Odet de Foix, Seigneur de Lautrec, besieged
Verona.
Verona, which made a furious resistance, was the last
city which Maximilian held in Upper Italy, and was
90 Two Great Rivals
greatly desired by Venice. The jealous Henry VIII.,
however, sent further large sums of money to the Em-
peror, being determined at all costs to frustrate the policy
of Francois. Max thereupon returned to the charge
with a new force, determined, coute que coute, to relieve
Verona, a place of the greatest importance to him, since
it covered the Tyrol. Should this place be lost, the
Emperor realised that he would have no starting-point
left whence he might issue upon new warlike expeditions
into Italy. Matters had reached this stage, and there
seemed little hope either that the French could take
Verona or that peace could be brought about between
the Emperor and France, when an incident of the greatest
importance occurred — one after which the young Arch-
duke Charles commenced to take an important hand in
the game of which up till the present he had remained
scarcely more than a spectator.
On January 2jrd, 1516, Ferdinand of Aragon, the
Catholic King, died, and Charles found himself the actual
heir to the thrones of Aragon and Castile, of which,
owing to her increasing insanity, his mother Queen
Joanna was unable to assume the rule. In order to be
able to take peaceable possession of these States it was
absolutely necessary for Charles to come to terms with
his powerful neighbour Francois ; and by the advice
of his aunt the Archduchess Marguerite, and the far-
seeing de Chievres, he realised that it was necessary that
he should persuade his grandfather the Emperor to come
to terms also.
All was arranged to his satisfaction by the treaty of
Noyon between Charles and Francois, while, by the
subsequent treaty of Brussels on December 3rd, 1516,
Maximilian agreed to resign Verona for the equivalent
of two hundred thousand ducats.
By the treaty of Noyon, Charles was to marry, not
Renee the daughter of Louis XII. as previously arranged,
but one of the infant daughters of Francois, and she was
to bring as her dowry to Charles the part of the kingdom
of Naples to which her father laid claim.
A Clear Sky, but a Clouded Horizon 91
Until the child should reach a marriageable age Charles
was to pay to Francois a hundred thousand golden
crowns yearly. To the Queen of Navarre, Catherine
de Foix, widow of Jean d'Albret, a large sum of money
was accorded in return for her Spanish possessions, which
had been taken from her by Ferdinand of Aragon when
she had been fighting as the ally of France.
Francois I. and Venice now shared the north of Italy
between them, while, by an alliance which the former
entered into at Fribourg with the thirteen Cantons, it
seemed as if his supremacy at Milan was absolutely
secured. To make the settlement still more binding the
young Charles, who now called himself King of Spain
his grandfather Maximilian and Francois, made yet a
third treaty at Cambray on March nth, 1517. By this
the three Monarchs vowed mutually to assist one another,
and further to prepare a combined army wherewith to
resist the aggression of the Turks. Even the jealous
Henry VIII. was induced to come into this bond of
friendship. He consented to give up Tournay and two
other cities in French Flanders on consideration of the
French King agreeing to pay six hundred thousand
crowns, and allying the infant Dauphin to the Princess
Mary, born in 1516.
Thus by the beginning of the year 1518 Francois
had consolidated his power in France and Italy, he had
covered himself with glory, and peace reigned throughout
Europe. It seemed as if the only disturbances likely to
jangle in the general quiet would be the sound of the
marriage bells of the projected alliances which were for
ever to unite the various Royal families.
Indeed, what cause for quarrel could there now be,
with the young Dauphin to marry the daughter of
Henry VIII., and Charles to become the son-in-law of
the French King ?
On such good terms did Charles at this time seem
to be with Francois that in his letters to him he addressed
as " My good father " this Prince only six years older
than himself, and signed himself " Your dutiful son."
92 Two Great Rivals
Alas, however, for treaties of friendship and treaties
of marriage ! Almost before the ink was dry on the
paper the elements of discord were rife by which they
would be torn to shreds.
The great question which was commencing to agitate
all Europe at this moment, when the outlook seemed to
be so peaceful, was who after Maximilian was to sway the
Imperial sceptre of Germany, commonly known as that of
the Holy Roman Empire. For Max was old, and worn
out with his perpetual wars and hunting excursions ; it
did not seem as if he could live much longer to enjoy
that tide of Emperor to which, as a matter of fact, he
had no right, for he was Emperor-Elect. According to
the constitution of the Empire, from the time that, long
after the downfall of Rome, it had been re-established
by Charlemagne, to be Emperor it was necessary to be
crowned by the Pope in Italy. Maximilian I., Archduke
of Austria, although crowned in 1486 at Aix-la-Chapelle,
had since his election never yet found time, opportunity,
or a Pope willing to invest him. He, therefore, was in
fact only the rightful possessor of the title always accorded
to the elected heir to the Empire, that is to say, King of
the Romans.
Herein lay the difficulty with reference to the future,
for had he not been really the King of the Romans
himself he could have contrived during his lifetime to
induce the Princes of Electoral rank, spiritual and temporal,
to elect his grandson Charles as King of the Romans, and
thereby have ensured his succession.
These Electoral Princes were seven in number, and
from ancient times the elections had taken place at a
Diet assembled at Frankfort, although the Electors also
met for various purposes occasionally at Augsburg.
Although, according to the Golden Bull of Charles IV.
regulating the elections, they were supposed to be per-
fectly honest and free, all of the seven Electors, of whom
three were Archbishop-Princes, were open to bribes.
Their suffrages — such was the virtue of these honest
Princes — could, in fact, be procured in no other way.
A Clear Sky, but a Clouded Horizon 93
The wily Maximilian was well aware of this fact.
He was a representative of the House of Habsburg, and
two of his ancestors had already worn the Imperial
Crown in the thirteenth and fourteenth centuries.
Again, for the last eighty-one years this Austrian
family had without a break continued to occupy the
Imperial throne ; he did not therefore think that, just
for want of a little money wisely expended, the Empire
should on his own decease be allowed to go elsewhere.
The impecunious Max did not, however, propose to
spend this money himself. His daughter Marguerite
was naturally of the same opinion as the Emperor, and
likewise his grandson Charles ; but while the former was
ready to sacrifice her last stiver to ensure the succession
of her nephew, the latter was anxious to buy the future
votes of the Electors at as cheap a rate as possible. In
the meantime, while the young Archduke, who now called
himself King of Spain, was preparing to set sail for that
country to endeavour to make good his claim to the
succession, in spite of the fact of his crazy mother having
become the actual Monarch of Castile and Aragon, he
became aware that he had a rival in the field for the
future possessions of the Empire.
The brilliant renown, the halo of glory, which floated
over the head of the young conqueror of Marignano had
caused many of the inhabitants of Europe to look towards
the Valois rather than the Habsburg as one likely to
defend them from the encroachment of the Turk. Over-
tures had been made to Francois from some of the Electors
themselves, headed by the Archbishop of Treves, to which
he had not been at all slow in responding. They wanted
his money, and he was quite ready to promise it to them,
moreover as that frequently engaged Princess, Renee of
France, did not happen just then to be betrothed to any-
one, Francois promised her to the Electoral Prince of
Brandenburg with an enormous dowry. At the same
time he made other large promises to the German Princes,
on the understanding that they should furnish him
with soldiers to be kept in his pay in case of war.
94 Two Great Rivals
Germany as a whole was willing enough to give herself
into the hands of Frangois at this time, if simply as a
means of freedom from the exactions of the Church and
the tyranny of religion. Luther was commencing to make
his voice heard, and his followers were increasing rapidly.
All that was required of Francois was to take the part of
freedom, to declare himself against the Pope, or any other
tyrant. Whether this tyrant belonged to the House of
Habsburg or no would make but little difference.
It was, however, a mistake on his part, not being a
German, to put himself forward as a candidate for the
Empire. What he should have done was to have selected
one of the Electoral Princes and made of him an Emperor,
to be kept in his own pocket, and in this way he would
have been able to resist the aggression which he might
have to expect in the future upon his frontiers, from the
directions both of the Low Countries and of Spain. He
preferred, however, instead of looking to security at home
by making the Germans his allies, and instead of con-
tenting himself with protecting these allies against the
oppression of the Empire, to become an Emperor himself
and to go on with his Italian conquests. The Archduke
Charles, who looked forward to himself succeeding his
grandfather, was informed of the dangerous intrigues
that were going on. He did not wish, at such an important
moment in his career, to break the peace by which the
safety of the Low Countries was secured, but at the very
moment of embarking for Spain he sent off to inform his
grandfather of what was taking place, and to ask him to
take all possible steps to frustrate the French designs.
The Germanic Empire, to which both of these young
Princes aspired, was an extraordinary agglomeration of
States, and greatly divided. It comprised a Kingdom, that
of Bohemia, Hereditary States, Elective Estates, and
Electoral Principalities, Duchies, Marquisates, ruled by a
Margrave, Sovereign Countships or Counties, Seigneuries,
Free Cities, and various Ecclesiastical Principalities. Of
these latter there were not only Sovereign Archbishoprics
and Bishoprics, but even Sovereign Priories.
A Clear Sky, but a Clouded Horizon 95
Among all these discordant units it had been in vain
that the Emperor Max had sought to establish a Common
Imperial Chamber of Justice ; for the various parts, small
and great, were not only constantly at war with each other,
but in a continual condition of ferment and revolt against
their nominal Imperial Master. The Empire likewise
included certain ancient rights in Italy, the chief of
which was that of the Kingdom of Lombardy, while
Maximilian, either as Emperor or in his own person as
ruler of Austria, or through his grandson, the heir to
his late wife Marie of Burgundy, ruler of the Netherlands,
was in a constant state of warfare with various martial
border Princelings. Among these, the most important
were Charles d'Egmont, Due de Gueldre, whose territories
on the affluents of the Meuse and the Rhine the Emperor
claimed, and the famous Robert de la Marck, the Wild
Boar of the Ardennes.
Some vague rights the Empire claimed likewise over
Switzerland, and it considered the Duchy of Lorraine as
being also under its influence, although the Duke of that
country was more often than not in arms on the side of
France. That the Emperor likewise claimed the powers
of Suzerain over that turbulent State the Duchy of
Savoy would seem apparent.
That there was little advantage other than honour in
becoming the titular chief of such a heterogeneous mass
of divided countries, cities, and States is evident from
the fact that the bold Maximilian was often so short of
cash as to be willing to enrol himself for pay as a soldier
in foreign armies. It was but an empty honour at best,
and one that a Frenchman like Francois had far better have
left alone. His vanity was, however, so great that when,
merely for the sake of what they thought they might get
out of him, he was approached by the treacherous and
greedy Electoral Princes, the young Prince fell into the
snare at once and forged his own fetters for the future.
His folly was shared by the English King, for
Henry VIII. likewise sought to make himself the repre-
sentative of the Holy Roman Empire in Europe. The
96 Two Great Rivals
way in which he went about the matter, when the time
came, was mean and treacherous in the extreme. While
representing to both the competitors, Francois and Charles,
that he was working in their interests, Henry was really
canvassing the Electors on his own behalf. He failed
entirely in his designs, and probably felt thoroughly
ashamed of himself when Europe saw through them. As,
however, his candidature was such an utter failure we
need say no more about it. He had not the excuse of
Francois I. — the popularity which made his success not
only possible, but probable.
The strength of Fran£ois was not only that of circum-
stances, but personal. Everything smiles on youth and
on success. His success at the start of his career deceived
every one. What he did wrong was put down to his
youth, but good seemed to prevail, and he had a fine
appearance. This magnificent young Prince fascinated
the world. Gifted with the power of brilliant speech,
successful with the sword in battle, he became an
imposing figure. The false hilarity of his deceitful
eyes seemed to represent nothing but French gaiety,
soldierly gallantry and frankness. To all he seemed the
veritable Prince Charming who for long had been
expected in vain. Why, indeed, should not every
triumph fall to the lot of such a gay Paladin, one beloved
by men and adored by women ? In his manners
Francois made a point of cultivating a charming courtesy.
The idol of his sister Marguerite and of his mother, the
latter of whom calls him in her diary " my Caesar," he
was to be seen bending low, hat in hand, when addressing
them in public. This studied politeness in one who was
a great King imposed on the popular mind ; people
thought that his heart must indeed be good. He had
only, in addition, to show himself generous to appear the
most gallant young Knight in Christendom ; and generosity
he practised, especially with his enemies, such as the
Swiss, when he wished to captivate them, with signal
success. His reputation, after three years of rule, was
universally assured, therefore, for generosity, gallantry to
A Clear Sky, but a Clouded Horizon 97
women, high-mi ndedness, chivalry, courteousness, and
courage.
To make himself the centre of resistance among all the
varied elements of Europe against the Pope and the
House of Austria, all that it remained to him to do was
to show himself really the protector of the weak against
the strong.
Had Francois but pursued this policy consistently,
instead of fitfully, with such high-hearted allies as the
weak but undaunted la Marck and the Due de Gueldre,
had he but continued to follow his sister's teachings and
supported those who strove for purity of religion, he
would have become, if not Emperor, certainly the King
of the hearts of Europe. He would have had none to
fear but Henry VIII., who could do nothing so long as
Francois backed up consistently the ambitions of Cardinal
Wolsey to the Papacy. Henry VIII. could, moreover,
have been controlled had Francois only followed a bolder
policy in Scotland. To that country he sent the Duke of
Albany as a Regent ; all that was required was to back up
Albany with an army, to keep the English King em-
ployed at home instead of allowing him a free hand to
descend from time to time into France.
If Francois had whole-heartedly backed up the revolu-
tion of the Church against the Pope, the ecclesiastical
funds would have been at his disposal, and he would
have been able to follow this course with signal success.
CHAPTER VIII
The Champions of Reform
1517 AND LATER
A LTHOUGH he had received his warlike education
A\ from Maximilian, whose prisoner he had been in
his youth, after first being the prisoner of Charles the
Bold, Charles d'Egmont, Due de Gueldre, was, as we
have seen, the friend of France and the enemy of Austria.
His mother was Catherine de Bourbon, and from the
time of Louis XI. both he and the Due de Bouillon,
the Wild Boar of the Ardennes, had drawn the sword
against Burgundy and Austria on many a field. Wonder-
ful indeed were the feats of these two noted leaders of
the Black Bands, composed chiefly of German mercenaries.
Having been taken prisoner by the Duke of Burgundy
with arms in his hands at the age of six, later the Due de
Gueldre, an almost imperceptible Prince, did not shrink
from defying the whole force of the Empire. It was in
vain that, aided by Saxons and Bavarians, the Emperor,
who claimed his Duchy, strove to crush this petty but
irritating foe, one who, not content with defending him-
self, never hesitated to invade and pillage Holland and
Brabant. The Archduchess Marguerite, Regent of the
Low Countries, during the minority of Charles was
frequently compelled to beg from England or from the
Pope aid against this constant thorn in her side, but for
nearly fifty years he remained indomitable, having for a
long period the tacit if not the open support of France in
Lower Germany. This French protection should have
98
The Champions of Reform 99
been further extended to the Upper Rhine, so as to in-
clude the resistance of all the Knights and small nobility,
so down-trodden by the feudal system, against the power-
ful liege lords by whom they were barbarously persecuted
and despoiled.
There was a general revolution taking place within the
confines of the Empire, and it was of two kinds. The
poor Knights and small nobles, who were ruined and
starving, and the peasantry, reduced to the utmost misery,
formed the elements of the first kind, and these different
classes joined hands in unanimously accusing the princely
ecclesiastics of causing the common ruin. All cried out
that the state of the Church in Germany could no longer
be supported. Since no relief came from the Emperor,
the people were determined to work out their own
salvation.
The other kind of revolution was among the upper
ranks of society. It was literary and religious, and in-
volved the right of the human mind to educate itself,
by the use of the ancient lore preserved to the world by
the Jews in their books. Those who revolted, when the
monks sought to burn the valuable Hebrew works and
their translations, were the nobles, the jurists, and the
savants. The whole of Germany was in an uproar over
this matter, in which the fiercely combative knight, Ulrich
von Hutten (who was named Poet Laureate by the
Emperor, whom he converted to his views) was, with
the talented scholar Reuchlin, in favour of the Jews and
their literature.
Just after the battle of Marignano, when Francois'
fame was at its greatest height, the young King, who was
supposed always to be devoted to every form of les belles
lettres^ had the opportunity given him of deciding upon
the rights of humanity in this matter. His opinion
would have had the force of law at that moment, when
Pope Leo X., a man who cared nothing for religion but
a great deal for literature, was cowering at the feet of the
splendid Knight and Monarch who held Italy in the
hollow of his hand. The Dominican monks — the in-
ioo Two Great Rivals
tolerant and cruel bigots who formed the backbone of the
Inquisition, had come from Germany to accuse von
Hutten and Reuchlin to the Pope. They visited Francois,
to ask him to give the weight of his opinion to their
cause. To see how he acted and lost his chance of
supporting this revival of learning, we will quote the
words of Michelet.
" It depended upon a still more general question, that
of knowing whether he was going to be the friend or the
enemy of the Pope.
" This young man was at the bottom very neuter in
all these great questions. Between the revolution and
the Pope he had chosen — what do you think ? A baker's
wife of Lodi ! In the same way that the Swiss, when
conquered, got drunk with the vin de Beaune, and
allowed themselves to be burned alive, the conqueror
established himself, they say, at the house of thisfornarina :
to his injury ; he fell sick, as he had been once already
before he came to the throne.
" Such, then, was the palm of this Caesar, as his mother
called him, the crown of this King of the world, the hope
of the oppressed, the poetic idol of the weak heart of
Marguerite. . . . This Royal figure, which seemed to
understand all and boasted wonderfully, was in reality
a splendid automaton in the hands of his mother, the
intriguing, violent, and cunning Savoyarde, and of a man
of business, Du Prat, cunning, vile, and base, whom he
took for Chancellor. The mother loved her son passion-
ately, and nevertheless played upon him. She said boldly
to the Legate, * Address yourself to me ; we will go our
own road together. If the King scolds, let him.' '
Du Prat was at this time on the look-out for a Cardinal's
hat, and accordingly was quite ready to play the Pope's
game. He was a widower, and caused his head to be
shaved, and made up to Leo X. quite irrespective of his
master, who was given up to the Pope by the designs of
Louise de Savoie and the man who was her Minister,
rather than her son's Minister.
Louise de Savoie was at this time trying to unite the
The Champions of Reform 101
lilies of France to the pills which were the arms of the
Medici, whose most ancient ancestor was an apothecary.
The match, as we have already mentioned, was arranged
between Lorenzo de' Medici and the King's cousin,
Madeleine de la Tour d'Auvergne, and Du Prat got his
hat. Francois at the same time allowed his Confessor
to write to Leo X. against the German revolution.
The monks seemed to have gained their victory,
but von Hutten was by no means suppressed. This
poet, this young Knight, who had nothing but his
sword and his pen, had a frail body, but indomitable
courage. With sword and pen he was equally suc-
cessful. He was famous for his duels and his love
affairs, and ever as ready to whip out his long rapier
from its sheath for a word against a woman as he was for
a slighting remark concerning his beloved Germany, and
his skill as a swordsman was as remarkable as that of
Bayard with the lance.
Being protected by the good-natured Emperor, one
day in Rome von Hutten heard seven Frenchmen abusing
Max, when such blasphemy was more than he could
stand. He charged the whole seven, and remained the
master of the field.
In spite of the supposed enmity of the Pope, this daring
spirit did not fear to revisit Rome. There he wrote a
brilliant satire upon the Church, supporting the views of
Luther, and boldly dedicated the work to no one less than
Leo X. The Pope, who was little better than an educated
Pagan and a sportsman who loved a joke, merely laughed
at this volume of epigrams upon " the city where Simon
the magician hunts the apostle Peter, and where the
successors of Cato are the Roman women."
As a matter of fact, it was difficult for the Medici
Pope to allow the Dominicans to burn, as they wished,
both Reuchlin and von Hutten. For these had behind
them the Emperor, the Dukes of Saxony, Wurtemburg,
and Bavaria, while thirty-six German cities were writing
in their favour. Likewise the humanists, with Erasmus
at their head, joined with the great mass of the German
io2 Two Great Rivals
nobles in supporting them. On the other side were the
pedantic Doctors of Paris and the Sorbonne ; but their
credit was in the decline, and they were killed by the
ridicule of the ironical works which made sport of their
antiquated methods.
Such was the force of the biting Epistol* obscurorum
virorum of Ulrich von Hutten, that after its appearance
there was no chance for the Inquisition in Germany. The
white robes of the Dominicans, which previously had
everywhere been seen with terror, became merely objects
of scorn. The monks themselves were treated as a joke —
they were laughed at, even in Rome, as ignorant beasts
who had been allowed to impose upon people too long —
the pen of Hutten had shown them up as impostors.
Upon leaving Italy, von Hutten, who had no place
but his ruined castle to resort to, and no money, was
recommended to change his ways. He was sick like-
wise, when the young Electoral Archbishop Prince of
Mayence, Albert of Brandenburg, the man who managed
the shady money-making affair of the sale of Indulgences
for the Pope, thought it would be amusing to entertain
him at his Court.
There was a certain amount of cunning in the action
of the avaricious Archbishop Prince. He thought that
the presence of this redoubtable hero of the German
revolution at Mayence would serve as a protection to
his own name — shield him from the attacks of those who
knew him for what he was and did not scruple to say
so. As von Hutten's protector, Albert imagined that he
could pose as the protector also of the Muses, of those
who supported freedom of thought, and of the learned.
The triumph of the Archbishop of Mayence, who was
the head trafficker in the ignoble bargains for the Imperial
elections about to take place, did not last long. Von
Hutten soon realised the dirt of the puddle in which
he had foolishly allowed himself to seek temporary repose,
and determined to sully his coat no longer.
One fine morning, when the voice of Luther was
commencing to make itself heard, without saying good-
The Champions of Reform 103
bye to his host, Ulrich von Hutten took his hat and
walked out. He went off and joined himself to that
celebrated Knight, the free-lance Franz von Seckingen,
a Paladin who had earned for himself the title of the
avenger of the oppressed and the defender of the weak.
Von Hutten was a poet, and Martin Luther, the father
of Reform, was a musician. This latter, far from being,
as may have been supposed, a dreary-faced ascetic, was
cheerful and robust, with a round, open countenance, and
was usually to be seen with a musical instrument, lute or
flute, in hand. Born at Eisleben in Saxony in 1483, by
the year 1517 this question of the sale of Indulgences
had aroused Luther's scorn and anger.
Leo X., the son of Lorenzo the Magnificent, was as
prodigal a Pope as Francois I. was a King. He could
not squander enough money on his immense entertain-
ments, the production of the gross and ridiculous farces
wherein his soul delighted, his Royal processions, and
continual hunting parties. Spending thus with both
hands, the immense sums which he received from the
Church and his Papal dominions in no way sufficed for
his boundless extravagance.
He invented or had suggested to him by his crony and
toady, Dovizi, Cardinal of Bibbiena, the idea of raising
money by the sale of eternal salvation, at so much a crime.
Under the pretence that he required funds for the
rebuilding of St. Peter's in Rome, Leo commenced to
exploit Germany, where his principal agents were Fugger,
the great banker of Augsburg, the financial King of
Europe, and the Archbishop of Mayence.
Fugger was at the same time the banker of the Empire,
and, for immense rights conferred, advanced all the
boundless sums which were placed at the disposal of
Maximilian and Charles for the purpose of bribing the
Electors. Since Fugger had been forbidden to cash any
French bills of exchange, when it came to the point that
Frangois required in a hurry more douceurs to pay to the
grasping Electors, he found himself greatly handicapped.
For these Electors, notably Albert of Brandenburg, re-
104 Two Great Rivals
quired money down each time that they made a new
promise to vote for the French or the Flemish aspirant
to the Imperial title.
While Albert of Brandenburg was raking in the spoils
by the sale of Indulgences and handing them on to Leo,
through Fugger, both Archbishop and Banker sticking
to their own share of the profits, it was a matter of in-
difference to him what kind of agent he employed for
the nefarious traffic. His principal agent wherewith to
deceive the people was an infamous monk named Tetzel,
a regular charlatan who went round from city to city,
like any other cheap-jack, advertising his wares. Luther
declared humorously : "I will smash in his drum for
him," and he was not long before he attacked Tetzel's
master, the Archbishop of Mayence.
Tetzel was a man who had been guilty of all sorts of
crimes deserving death. These, in his harangue to the
crowds, he did not deny. u Look at me ! " he exclaimed,
" see what an Indulgence has done for a rascal like my-
self ! I am now a lamb white as snow." He declared
that there was no crime committed in the past or to be
committed in the future which could not be covered by a
Papal Indulgence, that everything would be infallibly
forgiven. Tetzel had a scale of charges according to the
crime which had been committed, or which it was sought
to commit : murder so much, rape so much. Horrible
as it all was, his merchandise was proving highly profitable
throughout the States of Germany, when Luther took
up the cudgels and boldly attacked the Archbishop of
Mayence.
In 1517 Luther wrote a nobly worded letter to Albert,
pointing out to him the reckoning of his account which
he would infallibly one day have to render to God. At
the same time he boldly nailed to the door of the Church
of the Castle of Wittemburg his indignant and fiery con-
demnation, full of biting irony, of the sale of Indulgences.
Rome was terrified, especially as it imagined the de-
termined action of Luther to be the work of the German
Princes.
Tammi, photo after the painting by Lucas CranacJi.
MARTIN LUTHER.
p. 104]
The Champions of Reform 105
The Emperor Maximilian, who detested Leo X., began
to say, " The Pope is a rascal, he shall be the last of
them." And, oddly enough, he began seriously to think
of causing himself to be elected Pope. When Luther
was summoned to appear and answer for his performances
in Rome, Max said, " Let us keep the monk, we may
want him, he may be useful to us." The Electoral Duke
of Saxony and the other great Princes were also inclined
to sustain this defender of Germany.
Luther, however, appeared at a Diet at Augsburg
before the Cardinal Cajetano, sent to coerce him if
possible. Cajetano, who was at heart of Luther's own
way of thinking, sought to show the Reformer the danger
in which he stood and to persuade him to retract. " Do
you think," asked the Cardinal, " that the Pope worries
himself much about Germany ? Do you fancy that the
Princes will raise armies to defend you ? What shelter
will you find ? "
" The shelter of heaven," replied Luther. When
warned, later, not to pay any attention to the summons
to appear before the Diet of Worms, he boldly declared :
" I will go there, even if I should find as many devils as
there are tiles upon the roofs." Devils there were in
plenty, but Luther found protection in Germany, notably
from the Electoral Duke of Saxony, and, although he was
excommunicated in 1520, he publicly burned the Pope's
Bull.
After having bravely appeared before Charles V. at the
Diet of Worms in 1521, the Duke Frederick III. of
Saxony, to prevent Luther from being taken off to Rome,
probably to be burned at the stake, seized him and locked
him up for his own protection in the Castle of Wartburg.
There Luther occupied his time by translating the Old
and New Testaments. Although in Holy Orders, in
1525 the Reformer married Catherine von Bora, who
had been a nun, and he eventually died in 1546 at
Eisleben, where he had been born.
After Hutten left the Elector of Mayence, he established
himself with his printing press at Ebernburg, in the castle
io6 Two Great Rivals
of the bold Franz von Seckingen. He read to him
Luther's writings, and secured the sword of this redoubt-
able champion for the cause of Reform.
From this time until his death in 1523, at the early age
of thirty-five, Ulrich Hutten remained as much the back-
bone of the revolution in Germany as Luther himself.
While, however, Luther, confined to his rancours born in
the cloister, saw and desired only the reformation of the
dogma and ecclesiastical discipline, the poetical Knight,
whom the Emperor had caused to be crowned with laurels
by a fair maiden of high birth, went further in his views.
He attacked with passion political tyranny and social
abuses. Given over to these ideas of political and social
regeneration, Hutten inspired the powerful Seckingen
with his aims. Together they formed projects for the
unity of Germany on the ruins of princely and episcopal
feudality. Utterly fearless, at one time he published the
statement : " The real Turks are in Italy ; the Sultan is
the Pope and his army is the clergy."
Leo X. then demanded the Knight's extradition, but
Seckingen's protection ensured his safety.
CHAPTER IX
The Love Affair of Eleonore
WHILE such an element of unrest was prevailing in
Germany, Charles had proceeded to Spain to take
possession of his new dominions. He had delayed for
some time in Flanders after the death of his grandfather
Ferdinand of Aragon, who left two Regents, both church-
men, to manage the countries over which he had ruled.
His illegitimate son, the Archbishop of Saragossa, presided
over Aragon, while the very aged Cardinal Ximenes
governed Castile.
Charles had lost no time in causing himself to be
proclaimed, at his Court of Brussels, as King of Spain in
conjunction with his mother Joanna, but the touchy
grandees and the people of Spain were greatly annoyed
when they heard of this event, which they regarded as a
breach of etiquette. Ximenes, however, after some delay,
proclaimed Charles in Castile, and when the young
Monarch showed no signs of coming, wrote repeatedly to
hasten his departure from the Low Countries. Aragon,
however, declared that Joanna was Queen and Charles
only her heir. At length, after obtaining a loan from
Henry VIII. to meet his expenses, Charles departed in
September 1516 by sea, with a splendid retinue of Flemish
nobles headed by de Chievres, and taking with him also
the wives of his principal courtiers.
He visited his mother and young sister Catherine at
Tordesillas, when the former in her half-crazy condition
had great difficulty in recognising Charles and his elder
sister Eleonore, by whom he was accompanied,
107
io8 Two Great Rivals
The youthful Archduke Ferdinand, who was then in
Spain, Charles not long afterwards sent back to Marguerite
at Brussels, for he found his reception by the Spaniards
by no means too cordial, and as Ferdinand was most
popular he considered it better to have him out of
the way.
It must be remembered that although Charles was not
yet seventeen years old when he arrived in Spain, his
training had been such as to make him foreseeing and
careful, and he did not want to take any unnecessary risks
owing to his brother's possible rivalry.
His behaviour was not, however, such as to endear him
to the people of his Spanish dominions, since he gave at
once every possible post to his Burgundian and Flemish
followers, while excluding the ancient nobility of Spain.
De Chievres remained his principal adviser. Jean le
Sauvaige, the Chancellor of Burgundy, was appointed
Chancellor of Castile, while a Croy, a mere boy of
eighteen, the nephew of de Chievres, was made the Arch-
bishop of Toledo. The Flemish nobles soon made it plain
that they had come to Spain solely with the idea of filling
their pockets with the broad gold pieces of Ferdinand and
Isabella, while their wives were just as bad if not worse
than themselves. Although when the Castilians saw the
furious hunger of money with which the Flemings had
come, they had made their new King swear that no specie
should be taken out of the country, the Flemings thought
that it would be safer in Brussels than in Spain. They
set to work, accordingly, to collect every one of the pure
gold ducats that could be found. Soon there were so few
left that when a Spaniard saw one of these large golden
coins, with the head of Ferdinand on one side and Isabella
on the other, he uncovered himself, remarking : " May
God preserve you, double-headed ducat, since M. de
Chievres has not found you yet ! " Upon one occasion
when Charles ordered the assembly of the Cortes of
Castile, which he did in order to ask, as usual, for supplies,
he caused the greatest discontent by summoning it to
assemble, away from Castile, upon the coast in a seaport
Photo by J. Laurent & Co. after the painting in the Prado, Madrid
QUEEN JOANNA OF CASTILE,
Mother of Charles V.
p. 108]
The Love Affair of Eteonore 109
of Galicia upon the Atlantic, whence it was more con-
venient to ship away the gold to Flanders.
One seems to be reading once more of the unscrupulous
actions of the Princes de Conde and de Conti — who, in the
time of John Law and the Regent d'Orleans, calmly drove
off many wagonfuls of gold from the Banque Royale —
when one learns what took place at this Galician port.
" Madame de Chievres, after the fashion of a good
housekeeper, brought there the load of eighty chariots and
three hundred mules ; Madame de Lannoy that of ten
wagons and forty horses ; the King's Confessor that of
sixteen mules and ten chariots."
This Madame de Lannoy was the wife of the future
Viceroy of Naples, a man whose name was before long
to become very celebrated in connection with the Italian
wars against, and capture of, Francois I. in Italy. When
after three years in Spain Charles and his courtiers re-
turned to Flanders they left civil war behind them, the
whole country being up in arms owing to their extortions.
While there their sole idea was not to be disturbed by
Francois I., whom they kept amused with the hope of
Charles marrying a daughter of France.
Francois had his own ideas as to their sincerity, but so
long as he was paid a hundred thousand golden crowns
annually, under the pretence of this marriage, he was
perfectly satisfied.
In spite of the great disinclination of the various
Kingdoms of Spain to acknowledge him, Charles soon
succeeded by his strong force of will in making the
Castilians recognise him as co-Sovereign of Castile. He
also persuaded the Cortes of Valladolid not only to place
his name before his mother's in all official documents, but
to vote him a subsidy of six hundred thousand ducats, to
be raised in three years in the Kingdoms of Castile, Leon,
and Granada. Proceeding from Valladolid to Saragossa
in May 1518, Charles found the proud Aragonese nobles
openly declaring that they would not call Don Carlos King,
nor give him a single obolus so long as his mother should
live. He, however, solemnly swore in the Church of San
no Two Great Rivals
Salvador, in his mother's name and his own, before the
permanent Council of the Kingdom of Aragon, to respect
all the ancient rights, privileges, and customs of the
country. Subsequently he convoked the Cortes in person,
and demanded recognition as King and also a subsidy.
After two months of hesitation, the four orders of the
kingdom were overawed into admitting Charles to a
share in the Kingdom with his mother. It was not,
however, until a further period of six months had elapsed
that, by requests accompanied by menaces, the Cortes of
Saragossa consented to vote him the sum of two hundred
thousand ducats. From Saragossa Charles proceeded to
the Principality of Catalonia, and then to the Kingdom
of Valencia, to enforce equal recognition and subsidies.
It was when he was entering Barcelona in February 1519
that he learned of the death of his grandfather Maximilian,
who had, ever since his departure from the Low Countries,
been constantly writing to him, causing Marguerite to
write to him, and working in the interests of his future
grandeur.
We have mentioned above that Charles had taken his
elder sister Eleonore with him into Spain. There had
been a reason for this. The Archduchess was a hand-
some and very high-spirited girl of a romantic tempera-
ment, and she had contrived to fall deeply in love with the
Count Frederick, brother of the Electoral Count Palatine,
Louis V. She was at that time nearly twenty years
of age, and, as Frederick had been brought up in the
Court of her father, the Archduke Philippe Le Beau,
the couple had had ample opportunities for love-making.
Her passion was shared with fervour by the handsome
cadet of the Palatine House, and it is uncertain to what
extent their amours had proceeded when the astute
Guillaume de Croy opened the eyes of Eleonore's brother
to what was going on. De Chievres was even mean
enough to inform the Prince, then lately attained to his
majority at the age of fifteen, that his sister had just
received a love-letter from her beloved, and concealed
it in her bosom. Charles determined to obtain this
The Love Affair of Eleonore in
epistle, and, after a personal scuffle with his sister, at
length succeeded in wresting it from her. From its
contents, in which the Count wrote, " Ma mie^ I don't
care for anything so long as I belong to you and you
belong to me," Charles discovered that the loving couple
intended to be married on the first opportunity.
Charles, the descendant of numberless Royal and
semi-Royal personages, did not choose that his elder
sister should marry the mere brother of an Elector
Palatine, no matter how deeply her affections should be
engaged. Nor did it matter to him that he had himself
o o
always been attached to the Count, who was, however,
considerably his senior. Making use of his authority as
ruling Prince of the Low Countries, the youthful Arch-
duke caused his sister and her lover to undergo con-
siderable humiliation. In the presence of " an apostolical
notary," whatever he may have been, before also the
Seigneur de Chievres, the Seigneur de Roeulx, the Baron
de Montigny, and the Chamberlain de Courteville, all
Knights of the Golden Fleece, he caused the guilty
couple to abjure each other.
He then sent the Count Frederick away from his
Court, and carried his sister off with him to Spain, so
that she might have no further opportunities of giving
herself up to the delights of love in his absence.
When he had arrived in Spain the astute boy soon
found an opportunity of marrying his sister off to a
King who was not likely to trouble his head as to any
previous amourettes on the part of a bride so highly placed
by birth as the delinquent Eleonore. This was Emanuel
of Portugal, nicknamed the Fortunate or the Lucky, a
Monarch who had already had two wives, Isabella and
Maria, both of whom were aunts of his third spouse, since
they were daughters of Ferdinand and Isabella. In his
society Eleonore was not, however, compelled to live very
long while mourning the loss of her affinity, for, his good
fortune at last deserting him, Emanuel, who was by no
means young, departed this life after making Eleonore
the mother of a little girl.
H2 Two Great Rivals
The fair Eleonore thus became again a Princesie a
marier — and, as a widowed Queen, she was left a valuable
asset on her brother's hands, in that day when Royal
matrimonial alliances were held out as a bait upon every
possible occasion that political exigencies required. In
spite of this, it was no less than twelve years before she
again found a husband. When she did so, not only was
he not the man of her own early choice, but she herself,
from dwelling in the sultry climates of Portugal and
Spain, had lost entirely the pristine freshness of her youth
passed in the salt-laden airs of her northern land, washed
by the stormy waves of the German Ocean.
Nor was she to be united en secondes noces to a very
great and warlike, if very unfortunate, personage of
whom we shall hear a good deal before long, one who
had made of the promise of her hand a stipulation for
the performance of various very great services which he
rendered to her brother Charles, and which proved
extremely unfortunate to the fair realm of France. She
was promised to Bourbon by her brother, it is true, but
what were promises to Charles V. when he had made up
his mind that he had more to gain by breaking than
keeping them ? Her second marriage with Fra^ois I.
was a most unhappy one for poor Eleonore. Even if,
at the time of its consummation, it seemed as though it
might bring to herself great honour and to her brother
great profit, she very soon realised that she would have
been far happier if, when she became her own mistress
as the widow of the King, she had snapped her fingers
at her Royal brother and redeemed the tender vows
made at the age of twenty to the man whom she loved
so dearly.
In the year 1524 Eleonore's youngest sister, Catherine,
married John III., who in 1523 had succeeded the lucky
Emanuel on the throne of Portugal. This Catherine was
the sixth child of the Archduke Philippe and Joanna of
Castile, and was born early in 1507 after her father
had been dead five months, he having only lived to the
age of twenty-eight.
CHAPTER X
Max and Marguerite Lay their Plans
1516 — 1519
WHEN Charles left for Spain in 1516 Maximilian and
Marguerite were both agreed to look after his in-
terests in his absence. Marguerite, whose hostile rancour
to France was never forgotten, was as determined as was
her father himself that if she could prevent it Francois
should never become Emperor. She was now reinstated
in all her ancient grandeur as Ruler of the Low Countries ;
indeed, her power was greater than it had been before
Charles attained his majority. For Charles, in leaving for
Spain, had not only invested her as Regent, but directly
instructed that every paper signed or sealed by his aunt
was to have exactly the same force and weight as though
signed by his own hand. To make Marguerite's rule the
more absolute, Charles even revoked certain ancient
privileges of Home Rule enjoyed by some of the United
Provinces of Holland and Flanders. These powers and all
financial powers were now centred in Marguerite, who,
while signing her orders Par le Roy, Marguerite, held the
position of an autocratic Queen.
The busy life which she led as a ruler did not induce
Marguerite to forget her spinning and sewing. She was
constantly spinning flax, and at times making shirts for
her father, concerning which garments Max wrote : "Our
skin will be comforted with meeting the fineness and soft-
ness of such beautiful linen, such as the angels use for
their clothes in Paradise." She likewise found the time in
"3 8
ii4 Two Great Rivals
which to make various jams and pickles for her household
use, and to send to rejoice the Emperor's heart withal.
However, while this wonderful woman was spinning
flax and making pickles, her brain was ever kept as
actively employed in weaving plots for the downfall of
France and the elevation of the House of Austria. It
was, indeed, scarcely necessary for her " good father
Maxi," as the Emperor signed himself, to write to his
daughter, from Wels on December I2th, 1518 : u We
have good hope that you will so acquit yourself to the
well-being, guidance, and direction of his affairs that he
may not only have cause to be pleased, but, as your good
nephew, he will increase your said authority more and
more. In doing which he could do nothing more pleas-
ing to us. This God knows, and may He, very dear and
much-beloved daughter, have you in His keeping." The
Emperor died just a month after writing this letter.
In spite of the above, there came a time only a few
months after it was written when Marguerite did not act
so that her good nephew felt that he had cause to be
pleased, and this was when, feeling that Charles' chances
of gaining the Imperial Crown were becoming very slim,
she wrote and proposed that she should run his younger
brother Ferdinand for the Empire in place of himself.
Charles was furious, and wrote that it was absolutely
necessary that he alone of the House of Austria, for the
general benefit of their House, should occupy that post.
Marguerite, who had already sent the juvenile Archduke
into Germany, found herself compelled to write and ex-
plain that she had only done so in order that he might be
near his grandfather, who was not in good health, and in
order to watch over the German and Austrian hereditary
domains of his elder brother. However, for a couple of
years and more before this event, the Emperor and his
daughter had been working hand-in-hand, and with con-
siderable astuteness Max had contrived to make use of
the discarded suitor of Eleonore, Count Frederick, in
order to influence the Count Palatine his brother, whose
vote seemed more likely to go to France than to Austria.
Max and Marguerite Lay their Plans 115
The seven Electoral Princes were the following, with
two Hohenzollerns to begin with. These were Albert
of Brandenburg, Archbishop of Mayence, and his brother,
the ruling Margrave, Joachim of Brandenburg. Then
came Richard of Greiffenclau of Wolrath, Archbishop of
Treves, Hermann of Wied, Archbishop of Cologne,
Louis II., the very young King of Bohemia and Hungary,
Frederick III., Duke of Saxony, and the Count Palatine,
Louis V. The account of the various intrigues entered
into between these seven Electors, and their near relatives,
with Francois I., the Emperor, Marguerite and Charles V.,
with all the proposed matrimonial alliances of the young
Princess Renee of France and the younger Catherine of
Austria, which were held out as baits for votes, occupy
no less than a hundred pages of small type of the his-
torian Mignet. We will endeavour to avoid giving any
particular description of them whatever, but a few general
remarks cannot be avoided, especially with regard to the
actions of the old Emperor in assembling a Diet over
which he could exert his personal influence, and thus
obtain promises of votes for the future election of his
grandson to the dignity of Rex Romanorum — King of
the Romans. There was no vote for Emperor, but after
the King of the Romans had been crowned at Aix-la-
Chapelle with the Crown of Charlemagne he became, as
Maximilian remained till his death, Emperor-Elect. Only
when crowned by the Pope in Italy could he be styled
Emperor of the Romans.
A Diet was a Feudal Body which constituted the cen-
tral authority of the Holy Roman Empire. It consisted of
two colleges, until the peace of Westphalia in 1648, when
an extra college was added. The first of these contained
merely the three spiritual and four temporal Electors.
The second was The College of the Princes of the
Empire, and in all but actual voting these were the equals
of the Electors. Maximilian assembled a Diet at Augs-
burg in August 1518, at which to discuss, openly, the
great question of the defence of Christianity against
the Turks ; secondly, and privately, the succession to the
1 1 6 Two Great Rivals
Empire of Germany. The two questions hung together,
since the Pope must openly declare himself in favour of
that Prince who by his power and warlike exploits seemed
the most capable of staying the Mussulman invasion of
the south-east of Europe, which seemed likely to spread
to Italy and Germany before long.
The Sultan, Selim I., had already shown himself
terribly powerful and horribly cruel, and, in addition to
a splendid army, he had recently established an immense
fleet. Leo X. was openly in favour of the election of
Francois I., whose prowess at Marignano had shown him
to be a redoubtable warrior, whereas the youthful Charles
had as yet never appeared in any warlike capacity. Each
of these Princes, however, publicly gave out that it was
from no personal ambition, but merely with the desire
of protecting Europe from the Turk that they desired
to assume the reins of Empire.
Leo X. sent a Legate to the Germanic Diet of
Augsburg, to beg that body to furnish a contingent for
an immense crusade, the idea of which had sprung from
the fertile imagination of Max. By this crusade Europe
was to be defended, Constantinople retaken, and Jerusalem
likewise to be captured from the all powerful Selim I.
When, however, the proposition was made by the Pope's
Legate of an enormous scheme of general taxation
throughout Germany, the Princes of the Diet, upon
whom the resistance of Luther to the Pope had made
its impression, refused to listen to the Sovereign Pontiff.
They rudely declared that there was no more chance of
the money demanded by Leo X. being used for a crusade
against the Turk than there was that the cash raked in
by the sale of the Indulgences would be used by the
spendthrift Pope for the reconstruction of Saint Peter's
in Rome. The Princes would, therefore, only agree to
a very small tax being levied during three years upon
such persons as should receive the Holy Communion—
and this was practically to shelve the question of the
crusade altogether.
In his secret negotiations Max was, however, more
Max and Marguerite Lay their Plans 117
successful. By repeatedly writing to Charles, and up-
braiding his grandson for his niggardly spirit, he
compelled him to agree to an enormous system of over-
bribing the Electors who were already being bribed by
Francois — the bribes to be paid in cash without any
delay. By the time that the Diet had ended its sittings,
Maximilian had obtained the promises of the votes of five
out of the seven Electors, for the immense sum of five
hundred and fifty thousand golden crowns, the equivalent
of more than a million and a quarter pounds sterling of
to-day ! Of this sum the needy Emperor retained fifty
thousand golden crowns for his own commission.
He said that he required at least this amount for the
expenses which he expected to incur in holding another
Diet before long at Frankfort, at which he would cause
the election, by the bought majority of Electors, of his
grandson Charles to the dignity of King of the Romans.
Unfortunately for the fulfilment of this pleasant little
family arrangement, the two Electors who had refused
to accept bribes from the Emperor remained in favour
of France, while, for that matter, all of the others likewise
had in their pockets written agreements to vote for
Frangois.
These two, however, the Archbishop of Treves and the
Duke of Saxony, informed the Emperor that he was only
King of the Romans himself; therefore, until he ceased
to be so, it would be illegal to hold an election or to vote
for any other King of the Romans. Max, greatly to the
alarm of the timid courtiers of Charles in Spain, who
dreaded nothing more at that time than fresh disturbances
in Italy, talked of assembling an army and marching with
it to Rome to be crowned. Probably Marguerite, and
certainly Charles, sent representations that should the
Emperor pursue such a course war must also break out
with France in the Pyrenees, upon the open question of
the Kingdom of Navarre ; Max therefore, ever full of
expedients, thought of a new plan. He caused Charles
to request the Pope to send the Imperial Crown, with
a couple of Cardinals, to the city of Trent for the
1 1 8 Two Great Rivals
coronation of himself as Emperor at that place on
Christmas Day.
These Cardinals were to be the Pope's illegitimate
cousin, Giulio de' Medici, who afterwards became Pope
Clement VII., and Albert of Brandenburg, who, on
account of his previous promises made to vote for
Francois, had recently been promoted to Cardinal rank
by Leo X.
The Pope, however, was but little anxious to see the
elevation of Charles, who as a King of Naples, in
succession to Ferdinand of Aragon, and a Papal vassal,
was, according to an old-established rule of Clement IV.,
expressly debarred from becoming Emperor. For that
matter, he did not really wish a Duke of Milan, as
Francois now was — or any Italian potentate who might
interfere with himself in Italy — to be Emperor either ;
but he could hardly help himself. At all events, he
vastly preferred a French Duke of Milan to a Spanish
King of Naples, since he must have one of the two.
Accordingly, he declined to send the Imperial Crown to
Trent ; and it is difficult to know what might have
taken place as the next move on the part of Maximilian
had not the Emperor suddenly become ill with fever
after indulging in violent hunting excursions. He
knew that he was dying, and prepared in the calmest
manner for death at Wels, in Upper Austria. There,
after giving the extraordinary instructions that his teeth
were to be drawn and his body shaved and exposed after
death, the worthy Max passed away peaceably, in all the
odour of sanctity, upon January I2th, 1519. His had
been an extraordinary and adventurous career from his
earliest childhood, when he suffered great hardships, and
was almost starved. His character was both chivalrous
and bizarre, but his rule was distinctly advantageous to
Germany. In conjunction with his daughter Marguerite,
he likewise established the greatness of the House of
Austria.
Francois I. in the course of his career was always
making foolish mistakes, by which he contrived to
F . Han/staengl, photo after the painting by Albert Durer.
MAXIMILIAN I.,
Archduke of Austria, Emperor of Germany.
P. 118]
Max and Marguerite Lay their Plans 119
deprive himself of the services of his most faithful friends
and allies for some petty reason just when he was most
likely to require their services. In the same manner as
we shall find him later on making enemies of the
Constable de Bourbon and that gallant hero of Genoa,
Andrea Doria, he now committed the signal error of
estranging both the Wild Boar of the Ardennes and
Franz von Seckingen. The anger of the Seigneur de
Bouillon et de Sedan he incurred by foolishly disbanding
the Company of men-at-arms which he commanded in
the service of France, while of Seckingen he aroused the
anger in another manner.
The Knight Franz, who was an untitled member of the
secondary nobility of Germany, held an extraordinary
position. A mere country gentleman, he owned various
castles, and maintained an army sometimes amounting to
large dimensions, with excellent artillery. He was known
as the National Justiciary of Germany, from his habit
of righting the wrongs of those not strong enough to
obtain redress for themselves, and had always been the
friend of France, until Francois offended him so deeply
that he refused to be placated.
The cause of the quarrel was that Seckingen having
righted, sword in hand, the injustice inflicted upon a
German merchant by some Milanese, the latter com-
plained to Francois as their Sovereign. Thereupon the
French King suspended the allowance which he was in
the habit of making to the German Knight. When the
wideawake Maximilian took the opportunity of making
brilliant offers to Seckingen, he went over to the cause
of Austria, as also did Robert de la Marck at the same
time. It was in vain that Francois endeavoured to regain
Franz, and a short time afterwards Seckingen was placed
at the head of an army of twenty-four thousand men of
the Suabian League, wherewith he attacked and utterly
defeated the Duke of Wurtemburg, who passed for being
the ally of France. After this triumph, which was in
itself a heavy blow to the prestige of Francois I.,
Seckingen came and posted himself with his victorious
120 Two Great Rivals
army in the environs of Frankfort, so as to overawe
the Electors when at length they were, in June 1519,
assembled to determine the fate of the Empire.
With him was Robert de la Marck : he it was, indeed,
who had stirred up the resentment of his friend. With
them both was Ulrich von Hutten, who by his writings
had mainly aroused the resentment of the Suabian League
against the Duke of Wurtemburg, a Prince who had
killed a relation of Hutten's whom he had discovered
to be the lover of his wife. Behind all of these was the
ever-vigilant, ever-agitating Marguerite, who had detached
la Marck from Francois I. At a time when she knew
the Wild Boar to be sore with Francois, she had suc-
ceeded in seducing him from his allegiance by promising
to obtain him a Cardinal's hat for his brother, Erard de
la Marck, who was Bishop of Liege. But she made a
proviso, which was that if he did not succeed in com-
pletely detaching Seckingen also there was to be no hat.
The needy Hutten, the intimate friend of Seckingen, as
we know, had also been bought by the skilful Marguerite.
The Regent of the Low Countries even sent six
hundred lances of her own forces, representing three
thousand six hundred mounted men, to fight under the
command of Franz, the National Justiciary. "La Fla-
mande " it was likewise who caused Seckingen, after the
reduction of the Duke of Wurtemburg, to approach with
his forces to the neighbourhood of Frankfort when the
election was about to take place. The German Electors
now pretty plainly understood that they were about to
give themselves to a master in the shape of the Fleming—
the Austrian — the Spaniard — Charles. Above all, the
Count Palatine, who had been talked over by his heavily
bribed brother, realised it. The Imperial cities of Strasburg
and Constance, which belonged to the Suabian League,
regretted bitterly also, now that it was too late, that they
had given over their forces to the Flemish, to aid with their
powerful weight in influencing the election.
But, oddly enough, the situation was so arranged by
the manoeuvres of Marguerite that all of the chiefs of
Max and Marguerite Lay their Plans 121
the German revolution were now about to give Germany
over, bound, into the hands of those of the party of
the counter-revolution. Seckingen, la Marck, Hutten,
the German cities, all were in favour of Reform — all the
enemies of the priests. But, by a paradox, they were
there to aid in the election of an Emperor who came from
Spain, from the country where the priests — the Bene-,
dictine monks — were more powerful than the Monarchs
themselves.
All around Frankfort ambushes were laid by the Flemish
party to capture and cut the throats of the partisans of
Francois. While the Fuggers had been pouring out gold
like water on the one side, on the other Bonnivet, the
gay spark, the hero of so many love adventures, had come
to the Rhine with many mules and men-at-arms, each
laden with sacks of gold, to be distributed with both
hands — what shall we say ? — by the barrowful. But when
the election was about to take place, the Ambassador
Bonnivet was only able to penetrate to the neighbour-
hood of Frankfort in disguise, as a Captain Jacob.
While the army of Francois was lying not far away
beyond the Rhine, which the existing peace prevented his
crossing, there were twenty-five thousand men of the
opposite faction actually in arms around Frankfort. Who
can wonder at the way that the election went ? At the
last moment, when it was too late, Francois did what he
ought to have done long before. He told his Ambas-
sadors to support the election of a German Prince against
the Austrian.
Bonnivet thereupon proposed first Joachim, Margrave
of Brandenburg, and then Frederick, Duke of Saxony.
For Brandenburg not even his brother Albert — who had
at the last secretly insisted upon being paid twenty thou-
sand additional golden florins, and received them — would
vote. As for the Duke of Saxony, he was overawed by
the presence of the armed forces — moreover, he was taken
by surprise. He refused to allow himself to be made
into an Emperor ; he said that he was not strong enough
to hold the position. Had he but agreed, the other
122 Two Great Rivals
Electors, while keeping the money that they had received,
would have voted for him. He, personally, however, gave
his vote for Charles — the Burgundian, Fleming, Austrian,
and Spaniard. He lived to regret it later, when Charles V.
proved to be his most bitter foe. The Emperor, more-
over, cruelly imprisoned one of his immediate successors,
the Elector Henry of Saxony, and utterly destroyed his
House. The other six Electors, including the repre-
sentative of the young King of Bohemia and Hungary,
voted the same way as Duke Frederick.
Charles was elected unanimously the King of the
Romans.
Thus, upon June 28th, 1519, in the person of a boy
of nineteen, was accomplished at Frankfort the monstrous
union of Spain and Germany — the forces of the Inquisition
joined to the followers of Luther !
CHAPTER XI
Turkish Dangers and Troubles Ahead
1519 — 1520
WHILE the world had been torn to pieces by the
jealousies aroused by the election of an Emperor,
the Continent of Europe was being threatened by a very
actual danger.
The Sultan Selim I., having conquered Syria, Baby-
lonia, and Persia, subdued Asia Minor and Egypt, and
inspired his own terrible Janissaries with fear of his strong
arm, had invaded the Balkan States, and was threatening
Hungary, Germany, Italy, and the coasts of France. His
armies were immense, well disciplined, and quite equal
in point of armament to those that the countries of
Europe could put into the field, while that which made
this particular Sultan so much to be feared was his fierce
hatred of the Christian, and system of wholesale massacre
of the followers of the Cross.
Up to the present the brave Hungarians had warded
off" the peril from Europe, but how long could this
immunity endure ?
Louis II., King of Bohemia and Hungary, was but a
boy of thirteen, the son of the Pole Vladislav II., and
his mother was a Frenchwoman, niece of the brilliant
Gaston de Foix. He had been brought up under Polish
tutelage, while the close friendship of Maximilian for the
King of Poland had left the boy practically under the
thumb of Austria. Of this fact Maximilian had duly
taken advantage. He had brought about a scheme for
123
124 Two Great Rivals
the double alliance of Austria and Hungary — one which
was later to make of Hungary but an Austrian province.
Anne, the sister of the boy-King Louis, was affianced
to the young Archduke Ferdinand, while the Archduchess
Marie of Austria, Ferdinand's sister, was sent to the
Court of Hungary, to stay there until she should be
married to King Louis.
Ferdinand had no cause to complain of any want of
generosity on the part of his brother Charles, for the
young Emperor richly rewarded the Archduke for the
manner in which he had behaved in accordance with his
wishes, in not allowing himself to be run by Marguerite
for the Imperial Crown. When Ferdinand married
Princess Anne in 1521, Charles bestowed upon his
brother no less than five Duchies, of which Austria was
one. The others were Styria, Carinthia, Carniola, and
the Tyrol. Later on, Charles bestowed also great
territories in Germany, which he had inherited from his
grandfather, upon his brother.
By behaving thus generously to his brother, who before
long, through his wife, obtained the Crown of Hungary,
Charles did a great deal towards consolidating his power
as Emperor.
To return to the Sultan Selim. Having slaughtered
all the Mamelouks of Egypt, he put the question to the
learned Mullahs of Islam if it was not his duty to
destroy some twelve millions of Christians in the south of
Europe.
He wished to begin by the utter destruction of the
Greeks. His Grand Vizier, however, more merciful than
Selim, reminded the Sultan that according to old promises
made by the Sultan Mahomed II. the lives of the Greeks
were to be spared. Selim had, however, made up his
mind that for the benefit of the souls of the rest of
Europe, he would kill and destroy two-thirds of its
Christian inhabitants. This bloodthirsty Turk imagined,
perhaps with reason, that he would then have no trouble
in converting the remaining third of the population to
the tenets of Islam. Such was the terrible foe that
Turkish Dangers and Troubles Ahead 125
Europe had to dread, and whom, had Frangois been
elected, he had vowed to destroy.
By the election, however, which provided Christianity
with another head than Frangois, instead of all Europe
uniting, in accordance with the dictates of reason and the
urgings of Leo X., against the Turk, the Continent was
again to become an armed camp in which Christian was
to be pitted against Christian, while leaving to Selim a
free hand to work his evil will in his own way.
At his Court, when Francois received the news of his
defeat at Frankfort, he took the tidings well and calmly.
Not so his mother, Louise de Savoie. Her diary shows
only too plainly how readily she would, if she could, have
wiped the detested Austrian who was the victor from
the face of the earth.
All was not exactly peace at this time at the Court of
France, where the eternal bickerings and jealousies of the
King's mother and Fran9oise de Chateaubriand, his
beautiful mistress, made life anything but a bed of roses
for the frivolous young King.
The diplomatic Marguerite had now, by reducing
everything to a matter of money, successfully abased
the France which she hated to a secondary position.
Frangois realised that he would have to fight for his
own hand if he would not soon be compelled to relinquish
his conquests in Italy, lose there his beloved Duchy of
Milan, and be also for ever deprived of the Kingdom of
Naples. This remained in the hands of the rival, who,
until he became Emperor, had kept up the farce of pre-
tending that he intended to become the French King's
son-in-law.
Frangois began at once to cast his eyes around for
an ally, and they fell naturally upon his very near neigh-
bour, Henry VIII., with whom he began to exchange
affectionate correspondence and to try to arrange for a
personal meeting. Until Charles V. could, however,
manage to return from Spain, in order to have himself
crowned King of the Romans at Aix la Chapelle, Mar-
guerite was not going to allow the grass to grow under
i26 Two Great Rivals
her feet. She therefore, likewise continued the most
friendly relations with Henry — who as the husband of
Catherine of Aragon was her brother-in-law.1 While,
therefore, Francis was planning the celebrated meeting
soon to take place between himself and Henry at the
Field of the Cloth of Gold, Marguerite, on her side,
arranged that her nephew Charles should, on the way
home with his fleet to Flanders, pay a friendly call upon
his uncle the young King of England.
Owing to the numerous questions open between
France and Spain, it was easy enough even for a child
to see that war was becoming inevitable. The question
of Navarre, for instance, of which the Spanish dominions
had been torn from Jean d'Albret and Catherine de Foix
by Ferdinand of Aragon in 1512. How was it possible
for either Francois or Charles to give way upon this
point ? Navarre was the gateway by which access could
be obtained to either of their respective kingdoms.
Then again, Milan — this Duchy was a fief of the Empire!
Then there was the still more burning question of the
Duchy of Burgundy, of which Louis XI. had despoiled
Marie, the first wife of the Emperor Maximilian, when
she had been left an orphan by the death of her father,
Charles the Bold.
As ardently as Francois desired to retain his Italian
dominions was Charles wildly desirous to recover this lost
Duchy of Burgundy. It was a constant source of irritation.
France maintained that in annexing Burgundy she had but
absorbed a fief which originally belonged to the French
Crown — and maintained, moreover, that Burgundy had
proved both ungrateful and dangerous, since she had
persistently aided the English, to the extent even of
making English kings, such as Henry V. and Henry VI.,
the Kings likewise of France. On account of this
1 The Infanta Catalina, or Catherine, of Aragon, born December 1485,
was the fifth and youngest child of Ferdinand and Isabella. The first
husband of the Archduchess Marguerite was Juan, Prince of Asturias, only
son of those Monarchs. He died, seven months after marriage, on
October 4, 1497. Shortly after his death, and after twelve days of labour
Marguerite gave birth to a still-born son.
Turkish Dangers and Troubles Ahead 127
ingratitude the gift of Burgundy, so insisted Francois,
had been rightfully revoked. Nothing would induce
him to return the Duchy to the Fleming.
Before matters had reached an acute stage, Charles
was gaily continuing to engage himself in marriage in
all directions. At the same time that he was affianced
to a child-daughter of France he was likewise secretly
engaged to a child-daughter of England — Mary, daughter
of Catherine of Aragon and Henry — his first cousin.
His Spanish subjects at the same time were crying out
that to procure an heir to_the Crown of Spain he should
take a Princess who was already of a marriageable age.
He therefore negotiated a third marriage in Portugal,
before leaving Spain, from which country he, however,
departed as a bachelor, when, with a large fleet, he set
sail from Corunna for England in May 1 520.
The young Emperor arrived safely at Dover on
May 26th, where Henry VIII. and Cardinal Wolsey
were waiting to receive him, and he met his aunt
Catherine at Canterbury.
This visit was a time of unlimited feasting, during
which Charles V. had every opportunity given to him
of satisfying his enormous appetite with the roast beef
of Old England. At the same time, he did not forget
to closely cultivate Wolsey, whom he promised that he
would strongly support when next the Papal Chair should
become vacant. As Leo X. was always ill, and did
nothing by his mode of life to take care of himself, it
seemed more than likely that the ambitions of the son
of the butcher might be realised before long.
When Charles left England, where by his courtly
deference to his uncle Henry he had completely
captured the heart of the Monarch, it was with the
secret understanding that they should meet again very
shortly, at Gravelines, immediately after Henry should
have had his friendly meeting with the King of France
in the neighbourhood of Calais.
Henry and Charles sailed on the same day from
England, and the latter landed at Flushing on June ist,
128 Two Great Rivals
1520. At Bruges he was welcomed with the greatest
affection and pomp by Marguerite and his brother
Ferdinand, while Ambassadors and nobles of the various
European countries were present, in numbers too great
to be counted, to pay their court to the new Emperor,
who was still only twenty years of age.
Up to the time of his return to the Low Countries,
Charles had managed, by borrowing from his prospective
father-in-law, Henry VIII. , to pay the yearly pension
that he had promised to his prospective father-in-law,
Francois I. Once, however, that he had assumed the
reins as Emperor, he gave no further thoughts to the
matter of paying Francois what he owed in accordance
with the treaty of Noyon, and shut up his pockets
tight <
This action on his part was apt to hurry up the
coming trouble, especially as he paid Henry d'Albret
nothing on account of the usurpation of Navarre from
his mother, now dead. He was careless enough also,
after having made use of Robert de la Marck for the
purposes of his election, to offend this " Brigand of
the Meuse." When Charles V. declared that la Marck
was merely one of his vassals of the Low Countries,
the Wild Boar of the Ardennes quitted Austria as
brusquely as he had France, and returned to his allegi-
ance to Francois. What is more, it was Robert who
in 1521 actually commenced the war. He openly sent
his herald to defy Charles and all the might of the
Empire, and then, with only three or four thousand
men, marched into his dominions.
Unfortunately at that time, for one reason or another,
Francois was not quite ready to back up the Seigneur
of Bouillon, and therefore disavowed this movement
of his bold ally ; although by so doing he deceived
nobody.
Charles was, however, for the time being, inclined
to accept the excuses of Francois, while his Chancellor,
Mercurin de Gattinara, gave him a hundred reasons
for maintaining the peace.
Turkish Dangers and Troubles Ahead 129
It was not until Marguerite spitefully informed her
nephew that the French were sneering at him, calling
him " Un quidam, certain petit roi" that, his vanity
being deeply offended, the Emperor felt that the sword
alone could decide his differences with the King of
France.
CHAPTER XII
The Field of the Cloth of Gold
JUNE 1520
THERE was no man living more ambitious or more
fond of magnificence than Cardinal Wolsey, the son
of the butcher of Ipswich. Possessing entirely the ear
of Henry VIII. , he was for a long time in England more
the King than the King himself. Everything else having
fallen to his share, he was determined to become Pope,
and had made up his mind accordingly to throw in the
weight of his master on that side most likely to be
useful to himself in gaining the Tiara and Keys of
St. Peter.
Francois, determined if possible to remain master in
Europe, lost no opportunity of writing the sweetest of
epistles to the puissant Cardinal, whom he courted like a
woman.
Charles, on the other side, sent him cash. The
flattery and the cash from the two potentates were
equally agreeable to Wolsey, but he determined to go
over to France and see Francois for himself, and hear
what he had to say before making up his mind to which
of the rivals Henry should give his support. The
chances were, however, considerably in favour of Charles,
for the whole English instinct was antipathetic to France,
the Crown of which Kingdom was still claimed by the
island nation, where the victories of Crecy, Poitiers and
Agincourt were not forgotten. The constant commerce,
moreover, between England and the Low Countries
130
From an engraving by F. Holt after the painting by Holbein at Christ Church, Oxford.
THOMAS WOLSEY,
Cardinal of York.
P. i30j
The Field of the Cloth of Gold 131
made it highly desirable to remain on good terms with
the ruler of those industrial States — London was there-
fore all in favour of Antwerp. The personal interview
between the Monarchs of France and England was,
however, arranged, Francois vainly hoping that by it
miracles could be accomplished, old rancours forgotten,
and a close and intimate friendship established.
Unfortunately, both of the young Kings, Henry of
twenty- eight and Francois of twenty-six, started for their
rendezvous between Calais and Ardres with the idea of
cutting each other out by the brilliancy that they should
display. Especially were these vain young men anxious
to shine in the presence of the numerous gay ladies,
whose bright eyes were to reign influence over the
coming festivities.
Fearing, from the fact of his funds being short, that he
might not be able to shine sufficiently, Francois wrote in
advance to Wolsey, to suggest that, if his brother the
King of England should think fit to forbid the nobles of
his suite to erect tents of great richness, he would do the
same. The result of this message, received through the
French Ambassador, was only to determine Henry VIII.
to do all the more in order to eclipse the Court of France.
The English nobles were of the same mind ; it was deter-
mined by them that no expense should be spared. The
Cardinal was accustomed to make public processions sur-
rounded by his bodyguard of giants. He loved to
perambulate the streets preceded by men of enormous
stature carrying golden crosses, while he himself, attired
in the purple of a Roman Legate, formed a magnificent
figure in the centre of his huge retainers, from whose
necks depended massive gold chains. When he found
that Francois was alarmed at the prospective expense, he
at once made up his mind that no effort should be spared
by which Henry VIII. should outshine the King of
France, and preparations were made accordingly.
When the French Court learned of this determination,
it felt ashamed of its efforts in the direction of economy,
and from that moment it was resolved that, since the
i32 Two Great Rivals
English wanted magnificence, they should find that the
French could produce as much of it as themselves.
For the sake of the national honour, the French
nobles set about ruining themselves to appear in the most
brilliant attire and with the greatest eclat. Each one was
resolved not only to outdo the English in the matter of
expense, but likewise to outshine his own brother noble.
No sacrifice appeared too great — chateaux, farms, estates
were sold, while jewels, velvets, satins and brocades were
bought. Above all, immense golden chains, to surpass
the golden chains of the English, were obtained, which
the Knights were to wear over their armour.
Of all the nobles of the French Court none made a
greater outlay than that fop, the ladies' darling, Bonnivet,
Admiral of France. As if to avenge himself for his
recent defeat in his ambassadorial capacity at the Imperial
election, he resolved to outshine all others. With his
brother, Bonnivet raised a force of a thousand horsemen
wherewith to appear at the festivities. Eminently satis-
fied with himself, he imagined that even the King's sister,
Marguerite d'Angouleme, Duchesse d'Alen^on, in whose
good graces he was anxious to cut out the Due de
Bourbon, must acknowledge that he was worthy of the
admiration of a Princess. Henry VIII. arrived at Calais
on June ist, 1520. He had brought with him Queen
Catherine of Aragon, all the grand officers of his Crown,
Cardinal Wolsey and all the prelates of his kingdom.
All that was noble and rich in England had followed in
his train. He carried with him in his fleet an immense
palace of wood and glass, which was put together and
set up outside his Castle of Guines, a little way from
Calais. The interior of this palace was covered with the
richest velvets and silks, and also ornamented with grand
Arras tapestry. It was inside this temporary palace that
Henry was to receive and entertain the Court of France.
Francois, on his side, had established himself at his
Castle of Ardres. He had brought with him his wife,
the young Queen Claude, his mother, the Duchesse
d'Angouleme and his sister Marguerite. One lady there
The Field of the Cloth of Gold 133
was, however, in his train who outshone all of these
Royal ladies. This was his brilliant mistress, Fran9oise
de Chateaubriand, the real Queen of the fete.
This young lady, of the Royal race of Foix, still at
this time reigned over the Court of France, although
there were not wanting those who foretold that her
brilliant reign would not endure much longer. For the
present, however, in spite of the jealousy of Louise de
Savoie, her sun remained strongly in the ascendant.
What served to make Fran9ois I. all the more assiduous
to his lady-love was the furious jealousy of her husband,
who often caused her beautiful eyes to be filled with
tears by boxing her ears and administering other corporal
punishment to his faithless spouse.
While the exhibitions of this ill-bred jealousy delighted
the King's mother and the rivals of Franchise in the
King's graces, they but served to keep the King at her
feet. For Fra^ois imagined that what another man
desired so much must surely be worth keeping for himself,
and he accordingly kept her, in spite of the jealous rages
of the Comte de Chateaubriand — which he laughed at —
in spite too of the jealous rages of his mother, which he
disregarded.
Notwithstanding the element of immorality supplied
by the presence of the fair but frail Fran9oise de Foix
in the King's camp, there were not wanting various
dignitaries of the Church to lend their splendour to the
French King's suite.
No less than four Cardinals, each with a magnificent
train, repaired to Ardres, while Du Prat, the Chancellor,
and all the grands seigneurs of the realm were present.
All the Princes of the Blood Royal had of course followed
the young King. Of these, by far the most important
and most imposing was the proud Connetable de Bourbon,
at this time much beloved by the ardent Louise de Savoie.
The career of this Princess, who was passionate, violent,
and sensual, had by no means been devoid of adventures
when, neglecting all other lovers, she became violently
in love with Charles de Montpensier-Bourbon. It will
Two Great Rivals
be remembered that she had been married as a child, and
was only a half-grown girl of sixteen when her first child,
Marguerite, came into the world. She was still com-
paratively young and handsome when she centred all
her ardent aspirations upon the Constable, who, for his
own objects, was not averse to humouring her passion,
although he was a good deal younger than herself. As
the years rolled on and Bourbon lost his wife, Suzanne de
Beaujeu, Madame, or the Queen-mother, as Louise was
sometimes called, made up her mind that it would be
impossible for her to live without Charles, to whom she
proposed matrimony.
He could not well refuse the gold ring of affiance with
which Louise presented him, but, already tired of her
exigeant affections, the Constable had no intention of
marrying her except under certain conditions. When,
after having borne several girls in succession, Queen
Claude presented the King first with one son and then
with two others, these conditions no longer existed. The
Due de Bourbon had no object in becoming the father-in-
law of the King unless he should become at the same
time heir to the throne, and with the appearance of these
Princes his chance of the succession was gone. By
espousing the King's mother he could not now even
expect to become the father of a future King of France.
This young man, who was half Italian, was, however,
by far too politic to show his hand too plainly, although
it was an open secret at the Court that his affections were
far more interested in Marguerite, the daughter, than in
Louise the mother.
Should the Due d'Alen^on die — as well he might —
Bourbon might reasonably expect to obtain the hand of
his widow. In the meantime, like that viveur Bonnivet,
he aspired in that day of facile morals to become some
day, at all events, the successful lover of the lively
authoress of the " Heptameron."
Failing the still married Marguerite, the ambitious
Constable had another card up his sleeve, by which he
might obtain a daughter of France for a bride. This was
The Field of the Cloth of Gold 135
to demand the hand of the so often promised young
Princess Renee, daughter of Louis XII. and sister to
Queen Claude.
Lest we should forget to mention it later, we may as
well mention here that this charming and spirituelle
Princess, who was even more inclined to the Reformed
religion than her cousin Marguerite, was eventually
married into Italy — to the Duke of Ferrara.
The camp of the King of France was pitched outside
the small town of Ardres, not far from the banks of
a little rivulet. It consisted of more than three hundred
splendid tents covered with cloth of gold and silver.
The side-walls and linings consisted of velvet and silken
hangings. Upon these were worked the Royal arms
of France, or the heraldic escutcheons of the Princes and
lords of the French King's noble following. The huge
golden Royal tent was placed in the centre of the camp.
It was higher than the others, but could scarcely be
described as being more brilliant. It was, however,
surmounted by a golden statue of St. Michael, which,
like the burnished coverings of the tents, dazzled the
eyes in the rays of the glorious sun of a perfect June.
The bodyguard of Francois consisted of a picked body
of a hundred Swiss, magnificently attired, and under the
command of that hero of many battles, the Seigneur
de Fleurange, son of Robert de la Marck. It is from
the Mtmoires of Fleurange that one of the best descrip-
tions of this famous meeting has been preserved. Some
twelve years previously, Fleurange had been left for dead at
the battle of Agnadello, with no less than forty-two wounds.
He lived, however, to figure in many another conflict,
and married one of the two daughters of the celebrated
Diane de Poitiers. Eventually, after many vicissitudes,
this Due de Bouillon et Sedan died, not on the field
of battle, but of poison in Paris. The camp of Henry,
which was erected at some distance from the dividing
stream, was, like that of Francois, placed on the slope
of a hill. It was almost, if not quite, equal in magnifi-
cence to that of France — we have the authority of
136 Two Great Rivals
Shakespeare for saying that the French outshone the
English.
Behold, then, the two friendly Kings and their Courts
in presence of each other, and quite ready to shake
hands if only they know how it is to be done. It might
have been thought a simple enough matter — but no,
nothing of the sort. It seemed rather that two hostile
armies were in position, each in fear of being attacked
by the other, such were the precautions taken on either
side to avoid a surprise. And meanwhile, for a whole
week, negotiations were carried on as to when, where,
and how the two young Monarchs should give to one
another the kiss of peace. Fortunately the weather re-
mained fine, but as " Satan finds some mischief still for
idle hands to do," so in the French camp jealousies and
quarrels broke out between the followers of the saturnine
Due de Bourbon and those of the gay Bonnivet.
Had it not been for the actual presence of the King,
the retainers of the Due would undoubtedly have
attempted to cut the throats wholesale of those of the
Amiral de France. As a matter of fact, only one life
was lost, when M. de Pomperan, to please his master
the Constable, killed one of the Knights belonging to
Bonnivet.
By the following day, June yth, 1520, satisfied etiquette
at length allowed the two handsome young Kings to meet
Each rode down the slope of his own hill, followed
by an armed force of four hundred men. These forces
were halted at such a distance as not to be dangerous
to each other. Especially had it been stipulated in the
Jong -pourparlers that the English archers should keep out
of bow-shot of Frangois I., while the men-at-arms of
Frangois were not to come within charging distance of
Henry.
Down the slope to the little stream rippling in the
bottom of the valley rode, on one side, the King of
England, large-built, rosy-cheeked, strong and robust,
and, on the other, the tall, sinewy, handsome and
knightly King of France.
The Field of the Cloth of Gold 137
This latter was preceded by the Constable of France,
holding the Royal sword drawn in his hand. Henry
perceiving this from a distance was all in a fluster. His
Constable was also preceding him, but the English noble's
sword was not drawn. He was ordered to make haste
and whip out his blade in a hurry, so as not to be out-
done by the Frenchman, to whose haughty looks Henry
took exception. He afterwards remarked to Francois :
" If I had a subject like that I'd soon have his head
off his shoulders." As the two Kings, both perfect
horsemen, advanced towards each other on their curveting
steeds, they formed a splendid picture in the rays of
that summer sun. The King of France was attired in
cloth of gold, while his Majesty of England was re-
splendent in cloth of silver, spangled with pearls,
diamonds, rubies, and emeralds. Upon his head he wore
a toque of velvet, splendid with jewels, and surmounted
by magnificent white plumes.
As they got near to each other the Kings spurred
their respective steeds to a gallop ; then, as they checked
their chargers suddenly side by side, each saluted the
other with his hand to his cap. This was followed up
by an embrace, given on horseback. After this they
dismounted, and arm in arm they walked together to a
splendid golden pavilion over which floated the English
and French standards, while within were Cardinal Wolsey
and Admiral Bonnivet, each waiting to do obeisance to
the King of the other's nation.
Other courtiers from each side followed, a banqueting
table, richly laden with gold and silver vases, was found
spread before them, and the Englishmen and Frenchmen
pledged each other in a cup of wine.
Presently, with all courtesy and humility, Francois
placed all his Kingdoms and Seigneuries at the disposal
of Henry, to which compliment the latter replied :
" Sir, neither your realms nor the other places of your
power is the matter of my regard, but the steadfastness
and keeping of promise comprised in charters between
you and me. That observed and kept, I never saw
138 Two Great Rivals
Prince with my eyes, that might, of my heart, be more
loved." That, at least, is how his words were recorded
in English, but Henry was well acquainted with the
French language.
A treaty was brought out for the two Princes to
sign. As a matter of course, it contained one of the
usual deceitful contracts of marriage never to be fulfilled.
This time it was a renewal of the contract of the infant
Francois, Dauphin of France, with the Princess Mary
of England, now four years old. In the preamble of
the treaty, Henry VIII. was described among his other
titles as " King of France," a title which continued in
use by the English Kings until the reign of George III.
As it was read aloud, Henry smilingly apologised to
Frangois. " I will omit it, since you are here, for I
should lie." None the less, not long afterwards Henry
endeavoured once more to prove, arms in hand, that it
was no lie but a reality.
On the following day the lists were laid out for
jousting on the green sward of the valley. They were
nine hundred paces in length and three hundred in
width. At the ends were trees formed of cloth of
gold, with leaves of green silk, from whose branches
depended the joined shields of England and France.
Around, immense stands were erected for the ladies
and the nobility. Here and there around the lists were
also refreshment tents and improvised palaces of unheard-
of magnificence. The greatest care was observed during
the tournaments, which took place daily, to do every-
thing to exaggerate etiquette and thus prevent any real
friendship being engendered between the two Kings.
This was chiefly the work of Wolsey and Du Prat,
who wished for no friendly understanding to which
they were not personally parties to be entered into.
Also the Kings were not allowed to tilt with each other.
Nevertheless, both entered the lists, and ran several
courses with other knights. Francois made an exhibition
both of elegance and strength, and broke his lances with
accomplished regularity.
The Field of the Cloth of Gold 139
Henry, however, forgetting that the tilting was only
a game and not actual warfare, charged the first poor
devil to whom he was opposed with such headlong
impetuosity that he struck him on the head with his
spear with such force as to leave him stretched for dead
on the field.
If Fran9ois excelled with the lance, King Henry
astonished all the ladies of the French Court by his
wonderful skill at archery. With the long bow, he
shot with surprising swiftness and exceeding accuracy,
even at a great distance. At wrestling he was not,
however, so lucky. One day, just before a dinner at
which both the Queens were present, after they had
been witnessing some wrestling matches, in which the
English had won everything, Henry suddenly said to
Fran9ois : " Come, you have a turn with me." At the
same moment he threw his arm around the French
King. Fran9ois, however, could wrestle. Although
Henry's strength seemed to be superior, suddenly, by
an adroit twist of his leg, Francois tripped his opponent
and threw him on his back. The Englishman was up
in a moment, red with vexation, and rushing at the
Frenchman collared him for another bout. Each of the
Queens, however, got hold of a King, and Catherine
of Aragon and Claude de Valois, assisted by other
ladies whom they called to help them, pulled the com-
batants apart as though they had been separating a
couple of fighting terriers.
The Queens had far, far better have let the Kings
have the regular three bouts of the match. As it was
left unfinished, it was a far more unlucky throw for
Fran9ois than for Henry, since the latter never forgot
it and it cost the former many lives. Had Fran9ois,
who so wanted Henry's friendship, been only a little
more diplomatic, he would never have used that unlucky
twist of the ankle, but allowed himself to be thrown.
He could not, however, forget that he was being
watched by the bright eyes of the fairest women of
the day, and so exerted all his skill with fatal success.
140 Two Great Rivals
One pleasant incident of a real friendly nature has,
however, been recorded as taking place during the four
weeks' encampment upon the Field of the Cloth of Gold.
Getting tired of the eternal etiquette, by which he
was kept apart from Henry, Frangois rode out early
one morning without any guard, to where Henry was
still sleeping within the Chateau de Guines. The archers
on duty at the gate were astonished when the French
King suddenly appeared, declaring merrily that he had
come to take them all prisoners. He penetrated to
Henry's bedroom, woke him up and offered to bring
him his hot water. The pair exchanged rich presents
of jewellery, and for a time after that there was real
cordiality and friendship between them, in spite of
Wolsey and Du Prat.
CHAPTER XIII
Anne Boleyn and her Effect on Henry
I52O AND LATER
WE have mentioned in what manner the two Cardinals,
Wolsey and Du Prat, endeavoured to keep Fran-
9018 and Henry apart. So successful were they in keeping
up the mutual distrust during the meeting at the Field
of the Cloth of Gold, that the wives of the two Kings
became in a sense the hostages for their husbands. Ac-
cordingly, usually when Henry VIII. went to dine with
Fran9ois I., the amiable Queen Claude went over to the
English camp, to pass the afternoon with Queen Catherine,
while, on the other hand, should Fra^ois spend the day
at Guines, Catherine of Aragon would employ the time
in a friendly chat on some religious subject with Claude
at Ardres.
The followers of the two Kings, and the Kings them-
selves, had contrived to get closer together, in spite of
the ambitious Ministers, after a daily communion ex-
tending over several weeks, and, even in spite of the
unfortunate wrestling bout which was never completed,
had but the Cardinals been removed altogether from the
counsels of their masters, France and England might
have entered into a solid union.
Although the commerce of the Low Countries was of
such great concern to England, which imported hides and
wools, it was evident enough to all the thinkers of the
English Court that a political union with France was
more to be desired than one with an Emperor who was
141
142 Two Great Rivals
at the same time a King of Spain, and who, as such, would
be certain to oppose the secularisation of the Church.
The idea of the two peoples, springing from the
teachings of the German Reformers, was that the State
in each country should succeed to the Church, and profit
by complete emancipation. The smaller ideas of Wolsey
and Du Prat were, on the other hand, while remaining
subject to Rome, to obtain as much from Rome as the
Pope could be induced to give. A few years later,
while France continued to follow Du Prat, Henry VIII.
broke away from Rome altogether, and the commence-
ment of this severance can be traced back to the four
festive weeks passed in June 1520 between Guines and
Ardres.
Then it was that the seeds of a fatal passion first took
root in the inflammable heart of Henry, a passion of a
young man for a woman, which later in its effects re-
volutionised half of a world, and of which we still feel
the effects to-day.
While Catherine of Aragon, then aged thirty-five,
was averse to frivolity and fond of reading religious books,
in which the sanguine Henry took but little interest,
among the gay ladies of the French Court her twenty-
eight year old husband found an altogether different
tone prevailing. Love, gaiety, impassioned glances,
freedom of speech and manners, were the rule in a
society of merry women over which the lively Marguerite
d'Angouleme and the frivolous Fran9oise de Foix reigned
supreme.
Frequently in the company of the former Henry found
a young girl who, although only fourteen years of age,
had learned all the graces and attractive arts of the French
ladies. A Frenchwoman in all but name, the girl was
of English parentage.
Henry's skittish sister, Mary Tudor, who married
Louis XII. in his last days and, by the late hours which
she forced him to keep, killed him off in three months,
had taken over with her to France a little girl of six,
whose name was Anne Boleyn.
From a photograph after the painting by an unknown artist in the National Gallery.
CATHERINE OF ARAGON,
First Queen of Henry VIII.
Anne Boleyn and her Effect on Henry 143
When Louis XII. died in January 1515, and Mary,
the widow, was at once married again, to the brilliant Duke
of Suffolk, she left this beautiful child behind her in
France, where the youthful Queen Claude took charge
of her, and eventually handed her over to Marguerite,
the sister of Frangois. This Princess did all in her
power to make of her an accomplished pupil. With
Marguerite's known ideas on the subject of Reform, it
is no wonder if the little Anne acquired at an early
age similar views, and distrusted monks, priests, and
even Cardinals, as much as her gay and talented mistress.
The youthful Anne was presented to Henry VIII. as
a young lady who, although one of the brightest orna-
ments of the French Court, was nevertheless of British
parentage. As such, Henry took an interest in her at
once. When he met her laughing eyes and was enter-
tained by her frolicsome manners, he forgot all about
Catherine and fell in love with the young girl. When
Henry left the Field of the Cloth of Gold, he
carried away with him her portrait in his heart, with the
results later which we know.
The parentage of Anne Boleyn was of bourgeois origin
on the father's side, but noble on that of her mother.
Her great-grandfather, Sir Geoffrey, was a civic digni-
tary, Lord Mayor of London, while her father, Sir
Thomas, was frequently employed as Ambassador to
France.
His wife was the Lady Elizabeth, daughter and grand-
daughter of Dukes of Norfolk, and he eventually became
the Earl of Wiltshire. From the time that Henry first
began to realise what an impression this handsome child,
with her saucy ways and rippling, provocative laughter,
had made upon his heart, he was in a bad humour. The
attractions of the ladies of the English Court, handsome
though they were, could not counterbalance the fact that
Frangois seemed to outshine him in everything in the
brilliant French circle, where above all he desired to shine.
He left Guines at length in an irritable condition, and
hurried off" to Gravelines to meet Charles V.
144 Two Great Rivals
When, for the second time within the month, the
Emperor attended to pay his respects to the English
King and his great Minister, he could not make himself
too small, too humble. His modesty was so excessive,
his obsequiousness so great, that Henry VIII. soon forgot
his ill-humour, and decided that in this young man, eight
years his junior, he had at all events found one who
appreciated him at his true worth — one who did not wish
to pose before the eyes of the world as being more
brilliant than his already slightly corpulent uncle.
By the baseness of his humility, Charles easily gained
over the good graces of the English King, whose pride
was gratified at finding himself thus appreciated at his
proper value.
Cardinal Wolsey also was delighted at the deference
paid him by the young Emperor. He began to feel that
he was looked upon by Charles V., who took such
pains to conciliate him, in his proper light — that of
arbiter of the fate of Europe.
Moreover, he was convinced that in any new election
at Rome for the Papacy, the weight of the Emperor, the
Austrian who also owned the Kingdom of Naples, would
tell much more in his favour than that of a mere King of
France and Duke of Milan. The die was cast accordingly.
Charles parted from Henry VIII. with a smile of satisfac-
tion on his features. Marguerite also, for his aunt had
accompanied him to Gravelines, and, having neglected
nothing to influence both the King and the Cardinal, she
felt that her efforts had not been in vain. When the
King and the Emperor parted, in spite of the recent
treaty made by the former with Frangois, they were firm
allies, pledged to assist each other against the King of
France.
Meanwhile affairs in Spain had been going very badly
for Charles. Upon leaving that country, where already
an insurrection was breaking out, called that of the
comuneros, against his authority, the King of Spain had
left Adrien d'Utrecht, his old tutor, as sole Regent.
This appointment had more than ever angered the old
Anne Boleyn and her Effect on Henry 145
Spanish nobility, who for a time made common cause
with the communes against the authority of the Flemish
Regent. Speedy concessions made by Charles after his
arrival in the Low Countries caused, however, the
grandees of Spain to rally to their King's banner, with
the result that, after a civil war had raged for some time
and many bloody battles had taken place, the insurrection
seemed on a fair way towards being suppressed by the
nobility.
Advantage of the unsettled state of affairs in Spain had,
however, been taken by Henri d'Albret, King of Navarre,
secretly backed up by the King of France, at the same
time that Robert de la Marck had challenged the
Emperor and that his son Fleurange had actually invaded
the Duchy of Luxembourg. This Duchy Fleurange
claimed from Marguerite, who still remained the Gover-
ness of the Low Countries after Charles succeeded to the
Empire. Affairs were already looking pretty badly for
the young Emperor, who had got no proper forces ready,
when he learned that Andre de Foix, Seigneur de
Lesparre, one of the brothers of the King's mistress, had
invaded Spanish Navarre. As Lesparre was the first
cousin of the Prince of Beam, Henri II. (d'Albret), there
was nothing strange in his action. The inquieting part
of the matter was, however, that in addition to eight
thousand good Gascon infantry, taken from the territories
of Albret and Foix, he commanded three hundred lances,
and this cavalry was composed indubitably of Frenchmen
subject to King Fra^ois I. This admixture of French
gens d'armes in Lesparre's force seemed to betoken
beyond doubt the fact that Fra^ois was already com-
mencing to seek his revenge for his loss of the election,
by entering into a state of war with his successful rival.
The invasion of Navarre was carried out with the
greatest ease by Lesparre, owing to the fact that the
Spanish Governor, the Duke of Najera, had withdrawn
the greater part of his forces to aid in the suppression of
the comunidades. The people of Navarre were, more-
over, faithful to their rightful King. The result was,
10
146 Two Great Rivals
therefore, that in about a fortnight Andre de Foix had
retaken the whole of that country for his cousin the
youthful Henri II. of Navarre.
Charles V. was without money and without an army,
but he had secretly gained Henry VIII. and Cardinal
Wolsey ; and de Chievres, dying about this time, left a
large fortune to the master whom he had trained. He
therefore put a bold face upon the matter and exclaimed :
" God be praised that it is not I but the very Christian
King who has started the war — it is evident that he
wishes to make me bigger than I am. For either before
long I shall be but a beggarly Emperor, or else he will
be a very poor King of France."
At the same time Charles pressed Henry VIII. to cut
into the conflict against Frangois, whom he declared had
broken the peace. Henry did not see matters in this
light. Although he intended on the first opportunity
to endeavour to regain several French provinces for
himself, he was not ready to begin. Moreover, as a
result of the treaty made at the Field of the Cloth of
Gold, Fra^ois was to pay him over a good deal of money.
Until Charles agreed to himself pay him the large
subsidies which he would lose by declaring war with
France, Henry would, therefore, only agree for the
present to put pressure upon Francois, and, by trickery,
to prevent him from putting his forces in the field against
the young Emperor.
This plan was carried out with great success. Fra^ois,
taken in, and wishing to keep Henry as an ally, disavowed
any connection with either Robert de Ja Marck or the
King of Navarre, and by sending no assistance to either
lost all the initial advantages which they had gained for
him in Flanders and on the Pyrenees. Charles accord-
ingly was able to send Franz von Seckingen to drive
back the Wild Boar of the Ardennes, and to ravage
his country, at the same time that Lesparre, foolishly
advancing beyond Navarre into Spanish territory, con-
trived to get himself thoroughly beaten, on June 3Oth,
1521, at the battle of Ezquiros. Here the Duke of
Anne Bolcyn and her Effect on Heairy 147
Najera destroyed his army, and the unfortunate Lesparre
was not only blinded by a wound but taken prisoner. By
this battle Spanish Navarre was lost for ever to the
family of Albret, and although the grandson of Henri
d'Albret became King of France, as Henri IV., it never
was reunited to that kingdom.
When it was too late, Fra^ois I. found how utterly
he had been befooled by the pretended arbitrage which
Cardinal Wolsey, representing his master, had gone
through the farce of holding at Calais. Fra^ois had
sent word to Robert de la Marck to withdraw his troops
from Luxembourg, and Robert had complied, to his
great misfortune and loss, and at the same time both
Francois and Charles V. had sent Ambassadors to lay
their differences before Wolsey. Henry promised that,
as soon as he found out, by due inquiry, which of the
two Princes was responsible for the breach of the peace
that had taken place, he would give his aid to that one
who was not to blame. The whole affair was nothing
but a blind to deceive Frangois, and gain time.. While
he was thus wasting his time, in explaining to Wolsey
through his Ambassadors the manner in which Charles V.
had failed to fulfil any of the articles of the treaty of
Noyon, Charles himself was not only causing Seckingen
to punish his old friend la Marck, but sending him, with
other troops under the Count of Nassau, to invade France.
Before Francois became awake to the Cardinal's
treachery he had lost the towns of Mouzon, Ardres,
Saint Armand, and Montagne, while the city of Tournay
was besieged.
The war with the Empire was now to begin in earnest.
CHAPTER XIV
Two Disappointments for the Butcher's Son
1521—1523
THE state of armed rivalry between the Houses of
France and Austria that commenced with the
outbreak of war in the year 1521 may be said to have
continued for a couple of hundred years.
Until the death of Louis XIV., the so-called Grand
Monarque, in 1715, the eternal wars, springing from
the jealousy engendered between two young men for the
possession of an Imperial crown that brought with it no
territorial or monetary advantages, were to devastate
Europe.
Millions of lives were to be lost, hundreds of thousands
of homesteads devastated and burned, endless cities were
to be sacked, numberless women violated, men tortured
and slain in cold blood. Horror after horror was to be
piled up, first in one country, then in another, frequently
in several countries at the same time. By land and by sea
the work of destruction was to continue, while, fainting
by the waysides or limping along the streets all over
Europe, were to be seen men without arms, men without
legs, or blinded by wounds — all mere parodies of humanity.
The resources of the various States in the meantime
were continually so strained, taxation so oppressive, that
life for the multitude was one long struggle with starva-
tion. Tax succeeded tax. When no money remained
the horse was taken — after the horse the cow, the sheep,
the goat that alone remained. During this terrible state
148
Two Disappointments for the Butcher's Son 149
of affairs, which, owing to the ambitions of rulers whom
it had pleased Providence to set over humanity for its
curse, endured so long, no country suffered more than
France.
There generation after generation of mortals suffered
untold privations, underwent every kind of horror, merely
for the gratification of the ambitions of the Kings. Even
by the time of Henri IV. the country was nothing but
a living sore.
France was invaded time after time in the north or the
south, and with each invasion came a repetition of the
same terrible tale of death, arson, plunder, and rapine.
The unfortunate peasants lived in constant dread of the
appearance of a new army, whether of friend or foe it
mattered little : they remembered only too well what had
happened to them the last time that soldiers had passed
that way. When we think that there were no proper
hospitals, no ambulances or efficient medical service for
these soldiers themselves, who were left only too fre-
quently to perish miserably where they fell, the horror of
it all is the more easy to understand. We can imagine
the fearful agonies with the gaunt wolves, the prowling
unfed dogs, savage with hunger, preying upon these
poor defenceless beings, tearing them to pieces, worrying
them, before they were dead !
Then, again, what was the fate of the thousands of
prisoners that fell into the hands of one side or the other ?
The Knights, the nobles were, we know, held for ransom,
but how were the others treated ? What became of them
when dragged in the wake of a retreating army ? History
is singularly reticent upon this point. We can only
imagine their sufferings, since no one seems to have thought
it worth while to record them. Must they not, time after
time, have been put ruthlessly to the sword, merely to get
them out of the way ? Were they not, when food was
scarce for an army passing through an already devastated
country, left to die of the awful pangs of slow starvation ?
Terrible as were these awful and untold sufferings, did
the Kings, the Princes, who must have constantly had
150 Two Great Rivals
them under their eyes, ever on that account abate one
jot or tittle of their inordinate ambitions, their thirst for
military glory ? Alas ! no answer is necessary.
Such, then, was the ghastly future that was opening
up for Europe ; and since no amount of commiseration
bestowed by us now upon the unhappy ones who were
to suffer and die through the cruelty of the Princes
will alter matters, it only remains for us to chronicle
the events by which, from time to time, one or the other
of them exalted himself and abased his rival.
To return to the opening scenes of these two centuries
of warfare : while one brother of the King's mistress
was, as we have seen, first successful and then miserably
defeated in Navarre, Franfois I., while getting ready to
repel the invasion of his province of Champagne, sent
back another brother into Italy. This was Odet de Foix,
Seigneur de Lautrec, who was the Governor of Milan.
In this country, owing to the giddy ambition of the Pope,
Leo X., who was trying subtly to take advantage of
both the combatants at the same time, and thereby to
regain the territories of Parma and Piacenza, a most
deplorable state of warfare soon existed.
Since the Medici Pope was treating shrewdly with
both the combatants, he had no difficulty in persuading
Fran9ois that he would provide him in his native city of
Florence with the sum of four hundred thousand crowns.
In the expectancy of this money, wherewith to pay his
troops, Lautrec gaily went ahead ; but not before, with
a considerable amount of forethought, he had extracted
a solemn promise from the King that the funds should
be remitted to him without delay in Milan.
Not content with the King's promise, Lautrec obtained
the word also of the Duchesse d'Angouleme, and of the
Treasurer of the kingdom, Jacques de Semblancay, an
honest old man upon whom he felt that he could rely.
Louise de Savoie did not hesitate to give her assurance
that all would be well, and in addition declared solemnly
that if the money did not come from Florence it should
be raised in Languedoc, and forwarded from that province.
Two Disappointments for the Butcher's Son 151
The Treasurer gave similar assurances, but alas for
promises ! When Lautrec arrived in Milan he received
money neither from one source nor from another.
Furious at his deception, Lautrec, who for five years
had mismanaged Milan, set about obtaining funds by
the most unscrupulous methods — by fines, judicial
murders, and confiscations. He was joined by his brother
the Marechal Thomas de Foix, Seigneur de Lescun, to
which third brother of Madame de Chateaubriand he
passed over a considerable part of the sums which he
raised by such unjust means. The discontent among
the despoiled inhabitants of the Duchy of Milan was
naturally excessive, and they began loudly to cry for the
return of a Sforza.
Before long the Pope declared openly for the Emperor ;
and although the two brothers de Foix had several
successes, of which Lautrec very foolishly failed to take
advantage, the French troops soon found themselves
besieged in Milan by Spaniards under Ferdinand d'Avalos,
Marquis of Pescara, and a Papal army under Prospero
Colonna. By these the city was captured on Novem-
ber 1 9th, 1521.
The principal causes of the loss of Milan were the
non-payment of his soldiers by Lautrec, for want of
funds, and the cruelty of which he had been guilty in
order to obtain money. The unpaid soldiers — many of
whom were Swiss, some French, and the rest Venetian
allies — were discouraged and disinclined to fight, and the
more so since Lautrec had failed a short time previously
to take an excellent opportunity of attacking the con-
federated foe, at a place called Robecco, where victory
seemed to be certain.
The money, however, which Lautrec had never received
had been duly raised in Languedoc. It had been retained
— it will scarcely be believed by whom — by the King's
own mother ! The avaricious Louise de Savoie had
secretly diverted the funds required to pay her son's
troops, and to ensure the salvation of his much-beloved
Duchy of Milan, to her own private purse. One reason
I52 Two Great Rivals
for this disgraceful action was her hatred of the King's
mistress, whose brothers Louise sought to discredit and
ruin.
Among the political crimes committed by Lautrec had
been the recent public decapitation in Milan of the chief
of one of the greatest houses of Lombardy. This was
the aged Cristofano Pallavicino, suspected by him of
being in league with a large number of Milanese mal-
contents, who had not long since risen in rebellion owing
to the Governor's exactions, but had been defeated by
Lescun, whom they had besieged in Parma. Lescun,
who had for a time governed Milan in his brother's
absence, had likewise caused Manfredo Pallavicino, the
nephew of Cristofano, to be cut in quarters and his
limbs to be nailed to the doors of Milan. Disgusted
with these cruelties, while the city was being attacked,
its inhabitants rose against the French and opened the
gates to Pescara and Prospero Colonna, some of whose
troops had already entered the city by an aqueduct.
These Generals were, however, unable to capture the
citadel, in which, while retiring from the town, Lautrec
left a strong garrison well provided with provisions. He
himself, with the debris of his army, retired into Venetian
territory, while the greater part of the Milanese fell into
the hands of the enemy. Lodi, Parma, Piacenza, and
Pavia followed the example of Milan, and surrendered to
the forces of the confederates.
In addition to desiring Parma and Piacenza, Leo X.
had in view the future annexation of the Duchy of Ferrara
to the Papal dominions, and likewise the re-establishment
of a Duke of the Sforzas at Milan. In order to obtain
the assistance of the Spanish forces of the Imperialists,
he had suddenly relented in the matter of investing
Charles V. with the kingdom of Naples.
At the very time that Leo X. was treating in a friendly
manner with the Very Christian King, he, therefore,
treacherously accorded the Crown of Naples to Charles V.,
as his vassal. On June 29th, 1521, the vassal Emperor
accordingly presented to the Pope a white hackney, in
From the painting at the Vatican, Rome, Photo by Alinari.
LEO X. RIDING IN STATE.
P- 152]
Two Disappointments for the Butcher's Son 153
sign of feudal homage. At the same time he paid
Leo X. tribute, which was increased by the sum of seven
thousand golden ducats above the usual tribute paid by
the Kings of the Two Sicilies.
While the Emperor then agreed to aid the Pope in
the objects of his ambition, Leo X. promised to help
Charles to expel the French from Lombardy. He also
helped largely, with funds raised from the Papal States,
in paying the troops of the impoverished Emperor, which
would otherwise have been unable to keep the field.
When Leo X. was made acquainted with the occupa-
tion of Milan, and the gain to the Papal dominions of
Parma and Piacenza, he may literally be said to have
died of joy. Always in a bad state of health, the cerebral
excitement caused by this good news, which he caused
to be celebrated by universal illuminations and rejoicings,
had already weakened him, when exposure to chilling
night winds while witnessing the blazing of the bonfires
which he had ordered rendered him violently ill.
Leo X. went to bed, and died in a few hours, it is
said without even receiving the last rites of the Church.
He was not yet forty-six at the time of his sudden
death, on December ist, 1521, and appears to have been
mourned only by the poets, scholars, painters, huntsmen,
and buffoons, upon whom he had squandered such im-
mense sums during his reign.
The Pope's body was cut up after death, in the search
for poison, which was not found, although his cup-bearer
was imprisoned for a time on suspicion of having ad-
ministered to him a dose after the fashion of that which
had taken ofF his predecessor, Alexander VI. The
funeral of Leo X., who had been so fond of magnificence
during his lifetime, was not accompanied by any of the
pomp in which he had so much rejoiced. The fact was
that this extravagant scion of the family of Medici had
left no money in the Papal coffers wherewith he could
be suitably buried. As the leader of the movement of
the Renaissance in Italy, Leo X. must justly remain
famous, but his general character was so ignoble, he was
154 Two Great Rivals
invariably so cunning, shifty, and unreliable, that when
his encouragement of the arts and letters has been
mentioned it is better to say no more about him.
By Leo's death, Cardinal Wolsey thought that he saw
a chance of attaining his ambitions and succeeding to the
Papacy. The Pope's illegitimate cousin had the same
ideas in his head. Both were, however, to be thoroughly
disappointed at the sittings of the Conclave during the
month of December, for there was fierce opposition to
Giulio de' Medici among the members of the Sacred
College of Cardinals. He, accordingly, only hurried back
to Rome from the Imperialist Camp in Lombardy to find
that they would have none of him.
As for Wolsey, Cardinal of York, this tricky Prelate,
who had for so long past been busily employed in deceiv-
ing Fran9ois I. on behalf of the Emperor, now found
himself deceived in turn. For, although Charles V. had
solemnly promised again and again that he would contrive
to have Wolsey elected Pope, a strange and inexplicable
thing happened.
This was that the Emperor's old Flemish tutor, and
now his Viceroy in Spain, Adrien d'Utrecht, Cardinal of
Tortosa, was elected to the Papal Chair.
When Henry VIII. and Wolsey heard of this, they
naturally asked somewhat testily of the Emperor the
question : " Now, how on earth has that happened ? "
" I assure you that I have not the slightest idea in the
world," replied Charles innocently ; " but I had nothing
to do with it. I am as surprised as you are."
" It seems rather odd — your own tutor too ! And now
he, of all men, is your Over-Lord in Naples, where you
happen to have some interests," replied Henry and the
Cardinal of York.
" It is odd, certainly," retorted Charles ; " but 1 will see
that it doesn't happen again — it shall be Wolsey who
is Pope next time, as sure as I am King of the Romans
and Emperor-Elect."
With this reply Wolsey had to be satisfied, especially
as the worthy Adrien Dedel, well known for his piety,
Two Disappointments for the Butcher's Son 155
wrote a letter publicly to the Emperor, in which he took
care to say that he was in no way beholden to his former
pupil for his unexpected elevation to the Papacy — to
which he ascended under the title of Adrian VI.
This Pope lasted for only a year at the head of the
Church of Rome, and during that period he shone out
as a good and just soul in a sordid and selfish age.
Without personal ambition, and seeking the reformation
of, that sink of iniquity, Rome, Adrian did all within his
power to reconcile Fra^ois I. and Charles V., for the
good of Europe and its protection against the Turk.
He was, however, too good for his age, and when he
died, it was said of poison, in September 1523, he did
so utterly disappointed at his wasted efforts.
Rome was openly delighted to see the last of him,
and, when the Conclave again met, the Cardinals elected,
not Wolsey, but Giulio de' Medici, who ascended the
Papal Throne as Clement VII.
Giulio was the illegitimate son of Giuliano de' Medici,
the brother of Lorenzo I. (// Magnified), and was born
in the year 1478. >
CHAPTER XV
Bayard to the Rescue
1521
WHILE matters were going so badly for Odet de
Foix and his master's cause in Italy, Fra^ois
was trying to repair the fault of which he had been
guilty in leaving his frontiers on the side of Flanders
unprotected. He commenced, however, by a grave
error, which was in sending some troops to the north
under his brother-in-law, the Due d'Alen9on, when he
should by rights have sent the Connetable de France,
the Due de Bourbon. The reason for this error and
injustice was apparent. While the credit of his sister
Marguerite had commenced to outweigh even that of
the lovely Comtesse de Chateaubriand, that of the
haughty Bourbon was in the decline, and already Louise
de Savoie was commencing to hate her unreliable lover.
Marguerite's husband, the Due d'Alengon, who was by no
means a great soldier, did nothing of any account before
it was learned that Mezieres, the key to Champagne,
was about to be invested by the Imperial armies, under
the Count of Nassau and Franz von Seckingen.
It was suddenly realised that this important place
was in the worst possible condition for defence, and
while Fran9ois himself was busily employed in trying
to get an army together, the question arose, who was
there who could be trusted to do anything to prevent
the town from falling into the hands of the enemy, for
at all events the space of one month.
There was only one man upon whose known courage
156
Bayard to the Rescue 157
and ability Frar^ois knew that he could rely. This
was the Chevalier sans peur et sans reproche.
The gallant Bayard replied with joy and alacrity to
the call of his King. " More delighted than if he
had received the King's order for a hundred thousand
crowns," the Gentil Seigneur threw himself into Mezieres,
with two companies of men-at-arms, some gentlemen
volunteers, and a couple of thousand foot soldiers. Some
of those with him thought the place too weak to be
defended. " For courageous hearts," exclaimed the
bold Bayard, " there is no place too weak to defend."
He set to work at once to destroy the bridge across
the river Meuse and to repair the fortifications. He
gave away the whole of his own money to those under
him, and set them the example of working himself with a
pick and shovel.
It was while awaiting the attack of the enemy at
Mezieres that the brave Knight made one of those notable
harangues by which, in times of the greatest difficulty
and danger, he was wont to raise the failing spirits of
those around him. " Comrades," he remarked gaily,
" if we were in a field, having nothing before us but
a four-foot ditch, still could we fight for a whole day
without being defeated. Thank God ! here we have
a moat, walls, and ramparts ; and I verily believe that
before ever the enemies put a foot within them many
of their number will sleep in the ditches."
The garrison cheered his words — they believed that
under such a man they could never suffer defeat.
Soon Seckingen appeared on one side of Mezieres and
that able soldier Nassau on the other. These two
Imperialist leaders sent a herald with a polite message,
inviting Bayard to surrender the town. This herald
was charged to say that " they esteemed the great and
praiseworthy courage which existed in the Seigneur de
Bayard, and they would be greatly displeased if he
should be taken by assault, for his honour would suffer
in such an unfortunate eventuality, and also, possibly,
it might cost him his life."
158 Two Great Rivals
The Bon Chevalier sent back reply " that he had
not the honour of the acquaintance of the Seigneurs de
Nassau and Seckingen, but he thanked them for their
gracious intentions towards himself. Nevertheless, the
King having chosen him to keep the place, he would
preserve it so well that the Imperialists would be tired
of the siege before himself, and that before hearing any
talk of leaving the town, he hoped to make in the
ditches a bridge of dead bodies, over which he would
be able to pass."
When this defiant answer to their summons was brought
back to Nassau, an officer who knew the Knight said :
" Do not expect ever to get into the town while the
Chevalier lives : he is a man who would inspire the
greatest cowards with courage. He and those under
him will all die in the breach before ever they let us
pass. Better for us if there were two thousand more
men in the place and Bayard out of it."
" Come, come," replied Nassau ; " he is not made
either of bronze or steel. If he is so brave let him
get ready to prove it to us, for in the next four days
I will send him so many bombs that he will not know
which way to turn."
Nassau was as good as his word, and during the
ensuing days he kept up the most furious cannonade
imaginable. Its effects were so terrible that a number
of Bayard's foot-soldiers let themselves down over the
walls and escaped. cc All the better," remarked the
Knight ; " I would rather be without such rascals than
with them — such canaille are not fit to gain honour
with us."
When Seckingen's batteries, placed on a hill on the
other side of the town, were found to be doing even
more damage than those of Nassau, the wily Bayard
conceived an excellent ruse whereby he might be rid of
the too close attentions of this celebrated free-lance.
Robert de la Marck was in his fortified city of Sedan
close at hand, and to him the commandant of Mezieres
wrote a letter. This was so worded as to make it appear
Bayard to the Rescue 159
that a large body of Swiss were about to arrive and fall
suddenly upon Seckingen, for whom Bayard said he was
sorry, as he had evidently been purposely placed in the
post of the greatest danger. The letter further implied
that Nassau himself, with his army, was about to come
over to the King of France.
The letter was given to a peasant to carry, and Bayard
awaited events with a delighted sense of anticipation.
The Chevalier did not have to wait long for his
expected amusement. When the peasant had been, as
he was expected to be, stopped at Seckingen's outposts,
there was soon plenty to be seen to offer entertainment
for those watching from the damaged ramparts of
Mezieres.
Within a few minutes after the capture of the bearer
of the supposed missive to the Wild Boar of the
Ardennes, drums were heard beating and trumpets
sounding, in all directions the tents were observed being
struck, and the troops falling in by companies on every
side. Directly afterwards, Seckingen and all his forces
— cavalry, artillery, and infantry — were seen recrossing
the Meuse, to the same side of the river as that upon
which the Count of Nassau's forces were in position.
Frequent messengers were seen swiftly coming from
Nassau, and returning as hurriedly, and then all the
drumming and trumpeting was repeated from Nassau's
camp, where there was the greatest commotion as the
troops of that General took their places in the ranks.
When, after a short time, the Chevalier Bayard saw
the army of Nassau all drawn up in battle array, and
opposed to the army of Seckingen, now also deployed in
fighting formation, he laughed to fits (rit a gorge
deploy ee) at the success of his stratagem. Without
waiting for the two Imperialist armies to fall upon each
other, as they seemed about to do, Bayard caused every
gun that he could bring to bear from the walls to be
repeatedly discharged into the opposing ranks of his
formerly united foes. So angry, however, were Seckingen
and Nassau, who had previously quarrelled with each
i6o Two Great Rivals
other, that without waiting to return the fire from
Mezieres, each drew off his forces in an opposite direction.
In this manner, after a three weeks' investment, in which
the attackers had lost many men but no assault had been
attempted, was the siege of Mezieres raised. By a
miracle, the peasant who had carried the letter escaped
in the confusion without being hanged, and returned to
the triumphant Bayard to tell him of all the furious
messages which he had heard sent backwards and forwards,
between Franz von Seckingen and Nassau, after the
supposed letter to Robert de la Marck was read aloud
in the presence of a council of infuriated officers at the
headquarters of the former.
Such was the distrust caused between these two leaders
of the Emperor's forces by this cunning trick of the
Gentil Seigneur, that for a long time afterwards they
refused to act together. Seckingen retired through
Picardy in his rage, and ravaged the country.
In the meantime Frangois I. had got an excellent army
together. Putting d'Alengon in command of the advance
guard, which belonged by rights to Bourbon, and keeping
the latter with him with the main body, he advanced
to meet Nassau. The Emperor himself now came to
take command of Nassau's forces, but while he sent the
Count forward to oppose the passage by Francois of the
Meuse, Charles prudently remained within the sheltering
walls of Valenciennes. Now it was that the result of
the French King's distrust of the warlike Constable
proved most disadvantageous to France. For after
having crossed the river Escaut, in spite of Nassau's
opposition, Fra^ois found himself in a splendid position
to give battle. Had he done so with his superior forces,
it is more than probable that he would not only have
crushed the Emperor completely but taken him prisoner
also. On October 22nd, 1521, Fra^ois was between
Cambray and Valenciennes, when the Constable pointed
out to him that the decisive moment had come and
success was certain. Fra^ois was brave enough, but
he had no grasp of a situation. He turned coldly from
Bayard to the Rescue i6i
the capable Bourbon and preferred to listen to the
advice of the Due d'Alenc.on, who said that with an army
chiefly consisting of recruits it was better to risk no
pitched battle. Charles V. accordingly made his escape
with barely a hundred horsemen, while Nassau retired
hastily, followed by Fra^ois, who took several of the
Emperor's cities in Flanders.
At no time was the influence of that brilliant woman
the Archduchess Marguerite more en Evidence than at
about this period. At one time she was personally
treating with Wolsey, who repaired to meet her at
Bruges ; at another she was to be found addressing the
States-General and inveighing against the treacherous
conduct of Fran9ois. Again she made personal appeals
to the patriotism of the people, through the assembled
States of Ghent, begging them to give their lives and
their purses to her nephew the Emperor. Her eloquence
and arguments were equally convincing, and Charles
owed his aunt everything, since it was entirely through
her efforts that an army of over twenty thousand men
was placed at his disposition.
She busied herself at the same time with various
affiances and marriages in that year, 1521, when the
nuptials of her nephew Ferdinand were successfully carried
out with the young Anne, soon to become heiress of
Hungary, almost at the same time that Marguerite was
signing a contract with Wolsey for the espousal of the
Emperor to his cousin Mary of England. This marriage,
according to the arrangements made by Marguerite at
Bruges, was not to take place until Mary should be
twelve years old. The astute Archduchess stipulated,
as one of the terms of this alliance, that Henry VIII.
should join the Emperor with forty thousand men, to
invade the dominions of the French King, whose conduct,
in endeavouring to protect himself against her machina-
tions, Marguerite had denounced publicly as being so
" perfidious."
This same perfidious King was, however, causing the
vindictive Marguerite considerable heartburnings before
II
1 62 Two Great Rivals
the end of the year, as he amply revenged himself for
the ravages of Seckingen in Picardy by laying waste a
considerable part of the border countries over which the
Archduchess ruled.
After taking the cities of Bouchain and Hesdin, how-
ever, Francois found that the heavy autumnal rains made
it impossible for him to follow up his successes.
Marguerite therefore had her revenge in a measure, when
the French town of Tournay fell into the hands of the
forces which she had raised for her nephew.
On the southern borders of France fortune seemed,
however, to smile on the Very Christian King, as the gay
Bonnivet, usually as incompetent in war as he was gallant
and rash, having been entrusted with command of the army
of Guienne, was attended with unusual good luck. He
took Saint-Jean-de-Luz, recovered all of French Navarre,
that is to say, the part of that country north of the
Pyrenees, and particularly distinguished himself by
capturing from the Spanish troops of Charles the im-
portant town of Fontarabia.
Whether successful or unsuccessful, Bonnivet — the
Admiral of France, who probably never even saw a ship-
of-war in his life — was always a favourite at Court. One
reason for this fact was that he had been the intimate
friend of Fra^ois from boyhood. To such an extent
was the friendship carried that, apart from the never
resented attempt upon the honour of the King's sister,
Marguerite, which we have mentioned, the King on several
occasions had cause to complain that Bonnivet success-
fully contested with him the favours of some fair lady.
By Louise de Savoie he was always strongly supported,
for the reason that he was closely leagued with her against
Bourbon — the man who would not marry her when she
asked him. The alliance of Bonnivet with the King's
mother was, indeed, one of the chief causes of the ultimate
defection of the Constable, who hated the Admiral and
rightly accused him of instigating the King against himself.
From a photo by W . A. Mansell of a lithograph after the stained-glass window in the church of
Notre Dame de Brou (Bourg-en-Bresse).
MARGUERITE, ARCHDUCHESS OF AUSTRIA.
P. »6a]
CHAPTER XVI
How Marguerite d'Angouleme Influenced
Francois I.
1517 AND LATER
rT~'HE three Monarchs who throughout the first half
1 of the sixteenth century were so constantly em-
ployed in trying to cut one another's throats had a
common ancestor. Henry VIII. , Fransois I., and
Charles V. were all descended from Louis IX. of France,
called Saint-Louis. So also were the Due d'Alen^on and
the Due de Bourbon, the Constable — all were cousins.
This fact is interesting to note, as showing how little
the ties of marriages, about which so much fuss was made,
served to promote any real friendly feeling, any kind
of faith and loyalty to one another, among the common
descendants of those marriages, when they happened to
be of the great ones of the earth.
On the contrary, the strain of the same blood in them
only seemed to make them the more treacherous to,
the more bitter against, one another, the mere fact of
the relationship generally involving the claim of one
to some possession which had fallen into the hands of
another.
Of all the open claims to which we could refer as
existing between the personages of Royal blood men-
tioned above, none was the cause of such deadly strife
as that of the Duchy of Burgundy, claimed by the
Emperor from " his dear brother and cousin,"
Fran9ois I.
163
164 Two Great Rivals
In spite of all the Kingdoms that he possessed, this
one Duchy was apparently of greater value in the eyes
of Charles than all the rest of Europe put together.
Its ownership was one of the principal subjects laid
before Wolsey to decide upon in his mock arbitration
at Calais, which commenced before the nominal beginning
of the war, and continued for some time after the troops
of Charles had actually invaded France.
There were half a dozen other places asked for by
Charles, towns and counties which, if yielded up, would
have established him in the heart of France, within
striking distance of Paris. His claim to these, founded
on old treaties, was probably just as good or better than
that to Burgundy. Had but the latter Duchy been
yielded by Francois, however, there might have been
peace at once and for ever between the rivals, and they
might have become firm friends. For in all other matters
Charles's ambition was not so much at stake but that
there might always have been found a means of mutual
accommodation.
Had the Emperor but obtained his precious Burgundy,
Francois would in all probability never have had any
complaints to make about Imperial molestation in Milan.
Instead of aiding the Pope to put the King of France
out of Italy, Charles would then more likely have suggested
to Francois that together they should put the Pope out
of that country, and divide the Papal dominions between
them.
What a deal of trouble there might have been saved !
Even, in all probability, Francois, if he had bargained
for it, could have had Spanish Navarre back for his
friend and ally, Henri d'Albret, and thus have secured
his frontiers permanently from attack on the side of
Spain.
There was, however, at the beginning of 1522 not
the slightest chance of Francois giving way> and as he,
on his side, thought more about the recovery of Milan,
recently lost by Lautrec, than the defence of his own
realms, he devoted all his efforts towards sending more
Marguerite's Influence 165
troops to Italy, where not only did the citadel of Milan
still hold out, but the French retained a number of
fortified places.
Meanwhile money was wanted, and money was hard
to obtain as — owing to the ravages of Seckingen in
the north of France, from which Frangois had failed to
protect his unfortunate people — the King found himself
very unpopular.
Frangois had up to this time lived triumphantly upon
his glory as the victor of Marignano, but his subjects
were beginning to see through him — he had ceased to
be for them the Paladin, the modern Roland, as which
for a time he had shone in the popular eye.
A feeling of despair, of want of reliance on the King,
pervaded the land. Men of the various Parliaments
of Paris and the provinces, the clergy, and the nobility,
saw all places and emoluments given into the hands of
that newly established institution, the Court. Men
raged when they saw the incompetent brothers of the
King's mistress entrusted with the highest commands,
while Bourbon, a warrior of worth, was neglected. The
people cried out in their despair : " Our King does not
help us ! Have we no redress ? "
The teachings of Reform were commencing to spread
in France, especially in the industrial centre of Meaux,
where the Bishop Brigonnet encouraged the movement.
These teachings said : " Yes, there is redress to be
found. Redress is to be obtained, but only from God,
who will, without the intervention of either King or
clergy, afford you protection."
With this feeling implanted in the heart, immense
numbers of the people began to incline more and more
towards the doctrines of Luther, while the movement
was encouraged by Marguerite, the King's sister, who
was constantly in communication with the Bishop of
Meaux. The Duchesse d'Alengon even endeavoured,
for a time it seemed with success, to incline her brother
and her mother towards listening with a favourable ear
to the new teachings. She also without much difficulty
1 66 Two Great Rivals
induced Francois to encourage what was called " the new
learning " of the Renaissance, which new learning was
merely the revival of interest in the ancient classical
writers, the reversal of the musty and stupid tenets
of the clergy of the Middle Ages, men who looked upon
anything Greek as absolute heresy. How ridiculous
were these teachings, as still carried on by the doctors
of the Sorbonne 1 in Paris, can be judged by a letter
written about this time by Glarean to that brilliant
scholar, but by no means too reliable savant and
humanist, Erasmus. The writer's scorn is evident, as
he says :
" What a disillusion ! There is no one here who
explains, either in public or private lessons, an important
Greek author. The numberless cohorts of sophists
block all progress. I was lately present at a disputation
in the Sorbonne, where I heard frequent applause. They
were not a little out of temper with Adam, our first
father, for having eaten apples instead of pears ; those
grave individuals could scarcely restrain their indignation.
But the gravity of the theologian entirely outweighed
the anger — not a single soul laughed."
Marguerite d'Angouleme was constantly stirring her
brother up to do away with this condition of idiocy in
the schools. She was backed up in her efforts by the
Cardinal Jean du Bellay, who was privately married to
her old friend and instructress, the lively and learned
Madame de Chatillon. There were also several well-
instructed men about the Court whom Marguerite
encouraged to go ahead. Guillaume Bude, an excellent
Greek scholar, was one of these, and Guillaume Petit, the
King's Confessor, was another. Fra^ois was easily
influenced in the right direction where the restoration of
classical learning was concerned. He longed to shine as
the protector of letters, to earn fame for the encourage-
1 The Sorbonne was the most famous of the colleges of the medieval
University of Paris, originally exclusively devoted to theology. It was
founded in 1253 by Robert of Sorbon, in the diocese of Rheims. Its
dogmatic decisions controlled the intellectual life of Europe.
Marguerite's Influence 167
ment of science and learning in France, as much as did
Leo X. in Rome.
He commenced to talk of forming a new Royal College,
one richly provided with funds, in which every branch of
human learning should be taught by instructors famed
for their erudition, who should be summoned from all
parts of the earth. Marguerite had no difficulty, there-
fore, in persuading her brother to send for Erasmus, as
one who would form a brilliant nucleus for others to
gather around. The clever but shifty Erasmus, a man
born of illegitimate parentage in the Low Countries, who
had acquired much knowledge but was never too sure of
what his religious opinions were, was, however, too
wary to place himself in those ticklish times anywhere
within reach of the jealous doctors of the Sorbonne.
He was wise in his generation, for had he not translated
the Greek Testament, and was not that in itself a crime
against religion ? The Sorbonne distinctly forbade the
reading of Greek a little later on, and of Hebrew also.
This was, however, when the King happened to be out
of the way, in a Spanish prison, and when the doctors
were, in spite of the efforts of Marguerite and of the
King's orders, sent from afar, beginning to burn people
in Paris on account of their heresies.
It was not until after his return from Spain that, for
one reason or another — such as having a Spanish wife or
a desire to keep in with Pope Clement VII. — Fra^ois
definitely turned his back on Reform, and, greatly to the
disappointment of his sister, after having saved some of
her proteges from the Sorbonne, allowed the burnings to
continue.
Marguerite's influence nevertheless prevailed in the
end against the savage ferocity of the Sorbonne in the
matter of the formation of a College de France. In this,
although it was in no way established on the scale of
magnificence originally intended, there were chairs for
Hebrew, Greek, Latin, Medicine, and Philosophy. Even
Arabic and Physiology had their instructors in this
establishment ; but it was a long time before all of these
1 68 Two Great Rivals
different teachers were installed. One of the greatest op-
ponents of the spirifuetle authoress of the " Heptameron "
in the matter was the bigoted Maitre Noel Beda. This
fanatic could not be restrained even by the King ; he
even dared to denounce the amiable Queen of Navarre
as herself a heretic, and forbade the reading of the mys-
tical book she published called the Miroir de fAme
pecheresse. Not long before this Marguerite had begged
of her brother, the life of Calvin, the young cooper's son
from Noyon, and Beda was all the more anxious to be
revenged on the King's sister. Fransois caused the
doctors of the Sorbonne, who had placed Marguerite's
name on the " Index," to make a public apology and
retractation, which they did in the most abject manner.
It was not likely, however, that B£da, a bigot who
openly maintained before the King that " Hebrew and
Greek would be the cause of numerous heresies,"
could be subdued so easily. His next move was to cause
a farce to be performed by students, in which Marguerite
was shown as receiving a translation of the Gospels
direct from Hell. Then Frat^ois sent Beda and three of
his confreres to prison, but the good-hearted Marguerite
begged their release from her brother.
She had better, however, have left these bitter op-
ponents of learning in the Conciergerie, as not long after
their release they took a terrible revenge. For some time
Marguerite, become Queen of Navarre, had been defending
from the Sorbonne a rich and amiable gentleman from
Picardy, named Louis de Berquin. She had already
succeeded in tearing Berquin once from the doctors'
clutches. Now, in the absence of the King, they con-
demned the unfortunate gentleman to be imprisoned for
ever between four walls in a dark dungeon. Then,
when he appealed, fearing that the influence of the
King's sister might cause his release, they took Berquin
out and, before orders to the contrary could be received
from the Court at Blois, burned him alive in the Place de
Greve at Paris.
After this insult to his sister, Fran9ois ordered the
Marguerite's Influence 169
imprisonment for life of the truculent Beda, and he died
in a damp dungeon. The King himself, however, owing
to the inflammatory notices nailed by the Reformers to the
walls of the Churches, now ceased to protect them any
longer, and also, as we have said, for political reasons he
ceased to listen to his sister's intercessions on their
behalf. Nevertheless she herself continued to give refuge
to many so-called heretics at her Navarrese Court, at
Pau or Nerac.
To return to the year 1522, when all of this religious
commotion was commencing in France. The King
found himself so unpopular in Paris that he had actually
to humble himself before the Provosts at the Hotel de
Ville in order to induce the Parisians to raise the troops
that he required. He did the same thing at Rouen,
where his prayers for assistance were listened to with a
better grace. At length, having obtained what he re-
quired, Fran£ois left for Lyon, always preoccupied with
the idea of Italy, and not troubling his brain about the
defence of France.
CHAPTER XVII
The Luck of Charles V.
OCCUPIED in his usual fashion with the delights of
love and the chase, Fra^ois did not commence
his new campaign in Italy in person, but once more
confided the command of the newly raised troops
to the inefficient and cruel Lautrec, the influence of
whose sister, Fran£oise de Foix, not yet having reached
the vanishing point which had been foretold by her
enemies.
The chances for the recovery of Milan seemed pretty
good, for, while the new Pope, Adrian VI., did not appear
hostile to France, and Florence, no longer at the beck
and call of a Medici, seemed also neutral, the Venetians
were again ready to cast in their lot with Fra^ois I.
An additional advantage was that the Swiss, who had
previously been divided for and against France, now
determined to enrol their mercenary bands only on the
side opposed to Charles V.
With Lautrec were associated in the command of the
united French forces the young Marechal de France,
Anne de Montmorency, and the Bastard of Savoy, the
illegitimate brother of Louise. Rene the Bastard had
not forgotten his former harsh treatment at the hands
of the Archduchess Marguerite, and was anxious if
possible to take his revenge upon her nephew.
On the Imperialist side the principal commanders
were the cautious and capable Prospero Colonna and,
a very obstinate and determined soldier of Spain, Antonio
da Leyva. With them was a considerable body of
170
The Luck of Charles V, 171
German lansquenets, under the leadership of a tough
old soldier named George von Frundsberg : these had
been raised in person by the young Francesco Sforza with
the object of recovering for himself the Duchy of Milan.
More German troops had also been raised by Jerome
Adorno, who was seeking to take advantage of the
occasion in order to oust the French from Genoa, and
establish himself as ruler in that city, of which Fran9ois I.
was the Seigneur.
The army with which Odet de Foix took the field
for the campaign of 1522 was of formidable dimensions.
In addition to being joined by the Venetians and thousands
of the warlike Swiss, he had the good luck to be able
to engage the services of a noted Florentine leader, one
who had in the time of Leo X. fought with the Holy
League against France. This was Giovanni de' Medici,
the noted commander of the Black Bands of Italy, who
with his three thousand followers now enrolled himself
under the banners of France.
With his splendid host, Lautrec made a bold dash
upon Milan, the city from which he had been ousted but
a few months earlier, and in whose citadel he still
retained a strong garrison which Colonna had been unable
to reduce. The inhabitants of Milan had, however, far
too lively a recollection of the tender amenities of
Lautrec' s rule to allow him once more to enter their
city. They formed themselves into military companies,
and gave such excellent assistance to Colonna' s Imperial
troops that Odet de Foix not only was unable to com-
municate with the citadel but lost great numbers of his
men. He fell back disheartened, and retired to await
the arrival of his brother Lescun, the Marechal de Foix,
with more troops from France.
In spite of his efforts, while thus waiting to keep
Francesco Sforza, who was in Pavia, from joining
Colonna, he was outwitted, and Sforza entered triumphantly
into Milan at the beginning of April 1522.
There he was acclaimed as their rightful Duke with
the most tumultuous joy by the fickle population, while
172 Two Great Rivals
Lautrec marched off to besiege Pavia, held by Antonio
da Leyva. His ineptitude now became more than ever
apparent, for, although his brother's reinforcements left
him in possession of a magnificent fighting force, he
allowed Prospero Colonna to throw a large body of men
into Pavia under his very eyes.
This prudent Italian now came out of Milan and
threatened Lautrec in rear from a very advantageous
position, whereupon the brother of the King's mistress
marched back once more to Milan. Again, however,
Colonna circumvented him, and took up an excessively
strong post, in the immense walled park of a villa called
La Bicocca, to cover Milan.
At this place everything was in favour of the defenders,
who were at least twenty thousand in number. The
spacious gardens, placed on a height, were covered with
trees, rivulets divided them in places, and the only easy
access was by a bridge. Colonna did all that military
art required to improve the advantages of nature : he
dug deep ditches, raised batteries of artillery upon
platforms, and placed his troops with the greatest skill
so as to resist attack.
Lautrec, who had superior numbers, conceived the
idea of starving Colonna and his army out of La
Bicocca, and forcing him to fight in the open ; but he
was reckoning without his Swiss. The weather was
miserable, rain being incessant, and the Swiss, who had
received no pay, were perfectly disgusted with a campaign
which consisted chiefly in marching up and down a
flooded country. They reminded Lautrec of Robecco,
where he might have fought with advantage but would
not, and said that now they must either have their pay
or a battle, otherwise they would go home. Odet de
Foix saw that a battle must inevitably mean defeat : he
begged the Swiss to have patience, as he was expecting
every day four hundred thousand crowns from the King
of France. He further explained to them that to attack
such a position as that of the Bicocca would be madness.
Nothing but the money which did not come would
The Luck of Charles V. 173
have made the fiery Swiss listen to reason. They said,
however, that just to prove to France that they were
more faithful at keeping their engagements than the
French, they would attack the Bicocca without pay —
but fight they would, and at once, or else go home.
Rather than lose his Swiss, their commander had to
give in and agree to assault the fortified position on three
sides at once. His brother, the Marechal de Foix, was
to attack with the French men-at-arms and Italian foot-
soldiers from the side of Milan ; the Swiss were to
endeavour to scale the walls in front, while Lautrec
himself expected by a trick to deceive the defenders
while attacking the position on the right face. His
ruse consisted in causing his troops to wear a red cross,
in imitation of the men of the Imperial forces ; and it
was agreed, further, that the army of Venice was to
support him.
Of the defending forces, Francesco Sforza, with Italians,
was opposed to the Marechal de Foix as he strove to
force the bridge ; the German lansquenets, under George
von Frundsberg, were face to face with the Swiss, whom
they hated bitterly, as they had often been vanquished
by them, while Colonna, who commanded, among others,
the disciplined arquebus-men of Spain, held the walls
in front of Lautrec. After the fight commenced Prospero
had not been long in finding out the trick of Lautrec,
but, lest in the melee it should prove of some avail,
he checkmated it by a counter -order of a similar nature.
This was that every man of the Imperial forces should
stick in his helmet, or in some conspicuous part of his
accoutrements, a sprig of a tree or a bunch of green
wheat, so that they should recognise one another for
friends.
The Swiss, who were commanded by Arnold von
Winckelried and Arnold von Stein, behaved with the
most magnificent courage in this ill-fated battle brought
on by their own obstinacy. Although their scaling
ladders were too short, and the artillery of the defenders
knocked them over wholesale, they made effort after
174 Two Great Rivals
effort to storm the walls. Von Winckelried, recognising
George Frundsberg, shouted defiance to his old enemy,
swearing to kill him with his own hands. The tough
old commander of the lansquenets answered in similar
style, swearing that he was only waiting for Winckelried
to cut his throat. Unfortunately, the two commanders
were deprived of the pleasure of a personal combat, as
a Spanish arquebus-man, thinking that they had abused
each other in the ancient Homeric style long enough,
cut short the colloquy by shooting the unlucky Winckel-
ried dead. His body rolled over into the ditch, and
thus perished a man whose name had been noted in every
combat in which the Swiss mercenaries had taken part
during more than a quarter of a century.
The death of their commander only enraged the men
from the land of William Tell. They clambered up the
walls time after time, and killed many of the detested
Germans ere at last they had to fall back, leaving three
thousand of their number dead and dying behind them.
The courageous Lescun was more lucky for a time.
With his French men-at-arms he took the bridge and
charged home right into the camp of the Imperial forces.
He drove back Antonio da Leyva, who had come from
Pavia with his Spaniards, overthrew also Francesco Sforza,
fighting bravely for his Duchy at the head of his Italians.
Unfortunately, however, for Thomas de Foix, the lans-
quenets, after seeing that there was nothing more to fear
from the Swiss, rushed to reinforce the retiring troops
of other nationalities. They by their charges decided
the battle on this side. Slowly Lescun and all the
chivalry of France were driven backwards, and at length
the bridge was retaken. As for Lautrec, the incessant
cannonade and the fire of the arquebus-men of Colonna
proved too much for him. In spite of fighting with bravery
worthy of the name of Foix, as the Venetians faithlessly
failed to support him and remained inactive, he could
not force the enclosed position on the right, and was
compelled to draw off his men.
Lautrec was a bad commander, but he had the merit
The Luck of Charles V. 175
of his race — he was brave and, moreover, loyal to his
King. It was with despair in his heart that he withdrew,
but he still did not give up hope of retaining the Duchy
even if he could not for the present regain the city
of Milan. His efforts now were directed towards
retaining the surviving Swiss, in order to fight again,
offering to dismount all the men-at-arms to renew the
conflict with them, indeed, to lead the van on foot.
The men of the Cantons, however, said no. They had
had enough ; they had not earned the increased pay
which would be due to them for a successful combat,
and they were not going to take any more chances for
a King who did not keep his word — they were going
home.
Lautrec had been defeated but not routed. He retired
unmolested from before the walls of La Bicocca, and
escorted the retiring Swiss until they had reached a safe
distance from the foe and were able to retire in safety
to their own country ; which they did immediately.
After this everything went wrong for the French.
The Venetians, less brave than the Swiss, retired without
fighting, and Lautrec, after losing the city of Lodi and
other places, returned to France, leaving his brother, the
Mar£chal, behind him in Cremona, where after a time
he had to capitulate. The Citadel of Milan and that1 of
Novara also yielded — and all was lost in Lombardy.
When Lautrec got back to Lyon he found Fra^ois I.
still amusing himself hunting and carrying on his usual
dissipations. The King was so enraged with the loss
of Milan that he refused to see Odet de Foix. The
Constable de Bourbon, however, although in bad odour
at Court, had sufficient generosity to take the man who
had succeeded him as Viceroy of Milan almost by force
into the presence of the King.
" You have lost my Duchy of Milan ! " exclaimed
Francois furiously.
<l It is your Majesty who has lost it and not I," boldly
retorted Lautrec. " How many times have I warned
you that the gens tfarmes had not been paid for eighteen
176 Two Great Rivals
months, and that without pay I could do nothing with
the Swiss ? "
" Money ! Did I not send you four hundred thousand
crowns ? "
" You sent me letters, sire, in plenty, certainly, but
not a ducat have I received."
" Send for de Semblan9ay at once," exclaimed the King.
" I must hear more about this."
The Superintendent of the Finances arriving, he was
asked what he had done with the money for Lautrec.
" The Duchesse d'Angouleme retained it for herself
just when I was sending it off," replied de Semblan^ay.
Almost out of his mind with rage, Fra^ois rushed
off to his mother, and, quite forgetting his usual courtesy,
reproached her bitterly for causing him the loss of Milan.
Louise de Savoie, however, gave the lie to the Treasurer,
and vowed that the money she had retained was her own
revenue — part of her own savings. When the old Sem-
blan^ay stuck to his story — which was the true one —
the infamous Louise determined to be revenged upon
him. So great was her power over her son that in this
she was successful, as not long afterwards the innocent
Jacques de Semblancay was strung up on a gallows at
Montfaucon.
In spite of this miserable action of the King's mother,
it is not to her fault alone that must be attributed the
loss to Fran9ois of the inheritance of the Viscontis. In
the first instance, the King was to blame for having with-
drawn the able Bourbon from the Viceroyalty of Milan,
and, after that, the cruelties of Lautrec, by which the
people had become disaffected, were answerable for the
return of a Sforza ; and with the return of a Sforza there
was a tangible head to the resistance to France.
Merely the want of money wherewith to pay troops did
not in those days prevent Generals from winning battles.
The armies of Charles V., which conquered Lautrec, were
as badly paid as those of France. Lautrec had, however,
succeeded in setting the whole country against himself
and the French, so that, while doing everything in their
The Luck of Charles V. 177
power to injure the armies of Francis, the inhabitants
made it all the more easy for Colon na, Pescara, and
Antonio da Leyva to live in Lombardy until they had
reconquered the country for the Emperor and established
his nominee in Milan.
By this conquest Charles V. was able once more to
assume the position of the Emperors as Suzerains of
Lombardy, and since he had already been invested with
Naples he became supreme in Italy. Nor was he the
only foe whom Fra^ois had now to dread, for while,
waking up from his lethargy at Lyon, he was preparing
for a new invasion of Italy in person, he learned that the
tricky Henry VIII. had at last openly declared himself
as the Emperor's ally and the foe of France.
This, then, was all that had been gained by the meeting
at the Field of the Cloth of Gold. It was a bitter pill
for Fran9ois to swallow, especially after the manner in
which he had done all in his power to keep on friendly
terms with Henry, for whom he seems, oddly enough, to
have conceived a real — if unreturned — affection.
It must now be taken into consideration how lucky
a man was Charles V. Almost without doing anything
to deserve it, fortune seemed always to be playing into
his hands, and especially in all matters where his rivalry
to Francis was concerned.
In Spain, where he had done everything to insult and
antagonise the whole Spanish race, the nobles had come
over to his side and practically subdued the insurrection
of the Comuneros. At Rome, without, so he declared,
any assistance from himself, his old tutor, Adrien
d' Utrecht, had been elected Pope. In Northern Italy
his commanders, aided by the people of the country, had
turned the French out of Lombardy. Even had Adorno
contrived to obtain possession of Genoa, where he was
elected Doge. And now, to crown the Emperor's
triumphs, Henry VIII., who had been promising his
daughter to the King of France, whose money he had
been pocketing, declared himself in his favour.
Luck was on his side again in having such a capable
12
178 Two Great Rivals
aunt as Marguerite, one to whom he was always able
to entrust the government of the Netherlands with every
confidence, while knowing that she would make any
personal sacrifice on his behalf and do all in her power
to humble France. Even once more was he lucky in his
young brother Ferdinand, upon whom he could always
rely as a true and staunch ally, as ruler in Austria and
the adjoining soldier producing Duchies of Styria,
Carniola, Carinthia, and the Tyrol, lying so conveniently
to the debatable land in the north of Italy.
In Germany his luck had perhaps been more remark-
able than anywhere else. For there not only had the
Electoral Princes^ who had promised their votes to Fran-
9ois, come over to him and made him Emperor, but, for
the present at all events, he found his authority un-
questioned, in spite of his known dislike to the Reformed
religion professed by many of the ruling Princes.
He now established an Imperial Council of Regency
in that country, and in the middle of May 1522 started
off for England, to arrange with Henry for a combined
attack upon Fra^ois I. After a couple of months in
England, Charles re-embarked at Southampton, taking
a large force of Germans with him to Spain, and also
plenty of artillery. With these troops he proposed to
complete the pacification of the Peninsula, while replenish-
ing his pockets with Spanish gold.
CHAPTER XVIII
Unholy Love of Francois for Marguerite
' I 'HE blood of the passionate Louise de Savoie was
A radically impure, and it ran more strongly than
any other in the veins of her son. How it affected
him to the point of reducing him to the level of the
beasts of the field can be judged by his behaviour
towards his sister, not long before the events detailed
in the last chapter. She was two years the senior of
Fran£ois, and from his earliest years had treated him
not as a younger brother, but with the adoration of a
deity. Marguerite called him "her sun," and adopted
for her emblem a sunflower, with the legend Non in-
feriora secutus — it will follow no lesser orb.
In return for this adoration Fra^ois gave a little
love, he allowed himself to be touched sometimes.
More often than not, however, he allowed himself to
be worshipped, merely accepting the worship as his
just due. Sometimes he tyrannised over his sister ; he
recognised her as his thing to do with what he chose,
to trample upon when he felt so inclined. While de-
manding everything from her, her heart, her life, it
rarely seemed to occur to Francois that he owed any-
thing in return to the woman who gave him so much
devotion, and whom it seemed that nothing could change.
Marguerite was, however, a woman who was for many
years surrounded by adorers. Not only the Due
d'Alen9on and Henri d'Albret, but a crowd of others,
such as Bourbon, Bonnivet, and the poet Clement Marot,
were for ever throwing themselves at her feet. It
179
180 Two Great Rivals
gratified the pride of Frar^ois to think that he should
remain the only sun of this admired beauty, this loving
creature, whose superior intelligence shone out above
all her contemporaries. His vanity was doubly gratified
when she wrote to him in strangely extravagant terms,
and, as if she had no husband of her own, that " he
alone existed for her — that he was her father and her
son, her brother, her friend, and her husband."
It was indeed strange how this passion of Marguerite
for her brother resisted the onslaughts of time, the
diseases which sapped his life and marred his manly
beauty. The fact, however, remains that nothing
changed it — neither old age nor the illnesses brought
on by his own dissipations ever affected her unalterable
and passionate affection.
When Fran9ois I. was in distress of mind, about the
time that Lautrec was compelled to evacuate the city
of Milan ; when he found that Paris was hostile to him
and that money was hard to obtain from the subjects,
who had ceased to admire his chivalrous virtues, he
was also getting tired of his brilliant mistress, Fran^oise
de Foix.
This daughter of the princely and warlike race of
Gascony had for years outshone all rivals — queened it
over even the Queen-mother herself. Before the radiance
of the Comtesse de Chateaubriand, Marguerite had like-
wise perforce been compelled to occupy but a secondary
position. But towards the end of 1521 Fra^ois seemed
suddenly to remember his sister's existence, he turned
towards her and gave to her husband, d'Alen9on, the
command of the advance-guard of the army of Picardy,
a command which belonged by right to the Connetable
de Bourbon.
At that same time the brother of the mistress, Andre
de Foix, Seigneur de Lesparre, was given the command
of the troops for the invasion of Spanish Navarre : there-
fore honours were divided between the two leading
ladies of France.
Francois, however, threw himself more and more
Unholy Love of Francois for Marguerite 181
upon the counsels of his sister, so that we find her
writing in a perplexed frame of mind to her friend the
Bishop Brisonnet : a For I am obliged to meddle with
many matters which may well give me cause to fear."
The fact was that the King was commencing to
understand that he was being misled by his mother's
minion, the Cardinal du Prat ; he realised that the
relations and hangers-on of his mistress were but so
many broken reeds to lean upon ; he recognised that
Charles V. was laughing at him up his sleeve, and could
not but perceive that he was being thoroughly deceived
by Cardinal Wolsey.
In his mother he found no real support. Much as
Francois had been accustomed to rely upon her, he was
clever enough to understand his mother's grasping and
selfish character, to see that if she had advised him to
a certain course it was merely for her own ends. Louise
de Savoie was, in fact, his evil genius, whereas in
Marguerite he found more clearness of vision, while
no image existed in her mind but his own.
She, at this time, was endeavouring to guide her
brother's conscience into the way which she believed the
right one. She believed, poor, deceived creature, that she
was actually leading both her mother and her brother
towards the worship of God in the right way, as she
commenced herself to see it. She wrote to the Bishop
again, that they were both " becoming inclined towards
the Reformation of the Church, and beginning to under-
stand that the truth of God was not heresy."
Finding Fra^ois unhappy, she but increased in tender-
ness towards him, tried to console him for the want of
money, condoled with him over the loss of Milan.
When he had fresh cause for grief and disappointment
in the appointment to the Papacy of the Emperor's tutor,
Adrian VI., when Picardy was invaded and ravaged, and
when Henry VIII. was threatening to make a descent
in France, the sister's tender bosom was ever open to
receive her brother's woes and to give him consolation
in his hour of trial.
1 82 Two Great Rivals
All of that autumn and winter Francis sought to get
rid of his black thoughts by indulging freely in the
chase. But black care sat behind the rider, and followed
him into the leafless forests of Fontainebleau and Com-
piegne ; nowhere could he obtain relief.
His wife Claude was engaged in her usual occupation
of adding to the number of Princes and Princesses of
the House of Valois ; in her society he took no pleasure.
His mistress was commencing to weary him more and
more ; where then could he seek for relief if it were not
in the company of the sister who followed him every-
where, the attractive Princess whom he now called his
mignonne — his darling ? She alone knew how to drive black
care away. Now, in what manner did Fra^ois reward
this touching, this all-enveloping love ? Shocking as it
is to relate, it was by treating Marguerite with a baseness
that humiliated her, an ingratitude that caused her to
shrink from him with reddening cheeks and horror in
her heart.
He thought that he would see to what an extent he
could compel his sister's will — a will that seemed to be
nothing but a reflex of his own. Possibly it was but
merely the King's inordinate vanity which caused him to
desire to succeed where such brilliant cavaliers as Bourbon
and the gay Bonnivet had failed ; perhaps it was mere
brutish desire on his part which caused his infamous
action. Whatever the inspiring cause of his infamy,
Francois pretended to disbelieve in the real tenderness,
the deep affection of Marguerite ; he was sufficiently
without shame to tell his sister that unless she would give
him the tangible proof of her love, allow him to make
its " definite experience," he would not credit its actual
existence.
The reply of the terrified and trembling Marguerite —
ever heretofore accustomed to blindly obey his slightest
whim — astonished the brutal brother. " Pis que morte ! "
(" worse than death ! ") she exclaimed, and fled from his
presence. Terrified at what she had done — more terri-
fied still at what she might expect from the violence of
From an engraving by Charles Heath after a painting by R. P. Bonnington.
FRANCOIS I. AND HIS SISTER MARGUERITE,
p. 182]
Unholy Love of Francois for Marguerite 183
Fran9ois should she remain, Marguerite left the Court at
once and hurried off to rejoin her husband in their Duchy
of Alenson.
In flying she left behind her a touching letter of
excuses, calculated, she hoped, to appease the wrath of the
King, raging at his disappointment. He replied cruelly,
striving by every means to make his sister's tender heart
bleed, saying that since she withdrew herself from him,
he too would go off — perhaps to his death. In his
cruelly selected words Fra^ois spared his sister nothing ;
it was evident that his unholy passion was only the more
inflamed by her flight. Marguerite feared to return ;
she recognised that her virtue would not be safe from
this tyrant, whom for so long she had set up upon so
high a pedestal.
The strange thing about this matter is that, although
Marguerite for a time kept out of her brother's way, she
never seems in the least to have felt any anger towards
Fran9ois for his intended crime. Perhaps, in her heart,
she did not think it so very dreadful after all in a
Prince — whatever it might have been in a more ordinary
mortal. All those who have read the disgraceful history
of the Due d'Orleans, Regent of France, and his
daughter the Duchesse du Berry, and likewise that of
Louis XV. and his various daughters, will easily realise
that those of the ruling race believed, to quote the
words of the Princess Adelaide, that there was " one law
of morality for those of the Royal House, and another
for the rest of the world." We have described the
shocking events that these perverted ideas led to in our
works " The Regent of the Roues " and " The Real
Louis XV.," the readers of which cannot fail to draw a
parallel with the case of Fra^ois I. and Marguerite
d'Angouleme.
Instead of showing anger to her brother, after she had
got away from him Marguerite wrote to Francois the
most humble and self-humiliating letter, in which she
apparently seemed to give way, to surrender and place
herself at his feet. She wrote in ambiguous verse as well
184 Two Great Rivals
as in prose, but the real sense of the letter would seem to
be that, while she yielded to his power, she hoped that he
would not take advantage of her weakness. The letter,
which is still in existence, although Marguerite begged
her brother to burn it, ends up with the words : " Not
that I ever distrust you." In spite of this, it is evident
that the real meaning of the epistle is that Marguerite
begs for mercy from her brother's brutality, but that she
will be in the future, as she has been in the past, his slave.
Slave she ever remained, but, so far as history relates,
Fran9ois never demanded from his sister the sacrifice
which, rather than lose his love, she expressed herself as
willing to make. She, however, lost her influence over
him by degrees, and never succeeded in leading the King
into the real paths of enlightenment and Reform.
In this instance of his unholy passion for his sister it
was, as we have said, probably more the King's vanity
which was at stake than anything else — a vanity which
was proved by his showing her letter to his associates in
token of her submission to his will. That he was,
however, notorious as a man to be feared by modest
women is to be gleaned from the following anecdote,
related by a French historian.
In the year 1524, just after he had gone into mourning
for the young wife whom he had neglected while living
but pretended to deplore when dead, Fra^ois was ad-
vancing to the relief of Marseilles, at that time besieged
by the Imperialists under the rebellious Bourbon and
Pescara. He paused at the town of Manosque, in
Provence, where the municipal authorities came to pre-
sent the King with an address.
With the mayor, who headed the deputation, was his
daughter, a young and lively demoiselle. While the
speech was being read aloud to him, Fran£ois fastened
upon the girl a look so full of meaning that she took
affright. The unhappy maiden, conscious of her good
looks and fearing the worst outrages, that evening applied
a violent corrosive to her cheeks and ruined her features
entirely.
Unholy Love of Francois for Marguerite 185
On the following day she had nothing more to fear
from the King, and history has not recorded if she found
any faithful suitor, for whose sake she may perhaps have
sacrificed her beauty, to marry her.
Without having the data to refer to, it seems to us that
we have heard a somewhat similar story of the less hot-
blooded but equally unscrupulous Charles V. He saw at
Ratisbon the beautiful daughter of an honest German
magistrate, was taken by her appearance, and sent for
her the same evening. Her name was Barbara Blomberg,
and this young lady, although equally virtuous, did not,
like the French girl, think it necessary to destroy her
beauty. The Emperor, who was travelling, kept her
with him for a night only, and by some the child that
she bore him is said to have been the famous Don Juan
of Austria, about whose mother there has always been so
much mystery.
CHAPTER XIX
Madame's Lawsuit
1522
IT was not long after Francois had behaved in such an
abominable manner to his sister, and been forgiven
by her, that " the trinity " of the Royal family were
together at Lyon, when Lautrec returned after having
lost Milan. Louise de Savoie, knowing how greatly
the King's anger would be aroused should he learn the
truth of the manner in which she had pocketed the
money intended for the troops, did her utmost to prevent
the unlucky Odet de Foix from gaining access to her son.
Any love that the Constable de Bourbon had ever had
for either Louise or her daughter had, however, by this
time turned to hate under the continual persecution to
which he had been subjected. He imagined that he
would very greatly discredit the King's mother in her
son's eyes when, taking Lautrec by the hand, against all
orders to the contrary, he led him by force into the
King's presence. Although he had himself been removed
from the vice-royalty of Milan on most frivolous pretexts,
Bourbon had a fellow-feeling for Lautrec, who had
replaced him, when he saw him like himself the victim of
the evil passions, the greed, of the Duchesse d'Angouleme.
" Who would have believed such a thing of my
mother ? " Fra^ois cried out in his despair ; and for a
time it seemed as though the King would not forgive
Louise de Savoie. Marguerite was, however, at hand
to mend the breach, and although she now ceased to
1 86
Madame's Lawsuit 187
hold her head as high as before, or to dominate the
King as previously to her written submission to his will,
her weight was sufficient to obtain her mother's forgive-
ness.
Thus the only one to surfer for the Queen-mother's
crime was old de Semblansay, and although the Seigneur
de Lautrec was perforce forgiven, Bourbon was baulked
of his revenge for the many slights to which he had
already been subjected.
The time had, however, now come when the action of
Louise de Savoie, and the King's injustice owing to his
mother's instigations, were to drive this puissant Prince
into open rebellion against his King. Save for the
accident of the premature betrayal of his plans, the
Constable might well have supplanted Fran9ois on
the throne of France, where, judging by the force of
his character, his talents both in the Council and on the
field of battle, he would probably have made a better
King than the son of Louise de Savoie. Charles de
Montpensier, now thirty-two years old, was the First
Prince of the Blood ; he was the senior representative of
the junior branch of the Bourbons, the Montpensiers,
and his mother was a Gonzaga, daughter of the rulers
of Mantua, whose Marquisate had been elevated into a
Duchy in 1433. From his youth up he had been
greatly beloved by his kinswoman and godmother Anne
de France, daughter of Louis XI. When that foreseeing
King had consolidated the power of the Monarchy by
crushing the great feudal lords of France, he had left
unmolested his two kinsmen the Bourbons of the elder
branch. Of these he knew that the elder, the Due, was
a dying man, while his younger brother, Pierre, Due
de Beaujeu, seemed unlikely either by his health or his
talents ever to cause any anxiety to the Crown.
To make sure of Pierre de Beaujeu, Louis XL married
him to his daughter Anne de France, while leaving him
for life in possession of all the mighty fiefs which the
Bourbons held under the Crown. Louis made Pierre
sign an engagement on his marriage, that on his death
1 88 Two Great Rivals
all of these immense territories, comprising perhaps as
much as a fifth of the Kingdom, should revert to the
ruling line. That he hardly expected any children to
be born to his daughter by the decrepit Pierre is evident
by his remark : " To keep the children that will spring
from them won't cost much."
He was, however, reckoning without his daughter—
the forceful Anne, who, after giving birth to a daughter,
Suzanne, completely ruled her brother Charles VIII. after
her father died. While Charles VIII. was still young,
Anne compelled her brother to sign documents which
entirely reversed the arrangements of her father ; and in
this manner she preserved the almost Kingdom of the
Bourbons to her daughter. This daughter Suzanne was
fragile and partly deformed ; nevertheless Anne de Beaujeu
married her, at the age of thirteen, to her favourite
Charles de Montpensier, who became, by the death of
Anne's husband, Due de Bourbon. This marriage took
place in 1504 during the reign of Louis XII., who had
succeeded Anne's brother Charles VIII. on the throne,
and Anne de France (or de Beaujeu) caused her little
humpbacked daughter to convey by deed of gift all the
inheritance of the Bourbons to her husband.
The daughter of Louis XI. might not have been able
to carry out this arrangement, by which all the Bourbon
fiefs were definitely diverted from the Crown, had she
not always cultivated the closest intimacy and friendship
with the other forceful Anne, the ruling Duchess of
Brittany, who married first Charles VIII. and then
Louis XII. With the support, however, of Queen Anne
de Bretagne the matter was carried through at the time
when, as we have mentioned, Louis XII. being sick, Anne
of Brittany had likewise made (at Blois) a treaty whereby
her daughter Claude was affianced to the child-Charles V.
The two Annes had thus mutually supported each other
in their pet projects, but, although Louis XII. on his
recovery managed to break the treaty which would have
given France to the Emperor, nothing was ever done to
upset the arrangement by which the immense territories
Madame's Lawsuit 189
of the Bourbons had legally passed to Charles de Mont-
pensier, who became the Connetable de Bourbon.
When in 1519 the Constable had reached the age of
thirty, he became a widower and the absolute ruler of no
less than seven provinces of France, and from that date
the King's mother, who was some fourteen years his
senior, determined to marry him. Long before this — in
fact, from before the date of her son's accession — Louise
had shown in many ways her marked partiality for Charles
de Montpensier. He, half an Italian, had, while he still
had a wife living, been clever or cunning enough not to
reject her advances, of which he reaped the benefit. By
her good will it undoubtedly was that Fran£ois on his
accession confirmed his kinsman in the rank of Constable
which had been verbally conferred upon him by his pre-
decessor Louis XII. The passionate Louise treated him in
fact almost as though he were her husband even during
the lifetime of his wife Suzanne, placing a gold ring upon
his finger and procuring for him the following pensions.
As Constable, Bourbon had twenty-four thousand
livres ; as Chamberlain, fourteen thousand. Twenty-four
thousand more he received in his capacity of Governor
of Languedoc ; while from the taxes of Bourbonnais he
was paid annually fourteen thousand. As though these
pensions were not enough, the Constable had, moreover,
the right to levy taxes for himself in a regal manner.
Thus, upon one occasion, when he found himself a little
short of cash, the Due de Bourbon caused the States of
Auvergne, by no means a rich country, to vote him
fifty thousand livres. Since money in the days of
Fran9ois I. was at least of ten times as much value as
it is nowadays, some idea can be formed of the riches
of the Constable de Bourbon. Indeed, so rich and so
powerful was he that Fran9ois scarcely required the
incentive of his mother's displeasure with her lover to
become jealous of him, especially as his actions seemed
often to be as kingly as those of the King himself.
For instance, after the battle of Marignano in 1515,
in which he had particularly distinguished himself,
190 Two Great Rivals
Bourbon founded a convent in commemoration of the
victory, close to his castle at Moulins. Again, when his
child was christened, the King, who came to act as god-
father, found himself being waited upon at table by no
less than five hundred gentlemen clad in velvet, retainers
of the Due de Bourbon, drawn from only one part of
his feudal sovereignty. Uniting in his own person two
Duchies, four Counties, two Viscounties, and an immense
number of Seigneuries, the Constable was indeed a force
to be reckoned with, and one, moreover, whose power
did not only lie in the great central position of the
Bourbonnais, but was scattered about in various directions
throughout the kingdom. The cause of this diversity
of the territories of the Constable was that Louis XI.
had granted the results of many confiscations from other
great nobles to his daughter Anne and her husband,
Pierre de Beaujeu.
The eldest son of Francois I. was Francois the
Dauphin, born, after several girls, in 1518. From the
time of the birth of this boy, whatever may have been
the views of " Madame," Bourbon had made up his
mind that he required something younger than the King's
mother for a wife. His flirtation with the married
Marguerite did not count for anything. Every one
flirted with that Princess and made up to her. Even
those of far humbler station than the Constable were in
the habit of throwing themselves at her feet, while she
would laughingly encourage them in their folly — to a
certain point, but no farther. The wife that the
Constable had in view was the so-often promised
Renee de France, the daughter of Louis XII. and sister
of Queen Claude. With Renee, the daughter of the
elder branch of the Valois, as his bride, the Due de
Bourbon might well have some day laid claim to the
throne through her, by maintaining that the junior
Angouleme branch to which Fra^ois belonged had no
right to the Crown.
It is true that the Salic law existed, by which females
could not succeed to the throne in France, but with
Madame's Lawsuit 191
the assistance of his cousin Charles V., and other Princes
related through the female line to the Crown to back
him up, that would not have been a difficult law for
Bourbon to traverse.
It is more than probable that, from the year 1521,
when the King deprived the Constable of his right of
commanding the vanguard of the army in Picardy, this
haughty Prince had some such idea in his head. From
that moment the Constable began, if not actually to plot
against the Crown, at all events to enter into secret
negotiations with the enemies of the King. There was
the more cause for his defection from the fact that —
seeing that Bourbon not only would not marry her,
but made light of her pretensions of being affianced to
him — Madame persuaded the King to discontinue the
payment of the Constable's pensions. He had his oppor-
tunity when he captured the town of Hesdin, held by
the Flemish troops of the Archduchess Marguerite. In
that city he captured a lady of the family of Croy who
was a cousin of his own. This lady was the Comtesse
de Rceulx, whose husband was a Flemish noble deep
in the confidences of the Emperor. The Constable gave
Madame de Rceulx her liberty without demanding any
ransom, and at the same time gave her to understand
that he was being so badly treated in France that he
soon might be compelled to seek for support elsewhere.
The members of the family of Croy were not long in
going to the Emperor, to endeavour to get up their
own credit by representing that they were to be the
means of bringing over to his cause a man who was
of all others the most desirable ally. The First Prince
of the Blood, the last of the great vassals, the Constable,
and, above all, the most popular man with the various
Parliaments in France, who looked upon him as the
apostle of liberty against oppression — such was the great
personage whom the Croys now informed the young
Charles V. that he could have for the asking. We can
imagine if he received the information with pleasure ;
it was not, indeed, long before both he and the King
192 Two Great Rivals
of England had taken means to enter into direct negotia-
tions with the Due de Bourbon.
In the meantime Louise de Savoie, upon the advice
of the Chancellor Du Prat, had proceeded to take very
much more drastic measures, to either ruin the Constable
or force him to marry her. When he definitely refused
to Du Prat to make the King's mother his wife, the
enraged Princess commenced her long-threatened lawsuit
to deprive the Due de Bourbon of the whole of his
territorial possessions, which she claimed as her own.
The claim of Louise de Savoie to the territories of the
House of Bourbon was founded on the fact that her
mother had been Marguerite de Bourbon, sister of Pierre
de Beaujeu. She was herself, therefore, the niece of the
last Due de Bourbon and first cousin to Suzanne de
Beaujeu who had married Charles de Montpensier, and in
marrying him conveyed to him the possessions which
Louis XI. had so distinctly stipulated should revert to
the Crown when Pierre de Beaujeu should die. This
conveyance Louise declared illegal.
It is difficult to see what better right Louise de Savoie
should possibly have to these possessions than the
Constable, if it was in the first instance illegal of
Charles VIII. to break, in his sister Anne's favour, the
act of Louis XI. ; but Bourbon did not pause to argue
about the rights of the matter. He said that, right
or wrong, it was quite evident that the King's mother,
with the King on her side, must win in the end in any
lawsuit which she should choose to bring against him
before the Parliaments, and that he was therefore doomed
to be ruined, to be reduced from the position almost
of a King to that of a beggar. None the less was he
determined not to marry this woman of forty-six, but
rather to rebel against Francois I., whose slights and
injustices he had borne with great moderation and without
murmuring for some years past.
By the advice of Du Prat, the great lawsuit was com-
menced in August 1522, when a great part of the
estate of the House of Bourbon was claimed for Louise
Madame's Lawsuit 193
as the nearest heir, while all the rest was claimed in the
King's name as having fallen to the Crown.
The judges of the Parliaments were, however, in
favour of Bourbon, and with many a legal quibble and
delay they, for a time, thwarted the King's will, the
spirit of their opposition being chiefly caused by anta-
gonism to the favouritism of the Royal Court, where
all gifts, places, and emoluments seemed to be in the
hands of the various women who ruled over this newly
established institution. As the great body of the
nobility excluded from Court favour were of the same
mind as the Parliamentarians, Bourbon had no great
fear of being immediately dispossessed of his estates,
although he felt certain that he must lose in the end. In
the meantime, the impatient Louise induced the King to
send the parliamentary judges to make inquiries on the
spot, at the Due de Bourbon's great feudal Chateau
de Moulins. The Constable took care to be at home
to receive them, and he entertained them so generously
and profusely, flattered them so adroitly upon their views
as to the public welfare, that they returned to Paris more
than ever impressed in his favour.
In that city during the winter of 1522-23, the "men
of the robe " found the most universal misery prevailing,
when they took upon themselves to complain to the
King, through the Chancellor, and to ask him to do some-
thing to alleviate the public burdens which caused the
general distress.
The only answer of Fran£ois to the Parliament was
promptly to clap into prison the deputies who had been
sent to bear their complaints to the Chancellor Du Prat.
In the month of March, Bourbon himself repaired
to Paris, to plead his cause in person, and at that time
found some of the noblesse imitating the magistrates
in the matter of complaining of their wrongs to the
King. The nobles, finding no relief from the Crown,
were most discontented, and notably so a great baron
named Jean de La Brosse, whose fiefs had been annexed
to the Crown by Louis XI.
194 Two Great Rivals
Although La Brosse had pleaded from the three Kings
Charles VIII., Louis XII., and Frangois I. for the re-
storation of his estates, he could gain no redress other
than that of an inadequate pension. At length he
angrily remarked to Frangois : " Very well, Monseigneur,
I must look out for myself outside the kingdom."
" Do as you like about that, La Brosse," drily replied
the King.
This La Brosse and many other discontented nobles
rallied around the Constable, who continued to hold
his head high. Among the most important of these
was Jean de Poitiers, Comte de Saint-Vallier, the Captain
of a hundred gentlemen of the King's Household and
father of the celebrated beauty known to history as
Diane de Poitiers, who was to become the mistress of two
kings, father and son. She had been married at the age
of fifteen to Louis de Breze, Grand Senechal de Nor-
mandie, who was himself the grandson of Charles VII.
and his talented mistress Agnes Sorel.
At the time of the commencement of Madame's law-
suit against Bourbon, the <l Grande Senechale," as Diane
was always called, was twenty-two years of age and in
the early flower of that marvellous beauty which never
faded so long as she lived — that is to say, for another
forty- five years.
Unfortunately for the subsequent affairs of the Due
de Bourbon, the husband of Diane de Poitiers was not
of the same way of thinking as her father Saint-Vallier,
since he preferred the cause of the King to that of the
Constable.
CHAPTER XX
The Constable's Conspiracy
WHILE the lawsuit of Louise was slowly dragging
out its length, various friendly messages had been
passing backwards and forwards between the Constable
and the Emperor Charles V. When the Emperor asked
Bourbon to become a traitor and co-operate with him
against Fra^ois, he made no objection, but asked for
the Emperor's sister Eleonore, the now widowed Queen
of Portugal, as a wife. Charles willingly promised the
hand of his sister Eleonore to the Constable, and a large
dowry into the bargain.
Matters had gone no farther than this when, according
to a story told by the Emperor Charles V. to Sir Thomas
Boleyn, the Constable one day visited Queen Claude,
the neglected wife of Fra^ois. Claude was very
favourable to his cause, and she would willingly, had
she been able to do so, have accorded to him the hand
of her sister Renee.
As the Queen was about to dine alone when the
Due de Bourbon happened to make his visit, she
cordially pressed him to sit down and dine with her.
The tete-A-tete repast was proceeding very comfortably
when the King unexpectedly arrived to trouble the feast.
The Constable instantly sprang to his feet.
" No, Monseigneur, pray remain seated," remarked
Fran9ois ironically. Then he added with a sneer :
" Well, is the news true ? are you going to get
married ? "
195
196 Two Great Rivals
" Not that I am aware of," answered Bourbon.
" Oh yes, you are ; I am sure of it. I know all
about your dealings with the Emperor, and do not you
forget what I say," retorted the King angrily.
" Sire, you menace me ! I have not deserved to be
treated in this manner by you."
The Constable finished his dinner with the Queen,
but after it was over he left Paris, and nearly all of
the nobility left the capital with him.
When Charles V. related this circumstance to the
father of Anne Boleyn, Sir Thomas expressed his astonish-
ment that the King of France should have allowed the
Constable to leave. <c He could not help himself,"
replied the Emperor ; " everybody of any consequence
is on the side of the Due de Bourbon."
The Constable gave as his pretext for leaving Paris
that he was going off to hunt down the bands of armed
brigands who harried the northern parts of France and
prevented provisions from reaching the capital. He
actually did reduce these scoundrels, but afterwards,
instead of returning to Paris, he repaired to his own
provinces of Auvergne and Bourbonnais, which were
likewise infested by bandits. The principal of these
was a regular brigand King, a gentleman of the name
of Montholon, who was suspected by many of being
a follower and partisan of Bourbon's own party, one
who had, however, risen in arms too soon. This King
of the bandits had a regular Court of his own — he
appointed his Ministers and collected his own taxes.
Whatever his relations may really have been with
King Montholon, the Constable, not to alienate his
friends the Magistrates in the Parliaments, determined
to attack and suppress him, which he did with the
promptitude which he always displayed when carrying
out any military operations. Before long Montholon,
who was nicknamed " le Roi • Guillot," was taken
prisoner, and sent to Paris for trial by the Parliament.
Thereupon there took place a struggle between the
King and the Parliament of Paris. Already before this
The Constable's Conspiracy 197
event there had been existing a very disordered state
of affairs in Paris, where the streets were utterly unsafe,
free fights and massacres being of daily occurrence.
Francois I., at this time most unpopular, caused a
number of gibbets to be erected close to the gates of
his palace, but armed persons came in force and removed
them in the night-time. Thereupon the King attacked
the Parliament for its incapacity, he repaired in person
to the Palais de Justice and held a Bed of Justice,
wherein he angrily rated the Magistrates. When
Montholon was tried, these offended conseillers chose to
treat the brigand King as a simple bandit, one who
happened by chance also to be a gentleman — they refused
to attach any political importance to his crimes. They
therefore sentenced him to be beheaded, as a gentleman,
not hanged as a common criminal, and to be cut in
quarters after his death.
The King, however, insisting upon the brigand being
a traitor, guilty of treason in arms against himself, gave
orders to the executioner to reverse the sentence of
the Parliament and to quarter the unfortunate Roi Guillot
while alive ! After this the Parliament of Paris flatly
refused to try Bourbon's case any further. It declared
insolently that it was quite incompetent, in a time in
which there was no justice, to adjudicate upon such a
weighty matter, and referred the matter of the Constable's
estates back to the King's own Council.
While matters remained thus, the Constable retired
to his castle at Moulins and continued to treat with all
the enemies of Francis. During the summer of 1523
he was frequently also in the territories of the Duke
of Savoy, who was at this time on unfriendly terms with
France, in spite of his close relationship with the King's
mother. From Savoy the Constable sent messages to
Wolsey, and at Bourg-en-Bresse he received the accredited
envoy of the Emperor, who was Adrien de Croy,
Seigneur de Beaurain, the son of the Comtesse de
Rceulx.
The Due de Bourbon did not by any means find it
198 Two Great Rivals
all plain sailing in his dealings with either Henry VIII.
or Charles V. For while both of these Monarchs made
considerable offers, they were cunning enough, and selfish
enough, not to wish to make them good until Bourbon on
his side should have done something first.
Henry VIII., for instance, would only pay a subsidy
to Bourbon wherewith to raise troops after he should have
sworn an oath of fealty to him as his vassal, while recog-
nising Henry as King of France. The Emperor would
only hand over his sister, with two hundred thousand
golden crowns, after the Constable should have actually
risen against Fra^ois I. The followers of Bourbon in
France, again, had views of their own, and these were not
at all in accordance with those of either the Emperor or the
King of England. The Parliamentary party, for instance,
which might not have been at all averse to seeing the
Constable himself on the throne, in place of the King
who had lately so much browbeaten them, would not
at all have approved of the idea of an English King
being once more established and wearing the Crown of
France. The hatred of the foreign yoke was indeed
much more active than formerly, in the days when
Henry V. and Henry VI. of England were practically
as well as nominally Kings of France. Henry VIII.
did not understand this fact, nor realise that since the
consolidation of the kingdom by Louis XI. a national
as opposed to a merely provincial spirit had sprung up
throughout the country.
Bourbon for a time flatly refused to agree to acknow-
ledge Henry VIII. as his King or liege lord, and there-
upon the negotiations languished with Wolsey, while
Charles V. acted in a tricky manner about his sister —
using a saving clause which might enable him to get out
of his bargain later. When Beaurain came to draw up
the treaty with Bourbon at Bourg, the words " if she
will agree to it " were found to be dovetailed into the
bond, much to the disgust of the Constable, who was by
no means averse to obtaining possession, not only of the
person of the widowed Queen of Portugal, but also
The Constable's Conspiracy 199
of Eleonore's jewels, valued at considerably over half a
million of crowns.
Charles V. was, however, ready to accept the Due de
Bourbon as his ally upon an equal footing with himself,
willing also to dismember France and to give a piece of
it to the Constable with the title of King. He proposed
to keep a large slice of it himself, notably Burgundy, and
to allow Henry VIII. to help himself to the rest.
When Henry, who wished to grab the whole of the
country for himself, continued to insist upon Bourbon
swearing fidelity to him as his vassal, the Constable got
out of the matter by saying that he was in the Emperor's
hands, he would leave him to decide about it.
The terms agreed upon by the three conspirators
against Fra^ois I. were that Henry was to invade France
from the side of Calais, while Charles should at the
same time do so from the side of Spain. Bourbon,
in the meanwhile using the money supplied by Henry
and Charles, should enter France with ten thousand
Germans on the east, and at the same time raise his
own followers in the interior of France. It was hoped
that he could raise among his vassals and retainers and
other discontented persons no less than forty thousand
men wherewith to war upon his Sovereign.
The Constable understood, however, very well that if
he should bind himself to England in the manner desired
by Henry VIII., he would lose all the support of the
men of the Parliaments, to be given merely in favour of
the Bourbon against the Valois ; while if he showed him-
self in the light of the servant of Charles V., he would
likewise render himself unpopular and lose his expected
following. He had therefore a very difficult game to
play in endeavouring not to bind himself too deeply
with either, and he accordingly refused to accept the
Order of the Golden Fleece from Charles V., as its
acceptance would seem to imply an acknowledgment of
having sworn fealty to Spain. However, being very
anxious to obtain the hand of a sister of Charles, the
Constable asked that, failing Eleonore, he should be
2oo Two Great Rivals
given the Emperor's youngest sister Catherine to
wife.
The Archduchess Marguerite was, of course, deeply
involved in the plottings with the Constable, and was
preparing an army to invade the France that she detested
on the side of Picardy, in conjunction with Henry VIII.,
who at length obtained a merely verbal promise from the
Constable to recognise him as his liege lord. She arranged
that everything should be ready by September ist, 1523.
The only fear of Marguerite was, however, lest the
Constable should be ready and strike too soon. To start
with, she gave Henry two thousand horse, twelve guns,
and four thousand infantry, and promised more. The
Archduchess need not have alarmed herself. Instead of
being too soon, circumstances took place which not only
made the Due de Bourbon long behind his confederates
in taking the field, but very nearly caused him to become
the prisoner of Fra^ois, and to lose his head instead ot
gaining the hoped-for crown.
While the German lansquenets levied by Bourbon
duly entered France, by the neutral province of Franche
Comte,1 and reached the borders of Champagne by the
appointed time ; while the English troops disembarked at
Calais on September 4th, and the Spaniards entered France
by the Pyrenees on the 6th of the same month, the
Constable alone did nothing — he wrote that he was not
ready, that he could not rise for another ten days at least.
Everything accordingly hung fire, the English remained
inactive at Calais, while the Germans retreated towards
the frontier.
Meanwhile, in face of all the dangers with which
he was being threatened, how was Fra^ois behav-
ing? Strange to relate, instead of preparing to resist
the invasion of his frontiers, he was calmly getting
himself ready for another invasion of Milan. At the
same time, as a means of disconcerting Henry VIIL in
1 Franche Comic", part of the old Burgundian possessions, was, by
express stipulations made by the Archduchess Marguerite, neutral ground
in the wars between France and the Empire.
The Constable's Conspiracy 201
his own dominions, Francois prepared a French fleet to
sail with troops for Scotland under the Scotch Duke of
Albany. His idea was to let loose Scotland on England,
and so to keep Henry busy at home. His design,
however, proved a failure, as the English made short
work of the French fleet and carried out their design of
descending on France.
Knowing that Fra^ois was about to march into Italy,
the Constable was waiting until he should have got past
the city of Lyon with the army before rising behind the
King so as to prevent his return. This army, however,
consisting in a large measure of Swiss levies, took a long
time to assemble, and while putting the Admiral Bonnivet
in command of the advance guard and sending him
forward, the King only moved forward himself by slow
daily marches across France. Bourbon meanwhile was
in despair, and the more so as Fra^ois, having recognised
the Constable's strength, was determined to take him
with him into Italy willy-nilly. To do this the King
endeavoured to obtain a reconciliation with his cousin
Bourbon, by offering him back again the fiefs of which he
was being so shamefully deprived, on condition of his
serving him faithfully — and marrying his mother.
Before leaving Paris the King had informed the Parlia-
ment that he appointed his mother Regent of the Kingdom,
and at the same time that he was leaving the Due de
Bourbon Lieutenant of the Kingdom. This latter title
was of course purely honorary, as the King was intending
to take the Constable off with him — if he could get him.
In order to do so, the King directed his march towards
the Chateau de Moulins, to which place the Constable,
after meeting the Emperor's agent Beaurain and many
discontented nobles at Montbrison, had recently repaired.
The Due de Bourbon immediately played the sick man —
went to bed and stopped there ; when the King arrived
he declared himself unable to rise.
Before the King's arrival he had received a letter
from his mother, the Regent. In terrified language she
informed him that " a great person of the Blood Royal "
202 Two Great Rivals
was about to deliver up the State and that his own life was
in danger. What had happened was that two Norman
gentlemen who had been invited to join Bourbon's con-
spiracy had given the whole thing away. Their names
were Jacques de Matignon and Jacques d'Argouges ; they
had served the Constable on several military expeditions
and received great benefits from him. Thinking that he
could rely upon them, Bourbon had sent a very indiscreet
follower of his named Lurcy to propose to them that
they should facilitate the invasion and occupation of
Normandy by the English Admiral.
Without waiting to make sure of the two Normans,
or feeling his ground at all, Lurcy seems to have blurted
out to Matignon and Argouges the whole of the details
of Bourbon's plot, not forgetting to add a few improve-
ments of his own calculated to enhance his own import-
ance in the eyes of his hearers. Such, for instance, was
the statement that there had been a question of arresting
the King on his way through Bourbonnais and locking
him up in the Constable's castle of Chantelle. Lurcy
even boasted that his own advice had been to kill the
King, but that the Constable had repudiated any such an
idea with horror.
Lurcy having perfectly horrified the two Norman
gentlemen, they went straight off and, under the seal of
confession, related everything that they had learned to
the Bishop of Lisieux. The Bishop in turn told every-
thing to Louis de Breze, the Grand Senechal de
Normandie, who wrote off the news at once both to the
Regent and the King, notwithstanding the fact that his
own father-in-law, Saint-Vallier, was involved in the
conspiracy.
Forewarned, Fra^ois surrounded himself with pre-
cautions while approaching Moulins, and sent orders to
the Bastard of Savoy, who had gone past Moulins, to
come back with his lansquenets. It was only surrounded
by a large body of his guards that he entered the capital
of the States of the Bourbon. He took possession of
the keys of the Castle, in which he installed himself, and
The Constable's Conspiracy 203
caused strong picquets to patrol the town of Moulins
during the night. The Constable was really sick,
although not so ill as he pretended to be. When the
King accused him of holding criminal relations with the
enemies of the State, he did not deny the fact, but strove
to place matters in the most favourable light, saying that
he had received messengers from the Emperor, but had
rejected his overtures. He denied his engagement to
the sister of Charles. Apparently Fra^ois did not feel
himself strong enough to listen to those who now advised
him to arrest the Constable as a traitor, for he pretended
to believe him, offered to share the command of the
army with him if he would accompany him into Italy,
and further promised that, even if the Parliament should
finally decide the lawsuit against Bourbon, he would
restore to him his possessions. But the feelings of the
Constable had been too deeply hurt for him to forgive
his wrongs ; moreover, he was suspicious of the King.
The King left Moulins after having obtained from the
Constable his promise to follow him into Italy and to
join him at Lyon as soon as he should be well enough to
travel. The King, however, did not trust alone to the
word of the Due de Bourbon, but in departing left behind
him a noble named La Roche-Beaucourt, with instructions
never to leave the Constable until he should reach the
Royal camp. Subsequently he also sent an equerry
named Warthy, who narrowly escaped being hanged by
Bourbon's angry retainers.
In vain the King waited for a fortnight at Lyon for
the Due de Bourbon, whom never more was he to see
serving under his command, but would next meet on the
field of battle, as his deadly foe in the moment of his own
capture and disgrace. As for the Constable, the tricks that
he employed and the adventures that he met with before
he actually got clear of France would fill a book by them-
selves, but eventually, after undergoing the greatest
dangers, he got away in safety to Italy. This was after
remaining for no less than three months in the Burgundian
province of Franche-Comte, of which Marguerite of
2O4 Two Great Rivals
Austria was still clever enough to maintain the neutrality,
notwithstanding the fact that the German lansquenets
had recently marched through it into Champagne.
Bourbon did not leave Franche-Comte until November
1523, and when at last he reached Italy, he received a
very kind and brotherly letter from Charles V., to con-
gratulate him on his escape from his enemies.
"Anxious as I am," wrote the Emperor, "for your
safety, you may rest assured there is nothing which the
King of England, my good father, and I, as well as all our
friends and allies, will not be ready to do for your suc-
cour and assistance, and that, faithful to my promise, you
will ever find me a true Prince, your good brother,
cousin, and friend, who, come what may of good or evil
fortune, will never abandon your interest, as I am sure
you will never cease to feel and do the like for me."
Long before this Francis had caused the seizure in
France of many of the adherents of the Due de Bourbon,
including Saint- Vallier, father of the lovely Diane de
Poitiers.
As for the remainder of all those who had promised to
rally to the standard of the Constable, save for a few of
his most faithful adherents who followed him into Italy,
they were too frightened or faint-hearted to rise — his
long delay in hiding with a price upon his head had been
fatal to his interests.
At the request of the Emperor, his Aunt Marguerite
wrote to her old lover the Duke of Suffolk, who was in
command of the English troops operating with her own
Flemish in Picardy, to ask him to retain the persons of
all nobles whom he might capture, and not to let them
go for ransom. It was doubtless intended to hold these
captives as hostages against the vengeance that Fra^ois I.
might be expected to take upon the prisoners whom he
held of the Constable's party.
The successes of Charles Brandon, Duke of Suffolk, were
not, however, great after the first few weeks of his inva-
sion. Although he had ten thousand English troops, and
twenty thousand Imperialists under the Comte de Beuren,
The Constable's Conspiracy 205
all the north of France rose against him and, under La
Tremouille and Crequy, opposed a constantly harassing
resistance to his advance.
Moreover, the allies were at loggerheads with one
another. The Governess of the Netherlands wanted to
take all the strong places in Picardy for the Emperor.
Henry VIII., on the other hand, merely wished to cap-
ture Boulogne, to keep it for himself, not being content
with the port of Calais — he did not care for the Imperial
interests in the least.
Cardinal Wolsey, who was on the look-out to obtain
the Papacy in the place of Adrian VI., just dead, thought
that it would suit his book better to keep in with the
Imperialists than to follow out his master's wishes. The
weather was awful, and while the Cardinal remained with
the allied army in Picardy, to keep up the courage of the
soldiers, who were losing their limbs from frost-bite, he
gave them free leave to pillage and ravage the country
as they chose. Burning everything that could not be
removed, at length the English and Flemish army arrived
within eleven leagues of Paris. It is quite possible that
the city would have fallen into their hands had they
pushed on. It is true that Fra^ois had sent back some
few troops, and various leaders to arrange for the defence,
but Paris, although alarmed, did not welcome these warmly.
But suddenly, without any apparent reason, the
English army turned round and marched straight back to
Calais. There was, however, a reason for this retreat.
Wolsey had found out that in leaning upon the Emperor
for his election to the Papal chair he had been trusting to a
broken reed, and Giulio de' Medici had become Clement
VII. He was utterly disgusted, and did not choose
to work with the Imperialists any longer. The Cardinal
took his pen and wrote to the Emperor : " It is too cold ;
neither man nor beast can stand it. Moreover, your
Germans who were coming from the Rhine have now
vanished." The fact was that, for want of a leader in
Bourbon, these Germans had been cut to pieces by the
Comte de Guise. The Lorraine ladies looked on from
206 Two Great Rivals
the walls of a castle and applauded the carnage, clapping
their hands with the greatest merriment as Guise drove the
lansquenets across the Meuse into Lorraine at Neufchateau.
In the south of France, at Bayonne, the Spanish armies
of regular troops were likewise driven back. The whole
border populace rose up in arms, the invasion was a failure.
Lautrec and his brother Lescun had been at the head of
the defence on the side of the Pyrenees, and on this
occasion they made up for previous misfortunes in Italy.
Thus by the end of the year France was out of
danger. For one reason or another, the projected com-
bined triple invasion had fizzled out and only resulted
in three separate incursions by bodies, having no cohe-
sion with one another. The King, however, who, from
fear of Bourbon, had remained in France, at Lyon, while
sending Bonnivet on into Italy, was most unpopular.
He found the Parliaments so much against him that he
could not get them to convict the accomplices of the
Due de Bourbon, the Magistrates declaring that they had
not enough evidence.
Meanwhile, Bonnivet's irruption into Italy had proved
a failure, entirely owing to his own incompetence. He
might easily have taken Milan had he pushed straight on
at first through Piedmont and Lombardy, as the Im-
perialist forces were weak and unprepared. He delayed,
however, shamefully, with the result that the eighty-year-
old Prospero Colonna was enabled to put Milan in an
excellent state of defence. After trying to starve the
city out, owing to the terribly snowy weather Bonnivet
was compelled to retreat and encamp upon the banks of
the Ticino. There he and his men shivered for four
or five months at the foot of the Alps.
Fra^ois meanwhile had, through the Constable's
sister the Duchess of Lorraine, been trying to make up
his quarrel with Bourbon. The Constable sent him back
word that it was " now too late." As for returning the
Constable's sword, that, he said, had been taken from him
when the Due d'Alenfon had replaced him in command
of the advance-guard in Picardy.
CHAPTER XXI
Saint'Vallier and Diane de Poitiers
WHILE Bonnivet and his army were in such a bad
case in Piedmont, that splendid old Roman soldier
Prospero Colonna died. He had been Commander-in-
Chief for Charles V. in Italy, and acquitted himself well
to the last.
The Emperor, who knew that the old man was
dying, sent word to his Flemish Viceroy of Naples to
move up to the Milanese to replace him. This was
one of the family of Croy, Charles de Lannoy, a man
of not much ability as a soldier, whatever he may have
been as a politician. He was, at all events, devoted to
his master's interests and a useful servant.
Ferdinand d'Avalos, Marquis de Pescara, a tricky Italian
who had become entirely Spanish, was a much rougher
blade and one who was now to be associated with Lannoy
in the command ; while as supreme chief, as Lieutenant-
General of the Emperor in Lombardy, the Due de
Bourbon was appointed.
Bourbon, now no longer Constable of France, was
at Genoa when Beaurain came to him from Charles to
ask him to accept this post. He could not well refuse, but
Bourbon felt the humiliation of being yoked with a Lannoy
and a Pescara, with whom he was requested to consult.
The Emperor was, however, afraid of Bourbon
proving too strong, and from jealousy he purposely
hampered him in his command, to his own eventual dis-
advantage when Bourbon, a little later, invaded the south
of France with the Imperial army.
207
20 8 Two Great Rivals
In addition to six thousand new lansquenets, whom
by his energy Bourbon brought in person from Germany,
the Venetians, who had been holding off, now joined
the Imperial army, being under the command of that
very cautious and extra-calculating leader the Duke of
Urbino. Duke Francesco Sforza, who still retained the
Duchy of Milan, likewise raised troops for the army
of the Emperor, while Giovanni de' Medici, the famous
leader of the Italian Black Bands, also enrolled himself
under the banner of Bourbon.
From a defensive war the combined Spanish and Italian
forces now assumed the offensive, the leagued Italians
being as determined as were Bourbon and Lannoy to
bundle the French neck and crop out of Italy.
Only one member of the league, and that a formerly
bitter enemy of France, was not now over-anxious to see
the last of the French troops. The Florentine Cardinal,
Giulio de' Medici, having become Pope Clement VII.,
was now violently alarmed lest the young Emperor
should become too strong a neighbour in the Italian
peninsula. He began to talk about the necessity of
the rival Monarchs burying the hatchet and combining
to fight against the Turk. But nobody listened to him,
and while Bourbon and his army now commenced the
pushing out process, and day by day violently drove the
unfortunate Bonnivet back a little nearer to the Alpine
passes, Charles V. went in person to join his army
in the Pyrenees, and after a siege succeeded in retaking
the town of Fontarabia in Spanish Navarre from the
French.
Fran9ois seemed to be in no hurry to assume command
of the army of Italy, which was being so rapidly reduced
to a vanishing-point. Having remained in France at
first on account of Bourbon's insurrection, he was now
amusing himself continually with the delights of love
and the excitement of the chase. From Lyon he trans-
ferred his head-quarters to the Castle of Blois, from
which place he endeavoured to rule France.
His most strenuous efforts were directed against the
Saint' Vallier and Diane de Poitiers 209
Magistrates of the Parliament of Paris, whom he vainly
endeavoured to induce to hurry up and inflict adequate
sentences upon those fellow-conspirators of the Constable
who had been captured in various parts of France.
Just in the same way, however, as the lawsuit of Louise
de Savoie. still languished, so did the Magistrates throw
every possible legal delay in the way of the trial of the
rebels.
It was in vain that the King raged and fumed. At
length, on January I5th, 1524, the Parliament con-
demned Jean de Poitiers, Comte de Valentinois and
Seigneur de Saint- Vallier, to be beheaded, but that was
all the satisfaction which the King could obtain. While
the arrest of a dozen other nobles who had escaped
from the kingdom was vainly decreed, the Parliament
either released or let off with light sentences those whom
it held in its hands.
Aymard de Prie and Baudemanche, two of the guilty
ones, were set at liberty, merely with the understanding
that they were to remain in Paris and come before the
judges if ever they should be required. Desguieres and
Brion, who were proved to have been aware of the
Constable's plot, but not to have revealed it, were merely
condemned to make the amende honorable, and to remain
for three years in any place that the King should
designate.
The angry Fran£ois wrote to the Chancellor Du Prat
from Blois to have all these sentences suspended until
his arrival. He ordered the degradation of Saint-Vallier
from the Order of Saint-Michael, and his severe " ques-
tioning " — that is to say torture, before his decapitation.
Jean de Poitiers had been a valiant soldier and good
servant to the King until he had been driven into
rebellion by the injustice of Marguerite, the King's
sister. The Duchesse d'Alen9on, without any reason,
had taken possession of his County of Valentinois,
of which she enjoyed the revenues. Nor, in spite of
many applications, would she restore the said County.
It is the only arbitrary or dishonest action that remains
H
210 Two Great Rivals
on record against the fair and versatile authoress of the
" Heptameron." Of course there may have been others,
however, which have not been heard of, whereas the
importance of the case of the treason and trial of Saint-
Vallier brought to light this particular little confiscation
on the part of the fair " Marguerite des Marguerites."
Although condemned to die, Saint-Vallier was not
above asking the King's mercy. He wrote to his son-
in-law, Louis de Br6z6, the Senechal of Normandy, who
had revealed the plot in the first instance, and to his
daughter the handsome Diane de Poitiers, to go to
Fran9ois I. and plead for him. Louis de Brez£ did not
repair to the Court, but his beautiful young wife went in
person to Blois, where, according to all accounts, she
found the now thirty-year-old Fra^ois to be highly
inflammable. The King and Madame la S£n£chale appear
to have struck a bargain. She became his mistress and
he promised to spare her father's life. Diane remained
awhile at Blois, and after leaving to see her father in prison,
returned there. Saint-Vallier in the meantime was having
a hard time of it, for the King was determined to keep
up to the very last a pretence of carrying out his
execution and even that of having him tortured.
While Jean de Poitiers was very ill of fever in prison,
the Due Charles de Luxembourg was sent, with a President
of the Parliament and seven conseillers, to degrade him.
Upon their arrival in the Conciergerie, where the prisoner
was found in bed, the sentence of degradation before
execution was read out to him. The Captain of the King's
Gentlemen was indignant at this insult and protested :
" The King cannot deprive me of the Order of Saint-
Michael, except in the presence of my brethren duly
convoked and assembled."
" Where is your collar, anyway ? " demanded Luxem-
bourg.
" The King knows well enough where it was lost,
and that it was in his service," was the reply.
As Saint-Vallier had not got his collar of the Order,
one was produced, and twice it was endeavoured to be
Saint 'Vallier and Diane de Poitiers 211
placed on the sick man's neck with the intention of
degrading him by removing it. This indignity the
prisoner succeeded in resisting, when instruments of
torture were brought into the chamber and he was
pressed to make further avowals.
The unhappy man said that he had nothing more
to add, beyond the fact that he had always served the
King at his own expense and that he had never agreed
to any attempt upon the person of either the King or
his children. He was allowed to confess to a priest,
and after he had said that the priest was at liberty to
repeat all that he had said, the judges decided that it
would be both useless and dangerous to administer the
torture before his decapitation.
Saint- Vallier was now taken from the Conciergerie,
placed on a mule with an archer mounted behind him
to support him, and taken to the Place de Greve to be
beheaded. The farce was carried out to the end. As
the executioner was about to deliver his blow, an archer
of the guard was seen fighting his way through the
crowd, shouting out " Reprieve ! Reprieve ! "
The sentence had been commuted to imprisonment for
life between four walls, with only a small window through
which Saint- Vallier was to receive his food.
The interest of Diane de Poitiers with the King was,
however, by this time too great for this cruel sentence
to be carried out. In a few days she obtained the release
of her father, who was allowed to retire for the rest of
his life to one of his castles, where he lived in peace
for the period of twelve or fifteen years.
The friendship or intimacy of the ever-calculating
Diane was maintained for long after this with Fran£ois I.
Some of the autograph letters between the couple are
still in existence.
From them it appears that she wished to keep secret
from her husband's relatives the real nature of her re-
lations with the King. When Fra^ois I. showered
benefits upon her husband, Louis de Breze, apparently
with the intention of keeping him in a good humour,
212
Two Great Rivals
Diane wrote to the King, to request him to be good
enough to make it appear to her father and mother-in-law
that it was for some other reason. In later years, as we
know, when Frangois found his elder surviving son the
Dauphin to be gauche and unmannerly, Diane under
took to the King to form his son's manners for him.
The story of the connection which then commenced
between Diane and the Prince who became Henri II.,
with all its consequences, belonging as it does to a later
period in the history of Frangois I., need not be gone
into at present. Diane had become a widow long before
the Constable, Anne de Montmorency, commenced facili-
tating her meetings with the Dauphin at his house at
Ecouen, as the Grand Senechal of Normandy died in the
year 1531.
CHAPTER XXII
The Death of Bayard
APRIL 1524
IN no particular did that fop the Admiral Bon ni vet
prove his ineptitude in warfare more than by his
unsoldierly conduct towards, his comrade in arms, the
Chevalier sans peur et sans reproche. This is very
clearly pointed out to us by the admiring historian of
Bayard, who simply designates himself under the modest
cognomen of " Le Loyal Serviteur."
An instance which this loyal servant gives us took
place in the early part of 1524, when Bonnivet was
occupying a fortified place called Biagrasso. He then
ordered Bayard to occupy the open village of Robecco,
near Milan, with two hundred men-at-arms and two
thousand foot soldiers, the latter under the command of
the Seigneur de Lorges.
Bayard, having received instructions with this small
force to harry the defenders of the strongly fortified
Milan, to prevent them from obtaining food or fodder,
and to keep himself informed as to their movements,
felt that to use such a small force in such a weak position
was purely futile and exceedingly dangerous. He did
not hesitate to speak out very plainly on the subject to
the incompetent favourite of the King. He told him
that half of the army would not suffice to hold such a
position, and that nothing but shame was to be gained
by going there.
When Bayard emphatically impressed upon the
213
214 Two Great Rivals
Admiral that he would do well to think twice before
risking the lives of the King's soldiers in such a foolish
way, Bon ni vet would not give way, but vowed that if
only the Gentil Seigneur would occupy the position, he
would soon send him large reinforcements of infantry.
Relying upon the Admiral's word, Bayard repaired to
the wretched village of Robecco, which was so situated
that no other defences than a few barriers across the
entrances could be made.
For a time he held the place successfully, but when,
in spite of his repeated letters to Bonnivet, the latter
failed to keep his promise to send more men, Bayard
became angry, and said that it was evident that from
jealousy the Admiral must have sent him there on purpose
to cause him if possible to perish. And he vowed that,
sooner or later, he would cause Bonnivet to fight him,
man to man.
Prospero Colonna being sick at that time, Pescara was
in temporary command of the Emperor's troops in Milan,
and he possessed in his immediate service a soldier
possessing both immense strength and great swiftness
of foot. This man, whose name was Lupon, contrived
in the night time to surprise, seize, and carry off upon
his back a French sentinel from Robecco, whom he
brought as a terrified prisoner into Pescara's presence.
From this captive the Marquis speedily found out all
about the weakness of Bayard's position, and he deter-
mined to attack that valiant soldier with an overwhelming
force on the following night, his primary object being to
obtain the person of the redoubtable Chevalier himself —
alive or dead.
The ever-vigilant Bayard had been up on watch and
going the rounds in person for three nights preceding
that upon which Pescara, with about eight thousand men,
attacked the village. On that night, sick with cold and
fatigue, he had remained in a house to rest, after giving
strict orders to his captains to keep good watch and to
relieve each other at regular intervals during the night.
No sooner had Bayard gone to sleep, however, than
The Death of Bayard 215
all of his careless officers promptly followed his example ;
only three or four archers were left as sentries to protect
the whole enceinte of the village.
The Spanish soldiers, surrounding the place quietly and
finding no one on foot, imagined that Bayard must have
learned of their plan of surprising him, and retired in
time.
He was, however, merely sleeping with one eye open
and fully dressed, and at the first cry of " alarm ! " rushed
with five or six men to the threatened barrier and held
it until the Seigneur de Lorges came to his assistance
with a company of foot-soldiers.
Soon realising the overwhelming forces of the enemy,
Bayard, with his usual bravery, told de Lorges to make
good his retreat while he remained behind with a few
men to cover the retirement. " Companion, my friend,"
he said, " this match is unequal ; if they get past the
barriers, we are all lost men. Let us leave our spare horses
and outfits and save the men. You retire with yours
and march in close order ; as for me, with my men-at-
arms I will form the rear-guard."
So well did the gallant Chevalier perform his share of
the dangerous retreat that he got off with only the loss
of about ten men and a hundred and fifty horses. While
the Spaniards were still searching the houses in the hope
of securing this famed commander, he contrived safely
to reach Biagrasso, where he told Bonnivet in very plain
language what he thought of his conduct. On account
of the necessity of their services to the King at this time,
Bayard did not, however, force the issue of his quarrel
with the commander of the forces to a personal combat,
especially as the French army was in the greatest state
of misery and the efforts of all the superior officers were
required to preserve order during the retreat to the
rushing river Sesia. This stream was in flood, and had
to be crossed under the harassing attacks of Bourbon and
Pescara combined.
Fighting bravely with the rear-guard, Bonnivet was
badly wounded by an arquebus-shot in the arm, and
216 Two Great Rivals
had to be carried across the river. The Admiral then
begged Bayard, for the sake of the honour of France,
to try to save the artillery and the ensigns. He told
him that he trusted entirely to his fidelity, and added :
" There is no one in the army of the King who for valour,
experience, and good counsel is as capable of doing so
as yourself."
Bayard said that he would rather have been entrusted
with such an honour at some more favourable moment,
for the situation was now desperate. But he added
that so long as he remained alive, they should never fall
into the hands of the enemy.
The good Chevalier kept his word. Staying behind
and fighting desperately with the rear-guard, Bayard
saved the artillery, the ensigns, and the army itself.
But this most wonderful soldier lost his own life in the
process. When all except himself and a few companions
had crossed the Sesia, the noble Bayard was shot through
the spine by a stone ball from an arquebus.
" Jesus ! " he cried, " I am done for " ; but he would
not be carried away out of the melee. " No ! " he
exclaimed. " I am not going to turn my back on the
enemy for the first time in my dying moments. Put
me down against a tree with my face to the foe, and
charge the Spaniards once more."
The Spaniards having been driven back temporarily
by the gallant charge made by those desirous of avenging
the Chevalier, he begged all his friends to leave him
and save themselves, since they could do him no good,
and it would grieve him that they should be made
prisoners for his sake.
" Assure the King," Bayard said to his friend 1'Allegre,
" that I die his faithful servant, having no other regret
than to be unable to continue to give him my services.
Adieu, my good friends ; I recommend my poor soul
to you."
At this moment we are told that the Spanish General,
the Italian Marquis Pescara arrived, with tears in his
eyes. "Would to God, Seigneur de Bayard," he ex-
After the engraving from Thevel.
PIERRE DE TERRAIL,
Chevalier de Bayard.
p. 216]
The Death of Bayard 217
claimed, " that I might be able to give you sufficient
of my own blood to ensure your recovery and keep
you as my prisoner in good health."
Pescara seems indeed to have behaved very well.
He had his own tent pitched for the dying warrior, and
caused him to be placed on his bed while a priest was called
to hear his confession. Never was an enemy so honoured
in his dying moments. The whole of the Spanish forces
defiled before the dying warrior with every sign of
grief and respect. When the Due de Bourbon arrived
in turn in the presence of the dying man, he exclaimed :
" Alas ! Monsieur de Bayard, how I regret to see you
in this sad condition, you who were such a virtuous
Knight."
The Gentil Seigneur replied : " You need not pity
me, Monseigneur ; I die as a man of honour, serving
my King. You rather require pity yourself, who carry
arms against your Prince, your country, and your oath."
The Due de Bourbon departed thoughtfully, without
making any reply to this biting reproof, and Bayard
remained listening to and repeating the psalms, and
occupied with prayer until death overtook him at two
o'clock on the afternoon of the day upon which he had
been wounded, which was April joth, 1524. Having
lived a hero, he died a Christian.
After the Chevalier sans -peur et sans reproche had
departed to " that bourne whence no traveller returns,"
his enemies still showed the respect to his remains that
they had shown to him while dying. It indeed convinces
us to how great an extent, in those bloodthirsty and
heartless days, the doughty Knight must have enjoyed
the admiration of the whole world, when we learn the
circumstances attending his decease. A Spanish guard
of honour, which had been posted over his tent, bore
his remains solemnly to a church, where funeral services
were celebrated for two days. Then his coffin was
remitted into the hands of his own servants, who appear
not to have deserted him, and who were given permission
to carry the body off with them into France,
2i 8 Two Great Rivals
On the journey through the Duchy of Savoy the
Duke of that country received the remains of Pierre de
Terrail with the same honours as though they had been
those of his own brother ; and upon its arrival in
Dauphine, the country that gave birth to the Gentil
Seigneur de Bayard, all the nobility and the entire
population escorted the coffin from the top of the Alps
to Grenoble, where the virtuous hero of so many
wonderful conflicts was buried in a convent of the order
of Minimes.
The description of the death of this preux chevalier,
as written by one of his enemies to Charles V., is
interesting as bearing out the respect with which he
was looked upon by his adversaries.
Adrien de Croy, Seigneur de Beaurain, wrote to
the Emperor on May 5th, 1524, as follows :
" The Captain Bayard returned with some French
riders and four or five ensigns of the foot-soldiers, and
drove back our people and rescued the pieces of artillery,
which it would have been better for him if he had
allowed to be lost, for just as he thought about returning
he received the shot of a hackbut, from which he died
the same day.
" Sire, no matter how much the said Seigneur Bayard
was the servitor of your enemy, his death has been a
great pity, for he was a gentle Knight, much beloved
by everybody, and who had also lived as well as ever
did one of his condition. In truth, he showed it plainly
in his last moments, for his death was the most
beautiful of any that I have ever heard of. The loss
is not little for the French, and indeed they have been
stunned by it, and all the more so since the greater
number of their captains are killed, sick, or wounded."
CHAPTER XXIII
The Useless Bravery of Bourbon
1524
HAVING driven the French entirely out of Italy in
the summer of the same year in which Bayard
died, the Due de Bourbon invaded France at the head of
the Imperial army.
Charing at the restraint to which he was subjected by
Lannoy and Pescara, he had first communicated with
England. While pressing Henry VIII. to make a fresh
invasion of the north of France, and to head it in person,
Bourbon asked for money wherewith to act on his own
account. For reply from Wolsey, he had a determined
message to the effect that not one sou should he receive
until he formally acknowledged Henry VIII. as King
of both England and France. For fear of angering
Charles V., and likewise his own partisans in France, it
was only in the strictest secrecy that he at length gave the
required oath. Henry VIII. then remitted to Bourbon a
hundred thousand ducats by the hand of Sir John Russell.
The two Monarchs with whom Bourbon was allied had
agreed to give him back all his own vast estates, and also
to hand over to him the whole of Provence, of which
he was to assume the title of King. Provence had
formerly been an independent Kingdom, and even ruled
Naples and Sicily. Bourbon, under the suzerainty at the
same time of Henry VIII. and Charles V., proposed to
make it an independent Monarchy once more under
himself. It would seem as if the Due was not without
219
220 Two Great Rivals
confederates and friends in the Provencal Parliament of
Aix-les-Bains.
When he wanted provisions for his army and sum-
moned the city of Marseilles to furnish them, that town
consulted the Parliament at Aix, which body sent one
of its number to request Marseilles to give Bourbon
victuals. This Marseilles promised to do, but in small
quantities only.
The invasion of France by the former Constable
seemed to promise every chance of success. It was
entirely unopposed as far as Aix, as Fra^ois I. had got
no fresh army together to replace that of Bonnivet, which
had been entirely dispersed. All that Bourbon had
to do was to march directly into Dauphine, advance on
Lyon, and penetrate into his own province of the Bour-
bonnais. There the weight of his authority, especially
with an army behind him, would have been sufficient
for him to raise in immense numbers all his vassals, re-
tainers, and partisans. Nothing could have prevented
him from marching forward at once upon Paris.
A bold and determined soldier, above all, a skilful
soldier, like Charles de Montpensier, saw his chance and
was ready to take it. Whether fighting for the Emperor
or merely for his own hand, everything seemed to be-
token a wonderful triumph for his forces ; a splendid
revenge upon Fran9ois and Louise de Savoie was certain.
The Emperor, it is true, was, as he always was, short of
money to pay his troops ; that, however, would not
matter. Bourbon proposed to make the France from
which he had been compelled to fly pay for everything
with the spoils of the big cities, the ransoms to be in-
flicted, the subsidies raised. The cup of triumph being
thus raised to his lips, who or what was it that prevented
the Due de Bourbon from quaffing it ?
Not the French King certainly — he was helpless. No,
the enemy whom Bourbon now had to encounter was
his employer, his cousin, friend, and prospective brother-
in-law, Charles V.
Charles was now in Spain, where he had shown cold-
The Useless Bravery of Bourbon 221
blooded cruelty in punishing the people who had lately-
been in a state of insurrection, even causing many to
be executed without trial who had been promised im-
munity by the nobles who had come over to his side
and had conquered in his name. The nobles of Spain
were disgusted and furious with their King, while the
Cortes showed their disgust at the want of honour
shown by their Flemish Prince by refusing to vote him
money. The meanness of the ruler was also too apparent
to those grandees whose Spanish ideas of honour had
been deeply offended by their pledged word being dis-
regarded. Charles had allowed these nobles not only
to fight and conquer in his name, but also to have
the pleasure of paying the bill of the expenses of the
civil war. There was no greater grandee in Spain than
the Constable of Castile, who could not resist saying
sarcastically to Charles : " Am I, then, to be allowed to
pay for the expenses of having won a couple of battles
for you in two months ? " Charles, who even at his
then early age cultivated an excessive gravity of de-
meanour while in Spain, quite forgot himself for once
and lost his temper. He replied furiously : " What if
I threw you over the balcony ? " The Constable of
Castile, not in the least awed, chuckled in reply : " You
couldn't do it ; I am too heavy for you."
Having aroused this feeling of antagonism against
himself, Charles, as we have said, found it a matter of
great difficulty to extract from the country any more
of those golden doubloons to which his Flemish followers
had formerly helped themselves so freely. He therefore
had the excuse when, in his jealousy and mistrust of
Bourbon, he did not want him to be too successful,
of saying that he could not remit funds sufficient for
the projected onward march through France.
Pescara, with whom Bourbon found himself hampered
just at the very time in August 1524 when he wanted
a free hand, flatly refused with his Spaniards to obey
Bourbon, giving the Emperor's wishes as his excuse.
Pescara calmly stated that the Emperor required more
222 Two Great Rivals
than anything else a good port in France on the
Mediterranean, that therefore, before anything else could
be thought of, it was necessary to capture the city of
Marseilles ; he refused to budge in any other direction.
Marseilles, he pointed out, was a most excellent place
for the Emperor's purpose, as it formed a connecting
link between Spain and Italy. It was useless for Bourbon
to resist ; he was forced to resign his golden opportunity,
he had to remain on the coast of the Mediterranean
and invest Marseilles.
In spite of his disappointment, receiving no money
from Charles and not enough from Henry VIII., the
Due de Bourbon set about loyally to do his utmost
to carry out the Emperor's intentions. He invested the
city, and everything that a bold and determined com-
mander could do to reduce it was done by him. The
Marseillais, however, who might have yielded to Bourbon
had he come alone, hated the Spaniards as they did
the devil. In former days the place had been surprised
and put to the sack by the Aragonese Kings of Naples.
Not if the inhabitants could help it should a Spaniard
again place a foot in the city. Moreover, Marseilles was
full of proscribed Italians in the French service, refugees
from various places in Italy against which the Emperor
had vowed vengeance. The chief of these was a very
gallant captain, one of the ancient noble family of Orsini,
Renzo da Ceri by name.
This " Capitaine Ranee," as the admiring French called
him, had already done valiant service to France ; he
now became the heart and soul of the defence of
Marseilles. Noble gentlemen of France sent by the
King managed to penetrate to the city and enrol them-
selves under the command of Renzo ; the inhabitants
rose as one man and formed themselves into military
companies ; the women — who, above all, felt that they had
all to fear should the city fall — lent a hand, and toiled
day and night on the fortifications. It was in vain
that Pescara promised to the Imperialists the sacking of
the city ; their courage failed when assault after assault,
The Useless Bravery of Bourbon 223
led by the gallant Bourbon in person upon the walls,
was repulsed with heavy losses. Instead of working
loyally with Bourbon, Pescara commenced to sneer at
him, to jeer at the confidence which he had at first
expressed to the effect that the city would yield to him
personally.
When one day the cannon-balls from the city came
tearing into a church where they were hearing Mass
together, and killed several priests at the altar, Pescara
taunted the Due de Bourbon : "Here they come then,
your Marseillais, with their ropes round their necks
and the keys of the city in their hands."
The siege languished, but Bourbon captured Toulon
and took all the French artillery at that place. He also
reduced the whole of the Riviera. In front of Monaco he
distinguished himself by great personal bravery, behaving
indeed in a manner worthy of a Bayard.
The Imperial fleet was off the port of Monaco, which
then belonged to the young Prince Honore Grimaldi.
Bourbon was encamped with his troops in the neighbour-
hood of Nice, when the Spanish fleet sought to disembark
stores and artillery at Monte Carlo. Suddenly the
famous Genoese Admiral Andrea Doria, then in the
service of France, appeared with his fleet, to which was
joined the French fleet, which had already captured the
Prince of Orange, in the service of Spain, while on his
way to join Bourbon.
These combined fleets fell suddenly in superior force
upon the Emperor's fleet commanded by Ugo de
Moncada, and three of the ships of the latter were run
ashore and basely abandoned by their crews, who took
to the mountains behind Monaco. Learning what had
happened, Bourbon arrived in a hurry with some Spanish
arquebus-men, with also Pescara and the Seigneur de
Beaurain.
The enemies' fleets were about to seize the three
abandoned vessels when the Due cried out : " Let us
save the honour of the camp and of the Emperor." He
boarded one of the deserted ships with one party, and
224 Two Great Rivals
ordered Pescara and Beaurain to man the other two.
All three fought valiantly, and during the whole of
that day they were under the fire of the artillery of
the combined Genoese and French fleets. Inspired,
however, by the courage of their leader, the arquebus-
men resisted successfully all attempts to board the
stranded vessels, which were saved with all their stores.
Bourbon, in his account of this affair to the Emperor,
wrote most modestly. Beaurain, however, in a letter
written to Charles at the same time, was most
enthusiastic.
" If you could have seen Monsieur de Bourbon you
would have esteemed him one of the bravest gentlemen
that exists in this world ; and seeing all the galleys of
France coming to take the three of yours, he com-
manded the Marquis and myself each to save one, and
that he would keep the other, and to do that he showed
us the way."
From the time of his entry into Provence, Bourbon had
assumed the old sovereign title of Comte de Provence ;
he had also caused the Magistrates to swear an oath of
fealty to him, which, the French Marechal la Palice
having retired before Bourbon without fighting, they had
apparently been ready enough to do.
After being for a considerable time in front of Mar-
seilles, however, he commenced to see that his chances
of ever becoming King of Provence were pretty low.
The fortifications had been placed in an excellent con-
dition by an engineer named Mirandel, while all convents
and other buildings in the neighbourhood of the town
likely to form a shelter for the attacking party had
been levelled with the ground. Even most of the gates
of the city had been built up solid with masonry, while
strong works were constructed in rear of those gates
that still remained open. The port was, moreover, open
for a time, and the Marseillais able to receive provisions
from the sea, while also the city was well provided with
heavy guns. One of these, named " the Basilisk," was
immense for those days. It fired a ball weighing a
The Useless Bravery of Bourbon 225
hundred pounds, and sixty men were necessary to re-
place it in position after the kick caused by each
discharge.
The Due de Bourbon, however, by his well-placed
batteries, drove off the French fleet and closed the port,
and he also caused heavy losses both in killed and
prisoners to the besieged. Even after he found, by
Pescara's ironical speech on September loth, that the
Spaniards' confidence in him was shaken, he did not
give up hope of reducing the city. Above all, he
expected the speedy arrival of the Emperor by land
from Catalonia in Spain, with an army. Wolsey also
sent word that Henry VIII. was about to make a descent
into Picardy, which information was encouraging.
All of this time Francois I. was gradually assembling
an army in the valley of the Rhone. It was composed
in a large measure of Swiss, of German lansquenets from
the Moselle, and of other lansquenets from the Duchy
of Gueldre. The remainder consisted of French ad-
venturers. As neither the English nor the Flemish
troops of the Archduchess Marguerite made their ex-
pected appearance in the north, Fran£ois thought at
length that he might safely withdraw all troops from,
that region and march to the relief of Marseilles. He
called, moreover, to his assistance the young King of
Navarre, Henri d'Albret, who brought to his standard a
fine force of Gascons. Having got this splendid army
together, Francis wrote a letter full of warlike ardour
and bombast to the Marechal Anne de Montmorency,
to tell him, in case he would like to have his share in
the fighting, to come and bring with him all the men-
at-arms that he could obtain to join him in his camp
near Avignon.
We cannot describe at length the fury of the attacks
of Bourbon and the courage of the defenders at Mar-
seilles. At length the Due found that he could get
none of the Imperial army, neither lansquenets nor
Spaniards, to follow him in the breaches when he strove
to press his assaults home.
15
226 Two Great Rivals
Time wore on, Charles V. did not keep his promise
to come from Catalonia, and Pescara became facetiously
mutinous in his remarks to Bourbon.
" Go to the table prepared for you by the Marseillais
if you want to sup in Paradise ; but, if you do not care
to, you had better follow me into Italy." As the Italian
troops in the Imperial army likewise refused to follow
him any longer, Bourbon was at length compelled to
abandon his idea of taking Marseilles by storm. He
would have liked, if forced to abandon the siege, to have
advanced boldly to attack the army of the King of France,
of which the advance guard under la Palice was not far
distant.
His troops, however, were discouraged and, including
Pescara, mutinous. Lannoy, Viceroy of Naples, had not
kept his word to send reinforcements ; the Emperor had
not come according to his repeatedly pledged word. The
King of England had not kept his engagements either.
The unhappy Bourbon felt himself to be deserted by
everybody — what was he to do ? He determined on hold-
ing a council of war. He assembled his captains, and
found them as disinclined to follow him to fight a battle
with Fran9ois as they were to follow him in the great
final assault that he had planned on Marseilles. They all
said that probably Francois would decline a battle and
waste time while keeping them there in France ; that
the best thing, therefore, was to evacuate Provence and
march back to Italy.
Regretfully Bourbon made ready to retreat. He
threw away useless ammunition into the sea, sent off by
ship from Toulon some of his guns to go to Genoa, and
buried four large cannons.
On September 29th, 1524, Bourbon commenced
his march back along the Riviera towards the Maritime
Alps. In spite of his boasting, Fra^ois I. was too
prudent to put himself in front of the retreating army,
and so risk a battle. He contented himself with sending
Montmorency and all the mounted men to harry the
Imperialists in their retreat. The peasants in the country
The Useless Bravery of Bourbon 227
of Provence likewise rose and harassed the flanks of the
Imperial army, whose retreat, although remarkably speedy,
was by no means disorderly or of the nature of a rout.
Pescara commmanded the rear-guard, and did un-
commonly well in preventing stragglers from falling into
the hands of the enemy, even if his methods of preserving
them were somewhat drastic to those of his men who
disobeyed orders. Upon one occasion when the time
came to march he found it impossible to arouse
a quantity of lansquenets who were asleep in a barn.
They had drunk themselves stupid with the wine of the
country. Already could Pescara see the light horse of
the King of France appearing in the distance. Rather
than that they should slaughter the sleeping Germans as
soon as the rear-guard should have moved off, Pescara
preferred to do so himself. He gave orders to his men
to set fire to the barn on all sides, and so to burn alive
the sleepy soldiers whom he could not induce to come
out.
Montmorency pressed the rear-guard hard, and at
the passage of the river Var destroyed a large number
of that body, who had remained posted in order to
keep him back with his men-at-arms. The remainder
of the force which Bourbon led back into Italy were in
rags and without shoes. When any animals were
slaughtered for food, the soldiers pounced upon the
skins and cut them up in order to turn them into
sandals. All the time they murmured against Bourbon,
who had promised them slippers of gold brocade as soon
as they should have captured the cities of France.
Fran9ois I. had in the meantime reoccupied Provence,
where he lost no time in cutting off the heads of those
Magistrates who had sworn fidelity to the Due de Bourbon.
When the King had altogether re-established the Royal
authority, he prepared to follow the discomfited Imperial
army into Italy, and make yet once again a conquest of
his beloved Duchy of Milan.
It must be admitted that Charles V. had well deserved
his reverse, owing to the way in which he had treated the
228 Two Great Rivals
Due de Bourbon, whom he had delivered over bound
into the hands of Lannoy and Pescara. After starting
him off on a career which could but have been one of
conquest, he suddenly pulled his able lieutenant up with
a jerk as from a rope. Moreover, the rumour of the
cold-blooded severity with which Charles had treated the
Spanish insurgents had reached the many proscribed
Italians fighting in Marseilles, who knew therefore what
to expect if captured, and preferred to fight to the last
gasp. The result was what we have seen. And thus,
in two successive years, instead of Charles remaining
triumphant, with Burgundy recaptured in his hands, the
troops of Charles V. and Henry VIII. had first retired
from the north of France with nothing accomplished,
and then the Imperial forces had been ignominiously
flung out of the south of France, in shame and disgrace.
The position of Fra^ois, who had himself done but
little to deserve his good fortune, was now better than
it had been for several years. While able to triumph
over his rival, his success in the south had likewise
completely restored his popularity throughout France.
Had he been wise he would now have remained at home
to preserve the kingdom which was so providentially
delivered from all its enemies. Wisdom, however, was
not a quality to be expected from the brilliant and
showy Fran£ois I.
CHAPTER XXIV
The Preludes to Pavia
J524—
IT took Fran9ois merely three or four days to settle up
matters according to his satisfaction in Provence, and
then he started off with his army for Italy. His generals —
all, that is, with the exception of Bonnivet — were strongly
against the King undertaking an Italian campaign so late
in the season. His mother also, after writing to urge
him to give up the idea, hurried off from Paris to try
to join him in time to prevent his starting, but arrived
too late. Fran9ois had purposely avoided Louise de
Savoie, while leaving behind him powers constituting her
once more Regent of the Kingdom.
A curious reason has been assigned both for the anxiety
of Bonnivet to return to Italy and for the obstinacy of
the King in following his advice. It seems that during
his last ill-fated expedition the giddy Admiral had dis-
covered a lady of exceptional beauty at Milan, of whom
he had made a conquest. So great was his passion for
the beauty that he was dying to see her again. The
King, as we know, at times shared his own conquests
with Bonnivet, and now the intimate descriptions given
to him of the charms of the Milanese lady had aroused
the inflammable heart of Francois to such an extent that
he determined at all costs to see and appreciate them in
equal measure with his bosom friend.
Such is the story that is told, and when the unstable,
pleasure-loving nature of Fran9ois is taken into con-
sideration, it does not seem in the least improbable,
229
230 Two Great Rivals
The King had, at all events, a splendid army under
his command, and, while Bourbon and his forces hurried
back by the way of Monaco and the Maritime Alps,
he took a shorter route over the Alps by the pass of
Mont Cenis and two other passes, and, owing to the
favourable weather, arrived in Italy at the same time as
the fugitive Imperialists.
These, under Bourbon and Pescara, had been instantly
joined by Lannoy, with those reinforcements of both
foot and men-at-arms which had been awaited in vain
before Marseilles. Want of money was the excuse that
he gave for not having sent them on, and now there was
no money either wherewith to pay the discouraged and
worn-out veterans who had returned to Italy almost at
a run.
It must be confessed, however unfortunate it had been
for Bourbon hitherto to be tied by the leg and restrained
by the Marquis Pescara and Charles de Lannoy, that the
Emperor was lucky in the possession of all three of these
leaders at this juncture. For each of the three vied with
the other in leaving no stone unturned in order to raise
money, and to keep together the remnants of the army
with which they now had to endeavour to preserve the
Emperor's interests and save his possessions in Italy.
Pescara (who, although an Italian by birth, was Spanish
in all his feelings) was adored by the Spanish troops ;
and to them he spoke in such convincing terms of the
necessity of retrieving their lost honour that they con-
sented to go on serving for a time without pay. Lannoy,
Viceroy of Naples, contrived in some manner to mortgage
the revenues of Naples, and in this way to raise sufficient
money to supply the most pressing necessities of the
troops. The Due de Bourbon, thirsting for vengeance
upon Fran9ois, generously pawned all of his jewels and
started off to Germany to raise fresh troops at his own
expense for Charles V.
Previous to this, however, the three commanders,
after disposing of the bulk of their men in various strong
places, had hurried off together with the remainder to
The Preludes to Pavia 231
endeavour to reach Milan before Francis could get
there.
In this effort they were successful, and they had oc-
cupied the place and re-garrisoned the citadel just before
the Marechal Theodore Trivulzi, sent on by Fra^ois,
arrived with some eight thousand men. The King of
France was not, however, going to fall into the error
of Bonnivet in the preceding campaign, who, owing to
his foolish delays — caused, it is said, for love-making
en route — had lost Milan. Fra^ois did not pause a
moment, but hurried on rapidly after Trivulzi with the
whole of his army. Marching all night long, he arrived
before Pescara and Bourbon, who had found Milan
decimated by the plague, had time to restore the fortifica-
tions. The people in the meantime, by the advice of
Girolamo Morone, the Minister of Duke Francesco
Sforza, had sent to present the keys of the city to
Fran9ois I., but, fickle as ever, no sooner had the Imperial
troops made their appearance than they commenced
shouting " Viva ! " for the Duke and for the Empire.
With so few men in the place to work upon the walls,
Bourbon, Pescara, and Lannoy made up their minds
that it would be wiser to abandon Milan than to stay
and fight the whole of the large French army, and so
risk defeat.
Accordingly, they marched out of the city by two
gates, while Francois marched in by a third. In one
point, however, they scored a signal success over the
French King. By a brilliant march the three Imperial
commanders contrived to throw a considerable garrison
into the important city of Pavia on the river Ticino,
under the command of one of the toughest captains who
had ever fought for either King or Emperor. This was
Antonio da Leyva, a man of great experience in war
and as courageous as a lion. He was full of re-
sources, a splendid leader, with a brain as active as
his arm was doughty. After establishing this notable
warrior in Pavia, the Imperialist forces split themselves up
and were lost for a time. To such as extent was this the
232 Two Great Rivals
case, that in Rome pasquinades, such as " lost and cannot
be found — an Imperial army," were posted upon the
famous mutilated statue in front of the house of the
sarcastic tailor Pasquino, who had lived in the preceding
century.
The moral effect of the second capture of Milan by
Francois was very great. All of the small States of Italy,
and likewise the unstable Pope Clement VII., immediately
began to turn towards the King. From the repeated
reappearances of the French arms in Italy, these various
States, with reason, began to argue as follows : " These
French have come here to remain ; they will not be put
out ; they always return, no matter what happens to them.
They are surely stronger than this young Emperor,
who has so many countries but no money ; it will be
wiser by far for us to throw in our lot with them."
That is accordingly what they did, and Venice among
the rest, and Fra^ois, determined to take advantage of
the situation accordingly, just as the Emperor was in the
habit of doing when he could, commenced to make
the various States pay up for the support of himself
and his army. From the towns of Tuscany he com-
menced to receive subsidies, from the warlike Duchy
of Ferrara he was supplied with munitions of war.
The Pope, going back upon the Emperor, whose power
he was anxious to see abased, formed a treaty of
neutrality with Fra^ois, in which he included the city
of Florence, and by this treaty the French King was
accorded the permission to march at will through either
the Papal or the Florentine dominions. Clement VII.
differed in his tactics from those of the previous Medici
Pope, Leo X. This latter, it will be remembered, had
formed the design of getting rid of both the rivals at
once, and clearing Italy of the French and the Imperialists,
but had failed. Clement thought that it would be a
far simpler plan to employ one of the rivals to get rid
of the other. As Fran9ois, who had a brand-new army,
and had arrived in great force and reconquered Milan,
seemed to be decidedly the stronger, Clement did not
The Preludes to Pavia 233
attempt to conceal the satisfaction that he felt, and
determined to make use of him in any possible way in
order to get rid of Charles.
Having this object in view, making use of his old
cry of the necessity of the Christian Monarchs combining
in order to resist the aggression of the Turk, Clement
subtly, as he imagined, now endeavoured to bring about
a peace favourable to Fra^ois, one by which he should
retain all his conquests in Lombardy. The tenacious
Charles, who, however slow, never gave up any
project upon which he had set his mind, listened to
these proposals with scorn. He did not forget that it
had been the Cardinal Giulio de' Medici himself who
had formerly instigated him to invade the Milanese.
He conceived a violent hatred of the Pope, which hatred
was before very long, by a strange turn of Fortune's
wheel, to result in the most signal discomfiture to the
august Pontiff who held the tiara and keys of St. Peter.
Fran£ois meanwhile, while foolishly dividing his forces
by sending off a body of ten thousand men, under John
Stuart, Duke of Albany, to invade the Kingdom of
Naples, went with the rest of his army and sat down
before the city of Pavia, which was placed between two
branches of the Ticino.
In this city there were as garrison under Antonio
da Leyva five thousand Germans and five hundred
Spaniards, who, for want of pay and from shortness of
provisions, were so discontented that on several occasions
they were on the point of giving themselves and the
town up to the King of France.
It was on October 28th, 1524, that the investment of
Pavia commenced, and for four months Francois seemed
to enjoy himself thoroughly in the neighbourhood of
the city that his troops, and notably his engineers, were
doing all in their power to capture. While his soldiers
fought, he amused himself. According to Guicciardini,
he gave " all to pleasure, nothing to business." It is only
reasonable to suppose that he had either found the lovely
lady of Bonnivet's fancy, and been allowed by his
234
Two Great Rivals
favourite to supplant him in her affections, or else that
some other and equally lovely houri had been discovered,
with whom the King's idle moments were fully and
agreeably occupied.
Meanwhile his troops remained encamped under the
stars throughout the long and inclement winter season.
CHAPTER XXV
The Battle of Pavia
1525
DURING the four months that the siege of Pavia
continued, the King of France installed himself
first in the luxurious Abbey of San Lanfranco, where the
wines and accommodation were of the best, and then in
the beautiful ducal villa of Mirabello. He divided his
time between the two residences, and indeed, could not
have chosen one more beautiful, more richly furnished
and adorned with statues and pictures than the latter.
In this resort the artistic soul of Frangois I. was satisfied,
while likewise, although scenes of war were daily present
around the walls of Pavia, he was not debarred from
the pleasures of the chase. For Mirabello was surrounded
by an immense park enclosed by a stone wall, and it
was one of the most favourite hunting resorts of the
Dukes of Milan.
The so-called villa was adorned like a palace and at
the same time fortified like a castle ; streams of water
flowed through the grounds between woods and meadow-
lands, while the hills and undulating nature of the
immense park made it at the same time more beautiful
and more easy to defend.
Nothing could have been more different from the
melancholy old feudal residences of France than this
delightful Italian villa, luxuriously furnished with rich
silks and splendid brocades, in which Fra^ois had in-
stalled himself with his bosom crony Bonnivet and other
235
236 Two Great Rivals
favourites of both sexes. While with his big siege
cannons he was daily pounding away at the walls of
Pavia, and the French engineers were erecting dams to
turn one of the branches of the river which swept by
the walls of that beleaguered city, Fra^ois seemed to
take it for granted that everything would take place as
he wished, that he had merely personally to take things
easily and all Italy would soon be his. He was all the
more encouraged in these ideas from the fact that the
large body of men he had detached from his army under
the Duke of Albany had made its way into the Emperor's
territory of Naples unopposed, and further, because he
had been successful in engaging the services of that
famous condottiere of the Black Bands, Giovanni de' Medici,
who was harrying the defenders of Pavia day and night
with his accustomed bravery.
Another of the more energetic of the commanders on
the French side was the Marechal Anne de Montmorency,
who, with a mixed force of Germans, Italians, Corsicans,
and French men-at-arms, contrived to effect a lodgment
on an island between the two branches of the Ticino
to the south of Pavia. There was a bridge, connecting
this island with the city, defended by a tower. When
Montmorency at length took this tower, which had been
most bravely defended, he cruelly hanged all of its
garrison. This barbarity was, so he facetiously declared,
merited, " because the defenders of the tower had dared
to defy the armies of the King in such a hen-roost."
Antonio da Leyva threatened Montmorency with
bloody reprisals before long, and at the same time by
breaking down the bridge he effectually kept Mont-
morency on the other side of the river. The French,
however, could cross both above and below the town,
and thus their various camps could communicate.
On Antonio da Leyva and Pavia hung for the time
being the whole onus of maintaining the Imperial arms
in Italy, and nobly he fulfilled his trust. Although
breaches were made in the walls, and the troops of the
Marechal de la Palice bravely endeavoured to storm them
The Battle of Pavia 237
on one side at the same time that other breaches were
being stormed on another side, Leyva was ready in all
directions. Wherever the danger was greatest he was
to be found, and, aided by the German Count of
Hohenzollern, he flung back the assailants after the
most desperate hand-to-hand conflicts. Two thousand
men were lost to the French on November 8th, 1524 ;
and although Fra^ois gave orders for a second attempt
to storm the city on the following day, he thought better
of it when he learned that the vigilant Leyva had caused
deep trenches to be dug behind the breaches, and had
manned a quantity of loopholed houses in their neigh-
bourhood with men armed with the heavy muskets called
arquebuses.
It is indeed remarkable to what a large extent the
arquebus — an arm which Bayard, who was slain by one,
had strongly condemned as ungentlemanly and unfit for
honest warfare — was employed by infantry soldiers in
Europe from the beginning of the sixteenth century.
The use of these weapons was, however, chiefly confined
to the Spaniards ; the English still used the long bow
and the French the arbalete or crossbow, while the
Germans and Swiss foot-soldiers confined themselves in
a great measure to the use of the pike and broadsword.
The good use which Antonio da Leyva made of his five
hundred Spanish arquebus-men was in a great measure the
cause of the failure of the French to storm the city of Pavia.
It was after the failure of the assault of November 8th
that Fran9ois set his engineers to work to dig a new
bed for the river Ticino, at the same time as an
immense dam of trunks of trees, stone, and earth was
made to block the old channel. This hazardous attempt
to divert the protecting stream from the walls of the city
might have been successful earlier in the year, but
Fran9ois now began to discover that those of his Generals
who had told him that the season was too far advanced
for warlike operations in Italy had spoken the truth.
Tremendous winter rains suddenly caused the river to
rise enormously, and, while the defenders chuckled, the
238 Two Great Rivals
French had the mortification of seeing the whole of their
works swept away.
After this failure, Francois settled himself down and,
while easily obtaining all the provisions that he required
for his troops, endeavoured to starve out Leyva and his
garrison.
Knowing how greatly the defenders of Pavia suffered
in that cold winter for want of wood to burn, how
short they were of food aud munitions of war, Fra^ois
felt certain that he had the place at his mercy. There-
fore, while giving orders to Renzo da Ceri to go with
a French fleet and a body of men from Marseilles to
assist in the subjugation of the Kingdom of Naples,
the King of France waited quietly, with an easy mind,
in his comfortable quarters until he should see himself
the conqueror of all Italy.
While the King of the French Renaissance was enjoy-
ing his dreamy Italian existence in the land of Titian and
Correggio, and while the former artist was painting his
portrait, he failed entirely to perceive the signs of the
times. When informed on four different occasions that
the fiery Leyva, dashing forth from the city, had de-
stroyed bodies of his troops, he was not disturbed. In
the cold weather of January 1525 a large number of his
Italian levies, chiefly Corsicans, were recalled by their
masters the Genoese, but their loss did not affect Fra^ois.
When provisions were short, and a fowl cost ten francs,
while his now hungry army was gradually melting
away from sickness, it made not the slightest impression
on the insouciant King. He was expecting the arrival of
some new Swiss troops before long ; with that expectancy
Fran9ois was quite content — he did not even take the wise
precaution of recalling the ten thousand men whom he
had sent off" to the south. Thither Pescara and Lannoy
had cunningly decided to allow them to go unmolested,
instead of, as Fra^ois had vainly expected, weakening
their already weak forces in Lombardy by attempting to
follow them into Naples.
In good sooth Fran£ois I., an athletic young man of
The Battle of Pavia 239
thirty, a gallant Knight, at times so anxious to shine by
his warlike feats, proved himself at this period to be an
absolute failure as a commander. Not only did he in-
dulge in the extreme folly of despising his enemy just
because for the time being he heard nothing from him,
but his conduct at Mirabello was more of the nature of
some pleasure-loving old debauchee than that of a brave
and brilliant young King, one who had already won for
himself the reputation of a valiant warrior at Marignano.
Being, as he was, even if a voluptuary a man of con-
siderable intelligence, it seems inexplicable that Fra^ois
can have forgotten the fact that Bourbon now had not
only all of his old wrongs to avenge, but also to wipe
out the recollection of the recent ignominious retreat from
Provence. And did he not know the Due de Bourbon,
what kind of a soldier he was ? Was it not owing to the
gallantry and good generalship of the despoiled First
Prince of the Blood that France had been victorious on
many a field, not even excepting Marignano, where his
courage and skill had not a little helped to win the day
for Fran9ois the boaster ? And now had not Bourbon
gone to Germany for something else than a pleasure
trip ? Surely also the supine French King, while
devoting himself "all to pleasure," might have paused
for a moment to consider the energetic character of
Pescara, as it had been made apparent in the previous
Italian campaign against Bonnivet, again before Marseilles,
and in his rear-guard actions while retiring from that city
in the previous October. But no, for all his importance
to Fran9ois I., Pescara might just as well never have existed
in Italy, any more than Bourbon might ever have been
expected to return from Germany.
While Fran9ois was writing to the Pope, " I will have
nothing less than the whole of the State of Milan and
the Kingdom of Naples," his adversaries were showing
extraordinary vigour, and making preparations to prevent
him from having either one or the other.
Although Lannoy had been weakening, and seeming
rather inclined either to take steps to succour Naples or
240 Two Great Rivals
to treat with Frar^ois I., Pescara persuaded the Viceroy to
do neither the one nor the other, but to wait in the camp
that they had formed at Lodi for reinforcements, and
then fight the matter out.
These reinforcements came at length. First of all
arrived a quantity of lansquenets under George von
Frundsberg, sent by the Archduke Ferdinand, the
Emperor's young brother ; then, in the month of January,
Bourbon returned in person. He had been eminently
successful. In addition to pawning his own jewels, he
had taken his revenge upon the King's mother by making
a raid on Savoy and seizing the jewels of her relative the
Duchess, which he had pawned in Germany.
In that country he was clever enough also to raise
subsidies of men from the Imperial cities, which were
nearly all Lutheran in sentiment. Bourbon told them
that the King of France was the intimate ally of the
Pope who was so much opposed to Luther, and by this
means he contrived to obtain a quantity of Protestant
German soldiers to fight under the Catholic banner of
Charles V.
No sooner had Bourbon returned, than Pescara ad-
dressed the soldiers. Appealing to their cupidity, he
told them that by vanquishing the French King and
sacking his camp at Mirabello they would obtain un-
known riches, especially by the ransoms that they would
obtain for the persons of all the great lords of France
whom they would no doubt take prisoners. The Spanish
soldiers were caught by this prospect ; but to the Germans,
who were more wary, Pescara represented that they
should exert every effort to save their brethren shut up
in Pavia, especially the son of their beloved chief
Frundsberg, who was with Leyva. All the money that
he could procure Pescara gave to the men-at-arms, who
would listen to none of his reasons but wanted cash
down and at once.
Antonio da Leyva was at this time having trouble
with his Germans in Pavia — they also were clamouring
for pay and wished to surrender. Their unscrupulous
The Battle of Pavia 241
commander got over this difficulty in two ways. First,
he poisoned the chief of the Germans ; secondly, he said
that all of their long-deferred pay was outside the city
waiting for them.
Thus, by one means or another, the commanders of
the army of Charles V. contrived to keep their soldiers
from deserting and likewise to keep their courage up to
the fighting point, but at the same time they were clever
enough, by the means of Italian agents and spies, to pro-
mote numerous desertions from the forces of Francis I.
The worst of all these took place after the Imperial
Generals, having joined all their forces, advanced from
Lodi and took up a strong position only about half a
mile from the now fortified park of Mirabello. Five
thousand Swiss soldiers then left Fra^ois, and marched
away into their native Canton of Grisons.
The King was at length alarmed. He now closed his
troops in nearer together and got his batteries ready behind
the walls. The army outside was now as strong as his
own, with the exception of men-at-arms and artillery ; but
Fran£ois was well aware that for want of pay, food, and
ammunition that army could only be kept together for
a very short time. He knew that the Imperialists were
in such a condition that they must either fight almost
immediately, be disbanded, or rise in mutiny.
Now, if ever, Francois had an opportunity of winning
all by strategy, while he risked all by fighting a battle.
He would merely to have abandoned the siege of Pavia,
to have evacuated also his position at Mirabello, which
was too extended, and fallen back with all his forces
on Milan, where he had left a small garrison. The
Imperial army, of which the newly raised German troops
had not received a florin beyond their first engagement
money, must have gone all to pieces. He could then
have returned, crushed such fragments as remained, and
have taken the starving Pavia when it was no longer
supported by a large force outside. Of the King's
Generals when assembled in a council of war, all strongly
urged him to pursue this course except one. Why, they
16
242 Two Great Rivals
asked, fight an army compelled to fight from sheer despair,
and merely from the hope of plunder, one which will
soon cease to exist ?
The one exception, the one man who gave contrary
advice, was, as might well have been expected, Bonnivet.
The Admiral pointed out to Fra^ois that his name
would be shamed and his honour tarnished if he now
raised the siege of Pavia, which he had sworn to take
or perish, and if he refused a battle with forces inferior
to his own.
Fran9ois, whom no experience could teach, listened
to his evil counsellor, determined to follow the advice
of the man who always made mistakes likely to endanger
his country.
Already on the night of February 8th, 1 525, an immense
body of masons, sent by Pescara, had knocked down wide
pieces of the walls of the park of Mirabello in several
places, and after this Bourbon and Pescara determined
to attack by night, and to make the main attack not
on the front face of the park, which was most strongly
fortified, but by the rear, on the north side. The King
of France would then be compelled to come down from
the high ground which he held and fight in the plain.
The attack was arranged to take place before daylight
on February 24th, which was the Emperor's birthday,
and Antonio da Leyva was warned to combine by
making a sortie from Pavia.
Owing to the time occupied in knocking down the
walls on the side proposed to assault, it was no longer
night but a clear and cold morning when a large body
of the Imperial troops, penetrating into the park of
Mirabello, found themselves faced by the army of the
French King, who was full of high courage and confident
of success.
The Marquis del Vasto, with three thousand mixed
Spanish arquebus-men and German lansquenets, eluding
the French army, marched straight upon the villa. This
he occupied with but little resistance, as it was merely
occupied by merchants and a few stragglers, its
The Battle of Pavia 243
garrison having followed the King. The rest of the
Imperial troops with Pescara, following Vasto into the
park, were thrown at first into the greatest confusion
by the French artillery, which took them in flank. An
eye-witness declared that " nothing was to be seen but
heads and arms flying among them," until they gained
a little valley where they were under cover. Here,
however, they were charged by the splendid men-at-
arms of the Due d'Alen9on and the Seigneur Chabot
de Brion and very much cut up. While the shaken
Imperialists fled before the lances and sought cover in
wooded ground, Lannoy commenced to talk about the
necessity of entrenching themselves, but not so Pescara.
This brave soldier sent for Vasto to come from the villa
and join him ; he urged Lannoy to charge with the
advance guard, and sent to beg Bourbon, who com-
manded the main body, to come to his assistance as soon
as possible.
Lannoy, although without much confidence, advanced,
being covered by the light cavalry under the Marquis
de Civita Sant' Angelo, when suddenly the King of
France, at the head of all the noble Seigneurs of his
Court and the men-at-arms, charged down upon the
leading squadrons.
Frangois encountered Sant' Angelo in person. He
ran him through with his lance and killed him, and his
followers dispersed the light cavalry like chaff. The
following men-at-arms of Lannoy were likewise broken
up, and some foot-soldiers carrying pikes and a number
of arquebus- men were also dispersed by this brilliant
charge and many killed.
Seeing them run, the King of France remarked to
Lescun, Marechal de Foix, who had charged by his side :
" Seigneur de Lescun, now it is that I can indeed call
myself the Duke of Milan." Francois thought that the
battle was won when it was scarcely begun, for Pescara
and Bourbon soon changed the face of matters, after
having been joined by the three thousand men of del
Vasto. The French were charged in flank and in face
244 Two Great Rivals
at the same time, and the battle became furious, the
French artillery now proving quite inadequate to stop
the advance of either the Spanish troops or the lansquenets
of George von Frundsberg. Soon indeed the French
batteries were masked by the lansquenets belonging to
the French side, these Germans, under the leadership
of Francois de Lorraine and Richard Pole, so-called Duke
of Suffolk, overlapping both the guns and the Swiss
battalions in their eagerness to get at the enemy. A
bloody hand-to-hand fight now ensued between them
and the Imperialist Germans, but these latter, being
reinforced by some Spaniards, the lansquenets of the
German Black Bands were destroyed. These unfortu-
nate men, slain by their fellow-countrymen, had formed
the right wing of the French army, and now the heavy
cavalry of the centre suffered equally from the fire of
the Spanish arquebus-men, whose bullets pierced the
heaviest armour of the men-at-arms.
As these men-at-arms gave way, they left all the
Swiss soldiery behind them face to face with the Imperial
Germans and Spaniards, and now ensued the most critical
part of this sanguinary encounter. Had but these cele-
brated Swiss battalions stood firm, all would have gone
well for France. Unfortunately, having already been
shaken owing to the men-at-arms falling back upon their
ranks in disorder, they made but a poor resistance to Pescara
and the Marquis del Vasto. They broke and ran just
as the King, whose lance had been broken, had drawn
his sword and was advancing to make a new charge.
Failing in his effort to rally the Swiss, and horrified at
this disaster, Fran£ois got together all of the men-at-arms
that he could. With the surviving great nobles
around him, with heroic courage the King threw himself
furiously into the thickest of the Imperialist ranks.
This band of King and nobles were determined neither
to give way nor to yield, and for long they cut and thrust
savagely and desperately, their ranks getting gradually
thinner as one after another went down, many being
mortally wounded or killed outright. Among their
The Battle of Pavia 245
opponents was Pescara, bleeding from three wounds,
while from another direction arrived Antonio da Leyva.
Thirsting for vengeance, he had broken out of Pavia with
all his garrison of hungry men, and now appeared dealing
death and destruction upon all the broken bands that
he encountered.
Bravely the King and his faithful nobles kept up the
uneven struggle. The old Marechal La Tremouille
went down : he had fought in every war from the time
of Charles VIII., but Pavia was to be his last battle.
La Palice fell also ; and near him Richard Pole, a claimant
to the British Crown, bit the dust ; while a few yards away
died the Bastard of Savoy.
Bonnivet, the cause of the disaster, determined not to
survive a day which must bring such disgrace to himself
and to France. He raised his vizor so that he might be
recognised, and sought the death which he found not far
from the King. Next it was the turn of Lescun,
Marechal de Foix, to be mortally wounded ; then Henri
d'Albret, King of Navarre, was unhorsed and taken
prisoner before he could struggle to his feet. Fran£ois
was slightly wounded in three places, when his horse,
pierced by the lance of the Count Nicolas de Salm, fell
with him close to a bridge. Several Spanish soldiers
rushed upon him, and although the prostrate King still
strove to defend himself with his sword, had not the
former rebel noble Pomperan, who had for a time
followed Bourbon, come to his assistance, he would
probably have been killed. While fighting off the
Spaniards, Pomperan cried to the King to yield himself
prisoner to the Due de Bourbon, who was near at hand,
but to do this he refused.
Lannoy happened to be close by ; he was called, and
the King of France said that he would surrender to the
Viceroy. Upon his knee Lannoy received the sword of
Fran9ois I. ; then, politely remarking that it was not right
that so great a Monarch should be without a sword, the
Viceroy handed his own to the defeated and captive King.
CHAPTER XXVI
How Charles V. took the News
THE Spanish soldiers, who were the real captors of
the King, expected him to be held for ransom as
their proper spoil. They gleefully imagined that the large
sum of money to be demanded for his liberation would
be handed over to them by their commanders in lieu
of their long-deferred pay. Before Fran9ois had been
removed from the field of battle, one of these arquebus-
men came forward and remarked in a friendly and
familiar manner to the captive King : " Sire, pray accept
this golden bullet from me. I had intended to shoot
you with it, but now you had better keep it to help to
pay for your ransom."
Lannoy and Pescara, however, had their own ideas,
and, knowing the vast importance of their prisoner to
their master the Emperor, determined to remove the
King as soon as possible from the neighbourhood of
the troops, who might perhaps take it into their heads
to seize his person.
He had two trivial wounds in the face and a third
in the leg, but none of these was sufficient to cause
any anxiety. Just for a day or two, his place of de-
tention was the monastery of Saint-Paul, which had
been in the centre of his own camp on the day before
the battle, but the King, to his own surprise, soon found
himself removed to a fortress named Pizzighettone,
where he was placed under a very strong guard, com-
manded by one of the strictest of the Spanish captains,
an officer named Alarcon, who held the rank of General.
246
How Charles V. took the News 247
Before being removed to this place, however, Frar^ois
managed to deliver in secret his signet-ring to one of his
officers, whom he was given permission to despatch with a
letter to his mother. All of his scruples on the subject of
religion having fled, the King gave instructions that this
ring was to be taken to the Turkish Sultan, with a re-
quest for his alliance and assistance against Charles V.
Although the first messenger who was sent with this
ring was murdered on the way, the ring itself reached
the hands of Ibrahim Pasha, the great Vizier of the
great Sultan known as Soliman the Magnificent, and a
second messenger named Frangipanni subsequently con-
cluded the first alliance between the Very Christian King
and the acknowledged head of the Mahomedan religion
in Europe and in Asia.
The King, hoping to secure good treatment from
his captors, instead of displaying a haughty or sulky
demeanour, indulged in profound dissimulation. While
addressing Lannoy with deference, as the Viceroy of
the Emperor, to whom alone he consented to yield,
Francois flattered Pescara to the top of his bent, as
being the head of the Italian party, from whom he hoped
some day to gain assistance.
Pescara, skilful courtier as he was, although covered
with wounds, did not neglect to present his homage
to the illustrious prisoner, after having first dressed in
deep mourning, whereupon Fra^ois I. embraced the
cunning Italian heartily.
On the night after the battle, Frai^ois even thought
it well worth his while to conceal his hatred of the
former Constable. He received the Due de Bourbon
affably, and even asked him to dine with the other
Generals at his own table. All of these courtesies were,
however, nothing but by-play on the one side and the
other : the only advantage gained by them was that of
Fran9ois, when he managed to send ofF his ring to the
Sultan.
Meanwhile Fra^ois himself gave a safe-conduct to
pass through France to the Commander Penalosa, whom
248 Two Great Rivals
the Viceroy sent off to Charles V. in Spain with the
glorious tiews of the victory.
The Due de Bourbon at the same time sent off to
Charles a messenger of his own, named Le Peloux, by
water from an Italian port, and, full of designs of re-
venge as ever, he instantly despatched messengers to
Henry VIII. also, telling him that now was his grand
opportunity of regaining the throne of France, showing
him the best way in which it could be done, and offering
him his personal assistance with an army.
The astute Bourbon was indeed right — all of the
French captains were either dead or captive, that is, with
two exceptions ; never was France so denuded of leaders.
The two exceptions were, that Prince of the Blood, the
Due d'Alengon, husband of the King's sister Marguerite,
who made good his escape from Pavia with the remains
of the rear-guard, and the Marechal Theodore Trivulzi,
who, after Pavia abandoned Milan with the small garrison
under his command, and joined the King's brother-in-law
in his hurried retreat into France.
The captive King meanwhile sent off to the Regent,
Louise de Savoie, a letter which showed very clearly
how terribly he had been cast down by this defeat, which
had cost him the lives of over ten thousand men and
his own liberty. He ended up his epistle with the
words, " Nothing is left me except honour, and my
life, which is safe."
A very unworthy side of his character was now dis-
played by the formerly boasting Francois in his letters
to Charles V. These were such as to excite disgust
rather than pity, although pity was what he asked for.
Humbling himself, indeed grovelling before the feet of
the Emperor, Frangois wrote to Charles that he hoped
" that in his clemency he would make a friend and not
a despairing man of him, that instead of a useless prisoner
he would render a King for ever his slave."
It must be confessed that Frangois presented but a
sorry figure in his imprisonment. From libertine he
became devout, while he devoted his time to writing
How Charles V, took the News 249
interminable poems on the subject of his amours and
his misfortunes. Much of this verse seems but little
better than doggrel, although some of the verses, which
were probably touched up later by some other hand,
show a real poetic spirit. However, throughout them
all runs a tone of alternate vaunting and self-pity which
displeases the reader.
We can imagine the emotion in the tender heart of
his sister Marguerite when she learned that her hero,
her Paladin of a brother, was not only a prisoner, but
giving himself over to devotion and fasting, so that
he actually became thin. The King's neglected wife
Claude had died just at the commencement of his ex-
pedition into Italy, and now upon Marguerite devolved
the care of the six children whom Claude had left behind
her — three girls, Charlotte, Madeleine, and Marguerite,
and three boys, Frat^ois, Henri, and Charles. While
nursing the occasional gout of Louise de Savoie, and
also nursing the children during their respective attacks
of measles, which killed little Charlotte, Marguerite did
not forget her brother's soul. She sent to him the
sacred writings of Saint Paul, with, however, the earnest
recommendation not to fast sufficiently to injure his
precious health.
We have already mentioned that Marguerite's husband,
the Due d'Alen9on, had contrived to bring off the debris
of the French army from Pavia. It might have been
imagined that, when nearly every other Prince and noble,
including Marguerite's old friend Anne de Montmorency,
who was a prisoner, had been killed or captured, she
might have been glad to see her husband return safe and
sound from a terrible battle. In this he had certainly
behaved with as much courage as any one else — witness,
for example, his brilliant charge in company with Chabot
de Brion upon Pescara and Lannoy.
Chabot, who was now to be Admiral of France in the
place of Bonnivet, had remained among the captives in
the hands of the victors, while d'Alen9on had, at all
events, the merit, when all was lost, of saving a portion
250 Two Great Rivals
of the army, that it might be able to fight again another
day.
Such, however, was Marguerite's mad infatuation for
her brother that, instead of welcoming Charles d'Alen9on
home alive, she could not pardon him for having escaped
when Fran9ois had not done so. She treated him with
scorn and irony, as having basely deserted his King, and was
seconded in her cruel behaviour by her mother. The
wretched d'Alen9on took this conduct so much to heart
that he took to his bed and died of grief less than two
months after the battle of Pavia. France had joined in
with his wife in the outcry against him, and the injustice
of the universal abuse to which he had been subjected
seemed so great that it broke his heart.
Before he died, on April i ith, 1525, Marguerite,
who had never really loved her husband, relented towards
him so far as to visit him on his deathbed ; and she even
wrote a letter from his bedside to her brother, in which
she conveyed his dying messages of adieu to the King.
These messages, it may be noted, conveyed no kind of
intimation on the part of the ill-used d'Alen9on that he
had conducted himself in any way unbecoming to a
soldier, a gentleman, and a Prince of the Blood.
By thus becoming a widow, the Pearl of the Valois at
once assumed additional value in her brother's eyes,
for Fran9ois now thought that he could make use of his
sister as a pawn in the losing game that he was playing
with Charles V., and, although she was eight years the
Emperor's senior, induce him to marry her. She was
still good-looking and remarkably attractive, and Charles,
who had seen her once in his boyhood, was said to have
retained a high opinion of her charms. Charles, of
course, was at this time still affianced to the Princess
Mary of England, but that was a mere trifle hardly worth
being considered in a time when Royal engagements were
broken as easily as they were made.
Fran9ois indeed at this time elaborated a great scheme
in his mind of endeavouring to accomplish by matrimony
that which he was utterly unable to gain in any other
How Charles V. took the News 251
way. He thought, for instance, that he might be able
himself to obtain as his second wife Eleonore, the widowed
Queen of Portugal, and with her procure his freedom,
notwithstanding that he was perfectly well aware of the
fact that Charles had promised the hand of his eldest
sister to the Due de Bourbon.
While the prisoner of Pavia was revolving these
schemes in his head, let us see how the Emperor received
the news of the great victory which had been won for
him by the courage and skill of his Generals.
Charles V. was in his castle in Madrid, in an extremely
anxious frame of mind. He knew that his army in
Italy was starving with hunger, and that he had no money
wherewith to pay the men. He knew that if the troops
did not give battle they would probably soon become
nothing better than a mutinous mass of dangerous
brigands, while if they did venture to attack Fra^ois I.
in his fortified position they ran every risk of a defeat.
While in this unenviable frame of mind, Charles was
suddenly informed that a messenger from the Viceroy of
Naples was waiting to see him. Trembling at the
anticipation of the news that he might be about to learn,
the Emperor nevertheless composed his features as he
ordered the messenger to be admitted.
With due Spanish ceremony, Penalosa was ushered
into the Royal presence. Placing himself on one knee,
he tersely announced : " Sire, the battle has been fought
near Pavia, your Majesty's troops have won the victory,
the King of France himself has been taken prisoner and
is in your Majesty's power."
Such was the emotion of the twenty-five-year-old
Monarch that he turned white, and for a minute was
unable to speak.
At length he cried, as if doubting his ears : " The
King of France in my power ! the battle gained by me ! "
He did not add a word, but threw himself upon his
knees on his prie Dieu, and remained for long giving
thanks.
His prayers completed, Charles never allowed any
252 Two Great Rivals
signs of joy to appear upon his features, while, instead
of expressing ambitious designs, his words were all of
peace. His conduct, moreover, was most humble.
Saying that it was unbecoming to rejoice at the capture
of the Very Christian King, Charles refused to allow any
public rejoicing or the decoration of Madrid : he only
permitted a solemn thanksgiving service in the Chapel
of Our Lady of Atocha, to which he proceeded plainly
dressed and on foot. He distinctly ordered the preacher
who officiated at this celebration of the Mass in no way
to praise him, and, moreover, not to say hard things
against his vanquished foes. To Dr. Sampson, the
Ambassador of Henry VIII., who came to congratulate
him, Charles behaved with equal modesty of demeanour,
talking gravely of human events being all in Divine
hands and the prospects of there now being concluded a
lasting peace between all Christians, which might permit
of the repulse of the infidels and the repression of errors
in the Church. As for himself, Charles added, he wished
for nothing more than he had already, and said that his
intention was to behave with such moderation that no
one should perceive in him any signs of a desire of
vengeance upon his humbled foe.
In all of this studied moderation Charles was merely
playing to the gallery and acting the part of a hypocrite,
for he was all the time considering how he was going to
get the most possible out of his victory.
He might now combine with Henry VIII. and invade
and crush France ; he might propose a peace by
which he could denude Frai^ois of half of his Kingdom
and reduce him to beggary, or, of course, he might act
up to his professions of humility, and earn the eternal
gratitude and friendship of the King of France by setting
him free.
Needless to say, the latter course was not the one
that recommended itself to the Emperor, who was, at all
events, determined now to recover Burgundy.
CHAPTER XXV11
Charles Tries to Jockey Francois
1525
SOME few months earlier than the time of which we are
writing, indeed, just after the period when Bourbon
had been obliged by the want of Spanish co-operation to
retire from before Marseilles, the situation had become
very strained between Charles V. on the one side and
Henry VIII. and Wolsey on the other.
The Seigneur de Beaurain had then come to England
with messages from the Due de Bourbon and the Arch-
duke Ferdinand, to ask for two hundred thousand crowns
to pay for an army which Bourbon should raise in
Germany and employ to invade France by way of Franche
Comt6.
The reply of Henry VIII. was anything but polite.
He called the Emperor a liar, said that the Archduchess
Marguerite was no better than a courtesan, the Archduke
Ferdinand a mere child, and Bourbon a traitor.
These offensive terms fell, it is true, from the lips of
the Cardinal, but Henry had told him what to say to
Beaurain, and further to add that he was entirely opposed
to allowing Charles to obtain the object of his ambition,
which was nothing short of the domination of the whole
world.
So furious was the Cardinal at the delay and failure
before Marseilles, when Paris might so easily have been
marched upon by Bourbon, that he even opened negotia-
tions with Louise de Savoie, the Regent. The price
253
254 Two Great Rivals
that he demanded for the English alliance was too high,
consisting of Boulogne and other places in the north,
and of a sum of a million and a half of golden
crowns. Louise bargained ; she did not wish to yield any
territory ; one million one hundred thousand crowns was,
she said, the utmost that she could possibly pay. Wolsey
gave a very insulting reply to the envoys of Louise,
for, as we have already seen, the Cardinal was not
particular as to language. He further told them to be
off at once, especially — and this was news to the French
Ambassadors — as Fra^ois I. had just been defeated and
taken at Pavia.
After this defeat, forgetting all the insulting things
that he had caused to be said to Beaurain, Henry sent
off Sir Richard Wingfield to Spain, to propose to
Charles that they should now conquer and divide France.
Henry proposed that he should himself be crowned at
Paris, and then that he should accompany Charles V. to
Rome, to be crowned there with the Imperial Crown
by the Pope, so that he might re-establish the Empire
in all its ancient dignity. In addition to all the countries
that he already ruled, Henry VIII. pointed out that the
Emperor by his marriage with the Princess Mary would
succeed to the heirship of England and Ireland, to
eventual rights over Scotland, and the reversion of the
Crown of France. In case Charles V. should not care
to head in person the army which was to recover France
for Henry, this latter suggested that the Due de Bourbon
should carry out the invasion of France according to
his own plan, but partly at Henry's expense, while
making use of the army of Italy for the purpose. The
Archduchess Marguerite was to furnish an army to
combine with that of England, while the Pope, Venice,
Florence, and the Duke of Ferrara should all be com-
pelled to give suitable contributions to aid in the
despoiling of France. Henry generously said that he
did not propose to keep the whole of France for himself,
for he would give back Burgundy and Provence to the
Emperor. Bourbon also should have Dauphine given to
Charles Tries to Jockey Francois 255
him, to add to all his immense patrimonial estates, which
would be restored to him with independent Sovereignty.
By this plan, if carried out, Charles V. stood a very good
chance of eventually succeeding to the Crowns of France
and England, as Henry VIII. had at this time no heir
but his daughter Mary, and had not yet begun to talk
about divorcing Catherine of Aragon. The English King
realised, however, that his ambitious views might not
be agreed to by his ally, to whom lately he had given
no help whatever. He therefore told Wingfield to
submit an alternative plan to the Emperor, one by which
England would recover her old Duchies of Normandy,
Gascony, Guyenne, Poitou, Anjou, and Maine.
Whatever the division that was to be made between
the three potentates, the great point was, so urged
Henry VIII., to leave to Fra^ois I. only a kingdom
very much reduced in size. France, if left to the Very
Christian King, was indeed to become but a shadow of
her former self.
As it happened, Charles had at this time a very
long-headed Minister named Mercurin de Gattinara, who
held the position of his Chancellor in Spain. Gattinara
shrewdly pointed out to the Emperor that there was
no particular advantage to be gained in helping to make
bigger the English King, who was, moreover, an un-
faithful ally, who had been quite recently plotting with
his enemies behind his back. What was necessary, said
Gattinara, was to take advantage of holding the French
King prisoner to get what was wanted out of him,
without reference to any one else. A good peace could
easily be arranged with Francois, who was held tight
in an Italian prison, and who, in his anxiety to get out,
would probably yield all that was required.
" As for King Henry VIII. ! Well, at present he
wants to make himself King of France ; supposing that
he should succeed, what will there be to prevent him
from injuring us in the Low Countries a little later on?
Let us leave him where he is, in England and Calais ;
without him we can lower France sufficiently to make
256 Two Great Rivals
her perfectly innocuous on the side of our Flemish
dominions."
This advice of his Chancellor was entirely in accord-
ance with Charles' own ideas. His usual messenger and
negotiator, the Seigneur de Beaurain, had returned to
Spain, and Charles now prepared him for another journey
to propose terms of peace to Francois. The pains that
the hypocritical young Emperor took to try to keep
up the show of moderation which he had assumed were
almost laughable.
His written communication commenced with a long
rigmarole about not showing ingratitude to God, who
had caused the French King to fall into his power, and
how, in the interests of Christianity, he intended to show
kindness, not rigour.
He then proceeded to ask " the King of France to
condescend to reasonable terms of peace." In these, after
modestly stating that he might, if he liked, very well
have demanded the Kingdom of France, Charles made
the most enormous demands of territory upon Francois,
heading the list with a request for the Duchy of Bur-
gundy. The list of Counties and places which Charles
asked for in France alone would fill up a paragraph,
while he insisted also on the King of France resigning
the Suzerainty of Flanders and Artois, which made him
the Emperor's feudal lord. In Italy, he asked that
Frangois should resign every claim that he had : the King-
dom of Naples, the Duchy of Milan, the County of Asti,
the Seigneury of Genoa, all were to be given up. Nor
did Charles forget in this proposed treaty of peace his
ally the Due de Bourbon. For the rebel Constable
he demanded an independent Kingdom, consisting of his
old possessions and the whole of Provence ; he likewise
insisted upon the immediate liberation of all the former
confederates of Bourbon who were prisoners in France.
With reference to the King of England, to whom
Charles V. owed large sums of money, the Emperor
calmly requested that Frangois should make these good
out of his own pocket. The Prince of Orange likewise,
Charles Tries to Jockey Francois 257
whose Principality in France had been confiscated, was to
have it restored to him. In fact, there was nobody
forgotten in this wonderful treaty which was to establish,
at least so Charles flattered himself, an universal and
durable peace throughout the Christian world.
To finish it all up with, Francis was requested to
constitute himself in a manner the vassal of the Emperor,
to lead his own armies under Charles against the Turk.
The Sultan Suleiman I., El Kanouni or the Lawgiver,
commonly called Soliman in contemporary literature, was
the son of Selim I., and he had been at this time five
years on the throne at Constantinople. He was a great
warrior, and during the forty-six years that he reigned
conducted no less than thirteen campaigns in person into
Europe. So much was his power recognised, that for
several years before the battle of Pavia he had been in
receipt of a tribute of ten thousand ducats yearly from
the powerful Republic of Venice. At the time of the
battle of Pavia he was gradually advancing farther into
Europe, and had now invaded Hungary. This country
and Bohemia were ruled by the youthful and spirited
King Louis II., the son of Vladislav II., a Pole, and of
a French mother.
Young Louis was married to one of the Emperor's
sisters, the juvenile Archduchess Marie, while the
Emperor's brother Ferdinand was married to Anne,
the sister of Louis II. Both of these political marriages
had been arranged by that clever woman, the Archduchess
Marguerite, and they resulted eventually in the gaining
by the Habsburg Ferdinand of Bohemia and Hungary.
From the interests of his brother and sister, both
being involved, it will easily be understood that Charles
had a very personal interest in keeping the Turk out
of Hungary and Austria, to say nothing of his quite
possible invasion of Germany. Soliman had, however,
at this time strongly established himself in Hungary.
In order to hunt him out from that country, Charles
demanded from Frangois that after the peace was signed
he should assist him with fifteen thousand foot and five
258 Two Great Rivals
thousand horse in an expedition to which the Pope and
other Princes should be requested to contribute, and of
which the Emperor should be Captain-General.
The propositions of Charles were first of all taken by
Beaurain to Louise de Savoie, by whom they were not
received by any means with enthusiasm. The Regent
indeed was bestirring herself, not to yield up French
territory, but to get together such fragments of troops
as she could in all directions wherewith to protect the
country. Fortunately for her, the remaining nobles and
the various Parliaments now displayed a very patriotic
spirit, and did all in their power to assist her efforts.
While so employed, she had written a letter to Charles
V. to endeavour to move his heart to deal kindly to her
son, but the Emperor in his reply, which he sent by
Beaurain, answered very stiffly, and made no use
of any of the affectionate terms, such as " my dear
mother," which he had been wont formerly to employ in
corresponding with the Duchesse d'Angouleme. Without
herself making any official response to the Emperor's
propositions, she sent them on by messengers accompany-
ing Beaurain to Francis in his prison, who took with
them her own personal notes and observations as to the
way in which she considered that he ought to reply.
From these it is evident that Louise was utterly devoid
of all feelings of shame. She suggested that they should
now fling the widowed Marguerite at the head of the
Emperor ; that Francis also, while asking for the hand
of Charles' sister, should offer to become his soldier to
aid him to take the Imperial Crown in Italy ; above every-
thing, that Francois should promise to help to deliver
his old ally Venice into the hands of the Emperor.
Learning from his mother the good disposition of his
subjects, Fran9ois sent back a letter addressed to them,
in which he called them " his friends," and expressed his
pleasure at their faithful attitude. He concluded this
letter in bombastic style, as follows : " As for my honour
and that of my nation, I have rather chosen an honest
prison than dishonest flight. Be sure that it shall never
Charles Tries to Jockey Francois 259
be said, if I have not been happy enough to do good
to my kingdom, that for the sake of gaining my freedom
I should do it evil." He declared that he would much
prefer to remain in prison all his life than to injure his
country.
While writing in this style and making on the surface
a great bluff and show of firmness, Frangois and, that
subtle scion of the Croy family, Charles de Lannoy, were
laying their heads together. As a result of his con-
sultations with the Viceroy, Frangois, wildly anxious to
be free, made propositions which were not far short
of those of the Emperor. He offered to marry Eleonore
and to give her Burgundy in dowry, to descend to her
heirs male, or to the Emperor's second son if she had
none, or, if the Emperor should have no sons, to his
own second son, who should marry a daughter of the
Emperor. First of all, however, Frangois suggested
that the Courts of Justice should decide if the Duchy of
Burgundy belonged to the Emperor, and said that he
would yield it up if the decision should be against himself.
With reference to Italy, Frangois yielded up everything
to Charles, including the sum of one hundred thousand
ducats owing for the old arrangement that had been
made concerning the Kingdom of Naples. In the Low
Countries he would restore to him the cities of Hesdin
and Tournay. The Suzerainty of Flanders and Artois
the King offered to resign, and he further promised, if
Charles should go to cause himself to be crowned in
Italy, or should undertake any military operations in
Germany, that he would furnish half of the army and
pay half of the expenses. If the war should be against
the Turk, the King of France vowed that he would go
at the head of his own troops, paid by himselfj under
Charles as Captain-General.
With reference to Henry VIII., Frangois undertook to
pay up all Charles' debts to him.
There yet remained to be considered the case of the
Due de Bourbon. Frangois abjectly promised to restore
to his rebel cousin all of his estates, his pensions and his
260 Two Great Rivals
offices, with the charges of Chamberlain and Constable,
and to throw in the government of the province of
Languedoc into the bargain. As he was himself asking
for Bourbon's promised wife, Eleonore, instead of the
Queen of Portugal, Francois offered to the Due the hand
of the Princess Renee, his own sister-in-law, the daughter
of Louis XII.
As if this were not enough, the King said that he
would allow Bourbon to contest in the Courts his right
to the Sovereign title of Comte de Provence, which he
claimed. He further said that he would recognise this
rebel Prince of the Blood as his own Lieutenant-General,
and would place him at the head of the army which he
would send to serve under the Emperor, should he not
happen to be able to be present in person.
These immense concessions on the part of Francois
surely were but little in keeping with his bold words to
his subjects. His mother the Regent, at all events,
thought that her son was giving up too much, as she
sent a messenger, Pierre de Wartz by name, to the
Archduchess Marguerite, who as usual had a finger in
the pie, to say that she really could not agree to these
terms.
Lannoy, however, who had considerable sense in his
head, wrote to the Emperor to beg him to agree to a
peace which would make a friend of the King of France ;
and both his letter and Fra^ois' reply were sent by Don
Ugo de Moncada, a Spanish Admiral who had been
captured by the French before the battle of Pa via, and
who had been exchanged against the captive Marshal de
Montmorency.
The greedy Charles, however, was not contented with
what he was offered. He wanted Burgundy, now and
for himself, without any restrictions and not for any
possible sons and daughters, or grandsons and grand-
daughters, of his sister or himself. Accordingly he
began to make preparations to continue the war, and so
sent off the Commander Penalosa, to try through him to
get in touch with Henry VIII. once more.
Charles Tries to Jockey Francois 261
In order to get hold of her dowry of six hundred
thousand ducats, although the Princess Mary was not yet
of a marriageable age, Penalosa was told to ask Henry VIII.
to send her and her dowry to Spain at once, and like-
wise himself to invade France from Calais, where the
Archduchess Marguerite would send an army to join him.
With or without the Princess Mary, Charles asked
Henry to send him at once four hundred thousand
ducats for the expenses of the coming war.
Henry, however, happened to be both in a bad
humour and short of cash, and angrily said that he did
not see why the Emperor should obtain all that he wanted
with English money. He replied therefore, shortly,
that he had heard all about the marriage contract that the
Emperor was now arranging with his cousin the rich
Princess of Portugal, that he did not rely upon him in
consequence, and excused him from marrying his child-
daughter Mary, who was for that matter, as he knew, far
too young to be sent to Spain. He reminded Charles
that he already owed him very large sums, and added
that he would very much like to see the colour of his
money without further delay.
With this reply the Emperor had to be contented, and
he was likewise convinced that in any new plans that he
might be forming against France he could not count
upon English assistance.
The most remarkable trait of Charles was, however,
the grim bulldog determination with which he always
held on to any point upon which he had made up his
mind. He was not therefore in the least discouraged,
but resolved, by hook or by crook, to gain his ends
about Burgundy. And as he held such a valuable asset
as the King of France in his hands, he seemed to have a
pretty fair chance of succeeding in his designs.
CHAPTER XXVIII
Francois Gets a Surprise
1525
L ANNOY, the guardian, and Francis, the prisoner,
were, as we have mentioned, conspiring together,
and it was quite a little romance that they concocted
with reference to the Emperor's sister. Although
Eleonore was by no means beautiful, Fra^ois had the
effrontery to write that she had been in his thoughts
for a long time, that he was deeply in love without ever
having seen her.
The better to speed in his wooing, Lannoy suggested
to his captive that it would be better for him if he were
to be transported from Italy to Spain, where he would
have an opportunity of seeing the lady in person. To
this Fran9ois readily agreed, and even offered to facilitate
his transportation thither by demanding his own warships
for the purpose. In arranging this plan, however, each
of the conspirators had an arriere-pensee. That of
Lannoy was that the King would be safer out of the
hands of the army of Italy and in those of Charles V.
Fran9ois, on the other hand, hoped that he might be
rescued en route by the ships of his Genoese Admiral,
Andrea Doria.
Bourbon, Pescara, and Antonio da Leyva were left
in the dark as to this project. They had agreed with
Lannoy that it would be wiser to transport the King
to the Kingdom of Naples, whence the Duke of Albany,
with his troops, had hurriedly set sail for France, and
262
Francois Gets a Surprise 263
therefore made no objection when Lannoy, with Alarcon,
carried off the King, as they pretended, to the south of
Italy.
Instead of proceeding south, however, Alarcon and
and his escort of two thousand men took Fra^ois to
Genoa, whence at the end of May he was transported
by sea to Porto-Fino. In June the Marechal de Mont-
morency, having joined the King, informed him that
the plan concocted with the Regent for his deliverance at
sea had fallen through, as the risk was too great. The
King was not greatly cast down, as he hoped for great
things from his proposed meeting with Charles V., and
it was agreed that Montmorency, who was now com-
manding the French galleys, should give six of them
to help the Spanish galleys to convey the Royal captive
to Barcelona in safety. All hostilities were to be
suspended until a fortnight after the combined fleets
should have returned to France and Italy respectively.
Putting Spanish soldiers on the French ships, Lannoy
set sail with the King, after hurriedly sending ahead
word to the Emperor, who had no idea of the manoeuvres
of the Viceroy, of what he was about.
The Viceroy wrote : u I am bringing you the King,
which will I am sure be agreeable to your Majesty, as
it will only depend upon yourself to promptly settle
your affairs together."
After a nine days' sail Fran£ois I. arrived at Barcelona,
on June i9th, 1525. Here he was received with the
highest honours, and lodged in the palace of the Arch-
bishop of Tarragona.
Francois, who found himself quite a popular hero,
was lionised to his heart's content by the Spaniards, and
very pleased at the agreeable change from an Italian
prison. Popular sympathy was entirely on the side of
the gallant and unfortunate King, who had fought with
all the courage of a Bayard upon the bloody field of
Pavia. Not only did all the chief officials of Catalonia
come to present addresses, but twenty-two beautiful
ladies, headed by the widow of the famous Ramon de
264 Two Great Rivals
Cardona, who had commanded the Spaniards at Ravenna,
came in a splendid cavalcade to visit him and offer their
sympathy.
On the following day the King was taken publicly
to hear the Mass, surrounded by a guard of honour,
through the streets of Barcelona, which were decorated
in his honour.
After being thus feted at Barcelona, on the third day
Fran£ois was taken by sea to Valencia. As here he
received another ovation, Fra^ois came to the conclusion
that being a captive under such circumstances was far
from disagreeable, indeed highly delightful, and he looked
forward with pleasant anticipations to his arrival in
Madrid and meeting with Charles V. and El£onore, the
young Dowager Queen of Portugal.
At Valencia he was received in the Royal Palace, where
he was the guest of his fair cousin, Queen Germaine
de Foix, second wife and widow of King Ferdinand of
Aragon. This Germaine de Foix, now a woman in
the thirties, was still a great beauty ; she was the
cousin of the King's fair mistress, Fran9oise de Foix,
Comtesse de Chateaubriand. After the death of King
Ferdinand, who was three times her age, and whose
son by her, named Juan, had died before his father,
Germaine had married John, Margrave of Brandenburg,
who had been appointed Governor of Valencia by
Charles V. After the death of this German Prince,
her good looks and high rank procured her yet a third
husband, in the person of Ferdinand, Duke of Calabria.
At the time of the King's arrival she was a widow for
the second time. Everything that could be done by
Germaine for the entertainment of her Royal cousin was
arranged. While he did not want for the company of
the most elegant and noble ladies, all ready to adore the
handsome and agreeable young Monarch, he was taken
for a hunting trip into the mountains, to the beautiful
country villa of Geronimo Cabanillas, then Governor of
Valencia ; and here he remained for some time enjoying
himself to the full.
Francois Gets a Surprise 265
The only thing to remind Frangois of the fact that
he was not a free man was the constant presence of
Alarcon and his guards, even on the hunting parties ;
but here in Spain and under such pleasant auspices,
with due Spanish courtesy these rather treated the King
as being an honoured guest than as being in any way
under constraint.
There was, however, just one little drop of bitterness
at the bottom of the cup of pleasure of which Frangois
was at this time quaffing so freely. This was that, for
some unaccountable reason, the expected letter of wel-
come to his Spanish dominions did not arrive from his
host Charles V. From his unaccountable silence, the
Emperor in fact seemed not to be aware of the arrival
in Spain of the French Monarch, concerning whom he
had not long since, on the advice of Bourbon and
Pescara, given explicit orders that he was to be trans-
ferred to Naples. It was evident, if he was already
aware of the step that had been taken by Lannoy, that
he had not as yet quite made up his mind what he was
going to do about it. At least, such was the conclusion
to which the now slightly anxious Frangois was compelled
to arrive.
As a matter of fact, while the Due de Bourbon and
Pescara, who had been left behind in Italy, were raging
at having been so unjustifiably deprived by Lannoy of
the prisoner of the army, Charles was no less furious at
Toledo, where he was holding a session of the Cortes, when
he learned of the King's arrival. Although not usually
given to swearing, the Emperor indeed now astonished
his courtiers by swearing vigorously by the Order of
the Golden Fleece that it was a great surprise to him,
and entirely contrary to his orders that the Very Christian
King had been brought to Spain.
Charles had already received a letter from Bourbon
complaining in unmeasured terms of the Viceroy, who,
he said, " had put him to the greatest shame," and
pointing out to him the fact that by this unwarranted
deportation of the King of France, the Pope, the Venetians,
266 Two Great Rivals
and all the other potentates of Italy might be lost to his
cause.
As Bourbon was left without any money wherewith
to pay the fresh troops that he was raising, he became
more bitter still, and added that he would plainly show
the Emperor in the Viceroy's presence how greatly the
latter had injured his interests.
Pescara was equally discontented, particularly as, in-
stead of rewarding his brilliant services, the Emperor
had declined to bestow upon him the confiscated Count-
ship of Carpi, which he had demanded at his hands.
Pescara wrote bitterly to the Emperor, to complain of
the Viceroy, and published everywhere in Italy the
contents of his letter.
While Bourbon and Pescara were, however, a long
way off, in Italy, Charles de Lannoy, who as a Croy
was beloved of the Emperor, was in Spain to speak
for himself.
The Viceroy hurried off to Toledo to find out his
master's wishes. Montmorency was also sent there by
Fran9ois, to request an interview with Charles with a
view to arranging first a truce and then a peace, and
further to ask that his sister the Duchesse d'Alengon might
be granted a safe-conduct to come to Spain in order,
so Fran9ois said, that she might treat of these matters
on behalf of the Regent. In his innermost heart he
hoped that the arrival of his sister Marguerite might
lead to the Emperor marrying her.
When Lannoy reached Toledo he had not much
difficulty in persuading his master of the advantages of
having the captive King under his own eye, but he
found him determined to send him off at once to an
almost inaccessible fortress in the mountains of Valencia.
Lannoy advised Charles not to take this course, but
rather to get his prisoner in some place close at hand
where he could treat with him personally, and, for the
present, to arrange a truce, which would be entirely to
his own advantage.
Lannoy and all his Croy relations flattered their young
Francois Gets a Surprise 267
master by telling him that he need not depend upon
the assistance of Bourbon to invade France, but that
he was quite capable of gaining his own ends in his
own way without help from anybody. He could squeeze
all that he wanted from his prisoner.
The situation, as they put it, was that the Emperor
could not well at present invade France with a small force.
He wanted a new army, and a reliable one, which the
mixed army of Italy was not, being very little devoted
to the Emperor's interests. The money of the Low
Countries was also very desirable, the more so as if
the Low Countries would only subscribe, Spain might
be more likely to follow their example.
Money from the Low Countries was, however, hard to
get. In the previous month the clever Governess, the
Emperor's aunt, Marguerite of Austria, had convoked
the States of Holland and Flanders, begging them to
subscribe, if only for their own safety, against the ag-
gression of the rascally brigands of the Due de Gueldre.
Her request had been met with a flat refusal, and a
violent accusation of the whole system of levies of
money for the past hundred years.
Luxembourg, Hainault, and Artois swore that they
were already ruined by the wars, and that they had
not a florin left to give. Brabant replied cunningly to
Marguerite that if Bois-le-Duc would pay up it would
be pleased to do the same ; but Brabant was well aware
of the fact that Bois-le-Duc, having become entirely
Lutheran, was at that time in a state of religious insur-
rection, breaking open the monasteries and holding the
monks for ransom. Amsterdam and Delft were also
seething with heresy and sedition, and Marguerite was,
in consequence, writing terrified letters to her nephew,
who replied to her to make an example of the rebellious
Magistrates. He told her further that, if Rome would
only raise the money from the priests for the purpose,
he would come in person to be the executioner of the
heretical Lutherans of the Low Countries.
As Germany, headed by most of its Princes, was
268 Two Great Rivals
likewise seething with religious discontent, as Spain
had scarcely quieted down after its recent insurrection,
and as Italy was grimly growling with repressed rage,
it must be confessed that the Emperor had not a very
pleasant look-out before him, to whichever side he might
turn, and that it would be far wiser for him not to
commit himself to any further warfare with France for
the present.
What really saved France at this time was the serious
financial and religious revolution in the Low Countries,
when those peoples on the borders of the North Sea,
who had been under foreign domination for a century,
at last waking up, declared at the same time for liberty,
for the result of their industry and for liberty of conscience.
Faced by these difficulties, Charles lost his chance
once more of letting Bourbon go ahead, although there
seems but little doubt that had the Constable done so
shortly after Pavia, most of the thirteen French Parliaments
would have welcomed him, and he could have penetrated
with the greatest ease into his own countries of Bour-
bonnais, and thence, if he chose, on to Paris.
Charles was, however, waiting at this time for a
dispensation from the Pope to enable him to make a
rich marriage. His Spanish subjects, scoffing at the
idea of their King marrying the child — Princess Mary
of England, wished him instead to marry his own first
cousin, Isabella of Portugal. Charles, in spite of all
his pretended advances to Henry VIII. for his young
daughter, likewise wished to marry the handsome Isabella,
thinking that if he could only procure her dowry of
nine hundred thousand ducats, he could re-establish
himself generally upon a firmer basis everywhere through-
out his various Kingdoms and the Empire.
Until this event should be happily accomplished, the
designing young Emperor determined to listen to the
advice of Lannoy. It was, of course, far easier and
less expensive to make war upon a captive King of
France than upon the country of France, which was
now showing a distinctly warlike spirit.
Francois Gets a Surprise 269
Charles having made up his mind, Francis was not
left much longer to enjoy himself hunting and flirting
in Valencia, but when the Bishop of Avila arrived at
length to compliment the King on behalf of the Emperor,
he had not the slightest idea of the surprise that was
in store for him.
Under the charge of Alarcon, he quitted Benisano
quite merrily at the end of July 1525, being accom-
panied for a considerable part of his journey by a
joyous cavalcade of caballeros and some great ladies.
Greeted by Lannoy on the way, the journey of
Francois for three weeks across Spain was a magni-
ficent Royal progress. The Duke of Infantado at one
place entertained him to feasts and bull-fights, and
eleven thousand students greeted him at another.
The surprise came upon his arrival at Madrid. There,
by the command of the Emperor, the King of France
found himself clapped into a horrible dungeon in the
strongest tower of the fort called Alcazar.
CHAPTER XXIX
Marguerite de Valois visits Spain
SEPTEMBER 1525
THE dungeon in which Fra^ois I. found himself
boxed up upon his arrival in Madrid was a small
chamber with only one door, and one window placed a
hundred feet above the ground. The embrasure of the
window formed quite a cabinet, so thick was the wall
of the tower. It was glazed, but a double grating of iron
bars, firmly set into the wall, prevented any possible
means of escape. At the foot of the tower two battalions
of soldiers were always on guard. They were under the
command of Alarcon, who retained his position as gaoler
to the Very Christian King, and slept in the apartments
below his prisoner. The outlook from the window,
which could only be reached by climbing up several feet,
only revealed arid plains with no relieving foliage to
refresh the eye.
What a position for the puissant King of France !
accustomed not only to the adulation of his own courtiers
but to that of the representatives of all foreign powers.
The hard-hearted young Emperor knew, however, what
he was about, and was determined to tame the caged eagle
into submission. There was every reason, with a man
of the temperament of Fra^ois, that he might succeed.
Devoted to sports and out-of-door exercises of all
kinds, Charles deprived him of open-air recreations ;
constantly accustomed to the intimate society of women,
Charles compelled his prisoner for many months to live
270
Marguerite de Valois visits Spain 271
with the chastity of the cloister. Instead of the headlong
gallop, to the merry sound of the winding horn, through
the forests of Fontainebleau, Francois for all exercise could
take five paces in one direction and five paces in another ;
while the familiar rustle at his door of the silken skirts of
some fair Countess of France or black-eyed beauty of
Italy was now replaced by the heavy tramp of the Spanish
sentinel in the corridor.
Leading a life to which he was so utterly unaccustomed,
Fran9ois commenced to pine and fell sick, but although
the Emperor knew of his condition, he took care not to
go near him, but left him to mope in his solitude,
hoping the sooner to bring his prisoner to reason.
Louise, the Regent, had in the meanwhile sent Am-
bassadors to the Emperor to talk about a peace. These
were the Archbishop of Embrun and Jean de Selve, First
President of the Parliament of Paris. Among their
propositions was a third one of marriage — that of the
child-daughter of Eleonore and the seven-year-old
Dauphin of France.
As, in a pompous and boring address which Selve made
to Charles at Toledo, he only talked about the magnanimity
of former Monarchs, while contesting on legal grounds
the Emperor's claims to Burgundy, these envoys received
but a short and dry reply. The Emperor said that he
was not well versed in legal lore, and turned them over to
the tender mercies of his Council, and above all to the
rough-and-ready Mercurin de Gattinara. From this
latter the Ambassadors obtained no satisfaction, and as,
by the instructions of the Regent, they were not even
prepared to concede as much as Frangois himself had done,
in his reply sent from Italy by the hands of Ugo de
Moncada, negotiations were soon broken off.
In general terms, the reply sent by the Emperor to
Louise de Savoie consisted of a pitiless refusal to anything
that she proposed. He roughly said that if he wanted
Italy, he could get it without her interference ; nor, he
added, was she required to intervene in the matter of the
marriage of Francois I. to his sister. As for the indecent
Two Great Rivals
offer which Louise made of her own daughter to himself,
the Emperor did not even deign to reply to it.
When Fran9ois found the iron circle tightening around
him, and realised that the Emperor evidently intended,
without ever coming to visit him, to carry out his
designs of splitting up France with Henry VIII. and the
Due de Bourbon, he became more sick and despairing.
In his despair he wrote to his mother, to come to Madrid
in person to visit him. It was, however, the middle of
summer, and the journey would be hot and long ; the
Regent also did not relish the idea of placing herself in the
Emperor's power. Louise therefore determined to send
her daughter in her place, while entrusting her with
powers to make fresh negotiations for a peace which
should restore his liberty to her beloved son — her peer-
less Caesar.
When the application was made to Charles V. for
a safe-conduct for the Duchesse d'Alen9on to come to
Spain, he by no means welcomed the idea with en-
thusiasm. This Flemish Monarch had already viewed
with great disfavour the warm welcome given to his rival
by the Spanish nobles, whom he knew to detest himself.
He had learned that the Spanish ladies had gone crazy
about Francois, that Ximena, the lovely daughter of the
Duke of Infantado, had openly proclaimed her passion
for the King of France, and he had already conveyed
his displeasure to the Spanish nobles for their unseemly
gush over the defeated enemy of their King.
The Emperor understood perfectly well that should
an amiable Princess, the sister of Francois, one whose
devotion to her brother was well known, now arrive,
to make a display of that devotion at his own Court at
Toledo, near Madrid, the Spanish ; interest would revive
in the Royal prisoner whom he wished to keep quietly
shut up in the background. Should the whole of Spain
be carried away with the sister's emotion and indulge
too deeply in sympathy, he might wake up one morning
to find Spain demanding from him the key of the brother's
dungeon. Charles was not even quite sure of his own
Marguerite de Valois visits Spain 273
sister the Queen of Portugal, who had been heard to say
that she admired the courage of Fran£ois, and that if it
depended upon her she would rather be re-married to
a brave if unfortunate King of his description than to
his rebel subject, the Constable de Bourbon.
Francois was, however, undoubtedly a sick man, and
the presence of his sister might do him good ; whereas
if he were to die, all of the advantages to be gained from
him would be irretrievably lost. Thinking the matter
over, Charles therefore grudgingly decided to give the
safe-conduct for the visit to Madrid of the Marguerite
des Marguerites — the Pearl of the Valois.
This safe-conduct was, however, couched in but general
terms ; it did not even mention the name of " the person "
who was to be allowed to visit the King. Moreover, it
was only made out for three months, and in giving
it to Montmorency, who, his ransom having been paid,
was allowed to remain in Spain, Charles stipulated in
return that he should be allowed to send the Due de
Bourbon as his Ambassador to France.
The promise about Bourbon was given, but it was
never kept ; and in the hottest days of August Mar-
guerite started on her long and weary journey to Spain.
She well knew that she was taking a great risk in going,
as there was no certitude that she would ever be allowed
to return, but what risk could possibly be too great for
Marguerite d'Angouleme to take where her idolised
brother was concerned ?
Before her departure her mother, influenced by that
" worst of bipeds," as some scoffer called him, the Cardinal
Du Prat, had allowed the Parliament to commence pro-
ceedings against the Reforming friends of Marguerite :
Lefebvre, Roussel, and Caroli. The Duchess d'Alen^on
contrived, however, to procure an autograph letter
from her brother in his prison to stop these prosecu-
tions.
Although Fran9ois recommended the Magistrates to
treat these Reformers as " men of letters of great learning,"
they, when released, wisely thought it as well to fly from
18
274 Two Great Rivals
Paris to Strasbourg, especially as they were about to be
deprived of the presence of their amiable protectress.
In spite of the weakness of his character, upon one
point Fra^ois, even during his illness, remained firm-
he would not agree to give up Burgundy ; and his
obstinacy on this point only increased his popularity in
Spain, the twenty-six year old Illeonore heading the party
which declared itself in favour of his release for a large
money ransom instead of the renunciation of the great
Duchy which had been torn by Louis XI. from the
Emperor's grandmother Marie, daughter of Charles the
Bold.
We have mentioned that Eleonore was not par-
ticularly prepossessing, yet from a picture of her which
remains in existence, she does not seem to have been
devoid of some attractions. Among these were a childish
expression of amiability, hair which was rather golden
than red in hue, full, rather sensual lips, and a rosy
complexion. Although her eyes were rather dull and
expressionless, Eleonore appears to have been capable of
very warm feelings, and to have possessed a far better
heart than her brother Charles V., whose strength of
character she by no means shared. It was no doubt
partly owing to her heartfelt cry in a letter to Louise :
" Oh ! if it were only in my power to deliver the King ! "
that the idea of a marriage between her and Fra^ois
originated.
Marguerite hoped that upon her arrival in Spain she
might find a warm partisan and friend in this amiable
Princess ; but in the meantime, while being borne along
in her litter through the sultry south of France, and
then, after a sea voyage, through the arid plains of Spain,
she found the journey terribly long, as the later news that
she received on her wearying and everlasting journey
gave the very worst reports of the condition of her
brother's health. While traversing the dusty plains of
Castile, Marguerite became perfectly worn out with
anxiety. All the freshness of her complexion left her,
her face became wan and drawn, while she lost the usual
Marguerite de Valois visits Spain 275
attractive plumpness of her form. Since the thirty-
three year old Duchesse d'Alen^on was now on a quest
in search of a husband, and was moreover, if only for her
brother's sake, particularly anxious to impress Charles
favourably, these deleterious effects of the journey were,
to say the least of it, unfortunate in the extreme.
Whereas, in his prison, Fran£ois had been trying to
relieve the tedium of the weary hours by indulging freely
in versification, so did Marguerite likewise now endeavour
to beguile the time in her litter by writing poems, of
which her brother was the subject. In these the anxiety
of mind of the Princess is very clearly expressed, since she
boldly declares her intention to reward with a kiss any
messenger who may come to meet her, bringing better
tidings of the King's condition.
No messenger came, however, to receive the promised
kiss from the Royal and chaste lips of Marguerite, and
eventually she arrived at her journey's end, in a very
bedraggled condition, in the middle of the month of
September. Until the day before her arrival, Charles had
religiously kept his determination not to go near his
prisoner. Then, however, while out hunting near
Segovia, he received such alarming news of the King's
condition that he rode all night long, until he reached the
Alcazar in Madrid before daylight.
Climbing the endless steps of the tower, Charles entered
the King's dungeon and, with a great show of cordiality,
embraced the sick man, who was lying on his bed in
a great state of weakness.
Francois endeavoured to rise upon the Emperor's en-
trance, but the latter threw himself upon his knees beside
the couch, and appeared to be really moved at the pitiable
state in which he found his prisoner.
When Fran9ois remarked, with justifiable bitterness in
his accents : " Sire, you behold before you your captive
and your slave," Charles replied : " No, no, not my slave,
but my good brother and real friend, whom I consider as
a free man."
" Your slave, Sire," repeated Fra^ois firmly.
276 Two Great Rivals
" My good brother, who will soon be free," said the
Emperor again, kindly. " I desire nothing more than your
health. Only think about that ; everything else will come
out just as you wish."
The King answered : " It will happen just as you may
order, but, my Lord, I beg of you that there may be no
intermediary between you and me." He then fell back
exhausted, and Charles soon left him.
On the morrow he visited Francois again, and, keeping
up his show of kindness, said everything he could think
of to restore heart and courage to his captive, who seemed
so low.
Frangois, in return, spoke as if he were sure of ap-
proaching death. He begged the Emperor to be kind to
his little sons, and not to insist upon having too much
from them, and to defend them.
Charles V. replied : " All will be arranged according to
your desires when the Duchesse d'Alengon arrives."
Hardly had he uttered these words when a courtier
informed the Emperor that Marguerite de Valois had
actually entered Madrid, and was on her way to the
Alcazar.
Charles descended the stairs to greet the King's sister
at the entrance to the castle. He found the Princess,
who was wan, travelworn, and in tears, attired in white,
which she wore as the Royal mourning for her late husband.
These white garments only served to accentuate the pallor
of her face and her worn-out appearance. For the time being,
at all events, Marguerite had completely lost her good
looks, and although Charles greeted her, cap in hand, with
every courtesy, he made up his mind on the spot that
there could be no question of making her his wife. The
subject of a marriage between the Emperor and this weary-
eyed woman was, indeed, never referred to again.
The delight of the brother and the sister at meeting
was boundless. The Emperor left them together, and for
a day or two the King showed great signs of improvement.
A day or two later, however, the Emperor received a
message that, in addition to the low fever from which
Marguerite de Valois visits Spain 277
Francois had been suffering, an abscess had formed on his
head, and that he was at the last gasp.
Hearing that he was about to lose the prisoner
upon whose life all depended, Charles remarked, with
pious resignation, u The Lord gave him to me, the Lord
is taking him away from me again."
Fran9ois did not, however, die on this occasion. The
prayers of Marguerite, aided by those of the Archbishops
and priests whom she had caused to be introduced into
her brother's dungeon, evidently had a beneficial effect.
After hearing the Mass and receiving the Sacrament,
the King seemed to be dying, when suddenly the abscess
burst. He gained immediate relief, and from that moment
began to improve.
Now, thought Marguerite, was the time for the Em-
peror to remember the kind expressions of which he had
made use, and, by changing her brother's prison to some
larger and more comfortable apartment, where he could
have more and better air, to do something towards helping
on the King's recovery. Charles, however, seemed to
remember nothing that he had said, either to the King
or to the Duchesse d'Alencon upon greeting her. He
neither came near the unfortunate Fra^ois again nor gave
any orders for his better treatment.
Marguerite now found herself compelled to leave her
brother, in order to follow the Emperor to Toledo,
and, in numerous interviews with him and his Flemish
Ministers, to endeavour to get him to agree to a peace
which should restore the King to liberty and yet not
include the cession of Burgundy. It is supposed that,
while thus employed, she, doubtless by her mother's
instructions, basely gave away the Pope, Pescara and the
various Italian States, with whom Louise de Savoie had
entered into a sinister conspiracy against the Emperor.
This act of baseness, if it really took place, availed her,
however, nothing. Charles and his Flemish advisers
would not give way an inch ; the Emperor would have
Burgundy or the King of France might remain in prison
until he died.
278 Two Great Rivals
The rest of the Spanish Court, and especially the great
ladies, such as Queen Eleonore and Dona Ximena of
Infantado, who was so openly in love with the King,
with every courtesy endeavoured to make up to the un-
happy Marguerite de Valois for the brutal conduct of the
Emperor and his Council.
Every kindness possible was shown to her by these
ladies, who treated the Princess as one of their own
family. The Spaniards were lost in astonishment to think
that, just for the sake of a paltry province, the Emperor
should refuse for his sister the hand of a King who was
the mirror of chivalry — refuse also, for himself, the hand
of that King's charming and adorable sister.
So much was popular feeling on the side of Marguerite,
that one of the highest grandees in the Spanish realm told
her that, in case the Emperor should leave for Italy, she
would find Spaniards in plenty ready to open his prison
doors for the Very Christian King.
CHAPTER XXX
The Plot of Pescara
1525
r~T'O such an extent extended the sympathy of the
1 grandees for Frangois I. and his sister, that when,
after a time, the Due de Bourbon arrived in Spain, a
great many of them would not recognise or speak to him.
When the Emperor ordered a noble to house the Duke,
he replied : " I cannot refuse your Majesty's orders to
lend my house to the Constable de Bourbon, but, at all
events, I can burn it down afterwards." It is not recorded
if the grandee ever acted up to this proud boast.
By the Emperor himself the Due de Bourbon was
received with the very highest distinction, Charles riding
out in state to meet him, embracing him affectionately,
and riding back with him by his side as though he
were an equal. This reception of his enemy increased
the irritation of Francois, to whom the Emperor took
care that it should be reported. He sent word to
Charles that he was determined to abdicate, to cause
the Dauphin to be crowned in his place, and pass his
own days in prison. He therefore requested Charles
to point out a place where he might remain until he
died.
This idea of abdication had originated in the fertile
brain of Marguerite ; she cleverly pointed out to her
brother that should he resign his throne in favour of his
seven year old son, who would remain under the Regency
of Louise de Savoie, he would himself become worthless.
279
280 Two Great Rivals
as a prisoner. From a King he would revert to the status
of a private individual, out of whom the Emperor could
get nothing at all. By this means the clever Marguerite
thought that France could get ahead of this bargaining
Emperor, this false friend, who acted just as might any
other Flemish merchant. She had indeed every reason
for this action.
In the beginning of October Charles had recommenced
his old policy of, with apparent kind words, throwing
dust into the eyes of the Duchesse d'Alen9on, telling her
that " she would soon be satisfied," that " she would
be surprised " at the things he would do for her. At the
same time, however, she appeared before the Imperial
Council, under the Presidency of that crafty and violent
Fleming of Savoyard origin, Mercurin de Gattinara. She
then saw only too plainly how little the Emperor's pro-
testations were worth. Losing his temper completely,
Gattinara shouted at Marguerite and some French envoys
who were with her. He browbeat and menaced them to
such an extent that the unhappy Princess was terrified,
and went^ off to weep over her sorrows with the gentle
Queen Eleonore.
In this manner the autumn wore on, and as the
Emperor was by this time in full possession of all
the details of the intended disloyalty of the Regent in
the matter of Italy, which shall be explained presently,
he took a higher hand than ever in his negotiations with
Marguerite. Charles now said that the King should not
have his sister, and, moreover, that he would not be
content with Burgundy, but would have also the whole
of the Province of Picardy and the territories on the
banks of the river Somme.
By, in this manner, holding the dagger's point to the
throat of the fair suppliant, Charles indulged his ven-
geance upon the King's mother for her secret arrange-
ments for a separate peace with Henry VIII., and, above
all, for her crafty conspiracy against his supremacy in
Italy at the very time that she was pretending to offer
her friendship to himself.
The Plot of Pescara 281
This plot had in a notable way concerned that bold and
crafty General, but untrustworthy man, Fernando d'Avalos,
Marquis of Pescara.
While, for want of their pay, all of the German troops
in the Imperial army in Italy had taken themselves off
into their native country, the Spanish left behind, under
Pescara, had continued to live by extortion, robbing and
fleecing with perfect impartiality either friend or foe.
In the Milanese, of which Charles V. refused to give
the Duke Francesco Sforza the formal investiture unless
he paid up an enormous sum in return, the inhabitants
were ruined by the extortions of these soldiers. They
were nothing better than brigands, over whom, indeed,
Pescara would have had but little control had he even felt
inclined to limit their depredations.
This desire he had not, and consequently the Im-
perialists continued to hold up and put to ransom the
cities of Milan and those of other Italian States at their
own sweet will.
The desire, therefore, of all Italy was to bundle all the
Spaniards out of Italy neck and crop, to get rid of the
domination also of Charles V., who, in addition to his re-
asserted Imperial rights in Lombardy, was King of Naples
and Sicily.
The former Duke of Milan, Maximilian Sforza, had,
it will be remembered, retired long since into France,
where he lived comfortably on the banks of the Loire, on
a French pension. Acting as the intermediary of the
wily Louise de Savoie, Maximilian now' proposed a
cunning combination to his brother, the Duke Francesco.
This was to consist of a league between Italy and France
to get rid of Charles V. The offers of Louise to
Francesco Sforza included the hand of either of those
Royal Princesses the Duchesse d'Alen^on or Renee, both
of whom, it will be noticed, were now being offered in
two places at the same time. The latter of these, the
daughter of Louis XII. , must, one would imagine, about
this period have commenced to get a little tired of being
held out as a bait, first to one Duke or Prince and then
282 Two Great Rivals
to another. The Pope, Clement VII., who was asked to
join this league, agreed to do so, and with him the
Florentines, who obeyed him as a Medici, and likewise
the Venetians, who did not at all appreciate the presence
so near their territories in Eastern Lombardy of the
Emperor's Spanish ruffians in Western Lombardy.
While turning the Emperor out of both Milan and
Naples, of which latter the Pope was Suzerain, the idea
was conceived to hand over the Monarchy of this latter
Kingdom to some powerful noble who should be an
Italian, not a foreigner. Now Pescara, the discontented
General of Charles V., was an Italian, although descended
from distinguished Spanish ancestors. Who, thought the
conspirators, could possibly be a better man to be made
King of the Two Sicilies than Pescara, of whose valuable
services the Emperor would be deprived if only he
could be brought to enter into the plot for his own
elevation ?
Pescara, who was himself a poet, was married to a
poetess, the most beautiful woman in Italy, Vittoria
Colonna, descended from various ruling Princes. It was
thought that the offer of a Sovereignty to a man who
was married to the daughter of Sovereigns would seem to
himself singularly appropriate, if only for his lovely wife's
sake, and Girolamo Morone, the Chancellor of the Duke
of Milan, was sent to feel him on the subject.
As, after raising various objections, Pescara was
casuistically persuaded by the Pope that he would not
be wanting in honour to Charles V. if, before accepting a
Crown at his hands, he resigned his present employment,
the husband of Vittoria agreed to the propositions of
Morone.
The matter was therefore arranged : Pescara was to
become a King, while Louise de Savoie definitely resigned
to Francesco Sforza all of her son's claims on the Duchy
of Milan ; Louise promised also a French army to assist
in driving out the Emperor's troops, and likewise a navy
to convey troops wherever wanted. The Pope at the
same time engaged ten thousand Swiss troops, and when
The Plot of Pescara 283
all of this skilful combination was revealed to Pescara, he
swore solemnly, on his honour as a^Knight, never to dis-
close the plot to the Emperor, and to be faithful to the
league which was to make of him a Sovereign.
In spite of swearing this solemn oath, it was not very
long before Pescara proved a traitor to all his friends
of the league, whom he basely betrayed. The reasons
of his treason are uncertain. Possibly he feared that
the plot would not succeed, and that with its failure
would come his own downfall, or, as some have sug-
gested, his pious wife Vittoria Colonna persuaded him
to betray the Italian cause. She may well have reminded
him of the oath which he had given to the Emperor,
in whose confidence he had been, and so have induced
him to overlook the recent slight that had been put upon
him when the Countship which he had asked for had
been given to a Colonna, a relation of her own. Another
cause, for his defection was very probably that he was
at heart too good a Spaniard to join the French, whom
he had so often beaten, in fighting against the Spaniards
by whom he was admired and beloved. Whatever the
cause having determined not to endeavour to replace the
Emperor on the throne of Naples, Pescara now went so
far as basely to play the spy in his master's interests.
He led the agents of the league on, caused them to
compromise themselves more and more, and at the same
time secretly sent a confidential officer named Juan
Gastaldo ofF to Charles V. to inform him of the con-
spiracy. In the letter which Gastaldo, who later became
a famous General, bore to Charles, Pescara shows very
plainly that he feels the ignominy of the role he has
assumed, in which he is compelled to act traitorously to
either one party or the other.
He remarks : " These practices do not suit me.
Nevertheless, since necessity has brought them about, it
is not without a great deal of shame that I am able to
rejoice in serving your Majesty, because I recognise that
I am wanting towards some one, although it may not
be towards him to whom I owe the most."
284 Two Great Rivals
While writing thus, Pescara took military precautions,
such as occupying several strong cities ; he also begged
the Emperor to waste not a moment in remitting to him
money to pay the troops, to send him reinforcements
by sea, and, above all, to come to terms at once with
Francois I., without insisting on having Burgundy. He
added that Antonio da Leyva was of the same opinion
as himself. He finished up his epistle by saying with
bold frankness : " If your Majesty does not hurry up
to finish, you will be sorry for it, and will lament not
to have done so when it is too late. There is not a soul
in Italy who does not mistrust your Majesty's greatness,
and not a soul who does not abhor the yoke of this army.
You have not a friend in Italy, where the Duke of
Ferrara and the Marquis of Mantua are as antagonistic
to you as the Duke of Milan and Genoa, and where
Lucca is more French than Paris, and Sienna will soon
be the same, and where, moreover, your Majesty has
scarcely a servitor who is not tired out and utterly
discouraged."
We can easily understand, after having been so fully
informed by Pescara of what was in the wind, how little
Charles cared when he received the same information
from Marguerite, owing to the treachery of Louise to the
Italians, in her hopes of obtaining better terms for her son.
The Emperor seemed to be very much pleased at the
fidelity of Pescara to himself, and wrote to him to go
on watching and spying, and to continue plotting with
Clement VII. and the Duke of Milan that they might
the better fall into the toils.
Pescara did not shrink from this dirty work, and
eventually was guilty of a crowning work of meanness
towards Morone. Under the pretence that he was too
ill to move, he induced Girolamo Morone to come to
meet him at Novara, in order to arrange the final details
of the plot for rising against the Emperor. Pescara hid
Antonio da Leyva behind the arras in the apartment,
while the Duke of Milan's Chancellor unburdened his
mind, as he thought in perfect security. The irony in
The Plot of Pescara 285
this consisted in the fact that Pescara had promised to
put Leyva to death. As Morone came out, Leyva with
some soldiers pounced upon him, made him prisoner,
and hurried him off to imprisonment in Pavia. After
this Pescara had actually the effrontery to interrogate the
unhappy Morone as his judge ; he was condemned to
die, but for the time being kept in prison.
The Emperor, delighted at the opportunity, now
declared that Francesco Sforza had forfeited Milan. He
caused Pescara to besiege him in the citadel of that place,
and to take possession of all the other strong places in
the Duchy.
The Venetians, who had been found out, were at first
afraid of the Emperor's revenge, and were about to pay
him a large indemnity for their share in the conspiracy.
Seeing, however, that Charles was attacking Milan, the
wily Venetians concluded that it would be their turn
next, and that the Emperor would employ their own
money to carry on the war against themselves. They
therefore thought better of the matter of paying up,
well knowing that Charles, who was always necessitous,
could not fight without cash. Instead, therefore, of re-
mitting the promised subsidy, Venice sent a word of
advice to the Emperor. This was that it would be far
wiser for him not to take Milan, as if he did he would
cause the whole world to turn against him. Charles
found himself obliged to listen to this advice, and to
take it for what it might be worth, as he had no means
of resenting it.
Pescara now became sick in earnest, in all probability
his mind had affected his body, which was worn out. A
great soldier, he had had the opportunity of becoming
great in another way, by freeing Italy, the land of his
birth. Had he done so, his name would have become
as famous in the sixteenth century as did that of Garibaldi
three centuries later. He, however, declined to profit by
the chance that fate had thrown in his way, he declined
the glory and he lost an immortal name. Dying on
November 3Oth, 1525, he only left behind him in Italy
286 Two Great Rivals
a reputation to which was attached everything that was
shameful.
By one person, however, this man who might have
become a King was sincerely mourned. To Vittoria
Colonna he always remained the King of her heart, for she
was inconsolable, and as long as she lived never ceased to
weep for his memory.
CHAPTER XXXI
Marguerite and Henri d'Albret
AFTER a month and a half of useless negotiations
with the Emperor in Toledo, Marguerite com-
menced to be in despair, feeling that nothing that she
could do would be of any avail to obtain her brother's
release. The longer she stayed, the more exigeant Charles
seemed to become, and, in spite of her ardent desire to
see the King at large, she was too womanly a woman
to accept some of his extravagant propositions.
While, for instance, the Emperor refused the proposal
that Francois should marry Eleonore, and leave Burgundy
to her heirs, Charles demanded from the Duchesse
d'Alenc.on that she should give a guarantee to the effect
that the King would abandon both of his allies, Henri
d'Albret, King of Navarre, and Robert de la Marck,
to the tender mercies of the Emperor — to his justice, as
he called it.
While indignantly refusing to agree to this, she assented
to the demand that the Due de Bourbon, with all his allies
and friends, should be reinstated in their possessions.
Matters came to a deadlock a short time after this, and
then, failing all other measures, Marguerite concocted a
plan for her brother's escape from his dungeon. Any
scheme seemed good enough to evade the ever-watchful
Alarcon, and the plan, which was not one very noble
or chivalrous to be adopted by a great King, was as
follows.
There was a certain black slave who attended to the
fires in the King's prison, and who was accustomed to go
287
288 Two Great Rivals
in and out of the prisoner's dungeon without attracting
any attention from the guards. It was proposed that,
after having blacked his face and hands, Fran£ois should
change clothes with this negro, and escape in the dusk of
the evening. Horses were to be placed by sympathisers
at regular distances, and with the advantage of a night's
start, it was felt that the King would have a very good
chance of reaching the frontier.
When everything was almost ready for the dash for
liberty, the plan was disclosed, owing to an act of ven-
geance on the part of Clement Le Champion, the King's
valet de chambre.
One of the gentlemen who was allowed to be about
the person of Fra^ois I. was named La Rochepot ; he
was the brother of the Marechal de Montmorency. La
Rochepot struck Le Champion in the face, and, when
Montmorency refused any reparation to the insulted
valet de chambre, he took his revenge by betraying the
King. Mounting a horse, Le Champion rode straight
off to Charles V. at Toledo, and revealed all.
When the Emperor heard of this plot, his chief senti-
ment seems to have been one of disgust that, in order to
fly, a Monarch like Francois I. should have consented to
assume such an ignoble disguise. He meted out various
punishments, but the negro was only ordered not to enter
the King's chamber any more. It was probably lucky for
the poor wretch that the escape was never accomplished,
as we can imagine how he would have been tortured to
death by the revengeful Emperor in such a case. After
this, Charles had it under consideration to lock Fra^ois
up in some more disagreeable and remote dungeon than
before, but other concerns drove the matter from his
head.
Even before the arrival of the King of France in
Spain, a state of truce had existed between Louise de
Savoie and the Emperor. The time for this was,
however, drawing to a close ; and before making pre-
parations for renewing the conflict with France, Charles
was anxious to go off to -Seville to marry his cousin,
Marguerite and Henri d'Albret 289
the Infanta Isabella of Portugal, who was to provide
him with the sinews of war.
Marguerite, in the meantime, was hanging on in
Spain, arranging with her brother about the drawing up
of his act of abdication, which she wished to take back
with her to France. Matters seem to have been delayed
owing to the rivalry and jealousy displayed towards
her by her former friend Montmorency, of whose
constant interference she complained bitterly to the King,
begging him to listen to no one but herself. At last,
when the time of her safe-conduct had grown perilously
near its expiration, she received a secret warning, from
her former admirer the Due de Bourbon, that she had
better be off at once, for that if she remained on Spanish
soil a day or two longer the Emperor intended to make
her a prisoner.
Terribly upset by this well-timed warning, Marguerite
had to take her last despairing adieux of her brother
in a hurry. Leaving him in his prison, she proceeded
with forced marches towards the north of Spain, and
without being able to wait for the act of abdication,
which the Marechal de Montmorency said that he would
himself bring to France later.
In spite of the danger to herself, she still thought
of nothing but her brother. Meeting Chabot de Brion,
whom Louise de Savoie was sending to Charles in a
final effort to treat for her son's freedom, Marguerite
sent back by him a letter to Fran£ois, offering to return
to his side if he wanted her. In this letter she showed
distinct signs of weakening in the matter of Burgundy,
which she suggested to her brother it would be wiser
for him to abandon rather than to remain in a Spanish
dungeon for ever.
Fran9ois, however, knew better than to send for his
sister to return to him, and he did not either at that
time agree to her advice to give up Burgundy.
Marguerite had rejoined her mother by the middle
of December ; her journey had been a failure, her mission
uncrowned with success.
19
290 Two Great Rivals
The story of the act of abdication arriving with her,
the Duchesse d'Alengon appeared before the Parliament
of Paris, to put the case before that body, when she
was received with considerable discontent by the Magis-
trates, to whom the prospect of a long regency under
feminine rule appeared by no means an attractive picture.
When Marguerite had been a few days with her
mother, whom she had rejoined at Lyon, both mother
and daughter one day learned the agreeable news that
a gallant young man, who was before long to enter
very largely into the life of the Princess, had escaped
from captivity and arrived in the neighbourhood. This
was Henri d'Albret, King of Navarre, then nearly twenty-
two years of age. He was the son of Catherine de
Foix, who had been in her own right Queen of Navarre,
and Jean d'Albret, whose alliance with Louis XII. had
in 1512 cost them their Spanish dominions. During
the wars between Francois I. and Charles V. this young
Bearnese Prince was the faithful ally of France, but he
was only repaid by ingratitude. When in 1525 Henri
d'Albret followed Francois to Pavia he was, as we have
mentioned, captured in the great battle at that place.
He was shut up in a tower of the Castle of Pavia, and
all the more closely watched as it was important for the
Emperor to keep him away from his subjects.
The King of Navarre knew well that it would be
only by definitely renouncing his rights to his Spanish
dominions that he would be set at liberty.
This young Prince had, however, one great failing,
which became very plainly evident later on in his career.
He was, according to the reports of the chroniclers,
" terribly addicted to women," to which fact he owed
his release. Such being the case, while in the society
of the licentious Francois I. in the Villa of Mirabello,
Henri had not neglected his opportunities of cultivating
the society of a beautiful Italian lady of high rank, who
loved the young King of Navarre devotedly. After his
captivity, this lady obtained from his gaolers, who were
not so strict as Alarcon, permission to visit her beloved
Marguerite and Henri d'Albret 291
Knight in his place of captivity. Owing to her unusual
attractions, she succeeded before long in quite overcoming
the scruples of two officers who detained him. These
were an Italian gentleman from Mantua, who had indeed
been d'Albret's captor in the battle, and a Spanish
captain named Coimbres.
Being helped also by the B6arnese Baron, Francois
d'Arros, on Christmas night the fair Italian contrived
to bring a light rope-ladder under her clothes into the
apartment where the King of Navarre was confined.
There was no moon, and, after the ladder was attached,
Coimbres went down first into the half-dried-up moat of
the castle. Finding the ladder too short, d'Albret
hesitated to follow, but his valet, Francesco by name,
reminded him of all he stood to lose in addition to his
ransom if he remained. Thereupon the young King
went down, and, dropping from the end of the ladder,
stuck in the mud, from which he was pulled out with
difficulty by d'Arros and the Italian officer. As the
amiable lady had provided relays of horses and guides,
Henri d'Albret rode off at once at a gallop, all muddy as
he was.
Upon his departure by the window, the King's faithful
page, Francois de Rochefort, Seigneur de Viviers in the
County of Foix, took his place in bed.
When the Captain of the Guard came on his rounds
on the following morning, the valet said that the King
was ill and sleeping, at the same time pulling up the
curtain of the bed and disclosing a figure lying with face
to the wall. The deceived officer retired quietly, and
when the escape was found out, it was already late in the
afternoon. Some mounted men started in pursuit even
then, but they never overtook the fugitive Prince, who
gained France in safety.
The Spanish officers who were in charge of the castle
behaved with singular generosity to the faithful page and
the valet de chambre, who received nothing but praise
from the Spaniards for having risked their lives for their
young King.
292 Two Great Rivals
Great, however, was the anger and disappointment of
Charles when he learned of the escape of the King of
Navarre, whom he had expected to be able to force to
sign away the rights to his Kingdom, in the same way
as he was endeavouring to compel his more important
prisoner, the King of France, to abandon Burgundy.
Upon meeting with Henri, Marguerite, who was
thirty-three years of age, and therefore eleven years his
senior, would appear to have fallen in love with him, or
it may have been that, having been rejected by the
Emperor, she was not averse to showing him that she
could find others who would appreciate her at a higher
value.
Henri, for his part, had previously met, and probably
admired, the brilliant Duchesse d'Alen9on some six years
earlier, when, as a boy of sixteen, he had been for some
time at the Court of Franfois, shortly after his mother's
death had left him an orphan. At that time the young
Prince had been accustomed to see everybody of distinc-
tion at the feet of Marguerite, and no doubt, now that
they both were older, he found that she was still the
most agreeable and accomplished woman about the
French Court. Two subjects of mutual interest they
no doubt possessed, which would give them plenty of
scope for intimate conversation — the hatred which each
bore to Charles V. being one, and the Reform of religion
being the other.
Whatever the causes that brought together this brave
young King, possessing nothing more than the vestige
of a Kingdom, and that intellectual and richly dowered
widow the sister of the King of France, there is no
doubt that a considerable affection sprang up between the
couple, despite the disparity of their ages.
It has been the fashion for some historians to assert
boldly that Francois I., having grown tired of his sister,
and finding that her influence at the Court interfered
with the sway of his mistresses, after his return from
imprisonment married her off to the infinitesimal King
of Navarre on purpose to get her out of the way. The
Marguerite and Henri d'Albret 293
truth of the matter is, however, that the two people
concerned, finding that a warm attraction existed be-
tween them, engaged themselves to each other during
the King's absence in prison. When Fra^ois eventually
returned, although he thought and said that his sister
might have done better, he could not well, owing her
what he did, forbid her a marriage upon which she had
set her heart with passionate eagerness. Later on,
Fra^ois was certainly often glad to be able to banish
his sister to the distant Court of Beam, especially when
he wished to be able to continue the relentless policy
which he assumed towards the Reformers without being
constantly met with her reproaches.
From an intellectual point of view, Marguerite had
the advantage of the Bearnese Prince, although in the
manner in which he ruled his subjects he displayed much
good, sturdy common sense, and always showed very
plainly that he had their best interests at heart.
By the disgraceful Treaty of Madrid, by which
Fran£ois I. recovered his liberty, he meanly abandoned
his ally the King of Navarre, engaging himself to demand
him to resign his rights and not to assist him in any
way. In spite of this, the marriage between Marguerite
and Henri d'Albret was duly solemnised at the end of
January 1527. After this, Francois made various
promises and pretences to help his brother-in-law and
ally to recover the province of Biscay e, but he secretly
gave orders that the troops that he sent were not to pass
the frontier into Spain.
The after-life of the Royal couple, who had presumably
married from love, was not a particularly happy one.
While Marguerite, on the one hand, never gave up
adoring her brother, and trying to play his game even
when he was manifestly playing her husband false, Henri,
as his wife grew older, became tired of her and her ways,
which consisted of a fictitious coquetry mingled with
devotion. True to his early traditions, he became far
too intimate with several of his wife's fair ladies of
honour in succession. He also became rough with his
294
Two Great Rivals
Queen, when he found her so constantly acting in her
brother's interests instead of those of the Kingdom of
Navarre, and Henri is said upon one occasion even to
have struck this great, and formerly powerful, Princess.
Thus the learned Marguerite, perhaps partly from her
own fault, was not lucky in either of her marriages.
She had despised her first husband, Charles, Due
d'Alenson, and by her second husband she was ill-
treated. Whereas, however, by her first marriage she
had been childless, by Henri d'Albret she became the
mother of two children, a boy who died quite young, and
Jeanne d'Albret, who eventually became the mother of
Henri IV., the first of the Bourbon Kings of France.
CHAPTER XXXII
Francois commits Perjury
A COUPLE of months after the return of Marguerite,
A\ Montmorency suddenly arrived in Paris from
Madrid, and the news that he brought with him was not such
as to cause Francois to remain a popular hero in the eyes of
his subjects. The Marechal Anne de Montmorency did
not bring with him the expected act of abdication, but,
on the other hand, the news that the King was concluding
a treaty of peace at Madrid with the Emperor by which,
after all, he was to cede Burgundy, and further, that in
the beginning of February he had been officially affianced
to the Dowager Queen of Portugal, the promised wife of
the Due de Bourbon.
In order to recover his liberty, this chivalrous King,
who had talked so boldly about dying in prison rather
than doing anything against the interests of France, had
accepted everything proposed by Charles V., including
the disgraceful stipulation that either twelve of the
greatest men of France or else two of his own little
sons were to be sent to Spain as hostages in his
place.
Having become utterly sick of his imprisonment, the
propositions for this peace had come from Francois' him-
self, who sent Charles de Lannoy to the Emperor in the
first instance to say that he was inclined to give in.
Afterwards he told his envoys, of whom Chabot de Brion
was one, distinctly that they were to yield everything
or that they would cause him " irreparable displeasure."
The French King offered to give up all that Charles
295
296 Two Great Rivals
had asked for in France, Italy, Flanders, Artois, and
Burgundy ; to resign likewise all claims descended to
him from his predecessors to Aragon, Catalonia, and
Roussillon, and at the same time he repeated his demand
for the hand of fileonore. When Charles found that he
was at last to get all that he wished for, he did not well
see how he could refuse to give his sister as the price of
the peace, in spite of her long-standing engagement to
Bourbon. His Chancellor, Gattinara, pointed out, how-
ever, that it would be impossible to break off the match
with Bourbon, while the Due himself protested loudly
that he had lost his estates for the sake of the Emperor
and this alliance.
Charles consulted Lannoy, with whom Bourbon still
remained at daggers drawn, and the Viceroy in turn
consulted Eleonore herself, who said very decidedly that
she preferred Fra^ois to Bourbon. This declaration on
the part of his sister made matters easier for the Emperor,
who told Bourbon that, for the sake of the peace, he
must give way. In return for his renunciation he
promised to give him the Duchy of Milan, of which he
expressed his intention to deprive Francesco Sforza.
The unfortunate Bourbon, an exile from France, had no
one to depend upon but the Emperor. He found himself
between the devil and the deep sea, and was forced to
resign his promised bride to his deadly enemy.
Charles, however, who with reason did not trust the
King of France, was not inclined to let Fran9ois go until
Burgundy had been actually handed over, and Gattinara
also said : " No, get Burgundy first."
Lannoy, on the other hand, said : " Let the King go
first, and thus peace will become a certainty ; the cession
will be all the more easily arranged when the King has
returned to France. By getting the peace at once, the
Emperor will be the better able to arrange matters for
the preservation of the Low Countries, and he can in
addition more easily crush the Reform movement in
Germany, and also fight the Turks in Hungary." The
wiser Chancellor Gattinara, however, was not to be gain-
Francois commits Perjury 297
said. He declared that the promises of Frai^ois were of
no value, as had already been proved, and that no sooner
would he get loose than he would seek to obtain ven-
geance for his captivity. There were, he pointed out,
only two safe courses to be followed : either to let the
King of France go free without any conditions whatever,
or else to hold him for ever a prisoner. In conclusion,
Mercurin de Gattinara flatly refused to draw up the treaty
of peace.
Charles, however, did not for once listen to his astute
Chancellor. He remembered what Pescara had written
to him about not being too hard over the peace condi-
tions with France, as all Italy was against him ; and as
Pescara was now dying, and the Regent of France talking
about renewing the war when the truce should expire,
the Emperor feared to lose all that was now in his grasp
if a new conflict should begin. He might easily find
Italy invaded once more, and there would now be no
bold Pescara to resist the invasion, while he was not
himself in a position to invade France.
Accordingly Charles decided to accept what was offered
to him, but, while accepting the two sons of Fran9ois as
hostages, he thought it also wise to bind his prisoner by
his personal oath. He accordingly asked Fra^ois to
swear on his honour as a gentleman and a Knight that he
would keep all his promises, and sent the Viceroy, as
another gentleman and Knight, to receive his word.
While intending to perjure himself all the time, Francois
swore gaily to Lannoy, by everything that was sacred,
and by his honour as a King, a gentleman, and a Knight,
that he would be faithful in every particular to his
engagements.
He vowed to ratify the treaty of peace six weeks after
his deliverance, to cause it to be accepted by all the
Parliaments and the States of the various provinces in less
than four months, and finally, gave his word of honour
to the Emperor, if by any chance anything should prevent
his making restitution of Burgundy in that time, that he
would return of his own free will and constitute himself
298 Two Great Rivals
a prisoner once more, in the place of the child Dauphin
and still younger Due d'Orl£ans, who were to be sent as
hostages of his good faith.
And now we come to the crowning act of treachery
of Francois I., the preux chevalier who wrote from the
field of Pavia that "all was lost save honour and life."
Having sworn these oaths, Fra^ois assembled six
witnesses in his dungeon, among them being Mont-
morency and Chabot de Brion, and in their presence
signed a protestation against the treaty of peace, and made
a declaration that he would not consider himself bound
by any of the obligations of a treaty which, since he was
a prisoner, he considered as being imposed on him by
force. He protested that everything in the treaty with
the Emperor was null and of no effect, and that he would
not keep his promises, because he had not given them
while in a state of liberty.
He added that since he did not wish to be unfair to
the Emperor, and " in order to put God and justice on
his side," he intended to offer the Emperor a fair money
ransom, one such as should be paid by a King who had
been made a prisoner of war.
Six days after the signing of the Treaty of Madrid by
the representatives of the two Monarchs, Lannoy was
sent to the King of France, who was still kept in prison,
to accomplish the ceremony of betrothal as proxy on the
part of the Queen of Portugal. Francois, who was in
bed with an attack of fever, declared himself also with
certain solemn ceremonies as the affianced husband of
Eleonore ; and after this unusual celebration of marriage,
the Emperor declared that his sister and the King of
France might call themselves husband and wife. Not-
withstanding this ceremony, El£onore was not sent to see
her husband, nor were the guards taken away from be-
fore the door of the King, whom the Emperor now called
" his friend and brother-in-law." Frangois, was, however,
now allowed sometimes to go out in a litter in Madrid,
or to ride a mule, in order to go to hear Mass in church,
but always accompanied by Alarcon and his soldiers.
Francois commits Perjury 299
Even when the King of France was allowed to accept of
collations offered him by the nuns of various convents,
while these nuns stood round to gaze at him, there was
a ring of soldiers behind the nuns.
Charles signed the ratification of the treaty of peace at
Toledo upon February nth, 1526, when he wrote to
his aunt, the Archduchess Marguerite, that his " honour
and particular welfare had been well protected by its
terms." A couple of days later Charles thought that he
would ride over to Madrid to call upon the prisoner,
whom he flattered himself that he had now transformed
into a warm friend. He determined to pass a few days in
the society of his brother-in-law before he sent him off
to France upon the arrival of the two little hostages at
the frontiers of Navarre and Spain. The account of the
meeting between Charles and Fra^ois is worth recording
if only for its very falsity. They had not seen each other
since, with so many protestations of friendship, the Em-
peror had left his prisoner in the Alcazar after the arrival
of Marguerite de Valois.
In order to meet Charles, Fra^ois rode forth on a mule
richly caparisoned, and wearing a Spanish sword and Spanish
cape. To his right was the Grand Master of the Knights of
Saint John from Rhodes, and to his left was that faithful
watchdog Alarcon, while behind marched three hundred
men of the King's guard in full armour. When he met
the Emperor, on a bridge on the road to Toledo, he
found him attired in black velvet and surrounded by
all the grandees of the Court. For escort Charles had
two hundred and fifty cavaliers, all being noble men-at-
arms in the full panoply of war. Each of these had
his helmet carried by a page, who rode behind him.
Fran£ois wore a rich cap and Charles a hat. Holding
their headgear in their hands, the Monarchs met and
embraced each other closely and for a long time. One
would have said it was the meeting of two brothers who
loved each other dearly, and great was the courtesy each
showed the other. Neither would precede in the order
of march back to Madrid, but at last Fra^ois persuaded
300 Two Great Rivals
Charles, who showed great diffidence, to take a place to
his right, and thus they entered the city amid the plaudits
of the multitude, who showed every sign of joy at this
scene of cordiality. Afterwards Charles V. and Francis I.
had a grand supper together in the Alcazar, and kept it
up merrily until late at night.
During the following days the Emperor and the King
remained inseparable — and the people were delighted.
Francois was even now to be permitted the felicity of a
meeting with his future wife, whom he was to see for the
first time, and Charles readily agreed to his request that
she should follow him after a day or two on his journey
to France.
In return for this concession, Charles asked the King
to be so good as to give to the Due de Bourbon a pension
of twenty thousand crowns, and further asked that his
estates should be restored to him as an independent
Sovereignty. Francois agreed to give the pension, but
declined about the Sovereignty, and the Emperor did
not press the matter.
In the middle of February Fran?ois rode with Charles
to Toledo to see his fiancee. When she rode forth to
meet him, attended by Germaine de Foix, Francois em-
braced both of the Queens tenderly. The modest
Eleonore had at first tried to kiss the King's hand, but
he said gallantly : " No, no ; that is not what I want.
Give me your lips."
Arm-in-arm they afterwards entered a palace, where
they were entertained with dancing, and on the following
evening Eleonore delighted her future husband by the ease
and grace with which she danced several Moorish dances
before him. A few days later, while Charles went off
to marry his cousin Isabella, Francois, after repeating his
solemn promises to the Emperor, was allowed to depart
for France.
Photo by Anderson, Rome, from the picture in the Prado by Titian.
ISABELLA OF PORTUGAL, WIFE OF CHARLES V.
p. 300]
CHAPTER XXXIII
Liberty and a New Mistress
1526
WHILE the Emperor's sister danced a gay saraband
and Frangois played the lover, Charles had looked
on, laughing in his sleeve. He imagined that the marriage
of his prisoner to the full-lipped Austrian Princess, which
was one of sheer policy and brought about practically
by force, was going to prove a binding tie to fasten
the French King to his triumphal car. Seeing that
Clement VII. was on the side of Frangois, and only waiting
for an opportunity to whitewash him from all his perjured
oaths, Machiavelli has called Charles V. an imbecile for
being so taken in. In his jealousy of his rival, he vainly
imagined that he had utterly broken the spirit of this
bold soldier, this trickster brought up in an immoral
Court. Charles had himself as yet won no knightly spurs
upon the battlefield, and in his envy of the glorious
conqueror of Marignano had aimed at something beyond
the mere acquisition of Burgundy — this was the lowering of
his enemy. It seemed probable that this abasement would
now be satisfactorily accomplished, for if Frangois kept
to the terms of his treaty — which included, by the way,
the payment of two million golden crowns — Charles could
point him out as a weak fool to the infatuated Spaniards.
Should he, on the other hand, prove false to his pledged
knightly word, then, before all Europe, the Emperor
would be able to brand the King of France as a dastardly
liar, meriting universal shame and condemnation. What-
301
302 Two Great Rivals
ever happened, France was, at all events, humbled in the
person of her King, who had cringed and bound himself
to become the Emperor's henchman, to fight his battles
for him against the Turk. The infamy of the Treaty
of Madrid was one therefore which could never be for-
gotten by Frenchmen, whose cheeks for long years to
come must redden with shame and anger at the baseness
of their King. Among the Emperor's own partisans
there were, however, those who, like Machiavelli, con-
sidered that, owing to the absolute absence of material
guarantees, he had acted like an imbecile in allowing
Fra^ois to go free. So strongly did Gattinara feel on
the subject that, as we know, he, although as Chancellor
it was his duty to do so, absolutely declined to draw
up the treaty. Marguerite of Austria likewise complained
to her former pupil and nephew that he had not acted
wisely. She who hated France so deeply would, she
said, have preferred to have seen some actual results in
the shape of territory in the Emperor's hands before he
weakly listened to a Frenchman's promises and set a
French King at liberty. Had she not reason ? Had she
not, as the repudiated wife of Charles VIII., in her own
person experienced of how little value were the vows of
fidelity of a King of France ?
When Gattinara refused even to sign the treaty, the
Emperor had put his own signature to the document,
and from the moment that it was signed he rested satisfied
with the knowledge that he had already won a political
and a moral victory, no matter in whatever manner his
rival might behave.
When we learn of all the symptoms of distrust with
which he now caused Frai^ois to be sent to the frontier,
we are almost inclined to fancy that, in his heart of hearts,
the young Emperor can hardly have, after all, expected to
get much more than this political and moral victory.
When, four days under the year after the battle of
Pavia, Fran9ois left the Alcazar, he was under the double
escort of the Viceroy of Naples and the trusty Alarcon,
with plenty of soldiers into the bargain.
Liberty and a New Mistress 303
All sorts of precautions had been taken in advance to
see that no body of French troops should be assembled
within twenty leagues of the frontier, no men-at-arms who
might seize the person of the King without delivering over
the hostages. The whole length of the border of
Navarre was watched by scouts sent out by Lannoy.
The river Bidassoa, between Fontarabia and Andaye,
where, in the centre of the stream, the exchange was to
take place, was cleared of ships and boats likewise, while
no gentleman of the King's Household was allowed to
approach its banks.
Until the Regent Louise arrived, with the two poor
little Princes and her Court, at Bayonne, Lannoy kept the
impatient Francois halted at a distance of several marches
from the Bidassoa. Owing to the winter season and
terrible rains, it was not without difficulty and danger that
Louise de Savoie, who had the gout, arrived several days
later than she had been expected. Francois was mean-
while eating his heart out with anxiety, and by no means
certain that Lannoy and Alarcon would not march him
straight back again to Madrid.
The Regent had wisely decided that it would not be
safe to denude France of the twelve grandes seigneurs
whom the Emperor had demanded as an alternative to
the Princes, as they were the only leaders left in the
country to be employed in case of a renewal of the war.
She it was, therefore, who had decided that the two
Princes, aged now eight and seven years, should be
handed over. Fra^ois, whose fatherly feelings seem to
have been in abeyance, had agreed to this ; it mattered
little to him who took his place in a Spanish prison so
that he got free himself.
While Fran9ois was kept under guard in the castle
of Saint Sebastian, his promised wife, the Queen of
Portugal, had followed him as far as Vittoria, but there
she remained. Eventually, on March 2Oth, 1526, the
exchange took place in the exact centre of the frontier
river. There a raft had been anchored, and while
Lannoy, Alarcon, and ten armed gentlemen were rowed
304 Two Great Rivals
out to this raft from the Spanish side with the King,
Odet de. Foix, Seigneur de Lautrec, with the two
Princes and ten French gentlemen, were rowed out
from the Navarrese side.
They arrived at the same moment at opposite sides
of the raft, and as Lannoy and Alarcon mounted upon
it with Francois I., so did Lautrec, with the Dauphin
and his brother, mount likewise. The gentlemen re-
mained in the boats.
The King of France wasted no time over greetings
with the two little boys, whom his selfishness was to
condemn to years of hard imprisonment.
They kissed his hand, he embraced them hurriedly,
and then, as Alarcon remarked, " Sire, your Highness is
at liberty," he instantly jumped into the boat which had
brought his sons, and rowed off.
The Dauphin and the Due d'Orleans were then
taken away by Lannoy and Alarcon ; and not very
long afterwards, being separated from their servants, who
had followed them, were lodged with a guard of rough
Spanish soldiers in the mountain fortress of Pedraza.
Upon reaching the northern bank, Fran£ois wasted not
a moment to look back in regret at his children.
Mounting an Arab charger which stood waiting for him,
and exclaiming gleefully : " Now I am once more a
King ! " he galloped off at once to Saint Jean-de-Luz.
There he was welcomed by the King of Navarre, who
was now his host, the Chancellor Du Prat, Doctor
Taylor, the Ambassador of Henry VIII., who came to
felicitate him, and all the Seigneurs of his Court. That
same day he rode to Bayonne, near which place, at
Mont-de-Marsan, Francois was awaited by his sister
and Louise de Savoie, with a swarm of the immoral
ladies of honour, with whom, like Catherine de' Medici
later, the flighty Louise was wont to surround herself.
Among this group were two women, one of whom,
the Comtesse de Chateaubriand, the King's old love,
was detested by the Regent. The other was a young
beauty, with a dazzling complexion, white as the lily
Liberty and a New Mistress 305
and crimson as the rose, whom the Duchesse d'Angouleme
had brought with her in the hopes of making of her
the new mistress of her son. The King had already
heard of this fair young creature, and one of the numerous
love-poems which he composed in his prison had been
forwarded by him to his mother's new protegee. She
was said to be excessively lively, witty, and talkative, and
Francois' mother imagined that she would be just the
sort of young lady to interest her son, and keep him
amused in his moments of idle dalliance.
Knowing that her fate hung in the balance, Fran9oise
de Foix stood trembling, waiting for a greeting, and
possibly a loving one, from the Monarch who had first
lured her from her home under false pretences, and over
whose affections she had subsequently ruled so long.
As Fran£ois approached the bevy of fair ones, all the
courtiers looked eagerly to see to which of them he
would first address himself. They were not left long in
doubt. Turning his back upon Fran9oise de Foix, the
unfaithful Fra^ois went straight to Anne de Pisseleu,
the new beauty, and made some gallant remark which
brought the triumphant blushes to her carmine cheeks.
The die was cast, Louise de Savoie was triumphant
and the Comtesse de Chateaubriand disgraced — her
reign was over. Without delay, Anne de Pisseleu be-
came the King's mistress, and such she remained, at all
events officially, for the rest of his life. She was soon
provided with a merely nominal husband, in the shape
of that La Brosse whom we have already mentioned as
leaving the King and becoming the partisan of Bourbon.
It is, however, by the tide of Duchesse d'Etampes, con-
ferred upon her by the King, that this, for some time
fortunate, lady is best known to history.
It was the custom of the Kings of France, when they
took for mistress an unmarried lady, to endow her with a
husband, in order to provide her with an air of respecta-
bility and make her eligible for presentation at Court. We
see a dozen instances of this in the history of the Valois and
Bourbon Kings. After the marriage these husbands were
20
306 Two Great Rivals
told to make themselves scarce. La Brosse, or Penthievre,
was very glad to purchase the pardon for his defection
upon such easy terms. He married the charming Anne
de Pisseleu, and then, turning his back upon her for ever,
went off to his restored estates in Brittany, where he
lived as a bachelor in very grand style.
Not only the unfortunate Comtesse de Chateaubriand,
but also Marguerite de Valois suffered by the success
of this manoeuvre on the part of Louise de Savoie. Had
Marguerite possessed an aggressive spirit, she would now
have asserted herself. Making the most of all that she
had done for her brother in Spain, where the contagion of
her devotion had been caught by the Spanish grandees,
she could have resumed without difficulty the old
supremacy which she had held over the King before he
had insulted her honour with such ignoble proposals in
the year 1523.
Her nature, however, was not of the aggressive sort.
Therefore, when the brilliant Anne de Pisseleu showed
her jealousy of the sister's influence, and, after the marriage
of Marguerite to the handsome young King of Navarre,
requested Francois to send her away with her husband to
distant Beam, her sole remonstrance was to indulge in
copious tears. She wept, as she herself said, " enough to
melt a flint," but she gave way and went off into a species
of exile with Henri d' Albret.
It was a poor Kingdom, but one of great natural beauty,
to which she went, and possessing two capitals, Nerac in
the north, surrounded with poor uncultivated lands, and
Pau in the south, in full view of the snow-crowned
Pyrenees. Once she had established herself in Nerac and
Pau, Marguerite, in whom there sprung strongly the
spirit of the Renaissance, set herself to work to transform
everything, to make gardens where formerly the briar
alone had flourished. Sending for architects from Italy,
this intelligent Princess soon caused her surroundings to
show the effect of her cultivated mind and refined taste.
In a short time the castles of Pau and NeYac were entirely
changed, the old bare aspect of feudality was abolished
Liberty and a New Mistress 307
and elegant Italian art renovated the ancient dwellings.
They soon became not merely comfortable but beautiful
residences, worthy of the habitation of a Queen with
modern ideas, one who loved to surround herself with
all the men of talent, all the learned savants of the day.
She contrived, nevertheless, to pay numerous visits to
her brother's Court. Indeed, the state of her finances,
which, owing to her pensions not being paid by the
ungrateful King, compelled her to enact the part of a
Royal beggar, forced her at times to seek him where she
could find him, to endeavour to obtain her rights. It
was at the King's castle at Blois that her son was born.
He died, and at Pau, on the yth of January 1528, was
born her daughter Jeanne.
When this girl had attained two years of age, Francois
inflicted a cruel blow upon his sister. Under the pretence
that her parents might marry Jeanne to a Spanish Prince —
which, owing to the neglect of Navarrese interests by
Francois, Henri d'Albret was indeed later anxious to do —
Francois took her away, and installed her in the strongly
fortified Castle of Plessis-les-Tours. This ancient chateau
he presented to the child, and there she was brought up,
away from her mother's influence.
CHAPTER XXXIV
The Holy League of Cognac
1526
T^RANCOIS I. had hardly got back into his own
L country than three messengers were sent after him
in succession, to ask him to confirm the Treaty of Madrid.
To the two first, Louis de Prae't and Ugo de Moncada,
he returned evasive answers. To the third, Charles de
Lannoy, who followed the King to Cognac in Saintonge,
Fran9ois replied that he had no right to dismember his
Kingdom, that all the officials of his country said so, and
that Burgundy herself had distinctly refused to be
separated from France. Under these circumstances he
offered to pay the Emperor a money ransom in place of
Burgundy, which he refused to deliver over.
While communicating these evil tidings to his master,
the long-headed Lannoy, who always knew what he was
about, wrote : " I beg you to give me leave to go off at
once to Naples, for the practices of the Pope, of England,
France, and Venice, are such that it is high time that I
arrived there to improve matters."
The Emperor, who had been married but a short time
previously to his attractive cousin Isabella of Portugal,
was terribly cast down on receipt of the information
which stamped him in the eyes of Europe as a fool, and
one who had been taken in with his eyes open.
He had not anticipated such bad news, but, on the
contrary, having made peace with Fra^ois and con-
308
The Holy League of Cognac 309
summated his marriage, was looking forward to entering
Italy peacefully, in order to be crowned by the Pope with
the Imperial crown. Thence he proposed to go to
Germany, to crush the Lutherans, who were gaining ground
immensely, and to Austria, to drive back the Turks, who
were advancing upon Vienna. By the disloyal action of
Fran9ois in refusing to execute the Treaty of Madrid,
Charles found himself in a quandary, all of his projects
were upset, and for the time he felt crushed. Lee,
the English Ambassador, wrote to Henry VIII. con-
cerning his condition of melancholy : " Sire, the Emperor
is marvellously altered since his marriage. He is full
of dumps and solitary, musing sometimes three and
four hours together. There is no mirth nor comfort
in him."
What happened in Italy was briefly this. Instigated
in a great measure by the revengeful Wolsey and
Henry VIII., who declared that the Emperor was aiming
at universal Sovereignty, the Pope had got up a coalition
against Charles in the month of May 1526. Clement VII.
and the Doge of Venice both sent envoys to Francis
at Cognac to ask him to join this combination, of which
they said that the object was the putting of the Duke
Sforza in full possession of his Duchy, the restoration of
the States of Italy to the position they had been in
before the war, and the recovery of the children of the
King of France in return for a money ransom.
To this league, called the Holy League of Cognac,
Fran£ois very readily acceded ; but the amusing part of
the matter was that the confederates actually had the
effrontery to send and ask Charles himself to join this
Holy League — against himself!
The Emperor, containing his rage, pretended, in order
to gain time, to act in a conciliatory manner to the Pope ;
but when his Ambassador, the Duke of Sessa, asked
Clement VII. if he intended to make war on the Emperor,
as, if so, he had better leave to join the camp, he received
a fiery reply.
" You are quite at liberty to go or stay, as you please,"
310 Two Great Rivals
thundered the Pontiff ; " but when I make war, you will
find it out to the sound of the trumpets."
Three envoys — from France, the Pope, and Venice —
arrived shortly after this, to politely invite Charles to
resign Burgundy, to restore the King's sons, to withdraw
his troops from Lombardy, and to join the League.
Each of these envoys addressed him in turn. His reply
to the Papal Nuncio was guardedly conciliatory, but
Charles ended it up by saying : " To give up the sons
of the King of France is out of the question. In that
matter I am like Balaam's ass. The more he was
spurred to make him go on, the more he jibbed."
Jean de Calvimont, the envoy of Fra^ois, found,
however, that he had caught a Tartar. In an insolent
speech this self-sufficient Magistrate had cc summoned
and commanded " the Emperor, in the name of the
Very Christian King, to make a reasonable peace and
to give up his children for a money ransom.
In a biting reply the Emperor said, speaking angrily :
" Your King has deceived me : I will never believe
him again ; and he will never gain his ends by force
as long as there remains a stone in my Kingdoms. I
showed liberality and magnanimity towards him, while
he has shown cowardice and perfidy to me. He has
neither acted as a true Knight nor a true gentleman,
but evilly and falsely. I now demand from you, as his
Ambassador, that the Very Christian King shall keep
his faith, which he gave me, to become my prisoner again
if he did not keep his word." Charles ended by a
challenge : " Would to God that this dispute might be
decided between us two, body to body, rather than by
exposing so many Christians to death. God would show
on which side justice lay."
Calvimont did not dare to repeat the Emperor's provo-
cation to his master, but Francois learned later of all
that had been said, when he in turn sent a challenge to
Charles, which nearly resulted in a duel between the two
Monarchs.
Charles now sent Moncada to the Pope, to try to
The Holy League of Cognac 311
separate him from the King of France. He gave him
cunning instructions, to rub well into Clement VII. the
fact that Fran9ois had expressed himself as being perfectly
willing to deliver over Italy into his hands, without con-
cerning himself about the interests of the Pope or any
one else.
The meeting between Moncada and the Pope only
resulted in a quarrel, in which the envoy threatened the
Pontiff with the ruin of the Apostolic throne. The
usually weak-kneed Clement was now thoroughly
frightened, but he felt that he had gone too far to recede,
and apologetically said that he could not now honourably
separate himself from his allies.
Both Moncada and Sessa left the Pope with threats,
and they wrote off at once to the Emperor, to beg him to
send Bourbon back to Lombardy and Lannoy to Naples
at once, and at the same time to send money to pay the
soldiers.
As we have already explained, the cause of all the dis-
content in Italy was the conduct of the soldiers of the
Imperial army. When Bourbon arrived to take over the
command left vacant by the death of Pescara, he found a
strange condition of affairs. The forces had formed
themselves into a kind of military republic, which be-
haved as it chose, and even condemned one of its own
Generals to death.
The principal leaders of this military vampire, which
was sucking the life-blood out of Lombardy, were the
Marquis del Guasto and, that bold defender of Pavia, the
ferocious Antonio da Leyva.
Italy seemed unable to do anything against these
tyrants ; even Venice was frightened and trembled. The
General of the Venetian Republic was the Duke of
Urbino, who was placed in command of the newly levied
troops of the Holy League. His caution, however,
was so great that whenever he had an opportunity of
fighting successfully he lost it by making a judicious
retreat.
Meanwhile, the unpaid soldiers of Charles V. went on
312 Two Great Rivals
living just as they chose ; they quartered themselves in
such houses as suited them, and made their unwilling
hosts not only feed them but supply them with money.
Should they prove recalcitrant, they were strangled. The
wives and daughters of the citizens of Milan were looked
upon by these ruffians as their lawful prey. Day after
day, night after night, could be heard the screams of out-
raged women, of gentle ladies undergoing horrors worse
than death. But there were none to help them, the
rascally soldiery were supreme, and any resistance on the
part of the victims, or any attempt at rescue, was met by
the foulest of murder.
In their despair, many of those ladies who suffered at
the hands of these Spanish demons hanged themselves or
threw themselves from the windows. When the Due
de Bourbon arrived in Milan, the people hoped that
better times had come. The nobles and civic dignitaries
came and cast themselves at his feet, they humbly begged
him to have mercy upon their unfortunate city. Bourbon
replied kindly, and said that since all of these troubles
were merely the result of want of pay for the troops, the
matter could be remedied. All that was necessary was
that the city of Milan should raise the sum of thirty
thousand ducats for a month's pay. With that in hand,
in a short time he would be able to lead the soldiers away
elsewhere.
Wringing their hands, the impoverished citizens, who
had been mulcted over and over again, set about to try
to raise the money. The thirty thousand ducats were
found, somehow, and given to Bourbon — and then,
instead of removing the troops, he left them where they
were.
His difficulties about raising money were, however, very
great, as the Emperor, impecunious as usual, had left the
Due unprovided with the wherewithal, not for the men's
pay only, but for the necessary munitions of war. Among
other expedients to which Bourbon resorted was that of
granting his life and liberty to Girolamo Morone, whose
sentence of death for his plot with Pescara had never been
The Holy League of Cognac 313
carried out. In return for his pardon, Morone paid the
sum of twenty thousand ducats, and he was clever enough
soon to win his way into the good graces of the Due de
Bourbon.
This talented old man, who was upwards of fourscore,
soon became the prime favourite of the Due, into whose
mind he instilled the suspicion that the Emperor, in
promising him the Duchy of Milan, had been merely
playing with him, and was using, moreover, the other
Spanish Generals to spy upon his actions. After his
deception concerning Eleonore, Bourbon was only too
ready to believe anything. In Morone he found, how-
ever, an enterprising counsellor, and one who shortly
put into his head the idea that startled the whole Christian
world when it was acted upon. This was nothing less
than a march across Italy, in order to attack the Pope
in Rome.
Only a short time previously the Cardinal Pompeo
Colonna, with other members of that great Roman
family, having been stirred up by Moncada after his
angry parting with Clement VII., had marched to attack
the Pope, who had excommunicated the Colonna, was the
deadly enemy of their race, and had annexed their posses-
sions. When at the gates of Rome an agreement had
been come to with the Pope. Clement, who had been in
considerable fear, revoked his excommunication against
the Cardinal, upon the understanding that the Colonna
were to resign their claims to the seigneuries they had
held previously in the Papal States as the Pope's vassals.
Ugo de Moncada and the Colonna were merely playing
a game with the Pope which he did not see through ; but
Clement, who thought he had done a very clever thing,
stipulated that these allies of the Emperor were to dis-
band their troops altogether or send them to Naples.
The Pope then foolishly disbanded his own forces in
Rome, with the exception of three hundred men, after
which Cardinal Pompeo Colonna, with Moncada,
promptly marched back again to Rome, and took the
city by surprise on September 2Oth, 1526.
3H Two Great Rivals
While the Pope with all his Cardinals rushed for
safety to the Castle of Sant' Angelo, the troops of
Pompeo Colon na pillaged at their leisure the Papal
palacey and likewise the Cardinals' residences, to their
hearts' content.
At first Clement talked very big in his place of refuge
about " taking a pike in his hand and fighting under the
walls for his life," but in two days, finding himself short
of food, he sang another tune altogether.
Moncada, after taking a couple of Cardinals for
hostages, entered the castle and treated with Clement,
who made a truce for four months with the Emperor, on
behalf of himself and all the vassals of the Holy See. By
this truce he was obliged not only to restore to the
Colonna all their former possessions, but also to with-
draw all his troops then in the neighbourhood of Milan.
By this smart trick on the part of Ugo de Moncada
the Holy League was deprived of the Papal forces both
by land and sea, for Clement's galleys were withdrawn
from the fleet of the League before Genoa at the same
time as his Milanese troops were recalled.
Clement VII. was, however, a man who never fulfilled
his engagements to the letter. Accordingly, under the
false pretence that they were in the pay of the King of
France, he left that famous condottiere Giovanni de'
Medici, with four thousand men of the Italian Black
Bands, with the army of the Holy League under the
Duke of Urbino.
With this army of twenty-four thousand men Urbino
took the city of Cremona, after a siege of seven weeks,
but, with his usual caution, this General failed to attack
Bourbon, whose forces were greatly reduced owing to
sickness, in Milan.
The most that the commander of the army of the
League ventured to do was to make a feeble attempt to
prevent provisions from entering Milan, by blocking the
approaches. Bourbon, who was a General of entirely
another calibre, had made arrangements to upset this
design. Having succeeded in obtaining some money
The Holy League of Cognac 315
from the Emperor, Bourbon had written to George
von Frundsberg to bring him a force of lansquenets
from Germany, and with their arrival, instead of re-
maining on the defensive, this bold General proposed
to assume the offensive, and to treat all the forces of
the Holy League to something that they were far from
expecting in the way of a surprise.
CHAPTER XXXV
Charles at Twenty^six, Mentally and Physically
1526
r~T'HE onslaught of, that savage Cardinal and soldier,
1 Pompeo Colonna had proved to Bourbon that it would
be by no means a difficult business to take Rome. The diffi-
culty was, however, to get there, and first of all to join forces
with the old warrior Frundsberg, who was threatened by
the Duke of Urbino. This corpulent old man had with
difficulty crossed the snow-clad Alps, with thirteen thousand
Germans, into Italy. It was the month of November,
and the bold commander had to be pushed or carried the
greater part of the way through the mountain passes.
Urbino soon left the blockade of Milan, and went,
with half of his army, of which a large proportion of the
troops were Swiss, to prevent Frundsberg from joining
Bourbon. With him he took the intrepid Giovanni de'
Medici and the Black Bands, ten thousand Venetians,
and a quantity of cavalry. The rest of his forces he
foolishly left behind him at Vauri, in a fortified camp,
under the Savoyard Marquis de Saluces or Saluzzo, who
commanded the troops paid by the King of France. Had
Urbino only taken his full force, he could have crushed
Frundsberg easily ; as it was, his manoeuvres but showed
his incapacity. The body that he took with him was not
strong enough to easily smash up the lansquenets, while
the troops left behind with Saluces could not cope with
Bourbon.
Owing to the forethought of Charles V., who, with
316
Charles at Twenty^six, Mentally and Physically 317
grim determination, had been laying himself out to crush
the Holy League, while Fra^ois was giving himself over
to idleness and dissipation, he had obtained the alliance
and assistance of the warlike but changeable Alfonso
d'Este, Duke of Ferrara, who had now supplied Frunds-
berg with some artillery, which he greatly needed. Charles
had also by most determined efforts contrived to get
together a fleet, which he sent under Lannoy and Alarcon
with ten thousand men from Spain for the defence of Naples.
Lannoy had now been created Prince of Sulmona, and
Alarcon Marquis of Valle Siciliana, in reward of their
former services, and their fidelity to Charles was, as usual,
unbounded. Although attacked by the famous Genoese
Admiral, Andrea Doria, who was in the service of
Francois, they contrived to get away from him and to
land all their forces at Gaeta. In addition to the money
which Bourbon had sent to Frundsberg, by way of the
Tyrol, Charles had also sent this old German General an
extra fifty thousand ducats by way of Flanders, so that
there should be no question of his men going without
their pay— the Emperor, in fact, left no stone unturned
to get even with the treacherous Fra^ois and his Italian
allies.
As may have already been noticed, the young Emperor's
nature was one more given to reflection than promptness
of action — he thought for a long time before making up
his mind to a step ; but when he had decided, his power of
will was so great that he became, as he himself said, as
obstinate as Balaam's ass. Like the tortoise in the fable,
by his slow but steady perseverance Charles very fre-
quently arrived at the goal first in the end, after utterly
discomfiting foes who had started off in a hurry and with
a great flourish of trumpets.
The way that he started out to combat the Holy
League of Cognac was an example of the steadiness with
which he pursued his purpose. Perfectly aware of the
unreliability of the 'powerful Duke of Ferrara, he did all
in his power to win him to his side. Although the Due
de Bourbon was his Lieutenant-General and Commander-
3i 8 Two Great Rivals
in-Chief, Charles persuaded him not to decline to bestow
upon Alfonso d'Este the rank of Captain-General in
Italy, he conferred upon d'Este the coveted investiture of
the Duchy of Modena, which Clement had refused to
him, gave him the confiscated County of Carpi, and
promised to connect himself with him by marriage. It
will be remembered that Charles was the father of a
natural daughter, named Marguerite. This child, who
was still very young, he promised to the Duke of
Ferrara for his son Hercules, whom he had had by his
union with the beautiful Lucrezia Borgia.
Having made all these advances to Alfonso d'Este,
Charles wrote to Bourbon: "By the investiture which
we have given to him, and the homage he has caused his
Ambassador to make to us, as well as by the marriage of
our bastard that we have accorded to him, he must of
necessity declare himself for us, and render himself entirely
suspicious to the Pope." In this wise combination Charles
proved himself to be correct, for when Clement VII. sent
Guicciardini at last to concede to the Duke of Ferrara all
he wanted, including the cession of Rubiera and Reggio,
Church territory which he had recently occupied, Alfonso
d'Este replied that it was too late to treat, and that as
the Emperor had already conferred Rubiera and Reggio
upon him, he wanted nothing now from the Pope.
Having worked the Duke of Ferrara successfully,
Charles had proceeded at the same time to employ the
cunning of his brain equally against Fran£ois, in order to
render him suspicious to his Italian confederates. France,
probably entirely as a blind, had sent him an envoy,
named Danjay, charged with peace negotiations. There-
upon the Emperor wrote to Lannoy : " I am well warned
that they are nothing but fine words, but I will pay them
back in the same coin. I have consented to allow the
Sieur Danjay to come to me simply by doing so to instil
suspicion into the minds of the Italians, the Pope and the
Venetians, and fill them up so with jealousy that they
will be" anxious to be rid of their engagements with the
Very Christian King."
Charles at Twenty'Six, Mentally and Physically 319
From the two examples just given, it will be seen
that the Emperor was a very long-headed young man.
He was, although as yet he had taken no personal
part in warfare, of a bold and courageous disposition.
We have a picture of his person at this time from
the pen of Caspar Contarini, who had recently been
Venetian Ambassador in Spain ; and since, while we are
talking about the Emperor's mental capacity, we may
as well consider his bodily qualities also, we will now
describe him as he appeared between the ages of twenty-
six and twenty-seven, in Contarini's own words, as follows :
" He is of ordinary stature, neither tall nor short ; his
complexion is white, rather pale than coloured. He has
an aquiline nose, grey eyes, the chin too much advanced,
and an aspect which is grave without being either hard or
severe. His body is well proportioned, his leg very well
formed, his arm strong, and both in the joustings of arms
and in tilting at the ring he is as adroit as any Knight of
his Court, no matter who it may be."
It may be added that Charles was very religious, some-
what addicted to the pleasures of the chase, and, although
not libertine like Fra^ois L, not always faithful to his
marriage vows, although apparently attached to his wife
Isabella. In his manner he was not affable, unless it was
when he found himself in his Flemish dominions, when he
would unbend ; he was inclined to be mean, and he talked
but little. He was never happier than when presiding
and negotiating at the head of his Council ; the govern-
ment of the affairs of his various countries occupied
him incessantly. A remarkable trait in the character of
this self-contained Prince was that he never exulted in
moments of triumph, nor did he allow himself, except
by unusual silence, to appear cast down when evil
days came upon him. During that silence, as recently
seen when he had learned of the treachery of his released
prisoner Fra^ois L, Charles was revolving in his mind
how best he might right matters. The Emperor was
most assiduous as a worker, and it was owing to his
constant application and scheming that, as in this instance
Two Great Rivals
of the Holy League of Cognac, he often contrived to
defeat his enemies as much by cunningly calculated nego-
tiations as by the success of his arms in the field. Had
Charles but been quicker in his deliberations, and had he
but had the command of money equal to his ambitions,
he might have been the Alexander of Europe.
Even limited as he was in these two respects, the manner
in which for half a century he contrived to maintain himself
and retain all his vast possessions in the face of so many
foes compels our admiration, and stamps the Emperor
Charles V. as having been, if not one of the best, certainly
one of the most remarkable Monarchs that ever reigned.
CHAPTER XXXVI
Bourbon's Dash on Rome
1527
TTRANCOIS I. was, as we have mentioned, enjoying
r himself thoroughly now that he had got back to
France. He had apparently entirely forgotten the
existence of the fair Eleonore, whom he had kissed upon
the lips and who had danced the fandango so prettily
before him at Toledo. She, poor infatuated creature,
after following the so-called husband, whom Lannoy had
married for her in prison, as far as Vittoria, had, by her
brother's orders, been compelled in the dreary winter
season once more to traverse the whole length of Spain to
return from Vittoria to Toledo.
Fran9ois now had other lips, and far fresher ones, to
kiss than those of a widowed Queen with a little girl of
her own. In the first flush of his passion for Anne de
Pisseleu, he was not neglecting his opportunities in this
respect, while varying the amusement afforded by the gay
sallies of his new mistress by continual indulgence in the
pleasures of the chase.
Meanwhile, in Lombardy, the Due de Bourbon was
having trouble with his men, who were becoming mutinous.
For the second time since this Prince of the Blood had
taken service under the banner of Charles V., he pawned
his jewels and golden chains to satisfy them, and
he likewise persuaded Antonio da Leyva, the Marquis
del Vasto, and other high officers to do the same. He
also promised the soldiers the spoils of Florence and
321 21
322 Two Great Rivals
Rome. Leaving Leyva to keep Milan, Bourbon marched
out in the beginning of January 1527, and before the
middle of February he managed to unite forces with
Frundsberg, who had been recently joined by the young
Prince Philibert of Orange.
Shortly before this junction the Duke of Urbino had
made a half-hearted attack upon Frundsberg's rear-guard.
He was very sorry for himself, however, when a ball from
one of the Duke of Ferrara's cannons shattered the leg of
his bold young leader of the Black Bands, especially as the
spirited Giovanni de' Medici died of the wound a few days
later in Mantua.
Just after the Due de Bourbon had started in the
direction of Bologna, the Viceroy of Naples, without re-
ference to Bourbon, arranged a short truce with the Pope.
This would have been a clever enough arrangement on
the part of Clement VII. had he only been man enough
to keep his engagements. For the last month or two the
Pope had been trembling and shifting about between the
League and the Imperialists, first asking the one to help
him, then asking the others to treat.
Henry VIII., too, was not forgotten in his demands
for money, while as for the Very Christian King, he was
pressed to give more speedy and material aid in the war,
one of the objects of which was the recovery of his own
sons.
It was, however, in vain for the Papal Nuncio to en-
deavour to stir up Francois to activity, nor was the King
greatly moved when the Pope's envoy said: "Come your-
self, Sire, with the troops that you promised, and then
yours will be all the glory. Otherwise the Emperor will
crush us, to your eternal disgrace." Francois, who was
just then becoming very interested in a plan for building
a grand palace at Chambord, seemed for the time being not
to care a fig for military glory. He made new promises,
to send troops and a fleet to attack Naples, but personally
made no movement in the nature of leaving his amuse-
ments to take command of those troops. Fransois, who
always spoke beautifully, and could see perfectly well and
Bourbon's Dash on Rome 323
quickly just what ought to be done in an emergency, was,
however, lazy and entirely wanting in the application of
Charles V. He put off the Nuncio, therefore, by telling
him all that he was going to do, and further sent messages
to the Pope, to the effect that, if he only remained faithful
to the League, the King of England would very soon
send him a large sum by the hand of his Ambassador,
Sir John Russell.
Having sent these comforting messages, but nothing
else, Fran9ois went off for a gay hunting party into
Champagne, and nothing more was heard of him for over
a fortnight. When, upon his return from this expedition,
he heard of the truce between the Emperor and the Pope,
he expressed to the Nuncio great irritation with His
Holiness, but boasted that he, Henry VIII., and the
Venetians would be well able alone to resist the tyranny
of the Emperor, who, he said, would soon reduce
Clement VII. to the rank of a simple priest.
On the very day that the Pope concluded this truce,
his army won a victory over the Spanish and Italian
troops from Naples, commanded by Lannoy and Cardinal
Pompeo Colonna, in front of a place called Frosinone.
Learning this news, the unstable Pope instantly broke his
truce and joined the Holy League once more.
Hearing of this last lightning change, Fra^ois, who
was delighted, sent to arrange for a marriage between one
of his sons and the Pope's young relative, Catherine,
daughter of Lorenzo de' Medici, who had been unjustly
created Duke of Urbino by his uncle Leo X. This
was the famous Catherine de' Medici, and her father
being long since dead, she was known before her marriage
to Henri of France as Duchess of Urbino, although by
rights that title only belonged to the House of Delia
Eovere, in the person of Francesco Maria Delia Rovere,
Duke of Urbino, the commander of the forces of the
Holy League.1
1 The mother of Catherine de' Medici was, the French Princess, Made-
leine de la Tour d'Auvergne. Catherine was born April I3th, 1519, and
both her father and mother died within a month of her birth.
324 Two Great Rivals
Shortly after this matrimonial engagement had been
entered into, the shilly-shallying Pope, becoming more
frightened than ever, made a new truce — one which did
not include his allies of France and Venice. This time it
was a definite one with the Emperor's Equerry, Cesare
Feramosca, whom Lannoy had sent to Rome on behalf of
his master. For Charles, above everything, sought to
carry out his plan of separating the vacillating Clement
from Fran9ois I., after accomplishing which he proposed
to send Bourbon and his army into Venetian territory,
there to live as they chose at the expense of the
Republic.
Clement, by this last truce, which indeed resembled a
treaty of peace, promised to pay sixty thousand ducats
to the soldiers of Bourbon's army, who were more
mutinous than ever and clamouring for their pay. The
sum was, of course, not nearly enough for the required
purpose, and when Feramosca hurried ofF to Bourbon
near Bologna, to tell him of the truce and request him
to retire, he found the Imperial army halted and in want
of everything. There were no provisions in the camp,
the men were in rags and had no boots, and, to make
things worse, the rains were terrible. This was in the
middle of March 1527, and the mutinous Spanish soldiers
had even pillaged the Due de Bourbon's tent, and would
have killed him had he not fled from them to George
von Frundsberg and the German lansquenets.
The lansquenets were, however, no better than the
Spaniards, and it was in vain that their formerly beloved
commander sought to appease them when they sur-
rounded him, demanding instant payment of the sums
owing to them. It was without any result that
Frundsberg called them " his children," and begged them
to have a little more patience ; they would not listen to
him. At last, overcome by the tumult, Frundsberg
fell down in the midst of his angry soldiers, being stricken
with apoplexy.
This blow to their brave and able leader brought the
lansquenets to reason, and they vainly did all in their
Bourbon's Dash on Rome 325
power to save him. They carried him to Ferrara, where
he died in a few days' time.
After the death of his most trusted General, Bourbon
contrived to borrow from the Duke of Ferrara just
enough money to pay all the troops a ducat a man.
They seemed appeased, the more so as Bourbon
promised them over again all the riches of Florence and
Rome.
When Feramosca brought the news of the truce, and
gave to Bourbon letters from his old rival Lannoy,
ordering him, on behalf of the Emperor, to conform to
its terms, he was as furious as were his own frantic men.
He made use of the most unbridled language against
Lannoy, and swore furiously. Finally, he told Feramosca
he had better himself explain to the troops the necessity
of going back, for that he would have no hand in the
matter. On the contrary, he would leave the Emperor's
service and his command together. Bourbon knew well
enough what sort of a reception Feramosca would get
from the baffled troops, who were determined to march,
fight, and pillage. They tried to kill him, but Fernando
Gonzaga, the young Marquis of Mantua, a cousin of
Bourbon, contrived to save the wretched man, by giving
him his own horse, after he had been severely ill-
treated.
When Feramosca had got clear away, although in a
very battered condition, from the camp, Bourbon assembled
the Spaniards and the Germans, and asked them what
they wished him to do.
u We wish to go forward," was the vociferous reply of
the soldiers.
" Good ! " responded Bourbon ; " then I will go with
you." Placed as he was, no other reply would have been
possible : he was their servant.
The Marquis del Vasto, however, refused to disobey
the Emperor's orders, and retired from his command to
the city of Ferrara, although the Duke urged him to
remain with him and see the business through to the
bitter end.
326 Two Great Rivals
Accordingly, whether really of his own free will or no,
Bourbon advanced, with his vast assemblage of veteran
and ill-disciplined troops, wandering along in extended
order over a wide territory in the effort to obtain pro-
visions.
The Duke of Urbino with his army of Italians followed
him at a respectful distance. He professed himself unable
to attack until he should be joined by his Swiss troops.
When he was joined by these, he still found excuses from
day to day which made an attack unadvisable.
France was giving but poor help to the Holy League ;
merely a few hundred men-at-arms by way of troops were
sent by Fra^ois, while the galleys despatched to assist in
the attack on Naples were unseaworthy. The Pope,
however, felt secure in his truce with Lannoy ; he had
received some money from Henry VIII. to pay his troops
with, instead of doing which he disbanded nearly all of
them from motives of economy.
He had other reasons for feeling secure, since Bourbon
was writing to him in a respectful manner and deceiving
him as to his intentions.
While thus deceiving the Pope, Bourbon was making
a fool of Lannoy also. Having appointed a place of
meeting with the Viceroy in one direction, he marched
off in another, and, in spite of the spring rains and the
mountain snows, crossed the Apennines and appeared in
Tuscany. A great number of his German soldiers were
bitter Lutherans, longing in their religious hatred to kill
the Pope. Frundsberg himself had been of the Reformed
faith, and a friend of Luther ; the corpulent old man had
worn a golden chain with which he had boasted that he
intended to strangle Clement VII. These men and the
Spaniards now showed an implicit confidence in the
Due de Bourbon ; wherever he chose to lead, they would
follow. Rains, snows, mountains, rivers in flood, were
of no avail to turn them from their course. Like an
army of invading Huns under Attila, they swept onward,
irresistibly onward ; burning, destroying, wasting every-
thing in their path. Poor indeed was the chance of
Bourbon's Dash on Rome 327
existence for the army of Urbino which was supposed to
be following — the country was swept as bare as a board,
it remained one vast scene of desolation when Bourbon
had passed on his way.
Strange indeed was the composition of this army.
Bigoted Spaniards, from a land where, for the sake of
religion, the Moors were at that very time being ruthlessly
destroyed, marched as the best of comrades side by side
with the Lutherans, who never passed a church without
reducing it to ashes. In rear followed a vast mass of
armed Italian brigands, men without any homes, who
had attached themselves to this vast force of desperadoes
in the hopes of sharing in its spoils.
" Rome — let us burn Rome ! the home of Anti-
christ ! " This was the cry of the Germans. Neither
Clement VII. nor any one else outside the army of
Bourbon had, however, any idea that such a sacrilegious
action could be even contemplated, especially in a time
of truce. The advance of Bourbon was looked upon as
merely a sort of military parade, which had for its object
pillage and the ransoming of cities which happened to
be met with on the way.
Lannoy, having found himself treated with disdain
by Bourbon, whom he knew never to have forgiven the
trick played when he had whisked the captive King of
France suddenly off to Spain after Pavia, took care to
keep out of the way of the ferocious soldiery of the
army which had then considered itself defrauded of its
lawful rights. After returning to Rome for a time in
despair, when, at length, Bourbon seemed about to attack
Florence, that birthplace of the illegitimate Medicean
Pope, the Viceroy of Naples repaired to that city, which
was included in the truce made with the Pope, and should
therefore be respected by Bourbon.
Of the Medici family there were then present in
Florence one legitimate and two illegitimate represen-
tatives. The first of these was the child Catherine ; the
others were the handsome youth Ippolito, the bastard of
Giuliano, who was created Due de Nemours, and the
328 Two Great Rivals
ill-favoured Alessandro, who was generally understood to
be the bastard of Pope Clement VII. Of these two
young men, Ippolito was later compelled by the Pope,
against his will, to enter the Church and become a
Cardinal, while Alessandro was married to Marguerite
of Austria, the illegitimate daughter of the Emperor,
and, by the favour of Charles, created Duke of Florence.
The Governor of the city, who had been appointed by
Clement, was Cardinal Posserini of Cortona. Catherine
de' Medici's aunt, the haughty and unamiable Clarice de'
Medici, who was married to Filippo Strozzi, was at this
time absent from Florence, she having been taken to
Naples to be a hostage of the Pope's good faith in the
matter of the truce arranged with Feramosca.
Notwithstanding the fact that Florence was well pre-
pared for a siege, that fact would not have saved the city
from the fury of the soldiers, who had looked forward
to sacking it as a reward for all their miserable marches,
had it not been for Lannoy. He acted as intermediary,
and to escape the terrors of a siege and its probable
consequences, Florence promised to pay up a money
ransom to the invaders.
The Duke of Urbino, who had posted himself in the
neighbourhood, was now joined by the Marquis de
Saluces and the French troops ; but the leader of the
Imperial army had no intention of staying to fight them !
Without waiting for the ransom that Florence had
promised, and which he had rejected as too small, while
informing Lannoy that he must make the Pope double
it, Bourbon now played an entirely unexpected trick.
Leaving his entrenched position near Florence, he marched
off suddenly, almost at a run, in the direction of Rome.
All impedimenta were left behind ; even the guns that
had been received from the Duke of Ferrara were
abandoned. Rome was the goal ; and such was the
incentive of its pillage to the troops that, full of hatred
of the Pope as were both Catholics and Lutherans, the
army soon out-distanced the cavalry sent to follow on
its footsteps.
Bourbon's Dash on Rome 329
In a hurry the Pope, who had again joined the League,
now attempted to arm. The youth of Rome, the servants
of the Cardinals and the Bishops, the artists and painters
— all were enlisted. Those who have read the boasting
memoirs of, that marvellous workman and artist, Ben-
venuto Cellini, will remember how that immoral braggart
armed himself with his arquebus. Clement VII. was,
however, short of money, and when the Pope endeavoured
to raise money from the richest citizens of Rome for
their mutual defence, he was met by the greatest mean-
ness. A French historian tells us : " One of them did
not blush to offer only a few ducats. He wept for it
before long ; if he did not pay up, his daughters paid,
with their body, with their shame, and with the most
disgraceful suffering."
On May 5th, 1527, Bourbon bivouacked with all
his forces, fifty thousand in number, in a semi-circle
outside Rome. He sent in a sarcastic message to the
Pope, requesting permission to march through the city,
as, he said, he wished to go to Naples by that route.
CHAPTER XXXVII
The Awful Sack of Rome
MAY 1527
ON the morning of May 6th, 1527, a thick fog or
mist hung round about the city of Rome.
Clement VII. had shut himself up in the Vatican ;
but, hoping that the Imperialists under Bourbon would
be arrested by Urbino, he had not taken the proper
measures in time for the defence of the Holy City. In
his overweening confidence he had not even allowed the
rich merchants to leave Rome, although, in spite of the
Pope's orders, some of the more prudent were lucky
enough to get off down the Tiber in boats and to reach
Civita Vecchia.
Almost at the last minute Clement entrusted to Renzo
da Ceri, the hero of the defence of Marseilles, the raising
of a force. The celebrated " Capitaine Ranee," as the
French called him, contrived, with the money the Pope
raised by creating half a dozen new Cardinals, to get
together three or four thousand men, some of whom
were old soldiers recently disbanded. Renzo had not,
however, had the time to repair the walls of the city
before Bourbon encamped before them on May 5th,
1527. Rome was, however, not easy to get into, the
Borgo and the Trastevere forming two separate walled
cities. The Vatican was in the Borgo, called also the
Leonine City, and close at hand, connected with the
Vatican by a long stone corridor, was the Castle of
Sant' Angelo.
33°
From a contemporary engraving.
CHARLES DE MONTPENSIER, DUG DE BOURBON,
Constable de France.
P- 33°]
The Awful Sack of Rome 331
After taking the Borgo and the Trastevere, in order
to get into the older and more populous part of Rome,
containing the Forum and the Capitol, which was walled,
it would be necessary for the attacking force to cross
the Tiber by three bridges, which could be easily
defended or destroyed.
May 5th was a Sunday ; and Bourbon, while giving
orders for the construction of scaling ladders, assembled
his captains and told them that they must attack at once.
They all complained that the troops were too tired,
whereupon Bourbon put off the assault until the morrow,
informing the army, however, that if they failed to carry
the city, wherein they would find abundance and riches,
they would most assuredly die of want outside.
In the mist on the morning of May 6th the Borgo
was attacked at daybreak by the German lansquenets,
covered by Spanish arquebus-men.
The Due, on horseback, wore a white cloak over a
silver cuirass, and the boldness of his mien inspired
courage to his followers. Owing to the fog, the artillery
from the walls did but little damage to the assailants,
while, the Spanish arquebus-men keeping up a heavy fire
on the defenders, the scaling ladders were brought up
with ease.
The Due de Bourbon now dismounted, and, taking a
scaling ladder, boldly advanced to scale the western wall
of the Borgo. While mounting the ladder, and thus
setting a brilliant example to his men, the courageous
Due was struck by a bullet in the armpit — a bullet which
Benvenuto Cellini subsequently claimed the honour of
having fired, with what truth it would be hard to say.
The brave hero of so many conflicts was not, however,
killed outright. He gave instructions to his captains not
to be discouraged, and was carried to a chapel, wherein he
received the comforts of religion while his men went on
with their bloody work. By his confessor, Bourbon
transmitted his dying messages to the Emperor. He
said, among other things, that he had come to the Holy
City in spite of himself, and protested that he intended
332 Two Great Rivals
no irreverence to His Holiness. He pointed out to
Charles V. the Prince of Orange as being the most
worthy to receive the government of the Duchy of Milan.
Finally, Bourbon asked the Emperor, in case he should
make a peace with the King of France, to include in its
terms his nephew and heir, the Prince de la Roche-sur-
Yon, and all his gentlemen, servitors, and officers.
The last words of the gallant Charles de Montpensier
— a noble rebel against an ungrateful King — were " To
Rome ! To Rome ! "
While Bourbon was dying, Philibert of Orange had
taken over the command. The lansquenets at first only
went at their work half-heartedly, but the Spanish soldiers
from the commencement of the fight were furious in their
onslaught. Renzo da Ceri, making a bold front within,
took prisoners the first three or four ensigns who con-
trived to penetrate into the city, and drove back their
men, but soon the desperate assailants pouring over the
walls in every direction made short work of the followers
of the gallant Capitaine Ranee, the survivors of whom fled,
dragging Ceri with them.
The Spaniards, yelling a Espana ! Espana ! " and
" Amazza ! Amazza ! " (slay ! slay !) rushing through
the Borgo, and filling it with blood and corpses, pursued
the fugitives to the gates of the Castle of Sant' Angelo,
from which they themselves were only kept out at length
by the lowering of the portcullis.
Upon the bridge of this fortress the French Am-
bassador to Florence, Guillaume du Bellay, who had
hurried on to Rome to warn the Pope, made a brave
stand for a time by the side of Renzo da Ceri.
While thus, sword in hand, Bellay and Ceri thrust and
hewed away with might and main, the Pope was making
his escape from the Vatican into the Castle of Sant'
Angelo. As he hurried along the long gallery which
joined the two, and which had been built as a means of
escape by Alexander VI., the Borgia Pope, Clement VII.
was witness of the most horrible and blood-curdling
sights.
The Awful Sack of Rome 333
Under his eyes, and close at hand, he beheld seven or
eight thousand Romans lying dead, or dying with horrible
wounds from the blows of the pikes, halberds, and
swords. As he hurried along, a Bishop, named Paolo
Giovo, held up the Pope's train in order that he might
get the faster over the ground ; and when he arrived,
amid a host of other fugitives from the Vatican, at an
uncovered bridge leading into the Castle, this Bishop's
presence of mind probably saved the life of Clement VII.
For fear that the Pope would in this exposed position
be recognised in his white rochet, and be shot down by
the enemy so close at hand, the Bishop threw his own
violet cloak over the Pope's shoulders. Amid the
hustling, terror-stricken mass of Cardinals and priests
scurrying over this bridge, Clement therefore passed un-
noticed into Sant' Angelo in safety.
Although the Borgo was lost, Ceri, Bellay, and a small
but brave band of French gentlemen now rushed to the
Capitol, where the Romans were assembled, and begged
them to make an effort to^keep out the Colonna and their
followers, who were approaching on that side.
The Romans, however, would not consent to keeping
out the Colonna, saying that they were their fellow-
citizens, and they, moreover, refused to sacrifice their fine
bridges, which Renzo begged them to cut. Although
the newly raised troops fought fairly well for a time
under Renzo da Ceri to defend the Trastevere, at last
they were seized with panic and fled headlong before the
Imperial troops advancing to the assault under the Prince
of Orange.
Night was commencing to fall when the whole of the
invading army, entering the city, met with no further
resistance. Suspecting a trap, they marched in solid
companies over the undefended bridges. That night the
Spanish veterans and Germans encamped in the open
places, taking all military precautions against a surprise,
but in the morning all discipline was at an end — and then
the sack of Rome commenced.
According to a French writer of the last century :
334 Two Great Rivals
" Never was there a more atrocious scene, a more fearful
carnival of death. The women, the pictures, the stoles,
dragged, drawn pell-mell, torn, sullied, violated, Cardinals
being flogged, Princesses in the arms of the soldiers, a
chaos, an odd mixture of bloody obscenities, of horrible
comedies.
" The Germans, who killed a great deal at the beginning,
and made a Saint Bartholomew of pictures of saints, of
Virgins, were gradually swallowed up in the cellars, paci-
fied. The Spaniards, reflective, sober, horribly experienced
after Milan, snuffed Rome as torture and torment. The
mountaineers of the Abruzzi were likewise execrable.
The worst of it was that the three nations could not
communicate. Ruined and ransomed by one of them,
one fell into the hands of another.'-'
For a whole week the sack of Rome continued. The
Due de Bourbon being dead, there was no acknow-
ledged head to the Imperialist army, and every excess
was indulged in, every outrage that could be committed
by a vast body of fierce, undisciplined men was per-
petrated.
In this ancient city, the headquarters of the Christian
religion, sacrilege and the cruellest robbery were accom-
panied by wholesale violation and arson. The marauding
bands of armed men spared no house, no quarter of the
city, no church. Many of the unhappy Romans had shut
themselves up in their homes with their terrified families
and their most cherished possessions, or with their women
had taken shelter in the places of worship, which they had
vainly imagined would be respected, only to find, to their
horror and despair, that neither house nor sacred edifice
could save their lives or riches from the robber, their
wives or young daughters from the ravisher. Rome
became a vast pool of blood; the streets were running
with gore. All sense of religion was lost : while the
Catholic Spaniards indulged to the full their brutal licen-
tiousness even in the convents of the nuns, the Germans
dressed up asses in the sacerdotal robes of Bishops and
Cardinals, and gambled with courtesans upon the altars
The Awful Sack of Rome 335
of the churches. For an uninterrupted period of eight
days and nights naught could be heard but fierce cries,
screams of agony or dolorous shrieks and wailings in every
street, every palace, and private house, whether belonging
to rich or poor. The Lutheran lansquenets meanwhile,
with the most fiendish delight, were taking especial
pleasure in the pillage of the precious vessels and rich
vestments of the churches and chapels. Universal and
ruthless destruction seemed to be the password. The
images of the saints served as targets for arquebuses ; they
were cast down and smashed, and the most sacred objects,
such as broken crucifixes, trampled and sullied on the
blood-stained floor. The basilicas of Saint Peter and
Saint Paul were used as stables for the horses of the
troops, and, as litter was scarce, priceless books and
manuscripts from the libraries of churchmen or private
persons were torn up and thrown on the floor for the
horses to lie upon.
One of the most horrible features of the sack of Rome
was the grim humour, the terrible practical joking of the
sacrilegious soldiers. When tired for a time of ill-treating
young women, cutting off the ears and fingers of old ones
for their jewels, or murdering men and women indis-
criminately, the rufHans sought relaxation by baiting those
of the Cardinals who had not succeeded in taking refuge
in Sant' Angelo.
The mocking and ill-treating of these Princes of the
Church seemed to afford unlimited sport to the blood-
stained despoilers, and the more so as it was a means of
raising money. The following was an example of the
soldier's jests. A Cardinal, named Araceli, having been
placed in a coffin, was carried by a body of the German
pikem :n into a church. There, with all kinds of obscene
jests, funeral orations were pronounced over him. He
was then borne on his bier to his own palace, where the
soldiers got drunk on the Cardinal's wine, after which
the Cardinal was dragged from his coffin, mounted on a
horse behind a soldier, and taken all round the city to beg
for his ransom.
33 6 Two Great Rivals
Many other Roman Bishops were dragged round the
town tied on to donkeys, accompanied by lansquenets, who
were themselves attired in the richest priestly robes, and
who made a parody of the ceremonies of religion. These
ecclesiastics were also compelled to beg for the benefit of
their tormentors. To excite the pity of such of the
citizens as had anything left to give, the priestly victims
were cruelly beaten from time to time, or pricked with the
points of lances until the blood ran down their robes,
the soldiers meanwhile roaring with laughter at their
contortions.
In the matter of extracting money during this long
period of pillage, the Spaniards proved to be by far the
most successful, as they shrank from no kind of horrible
and cold-blooded torture to force men and women alike
to reveal the hiding-places of their money and jewellery.
The Italians who had accompanied the Imperialist army
were equally pitiless upon their compatriots, and neglected
no cruel or unscrupulous means of extracting the very
last coin from their victims. The lansquenets, after
their first outbreak of licentiousness upon entering the
city, showed far more mercy than the others, and even by
force interfered to prevent the Spaniards and Italians from
satisfying their brutal passions at the expense of defence-
less young girls, whose natural protectors had been
massacred. So long as they could find enough to eat
and especially to drink, and could collect enough money,
grand clothes, and golden chains to satisfy their wants,
they were content to ride round in state on the Pope's
mules and those of the Cardinals, without inflicting torture
or ill-treating the women.
With a beautiful impartiality, the soldiers of the three
nations plundered the palaces of their friends, and exacted
ransom from them, equally with those of their enemies.
Although Bourbon's cousin, the Marquis of Mantua,
commanded a force of Italians in the army, the palace
in which his mother resided was forced, in spite of his
prayers, and those who had taken refuge therein were
compelled to pay a ransom of fifty thousand ducats.
The Awful Sack of Rome 337
The Ambassador of Portugal, a country at that time
so very closely connected by ties of blood and marriage
with the Emperor, did not escape either. His palace
was pillaged from the basement to the attic.
As may be well imagined, in the hot climate of a
Roman May, with the streets full of blood and unburied
corpses rotting in the sun, the stench in the city soon
became unbearable. The air was filled by flies in millions,
and the horrible condition of Rome became such that it
was impossible to bring food into the city for fear of its
becoming polluted. The result was that first famine fell
upon the inhabitants and then the plague broke out in
fury, attacking the soldiers and the citizens alike, when
none who died were buried.
A Frenchman named Grolier, who was an eye-witness
of all these terrible horrors, has left a description of the
condition of Rome after these eight days of massacre and
unbridled licence.
He says : u When it became possible to do so I went
out. As I advanced in the direction of the Forum, the
horror, the silence, the solitude, the infection, the fetid
corpses lying stretched here and there, froze me with
terror.
"The houses were open, the doors torn down, the
shops empty, and in the deserted streets one only saw
running a few savage and uncouth soldiers."
Such, then, was the sack of Rome, and while it lasted
Clement VII., with many Cardinals, and a mass of Roman
nobles, merchants, and women, remained a prisoner in the
castle of Sant' Angelo, which was besieged and frequently
bombarded, although with little effect, owing to there
being no kind of control over its assailants. For three
weeks longer, until June yth, 1527, the Pope held out
— and then he capitulated.
22
CHAPTER XXXVIII
Francis Builds and the Pope Escapes
1527 — 1528
IF Pope Clement VII. had only had sufficient sense in
his head, he need never have undergone the humilia-
tion of the long captivity in Sant' Angelo to which he
was condemned by Charles V. after his surrender. Even
after the Imperialists had entered Rome, and for several
days afterwards, the left bank of the Tiber was free, and
he could easily have made his escape in that direction.
Sense, however, was not a quality with which Giulio de'
Medici was overburdened, and therefore, foolishly count-
ing on his approaching deliverance by the troops of the
Holy League, he remained where he was, besieged in
the crowded castle, to endure untold misery owing to the
heats of the summer and the stench of the dead bodies
rotting in the streets.
The Confederates of the League, however, did nothing
to help this misguided Pope. On the evening after the
savage troops of Bourbon had entered Rome, an Italian
captain of the League, named Guido Rangone, arrived with
a small army close to the walls, but he retired again without
attempting to relieve Sant' Angelo, which was not yet
surrounded, and from which the occupants might have
been rescued without much difficulty.
As for the Duke of Urbino, he did what might have
been expected of him — nothing. After making a very
slow and sedate march from the neighbourhood of
Florence, he arrived near Rome sixteen days after its
338
Francois Builds and the Pope Escapes 339
capture. He then posted himself at a place called Nepi,
where he talked vaguely of several plans for relieving the
Pope, but attempted none. Although the Pontifical
Lieutenant, Francesco Guicciardini, represented to him
how easy it would be to deliver Sant' Angelo from the
disorganised invaders, Urbino refused to move from
Nepi, and presently marched away again with the whole
of his fine army. He had formerly been grossly ill-treated
by the Medici Pope Leo X., and by this action gratified his
revenge upon the whole Medici family.1
The result was that, in spite of Guillaume du Bellay
and Renzo da Ceri, who were shut up with him, Clement
insisted upon yielding himself and the thirteen Cardinals
with him into captivity. Renzo and the other Captains
of Fran9ois I. were allowed to go free, while the valiant
Alarcon entered Sant' Angelo and, after having been the
gaoler of the King of France, now became that of the
Pope of Rome, whom he guarded closely.
The wretched Clement was now compelled to pay an
enormous subsidy and to yield up three fortresses, and,
in addition, the three cities, concerning the possession of
which the Popes were eternally squabbling, Parma,
Piacenza, and Modena.
Seven Cardinals, who were given over as hostages to
the army for the payment of the promised subsidy, under-
went the most miserable treatment. On several occasions
they were led out to execution with ropes round their
necks, but reprieved by the soldiers when a large sum
of money was paid over.
In the meantime a great part of Europe received with
indifference the news of the capture of a Pope — the Vicar
of God — and the profanation of the Holy City. Indeed,
throughout the greater part of Germany the news was
received with shouts of joy and derision. " Christ," said
the followers of Luther, " has now been delivered by the
capture of Antichrist."
When Charles V. was informed of what had taken place,
1 The Duke of Urbino was the nephew of Pope Julius II. (Giuliano Delia
Rovere). He had been deprived by Leo X. of his title and his dominions.
34° Two Great Rivals
the hypocrisy with which he behaved was amusing, and
typical of the man. The devout young Emperor expressed
himself as being dreadfully shocked at the profanity of the
action of his Italian army, and he even gave orders for his
Court to go into deep mourning out of sympathy with
the Holy Father, who had been so grossly insulted.
At the same time, while going about with an expression
of the deepest grief upon his countenance, the foxy
Charles was determined to draw every possible advantage
from the misfortunes of Clement VII. Accordingly, far
from giving orders for his release, he sent instructions to
Alarcon to hold his prisoner tight until further orders.
The Emperor was not the only one to take advantage
of the downfall of the trimming, vacillating Clement,
The city of Florence rose against the Pope's Governor,
the Cardinal of Cortona. The Pope's statue was thrown
down, the Medici were expelled, their arms defaced, and
a Republic once more proclaimed by the turbulent citizens.
Florence was much dearer to the heart of Giulio de'
Medici than was Rome itself, and he was ready therefore
to abase himself to any extent to the Emperor for the
sake of recovering what was now the most important city
in Italy. In the last days of 1527 the Pope contrived
to escape from Sant' Angelo, in the disguise of a gardener,
and to reach the almost inaccessible mountain city of
Orvieto, where he took possession of the Bishop's dila-
pidated palace. In this miserable place he was visited by
Doctors Foxe and Gardiner, the Ambassadors of Henry
VIII. , who have left behind them a description of the
appearance of penury of the tumbledown palace, and of
the Pope's own miserable surroundings.
Henry VIII. at this time had made up his mind that
he could not possibly exist longer without the possession
of the fair Anne Boleyn. Since, however, that young
lady absolutely declined to yield to the passion of the
amorous King and become his mistress, he had just deter-
mined by hook or by crook to get rid of his wife Catherine
of Aragon, and to marry Anne. The envoys Foxe and
Gardiner accordingly came to find Clement on his mountain-
Francois Builds and the Pope Escapes 34 l
top at Orvieto, being bound on a very particular mission.
This was nothing less than to ask the Pope to accord
to Henry a divorce from his wife, on the grounds that,
having been his brother Arthur's wife before she was his
own, the marriage had been illegal from the very beginning.
In the fix in which he found himself, Clement VII.
was very anxious to be able to oblige any Monarch who
could be of use to him. The question was which of
the two, Henry VIII. or Charles V., could be of the
most use to him at that particular juncture. The one, who
had given him money, lived a very long way off, and had
not a single man in Italy. The other, from whom the
Pope was in hiding, had Italy full of ferocious soldiers, and
was talking of coming in person before long to compel
the Pope to crown him as Emperor. Also, as it happened,
Catherine of Aragon was the aunt of Charles. It seemed
therefore to Clement that it would be rather a dangerous
matter for him to grant a divorce, to brand the Emperor's
aunt as having been living in nothing but an immoral
union, and to pronounce his cousin, the Princess Mary,
illegitimate.
Placed thus between two stools, the Pope took care
not to break with Henry and at the same time not to
offend the Emperor. He contrived to put off giving
a direct answer about the divorce, telling the Ambassadors
that he had no doubt that the matter would be arranged,
but that it would require a little time and consideration.
With this reply the impatient Henry was forced to be
contented, and not long afterwards Clement, having
arranged matters with Charles V., was able to leave
Orvieto, and to return in the spring of 1528 to his
pillaged Vatican, in his ruined city of Rome.
Henry VIII., who had no cause to be pleased with
the Pope, had at this time a greater cause of dis-
satisfaction with his nephew the Emperor, who had failed
to marry his English cousin Mary, now aged eleven,
and taken instead his Portuguese cousin Isabella, who
very soon presented him with a son. This son, after-
wards Philip II., was by a strange turn of fortune's wheel
342 Two Great Rivals
to become later the husband of that very Mary who
had been promised to his father.
In the meantime Frangois and Henry, having settled
all old differences, were arranging that the Princess Mary
should before long either marry Frangois himself, in
spite of his previous marriage by proxy to Eleonore, or
else espouse his second son, the Due d'Orleans. It was
a strange and indefinite arrangement surely, but one quite
in accordance with the extraordinary levity of the age
where the personal feelings of a Princesse a marier were
concerned.
While making a close alliance with Henry, who was
to attack the Emperor in the Low Countries, while he
himself was to intervene once more with an army in Italy,
Frangois was devoting his attention more towards the
building of various palaces than anything else. At this
particular time, with the aid of a clever architect from
Blois, he was building that of Chambord, the plan of
which has been preserved, stage by stage, in the Biblio-
theque in Paris. The King was continually present with
his fair Duchesse d'Ktampes superintending the works on
this edifice. It was built neither in the rigid, inhospitable
style of the old Gothic " donjon," nor in the villa style
of the Italian " palazzo," with more reception saloons
than comfortable chambers. In building it Frangois set
the example of comfort of construction to those who
came after him. He arranged everything with this
object in view. One set of apartments was isolated
completely from another, with a view to preserving
privacy, while there were separate sets of stairways, so
that those going up need not be needlessly embarrassed
by unexpected meetings with those coming down. The
outside appearance was harmonious in the extreme, with
various towers which corresponded, and a majestic central
tower which dominated all. Within all was arranged for
convenience of circulation, everything calculated so as to
give facility for either solitude or parties of pleasure as
might be desired.
For no less than twelve years, in spite of wars, in spite
Francois Builds and the Pope Escapes 343
of public financial distress, Francois kept eighteen hundred
workmen constantly employed upon this building. Its
beautification seemed to be the chief occupation of his
mind. In all directions the forms of the King's various
mistresses figured as caryatides, while everywhere were to
be seen the combined initials of F. for Fra^ois and D.
for the fair Diane de Poitiers, who was to be subsequently
for so many years the Egeria of this sacred grove with
the King's son, Henri II.
Taken up as much as he was with his building
projects, it was but by fits and starts, and apparently
regretfully, that Fra^ois allowed himself the leisure to
attend to more important matters. At the same time,
the greater part of the sums which he extracted from his
subjects by taxation went not to the promotion of works
of public utility, but were devoted to the expenses of his
Court.
Occupied as he was by his home amusements, Fra^ois
determined not again to head his Italian army in person,
but to give Lautrec the command once more. Odet de
Foix was accordingly sent back as the King's Lieutenant-
General in the year 1527, to recover if possible all that
he had not known how to hold in 1522. It was arranged
that for the present, instead of sending an army to harass
the Archduchess Marguerite in what is now Belgium,
Henry VIII. should help towards paying the French
troops by contributing thirty-two thousand crowns
monthly. Sir Robert Jerningham was to follow the
operations of Lautrec's army in the field and pay over
this money as it fell due.
The reason for the liberality of Henry VIII. is not
hard to find. Clement VII. was then still in durance
vile, and the English King's burning ardour for Anne
Boleyn so irresistible that he was anxious at any price
to set the Pope free, in order to obtain from him a
dispensation of divorce.
The Papal Nuncio, Acciajuoli, gave Lautrec good
advice on starting, saying, u Do not waste time in
besieging towns, but hurry against the Imperialist troops
344 Two Great Rivals
while they are in such a disorganised condition, and direct
your march through the Romagna to Naples. Having
once conquered Naples, it will be simple enough for you
to make yourself master of Lombardy later."
Starting from Lyon in July 1527, Lautrec crossed the
Alps by the Pass of Susa, and met with success after
success. He gave back various places that he took to
the Duke Francesco Sforza, and then, after a feint on
Antonio da Leyva in Milan, made a dash on Pavia.
While he attacked this town of evil memory for France
from one side, the Venetian army bombarded it furiously
from the other.
Pavia was this time carried by assault, when, out of
revenge for the defeat of Frangois under its walls a couple
of years earlier, it was sacked, and its garrison and
inhabitants treated with the most brutal barbarity.
Of all the small States into which at this time Italy was
divided, none was more constantly in a state of ebullition
than that of Genoa. Sometimes acknowledging the
superiority of the Emperor, at other times accepting
the domination of France, Genoa was constantly at war
within itself, owing to the rival factions of the inhabitants
which dominated it turn by turn. At this time Genoa
was a Republic, and, under the rule of the Doge
Antoniotto Adorno, it had submitted to the Imperial
over-rule. Making use of a brave Genoese officer,
named Caesar Fregoso, to command the land troops, and
the celebrated Genoese Admiral, Andrea Doria, Lautrec
now scored another success. Both of these men were of
the party opposed to the Doge, and when they invested
Genoa by land and sea their friends and partisans within
the city rose in their favour against the party of
Charles V. The result was that Genoa surrendered to
Frangois L, and, by the will of the inhabitants, became
a French Seigneury once more.
Owing to the prayers of the Pope, after these successes
Lautrec hurried off to the south to help Clement, not-
withstanding the supplications of the Duke of Milan to
aid him to put Leyva out of that city, which he was
Francois Builds and the Pope Escapes 345
occupying with only a very small force. This turned out
to be an unfortunate move on the part of Lautrec, as
the Pope had surrendered before he was in a' position to
render him any assistance.
At this period there was no real head to the Imperial
troops left in Rome, as the Spanish troops had risen
against Philibert de Chalons, Prince of Orange, and called
to Lannoy to come and command them. Orange, who
had been badly wounded in the face by an arquebus shot,
retired to Sienna to get cured, and wrote to the Em-
peror furiously against the scheming tricks by which the
Viceroy of Naples had supplanted him. The Prince of
Orange did not, however, long have to suffer from the
rivalry of this old enemy of the Due de Bourbon, for the
troops drove Lannoy away furiously almost as soon as
he came to command them. He had, however, been in
Rome long enough to contract the infection of the plague,
and while on his way back to Naples he was struck
down by it. This long-headed and subtle member of
the family of Croy died at Aversa on September 23rd,
1527, and by his death Charles lost a servant who, if self-
seeking and ambitious, had nevertheless always proved
himself thoroughly devoted to his master's interests.
Lannoy was replaced by Ugo de Moncada as Viceroy
of Naples, and for a considerable time, although he wrote
to the Emperor begging him to re-appoint the Prince of
Orange, Alarcon remained the only General with even a
shadow of authority over the Imperial army.
CHAPTER XXXIX
Proposed Duel between Charles and Francois
1528
WHILE everything had been so far couleur de rose for
Lautrec, and Charles V. was decidedly getting so
much the worst of it in Italy, Cardinal Wolsey went on
a mission to France, in order to talk over matters with
Fran9ois I. One especial subject there was for mutual
consultation, and this was the question of the divorce
of Catherine of Aragon.
Nothing that has ever been seen in modern times could
equal the magnificence of the Cardinal of York on this
really Royal Progress. Attired in a scarlet mantle
embroidered with gold, his train was carried by two
gentlemen bareheaded, while twelve hundred other lords
and gentlemen accompanied him on horseback. Two
priests carried respectively Wolsey 's seal and his Car-
dinal's hat. The mule upon which he rode was covered
with crimson velvet, while in front of it were borne
croziers and crosses of silver. He proceeded to Amiens,
after having crossed England in this state, and arriving
on French soil as the Minister and Lieutenant-General of
Henry VIII., Wolsey received Royal honours, at the same
time that, in his capacity of Papal Legate, he received
the same reception that would have been accorded to the
Pope. His transport train was guarded by a regiment of
archers. Passing from English to French territory at
Guines, the Cardinal was received with the thunderous
salute of cannon everywhere on his way, while every man-
346
Proposed Duel between Charles and Francois 34?
at-arms, every soldier, every Church and civic official in
the country, turned out to meet the great man with
waving banners and addresses of welcome.
The better to flatter the Cardinal of York, Francis
accorded to him the Royal privilege of granting pardons
to all criminals in the places he passed through, and, that
nothing should be wanting to do honour to Wolsey, the
King went to meet him in person.
Not only did Fra^ois repair to Amiens, but he took
with him his mother, Louise de Savoie, his sister
Marguerite with her new husband, the King of Navarre,
and the whole of the French Court in its grandest
array.
While the ladies waited in the city, Francois rode out
a couple of miles to meet the Cardinal, who was now
at his apogee of greatness. The King, attired in velvet
slashed with white satin, was attended by the King of
Navarre, the Cardinal de Bourbon, Charles de Bourbon,
Due de Vendome, whose son Antoine was later to marry
the daughter of Marguerite, and his brother, Fra^ois de
Bourbon, Comte de Saint-Paul. In addition to these
Princes of the Blood, the King was followed by the
Marechal Anne de Montmorency and the Sen^chal de
Normandie, husband of Diane de Poitiers, and many other
grands seigneurs.
Archbishops, Bishops, and priests there were likewise
in abundance with the train of the King of France, who
advanced, cap in hand, courteously to greet the son of
the butcher of Ipswich, and kissed him on the cheek
in the most friendly way. After this Wolsey was
treated exactly as though he were the King of England,
whom he represented, while the King's mother and sister
did not fail to shower upon him every polite and delicate
attention.
After being for some time at Amiens, the King and
Court moved to Compiegne and carried the Cardinal with
them. There a considerable time was devoted to enter-
taining Wolsey with every kind of amusement. Never
in his proud career had the mighty Cardinal of York
348 Two Great Rivals
cause to feel prouder or more pleased at the recognition
of his greatness.
In the negotiations which ensued Marguerite and the
King together discussed the various affairs on hand with
His Eminence. The Queen of Navarre and Fra^ois
took particular pains to appear to be entirely guided by
his advice ; but we have no doubt that it was not with
much of a pang that the King resigned the hand of
the eleven-year-old Princess Mary. Upon this point
Wolsey very wisely suggested that, as the Emperor still
held the King's sons captive, it would be wiser, if possible,
to arrange a peace than to continue the war ; for, as he
pointed out, even after the war had been fought, no matter
how successfully, there would still remain the question
of paying a ransom for the two Princes.
" Better not, therefore, marry the Princess Mary,"
said the Cardinal. " Peace and the restoration of your
children will be much more difficult to arrange if you
do, as the Emperor will be horribly offended if you
break off your marriage contracted at Madrid with the
Queen Eleonore."
In the end it was therefore agreed between them that
as soon as the Due d'Orleans and the Princess Mary
should arrive at a marriageable age, they should be made
man and wife. In order the better to arrange the divorce
of Henry VIII., the three negotiators agreed that for so
long as the Pope should remain a captive, and under the
Emperor's influence, any Bulls of his or the ordinances
of any General Council he might assemble, should be
disregarded. The Churches of France and England
were to be administered by their own dignitaries, while
any judgments delivered by Wolsey in his own Court
as Legate and Archbishop should hold good, even if
forbidden by the Pope. This meant, of course, that
Wolsey himself was to give a dispensation of divorce,
and that France would recognise it. To end up with,
Wolsey endeavoured to have himself declared Vicar
General of the whole Christian Church, and to cause
all the Cardinals to assemble under him in France. This
Proposed Duel between Charles and Francois 349
subtle move was, however, defeated, owing to the fore-
sight of the captive Clement, who, for fear that the
Cardinals might assemble elsewhere to depose him and
elect a successor, had ordered those not confined with
him in Sant' Angelo not to leave Italy. As there
were, it will be remembered, no less than thirteen
Cardinals shut up in Sant' Angelo, and a number of
others in Rome, it was impossible for an assembly of
the Cardinals to take place under Cardinal Wolsey in
France.
After the Cardinal of York had taken his departure,
Fran9ois sent a return mission to England, which was on
an equally grand scale to that of Wolsey to Amiens.
Headed by the " Grand Master," Anne de Montmorency,
there were six hundred noblemen and gentlemen attached
to this Embassy. To conclude these courtesies, while
Henry VIII. sent the Garter to Fra^ois, this latter sent
the collar of the Order of Saint Michael to the English
King.
When Charles V. heard of all these mutual courtesies
between France and England he was excessively angry.
Accordingly, when his brother Ferdinand wrote to him
begging him, in the interests of Germany and Hungary,
to conclude a peace, the Emperor replied, with dogged
determination, that he would do nothing of the sort, but
that he was resolved, with the aid of God, to upset the
plans of the King of France, and to defend himself. Far
from giving in, he raised troops in Germany, appointed
the Prince of Orange to the command of the leaderless
troops in Rome, and prepared for all emergencies, even
to the extent of raising, by all kinds of expedients,
the money which his Cortes refused in order to pay his
soldiers.
These were now playfully threatening to burn Rome,
to strangle the hostage Cardinals, whom they were drag-
ging round chained together, and finally to quit the
Emperor's service.
Fortunately for the unfortunate hostages, the soldier-
Cardinal Pompeo Colonna, in whose palace they were
35° Two Great Rivals
kept, was very popular with the troops. One day, after
they had been taken and placed on the scaffold of the
gallows, Colonna contrived to obtain the respite of the
hostages, on their promising to pay the army on the morrow
all that was demanded — or else to die as forfeit. That
evening Cardinal Colonna gave a great dinner to the
guards of those unhappy men. So great and so pressing
was his hospitality, that before the morning every one
of them was dead drunk. By the time that they had
recovered their senses, next day, it vaguely dawned upon
them that the hostages were not where they had left them
on the previous evening — they had got clear away, and
were not recaptured.
About this time Fran£ois I. contrived, by specious
talking, to obtain a large sum of money from the
Parliaments, the nobles, and the Gallican Church. In
order to do so, he was compelled to make an infamous
bargain with the clergy, one which almost broke the
tender heart of his sister Marguerite. This was to
promise to extirpate utterly the Lutheran heresy through-
out the Kingdom.
Having obtained this money, at the beginning of
1528, Fran9ois and Henry — after vainly demanding from
Charles the liberty of the Dauphin and the Due d'Orleans,
and the re-establishment of Francesco Sforza in all his
rights in Milan — took an extraordinary course. This was
to send their respective Heralds, Guyenne and Claren-
cieux, King-at-Arms, to Spain, to make a formal declara-
tion of war to the Emperor.
Charles V., seated upon his throne, received these
Heralds in great State. After each making three deep
reverences, the Heralds, at the foot of the throne,
donned their tabards, bearing the arms of France and
England respectively, and then demanded permission to
deliver their messages.
The Emperor replied courteously that they could do
so, and would receive no hurt or displeasure in his
dominions. Guyenne spoke first, and, on behalf of the
King of France, accused the Emperor of tyrannical con-
35'
duct, of bloodshed, and impious conduct to the Pope.
To him also was imputed the progress which the Turks
were making in Europe. He terminated an accusatory
address, to which Charles listened with patience, by de-
claring that the Very Christian King would attack and
injure the Emperor and his subjects everywhere through-
out his territories.
Charles, in his reply, very naturally expressed surprise
that he should be thus defied, after a state of warfare
had already existed for six or seven years, by a King
who, according to his pledged words, ought now to be his
prisoner. He added that he would defend himself in the
future as in the past, and was not afraid of the menaces of
the Very Christian King. As for the Pope, he continued,
he was very sorry for what had happened to him at
the hands of mutinous troops ; moreover, he mentioned
that he had learned for certain, on the previous day,
that the Pope had been set at liberty.
In making this reply, Charles combined haughtiness
with dignity ; but it must be conceded that, seeing how
he had been lied to and defrauded by Fra^ois in the
matter of the cession of Burgundy, his language was
moderate and reasonable. He had not, however, done
yet with the Herald Guyenne, but before unburdening
his mind to him, the Emperor listened to what the
Herald of Henry VIII. had to say.
The defiance of Clarencieux, King-at-Arms, was founded
principally upon the evil done to Christianity by the pro-
gress made by the Grand Turk, who had recently, after
a long siege, taken the island of Rhodes, considered as the
bulwark of Christendom, from the Knights of Saint John
of Jerusalem. After severely finding fault with the
Emperor for the sack of Rome, Clarencieux complained
that Henry VIII. was unable to recover from Charles the
large sums which had been advanced to him from time to
time. After this, the Herald declared that, by force of
arms, the King of England would compel him to release
the Pope, and likewise the two Children of France in
return for a reasonable ransom.
352 Two Great Rivals
Charles answered the English Herald firmly, but
without the haughtiness he had shown in replying to
Guyenne. He said that the English King could never
make him give up the Children of France by force, for
he was not accustomed to being forced to do anything.
With reference to his debts, he did not deny that he
owed his uncle money, and he was ready to pay it ; he
could not therefore understand why Henry should wish
to make war upon him for that which he did not refuse.
The Emperor ended up by saying, u If, nevertheless, he
will make war upon me, he will displease me and I shall
defend myself ; but I have given him no occasion to
do so."
Having thus disposed of Clarencieux, Charles now sent
for Guyenne back again, to speak to him in a very
different tone to that which he had just employed.
" I have an idea," said the Emperor, " that there is
something which I said about your master to his Am-
bassador Calvimont at Granada which has not been
repeated to him. Otherwise I hold him gentle Prince
enough to have taken it up and replied. I will now
repeat my words to you, and be good enough not to
forget to deliver them to the King of France."
In the most insulting and offensive language, Charles
then expressed to Guyenne the low opinion that he held
of Fran9ois I. as he had previously delivered it to Cal-
vimont, the President of the Parliament of Bordeaux,
who had taken very good care not to repeat it. So that
there might be no possible mistake this time, Charles V.
now wrote to Calvimont the following challenge to a
personal combat with the King of France.
" 1 told you that the King, your master, had behaved
in a cowardly and base manner not to have kept his faith
with me according to the Treaty of Madrid, and, if he
should choose to say the contrary, that I was ready
to maintain it with my body against his. These are the
same words which I made use of to the King your master
at Madrid — that I should hold him as a coward and bae
if he should fail in the vow which I hold of him. In
Proposed Duel between Charles and Francois 353
repeating them I keep my promise better to him than
he does his to me. I have written it for you, and signed
it with my own hand, in order that from this time
forth neither you nor any one else can make any mistake
about it."
Having delivered this letter for the Ambassador Cal-
vimont over into the keeping of Guyenne, Charles V.
allowed both of the Heralds to take their departure.
The Emperor's insults had been delivered openly before
all his Court, and Calvimont had now no choice but to
make known to Francois what had been written to him,
and also spoken in the presence of the Heralds of France
and England.
The reply of the King took the shape of insult, and
a challenge of the Emperor to a duel. In the presence
of all his Princes and nobles, Francois addressed Nicolas
Perrenot, Seigneur de Granvelle, the Emperor's Am-
bassador. After some preliminary abuse of the bad
manners of Charles, he remarked sarcastically that as
for the Emperor expressing surprise that he, his prisoner
of war, who had given his faith, should send him defiance,
he would like to know in what war the Emperor had ever
been to take him prisoner ? He had never seen him on
any battle-field ! Having continued by calling Charles V.
dishonourable for demanding a promise from him while
he was guarded by arquebus-men in prison, Fra^ois
insisted that under such circumstances no prisoner had
any faith to give, nor was able to make any promises that
would be valid.
The King then handed a cartel of defiance to the
Ambassador, in the shape of a letter full of insults, which
he requested him to first read and then deliver to his
master. The wording of this letter was most wounding,
and Granvelle refused to read it or take it. He asked
permission to retire, but Fra^ois called one of his
Secretaries of State to read it aloud in the presence of
all. It ended with a challenge. The challenge to a duel
of an Emperor by a King is an unusual event, and that
with which Fra^ois terminated his letter to Charles is
23
354 Two Great Rivals
accordingly worth recording. By it the French King
cunningly hoped to stop his rival's mouth, and prevent
him from henceforward saying things openly which would
prove that it was, of the two, Fra^ois alone who had
acted in a dishonourable manner. The wording of this
challenge was as follows : " If you have chosen to charge
us with having done a thing which a gentleman caring
for his honour should not do, we tell you that you have
lied in your throat, and as often as you may say it you
will lie, we being determined to defend our honour with
our life. Therefore safeguard the camp, and we will
carry arms against you, protesting that, if after this
declaration you should write or say words that are against
our honour, the shame of the delay of the combat will
be yours, seeing that in resorting to the said combat there
is an end of all letter-writings."
This cartel of defiance given by Francis may have
been all very well in its way, and have convinced him
personally that he was a very fine fellow. But no one
else was deceived ; the whole world knew the facts, and
upon which side lay the right. Moreover, it must be
remembered that, after all, it was Charles, the offended
party, who gave the first challenge, since he it was who
had offered, both through Calvimont and Guyenne, to
meet the Very Christian King, body to body, if he did
not like being told the plain truth concerning the dis-
honourable manner in which he had behaved.
Charles V. was, if less of a braggart, personally every
whit as brave as his rival, with whom he was perfectly
ready to fight the matter out as might any other two
Knights in their respective domains. He did not intend,
however, to be muzzled before having in advance shown
the world plainly the justice of his cause, as Fran9ois was
anxious that he should be.
When the Herald Guyenne brought the Emperor the
cartel, it was received openly by Charles in his Court.
While remarking scornfully that he would satisfy the
sender and keep his honour, he added, " The King your
master will not find it easy to do the same."
Proposed Duel between Charles and Francois 355
In his reply to the French King's cartel, which the
Emperor had caused to be publicly read, Charles accepted
the duel, but was careful to justify himself and to repeat
the accusations against the honour of Fra^ois which
he had previously made.
He requested Fran9ois to fight at once, on the borders
of Navarre and Spain.
CHAPTER XL
Pride comes before a Fall
1528 — 1529
IF, after these challenges given and received, the world
was, after all, deprived of the sensation of a hand-to-
hand combat between the two most powerful Monarchs
in Christendom, it was not the fault of Charles V.
After the Royal couple had thus descended from rivalry
to personal abuse, the Emperor was, he declared, most
anxious for a duel, which might by its result put an end
to the war and stop the endless effusion of blood.
Whereas, however, he had allowed the Herald
Guyenne, without let or hindrance, to enter Spain
with the French King's offensive cartel, Fran?ois showed
no such courtesy to the Herald-at-Arms Bourgogne, who
was charged by Charles with his biting reply, and ordered
to read it aloud before delivering it. It was very evident
that Francis did not wish to be reminded of the fact of
his broken word of honour pledged to Lannoy, nor to be
told that " to pretend that every man guarded could not
pledge his faith, or accept any obligations, was the argu-
ment of a badly brought up lawyer's clerk, and not that
of a King, a Knight, or a gentleman."
Fran9ois was indeed determined not to hear himself
accused in the presence of his Court, and accordingly it
was only with considerable difficulty that Bourgogne
contrived to enter France, after having to wait six weeks
at Fontarabia for a safe-conduct. He was again detained at
Bayonne, and when he eventually reached Etampes, where
Fran9ois was amusing himself stag-hunting, the King
356
Pride comes before a Fall 357
kept out of his way, after leaving him waiting for many
days.
At length, in the autumn of 1528, Bourgogne was
allowed to enter Paris, but treated with indignity. He
was not allowed to put on his tabard with the coat-of-
arms of the Emperor, and was lodged in a convent under
a guard of archers.
It must be confessed that Charles V. was, if judging
only by this behaviour on the part of Fran9ois, perfectly
justified in saying that he acted neither as a Knight nor a
gentleman. Worse was to come. Admitted at last to
the King's presence, Fran£ois commenced to browbeat
the Herald and would not hear him speak, only demand-
ing from him in a bullying tone if he had brought the
patent for " the safeguarding of the camp," saying that
that was all that concerned him, that he had no occasion
to speak about anything else.
Bourgogne was not allowed to read the cartel ; and, when
he wished to comply with the Emperor's orders on that
matter, Fra^ois sprang from his seat and shouted at him
furiously, saying that he would not allow any of the
Emperor's hypocritical tricks to be introduced into his
Kingdom.
Montmorency, the Grand Master of France, had better
manners, and more respect for the laws of chivalry than
his master ; he begged the King to allow the Emperor's
King-at-Arms to speak. The only reply was a fierce one.
" No, no ; I will not allow him unless I hold the assurance
of the camp, without which," he said, turning to Bourgogne,
" you can be off, and do not add a word."
Bourgogne was a plucky fellow, and stood his ground
well. He again demanded of the King his permission to
hand to him the Emperor's cartel, or, if he should refuse
to accept it, to give him a written statement to that effect,
and also a safe-conduct to return to Spain.
" Let him have his safe-conduct," shouted Fra^ois,
jumping from his throne once more in his rage.
The Imperial King-at-Arms made yet another attempt
to deliver the Emperor's cartel, but, after being refused
358 Two Great Rivals
an audience, had to leave. This bold Burgundian Herald,
of the name of Bourgogne, which name probably reminded
Francois unpleasantly of his broken oath, would not
depart from France, however, without publicly declaring
that the safeguard of the camp of combat was contained
within the Emperor's cartel, and that Charles V. would
publish everywhere that the King of France had refused
to receive the acceptation of his challenge to mortal
combat.
Upon the return of the King-at-Arms to Spain, Charles
laid the whole circumstances of the case before a Court of
Honour of the Supreme Council of Castile.
This Council decided that the Emperor had behaved in
an honourable manner, becoming a Knight, but that the
King of France had behaved neither as a Knight nor as a
gentleman, and, by refusing to allow the King-at-Arms to
fulfil his mission, had evidently declined to accept " the
field and the combat." This decision, the Council declared,
should be made known to all the grandees of Spain, and
to all the Captains of the Emperor's armies.
Charles accordingly published the facts everywhere,
and at the same time disclaimed all responsibility for the
war about to break out. While the Emperor's mani-
festo reached all parts of Europe, Frai^ois remained
silent, for he had nothing to say. He had evidently had
the worst of the dispute, which had become a merely
personal quarrel between the two Monarchs.
The stinging remark of Fra^ois — " He says that he
took me in battle ; I do not remember ever to have met
him in one " —filled the Emperor with rage. Not being
able to avenge himself with sword and lance upon the
body of the man who made it, Charles took his revenge
upon those Frenchmen whom he had in his power — the
attendants of the two young captive Princes. With
unheard-of barbarity, these innocent French subjects,
who had been taken in no battle, were torn from the
Princes and sent to be chained to the oar in the Spanish
galleys. Shortly afterwards, so that all trace of them
might be lost, they were sold as slaves to the Moors of
Pride comes before a Fall 359
Barbary. The Dauphin and the Due d'Orleans, hence-
forth confined in a dark and melancholy dungeon, now
never heard a word of French ; they forgot their mother-
tongue, and when allowed subsequently to be visited by
Bordin, an envoy from France, the children were com-
pelled to request him to speak in Spanish, as they could
not understand what he said.
The revenge which the Emperor thus took upon the
children whose father had so selfishly abandoned them
two years earlier, bore bitter fruit. The boys changed
in character, and the effects of the imprisonment in the
mountain fortress of Pedraza were such that the con-
stitution of Fran9ois the Dauphin was undermined, and
he died young.
The other, Henri, afterwards King of France, became
gloomy and violent by nature. None of the brightness
and bonhomie, the cleverness of tongue and attractiveness
of manner of Francois I., were ever apparent in Henri II.
The Pope Clement VII. , once more at liberty, had had
a good scare, but still he could not go straight — it was not
in him. He therefore only kept half of the promises
made to Charles whereby he had obtained his freedom.
His ransom was only partly paid, he never handed over
the fortress of Civita Castellana, and he secretly helped
Lautrec on his march towards the south. On one point,
however, he showed his cautious cunning ; he openly
refused to re-enter the Holy League of Cognac ; his fear
of the Emperor was too great. He was, moreover, furious
with the Venetians, who had taken advantage of his
troubles to help themselves to his places of Ravenna and
Cervia, frantic with Alfonso d' Este, Duke of Ferrara,
who had annexed Modena, and raging against the
Florentines, who had bundled the Medici neck and crop
out of his dearly beloved natal city.
It was, above all, with the hope that Fran£ois I. would,
if victorious, help him to recover Florence that the
deceitful Clement, at peace with Charles V., assisted
Lautrec's army with plentiful supplies of provisions on
its march to Naples.
360 Two Great Rivals
In this kingdom, where the remains of the old party of
Anjou were still strong, Odet de Foix found himself well
welcomed, as a liberator from Spain — the towns opened
their gates to him everywhere.
The Prince of Orange at last, with great difficulty,
having persuaded the remaining eleven thousand soldiers
of the Imperial army to follow him from Rome, marched
off likewise to the Kingdom of Naples, and entrenched
himself at Troja. He had left all his cannons behind
him with the Colonna, and Lautrec, with his splendid
army of twenty-eight thousand men — Germans, Swiss,
Saxons, and Italians — behind him, had but to attack to
wipe the Imperialists from the face of the earth.
While the Swiss, panting for the combat, kissed the
ground according to their custom, while the remainder of
his troops, full of ardour, shouted " Battle ! Battle ! "
Lautrec advanced upon the enemy. He ordered the
engagement to be commenced by artillery fire, and then !
— and then he might as well, from his conduct, have been
the Duke of Urbino, for he ordered his astonished army
to retire.
By this extraordinary and inexplicable conduct the
Marechal de Lautrec lost not the Kingdom of Naples
only, but the whole of Italy. He could have finished
off the pretensions of Charles V. in Italy at one blow,
and for some unknown reason he refused to strike that
blow !
His captains were simply furious, and, since even an
impartial chronicler is apt to share their feelings of disgust,
we will say as little as possible concerning the closing days
of the career of this usually daring if often effete com-
mander. Orange was now able to enter the city of
Naples by a night march, while Odet de Foix was foolishly
waiting for the Florentine Black Bands to join him before
attacking. The remaining two and a half months of
Lautrec's life were passed in a furious and obstinate
attempt to capture that city. He sat down before the
walls, while the famous sea-captain Andrea Doria, and
his nephew Philippine Doria, blocked the bay of Naples
Pride comes before a Fall 361
with their Genoese ships. It was on May ist, 1528,
that Lautrec began the siege. Shortly before this,
Philippino Doria had fought a bloody naval battle off
the coast with the fleet of Charles V., commanded by
that old sea-dog Ugo de Moncada, now Viceroy of
Naples.
This proved a complete victory for the French cause,
the principal event in the battle being a terrific duel
between the flagship upon which was Philippino and that
upon which Moncada had hoisted his flag.
Moncada was killed, and likewise the Grand Equerry,
Cesare Feramosca, while all the other Imperial captains
were taken prisoners. Among these was one of the
Colonna, Ascanio, who was the Constable of Naples,
and the Marquis del Vasto, who will be remembered
as having refused to follow Bourbon in his march to
Rome.
These captures had a serious effect upon the cause of
Fran9ois I., who, in his greed for the ransoms of the
Imperialist captains, demanded of Andrea Doria to hand
the captives over to him, which the Admiral flatly refused
to do. Since Fra^ois had last become Over-lord of
Genoa he had already foolishly contrived to wound the
feelings of the Genoese, and to irritate the valiant Doria,
by endeavouring to make a rival of Genoa out of the
neighbouring city of Savona. In spite of the patriotic
Doria's protestations, the French had continued to erect
fortifications at Savona, to draw ships to the port, and to
establish there the salt-market of the Mediterranean,
which had hitherto been held at Genoa.
Carrying his folly further, when Doria refused to
deliver over the captives, by the advice of Du Prat,
Fran9ois sent a French Admiral named Barbesieux to
command his Mediterranean fleet, and further decided
to cause Admiral Barbesieux to arrest Admiral Doria.
Hearing of this, the Marechal de Lautrec sent a noble
named de Langey as a special messenger to the King, to
beg him on no account to make such a mistake. Langey
saw Doria, whom he knew well, on his way, and took
362 Two Great Rivals
from the mouth of the old sailor the sole conditions upon
which he would renew his services under the King of
France. His time of engagement was then almost at an
end, and Doria sent an eloquent appeal to Fran£ois on
.behalf of the rights of Genoa as opposed to those of
Savona, which latter city, he represented, should be
placed under the obedience of the former. This appeal
was not listened to, but Barbesieux instructed to go
ahead and make a prisoner of Andrea Doria, and to take
from him by force all the Imperialist captives. It was
not, however, an easy matter to capture an old warrior
like this, one whose name had long been famous in the
Mediterranean. He ran with his prisoners under the
protection of a fortified castle in the Gulf of Spezzia, and
waited there securely until his term of service under
Fran9ois should have expired.
In the meantime the Prince of Orange, fighting for his
life in the beleaguered city of Naples, learned, while
treating with the Count Philippine for the ransom of
certain prisoners, what was taking place. He was clever
enough to write off to Charles in Spain and point out to
him how desirable it would be to win Doria over to his
cause, and in order to do so, advised Charles to refuse
nothing that he might demand.
The Emperor for once acted promptly on this excellent
advice, and promised Andrea Doria the entire liberty of
Genoa as a Republic, and sixty thousand crowns a year
for himself, if he would join him with his fleet.
When it was too late, Fra^ois repented his folly, and
employed Clement VII. to try and make up his quarrel
for him with Doria. He had, however, no success in
his efforts ; the offended Genoese would listen to no
apologies and accept no offers from France, but went
over to the Emperor.
Fransois, who was hunting and building a palace at
Fontainebleau, had just been congratulating himself on
his good luck when this bad news arrived.
The Duke of Brunswick, with an army of Germans
and Antonio da Leyva, had just been utterly defeated
Pride comes before a Fall 363
before Lodi by the bastard brother of the Duke Sforza,
and a new French army under Francis de Bourbon,
Comte de Saint-Paul, had arrived in Lombardy. Lautrec
had likewise been reinforced by troops taken to Naples
by Admiral Barbesieux. Thus all indeed seemed to be
going well for France. Fran?ois, who had been ill but
had recovered, wrote accordingly in a tone of jubilation
to Montmorency :
" My affairs all go well, and will soon go better, please
God ! I have, my dear Cousin, always heard it said that
strength crowns reason, and I leave it to you to consider
what an astonishment it will be to my enemies, while
themselves weakening daily, to see my strength and
prosperity constantly increasing."
But pride comes before a fall, and Fran£ois, by his own
ill-advised action, was now to find this out. Doria with
his ships soon revictualled the starving garrison of Naples,
Odet de Foix lost three quarters of his men by plague, and,
refusing to move away from before the walls of Naples, died
himself. The remainder of the unhappy Lautrec's men,
under the Marquis de Saluces, who was killed, were taken
prisoners by Orange. The famous Pedro Navarro, that
faithful servant of France, died at the same time. The
combined French and Venetian fleets were dispersed by
Andrea Doria, and Genoa and all Liguria were lost to
France. Doria was now created Prince of Melfi by
Charles V. and hailed by the Genoese as " Saviour of the
State and Father of his Country."
The fate of the war in Italy and the League of Cognac
was still more definitely decided in the following spring,
that of 1529. Then the Duke of Urbino, the Comte de
Saint-Paul, and Francesco Sforza combined to take Milan
from, the hero of the defence of Pavia, the ferocious
Antonio da Leyva ; their project being not to assault the
city, but to try to starve the Imperialists out.
Saint-Paul, who was a Bourbon, and as such an ad-
venturous spirit, soon found this plan, suggested by the
timidity of Urbino, not sufficiently exciting. Hearing
that Doria had sailed from Genoa to see Charles V. in
364 Two Great Rivals
Spain, he devised a scheme of his own which might prove
more interesting. He started off to attack Genoa with
his French, German, and Italian troops, leaving LJrbino
and Sforza to continue the blockade of Milan.
Having, however, taken his measures without secrecy,
Saint-Paul proved himself no match for that really excel-
lent soldier, Leyva — a man who differed vastly from the
unfortunate Lautrec in that he never failed to seize an
opportunity. Causing himself to be carried in a litter on
account of severe sickness, the bold Leyva issued with
most of his forces from Milan in the night-time. He
followed Saint-Paul, and fell upon his scattered troops
furiously, by surprise. The Comte was without his cavalry,
which had gone ahead, but, dismounting, he fought
vigorously on foot for a long time. At length his
Germans and Italians broke and ran. Remounting,
Saint-Paul endeavoured to jump a small canal, but his
horse falling with him, he and the greater number of his
officers were captured. The Italians, French, and Ger-
mans fled in all directions, and Lombardy was left at the
mercy of the Imperialists.
In this manner was the Emperor left victorious in both
north and south, and the hopes of Francois I. in Italy
completely dissipated.
CHAPTER XLI
Marguerite of Austria makes a Peace
1529
THE wheel of fortune had turned in earnest, and
Charles had been hoisted from the bottom of the
ladder to the top. If he did not now become the tyrant
of the whole of Europe, it was owing to two powerful
influences, those of Soliman, the Grand Turk, and the
Emperor's aunt, the Archduchess Marguerite. Already,
owing to the outcry of the merchants of London, whose
trade was being interfered with, Henry VIII. , dragging
France behind him in the bargain, had made a truce with
the Governess of the Netherlands. The scene of war was
therefore confined to the north of Italy, where Fran£ois in
desperation still clung on to Asti and one or two other
places. Louise de Savoie, taking advantage of the mes-
sengers of Marguerite being in France, began to send
friendly messages to that Princess, saying how deeply
hurt she had been at the insulting letters sent by the
Emperor to her son, and asking Marguerite if she did not
think it about time that these old insults were wiped off
the slate and hands shaken all round.
The Emperor's aunt was very much of that way of
thinking; but while the principal cause of the desire of the
Duchesse d'Angouleme for peace was the recovery of her
imprisoned grandchildren, Marguerite had another reason.
This was the alarming progress of the Turks in Europe.
After overrunning Hungary, they had even entered
Austria and were about to besiege Vienna, and for long
365
366 Two Great Rivals
past the Archduke Ferdinand had been writing pitiful
letters to his aunt, representing his extreme danger unless,
to save Austria and Germany, the Christian Powers
would make peace and combine against the mighty
Turkish hosts.
Ever since, just after the battle of Pavia, Fra^ois I.
had sent his ring to the Sultan, there had continued to be
friendly relations between the Very Christian King and
the Infidels of the Ottoman Empire. At this time, with
Austria thus gripped by the throat, Francois had a
splendid opportunity of profiting by this friendship, and
turning it into an active offensive and defensive alliance,
by which Austria would be annihilated.
Although Charles, taken up with his rivalry with
Fran9ois, had paid but little attention to his brother's cries
for assistance, there was every reason why he should do so.
For a double marriage-tie connected him with Hungary
and Bohemia. His youngest sister, Marie, by her
marriage with the young King Louis II., had become the
Queen of those countries, while his brother Ferdinand
had married Anne, daughter of the late King of Hungary,
the Pole Vladislav II., and the sister of Louis II.
Great misfortunes had now come upon the youthful
Queen Marie, who, having formerly lived at Malines with
the Archduchess Marguerite, at her palace called La Cour
de Cambray, was very dear to her aunt.
The Turks having overrun and devastated Hungary,
there were two Kings of that country, one being Louis
and the other the Transylvanian John Zapolya.
The march of Soliman having been irresistible, he had
seized the sacred crown of Saint Stephen and, a great
number of Hungarian magnates, out of their hatred to
Austria, having sworn fealty to Turkey, had determined
to crown with it a King who should be his vassal.
By the favour of, Soliman's talented favourite and Grand
Vizier, the renegade Greek Ibrahim of Parga, and also by
that of the Doge Gritti of Venice, who was on good terms
with the Sultan, as he paid him a large tribute, Zapolya
was made the Turkish vassal King, in opposition to
Marguerite of Austria makes a Peace 367
Louis, who was the King elected by the Hungarian hero
Batthori and those of the German party. Each king
ruled a part of Hungary. Thus, whereas in the fifteenth
century that country had been united, in the sixteenth three
quarters of Hungary were in the hands of the Turks, and
at this time ruled by Zapolya, while a narrow strip to the
north remained under Austrian influences.
The country being thus divided against itself, the task
became an easier one when, forced by his warlike and un-
ruly Janissaries into further aggressive operations, Soliman
advanced against the young King Louis in 1526.
The Ottoman army — which was well supplied with
artillery, whereas their opponents had none — met the
Hungarians near the marshes of Mohacz. The Transyl-
vanians, who had formed a party of their own, failed to
give Louis any assistance.
The Hungarians behaved, however, with splendid
valour. Although greatly inferior in numbers, with the
bold Louis at their head, their horsemen hurled themselves
against the mighty Ottoman host. As Hannibal treated
the Romans at the battle of Cannae, so did the Turks now
behave to the brave Hungarians. After these, with their
King still leading, had actually fought their way through
to the guns and were cutting down the gunners, the
wings of the Turkish army wheeled up and engulfed the
assailants.
The Janissaries fell upon them in rear, and hamstrung
the horses. Some, however, and Louis among them,
won their way through, only to plunge into bottomless
morasses, where they were swallowed up with their horses
and lost. After this fatal battle for Hungary, the Turks
returned to their own country, dragging behind them
three hundred thousand of the inhabitants of the country,
the greater number of whom were women and children,
to become their slaves and replenish the harems.
Zapolya, who had j ust been crowned, was an eye-witness
of this terrible leading into captivity of his people. Realis-
ing his hopeless position, should the arms of the Emperor
be turned against him, he now sought to consolidate his
368 Two Great Rivals
alliance with the Sultan, which he succeeded in doing
through the good offices of a bastard son of Gritti, the
Doge of Venice, and also to obtain the support of
France.
To Fran£ois he sent as envoy, that extraordinary man,
the corpulent Spanish Captain Rincon, a brave and capable
individual, who, in spite of his unwieldy bulk, was for
years to be seen travelling Europe from one end to the
other as the emissary of Kings. To Francois, Rincon
proposed that his second son, the Due d' Orleans, should
become the heir to the throne of Zapolya. In order that
the interests of the House of Poland might be recognised,
the French Prince was to marry a Polish Princess, the
second daughter of King Sigismond. To this arrangement
Fran9ois readily agreed. He promised to help Zapolya
with money, and become the ally of the Sultan, to whom
King Zapolya gave homage.
Less than three years later than this, the mighty Soliman
was found before Vienna, besieging that city. Charles
had by this time contrived to send a few good Spanish
troops, but it was chiefly owing to the terribly wet weather,
which prevented him from bringing up his heavy siege
guns, that the Sultan was for the time compelled to retreat.
Of the fact that he would return later, possibly to wipe
out Austria and then invade the Emperor's German
dominions, there seemed to be no kind of a doubt.
The Archduke Ferdinand, as the husband of Anne, the
sister of the unhappy King Louis, had in the meantime
contrived to procure his election to the throne of Hungary,
left vacant by the death of his brother-in-law.
In order to obtain his election, Ferdinand made specious
promises to the Hungarians, which he never kept ; and
in this manner was the Crown of Hungary first annexed
by the House of Habsburg.
When Charles learned of the election of his brother, he
wrote to thank the countries of Hungary and Bohemia,
while vowing to expend all his treasures and blood in their
defence. It was chiefly this letter which caused the alarm
of, Ferdinand's rival, King Zapolya. He need not, how-
Marguerite of Austria makes a Peace 369
ever, have been frightened, for every ducat of the
Emperor had already gone in Italy.
From the above facts it is easy for us to look at the
situation as it was viewed by the Archduchess Marguerite
when Louise de Savoie, without any reference to her son,
first began making friendly overtures to her. That very
clever woman Marguerite, who was always so capable of
grasping a situation clearly, perfectly understood that,
although Francois had been defeated by land in Italy,
and, owing to the loss of the services of Doria, likewise
had lost the command of the Mediterranean, he still had
behind him the immense power of the Turk to call to
his assistance. She also knew that there still existed the
large Venetian force under the Duke of Urbino, to which
there remained attached the odds and ends of some of
the smaller states of Italy, including the forces of Sforza.
Given another commander than Urbino, these troops of
the League, which had not been wasted by too much
fighting, might become valuable allies to Francois I. The
Papal forces might likewise again have to be reckoned
with, for Marguerite was wise enough to be convinced of
the truth, that the miserable Clement was still keeping in
with the Holy League, while pretending to have made
up his differences with her nephew, Charles V.
With a woman like Marguerite of Austria, to see a
way in which she could get ahead of the France that she
detested was to follow it. Without a moment's hesitation
she promised to Louise de Savoie her good offices as in-
termediary in the cause of peace, and at the same time
asked her to send to her at Brussels the terms that she
proposed.
Having received these, Marguerite went through them
clause by clause, cut out anything to which she objected,
introduced new clauses of her own, then sent off the draft
of the proposed treaty to Spain.
Marguerite wrote at the same time shrewdly to her
nephew, insisting that he should agree to the terms pro-
posed, which did not, however, include the cession of that
bone of contention, Burgundy. She urged that, if the
24
37° Two Great Rivals
Emperor really wished to protect his brother Ferdinand
from the Turk, now was his opportunity, and added that
Fran9ois I. would be hopelessly crippled for a long time
to come by the ransom he would have to pay for his sons'
liberty.
By a stroke of the pen, so Marguerite pointed out, Charles
could deprive Francois of all his allies at the same time
that, with the large sum that he would extract from his
rival, he would be able to make a Royal armed progress
into Italy, and compel the Pope to crown him with the
Imperial Crown. His aunt added that he would further
have all the old Italian allies of Francois by the throat,
and, that, after treating Italy to a taste of his power, he
could proceed to Germany, there to crush the Lutheran
heresies, and re-establish his authority over the Empire.
To crown all, by the terms which Marguerite proposed
to the Emperor that he should accept, she begged him to
notice that he would have the satisfaction of causing his
rival to escort him with his ships of war from Spain to
Italy.
With the admirably drawn-up dispositions of his aunt
in his hand, Charles was far too long-headed not to realise
how good was her advice, and to see upon which side
lay his advantage.
The Emperor accordingly wrote back to his aunt,
giving her full powers to treat for peace personally with
Louise de Savoie ; but upon two points he told her to
insist most emphatically. These were that Fran?ois should
abandon Italy entirely before his hostage sons would be
returned, and that he should also be base enough to enforce
the delivery to Charles by his allies the Venetians of all
the places which they had captured and still held on the
coasts of the Kingdom of Naples.
Having received the Emperor's instructions, which were
entirely in accordance with her own views, the able
daughter of the Emperor Maximilian wrote a charming
letter of invitation to Louise de Savoie, to come and meet
her in a friendly way at Cambray, a border city between
France and the Low Countries. The proposed conference
Marguerite of Austria makes a Peace 371
between the two ladies was arranged for the end of June
1529, but at the same time the Emperor was getting ready
an army and a fleet of Spanish and Genoese ships at
Barcelona, with which to proceed in person to Italy.
Hearing something of what was in the wind, and feeling
very uncomfortable concerning the uses to which the
Emperor might be about to put this fleet and army, the
unstable Pope now definitely cut himself adrift from his
allies, and sent to make a treaty of friendship with Charles.
Since it suited him admirably to go to Italy as the
Pope's friend rather than his enemy, Charles met Clement
VII. half-way, and promised to make the Venetians and the
Duke of Ferrara respectively return to him all the places
that he claimed. Also, to the great delight of the Pope,
he promised to upset the recently established Republic in
Florence, and to restore the Medici family as rulers in
that city. In his joy at this cheerful news, Clement VII.
undertook to give the Emperor the definite investiture of
the Kingdom of Naples, always claimed by France, and
further solemnly to crown Charles V. with the Imperial
Crown.
The untrustworthy Fran9ois, with a view to possible
eventualities, was at this same time raising a new army ;
and in order to reassure his terrified allies, who were justly
afraid that they were about to be left in the lurch, declared
that he was about once more to cross the Alps and continue
the war.
In spite of this pretence, the two Princesses who were
to discuss the terms of peace duly met at Cambray, at the
beginning of July 1529. Although Marguerite had been
warned not to go to that place without a large force, for
fear that the King of France might make her a prisoner,
she replied that she would not take an armed man with
her, as she was merely going on a mission of peace, but
that if any of her people were afraid to accompany her
they could stop at home.
After the manner in which Fra^ois I. had failed to
keep his word to her nephew the Emperor, in acting thus
the Archduchess certainly displayed considerable courage.
372 Two Great Rivals
She had, however, confidence in the word of the Queen-
mother, who had written to her saying that she loved her
extremely, and that there was nothing she desired so
much as to see " her sister." It will be remembered that
Louise de Savoie and Marguerite had been very good
friends in their childish days at the Court of France, and,
moreover, the Archduchess was perfectly well aware that
the Duchesse d'Angouleme was far too anxious to recover
her grandchildren from the revengeful Emperor's power
not to ensure her perfect safety. Before the meeting,
Marguerite had expressed her fears lest Henry VIII.
might do something to mar the negotiations. Louise,
however, had sent her back word to the effect that the
King of England, being her son's ally, had sent her full
powers to treat in his name as well as that of the King of
France.
While Marguerite of Austria took up her quarters in
an Abbey at Cambray, Louise, accompanied by the Queen
of Navarre, lodged in a mansion close by. In order to
be able to meet more freely, the Princesses had these
dwellings connected by a covered gallery.
After four weeks of acrimonious discussions, the Peace
of Cambray, otherwise called The Ladies' Peace, was
signed and proclaimed upon July 3ist, 1529. By it
Marguerite gained all for which she had contended,
while France was humiliated in the dust at her feet.
CHAPTER XLII
The Emperor is Crowned Gloriously
WHILE his mother had been at Cambray making
this infamous treaty for him, Francois had been
enjoying the pleasures of the chase not very far away.
He ratified it on August yth, 1529, and in so doing
covered himself with even more shame than he had
previously done when he broke his word of honour
pledged to the Emperor " as a King, as a Knight, and as
a gentleman."
Let us see to what infamy the knightly King of France
had committed himself. He renounced his friends
Robert de La Marck, the Wild Boar of the Ardennes,
and his son the Seigneur de Fleuranges. He deserted
Charles d'Egmont, Due de Gueldre, who, on his own
account, had, after he had been made a prisoner at Pavia,
been the first to draw the sword on his behalf, and,
invading Marguerite in the Low Countries, terrified her
into making a truce. Gueldre was now compelled to bow
his stubborn neck before Charles — to become a vassal of
the Emperor.
Although his sister, the Queen of Navarre, who loved
Fran9ois so devotedly, had personally assisted her mother
in struggling for his interests at the conference at
Cambray, he had not made a single stipulation on her
behalf or that of her husband, who had been defrauded of
his kingdom owing to his father's loyalty to France. He
promised not to interfere any more in Italy, nor to inter-
373
374 Two Great Rivals
vene on behalf of the Lutherans in Germany, who had
been looking to him for protection. He even menaced
the Lutherans, and threatened likewise, his avowed friend,
the Sultan Soliman. He renounced both Milan and
Naples for ever. He promised that he would compel
the Florentines to submit to the Emperor within four
months, and that he would compel Venice to yield up
places which she had held for the last sixty years. On
behalf of Francesco Sforza, who had been fighting with
him as an ally, the King did not say a single word,
nor did he make any bargain on behalf of the nobles
of the Angevin party in Naples, who had compromised
themselves by assisting Lautrec. They were now, in
consequence, cruelly imprisoned and beheaded by the
Spaniards. On account of his ally, the King of England,
he likewise said nothing. The Princess Renee, daughter
of Louis XII., his sister-in-law, had, after being so often
promised, at last found a mate in Italy. She had just
been given in marriage to Alfonso d'Este, Duke of
Ferrara. It might well have been imagined that Fra^ois
would have instructed his mother to make some effort on
behalf of this ally and brother-in-law. Far from it,
however, d'Este was left to throw himself upon the
clemency of the Emperor. Thus the so-called Ladies'
Peace was a mere catalogue of desertions.
The gains to Francois were that his sons were to be
restored to him, and that he was not compelled to give up
Burgundy ; but the moral loss to the name and prestige of
the King was infinitely greater than the material gain.
For the ransom of his sons he was bound to pay two
million golden crowns, which would be about the
equivalent of seventy million francs in France to-day.
Nor was this all ; in addition to lending his ships to the
triumphant Charles, Fran9ois had the pleasure of paying
up another sum of a hundred thousand crowns for the
expenses of his rival's journey into Italy.
The wily Governess of the Low Countries had not
forgotten to cajole the King's mother at Cambray with
some tempting promises, whereby it would seem that
The Emperor is Crowned Gloriously 375
after all, Milan might possibly revert to France. She had
held out as a bait a marriage between a daughter or a
niece of the Emperor with the child — Due d'Orleans, this
Imperial Princess to take Milan as a dowry to her husband.
This was but a blind, as was another vague promise made
by Marguerite, to the effect that Eleonore should herself
take Milan as her dowry, when the Queen of Portugal
should proceed to France to conclude the half-marriage
already contracted with Frangois when a prisoner in the
Alcazar.
We had almost forgotten to mention that in his list of
renunciations Frangois had allowed his mother to include
all of French Flanders and the feudal rights which he had
held over the Emperor as his Suzerain in Artois.
Such, then, was the great Treason of Cambray, for
which France had to thank her King, who had reduced
his country from the position of a great power to little
better than that of a petty State, dependent for existence
upon the goodwill of his rival. As a result of his
triumph, that rival was now at last able to send some
troops to Vienna, who materially assisted the terrible
inclemency of the weather in causing the retreat of the
army of two hundred thousand Turks from before
that city.
Charles at the same time passed into Italy, by way of
Genoa, and found not an enemy to bar the way of the
force that he took with him. He now found force no
longer necessary to gain his ends ; he had but to secure
the various Italian States by arrangement.
This arrangement in several instances took the form
of the payment of immense subsidies ; for example, he
only gave back the Duchy of Milan to Francesco Sforza
upon his making himself responsible for a subsidy of
upwards of a million ducats. Even then Charles kept
in his own hands the citadel of Milan, and also occupied
the Milanese territory in Lombardy by an army under
that old war-dog Antonio da Leyva, to whom he gave an
Italian city, while creating him Prince of Ascoli. When,
a year or two later, the unhappy and worn-out Francesco
376 Two Great Rivals
.Sforza departed this life, Charles retained Milan in his
own hands. It was never allowed to revert to France,
by marriage or any other means.
From Alfonso d' Este, who was rich and powerful, the
Emperor extracted, by way of arrangement, the sum of
two hundred thousand ducats ; and the advantage of the
bargain was not altogether on the side of the Emperor,
as that excellent trimmer, the Duke of Ferrara, contrived
to get his quid pro quo in various ways. Coming to meet
the Emperor in person at Bologna, whither he had gone
to be crowned by the Pope, Alfonso flattered Charles with
promises of devotion and future support, until between
them they concocted a subtle arrangement for doing the
shifty Clement VII. out of the restitution of Reggio,
Rubiera, and Modena.
These places, which had been originally wrested by
Ferrara from the warlike Pope Julius II., and lately
recaptured from Clement, Charles had promised recently
at Barcelona should be returned to the Pope.
D' Este, however, while delivering the three places into
the custody of the Emperor, obtained from him the promise
that he should hold them for him for the present, while com-
pelling Clement VII. to assent to his acting as arbitrator
in the matter as to whom they really belonged. Charles
told the Pope that for the present he must adjourn his
decision on this important matter, but, as he did not
wish to break with him, promised at once to satisfy His
Holiness concerning the wish that he held nearest to his
heart. This was the restitution of Florence to the Medici ;
with all their former power and grandeur in that city,
and the destruction of the newly formed Republic.
Clement VII., who was, above all things, anxious to
keep the Emperor from entering Rome, was able to
make an arrangement, which was in many ways con-
venient to Charles, that the ceremony of his coronation
should take place in the city of Bologna. While moving
slowly across Italy at the head of twenty thousand men,
Charles gave authority to the Prince of Orange, who had
formerly been the Pope's gaoler, at the head of the
The Emperor is Crowned Gloriously 377
Imperial army in Rome, to accept service under Clement
for the reduction of Florence. Aided by many veteran
Imperial soldiers, who were promised that they should
have the sack of the city, Florence was accordingly
invested in October 1529. As the place hated the Pope
and all the Medici clan with a most holy hatred, its
citizens made a magnificent defence, which lasted for ten
months. When at last, in August 1530, owing to the
treachery of Malatesta Baglioni, the Republican General,
Florence capitulated, it was, however, by the terms of
the surrender, spared the horrors of a sack, greatly to the
disappointment of the attacking soldiery.
Its existence as a Republic was, however, ended.
Florence was absolutely at the mercy of the Pope, who,
with the authority of the Emperor behind him, made his
natural son, Alessandro Medici, ruler of the city. To
this ill-favoured youth, who became the first Duke of
Florence, Charles V. gave the hand of his juvenile
illegitimate daughter Marguerite, who, like her great-
aunt in the Netherlands, was known by the name of
Marguerite of Austria. This daughter of Charles's fair
Flemish love, Marguerite Van Gest, was remarried in
1538 to a twelve-year-old boy, Octavius Farnese, made
Duke of Parma and Piacenza. She was a very able
woman, and became Regent of the Low Countries under
her half-brother, Philip II.
The Emperor did not reach Bologna until the month
of November 1529, but the Pope, who had already
arrived, was waiting for him in that city.
It must have appeared strange to the onlookers at the
ceremony of the meeting of the Pope and the Emperor,
to see the latter kneel down and kiss the foot of the
Pontiff whom he had so lately held a prisoner. Charles,
however, not merely kissed Clement's foot, but his hand
also, and treated him generally as if he were his dearest
friend.
The ceremony of the coronation was double. Upon
his birthday, February 24, 1530, when he attained the
age of thirty, Charles V. was, with the most magnificent
37 8 Two Great Rivals
ceremonial, crowned as Emperor of the Holy Roman
Empire, with the golden crown of Charlemagne. Two
days earlier he had been crowned with the iron crown of
Lombardy, in assuming which he took over the Sovereignty
of the Kingdom of Italy.
We need not describe the gorgeousness of the display
made upon this occasion of the assumption by the
fortunate young Emperor of the supreme rule of the
greater part of Europe. It was, of course, as magnificent
as was befitting the occasion. Perhaps the most interesting
sight for the spectators in the Royal procession was the
appearance, side by side, of Antonio da Leyva and Andrea
Doria. This pair preceded all the great dignitaries of
the Church, and, as Leyva was still a cripple, as when he
pursued and captured the Comte de Saint-Paul, he had
to be carried in a litter, while his war-horse was led
behind him. Four thousand of Leyva's Spanish veterans
and eighteen cannons came directly behind him and the
hero of Genoese independence, and then followed a
thousand men-at-arms, dressed in the old armour of that
Burgundy of which, in spite of all his other triumphs, the
Emperor was fated for ever to remain deprived.
CHAPTER XLIII
The Princes Released — Marguerite of Austria
Dies — Anne Boleyn
I53O AND LATER
WHEN mentioning above that Francis had promised
to pay two million golden crowns for the ransom
of his sons, we omitted to point out that some eight
hundred thousand of these represented money borrowed
from Henry VII. and Henry VIII. by Charles V. and
his grandfather, the Emperor Maximilian I. It will be
remembered that not long since, when Henry VIII. had
joined the League against Charles, the Emperor had said
that he did not see any reason for Henry so doing, as
he intended to pay his debts to his uncle. He now had
the opportunity of doing so without having to disburse
a single crown from his own exchequer, as Fran9ois it
was who was compelled to pay the piper.
With a mistrust born of experience, Charles, in spite
of the Peace of Cam bray, refused to hand over the young
Princes to his rival until all of the vast sum promised
by Fran9ois was paid in actual cash. He declared that
he was not going to be caught a second time, as he had
been by the French King's vow to hand over Burgundy
after he had been set free in 1 526. The Dauphin Francois
and Henri, Due d'Orleans, remained, therefore, close
prisoners in the middle of the mountains of Castile until
such time as the money should be forthcoming. This
mistrust on the part of Charles, which was no doubt
justified when dealing with a shifty monarch like
379
380 Two Great Rivals
Francis I., condemned the little boys, therefore, to another
painful year of imprisonment. In the summer of 1529,
however, Louise de Savoie was allowed to send her usher
Bordin to see them at Pedraza, when it was with con-
siderable difficulty that Bordin obtained access to the
fortress, as the boys' gaoler, the Marquis of Berlanga,
took the greatest pains to keep the Princes isolated.
When at last Bordin was admitted, he found the two
young Princes in a dark chamber with bare stone walls.
They were seated on stone seats near the solitary window,
which admitted light through a wall of immense thickness.
Bordin described the dungeon as being close and evil-
smelling, and in fact only fit for the detention of the worst
criminals, while the clothing in which he found the poor
boys was mean and ragged. The sight of the Princes in
such a condition brought tears to the eyes of their visitor,
and he was still more horrified when, after conveying to
them the loving messages of which he was the bearer, and
promises of speedy release, he perceived from the boys'
puzzled manner that they did not understand him properly.
The Dauphin indeed asked the Marquis of Berlanga if
Bordin could not speak Spanish, as he wished to talk
to him in that tongue. Bordin apparently knew Spanish,
as he replied, asking Fra^ois, the Dauphin, if he had
forgotten his own language. " How could I help doing
so ?" replied the boy. " I have never heard anything but
Spanish since we were deprived of our servants."
Each of the boys had a little dog to play with. " That
is all their pleasure," remarked Berlanga, pointing to
the spaniels.
" I call it but a poor pleasure for such great Princes,"
Bordin replied.
" Oh, well," retorted Peralta, the captain of the guard,
" now you can see the sort of way in which the sons
of the King your lord are treated in the mountains of
Spain."
Berlanga now told Bordin that it was time for him to go,
and refused to allow him to return to pay another visit.
With difficulty, before leaving, the messenger of Louise
The Princes Released 381
obtained permission to send to his inn for two velvet
toques, with gold embroidery and white plumes, which he
had brought for the Princes. When these caps arrived,
the Marquis snatched them from Bordin's hands and,
although the boys begged to be allowed to receive them,
brutally said that he would keep them for them. The
Spaniards apparently feared some enchantment if the
children should be allowed to wear the toques, and for the
same reason would not allow Bordin to measure the
Dauphin's height, to see how much he had grown.
For ten months after the usher's visit, the boys remained
prisoners. In the meantime the Archduchess Marguerite,
who, if she hated the French yet had a good heart, having
heard how hardly they were treated, wrote to beg her
nephew Charles to have mercy on the boys. Charles
listened to his aunt's remonstrances, and gave accordingly
instructions for their better treatment during the remainder
of their captivity. This kindly act of interference was
one of the last occasions upon which we hear of the worthy
Marguerite interposing in her nephew's affairs, for she
died in November 1530, as the result of having trodden
on a piece of glass which one of her ladies of honour, an
English girl, had dropped into her shoe by accident.
The actual cause of Marguerite's death was an overdose
of opium, given to her by the surgeons when they were
about to amputate her foot ; but, as the gangrene had in
all probability permeated her whole system, this peaceful
ending probably saved this most excellent Princess from
much suffering.
Charles V., who was hurrying to the Low Countries
from Germany, upon hearing of his aunt's illness, never
saw her again. However, on the day before her death
Marguerite wrote to the Emperor a tender letter of fare-
well, in which she informed him that, with exception of a
few legacies, she had left him her " sole and universal
heir."
This unselfish daughter of the sturdy old fighter
Maximilian was fifty years old when she died, and had
been for over twenty-two years the Regent and practical
382 Two Great Rivals
ruler of the Low Countries at the time of her decease.
During that long period of rule, how well she had
managed her difficult administration is proved by the fact
that there was never any rebellion in the Low Countries.
Things did not go so smoothly under her niece, and
successor as Regent, Marie, the widowed Queen of
Hungary, who soon drove the inhabitants of Ghent to
rise in arms owing to her arbitrary taxation.
To return to the sons of Francois I. In the summer
of the year 1530, with the greatest vigilance they were
conducted by the Constable of Castile to the northern
portion of Spain, Montmorency having at last arrived at
Bayonne with all the money in gold for their ransom.
The Grand Master of France had also brought with him
the papers for the renunciation of all the places in Italy
and elsewhere to which Fran9ois I. had agreed. He was
accompanied to the French frontier by Bryan, the
Ambassador of Henry VIII., who brought with him the
various notes of hand for money received which had been
signed by Maximilian I. and Charles V. Bryan brought
likewise with him some very costly and beautiful jewels,
which had been left in pledge by these two Emperors
with the two English Kings, from whom they had
borrowed money, which jewels included a magnificent
fleur de lys in diamonds.
By the instructions of the cautious Charles, the utmost
vigilance was observed by his messengers, Louis de Praet
and Alvaro de Lugo, to see that they should not allow
their master to be cheated in any way. Every paper,
every title, was carefully verified, and all of the immense
amount of gold brought by Montmorency on mules to
Bayonne had to be counted and sealed up again in sacks.
At length, being satisfied that all was correct, the
Constable of Castile allowed Anne de Montmorency to
proceed with the exchange of the money, documents, and
jewels, against the bodies of the two young Princes.
A pontoon or raft was, as before at the time of the
release of Fra^ois I., moored in the middle of the river
Bidassoa, and while two warships watched the mouth of
The Princes Released
the river, an equal number of French and Spanish troops
were drawn up on either side. Upon July ist, 1530,
while Montmorency arrived at the pontoon on one side
with his barge full of valuables, Fran9ois, the Dauphin,
and Henri, Due d'Orleans, were taken to the other side
of the pontoon by the Constable of Castile. The boats
were exchanged, and while, after rowing round the end of
the pontoon, the Constable of Castile and his gentlemen
returned with their precious freight to Spain, Anne de
Montmorency, rowing round in the opposite direction,
bore off into Navarrese territory the little Princes, who
had been prisoners for upwards of four and a half years.
Queen Eleonore, accompanied by a suite of her ladies,
at the same time crossed the Bidassoa at a point close at
hand, and, joining the Dauphm and his brother, proceeded
to meet the French King and Court at Bordeaux, when
the sister of the Emperor Charles V. became the Queen
of France.
By the release of the French Princes and the marriage
of the King of France to fileonore was concluded
the first great period of the rivalry of Charles V. and
Francis 1. There were, however, other periods to follow,
only to terminate with the death of the Monarch who
had now become the Emperor's brother-in-law.
During the two years following the Peace of Cambray
Charles endeavoured to consolidate his power in Germany,
and to bring the Lutheran German Princes back into the
fold of the Pope of Rome. As these Princes had,
however, combined by an union which they formed for
self-defence, called the League of Smalkalde, the Emperor
found the reduction of these rulers of various German
States no easy matter.
Owing to the renewed aggression of Soliman in the
south of Europe, he soon recognised that instead of
persecuting the Protestants he would act more wisely
by conciliating them and obtaining their support in a war
against the Turk. A Diet held at Augsburg, which had
been attended by the violent Papal Nuncio Campeggio,
had resulted in severe penalties being pronounced against
384 Two Great Rivals
the Lutherans. Campeggio wished, in fact, to introduce
the Inquisition into Germany, on the model of the
Spanish Inquisition, and represented to the Emperor that
it was requisite to accomplish " the destruction of these
venomous plants by iron and the fire."
Instead of being quelled by the decision against them
at Augsburg, the German Princes, headed by the Elector
Henry of Saxony and the Landgrave of Hesse, openly
despised the decisions of the Imperial Chamber. Feeling
that they could count in an emergency upon the help of
Henry VIII., who was furious at not obtaining his divorce
from the Pope, and Francois, who still wanted Milan,
they were ready to set the Emperor at defiance.
At this moment came the news that the Sultan Soliman
had entered Hungary with three hundred thousand men.
The frightened Charles made haste to come to terms with
the Princes, first at Nuremberg and then at the Diet at
Ratisbon, assuring them freedom of religion until a
general ecclesiastical council should meet to consider the
whole matter from every point of view.
The Protestants now came to assist the Emperor with
all their forces, and soon he was to be seen at the head of
an immense army in the neighbourhood of Vienna.
This was the first time that Charles V. had commanded
an army in person, and, as his brother Ferdinand joined
him with a swarm of Hungarian and Bohemian horsemen,
great things were now expected from the Emperor.
Charles himself, whom recent events had rendered con-
ceited, boasted how he was going to strangle " that dog
of a Turk," and all Europe stood by watching in joyful
anticipation for such an auspicious event to take place.
" Nothing," declared the Emperor, " shall prevent me
from being present at the battle," and having uttered this
bold speech, he waited without advancing to the attack.
The Sultan himself was present with his immense army,
and anxious to fight against Charles V. Presently he
learned, however, that the Emperor was said to have an
ulcer in the leg, and had gone off to Karlsbad or some
similar place to take the waters.
Anne Boleyn 385
Thereupon Soliman continued at his ease to devastate
Hungary once more. He likewise invaded a new
Austrian province, that of Styria, which this time fur-
nished the great tribute of young girls and children
without which a Turkish army never returned from its
expeditions.
While Charles boasted that the Turk had been afraid
of him, he nevertheless advised his brother Ferdinand to
treat, when he accepted the most humiliating terms at the
end of 1532, making of himself the vassal and tributary
of the Sultan, and agreeing to the division of Hungary
with Zapolya.
In order to wean the unreliable Clement away from the
Emperor's alliance, Fra^ois now cleverly thought of a
plan which he contrived to carry out. This was to
arrange a match betweeen his second son, Henri d'Orleans,
with the Pope's youthful relation Caterina de' Medici,
or, to use the name by which she is better known in
French history, Catherine de Medicis. Charles was both
furious and disgusted when he learned that his now dear
friend Clement was not only flattered and delighted at the
idea of this grand alliance with Fra^ois, but intended
to proceed in person to France, where the marriage was to
be solemnised at Marseilles. He said that he could not
believe that the King of France would marry his son into
a family of base mercantile origin ; nevertheless, the
Emperor was mistaken. After about three weeks of
continued festivities at Marseilles, where he was enter-
tained royally by Fran9ois and all his Court, the Pope
himself, in October 1533, performed the ceremony which
united Caterina de' Medici, of evil memory, to Henri de
Valois, Due d'Orleans.
Just a year later, greatly to the delight of all Europe, and
especially of Germany, England, and Italy, Clement VII.
died, after a reign which had lasted for upwards of eleven
years, when he was succeeded on the Papal throne by
Alessandro Farnese, who, upon his election in October
1534, assumed the name of Paul III.
Not long before the death of Clement, Henry VIII.,
386 Two Great Rivals
whose passion for Anne Boleyn would brook of no longer
delay, broke openly with Rome. He had waited for six
years for a divorce from Catherine of Aragon, but the
Emperor's efforts and those of Cardinal Wolsey, who had
secretly been false to his master's interests, had proved of
more avail than all Henry's supplications to the Pope.
The King therefore persuaded Cranmer, Archbishop of
Canterbury, to annul his first marriage and to declare his
daughter Mary illegitimate, and then, in 1533, married the
merry and volatile young maid-of-honour for whom he had
so long been pining in vain. When the enraged Clement
VII. had declared the English King excommunicated unless
he should return to his first wife, Henry caused his Parlia-
ment to abolish the Papal power in England and to
declare him the supreme head of the Church.
Although Henry VIII. remained a Catholic and per-
secuted those of the Protestant faith, by this action he
opened the way for the Protestant Reformation, which
commenced in England with his successor.
Before he thus took to his bridal bed one almost a
Frenchwoman, if of English parentage, whom he had first
admired as a child when at the Field of the Cloth of
Gold, there had previously been question of two really
French marriages for Henry. These had been with the
Princess Marguerite d'Angouleme, and Renee, who
married the Duke of Ferrara.
After Marguerite had set all Europe talking about her
in 1526, by the devotion shown by her to her brother in
her visit to Spain, Henry had loudly declared his admira-
tion for the talents of this Princess. He was already
living apart from his wife, on account of some female
ailment which seemed to preclude the possibility of her
bearing him a much-desired son, and he gave instructions
to his Ambassador in France to cultivate the good graces
of Marguerite.
It would have been a splendid opportunity for Francois,
in the person of his able, clever, and devoted sister, to
have obtained a real foothold in England. By the
influence of Montmorency and the clerical party in France,
Anne Boleyn 387
which then and later showed its attachment to the
cause of Charles V. and Spain, the matter came to
nothing. Fran£ois seemed to be alarmed when he saw
Henry's Ambassador in intimate converse with his sister,
and endeavoured successfully to keep them apart. A
little later, as we know, Marguerite married the im-
poverished Henri de Navarre, so much her junior.
Montmorency had represented that it would be unwise
to marry in England Marguerite, who had Protestant
leanings, just at the very moment that Fran£ois was
endeavouring to become the chief of a Catholic league
in Italy, and thus he had nipped in the bud any
chance of a match which would have been a most
excellent one for France. It was when Marguerite's
second marriage took place that Anne Boleyn, who had
been attached to her household at the French Court,
left her and went to England, where that old diplomat,
her father, contrived to have his daughter received among
the Queen's ladies-of-honour, of whom, with her French
vivacity, she formed the brightest ornament. The gaiety
and charm of her manner were recognised not only by
the King but others, and her style in dress copied by the
ladies of the English Court — they now wearing high
dresses instead of the very low-cut ones which had pre-
viously been the fashion.
It was in the year following the arrival of Anne in
England that Wolsey came on his splendid embassy to
the French Court. Then, when enjoying the festivities
at Compiegne, the Cardinal broached a subject which had
not been previously mentioned at Amiens. This was a
formal demand for the hand of the Princess Renee.
This daughter of Louis XII. had for mother Anne of
Brittany, and might possibly lay claim to hereditary
rights to that great Duchy, of which, when Anne had
been married in succession to Charles VIII. and Louis XII.,
she had so distinctly reserved the right of personal
government.
Louise de Savoie was anxious to accept this alliance in
the event of a divorce being obtained for Henry VIII.
388 Two Great Rivals
Not so, however, her son. Frar^ois, suspicious of the
English King, feared lest he might some day lay claim to
Brittany through his wife, and therefore refused to give
him the hand of Renee.
It was, so the Cardinal more than hinted, quite on the
cards that the security of the recently concluded Franco-
Anglo alliance might be endangered by this refusal ; but
on his return to England, after three months' absence,
Wolsey discovered that the loss of Renee was a matter of
the most perfect indifference to the King, whose master
he had hitherto been.
During his absence Wolsey had been supplanted by
another. Anne Boleyn had now completely wound
herself round the heart-strings of the still handsome if
somewhat corpulent Henry, and the butcher's son found
that no master, but a mistress, was now required at
Windsor.
The Cardinal, who distrusted the Reformed religious
leanings with which Anne Boleyn had been inspired by
Marguerite d'Angouleme, had already viewed this young
lady with suspicion before his departure. So had
Catherine of Aragon, who had once sent Anne away
from the Court, supposedly on account of a love
affair with a young gentleman who sought her hand.
While the Cardinal was away, Sir Thomas Boleyn had
taken advantage of that circumstance to contrive the
reinstatement of his daughter at the Court, and she had
become well aware to what an extent the King was
troubled by her presence.
Nevertheless, although her vanity was flattered, Anne
was frightened at the vista which opened out before her.
She fell before the King, declaring that she could not
become his mistress ; and when Henry replied that all
obstacles should be removed, that he would make her his
wife, Anne wished to decline the honour. Tremblingly
the fair maid-of-honour pointed out to her lord and
master that, should she marry him, she could never have
the same openness of heart towards him that she might
have if married in her own station in life.
Anne Boleyn 389
Now it was that Wolsey, reporting his failure in ob-
taining the hand of Renee, received for abrupt reply from
Henry that it did not matter, he intended to marry no
other than Anne Boleyn. The Cardinal, more suspicious
than ever of the Lutheran pupil of Marguerite d'Angou-
leme, commenced writing to Clement VII. to prevent the
divorce. A letter of his to the Pope to this effect
was seized, his subsequent disgrace ensued, and it was
only by a timely death that the great Cardinal escaped
the scaffold.
With the marriage of Henry VIII. to Anne Boleyn
there seemed a considerable probability of the triumph of
the Reformed religion in England. Fra^ois I., anxious
to keep on good terms with Henry on account of his
support against Charles, pushed also by his sister Mar-
guerite, was not therefore inclined at first to crush with
a heavy hand the new ideas in France. Fra^ois was
naturally inclined towards new ideas, new learning, new
art — or, at all events, the restoration of ancient learning
and artistic ideas as adapted to more modern times.
While he called to him the great artist Leonardo da Vinci
from Italy, he also, as we have already mentioned, sum-
moned Erasmus to Paris, who declined to come.
When, in 1528, the mutilation occurred of the image of
the Virgin in the Rue des Rosiers, Fra^ois allowed
himself to change round and persecute the Reformers.
Nevertheless, in his rivalry with Charles V., he still
endeavoured to keep in with the Protestant Princes in
Germany, who had snapped their fingers at the Emperor.
CHAPTER XLIV
The Emperor invades Tunis and France
1535—
WHEN, by such irregular means, Henry VIII.
divorced Catherine and married the attractive Anne,
Charles V., the nephew of the former Queen, was furious.
The Pope being of the same way of thinking, together
they sought for vengeance on the English King, and cast
about in their minds for any means to do him damage.
It so happened that Clement VII. had an instrument at
hand in the person of Reginald Pole, who became later
Archbishop of Canterbury and a Cardinal.
This young man, the son of Lord Montacute and
Margaret Plantagenet, Countess of Salisbury, was a
cousin of the King of England. He had been partly
brought up at the Court and loaded with many marks of
favour, especially by Catherine of Aragon, who had thrown
out hopes to him of marrying his cousin the Princess
Mary.
When Henry was negotiating with Clement VII. for a
divorce, he sent young Pole, who was educated at Oxford
and Padua, as one of his emissaries to the Pope, who
won him over to write violently against his benefactor
Henry VIII. Charles V. and Clement now talked of
deposing Henry, and Pole, being made a Cardinal, was
sent to Liege, to correspond from that place with the dis-
contented party in England, and stir up insurrection.
As a reward, Pole was promised the Crown of England.
Charles, being on friendly terms, at all events nominally,
39°
The Emperor invades Tunis and France 391
with his brother-in-law Frar^ois, wrote to him asking him
to execute the sentence of deposition against Henry VIII.
Fran£ois merely sneered, while replying that the King of
England was his friend, and that he did not in the least
wish to hurt him.
The casuistical reply Charles now made was that he
wished <c to save the King's conscience and honour,"
which was to be accomplished by shaving his head and
putting him in a monastery.
Even at the present day it is impossible to repress a
smile at the thought of Henry VIII. as a monk ! but
although Montmorency, at the instigation of Charles V.,
endeavoured to push Francois, the French King refused
to have anything to do with the scheme for reforming
Henry, even when the Emperor speciously offered to
marry one of the French Princes to the Princess Mary and
to make him King of England.
Such promises did not affect Fran£ois — he knew their
value. What he really desired was to get Milan back
again, in spite of his renunciation. He had recently
received a terrible insult in that Duchy, when, at the
instigation of the Spaniards, an envoy of his to the Duke
Sforza (who had, by the way, recently married the
Emperor's niece) was assassinated. The name of this
envoy was Maraviglia. It was owing to the threats made
by Charles against Francesco Sforza for receiving him that,
after first being decoyed into a duel, in which he proved
successful and killed his adversary, Maraviglia was seized
and beheaded.
When Francois complained to the Emperor of this cruel
crime, he received no satisfaction, and shortly afterwards
Charles caused the arrest of another French envoy, whom
Fran9ois was sending to the Sultan Soliman.
Here were the makings of a very pretty new quarrel
already, and, despite his marriage to the amiable Eleonore,
who very soon found that she had a hard time of it
between her husband and her brother, Francois made the
second move in the game.
This was to stir up the great pirate of the Mediterra-
39 2 Two Great Rivals
nean, commonly known as Barbarossa, to ravage the coasts
of Corsica, Sicily, and Italy.
There were two brothers — renegade Greeks — from their
red beards both known as Barbarossa ; their names were
Kheir-ed-Din and Ouradj, and both in turn became
Bey of Algiers. Kheir-ed-Din was likewise employed
by the Sultan as the commander of his fleets, and, by
treachery, he contrived to conquer Tunis from the Sultan
Muley-Hassan, a Prince who had murdered all his
thirty-three brothers, save one named Al Raschid, and
usurped the throne.
Having seized Tunis, which he now ruled under the
Suzerainty of the Sultan Soliman, and having murdered Al
Raschid, in whose name he had conquered that city and
surrounding country, Barbarossa, using that place as his
base, proceeded as before to plunder the shipping and
coasts of the Mediterranean.
When Frangois had made friends with Kheir-ed-Din,
the Italian subjects and Genoese allies of Charles V. soon
had cause to tremble, for he was quite the equal of Andrea
Doria in valour and skill as an Admiral, and vastly his
superior in the possession of warships. The unhappy
inhabitants of the Italian coasts and islands now began
constantly to dread the appearance of the turbaned pirates,
who pillaged their homes, drove the men to the fields or
killed them, and carried off their wives and daughters as
booty in their ships, to become inmates of some Turkish
seraglio.
Barbarossa made a regular trade of the rape of par-
ticularly beautiful women, for whose capture he received
large sums from some Bey or Pasha. He carried off in
this way the daughter of one of the Spanish Governors of
Charles V., while the beautiful Giulia of Aragon only just
escaped in her chemise, by the devotion of a Knight who
yielded up to her his horse and remained himself to escape
as best he could on foot.
As a mark of her gratitude, Giulia of Aragon, sister
of the famous beauty Joanna of Aragon whose picture
is in the Louvre, caused the death of her gallant pro-
The Emperor invades Tunis and France 393
tector from the Turks, the saviour of her honour ! In
order that he might not be able to boast of having seen her
unveiled charms, Giulia employed assassins to murder the
man to whose devotion she was indebted for salvation from
a life of imprisonment and shame in a Turkish harem.
When Fra^ois employed such allies as Barbarossa, a
perfect howl of execration went up against the Very
Christian King, who, the ally of Infidels, was himself no
better than an Infidel. Charles V., having failed to
attack the Sultan, determined to attack his Admiral in
Tunis, where also many of the troops of Soliman were
stationed under the great pirate's command. No expedi-
tion could make the Emperor more popular than this,
and volunteer troops of all nations flocked to his standard,
the Pope and the Knights of Saint John sending squadrons.
The Emperor, with a splendid fleet under Doria, and
numberless troops in transports, the whole amounting
to five hundred vessels, arrived in the Gulf of Tunis off
the fort of Goletta, which protects the city, in the middle
of July 1535. Barbarossa was ready for him with a
splendid army, while his Turkish troops held Goletta.
After a fierce and stubborn resistance, Goletta was cap-
tured, the Emperor marching in through the breach
which his cannon had made in the walls of the strong
fortress. The defenders, however, escaped through a
shallow arm of the sea, and joined the army with which
Barbarossa now advanced to give battle to Charles.
In the ensuing battle, fought in the burning sands
outside Tunis, the discipline and armour of the Spanish
hosts prevailed against the courage of Barbarossa and
his Turks, Moors, and Arabs. He would, however,
have saved the city of Tunis had but his own cruel
counsels, to kill ten thousand Christian slaves left in the
citadel, been followed. At the request of his captains,
the pirate chieftain had spared their lives. These
Christians now rose up against him in his city during
the continuance of the battle, and securing the guns,
completed the discomfiture of Barbarossa, while the
former subjects of Muley Hassan brought the keys of
394 Two Great Rivals
the city gates to Charles. The Emperor's army of fifty
thousand men entered Tunis, taking the deposed Sultan
Muley Hassan with them, it being the Emperor's pur-
pose to restore the Kingdom, under his own Suzerainty,
to this murderer of his thirty-two brothers.
No sooner had the Emperor's troops reached the city
gates than all discipline was lost. The sacking of
Tunis, where all the harems were broken into and the
innocent inhabitants murdered, was only equalled by
the sack of Rome. Great excesses, more horrible out-
rages, were indeed committed at Tunis than at Rome,
owing to the fiendish delight of the Christian soldiers,
Germans, Italians, and Spaniards alike, at finding the
Infidels in their power. Although the Moorish men
and women of Tunis had themselves been sufferers at
the hands of Kheir-ed-Din and his invading hosts, they
were now treated as if they had been the ravishers of
the coasts of the Mediterranean — no mercy was shown
to either man or woman. Thirty thousand persons were
butchered on that fatal 25th of July, 1535, and when, at
length, all the sacking was over, ten thousand Mussul-
mans were borne away into captivity ; but Barbarossa
escaped.
Having reinstated Muley Hassan upon his throne,
to be detested by the subjects upon whom he had brought
such untold horrors, Charles left a strong garrison in
Goletta, and returned in triumph to Europe.
Fran9ois I. took advantage of the absence of Charles
in Tunis to compass his revenge for the murder of
his envoy. Having raised an army of over forty
thousand men, he invaded the dominions of his uncle,
the Duke Charles of Savoy, whose wife Beatrice, the
sister of Isabella of Portugal, the Empress, had become
the practical ruler of the Duchy.
Owing to his wife's suggestions, the Duke Charles,
who had become a Spaniard at heart, had actually pro-
posed to exchange Savoy with the Emperor for some
equivalent in Italy. To have had Charles installed in
Savoy and Bresse would have been fatal to France, other-
The Emperor invades Tunis and France 395
wise the King had not the slightest pretence for his
aggression in Savoy, and likewise Piedmont, which be-
longed to Savoy. Geneva was also at that time subject
to the Duke Charles. This city, which now declared
itself Protestant, was aided against him by Francis, and
not only succeeded in procuring its freedom, but also
conquered the Duke's territory of what is now the
Swiss canton the Pays de Vaud.
The seizure of Savoy and Piedmont, which was not
accomplished without some hard fighting among the
mountains in the wintry season, was completed by the
following April (1536) ; and then the Emperor retaliated,
and a new war commenced between the rivals.
Before the Emperor proceeded to the invasion of
France (which, by abandoning his posts, the treachery
to Fran9ois of the Marquis de Saluces made easy),
Charles V. in the Vatican at Rome pronounced a most
bitter diatribe against the French King. There were
present Princes, Cardinals, and Ambassadors of all
powers, including those of France, when, in the most
violent terms, Charles gave utterance to this harangue.
It was subsequently printed and disseminated through-
out all Europe, when the accusations that it contained
injured Francois greatly, especially in the estimation of
the Protestant German Princes, who recoiled from " the
friend of the Turk."
One fiery remark of the Emperor was a fresh challenge
to Fran9ois to mortal combat. The French Ambassadors
were present, owing to the recent death of the Duke
Francesco Sforza, to demand that his ancient patrimony of
Milan might now be returned to the King of France.
The Emperor's reply was as follows :
" Let us not continue to wantonly shed the blood of
our innocent subjects ; let us decide the quarrel man to
man, with what arms he pleases to choose, in our shirts,
on an island, a bridge, or aboard a galley moored in a
river. Let the Duchy of Burgundy be put in deposit on
his part, and that of Milan on mine — these shall be the
prize of the conqueror ; and after that let the united
Two Great Rivals
forces of Germany, Spain, and France be employed to
humble the power of the Turk and to extirpate heresy
out of Christendom."
The Emperor, with the Marquis del Guasto, the Duke
of Alva, and the Marquis of Mantua, Fernando de
Gonzaga, all put themselves now under the supreme
command of Antonio da Leyva to invade France. As
Charles persuaded the Catholic Cantons to recall the Swiss
fighting under Francis, " the Turkish King," and as
Saluces abandoned his posts, the invasion of Provence by
Charles proved an easy affair.
To live in that French province, once the Imperial army
had arrived there, was, however, entirely a different
matter.
In that year of 1536 Montmorency was given the
command by Fra^ois, and, to prevent the army of
Charles V. from procuring food, in the most barbarous
manner this French General devastated the whole south
of France, ruined and starved all of the inhabitants of
Provence. While retiring with his army into various
large and very strongly entrenched camps, and occupying
one or two walled cities, Anne de Montmorency destroyed
completely the rest of the country round.
The awful sacrifice was made of a hundred towns and
villages ; all stores, all mills of every kind, were destroyed,
even the wells were filled up ; everything that could be
consumed was burned. Many of the large towns de-
stroyed, such as Aix, had been made receptacles by the
wretched inhabitants for their furniture and goods ;
Montmorency, however, ordered these to be burned with
the rest.
The result was what had been anticipated by this com-
mander. Charles V., constantly harassed by the starving
and furious peasantry, and occasionally by the light troops,
had to retire with the terrible loss of twenty-five thousand
of his men, including the veteran Commander-in-Chief
Antonio da Leyva. This retreat was a terrible disgrace
for the Emperor, but Montmorency took good care not
to turn it into a rout by issuing with his full force and
The Emperor invades Tunis and France 397
driving Charles back at a run. He was too good a friend
of Spain to crush the Emperor, who indeed had only been
attacked while in France by the peasantry and by adven-
turous Knights and men-at-arms who had refused to obey
their detested commander's orders to remain strictly on
the defensive. The peasants, however, inflicted terrible
losses upon the retiring force, and nearly succeeded in
killing the Emperor also. Nevertheless, as a reward for
having reduced a large part of France to the most fright-
ful condition of misery that it had ever known, even when
overrun by a successful enemy, Montmorency was created
Constable of France by his grateful Sovereign.
Meanwhile, after two months in France, Charles had
been compelled to retire excessively crestfallen, and, if
Fran9ois had but known how to play the game properly,
the year 1537 should have left the Emperor at his feet.
CHAPTER XLV
The Influence of the Women
1536—1547
IN order the better to understand why it was that
Fra^ois during the remainder of his career so fre-
quently failed to take advantage of his opportunities,
and so often played into his rival's hands, the position at
the French Court of various women must be considered.
Of his mother, Madame, the intriguing, passionate
Louise de Savoie, Fra^ois lost the counsels in 1533.
This Princess, who, as de Lussy remarked to Queen
Eleonore, was u a very terrible woman," suffered for a
long time with perpetual stomach-ache, which, added to
the gout, eventually carried her off. It is more than
probable that Eleonore found life easier after the death of
her mother-in-law, and the removal of her influence, which
was never a good one, over the King.
There were, however, other female influences remain-
ing, that of the mistress with whom Louise had supplied
her son being for a considerable time the most important.
This was Anne d'Heilly de Pisseleu, the blonde beauty
who had replaced Fransoise de Foix.
The " mtchante maztresse " was the daughter of
Guillaume de Pisseleu, Seigneur d'Heilly, a Captain in
the Legion of Picardy, and, having become a maid-of-
honour to Louise at the age of seventeen, was less than
nineteen when she became the mistress of Francis. By
the charm of her conversation, Anne was found from the
first to be a very desirable companion to the King. Like
398
The Influence of the Women 399
him, she was of an artistic temperament, fond of letters
and fine architecture. When Anne was first presented to
him on his return from captivity in Spain, the King fancied
that he saw in her a resemblance to Ximena de 1'Infan-
tado, the daughter of the great Spanish noble who went
into a nunnery from love for Fran9ois when he left Spain.
A French author has asked, what chance had the Comtesse
de Chateaubriand against one whom he describes as
" la jolie, fraiche, vive, pimpante demoiselle picarde,
brillante de nouveaute et de 1'esperance, qui, souple
comme une couleuvre, du premier coup tenta, enlasa,
ennoua irr6sistiblement le roi."
Having been married to a convenient husband, who
took himself off" to his restored estates and became the
Governor of Brittany, Anne de Pisseleu, as we know,
herself blossomed out into the Duchesse d'Etampes, and
remained the King's titular mistress for so long as he
lived.
During that period of a score of years, according to
M. de 1'Escure, after getting rid of Marguerite d'An-
gouleme with all the honours of war, she contrived to
provide handsomely for all of her thirty brothers and
sisters, and to make her uncle a Cardinal into the bargain.
For herself the Duchesse d'Etampes not only piled up
great wealth, with various chateaux and estates, but
obtained from the King many of the Royal jewels of the
French Crown. There are various stories told of the
grasping nature of Anne with reference to her dealings
with Charles V.
One of these is that when, owing to the weakness of
Francis, the Emperor was allowed to pass through
France, and even well received at the Court in Paris in
* *
the year 1540, the Duchesse d'Etampes gave to the King
a bit of advice which, if dishonourable, it would have
been to his interest to follow. This was to retain the
Emperor in his hands until he made good his promises
to hand over Milan. Charles, who was himself acting
dishonourably in beguiling Fra^ois with promises which
he had not the slightest intention of fulfilling, understood
400 Two Great Rivals
the antagonism of the Duchesse d'Etampes, and thought
he could buy her. Accordingly, while she held to him
at dinner-time a golden ewer of water, he purposely let
slip into it his most magnificent diamond ring. When
Anne fished the ring out of the basin to return it, the
Emperor, assuming his most amiable expression, begged
that one so fair as the holder of the bowl would honour
him by accepting the jewel.
She accepted the ring and the Emperor's friendship
together, and when next war broke out, and Charles was
invading France by way of Champagnen, Anne is said to
have acted as a spy in his behalf, and to have sold him
the secret concerning the presence of provisions at
Epernay and Chateau Thierry, the seizure of which
enabled the Emperor to hold out until he and Fran9ois
made their last peace at Crepy. Of this peace, which was
disgraceful for France, Anne de Pisseleu is said to have
arranged the terms.
While, as we have said, artistic by nature and fond
of building, the Duchesse d'Etampes was by no means
devoted to the artists whom Fra^ois called to the Court,
in whom she saw her rivals in the King's favour. Above
all, she hated and always fought with the braggart
Benvenuto Cellini, when Fra^ois summoned him to
France.
In the year 1537, when the Duchesse d'Etampes was
still a young woman twenty-nine years of age, she was
by no means the friend of either Charles V. or Spain.1
Therefore she was perfectly willing and inclined to push
Fran9ois to seize the opportunity, after the disgraceful
retreat of Charles from Provence, of employing the Turk,
and, by combining with him as an ally, crushing the
Emperor in Italy.
It was no longer with Barbarossa, an Admiral who
could only ravage the coasts, but with the whole might
of the Sultan Soliman, that it behoved Francois to ally
1 Anne de Pisseleu was born at Heilly in Picardy in 1508. She was
one of the thirty children of Guillaume de Pisseleu, by his second wife,
Anne Sanguin She died at the Chateau de Challuau, at the age of sixty-
eight, in 1576, surviving her rival Diane de Poitiers by ten years.
The Influence of the Women 401
himself firmly and faithfully ; not merely to make a
promise of aiding Soliman one day in some particular
adventure, to break it on the morrow, and to undertake
some other enterprise on his own account, entirely dif-
ferent to what had been arranged. There were others at
the Court, notably the old warlike diplomatist, Guillaume
du Bellay, and his brother, the witty Bishop Jean du
Bellay, who saw eye to eye with the Duchesse d'Etampes
in this matter.
Jean du Bellay, of whom Anne de Pisseleu made a
Cardinal, was the clever emissary of whom Fra^ois was
apt to make use to visit the German Protestant Princes,
when such was his power of persuasion that he almost
convinced them to believe in the King's protestations
even when they despised and distrusted him most.
Indeed, had it not been for the callous cruelty with which
Fran9ois allowed the Sorbonne to condemn twenty-four
French Lutherans to the fire at one time, Jean du Bellay
would no doubt have been able to arrange a warlike com-
bination with the German Princes which would have
proved fatal to their Sovereign lord the Emperor.
It is no wonder, however, that the Germans were dis-
gusted, when even the Pope Paul III. was horrified at
the cruelty of the Very Christian King, and wrote to
say that u even God Himself showed more mercy."
This was when, accompanied by Anne de Pisseleu, in
June 1535, Francois had proceeded in solemn procession,
torch in hand, to light the fires which were to burn
six Lutherans at once.
In 1536 the King suffered a severe loss. While
in the camp at Valence, at the time that the Emperor
was invading Provence, his eldest and best beloved
son, the Dauphin, was hurrying to meet him. This
young Prince, who had never been strong since his
imprisonment, died suddenly at Lyon, after partaking
of a glass of water from a very cold spring. Without
reason, his page, Montecuculli, was tortured on the
charge of having poisoned the Dauphin. By this
death Henri, Due d'Orleans, became the heir to the
26
402 Two Great Rivals
throne, and between that Prince and his father there
existed no confidence. Henri was attached with Mont-
morency, who was a man of detestable nature, to the
party fond of Spanish ideas in religion, especially con-
cerning the Turk. Spanish manners and gravity of
demeanour, which were considered to be good form, as
opposed to the spirit of levity of the King, his mistress,
the Bellays, and the Admiral, Chabot de Brion, dis-
tinguished this Spanish party.
It was soon to be recruited by a great lady who
became its captain, and then, while the Spanish party
became in their own opinion " the Elect," that of the
volatile King was considered as the party of the Lost
Ones. By the influence of Montmorency and the Elect
it was that the arms of Francis, instead of being em-
ployed to aid the Turk in an invincible invasion of Italy
or Austria, were in the year 1537 directed to Picardy,
which the Flemish troops of the Low Countries had
invaded in considerable force.
Jean du Bellay had at this time by the power of
his tongue proved himself a valuable aid to his master.
The Emperor had not long before compelled the Princely
German Electors to elect his brother Ferdinand as King
of the Romans, upon the pretence that his own frequent
absences in his other dominions required that the States
of the German Empire should have an authorised leader
near at hand to lead them against the Turk.
Ferdinand, with the weight of his newly won authority,
had duly secured large bodies of German lansquenets,
when Bellay, finding that these were to be employed
to invade Champagne, by his address and intrigues
persuaded the German Princes to withdraw their con-
tingents.
The greater part of the King's forces remained in the
south of France inactive ; but the Knights and men-at-
arms sent to Picardy defended Peronne, which was
besieged, and other places with great vigour, and the
enemy retired to their own country having done nothing.
From the end of the year 1537, when the King com-
The Influence of the Women 403
menced to be troubled with abscesses due to the de-
bauched life which he had always led, he may be said
to have commenced to go downhill.
The great lady who became the head of the party of
Elect, or the honnetes gens, as they liked to style themselves,
which was now to oppose Fra^ois, was a widow, one who
had been his own mistress in 1523, and hitherto had re-
mained upon very friendly terms with him. She was
Diane de Poitiers, the Senechale de Normandie, and until
this year, since her former intimacy with the King, she
had conducted herself with marked propriety in a Court
where immorality and debauchery were the rule, not the
exception.
In the year 1537 Francis, while lamenting to her the
loss of the Dauphin, complained of the awkward, gauche,
and sullen manners of his second son, Henri.
" Give him into my charge," exclaimed Diane laugh-
ingly ; a I will make him my gallant, and soon turn him
into a presentable fellow." The new Dauphin was then
eighteen, and Diane already aged thirty-eight, but ex-
cessively beautiful, with a perfectly moulded form.1 She
took Henri as " her gallant," and, aided by Montmorency,
who lent the lovers his Chateau of Ecouen for their
amours, took him completely under her protection.
While employed thus in forming the Dauphin's manners,
the still youthful looking widow became the mother of a
little girl, whose birth, which took place in great mystery,
was laid to the account of a perfectly blameless young
lady.
Henri, while Due d'Orleans, had, it will be remembered,
a few years earlier been united to a young girl of fourteen,
the black-eyed, swarthy Catarina de' Medici. This young
girl, having come from a mercantile stock, had been de-
spised by her young husband. Although bright-witted
and well educated, Catherine counted for nothing in the
eyes of her youthful and saturnine husband, whose chief
1 Diane was born at St. Vallier in 1499. She was sixty-seven when she
died at her Chateau d'Anet in 1566, and preserved her good looks and
youthful appearance until the end.
404 Two Great Rivals
and indeed only accomplishments consisted in his being the
best athlete, the best jumper, among the young Knights at
the Court. Only from the talkative, easy-going, pleasure-
loving King her father-in-law did Catherine receive any
notice at the Court, where she was looked upon as an
interloper and an outsider. At this time she was timid
and servile, giving no hint of the pernicious strength
which marked her later years ; and when Henri, her hus-
band, began openly to wear Diane's mottoes and arms,
Diane's colours of white and black, the young wife
turned also to Diane for protection, and received it even
after she had become Queen. To Diane, Montmorency,
and the^ Dauphin there now joined themselves the
Queen Eleonore, and likewise two great dignitaries of
the Church. These were the Cardinal de Lorraine, of
the Ducal family of Guise, and the Cardinal de Tournon.
All of these were for the Emperor against the Turk and
infidelity — their sole desire, they said, to save the soul
and honour of the King.
Fran9ois' mistress, the Duchesse d'litampes, was not,
however, by any means the woman to allow herself to be
snuffed out at the Court by any woman, even if, while for
ever wearing white and black as the mourning for her
deceased husband, that woman had become openly the
paramour of the Dauphin, who might have been her
son, and had, while living in immorality, styled herself
one of the Elect.
Anne, the young mistress, railed constantly against
Diane, whom she styled la vieille, the old one, and thus
there soon developed, not two parties merely, but two
Courts within the Court — that of the King and that of
the Dauphin. While Diane retaliated upon Anne de
Pisseleu by having herself painted nude, in order to show
that she had a far more beautiful figure than the King's
favourite, Francois himself was torn by the strings which
pulled him in different directions. Thus it happened that
while a splendid plan for united action was formed by
the King's agent Laforet in 1537, and Soliman and
Barbarossa actually landed troops at Castro, Francis
From a photograph of the statue in the Loiwre by Jean Goujon.
DIANE DE POITIERS (STATUE),
p. 404)
The Influence of the Women 405
failed to keep his engagements. The Turks accordingly
left Naples and invaded Venice, which Soliman compelled
to buy peace from him for three hundred thousand ducats.
Although from his constant desire to be popular, not
to displease those who surrounded him, Fra^ois had lost
this chance, in the year 1538 he sent his agent, the
wily and corpulent Captain Rincon, to Soliman once more,
when he had learned that the Turks had won a great victory
over Ferdinand of Austria.
The Pope Paul III. was, however, at this time making
the greatest efforts to bring about a personal meeting
between the Emperor and the King at Nice, with a view
to peace. Charles, who was once more penniless, as neither
the Low Countries nor Spain would give him a farthing,
was anxious enough for the meeting ; but not so Frangois,
who saw that he would be committing a weak action.
His wife Eleonore at length persuaded him to allow
her to go and meet her brother, but Fra^ois left the
Emperor waiting, and remained at a distance with many
of his Court — the rest accompanied Eleonore to Nice,
in the territory of the Duke of Savoy, half of whose
dominions were retained by France as a result of this
war.
With those who accompanied Eleonore were all of the
Elect, and the Emperor was perfectly content when he
thus succeeded in getting into touch with these enemies
of the King. Their influence, and that of his sister
Marguerite, who wished something to be done with the
Emperor with reference to the restoration of Navarre,
eventually induced Fra^ois to meet Charles at Aigues-
Mortes, a small port on the southern coast, when the
meeting of these old enemies was to all appearance ex-
cessively cordial and friendly. Montmorency and the
Princesses were with Fra^ois, and with their support
Charles V. contrived to come to an arrangement. By
this, while Charles promised definitely to give Milan, with
his niece, to the Due d'Angouleme, the King's youngest
son, who now had taken the title of d'Orleans, Fra^ois
accepted conversion, and promised to be good in the
406 Two Great Rivals
future — that is to say, he abandoned the Turk, swore
that he would fight against him and be an apostate no
longer.
The delight of the party of the Elect was unbounded
— ^leonore and Diane de Poitiers wept together for joy.
We have already considered Anne de Pisseleu, but
what kind of a woman was her rival, this leader of the
Elect, this friend, for personal and political reasons, both
of the brutal, uncouth Montmorency, and the suave
dignitaries of the Church, Tournon and Lorraine ? That
she was vain and greedy we know, also that she always
got up early, took a cold bath, and went for an early ride
with a view to preserving her health and her beauty. But
that she must have been possessed of considerable ability
there can be no doubt. Otherwise how could she, even
at an advanced age, still have continued to rule Henri II.
so absolutely ? rule also Catherine de Medicis ? It was
only by the orders of Diane de Poitiers that Henri
eventually lived maritalement with his wife, and consented
to become the father of heirs to the throne of France.1
Whatever the means by which she attained her ends,
she always succeeded. Once at the top of the tree, she
remained there until Catherine fiercely revolted, at length,
upon the death of Henri II. in July 1559. With such
plotting, such trickery and jealousy for ever around her,
Diane must indeed have possessed arts out of the common
to remain so successful until the end of Henri's reign.
Cruel and hard she was, we know, while, too, her greed
exceeded by far that of the Duchesse d'Etampes, from
whom at last she took away all the rich jewels in which
she had so greatly gloried. Created Duchesse de
Valentinois, Diane possessed not only Chenonceaux,
Anet, and the Duchy of Valentinois, but property to
the extent of about a quarter of France.
Truly she must have been a wonderful woman, this
Diane who always remained young and beautiful, who
1 Catherine's first child was not born until the eleventh year after her
marriage, which took place in 1 533. She then became the mother of ten
children in rapid succession, the last of whom was born in 1556. She was
born at Florence in 1519, and died at Blois in January 1589.
The Influence of the Women 407
carved up and made France sweat, and was never satisfied,
but always asked for more !
Wonderful or no, during the declining years of
Fran9ois I. her influence was sufficient to make him
appear as a nullity, and being thrown constantly
into the scale against the King contributed largely to
the exaltation of his rival the Emperor. In good sooth,
Diane de Poitiers proved herself the worthy captain of
the party of the honnetes gens, of which the lieutenant was
Anne de Montmorency, Constable of France.
CHAPTER XLVI
The Forced Marriage of Jeanne d'Albret
1541
FRANCOIS I., by this alliance with Charles V., stipu-
1 lated to defend the States of the Emperor during
the war against the Turks, and thus went over body and
soul to the reaction against the Reformation in Europe,
and especially in France. For it was solely owing to
the constant intervention of Soliman in the south of
Europe that Charles V, had hitherto been unable to carry
out his pet scheme of crushing the Protestant Princes,
and compelled, on the other hand, to temporise with
them for his own ends, in order to secure their armed
co-operation instead of being compelled to face their
armed rebellion.
From the date of the ten years' truce agreed to at Nice,
Charles, however, was left with a free hand to go ahead
as he chose in Germany, and as he never gave up any
project upon which he had set his mind, no matter how
much or how long he might dissimulate, the Emperor
soon proceeded to show that his promises made at Ratisbon
to respect the Reformed religion were nothing better than
a farce.
With his great rival Charles felt that, for a long time
to come at all events, he would no longer have to contend,
but into the circumstances concerning his imprisonment
of the Elector Henry of Saxony and the Landgrave of
Hesse, and the story of his consequent triumphs in
Germany, we do not now propose to enter, but rather
408
The Forced Marriage of Jeanne d'Albret 409
to confine ourselves as much as possible to the subject
of his relations with the husband of his sister Eleonore.
In the year 1539 things were going very badly for
Charles V. in several directions, and it may be safely said
that then the weight of Montmorency and the party of the
Dauphin proved his salvation. In Spain he was most
unpopular and being threatened by the nobles and the
Cortes ; in the Low Countries the excessive war taxation
imposed by the Governess, Queen Marie of Hungary,
had caused rebellion and outrage at Ghent, and in his
unpaid armies all was revolt and mutiny everywhere.
Thus the Emperor was at a very low ebb.
The insurgents in the Low Countries were treating
with Fran9ois, and offering him, in return for his armed
assistance, their country as a Kingdom for his younger
son. Here was a splendid acquisition assured, and lying
close at hand, a tangible scheme far better than the
nebulous recovery of the distant Milan.
What did Fran$ois do ? Did he jump at it ? Did he
ever jump at anything that was really to his advantage ?
Montmorency reminded him of the promises that
Charles had made at Nice, and then the King committed
a base act of treachery. He sent to Charles and told
him all about the propositions made to him by the
Belgians, he even had the infamy to lay their cor-
respondence before his rival. This abominable action,
which was equivalent to cutting off a number of heads
and torturing a quantity of people with his own hands,
Fra^ois committed to please the Emperor, so that he
might not by any chance forget to give Milan to the
Due d 'Orleans, with his niece. At the same time,
marvellous to relate, Fra^ois accorded to Charles the
permission to pass from Spain through France, in order
to go and punish his rebellious subjects in the Low
Countries. He was afraid of proceeding by sea for fear
of capture by the fleets of Henry VIII., and to go by
Italy and Germany would take too long. Just at this
period, by a lucky chance for Charles, Barbarossa destroyed
four thousand of his mutinous Spaniards, in a little
Two Great Rivals
Italian town called Castel-Nuovo, while the Viceroy of
Naples cunningly contrived the dispersion and massacre
in detail in Sicily of six thousand more turbulent Spaniards,
whom he had removed by ship from Tunis, ninety miles
away.
Being thus relieved from the necessity of paying his
old Spanish troops, when Charles wanted new ones he
only raised three thousand with difficulty. The spirit
of American adventure was in the air, and the Spaniard
would far rather embark in some maritime expedition to
rob the Indians of Mexico or Peru and to return laden
with gold, than run the risk of having his throat cut
by a Turk in Hungary or his weasand slit by a French-
man or German on the frontiers of France and Italy.
Weak as he had become, when, on August 5th, 1539,
Montmorency, the Constable, sent to Charles and revealed
to him all the details of French diplomacy in Turkey
and England, the Emperor became strong again. He
saw the loving arms of Fra^ois extended to him, and
resolved to throw himself into them with confidence.
Were not his sister, Diane de Poitiers, the Dauphin,
and Montmorency all at the French Court to protect
him ? He determined, accordingly, to take advantage
of the leave accorded him to traverse France ; he would
go to Paris and tell a few lies about surrendering Milan,
and then retire to the Low Countries, polish off his
rebellious subjects there, then snap his fingers at Fra^ois
and say that if he had seemed to promise Milan he had
not understood what he was saying, that he had meant
something entirely different.
This was exactly the course that Charles pursued, and,
if ever in the past Fra^ois had behaved dishonourably to
him, the Emperor now repaid the dishonour with interest.
For lying and deceit, if the palm were to be accorded to
either of the rivals, after his splendid procession through
France and hospitable reception in Paris, the crown of
dishonour belonged to Charles V.
While Diane de Poitiers had made a lover of Henri the
Dauphin, the harum-scarum young Charles, Due d'Orleans,
The Forced Marriage of Jeanne d' Albret 4 1 1
had attached himself to the skirts of Anne de Pisseleu.
During the visit of the Emperor, the Due Charles and his
party of young Knights offered to the King's mistress to
carry off the Emperor, and shut him up until Milan was
actually placed in the hands of the credulous King. They
also made another proposal, one which was, we should
imagine, particularly acceptable to the Duchesse d'Etampes.
This was to seize her rival, Diane de Poitiers, and spoil
her beauty by slitting her nose, or cutting it off. The
playful Due d'Orleans represented that it was scarcely
probable that his brother Henri would continue to be
subjugated by the fascinations of Diane after she had been
deprived of her nasal organ.
The Emperor, however, made friends, as we have
already described, with Anne de Pisseleu, and, for some
reason or other, Diane de Poitiers was allowed to retain
her nose.
Charles V. came into France, stayed a week of festivity
in Paris, and passed on to the Low Countries in safety,
although several contretemps occurred on the way. A
block of wood fell upon his head in one place, he was
nearly stifled in another, while at the Castle of Amboise he
and those with him, including Francois, were nearly burned
alive, owing to a page accidentally setting fire with his
torch to the tapestry hangings in a corridor. Fra^ois,
in his polite excuses to his guest, offered to hang the
Royal page on the spot, but the Emperor, not to be out-
done in politeness, declared that there was really no
occasion for the King, his host, to put himself out so
much as to deprive himself of the services of his young
attendant, after having already suffered the loss of his
splendid tapestry.
By the month of February 1540, after having cruelly
punished his rebellious subjects in Ghent, Charles found
himself firm on his feet once more. When he now so
plainly showed how completely he had hocussed the
King of France about Milan, Montmorency, although
unauthorised to do so,. '.wrote to the Emperor to try to
regain him, offering on behalf of the King his master to
412 Two Great Rivals
give French troops to fight against the German Protestant
Princes. When Charles published this letter, as may well
be supposed, there was little confidence left in Germany
for the French King. Montmorency, however, suffered in
his own credit at the French Court, and, in consequence,
at the instigation of Marguerite, to whom he had long
been hostile, the King publicly humiliated the Constable
upon the occasion of the first marriage of the child-
heiress of Navarre.
Jeanne d'Albret, the young daughter of Marguerite
and Henri, King of Navarre, had been forcibly brought
up in France by her uncle the King. While her father
had frequently been in communication with the Emperor,
with a view to the marriage of this little girl to the Infante,
afterwards Philip II., Fra^ois had proved too cunning
to give any opportunity for this Spanish marriage, by
which Henri d'Albret hoped to recover his lost dominions
in Spain.
Jeanne being kept closely, although with considerable
grandeur, at the Castle of Plessis-les-Tours, it was only
by trickery or some sudden coup de main that d'Albret
could hope to carry off his daughter to Beam with him,
whence it would be easy for him to pass her into Spain.
There was only one such opportunity for Henri to seize
his daughter, which was when she was in the south of
France with the Court to meet the Emperor on his journey
to Paris. Unfortunately Charles had not yet quite made
up his mind about the marriage, and, as the King of
Navarre was not willing to enrage his brother-in-law
Fransois for nothing, the chance was lost. Shortly after
having deceived the King concerning Milan, and safely
got through France to Flanders, Charles V. sent his
Ambassador, Fra^ois de Bonvalot, to demand the hand
of Jeanne d'Albret from the French King for his son
Philip. At the same time, instead of the promised
Milan, Charles offered the Low Countries, Gueldre,
Zutphen, and the renunciation of his own rights over
Burgundy as a dowry for his daughter on her proposed
marriage to the Due d'Orleans.
The Forced Marriage of Jeanne d'Albret 413
These offers were absolutely valueless. The Low
Countries, disgusted with Francois, no longer wanted
a French prince. Gueldre and Zutphen now belonged,
by purchase from his uncle the ruined Charles d'Egmont,
to the Duke of Cleves, a German Prince hostile to the
House of Austria ; while Burgundy and Charolais, which
Charles offered so magnanimously to resign, had for long
past effectually belonged to France.
As regards the marriage of Jeanne d'Albret, the King
refused to agree; he said that the parties were too young,
that there were more pressing matters to be arranged,
that he wanted that concerning Milan settled first. The
King and Queen of Navarre were both greatly disap-
pointed at this reply, for they naturally considered that
Fraii9ois should have given his consent, in their interests,
while stipulating for the return of Spanish Navarre to
Henri d'Albret.
There were, however, other candidates in the field for
Jeanne, who, born in 1528, was now twelve years of age.
These were Antoine de Bourbon, a young Prince of the
Blood, and Fra^ois de Lorraine, of the Ducal House of
Guise. Considerable jealousy existed between these two
applicants for the hand of the child-Princess, who fought
with each other with considerable valour in the lists on
her account, and subsequently quarrelled in the presence
of the King. The King, instead of promising his niece
to either of them, made entirely other arrangements,
which were as distasteful to the twelve-year-old girl as
they were to her father.
These were to promise her hand to the warlike Duke
William of Cleves, and, in spite of the opposition of the
King of Navarre, a contract with this enemy of the
Emperor was signed at Anet in 1540.
Cleves was already in very bad odour with Charles,
who had sought to cause this young Prince to resign the
Duchy of Gueldre in his favour. Had it not been for
his warlike preparations, these estates would have been
already taken from him by force, and now the announce-
ment of his engagement to Jeanne d'Albret was con-
4H Two Great Rivals
sidered as being tantamount to a declaration of war on
his behalf against his liege lord, Charles V.
Escaping the Emperor's minions, who were secretly
waiting to assassinate or arrest him, Cleves arrived in
Paris in April 1541. There now ensued a battle-royal
between Fra^ois and the King and Queen of Navarre,
who tried to make every delay in the marriage of their
daughter with a German Prince, one, moreover, whom the
child herself declared that nothing on earth should induce
her to accept.
Fran9ois, anxious for the support of Cleves against the
Emperor, and determined that the young Princess should
not be married into Spain, became very angry. He
vowed that he would marry his niece Jeanne by force to
the Duke William " not as a Princess of Navarre, but
as the mere daughter of the House of Albret, and as
such his vassal."
Marguerite, who could not for long resist her brother's
will, now came over to his side ; but Jeanne wrote out
a protestation, which she signed and had witnessed by
the principal officers of her Household, to the effect that,
although her mother was causing her to be flogged and
ill-treated (fessee et maltraitee\ she would only be dragged
to the altar with Cleves by force.
The King of France now in person endeavoured to
overcome the obstinate young girl's opposition. To his
question : " Why do you not wish to marry the Duke ? "
Jeanne replied diplomatically : " Because I do not want
to leave you." Fra^ois, mollified, answered that she
and her husband should live in France. " I will rather
throw myself down a well ! " was the determined reply
of the now thirteen-year-old Princess of Navarre.
Fran9ois wreaked his rage upon Aymee de Lafayette,
Jeanne's governess, whom he terrified by swearing that
he would cut some heads off. To this lady's son-in-
law, the Vicomte de Lavedan, he exclaimed furiously : " I
swear to God that I will punish you ! " and Madame
de Lafayette was caused to administer violent whippings
to Jeanne.
The Forced Marriage of Jeanne d'Albret 415
In spite of all her tears and opposition, neither Jeanne
nor the King of Navarre could resist the will of the
King of France, especially as Marguerite was working
constantly in his interest, and already treating the Duke
of Cleves affectionately, as a son-in-law.
Although the child fell into ill health, she was married
by force, in the presence of the King and the whole
Court, on June I4th, 1541. Wearing a golden crown
and attired in a dress of gold and silver, heavy with
jewels, Jeanne stubbornly declared that she was unable to
walk up the church.
Then it was that the displeasure of the King against
his former favourite Montmorency became apparent to
all. Fran9ois ordered the Constable to carry the Princess
to the altar. He told her to take his niece au col. Mont-
morency could but obey, and burdening himself with the
now big girl, heavily weighted as she was with gold and
precious stones, bore her to the altar, where the Duke of
Cleves placed a diamond ring upon her finger.
The Court was stupefied at the insult to the Constable,
but the Queen of Navarre openly showed her pleasure at
his humiliation. To his friends Montmorency remarked :
" It is all up with my favour. Adieu ! "
There was a grand dinner, followed by a ball and mum-
meries, after the wedding, but Marguerite obtained from
the Duke a promise that the marriage should not be con-
summated for a year, on account of her daughter's youth
and ill health.
The farce, however, was gone through of making them
man and wife. According to the German Ambassador
Dr. Olisleger : " They were put to bed together in their
chemises, while the King, the King and Queen of Navarre,
the Duchesse d'Ktampes, grande maitresse de cour, after
the King had drawn the curtains, went to talk in the
embrasure of a window. After a time the Duke was
taken away by them to another room, the King calling
him * my son.' '
In the following days a defensive alliance was made
between the King and the Duke of Cleves, and the
4i 6 Two Great Rivals
marriage was taken to prove that the Duchesse d'Etampes
had entirely reasserted her influence, and was now the
real Sovereign at the Court of France. Even the Queen
Eleonore humiliated herself before her. Writing to Spain,
to the Grand Commander of Leon, she says when speak-
ing of the King's dispositions towards peace : " Those
of the Duchesse d'Etampes are the capital point."
The Duchesse was not, however, always faithful to the
King, and the Queen Marguerite of Navarre spoke of
her infidelities with a gentleman named Le Bossut de
Longueval.
When the Constable de Montmorency, after this
marriage, sought to regain her favour, Anne de Pisseleu
would have none of him, but said : " He is a big rascal ;
he has deceived the King by saying that the Emperor
would give him Milan at once, when he well knew to
the contrary."
Not long before this wedding the Constable had brought
about the disgrace and imprisonment of his rival, the
Admiral Philippe Chabot de Brion, whose pretty young
wife had attracted the attention of the King. The
Duchesse, however, now procured the return to favour
of Chabot, while de Montmorency remained in evil
odour.
Shortly after this marriage the emissaries of Fransois
to Venice and Constantinople, Caesar Fregoso, son of the
Doge of Genoa, and the corpulent Captain Antoine Rincon,
were proceeding together on their mission and travelling
through Italy. Rincon being unable to ride on account
of his weight, the Ambassadors decided to descend the
river Po in a boat. Although they had been warned by
Guillaume du Bellay, who was in Piedmont at Rivoli,
that the Marquis del Guasto, the Governor of Milan,
intended to murder them, in order to procure their
despatches for the Emperor, they pooh-poohed the warn-
ing as Fregoso, having formerly served with Guasto, said
he was too good a soldier and comrade to commit such
a crime. They, however, sent back their written despatches
to du Bellay, and proceeded down the river, when they
The Forced Marriage of Jeanne d'Albret 417
were duly waylaid by armed men in boats, and murdered
not far from Pavia.
This dastardly murder of his Ambassadors caused
Fra^ois to get ready for his last war with Charles, who
in this same year, 1541, was most miserably defeated in
an expedition which he made to Algiers against the
Algerine pirates. It was owing to his own obstinacy that
he failed so lamentably, as Doria, in charge of the fleet,
had assured him repeatedly that the season was too far
advanced and that the elements were bound to be against
him.
Continued hurricanes and torrents of rain caused the
loss of most of the Emperor's shipping, and likewise
extinguished the matches of his arquebus-men, who thus,
after having landed, became the easy prey of the Algerines.
The slaughter of the Emperor's men was awful, and the
remnant nearly died of starvation while retreating along
the coast to the few ships which Doria managed to bring
back to pick up the survivors. In this retreat Charles
displayed great personal courage, fighting on foot with
the rear-guard to cover the embarkation of the miserable
remains of his army.
Upon his return to Europe, the first action of the
Emperor was to threaten the Duke of Cleves, who was
recruiting troops for, his uncle by marriage, Frangois L,
and upon November I2th, 1541, the last war commenced
between the two great rivals.
France was now alone in Europe, where she found no
support among the anti-Catholic party. With exception
of the troops being raised for him by the Catholic Duke
of Cleves, Fran£ois could not obtain a man in Germany.
He accordingly sent to Sweden and Denmark to endeavour
to enrol mercenaries, also to Switzerland.
In this last war Fra^ois managed to put five armies
into the field, and the rival Princes, the Dauphin and the
Due d'Orleans, each had a command. But very few French
soldiers of the middle class were employed owing to the
jealousy of the nobles, who declared that " the villeins
want to make themselves gentlemen." The family of
27
4i 8 Two Great Rivals
Guise, belonging to the reigning Ducal family of Lorraine,
was now commencing to show the ascendancy which it
afterwards held in France. Accordingly, while Claude de
Guise went off with the Due d'Orleans and the army
of the north to invade Luxembourg, his son Francois
joined the Dauphin in the south, and with him invaded
the Emperor's province of Roussillon.
CHAPTER XLVII
The End of the Struggle
1547
HENRY VIII. was disgusted with Francois for up-
setting his plans in Scotland, by first giving his
daughter Madeleine, and when she died Marie, the
sister of Fran£ois de Guise, to James V., which latter
Princess became the mother of Mary, Queen of Scots, in
December 1542.
In consequence of his pique, and his matrimonial
vagaries, the conduct of Henry VIII. had a consider-
able effect upon this last tussle between the two great
rivals.
The English King, having achieved the summit of his
happiness by marrying Anne Boleyn on January 25th,
1533, declared himself as being even more happy when
he had caused her head to be cut off on Tower Hill on
May 1 9th, 1536.
Upon the following day he married a fresh beauty,
Jane Seymour, who died after giving birth to Edward VI.
With Anne of Cleves, the sister of Duke William, a
marriage contract was signed upon September 4th, 1539,
but upon the appearance of this German Princess in
England in the following month, Henry expressed his
absolute disgust at her appearance. He called her " a
Flanders mare," and, although he married her, the
marriage was never consummated. On June gth, 1 540,
the King of England divorced his fourth wife, while
settling some large estates upon her, and ordering her
on no account to leave England.
419
420 Two Great Rivals
For so long as the Duke of Cleves had been the
brother-in-law of Henry VIII., the Emperor had not
ventured to attack him in force, but after his sister's
divorce had been pronounced, he had lost his importance
as the ally of England.
Cleves, being now nothing but the nephew by marriage
and active friend of his rival Frai^ois, Charles determined
to lose no time in endeavouring to bring him to reason.
He had the greater confidence in his approaching
success from the fact that Henry VIII. now became
the open foe both of Fra^ois I. and of his former
brother-in-law, Cleves, and in 1543 concluded an alliance
with Charles V.
Previously to this, relying on the promises of support
from Fran9ois, William of Cleves had taken the field, and,
after first beating the Flemish army of the Emperor's
sister Marie, Queen of Hungary, the Governess of the
Netherlands, commanded by the Prince of Orange, had
then administered severe punishment to another force led
by the able Count van Buren.
The French, at the same time, under the youthful
Antoine de Bourbon and the Due d'Orleans, had entered
Flanders, taken several cities, and likewise Luxembourg.
All for a time continued to go well with that bold
warrior the Duke of Cleves, who next smashed up an
army under the Duke of Arschott, and whose subsequent
feat was to vanquish the Duke of Nassau. Fra^ois I.
at the same time entered Hainault and took the city of
Landrecies.
All of these advantages over the Emperor were wasted,
owing to the conduct of the Due d'Orleans and the King
his father. The former, jealous of his brother the
Dauphin, foolishly left his command, and hurried off to
the south of France, to join him when he heard that a
big battle was expected shortly, a battle which never took
place.
Fran9ois I., who was taking matters very easily
besieging Perpignan, broke his promise to assist Cleves
when Charles, arriving from Spain, took command in
The End of the Struggle 421
person of an army of forty thousand men, and announced
his intention of chastising the Duke William.
Charles advanced against Cleves, and sent forward this
great force under Gonzaga, the Marquis of Mantua.
After a terrific struggle at Dueren, in the Duchy of
Juliers, which belonged to the Duke William, that city
was entered.
In order to strike terror, Charles now gave orders that
the whole of the defenders of Dueren should be put to
the sword. There were ten thousand Spaniards in his
force, and they not only murdered all whom they met,
but sacked the city, with their usual refined cruelty and
rapacity.
William of Cleves was possessed of plenty of backbone,
but what could he, a mere German princeling, do single-
handed against all the might of the Empire ? He tried
to defend Venloo, his strongest place, but his garrison
and the inhabitants, warned by the example of Dueren,
refused to fight.
The Duke of Cleves was therefore compelled to
submit, when the Duke of Brunswick personally con-
ducted him to Charles, before whom he was obliged to
fall on his knees and humbly beg for mercy.
While the Emperor stared haughtily at one whom he
termed his vassal, without making any reply, the Duke
of Brunswick endeavoured to make excuses for Cleves,
throwing all the blame for his conduct upon his mother,
the Duchess Maria of Juliers, who had always been the
partisan of France, and had but lately died.
Charles V. still glared ferociously at the Duke of
Cleves without answering a word, but at length he
relented, owing to Brunswick's well-chosen excuses.
The Emperor raised up the Duke of Cleves, shook
hands with him and forgave him, while annexing the
estates that he had purchased from his late uncle,
Charles d'Egmont, Due de Gueldre, and which the
Emperor had always claimed.
The Duke William signed the Treaty of Venloo on
September yth, 1543, by which he abandoned the alliance
422 Two Great Rivals
with France. While, for a time, Charles left the Prince
of Orange as Governor over Gueldre, Cleves, and
Zutphen, he eventually restored his Duchies to the Duke,
and even later gave him his niece in marriage.
After conquering the husband of Jeanne d'Albret, the
Emperor, who had already for years past been a sufferer
from the gout, was obliged to retire to Brussels to rest.
Although he had been joined by six thousand English
under Sir John Wallop, he had failed in retaking
Landrecies from Francois.
The King of France, after failing to take Perpignan,
and having, by his own fault, lost his useful ally Cleves,
had been having a very enjoyable time hunting in the
neighbourhood of Rheims, when, to his surprise, he
received a message from the Duke William requesting
him to be so good as to forward his wife to him. He
represented that it was by no means his own fault if he
had been compelled to submit to superior force, but that,
nevertheless, he held to his young wife, and would send
Ambassadors for her.
Fran9ois was furious, while the Queen of Navarre now
displayed all the antipathy which she had secretly felt
against the marriage of her daughter. Marguerite
declared that Jeanne was about as much joined to Cleves
as she herself to the Emperor, to whom she had once
been semi-betrothed.
A refusal was sent to the Duke of Cleves, and then
this Prince, by the good offices of the Emperor with
Paul III., contrived to obtain a dispensation of divorce
from Jeanne in January 1545. After this, as he was
happily united in marriage to the Archduchess Marie,
daughter of the Archduke Ferdinand, King of Hungary,
and was, moreover, restored his forfeited dominions,
William had no cause to complain of his lot.
Jeanne being now free, her father and mother sought
to marry her again, but to different Princes. While
Marguerite was in favour of her nephew the Due
d'Orleans, Henri d'Albret, who had been taking no part
in this last war against the Emperor, got into touch with
The End of the Struggle 423
him again without allowing his wife to have an inkling of
what he was doing.
Philip, the Infante of Spain, had just lost, in her
sixteenth year, his wife Maria of Portugal, who died in
childbirth. Charles and the King of Navarre now began
to discuss the old subject of Philip marrying Jeanne, but
they could not agree on the subject of the return of
Navarre.
Marguerite's plan for giving her daughter to d'Orleans
was upset in a different manner. This fiery young
fellow, who was greatly beloved by Fra^ois, as his
wildness reminded him of his own dissipated youth,
died in August 1545 of the plague, which he had
contracted by his own folly. While with the army
near Abbeville, he stayed in a chateau where there had
been a case of plague in one of the bedrooms. This
room the Due d'Orleans preferred to that which had been
allotted to himself, but he was warned not to occupy it.
" Bah ! " exclaimed the Prince, " who ever heard of the
pestilence attacking one of the Royal Blood ? "
Calling several of his wild companions to him, Charles,
Due d'Orleans, entered the room. With their swords
they playfully ripped up the mattress and the pillows
of the bed, filling the air with the feathers. Sleeping
there on the following night, the young man was attacked
with the disease. During its course the King showed the
greatest courage ; he could not be kept from the infected
chamber, and frequently took his plague-stricken boy in
his fatherly arms. When the Due d'Orleans died,
Fran9ois was inconsolable. He had now lost his two
favourite sons, and there was only left to him Henri,
who, with Diane de Poitiers, opposed his father in every
possible way.
In the course of this war the Infidel Turkish fleet,
under Barbarossa, gave its assistance to Christian and
Catholic France, where the chief directors of affairs of
State were now the two Cardinals of Lorraine and Tournon.
It was a strange combination, and one which shocked
Europe.
424 Two Great Rivals
In company with Barbarossa, the gallant young Comte
d'Enghien besieged in vain the Duke of Savoy's last
retreat at Nice. A Savoyard gentleman, named de
Montfort, made, however, a most gallant defence. After
first repulsing with loss a combined assault of the enemy,
who appeared together against him under the Crescent and
the Cross, de Montfort occupied the citadel, situated on
a strong rock, and could not be dislodged before the
Marquis del Guasto arrived by land, and Andrea Doria
by sea, to relieve him. The Algerines, compelled to
retire, were now put by the French into the port of
Toulon, where they showed their impartiality by ravaging
the neighbouring coasts of Provence, and carrying off
many French girls, and also French men as slaves for their
galleys. In the following year these barbarous allies of
France carried off six thousand slaves from Tuscany, and
eight thousand from Naples, including two hundred
virgins from the convents, especially selected as a present
for the Sultan Soliman, who had himself completely
overrun Hungary once more.
The young Comte d'Enghien, who was a Bourbon, the
son of Charles Due de Vendome, made up, in April 1544,
for his reverse before Nice by a brilliant victory at
Ceresola in Piedmont, called by the French Cerisoles.
The rival of the Guises, he was the rival also of the
Dauphin, to whose party those of this Lorraine family
had attached themselves. Enghien was compelled to send
a special messenger, named de Montluc, in order to ask
that he might, instead of retiring, as those of the opposing
faction desired him to do, be allowed the opportunity of
distinguishing himself by giving battle to an Imperial
army advancing against him, under the Marquis del
Guasto, the murderer of Rincon and Fregoso.
De Montluc, by his eloquence, persuaded the King,
who sent the required permission to the Comte d'Enghien.
The forces of this gallant young man consisted of seven-
teen thousand Swiss, Gascons, and Italians, many volunteer
French nobles being also under his command. The
army of del Guasto was composed of a superior force of
The End of the Struggle 425
Germans and Spanish. The battle was one of the most
hardly contested since the famous fight at Ravenna in
1512, when that brilliant boy Gaston de Foix lost his life
in the moment of victory by his own fool hardiness.
In the course of the action Enghien, with a party of
young Knights, made a magnificent charge, in which he
penetrated the serried ranks of the veteran Spaniards from
front to rear. Trying to return, he found himself nearly
alone, he had lost so many of his brave companions. He
found, however, that he had gained the victory — the
battle was won. Del Guasto had fled, leaving twelve
thousand of his men dead on the field. This brilliant
feat of arms availed, however, but little to France, as
Charles V. now invaded Champagne, pushing the
Dauphin before him in the direction where the English
awaited.
The mutual selfishness of the Emperor and Henry VIII.
saved the French, however, as, instead of combining, as
had been agreed upon, to march on Paris, each followed
his own devices. Thus, while the Emperor dallied to
besiege certain towns and thus delayed needlessly,
Henry VIIL, who had set his mind on the capture of
the port of Boulogne, directed all the efforts of his arms
to the reduction of that place. In the meantime all of
Champagne was laid waste by the French themselves,
so that when eventually, after a long delay before Saint-
Dizier, Charles advanced, as had happened previously in
Provence, his army ran great risk of starvation.
The brave Comte d'Enghien did not long survive his
triumph at Ceresola. He was killed by Francis de
Guise. In a supposed friendly game of snowballing, this
subsequently famous member of the Lorraine family threw
a small iron casket at the head of Enghien, which caused
his death.1 This murder was, so the murderer stated,
committed by the orders of Henri the Dauphin.
The King now found himself indeed alone, while the
1 The date of this crime was the 23rd of February 1 546 ; Francois
d'Enghien was only twenty-seven when Guise thus cut short his brilliant
426 Two Great Rivals
Duchesse d'&es had everything to fear from the
Dauphin, who, with his party, commenced * to have
absolute control in the kingdom. The health of Francois
was by this time in such a bad state that for a great part
of the time he was utterly unable to attend to business,
while the duties of his maitresse en litre became nothing
but those of a sick-nurse.
While in this feeble condition, Frangois, in 1545,
allowed the Cardinal de Tournon to extract from him
a paper to punish the chiefs of the large religious sect of
the Vaudois, formerly known as the Waldenses, from the
name of Waldo their founder. This document, by a
forgery, the infamous Cardinal changed into an order to
kill all those of this religious persuasion. Many villages
in the south of France were entirely destroyed and their
inhabitants massacred by the Baron d'Oppede and his
brutal soldiers, many of whom had been taken from the
galleys to accomplish this wholesale massacre of harmless,
God-fearing people, who were taken entirely by surprise
when the murderers arrived.
Many of these villages were not on French ground,
but on the Papal territory of Avignon, but that did not
save them. By the order of the Papal Legate at
Avignon, twenty-five women who had escaped were
stifled with smoke in a cave, while in another place five
hundred dead bodies were found in a church — but this
was on adjacent French territory. During this awful
persecution of the Vaudois, which is perhaps the worst
blot on the reign of Francois I., no woman's honour
was respected, all were treated as at the sack of a city
by the horrible ruffians employed by the Baron d'Oppede.
When the blood-stained soldiery returned from their
butchery, they behaved as though they were Turks,
carrying off young girls and boys with them as slaves,
whom they eventually sold.
While a cry of execration against the King arose from
Germany and Switzerland, in Spain this awful crime was
applauded as a meritorious action — a well-merited
destruction of heretics. Fra^ois himself was, however,
The End of the Struggle 427
made to swallow the forgery, and to accept the responsi-
bility for what had happened, it being represented to him
that those thus slaughtered in cold blood were a mere
nest of rebels about to rise in insurrection against his
authority.
Of real authority, however, Francois possessed none ;
the King had become the mere plaything of those around
him, even by the time of the termination of his last war
with Charles V. This took place at a small town named
Crepy-en-Valois, near Meaux, and only some forty miles
from Paris, in September 1544.
The Emperor, after losing a vast number of his men,
was about to retreat for want of food when (as her
enemies said,^by the information supplied to him by the
Duchesse d'Etampes) he learned of the presence of a large
quantity of supplies for the French troops at Epernay
and Chateau -Thierry on the Marne. Seizing these
magazines by forced marches, Charles established him-
self within a couple of days' march of Paris. Although
the Dauphin Henri contrived to send eight thousand
troops into the capital, nothing probably could have
saved Paris from the Imperialists but that which happened
some distance away, on the northern coast.
This was that Henry VIII. captured Boulogne, and
having done so was contented. He refused to budge
another inch to help Charles. Learning this, the Emperor
was quite ready to open peace negotiations with Fra^ois,
especially as he had the gout badly. As usual in these
treaties, Charles made fresh deceitful promises concerning
the giving of Milan to Charles, Due d'Orleans, who was
then still alive. Fra^ois had, on his side, to resign
Savoy, with exception of two strong places, and to repeat
the humiliating renunciations that he had made on
previous occasions.
The worst feature of this peace was that Fra^ois
disgracefully undertook, against the interests of his sister
Marguerite, that he would give no aid to the King of
Navarre to recover his Spanish Kingdom.
While Fran9ois, although suffering from a most painful
Two Great Rivals
disease, still continued to go hunting during the last years
of his life, often being borne in a litter, he was very low
in health by January 1 547, in which month he suffered a
severe shock by the news of the death of the King of
England.
Fran9ois, strange to say, had always been much
attached to Henry VIII., and when that Royal husband
of six wives was removed by death on January 28th, he
feared that his own decease would soon follow. By the
end of February, after several days' hunting at Ram-
bouillet, his painful disease assumed a still more acute
stage. Nevertheless, up to the last Frangois was exerting
himself to stir up the various countries of Europe against
his rival once more, and Charles, who was well aware of
his intrigues, trembled at the prospect of a new French
war, which would interrupt him in his drastic operations
for the disciplining of the various German Princes of the
Protestant faith.
The Germans were commencing not only to listen to
Francois, but to turn to him for assistance, when Charles V.,
who was at Madrid, received the most joyful tidings for
which he could have wished. This was that, his great
rival, Frangois I., had died at Rambouillet on March 3ist,
1547-
Francois I. had been for thirty-three years on the
throne, and was fifty-three years old when he died, and
for no less than twenty-eight years his life had been one
of long-continued rivalry with the Emperor, a rivalry
which had not interested France alone, but at different
times involved nearly all the States of Europe in the
quarrel.
By his death the mind of Charles V. was greatly
relieved, and the Emperor was left free to follow the
objects of his ambition with only Henri II. to oppose
him, a Prince whom he knew to be in no way possessed
of his father's great abilities.
Characteristically, Charles exclaimed hypocritically upon
hearing the eventful news : " He is dead ! the great
Prince ! Nature will never make another like him ! "
After the picture by Holbein.
P. 428]
HENRY VIII.
CHAPTER XLVIII
Love Match of Jeanne and Death of Charles V
1548 AND 1558
DURING the last hours of Francois I. the Dauphin
and Diane de Poitiers behaved with indecent
gaiety. When he was gone and Henri II. had become
King in his stead, Montmorency was instantly recalled
to the Court, while Diane indulged in her triumph over
the Duchesse d'Etampes.
This lady had retired to Limours before Fra^ois
died, and upon her return she found that the Constable
de Montmorency and his gentlemen had cavalierly occu-
pied her^ apartments at Saint-Germain. The neglected
Queen Eleonore was at the Convent of Poissy, and
Henri II. visited her there, and politely asked the
Emperor's sister to remain in France. Eleonore consented
to do this upon the condition that she was allowed to
send away from the Court the Dame de Canaples, a
young beauty who had been a mistress of Francois I. This
lady's revengeful husband now treated her much as the
Comte de Chateaubriand had formerly treated his wife
— he confined his unfaithful spouse for life in a
convent.
Owing to the renewal of hostilities with Charles V.,
the Queen Eleonore only remained for a year and a
half in France, after which she joined the Emperor in
Flanders, thoroughly contented to turn her back upon
the French Court for ever.
The Duchesse d'fitampes, upon her return to find
429
43° Two Great Rivals
her apartments occupied, demanded an audience of the
new King, who only treated her with indignity, while
general hatred was shown to her on all sides. While
all her jewels were torn from her, for the benefit of
Diane de Poitiers,1 the Chancellor Olivier brought an
accusation against " la vie et vexations de la dame
d'Etampes." Her " agent de confiance " and lover,
Bossut de Longueval, was arrested under disgraceful cir-
cumstances. He was seized unexpectedly in the middle
of the night in the bedroom of a beautiful young Italian
lady who was maid-of-honour to the new Queen,
Catherine de Medicis. As a writer of the time said :
" Et Dieu sait si Ton a ri de la honte quil re9ut meri-
toirement." He was sent to the Bastille, while his
mistress, Anne de Pisseleu, Duchesse d'Etampes, after
being fleeced of nearly all her possessions, was glad to
be able to retire to a distant part of the country and
there remain.
Not long after the death of his father, Henri II. gave
orders for the burial of Fran£ois I. and his two brothers,
the late Dauphin and the Due d'Orleans, together at
Saint-Denis. Watching the procession of coffins, Henri
remarked brutally, pointing to that of his brother Charles
d'Orleans, which came first : " Do you see that bell-
wether ? he heads the advance-guard of my happiness ! "
By one person Fra^ois was deeply mourned — this
was his sister Marguerite, who during the whole of the
winter before his decease had, in her distant Bearnese
dominions, lived in an agony of fear on his account.
She retired for a time to a convent, where she long
waited for news which never came. At length, fifteen
days after the King's death, she first learned of that
event from a half-crazy nun, when she nearly lost her
own senses from the shock.
1 On the death of Henry II., Diane, in turn, was forced by Catherine de
Medicis to restore this ill-gotten plunder, largely consisting of jewels
belonging to the Crown. The Guise faction, however, prevented Catherine
from keeping the jewels for herself ; she was compelled to surrender them
to, the niece of the Guises, the young Queen Mary of Scotland, then
married to the boy-king Francois II.
Love Match of Jeanne and Death of Charles V 43 1
While mourning her brother, Marguerite was com-
pelled, however, to think about the future of her
daughter Jeanne, who, now a girl of nineteen and re-
markably pretty, was leading a life of extreme gaiety
at the new Court, where her constant extravagances
were a source of the greatest embarrassment to the King
and Queen of Navarre.
The cost of the toilettes of this giddy young Princess
was immense, and when, owing to the non-payment of
her pensions by her nephew King Henri, Marguerite at
Nerac wrote to expostulate, she merely received for reply
from Jeanne that she was only spending that which was
becoming in a Royal Princess at the Court of Paris.
Suspecting the plans of his uncle for marrying his cousin
Jeanne into Spain, Henri now ordered Montmorency to
open the Queen of Navarre's letters in transition. The
new King was, moreover, determined to marry off Jeanne
quickly in France, and to spoil any such Spanish project.
With a view to preserving for France the succession of
what remained of the Kingdom of Navarre, he proposed
eventually to marry her to his cousin, the First Prince
of the Blood.
This was Antoine de Bourbon, Due de Vendome, who,
in the event of the death of the sickly Dauphin who after-
wards became Fra^ois II., would become heir to the
throne of France.1
While the self-willed Jeanne flatly declared that she
would not marry Vendome's rival, Fransois de Lorraine,
later Due de Guise, she looked with a favourable eye
upon Vendome. He was young and rich, handsome and
brave, and, seeing him frequently, Jeanne fell in love with
him.
Merely to please his middle-aged mistress Diane de
1 Antoine, son of Charles de Bourbon, Due de Vendome, was descended
from the Comte de Clermont, sixth son of Louis IX., called Saint Louis,
who died during the ninth crusade in 1270. After the death of Henri II.'s
four sons by Catherine de M6dicis, three of whom reigned, as Fran9ois II.,
Charles IX., and Henri III., the Valois line of Kings ended. The son of
Antoine de Bourbon and Jeanne d'Albret, the famed Henri de Navarre,
then ascended the throne of France as the first of the Bourbon Kings.
43 2 Two Great Rivals
Poitiers, whose daughter had been married to a brother
of this Guise, the Due de Mayenne, Henri at first pro-
posed Francois de Lorraine to the Princess as an eligible
parti. Her reply was scornful : " Would you allow,
Sire, that she who would have to carry my train
should become my sister-in-law, and that the daughter of
Madame de Valentinois [Diane] should go alongside of
me ? "
This settled the matter. In spite of the objections of
the King of Navarre, Henri II. at length compelled him
to agree to the marriage of his daughter with the brilliant
but extravagant young Due de Vend6me.
Henri d'Albret only did so, however, after first scolding
Vendome roundly on the subject of his prodigality, and
telling him plainly that when he became his son-in-law,
and the heir to Navarre, he would have to pull in his
horns and behave himself better. Marguerite liked the
idea of the match even less than did her jovial scapegrace
of a husband, but she had to give way to the will of the
King, and to her daughter, whose determination to marry
Vendome was as great as it had been not to marry Cleves.
Upon the return of Henry II. from a journey to Turin
in Piedmont, over which country he now ruled, he stopped
at the sumptuous old chateau of the Bourbons at Moulins,
which had been taken by Louise de Savoie from the
unfortunate Constable de Bourbon and annexed to the
Crown. Here Henri decided, in October 1548, that the
marriage of Jeanne should be celebrated without any
further delay, and accordingly sent for the bride's father
and mother to come and join him there at once, while
promising to Henri d'Albret to give him an income of
fifteen thousand livres yearly, secured on the revenues of
Gascony
As the King of Navarre was himself the Governor of
Gascony for the King of France, he was satisfied with this
arrangement, which he determined to see carried out
according to the letter.
With great magnificence the marriage of Jeanne was
celebrated at Moulins on October 2Oth, 1548. When,
Love Match of Jeanne and Death of Charles V 433
shortly after the marriage, the happy pair went off together
to the Duchy of Vendome, Queen Marguerite wept
bitterly, when Henri II. wrote facetiously concerning this
occurrence to Montmorency : "She hardly loves her son-
in-law."
That afterwards Marguerite was, however, reconciled to
the match which made of her daughter the mother of
the future gallant Henri IV. of France is evident to all
those who have read her licentious work, the "Hepta-
meron." Therein, with great good-humour, she relates
a risque story concerning an adventure which befel her
daughter Jeanne and her husband Antoine de Bourbon
while on their honeymoon.
Marguerite de Valois, Queen of Navarre, died at
Odos, near Tarbes, on December 2ist, 1549, in all the
odour of sanctity as a Catholic, and not as one of the
Reformed faith, towards which she had for a considerable
period of her life shown such a considerable leaning.
The cause of her death was a chill, contracted while
standing on her balcony watching a comet. The Lutherans
raised a great outcry against the deceased Princess, as
having been nothing better than an apostate, when they
learned of her death with crucifix in hand, after receiving
the last rites of the Church from which she had formerly
endeavoured to wean her mother, Louise de Savoie, and
her brother, Fran9ois I.
Nor had the Catholics, who remembered her former
protection of those whom they sought to burn as heretics,
a good word to say for her memory. The former quasi-
ruler of France, the clever Marguerite, died, in fact,
regretted by very few, and least of all by her husband.
The King of Navarre, after thinking for a time of
marrying again, resolved that a bachelor existence was,
after all, more to his liking. Completely reconciling him-
self to his son-in-law, he called him with his daughter
Jeanne to his Court, and entrusted the Due de Vendome
with the larger share in the administration of his domains
That Henri d'Albret was in some ways an extraordinary
man is proved by a strange tale related of him at the time
28
434 Two Great Rivals
of the birth of his grandson, who became Henri IV.,
King of France and Navarre. He told his daughter
Jeanne that only if she would sing a hymn during the
whole time of her accouchement would he make her
offspring heir to his Kingdom. Jeanne, with an unusual
courage, stood the test, and sang accordingly during the
time that she was giving birth to the first of the Bourbon
Kings, one who was to continue in his own person the
rivalry with Spain that had commenced with his great-
uncle Fran9ois I.
The further career of this Monarch's great rival,
Charles V., was terminated whenb after having failed to
secure the succession to the Empire for his son Philip II.,
he in 1555 prepared to resign the Imperial Crown to his
brother Ferdinand, and then actually abandoned the
Sovereignty of the Low Countries, Spain, and the rest of
his hereditary dominions to his son.
A martyr to the gout, the Emperor then retired to a
pleasant retreat which he had prepared for himself in the
monastery of St. Justus, or Yuste, near Placentia in
Estramadura. His wife Isabella had died in 1539, and
his sister fileonore died after the Emperor's retreat.
Having suffered on many occasions tortures from the
gout, the great Charles V. died at Yuste of a malignant
fever upon the 2ist day of September, 1558.
THE END
INDEX
Acciajuoli, 343
Adelaide, Princess, 183
Adorno, Antoinette, Doge of Genoa,
344
Adorno, Jerome, Doge of Genoa,
171. 177
Adrian VI., Pope (of Utrecht), 45,
51, 145, 152, 154-5, 177. 181,
205
Agnadel, Battle of, 24
Alarcon, Marquis of Valle Siciliana,
263, 269, 270, 287, 290, 298, 299,
302^5^,317,339,345
Albany, John Stuart, Duke of, 201,
233, 236, 262
Alexander VI., Pope, 6, 9, 13, 18,
153, 332
Alen9on, Charles Due d', 55, 57,
156, 160-1, 163, 179, 206, 243,
248-50
Alen9on, Duchesse d'. See Mar-
guerite de Valois
Alfonso, King of Aragon, 5, 6
Allegre, Yves d', 31
Al Raschid, 392
Alva, Duke of, 396
Alviano, General Bartolomeo, 24.
79, 81, 84
Amadis de Gaule, 53
Amboise, Georges d'. Cardinal, 9,
23
Angouleme, Charles d' Orlfians,
Comte d', 2, 13, 53
Angouleme, Duke of, youngest son
of Fran9ois I. See Orl6ans
Angouleme, Fra^ois d'. See
Fran9ois I.
Angouleme, Marguerite, Comtesse
d'. See Maguerite, Queen of
Navarre
AngoulSme, Louise, Duchesse d'.
See Louise de Savoie
Anna, wife of the Archduke Fer-
dinand, sister of Louis II., King
of Bohemia, 124, 257, 366, 368
Anne Boleyn, Queen of Henry VIII.,
142 et sqq., 340, 343, 386 et sqq.,
419
Anne de France, Duchesse de Bour-
bon-Beaujeu, i et sqq., i^etsqq.,
43, 187 et sqq., 192
Anne of Cleves, Duchesse d'Orleans,
8, 419
Anne of Brittany, Duchesse, Em-
press of Germany, second wife of
Maximilian, afterwards Queen of
Charles VIII., i, 3 et sqq., 9, 21
et sqq., 29, 54-5, 188, 387
Anhalt, Prince of, 25
Araceli, Cardinal, 335
Argouges, Jacques d', 202
Ars, Captain Louis d', 62, 65
Arschott, Duke of, 420
Arthur, Prince, 55, 341
Aubigny, Grand Connetable de, 7, 75
Auvergne, Madeleine de la Tour d',
86, 101, 323
Aval os, Fernando d', Marquis of
Pescara, 177, 219, 224, 249,
277, 297 ; besieges the French
at Milan, 151 ; besieges Mar-
seilles, 184 ; and Lannoy, 207 ;
in command at Milan, 214 ; his
attack on Bayard, 215 ; and
Bayard's death, 216-7 ; his dis-
agreements with Bourbon, 221,
223, 230 ; abandons Milan, 231 ;
and the battle of Pa via, 238 et
sqq., 242 et sqq. ; and Fra^ois,
262, 265 ; his unprincipled char-
acter, 281 ; his descent, 282 ; is
invited to become King of the
Two Sicilies, 283 ; his treachery
to his friends, 283 et sqq., 312 ;
his death, 285-6, 311
Avila, Bishop of, 269
435
436
Index
Baglioni, Malatesta, 377
Barbarossa, the Mediterranean
pirate, 392, 404, 409, 423-4
Barbesieux, Admiral, 361 et sqq.
Batthori, 367
Baudesmanche, 209
Bavaria, Duke of, 101
Bayard, Chevalier, Pierre de Terrail,
25, 28, 30 et sqq., 59 et sqq., 80
etsqq., 157 et sqq., 213 et sqq., 237,
263
Beatrice of Savoy, 394
Beaujeu, Pierre de, 187, 190,
192
Beaurain, Seigneur de, 207, 223,
224, 254, 256, 258
Beda, Maitre Noel, 167, 168
Bellabre, Seigneur de, 61
Bellay, Cardinal Jean du, 56, 166,
401-2
Bellay, Guillaume de, 332-3, 339,
401, 416
Bentivoglio, Giovanni, of Bologna,
u, 19
Berlanga, Marquis of, 380-1
Berquin, Louis de, 57, 168
Berry, Duchesse de, 183
Beuren, Comte de, 204
Boisy, Arthur Gouffier de, 43
Boleyn, Anne. See Anne
Boleyn, Lady Elizabeth, Countess
of Wiltshire, 143
Boleyn, Sir Geoffrey, 143
Boleyn, Sir Thomas, afterwards
Earl of Wiltshire, 143, 195-6,
388
Bonnivet, Admiral of France, 14,
53, 121, 134, 136, 137, 201, 220,
235» 239» 249 ; and Marguerite
d'Angouleme, 39, 40 ; his mag-
nificence at the Field of the Cloth
of Gold, 132; his popularity, 162;
his love for Marguerite de Valois,
179 ; his entry into Italy, 206 ;
his incompetence, 206 et sqq.,
213 ; Bayard's anger against,
213 et sqq. ; is wounded, 255 ; his
love-making at Milan, 229, 231,
233 ; and the siege of Pavia, 242 ;
his death, 245
Bonvalot, 412
Bora, Catherine von, wife of
Luther, 105
Bordin, 380-1
Borgia, Caesar, 9, 10, 13, 18
Borgia, Lucrezia, 318
Bourbon, Antoine de. Due de
Vendome, 413, 420, 424, 431 et
sqq.
Bourbon, Catherine de, 99
Bourbon, Charles, Cardinal de, Due
de Vendome, 347
Bourbon, Charles de Montpensier,
Due de, 14, 40, 80 et sqq., 119,
132, 136, 231, 239, 245, 263, 267-
8, 272, 273, 295, 345 ; appointed
Constable of France, 43-4 ; in
Milan, 88-9 ; Louise de Savoie's
infatuation for, 133 et sqq., 156,
189, 192 ; Fran9ois' distrust of,
160-1, 175-6 ; his descent, 163,
1 88 ; his love for Marguerite de
Valois, 179, 182, 289 ; Francois'
treatment of, 186-7 ; his choice of
a wife, 134-5, 190-1 ; Louise of
Valois' law-suit against, 192 et
sqq. ; dines with Queen Claude,
195-6 ; hunts the brigands, 196-
7 ; conspires against Francois,
197 et sqq. ; and Bayard's death,
217 ; invades France, 219 et sqq. ;
and Pescara's independence, 221
et sqq., 226 ; his bravery, 224 ;
and his jewels, 230, 240, 321 ;
attacks Mirabello, 242-3 ; re-
ceived by Francois, 247 ; offers
to assist Henry VIII., 248, 253-
4 ; Fran9ois' promises to, 259,
260 ; and the removal of Fran-
9ois to Spain, 265-6 ; arrives in
Spain, 279 ; receives a pension,
300 ; and the Spanish troops in
Milan, 311-2 ; and the attack on
Rome, 313 et sqq., 321 et sqq. ;
his death, 332, 334
Bourbon, Fraj^ois de, Comte de
St. Paul, 347, 363, 378
Bourbon, Marguerite de, 43, 192
Bourbon, Pierre, Due de, 43
Bourbon, Suzanne de Bourbon-
Beaujeu, Duchesse de, 43, 134,
188, 192
Bourgogne, 356 et sqq.
Brabant, 267
Brandenburg, Albert of, Cardinal,
Archbishop, Prince of Mayence,
102 et sqq., 115, 118
Brandon, Charles, Duke of Suffolk,
1 8, 34, 204
Brantome, 40
Brescia, Siege of, 28
Breze, Louis de, Senechal of Nor-
mandy, 194, 202, 210, 211
Bri9onnet, Bishop of Meaux, 56, 165,
181
Brion, Seigneur Chabot de, 209,
Index
437
243, 249, 2<?9, 295, 298, 403,
416
Brosse, Jean de La, 193, 305-6
Brunswick, Duke of, 362, 421
Bryan, 382
Bude, Guillaume, 166
Buren, Count van, 420
Burgundy, Duke of, 98
Cajetano, Cardinal, 105
Calvimont, Jean de, 310, 352-3
Calvin, 57, 168
Cam bray, Treaty of, 23
Campeggio, Papal Nuncio, 383-4
Cardona, Ramond de, 29, 32, 85,
262
Caroli, 273
Catherine of Aragon, Queen of
Henry VIII., 15, 55, 126, 127,
132, 139, 141 etsqq., 255, 340-1,
386, 388
Catherine, Archduchess of Austria,
sister of Charles V., 16, 107, 112,
115, 200
Catherine de Foix, Queen of Na-
varre, 19, 27, 42, 48, 91, 126, 290
Catherine de' Medici, Queen, 304,
323. 327. 385. 403-4. 4°6. 43°- J
Cazzachio, Captain, 61, 62
Cellini, Benvenuto, 329, 331, 400
Ceri, Renzo da, 222, 238, 330 et sqq.,
339
Chabannes, Jacques de, Seigneur de
la Palice, 27, 44, 67, 72, 75, 80,
224, 226, 236, 245
Champion, Clement Le, 288
Charlemagne, 51, 54, 92
Charles II., Duke of Savoy, 59, 394-
5-4°5
Charles IV., Emperor of Germany,
92
Charles V. , Emperor of Germany, i ,
2, 4; his birth, 15; his educa-
tion, 16, 20 ; Count of Flanders,
1 8 ; and the Princess Claude,
22, 29, 55; begins his rule, 45 et
sqq. ; and Ferdinand of Aragon,
47 ; his character and education,
49 et sqq. ; contrasted with Fran-
9ois I., 52-3 ; Princess Claude
and Marguerite de Valois, 55 ;
becomes heir to Aragon and
Castile, 90 et sqq. ; and Princess
Renee, 90-1, 127 ; and his elec-
tion to the Roman Empire, 96 ;
goes to Spain, 107 et sqq. ; ap-
points the Archduchess Mar-
guerite Regent, n^efsqq.; and
the Electors, 11.5 et sqq. ; elected
King of the Romans, 122, 125
and his brother Ferdinand, 124
and Burgundy, 126, 163 et sqq.
and proposed matrimonial al-
liances, 127-250 ; visits England,
127 ; and Fra^ois I., 128 ; and
Cardinal Wolsey, 130, 144 ; visited
by Henry VIII., 143 et sqq. ; and
his Spanish dominions, 144 et sqq. ;
and the war against France, 147
et sqq. ; and Leo X., 152 ; and
his kinship to Fra^ois I. and
Henry VIII., 163 ; and the Re-
formers, 178 ; and the conquest
of Milan, 177 ; and the Due de
Bourbon, 195 et sqq., 219 et sqq. ;
receives news of Francois" cap-
ture, 246, 251 ; and Henry VIII.,
252 et sqq. ; and his proposal that
Fran9ois should join him against
the Sultan, 257 ; states his terms
of peace to Fra^ois, 256 ; and
Fran9ois' 9ffer to marry the Arch-
duchesse Eleonore, 259, 300 ; and
Fran£ois' offer to pay his debts ;
Henry VIII. casts Fra^ois into
a Spanish prison, 269 et sqq. ;
visits Fran9ois in prison, 275 ;
and Marguerite de Valois, 287,
289 ; discovers Fra^ois' plot to
escape, 288 ; and Henri d'Albret,
King of Navarre, 290 et sqq. ; and
the negotiations for the release
of Fran9ois, 297 et sqq. ; meets
Fran9ois, 299 ; releases Fra^ois,
304 ; and the Holy League, 309
et sqq. ; challenges Fra^ois and
breaks faith with him, 310 ; his
character, 319 ; sends the Due
de Bourbon to attack Rome, 321
et sqq. ; and Clement VII., 338 et
sqq. ; and Fra^ois I.'s declara-
tion of war, 350 ; • insults and
challenges Fra^ois to a duel,
352 et sqq. ; and Francois' cow-
ardice, 358 et sqq. ; his aunt
Queen Marguerite makes peace,
365 et sqq. ; his coronation as
Emperor of the Holy Roman
Empire, 378 ; receives a ransom
for the release of $ the French
princes, 379 et sqq. ; and the
Mediterranean pirates, 392 et sqq.;
he invades France, 396 ; meets
Fran9ois, 405 ; his alliance with
Fran9ois I., 408 ; visits Paris,
438
Index
411 ; and Jeanne d'Albret, 412 ;
and the last war with Francis I.,
417 et sqq. ; peace, 427; his
death, 434
Charles V. of France, 9
Charles VII. of France, 194
Charles VIII. of France, 2 et sqq., 43,
53, 60, 61, 188, 192, 194, 245,
302
Charles IX., 431
Charles III., Duke of Savoy, 20
Charles of Anjou, 5
Charles the Bold, Duke of Bur-
gundy, 2, 17, 51-2, 89, 126, 274
Charles, Prince, son of Fran9ois I.,
249
Charles, Duke of Luxembourg, 210
Charles of Maine, 6
Charlotte of France, Princess, 249
Chateaubriand, Fran$oise Comtesse
de. See Fran9oise de Foix
Chateaubriand, Jean de Laval,
Comte de, 36 et sqq., 133, 439
Chatillon, Duchesse de, 56, 166
Chievres, Seigneur de. See Guil-
laume de Croy
Chimay, Jean de, 52
Clarencieux King-at-Arms, 350-1
Claude de Valois, Queen of France,
wife of Fran9ois I., 15, 37, 132,
J34. *39. 141 et sqq., 182, 190,
195. 249
Claude, Princess, 22, 29, 55
Clement IV., 118
Clement VII. (Giulio de Medici),
118, 154-5, I(H, 167, 205, 254,
258, 277, 301, 308, 362 ; fears
Charles V., 208; plots against
Charles, 232-3, 309; and Charles's
marriage, 268 ; and Pescara's
plot, 282, 284 ; and the Holy
League of Cognac, 309 et sqq.,
329 ; and the Duke of Ferrara,
•aiS ; his indecision, 322, 324 ;
his truce with Lannoy, 326 ; and
the attack on Rome, 327 et sqq. ;
shuts himself in the Vatican, 330 ;
escapes to the Castle of St. An-
gelo, 332-3, 337 ; his surrender,
338 et sqq., 349 ; his release,
351, 359 ; his cunning, 359, 369 ;
his compact with Charles, 371,
376 ; his meeting with Charles at
Bologna, 377 ; his death, 385 ;
and Henry VIII. 's marriage, 386,
389, 390
Clermont, Comte de, 431
Cleves, William, Duke of, 413 et
sqq., 417, 419 et sqq.
Colonna, Ascanio, 361
Colonna, Cardinal Pompeo, 313-14,
3*6. 323. 333. 349, 35°. 3<5o
Colonna, Prospero, 29, 75, 76, 151-
2, 170 et sqq. ; 177, 206-7, 2I4
Colonna, Vittoria. See Pescara
Conde, Prince de, 109
Conradin, 5
Contarini, Caspar, 319
Conti, Prince de, 109
Cordova, Gonsalvo da, 7, 12, 18
Cortona, Cardinal of, 340
Courteville, Chamberlain, in
Cranmer, Archbishop, 386
Crequy, 205
Croy, Adrien de, Seigneur de
Beaurain, 197, 218
Croy, Guillaume de, Seigneur de
Chievres, 45, 46, $oetsqq., 90, 107
et sqq., 146, 191
Croy, Madame de Chievres, 109
Dan jay, Sieur, 318
Desguieres, 209
Diane de Poitiers. See Poitiers
Doria, Admiral Andrea, Prince of
Mem, 119, 223, 262, 317, 344, 360
etsqq., 369, 378, 393, 417, 424
Doria, Philippine, 360-1, 378
Dovizi, Cardinal of Bibbiena, 103
Dumolard, 28, 30-1
Edward IV. of England, 17
Egmont, Charles d'. See Due de
, Gueldre
Eleonore, Queen of Portugal and
second wife of Frai^ois I., Arch-
duchess of Austria, 107, 114, 264,
278, 280, 313, 398, 405 ; her love
affair with Count Frederick, no-
ii ; marries Emmanuel of Por-
tugal, in ; her marriage to
Fran9ois I., 112 ; 195, 251, 259,
262, 273, 287, 298, 300, 303, 342,
348, 375, 383 ; and Bourbon's
plotting against, 198-9 ; her per-
sonal appearance, 274 ; her pro-
posed alliances, 295 ; and Fran-
9ois' fickleness, 321 ; meets her
brother, 405 ; retires to the con-
vent of Poissy, 429 ; her death,
434
Index
439
Embrun, Archbishop of, 271
Emmanuel of Portugal, 1 1 1
Empser, Jacob von, 28, 30-1
Enghien, Comte de, 424-5
Erasmus, 24, 51, 101, 166, 167
Escure, M. de 1', 399
Este, Alfonso d'. See Ferrara,
Duke of
Etampes, Duchesse d', Anne d'
Heilly de Pisseleu, 40, 304-6,
321, 342, 398 etsqq.; 406, 411,
, 415-6, 426-7, 429, 430
Etaples, Lefebre d', 57
Feramosca, Cesare, 324-5, 361
Ferdinand I., King of Naples, 6
Ferdinand II., 6
Ferdinand V. of Aragon, the Catho-
lic, 10, 12, 15, 25-6, 42, 46-7, 62,
65, 73, 76, 86, 88, 90, 91, 107, 118,
126, 264
Ferdinand, Archduke, grandson of
Maximilian I., 16, 33, 46, 52, 108,
114, 124, 128, 240, 257, 349, 366,
368, 370, 405 ; King of Hungary,
422"
Ferdinand, Duke of Calabria, 264
Ferrara, Alfonso d'Este, Duke of,
ii, 26, 29, 31, 135, 254, 284, 317-
18, 322, 325, 328, 359, 374, 376,
386
Fleurange, son of Robert de la
Marck, 80, 81, 83, 135, 373
Foix, Andrede, Seigneur de Les-
parre, 38, 145, 150, 180
Foix, Catherine de. See Catherine
Foix, Frangoise de, 36 et sqq. ; 44,
125, 133, 142, 156, 170, 180, 264,
304-6, 398-9
Foix, Gaston de, Due de Nemours,
26 et sqq., 44, 53, 60, 425
Foix, Germaine de, 13, 26, 264, 300
Foix, Jean de, Vicomte de Nar-
bonne, 13, 27
Foix, Marguerite de, 27
Foix, Odet de, Seigneur de Lautrec,
38 ; appointed Marechal de
France, 44, 89, 150 et sqq. ; 156,
164, 170 et sqq., 180, 186-7, 206,
304, 343 et sqq., 359 et sqq., 363,
374
Foix, Phebus de, Vicomte de Lau-
trec, 33, 36
Foix, Thomas de, Seigneur de
Lescun, 38, 151, 171, I74t 206,
243. 245
Fougas, David de, 61
Foxe, Dr., 340
Frangois I., King of France, i, 2, 5 ;
his birth and early life, 14 ; his
marriage to Claude de Valois, 15 ;
and Louis XII. and Anne of
Brittany, 22 ; ascends the throne
of France, 34 et sqq. ; character-
istics, 35, 49, 53 ; and Fran<joise
de Foix, 36 et sqq., 125, 133 ; his
taste in art, 38 ; his appearance,
43 ; and the Due de Bourbon,
44 ; and the embassy from
Flanders, 47 ; contrasted with
Charles V., 52-3 ; and the in-
vasion of Milan, 71 et sqq. ; and
Leo X., 78, 87 ; and the battle
of Marignano, 79 et sqq. ; and the
Chevalier Bayard, 81 ; and Henry
VIII., 88, 125 et sqq. ; and pro-
posed alliances, 109 ; his mar-
riage with the Archduchess Eleo-
nore, 112 ; and the electors, 115
et sqq. ; estranges himself from
Robert de la Marck and Franz
von Seckingen, 118; and his
Italian dominions, 126 ; and
Charles V., 128 ; and Cardinal
Wolsey, 130 et sqq., 147 ; Henry
VIII. and the Field of the Cloth
of Gold, 131 et sqq. ; and Henri
d'Albret, 146 ; and the war
against Austria, 147 et sqq. ; and
the siege of Mezieres, 156 et sqq. ;
recovers French Navarre, 162 ;
and his kinship to Charles V. and
Henry VIII., 163 ; and the
Reformers, 165 et sqq. ; and his
campaign in Italy, 170 et sqq. ;
and the loss of Milan, 175, 180 ;
and his sister Marguerite de
Valois, 179 et sqq. ; and the Con-
stable de Bourbon, 189 et sqq.t
195 et sqq. ; and La Brosse's es-
tates, 194 ; goes to Italy and ap-
points Louise de Savoie Regent,
20 1 et sqq. ; and Jean de Poitiers,
209 et sqq. ; reoccupies Provence,
227 ; goes again to Italy with his
army, 229 et sqq. ; his amours in
Italy, 233 ; and the battle of
Pa via, 235 et sqq. ; is taken
prisoner, 245 ; his prison amuse-
ments, 249 ; and the proposal to
join Charles V. against the Sul-
tan, 257 ; his proposal to marry
the Archduchess Eleonore, 251,
259, 260 ; his offer to pay Charles
Vs.' debts to Henry VIII., 259 ;
440
Index
is sent to Spain by Charles V., 262
et sqq. ; is cast into a Spanish
dungeon, 269 et sqq. ; is visited
in prison by Charles V., 275 ; is
visited by his sister Marguerite
de Valois, 276 ; and Charles V.'s
demands, 287 ; his plot to escape
from prison discovered, 287 etsqq. ;
negotiates for his release, 297 et
sqq. \ delivers up his sons as
hostages and meets Charles V.,
299 ; is released, 304 ; and the
Holy League of Cognac, 308 et
sqq. ; breaks faith with Charles
V. and is challenged by him, 310
et sqq. ; Cardinal Wolsey's mis-
sion to, 346 et sqq. ; declares war
against Charles V., 350 ; Charles
challenges him to a duel, 352 et
sqq. ; his cowardly behaviour,
357 ; peace and its terms, 372
et sqq. ; pays a ransom for his
sons' release, 379,et sqq. ; his
marriage to Queen Eleonore, 383 ;
his alliance with the Mediter-
ranean pirates, 391 et sqq. ; in-
vades Savoy, 394 ; and Diane de
Poitiers, 403 ; meets Charles V.,
405 ; his alliance with Charles
V., 408 ; and Jeanne d'Albret,
412 et sqq. ; murder of his am-
bassadors in Italy, 416 ; at war
again with Charles V., 417 etsqq. ;
peace, 427 ; his death, 428 ; his
burial, 430
Fran9ois II., King of France, 430
Fran9ois, the Dauphin, son of
Fran9ois I., 138, 190, 249, 297
etsqq., 303-4, 309, 350-1, 359,
379 et sqq., 401, 403, 417, 430
Frangois II., Duke of Brittany, i
Frederic III. of Aragon, 12
Frederick II., Emperor, 5
Frederick III., Duke of Saxony, 101,
105, 115, 117, 121
Frederick, Count, no, 114
Fregoso, Caesar, 344, 416, 424
Frundsburg, George von, 171, 173,
174, 240, 244, 315 etsqq., 322,
324
Fugger, the Banker, 103-4
Gama, Vasco da, 24
Gardiner, Dr., 340
Garibaldi, 285
Gastaldo, Juan, 283
Gattinara, Mercurin de, 47, 50, 128,
255. 271. 280, 296-7, 302
Gest, Marguerite van, mistress of
Charles V., 49, 377
Gi6, Marechal de. See Rohan
Giorgi, Marino, 83, 85
Giovanna II., Queen, 5
Giovo, Bishop Paolo, 333
Giulia of Aragon, 392-3
Glarean, 166
Gonsalvo da Cordova, 63, 64
Gonzaga. See Marquis of Mantua
Goufner, Guillaume, 39, 53
Granvelle, Seigneur de, 353
Greiffenclau of Wolrath, Richard of,
Archbishop of Tr6ves, 93, 115,
117
Grimaldi. See Honore
Grolier, 337
Guasto, Marquis del, 311, 396, 416,
424-5
Gueldre, Charles d'Egmont, Due de,
46, 47, 72, 80, 88, 95, 267, 373,
413, 420
Guicciardini, Francesco, 233, 318,
339
Guise, Claude de, 80, 84, 205-6, 418
Guise, Francois, Due de. See
Lorraine, Fra^ois de
Guyenne, 350 et sqq.
H
Henri II. of France (Due d'Orleans)
son of Fran9ois I., 249, 343, 424
et sqq. ; as hostage to Charles,
297 et sqq. ; 303-4, 309, 348, 350-
i ; his proposed marriage, 323,
342, 368, 375, 379 et sqq. ; his
gloomy disposition, 359, 403 ;
cruel treatment of in prison,
380 ; his release, 382-3 ; his
marriage to Catherine de Medicis,
385 ; becomes heir to the throne,
401-2 ; and Diane de Poitiers,
403-4, 406, 410-11, 429 ; in com-
mand, 417-18, 420 ; and Jeanne
d'Albret, 422-3, 431 et sqq.; as-
cends the throne, 429
Henri III. of France, 430
Henri IV. (d'Albret) of France and
Navarre, 54, 57, 147, 149, *79.
43L 434
Henri d'Albret (of Navarre), 128,
145-8, 164, 225, 245, 287, 290
etsqq., 306-7, 347, 387, 412 et
sqq., 422, 432
Henry V. of England, 71, 126, 198
Index
441
Henry VI. of England, 126, 198
Henry VII. of England, 18, 55, 379
Henry VIII. of England, 15, 26, 28,
34, 85, 107, 161, 177, 205, 222,
226, 228, 268, 280, 304, 309,
322-3, 326, 346, 409 ; invades
France, 33 ; his first marriage,
55; and Bayard, 6^etsqq., 69-
70 ; his wish to conquer France,
88, 90, 181, 219, 225, 248, 254-5,
372, 374 : his treaty with Charles
and Fran9ois, 91 ; aspires to
the crown of the Roman Empire,
95 et sqq. ; his friendship with
Fran9ois, 125-6, 140, 349, 372 ;
visited by Charles, 127-8 ; and
the Field of the Cloth of Gold,
130 et sqq. ; his passion for Anne
Boleyn, 142-3, 340, 386, 388 ; and
Charles' flattery of, 144, 146 ; his
descent, 163 ; and Bourbon's
allegiance to, 198 et sqq. ; his
reply to Beaurain's offer, 253;
Charles' debts to, 256, 259, 351-
2, 379, 382 ; his wish to divorce
Queen Catherine, 340-1, 343, 348,
384, 386, 390 ; and Mary Tudor's
marriage, 341-2, 3 ; declares war
against Spain, 350 ; truce with
the Netherlands, 365 ; his pro-
posed French marriages, 386-7 ;
his marriage to Anne Boleyn,
389, 390 ; his quarrel with
Fran?ois, 419-20 ; and Charles V.
425; captures Boulogne, 427;
and Francois, 428
Henry, Elector of Saxony, 408
Holy League, The, 26, 323, 171
Honore Grimaldi, Prince of Monaco,
223
Humbercourt, 75
Hutten, Ulrich von, 99 et sqq., 120-1
Ibrahim of Parga, 366
Infantado, Duke of, 269, 272
Isabella of Castile, n, 12, 15, 16,
126
Isabella of Portugal, in, 268, 289,
341
James V. of Scotland, 419
Jane Seymour, Queen of Henry
VIII., 419
Jean d'Albret, King of Navarre, 19,
27, 42, 48, 91, 126, 290
Jeanne d'Albret, mother of
Henri IV., 294, 307, 410 et sqq.,
422-3, 431
Jeanne de Valois, Queen of
Louis XII.
Jerningham, Sir Robert, 343
Joachim, Margrave of Brandenburg,
115, 121
Joanna of Aragon, 392
Joanna of Castile, the Infanta,
mother of Charles V., 12, 15, 16,
90, 107, 112
John II. of Aragon, 6
John III. of Portugal, in
John, Margrave of Brandenburg,
264
Juan of Austria, Don, 50, 185
Juan, Prince of the Asturias, the
Infante, 12, 126, 264
Juliers, Duchess Maria of, 421
Julius II., Pope, 19, 22 et sqq., 29,
33. 34. 7L 86. 376
K
Kheir-ed-Din, 392, 394
Lafayette, Aymee de, 414
Laforet, 404
Langey de, 361
Lannoy, Madame de, 109
Lannoy, Charles de, Prince of Sul-
mona, 268-9, 318 ; in command
with Pescara, 207-8, 219, 226,
228, 230-1, 238-9, 249 ; and the
battle of Pavia, 243 ; Fra^ois
surrenders to, 245 et sqq. ; and
Francois' propositions, 259, 260,
262-3, 295 et *??• : ms treatment
of Bourbon, 265-6, 296, 325, 327 ;
and the little Princes, 303-4 ; and
European affairs, 308 ; and de-
fence of Naples, 311, 317, 323,
345 ; and Fra^ois' marriage,
321 ; his truce with the Pope,
324- 326
Lautrec. See de Foix
Lavedan, Vicomte de, 414
Law, John, 109
Lee, English Ambassador, 309
Lefebvre, 273
Leo X., 75, 83, 125, 171, 232 ; takes
refuge in the Castle of Sant ' Angelo,
442
Index
33 ; his cunning, 78, 150 ; and
the battle of Marignano, 85 ; his
avaricious schemes, 87, 104 ; his
tastes, 99, 101, 103 ; and the
vacillating Franfois, 94, 97, 99
et sqq. ; and Martin Luther, 104
et sqq. ; and the Election, 116
et sqq. ; his health, 127 ; and the
Papal dominions, 152-3 ; his
death, 153 ; his character, 153-
4 ; his learning, 166 ; and the
Duke of Urbino, 323, 339
Leyva, Antonio da, Prince of
Ascoli, 170, 177, 262, 344 ; holds
Pavia, 172, 233, 236-7, 240,
242 ; driven back by Lescun, 174 ;
his courage, 231, 311 ; aban-
dons Pavia, 245 ; and Pescara's
treachery, 284-5 ; under the Due
de Bourbon, 321-2 ; defeated
before Lodi, 362 ; his victory
against Saint Paul, 364, 378 ;
invades France, 396
Ligny, Comte de, 60, 62
Lisieux, Bishop of, 202
Longueville, Bossut de, 430
Longueville, Due de, 67
Lorges, Seigneur de, 215
Lorraine, Cardinal de, 404, 423
Lorraine, Duchess of, 206
Lorraine, Duke of, 2, 72, 89, 95
Lorraine, Francois de, Due de Guise,
244, 413, 419, 425, 431-2
Ludovico, " The Moor," Duke of
Milan, 61, 62
Louis II., King of Bohemia and
Hungary, 115, 123, 124, 257,
366-8, 368
Louis V. , Electoral Count Palatine,
no, 115
Louis IX. (Saint Louis), 5, 163, 431
Louis XL, 2, 6, 15, 47, 98, 126, 187,
188, 190, 192-3, 198, 274
Louis XII., 5, & et sqq., 20, 22 et
sqq-, 53. 55. 61, 62, 65, 71, 72, 90,
135, 142, 143, 188 et sqq., 194,
260, 281, 290, 374, 387
Louis XIV., 148
Louis XV., The Real, 183
Louis III., de Male, Comte, 15
Louise de Savoie, Duchesse d'An-
gouleme (mother of Fran9ois I.),
i, 4, 17, 22, 37, 43, 100, 179, 220,
240, 249, 274, 347 ; birth of her
daughter Marguerite, 14 ; her
wish to marry the Due de Bour-
bon, 40, 134, 156, 162 ; her love
for Francis, 54 ; and Mar-
guerite's marriage, 55 ; her
jealousy, 125, 133 ; her efforts to
raise money, 150 ; her dis-
honesty, 176, 186-7 '• ner greed
and selfishness, 181 ; her law-
suit against Bourbon, 192-3, 209;
appointed Regent, 201, 229, 279 ;
and Francis's defeat, 248 ; and
Charles's propositions, 258 ; nego-
tiations with Wolsey, 253-4 '• her
proposals to Charles, 271-2 ; and
Francesco Sforza, 281-2 ; her
truce with Charles, 288-9 ; visits
Fran9ois in prison, 303-4 ; intro-
duces Anne de Pisseleu to Fran-
9ois, 305-6 ; her overtures to
the Archduchess Marguerite, 365,
369 et sqq., and the imprisoned
Princes, 380-1 ; and Henry
VIII. 's divorce, 387 ; her death,
398
Lugo, Alvaro de, 382
Luther, Martin, 57, 94, 101, 103 et
sqq., 165, 339
Luxembourg. See Charles
M
Machiavelli, 302
Madeleine of France, Princess, 249,
419
Mahomed II., Sultan, 124
Mantua, Gonzaga, Marquis of, 7,
n, 61, 187, 284, 325, 336, 396,
421
Maraviglia, 391
Marck, Due de Bouillon, Robert
de la, " The Wild Boar of the
Ardennes," 72, 80, 81, 95, 98, 118
etsqq., 128, 135, 145, 146-7, 158,
287, 373
Margaret of York, Princess, 4, 17
Marguerite d'Angouleme, or de
Valois, sister of Fra^ois I.,
Duchesse d'Alen9on, Queen of
Navarre, 2, 14, 37, 39, 54 et sqq.,
56 et sqq., 88, 132, 142, 150,
156, 166, 176, 248, 386, 388-
9. 399. 4°5. 427 ; her marriage,
55 ; her devotion to her brother
Fran9ois I., 100, 179 et sqq., 249,
373. 3^6, 430 ; educates Anne
Boleyn, 143 ; favours Martin
Luther, 165, 350, 433 ; and " the
new learning," 166 et sqq., and the
" Heptameron," 167, 210 ; her
admirers, 179 ; Francois' dis-
graceful treatment of, 182 et sqq.,
and Jean de Poitiers' property,
Index
443
209, 210 ; and her husband's
death, 250 ; goes to Spain, 272
et sqq. ; and Fra^ois" imprison-
ment, 276 et sqq., 287 et sqq. ;
meets Henri d'Albret, 292 ; her
marriage to d'Albret, 293, 387 ;
retires to'Nerac, 306; with her
son and daughter, 307 ; goes to
Amiens, 347-8 ; and her daughter
Jeanne's marriage, 412 et sqq.,
422-3, 432-3 ; retires to .a con-
vent, 430 ; mourns her brother,
430-1 ; her death, 433
Marguerite, Duchess of Florence,
natural daughter of Charles V.,
318. 328
Marguerite of France, Princess,
daughter of Fra^ois I., 249
Marguerite, Queen (Archduchess
of Austria), wife of Charles
VIII. ; the Infante Juan ; and
Duke Philibert II. of Savoy, i,
33, 60, 66, 71, 901, 108, 117-8,
124, 144-5, 191, 260 ; her early
betrothal and marriage, 3, 4 ;
the French Court's treatment of,
7 ; her marriage to the Prince of
the Asturias, 12, 16, 126 ; her
third marriage to Duke Philibert
II., 17 ; rules Savoy, 18 ; be-
comes Regent for Charles V., 18 ;
and the Holy League, 26 ; and
Charles's proposed marriage, 29 ;
and Charles V.'s coming of age,
45-6 ; and Charles's education,
50 et sqq. ; and the Due de
Gueldre, 80, 98, 267 ; her devo-
tion to Charles, 93, no, 178;
again becomes Regent, 113 ; her
industry, 113-14; her diplomacy,
120, 125, 203, 257 ; welcomes
Charles at Bruges, 128 ; her
hatred of France, 125, 129, 178,
200, 302 ; her great influence,
161 ; and her nephew Ferdinand's
marriage, 161 ; and Rene the
Bastard, 170 ; and the invasion
of France, 200, 225, 254, 261,
343 ; and the nobles, 204 ; makes
peace with France, 365-6, 369
et sqq. ; her death, 381
Maria of Portugal, in, 423
Marie, Archduchess of Austria,
daughter of Ferdinand, King of
Hungary, 422
Marie, Queen of Bohemia, Arch-
duchess of Austria, sister of
Charles V., 124, 257, 366, 409,
420
Marie de Bourgogne, Empress of
Germany, wife of Maximilian I.,
3. 15, 47. 95. 126, 274
Marie de Guise, 419
Marignano, The battle of, 78 et sqq.
Marot, Clement, 57, 179
Matignon, Jacques de, 202
Mary, Princess, afterwards Queen
of England, 91, 127, 138, 161, 250,
254-5, 261, 268, 340 et sqq., 348,
386, 39i
Mary, Queen of Scots, 419, 430
Mary Tudor, Queen of Louis XII.,
34. M2
Maximilian I. , Emperor of Germany,
i. 3. 4. 9. 17. 66, 80, 98, 101, 123,
126, 381 ; forms a league of
Italian States, 7 ; his hatred of
France, 10 ; and the Regency,
20 ; Anne of Brittany's affection
for, 9, 22 ; his love of war, 25 ;
borrows money from Louis XII.,
26, 29 ; and Charles' coming of
age, 45 ; and Fra^ois' marriage,
47; and Charles' training, 51-2 ;
and Bayard, 69 ; and his Lom-
bardy possessions, 85, 89 ; and
the conquest of France, 88 et
sqq. ; and his title of Emperor, 92
et sqq. ; his hatred of Leo X.,
105; his death, no, 114, 118;
and the Election, 113 et sqq.
Meaux, Briconnet, Bishop. See
Briconnet
Medici, Alessandro, Duke of Flor-
ence, 328, 377
Medici, Catherine de'. See Cath-
erine
Medici, Clarice de', 328
Medici, Giovanni de'. See Pope
Leo X.
Medici, Giovanni de', Leader of
Black Bands, 208, 236, 314, 316,
322
Medici, Giuliano de', 85, 86, 155, 327
Medici, Ippolito, Cardinal, 327-8
Medici, Lorenzo de', Due de Ne-
mours, 86, 101
Medici, Lorenzo de', " The Magnifi-
cent," 103, 155
Medici, Piero de', 6
Michelet, 50, 100
Mignet, 115
Mirandel, 224
Mirandola, Siege of, 26
Moncada, Ugo de, 223, 260, 271,
308, 310-12, 313-14, 345. 361
Montholon, 196-7
Montfort, 424
444
Index
Montluc, de, 424
Montigny, Baron de, in
Montmorency, Anne de, Marechal
of France, 14, 170, 212, 298, 347,
349. 391, 403, 431 ; fights under
Fran9ois I., 225 et sqq., 236, 263;
taken prisoner, 249 ; remains
in Spain, 273 ; and Clement Le
Champion, 288 ; his jealousy of
Marguerite de Valois, 289 ; re-
turns from Spain, 295 ; his letter
from Fran9ois, 363 ; ransoms
the young Princes, 382-3 ; and
Marguerite de Valois' marriage,
386-7 ; devastates the south
of France, 396-7 ; created Con-
stable of France, 397 ; and
Charles V., 409 et sqq. ; humili-
ated by Fran9ois I., 412, 415 ;
and Anne de Pisseleu, 416
Montpensier, Charles de, 220
Montpensier, Gilbert de, 7
Morone, Girolamo, 231, 282, 284-5,
312-13
Muley-Hassan, 392-4
N
Najera, Duke of, 145, 147
Nassau, Count of, 147, 156 et sqq.
Nassau, Duke of, 420
Navarro, Pedro, 29, 31, 73, 74, 80,
82, 84, 363
Novi, Doge Paul de, 65
Olisleger, Dr., 415
Olivier, Chancellor, 430
Oppede, Baron d', 426
Orange, Prince Philibert of, 223,
256, 332-3. 345. 360. 362-3, 376,
420
Orleans, Charles d'. See An-
gouleme, Comte d'
Orleans, Charles, Due d' (the Poet), 8
Orleans, Charles, Due d', Due
d'Angouleme, youngest son of
Francois I., 405, 409 et sqq.
Orleans, Henri, Due d'. See
Henri II.
Orleans, Louis, Due d', 9
Orleans, Philippe, Due d' ; the
Regent, 109, 183
Orleans, Valentina Visconti, Duch-
esse d', 9
Oroze, d', 64
Orsini, Pitigliano, 24
Ouradj, 392
Padua, Siege of, 25
Palice, Marechal de. See Cha-
bannes
Pallavicino, Cristofano, 152
Pallavicino, Manfred, 152
Parma and Placentia, Duchess of,
daughter of Marguerite van Gest,
49. 377
Parma and Placentia, Duke of,
Octavius Farnese, 377
Pasquino, 232
Paul III., Pope (Alessandro
Farnese), 385, 401, 405, 422
Pavia, Siege of, 235 et sqq.
Peloux, Le, 248
Penalosa, Commander, 247, 251,
260-1
Penthievre, Briant I., Comte de,
36. 306 .
Peralta, 380
Pescara, Vittoria Colonna, Mar-
chioness of, 282-3, 286
Pescara. See Avalos
Petit, Guillaume, 166
Philibert II., Duke of Savoy, i, 17,
60
Philiberta of Savoy, 85
Philip II. of Spain, 341, 377, 410,
4.23. 434
Philippe Le Beau, Archduke, King
of Castile, father of Charles V.,
3, 4, 10, 12, isetsqq., no, 112
Philippe Le Bon, Duke, 52
Philippe le Temeraire (the Bold)
Due, 15
Philippe II., Duke, 13
Philippine, Count, 362
Piennes, Seigneur de, 66
Pisseleu, Anne d'Heilly de. See
Etampes, Duchesse d'
Pisseleu, Guillaume de ; Seigneur
d' Heilly, 398, 400
Pius II., Pope, 6
Pius III., Pope, 19
Poitiers , Diane de ; wife of Louis de
Breze, 135, 194, 204, zogetsqq.,
343, 400, 403-4, 410, 411, 423,
429 et sqq.
Poitiers, Jean de, Comte de Saint-
Vallier, 194, 202, 204, 209 et sqq.,
347
Pole, Cardinal, 390
Pomperan, M. de, 136, 245
Posserini, Cardinal, 328
Index
445
Praet, Louis de, 308, 382
Prat, Antoine Du, 43, 100, 133, 138,
140, 181, 192, 209, 273, 304, 361
Prie, Aymard de, 209
R
Rabodanges, 8
Rangone, Guido, 338
Rene, King of Naples, 5, 6,
Rene, Bastard of Savoy, 17, 18,
170, 202, 245
Renee, de France, daughter of
Louis XII., 27, 90, 93, 115, 135,
JQ0, 195, 1 60. 281, 374, 384 et sqq.
Renzo, 222. See Ceri
Reuchlin, 99 et sqq.
Rincon, Fra^ois, 36% 405, 416,
424
Robert, King of France, 15
Robert I., Duke of Burgundy, 15
Robertet, Florimond, 43
Roche-Beaucourt, La, 203
Rochefort, Fra^ois de Seigneur
de Viviers, 291
Rochepot, La, 288
Roche-sur-yon, Prince de la, 332
Roeulx, Comtesse de 121, 197
Roeulx, Seigneur de, in
Rohan, Pierre Vicomte de, Mare"-
chal de Gie, 22-3
Roland, 53
Roussel, Gerard, 57, 273
Russell, Sir John, 219, 323
Sant' Angelo, Marquis de Civlta, 243
Saint Paul, Comte de. See Fian-
9ois de Bourbon
Saint-Vallier. See Poitiers
Salm, Count Nicolas de, 245
Saluzzo (or Saluces) Marquis de,
3J6, 363, 395, 396
Sampson, Dr., 252
Saragossa, Archbishop of, 107
Savoy, Duke of, 197, 424
Saxony, Duke of. See Frederick III.
Seckingen, Franz von, 103, 106, 118
et sqq., 146, 156 et sqq.
Selim I., Sultan, 116, 123, 124, 257
Selve, Jean de, First President of
Paris, 271
Semblan9ay, Jacques de, 150, 176
Sessa, Duke of, 309, 311
Sforza, Bianca, of Milan, second
wife of Maximilian I., 16
Sforza, Duke Francesco, 171, 173,
174, 208, 231, 281-2, 284-5, 309,
344- 350, 363. 374-6, 39 1, 395
Sforza, Gian Galeazzo, Duke of
Milan, 10, n
Sforza, Ludovico, Duke of Milan, 6,
10, ii, 89
Sforza, Maximilian, Duke of Milan,
72, 75, 76, 84, 85, 281
Shakespeare, 136
Shiner, Mathieu, Cardinal of Sion,
78, 79, 81 et sqq., 84, 88
Sicilian Vespers, 5
Siciliana, Marquis of Valle. See
Alarcon
Soliman. See Suleiman
Sorel, Agnds, 194
Soto Mayor, Count of, 63, 64
Spurs, Battle of, 33
Stein, Arnold von, 173
Stewart, Robert, Seigneur d'Au-
bigny, 63
Strozzi, Filippo, 32
Suffolk, Charles Brandon, Duke of,
1 8, 34, 204
Suffolk, Richard Pole, Duke of, 244,
245
Suleiman I., Sultan, 247, 257, 301,
365 et sqq., 374, 384-5, 391 et
sqq., 400-1, 404-5, 40^, 424
Sulmona, Prince of. See Lannoy
Talmont, Prince de, 83
Taylor, Dr., 304
Tetzel, 104
Tournon, Cardinal de, 404, 423, 426
Tremouille, General La, 33, 80, 83,
84, 205, 245
Treves, Archbishop of. See Greif-
fenclau
Trivulzi, Jean-Jacques, 44, 80, 89
Trivulzi, Marechal Theodore, 231,
248
U
Urbino, Duke of, 208, 311, 314, 316,
322-3, 326, 328, 330, 338-9, 363-
4- 369
Utrecht, Adrien of. See Adrian VI.
Vasto, Marquis del, 242 et sqq., 321,
325, 361
446
Index
Vaudrey, Comte de, 60
Vendome, Charles, Due de. See
Bourbon, Antoine de
Venice, 23 et sqq., 48
Visconti, Valentina, 42
Vladislav II., 123, 257, 366
W
Wallop, Sir John, 422
Warthy, 203
Wartz, Pierre de, 260
Weid, Hermann of. Archbishop of
Cologne, 115
Winckelried, Arnold von, 173-4
Wingfield, Sir Richard, 254-5
Wolsey, Cardinal, 142, 161, 197-8 ;
his ambitions to the Papacy, 97,
127, 130, 144, 154-5,205; and the
Field of the Cloth of Gold, 131-2,
137-8 ; fosters unfriendliness be-
tween Henry VIII. and Fra^ois,
138, 140-1 ; his friendliness to-
wards Charles V., 146 ; his
treachery to Fra^ois, 147, 164,
181 ; and the Due de Bourbon,
219, 225 ; and Henry VIII. 's
reply to Beaurain, 253-4 : and
the divorce of Catherine of Ara-
gon, 346, 348, 386 et sqq. ; his
mission to France, 346 et sqq.,
387
Wurtemburg, Duke of, 101, 119
Ximena, Dona, 272, 278, 399
Ximenes, Cardinal, 107
Zapolya, John, King of Hungary.
366-8, 385
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The Making of a King
The Childhood of Louis XIII.
By I. A. TAYLOR
Author of "The Life of Queen Henrietta Maria," " Queen Hortense and
her Friends," etc.
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" The Making of a King " deals with the first thirteen years of the life
of Louis XIII., giving also a picture in curious and graphic detail of the
relations of his father, Henri Quatre, with the children he loved so well.
Upon the tragedy of Henri's murder, when his son was no more than
nine, follows the story of his four years' minority ; the poor child who
was the nominal head of the State being seen standing out, a small
helpless figure, against the sombre background of turbulence, intrigue,
and warring passions by which he was surrounded.
China as I Saw It
A Woman's Letters from the Celestial Empire
By A. S. ROE
In demy 8vo, cloth gilt and gilt top, I2S. 6d. net, with 39 illustrations
The impressions of an Englishwoman on her journey through the
" Inner Land." She describes some of the Old World cities, and those
in which the Old and New are mingled with strange discord. She
travels in North and Mid-China and journeys to the Far West in native
boats, and across country in sedan-chairs and wheelbarrows, in muck-
carts and litters, enjoying now and again pleasant social intercourse
with the people, and realising more and more the truth of the old
prediction that they — the Chinese — will be numbered among the three
surviving nations of the future.
Ruskin and his Circle
By ADA EARLAND
In large crown 8vo, cloth gilt, 6s. net, with a photogravure frontispiece and
other illustrations after G. F. Watts, O.M., R.A., D. G. Rossetti,
Sir John Millais, P.R.A., George Richmond, R.A., etc.
The life-story of Ruskin is told impartially and with special regard to
the influence of environment on the development of his genius. His
unfortunate marriage receives due and sympathetic attention. Ruskin
students will find much here to explain the strange limitations and con-
tradictions noticeable in his works. The " Circle " includes Turner,
Millais, Holman Hunt, Burne-Jones, D. G. Rossetti, Kate Greenaway,
Coventry Patmore, Carlyle, Arnold Toynbee, Sir Henry Wentworth
Acland, Dr. John Brown, Charles Eliot Norton, and Mary Russell
Mitford.
Leopold the Second
King of the Belgians
By ANGELO S. RAPPOPORT, Ph.D.
Author of "The Curse of the Romanoffs," "Royal Lovers and
Mistresses," etc.
In I vol., demy Svo, cloth gilt and gilt top, l6s. net, wit ft photogravure
portrait and other illustrations
After Nicholas I. and the deposed Sultan Abdul Hamid— Leopold II.,
the late King of the Belgians, has perhaps been the best abused monarch
of the last century. His private life, his treatment of his daughters, the
Princesses Stephanie, Louise, and Clementine, his reputed avarice, and
the famous Congo atrocities have helped to rouse European opinion and
frequent indignation against the late Belgian monarch. It must, how-
ever, be admitted that in spite of his many faults Leopold II. was one of
the most intelligent and clever rulers of contemporary Europe. His
long reign was a reign of prosperity for Belgium, and the Belgians,
therefore, forgave him many of his transgressions and faults from which
even kings are not exempt. To give a true picture of Leopold II., based
upon an impartial judgment, and faithful to history is the aim of the
author in the present work, for which the information has been drawn
from the most reliable sources.
The Beautiful Queen :
Joanna of Naples
By FRANCESCA M. STEELE
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Joanna I., Queen of Naples, ascended the throne at the age of
sixteen, having previously married in 1343, Andrew, brother of the King
of Hungary, an uncouth semi-barbarian. They hated one another, and
Joan has been accused of conniving at his murder. She was an extra-
ordinarily beautiful and accomplished woman, whose romantic life re-
sembled in some respects that of Mary Queen of Scots. Her court was
highly civilised and refined, and attracted such men of genius as Petrarch
and Boccaccio. She was married four times, and she finally met her
death at the hands of the brother of her first husband. " Her long life,"
says Mr. Marion Crawford, " of forty years after she came to the throne
was spent in efforts to keep it, and all this time she fought, intrigued,
murdered, and fought again."
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