CHARLES learned all this news at Naples, and, tired of his late
conquests, which necessitated a labour in organisation for which he was
quite unfitted, turned his eyes towards France, where victorious fetes
and rejoicings were awaiting the victor’s return. So he yielded at the
first breath of his advisers, and retraced his road to his kingdom,
threatened, as was said, by the Germans on the north and the Spaniards
on the south. Consequently, he appointed Gilbert de Montpensier, of the
house of Bourbon, viceroy; d’Aubigny, of the Scotch Stuart family,
lieutenant in Calabria; Etienne de Vese, commander at Gaeta; and Don
Juliano, Gabriel de Montfaucon, Guillaume de Villeneuve, George de
Lilly, the bailiff of Vitry, and Graziano Guerra respectively governors
of Sant’ Angelo, Manfredonia, Trani, Catanzaro, Aquila, and Sulmone;
then leaving behind in evidence of his claims the half of his Swiss, a
party of his Gascons, eight hundred French lances, and about five
hundred Italian men-at-arms, the last under the command of the prefect
of Rome, Prospero and Fabrizio Colonna, and Antonio Savelli, he left
Naples on the 20th of May at two o’clock in the afternoon, to traverse
the whole of the Italian peninsula with the rest of his army, consisting
of eight hundred French lances, two hundred gentlemen of his guard, one
hundred Italian men-at-arms, three thousand Swiss infantry, one thousand
French and one thousand Gascon. He also expected to be joined by Camillo
Vitelli and his brothers in Tuscany, who were to contribute two hundred
and fifty men-at-arms.
A week before he left Naples, Charles had sent to Rome Monseigneur de
Saint-Paul, brother of Cardinal de Luxembourg; and just as he was
starting he despatched thither the new Archbishop of Lyons. They both
were commissioned to assure Alexander that the King of France had the
most sincere desire and the very best intention of remaining his friend.
In truth, Charles wished for nothing so much as to separate the pope
from the league, so as to secure him as a spiritual and temporal
support; but a young king, full of fire, ambition, and courage, was not
the neighbour to suit Alexander; so the latter would listen to nothing,
and as the troops he had demanded from the doge and Ludavico Sforza had
not been sent in sufficient number for the defense of Rome, he was
content with provisioning the castle of S. Angelo, putting in a
formidable garrison, and leaving Cardinal Sant’ Anastasio to receive
Charles while he himself withdrew with Caesar to Orvieto. Charles only
stayed in Rome three days, utterly depressed because the pope had
refused to receive him in spite of his entreaties. And in these three
days, instead of listening to Giuliano delta Rovere, who was advising
him once more to call a council and depose the pope, he rather hoped to
bring the pope round to his side by the virtuous act of restoring the
citadels of Terracina and Civita Vecchia to the authorities of the
Romagna, only keeping for himself Ostia, which he had promised Giuliano
to give back to him. At last, when the three days had elapsed, he left
Rome, and resumed his march in three columns towards Tuscany, crossed
the States of the Church, and on the 13th reached Siena, where he was
joined by Philippe de Commines, who had gone as ambassador extraordinary
to the Venetian Republic, and now announced that the enemy had forty
thousand men under arms and were preparing for battle. This news
produced no other effect on the king and the gentlemen of his army than
to excite their amusement beyond measure; for they had conceived such a
contempt for their enemy by their easy conquest, that they could not
believe that any army, however numerous, would venture to oppose their
passage.
Charles, however, was forced to give way in the face of facts, when he
heard at San Teranza that his vanguard, commanded by Marechal de Gie,
and composed of six hundred lances and fifteen hundred Swiss, when it
arrived at Fornova had come face to face with the confederates, who had
encamped at Guiarole. The marechal had ordered an instant halt, and he
too had pitched his tents, utilising for his defence the natural
advantages of the hilly ground. When these first measures had been
taken, he sent out, first, a herald to the enemy’s camp to ask from
Francesco di Gonzaga, Marquis of Mantua, generalissimo of the
confederate troops, a passage for his king’s army and provisions at a
reasonable price; and secondly, he despatched a courier to Charles VIII,
pressing him to hurry on his march with the artillery and rearguard. The
confederates had given an evasive answer, for they were pondering
whether they ought to jeopardise the whole Italian force in a single
combat, and, putting all to the hazard, attempt to annihilate the King
of France and his army together, so overwhelming the conqueror in the
ruins of his ambition. The messenger found Charles busy superintending
the passage of the last of his cannon over the mountain of Pontremoli.
This was no easy matter, seeing that there was no sort of track, and the
guns had to be lifted up and lowered by main farce, and each piece
needed the arms of as many as two hundred men. At last, when all the
artillery had arrived without accident on the other side of the
Apennines, Charles started in hot haste for Fornovd, where he arrived
with all his following on the morning of the next day.
From the top of the mountain where the Marechal de Gie had pitched his
tents, the king beheld both his own camp and the enemy’s. Both were on
the right bank of the Taro, and were at either end of a semicircular
chain of hills resembling an amphitheatre; and the space between the two
camps, a vast basin filled during the winter floods by the torrent which
now only marked its boundary, was nothing but a plain covered with
gravel, where all manoeuvres must be equally difficult for horse and
infantry. Besides, on the western slope of the hills there was a little
wood which extended from the enemy’s army to the French, and was in the
possession of the Stradiotes, who, by help of its cover, had already
engaged in several skirmishes with the French troops during the two days
of halt while they were waiting for the king.
The situation was not reassuring. From the top of the mountain which
overlooked Fornovo, one could get a view, as we said before, of the two
camps, and could easily calculate the numerical difference between them.
The French army, weakened by the establishment of garrisons in the
various towns and fortresses they had won in Italy, were scarcely eight
thousand strong, while the combined forces of Milan and Venice exceeded
a total of thirty-five thousand. So Charles decided to try once more the
methods of conciliation, and sent Commines, who, as we know, had joined
him in Tuscany, to the Venetian ’proveditori’, whose acquaintance he had
made when on his embassy; he having made a great impression on these
men, thanks to a general high opinion of his merits. He was commissioned
to tell the enemy’s generals, in the name of the King of France, that
his master only desired to continue his road without doing or receiving
any harm; that therefore he asked to be allowed a free passage across
the fair plains of Lombardy, which he could see from the heights where
he now stood, stretching as far as the eye could reach, away to the foot
of the Alps. Commines found the confederate army deep in discussion: the
wish of the Milanese and Venetian party being to let the king go by, and
not attack him; they said they were only too happy that he should leave
Italy in this way, without causing any further harm; but the ambassadors
of Spain and Germany took quite another view. As their masters had no
troops in the army, and as all the money they had promised was already
paid, they must be the gainer in either case from a battle, whichever
way it went: if they won the day they would gather the fruits of
victory, and if they lost they would experience nothing of the evils of
defeat. This want of unanimity was the reason why the answer to Commines
was deferred until the following day, and why it was settled that on the
next day he should hold another conference with a plenipotentiary to be
appointed in the course of that night. The place of this conference was
to be between the two armies.
The king passed the night in great uneasiness. All day the weather had
threatened to turn to rain, and we have already said how rapidly the
Taro could swell; the river, fordable to-day, might from tomorrow
onwards prove an insurmountable obstacle; and possibly the delay had
only been asked for with a view to putting the French army in a worse
position. As a fact the night had scarcely come when a terrible storm
arose, and so long as darkness lasted, great rumblings were heard in the
Apennines, and the sky was brilliant with lightning. At break of day,
however, it seemed to be getting a little calmer, though the Taro, only
a streamlet the day before, had become a torrent by this time, and was
rapidly rising. So at six in the morning, the king, ready armed and on
horseback, summoned Commines and bade him make his way to the rendezvous
that the Venetian ’proveditori’ had assigned. But scarcely had he
contrived to give the order when loud cries were heard coming from the
extreme right of the French army. The Stradiotes, under cover of the
wood stretching between the two camps, had surprised an outpost, and
first cutting the soldiers’ throats, were carrying off their heads in
their usual way at the saddle-bow. A detachment of cavalry was sent in
pursuit; but, like wild animals, they had retreated to their lair in the
woods, and there disappeared.
This unexpected engagement, in all probability arranged beforehand by
the Spanish and German envoys, produced on the whole army the effect of
a spark applied to a train of gunpowder. Commines and the Venetian
’proveditori’ each tried in vain to arrest the combat an either side.
Light troops, eager for a skirmish, and, in the usual fashion of those
days, prompted only by that personal courage which led them on to
danger, had already come to blows, rushing down into the plain as though
it were an amphitheatre where they might make a fine display of arms.
For a moment the young king, drawn on by example, was an the point of
forgetting the responsibility of a general in his zeal as a soldier; but
this first impulse was checked by Marechal de Gie, Messire Claude de la
Chatre de Guise, and M. de la Trimauille, who persuaded Charles to adopt
the wiser plan, and to cross the Taro without seeking a battle,—at the
same time without trying to avoid it, should the enemy cross the river
from their camp and attempt to block his passage. The king accordingly,
following the advice of his wisest and bravest captains, thus arranged
his divisions.
The first comprised the van and a body of troops whose duty it was to
support them. The van consisted of three hundred and fifty men-at-arms,
the best and bravest of the army, under the command of Marechal de Gie
and Jacques Trivulce; the corps following them consisted of three
thousand Swiss, under the command of Engelbert der Cleves and de Larnay,
the queen’s grand equerry; next came three hundred archers of the guard,
whom the king had sent to help the cavalry by fighting in the spaces
between them.
The second division, commanded by the king in person and forming the
middle of the army, was composed of the artillery, under Jean de
Lagrange, a hundred gentlemen of the guard with Gilles Carrone for
standard-bearer, pensioners of the king’s household under Aymar de Prie,
some Scots, and two hundred cross-bowmen on horseback, with French
archers besides, led by M. de Crussol.
Lastly, the third division, i.e. the rear, preceded by six thousand
beasts of burden bearing the baggage, was composed of only three hundred
men-at-arms, commanded by de Guise and by de la Trimouille: this was the
weakest part of the army.
When this arrangement was settled, Charles ordered the van to cross the
river, just at the little town of Fornovo. This was done at once, the
riders getting wet up to their knees, and the footmen holding to the
horses’ tails. As soon as he saw the last soldiers of his first division
on the opposite bank, he started himself to follow the same road and
cross at the same ford, giving orders to de Guise and de la Trimouille
to regulate the march of the rear guard by that of the centre, just as
he had regulated their march by that of the van. His orders were
punctually carried out; and about ten o’clock in the morning the whole
French army was on the left bank of the Taro: at the same time, when it
seemed certain from the enemy’s arrangements that battle was imminent,
the baggage, led by the captain, Odet de Reberac, was separated from the
rear guard, and retired to the extreme left.
Now, Francisco de Gonzaga, general-in-chief of the confederate troops,
had modelled his plans on those of the King of France; by his orders,
Count de Cajazzo, with four hundred men-at-arms and two thousand
infantry, had crossed the Taro where the Venetian camp lay, and was to
attack the French van; while Gonzaga himself, following the right bank
as far as Fornovo, would go over the river by the same ford that Charles
had used, with a view to attacking his rear. Lastly, he had placed the
Stradiotes between these two fords, with orders to cross the river in
their turn, so soon as they saw the French army attacked both in van and
in the rear, and to fall upon its flank. Not content with offensive
measures, Gonzaga had also made provision for retreat by leaving three
reserve corps on the right bank, one to guard the camp under the
instruction of the Venetian ’provveditori’, and the other two arranged
in echelon to support each other, the first commanded by Antonio di
Montefeltro, the second by Annibale Bentivoglio.
Charles had observed all these arrangements, and had recognised the
cunning Italian strategy which made his opponents the finest generals in
the world; but as there was no means of avoiding the danger, he had
decided to take a sideway course, and had given orders to continue the
match; but in a minute the French army was caught between Count di
Cajazzo, barring the way with his four hundred men-at-arms and his two
thousand infantry, and Gonzaga in pursuit of the rear, as we said
before; leading six hundred men-at-arms, the flower of his army, a
squadron of Stradiotes, and more than five thousand infantry: this
division alone was stronger than the whole of the French army.
When, however, M. de Guise and M. de la Trimouille found themselves
pressed in this way, they ordered their two hundred men-at-arms to turn
right about face, while at the opposite end—that is, at the head of the
army-Marechal de Gie and Trivulce ordered a halt and lances in rest.
Meanwhile, according to custom, the king, who, as we said, was in the
centre, was conferring knighthood on those gentlemen who had earned the
favour either by virtue of their personal powers or the king’s special
friendship.
Suddenly there was heard a terrible clash behind it was the French
rearguard coming to blows with the Marquis of Mantua. In this encounter,
where each man had singled out his own foe as though it were a
tournament, very many lances were broken, especially those of the
Italian knights; for their lances were hollowed so as to be less heavy,
and in consequence had less solidity. Those who were thus disarmed at
once seized their swords. As they were far more numerous than the
French, the king saw them suddenly outflanking his right wing and
apparently prepared to surround it; at the same moment loud cries were
heard from a direction facing the centre: this meant that the Stradiotes
were crossing the river to make their attack.
The king at once ordered his division into two detachments, and giving
one to Bourbon the bastard, to make head against the Stradiotes, he
hurried with the second to the rescue of the van, flinging himself into
the very midst of the melee, striking out like a king, and doing as
steady work as the lowest in rank of his captains. Aided by the
reinforcement, the rearguard made a good stand, though the enemy were
five against one, and the combat in this part continued to rage with
wonderful fury.
Obeying his orders, Bourbon had thrown himself upon the Stradiotes; but
unfortunately, carried off by his horse, he had penetrated so far into
the enemy’s ranks that he was lost to sight: the disappearance of their
chief, the strange dress of their new antagonists, and the peculiar
method of their fighting produced a considerable effect on those who
were to attack them; and for the moment disorder was the consequence in
the centre, and the horse men scattered instead of serrying their ranks
and fighting in a body. This false move would have done them serious
harm, had not most of the Stradiotes, seeing the baggage alone and
undefended, rushed after that in hope of booty, instead of following up
their advantage. A great part of the troop nevertheless stayed behind to
fight, pressing on the French cavalry and smashing their lances with
their fearful scimitars. Happily the king, who had just repulsed the
Marquis of Mantua’s attack, perceived what was going on behind him, and
riding back at all possible speed to the succour of the centre, together
with the gentlemen of his household fell upon the Stradiotes, no longer
armed with a lance, for that he had just broken, but brandishing his
long sword, which blazed about him like lightning, and—either because he
was whirled away like Bourbon by his own horse, or because he had
allowed his courage to take him too far—he suddenly found himself in the
thickest ranks of the Stradiotes, accompanied only by eight of the
knights he had just now created, one equerry called Antoine des Ambus,
and his standard-bearer. "France, France!" he cried aloud, to rally
round him all the others who had scattered; they, seeing at last that
the danger was less than they had supposed, began to take their revenge
and to pay back with interest the blows they had received from the
Stradiotes. Things were going still better, for the van, which the
Marquis de Cajazzo was to attack; for although he had at first appeared
to be animated with a terrible purpose, he stopped short about ten or
twelve feet from the French line and turned right about face without
breaking a single lance. The French wanted to pursue, but the Marechal
de Gie, fearing that this flight might be only a trick to draw off the
vanguard from the centre, ordered every man to stay in his place. But
the Swiss, who were German, and did not understand the order, or thought
it was not meant for them, followed upon their heels, and although on
foot caught them up and killed a hundred of them. This was quite enough
to throw them into disorder, so that some were scattered about the
plain, and others made a rush for the water, so as to cross the river
and rejoin their camp.
When the Marechal de Gie saw this, he detached a hundred of his own men
to go to the aid of the king, who was continuing to fight with
unheard-of courage and running the greatest risks, constantly separated
as he was from his gentlemen, who could not follow him; for wherever
there was danger, thither he rushed, with his cry of "France," little
troubling himself as to whether he was followed or not. And it was no
longer with his sword that he fought; that he had long ago broken, like
his lance, but with a heavy battle-axe, whose every blow was mortal
whether cut or pierced. Thus the Stradiotes, already hard pressed by the
king’s household and his pensioners, soon changed attack for defence and
defence for flight. It was at this moment that the king was really in
the greatest danger; for he had let himself be carried away in pursuit
of the fugitives, and presently found himself all alone, surrounded by
these men, who, had they not been struck with a mighty terror, would
have had nothing to do but unite and crush him and his horse together;
but, as Commines remarks, "He whom God guards is well guarded, and God
was guarding the King of France."
All the same, at this moment the French were sorely pressed in the rear;
and although de Guise and de la Trimouille held out as firmly as it was
possible to hold, they would probably have been compelled to yield to
superior numbers had not a double aid arrived in time: first the
indefatigable Charles, who, having nothing more to do among the
fugitives, once again dashed into the midst of the fight, next the
servants of the army, who, now that they were set free from the
Stradiotes and saw their enemies put to flight, ran up armed with the
axes they habitually used to cut down wood for building their huts: they
burst into the middle of the fray, slashing at the horses’ legs and
dealing heavy blows that smashed in the visors of the dismounted
horsemen.
The Italians could not hold out against this double attack; the ’furia
francese’ rendered all their strategy and all their calculations
useless, especially as for more than a century they had abandoned their
fights of blood and fury for a kind of tournament they chose to regard
as warfare; so, in spite of all Gonzaga’s efforts, they turned their
backs upon the French rear and took to flight; in the greatest haste and
with much difficulty they recrossed the torrent, which was swollen even
more now by the rain that had been falling during the whole time of the
battle.
Some thought fit to pursue the vanquished, for there was now such
disorder in their ranks that they were fleeing in all directions from
the battlefield where the French had gained so glorious a victory,
blocking up the roads to Parma and Bercetto. But Marechal de Gie and de
Guise and de la Trimouille, who had done quite enough to save them from
the suspicion of quailing before imaginary dangers, put a stop to this
enthusiasm, by pointing out that it would only be risking the loss of
their present advantage if they tried to push it farther with men and
horses so worn out. This view was adopted in spite of the opinion of
Trivulce, Camillo Vitelli, and Francesco Secco, who were all eager to
follow up the victory.
The king retired to a little village on the left bank of the Taro, and
took shelter in a poor house. There he disarmed, being perhaps among all
the captains and all the soldiers the man who had fought best.
During the night the torrent swelled so high that the Italian army could
not have pursued, even if they had laid aside their fears. The king did
not propose to give the appearance of flight after a victory, and
therefore kept his army drawn up all day, and at night went on to sleep
at Medesano, a little village only a mile lower down than the hamlet
where he rested after the fight. But in the course of the night he
reflected that he had done enough for the honour of his arms in fighting
an army four times as great as his own and killing three thousand men,
and then waiting a day and a half to give them time to take their
revenge; so two hours before daybreak he had the fires lighted, that the
enemy might suppose he was remaining in camp; and every man mounting
noiselessly, the whole French army, almost out of danger by this time,
proceeded on their march to Borgo San Donnino.
While this was going on, the pope returned to Rome, where news highly
favourable to his schemes was not slow to reach his ears. He learned
that Ferdinand had crossed from Sicily into Calabria with six thousand
volunteers and a considerable number of Spanish horse and foot, led, at
the command of Ferdinand and Isabella, by the famous Gonzalva de
Cordova, who arrived in Italy with a great reputation, destined to
suffer somewhat from the defeat at Seminara. At almost the same time the
French fleet had been beaten by the Aragonese; moreover, the battle of
the Taro, though a complete defeat for the confederates, was another
victory for the pope, because its result was to open a return to France
for that man whom he regarded as his deadliest foe. So, feeling that he
had nothing more to fear from Charles, he sent him a brief at Turin,
where he had stopped for a short time to give aid to Novara, therein
commanding him, by virtue of his pontifical authority, to depart out of
Italy with his army, and to recall within ten days those of his troops
that still remained in the kingdom of Naples, on pain of
excommunication, and a summons to appear before him in person.
Charles VIII replied:
(1) That he did not understand how the pope, the chief of the league,
ordered him to leave Italy, whereas the confederates had not only
refused him a passage, but had even attempted, though
unsuccessfully, as perhaps His Holiness knew, to cut off his
return into France;
(2) That, as to recalling his troops from Naples, he was not so
irreligious as to do that, since they had not entered the kingdom
without the consent and blessing of His Holiness;
(3) That he was exceedingly surprised that the pope should require his
presence in person at the capital of the Christian world just at
the present time, when six weeks previously, at the time of his
return from Naples, although he ardently desired an interview with
His Holiness, that he might offer proofs of his respect and
obedience, His Holiness, instead of according this favour, had
quitted Rome so hastily on his approach that he had not been able
to come up with him by any efforts whatsoever. On this point,
however, he promised to give His Holiness the satisfaction he
desired, if he would engage this time to wait for him: he would
therefore return to Rome so soon as the affairs that brought him
back to his own kingdom had been satisfactorily, settled.
Although in this reply there was a touch of mockery and defiance,
Charles was none the less compelled by the circumstances of the case to
obey the pope’s strange brief. His presence was so much needed in France
that, in spite of the arrival of a Swiss reinforcement, he was compelled
to conclude a peace with Ludovico Sforza, whereby he yielded Novara to
him; while Gilbert de Montpensier and d’Aubigny, after defending, inch
by inch, Calabria, the Basilicate, and Naples, were obliged to sign the
capitulation of Atella, after a siege of thirty-two days, on the 20th of
July, 1496. This involved giving back to Ferdinand II, King of Naples,
all the palaces and fortresses of his kingdom; which indeed he did but
enjoy for three months, dying of exhaustion on the 7th of September
following, at the Castello della Somma, at the foot of Vesuvius; all the
attentions lavished upon him by his young wife could not repair the evil
that her beauty had wrought.
His uncle Frederic succeeded; and so, in the three years of his papacy,
Alexander VI had seen five kings upon the throne of Naples, while he was
establishing himself more firmly upon his own pontifical seat—Ferdinand
I, Alfonso I, Charles VIII, Ferdinand II, and Frederic. All this
agitation about his throne, this rapid succession of sovereigns, was the
best thing possible for Alexander; for each new monarch became actually
king only on condition of his receiving the pontifical investiture. The
consequence was that Alexander was the only gainer in power and credit
by these changes; for the Duke of Milan and the republics of Florence
and Venice had successively recognised him as supreme head of the
Church, in spite of his simony; moreover, the five kings of Naples had
in turn paid him homage. So he thought the time had now come for
founding a mighty family; and for this he relied upon the Duke of
Gandia, who was to hold all the highest temporal dignities; and upon
Caesar Borgia, who was to be appointed to all the great ecclesiastical
offices. The pope made sure of the success of these new projects by
electing four Spanish cardinals, who brought up the number of his
compatriots in the Sacred College to twenty-two, thus assuring him a
constant and certain majority.
The first requirement of the pope’s policy was to clear away from the
neighbourhood of Rome all those petty lords whom most people call vicars
of the Church, but whom Alexander called the shackles of the papacy. We
saw that he had already begun this work by rousing the Orsini against
the Colonna family, when Charles VIII’s enterprise compelled him to
concentrate all his mental resources, and also the forces of his States,
so as to secure his own personal safety.
It had come about through their own imprudent action that the Orsini,
the pope’s old friends, were now in the pay of the French, and had
entered the kingdom of Naples with them, where one of them, Virginio, a
very important member of their powerful house, had been taken prisoner
during the war, and was Ferdinand II’s captive. Alexander could not let
this opportunity escape him; so, first ordering the King of Naples not
to release a man who, ever since the 1st of June, 1496, had been a
declared rebel, he pronounced a sentence of confiscation against
Virginio Orsini and his whole family in a secret consistory, which sat
on the 26th of October following—that is to say, in the early days of
the reign of Frederic, whom he knew to be entirely at his command, owing
to the King’s great desire of getting the investiture from him; then, as
it was not enough to declare the goods confiscated, without also
dispossessing the owners, he made overtures to the Colonna family,
saying he would commission them, in proof of their new bond of
friendship, to execute the order given against their old enemies under
the direction of his son Francesco, Duke of Gandia. In this fashion he
contrived to weaken his neighbours each by means of the other, till such
time as he could safely attack and put an end to conquered and conqueror
alike.
The Colonna family accepted this proposition, and the Duke of Gandia was
named General of the Church: his father in his pontifical robes bestowed
on him the insignia of this office in the church of St. Peter’s at Rome.