CHAPTER XXVIII.----FRANCIS I. AND CHARLE

HISTORY OF FRANCE

BY M. GUIZOT

VOLUME IV.

CONTENTS:

XXVIII. FRANCIS I. AND CHARLES V. 9

XXIX. FRANCIS I. AND THE RENAISSANCE. 137

XXX. FRANCIS I. AND THE REFORMATION. 179

XXXI. HENRY II. (1547-1559.) 230

XXXII. FRANCIS II. JULY 10, 1559--DECEMBER 5, 1560 269

XXXIII. CHARLES IX. AND THE RELIGIOUS WARS. (1560-1574.) 296

XXXIV. HENRY III. AND THE RELIGIOUS WARS. (1574-1589.) 388

LIST OF STEEL ENGRAVINGS:

THE CASTLE OF CHAIIIBORD. FRONTISPIECE.

FRANCIS I 137

GALLERY HENRY II 230

DIANA DE POITIERS 243

MARY STUART 270

HENRY OF LORRAINE (DUKE OF GUISE) 332

LIST OF WOOD-CUT ILLUSTRATIONS:

Cardinal Ximenes 14

All Night a-horseback 19

Bayard Knighting Francis I 19

Leo X. 21

Anthony Duprat 24

Charles V. 39

Francis I. surprises Henry VIII 44

The Field of the Cloth of Gold 45

The Constable de Bourbon 53

The Death of Bayard 76

Capture of Francis I. 91

Louise of Savoy and Marguerite de Valois 102

Francis I. 115

The Duke of Orleans and Charles V 128

Claude de Lorraine, Duke of Guise 130

St. Thomas Aquinas and Abelard 140

Clement Marot 162

Francis I. waits for Robert Estienne 168

Rabelais 171

The First Protestants 178

William Farel 181

The Castle of Pau 183

Burning of Reformers at Meaux 188

Erasmus 194

Berquin released by John de la Barre 198

Heretic Iconoclasts 201

Massacre of the Vaudians 218

Calvin 222

Henry II. 235

Anne de Montmorency 235

Guise at Metz 244

Francis II. and Mary Stuart love making. 251

Catherine de’ Medici (in her young days) 255

Joust between Henri II. and Count de Montgomery 268

Archers of the Body-guard 268

Francis II. 269

Death of La Renaudie 283

After-dinner Diversions 284

Mary Stuart 284

Louis de Bourbon, Prince of Condo 285

Coligny at the Death-bed of Francis II. 295

Francis de Lorraine, Duke of Aumale and of Guise 302

Massacre of Protestants 305

The Duke of Guise waylaid 315

Conde at the Ford 328

Parley before the Battle of Moncontour 337

Admiral Gaspard de Coligny 346

Charles IX. and Catherine de’ Medici 354

Henry de Guise and the Corpse of Coligny 369

The Queen of Navarre and the Huguenot 372

Chancellor Michael de l’Hospital 376

The St. Bartholomew 383

Henry III. 388

Indolence of Henry III. 390

Henry le Balafre 400

The Castle of Blois 428

Henry III. and the Murder of Guise 437

Henry of Navarre and the Scotch Guard 448

A POPULAR HISTORY OF FRANCE FROM THE EARLIEST TIMES.

CHAPTER XXVIII.----FRANCIS I. AND CHARLES V.

The closer the study and the wider the contemplation a Frenchman bestows

upon his country’s history, the deeper will be his feelings of patriotic

pride, dashed with a tinge of sadness. France, in respect of her

national unity, is the most ancient amongst the states of Christian

Europe. During her long existence she has passed through very different

regimens, the chaos of barbarism, the feudal system, absolute monarchy,

constitutional monarchy, and republicanism. Under all these regimens she

has had no lack of greatness and glory, material power and intellectual

lustre, moral virtues and the charms of social life. Her barbarism had

its Charlemagne; her feudal system St. Louis, Joan of Arc, and Bayard;

her absolute monarchy Henry IV. and Louis XIV. Of our own times we say

nothing. France has shone in war and in peace, through the sword and

through the intellect: she has by turns conquered and beguiled,

enlightened and troubled Europe; she has always offered to the foreigner

a spectacle or an abode full of the curious and the attractive, of noble

pleasures and of mundane amusements. And still, after so many centuries

of such a grand and brilliant career, France has not yet attained the end

to which she ever aspired, to which all civilized communities aspire, and

that is, order in the midst of movement, security and liberty united and

lasting. She has had shortcomings which have prevented her from reaping

the full advantage of her merits; she has committed faults which have

involved her in reverses. Two things, essential to political prosperity

amongst communities of men, have hitherto been to seek in her;

predominance of public spirit over the spirit of caste or of profession,

and moderation and fixity in respect of national ambition both at home

and abroad. France has been a victim to the personal passions of her

chiefs and to her own reckless changeability.

We are entering upon the history of a period and a reign during which

this intermixture of merits and demerits, of virtues and vices, of

progress and backsliding, was powerfully and attractively exhibited

amongst the French. Francis I., his government and his times commence

the era of modern France, and bring clearly to view the causes of her

greatnesses and her weaknesses.

Francis I. had received from God all the gifts that can adorn a man: he

was handsome and tall and strong; his armor, preserved in the Louvre, is

that of a man six feet high; his eyes were brilliant and soft, his smile

was gracious, his manners were winning. From his very childhood he

showed that he had wits, enterprise, skill, and boldness. He was but

seven years old when, “on the day of the conversion of St. Paul, January

25, 1501, about two P. M., my king, my lord, my Caesar, and my son, was

run away with, near Amboise, by a hackney which had been given him by

Marshal de Gye; and so great was the danger that those who were present

thought it was all over; howbeit God, the protector of widowed women and

the defender of orphans, foreseeing things to come, was pleased not to

forsake me, knowing that, if accident had so suddenly deprived me of my

love, I should have been too utter a wretch.” Such is the account given

of this little incident by his mother, Louise of Savoy, who was at that

time habitually kept, by Anne of Brittany’s jealousy, at a distance from

Paris and the court. [_Journal de Louise de Savoie_ in the Petitot

collection of _Memoires sur l’Histoire de France,_ Series I. t. xvi.

p. 390.] Some years later the young prince, who had become an ardent

huntsman, took the fancy into his head one day to let loose in the

courtyard of the castle of Amboise a wild boar which he had just caught

in the forest. The animal came to a door, burst it open with a blow of

his snout, and walked up into the apartments. Those who were there took

to their heels; but Francis went after the boar, came up with him, killed

him with a swordthrust, and sent him rolling down the staircase into the

courtyard. When, in 1513, Louis XII. sent for the young Duke of

Angouleme and bade him go and defend Picardy against the English, Francis

had scarcely done anything beyond so employing his natural gifts as to

delight the little court of which he was the centre; an estimable trait,

but very insufficient for the government of a people.

When, two years afterwards, on the 1st of January, 1515, he ascended the

throne before he had attained his one and twentieth year, it was a

brilliant and brave but spoiled child that became king. He had been

under the governance of Artus Gouffier, Sire de Boisy, a nobleman of

Poitou, who had exerted himself to make his royal pupil a loyal knight,

well trained in the moral code and all the graces of knighthood, but

without drawing his attention to more serious studies or preparing him

for the task of government. The young Francis d’Angouleme lived and was

moulded under the influence of two women, his mother, Louise of Savoy,

and his eldest sister, Marguerite, who both of them loved and adored him

with passionate idolatry. It has just been shown in what terms Louise of

Savoy, in her daily collection of private memoranda, used to speak to

herself of her son, “My king, my lord, my Caesar, and my son!” She was

proud, ambitious, audacious, or pliant at need, able and steadfast in

mind, violent and dissolute in her habits, greedy of pleasure and of

money as well as of power, so that she gave her son neither moral

principles nor a moral example: for him the supreme kingship, for herself

the rank, influence, and wealth of a queen-mother, and, for both,

greatness that might subserve the gratification of their passions--this

was all her dream and all her aim as a mother. Of quite another sort

were the character and sentiments of Marguerite de Valois. She was born

on the 11th of April, 1492, and was, therefore, only two years older than

her brother Francis; but her more delicate nature was sooner and more

richly cultivated and developed. She was brought up with strictness by

a most excellent and most venerable dame, in whom all the virtues, at

rivalry one with another, existed together. [Madame de Chatillon, whose

deceased husband had been governor to King Charles VIII.] As she was

discovered to have rare intellectual gifts and a very keen relish for

learning, she was provided with every kind of preceptors, who made her

proficient in profane letters, as they were then called. Marguerite

learned Latin, Greek, philosophy, and especially theology. “At fifteen

years of age,” says a contemporary, “the spirit of God began to manifest

itself in her eyes, in her face, in her walk, in her speech, and.

generally in all her actions.” “She had a heart,” says Brantome,

“mighty devoted to God, and she loved mightily to compose spiritual

songs. . . . She also devoted herself to letters in her young days,

and continued them as long as she lived, loving and conversing with, in

the time of her greatness, the most learned folks of her brother’s

kingdom, who honored her so that they called her their Maecenas.”

Learning, however, was far from absorbing the whole of this young soul.

“She,” says a contemporary, “had an agreeable voice of touching tone,

which roused the tender inclinations that there are in the heart.”

Tenderness, a passionate tenderness, very early assumed the chief place

in Marguerite’s soul, and the first object of it was her brother Francis.

When mother, son, and sister were spoken of, they were called a Trinity,

and to this Marguerite herself bore witness when she said, with charming

modesty,--

“Such boon is mine, to feel the amity

That God hath putten in our trinity,

Wherein to make a third, I, all unfitted

To be that number’s shadow, am admitted.”

Marguerite it was for whom this close communion of three persons had the

most dolorous consequences: we shall fall in with her more than once in

the course of this history; but, whether or no, she was assuredly the

best of this princely trio, and Francis I. was the most spoiled by it.

There is nothing more demoralizing than to be an idol.

The first acts of his government were sensible and of good omen. He

confirmed or renewed the treaties or truces which Louis XII., at the

close of his reign, had concluded with the Venetians, the Swiss, the

pope, the King of England, the Archduke Charles, and the Emperor

Maximilian, in order to restore peace to his kingdom. At home Francis I.

maintained at his council the principal and most tried servants of his

predecessor, amongst others the finance-minister, Florimond Robertet; and

he raised to four the number of the marshals of France, in order to

confer that dignity on Bayard’s valiant friend, James of Chabannes, Lord

of La Palice, who even under Louis XII. had been entitled by the

Spaniards “the great marshal of France.” At the same time he exalted to

the highest offices in the state two new men, Charles, Duke of Bourbon,

who was still a mere youth, but already a warrior of renown, and Anthony

Duprat, the able premier president of the Parliament of Paris; the former

he made constable, and the latter chancellor of France. His mother,

Louise of Savoy, was not unconcerned, it is said, in both promotions;

she was supposed to feel for the young constable something more than

friendship, and she regarded the veteran magistrate, not without reason,

as the man most calculated to unreservedly subserve the interests of the

kingly power and her own.

These measures, together with the language and the behavior of Francis

I., and the care he took to conciliate all who approached him, made a

favorable impression on France and on Europe. In Italy, especially,

princes as well as people, and Pope Leo X. before all, flattered

themselves, or were pleased to appear as if they flattered themselves,

that war would not come near them again, and that the young king had his

heart set only on making Burgundy secure against sudden and outrageous

attacks from the Swiss. The aged King of Spain, Ferdinand the Catholic,

adopting the views of his able minister, Cardinal Ximenes, alone showed

distrust and anxiety. “Go not to sleep,” said he to his former allies;

“a single instant is enough to bring the French in the wake of their

master whithersoever he pleases to lead them; is it merely to defend

Burgundy that the King of France is adding fifteen hundred lances to his

men-at-arms, and that a huge train of artillery is defiling into

Lyonness, and little by little approaching the mountains?”

[Illustration: Cardinal Ximenes----14]

Ferdinand urged the pope, the Emperor Maximilian, the Swiss, and

Maximilian Sforza, Duke of Milan, to form a league for the defence of

Italy; but Leo X. persisted in his desire of remaining or appearing

neutral, as the common father of the faithful. Meanwhile the French

ambassador at Rome, William Bude, “a man,” says Guicciardini, “of

probably unique erudition amongst the men of our day,” and, besides, a

man of keen and sagacious intellect, was unfolding the secret working of

Italian diplomacy, and sending to Paris demands for his recall, saying,

“Withdraw me from this court full of falsehoods; this is a residence too

much out of my element.” The answer was, that he should have patience,

and still negotiate; for France, meeting ruse by ruse, was willing to be

considered hoodwinked, whilst the eyes of the pope, diverted by a hollow

negotiation, were prevented from seeing the peril which was gathering

round the Italian league and its declared or secret champions.

[Gaillard, _Histoire de Francois 1er,_ t. i. p. 208.]

Neither the king nor the pope had for long to take the trouble of

practising mutual deception. It was announced at Rome that Francis I.,

having arrived at Lyons in July, 1515, had just committed to his mother,

Louise, the regency of the kingdom, and was pushing forward towards the

Alps an army of sixty thousand men and a powerful artillery. He had won

over to his service Octavian Fregoso, Doge of Genoa; and Barthelemy

d’Alviano, the veteran general of his allies the Venetians, was encamped

with his troops within hail of Verona, ready to support the French in the

struggle he foresaw. Francis I., on his side, was informed that twenty

thousand Swiss, commanded by the Roman, Prosper Colonna, were guarding

the passes of the Alps in order to shut him out from Milaness. At the

same time he received the news that the Cardinal of Sion, his most

zealous enemy in connection with the Roman Church, was devotedly

employing, with the secret support of the Emperor Maximilian, his

influence and his preaching for the purpose of raising in Switzerland

a second army of from twenty to five and twenty thousand men, to be

launched against him, if necessary, in Italy. A Spanish and Roman army,

under the orders of Don Raymond of Cardone, rested motionless at some

distance from the Po, waiting for events and for orders prescribing the

part they were to take. It was clear that Francis I., though he had been

but six months king, was resolved and impatient to resume in Italy, and

first of all in Milaness, the war of invasion and conquest which had been

engaged in by Charles VIII. and Louis XII.; and the league of all the

states of Italy save Venice and Genoa, with the pope for their

half-hearted patron, and the Swiss for their fighting men, were

collecting their forces to repel the invader.

It was the month of August; the snow was diminishing and melting away

among the Alps; and the king, with the main body of the army, joined at

Embrun the Constable de Bourbon, who commanded the advance-guard. But

the two passes of Mount Cenis and Mount Ginevra were strongly guarded by

the Swiss, and others were sought for a little more to the south. A

shepherd, a chamois-hunter, pointed out one whereby, he said, the

mountains might be crossed, and a descent made upon the plains of the

marquisate of Saluzzo. The young constable went in person to examine the

spots pointed out by the shepherd; and, the statement having been

verified, it did not seem impossible to get the whole army over, even the

heavy artillery; and they essayed this unknown road. At several points,

abysses had to be filled up, temporary bridges built, and enormous rocks

pierced; the men-at-arms marched on foot, with great difficulty dragging

their horses; with still greater difficulty the infantry hauled the

cannon over holes incompletely stopped and fragments of yawning rock.

Captains and soldiers set to work together; no labor seems too hard to

eager hope; and in five days the mountain was overcome, and the army

caught sight of the plain where the enemy might be encountered. A small

body of four hundred men-at-arms, led by Marshal de Chabannes, were the

first to descend into it; and among them was Bayard. “Marshal,” said he

to Chabannes, “we are told that over the Po yonder is Sir Prosper Colonna,

with two thousand horse, in a town called Villafranca, apprehending

nought and thinking of nought but gaudies. We must wake up his wits a

little, and this moment get into the saddle with all our troops, that he

be not warned by any.” “Sir Bayard,” said the marshal, “it is right well

said; but how shall we cross the River Po, which is so impetuous and

broad?” “Sir,” said Bayard, “here is my Lord de Morette’s brother, who

knows the ford; he shall cross first, and I after him.” So they mounted

their horses, crossed the Po, and “were soon there, where Sir Prosper

Colonna was at table and was dining, as likewise were all his folk.”

Bayard, who marched first, found the archers on guard in front of the

Italian leader’s quarters. “Yield you and utter no sound,” cried he,

“else you are dead men.” Some set about defending themselves; the rest

ran to warn Colonna, saying, “Up, sir; for, here are the French in a

great troop already at this door.” “Lads,” said Colonna to them, “keep

this door a little till we get some armor on to defend ourselves.” But

whilst the fight was going on at the door Bayard had the windows scaled,

and, entering first, cried out, “Where are you, Sir Prosper? Yield you;

else you are a dead man.” “Sir Frenchman, who is your captain?” asked

Colonna. “I am, sir.” “Your name, captain?” “Sir, I am one Bayard of

France, and here are the Lord of La Palice, and the Lords d’Aubigny and

d’Himbercourt, the flower of the captains of France.” Colonna

surrendered, cursing Fortune, “the mother of all sorrow and affliction,

who had taken away his wits, and because he had not been warned of their

coming, for he would at least have made his capture a dear one;” and he

added, “It seems a thing divinely done; four noble knights at once, with

their comrades at their backs, to take one Roman noble!”

Francis I. and the main body of his army had also arrived at the eastern

foot of the Alps, and were advancing into the plains of the country of

Saluzzo and Piedmont. The Swiss, dumbfounded at so unexpected an

apparition, fell back to Novara, the scene of that victory which two

years previously had made them so proud. A rumor spread that negotiation

was possible, and that the question of Milaness might be settled without

fighting. The majority of the French captains repudiated the idea, but

the king entertained it. His first impulses were sympathetic and

generous. “I would not purchase,” said he to Marshal de Lautrec, “with

the blood of my subjects, or even with that of my enemies, what I can pay

for with money.” Parleys were commenced; and an agreement was hit upon

with conditions on which the Swiss would withdraw from Italy and resume

alliance with the French. A sum of seven hundred thousand crowns, it was

said, was the chief condition; and the king and the captains of his army

gave all they had, even to their plate, for the first instalment which

Lautrec was ordered to convey to Bufalora, where the Swiss were to

receive it. But it was suddenly announced that the second army of twenty

thousand Swiss, which the Cardinal of Sion had succeeded in raising, had

entered Italy by the valley of the Ticino. They formed a junction with

their countrymen; the cardinal recommenced his zealous preaching against

the French; the newcomers rejected the stipulated arrangements; and,

confident in their united strength, all the Swiss made common accord.

Lautrec, warned in time, took with all speed his way back to the French

army, carrying away with him the money he had been charged to pay over;

the Venetian general, D’Alviano, went to the French camp to concert with

the king measures for the movements of his troops; and on both sides

nothing was thought of but the delivery of a battle.

On the 13th of September, 1515, about midday, the Constable de Bourbon

gave notice to the king, encamped at Melegnano (a town about three

leagues from Milan), that the Swiss, sallying in large masses from Milan,

at the noisy summons of the bull of Uri and the cow of Unterwalden, were

advancing to attack. “The king, who was purposing to sit down to supper,

left it on the spot, and went off straight towards the enemy, who were

already engaged in skirmishing, which lasted a long while before they

were at the great game. The king had great numbers of lanzknechts, the

which would fain have done a bold deed in crossing a ditch to go after

the Swiss; but these latter let seven or eight ranks cross, and then

thrust you them back in such sort that all that had crossed got hurled

into the ditch. The said lanzknechts were mighty frightened; and but for

the aid of a troop of men-at-arms, amongst the which was the good knight

Bayard, who bore down right through the Swiss, there had been a sad

disaster there, for it was now night, and night knows no shame. A band

of Swiss came passing in front of the king, who charged them gallantly.

There was heavy fighting there and much danger to the king’s person, for

his great buffe [the top of the visor of his helmet] was pierced, so as

to let in daylight, by the thrust of a pike. It was now so late that

they could not see one another; and the Swiss were, for this evening,

forced to retire on the one side, and the French on the other. They

lodged as they could; but well I trow that none did rest at ease. The

King of France put as good a face on matters as the least of all his

soldiers did, for he remained all night a-horseback like the rest

(according to other accounts he had a little sleep, lying on a

gun-carriage).

[Illustration: All Night a-horseback----19]

On the morrow at daybreak the Swiss were for beginning again, and they

came straight towards the French artillery, from which they had a good

peppering. Howbeit, never did men fight better, and the affair lasted

three or four good hours. At last they were broken and beaten, and there

were left on the field ten or twelve thousand of them. The remainder, in

pretty good order along a high road, withdrew to Milan, whither they were

pursued sword-in-hand.” [_Histoire du bon Chevalier sans Peur et sans

Reproehe,_ t. ii. pp. 99-102.]

The very day after the battle Francis I. wrote to his mother the regent a

long account, alternately ingenuous and eloquent, in which the details

are set forth with all the complacency of a brave young man who is

speaking of the first great affair in which he has been engaged and in

which he did himself honor. The victory of Melegnano was the most

brilliant day in the annals of this reign. Old Marshal Trivulzio, who

had taken part in seventeen battles, said that this was a strife of

giants, beside which all the rest were but child’s play. On the very

battle-field, “before making and creating knights of those who had done

him good service, Francis I. was pleased to have himself made knight by

the hand of Bayard. ‘Sir,’ said Bayard, ‘the king of so noble a realm,

he who has been crowned, consecrated and anointed with oil sent down from

heaven, he who is the eldest son of the church, is knight over all other

knights.’ ‘Bayard, my friend,’ said the king, ‘make haste; we must have

no laws or canons quoted here; do my bidding.’ ‘Assuredly, sir,’ said

Bayard, ‘I will do it, since it is your pleasure;’ and, taking his sword,

‘Avail it as much,’ said he, ‘as if I were Roland or Oliver, Godfrey or

his brother Baldwin; please God, sir, that in war you may never take

flight!’ and, holding up his sword in the air, he cried, ‘Assuredly, my

good sword, thou shalt be well guarded as a relic and honored above all

others for having this day conferred upon so handsome and puissant a king

the order of chivalry; and never will I wear thee more if it be not

against Turks, Moors, and Saracens!’ Whereupon he gave two bounds and

thrust his sword into the sheath.” [_Les testes et la Vie du Chevalier

Bayard, by Champier,_ in the _Archives curieuses de l’Histoire de

France,_ Series I. t. ii. p. 160.]

[Illustration: Bayard Knighting Francis I----19]

The effect of the victory of Melegnano was great, in Italy primarily, but

also throughout Europe. It was, at the commencement of a new reign and

under the impulse communicated by a young king, an event which seemed to

be decisive and likely to remain so for a long while. Of all the

sovereigns engaged in the Italian league against Francis I., he who was

most anxious to appear temperate and almost neutral, namely, Leo X., was

precisely he who was most surprised and most troubled by it. When he

knew that a battle was on the eve of being fought between the French and

the Swiss, he could not conceal his anxiety and his desire that the Swiss

might be victorious. The Venetian ambassador at Rome, Marino Giorgi,

whose feelings were quite the other way, took, in his diplomatic

capacity, a malicious pleasure in disquieting him. “Holy father,” said

he, “the Most Christian King is there in person with the most warlike and

best appointed of armies; the Swiss are afoot and ill armed, and I am

doubtful of their gaining the day.” “But the Swiss are valiant soldiers,

are they not?” said the pope. “Were it not better, holy father,”

rejoined the ambassador, “that they should show their valor against the

infidel?” When the news of the battle arrived, the ambassador, in grand

array, repaired to the pope’s; and the people who saw him passing by in

such state said, “The news is certainly true.” On reaching the pope’s

apartment the ambassador met the chamberlain, who told him that the holy

father was still asleep. “Wake him,” said he; but the other refused.

“Do as I tell you,” insisted the ambassador. The chamberlain went in;

and the pope, only half dressed, soon sallied from his room. “Holy

father,” said the Venetian, “your Holiness yesterday gave me some bad

news which was false; to-day I have to give you some good news which is

true: the Swiss are beaten.” The pope read the letters brought by the

ambassador, and some other letters also. “What will come of it for us

and for you?” asked the pope. “For us,” was the answer, “nothing but

good, since we are with the Most Christian king; and your Holiness will

not have aught of evil to suffer.” “Sir Ambassador,” rejoined the pope,

“we will see what the Most Christian king will do; we will place

ourselves in his hands, demanding mercy of him.” “Holy father, your

Holiness will not come to the least harm, any more than the holy See: is

not the Most Christian king the church’s own son?” And in the account

given of this interview to the Senate of Venice the ambassador added,

“The holy father is a good sort of man, a man of great liberality and of

a happy disposition; but he would not like the idea of having to give

himself much trouble.”

[Illustration: Leo X.----21]

Leo X. made up his mind without much trouble to accept accomplished

facts. When he had been elected pope, he had said to his brother, Julian

de’ Medici, “Enjoy we the papacy, since God hath given it us” [_Godiamoci

il papato, poiche Dio ci l’ ha dato_]. He appeared to have no further

thought than how to pluck from the event the advantages he could discover

in it. His allies all set him an example of resignation. On the 15th of

September, the day after the battle, the Swiss took the road back to

their mountains. Francis I. entered Milan in triumph. Maximilian Sforza

took refuge in the castle, and twenty days afterwards, on the 4th of

October, surrendered, consenting to retire to France with a pension of

thirty thousand crowns, and the promise of being recommended for a

cardinal’s hat, and almost consoled for his downfall “by the pleasure of

being delivered from the insolence of the Swiss, the exactions of the

Emperor Maximilian, and the rascalities of the Spaniards.” Fifteen years

afterwards, in June, 1530, he died in oblivion at Paris. Francis I.

regained possession of all Milaness, adding thereto, with the pope’s

consent, the duchies of Parma and Piacenza, which had been detached from

it in 1512. Two treaties, one of November 7, 1515, and the other of

November 29, 1516, re-established not only peace, but perpetual alliance,

between the King of France and the thirteen Swiss cantons, with

stipulated conditions in detail. Whilst these negotiations were in

progress, Francis I. and Leo X., by a treaty published at Viterbo on the

13th of October, proclaimed their hearty reconciliation. The pope

guaranteed to Francis I. the duchy of Milan, restored to him those of

Parma and Piacenza, and recalled his troops which were still serving

against the Venetians; being careful, however, to cover his concessions

by means of forms and pretexts which gave them the character of a

necessity submitted to rather than that of an independent and definite

engagement. Francis I., on his side, guaranteed to the pope all the

possessions of the church, renounced the patronage of the petty princes

of the ecclesiastical estate, and promised to uphold the family of the

Medici in the position it had held at Florence since, with the King of

Spain’s aid, in 1512, it had recovered the dominion there at the expense

of the party of republicans and friends of France.

The King of France and the pope had to discuss together questions far

more important on both sides than those which had just been thus settled

by their accredited agents. When they signed the treaty of Viterbo, it

was agreed that the two sovereigns should have a personal interview, at

which they should come to an arrangement upon points of which they had as

yet said nothing. Rome seemed the place most naturally adapted for this

interview; but the pope did not wish that Francis I. should go and

display his triumph there. Besides, he foresaw that the king would speak

to him about the kingdom of Naples, the conquest of which was evidently

premeditated by the king; and when Francis I., having arrived at Rome,

had already done half the journey, Leo X. feared that it would be more

difficult to divert him. He resolved to make to the king a show of

deference to conceal his own disquietude; and offered to go and meet him

at Bologna, the town in the Roman States which was nearest to Milaness.

Francis accepted the offer. The pope arrived at Bologna on the 8th of

December, 1515, and the king the next day. After the public ceremonies,

at which the king showed eagerness to tender to the pope acts of homage

which the pope was equally eager to curtail without repelling them, the

two sovereigns conversed about the two questions which were uppermost in

their minds. Francis did not attempt to hide his design of reconquering

the kingdom of Naples, which Ferdinand the Catholic had wrongfully

usurped, and he demanded the pope’s countenance. The pope did not care

to refuse, but he pointed out to the king that everything foretold the

very near death of King Ferdinand; and “Your majesty,” said he, “will

then have a natural opportunity for claiming your rights; and as for me,

free, as I shall then be, from my engagements with the King of Arragon in

respect of the crown of Naples, I shall find it easier to respond to your

majesty’s wish.” The pope merely wanted to gain time. Francis, setting

aside for the moment the kingdom of Naples, spoke of Charles VII.’s

Pragmatic Sanction, and the necessity of putting an end to the

difficulties which had arisen on this subject between the court of Rome

and the Kings of France, his predecessors. “As to that,” said the pope,

“I could not grant what your predecessors demanded; but be not uneasy;

I have a compensation to propose to you which will prove to you how dear

your interests are to me.” The two sovereigns had, without doubt,

already come to an understanding on this point, when, after a three days’

interview with Leo X., Francis I. returned to Milan, leaving at Bologna,

for the purpose of treating in detail the affair of the Pragmatic

Sanction, his chancellor, Duprat, who had accompanied him during all this

campaign as his adviser and negotiator.

In him the king had, under the name and guise of premier magistrate of

the realm, a servant whose bold and complacent abilities he was not slow

to recognize and to put in use. Being irritated “for that many, not

having the privilege of sportsmen, do take beasts, both red and black, as

hares, pheasants, partridges, and other game, thus frustrating us of our

diversion and pastime that we take in the chase,” Francis I. issued, in

March, 1516, an ordinance which decreed against poachers the most severe

penalties, and even death, and which “granted to all princes, lords, and

gentlemen possessing forests or warrens in the realm, the right of

upholding therein by equally severe punishments the exclusive privileges

of their preserves.” The Parliament made remonstrances against such

excessive rigor, and refused to register the ordinance. The chancellor,

Duprat, insisted, and even threatened. “To the king alone,” said he,

“belongs the right of regulating the administration of his state obey, or

the king will see in you only rebels, whom he will know how to chastise.”

For a year the Parliament held out; but the chancellor persisted more

obstinately in having his way, and, on the 11th of February, 1517, the

ordinance was registered under a formal order from the king, to which the

name was given of “letters of command.”

[Illustration: Anthony Duprat----24]

At the commencement of the war for the conquest of Milaness there was a

want of money, and Francis I. hesitated to so soon impose new taxes.

Duprat gave a scandalous extension to a practice which had been for a

long while in use, but had always been reprobated and sometimes formally

prohibited, namely, the sale of public appointments or offices: not only

did he create a multitude of financial and administrative offices, the

sale of which brought considerable sums into the treasury, but he

introduced the abuse into the very heart of the judicial body; the

tribunals were encumbered by newly-created magistrates. The estates of

Languedoc complained in vain. The Parliament of Paris was in its turn

attacked. In 1521, three councillors, recently nominated, were convicted

of having paid, one three thousand eight hundred livres, and the two

others six thousand livres. The Parliament refused to admit them.

Duprat protested. The necessities of the state, he said, made borrowing

obligatory; and the king was free to prefer in his selections those of

his subjects who showed most zeal for his service. Parliament persisted

in its refusal. Duprat resolved to strike a great blow. An edict of

January 31, 1522, created within the Parliament a fourth chamber,

composed of eighteen councillors and two presidents, all of fresh, and,

no doubt, venal appointment, though the edict dared not avow as much.

Two great personages, the Archbishop of Aix and Marshal de Montmorenci,

were charged to present the edict to Parliament and require its

registration. The Parliament demanded time for deliberation. It kept an

absolute silence for six weeks, and at last presented an address to the

queen-mother, trying to make her comprehend the harm such acts did to the

importance of the magistracy and to her son’s government. Louise

appeared touched by these representations, and promised to represent

their full weight to the king, “if the Parliament will consent to point

out to me of itself any other means of readily raising the sum of one

hundred and twenty thousand livres, which the king absolutely cannot do

without.” The struggle was prolonged until the Parliament declared “that

it could not, without offending God and betraying its own conscience,

proceed to the registration; but that if it were the king’s pleasure to

be obeyed at any price, he had only to depute his chancellor or some

other great personage, in whose presence and on whose requirement the

registration should take place.” Chancellor Duprat did not care to

undertake this commission in person. Count de St. Pol, governor of

Paris, was charged with it, and the court caused to be written at the

bottom of the letters of command, “Read and published in presence of

Count de St. Pol, specially deputed for this purpose, who ordered viva

voce, in the king’s name, that they be executed.”

Thus began to be implanted in that which should be the most respected and

the most independent amongst the functions of government, namely, the

administration of justice, not only the practice, but the fundamental

maxim, of absolute government. “I am going to the court, and I will

speak the truth; after which the king will have to be obeyed,” was said

in the middle of the seventeenth century by the premier president Mold to

Cardinal de Retz. Chancellor Duprat, if we are not mistaken, was, in the

sixteenth century, the first chief of the French magistracy to make use

of language despotic not only in fact, but also in principle. President

Mole was but the head of a body invested, so far as the king was

concerned, with the right of remonstrance and resistance; when once that

right was exercised, he might, without servility, give himself up to

resignation. Chancellor Duprat was the delegate, the organ, the

representative of the king; it was in the name of the king himself that

he affirmed the absolute power of the kingship and the absolute duty of

submission. Francis I. could not have committed the negotiation with Leo

X. in respect of Charles VII.’s Pragmatic Sanction to a man with more

inclination and better adapted for the work to be accomplished.

The Pragmatic Sanction had three principal objects:--

1. To uphold the liberties and the influence of the faithful in the

government of the church, by sanctioning their right to elect

ministers of the Christian faith, especially parish priests and

bishops;

2. To guarantee the liberties and rights of the church herself in

her relations with her head, the pope, by proclaiming the necessity

for the regular intervention of councils and their superiority in

regard to the pope;

3. To prevent or reform abuses in the relations of the papacy with

the state and church of France in the matter of ecclesiastical

tribute, especially as to the receipt by the pope, under the name of

annates, of the first year’s revenue of the different ecclesiastical

offices and benefices.

In the fifteenth century it was the general opinion in France, in state

and in church, that there was in these dispositions nothing more than the

primitive and traditional liberties and rights of the Christian church.

There was no thought of imposing upon the papacy any new regimen, but

only of defending the old and legitimate regimen, recognized and upheld

by St. Louis in the thirteenth century as well as by Charles VII. in the

fifteenth.

The popes, nevertheless, had all of them protested since the days of

Charles VII. against the Pragmatic Sanction as an attack upon their

rights, and had demanded its abolition. In 1461, Louis XI., as has

already been shown, had yielded for a moment to the demand of Pope Pius

II., whose countenance he desired to gain, and had abrogated the

Pragmatic; but, not having obtained what he wanted thereby, and having

met with strong opposition in the Parliament of Paris to his concession,

he had let it drop without formally retracting it, and, instead of

engaging in a conflict with Parliament upon the point, he thought it no

bad plan for the magistracy to uphold in principle and enforce in fact

the regulations of the Pragmatic Sanction. This important edict, then,

was still vigorous in 1515, when Francis I., after his victory at

Melegnano and his reconciliation with the pope, left Chancellor Duprat

at Bologna to pursue the negotiation reopened on that subject. The

compensation, of which Leo X., on redemanding the abolition of the

Pragmatic Sanction, had given a peep to Francis I., could not fail to

have charms for a prince so little scrupulous, and for his still less

scrupulous chancellor. The pope proposed that the Pragmatic, once for

all abolished, should be replaced by a Concordat between the two

sovereigns, and that this Concordat, whilst putting a stop to the

election of the clergy by the faithful, should transfer to the king the

right of nomination to bishoprics and other great ecclesiastical offices

and benefices, reserving to the pope the right of presentation of

prelates nominated by the king. This, considering the condition of

society and government in the sixteenth century, in the absence of

political and religious liberty, was to take away from the church her own

existence, and divide her between two masters, without giving her, as

regarded either of them, any other guarantee of independence than the

mere chance of their dissensions and quarrels.

Egotism, even in kings, has often narrow and short-sighted views. It was

calculated that there were in France at this period ten archbishoprics,

eighty-three bishoprics, and five hundred and twenty-seven abbeys.

Francis I. and his chancellor saw in the proposed Concordat nothing but

the great increment of influence it secured to them, by making all the

dignitaries of the church suppliants at first and then clients of the

kingship. After some difficulties as to points of detail, the Concordat

was concluded and signed on the 18th of August, 1516. Five months

afterwards, on the 5th of February, 1517, the king repaired in person to

Parliament, to which he had summoned many prelates and doctors of the

University. The chancellor explained the points of the Concordat, and

recapitulated all the facts which, according to him, had made it

necessary. The king ordered its registration, “for the good of his

kingdom and for quittance of the promise he had given the pope.”

Parliament on one side, and the prelates and doctors of the University

on the other, deliberated upon this demand. Their first answer was that,

as the matter concerned the interest of the whole Gallican church, they

could not themselves decide about it, and that the church, assembled in

national council, alone had the right of pronouncing judgment. “Oho! so

you cannot,” said the king; “I will soon let you see that you can, or I

will send you all to Rome to give the pope your reasons.” To the

question of conscience the Parliament found thenceforth added the

question of dignity. The magistrates raised difficulties in point of

form, and asked for time to discuss the matter fundamentally; and

deputies went to carry their request to the king. He admitted the

propriety of delay, but with this comment: “I know that there are in my

Parliament good sort of men, wise men; but I also know that there are

turbulent and rash fools; I have my eye upon them; and I am informed of

the language they dare to hold about my conduct. I am king as my

predecessors were; and I mean to be obeyed as they were. You are

constantly vaporing to me about Louis XII. and his love of justice; know

ye that justice is as dear to me as it was to him; but that king, just as

he was, often drove out from the kingdom rebels, though they were members

of Parliament; do not force me to imitate him in his severity.”

Parliament entered upon a fundamental examination of the question; their

deliberations lasted from the 13th to the 24th of July, 1517; and the

conclusion they came to was, that Parliament could not and ought not to

register the Concordat; that, if the king persisted in his intention of

making it a law of the realm, he must employ the same means as Charles

VII. had employed for establishing the Pragmatic Sanction, and that,

therefore, he must summon a general council. On the 14th of January,

1518, two councillors arrived at Amboise, bringing to the king the

representations of the Parliament. When their arrival was announced to

the king, “Before I receive them,” said he, “I will drag them about at my

heels as long as they have made me wait.” He received them, however, and

handed their representations over to the chancellor, bidding him reply to

them. Duprat made a learned and specious reply, but one which left

intact the question of right, and, at bottom, merely defended the

Concordat on the ground of the king’s good pleasure and requirements of

policy. On the last day of February, 1518, the king gave audience to the

deputies, and handed them the chancellor’s reply. They asked to examine

it. “You shall not examine it,” said the king; “this would degenerate

into an endless process. A hundred of your heads, in Parliament, have

been seven months and more painfully getting up these representations,

which my chancellor has blown to the winds in a few days. There is but

one king in France; I have done all I could to restore peace to my

kingdom; and I will not allow nullification here of that which I brought

about with so much difficulty in Italy. My Parliament would set up for a

Venetian Senate; let it confine its meddling to the cause of justice,

which is worse administered than it has been for a hundred years; I

ought, perhaps, to drag it about at my heels, like the Grand Council, and

watch more closely over its conduct.” The two deputies made an attempt

to prolong their stay at Amboise: but, “If before six to-morrow morning,”

said the king, “they be not gone, I will send some archers to take them

and cast them into a dungeon for six months; and woe to whoever dares to

speak to me for them!”

On returning to Paris the deputies were beginning to give their fellows

an account of how harsh a reception they met with, when Louis de la

Tremoille, the most respected amongst the chiefs of the army, entered the

hall. He came by order of the king to affirm to the Parliament that to

dismiss the Concordat was to renew the war, and that it must obey on the

instant or profess open rebellion. Parliament upheld its decision of

July 24, 1517, against the Concordat, at the same time begging La

Tremoille to write to the king to persuade him, if he insisted upon

registration, to send some person of note or to commission La Tremoille

himself to be present at the act, and to see indorsed upon the Concordat,

“Read, published, and registered at the king’s most express command

several times repeated, in presence of . . . , specially deputed by

him for that purpose.” Tremoille hesitated to write, and exhibited the

letters whereby the king urged him to execute the strict orders laid upon

him. “What are those orders, then?” asked the premier president. “That

is the king’s secret,” answered La Tremoille: “I may not reveal it; all

that I can tell you is, that I should never have peace of mind if you

forced me to carry them out.” The Parliament in its excitement begged La

Tremoille to withdraw, and sent for him back almost immediately.

“Choose,” said the premier president to him, “between Saturday or Monday

next to be present at the registration.” La Tremoille chose Monday,

wishing to allow himself time for an answer even yet from the king. But

no new instructions came to him; and on the 22d of March, 1518,

Parliament proceeded to registration of the Concordat, with the forms and

reservations which they had announced, and which were evidence of

compulsion. The other Parliaments of France followed with more or less

zeal, according to their own particular dispositions, the example shown

by that of Paris. The University was heartily disposed to push

resistance farther than had been done by Parliament: its rector caused to

be placarded on the 27th of March, 1518, in the streets of Paris, an

order forbidding all printers and booksellers to print the Concordat on

pain of losing their connection with the University. The king commanded

informations to be filed against the authors and placarders of the order,

and, on the 27th of April, sent to the Parliament an edict, which forbade

the University to meddle in any matter of public police, or to hold any

assembly touching such matters, under pain, as to the whole body, of

having its privileges revoked, and, as to individuals, of banishment and

confiscation. The king’s party demanded of Parliament registration of

this edict. Parliament confined itself to writing to the king, agreeing

that the University had no right to meddle in affairs of government, but

adding that there were strong reasons, of which it would give an account

whenever the king should please to order, why it, the Parliament, should

refuse registration of the edict. It does not appear that the king ever

asked for such account, or that his wrath against the University was more

obstinately manifested. The Concordat was registered, and Francis I.,

after having achieved an official victory over the magistrates, had small

stomach for pursuing extreme measures against the men of letters.

We have seen that in the course of the fifteenth century, there were made

in France two able and patriotic attempts; the Pragmatic Sanction, in

1458, under Charles VII., and the States General of 1484, under Charles

VIII. We do not care to discuss here all the dispositions of those acts;

some of them were, indeed, questionable; but they both of them, one in

respect of the church and the other of the state, aimed at causing France

to make a great stride towards a national, free and legalized regimen, to

which French feudal society had never known how or been willing to adjust

itself. These two attempts failed. It would be unjust to lay the blame

on the contemporary governments. Charles VII. was in earnest about the

Pragmatic Sanction which he submitted to the deliberations and votes of a

national council; and Louis XI., after having for a while given it up to

the pope, retraced his steps and left it in force. As to the States

General of 1484, neither the regent, Anne de Beaujeu, nor Charles VIII.,

offered the slightest hinderance to their deliberations and their votes;

and if Louis XII. did not convoke the States afresh, he constantly strove

in the government of his kingdom to render them homage and give them

satisfaction. We may feel convinced that, considering the social and

intellectual condition of France at this time, these two patriotic

attempts were premature; but a good policy, being premature, is not on

that account alone condemned to failure; what it wants is time to get

itself comprehended, appreciated, and practised gradually and

consistently. If the successors of Louis XII. had acted in the same

spirit and with the same view as their predecessor, France would probably

have made progress in this salutary path. But exactly the contrary took

place. Instead of continuing a more and more free and legal regimen,

Francis I. and his chancellor, Duprat, loudly proclaimed and practised

the maxims of absolute power; in the church, the Pragmatic Sanction was

abolished; and in the state, Francis I., during a reign of thirty-two

years, did not once convoke the States General, and labored only to set

up the sovereign right of his own sole will. The church was despoiled

of her electoral autonomy; and the magistracy, treated with haughty and

silly impertinence, was vanquished and humiliated in the exercise of its

right of remonstrance. The Concordat of 1516 was not the only, but it

was the gravest pact of alliance concluded between the papacy and the

French kingship for the promotion mutually of absolute power.

Whilst this question formed the subject of disputes in France between the

great public authorities, there was springing up, outside of France,

between the great European powers another not more grave in regard to a

distant future, but more threatening in regard to the present peace of

nations. King Ferdinand the Catholic had died on the 23d of January,

1516; and his grandson and successor, Archduke Charles, anxious to go and

take possession of the throne of Spain, had hastily concluded with

Francis I., on the 13th of August, 1516, at Noyon, a treaty intended to

settle differences between the two crowns as to the kingdoms of Naples

and Navarre. The French and Spanish plenipotentiaries, Sires de Boisy

and de Chievres, were still holding meetings at Montpellier, trying to

come to an understanding about the execution of this treaty, when the

death of Emperor Maximilian at Wels, in Austria, on the 12th of January,

1519, occurred to add the vacant throne of a great power to the two

second-rate thrones already in dispute between two powerful princes.

Three claimants, Charles of Austria, who was the new King of Spain,

Francis I., and Henry VIII., King of England, aspired to this splendid

heritage. In 1517, Maximilian himself, in one of his fits of temper and

impecuniosity, had offered to abdicate and give up the imperial dignity

to Henry VIII. for a good round sum; but the King of England’s envoy, Dr.

Cuthbert Tunstall, a stanch and clearsighted servant, who had been sent

to Germany to deal with this singular proposal, opened his master’s eyes

to its hollowness and falsehood, and Henry VIII. held himself aloof.

Francis I. remained the only rival of Charles of Austria; Maximilian

labored eagerly to pave the way for his grandson’s success; and at his

death the struggle between the two claimants had already become so keen

that Francis I., on hearing the news, exclaimed, “I will spend three

millions to be elected emperor, and I swear that, three years after the

election, I will be either at Constantinople or dead.”

The Turks, who had been since 1453 settled at Constantinople, were the

terror of Christian Europe; and Germany especially had need of a puissant

and valiant defender against them. Francis I. calculated that the

Christians of Germany and Hungary would see in him, the King of France

and the victor of Melegnano, their most imposing and most effectual

champion.

Having a superficial mind and being full of vain confidence, Francis I.

was mistaken about the forces and chances on his side, as well as about

the real and natural interests of France, and also his own. There was no

call for him to compromise himself in this electoral struggle of kings,

and in a distant war against triumphant Islamry. He miscalculated the

strong position and personal valor of the rival with whom he would have

to measure swords. Charles of Austria was but nineteen, and Francis I.

was twenty-three, when they entered, as antagonists, into the arena of

European politics. Charles had as yet gained no battle and won no

renown; while Francis I. was already a victorious king and a famous

knight. But the young archduke’s able governor, William de Croy, Lord of

Chievres, “had early trained him,” says M. Mignet, “to the understanding

and management of his various interests; from the time that he was

fifteen, Charles presided every day at his council; there he himself read

out the contents of despatches which were delivered to him the moment

they arrived, were it even in the dead of night; his council had become

his school, and business served him for books. . . . Being naturally

endowed with superior parts, a penetrating intellect and rare firmness of

character, he schooled himself to look Fortune in the face without being

intoxicated by her smiles or troubled at her frowns, to be astonished by

nothing that happened, and to make up his mind in any danger. He had

even now the will of an emperor and an overawing manner. ‘His dignity and

loftiness of soul are such,’ says a contemporary writer, ‘that he seems

to hold the universe under his feet.’” Charles’s position in Germany was

as strong as the man himself; he was a German, a duke of Austria, of the

imperial line, as natural a successor of his grandfather Maximilian at

Frankfort as of his grandfather Ferdinand at Madrid. Such was the

adversary, with such advantages of nationality and of person, against

whom Francis I., without any political necessity, and for the sole

purpose of indulging an ambitious vision and his own kingly self-esteem,

was about to engage in a struggle which was to entail a heavy burden on

his whole life, and bring him not in triumph to Constantinople, but in

captivity to Madrid.

Before the death of Maximilian, and when neither party had done more than

foresee the struggle and get ready for it, Francis I. was for some time

able to hope for some success. Seven German princes, three

ecclesiastical and four laic, the Archbishops of Mayence, Cologne, and

Troves, and the Duke of Saxony, the Margrave of Brandenburg, the Count

Palatine of the Rhine, and the King of Bohemia, had the sole power of

electing the emperor. Four of them, the Archbishops of Troves and of

Cologne, the Count Palatine of the Rhine and the Margrave of Brandenburg,

had favorably received the overtures of Francis I., and had promised him

their suffrages. His devoted servant, Robert de la Marck, Lord of

Fleuranges, had brought to him at Amboise a German gentleman from the

Palatinate, Franz von Sickingen, “of very petty family, but a very gentle

companion,” says Fleuranges, “the most beautiful talker that I think I

ever saw in my life, and in so much that there was no gentleman in

Germany, prince or man of war, who would not have been glad to do him

pleasure.” Francis I. had received him with very chivalrous grace, and

had given him a pension of three thousand livres and handsome presents

for his comrades in adventure; and Sickingen was so charmed that he said

to Fleuranges on leaving Amboise, “The king did not open his heart to me

on the subject of the empire; however, I know all about it, and I beg you

to tell him that I will do his service and keep the oath I gave him.”

A more important personage than Sickingen, Leo X., would have been very

glad to have for emperor in Germany neither the King of France nor the

King of Spain, both of them being far too powerful in Europe and far too

emulous in Italy not to be dangerous enemies or inconvenient allies for

him; and he tried to dissuade Francis I. from making any claim to the

empire, and to induce him to employ his influence in bringing about the

election of a second-rate German prince, Frederick the Wise, Duke of

Saxony, who was justly popular in Germany, and who would never be in a

condition to do France any harm. It was judicious advice and a policy

good for France as well as for Europe in general; but Francis I.,

infatuated by his desire and his hope, did not relish it at all; and Leo

X., being obliged to choose between the two great claimants, declared for

Francis I., without any pleasure or confidence, but also without any

great perplexity, for he had but little faith in the success which he

made a show of desiring. Francis, deceived by these appearances and

promises, on the part both of ecclesiastics and laics, held language

breathing a gallant and almost careless confidence. “We are not enemies,

your master and I,” he said to the ambassadors of Spain; “we are two

lovers courting the same mistress: whichever of the two she may prefer,

the other will have to submit, and harbor no resentment.” But when,

shortly after Maximilian’s death, the struggle became closer and the

issue nearer, the inequality between the forces and chances of the two

rivals became quite manifest, and Francis I. could no longer affect the

same serenity. He had intrusted the management of his affairs in Germany

to a favorite comrade of his early youth, Admiral de Bonnivet, a soldier

and a courtier, witty, rash, sumptuous, eager to display his master’s

power and magnificence. Charles of Austria’s agents, and at their head

his aunt Margaret, who had the government of the Low Countries in his

absence, were experienced, deliberate, discreet, more eager to succeed in

their purpose than to make a brilliant appearance, and resolved to do

quietly whatever was necessary for success. And to do so they were

before long as fully authorized as they were resolved. They discovered

that Francis I. had given Bonnivet four hundred thousand crowns in gold

that he might endeavor to bribe the electors; it was, according to

report, double the sum Charles of Austria had promised for the same

object; and his agents sent him information of it, and received this

answer: “We are wholly determined to spare nothing and to stake all for

all upon it, as the matter we most desire and have most at heart in this

world. . . . The election must be secured, whatever it may cost me.”

The question before the seven elective princes who were to dispose of the

empire was thenceforth merely which of the two claimants would be the

higher and the safer bidder. Francis I. engaged in a tussle of wealth

and liberality with Charles of Austria. One of his agents wrote to him,

“All will go well if we can fill the maw of the Margrave Joachim of

Brandenburg; he and his brother the elector from Mayence fall every day

into deeper depths of avarice; we must hasten to satisfy them with

_speed, speed, speed_.” Francis I. replied, “I will have Marquis Joachim

_gorged_ at any price;” and he accordingly made over to him in ready

money and bills of short dates all that was asked for by the margrave,

who on the 8th of April, 1519, gave a written undertaking to support the

candidature “of the most invincible and Most Christian prince, Francis,

by the grace of God King of the French, Duke of Milan, and Lord of Genoa,

who, what with his vigorous age, his ability, his justice, his military

experience, the brilliant fortune of his arms, and all other qualities

required for war and the management of the commonwealth, surpasses, in

the judgment of every one, all other Christian princes.” But Charles of

Austria did not consider himself beaten because two of the seven electors

displayed avarice and venality. His aunt Margaret and his principal

agent in Germany, the Chamberlain Armerstoff, resumed financial

negotiations with the Archbishop of Mayence, for his brother the margrave

as well as for himself, and the archbishop, without any formal

engagement, accepted the Austrian over-bid. “I am ashamed at his

shamelessness,” wrote Armerstorff to Charles. Alternate and antagonistic

bargaining went on thus for more than two months. The Archbishop of

Cologne, Hermann von Wied, kept wavering between the two claimants; but

he was careful to tell John d’Albret, Francis I.’s agent, that “he

sincerely hoped that his Majesty would follow the doctrine of God, who

gave as much to those who went to work in His vineyard towards the middle

of the day as to those who had been at it all the morning.” Duke

Frederick of Saxony was the only one of the seven electors who absolutely

refused to make any promise, as well as to accept any offer, and

preserved his independence, as well as his dignity. The rumor of all

these traffickings and these uncertainties rekindled in Henry VIII., King

of England, a fancy for placing himself once more in the ranks; but his

agent, Richard Pace, found the negotiations too far advanced and the

prices too high for him to back up this vain whim of his master’s; and

Henry VIII. abandoned it. The diet had been convoked for the 17th of

June at Frankfort. The day was drawing near; and which of the two

parties had the majority was still regarded as, uncertain. Franz von

Sickingen appeared in the outskirts of Frankfort with more than twenty

thousand men of the German army, “whereat marvellously astonished,” says

Fleuranges, “were they who wished well to the King of France and very

mightily rejoiced they who wished well to the Catholic king.”

The gentleman-adventurer had not been less accessible than the

prince-electors to bribery. The diet opened on the 18th of June. The

Archbishop of Mayence made a great speech in favor of Charles of Austria;

and the Archbishop of Troves spoke in favor of Francis I., to whom he had

remained faithful. Rival intrigues were kept up; Sickingen and his

troops were a clog upon deliberation; the electors were embarrassed and

weary of their dissensions; and the Archbishop of Troves proposed by way

of compromise the election of the Duke of Saxony, Frederick the Wise,

who, at this crisis so shameful for his peers, had just given fresh

proofs of his sound judgment, his honesty, and his patriotic

independence. But Frederick declined the honor it was intended to do

him, and which he considered beyond his powers to support; and he voted

for Archduke Charles, “a real German prince,” said he, “the choice of

whom seemed to him most natural in point of right and most suitable in

point of fact under the present circumstances of Europe.” The six other

electors gave in to his opinion, and that same day, June 18, 1519,

unanimously elected the King of Spain, Charles, King of the Romans and

Emperor of Germany, with the title of Charles V.

[Illustration: Charles V----39]

Whatever pains were taken by Francis I. to keep up a good appearance

after this heavy reverse, his mortification was profound, and he thought

of nothing but getting his revenge. He flattered himself he would find

something of the sort in a solemn interview and an appearance of alliance

with Henry VIII., King of England, who had, like himself, just undergone

in the election to the empire a less flagrant but an analogous reverse.

It had already, in the previous year and on the occasion of a treaty

concluded between the two kings for the restitution of Tournai to France,

been settled that they should meet before long in token of

reconciliation. Allusion had even been made, at that period, to a much

more important restitution, of Calais in fact, for which Francis I., at

what price we know not, had obtained the advocacy of Cardinal Wolsey, who

was then all-powerful with Henry VIII. “Of what use to Us,” Wolsey had

said, “is this town of Calais, where in time of peace as well as of war

we have to keep up such numerous garrisons, which costs us so much money,

and which so often forces us to measures contrary to the real interests

of England?” But this idea was vehemently scouted by the English, and

the coming interview between the two kings remained the sole accessory of

the treaty of 1518. After Charles V.’s election to the empire, Francis

I. was eager to claim this interview, which was sure to cause in Europe

the impression of a close understanding between the two kings before the

very eyes of their common rival. A convention, signed on the 26th of

March, 1520, regulated its details. It was stipulated that the two kings

should meet in Picardy between Guines, an English possession in the

neighborhood of Calais, and Ardres, which belonged to France. But, so

soon as Charles V., at that time in Spain, was informed of this design,

he used all his efforts to make it abortive. Henry, however, stood firm;

not that he had resolved to knit himself closely with Francis I. against

the new emperor, whom, a few months previously, he had shown alacrity in

felicitating upon his accession to the empire, but he was unwilling to

fail in his promise to the King of France, and he liked to assume in

respect of the two rivals the part of an arbiter equally courted by both.

Charles V., still actively working against the interview, entered into

secret negotiation with Cardinal Wolsey to obtain for himself also an

interview with Henry VIII., which would destroy the effect of that in

course of arrangement between the Kings of France and England. In

writing to Wolsey he called him his “very dear friend,” and guaranteed

him a pension of seven thousand ducats, secured upon two Spanish

bishoprics; and on the 26th of May, 1520, Henry VIII. received at

Canterbury, as he was passing by on his way to embark at Dover for the

interview in France, the as it were unexpected information that Charles

V. had just arrived with his fleet at the port of Hythe. The king

immediately sent Wolsey to meet the emperor, who disembarked at Dover,

whither Henry went to visit him; and the two sovereigns repaired together

to Canterbury, where they went in state to the cathedral, “resplendent,”

says Erasmus, “with all the precious gifts it had received for so many

centuries, especially with the most precious of all, the chest containing

the remains of Thomas a-Becket, so magnificent that gold was the least of

its ornaments.” There they passed three days, treating of their affairs

in the midst of galas, during which Charles V. completely won over Wolsey

by promising to help him to become pope. On the 31st of May, 1520,

Charles, quite easy about the interview in France, embarked at Sandwich

for his Flemish possessions, and Henry VIII. made sail for Calais, his

point of departure to the place agreed upon for Francis to meet him, and

where they had made up their minds, both of them, to display all the

splendors of their two courts.

This meeting has remained celebrated in history far more for its royal

pomp, and for the personal incidents which were connected with it, than

for its political results. It was called _The Field of Cloth of Gold;_

and the courtiers who attended the two sovereigns felt bound to almost

rival them in sumptuousness, “insomuch,” says the contemporary Martin du

Bellay, “that many bore thither their mills, their forests, and their

meadows on their backs.” Henry VIII. had employed eleven hundred

workmen, the most skilful of Flanders and Holland, in building a

quadrangular palace of wood, one hundred and twenty-eight feet long every

way; on one side of the entrance-gate was a fountain, covered with

gilding, and surmounted by a statue of Bacchus, round which there flowed

through subterranean pipes all sorts of wines, and which bore in letters

of gold the inscription, “Make good cheer, who will;” and on the other

side a column, supported by four lions, was surmounted by a statue of

Cupid armed with bow and arrows. Opposite the palace was erected a huge

figure of a savage wearing the arms of his race, with this inscription,

chosen by Henry VIII.: “He whom I back wins.” The frontage was covered

outside with canvas painted to represent freestone; and the inside was

hung with rich tapestries. Francis I., emulous of equalling his royal

neighbor in magnificence, had ordered to be erected close to Ardres an

immense tent, upheld in the middle by a colossal pole firmly fixed in the

ground and with pegs and cordage all around it. Outside, the tent, in

the shape of a dome, was covered with cloth of gold; and, inside, it

represented a sphere with a ground of blue velvet and studded with stars,

like the firmament. At each angle of the large tent there was a small

one equally richly decorated. But before the two sovereigns exchanged

visits, in the midst of all these magnificent preparations, there arose

a violent hurricane, which tore up the pegs and split the cordage of the

French tent, scattered them over the ground, and forced Francis I. to

take up his quarters in an old castle near Ardres. When the two kings’

two chief councillors, Cardinal Wolsey on one side and Admiral Bonnivet

on the other, had regulated the formalities, on the 7th of June, 1520,

Francis I. and Henry VIII. set out on their way, at the same hour and the

same pace, for their meeting in the valley of Ardres, where a tent had

been prepared for them. As they drew near, some slight anxiety was

manifested by the escort of the King of England, amongst whom a belief

prevailed that that of the King of France was more numerous; but it was

soon perceived to be nothing of the sort. The two kings, mounted upon

fine horses and superbly dressed, advanced towards one another; and Henry

VIII.’s horse stumbled, which his servants did not like. The two kings

saluted each other with easy grace, exchanged embraces without getting

off their horses, dismounted, and proceeded arm-in-arm to the tent where

Wolsey and De Bonnivet were awaiting them. “My dear brother and cousin,”

immediately said Francis with his easy grace, “I am come a long way, and

not without trouble, to see you in person. I hope that you hold me for

such as I am, ready to give you aid with the kingdoms and lordships that

are in my power.” Henry, with a somewhat cold reserve, replied, “It is

not your kingdoms or your divers possessions that I regard, but the

soundness and loyal observance of the promises set down in the treaties

between you and me. My eyes never beheld a prince who could be dearer to

my heart, and I have crossed the seas at the extreme boundary of my

kingdom to come and see you.” The two kings entered the tent and signed

a treaty whereby the Dauphin of France was to marry Princess Mary, only

daughter at that time of Henry VIII., to whom Francis I. undertook to pay

annually a sum of one hundred thousand livres [two million eight hundred

thousand francs, or one hundred and twelve thousand pounds in the money

of our day], until the marriage was celebrated, which would not be for

some time yet, as the English princess was only four years old. The two

kings took wine together, according to custom, and reciprocally presented

the members of their courts. “King Francis,” says Henry VIII.’s favorite

chronicler, Edward Hall, who was there, “is an amiable prince, proud in

bearing and gay in manner, with a brown complexion, large eyes, long

nose, thick lips, broad chest and shoulders, short legs, and big feet.”

Titian’s portrait gives a loftier and more agreeable idea of Francis I.

When the two kings proceeded to sign, in their tent, the treaty they had

just concluded, “the King of England,” according to Fleuranges’

_Memoires,_ “himself took up the articles and began to read them. When

he had read those relating to the King of France, who was to have the

priority, and came to speak of himself, he got as far as, ‘I, Henry,

King’ . . . (he would have said of _France and England_), but he left

out the title as far as France was concerned, and said to King Francis,

‘I will not put it in as you are here, for I should lie;’ and he said

only, ‘I Henry, King of _England_.’” But, as M. Mignet very properly

says, “if he omitted the title in his reading, he left it in the treaty

itself, and, shortly afterwards, was ambitious to render it a reality,

when he invaded France and wished to reign over it.”

After the diplomatic stipulations were concluded, the royal meeting was

prolonged for sixteen days, which were employed in tourneys, jousts, and

all manner of festivals. The personal communication of the two kings was

regulated with all the precautions of official mistrust and restraint;

and when the King of England went to Ardres to see the Queen of France,

the King of France had to go to Guines to see the Queen of England, for

the two kings were hostages for one another. “The King of France, who

was not a suspicious man,” says Fleuranges, “was mighty vexed at there

being so little confidence in one another. He got up one morning very

early, which is not his habit, took two gentlemen and a page, the first

three he could find, mounted his horse, and went to visit the King of

England at the castle of Guines. When he came on to the castle-bridge,

all the English were mighty astonished. As he rode amongst them, the

king gayly called upon them to surrender to him, and asked them the way

to the chamber of the king his brother, the which was pointed out to him

by the governor of Guines, who said to him, ‘Sir, he is not awake.’ But

King Francis passed on all the same, went up to the said chamber, knocked

at the door, awoke the King of England, and walked in.

[Illustration: Francis I. surprises Henry VIII.----44]

Never was man more dumbfounded than King Henry, who said to King Francis,

‘Brother, you have done me a better turn than ever man did to another,

and you show me the great trust I ought to have in you. I yield myself

your prisoner from this moment, and I proffer you my parole.’ He undid

from his neck a collar worth fifteen thousand angels, and begged the King

of France to take it and wear it that very day for his prisoner’s sake.

And, lo, the king, who wished to do him the same turn, had brought with

him a bracelet which was worth more than thirty thousand angels, and

begged him to wear it for his sake, which thing he did, and the King of

France put what had been given him on his neck. Thereupon the King of

England was minded to get up, and the King of France said that he should

have no other chamber-attendant but himself, and he warmed his shirt and

handed it to him when he was up. The King of France made up his mind to

go back, notwithstanding that the King of England would have kept him to

dinner; but, inasmuch as there was to be jousting after dinner, he

mounted his horse and went back to Ardres. He met a many good folk who

were coming to meet him, amongst the rest l’Aventureux [a name given to

Fleuranges himself], who said to him, ‘My dear master, you are mad to

have done what you have done; I am very glad to see you back here, and

devil take him who counselled you.’ Whereupon the king said that never a

soul had counselled him, and that he knew well that there was not a soul

in his kingdom who would have so counselled him; and then he began to

tell what he had done at the said Guines, and so returned, conversing, to

Ardres, for it was not far.”

“Then began the jousts, which lasted a week, and were wondrous fine, both

a-foot and a-horseback. After all these pastimes the King of France and

the King of England retired to a pavilion, where they drank together.

And there the King of England took the King of France by the collar, and

said to him, ‘Brother, I should like to wrestle with you,’ and gave him a

feint or two; and the King of France, who is a mighty good wrestler, gave

him a turn and threw him on the ground. And the King of England would

have had yet another trial; but all that was broken off, and it was time

to go to supper. After this they had yet three or four jousts and

banquets, and then they took leave of one another [on the 24th of June,

1520], with the greatest possible peace between the princes and

princesses. That done, the King of England returned to Guines, and the

King of France to France; and it was not without giving great gifts at

parting, one to another.” [_Memoires de Fleuranges,_ pp. 349-363.]

[Illustration: The Field of the Cloth of Gold----45]

Having left the Field of Cloth of Gold for Amboise, his favorite

residence, Francis I. discovered that Henry VIII., instead of returning

direct to England, had gone, on the 10th of July, to Gravelines, in

Flanders, to pay a visit to Charles V., who had afterwards accompanied

him to Calais. The two sovereigns had spent three days there, and

Charles V., on separating from the King of England, had commissioned him

to regulate, as arbiter, all difficulties that might arise between

himself and the King of France. Assuredly nothing was less calculated to

inspire Francis I. with confidence in the results of his meeting with

Henry VIII. and of their mutual courtesies. Though he desired to avoid

the appearance of taking the initiative in war, he sought every occasion

and pretext for recommencing it; and it was not long before he found them

in the Low Countries, in Navarre, and in Italy. A trial was made of

Henry VIII.’s mediation and of a conference at Calais; and a discussion

was raised touching the legitimate nature of the protection afforded by

the two rival sovereigns to their petty allies. But the real fact was,

that Francis I. had a reverse to make up for and a passion to gratify;

and the struggle recommenced in April, 1521, in the Low Countries.

Charles V., when he heard that the French had crossed his frontier,

exclaimed, “God be praised that I am not the first to commence the war,

and that the King of France is pleased to make me greater than I am, for,

in a little while, either I shall be a very poor emperor or he will be a

poor King of France.” The campaign opened in the north, to the advantage

of France, by the capture of Hesdin; Admiral Bonnivet, who had the

command on the frontier of Spain, reduced some small forts of Biscay and

the fortress of Fontarabia; and Marshal de Lautrec, governor of Milaness,

had orders to set out at once to go and defend it against the Spaniards

and Imperialists, who were concentrating for its invasion.

Lautrec was but little adapted for this important commission. He had

been made governor of Milaness in August, 1516, to replace the Constable

de Bourbon, whose recall to France the queen-mother, Louise of Savoy, had

desired and stimulated. Lautrec had succeeded ill in his government. He

was active and brave, but he was harsh, haughty, jealous, imperious, and

grasping; and he had embroiled himself with most of the Milanese lords,

amongst others with the veteran J. J. Trivulzio, who, under Charles VIII.

and Louis XII., had done France such great service in Italy. Trivulzio,

offensively treated at Milan, and subjected to accusations at Paris,

went, at eighty-two years of age, to France to justify himself before the

king; but Francis I. gave him a cold reception, barely spoke to him, and

declined his explanations. One day, at Arpajon, Trivulzio heard that the

king was to pass on horseback through the town; and, being unable to

walk, had himself carried, ill as he was, in his chair to the middle of

the street. The king passed with averted head, and without replying to

Trivulzio, who cried, “Sir, ah! sir, just one moment’s audience!”

Trivulzio, on reaching home, took to his bed, and died there a month

afterwards, on the 5th of December, 1518, having himself dictated this

epitaph, which was inscribed on his tomb, at Milan, “J. J. Trivulzio, son

of Anthony: he who never rested, rests. Hush!” [_J. J. Trivultius,

Antonii filius, qui nunquam quievit, quiescit. Tace!_]

Francis I., when informed that Trivulzio was near his end, regretted, it

is said, his harsh indifference, and sent to express to him his regret;

but, “It is too late,” answered the dying man. In the king’s harshness

there was something more than ungrateful forgetfulness of a veteran’s

ancient services. While Francis was bringing about a renewal of war in

Italy, in the Low Countries, and on the frontier of Spain, he was

abandoning himself at Paris, Tours, Amboise, and wherever he resided, to

all the diversions and all the enticements of the brilliant court which

was gathered around him. Extravagance and pleasure were a passion with

him. “There has been talk,” says Brantome, “of the great outlay,

magnificence, sumptuousness and halls of Lucullus; but in nought of that

kind did he ever come near our king . . . and what is most rare is,

that in a village, in the forest, at the meet, there was the same service

as there would have been in Paris. . . . One day, when the king was

expecting the Emperor Charles to dinner, word came that he had slipped

away, and had gone to give a sudden surprise to the constable, just as he

was sitting down to table, and to dine with him and all his comrades

comradewise. He found this table as well furnished and supplied, and

laden with victuals as well cooked and flavored, as if they had been in

Paris or some other good city of France; whereat the emperor was so

mightily astonished that he said that there was no such grandeur in the

world as that of such a King of France. . . . In respect of ladies,

of a surety it must be confessed that before the time of King Francis

they set foot in and frequented the court but little and in but small

numbers. It is true that Queen Anne (of Brittany) began to make her

ladies’ court larger than it had been under former queens; and, without

her, the king her husband (Louis XII.) would have taken no trouble about

it. But Francis I., coming to reign, and considering that the whole

grace of the court was the ladies, was pleased to fill it up with them

more than had been the ancient custom. Since, in truth, a court without

ladies is a garden without any pretty flowers, and more resembles a

Satrap’s or a Turk’s court than that of a great Christian king. . . .

As for me, I hold that there was never anything better introduced than

the ladies’ court. Full often have I seen our kings go to camp, or town,

or elsewhither, remain there and divert themselves for some days, and yet

take thither no ladies. But we were so bewildered, so lost, so moped,

that for the week we spent away from them and their pretty eyes it

appeared to us a year; and always a-wishing, ‘When shall we be at the

court?’ Not, full often, calling that the court where the king was, but

that where the queen and ladies were.” [_OEuvres de Brantome, edition of

the Societe de l’Histoire de France,_ t. iii. pp. 120-129.]

Now, when so many fair ladies are met together in a life of sumptuousness

and gayety, a king is pretty sure to find favorites, and royal favorites

rarely content themselves with pleasing the king; they desire to make

their favor serviceable their family and their friends. Francis I. had

made choice one, Frances de Foix, countess of Chateaubriant, beautiful

ambitious, dexterous, haughty, readily venturing upon rivalry with even

the powerful queen-mother. She had three brothers; Lautrec was one of

the three, and she supported him in all his pretensions and all his

trials of fortune. When he set out to go and take the command in Italy,

he found himself at the head of an army numerous indeed, but badly

equipped, badly paid, and at grips with Prosper Colonna, the most able

amongst the chiefs of the coalition formed at this juncture between

Charles V. and Pope Leo X. against the French. Lautrec did not succeed

in preventing Milan from falling into the hands of the Imperialists, and,

after an uncertain campaign of some months’ duration, he lost at La

Bicocca, near Monza, on the 27th of April, 1522, a battle, which left in

the power of Francis I., in Lombardy, only the citadels of Milan,

Cremona, and Novara. At the news of these reverses, Francis I. repaired

to Lyons, to consult as to the means of applying a remedy. Lautrec also

arrived there. “The king,” says Martin du Bellay, “gave him a bad

reception, as the man by whose fault he considered he had lost his duchy

of Milan, and would not speak to him.” Lautrec found an occasion for

addressing the king, and complained vehemently of “the black looks he

gave him.” “And good reason,” said the king, “when you have lost me such

a heritage as the duchy of Milan.” “‘Twas not I who lost it,” answered

Lautrec; “‘twas your Majesty yourself: I several times warned you that,

if I were not helped with money, there was no means of retaining the

men-at-arms, who had served for eighteen months without a penny, and

likewise the Swiss, who forced me to fight at a disadvantage, which they

would never have done if they had received their pay.” “I sent you four

hundred thousand crowns when you asked for them.” “I received the

letters in which your Majesty notified me of this money, but the money

never.” The king sent at once for the superintendent-general of finance,

James de Beaune, Baron of Semblancay, who acknowledged having received

orders on the subject from the king, but added that at the very moment

when he was about to send this sum to the army, the queen-mother had come

and asked him for it, and had received it from him, whereof he was ready

to make oath. Francis I. entered his mother’s room in a rage,

reproaching her with having been the cause of losing him his duchy of

Milan. “I should never have believed it of you,” he said, “that you would

have kept money ordered for the service of my army.” The queen-mother,

somewhat confused at first, excused herself by saying, that “those were

moneys proceeding from the savings which she had made out of her

revenues, and had given to the superintendent to take care of.”

Semblancay stuck to what he had said. The question became a personal one

between the queen-mother and the minister; and commissioners were

appointed to decide the difference. Chancellor Duprat was the docile

servant of Louise of Savoy and the enemy of Semblancay, whose authority

in financial matters he envied; and he chose the commissioners from

amongst the mushroom councillors he had lately brought into Parliament.

The question between the queen-mother and the superintendent led to

nothing less than the trial of Semblancay. The trial lasted five years,

and, on the 9th of April, 1527, a decree of Parliament condemned

Semblancay to the punishment of death and confiscation of all his

property; not for the particular matter which had been the origin of the

quarrel, but “as attained and convicted of larcenies, falsifications,

abuses, malversations, and maladministration of the king’s finances,

without prejudice as to the debt claimed by the said my lady, the mother

of the king.” Semblancay, accordingly, was hanged on the gibbet of

Montfaucon, on the 12th of August. In spite of certain ambiguities which

arose touching some acts of his administration and some details of his

trial, public feeling was generally and very strongly in his favor. He

was an old and faithful servant of the crown; and Francis I. had for a

long time called him “his father.” He was evidently the victim of the

queen-mother’s greed and vengeance. The firmness of his behavior, at the

time of his execution, became a popular theme in the verses of Clement

Marot:--

When Maillart, officer of hell, escorted

To Montfaucon Semblancay, doomed to die,

Which, to your thinking, of the twain supported

The better havior? I will make reply:

Maillart was like the man to death proceeding;

And Semblancay so stout an ancient looked,

It seemed, forsooth, as if himself were leading

Lieutenant Maillard--to the gallows booked!