CHAP. III.]

CHARLES THE BOLD ATTACKS THE SWISS.

153

James Galiotto and Count Campobasso; the latter of whom traitorously sold the Duke's secrets to Louis XI., and hinted how the King might seize and murder him. A more respectable coadjutor was Frederick, son of the Neapolitan King Ferdinand, whom Charles had lured with the offer of his daughter.

When the Swiss heard of the approach of the Duke of Burgundy, they were seized at first with fear. They represented to him that theirs was a poor country, and that the spurs and horses' bits of the Burgundian knights were of more value than the whole Swiss League could pay, if captured, for their ransom; and they offered, but without effect, to restore the Pays de Vaud, which they had conquered from the Count of Romont, a Prince of the house of Savoy. The Pays de Vaud was occupied by the men of Berne, and they had garrisons also in Granson and Yverdun; but Charles's army had already occupied the Jura district, when he himself appeared, early in the spring of 1476, before Granson, and took the town and castle. The Swiss army had concentrated itself at no great distance, and everybody advised Charles not to abandon his advantageous position, covered by the Lake of Neuchâtel on one side, and by his artillery on the other.1 He was, however, too proud and rash to listen to any counsels, and on March 3rd he delivered battle. Nothing could be more unskilful than his array. He himself led the van, which, instead of consisting of bowmen and light troops for skirmishing, was composed of his choicest gens d'armes, and as the road was hemmed in by the lake and mountains, they had no room to deploy. To receive the charge, the Swiss had fixed the ends of their long lances in the earth; and in order to draw them from this position by a feint the Duke ordered his first line to retreat; but this manœuvre alarmed the second line, which took to flight. At this crisis the troops of other Cantons arrived; the cry of Sauve qui peut! rose among the Burgundians; nothing could stop their flight, and the Duke himself was carried away by the stream of fugitives. the loss was ridiculously small on both sides. The Swiss captured all the Duke's artillery and camp, and rifled his vast and splendid tent. Among the spoils was the large diamond which had once sparkled in the diadem of the Great Mogul."

But

This diamond was sold by a mountaineer for a florin to a neighbouring curé, and passing from hand to hand, was at length bought by Pope Julius II. for 20,000 ducats. It still adorns the Pope's tiara. Barante, Hist. des Ducs de Bourgogne, t. vii. p. 220 (ed. 1836).

154

BATTLE OF MORAT.

[CHAP. III. This victory, though so easily won, acquired great military reputation for the Swiss. But they did not use their advantage skilfully. Although they occupied the passes leading into Burgundy, they neglected those towards the Pays de Vaud, and Charles penetrated through them to Lausanne, in the neighbourhood of which he long lay encamped, till his army was sufficiently recruited to venture another attack. He then marched against the town of Morat; but it was so valiantly defended during a fortnight by Hadrian of Bubenberg that the Swiss army had time to come to its relief. The united force of the Cantons had been joined by the nobility of Suabia and Tyrol, by the vassals of Duke Sigismund, and by the contingents of Basle and of the towns of Alsace; the young Duke René of Lorraine also fought with them. The Burgundian army is said to have been thrice as strong as the Swiss; yet the latter began the attack, June 22nd, and Charles again rashly abandoned an advantageous position to meet them. This time his defeat was bloody, as well as decisive. His loss is variously estimated at from 8,000 to 18,000 men,' including many distinguished nobles and knights; among them the Duke of Somerset, who led a band of English archers in the service of Charles. Duke Charles, with only eleven attendants, after a flight of twelve leagues, arrived at Morges on the Lake of Geneva, and proceeded thence into Gex. He had sunk into the deepest despondency; he suffered his beard and nails to grow; and his countenance resembled that of a madman, so that his courtiers and servants feared to approach him.

René II. took advantage of Charles's distress to attempt the recovery of his Duchy of Lorraine; with which view he hired some Swiss and German mercenaries and opened a secret correspondence with Campobasso. With this force and the help of his own subjects, René drove the Burgundians from the open country into the town of Nanci, to which he laid siege. Rubempré the commandant relied for the defence of the place chiefly on a body of English archers, who not choosing to endure the famine which ensued in a cause in which they were engaged merely as mercenaries, compelled him to surrender the town (October, 1476). The rage of Charles at this news was uncontrollable; though winter was approaching, he resolved immediately to

The force of armies, and the numbers of killed or wounded are very little to be relied upon in these remote periods; but the bones of those slain in this engagement formed during three centuries a

hideous monument, which the French, or rather perhaps some Burgundian reg ments, destroyed when passing this spot

in 1798.

CHAP. III.]

DEATH OF CHARLES THE BOLD.

155

attempt the recovery of Nanci, which he instructed Campobasso to invest and he himself joined the besieging army in December, though he had been able to procure but little aid from his subjects.

Meanwhile René was approaching to raise the siege with a well disciplined army, which it was evident Charles's force would be unable to withstand. Charles made an assault on the town, which was repulsed, and René then offered him battle, January 5th, 1477. Before it began, Campobasso went over to René with his Italian troops. Charles displayed both valour and conduct in the fight, and was well supported by his nobles; but it was from the first a hopeless struggle, and he was obliged to retreat towards Luxemburg. Campobasso, however, had taken up a position to intercept him; Charles's army broke and fled in all directions, and he himself, urging his horse over a half-frozen brook, was immersed and killed unrecognized. Thus perished miserably, in the midst of his ambitious dreams, Charles of Burgundy, the great Duke of the West. The peasants now rose on all sides, and for many days Lorraine presented a scene of murder and pillage. On January 10th a messenger of René appeared before Louis XI. to relate the finding of the Duke of Burgundy's body, and bearing with him Charles's battered casque in proof of his tale. By this victory young René II. recovered Lorraine.

son.

Louis betrayed an indecent joy at the death of an enemy whom he had not ventured openly to oppose. He had begun to profit by the Duke's misfortunes immediately after his defeat at GranHe instituted a process for high treason in the Parliament of Provence against the aged René, who had assisted Charles; and to frighten the old man, a dreadful sentence was pronounced against him. But Louis then entered into negotiations with him; and he was compelled to make his daughter Margaret, just set free from her captivity in London, renounce the inheritance of Provence in favour of Charles du Maine, the childless son of her father's brother, at whose death in 1481 the County of Provence devolved to the French Crown. René was compensated with the Duchy of Bar, and the payment by Louis of Margaret's

ransom.

The death of Charles offered the opportunity of seizing Burgundy, the most important of all the French fiefs. Immediately on receiving intelligence of that event the King ordered La Trémoille, who commanded a corps of observation in the territory of Bar, and Chaumont d'Amboise, Governor of Champagne,

156

LOUIS XI. SEIZES BURGUNDY.

[CHAP. IIL to take military possession of both Burgundies, and to announce to the inhabitants his intention of affiancing Mary of Burgundy, his god-daughter, to the Dauphin. At the same time royal letters were addressed to the "good towns" of the Duchy to recall to their recollection that the said Duchy belonged to the Crown and Kingdom of France, though the King protested that he would protect the right of Mademoiselle de Bourgogne as if it were his own. Louis also revived his claim to Flanders, Ponthieu, Boulogne, Artois, and other lands and lordships previously held by the Duke of Burgundy. To conciliate John, Prince of Orange, whom he had formerly despoiled of his principality, and who had been confidentially employed by the Duke of Burgundy, the King named him his Governor in the Burgundian Duchy and County, and promised to restore his lands. Commissaries were appointed to take possession of Burgundy, who required the Burgundian States, assembled at Dijon, to do homage to the King of France: but the States raised a difficulty by asserting that they did not believe in Charles's death; a very common opinion, though his body had been exhibited six days at Nanci. A report ran that he was a prisoner in Germany; another that he was hidden in the Forest of Ardennes. In their dilemma, the States appealed to Charles's daughter, Mary, and the faithful counsellors by whom she was surrounded; who answered, that Louis's claim to Burgundy was unfounded, that Duchy being in a different situation from other fiefs vested as appanages in French Princes; and at all events, if the King insisted on uniting Burgundy to the French Crown, that it contained several lordships to which he could make no pretensions; especially the Counties of Charolais, Mâcon, and Auxerre. The Burgundians, however, did not think it wise to incur Louis's anger, and did him homage, January 19th, 1477; though a few towns, as Chalon, Beaune, Semur, made some show of resistance. Franche-Comté also submitted, though this province was feudally dependent, not on the Crown of France, but on the Empire.

Mary herself was in still greater embarrassment than the Burgundians. The different provinces of the Netherlands had their own separate rights and privileges, and all of them had more or less felt themselves aggrieved by the despotic and military authority exercised by Charles's ministers. The wealthy and industrious citizens of Bruges, Antwerp, Brussels, and other towns had been oppressed and disgusted by the insolence and extortion of Charles's nobles; and they rose in opposition to the collectors of

the taxes. The States of Flanders assembled at Ghent, before they would support the government with their money, obtained a promise from Mary that their privileges should be confirmed, and the abuses of the previous government abolished. It was now that she granted to the Hollanders and Zealanders the charter called the Grand Privilege, by which all the effectual rights of sovereignty were transferred to the local States. Mary agreed by this instrument that she would neither raise taxes nor conclude a marriage without their consent; that they might assemble without her authority; that she would undertake no war, not even a defensive one, without their approval; that the right of coining money should be vested in them; lastly, that they should choose their own magistrates, she only enjoying the privilege of selecting from the names presented to her.

Meanwhile Louis was engaged in reducing the towns in Picardy. At Péronne he was waited on by Mary's Chancellor, Hugonet, and the Sire d'Humbercourt, with a letter, in which she signified that the government was in her hands, naming the members of it, and that Hugonet and Humbercourt had full powers to treat. In reality, however, Mary was now entirely under the control of the Flemish States, who contemplated erecting a sort of Republic, and had appointed a regency quite independently of her. Louis listened not to her envoys, who had scarcely departed when a deputation came to him from the States of Flanders and Brabant to negotiate a peace; and they remarked that Mary was entirely guided by the advice of her three Estates. "You are mistaken," answered Louis; "Mademoiselle de Bourgogne conducts her affairs through people who do not wish for peace; you will be disavowed," and he handed to the deputies the letter presented to him by Mary's envoys. The deputies returned in fury to Ghent, where they presented themselves at the levée of the Duchess to give a public account of their mission. mentioned the letter, Mary exclaimed that it was an imposture, and that she had never written anything of the kind. words the Pensionary of Ghent, the head of the deputation, drew the fatal despatch from his bosom, and handed it to her before the assembly. Mary was struck dumb with astonishment and shame.

When they

At these

The same evening Hugonet and Humbercourt were arrested. They had previously been very unpopular; the people were lashed into fury against them by the addresses of certain intriguers; they were arraigned, and after being dreadfully tortured, were con