The History of the Reign of Ferdinand and Isabella the Catholic Volume III Part 11

From the moment hostilities were brought to a close; Gonsalvo displayed such generous sympathy for his late enemies, and such humanity in relieving them, as to reflect more honor on his character than all his victories. He scrupulously enforced the faithful performance of the treaty, and severely punished any violence offered to the French by his own men. His benign and courteous demeanor towards the vanquished, so remote from the images of terror with which he had been, hitherto a.s.sociated in their minds, excited unqualified admiration; and they testified their sense of his amiable qualities, by speaking of him as the "gentil capitaine et gentil cavalier." [14]

The news of the rout of the Garigliano and the surrender of Gaeta diffused general gloom and consternation over France. There was scarcely a family of rank, says a writer of that country, that had not some one of its members involved in these sad disasters. [15] The court went into mourning. The king, mortified at the discomfiture of all his lofty schemes, by the foe whom he despised, shut himself up in his palace, refusing access to every one, until the agitation of his spirits threw him into an illness, which had wellnigh proved fatal.

Meanwhile his exasperated feelings found an object on which to vent themselves in the unfortunate garrison of Gaeta, who so pusillanimously abandoned their post to return to their own country. He commanded them to winter in Italy, and not to recross the Alps without further orders. He sentenced Sandricourt and Allegre to banishment for insubordination to their commander-in-chief; the latter, for his conduct, more particularly, before the battle of Cerignola; and he hanged up the commissaries of the army, whose infamous peculations had been a princ.i.p.al cause of its ruin.

[16]

But the impotent wrath of their monarch was not needed to fill the bitter cup, which the French soldiers were now draining to the dregs. A large number of those, who embarked for Genoa, died of the maladies contracted during their long bivouac in the marshes of Minturnae. The rest recrossed the Alps into France, too desperate to heed their master's prohibition.

Those who took their way by land suffered still more severely from the Italian peasantry, who retaliated in full measure the barbarities they had so long endured from the French. They were seen wandering like spectres along the high roads and princ.i.p.al cities on the route, pining with cold and famine; and all the hospitals in Rome, as well as the stables, sheds, and every other place, however mean, affording shelter, were filled with the wretched vagabonds, eager only to find some obscure retreat to die in.

The chiefs of the expedition fared little better. Among others, the marquis of Saluzzo, soon after reaching Genoa, was carried off by a fever, caused by his distress of mind. Sandricourt, too haughty to endure disgrace, laid violent hands on himself. Allegre, more culpable, but more courageous, survived to be reconciled with his sovereign, and to die a soldier's death on the field of battle. [17]

Such are the dismal colors in which the French historians depict the last struggle made by their monarch for the recovery of Naples. Few military expeditions have commenced under more brilliant and imposing auspices; few have been conducted in so ill-advised a manner through their whole progress; and none attended in their close with more indiscriminate and overwhelming ruin.

On the 3d of January, 1504, Gonsalvo made his entry into Gaeta; and the thunders of his ordnance, now for the first time heard from its battlements, announced that this strong key to the dominions of Naples had pa.s.sed into the hands of Aragon. After a short delay for the refreshment of his troops, he set out for the capital. But, amidst the general jubilee which greeted his return, he was seized with a fever, brought on by the incessant fatigue and high mental excitement in which he had been kept for the last four months. The attack was severe, and the event for some time doubtful. During this state of suspense the public mind was in the deepest agitation. The popular manners of Gonsalvo had won the hearts of the giddy people of Naples, who transferred their affections, indeed, as readily as their allegiance; and prayers and vows for his restoration, were offered up in all the churches and monasteries of the city. His excellent const.i.tution at length got the better of his disease. As soon as this favorable result was ascertained, the whole population, rus.h.i.+ng to the other extreme, abandoned itself to a delirium of joy; and, when he was sufficiently recovered to give them audience, men of all ranks thronged to Castel Nuovo to tender their congratulations, and obtain a sight of the hero, who now returned to their capital, for the third time, with the laurel of victory on his brow. Every tongue, says his enthusiastic biographer, was eloquent in his praise; some dwelling on his n.o.ble port, and the beauty of his countenance; others on the elegance and amenity of his manners; and all dazzled by a spirit of munificence, which would have become royalty itself. [18]

The tide of panegyric was swelled by more than one bard, who sought, though with indifferent success, to catch inspiration from so glorious a theme; trusting doubtless that his liberal hand would not stint the recompense to the precise measure of desert. Amid this general burst of adulation, the muse of Sannazaro, worth all his tribe, was alone silent; for the trophies of the conqueror were raised on the ruins of that royal house, under which the bard had been so long sheltered; and this silence, so rare in his tuneful brethren, must be admitted to reflect more credit on his name, than the best he ever sung. [19]

The first business of Gonsalvo was to call together the different orders of the state, and receive their oaths of allegiance to King Ferdinand. He next occupied himself with the necessary arrangements for the reorganization of the government, and for reforming various abuses which had crept into the administration of justice, more particularly. In these attempts to introduce order, he was not a little thwarted, however, by the insubordination of his own soldiery, They loudly clamored for the discharge of the arrears, still shamefully protracted, till, their discontents swelling to open mutiny, they forcibly seized on two of the princ.i.p.al places in the kingdom as security for the payment. Gonsalvo chastised their insolence by disbanding several of the most refractory companies, and sending them home for punishment. He endeavored to relieve them in part by raising contributions from the Neapolitans. But the soldiers took the matter into their own hands, oppressing the unfortunate people on whom they were quartered in a manner which rendered their condition scarcely more tolerable, than when exposed to the horrors of actual war. [20] This was the introduction, according to Guicciardini, of those systematic military exactions in time of peace, which became so common afterwards in Italy, adding an inconceivable amount to the long catalogue of woes which afflicted that unhappy land. [21]

Amidst his manifold duties, Gonsalvo did not forget the gallant officers who had borne with him the burdens of the war, and he requited their services in a princely style, better suited to his feelings than his interests, as subsequently appeared. Among them were Navarro, Mendoza, Andrada, Benavides, Leyva, the Italians Alviano and the two Colonnas, most of whom lived to display the lessons of tactics, which they learned under this great commander, on a still wider theatre of glory, in the reign of Charles the Fifth. He made them grants of cities, fortresses, and extensive lands, according to their various claims, to be held as fiefs of the crown. All this was done with the previous sanction of his royal master, Ferdinand the Catholic. They did some violence, however, to his more economical spirit, and he was heard somewhat peevishly to exclaim, "It boots little for Gonsalvo de Cordova to have won a kingdom for me, if he lavishes it all away before it comes into my hands." It began to be perceived at court that the Great Captain was too powerful for a subject.

[22]

Meanwhile, Louis the Twelfth was filled with serious apprehensions for the fate of his possessions in the north of Italy. His former allies, the emperor Maximilian and the republic of Venice, the latter more especially, had shown many indications, not merely of coldness to himself, but of a secret understanding with his rival, the king of Spain. The restless pope, Julius the Second, had schemes of his own, wholly independent of France.

The republics of Pisa and Genoa, the latter one of her avowed dependencies, had entered into correspondence with the Great Captain, and invited him to a.s.sume their protection; while several of the disaffected party in Milan had a.s.sured him of their active support, in case he would march with a sufficient force to overturn the existing government. Indeed, not only France, but Europe in general, expected that the Spanish commander would avail himself of the present crisis, to push his victorious arms into upper Italy, revolutionize Tuscany in his way, and, wresting Milan from the French, drive them, crippled and disheartened by their late reverses, beyond the Alps. [23]

But Gonsalvo had occupation enough on his hands in settling the disordered state of Naples. King Ferdinand, his sovereign, notwithstanding the ambition of universal conquest absurdly imputed to him by the French writers, had no design to extend his acquisitions beyond what he could permanently maintain. His treasury, never overflowing, was too deeply drained by the late heavy demands on it, for him so soon to embark on another perilous enterprise, that must rouse anew the swarms of enemies, who seemed willing to rest in quiet after their long and exhausting struggle; nor is there any reason to suppose he sincerely contemplated such a movement for a moment. [24]

The apprehension of it, however, answered Ferdinand's purpose, by preparing the French monarch to arrange his differences with his rival, as the latter now earnestly desired, by negotiation. Indeed, two Spanish ministers had resided during the greater part of the war at the French court, with the view of improving the first opening that should occur for accomplis.h.i.+ng this object; and by their agency a treaty was concluded, to continue for three years, which guaranteed to Aragon the undisturbed possession of her conquests during that period. The chief articles provided for the immediate cessation of hostilities between the belligerents, and the complete re-establishment of their commercial relations and intercourse, with the exception of Naples, from which the French were to be excluded. The Spanish crown was to have full power to reduce all refractory places in that kingdom; and the contracting parties solemnly pledged themselves, each to render no a.s.sistance, secretly or openly, to the enemies of the other. The treaty, which was to run from the 25th of February, 1504, was signed by the French king and the Spanish plenipotentiaries at Lyons, on the 11th of that month, and ratified by Ferdinand and Isabella, at the convent of Santa Maria de la Mejorada, the 31st of March following. [25]

There was still a small spot in the heart of Naples, comprehending Venosa and several adjoining towns, where Louis d'Ars and his brave a.s.sociates yet held out against the Spanish arms. Although cut off by the operation of this treaty from the hope of further support from home, the French knight disdained to surrender; but sallied out at the head of his little troop of gallant veterans, and thus, armed at all points, says Brantome, with lance in rest, took his way through Naples, and the centre of Italy.

He marched in battle array, levying contributions for his support on the places through which he pa.s.sed. In this manner he entered France, and presented himself before the court at Blois. The king and queen, delighted with his prowess, came forward to welcome him, and made good cheer, says the old chronicler, for himself and his companions, whom they recompensed with liberal largesses, proffering at the same time any boon to the brave knight, which he should demand for himself. The latter in return simply requested that his old comrade Ives d'Allegre should be recalled from exile. This trait of magnanimity, when contrasted with the general ferocity of the times, has something in it inexpressibly pleasing. It shows, like others recorded of the French gentlemen of that period, that the age of chivalry,--the chivalry of romance, indeed,--had not wholly pa.s.sed away. [26]

The pacification of Lyons sealed the fate of Naples; and, while it terminated the wars in that kingdom, closed the military career of Gonsalvo de Cordova. It is impossible to contemplate the magnitude of the results, achieved with such slender resources, and in the face of such overwhelming odds, without deep admiration for the genius of the man by whom they were accomplished.

His success, it is true, is imputable in part to the signal errors of his adversaries. The magnificent expedition of Charles the Eighth failed to produce any permanent impression, chiefly in consequence of the precipitation with which it had been entered into, without sufficient concert with the Italian states, who became a formidable enemy when united in his rear. He did not even avail himself of his temporary acquisition of Naples to gather support from the attachment of his new subjects. Far from incorporating with them, he was regarded as a foreigner and an enemy, and, as such, expelled by the joint action of all Italy from its bosom, as soon as it had recovered sufficient strength to rally.

Louis the Twelfth profited by the errors of his predecessor. His acquisitions in the Milanese formed a basis for future operations; and by negotiation and otherwise he secured the alliance and the interests of the various Italian governments on his side. These preliminary arrangements were followed by preparations every way commensurate with his object. He failed in the first campaign, however, by intrusting the command to incompetent hands, consulting birth rather than talent or experience.

In the succeeding campaigns, his failure, though partly chargeable on himself, was less so than on circ.u.mstances beyond his control. The first of these was the long detention of the army before Rome by Cardinal D'Amboise, and its consequent exposure to the unexampled severity of the ensuing winter. A second was the fraudulent conduct of the commissaries, implying, no doubt, some degree of negligence in the person who appointed them; and lastly, the want of a suitable commander-in-chief of the army.

La Tremouille being ill, and D'Aubigny a prisoner in the hands of the enemy, there appeared no one among the French qualified to cope with the Spanish general. The marquis of Mantua, independently of the disadvantage of being a foreigner, was too timid in council, and dilatory in conduct, to be any way competent to this difficult task.

If his enemies, however, committed great errors, it is altogether owing to Gonsalvo that he was in a situation to take advantage of them. Nothing could be more unpromising than his position on first entering Calabria.

Military operations had been conducted in Spain on principles totally different from those which prevailed in the rest of Europe. This was the case especially in the late Moorish wars, where the old tactics and the character of the ground brought light cavalry chiefly into use. This, indeed, const.i.tuted his princ.i.p.al strength at this period; for his infantry, though accustomed to irregular service, was indifferently armed and disciplined. An important revolution, however, had occurred in the other parts of Europe. The infantry had there regained the superiority which it maintained in the days of the Greeks and Romans. The experiment had been made on more than one b.l.o.o.d.y field; and it was found that the solid columns of Swiss and German pikes not only bore down all opposition in their onward march, but presented an impregnable barrier, not to be shaken by the most desperate charges of the best heavy-armed cavalry. It was against these dreaded battalions that Gonsalvo was now called to measure for the first time the bold but rudely armed and comparatively raw recruits from Galicia and the Asturias.

He lost his first battle, into which it should be remembered he was precipitated against his will. He proceeded afterwards with the greatest caution, gradually familiarizing his men with the aspect and usages of the enemy whom they held in such awe, before bringing them again to a direct encounter. He put himself to school during this whole campaign, carefully acquainting himself with the tactics, discipline, and novel arms of his adversaries, and borrowing just so much as he could incorporate into the ancient system of the Spaniards, without discarding the latter altogether.

Thus, while he retained the short sword and buckler of his countrymen, he fortified his battalions with a large number of spearmen, after the German fas.h.i.+on. The arrangement is highly commended by the sagacious Machiavelli, who considers it as combining the advantages of both systems, since, while the long spear served all the purposes of resistance, or even of attack on level ground, the short swords and targets enabled their wearers, as already noticed, to cut in under the dense array of hostile pikes, and bring the enemy to close quarters, where his formidable weapon was of no avail. [27]

While Gonsalvo made this innovation in the arms and tactics, he paid equal attention to the formation of a suitable character in his soldiery. The circ.u.mstances in which he was placed at Barleta, and on the Garigliano, imperatively demanded this. Without food, clothes, or pay, without the chance even of retrieving his desperate condition by venturing a blow at the enemy, the Spanish soldier was required to remain pa.s.sive. To do this demanded, patience, abstinence, strict subordination, and a degree of resolution far higher than that required to combat obstacles, however formidable in themselves, where active exertion, which tasks the utmost energies of the soldier, renews his spirits and raises them to a contempt of danger. It was calling on him, in short, to begin with achieving that most difficult of all victories, the victory over himself.

All this the Spanish commander effected. He infused into his men a portion of his own invincible energy. He inspired a love of his person, which led them to emulate his example, and a confidence in his genius and resources, which supported them under all their privations by a firm reliance on a fortunate issue. His manners were distinguished by a graceful courtesy, less enc.u.mbered with etiquette than was usual with persons of his high rank in Castile. He knew well the proud and independent feelings of the Spanish soldier; and, far from annoying him by unnecessary restraints, showed the most liberal indulgence at all times. But his kindness was tempered with severity, which displayed itself, on such occasions as required interposition, in a manner that rarely failed to repress everything like insubordination. The reader will readily recall an example of this in the mutiny before Tarento; and it was doubtless by the a.s.sertion of similar power, that he was so long able to keep in check his German mercenaries, distinguished above the troops of every other nation by their habitual license and contempt of authority.

While Gonsalvo relied so freely on the hardy const.i.tution and patient habits of the Spaniards, he trusted no less to the deficiency of these qualities in the French, who, possessing little of the artificial character formed under the stern training of later times, resembled their Gaulish ancestors in the facility with which they were discouraged by unexpected obstacles, and the difficulty with which they could be brought to rally. [28] In this he did not miscalculate. The French infantry, drawn from the militia of the country, hastily collected and soon to be disbanded, and the independent n.o.bility and gentry who composed the cavalry service, were alike difficult to be brought within the strict curb of military rule. The severe trials, which steeled the souls, and gave sinewy strength to the const.i.tutions, of the Spanish soldiers, impaired those of their enemies, introduced divisions into their councils, and relaxed the whole tone of discipline. Gonsalvo watched the operation of all this, and, coolly waiting the moment when his weary and disheartened adversary should be thrown off his guard, collected all his strength for a decisive blow, by which to terminate the action. Such was the history of those memorable campaigns, which closed with the brilliant victories of Cerignola and the Garigliano.

In a review of his military conduct, we must not overlook his politic deportment towards the Italians, altogether the reverse of the careless and insolent bearing of the French. He availed himself liberally of their superior science, showing great deference, and confiding the most important trusts, to their officers. [29] Far from the reserve usually shown to foreigners, he appeared insensible to national distinctions, and ardently embraced them as companions in arms, embarked in a common cause with himself. In their tourney with the French before Barleta, to which the whole nation attached such importance as a vindication of national honor, they were entirely supported by Gonsalvo, who furnished them with arms, secured a fair field of fight, and shared the triumph of the victors as that of his own countrymen,--paying those delicate attentions, which cost far less, indeed, but to an honorable mind are of greater value, than more substantial benefits. He conciliated the good-will of the Italian states by various important services; of the Venetians, by his gallant defence of their possessions in the Levant; of the people of Rome, by delivering them from the pirates of Ostia; while he succeeded, notwithstanding the excesses of his soldiery, in captivating the giddy Neapolitans to such a degree, by his affable manners and splendid style of life, as seemed to efface from their minds every recollection of the last and most popular of their monarchs, the unfortunate Frederic.

The distance of Gonsalvo's theatre of operations from his own country, apparently most discouraging, proved extremely favorable to his purposes.

The troops, cut off from retreat by a wide sea and an impa.s.sable mountain barrier, had no alternative but to conquer or to die. Their long continuance in the field without disbanding gave them all the stern, inflexible qualities of a standing army; and, as they served through so many successive campaigns under the banner of the same leader, they were drilled in a system of tactics far steadier and more uniform than could be acquired under a variety of commanders, however able. Under these circ.u.mstances, which so well fitted them for receiving impressions, the Spanish army was gradually moulded into the form determined by the will of its great chief.

When we look at the amount offered at the disposal of Gonsalvo, it appears so paltry, especially compared with the gigantic apparatus of later wars, that it may well suggest disparaging ideas of the whole contest. To judge correctly, we must direct our eyes to the result. With this insignificant force, we shall then see the kingdom of Naples conquered, and the best generals and armies of France annihilated; an important innovation effected in military science; the art of mining, if not invented, carried to unprecedented perfection; a thorough reform introduced in the arms and discipline of the Spanish soldier; and the organization completed of that valiant infantry, which is honestly eulogized by a French writer, as irresistible in attack, and impossible to rout; [30] and which carried the banners of Spain victorious, for more than a century, over the most distant parts of Europe.

The brilliant qualities and achievements of Gonzalo de Cordova have naturally made him a popular theme both for history and romance. Various biographies of him have appeared in the different European languages, though none, I believe, hitherto in English. The authority of princ.i.p.al reference in these pages is the Life which Paolo Giovio has incorporated in his great work, "Vitae Ill.u.s.trium Virorum," which I have elsewhere noticed. This Life of Gonsalvo is not exempt from the prejudices, nor from the minor inaccuracies, which may be charged on most of this author's productions; but these are abundantly compensated by the stores of novel and interesting details which Giovio's familiarity with the princ.i.p.al actors of the time enabled him to throw into his work, and by the skilful arrangement. of his narrative, so disposed as, without studied effort, to bring into light the prominent qualities of his hero. Every page bears the marks of that "golden pen," which the politic Italian reserved for his favorites; and, while this obvious partiality may put the reader somewhat on his guard, it gives an interest to the work, inferior to none other of his agreeable compositions.

The most imposing of the Spanish memoirs of Gonsalvo, in bulk at least, is the "Chronica del Gran Capitan," Alcala de Henares, 1584. Nic. Antonio doubts whether the author were Pulgar, who wrote the "History of the Catholic Kings," of such frequent reference in the Granadine wars', or another Pulgar del Salar, as he is called, who received the honors of knighthood from King Ferdinand for his valorous exploits against the Moors. (See Bibliotheca Uova, tom. i. p. 387.) With regard to the first Pulgar, there is no reason to suppose that he lived into the sixteenth century; and, as to the second, the work composed by him, so far from being the one in question, was a compendium, bearing the t.i.tle of "Sumario de los Hechos del Gran Capitan," printed as early as 1527, at Seville, (See the editor's prologue to Pulgar's "Chronica de los Reyes Catolicos,"

ed Valencia, 1780.) Its author, therefore, remains in obscurity. He sustains no great damage on the score of reputation, however, from this circ.u.mstance; as his work is but an indifferent specimen of the rich old Spanish chronicle, exhibiting most of its characteristic blemishes, with a very small admixture of its beauties. The long and prosy narrative is overloaded with the most frivolous details, trumpeted forth in a strain of glorification, which sometimes disfigures more meritorious compositions in the Castilian. Nothing like discrimination of character, of course, is to be looked for in the unvarying swell of panegyric, which claims for its subject all the extravagant flights of a hero of romance. With these deductions, however, and a liberal allowance, consequently, for the nationality of the work, it has considerable value as a record of events, too recent in their occurrence to be seriously defaced by those deeper stains of error, which are so apt to settle on the weather-beaten monuments of antiquity. It has accordingly formed a princ.i.p.al source of the "Vida del Gran Capitan," introduced by Quintana in the first volume of his "Espanoles Celebres," printed at Madrid, in 1807. This memoir, in which the incidents are selected with discernment, displays the usual freedom and vivacity of its poetic author. It does not bring the general politics of the period under review, but will not be found deficient in particulars having immediate connection with the personal history of its subject; and, on the whole, exhibits in an agreeable and compendious form whatever is of most interest or importance for the general reader.

The French have also a "Histoire de Gonsalve de Cordoue," composed by Father Duponcet, a Jesuit, in two vols. 12mo, Paris, 1714. Though an ambitious, it is a bungling performance, most unskilfully put together, and contains quite as much of what its hero did not do, as of what he did.

The prolixity of the narrative is not even relieved by the piquancy of style, which forms something like a subst.i.tute for thought in many of the lower order of French historians. It is less to history, however, than to romance, that the French public is indebted for its conceptions of the character of Gonsalvo de Cordova, as depicted by the gaudy pencil of Florian, in that highly poetic coloring, which is more attractive to the majority of readers than the cold and sober delineations of truth.

The contemporary French accounts of the Neapolitan wars of Louis XII. are extremely meagre, and few in number. The most striking, on the whole, is D'Auton's chronicle, composed in the true chivalrous vein of old Froissart, but unfortunately terminating before the close of the first campaign. St. Gelais and Claude Seyssel touch very lightly on this part of their subject. History becomes in their hands, moreover, little better than fulsome panegyric, carried to such a height, indeed, by the latter writer, as brought on him the most severe strictures from his contemporaries; so that he was compelled to take up the pen more than once in his own vindication. The "Memoires de Bayard," Fleurange, and La Tremouille, so diffuse in most military details, are nearly silent in regard to those of the Neapolitan war. The truth is, the subject was too ungrateful in itself, and presented too unbroken a series of calamities and defeats, to invite the attention of the French historians, who willingly turned to those brilliant pa.s.sages in this reign, more soothing to national vanity.

The blank has been filled up, or rather attempted to be so, by the a.s.siduity of their later writers. Among these, occasionally consulted by me, are Varillas, whose "Histoire de Louis XII.," loose as it is, rests on a somewhat more solid basis than his metaphysical reveries, a.s.suming the t.i.tle of "Politique de Ferdinand," already repeatedly noticed; Garnier, whose perspicuous narrative, if inferior to that of Gaillard in acuteness and epigrammatic point, makes a much nearer approach to truth; and, lastly, Sismondi, who, if he may be charged, in his "Histoire des Francais," with some of the defect incident to indiscreet rapidity of composition, succeeds by a few brief and animated touches in opening deeper views into character and conduct than can be got from volumes of ordinary writers.

The want of authentic materials for a perfect acquaintance with the reign of Louis XII. is a subject of complaint with French writers themselves.

The memoirs of the period, occupied with the more dazzling military transactions, make no attempt to instruct us in the interior organization or policy of the government. One might imagine, that their authors lived a century before Philippe de Comines, instead of coming after him, so inferior are they, in all the great properties of historic composition, to this eminent statesman. The French _savans_ have made slender contributions to the stock of original doc.u.ments collected more than two centuries ago by G.o.defroy for the ill.u.s.tration of this reign. It can scarcely be supposed, however, that the labors of this early antiquary exhausted the department, in which the French are rich beyond all others, and that those, who work the same mine hereafter, should not find valuable materials for a broader foundation of this interesting portion of their history.

It is fortunate that the reserve of the French in regard to their relations with Italy, at this time, has been abundantly compensated by the labors of the most eminent contemporary writers of the latter country, as Bembo, Machiavelli, Giovio, and the philosophic Guicciardini; whose situation as Italians enabled them to maintain the balance of historic truth undisturbed, at least by undue partiality for either of the two great rival powers; whose high public stations introduced them to the princ.i.p.al characters of the day, and to springs of action hidden from vulgar eyes; and whose superior science, as well as genius, qualified them for rising above the humble level of garrulous chronicle and memoir to the cla.s.sic dignity of history. It is with regret that we must now strike into a track unillumined by the labors of these great masters of their art in modern times.

Since the publication of this History, the Spanish Minister at Was.h.i.+ngton, Don Angel Calderon de la Barca, did me the favor to send me a copy of the biography above noticed as the "Sumario de los Hechos del Gran Capitan."

It is a recent reprint from the ancient edition of 1527, of which the industrious editor, Don F. Martinez de la Rosa, was able to find but one copy in Spain. In its new form, it covers about a hundred duodecimo pages.

It has positive value, as a contemporary doc.u.ment, and as such I gladly avail myself of it. But the greater part is devoted to the early history of Gonsalvo, over which my limits have compelled me to pa.s.s lightly; and, for the rest, I am happy to find, on the perusal of it, nothing of moment, which conflicts with the statements drawn from other sources. The able editor has also combined an interesting notice of its author, Pulgar, _El de las Hazanas_, one of those heroes whose doughty feats shed the illusions of knight-errantry over the war of Granada.

FOOTNOTES

[1] He succeeded Garcila.s.so de la Vega at the court of Rome. Oviedo says, in reference to the ill.u.s.trious house of Rojas, "En todas las historias de Espana no se hallan tantos caballeros de un linage y nombre notados por valerosos caballeros y valientes milites como deste nombre de Rojas."

Quincuagenas, MS., bat. 1, quinc. 2, dial. 8.

[2] Mariana, Hist. de Espana, tom. ii. lib. 28, cap. 5.--Guicciardini, Istoria, lib. 6, pp. 319, 320.--Zurita, a.n.a.les, tom. v. lib. 5, cap. 48, 57.--Abarca, Reyes de Aragon, tom. ii. rey 30, cap. 14, sec. 4, 5.--Daru, Hist. de Venise, tom. iii. pp. 364, 365.

[3] Giovio, Vitae Ill.u.s.t. Virorum, pp. 267, 268.--Ulloa, Vita di Carlo V., fol. 22.--Guicciardini, Istoria, tom. i. lib. 6, pp. 329, 330.-- Machiavelli, Legazione Prima a Roma, let. 36.

[4] Chronica del Gran Capitan, lib. 2, cap. 110.--Bernaldez, Reyes Catolicos, MS., cap. 189.--Giovio, Vita Magni Gonsalvi, lib. 3, fol. 266.

--Zurita, Historia del Rey Hernando, tom. i. lib. 5, cap. 60.--Peter Martyr, Opus Epist., epist. 270.--Buonaccorsi, Diario, p. 84.

[5] Bernaldez, Reyes Catolicos, MS., cap. 189.--Ulloa, Vita di Carlo V., fol. 22, 23.--Guicciardini, Istoria, p. 330.--Garnier, Hist. de France, tom. v. pp. 448, 449.--Chronica del Gran Capitan, lib. 2, cap. 110.-- Abarca, Reyes de Aragon, tom. ii. rey 30, cap. 14, sec. 6.--Zurita, a.n.a.les, tom. v. lib. 5, cap. 60.--Senarega, apud Muratori, Rerum Ital.

Script., tom. xxiv. p. 579.