him for the great estates he enjoyed in right of his wife; and obtained an order for their sequestration. This nearly drove him to despair; and he joined the emperor Charles V., and the king of England, in an invasion of France. It was planned for the duke to have Provence and Dauphine, with the title of a kingdom. This conspiracy was detected by Francis in its infancy, on which Bourbon escaped into Italy. Here he was declared the emperor's lieutenant-general, and, in conjunction with Pescara, he defeated the French army under Bonivet, in 1524, and drove it out of Italy. In the midst of this severe vengeance exercised against his lawful sovereign, it deserves record that he refused to recognize Henry VIII's title to the crown of France, which was a condition of that vain prince's aid. In 1525, when Francis had laid siege to Pavia, Bourbon advanced to its relief, and contributed much to the victory, in which that prince lost his liberty. He followed the captive monarch to Madrid, in order to treat concerning his own interests. Charles received him with great distinction, but the Spanish honour made him feel that his successes did not, in the eyes of the nation, varnish over his treason. The marquis of Villena, being desired by Charles to accommodate Bourbon with his palace at Toledo, said, that he could not refuse his sovereign's request, but that the emperor must not be surprised if he should burn it to the ground the moment the constable had left it, as having harboured a traitor. On the death of Pescara, the emperor made him general-in-chief of his forces in Italy, and gave him a grant of the duchy of Milan. Of this he took possession by force, driving out the late duke, Sforza. His motley army, however, consisting of Spanish and German mercenaries, fierce and rapacious, were not to be satisfied without full payment of arrears, and the advancement of pronised gifts. He was at length compelled to advance with his army towards the heart of Italy, bent on a scheme of plunder, which for some time remained dubious. Rome and Florence both trembled at his advance. The difficulties of the march, and want of necessaries, caused a mutiny to break out in his camp, which few generals but himself could have quelled. "My children," he often cried, "I am a poor cavalier, not a Jenny richer than any of you. We will make our fortunes together." Rome was, at length, the declared object which was to repay their toils. On May 5, 1527, Bourbon's army came in sight of the metropolis of the Christian_world, and the next morning was destined for the assault. On that day Bourbon put on a white vest over his armour, in order, as he said, to be more conspicuous both to friends and enemies. He led on to the walls, and a furious attack commenced, which was repelled with equal resolution. Seeing his men waver, the constable leaped from his horse, snatched a scaling ladder

from a soldier, and began to ascend. At the instant a musket ball pierced his groin, and he fell. Perceiving the wound to be mortal, he desired the by-standers to cover his body with a cloak, that it might not be seen by his men, and then expired. Thus he died, a traitor to his king and country, and the author of an enterprise which, for months filled a metropolis with every horror and calamity that military licentiousness could inflict. Yet his provocations were great; and he is universally allowed to have possessed qualities worthy of a better cause and fate.

LOUISA of SAVOY, countess of Angouleme, mother of Francis I., who succeeded to the throne of France, in 1515, on the demise of Lewis, XII., his great uncle, and with whom expired the elder branch of the house of Orleans. Immediately on h's accession, he raised Angouleme into a duchy, from motives of filial affection. Louisa had been in person eminently beautiful, and even then the hand of time had scarcely been able to diminish the splendour of her charms, while the gifts of nature had been carefully improved and embellished by the acquisitions of art. Born with strong talents, and a mind active, vigorous, penetrating, and decisive, she aimed at the acquisition of power, and braved, unappalled, the most furious storms of adversity, but, unhappily for the nation, her virtues were greatly overbalanced by her vices, her passions were strong and impetuous, and to their gratification she sacrificed all that a woman should hold dear in life; vain, avaricious, intriguing, and jealous, implacable in her resentments, impatient of controul, and insatiate in her avarice, she thwarted the best concerted projects of her son, and occasioned the greatest distress to the nation. When Francis on his Italian expedition, left his mother regent of the kingdom, and after his return from it, when his duchy of Milan was threatened to be invaded by the Pope, and Lautrec was appointed to be its governor, Louisa, partly through avarice, and partly from the inveterate dislike she had conceived for Lautrec, who had been rather too free in his remarks on the numerous adventures to which her disposition had given rise, seized the three hundred thousand crowns, which had been raised for the pay of the Milanese troops, and appropriated them to her

own use.

Lautrec performed prodigies of valour, but the Swiss mercenaries who formed the greater part of his army, enraged at not receiving their pay, left him and retired to their own country, and Lautrec was obliged to return to France. The king was so enraged at the loss of the Milanese, that at first he refused to see him, but having at length obtained an audience, he justified himself by imputing the disasters of the campaign, to the want of the promised money. Francis, who

was ignorant of his mother's conduct, flew into a violent passion with Semblancy, superintendant of the finances, peremptorily insisting on knowing what was become of the money, which he had ordered to be sent to Italy; the minister, a man of integrity and virtue, who had grown grey in the service of his country, confessed he had been obliged to pay it to the duchess of Angouleme, who had taken the consequences upon herself, but that infamous woman, sacrificing every principle of honour to avarice and revenge, had the presumption to deny the fact, and though Semblancy, in his own defence, produced her receipt, she still persisted in the denial, maintaining that the receipt was given for another sum of the same amount. Though Semblancy was justified in the eyes of his sovereign, and continued to enjoy his place a little longer, yet the vindictive Louisa soon suborned one of his clerks to accuse him of peculation; he was committed to the Bastile, tried by partial judges, and at length executed on a gibbet. Her affections had long been fixed on the duke of Bourbon, but finding her love rejected by a prince sincerely attached to his wife, her love was converted into hatred, and she prejudiced the king against him. But the death of the duchess of Bourbon, revived her former tenderness, she sacrificed her resentment to love, and offered her hand to the disconsolate duke. This being rejected with contempt, the insult was deemed irreparable: the resentment of slighted love and wounded vanity, raged with increased violence, and Bourbon was doomed to destruction by this implacable princess. A law-suit was commenced against him, to recover some possessions he held in right of his deceased wife, and the criminal judges, overawed by Louisa's authority, pronounced a sentence by which his estate was sequestered. Bourbon, inflamed by a repetition of injuries, and driven to desperation, entered into a treaty with Henry VIII. of England, and Charles V. of Germany, against the king of France.

At first Francis was successful in repelling the confederate princes, which encouraged him to attempt in person the recovery of the Milanese; in vain did his mother and his wisest ministers dissuade him from it, he was determined, and leaving the duchess regent of the kingdom, he departed. After the fatal battle of Pavia, at which, after the most valorous exertions, he lost both his army and his liberty; he addressed Louisa in this laconic, but expressive note, " Madam, all is lost except our honour." The kingdom was now reduced to a situation pregnant with dangers; the captivity of the king, the loss of a flourishing army, added to a discontent prevailing through the kingdom, seemed to threaten a general insurrection. The people murmured, the parliament complained. In this trying emergency the magnanimity of Louisa was eminently displayed, VOL. IV.

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and that kingdom which her passions had endangered, her abilities were exerted to save; she assembled at Lyons, the princes of the blood, the governors of the provinces, and notables of the realm, who came to the generous resolution of immediately paying the ransom of the officers and soldiers taken at the battle of Pavia. The army and garrisons were recruited, and enabled to repel an attack of the Imperialists, whilst Louisa conciliated the favour of the king of England, whom she disengaged from the confederacy, and to her mediation, Francis acknowledged himself indebted for his liberty, which he recovered in March 1526, and was joyfully received by his mother and the whole nation. The terms of his liberation by the emperor were so exorbitant that he never intended to fulfil them, and the pope absolved him from his oaths. Hostilities continued, till at length, Margaret of Austria and the duchess of Angouleme met at Cambray, and settled the terms of pacification, whence the peace derived the name of the "Ladies' peace.' Louisa died 1571, delivering Francis from a counsellor whose passions had frequently endangered the kingdom, which her wisdom and magnanimity had contributed to protect. Mindful of her counsel, he completed her favourite project, of annexing the duchy of Brittany to the

crown.

FRANCIS I., King of France, surnamed "The Great, and the restorer of learning. He was the only son of Charles duke of Orleans, constable of Angouleme, and Louisa of Savoy, and born at Cognax, September 12, 1494. He was presumptive heir to the crown, in the reign of Louis XII., who married him to his eldest daughter. At the death of that king he succeeded to the throne on Jan. 1, 1515, being then in his 21st year, of a martial figure, expert in warlike exercises, brave, and impatient to distinguish himself. Immediately after his coronation, he took the title of duke of Milan, and put himself at the head of a powerful army to assert his right to that duchy. The Swiss, who were allies to Francis Sforza the duke, opposed the king and attacked him near Marignano, but they were cut to pieces in a sanguinary contest, and about 15,000 left dead on the field. The famous Trivulzio, who had been engaged in eighteen battles, called this "The battle of the giants," and the others," Children's play." It was on this occasion, that the king was knighted by the famous Bayard. By this victory at Marignano, Francis I., became master of the Milanese, which so alarmed pope Leo X. that he had a conference with the king at Bologna, obtained from him the abolition of the pragmatic sanction, and settled the concordat, which was confirmed in the year following, in the Lateran council. From that time the kings of France had the appointment to all consistoral benefices, and the pope received one year's income

upon every change. The ambition of Francis led him to be a competitor for the Imperial crown, left vacant by the death of Maximilian in 1519; but the superior interest of Charles V. carried it against him; and the rivalry between these young and powerful monarchs kindled a long war, which proved fatal to all Europe. The French, commanded by Andrew de Foix, conquered Navarre in 1520, but very soon lost it again. They drove the English and Imperialists from Picardy, took Hesdin, Fontarabia, and several other places; but lost Milan and Tournay in 1521. The following year, Odet de Foix, viscount of Lautrec, was defeated at the bloody battle of Bicoque, which was followed by the loss of Cremona, Genoa, and a great part of Italy. Nor did their misfortunes end here. The constable of Bourbon, persecuted by the duchess of Angouleme, joined the emperor 1523, and being appointed commander of his forces in 1534, defeated admiral Bonivet's rear at the retreat of Rebec, and retook all the Milanese. He afterwards entered Provence with a powerful army, but was obliged to raise the siege of Marseilles, and retired with loss. Francis I., however, went into Italy, retook Milan, and was going to besiege Pavia; but, having imprudently detached part of his troops to send them to Naples, he was defeated by the constable de Bourbon in a bloody battle before Pavia. At this battle, fought on February 24, 1525, Francis, after displaying great personal valour, was compelled to surrender himself prisoner. The flower of his troops, and many officers of high rank and merit fell in the field, and such was the extent of the disaster, that he wrote this short billet to his mother, "Madam, all is lost but our honour!" Francis was conducted as a prisoner to Madrid, and restored the following year, after the treaty which was concluded in that city, January 14, 1526. He was exchanged for his two sons, in a boat in the midst of the stream which separates France from Spain, and instantly, upon touching his own shore, he mounted a Turkish horse, and waving his hand over his head, cried, "I am yet a king." He then rode full speed to St. John de Luz, and thence to Bayonne. The treaty which had been extorted by force, was not fulfilled; the emperor had insisted on the duchy of Burgundy, but the king declared, that he had no power to give up any province of his kingdom. Upon this the war recommenced immediately. Francis I., sent forces into Italy, under the command of Lautrec, who, at first gained considerable advantages, but afterwards perished with his army, by the plague. The defection of Doria completed the ruin of the French affairs in Italy. At length the peace of Cambray, in 1529, gave a temporary respite to the hostilities of the two rivals. By this treaty, Francis engaged to marry Eleanor of Austria, the emperor's sister; and his two sons, who had been