33. Louis XII.
CHAPTER XXXIII. Louis XII. (1498-1515)
Charles left no son. He had three, but they all died (as) children, and his cousin, the Duke of Orleans, became king after him, and was called Louis XII. The wife Charles had left behind him, Anne, who had been Duchess of Brittany before he married her, was very unhappy at his death. She crouched down in a corner of her room, and did nothing but sob when her friends came to try and comfort her. People said it was not so much her husband she cared for as the pleasure and glory of being queen; and it certainly seemed as if this were true, for in less than two months she had persuaded Louis to marry her, and was Queen of France once more. Louis had another wife, but she was ugly and deformed, and he had never cared for her. The Pope gave him leave to divorce her (— that is, to send her away from being his wife). She, poor thing, knew that it was of no use to resist, and went away into a convent, where she spent the rest of her days in doing good deeds, and was considered a saint by the people. She had been a sister of Charles VIII. and of Madam Anne, who had governed his kingdom so well for him.
Louis XII., by marrying Anne, became master of Brittany, as Charles had been; but it was settled that if Anne had children Brittany would not belong to the eldest son, who would be King of France, but to one of the other children, so that it might be kept a distinct province (by itself). Louis, though he had behaved so unkindly to his first wife, was on the whole a kind, good-hearted man. He punished none of the people who had been his enemies in the last reign. When some of his friends advised him to do so, he refused, saying, "It would not become the King of France to revenge the quarrels of the Duke of Orleans." You remember that he had been Duke of Orleans before he was King of France. By this kindness he soon made friends with all the chief people of the country, and all through his reign he had no disturbances of any kind in France.
Very soon after he became king Louis called together an assembly of some of the wisest among his subjects, and with their help he made a set of laws called an ordonnance, changing and improving many of the arrangements for doing justice, about which he was always very anxious. After this he unfortunately did as Charles VIII. had done before him, and began another Italian war.
There was one town in the north part of Italy named Milan, which had belonged to the great-grandfather of Louis, and Louis always called himself Duke of Milan, and hoped, with the help of some of his friends among the Italian princes, to make himself master of the town. He collected a great army, and marched across the Alps into Switzerland. Many of the States that had fought against Charles VIII. were quite willing to help Louis, and he became master of Milan without having had to fight any great battle.
Louis went back to France well pleased at his success, but as soon as he was gone the Duke of Milan came back with an army, and tried to win back his town. At first it seemed as if he would succeed. All the towns through which he passed turned out the French, and gave themselves up to their duke. It was said that he won back his country even more quickly than he had lost it. But Louis heard of what was happening, gathered a large army, which could now be done easily in France, because of the regiments and captains always ready for use, (as I told you,) and marched with them into Italy again. The duke Louis Sforza of Milan shut himself up in a town with his soldiers.
Among the duke's soldiers was a body of Swiss. It was the custom at that time for any king or prince who wanted soldiers to hire some from Switzerland. The Swiss were fierce, brave, fond of fighting, and their country being very poor they were always glad to earn money by fighting for any one who would pay for soldiers. It sometimes happened in a battle that there were Swiss on both sides, and so it was now.
These men soon met and made a bargain together; the Swiss who were paid to fight for the duke, and some of the other soldiers on the same side, agreed to give up the town to the French, in return for which it was promised that they and all that belonged to them should be safe. They made no agreement that the duke, their employer, should be safe. When they yielded up the town next morning, and were marching out with the French soldiers watching them, the duke disguised himself as a Swiss soldier and marched with the others, hoping that no one would notice him; but the French, suspecting that he might do this, made them go out by twos and threes, so that each man might be examined as he passed. Still, perhaps, the duke might have passed safely, but that some of his soldiers were persuaded by a present of money to point him out to the French. He was taken prisoner, carried to France, and very badly treated by Louis, who was usually kind and merciful to every one. He was kept in one of the horrible iron cages which had been invented in the reign of Louis XI.
One great man had distinguished himself in this Italian war. He was a knight named Bayard, one of the bravest and at the same time the best of the French soldiers, who is sometimes spoken of as the knight without fear and without blame. He was born at an old castle, called like himself Bayard, and there he had lived with his parents till he was fourteen, when his uncle, a bishop, had come to stay at the castle, and offered to take his nephew away with him and find him some place at court or in the army, from which he might rise to higher things.
The boy was delighted to go. His uncle gave him a horse; the tailor of the place sat up all night to make him handsome clothes "of velvet, satin, and other things needful to clothe a good knight." The next morning, when he was ready to set off, his mother came down to say goodbye to him. She gave him a purse with six crowns of gold in it, and also some good advice, which very likely helped to make him the great and good man he afterwards became; for she told him to bear himself wisely and well, to love and serve God, to be courteous to his equals and merciful to the poor, to tell the truth, and be loving and faithful. After this Bayard became a page in the court of the Duke of Savoy, and in time a soldier.
A year or two later there was another Italian war, but in this Louis was less fortunate than before. At first everything seemed to go well with him, and he and the King of Spain, who was helping him, took Naples and some other Italian towns from the King of Naples; but when they had done this they began to quarrel about dividing the land which had become theirs. After long disputes the French and Spaniards began to fight with each other, and at last the French were driven entirely out of the country, and the Spaniards kept everything for themselves, so Louis XII. had not gained much for his country by this war, which had cost much money and the lives of so many brave soldiers.
Louis had only one child, a daughter, and the queen was very anxious that she should marry the young man who was going to be King of Spain. But the French lords did not wish that Spain and France should belong to the same person, and said that it would be better for the princess to marry the greatest of the French lords, the man who, if Louis should have no son, would be the next King of France. Louis did not like to disappoint his wife, and at first agreed that the marriage should be as she wished it, but when he thought himself dying he considered how much trouble he should bring upon his people if he did anything which was likely to make a war between France and Spain, and he changed his mind and made a will saying that his daughter should marry the French prince as soon as she was old enough. When he grew better he called together the deputies of the Three Estates, and asked them for advice. They all wished that his daughter should be betrothed to Francis, the young French prince, which was done. It was at this time that the deputies first called Louis the Father of his People, the name by which he has since been known, and on hearing which, he was so much delighted that he wept for joy.
There was one more Italian war; this time France joined with several others of the Italian states against one state named Venice, and, as usual, he succeeded very well at first, and took a great deal of the country, but afterwards the Italians all joined together against him, and Henry VIII. of England came to help the enemies of Louis. Henry was quite young, and had only just become king. He was a bold, warlike young prince, and beat the French in a battle called the battle of the Spurs, because the French used their spurs to run away with more than their swords to fight with. The French were also driven quite out of Italy, so that they had no land at all belonging to them there. If it had not been for the Italian wars, Louis XII. would have been a good king; much that he did was good, and when he died, which happened soon after the end of the war, his people grieved for him, and the ringers went through the streets (sounding) their bells and crying in a sad voice, "The good King Louis, the father of his people, is dead." He left no son.
