Page:Forget Me Not (1826).djvu/57

 enthusiasm, that most of them rejoined their colours, and promised to share the fortune of the day. The service thus rendered by Camillo to King Francis was the more important, as the army had been greatly weakened by the unseasonable detachment of sixteen thousand men on an expedition to Naples. The commander was honoured for it with a heavy gold chain.

History has recorded what a bloody day the fifteenth of February, 1525, was for France and Venice. The French rushed with impetuous valour upon the enemy, and forced particular portions of their army to give way; but fortune soon deserted their banners. The perfidy of the Swiss, who forsook their post; and the fury with which the imperial cavalry under the Marchese Pescara charged the French squadrons; while the Venetian mercenaries, posted to cover them, were overthrown in spite of their resistance, and the garrison of Pavia under Antonio de Leyra fell unexpectedly on the enemy’s rear; decided the fate of the day. The rout became general, and the conflict changed into the most sanguinary carnage. In vain did Francis the First, surrounded by the French and Italian nobility, who lay bleeding about him, strive by the most daring intrepidity to renew the contest. His horse was already killed under him, and he was fighting on foot, when he too was at length overpowered and taken prisoner, with the king of Navarre.