Page:History of the Reign of Ferdinand and Isabella the Catholic Vol. II.djvu/349

325 CAMPAIGNS OF GONSALVO. 325 that of the autumnal season, and an intemperate chapter indulgence in fruits and wine, soon brought on an — epidemic among the soldiers, which swept them off in great numbers. The gallant Montpensier was one of the first victims. He refused the earnest solicitations of his brother-in-law, the marquis of Mantua, to quit his unfortunate companions, and retire to a place of safety in the interior. The shore was literally strewed with the bodies of the dying and the dead. Of the whole number of Frenchmen, amounting to not less than five thou- sand, who marched out of Atella, not more than five hundred ever reached their native country. The Swiss and other mercenaries were scarcely more fortunate. " They made their way back as they could through Italy," says a writer of the period, " in the most deplorable state of destitution and suffering, the gaze of all, and a sad example of the caprice of fortune." ^^ Such was the misera- ble fate of that brilliant and formidable array, which scarcely two years before had poured down on the fair fields of Italy in all the insolence of expected conquest. Well would it be, if the name of every conqueror, whose successes, though built on human misery, are so dazzling to the imagination, could be made to point a moral for the instruction of his species, as effectually as that of Charles the Eighth. The young king of Naples did not live long to °|^^j^|^°f enjoy his triumphs. On his return from Atella, he of^^p'^s- 33 Giovio, Hist, sui Temporis, dini, Istoria, lib. 3, p. 160. — Ville- p. 137. — Comines, Meinoires, liv. neuve, M6moires, apud Petitot, 8, chap. 21. — Giovio, Vita Magni torn. xiv. p. 318. Gonsalvi, lib. 1, p. 221. — Guicciar-