the spires and
domes of the Eternal City rising before them; on the followingmorning, they advanced to the assault. Bourbon himself
planted the first scaling-ladder against the walls, and was
mortally wounded by a ball from an arquebus 08 with his foot
on the second rung; but the assailants, roused to fury by the
fall of their leader, poured over the ramparts in a resistless
torrent; the terror-stricken Pope fled to the Castle of St.
Angelo, and in a few hours all resistance was at an end.
The grim tragedy which followed is well known. For weeks
the city was a prey to the lawless soldiery, who pillaged,
murdered, and committed every act of brutal violence without
respect of age or sex or dignity. "The sack of Rome," writes
Brantôme, "was so terrible that neither before nor since has
anything been seen like it." "Never," says another writer,
"had there been such calamity, misery, damage, cruelty, and
inhumanity witnessed." 09
The sack of Rome and the captivity of the Pope, who,
after sustaining a siege of a month in the Castle of St. Angelo,
was forced to capitulate, sent a thrill of horror through
Christendom, and though the Emperor made every effort
to exculpate himself, his protestations fell on unheeding
ears. The opportunity thus offered him was too favourable
for François to lose. In the previous March, a French embassy,
with Grammont, Bishop of Tarbes, at its head, had
visited England, where Henry VIII and Wolsey were becoming
seriously alarmed at the successes of the Imperialists;
and on April 30 — a week before Rome fell — a treaty was
concluded at Westminster, whereby it was arranged that
either François himself or his second son, Henri, should
marry Mary Tudor, 10 then eleven years old; that Henry VIIIshould renounce the pretensions to the Crown of France on
payment of an annual sum of 50,000 crowns by François and
of 15,000 by his successors; that, in the meanwhile, the two
Kings should present an ultimatum to the Emperor calling
upon him to make peace, to liberate the princes on payment
of the ransom already offered, and to discharge his debts to
England, and that, in the event of his refusal, they should
make joint war upon him. The tragic news from Italy caused
this alliance to bear speedy fruit, and at the beginning of
August Lautrec, at the head of an army of over 30,000
men, entered Lombardy. It was officially called "
exercitus
Anglicæ et Gallicæ regum pro pontifice romano congregatus
," but
was English only in the money part, Henry VIII supplying
50,000 crowns a month, and,
mirabile dictu
, actually paying
two months' subsidies in advance. 11
Antonio de Leyva, who commanded the Imperialists left in
Northern Italy, was quite unable to make head against such a
force. Alessandria capitulated; Pavia was taken by assault
and ruthlessly sacked, in revenge for the disaster of 1525, and
before the end of the year practically the whole of the
Milanese, with the exception of the capital, was lost to the
Emperor; while Genoa, which had refused to join the League,
also surrendered, after being closely blockaded, both by land
and sea, and Ferrara, Florence, Savoy, and Mantua deserted
the Imperial cause.
On December 9, Clement VII, after paying a portion of
the 250,000 ducats demanded as his ransom, escaped from
Rome, "disguised as a merchant," and fled to his palace at
Orvieto, where the advance of Lautrec's army, which early inJanuary began to march southwards, protected him from
further molestation.
On the 22nd of the same month, the heralds of England
and France brought to the Emperor at Burgos a formal
declaration of war. Charles replied in very moderate terms to
the English herald, but said to the other: "The King, your
master, has done a sorry, dastard deed in breaking his
plighted word to me in regard to the Treaty of Madrid; and
this I am ready to maintain, my person against his." François
replied by a violent cartel, in which he informed the Emperor
that "if he had wished or wished to charge
domes of the Eternal City rising before them; on the followingmorning, they advanced to the assault. Bourbon himself
planted the first scaling-ladder against the walls, and was
mortally wounded by a ball from an arquebus 08 with his foot
on the second rung; but the assailants, roused to fury by the
fall of their leader, poured over the ramparts in a resistless
torrent; the terror-stricken Pope fled to the Castle of St.
Angelo, and in a few hours all resistance was at an end.
The grim tragedy which followed is well known. For weeks
the city was a prey to the lawless soldiery, who pillaged,
murdered, and committed every act of brutal violence without
respect of age or sex or dignity. "The sack of Rome," writes
Brantôme, "was so terrible that neither before nor since has
anything been seen like it." "Never," says another writer,
"had there been such calamity, misery, damage, cruelty, and
inhumanity witnessed." 09
The sack of Rome and the captivity of the Pope, who,
after sustaining a siege of a month in the Castle of St. Angelo,
was forced to capitulate, sent a thrill of horror through
Christendom, and though the Emperor made every effort
to exculpate himself, his protestations fell on unheeding
ears. The opportunity thus offered him was too favourable
for François to lose. In the previous March, a French embassy,
with Grammont, Bishop of Tarbes, at its head, had
visited England, where Henry VIII and Wolsey were becoming
seriously alarmed at the successes of the Imperialists;
and on April 30 — a week before Rome fell — a treaty was
concluded at Westminster, whereby it was arranged that
either François himself or his second son, Henri, should
marry Mary Tudor, 10 then eleven years old; that Henry VIIIshould renounce the pretensions to the Crown of France on
payment of an annual sum of 50,000 crowns by François and
of 15,000 by his successors; that, in the meanwhile, the two
Kings should present an ultimatum to the Emperor calling
upon him to make peace, to liberate the princes on payment
of the ransom already offered, and to discharge his debts to
England, and that, in the event of his refusal, they should
make joint war upon him. The tragic news from Italy caused
this alliance to bear speedy fruit, and at the beginning of
August Lautrec, at the head of an army of over 30,000
men, entered Lombardy. It was officially called "
exercitus
Anglicæ et Gallicæ regum pro pontifice romano congregatus
," but
was English only in the money part, Henry VIII supplying
50,000 crowns a month, and,
mirabile dictu
, actually paying
two months' subsidies in advance. 11
Antonio de Leyva, who commanded the Imperialists left in
Northern Italy, was quite unable to make head against such a
force. Alessandria capitulated; Pavia was taken by assault
and ruthlessly sacked, in revenge for the disaster of 1525, and
before the end of the year practically the whole of the
Milanese, with the exception of the capital, was lost to the
Emperor; while Genoa, which had refused to join the League,
also surrendered, after being closely blockaded, both by land
and sea, and Ferrara, Florence, Savoy, and Mantua deserted
the Imperial cause.
On December 9, Clement VII, after paying a portion of
the 250,000 ducats demanded as his ransom, escaped from
Rome, "disguised as a merchant," and fled to his palace at
Orvieto, where the advance of Lautrec's army, which early inJanuary began to march southwards, protected him from
further molestation.
On the 22nd of the same month, the heralds of England
and France brought to the Emperor at Burgos a formal
declaration of war. Charles replied in very moderate terms to
the English herald, but said to the other: "The King, your
master, has done a sorry, dastard deed in breaking his
plighted word to me in regard to the Treaty of Madrid; and
this I am ready to maintain, my person against his." François
replied by a violent cartel, in which he informed the Emperor
that "if he had wished or wished to charge
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