PART II. 1503. Feb. 22. Gonsalvo storms and takes it. once to make an attack on the town of Ruvo, about twelve miles distant, and defended by the brave La Palice, with a corps of three hundred French lances, and as many foot. With his usual promptness, the Spanish general quitted the walls of Barleta the same night on which he received the news, taking with him his whole effective force, amounting to about three thousand infantry and one thousand light and heavy armed horse. So few, indeed, remained to guard the city, that he thought it prudent to take some of the principal inhabitants as hostages to insure its fidelity in his absence. At break of day, the little army arrived before Ruvo. Gonsalvo immediately opened a lively cannonade on the old ramparts, which in less than four hours effected a considerable breach. He then led his men to the assault, taking charge himself of those who were to storm the breach, while another division, armed with ladders for scaling the walls, was intrusted to the adventurous cavalier Diego de Paredes. The assailants experienced more resolute resistance than they had anticipated from the inconsiderable number of the garrison. La Palice, throwing himself into the breach with his iron band of dismounted gendarmes, drove back the Spaniards as often as they attempted to set foot on the broken ramparts; while the Gascon archery showered down volleys of arrows thick as hail, from the battlements, on the exposed persons of the assailThe latter, however, soon rallied under the eye of their general, and returned with fresh fury ants. XI. to the charge, until the overwhelming tide of num- CHAPTER bers bore down all opposition, and they poured in through the breach and over the walls with irresistible fury. The brave little garrison were driven before them; still, however, occasionally making fight in the streets and houses. Their intrepid young commander, La Palice, retreated facing the enemy, who pressed thick and close upon him, till, his further progress being arrested by a wall, he placed his back against it, and kept them at bay, making a wide circle around him with the deadly sweep of his battle-axe. But the odds were too much for him; and at length, after repeated wounds, having been brought to the ground by a deep cut in the head, he was made prisoner; not, however, before he had flung his sword far over the heads of the assailants, disdaining, in the true spirit of a knight-errant, to yield it to the rabble around him. 30 All resistance was now at an end. The women of the place had fled like so many frighted deer, to one of the principal churches; and Gonsalvo, with more humanity than was usual in these barbarous wars, placed a guard over their persons, which effectually secured them from the insults of the PART II. His treatment of the prisoners. soldiery. After a short time spent in gathering up the booty and securing his prisoners, the Spanish general, having achieved the object of his expedition, set out on his homeward march, and arrived without interruption at Barleta. The duke of Nemours had scarcely appeared before Castellaneta, before he received tidings of the attack on Ruvo. He put himself, without losing a moment, at the head of his gendarmes, supported by the Swiss pikemen, hoping to reach the beleaguered town in time to raise the siege. Great was his astonishment, therefore, on arriving before it, to find no trace of an enemy, except the ensigns of Spain unfurled from the deserted battlements. Mortified and dejected, he made no further attempt to recover Castellaneta, but silently drew off to hide his chagrin in the walls of Canosa. $1 Among the prisoners were several persons of distinguished rank. Gonsalvo treated them with his usual courtesy, and especially La Palice, whom he provided with his own surgeon and all the appliances for rendering his situation as comfortable as possible. For the common file, however, he showed no such sympathy; but condemned them all to serve in the Spanish admiral's galleys, where they continued to the close of the campaign. An unfortunate misunderstanding had long subsisted between the French and Spanish commanders respecting the ransom and exchange of prisoners; and Gonsalvo was probably led to this severe meas 31 Bernaldez, Reyes Católicos, Carlo V., fol. 16. — Chrónica del MS., ubi supra. - Ulloa, Vita di Gran Capitan, cap. 72. ure, so different from his usual clemency, by an unwillingness to encumber himself with a superfluous population in the besieged city. But, in truth, such a proceeding, however offensive to humanity, was not at all repugnant to the haughty spirit of chivalry, which, reserving its courtesies exclusively for those of gentle blood and high degree, cared little for the inferior orders, whether soldier or peasant, whom it abandoned without remorse to all the caprices and cruelties of military license. The capture of Ruvo was attended with important consequences to the Spaniards. Besides a valuable booty of clothes, jewels, and money, they brought back with them nearly a thousand horses, which furnished Gonsalvo with the means of augmenting his cavalry, the small number of which had hitherto materially crippled his operations. He accordingly selected seven hundred of his best troops and mounted them on the French horses; thus providing himself with a corps, burning with zeal to approve itself worthy of the distinguished honor conferred on it.33 A few weeks after, the general received an important accession of strength from the arrival of two thousand German mercenaries, which Don Juan Manuel, the Spanish minister at the Austrian court, had been permitted to raise in the emperor's dominions. This event determined the Great Cap 32 D'Auton, Hist. de Louys XII., ubi supra. Giovio, Vitæ Illust. Virorum, p. 249. Quintana, Españoles Célebres, tom. ii. p. 270.- Zurita, Hist. del Rey p. 249. PART II. tain on a step which he had been some time meditating. The new levies placed him in a condition for assuming the offensive. His stock of provisions, moreover, already much reduced, would be obviously insufficient long to maintain his increased numbers. He resolved, therefore, to sally out of the old walls of Barleta, and, availing himself of the high spirits in which the late successes had put his troops, to bring the enemy at once to battle. 34 Garibay, Compendio, tom. ii. lib. 19, cap. 15.-Zurita, Hist. del Rey Hernando, tom. i. lib. 5, 34 cap. 16. Ulloa, Vita di Carlo V., fol. 17. |