delayed. He begged to be informed whether he was to attack the enemy in
Burgundy, whether he should await where he then was the succor of his
Majesty, or whether he was to fight, and if so with which of his enemies:
in fine, what he was to do; because, losing or winning, he meant to
conform to his Majesty's will. He felt deeply pained, he said, at being
disgraced and abandoned by the King, having served him, both as a
brother, and a man, with love and faith and heartiness. "Our lives,"
said he, "are at stake upon this game, and all we wish is to lose them
honorably." He begged the King to send a special envoy to France, with
remonstrances on the subject of Alencon, and another to the Pope to ask
for the Duke's excommunication. He protested that he would give his
blood rather than occasion so much annoyance to the King, but that he
felt it his duty to tell the naked truth. The pest was ravaging his
little army. Twelve hundred were now in hospital, besides those nursed
in private houses, and he had no means or money to remedy the evil.
Moreover, the enemy, seeing that they were not opposed in the open field,
had cut off the passage into Liege by the Meuse, and had advanced to
Nivelles and Chimay for the sake of communications with France, by the
same river.

Ten days after these pathetic passages had been written, the writer was
dead. Since the assassination of Escovedo, a consuming melancholy had
settled upon his spirits, and a burning fever came, in the month of
September, to destroy his physical strength. The house where he lay was
a hovel, the only chamber of which had been long used as a pigeon-house.
This wretched garret was cleansed, as well as it could be of its filth,
and hung with tapestry emblazoned with armorial bearings. In that
dovecot the hero of Lepanto was destined to expire. During the last few,
days of his illness, he was delirious. Tossing upon his uneasy couch, he
again arranged in imagination, the combinations of great battles, again