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 shouted
his orders to rushing squadrons, and listened with brightening eye to the
trumpet of victory. Reason returned, however, before the hour of death,
and permitted him, the opportunity to make the dispositions rendered