CHAPTER IV
FROM THE TREATY OF MADRID TO THE TREATY OF CRESPI
Treaty of Madrid—League of Cognac—Sack of Rome—Medici driven from Florence—Battle of Aversa—Treaty of Barcelona—Peace of Cambray—Charles crowned Emperor—Diets of Spires and Augsburg—League of Schmalkalde—Zwingle in Switzerland—Peace of Nuremberg—Barbarossa of Algiers—Renewed war between Charles and Francis—Truce of Nice—Revolt at Ghent suppressed—The Anabaptists at Münster—Diet of Ratisbon—Campaign of 1542—Treaties of Crespi and Ardres.
§ 1. Treaty of Madrid and League of Cognac.
Charles maintained the same imperturbable composure at the news of his good fortune as he had displayed in the days when defeat seemed to stare him in the face.Behaviour and difficulties of Charles after the victory of Pavia. He forbade all public rejoicing. He attributed all to God, and protested that his only desire was for a lasting peace, so that he might turn the arms of Christendom against the Turk. But he had before asserted that the only hope of peace lay in the submission of France, and he had not changed his mind. Yet how was that submission to be effected? War was at the moment out of the question. Charles had no money, and even the payment of the troops was in arrear. The Peasants’ War still continued in Germany, and Ferdinand could not help. Henry VIII. might perhaps have been prevailed upon to invade France, if the Emperor would have recognised his claim to the French throne; but Charles did not wish to see England thus aggrandised, and refused all definite promises. Wolsey therefore had his way, and, in August, concluded a treaty of alliance with the Regent of France, in which Henry, in return for an annual pension, promised to demand the liberty of the King on honourable terms. Italy was forming a league of self-defence, and Clement, though still full of promises, was known to be playing double. France, although she had lost an army and her King, was still France, and was determined to resist invasion to the last penny in her purse, and the last drop of her blood. War then was not to be thought of; nor did Charles’ prospects of gaining his end by treaty seem much better. His demands that Burgundy and Artois should be ceded to him, and that Bourbon should hold Provence independently of France, were indignantly rejected. To the mutilation of their territory, the French would not submit, and the French King declared that he would sooner die in captivity than buy his freedom by such dishonour. Francis, however, had not the strength of character of his rival, and presently began to pine for freedom. Hearing that it was proposed to send him a prisoner to Naples, he prevailed upon Lannoy to send him to Spain instead (June), for he hoped much from a personal interview with Charles. He did not understand the man with whom he had to deal. Nothing is more remarkable than the tenacity, often amounting to obstinacy, with which Charles clung to a decision once made. He looked upon his claims to Artois and Burgundy as just; Burgundy especially was the cradle of his race, and had been wrongly taken from his grandmother, Mary of Burgundy; it should be restored to him. In vain Francis and the French envoys pleaded for some abatement of his demands. Charles remained unmoved: he even refused to see the King of France until a serious attack of fever threatened the prisoner’s life. The news that Clement and the Italians were making a league with France, that Francesco Maria Sforza of Milan, his own creature, was turning against him; the attempt of Morone, the Milanese chancellor, to corrupt the honour of his best general Pescara—an attempt which Pescara,[46] urged by feelings of loyalty or self-interest, betrayed to his master—all this had no effect on Charles. Morone was seized, Sforza was declared to have forfeited his dukedom, and was besieged, in his citadel, by the imperial troops.
Francis, having recovered from his serious illness, tried to escape; but the plan was betrayed. There was nothing for it but to abandon Burgundy; and to this course the queen-mother, Louise of Savoy, now urged him. Francis accordingly yielded; but, asserting that he alone could obtain the consent of his people to the cession, offered to leave his two eldest sons as hostages, and promised to return to captivity if that consent could not be obtained. Charles was most unwilling to grant even this, and was supported by his chancellor Gattinara, who predicted the result. The condition of Italy was, however, desperate. Pescara died on December 3, urging his master almost with his last breath to make peace with France, if he would save Italy; all his other counsellors were of the same opinion. Charles accordingly gave way, and consented to the Treaty of Madrid.
By this treaty Francis was to cede Tournay, to ‘restore’ Burgundy in full sovereignty, to surrender all claims on Italy, as well as the suzerainty over Flanders and Artois.The Treaty of Madrid. Jan. 14, 1526. He was to withdraw his protection from his allies, pay the debt incurred by Charles to England in the late war, and aid him against the Turk. The Duke of Bourbon was to regain his forfeited possessions, and to receive besides the Duchy of Milan. In ratification of the treaty, Francis promised to marry Eleonora, the widowed Queen of Portugal, sister of the Emperor, and left his sons as hostages for the fulfilment of the treaty. The treaty was not, however, worth the paper it was written on. Although Charles had made Francis swear on the honour of a knight, and on the gospel, to fulfil the compact or return to captivity, no sooner was the latter free again than he repudiated it. The day before he signed it, he had protested to his own ambassadors that he would not consider promises thus extorted from him as binding, and gave them notice that he did not mean to keep it. We are astonished to find that this conduct excited no surprise in Europe. Wolsey actually urged Francis to take this course, and Clement absolved him from his oath.
The release of the French King, therefore, served but to encourage the enemies of Charles, and, on May 22,The League of Cognac. May 22, 1526. the Pope, Francis, Sforza, Venice, and Florence concluded the Holy League of Cognac, under the ‘protection of Henry of England.’ Sforza was to be confirmed in his possession of Milan; all Italian states were to be restored to the position they held before the war; Charles was to release the young French princes for a sum of money, and pay his debt to England within three months. The Leaguers proclaimed their desire to secure a lasting peace. Charles and all other princes were therefore offered the opportunity of joining the League. But if the Emperor refused, he was to be driven not only from the Milanese, but from Naples, which was then to be held by the Pope on payment of a yearly revenue to France.