It is a significant comment on the period, that amid the commotion at the inn the first thought was of foul play. "The two squires who had brought water to wash in the basin said, to free themselves from any charge of having poisoned him: 'Here is the water; we have already drank of it, and will now again in your presence,' which they did, to the satisfaction of all. They put into his mouth bread and water and spices, with other comforting things, but to no purpose, for in less than half an hour he was dead, having surrendered his soul very quietly. God, out of his grace, was merciful to him."
He was entombed before the altar in the little church at Orthez, with imposing obsequies. No epitaph remains, but this of a preceding Gaston, buried in the same church, deserves note for its curious, jingling Latin rhyme:
"Continet hæc fossa Gastonis principis ossa,
Nobilis ac humilis aliis, pulvis sibi vilis,
Subjectis parcens, hastes pro viribus arcens.
Da veniam, Christe, flos militiæ fuit isle,
Et virtute precum, confer sibi gaudia tecum,
Gastonis nomen gratum fert auribus omen,
Mulcet prolatum, dulcescis sæpe relatum,"
Two hundred years afterward, in the tumult of Protestant iconoclasm, Gaston Phoebus's tomb was broken open, its débris sold, piece by piece, and Montgomery's Huguenots derisively kicked the august skull about the streets of Orthez and used it for a bowling-ball: