succumb. Yet, though failing, each man died a hero. Some drew arrows from their wounds, and hurled them at the enemy; others who had lost one hand swung their halberts with the other. The Armagnacs, who had fought in many a bloody battle, confessed that never before had they met with a foe so dauntless, so regardless of death. The Austrians, however, denied the Swiss such testimony. On the day following the battle a German knight was riding over the field wading in blood, and boasted to his comrades, "To-day we seem to be bathing in roses." "There, eat thy roses!" yelled a dying Uri soldier, flinging at his head a large stone which struck him dead from his horse. Louis, who had lost some four thousand men in the fight, was greatly impressed by such show of bravery on the part of the Swiss, and concluded an honourable peace with them at Ensisheim, on the 28th of October, 1444. St. Jacques is a second Swiss Thermopylæ, and sheds immortal honour on the combatants. Though beaten the Confederates were not dishonoured. Like the brave Spartans under Leonidas they preferred death to servitude and dishonour. This battle was also the turning-point of the federal war; it rendered the Confederates more pliant. And though desultory feuds still showed themselves, peace was at last concluded, in 1450, by which Zurich was forced to give up her Austrian alliance. The federal league was knit more closely together than ever before; old injuries were soon forgotten, and the Eidgenossen accepted an invitation to Zurich to join in the carnival festivities got up to celebrate the reconciliation, 1454. A deplorable
Arms of Schwyz.
incident took place during the festivities, the seizure by the Eidgenossen, at the minster, of the famous savant, Felix Malleolus, a canon of the Church. Born of an ancient family at Zurich, he was educated first at the Carolinum in his native city, and afterwards at the university of Bologna, which was the glory of the Middle Ages. Bold, and of an unbending will, early acquainted with the corruptions of the Church and clergy, he hurled bitter invectives against the guilty, and raised for himself a host of enemies amongst the priesthood. And during the early years of the war he had likewise attacked the Eidgenossen as enemies of his native town, and called them an illiterate, uncouth, and belligerent race. His own chapter had objected to so stern a man as provost, and he had consequently contented himself with the position of canon, a position which left him ample time for study, and the composition of learned pamphlets. When the Eidgenossen seized him he was bending over his beloved books. He was hurried to Constance, and was there, by the bishop, thrown into the same prison as that occupied by the martyr Huss. The higher clergy as a rule connived at the deed, and, though promised release, he was handed over a prisoner to the monks at Lucerne. Here the lofty words of Cellano, "Dies irae, dies illa," so well known from their use in Mozart's Requiem Mass, seem to have been a great consolation to the unfortunate canon. It is not known exactly when he died.
