Du Bos discriminates between the character of the German levies or landsknechts and the Swiss, in the following terms. "Les lansquenets étoient même de beaucoup mieux faits, généralement parlant, et de bien meilleure mine sous les armes, que les fantassins Suisses; mais ils étoient incapables de discipline. Au contraire des Suisses, ils étoient sans obéissance pour leur chefs, et sans amitié pours leurs camarades." (Ligue de Cambray, tom. i. dissert. prélim., p. 66.) Comines confirms the distinction with a high tribute to the loyalty of the Swiss, which has continued their honorable characteristic to the present day. Mémoires, liv. 8, chap. 21.
[25] Giovio, Vita Magni Gonsalvi, lib. 1, pp. 218, 219.—Chrónica del Gran Capitan, cap. 28.—Quintana, Españoles Célebres, tom. i. p. 226.—Bembo, Istoria Viniziana, lib. 3, p. 184.—Guicciardini, Istoria, lib. 3, p. 158.
[26] Giovio, Vita Magni Gonsalvi, pp. 219, 220.—Chrónica del Gran Capitan, cap. 27.—Zurita, Hist. del Rey Hernando, tom. i. lib. 2, cap. 26.—Quintana, Españoles Célebres, tom. i. pp. 227, 228.—Guicciardini, Istoria, lib. 3, pp. 158, 159.—Mariana, Hist. de España, tom. ii. lib. 26, cap. 12.
[27] Giovio, Hist. del Rey Hernando, lib. 4, p. 132.
[28] Quintana, Españoles Célebres, tom. i. p. 228.—Giovio, Vita Magni Gonsalvi, lib. 1, p. 220.
The Aragonese historians are much ruffled by the irreverent manner in which Guicciardini notices the origin of the cognomen of the Great Captain; which even his subsequent panegyric cannot atone for. "Era capitano Gonsalvo Ernandes, di casa d'Aghilar, di patria Cordovese, uomo di molto valore, ed esercitato lungamente nelle guerre di Granata, il quale nel principio della venuta sua in Italia, cognominato dalla jattanza Spagnuola il Gran Capitano, per significare con questo titolo la suprema podestà sopra loro, meritò per le preclare vittorie che ebbe dipoi, che per consentimento universale gli fosse confermato e perpetuate questo sopranome, per significazione di virtù grande, e di grande eccellenza nella disciplina militare." (Istoria, tom. i. p. 112.) According to Zurita, the title was not conferred till the Spanish general's appearance before Atella, and the first example of its formal recognition was in the instrument of capitulation at that place. (Hist. del Rey Hernando, lib. 2, cap. 27.) This seems to derive support from the fact that Gonsalvo's biographer and contemporary, Giovio, begins to distinguish him by that epithet from this period. Abarca assigns a higher antiquity to it, quoting the words of the royal grant of the duchy of Sessa, made to Gonsalvo, as authority. (Reyes de Aragon, rey 39, cap. 9.) In a former edition, I intimated my doubt of the historian's accuracy. A subsequent inspection of the instrument itself, in a work since come into my possession, shows this distrust to have been well founded; for it is there simply said, that the title was conferred in Italy. Pulgar, Sumario, p. 188.
[29] This was improving on the somewhat similar expedient ascribed by Polybius to King Pyrrhus, who mingled alternate cohorts, armed with short weapons after the Roman fashion, with those of his Macedonian spearmen. Lib. 17 sec. 24.
[30] Giovio, Hist. sui Temporis, lib. 4, p. 133.—Idem, Vita Magni Gonsalvi, pp. 220, 221.—Zurita, Hist. del Rey Hernando, lib. 2, cap. 27. —Chrónica del Gran Capitan, cap. 28.—Quintana, Españoles Célebres, tom. i. p. 229.—Abarca, Reyes de Aragon, rey 30, cap. 9.
[31] Villeneuve, Mémoires, p. 318.—Comines, Mémoires, liv. 8, chap. 21.— Giovio, Hist. sui Temporis, lib. 4, p. 136.
[32] Comines, Mémoires, liv. 8, chap. 21.