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Louis had not, and could not have, any confidence in Ferdinand the Catholic; but he knew him to be as prudent as he was rascally, and he concluded with him at Orthez, on the 1st of April, 1513, a year's truce, which Ferdinand took great care not to make known to his allies, Henry VIII., King of England, and the Emperor Maximilian, the former of whom was very hot-tempered, and the latter very deeply involved, through his daughter Marguerite of Austria, in the warlike league against France.
Clad in his favourite green uniform, he fared forth to his resting-place under two large weeping willow trees in a secluded valley: the coffin, surmounted by his sword and the cloak he had worn at Marengo, was borne with full military honours by grenadiers of the 20th and 66th Regiments before a long line of red-coats; and their banners, emblazoned with the names of "Talavera," "Albuera," "Pyrenees," and "Orthez," were lowered in a last salute to our mighty foe.
Selkirk's continued ill-health caused him to seek the temperate climate of the south of France, and there he died on April 8, 1820, at Pau, in the foothills of the Pyrenees. His body was taken to Orthez, a small town some twenty-five miles away, and buried there in the Protestant cemetery. The length of two countries separates Lord Selkirk's place of burial from his place of birth.
He almost lost his English flavour when he spoke in downright approval of a small French fellow, coming from Orthez, near the Pyrenees, for senselessly dashing and kicking at a couple of English who jeered to hear Orthez named a place trampled under Wellington's heels, on his march across conquered France.
The Governor of Auvergne replied to the secret letter of the king in the following words: "Sire, I have received an order, under your majesty's seal, to put all the Protestants of this province to death, and if, which God forbid, the order be genuine, I respect your majesty still too much to obey you." The king had sent a similar order to the commandant at Bayonne, the Viscount of Orthez.
For a long period he had lived happy and respected in his native town of Orthez, when all at once he was tempted by the thought of titular rank, and from that time his life was one long misery. He took the name of one of his estates, he bought his title in Italy, and ordered his coat-of-arms from a heraldic agent in Paris, and now his ambition was to be treated as a real nobleman.
He liked best the company of his little French friend from Orthez, over whose shoulder his hand was laid sometimes as they strolled and chatted in two languages. He really went a long way to make French fellows popular, and the boys were sorry that little Emile was off to finish his foreign education in Germany. His English was pretty good, thanks to Matey.
Colonel Battledown fought under Wellington against Soult at Orthez; and in a charge of the French cavalry the gallant officer and genial gentleman was cut in the head by a sabre-stroke and ridden down; and when picked up after the battle he was dead.
In French, 'ilz se arresterent, without 'and. It was shewed me by such as had been at the same battle, as well by knights and squires of England as of Scotland, at the house of the earl of Foix, for anon after this battle was done I met at Orthez two squires of England called John of Chateauneuf and John of Cantiron; also when I returned to Avignon I found also there a knight and a squire of Scotland; I knew them and they knew me by such tokens as I shewed them of their country, for I, author of this book, in my youth had ridden nigh over all the realm of Scotland, and I was as then a fifteen days in the house of earl William Douglas, father to the same earl James, of whom I spake of now, in a castle of five leagues from Edinburgh in the country of Dalkeith; the same time I saw there this earl James, a fair young child, and a sister of his called the lady Blanche, and I was informed by both these parties how this battle was as sore a battle fought as lightly hath been heard of before of such a number; and I believe it well, for Englishmen on the one party and Scots on the other party are good men of war, for when they meet there is a hard fight without sparing, there is no ho between them as long as spears, swords, axes or daggers will endure, but lay on each upon other, and when they be well beaten and that the one party hath obtained the victory, they then glorify so in their deeds of arms and are so joyful, that such as be taken they shall be ransomed or they go out of the field, so that shortly each of them is so content with other that at their departing-courteously they will say, 'God thank you'; but in fighting one with another there is no play nor sparing, and this is true, and that shall well appear by this said rencounter, for it was as valiantly foughten as could be devised, as ye shall hear.
"Thou knowest, uncle mine, how the Prince and the King did long ago confirm to me the rights of the De Brocas to the ancient Castles of Orthez and Saut. If he would but give me his royal warrant for mustering men and recovering mine own, I trow, be the walls of Saut never so strong, that I would speedily make mine entrance within them!
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