When the fatal news was known, the consternation and grief were profound. At the age of twenty-three Gaston de Foix had in less than six months won the confidence and affection of the army, of the king, and of France. It was one of those sudden and undisputed reputations which seem to mark out men for the highest destinies. “I would fain,” said Louis XIL, when he heard of his death, “have no longer an inch of land in Italy, and be able at that price to bring back to life my nephew Gaston and all the gallants who perished with him. God keep us from often gaining such victories!” “In the battle of Ravenna,” says Guicciardini, “fell at least ten thousand men, a third of them French, and two thirds their enemies; but in respect of chosen men and men of renown the loss of the victors was by much the greater, and the loss of Gaston de Foix alone surpassed all the others put together; with him went all the vigor and furious onset of the French army.” La Palisse, a warrior valiant and honored, assumed the command of this victorious army; but under pressure of repeated attacks from the Spaniards, the Venetians, and the Swiss, he gave up first the Romagna, then Milanes, withdrew from place to place, and ended by falling back on Piedmont. Julius II. won back all he had won and lost. Maximilian Sforza, son of Ludovic the Moor, after twelve years of exile in Germany, returned to Milan to resume possession of his father’s duchy. By the end of June, 1512, less than three months after the victory of Ravenna, the domination of the French had disappeared from Italy. [Illustration: Gaston de Foix----364]