The king (as I said before) remained in the same place, and so ill attended that of all his squadron he had none left him but Anthony des Aubus, a gentleman of his bed-chamber, a little man, and but ill-armed; the others were all dispersed, as he told me himself at night before their faces, and they ought to have been ashamed of themselves: but they returned to his assistance very seasonably; for a small party of the routed enemy coming along the road, and perceiving it so thin of men, fell upon the king and the aforesaid gentleman of his bed-chamber; but the king, by the activity of his horse (which was the best in the world), kept them at bay till others of his men came up, who were not far off; and then the Italians were all forced to fly. Upon this the king took their counsel and retired to his van, which had never stirred from its ground. Thus the king came off victoriously with the main battle, and if the van had advanced but a hundred paces, the enemy’s whole army would have fled: some said they ought to have advanced, and others that they ought not. Our troops, which had pursued, followed the enemy to their very camp, which was extended towards Fornovo; and I saw none of our men touched but one Julian Bourgneuf, who fell down dead from a blow that was given him by an Italian who passed by him; but he was very ill armed. Upon that accident our men stopped, and cried, “Let us return to the king;” and at that very word the whole party halted to give their horses breath, which had been very hard ridden, and were tired with the length of the way, which was full of sharp stones and gravel. Not far from us we saw a party of about thirty of the enemy’s men-at-arms march along in retreat; but we were in disorder and suffered them to pass. When our horses had taken a little breath we went in search of the king, not knowing where he was: we set off at a good trot, but we had not gone far before we perceived him at a great distance. We then caused our servants to alight and gather up the lances, which lay very thick upon the field, and especially the bourdonnasses; but they were good for nothing, for they were hollow and light, and weighed no more than a javelin, yet they were finely painted; so that we were now better furnished with lances than on the day before, and marched directly towards the king. In our way we fell in with several bodies of the enemy’s foot, who were of the marquis’s division, and had hid themselves behind the hills when he made his charge upon the king. Several of them were slain; but others got over the river and escaped, and we did not trouble ourselves much about them.