This first comparatively bright and hopeful phase of the struggle ended with the summer. Piero Strozzi with the flower of the French army retreated from the city, hoping to make a diversion, to unite with reinforcements that he expected, to carry the war into Florentine territory. At the beginning of August he came to a pitched battle with Marignano's forces, on the hills of Scannagalli near Marciano in the Valdichiana. Over his army, together with the golden lilies of France, there floated a green banner with the Dantesque text: _Libertà vo cercando_, "I go seeking Liberty." Under a blazing sun, Swiss and Frenchmen, Spaniards, Germans and Italians, dashed together in a terrible melée; but the victory on the part of Spain and the Empire was complete and crushing. Four thousand men of Strozzi's army are said to have been killed. The hospitals of Siena were filled to overflowing with the wounded, who made their way in from the scene of disaster; while the rest limped slowly along the streets or lay about in the squares, utterly broken in spirit, wailing for aid. No one who beheld this piteous spectacle, says Sozzini, "could have possibly kept back his tears, even if he had had a heart of hardest stone." It was said that the defeat had been caused by the treachery of a French ancient--though Montluc will not assert this--and Strozzi, while he lay helpless with his wounds at Montalcino, got the man into his hands, extorted a confession by torture, and executed him together with one of his own officers to whom he ascribed his overthrow.