By this time, the scout was come back, who informed the Prince that now was the best time in the world to attack the enemy, who all lay supinely in their tents, and did not expect a surprise: that the very out-guards were slender, and that it would not be hard to put them to a great deal of confusion. The Prince, who was enough impatient before, now was all fire and spirit, and it was not in the power of magic to withhold him; but hasting immediately to horse, with as much speed as possible, he got at the head of his men; and marching on directly to the enemy, put them into so great a surprise, that it may be admired how they got themselves into a condition of defence; and, to make short of a business that was not long in acting, I may avow, nothing but the immediate hand of the Almighty, (who favours the juster side, and is always ready for the support of those, who approach so near his own divinity; sacred and anointed heads) could have turned the fortune of the battle to the royal side: it was prodigious to consider the unequal numbers, and the advantage all on the Prince’s part; it was miraculous to behold the order on his side, and surprise on the other, which of itself had been sufficient to have confounded them; yet notwithstanding all this unpreparedness on this side, and the watchfulness and care on the other; so well the general and officers of the royal army managed their scanted time, so bravely disciplined and experienced the soldiers were, so resolute and brave, and all so well mounted and armed, that, as I said, to a miracle they fought, and it was a miracle they won the field: though that fatal night Cesario did in his own person wonders; and when his horse was killed under him, he took a partisan, and as a common soldier, at the head of his foot, acted the hero with as much courage and bravery, as ever Caesar himself could boast; yet all this availed him nothing: he saw himself abandoned on all sides, and then under the covert of the night, he retired from the battle, with his sword in his hand, with only one page, who fought by his side: a thousand times he was about to fall on his own sword, and like Brutus have finished a life he could no longer sustain with glory: but love, that coward of the mind, and the image of divine Hermione, as he esteemed her, still gave him love to life; and while he could remember she yet lived to charm him, he could even look with contempt on the loss of all his glory; at which, if he repined, it was for her sake, who expected to behold him return covered over with laurels. In these sad thoughts he wandered as long as his wearied legs would bear him, into a low forest, far from the camp; where, over-pressed with toil, all over pain, and a royal heart even breaking with anxiety, he laid him down under the shelter of a tree, and found but his length of earth left to support him now, who, not many hours before, beheld himself the greatest monarch, as he imagined, in the world. Oh who, that had seen him thus; which of his most mortal enemies, that had viewed the royal youth, adorned with all the charms of beauty, heaven ever distributed to man; born great, and but now adored by all the crowding world with hat and knee; now abandoned by all, but one kind trembling boy weeping by his side, while the illustrious hero lay gazing with melancholy weeping eyes, at those stars that had lately been so cruel to him; sighing out his great soul to the winds, that whistled round his uncovered head; breathing his griefs as silently as the sad fatal night passed away; where nothing in nature seemed to pity him, but the poor wretched youth that kneeled by him, and the sighing air: I say, who that beheld this, would not have scorned the world, and all its fickle worshippers? Have cursed the flatteries of vain ambition, and prized a cottage far above a throne? A garland wreathed by some fair innocent hand, before the restless glories of a crown?

Some authors, in the relation of this battle, affirm, that Philander quitted his post as soon as the charge was given, and sheered off from that wing he commanded; but all historians agree in this point, that if he did, it was not for want of courage; for in a thousand encounters he has given sufficient proofs of as much bravery as a man can be capable of: but he disliked the cause, disapproved of all their pretensions, and looked upon the whole affair and proceeding to be most unjust and ungenerous; and all the fault his greatest enemies could charge him with was, that he did not deal so gratefully with a prince that loved him and trusted him; and that he ought frankly to have told him, he would not serve him in this design; and that it had been more gallant to have quitted him that way, than this; but there are so many reasons to be given for this more politic and safe deceit, than are needful in this place, and it is most certain, as it is the most justifiable to heaven and man, to one born a subject of France, and having sworn allegiance to his proper king, to abandon any other interest; so let the enemies of this great man say what they please, if a man be obliged to be false to this or that interest, I think no body of common honesty, sense and honour, will dispute which he ought to abandon; and this is most certain, that he did not forsake him because fortune did so, as this one instance may make appear. When Cesario was first proclaimed king, and had all the reason in the world to believe that fortune would have been wholly partial to him, he offered Philander his choice of any principality and government in France, and to have made him of the Order of Saint Esprit: all which he refused, though he knew his great fortune was lost, and already distributed to favourites at Court, and himself proscribed and convicted as a traitor to France. Yet all these refusals did not open the eyes of this credulous great young man, who still believed it the sullenness and generosity of his temper.

No sooner did the day discover to the world the horrid business of the preceding night, but a diligent search was made among the infinite number of dead that covered the face of the earth, for the body of the Prince, or new King, as they called him: but when they could not find him among the dead, they sent out parties all ways to search the woods, the forests and the plains; nor was it long they sought in vain; for he who had laid himself, as I said, under the shelter of a tree, had not for any consideration removed him; but finding himself seized by a common hand, suffered himself, without resistance, to be detained by one single man ‘till more advanced, when he could as easily have killed the rustic as speak or move; an action so below the character of this truly brave man, that there is no reason to be given to excuse his easy submission but this, that he was stupefied with long watching, grief, and the fatigues of his daily toil for so many weeks before: for it is not to be imagined it was carelessness, or little regard for life; for if it had been so, he would doubtless have lost it nobly with the victory, and never have retreated while there had been one sword left advanced against him; or if he had disdained the enemy should have had the advantage and glory of so great a conquest, at least when his sword had been yet left him, he should have died like a Roman, and have scorned to have added to the triumph of the enemy. But love had unmanned his great soul, and Hermione pleaded within for life at any price, even that of all his glory; the thought of her alone blackened this last scene of his life, and for which all his past triumphs could never atone nor excuse.

Thus taken, he suffered himself to be led away tamely by common hands without resistance: a victim now even fallen to the pity of the mobile as he passed, and so little imagined by the better sort who saw him not, they would not give a credit to it, every one affirming and laying wagers he would die like a hero, and never surrender with life to the conqueror. But this submission was but too true for the repose of all his abettors; nor was his mean surrender all, but he shewed a dejection all the way they were bringing him to Paris, so extremely unworthy of his character, that it is hardly to be credited so great a change could have been possible. And to shew that he had lost all his spirit and courage with the victory, and that the great strings of his heart were broke, the Captain who had the charge of him, and commanded that little squadron that conducted him to Paris, related to me this remarkable passage in the journey; he said, that they lodged in an inn, where he believed both the master, and a great many strangers who that night lodged there, were Huguenots, and great lovers of the Prince, which the Captain did not know, till after the lodgings were taken: however, he ordered a file of Musketeers to guard the door; and himself only remaining in the chamber with the Prince, while supper was getting ready: the Captain being extremely weary with watching and toiling for a long time together, laid himself down on a bench behind a great long table, that was fastened to the floor, and had unadvisedly laid his pistols on the table; and though he durst not sleep, he thought there to stretch himself into a little ease, who had not quitted his horseback in a great while: the Prince, who was walking with his arms a-cross about the room, musing in a very dejected posture, often casting his eyes to the door, at last advances to the table, and takes up the Captain’s pistols; the while he who saw him advance, feared in that moment, what the Prince was going to do; he thought, if he should rise and snatch at the pistols, and miss of them, it would express so great a distrust of the Prince, it might provoke him to do, what by his generous submitting of them, might make him escape; and therefore, since it was too late, he suffered the Prince to arm himself with two pistols, who before was disarmed of even his little penknife. He was, he said, a thousand times about to call out to the guards; but then he thought before they could enter to his relief, he was sure to be shot dead, and it was possible the Prince might make his party good with four or five common soldiers, who perhaps loved the Prince as well as any, and might rather assist than hinder his flight; all this he thought in an instant, and at the same time, seeing the Prince stand still, in a kind of consideration what to do, looking, turning, and viewing of the pistols, he doubted not but his thoughts would determine with his life, and though he had been in the heat of all the battle, and had looked death in the face, when it appeared most horrid, he protested he knew not how to fear till this moment, and that now he trembled with the apprehension of unavoidable ruin; he cursed a thousand times his unadvisedness, now it was too late; he saw the Prince, after he had viewed and reviewed the pistols, walk in a great thoughtfulness again about the chamber, and at last, as if he had determined what to do, came back and laid them again on the table; at which the Captain snatched them up, resolving never to commit so great an over- sight more. He did not doubt, he said, but the Prince, in taking them up, had some design of making his escape; and most certainly, if he had but had courage to have attempted it, it had not been hard to have been accomplished: at worst, he could but have died: but there is a fate, that over-rules the most lucky minutes of the greatest men in the world, and turns even all advantages offered to misfortunes, when it designs their ruin.

While they were on their way to Paris, he gave some more signs, that the misfortunes he had suffered, had lessened his heart and courage: he writ several the most submissive letters in the world to the King, and to the Queen- Mother of France; wherein he strove to mitigate his treason, with the poorest arguments imaginable, and, as if his good sense had declined with his fortune, his style was altered, and debased to that of a common man, or rather a schoolboy, filled with tautologies and stuff of no coherence; in which he neither shewed the majesty of a prince, nor sense of a gentleman; as I could make appear by exposing those copies, which I leave to history; all which must be imputed to the disorder his head and heart were in, for want of that natural rest, he never after found. When he came to Paris, he fell at the feet of His Majesty, to whom they brought him, and with a shower of tears bedewing his shoes, as he lay prostrate, besought his pardon, and asked his life; perhaps one of his greatest weaknesses, to imagine he could hope for mercy, after so many pardons for the same fault; and which, if he had had but one grain of that bravery left him, he was wont to be master of, he could not have expected, nor have had the confidence to have implored; and he was a poor spectacle of pity to all that once adored him, to see how he petitioned in vain for life; which if it had been granted, had been of no other use to him, but to have passed in some corner of the earth, with Hermione, despised by all the rest: and, though he fetched tears of pity from the eyes of the best and most merciful of kings, he could not gain on his first resolution; which was never to forgive him that scurrilous Declaration he had dispersed at his first landing in France; that he took upon him the title of king, he could forgive; that he had been the cause of so much bloodshed, he could forgive; but never that unworthy scandal on his unspotted fame, of which he was much more nice, than of his crown or life; and left him (as he told him this) prostrate on the earth, when the guards took him up, and conveyed him to the Bastille: as he came out of the Louvre, it is said, he looked with his wonted grace, only a languishment sat there in greater beauty, than possibly all his gayer looks ever put on, at least in his circumstances all that beheld him imagined so; all the Parisians were crowded in vast numbers to see him: and oh, see what fortune is! Those that had vowed him allegiance in their hearts, and were upon all occasions ready to rise in mutiny for his least interest, now saw him, and suffered him to be carried to the Bastille with a small company of guards, and never offered to rescue the royal unfortunate from the hands of justice, while he viewed them all around with scorning, dying eyes.

While he remained in the Bastille, he was visited by several of the ministers of State, and cardinals, and men of the Church, who urged him to some discoveries, but could not prevail with him: he spoke, he thought, he dreamed of nothing but Hermione; and when they talked of heaven, he ran on some discourse of that beauty, something of her praise; and so continued to his last moment, even on the scaffold, where, when he was urged to excuse, as a good Christian ought, his invasion, his bloodshed, and his unnatural war, he set himself to justify his passion to Hermione, endeavouring to render the life he had led with her, innocent and blameless in the sight of heaven; and all the churchmen could persuade could make him speak of very little else. Just before he laid himself down on the block, he called to one of the gentlemen of his chamber, and taking out the enchanted tooth-pick- case, he whispered him in the ear, and commanded him to bear it from him to Hermione; and laying himself down, suffered the justice of the law, and died more pitied than lamented; so that it became a proverb, ‘If I have an enemy, I wish he may live like —— , and die like Cesario’: so ended the race of this glorious youth, who was in his time the greatest man of a subject in the world, and the greatest favourite of his prince, happy indeed above a monarch, if ambition and the inspiration of knaves and fools, had not led him to destruction, and from a glorious life, brought him to a shameful death.

This deplorable news was not long in coming to Hermione, who must receive this due, that when she heard her hero was dead, (and with him all her dearer greatness gone) she betook herself to her bed, and made a vow she would never rise nor eat more; and she was as good as her word, she lay in that melancholy estate about ten days, making the most piteous moan for her dead lover that ever was heard, drowning her pillow in tears, and sighing out her soul. She called on him in vain as long as she could speak; at last she fell into a lethargy, and dreamed of him, till she could dream no more; an everlasting sleep closed her fair eyes, and the last word she sighed was Cesario.