With five hundred horse, and about a thousand foot soldiers, he crossed
the Alps. Here he learned that for some unknown reason Charles had
postponed his expedition. Recoiling from the ridicule attending a
quixotic and useless adventure, he hunted around for some time to find
some heroic achievement which would redeem his name from reproach, when,
thwarted in every thing, he returned to Austria, chagrined and
humiliated.
Thus frustrated in all his attempts to gain ascendency in Italy,
Maximilian turned his eyes to the Swiss estates of the house of
Hapsburg, now sundered from the Austrian territories. He made a vigorous
effort, first by diplomacy, then by force of arms, to regain them. Here
again he was frustrated, and was compelled to enter into a capitulation
by which he acknowledged the independence of the Helvetic States, and
their permanent severance from Austrian jurisdiction.
In April, 1498, Charles VIII. died, and Louis XII. succeeded him on the
throne of France. Louis immediately made preparations for a new invasion
of Italy. In those miserable days of violence and blood, almost any
prince was ready to embark in war under anybody's banner, where there
was the least prospect of personal aggrandizement.
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