Page:History of the Reign of Ferdinand and Isabella the Catholic Vol. I.djvu/200

56 REIGN OF JOHN II., OF ARAGON. PART I. Popularity of ilie iliike i.f Lorraine. to them on their father's decease, threatened a similar rebellion, though on much less justifiable pretences, to that which he had just experienced from Don Carlos. To crown the whole of John's calamities, his eyesight, which had been impaired by exposure and protracted sufferings during the winter siege of Amposta, now failed him alto- gether.^^ In this extremity, his intrepid wife, putting her- self at the head of such forces as she could collect, passed by water to the eastern shores of Catalonia, besieging Rosas in person, and checking the opera- tions of the enemy by the capture of several inferior places ; while Prince Ferdinand, effecting a junction with her before Gerona, compelled the duke of Lorraine to abandon the siege of that important city. Ferdinand's ardor, however, had nearly proved fatal to him ; as, in an accidental encounter with a more numerous party of the enemy, his jaded horse would inHillibly have be- trayed him into their hands, had it not been for the devotion of his officers, several of whom, throw- ing themselves between him and his pursuers, enabled him to escape by the sacrifice of their own liberty. These ineffectual struggles could not turn the tide of fortune. The duke of Lorraine succeeded in this and the two following campaigns in making ^ L. Marineo, Cosas Memora- pp. 611-613. — Duclos, Hist.de bles, fol. 139. — Zurita, Anales, Louis XI., (Amsterdam, 1746,) torn. iv. fol. 148, 149, 158. —Ale- lom. ii. p. 111. — M6m. de Comi- son, Anales de Navarra, torn. iv. nes, Introd. p. 258, apud Petilot.