Chapter IX: “the Convalescence of France” (2)

Charles hastened to set in motion, in as orderly a fashion as possible, an army of 14,000 French and 8,000 English, Scotch, Brabanters, Spaniards, and Italians. The commander-in-chief was the former leader of the praguerie--the dauphin Louis. This terrible band turned the Jura in fairly good order, and entered Switzerland by crossing the little river Birse. The Swiss, who were then besieging Zurich, were able to send only 2,000 men to meet the enemy. These brave fellows had expected only to skirmish and knew not with what force they had to deal. A messenger had come from Bâle to warn them of the numbers of the French, but they had killed him; and in the brutal pride their former successes had inspired, they threw themselves head-foremost on the first corps they met (1444). Their bravoura did not save them. After making a desperate resistance in a hospital and behind the dilapidated walls of a garden, their position was forced and they perished, every one. The dauphin had such respect for the brave men that fought so well that he went no further and made a treaty of alliance with the Swiss. As for the _écorcheurs_, they found nothing to take away from these poor mountaineers and many turned towards Alsace and Swabia.[c]

The dauphin’s return, and the report of the check the Swiss had suffered, considerably advanced the affairs of Lorraine. The towns which sheltered themselves under the name of the empire saw that, if the emperor and the German nobility had called in the French to the heart of the German countries, to save Zurich, they would not come and fight the French on the marches of France. Toul and Verdun acknowledged the king as protector.

Metz alone resisted. That great and aspiring town had others dependent on it, and was encompassed by from twenty-four to thirty forts. Épinal, however, had from the beginning seized the opportunity to emancipate itself, and had put itself into the king’s hands. The forts having afterwards surrendered, the Metz men made up their mind to negotiate. They represented to the king that “they were not of his realm or lordship, but that, in his wars with the duke of Burgundy and others, they had always received and comforted his men.” Thereupon, by order of the king, Master Jean Rabateau, president of the parliament, propounded many arguments to the contrary. The grand question of the limits of France and the empire could not be settled thus incidentally, and during a truce to the English war. The matter remained undecided. The king contented himself with drawing on the finances of the wealthy town of Metz.[b]

MILITARY AND FINANCIAL REFORMS (1443-1448 A.D.)

[Sidenote: [1443-1448 A.D.]]

These two expeditions had disembarrassed the king of the most riotous among his adventurers, and broken in the rest to an elementary discipline; it was at last possible to put into execution the ordinance of Orleans. In 1445, the army was consolidated into fifteen companies of one hundred lances; to each lance six paid men were reckoned--a man-at-arms and his esquire, three archers and a _coutillier_, all mounted. By these were the cities garrisoned, the largest having only from twenty to thirty lances; in this way the inhabitants remained stronger than the soldiers, and in a position to check any disorder. The demand for positions in the army was so great that numerous old stagers followed the companies about that they might be ready to snap up the first vacancy. All the others were obliged to retire immediately to their homes without disturbing the peace, under penalty of being given up to justice as vagabonds. Such was the progress of order that they obeyed and at the end of the fifteen days nothing more was heard of them; as for those who had enlisted, they submitted to a rigorous discipline. Charles VII had thus at his disposition a picked troop of nine thousand horse.

By another ordinance, that of April 28th, 1448, the king secured to France an advantage which she had hitherto furnished to foreigners--to the Genoese, at need--but had never herself possessed: a regular and permanent infantry. Each of the sixteen thousand parishes of the kingdom was obliged to furnish the king “a good comrade,” said the ordinance, “who has seen service.” He had to furnish at his own expense his _brigandine_, a light coat of armour of iron plates joined together; a short coat, light helmet, dagger, sword, crossbow, and quiver of arrows. He was obliged to drill on all feast days, and be ready to serve the king at any time he should be called upon to do so; he received in payment four francs a month when in service and exemption from all taxes and subsidies, excepting the _aide_ and the _gabelle_.

The free archer did not become at once a model soldier; military genius was not developed in a day in a nation so long without arms. But while Villon depicts for us one of those archers dropping on his knees before a scarecrow, taking it for a gendarme, entreating pardon, and beginning to feel extremely ill, satiric poetry is not history; a century later, in 1554, the same archers, incorporated in the provincial legions of Francis I, gained against the first army in the world--the Castilian veterans--a battle that had been once lost by the men-at-arms; still another century, and in 1643, changing their quivers for guns, they had developed into the foot-soldiers that fought at Rocroi.

All these reforms were subordinate to that of the finances, set in motion in 1443 by Jacques Cœur. To establish a reciprocal control by the regulators of finances over one another; to oblige individual receivers to account to the receiver-general and the latter in his turn to the chamber of accounts; to force the king’s officers--the ministers of finance, the master of the horse, the treasurer of wars, and the commander of artillery--to render monthly accounts to the king in person--these were excellent and admirable reforms, thanks to which Charles VII found himself in a position to create in France an institution that the most powerful of his predecessors had been unable to establish--a military force dependent only on the king, and protecting him, instead of leaving him at the mercy of the barons’ evil humours, as had heretofore been the case. Since Charles V, the ordinary indirect taxes, such as that on salt, on merchandise, and on liquors, had been permanent. Since Charles VI, the land tax (the _taille_), for payment of the soldiers, had become permanent--that is, it continued to be levied without the vote of the estates. But the king gave guarantee for the proper administration of financial justice by declaring sovereign the _cour des aides_, which alone had the right to interpret ordinances pertaining to the taxes and was the last resort of all civil and criminal processes growing out of the administration of the finances.

Though it was not yet possible, in the fifteenth century, to reduce all France to one uniform law, she was at least beginning to emerge from the arbitrary customs of a justice exercised, above all in the north of France, according to unwritten laws. Charles VII thought--and the thought is an honour to him--that it was essential that all the laws of a kingdom should be written and “agreed upon by the lawyers of each country,” and examined and authorised by the supreme court and by the parliament, so that it would not be possible to deviate from the text thus officially inscribed. To him was due this innovation.

THE CLOSE OF THE HUNDRED YEARS’ WAR

[Sidenote: [1448-1450 A.D.]]

Having accomplished these reforms, Charles found himself sufficiently strong to finish with the English. A certain Francis de Surienne, an Aragonese adventurer in the service of the English, wishing to garrison one of the Norman villages possessed by the English, found himself repulsed on all sides. The soldiers, having received from Henry VI neither pay, provisions, nor munitions, were unwilling to share with this foreigner their already insufficient resources. The Aragonese, finding the doors of the allies closed to him, provided for the needs of his company after the fashion of the greater number of the military leaders: during the season of peace he fell upon Fougères, a rich city of Brittany, and gave it over to his men to plunder in lieu of their arrears of pay.

Immediately the king of France and the duke of Brittany demanded of the English governor of Normandy reparation and an indemnity of 1,600,000 crowns damages. They demanded an impossibility. The indemnity not arriving, the French set out to collect it for themselves at Pont-de-l’Arche, Gerberoy, Verneuil. Dunois entered the province with an efficient army which the Burgundians and Bretons joined voluntarily. Pont-Audemer, Lisieux, Mantes, Vernon, Évreux, Louviers, St. Lô, Coutances, and Valognes were taken or surrendered by the inhabitants without striking a blow.

England was then beginning her Wars of the Roses, which during thirty years were to cover her with blood and ruins. The parliament, not as yet daring to take action against the king, fastened upon his minister, the duke of Suffolk, and troubled itself little about Normandy, since the reverses there were new and potent arguments against the accused. The governor, Somerset, instead of concentrating his forces, divided them into twenty garrisons, and sent ambassadors to open negotiations; but, knowing no better how to make treaties than how to make war, he forgot to invest them with authority. Order, proficiency--all that had hitherto contributed to their success was now on the side of the French: to the French Victory went over. On October 18th, 1449, they appeared beneath the walls of Rouen.

In a moment all the inhabitants of Rouen were armed, but armed against the English, who took refuge in the citadel. Somerset was there, and the veteran Talbot, and numerous lords, officers, and soldiers; but it must be remembered that it would have been impossible to resist at once both the population and the French army. There was talk of a treaty, but on what conditions!--that, in addition to Rouen, Caudebec, Villequier, Lillebonne, Tancarville, Harfleur,--that is to say all the lower course of the Seine,--should be delivered up to the king of France; and that a hostage should be furnished in the person of the famous Talbot himself--the English Achilles.

The governor of Honfleur refused to recognise this capitulation. The city was taken in the middle of winter (December, 1449); Harfleur met the same fate. The English, pushed to extremities, sent a knight of great renown, Thomas Kyriell, with 6,000 men. It was a last effort. Landing at Cherbourg, Kyriell sought to join the duke of Somerset at Bayeux, by way of the shore; the French followed, and on April 15th, 1450, near the village of Formigny, the constables of Richemont from one side, the count of Clermont from the other, vigorously attacked him. Kyriell’s soldiers fought bravely, but were defeated and left 4,000 on the field. This insignificant number sufficed to blot out from the minds of the French the 30,000 dead at Crécy, the 12,000 captive at Poitiers and at Agincourt. Vire, Bayeux, Avranches, Caen, Domfront, and Falaise fell into the hands of Charles.

[Sidenote: [1450-1453 A.D.]]

The numerous garrison of Cherbourg counted upon having nothing to fear, thanks to its own strength and above all to the neighbourhood of the sea. From this side it was taken. The French cannoneers established seven batteries in the sea itself; when the tide rose they left their cannon well anchored on the beach and protected by oiled skins; when the tide fell they returned to them. It was the English who, first of all, had turned against the French, at Crécy and Agincourt, this terrible arm of the artillery; the latter now manipulated it better than themselves. Cherbourg capitulated, and in a year the whole of Normandy was taken. Also the French army presented a novel spectacle: disciplined and obedient, it now lived on its pay and not by plunder.

A month later, Dunois, Saintrailles, Chabannes, and the brothers Jean and Gaspard Bureau, who directed so advantageously the French artillery, marched with 20,000 men against Guienne. Bourg-sur-Gironde, Blaye, Castillon, Libourne, St. Émilion, offshoots from Bordeaux, which the English had loaded with privileges as they had that city, were easily taken. The inhabitants of Bordeaux, so well disposed to the England who bought their wines, attempted a sortie, fled upon catching sight of the enemy, and entered like the others into negotiations. The French granted nearly all that was asked of them. This was the 5th of June, 1451; the surrender was delayed until the 23rd. On that day, the herald of the city having cried with a loud voice for succour from the English for the people of Bordeaux, and no one replying, the gates were opened to the French.

However mild the conquerors were, the great town soon regretted that English domination so far removed as to be scarcely felt. Now it had to pay taxes and furnish soldiers, the harbour was deserted, the shops were encumbered with unsold tuns. If an English army had appeared, no matter how weak, Bordeaux would have thrown herself into its arms. Such an army now appeared.

The government of Henry VI, or, to speak more correctly, of Margaret of Anjou, had need of a great success abroad in order to establish itself at home. Talbot, earl of Shrewsbury, now eighty years of age, was charged with bringing Guienne again under the English rule. The first steps were easy. The inhabitants of Bordeaux themselves introduced the English into their town, September 22nd, 1452; almost the whole province followed their example, and the king of France had to recommence his conquest. With the spring of 1453 his troops were marching into Guienne; on the 14th of July they laid siege to Castillon.[c]

_The Battle of Castillon (July 17th, 1453)_

The royal army, the greater part of which, including the artillery under the Bureau brothers, was concentrated in the camp, nearly two thousand feet long by one thousand wide, occupied also an abbey, which was later on the priory of St. Florent, and which overlooked Castillon; on the plain of Mount Horable, near to the village of Capitourlans, were the Bretons of Count d’Étampes, to the number of 240 lances under the command of the knights of Hunaudaye and Montauban. The night of the 16th of July was passed in fortifying the camp, which was surrounded by deep trenches and defended by powerful artillery. Talbot on the morning of the 17th attacked the abbeys, defended by eight hundred free archers under the command of Jacques Rouhault and Pierre de Beauvau. The archers, terrified by the impetuosity of the English, who shouted the war-cry of their old leader, abandoned the abbey and retreated in the direction of the entrenched camp, followed by the enemy. On hearing of the approach of Talbot, Jacques de Chabannes left the camp and advanced at the head of two hundred lances. Aided by Rouhault and Beauvau, he protected the retreat of the archers. A very brief engagement took place; one hundred men were killed on either side. Rouhault, thrown from his horse, owed his safety only to the devotion of his archers, to whom he had sworn that he would live and die with them. Chabannes, surrounded at one moment, was delivered by his men.

Finally it was possible to effect the retreat. Talbot rallied his men and regained the abbey. There, seizing the provisions abandoned by the French, he broke open the casks and distributed wine to his soldiers; it was still early in the day; the earl of Shrewsbury (Talbot) had mass performed by his chaplain. The holy sacrament was about to be celebrated, when news was brought that the French were abandoning their enclosure and fleeing. “Never,” he exclaimed, “will I hear mass till I shall, to-day, have overthrown the band of Frenchmen which is before me”; and he gave orders to advance. The English advanced uttering their war-cry, “Talbot, Talbot, St. George!” Mounted on a little nag, the old captain was dressed in a simple red velvet cassock. Vain attempts were made to stop him, he was told that it was a false rumour, and that it would be better to await quietly the onset of the enemy; he answered his standard-bearer, who gave him this advice, by insults, and drove him away, it was said, by a sword-cut across the face. On arriving at the palisade Talbot began to shout, “On foot, on foot, all!” His men-at-arms, supported by the archers, who arrived gradually and fell into rank, were received by a formidable discharge; three hundred catapults, howitzers, culverins, and ribaudequins, the firing of which was directed by the famous gunner Giribault, threw their projectiles, which slew a large number of victims. The English hesitated. Talbot brought them back, and formed them in testudo; sheltered behind their bucklers they attacked the entrenchments. Talbot succeeded in planting the banner of St. George on the summit of the trench. A terrible conflict took place; for more than an hour they fought hand to hand.

Suddenly, from the neighbouring heights, the sires de Montauban and de la Hunaudaye descended with their Bretons, and took the enemy in the rear; this movement decided the issue of the combat. The English stopped to face this fresh body of troops. The terrible tempest of the artillery did not cease to rain down on them. Seizing the opportunity, the French dashed from the camp, some on foot, some on horse, and charged with fury. Talbot, though wounded, held out. A blow from a culverin struck him on the leg and threw him under his horse. The French archers surrounded him and pierced him with their arrows. His son, who had vainly endeavoured to persuade him to flee, died at his side, trying to protect him. The English, seeing the fall of their chief, fled in disorder. Some wished to regain their vessels or to cross the Dordogne at the ford of Rozan; the others took the road to St. Émilion. A body of about two thousand men under the leadership of the Gascon nobles fell back in good order on Castillon and succeeded in penetrating into the town. The French, tired, worn out, breathless, renounced the pursuit of the enemy; only the count de Penthièvre, with his troops, gave chase to the fugitives in the direction of St. Émilion. The English army was overwhelmed; thirty knights and four thousand soldiers perished; in the heat of the action they were killed without mercy. It is said that even in our day bones are found in the plain which was the scene of this sanguinary struggle. On the French side the loss was considerable; some of their leaders, Admiral de Bueil, Jacques de Chabannes, Pierre de Beauvau, were wounded, but not seriously. In spite of the reinforcements brought by the Gascon nobles, Castillon could not oppose a long resistance; the town capitulated July 20th. From there the army marched immediately against St. Émilion and Libourne, which opened their gates.[n]

Cadillac and Blanquefort followed suit. The royal army closed in around Bordeaux. The free archers overran the country; the ships loaned by La Rochelle and Brittany blocked the mouth of the Gironde. Bordeaux, threatened with famine, sent deputies to Charles VII. In their presence Jean Bureau made it a point to say to the king: “Sire, I have been reconnoitring for proper positions for our batteries; if such is your pleasure, I promise you on my life that in a few days I shall have demolished the town.” The envoys understood that this time they must accept what conditions the king would make. He stripped Bordeaux of her privileges, exacted a contribution of 100,000 crowns and ordered the banishment of twenty guilty citizens with the confiscation of their wealth; finally the construction of two citadels to guarantee the fidelity of the town in the future. The sire de l’Esparre, who had called in the English, promising a rising of all the nobility of the province, lost his head. On the 19th of October, 1453, Charles VII entered Bordeaux in triumph--the Hundred Years’ War was over. The English held nothing in France except Calais and two small neighbouring towns.[c]

Thus after a century’s struggle was decided the impossibility of English monarchs holding France, under whatever pretensions or rights. The French had outgrown those times when the sovereignty over them could be transmitted to foreigners, or divided with them by the mere laws of feudal heritage or proprietorial descent. All that the ablest kings and bravest warriors of England could do was to hold their ground upon the continent. Any lack of talent, suspension of vigilance, or remissness of energy on their part restored military superiority to the French upon their own soil, and insured with this their independence.

It was fortunate for both countries that such a decision had taken place, and that it should be final. The circumstances as well as the result of the war now rendered it so. The re-conquest of all the French provinces by Charles was not, like that of Philip Augustus or Philip the Fair, the work of trickery or deceit. It had been achieved in fair and stand-up fight, and, what was more remarkable, with forces on either side almost balanced in number. The French were not more numerous than the English at Formigny; and Talbot, when he fell at Castillon, led a greater army than that which defeated him. It was the French free archers, too, and peasant soldiers, who fought more than the knights on that field. Experience had taught the mistake of attempting to ride down the hardy sons of the soil by mounted gentry. English and French met on these last fields equal in courage and in strength. But as the French soldiers were now more carefully selected, disciplined, and organised, they were victorious over those of England, distracted as it was by civil war, sending forth armies as distracted as its government.[g]

THE LAST YEARS OF CHARLES VII

[Sidenote: [1451-1456 A.D.]]

About this time the services of the wise counsellor we have already mentioned--the great merchant and shipper, Jacques Cœur--were lost to the state. After the conviction of Jean de Xaincoings, receiver-general of the realm, for embezzlement in 1451, Jacques Cœur was accused of malversation in his office of treasurer of the crown. He was said to have heaped up incredible riches; and on some occasions he made a display of his wealth which in a great measure compensated for the evil proceedings, if such they were, by which he gained it. He furnished funds for fleets and armies out of his private stores, when they could not otherwise be had; and continued his sage advices to the king, inculcating economy and repose. Charles was still indolent and self-indulgent when no great national effort was to be made. He allowed the prosecution of his faithful servitor, accepted the sentence of death which was passed upon him, and only started up to the kindness and generosity of his character when he remembered his services, and granted him his life (1453). The rest of the treasurer’s story is very strange. Jacques Cœur escaped from prison and found refuge at Rome, was appointed admiral of the Italian fleets against the Saracens, trafficked in goods and money while sweeping the infidels from the sea, and died in the island of Chios, 1456, richer and more honoured than he had ever been in Paris. The king must have seen, when it was too late, that he had banished a financier whose advice on public affairs was cheaply paid for by the acquisition of private riches.[j]

_Quarrels with Burgundy and with the Dauphin_

[Sidenote: [1451-1453 A.D.]]

The expulsion of the English from the continent, where they no longer held any town save Calais, left the king of France in the presence of his powerful rival, the duke of Burgundy, who reigned over dominions no less vast, and after a manner quite as independent.

After the English had been driven from Normandy, Philip of Burgundy began to feel the hostility of Charles and of his court. Whenever his subjects, especially of towns, had cause of complaint against him, they appealed to the king of France and his parliament as suzerain. Ghent would not submit to the _gabelle_ (or salt tax) imposed by Philip, and the people appealed to the king of France, who pretended that the _gabelle_ peculiarly belonged to the suzerain, and a French embassy soon arrived to arbitrate between the duke and the Ghenters. The duke altogether set aside the demand of _gabelle_, but insisted merely on the fact of the chiefs of trades and the demagogues having usurped the entire power in Ghent, even the administration and the election of magistrates. The French envoys took completely the duke’s view of the difference, and gave an award, obliging the people of Ghent to admit the ducal bailiffs to a share of authority, to pay a large fine, give up the rallying emblem of the white _chaperon_, and desist from holding the meetings of the united trades.

In the following year, 1452, the French court returned to the charge and sent fresh ambassadors, not approving of the facility with which their predecessors had abandoned and condemned the democracy of Ghent. But at that time occurred the descent of Talbot on the Garonne, and the attention and efforts of Charles were necessarily turned in that direction. Duke Philip saw his opportunity. He must crush the rebellious towns ere Charles succeeded in expelling the English from Guienne. He raised a large army, brought it to Ghent, and captured several small places round it, cruelly hanging every prisoner. Treachery is reported to have been employed to induce the citizens to come forth to battle on the open plain. But 40,000 armed inhabitants of the Flemish capital, so often victorious in the field, scarcely needed any incentives to march to the relief of their towns and garrisons. Duke Philip was engaged in the siege of Gavre, from which the commander escaped to Ghent, craving succour, if the fortress was to be saved. The citizens accordingly mustered to the number of 30,000 and marched to attack the Burgundians. The encounter took place on the 23rd of July, 1453; it began by the cannon on both sides. The Ghenters were most of them slain, 20,000 being left on the field; and the duke, on beholding the heaps of slaughtered men, felt, for the first time, that these were his subjects, the sources of his wealth and the sinews of his strength.

In the same year Muhammed II carried Constantinople by assault, and extinguished the Greek empire in the East. The catastrophe, alarming to Italy and Germany, might well have aroused the king of France. Charles VII was not the hero of a crusade; the sphere of his activity and ambition did not extend so far. Yet, when the duke of Burgundy, in a solemn festivity at Lille, made a public vow to lead his armies against the Turks, when all his noblesse became associated in the same vow, and when the pope and emperor joined in the enterprise, Charles was mortified; nor was his jealousy diminished when Philip, after this vow, set forth in person to visit the Swiss and the Germans, in order to negotiate alliances and aid in his great design.

However wisely the councillors of King Charles had conducted his military operations, and his negotiations with England and with Burgundy, the spirit of their domestic administration was narrow in the extreme. The princes of the blood, however cautious and apparently submissive, looked with jealousy and anger upon those upstarts of the king’s court who so completely eclipsed and set them aside.

The king and his council, therefore, looked upon the duke of Burgundy’s proposed crusade as merely a scheme for enhancing his importance, and placing himself at the head of the princes of Europe and of a formidable army, and they resolved to attack and crush those of his subjects whom he supposed to be associates and fellow-conspirators with Duke Philip. The principal of these was his son Louis, who lived independently, but not tranquilly, in Dauphiné, now warring, now intriguing with the duke of Savoy, and omitting no opportunity of gaining followers and procuring money.

[Sidenote: [1453-1457 A.D.]]

The first of the dauphin’s friends whom the court attacked was the count d’Armagnac, who afforded every pretext for Charles’ interference. He was living in incest, excommunicated by the pope, and guilty of many crimes. Unable to resist Charles’ lieutenants, Armagnac was soon reduced, his seventeen castles were taken, and he was driven across the Pyrenees. The court then resolved to make an example of the duke of Alençon. The prince was noted for his gallantry and independent spirit, which had won the admiration of Joan of Arc. He had been foremost as a partisan against the English, yet was an object of suspicion to Charles. Dunois was sent to arrest and bring him to the king’s presence, who accused him of conspiring to receive the English into his fortresses. According to some he made an indignant answer to the king; according to others he confessed his treason, and gave information of the designs of his confederates.

By what was elicited from the duke of Alençon, the king’s suspicion and anger were increased against his son Louis, whom he resolved to leave no longer in possession of the revenues and government of Dauphiné, at least unless he submitted. In April, 1456, the king signified his intention of resuming the government of that province. The dauphin would not put himself in the power of the council, the members of which he believed capable of any crime. Nor would Charles receive his son into favour, except upon his complete submission. The march of an army, led by his declared enemy, Dammartin, alarmed Louis. He at first thought of resistance, but none of the nobles of Dauphiné or of his court would support him in resistance to his father. With a few followers Louis abruptly quitted Dauphiné, as Dammartin advanced into it, and hastened to St. Claude, in Franche-Comté. From thence he informed the king that he was determined to take part in his uncle the duke of Burgundy’s crusade against the Turks. He at the same time informed that potentate of his arrival. An answer of welcome speedily came, and Louis proceeded to Brussels. Here the duke embraced him so cordially and so long, as scarcely, so Chastelain[k] relates, to let his feet touch the earth. The dauphin was all in all for a few days; but a quarrel arising between the duke and his son, the latter was brought by his mother to Louis, who undertook to intercede for him, and remonstrate with his sire. This at once interrupted friendship and harmony. The duke saw in the dauphin one who might take his son’s part against him. Louis thus found it necessary to retire to the château of Gennape, near Brussels, where he lived on a monthly pension of 2,500 livres allowed him by the duke (1456-1457).

_Death of Charles VII; the Influence of His Reign_

[Sidenote: [1457-1461 A.D.]]

This was the very result which Charles most dreaded, and which he most carefully should have avoided. But his council feared the reconciliation between father and son: and some of them meditated setting Louis aside altogether, and prolonging their own power by proclaiming his brother Charles, then but a boy. The king would not entertain a project necessarily so fatal to his family and his kingdom. As to Charles, his inward distrust became at last a malady, and almost an insanity. Yet his suspicions were not without grounds; for as his health and strength visibly declined, especially after the breaking of a boil in the mouth, the members of his court--even those who had been the bitterest enemies of the dauphin--addressed letters to that prince containing information as to the state of things, and assurances of their own attachment. Even the king’s new mistress, the dame de Villequier,[55] was amongst those who hastened to seek security in the worship of the rising sun.

The desertion of his own ministers did not escape Charles, who reasoned that those who were so eager to abandon him in his decline might, without scruple, hasten his death. The dauphin is said to have caused some of the letters addressed to him to be placed within reach and view of the king. Charles’ terror was equal to his disgust. A captain told him that his physicians had been suborned to administer poison; one was instantly sent to prison, whilst the others fled. In his alarm, Charles refrained from taking sustenance altogether; and when the cause of his consequently weak state was discovered, and it was sought to administer food, his stomach refused to retain it. Thus did one of the most successful and triumphant among monarchs expire of mistrust--of hunger and inanition. Death levels all distinctions: Charles, the restorer of the French monarchy, died the death of a beggar (July 22nd, 1461).

The character of Charles VII is perplexing to the historian; it affords subject of surprise that such great aims, which must have been wisely conceived and steadily pursued, should have been attained by a personage in many respects so weak. We are thus obliged to separate the private habits of the prince from the public life of the monarch. In the one Charles was indolent, self-indulgent, inconstant, and immoral; in the other, active, adventurous, persevering, and patriotic. He first introduced the important novelty of a royal council. Such, indeed, had existed under his predecessor, but it was an assemblage of magnates, not of ministers, the orators and inferior members being the followers or exponents of their chiefs’ opinions. Charles VII did nothing without consulting his council. This, perhaps, is the most remarkable characteristic of his rule. And it stands in strong contrast with the habits of his son and successor, who ruled altogether from his own judgment, and who with far greater talents and capacity committed the greatest blunders, and fell far short in all his aims, which his sire contrived to avoid or to accomplish, by merely mistrusting his own omniscience and not disdaining the counsels of others.

The upper classes, their ideas, their spirit, and privileges, were no doubt undergoing in this century a great and remarkable change. This was the gradual metamorphosis from the feudal baron and knight into the courtly _seigneur_ and the modern gentleman. As their numbers greatly increased it became impossible for all to preserve the superiority in power and wealth which the ancient holders of fiefs had possessed. The younger brothers of the gentry were obliged to seek for public service and live upon pensions or pay, in military or other capacity. But they carefully preserved themselves from losing caste, by insisting that they alone should fill these numerous offices. Thus the originally restricted class of the nobility in France was spread into the wider caste of the _gentilhomme_, the power and pretensions of the whole being undiminished.[g]

Most important of all, however, was the steady growth in power of the crown. We have seen that Charles VII practically dispensed with the aid of the states-general after 1439, and that in so doing he virtually established a standing army and a permanent tax.[a] In reality the taxes were already permanent, or nearly so, but they had been considered as extra revenue; now they became usual. Charles VII in suppressing the vote of the assembly followed the example of Charles V under identical circumstances, and thus rid himself of an obligation which was often only a useless formality, and often a hindrance and restraint.[e]

A more fatal consequence of this usurpation on the part of the crown was that the nobility and clergy, remaining exempt from the tax on land which was only levied on the property of the _roturiers_, ended by taking no interest in the question. They abandoned the great principles supported at the estates of 1355 and 1356, to wit, that no tax could be levied save with the assent of the estates, and that the three orders should be subjected to the same taxes. Liberty established itself in England because the prelates, nobles, and towns remained closely united in their resistance to the encroachments of royalty, all accepting the same burdens and vindicating the same guarantees. In France the nobility and clergy deserted the common cause, handed over the third estate to the arbitrary authority of the crown, and sold the public liberties for a pecuniary advantage. From that moment it was an admitted formula that the clergy paid with their prayers, the nobility with their swords, the people with their money. The third estate, betrayed by the privileged orders, approached the king, applauded all the attacks made by the crown on the rights of the nobles and clergy, and energetically aided it to consummate the ruin of their power, until the moment that it found itself alone, face to face with the crown, and overthrew it. The defection of the clergy and the nobility was the first cause of the establishment of absolute power and of the Revolution which was accomplished 350 years later.[p]

But little enough did Charles VII or his contemporaries concern themselves with such remote consequences of their deeds as are here ominously suggested; and, not to be ourselves blinded to the true historical relations of the times we are treating, let us seek again the atmosphere of the fifteenth century, and in leaving Charles VII take a parting glance at him through the eyes of a contemporary writer, whose quaint phrasing and peculiar smack of piety will remind us that our stage setting is still of the Middle Ages. That the phrases of the courtier are somewhat more flattering than strict justice demands need neither surprise nor concern us. “Charles VII,” says Henry Baude,[o] “was loved as much by his subjects as by foreign nations, who came often to him for advice in settling their disputes, and this because of the great justice that he observed. He was feared by the good and by the wicked: by the good, who were afraid to do evil lest it should come to his knowledge; by the wicked who were afraid of his justice. He was obeyed by his vassals and subjects, and well served by old, wise, and well-tutored servants, who knew his disposition to be such that he wished each to have his own. He died in old age [in reality he was but fifty-nine]; and after his death was in great solemnity, weeping, and lamentation honourably buried, and with great regret by men of all estates, in the church of St. Denis in France, with his ancestors. May God in his holy grace receive his soul into Paradise. Amen.”

FOOTNOTES

[48] [The fall of La Trémouille was due to a conspiracy aroused by his lethargy, through which the English in 1432 were able to regain Montargis and take several important towns. “M. de la Trémouille,” says De Brantôme;[l] “was so happy as to prove a faithful and worthy servant to three kings. He was an excellent and worthy captain, and for this reason he had the honour and happiness to be known as ‘the knight without fear and without reproach.’ Splendid title indeed for him who can keep it, and wear it to the end of his life!”]

[49] [Vaudemont was the nephew and René the son-in-law of Duke Charles I who had just died. René was appointed heir by Charles’ will, but Vaudemont persisted in his pretensions, alleging Lorraine to be a masculine fief.]

[50] [Just how much of truth there is in this tale of Gilles de Retz, it would be difficult to determine. The motive alleged for the crimes smacks of the familiar witchcraft stories. A perversion of a type well known to psychiatrists might offer a more plausible explanation, supposing the facts to be assured.]

[51] [Henri Baude[o] has a different conception of the personality of the king. He says: “Charles was a man of handsome figure, tall, and of good temperament; of sanguine complexion; humble, gentle, gracious, and of pleasant temper, liberal and not prodigal. He was solitary, living soberly, loving joyously, frank, decorous, and humane. He loved ladies in all honesty, and held all women in honour. His amusements were chess and shooting with the crossbow, and he rose early. The day after he entered a town and the day before he left it he went to the principal church. His oath was ‘St. George! St. George!’ He took only two meals a day. He spoke and drank little. He had a courteous gravity, tempered familiarity, and effective diligence. His word was the word of a prince and kept as law. He thought continually of the affairs of his kingdom and the relief of his people. He heard three masses a day, that is to say, the high mass with music and two low masses, and said his prayers every day without fail. At meals he was alone at table, and few persons in his room; and his doctor was always there, and honest people and valets who spoke of gay subjects or told old stories in which he took delight.

“Naught cared he for false wisdom. At the yearly feasts, a bishop or abbot was seated at the head of his table, he in the centre, and at the end of the table one of the nobles of royal blood. When the table was spread there was none so great that did not leave the room, and all was so well arranged that none presumed to remain. He loved all virtuous people; was true and certain in promise and in all his acts. When he knew a man of virtue he took him. He had in his house and in his service the children of the princes, great nobles, and barons of his kingdom. He had around him, his chamberlains and others, the most handsome persons of the kingdom.”]

[52] Many of these captains of _écorcheurs_ have left lasting traces in the memory of the people. The Gascon La Hire has given his name to the knave of hearts. The Englishman, Matthew Gough, whom the chroniclers call Mathago, has remained, we believe, as a puppet and bugbear for children in certain provinces. The history of Gilles de Retz, greatly softened down, has furnished matter for a tale: he is the original of Blue Beard.

[53]

More honour, gentle Agnes, thou hast won,
For that thy voice our France recoverèd,
Than could be achieved by cloister-prisoned nun,
Or holiest beadsman to the desert fled.

[54] [The order of the Golden Fleece was instituted at Bruges in 1429, by the duke of Burgundy, Philip the Good, in honour of one of his mistresses, Marie de Cumbrugge, whose red tresses had been the object of many pleasantries. On the extinction of the Burgundian house the grand-mastership passed to the Habsburgs.]

[55] [Agnes Sorel had died of dysentery on the 9th of February, 1450. The _dame de Beauté_, as she was called, had her enemies, the dauphin among them, and rumours that she had been poisoned were not long in spreading through the court. These were made use of later in many infamous machinations, even against Jacques Cœur.]