of the Lord of Marie.  Before long the rumor spread abroad amongst the population of the country-places near Laon that that town was quite empty of inhabitants; and all the peasants rushed thither and took possession of the houses they found without defenders.  Who could tell, or be believed if he were to attempt to tell, how much money, raiment, and provision of all kinds was discovered in this city?  Before long there arose between the first and last comers disputes about the partition of their plunder; all that the small folks had taken soon passed into the hands of the powerful; if two men met a third quite alone they stripped him; the state of the town was truly pitiable.  The burghers who had quitted it with Thomas de Marle had beforehand destroyed and burned the houses of the clergy and grandees whom they hated; and now the grandees, escaped from the massacre, carried off in their turn from the houses of the fugitives all means of subsistence and all movables to the very hinges and bolts.”

The rumor of so many disasters, crimes, and reactions succeeding one another spread rapidly throughout all districts.  Thomas de Marle was put under the ban of the kingdom, and visited with excommunication “by a general assembly of the Church of the Gauls,” says Guibert of Nogent, “assembled at Beauvais; “and this sentence was read every Sunday after mass in all the metropolitan and parochial churches.  Public feeling against Thomas de Marle became so strong that Enguerrand de Bowes, Lord of Coucy, who passed, says Suger, for his father, joined those who declared war against him in the name of Church and King.  Louis the Fat took the field in person against him.  “Men-at-arms, and in very small numbers, too,” says Guibert of Nogent, “were with difficulty induced to second the king, and did not do so heartily; but the light-armed infantry made up a considerable force, and the Archbishop of Rheims and the bishops had summoned all the people to this expedition, whilst offering to all absolution from their sins.  Thomas de Marle, though at that time helpless and stretched upon his bed, was not sparing of scoffs and insults towards his assailants; and at first he absolutely refused to listen to the king’s summons.”  But Louis persisted without wavering in his enterprise, exposing himself freely, and in person leading his infantry to the attack when the men-at-arms did not come on or bore themselves slackly.  He carried successively the castles of Crecy and Nogent, domains belonging to Thomas de Marle, and at last reduced him to the necessity of buying himself off at a heavy ransom, indemnifying the churches he had spoiled, giving guarantees for future behavior, and earnestly praying for re-admission to the communion of the faithful.  As for those folks of Laon, perpetrators of or accomplices in the murder of Bishop Gaudri, who had sought refuge with Thomas de Marle, the king showed them no mercy.  “He ordered them,” says Suger, “to be strung up to the gibbet, and left for food to the voracity of kites, and crows, and vultures.”