castles appertaining thereto, that he should restore
to the pope all the towns, castles, lands, and lordships
which belonged to him, and that he should pay the
Swiss four hundred thousand crowns, to wit, two hundred
thousand down and two hundred thousand at Martinmas
in the following winter.” [Corps Diplomatique
du Droit des Gens, by Dumont, t. vi. part 1,
p. 175.] As brave in undertaking a heavy responsibility
as he was in delivering a battle, La Tremoille did
not hesitate to sign, on the 13th of September, this
harsh treaty; and, as he had not two hundred thousand
crowns down to give the Swiss, he prevailed upon them
to be content with receiving twenty thousand at once,
and he left with them as hostage, in pledge of his
promise, his nephew Rend d’Anjou, lord of Mezieres,
“one of the boldest and discreetest knights in
France.” But for this honorable defeat,
the veteran warrior thought the kingdom of France
had been then undone; for, assailed at all its extremities,
with its neighbors for its foes, it could not, without
great risk of final ruin, have borne the burden and
defended itself through so many battles. La
Tremoille sent one of the gentlemen of his house, the
chevalier Reginald de Moussy, to the king, to give
an account of what he had done, and of his motives.
Some gentlemen about the persons of the king and
the queen had implanted some seeds of murmuring and
evil thinking in the mind of the queen, and through
her in that of the king, who readily gave ear to her
words because good and discreet was she. The
said Reginald de Moussy, having warning of the fact,
and without borrowing aid of a soul (for bold man
was he by reason of his virtues), entered the king’s
chamber, and, falling on one knee, announced, according
to order, the service which his master had done, and
without which the kingdom of France was in danger
of ruin, whereof he set forth the reasons. The
whole was said in presence of them who had brought
the king to that evil way of thinking, and who knew
not what to reply to the king when he said to them,
’By the faith of my body, I think and do know
by experience that my cousin the lord of La Tremoille
is the most faithful and loyal servant that I have
in my kingdom, and the one to whom I am most bounden
to the best of his abilities. Go, Reginald, and
tell him that I will do all that he has promised;
and if he has done well, let him do better.’
The queen heard of this kind answer made by the king,
and was not pleased at it; but afterwards, the truth
being known, she judged contrariwise to what she,
through false report, had imagined and thought.”
[Memoires de la Tremoille, in the Petitot collection,
t. xiv. pp. 476-492.]
Word was brought at the same time to Amiens that Tournai, invested on the 15th of September by the English, had capitulated, that Henry VIII. had entered it on the 21st, and that he had immediately treated it as a conquest of which he was taking possession, for he had confirmed it in all its privileges except that of having no garrison.