the ghastly procession of more than three thousand women, many with gaping wounds in the face, many with their arms cut off and festering, of all ranks and ages, some numbering more than ninety years, bareheaded, with grey hair streaming upon their shoulders; others with nursing infants in their arms, all escorted by a company of heavy-armed troopers, left forever their native city.  All made the dismal journey upon foot, save that carts were allowed to transport the children between the ages of two and six years.  The desolation and depopulation were now complete.  “I wandered through the place, gazing at all this,” says a Spanish soldier who was present, and kept a diary of all which occurred, “and it seemed to me that it was another destruction of Jerusalem.  What most struck me was to find not a single denizen of the town left, who was or who dared to call himself French.  How vain and transitory, thought I, are the things of this world!  Six days ago what riches were in the city, and now remains not one stone upon another.”

The expulsion of the women had been accomplished by the express command of Philip, who moreover had made no effort to stay the work of carnage, pillage, and conflagration.  The pious King had not forgotten, however, his duty to the saints.  As soon as the fire had broken out, he had sent to the cathedral, whence he had caused the body of Saint Quentin to be removed and placed in the royal tent.  Here an altar, was arranged, upon one side of which was placed the coffin of that holy personage, and upon the other the head of the “glorious Saint Gregory” (whoever that glorious individual may have been in life), together with many other relics brought from the church.  Within the sacred enclosure many masses were said daily, while all this devil’s work was going on without.  The saint who had been buried for centuries was comfortably housed and guarded by the monarch, while dogs were gnawing the carcases of the freshly-slain men of Saint Quentin, and troopers were driving into perpetual exile its desolate and mutilated women.

The most distinguished captives upon this occasion were, of course, Coligny and his brother.  Andelot was, however, fortunate enough to make his escape that night under the edge of the tent in which he was confined.  The Admiral was taken to Antwerp.  Here he lay for many weeks sick with a fever.  Upon his recovery, having no better pastime, he fell to reading the Scriptures.  The result was his conversion to Calvinism; and the world shudders yet at the fate in which that conversion involved him.

Saint Quentin being thus reduced, Philip was not more disposed to push his fortune.  The time was now wasted in the siege of several comparatively unimportant places, so that the fruits of Egmont’s valor were not yet allowed to ripen.  Early in September Le Catelet was taken.  On the 12th of the same month the citadel of Ham yielded, after receiving two thousand shots from Philip’s artillery, while