Many personal reasons would have made Henri prefer returning towards Chatillon, but it had been decided that, in the event of such a disaster as that which had now befallen them, the cause in which they were engaged would be best furthered by a general retreat of all the troops across the Loire into Brittany; and consequently Henri, collecting together what he could of his shattered army, made the best of his way to St. Florent.  The men did not now hurry to their homes, as they did after every battle, when the war first began; but their constancy to their arms arose neither from increased courage nor better discipline.  They knew that their homes were now, or would soon be, but heaps of ruins, and that their only hope of safety consisted in their remaining with the army.  This feeling, which prevented the dispersion of the men, had another effect, which added greatly to the difficulty of the officers.  The wives, children, and sisters of the Vendean peasants, also flocked to the army in such numbers, that by the time the disordered multitude reached St. Florent, Henri found himself surrounded by 80,000 human, creatures, flying from the wrath of the blues, though not above a quarter of that number were men capable of bearing arms.

De Lescure, in a litter, accompanied them to St. Florent, and Chapeau was sent back to Chatillon to bid the ladies and the old Marquis join the army at that place.  Chapeau was sent direct from the field of battle before it was known whether or no M. de Lescure’s wound was mortal, and at a moment when Henri could give him nothing but a general direction as to the route which the army was about to take.  Chapeau reached Chatillon without accident; but having reached it, he found that his difficulties were only about to commence.  What was he to tell Madame de Lescure of her husband?  How was he to convey the three ladies and the Marquis from Chatillon to St. Florent, through a country, the greater portion of which would then be in the hands of the blues?

Make the best he could of it, the news was fearfully bad.  He told Madame de Lescure that her husband was certainly wounded, but that as certainly he was not killed; and that he had every reason, though he could not say what reason, to believe that the wound was not likely to be fatal.  The doubt conveyed in these tidings was, if possible, more fearful than any certainty; added to this was the great probability that Chatillon would, in a day or two, be in the hands of the republicans.  They decided, or rather Chapeau decided for them, that they should start immediately for St. Florent; and that, instead of attempting to go by the direct road, they should make their way thither by bye-lanes, and through small villages, in which they possibly might escape the ferocity of their enemies.