• Sit and taken of Fontenay by Henri de Navarre (June 1, 1587). - It also seizes Maillezais
• Continuation of the Fight after the catch of Fontenay
• Anarchy In Fontenay
• Catch of the Herbaria by Mercoeur. - New attack of Montaigu and head offices of Garnache and Beauvoir. - Disease of the King
• Taken of Niort by Saint-Gelais (28 Décembre 1588)
• Complaints of Fontenaisiens against the taxes. - strengthened Talmont
• Garnache, Tiffauges, Pouzauges and Flocellière go to the King. - Marriage of the girl of the Duke of Mercoeur with the Duke of Vendôme
• Division of the province in seven cantons. - Exploits of famous Guilleri. - Edict of Nantes (13 avirl 1598)
• Travel of Sully to Fontenay (1604). - Consistory. - troops of brigands infect the country. - Entry of Richelieu in Fontenay (December 21, 1608)
• Assassination of Henri IV (May 14, 1610). - the first king in Poitou. - States General of 1614. - Entry of Cop in shift (161). - Sully delivers to him its places of sureté of Poitou
• Peace of Loundun. - stopped Cop (1616). - General meeting of the Small rock. - Sale of Doignon and Maillezais to the Duke of Rohan by Aubigné (1619)
• Plan of a federative republic. - the king walks against revolted. - Duplessis loses its government of Saumur. - Louis XIII Acclaimed In Thouars, Parthenay, Chatellerault
• Maillezais and Marans go to him. - Seat and catch of Saint-Jean-in Angély by Louis XIII. - Its return in Paris. - again molesté clergy
• Sit of Sands of Olonne and bag of the city by Soubise. - the count of Rochefoucauld continues Soubise which, 31 Mars 1622, takes Luçon and delivers to plundering. - failures of Soubise with Saint-Gilles, Talmont and Noirmoutier
• Arrival of LOUIS XIII in Low-Poitou.
• Attack of Soubise (April 16). - Its escape. - many prisoners. - Horrible spectacle after the battle
• The king moves of Apremont on Fontenay, by Aizenay, the Rock, the Chaize-the-Viscount, Sainte-Hermine. - Its departure for Niort. - Marie de Médicis remains with Fontenay-the-Count (May 16, 1622)
• La Rochelle revolts again
• Guitton and Soubise are withdrawn on the dimensions of England
• Richelieu offers peace to Rochelais and to reformed
• Dismantling of Niort, Herbaria, Mortagne, Montaigu, Tiffauges, Parthenay, Saint-Maixent, Fontenay
• Disease of the King
• Royal declaration. - Investment of the Small rock
• Richelieu requires Money of the clergy. - General meeting of Fontenay (27 Avril - May 14, 1628). - Rendering of the Small rock (28 Octobre 1628)

Three months afterwards, Henri de Navarre was in front of Fontenay. As soon as the news of its arrival was spread in the city, terror was with its roof. Most of the population escaped: the body of city and the mayor gave the example of the defection. Eleven aldermen and advisers remained alone at their station. Among them, old Hilaire Goguet, father-in-law of Julien Collardeau, partly ensured the heavy task of defense. It took the command of the middle-class militia, made up of approximately four hundred men, borrowed various sums to pay the soldiers of the Morinière captain, and gave to all the example of firmness and the abnegation. Assisted in his energetic resolution by Roussière-Culdebraye, governor who occupied the city with the regiment of Verluisant, it put the Cabins in a state of defense and awaited the enemy.

In the nuit from the 23 to May 24, the count of Rochefoucauld, under the orders of the king, occupied Charzais with the head of the companies of arquebusiers and some others drawn from the infantry which it divided into five columns. The following day, Maximilien de Béthune, more known under the name of Sully, arrived with forty gentlemen, and the attack began side of Horts at once. - Thanks to Démosthène Jamoneau, nephew of Nicolas Rapin, who, with Feuquière, Puy-Vidal and the Bar, threw a beam on the ditch of the gardens, king de Navarre penetrated in the Cabins, and came, according to the popular tradition, to move into the house known today under the name of Mille-Pertuis (n° 85 of the streets of the Cabins).

While that occurred, besieged fought valiantly with the Bareil bridge, and after two hours of a baited combat, Sully, Dangeau and others having wanted to cross the barricade, were pushed back with blows of spades. - By learning the entry from the king at the end of the Cabins, the terrified catholics withdrew themselves behind the other barricades of the suburb which they gave up little by little. - But Henri de Navarre had made the same fault as the duke of Montpensier in 1574; the artillery missed. One realized well quickly whom the place could not be forced that with parts of strong gauge which one hastened to go to seek in Rochelle and with Saint-Jean- Angély. - While waiting for the guns, one devoted oneself to a series of escarmouches which held constantly in breath besieged. Soon five parts of gun directed on the Gross Tower, attacked by Cop, one on Marchoux which the regiment surrounded of Borie, and four others on the fort of the Ladies, where Sully appeared a tactician and a military engineer, of first order, before becoming a large minister, made rain a hail of balls on the unhappy city.

May the 30 and 31, a terrible cannonade announced in Fontenaisiens that the Protestants were going to give the general attack to their city. Despevilles seizes the fort of the Ladies, while the captain of Littres and Lhomeau tackle strong the Michaelmas bravely.

June 1, work of attack was so advanced that one heard the voice of besieged. Then Roussière seeing that it could not think of being defended more a long time, sent its lieutenant towards Henri, that it found in the approaches of the walls directing itself work and paying his person bravely. The proposals of the governor were accepted and the immediately regulated conditions: at midday the capitulation was signed; Boulaye was named by it governor and three days after the king seized Maillezais, whose abbey, unfortunately, was put at bag as well as the cathedral.

Henri de Navarre, after having laid off almost all his cavalry at once the catch of Fontenay, had withdrawn himself during a few days with Luçon. He confined that and there, with his companies of foot, including one good part, to rest his tirednesses remained in front of the city taken by storm, while waiting for a favorable occasion to take again the hostilities. He then made dismantle several cities, preserving in the area only Fontenay, Talmont, Maillezais and Saint-Maixent, and withdrew himself with the Small rock to taste a little rest there. This rest was not to be of long duration.

The duke of Merry, left Paris on June 30, threatened Fontenay, but during and August, July all September limited itself to escarmouches of no importance and cruelties without a number, made by the royal army in front of Fontenay. - During this time, king de Navarre did not remain inactive. Reinforced by Condé and all that the huguenots had people of war available in Guyenne, Aunis and Poitou, Navarrois went to the meeting of Joyeuse(1) and the battle in the plain of Coutras offered to him.

The morning, per first hour, the time when the catholic army shook, the ministers Protestant Chandieu and of Loves, entonnèrent in front of the face of the Protestant army verse XII of the ps.118:

At the sight of reformed knelt, the insane one, youth which surrounded Joyeuse pushed insulting clamours

"By death! they tremble, the cowards, they are confessed! "

- "You are mistaken, answered a captain more experienced, when the huguenots make this mine, they are solved to overcome or die"

They were to overcome indeed: four hundred gentlemen and two thousand soldiers of Merry last with the wire of the sword, of many deaths, immense spoils that one evaluates with six hundred and thousand ecus, of the standards deposited with Marans, with the feet of the mistress of the king, giving, like known as of Aubigné "its victory with the love", such were the assessment of this day when the Protestants did not lose forty men.

During this time, the plague prevailed with an extreme violence in Fontenay, where for thirty years, the plots and the massacres had familiarized the majority of the spirits with the murder. - In the medium of this upheaval, the magistrates of Fontenay accepted secret letters of Henri III, who mandait to them to leave the city with all the faithful catholics and subjects. The advice was taken and the unhappy ones exiled were withdrawn in Niort, where one establishes the seat of the legal administration. At once their departure carried out, the houses of the magistrates were plundered and ransacked by the remainder of the Protestant troops lived Fontenay under the command of Boulaye.

After the battle of Coutras, Low-Poitou had been during some relatively quiet time. Last months of the year 1587, and the first months of the following year had hardly been marked but by the catch of Marans and Maillezais, fallen to the hands from the catholics, and by the fire of the church of Wood-to-Céné and of the abbey of the Island Chauvet (March 16, 1588).

Nevertheless the victory of Coutras, while returning courage with reformed, in spite of some partial failures, had made that much Fontenaisiens Protestants had returned in the city accompanied by a certain number of catholics. - the Frouard mayor announced his administration by measurements suitable to inspire confidence, and soon the consequences of this wise control were not long in appearing, but the events which occurred to Paris, the day barricades (May 11, 1588) fanatic preachings, the congratulations of the court of Spain, the papal blessings, etc, had had their consequence in Fontenay, and anarchy started to reign there again when it was learned that under the terms of one of the secret articles of the Union, Henri III committed himself sending an army in Poitou.

In this province, the Members of a league had everywhere raised the standard of the revolt as well as the Protestants. Boulaye, helped of Claude of Trémouille, had failed in a blow of hand against Vouvent; king de Navarre, after having begun again the forts of Brault and Cartwright, had seized Marans (June 27, 1588).

On another side, the duke of Nevers advanced to avenge the defeat for Coutras; its passage was announced by all kinds of excess, and desolation was with its roof in Low-Poitou.

At the same time, the duke of Mercoeur directed many troops on Montaigu, which belonged to the family of Trémouille, and Rene Bourré, sior of Gersac, one of his more brave men officers, was already returned to Saint-George-to-Montaigu with a regiment, when king de Navarre learned the critical situation from this place which held for him.

The fortifications, shaven by Albert de Gondy, duke of Retz, lord of Dompierre-on-Yon, could only have been incompletely remade by Colombières which ordered there, and did everything to predict the nearest fall of Monlaigu if the garrison did not receive prompt helps.

King de Navarre hastened to leave the Small rock with only hundred horses and some arquebusiers. April 9 it was in Luçon, the 10 in Bournezau, where Boulaye and Pidoux brought some reinforcements to him, and 11 in Essarts, where it learned that the duke of Mercoeur, after having besieged the Saint-Jacob suburb vainly, had withdrawn himself in Clisson. - the king did not continue of them less his continuations. Accompanied by Sully and Trémouille which joined it with the head of troops raised in its grounds, it moved towards Montaigu, of which it entrusted defense to Luzernec, brother of Colombières. - With the reinforcement which the garrison of Montaigu got to him, Henri de Navarre inflicted close to Mousnières a bloody defeat with Gersay and returned at once to Saint-George-to-Montaigu to make there put back his troops. He put Montaigu in a state of defense and solved the head office of Beauvoir about which we will speak further.

Mercoor was not to be long in taking again the offensive, and the Herbaria, which had victoriously resisted a first attack of the duke, could not hold against one second. To the devastations caused by a powerful artillery, the castle capitulated.

During this time, Henri de Navarre lavished himself everywhere, visited the cities of Low-Poitou which was remained to him faithful, and engaged them with resistance, of as much better than did everything to envisage new attacks of the Members of a league.

Indeed, the duke of Nevers had just entered to Low-Poitou and Mauléon, defended by Joachim of Bouchet, treated downtown taken by storm, although she had gone to the sight of the gun.

The royal army then went to invest the small town of Montaigu, which belonged then to Condé, and who was defended by three hundred men of foot, hundred arquebusiers with horse and sixty men-at-arms. The castle, although given in rather good state on the orders of king de Navarre, could not hold against the twelve pieces of artillery which struck down it, and on December 8, 1588 the garrison capitulated.

After the catch of Montaigu the royal army went on Garnache, whose castle was occupied by a garrison of the army of king de Navarre, who had just obtained many successes on the littoral of Saintonge and Poitou. Mathurin Brunetière, lord of Plessis-Gesté ordered the place: it had with him a company of light horsemen and two companies of infantry, which are transfered soon reinforced by new troops and artillery brought to haste by the Vignole baron, of Aubigné and Robinière. - the governor hastened to make profitable the few days which remained to him to multiply the means of defense; he occupied his men to strengthen the castle, made guarantee by a spur the door which existed close the roadway of the pond, and made shave the houses of the suburbs, as well as the vault of the Holy Spirit.

The most dangerous stations having been entrusted to Aubigné, Robinière, Beauregard, Tool bag and Forest, one worked with heat to make them bearable, and one sought in the countryside of the men to contribute to work.

December 15, 1588, the scouts of the royal army advanced on the heights of Poirières to recognize Garnache. Following day 16, large of cavalry was presented at the same place, and in spite of the energetic resistance of Perrine, lieutenant of Plessis-Gesté, the enemy could the evening place in the ruins of Saint-Léonard. - In spite of this success of the Members of a league, the remainder of the month occurred in escarmouches, during which the cavalry of the garrison made frequent exits and prisoners, of which the ones were employed with the fortifications, others held to ransom, others even last being returned on word, so much one made some.

However on December 30 the artillery, consistent in six guns of battery, four couleuvrines royal and two averages, greeted the town of a flight of balls, but it was not that a false attack. The parts were soon transported side of Justices, while the duke of Nevers summoned the garrison to go. The governor refused, informant whom it recognized of another general lieutenant only king de Navarre.

A terrible cold inconvenienced extremely besieged, which could not continue work of defense, and the fall in temperature was such as an epidemic was declared among besieged almost instantaneously. Nevertheless the first New Year's Day 1589 (day of Sunday), each party seemed more occupied festivals which usually take place on this occasion than to act against the enemy, and it was hardly but Wednesday January 4, than more "huit-cents drawn blows of gun" opened a broad breach on the right and on the left of the door of entry. But the day was too advanced so that the attack was delivered.

The next morning, besieging them, arranged in battle, advanced quickly against the breaches which were broad of sixteen steps; they crossed the first demolished works, wiped the discharge of both fort which flanked the breaches and lost some men, because the soldiers who kept the door had, no matter what inferiors in a number, fought heroically.

The Tool bag, on its side, fought hopelessly; indicator which the ice could carry its men, it rejoined them and on this point resistance was so energetic that the members of a league were obliged to retrogress, leaving on the killed or wounded ground trois-cents. The fight was going to still continue if Henri de Navarre had not fallen sick to the Mothe-Frelon, close the Field-Saint-Father: what seeing besieged left the place on January 14 and were led to the abbey of Breuil-Herbault, from where they joined easily the army of king de Navarre. Robert de Joyeuse remained with the castle of Garnache with his regiment.

A few months before the rendering of Garnache, Henri de Navarre had come to make the head office of Beauvoir. October 5, during a recognition in front of the place, Navarrois failed to be killed by the arquebusiers of Villeserein. Thanks to the devotion of Angeunes, which covered the king of its body, Henri did not have any evil. Irritated by what had failed to arrive to their head, the Protestant gentlemen, with the number of forty, sprang, the sword with the hand, on the troop of Villeserein which was withdrawn with precipitation towards the fortress.

Duplessis-Mornay having arrived a few days afterwards with artillery unloaded at Saint-Gilles, city was obliged to go on October 21; the garrison, made up of cinquante-trois men, conceited person led in the island of Bouin, where it had asked to be withdrawn.

On these entrefaites Saint-Gelais removed Niort with the catholics (December 28, 1588), and of Aubigné seized Maillezais defended by Saint-Pompoint. - Saint-Gervais, Thouars, Loudun also went to reformed which failed in front of Parthenay and Vouvent.

But reconciliation of Henri III, given up by the League, and of king de Navarre, who had just taken place with Plessis-the-Turns, via Duplessis-Mornay, was going to give to the hostilities another political color. The combined armies of the two kings came, at the end of July, to camp in front of Paris whose the Members of a league were Masters. Their royal forces were imposing, but the two sovereigns had to fight against the popular masses, and the spirit of party which does not forgive.

Henri III had been just excommunicated because of his relations with the Protestants. Paris resounded of the declamations which some carried speakers exhaled against him. Terrible passions fomented at the bottom of the cloisters; the idea of the entry of the huguenots in Paris raised paroxysms of rage there. It was impossible that these passions did not arm some arms with sectarian and that the League did not have also its Poltrot. The traditional tradition and the Jewish tradition, the memory of Brutus and that of Judith, were as popular among catholics as among Protestants. She was going to generate one of these fanatics who are the shame of their time. August 1, 1589, Dominican, Jacques Clement, struck in Saint-Cloud, of a blow of knife, Henri III, who expired the following day at four hours, by reciting with low voice the first verse of psalm LV: Miserere Mei Deus, quoniam conculvavit me homo.

It had trente-huit years.

The death of Henri III exalta still the Members of a league, who were given for sovereign, under the name of Charles X, the old cardinal of Bourbon, then captive with Chinon.

But behind the royal cassock of his candidate, Henri de Navarre, who had been just made recognize king under the name of Henri IV, saw the ambitious family of Lorraine and the heads of the League who, by means of some generous ideas, only aimed at raising the people, with ressusciter feudality, to make France a federation. But the cause of Henri 1V, in 1589, was the national cause; above, of these one day heterogeneous majorities, there was the permanent unit of the French fatherland which, at the hours of our larger reverses, is always remained like a guardian principle.

Duplessis-Mornay, which ordered Saumur, accepted from the king the order to remove hands of Chavigny, governor of Chinon, the cardinal that Henri III had given him in guard. The king of the League was led to Maillezais and was entrusted to Aubigné, but the climate of our country quickly undermined the dilapidated health of this old man who, transferred a few months afterwards in Fontenay, in a house of the street of the Cabins, died there of the gravel on May 9, 1590.

The death of the king of the League was far from bringing back calms it in the spirits. Sainte-Union was always agitated, and, under cover of the religion, threw the disorder everywhere. The internal discussions continued to afflict Low-Poitou, where the royal capacity was less and less recognized; the king, who was with the camp of Gonesse, close to Paris, accepted careful of enjoindre the duke of Trémouille to remain in the country with the forces that it was to bring to him.

With Fontenay, catholics asked urgently that Our-Lady was returned with worship, that the city was removed from the ruins which encumbered it, that the taxes were decreased, etc, but the petition of the "dear subjects of the good small town of Fontenay" had of another result only being worth with the mayor the honor to receive a letter autograph of the king, requesting Fontenaisiens to wait "which liked it God to allow him to reduce them" and a royal decree given in Saint-Denis, in August 1592, confirming the privileges of the city (1).

A few months before, and to guarantee the coasts of a possible incursion of the Members of a league, Henri IV had charged Giron of Bessay of the command of a company of cavalry, with mission of strengthening the town of Talmont, of which his/her Jonas son was named governor, October 31, 1596, to replace his uncle Saint-Etienne, deceased.

Religious disorders occurred also at the same time with Chavagnes-in-Paillers, about the burial of Gilles de Durcot in the parish church, and on another side, in March 1594, the time when Henri IV made his solemn entry in Paris (March 22, 1594), the regular troops of Low-Poitou not being paid, were about to relax itself.

Some time after the abjuration of Henri IV, a terrible massacre of Protestants took place at the village of Brossardière, close to the Chestnut grove. Sunday August 13, 1595, at the end of the sermon, the sicaires from Rochefort to Anjou, 31 killed reformed without defense, wounded as much and made 4 prisoners of it.

This massacre spread fear among the Protestants of the country, Duplessis-Mornay sent the Bruneau captain near the governors of the places of Poitou to commit them to take the weapons against the bands of the League and to repress their excesses, but few days afterwards, Mercoeur signed a treaty with the royalists and the monstrous assassination of Brossardière remained unpunished. 

In the North-West of Low-Poitou one still guerroyait: Garnache, pertaining like Beauvoir to the house of Rohan, had as a Eusèbe governor of Puy-of-Insane, very attached to Jean de Beaumanoir de Lavardin, Marshal of France, but it was it also to the duke of Mercoeur. Wanting to release itself from this false situation, it benefitted from the approach of the regiments of Goulaine, Perraudière and Vauvrilles, to return the place to the king (May 20, 1597). The same day, the ligueuse garrison of. Barn-Maronnière, close to Aizenay, was also cut in parts by the captain the Tool bag.

At the beginning of the year 1597, the League was so to speak extinct by all France, except in Brittany and Poitou, where Mercoeur was maintained less by its own force than by the circumstances which retained the king then elsewhere. Many castles which the duke had in the scrap-metal, in particular Tiffauges, were as many haunts of robbers. The country was afflicted by them. They stole and plundered everywhere, known as a chronicler, and "it had ensured nobody there of his house, nor on the ways" - At the same time, Flocellière was taken by lieutenant de Mercoeur, the Viscount of Guerche, and was delivered to the bag (July 30, 1597).

But these exactions could not last a long time any more. Following a meeting of the nobility and catholic middle-class convened in Fontenay by Malicorne, to warn with the means of putting an end to the disorders which agitated the country, one decided to take the weapons against the bands of the last head of Sainte-Union, and the people end up sounding the alarm bell with the sight of the black scarf of the defenders of the faith.

August 3, i.e. four days after the bag of Flocellière, the governor of Poitou ordered in Parabère to lead gun in front of this place and to seize some. In the presence of the considerable forces brought by the general lieutenant, the Protestants of Flocellière reflect the weapons low. Tiffauges was given up by Champigny, and Pouzauges went to Pierre de Chouppes, while Mercoeur sent his wife in Angers, to deal with its compromise with the king (March 20, 1598).

3 next April, the marriage of his/her Francoise daughter with the duke of Vendôme, wire natural of the king and Gabrielle d' Estrée, devoted peace definitively.

The province was then divided into seven cantons, under the command of an equal number captains. These precautions brought the destruction of the last leavens of discords and the destruction of the gangsters who held to ransom the region, except for the most frightening troop ordered by one named Guilleri, man of a courage to any test and an incredible audacity, born with the Moors, parish of Boulogne, a father mason of his state. Cut off in a small castle from the surroundings of Essarts, named the Wood-Potuyeau, which one indicates like his headquarters, it used all the country, and extended its armed robberies until worms Niort and La Rochelle. Besieged and taken in its den of Wood-Potuyau, Guilleri was made sharp prisoner and coiled on the place of Holy in 1608.

To Fontenay, the catholics had returned in possession of Our-Lady, and on their side the Protestants took their measurements to make build a temple in a city which was given to them (December 6, 1597) like places sureté, but this concession was only the prelude of the Edict of Nantes, published on next 13 April.

Peace being made with Spain, and Mercoeur has just deposited the weapons, Henri IV understood that one era of pacification was to succeed trente-cinq years of bloody tearings.

Famous Edit irrevocably fixed the marital status, political and monk of the Protestants. Invited like the catholics to contribute to the loads of the State, reformed were declared capable of all public employment and dignities.

It was a measurement of high policy, approved by wise people, blamed by the fanatics, a veil thrown on the terrible past, which had put France at two fingers of its loss, and a guarantee of peace for the future.

Many places of safety were left with the hands of the Protestants, like guarantee of the execution of the Edict. With the exception of the capital, all the principal cities of Poitou were in their capacity and remained there.

In our country, Niort, Fontenay, Maillezais, Marans, Talmont, Beauvoir-on-Sea, and later Garnache were entrusted to garrisons huguenotes balanced by the State. - part of the maintenance of the ministers was also put at the load of the Treasury: twelve pastors were charged to serve the conference or the class of Fontenay, which included/understood in its spring, Fontenay, Maillezais with Saint-Hilaire, Luçon, Saint-Benoît with the Apron, Talmont, Thatch, Saint-Gilles-sur-Vie, Poiré with Belleville, Mareuil with Bretonnière. Sainte-Hermine with the Vault-Thémer, Puybelliard with Chantonnay, Mouilleron with Bazoges, the Chestnut grove with Pouzauges, Mouchamps with the Herbaria and Saint-Fulgent, Vaudoré.

Malgé all, Poitou was not without causing some fears with Henri IV Since it had abjured Protestantism, his/her former friends defied themselves of him and kept a deep resentment of what they called his ingratitude. - It was thus urgent to prevent the dissatisfied ones with this province from joining those which the conspiracy of the Biron marshal had uncovered. It is in the hope to bring back to him the still hesitant spirits, that it sent Sully to make in Poitou, a round which had as a pretext the taking possession of the province with which it had been provided on December 3, 1603, to replace Mr. de Malicorne, but who actually was triumphal, and the result produced that one expected some.

July 9, 1604, Sully was accepted in large pump in Fontenay, where it remained during several days. It made profitable its voyage in this city to regulate a disagreement between the commune and Zacharie de Pirelle, controller of the wars, to study the question of the navigability of the Vendée and to make visit all the coasts of Low-Poitou, by Nicolas and Boy.

Thanks to him, an assembly made up of the deputies of the consistories could, the following year, to meet in Fontenay and to discuss the temporal intérêtes and spitituels there, but by fear of possible disorders, to roir it was opposed in 1606 to the national synod that the Protestants wanted to hold with the Small rock.

In spite of an apparent peace in the scrap-metal especially, the inhabitants continued to be dévalisées, and during long years still, the area of. Chestnut grove and Pouzauges were the point of meeting of all people without consent of fifty miles to the round.

Four years after the death of Guilleri, in 1612, the passage of Lay, between Chantonnay and Sain T-Philhert-of-Bridge-Charrault, was so dreaded travellers, who they were forced to form of the caravans to go from Nantes to the Small rock. September 14 of this year, the carrier of the dispatches, three merchants Breton, two other travellers and their servant were attacked in this place. Two were killed, four wounded and the mail had its safety only with the speed of sound horse.

In the religious field, escarmouches between Protestants and catholics followed one another with almost equal chances, and often the capuchins and the ministers, nonglad to dogmatize, failed to come to the hands.

While these poor wretches quarrels revived hatreds, a bishop who, a few years later was to become a large minister, Richelieu, crowned bishop of Luçon on April 17, 1607, made on December 21, 1608 his entry in Fontenay in the medium of a many and enthusiastic crowd.

The same reception was not to occur in the episcopal city, where as of its arrival, it encountered many difficulties caused by the Protestants, and also by certain catholics who cultivated on a vast scale the system of the confiscations; but the large bishop was of size to be made obey.

It is on these entrefaites that a criminal, François Ravaillac, loosely struck blow of knife Henri IV, in the street of Ferronerie, in Paris (May 14, 1610).

Immense cry of pain raised of end of France with other, with news of died of king which was more sympathetic nerve by the manners and the heart, of the king who dealt most seriously with the interests of the ground and the workers, and in which them thinkers will never cease honouring the precursor with new Europe.

The consequences of the assassination of the king were not going to be made wait a long time, and passed them, avid and turbulent, until the firmness of Henri IV had contained were to be re-ignited. On a side, the large ones, at one time crushed with the League, tried soon to seize again the capacity and to start again the exhausted fights of feudality. Other Protestantism with its military force, its places of safety, its assemblies, her military, political organization and all the guarantees which were ensured to him by the Edict of Nantes, tried to create in the State an independent body and did not dissimulate its sights menaçantes.

The duke of Rohan sought to create a party in the West, and since 1612 would have taken the weapons without the wise intervention of Mornay. The famous assembly of Saumur, where the deputies of the sixteen ecclesiastical provinces of Protestant France had met, had just been dissolved, without putting an end to the agitation which reigned among reformed.

Anarchy was everywhere, and at the court especially, where Condé, February 13, 1614, sum the queen-mother to convene the State-Generals under three months. - Marie de Médicis, who knew by her emissary that part of the nobility of Low-Poitou was laid out to assist the ambitious projects of Cop, decided to come in this country, with the young king. She left Paris, July 5, 1614: everywhere the populations, irritated against the instigators of the disorders, greeted Louis XIII their acclamations and Fontenay, where they passed appears it at August, made to its hosts an enthusiastic reception.

A few days afterwards, met the State-Generals, where were to be distinguished François Brisson, seneshal of the king in Fontenay, Jean Besly, lawyer with the same seat and especially the bishop of Luçon, Richelieu, which for the first time, at least on a large theatre, had the occasion to raise this voice which was one day to control many other storms.

The State-Generals being separated without anything to decide, the dissatisfied ones solved to benefit from it to raise the standard of the revolt again. - De.toutes.parts the Protestants ran to the weapons. August 9, 1615, Condé launches a violent proclamation against the catholic clergy, and enters to shift with five or six thousand men, decided to walk in Guyenne to be opposed to the marriage of the king. - A the end of December of this year, Sully delivered to him its places of Poitou, in particular Fontenay.

Next 16 May was signed the peace of Loudun, which granted in particular quinze-cent-mille books to Condé for the expenses of the war; it was only one break in a sky in charge of storm. Cop, whom one did not cease representing with the queen-mother as a future usurper was, 1 September 1616, stopped by the marquis de Thémines, seneshal of Quercy. The other princes who had made a pact with him escaped and could withdraw themselves in the provinces which were devoted for them.

The entry in shift was not made wait: the princes, declared criminal of lese-majesty, were attacked as of April 1617 and were beaten on all the points. There did not remain to them any more other resource but leniency of the king.

June 25 of this year, a stop of the Council having ordered the re-establishment of the catholic worship in all the cities, boroughs and villages of Béarn, raised virulent protests among reformed. In spite of the men enlightened of the party, the General meeting was transferred to the Small rock, the end of 1618. In spite of also a violent declaration fulminated against it in January 1619, by the Parliament, it did not remain about it less the center from which left all the declarations ignited certain speakers, the wording of exaltés of the party, of as much better than everywhere, in Low-Poitou, created for themselves convents, in particular in the regions where Protestantism remained alive.

To the doors of Fontenay, of Aubigné, governor of Maillezais, stuck to the party of the duke of Rohan, bought the island of Doignon, and y built a fortress from where it exerted a right of toll on the boats which descended or went up Sèvre.

These two places, of which had Aubigné, inspired by fears at the court, and one made offer to the old captain deux-cent-mille ecus so that it is deprived some. But of Aubigné, which did not want that they fell between the hands from the bishop from Maillezais or the duke from Épernon, treated with the duke of Rohan for half of the price that one offered to him.

The heads of the protesting party, joined together with the Small rock, had not listened to anything, and in spite of the efforts of a many minority, the most violent resolutions had prevailed, in particular that to make France a vast federative republic. One of the principal characters of this organization was to be the duke of Soubise, to which one allotted the second circle, formed of Brittany, Anjou and Poitou.

The court, opposite this antinational dream, pressed without slackening of frightening preparations. April 29, 1621, the king got under way, with the head his troops, not without to have launched on the Parliament of the Small rock and his members, a declaration of lese-majesty, which guaranteed any civil and religious safety with reformed peaceful. This equitable and political distinction was confirmed by a significant act: Louis XIII, while passing to Tours, made hang five of the authors of a riot in which the rabble of this city recently had ransacked the temple and some houses of reformed.

The Parliament of the Small rock answered the declaration of the king by a proclamation who justified the war, and by a payment which organized it (May 10). She made make a seal on which an angel holding of a hand was illustrated a cross, other the Gospel and pressing with the feet a figure "that they disoient being the Roman Church (1)".

The king, entered to Saumur this same day, set out again about it the 17, after having removed the government with Duplessis-Mornay, which had had it for thirty-two years. Arrived at Thouars, where Julien Collardeau, mayor of Fontenay, bring to him, May 20, the keys of the city, the king detaches the duke of Trémouille of the party of reformed. All the cities were subjected: Parthenay accepted the king with enthusiasm, and Châtellerault sent deputies to him, to ensure it of its obedience. May 23, Louis XIII presented himself in front of Fontenay. The lady of Boulaye was controlling. In his absence, its lieutenant, Delorière, gave the place to the king, who there placed quatre-cents men, and the government to the count of Rochefoucauld, obliged to live Fontenay.

The following day May 21, Maillezais went to the king and the same day, the governor of Marans, brother of Boulaye, brought the keys of the castle. Saint-Maixent being also returned, the king arised on June 1 in front of Saint-Jean-in Angély which, in spite of its old enclosure of the Middle Ages, could not hold a long time against a powerful artillery. June 25 (1) the city asked for a capitulation via a bas-poitevin, Isaie of the Chechmates, lord of Montmorin and Pouzauges. This capitulation was granted, and Soubise had, under promise of fidelity for the future, the forgiveness which it requested.

After having maintained in the subjected city the freedom of conscience and the worship, Louis XIII went back to Paris, not without to have beforehand made put by his lieutenants, Favas, the Valley and Bessay, in impossibility of continuing the fight on Lay, where they had operated several descents, and in Talmondais which they had devastated.

But the engagement of Soubise was not to be long in being torn. Rochelais, Masters of the sea since the autumn of 1621, devastate the country ranging between the Loire and the Garonne; the monks of the abbey of the island-Chauvet are driven out and replaced by soldiers calvinists; the priest of Mouchamps, Isaac Ringère, ligotté by the Protestants, and led to Chaize-leVicomte "in the army of Soubise" which was on the point of putting the seat in front of Sand-in Olonne.

In February 1622, the Protestant army came to invest this city. Considerable catholic gentlemen who had withdrawn themselves there made, in.liaison.with the inhabitants, a vigorous resistance. But the majority perished, and besieged, indicator which they could not be defended more a long time, addressed proposals to Soubise. This one imposed to them for conditions 1° of paying him vingt-mille ecus; 2° to provide him eighty parts of gun and three vessels. It engaged, on its side, to preserve them plundering. Besieged accepted the treaty and carried out it, but Soubise was not more faithful to this promise than with that which it had done to the king.

It allowed to its soldiers plundering during two hours; they were devoted to all the conceivable disorders. They carried the chalices, the church vestments and the bells, broke the images, profaned what it moreover crowned there. They made flags with the most beautiful ornaments of the churches, removed all that belonged to the inhabitants, and left them almost naked, exposed with greatest misery.

The count of Rochefoucauld joins together the nobility of the country in order to repress these armed robberies. Assisted by Rocks-Baritaud, it continues Soubise with Rock-on-Yon, in Clouzeaux, with the Chair-the-Viscount, beats his lieutenant Cressonnière in Mareuil. - But intrepid the huguenot remained always intractable. Beaten in Pouillé and Thiré, it goes, March 31, 1622, to put the seat in front of Luçon which is taken again and delivered to plundering.

It was necessary to undertake a new campaign against the terrible one reformed which had just tested a failure in front of Saint-Gilles and who had vainly besieged Talmont and Noirmoutier. The king decided to go in person to fight the rebels.

The king, then hardly old twenty years, left Paris Palm Sunday, March 22, 1622 and arrived to Nantes on April 10, with a many escort of princes and lords, dignitaries of the Church. - the 9, Soubise, stopped in its walk on the side of Brittany, had moved towards the islands of Laugh and Mounts, with the intention connect to be placed there. Its forces were composed of six to seven thousand men of infantry, ordered by the count de Marenne, Mothe-St-Surin, Vaudoré, Ballebat and Rollandière, of huit-cents horses and seven parts of gun.

Without awaiting the reinforcements requested, and in spite of the opinion of several of his advisers who pointed out to him that the royal army was deprived of artillery, the king decided to walk immediately to the meeting of Soubise. The count of Rochefoucauld, which was then in front of the castle of the Thatch, accepted the order to come in Apremont to join the monarch which, April 12, left Nantes, moving on Vieillevigne, where the concentration of the troops was to take place. The royal army, made up of eight thousand men of infantry to the orders of Louis de Marillac, Bassompierre and Clérembault, of the gendarmes of the guard of the king, the light horsemen and a company of police officers, ordered by Schombert, achieved the goal merrily, under a beating rain, by devisant troubles of the day. The castle of Vieillevigne, given up by Gabriel de Machecoul, which had gone to join the army calvinist, was taken by the duke of Vendôme, which seized the weapons which were there.

On its side, Rochefoucauld, with the glance of a consumed captain, had admirably organized its forces, composed independently of a great number of volunteers, the nobility poitevine, three regiments of infantry, of which one with the orders of Châtellier-Barlot, lord of Velluire.

After having invested the fort of the Thatch, which appeared to be the point of support of the military operations of the army calvinist, thus cut its relations with the sea, and in spite of the numerical weakness of its forces, it did not hesitate to badger Soubise into the island with Laugh, defended by a valiant royalist of the Wood of Kergrois, but which in front of the number of the enemies had had to give up the position.

Following a council of war held in the night from the 13 to April 14, it was decided on the opinion of Cop, General as a head, and of Bassompierre to hasten the walk of the royal army.

The 14 in the morning, the columns moved in order of battle towards Challans, where the king settled at the sior Massé of Grousseau of Coursandière, and the prince of Condé at Mrs. de Logerie. After having taken information, one combined his measurements for an attack which one expected to be so hot, that several among the heads, in particular the prince of Condé, the count de Soissons, the duke of Vendôrne, the count of Saint Paul and their continuation "believed duty to put order at their conscience, while being confessed and as a communicant (1).

"Established in the island of Laugh as in a fort inexpugnable, protected on a side by the sea, of another by deep water of the Life, in addition finally by the channels and the mud of the marshes, the calvinist head had believed himself there in safety. But the king did not leave in Soubise time to cut off itself in this strong position. Friday 15, at three o'clock in the morning, the king from went away with his white cornet in front of Riez, while following the long one and painful roadway which, flanked of two broad ditches filled with water, crossed the marsh. - the whole day occurred to await companies which had been mislaid and to observe the enemy who strengthened himself with the bridge of Orouet.

After a happy engagement against Soubise, Rochefoucauld having operated its junction with the royal army, between Coumequiers and the commandery of Live, the king passed the review of the troops, and all being ready for forwarding, one decided to act.

At midnight, benefitting from what the sea was low, the king, to horse with the head of his gendarmerie, crossed the channel of Besse, distant of the sea of fifty steps, leaving at this place a name which it carries still today.

The cavalry and the infantry having been able to meet, the king made make large fires to heat the soldiers and to distribute food. Louis ate in the medium of them on the grass, took a few moments of rest on a handle of straw, then having provided for the need for its troops, it laid out them with the combat. - One was at Saturday 16.

The king, ridden on superb a genet of Spain white, walked in the medium of the troops with his company of gendarmes, and one advanced in good order towards the borough of Laugh, when the marshal of Vitry learned that this borough was evacuated, and that Soubise had been run away with the stroke, riding follow-up of cent-cinquante, giving up the large one of its army to the enemy (1). Its infantrymen, who filled the houses and the boats of Saint-Gilles, Cross-of-Life and of Laugh, made efforts despaired to gain the broad one. Cop fell on them as on an easy prey, and they were going to be pitilessly massacred, if the king had not granted the life to them, in the condition of being useful on its galères.

A certain number of boats being however moved away from the ground are reflected to draw on the royal troops. One answered them by a fatal discharge which killed many people to them. Others rebel, which tried to be run away through the marshes, were struck by the peasants. The cavalry was not happier, in spite of the energy of its honest commander who only in the medium of this universal panic did not lose the head. It was made prisoner by Baïes, lieutenant of Rochefoucauld, which had been put at its continuation.

Almost all the heads of the army calvinist fell to the capacity from the king, in particular: the count of Marennes, principal lieutenant de Soubise, Louis Regnier of the Board, wire of the famous author of Estat of France, the Religion and the Republic during the reign of François II; Morinière, Gabriel de Machecoul, and the sior of Rollandière, of Aizenay, whose woman, Renee de Rivaudeau, were the niece of the poet poitevin of this name.

The spoils were considerable: the seven guns which the army calvinist had remained with the capacity of the king. The white and blue flags, which had not been destroyed, were taken. The king sent them to his mother and gave the ships to the count of Rochefoucauld. The remainder of the spoils was partly abandoned to the soldiers, except for the ornaments of church, which as much as possible were restored.

Several carriages were charged with bells removed in the churches. The island and the surroundings of Laugh, that the king visited with Châtellier-Barlot, presented a horrible spectacle after the battle. Deux-mille-cinq-cents inanimate bodies were wide that and there on the wet ground of the marshes, or drowned in the channels and the rivers, while the sea, to add to the horror of this scene, rejected cent-vingt corpses on the shore. The king had lost only twenty men, and had torn off sept-cents Protestant with the rage of his troops. He sent the soldiers in Nantes and then distributed them on its galères. The gentlemen, to the number of neuf-cents, went expier their fault in the prisons the Holy ones, of Fontenay and Poitiers.

The king, satisfied to have delivered the country of the armed robberies, went to Apremont, where it ordered the demolition of the castle of Apremont, then moved on Fontenay, while passing by Aizenay, it Rock-on-Yon, the Chaize-the-Viscount and Sainte-Hermine, where it was accepted with his many escort, by Madam of Tabarière, girl of Duplessis-Mornay, and woman of Jacques of Nouhes. By leaving Sainte-Hermine, the king continued his walk towards Fontenay, where it arrived, with all its court, the 22 at the evening. He remained there until the 26 and the following day went to Niort. The queen-mother, retained by an indisposition, had been able to arrive only on May 12 to Fontenay, where it remained in the house of the governor, who still exists close to Grand' Fontaine.

In the one era old middle of appeasing brought especially by the defeat of Soubise, La Rochelle always murmured measures which one took against it, and on October 20, 1622, it had still delivered in water of the island of D, a naval action with the royal fleet, ordered by the duke of Own way. All thus announced the project to finish some with this city so jealous of its freedoms, and also with the Protestants, too often plugged by the spirit of party and the bitterness of their last defeats.

Following certain scandals, arrived especially in various churches, where some Protestants had been molestés a little, La Rochelle still came to raise and appeal abroad. The two brothers Rohan and Soubise, carried by a giddiness difficult to explain, reached the project of Rochelais, and a monstrous bringing together took place secretly between these heads calvinists and the agents of Spain, which had threatened Richelieu to return to the huguenots the money given by France to the Dutchmen, and who held word.

In early January 1625, Soubise is put at sea with a dozen small buildings and seizes island of D From there, it sets sail towards the coasts of Brittany and surprises, in the port of Blavet, six vessels of the king, including one, the Virgin, carried eighty green cast iron guns "", extraordinary thing for this time. Then it seizes Saint-Gilles and the island of Oléron, while a body of troops is sent by Richelieu to the limit of Poitou and Aunis, and that vessels, requested from the Protestant powers, are on the point of delivering combat with the French huguenots, which came madly contributes some to the house of Austria.

The naval armies were soon in presence; the twenty ships promised by Holland had arrived on the coasts of the Vendée, and twelve of them had received French captains and soldiers, condition required by Richelieu, which knew that the Dutch sailors were used only for regret against their co-religionists. Manti, vice-admiral, had met with a dozen French vessels with Houtsteen, admiral of. Zélandé which ordered the auxiliary squadron, and one awaited twenty-two more buildings which completed to be equipped with Sand-in Olonne, that animated a burning competition against La Rochelle. Soubise wanted to prevent the junction of Olonnais with the two admirals; July 16, it attacked abruptly, with trente-neuf veils, the fleet franco-batave which was believed on the faith of a suspension of fighting, and launched scathing attacks on the principal ships. The flagship de Houtsteen was consumed, and four other ships taken or run. But Soubise was less happy in front of the island of D; its defenders were beaten on sea and on ground, the English sailors operated only the sword under the throat.

Ten Protestant vessels were taken. The Virgin, the most powerful ship which one had still seen in France, conquered by Soubise in front of the port of Blavet, had touched at the coast; three French vessels and Dutch approached it: it was Harlem, ordered by the knight of Villeneuve; Saint-Louis, ordered by the knight of Bazzili; SaintFrançois, Kergueser captain and Olonnais, Veillon captain, of Sand-in Olonne. The first three vessels, which were studded in Olonnais, by throwing their hooks in its masts surround the Virgin, and them Sablais spring with the boarding. The sailors of the Virgin are attacked de.toutes.parts by the stays, the prow, the tillac. One of, named them Durand, of the island of D, exclaims of the bottom of the aftercastle where were the powders: "Give the life or you do not hold nothing"

- "No district" it is answered to him. The crew defends his building step by step, makes jump the first, then the second bridge, then finally Durand makes steal in glares the enormous ship by the terrible detonation of deux-cent-trente barrels of powder. The four vessels which attacked the Virgin damaged in the floods with it. Rochelais made pay their defeat expensive. Sept-cent-trente-six royalists perished in the floods. Two people only were saved by miracle, the Kergueser captain, and a gentleman bas-poitevin, named Chaligny, living close Ste-Pexine.

Guitton regained La Rochelle in a boat, without pourpoint, fit, coat nor sword. It was shown of treason; it had been unhappy. But the council returned justice to its efforts. He became mayor, the heart of defense during the seat of the Small rock and died apparently on March 15, 1664, lord of Mepose-Virgin, 69 years old approximately.

Soubise and Guitton, after a few days spent to the Small rock, were withdrawn on the coasts of England with twenty-two veils which they had rejoined.

Saint-Martin-de-Ré and the castle of Oléron went, and La Rochelle, narrowly tightened de.toutes.parts was, according to the energetic expression of its adversaries, "returned without grounds, without islands, without sea, soldiers and vessels"

Firm in the danger, Richelieu was not enivré victory. It judged that the seat of the Small rock was still premature in the general situation of the businesses, and that the energetic city would draw from its despair of the new resources. It offered peace in the condition to him, in a word, that the republic of the Small rock would return in the common right of the cities of the kingdom.

Lastly, April 5, 1621, it "gave" peace, on the one hand with the reformed churches, other in Rochelais, by a separated act, whose conditions were less hard than those that Richelieu had proposed after the battle of D.

July 31, an ordinance gone back to Nantes, issued that the fortifications of the cities and castles useless to the defense of the borders, and suitable to be used as retirement with the disturbers of public peace, would be in all the extent of France, shaven and demolished, as well as the fortifications made for thirty years "have been castles and houses of the private individuals without permission express of the king". Under the terms of this ordinance, Niort, the Herbaria, Mortagne, Tiffauges, Montaigu, Parthenay, Saint-Maixent and Fontenay were to be dismantled. But these measurements were carried out only later.

An immense cry of popular joy burst in all Brittany, then in all France: since Louis the Large one, monarchy had not done anything of larger for the national unit, against feudal tyranny and anarchy: all that remained of political feudality was struck in the heart.

The king had fallen sick little from time after the ordinance of July 31, and de.toutes.parts arrived of the news menaçantes. Rohan still agitated Languedoc; July 20, the English fleet was, for the island of D, and Buckingham, which ordered it, had promised to him, like with its others allied secrecies, to throw three army corps in France, one in Normandy, the second in Aunis and the third in Guyenne.

The anxiety of Richelieu was extreme, but successes of Toiras with Saint-Martin-de-Ré, and the unhappy beginnings of the English admiral against the island of D and the Extremely-Louis returned the hope to him.

A fleet was formed with haste, and the best trading vessels of Dieppe, Le Havre, Saint-halation and Sablesd' Olonne equipped in war. In this last city, one had joined together vast provisioning, like in Brouage, posts significant that Richelieu had made repurchase by the king with the former governor, and that it had been adapted, as well as Le Havre, under the name of the queen-mother. It dispatches considerable reinforcements in the island of Oléron and with Saint-Martin-de-Ré, in order to enable them to be able to fight against the English, Masters of the sea, informed well by the huguenots of the coasts, and supplied by their fleets and Rochelais.

The French Army however, grew bigger at sight of eye around its headquarters of Marans, where arrivearrived considerable Fontenaisiens catholics and gentlemen bas-poitevins (1), in particular famous Châtellier-Barlot, of Poiré-deVelluire, with the head of its regiment, while the Protestants ran to contain themselves in La Rochelle, being thus devoted to a company which they looked like an act méritoire with the eyes of God. This number was Grossetière, old page of the stables of the king which, at the height of the fight, did not fear to cross during the night the lines of besieging, for going to London to carry itself of the dispatches.

Taken on its return and held to Marans until the rendering of the Small rock, it was, according to Bernard, condemned to have the sliced tète; its members put in districts, were exposed around La Rochelle, and its head placed on the lathe of the Lantern.

Grossetière was not only which, during the seat, had courage to pass the lines "One, inter alia the, known as one French Mercury, p. 667, which was taken and hung, and when him the question was given, acknowledged that it had swallowed a money almond digs, in which a letter was contained... because it returned it by bottom, having kept it four days in its body, notwithstanding the rectal injections that one gave him (2).

Catherine de Parthenay and Anne de Rohan of the Soubise Park had thrown herself in the place from the very start of the hostilities, and by their male energy, encouragaient resistance there.

On a refusal which made him Louis XIII let leave the city with deux-cents women, with which it humanity required that tortures of a longer seat be saved, Catherine and his/her daughter wanted consequently to live like most miserable. They sacrificed the horses of their fits with body, and distributed the meat of it to famished crowd.

At the time of the rendering of the city, Catherine did not want that it was particularly mentioned her in the act of capitulation. It him be repugnant to that one can believe one moment that it have fold its will, and be enter for a share in the assent of peace treaty de paix. Control captive with his/her daughter with the castle of Niort, November 2, 1628, it died in the Park of Mouchamps, October 26, 1631, old of almost soixante-dix-sept years. Girl of Jean Parthenay Archevesque and Antoinette d' Aubeterre, it was the mother of the duke of Rohan and prince de Soubise.

August 5, a royal declaration had been launched against the rebels who joined abroad, and who, by a blind man fate, did not fear to request helps of England, this eternal enemy of France, that we will see at the end of the next century, always perfidious, to push towards the ruin the heroic Vendée, and to dedicate to death, for the triumph of its egoistic and harmful policy, of unhappy stray French.

August 15, 1627, the royal army sat its camp in front of La Rochelle, and the hostilities started as of the first days of September between the royal troops and Rochelais. In spite of the fleet of Buckingham which held the sea, a flotilla of the Trent-five boats, with veils and oars, part of Sand-in Olonne with the cry of: To pass or die, had, in the night from the 7 to 8 September, crossed the English fleet with an audacity and a happiness inouïs, forced a floating pier, made with masts and cables, in front of the port of Saint Martin's day and which been able to bring to besieging food for six weeks and quatre-cents men of reinforcements (1). The king and the cardinal had arrived four days after at the camp, in front of La Rochelle.

But to complete its great intentions, Richelieu needed money. It was addressed, quite naturally with the clergy which had most actively pushed with the seat. November 3, 1627, it made sign with the king of the notices of meeting of a general assembly of the prelates, which opened her meetings with Fontenay-the-Count, April 27, under the presidency of the Archbishop of Direction. This remarkable event, to which took share vingt-neuf archbishops, bishops and abbots, was the occasion of festivals and pompeuses ceremonies. Our-lady hardly reappearing was decorated paintings and new decorations, the flagstones of the chorus covered rich person carpet, the throne archiépiscopal surmounted of its platform and of its strainers of gold, rose in the medium of the velvet seats, and the caps with the sharp colors, the fabrics chatoyantes, the invaluable muds shone with the eyes of the astonished crowd which pressed itself in the nave. It was decided that the meetings would be taken place at the Hotel-of-City, and one sent to request the mayor, Giles Fradet, and the general lieutenant to make support the floor of the high room for more safety. The mayor answered the 28 that it would be made according to their desire. May 2, arrived of the delegations, having at the head the clergy of the diocese of Maillezais. The General Vicar and Jacques Valin, priest of Our-Lady and large penitentiary, made Latin speeches. The general lieutenant of the seneschalsy came then, accompanied by Julien Collardeau, prosecutor of the king, and four law officers, preceded by their ushers. The compliment of the pronounced general lieutenant, the president thanked. Finally the mayor, Giles Fradet, surrounded of the aldermen and advisers, middle-class man and his ordinary guards, presented himself. The president accomodated it in a benevolent way, answered his speech, and made it take back to the staircase by the agents.

The meetings, during which the clergy voted three million subsidies, lasted until May 23. The 24 in the morning, a solemn mass was celebrated with Our-Lady by the archbishop of Direction, and the Parliament separated after a speech from good-bye pronounced by the sior from Breteuille, secretary of the Parliament (1).

However, the seat of the Small rock advanced slowly. It was necessary to close at all costs the sea to prevent the town of supplying and from receiving helps of the English. Helped by the councils of Métezeau, architect of the king, Richelieu conceived and made carry out the gigantic project to close the port and to cut the Ocean by a dam of more than sept-cents measuring apparatuses. This colossal work was completed under its eyes, in spite of the storms which destroyed it first once. It directed work, ordered itself the troops in the presence of the king, and reduced finally this city after one year of seat, in spite of the dark exaltation of these people, so vigorously personified in the corsair whom it had given itself for head, in spite of the energy of the mayor Guitton, the eloquence of the Salbert minister, and the heroic fanastime that it had known to maintain in the heart his fellow-citizens.

All the tragedies of the large wars of religion were renewed, less the crime, in the devoted city which, October 28, 1628, not having more that cent-trente-six men, of which French soixante-quatorze and soixante-deux English in a position to carry the weapons (2); opened its doors with the king and the cardinal who, November 1, of become again General priest, celebrated a solemn mass and sang Te Deum in theSainte-Marguerite church of the Small rock. Its faithful lieutenant, Henri de Sourdis, whom it had made of bishop of Maillezais, archbishop of Bordeaux, was used to him as deacon.

Thus finishes the last and the most vigorous fight of the municipal spirit against monarchy. La Rochelle was the last and one of most glorious between this family of middle-class republics, which had often pointed out, to the Middle Ages, the virtues of the ancient cities, but whose independence had become incompatible, not only with monarchy, but with the national unit.