"What is that man-at-arms saying?" she asked.
And when she knew, turning to Arthur of Brittany, who was close by, she said: "Ah! Fair Constable, it was not my will that you should come, but since you are here, I bid you welcome."[1266]
The force the French had to face was Sir John Talbot and Sir John Fastolf with the whole English army.
CHAPTER XVI
THE BATTLE OF PATAY—OPINIONS OF ITALIAN AND GERMAN ECCLESIASTICS—THE GIEN ARMY
AVING left Paris on the 9th of June, Sir John Fastolf was coming through La Beauce with five thousand fighting men. To the English at Jargeau he was bringing victuals and arrows in abundance. Learning by the way that the town had surrendered, he left his stores at Étampes and marched on to Janville, where Sir John Talbot joined him with forty lances and two hundred bowmen.[1267]
There they heard that the French had taken the Meung bridge and laid siege to Beaugency. Sir John Talbot wished to march to the relief of the inhabitants of Beaugency and deliver them with the aid of God and Saint George. Sir John Fastolf counselled abandoning Sir Richard Gethyn and his garrison to their fate; for the moment he deemed it wiser not to fight. Finding his own men fearful and the French full of courage, he thought the best thing the English could do would be to establish themselves in the towns, castles, and strongholds remaining to them, there to await the reinforcements promised by the Regent.