On reaching the shore, the troops encamped and lighted a great number of fires to dry their clothes. At daybreak they were formed in order of battle, and, after a march of about two leagues, came in sight of the enemy. Soubise and his cavalry, to the number of five or six hundred, fled at once in the direction of La Rochelle, without striking a blow. Part of the infantry had already embarked in the launches that had arrived to take them off; the rest threw down their arms and demanded quarter. But this was refused to the majority of them, and more than 1,500 were shot or cut down in cold blood; while as many more were taken prisoners and sent to the galleys. The rest fled across the marshes, in which some of them were drowned, while many others were slain by the troops of La Rochefoucauld, governor of Poitou, or by the peasants, furious at the devastation which the Huguenots had committed. Only some four hundred succeeded in effecting their escape and making their way to La Rochelle.
Leaving a force under the Comte de Soissons to watch La Rochelle on the land side, while Guise was directed to blockade it by sea, Louis XIII marched southwards, with the intention of raising the blockade of the Gironde by the reduction of Royan. During the siege, the King gave further proofs of that courage and presence of mind which Bassompierre had admired before the attack on the Île de Rié.
“That same evening I went to the King in his quarters, and he told me that he was coming to see our trench at five o’clock the next morning ... and desired me to await him at the commencement of it. He came, accompanied by M. d’Épernon and M. de Schomberg. It was the first time he had ever been in the trenches, and he did me the honour to say to me: ‘Bassompierre, I am a novice here; tell me what I must do, so that I may not make mistakes.’ In this I found little difficulty, for he was more prodigal of his safety than any of us would have been, and mounted three or four times on to the banquette of the trench, where he was exposed to the fire of the enemy, to reconnoitre. And he stayed there so long that we trembled at the danger he was incurring, which he braved with more coolness and intrepidity than an old captain would have shown, and gave orders for the work of the following night as though he had been an engineer. While he was returning, I saw him do what pleased me extremely. After we had remounted our horses, at a certain passage which the enemy knew, they fired a cannon-shot, which passed two feet above the head of the King, who was talking to M. d’Épernon. I was riding in front of him, and turned round, fearing that the shot might have struck him. ‘Mon Dieu, Sire,’ I exclaimed, ‘that ball was near killing you!’ ‘No, not me,’ said he, ‘but M. d’Épernon.’ He neither started nor lowered his head, as so many others would have done; and afterwards, perceiving that some of those who accompanied him had drawn aside, he said to them: ‘What! Are you afraid that they will fire again? They will have to reload.’ I have witnessed many and various actions of the King in several perilous situations, and I can affirm, without flattery or adulation, that I have never seen a man, not to say a king, who was more courageous than he was. The late King, his father, though, as everyone knows, celebrated for his valour, did not display a like intrepidity.”
It is not the degree, but the kind of courage, which is remarkable at his age. Bassompierre, however, relates an instance of equal coolness in a boy, who had not the same strong motive to self-possession as was furnished by the consciousness of being the object of the whole army’s attention:
“The enemy had constructed a barricade in their fosse, on the side of the sea, and a palisade, which hindered us from being entirely masters of their fosse. I sent my volunteer, a young lad of sixteen, to reconnoitre it. This lad had, the previous year, executed with other camp-boys the most hazardous works at the siege of Montauban, which the soldiers refused to undertake. He had received several wounds, amongst others a musket-ball through the body, of which I got him cured. This young rogue undertook a number of dangerous works by the piece, and the camp-boys worked under him and made a great deal of money. He went to reconnoitre this barricade with the same bearing and as much boldness as the best sergeant in the army; and after getting a musket-ball through his breeches and another through the brim of his hat, returned to us and made his report, which was very judicious.”
Royan capitulated on May 11, and shortly afterwards La Force surrendered the town of Sainte-Foy and returned to his allegiance, in return for the bâton of Marshal of France. Louis XIII, who had been given to understand that both Bassompierre and Schomberg were deeply mortified that a rebel should have been created a marshal before either of them, sent for the former and said to him: “Bassompierre, I know that you are angry that I am making M. de La Force Marshal of France, and that you and M. de Schomberg complain of it, and with reason; but it is not I who am the cause of it, so much as Monsieur le Prince, who counselled me to do it, for the good of my affairs, and in order to leave nothing behind me in Guienne which might prevent me passing promptly into Languedoc. Nevertheless, be sure that what you desire I shall do for you, whom I love and hold as my good and faithful servant.”
Bassompierre tells us that at that time he had no particular desire for the office of marshal, “since, in his opinion, it was that of an old man, while he wished to play the part of a gallant of the Court for some years longer.” He therefore assured his Majesty that he had been entirely misinformed, and that, so far from being annoyed at La Force’s appointment, he regarded it as a most proper one, since he was an old man and a soldier of great experience, who had been promised the bâton by the late King and would have received it, if Henri IV had lived another month; that, although he had been a rebel, he was one no longer; and that it was “a signal example of the kindness of the King to forget the faults of his servants, in order to remember and recompense their merits and their services.” And he added that he did not aspire to the office of marshal or any other charge, unless his Majesty “out of pure kindness and desire to recognise his service,” wished to confer it upon him, and that he “very humbly besought him never to allow any consideration for him to prevent him doing what he judged to be for the good of his service.”
This diplomatic speech greatly pleased the King, who thanked Bassompierre and told him that he might rely on him to advance his interests. He then sent for Schomberg, who, much less tactful than his colleague, pressed his Majesty to make him a marshal conjointly with La Force, and proposed that Bassompierre should be created one also, “though this was chiefly in order to strengthen his own request.”
CHAPTER XXVIII
Condé and his allies offer to secure for Bassompierre the position of favourite, if he will join forces with them to bring about the fall of Puisieux—Refusal of Bassompierre—Condé complains to Louis XIII of Bassompierre’s hostility to him—Bassompierre informs the King of the proposal which has been made him—Louis XIII orders Monsieur le Prince to be reconciled with Bassompierre—Siege of Négrepelisse—The town is taken by storm—Terrible fate of the garrison and the inhabitants—Fresh differences between Condé and Bassompierre—Discomfiture of Monsieur le Prince—Bassompierre placed temporarily in command of the Royal army, captures the towns of Carmain and Cuq-Toulza—Offer of Bassompierre to resign his claim to the marshal’s bâton in favour of Schomberg—Surrender of Lunel—Massacre of the garrison by disbanded soldiers of the Royal army—Bassompierre causes eight of the latter to be hanged—Lunel in danger of being destroyed by fire with all within its walls—Bassompierre, by his presence of mind, saves the situation—Schomberg and Bassompierre—The latter is promised the marshal’s bâton.