In 1450 the English were driven out of Guyenne, but a fresh attempt to recover it was made, that ended in the defeat and death of Talbot, in 1453. The Companies had then to dissolve. Out of a thousand churches in Quercy but four hundred were in condition for the celebration of divine service; many had been converted into fortresses. Most of the little towns in Upper Quercy had lost the major portion of their inhabitants; the villages were void of inhabitants. None knew who were the heirs to the deserted houses and untilled fields.
[Footnote: "Agros atque Lares proprios, habitandaque fana
Apres reliquit, et rapacibus lupis,
Ire, pedes quocunque ferent,"
—HORACE, Epod. Od., 16.]
An emigration from Limousin and the Rouergue was called for to repeople the waste places. Grammat, that had been a thriving town, in 1460 was left with only five inhabitants, Lavergne with but three. Lhern, once a flourishing place, was absolutely desert, the fields covered with briars and thorns, not one house tenanted, and in the church a she-wolf had littered her cubs.
Throughout the country can be distinguished the churches built when the war was over—quadrangular structures, without ornament.
Two of the strongest fortresses held by the English in Perigord were Bigaroque and the Roc de Tayac. The former belonged to the Archbishop of Bordeaux, staunch in his adhesion to the English cause, and he placed a garrison in it. The French did not attempt a siege, but in 1376 they raised a large sum in the neighbourhood and bought the garrison out. Either they culpably neglected to place troops in it, or were too weak to do so, and in 1386 the English reoccupied it without a blow, and made it a centre whence they pillaged the country up to 1408. In 1409 the Constable of France, however, laid siege to it and the garrison capitulated, on condition that all prisoners taken by the French should be set free. The French then demolished the fortifications, but did this so inefficiently that in 1432 the English had again established themselves therein. It was not recovered by the French till 1443; somewhat later the Companies disbanded, and then they so completely destroyed the fortress that of it nothing now remains.
The other stronghold was the Rock of Tayac. The white cliff streaked with black tears rises to the height of 300 feet, and is precipitous. Throughout the whole length it is lined and notched and perforated, showing tokens of having been a combination of cliff caves, and wooden galleries, connecting the caves, as also of structures at the base of the crag. These latter have disappeared, having been torn down when the castle was demolished, but the indications of the roofs remain. There were several storeys in the fortress. In one cave is a stable reached by a ladder, also a well that was driven from an upper cavern through the roof of the stable and through its floor to the level of the river. The oven of these freebooters hanging in mid-cliff remains, guard-rooms are still extant, and the principal upper storey is now turned into a hotel, as already mentioned, but in so doing the stable has been injured and the well filled up. The hotel is reached by a ladder.
[Illustration: CHÂTEAU DES ANGLAIS, BRENGUES. This castle occupied by the Free Companies, is now wholly inaccessible. The goat-path below was closed, above and below, by gate-houses and guard-rooms.]
[Illustration: CHÂTEAU DU DIABLE, CABRERET, LOT. A castle on a narrow ledge of rock above the River Célé, built by the Bastard of Albert, circ. 1380, and held for the English.]
From this vultures' nest the Ribauds devastated the neighbourhood and the Sieur des Eyzies on the opposite side of the river, and who was on the French side, was powerless against them. In company with the garrison of Bigaroque they surprised Temniac near Sarlat, S. Quentin and Campagnac, in 1348, but were shortly after dislodged by the Seneschal of Perigord from these acquisitions.