The era of good feeling between Louis XI. and his Burgundian kinsmen was of short duration, and no wonder. The rich rewards confidently expected as fitting recompense for five years' kindness more than cousinly, towards a penniless refugee were not forthcoming.
The king was lavish in fine words, and not chary in certain ostentatious recognition towards his late host, but the fairly munificent pension, together with the charge of Normandy settled upon the Count of Charolais, proved only a periodical reminder of promises as regularly unfulfilled on each recurring quarter day, while the post of confidential adviser to the inexperienced monarch, which Philip had intended to occupy, remained empty.
Louis put perfect trust in no one but turned now to one counsellor, now to another, and used such fragments of advice as pleased his whim and paid no further heed to the giver.
Not long after Louis's coronation there occurred that change in Philip's bodily constitution that comes to all active men sooner or later. His health began to give way, his energies relaxed, and matters that had been of paramount importance throughout his career were allowed to slip into the background of his desires. In the famous treaty of 1435, no article was rated at greater importance than that which placed the towns on the Somme in Philip's hands, subject to a redemption of two hundred thousand gold crowns. Whether Charles VII. had actually pledged himself that the mortgage should hold at least during Philip's life does not seem assured, but that any sum would be insufficient to induce the duke to release them unless his intellect were somewhat deadened, is clear.
In 1462, when he recovered from a sharp attack, possibly the result of his indulgence in the pleasures of the table during the prolonged festivities at Paris, he did not regain his previous vigour. This was the time, by the way, when opportunity was afforded his courtiers to prove that devotion to their seigneur outweighed personal vanity. When his head was shaved by order of the court physician, more than five hundred nobles sacrificed their own locks so that their becoming curls might not remind their chief of his own bald head. The sacrifice was not always voluntary, adds an informant.1 Philip forced compliance with this new fashion upon all who seemed reluctant to be unnecessarily shorn of what beauty was theirs by nature's gift. This servility may have consoled Philip for the deprivation of his hair. In his depressed condition any solace was acceptable.
It was just when the duke was in this enfeebled state that Louis, through the mediation of the Croys, pushed forward his proposition to redeem the towns and Philip agreed, possibly relying upon the chance that it would be no easy matter for the French king to wring the required sum from his impoverished land. Philip's assent was, however, promptly clinched by a cash payment of half the amount2; the remainder followed.
Amiens, Abbeville, and the other towns, valuable bulwarks for the Netherland provinces, fine nurseries for the human material requisite for Burgundian armies, rich tax payers as they were, all tumbled into the outstretched hands of the duke's wily rival.
The transaction was hurried through and completed before a rumour of its progress came to the ear of the interested heir. Charles was in Holland sulking and indignant. He had expected good results from his tender devotion during his father's acute illness, a devotion shared by Isabella of Portugal who hastened to her husband's bedside from her convent seclusion when Philip was in need of her ministrations. But, in his convalescence, Philip renewed his friendship for the Croys whom Charles continued to distrust with bitterness that varied in its intensity, but which never vanished from his consciousness. The young man felt misjudged, misused, and ever suspicious that personal danger to himself lurked in the air of his father's court.
The various rumours of plots against his life may not all have been baseless. At last, one of own cousins, the Count of Nevers, was accused of having recourse to diabolic means of doing away with the duke's legitimate heir.3 Three little waxen images were found in his house, and it was alleged that he practised various magic arts withal in order to win the favour of the duke and of the French king, and still worse to cause Charles to waste away with a mysterious sickness. The accusations were sufficient to make Nevers resign all his offices in his kinsman's court and retire, post-haste, to France. Had he been wholly innocent he would have demanded trial at the hands of his peers of the Golden Fleece as behooved one of the order. But he withdrew undefended, and left his tattered reputation fluttering raggedly in the breeze of gossip.
Charles stayed in Holland aloof from the ducal court until a fresh incident drove him thither to give vent to his indignation. Only three days had Philip de Commines been page to Duke Philip, then resident at Lille, when an embassy headed by Morvilliers, Chancellor of France, was given audience in the presence of the Burgundian court, including the Count of Charolais. The future historian,4 then nineteen years old, was keenly alive to all that passed on that November fifth, 1464. Morvilliers used very bitter terms in his assertion that Charles had illegally stopped a little French ship of war and arrested a certain bastard of Rubempré on the false charge that his errand in Holland, where the incident occurred, was to seize and carry off Charles himself. Moreover, one knight of Burgundy, Sir Olivier de La Marche had caused this tale to be bruited everywhere,
"especially at Bruges whither strangers of all nations resort. This had hurt Louis deeply, and he now demanded through his chancellor that Duke Philip should send this same Sir Olivier de La Marche prisoner to Paris, there to be punished as the case required. Whereupon, Duke Philip answered that the said Sir Olivier was steward of his house, born in the County of Burgundy and in no respect subject to the Crown of France."
Philip added that if his servant had wrought ill to the king's honour he, the duke, would see to his punishment. As to the bastard of Rubempré, true it was that he had been apprehended in Holland,5 but there was adequate ground for his arrest as his behaviour had been strange, at least so thought the Count of Charolais. Philip added that if his son were suspicious
"he took it not of him for he was never so, but of his mother who had been the most jealous lady that ever lived. But notwithstanding" [quoth he] "that myself never were supicious, yet if I had been in my son's place at the same time that this bastard of Rubempré haunted those coasts I would surely have caused him to be apprehended as my son did."
In conclusion, Philip promised to deliver up Rubempré to the king were his innocence satisfactorily proven.
Morvilliers then resumed his discourse, enlarging upon the treacherous designs of Francis, Duke of Brittany, with whom Charles had lately sworn brotherhood at the very moment when he was the honoured guest of King Louis at Tours. During this discussion the Count of Charolais became very restive. Finally he could no longer endure Morvilliers's indirect slurs, and
"made offer eftsoon to answer, being marvellously out of patience to hear such reproachful speeches used of his friend and confederate. But Morvilliers cut him off, saying: 'My Lord of Charolais, I am not come of ambassage to you, but to my Lord your father.' The said earl besought his father divers times to give him leave to answer, who in the end said unto him: 'I have answered for thee as methinketh the father should answer for the son, notwithstanding if thou have so great desire to speak bethink thyself to-day and to-morrow speak and spare not.'"
Then Morvilliers to his former speech added that he could not imagine what had moved the earl to enter into the league with the Duke of Brittany unless it were because of a pension the king had once given him together with the government of Normandy and afterwards taken from him.
In regard to Rubempré, Commines adds to his story Charles's own statement given on the morrow:
"Notwithstanding, I think nothing was ever proved against him, though I confess the presumption to have been great. Five years after I myself saw him delivered out of prison." This from Commines. La Marche is less detailed in his record6 of the Rubempré incident:
"The bastard was put in prison and the Count of Charolais sent me to Hesdin to the duke to inform him of the arrest and its cause. The good duke heard my report kindly like a wise prince. In truth he at once suspected that the craft of the King of France lurked at the bottom of the affair. Shortly afterwards the duke left Hesdin and returned to his own land, which did not please the King of France who despatched thither a great embassy with the Count d'Eu at the head. Demands were made that I should be delivered to him to be punished as he would, because he claimed that I had been the cause of the arrest of the bastard of Rubempré and also of the duke's departure from Hesdin without saying adieu to the King of France, but the good duke, moderate in all his actions, replied that I was his subject and his servitor, and that if the king or any one else had a grievance against me he would investigate it. The matter was finally smoothed over [adds La Marche], and Louis evinced a readiness to conciliate his offended cousin."
In spite of La Marche, the matter proved to be one not easily disposed of by soft phrases flung into the breach. Charles obeyed his father and prepared in advance his defence to the chancellor. When he had finished his own statement about Rubempré, he proceeded to the point of his friendship with the Duke of Brittany, declaring that it was right and proper and that if King Louis knew what was to the advantage of the French sovereign, he would be glad to see his nobles welded together as a bulwark to his throne. As to his pension, he had never received but one quarter, nine thousand francs. He had made no suit for the remainder nor for the government of Normandy. So long as he enjoyed the favour and good will of his father he had no need to crave favour of any man.
"I think verily had it not been for the reverence he bore to his said father who was there present" continues the observant page, "and to whom he addressed his speech that he would have used much bitterer terms. In the end, Duke Philip very wisely and humbly besought the king not lightly to conceive an evil opinion of him or his son but to continue his favour towards them. Then the banquet was brought in and the ambassadors took their leave. As they passed out Charles stood apart from his father and said to the archbishop of Narbonne, who brought up the rear of the little company:
"'Recommend me very humbly to the good grace of the king. Tell him he has had me scolded here by the chancellor but that he shall repent it before a year is past.'" His message was duly delivered and to this incident Commines attributes momentous results.
Exasperated at the nonchalant manner in which Louis's ambassadors treated him, indignant at the injury to his heritage by the redemption of the towns on the Somme, and further, already alienated from his royal cousin through the long series of petty occasions where the different natures of the two young men clashed, in this year 1464, Charles was certainly more than ready to enter into an open contest with the French monarch. It was not long before the opportunity came for him to do so with a certain éclat.
In the early years of his own freedom, before he learned wisdom, Louis XI. had planted many seeds of enmity which brought forth a plentiful crop, and the fruit was an open conspiracy among the nobles of the land.
One of the causes of loosening feudal ties was the gradual growth of the body of standing troops instituted in 1439 by Charles VII. These, in the regular pay of the crown, gave the king a guarantee of support without the aid of his nobles. By the date of Louis's accession, certain ducal houses besides that of Burgundy had grown very independent within their own boundaries: Orleans, Anjou, Bourbon, not to speak of Brittany.7 Now the efforts to curtail the prerogatives of these petty sovereigns, begun by Charles VII., were steady and persistent in the new reign. They had no longer the power of coining money, of levying troops, or of imposing taxes, while the judicial authority of the crown had been extended little by little over France. Then their privileges were further attacked by Louis's restrictions of the chase.
It was the accumulation of these invasions of local authority, added to a real disbelief in the king's ability, that led to a formation of a league among the nobles, designed to check the centralisation policy of the monarch, a League of Public Weal to form a bulwark against the tyrannical encroachments of their liege lord.
Not to follow the steps of the growth of this coalition, it is sufficient for the thread of this narrative to say that it comprised all the great French nobles, the princes of the blood as well as others. Men whom Louis had flattered as well as those whom he had slighted alike fell from his standards, distrustful of his ability to withstand organised opposition, and they threw in their lot with the protestors so as not to miss their share of the spoil.
The Count of Charolais, as already mentioned, was in a mood when his ears were eagerly open to overtures from Louis's critics. The redemption of the towns on the Somme he was unable to prevent, but the affair left him very sore. Shortly after its completion, the count did, indeed, succeed in depriving the Croys of their ascendency over the Duke of Burgundy, but when that long desired victory was attained, the towns had one and all accepted their transfer and were under French sovereignty. When the count joined the league, the hope of ultimate restoration was undoubtedly prominent among the motives for his own course of action, though his intimacy with the chief leader of the revolt, the Duke of Brittany, might easily have led to the same result.
Towards Francis of Brittany, Louis XI. had been especially wanting in tact during the first months of his reign. The king treated him as a vassal of France, while the duke held that he and his forbears owed simple homage to the crown, not dependence. Therefore, in order to resist being subordinated, the Duke of Brittany resolved not to leave his estates except in a suitable manner. His messages to the king were sent in all ceremony, he rendered proper homage, declared his readiness to serve him as a kinsman and as a vassal for certain territories, but demanded freedom to exercise his hereditary rights and to enjoy his hereditary dignities.8
"Rude and strange" were the terms employed by the king in response to these statements, and then he proceeded to encroach still farther on the duke's seigniorial rights by attempts to dispose of the hands of Breton heiresses in unequal marriages, and to arrogate to himself other rights—all sufficient provocation to justify Francis of Brittany in becoming one of the chiefs in the league. Very delightful is Chastellain's colloquy with himself 9 as to the difficulty of maintaining perfect impartiality in discussing the cause of this Franco-Burgundian war, but unfortunately the result of his patient efforts is lost.
Olivier de La Marche and Philip de Commines, however, were both present in the Burgundian army and their stories are preserved. La Marche had reason to remember the first actual engagement between the royal and invading forces at Montl'héry, "because on that day I was made knight." He does not say, as does Commines, that this battle was against the king's desire. Louis had hoped to avoid any use of arms and to coerce his rebellious nobles into quiescence by other methods. Not that they characterised themselves as rebellious, far from it. Clear and definite was their statement that in their obligation
"to give order to the estate, the police and the government of the kingdom, the princes of the blood as chief supports of the crown, by whose advice and not by that of others, the business of the king and of the state ought to be directed, are ready to risk their persons and their property, and in this laudable endeavour all virtuous citizens ought to aid." 10
Thus wrote Charles to the citizens of Amiens, and the words were typical of similar appeals made in every quarter of the realm by the various feudal chiefs to their respective subjects. In truth this war, ostentatiously called that of the Public Weal, was but a struggle on the part of the great nobles for local sovereignty. The weal demanded was home rule for the feudal chiefs. The War of Public Weal was a fierce protest against monarchical authority, against concentration. A king indeed, but a king in leading strings was the ideal of the peers.
Thus matters stood in June, 1465. Louis almost alone, deserted by his brother the Duke of Berry, and his nobles banded together in apparent unity, hedged in by their pompous and self-righteous assertions that all their thoughts were for the poor oppressed people whose burdens needed lightening. Of all the great vassals, Gaston de Foix was the single one loyal to the king.
The part of the great duke fell entirely to the share of the Count of Charolais. A small force was levied for him within the Netherlands, and he started for Paris where he hoped to meet contingents from the two Burgundies and his brother peers of France with their own troops. His men were good individually but they had not been trained to act as one, and there was no coherence between the different companies.
July, 1465, found Charles at St. Denis, the appointed rendezvous. He was first in the field. While he awaited his allies, his little army became restive at the situation in which they found themselves, fifty leagues from Burgundian territory with no stronghold as their base. It was urged again and again upon the count that his first consideration ought to be his men's safety. His allies had failed him. He should retreat. "I have crossed the Oise and the Marne and I will cross the Seine if I have but a single page to follow me," was the leader's firm reply to these demands.
The leaguers were slow to keep their pledges, and Charles decided that it was his mission to prevent Louis from entering his capital, to which he was advancing with great rapidity from the south. To carry out this purpose Charles disregarded all protests, crossed the Seine at St. Cloud, and made his way to the little village of Longjumeau, whither he was preceded by the Count of St. Pol, commanding one division of the Burgundian army. Montl'héry was a village still farther to the south, and here it was that La Marche and other gentlemen were knighted. This ceremony was evidently part of the count's endeavour to encourage his followers—all unwilling to risk an engagement before the arrival of the allies.
To the king it was of infinite advantage that no delay should occur. Nevertheless, it was Charles who opened active hostilities on July 15th, with soldiers who had not broken their fast that day. Armed since early dawn, wearied by a forced march with a July sun beating down upon their heads, their movements hampered by standing wheat and rye, the men were at a tremendous disadvantage when they were led to the attack. It was a hot assault. No quarter was given, many fled. At length, Louis found himself abandoned by all save his body-guard. Pressed against the hill that bounded the grain fields, the king at last retreated up its slope into a castle on its summit.
Charles rode impetuously after the retreating royalists. Separated from his men, he fell among the royal guard at the gate of the castle. There was a vehement assault resisted as vehemently by his meagre escort. Several fell and Charles himself received a sword wound on his neck where his armour had slipped. Recognised by the French, he might have been taken or slain in his resistance, when the Bastard of Burgundy rode in and rescued him. Very desperate seemed the count's condition. When night fell, no one knew where lay the advantage. The fugitives spread rumours that the king was dead and that Charles was in possession, others carried the reverse statements as they rode headlong to the nearest safety. It was a rout on both sides with no credit to either leader. But in the darkness of the night, the king managed to slip out of his retreat and march quietly towards the greater security of Paris.
It was a very shadowy victory that Charles proudly claimed. All through the night of July 15th, the Burgundians were discussing whether to flee or to risk further fighting against the odds all recognised. Daybreak found the council in session when a peasant brought tidings that the foe had departed. The fires in sight only covered their retreat. To be sure that same foe had taken Burgundian baggage with them to Paris. But what of that? The Burgundians held the battlefield and they made the best of it.
On July 16th, Louis supped with the military governor of Paris and "moved the company, nobles and ladies, to sympathetic tears by his touching description of the perils he had met and escaped." Charles, meanwhile, effected a junction with his belated allies, Francis of Brittany and Charles of France, the Duke of Berry, at Étampes. Thither too, came the dukes of Bourbon and of Lorraine, but none of these leaguers could claim any share in the battle of Montl'héry.
BATTLE OF MONTL'HÉRY (JULY 16, 1465)
While these peers perfected their plans to force their chief into redressing the wrongs of the poor people, the king was showing a very pleasant side of his character to the Parisian citizens. In response to a petition that he should take advice on the conduct of his administration, he declared his perfect willingness to add to his council six burgesses, six members of parlement, and the same number from the university. Besides this concession, he relieved the weight of the imposts and hastened to restore certain financial franchises to the Church, to the university, and to various individuals. Three weeks were consumed in establishing friendly relations in this all important city, and then the king departed for Normandy to levy troops and to collect provisions for a siege.11 There was need for this last for the allies had moved up to the immediate vicinity of Paris.
Before the king's return to his capital on August 28th, a formidable array was encamped at Charenton and its neighbourhood. More formidable, however, they were in numbers than in strength. Like all confederated bodies there was inherent weakness, for there was no leader whom all would be willing to obey. The Duke of Berry, heir presumptive to the throne, was the only one among the peers whose birth might have commanded the needful authority, but he had not sufficient personal character to assert his position. So the confederates remained a loose aggregation of small armies. The longer they remained in camp the weaker they grew, the more disintegrated. A pitched battle might have been a great advantage to these gallant defenders of the Public Weal of France and that was the last desire of their antagonist.
Many skirmishes took place between the Parisians and the leaguers, but no engagement. Once, indeed, there were hurried preparations on the part of the Burgundians to repulse an attack, of whose imminence they were warned by a page before break of day, one misty morning. Yes, there was no doubt. The pickets could see the erect spears and furled banners of the enemy all ready to advance upon the unwary camp. Quick were the preparations. There were no laggards. The Duke of Calabria was more quickly armed than even the Count of Charolais. He came to a spot where a number of Burgundians, the count's own household stood, by the standard. Among them was Comminesl2 and he heard the duke say: "We now have our desire, for the king is issued forth with his whole force and marches towards us as our scouts report. Wherefore let us determine to play the men. So soon as they be out of the town we will enter and measure with the long ell." By these words he meant that the soldiers would speedily have a chance to use their pikes as yard sticks to measure out their share of the booty. False prophet was the duke that time! When the daylight grew stronger, the upright spears and furled banners of the advancing foe proved to be a mass of thistles looming large in the magnifying morning mist! The princes took their disappointment philosophically, enjoyed early mass, and then had their breakfast.
The young Commines is surprised that Paris and her environs were rich enough to feed so many men. Gradually the aspect of affairs changed. Negotiating back and forth became more frequent. The disintegration of the allies became more and more evident. Louis XI. bided his time and then took the extraordinary resolution to go in person to the camp at Charenton to visit his cousin of Burgundy. With a very few attendants, practically unguarded, he went down the Seine. His coming had been heralded and the Count of Charolais stood ready to receive him, with the Count of St. Pol at his side. "Brother, do you pledge me safety?" (for the count's first wife was sister of Louis) to which the count responded: "Yes, as one brother to another."13
Nothing could have been more genial than was the king. He assured Charles that he loved a man who kept his word beyond anything.
Veracity was his passion. Charles had kept the promise he had sent by the archbishop of Narbonne, and now he knew in very truth that he was a gentleman and true to the blood of France. Further, he disavowed the insolence of his chancellor towards Charles, and repeated that his cousin had been justified in resenting it. "You have kept your promise and that long before the day."14
Then in a friendly promenade, Louis gave an opportunity to Charles and St. Pol to state, informally, the terms on which they would withdraw from their hostile footing, and count the weal restored to the oppressed public whose sorrows had moved them to a confederation.
Distasteful as was every item to Louis, he accepted the requisition of those who felt that they were in a position to dictate, and after a little more parleying at later dates, the treaty of Conflans was duly arranged. It was none too soon for the allies. They could hardly have held together many days longer in the midst of the jealousies rife in their camps.
The king paused at nothing. To his brother he gave Normandy, to Charles of Burgundy the towns on the Somme with guarantee of possession for his lifetime, while the Count of St. Pol was made Constable of France.
LOUIS XI, WITH THE PRINCES AND SEIGNEURS OF THE WAR OF THE PUBLIC WEAL
Boulogne and Guienne, too, were ceded to Charles, lesser places and pensions to the other confederates. The contest ended with complete victory for the allies who were left with the proud consciousness that they had set a definite limit to royal pretensions, at least, on paper.
After the treaty was signed, the king showed no resentment at his defeat but urged his cousin to amuse himself a while in Paris before returning home. Charles was rash, but he had not the temerity to trust himself so far. Pleading a promise to his father to enter no city gate until on paternal soil, he declined the invitation and soon returned to the Netherlands, where his own household had suffered change. During his absence, the Countess of Charolais had died and been buried at Antwerp. Charles is repeatedly lauded for his perfect faithfulness to his wife, but her death seems to have made singularly little ripple on the surface of his life. The chroniclers touch on the event very casually, laying more stress on the opportunity it gave Louis XI. to offer his daughter Anne as her successor, than on the event itself.15
[Footnote 1: La Marche, ii., 227. Peter von Hagenbach was the chamberlain to enforce this.]
[Footnote 2: The receipt for this half payment was signed October 8, 1462. (Comines, Mémoires, Lenglet du Fresnoy edition, ii., 392-403.)]
[Footnote 3: Du Clercq, iii., 236; Comines-Lenglet, ii., 393.]
[Footnote 4: Commines, Mêmoires I., ch. i. In the above passages Dannett's translation is followed for the racy English.]
[Footnote 5: Commines says at The Hague; Meyer makes it Gorcum.]
[Footnote 6: III., 3.]
[Footnote 7: Lavisse ivii., 336.]
[Footnote 8: Chastellain, v., i, etc.]
[Footnote 9: V., II.]
[Footnote 10: Letter of the Count of Charolais to the citizens of Amiens. (Collection de Documents inédits sur l'histoire de France.) "Mélanges," ii., 317. In this collection taken from MS. in the Bibl. Nat. there are many letters private and public about these events.]
[Footnote 11: Since its recovery from the English, there had been no duke in Normandy. It was thus the one province open to the king.]
[Footnote 12: I., ch. xi. His vivacious story of the siege should be read in detail.]
[Footnote 13: I., ch. xii.]
[Footnote 14: Commines, I., ch. xii.]
[Footnote 15: La Marche, iii., p. 27.]
"When we have finished here we shall make a fine beginning against those villains the Liegeois." Thus wrote the count's secretary on October 18th.1 Charles had no desire to rest on the laurels won before Paris. To another city he now turned his attention, to Liege which owed nothing whatsoever to Burgundy.
Before the days when the buried treasures of the soil filled the air with smoke, the valley where Liege lies was a lovely spot.2 Tradition tells how, in the sixth century, Monulphe, Bishop of Tongres, as he made a progress through his diocese was attracted by the beauties of the site where a few hovels then clustered near the Meuse. After looking down from the heights to the river's banks for a brief space, the bishop turned to his followers and said, as if uttering a prophecy:
"Here is a place created by God for the salvation of many faithful souls. One day a prosperous city shall flourish here. Here I will build a chapel." Dedicated to Cosmo and Damian, the promised chapel became a shrine which attracted many pilgrims who returned to their various homes with glowing tales of the beautiful and fertile valley. Little by little others came who did not leave, and by the seventh century when Bishop Lambert sat in the see of Tongres, Liege was a small town.
An active and loving shepherd was this Lambert. He gave himself no rest but travelled continually from one church to another in his diocese to look after the needs of his flock. He was a fearless prelate, too, and his words of well-deserved rebuke to the Frankish Pepin for a lawless deed excited the wrath of a certain noble, accessory to the act. Trouble ensued and Lambert was slain as he knelt before the altar in Monulphe's chapel at Liege. Absorbed in prayer the pious man did not hear the servants' calls, "Holy Lambert, Holy Lambert come to our aid," words that later became a war-cry when the bishop was exalted into the patron saint of the town.
Not until the thirteenth century, however, when the episcopal see was finally established at Liege, was Lambert's successor virtual lay overlord of the region as well as Bishop of Liege. Monulphe's little chapel had given way to a mighty church dedicated to the canonised Bishop Lambert. The ecclesiastical state became almost autonomous, the episcopal authority being restricted without the walls only by the distant emperor and still more distant pope. Within the walls, the same authority had by no means a perfectly free hand. There were certain features in the constitution of Liege which differentiated it from its sister towns in the Netherlands.
Municipal affairs were conducted in a singularly democratic manner. There was no distinction between the greater and lesser gilds, and, within these organisations, the franchise was given to the most ignorant apprentice had he only fulfilled the simple condition of attaining his fifteenth year. Moreover, the naturalisation laws were very easy. Newcomers were speedily transformed into citizens and enjoyed eligibility to office as well as the franchise. The tenure of office being for one year only, there was opportunity for frequent participation in public affairs, an opportunity not neglected by the community.3
The bishop was, of course, not one of the civic officers chosen by this liberal franchise. He was elected by the chapter of St. Lambert, subject to papal and imperial ratification for the two spheres of his jurisdiction. But in the exercise of his function there were many restrictions to his free administration, which papal and imperial sanction together were unable to remove.
A bishop-prince of Liege could make no change in the laws without the consent of the estates, and he could administer justice only by means of the regular tribunals. Every edict had to be countersigned. When there was an issue between overlord and people, the question was submitted to the schepens or superior judges who, before they gave their opinion, consulted the various charters which had been granted from time to time, and which were not allowed to become dead letters. A permanent committee of the three orders supervised the executive and the administration of the laws. These "twenty-two" received an appeal from the meanest citizen, and the Liege proverb "In his own home the poor man is king," was very near the possible truth.
Yet the wheels of government were by no means perfect in their running. Many were the conflicts between the different members of the state, and broils, with the character of civil war in miniature, were of frequent occurrence. The submergence of the aristocratic element, the nobles, destroyed a natural balance of power between the bishop-prince and the people. The commons exerted power beyond their intelligence. Annual elections, party contests headed by rival demagogues kept the capital, and, to a lesser extent, the smaller towns of the little state in continuous commotion.4
The ecclesiastical origin of the community was evident at all points of daily life. The cathedral of St. Lambert was the pride of the city. Its chapter, consisting of sixty canons, took the place held by the aristocratic element in the other towns.
In the cathedral, the holy standard of St. Lambert was suspended. At the outbreak of war this was taken down and carried to the door by the clergy in solemn procession. There it was unfurled and delivered to the commander of the civic militia mounted on a snow-white steed. When he received the precious charge he swore to defend it with his life.
One object of popular veneration was this standard, another was the perron, an emblem of the civic organisation. This was a pillar of gilded bronze, its top representing a pineapple surmounted by a cross. This stood on a pedestal in the centre of the square where was the violet or city hall. In front of the perron were proclaimed all the ordinances issued by the magistrates, or the decrees adopted by the people in general assembly. On these occasions the tocsin was rung, the deans of the gilds would hasten out with their banners and plant them near the perron as rallying points for the various gild members who poured out from forge, work-shop, and factory until the square was filled.
There were two powerful weapons whereby the bishop-prince might enforce his will in opposition to that of his subjects did the latter become too obstreperous. He could suspend the court of the schepens, and he could pronounce an interdict of the Church which caused the cessation of all priestly functions. When this interdict was in action, civil suits between burghers could be adjudged by the municipal magistrates, but no criminals could be arrested or tried. The elementary principles of an organised society were thrown into confusion. Still worse confusion resulted from the bishop's last resort as prince of the Church. An interdict caused the church bells to be silent, the church doors to be closed. The celebration of the rites of baptism, of marriage, of burial ceased.5 The fear of such cessation was potent in its restraint, unless the populace were too far enraged to be moved by any consideration.
While the Burgundian dukes extended their sway over one portion of Netherland territory after another, this little dominion maintained its complete independence of them. The fact that its princes were elective protected it from lapsing through heritage to the duke who had been so neatly proven heir to his divers childless kinsfolk. It was a rich little vineyard without his pale.
They were clever people those Liegeois. Their Walloon language is a species of French with many peculiarities showing Frankish admixture.6 The race was probably a mixed one too, but its acquired characteristics made a very different person from a Hollander, a Frisian, or a Fleming, though there was a certain resemblance to the latter.
In 1465, not yet exploited were the wonderful resources of coal and minerals which now glow above and below the furnace fires until, from a distance, Liege looks like a very Inferno. But the people were industrious and energetic in their crafts. It was a country of skilled workmen. The city of Liege is accredited with one hundred thousand inhabitants at this epoch, and the numbers reported slain in the various battles in which the town was involved run into the thousands.7
In 1456, Philip of Burgundy, encouraged by his success in the diocese of Utrecht, obtained a certain ascendency over the affairs of Liege by interfering in the election of a bishop. There was no natural vacancy at the moment. John of Heinsberg was the incumbent, a very pleasant prelate with conciliatory ways. He loved amusement and gay society, pleasures more easily obtainable in Philip's court than in his own, and his agreeable host found means of persuading him to resign all the cares of his see. Then the enterprising duke proceeded to place his own nephew, Louis of Bourbon, upon the vacant episcopal throne.
This nephew was an eighteen-year-old student at the University of Louvain, destitute of a single qualification for the office proposed. Nevertheless, all difficulties, technical and general were ignored, and a papal dispensation enabled the candidate even to dispense with the formality of taking orders. Attired in scarlet with a feathered Burgundian cap on his head, Louis made his entry into his future capital and was duly enthroned as bishop-prince in spite of his manifest unfitness for the place.
Nor did he prove a pleasant surprise to his people, better than the promise of his youth, as some reckless princes have done. On the contrary, ignorant, sensuous, extortionate, he was soon at drawn swords with his subjects. After a time he withdrew to Huy where he indulged in gross pleasures while he attempted to check the rebellious citizens of his capital by trying some of the measures of coercion used by his predecessors as a last resort.
Liege was lashed into a state of fury. Matters dragged on for a long time. The people appealed to Cologne, to the papal legate, to the pope, and to the "pope better informed," but no redress was given. Philip continued to protect the bishop, and none dared put themselves in opposition to him. Finally, the people turned to Louis XI. for aid. Their appeal was heard and the king's agent arrived in the city just as one of the bishop's interdicts was about to be enforced, an interdict, too, endorsed by a papal bull, threatening the usual anathema if the provisions were not obeyed.
It was the moment for a demagogue and one appeared in the person of Raes de la Rivière, lord of Heers. On July 5, 1465, there was to be unbroken silence in all sacred edifices. Heers and his followers proclaimed that every priest who refused to chant should be thrown into the river. Mass was said under those unpeaceful and unspiritual conditions, and the presence of the French envoys gave new heart to the bishop's opponents. A treaty was signed between the Liegeois and Louis; wherein mutual pledges were made that no peace should be concluded with Burgundy in which both parties were not included. It was a solemn pledge but it did not hamper Louis when he signed the treaty of Conflans whose articles contained not a single reference to the Liegeois.
Meanwhile, it chanced that the first report of the battle of Montl'héry reaching Liege gave the victory to Louis, a report that spurred on the Liegeois to carry their acts of open hostility to their neighbour, still farther afield. The other towns of the Church state were infected by an anti-Burgundian sentiment. In Dinant this feeling was high, and there was, moreover, a manifestation of special animosity against the Count of Charolais. A rabble marched out of the city to the walls of Bouvignes, a town of Namur, loyal to Burgundy, carrying a stuffed figure with a cow-bell round its neck. Certain well-known emblems of Burgundy on a tattered mantle showed that this represented Charles of Burgundy. With rude words the crowd declared that they were going to hang the effigy as his master, the King of France, had already hanged Count Charles in reality. Further, they said that he was no count at all, but the son of their old bishop, Heinsberg. They went so far as to suspend the effigy on a gallows and then riddled it with arrows and left it dangling like a scarecrow in sight of the citizens of Bouvignes.8
The actual contents of the treaty made at Conflans did not reach Liege until messages from Louis had assured them that he had been mindful of their interests in making his own terms, assurances, however, coupled with advice to make peace with their good friend the duke. But there speedily came later information that the only mention of Liege in the new treaty was an apology that Louis had ever made friends in that city!
The rebels lost heart at once. Without the king, they had no confidence in their own efforts. Envoys were despatched to Philip who refused to answer their humble requests for pardon until his son could decide what punishment the principality deserved. Nor was much delay to be anticipated before an answer would be forthcoming. Charles hastened to Liege direct from Paris, not pausing even to greet his father. By the third week of January, he was encamped between St. Trond and Tongres, where a fresh deputation from Liege found him. These envoys, between eighty and a hundred, were well armed chiefly because they feared attacks from their anti-peace fellow-citizens.9
They found Charles flushed by his recent achievement of bringing King Louis to his way of thinking. His army, too, was a stronger body than when it left the Netherlands. The troops were more skilled from their experience and elated at what they counted their success; more capable, too, of acting as one body under the guidance of a resolute leader, now inclined to despise councils with free discussion. The count's quick temper had gained him weight but it had made him feared. The slightest breach of discipline brought a thunder-cloud on his face. If we may believe one authority,10 he himself was often so lacking in discipline that he would strike an officer with a baton, and once at least, he killed a soldier with his own hand.
His audience with the envoys resulted in a treaty, of which certain articles were so harsh that the messengers were insulted when the report was made in Liege. Only eleven out of thirty-two gilds voted to accept all the articles. A certain noble on pleasant terms with the count offered to carry the unpopular document back to him to ask for a modification of the harsh terms.
By this time the weather was severe. Charles's troops were in need of repose, and it seemed prudent to avoid hostility if possible. Charles revoked the objectionable clauses in consideration of an increase of the war indemnity. With this change the treaty was accepted, and a Piteous Peace it was indeed for the proud folk of Liege. Instead of owing allegiance to emperor and to pope alone as free imperial citizens, they agreed to recognise the Burgundian dukes as hereditary protectors of Liege.
When it was desired, Burgundian troops could march freely across the territory. Burgundian coins were declared valid at Burgundian values. No Liege fortresses were to menace Burgundian marches, and unqualified obedience was pledged to the new overlords. The same terms were conceded to all the rebel towns alike except to Dinant. The story of the personal insult to himself and his mother had reached the count's ears and he was not inclined to ignore the circumstance. His further action was, however, deferred.
January 24, 1466, is the final date of the treaty11 and, after its conclusion, Charles ordered a review of his forces, a review that almost culminated in a pitched battle between army and citizens of St. Trond, and then on January 31st, the count returned to Brussels where there was a great display of Burgundian etiquette before the duke embraced his victorious son.
Piteous as was the peace for Liege and the province at large, still more piteous was the lot of Dinant which alone was excluded from the participation in the treaty. Her fate remained uncertain for months. Other affairs occupied the Count of Charolais until late in the summer of 1466. Time had quickly proven that Louis, well freed from the allies pressing up to the gates of Paris, was in very different temper from Louis ill at ease under their strenuous demands. Not only had he withdrawn his promises in regard to the duchy conferred on his brother, but he had begun taking other measures, ostensibly to prepare against a possible English invasion, which alarmed his cousin of Burgundy for the undisturbed possession of his recently recovered towns on the Somme.
Excited by the rumours of Louis's purposes, Charles despatched the following letter from Namur:12
"MONSEIGNEUR:
"I recommend myself very humbly to your good grace and beg to inform you, Monseigneur, that recently I have been advised of something very surprising to me, Moreover, I am now put beyond doubt considering the source of my information. It is with much regret that I communicate it to you when I remember all the good words you have given to me this year, orally and in writing. Monseigneur, it is evident that there has been some agreement between your people and the English, and that the matter has been so well worked that you have consented, as I have heard, to yield them the land of Caux, Rouen, and the connecting villages, and to aid them in withholding Abbeville and the county of Ponthieu, and further, to cement with them certain alliances against me and my country in making them large offers greatly to my prejudice and, in order to complete the whole, they are to come to Dieppe.
"Monseigneur, you may dispose of your own as you wish: but, Monseigneur, in regard to what concerns me, it seems to me that you would do better to leave my property in my hand than to be the instrument of putting it into the hands of the English or of any foreign nation. For this reason I entreat you, Monseigneur, that if such overtures or greater ones have been opened by your people that you will not commit yourself to them in any manner but will insist on their cessation, and that you will do this in a way that I may always have cause to remain your very humble servant as I desire to do with all my heart. Above all, write to me your good pleasure, and I implore you, Monseigneur, if there be any service that I can render you, I am the one who would wish to employ all that God has given me [to do it]. Written at Namur, August 16th.
"Your very humble and obedient subject,
"CHARLES."
Then the count proceeded to Dinant to inflict the punishment that the culprits had, to his mind, too long escaped.
Commines calls this a strong and rich town, superior even to Liege.13 A comparison of the two sites shows, however, that this statement could hardly have been true at any time. Dinant lies in a narrow space between the Meuse and high land. A lofty rock at one end of the town dominating the river is crowned by a fortress most picturesque in appearance. It is difficult to estimate how many inhabitants there actually were in the place in 1466, but there is no doubt as to their energy and character. As mentioned before, the artisans had acquired a high degree of skill in their specialty, and their brass work was renowned far and wide. Pots and pans and other utensils were known as Dinanderies.
The traffic in them was so important that Dinant had had her own commercial relations with England for a long period. Her merchants enjoyed the same privileges in London as the members of the Hanseatic League, and an English company was held in high respect at Dinant.14 The brass-founders' gild ranked at Dinant as the drapers at Louvain, and the weavers at Ghent. As a "great gild they formed a middle class between the lower gilds and the bourgeois," the merchants and richer folk.15 In municipal matters each of these three classes had a separate vote.
As it happened, Dinant had not been very ready to open hostilities against the House of Burgundy though she was equally critical of Louis of Bourbon in his episcopal misrule. It was undoubtedly her rivalry with Bouvignes of Namur that brought her into the strife. That neighbour had taunted her rival to exasperation, and the fact that it was safe under the Duke of Burgundy and backed by him as Count of Namur, had brought a Burgundian element into the local contest.
The incidents of the insult to Charles and the aspersion on his mother's reputation undoubtedly were due to an irresponsible rabble rather than to any action that could properly be attributed to the leading men. Further, it really seems probable that the weight attached to the insulting act never occurred to the respectable burghers until they heard of it from others, so insignificant were the participants in it.
As soon as it was realised that serious consequences might result from reckless folly, the authorities were quite ready to separate themselves from the event, and to arrest the culprits as common malefactors. Once, indeed, the prisoners were temporarily rescued by their friends, and it seemed to Burgundian sympathisers a suspicious circumstance that this happened just at a moment when there was renewed hope for help from Louis XI. When convinced that such hopes were vain, the magistrates became seriously alarmed and ready to go to any lengths to avert Burgundian vengeance. Finally the following letter was despatched to the Duke of Burgundy:16
"The poor, humble and obedient servants and subjects of the most reverend father in God, Louis of Bourbon, Bishop of Liege; and your petty neighbours and borderers, the burgomaster's council and folk of Dinant, humbly declare that it has come to their knowledge that the wrath of your grace has been aroused against the town on account of certain ill words spoken by some of the inhabitants thereof, in contempt of your honourable person. The city is as displeased about these words as it is possible to be, and far from wishing to excuse the culprits has arrested as many as could be found and now holds them in durance awaiting any punishment your grace may decree. As heartily and as lovingly as possible do your petitioners beseech your grace to permit your anger to be appeased, holding the people of Dinant exonerated, and resting satisfied with the punishment of the guilty, inasmuch as the people are bitterly grieved on account of the insults and have, as before stated, arrested the culprits."
With further apologies for any failure of duty towards the Duke of Burgundy, the petitioners humbly begged to be granted the same terms that Liege and the other towns had received. March 31st is the date of this humble document. Months of doubt followed before the terrible experience of August proved the futility of their pleas, to which the ducal family refused to listen, so deep was their sense of personal aggrievement. Long as it was since the duchess had taken part in public affairs, she, too, had a word to say here. And she, too, was implacable against the town where any citizen had dared accuse her of infidelity to her husband and to the Church whose interests were more to her than anything in the world except her son.17
The petition was as unheeded as were all the representations of the would-be mediators. Again Dinant turned in desperation to Louis XI. and with assurances that after God his royal majesty was their only hope, besought him from mere charity and pity to persuade his cousin of Burgundy to forgive them. Apparently Louis took no notice of this appeal. Dinant's last hope was that her fellow-communes of Liege would refuse to ratify the treaty unless she, too, were included. The sole concession, obtained by their envoys to Charles in the winter, had been a short truce afterwards extended to May, 1466.
During that summer the critical position of the little town was well known. Some sympathisers offered aid but it was aid that there was possible danger in accepting. Many of the outlaws from Liege, who had been expressly excluded from the terms of the peace, had joined the ranks of a certain free lance company called "The Companions of the Green Tent," as their only shelter was the interlaced branches of the forest. To Dinant came this band to aid in her defence.18 At one time it seemed as though a peaceful accommodation might be reached but it fell through. Not yet were the citizens ready to surrender their charters—"Franchises,—to the rescue," was a frequent cry and no treaty was made.
Philip, long inactive, resolved to assist at the reduction of this place in person. Too feeble to ride, he was carried to the Meuse in a litter, and arrived at Namur on August 14th. Then attended by a small escort only, he proceeded to Bouvignes, a splendid vantage point whence he could command a view of the scene of his son's intended operations. As the crisis became imminent there were a few further efforts to effect a reconciliation. When these failed, the town prepared to meet the worst.19 Stories gravely related by Du Clercq20 represent the people of Dinant goaded to actual fury of resistance.
By August 7th, the Burgundian troops made their appearance, winding down to the river. Conspicuous among the standards—and nobles from all Philip's dominions were in evidence—was the banner of the Count of Charolais, displaying St. George slaying the dragon.
On Tuesday, August 19th, Dinant was invested and the siege began. Within the walls the most turbulent element had gained complete control of affairs. All thought of prudence was thrown to the winds. From the walls they hurled words at the foe:
"Is your old doll of a duke tired of life that you have brought him here to perish?21 Your Count Charlotel is a green sprout. Bid him go fight the King of France at Montl'héry. If he waits for the noble Louis or the Liegeois he will have to take to his heels," etc.
It was a heavy siege and the town was riddled with cannon-balls but there was no assault. By the sixth day the magistrates determined to send their keys to the Count of Charolais and beg for mercy. The captain of the great gild of coppersmiths, Jean de Guérin, tried to encourage the faint-hearted to protest openly against this procedure. Seizing the city colours he declared: "I will trust to no humane sentiment. I am ready to carry this flag to the breach and to live or die with you. If you surrender, I will quit the town before the foe enter it." It was too late, the capitulation was made.
When the keys were brought to Charles he remembered that he was not yet duke and ordered them presented to his father in his stead, and to his half-brother Anthony was entrusted the task of formally accepting the surrender.
It was late in the evening when the Bastard of Burgundy marched in. At first he held the incoming troops well under control, but the stores of wine were easy to reach, and by the morning there were wild scenes of disorder. When Charles arrived, however, on the morrow, Tuesday, just a week after the beginning of the siege, lawlessness was checked with a strong hand. Any ill treatment of women was peculiarly repugnant to him, and he did not hesitate to execute the sternest justice upon offenders.22