our 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'hery. 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 Guerin, 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]

[Illustration: ANTHONY OF BURGUNDY AFTER HANS MEMLING. DRESDEN
GALLERY]

His entry into the fallen town was made with all the wonted Burgundian
pomp. Nothing in the proceedings occurred in a headlong or passionate
manner. A council of war was held and the proceedings decided upon.
The cruelty that was exercised was used in deliberate punishment,
not in savage lawlessness. The personal insults to his mother and to
himself rankled in the count's mind. As one author remarks[23] with
undoubted reason, it is not likely that any of those responsible for
the insult were among those punished. After the siege, "pitiable it
was to see, for the innocent suffered and the guilty escaped."

Certain rich citizens bought their lives with large sums, others _were
sold as slaves,_[24] or were hanged or beheaded, or were thrown into
the Meuse.[25] In the monasteries, li