and
dispersion of his forces, in the loss of one important city after another,
and almost of entire provinces, and, worst of all, in the discouragement
pervading all classes of the Huguenot population.[185] Now, however, he
was on the eve of obtaining relief. Two days after the fall of Rouen, on
the twenty-eighth of October, a second detachment of the English fleet
succeeded in overcoming the contrary winds that had detained them ten days
in crossing the channel, and landed three thousand troops at the port of
Havre.[186] D'Andelot had finally been able to gather up his German
"reiters" and "lansquenets,"[187] and was making a brilliant march through
Alsace, Lorraine, Burgundy, and Champagne, skilfully avoiding the enemy's
forces sent out to watch and intercept him.[188] On the sixth of
November, he presented himself before the gates of Orleans, and was
received with lively enthusiasm by the prince and his small army.[189]

Now at length, on the seventh of November, Conde could leave the walls
which for seven months had sheltered him in almost complete inaction, and
within which a frightful pestilence had been making havoc among the flower
of the chivalry of France; for, whilst fire and sword were everywhere
laying waste the country, heaven had sent a subtle and still more
destructive foe to decimate the wretched inhabitants. Orleans had not
escaped the scourge. The city was crowded with refugees from Paris and
from the whole valley of the Loire. Among these strangers, as well as
among the citizens, death found many victims. In a few months it was
believed that ten thousand persons perished in Orleans alone; while in
Paris, where the disease raged more than an entire year, the number of
deaths was much larger.[190]

[Sidenote: Conde takes the field.]

With the four thousand lansquenets and the three thousand reiters brought
him from Germany,[191] Conde was able to leave a force, under command of
D'Andelot, sufficient to defend the city of Orleans, and himself to take
the field with an army of about fifteen thousand men.[192] "Our enemies,"
he said, "have inflicted two great losses upon us in taking our
castles"--meaning Bourges and Rouen--"but I hope that now we shall have
their knights, if they move out upon the board."[193]

As he was leaving Orleans, he was waited upon by a deputation of fifty
reformed ministers, who urged him to look well to the discipline and
purity of the army. They begged him, by salutary pun