y estimate his
own competence, who never put his nose anywhere but into a bar-parlor to
drink himself drunk; and it is also to show distrust of the excellent
means you have for preventing all the ruses and artifices that might be
invented to throw your service into confusion." The king acquiesced, but
not without anxiety, in Vieilleville's refusal, and, leaving at Metz as
governor a relative of the constable's, whom the latter warmly
recommended to him, he set out on the 22d of April, 1552, with all his
household, to go and attempt in Alsace the same process that he had
already carried out in Lorraine. "But when we had entered upon the
territory of Germany," says Vieilleville, "our Frenchmen at once showed
their insolence in their very first quarters, which so alarmed all the
rest that we never found from that moment a single man to speak to, and,
as long as the expedition lasted, there never appeared a soul with his
provisions to sell on the road; whereby the army suffered infinite
privations. This misfortune began with us at the approach to Saverne
(Zabern), the episcopal residence of Strasbourg." When the king arrived
before Strasbourg he found the gates closed, and the only offer to open
them was on the condition that he should enter alone with forty persons
for his whole suite. The constable, having taken a rash fit, was of
opinion that he should enter even on this condition. This advice was
considered by his Majesty to be very sound, as well as by the princes and
lords who were about him, according to the natural tendency of the
Frenchman, who is always for seconding and applauding what is said by the
great. But Vieilleville, on being summoned to the king's quarters,
opposed it strongly. "Sir," said he, "break this purpose, for in
carrying it out you are in danger of incurring some very evil and very
shameful fate; and, should that happen, what will become of your army
which will be left without head, prince, or captain, and in a strange
country, wherein we are already looked upon with ill will because of our
insolence and indiscretions? As for me, I am off again to my quarters to
quaff and laugh with my two hundred men-at-arms, in readiness to march
when your standard is a-field, but not thither." Nothing has a greater
effect upon weak and undecided minds than the firm language of men
resolved to do as they say. The king gave up the idea of entering
Strasbourg, and retired well pleased nevertheless, for