ded by a kind of
fortress called a Bastide or Bastille.]

[Footnote 89: Aubriot is said to have been the first prisoner
incarcerated in the dungeon of his own Bastille.]

"Woe to thee O land, when thy king is a child!" During the minority
and reign of Charles VI. France lay prostrate under a hail of evils
that menaced her very existence, and Paris was reduced to the
profoundest misery and humiliation. The breath had not left the old
king's body before his elder brother, the Count of Anjou, who was
hiding in an adjacent room, hastened to seize the royal treasure and
the contents of the public exchequer. No regent had been appointed,
and the four royal dukes, the young king's uncles of Anjou, Burgundy,
Bourbon, and Berri, began to strive for power.

In 1382 Anjou, who had been suffered to hold the regency, sought to
enforce an unpopular tax on the merchants of Paris. A collector having
seized an old watercress seller at the Halles with much brutality, the
people revolted, armed themselves with the loaded clubs (_maillotins_)
stored in the Hotel de Ville for use against the English, attacked and
put to death with great cruelty some of the royal officers and opened
the prisons. The court temporised, promised to remit the tax and to
grant an amnesty; but with odious treachery caused the leaders of the
movement to be seized, put them in sacks and flung them at dead of
night into the Seine. The angry Parisians now barricaded their streets
and closed their gates against the king. Negotiations followed and by
payment of 100,000 francs to the Duke of Anjou the citizens were
promised immunity and the king and his uncles entered the city. But
the court nursed its vengeance, and after the victory over the
Flemings at Rosebecque, Charles and his uncles with a powerful force
marched on Paris. The Parisians, 20,000 strong, stood drawn up in arms
at Montmartre to meet him. They were asked who were their chiefs and
if the Constable de Clisson might enter Paris. "None other chiefs have
we," they answered, "than the king and his lords: we are ready to obey
their orders." "Good people of Paris," said the Constable on his
arrival at their camp, "what meaneth this? meseems you would fight
against your king." They replied that their purpose was but to show
the king the puissance of his good city of Paris. "'Tis well," said
the Constable, "if you would see the king return to your homes and
put aside your arms."

On the morrow, 11th January