reatest expedition, and every one had
to lend somewhat to help to supply it on the spot. The king said that
there was nothing in the world he would not do to thrust the King of
England out of the realm, save only that he would never consent that the
English should have a bit of territory there; and, rather than suffer
that, he would put everything to jeopardy and risk."

Commynes had good reason to say that the kingdom was in great peril. The
intentions of Charles the Rash tended to nothing short of bringing back
the English into France, in order to share it with them. He made no
concealment of it. "I am so fond of the kingdom," said he, "that I would
make six of it in France." He was passionately eager for the title of
king. He had put out feelers for it in the direction of Germany, and the
emperor, Frederic III., had promised it to him together with that of
vicar-general of the empire, on condition that his daughter, Mary of
Burgundy, married Duke Maximilian, Frederic's son. Having been
unsuccessful on the Rhine, Charles turned once more towards the Thames,
and made alliance with Edward IV., King of England, with a view of
renewing the English invasion of France, flattering himself, of course,
that he would profit by it. To destroy the work of Joan of Arc and
Charles VII.--such was the design, a criminal and a shameful one for a
French prince, which was checkmated by the peace of Peequigny. Charles
himself acknowledged as much when, in his wrath at this treaty, he said,
"He had not sought to bring over the English into France for any need he
had of them, but to enable them to recover what belonged to them;" and
Louis XI. was a patriotic king when he declared that "there was nothing
in the world he would not do to thrust the King of England out of the
realm, and, rather than suffer the English to have a bit of territory in
France, he would put everything to jeopardy and risk."

The Duke of Burgundy, as soon as he found out that the King of France
had, under the name of truce, made peace for seven years with the King of
England, and that Edward IV. had recrossed the Channel with his army, saw
that his attempts, so far, were a failure. Accordingly he too lost no
time in signing [on the 13th of September, 1475] a truce with King Louis
for nine years, and directing his ambition and aiming his blows against
other quarters than Western France. Two little states, his neighbors on
the east, Lorraine and Switzerland,