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The monarch, as if to test the efficiency of his new residence as a stronghold, made a dungeon tower, his greatest constructive achievement until he built the castle of Gisors, and in the tower imprisoned the Comte de Flandre, whom he had taken prisoner at Bouvines.

But their bravery saved only their master; the battle of Bouvines was lost for the Anglo-Germano-Flemish coalition. It was still prolonged for several hours; but in the evening it was over, and the prisoners of note were conducted to Philip Augustus.

The battle of Bouvines was not the victory of Philip Augustus, alone, over a coalition of foreign princes; the victory was the work of king and people, barons, knights, burghers, and peasants of Ile-de-France, of Orleanness, of Picardy, of Normandy, of Champagne, and of Burgundy.

There are also, in the Gallery of French History, at Versailles, several others of his, such as the "Battle of Bouvines;" "Charles X. reviewing the National Guard;" the "Marshal St. Cyr," and some others among those we have already named. In them the qualities of the artist are manifested more fully, we think, than in any others of his works.

Virtue, moreover, was as natural to the Lavals as bravery on the field of battle, and whether it were in the retinue of Clovis, when the First Barons received the regenerating water of baptism, or on the immortal plain of Bouvines; whether it were by the side of Blanche of Castile, attacked by the rebellious nobles, or in the terrible holocaust of Crécy; whether it were in the fight of the giants at Marignan, or after Pavia during the captivity of the roi-gentilhomme; everywhere where country and religion appealed to their defenders one was sure of hearing shouted in the foremost ranks the motto of the Montmorencys: "Dieu ayde au premier baron chrétien!"

Lafayette, on arriving at Bouvines, after travelling fifty leagues of bad roads in two or three days, learnt the disasters of Valenciennes and Lille; he at once saw that the object of the invasion had failed; and he justly thought that the best course would be to effect a retreat.

Four hundred knights and six times as many archers fought round the banner of Barbazure at Bouvines, Malplaquet, and Azincour.

When the limits were extended, the burgher had to deal with towns and villages and men and things which he did not know, and which he probably hated, as every small community hated its neighbour; witness the horrible war, lasting centuries, between the two little towns of Dinant and Bouvines on the Meuse.

In response to her entreaties a hundred knights and several hundred men-at-arms took ship for England. Among the knights was the famous William des Barres, one of the heroes of Bouvines, and Theobald, Count of Blois. Eustace the Monk, a renegade clerk turned pirate, and a hero of later romance, took command of the fleet. On the eve of St.

None denied that many great families had won their spurs in the service of their country; everybody indeed knew that the noblest of all, Montmorency, bore the arms of France because, at the victory of Bouvines, where their ancestor was desperately wounded, the king laid his finger on the wound and drew with his blood the lilies upon his shield.