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In 1450 the English were driven out of Guyenne, but a fresh attempt to recover it was made, that ended in the defeat and death of Talbot, in 1453. The Companies had then to dissolve. Out of a thousand churches in Quercy but four hundred were in condition for the celebration of divine service; many had been converted into fortresses.
I did indeed make it under shadow of the King of England's name, in preference to any other; but I always looked for gain and conquest, wherever it was to be had." When they captured a town or castle, nominally for the English, they were quite ready to sell it to the French for a stipulated sum. Among those who harassed the Languedoc, Quercy and Perigord, not a single captain was English.
How much the Lieutenant-Governor of Quercy, going down to his province, requisitioned in the king's name; and for how much he paid, we could only judge from the gloomy looks which followed us as we rode away each morning. Such looks were not solely due I fear to the news from Paris, although for some time we were the first bearers of the tidings.
Thence the wretched peasants fled to the deserted limestone Causse of Quercy and occupied the abandoned villages and farms. They obtained but a short respite, for in 1407 the Companies returned to their former quarters. Charles VI. imposed a heavy tax on the whole kingdom to enable him to carry on the war against the English.
The routiers, still going by the name of the English companies, continued to hold the least accessible places in Guyenne, fortified in the main by nature, until long after the British sovereigns had abandoned their ambitious designs in France. In the fifteenth century so many of the inhabitants of the Quercy had been killed or ruined by the companies that some districts were almost depopulated.
But he was pardoned, probably because Richard was a troubadour himself in his leisure moments, and had a fellow-feeling for all who loved the 'gai sçavoir. Meanwhile, the Lord of Gourdon was not to be gained over by fair words or bribes, and Richard besieged his castle, some ruins of which may still be seen on the rock that overhangs the little town of Gourdon in the Quercy.
The garrisons that occupied these places represented six thousand lances distributed over the Quercy, the Rouergue, and High Auvergne. In fine, the Quercy was continually devastated, and the inhabitants only tilled the earth to satisfy the avidity of the English companies.
Gluges is on the Dordogne near Martel, where high up in the cliff, difficult of access, is the fortified cave-castle of Guillaume Taillefer, son of Raymond IV., Count of Toulouse, who was created Lord of Quercy in 972. Nearly on the level of the river is a cave half walled up, with traces of fresco on the walls, of course much later than the time of Taillefer.
Montauban and Milhau hoisted on their walls the royal standard; the Archbishop of Toulouse "went riding through the whole of Quercy, preaching and demonstrating the good cause of the King of France; and he converted, without striking a blow, Cahors and more than sixty towns, castles, or fortresses." Charles V. neglected no means of encouraging and keeping up the public impulse.
The weather was bitterly cold and rainy, much sickness set in, and we suffered numerous hardships. Still we pushed steadily forward, through Guienne, Ronergue, and Quercy, passed the Lot below Cadence, and halted at Montauban. Here we were cheered by the arrival of Montgomery, with two thousand Bearnese, a welcome addition to our scanty force.
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