King of France. Bayard added that he desired nothing more, but Sickingen
must lose no time, for his camp would soon be hemmed in by the approaching
Swiss and by a sortie well timed from the town. This information was to be
kept quite private....

The letter was written giving other particulars, and was then given to a
peasant with a crown and the order to take it at once to Sedan from the
Captain Bayard. The good man set off with it, but, as Bayard had foreseen,
he had not gone far before he was taken and gave up the letter to save his
life. This message greatly troubled Count Sickingen, who was already
suspicious of the other general, and was not slow to imagine that he had
been betrayed and left in the post of danger. The more he thought of it the
more his rage increased, and at last he gave orders to sound the retreat
and cross the river, to the dismay and indignation of Count Nassau, who saw
that this was practically raising the siege. Angry messages passed between
the two generals, until at length they were on the point of actual
fighting.

The Good Knight had been watching all this from the ramparts to his great
amusement, and he now thought it time to add to the confusion by a
well-aimed attack of artillery, which so added to the nervous alarms of the
besiegers that next morning they packed up their tents and camp equipment,
and the two Counts went off in different directions, while it was a long
time before they became friends again. Thus it was that Bayard kept at bay
the overwhelming forces of the enemy for three weeks, until the King of
France himself arrived with a great army. We see how it was that enemies of
the Good Knight could never get over a kind of supernatural terror both of
his splendid valour and his endless resources. King Francis sent for Bayard
to his camp, and on his way thither the indomitable captain retook the town
of Mouzon. He was received with the greatest honour by the King, who