[Illustration: Battle of Agnadello----334]

[Illustration: Cardinal d'Amboise----347]

[Illustration: Chaumont d'Amboise----350]

[Illustration: Bayard's Farewell----358]

[Illustration: Gaston de Foix----364]





CHAPTER XXIII.----THE HUNDRED YEARS' WAR--CHARLES VI. AND THE DUKES OF
BURGUNDY.

Sully, in his Memoirs, characterizes the reign of Charles VI. as "that
reign so pregnant of sinister events, the grave of good laws and good
morals in France." There is no exaggeration in these words; the
sixteenth century with its St. Bartholomew and The League, the eighteenth
with its reign of terror, and the nineteenth with its Commune of Paris,
contain scarcely any events so sinister as those of which France was, in
the reign of Charles VI., from 1380 to 1422, the theatre and the victim.

Scarcely was Charles V. laid on his bier when it was seen what a loss he
was and would be to his kingdom. Discord arose in the king's own family.
In order to shorten the ever critical period of minority, Charles V. had
fixed the king's majority at the age of fourteen. His son, Charles VI.,
was not yet twelve, and so had two years to remain under the guardianship