servants and those of the admiral, with a few
noblemen that came in from the neighborhood, swelled their escort to about
one hundred and fifty horse.[582] With such a handful of men, and
embarrassed in their flight by the presence of those whom their age or
their sex disqualified for the endurance of the fatigues of a protracted
journey, Conde and Coligny undertook to reach the friendly shelter of the
walls of La Rochelle. It was a perilous attempt. The journey was one of
several hundred miles, through the very heart of France. The cities were
garrisoned by their enemies. The bridges and fords were guarded. The
difficulties, in fact, were apparently so insurmountable, that the Roman
Catholics seem to have expected that any attempt to escape would be made
in the direction of Germany, where Casimir, their late ally, would
doubtless welcome the Protestant leaders. This mistake was the only
circumstance in their favor, for it diminished the number and the
vigilance of the opposing troops.

The march was secret and prompt. Contrary to all expectation, an unguarded
ford was discovered not far from the city of Sancerre,[583] by which, on a
sandy bottom, the fugitive Huguenots crossed the Loire, elsewhere deep and
navigable as far as Roanne.[584] If the drought which had so reduced the
stream as to render the passage practicable was justly regarded as a
providential interposition of Heaven in their behalf, the sudden rise of
the river immediately afterward, which baffled their pursuers, was not
less signal a blessing.[585] Other dangers still confronted them, but
their prudence and expedition enabled them to escape them, and on the
eighteenth of September[586] the weary travellers, with numbers
considerably increased by reinforcements by the way, entered the gates of
La Rochelle amid the acclamations of the brave inhabitants.

[Sidenote: The third civil war opens.]

The escape of the prince and the admiral rendered useless all further
attempt at the concealment of the treacherous designs of the papal party;
and the third religious war dates from this moment.

* * * * *

[Sidenote: The city of La Rochelle and its privileges.]

The city of La Rochelle, said to have become a walled place
about 1126, had received many tokens of favor at the hands of
its successive masters before the accession of Queen Alienor,
or Eleonore, last Duchess of Aquitaine. It was by a charter of