by a common language and centuries of amicable commercial
relations. Supported by the Duchess Yolande, he was still more closely
allied with his brother-in-law, the able Jacques de Savoy, who was count
of Romont and ruler of the whole Savoyard country of Vaud. An early
comrade of Duke Charles, he had been appointed marechal of his Flemish
provinces, and by this office maintained the close relations between
Romand Switzerland and Burgundy. But Louis devilishly and implacably
planning his rival cousin's ruin, sowed dissension between the
confederated cities and their lately acknowledged suzerain the duchess
of Savoy. Determined to attach to himself the indomitable Swiss
soldiers, he bought with pensions and unlimited promises the alliance of
Berne and Fribourg and the associated cantons of German Switzerland.

Divided between French and German-speaking inhabitants, the French
citizens in the two cities who were loyal to Savoy and sympathetic with
their Burgundian cousins, were outwitted by Louis' agent, his former
page Nicholas de Diesbach. In October of the year 1474, the adherents of
Louis in Berne had so prevailed that war was formally declared against
Burgundy by the confederates, and in November before the fortress of
Hericourt, Louis' brother-in-law the Archduke Sigismund of Austria, with
the assistance of the Bernois, inflicted the first bloody defeat upon
Duke Charles. Messengers were then sent by Charles to Berne to treat for
peace but with no result, and two months later the Bernois, who had
already seized a Savoy fortress in the Jura, took possession of three
chateaux in the Pays de Vaud belonging to Count Romont. Justly indignant
at this invasion of the Savoy territory, the duchess sent the Count de
Gruyere to Berne to remonstrate against the infraction of the still
existing alliance with her house. A strange reception was accorded him.
No penitence for the unwarranted attack upon the Savoy fortresses, but
an insolent ultimatum, declaring instant war unless she immediately
recalled Count Romont from his command in the Flemish provinces, and
herself declared war upon Duke Charles. No more Lombard soldiers of Duke
Charles were to be permitted to pass through the Bernese territories,
but Swiss soldiers unarmed or armed should pass at their discretion.
Equally unsuccessful with Fribourg, the duchess, wondering "whence came
the evil wind which had blown upon the two cities," heeded no one of the
commands which had b