nd so Maitre
Jean's culverin was brought wherever it was needed.

[Footnote 535: _Journal du siege_, p. 28. Lottin, _Recherches_, vol.
i, p. 214.]

[Footnote 536: Loiseleur, _Comptes_, p. 114. P. Mantellier, _Histoire
du siege_, p. 33.]

On the 25th of December a truce was proclaimed for the celebration of
the Nativity of Our Lord. Of one faith and one religion, on feast days
the hostility of the combatants ceased, and courtesy reconciled the
knights of the two camps whenever the calendar reminded them that they
were Christians. Noel is a gay feast. Captain Glasdale wanted to
celebrate it with carol singing according to the English custom. He
asked my Lord Jean, the Bastard of Orleans, and Marshal de Boussac to
send him a band of musicians, which they graciously did. The Orleans
players went forth to Les Tourelles with their clarions and their
trumpets; and they played the English such carols as rejoiced their
hearts. To the folk of Orleans, who came on to the bridge to listen to
the music, it sounded very melodious; but no sooner had the truce
expired than every man looked to himself. For from one bank to the
other the cannon burst from their slumber, hurling balls of stone and
copper with renewed vigour.[537]

[Footnote 537: _Journal du siege_, pp. 15, 18.]

That which the people of Orleans had foreseen happened on the 30th of
December. On that day the English came in great force through La
Beauce to Saint-Laurent-des-Orgerils.[538] All the French knights went
out to meet them and performed great feats of arms; but the English
occupied Saint-Laurent, and then the siege really began. They erected
a bastion on the left bank of the Loire, west of Le Portereau, in a
place called the Field of Saint-Prive. Another they erected in the
little island to the right of Saint-Laurent-des-Orgerils.[539] On the
right bank, at Saint-Laurent, they constructed an entrenched camp. At
a bow-shot's distance on the road to Blois, in a place called la
Croix-Boissee, they built another bastion. Two bow-shots away, towards
the north on the road to Mans, at a spot called Les Douze-Pierres,
they raised a fort which they called London.[540]

[Footnote 538: To the number of 2500. _Journal du siege_, p. 20.
_Chronique de la Pucelle_, p. 265. Abbe Dubois, _Histoire du siege_,
p. 252. Jollois, _Histoire du siege_, pp. 26, 27.]

[Footnote 539: Cf. _ante_, p. 112, note 1. On the plan this island is
called Petite Ile Charlemagne.]

[Footnote