and therefore it was no great harm if they died. Moreover, he said he would never depart from the town till he had taken it by force or by famine, though he should lose all his army; because of the great number of princes who were shut up in it, with the greater part of the nobility of France, who he hoped would pay his expenses four times over; and he would go yet again to Paris, to see the Parisians, and to make himself King of all the kingdom of France. M. de Guise, with the princes, captains, and soldiers, and in general all the citizens of the town, having heard the Emperor's resolve to exterminate us all, forbade the soldiers and citizens, and even the princes and seigneurs, to eat fresh fish or venison, or partridges, woodcocks, larks, francolines, plovers, or other game, for fear these had acquired any pestilential air which could bring infection among us. So they had to content themselves with the fare of the army; biscuit, beef, salt cow-beef, bacon, cervelas, and Mayence hams; also fish, as haddock, salmon, shad, tunny, whale, anchovy, sardines, herrings; also peas, beans, rice, garlic, onions, prunes, cheeses, butter, oil, and salt; pepper, ginger, nutmegs and other spices to put in our pies, mostly of horses, which without the spice had a very bad taste. Many citizens, having gardens in the town, had planted them with fine radishes, turnips, carrots, and leeks, which they kept flourishing and very dear, for the extreme necessity of the famine. Now all these stores were distributed by weight, measure, and justice, according to the quality of the persons, because we knew not how long the siege would last. For after we heard the Emperor's words, how he would not depart from before Metz, till he had taken it by force or by famine, the victuals were cut down; and what they used to distribute to three soldiers was given to four; and it was forbidden to them to sell the remains which might be left after their meals; but they might give them to the rabble. And they always rose from table with an appetite, for fear they should be subject to take physick. And before we surrendered to the mercy of the enemy, we had determined to eat the asses, mules, and horses, dogs, cats, and rats, even our boots and collars, and other And, in a skins that we could have softened and stewed. word, all the besieged were resolved to defend themselves valiantly with all instruments of war; to set the artillery at the entry of the breach, and load with balls, stones, cartnails, bars and chains of iron; also all sorts and kinds of artificial fires, as barricadoes, grenades, stink-pots, torches, squibs, fire-traps, burning faggots; with boiling water, melted lead, and lime, to put out the enemy's eyes. Also, they were to make holes right through their houses, and put arquebusiers in them, to take the enemy in flank and hasten his going, or else give him stop then and there. Also they were to order the women to pull up the streets, and throw from their windows billets, tables, trestles, benches, and stools, to dash out the enemy's brains. Moreover, a little within the breach, there was a great stronghold full of carts and palisades, tuns and casks; and barricades of earth to serve as gabions, interlaid with falconets, falcons, fieldpieces, crooked arquebuses, pistols, arquebuses, and wildfires, to break their legs and thighs, so that they would be taken from above and on the flank and from behind; and if they had carried this stronghold, there were others where the streets crossed, every hundred paces, which would have been as bad friends to them as the first, or worse, and would have made many widows and orphans. And if fortune had been so hard on us that they had stormed and broken up our strongholds, there would yet have been seven great companies, drawn up in square and in triangle, to fight them all at once, each led by one of the princes, for the better encouragement of our men to fight and die all together, even to the last breath of their souls. And all were resolved to bring their treasures, rings, and jewels, and their best and richest and most beautiful household stuffs, and burn them to ashes in the great square, lest the enemy should take them and make trophies of them. Also there were men charged to set fire to all the stores and burn them, and to stave in all the wine-casks; others to set fire to every single house, to burn the enemy and us together. The citizens thus were all of one mind, rather than see the bloody knife at their throats, and their wives and daughters ravished and taken by the cruel savage Spaniards. Now we had certain prisoners, who had been made secretly to understand our last determination and desperation; these prisoners M. de Guise sent away on parole, who being come to their camp, lost no time in saying what we had told them; which restrained the great and vehement desire of the enemy, so that they were no longer eager to enter the town to cut our throats and enrich themselves with the spoils. The Emperor, having heard the decision. of this great warrior, M. de Guise, put water in his wine, and restrained his fury; saying that he could not enter the town save with vast butchery and carnage, and shedding of much blood, both of those defending and of those attacking, and they would be all dead together, and in the end he would get nothing but ashes; and afterward men might say it was a like destruction to that of the town of Jerusalem, made of old time by Titus and Vespasian. The Emperor thus having heard our last resolve, and seeing how little he had gained by his attack, sappings, and mines, and the great plague that was through all his camp, and the adverse time of the year, and the want of victuals and of money, and how his soldiers were disbanding themselves and going off in great companies, decided at last to raise the siege and go away, with the cavalry of his vanguard, and the greater part of the artillery and engines of war. The Marquis of Brandebourg was the last to budge from his place; he had with him some troops of Spaniards and Bohemians, and his German regiments, and there he stopped for a day and a half, to the great regret of M. de Guise, who brought four pieces of artillery out of the town, which he fired on him this side and that, to hurry him off: and off he went, sure enough, and all his men with him. When he was a quarter of a league from Metz, he was seized with a panic lest our cavalry should fall upon his tail; so he set fire to his store of powder, and left behind him some pieces of artillery, and a quantity of baggage, which he could not take along with him, because their vanguard and their great cannons had broken and torn up the roads. Our cavalry were longing with all their hearts to issue from the town and attack him behind; but M. de Guise would |