Towards the end of August, Louis XIII was sufficiently recovered to remove to Saint-Germain. He had declared his intention of joining the army and personally superintending the measures being taken for the relief of Saint-Martin so soon as he was strong enough to mount his horse, and, in the second week of September, he sent for Bassompierre and told him to prepare to accompany him to La Rochelle in five days’ time. Bassompierre inquired “in what quality his Majesty was pleased that he should accompany him.” The King replied that he would, of course, do so as his lieutenant-general, upon which Bassompierre pointed out that the Duc d’Angoulême occupied that position, and that, since the army, when the King was present, had never yet been commanded except by marshals of France, “he begged him very humbly not to take him there to put an affront upon his office.” Louis declared that Angoulême’s command was but a temporary one, and that he intended to send him an order to retire; but Bassompierre, who knew how easily Richelieu could persuade the King to go back on his word, asked if the King would direct the Cardinal to give him an assurance that the prince should not continue in the command, since his Eminence, having advised the appointment, might wish to retain him. This Louis promised, and, a day or two later, gave the marshal the assurance he desired. The King left Saint-Germain on September 17 and travelled by easy stages towards the West. Bassompierre remained in Paris until the end of the month, when he received a message from Louis telling him to follow him as quickly as possible. He set out at once and joined the King and the Cardinal at the Château of Saumery, near Blois. They both received him most cordially and told him that the King had sent orders to Angoulême to leave the army and join his Majesty at Saumur. Although obliged to remain near the person of the King, Richelieu had practically assumed the direction of the military operations. All his efforts were at present directed towards the re-victualling of Saint-Martin-de-Ré, the situation of which was rapidly becoming desperate. His ecclesiastical lieutenants, the Bishops of Maillezais and Mende, the Abbé de Marsillac and Père Placide de Brémond, a Benedictine monk, who entitled himself the “Knight of the Crusade,” hurried from one harbour to another along the coast, assembling shallops and flat-bottomed boats, arming them, loading them with stores, and despatching them towards Ré. “I swear to you,” wrote the Cardinal to his brother-in-law, the Marquis de Brézé, “that I would as lief die as see M. de Toiras perish from want of provisions.”