But the growing desire for peace was now increased by a terrible fear. The rulers of Europe remembered that desire to throw off the power of their predecessors, which had shown itself among the peasantry of Europe after the failure of the crusades in the thirteenth century; and which had been renewed after the overthrow of the French nobles by the English invaders of the fourteenth. This same feeling was now again apparent; and this time the hopes which accompanied it were evidently based on more reasonable grounds. That the Saracen generals should defeat the armies of Louis IX., or that the English nobles should overthrow the French at Crecy and Poictiers, might be convincing arguments of the weakness of the defeated parties; but they did not necessarily prove that those who yielded to such opponents, would succumb to the attacks of an untrained peasantry. Now, however, for twelve years past, the peasantry of Bohemia, armed mainly with their thrashing flails, had repeatedly put to flight the greatest armies of Europe, and overawed their own nobility. Surely such an example might give to the peasants of Germany and France some hope that a time was coming in which they too might be the equals of their oppressors! In the South of France the French peasantry rose in large numbers, demanding that the nobles should, for the future, be content to earn their bread by the sweat of their brow, and declaring that two priests were all that were required for the spiritual needs of the country. In Dauphiné collections were made on behalf of the Bohemians; while in the Rhine district three thousand peasants near Bonn and Speier declared their determination to overthrow the power of the clergy and nobles. Under these circumstances, there was a general cry that, if the Council did not come to terms with the Hussites, the peasant insurrection would spread throughout Europe. Nor, on the other hand, were there wanting strong reasons why the Bohemians, on their side, should be eager for a peaceable settlement. On them had fallen the main misery of the war; and it is a curious fact that, in spite of their brilliant successes on the battlefield, much of their country was still in the hands of the enemy. Not only was the greater part of Moravia held down by Albert of Austria, but, in Bohemia itself, the strong fortress of Carlstein, and the important towns of Budweis (Budejóvice), Pilsen (Plz̆en), and Eger (Cheb), still held out against the Utraquists. Moreover, the discontent with the power which Procop had gained by his victories, was working among the more moderate section of the Utraquists in favour of a settlement in which learned men should have more power than soldiers.