The fact was that the Duke of Burgundy was playing a double part. While the conferences at Melun were going on, he had been in frequent communication with the Dauphin. Twelve days after his last conference with Henry, the Dauphin and the Duke met at Pouilly-le-Fort, a place only a league distant from Melun itself. The interview of the two was, to all appearance, cordial and even affectionate. The Duke bowed several times very low, and finally kneeled to the Dauphin, who raised him in the most gracious way from the ground. At parting the Duke insisted on holding the stirrup while the Dauphin mounted. The two princes were to share the administration of the kingdom between them; they were to give each other all the help in their power; they were not to enter into any agreement without mutual consent. The treaty, which was finally concluded on July 29th, was published throughout France. To Henry, of course, this was a declaration of war. He immediately took the field. The first point of attack was Pontoise in the Isle of France. The town was taken by a surprise, skilfully planned by Henry himself. The English troops arrived in the early morning, scaled the walls before the guard was even aware of their presence, and, after a sharp struggle with the garrison, made themselves masters of the town. Pontoise was a great prize. It contained a great store of war-material and a large sum of money; and it was the only fortified place between the country occupied by Henry and Paris itself. The King declared in a letter to his Council at home that it was the most important place that he had taken since the beginning of the war. The fact was emphasised in the course of a few days by the appearance of the Duke of Clarence before the walls of Paris. But Henry’s victories, brilliant as they were, could hardly have brought him final success but for the criminal folly of his adversaries. On September 10th the Duke of Burgundy was murdered at the Bridge of Montereau. What share the Dauphin had in this atrocious deed--whether he commanded it and even gave the signal for the assassins to strike, or whether he simply stood by and suffered it to be perpetrated without interfering--scarcely concerns us. Perhaps we may take the more favourable account of Monstrelet, who indeed had the best opportunities for learning the truth. “While these things were passing,” he says, “the Dauphin leaned on the barrier, looking on, but soon drew back, as one much frightened.” And indeed the Duke had private and public enemies who would not scruple to take his life. One cannot wonder at the violent death of the man who had perpetrated such a deed as the assassination of the Duke of Orleans.