But, whatever doubt may be entertained respecting the propriety of the plan of the campaign adopted by the Prince of Conde, there can be none respecting the error committed in not promptly carrying that plan into execution. The army loitered about Etampes instead of pressing on and seizing the bridges across the Seine. Over these it ought to have crossed, and, entering the fruitful district of Brie, to have become master of the rivers by which the means of subsistence were principally brought to Paris. With Corbeil and Lagny in his possession, Conde would have held Paris in as deadly a grasp as Henry the Fourth did twenty-eight years later, when Alexander of Parma was forced to come from Flanders to its assistance.[199] When, at last, the Huguenot army took the direction of Corbeil, commanding one of the bridges, the news arrived of the death of Antoine of Navarre. And with this intelligence came fresh messengers from Catharine, who had already endeavored more than once by similar means to delay the Huguenots in their advance. She now strove to amuse Conde with the hope of succeeding his brother as lieutenant-general of the kingdom during Charles's minority.[200] In vain did the soldiers chafe at this new check upon their enthusiasm, in vain did prudent counsellors remonstrate. There was a traitor even in the prince's council, in the person of Jean de Hangest, sieur de Genlis (brother of D'Ivoy, the betrayer of Bourges), whose open desertion we shall soon have occasion to notice, and this treacherous adviser was successful in procuring a delay of four days.[201] The respite was not thrown away. Before the Huguenots were again in motion, Corbeil was reinforced and rendered impregnable against any assaults which, with their feeble artillery, they could make upon it. Repulsed from its walls, after several days wasted in the vain hope of taking it, the prince moved down the left bank of the Seine, and, on the twenty-eighth of November, encamped opposite to Paris in the villages of Gentilly and Arcueil.[202] New proffers came from Catharine; there were new delays on the road. At Port a l'Anglais a conference with Conde had been projected by the queen mother, resulting merely in one between the constable and his nephew Coligny--as fruitless as any that had preceded; for Montmorency would not hear of tolerating in France another religion besides the Roman Catholic, and the Admiral would rather die a thousand deaths than abandon the point.[203]