The duke of Orleans was not worth much regret. His administration had been as deplorable as his morals. He had declared war on England, and had not carried it out, and had used this pretext for an increase of taxes which he himself had appropriated. Burgundy had bitterly opposed this new burden, and to appease the people, and especially to lay his own hand on the rich spoil, he now sent the superintendent of finances to the scaffold (1408). Then he restored the Parisians their ancient free constitution, the rights to elect their provost and to organise a citizen militia under elective leaders, and even to hold noble fiefs with the privileges thereto attached. Besides this he was extremely popular, which state of affairs he increased by showing citizens, even the least important, such consideration as they had never before known. These were the market people who formed, in Paris, the strength of the Burgundian party. Feudalism never forgave John the Fearless for having sought such support, no more than it did for having compromised seignorial inviolability by slaying a prince of the blood, the king’s brother. A considerable faction of the nobility turned against him. The avengers of Orleans ranged themselves under the banner of the father-in-law of one of his sons, the count d’Armagnac, who gave the party its name (1410). Thus, with the king mad, the queen ignored and incapable, the dauphin threatened by his excesses with his father’s end, the first prince of the blood stained with an infamous murder, there was no government--only armed factions, and war at home and abroad. Such was the state of France; nothing but disaster could come of it. CIVIL WAR [Illustration: SHIELD USED IN THE FIRST PART OF THE FIFTEENTH CENTURY]