The truce, which had been concluded for five years, was soon broken, and at the beginning of 1557 the dogs of war were again slipped. In the summer, the Spaniards invaded Picardy and laid siege to Saint-Quentin, on the Somme, one of the bulwarks of Paris. Realizing the importance of saving a town the fall of which would open the road to the capital, the Constable hurried northwards with all the troops he could muster, and Condé accompanied him. The overwhelming superiority of the enemy in numbers, however, decided Montmorency not to risk an engagement, but merely to make a feint against the besiegers’ lines, and, under cover of this movement, to throw reinforcements and provisions into the town, after which he intended to retire. But the non-arrival of the boats required to transport the reliefs across the Somme caused a delay of more than two hours; and, when Montmorency began to retire, he found that the enemy had crossed the river by a ford of which he appears to have been in ignorance, seized the only road by which he could retreat, and cut his army right in two. Surprised and hopelessly outnumbered, the French were routed with terrible loss. Condé’s brother, the gallant Comte d’Enghien, was among the slain, while the Constable and the Maréchal de Saint-André were taken prisoners. Condé himself, who was stationed with part of the light cavalry on the extreme right wing of the army, displayed the most admirable courage and presence of mind amid the general panic, and, keeping his men together, succeeded in cutting his way through the victorious Spaniards and reaching La Fère. He lost no time in taking the field again and kept it throughout the autumn, continually harassing the enemy and attacking their foraging-parties and convoys. So much activity and vigour on the morrow of a great defeat undoubtedly merited some substantial recognition; but when, at the beginning of the following year, he solicited the post of colonel-general of the light cavalry which he had so gallantly led, he was, to his intense mortification, passed over in favour of the Duc de Nemours, the candidate of the Guises. It is true that, by way of compensation, he was nominated colonel-general of the Cisalpine infantry, that is to say, of the infantry stationed in Piedmont; but, since France had lately withdrawn all her troops from Piedmont with the exception of a few garrisons, the appointment was regarded as an affront rather than an honour.