These perpetual quarrels, however, did not prevent this ill-assorted couple from having three children: two sons and a daughter, of whom the latter, Madeleine Sardini, is said to have inherited not a little of her mother’s beauty. Unfortunately, she appears to have inherited her quarrelsome disposition as well, as did her brothers, for, after their parents’ death, they went to law over the division of the Sardini fortune and provided the gentlemen of the long robe with some very pretty pickings. * * * * * We shall pass briefly over the last three years of Condé’s eventful life. In September 1567, civil war broke out again. The Protestants, alarmed and exasperated by the refusal of the Government to disband a force of 6000 Swiss mercenaries, which had been raised to protect the eastern frontier from any aggression on the part of the Spanish troops marching from Italy to the Netherlands, and by the rumour that this force was to be used against them, rose in arms. An attempt was made by Condé and Coligny, at the head of a body of cavalry, to seize the person of the King, as he was on his way from Monceaux, where he had intended to pass the autumn, to Paris. But Charles IX. had had time to summon the Swiss to his aid, and, the Huguenots not being in sufficient force to risk an engagement with these valiant mercenaries, who, “lowering their pikes, ran at them like mad dogs, at full speed,” he reached his capital in safety. Condé followed, and, having been reinforced, occupied Saint-Denis and proceeded, with astonishing daring, to blockade Paris, although his army does not seem to have exceeded 6000 men and he was without a single piece of artillery; while the Constable, with a vastly superior force, lay within the city. Montmorency, however, who always carried caution to excess, was disinclined to take the offensive, and it was not until the Huguenots had committed the mistake of detaching a considerable part of their slender forces, under Andelot and Montgomery, to occupy Poissy and Pontoise that he ventured to offer battle. The royal army was 19,000 strong, that of Condé certainly did not exceed 3000 men; but the prince had no thought of declining an engagement, and ranged his little force in the plain near Saint-Denis. The Catholic attack was repulsed all along the line, and then, while Coligny fell upon the Parisian militia, who, arrayed in all their martial finery--“gilded like chalices,” as a Huguenot historian puts it[80]--formed the left wing of the Royalists, and drove them in headlong rout towards the city, Condé, with the bulk of the Huguenot horse, burst suddenly upon the centre, where the Constable commanded in person. So furious was his charge that the Catholic cavalry were broken and hurled back, and the Constable himself fell mortally wounded. “If the Grand Signior,” exclaimed the Turkish Ambassador, who, from the heights of Montmartre, had witnessed the prince’s onslaught, “if the