On the day of Jarnac, the young prince and his cousin, Henri of Navarre, had been with the Protestant army. But they had not been permitted to take any part in the engagement, and had been ordered to retire to Saintes, where they were joined by Jeanne d’Albret, who at the first news of the defeat had left La Rochelle. Taking the two lads with her, the indomitable Queen of Navarre hastened to the Huguenot camp at Tonnay-Charente, and, in an eloquent speech, presented them to the troops, and made each of them swear “on his honour, soul, and life” never to abandon the cause. The army received them with acclamations, and the young Prince of Béarn was forthwith chosen as its leader; while, as a mark of its respect and gratitude for the hero whom it had lost, the new Prince de Condé was associated with him in command. For more than two years the double signature, “Henry, Henry de Bourbon,” appeared at the foot of the official documents of the Reformed party.[89] But, though always accompanied by the two young princes, and nominally acting as their lieutenant and counsellor, Coligny had henceforward the undivided command of the Huguenot army, as well as the principal voice in determining the policy of his party; and, by the camp-fire, the lads were commonly referred to as “the Admiral’s pages.” The young Béarnais, with his good-humoured, sunburned face, his broad shoulders, and his wiry frame strengthened and developed by the manly, out-door life which he had led amid the keen and bracing air of the Pyrenees, presented a singular contrast to his slight, delicate-looking, grave cousin. The Queen of Navarre had charged him to love Condé as a brother and “cultivate with him an affection cemented by the ties of blood and religion which should never be severed.” But, though the prince, ever a dutiful son, seems to have made some effort to follow her instructions, and though, during the remainder of the Queen’s life, an appearance of close intimacy was strictly maintained between the cousins, their characters and tastes were far too dissimilar for much sympathy to have existed between them, and, in later years, their relations became at times very strained indeed. The summer and autumn of 1569 were disastrous to the Protestant cause. Although, owing to the jealousy between the Court generals, in May, the Duke of Zweibrücken’s German mercenaries were able to cross the Loire and join the main Huguenot army, the combined forces effected comparatively little, and at the beginning of October they experienced a crushing defeat in the bloody battle of Moncontour.