Nothing, however, could stop the progress of the enemy; and, early in March, the Duke of Anjou made himself master of Chateauneuf on the Charente. The bridge, however, was in our possession, and we had various small cars pushed across the river in different directions, in order to guard against surprise. I myself, no longer acting as a mere partisan, but attending implicitly to the orders I received as a soldier, was stationed some little way in advance of Cognac, with orders to obtain every information that I could regarding the enemy's movements, and communicate them immediately to the admiral or the Prince de Condé; and at three o'clock on the very day of my arrival, I perceived a large body of the enemy marching down towards me. The continual noise they made, the sounding of trumpets and beating of drums, made me suspect at once that their appearance was a mere feint; and, having ridden to a rising ground, which gave me a view over the country beyond, I clearly perceived that they were followed by no sufficient force to attempt the passage of the river at that point, and sent immediate intelligence of what I had observed to the admiral, in order to make sure that he was not deceived by any stratagem of the enemy. Coligny sent me down thanks in return, telling me that he was not deceived, and that, after maintaining my ground as well as I could, I might come round to join the Count de Montgomery at the village of Triac. The affair at Cognac lasted scarcely half an hour; but it was past midnight before I could bring my men, fatigued with a long march, to the quarters appointed me. The house seemed pretty comfortable, and the stables for the horses good, with room in a granary above for the greater part of the men, and plenty of room in the house for the rest. Not a truss of straw, however, was to be found; no forage of any kind; and while I was endeavouring to obtain some in the village by sending hither and thither, I saw a head put out from one of the up-stairs windows of the house, and heard a voice call me by name. "Monsieur de Cerons, Monsieur de Cerons," said the voice, "I give you good-evening; it is long since we met." The tones were not unfamiliar to my ear, but yet I could not recollect where I had heard them; and I merely replied, "I will come up in a minute, when I have seen the horses fed." "_Morbleu!_" said Moric Endem, "you may think yourself lucky if you get a straw a horse, seigneur. These are one of the nights, I take it, which teach cavalry horses to be crib-biters, seeing that they can get nothing else to bite."