CH. VII.—How the Duke of Lorraine with a powerful Army of Germans took the field, and encamped at St. Nicholas, whilst the Duke of Burgundy lay before Nancy; and how the King of Portugal, who was in France at that time, paid a visit to the Duke in his Camp before that Town.—1477. But now to proceed with our principal subject. You must know that the Duke of Burgundy besieged Nancy in the depth of winter, with a small army which was ill provided and ill paid. Several of his officers had entered into a conspiracy against him, and there was a general mutiny among the common soldiers, who censured and despised all his enterprises; which, as I have observed at large before, is the common fate in times of adversity; but nobody practised against his person and dominions except the Count of Campobasso, for his subjects were all loyal to him. The Duke of Burgundy being in this miserable condition, the Duke of Lorraine treated with the old and new allies[551] (whom I have mentioned before) for a supply of troops to enable him to give the duke battle, and raise the siege of Nancy. They all readily consented, and every town furnished him with a body of troops, so that now his only want was money for their subsistence. The king by his ambassadors in Switzerland encouraged him extremely in this enterprise, and remitted him 400,000 francs to pay his Swiss: and the Lord of Craon, the king’s lieutenant in Champagne, was quartered in Barrois with a body of 700 or 800 lances and frank-archers, commanded by experienced officers. The Duke of Lorraine, by help of the king’s favour and money, assembled a good body of Swiss, both horse and foot; for, besides the troops that were in his own pay, they furnished him with some at their own expense. He had also many French volunteers, and the king’s army (as you have already heard) was quartered in Barrois, not with a design to commit any act of hostility, but only to wait the issue of a battle, which was every day expected; for the Duke of Lorraine had marched with his Germans to St. Nicholas[552], not far from Nancy. The King of Portugal[553] had now been in France for nine months or thereabouts; for our king, being in an alliance with him against the King of Castile[554], the King of Portugal flattered himself that he would assist him with a powerful army to make war upon his adversary on the side of Biscay or Navarre, for he had several towns in Castile, upon the frontiers of Portugal, and some upon our borders, as the Castle of Burgos, and others; so that I am of opinion, if our king had assisted him, as he was sometimes inclined to do, the King of Portugal might have succeeded in his designs; but, by degrees, the king’s mind changed, and the King of Portugal was amused with fair words, and fed with hopes, for a year or more.