(call it cruelty if you please) is requisite in case of a resolute opposition, so on the other side mercy is very commendable, and fit, if you see that they in good time surrender to your discretion.[1439] Since his assumption of the command at La Rochelle La Noue had displayed an energy that drove the enemy to despair. On land and on sea he became a terror to them. Sometimes it was by arresting the King’s galleys and bringing them as prizes to La Rochelle or Brouage;[1440] sometimes it was by driving them out, as at Rochefort, by digging a trench which poured waters waist deep down upon them; sometimes it was by battle in the open field. La Noue outmatched Puygaillard at every point, notwithstanding that his antagonist had the King’s picked troops. In the plain of Ste. Gemme, near Luçon, their armies clashed in a fierce, stubbornly fought engagement. Nearly all the captains of his enemy’s two regiments and 500 arquebusiers were killed and as many more taken prisoner. The brilliant captain at last won, although he was so badly injured by an arquebus shot in the left arm that amputation was necessary. Yet in the hour of his own intense suffering he magnanimously lamented “the death of so many brave gentlemen.”[1441] Much more decisive than this engagement, however, was Coligny’s action. The admiral had been lingering at Montbrison in Auvergne during May for the purpose of guarding the upper Loire.[1442] Alarmed by the formidable army under the marshal Cossé, Coligny now determined to strike suddenly and hard in order to preserve La Charité. This resolution precipitated the battle of Arnay-le-Duc on June 15, 1570.[1443] The result of this victory was startling. The government capitulated almost at once. All the essential terms of peace had been thrashed over during the spring and in less than a week after the battle Charles IX held in his hands the articles of pacification demanded by the Huguenots, chiefly stipulating for the free exercise of religion within three towns in every province and at Charenton, amnesty for the past and restitution of offices and estates. But the crown flatly refused the right within ten miles of Paris, or even for Protestant noblemen attending court in their own chambers and offered two towns in each province instead of three. When this was refused it was finally settled to adopt August 1, 1570, as an _annus normalis_, and permit Calvinist worship to be held in all towns in the possession of the Huguenots on that date. The two points of contention still unsettled were the payment of the reiters and determination of the surety-towns. The government at first proposed that the payment of the reiters be equally apportioned between the subjects of both religions, but finally shouldered the burden. As to the surety-towns—the most important point of all as far as practical politics was concerned—great difficulty was experienced before agreement was made. The King at first offered to yield La Rochelle,