When the King sent the cardinal of Bourbon to talk with him, Damville sent back word that he thought the example of his brother “too dangerous to come to court where they who sought the ruin of his house had too much credit,”[1675] and advised the King to remove the strangers within his gates, meaning Biragues and De Retz.[1676] Henry III could accomplish nothing at Avignon and yet knew not how to get away. He could not go up-river on account of the current. The Huguenots at Livron barred the road on the left bank; Montbrun was in the hills in Auvergne; La Noue’s men were stopping the King’s post daily and Damville controlled Provence and Languedoc; La Haye, King’s lieutenant in the _séné-chaussée_ of Poitou seceded to the Politiques.[1677] Vivarais declared its neutrality and refused to side with King or Politiques. The people of Tulle refused to pay taxes either to Catholics or Protestants until overpowered by the latter, and thus the country continued to endure a war which it hated. Henry truly was in a plight. He was without money, too, and could not hope to get any so far from Paris. He even feared that the soldiery with him might be bribed to desert.[1678] To crown the royal anxiety Damville’s declaration was so public and so bold that the King feared that foreign aid would soon be forthcoming in the Protestant service. The fear was not without ground. For the marshal actually proposed to make a league with the Sultan and introduce a Turkish fleet into the harbor of Aigues-Mortes.[1679] Coupled with this possibility was a projected enterprise against Spain in Franche-Comté in which the Huguenots of Champagne and Burgundy were interested, but which was primarily the project of the elector palatine and the prince of Orange.[1680]