“We, Francis, by the grace of God, &c. to you, Charles, by the same grace, King of Spain, do maintain that if you accuse me of having done any act unbecoming a gentleman jealous of his honour, we tell you that you have lied in your throat so often as you may have made, or shall make, such an assertion. And, as we are determined to defend our honour to the end of our life, we protest that, after this declaration, in whatever place you either speak or write any matter against our honour, any delay in the combat shall, to your shame, be attributed to you, as your attending this challenge will put an end to all further correspondence.” Charles V. did accept the challenge, and sent to the French King a herald, bearing what was called _la sureté du camp_, to appoint time and place. The French monarch, however, received the messenger in the hall of the Louvre in presence of all his court and the foreign ambassadors; when, strange to say, in the exercise of his kingly power, he would not permit the herald to open his lips; thus pusillanimously avoiding a meeting he had so impudently provoked. What made this gasconading worse than ridiculous was, the circumstance of Francis applying to Pope Clement VII. for absolution for having ceded Flanders and Artois; thus requiring absolution for the maintenance of an oath that he could not violate, without asking for a similar exoneration for the breach of the solemn promise he had made to give up Burgundy. Voltaire has truly said of this rodomontade, “_Tant d’appareil n’aboutit qu’au ridicule, dont le trône même ne garantit pas les hommes_.” Not unfrequently was this recourse to arms declined both in ancient and modern times. Metellus in Spain refused the challenge of Sertorius; Antigonus was defied by Pyrrhus; and Marius sent word to a Teutonic chief, who urged him to a personal trial of prowess, that, if he was tired of life, he had better hang himself.