Remember his very claim to the throne was disputed.

He became like a blind man going the rounds with a tin cup begging sous.

His court at Chinon was a snarl of intrigue complicated by an occasional murder.

Weary of being hunted, more or less out of harm's way behind the Loire, Charles and his partisans finally consoled themselves by flaunting in the face of inevitable disaster the devil-may-care debaucheries of the condemned making the most of the few moments left them.

Forays and loans furnished them with opulent cheer and permitted them to carouse on a grand scale.