Thus defending themselves they had the right to refuse to admit any garrison within the walls.
They held to this right because it delivered them from the pillage, the rapine, the burnings and constant molestations inflicted by the King's men.

But now they were eager to renounce it; for they realised that alone with only the town bands and those from the neighbouring villages, mere peasants, they could not sustain the siege; to resist the enemy they must have horsemen, skilled in wielding the lance, and foot, skilled in the use of the cross-bow.

While their Governor the Sire de Gaucourt and my Lord, the Bastard of Orleans, the King's Lieutenant General, went to Chinon and Poitiers to obtain supplies of men and money[496] from the King, the citizens in commissions of two and two went forth asking help of the towns, travelling as far as Bourbonnais and Languedoc.[497] The magistrates appealed to those soldiers of fortune who held the neighbouring country for the King of France.

By the mouths of the two heralds of the city, Orleans and Coeur-de-Lis, they proclaimed that within the city walls were gold and silver in abundance and such good provision of victuals and arms as would nourish and accoutre two thousand combatants for two years, and that every gentle, honest knight who would might share in the defence of the city and wage battle to the death.[498] [Footnote 496: Accounts of Hemon Raguier, Bibl.Nat.Fr.7858, fol.
41.

Loiseleur, _Comptes des depenses_, p.65.Pallet, _Nouvelle histoire du Berry_, vol.iii, pp.