The royal army, with a strength of twenty thousand men, and commanded by the young Duke of Mayenne, son of the great Leaguer, came up on the 18th of August, 1621, to besiege Montauban, with its population of from fifteen thousand to twenty thousand.

Besiegers and besieged were all of them brave; the former the more obstinate, the latter the more hare-brained and rash.
The siege lasted two months and a half with alternate successes and reverses.

The people of the town were directed and supported by commissions charged with the duty of collecting meal, preparing quarters for the troops, looking after the sick and wounded, and distributing ammunition.

"Day and night, from hour to hour, one of the consuls went to inspect these services.

All was done without confusion, without a murmur.