HISTORY OF FRANCE

BY M. GUIZOT

VOLUME II. 

TABLE OF CONTENTS. 

XVII. THE CRUSADES, THEIR DECLINE AND END. 9

XVIII. THE KINGSHIP IN FRANCE 65

XIX. THE COMMUNES AND THE THIRD ESTATE 205

XX. THE HUNDRED YEARS' WAR. PHILIP VI. AND JOHN II. 249

XXI. THE STATES-GENERAL OF THE FOURTEENTH CENTURY 328

XXII. THE HUNDRED YEARS' WAR. CHARLES V. 358

LIST OF STEEL ENGRAVINGS. 

BRIDGE OF TOULOUSE FRONTISPIECE. 

PREACHING THE SECOND CRUSADE 13

ST. LOUIS ADMINISTERING JUSTICE 46

ST. LOUIS MEDIATING BETWEEN HENRY III. AND HIS BARONS 136

THE SICILIAN VESPERS 156

THE TOWN AND FORTRESS OF LILLE 164

LIST OF WOOD-CUT ILLUSTRATIONS. 

Richard's Farewell to the Holy Land 10

Defeat of the Turks 16

The Christians of the Holy City defiling before Saladin. 28

Richard Coeur de Lion having the Saracens beheaded. . 37

Sire de Joinville 55

The Death of St. Louis 64

Thomas de Marie made Prisoner 69

Louis the Fat on an Expedition 69

The Battle of Bouvines 81

Death of De Montfort 104

De la Marche's parting Insult 126

"It is rather hard Bread. " 146

The Battle of Courtrai 167

Colonna striking the Pope 185

The Hanging of Marigny 200

The Peasants resolved to Live according to their own Inclinations andtheir own Laws. . . . 209

Insurrection in favor of the Commune at Cambrai 214

Burghers of Laon 220

View of the Town of Laon 223

Bishop Gaudri dragged from the Cask 224

The Cathedral of Laon 233

Homage of Edward III. To Philip VI. 250

Van Artevelde at his Door 264

"See! See!" she cried 283

Statue of James Van Artevelde 296

Queen Philippa at the Feet of the King 314

John II. , called the Good 318

"Father, ware right! Father, ware left!" 326

King John taken Prisoner 326

Arrest of the Dauphin's Councillors 334

Charles the Bad, King of Navarre 335

The Louvre in the Fourteenth Century 336

Stephen Marcel 342

The Murder of the Marshals 345

"In his Hands the Keys of the Gates. " 354

Charles V. 371

Big Ferre 376

Bertrand du Guesclin 388

Putting the Keys on Du Guesclin's Bier 407

A POPULAR HISTORY OF FRANCE FROM THE EARLIEST TIMES. 

CHAPTER XVII. ----THE CRUSADES, THEIR DECLINE AND END. 

In the month of August, 1099, the Crusade, to judge by appearances, hadattained its object. Jerusalem was in the hands of the Christians, andthey had set up in it a king, the most pious and most disinterested ofthe crusaders. Close to this ancient kingdom were growing up likewise, in the two chief cities of Syria and Mesopotamia, Antioch and Edessa, twoChristian principalities, in the possession of two crusader-chiefs, Bohemond and Baldwin. A third Christian principality was on the point ofgetting founded at the foot of Libanus, at Tripolis, for the advantrge ofanother crusader, Bertrand, eldest son of Count Raymond of Toulouse. Theconquest of Syria and Palestine seemed accomplished, in the name of thefaith, and by the armies of Christian Europe; and the conquerorscalculated so surely upon their fixture that, during his reign, short asit was (for he was elected king July 23, 1099, and died July 18, 1100, aged only forty years), Godfrey de Bouillon caused to be drawn up andpublished, under the title of Assizes of Jerusalem, a code of laws, whichtransferred to Asia the customs and traditions of the feudal system, justas they existed in France at the moment of his departure for the HolyLand. 

Forty-six years afterwards, in 1145, the Mussulmans, under the leadershipof Zanghi, sultan of Aleppo and of Mossoul, had retaken Edessa. Forty-two years after that, in 1187, Saladin (Salah-el-Eddyn), sultan of Egyptand of Syria, had put an end to the Christian kingdom of Jerusalem; andonly seven years later, in 1194, Richard Coeur de Lion, king of England, after the most heroic exploits in Palestine, on arriving in sight ofJerusalem, retreated in despair, covering his eyes with his shield, andsaying that he was not worthy to look upon the city which he was not in acondition to conquer. When he re-embarked at St. Jean d'Acre, casting alast glance and stretching out his arms towards the coast, he cried, "Most Holy Land, I commend thee to the care of the Almighty; and may Hegrant me long life enough to return hither and deliver thee from the yokeof the infidels! "A century had not yet rolled by since the triumph ofthe first crusaders, and the dominion they had acquired by conquest inthe Holy Land had become, even in the eyes of their most valiant and mostpowerful successors, an impossibility. 

[Illustration: Richard's Farewell to the Holy Land----10]

Nevertheless, repeated efforts and glory, and even victories, were notthen, and were not to be still later, unknown amongst the Christians intheir struggle against the Mussulmans for the possession of the HolyLand. In the space of a hundred and seventy-one years from thecoronation of Godfrey de Bouillon as king of Jerusalem, in 1099, to thedeath of St. Louis, wearing the cross before Tunis, in 1270, seven grandcrusades were undertaken with the same design by the greatest sovereignsof Christian Europe; the Kings of France and England, the Emperors ofGermany, the King of Denmark, and princes of Italy successively engagedtherein. And they all failed. It were neither right nor desirable tomake long pause over the recital of their attempts and their reverses, for it is the history of France, and not a general history of thecrusades, which is here related; but it was in France, by the Frenchpeople, and under French chiefs, that the crusades were begun; and it waswith St. Louis, dying before Tunis beneath the banner of the cross, thatthey came to an end. They received in the history of Europe the gloriousname of _Gesta Dei per Francos_ (God's works by French hands); and theyhave a right to keep, in the history of France, the place they reallyoccupied. 

During a reign of twenty-nine years, Louis VI. , called the Fat, son ofPhilip I. , did not trouble himself about the East or the crusades, atthat time in all their fame and renown. Being rather a man of sense thanan enthusiast in the cause either of piety or glory, he gave all hisattention to the establishment of some order, justice, and royalauthority in his as yet far from extensive kingdom. A tragic incident, however, gave the crusade chief place in the thoughts and life of hisson, Louis VII. , called the Young, who succeeded him in 1137. He gothimself rashly embroiled, in 1142, in a quarrel with Pope Innocent II. , on the subject of the election of the Archbishop of Bourges. The popeand the king had each a different candidate for the see. "The king is achild, " said the pope; "he must get schooling, and be kept from learningbad habits. "

"Never, so long as I live, " said the king, "shall Peter de la Chatre (thepope's candidate) enter the city of Bourges. " The chapter of Bourges, thinking as the pope thought, elected Peter de la Chatre; and TheobaldII. , Count of Champagne, took sides for the archbishop elect. Mind yourown business, " said the king to him; "your dominions are large enough tooccupy you; and leave me to govern my own as I have a mind. " Theobaldpersisted in backing the elect of pope and chapter. The popeexcommunicated the king. The king declared war against the Count ofChampagne; and went and besieged Vitry. Nearly all the town was built ofwood, and the besiegers set fire to it. The besieged fled for refuge toa church, in which they were invested; and the fire reached the church, which was entirely consumed, together with the thirteen hundredinhabitants, men, women, and children, who had retreated thither. Thisdisaster made a great stir. St. Bernard, Abbot of Clairvaux and theleading ecclesiastical authority of the age, took the part of CountTheobald. King Louis felt a lively sorrow, and sincere repentance. Soonafterwards it became known in the West that the affairs of the Christianswere going ill in the East; that the town of Edessa had been re-taken bythe Turks, and all its inhabitants massacred. The kingdom of Jerusalem, too, was in danger. Great was the emotion in Europe; and the cry of thecrusade was heard once more. Louis the Young, to appease his troubledconscience, and to get reconciled with the pope, to say nothing ofsympathy for the national movement, assembled the grandees, laic andecclesiastical, of the kingdom, to deliberate upon the matter. 

Deliberation was more prolonged, more frequently repeated, and moreindecisive than it had been at the time of the first crusade. Threegrand assemblies met, the first in 1145, at Bourges; the second in 1146, at Vezelai, in Nivernais; and the third in 1147, at Etampes; all threebeing called to investigate the expediency of a new crusade, and of theking's participation in the enterprise. Not only was the questionseriously discussed, but extremely diverse opinions were expressed, bothamongst the rank and file of these assemblies, and amongst their mostillustrious members. There were two men whose talents and fame made themconspicuous above all; Suger, Abbot of St. Denis, the intimate and ableadviser of the wise king, Louis the Fat, and St. Bernard, Abbot ofClairvaux, the most eloquent, most influential, and most piouslydisinterested amongst the Christians of his age. Though both wereecclesiastics, these two great men were, touching the second crusade, of opposite opinions. "Let none suppose, " says Suger's biographer andconfidant, William, monk of St. Denis, "that it was at his instance or byhis counsel that the king undertook the voyage to the Holy Land. Although the success of it was other than had been expected, this princewas influenced only by pious wishes and zeal for the service of God. Asfor Suger, ever far-seeing and only too well able to read the future, notonly did he not suggest to the monarch any such design, but hedisapproved of it so soon as it was mentioned to him. The truth of itis, that, after having vainly striven to nip it in the bud, and beingunable to put a check upon the king's zeal, he thought it wise, eitherfor fear of wounding the king's piety, or of uselessly incurring thewrath of the partisans of the enterprise, to yield to the times. " As forSt. Bernard, at the first of the three assemblies, viz. , at Bourges, whether it were that his mind was not yet made up or that he desired tocover himself with greater glory, he advised the king to undertakenothing without having previously consulted the Holy See; but when PopeEugenius III. , so far from hesitating, had warmly solicited the aid ofthe Christians against the infidels, St. Bernard, at the second assembly, viz. , at Vezelai, gave free vent to his feelings and his eloquence. After having read the pope's letters, "If ye were told, " said he, "thatan enemy had attacked your castles, your cities, and your lands, hadravished your wives and your daughters, and had profaned your temples, which of you would not fly to arms? Well, all those evils, and evilsstill greater, have come upon your brethren, upon the family of Christ, which is your own. Why tarry ye, then, to repair so many wrongs, toavenge so many insults? Christian warriors, He who gave His life for youto-day demandeth yours; illustrious knights, noble defenders of thecross, call to mind the example of your fathers, who conquered Jerusalem, and whose names are written in heaven! The living God hath charged me totell unto you that He will punish those who shall not have defended Himagainst His enemies. Fly to arms, and let Christendom re-echo with thewords of the prophet, 'Woe to him who dyeth not his sword with blood!'"At this fervent address the assembly rang with the shout of the firstcrusade, 'God willeth it! God willeth it!' The king, kneeling beforeSt. Bernard, received from his hands the cross; the queen, Eleanor ofAquitaine, assumed it, like her husband; nearly all the barons presentfollowed their example; St. Bernard tore up his garments into crosses fordistribution, and, on leaving the assembly, he scoured the countryplaces, everywhere preaching and persuading the people. The villages andcastles are deserted, " he wrote to the pope; "there is none to be seensave widows and orphans whose husbands and fathers are alive. " Nor didhe confine himself to France; he crossed into Germany, and preached thecrusade all along the Rhine. The emperor, Conrad III. , showed greathesitation; the empire was sorely troubled, he said, and had need of itshead. "Be of good cheer, " replied St. Bernard "so long as you defendHis heritage, God himself will take the burden of defending yours. " Oneday, in December, 1146, he was celebrating mass at Spire, in presence ofthe emperor and a great number of German princes. Suddenly he passedfrom the regular service to the subject of the crusade, and transportedhis audience to the last judgment, in the presence of all the nations ofthe earth summoned together, and Jesus Christ bearing his cross, andreproaching the emperor with ingratitude. Conrad was deeply moved, andinterrupted the preacher by crying out, "I know what I owe to JesusChrist: and I swear to go whither it pleaseth Him to call me. " Theattraction became general; and Germany, like France, took up the cross. 

[Illustration: PREACHING THE SECOND CRUSADE----13]

St. Bernard returned to France. The ardor there had cooled a littleduring his absence; the results of his trip in Germany were being waitedfor; and it was known that, on being eagerly pressed to put himself atthe head of the crusaders, and take the command of the whole expedition, he had formally refused. His enthusiasm and his devotion, sincere anddeep as they were, did not, in his case, extinguish common sense; and hehad not forgotten the melancholy experiences of Peter the Hermit. Insupport of his refusal he claimed the intervention of Pope Eugenius III. "Who am I, " he wrote to him, "that I should form a camp, and march at thehead of an army? What can be more alien to my calling, even if I lackednot the strength and the ability? I need not tell you all this, for youknow it perfectly. I conjure you by the charity you owe me, deliver menot over, thus, to the humors of men. " The pope came to France; and thethird grand assembly met at Etampes, in February, 1147. The presence ofSt. Bernard rekindled zeal; but foresight began to penetrate men's minds. Instead of insisting upon his being the chief of the crusade, attentionwas given to preparations for the expedition; the points were indicatedat which the crusaders should form a junction, and the directions inwhich they would have to move; and inquiry was made as to what measuresshould be taken, and what persons should be selected for the governmentof France during the king's absence. "Sir, " said St. Bernard, afterhaving come to an understanding upon the subject with the principalmembers of the assembly, at the same time pointing to Suger and the Countde Nevers, "here be two swords, and it sufficeth. " The Count de Neversperemptorily refused the honor done him; he was resolved, he said, toenter the order of St. Bruno, as indeed he did. Suger also refused atfirst, "considering the dignity offered him a burden, rather than anhonor. " Wise and clear-sighted by nature, he had learned in the reign ofLouis the Fat, to know the requirements and the difficulties ofgovernment. "He consented to accept, " says his biographer, "only when hewas at last forced to it by Pope Eugenius, who was present at the king'sdeparture, and whom it was neither permissible nor possible for him toresist. " It was agreed that the French crusaders should form a junctionat Metz, under the command of King Louis, and the Germans at Ratisbonne, under that of the Emperor Conrad, and that the two armies shouldsuccessively repair by land to Constantinople, whence they would crossinto Asia. 

Having each a strength, it is said, of one hundred thousand men, theymarched by Germany and the Lower Danube, at an interval of two monthsbetween them, without committing irregularities and without meetingobstacles so serious as those of the first crusade, but still muchincommoded, and subjected to great hardships in the countries theytraversed. The Emperor Conrad and the Germans first, and then King Louisand the French, arrived at Constantinople in the course of the summer of1117. Manuel Comnenus, grandson of Alexis Comnenus, was reigning there;and he behaved towards the crusaders with the same mixture of caressesand malevolence, promises and perfidy, as had distinguished hisgrandfather. "There is no ill turn he did not do them, " says thehistorian Nicetas, himself a Greek. Conrad was the first to cross intoAsia Minor, and, whether it were unskilfulness or treason, the guideswith whom he had been supplied by Manuel Comnenus led him so badly that, on the 28th of October, 1147, he was surprised and shockingly beaten bythe Turks near Iconium. An utter distrust of Greeks grew up amongst theFrench, who had not yet left Constantinople; and some of their chiefs, and even one of their prelates, the Bishop of Langres, proposed to make, without further delay, an end of it with this emperor and empire, sotreacherously hostile, and to take Constantinople in order to march moresecurely upon Jerusalem. But King Louis and the majority of his knightsturned a deaf ear: "We be come forth, " said they, "to expiate our ownsins, not to punish the crimes of the Greeks; when we took up the cross, God did not put into our hands the sword of His justice;" and they, intheir turn, crossed over into Asia Minor. There they found the Germansbeaten and dispersed, and Conrad himself wounded and so discouraged that, instead of pursuing his way by land with the French, he returned toConstantinople to go thence by sea to Palestine. Louis and his armycontinued their march across Asia Minor, and gained in Phrygia, at thepassage of the river Meander, so brilliant a victory over the Turks that, "if such men, " says the historian Nicetas, abstained from takingConstantinople, one cannot but admire their moderation and forbearance. "

[Illustration: Defeat of the Turks----16]

But the success was short, and, ere long, dearly paid for. On enteringPisidia, the French army split up into two, and afterwards into severaldivisions, which scattered and lost themselves in the defiles of themountains. The Turks waited for them, and attacked them at the mouthsand from the tops of the passes; before long there was nothing butdisorder and carnage; the little band which surrounded the king was cutto pieces at his side; and Louis himself, with his back against a rock, defended himself, alone, for some minutes, against several Turks, tillthey, not knowing who he was, drew off, whereupon he, suddenly throwinghimself upon a stray horse, rejoined his advanced guard, who believed himdead. The army continued their march pell-mell, king, barons, knights, soldiers, and pilgrims, uncertain day by day what would become of them onthe morrow. The Turks harassed them afield; the towns in which therewere Greek governors residing refused to receive them; provisions fellshort; arms and baggage were abandoned on the road. On arriving inPamphylia, at Satalia, a little port on the Mediterranean, theimpossibility of thus proceeding became evident; they were still, byland, forty days' march from Antioch, whereas it required but three toget there by sea. The governor of Satalia proposed to the king to embarkthe crusaders; but, when the vessels arrived, they were quite inadequatefor such an operation; hardly could the king, the barons, and the knightsfind room in them; and it would be necessary to abandon and expose to theperils of the land-march the majority of the infantry and all the merepilgrims who had followed the army. Louis, disconsolate, fluctuatedbetween the most diverse resolutions, at one time demanding to haveeverybody embarked at any risk, at another determining to march by landhimself with all who could not be embarked; distributing whatever moneyand provisions he had left, being as generous and sympathetic as he wasimprovident and incapable, and "never letting a day pass, " says Odo ofDeuil, who accompanied him, "without hearing mass and crying unto the Godof the Christians. " At last he embarked with his queen, Eleanor, and hisprincipal knights; and towards the end of March, 1148, he arrived atAntioch, having lost more than three quarters of his army. 

Scarcely had he taken a few days' rest when messengers came to him onbehalf of Baldwin III. , king of Jerusalem, begging him to repair withoutdelay to the Holy City. Louis was as eager to go thither as the king andpeople of Jerusalem were to see him there; but his speedy departureencountered unforeseen hinderances. Raymond, of Poitiers, at that timePrince of Antioch by his marriage with Constance, granddaughter of thegreat Bohemond of the first crusade, was uncle to the Queen of France, Eleanor of Aquitaine. He was, says William of Tyre, "a lord of nobledescent, of tall and elegant figure, the handsomest of the princes of theearth, a man of charming affability and conversation, open-handed andmagnificent beyond measure, " and, moreover, ambitious and eager to extendhis small dominion. He had at heart, beyond everything, the conquest ofAleppo and Caesarea. In this design the King of France and the crusaderswho were still about him might be of real service; and he attempted towin them over. Louis answered that he would engage in no enterpriseuntil he had visited the holy places. Raymond was impetuous, irritable, and as unreasonable in his desires as unfortunate in his undertakings. He had quickly acquired great influence over his niece, Queen Eleanor, and he had no difficulty in winning her over to his plans. "She, " saysWilliam of Tyre, "was a very inconsiderate woman, caring little for royaldignity or conjugal fidelity; she took great pleasure in the court ofAntioch, where she also conferred much pleasure, even upon Mussulmans, whom, as some chronicles say, she did not repulse; and, when the king, her husband, spoke to her of approaching departure, she emphaticallyrefused, and, to justify her opposition, she declared that they could nolonger live together, as there was, she asserted, a prohibited degree ofconsanguinity between them. " Louis, "who loved her with an almostexcessive love, " says William of Nangis, was at the same time angered andgrieved. He was austere in morals, easily jealous, and religiouslyscrupulous, and for a moment he was on the point of separating from hiswife; but the counsels of his chief barons dissuaded him, and, thereupon, taking a sudden resolution, he set out from Antioch secretly, by night, carrying off the queen almost by force. "They both hid their wrath asmuch as possible, " says the chronicler; "but at heart they had ever thisoutrage. " We shall see, before long, what were the consequences. Nohistory can offer so striking an example of the importance ofwell-assorted unions amongst the highest as well as the lowest, and ofthe prolonged woes which may be brought upon a nation by the domesticevils of royalty. 

On approaching Jerusalem, in the month of April, 1148, Louis VII. Sawcoming to meet him King Baldwin III. , and the patriarch and the people, singing, "Blessed be he that cometh in the name of the Lord!" So soonas he had entered the city, his pious wishes were fulfilled by his beingtaken to pay a solemn visit to all the holy places. At the same timearrived from Constantinople the Emperor Conrad, almost alone and in theguise of a simple pilgrim. All the remnant of the crusaders, French andGerman, hurried to join them. Impatient to exhibit their power on thetheatre of their creed, and to render to the kingdom of Jerusalem somestriking service, the two Western sovereigns, and Baldwin, and theirprincipal barons assembled at Ptolemais (St. Jean d'Acre) to determinethe direction to be taken by their enterprise. They decided upon thesiege of Damascus, the most important and the nearest of the Mussulmanprincedoms in Syria, and in the early part of June they moved thitherwith forces incomplete and ill united. Neither the Prince of Antioch northe Counts of Edessa and Tripolis had been summoned to St. Jean d'Acre;and Queen Eleanor had not appeared. At the first attack, the ardor ofthe assailants and the brilliant personal prowess of their chiefs, of theEmperor Conrad amongst others, struck surprise and consternation into thebesieged, who, foreseeing the necessity of abandoning their city, laidacross the streets beams, chains, and heaps of stones, to stop theprogress of the conquerors and give themselves time for flying, withtheir families and their wealth, by the northern and southern gates. Butpersonal interest and secret negotiations before long brought into theChristian camp weakness, together with discord. Many of the barons werealready disputing amongst themselves, at the very elbows of thesovereigns, for the future government of Damascus; others were notinaccessible to the rich offers which came to them from the city; and itis maintained that King Baldwin himself suffered himself to be bribed bya sum of two hundred thousand pieces of gold which were sent to him byModjer-Eddyn, Emir of Damascus, and which turned out to be only pieces ofcopper, covered with gold leaf. News came that the Emirs of Aleppo andMossoul were coming, with considerable forces, to the relief of theplace. Whatever may have been the cause of retreat, the crusader-sovereigns decided upon it, and, raising the siege, returned toJerusalem. The Emperor Conrad, in indignation and confusion, set outprecipitately to return to Germany. King Louis could not make up hismind thus to quit the Holy Land in disgrace, and without doing anythingfor its deliverance. He prolonged his stay there for more than a yearwithout anything to show for his time and zeal. His barons and hisknights nearly all left him, and, by sea or land, made their way back toFrance. But the king still lingered. I am under a bond, " he wrote toSuger, "not to leave the Holy Land, save with glory, and after doingsomewhat for the cause of God and the kingdom of France. " At last, aftermany fruitless entreaties, Suger wrote to him, "Dear king and lord, Imust cause thee to hear the voice of thy whole kingdom. Why dost thoufly from us? After having toiled so hard in the East, after havingendured so many almost unendurable evils, by what harshness or whatcruelty comes it that, now when the barons and grandees of the kingdomhave returned, thou persistest in abiding with the barbarians? Thedisturbers of the kingdom have entered into it again; and thou, whoshouldst defend it, remainest in exile as if thou wert a prisoner; thougivest over the lamb to the wolf, thy dominions to the ravishers. Weconjure thy majesty, we invoke thy piety, we adjure thy goodness, wesummon thee in the name of the fealty we owe thee; tarry not at all, oronly a little while, beyond Easter; else thou wilt appear, in the eyes ofGod, guilty of a breach of that oath which thou didst take at the sametime as the crown. " At length Louis made up his mind and embarked at St. Jean d'Acre at the commencement of July, 1149; and he disembarked in themonth of October at the port of St. Gilles, at the mouth of the Rhone, whence he wrote to Suger, "We be hastening unto you safe and sound, andwe command you not to defer paying us a visit, on a given day and beforeall our other friends. Many rumors reach us touching our kingdom, andknowing nought for certain, we be desirous to learn from you how weshould bear ourselves or hold our peace, in every case. And let none butyourself know what I say to you at this present writing. "

This preference and this confidence were no more than Louis VII. Owed toSuger. The Abbot of St. Denis, after having opposed the crusade with afreedom of spirit and a far-sightedness unique, perhaps, in his times, had, during the king's absence, borne the weight of government with apolitical tact, a firmness, and a disinterestedness rare in any times. He had upheld the authority of absent royalty, kept down the pretensionsof vassals, and established some degree of order wherever his influencecould reach; he had provided for the king's expenses in Palestine by goodadministration of the domains and revenues of the crown; and, lastly, hehad acquired such renown in Europe, that men came from Italy and fromEngland to view the salutary effects of his government, and that the nameof Solomon of his age was conferred upon him by strangers hiscontemporaries. With the exception of great sovereigns, such asCharlemagne or William the Conqueror, only great bishops or learnedtheologians, and that by their influence in the Church or by theirwritings, had obtained this European reputation; from the ninth to thetwelfth century, Suger was the first man who attained to it by the solemerit of his political conduct, and who offered an example of a ministerjustly admired, for his ability and wisdom, beyond the circle in which helived. When he saw that the king's return drew near, he wrote to him, saying, "You will, I think, have ground to be satisfied with our conduct. We have remitted to the knights of the Temple the money we had resolvedto send you. We have, besides, reimbursed the Count of Vermandois thethree thousand livres he had lent us for your service. Your land andyour people are in the enjoyment, for the present, of a happy peace. Youwill find your houses and your palaces in good condition through the carewe have taken to have them repaired. Behold me now in the decline ofage: and I dare to say that the occupations in which I have engaged forthe love of God and through attachment to your person have added many tomy years. In respect of the queen, your consort, I am of opinion thatyou should conceal the displeasure she causes you, until, restored toyour dominions, you can calmly deliberate upon that and upon othersubjects. "

On once more entering his kingdom, Louis, who, at a distance, hadsometimes lent a credulous ear to the complaints of the discontented orto the calumnies of Suger's enemies, did him full justice and was thefirst to give him the name of Father of the country. The ill success ofthe crusade and the remembrance of all that France had risked and lostfor nothing, made a deep impression upon the public; and they honoredSuger for his far-sightedness whilst they blamed St. Bernard for theinfatuation which he had fostered and for the disasters which hadfollowed it. St. Bernard accepted their reproaches in a pious spirit:"If, " said he, "there must be murmuring against God or against me, Iprefer to see the murmurs of men falling upon me rather than upon theLord. To me it is a blessed thing that God should deign to use me as abuckler to shield Himself. I shrink not from humiliation, provided thatHis glory be unassailed. " But at the same time St. Bernard himself wastroubled, and he permitted himself to give expression to his troubledfeelings in a singularly free and bold strain of piety. "We be fallenupon very grievous times, " he wrote to Pope Eugenius III. ; "the Lord, provoked by our sins, seemeth in some sort to have determined to judgethe world before the time, and to judge it, doubtless, according to Hisequity, but not remembering His mercy. Do not the heathen say, 'Where isnow their God?' And who can wonder? The children of the Church, thosewho be called Christian, lie stretched upon the desert, smitten with thesword or dead of famine. Did we undertake the work rashly? Did webehave ourselves lightly? How patiently God heareth the sacrilegiousvoices and the blasphemies of these Egyptians! Assuredly His judgmentsbe righteous; who doth not know it? But in the present judgment there isso profound a depth, that I hesitate not to call him blessed whosoever isnot surprised and offended by it. "

The soul of man, no less than the shifting scene of the world, is often agreat subject of surprise. King Louis, on his way back to France, hadstaid some days at Rome; and there, in a conversation with the pope, hehad almost promised him a new crusade to repair the disasters of thatfrom which he had found it so difficult to get out. Suger, when hebecame acquainted with this project, opposed it as he had opposed theformer; but, at the same time, as he, in common with all his age, considered the deliverance of the Holy Land to be the bounden duty ofChristians, he conceived the idea of dedicating the large fortune andgreat influence he had acquired to the cause of a new crusade, to beundertaken by himself and at his own expense, without compromising eitherking or state. He unfolded his views to a meeting of bishops assembledat Chartres; and he went to Tours, and paid a visit to the tomb of St. Martin to implore his protection. Already more than ten thousandpilgrims were in arms at his call, and already he had himself chosen awarrior, of ability and renown, to command them, when he fell ill, anddied at the end of four months, in 1152, aged seventy, and "thanking theAlmighty, " says his biographer, "for having taken him to Him, notsuddenly, but little by little, in order to bring him step by step to therest needful for the weary man. " It is said that, in his last days andwhen St. Bernard was exhorting him not to think any more save only of theheavenly Jerusalem, Suger still expressed to him his regret at dyingwithout having succored the city which was so dear to them both. 

Almost at the very moment when Suger was dying, a French council, assembled at Beaugency, was annulling on the ground of prohibitedconsanguinity, and with the tacit consent of the two persons mostconcerned, the marriage of Louis VII. And Eleanor of Aquitaine. Somemonths afterwards, at Whitsuntide in the same year, Henry Plantagenet, Duke of Normandy and Count of Anjou, espoused Eleanor, thus adding to hisalready great possessions Poitou and Aquitaine, and becoming, in France, a vassal more powerful than the king his suzerain. Twenty months later, in 1154, at the death of King Stephen, Henry Plantagenet became King ofEngland; and thus there was a recurrence, in an aggravated form, of theposition which had been filled by William the Conqueror, and which wasthe first cause of rivalry between France and England and of theconsequent struggles of considerably more than a century's duration. 

Little more than a year after Suger, on the 20th of April, 1153, St. Bernard died also. The two great men, of whom one had excited andthe other opposed the second crusade, disappeared together from thetheatre of the world. The crusade had completely failed. After a lapseof scarce forty years, a third crusade began. When a great idea isfirmly fixed in men's minds with the twofold sanction of duty andfeeling, many generations live and die in its service before efforts areexhausted and the end reached or abandoned. 

During this forty years' interval between the end of the second andbeginning of the third crusade, the relative positions of West and East, Christian Europe and Mussulman Asia, remained the same outwardly andaccording to the general aspect of affairs; but in Syria and in Palestinethere was a continuance of the struggle between Christendom and Islamry, with various fortunes on either side. The Christian kingdom of Jerusalemstill stood; and after Godfrey de Bouillon, from 1100 to 1180, there hadbeen a succession of eight kings; some energetic and bold, aspiring toextend their young dominion, others indolent and weak upon a totteringthrone. The rivalries and often the defections and treasons of the pettyChristian princes and lords who were set up at different points inPalestine and Syria endangered their common cause. Fortunately similarrivalries, dissensions, and treasons prevailed amongst the Mussulmanemirs, some of them Turks and others Persians or Arabs, and at one timefoes, at another dependants, of the Khalifs of Bagdad or of Egypt. Anarchy and civil war harassed both races and both religions with almostequal impartiality. But, beneath this surface of simultaneous agitationand monotony, great changes were being accomplished or preparing foraccomplishment in the West. The principal sovereigns of the precedinggeneration, Louis VII. , King of France, Conrad III. , Emperor of Germany, and Henry II. , King of England, were dying; and princes more juvenile andmore enterprising, or simply less wearied out, --Philip Augustus, Frederick Barbarossa, and Richard Coeur de Lion, --were taking theirplaces. In the East the theatre of policy and events was being enlarged;Egypt was becoming the goal of ambition with the chiefs, Christian orMussulman, of Eastern Asia; and Damietta, the key of Egypt, was theobject of their enterprises, those of Amaury I. , the boldest of the kingsof Jerusalem, as well as those of the Sultans of Damascus and Aleppo. Noureddin and Saladin (Nour-Eddyn and Sala-Eddyn), Turks by origin, hadcommenced their fortunes in Syria; but it was in Egypt that theyculminated, and, when Saladin became the most illustrious as well as themost powerful of Mussulman sovereigns, it was with the title of Sultan ofEgypt and of Syria that he took his place in history. 

In the course of the year 1187, Europe suddenly heard tale upon taleabout the repeated disasters of the Christians in Asia. On the 1st ofMay, the two religious and warlike orders which had been founded in theEast for the defence of Christendom--the Hospitallers of St. John ofJerusalem and the Templars--lost, at a brush in Galilee, five hundred oftheir bravest knights. On the 3d and 4th of July, near Tiberias, aChristian army was surrounded by the Saracens, and also, ere long, by thefire which Saladin had ordered to be set to the dry grass which coveredthe plain. The flames made their way and spread beneath the feet of menand horses. "There, " say the Oriental chroniclers, "the sons of Paradiseand the children of fire settled their terrible quarrel. Arrows hurtledin the air like a noisy flight of sparrows, and the blood of warriorsdripped upon the ground like rain-water. " "I saw, " adds one of them whowas present at the battle, "hill, plain, and valley covered with theirdead; I saw their banners stained with dust and blood; I saw their headslaid low, their limbs scattered, their carcasses piled on a heap likestones. " Four days after the battle of Tiberias, on the 8th of July, 1187, Saladin took possession of St. Jean d'Acre, and, on the 4th ofSeptember following, of Ascalon. Finally, on the 18th of September, helaid siege to Jerusalem, wherein refuge had been sought by a multitude ofChristian families driven from their homes by the ravages of the infidelsthroughout Palestine; and the Holy City contained at this time, it issaid, nearly one hundred thousand Christians. On approaching its walls, Saladin sent for the principal inhabitants, and said to them, "I know aswell as you that Jerusalem is the house of God; and I will not have itassaulted if I can get it by peace and love. I will give you thirtythousand byzants of gold if you promise me Jerusalem, and you shall haveliberty to go whither you will and do your tillage, to a distance of fivemiles from the city. And I will have you sup-plied with such plenty ofprovisions that in no place on earth shall they be so cheap. You shallhave a truce from now to Whitsuntide, and when this time comes, if yousee that you may have aid, then hold on. But if not, you shall give upthe city, and I will have you conveyed in safety to Christian territory, yourselves and your substance. " "We may not yield up to you a city wheredied our God, " answered the envoys: "and still less may we sell you. "The siege lasted fourteen days. After having repulsed several assaults, the inhabitants saw that effectual resistance was impossible; and thecommandant of the place, a knight named Dalian d'Ibelin, an old warrior, who had been at the battle of Tiberias, returned to Saladin, and askedfor the conditions back again which had at first been rejected. Saladin, pointing to his own banner already planted upon several parts of thebattlements, answered, "It is too late; you surely see that the city ismine. " "Very well, my lord, " replied the knight: "we will ourselvesdestroy our city, and the mosque of Omar, and the stone of Jacob: andwhen it is nothing but a heap of ruins, we will sally forth with swordand fire in hand, and not one of us will go to Paradise without havingsent ten Mussulmans to hell. " Saladin understood enthusiasm, andrespected it; and to have had the destruction of Jerusalem connected withhis name would' have caused him deep displeasure. He therefore consentedto the terms of capitulation demanded of him. The fighting men werepermitted to retreat to Tyre or Tripolis, the last cities of anyimportance, besides Antioch, in the power of the Christians; and thesimple inhabitants of Jerusalem had their lives preserved, and permissiongiven them to purchase their freedom on certain conditions; but, as manyamongst them could not find the means, Malek-Adhel, the sultan's brother, and Saladin himself paid the ransom of several thousands of captives. All Christians, however, with the exception of Greeks and Syrians, hadorders to leave Jerusalem within four days. When the day came, all thegates were closed, except that of David by which the people were to goforth; and Saladin, seated upon a throne, saw the Christians defilebefore him. First came the patriarch, followed by the clergy, carryingthe sacred vessels, and the ornaments of the church of the HolySepulchre. After him came Sibylla, Queen of Jerusalem, who had remainedin the city, whilst her husband, Guy de Lusignan, had been a prisoner atNablous since the battle of Tiberias. Saladin saluted her respectfully, and spoke to her kindly. He had too great a soul to take pleasure in thehumiliation of greatness. 

[Illustration: The Christians of the Holy City defiling before Saladin. ----28]

The news, spreading through Europe, caused amongst all classes there, high and low, a deep feeling of sorrow, anger, disquietude, and shame. Jerusalem was a very different thing from Edessa. The fall of thekingdom of Jerusalem meant the sepulchre of Jesus Christ fallen once moreinto the hands of the infidels, and, at the same time, the destruction ofwhat had been wrought by Christian Europe in the East, the loss of theonly striking and permanent gage of her victories. Christian pride wasas much wounded as Christian piety. A new fact, moreover, wasconspicuous in this series of reverses and in the accounts received ofthem; after all its defeats and in the midst of its discord, Islamry hadfound a chieftain and a hero. Saladin was one of those strange andsuperior beings who, by their qualities and by their very defects, make astrong impression upon the imaginations of men, whether friends or foes. His Mussulman fanaticism was quite as impassioned as the Christianfanaticism of the most ardent crusaders. When he heard that Reginald ofChatillon, Lord of Karat, on the confines of Palestine and Arabia, hadall but succeeded in an attempt to go and pillage the Caaba and the tombof Mahomet, he wrote to his brother Malek-Adhel, at that time governor ofEgypt, "The infidels have violated the home and the cradle of Islamism;they have profaned our sanctuary. Did we not prevent a like insult(which God forbid!) we should render ourselves guilty in the eyes of Godand the eyes of men. Purge we, therefore, our land from these men whodishonor it; purge we the very air from the air they breathe. " Hecommanded that all the Christians who could possibly be captured on thisoccasion should be put to death; and many were taken to Mecca, where theMussulman pilgrims immolated them instead of the sheep and lambs theywere accustomed to sacrifice. The expulsion of the Christians fromPalestine was Saladin's great idea and unwavering passion; and heseverely chid the Mussulmans for their soft-heartedness in the struggle. "Behold these Christians, " he wrote to the Khalif of Bagdad, "how theycome crowding in! How emulously they press on! They are continuallyreceiving fresh re-enforcements more numerous than the waves of the sea, and to us more bitter than its brackish waters. Where one dies by land, a thousand come by sea. . . . The crop is more abundant than theharvest; the tree puts forth more branches than the axe can lop off. Itis true that great numbers have already perished, insomuch that the edgeof our swords is blunted; but our comrades are beginning to grow weary ofso long a war. Haste we, therefore, to implore the help of the Lord. "Nor needed he the excuse of passion in order to be cruel and sanguinarywhen he considered it would serve his cause; for human lives and deathshe had that barbaric indifference which Christianity alone has rooted outfrom the communities of men, whilst it has remained familiar to theMussulman. When he found himself, either during or after a battle, confronted by enemies whom he really dreaded, such as the Hospitallers ofSt. John of Jerusalem or the Templars, he had them massacred, andsometimes gave them their death-blow himself, with cool satisfaction. But, apart from open war and the hatred inspired by passion or coldcalculation, he was moderate and generous, gentle towards the vanquishedand the weak, just and compassionate towards his subjects, faithful tohis engagements, and capable of feeling sympathetic admiration for men, even his enemies, in whom he recognized superior qualities, courage, loyalty, and loftiness of mind. For Christian knighthood, its preceptsand the noble character it stamped upon its professors, he felt so muchrespect and even inclination that the wish of his heart, it is said, wasto receive the title of knight, and that he did, in fact, receive it withthe approval of Richard Coeur de Lion. By reason of all these facts andon all these grounds he acquired, even amongst the Christians, thatpopularity which attaches itself to greatness justified by personal deedsand living proofs, in spite of the fear and even the hatred inspiredthereby. Christian Europe saw in him the able and potent chief ofMussulman Asia, and, whilst detesting, admired him. 

After the capture of Jerusalem by Saladin, the Christians of the East, intheir distress, sent to the West their most eloquent prelate and gravesthistorian William, Archbishop of Tyre, who, fifteen years before, in thereign of Baldwin IV. , had been Chancellor of the kingdom of Jerusalem. He, accompanied by a legate of Pope Gregory VIII. , scoured Italy, France, and Germany, recounting everywhere the miseries of the Holy Land, andimploring the aid of all Christian princes and peoples, whatever might betheir own position of affairs and their own quarrels in Europe. At aparliament assembled at Gisors, on the 21st of January, 1188, and at adiet convoked at Mayence on the 27th of March following, he so powerfullyaffected the knighthood of France, England, and Germany, that the threesovereigns of these three states, Philip Augustus, Richard Coeur de Lion, and Frederick Barbarossa, engaged with acclamation in a new crusade. They were princes of very different ages and degrees of merit, but allthree distinguished for their personal qualities as well as theirpuissance. Frederick Barbarossa was sixty-seven, and for the lastthirty-six years had been leading, in Germany and Italy, as politicianand soldier, a very active and stormy existence. Richard Cceur de Lionwas thirty-one, and had but just ascended the throne where he was toshine as the most valiant and adventurous of knights rather than as aking. Philip Augustus, though only twenty-three, had already shownsigns, beneath the vivacious sallies of youth, of the reflective andsteady ability characteristic of riper age. Of these three sovereigns, the eldest, Frederick Barbarossa, was first ready to plunge amongst theperils of the crusade. Starting from Ratisbonne about Christmas, 1189, with an army of one hundred and fifty thousand men, he traversed theGreek empire and Asia Minor, defeated the Sultan of Iconium, passed thefirst defiles of Taurus, and seemed to be approaching the object of hisvoyage, when, on the 10th of June, 1190, having arrived at the borders ofthe Selef, a small river which throws itself into the Mediterranean closeto Seleucia, he determined to cross it by fording, was seized with achill, and, according to some, drowned before his people's eyes, but, according to others, carried dying to Seleucia, where he expired. Hisyoung son Conrad, Duke of Suabia, was not equal to taking the command ofsuch an army; and it broke up. 

The majority of the German princes returned to Europe: and "thereremained beneath the banner of Christ only a weak band of warriorsfaithful to their vow, a boy-chief, and a bier. When the crusaders ofthe other nations, assembled before St. Jean d'Acre, saw the remnant ofthat grand German army arrive, not a soul could restrain his tears. Three thousand men, all but stark naked, and harassed to death, marchedsorrowfully along, with the dried bones of their emperor carried in acoffin. For, in the twelfth century, the art of embalming the dead wasunknown. Barbarossa, before leaving Europe, had asked that, if he shoulddie in the crusade, he might be buried in the church of the Resurrectionat Jerusalem; but this wish could not be accomplished, as the Christiansdid not recover the Holy City, and the mortal remains of the emperor werecarried, as some say, to Tyre, and, as others, to Antioch, Where his tombhas not been discovered. " (_Histoire de la Lutte des Papes et desEmpereurs de la Maison de Souabe, _ by M. De Cherrier, Member of theInstitute, t. I. , p. 222. )

Frederick Barbarossa was already dead in Asia Minor, and the German armywas already broken up, when, on the 24th of June, 1190, Philip Augustuswent and took the oriflamme at St. Denis, on his way to Vezelai, where hehad appointed to meet Richard, and whence the two kings, in fact, setout, on the 4th of July, to embark with their troops, Philip at Genoa, and Richard at Marseilles. They had agreed to touch nowhere until theyreached Sicily, where Philip was the first to arrive, on the 16th ofSeptember; and Richard was eight days later. But, instead of simplytouching, they passed at Messina all the autumn of 1190, and all thewinter of 1190-91, no longer seeming to think of anything but quarrellingand amusing themselves. Nor were grounds for quarrel or opportunitiesfor amusements to seek. Richard, in spite of his promise, was unwillingto marry the Princess Alice, Philip's sister; and Philip, after livelydiscussion, would not agree to give him back his word, save "inconsideration of a sum of ten thousand silver marks, whereof he shall payus three thousand at the feast of All Saints, and year by year insuccession, at this same feast. " Some of their amusements were not morerefined than their family arrangements, and ruffianly contests andviolent enmities sprang up amidst the feasts and the games in which kingsand knights nearly every evening indulged in the plains round aboutMessina. One day there came amongst the crusaders thus assembled apeasant driving an ass, laden with those long and strong reeds known bythe name of canes. English and French, with Richard at their head, bought them of him; and, mounting on horseback, ran tilt at one another, armed with these reeds by way of lances. Richard found himself oppositeto a French knight, named William des Barres, of whose strength and valorhe had already, not without displeasure, had experience in Normandy. Thetwo champions met with so rude a shock that their reeds broke, and theking's cloak was torn. Richard, in pique, urged his horse violentlyagainst the French knight, in order to make him lose his stirrups; butWilliam kept a firm seat, whilst the king fell under his horse, whichcame down in his impetuosity. Richard, more and more exasperated, hadanother horse brought, and charged a second time, but with no moresuccess, the immovable knight. One of Richard's favorites, the Earl ofLeicester, would have taken his place, and avenged his lord; but "let be, Robert, " said the king: "it is a matter between him and me;" and he oncemore attacked William des Barres, and once more to no purpose. "Fly frommy sight, " cried he to the knight, "and take care never to appear again;for I will be ever a mortal foe to thee, to thee and thine. " William desBarres, somewhat discomfited, went in search of the King of France, toput himself under his protection. Philip accordingly paid a visit toRichard, who merely said, "I'll not hear a word. " It needed nothing lessthan the prayers of the bishops, and even, it is said, a threat ofexcommunication, to induce Richard to grant William des Barres the king'speace during the time of pilgrimage. 

Such a comrade was assuredly very inconvenient, and might be underdifficult circumstances very dangerous. Philip, without beingsusceptible or quarrelsome, was naturally independent, and disposed toact, on every occasion, according to his own ideas. He resolved, not tobreak with Richard, but to divide their commands, and separate theirfortunes. On the approach of spring, 1191, he announced to him that thetime had arrived for continuing their pilgrimage to the Holy Land, andthat, as for himself, he was quite ready to set out. "I am not ready, "said Richard; "and I cannot depart before the middle of August. " Philip, after some discussion, set out alone, with his army, on the 30th ofMarch, and on the 14th of April arrived before St. Jean d'. Acre. Thisimportant place, of which Saladin had made himself master nearly fouryears before, was being besieged by the last King of Jerusalem, Guy deLusignan, at the head of the Christians of Palestine, and by a multitudeof crusaders, Genoese, Danish, Flemish, and German, who had flockedfreely to the enterprise. A strong and valiant Mussulman garrison wasdefending St. Jean d'Acre. Saladin manoeuvred incessantly for itsrelief, and several battles had already been fought beneath the walls. When the King of France arrived, he was received by the Christiansbesieging, " say the chronicles of St. Denis, "with supreme joy, as if hewere an angel come down from heaven. ". Philip set vigorously to work topush on the siege; but at his departure he had promised Richard not todeliver the grand assault until they had formed a junction before theplace with all their forces. Richard, who had set out from Messina atthe beginning of May, though he had said that he would not be ready tillAugust, lingered again on the way to reduce the island of Cyprus, and tocelebrate there his marriage with Berengaria of Navarre, in lieu of Aliceof France. At last he arrived, on the 7th of June, before St. Jeand'Acre; and several assaults in succession were made on the place withequal determination on the part of the besiegers and the besieged. "Thetumultuous waves of the Franks, " says an Arab historian, "rolled towardsthe walls of the city with the rapidity of a torrent; and they climbedthe half-ruined battlements as wild goats climb precipitous rocks, whilstthe Saracens threw themselves upon the besiegers like stones unloosedfrom the top of a mountain. " At length, on the 13th of July, 1191, inspite of the energetic resistance offered by the garrison, which defendeditself "as a lion defends his blood-stained den, " St. Jean d'Acresurrendered. The terms of capitulation stated that two hundred thousandpieces of gold should be paid to the chiefs of the Christian army; thatsixteen hundred prisoners and the wood of the true cross should be givenup to them; and that the garrison as well as all the people of the townshould remain in the conquerors' power, pending full execution of thetreaty. 

Whilst the siege was still going on, the discord between the Kings ofFrance and England was increasing in animosity and venom. The conquestof Cyprus had become a new subject of dispute. When the French were mosteager for the assault, King Richard remained in his tent; and so thebesieged had scarcely ever to repulse more than one or other of the kingsand armies at a time. Saladin, it is said, showed Richard particularattention, sending him grapes and pears from Damascus; and Philipconceived some mistrust of these relations. In camp the common talk, combined with anxious curiosity, was, that Philip was jealous ofRichard's warlike popularity, and Richard was jealous of the power andpolitical weight of the King of France. 

When St. Jean d'Acre had been taken, the judicious Philip, in view ofwhat it had cost the Christians of East and West, in time and blood, torecover this single town, considered that a fresh and complete conquestof Palestine and Syria, which was absolutely necessary for are-establishment of the kingdom of Jerusalem, was impossible: he haddischarged what he owed to the crusade; and the course now permitted andprescribed to him was to give his attention to France. The news hereceived from home was not encouraging; his son Louis, hardly four yearsold, had been dangerously ill; and he himself fell ill, and remained somedays in bed, in the midst of the town he had just conquered. His enemiescalled his illness in question, for already there was a rumor abroad thathe had an idea of giving up the crusade, and returning to France; but thedetails given by contemporary chroniclers about the effects of hisillness scarcely permit it to be regarded as a sham. "Violent sweats, "they say, "committed such havoc with his bones and all his members, thatthe nails fell from his fingers and the hair from his head, insomuch thatit was believed--and, indeed, the rumor is not yet dispelled--that he hadtaken a deadly poison. " There was nothing strange in Philip's illness, after all his fatigues, in such a country and such a season; Saladin, too, was ill at the same time, and more than once unable to take partwith his troops in their engagements. But, however that may be, acontemporary English chronicler, Benedict, Abbot of Peterborough, relatesthat, on the 22d of July, 1191, whilst King Richard was playing chesswith the Earl of Gloucester, the Bishop of Beauvais, the Duke ofBurgundy, and two knights of consideration, presented themselves beforehim on behalf of the King of France. "They were dissolved in tears, "says he, "in such sort they could not utter a single word; and, seeingthem so moved, those present wept in their turn for pity's sake. 'Weepnot, ' said King Richard to them; 'I know what ye be come to ask; yourlord, the King of France, desireth to go home again, and ye be come inhis name to ask on his behalf my counsel and leave to get him gone. ''It is true, sir; you know all, ' answered the messengers; 'our kingsayeth, that if he depart not speedily from this land, he will surelydie. ' 'It will be for him and for the kingdom of France, ' replied KingRichard, 'eternal shame, if he go home without fulfilling the work forthe which he came, and he shall not go hence by my advice; but if he mustdie or return home, let him do what he will, and what may appear to himexpedient for him, for him and his. '" The source from which this storycomes, and the tone of it, are enough to take from it all authority; forit is the custom of monastic chroniclers to attribute to political ormilitary characters emotions and demonstrations alien to their positionand their times. Philip Augustus, moreover, was one of the most decided, most insensible to any other influence but that of his own mind, and mostdisregardful of his enemies' bitter speeches, of all the kings in Frenchhistory. He returned to France after the capture of St. Jean d' Acre, because he considered the ultimate success of the crusade impossible, andhis return necessary for the interests of France and for his own. He wasright in thus thinking and acting; and King Richard, when insultinglyreproaching him for it, did not foresee that, a year later, he wouldhimself be doing the same thing, and would give up the crusade withouthaving obtained anything more for Christendom, except fresh reverses. 

[Illustration: RICHARD COEUR DE LION HAVING THE SARACENS BEHEADED. ----7]

On the 31st of July, 1191, Philip, leaving with the army of the crusadersten thousand foot and five hundred knights, under the command of DukeHugh of Burgundy, who had orders to obey King Richard, set sail forFrance; and, a few days after Christmas in the same year, landed in hiskingdom, and forth-with resumed, at Fontainebleau according to some, andat Paris according to others, the regular direction of his government. We shall see before long with what intelligent energy and with whatsuccess he developed and consolidated the territorial greatness of Franceand the influence of the kingship, to her security in Europe and herprosperity at home. 

From the 1st of August, 1191, to the 9th of October, 1192, King Richardremained alone in the East as chief of the crusade and defender ofChristendom. He pertains, during that period, to the history of England, and no longer to that of France. We will, however, recall a few facts toshow how fruitless, for the cause of Christendom in the East, was theprolongation of his stay and what strange deeds--at one time of savagebarbarism, and at another of mad pride or fantastic knight-errantry--wereunited in him with noble instincts and the most heroic courage. On the20th of August, 1191, five weeks after the surrender of St. Jean d'Acre, he found that Saladin was not fulfilling with sufficient promptitude theconditions of capitulation, and, to bring him up to time, he ordered thedecapitation, before the walls of the place, of, according to some, twenty-five hundred, and, according to others, five thousand, Mussulmanprisoners remaining in his hands. 

[Illustration: Richard Coeur de Lion having the Saracens beheaded. ----37]

The only effect of this massacre was, that during Richard's firstcampaign after Philip's departure for France, Saladin put to the swordall the Christians taken in battle or caught straggling, and orderedtheir bodies to be left without burial, as those of the garrison of St. Jean d'Acre had been. Some months afterwards Richard conceived the ideaof putting an end to the struggle between Christendom and Islamry, whichhe was not succeeding in terminating by war, by a marriage. He had asister, Joan of England, widow of William II. , king of Sicily; andSaladin had a brother, Malek-Adhel, a valiant warrior, respected by theChristians. Richard had proposals made to Saladin to unite them inmarriage and set them to reign together over the Christians andMussulmans in the kingdom of Jerusalem. The only result of thenegotiation was to give Saladin time for repairing the fortifications ofJerusalem, and to bring down upon King Richard and his sister, on thepart of the Christian bishops, the fiercest threats of the fulminationsof the Church. With the exception of this ridiculous incident, Richard'slife, during the whole course of this year, was nothing but a series ofgreat or small battles, desperately contested, against Saladin. WhenRichard had obtained a success, he pursued it in a haughty, passionatespirit; when he suffered a check, he offered Saladin peace, but always oncondition of surrendering Jerusalem to the Christians, and Saladin alwaysanswered, "Jerusalem never was yours, and we may not without sin give itup to you; for it is the place where the mysteries of our religion wereaccomplished, and the last one of my soldiers will perish before theMussulmans renounce conquests made in the name of Mahomet. " TwiceRichard and his army drew near Jerusalem, "without his daring to lookupon it, he said, since he was not in a condition to take it. " At last, in the summer of 1192, the two armies and the two chiefs began to beweary of a war without result. A great one, however, for Saladin and theMussulmans was the departure of Richard and the crusaders. Being unableto agree about conditions for a definitive peace, they contentedthemselves, on both sides, with a truce for three years and eight months, leaving Jerusalem in possession of the Mussulmans, but open for worshipto the Christians, in whose hands remained, at the same time, the townsthey were in occupation of on the maritime coast, from Jaffa to Tyre. This truce, which was called peace, having received the signature of allthe Christian and Mussulman princes, was celebrated by galas andtournaments, at which Christians and Mussulmans seemed for a moment tohave forgotten their hate; and on the 9th of October, 1192, Richardembarked at St. Jean d'Acre to go and run other risks. 

Thus ended the third crusade, undertaken by the three greatest sovereignsand the three greatest armies of Christian Europe, and with the loudlyproclaimed object of retaking Jerusalem from the infidels, andre-establishing a king over the sepulchre of Jesus Christ. The EmperorFrederick Barbarossa perished in it before he had trodden the soil ofPalestine. King Philip Augustus retired from it voluntarily, so soon asexperience had foreshadowed to him the impossibility of success. KingRichard abandoned it perforce, after having exhausted upon it his heroismand his knightly pride. The three armies, at the moment of departurefrom Europe, amounted, according to the historians of the time, to fiveor six hundred thousand men, of whom scarcely one hundred thousandreturned; and the only result of the third crusade was to leave as headover all the most beautiful provinces of Mussulman Asia and Africa, Saladin, the most illustrious and most able chieftain, in war and inpolitics, that Islamry had produced since Mahomet. 

From the end of the twelfth to the middle of the thirteenth century, between the crusade of Philip Augustus and that of St. Louis, it is usualto count three crusades, over which we will not linger. Two of thesecrusades--one, from 1195 to 1198, under Henry VI. , Emperor of Germany, and the other, from 1216 to 1240, under the Emperor Frederick II. AndAndrew II. , King of Hungary--are unconnected with France, and almostexclusively German, or, in origin and range, confined to Eastern Europe. They led, in Syria, Palestine, and Egypt, to wars, negotiations, andmanifold complications; Jerusalem fell once more, for a while, into thehands of the Christians; and there, on the 18th of March, 1229, in thechurch of the Resurrection, the Emperor Frederick II. , at that timeexcommunicated by Pope Gregory IX. , placed with his own hands the royalcrown upon his head. But these events, confused, disconnected, andshort-lived as they were, did not produce in the West, and especially inFrance, any considerable reverberation, and did not exercise upon therelative situations of Europe and Asia, of Christendom and Islamry, anyreally historical influence. In people's lives, and in the affairs ofthe world, there are many movements of no significance, and more cry thanwool; and those facts only which have had some weight and some durationare here to be noted for study and comprehension. The event which hasbeen called the fifth crusade was not wanting, so far, in realimportance, and it would have to be described here, if it had been reallya crusade; but it does not deserve the name. The crusades were a verydifferent thing from wars and conquests; their real and peculiarcharacteristic was, that they should be struggles between Christianityand Islamism, between the fruitful civilization of Europe and thebarbarism and stagnation of Asia. Therein consist their originality andtheir grandeur. It was certainly on this understanding, and with thisview, that Pope Innocent III. , one of the greatest men of the thirteenthcentury, seconded with all his might the movement which was at that timespringing up again in favor of a fresh crusade, and which brought about, in 1202, an alliance between a great number of powerful lords, French, Flemish, and Italian, and the republic of Venice, for the purpose ofrecovering Jerusalem from the infidels. But from the very first, theambition, the opportunities, and the private interests of the Venetians, combined with a recollection of the perfidy displayed by the Greekemperors, diverted the new crusaders from the design they had proclaimed. What Bohemond, during the first crusade, had proposed to Godfrey deBouillon, and what the Bishop of Langres, during the second, hadsuggested to Louis the Young, namely, the capture of Constantinople forthe sake of insuring that of Jerusalem, the first crusaders of thethirteenth century were led by bias, greed, anger, and spite to take inhand and accomplish; they conquered Constantinople, and, having once madethat conquest, they troubled themselves no more about Jerusalem. Founded, May 16th, 1204, in the person of Baldwin IX. , Count of Flanders, the Latin empire of the East existed for seventy years, in the teeth ofmany a storm, only to fall once more, in 1273, into the hands of theGreek emperors, overthrown in 1453 by the Turks, who are still inpossession. 

One circumstance, connected rather with literature than politics, givesFrenchmen a particular interest in this conquest of the Greek empire bythe Latin Christians; for it was a Frenchman, Geoffrey de Villehardouin, seneschal of Theobald III. , Count of Champagne, who, after having beenone of the chief actors in it, wrote the history of it; and his work, strictly historical as to facts, and admirably epic in description ofcharacter and warmth of coloring, is one of the earliest and finestmonuments of French literature. 

But to return to the real crusades. 

At the beginning of the thirteenth century, whilst the enterprises whichwere still called crusades were becoming more and more degenerate incharacter and potency, there was born in France, on the 25th of April, 1215, not merely the prince, but the man who was to be the most worthyrepresentative and the most devoted slave of that religious and moralpassion which had inspired the crusades. Louis IX. , though born to thepurple, a powerful king, a valiant warrior, a splendid knight, and anobject of reverence to all those who at a distance observed his life, andof affection to all those who approached his person, was neither biassednor intoxicated by any such human glories and delights; neither in histhoughts nor in his conduct did they ever occupy the foremost place;before all and above all he wished to be, and was indeed, a Christian, a true Christian, guided and governed by the idea and the resolve ofdefending the Christian faith and fulfilling the Christian law. Had hebeen born in the most lowly condition, as the world holds, or, asreligion, the most commanding; had he been obscure, needy, a priest, amonk, or a hermit, he could not have been more constantly and morezealously filled with the desire of living as a faithful servant of JesusChrist, and of insuring, by pious obedience to God here, the salvation ofhis soul hereafter. This is the peculiar and original characteristic ofSt. Louis, and a fact rare and probably unique in the history of kings. (He was canonized on the 11th of August, 1297; and during twenty-fouryears nine successive popes had prosecuted the customary inquiries as tohis faith and life. )

It is said that the Christian enthusiasm of St. Louis had its source inthe strict education he received from Queen Blanche, his mother. That isoverstepping the limits of that education and of her influence. QueenBlanche, though a firm believer and steadfastly pious, was a stranger toenthusiasm, and too discreet and too politic to make it the dominatingprinciple of her son's life any more than of her own. The truth of thematter is that, by her watchfulness and her exactitude in morals, shehelped to impress upon her son the great Christian lesson of hatred forsin and habitual concern for the eternal salvation of his soul. "Madameused to say of me, " Louis was constantly repeating, "that if I were sickunto death, and could not be cured save by acting in such wise that Ishould sin mortally, she would let me die rather than that I should angermy Creator to my damnation. "

[Illustration: ST. LOUIS ADMINISTERING JUSTICE----46]

In the first years of his government, when he had reached his majority, there was nothing to show that the idea of the crusade occupied LouisIX. 's mind; and it was only in 1239, when he was now four and twenty, that it showed itself vividly in him. Some of his principal vassals, theCounts of Champagne, Brittany, and Macon, had raised an army ofcrusaders, and were getting ready to start for Palestine; and the kingwas not contented with giving them encouragement, but "he desired thatAmaury de Montfort, his constable, should, in his name, serve JesusChrist in this war; and for that reason he gave him arms and assigned tohim per day a sum of money, for which Amaury thanked him on his knees, that is, did him homage, according to the usage of those times. And thecrusaders were mighty pleased to have this lord with them. "

Five years afterwards, at the close of 1244, Louis fell seriously ill atPontoise; the alarm and sorrow in the kingdom were extreme; the kinghimself believed that his last hour was come; and he had all hishousehold summoned, thanked them for their kind attentions, recommendedthem to be good servants of God, "and did all that a good Christian oughtto do. His mother, his wife, his brothers, and all who were about himkept continually praying for him; his mother, beyond all others, addingto her prayers great austerities. " Once he appeared motionless andbreathless; and he was supposed to be dead. "One of the dames who weretending him, " says Joinville, "would have drawn the sheet over his face, saying that he was dead; but another dame, who was on the other side ofthe bed, would not suffer it, saying that there was still life in hisbody. When the king heard the dispute between these two dames, our Lordwrought in him: he began to sigh, stretched his arms and legs, and said, in a hollow voice, as if he had come forth from the tomb, 'He, by God'sgrace, hath visited me, He who cometh from on high, and hath recalled mefrom amongst the dead. ' Scarcely had he recovered his senses and speech, when he sent for William of Auvergne, Bishop of Paris, together withPeter de Cuisy, Bishop of Meaux, in whose diocese he happened to be, andrequested them 'to place upon his shoulder the cross of the voyage overthe sea. ' The two bishops tried to divert him from this idea, and thetwo queens, Blanche and Marguerite, conjured him on their knees to waittill he was well, and after that he might do as he pleased. He insisted, declaring that he would take no nourishment till he had received thecross. At last the Bishop of Paris yielded, and gave him a cross. Theking received it with transport, kissing it, and placing it right gentlyUpon his breast. " "When the queen, his mother, knew that he had takenthe cross, " says Joinville, "she made as great mourning as if she hadseen him dead. "

Still more than three years rolled by before Louis fulfilled theengagement which he had thus entered into, with himself alone, one mightsay, and against the wish of nearly everybody about him. The crusades, although they still remained an object of religious and knightlyaspiration, were from the political point of view decried; and, withoutdaring to say so, many men of weight, lay or ecclesiastical, had nodesire to take part in them. Under the influence of this public feeling, timidly exhibited but seriously cherished, Louis continued, for threeyears, to apply himself to the interior concerns of his kingdom and tohis relations with the European powers, as if he had no other idea. There was a moment when his wisest counsellors and the queen his motherconceived a hope of inducing him to give up his purpose. "My lord king, "said one day that same Bishop of Paris, who, in the crisis of hisillness, had given way to his wishes, "bethink you that, when youreceived the cross, when you suddenly and without reflection made thisawful vow, you were weak, and, sooth to say, of a wandering mind, andthat took away from your words the weight of verity and authority. Ourlord the pope, who knoweth the necessities of your kingdom and yourweakness of body, will gladly grant unto you a dispensation. Lo! we havethe puissance of the schismatic Emperor Frederick, the snares of thewealthy King of the English, the treasons but lately stopped of thePoitevines, and the subtle wranglings of the Albigensians to fear;Germany is disturbed; Italy hath no rest; the Holy Land is hard ofaccess; you will not easily penetrate thither, and behind you will beleft the implacable hatred between the pope and Frederick. To whom willyou leave us, every one of us, in our feebleness and desolation? "QueenBlanche appealed to other considerations, the good counsels she hadalways given her son, and the pleasure God took in seeing a son givingheed to and believing his mother; and to hers she promised, that, if hewould remain, the Holy Land should not suffer, and that more troopsshould be sent thither than he could lead thither himself. The kinglistened attentively and with deep emotion. You say, " he answered, "thatI was not in possession of my senses when I took the cross. Well, as youwish it, I lay it aside; I give it back to you;" and raising his hand tohis shoulder, he undid the cross upon it, saying, "Here it is, my lordbishop; I restore to you the cross I had put on. " All presentcongratulated themselves; but the king, with a sudden change of look andintention, said to them, "My friends, now, assuredly, I lack not senseand reason; I am neither weak nor wandering of mind; and I demand mycross back again. He who knoweth all things knoweth that until it isreplaced upon my shoulder, no food shall enter my lips. " At these wordsall present declared that "herein was the finger of God, and none daredto raise, in opposition to the king's saying, any objection. "

In June, 1248, Louis, after having received at St. Denis, together withthe oriflamme, the scrip and staff of a pilgrim, took leave, at Corbeilor Cluny, of his mother, Queen Blanche, whom he left regent during hisabsence, with the fullest powers. "Most sweet fair son, " said she, embracing him; "fair tender son, I shall never see you more; full well myheart assures me. " He took with him Queen Marguerite of Provence, hiswife, who had declared that she would never part from him. On arriving, in the early part of August, at Aigues-Mortes, he found assembled there afleet of thirty-eight vessels with a certain number of transport-shipswhich he had hired from the republic of Genoa; and they were to convey tothe East the troops and personal retinue of the king himself. The numberof these vessels proves that Louis was far from bringing one of thosevast armies with which the first crusades had been familiar; it evenappears that he had been careful to get rid of such mobs, for, beforeembarking, he sent away nearly ten thousand bow-men, Genoese, Venetian, Pisan, and even French, whom he had at first engaged, and of whom, afterinspection, he desired nothing further. The sixth crusade was thepersonal achievement of St. Louis, not the offspring of a popularmovement, and he carried it out with a picked army, furnished by thefeudal chivalry and by the religious and military orders dedicated to theservice of the Holy Land. 

The Isle of Cyprus was the trysting-place appointed for all the forces ofthe expedition. Louis arrived there on the 12th of September, 1248, andreckoned upon remaining there only a few days; for it was Egypt that hewas in a hurry to reach. The Christian world was at that time of opinionthat, to deliver the Holy Land, it was necessary first of all to strike ablow at Islamism in Egypt, wherein its chief strength resided. Butscarcely had the crusaders formed a junction in Cyprus, when the vices ofthe expedition and the weaknesses of its chief began to be manifest. Louis, unshakable in his religious zeal, was wanting in clear ideas andfixed resolves as to the carrying out of his design; he inspired hisassociates with sympathy rather than exercised authority over them, andhe made himself admired without making himself obeyed. He did notsucceed in winning a majority in the council of chiefs over to hisopinion as to the necessity for a speedy departure for Egypt; it wasdecided to pass the winter in Cyprus, and during this leisurely halt ofseven months, the improvidence of the crusaders, their ignorance of theplaces, people, and facts amidst which they were about to launchthemselves, their headstrong rashness, their stormy rivalries, and theirmoral and military irregularities aggravated the difficulties of theenterprise, great as they already were. Louis passed his time ininterfering between them, in hushing up their quarrels, in upbraidingthem for their licentiousness, and in reconciling the Templars andHospitallers. His kindness was injurious to his power; he lent too readyan ear to the wishes or complaints of his comrades, and small matterstook up his thoughts and his time almost as much as great. 

At last a start was made from Cyprus in May, 1249, and, in spite ofviolent gales of wind which dispersed a large number of vessels, theyarrived on the 4th of June before Damietta. 

The crusader-chiefs met on board the king's ship, the Mountjoy; and oneof those present, Guy, a knight in the train of the Count of Melun, in aletter to one of his friends; a student at Paris, reports to him theking's address in the following terms: "My friends and lieges, we shallbe invincible if we be inseparable in brotherly love. It was not withoutthe will of God that we arrived here so speedily. Descend we upon thisland and occupy it in force. I am not the King of France. I am not HolyChurch. It is all ye who are King and Holy Church. I am but a man whoselife will pass away as that of any other man whenever it shall pleaseGod. Any issue of our expedition is to usward good; if we be conqueredwe shall wing our way to heaven as martyrs; and if we be conquerors, menwill celebrate the glory of the Lord; and that of France, and, what ismore, that of Christendom, will grow thereby. It were senseless tosuppose that God, whose providence is over everything, raised me up fornought: He will see in us His own, His mighty cause. Fight we forChrist; it is Christ who will triumph in us, not for our own sake, butfor the honor and blessedness of His name. " It was determined todisembark the next day. An army of Saracens lined the shore. The galleywhich bore the oriflamme was one of the first to touch. When the kingheard tell that the banner of St. Denis was on shore, he, in spite of thepope's legate, who was with him, would not leave it; he leaped into thesea, which was up to his arm-pits, and went, shield on neck, helm onhead, and lance in hand, and joined his people on the sea-shore. When hecame to land, and perceived the Saracens, he asked what folk they were, and it was told him that they were the Saracens; then he put his lancebeneath his arm and his shield in front of him, and would have chargedthe Saracens, if his mighty men, who were with him, had suffered him. 

This, from his very first outset, was Louis exactly, the most fervent ofChristians and the most splendid of knights, much rather than a generaland a king. 

Such he appeared at the moment of landing, and such he was during thewhole duration, and throughout all the incidents of his campaign inEgypt, from June, 1249, to May, 1250: ever admirable for his moralgreatness and knightly valor, but without foresight or consecutive planas a leader, without efficiency as a commander in action, and everdecided or biassed either by his own momentary impressions or the fanciesof his comrades. He took Damietta without the least difficulty. TheMussulmans, stricken with surprise as much as terror, abandoned theplace; and when Fakr-Eddin, the commandant of the Turks, came before theSultan of Egypt, Malek-Saleh, who was ill, and almost dying, "Couldstthou not have held out for at least an instant?" said the sultan. "What! not a single one of you got slain!" Having become masters ofDamietta, St. Louis and the crusaders committed the same fault there asin the Isle of Cyprus: they halted there for an indefinite time. Theywere expecting fresh crusaders; and they spent the time of expectation inquarrelling over the partition of the booty taken in the city. They madeaway with it, they wasted it blindly. "The barons, " said Joinville, "took to giving grand banquets, with an excess of meats; and the peopleof the common sort took up with bad women. " Louis saw and deplored theseirregularities, without being in a condition to stop them. 

At length, on the 20th of November, 1249, after more than five months'inactivity at Damietta, the crusaders put themselves once more in motion, with the determination of marching upon Babylon, that outskirt of Cairo, now called _Old Cairo, _ which the greater part of them, in theirignorance, mistook for the real Babylon, and where they flatteredthemselves they would find immense riches, and avenge the oldensufferings of the Hebrew captives. The Mussulmans had found time torecover from their first fright, and to organize, at all points, avigorous resistance. On the 8th of February, 1250, a battle took placetwenty leagues from Damietta, at Mansourah (the city of victory), on theright bank of the Nile. The king's brother, Robert, Count of Artois, marched with the vanguard, and obtained an early success; but William deSonnac, grand master of the Templars, and William Longsword, Earl ofSalisbury, leader of the English crusaders but lately arrived atDamietta, insisted upon his waiting for the king before pushing thevictory to the uttermost. Robert taxed them, ironically, with caution. "Count Robert, " said William Longsword, "we shall be presently wherethou'lt not dare to come nigh the tail of my horse. " There came amessage from the king ordering his brother to wait for him; but Robertmade no account of it. " I have already put the Saracens to flight, " saidhe, "and I will wait for none to complete their defeat; "and he rushedforward into Mansourah. All those who had dissuaded him followed after;they found the Mussulmans numerous and perfectly rallied; in a fewmoments the Count of Artois fell, pierced with wounds, and more thanthree hundred knights of his train, the same number of English, togetherwith their leader, William Longsword, and two hundred and eightyTemplars, paid with their lives for the senseless ardor of the Frenchprince. 

The king hurried up in all haste to the aid of his brother; but he hadscarcely arrived, and as yet knew nothing of his brother's fate, when hehimself engaged so impetuously in the battle that he was on the point ofbeing taken prisoner by six Saracens who had already seized the reins ofhis horse. He was defending himself vigorously with his sword, whenseveral of his knights came up with him, and set him free. He asked oneof them if he had any news of his brother; and the other answered, "Certainly I have news of him: for I am sure that he is now in Paradise. ""Praised be God!" answered the king, with a tear or two, and went on withhis fighting. The battle-field was left that day to the crusaders; butthey were not allowed to occupy it as conquerors, for, three daysafterwards, on the 11th of February, 1250, the camp of St. Louis wasassailed by clouds of Saracens, horse and foot, Mamelukes and Bedouins. All surprise had vanished, the Mussulmans measured at a glance thenumbers of the Christians, and attacked them in full assurance ofsuccess, whatever heroism they might display; and the crusadersthemselves indulged in no more self-illusion, and thought only ofdefending themselves. Lack of provisions and sickness soon rendereddefence almost as impossible as attack; every day saw the Christian campmore and more encumbered with the famine-stricken, the dying, and thedead; and the necessity for retreating became evident. Louis made to theSultan Malek-Moaddam an offer to evacuate Egypt, and give up Damietta, provided that the kingdom of Jerusalem were restored to the Christians, and the army permitted to accomplish its retreat without obstruction. The sultan, without accepting or rejecting the proposition, asked whatguarantees would be given him for the surrender of Damietta. Louisoffered as hostage one of his brothers, the Count of Anjou, or the Countof Poitiers. "We must have the king himself, " said the Mussulmans. Aunanimous cry of indignation arose amongst the crusaders. "We wouldrather, " said Geoffrey de Sargines, "that we had been all slain, or takenprisoners by the Saracens, than be reproached with having left our kingin pawn. " All negotiation was broken off; and on the 5th of April, 1250, the crusaders decided upon retreating. 

This was the most deplorable scene of a deplorable drama; and at the sametime it was, for the king, an occasion for displaying, in their mostsublime and most attractive traits, all the virtues of the Christian. Whilst sickness and famine were devastating the camp, Louis made himselfvisitor, physician, and comforter; and his presence and his wordsexercised upon the worst cases a searching influence. He had one daysent his chaplain, William de Chartres, to visit one of his householdservants, a modest man of some means, named Gaugelme, who was at thepoint of death. When the chaplain was retiring, "I am waiting for mylord, our saintly king, to come, " said the dying man; "I will not departthis life until I have seen him and spoken to him: and then I will die. "The king came, and addressed to him the most affectionate words ofconsolation; and when he had left him, and before he had re-entered histent, he was told that Gaugelme had expired. When the 5th of April, theday fixed for the retreat, had come, Louis himself was ill and muchenfeebled. He was urged to go aboard one of the vessels which were todescend the Nile, carrying the wounded and the most suffering; but herefused absolutely, saying, "I don't separate from my people in the hourof danger. " He remained on land, and when he had to move forward hefainted twice. When he came to himself, he was amongst the last to leavethe camp, got himself helped on to the back of a little Arab horse, covered with silken housings, and marched at a slow pace with therear-guard, having beside him Geoffrey de Sargines, who watched over him, "and protected me against the Saracens, " said Louis himself to Joinville, "as a good servant protects his lord's tankard against the flies. "

Neither the king's courage nor his servants' devotion was enough toinsure success, even to the retreat. At four leagues' distance from thecamp it had just left, the rear-guard of the crusaders, harassed byclouds of Saracens, was obliged to halt. Louis could no longer keep onhis horse. He was put up at a house, " says Joinville, "and laid, almostdead, upon the lap of a tradeswoman from Paris; and it was believed thathe would not last till evening. " With his consent, one of his liegesentered into parley with one of the Mussulman chiefs; a truce was aboutto be concluded, and the Mussulman was taking off his ring from hisfinger as a pledge that he would observe it. "But during this, " saysJoinville, "there took place a great mishap. A traitor of a sergeant, whose name was Marcel, began calling to our people, 'Sirs knights, surrender, for such is the king's command: cause not the king's death. 'All thought that it was the king's command; and they gave up their swordsto the Saracens. " Being forthwith declared prisoners, the king and allthe rear-guard were removed to Mansourah; the king by boat; and his twobrothers, the Counts of Anjou and Poitiers, and all the other crusaders, drawn up in a body and shackled, followed on foot on the river bank. Theadvance-guard, and all the rest of the army, soon met the same fate. 

Ten thousand prisoners--this was all that remained of the crusade thathad started eighteen months before from Aigues-Mortes. Nevertheless thelofty bearing and the piety of the king still inspired the Mussulmanswith great respect. A negotiation was opened between him and the SultanMalek-Moaddam, who, having previously freed him from his chains, had himtreated with a certain magnificence. As the price of a truce and of hisliberty, Louis received a demand for the immediate surrender of Damietta, a heavy ransom, and the restitution of several places which theChristians still held in Palestine. "I cannot dispose of those places, "said Louis, "for they do not belong to me; the princes and the Christianorders, in whose hands they are, can alone keep or surrender them. " Thesultan, in anger, threatened to have the king put to the torture, or sentto the Grand Khalif of Bagdad, who would detain him in prison for therest of his days. "I am your prisoner, " said Louis; "you can do with mewhat you will. " "You call yourself our prisoner, " said the Mussulmannegotiators, "and so, we believe you are; but you treat us as if you hadus in prison. " The sultan perceived that he had to do with anindomitable spirit; and he did not insist any longer upon more than thesurrender of Damietta, and on a ransom of five hundred thousand livres(that is, about ten million one hundred and thirty-two thousand francs, or four hundred and five thousand two hundred and eighty pounds, ofmodern money, according to M. De Wailly, supposing, as is probable, thatlivres of Tours are meant). "I will pay willingly five hundred thousandlivres for the deliverance of my people, " said Louis, and I will give upDamietta for the deliverance of my own person, for I am not a man whoought to be bought and sold for money. " "By my faith, " said the sultan, the Frank is liberal not to have haggled about so large a sum. Go tellhim that I will give him one hundred thousand livres to help towardspaying the ransom. " The negotiation was concluded on this basis; andvictors and vanquished quitted Mansourah, and arrived, partly by land andpartly by the Nile, within a few leagues of Damietta, the surrender ofwhich was fixed for the 7th of May. But five days previously a tragicevent took place. Several emirs of the Mamelukes suddenly enteredLouis's tent. They had just slain the Sultan Malek-Moaddam, against whomthey had for some time been conspiring. "Fear nought, sir, " said they tothe king; "this was to be. Do what concerns you in respect of thestipulated conditions, and you shall be free. " Of these emirs one, whohad slain the sultan with his own hand, asked the king, brusquely, "Whatwilt thou give me? I have slain thine enemy, who would have put thee todeath, had he lived;" and he asked to be made knight. Louis answered nota word. Some of the crusaders present urged him to satisfy the desire ofthe emir, who had in his power the decision of their fate. "I will neverconfer knighthood on an infidel, " said Louis; "let the emir turnChristian; I will take him away to France, enrich him, and make himknight. " It is said that, in their admiration for this piety and thisindomitable firmness, the emirs had at one time a notion of taking Louishimself for sultan in the place of him whom they had just slain; and thisreport was probably not altogether devoid of foundation, for, some timeafterwards, in the intimacy of the conversations between them, Louis oneday said to Joinville, "Think you that I would have taken the kingdom ofBabylon, if they had offered it to me?" "Whereupon I told him, " addsJoinville, "that he would have done a mad act, seeing that they had slaintheir lord; and he said to me that of a truth he would not have refused. "However that may be, the conditions agreed upon with the late SultanMalek-Moaddam were carried out; on the 7th of May, 1250, Geoffreyde Sargines gave up to the emirs the keys of Damietta; and the Mussulmansentered in tumultuously. The king was waiting aboard his ship for thepayment which his people were to make for the release of his brother, theCount of Poitiers; and, when he saw approaching a bark on which herecognized his brother, "Light up! light up!" he cried instantly to hissailors; which was the signal agreed upon for setting out. And leavingforthwith the coast of Egypt, the fleet which bore the remains of theChristian army made sail for the shores of Palestine. 

The king, having arrived at St. Jean d'Acre on the 14th of May, 1250, accepted without shrinking the trial imposed upon him by his unfortunatesituation. He saw his forces considerably reduced; and the majority ofthe crusaders left to him, even his brothers themselves, did not hidetheir ardent desire to return to France. He had that virtue, so rareamongst kings, of taking into consideration the wishes of his comrades, and of desiring their free assent to the burden he asked them to bearwith him. He assembled the chief of them, and put the question plainlybefore them. "The queen, my mother, " he said, "biddeth me and prayeth meto get me hence to France, for that my kingdom hath neither peace nortruce with the king of England. The folk here tell me that, if I get mehence, this land is lost, for none of those that be there will dare toabide in it. I pray you, therefore, to give it thought, for it is agrave matter, and I grant you nine days for to answer me whatever shallseem to you good. " Eight days after, they returned; and Guy deMauvoisin, speaking in their name, said to the king, "Sir, your brothersand the rich men who be here have had regard unto your condition, andthey see that you cannot remain in this country to your own and yourkingdom's honor, for of all the knights who came in your train, and ofwhom you led into Cyprus twenty-eight hundred, there remain not onehundred in this city. Wherefore they do counsel you, sir, to get youhence to France, and to provide troops and money wherewith you may returnspeedily to this country, to take vengeance on these enemies of God whohave kept you in prison. " Louis, without any discussion, interrogatedall present, one after another, and all, even the pope's legate, agreedwith Guy de Mauvoisin. "I was seated just fourteenth, facing thelegate, " says Joinville, "and when he asked me how it seemed to me, Ianswered him that if the king could hold out so far as to keep the fieldfor a year, he would do himself great honor if he remained. "

[Illustration: Sire de Joinville----55]

Only two knights, William de Beaumont and Sire de Chatenay, had thecourage to support the opinion of Joinville, which was bolder for thetime being, but not less indecisive in respect of the immediate futurethan the contrary opinion. "I have heard you out, sirs, " said the king:"and I will answer you, within eight clays from this time, touching thatwhich it shall please me to do. " "Next Sunday, " says Joinville, "we cameagain, all of us, before the king. 'Sirs, ' said he, 'I thank very muchall those who have counselled me to get me gone to France, and likewisethose who have counselled me to bide. But I have bethought me that, if Ibide, I see no danger lest my kingdom of France be lost, for the queen, my mother, hath a many folk to defend it. I have noted likewise that thebarons of this land do say that, if I go hence, the kingdom of Jerusalemis lost. At no price will I suffer to be lost the kingdom of Jerusalem, which I came to guard and conquer. My resolve, then, is, that I bide forthe present. So I say unto you, ye rich men who are here, and to allother knights who shall have a mind to bide with me, come and speakboldly unto me, and I will give ye so much that it shall not be my faultif ye have no mind to bide. '"

Thus none, save Louis himself, dared go to the root of the question. Themost discreet advised him to depart, only for the purpose of coming back, and recommencing what had been so unsuccessful; and the boldest onlyurged him to remain a year longer. None took the risk of saying, evenafter so many mighty but vain experiments, that the enterprise waschimerical, and must be given up. Louis alone was, in word and deed, perfectly true to his own absorbing idea of recovering the Holy Sepulchrefrom the Mussulmans and re-establishing the kingdom of Jerusalem. Hiswas one of those pure and majestic souls, which are almost alien to theworld in which they live, and in which disinterested passion is so strongthat it puts judgment to silence, extinguishes all fear, and keeps uphope to infinity. The king's two brothers embarked with a numerousretinue. How many crusaders, knights, or men-at-arms, remained withLouis, there is nothing to show; but they were, assuredly, far fromsufficient for the attainment of the twofold end he had in view, and evenfor insuring less grand results, such as the deliverance of the crusadersstill remaining prisoners in the hands of the Mussulmans, and anythinglike an effectual protection for the Christians settled in Palestine andSyria. 

Twice Louis believed he was on the point of accomplishing his desire. Towards the end of 1250, and again in 1252, the Sultan of Aleppo andDamascus, and the Emirs of Egypt, being engaged in a violent struggle, made offers to him, by turns, of restoring the kingdom of Jerusalem if hewould form an active alliance with one or the other party against itsenemies. Louis sought means of accepting either of these offers withoutneglecting his previous engagements, and without compromising the fate ofthe Christians still prisoners in Egypt, or living in the territories ofAleppo and Damascus; but, during the negotiations entered upon with aview to this end, the Mussulmans of Syria and Egypt suspended theirdifferences, and made common cause against the remnants of the Christiancrusaders; and all hope of re-entering Jerusalem by these means vanishedaway. Another time, the Sultan of Damascus, touched by Louis's piousperseverance, had word sent to him that he, if he wished, could go on apilgrimage to Jerusalem, and should find himself in perfect safety. "Theking, " says Joinville, "held a great council; and none urged him to go. It was shown unto him that if he, who was the greatest king inChristendom, performed his pilgrimage without delivering the Holy Cityfrom the enemies of God, all the other kings and other pilgrims who cameafter him would hold themselves content with doing just as much, andwould trouble themselves no more about the deliverance of Jerusalem. " Hewas reminded of the example set by Richard Coeur de Lion, who, sixtyyears before, had refused to cast even a look upon Jerusalem, when he wasunable to deliver her from her enemies. Louis, just as Richard had, refused the incomplete satisfaction which had been offered him, and fornearly four years, spent by him on the coasts of Palestine and Syriasince his departure from Damietta, from 1250 to 1254, he expended, insmall works of piety, sympathy, protection, and care for the future ofthe Christian populations in Asia, his time, his strength, his pecuniaryresources, and the ardor of a soul which could not remain icily abandonedto sorrowing over great desires unsatisfied. 

An unexpected event occurred and brought about all at once a change inhis position and his plans. At the commencement of the year 1253, atSidon, the ramparts of which he was engaged in repairing, he heard thathis mother, Queen Blanche, had died at Paris on the 27th of November, 1252. "He made so great mourning thereat, " says Joinville, "that for twodays no speech could be gotten of him. After that he sent a chamber-manfor to fetch me. When I carne before him, in his chamber where he wasalone, so soon as he got sight of me, he stretched forth his arms, andsaid to me, 'O, seneschal, I have lost my mother!'" It was a great lossboth for the son and for the king. Imperious, exacting, jealous, andoften disagreeable in private life and in the bosom of her family, Blanche was, nevertheless, according to all contemporary authority, eventhe least favorable to her, "the most discreet woman of her time, with amind singularly quick and penetrating, and with a man's heart to leavenher Woman's sex and ideas; personally magnanimous, of indomitable energy, sovereign mistress in all the affairs of her age, guardian andprotectress of France, worthy of comparison with Semiramis, the mosteminent of her sex. " From the time of Louis's departure on the crusadeas well as during his minority she had given him constant proofs of adevotion as intelligent as it was impassioned, as useful as it wasmasterful. All letters from France demanded the speedy return of theking. The Christians of Syria were themselves of the same opinion; theking, they said, has done for us, here, all he could do; he will serve usfar better by sending us strong re-enforcements from France. Louisembarked at St. Jean d'Acre, on the 24th of April, 1254, carrying awaywith him, on thirteen vessels, large and small, Queen Marguerite, hischildren, his personal retinue, and his own more immediate men-at-arms, and leaving the Christians of Syria, for their protection in his name, a hundred knights under the orders of Geoffrey de Sargines, that comradeof his in whose bravery and pious fealty he had the most entireconfidence. After two months and a half at sea, the king and his fleetarrived, on the 8th of July, 1254, off the port of Hyeres, which at thattime belonged to the Empire, and not to France. For two days Louisrefused to land at this point; for his heart was set upon not putting hisfoot upon land again save on the soil of his own kingdom, at Aigues-Mortes, whence he had, six years before, set out. At last he yielded tothe entreaties of the queen and those who were about him, landed atHyeres, passed slowly through France, and made his solemn entry intoParis on the 7th of September, 1254. "The burgesses and all those whowere in the city were there to meet him, clad and bedecked in all theirbest according to their condition. If the other towns had received himwith great joy, Paris evinced even more than any other. For several daysthere were bonfires, dances, and other public rejoicings, which endedsooner than the people wished; for the king, who was pained to see theexpense, the dances, and the vanities indulged in, went off to the woodof Vincennes to put a stop to them. 

So soon as he had resumed the government of his kingdom, after six years'absence and adventures, heroic, indeed, but all in vain for the cause ofChristendom, those of his counsellors and servants who lived most closelywith him and knew him best were struck at the same time with what he hadremained and what he had become during this long and cruel trial. "Whenthe king had happily returned to France, how piously he bare himselftowards God, how justly towards his subjects, how compassionately towardsthe afflicted, and how humbly in his own respect, and with what zeal helabored to make progress, according to his power, in every virtue, allthis can be attested by persons who carefully watched his manner of life, and who knew the spotlessness of his conscience. It is the opinion ofthe most clear-sighted and the wisest that, in proportion as gold is moreprecious than silver, so the manner of living and acting which the kingbrought back from his pilgrimage in the Holy Land was holy and new, andsuperior to his former behavior, albeit, even in his youth, he had everbeen good and guileless, and worthy of high esteem. " These are the wordswritten about St. Louis by his confessor Geoffrey de Beaulieu, achronicler, curt and simple even to dryness, but at the same time wellinformed. An attempt will be made presently to give a fair idea of thecharacter of St. Louis's government during the last fifteen years of hisreign, and of the place he fills in the history of the kingship and ofpolitics in France; but just now it is only with the part he played inthe crusades and with what became of them in his hands that we have tooccupy our attention. For seven years after his return to France, from1254 to 1261, Louis seemed to think no more about them, and there isnothing to show that he spoke of them even to his most intimateconfidants; but, in spite of his apparent calmness, he was living, so faras they were concerned, in a continual ferment of imagination andinternal fever, ever flattering himself that some favorable circumstancewould call him back to his interrupted work. And he had reason tobelieve that circumstances were responsive to his wishes. The Christiansof Palestine and Syria were a prey to perils and evils which became morepressing every day; the cross was being humbled at one time before theTartars of Tchingis-Khan, at another before the Mussulmans of Egypt; PopeUrban was calling upon the King of France; and Geoffrey de Sargines, theheroic representative whom Louis had left in St. Jean d'Acre, at thehead of a small garrison, was writing to him that ruin was imminent, andspeedy succor indispensable to prevent it. In 1261, Louis held, atParis, a parliament, at which, without any talk of a new crusade, measures were taken which revealed an idea of it: there were decrees forfasts and prayers on behalf of the Christians of the East and forfrequent and earnest military drill. In 1263, the crusade was openlypreached; taxes were levied, even on the clergy, for the purpose ofcontributing towards it; and princes and barons bound themselves to takepart in it. Louis was all approval and encouragement, without declaringhis own intention. In 1267, a parliament was convoked at Paris. Theking, at first, conversed discreetly with some of his barons about thenew plan of crusade; and then, suddenly, having had the precious relicsdeposited in the Holy Chapel set before the eyes of the assembly, heopened the session by ardently exhorting those present "to avenge theinsult which had so long been offered to the Saviour in the Holy Land andto recover the Christian heritage possessed, for our sins, by theinfidels. " Next year, on the 9th of February, 1268, at a new parliamentassembled at Paris, the king took an oath to start in the month of May, 1270. 

Great was the surprise, and the disquietude was even greater than thesurprise. The kingdom was enjoying abroad a peace and at home atranquillity and prosperity for a long time past without example; feudalquarrels were becoming more rare and terminating more quickly; and theking possessed the confidence and the respect of the whole population. Why compromise such advantages by such an enterprise, so distant, socostly, and so doubtful of success? Whether from good sense or fromdispleasure at the burdens imposed upon them, many ecclesiastics showedsymptoms of opposition, and Pope Clement IV. Gave the king nothing butambiguous and very reserved counsel. When he learned that Louis wastaking with him on the crusade three of his sons, aged respectivelytwenty-two, eighteen, and seventeen, he could not refrain from writing tothe Cardinal of St. Cecile, "It doth not strike us as an act of well-balanced judgment to impose the taking of the cross upon so many of theking's sons, and especially the eldest; and, albeit we have heard reasonsto the contrary, either we be much mistaken or they are utterly devoid ofreason. " Even the king's personal condition was matter for graveanxiety. His health was very much enfeebled; and several of his mostintimate and most far-seeing advisers were openly opposed to his design. He vehemently urged Joinville to take the cross again with him; butJoinville refused downright. "I thought, " said he, "that they allcommitted a mortal sin to advise him the voyage, because the wholekingdom was in fair peace at home and with all neighbors, and, so soon ashe departed, the state of the kingdom did nought but worsen. They alsocommitted a great sin to advise him the voyage in the great state ofweakness in which his body was, for he could not bear to go by chariot orto ride; he was so weak that he suffered me to carry him in my arms fromthe hotel of the Count of Auxerre, the place where I took leave of him, to the Cordeliers. And nevertheless, weak as he was, had he remained inFrance, he might have lived yet a while and wrought much good. "

All objections, all warnings, all anxieties came to nothing in the faceof Louis's fixed idea and pious passion. He started from Paris on the16th of March, 1270, a sick man almost already, but with soul content, and probably the only one without misgiving in the midst of all hiscomrades. It was once more at Aigues-Mortes that he went to embark. Allwas as yet dark and undecided as to the plan of the expedition. WasEgypt, or Palestine, or Constantinople, or Tunis, to be the first pointof attack? Negotiations, touching this subject, had been opened with theVenetians and the Genoese without arriving at any conclusion orcertainty. Steps were taken at haphazard with full trust in Providenceand utter forgetfulness that Providence does not absolve men fromforesight. On arriving at Aigues-Mortes about the middle of May, Louisfound nothing organized, nothing in readiness, neither crusaders norvessels; everything was done slowly, incompletely, and with the greatestirregularity. At last, on the 2d of July, 1270, he set sail without anyone's knowing and without the king's telling any one whither they weregoing. It was only in Sardinia, after four days' halt at Cagliari, thatLouis announced to the chiefs of the crusade, assembled aboard his shipthe Mountjoy, that he was making for Tunis, and that their Christian workwould commence there. The King of Tunis (as he was then called), Mohammed Mostanser, had for some time been talking of his desire tobecome a Christian, if he could be efficiently protected against theseditions of his subjects. Louis welcomed with transport the prospect ofMussulman conversions. "Ah!" he cried, "if I could only see myself thegossip and sponsor of so great a godson!"

But on the 17th of July, when the fleet arrived before Tunis, theadmiral, Florent de Varennes, probably without the king's orders and withthat want of reflection which was conspicuous at each step of theenterprise, immediately took possession of the harbor and of someTunisian vessels as prize, and sent word to the king "that he had only tosupport him and that the disembarkation of the troops might be effectedin perfect safety. " Thus war was commenced at the very first momentagainst the Mussulman prince whom there had been a promise of seeingbefore long a Christian. 

At the end of a fortnight, after some fights between the Tunisians andthe crusaders, so much political and military blindness produced itsnatural consequences. The re-enforcements promised to Louis, by hisbrother Charles of Anjou, king of Sicily, had not arrived; provisionswere falling short; and the heats of an African summer were working havocamongst the army with such rapidity that before long there was no time tobury the dead, but they were cast pell-mell into the ditch whichsurrounded the camp, and the air was tainted thereby. On the 3d ofAugust Louis was attacked by the epidemic fever, and obliged to keep hisbed in his tent. He asked news of his son John Tristan, Count of Nevers, who had fallen ill before him, and whose recent death, aboard the vesselto which he had been removed in hopes that the sea air might bebeneficial, had been carefully concealed from him. The count, as well asthe Princess Isabel, married to Theobald the Young, King of Navarre, wasa favorite child of Louis, who, on hearing of his loss, folded his handsand sought in silence and prayer some assuagement of his grief. Hismalady grew worse; and having sent for his successor, Prince Philip(Philip the Bold), he took from his hour-book some instructions which hehad written out for him, with his own hand and in French, and deliveredthem to him, bidding him to observe them scrupulously. He gave likewiseto his daughter Isabel, who was weeping at the foot of his bed, and tohis son-in-law the King of Navarre, some writings which had been intendedfor them, and he further charged Isabel to deliver another to heryoungest sister, Agnes, affianced to the Duke of Burgundy. "Dearestdaughter, " said he, "think well hereon: full many folk have fallen asleepwith wild thoughts of sin, and in the morning their place hath not knownthem. " Just after he had finished satisfying his paternal solicitude, itwas announced to him, on the 24th of August, that envoys from the EmperorMichael Palaeologus had landed at Cape Carthage, with orders to demandhis intervention with his brother Charles, King of Sicily, to deter himfrom making war on the but lately re-established Greek empire. Louissummoned all his strength to receive them in his tent, in the presence ofcertain of his counsellors, who were uneasy at the fatigue he wasimposing upon himself. "I promise you, if I live, " said he to theenvoys, "to cooperate, so far as I may be able, in what your masterdemands of me; meanwhile, I exhort you to have patience, and be of goodcourage. " This was his last political act, and his last concern with theaffairs of the world; henceforth he was occupied only with piouseffusions which had a bearing at one time on his hopes for his soul, atanother on those Christian interests which had been so dear to him allhis life. He kept repeating his customary orisons in a low voice, and hewas heard murmuring these broken words: "Fair Sir God, have mercy on thispeople that bideth here, and bring them back to their own land! Let themnot fall into the hands of their enemies, and let them not be constrainedto deny Thy name!" And at the same time that he thus expressed his sadreflections upon the situation in which he was leaving his army and hispeople, he cried from time to time, as he raised himself on his bed, "Jerusalem! Jerusalem! We will go up to Jerusalem!" During the night ofthe 24th 25th of August he ceased to speak, all the time continuing toshow that he was in full possession of his senses; he insisted uponreceiving extreme unction out of bed, and lying upon a coarse sack-clothcovered with cinders, with the cross before him; and on Monday, the 25thof August, 1270, at three P. M. , he departed in peace, whilst utteringthese his last words: "Father, after the example of the Divine Master, into Thy hands I commend my spirit!"

[Illustration: The Death of St. Louis----64]

CHAPTER XVIII. ----THE KINGSHIP IN FRANCE. 

That the kingship occupied an important place and played an importantpart in the history of France is an evident and universally recognizedfact. But to what causes this fact was due, and what particularcharacteristics gave the kingship in France that preponderating influencewhich, in weal and in woe, it exercised over the fortunes of the country, is a question which has been less closely examined, and which stillremains vague and obscure. This question it is which we would now shedlight upon and determine with some approach to precision. We cannotproperly comprehend and justly appreciate a great historical force untilwe have seen it issuing from its primary source and followed it in itsvarious developments. 

At the first glance, two facts strike us in the history of the kingshipin France. It was in France that it adopted soonest and mostpersistently maintained its fundamental principle, heredity. In theother monarchical states of Europe--in England, in Germany, in Spain, andin Italy--divers principles, at one time election, and at another rightof conquest, have been mingled with or substituted for the heredity ofthe throne; different dynasties have reigned; and England has had herSaxon, Danish, and Norman kings, her Plantagenets, her Tudors, herStuarts, her Nassaus, her Brunswicks. In Germany, and up to theeighteenth century, the Empire, the sole central dignity, was electiveand transferable. Spain was for a long while parcelled out into severaldistinct kingdoms, and since she attained territorial unity the houses ofAustria and Bourbon have both occupied her throne. The monarchy and therepublic for many a year disputed and divided Italy. Only in France wasthere, at any time during eight centuries, but a single king and a singleline of kings. Unity and heredity, those two essential principles ofmonarchy, have been the invariable characteristics of the kingship inFrance. 

A second fact, less apparent and less remarkable, but, nevertheless, notwithout importance or without effect upon the history of the kingship inFrance, is the extreme variety of character, of faculties, ofintellectual and moral bent, of policy and personal conduct amongst theFrench kings. In the long roll of thirty-three kings who reigned inFrance from Hugh Capet to Louis XVI. There were kings wise and kingsfoolish, kings able and kings incapable, kings rash and kings slothful, kings earnest and kings frivolous, kings saintly and kings licentious, kings good and sympathetic towards their people, kings egotistical andconcerned solely about themselves, kings lovable and beloved, kingssombre and dreaded or detested. As we go forward and encounter them onour way, all these kingly characters will be seen appearing and acting inall their diversity and all their incoherence. Absolute monarchicalpower in France was, almost in every successive reign, singularlymodified, being at one time aggravated and at another alleviatedaccording to the ideas, sentiments, morals, and spontaneous instincts ofthe monarchs. Nowhere else, throughout the great European monarchies, has the difference between kingly personages exercised so much influenceon government and national condition. In that country the free action ofindividuals has filled a prominent place and taken a prominent part inthe course of events. 

It has been shown how insignificant and inert, as sovereigns, were thefirst three successors of Hugh Capet. The goodness to his peopledisplayed by King Robert was the only kingly trait which, during thatperiod, deserved to leave a trace in history. The kingship appeared oncemore with the attributes of energy and efficiency on the accession ofLouis VI. , son of Philip I. He was brought up in the monastery of St. Denis, which at that time had for its superior a man of judgment, theAbbot Adam; and he then gave evidence of tendencies and received histraining under influences worthy of the position which awaited him. Hewas handsome, tall, strong, and alert, determined and yet affable. Hehad more taste for military exercises than for the amusements ofchildhood and the pleasures of youth. He was at that time called Louisthe Wide-awake. He had the good fortune to find in the Monastery of St. Denis a fellow-student capable of becoming a king's counsellor. Suger, achild born at St. Denis, of obscure parentage, and three or four yearsyounger than Prince Louis, had been brought up for charity's sake in theabbey, and the Abbot Adam, who had perceived his natural abilities, hadtaken pains to develop them. A bond of esteem and mutual friendship wasformed between the two young people, both of whom were disposed toearnest thought and earnest living; and when, in 1108, Louis the Wide-awake ascended the throne, the monk Suger became his adviser whilstremaining his friend. 

A very small kingdom was at that time the domain belonging properly anddirectly to the King of France. Ile-de-France, properly so called, and apart of Orleanness (_l'Oreanais_), pretty nearly the five departments ofthe Seine, Seine-et-Oise, Seineet-Marne, Oise and Loiret, besides, through recent acquisitions, French Vexin (which bordered on the Ile-de-France and had for its chief place Pontoise, being separated by thelittle River Epte from Norman Vexin, of which Rouen was the capital), half the countship of Sens and the countship of Bourges--such was thewhole of its extent. But this limited state was as liable to agitation, and often as troublous and as toilsome to govern, as the very greatest ofmodern states. It was full of Petty lords, almost sovereigns in theirown estates, and sufficiently strong to struggle against their kinglysuzerain, who had, besides, all around his domains, several neighborsmore powerful than himself in the extent and population of their states. But lord and peasant, layman and ecclesiastic, castle and country and thechurches of France, were not long discovering that, if the kingdom wassmall, it had verily a king. Louis did not direct to a distance fromhome his ambition and his efforts; it was within his own dominion, tocheck the violence of the strong against the weak, to put a stop to thequarrels of the strong amongst themselves, to make an end, in France atleast, of unrighteousness and devastation, and to establish there somesort of order and some sort of justice, that he displayed his energy andhis perseverance. "He was animated, " says Suger, "by a strong sense ofequity; to air his courage was his delight; he scorned inaction; heopened his eyes to see the way of discretion; he broke his rest and wasunwearied in his solicitude. " Suger has recounted in detail sixteen ofthe numerous expeditions which Louis undertook into the interior, toaccomplish his work of repression or of exemplary chastisement. Bouchard, Lord of Montmorency, Matthew de Beaumont, Dreux de Mouchy-le-Chatel, Ebble de Roussi, Leon de Mean, Thomas de Marle, Hugh de Crecy, William de la Roche-Guyon, Hugh du Puiset, and Amaury de Montfortlearned, to their cost, that the king was not to be braved with impunity. "Bouchard, on taking up arms one day against him, refused to accept hissword from the hands of one of his people who offered it to him, and saidby way of boast to the countess his wife, 'Noble countess, give thoujoyously this glittering sword to the count thy spouse: he who taketh itfrom thee as count will bring it back to thee as king. ' "In this verycampaign, Bouchard, " by his death, " says Suger, "restored peace to thekingdom, and took away himself and his war to the bottomless pit ofhell. " Hugh du Puiset had frequently broken his oaths of peace andrecommenced his devastations and revolts; and Louis resumed his course ofhunting him down, "destroyed the castle of Puiset, threw down the walls, dug up the wells, and razed it completely to the ground, as a placedevoted to the curse of Heaven. " Thomas de Marle, Lord of Couci, hadbeen_ committing cruel ravages upon the town and church of Laon, landsand inhabitants; when "Louis, summoned by their complaints, repaired toLaon, and there, on the advice of the bishops and grandees, andespecially of Raoul, the illustrious Count of Vermandois, the mostpowerful, after the king, of the lords in this part of the country, hedetermined to go and attack the castle of Couci, and so went back to hisown camp. The people whom he had sent to explore the spot reported thatthe approach to the castle was very difficult, and in truth impossible. Many urged the king to change his purpose in the matter; but he cried, 'Nay, what we resolved on at Laon stands: I would not hold backtherefrom, though it were to save my life. The king's majesty would bevilified, if I were to fly before this scoundrel. ' Forthwith, in spiteof his corpulence, and with admirable ardor, he pushed on with his troopsthrough ravines and roads encumbered with forests. . . . Thomas, madeprisoner and mortally wounded, was brought to King Louis, and by hisorder removed to Laon, to the almost universal satisfaction of his ownfolk and ours. Next day, his lands were sold for the benefit of thepublic treasury, his ponds were broken up, and King Louis, sparing thecountry because he had the lord of it at his disposal, took the road backto Laon, and afterwards returned in triumph to Paris. "

Sometimes, when the people, and their habitual protectors, the bishops, invoked his aid, Louis would carry his arms beyond his own dominions, bysole right of justice and kingship. It is known, " says Suger, "thatkings have long hands. " In 1121, the Bishop of Clermont-Ferrand made acomplaint to the king against William VI. , Count of Auvergne, who hadtaken possession of the town, and even of the episcopal church, and wasexercising therein "unbridled tyranny. " The king, who never lost amoment when there was a question of helping the Church, took up withpleasure and solemnity what was, under these circumstances, the cause ofGod; and having been unable, either by word of mouth or by letters sealedwith the seal of the king's majesty, to bring back the tyrant to hisduty, he assembled his troops, and led into revolted Auvergne a numerousarmy of Frenchmen. He had now become exceeding fat, and could scarcesupport the heavy mass of his body. Any one else, however humble, wouldhave had neither the will nor the power to ride a-horseback; but he, against the advice of all his friends, listened only to the voice ofcourage, braved the fiery suns of June and August, which were the dreadof the youngest knights, and made a scoff of those who could not bear theheat, although many a time, during the passage of narrow and difficultswampy places, he was constrained to get himself held on by those abouthim. " After an obstinate struggle, and at the intervention of WilliamVII. , Duke of Aquitaine, the Count of Auvergne's suzerain, "Louis fixed aspecial day for regulating and deciding, in parliament, at Orleans, andin the duke's presence, between the bishop and the count, the points towhich the Auvergnats had hitherto refused to subscribe. Thentriumphantly leading back his army, he returned victoriously to France. "He had asserted his power, and increased his ascendency, without anypretension to territorial aggrandizement. 

[Illustration: Louis the Fat on an Expedition----69]

Into his relations with his two powerful neighbors, the King of England, Duke of Normandy, and the Emperor of Germany, Louis the Fat introducedthe same watchfulness, the same firmness, and, at need, the same warlikeenergy, whilst observing the same moderation, and the same policy ofholding aloof from all turbulent or indiscreet ambition, adjusting hispretensions to his power, and being more concerned to govern his kingdomefficiently than to add to it by conquest. Twice, in 1109 and in 1118, he had war in Normandy with Henry I. , King of England, and he therein wasguilty of certain temerities resulting in a reverse, which he hastened torepair during a vigorous prosecution of the campaign; but, when once hishonor was satisfied, he showed a ready inclination for the peace whichthe Pope, Calixtus II. , in council at Rome, succeeded in establishingbetween the two rivals. The war with the Emperor of Germany, Henry V. , in 1124, appeared, at the first blush, a more serious matter. Theemperor had raised a numerous army of Lorrainers, Allemannians, Bavarians, Suabians, and Saxons, and was threatening the very city ofRheims with instant attack. Louis hastened to put himself in position;he went and took solemnly, at the altar of St. Denis, the banner of thatpatron of the kingdom, and flew with a mere handful of men to confrontthe enemy, and parry the first blow, calling on the whole of France tofollow him. France summoned the flower of her chivalry; and when thearmy had assembled from every quarter of the kingdom at Rheims, there wasseen, says Suger, "so great a host of knights and men a-foot, that theymight have been compared to swarms of grasshoppers covering the face ofthe earth, not only on the banks of the rivers, but on the mountains andover the plains. " This multitude was formed in three divisions. Thethird division was composed of Orleanese, Parisians, the people ofEtampes, and those of St. Denis; and at their head was the king inperson: "With them, " said he, "I shall fight bravely and with goodassurance; besides being protected by the saint, my liege lord, I havehere of my country-men those who nurtured me with peculiar affection, andwho, of a surety, will back me living, or carry me off dead, and save mybody. " At news of this mighty host, and the ardor with which they wereanimated, the Emperor Henry V. Advanced no farther, and, before long, "marching, under some pretext, towards other places, he preferred theshame of retreating like a coward to the risk of exposing his empire andhimself to certain destruction. After this victory, which was more thanas great as a triumph on the field of battle, the French returned, everyone, to their homes. "

The three elements which contributed to the formation and character ofthe kingship in France, --the German element, the Roman element, and theChristian element, --appear in con-junction in the reign of Louis the Fat. We have still the warrior-chief of a feudal society founded by conquestin him who, in spite of his moderation and discretion, cried many a time, says Suger, "What a pitiable state is this of ours, to never haveknowledge and strength both together! In my youth had knowledge, and inmy old age had strength been mine, I might have conquered many kingdoms;"and probably from this exclamation of a king in the twelfth century camethe familiar proverb, "If youth but knew, and age could do! "We see themaxims of the Roman empire and reminiscences of Charlemagne in Louis'shabit of considering justice to emanate from the king as fountain head, and of believing in his right to import it everywhere. And whatconclusion of a reign could be more Christian-like than his when, "exhausted by the long enfeeblement of his wasted body, but disdaining todie ignobly or unpreparedly, he called about him pious men, bishops, abbots, and many priests of holy Church; and then, scorning all falseshame, he demanded to make his confession devoutly before them all, andto fortify himself against death by the comfortable sacrament of the bodyand blood of Christ! Whilst everything is being arranged, the king on asudden rises, of himself, dresses himself, issues, fully clad, from hischamber, to the wonderment of all, advances to meet the body of our LordJesus Christ, and prostrates himself in reverence. Thereupon, in thepresence of all, cleric and laic, he lays aside his kingship, deposeshimself from the government of the state, confesses the sin of havingordered it ill, hands to his son Louis the king's ring, and binds him topromise, on oath, to protect the Church of God, the poor, and the orphan, to respect the rights of everybody, and to keep none prisoner in hiscourt, save such a one as should have actually transgressed in the courtitself. "

This king, so well prepared for death, in his last days found great causefor rejoicing as a father. William VII. , Duke of Aquitaine, had, at hisdeath, intrusted to him the guardianship of his daughter Eleanor, heiressof all his dominions, that is to say, of Poitou, of Saintonge, ofGascony, and of the Basque country, the most beautiful provinces of thesouth-west of France, from the lower Loire to the Pyrenees. A marriagebetween Eleanor and Louis the Young, already sharing his father's throne, was soon concluded; and a brilliant embassy, composed of more than fivehundred lords and noble knights, to whom the king had added his intimateadviser, Suger, set out for Aquitaine, where the ceremony was to takeplace. At the moment of departure the king had them all assembled abouthim, and, addressing himself to his son, said, "May the strong hand ofGod Almighty, by whom kings reign, protect thee, my dear son, both theeand thine! If, by any mischance, I were to lose thee, thee and those Isend with thee, neither my life, nor my kingdom would thenceforth beaught to me. " The marriage took place at Bordeaux, at the end of July, 1137, and, on the 8th of August following, Louis the Young, on his wayback to Paris, was crowned at Poitiers as Duke of Aquitaine. He therelearned that the king, his father, had lately died, on the 1st of August. Louis the Fat was far from foreseeing the deplorable issues of themarriage, which he regarded as one of the blessings of his reign. 

In spite of its long duration of forty-three years, the reign of LouisVII. , called the Young, was a period barren of events and of personsworthy of keeping a place in history. We have already had the story ofthis king's unfortunate crusade from 1147 to 1149, the commencement atAntioch of his imbroglio with his wife, Eleanor of Aquitaine, and thefatal divorce which, in 1152, at the same time that it freed the kingfrom a faithless queen, entailed for France the loss of the beautifulprovinces she had brought him in dowry, and caused them to pass into thepossession of Henry II. , King of England. Here was the only event, underLouis the Young's reign, of any real importance, in view of its long andbloody consequences for his country. A Petty war or a sullen strifebetween the Kings of France and England, petty quarrels of Louis withsome of the great lords of his kingdom, certain rigorous measures againstcertain districts in travail of local liberties, the first bubblings ofthat religious fermentation which resulted before long, in the south ofFrance, in the crusade against the Albigensians--such were the factswhich went to make up with somewhat of insipidity the annals of thisreign. So long as Suger lived, the kingship preserved at home the wisdomwhich it had been accustomed to display, and abroad the respect it hadacquired under Louis the Fat; but at the death of Suger it went onlanguishing and declining, without encountering any great obstacles. Itwas reserved for Louis the Young's son, Philip Augustus, to open forFrance, and for the kingship in France, a new era of strength andprogress. 

Philip II. , to whom history has preserved the name of Philip Augustus, given him by his contemporaries, had shared the crown, been anointed, andtaken to wife Isabel of Hainault, a year before the death of Louis VII. Put him in possession of the kingdom. He was as yet only fifteen, andhis father, by his will, had left him under the guidance of Philip ofAlsace, Count of Flanders, as regent, and of Robert Clement, marshal ofFrance, as governor. But Philip, though he began his reign under thisdouble influence, soon let it be seen that he intended to reign byhimself, and to reign with vigor. "Whatever my vassals do, " said he, during his minority, "I must bear with their violence and outrageousinsults and villanous misdeeds; but, please God, they will get weak andold whilst I shall grow in strength and power, and shall be, in my turn, avenged according to my desire. " He was hardly twenty, when, one day, one of his barons seeing him gnawing, with an air of abstraction anddreaminess, a little green twig, said to his neighbors, "If any one couldtell me what the king is thinking of, I would give him my best horse. "Another of those present boldly asked the King. "I am thinking, "answered Philip, "of a certain matter, and that is, whether God willgrant unto me or unto one of my heirs grace to exalt France to the heightat which she was in the time of Charlemagne. "

It was not granted to Philip Augustus to resuscitate the Frankish empireof Charlemagne, a work impossible for him or any one whatsoever in thetwelfth and thirteenth centuries; but he made the extension andterritorial construction of the kingdom of France the chief aim of hislife, and in that work he was successful. Out of the forty-three yearsof his reign, twenty-six at the least were war-years, devoted to thatvery purpose. During the first six, it was with some of his great Frenchvassals, the Count of Champagne, the Duke of Burgundy, and even the Countof Flanders, sometime regent, that Philip had to do battle, for they allsought to profit by his minority so as to make themselves independent andaggrandize themselves at the expense of the crown; but, once inpossession of the personal power as well as the title of king, it was, from 1187 to 1216, against three successive kings of England, Henry II. , Richard Coeur de Lion, and John Lackland, masters of the most beautifulprovinces of France, that Philip directed his persistent efforts. Theywere in respect of power, of political capacity and military popularity, his most formidable foes. Henry II. , what with his ripeness of age, hisability, energy, and perseverance, without any mean jealousy or puerileobstinacy, had over Philip every advantage of position and experience, and he availed himself thereof with discretion, habitually maintaininghis feudal status of great French vassal as well as that of foreignsovereign, seeking peace rather than strife with his youthful suzerain, and some-times even going to his aid. He thus played off the greaterpart of the undeclared attempts or armed expeditions by which, from 1186to 1189, Philip tried to cut him short in his French possessions, and, so long as Henry IL lived, there were but few changes in the territorialproportions of the two states. But, at Henry's death, Philip foundhimself in a very different position towards Henry's two sons, RichardCoeur de Lion and John Lackland. They were of his own generation; he hadbeen on terms with them, even in opposition to their own father, ofcomplicity and familiarity: they had no authority over him, and he had norespect for them. Richard was the feudal prince, beyond comparison theboldest, the most unreflecting, the most passionate, the most ruffianly, the most heroic adventurer of the middle ages, hungering after movementand action, possessed of a craving spirit for displaying his strength, and doing his pleasure at all times and in all places, not only incontempt of the rights and well-being of his subjects, but at the risk ofhis own safety, his own power, and even of his crown. Philip was of asedate temperament, patient, persevering, moved but little by the spiritof adventure, more ambitious than fiery, capable of far-reaching designs, and discreet at the same time that he was indifferent as to theemployment of means. He had fine sport with Richard. We have alreadyhad the story of the relations between them, and their rupture duringtheir joint crusade in the East. On returning to the West, Philip didnot wrest from King Richard those great and definitive conquests whichwere to restore to France the greater part of the marriage-portion thatwent with Eleanor of Aquitaine; but he paved the way for them by pettyvictories and petty acquisitions, and by making more and more certain hissuperiority over his rival. When, after Richard's death, he had to dowith John Lackland, cowardly and insolent, knavish and addle-pated, choleric, debauched, and indolent, an intriguing subordinate on thethrone on which he made pretence to be the most despotic of kings, Philiphad over him, even more than over his brother Richard, immenseadvantages. He made such use of them that after six years' struggling, from 1199 to 1205, he deprived John of the greater part of his Frenchpossessions, Anjou, Normandy, Touraine, Maine, and Poitou. Philip wouldhave been quite willing to dispense with any legal procedure by way ofsanction to his conquests, but John furnished him with an excellentpretext; for on the 3d of April, 1203, he assassinated with his own hand, in the tower of Rouen, his young nephew Arthur, Duke of Brittany, and inthat capacity vassal of Philip Augustus, to whom he was coming to dohomage. Philip had John, also his vassal, cited before the court of thebarons of France, his peers, to plead his defence of this odious act. "King John, " says the contemporary English historian Matthew Paris, "sentEustace, Bishop of Ely, to tell King Philip that he would willingly go tohis court to answer before his judges, and to show entire obedience inthe matter, but that he must have a safe-conduct. King Philip replied, but with neither heart nor visage unmoved, 'Willingly; let him come inpeace and safety. ' 'And return so too, my lord?' said the bishop. 'Yes, ' rejoined the king, 'if the decision of his peers allow him. 'And when the envoys from England entreated him to grant to the King ofEngland to go and return in safety, the King of France was wroth, andanswered with his usual oath, 'No, by all the saints of France, unlessthe decision tally therewith. ' 'My lord king, ' rejoined the bishop, 'theDuke of Normandy cannot come unless there come also the King of England, since the duke and the king are one and the same person. The baronage ofEngland would never allow it in any way, and if the king were willing, he would run, as you know, risk of imprisonment or death. ' King Philipanswered him, 'How now, my lord bishop? It is well known that myliegeman, the Duke of Normandy, by violence got possession of England. And so, prithee, if a vassal increase in honor and power, shall his lordsuzerain lose his rights? Never!'

"King John was not willing to trust to chance and the decision of theFrench, who liked him not; and he feared above everything to bereproached with the shameful murder of Arthur. The grandees of France, nevertheless, proceeded to a decision, which they could not do lawfully, since he whom they had to try was absent, and would have gone had he beenable. "

The condemnation, not a whit the less, took full effect; and PhilipAugustus thus recovered possession of nearly all the territories whichhis father, Louis VII. , had kept but for a moment. He added, insuccession, other provinces to his dominions; in such wise that thekingdom of France, which was limited, as we have seen, under Louis theFat, to the Ile-de-France and certain portions of Picardy and Orleanness, comprised besides, at the end of the reign of Philip Augustus, Vermandois, Artois, the two Vexins, French and Norman, Berri, Normandy, Maine, Anjou, Poitou, Touraine, and Auvergne. 

In 1206 the territorial work of Philip Augustus was well nigh completed;but his wars were not over. John Lackland, when worsted, kicked againstthe pricks, and was incessantly hankering, in his antagonism to the Kingof France, after hostile alliances and local conspiracies easy to hatchamongst certain feudal lords discontented with their suzerain. John wason intimate terms with his nephew, Otho IV. , Emperor of Germany and thefoe of Philip Augustus, who had supported against him Frederick II. , hisrival for the empire. They prepared in concert for a grand attack uponthe King of France, and they had won over to their coalition some of hismost important vassals, amongst others, Renaud de Dampierre, Count ofBoulogne. Philip determined to divert their attack, whilst anticipatingit, by an unexpected enterprise--the invasion of England itself. Circumstances seemed favorable. King John, by his oppression and hisperfidy, had drawn upon him the hatred and contempt of his people; andthe barons of England, supported and guided by the Archbishop ofCanterbury, Stephen Langton, had commenced against him the struggle whichwas to be ended some years afterwards by the forced concession of MagnaCharta, that foundation-stone of English liberties. John, having beenembroiled for five years past with the court of Rome, affected to defythe excommunication which the pope had hurled at him, and of which theKing of France had been asked by several prelates of the English Churchto insure the efficient working. On the 8th of April, 1213, Philipconvoked, at Soissons, his principal vassals or allies, explained to themthe grounds of his design against the King of England, and, by a sort ofspecial confederation, they bound themselves, all of them, to supporthim. One of the most considerable vassals, however, the sometime regentof France during the minority of Philip, Ferrand, Count of Flanders, didnot attend the meeting to which he had been summoned, and declared hisintention of taking no part in the war against England. "By all thesaints of France, " cried Philip, "either France shall become Flanders, orFlanders France!" And, all the while pressing forward the equipment of alarge fleet collected at Calais for the invasion of England, he enteredFlanders, besieged and took several of the richest cities in the country, Cassel, Ypres, Bruges, and Courtrai, and pitched his camp before thewalls of Ghent, "to lower, " as he said, "the pride of the men of Ghentand make them bend their necks beneath the yoke of kings. " But he heardthat John Lackland, after making his peace with the court of Rome throughacceptance of all the conditions and all the humiliations it had thoughtproper to impose upon him, had just landed at Rochelle, and was excitinga serious insurrection amongst the lords of Saintonge and Poitou. At thesame time Philip's fleet, having been attacked in Calais roads by that ofJohn, had been half destroyed or captured; and the other half had beenforced to take shelter in the harbor of Damme, where it was strictlyblockaded. Philip, forthwith adopting a twofold and energeticresolution, ordered his son Philip to go and put down the insurrection ofthe Poitevines on the banks of the Loire, and himself took in hand thewar in Flanders, which was of the most consequence, considering thequality of the foe and the designs they proclaimed. They had at theirhead the Emperor Otho IV. , who had already won the reputation of a braveand able soldier; and they numbered in their ranks several of thegreatest lords, German, Flemish, and Dutch, and Hugh de Boves, the mostdreaded of those adventurers in the pay of wealthy princes who were knownat that time by the name of roadsters (routiers, mercenaries). Theyproposed, it was said, to dismember France; and a promise to that effecthad been made by the Emperor Otho to his principal chieftains assembledin secret conference. "It is against Philip himself, and him alone, " hehad said to them, "that we must direct all our efforts; it is he who mustbe slain first of all, for it is he alone who opposes us and makeshimself our foe in everything. When he is dead, you will be able tosubdue and divide the kingdom according to our pleasure; as for thee, Renaud, thou shalt take Peronne and all Vermandois; Hugh shall be masterof Beauvais, Salisbury of Dreux, Conrad of Mantes, together with Vexin, and as for thee, Ferranti, thou shalt have Paris. "

The two armies marched over the Low Countries and Flanders, seeking outboth of them the most favorable position for commencing the attack. OnSunday, the 27th of August, 1214, Philip had halted near the bridge ofBouvines, not far from Lille, and was resting under an ash beside a smallchapel dedicated to St. Peter. There came running to him a messenger, sent by Guerin, Bishop of Senlis, his confidant in war as well asgovernment, and brought him word that his rear-guard, attacked by theEmperor Otho, was not sufficient to resist him. Philip went into thechapel, said a short prayer, and cried as he came out, "Haste we forwardto the rescue of our comrades!" Then he put on his armor, mounted hishorse, and made swiftly for the point of attack, amidst the shouts of allthose who were about him, "To arms! to arms!"

[Illustration: BATTLE OF BOUVINES----81]

Both armies numbered in their ranks not only all the feudal chivalry onthe two sides, but burgher-forces, those from the majority of the greatcities of Flanders being for Otho, and those from sixteen towns orcommunes of France for Philip Augustus. It was not, as we have seen, thefirst time that the forces from the French rural districts had taken partin the king's wars; Louis the Fat had often received their aid againstthe tyrannical and turbulent lords of his small kingdom; but since thereign of Louis the Fat the organization and importance of the communeshad made great progress in France; and it was not only rural communes, but considerable cities, such as Amiens, Arras, Beauvais, Compiegne, andSoissons, which sent to the army of Philip Augustus bodies of men inlarge numbers and ready trained to arms. Contemporary historians put thearmy of Otho at one hundred thousand, and that of Philip Augustus at fromfifty to sixty thousand men; but amongst modern historians one of themost eminent, M. Sismondi, reduces them both to some fifteen or twentythousand. One would say that the reduction is as excessive as theoriginal estimate. However that may be, the communal forces evidentlyfilled an important place in the king's army at Bouvines, and maintainedit brilliantly. So soon as Philip had placed himself at the head of thefirst line of his troops, "the men of Soissons, " says William the Breton, who was present at the battle, "being impatient and inflamed by the wordsof Bishop Guerin, let out their horses at the full speed of their legs, and attacked the enemy. But the Flemish knights prick not forward to theencounter, indignant that the first charge against them was not made byknights, as would have been seemly, and remain motionless at their post. The men of Soissons, meanwhile, see no need of dealing softly with themand humoring them, so thrust them roughly, upset them from their horses, slay a many of them, and force them to leave their place or defendthemselves, willy nilly. At last, the Chevalier Eustace, scorning theburghers and proud of his illustrious ancestors, moves out into themiddle of the plain, and with haughty voice, roars, "Death to theFrench!" The battle soon became general and obstinate; it was amultitude of hand-to-hand fights in the midst of a confused melley. In this melley, the knights of the Emperor Otho did not forget theinstructions he had given them before the engagement: they sought out theKing of France himself, to aim their blows at him; and ere long they knewhim by the presence of the royal standard, and made their way almost upto him. The communes, and chiefly those of Corbeil, Amiens, Beauvais, Compiegne, and Arras, thereupon pierced through the battalions of theknights and placed themselves in front of the king, when some Germaninfantry crept up round Philip, and with hooks and light lances threw himdown from his horse; but a small body of knights who had remained by himoverthrew, dispersed, and slew these infantry, and the king, recoveringhimself more quickly than had been expected, leaped upon another horse, and dashed again into the melley. Then danger threatened the EmperorOtho in his turn. The French drove back those about him, and came rightup to him; a sword thrust, delivered with vigor, entered the brain ofOtho's horse; the horse, mortally wounded, reared up and turned his headin the direction whence he had come; and the emperor, thus carried away, showed his back to the French, and was off in full flight. "Ye will seehis face no more to-day, " said Philip to his followers: and he saidtruly. In vain did William des Barres, the first knight of his day instrength, and valor, and renown, dash off in pursuit of the emperor;twice he was on the point of seizing him, but Otho escaped, thanks to theswiftness of his horse and the great number of his German knights, who, whilst their emperor was flying, were fighting to a miracle. But theirbravery saved only their master; the battle of Bouvines was lost for theAnglo-Germano-Flemish coalition. It was still prolonged for severalhours; but in the evening it was over, and the prisoners of note wereconducted to Philip Augustus. There were five counts, Ferrand ofFlanders, Renaud of Boulogne, William of Salisbury, a natural brother ofKing John, Otho of Tecklemburg, and Conrad of Dartmund; and twenty-fivebarons "bearing their own standard to battle. " Philip Augustus sparedall their lives; sent away the Earl of Salisbury to his brother, confinedthe Count of Boulogne at Peronne, where he was subjected "to veryrigorous imprisonment, with chains so short that he could scarce move onestep, " and as for the Count of Flanders, his sometime regent, Philipdragged him in chains in his train, [Illustration: The Battle of Bouvines----81]

It is difficult to determine, from the evidence of contemporaries, whichwas the more rejoiced at and proud of this victory, king or people. "Thesame day, when evening approached, " says William the Breton, "the armyreturned laden with spoils to the camp; and the king, with a heart fullof joy and gratitude, offered a thousand thanksgivings to the SupremeKing, who had vouchsaved to him a triumph over so many enemies. And inorder that posterity might preserve forever a memorial of so great asuccess, the Bishop of Senlis founded, outside the walls of that town, achapel, which he named Victory, and which, endowed with great possessionsand having a government according to canonical rule, enjoyed the honor ofpossessing an abbot and a holy convent. . . . Who can recount, imagine, or set down with a pen, on parchment or tablets, the cheers ofjoy, the hymns of triumph, and the numberless dances of the people; thesweet chants of the clergy; the harmonious sounds of warlike instruments;the solemn decorations of the churches, inside and out; the streets, thehouses, the roads of all the castles and towns, hung with curtains andtapestry of silk and covered with flowers, shrubs and green branches; allthe inhabitants of every sort, sex, and age running from every quarter tosee so grand a triumph; peasants and harvesters breaking off their work, hanging round their necks their sickles and hoes (for it was the seasonof harvest), and throwing themselves in a throng upon the roads to see inirons that Count of Flanders, that Fernand whose arms they had formerlydreaded!"

It was no groundless joy on the part of the people, and a spontaneousinstinct gave them a forecast of the importance of that triumph whichelicited their cheers. The battle of Bouvines was not the victory ofPhilip Augustus, alone, over a coalition of foreign princes; the victorywas the work of king and people, barons, knights, burghers, and peasantsof Ile-de-France, of Orleanness, of Picardy, of Normandy, of Champagne, and of Burgundy. And this union of different classes and differentpopulations in a sentiment, a contest, and a triumph shared in common wasa decisive step in the organization and unity of France. The victory ofBouvines marked the commencement of the time at which men might speak, and indeed did speak, by one single name, of the French. The nation inFrance and the kingship in France on that day rose out of and above thefeudal system. 

Philip Augustus was about the same time apprised of his son Louis'ssuccess on the banks of the Loire. The incapacity and swaggeringinsolence of King John had made all his Poitevine allies disgusted withhim; he had been obliged to abandon his attack upon the King of France inthe provinces, and the insurrection, growing daily more serious, of theEnglish barons and clergy for the purpose of obtaining Magna Charta waspreparing for him other reverses. He had ceased to be a dangerous rivalto Philip. 

No period has had better reason than our own to know how successes andconquests can intoxicate warlike kings; but Philip, whose valor, onoccasion, was second to none, had no actual inclination towards war ortowards conquest for the sole pleasure of extending his dominion. "Liking better, according to his custom, " says William the Breton, "toconquer by peace than by war, " he hasted to put an end by treaties, truces, or contracts to his quarrels with King John, the Count ofFlanders, and the principal lords made prisoners at Bouvines; discretion, in his case, was proof against the temptations of circumstances, or thepromptings of passion, and he took care not to overtly compromise hispower, his responsibility, and the honor of his name by enterprises whichdid not naturally come in his way, or which he considered without chancesof success. Whilst still a youth, he had given, in 1191, a sure proof ofthat self-command which is so rare amongst ambitious princes bywithdrawing from the crusade in which he had been engaged with RichardCoeur de Lion; and it was still more apparent in two great events at thelatter end of his reign--the crusade against the Albigensians and his sonLouis's expedition in England, the crown of which had, in 1215, beenoffered to him by the barons at war with King John in defence of MagnaCharta. 

The organization of the kingdom, the nation, and the kingship in Francewas not the only great event and the only great achievement of thatepoch. At the same time that this political movement was going on in theState, a religious and intellectual ferment was making head in the Churchand in men's minds. After the conquest of the Gauls by the Franks, theChristian clergy, sole depositaries of all lights to lighten their age, and sole possessors of any idea of opposing the conquerors with argumentsother than those of brute force, or of employing towards the vanquishedany instrument of subjection other than violence, became the connectinglink between the nation of the conquerors and the nation of theconquered, and, in the name of one and the same divine law, enjoinedobedience on the subjects, and, in the case of the masters, moderated thetransports of power. But in the course of this active and salutaryparticipation in the affairs of the world, the Christian clergy lostsomewhat of their primitive and proper character; religion in their handswas a means of power as well as of civilization; and its principalmembers became rich, and frequently substituted material weapons for thespiritual authority which had originally been their only reliance. Whenthey were in a condition to hold their own against powerful laymen, theyfrequently adopted the powerful laymen's morals and shared theirignorance; and in the seventh and eighth centuries the barbarism whichheld the world in its clutches had made inroads upon the Church. Charlemagne essayed to resuscitate dying civilization, and sought amongstthe clergy his chief means of success; he founded schools, filled themwith students to whom promises of ecclesiastical preferments were heldout as rewards of their merit, and, in fine, exerted himself with all hismight to restore to the Christian Church her dignity and her influence. When Charlemagne was dead, nearly all his great achievements disappearedin the chaos which came after him; his schools alone survived andpreserved certain centres of intellectual activity. When the feudalsystem had become established, and had introduced some rule into socialrelations, when the fate of mankind appeared no longer entirely left tothe risks of force, intellect once more found some sort of employment, and once more assumed some sort of sway. Active and educated minds oncemore began to watch with some sort of independence the social factsbefore their eyes, to stigmatize vices and to seek for remedies. Thespectacle afforded by their age could not fail to strike them. Society, after having made some few strides away from physical chaos, seemed indanger of falling into moral chaos; morals had sunk far below the laws, and religion was in deplorable contrast to morals. It was not laymenonly who abandoned themselves with impunity to every excess of violenceand licentiousness; scandals were frequent amongst the clergy themselves;bishoprics and other ecclesiastical benefices, publicly sold or left bywill, passed down through families from father to son, and from husbandto wife, and the possessions of the Church served for dowry to thedaughters of bishops. Absolution was at a low quotation in the market, and redemption for sins of the greatest enormity cost scarcely the priceof founding a church or a monastery. Horror-stricken at the sight ofsuch corruption in the only things they at that time recognized as holy, men no longer knew where to find the rule of life or the safeguard ofconscience. But it is the peculiar and glorious characteristic ofChristianity that it is unable to bear for long, without making an effortto check them, the vices it has been unable to prevent, and that italways carries in its womb the vigorous germ of human regeneration. Inthe midst of their irregularities, the eleventh and twelfth centuries sawthe outbreak of a grand religious, moral, and intellectual fermentation, and it was the Church herself that had the honor and the power of takingthe initiative in the reformation. Under the influence of Gregory VII. The rigor of the popes began to declare itself against the scandals ofthe episcopate, the traffic in ecclesiastical benefices, and the badmorals of the secular clergy. At the same time, austere men exertedthemselves to rekindle the fervor of monastic life, re-established rigidrules in the cloister, and refilled the monasteries by their preachingand example. St. Robert of Moleme founded the order of Citeaux; St. Norbert that of Premontre; St. Bernard detached Clairvaux from Meaux, which he considered too worldly; St. Bruno built Chartreuse; St. Hugo, St. Gerard, and others besides gave the Abbey of Cluni its renown; andecclesiastical reform extended everywhere. Hereupon rich and powerfullaymen, filled with ardor for their faith or fear for their eternalwelfare, went seeking after solitude, and devoted themselves to prayer inthe monasteries they had founded or enriched with their wealth; wholefamilies were dispersed amongst various religious houses; and all theseverities of penance hardly sufficed to quiet imaginations scared at theperils of living in the world or at the vices of their age. And, at thesame time, in addition to this outburst of piety, ignorance was decriedand stigmatized as the source of the prevailing evils; the function ofteaching was included amongst the duties of the religious estate; andevery newly-founded or reformed monastery became a school in which pupilsof all conditions were gratuitously instructed in the sciences known bythe name of liberal arts. Bold spirits began to use the rights ofindividual thought in opposition to the authority of establisheddoctrines; and others, without dreaming of opposing, strove at any rateto understand, which is the way to produce discussion. Activity andfreedom of thought were receiving development at the same time thatfervent faith and fervent piety were. 

This great moral movement of humanity in the eleventh and twelfthcenturies arose from events very different in different parts of thebeautiful country which was not yet, but was from that time forwardtending to become, France. Amongst these events, which cannot be hererecounted in detail, we will fix upon two, which were the most striking, and the most productive of important consequences in the whole history ofthe epoch, the quarrel of Abelard with St. Bernard and the crusadeagainst the Albigensians. We shall there see how Northern France andSouthern France differed one from the other before the bloody crisiswhich was to unite them in one single name and one common destiny. 

In France properly so called at that time, north of the Rhone and theLoire, the church had herself accomplished the chief part of the reformswhich had become necessary. It was there that the most active and mosteloquent of the reforming monks had appeared, had preached, and hadfounded or regenerated a great number of monasteries. It was there that, at first amongst the clergy, and then, through their example, amongst thelaity, Christian discipline and morals had resumed some sway. There, too, the Christian faith and church were, amongst the mass of thepopulation, but little or not at all assailed; heretics, when anyappeared, obtained support neither from princes nor people; they wereproceeded against, condemned, and burned, without their exciting publicsympathy by their presence, or public commiseration by their punishment. It was in the very midst of the clergy themselves, amongst literates andteachers, that, in Northern France, the intellectual and innovatingmovement of the period was manifested and concentrated. The movement wasvigorous and earnest, and it was a really studious host which thronged tothe lessons of Abelard at Paris, on Mount St. Genevieve, at Melun, atCorbeil, and at the Paraclete; but this host contained but few of thepeople; the greater part of those who formed it were either already inthe church, or soon, in various capacities, about to be. And thediscussions raised at the meetings corresponded with the personsattending them; there was the disputation of the schools; there was nofounding of sects; the lessons of Abelard and the questions he handledwere scientifico-religious; it was to expound and propagate what theyregarded as the philosophy of Christianity, that masters and pupils madebold use of the freedom of thought; they made but slight war upon theexisting practical abuses of the church; they differed from her in theinterpretation and comments contained in some of her dogmas; and theyconsidered themselves in a position to explain and confirm faith byreason. The chiefs of the church, with St. Bernard at their head, werenot slow to descry, in these interpretations and comments based uponscience, danger to the simple and pure faith of the Christian; they sawthe apparition of dawning rationalism confronting orthodoxy. They were, as all their contemporaries were, wholly strangers to the bare notion offreedom of thought and conscience, and they began a zealous struggleagainst the new teachers; but they did not push it to the last cruelextremities. They had many a handle against Abelard: his private life, the scandal of his connection with Heloise, the restless and haughtyfickleness of his character, laid him open to severe strictures; but hisstern adversaries did not take so much advantage of them as they mighthave taken. They had his doctrines condemned at the councils of Soissonsand Sens; they prohibited him from public lecturing; and they imposedupon him the seclusion of the cloister; but they did not even harbor thenotion of having him burned as a heretic, and science and glory wererespected in his person, even when his ideas were proscribed. Peter theVenerable, Abbot of Cluni, one of the most highly considered and honoredprelates of the church, received him amongst his own monks, and treatedhim with paternal kindness, taking care of his health, as well as of hiseternal welfare; and he who was the adversary of St. Bernard and theteacher condemned by the councils of Soissons and Sens, died peacefully, on the 21st of April, 1142, in the abbey of St. Marcellus, nearChalon-sur-Saone, after having received the sacraments with much piety, and in presence of all the brethren of the monastery. "Thus, " wrotePeter the Venerable to Heloise, abbess for eleven years past of theParaclete, "the man who, by his singular authority in science, was knownto nearly all the world, and was illustrious wherever he was known, learned, in the school of Him who said, 'Know that I am meek and lowly ofheart, ' to remain meek and lowly; and, as it is but right to believe, hehas thus returned to Him. "

The struggle of Abelard with the Church of Northern France and thecrusade against the Albigensians in Southern France are divided by muchmore than diversity and contrast; there is an abyss between them. Intheir religious condition, and in the nature as well as degree of theircivilization, the populations of the two regions were radicallydifferent. In the north-east, between the Rhine, the Scheldt, and theLoire, Christianity had been obliged to deal with little more than thebarbarism and ignorance of the German conquerors. In the south, on thetwo banks of the Rhone and the Garonne, along the Mediterranean, and bythe Pyrenees, it had encountered all manner of institutions, traditions, religions, and disbeliefs, Greek, Roman, African, Oriental, Pagan, andMussulman; the frequent invasions and long stay of the Saracens in thosecountries had mingled Arab blood with the Gallic, Roman, Asiatic, andVisigothic, and this mixture of so many different races, tongues, creeds, and ideas had resulted in a civilization more developed, more elegant, more humane, and more liberal, but far less coherent, simple, and strong, morally as well as politically, than the warlike, feudal civilization ofGermanic France. In the religious order especially, the dissimilaritywas profound. In Northern France, in spite of internal disorder, andthrough the influence of its bishops, missionaries, and monasticreformers, the orthodox Church had obtained a decided superiority andfull dominion; but in Southern France, on the contrary, all thecontroversies, all the sects, and all the mystical or philosophicalheresies which had disturbed Christendom from the second century to theninth, had crept in and spread abroad. In it there were Arians, Manicheans, Gnostics, Paulicians, Cathars (the pure), and other sects ofmore local or more recent origin and name, Albigensians, Vaudians, GoodPeople and Poor of Lyons, some piously possessed with the desire ofreturning to the pure faith and fraternal organization of the primitiveevangelical Church, others given over to the extravagances of imaginationor asceticism. The princes and the great laic lords of the country, theCounts of Toulouse, Foix, and Comminges, the Viscount of Beziers, andmany others had not remained unaffected by this condition of the people:the majority were accused of tolerating and even protecting the heretics;and some were suspected of allowing their ideas to penetrate within theirown households. The bold sallies of the critical and jeering spirit, andthe abandonment of established creeds and discipline, bring about, beforelong, a relaxation of morals; and liberty requires long time and manytrials before it learns to disavow and rise superior to license. In manyof the feudal courts and castles of Languedoc, Provence, and Aquitaine, imaginations, words, and lives were licentious; and the charming poetryof the troubadours and the gallant adventures of knights caused it to betoo easily forgotten that morality was but little more regarded than thefaith. Dating from the latter half of the eleventh century, not only thepopes, but the whole orthodox Church of France and its spiritual heads, were seriously disquieted at the state of mind of Southern France, andthe dangers it threatened to the whole of Christendom. In 1145St. Bernard, in all the lustre of his name and influence, undertook, inconcert with Cardinal Alberic, legate of the Pope Eugenius III. , to goand preach against the heretics in the countship of Toulouse. "We seehere, " he wrote to Alphonse Jourdain, Count of Toulouse, "churcheswithout flocks, flocks without priests, priests without the respect whichis their due, and Christians without Christ; men die in their sinswithout being reconciled by penance or admitted to the holy communion;souls are sent pell-mell before the awful tribunal of God; the grace ofbaptism is refused to little children; those to whom the Lord said, 'Suffer little children to come unto Me, ' do not obtain the means ofcoming to salvation. Is it because of a belief that these littlechildren have no need of the Saviour, inasmuch as they are little? Is itthen for nought that our Lord from being great became little? What sayI? Is it then for nought that He was scourged and spat upon, crucifiedand dead?" St. Bernard preached with great success in Toulouse itself, but he was not satisfied with easy successes. He had come to fight theheretics; and he went to look for them where he was told he would findthem numerous and powerful. "He repaired, " says a contemporarychronicler, "to the castle of Vertfeuil (or Verfeil, in the district ofToulouse), where flourished at that time the scions of a numerousnobility and of a multitude of people, thinking that, if he couldextinguish heretical perversity in this place where it was so very muchspread, it would be easy for him to make head against it elsewhere. Whenhe had begun preaching, in the church, against those who were of mostconsideration in the place, they went out, and the people followed them;but the holy man, going out after them, gave utterance to the word of Godin the public streets. The nobles then hid themselves on all sides intheir houses; and as for him, he continued to preach to the common peoplewho came about him. Whereupon, the others making uproar and knockingupon the doors, so that the crowd could not hear his voice, he then, having shaken off the dust from his feet as a testimony against them, departed from their midst, and, looking on the town, cursed it, saying, 'Vertfeuil, God wither thee!' Now there were, at that time, in thecastle, a hundred knights abiding, having arms, banners, and horses, andkeeping themselves at their own expense, not at the expense of other. "

After the not very effectual mission of St. Bernard, who died in 1153, and for half a century, the orthodox Church was several times occupiedwith the heretics of Southern France, who were before long calledAlbigensians, either because they were numerous in the diocese of Albi, or because the council of Lombers, one of the first at which theircondemnation was expressly pronounced (in 1165), was held in thatdiocese. But the measures adopted at that time against them were atfirst feebly executed, and had but little effect. The new ideas spreadmore and more; and in 1167 the innovators themselves held, atSt. Felix-de-Caraman, a petty council, at which they appointed bishopsfor districts where they had numerous partisans. Raymond VI. , who, in1195, succeeded his father, Raymond V. , as Count of Toulouse, wassupposed to be favorably disposed towards them; he admitted them tointimacy with him, and, it was said, allowed himself, in respect of theorthodox Church, great liberty of thought and speech. Meanwhile thegreat days and the chief actors in the struggle commenced by St. Bernardwere approaching. In 1198, Lothaire Conti, a pupil of the University ofParis, was elected pope, with the title of Innocent III. ; and, four orfive years later, Simon, Count of Montfort l'Amaury, came back from thefifth crusade in the East, with a celebrity already established by hisvalor and his zeal against the infidels. Innocent III. , no unworthyrival of Gregory VII. , his late predecessor in the Holy See, had the samegrandeur of ideas and the same fixity of purpose, with less headiness inhis character, and more knowledge of the world, and more of the spirit ofpolicy. He looked upon the whole of Christendom as his kingdom, and uponhimself as the king whose business it was to make prevalent everywherethe law of God. Simon, as Count of Montfort l'Amaury, was not a powerfullord; but he was descended, it was said, from a natural son of KingRobert his mother, who was English, had left him heir to the earldom ofLeicester, and he had for his wife Alice de Montmorency. His socialstatus and his personal renown, superior as they were to his worldlyfortunes, authorized in his case any flight of ambition; and in the Easthe had learned to believe that anything was allowed to him in the serviceof the Christian faith. Innocent III. , on receiving the tiara, set towork at once upon the government of Christendom. Simon de Montfort, onreturning from Palestine, did not dream of the new crusade to which hewas soon to be summoned, and for which he was so well prepared. 

Innocent III. At first employed against the heretics of Southern Franceonly spiritual and legitimate weapons. Before proscribing, he tried toconvert them; he sent to them a great number of missionaries, nearly alltaken from the order of Citeaux, and of proved zeal already; many amongstthem had successively the title and power of legates; and they wentpreaching throughout the whole country, communicating with the princesand laic lords, whom they requested to drive away the heretics from theirdomains, and holding with the heretics themselves conferences whichfrequently drew a numerous attendance. A knight "full of sagacity, "according to a contemporary chronicler, "Pons d'Adhemar, of Rodelle, saidone day to Foulques, Bishop of Toulouse, one of the most zealous of thepope's delegates, 'We could not have believed that Rome had so manypowerful arguments against these folk here. ' 'See you not, ' said thebishop, 'how little force there is in their objections?' 'Certainly, 'answered the knight. 'Why, then, do you not expel them from your lands?''We cannot, ' answered Pons; 'we have been brought up with them; we haveamongst them folk near and dear to us, and we see them living honestly. '"Some of the legates, wearied at the little effect of their preaching, showed an inclination to give up their mission. Peter de Castelnauhimself, the most zealous of all, and destined before long to pay for hiszeal with his life, wrote to the pope to beg for permission to return tohis monastery. Two Spanish priests, Diego Azebes, Bishop of Osma, andhis sub-prior Dominic, falling in with the Roman legates at Montpellier, heard them express their disgust. "Give up, " said they to the legates, "your retinue, your horses, and your goings in state; proceed in allhumility, afoot and barefoot, without gold or silver, living and teachingafter the example of the Divine Master. " "We dare not take on ourselvessuch things, " answered the pope's agents; "they would seem sort ofinnovation; but if some person of sufficient authority consent to precedeus in such guise, we would follow him readily. " The Bishop of Osma sentaway his retinue to Spain, and kept with him only his companion Dominic;and they, taking with them two of the monks of Citeaux, Peter deCastelnau and Raoul, --the most fervent of the delegates from Rome, --beganthat course of austerity and of preaching amongst the people which wasultimately to make of the sub-prior Dominic a saint and the founder of agreat religious order, to which has often, but wrongly, been attributedthe origin, though it certainly became the principal agent, of theInquisition. Whilst joining in humble and pious energy with the twoSpanish priests, the two monks of Citeaux, and Peter de Castelnauespecially, did not cease to urge amongst the laic princes theextirpation of the heretics. In 1205 they repaired to Toulouse to demandof Raymond VI. A formal promise, which indeed they obtained; but Raymondwas one of those undecided and feeble characters who dare not refuse topromise what they dare not attempt to do. He wished to live in peacewith the orthodox Church without behaving cruelly to a large number ofhis subjects. The fanatical legate, Peter de Castelnau, enraged at histergiversation, instantly excommunicated him; and the pope sent the counta threatening letter, giving him therein to understand that in case ofneed stronger measures would be adopted against him. Raymond, affrighted, prevailed on the two legates to repair to St. Gilles, and hethere renewed his promises to them; but he always sought for and found onthe morrow some excuse for retarding the execution of them. The legates, after having reproached him vehemently, determined to leave St. Gilleswithout further delay, and the day after their departure (January 15th, 1208), as they were getting ready to cross the Rhone, two strangers, whohad lodged the night before in the same hostelry with them, drew near, and one of the two gave Peter de Castelnau a lance-thrust with suchforce, that the legate, after exclaiming, "God forgive thee, as I do!"had only time to give his comrade his last instructions, and thenexpired. 

Great was the emotion in France and at Rome. It was barely thirty yearssince in England, after an outburst of passion on the part of King HenryII. , four knights of his court had murdered the Archbishop Thomas-a-Becket in Canterbury Cathedral. Was the Count of Toulouse, too, guiltyof having instigated the shedding of blood and the murder of a prelate?Such was, in the thirteenth century, the general cry throughout theCatholic Church and the signal for war against Raymond VI. ; a warundertaken on the plea of a personal crime, but in reality for theextirpation of heresy in Southern France, and for the dispossession ofthe native princes, who would not fully obey the decrees of the papacy, in favor of foreign conquerors who would put them into execution. Thecrusade against the Albigensians was the most striking application of twoprinciples equally false and fatal, which did more than as much evil tothe Catholics as to the heretics, and to the papacy as to freedom; andthey are, the right of the spiritual power to claim for the coercion ofsouls the material force of the temporal powers, and its right to striptemporal sovereigns, in case they set at nought its injunctions, of theirtitle to the obedience of their people; in other words, denial ofreligious liberty to conscience and of political independence to states. It was by virtue of these two principles, at that time dominant, but notwithout some opposition, in Christendom, that Innocent III. , in 1208, summoned the King of France, the great lords and the knights, and theclergy, secular and regular, of the kingdom to assume the cross and goforth to extirpate from Southern France the Albigensians, "worse than theSaracens;" and that he promised to the chiefs of the crusaders thesovereignty of such domains as they should win by conquest from theprinces who were heretics or protectors of heretics. 

Throughout all France, and even outside of France, the passions ofreligion and ambition were aroused at this summons. 

Twelve abbots and twenty monks of Citeaux dispersed themselves in alldirections preaching the crusade; and lords and knights, burghers andpeasants, laymen and clergy, hastened to respond. "From near and farthey came, " says the contemporary poet-chronicler, William of Tudela;"there be men from Auvergne and Burgundy, France and Limousin; there bemen from all the world; there be Germans, Poitevines, Gascons, Rouergats, and Saintongese. Never did God make scribe who, whatsoever his pains, could set them all down in writing, in two months or in three. " The poetreckons "twenty thousand horsemen armed at all points, and more than twohundred thousand villeins and peasants, not to speak of burghers andclergy. " A less exaggerative though more fanatical writer, Peter ofVaulx-Cernay, the chief contemporary chronicler of this crusade, contentshimself with saying that, at the siege of Carcassonne, one of the firstoperations of the crusaders, "it was said that their army numbered fiftythousand men. " Whatever may be the truth about the numbers, thecrusaders were passionately ardent and persevering: the war against theAlbigensians lasted fifteen years (from 1208 to 1223), and of the twoleading spirits, one ordering and the other executing, Pope Innocent III. And Simon de Montfort, neither saw the end of it. During these fifteenyears, in the region situated between the Rhone, the Pyrenees, theGaronne, and even the Dordogne, nearly all the towns and strong castles, Beziers, Carcassonne, Castelnaudary, Lavaur, Gaillac, Moissae, Minerve, Termes, Toulouse, &c. , were taken, lost, retaken, given over to pillage, sack, and massacre, and burnt by the crusaders with all the cruelty offanatics and all the greed of conquerors. We do not care to dwell herein detail upon this tragical and monotonous history; we will simplyrecall some few of its characteristics. Doubt has been thrown upon theanswer attributed to Arnauld-Amaury, Abbot of Citeaux, when he was asked, in 1209, by the conquerors of Beziers, how, at the assault of the city, they should distinguish the heretics from the faithful: "Slay them all;God will be sure to know His own. " The doubt is more charitable thanreasonable; for it is a contemporary, himself a monk of Citeaux, whoreports, without any comment, this hateful speech. Simon de Montfort, the hero of the crusade, employed similar language. One day twoheretics, taken at Castres, were brought before him; one of them wasunshakable in his belief, the other expressed a readiness to turnconvert: "Burn them both, " said the count; "if this fellow mean what hesays, the fire will serve for expiation of his sins, and, if he lie, hewill suffer the penalty for his imposture. " At the siege of the castleof Lavaur, in 1211, Amaury, Lord of Montr6al, and eighty knights, hadbeen made prisoners: and "the noble Count Simon, " says Peter of Vaulx-Cernay, decided to hang them all on one gibbet; but when Amaury, the mostdistinguished amongst them, had been hanged, the gallows-poles, which, from too great haste, had not been firmly fixed in the ground, havingcome down, the count, perceiving how great was the delay, ordered therest to be slain. The pilgrims therefore fell upon them right eagerlyand slew them on the spot. Further, the count caused stones to be heapedupon the lady of the castle, Amaury's sister, a very wicked heretic, whohad been cast into a well. Finally our crusaders, with extreme alacrity, burned heretics without number. "

In the midst of these atrocious unbridlements of passions supposed to bereligious, other passions were not slow to make their appearance. Innocent III. Had promised the crusaders the sovereignty of the domainsthey might win by conquest from princes who were heretics or protectorsof heretics. After the capture, in 1209, of Beziers and Carcassonne, possessions of Raymond Roger, Viscount of Albi, and nephew of the Countof Toulouse, the Abbot of Citeaux, a legate of the pope, assembled theprincipal chiefs of the crusaders that they might choose one amongst themas lord and governor of their conquests. The offer was made, successively, to Eudes, Duke of Burgundy, to Peter de Courtenay, Count ofNevers, and to Walter de Chatilion, Count of St. Paul; but they all threedeclined, saying that they had sufficient domains of their own withoutusurping those of the Viscount of Beziers, to whom, in their opinion, they had already caused enough loss. The legate, somewhat embarrassed, it is said, proposed to appoint two bishops and four knights, who, inconcert with him, should choose a new master for the conqueredterritories. The proposal was agreed to, and, after some moments ofhesitation, Simon de Montfort, being elected by this committee, acceptedthe proffered domains, and took imdiate possession of them on publicationof a charter conceived as follows: "Simon, Lord of Montfort, Earl ofLeicester, Viscount of Beziers and Carcassonne. The Lord havingdelivered into my hands the lands of the heretics, an unbelieving people, that is to say, whatsoever He hath thought fit to take from them by thehand of the crusaders, His servants, I have accepted humbly and devoutlythis charge and administration, with confidence in His aid. " The popewrote to him forthwith to confirm him in hereditary possession of his newdominions, at the same time expressing to him a hope that, in concertwith the legates, he would continue to carry out the extirpation of theheretics. The dispossessed Viscount, Raymond Roger, having been put inprison by his conqueror in a tower of Carcassonne itself, died there atthe end of three months, of disease according to some, and a violentdeath according to others; but the latter appears to be a groundlesssuspicion, for it was not to cowardly and secret crimes that Simon deMontfort was inclined. 

From this time forth the war in Southern France changed character, or, rather, it assumed a double character; with the war of religion wasopenly joined a war of conquest; it was no longer merely against theAlbigensians and their heresies, it was against the native princes ofSouthern France and their domains that the crusade was prosecuted. Simonde Montfort was eminently qualified to direct and accomplish this twofolddesign: sincerely fanatical and passionately ambitious; of a valor thatknew no fatigue; handsome and strong; combining tact with authority;pitiless towards his enemies as became his mission of doing justice inthe name of the faith and the Church; a leader faithful to his friendsand devoted to their common cause whilst reckoning upon them for his ownprivate purposes, he possessed those natural qualities which conferspontaneous empire over men and those abilities which lure them on byopening a way for the fulfilment of their interested hopes. And as forhimself, by the stealthy growth of selfishness, which is so prone tobecome developed when circumstances are tempting, he every day made hispersonal fortunes of greater and greater account in his views and hisconduct. His ambitious appetite grew by the very difficulties itencountered as well as by the successes it fed upon. The Count ofToulouse, persecuted and despoiled, complained loudly in the ears of thepope; protested against the charge of favoring the heretics; offered andactually made the concessions demanded by Rome; and, as security, gave upseven of his principal strongholds. But, being ever too irresolute andtoo weak to keep his engagements to his subjects' detriment no less thanto stand out against his adversaries' requirements, he was continuallyfalling back into the same condition, and keeping off attacks which weremore and more urgent by promises which always remained without effect. After having sent to Rome embassy upon embassy with explanations andexcuses, he twice went thither himself, in 1210 and in 1215; the firsttime alone, the second with his young son, who was then thirteen, and whowas at a later period Raymond VII. He appealed to the pope's sense ofjustice; he repudiated the stories and depicted the violence of hisenemies; and finally pleaded the rights of his son, innocent of all thatwas imputed to himself, and yet similarly attacked and despoiled. Innocent III. Had neither a narrow mind nor an unfeeling heart; helistened to the father's pleading, took an interest in the youth, andwrote, in April, 1212, and January, 1213, to his legates in Languedoc andto Simon de Montfort, "After having led the army of the crusaders intothe domains of the Count of Toulouse, ye have not been content withinvading all the places wherein there were heretics, but ye have furthergotten possession of those where-in there was no suspicion of heresy. . . . The same ambassadors have objected to us that ye have usurpedwhat was another's with so much greed and so little consideration that ofall the domains of the Count of Toulouse there remains to him barely thetown of that name, together with the castle of Montauban. . . . Now, though the said count has been found guilty of many matters against Godand against the Church, and our legates, in order to force him toacknowledgment thereof, have excommunicated his person, and have left hisdomains to the first captor, nevertheless, he has not yet been condemnedas a heretic nor as an accomplice in the death of Peter de Castelnau, ofsacred memory, albeit he is strongly suspected thereof. That is why wedid ordain that, if there should appear against him a proper accuser, within a certain time, there should be appointed him a day for clearinghimself, according to the form pointed out in our letters, reserving toourselves the delivery of a definitive sentence thereupon: in all whichthe procedure hath not been according to our orders. We wot not, therefore, on what ground we could yet grant to others his dominionswhich have not been taken away either from him or from his heirs; and, above all, we would not appear to have fraudulently extorted from him thecastles he hath committed to us, the will of the Apostle being that weshould refrain from even the appearance of wrong. "

But Innocent III. Forgot that, in the case of either temporal orspiritual sovereigns, when there has once been an appeal to force, thereis no stopping, at pleasure and within specified limits, the movementthat has been set going and the agents which have the work in hand. Hehad decreed war against the princes who were heretics or protectors ofheretics; and he had promised their domains to their conquerors. Hemeant to reserve to himself the right of pronouncing definitive judgmentas to the condemnation of princes as heretics, and as to dispossessingthem of their dominions; but when force had done its business on the veryspot, when the condemnation of the princes as heretics had beenpronounced by the pope's legates and their bodily dispossession effectedby his laic allies, the reserves and regrets of Innocent III. Were vain. He had proclaimed two principles--the bodily extirpation of the hereticsand the political dethronement of the princes who were their accomplicesor protectors; but the application of the principles slipped out of hisown hands. Three local councils assembled in 1210, 1212, and 1213, atSt. Gilles, at Arles, and at Lavaur, and presided over by the pope'slegates, proclaimed the excommunication of Raymond VI. , and the cessionof his dominions to Simon de Montfort, who took possession of them forhimself and his comrades. Nor were the pope's legates without theirshare in the conquest; Arnauld Amaury, Abbot of Citeaux, becameArchbishop of Narbonne; and Abbot Foulques of Marseilles, celebrated inhis youth as a gallant troubadour, was Bishop of Toulouse and the mostardent of the crusaders. When these conquerors heard that the pope hadgiven a kind reception to Raymond VI. And his young son, and lent afavorable ear to their complaints, they sent haughty warnings to InnocentIII. , giving him to understand that the work was all over, and that, ifhe meddled, Simon de Montfort and his warriors might probably not bow tohis decisions. Don Pedro II. , king of Aragon, had strongly supportedbefore Innocent III. The claims of the Count of Toulouse and of thesouthern princes his allies. "He cajoled the lord pope, " says theprejudiced chronicler of these events, the monk Peter of Vaulx-Cernay, "so far as to persuade him that the cause of the faith was achievedagainst the heretics, they being put to distant flight and completelydriven from the Albigensian country, and that accordingly it wasnecessary for him to revoke altogether the indulgence be had granted tothe crusaders. . . . The sovereign pontiff, too credulously listeningto the perfidious suggestions of the said king, readily assented to hisdemands, and wrote to the Count of Montfort, with orders and commands torestore without delay to the Counts of Comminges and of Foix, and toGaston of Beam, very wicked and abandoned people, the lands which, byjust judgment of God and by the aid of the crusaders, he at last hadconquered. " But, in spite of his desire to do justice, Innocent III. , studying policy rather than moderation, did not care to enter upon astruggle against the agents, ecclesiastical and laic, whom he had letloose upon Southern France. In November, 1215, the fourth Laterancouncil met at Rome; and the Count of Toulouse, his son, and the Count ofFoix brought their claims before it. "It is quite true, " says Peter ofVaulx-Cernay, "that they found there--and, what is worse, amongst theprelates--certain folk who opposed the cause of the faith, and laboredfor the restoration of the said counts; but the counsel of Ahitophel didnot prevail, for the lord pope, in agreement with the greater and sanerpart of the council, decreed that the city of Toulouse and otherterritories conquered by the crusaders should be ceded to the Count ofMontfort, who, more than any other, had borne himself right valiantly andloyally in the holy enterprise; and, as for the domains which CountRaymond possessed in Provence, the sovereign pontiff decided that theyshould be reserved to him, in order to make provision, either with partor even the whole, for the son of this count, provided always that, bysure signs of fealty and good behavior, he should show himself worthy ofcompassion. "

This last inclination towards compassion on the part of the pope in favorof the young Count Raymond, "provided he showed himself worthy of it, "remained as fruitless as the remonstrances addressed to his legates; foron the 17th of July, 1216, seven months after the Lateran council, Innocent III. Died, leaving Simon de Montfort and his comrades inpossession of all they had taken, and the war still raging between thenative princes of Southern France and the foreign conquerors. Theprimitive, religious character of the crusade wore off more and more;worldly ambition and the spirit of conquest became more and morepredominant; and the question lay far less between catholics and hereticsthan between the old and new masters of the country, between theindependence of the southern people and the triumph of warriors comefrom the north of France, that is to say, between two different races, civilizations, and languages. Raymond VI. And his son recoveredthenceforth certain supports and opportunities of which hitherto theaccusation of heresy and the judgments of the court of Rome had robbedthem; their neighboring allies and their secret or intimidated partisanstook fresh courage; the fortune of battle became shifty; successes andreverses were shared by both sides; and not only many small places andcastles, but the largest towns, Toulouse amongst others, fell into thehands of each party alternately. Innocent III. 's successor in the HolySee, Pope Honorius III. , though at first very pronounced in hisopposition to the Albigensians, had less ability, less perseverance, andless influence than his predecessor. Finally, on the 20th of June, 1218, Simon de Montfort, who had been for nine months unsuccessfully besiegingToulouse, which had again come into the possession of Raymond VI. , waskilled by a shower of stones, under the walls of the place, and left tohis son Amaury the inheritance of his war and his conquests, but not ofhis vigorous genius and his warlike renown. 

[Illustration: Death of De Montfort----104]

The struggle still dragged on for five years with varied fortune on eachside, but Amaury de Montfort was losing ground every day, and RaymondVI. , when he died in August, 1222, had recovered the greater part of hisdominions. His son, Raymond VII. , continued the war for eighteen monthslonger, with enough of popular favor and of success to make his enemiesdespair of recovering their advantages; and, on the 14th of January, 1224, Amaury de Montfort, after having concluded with the Counts ofToulouse and Foix a treaty which seemed to have only a provisionalcharacter, "went forth, " says the History of Languedoc, "with all theFrench from Carcassonne, and left forever the country which his house hadpossessed for nearly fourteen years. " Scarcely had he arrived at thecourt of Louis VIII. , who had just succeeded his father, Philip Augustus, when he ceded to the King of France his rights over the domains which thecrusaders had conquered by a deed conceived in these terms: "Know that wegive up to our Lord Louis, the illustrious King of the French, and to hisheirs forever, to dispose of according to their pleasure, all theprivileges and gifts that the Roman Church did grant unto our fatherSimon of pious memory, in respect of the countship of Toulouse and otherdistricts in Albigeois; supposing that the pope do accomplish all thedemands made to him by the king through the Archbishop of Bourges, andthe Bishops of Langres and Chartres; else, be it known for certain thatwe cede not to any one aught of all these domains. "

Whilst this cruel war lasted Philip Augustus would not take any part init. Not that he had any leaning towards the Albigensian heretics on thescore of creed or religious liberty; but his sense of justice andmoderation was shocked at the violence employed against them, and hehad a repugnance to the idea of taking part in the devastation of thebeautiful southern provinces. He took it ill, moreover, that the popeshould arrogate to himself the right of despoiling of their dominions, onthe ground of heresy, princes who were vassals of the King of France;and, without offering any formal opposition, he had no mind to give hisassent thereto. When Innocent III. Called upon him to co-operate in thecrusade, Philip answered, "that he had at his flanks two huge andterrible lions, the Emperor Otho, and King John of England, who wereworking with all their might to bring trouble upon the kingdom of France;that, consequently, he had no inclination at all to leave France, or evento send his son; but it seemed to him enough, for the present, if heallowed his barons to march against the disturbers of peace and of thefaith in the province of Narbonne. " In 1213, when Simon de Montfort hadgained the battle of Muret, Philip allowed Prince Louis to go and look onwhen possession was taken of Toulouse by the crusaders; but when Louiscame back and reported to his father, "in the presence of the princes andbarons who were, for the most part, relatives and allies of CountRaymond, the great havoc committed by Count Simon in the city aftersurrender, the king withdrew to his apartments without any ado beyondsaying to those present, 'Sirs, I have yet hope that before very longCount de Montfort and his brother Guy will die at their work, for God isjust, and will suffer these counts to perish thereat, because theirquarrel is unjust. '" Nevertheless, at a little later period, when thecrusade was at its greatest heat, Philip, on the pope's repeatedentreaty, authorized his son to take part in it with such lords as mightbe willing to accompany him; but he ordered that the expedition shouldnot start before the spring, and, on the occurrence of some freshincident, he had it further put off until the following year. Hereceived visits from Count Raymond VI. , and openly testified good willtowards him. When Simon de Montfort was decisively victorious, and inpossession of the places wrested from Raymond, Philip Augustus recognizedaccomplished facts, and received the new Count of Toulouse as his vassal;but when, after the death of Simon de Montfort and Innocent III. , thequestion was once more thrown open, and when Raymond VI. , first, and thenhis son Raymond VII. , had recovered the greater part of their dominions, Philip formally refused to recognize Amaury de Montfort as successor tohis father's conquests: nay, he did more; he refused to accept thecession of those conquests, offered to him by Amaury de Montfort andpressed upon him by Pope Honorius III. Philip Augustus was not ascrupulous sovereign, nor disposed to compromise himself for the meresake of defending justice and humanity; but he was too judicious not torespect and protect, to a certain extent, the rights of his vassals aswell as his own, and, at the same time, too discreet to involve himself, without necessity, in a barbarous and dubious war. He held aloof fromthe crusade against the Albigensians with as much wisdom, and more thanas much dignity, as he had displayed, seventeen years before, inwithdrawing from the crusade against the Saracens. 

He had, in 1216, another great chance of showing his discretion. TheEnglish barons were at war with their king, John Lackland, in defence ofMagna Charta, which they had obtained the year before; and they offeredthe crown of England to the King of France, for his son, Prince Louis. Before accepting, Philip demanded twenty-four hostages, taken from themen of note in the country, as a guarantee that the offer would besupported in good earnest; and the hostages were sent to him. But PopeInnocent III. Had lately released King John from his oath in respect ofMagna Charta, and had excommunicated the insurgent barons; and he nowinstructed his legate to oppose the projected design, with a threat ofexcommunicating the King of France. Philip Augustus, who in his youthhad dreamed of resuscitating the empire of Charlemagne, was stronglytempted to seize the opportunity of doing over again the work of Williamthe Conqueror; but he hesitated to endanger his power and his kingdom insuch a war against King John and the pope. The prince was urgent inentreating his father: "Sir, " said he, "I am your liegeman for the fiefyou have given me on this side of the sea; but it pertains not to you todecide aught as to the kingdom of England; I do beseech you to place noobstacle in the way of my departure. " The king, "seeing his son's firmresolution and anxiety, " says the historian Matthew Paris, "was one withhim in feeling and desire; but, foreseeing the dangers of events to come, he did not give his public consent, and, without any expression of wishor counsel, permitted him to go, with the gift of his blessing. " It wasthe young and ambitious Princess Blanche of Castille, wife of PrinceLouis, and destined to be the mother of St. Louis, who, after herhusband's departure for England, made it her business to raise troops forhim and to send him means of sustaining the war. Events justified thediscreet reserve of Philip Augustus; for John Lackland, after havingsuffered one reverse previously, died on the 19th of October, 1216; hisdeath broke up the party of the insurgent barons; and his son, HenryIII. , who was crowned on the 28th of October, in Gloucester cathedral, immediately confirmed the Great Charter. Thus the national grievancevanished, and national feeling resumed its sway in England; the Frencheverywhere became unpopular; and after a few months' struggle, with equalwant of skill and success, Prince Louis gave up his enterprise andreturned to France with his French comrades, on no other conditions but amutual exchange of prisoners, and an amnesty for the English who had beenhis adherents. 

At this juncture, as well as in the crusade against the Albigensians, Philip Augustus behaved towards the pope with a wisdom and ability hardof attainment at any time, and very rare in his own: he constantlyhumored the papacy without being subservient to it, and he testifiedtowards it his respect, and at the same time his independence. Heunderstood all the gravity of a rupture with Rome, and he neglectednothing to avoid one; but he also considered that Rome, herself notwanting in discretion, would be content with the deference of the King ofFrance rather than get embroiled with him by exacting his submission. Philip Augustus, in his political life, always preserved this propermean, and he found it succeed; but in his domestic life there came a daywhen he suffered himself to be hurried out of his usual deference towardsthe pope; and, after a violent attempt at resistance, he resigned himselfto submission. Three years after the death of his first wife, Isabel ofHainault, who had left him a son, Prince Louis, he married PrincessIngeburga of Denmark, without knowing anything at all of her, just as itgenerally happens in the case of royal marriages. No sooner had shebecome his wife than, without any cause that can be assigned withcertainty, he took such a dislike to her that, towards the end of thesame year, he demanded of and succeeded in obtaining from a Frenchcouncil, held at Compiegne, nullity of his marriage on the ground ofprohibited consanguinity. "O, naughty France! naughty France! O, Rome!Rome!" cried the poor Danish princess, on learning this decision; and shedid in fact appeal to Pope Celestine III. Whilst the question was beinginvestigated at Rome, Ingeburga, whom Philip had in vain tried to sendback to Denmark, was marched about, under restraint, in France fromcastle to castle and convent to convent, and treated with iniquitous andshocking severity. Pope Celestine, after examination, annulled thedecision of the council of Compiegne touching the pretendedconsanguinity, leaving in suspense the question of divorce, and, consequently, without breaking the tie of marriage between the king andthe Danish princess. "I have seen, " he wrote to the Archbishop of Sens, "the genealogy sent to me by the bishops, and it is due to thatinspection and the uproar caused by this scandal that I have annulled thedecree; take care now, therefore, that Philip do not marry again, and sobreak the tie which still unites him to the Church. " Philip paid no heedto this canonical injunction; his heart was set upon marrying again; and, after having unsuccessfully sought the band of two German princesses, onthe borders of the Rhine, who were alarmed by the fate of Ingeburga, heobtained that of a princess, a Tyrolese by origin, Agnes (according toothers, Mary) of Merania, that is, Moravia (an Austrian province, inGerman _Moehren, _ out of which the chroniclers of the time made Meranieor Merania, the name that has remained in the history of Agnes). She wasthe daughter of Berthold, Marquis of Istria, whom, about 1180, theEmperor Frederick Barbarossa had made Duke of Moravia. According to allcontemporary chronicles, Agnes was not only beautiful, but charming; shemade a great impression at the court of France; and Philip Augustus, after his marriage with her in June, 1196, became infatuated with her. But a pope more stern and bold than Celestine III. , Innocent III. , hadjust been raised to the Holy See, and was exerting himself, in court aswell as monastery, to effect a reformation of morals. Immediately afterhis accession, he concerned himself with the conjugal irregularity inwhich the King of France was living. "My predecessor, Celestine, " hewrote to the Bishop of Paris, "would fain have put a stop to thisscandal, but he was unsuccessful; as for me, I am quite resolved toprosecute his work, and obtain by all and any means fulfilment of God'slaw. Be instant in speaking thereof to the king on my behalf; and tellhim that his obstinate refusals may probably bring upon him both thewrath of God and the thunders of the Church. " And indeed Philip'srefusals were very obstinate; for the pride of the king and the feelingsof the man were equally wounded. "I had rather lose half my domains, "said he, "than separate from Agnes. " The pope threatened him with theinterdict, --that is, the suspension of all religious ceremonies, festivals, and forms in the Church of France. Philip resisted not onlythe threat, but also the sentence of the interdict, which was actuallypronounced, first in the churches of the royal domain, and afterwards inthose of the whole kingdom. "So wroth was the king, " says the chronicleof St. Denis, "that he thrust from their sees all the prelates of hiskingdom, because they had assented to the interdict. " "I had rather turnMussulman, " said Philip; "Saladin was a happy man, for he had no pope. "But Innocent III. Was inflexible; he claimed respect for laws divine andhuman, for the domestic hearth and public order. The conscience of thenation was troubled. Agnes herself applied to the pope, urging heryouth, her ignorance of the world, the sincerity and purity of her lovefor her husband. Innocent III. Was touched, and before long gaveindisputable evidence that he was, but without budging from his duty andhis right as a Christian. For four years the struggle went on. At lastPhilip yielded to the injunction of the pope and the feeling of hispeople; he sent away Agnes, and recalled Ingeburga. The pope, in hishour of victory, showed his sense of equity and his moral appreciation;taking into consideration the good faith of Agnes in respect of hermarriage, and Philip's possible mistake as to his right to marry her, hedeclared the legitimacy of the two children born of their union. Agnesretired to Poissy, where, a few months afterwards, she died. Ingeburgaresumed her title and rights as queen, but without really enjoying them. Philip, incensed as well as beaten, banished her far from him and hiscourt, to Etampes, where she lived eleven years in profound retirement. It was only in 1212 that, to fully satisfy the pope, Philip, morepersevering in his political wisdom than his domestic prejudices, restored the Danish princess to all her royal station at his side. Shewas destined to survive him. 

There can be little doubt but that the affection of Philip Augustus forAgnes of Merania was sincere; nothing can be better proof of it than thelong struggle he maintained to prevent separation from her; but, to saynothing of the religious scruples which at last, perhaps, began to prickthe conscience of the king, great political activity and the governmentof a kingdom are a powerful cure for sorrows of the heart, and seldom isthere a human soul so large and so constant as to have room forsentiments and interests so different, both of them at once, and for along continuance. It has been shown with what intelligent assiduityPhilip Augustus strove to extend, or, rather, to complete the kingdom ofFrance; what a mixture of firmness and moderation he brought to bear uponhis relations with his vassals, as well as with his neighbors; and whatbravery he showed in war, though he preferred to succeed by the weaponsof peace. He was as energetic and effective in the internaladministration of his kingdom as in foreign affairs. M. Leopold Delisle, one of the most learned French academicians, and one of the most accuratein his knowledge, has devoted a volume of more than seven hundred pagesoctavo to a simple catalogue of the official acts of Philip Augustus, andthis catalogue contains a list of two thousand two hundred and thirty-sixadministrative acts of all kinds, of which M. Delisle confines himself tomerely setting forth the title and object. Search has been made in thislong table to see what part was taken by Philip Augustus in theestablishment and interior regulation of the communes, that great factwhich is so conspicuous in the history of French civilization, and whichwill before long be made the topic of discourse here. The search bringsto light, during this reign, forty-one acts confirming certain communesalready established, or certain privileges previously granted to certainpopulations, forty-three acts establishing new communes, or granting newlocal privileges, and nine acts decreeing suppression of certaincommunes, or a repressive intervention of the royal authority in theirinternal regulation, on account of quarrels or irregularities in theirrelations either with their lord, or, especially, with their bishop. These mere figures show the liberal character of the government of PhilipAugustus, in respect of this important work of the eleventh, twelfth, andthirteenth centuries. Nor are we less struck by his efficient energy inhis care for the interests and material civilization of his people. In1185, "as he was walking one day in his palace, he placed himself at awindow whence he was sometimes pleased, by way of pastime, to watch theSeine flowing by. Some carts, as they passed, caused the mud with whichthe streets were filled to emit a fetid smell, quite unbearable. Theking, shocked at what was as unhealthy as it was disgusting, sent for theburghers and provost of the city, and ordered that all the thoroughfaresand streets of Paris should be paved with hard and solid stone, for thisright Christian prince aspired to rid Paris of her ancient name, Lutetia(Mud-town). " It is added that, on hearing of so good a resolution, amoneyed man of the day, named Gerard de Poissy, volunteered to contributetowards the construction of the pavement eleven thousand silver marks. Nor was Philip Augustus less concerned for the external security than forthe internal salubrity of Paris. In 1190, on the eve of his departurefor the crusade, "he ordered the burghers of Paris to surround with agood wall, flanked by towers, the city he loved so well, and to makegates thereto;" and in twenty years this great work was finished on bothsides of the Seine. "The king gave the same orders, " adds the historianRigord, "about the towns and castles of all his kingdom; "and indeed itappears from the catalogue of M. Leopold Delisle, at the date of 1193, "that, at the request of Philip Augustus, Peter de Courtenai, Count ofNevers, with the aid of the church-men, had the walls of the town ofAuxerre built. " And Philip's foresight went beyond such importantachievements. "He had a good wall built to enclose the wood ofVincennes, heretofore open to any sort of folk. The King of England, onhearing thereof, gathered a great mass of fawns, hinds, does, and bucks, taken in his forests in Normandy and Aquitaine; and having had themshipped aboard a large covered vessel, with suitable fodder, he sent themby way of the Seine to King Philip Augustus, his liege-lord at Paris. King Philip received the gift gladly, had his parks stocked with theanimals, and put keepers over them. " A feeling, totally unconnected withthe pleasures of the chase, caused him to order an enclosure verydifferent from that of Vincennes. "The common cemetery of Paris, hard bythe Church of the Holy Innocents, opposite the street of St. Denis, hadremained up to that time open to all passers, man and beast, withoutanything to prevent it from being confounded with the most profane spot;and the king, hurt at such indecency, had it enclosed by high stonewalls, with as many gates as were judged necessary, which were closedevery night. " At the same time he had built, in this same quarter, thefirst great municipal market-places, enclosed, likewise, by a wall, withgates shut at night, and surmounted by a sort of covered gallery. He wasnot quite a stranger to a certain instinct, neither systematic nor ofgeneral application, but practical and effective on occasion, in favor ofthe freedom of industry and commerce. Before his time, the ovensemployed by the baking trade in Paris were a monopoly for the profit ofcertain religious or laic establishments; but when Philip Augustusordered the walling in of the new and much larger area of the city "hedid not think it right to render its new inhabitants subject to these oldliabilities, and he permitted all the bakers to have ovens wherein tobake their bread, either for themselves, or for all individuals who mightwish to make use of them. " Nor were churches and hospitals a whit lessthan the material interests of the people an object of solicitude to him. His reign saw the completion, and, it might almost be said, theconstruction of _Notre-Dame de Paris, _ the frontage of which, inparticular, was the work of this epoch. At the same time the king hadthe palace of the Louvre repaired and enlarged; and he added to it thatstrong tower in which he kept in captivity for more than twelve yearsFerrand, Count of Flanders, taken prisoner at the battle of Bouvines. Itwould be a failure of justice and truth not to add to these proofs ofmanifold and indefatigable activity on the part of Philip Augustus theconstant interest he testified in letters, science, study, the Universityof Paris, and its masters and pupils. It was to him that in 1200, aftera violent riot, in which they considered they had reason to complain ofthe provost of Paris, the students owed a decree, which, by regardingthem as clerics, exempted them from the ordinary criminal jurisdiction, so as to render them subject only to ecclesiastical authority. At thattime there was no idea how to efficiently protect freedom save bygranting some privilege. 

A death which seems premature for a man as sound and strong inconstitution as in judgment struck down Philip Augustus at the age ofonly fifty-eight, as he was on his way from Pacy-sur-Eure to Paris to bepresent at the council which was to meet there and once more take up theaffair of the Albigensians. He had for several months been battling withan incessant fever; he was obliged to halt at Mantes, and there he diedon the 14th of January, 1223, leaving the kingdom of France far moreextensive and more compact, and the kingship in France far stronger andmore respected than he had found them. It was the natural andwell-deserved result of his life. At a time of violence and irregularadventure, he had shown to Europe the spectacle of an earnest, far-sighted, moderate, and able government, and one which in the end, under many hard trials, had nearly always succeeded in its designs, during a reign of forty-three years. 

He disposed, by will, of a considerable amount amassed without parsimony, and even, historians say, in spite of a royal magnificence. We will takefrom that will but two paragraphs, the first two:--

"We will and prescribe first of all that, without any gainsaying, ourtestamentary executors do levy and set aside, out of our possessions, fifty thousand livres of Paris, in order to restore, as God shall inspirethem with wisdom, whatsoever may be due to those from whom they shallrecognize that we have unjustly taken or extorted or kept back aught; andwe do ordain this most strictly. "

"We do give to our dear spouse _Isamber_ (evidently _Inyeburya_), Queenof the French, ten thousand livres of Paris. We might have given more tothe said queen, but we have confined ourselves to this sum in order thatwe might make more complete restitution and reparation of what we haveunjustly levied. "

There is in these two cases of testamentary reparation, to personsunknown on the one hand and to a lady long maltreated on the other, atouch of probity and honorable regret for wrong-doing which arouses forthis great king, in his dying hour, more moral esteem than one wouldotherwise be tempted to feel for him. 

His son, Louis VIII. , inherited a great kingdom, an undisputed crown, anda power that was respected. It was matter of general remark, moreover, that, by his mother, Isabel of Hainault, he was descended in the directline from Hermengarde, Countess of Namur, daughter of Charles ofLorraine, the last of the Carlovingians. Thus the claims of the twodynasties of Charlemagne and of Hugh Capet were united in his person;and, although the authority of the Capetians was no longer disputed, contemporaries were glad to see in Louis VIII. This two-fold heirship, which gave him the perfect stamp of a legitimate monarch. He was, besides, the first Capetian whom the king his father had not consideredit necessary to have consecrated during his own life so as to impressupon him in good time the seal of religion. Louis was consecrated atRheims no earlier than the 6th of August, 1223, three weeks after thedeath of Philip Augustus; and his consecration was celebrated, at Parisas well as at Rheims, with rejoicings both popular and magnificent. But in the condition in which France was during the thirteenth century, amidst a civilization still so imperfect and without the fortifyinginstitutions of a free government, no accidental good fortune could makeup for a king's want of personal merit; and Louis VIII. Was a man ofdownright mediocrity, without foresight, volatile in his resolves andweak and fickle in the execution of them. He, as well as PhilipAugustus, had to make war on the King of England, and negotiate with thepope on the subject of the Albigensians; but at one time he followed, without well understanding it, his father's policy, at another heneglected it for some whim, or under some temporary influence. Yet hewas not unsuccessful in his wax-like enterprises; in his campaign againstHenry III. , King of England, he took Niort, St. Jean d'Angely, andRochelle; he accomplished the subjection of Limousin and Perigord; andhad he pushed on his victories beyond the Garonne, he might perhaps havedeprived the English of Aquitaine, their last possession in France; butat the solicitation of Pope Honorius III. , he gave up this war, to resumethe crusade against the Albigensians. Philip Augustus had foreseen thismistake. After my death, " he had said, "the clergy will use all theirefforts to entangle my son Louis in the matters of the Albigensians; buthe is in weak and shattered health; he will be unable to bear thefatigue; he will soon die, and then the kingdom will be left in the handsof a woman and children; and so there will be no lack of dangers. " Theprediction was realized. The military campaign of Louis VIII. On theRhone was successful; after a somewhat difficult siege, he took Avignon;the principal towns in the neighborhood, Nimes and Arles, amongst others, submitted; Amaury de Montfort had ceded to him all his rights over hisfather's conquests in Languedoc; and the Albigensians were so completelydestroyed or dispersed or cowed that, when it seemed good to make afurther example amongst them of the severity of the Church againstheretics, it was a hard matter to rout out in the diocese of Narbonne oneof their former preachers, Peter Isarn, an old man hidden in an obscureretreat, from which he was dragged to be burned in solemn state. Thiswas Louis VIII. 's last exploit in Southern France. He was displeasedwith the pope, whom he reproached with not keeping all his promises; histroops were being decimated by sickness; and he was deserted by TheobaldIV. , Count of Champagne, after serving, according to feudal law, forforty days. 

Louis, incensed, disgusted, and ill, himself left his army, to return tohis own Northern France; but he never reached it, for fever compelled himto halt at Montpensier, in Auvergne, where he died on the 8th ofNovember, 1226, after a reign of three years, adding to the history ofFrance no glory save that of having been the son of Philip Augustus, thehusband of Blanche of Castille, and the father of St. Louis. 

We have already perused the most brilliant and celebrated amongst theevents of St. Louis's reign, his two crusades against the Mussulmans; andwe have learned to know the man at the same time with the event, for itwas in these warlike outbursts of his Christian faith that the king'scharacter, nay, his whole soul, was displayed in all its originality andsplendor. It was his good fortune, moreover, to have at that time as hiscomrade and biographer, Sire de Joinville, one of the most sprightly andcharming writers of the nascent French language. It is now of Louis inFrance and of his government at home that we have to take note. And inthis part of his history he is not the only royal and really regnantpersonage we encounter: for of the forty-four years of St. Louis's reign, nearly fifteen, with a long interval of separation, pertained to thegovernment of Queen Blanche of Castille rather than that of the king herson. Louis, at his accession in 1226, was only eleven; and he remained aminor up to the age of twenty-one, in 1236, for the time of majority inthe case of royalty was not yet specially and rigorously fixed. Duringthose ten years Queen Blanche governed France; not at all, as is commonlyasserted, with the official title of regent, but simply as guardian ofthe king her son. With a good sense really admirable in a person soproud and ambitious, she saw that official power was ill suited to herwoman's condition, and would weaken rather than strengthen her; and shescreened herself from view behind her son. He it was who, in 1226, wroteto the great vassals, bidding them to his consecration; he it was whoreigned and commanded; and his name alone appeared on royal decrees andon treaties. It was not until twenty-two years had passed, in 1248, thatLouis, on starting for the crusade, officially delegated to his motherthe kingly authority, and that Blanche, during her son's absence, reallygoverned with the title of regent, up to the 1st of December, 1252, theday of his death. 

During the first period of his government, and so long as her son'sminority lasted, Queen Blanche had to grapple with intrigues, plots, insurrections, and open war, and, what was still worse for her, with theinsults and calumnies of the crown's great vassals, burning to seize oncemore, under a woman's government, the independence and power which hadbeen effectually disputed with them by Philip Augustus. Blanche resistedtheir attempts, at one time with open and persevering energy, at anotherdexterously with all the tact, address, and allurements of a woman. Though she was now forty years of age, she was beautiful, elegant, attractive, full of resources, and of grace in her conversation as wellas her administration, endowed with all the means of pleasing, andskilful in availing herself of them with a coquetry which wasoccasionally more telling than discreet. The malcontents spread themost odious scandals about her. It so happened that one of the mostconsiderable amongst the great vassals of France, Theobald IV. , Count ofChampagne, a brilliant and gay knight, an ingenious and prolific poet, had conceived a passion for her; and it was affirmed not only that shehad yielded to his desires, in order to keep him bound to her service, but that she had, a while ago, in concert with him, murdered her husband, King Louis VIII. In 1230, some of the greatest barons of the kingdom, the Count of Brittany, the Count of Boulogne, and the Count of St. Polformed a coalition for an attack upon Count Theobald, and invadedChampagne. Blanche, taking with her the young king her son, went tothe aid of Count Theobald, and, on arriving near Troyes, she had ordersgiven, in the king's name, for the barons to withdraw: "If you haveplaint to make, " said she, "against the Count of Champagne, presentbefore me your claim, and I will do you justice. " "We will not pleadbefore you, " they answered, "for the custom of women is to fix theirchoice upon him, in preference to other men, who has slain theirhusband. " But in spite of this insulting defiance, the barons didwithdraw. Five years later, in 1235, the Count of Champagne had, in histurn, risen against the king, and was forced, as an escape from imminentdefeat, to accept severe terms. 

An interview took place between Queen Blanche and him; and "'Pardie, Count Theobald, ' said the queen, 'you ought not to have been against us;you ought surely to have remembered the kindness shown you by the king myson, who came to your aid, to save your land from the barons of Francewhen they would fain have set fire to it all and laid it in ashes. ' Thecount cast a look upon the queen, who was so virtuous and so beautifulthat at her great beauty he was all abashed, and answered her, 'By myfaith, madame, my heart and my body and all my land is at your command, and there is nothing which to please you I would not readily do; andagainst you or yours, please God, I will never go. ' Thereupon he wenthis way full pensively, and often there came back to his remembrance thequeen's soft glance and lovely countenance. Then his heart was touchedby a soft and amorous thought. But when he remembered how high a dameshe was, so good and pure that he could never enjoy her, his soft thoughtof love was changed to a great sadness. And because deep thoughtsengender melancholy, it was counselled unto him by certain wise men thathe should make his study of canzonets for the viol and soft delightfulditties. So made he the most beautiful canzonets and the most delightfuland most melodious that at any time were heard. " (_Histoire des Dues etdes Comtes de Champagne, _ by M. D'Arbois de Jubainville, t. Iv. Pp. 249, 280; _Chroniques de Saint-Denis, _ in the _Recueil des Historiens desGaules et de France, _ t. Xxi. Pp. 111, 112. )

Neither in the events nor in the writings of the period is it easy tofind anything which can authorize the accusations made by the foes ofQueen Blanche. There is no knowing whether her heart were ever so littletouched by the canzonets of Count Theobald; but it is certain thatneither the poetry nor the advances of the count made any difference inthe resolutions and behavior of the queen. She continued her resistanceto the pretensions and machinations of the crown's great vassals, whetherfoes or lovers, and she carried forward, in the face and in the teeth ofall, the extension of the domains and the power of the kingship. Weobserve in her no prompting of enthusiasm, of sympathetic charitableness, or of religious scrupulousness, that is, none of those grand moralimpulses which are characteristic of Christian piety, and which werepredominant in St. Louis. Blanche was essentially politic and concernedwith her temporal interests and successes; and it was not from herteaching or her example that her son imbibed those sublime anddisinterested feelings which stamped him the most original and the rareston the roll of glorious kings. What St. Louis really owed to his mother--and it was a great deal--was the steady triumph which, whether by armsor by negotiation, Blanche gained over the great vassals, and thepreponderance which, amidst the struggles of the feudal system, shesecured for the kingship of her son in his minority. She saw by profoundinstinct what forces and alliances might be made serviceable to thekingly power against its rivals. When, on the 29th of November, 1226, only three weeks after the death of her husband, Louis VIII. , she had herson crowned at Rheims, she bade to the ceremony not only the prelates andgrandees of the kingdom, but also the inhabitants of the neighboringcommunes; wishing to let the great lords see the people surrounding theroyal child. Two years later, in 1228, amidst the insurrection of thebarons, who were assembled at Corbeil, and who meditated seizing theperson of the young king during his halt at Montlhery on his march toParis, Queen Blanche had summoned to her side, together with the faithfulchivalry of the country, the burghers of Paris and of the neighborhood;and they obeyed the summons with alacrity. "They went forth all underarms, and took the road to Montlhery, where they found the king, andescorted him to Paris, all in their ranks and in order of battle. FromMontlhery to Paris, the road was lined, on both sides, by men-at-arms andothers, who loudly besought Our Lord to grant the young king long lifeand prosperity, and to vouchsafe him protection against all his enemies. As soon as they set out from Paris, the lords, having been told the news, and not considering themselves in a condition to fight so great a host, retired each to his own abode; and by the ordering of God, who disposesas he pleases Him of times and the deeds of men, they dared not undertakeanything against the king during the rest of this year. " (_Vie de SaintLouis, _ by Lenain de Tillemont, t. I. Pp. 429, 478. )

Eight years later, in 1236, Louis IX. Attained his majority, and hismother transferred to him a power respected, feared, and encompassed byvassals always turbulent and still often aggressive, but disunited, weakened, intimidated, or discredited, and always outwitted, for a spaceof ten years, in their plots. 

When she had secured the political position of the king her son, and asthe time of his majority approached, Queen Blanche gave her attention tohis domestic life also. She belonged to the number of those who aspireto play the part of Providence towards the objects of their affection, and to regulate their destiny in everything. Louis was nineteen; he washandsome, after a refined and gentle style which spoke of moral worthwithout telling of great physical strength; he had delicate and chiselledfeatures, a brilliant complexion, and light hair, abundant and glossy, which, through his grandmother Isabel, he inherited from the family ofthe Counts of Hainault. He displayed liveliness and elegance in histastes; he was fond of amusements, games, hunting, hounds andhawking-birds, fine clothes, magnificent furniture. A holy man, theysay, even reproached the queen his mother with having winked at certaininclinations evinced by him towards irregular connections. Blanchedetermined to have him married; and had no difficulty in exciting in himso honorable a desire. Raymond Beranger, Count of Provence, had adaughter, his eldest, named Marguerite, "who was held, " say thechronicles, "to be the most noble, most beautiful, and best educatedprincess at that time in Europe. . . . By the advice of his motherand of the wisest persons in his kingdom, " Louis asked for her hand inmarriage. The Count of Provence was overjoyed at the proposal; but hewas somewhat anxious about the immense dowry which, it was said, he wouldhave to give his daughter. His intimate adviser was a Provencalnobleman, named Romeo de Villeneuve, who said to him, "Count, leave it tome, and let not this great expense cause you any trouble. If you marryyour eldest high, the more consideration of the alliance will get theothers married better and at less cost. " Count Raymond listened toreason, and before long acknowledged that his adviser was right. He hadfour daughters, Marguerite, Eleanor, Sancie, and Beatrice; and whenMarguerite was Queen of France, Eleanor became Queen of England, SancieCountess of Cornwall and afterwards Queen of the Romans, and BeatriceCountess of Anjou and Provence, and ultimately Queen of Sicily. PrincessMarguerite arrived in France escorted by a brilliant embassy, and themarriage was celebrated at Sens, on the 27th of May, 1234, amidst greatrejoicings and abundant largess to the people. As soon as he was marriedand in possession of happiness at home, Louis of his own accord gave upthe worldly amusements for which he had at first displayed a taste; hishunting establishment, his games, his magnificent furniture and dress, gave place to simpler pleasures and more Christian occupations. Theactive duties of the kingship, the fervent and scrupulous exercise ofpiety, the pure and impassioned joys of conjugal life, the glorious plansof a knight militant of the cross, were the only things which took up thethoughts and the time of this young king, who was modestly laboring tobecome a saint and a hero. 

There was one heartfelt discomfort which disturbed and troubled sometimesthe sweetest moments of his life. Queen Blanche, having got her sonmarried, was jealous of the wife and of the happiness she had conferredupon her; jealous as mother and as queen, a rival for affection and forempire. This sad and hateful feeling hurried her into acts as devoid ofdignity as they were of justice and kindness. "The harshness of QueenBlanche towards Queen Marguerite, " says Joinville, "was such that QueenBlanche would not suffer, so far as her power went, that her son shouldkeep his wife's company. Where it was most pleasing to the king and thequeen to live was at Pontoise, because the king's chamber was above andthe queen's below. And they had so well arranged matters that they heldtheir converse on a spiral staircase which led down from the one chamberto the other. When the ushers saw the queen-mother coming into thechamber of the king her son, they knocked upon the door with theirstaves, and the king came running into his chamber, so that his mothermight find him there; and so, in turn, did the ushers of QueenMarguerite's chamber when Queen Blanche came thither, so that she mightfind Queen Marguerite there. One day the king was with the queen hiswife, and she was in great peril of death, for that she had suffered froma child of which she had been delivered. Queen Blanche came in, and tookher son by the hand, and said to him, 'Come you away; you are doing nogood here. ' When Queen Marguerite saw that the queen-mother was takingthe king away, she cried, 'Alas! neither dead nor alive will you let mesee my lord; and thereupon she swooned, and it was thought that she wasdead. The king, who thought she was dying, came back, and with greatpains she was brought round. "

Louis gave to his wife consolation and to his mother support. Amongstthe noblest souls and in the happiest lives there are wounds which cannotbe healed and sorrows which must be borne in silence. 

When Louis reached his majority, his entrance upon personal exercise ofthe kingly power produced no change in the conduct of public affairs. There was no vain seeking after innovation on purpose to mark theaccession of a new master, and no reaction in the deeds and words of thesovereign or in the choice and treatment of his advisers; the kingship ofthe son was a continuance of the mother's government. Louis persisted instruggling for the preponderance of the crown against the great vassals;succeeded in taming Peter Mauclerc, the turbulent Count of Brittany;wrung from Theobald IV. , Count of Champagne, the rights of suzerainty inthe countships of Chartres, Blois, and Sancerre, and the viscountship ofChateaudun, and purchased the fertile countship of Macon from itspossessor. It was almost always by pacific procedure, by negotiationsably conducted, and conventions faithfully executed, that he accomplishedthese increments of the kingly domain; and when he made war on any of thegreat vassals, he engaged therein only on their provocation, to maintainthe rights or honor of his crown, and he used victory with as muchmoderation as he had shown before entering upon the struggle. In 1241, he was at Poitiers, where his brother Alphonso, the new Count of Poitou, was to receive, in his presence, the homage of the neighboring lordswhose suzerain he was. A confidential letter arrived, addressed not toLouis himself, but to Queen Blanche, whom many faithful subjectscontinued to regard as the real regent of the kingdom, and who probablycontinued also to have her own private agents. An inhabitant ofRochelle, at any rate, wrote to inform the queen-mother that a greatplot was being hatched amongst certain powerful lords, of La Marche, Saintonge, Angoumois, and perhaps others, to decline doing homage to thenew Count of Poitou, and thus to enter into rebellion against the kinghimself. The news was true, and was given with circumstantial detail. Hugh de Lusignan, Count of La Marche, and the most considerable amongstthe vassals of the Count of Poitiers, was, if not the prime mover, at anyrate the principal performer in the plot. His wife, Joan (Isabel) ofAngouleme, widow of the late King of England, John Lackland, and motherof the reigning king, Henry III. , was indignant at the notion of becominga vassal of a prince himself a vassal of the King of France, and soseeing herself--herself but lately a queen, and now a king's widow and aking's mother--degraded, in France, to a rank below that of the Countessof Poitiers. When her husband, the Count of La Marche, went and rejoinedher at Angouleme, he found her giving way alternately to anger and tears, tears and anger. "Saw you not, " said she, "at Poitiers, where I waitedthree days to please your king and his queen, how that when I appearedbefore them, in their chamber, the king was seated on one side of thebed, and the queen, with the Countess of Chartres, and her sister, theabbess, on the other side: They did not call me nor bid me sit with them, and that purposely, in order to make me vile in the eyes of so many folk. And neither at my coming in nor at my going out did they rise just alittle from their scats, rendering me vile, as you did see yourself. Icannot speak of it, for grief and shame. And it will be my death, farmore even than the less of our land which they have unworthily wrestedfrom us; unless, by God's grace, they do repent them, and I see them intheir turn reduced to desolation, and losing somewhat of their own lands. As for me, either I will lose all I have for that end or I will perish inthe attempt. " Queen Blanche's correspondent added, "The Count of LaMarche, whose kindness you know, seeing the countess in tears, said toher, 'Madam, give your commands: I will do all I can; be assured ofthat. ' 'Else, ' said she, 'you shall not come near my person, and I willnever see you more. ' Then the count declared, with many curses, that hewould do what his wife desired. "

And he was as good as his word. That same year, 1241, at the end of theautumn, "the new Count of Poitiers, who was holding his court for thefirst time, did not fail to bid to his feasts all the nobility of hisappanage, and, amongst the very first, the Count and Countess of LaMarche. They repaired to Poitiers; but, four days before Christmas, whenthe court of Count Alphonso had received all its guests, the Count of LaMarche, mounted on his war-horse, with his wife on the crupper behindhim, and escorted by his men-at-arms also mounted, cross-bow in hand andin readiness for battle, was seen advancing to the prince's presence. Every one was on the tiptoe of expectation as to what would come next. Then the Count of La Marche addressed himself in a loud voice to theCount of Poitiers, saying, 'I might have thought, in a moment offorgetfulness and weakness, to render thee homage; but now I swear tothee, with a resolute heart, that I will never be thy liegeman; thou dostunjustly dub thyself my lord; thou didst shamefully filch this countshipfrom my step-son, Earl Richard, whilst he was faithfully fighting for Godin the Holy Land, and was delivering our captives by his discretion andhis compassion. ' After this insolent declaration, the Count of La Marcheviolently thrust aside, by means of his men-at-arms, all those who barredhis passage; hasted, by way of parting insult, to fire the lodgingappointed for him by Count Alphonso, and, followed by his people, leftPoitiers at a gallop. " (_Histoire de Saint Louis, _ by M. Felix Faure, t. I. P. 347. )

[Illustration: De la Marche's parting Insult----126]

This meant war; and it burst out at the commencement of the followingspring. It found Louis equally well prepared for it and determined tocarry it through. But in him prudence and justice were as little to seekas resolution; he respected public opinion, and he wished to have theapproval of those whom he called upon to commit themselves for him andwith him. He summoned the crown's vassals to a parliament; and, "Whatthink you, " he asked them, "should be done to a vassal who would fainhold land without owning a lord, and who goeth against the fealty andhomage due from him and his predecessors?" The answer was, that the lordought in that case to take back the fief as his own property. "As myname is Louis, " said the king, "the Comet of La Marche doth claim to holdland in such wise, land which hath been a fief of France since the daysof the valiant King Clovis, who won all Aquitaine from King Alaric, apagan without faith or creed, and all the country to the Pyrenean mount. "And the barons promised the king their energetic co-operation. 

The war was pushed on zealously by both sides. Henry III. , King ofEngland, sent to Louis messengers charged to declare to him that hisreason for breaking the truce concluded between them was, that heregarded it as his duty towards his step-father, the Count of La Marche, to defend him by arms. Louis answered that, for his own part, he hadscrupulously observed the truce, and had no idea of breaking it; but heconsidered that he had a perfect right to punish a rebellious vassal. Inthis young King of France, this docile son of an able mother, none knewwhat a hero there was, until he revealed himself on a sudden. Near twotowns of Saintonge, Taillebourg and Saintes, at a bridge which coveredthe approaches of one and in front of the walls of the other, Louis, onthe 21st and 22d of July, delivered two battles, in which the brilliancyof his personal valor and the affectionate enthusiasm he excited in histroops secured victory and the surrender of the two places. "At sight ofthe numerous banners, above which rose the oriflamme, close toTaillebourg, and of such a multitude of tents, one pressing againstanother and forming as it were a large and populous city, the King ofEngland turned sharply to the Count of La Marche, saying, 'My father, isthis what you did promise me? Is yonder the numerous chivalry that youdid engage to raise for me, when you said that all I should have to dowould be to get money together?' 'That did I never say, ' answered thecount. 'Yea, verily, ' rejoined Richard, Earl of Cornwall, brother ofHenry III. : 'for yonder I have amongst my baggage writing of your own tosuch purport. ' And when the Count of La Marche energetically denied thathe had ever signed or sent such writing, Henry III. Reminded him bitterlyof the messages he had sent to England, and of his urgent exhortations towar. 'It was never done with my consent, ' cried the Count of La Marche, with an oath; 'put the blame of it upon your mother, who is my wife; for, by the gullet of God, it was all devised without my knowledge. '"

It was not Henry III. Alone who was disgusted with the war in which hismother had involved him; the majority of the English lords who hadaccompanied him left him, and asked the King of France for permission topass through his kingdom on their way home. There were those who wouldhave dissuaded Louis from compliance; but, "Let them go, " said he;"I would ask nothing better than that all my foes should thus departforever far away from my abode. " Those about him made merry over HenryIII. , a refugee at Bordeaux, deserted by the English and plundered by theGascons. "Hold! hold! said Louis; "turn him not into ridicule, and makeme not hated of him by reason of your banter; his charities and his pietyshall exempt him from all contumely. " The Count of La Marche lost notime in asking for peace; and Louis granted it with the firmness of afar-seeing politician and the sympathetic feeling of a Christian. Herequired that the domains he had just wrested from the count shouldbelong to the crown, and to the Count of Poitiers, under the suzeraintyof the crown. As for the rest of his lands, the Count of La Marche, hiswife and children, were obliged to beg a grant of them at the goodpleasure of the king, to whom the count was, further, to give up, asguarantee for fidelity in future, three castles, in which a royalgarrison should be kept at the count's expense. When introduced into theking's presence, the count, his wife, and children, "with sobs, andsighs, and tears, threw themselves upon their knees before him, and beganto cry aloud, 'Most gracious sir, forgive us thy wrath and thydispleasure, for we have done wickedly and pridefully towards thee. 'And the king, seeing the Count of La Marche such humble guise before him, could not restrain his compassion amidst his wrath, but made him rise up, and forgave him graciously all the evil he had wrought against him. "

A prince who knew so well how to conquer and how to treat the conqueredmight have been tempted to make an unfair use, alternately, of hisvictories and of his clemency, and to pursue his advantages beyondmeasure; but Louis was in very deed a Christian. When War was not eithera necessity or a duty, this brave and brilliant knight, from sheer equityand goodness of heart, loved peace rather than war. The successes he hadgained in his campaign of 1242 were not for him the first step in anendless career of glory and conquest; he was anxious only to consolidatethem whilst securing, in Western Europe, for the dominions of hisadversaries, as well as for his own, the benefits of peace. He enteredinto negotiations, successively, with the Count of La Marche, the King ofEngland, the Count of Toulouse, the King of Aragon, and the variousprinces and great feudal lords who had been more or less engaged in thewar; and in January, 1213, says the latest and most enlightened of hisbiographers, "the treaty of Lorris marked the end of feudal troubles forthe whole duration of St. Louis's reign. He drew his sword no more, saveonly against the enemies of the Christian faith and Christiancivilization, the Mussulmans. " (_Histoire de St. Louis, _ by M. FelixFaure, t. I. P. 388. )

Nevertheless there was no lack of opportunities for interfering with apowerful arm amongst the sovereigns his neighbors, and for working theirdisagreements to the profit of his ambition, had ambition guided hisconduct. The great struggle between the Empire and the Papacy, in thepersons of Frederick II. , Emperor of Germany, and the two popes, GregoryIX. And Innocent IV. , was causing violent agitation in Christendom, thetwo powers setting no bounds to their aspirations of getting the dominionone over the other, and of disposing one of the other's fate. Scarcelyhad Louis reached his majority when, in 1237, he tried his influence withboth sovereigns to induce them to restore peace to the Christian world. He failed; and thenceforth he preserved a scrupulous neutrality towardseach. The principles of international law, especially in respect of agovernment's interference in the contests of its neighbors, whetherprinces or peoples, were not, in the thirteenth century, systematicallydiscussed and defined as they are nowadays with us; but the good senseand the moral sense of St. Louis caused him to adopt, on this point, theproper course, and no temptation, not even that of satisfying his ferventpiety, drew him into any departure from it. Distant or friendly, byturns, towards the two adversaries, according as they tried to intimidatehim or win him over to them, his permanent care was to get neither theState nor the Church of France involved in the struggle between thepriesthood and the empire, and to maintain the dignity of his crown andthe liberties of his subjects, whilst employing his influence to makeprevalent throughout Christendom a policy of justice and peace. 

That was the policy required, in the thirteenth century more than ever, by the most urgent interests of entire Christendom. 

She was at grips with two most formidable foes and perils. Through thecrusades she had, from the end of the eleventh century, become engaged ina deadly struggle against the Mussulmans in Asia; and in the height ofthis struggle, and from the heart of this same Asia, there spread, towards the middle of the thirteenth century, over Eastern Europe, inRussia, Poland, Hungary, Bohemia, and Germany, a barbarous and verynearly pagan people, the Mongol Tartars, sweeping onward like aninundation of blood, ravaging and threatening with complete destructionall the dominions which were penetrated by their hordes. The name anddescription of these barbarians, the fame and dread of theirdevastations, ran rapidly through the whole of Christian Europe. "Whatmust we do in this sad plight?" asked Queen Blanche of the king, her son. "We must, my mother, " answered Louis (with sorrowful voice, but notwithout divine inspiration, adds the chronicler), "we must be sustainedby a heavenly consolation. If these Tartars, as we call them, arrivehere, either we will hurl them back to Tartarus, their home, whence theyare come, or they shall send us up to Heaven. " About the same period, another cause of disquietude and another feature of attraction came to beadded to all those which turned the thoughts and impassioned piety ofLouis towards the East. The perils of the Latin empire ofConstantinople, founded, as has been already mentioned, in 1204, underthe headship of Baldwin, Count of Flanders, were becoming day by day moreserious. Greeks, Mussulmans, and Tartars were all pressing it equallyhard. In 1236, the emperor, Baldwin II. , came to solicit in person thesupport of the princes of Western Europe, and especially of the youngKing of France, whose piety and chivalrous ardor were already celebratedeverywhere. Baldwin possessed a treasure, of great power over theimaginations and convictions of Christians, in the crown of thorns wornby Jesus Christ during His passion. He had already put it in pawn atVenice for a considerable loan advanced to him by the Venetians; and henow offered it to Louis in return for effectual aid in men and money. Louis accepted the proposal with transport. He had been scared, a shorttime ago, at the chance of losing another precious relic deposited in theabbey of St. Denis, one of the nails which, it was said, had held OurLord's body upon the cross. It had been mislaid one ceremonial daywhilst it was being exhibited to the people; and, when he recovered it, "I would rather, " said Louis, "that the best city in my kingdom had beenswallowed up in the earth. " After having taken all the necessaryprecautions for avoiding any appearance of a shameful bargain, heobtained the crown of thorns, all expenses included, for eleven thousandlivres of Paris, that is, they say, about twenty-six thousand dollars ofour money. Our century cannot have any fellow-feeling with such readycredulity, which is not required by Christian faith or countenanced bysound criticism; but we can and we ought to comprehend such sentiments inan age when men not only had profound faith in the facts recorded in theGospels, but could not believe themselves to be looking upon the smallesttangible relic of those facts without experiencing an emotion and areverence as profound as their faith. It is to such sentiments that weowe one of the most perfect and most charming monuments of the middleages, _the Holy Chapel, _ which St. Louis had built between 1245 and 1248in order to deposit there the precious relics he had collected. Theking's piety had full justice and honor done it by the genius of thearchitect, Peter de llontreuil, who, no doubt, also shared his faith. 

It was after the purchase of the crown of thorns and the building of _theHoly Chapel_ that Louis, accomplishing at last the desire of his soul, departed on his first crusade. We have already gone over thecircumstances connected with his determination, his departure, and hislife in the East, during the six years of pious adventure and gloriousdisaster he passed there. We have already seen what an impression ofadmiration and respect was produced throughout his kingdom when he wasnoticed to have brought back with him from the Holy Land "a fashion ofliving and doing superior to his former behavior, although in his youthhe had always been good and innocent and worthy of high esteem. " Theseexpressions of his confessor are fully borne out by the deeds and laws, the administration at home and the relations abroad, by the wholegovernment, in fact, of St. Louis during the last fifteen years of hisreign. The idea which was invariably conspicuous and constantlymaintained during his reign was not that of a premeditated and ambitiouspolicy, ever tending towards an interested object which is pursued withmore or less reasonableness and success, and always with a large amountof trickery and violence on the part of the prince, of unrighteousness inhis deeds, and of suffering on the part of the people. Philip Augustus, the grandfather, and Philip the Handsome, the grandson, of St. Louis, theformer with the moderation of an able man, the latter with headiness anddisregard of right or wrong, labored both of them without cessation toextend the domains and power of the crown, to gain conquests over theirneighbors and their vassals, and to destroy the social system of theirage, the feudal system, its rights as well as its wrongs and tyrannies, in order to put in its place pure monarchy, and to exalt the kinglyauthority above all liberties, whether of the aristocracy or of thepeople. St. Louis neither thought of nor attempted anything of the kind;he did not make war, at one time openly, at another secretly, upon thefeudal system; he frankly accepted its principles, as he found themprevailing in the facts and the ideas of his times. Whilst fully bent onrepressing with firmness his vassals' attempts to shake themselves freefrom their duties towards him, and to render themselves independent ofthe crown, he respected their rights, kept his word to them scrupulously, and required of them nothing but what they really owed him. Into hisrelations with foreign sovereigns, his neighbors, he imported the sameloyal spirit. "Certain of his council used to tell him, " reportsJoinville, "that he did not well in not leaving those foreigners to theirwarfare; for, if he gave them his good leave to impoverish one another, they would not attack him so readily as if they were rich. To that theking replied that they said not well; for, quoth he, if the neighboringprinces perceived that I left them to their warfare, they might takecounsel amongst themselves, and say, 'It is through malice that the kingleaves us to our warfare; then it might happen that by cause of thehatred they would have against me, they would come and attack me, and Imight be a great loser there-by. Without reckoning that I should therebyearn the hatred of God, who says, 'Blessed be the peacemakers!' So wellestablished was his renown as a sincere friend of peace and a justarbiter in great disputes between princes and peoples that hisintervention and his decisions were invited wherever obscure anddangerous questions arose. In spite of the brilliant victories which, in1212, he had gained at Taillebourg and Saintes over Henry III. , King ofEngland, he himself perceived, on his return from the East, that theconquests won by his victories might at any moment become a fresh causeof new and grievous wars, disastrous, probably, for one or the other ofthe two peoples. He conceived, therefore, the design of giving to apeace which was so desirable a more secure basis by founding it upon atransaction accepted on both sides as equitable. And thus, whilstrestoring to the King of England certain possessions which the war of1242 had lost to him, he succeeded in obtaining from him in return "aswell in his own name as in the names of his sons and their heirs, aformal renunciation of all rights that he could pretend to over the duchyof Normandy, the countships of Anjou, Maine, Touraine, Poitou, and, generally, all that his family might have possessed on the continent, except only the lands which the King of France restored to him by thetreaty and those which remained to him in Gascony. For all these lastthe King of England undertook to do liege-homage to the King of France, in the capacity of peer of France and Duke of Aquitaine and to faithfullyfulfil the duties attached to a fief. " When Louis made known thistransaction to his counsellors, "they were very much against it, " saysJoinville. "It seemeth to us, sir, " said they to the king, "that, if youthink you have not a right to the conquest won by you and yourantecessors from the King of England, you do not make proper restitutionto the said king in not restoring to him the whole; and if you think youhave a right to it, it seemeth to us that you are a loser by all yourestore. " "Sirs, " answered Louis, "I am certain that the antecessors ofthe King of England did quite justly lose the conquest which I hold; andas for the land I give him, I give it him not as a matter in which I ambound to him or his heirs, but to make love between my children and his, who are cousins-german. And it seemeth to me that what I give him I turnto good purpose, inasmuch as he was not my liegeman, and he hereby comethin amongst my liegeman. " Henry III. , in fact, went to Paris, having withhim the ratification of the treaty, and prepared to accomplish theceremony of homage. "Louis received him as a brother, but withoutsparing him aught of the ceremony, in which, according to the ideas ofthe times, there was nothing humiliating any more than in the name ofvassal, which was proudly borne by the greatest lords. It took place onThursday, December 4, 1259, in the royal enclosure stretching in front ofthe palace, on the spot where at the present day is the Place Dauphine. There was a great concourse of prelates, barons, and other personagesbelonging to the two courts and the two nations. The King of England, on his knees, bareheaded, without cloak, belt, sword, or spurs, placedhis folded hands in those of the King of France his suzerain, and said tohim, 'Sir, I become your liegeman with mouth and hands, and I swear andpromise you faith and loyalty, and to guard your right according to mypower, and to do fair justice at your summons or the summons of yourbailiff, to the best of my wit. ' Then the king kissed him on the mouthand raised him up. "

[Illustration: ST. LOUIS MEDIATING BETWEEN HENRY III. AND HIS BARONS----136]

Three years later Louis gave not only to the King of England, but to thewhole English nation, a striking proof of his judicious and true-heartedequity. An obstinate civil war was raging between Henry III. And hisbarons. Neither party, in defending its own rights, had any notion ofrespecting the rights of its adversaries, and England was alternatingbetween a kingly and an aristocratic tyranny. Louis, chosen as arbiterby both sides, delivered solemnly, on the 23d of January, 1264, adecision which was favorable to the English kingship, but at the same, time expressly upheld the Great Charter and the traditional liberties ofEngland. He concluded his decision with the following suggestions ofamnesty: "We will also that the King of England and his barons do forgiveone another mutually, that they do forget all the resentments that mayexist between them; by consequence of the matters submitted to ourarbitration, and that henceforth they do refrain reciprocally from anoffence and injury on account of the same matters. " But when men havehad their ideas, passions, and interests profoundly agitated and made toclash, the wisest decisions and the most honest counsels in the world arenot sufficient to re-establish peace; the cup of experience has to bedrunk to the dregs; and the parties are not resigned to peace until on orthe other, or both, have exhausted themselves in the struggle andperceive the absolute necessity of accepting either defeat compromise. In spite of the arbitration of the King of France the civil war continuedin England; but Louis did not seek any way to profit by it so as toextend, at the expense of his neighbors, his own possessions or power;he held himself also from their quarrels, and followed up by honestneutrality ineffectual arbitration. Five centuries afterwards the greatEnglish historian, Hume, rendered him due homage in these terms: "Everytime this virtuous prince interfered in the affairs of England, it wasinvariably with the view of settling differences between the king and thenobility. Adopting an admirable course of conduct, as politic probablyas it certainly was just, he never interposed his good offices save toput an end the disagreements of the English; he seconded all the measureswhich could give security to both parties, and he made persistentefforts, though without success, to moderate the fiery ambition of theEarl of Leicester. " (Hume, _History of England, _ t. Ii. P. 465. )

It requires more than political wisdom, more even than virtue, to enablea king, a man having in charge the government of men, to accomplish hismission and to really deserve the title of Most Christian; it requiresthat he should be animated by a sentiment of affection, and that heshould, in heart as well as mind, be in sympathy with those multitudes ofcreatures over whose lot he exercises so much influence. St. Louis moreperhaps than any other king was possessed of this generous and humanequality: spontaneously and by the free impulse of his nature he loved hispeople, loved mankind, and took a tender and comprehensive interest intheir fortunes, their joys, or their miseries. Being seriously ill in1259, and desiring to give his eldest son, Prince Louis, whom he lost inthe following year, his last and most heartfelt charge, "Fair son, " saidhe, "I pray thee make thyself beloved of the people of thy kingdom, forverily I would rather a Scot should come from Scotland and govern ourpeople well and loyally than have thee govern it ill. " To watch over theposition and interests of all parties in his dominions, and to secure toall his subjects strict and prompt justice, this was what continuallyoccupied the mind of Louis IX. There are to be found in his biographytwo very different but equally striking proofs of his solicitude in thisrespect. M. Felix Faure has drawn up a table of all the journeys made byLouis in France, from 1254 to 1270, for the better cognizance of mattersrequiring his attention, and another of the parliaments which he held, during the same period, for considering the general affairs of thekingdom and the administration of justice. Not one of these sixteenyears passed without his visiting several of his provinces, and the year1270 was the only one in which he did not hold a parliament. (_Histoirede Saint Louis, _ by M. Felix Faure, t. Ii. Pp. 120, 339. ) Side by sidewith this arithmetical proof of his active benevolence we will place amoral proof taken from Joinville's often-quoted account of St. Louis'sfamiliar intervention in his subjects' disputes about matters of privateinterest. "Many a time, " says he, "it happened in summer that the kingwent and sat down in the wood of Vincennes after mass, and leaned againstan oak, and made us sit down round about him. And all those who hadbusiness came to speak to him without restraint of usher or other folk. And then he demanded of them with his own mouth, 'Is there here any whohath a suit?' and they who had their suit rose up; and then he said, 'Keep silence, all of ye; and ye shall have despatch one after theother. ' And then he called my Lord Peter de Fontaines and my LordGeoffrey de Villette (two learned lawyers of the day and counsellors ofSt. Louis), and said to one of them, 'Despatch me this suit. ' And whenhe saw aught to amend in the words of those who were speaking foranother, he himself amended it with his own mouth. I sometimes saw insummer that, to despatch his people's business, he went into the Parisgarden, clad in camlet coat and linsey surcoat without sleeves, a mantleof black taffety round his neck, hair right well combed and without coif, and on his head a hat with white peacock's plumes. And he had carpetslaid for us to sit round about him. And all the people who had businessbefore him set themselves standing around him; and then he had theirbusiness despatched in the manner I told you of before as to the wood ofVincennes. " (Joinville, chap. Xii. )

The active benevolence of St. Louis was not confined to this paternalcare for the private interests of such subjects as approached his person;he was equally attentive and zealous in the case of measures called forby the social condition of the times and the general interests of thekingdom. Amongst the twenty-six government ordinances, edicts, orletters, contained under the date of his reign in the first volume of the_Recueil des Ordonnances des Rois de France, _ seven, at the least, aregreat acts of legislation and administration of a public kind; and theseacts are all of such a stamp as to show that their main object is not toextend the power of the crown or subserve the special interests of thekingship at strife with other social forces; they are real reforms, ofpublic and moral interest, directed against the violence, disturbances, and abuses of the feudal system. Many other of St. Louis's legislativeand administrative acts have been published either in subsequent volumesof the _Recueil des Ordonnances des Rois, _ or in similar collections, andthe learned have drawn attention to a great number of them stillremaining unpublished in various archives. As for the large collectionof legislative enactments known by the name of _Etailissements de SaintLouis, _ it is probably a lawyer's work, posterior, in great part atleast, to his reign, full of incoherent and even contradictoryenactments, and without any claim to be considered as a general code oflaw of St. Louis's date and collected by his order, although theparagraph which serves as preface to the work is given under his name andas if it had been dictated by him. 

Another act, known by the name of the Pragmatic Sanction, has likewisegot placed, with the date of March, 1268, in the _Recueil des Ordonnancesdes Rois de France, _ as having originated with St. Louis. Its object is, first of all, to secure the rights, liberties, and canonical rules, internally, of the Church of France; and, next, to interdict "theexactions and very heavy money-charges which have been imposed or mayhereafter be imposed on the said Church by the court of Rome, and by thewhich our kingdom hath been miserably impoverished; unless they takeplace for reasonable, pious, and very urgent cause, through inevitablenecessity, and with our spontaneous and express consent and that of theChurch of our kingdom. " The authenticity of this act, vigorouslymaintained in the seventeenth century by Bossuet (in his _Defense de laDeclaration du Clerge de France de 1682, _ chap. Ix. T. Xliii. P. 26), and in our time by M. Daunou (in the _Histoire litteraire de la France, continuee par des Hembres de l'Institut, _ t. Xvi. P. 75, and t. Xix. P. 169), has been and still is rendered doubtful for strong reasons, which M. Felix Faure, in his _Histoire de Saint Louis_ (t. Ii. P. 271), has summed up with great clearness. There is no design of entering hereupon an examination of this little historical problem; but it is abounden duty to point out that, if the authenticity of the PragmaticSanction, as St. Louis's, is questionable, the act has, at bottom, nothing but what bears a very strong resemblance to, and is quite inconformity with, the general conduct of that prince. He was profoundlyrespectful, affectionate, and faithful towards the papacy, but, at thesame time, very careful in upholding both the independence of the crownin things temporal, and its right of superintendence in things spiritual. Attention has been drawn to his posture of reserve during the greatquarrel between the priestdom and the empire, and his firmness inwithstanding the violent measures adopted by Gregory IX. And Innocent IV. Against the Emperor Frederick II. Louis carried his notions, as to theindependence of his judgment and authority, very far beyond the cases inwhich that policy went hand in hand with interest, and even into purelyreligious questions. The Bishop of Auxerre said to him one day, in thename of several prelates, "'Sir, these lords which be here, archbishopsand bishops, have told me to tell you that Christianity is perishing inyour hands. ' The king crossed himself and said, Well, tell me how thatis made out!' 'Sir, ' said the bishop, 'it is because nowadays so littlenote is taken of excommunications, that folk let death overtake themexcommunicate without getting absolution, and have no mind to makeatonement to the Church. These lords, therefore, do pray you, sir, forthe love of God and because you ought to do so, to command your provostsand bailiffs that all those who shall remain a year and a dayexcommunicate be forced, by seizure of their goods, to get themselvesabsolved. ' Whereto the king made answer that he would willingly commandthis in respect of the excommunicate touching whom certain proofs shouldbe given him that they were in the wrong. The bishop said that theprelates would not have this at any price, and that they disputed theking's right of jurisdiction in their causes. And the king said that hewould not do it else; for it would be contrary to God and reason if heshould force folks to get absolution when the clergy had done them wrong. As to that, ' said the king, 'I will give you the example of the Count ofBrittany, who for seven years, being fully excommunicate, was at pleaswith the prelates of Brittany; and he prevailed so far that the popecondemned them all. If, then, I had forced the Count of Brittany, thefirst year, to get absolution, I should have sinned against God andagainst him. ' Then the prelates gave up; and never since that time haveI heard that a single demand was made touching the matters above spokenof. " (Joinville, chap. Xiii. P. 43. )

One special fact in the civil and municipal administration of St. Louisdeserves to find a place in history. After the time of Philip Augustusthere was malfeasance in the police of Paris. The provostship of Paris, which comprehended functions analogous to those of prefect, mayor, andreceiver-general, became a purchasable office, filled sometimes by twoprovosts at a time. The burghers no longer found justice or security inthe city where the king resided. At his return from his first crusade, Louis recognized the necessity for applying a remedy to this evil; theprovostship ceased to be a purchasable office; and he made it separatefrom the receivership of the royal domain. In 1258 he chose as provostStephen Boileau, a burgher of note and esteem in Paris; and in order togive this magistrate the authority of which he had need, the kingsometimes came and sat beside him when he was administering justice atthe Chatelet. Stephen Boileau justified the king's confidence, andmaintained so strict a police that he had his own godson hanged fortheft. His administrative foresight was equal to his judicial severity. He established registers wherein were to be inscribed the ruleshabitually followed in respect of the organization and work of thedifferent corporations of artisans, the tariffs of the dues charged, inthe name of the king, upon the admittance of provisions and merchandise, and the titles on which the abbots and other lords founded the privilegesthey enjoyed within the walls of Paris. The corporations of artisans, represented by their sworn masters or prud'hommes, appeared one after theother before the provost to make declaration of the usages in practiceamongst their communities, and to have them registered in the bookprepared for that purpose. This collection of regulations relating tothe arts and trades of Paris in the thirteenth century, known under thename of _Livre des Metiers d'Etienne Boileau, _ is the earliest monumentof industrial statistics drawn up by the French administration, and itwas inserted, for the first time in its entirety, in 1837, amongst the_Collection des Documents relatifs d l'Histoire de France, _ publishedduring M. Guizot's ministry of public instruction. 

St. Louis would be but very incompletely understood if we considered himonly in his political and kingly aspect; we must penetrate into hisprivate life, and observe his personal intercourse with his family, hishousehold, and his people, if we would properly understand and appreciateall the originality and moral worth of his character and his life. Mention has already been made of his relations towards the two queens, his mother and his wife; and, difficult as they were, they werenevertheless always exemplary. Louis was a model of conjugal fidelity, as well as of filial piety. He had by Queen Marguerite eleven children, six sons and five daughters; he loved her tenderly, he never severedhimself from her, and the modest courage she displayed in the firstcrusade rendered her still dearer to him. But he was not blind to herambitious tendencies, and to the insufficiency of her qualifications forgovernment. When he made ready for his second crusade, not only did henot confide to Queen Marguerite the regency of the kingdom, but he eventook care to regulate her expenses, and to curb her passion forauthority. He forbade her to accept any present for herself or herchildren, to lay any commands upon the officers of justice, and to chooseany one for her service, or for that of her children, without the consentof the council of the regency. And he had reason so to act; for, aboutthis same time, Queen Marguerite, emulous of holding in the state thesame place that had been occupied by Queen Blanche, was giving all herthoughts to what her situation would be after her husband's death, andwas coaxing her eldest son, Philip, then sixteen years old, to make her apromise on oath to remain under her guardianship up to thirty years ofage, to take to himself no counsellor without her approval, to reveal toher all designs which might be formed against her, to conclude no treatywith his uncle, Charles of Anjou, King of Sicily, and to keep as a secretthe oath she was thus making him take. Louis was probably informed ofthis strange promise by his young son Philip himself, who got himselfreleased from it by Pope Urban IV. At any rate, the king had aforeshadowing of Queen Marguerite's inclinations, and took precautionsfor rendering them harmless to the crown and the state. 

As for his children, Louis occupied himself in thought and deed withtheir education and their future, moral and social, showing as muchaffection and assiduity as could have been displayed by any father of afamily, even the most devoted to this single task. "After supper theyfollowed him into his chamber, where he made them sit down around him;he instructed them in their duties, and then sent them away to bed. Hedrew their particular attention to the good and evil deeds of princes. He, moreover, went to see then in their own apartment when he had anyleisure, informed himself as to the progress they were making, and, likeanother Tobias, gave them excellent instructions. . . . On HolyThursday his sons used to wash, just as he used, the feet of thirteen ofthe poor, give them a considerable sum as alms, and then wait upon themat table. The king having been minded to carry the first of the poorsouls to the Hotel-Dieu, at Compiegne, with the assistance of his son-in-law, King Theobald of Navarre, whom he loved as a son, his two eldestsons, Louis and Philip, carried the second thither. " They were wont tobehave towards him in the most respectful manner. He would have all ofthem, even Theobald, yield him strict obedience in that which he enjoinedupon them. He desired anxiously that the three children born to him inthe East, during his first crusade, John Tristan, Peter, and Blanche, andeven Isabel, his eldest daughter, should enter upon the cloistered life, which he looked upon as the safest for their salvation. He exhorted themthereto, especially his daughter Isabel, many and many a time, in lettersequally tender and pious; but, as they testified no taste for it, he madeno attempt to force their inclinations, and concerned himself only abouthaving them well married, not forgetting to give them good appanages, and, for their life in the world, the most judicious counsels. Theinstructions, written with his own hand in French, which he committed tohis eldest son, Philip, as soon as he found himself so seriously illbefore Tunis, are a model of virtue, wisdom, and tenderness on the partof a father, a king, and a Christian. 

Pass we from the king's family to the king's household, and from thechildren to the servitors of St. Louis. We have here no longer thepowerful tie of blood, and of that feeling, at the same time personal andyet disinterested, which is experienced by parents on seeing themselvesliving over again in their children. Far weaker motives, mere kindnessand custom, unite masters to their servants, and stamp a moral characterupon the relations between them; but with St. Louis, so great was hiskindness, that it resembled affection, and caused affection to spring upin the hearts of those who were the objects of it. At the same time thathe required in his servitors an almost austere morality, he readilypassed over in silence their little faults, and treated them, in suchcases, not only with mildness, but with that consideration which, in thehumblest conditions, satisfies the self-respect of people, and elevatesthem in their own eyes. "Louis used to visit his domestics when theywere ill; and when they died he never failed to pray for them, and tocommend them to the prayers of the faithful. He had the mass for thedead, which it was his custom to hear every day, sung for them. " He hadtaken back an old servitor of his grandfather, Philip Augustus, whom thatking had dismissed because his fire sputtered, and John, whose duty itwas to attend to it, did not know how to prevent that slight noise. Louis was, from time to time, subject to a malady, during which his rightleg, from the ankle to the calf, became inflamed, as red as blood, andpainful. One day, when he had an attack of this complaint, the king, ashe lay, wished to make a close inspection of the redness in his leg; asJohn was clumsily holding a lighted candle close to the king, a drop ofhot grease fell on the bad leg; and the king, who had sat up on his bed, threw himself back, exclaiming, "Ah! John, John, my grandfather turnedyou out of his house for a less matter!" and the clumsiness of John drewdown upon him no other chastisement save this exclamation. (_Vie deSaint Louis, _ by Queen Marguerite's confessor; _Recueiz des Historiens deFrance, _ t. Xx. P. 105; _Vie de Saint Louis, _ by Lenain de Tillemont, t. V. P. 388. )

Far away from the king's household and service, and without any personalconnection with him, a whole people, the people of the poor, the infirm, the sick, the wretched, and the neglected of every sort occupied aprominent place in the thoughts and actions of Louis. All thechroniclers of the age, all the historians of his reign, have celebratedhis charity as much as his piety; and the philosophers of the eighteenthcentury almost forgave him his taste for relics, in consideration of hisbeneficence. And it was not merely legislative and administrativebeneficence; St. Louis did not confine himself to founding and endowinghospitals, hospices, asylums, the Hotel-Dieu at Pontoise, that at Vernon, that at Compiegne, and, at Paris, the house of Quinze-Vingts, for threehundred blind, but he did not spare his person in his beneficence, andregarded no deed of charity as beneath a king's dignity. Every day, wherever the king went, one hundred and twenty-two of the poor receivedeach two loaves, a quart of wine, meat or fish for a good dinner, and aParis denier. The mothers of families had a loaf more for each child. Besides these hundred and twenty-two poor having out-door relief, thirteen others were every day introduced into the hotel, and there livedas the king's officers; and three of them sat at table at the same timewith the king, in the same hall as he, and quite close. " . . . "Manya time, " says Joinville, "I saw him cut their bread, and give them todrink. He asked me one day if I washed the feet of the poor on HolyThursday. 'Sir, ' said I, 'what a benefit! The feet of those knaves!Not I. ' 'Verily, ' said he, 'that is ill said, for you ought not to holdin disdain what God did for our instruction. I pray you, therefore, forlove of me accustom yourself to wash them. '" Sometimes, when the kinghad leisure, he used to say, "Come and visit the poor in such and such aplace, and let us feast them to their hearts' content. " Once when hewent to Chateauneuf-sur-Loire, a poor old woman, who was at the door ofher cottage, and held in her hand a loaf, said to him, "Good king, it isof this bread, which comes of thine alms, that my husband, who lieth sickyonder indoors, doth get sustenance. " The king took the bread, saying, "It is rather hard bread. " And he went into the cottage to see with hisown eyes the sick man. 

[Illustration: "It is rather hard Bread. "----146]

When he was visiting the churches one Holy Friday, at Compiegne, as hewas going that day barefoot according to his custom, and distributingalms to the poor whom he met, he perceived, on the yonder side of a mirypond which filled a portion of the street, a leper, who, not daring tocome near, tried, nevertheless, to attract the king's attention. Louiswalked through the pond, went up to the leper, gave him some money, tookhis hand and kissed it. "All present, " says the chronicler, "crossedthemselves for admiration at seeing this holy temerity of the king, whohad no fear of putting his lips to a hand that none would have dared totouch. " In such deeds there was infinitely more than the goodness andgreatness of a kingly sold; there was in them that profound Christiansympathy which is moved at the sight of any human creature sufferingseverely in body or soul, and which, at such times, gives heed to nofear, shrinks from no pains, recoils with no disgust, and has no otherthought but that of offering some fraternal comfort to the body or thesoul that is suffering. 

He who thus felt and acted was no monk, no prince enwrapt in meredevoutness and altogether given up to works and practices of piety; hewas a knight, a warrior, a politician, a true king, who attended to theduties of authority as well as to those of charity, and who won respectfrom his nearest friends as well as from strangers, whilst astonishingthem at one time by his bursts of mystic piety and monastic austerity, at another by his flashes of the ruler's spirit and his judiciousindependence, even towards the representatives of the faith and Churchwith whom he was in sympathy. "He passed for the wisest man in all hiscouncil. " In difficult matters and on grave occasions none formed ajudgment with more sagacity, and what his intellect so well apprehendedhe expressed with a great deal of propriety and grace. He was, inconversation, the nicest and most agreeable of men; "he was gay, " saysJoinville, "and when we were private at court, he used to sit at the footof his bed; and when the preachers and cordeliers who were there spoke tohim of a book he would like to hear, he said to them, 'Nay, you shall notread to me, for there is no book so good, after dinner, as talk _adlibitum, _ that is, every one saying what he pleases. ' "Not that he was atall averse from books and literates: "He was sometimes present at thediscourses and disputations of the University; but he took care to searchout for himself the truth in the word of God and in the traditions of theChurch. . . . Having found out, during his travels in the East, thata Saracenic sultan had collected a quantity of books for the service ofthe philosophers of his sect, he was shamed to see that Christians hadless zeal for getting instructed in the truth than infidels had forgetting themselves made dexterous in falsehood; so much so that, afterhis return to France, he had search made in the abbeys for all thegenuine works of St. Augustin, St. Ambrose, St. Jerome, St. Gregory, andother orthodox teachers, and, having caused copies of them to be made, hehad them placed in the treasury of Sainte-Chapelle. He used to read themwhen he had any leisure, and he readily lent them to those who might getprofit from them for themselves or for others. Sometimes, at the end ofthe afternoon meal, he sent for pious persons with whom he conversedabout God, about the stories in the Bible and the histories of thesaints, or about the lives of the Fathers. " He had a particularfriendship for the learned Robert of Sorbon, founder of the Sorbonne, whose idea was a society of secular ecclesiastics, who, living in commonand having the necessaries of life, should give themselves up entirely tostudy and gratuitous teaching. Not only did St. Louis give him everyfacility and every aid necessary for the establishment of his learnedcollege, but he made him one of his chaplains, and often invited him tohis presence and his table in order to enjoy his conversation. "One dayit happened, " says Joinville, "that Master Robert was taking his mealbeside me, and we were talking low. The king reproved us, and said, 'Speak up, for your company think that you may be talking evil of them. If you speak, at meals, of things which should please us, speak up; ifnot, be silent. ' "Another day, at one of their reunions, with the kingin their midst, Robert of Sorbon reproached Joinville with being "morebravely clad than the king; for, " said he, "you do dress in furs andgreen cloth, which the king doth not. " Joinville defended himselfvigorously, in his turn attacking Robert for the elegance of his dress. The king took the learned doctor's part, and when he had gone, "My lordthe king, " says Joinville, "called his son, my lord Philip, and KingTheobald, sat him down at the entrance of his oratory, placed his hand onthe ground and said, 'Sit ye down here close by me, that we be notoverheard;' and then he told me that he had called us in order to confessto us that he had wrongfully taken the part of Master Robert; for, justas the seneschal [Joinville] saith, ye ought to be well and decentlyclad, because your womankind will love you the better for it, and yourpeople will prize you the more; for, saith the wise man, it is right soto bedeck one's self with garments and armor that the proper men of thisworld say not that there is too much made thereof, nor the young folk toolittle. " (Joinville, ch. Cxxxv. P. 301; ch. V. And vi. Pp. 12 16;t. V. Pp. 326, 364, and 368. )

Assuredly there was enough in such and so free an exercise of mind, insuch a rich abundance of thoughts and sentiments, in such a religious, political, and domestic life, to occupy and satisfy a soul full of energyand power. But, as has already been said, an idea cherished with alasting and supreme passion, the idea of the crusade took entirepossession of St. Louis. For seven years, after his return from theEast, from 1254 to 1261, he appeared to think no more of it; and there isnothing to show that he spoke of it even to his most intimate confidants. But, in spite of apparent tranquillity, he lived, so far, in a ferment ofimagination and a continual fever, resembling in that respect, though theend aimed at was different, those great men, ambitious warriors orpoliticians, of natures forever at boiling point, for whom nothing issufficient, and who are constantly fostering, beyond the ordinary courseof events, some vast and strange desire, the accomplishment of whichbecomes for them a fixed idea and an insatiable passion. As Alexanderand Napoleon were incessantly forming some new design, or, to speak morecorrectly, some new dream of conquest and dominion, in the same way St. Louis, in his pious ardor, never ceased to aspire to a re-entry ofJerusalem, to the deliverance of the Holy Sepulchre, and to the victoryof Christianity over Mohammedanism in the East, always flattering himselfthat some favorable circumstance would recall him to his interruptedwork. It has already been told, at the termination, in the precedingchapter, of the crusaders' history, how he had reason to suppose, in1261, that circumstances were responding to his desire; how he first ofall prepared, noiselessly and patiently, for his second crusade; how, after seven years' labor, less and less concealed as days went on, heproclaimed his purpose, and swore to accomplish it in the following year;and how at last, in the month of March, 1270, against the will of France, of the pope, and even of the majority of his comrades, he actually setout--to go and die, on the 25th of the following August, before Tunis, without having dealt the Mussulmans of the East even the shadow of aneffectual blow, having no strength to do more than utter, from time totime, as he raised himself on his bed, the cry of Jerusalem! Jerusalem!and, at the last moment, as he lay in sackcloth and ashes, pronouncingmerely these parting words: "Father, after the example of our DivineMaster, into Thy hands I commend my spirit!" Even the crusader wasextinct in St. Louis; and only the Christian remained. 

The world has seen upon the throne greater captains, more profoundpoliticians, vaster and more brilliant intellects, princes who haveexercised, beyond their own lifetime, a more powerful and a more lastinginfluence than St. Louis; but it has never seen a rarer king, never seena man who could possess, as he did, sovereign power without contractingthe passions and vices natural to it, and who, in this respect, displayedin his government human virtues exalted to the height of Christian. Forall his moral sympathy, and superior as he was to his age, St. Louis, nevertheless, shared, and even helped to prolong, two of its greatestmistakes; as a Christian he misconceived the rights of conscience inrespect of religion, and, as a king, he brought upon his peopledeplorable evils and perils for the sake of a fruitless enterprise. Waragainst religious liberty was, for a long course of ages, the crime ofChristian communities and the source of the most cruel evils as well asof the most formidable irreligious reactions the world has had toundergo. The thirteenth century was the culminating period of this fatalnotion and the sanction of it conferred by civil legislation as well asecclesiastical teaching. St. Louis joined, so far, with sincereconviction, in the general and ruling idea of his age; and the jumbledcode which bears the name of _Etablissements de Saint Louis, _ and inwhich there are collected many ordinances anterior or posterior to hisreign, formally condemns heretics to death, and bids the civil judges tosee to the execution, in this respect, of the bishops' sentences. In1255 St. Louis himself demanded of Pope Alexander IV. Leave for theDominicans and Franciscans to exercise, throughout the whole kingdom, theinquisition already established, on account of the Albigensians, in theold domains of the Counts of Toulouse. The bishops, it is true, were tobe consulted before condemnation could be pronounced by the inquisitorsagainst a heretic; but that was a mark of respect for the episcopate andfor the rights of the Gallican Church rather than a guarantee for libertyof conscience; and such was St. Louis's feeling upon this subject, thatliberty, or rather the most limited justice, was less to be expected fromthe kingship than from the episcopate. St. Louis's extreme severitytowards what he called the knavish oath (_vilain serment_), that is, blasphemy, an offence for which there is no definition save what iscontained in the bare name of it, is, perhaps, the most strikingindication of the state of men's minds, and especially of the king's, inthis respect. Every blasphemer was to receive on his mouth the imprintof a red-hot iron. "One day the king had a burgher of Paris branded inthis way; and violent murmurs were raised in the capital and came to theking's ears. He responded by declaring that he wished a like brand mightmark his lips, and that he might bear the shame of it all his life, ifonly the vice of blasphemy might disappear from his kingdom. Some timeafterwards, having had a work of great public utility executed, hereceived, on that occasion, from the landlords of Paris numerousexpressions of gratitude. 'I expect, ' said he, 'a greater recompensefrom the Lord for the curses brought upon me by that brand inflicted uponblasphemers than for the blessings I get because of this act of generalutility. ' "(Joinville, chap. Cxxxviii. ; _Histoire de Saint Louis, _ by M. Felix Faure, t. Ii. P. 300. )

Of all human errors those most in vogue are the most dangerous, for theyare just those from which the most superior minds have the greatestdifficulty in preserving themselves. It is impossible to see, withouthorror, into what aberrations of reason and of moral sense men otherwisemost enlightened and virtuous may be led away by the predominant ideas oftheir age. And the horror becomes still greater when a discovery is madeof the iniquities, sufferings, and calamities, public and private, consequent upon the admission of such aberrations amongst the choicespirits of the period. In the matter of religious liberty, St. Louis isa striking example of the vagaries which may be fallen into, under thesway of public feeling, by the most equitable of minds and the mostscrupulous of consciences. A solemn warning, in times of greatintellectual and popular ferment, for those men whose hearts are set onindependence in their thoughts as well as in their conduct, and whoseonly object is justice and truth. 

As for the crusades, the situation of Louis was with respect to themquite different and his responsibility far more personal. The crusadeshad certainly, in their origin, been the spontaneous and universalimpulse of Christian Europe towards an object lofty, disinterested, andworthy of the devotion of men; and St. Louis was, without any doubt, themost lofty, disinterested, and heroic representative of this grandChristian movement. But towards the middle of the thirteenth century themoral complexion of the crusades had already undergone great alteration;the salutary effect they were to have exercised for the advancement ofEuropean civilization still loomed obscurely in the distance; whilsttheir evil results were already clearly manifesting themselves, and theyhad no longer that beauty lent by spontaneous and general feeling whichhad been their strength and their apology. Weariness, doubt, and commonsense had, so far as this matter was concerned, done their work amongstall classes of the feudal community. As Sire de Joinville, so also hadmany knights, honest burghers, and simple country-folks recognized theflaws in the enterprise, and felt no more belief in its success. It isthe glory of St. Louis that he was, in the thirteenth century, thefaithful and virtuous representative of the crusade such as it was whenit sprang from the womb of united Christendom, and when Godfrey deBouillon was its leader at the end of the eleventh. It was themisdemeanor of St. Louis, and a great error in his judgment, that heprolonged, by his blindly prejudiced obstinacy, a movement which was moreand more inopportune and illegitimate, for it was becoming day by daymore factitious and more inane. 

In the long line of kings of France, called Most Christian Kings, onlytwo, Charlemagne and Louis IX. , have received the still more august titleof Saint. As for Charlemagne, we must not be too exacting in the way ofproofs of his legal right to that title in the Catholic Church; he wascanonized, in 1165 or 1166, only by the anti-pope Pascal III. , throughthe influence of Frederick Barbarossa; and since that time, thecanonization of Charlemagne has never been officially allowed anddeclared by any popes recognized as legitimate. They tolerated andtacitly admitted it, on account, no doubt, of the services rendered byCharlemagne to the papacy. But Charlemagne had ardent and influentialadmirers outside the pale of popes and emperors; he was the great man andthe popular hero of the Germanic race in Western Europe. His saintshipwas welcomed with acclamation in a great part of Germany, where it hadalways been religiously kept up. Prom the earliest date of theUniversity of Paris, he had been the patron there of all students of theGerman race. In France, nevertheless, his position as a saint was stillobscure and doubtful, when Louis XI. , towards the end of the fifteenthcentury, by some motive now difficult to unravel, but probably in orderto take from his enemy, Charles the Rash, Duke of Burgundy, who was inpossession of the fairest provinces of Charlemagne's empire, theexclusive privilege of so great a memory, ordained that there should berendered to the illustrious emperor the honors due to the saints; and heappointed the 28th of January for his feast-day, with a threat of thepenalty of death against all who should refuse conformity with the order. Neither the command nor the threat of Louis XI. Had any great effect. It does not appear that, in the Church of France, the saintship ofCharlemagne was any the more generally admitted and kept up; but theUniversity of Paris faithfully maintained its traditions, and some twocenturies after Louis XI. , in 1661, without expressly giving toCharlemagne the title of saint, it loudly proclaimed him its patron, andmade his feast-day an annual and solemn institution, which, in spite ofsome hesitation on the part of the parliament of Paris, and in spite ofthe revolutions of our time, still exists as the grand feast-daythroughout the area of our classical studies. The University of Francerepaid Charlemagne for the service she had received from him; sheprotected his saintship as he had protected her schools and her scholars. 

The saintship of Louis IX. Was not the object of such doubt, and had nosuch need of learned and determined protectors. Claimed as it was on thevery morrow of his death, not only by his son Philip III. , called TheBold, and by the barons and prelates of the kingdom, but also by thepublic voice of France and of Europe, it at once became the subject ofinvestigations and deliberations on the part of the Holy See. Fortwenty-four years, new popes, filling in rapid succession the chair ofSt. Peter (Gregory X. , Innocent V. , John XXI. , Nicholas III. , Martin IV. , Honorius IV. , Nicholas IV. , St. Celestine V. , and Boniface VIII. ), prosecuted the customary inquiries touching the faith and life, thevirtues and miracles, of the late king; and it was Boniface VIII. , thepope destined to carry on against Philip the Handsome, grandson of St. Louis, the most violent of struggles, who decreed, on the 11th of August, 1297, the canonization of the most Christian amongst the kings of France, and one of the truest Christians, king or simple, in France and inEurope. 

St. Louis was succeeded by his son, Philip III. , a prince, no doubt, ofsome personal valor, since he has retained in history the nickname of TheBold, but not otherwise beyond mediocrity. His reign had an unfortunatebeginning. After having passed several months before Tunis, in slack andunsuccessful continuation of his father's crusade, he gave it up, andre-embarked in November, 1270, with the remnants of an army anxious toquit "that accursed land, " wrote one of the crusaders, "where we languishrather than live, exposed to torments of dust, fury of winds, corruptionof atmosphere, and putrefaction of corpses. " A tempest caught the fleeton the coast of Sicily; and Philip lost, by it several vessels, four orfive thousand men, and all the money he had received from the Mussulmansof Tunis as the price of his departure. Whilst passing through Italy, atCosenza, his wife, Isabel of Aragon, six months gone with child, fellfrom her horse, was delivered of a child which lived barely a few hours, and died herself a day or two afterwards, leaving her husband almost assick as sad. He at last arrived at Paris, on the 21st of May, 1271, bringing back with him five royal biers, that of his father, that of hisbrother, John Tristan, Count of Nevers, that of his brother-in-law, Theo-bald King of Navarre, that of his wife, and that of his son. The dayafter his arrival he conducted them all in state to the Abbey of St. Denis, and was crowned at Rheims, not until the 30th of August following. His reign, which lasted fifteen years, was a period of neither repose norglory. He engaged in war several times over in Southern France and inthe north of Spain, in 1272, against Roger Bernard, Count of Foix, and in1285 against Don Pedro III. , King of Aragon, attempting conquests andgaining victories, but becoming easily disgusted with his enterprises andgaining no result of importance or durability. Without his takinghimself any official or active part in the matter, the name and credit ofFrance were more than once compromised in the affairs of Italy throughthe continual wars and intrigues of his uncle Charles of Anjou, King ofSicily, who was just as ambitious, just as turbulent, and just astyrannical as his brother St. Louis was scrupulous, temperate, and just. It was in the reign of Philip the Bold that there took place in Sicily, on the 30th of March, 1282, that notorious massacre of the French whichis known by the name of Sicilian Vespers, which was provoked by theunbridled excesses of Charles of Anjou's comrades, and through which manynoble French families had to suffer cruelly. 

[Illustration: THE SICILIAN VESPERS----156]

At the same time, the celebrated Italian Admiral Roger de Loriainflicted, by sea, on the French party in Italy, the Provincal navy, andthe army of Philip the Bold, who was engaged upon incursions into Spain, considerable reverses and losses. At the same period the foundationswere being laid in Germany and in the north of Italy, in the person ofRudolph of Hapsburg, elected emperor, of the greatness reached by theHouse of Austria, which was destined to be so formidable a rival toFrance. The government of Philip III. Showed hardly more ability at homethan in Europe; not that the king was himself violent, tyrannical, greedyof power or money, and unpopular; he was, on the contrary, honorable, moderate in respect of his personal claims, simple in his manners, sincerely pious and gentle towards the humble; but he was at the sametime weak, credulous, very illiterate, say the chroniclers, and withoutpenetration, foresight, or intelligent and determined will. He fellunder the influence of an inferior servant of his house, Peter de laBrosse, who had been surgeon and barber first of all to St. Louis andthen to Philip III. , who made him, before long, his chancellor andfamiliar counsellor. Being, though a skilful and active intriguer, entirely concerned with his own personal fortunes and those of hisfamily, this barber-mushroom was soon a mark for the jealousy and theattacks of the great lords of the court. And he joined issue with them, and even with the young queen, Maria of Brabant, the second wife ofPhilip III. Accusations of treason, of poisoning and peculation, wereraised against him, and, in 1276, he was hanged at Paris, on the thieves'gibbet, in presence of the Dukes of Burgundy and Brabant, the Count ofArtois, and many other personages of note, who took pleasure inwitnessing his execution. His condemnation, "the cause of which remainedunknown to the people, " says the chronicler William of Nangis, "was agreat source of astonishment and grumbling. " Peter de la Brosse was oneof the first examples, in French history, of those favorites who did notunderstand that, if the scandal caused by their elevation were not toentail their ruin, it was incumbent upon them to be great men. 

In spite of the want of ability and the weakness conspicuous in thegovernment of Philip the Bold, the kingship in France had, in his reign, better fortunes than could have been expected. 

The death, without children, of his uncle Alphonso, St. Louis's brother, Count of Poitiers and also Count of Toulouse, through his wife, Joan, daughter of Raymond VII. , put Philip in possession of those fairprovinces. He at first possessed the count-ship of Toulouse merely withthe title of count, and as a private domain which was not definitivelyincorporated with the crown of France until a century later. Certaindisputes arose between England and France in respect of this greatinheritance; and Philip ended them by ceding Agenois to Edward I. , Kingof England, and keeping Quercy. He also ceded to Pope Urban IV. Thecounty of Venaissin, with its capital Avignon, which the court of Romeclaimed by virtue of a gift from Raymond VII. , Count of Toulouse, andwhich, through a course of many disputations and vicissitudes, remainedin possession of the Holy See until it was reunited to France on the 19thof February, 1797, by the treaty of Tolentino. But, notwithstandingthese concessions, when Philip the Bold died, at Perpignan, the 5th ofOctober, 1285, on his return from his expedition in Aragon, thesovereignty in Southern France, as far as the frontiers of Spain, hadbeen won for the kingship of France. 

A Flemish chronicler, a monk at Egmont, describes the character of Philipthe Bold's successor in the following words: "A certain King of France, also named Philip, eaten up by the fever of avarice and cupidity. " Andthat was not the only fever inherent in Philip IV. , called The Handsome;he was a prey also to that of ambition, and, above all, to that of power. When he mounted the throne, at seventeen years of age, he was handsome, as his nickname tells us, cold, taciturn, harsh, brave at need, butwithout fire or dash, able in the formation of his designs, and obstinatein prosecuting them by craft or violence, by means of bribery or cruelty, with wit to choose and support his servants, passionately vindictiveagainst his enemies, and faithless and unsympathetic towards hissubjects, but from time to time taking care to conciliate them, either bycalling them to his aid in his difficulties or his dangers, or by givingthem protection against other oppressors. Never, perhaps, was kingbetter served by circumstances or more successful in his enterprises;but he is the first of the Capetians who had a scandalous contempt forrights, abused success, and thrust the king-ship, in France, upon thehigh road of that arrogant and reckless egotism which is sometimescompatible with ability and glory, but which carries with it in the germ, and sooner or later brings out in full bloom, the native vices and fatalconsequences of arbitrary and absolute power. 

Away from his own kingdom, in his dealings with foreign countries, Philipthe Handsome had a good fortune, which his predecessors had lacked, andwhich his successors lacked still more. Through William the Conqueror'ssettlement in England and Henry II. 's marriage with Eleanor of Aquitaine, the Kings of England had, by reason of their possessions and their claimsin France, become the natural enemies of the Kings of France, and war wasalmost incessant between the two kingdoms. But Edward I. , King ofEngland, ever since his accession to the throne, in 1272, had his ideasfixed upon, and his constant efforts directed towards, the conquests ofthe countries of Wales and Scotland, so as to unite under his sway thewhole island of Great Britain. The Welsh and the Scotch, from prince topeasant, offered an energetic resistance in defence of theirindependence; and it was only after seven years' warfare, from 1277 to1284, that the conquest of Wales by the English was accomplished, and thestyle of Prince of Wales became the title of the heir to the throne ofEngland. Scotland, in spite of dissensions at home, made a longer and amore effectual resistance; and though it was reduced to submission, itwas not conquered by Edward I. Two national heroes, William Wallace andRobert Bruce, excited against him insurrections which were oftentriumphant and always being renewed; and after having, during eighteenyears of strife, maintained a precarious dominion in Scotland, Edward I. Died, in 1307, without having acquired the sovereignty of it. But hispersevering ardor in this two-fold enterprise kept him out of war withFrance; he did all he could to avoid it, and when the pressure ofcircumstances involved him in it for a time, he was anxious to escapefrom it. Being summoned to Paris by Philip the Handsome, in 1286, toswear fealty and homage on account of his domains in France, he repairedthither with a good grace, and, on his knees before his souzerain, repeated to him the solemn form of words, "I become your liegeman for thelands I hold of you this side the sea, according to the fashion of thepeace which was made between our ancestors. " The conditions of thispeace were confirmed, and, by a new treaty between the two princes, theannual payment of fifty thousand dollars to the King of England, inexchange for his claims over Normandy, was guaranteed to him, and Edwardrenounced his pretensions to Querey in consideration of a yearly sum ofthree thousand livres of Tours. In 1292, a quarrel and some hostilitiesat sea between the English and Norman commercial navies grew into a warbetween the two kings; and it dragged its slow length along for fouryears in the south-west of France. Edward made an alliance, in thenorth, with the Flemish, who were engaged in a deadly struggle withPhilip the Handsome, and thereby lost Aquitaine for a season; but, in1296, a truce was concluded between the belligerents, and though theimportance of England's commercial relations with Flanders decided Edwardupon resuming his alliance with the Flemish, when, in 1300, war broke outagain between them and France, he withdrew from it three yearsafterwards, and made a separate peace with Philip the Handsome, who gavehim back Aquitaine. In 1306, fresh differences arose between the twokings; but before they had rekindled the torch of war, Edward I. Died atthe opening of a new campaign in Scotland, and his successor, Edward II. , repaired to Boulogne, where he, in his turn, did homage to Philip theHandsome for the duchy of Aquitaine, and espoused Philip's daughterIsabel, reputed to be the most beautiful woman in Europe. In spite, then, of frequent interruptions, the reign of Edward I. Was on the wholea period of peace between England and France, being exempt, at any rate, from premeditated and obstinate hostilities. 

In Southern France, at the foot of the Pyrenees, Philip the Handsome, just as his father, Philip the Bold, was, during the first years of hisreign, at war with the Kings of Aragon, Alphonso III. And Jayme II. ; butthese campaigns, originating in purely local quarrels, or in the tiesbetween the descendants of St. Louis and of his brother, Charles ofAnjou, King of the Two Sicilies, rather than in furtherance of thegeneral interests of France, were terminated in 1291 by a treatyconcluded at Tarascon between the belligerents, and have remained withouthistorical importance. 

The Flemish were the people with whom Philip the Handsome engaged in andkept up, during the whole of his reign, with frequent alternations ofdefeat and success, a really serious war. In the thirteenth century, Flanders was the most populous and the richest country in Europe. Sheowed the fact to the briskness of her manufacturing and commercialundertakings, not only amongst her neighbors, but throughout Southern andEastern Europe, in Italy, in Spain, in Sweden, in Norway, in Hungary, inRussia, and even as far as Constantinople, where, as we have seen, Baldwin I. , Count of Flanders, became, in 1204, Latin Emperor of theEast. Cloth, and all manner of woollen stuffs, were the principalarticles of Flemish production, and it was chiefly from England thatFlanders drew her supply of Wool, the raw material of her industry. Thence arose between the two countries commercial relations which couldnot fail to acquire political importance. As early as the middle of thetwelfth century, several Flemish towns formed a society for founding inEngland a commercial exchange, which obtained great privileges, and, under the name of the Flemish hanse of London, reached rapid development. The merchants of Bruges had taken the initiative in it; but soon all thetowns of Flanders--and Flanders was covered with towns--Ghent, Lille, Ypres, Courtrai, Furnes, Alost, St. Omer, and Douai, entered theconfederation, and made unity as well as extension of liberties inrespect of Flemish commerce the object of their joint efforts. Theirprosperity became celebrated; and its celebrity gave it increase. It wasa burgher of Bruges who was governor of the hanse of London, and he wascalled the Count of the Hanse. The fair of Bruges, held in the month ofMay, brought together traders from the whole world. "Thither came forexchange, " says the most modern and most enlightened historian ofFlanders (Baron Kervyn de Lettenhove, _Histoire de Flandre, _ t. Ii. P. 300), "the produce of the North and the South, the riches collected inthe pilgrimages to Novogorod, and those brought over by the caravans fromSamarcand and Bagdad, the pitch of Norway and the oils of Andalusia, thefurs of Russia and the dates from the Atlas, the metals of Hungary andBohemia, the figs of Granada, the honey of Portugal, the wax of Morocco, and the spice of Egypt; whereby, says an ancient manuscript, no land isto be compared in merchandise to the land of Flanders. " At Ypres, thechief centre of cloth fabrics, the population increased so rapidly that, in 1247, the sheriffs prayed Pope Innocent IV. To augment the number ofparishes in their city, which contained, according to their account, about two hundred thousand persons. So much prosperity made the Countsof Flanders very puissant lords. "Marguerite II. , called the Black, Countess of Flanders and Hainault, from 1244 to 1280, was extremelyrich, " says a chronicler, "not only in lands, but in furniture, jewels, and money; and, as is not customary with women, she was right liberal andright sumptuous, not only in her largesses, but in her entertainments, and whole manner of living; insomuch that she kept up the state of queenrather than countess. " Nearly all the Flemish towns were stronglyorganized communes, in which prosperity had won liberty, and which becamebefore long small republics sufficiently powerful not only for thedefence of their municipal rights against the Counts of Flanders, theirlords, but for offering an armed resistance to such of the sovereignstheir neighbors as attempted to conquer them or to trammel them in theircommercial relations, or to draw upon their wealth by forcedcontributions or by plunder. Philip Augustus had begun to have a tasteof their strength during his quarrels with Count Ferdinand of Portugal, whom he had made Count of Flanders by marrying him to the Countess Joan, heiress of the countship, and whom, after the battle of Bouvines, he hadconfined for thirteen years in the tower of the Louvre. Philip theHandsome laid himself open to and was subjected by the Flemings to stillrougher experiences. 

At the time of the latter king's accession to the throne, Guy deDampierre, of noble Champagnese origin, had been for five years Count ofFlanders, as heir to his mother, Marguerite II. He was a prince who didnot lack courage, or, on a great emergency, high-mindedness and honor;but he was ambitious, covetous, as parsimonious as his mother had beenmunificent, and above all concerned to get his children married in amanner conducive to his own political importance. He had by his twowives, Matilda of Bethune and Isabel of Luxembourg, nine sons and eightdaughters, offering free scope for combinations and connections, inrespect of which Guy de Dampierre was not at all scrupulous about themeans of success. He had a quarrel with his son-in-law, Florent V. , Count of Holland, to whom he had given his daughter Beatrice in marriage;and another of his sons-in-law, John I. , Duke of Brabant, married toanother of his daughters, the Princess Marguerite, offered himself asmediator in the difference. The two brothers-in-law went together to seetheir father-in-law; but, on their arrival, Guy de Dampierre seized theperson of the Count of Holland, and would not release him until the Dukeof Brabant offered to become prisoner in his place, and found himselfobliged, in order to obtain his liberty, to pay his father-in-law a toughransom. It was not long before Guy himself suffered from the same sortof iniquitous surprise that he had practised upon his sons-in-law. In1293 he was secretly negotiating the marriage of Philippa, one of hisdaughters, with Prince Edward, eldest son of the King of England. Philipthe Handsome, having received due warning, invited the Count of Flandersto Paris, "to take counsel with him and the other barons touching thestate of the king-dom. " At first Guy hesitated; but he dared not refuse, and he repaired to Paris, with his sons John and Guy. As soon as hearrived he bashfully announced to the king the approaching union of hisdaughter with the English prince, protesting, "that he would never cease, for all that, to serve him loyally, as every good and true man shouldserve his lord. " "In God's name, Sir Count, " said the enraged king, "this thing will never do; you have made alliance with my foe, without mywit; wherefore you shall abide with me;" and he had him, together withhis sons, marched off at once to the tower of the Louvre, where Guyremained for six months, and did not then get out save by leaving ashostage to the King of France his daughter Philippa herself, who wasdestined to pass in this prison her young and mournful life. On oncemore entering Flanders, Count Guy oscillated for two years between theKing of France and the King of England, submitting to the exactions ofthe former, at the same time that he was privily renewing his attempts toform an intimate alliance with the latter. Driven to extremity by thehaughty severity of Philip, he at last came to a decision, concluded aformal treaty with Edward I. , affianced to the English crown-prince themost youthful of his daughters, Isabel of Flanders, youngest sister ofPhilippa, the prisoner in the tower of the Louvre, and charged twoambassadors to go to Paris, as the bearers of the following declaration:"Every one doth know in how many ways the King of France hath misbehavedtowards God and justice. Such is his might and his pride, that he dothacknowledge nought above himself, and he hath brought us to the necessityof seeking allies who may be able to defend and protect us. . . . Byreason whereof we do charge our ambassadors to declare and say, for usand from us, to the above said king, that because of his misdeeds anddefaults of justice, we hold ourselves unbound, absolved, and deliveredfrom all bonds, all alliances, obligations, conventions, subjections, services, and dues whereby we may have been bounden towards him. "

[Illustration: THE TOWN AND FORTRESS OF LILLE----164]

This meant war. And it was prompt and sharp on the part of the King ofFrance, slow and dull on the part of the King of England, who was alwaysmore bent upon the conquest of Scotland than upon defending, on theContinent, his ally, the Count of Flanders. In June, 1297, Philip theHandsome, in person, laid siege to Lille, and, on the 13th of August, Robert, Count of Artois, at the head of the French chivalry, gained atFurnes, over the Flemish army, a victory which decided the campaign. Lille capitulated. The English re-enforcements arrived too late, andserved no other purpose but that of inducing Philip to grant the Flemingsa truce for two years. A fruitless attempt was made, with the help ofPope Boniface VIII. , to change the truce into a lasting peace. The veryday on which it expired, Charles, Count of Valois, and brother of Philipthe Handsome, entered Flanders with a powerful army, surprised Douai, passed through Bruges, and, on arriving at Ghent, gave a reception to itsmagistrates, who came and offered him the keys. "The burghers of thetowns of Flanders, " says a chronicler of the age, "were all bribed bygifts or promises from the King of France, who would never have dared toinvade their frontiers, had they been faithful to their count. " Guy deDampierre, hopelessly beaten, repaired, with two of his sons, and fifty-one of his faithful knights, to the camp of the Count of Valois, who gavehim a kind reception, and urged him to trust himself to the king'sgenerosity, promising at the same time to support his suit. Guy set outfor Paris with all his retinue. On approaching the City-palace which wasthe usual residence of the kings, he espied at one of the windows QueenJoan of Navarre, who took a supercilious pleasure in gazing upon thehumiliation of the victim of defeat. Guy drooped his head, and gave nogreeting. When he was close to the steps of the palace, he dismountedfrom his horse, and placed himself and all his following at the mercy ofthe king. The Count of Valois said a few words in his favor, but Philip, cutting his brother short, said, addressing himself to Guy, "I desire nopeace with you, and if my brother has made any engagements with you, hehad no right to do so. " And he had the Count of Flanders taken offimmediately to Compiegne, "to a strong tower, such that all could seehim, " and his comrades were distributed amongst several towns, where theywere strictly guarded. The whole of Flanders submitted; and itsprincipal towns, Ypres, Audenarde, Ter-monde, and Cassel, fellsuccessively into the hands of the French. Three of the sons of CountGuy retired to Namur. The constable Raoul of Nesle "was lieutenant forthe King of France in his newly-won country of Flanders. " Next year, inthe month of May, 1301, Philip determined to pay his conquest a visit;and the queen, his wife, accompanied him. There is never any lack ofgalas for conquerors. After having passed in state through Tournai, Courtrai, Audenarde, and Ghent, the King and Queen of France made theirentry into Bruges. All the houses were magnificently decorated; onplatforms covered with the richest tapestry thronged the ladies ofBruges; there was nothing but haberdashery and precious stones. Such anarray of fine dresses, jewels, and riches, excited a woman's jealousy inthe Queen of France: "There is none but queens, " quoth she, "to be seenin Bruges; I had thought that there was none but I who had a right toroyal state. " But the people of Bruges remained dumb; and their silencescared Philip the Handsome, who vainly attempted to attract a concourseof people about him by the proclamation of brilliant jousts. "Thesegalas, " says the historian Villani, who was going through Flanders atthis very time, "were the last whereof the French knew aught in our time, for Fortune, who till then had shown such favor to the King of France, ona sudden turned her wheel, and the cause thereof lay in the unrighteouscaptivity of the innocent maid of Flanders, and in the treason whereofthe Count of Flanders and his sons had been the victims. " There werecauses, however, for this new turn of events of a more general and moreprofound character than the personal woes of Flemish princes. James deChiltillon, the governor assigned by Philip the Handsome to Flanders, wasa greedy oppressor of it; the municipal authorities whom the victories orthe gold of Philip had demoralized became the objects of popular hatred;and there was an outburst of violent sedition. A simple weaver, obscure, poor, undersized, and one-eyed, but valiant, and eloquent in his Flemishtongue, one Peter Deconing, became the leader of revolt in Bruges;accomplices flocked to him from nearly all the towns of Flanders; and hefound allies amongst their neighbors. In 1302 war again broke out; butit was no longer a war between Philip the Handsome and Guy de Dampierre:it was a war between the Flemish communes and their foreign oppressors. Everywhere resounded the cry of insurrection: "Our bucklers and ourfriends for the lion of Flanders! Death to all Walloons! "Philip theHandsome precipitately levied an army of sixty thousand men, saysVillani, and gave the command of it to Count Robert of Artois, the heroof Furnes. The forces of the Flemings amounted to no more than twentythousand fighting men. The two armies met near Courtrai. The Frenchchivalry were full of ardor and confidence; and the Italian archers intheir service began the attack with some success. My lord, " said one ofhis knights to the Count of Artois, "these knaves will do so well thatthey will gain the honor of the day; and, if they alone put an end to thewar, what will be left for the noblesse to do?" "Attack, then!"answered the prince. Two grand attacks succeeded one another; the firstunder the orders of the Constable Raoul of Nesle, the second under thoseof the Count of Artois in person. After two hours' fighting, both failedagainst the fiery national passion of the Flemish communes, and the twoFrench leaders, the Constable and the Count of Artois, were left, both ofthem, lying on the field of battle amidst twelve or fifteen thousand oftheir dead. "I yield me! I yield me!" cried the Count of Artois; but, "We understand not thy lingo, " ironically answered in their own tonguethe Flemings who surrounded him; and he was forthwith put to the sword. Too late to save him galloped up a noble ally of the insurgents, Guy ofNamur. "From the top of the towers of our monastery, " says the Abbot ofSt. Martin's of Tournai, "we could see the French flying over the roads, across fields and through hedges, in such numbers that the sight musthave been seen to be believed. There were in the outskirts of our townand in the neighboring villages, so vast a multitude of knights and men-at-arms tormented with hunger, that it was a matter horrible to see. They gave their arms to get bread. "

[Illustration: The Battle of Courtrai----167]

A French knight, covered with wounds, whose name has remained unknown, hastily scratched a few words upon a scrap of parchment dyed with blood;and that was the first account Philip the Handsome received of the battleof Courtrai, which was fought and lost on the 11th of July, 1302. 

The news of this great defeat of the French spread rapidly throughoutEurope, and filled with joy all those who were hostile to or jealous ofPhilip the Handsome. The Flemings celebrated their victory withsplendor, and rewarded with bounteous gifts their burgher heroes, PeterDeconing amongst others, and those of their neighbors who had broughtthem aid. Philip, greatly affected and a little alarmed, sent for hisprisoner, the aged Guy de Dampierre, and loaded him with reproaches, asif he had to thank him for the calamity; and, forthwith levying a fresharmy, "as numerous, " say the chroniclers, "as the grains of sand on theborders of the sea from Propontis to the Ocean, " he took up a position atArras, and even advanced quite close to Douai; but he was of those inwhom obstinacy does not extinguish prudence, and who, persevering all thewhile in their purposes, have wit to understand the difficulties andclangers of them. Instead of immediately resuming the war, he enteredinto negotiations with the Flemings; and their envoys met him in a ruinedchurch beneath the walls of Douai. John of Chalons, one of Philip'senvoys, demanded, in his name, that the king should be recognized as lordof all Flanders, and authorized to punish the insurrection of Bruges, with a promise, however, to spare the lives of all who had taken part init. "How!" said a Fleming, Baldwin de Paperode; "our lives would be leftus, but only after our goods had been pillaged and our limbs subjected toevery torture!" "Sir Castellan, " answered John of Chalons, "why speakyou so? A choice must needs be made; for the king is determined to losehis crown rather than not be avenged. " Another Fleming, John de Renesse, who, leaning on the broken altar, had hitherto kept silence, cried, "Since so it is, let answer be made to the king that we be come hither tofight him, and not to deliver up to him our fellow-citizens;" and theFlemish envoys withdrew. Still Philip did not give up negotiating, forthe purpose of gaining time and of letting the edge wear off theFlemings' confidence. He returned to Paris, fetched Guy de Dampierrefrom the tower of the Louvre, and charged him to go and negotiate peaceunder a promise of returning to his prison if he were unsuccessful. Guy, respected as he was throughout Flanders on account of his age and hislong misfortunes, failed in his attempt, and, faithful to his word, wentback and submitted himself to the power of Philip. "I am so old, " saidhe to his friends, "that I am ready to die whensoever it shall pleaseGod. " And he did die, on the 7th of March, 1304, in the prison ofCompiegne, to which he had been transferred. Philip, all the whilepushing forward his preparations for war, continued to make protestationof pacific intentions. The Flemish communes desired the peace necessaryfor the prosperity of their commerce; but patriotic anxieties wrestledwith material interests. A burgher of Ghent was quietly fishing on thebanks of the Scheldt, when an old man acosted him, saying sharply, "Knowest thou not, then, that the king is assembling all his armies? Itis time the Ghentese shook off their sloth; the lion of Flanders must nolonger slumber. " In the spring of 1304, the cry of war resoundedeverywhere. Philip had laid an impost extraordinary upon all realproperty in his kingdom; regulars and reserves had been summoned toArras, to attack the Flemings by land and sea. He had taken into his paya Genoese fleet commanded by Regnier de Grimaldi, a celebrated Italianadmiral; and it arrived in the North Sea, and blockaded Zierikzee, amaritime town of Zealand. On the 10th of August, 1304, the Flemish fleetwhich was defending the place was beaten and dispersed. Philip hoped fora moment that this reverse would discourage the Flemings; but it was notso at all. A great battle took place on the 17th of August between thetwo land armies at Mons-en-Puelle (or, Mont-en-Pevele, according to thetrue local spelling), near Lille; the action was for some timeindecisive, and even after it was over both sides hesitated aboutclaiming the victory; but when the Flemings saw their camp swept off andrifled, and when they no longer found in it, say the chroniclers, "theirfine stuffs of Bruges and Ypres, their wines of Rochelle, their beers ofCambrai, and their cheeses of Bethune, " they declared that they wouldreturn to their hearths; and their leaders, unable to restrain them, wereobliged to shut themselves up in Lille, whither Philip, who had himselfretired at first to Arras, came to besiege them. When the first days ofdownheartedness were over, and at sight of the danger which threatenedLille and the remains of the Flemish army assembled within its walls, allFlanders rushed to arms. "The labors of the workshop and the field wereeverywhere suspended, " say contemporary Historians: "the women kept guardin the towns: you might traverse the country without meeting a singleman, for they were all in the camp at Courtrai, to the number of twelvehundred thousand, according to popular exaggeration, swearing one toanother that they would rather die fighting than live in slavery. "Philip was astounded. "I thought the Flemings, " said he, "weredestroyed; but they seem to rain from heaven; "and he resumed hisprotestations and pacific overtures. Circumstances were favorable tohim: old Guy de Dampierre was dead; Robert of Bethune, his eldest son andsuccessor, was still the prisoner of Philip the Handsome, who set him atliberty after having imposed conditions upon him. Robert, timid inspirit and weak of heart, accepted them, in spite of the grumblings ofthe Flemish populations, always eager to recommence war after a shortrespite from its trials. The burghers of Bruges had made themselves anew seal, whereon the old symbol of the bridge of their city on the Reyewas replaced by the lion of Flanders wearing the crown and armed with thecross, with this inscription: "The lion hath roared and burst his fetters"(_Rugiit leo, vincula fregit_). During ten years, from 1305 to 1314, there was between France and Flanders a continual alternation ofreciprocal concessions and retractations, of treaties concluded and ofrenewed insurrections, without decisive and ascertained results. It wasneither peace nor war; and, after the death of Philip the Handsome, hissuccessors were destined, for a long time to come, to find again andagain amongst the Flemish communes deadly enmities and grievous perils. 

At the same time that he was prosecuting this interminable war againstthe Flemings, Philip was engaged, in this case also beyond the boundariesof his kingdom, in a struggle which was still more serious, owing to thenature of the questions which gave rise to it and to the quality of hisadversary. In 1294 a new pope, Cardinal Benedetto Gaetani, had beenelected under the name of Boniface VIII. He had been for a long timeconnected with the French party in Italy, and he owed his elevation tothe influence, especially, of Charles II. , King of Naples and Sicily, grandson of St. Louis and cousin-german of Philip the Handsome. Shortlybefore his election, Benedetto Gaetani said to that prince, "Thy pope(Celestine V. ) was willing and able to serve thee, only he knew not how;as for me, if thou make me pope, I shall be willing and able and know howto be useful to thee. " The long quarrel between the popes and theEmperors of Germany, who, as Kings of the Romans, aspired to invade ordominate Italy, had made the Kings of France natural allies of thepapacy, and there had been a saying ever since, arising from a popularinstinct, which had already found its way into poetry, --

 "'Tis a goodly match as match can be, To marry the Church and the fleurs-de-lis: Should either mate a-straying go, Then each--too late--will own 'twas so. "

Boniface VIII. Did not seem fated to withdraw from this policy; he wasold (sixty-six); his party-engagements were of long standing; hispersonal fortune was made; three years before his election he possessedtwelve ecclesiastical benefices, of which seven were in France; by hisaccession to the Holy See his ambition was satisfied; and as legate inFrance in 1290 he had made the acquaintance there of the young king, Philip the Handsome, and had conceived a liking for him. King Philipmust have considered that he had ground for seeing in him a faithful anduseful ally. 

Neither of the two sovereigns took into account the changes that hadcome, during two centuries past, over the character of their power, andof the influence which these changes must exercise upon their posture andtheir relations one towards the other. Louis the Fat in the firstinstance, and then in a special manner Philip Augustus and St. Louis, each with very different sentiments and by very different processes, haddisentangled the kingship in France from the feudal system, and hadacquired for it a sovereignty of its own, beyond and above the rights ofthe suzerain over his vassals. The popes, for their part, Gregory VII. And Innocent III. Amongst others, had raised the papacy to a region ofintellectual and moral supremacy whence it looked down upon all theterrestrial powers. Gregory VII. , the most disinterested of allambitious men in high places, had dedicated his stormy life toestablishing the dominion of the Church over the world, kings as well aspeople, and also to reforming internally the Church herself, her moralsand her discipline. "I have loved justice and hated iniquity; and thatis why I am dying in exile, " he had said on his death-bed: but his workssurvived him, and a hundred years after him, in spite of the troubleswhich had disturbed the Church under eighteen mediocre and transitorypopes, Innocent III. , whilst maintaining, only with more moderation andprudence, the same principles as Gregory VII. Had maintained, exercisedpeacefully, for a space of eighteen years, the powers of the rightdivine, whilst Philip Augustus was extending and confirming the kinglypower in France. This parallel progress of the kingship and the papacyhad its critics and its supporters. Learned lawyers, on the authority ofthe maxims and precedents of the Roman empire, proclaimed the king'ssovereignty in the State; and profound theologians, on the authority ofthe divine origin of Christianity, laid down as a principle the rightdivine of the papacy in the Church and in the dealings of the Church withthe State. 

Thus, at the end of the thirteenth century, there were found face to facetwo systems, one laic and the other ecclesiastical, of absolute power. But the teachers of the doctrine of the right divine do not expunge fromhuman affairs the passions, errors, and vices of the individuals who puttheir systems in practice; and absolute power, which is the greatest ofall demoralizers, entails before long upon communities, whether civil orreligious, the disorders, abuses, faults, and evils which it is thespecial province of governments to prevent or keep under. The Frenchkingship and the papacy, the representatives of which had but lately beengreat and glorious princes, such as Philip Augustus and St. Louis, Gregory VII. And Innocent III. , were, at the end of the thirteenthcentury, vested in the persons of men of far less moral worth and lesspolitical wisdom, Philip the Handsome and Boniface VIII. We have alreadyhad glimpses of Philip the Handsome's greedy, ruggedly obstinate, haughtyand tyrannical character; and Boniface VIII. Had the same defects, withmore hastiness and less ability. The two great poets of Italy in thatcentury, Dante and Petrarch, who were both very much opposed to Philipthe Handsome, paint Boniface VIII. In similar colors. "He was, " saysPetrarch (_Epistoloe Ramiliares, _ bk. Ii. Letter 3), "an inexorablesovereign, whom it was very hard to break by force, and impossible tobend by humility and caresses; "and Dante (_Inferno, _ canto xix. V. 45 57) makes Pope Nicholas III. Say, "Already art thou here andproudly upstanding, O Boniface? Hast thou so soon been sated with thatwealth for which thou didst not fear to deceive that fair dame (theChurch) whom afterwards thou didst so disastrously govern? "Two men sodeeply imbued with evil and selfish passions could not possibly meetwithout clashing; and it was not long before facts combined to producebetween them an outburst of hatred and strife which revealed the latentvices and fatal results of the two systems of absolute power of whichthey were the representatives. 

Philip the Handsome had been nine years king when Boniface VIII. Becamepope. On his accession to the throne he had testified an intention ofcurtailing the privileges and power of the Church. He had removed theclergy from judicial functions, in the domains of the lords as well as inthe domain of the king, and he had everywhere been putting into the handsof laymen the administration of civil justice. He had considerablyincreased the percentage to be paid on real property acquired by theChurch (called possessions in mortmain), by way of compensation for themutation-dues which their fixity caused the State to lose. At the timeof the crusades the property of the clergy had been subjected to aspecial tax of a tenth of the revenues, and this tax had been severaltimes renewed for reasons other than the crusades. The Church recognizedher duty of contributing towards the defence of the kingdom, and thechapter-general of the order of Citeaux wrote to Philip the Handsomehimself, "On all grounds of natural equity and rules of law we ought tobear our share of such a burden out of the goods which God hath givenus. " In every instance, the question had been as to the necessity forand the quota of the ecclesiastical contribution, which was at one timegranted by the bishops and local clergy, at another expressly authorizedby the papacy. There is nothing to show that Boniface VIII. , at the timeof his elevation to the Holy See, was opposed to these augmentations anddemands on the part of the French crown; he was at that time too muchoccupied by his struggle against his own enemies at Rome, the family ofthe Colonnas, and he felt the necessity of remaining on good terms withFrance; but in 1296, Philip the Handsome, at war with the King of Englandand the Flemings, imposed upon the clergy two fresh tenths. The bishopsalone were called upon to vote them; and the order of Citeaux refused topay them, and addressed to the pope a protest, with a comparison betweenPhilip and Pharaoh. Boniface not only entertained the protest, butaddressed to the king a bull (called _Clericis laicos, _ from its firsttwo words), in which, led on by his zeal to set forth the generality andabsoluteness of his power, he laid down as a principle that churches andecclesiastics could not be taxed save with the permission of thesovereign pontiff, and that "all emperors, kings, dukes, counts, barons, or governors whatsoever, who should violate this principle, and allprelates or other ecclesiastics who should through weakness lendthemselves to such violation, would by this mere fact incurexcommunication, and would be incapable of release therefrom, save in_articulo mortis, _ unless by a special decision of the Holy See. " Thiswas going far beyond the traditions of the French Church, and, in thevery act of protecting it, to strike a blow at its independence in itsdealings with the French State. Philip was mighty wroth, but he did notburst out; he confined himself to letting the pope perceive hisdispleasure by means of divers administrative measures, amongst others byforbidding the exportation from the kingdom of gold, silver, and valuablearticles, which found their way chiefly to Rome. Boniface, on his side, was not slow to perceive that he had gone too far, and that his owninterests did not permit him to give so much offence to the King ofFrance. A year after the bull _Clericis laicos, _ he modified it by a newbull, which not only authorized the collection of the two tenths voted bythe French bishops, but recognized the right of the King of France to taxthe French clergy with their consent and without authorization from theHoly See, whenever there was a pressing necessity for it. Philip, on hisside, testified to the pope his satisfaction at this concession byhimself making one at the expense of the religious liberty of hissubjects. In 1292 he had ordered the seneschal of Carcassonne to placelimits to the power of the inquisitors in Languedoc by taking from themthe right of having their sentences against heretics executed withoutappeal; and in 1298 he issued an ordinance to the effect that "to furtherthe proceedings of the Inquisition against heretics, for the glory of Godand for the augmentation of the faith, he laid his injunctions upon alldukes, counts, barons, seneschals, bailiffs, and provosts of his kingdom, to obey the diocesan bishops and the inquisitors deputed by the Holy Seein handing over to them, whenever they should be requested, all hereticsand their creed-fellows, favorers, and harborers, and to see to theimmediate execution of sentences passed by the judges of the Church, notwithstanding any appeal and any complaint on the part of heretics andtheir favorers. "

Thus the two absolute sovereigns changed their policy and made temporarysacrifice of their mutual pretensions, according as it suited them tofight or to agree. But there arose a question in respect of which thiscontinual alternation of pretensions and compromises, of quarrels andaccommodations, was no longer possible; in order to keep up theirposition in the eyes of one another, they were obliged to come to adeadly clash; and in this struggle, perilous for both, Boniface VIII. Was the aggressor, and with Philip the Handsome remained the victory. 

On the 2d of February, 1300, Boniface VIII. , who had much at heart thelustre and popularity of the Holy See, published a bull which grantedindulgences to the pilgrims who should that year, and every centenary tocome, visit the church of the apostles St. Peter and St. Paul at Rome. At this first celebration of the centenarian Christian jubilee theconcourse was immense; the most moderate historians say that there werenever fewer than a hundred thousand pilgrims at Rome; others put thenumbers as high as two hundred thousand, and contemporary poetry as wellas history has celebrated this pious assemblage of Christians of everynation, language, and age around the tomb of their fathers in the faith. "The old man with white hair goeth far away, " says Petrarch (Sonnetxiv. ), "from the sweet haunts where his life hath been passed, and fromhis little family astonished to find their dear father missing. As forhim, in the last days of his age, broken down by weight of years anda-weary of the road, he draggeth along as best he may by force of willingspirit his old and tottering limbs, and cometh to Rome to fulfil hisdesire of seeing the image of Him whom he hopeth to see ere long upyonder in the heavens. " The success of the measure and the solemn homageof Christendom filled with joy and proud confidence the heart of theseptuagenarian pontiff. He had three years before decreed to Louis IX. , the most Christian of the Kings of France, the honors of canonization andthe title of Saint. Being chosen as mediator, in 1298, by the Kings ofFrance and England in a war which pressed heavily on both, the decree ofarbitration which he pronounced, favorable rather to Philip than toEdward I. , had been accepted by both of them; and the pope, on laying hisinjunctions upon them with some severity of language, had exhibitedauthority in a manner salutary for both kingdoms. Everything seemed atthat time to smile on Boniface, and to invite him to believe himself thereal sovereign of Christendom. 

An opportunity for a splendid confirmation of his universal supremacy inthe Christian world came to tempt him. A quarrel had arisen betweenPhilip and the Archbishop of Narbonne on the subject of certain duesclaimed by both in that great diocese. Boniface was loud in his advocacyof the archbishop against the officers of the king: "If, my son, thoutolerate such enterprises against the Churches of thy kingdom, " he wroteto Philip (on the 18th of July, 1300), "thou mayest thereafter havereasonable fear lest God, the author of judgments and the King of kings, exact vengeance for it; and assuredly His vicar will not, in the longrun, keep silence. Though he wait a while patiently, in order not toclose the door to compassion, there will be full need at last that herouse himself for the punishment of the wicked and the glory of thegood. " Nor did Boniface content himself with writing: he sent to Paris, to support his words, Bernard de Saisset, whom he, on his own authority, had just appointed Bishop of Pamiers. The choice of bishops was not yet, at that time, subject to any fixed and generally recognized rule: mostoften it was the chapter of the diocese that elected its bishop, with asubsequent application for the approbation of the king and the pope;sometimes the king and also the pope made such appointments directly andindependently. Boniface VIII. Had quite recently created a new bishopricat Pamiers in order to immediately appoint to it Bernard de Saisset, hitherto simple Abbot of St. Antonine in that city. Bernard, who wasdevoted to his patron, was, further, a passionate Languedocian and a foeto the dominion of the French kings of the North over Southern France;and he gave himself out as a personal descendant of the last Counts ofToulouse. On arriving in Paris as the pope's legate, he made use thereof violent and inconsiderate language; he even affirmed, it was said, that St. Louis had predicted the disappearance of his line in the thirdgeneration, and that King Philip was only an illegitimate descendant ofCharlemagne. He was accused of having incessantly labored to exciterevolts against the king in the south, at one time for the advantage ofthe local lords, at another in favor of foreign enemies of the kingdom. Being summoned before the king and his council at Senlis (October 14, 1301), he denied, but with an air of arrogance and aggression, theaccusations against him. Philip had, at that time, as his chiefcouncillors, lay-lawyers, servants passionately attached to the kingship. They were Peter Flotte his chancellor, William of Nogaret, judge-major atBeaucaire, and William of Plasian, Lord of Vezenobre, the two latterbelonging, as Bernard de Saisset belonged, to Southern France, anddetermined to withstand, in the south as well as the north, thedomination of ecclesiastics. They, in their turn, rose up against thedoctrine and language of the Bishop of Pamiers. He was arrested andcommitted to the keeping of the Archbishop of Narbonne; and Philip sentto Rome his chancellor Peter Flotte himself and William of Nogaret, withorders to demand of the pope "that he should avenge the wrongs of God, the king, and the whole kingdom, by depriving of his orders and everyclerical privilege that man whose longer life would taint the places heinhabited; and this in order that the king might make of him a sacrificeto God in the way of justice, for there could be no hope of his amendmentif he were suffered to live, seeing that, from his youth up, he hadalways lived ill, and that baseness and abandonment only became more andmore confirmed in him by inveterate habit. "

To this violent and threatening language Boniface replied by changing thevenue to his own personal tribunal in the case of the Bishop of Pamiers. "We do bid thy majesty, " he wrote to the king, "to give this bishop freeleave to depart and come to us, for we do desire his presence. We dowarn thee to have all his goods restored to him, not to stretch out forthe future thy rapacious hands towards the like things, and not to offendthe Divine Majesty or the dignity of the Apostolic See, lest we be forcedto employ some other remedy; for thou must know that, unless thou canstallege some excuse founded on reason and truth, we do not see how thoushouldest escape the sentence of the holy canons for having laid rashhands on this bishop. "

"My power, --the spiritual power, "--said the pope to the Chancellor ofFrance, "embraces the temporal, and includes it. " "Be it so, " answeredPeter Flotte; "but your power is nominal, the king's real. "

Here was a coarse challenge hurled by the crown at the tiara: andBoniface VIII. Unhesitatingly accepted it. But, instead of keeping theadvantage of a defensive position by claiming, in the name of lawfulright, the liberties and immunities of the Church, he assumed theoffensive against the kingship by proclaiming the supremacy of the HolySee in things temporal as well as spiritual, and by calling upon Philipthe Handsome to acknowledge it. On the 5th of December, 1301, headdressed to the king, commencing with the words, "Hearken, most dearson" (_Ausculta, carissime fili_), a long bull, in which, withcircumlocutions and expositions full of obscurity and subtlety, he laiddown and affirmed, at bottom, the principle of the final sovereignty ofthe spiritual power, being of divine origin, over every temporal power, being of human creation. "In spite of the insufficiency of our deserts, "said he, "God hath established us above kings and kingdoms by imposingupon us, in virtue of the Apostolic office, the duty of plucking away, destroying, dispersing, dissipating, building up and planting in His nameand according to His doctrine; to the end that, in tending the flock ofthe Lord, we may strengthen the weak, heal the sick, bind up the brokenlimbs, raise the fallen, and pour wine and oil into all wounds. Letnone, then, most dear son, persuade thee that thou hast no superior, andthat thou art not subject to the sovereign head of the ecclesiasticalhierarchy; for he who so thinketh is beside himself; and if heobstinately affirm any such thing, he is an infidel, and hath no placeany longer in the fold of the good Shepherd. " At the same time Bonifacesummoned the bishops of France to a council at Rome, "in order to laborfor the preservation of the liberties of the Catholic Church, thereformation of the kingdom, the amendment of the king, and the goodgovernment of France. "

Philip the Handsome and his councillors did not misconceive the tendencyof such language, however involved and full of specious reservations itmight be. The final supremacy of the pope in the body politic, and overall sovereigns, meant the absorption of the laic community in thereligious, and the abolition of the State's independence, not in favor ofthe national Church, but to the advantage of the foreign head of theuniversal Church. The defenders of the French kingship formed a betterestimate than was formed at Rome of the effect which would be produced bysuch doctrine on France, in the existing condition of the French mind;they entered upon no theological and abstract polemics; they confinedthemselves entirely to setting in a vivid light the pope's pretensionsand their consequences, feeling sure that, by confining themselves tothis question, they would enlist in their opposition not only all laymen, nobles, and commoners, but the greater part of the French ecclesiasticsthemselves, who were no strangers to the feeling of national patriotism, and to whom the pope's absolute power in the body politic was scarcelymore agreeable than the king's. In order to make a strong impressionupon the public mind, there was published at Paris, as the actual text ofthe pope's bull, a very short summary of his long bull, "Hearken, mostdear Son, " in the following terms: "Boniface, bishop, servant of theservants of God, to Philip, King of the French. Fear thou God, and keepHis commandments. We would have thee to know that thou art subject untous in things spiritual and temporal. The presentation to benefices andprebends appertaineth to thee in no wise. If thou have the keeping ofcertain vacancies, thou art bound to reserve the revenues of them for thesuccessors to them. If thou have made any presentations, we declare themvoid, and revoke them. We consider as heretics all those who believeotherwise. " Together with this document there was put in circulation theking's answer to the pope, in the following terms: "Philip, by the graceof God, King of the French, to Boniface, who giveth himself out forsovereign pontiff, little or no greeting. Let thy Extreme Fatuity knowthat we be subject to none in things temporal, that the presentation tochurches and prebends that be vacant belongeth to us of kingly right, that the revenues therefrom be ours, that presentations already made orto be made be valid both now and hereafter, that we will firmly supportthe possessors of them to thy face and in thy teeth, and that we do holdas senseless and insolent those who think otherwise. " The popedisavowed, as a falsification, the summary of his long bull; and there isnothing to prove that the unseemly and insulting letter of Philip theHandsome was sent to Rome. But, at bottom, the situation of affairsremained the same; indeed, it did not stop where it was. On the 11th ofFebruary, 1302, the bull, Hearken, most dear Son, was solemnly burned atParis in presence of the king and a numerous multitude. Philip convoked, for the 8th of April following, an assembly of the barons, bishops, andchief ecclesiastics, and of deputies from the communes to the number oftwo or three for each city, all being summoned "to deliberate on certainaffairs which in the highest degree concern the king, the kingdom, thechurches, and all and sundry. " This assembly, which really met on the10th of April, at Paris, in the church of Notre-Dame, is reckoned inFrench history as the first "states-general. " The three estates wroteseparately to Rome; the clergy to the pope himself, the nobility and thedeputies of the communes to the cardinals, all, however, protestingagainst the pope's pretensions in matters temporal, the two laic orderswriting in a rough and threatening tone, the clergy making an appeal "tothe wisdom and paternal clemency of the Holy Father, with tearfulaccents, and sobs mingled with their tears. " The king evidently had onhis side the general feeling of the nation: and the news from Rome wasnot of a kind to pacify him. In spite of the king's formal prohibition, forty-five French bishops had repaired to the council summoned by thepope for All Saints' day, 1302, and, after this meeting, a papal decreeof November 18 had declared, "There be two swords, the temporal and thespiritual; both are in the power of the Church, but one is held by theChurch herself, the other by kings only with the assent and by sufferanceof the sovereign pontiff. Every human being is subject to the Romanpontiff; and to believe this is necessary to salvation. " Philip made aseizure of the temporalities of such bishops as had been present at thatcouncil, and renewed his prohibition forbidding them to leave thekingdom. Boniface ordered those who had not been to Rome to attend therewithin three months; and the cardinal of St. Marcellinus, legate of theHoly See, called a fresh council in France itself, without the king'sknowledge. On both sides, there were at one time words of conciliationand attempts to keep up appearances of respect, at another new explosionsof complaints and threats; but, amidst all these changes of language, thestruggle was day by day becoming more violent, and preparations werebeing made by both parties for something other than threats. 

On the 12th of March and the 13th of June, 1303, at two assemblies ofbarons, prelates, and legists held at the Louvre, in presence of theking, which several historians have considered to have been states-general, one of the crown's most intimate advisers, William of Plasian, proposed, against Boniface, a form of accusation which imputed to him, beyond his ambition and his claims to absolutism, crimes as improbable asthey were hateful. It was demanded that the Church should be governed bya lawful pope, and the king, as defender of the faith, was pressed toappeal to the convocation of a general council. On the 24th of June, inthe palace-garden, a great crowd of people assembled; and, after a sermonpreached in French, the form of accusation against Boniface, and theappeal to the future council, were solemnly made public. The popemeanwhile did not remain idle; he protested against the imputations ofwhich he was the subject. "Forty years ago, " he said, "we were admitteda doctor of laws, and learned that both powers, the temporal and thespiritual, be ordained of God. Who can believe that such fatuity canhave entered into our mind? But who can also deny that the king issubject unto us on the score of sin? . . . We be disposed to grantunto him every grace. . . . So long as I was cardinal, I was Frenchin heart; since then, we have testified how we do love the king. . . . Without us, he would not have even one foot on the throne. We do knowall the secrets of the kingdom. We do know how the Germans, theBurgundians, and the folks who speak the Oc tongue do love the king. Ifhe mend not, we shall know how to chastise him, and treat him as a littleboy (_sicut unum garcionem_), though greatly against our will. " On the13th of April, Boniface declared Philip excommunicate if he persisted inpreventing the prelates from attending at Rome. Philip, being warned, effected the arrest at Troyes of the priest who was bringing the pope'sletter to his legate in France. The legate took to flight. Boniface, on his side, being warned that the king was appealing against him to anapproaching council, declared by a bull, on the 15th of August, that itappertained to him alone to summon a council. After this bull, there wasfull expectation that another would be launched, which would pronouncethe deposition of the king. And a new bull was actually prepared at Romeon the 5th of September, and was to be published on the 8th. It did notexpressly depose the king; it merely announced that measures would betaken more serious even than excommunication. Philip had taken hisprecautions. He had demanded and obtained from the great towns, churches, and universities more than seven hundred declarations ofsupport in his appeal to the future council, and an engagement to take nonotice of the decree which might be issued by the pope to release theking's subjects from their oath of allegiance. Only a few, and amongstthem the Abbot of Citeaux, gave him a refusal. The order of the Templarsgave only a qualified support. At the approaching advent of the new bullwhich was being anticipated, the king resolved to act still more roughlyand speedily. Notification must be sent to the pope of the king's appealto the future council. Philip could no longer confide this awkwardbusiness to his chancellor, Peter Flotte; for he had fallen at Courtrai, in the battle against the Flemings. William of Nogaret undertook it, atthe same time obtaining from the king a sort of blank commissionauthorizing and ratifying in advance all that, under the circumstances, he might consider it advisable to do. Notification of the appeal had tobe made to the pope at Anagni, his native town, whither he had gone forrefuge, and the people of which, being zealous in his favor, had alreadydragged in the mud the lilies and the banner of France. Nogaret wasbold, ruffianly, and clever. He repaired in haste to Florence, to theking's banker, got a plentiful supply of money, establishedcommunications in Anagni, and secured, above all, the co-operation ofSciarra Colonna, who was passionately hostile to the pope, had beenformerly proscribed by him, and, having fallen into the hands ofcorsairs, had worked at the oar for them during many a year rather thanreveal his name and be sold to Boniface Gaetani. On the 7th ofSeptember, 1303, Colonna and his associates introduced Nogaret and hisfollowing into Anagni, with shouts of "Death to Pope Boniface! Long livethe King of France!" The populace, dumbfounded, remained motionless. The pope, deserted by all, even by his own nephew, tried to touch theheart of Colonna himself, whose only answer was a summons to abdicate, and to surrender at discretion. "Those be hard words, " said Boniface, and burst into tears. But this old man, seventy-five years of age, had aproud spirit, and a dignity worthy of his rank. "Betrayed, like Jesus, "said he, "shall I die; but I will die pope. " He donned the cloak of St. Peter, put the crown of Constantine upon his head, took in his hands thekeys and the cross, and, as his enemies drew nigh, he said to them, "Hereis my neck, and here is my head. " There is a tradition, of considerabletrustworthiness, that Sciarra Colonna would have killed him, and did withhis mailed hand strike him in the face. Nogaret, however, prevented themurder, and confined himself to saying, "Thou caitiff pope, confess, andbehold the goodness of my lord, the King of France, who, though so faraway from thee in his own kingdom, both watcheth over and defendeth theeby my hand. " "Thou art of heretic family, " answered the pope: "at thyhands I look for martyrdom. "

[Illustration: Colonna striking the Pope----185]

The captivity of Boniface VIII. , however, lasted only three days; for thepeople of Anagni, having recovered themselves, and seeing the scantynumbers of the foreigners, rose and delivered the pope. The old man wasconducted to the public square, crying like a child. "Good folks, " saidhe to the crowd around him, "ye have seen that mine enemies have robbedme of all my goods and those of the Church. Behold me here as poor asJob. Nought have I either to eat or drink. If there be any good womanwho would give me an alms of wine and bread, I would bestow upon herGod's blessing and mine. " All the people began to shout, "Long live theHoly Father!" He was reconducted into his palace: "and women throngedtogether thither, bringing him bread, wine, and water. Finding no propervessels, they poured them into a chest. . . . Any one who liked wentin, and talked with the pope, as with any other beggar. " So soon as theagitation was somewhat abated, Boniface set out for Rome, with a greatcrowd following him; but he was broken down in spirit and body. Scarcelyhad he arrived when he fell into a burning fever, which traditions, probably invented and spread by his enemies, have represented as a fit ofmad rage. He died on the 11th of October, 1303, without having recoveredhis reason. It is reported that his predecessor, Celestine V. , had saidof him, "Thou risest like a fox; thou wilt rule like a lion, and die likea dog. " The last expression was unjustified. Boniface VIII. Was afanatic, ambitious, proud, violent, and crafty, but with sincerity at thebottom of his prejudiced ideas, and stubborn and blind in his fits oftemper: his death was that of an old lion at bay. 

We were bound to get a good idea and understanding of this violentstruggle between the two sovereigns of France and Rome, not only becauseof its dramatic interest, but because it marks an important period in thehistory of the papacy and its relations with foreign governments. Fromthe tenth century and the accession of the Capetians the policy of theHoly See had been enterprising, bold, full of initiative, often evenaggressive, and more often than not successful in the prosecution of itsdesigns. Under Innocent III. It had attained the apogee of its strengthand fortune. At that point its motion forward and upward came to a stop. Boniface had not the wit to recognize the changes which had taken placein European communities, and the decided progress which had been made bylaic influences and civil powers. He was a stubborn preacher of maximshe could no longer practise. He was beaten in his enterprise; and thepapacy, even on recovering from his defeat, found itself no longer whatit had been before him. Starting from the fourteenth century we find nosecond Gregory VII. , or Innocent III. Without expressly abandoning theirprinciples, the policy of the Holy See became essentially defensive andconservative, more occupied in the maintenance than the aggrandizement ofitself, and sometimes even more stationary and stagnant than was requiredby necessity or recommended by foresight. The posture assumed and theconduct adopted by the earliest successors of Boniface VIII. Showed howfar the situation of the papacy was altered, and how deep had been thepenetration of the stab which, in this conflict between the two aspirantsto absolute power, Philip the Handsome had inflicted on his rival. 

On the 22d of October, 1303, eleven days after the death of BonifaceVIII. , Benedict XI. , son of a simple shepherd, was elected at Rome tosucceed him. Philip the Handsome at once sent his congratulations, butby William of Plasian, who had lately been the accuser of Boniface, andwho was charged to hand to the new pope, on the king's behalf, a verybitter memorandum touching his predecessor. Philip at the same timecaused an address to be presented to himself in his own kingdom and inthe vulgar tongue, called a supplication from the people of France to theKing against Boniface. Benedict XI. Exerted himself to give satisfactionto the conqueror; he declared the Colonnas absolved; he released thebarons and prelates of France from the excommunications pronouncedagainst them; and he himself wrote to the king to say that he wouldbehave towards him as the good shepherd in the parable, who leaves ninetyand nine sheep to go after one that is lost. Nogaret and the directauthors of the assault at Anagni were alone excepted from this amnesty. The pope reserved for a future occasion the announcement of theirabsolution, when he should consider it expedient. But on the 7th ofJune, 1304, instead of absolving them, he launched a fresh bull ofexcommunication against "certain wicked men who had dared to commit ahateful crime against a person of good memory, Pope Boniface. " A monthafter this bull Benedict XI. Was dead. It is related that a young womanhad put before him at table a basket of fresh figs, of which he had eatenand which had poisoned him. The chroniclers of the time impute thiscrime to William of Nogaret, to the Colonnas, and to their associates atAnagni; a single one names King Philip. Popular credulity is great inmatters of poisoning; but one thing is certain, namely, that noprosecution was ordered. There is no proof of Philip's complicity; but, full as he was of hatred and dissimulation, he was of those who do theirbest to profit by crimes which they have not ordered. It is clear thatsuch a pope as Benedict XI. Would not do either for his passions or hispurposes. 

He found one, however, from whom he flattered himself, not withoutreason, that he would get more complete and efficient co-operation. Thecardinals, after being assembled in conclave for six months at Perouse, were unable to arrive at an agreement about a choice of pope. As a wayout of their embarrassment, they entered into a secret convention to theeffect that one of them, a confidant of Philip the Handsome, should makeknown to him that the Archbishop of Bordeaux, Bertrand de Goth, was thecandidate in respect of whom they could agree. He was a subject of theKing of England and a late favorite of Boniface VIII. , who had raised himfrom the bishopric of Comminges to the archbishopric of Bordeaux. He wasregarded as an enemy of France; but Philip knew what may be done with anambitious man, whose fortune is only half made, by offering to advancehim to his highest point. He, therefore, appointed a meeting with thearchbishop. "Hearken, " said he: "I have in my grasp wherewithal to makethee pope if I please; and provided that thou promise me to do six thingsI demand of thee, I will confer upon thee that honor; and to prove tothee that I have the power, here be letters and advices I have receivedfrom Rome. " After having heard and read, "the Gascon, overcome withjoy, " says the contemporary historian Villani, "threw himself at theking's feet, saying, 'My lord, now know I that thou art my best friend, and that thou wouldest render me good for evil. It is for thee tocommand and for me to obey: such will ever be my disposition. '" Philipthen set before him his six demands, amongst which there were only twowhich could have caused the archbishop any uneasiness. The fourthpurported that he should condemn the memory of Pope Boniface. "Thesixth, which is important and secret, I keep to myself, " said Philip, "tomake known to thee in due time and place. " The archbishop bound himselfby oath taken on the sacred host to accomplish the wishes of the king, towhom, furthermore, he gave as hostages his brother and his two nephews. Six weeks after this interview, on the 5th of June, 1305, Bertrand deGoth was elected pope, under the name of Clement V. 

It was not long before he gave the king the most certain pledge of hisdocility. After having held his pontifical court at Bordeaux andPoitiers he declared that he would fix his residence in France, in thecounty of Venaissin, at Avignon, a territory which Philip the Bold hadremitted to Pope Gregory X. In execution of a deed of gift from RaymondVII. , Count of Toulouse. It was renouncing, in fact, if not in law, thepractical independence of the papacy to thus place it in the midst of thedominions and under the very thumb of the King of France. "I know theGaseous, " said the old Italian Cardinal Matthew Rosso, dean of the SacredCollege, when he heard of this resolution; "it will be long ere theChurch comes back to Italy. " And, indeed, it was not until sixty yearsafterwards, under Pope Gregory XI. , that Italy regained possession of theHoly See; and historians called this long absence the Babylonishcaptivity. Philip lost no time in profiting by his propinquity to makethe full weight of his power felt by Clement V. He claimed from him thefulfilment of the fourth promise Bertrand de Goth had made in order tobecome pope, which was the condemnation of Boniface VIII. ; and herevealed to him the sixth, that "important and secret one which he keptto himself to make known to him in clue time and place;" and it was thepersecution and abolition of the order of the Templars. The pontificateof Clement V. At Avignon was, for him, a nine years' painful effort, atone time to elude and at another to accomplish, against the grain, theheavy engagements he had incurred towards the king. 

He found the condemnation of Boniface VIII. Rather an embarrassment thana danger. He shrank, on becoming pope, from condemning the pope hispredecessor, who had appointed him archbishop and cardinal. Instead ofan official condemnation, he offered the king satisfaction in variousways. It was only from headstrong pride and to cloak himself in the eyesof his subjects that Philip clung to the condemnation of the memory ofBoniface; and, after a long period of mutual tergiversation, it wasagreed in the end to let bygones be bygones. The principal promoter ofthe assault at Anagni, William of Nogaret, was the sole exception to theamnesty; and the pope imposed upon him, by way of penance, merely theobligation of making a pilgrimage to the Holy Land, which he neverfulfilled. On the contrary he remained, in great favor, about the personof King Philip, who made him his chancellor, and gave him, in Languedoc, some rich lands, amongst others those of Calvisson, Massillargues, andManduel. For Philip knew how to liberally reward and faithfully supporthis servants. 

And he knew still better how to persecute and ruin his foes. He had noreason, of a public kind, to consider the Templars his enemies. It istrue that they had given him a merely qualified support on his appeal tothe council against Boniface VIII. ; but, both before and after thatoccurrence, Philip had shown them marks of the most friendly regard. Hehad asked to be affiliated to their order; and he had borrowed theirmoney. During a violent outbreak of the populace at Paris, in 1306, onthe occasion of a fresh tax, he had sought and found a refuge in the verypalace of the Temple, where the chapters-general were held and where itstreasures were kept. It is said that the sight of these treasureskindled the longings of Philip, and his ardent desire to get hold ofthem. At the time of the formation of the order, in 1119, after thefirst crusade, the Templars were far from being rich. Nine knights hadjoined together to protect the arrival and sojourning of pilgrims inPalestine; and Baldwin II. , the third Christian King of Jerusalem, hadgiven them a lodging in his own palace, to the east of Solomon's temple, whence they had assumed the name of "Poor United Champions of Christ andthe Temple. " Their valor and pious devotion had soon rendered themfamous in the West as well as the East; and St. Bernard had commendedthem to the Christian world. At the council of Troyes, in 1123, PopeHonorius II. Had recognized their order, and regulated their dress, awhite mantle, on which Pope Eugenius III. Placed a red cross. In 1172the rules of the order were drawn up in seventy-two articles, and theTemplars began to exempt themselves from the jurisdiction of thepatriarch of Jerusalem, recognizing that of the pope only. Their numberand their importance rapidly increased. In 1130 the Emperor Lothaire II. Gave them lands in the Duchy of Brunswick. They received other gifts inthe Low Countries, in Spain, and in Portugal. After a voyage to theWest, Hugh des Payens, the chief of the nine Templars, returned to theEast with three hundred knights enlisted in his order; and a hundred andfifty years after its foundation the order of the Temple, divided intofourteen or fifteen provinces, --four in the East and ten or eleven in theWest, --numbered, it is said, eighteen or twenty thousand knights, mostlyFrench, and nine thousand commanderies or territorial benefices, therevenue of which is calculated at fifty-four millions of francs (aboutten and a half million dollars). It was an army of monks, once poor menand hard-working soldiers, but now rich and idle, and abandoned to allthe temptations of riches and idleness. There was still some fine talkabout Jerusalem, pilgrims, and crusades. The popes still kept thesewords prominent, either to distract the Western Christians from intestinequarrels, or to really promote some new Christian effort in the East. The Isle of Cyprus was still a small Christian kingdom, and the warrior-monks, who were vowed to the defence of Christendom in the East, theTemplars and the Hospitallers, had still in Palestine, Syria, Armenia, and the adjacent lands, certain battles to fight and certain services torender to the Christian cause. But these were events too petty and tootransitory to give serious employment to the two great religious andmilitary orders, whose riches and fame were far beyond the proportions oftheir public usefulness and their real strength; a position fraught withperils for them, for it inspired the sovereign powers of the state withthe spirit rather of jealousy than fear of them. 

In 1303 the king and the pope simultaneously summoned from Cyprus toFrance the Grand Master of the Templars, James do Molay, a Burgundiannobleman, who had entered the order when he was almost a child, hadvaliantly fought the infidels in the East, and fourteen years ago hadbeen unanimously elected Grand Master. For several months he was welltreated, to all appearance, by the two monarchs. Philip said he wishedto discuss with him a new plan of crusade, and asked him to standgodfather to one of his children; and Molay was pall-bearer at the burialof the king's sister-in-law. Meanwhile the most sinister reports, thegravest imputations, were bruited abroad against the Templars; they wereaccused "of things distasteful, deplorable, horrible to think on, horrible to hear, of betraying Christendom for the profit of theinfidels, of secretly denying the faith, of spitting upon the cross, ofabandoning themselves to idolatrous practices and the most licentiouslives. " In 1307, in the month of October, Philip the Handsome andClement V. Had met at Poitiers; and the king asked the pope to authorizean inquiry touching the Templars and the accusations made against them. James de Molay was forthwith arrested at Paris with a hundred and fortyof his knights; sixty met the same fate at Beaucaire; many others allover France; and their property was put in the king's keeping for theservice of the Holy Land. On the 12th of August, 1308, a papal bullappointed a grand commission of inquiry charged to conduct, at Paris, anexamination of the matter "according as the law requires. " TheArchbishops of Canterbury in England and of Mayence, Cologne, and Trovesin Germany, were also named commissioners, and the pope announced that hewould deliver his judgment within two years, at a general council held atVienne, in Dauphiny, territory of the Empire. Twenty-six princes andlaic lords, the Dukes of Burgundy and Brittany, the Counts of Flanders, Nevers, and Auxerre, and the Count of Talleyrand de Perigord, offeredthemselves as the Templars' accusers, and gave powers of attorney to actin their names. On the 22d of November, 1309, the Grand Master, Molay, was, called before the commission. At first he firmly denied all thathis order had been accused of; afterwards he became confused andembarrassed, said that he had not the ability to undertake the defence ofhis order, that he was but a poor, unlettered knight, that the pope hadreserved to himself the decision in the case, and that, for his part, he only wished the pope would summon him as soon as possible before him. On the 28th of March, 1310, five hundred and forty-six knights, who haddeclared their readiness to defend their order, appeared before thecommission; and they were called upon to choose proctors to speak intheir name. We ought also, then, " said they, "to have been tortured byproxy only. " The prisoners were treated with the uttermost rigor andreduced to the most wretched plight: "out of their poor pay of twelvedeniers per diem they were obliged to pay for their passage by water togo and submit to their examination in the city, and to give money besidesto the man who undid and riveted their fetters. " In October, 1310, at acouncil held at Paris, a large number of Templars were examined, severalacquitted, some subjected to special penances, and fifty-four condemnedas heretics to the stake, and burned the same day in a field close to theabbey of St. Anthony; and nine others met the same fate at the hands of acouncil held at Senlis the same year: "They confessed under theirtortures, " says Bossuet, "but they denied at their execution. " Thebusiness dragged slowly on; different decisions were pronounced, according to the place of decision; the Templars were pronouncedinnocent, on the 17th of June, 1310, at Ravenna, on the 1st of July atMayence, and on the 21st of October at Salamanca; and in Aragon they madea successful resistance. Europe began to be wearied at the uncertaintyof such judgments and at the sight of such horrible spectacles; andClement V. Felt some shame at thus persecuting monks who, on more thanone occasion, had shown devotion to the Holy See. 

But Philip the Handsome had attained his end: he was in possession of theTemplars' riches. On the 11th of June, 1311, the commission of inquiryterminated its sittings, and the report of its labors concluded asfollows: "For further precaution, we have deposited the said procedure, drawn up by notaries in authentic form, in the treasury of Notre-Dame, atParis, to be shown to none without special letters from Your Holiness. "The council-general, announced in 1308 by the pope, to decidedefinitively upon this great case, was actually opened at Vienne, inOctober, 1311; more than three hundred bishops assembled; and nineTemplars presented themselves for the defence of their order, saying thatthere were at Lyons, or in the neighborhood, fifteen hundred or twothousand of their brethren, ready to support them. The pope had the ninedefenders arrested, adjourned the decision once more, and, on the 22d ofMarch in the following year, at a mere secret consistory, made up of themost docile bishops and a few cardinals, pronounced, solely on hispontifical authority, the abolition of the order of the Temple: and itwas subsequently proclaimed officially, on the 3d of April, 1312, inpresence of the king and the council. And not a soul protested. 

The Grand Master, James de Molay, in confinement at Gisors, survived hisorder. The pope had reserved to himself the task of trying him; but, disgusted with the work, he committed the trial to ecclesiasticalcommissioners assembled at Paris, before whom Molay was brought, togetherwith three of the principal leaders of the Temple, survivors likehimself. They had read over to them, from a scaffold erected in theforecourt of Notre-Dame, the confessions they had made, but lately, undertorture, and it was announced to them that they were sentenced toperpetual imprisonment. Remorse had restored to the Grand Master all hiscourage; he interrupted the reading, and disavowed his avowals, protesting that torture alone had made him speak so falsely, andmaintaining that

 "Of his grand order nought he wist 'Gainst honor and the laws of Christ. "

One of his three comrades in misfortune, the commander of Normandy, madealoud a similar disavowal. The embarrassed judges sent the two Templarsback to the provost of Paris, and put off their decision to the followingday; but Philip the Handsome, without waiting for the morrow, and withoutconsulting the judges, ordered the two Templars to be burned the sameevening, March 11, 1314, at the hour of vespers, in Ile-de-la-Cite, onthe site of the present Place Dauphine. A poet-chronicler, Godfrey ofParis, who was a witness of the scene, thus describes it: "The GrandMaster, seeing the fire prepared, stripped himself briskly; I tell justas I saw; he bared himself to his shirt, light-heartedly and with a goodgrace, without a whit of trembling, though he was dragged and shakenmightily. They took hold of him to tie him to the stake, and they werebinding his hands with a cord, but he said to them, 'Sirs, suffer me tofold my hands a while, and make my prayer to God, for verily it is time. I am presently to die; but wrongfully, God wot. Wherefore woe will come, ere long, to those who condemn us without a cause. God will avenge ourdeath. '"

It was probably owing to these last words that there arose a popularrumor, soon spread abroad, that James de Molay, at his death, had citedthe pope and the king to appear with him, the former at the end of fortydays, and the latter within a year, before the judgment-seat of God. Events gave a sanction to the legend: for Clement V. Actually died on the20th of April, 1314, and Philip the Handsome on the 29th of November, 1314, the pope, undoubtedly, uneasy at the servile acquiescence he hadshown towards the king, and the king expressing some sorrow for his greedand for the imposts (_maltote, maletolta, _ or _black mail_) with which hehad burdened his people. 

In excessive and arbitrary imposts, indeed, consisted the chief grievancefor which France, in the fourteenth century, had to complain of Philipthe Handsome; and, probably, it was the only wrong for which he upbraidedhimself. Being badly wounded, out hunting, by a wild boar, andperceiving himself to be in bad case, he gave orders for his removal toFontainebleau, and there, says Godfrey of Paris, the poet-chronicler justquoted in reference to the execution of the Templars, "he said andcommanded that his children, his brothers, and his other friends shouldbe sent for. They were no long time in coming; they enteredFontainebleau, into the chamber where the king was, and where there wasvery little light. So soon as they were there, they asked him how hewas, and he answered, 'Ill in body and in soul; if our Lady the Virginsave me not by her prayers, I see that death will seize me here; I haveput on so many talliages, and laid hands on so much riches, that I shallnever be absolved. Sirs, I know that I am in such estate that I shalldie, methinks, to-night, for I suffer grievous hurt from the curses whichpursue me: there will be no fine tales to be told of me. '" Philip'sanxiety about his memory was not without foundation; his greed is thevice which has clung to his name; not only did he load his subjects withpoll taxes and other taxes unauthorized by law and the traditions of thefeudal system; not only was he unjust and cruel towards the Templars inorder to appropriate their riches; but he committed, over and over again, that kind of spoliation which imports most trouble into the general lifeof a people; he debased the coinage so often and to such an extent, thathe was everywhere called "the base coiner. " This was a financial processof which none of his predecessors, neither St. Louis nor Philip Augustus, had set him an example, though they had quite as many costly wars andexpeditions to keep up as he had. Some chroniclers of the fourteenthcentury say that Philip the Handsome was particularly munificent andlavish towards his family and his servants; but it is difficult to meetwith any precise proof of this allegation, and we must impute thefinancial difficulties of Philip the Hand-some to his natural greed, andto the secret expenses entailed upon him by his policy of dissimulationand hatred, rather than to his lavish generosity. As he was no strangerto the spirit of order in his own affairs, he tried, towards the end ofhis reign, to obtain an exact account of his finances. His chiefadviser, Enguerrand de Marigny, became his superintendent-general, andon the 19th of January, 1311, at the close of a grand council held atPoissy, Philip passed an ordinance which established, under the headingsof expenses and receipts, two distinct tables and treasuries, one forordinary expenses, the civil list, and the payment of the great bodies ofthe state, incomes, pensions, &c. , and the other for extraordinaryexpenses. The ordinary expenses were estimated at one hundred andseventy-seven thousand five hunded livres of Tours, that is, according toM. Boutaric, who published this ordinance, fifteen million nine hundredthousand francs (about three million eighty-four thousand dollars). Numerous articles regulated the execution of the measure; and the royaltreasurers took an oath not to reveal, within two years, the state oftheir receipts, save to Enguerrand de Marigny, or by order of the kinghimself. This first budget of the French monarchy dropped out of sightafter the death of Philip the Handsome, in the reaction which took placeagainst his government. "God forgive him his sins, " says Godfrey ofParis, "for in the time of his reign great loss came to France, and therewas small regret for him. " The general history of France has been moreindulgent towards Philip the Handsome than his contemporaries were; ithas expressed its acknowledgments to him for the progress made, under hissway, by the particular and permanent characteristics of civilization inFrance. The kingly domain received in the Pyrenees, in Aquitaine, inFranche-Comte, and in Flanders territorial increments which extendednational unity. The legislative power of the king penetrated into andsecured footing in the lands of his vassals. The scatteredsemi-sovereigns of feudal society bowed down before the incontestablepre-eminence of the kingship, which gained the victory in its struggleagainst the papacy. Far be it from us to attach no importance to theintervention of the deputies of the communes in the states-general of1302, on the occasion of that struggle: it was certainly homage paid tothe nascent existence of the third estate; but it is puerile to considerthat homage as a real step towards public liberties and constitutionalgovernment. The burghers of 1302 did not dream of such a thing; Philip, knowing that their feelings were, in this instance, in accordance withhis own, summoned them in order to use their co-operation as a usefulappendage for himself, and absolute kingship gained more strength by theco-operation than the third estate acquired influence. The generalconstitution of the judiciary power, as delegated from the kingship, thecreation of several classes of magistrates devoted to this great socialfunction, and, especially, the strong organization and the permanence ofthe parliament of Paris, were far more important progressions in thedevelopment of civil order and society in France. But it was to theadvantage of absolute power that all these facts were turned, and theperverted ability of Philip the Handsome consisted in working them forthat single end. He was a profound egotist; he mingled with hisimperiousness the leaven of craft and patience, but he was quite astranger to the two principles which constitute the morality ofgovernments, respect for rights and patriotic sympathy with publicsentiment; he concerned himself about nothing but his own position, hisown passions, his own wishes, or his own fancies. And this is theradical vice of absolute power. Philip the Handsome is one of the kingsof France who have most contributed to stamp upon the kingship in Francethis lamentable characteristic, from which France has suffered so much, even in the midst of her glories, and which, in our time, was sogrievously atoned for by the kingship itself when it no longer deservedthe reproach. 

Philip the Handsome left three sons, Louis X. , called _le Hutin_ (_theQuarreller_), Philip V. , called the _Long, _ and Charles IV. , called _theHandsome, _ who, between them, occupied the throne only thirteen years andten months. Not one of them distinguished himself by his personalmerits; and the events of the three reigns hold scarcely a higher placein history than the actions of the three kings do. Shortly before thedeath of Philip the Handsome, his greedy despotism had already excitedamongst the people such lively discontent that several leagues wereformed in Champagne, Burgundy, Artois, and Beauvaisis, to resist him; andthe members of these leagues, "nobles and commoners, " say the accounts, engaged to give one another mutual support in their resistance, "at theirown cost and charges. " After the death of Philip the Handsome, theopposition made head more extensively and effectually; and it producedtwo results: ten ordinances of Louis the Quarreller for redressing thegrievances of the feudal aristocracy, for one; and, for the other, thetrial and condemnation of Enguerrand de Marigny "coadjutor and rector ofthe kingdom" under Philip the Hand-some. Marigny, at the death of theking his master, had against him, rightly or wrongly, popular clamor andfeudal hostility, especially that of Charles of Valois, Philip theHandsome's brother, who acted as leader of the barons. "What has becomeof all those subsidies, and all those sums produced by so much tamperingwith the coinage? "asked the new king one day in council. "Sir, " saidPrince Charles, "it was Marigny who had the administration of everything;and it is for him to render an account. " "I am quite ready, " saidMarigny. "This moment, then, " said the prince. "Most willingly, mylord: I gave a great portion to you. " "You lie!" cried Charles. "Nay, you, by God!" replied Marigny. The prince drew his sword, and Marignywas on the point of doing the same. The quarrel was, however, stifledfor the moment; but, shortly afterwards, Marigny was accused, condemnedby a commission assembled at Vincennes, and hanged on the gibbet ofMontfaucon which he himself, it is said, had set up. He walked toexecution with head erect, saying to the crowd, "Good folks, pray forme. " Some months afterwards, the young king, who had indorsed thesentence reluctantly, since he did not well know, between his father'sbrother and minister, which of the two was guilty, left by will ahandsome legacy to Marigny's widow "in consideration of the greatmisfortune which had befallen her and hers;" and Charles of Valoishimself, falling into a decline, and considering himself stricken by thehand of God "as a punishment for the trial of Enguerrand de Marigny, " hadliberal alms distributed to the poor with this injunction: "Pray God forEuguerrand de Marigny and for the Count of Valois. " None can tell, afterthis lapse of time, whether this remorse proceeded from weakness of mindor sincerity of heart, and which of the two personages was really guilty;but, ages afterwards, such is the effect of blind, popular clamor andunrighteous judicial proceedings, that the condemned lives in history asa victim and all but a guileless being. 

[Illustration: The Hanging of Marigny----200]

Whilst the feudal aristocracy was thus avenging itself of kingly tyranny, the spirit of Christianity was noiselessly pursuing its work, the generalenfranchisement of men. Louis the Quarreller had to keep up the war withFlanders, which was continually being renewed; and in order to find, without hateful exactions, the necessary funds, he was advised to offerfreedom to the serfs of his domains. Accordingly he issued, on the 3d ofJuly, 1315, an edict to the following effect: "Whereas, according tonatural right, every one should be born free, and whereas, by certaincustoms which, from long age, have been introduced into and preserved tothis day in our kingdom . . . Many persons amongst our common peoplehave fallen into the bonds of slavery, which much displeaseth us; we, considering that our kingdom is called and named the kingdom of the Free(Franks), and willing that the matter should in verity accord with thename . . . Have by our grand council decreed and do decree thatgenerally throughout our whole kingdom . . . Such serfdoms be redeemedto freedom, on fair and suitable conditions . . . And we will, likewise, that all other lords who have body-men (or serfs) do takeexample by us to bring them to freedom. " Great credit has very properlybeen given to Louis the Quarreller for this edict; but it has not beensufficiently noticed that Philip the Handsome had himself set his sonsthe example, for, on confirming the enfranchisement granted by hisbrother Charles to the serfs in the countship of Valois, he had based hisdecree on the following grounds: "Seeing that every human being, which ismade in the image of Our Lord, should generally be free by naturalright. " The history of Christian communities is full of these happyinconsistencies; when a moral and just principle is implanted in thesoul, absolute power itself does not completely escape from its healthyinfluence, and the good makes its way athwart the evil, just as a sourceof fresh and pure water ceases not to flow through and spread over a landwasted by the crimes or follies of men. 

It is desirable to give an idea and an example of the conduct which wasalready beginning to be adopted and of the authority which was alreadybeginning to be exercised in France, amidst the feudal reaction that setin against Philip the Handsome and amidst the feeble government of hissons, by that magistracy, of such recent and petty origin, which wascalled upon to defend, in the king's name, order and justice against thecount-less anarchical tyrannies scattered over the national territory. During the early years of the fifteenth century, a lord of Gascony, Jordan de Lisle, "of most noble origin, but most ignoble deeds, " says acontemporary chronicler, "abandoned himself to all manner ofirregularities and crimes. " Confident in his strength and hisconnections, --for Pope John XXII. Had given his niece to him inmarriage, --"he committed homicides, entertained evil-doers and murderers, countenanced robbers, and rose against the king. He killed, with theman's own truncheon, one of the king's servants who was wearing the royallivery according to the custom of the royal servants. When his misdeedswere known, he was summoned for trial to Paris; and he went thithersurrounded by a stately retinue of counts, nobles, and barons ofAquitaine. He was confined, at first, in the prison of Chatelet; andwhen a hearing had been accorded to his reply and to what he alleged inhis defence against the crimes of which he was accused, he was finallypronounced worthy of death by the doctors of the parliament, and onTrinity-eve he was dragged at the tail of horses and hanged, as hedeserved, on the public gallows at Paris. " It was, assuredly, adifficult and a dangerous task for the obscure members of thisparliament, scarcely organized as it was and quite lately establishedfor a permanence in Paris, to put down such disorders and such men. In the course of its long career the French magistracy has committed manyfaults; it has more than once either aspired to overstep its properlimits or failed to fulfil all its duties; but history would beungrateful and untruthful not to bring into the light the virtues thisbody has displayed from its humble cradle, and the services it hasrendered to France, to her security at home, to her moral dignity, to herintellectual glory, and to the progress of her civilization with all itsbrilliancy and productiveness, though it is still so imperfect and sothwarted. 

Another fact which has held an important place in the history of France, and exercised a great influence over her destinies, likewise dates fromthis period; and that is the exclusion of women from the succession tothe throne, by virtue of an article, ill understood, of the Salic law. The ancient law of the Salian Franks, drawn up, probably, in the seventhcentury, had no statute at all touching this grave question; the articlerelied upon was merely a regulation of civil law prescribing that "noportion of really Salic land (that is to say, in the full territorialownership of the head of the family) should pass into the possession ofwomen, but it should belong altogether to the virile sex. " From the timeof Hugh Capet heirs male had never been wanting to the crown, and thesuccession in the male line had been a fact uninterrupted indeed, but notdue to prescription or law. Louis the Quarreller, at his death, on the5th of June, 1316, left only a daughter, but his second wife, QueenClemence, was pregnant. As soon as Philip the Long, then Count ofPoitiers, heard of his brother's death, he hurried to Paris, assembled acertain number of barons, and got them to decide that he, if the queenshould be delivered of a son, should be regent of the kingdom foreighteen years; but that if she should bear a daughter he shouldimmediately take possession of the crown. On the 15th of November, 1316, the queen gave birth to a son, who was named John, and who figures asJohn I. In the series of French kings; but the child died at the end offive days, and on the 6th of January, 1317, Philip the Long was crownedking at Rheims. He forthwith summoned--there is no knowing exactly whereand in what numbers--the clergy, barons, and third estate, who declared, on the 2d of February, that "the laws and customs, inviolably observedamong the Franks, excluded daughters from the crown. " There was no doubtabout the fact; but the law was not established, nor even in conformitywith the entire feudal system or with general opinion. And "thus thekingdom went, " says Froissart, "as seemeth to many folks, out of theright line. " But the measure was evidently wise and salutary for Franceas well as for the king-ship; and it was renewed, after Philip the Longdied on the 3d of January, 1322, and left daughters only, in favor of hisbrother Charles the Handsome, who died, in his turn, on the 1st ofJanuary, 1328, and likewise left daughters only. The question as to thesuccession to the throne then lay between the male line represented byPhilip, Count of Valois, grandson of Philip the Bold through Charles ofValois, his father, and the female line represented by Edward III. , Kingof England, grandson, through his mother, Isabel, sister of the late KingCharles the Handsome, of Philip the Handsome. A war of more than acentury's duration between France and England was the result of thislamentable rivalry, which all but put the kingdom of France under anEnglish king; but France was saved by the stubborn resistance of thenational spirit and by Joan of Arc, inspired by God. One hundred andtwenty-eight years after the triumph of the national cause, and fouryears after the accession of Henry IV. , which was still disputed by theLeague, a decree of the parliament of Paris, dated the 28th of June, 1593, maintained, against the pretensions of Spain, the authority of theSalic law, and on the 1st of October, 1789, a decree of the NationalAssembly, in conformity with the formal and unanimous wish of thememorials drawn up by the states-general, gave a fresh sanction to thatprinciple, which, confining the heredity of the crown to the male line, had been salvation to the unity and nationality of the monarchy inFrance. 

CHAPTER XIX. ----THE COMMUNES AND THE THIRD ESTATE. 

The history of the Merovingians is that of barbarians invading Gauland settling upon the ruins of the Roman empire. The history of theCarlovingians is that of the greatest of the barbarians taking uponhimself to resuscitate the Roman empire, and of Charlemagne's descendantsdisputing amongst themselves for the fragments of his fabric, as fragileas it was grand. Amidst this vast chaos and upon this double ruin wasformed the feudal system, which by transformation after transformationbecame ultimately France. Hugh Capet, one of its chieftains, madehimself its king. The Capetians achieved the French kingship. We havetraced its character and progressive development from the eleventh to thefourteenth century, through the reigns of Louis the Fat, of PhilipAugustus, of St. Louis, and of Philip the Handsome, princes very diverseand very unequal in merit, but all of them able and energetic. Thisperiod was likewise the cradle of the French nation. That was the timewhen it began to exhibit itself in its different elements, and to ariseunder monarchical rule from the midst of the feudal system. Its earliestfeatures and its earliest efforts in the long and laborious work of itsdevelopment are now to be set before the reader's eyes. 

The two words inscribed at the head of this chapter, the Communes and theThird-Estate, are verbal expressions for the two great facts at that timerevealing that the French nation was in labor of formation. Closelyconnected one with the other and tending towards the same end, these twofacts are, nevertheless, very diverse, and even when they have not beenconfounded, they have not been with sufficient clearness distinguishedand characterized, each of them apart. They are diverse both in theirchronological date and their social importance. The Communes are thefirst to appear in history. They appear there as local facts, isolatedone from another, often very different in point of origin, thoughanalogous in their aim, and in every case neither assuming nor pretendingto assume any place in the government of the state. Local interests andrights, the special affairs of certain populations agglomerated incertain spots, are the only objects, the only province of the communes. With this purely municipal and individual character they come to theirbirth, their confirmation, and their development from the eleventh to thefourteenth century; and at the end of two centuries they enter upon theirdecline, they occupy far less room and make far less noise in history. It is exactly then that the Third Estate comes to the front, and upliftsitself as a general fact, a national element, a political power. It isthe successor, not the contemporary, of the Communes; they contributedmuch towards, but did not suffice for its formation; it drew upon otherresources, and was developed under other influences than those which gaveexistence to the communes. It has subsisted, it has gone on growingthroughout the whole course of French history; and at the end of fivecenturies, in 1789, when the Communes had for a long while sunk intolanguishment and political insignificance, at the moment at which Francewas electing her Constituent Assembly, the Abbe Sicyes, a man of powerfulrather than scrupulous mind, could say, "What is the Third Estate?Everything. What has it hitherto been in the body politic? Nothing. What does it demand? To be something. "

These words contain three grave errors. In the course of governmentanterior to 1789, so far was the third estate from being nothing, that ithad been every day becoming greater and stronger. What was demanded forit in 1789 by M. Sicyes and his friends was not that it might becomesomething, but that it should be everything. That was a desire beyondits right and its strength; and the very Revolution, which was its ownvictory, proved this. Whatever may have been the weaknesses and faultsof its foes, the third estate had a terrible struggle to conquer them;and the struggle was so violent and so obstinate that the third estatewas broken up therein, and had to pay dearly for its triumph. At firstit obtained thereby despotism instead of liberty; and when libertyreturned, the third estate found itself confronted by twofold hostility, that of its foes under the old regimen and that of the absolute democracywhich claimed in its turn to be everything. Outrageous claims bringabout in-tractable opposition and excite unbridled ambition. What therewas in the words of the Abbe Sicyes in 1789 was not the verity ofhistory; it was a lying programme of revolution. 

We have anticipated dates in order to properly characterize and explainthe facts as they present themselves, by giving a glimpse of their scopeand their attainment. Now that we have clearly marked the profounddifference between the third estate and the communes, we will return tothe communes alone, which had the priority in respect of time. We willtrace the origin and the composition of the third estate, when we reachthe period at which it became one of the great performers in the historyof France by reason of the place it assumed and the part it played in thestates-general of the kingdom. 

In dealing with the formation of the communes from the eleventh to thefourteenth century, the majority of the French historians, evenM. Thierry, the most original and clear-sighted of them all, oftenentitle this event the communal revolution. This expression hardly givesa correct idea of the fact to which it is applied. The word revolution, in the sense, or at least the aspect, given to it amongst us bycontemporary events, points to the overthrow of a certain regimen, and ofthe ideas and authority predominant thereunder, and the systematicelevation in their stead of a regimen essentially different in principle, and in fact. The revolutions of our day substitute, or would fainsubstitute, a republic for a monarchy, democracy for aristocracy, political liberty for absolute power. The struggles which from theeleventh to the fourteenth century gave existence to so many communeshad no such profound character; the populations did not pretend to anyfundamental overthrow of the regimen they attacked; they conspiredtogether, they swore together, as the phrase is according to thedocuments of the time--they rose to extricate themselves from theoutrageous oppression and misery they were enduring, but not to abolishfeudal sovereignty and to change the personality of their masters. Whenthey succeeded they obtained those treaties of peace called charters, which brought about in the condition of the insurgents salutary changesaccompanied by more or less effectual guarantees. When they failed orwhen the charters were violated, the result was violent reactions, mutualexcesses; the relations between the populations and their lords weretempestuous and full of vicissitudes; but at bottom neither the politicalregimen nor the social system of the communes was altered. And so therewere, at many spots without any connection between them, local revoltsand civil wars, but no communal revolution. 

One of the earliest facts of this kind which have been set forth withsome detail in history clearly shows their primitive character; a factthe more remarkable in that the revolt described by the chroniclersoriginated and ran its course in the country among peasants with a viewof recovering complete independence, and not amongst an urban populationwith a view of resulting in the erection of a commune. Towards the endof the tenth century, under Richard II. , Duke of Normandy, called theGood, and whilst the good King Robert was reigning in France, "In severalcountships of Normandy, " says William of Jumiege, "all the peasants, assembling in their conventicles, resolved to live according to theirinclinations and their own laws, as well in the interior of the forestsas along the rivers, and to reck nought of any established right. Tocarry out this purpose these mobs of madmen chose each two deputies, whowere to form at some central point an assembly charged to see to theexecution of their decrees. As soon as the duke (Richard II. ) wasinformed thereof, he sent a large body of men-at-arms to repress thisaudaciousness of the country districts and to scatter this rusticassemblage. In execution of his orders, the deputies of the peasants andmany other rebels were forthwith arrested, their feet and hands were cutoff, and they were sent away thus mutilated to their homes, in order todeter their like from such enterprises, and to make them wiser, for fearof worse. After this experience the peasants left off their meetings andreturned to their ploughs. "

[Illustration: The Peasants resolved to Live according to their ownInclinations and their own Laws----209]

It was about eighty years after the event when the monk William ofJumiege told the story of this insurrection of peasants so long anterior, and yet so similar to that which more than three centuries afterwardsbroke out in nearly the whole of Northern. France, and which was calledthe Jacquery. Less than a century after William of Jumiege, a Normanpoet, Robert Wace, told the same story in his Romance of Rou, a historyin verse of Rollo and the first dukes of Normandy: "The lords do usnought but ill, " he makes the Norman peasants say: with them we have norgain nor profit from our labors; every day is for us a day of suffering, of travail, and of fatigue; every day our beasts are taken from us forforced labor and services . . . Why put up with all this evil, and whynot get quit of travail? Are not we men even as they are? Have we notthe same stature, the same limbs, the same strength--for suffering? Bindwe ourselves by oath; swear we to aid one another; and if they be mindedto make war on us, have we not for every knight thirty or forty youngpeasants ready and willing to fight with club, or boar-spear, or arrow, or axe, or stones, if they have not arms? Learn we to resist theknights, and we shall be free to hew down trees, to hunt game, and tofish after our fashion, and we shall work our will on flood and in fieldand wood. "

These two passages have already been quoted in Chapter XIV. Of thishistory in the course of describing the general condition of France underthe Capetians before the crusades, and they are again brought forwardhere because they express and paint to the life the chief cause whichfrom the end of the tenth century led to so many insurrections amongstthe rural as well as urban populations, and brought about theestablishment of so many communes. 

We say the chief cause only, because oppression and insurrection were notthe sole origin of the communes. Evil, moral and material, abounds inhuman communities, but it never has the sole dominion there; force neverdrives justice into utter banishment, and the ruffianly violence of thestrong never stifles in all hearts every sympathy for the weak. Twocauses, quite distinct from feudal oppression, viz. , Roman traditions andChristian sentiments, had their share in the formation of the communesand in the beneficial results thereof. 

The Roman municipal regimen, which is described in M. Guizot's _L'Essaissur l'Histoire de France_ (1st Essay, pp. 1-44), did not everywhereperish with the empire; it kept its footing in a great number of towns, especially in those of Southern Gaul, Marseilles, Arles, Nismes, Narbonne, Toulouse, &c. At Arles the municipality actually bore the nameof commune (_communitas_), Toulouse gave her municipal magistrates thename of _Capitouls, _ after the Capitol of Rome, and in the greater partof the other towns in the south they were called Consuls. After thegreat invasion of barbarians from the seventh to the end of the eleventhcentury, the existence of these Roman municipalities appears but rarelyand confusedly in history; but in this there is nothing peculiar to thetowns and the municipal regimen, for confusion and obscurity were at thattime universal, and the nascent feudal system was plunged therein as wellas the dying little municipal systems were. Many Roman municipalitieswere still subsisting without influencing any event of at all a generalkind, and without leaving any trace; and as the feudal system grew andgrew they still went on in the midst of universal darkness and anarchy. They had penetrated into the north of Gaul in fewer numbers and with aweaker organization than in the south, but still keeping their footingand vaunting themselves on their Roman origin in the face of theirbarbaric conquerors. The inhabitants of Rheims remembered with pridethat their municipal magistracy and its jurisdiction were anterior toClovis, dating as they did from before the days of St. Remigius, theapostle of the Franks. The burghers of Metz boasted of having enjoyedcivil rights before there was any district of Lorraine: "Lorraine, " saidthey, "is young, and Metz is old. " The city of Bourges was one of themost complete examples of successive transformations and denominationsattained by a Roman municipality from the sixth to the thirteenth centuryunder the Merovingians, the Carlovingians, and the earliest Capetians. At the time of the invasion it had arenas, an amphitheatre, and all thatcharacterized a Roman city. In the seventh century, the author of thelife of St. Estadiola, born at Bourges, says that "she was the child ofillustrious parents who, as worldly dignity is accounted, were notable byreason of senatorial rank; and Gregory of Tours quotes a judgmentdelivered by the principals (_primores_) of the city of Bourges. Coinsof the time of Charles the Bald are struck with the name of the city ofBourges and its inhabitants (_Bituriges_). In 1107, under Philip I. , themembers of the municipal body of Bourges are named _prud'hommes_. In twocharters, one of Louis the Young, in 1145, and the other of PhilipAugustus, in 1218, the old senators of Bourges have the name at one timeof _bons hommes, _ at another of _barons_ of the city. Under differentnames, in accordance with changes of language, the Roman municipalregimen held on and adapted itself to new social conditions. 

In our own day there has been far too much inclination to dispute, andM. Augustin Thierry has, in M. Guizot's opinion, made far too little of, the active and effective part played by the kingship in the formation andprotection of the French communes. Not only did the kings, as we shallpresently see, often interpose as mediators in the quarrels of thecommunes with their laic or ecclesiastical lords, but many amongst themassumed in their own domains and to the profit of the communes anintelligent and beneficial initiative. The city of Orleans was a happyexample of this. It was of ancient date, and had prospered under theRoman empire; nevertheless the continuance of the Roman municipal regimendoes not appear there clearly as we have just seen that it did in thecase of Bourges; it is chiefly from the middle ages and their kings thatOrleans held its municipal franchises and its privileges; they neverraised it to a commune, properly so called, by a charter sworn to andguaranteed by independent institutions, but they set honestly to workto prevent local oppression, to reform abuses, and make justice prevailthere. From 1051 to 1281 there are to be found in the _Recueil desordonnances des rois_ seven important charters relating to Orleans. In1051, at the demand of the people of Orleans and its bishop, who appearsin the charter as the head of the people, the defender of the city, HenryI. Secures to the inhabitants of Orleans freedom of labor and of going toand fro during the vintages, and interdicts his agents from exactinganything upon the entry of wines. From 1137 to 1178, during theadministration of Suger, Louis the Young in four successive ordinancesgives, in respect of Orleans, precise guarantees for freedom of trade, security of person and property, and the internal peace of the city; andin 1183 Philip Augustus exempts from all talliage, that is, from allpersonal impost, the present and future inhabitants of Orleans, andgrants them divers privileges, amongst others that of not going tolaw-courts farther from their homes than Etampes. In 1281 Philip theBold renews and confirms the concessions of Philip Augustus. Orleans wasnot, within the royal domain, the only city where the kings of thatperiod were careful to favor the progress of the population, of wealth, and of security; several other cities, and even less considerable burghs, obtained similar favor; and in 1155 Louis the Young, probably inconfirmation of an act of his father, Louis the Fat, granted to thelittle town of Lorris, in Gatinais (nowadays chief place of a canton inthe department of the Loiret), a charter, full of detail, which regulatedits interior regimen in financial, commercial, judicial, and militarymatters, and secured to all its inhabitants good conditions in respect ofcivil life. This charter was in the course of the twelfth centuryregarded as so favorable that it was demanded by a great number of townsand burghs; the king was asked for _the customs of Lorris_(_consuetudines Lauracienses_), and in the space of fifty years they weregranted to seven towns, some of them a considerable distance fromOrleanness. The towns which obtained them did not become by thisqualification communes properly so called in the special and historicalsense of the word; they had no jurisdiction of their own, no independentmagistracy; they had not their own government in their hands; the king'sofficers, provosts, bailiffs, or others, were the only persons whoexercised there a real and decisive power. But the king's promises tothe inhabitants, the rights which he authorized them to claim from him, and the rules which he imposed upon his officers in their government, were not concessions which were of no value or which remained withoutfruit. As we follow in the course of our history the towns which, without having been raised to communes properly so called, had obtainedadvantages of that kind, we see them developing and growing in populationand wealth, and sticking more and more closely to that kingship fromwhich they had received their privileges, and which, for all itsimperfect observance and even frequent violation of promises, wasnevertheless accessible to complaint, repressed from time to time themisbehavior of its officers, renewed at need and even extendedprivileges, and, in a word, promoted in its administration the progressof civilization and the counsels of reason, and thus attached theburghers to itself without recognizing on their side those positiverights and those guarantees of administrative independence which are in aperfect and solidly constructed social fabric the foundation of politicalliberty. 

[Illustration: Insurrection in favor of the Commune at Cambrai----214]

Nor was it the kings alone who in the middle ages listened to thecounsels of reason, and recognized in their behavior towards their townsthe rights of justice. Many bishops had become the feudal lords of theepiscopal city; and the Christian spirit enlightened and animated manyamongst them just as the monarchical spirit sometimes enlightened andguided the kings. Troubles had arisen in the town of Cambrai between thebishops and the people. "There was amongst the members of themetropolitan clergy, " says M. Augustin Thierry, "a certain Baudri deSarchainville, a native of Artois, who had the title of chaplain of thebishopric. He was a man of high character and of wise and reflectingmind. He did not share the violent aversion felt by most of his orderfor the institution of communes. He saw in this institution a sort ofnecessity beneath which it would be inevitable sooner or later, Willynilly, to bow, and he thought it was better to surrender to the wishes ofthe citizens than to shed blood in order to postpone for a while anunavoidable revolution. In 1098 he was elected Bishop of Noyon. Hefound this town in the same state in which he had seen that of Cambrai. The burghers were at daily loggerheads with the metropolitan clergy, andthe registers of the Church contained a host of documents entitled _Peacemade between us and the burghers of Noyon. _ But no reconciliation waslasting; the truce was soon broken, either by the clergy or by thecitizens, who were the more touchy in that they had less security fortheir persons and their property. The new bishop thought that theestablishment of a commune sworn to by both the rival parties mightbecome a sort of compact of alliance between them, and he set aboutrealizing this noble idea before the word commune had served at Noyon asthe rallying cry of popular insurrection. Of his own mere motion heconvoked in assembly all the inhabitants of the town, clergy, knights, traders, and craftsmen. He presented them with a charter whichconstituted the body of burghers an association forever under magistratescalled jury-men, like those of Cambrai. 'Whosoever, ' said the charter, 'shall desire to enter this commune shall not be able to be received as amember of it by a single individual, but only in the presence of thejurymen. The sum of money he shall then give shall be employed for thebenefit of the town, and not for the private advantage of any onewhatsoever. If the commune be outraged, all those who have sworn to itshall be bound to march to its defence, and none shall be empowered toremain at home unless he be infirm or sick, or so poor that he must needsbe himself the watcher of his own wife and children lying sick. If anyone have wounded or slain any one on the territory of the commune, thejurymen shall take vengeance therefor. '"

The other articles guarantee to the members of the commune of Noyon thecomplete ownership of their property, and the right of not being handedover to justice save before their own municipal magistrates. The bishopfirst swore to this charter, and the inhabitants of every condition tookthe same oath after him. In virtue of his pontifical authority hepronounced the anathema, and all the curses of the Old and New Testament, against whoever should in time to come dare to dissolve the commune orinfringe its regulations. Furthermore, in order to give this new pact astronger warranty, Baudri requested the hing of France. Louis the Fat, to corroborate it, as they used to say at the time, by his approbationand by the great seal of the crown. The king consented to this requestof the bishop, and that was all the part taken by Louis the Fat in theestablishment of the commune of Noyon. The king's charter is notpreserved, but, under the date of 1108, there is extant one of thebishop's own, which may serve to substantiate the account given:--

"Baudri, by the grace of God Bishop of Noyon, to all those who dopreserve and go on in the faith:

"Most dear brethren, we learn by the example and words of-the holyFathers, that all good things ought to be committed to writing, for fearlest hereafter they come to be forgotten. Know, then, all Christianspresent and to come, that I have formed at Noyon a commune, constitutedby the counsel and in an assembly of clergy, knights, and burghers; thatI have confirmed it by oath, by pontifical authority, and by the bond ofanathema; and that I have prevailed upon our lord King Louis to grantthis commune and corroborate it with the king's seal. This establishmentformed by me, sworn to by a great number of persons, and granted by theking, let none be so bold as to destroy or alter; I give warning thereof, on behalf of God and myself, and I forbid it in the name of pontificalauthority. Whosoever shall transgress and violate the present law, besubjected to excommunication; and whosoever, on the contrary, shallfaithfully keep it, be preserved forever amongst those who dwell in thehouse of the Lord. "

This good example was not without fruit. The communal regimen wasestablished in several towns, notably at St. Quentin and at Soissons, without trouble or violence, and with one accord amongst the laic andecclesiastical lords and the inhabitants. 

We arrive now at the third and chief source of the communes, at the caseof those which met feudal oppression with energetic resistance, andwhich, after all the sufferings, vicissitudes, and outrages, on bothsides, of a prolonged struggle, ended by winning a veritableadministrative, and, to a certain extent, political independence. Thenumber of communes thus formed from the eleventh to the thirteenthcentury was great, and we have a detailed history of the fortunes ofseveral amongst them, Cambrai, Beauvais, Laon, Amiens, Rheims, Etampes, Vezelay, &c. To give a correct and vivid picture of them we will choosethe commune of Laon, which was one of those whose fortunes were mostcheckered as well as most tragic, and which after more than two centuriesof a very tempestuous existence was sentenced to complete abolition, first by Philip the Handsome, then by Philip the Long and Charles theHandsome, and, finally, by Philip of Valois, "for certain misdeeds andexcesses notorious, enormous, and detestable, and on full deliberation ofour council. " The early portion of the history connected with thecommune of Laon has been narrated for us by Guibert, an abbot of Nogent-sous-Coucy, in the diocese of Laon, a contemporary writer, sprightly andbold. "In all that I have written and am still writing, " says he, "Idismiss all men from my mind, caring not a whit about pleasing anybody. I have taken my side in the opinions of the world, and with calmness andindifference on my own account I expect to be exposed to all sorts oflanguage, to be as it were beaten with rods. I proceed with my task, being fully purposed to bear with equanimity the judgments of all whocome snarling after me. "

Laon was at the end of the eleventh century one of the most importanttowns in the kingdom of France. It was full of rich and industriousinhabitants; the neighboring people came thither for provisions ordiversion; and such concourse led to the greatest disturbances. "Thenobles and their servitors, " says M. Augustin Thierry, "sword in hand, committed robbery upon the burghers; the streets of the town were notsafe by night or even by day, and none could go out without running arisk of being stopped and robbed or killed. The burghers in their turncommitted violence upon the peasants, who came to buy or sell at themarket of the town. " "Let me give as example, " says Guibert of Nogent, "a single fact, which, had it taken place amongst the Barbarians or theScythians, would assuredly have been considered the height of wickedness, in the judgment even of those who recognize no law. On Saturday theinhabitants of the country places used to leave their fields, and comefrom all sides to Laon to get provisions at the market. The townsfolkused then to go round the place, carrying in baskets, or bowls, orotherwise, samples of vegetables, or grain, or any other article, as ifthey wished to sell. They would offer them to the first peasant who wasin search of such things to buy; he would promise to pay the price agreedupon; and then the seller would say to the buyer, 'Come with me to myhouse to see and examine the whole of the articles I am selling you. ' Theother would go; and then, when they came to the bin containing the goods, the honest seller would take off and hold up the lid, saying to thebuyer, 'Step hither, and put your head or arms into the bin, to makequite sure that it is all exactly the same goods as I showed yououtside. ' And then when the other, jumping on to the edge of the bin, remained leaning on his belly, with his head and shoulders hanging down, the worthy seller, who kept in the rear, would hoist up the thoughtlessrustic by the feet, push him suddenly into the bin, and, clapping on thelid as he fell, keep him shut up in this safe prison until he had boughthimself out. "

In 1106 the bishopric of Laon had been two years vacant. It was soughtafter and obtained for a sum of money, say contemporaries, by Gaudri, aNorman by birth, referendary of Henry I. , King of England, and one ofthose Churchmen who, according to M. Augustin Thierry's expression, "hadgone in the train of William the Bastard to seek their fortunes amongstthe English by seizing the property of the vanquished. " It appears thatthenceforth the life of Gaudri had been scarcely edifying; he had, it issaid, the tastes and habits of a soldier; he was hasty and arrogant, andhe liked beyond everything to talk of fighting and hunting, of arms, ofhorses, and of hounds. When he was repairing with a numerous followingto Rome, to ask for confirmation of his election, he met at Langres PopePascal II. , come to France to keep the festival of Christmas at the abbeyof Cluny. The pope had no doubt heard something about the indifferentreputation of the new bishop, for, the very day after his arrival atLangres, he held a conference with the ecclesiastics who had accompaniedGaudri, and plied them with questions concerning him. "He asked usfirst, " says Guibert of Nogent, who was in the train, "why we had chosena man who was unknown to us. As none of the priests, some of whom didnot know even the first rudiments of the Latin language, made any answerto this question, he turned to the abbots. I was seated between my twocolleagues. As they likewise kept silence, I began to be urged, rightand left, to speak. I was one of those whom this election haddispleased; but with culpable timidity I had yielded to the authority ofmy superiors in dignity. With the bashfulness of youth I could only withgreat difficulty and much blushing prevail upon myself to open my mouth. The discussion was carried on, not in our mother tongue, but in thelanguage of scholars. I therefore, though with great confusion of mindand face, betook myself to speaking in a manner to tickle the palate ofhim who was questioning us, wrapping up in artfully arranged form ofspeech expressions which were softened down, but were not entirelyremoved from the truth. I said that we did not know, it was true, to theextent of having been familiar by sight and intercourse with him, the manof whom we had made choice, but that we had received favorable reports ofhis integrity. The pope strove to confound my arguments by thisquotation from the Gospel: 'He that hath seen giveth testimony. ' But ashe did not explicitly raise the objection that Gaudri had been elected bydesire of the court, all subtle subterfuge on any such point becameuseless; so I gave it up, and confessed that I could say nothing inopposition to the pontiff's words; which pleased him very much, for hehad less scholarship than would have become his high office. Clearlyperceiving, however, that all the phrases I had piled up in defence ofour election had but little weight, I launched out afterwards upon theurgent straits wherein our Church was placed, and on this subject I gavemyself the more rein in proportion as the person elected was unfitted forthe functions of the episcopate. "

[Illustration: Burghers of Laon----220]

Gaudri was indeed very scantily fitted for the office of bishop, as thetown of Laon was not slow to perceive. Scarcely had he been installedwhen he committed strange outrages. He had a man's eyes put out onsuspicion of connivance with his enemies; and he tolerated the murder ofanother in the metropolitan church. In imitation of rich crusaders ontheir return from the East, he kept a black slave, whom he employed uponhis deeds of vengeance. The burghers began to be disquieted, and to waxwroth. During a trip the bishop made to England, they offered a greatdeal of money to the clergy and knights who ruled in his absence, if theywould consent to recognize by a genuine Act the right of the commonaltyof the inhabitants to be governed by authorities of their own choice. "The clergy and knights, " says a contemporary chronicler, "came to anagreement with the common folk in hopes of enriching themselves in aspeedy and easy fashion. " A commune was therefore set up and proclaimedat Laon, on the model of that of Noyon, and invested with effectivepowers. The bishop, on his return, was very wroth, and for some daysabstained from re-entering the town. But the burghers acted with him, asthey had with his clergy and the knights: they offered him so large a sumof money that "it was enough, " says Guibert of Nogent, "to appease thetempest of his words. " He accepted the commune, and swore to respect it. The burghers wished to have a higher warranty; so they sent to Paris, toKing Louis the Fat, a deputation laden with rich presents. "The king, "says the chronicler, "won over by this plebeian bounty, confirmed thecommune by his own oath, " and the deputation took back to Laon theircharter sealed with the great seal of the crown, and augmented by twoarticles to the following purport: "The folks of Laon shall not be liableto be forced to law away from their town; if the king have a suit againstany one amongst them, justice shall be done him in the episcopal court. For these advantages, and others further granted to the aforesaidinhabitants by the king's munificence, the folks of the commune havecovenanted to give the king, besides the old plenary court dues, andman-and-horse dues [dues paid for exemption from active service in caseof war], three lodgings a year, if he come to the town, and, if he do notcome, they will pay him instead twenty livres for each lodging. "

For three years the town of Laon was satisfied and tranquil; the burgherswere happy in the security they enjoyed, and proud of the liberty theyhad won. But in 1112 the knights, the clergy of the metropolitan church, and the bishop himself had spent the money they had received, and keenlyregretted the power they had lost; and they meditated reducing to the oldcondition the serfs emancipated from the yoke. The bishop invited KingLouis the Fat to come to Laon for the keeping of Holy Week, calculatingupon his presence for the intimidation of the burghers. "But theburghers, who were in fear of ruin, says Guibert of Nogent, "promised theking and those about him four hundred livres, or more, I am not quitesure which; whilst the bishop and the grandees, on their side, urged themonarch to come to an understanding with them, and engaged to pay himseven hundred livres. King Louis was so striking in person that heseemed made expressly for the majesty of the throne; he was courageous inwar, a foe to all slowness in business, and stout-hearted in adversity;sound, however, as he was on every other point, he was hardlypraiseworthy in this one respect, that he opened too readily both heartand ear to vile fellows corrupted by avarice. This vice was a fruitfulsource of hurt, as well as blame, to himself, to say nothing ofunhappiness to many. The cupidity of this prince always caused him toincline towards those who promised him most. All his own oaths, andthose of the bishops and the grandees, were consequently violated. " Thecharter sealed with the king's seal was annulled; and on the part of theking and the bishop, an order was issued to all the magistrates of thecommune to cease from their functions, to give up the seal and banner ofthe town, and to no longer ring the belfry chimes which rang out theopening and closing of their audiences. But at this proclamation, soviolent was the uproar in the town, that the king, who had hithertolodged in a private hotel, thought it prudent to leave, and go to passthe night in the episcopal palace, which was surrounded by strong walls. Not content with this precaution, and probably a little ashamed of whathe had done, he left Laon the next morning at daybreak, with all histrain, without waiting for the festival of Easter, for the celebrationof which he had undertaken his journey. 

All the day after his departure the shops of the tradespeople and thehouses of the innkeepers were kept closed; no sort of article was offeredfor sale; everybody remained shut up at home. But when there is wrath atthe bottom of men's souls, the silence and stupor of the first paroxysmare of short duration. Next day a rumor spread that the bishop and thegrandees were busy "in calculating the fortunes of all the citizens, inorder to demand that, to supply the sum promised to the king, each shouldpay on account of the destruction of the commune as much as each hadgiven for its establishment. " In a fit of violent indignation theburghers assembled; and forty of them bound themselves by oath, for lifeor death, to kill the bishop and all those grandees who had labored forthe ruin of the commune. The archdeacon, Anselm, a good sort of man, ofobscure birth, who heartily disapproved of the bishop's perjury, wentnevertheless and warned him, quite privately, and without betraying anyone, of the danger that threatened him, urging him not to leave hishouse, and particularly not to accompany the procession on Easter-day. "Pooh!" answered the bishop, "I die by the hands of such fellows!" Nextday, nevertheless, he did not appear at matins, and did not set footwithin the church; but when the hour for the procession came, fearing tobe accused of cowardice, he issued forth at the head of his clergy, closely followed by his domestics and some knights with arms and armorunder their clothes. As the company filed past, one of the fortyconspirators, thinking the moment favorable for striking the blow, rushedout suddenly from under an arch, with a shout of "_Commune! commune!_"A low murmur ran through the throng; but not a soul joined in the shoutor the movement, and the ceremony carne to an end without any explosion. The day after, another solemn procession was to take place to the churchof St. Vincent. Somewhat reassured, but still somewhat disquieted, thebishop fetched from the domains of the bishopric a body of peasants, someof whom he charged to protect the church, others his own palace, and oncemore accompanied the procession without the conspirators daring to attackhim. This time he was completely reassured, and dismissed the peasantshe had sent for. "On the fourth day after Easter, " says Guibert ofNogent, "my corn having been pillaged in consequence of the disorder thatreigned in the town, I repaired to the bishop's, and prayed him to put astop to this state of violence. 'What do you suppose, ' said he to me, 'those fellows can do with all their outbreaks? Why, if my blackamoorJohn were to pull the nose of the most formidable amongst them, the poordevil durst not even grumble. Have I not forced them to give up whatthey called their commune, for the whole duration of my life?' I held mytongue, " adds Guibert; "many folks besides me warned him of his danger;but he would not deign to believe anybody. "

Three days later all seemed quiet; and the bishop was busy with hisarchdeacon in discussing the sums to be exacted from the burghers. Allat once a tumult arose in the town; and a crowd of people thronged thestreets, shouting "_Commune! commune!_" Bands of burghers armed withswords, axes, bows, hatchets, clubs, and lances, rushed into theepiscopal palace. At the news of this, the knights who had promised thebishop to go to his assistance if he needed it came up one after anotherto his protection; and three of them, in succession, were hotly attackedby the burgher bands, and fell after a short resistance. The episcopalpalace was set on fire. The bishop, not being in a condition to repulsethe assaults of the populace, assumed the dress of one of his owndomestics, fled to the cellar of the church, shut himself in, andensconced himself in a cask, the bung-hole of which was stopped up by afaithful servitor. The crowd wandered about everywhere in search of himon whom they wished to wreak their vengeance. A bandit named Teutgaud, notorious in those times for his robberies, assaults, and murders oftravellers, had thrown himself headlong into the cause of the commune. The bishop, who knew him, had by way of pleasantry and on account of hisevil mien given him the nickname of _Isengrin_. This was the name whichwas given in the fables of the day to the wolf, and which corresponded tothat of Master Reynard. Teutgaud and his men penetrated into the cellarof the church; they went along tapping upon all the casks; and on whatsuspicion there is no knowing, but Teutgaud halted in front of that inwhich the bishop was huddled up, and had it opened, crying, "Is there anyone here?" "Only a poor prisoner, " answered the bishop, trembling. "Ha!ha!" said the playful bandit, who recognized the voice, "so it is you, Master Isengrin, who are hiding here! "And he took him by the hair, anddragged him out of his cask. The bishop implored the conspirators tospare his life, offering to swear on the Gospels to abdicate thebishopric, promising them all the money he possessed, and saying that ifthey pleased he would leave the country. The reply was insults andblows. He was immediately despatched; and Teutgaud, seeing the episcopalring glittering on his finger, cut off the finger to get possession ofthe ring. The body, stripped of all covering, was thrust into a corner, where passers-by threw stones or mud at it, accompanying their insultswith ribaldry and curses. 

[Bishop Gaudri dragged from the Cask----224]

Murder and arson are contagious. All the day of the insurrection and allthe following night armed bands wandered about the streets of Laonsearching everywhere for relatives, friends, or servitors of the bishop, for all whom the angry populace knew or supposed to be such, and wreakingon their persons or their houses a ghastly or a brutal vengeance. In afit of terror many poor innocents fled before the blind wrath of thepopulace; some were caught and cut down pell-mell amongst the guilty;others escaped through the vineyards planted between two hills in theoutskirts of the town. "The progress of the fire, kindled on two sidesat once, was so rapid, " says Guibert of Nogent, "and the winds drove theflames so furiously in the direction of the convent of St. Vincent, thatthe monks were afraid of seeing all they possessed become the fire'sprey, and all the persons who had taken refuge in this monastery trembledas if they had seen swords hanging over their heads. " Some insurgentsstopped a young man who had been body-servant to the bishop, and askedhim whether the bishop had been killed or not; they knew nothing aboutit, nor did he know any more; he helped them to look for the corpse, andwhen they came upon it, it had been so mutilated that not a feature wasrecognizable. "I remember, " said the young man, "that when the prelatewas alive he liked to talk of deeds of war, for which to his hurt healways showed too much bent; and he often used to say that one day in asham-fight, just as he was, all in the way of sport, attacking a certainknight, the latter hit him with his lance, and wounded him under theneck, near the tracheal artery. " The body of Gaudri was eventuallyrecognized by this mark, and "Archdeacon Anselm went the next day, " saysGuibert of Nogent, "to beg of the insurgents permission at least to buryit, if only because it had once borne the title and worn the insignia ofbishop. They consented, but reluctantly. It were impossible to tell howmany threats and insults were launched against those who undertook theobsequies, and what outrageous language was vented against the deadhimself. His corpse was thrown into a half-dug hole, and at church therewas none of the prayers or ceremonies prescribed for the burial of, Iwill not say a bishop, but the worst of Christians. " A few daysafterwards, Raoul, Archbishop of Rheims, came to Laon to purify thechurch. "The wise and venerable archbishop, " says Guibert, "afterhaving, on his arrival, seen to more decently disposing the remains ofsome of the dead and celebrated divine service in memory of all, amidstthe tears and utter grief of their relatives and connections, suspendedthe holy sacrifice of the mass, in order to deliver a discourse, touchingthose execrable institutions of communes, whereby we see serfs, contraryto all right and justice, withdrawing themselves by force from the lawfulauthority of their masters. "

Here is a striking instance of the changeableness of men's feelings andjudgments; and it causes a shock even when it is natural and almostallowable. Guibert of Nogent, the contemporary historian, who was butlately loud in his blame of the bishop of Laon's character and conduct, now takes sides with the reaction aroused by popular excesses andvindictiveness, and is indignant with "those execrable institutions ofcommunes, " the source of so many disturbances and crimes. The burghersof Laon themselves, "having reflected upon the number and enormity of thecrimes they had committed, shrank up with fear, " says Guibert, "anddreaded the judgment of the king. " To protect themselves against theconsequences of his resentment, they added a fresh wound to the old bysummoning to their aid Thomas de Marle, son of Lord Enguerrand de Coucy. "This Thomas, from his earliest youth, enriched himself by plundering thepoor and the pilgrim, contracted several incestuous marriages, andexhibited a ferocity so unheard of in our age, that certain people, evenamongst those who have a reputation for cruelty, appear less lavish ofthe blood of common sheep than Thomas was of human blood. Such was theman whom the burghers of Laon implored to come and put himself at theirhead, and whom they welcomed with joy when he entered their town. As forhim, when he had heard their request, he consulted his own people to knowwhat he ought to do; and they all replied that his forces were notsufficiently numerous to defend such a city against the king. Thomasthen induced the burghers to go out and hold a meeting in a field wherehe would make known to them his plan. When they were about a mile fromthe town, he said to them, 'Laon is the head of the kingdom; it isimpossible for me to keep the king from making himself master of it. Ifyou dread his arms, follow me to my own land, and you will find in me aprotector and a friend. ' These words threw them into an excess ofconsternation; soon, however, the popular party, troubled at therecollection of the crime they had committed, and fancying they alreadysaw the king threatening their lives, fled away to the number of a greatmany in the wake of Thomas. Teutgaud himself, that murderer of BishopGaudri, hastened to put himself under the wing of the Lord of Marie. Before long the rumor spread abroad amongst the population of thecountry-places near Laon that that town was quite empty of inhabitants;and all the peasants rushed thither and took possession of the housesthey found without defenders. Who could tell, or be believed if he wereto attempt to tell, how much money, raiment, and provision of all kindswas discovered in this city? Before long there arose between the firstand last comers disputes about the partition of their plunder; all thatthe small folks had taken soon passed into the hands of the powerful; iftwo men met a third quite alone they stripped him; the state of the townwas truly pitiable. The burghers who had quitted it with Thomas de Marlehad beforehand destroyed and burned the houses of the clergy and grandeeswhom they hated; and now the grandees, escaped from the massacre, carriedoff in their turn from the houses of the fugitives all means ofsubsistence and all movables to the very hinges and bolts. "

The rumor of so many disasters, crimes, and reactions succeeding oneanother spread rapidly throughout all districts. Thomas de Marle was putunder the ban of the kingdom, and visited with excommunication "by ageneral assembly of the Church of the Gauls, " says Guibert of Nogent, "assembled at Beauvais; "and this sentence was read every Sunday aftermass in all the metropolitan and parochial churches. Public feelingagainst Thomas de Marle became so strong that Enguerrand de Bowes, Lordof Coucy, who passed, says Suger, for his father, joined those whodeclared war against him in the name of Church and King. Louis the Fattook the field in person against him. "Men-at-arms, and in very smallnumbers, too, " says Guibert of Nogent, "were with difficulty induced tosecond the king, and did not do so heartily; but the light-armed infantrymade up a considerable force, and the Archbishop of Rheims and thebishops had summoned all the people to this expedition, whilst offeringto all absolution from their sins. Thomas de Marle, though at that timehelpless and stretched upon his bed, was not sparing of scoffs andinsults towards his assailants; and at first he absolutely refused tolisten to the king's summons. " But Louis persisted without wavering inhis enterprise, exposing himself freely, and in person leading hisinfantry to the attack when the men-at-arms did not come on or borethemselves slackly. He carried successively the castles of Crecy andNogent, domains belonging to Thomas de Marle, and at last reduced him tothe necessity of buying himself off at a heavy ransom, indemnifying thechurches he had spoiled, giving guarantees for future behavior, andearnestly praying for re-admission to the communion of the faithful. Asfor those folks of Laon, perpetrators of or accomplices in the murder ofBishop Gaudri, who had sought refuge with Thomas de Marle, the kingshowed them no mercy. "He ordered them, " says Suger, "to be strung up tothe gibbet, and left for food to the voracity of kites, and crows, andvultures. "

There are certain discrepancies between the two accounts, bothcontemporaneous, which we possess of this incident in the earliest yearsof the twelfth century, one in the Life of Louis the Fat, by Suger, andthe other in the Life of Guibert of Nogent, by himself. They will beeasily recognized on comparing what was said, after Suger, in ChapterXVIII. Of this history, with what has just been said here after Guibert. But these discrepancies are of no historical importance, for they make nodifference in respect of the essential facts characteristic of socialcondition at the period, and of the behavior and position of the actors. 

Louis the Fat, after his victory over Thomas de Marle and the fugitivesfrom Laon, went to Laon with the Archbishop of Rheims; and the presenceof the king, whilst restoring power to the foes of the commune, inspiredthem, no doubt, with a little of the spirit of moderation, for there wasan interval of peace, during which no attention was paid to anything butexpiatory ceremonies and the restoration of the churches which had been aprey to the flames. The archbishop celebrated a solemn mass for therepose of the souls of those who had perished during the disturbances, and he preached a sermon exhorting serfs to submit themselves to theirmasters, and warning them on pain of anathema from resisting by force. The burghers of Laon, however, did not consider every sort of resistanceforbidden, and the lords had, no doubt, been taught not to provoke it, for in 1128, sixteen years after the murder of Bishop Gaudri, fear of afresh insurrection determined his successor to consent to the institutionof a new commune, the charter of which was ratified by Louis the Fat inan assembly held at Compiegne. Only the name of commune did not recur inthis charter; it was replaced by that of Peace-establishment; theterritorial boundaries of the commune were called peace-boundaries, andto designate its members recourse was had to the formula, _All those whohave signed this peace_. The preamble of the charter runs, "In the nameof the holy and indivisible Trinity, we Louis, by the grace of God kingof the French, do make known to all our lieges present and to come that, with the consent of the barons of our kingdom and the inhabitants of thecity of Laon, we have set up in the said city a peace-establishment. "And after having enumerated the limits, forms, and rules of it, thecharter concludes with this declaration of amnesty: "All formertrespasses and offences committed before the ratification of the presenttreaty are wholly pardoned. If any one, banished for having trespassedin past time, desire to return to the town, he shall be admitted andshall recover possession of his property. Excepted from pardon, however, are the thirteen whose names do follow; "and then come the names of thethirteen excepted from the amnesty and still under banishment. "Perhaps, " says M. Augustin Thierry, "these thirteen under banishment, shut out forever from their native town at the very moment it becamefree, had been distinguished amongst all the burghers of Laon by theiropposition to the power of the lords; perhaps they had sullied by deedsof violence this patriotic opposition; perhaps they had been taken athaphazard to suffer alone for the crimes of their fellow-citizens. " Thesecond hypothesis appears the most probable; for that deeds of violenceand cruelty had been committed alternately by the burghers and their foesis an ascertained fact, and that the charter of 1128 was really a work ofliberal pacification is proved by its contents and wording. After suchstruggles and at the moment of their subsidence some of the most violentactors always bear the burden of the past, and amongst the most violentsome are often the most sincere. 

For forty-seven years after the charter of Louis the Fat the town of Laonenjoyed the internal peace and the communal liberties it had thusachieved; but in 1175 a new bishop, Roger de Rosoy, a man of high birth, and related to several of the great lords his neighbors, took uponhimself to disregard the regimen of freedom established at Laon. Theburghers of Laon, taught by experience, applied to the king, Louis theYoung, and offered him a sum of money to grant them a charter of commune. Bishop Roger, "by himself and through his friends, " says a chronicler, acanon of Laon, "implored the king to have pity on his Church, and abolishthe serfs' commune; but the king, clinging to the promise he had receivedof money, would not listen to the bishop or his friends, " and in 1177gave the burghers of Laon a charter which confirmed their peace-establishment of 1128. Bishop Roger, however, did not hold himselfbeaten. He claimed the help of the lords his neighbors, and renewed thewar against the burghers of Laon, who, on their side, asked and obtainedthe aid of several communes in the vicinity. In an access of democraticrashness, instead of awaiting within their walls the attack of theirenemies, they marched out without cavalry to the encounter, ravaging asthey went the lands of the lords whom they suspected of beingill-disposed towards them; but on arriving in front of the bishop'sallies, "all this rustic multitude, " says the canon-chronicler, "terror-stricken at the bare names of the knights they found assembled, tooksuddenly to flight, and a great number of the burghers were massacredbefore reaching their city. " Louis the Young then took the field to helpthem; but Baldwin, Count of Hainault, went to the aid of the Bishop ofLaon with seven hundred knights and several thousand infantry. KingLouis, after having occupied and for some time held in sequestration thelands of the bishop, thought it advisable to make peace rather thancontinue so troublesome a war, and at the intercession of the pope andthe Count of Hainault he restored to Roger de Rosoy his lands and hisbishopric on condition of living in peace with the commune. And so longas Louis VII. Lived, the bishop did refrain from attacking the libertiesof the burghers of Laon; but at the king's death, in 1180, he applied tohis successor, Philip Augustus, and offered to cede to him the lordshipof Fere-sur-Oise, of which he was the possessor, provided that Philip bycharter abolished the commune of Laon. Philip yielded to the temptation, and in 1190 published an ordinance to the following purport: "Desiring toavoid for our soul every sort of danger, we do entirely quash the communeestablished in the town of Laon as being contrary to the rights andliberties of the metropolitan church of St. Mary, in regard for justiceand for the sake of a happy issue to the pilgrimage which we be bound tomake to Jerusalem. " But next year, upon entreaty and offers from theburghers of Laon, Philip changed his mind, and without giving back thelordship of Fere-sur-Oise to the bishop, guaranteed and confirmed inperpetuity the peace-establishment granted in 1128 to the town of Laon, "on the condition that every year at the feast of All Saints they shallpay to us and our successors two hundred livres of Paris. " For a centuryall strife of any consequence ceased between the burghers of Laon andtheir bishop; there was no real accord or good under-standing betweenthem, but the public peace was not troubled, and neither the Kings ofFrance nor the great lords of the neighborhood interfered in its affairs. In 1294 some knights and clergy of the metropolitan chapter of Laon tookto quarrelling with some burghers; and on both sides they came to deedsof violence, which caused sanguinary struggles in the streets of the townand even in the precincts of the episcopal palace. The bishop and hischapter applied to the pope, Boniface VIII. , who applied to the king, Philip the Handsome, to put an end to these scandalous disturbances. Philip the Handsome, in his turn, applied to the Parliament of Paris, which, after inquiry, "deprived the town of Laon of every right ofcommune and college, under whatsoever name. " The king did not like toexecute this decree in all its rigor. He granted the burghers of Laon acharter which maintained them provisionally in the enjoyment of theirpolitical rights, but with this destructive clause: "Said commune andsaid shrievalty shall be in force only so far as it shall be ourpleasure. " For nearly thirty years, from Philip the Handsome to Philipof Valois, the bishops and burghers of Laon were in litigation before thecrown of France, the former for the maintenance of the commune of Laon inits precarious condition and at the king's good pleasure, the latter forthe recovery of its independent and durable character. At last, in 1331, Philip of Valois, "considering that the olden commune of Laon, by reasonof certain misdeeds and excesses, notorious, enormous, and detestable, had been removed and put down forever by decree of the court of our mostclear lord and uncle, King Philip the Handsome, confirmed and approved byour most dear lords, Kings Philip and Charles, whose souls are with God, we, on great deliberation of our council, have ordained that no commune, corporation, college, shrievalty, mayor, jurymen, or any other estate orsymbol belonging thereto, be at any time set up or established at Laon. "By the same ordinance the municipal administration of Laon was put underthe sole authority of the king and his delegates; and to blot out allremembrance of the olden independence of the commune, a later ordinanceforbade that the tower from which the two huge communal bells had beenremoved should thenceforth be called belfry-tower. 

[Illustration: The Cathedral of Laon----233]

The history of the commune of Laon is that of the majority of the townswhich, in Northern and Central France, struggled from the eleventh to thefourteenth century to release themselves from feudal oppression andviolence. Cambrai, Beauvais, Amiens, Soissons, Rheims, Vezelay, andseveral other towns displayed at this period a great deal of energy andperseverance in bringing their lords to recognize the most natural andthe most necessary rights of every human creature and community. Butwithin their walls dissensions were carried to extremity, and existencewas ceaselessly tempestuous and troublous; the burghers were hasty, brutal, and barbaric, --as barbaric as the lords against whom they weredefending their liberties. Amongst those mayors, sheriffs, jurats, andmagistrates of different degrees and with different titles, set up in thecommunes, many came before very long to exercise dominion arbitrarily, violently, and in their own personal interests. The lower orders were inan habitual state of jealousy and sedition of a ruffianly kind towardsthe rich, the heads of the labor market, the controllers of capital andof work. This reciprocal violence, this anarchy, these internal evilsand dangers, with their incessant renewals, called incessantly forintervention from without; and when, after releasing themselves fromoppression and iniquity coming from above, the burghers fell a prey topillage and massacre coming from below, they sought for a fresh protectorto save them from this fresh evil. Hence that frequent recourse to theking, the great suzerain whose authority could keep down the badmagistrates of the commune or reduce the mob to order; and hence also, before long, the progressive downfall, or, at any rate, the utterenfeeblement of those communal liberties so painfully won. France was atthat stage of existence and of civilization at which security can hardlybe purchased save at the price of liberty. We have a phenomenon peculiarto modern times in the provident and persistent effort to reconcilesecurity with liberty, and the bold development of individual powers withthe regular maintenance of public order. This admirable solution of thesocial problem, still so imperfect and unstable in our time, was unknownin the middle ages; liberty was then so stormy and so fearful, thatpeople conceived before long, if not a disgust for it, at any rate ahorror of it, and sought at any price a political regimen which wouldgive them some security, the essential aim of the social estate. When wearrive at the end of the thirteenth and the beginning of the fourteenthcentury, we see a host of communes falling into decay or entirelydisappearing; they cease really to belong to and govern themselves; some, like Laon, Cambrai, Beauvais, and Rheims, fought a long while againstdecline, and tried more than once to re-establish themselves in all theirindependence; but they could not do without the king's support in theirresistance to their lords, laic or ecclesiastical; and they were not in acondition to resist the kingship, which had grown whilst they wereperishing. Others, Meulan and Soissons, for example (in 1320 and 1335), perceived their weakness early, and themselves requested the kingship todeliver them from their communal organization, and itself assume theiradministration. And so it is about this period, under St. Louis andPhilip the Handsome, that there appear in the collections of acts of theFrench kingship, those great ordinances which regulate the administrationof all communes within the kingly domains. Hitherto the kings hadordinarily dealt with each town severally; and as the majority werealmost independent, or invested with privileges of different kiwis andcarefully respected, neither the king nor any great suzerain dreamed ofprescribing general rules for communal regimen, nor of administeringafter a uniform fashion all the communes in their domains. It was underSt. Louis and Philip the Handsome that general regulations on thissubject began. The French communes were associations too small and tooweak to suffice for self-maintenance and self-government amidst thedisturbances of the great Christian community; and they were too numerousand too little enlightened to organize themselves into one vastconfederation, capable of giving them a central government. The communalliberties were not in a condition to found in France a great republicancommunity; to the kingship appertained the power and fell the honor ofpresiding over the formation and the fortunes of the French nation. 

But the kingship did not alone accomplish this great work. At the verytime that the communes were perishing and the kingship was growing, a newpower, a new social element, the Third Estate, was springing up inFrance; and it was called to take a far more important place in thehistory of France, and to exercise far more influence upon the fate ofthe French father-land, than it had been granted to the communes toacquire during their short and incoherent existence. 

It may astonish many who study the records of French history from theeleventh to the fourteenth century, not to find anywhere the words thirdestate; and a desire may arise to know whether those inquirers of our daywho have devoted themselves professedly to this particular study, havebeen more successful in discovering that grand term at the time when itseems that we ought to expect to meet with it. The question was, therefore, submitted to a learned member of the _Academie desInscriptions et Belles-lettres, _ M. Littre, in fact, whose _Dictionnaireetymologique de la Langur Francaise_ is consulted with respect by thewhole literary world, and to a young magistrate, M. Picot, to whom the_Acacdemie des Sciences morales et politiques_ but lately assigned thefirst prize for his great work on the question it had propounded, as tothe history and influence of states-general in France; and here areinserted, textually, the answers given by two gentlemen of so muchenlightenment and authority upon such a subject. 

M. Littre, writing on the 3d of October, 1871, says, "I do not find, inmy account of the word, third estate before the sixteenth century. Iquote these two instances of it: 'As to the third order called thirdestate . . . ' (_La Noue, Discours, _ p. 541); and 'clerks and deputiesfor the third estate, same for the estate of labor (laborers). '(_Coustumier general, _ t. I. P. 335. ) In the fifteenth century, or atthe end of the fourteenth, in the poems of Eustace Deschamps, I have--

 '_Prince, dost thou yearn for good old times again? In good old ways the Three Estates restrain. _'

"At date of fourteenth century, in Du Cange, we read under the wordstatus, '_Per tres status concilii generalis Praelatorum, Baronum, nobilium et universitatum comitatum. _' According to these documents, Ithink it is in the fourteenth century that they began to call the threeorders _tres status_, and that it was only in the sixteenth century thatthey began to speak in French of the _tiers estat_ (third estate). But Icannot give this conclusion as final, seeing that it is supported only bythe documents I consulted for my dictionary. "

M. Picot replied on the 3d of October, 1871, "It is certain that actscontemporary with King John frequently speak of the 'three estates, ' butdo not utter the word _tiers-etat_ (third estate). The great chroniclesand Froissart say nearly always, 'the church-men, the nobles, and thegood towns. ' The royal ordinances employ the same terms; but sometimes, in order not to limit their enumeration to the deputies of closed cities, they add, _the good towns, and the open country_ (Ord. T. Iii p. 221, note). When they apply to the provincial estates of the _Oil_ tongue itis the custom to say, the burghers and inhabitants; when it is a questionof the Estates of Languedoc, the commonalties of the seneschalty. Suchwere, in the middle of the fourteenth century, the only expressions fordesignating the third order. 

"Under Louis XI. , Juvenal des Ursins, in his harangue, addresses thedeputies of the third by the title of _burghers and inhabitants of thegood towns_. At the States of Tours, the spokesman of the estates, Johnde Rely, says, _the people of the common estate, the estate of thepeople_. The special memorial presented to Charles VIII. By the threeorders of Languedoc likewise uses the word _people_. 

"It is in Masselin's report and the memorial of grievances presented in1485 that I meet for the first time with the expression third estate(_tiers-etat_). Masselin says, 'It was decided that each section shouldfurnish six commissioners, two ecclesiastics, two nobles, and two of thethird estate (_duos ecclesiasticos, duos nobiles, et duos tertiistatus. _)' (_Documents inedits sur l'Histoire de France; proces-verbal deMasselin, _ p. 76. ) The commencement of the chapter headed _Of the Commons(du commun)_ is, 'For the third and common estate the said folks dorepresent . . . ' and a few lines lower, comparing the kingdom with thehuman body, the compilers of the memorial say, 'The members are theclergy, the nobles, and the folks of the third estate. (_Ibid. Afterthe report of Masselin, memorial of grievances, _ p. 669. )

"Thus, at the end of the fifteenth century, the expression third estatewas constantly employed; but is it not of older date? There are wordswhich spring so from the nature of things that they ought to becontemporaneous with the ideas they express; their appearance in languageis inevitable, and is scarcely noticed there. On the day when thedeputies of the communes entered an assembly, and seated themselvesbeside the first two orders, the new comer, by virtue of the situationand rank occupied, took the name of third order; and as our fathers usedto speak of the third denier (_tiers denier_), and the third day (_tiercejournee_), so they must have spoken of the (_tiers-etat_) third estate. It was only at the end of the fifteenth century that the expressionbecame common; but I am inclined to believe that it existed in thebeginning of the fourteenth. 

"For an instant I had imagined, in the course of my researches, that, under King John, the ordinances had designated the good towns by the nameof third estate. I very soon saw my mistake; but you will see how near Ifound myself to the expression of which we are seeking the origin. Fourtimes, in the great ordinance of December, 1335, the deputies wrest fromthe king a promise that in the next assemblies the resolutions shall betaken according to the unanimity of the orders 'without two estates, ifthey be of one accord, being able to bind the _third. _' At first sight itmight be supposed that the deputies of the towns had an understanding tosecure themselves from the dangers of common action on the part of theclergy and noblesse, but a more attentive examination made me fly back toa more correct opinion: it is certain that the three orders had combinedfor mutual protection against an alliance of any two of them. Besides, the States of 1576 saw how the clergy readopted to their profit, againstthe two laic orders, the proposition voted in 1355. It is beyond a doubtthat this doctrine served to keep the majority from oppressing theminority whatever may have been its name. Only, in point of fact, it wasmost frequently the third estate that must have profited by theregulation. 

"In brief, we may, before the fifteenth century, make suppositions, butthey are no more than mere conjectures. It was at the great States ofTours, in 1468, that, for the first time, the third order bore the namewhich has been given to it by history. "

The fact was far before its name. Had the third estate been centredentirely in the communes at strife with their lords, had the fate ofburgherdom in France depended on the communal liberties won in thatstrife, we should see, at the end of the thirteenth century, that elementof French society in a state of feebleness and decay. But it was farotherwise. The third estate drew its origin and nourishment from allsorts of sources; and whilst one was within an ace of drying up, theothers remained abundant and fruitful. Independently of the communeproperly so called and invested with the right of self-government, manytowns had privileges, serviceable though limited franchises, and underthe administration of the king's officers they grew in population andwealth. These towns did not share, towards the end of the thirteenthcentury, in the decay of the once warlike and victorious communes. Localpolitical liberty was to seek in them; the spirit of independence andresistance did not prevail in them; but we see growing up in them anotherspirit which has played a grand part in French history, a spirit oflittle or no ambition, of little or no enterprise, timid even andscarcely dreaming of actual resistance, but honorable, inclined to order, persevering, attached to its traditional franchises, and quite able tomake them respected, sooner or later. It was especially in the townsadministered in the king's name and by his provosts that there was adevelopment of this spirit, which has long been the predominantcharacteristic of French burgherdom. It must not be supposed that, inthe absence of real communal independence, these towns lacked allinternal security. The kingship was ever fearful lest its local officersshould render themselves independent, and remembered what had become inthe ninth century of the crown's offices, the duchies and the countships, and of the difficulty it had at that time to recover the scatteredremnants of the old imperial authority. And so the Capetian kings withany intelligence, such as Louis VI. , Philip Augustus, St. Louis, andPhilip the Handsome, were careful to keep a hand over their provosts, sergeants, and officers of all kinds, in order that their power shouldnot grow so great as to become formidable. At this time, besides, Parliament and the whole judicial system was beginning to take form; andmany questions relating to the administration of the towns, many disputesbetween the provosts and burghers, were carried before the Parliament ofParis, and there decided with more independence and equity than theywould have been by any other power. A certain measure of impartiality isinherent in judicial power; the habit of delivering judgment according towritten texts, of applying laws to facts, produces a natural and almostinstinctive respect for old-acquired rights. In Parliament the townsoften obtained justice and the maintenance of their franchises againstthe officers of the king. The collection of kingly ordinances at thistime abounds with instances of the kind. These judges, besides, thesebailiffs, these provosts, these seneschals, and all these officers of theking or of the great suzerains, formed before long a numerous andpowerful class. Now the majority amongst them were burghers, and theirnumber and their power were turned to the advantage of burgherdom, andled day by day to its further extension and importance. Of all theoriginal sources of the third estate, this it is, perhaps, which hascontributed most to bring about the social preponderance of that order. Just when burgherdom, but lately formed, was losing in many of thecommunes a portion of its local liberties, at that same moment it wasseizing by the hand of Parliaments, provosts, judges, and administratorsof all kinds, a large share of central power. It was through burghersadmitted into the king's service and acting as administrators or judgesin his name that communal independence and charters were often attackedand abolished; but at the same time they fortified and elevatedburgherdom, they caused it to acquire from day to day more wealth, morecredit, more importance and power in the internal and external affairs ofthe state. 

Philip the Handsome, that ambitious and despotic prince, was under nodelusion when in 1302, 1308, and 1314, on convoking the first states-general of France, he summoned thither "the deputies of the good towns. "He did not yet give them the name of third estate; but he was perfectlyaware that he was thus summoning to his aid against Boniface VIII. Andthe Templars and the Flemings a class already invested throughout thecountry with great influence and ready to lend him efficient support. His son, Philip the Long, was under no delusion when in 1317 and 1321 hesummoned to the states-general "the commonalties and good towns of thekingdom "to decide upon the interpretation of the Salle law as to thesuccession to the throne, "or to advise as to the means of establishing auniformity of coins, weights, and measures;" he was perfectly aware thatthe authority of burgherdom would be of great assistance to him in theaccomplishment of acts so grave. And the three estates played theprelude to the formation, painful and slow as it was, of constitutionalmonarchy, when, in 1338, under Philip of Valois, they declared, "inpresence of the said king, Philip of Valois, who assented thereto, thatthere should be no power to impose or levy talliage in France if urgentnecessity or evident utility did not require it, and then only by grantof the people of the estates. "

In order to properly understand the French third estate and itsimportance, more is required than to look on at its birth; a glance mustbe taken at its grand destiny and the results at which it at lastarrived. Let us, therefore, anticipate centuries and get a glimpse, nowat once, of that upon which the course of events from the fourteenth tothe nineteenth century will shed full light. 

Taking the history of France in its entirety and under all its phases, the third estate has been the most active and determining element in theprocess of Freneh civilization. If we follow it in its relation with thegeneral government of the country, we see it at first allied for sixcenturies to the kingship, struggling without cessation against thefeudal aristocracy and giving predominance in place thereof to a singlecentral power, pure monarchy, closely bordering, though with somefrequently repeated but rather useless reservations, on absolutemonarchy. But, so soon as it had gained this victory and brought aboutthis revolution, the third estate went in pursuit of a new one, attackingthat single power to the foundation of which it had contributed so muchand entering upon the task of changing pure monarchy into constitutionalmonarchy. Under whatever aspect we regard it during these two greatenterprises, so different one from the other, whether we study theprogressive formation of French society or that of its government, thethird estate is the most powerful and the most persistent of the forceswhich have influenced French civilization. 

This fact is unique in the history of the world. We recognize in thecareer of the chief nations of Asia and ancient Europe nearly all thegreat facts which have agitated France; we meet in them mixture ofdifferent races, conquest of people by people, immense inequality betweenclasses, frequent changes in the forms of government and extent of publicpower; but nowhere is there any appearance of a class which, startingfrom the very lowest, from being feeble, despised, and almostimperceptible at its origin, rises by perpetual motion and by laborwithout respite, strengthens itself from period to period, acquires insuccession whatever it lacked, wealth, enlightenment, influence, changesthe face of society and the nature of government, and arrives at last atsuch a pitch of predominance that it may be said to be absolutely thecountry. More than once in the world's history the external semblancesof such and such a society have been the same as those which have justbeen reviewed here, but it is mere semblance. In India, for example, foreign invasions and the influx and establishment of different racesupon the same soil have occurred over and over again; but with whatresult? The permanence of caste has not been touched; and society haskept its divisions into distinct and almost changeless classes. AfterIndia take China. There too history exhibits conquests similar to theconquest of Europe by the Germans; and there too, more than once, thebarbaric conquerors settled amidst a population of the conquered. Whatwas the result? The conquered all but absorbed the conquerors, andchangelessness was still the predominant characteristic of the socialcondition. In Western Asia, after the invasions of the Turks, theseparation between victors and vanquished remained insurmountable; noferment in the heart of society, no historical event, could efface thisfirst effect of conquest. In Persia, similar events succeeded oneanother; different races fought and intermingled; and the end wasirremediable social anarchy, which has endured for ages without anychange in the social condition of the country, without a shadow of anydevelopment of civilization. 

So much for Asia. Let us pass to the Europe of the Greeks and Romans. At the first blush we seem to recognize some analogy between the progressof these brilliant societies and that of French society; but the analogyis only apparent; there is, once more, nothing resembling the fact andthe history of the French third estate. One thing only has struck soundjudgments as being somewhat like the struggle of burgherdom in the middleages against the feudal aristocracy, and that is the struggle between theplebeians and patricians at Rome. They have often been compared; but itis a baseless comparison. The struggle between the plebeians andpatricians commenced from the very cradle of the Roman republic; it wasnot, as happened in the France of the middle ages, the result of a slow, difficult, incomplete development on the part of a class which, through along course of great inferiority in strength, wealth, and credit, littleby little extended itself and raised itself, and ended by engaging in areal contest with the superior class. It is now acknowledged that thestruggle at Rome between the plebeians and patricians was a sequel and aprolongation of the war of conquest, was an effort on the part of thearistocracy of the cities conquered by Rome to share the rights of theconquering aristocracy. The families of plebeians were the chieffamilies of the vanquished peoples; and though placed by defeat in aposition of inferiority, they were not any the less aristocraticfamilies, powerful but lately in their own cities, encompassed byclients, and calculated from the very first to dispute with theirconquerors the possession of power. There is nothing in all this likethat slow, obscure, heart-breaking travail of modern burgherdom escaping, full hardly, from the midst of slavery or a condition approximating toslavery, and spending centuries, not in disputing political power, but inwinning its own civil existence. The more closely the French thirdestate is examined, the more it is recognized as a new fact in theworld's history, appertaining exclusively to the civilization of modern, Christian Europe. 

Not only is the fact new, but it has for France an entirely specialinterest, since--to employ an expression much abused in the present day--it is a fact eminently French, essentially national. Nowhere hasburgherdom had so wide and so productive a career as that which fell toits lot in France. There have been communes in the whole of Europe, inItaly, Spain, Germany, and England, as well as in France. Not only havethere been communes everywhere, but the communes of France are not thosewhich, as communes, under that name and in the middle ages, have playedthe chiefest part and taken the highest place in history. The Italiancommunes were the parents of glorious republics. The German communesbecame free and sovereign towns, which had their own special history, andexercised a great deal of influence upon the general history of Germany. The communes of England made alliance with a portion of the Englishfeudal aristocracy, formed with it the preponderating house in theBritish government, and thus played, full early, a mighty part in thehistory of their country. Far were the French communes, under that nameand in their day of special activity, from rising to such politicalimportance and to such historical rank. And yet it is in France that thepeople of the communes, the burgherdom, reached the most complete andmost powerful development, and ended by acquiring the most decidedpreponderance in the general social structure. There have been communes, we say, throughout Europe; but there has not really been a victoriousthird estate anywhere, save in France. The revolution of 1789, thegreatest ever seen, was the culminating point arrived at by the thirdestate; and France is the only country in which a man of large mindcould, in a burst of burgher's pride, exclaim, "What is the third estate?Everything. "

Since the explosion, and after all the changes, liberal and illiberal, due to the revolution of 1789, there has been a common-place, ceaselesslyrepeated, to the effect that there are no more classes in French society--there is only a nation of thirty-seven millions of persons. If it bemeant that there are now no more privileges in France, no special lawsand private rights for such and such families, proprietorships, andoccupations, and that legislation is the same, and there is perfectfreedom of movement for all, at all steps of the social ladder, it istrue; oneness of laws and similarity of rights, is now the essential andcharacteristic fact of civil society in France, an immense, an excellent, and a novel fact in the history of human associations. But beneath thedominance of this fact, in the midst of this national unity and thiscivil equality, there evidently and necessarily exist numerous andimportant diversities and inequalities, which oneness of laws andsimilarity of rights neither prevent nor destroy. In point of property, real or personal, land or capital, there are rich and poor; there are thelarge, the middling, and the small property. Though the greatproprietors may be less numerous and less rich, and the middling and thesmall proprietors more numerous and more powerful than they were of yore, this does not prevent the difference from being real and great enough tocreate, in the civil body, social positions widely different and unequal. In the professions which are called liberal, and which live by brains andknowledge, amongst barristers, doctors, scholars, and literates of allkinds, some rise to the first rank, attract to themselves practice andsuccess, and win fame, wealth, and influence; others make enough, by hardwork, for the necessities of their families and the calls of theirposition; others vegetate obscurely in a sort of lazy discomfort. In theother vocations, those in which the labor is principally physical andmanual, there also it is according to nature that there should bedifferent and unequal positions; some, by brains and good conduct, makecapital, and get a footing upon the ways of competence and progress;others, being dull, or idle, or disorderly, remain in the straitened andprecarious condition of existence depending solely on wages. Throughoutthe whole extent of the social structure, in the ranks of labor as wellas of property, differences and inequalities of position are produced orkept up and co-exist with oneness of laws and similarity of rights. Examine any human associations, in any place and at any time, andwhatever diversity there may be in point of their origin, organization, government, extent, and duration, there will be found in all three typesof social position always fundamentally the same, though they may appearunder different and differently distributed forms; 1st, men living onincome from their properties, real or personal, land or capital, withoutseeking to increase them by their own personal and assiduous labor; 2d, men devoted to working up and increasing, by their own personal andassiduous labor, the real or personal properties, land or capital theypossess; 3d, men living by their daily labor, without land or capital togive them an income. And these differences, these inequalities in thesocial position of men, are not matters of accident or violence, orpeculiar to such and such a time, or such and such a country; they arematters of universal application, produced spontaneously in every humansociety by virtue of the primitive and general laws of human nature, inthe midst of events and under the influence of social systems utterlydifferent. 

These matters exist now and in France as they did of old and elsewhere. Whether you do or do not use the name of classes, the new French socialfabric contains, and will not cease to contain, social positions widelydifferent and unequal. What constitutes its blessing and its glory is, that privilege and fixity no longer cling to this difference ofpositions; that there are no more special rights and advantages legallyassigned to some and inacessible to others; that all roads are free andopen to all to rise to everything; that personal merit and toil have aninfinitely greater share than was ever formerly allowed to them in thefortunes of men. The third estate of the old regimen exists no more; itdisappeared in its victory over privilege and absolute power; it has forheirs the middle classes, as they are now called; but these classes, whilst inheriting the conquests of the old third estate, hold them on newconditions also, as legitimate as binding. To secure their owninterests, as well as to discharge their public duty, they are bound tobe at once conservative and liberal; they must, on the one hand, enlistand rally beneath their flag the old, once privileged superioritics, which have survived the fall of the old regimen, and, on the other hand, fully recognize the continual upward movement which is fermenting in thewhole body of the nation. That, in its relations with the aristocraticclasses, the third estate of the old regimen should have been and for along time remained uneasy, disposed to take umbrage, jealous and evenenvious, is no more than natural; it had its rights to urge and itsconquests to gain; nowadays its conquests have been won, the rights arerecognized, proclaimed, and exercised; the middle classes have no longerany legitimate ground for uneasiness or envy; they can rest with fullconfidence in their own dignity and their own strength; they haveundergone all the necessary trials, and passed all the necessary tests. In respect of the lower orders, and the democracy properly so called, theposition of the middle classes is no less favorable; they have no fixedline of separation; for who can say where the middle classes begin andwhere they end? In the name of the principles of common rights andgeneral liberty they were formed; and by the working of the sameprinciples they are being constantly recruited, and are incessantlydrawing new vigor from the sources whence they sprang. To maintaincommon rights and free movement upwards against the retrograde tendenciesof privilege and absolute power, on the one hand, and on the otheragainst the insensate and destructive pretensions of levellers andanarchists, is now the double business of the middle classes; and it isat the same time, for themselves, the sure way of preservingpreponderance in the state, in the name of general interests, of whichthose classes are the most real and most efficient representatives. 

On reaching, in our history, the period at which Philip the Handsome, bygiving admission amongst the states-general to the "burghers of the goodtowns, " substituted the third estate for the communes, and the unitedaction of the three great classes of Frenchmen for their local struggles, we did well to halt a while, in order clearly to mark the position andpart of the new actor in the great drama of national life. We will nowreturn to the real business of the drama, that is, to the history ofFrance, which became, in the fourteenth century, more complex, moretragic, and more grand than it had ever yet been. 

CHAPTER XX. ----THE HUNDRED YEARS' WAR. --PHILIP VI. AND JOHN II. 

We have just been spectators at the labor of formation of the Frenchkingship and the French nation. We have seen monarchical unity andnational unity rising, little by little, out of and above the feudalsystem, which had been the first result of barbarians settling upon theruins of the Roman empire. In the fourteenth century, a new and a vitalquestion arose: Will the French dominion preserve its nationality? Willthe kingship remain French, or pass to the foreigner? This questionbrought ravages upon France, and kept her fortunes in suspense for ahundred years of war with England, from the reign of Philip of Valois tothat of Charles VII. ; and a young girl of Lorraine, called Joan of Arc, had the glory of communicating to France that decisive impulse whichbrought to a triumphant issue the independence of the French nation andkingship. 

As we have seen in the preceding chapter, the elevation of Philip ofValois to the throne, as representative of the male line amongst thedescendants of Hugh Capet, took place by virtue, not of any old writtenlaw, but of a traditional right, recognized and confirmed by two recentresolutions taken at the death of the two eldest sons of Philip theHandsome. The right thus promulgated became at once a fact accepted bythe whole of France; Philip of Valois had for rival none but a foreignprince, and "there was no mind in France, " say contemporary chroniclers, "to be subjects of the King of England. " Some weeks after his accession, on the 29th of May, 1328, Philip was crowned at Rheims, in presence of abrilliant assemblage of princes and lords, French and foreign; and nextyear, on the 6th of June, Edward III. , King of England, being summoned tofulfil a vassal's duties by doing homage to the King of France for theduchy of Aquitaine, which he held, appeared in the cathedral of Amiens, with his crown on his head, his sword at his side, and his gilded spurson his heels. When he drew near to the throne, the Viscount de Melun, king's chamberlain, invited him to lay aside his crown, his sword, andhis spurs, and go down on his knees before Philip. Not without a murmur, Edward obeyed; but when the chamberlain said to him, "Sir, you, as Dukeof Aquitaine, became liegeman of my lord the king who is here, and dopromise to keep towards him faith and loyalty, " Edward protested, sayingthat he owed only simple homage, and not liege-homage--a closer bond, imposing on the vassal more stringent obligations [to serve and defendhis suzerain against every enemy whatsoever]. "Cousin, " said Philip tohim, "we would not deceive you, and what you have now done contenteth uswell until you have returned to your own country, and seen from the actsof your predecessors what you ought to do. "

[Illustration: Homage of Edward III. To Philip VI. ----250]

"Gramercy, dear sir, " answered the King of England; and with thereservation he had just made, and which was added to the formula ofhomage, he placed his hands between the hands of the King of France, whokissed him on the mouth, and accepted his homage, confiding in Edward'spromise to certify himself by reference to the archives of England of theextent to which his ancestors had been bound. The certification tookplace, and on the 30th of March, 1331, about two years after his visit toAmiens, Edward III. Recognized, by letters express, "that the said homagewhich we did at Amiens to the King of France in general terms, is andmust be understood as liege; and that we are bound, as Duke of Aquitaineand peer of France, to show him faith and loyalty. "

The relations between the two kings were not destined to be for longso courteous and so pacific. Even before the question of the successionto the throne of France arose between them they had adopted contrarypolicies. When Philip was crowned at Rheims, Louis de Nevers, Count ofFlanders, repaired thither with a following of eighty-six knights, and heit was to whom the right belonged of carrying the sword of the kingdom. The heralds-at-arms repeated three times, "Count of Flanders, if you arehere, come and do your duty. " He made no answer. The king wasastounded, and bade him explain himself. "My lord, " answered the count, "may it please you not to be astounded; they called the Count ofFlanders, and not Louis de Nevers. " "What then!" replied the king; "areyou not the Count of Flanders?" "It is true, sir, " rejoined the other, "that I bear the name, but I do not possess the authority; the burghersof Bruges, Ypres, and Cassel have driven me from my land, and therescarce remains but the town of Ghent where I dare show myself. " "Faircousin, " said Philip, we will swear to you by the holy oil which haththis day trickled over our brow that we will not enter Paris again beforeseeing you reinstated in peaceable possession of the countship ofFlanders. " Some of the French barons who happened to be presentrepresented to the king that the Flemish burghers were powerful; thatautumn was a bad season for a war in their country; and that Louis theQuarreller, in 1315, had been obliged to come to a stand-still in asimilar expedition. Philip consulted his constable, Walter de Chatillon, who had served the kings his predecessors in their wars against Flanders. "Whoso hath good stomach for fight, " answered the constable, "findeth alltimes seasonable. " "Well, then, " said the king, embracing him, "whosoloveth me will follow me. " The war thus resolved upon was forthwithbegun. Philip, on arriving with his army before Cassel, found the placedefended by sixteen thousand Flemings under the command of NicholasZannequin, the richest of the burghers of Furnes, and already renownedfor his zeal in the insurrection against the count. For several days theFrench remained inactive around the mountain on which Cassel is built, and which the knights, mounted on iron-clad horses, were unable to scale. The Flemings had planted on a tower of Cassel a flag carrying a cock, with this inscription:--

 "When the cock that is hereon shall crow, The foundling king herein shall go. "

They called Philip the foundling king because he had no business toexpect to be king. Philip in his wrath gave up to fire and pillage theoutskirts of the place. The Flemings marshalled at the top of themountain made no movement. On the 24th of August, 1328, about three inthe afternoon, the French knights had disarmed. Some were playing atchess; others "strolled from tent to tent in their fine robes, in searchof amusement; "and the king was asleep in his tent after a long carouse, when all on a sudden his confessor, a Dominican friar, shouted out thatthe Flemings were attacking the camp. Zannequin, indeed, "came out fullsoftly and without a bit of noise, " says Froissart, with his troops inthree divisions, to surprise the French camp at three points. He wasquite close to the king's tent, and some chroniclers say that he wasalready lifting his mace over the head of Philip, who had armed in hothaste, and was defended only by a few knights, of whom one was waving theoriflamme round him, when others hurried up, and Zannequiii was forced tostay his hand. At two other points of the camp the attack had failed. The French gathered about the king and the Flemings about Zannequin; andthere took place so stubborn a fight, that "of sixteen thousand Flemingswho were there not one recoiled, " says Froissart, "and all were leftthere dead and slain in three heaps one upon another, without budgingfrom the spot where the battle had begun. " The same evening Philipentered Cassel, which he set on fire, and, in a few days afterwards, onleaving for France, he said to Count Louis, before the French barons, Count, I have worked for you at my own and my barons' expense; I give youback your land, recovered and in peace; so take care that justice be keptup in it, and that I have not, through your fault, to return; for if Ido, it will be to my own profit and to your hurt. "

The Count of Flanders was far from following the advice of the King ofFrance, and the King of France was far from foreseeing whither he wouldbe led by the road upon which he had just set foot. It has already beenpointed out to what a position of wealth, population, and power, industrial and commercial activity had in the thirteenth century raisedthe towns of Flanders, Bruges, Ghent, Lille, Ypres, Fumes, Courtrai, andDouai, and with what energy they had defended against their lords theirprosperity and their liberties. It was the struggle, sometimes sullen, sometimes violent, of feudal lordship against municipal burgherdom. Theable and imperious Philip the Handsome had tested the strength of theFlemish cities, and had not cared to push them to extremity. When, in1322, Count Louis de Nevers, scarcely eighteen years of age, inheritedfrom his grandfather Robert III. The countship of Flanders, he gavehimself up, in respect of the majority of towns in the countship, to thesame course of oppression and injustice as had been familiar to hispredecessors; the burghers resisted him with the same, often ruffianly, energy; and when, after a six years' struggle amongst Flemings, the Countof Flanders, who had been conquered by the burghers, owed his return asmaster of his countship to the King of the French, he troubled himselfabout nothing but avenging himself and enjoying his victory at theexpense of the vanquished. He chastised, despoiled, proscribed, andinflicted atrocious punishments; and, not content with striking atindividuals, he attacked the cities themselves. Nearly all of them, save Ghent, which had been favorable to the count, saw their privilegesannulled or curtailed of their most essential guarantees. The burghersof Bruges were obliged to meet the count half way to his castle of Vale, and on their knees implore his pity. At Ypres the bell in the tower wasbroken up. Philip of Valois made himself a partner in these severities;he ordered the fortifications of Bruges, Ypres, and Courtrai to bedestroyed, and he charged French agents to see to their demolition. Absolute power is often led into mistakes by its insolence; but when itis in the hands of rash and reckless mediocrity, there is no knowing howclumsy and blind it can be. Neither the King of France nor the Count ofFlanders seemed to remember that the Flemish communes had at their door anatural and powerful ally who could not do without them any more thanthey could do without him. Woollen stuffs, cloths, carpets, warmcoverings of every sort were the chief articles of the manufactures andcommerce of Flanders; there chiefly was to be found all that the activeand enterprising merchants of the time exported to Sweden, Norway, Hungary, Russia, and even Asia; and it was from England that they chieflyimported their wool, the primary staple of their handiwork. "AllFlanders, " says Froissart, "was based upon cloth and no wool, no cloth. "On the other hand it was to Flanders that England, her land-owners andfarmers, sold the fleeces of their flocks; and the two countries werethus united by the bond of their mutual prosperity. The Count ofFlanders forgot or defied this fact so far as in 1336, at theinstigation, it is said, of the King of France, to have all the Englishin Flanders arrested and kept in prison. Reprisals were not longdeferred. On the 5th of October in the same year the King of Englandordered the arrest of all Flemish merchants in his kingdom and theseizure of their goods; and he at the same time prohibited theexportation of wool. "Flanders was given over, " says her principalhistorian, "to desolation; nearly all her looms ceased rattling on oneand the same day, and the streets of her cities, but lately filled withrich and busy workmen, were overrun with beggars who asked in vain forwork to escape from misery and hunger. " The English land-owners andfarmers did not suffer so much, but were scarcely less angered; only itwas to the King of France and the Count of Flanders rather than their ownking that they held themselves indebted for the stagnation of theiraffairs, and their discontent sought vent only in execration of theforeigner. 

When great national interests are to such a point misconceived andinjured, there crop up, before long, clear-sighted and bold men whoundertake the championship of them, and foment the quarrel toexplosion-heat, either from personal views or patriotic feeling. The question of succession to the throne of France seemed settled by theinaction of the King of England, and the formal homage he had come andpaid to the King of France at Amiens; but it was merely in abeyance. Many people both in England and in France still thought of it and spokeof it; and many intrigues bred of hope or fear were kept up withreference to it at the courts of the two kings. When the rumblings ofanger were loud on both sides in consequence of affairs in Flanders, twomen of note, a Frenchman and a Fleming, considering that the hour hadcome, determined to revive the question, and turn the great strugglewhich could not fail to be excited thereby to the profit of their own andtheir countries' cause, for it is singular how ambition and devotion, selfishness and patriotism, combine and mingle in the human soul, andeven in great souls. 

Philip VI. Had embroiled himself with a prince of his line, Robert ofArtois, great-grandson of Robert the first Count of Artois, who was abrother of St. Louis, and was killed during the crusade in Egypt, at thebattle of Mansourah. As early as the reign of Philip the Handsome Robertclaimed the count-ship of Artois as his heritage; but having had hispretensions rejected by a decision of the peers of the kingdom, he hadhoped for more success under Philip of Valois, whose sister he hadmarried. Philip tried to satisfy him with another domain raised to apeerage; but Robert, more and more discontented, got involved in a seriesof intrigues, plots, falsehoods, forgeries, and even, according to publicreport, imprisonments and crimes, which, in 1332, led to his beingcondemned by the court of peers to banishment and the confiscation ofhis property. He fled for refuge first to Brabant, and then to England, to the court of Edward III. , who received him graciously, and whom heforthwith commenced inciting to claim the crown of France, "hisinheritance, " as he said, "which King Philip holds most wrongfully. "Edward III. , who was naturally prudent, and had been involved, almostever since his accession, in a stubborn war with Scotland, cared butlittle for rushing into a fresh and far more serious enterprise. But ofall human passions hatred is perhaps the most determined in theprosecution of its designs. Robert accompanied the King of England inhis campaigns northward; and "Sir, " said he, whilst they were marchingtogether over the heaths of Scotland, "leave this poor country, and giveyour thoughts to the noble crown of France. " When Edward, on returningto London, was self-complacently rejoicing at his successes over hisneighbors, Robert took pains to pique his self-respect, by expressingastonishment that he did not seek more practical and more brilliantsuccesses. Poetry sometimes reveals sentiments and processes about whichhistory is silent. We read in a poem of the fourteenth century, entitledThe vow on the heron, "In the season when summer is verging upon itsdecline, and the gay birds are forgetting their sweet converse on thetrees, now despoiled of their verdure, Robert seeks for consolation inthe pleasures of fowling, for he cannot forget the gentle land of France, the glorious country whence he is an exile. He carries a falcon, whichgoes flying over the waters till a heron falls its prey; then he callstwo young damsels to take the bird to the king's palace, singing thewhile in sweet discourse: 'Fly, fly, ye honorless knights; give place togallants on whom love smiles; here is the dish for gallants who arefaithful to their mistresses. The heron is the most timid of birds, forit fears its own shadow; it is for the heron to receive the vows of KingEdward, who, though lawful King of France, dares not claim that nobleheritage. ' At these words the king flushed, his heart was wroth, and hecried aloud, 'Since coward is thrown in my teeth, I make vow [on thisheron] to the God of Paradise that ere a single year rolls by I will defythe King of Paris. ' Count Robert hears and smiles; and low to his ownheart he says, 'Now have I won: and my heron will cause a great war. '"

Robert's confidence in this tempter's work of his was well founded, but alittle premature. Edward III. Did not repel him; complained loudly ofthe assistance rendered by the King of France to the Scots; gave anabsolute refusal to Philip's demands for the extradition of the rebelRobert, and retorted by protesting, in his turn, against the receptionaccorded in France to David Bruce, the rival of his own favorite Baliolfor the throne of Scotland. In Aquitaine he claimed as of his own domainsome places still occupied by Philip. Philip, on his side, neglected nochance of causing Edward embarrassment, and more or less overtlyassisting his foes. The two kings were profoundly distrustful one of theother, foresaw, both of them, that they would one day come to blows, andprepared for it by mutually working to entangle and enfeeble one another. But neither durst as yet proclaim his wishes or his fears, and take theinitiative in those unknown events which war must bring about to thegreat peril of their people and perhaps of themselves. From 1334 to1337, as they continued to advance towards the issue, foreseen and at thesame time deferred, of this situation, they were both of them seekingallies in Europe for their approaching struggle. Philip had a notableone under his thumb, the pope at that time settled at Avignon; and hemade use of him for the purpose of proposing a new crusade, in whichEdward III. Should be called upon to join with him. If Edward complied, any enterprise on his part against France would become impossible; and ifhe declined, Christendom would cry fie upon him. Two successive popes, John XXII. And Benedict XII. , preached the crusade, and offered theirmediation to settle the differences between the two kings; but they wereunsuccessful in both their attempts. The two kings strained every nerveto form laic alliances. Philip did all he could to secure to himself thefidelity of Count Louis of Flanders, whom the King of England severaltimes attempted, but in vain, to win over. Philip drew into closerelations with himself the Kings of Bohemia and Navarre, the Dukes ofLorraine and Burgundy, the Count of Foix, the Genoese, the Grand Prior ofthe Knights of St. John of Jerusalem, and many other lords. The twoprincipal neighbors of Flanders, the Count of Hainault and the Duke ofBrabant, received the solicitations of both kings at one and the sametime. The former had to wife Joan of Valois, sister of the King ofFrance, but he had married his daughter Philippa to the King of England;and when Edward's envoys came and asked for his support in "the greatbusiness "which their master had in view. " "If the king can succeed init, " said the count, "I shall be right glad. It may well be supposedthat my heart is with him, him who hath my daughter, rather than withKing Philip, though I have married his sister; for he hath filched fromme the hand of the young Duke of Brabant, who should have wedded mydaughter Isabel, and hath kept him for a daughter of his own. So helpwill I my dear and beloved son the King of England to the best of mypower. But he must get far stronger aid than mine, for Hainault is but alittle place in comparison with the kingdom of France, and England is toofar off to succor us. " "Dear sir, " said the envoys, "advise us of whatlords our master might best seek aid, and in what he might best put histrust. " "By my soul, " said the count, "I could not point to lord sopowerful to aid him in this business as would be the Duke of Brabant, whois his cousin-german, the Duke of Gueldres, who hath his sister to wife, and Sire de Fauquemont. They are those who would have most men-at-armsin the least time, and they are right good soldiers; provided that moneybe given them in proportion, for they are lords and men who are glad ofpay. " Edward III. Went for powerful allies even beyond the Rhine; hetreated with Louis V. Of Bavaria, Emperor of Germany; he even had asolemn interview with him at a diet assembled at Coblenz, and Louis namedEdward vicar imperial throughout all the empire situated on the left bankof the Rhine, with orders to all the princes of the Low Countries tofollow and obey him, for a space of seven years, in the field. But Louisof Bavaria was a tottering emperor, excommunicated by the pope, and witha formidable competitor in Frederick of Austria. When the time foraction arrived, King John of Bohemia, a zealous ally of the French king, persuaded the Emperor of Germany that his dignity would be compromised ifhe were to go and join the army of the English king, in whose pay hewould appear to have enlisted; and Louis of Bavaria withdrew from hisalliance with Edward III. , sending back the subsidies he had receivedfrom him. 

Which side were the Flemings themselves to take in a conflict of suchimportance, and already so hot even before it had reached bursting point?It was clearly in Flanders that each king was likely to find his mostefficient allies; and so it was there that they made the most strenuousapplications. Edward III. Hastened to restore between England and theFlemish communes the commercial relations which had been for a whiledisturbed by the arrest of the traders in both countries. He sent intoFlanders, even to Ghent, ambassadors charged to enter into negotiationswith the burghers; and one of the most considerable amongst theseburghers, Solver of Courtrai, who had but lately supported Count Louis inhis quarrels with the people of Bruges, loudly declared that the allianceof the King of England was the first requirement of Flanders, and gaveapartments in his own house to one of the English envoys. Edwardproposed the establishment in Flanders of a magazine for English wools;and he gave assurance to such Flemish weavers as would settle in Englandof all the securities they could desire. He even offered to give hisdaughter Joan in marriage to the son of the Count of Flanders. Philip, on his side, tried hard to reconcile the communes of Flanders to theircount, and so make them faithful to himself; he let them off two years'payment of a rent due to him of forty thousand livres of Paris per annum;he promised them the monopoly of exporting wools from France; heauthorized the Brugesmen to widen the moats of their city, and even torepair its ramparts. The King of England's envoys met in most of theFlemish cities with a favor which was real, but intermingled with prudentreservations, and Count Louis of Flanders remained ever closely alliedwith the King of France, "for he was right French and loyal, " saysFroissart, "and with good reason, for he had the King of France almostalone to thank for restoring him to his country by force. "

Whilst, by both sides, preparations were thus being made on the Continentfor war, the question which was to make it burst forth was being decidedin England. In the soul of Edward temptation overcame indecision. Asearly as the month of June, 1336, in a Parliament assembled atNorthampton, he had complained of the assistance given by the King ofFrance to the Scots, and he had expressed a hope that if the French andthe Scots were to join, they would at last offer him battle, which thelatter had always carefully avoided. " In September of the same year heemployed similar language in a Parliament held at Nottingham, and heobtained therefrom subsidies for the war going on not only in Scotland, but also in Aquitaine, against the French king's lieutenants. In Apriland May of the following year, 1337, he granted to Robert of Artois, histempter for three years past, court favors which proved his resolution tohave been already taken. On the 21st of August following he formallydeclared war against the King of France, and addressed to all thesheriffs, archbishops, and bishops of his kingdom a circular in which heattributed the initiative to Philip; on the 26th of August he gave hisally, the Emperor of Germany, notice of what he had just done, whilst, for the first time, insultingly describing Philip as "setting himself upfor King of France. " At last, on the 7th of October, 1337, he proclaimedhimself King of France, as his lawful inheritance, designating asrepresentatives and supporters of his right the Duke of Brabant, theMarquis of Juliers, the Count of Haiiiault, and William de Bohun, Earl ofNorthampton. 

The enterprise had no foundation in right, and seemed to have few chancesof success. If the succession to the crown of France had not beenregulated beforehand by a special and positive law, Philip of Valois hadon his side the traditional right of nearly three centuries past andactual possession without any disputes having arisen in France upon thesubject. His title had been expressly declared by the peers of thekingdom, sanctioned by the Church, and recognized by Edward himself, whohad come to pay him homage. He had the general and free assent of hispeople: to repeat the words of the chroniclers of the time, "There was nomind in France to be subjects of the King of England. " Philip VI. Wasregarded in Europe as a greater and more powerful sovereign than EdwardIII. He had the pope settled in the midst of his kingdom; and he oftentraversed it with an array of valiant nobility whom he knew how tosupport and serve on occasion as faithfully as he was served by them. "He was highly prized and honored, " says Froissart, "for the victory hehad won (at Cassel) over the Flemings, and also for the handsome servicehe had done his cousin Count Louis. He did thereby abide in greatprosperity and honor, and he greatly increased the royal state; never hadthere been king in France, it was said, who had kept state like KingPhilip, and he provided tourneys and jousts and diversions in greatabundance. " No national interest, no public ground, was provocative ofwar between the two peoples; it was a war of personal ambition, like thatwhich in the eleventh century William the Conqueror had carried intoEngland. The memory of that great event was still, in the fourteenthcentury, so fresh in France, that when the pretensions of Edward weredeclared, and the struggle was begun, an assemblage of Normans, baronsand knights, or, according to others, the Estates of Normandy themselves, came and proposed to Philip to undertake once more, and at their ownexpense, the conquest of England, if he would put at their head hiseldest son, John, their own duke. The king received their deputation atVincennes, on the 23d of March, 1339, and accepted their offer. Theybound themselves to supply for the expedition four thousand men-at-armsand twenty thousand foot, whom they promised to maintain for ten weeks, and even a fortnight beyond, if, when the Duke of Normandy had crossed toEngland, his council should consider the prolongation necessary. Theconditions in detail and the subsequent course of the enterprise thusprojected were minutely regulated and settled in a treaty published byDutillet in 1588, from a copy found at Caen when Edward III. Becamemaster of that city in 1346. The events of the war, the long fits ofhesitation on the part of both kings, and the repeated alternations fromhostilities to truces and truces to hostilities, prevented anything fromcoming of this proposal, the authenticity of which has been questioned byM. Michelet amongst others, but the genuineness of which has beendemonstrated by M. Adolph Despont, member of the appeal-court of Caen, inhis learned Histoire du Cotentin. 

Edward III. , though he had proclaimed himself King of France, did not atthe outset of his claim adopt the policy of a man firmly resolved andburning to succeed. From 1337 to 1340 he behaved as if he were at strifewith the Count of Flanders rather than with the King of France. He wasincessantly to and fro, either by embassy or in person, between England, Flanders, Hainault, Brabant, and even Germany, for the purpose ofbringing the princes and people to actively co-operate with him againsthis rival; and during this diplomatic movement such was the hostilitybetween the King of England and the Count of Flanders that Edward'sambassadors thought it impossible for them to pass through Flanders insafety, and went to Holland for a ship in which to return to England. Nor were their fears groundless; for the Count of Flanders had caused tobe arrested, and was still detaining in prison at the castle ofRupelmonde, the Fleming Sohier of Courtrai, who had received into hishouse at Ghent one of the English envoys, and had shown himself favorableto their cause. Edward keenly resented these outrages, demanded, but didnot obtain, the release of Sohier of Courtrai, and by way of revenge gaveorders in November, 1337, to two of his bravest captains, the Earl ofDerby and Walter de Manny, to go and attack the fort of Cadsand, situatedbetween the Island of Walcheren and the town of Ecluse (or Sluys), a postof consequence to the Count of Flanders, who had confided the keeping ofit to his bastard brother Guy, with five thousand of his most faithfulsubjects. It was a sanguinary affair. The besieged were surprised, butdefended themselves bravely; the landing cost the English dear; the Earlof Derby was wounded and hurled to the ground, but his comrade, Walter deManny, raised him up with a shout to his men of "Lancaster, for the Earlof Derby; "and at last the English prevailed. The Bastard of Flanderswas made prisoner; the town was pillaged and burned; and the Englishreturned to England, and "told their adventure, " says Froissart, "to theking, who was right joyous when he saw them and learned how they hadsped. "

Thus began that war which was to be so cruel and so long. The Flemingsbore the first brunt of it. It was a lamentable position for them; theirindustrial and commercial prosperity was being ruined; their security athome was going from them; their communal liberties were compromised;divisions set in amongst them; by interest and habitual intercourse theywere drawn towards England, but the count, their lord, did all he couldto turn them away from her, and many amongst them were loath to separatethemselves entirely from France. "Burghers of Ghent, as they chatted inthe thoroughfares and at the cross-roads, said one to another, that theyhad heard much wisdom, to their mind, from a burgher who was called JamesVan Artevelde, and who was a brewer of beer. They had heard him saythat, if he could obtain a hearing and credit, he would in a little whilerestore Flanders to good estate, and they would recover all their gainswithout standing ill with the King of France or the King of England. These sayings began to get spread abroad, insomuch that a quarter or halfthe city was informed thereof, especially the small folks of thecommonalty, whom the evil touched most nearly. They began to assemble inthe streets, and it came to pass that one day, after dinner, several wentfrom house to house calling for their comrades, and saying, 'Come andhear the wise man's counsel. ' On the 26th of December, 1337, they cameto the house of the said James Van Artevelde, and found him leaningagainst his door. 

[Illustration: Van Artevelde at his Door----264]

Far off as they were when they first perceived him, they made him a deepobeisance, and 'Dear sir, ' they said, 'we are come to you for counsel;for we are told that by your great and good sense you will restore thecountry of Flanders to good case. So tell us how. ' Then James VanArtevelde came forward, and said, 'Sirs comrades, I am a native andburgher of this city, and here I have my means. Know that I would gladlyaid you with all my power, you and all the country; if there were here aman who would be willing to take the lead, I would be willing to riskbody and means at his side; and if the rest of ye be willing to bebrethren, friends and comrades to me, to abide in all matters at my side, notwithstanding that I am not worthy of it, I will undertake itwillingly. ' Then said all with one voice, 'We promise you faithfully toabide at your side in all matters and to therewith adventure body andmeans, for we know well that in the whole countship of Flanders there isnot a man but you worthy so to do. '" Then Van Artevelde bound them toassemble on the next day but one in the grounds of the monastery ofBiloke, which had received numerous benefits from the ancestors of Sohierof Courtrai, whose son-in-law Van Artevelde was. 

This bold burgher of Ghent, who was born about 1285, was sprung from afamily the name of which had been for a long while inscribed in theircity upon the register of industrial corporations. His father, John VanArtevelde, a cloth-worker, had been several times over sheriff of Ghent, and his mother, Mary Van Groete, was great aunt to the grandfather of theillustrious publicist called in history Grotius. James Van Artevelde inhis youth accompanied Count Charles of Valois, brother of Philip theHandsome, upon his adventurous expeditions in Italy, Sicily, and Greece, and to the Island of Rhodes; and it had been close by the spots where thesoldiers of Marathon and Salamis had beaten the armies of Darius andXerxes that he had heard of the victory of the Flemish burghers andworkmen attacked in 1302, at Courtrai, by the splendid army of Philip theHandsome. James Van Artevelde, on returning to his country, had beenbusy with his manufactures, his fields, the education of his children, and Flemish affairs up to the day when, at his invitation, the burghersof Ghent thronged to the meeting on the 28th of December, 1337, in thegrounds of the monastery of Biloke. There he delivered an eloquentspeech, pointing out, unhesitatingly but temperately, the policy which heconsidered good for the country. "Forget not, " he said, "the might andthe glory of Flanders. Who, pray, shall forbid that we defend ourinterests by using our rights? Can the King of France prevent us fromtreating with the King of England? And may we not be certain that if wewere to treat with the King of England, the King of France would not bethe less urgent in seeking our alliance? Besides, have we not with usall the communes of Brabant, of Hainault, of Holland, and of Zealand?"The audience cheered these words; the commune of Ghent forthwithassembled, and on the 3d of January, 1337 [according to the old style, which made the year begin at the 25th of March], re-established theoffices of captains of parishes according to olden usage, when the citywas exposed to any pressing danger. It was carried that one of thesecaptains should have the chief government of the city; and James VanArtevelde was at once invested with it. From that moment the conduct ofVan Artevelde was ruled by one predominant idea: to secure free and faircommercial intercourse for Flanders with England, whilst observing ageneral neutrality in the war between the Kings of England and France, and to combine so far all the communes of Flanders in one and the samepolicy. And he succeeded in this twofold purpose. "On the 29th ofApril, 1338, the representatives of all the communes of Flanders (thecity of Bruges numbering amongst them a hundred and eight deputies)repaired to the castle of Male, a residence of Count Louis, and thenJames Van Artevelde set before the count what had been resolved uponamongst them. The count submitted, and swore that he would thenceforthmaintain the liberties of Flanders in the state in which they had existedsince the treaty of Athies. In the month of May following a deputation, consisting of James Van Artevelde and other burghers appointed by thecities of Ghent, Bruges, and Ypres scoured the whole of Flanders, fromBailleul to Termonde, and from Ninove to Dunkerque, "to reconcile thegood folks of the communes to the Count of Flanders, as well for thecount's honor as for the peace of the country. " Lastly, on the 10th ofJune, 1338, a treaty was signed at Anvers between the deputies of theFlemish communes and the English ambassadors, the latter declaring: "Wedo all to wit that we have negotiated way and substance of friendshipwith the good folks of the communes of Flanders, in form and mannerherein-after following:--

"First, they shall be able to go and buy the wools and other merchandisewhich have been exported from England to Holland, Zealand, or any otherplace whatsoever; and all traders of Flanders who shall repair to theports of England shall there be safe and free in their persons and theirgoods, just as in any other place where their ventures might bring themtogether. 

"Item, we have agreed with the good folks and with all the common countryof Flanders that they must not mix nor inter-meddle in any way, byassistance of men or arms, in the wars of our lord the king and the nobleSir Philip of Valois (who holdeth himself for King of France). "

Three articles following regulated in detail the principles laid down inthe first two, and, by another charter, Edward III. Ordained that "allstuffs marked with the seal of the city of Ghent might travel freely inEngland without being subject according to ellage and quality to thecontrol to which all foreign merchandise was subject. " (_Histoire deFlandre, _ by M, le Baron Kerwyn de Lettenhove, t. Iii. Pp. 199-203. )

Van Artevelde was right in telling the Flemings that, if they treatedwith the King of England, the King of France would be only the moreanxious for their alliance. Philip of Valois, and even Count Louis ofFlanders, when they got to know of the negotiations entered into betweenthe Flemish communes and King Edward, redoubled their offers and promisesto them. But when the passions of men have taken full possession oftheir souls, words of concession and attempts at accommodation arenothing more than postponements or lies. Philip, when he heard about theconclusion of a treaty between the Flemish communes and the King ofEngland, sent word to Count Louis "that this James Van Artevelde mustnot, on any account, be allowed to rule, or even live, for, if it were sofor long, the count would lose his land. " The count, very much disposedto accept such advice, repaired to Ghent and sent for Van Artevelde tocome and see him at his hotel. He went, but with so large a followingthat the count was not at the time at all in a position to resist him. He tried to persuade the Flemish burgher that "if he would keep a hand onthe people so as to keep them to their love for the King of France, hehaving more authority than any one else for such a purpose, much goodwould result to him: mingling, besides, with this address, some words ofthreatening import. " Van Artevelde, who was not the least afraid of thethreat, and who at heart was fond of the English, told the count that hewould do as he had promised the communes. "Hereupon he left the count, who consulted his confidants as to what he was to do in this business, and they counselled him to let them go and assemble their people, sayingthat they would kill Van Artevelde secretly or otherwise. And indeed, they did lay many traps and made many attempts against the captain; butit was of no avail, since all the commonalty was for him. " When therumor of these projects and these attempts was spread abroad in the city, the excitement was extreme, and all the burghers assumed white hoods, which was the mark peculiar to the members of the commune when theyassembled under their flags; so that the count found himself reduced toassuming one, for he was afraid of being kept captive at Ghent, and, onthe pretext of a hunting party, he lost no time in gaining his castle ofMale. 

The burghers of Ghent had their minds still filled with their late alarmwhen they heard that, by order, it was said, of the King of France, CountLouis had sent and beheaded at the castle of Rupehuonde, in the very bedin which he was confined by his infirmities, their fellow-citizen Solverof Courtrai, Van Artevelde's father-in-law, who had been kept for manymonths in prison for his intimacy with the English. On the same day theBishop of Senlis and the Abbot of St. Denis had arrived at Tournay, andhad superintended the reading out in the market-place of a sentence ofexcommunication against the Ghentese. 

It was probably at this date that Van Artevelde, in his vexation anddisquietude, assumed in Ghent an attitude threatening and despotic evento tyranny. "He had continually after him, " says Froissart, "sixty oreighty armed varlets, amongst whom were two or three who knew some of hissecrets. When he met a man whom he had hated or had in suspicion, thisman was at once killed, for Van Artevelde had given this order to hisvarlets: 'The moment I meet a man, and make such and such a sign to you, slay him without delay, however great he may be, without waiting for morespeech. ' In this way he had many great masters slain. And as soon asthese sixty varlets had taken him home to his hotel, each went to dinnerat his own house; and the moment dinner was over they returned and stoodbefore his hotel, and waited in the street until that he was minded to goand play and take his pastime in the city, and so they attended him tillsupper-time. And know that each of these hirelings had per diem fourgroschen of Flanders for their expenses and wages, and he had themregularly paid from week to week. . . . And even in the case of allthat were most powerful in Flanders, knights, esquires, and burghers ofthe good cities, whom he believed to be favorable to the Count ofFlanders, them he banished from Flanders, and levied half their revenues. He had levies made of rents, of dues on merchandise, and all the revenuesbelonging to the count, wherever it might be in Flanders, and hedisbursed them at his will, and gave them away without rendering anyaccount. . . . And when he would borrow of any burghers on his wordfor payment, there was none that durst say him nay. In short, there wasnever in Flanders, or in any other country, duke, count, prince, orother, who can have had a country at his will as James Van Artevelde hadfor a long time. "

It is possible that, as some historians have thought, Froissart, beingless favorable to burghers than to princes, did not deny himself a littleexaggeration in this portrait of a great burgher-patriot transformed bythe force of events and passions into a demagogic tyrant. But some of usmay have too vivid a personal recollection of similar scenes to doubt thegeneral truth of the picture; and we shall meet before long in thehistory of France during the fourteenth century with an example stillmore striking and more famous than that of Van Artevelde. 

Whilst the Count of Flanders, after having vainly attempted to excite anuprising against Van Artevelde, was being forced, in order to escape fromthe people of Bruges, to mount his horse in hot haste, at night andbarely armed, and to flee away to St. Omer, Philip of Valois and EdwardIII. Were preparing, on either side, for the war which they could seedrawing near. Philip was vigorously at work on the pope, the Emperor ofGermany, and the princes neighbors of Flanders, in order to raiseobstacles against his rival or rob him of his allies. He ordered thatshort-lived meeting of the states-general about which we have noinformation left us, save that it voted the principle that "no talliagecould be imposed on the people if urgent necessity or evident utilityshould not require it, and unless by concession of the Estates. " Philip, as chief of feudal society, rather than of the nation which was formingitself little by little around the lords, convoked at Amiens all hisvassals, great and small, laic or cleric, placing all his strength intheir co-operation, and not caring at all to associate the country itselfin the affairs of his government. Edward, on the contrary, whilstequipping his fleet and amassing treasure at the expense of the Jews andLombard usurers, was assembling his Parliament, talking to it "of thisimportant and costly war, " for which he obtained large subsidies, andaccepting without making any difficulty the vote of the Commons' House, which expressed a desire "to consult their constituents upon thissubject, and begged him to summon an early Parliament, to which thereshould be elected, in each county, two knights taken from among the bestland-owners of their counties. " The king set out for the Continent; theParliament met and considered the exigencies of the war by land and sea, in Scotland and in France; traders, ship-owners, and mariners were calledand examined; and the forces determined to be necessary were voted. Edward took the field, pillaging, burning, and ravaging, "destroying allthe country for twelve or fourteen leagues to extent, " as he himself saidin a letter to the Archbishop of Canterbury. When he set foot on Frenchterritory, Count William of Hainault, his brother-in-law, and up to thattime his ally, came to him and said that "he would ride with him nofarther, for that his presence was prayed and required by his uncle, theKing of France to whom he bore no hate, and whom he would go and serve inhis own kingdom, as he had served King Edward on the territory of theemperor, whose vicar he was; "and Edward wished him 'God speed!'" Suchwas the binding nature of feudal ties that the same lord held himselfbound to pass from one camp to another, according as he found himselfupon the domains of one or the other of his suzerains in a war oneagainst the other. Edward continued his march towards St. Quentin, wherePhilip had at last arrived with his allies, the Kings of Bohemia, Navarre, and Scotland, "after delays which had given rise to greatscandal and murmurs throughout the whole kingdom. " The two armies, witha strength, according to Froissart, of a hundred thousand men on theFrench side, and forty-four thousand on the English, were soon facing oneanother, near Buironfosse, a large burgh of Picardy. A herald came fromthe English camp to tell the King of France that the King of England"demanded of him battle. To which demand, " says Froissart, "the King ofFrance gave willing assent, and accepted the day, which was fixed atfirst for Thursday the 21st, and afterwards for Saturday the 25th ofOctober, 1339. " To judge from the somewhat tangled accounts of thechroniclers and of Froissart himself, neither of the two kings was veryanxious to come to blows. The forces of Edward were much inferior tothose of Philip; and the former had accordingly taken up, as it appears, a position which rendered attack difficult for Philip. There was muchdivision of opinion in the French camp. Independently of militarygrounds, a great deal was said about certain letters from Robert, King ofNaples, "a mighty necromancer and full of mighty wisdom, it was reported, who, after having several times cast their horoscopes, had discovered byastrology and from experience, that, if his cousin, the King of France, were to fight the King of England, the former would be worsted. " "Inthus disputing and debating, " says Froissart, "the time passed till fullmidday. A little afterwards a hare came leaping across the fields, andrushed amongst the French. Those who saw it began shouting and making agreat halloo. Those who were behind thought that those who were in frontwere engaging in battle; and several put on their helmets and grippedtheir swords. Thereupon several knights were made; and the Count ofHainault himself made fourteen, who were thenceforth nicknamed Knights ofthe Hare. " Whatever his motive may have been, Philip did not attack; andEdward promptly began a retreat. They both dismissed their allies; andduring the early days of. November, Philip fell back upon St. Quentin, and Edward went and took up his winter quarters at Brussels. 

For Edward it was a serious check not to have dared to attack the kingwhose kingdom he made a pretence of conquering; and he took it grievouslyto heart. At Brussels he had an interview with his allies, and askedtheir counsel. Most of the princes of the Low Countries remainedfaithful to him, and the Count of Hainault seemed inclined to go back tohim; but all hesitated as to what he was to do to recover from the check. Van Artevelde showed more invention and more boldness. The Flemishcommunes had concentrated their forces not far from the spot where thetwo kings had kept their armies looking at one another; but they hadmaintained a strict neutrality, and at the invitation of the Count ofFlanders, who promised them that the King of France would entertain alltheir claims, Artevelde and Breydel, the deputies from Ghent and Bruges, even repaired to Courtrai to make terms with him. But as they got therenothing but ambiguous engagements and evasive promises, they let thenegotiation drop, and, whilst Count Louis was on his way to rejoin Philipat St. Quentin, Artevelde, with the deputies from the Flemish communes, started for Brussels. Edward, who was already living on veryconfidential terms with him, told him that "if the Flemings were mindedto help him to keep up the war, and go with him whithersoever he wouldtake them, they should aid him to recover Lille, Douai, and B4thune, thenoccupied by the King of France. Artevelde, after consulting hiscolleagues, returned to Edward, and, 'Dear sir, ' said he, 'you havealready made such requests to us, and verily if we could do so whilstkeeping our honor and faith, we would do as you demand; but we be bound, by faith and oath, and on a bond of two millions of florins entered intowith the pope, not to go to war with the King of France without incurringa debt to the amount of that sum, and a sentence of ex-communication; butif you do that which we are about to say to you, if you will be pleasedto adopt the arms of France, and quarter them with those of England, andopenly call yourself King of France, we will uphold you for true King ofFrance; you, as King of France, shall give us quittance of our faith; andthen we will obey you as King of France, and will go whithersoever youshall ordain. '"

This prospect pleased Edward mightily: but "it irked him to take the nameand arms of that of which he had as yet won no tittle. " He consulted hisallies. Some of them hesitated; but "his most privy and especialfriend, " Robert d'Artois, strongly urged him to consent to the proposal. So a French prince and a Flemish burgher prevailed upon the King ofEngland to pursue, as in assertion of his avowed rights, the conquest ofthe kingdom of France. King, prince, and burgher fixed Ghent as theirplace of meeting for the official conclusion of the alliance; and there, in January, 1340, the mutual engagement was signed and sealed. The Kingof England "assumed the arms of France quartered with those of England, "and thenceforth took the title of King of France. 

Then burst forth in reality that war which was to last a hundred years;which was to bring upon the two nations the most violent struggles, aswell as the most cruel sufferings, and which, at the end of a hundredyears, was to end in the salvation of France from her tremendous peril, and the defeat of England in her unrighteous attempt. In January, 1340, Edward thought he had won the most useful of allies; Artevelde thoughtthe independence of the Flemish communes and his own supremacy in his owncountry secured; and Robert d'Artois thought with complacency how he hadgratified his hatred for Philip of Valois. And all three were deceivingthemselves in their joy and their confidence. 

Edward, leaving Queen Philippa at Ghent with Artevelde for her adviser, had returned to England, and had just obtained from the Parliament, forthe purpose of vigorously pushing on the war, a subsidy almost withoutprecedent, when he heard that a large French fleet was assembling on thecoasts of Zealand, near the port of Ecluse (or Sluys), with a design ofsurprising and attacking him when he should cross over again to theContinent. For some time past this fleet had been cruising in theChannel, making descents here and there upon English soil, at Plymouth, Southampton, Sandwich, and Dover, and everywhere causing alarm andpillage. Its strength, they said, was a hundred and forty large vessels, "without counting the smaller, " having on board thirty-five thousand men, Normans, Picards, Italians, sailors and soldiers of all countries, underthe command of two French leaders, Hugh Quiret, titular admiral, andNicholas Bchuchet, King Philip's treasurer, and of a famous Genoesebuccaneer, named Barbavera. Edward, so soon as he received thisinformation, resolved to go and meet their attack; and he gave orders tohave his vessels and troops summoned from all parts of England toOrewell, his point of departure. His advisers, with the Archbishop ofCanterbury at their head, strove, but in vain, to restrain him. "Ye areall in conspiracy against me, " said he; "I shall go; and those who areafraid can abide at home. " And go he did on the 22d of June, 1340, andaboard of his fleet "went with him many an English dame, " says Froissart, "wives of earls, and barons, and knights, and burghers, of London, whowere off to Ghent to see the Queen of England, whom for a long time pastthey had not seen; and King Edward guarded them carefully. " "For many along day, " said he, "have I desired to fight those fellows, and now wewill fight them, please God and St. George; for, verily, they have causedme so many displeasures, that I would fain take vengeance for them, if Ican but get it. " On arriving off the coast of Flanders, opposite Ecluse(or Sluys), he saw "so great a number of vessels that of masts thereseemed to he verily a forest. " He made his arrangements forthwith, "placing his strongest ships in front, and manoeuvring so as to have thewind on the starboard quarter, and the sun astern. The Normans marvelledto see the English thus twisting about, and said, 'They are turning tail;they are not men enough to fight us. '" But the Genoese buccaneer was notmisled. "When he saw the English fleet approaching in such fashion, hesaid to the French admiral and his colleague, Behuchet, 'Sirs, here isthe King of England, with all his ships, bearing down upon us: if ye willfollow my advice, instead of remaining shut up in port, ye will draw outinto the open sea; for, if ye abide here, they, whilst they have in theirfavor sun, and wind, and tide, will keep you so short of room, that yewill be helpless and unable to manoeuvre. ' Whereupon answered thetreasurer, B6huchet, who knew more about arithmetic than sea fights, 'Let him go hang, whoever shall go out: here will we wait, and take ourchance. ' 'Sir, ' replied Barbavera, 'if ye will not be pleased to believeme, I have no mind to work my own ruin, and I will get me gone with mygalleys out of this hole. ' "And out he went, with all his squadron, engaged the English on the high seas, and took the first ship whichattempted to board him. But Edward, though he was wounded in the thigh, quickly restored the battle. After a gallant resistance, Barbaverasailed off with his galleys, and the French fleet found itself alone atgrips with the English. The struggle was obstinate on both sides; itbegan at six in the morning of June 24, 1340, and lasted to midday. Itwas put an end to by the arrival of the re-enforcements promised by theFlemings to the King of England. "The deputies of Bruges, " says theirhistorian, "had employed the whole night in getting under way an armamentof two hundred vessels, and, before long, the French heard echoing aboutthem the horns of the Flemish mariners sounding to quarters. " Theselatter decided the victory, Behuchet, Philip of Valois' treasurer, fellinto their hands; and they, heeding only their desire of avengingthemselves for the devastation of Cadsand (in 1337), hanged him from themast of his vessel "out of spite to the King of France. " The admiral, Hugh Quieret, though he surrendered, was put to death; "and with himperished so great a number of men-at-arms that the sea was dyed withblood on this coast, and the dead were put down at quite thirty thousandmen. "

The very day after the battle, the Queen of England came from Ghent tojoin the king her husband, whom his wound confined to his ship; and atValenciennes, whither the news of the victory speedily arrived, Artevelde, mounting a platform set up in the market-place, maintained, inthe presence of a large crowd, the right which the King of England had toclaim the kingdom of France. He vaunted "the puissance of the threecountries, Flanders, Hainault, and Brabant, when at one accord amongstthemselves, and what with his words and his great sense, " says Froissart, "he did so well that all who heard him said that he had spoken mightywell, and with mighty experience, and that he was right worthy to governthe countship of Flanders. " From Valenciennes he repaired to King Edwardat Bruges, where all the allied princes were assembled; and there, inconcert with the other deputies from the Flemish communes, Arteveldeoffered Edward a hundred thousand men for the vigorous prosecution of thewar. "All these burghers, " says the modern historian of the Flemings, "had declared that, in order to promote their country's cause, they wouldserve without pay, so heartily had they entered into the war. " The siegeof Tournay was the first operation Edward resolved to undertake. He hadpromised to give this place to the Flemings; the burghers were getting ataste for conquest, in company with kings. 

They found Philip of Valois better informed, and also more hot for war, than perhaps they had expected. It is said that he learned the defeat ofhis navy at Ecluse from his court fool, who was the first to announce it, and in the following fashion. "The English are cowards, " said he. "Whyso?" asked the king. "Because they lacked courage to leap into the seaat Ecluse, as the French and Normans did. " Philip lost no time aboutputting the places on his northern frontier in a state of defence, hetook up his quarters first at Arras, and then three leagues from Tournay, into which his constable, Raoul d'Eu, immediately threw himself, with aconsiderable force, and whither his allies, the Duke of Lorraine, theCount of Savoy, the Bishops of Liege, Metz, and Verdun, and nearly allthe barons of Burgundy came and joined him. On the 27th of July, 1340, he received there from his rival a challenge of portentous length, theprincipal terms of which are set forth as follows:

"Philip of Valois, for a long time past we have taken proceedings, bymeans of messages and other reasonable ways, to the end that you mightrestore to us our rightful heritage of France, which you have this longwhile withheld from us and do most wrongfully occupy. And as we doclearly see that you do intend to persevere in your wrongful withholding, we do give you notice that we are marching against you to bring ourrightful claims to an issue. And, whereas so great a number of folksassembled on our side and on yours, cannot keep themselves together forlong without causing great destruction to the people and the country, wedesire, as the quarrel is between you and us, that the decision of ourclaim should be between our two bodies. And if you have no mind to thisway, we propose that our quarrel should end by a battle, body to body, between a hundred persons, the most capable on your side and on ours. And, if you have no mind either to one way or to the other, that you doappoint us a fixed day for fighting before the city of Tournay, power topower. Given under our privy seal, on the field near Tournay, the 26thday of July, in the first year of our reign in France and in England thefourteenth. "

Philip replied, "Philip, by the grace of God King of France to Edward, King of England. We have seen your letters brought to our court, as fromyou to Philip of Valois, and containing certain demands which you makeupon the said Philip of Valois. And, as the said letters did not come toourself, we make you no answer. Our intention is, when it shall seemgood to us, to hurl you out of our kingdom for the benefit of our people. And of that we have firm hope in Jesus Christ, from whom all power comethto us. "

Events were not satisfactory either to the haughty pretensions of Edwardor to the patriotic hopes of Philip. The war continued in the north andsouth-west of France without any result. In the neighborhood of Tournaysome encounters in the open country were unfavorable to the English andtheir allies; the siege of the place was prolonged for seventy-four dayswithout the attainment of any success by assault or investment; and theinhabitants defended themselves with so obstinate a courage, that, whenat length the King of England found himself obliged to raise the siege, Philip, to testify his gratitude towards them, restored them their law, that is, their communal charter, for some time past withdrawn, and "theywere greatly rejoiced, " says Froissart, "at having no more royalgovernors, and at appointing provosts and jurymen according to theirfancy. " The Flemish burghers, in spite of their display of warlike zeal, soon grew tired of being so far from their business and of living undercanvas. In Aquitaine the lieutenants of the King of France had theadvantage over those of the King of England; they retook or deliveredseveral places in dispute between the two crowns, and they closelypressed Bordeaux itself both by land and sea. Edward, the aggressor, wasexhausting his pecuniary resources, and his Parliament was displaying butlittle inclination to replenish them. For Philip, who had merely todefend himself in his own dominions, any cessation of hostilities wasalmost a victory. A pious princess, Joan of Valois, sister of Philip andmother-in-law of Edward, issued from her convent at Fontenelle, for thepurpose of urging the two kings to make peace, or at least to suspendhostilities. "The good dame, " says Froissart, "saw there, on the twosides, all the flower and honor of the chivalry of the world; and many atime she had fallen at the feet of her brother, the King of France, praying him for some respite or treaty of agreement between himself andthe English king. And when she had labored with them of France, she wenther way to them of the Empire, to the Duke of Brabant, to the Marquis ofJuliers, and to my Lord John of Hainault, and prayed them, for God's andpity's sake, that they would be pleased to hearken to some terms ofaccord, and would win over the King of England to be pleased tocondescend thereto. " In concert with the envoys of Pope Benedict XII. , Joan of Valois at last succeeded in bringing the two sovereigns and theirallies to a truce, which was concluded on the 25th of September, 1340, atfirst for nine months, and was afterwards renewed on several occasions upto the month of June, 1342. Neither sovereign, and none of their allies, gave up anything, or bound themselves to anything more than not to fightduring that interval; but they were, on both sides, without the power ofcarrying on without pause a struggle which they would not entirelyabandon. 

An unexpected incident led to its recommencement in spite of the truce:not, however, throughout France or directly between the two kings, butwith fiery fierceness, though it was limited to a single province, andarose not in the name of the kingship of France, but out of a purelyprovincial question. John III. , Duke of Brittany and a faithful vassalof Philip of Valois, whom he had gone to support at Tournay "more stoutlyand substantially than any of the other princes, " says Froissart, diedsuddenly at Caen, on the 30th of April, 1341, on returning to his domain. Though he had been thrice married, he left no child. The duchy ofBrittany then reverted to his brothers or their posterity, but his verynext brother, Guy, Count of Penthievre, had been dead six years, and hadleft only a daughter, Joan, called the Cripple, married to Charles ofBlois, nephew of the King of France. The third brother was still alive;he too was named John, had from his mother the title of Count ofMontfort, and claimed to be heir to the duchy of Brittany in preferenceto his niece Joan. The niece, on the contrary, believed in her own rightto the exclusion of her uncle. The question was exactly the same as thatwhich had arisen touching the crown of France when Philip the Long hadsuccessfully disputed it with the only daughter of his brother Louis theQuarreller; but the Salic law, which had for more than three centuriesprevailed in France, and just lately to the benefit of Philip of Valois, had no existence in the written code, or the traditions of Brittany. There, as in several other great fiefs, women had often been recognizedas capable of holding and transmitting sovereignty. At the death of JohnIII. , his brother, the Count of Montfort, immediately put himself inpossession of the inheritance, seized the principal Breton towns, Nantes, Brest, Rennes, and Vannes, and crossed over to England to secure thesupport of Edward III. His rival, Charles of Blois, appealed to thedecision of the King of France, his uncle and natural protector. Philipof Valois thus found himself the champion of succession in the femaleline in Brittany, whilst he was himself reigning in France by virtue ofthe Salic law, and Edward III. Took up in Brittany the defence ofsuccession in the male line which he was disputing and fighting againstin France. Philip and his court of peers declared on the 7th ofSeptember, 1341, that Brittany belonged to Charles of Blois, who at oncedid homage for it to the King of France, whilst John of Montfort demandedand obtained the support of the King of England. War broke out betweenthe two claimants, effectually supported by the two kings, whonevertheless were not supposed to make war upon one another and in theirown dominions. The feudal system sometimes entailed these strange anddangerous complications. 

If the two parties had been reduced for leaders to the two claimantsonly, the war would not, perhaps, have lasted long. 

In the first campaign the Count of Montfort was made prisoner at thesiege of Nantes, carried off to Paris, and shut up in the tower of theLouvre, whence he did not escape until three years were over. Charles ofBlois, with all his personal valor, was so scrupulously devout that heoften added to the embarrassments and at the same time the delays of war. He never marched without being followed by his almoner, who took with himeverywhere bread, and wine, and water, and fire in a pot, for the purposeof saying mass by the way. One day when Charles was accordingly hearingit and was very near the enemy, one of his officers, Auffroy deMontboucher, said to him, "Sir, you see right well that your enemies areyonder, and you halt a longer time than they need to take you. ""Auffroy, " answered the prince, "we shall always have towns and castles, and, if they are taken, we shall, with God's help, recover them; but ifwe miss hearing of mass we shall never recover it. " Neither side, however, had much detriment from either the captivity or pious delays ofits chief. Joan of Flanders, Countess of Montfort, was at Rennes whenshe heard that her husband had been taken prisoner at Nantes. "Althoughshe made great mourning in her heart, " says Froissart, "she made it notlike a disconsolate woman, but like a proud and gallant man. She showedto her friends and soldiers a little boy she had, and whose name wasJohn, even as his father's, and she said to them, 'Ah! sirs, be notdiscomforted and cast down because of my lord whom we have lost; he wasbut one man; see, here is my little boy, who, please God, shall be hisavenger. I have wealth in abundance, and of it I will give you enow, andI will provide you with such a leader as shall give you all fresh heart. 'She went through all her good towns and fortresses, taking her young sonwith her, re-enforcing the garrisons with men and all they wanted, andgiving away abundantly wherever she thought it would be well laid out. Then she went her way to Hennebon-sur-Mer, which was a strong town andstrong castle, and there she abode, and her son with her, all thewinter. " In May, 1242, Charles of Blois came to besiege her; but theattempts at assault were not successful. "The Countess of Montfort, whowas cased in armor and rode on a fine steed, galloped from street tostreet through the town, summoned the people to defend themselvesstoutly, and called on the women, dames, damoisels, and others, to pullup the roads, and carry the stones to the ramparts to throw down on theassailants. " She attempted a bolder enterprise. "She sometimes mounteda tower, right up to the top, that she might see the better how herpeople bore themselves. She one day saw that all they of the hostilearmy, lords and others, had left their quarters and gone to watch theassault. She mounted her steed, all armed as she was, and summoned tohorse with her about three hundred men-at-arms who were on guard at agate which was not being assailed. She went out thereat with all hercompany and threw herself valiantly upon the tents and quarters of thelords of France, which were all burned, being guarded only by boys andvarlets, who fled as soon as they saw the countess and her folks enteringand setting fire. When the lords saw their quarters burning and heardthe noise which came therefrom, they ran up all dazed and crying, 'Betrayed! betrayed!' so that none remained for the assault. When thecountess saw the enemy's host running up from all parts, she re-assembledall her folks, and seeing right well that she could not enter the townagain without too great loss, she went off by another road to the castleof Brest [or, more probably, d'Auray, as Brest is much more than threeleagues from Hennebon], which lies as near as three leagues from thence. "Though hotly pursued by the assailants, "she rode so fast and so wellthat she and the greater part of her folks arrived at the castle ofBrest, where she was received and feasted right joyously. Those of herfolks who were in Hennebon were all night in great disquietude becauseneither she nor any of her company returned; and the assailant lords, whohad taken up quarters nearer to the town, cried, 'Come out, come out, andseek your countess; she is lost; you will not find a bit of her. ' In suchfear the folks in Hennebon remained five days. But the countess wroughtso well that she had now full five hundred comrades armed and wellmounted; then she set out from Brest about midnight and came away, arriving at sunrise and riding straight upon one of the flanks of theenemy's host; there she had the gate of Hennebon castle opened, andentered in with great joy and a great noise of trumpets and drums;whereby the besiegers were roughly disturbed and awakened. "

The joy of the besieged was short. Charles of Blois pressed on the siegemore rigorously every day, threatening that, when he should have takenthe place, he would put all the inhabitants to the sword. Consternationspread even to the brave; and a negotiation was opened with a view ofarriving at terms of capitulation. By dint of prayers Countess Joanobtained a delay of three days. The first two had expired, and thebesiegers were preparing for a fresh assault, when Joan, from the top ofher tower, saw the sea covered with sails: "'See, see, ' she cried, theaid so much desired!' Every one in the town, as best they could, rushedup at once to the windows and battlements of the walls to see what itmight be, " says Froissart. In point of fact it was a fleet with sixthousand men brought from England to the relief of Hennebon by Amaury deClisson and Walter de Manny; and they had been a long while detained atsea by contrary winds. "

[Illustration: 'See! See!' she cried----283]

When they had landed the countess herself went to them and feasted themand thanked them greatly, which was no wonder, for she had sore need oftheir coming. " It was far better still when, next day, the new arrivalshad attacked the besiegers and gained a brilliant victory over them. When they re-entered the place, "whoever, " says Froissart, "saw thecountess descend from the castle, and kiss my lord Walter de Manny andhis comrades, one after another, two or three times, might well have saidthat it was a gallant dame. "

All the while that the Count of Montfort was a prisoner in the tower ofthe Louvre, the countess his wife strove for his cause with the sameindefatigable energy. He escaped in 1345, crossed over to England, sworefealty and homage to Edward III. For the duchy of Brittany, andimmediately returned to take in hand, himself, his own cause. But in thevery year of his escape, on the 26th of September, 1345, he died at thecastle of Hennebon, leaving once more his wife, with a young child, aloneat the head of his party and having in charge the future of his house. The Countess Joan maintained the rights and interests of her son as shehad maintained those of her husband. For nineteen years, she, with thehelp of England, struggled against Charles of Blois, the head of a partygrowing more and more powerful, and protected by France. Fortune shiftedher favors and her asperities from one camp to the other. Charles ofBlois had at first pretty considerable success; but on the 18th of June, 1347, in a battle in which he personally displayed a brilliant courage, he was in his turn made prisoner, carried to England, and immured in theTower of London. There he remained nine years. But he too had a valiantand indomitable wife, Joan of Penthievre, the Cripple. She did for herhusband all that Joan of Montfort was doing for hers. All the time thathe was a prisoner in the Tower of London, she was the soul and the headof his party, in the open country as well as in the towns, turning toprofitable account the inclinations of the Breton population, whom thepresence and the ravages of the English had turned against John ofMontfort and his cause. She even convoked at Dinan, in 1352, a generalassembly of her partisans, which is counted by the Breton historians asthe second holding of the states of their country. During nine years, from 1347 to 1356, the two Joans were the two heads of their parties inpolitics and in war. Charles of Blois at last obtained his liberty fromEdward III. On hard conditions, and returned to Brittany to take up theconduct of his own affairs. The struggle between the two claimants stilllasted eight years, with vicissitudes ending in nothing definite. In1363 Charles of Blois and young John of Montfort, weary of theirfruitless efforts and the sufferings of their countries, determined bothof them to make peace and share Brittany between them. Rennes was to beCharles's capital, and Nantes that of his rival. The treaty had beensigned, an altar raised between the two armies, and an oath taken on bothsides; but when Joan of Penthivre was informed of it she refuseddownright to ratify it. "I married you, " she said to her husband, "todefend my inheritance, and not to yield the half of it; I am only awoman, but I would lose my life, and two lives if I had them, rather thanconsent to any cession of the kind. " Charles of Blois, as weak beforehis wife as brave before the enemy, broke the treaty he had but justsworn to, and set out for Nantes to resume the war. "My lord, " saidCountess Joan to him in presence of all his knights, "you are going todefend my inheritance and yours, which my lord of Montfort--wrongfully, God knows--doth withhold from us, and the barons of Brittany who are herepresent know that I am rightful heiress of it. I pray you affectionatelynot to make any ordinance, composition, or treaty whereby the duchycorporate remain not ours. " Charles set out; and in the following year, on the 29th of September, 1364, the battle of Auray cost him his life andthe countship of Brittany. When he was wounded to death he said, "I havelong been at war against my conscience. " At sight of his dead body onthe field of battle young John of Montfort, his conqueror, was touched, and cried out, "Alas my cousin, by your obstinacy you have been the causeof great evils in Brittany: may God forgive you! It grieves me much thatyou are come to so sad an end. " After this outburst of generouscompassion came the joy of victory, which Montfort owed above all to hisEnglish allies and to John Chandos their leader, to whom, "My Lord John, "said he, "this great fortune path come to me through your great sense andprowess: wherefore, I pray you, drink out of my cup. " "Sir, " answeredChandos, "let us go hence, and render you your thanks to God for thishappy fortune you have gotten, for, without the death of yonder warrior, you could not have come into the inheritance of Brittany. " From that dayforth John of Monfort remained in point of fact Duke of Brittany, andJoan of Penthievre, the Cripple, the proud princess who had soobstinately defended her rights against him, survived for full twentyyears the death of her husband and the loss of her duchy. 

Whilst the two Joans were exhibiting in Brittany, for the preservation orthe recovery of their little dominion, so much energy and persistency, another Joan, no princess, but not the less a heroine, was, in no otherinterest than the satisfaction of her love and her vengeance, making war, all by herself, on the same territory. Several Norman and Breton lords, and amongst others Oliver de Clisson and Godfrey d'Harcourt, weresuspected, nominally attached as they were to the King of France, ofhaving made secret overtures to the King of England. Philip of Valoishad them arrested at a tournament, and had them beheaded without any formof trial, in the middle of the market-place at Paris, to the number offourteen. The head of Clisson was sent to Nantes and exposed on one ofthe gates of the city. At the news thereof, his widow, Joan ofBelleville, attended by several men of family, her neighbors and friends, set out for a castle occupied by the troops of Philip's candidate, Charles of Blois. The fate of Clisson was not yet known there; it wassupposed that his wife was on a hunting excursion; and she was admittedwithout distrust. As soon as she was inside, the blast of a horn gavenotice to her followers, whom she had left concealed in the neighboringwoods. They rushed up, and took possession of the castle, and Joan deClisson had all the inhabitants--but one--put to the sword. But this wastoo little for her grief and her zeal. At the head of her troops, augmented, she scoured the country and seized several places, everywheredriving out or putting to death the servants of the King of France. Philip confiscated the property of the house of Clisson. Joan moved fromland to sea. She manned several vessels, attacked the French ships shefell in with, ravaged the coasts, and ended by going and placing at theservice of the Countess of Montfort her hatred and her son, a boy ofseven years of age, whom she had taken with her in all her expeditions, and who was afterwards the great constable, Oliver de Clisson. We shallfind him under Charles V. And Charles VI. As devoted to France and herkings as if he had not made his first essays in arms against thecandidate of their ancestor, Philip. His mother had sent him to England, to be brought up at the court of Edward III. , but, shortly after taking aglorious part with the English in the battle of Auray, in which he lostan eye, and which secured the duchy of Brittany to the Count of Montfort, De Clisson got embroiled none the less with his suzerain, who had givenJohn Chandos the castle of Gavre, near Nantes. "Devil take me, my lord, "said Oliver to him, "if ever Englishman shall be my neighbor;" and hewent forthwith and attacked the castle, which he completely demolished. The hatreds of women whose passions have made them heroines of war aremore personal and more obstinate than those of the roughest warriors. Accordingly the war for the duchy of Brittany, in the fourteenth century, has been called, in history, the war of the three Joans. 

This war was, on both sides, remarkable for cruelty. If Joan de Clissongave to the sword all the people in a castle, belonging to Charles ofBlois, to which she had been admitted on a supposition of pacificintentions, Charles of Blois, on his side, finding in another castlethirty knights, partisans of the Count of Montfort, had their heads shotfrom catapults over the walls of Nantes, which he was besieging, and, atthe same time that he saved from pillage the churches of Quimper, whichhe had just taken, he allowed his troops to massacre fourteen hundredinhabitants, and had his principal prisoners beheaded. One of them, being a deacon, he caused to be degraded, and then handed over to thepopulace, who stoned him. It is characteristic of the middle ages thatin them the ferocity of barbaric times existed side by side with thesentiments of chivalry and the fervor of Christianity: so slow is therace of man to eschew evil, even when it has begun to discern and relishgood. War was then the passion and habitual condition of men. They madeit without motive as well as without prevision, in a transport of feelingor for the sake of pastime, to display their strength or to escape fromlistlessness; and, whilst making it, they abandoned themselves withoutscruple to all those deeds of violence, vengeance, brutal anger, orfierce delight, which war provokes. At the same time, however, thegenerous impulses of feudal chivalry, the sympathies of Christian piety, tender affections, faithful devotion, noble tastes, were fermenting intheir souls; and human nature appeared with all its complications, itsinconsistencies, and its irregularities, but also with all its wealth ofprospective development. The three Joans of the fourteenth century werebut eighty years in advance of the Joan of Arc of the fifteenth; and theknights of Charles V. , Du Guesclin and De Clisson, were the forerunnersof the Bayard of Francis I. 

An incident which has retained its popularity in French history, to wit, the fight between thirty Bretons and thirty English during the just nowcommemorated war in Brittany, will give a better idea than any generalobservations could of the real, living characteristics of facts andmanners, barbaric and at the same time chivalric, at that period. Noapology is needed for here reproducing the chief details as they havebeen related by Froissart, the dramatic chronicler of the middle ages. 

In 1351, "it happened on a day that Sir Robert de Beaumanoir, a valiantknight and commandant of the castle which is called Castle Josselin, camebefore the town and castle of Ploermel, whereof the captain, calledBrandebourg [or Brembro, probably Bremborough], had with him a plenty ofsoldiers of the Countess of Montfort. 'Brandebourg, ' said Robert, 'haveye within there never a man-at-arms, or two or three, who would faincross swords with other three for love of their ladies?' Brandebourganswered that their ladies would not have them lose their lives in somiserable an affair as single combat, whereby one gained the name of foolrather than honorable renown. 'I will tell you what we will do, if itplease you. You shall take twenty or thirty of your comrades, as I willtake as many of ours. We will go out into a goodly field where none canhinder or vex us, and there will we do so much that men shall speakthereof in time to come in hall, and palace, and highway, and otherplaces of the world. ' 'By my faith, ' said Beaumanoir, 'tis bravely said, and I agree: be ye thirty, and we will be thirty, too. ' And thus thematter was settled. When the day had come, the thirty comrades ofBrandebourg, whom we shall call English, heard mass, then got on theirarms, went off to the place where the battle was to be, dismounted, andwaited a long while for the others, whom we shall call French. When thethirty French had come, and they were in front one of another, theyparleyed a little together, all the sixty; then they fell back, and madeall their fellows go far away from the place. Then one of them made asign, and forthwith they set on and fought stoutly all in a heap, andthey aided one another handsomely when they saw their comrades in evilcase. Pretty soon after they had come together, one of the French wasslain, but the rest did not slacken the fight one whit, and they borethemselves as valiantly all as if they had all been Rolands and Olivers. At last they were forced to stop, and they rested by common accord, giving themselves truce until they should be rested, and the first to getup again should recall the others. They rested long, and there were somewho drank wine which was brought to them in bottles. They rebuckledtheir armor, which had got undone, and dressed their wounds. Four Frenchand two English were dead already. "

It was no doubt during this interval that the captain of the Bretons, Robert de Beaumanoir, grievously wounded and dying of fatigue and thirst, cried out for a drink. "Drink thy blood, Beaumanoir, " said one of hiscomrades, Geoffrey de Bois, according to some accounts, and Sire deTinteniac, according to others. From that day those words became thewar-cry of the Beaumanoirs. Froissart says nothing of this incident. Let us return to his narrative. 

"When they were refreshed, the first to get up again made a sign, andrecalled the others. Then the battle recommenced as stoutly as before, and lasted a long while. They had short swords of Bordeaux, tough andsharp, and boar-spears and daggers, and some had axes, and therewith theydealt one another marvellously great dings, and some seized one anotherby the arms a-struggling, and they struck one another, and spared not. At last the English had the worst of it; Brandebourg, their captain, wasslain, with eight of his comrades, and the rest yielded themselvesprisoners when they saw that they could no longer defend themselves, forthey could not and must not fly. Sir Robert de Beaumanoir and hiscomrades, who remained alive, took them and carried them off to CastleJosselin as their prisoners; and then admitted them to ransom courteouslywhen they were all cured, for there was none that was not grievouslywounded, French as well as English. I saw afterwards, sitting at thetable of King Charles of France, a Breton knight who had been in it, SirYvon Charnel, and he had a face so carved and cut that he showed fullwell how good a fight had been fought. The matter was talked of in manyplaces, and some set it down as a very poor, and others as a veryswaggering business. "

The most modern and most judicious historian of Brittany, Count Daru, who has left a name as honorable in literature as in the higheradministration of the First Empire, says, very truly, in recounting thisincident, "It is not quite certain whether this was an act of patriotismor of chivalry. " He might have gone farther, and discovered in thisexploit not only the characteristics he points out, but many othersbesides. Local patriotism, the honor of Brittany, party spirit, thesuccess of John of Montfort or Charles of Blois, the sentiment ofgallantry, the glorification of the most beautiful one amongst theirlady-loves, and, chiefly, the passion for war amongst all and sundry--there was something of all this mixed up with the battle of the Thirty, a faithful reflex of the complication and confusion of minds, of morals, and of wants at that forceful period. It is this very variety of theideas, feelings, interests, motives, and motive tendencies involved inthat incident which accounts for the fact that the battle of the Thirtyhas remained so vividly remembered, and that in 1811 a monument, unpretentious but national, replaced the simple stone at first erected onthe field of battle, on the edge of the road from P1o6rmel to Josselin, with this inscription: "To the immortal memory of the battle of theThirty, gained by Marshal Beaumanoir, on the 26th of March, 1350 (1351). "

With some fondness, and at some length, this portion of Brittany'shistory in the fourteenth century has been dwelt upon, not only becauseof the dramatic interest attaching to the events and the actors, but alsofor the sake of showing, by that example, how many separate associations, diverse and often hostile, were at that time developing themselves, eachon its own account, in that extensive and beautiful country which becameFrance. We will now return to Philip of Valois and Edward III. , and tothe struggle between them for a settlement of the question whether Franceshould or should not preserve its own independent kingship, and thatnational unity of which she already had the name, but of which she wasstill to undergo so much painful travail in acquiring the reality. 

Although Edward III. By supporting with troops and officers, andsometimes even in person, the cause of the Countess of Montfort, andPhilip of Valois by assisting in the same way Charles of Blois and Joanof Penthievre, took a very active, if indirect, share in the war inBrittany, the two kings persisted in not calling themselves at war; andwhen either of them proceeded to acts of unquestionable hostility, theyeluded the consequences of them by hastily concluding truces incessantlyviolated and as incessantly renewed. They had made use of this expedientin 1340; and they had recourse to it again in 1342, 1343, and 1344. Thelast of these truces was to have lasted up to 1346; but, in the spring of1345, Edward resolved to put an end to this equivocal position, and toopenly recommence war. He announced his intention to Pope Clement IV. , to his own lieutenants in Brittany, and to all the cities andcorporations of his kingdom. He accused Philip of having "violated, without even sending us a challenge, the truce which, out of regard tothe sovereign pontiff, we had agreed upon with him, and which he hadtaken an oath, upon his soul, to keep. On account whereof we haveresolved to proceed against him, him and all his adherents, by land andsea, by all means possible, in order to recover our just rights. " It isnot quite clear what pressing reasons urged Edward to this decisiveresolution. The English Parliament and people, it is true, showed moredisposition to support their king in his pretensions to the throne ofFrance, and the cause of the Count of Montfort was maintaining itselfstubbornly in Brittany, but nothing seemed to call for so startling arupture, or to promise Edward any speedy and successful issue. He hadlost his most energetic and warlike adviser; for Robert d'Artois, thedeadly enemy of Philip of Valois, had been so desperately wounded in thedefence of Vannes against Robert de Beaumanoir, that he had returned toEngland only to die. Edward felt this loss severely, gave Robert asplendid funeral in St. Paul's church, and declared that "he would listento nought until he had avenged him, and that he would reduce the countryof Brittany to such plight that, for forty years, it should not recover. "Philip of Valois, on his side, gave signs of getting ready for war. In1343 he had convoked at Paris one of those assemblies which werebeginning to be called the states-general of the kingdom, and he obtainedfrom it certain subventions. It was likewise in 1343 and at thebeginning of 1344, that he ordered the arrest, at a tournament to whichhe had invited them, and the decapitation, without any form of trial, offourteen Breton and three Norman lords whom he suspected of intriguingagainst him with the King of England. And so Edward might haveconsidered himself threatened with imminent peril; and, besides, he hadfriends to avenge. But it is not unreasonable to suppose that his fieryambition, and his impatience to decide, once for all, that question ofthe French kingship which had been for five years in suspense betweenhimself and his rival, were the true causes of his warlike resolve. However that may be, he determined to push the war vigorously forward atthe three points at which he could easily wage it. In Brittany he had aparty already engaged in the struggle; in Aquitaine, possessions ofimportance to defend or recover; in Flanders, allies with power to backhim, and as angry as he himself. To Brittany he forwarded fresh suppliesfor the Count of Montfort; to Aquitaine he sent Henry of Lancaster, Earlof Derby, his own cousin, and the ablest of his lieutenants; and hehimself prepared to cross over with a large army to Flanders. 

The Earl of Derby met with solid and brilliant success in Aquitaine. He attacked and took in rapid succession Bergerac, La Reole, Aiguillon, Montpezat, Villefranche, and Angouleme. None of those places wasrelieved in time; the strict discipline of Derby's troops and the skillof the English archers were too much for the bravery of the men-at-arms, and the raw levies, ill organized and ill paid, of the King of France;and, in a word, the English were soon masters of almost the whole countrybetween the Garonne and the Charente. Under such happy auspices EdwardIII. Arrived on the 7th of July, 1345, at the port of Ecluse (Sluys), anxious to put himself in concert with the Flemings touching the campaignhe proposed to commence before long in the north of France. Artevelde, with the consuls of Bruges and Ypres, was awaiting him there. Accordingto some historians, Edward invited them aboard of his galley, andrepresented to them that the time had come for renouncing imperfectresolves and half-measures; told them that their count, Louis ofFlanders, and his ancestors, had always ignored and attacked theirliberties, and that the best thing they could do would be to sever theirconnection with a house they could not trust; and offered them for theirchieftain his own son, the young Prince of Wales, to whom he would givethe title of Duke of Flanders. According to other historians, it was notKing Edward, but Artevelde himself, who took the initiative in thisproposition. The latter had for some time past felt his own dominion inFlanders attacked and shaken; and he had been confronted, in his ownnative city, by declared enemies, who had all but come to blows with hisown partisans. The different industrial corporations of Ghent were nolonger at one amongst themselves; the weavers had quarrelled with thefullers. Division was likewise reaching a great height amongst theFlemish towns. The burghers of Poperinghe had refused to continuerecognizing the privileges of those of Ypres; and the Ypres men, enraged, had taken up arms, and, after a sanguinary melley, had forced the folksof Poperinghe to give in. Then the Ypres men, proud of their triumph, had gone and broken the weavers' machinery at Bailleul, and in some othertowns. Artevelde, constrained to take part in these petty civil wars, had been led on to greater and greater abuse, in his own city itself, of his municipal despotism, already grown hateful to many of his fellow-citizens. Whether he himself proposed to shake off the yoke of CountLouis of Flanders, and take for duke the Prince of Wales, or merelyaccepted King Edward's proposal, he set resolutely to work to get itcarried. The most able men, swayed by their own passions and the growingnecessities of the struggle in which they may be engaged, soon forgettheir first intentions, and ignore their new perils. The consuls ofBruges and Ypres, present with Artevelde at his interview with KingEdward in the port of Ecluse (Sluys), answered that "they could notdecide so great a matter unless the whole community of Flanders shouldagree thereto, " and so returned to their cities. Artevelde followed themthither, and succeeded in getting the proposed resolution adopted by thepeople of Ypres and Bruges. But when he returned to Ghent, on the 24thof July, 1345, "those in the city who knew of his coming, " saysFroissart, "had assembled in the street whereby he must ride to hishostel. So soon as they saw him they began to mutter, saying, 'Theregoes he who is too much master, and would fain do with the countship ofFlanders according to his own will; which cannot be borne. ' It had, besides this, been spread about the city that James Van Artevelde hadsecretly sent to England the great treasure of Flanders, which he hadbeen collecting for the space of the nine years and more during which hehad held the government. This was a matter which did greatly vex andincense them of Ghent. As James Van Artevelde rode along the street, hesoon perceived that there was something fresh against him, for those whowere wont to bow down and take off their caps to him turned him a coldshoulder, and went back into their houses. Then he began to be afraid;and so soon as he had dismounted at his house, he had all the doors andwindows shut and barred. Scarcely had his varlets done so, when thestreet in which he lived was covered, front and back, with folk, andchiefly small crafts-folk. His hostel was surrounded and beset, frontand back, and broken into by force. Those within defended themselves along while, and overthrew and wounded many; but at last they could nothold out, for they were so closely assailed that nearly three quarters ofthe city were at this assault. When Artevelde saw the efforts a-making, and how hotly he was pressed, he came to a window over the street, andbegan to abase himself, and say with much fine language, 'Good folks, what want ye? What is it that doth move ye? Wherefore are ye so vexedat me? In what way can I have angered ye? Tell me, and I will mend itaccording to your wishes. ' Then all those who had heard him answeredwith one voice, 'We would have an account of the great treasure ofFlanders, which you have sent to England without right or reason. 'Artevelde answered full softly, 'Of a surety, sirs, I have never taken adenier from the treasury of Flanders; go ye back quietly home, I prayyou, and come again to-morrow morning; I shall be so well prepared torender you a good account, that, according to reason, it cannot butcontent ye. ' 'Nay, nay, ' they answered, with one voice, 'but we wouldhave it at once; you shall not escape us so; we do know of a verity thatyou have taken it out and sent it away to England, without our wit; forwhich cause you must needs die. ' When Artevelde heard this word, hebegan to weep right piteously, and said, 'Sirs, ye have made me what Iam, and ye did swear to me aforetime that ye would guard and defend meagainst all men; and now ye would kill me, and without a cause. Ye cando so an if it please you, for I am but one single man against ye all, without any defence. Think hereon, for God's sake, and look back tobygone times. Consider the great courtesies and services that I havedone ye. Know ye not how all trade had perished in this country? It wasI who raised it up again. Afterwards I governed ye in peace so great, that, during the time of my government, ye have had everything to yourwish, grains, wools, and all sorts of merchandise, wherewith ye are wellprovided and in good case. ' Then they began to shout, 'Come down, andpreach not to us from such a height; we would have account and reckoningof the great treasure of Flanders which you have too long had undercontrol without rendering an account, which it appertaineth not to anyofficer to do. ' When Artevelde saw that they would not cool down, andwould not restrain themselves, he closed the window, and bethought himthat he would escape by the back, and get him gone to a church adjoininghis hostel; but his hostel was already burst open and broken into behind, and there were more than four hundred persons who were all anxious toseize him. At last he was caught amongst them, and killed on the spotwithout mercy. A weaver, called Thomas Denis, gave him his death-blow. This was the end of Artevelde, who in his time was so great a master inFlanders. Poor folk exalted him at first, and wicked folk slew him atthe last. "

[Illustration: Statue of James Van Artevelde----296]

It was a great loss for King Edward. Under Van Artevelde's bolddominance, and in consequence of his alliance with England, the warlikerenown of Flanders had made some noise in Europe, to such an extent thatPetrarch exclaimed, "List to the sounds, still indistinct, that reach usfrom the world of the West; Flanders is plunged in ceaseless war; all thecountry stretching from the restless Ocean to the Latin Alps is rushingforth to arms. Would to Heaven that there might come to us some gleamsof salvation from thence! O Italy, poor father-land, thou prey tosufferings without relief, thou who wast wont with thy deeds of arms totrouble the peace of the world, now art thou motionless when the fate ofthe world hangs on the chances of battle! "The Flemings spared no effortto re-assure the King of England. Their envoys went to Westminster todeplore the murder of Van Artevelde, and tried to persuade Edward thathis policy would be perpetuated throughout their cities, and "to suchpurpose, " says Froissart, "that in the end the king was fairly contentwith the Flemings, and they with him, and, between them, the death ofJames Van Artevelde was little by little forgotten. " Edward, however, was so much affected by it that he required a whole year before he couldresume with any confidence his projects of war; and it was not until the2d of July, 1346, that he embarked at Southampton, taking with him, besides his son, the Prince of Wales, hardly sixteen years of age, anarmy which comprised, according to Froissart, seven earls, more thanthirty-five barons, a great number of knights, four thousand men-at-arms, ten thousand English archers, six thousand Irish, and twelve thousandWelsh infantry, in all something more than thirty-two thousand men, troops even more formidable for their discipline and experience of warthan for their numbers. When they were out at sea none knew, not eventhe king himself, for what point of the Continent they were to make, forthe south or the north, for Aquitaine or Normandy. "Sir, " said Godfreyd'Harcourt, who had become one of the king's most trusted counsellors, "the country of Normandy is one of the fattest in the world, and Ipromise you, at the risk of my head, that if you put in there you shalltake possession of land at your good pleasure, for the folk there neverwere armed, and all the flower of their chivalry is now at Aiguillon withtheir duke; for certain, we shall find there gold, silver, victual, andall other good things in great abundance. " Edward adopted this advice;and on the 12th of July, 1346, his fleet anchored before the peninsula ofCotentin, at Cape La Hogue. Whilst disembarking, at the very first stephe made on shore, the king fell "so roughly, " says Froissart, "that bloodspurted from his nose. 'Sir, ' said his knights to him, 'go back to yourship, and come not now to land, for here is an ill sign for you. ' 'Nay, verily, ' quoth the king, full roundly, 'it is a right good sign for me, since the land doth desire me. '" Caesar did and said much the same ondisembarking in Africa, and William the Conqueror on landing in England. In spite of contemporary accounts, there is a doubt about theauthenticity of these striking expressions, which become favorites, and crop up again on all similar occasions. 

For a month Edward marched his army over Normandy, "finding on his road, "says Froissart, "the country fat and plenteous in everything, the garnersfull of corn, the houses full of all manner of riches, carriages, wagonsand horses, swine, ewes, wethers, and the finest oxen in the world. " Hetook and plundered on his way Barfleur, Cherbourg, Valognes, Carentan, and St. Lo. When, on the 26th of July, he arrived before Caen, "a citybigger than any in England save London, and full of all kinds ofmerchandise, of rich burghers, of noble dames, and of fine churches, " thepopulation attempted to resist. Philip had sent to them the constable, Raoul d'Eu, and the Count of Tancarville; but, after three days of pettyfighting around the city and even in the streets themselves, Edwardbecame master of it, and on the entreaty, it is said, of Godfreyd'Hareourt, exempted it from pillage. Continuing his march, he occupiedLouviers, Vernon, Verneuil, Mantes, Meulan, and Poissy, where he took uphis quarters in the old residence of King Robert; and thence his troopsadvanced and spread themselves as far as Ruel, Neuilly, Boulogne, St. Cloud, Bourg-la-Reine, and almost to the gates of Paris, whence could beseen "the fire and smoke from burning villages. " "We ourselves, " says acontemporary chronicler, "saw these things; and it was a great dishonorthat in the midst of the kingdom of France the King of England shouldsquander, spoil, and consume the king's wines and other goods. " Greatwas the consternation at Paris. And it was redoubled when Philip gaveorders for the demolition of the houses built along by the walls ofcircumvallation, on the ground that they embarrassed the defence. Thepeople believed that they were on the eve of a siege. The order wasrevoked; but the feeling became even more intense when it was known thatthe king was getting ready to start for St. Denis, where his principalallies, the King of Bohemia, the Dukes of Hainault and of Lorraine, theCounts of Flanders and of Blois, "and a very great array of baronry andchivalry, " were already assembled. "Ah! dear sir and noble king, " criedthe burghers of Paris as they came to Philip and threw themselves ontheir knees before him, "what would you do? Would you thus leave yourgood city of Paris? Your enemies are already within two leagues, andwill soon be in our city when they know that you are gone; and we haveand shall have none to defend us against them. Sir, may it please you toremain and watch over your good city. " "My good people, " answered theking, "have ye no fear; the English shall come no nigher to you; I amaway to St. Denis to my men-at-arms, for I mean to ride against theseEnglish, and fight them, in such fashion as I may. " Philip recalled inall haste his troops from Aquitaine, commanded the burgher-forces toassemble, and gave them, as he had given all his allies, St. Denis forthe rallying-point. At sight of so many great lords and all sorts of menof war flocking together from all points, the Parisians took freshcourage. "For many a long day there had not been seen at St. Denis aking of France in arms and fully prepared for battle. "

Edward began to be afraid of having pushed too far forward, and offinding himself endangered in the heart of France, confronted by an armywhich would soon be stronger than his own. Some chronicles say thatPhilip, in his turn, sent a challenge either for single combat or for abattle on a fixed day, in a place assigned, and that Edward, in his turnalso, declined the proposition he had but lately made to his rival. Itappears, further, that at the moment of commencing his retreat away fromParis, he tried ringing the changes on Philip with respect to the line heintended to take, and that Philip was led to believe that the Englisharmy would fall back in a westerly direction, by Orleans and Tours, whereas it marched northward, where Edward flattered himself he wouldfind partisans, counting especially on the help of the Flemings, who, infulfilment of their promise, had already advanced as far as Bethune tosupport him. Philip was soon better informed, and moved with all hisarmy into Picardy in pursuit of the English army, which was in a hurry toreach and cross the Somme, and so continue its march northward. It wasmore than once forced to fight on its march with the people of the townsand country through which it was passing; provisions were beginning tofall short; and Edward sent his two marshals, the Earl of Warwick andGodfrey d'Harcourt, to discover where it was practicable to cross theriver, which, at this season of the year and so near its mouth, was bothbroad and deep. They returned without having any satisfactoryinformation to report; "whereupon, " says Froissart, "the king was notmore joyous or less pensive, and began to fall into a great melancholy. "He had halted three or four days at Airaines, some few leagues fromAmiens, whither the King of France had arrived in pursuit with an army, it is said, more than a hundred thousand strong. Philip learned throughhis scouts that the King of England would evacuate Airaines the nextmorning, and ride to Abbeville in hopes of finding some means of gettingover the Somme. Philip immediately ordered a Norman baron, Godemar duFay, to go with a body of troops and guard the ford of Blanche-Tache, below Abbeville, the only point at which, it was said, the English couldcross the river; and on the same day he himself moved with the bulk ofhis army from Amiens on Airaines. There he arrived about midday, somefew hours after that the King of England had departed with suchprecipitation that the French found in it "great store of provisions, meat ready spitted, bread and pastry in the oven, wines in barrel, andmany tables which the English had left ready set and laid out. " "Sir, "said Philip's officers to him, as soon as he was at Airaines, "rest youhere and wait for your barons and their folk, for the English cannotescape you. " It was concluded, in point of fact, that Edward and histroops, not being able to cross the Somme, would find themselves hemmedin between the French army and the strong places of Abbeville, St. Valery, and Le Crotoi, in the most evil case and perilous positionpossible. But Edward, on arriving at the little town of Oisemont, hardby the Somme, set out in person in quest of the ford he was so anxious todiscover. He sent for some prisoners he had made in the country, andsaid to them, "right courteously, " according to Froissart, "'Is therehere any man who knows of a passage below Abbeville, where-by we and ourarmy might cross the river without peril?' And a varlet from aneighboring mill, whose name history has preserved as that of a traitor, Gobin Agace, said to the king, 'Sir, I do promise you, at the risk of myhead, that I will guide you to such a spot, where you shall cross theRiver Somme without peril, you and your army. ' 'Comrade, ' said the kingto him, 'if I find true that which thou tellest us, I will set thee freefrom thy prison, thee and all thy fellows for love of thee, and I willcause to be given to thee a hundred golden nobles and a good stallion. '"The varlet had told the truth; the ford was found at the spot calledBlanche-Tache, whither Philip had sent Godemar du Fay with a few thousandmen to guard it. A battle took place; but the two marshals of England, "unfurling their banners in the name of God and St. George, and havingwith them the most valiant and best mounted, threw themselves into thewater at full gallop, and there, in the river, was done many a deed ofbattle, and many a man was laid low on one side and the other, for SirGodemar and his comrades did valiantly defend the passage; but at lastthe English got across, and moved forward into the fields as fast as everthey landed. When Sir Godemar saw the mishap, he made off as quickly ashe could, and so did a many of his comrades. " The King of France, whenhe heard the news, was very wroth, "for he had good hope of finding theEnglish on the Somme and fighting them there. 'What is it right to donow?' asked Philip of his marshals. 'Sir, ' answered they, 'you cannotnow cross in pursuit of the English, for the tide is already up. '"Philip went disconsolate to lie at Abbeville, whither all his menfollowed him. Had he been as watchful as Edward was, and had he, insteadof halting at Airaines "by the ready-set tables which the English hadleft, " marched at once in pursuit of them, perhaps he would have caughtand beaten them on the left bank of the Somme, before they could crossand take up position on the other side. This was the first strikinginstance of that extreme inequality between the two kings in point ofability and energy which was before long to produce results so fatal forPhilip. 

When Edward, after passing the Somme, had arrived near Crecy, fiveleagues from Abbeville, in the countship of Ponthieu which had formedpart of his mother Isabel's dowry, "'Halt we here, ' said he to hismarshals; 'I will go no farther till I have seen the enemy; I am on mymother's rightful inheritance which was given her on her marriage; I willdefend it against mine adversary, Philip of Valois;' and he rested in theopen fields, he and all his men, and made his marshals mark well theground where they would set their battle in array. " Philip, on his side, had moved to Abbeville, where all his men came and joined him, and whencehe sent out scouts "to learn the truth about the English. When he knewthat they were resting in the open fields near Crecy and showed that theywere awaiting their enemies, the King of France was very joyful, and saidthat, please God, they should fight him on the morrow [the day afterFriday, August 25, 1346]. He that day bade to supper all the high-bornprinces who were at Abbeville. They were all in great spirits and hadgreat talk of arms, and after supper the king prayed all the lords to beall of them, one toward another, friendly and courteous, without envy, hatred, and pride, and every one made him a promise thereof. On the sameday of Friday the King of England also gave a supper to the earls andbarons of his army, made them great cheer, and then sent them away torest, which they did. When all the company had gone, he entered into hisoratory, and fell on his knees before the altar, praying devoutly thatGod would permit him on the morrow, if he should fight, to come out ofthe business with honor; after which, about midnight, he went and laydown. On the morrow he rose pretty early, for good reason, heard masswith the Prince of Wales, his son, and both of them communicated. Themajority of his men confessed and put themselves in good ease. Aftermass the king commanded all to get on their arms and take their places inthe field according as he had assigned them the day before. " Edward haddivided his army into three bodies; he had put the first, forming thevan, under the orders of the young Prince of Wales, having about him thebest and most tried warriors; the second had for commanders earls andbarons in whom the king had confidence; and the third, the reserve, hecommanded in person. Having thus made his arrangements, Edward, mountedon a little palfrey, with a white staff in his hand and his marshals inhis train, rode at a foot-pace from rank to rank, exhorting all his men, officers and privates, to stoutly defend his right and do their duty; and"he said these words to them, " says Froissart, "with so bright a smileand so joyous a mien that whoso had before been disheartened feltreheartened on seeing and hearing him. " Having finished his ride, Edwardwent back to his own division, giving orders for all his folk to eattheir fill and drink one draught: which they did. "And then they satdown all of them on the ground, with their head-pieces and their bows infront of them, resting themselves in order to be more fresh and cool whenthe enemy should come. "

Philip also set himself in motion on Saturday, the 26th of August, and, after having heard mass, marched out from Abbeville with all his barons. "There was so great a throng of men-at-arms there, " says Froissart, "thatit were a marvel to think on, and the king rode mighty gently to wait forall his folk. " When they were two leagues from Abbeville, one of themthat were with him said, "Sir, it were well to put your lines in order ofbattle, and to send three or four of your knights to ride forward andobserve the enemy and in what condition they be. " So four knights pushedforward to within sight of the English, and, returning immediately to theking, whom they could not approach without breaking the host thatencompassed him, they said by the mouth of one of them, "Know, sir, thatthe English be halted, well and regularly, in three lines of battle, andshow no sign of meaning to fly, but await your coming. For my part, mycounsel is that you halt all your men, and rest them in the fieldsthroughout this day. Before the hindermost can come up, and before yourlines of battle are set in order, it will be late; your men will be tiredand in disarray; and you will find the enemy cool and fresh. To-morrowmorning you will be better able to dispose your men and determine in whatquarter it will be expedient to attack the enemy. Sure may you be thatthey will await you. " This counsel was well pleasing to the King ofFrance, and he commanded that thus it should be. "The two marshals rodeone to the front and the other to the rear with orders to the bannerets, 'Halt, banners, by command of the king, in the name of God and St. Denis!' At this order those who were foremost halted, but not those whowere hindermost, continuing to ride forward and saying that they wouldnot halt until they were as much to the front as the foremost were. Neither the king nor his marshals could get the mastery of their men, forthere was so goodly a number of great lords that each was minded to showhis own might. There was, besides, in the fields, so goodly a number ofcommon people that all the roads between Abbeville and Crecy were coveredwith them; and when these folk thought themselves near the enemy, theydrew their swords, shouting, 'Death! death!' And not a soul did theysee. "

"When the English saw the French approaching, they rose up in fine orderand ranged themselves in their lines of battle, that of the Prince ofWales right in front, and the Earls of Northampton and Arundel, whocommanded the second, took up their place on the wing, right orderly andall ready to support the prince, if need should be. Well, the lords, kings, dukes, counts, and barons of the French came not up all together, but one in front and another behind, without plan or orderliness. WhenKing Philip arrived at the spot where the English were thus halted, andsaw them, the blood boiled within him, for he hated them, and he said tohis marshals, 'Let our Genoese pass to the front and begin the battle, inthe name of God and St. Denis. ' There were there fifteen thousand ofthese said Genoese bowmen; but they were sore tired with going a-footthat day more than six leagues and fully armed, and they said to theircommanders that they were not prepared to do any great feat of battle. 'To be saddled with such a scum as this that fails you in the hour ofneed!' said the Duke d'Alencon on hearing those words. Whilst theGenoese were holding back, there fell from heaven a rain, heavy andthick, with thunder and lightning very mighty and terrible. Before long, however, the air began to clear and the sun to shine. The French had itright in their eyes and the English at their backs. When the Genoese hadrecovered themselves and got together, they advanced upon the Englishwith loud shouts, so as to strike dismay; but the English kept quitequiet, and showed no sign of it. Then the Genoese bent their cross-bowsand began to shoot. The English, making one step forward, let fly theirarrows, which came down so thick upon the Genoese that it looked like afall of snow. The Genoese, galled and discomfited, began to fall back. Between them and the main body of the French was a great hedge ofmen-at-arms who were watching their proceedings. When the King of Francesaw his bowmen thus in disorder he shouted to the men-at-arms, 'Up nowand slay all this scum, for it blocks our way and hinders us from gettingforward. '" Then the French, on every side, struck out at the Genoese, atwhom the English archers continued to shoot. 

"Thus began the battle between Broye and Crecy, at the hour of vespers. "The French, as they came up, were already tired and in great disorder:"howbeit so many valiant men and good knights kept ever riding forwardfor their honor's sake, and preferred rather to die than that a baseflight should be cast in their teeth. " A fierce combat took placebetween them and the division of the Prince of Wales. Thither penetratedthe Count d'Alenccon and the Count of Flanders with their followers, round the flank of the English archers; and the King of France, who wasfoaming with displeasure and wrath, rode forward to join his brotherD'Alencon, but there was so great a hedge of archers and men-at-armsmingled together that he could never get past. Thomas of Norwich, aknight serving under the Prince of Wales, was sent to the King of Englandto ask him for help. "'Sir Thomas, ' said the king, 'is my son dead orunhorsed, or so wounded that he cannot help himself?' 'Not so, my lord, please God; but he is fighting against great odds, and is like to haveneed of your help. ' 'Sir Thomas, ' replied the king, 'return to them whosent you, and tell them from me not to send for me, whatever chancebefall them, so long as my son is alive, and tell them that I bid themlet the lad win his spurs; for I wish, if God so deem, that the dayshould be his, and the honor thereof remain to him and to those to whom Ihave given him in charge. ' The knight returned with this answer to hischiefs; and it encouraged them greatly, and they repented withinthemselves for that they had sent him to the king. " Warlike ardor, ifnot ability and prudence, was the same on both sides. Philip's faithfulally, John of Luxembourg, King of Bohemia, had come thither, blind as hewas, with his son Charles and his knights; and when he knew that thebattle had begun he asked those who were near him how it was going on. "'My lord, ' they said, 'the Genoese are discomfited, and the king hasgiven orders to slay them all; and all the while between our folk andthem there is so great disorder that they stumble one over another andhinder us greatly. ' 'Ha!' said the king, 'that is an ill sign for us;where is Sir Charles, my son?' 'My lord, we know not; we have reason tobelieve that he is elsewhere in the fight. ' 'Sirs, ' replied the oldking, 'ye are my liegemen, my friends, and my comrades; I pray you andrequire you to lead me so far to the front in the work of this day that Imay strike a blow with my sword; it shall not be said that I came hitherto do nought. ' So his train, who loved his honor and their ownadvancement, " says Froissart, "did his bidding. For to acquit themselvesof their duty, and that they might not lose him in the throng, they tiedthemselves all together by the reins of their horses, and set the king, their lord, right in front, that he might the better accomplish hisdesire, and thus they bore down on the enemy. And the king went so farforward that he struck a good blow, yea, three and four; and so did allthose who were with him. And they served him so well and charged so wellforward upon the English, that all fell there and were found next day onthe spot around their lord, and their horses tied together. "

"The King of France, " continues Froissart, "had great anguish at heartwhen he saw his men thus discomfited and falling one after another beforea handful of folk as the English were. He asked counsel of Sir John ofHainault, who was near him and who said to him, 'Truly, sir, I can giveyou no better counsel than that you should withdraw and place yourself insafety, for I see no remedy here. It will soon be late; and then youwould be as likely to ride upon your enemies as amongst your friends, andso be lost. ' Late in the evening, at nightfall, King Philip left thefield with a heavy heart--and for good cause; he had just five baronswith him, and no more! He rode, quite broken-hearted, to the castle ofBroye. When he came to the gate, he found it shut and the bridge drawnup, for it was fully night, and was very dark and thick. The king hadthe castellan summoned, who came forward on the battlements and criedaloud, 'Who's there? who knocks at such an hour?' 'Open, castellan, 'said Philip; 'it is the unhappy King of France. ' The castellan went outas soon as he recognized the voice of the King of France; and he wellknew already that they had been discomfited, from some fugitives who hadpassed at the foot of the castle. He let down the bridge and opened thegate. Then the king, with his following, went in, and remained there upto midnight, for the king did not care to stay and shut himself uptherein. He drank a draught, and so did they who were with him; thenthey mounted to horse, took guides to conduct them, and rode in such wisethat at break of day they entered the good city of Amiens. There theking halted, took up his quarters in an abbey, and said that he would gono farther until he knew the truth about his men, which of them were lefton the field and which had escaped. "

Whilst Philip, with all speed, was on the road back to Paris with hisarmy as disheartened as its king, and more disorderly in retreat than ithad been in battle, Edward was hastening, with ardor and intelligence, toreap the fruits of his victory. In the difficult war of conquest he hadundertaken, what was clearly of most importance to him was to possess onthe coast of France, as near as possible to England, a place which hemight make, in his operations by land and sea, a point of arrival anddeparture, of occupancy, of provisioning, and of secure refuge. Calaisexactly fulfilled these conditions. It was a natural harbor, protected, for many centuries past, by two huge towers, of which one, it is said, was built by the Emperor Caligula and the other by Charlemagne; it hadbeen deepened and improved, at the end of the tenth century, by BaldwinIV. , Count of Flanders, and in the thirteenth by Philip of France, calledToughskin (Hurepel), Count of Boulogne; and, in the fourteenth, it hadbecome an important city, surrounded by a strong wall of circumvallation, and having erected in its midst a huge keep, furnished with bastions andtowers, which was called the Castle. On arriving before the place, September 3, 1346, Edward "immediately had built all round it, " saysFroissart, "houses and dwelling-places of solid carpentry, and arrangedin streets as if he were to remain there for ten or twelve years, for hisintention was not to leave it winter or summer, whatever time andwhatever trouble he must spend and take. He called this new townVilleneuve la Hardie; and he had therein all things necessary for anarmy, and more too, as a place appointed for the holding of a market onWednesday and Saturday; and therein were mercers' shops, and butchers'shops, and stores for the sale of cloth, and bread, and all othernecessaries. King Edward did not have the city of Calais assaulted byhis men, well knowing that he would lose his pains, but said he wouldstarve it out, however long a time it might cost him, if King Philip ofFrance did not come to fight him again, and raise the siege. "

Calais had for its governor John de Vienne, a valiant and faithfulBurgundian knight, "the which, seeing, " says Froissart, "that the King ofEngland was making every sacrifice to keep up the siege, ordered that allsorts of small folk, who had no provisions, should quit the city withoutfurther notice. They went forth on a Wednesday morning, men, women, andchildren, more than seventeen hundred of them, and passed through KingEdward's army. They were asked why they were leaving; and they answered, because they had no means of living. Then the king permitted them topass, and caused to be given to all of them, male and female, a heartydinner, and after dinner two shillings apiece, the which grace wascommended as very handsome; and so indeed it was. " Edward probably hopedthat his generosity would produce, in the town itself which remained in astate of siege, a favorable impression; but he had to do with apopulation ardently warlike and patriotic, burghers as well as knights. They endured for eleven months all the sufferings arising from isolationand famine; though, from time to time, fishermen and seamen in theirneighborhood, and amongst others two seamen of Abbeville, the names ofwhom have been preserved in history, Marant and Mestriel, succeeded ingetting victuals in to them. The King of France made two attempts torelieve them. On the 20th of May, 1347, he assembled his troops atAmiens; but they were not ready to march till about the middle of July, and as long before as the 23d of June a French fleet of ten galleys andthirty-five trans-ports had been driven off by the English. John deVienne wrote to Philip, "Everything has been eaten, cats, dogs, andhorses, and we can no longer find victual in the town unless we eat humanflesh. . . . If we have not speedy succor, we will issue forth fromthe town to fight, whether to live or die, for we would rather diehonorably in the field than eat one another. . . . If a remedy be notsoon applied, you will never more have letter from me, and the town willbe lost as well as we who are in it. May our Lord grant you a happy lifeand a long, and put you in such a disposition that, if we die for yoursake, you may settle the account therefor with our heirs!" On the 27thof July Philip arrived in person before Calais. If Froissart can betrusted, "he had with him full two hundred thousand men, and these Frenchrode up with banners flying as if to fight, and it was a fine sight tosee such puissant array; and so, when they of Calais who were on thewalls saw them appear and their banners floating on the breeze, they hadgreat joy, and believed that they were going to be soon delivered! Butwhen they saw camping and tenting going forward they were more angeredthan before, for it seemed to them an evil sign. " The marshals of Francewent about everywhere looking for a passage, and they reported that itwas nowhere possible to open a road without exposing the army to loss, so well all the approaches to the place, by sea and land, were guarded bythe English. The pope's two legates, who had accompanied King Philip, tried in vain to open negotiations. Philip sent four knights to the Kingof England to urge him to appoint a place where a battle might be foughtwithout advantage on either side; but, "Sirs, " answered Edward, "I havebeen here nigh upon a year, and have been at heavy charges by it; andhaving done so much that before long I shall be master of Calais. I willby no means retard my conquest which I have so much desired. Let mineadversary and his people find out a way, as they please, to fight me. "

Other testimony would have us believe that Edward accepted Philip'schallenge, and that it was the King of France who raised freshdifficulties in consequence of which the proposed battle did not takeplace. Froissart's account, however, seems the more truth-like initself, and more in accordance with the totality of facts. However thatmay be, whether it were actual powerlessness or want of spirit both onthe part of the French army and of the king, Philip, on the 2d of August, 1347, took the road back to Amiens, and dismissed all those who had gonewith him, men-at-arms and common folk. 

When the people of Calais saw that all hope of a rescue had slipped fromthem, they held a council, resigned themselves to offer submission to theKing of England rather than die of hunger, and begged their governor, John de Vienne, to enter into negotiations for that purpose with thebesiegers. Walter de Manny, instructed by Edward to reply to theseovertures, said to John de Vienne, "The king's intent is, that ye putyourselves at his free will to ransom or put to death such as it shallplease him; the people of Calais have caused him so great displeasure, cost him so much money, and lost him so many men, that it is notastonishing if that weighs heavily upon him. " "Sir Walter, " answeredJohn de Vienne, "it would be too hard a matter for us if we were toconsent to what you say. There are within here but a small number of usknights and squires who have loyally served our lord the King of Franceeven as you would serve yours in like case; but we would suffer greaterevils than ever men have had to endure rather than consent that themeanest 'prentice-boy or varlet of the town should have other evil thanthe greatest of us. We pray you be pleased to return to the King ofEngland, and pray him to have pity upon us; and you will do us courtesy. ""By my faith, " answered Walter de Manny, "I will do it willingly, SirJohn; and I would that, by God's help, the king might be pleased tolisten unto me. " And the brave English knight reported to the king theprayer of the French knights in Calais, saying, "My lord, Sir John deVienne told me that they were in very sore extremity and famine, butthat, rather than surrender all to your will, to live or die as it mightplease you, they would sell themselves so dearly as never did men-at-arms. " "I will not do otherwise than I have said, " answered the king. "My lord, " replied Walter, "you will perchance be wrong, for you willgive us a bad example; if you should be pleased to send us to defend anyof your fortresses, we should of a surety not go willingly if you havethese people put to death, for thus would they do to us in like case. "These words caused Edward to reflect; and the greater part of the Englishbarons came to the aid of Walter de Manny. "Sirs, " said the king, "Iwould not be all alone against you all. Go, Walter, to them of Calais, and say to the governor that the greatest grace they can find in my sightis that six of the most notable burghers come forth from their town, bare-headed, bare-footed, with ropes round their necks, and with the keysof the town and castle in their hands. With them I will do according tomy will, and the rest I will receive to mercy. " "My lord, " said Walter, "I will do it willingly. " He returned to Calais, where John de Viennewas awaiting him, and reported the king's decision. The governorimmediately left the ramparts, went to the market-place, and had the bellrung to assemble the people. At sound of the bell men and women camehurrying up hungering for news, as was natural for people so hard-pressedby famine that they could not hold out any longer. John de Vienne thenrepeated to them what he had just been told, adding that there was noother way, and that they would have to make short answer. On this theyall fell a-weeping and crying out so bitterly that no heart in the world, however hard, could have seen and heard them without pity. Even John deVienne shed tears. Then rose up to his feet the richest burgher of thetown, Eustace de St. Pierre, who, at the former council, had been forcapitulation. "Sir, " said he, "it would be great pity to leave thispeople to die, by famine or otherwise, when any remedy can be foundagainst it; and he who should keep them from such a mishap would findgreat favor in the eyes of our Lord. I have great hope to find favor inthe eyes of our Lord if I die to save this people; I would fain be thefirst herein, and I will willingly place myself in my shirt andbare-headed and with a rope round my neck, at the mercy of the King ofEngland. " At this speech, men and women cast themselves at the feet ofEustace de St. Pierre, weeping piteously. Another right-honorableburgher, who had great possessions and two beautiful damsels fordaughters, rose up and said that he would act comrade to Eustace de St. Pierre: his name was John d'Aire. Then, for the third, James de Vissant, a rich man in personalty and realty; then his brother Peter de Vissant;and then the fifth and sixth, of whom none has told the names. On the5th of August, 1347, these six burghers, thus apparelled, with cordsround their necks and each with a bunch of the keys of the city and ofthe castle, were conducted outside the gates by John de Vienne, who rodea small hackney, for he was in such ill plight that he could not goa-foot. He gave them up to Sir Walter, who was awaiting him, and said tohim, "As captain of Calais I deliver to you, with the consent of the poorpeople of the town, these six burghers, who are, I swear to you, the mosthonorable and notable in person, in fortune, and in ancestry, in the townof Calais. I pray you be pleased to pray the King of England that thesegood folks be not put to death. " "I know not, " answered De Manny, "whatmy lord the king may mean to do with them; but I promise you that I willdo mine ability. " When Sir Walter brought in the six burghers in thiscondition, King Edward was in his chamber with a great company of earls, barons, and knights. As soon as he heard that the folks of Calais werethere as he had ordered, he went out and stood in the open space beforehis hostel and all those lords with him; and even Queen Philippa ofEngland, who was with child, followed the king her lord. He gazed mostcruelly on those six poor men, for he had his heart possessed with somuch rage that at first he could not speak. When he spoke, he commandedthem to be straightway beheaded, All the barons and knights who werethere prayed him to show them mercy. "Gentle sir, " said Walter de Manny, "restrain your wrath; you have renown for gentleness and nobleness; bepleased to do nought whereby it may be diminished; if you have not pityon yonder folk, all others will say that it was great cruelty on yourpart to put to death these six honorable burghers, who of their own freewill have put themselves at your mercy to save the others. " The kinggnashed his teeth, saying, "Sir Walter, hold your peace; let them fetchhither my headsman; the people of Calais have been the death of so manyof my men that it is but meet that yon fellows die also. " Then, withgreat humility, the noble queen, who was very nigh her delivery, threwherself on her knees at the feet of the king, saying, "Ah gentle sir, if, as you know, I have asked nothing of you from the time that I crossed thesea in great peril, I pray you humbly that as a special boon, for thesake of Holy Mary's Son and for the love of me, you will please to havemercy on these six men. "

[Illustration: Queen Philippa at the Feet of the King----314]

The king did not speak at once, and fixed his eyes on the good dame hiswife, who was weeping piteously on her knees. She softened his sternheart, for he would have been loath to vex her in the state in which shewas; and he said to her, "Ha! dame, I had much rather you had beenelsewhere than here; but you pray me such prayers that I dare not refuseyou, and though it irks me much to do so, there! I give them up to you;do with them as you will. " "Thanks, hearty thanks, my lord, " said thegood queen. Then she rose up and raised up the six burghers, had theropes taken off their necks, and took them with her to her chamber, whereshe had fresh clothes and dinner brought to them. Afterwards she gavethem six nobles apiece, and had them led out of the host in all safety. 

Edward was choleric and stern in his choler, but judicious and politic. He had sense enough to comprehend the impressions exhibited around himand to take them into account. He had yielded to the free-spokenrepresentations of Walter de Manny and to the soft entreaties of hisroyal wife. When he was master of Calais he did not suffer himself to beunder any illusion as to the sentiments of the population he hadconquered, and, without excluding the French from the town, he took greatcare to mingle with them an English population. He had allowed a freepassage to the poor Calaisians driven out by famine; he now fetched fromLondon thirty-six burghers of position and three hundred others ofinferior condition, with their wives and children, and he granted to thetown thus depeopled and repeopled all such municipal and commercialprivileges as were likely to attract new inhabitants thither. But, atthe same time, he felt what renown and importance a devotion like that ofthe six burghers of Calais could not fail to confer upon such men, andnot only did he trouble himself to get them back to their own hearths, but on the 8th of October, 1347, two months after the surrender ofCalais, he gave Eustace de St. Pierre a considerable pension "on accountof the good services he was to render in the town by maintaining goodorder there, " and he re-instated him, him and his heirs, in possession ofthe properties that had belonged to him. Eustace, more concerned for theinterests of his own town than for those of France, and being more of aCalaisian burgher than a national patriot, showed no hesitation, for allthat appears, in accepting this new fashion of serving his native city, for which he had shown himself so ready to die. He lived four years as asubject of the King of England. At his death, which happened in 1351, his heirs declared themselves faithful subjects of the King of France, and Edward confiscated away from them the possessions he had restored totheir predecessor. Eustace de St. Pierre's cousin and comrade indevotion to their native town, John d'Aire, would not enter Calais again;his property was confiscated, and his house, the finest, it is said, inthe town, was given by King Edward to Queen Philippa, who showed no morehesitation in accepting it than Eustace in serving his new king. Long-lived delicacy of sentiment and conduct was rarer in those rough andrude times than heroic bursts of courage and devotion. 

Philip of Valois tried to afford some consolation and supply some remedyfor the misfortune of the Calaisians banished from their town. Hesecured to them exemption from certain imposts, no matter whither theyremoved, and the possession of all property and inheritances that mightfall to them, and he promised to confer upon them all vacant officeswhich it might suit them to fill. But it was not in his gift to repair. Even superficially and in appearance, the evils he had not known how toprevent or combat to any purpose. The outset of his reign had beenbrilliant and prosperous; but his victory at Cassel over the Flemingsbrought more cry than wool. He had vanity enough to flaunt it ratherthan wit enough to turn it to account. He was a prince of courts, andtournaments, and trips, and galas, whether regal or plebeian; he wasvolatile, imprudent, haughty, and yet frivolous, brave without ability, and despotic without anything to show for it. The battle of Crecy andthe loss of Calais were reverses from which he never even made a seriousattempt to recover; he hastily concluded with Edward a truce, twicerenewed, which served only to consolidate the victor's successes. Acalamity of European extent came as an addition to the distresses ofFrance. From 1347 to 1349 a frightful disease, brought from Egypt andSyria through the ports of Italy, and called the black plague or theplague of Florence, ravaged Western Europe, especially Provence andLanguedoc, where it carried off, they say, two thirds of the inhabitants. Machiavelli and Boccaccio have described with all the force of theirgenius the material and moral effects of this terrible plague. The courtof France suffered particularly from it, and the famous object ofPetrarch's tender sonnets, Laura de Noves, married to Hugh de Sade, fella victim to it at Avignon. When the epidemic had well nigh disappeared, the survivors, men and women, princes and subjects, returned passionatelyto their pleasures and their galas; to mortality, says a contemporarychronicler, succeeded a rage for marriage; and Philip of Valois himself, now fifty-eight years of age, took for his second wife Blanche ofNavarre, who was only eighteen. She was a sister of that young King ofNavarre, Charles II. , who was soon to get the name of Charles the Bad, and to become so dangerous an enemy for Philip's successors. Sevenmonths after his marriage, and on the 22d of August, 1350, Philip died atNogent-le-Roi in the Haute-Marne, strictly enjoining his son John tomaintain with vigor his well-ascertained right to the crown he wore, andleaving his people bowed down beneath a weight "of extortions so heavythat the like had never been seen in the kingdom of France. "

Only one happy event distinguished the close of this reign. As early as1343 Philip had treated, on a monetary basis, with Humbert II. , Count andDauphin of Vienness, for the cession of that beautiful province to thecrown of France after the death of the then possessor. Humbert, anadventurous and fantastic prince, plunged, in 1346, into a crusadeagainst the Turks, from which he returned in the following year withouthaving obtained any success. Tired of seeking adventures as well as ofreigning, he, on the 16th of July, 1349, before a solemn assembly held atLyons, abdicated his principality in favor of Prince Charles of France, grandson of Philip of Valois, and afterwards Charles V. The new dauphintook the oath, between the hands of the Bishop of Grenoble, to maintainthe liberties, franchises, and privileges of the Dauphiny; and theex-dauphin, after having taken holy orders and passed successivelythrough the Archbishopric of Rheims and the Bishopric of Paris, both ofwhich he found equally unpalatable, went to die at Clermont in Auvergne, in a convent belonging to the order of Dominicans, whose habit he haddonned. 

In the same year, on the 18th of April, 1349, Philip of Valois bought ofJayme of Arragon, the last king of Majorca, for one hundred and twentythousand golden crowns, the lordship and town of Montpellier, thus tryingto repair to some extent, for the kingdom of France, the losses he hadcaused it. 

[Illustration: John II. , called the Good----318]

His successor, John II. , called the Good, on no other ground than that hewas gay, prodigal, credulous, and devoted to his favorites, did nothingbut reproduce, with aggravations, the faults and reverses of his father. He had hardly become king when he witnessed the arrival in Paris of theConstable of France, Raoul, Count of Eu and of Guines, whom Edward III. Had made prisoner at Caen, and who, after five years' captivity, had justobtained, that is, purchased, his liberty. Raoul lost no time inhurrying to the side of the new king, by whom he believed himself to begreatly beloved. John, as soon as he perceived him, gave him a look, saying, "Count, come this way with me; I have to speak with you aside. ""Right willingly, my lord. " The king took him into an apartment, andshowing him a letter, asked, "Have you ever, count, seen this letteranywhere but here?" The constable appeared astounded and troubled. "Ah! wicked traitor, " said the king, "you have well deserved death, and, by my father's soul, it shall assuredly not miss you;" and he sent himforthwith to prison in the tower of the Louvre. "The lords and barons ofFrance were sadly astonished, " says Froissart, "for they held the countto be a good man and true, and they humbly prayed the king that he wouldbe pleased to say wherefore he had imprisoned their cousin, so gentle aknight, who had toiled so much and so much lost for him and for thekingdom. But the king would not say anything, save that he would neversleep so long as the Count of Guines was living; and he had him secretlybeheaded in the castle of the Louvre, whether rightly or wrongly; forwhich the king was greatly blamed, behind his back, by many of the baronsof high estate in the kingdom of France, and the dukes and counts of theborder. " Two months after this execution, John gave the office ofconstable and a large portion of Count Raoul's property to his favorite, Charles of Spain, a descendant of King Alphonso of Castille andnaturalized in France; and he added thereto before long some landsclaimed by the King of Navarre, Charles the Bad, a nickname which ateighteen years of age he had already received from his Navarresesubjects, but which had not prevented King John from giving him inmarriage his own daughter, Joan of France. From that moment a deephatred sprang up between the King of Navarre and the favorite. Thelatter was sometimes disquieted thereby. "Fear nought from my son ofNavarre, " said John; "he durst not vex you, for, if he did, he would haveno greater enemy than myself. " John did not yet know his son-in-law. Two years later, in 1354, his favorite, Charles of Spain, arrived atLaigle in Normandy. The King of Navarre, having notice thereof, instructed one of his agents, the Bastard de Mareuil, to go with a troopof men-at-arms and surprise him in that town; and he himself remainedoutside the walls, awaiting the result of his design. At break of day, he saw galloping up the Bastard de Mareuil, who shouted to him from afar, "'Tis done. " "What is done?" asked Charles. "He is dead, " answeredMareuil. King John's favorite had been surprised and massacred in hisbed. John burst out into threats; he swore he would have vengeance, andmade preparations for war against his son-in-law. But the King ofEngland promised his support to the King of Navarre. Charles the Bad wasa bold and able intriguer; he levied troops and won over allies amongstthe lords; dread of seeing the recommencement of a war with Englandgained ground; and amongst the people, and even in the king's council, there was a cry of "Peace with the King of Navarre!" John took frightand pretended to give up his ideas of vengeance; he received his son-in-law, who thanked him on bended knee. But the king gave him never a word. The King of Navarre, uneasy but bold as ever, continued his intrigues forobtaining partisans and for exciting troubles and enmities against theking. "I will have no master in France but myself, " said John to hisconfidant: "I shall have no joy so long as he is living. " His eldestson, the young Duke of Normandy, who was at a later period Charles V. , had contracted friendly relations with the King of Navarre. On the 16thof April, 1356, the two princes were together at a banquet in the castleof Rouen, as well as the Count d'Harcourt and some other lords. All on asudden King John, who had entered the castle by a postern with a troop ofmen-at-arms, strode abruptly into the hall, preceded by the MarshalArnoul d'Audenham, who held a naked sword in his hand, and said, "Letnone stir, whatever he may see, unless he wish to fall by this sword. "The king went up to the table; and all rose as if to do him reverence. John seized the King of Navarre roughly by the arm, and drew him towardshim, saying, "Get up, traitor; thou art not worthy to sit at my son'stable; by my father's soul I cannot think of meat or drink so long asthou art living. " A servant of the King of Navarre, to defend hismaster, drew his cutlass, and pointed it at the breast of the King ofFrance, who thrust him back, saying to his sergeants, "Take me thisfellow and his master too. " The King of Navarre dissolved in humbleprotestations and repentant speeches over the assassination of theConstable Charles of Spain. "Go, traitor, go, " answered John: "you willneed to learn good rede or some infamous trick to escape from me. " Theyoung Duke of Normandy had thrown himself at the feet of the king hisfather, crying, "Ah! my lord, for God's sake have mercy; you do medishonor; for what will be said of me, having prayed King Charles and hisbarons to dine with me, if you do treat me thus? It will be said that Ibetrayed them. " "Hold your peace, Charles, " answered his father: "youknow not all I know. " He gave orders for the instant removal of the Kingof Navarre, and afterwards of the Count d'Harcourt and three others ofthose present under arrest. "Rid us of these men, " said he to thecaptain of the Ribalds, forming the soldiers of his guard; and the fourprisoners were actually beheaded in the king's presence outside Rouen, ina field called the Field of Pardon. John was with great difficultyprevailed upon not to mete out the same measure to the King of Navarre, who was conducted first of all to Gaillard Castle, then to the tower ofthe Louvre, and then to the prison of the Chatelet: "and there, " saysFroissart, "they put him to all sorts of discomforts and fears, for everyday and every night they gave him to understand that his head would becut off at such and such an hour, or at such and such another he would bethrown into the Seine . . . Whereupon he spoke so finely and so softlyto his keepers that they who were so entreating him by the command of theKing of France had great pity on him. "

With such violence, such absence of all legal procedure, such a mixtureof deceptive indulgence and thoughtless brutality, did King John treathis son-in-law, his own daughter, some of his principal barons, theirrelations, their friends, and the people with whom they were in goodcredit. He compromised more and more seriously every day his own safetyand that of his successor, by vexing more and more, without destroying, his most dangerous enemy. He showed no greater prudence or ability inthe government of his kingdom. Always in want of money, because he spentit foolishly on galas or presents to his favorites, he had recourse, forthe purpose of procuring it, at one time to the very worst of allfinancial expedients, debasement of the coinage; at another, todisreputable imposts, such as the tax upon salt, and upon the sale of allkinds of merchandise. In the single year of 1352 the value of a silvermark varied sixteen times, from four livres ten sous to eighteen livres. To meet the requirements of his government and the greediness of hiscourtiers, John twice, in 1355 and 1356, convoked the states-general, tothe consideration of which we shall soon recur in detail, and which didnot refuse him their support; but John had not the wit either to makegood use of the powers with which he was furnished, or to inspire thestates-general with that confidence which alone could decide them uponcontinuing their gifts. And, nevertheless, King John's necessities weremore evident and more urgent than ever: war with England had begun again. 

The truth is that, in spite of the truce still existing, the English, since the accession of King John, had at several points resumedhostilities. The disorders and dissensions to which France was a prey, the presumptuous and hare-brained incapacity of her new king, were, forso ambitious and able a prince as Edward III. , very strong temptations. Nor did opportunities for attack, and chances of success, fail him anymore than temptations. He found in France, amongst the grandees of thekingdom, and even at the king's court, men disposed to desert the causeof the king and of France to serve a prince who had more capacity, andwho pretended to claim the crown of France as his lawful right. Thefeudal system lent itself to ambiguous questions and doubts ofconscience: a lord who had two suzerains, and who, rightly or wrongly, believed that he had cause of complaint against one of them, wasjustified in serving that one who could and would protect him. Personalinterest and subtle disputes soon make traitors; and Edward had theability to discover them and win them over. The alternate outbursts andweaknesses of John in the case of those whom he suspected; the snares helaid for them; the precipitancy and cruel violence with which he struckthem down, without form of trial, and almost with his own hand, forbidhistory to receive his suspicious and his forcible proceedings as anykind of proof; but amongst those whom he accused there were undoubtedlytraitors to the king and to France. There is one about whom there can beno doubt at all. As early as 1351, amidst all his embroilments and allhis reconciliations with his father-in-law, Charles the Bad, King ofNavarre, had concluded with Edward III. A secret treaty, whereby, inexchange for promises he received, he recognized his title as King ofFrance. In 1355 his treason burst forth. The King of Navarre, who hadgone for refuge to Avignon, under the protection of Pope Clement VI. , crossed France by English Aquitaine, and went and landed at Cherbourg, which he had an idea of throwing open to the King of England. He oncemore entered into communications with King John, once more obtainedforgiveness from him, and for a while appeared detached from his Englishalliance. But Edward III. Had openly resumed his hostile attitude; andhe demanded that Aquitaine and the courtship of Ponthieu, detached fromthe kingdom of France, should be ceded to him in full sovereignty, andthat Brittany should become all but independent. John haughtily rejectedthese pretensions, which were merely a pretext for recommencing war. Andit recommenced accordingly, and the King of Navarre resumed his course ofperfidy. He had lands and castles in Normandy, which John put undersequestration, and ordered the officers commanding in them to deliver upto him. Six of them, the commandants of the castles of Cherbourg andEvreux, amongst others, refused, believing, no doubt, that in betrayingFrance and her king, they were remaining faithful to their own lord. 

At several points in the kingdom, especially in the northernprovinces, the first fruits of the war were not favorable for the English. KingEdward, who had landed at Calais with a body of troops, made anunsuccessful campaign in Artois and Picardy, and was obliged to re-embarkfor England, falling back before King John, whom he had at one timeoffered and at another refused to meet and fight at a spot agreed upon. But in the south-west and south of France, in 1355 and 1356, the Princeof Wales, at the head of a small picked army, and with John Chandos forcomrade, victoriously overran Limousin, Perigord, Languedoc, Auvergne, Berry, and Poitou, ravaging the country and plundering the towns intowhich he could force an entrance, and the environs of those that defendedthemselves behind their walls. He met with scarcely any resistance, andhe was returning by way of Berry and Poitou back again to Bordeaux, whenhe heard that King John, starting from Normandy with a large army, wasadvancing to give him battle. John, in fact, with easy self-complacency, and somewhat proud of his petty successes against King Edward in Picardy, had been in a hurry to move against the Prince of Wales, in hopes offorcing him also to re-embark for England. He was at the head of fortyor fifty thousand men, with his four sons, twenty-six dukes or counts, and nearly all the baronage of France; and such was his confidence inthis noble army, that on crossing the Loire he dismissed the burgherforces, "which was madness in him and in those who advised him, " saideven his contemporaries. John, even more than his father Philip, was aking of courts, ever surrounded by his nobility, and caring little forhis people. Jealous of the order of the Garter, lately instituted byEdward III. In honor of the beautiful Countess of Salisbury, John hadcreated, in 1351, by way of following suit, a brotherhood called Our Ladyof the Noble House, or of the Star, the knights of which, to the numberof five hundred, had to swear, that if they were forced to recoil in abattle they would never yield to the enemy more than four acres ofground, and would be slain rather than retreat. John was destined tofind out before long that neither numbers nor bravery can supply theplace of prudence, ability, and discipline. When the two armies wereclose to one another, on the platform of Maupertuis, two leagues to thenorth of Poitiers, two legates from the pope came hurrying up from thattown, with instructions to negotiate peace between the Kings of France, England, and Navarre. John consented to an armistice of twenty-fourhours. The Prince of Wales, seeing himself cut off from Bordeaux byforces very much superior to his own, --for he had but eight or tenthousand men, --offered to restore to the King of France "all that he hadconquered this bout, both towns and castles, and all the prisoners thathe and his had taken, and to swear that, for seven whole years, he wouldbear arms no more against the King of France; "but King John and hiscouncil would not accept anything of the sort, saying that "the princeand a hundred of his knights must come and put themselves as prisoners inthe hands of the King of France. " Neither the Prince of Wales norChandos had any hesitation in rejecting such a demand: "God forbid, " saidChandos, "that we should go without a fight! If we be taken ordiscomfited by so many fine men-at-arms, and in so great a host, we shallincur no blame; and if the day be for us, and fortune be pleased toconsent thereto, we shall be the most honored folk in the world. " Thebattle took place on the 19th of September, 1356, in the morning. Thereis no occasion to give the details of it here, as was done but lately inthe case of Crecy; we should merely have to tell an almost perfectlysimilar story. The three battles which, from the fourteenth to thefifteenth century, were decisive as to the fate of France, to wit, Crecy, on the 26th of August, 1346; Poictiers, on the 19th of September, 1356;and Azincourt, on the 25th of October, 1415, considered as historicalevents, were all alike, offering a spectacle of the same faults and thesame reverses, brought about by the same causes. In all three, no matterwhat was the difference in date, place, and persons engaged, it was acase of undisciplined forces, without co-operation or order, andill-directed by their commanders, advancing, bravely and one afteranother, to get broken against a compact force, under strict command, andas docile as heroic. From the battle of Poictiers we will cull but thatglorious feat which was peculiar to it, and which might be called asunfortunate as glorious if the captivity of King John had been amisfortune for France. Nearly all his army had been beaten anddispersed; and three of his sons, with the eldest, Charles, Duke ofNormandy, at their head, had left the field of battle with the wreck ofthe divisions they commanded. John still remained there with the knightsof the Star, a band of faithful knights from Picardy, Burgundy, Normandy, and Poitou, his constable, the Duke of Artois, his standard-bearer, Geoffrey de Charny, and his youngest son Philip, a boy of fourteen, whoclung obstinately to his side, saying, every instant, "Father, wareright! Father, ware left!"

[Illustration: "Father, ware right! Father, ware left!"----326]

The king was surrounded by assailants, of whom some did and some did notknow him, and all of whom kept shouting, "Yield you! yield you! else youdie. " The banner of France fell at his side; for Geoffrey de Charny wasslain. Denis de Morbecque, a knight of St. Omer, made his way up to theking, and said to him, in good French, "Sir, sir, I pray you, yield!""To whom shall I yield me?" said John:where is my cousin, the Prince of Wales?" "Sir, yield you to me; I willbring you to him. " "Who are you?" "Denis de Morbecque, a knight ofArtois; I serve the King of England, not being able to live in thekingdom of France, for I have lost all I possessed there. " "I yield meto you, " said John: and he gave his glove to the knight, who led him away"in the midst of a great press, for every one was dragging the king, saying, 'I took him!' and he could not get forward, nor could my lordPhilip, his young son. . . . The king said to them all, Sirs, conductme courteously, and quarrel no more together about the taking of me, forI am rich and great enough to make every one of you rich. '" Hereupon, the two English marshals, the Earl of Warwick and the Earl of Suffolk, "seeing from afar this throng, gave spur to their steeds, and came up, asking, 'What is this yonder?' And answer was made to them, 'It is theKing of France who is taken, and more than ten knights and squires wouldfain have him. ' Then the two barons broke through the throng by dint oftheir horses, dismounted and bowed full low before the king, who was veryjoyful at their coming, for they saved him from great danger. " A verylittle while afterwards, the two marshals "entered the pavilion of thePrince of Wales, and made him a present of the King of France; the whichpresent the prince could not but take kindly as a great and noble one, and so truly he did, for he bowed full low before the king, and receivedhim as king, properly and discreetly, as he well knew how to do. . . . When evening came, the Prince of Wales gave a supper to the King ofFrance, and to my lord Philip, his son, and to the greater part of thebarons of France, who were prisoners. . . . And the prince would notsit at the king's table for all the king's entreaty, but waited as aserving-man at the king's table, bending the knee before him, and saying, 'Dear sir, be pleased not to put on so sad a countenance because it hathnot pleased God to consent this day to your wishes, for assuredly my lordand father will show you all the honor and friendship he shall be able, and he will come to terms with you so reasonably that ye shall remaingood friends forever. "

[Illustration: King John taken Prisoner----326]

Henceforth it was, fortunately, not on King John, or on peace or warbetween him and the King of England, that the fate of France depended. 

CHAPTER XXI. ----THE STATES--GENERAL OF THE FOURTEENTH CENTURY. 

Let us turn back a little, in order to understand the government andposition of King John before he engaged in the war which, so far as hewas concerned, ended with the battle of Poitiers and imprisonment inEngland. 

A valiant and loyal knight, but a frivolous, hare-brained, thoughtless, prodigal, and obstinate as well as impetuous prince, and even moreincapable than Philip of Valois in the practice of government, John, after having summoned at his accession, in 1351, a states-assemblyconcerning which we have no explicit information left to us, triedfor a space of four years to suffice in himself for all the perils, difficulties, and requirements of the situation he had found bequeathedto him by his father. For a space of four years, in order to get money, he debased the coinage, confiscated the goods and securities of foreignmerchants, and stopped payment of his debts; and he went through severalprovinces, treating with local councils or magistrates in order to obtainfrom them certain subsidies which he purchased by granting them newprivileges. He hoped by his institution of the order of the Star toresuscitate the chivalrous zeal of his nobility. All these means werevain or insufficient. The defeat of Crecy and the loss of Calais hadcaused discouragement in the kingdom and aroused many doubts as to theissue of the war with England. Defection and even treason broughttrouble into the court, the councils, and even the family of John. Toget the better of them he at one time heaped favors upon the men hefeared, at another he had them arrested, imprisoned, and even beheaded inhis presence. He gave his daughter Joan in marriage to Charles the Bad, King of Navarre, and, some few months afterwards, Charles himself, thereal or presumed head of all the traitors, was seized, thrown intoprison, and treated with extreme rigor, in spite of the supplications ofhis wife, who vigorously took the part of her husband against her father. After four years thus consumed in fruitless endeavors, by turns violentlyand feebly enforced, to reorganize an army and a treasury, and topurchase fidelity at any price or arbitrarily strike down treason, Johnwas obliged to recognize his powerlessness and to call to his aid theFrench nation, still so imperfectly formed, by convoking at Paris, forthe 30th of November, 1355, the states-general of _Langue d'oil_. Thatis, Northern France, separated by the Dordogne and the Garonne from_Langue d'oc, _ which had its own assembly distinct. Auvergne belonged to_Langue d'oil_. 

It is certain that neither this assembly nor the king who convoked it hadany clear and fixed idea of what they were meeting together to do. Thekingship was no longer competent for its own government and its ownperils; but it insisted none the less, in principle, on its own all butunregulated and unlimited power. The assembly did not claim for thecountry the right of self-government, but it had a strong leaven ofpatriotic sentiment, and at the same time was very much discontented withthe king's government: it had equally at heart the defence of Franceagainst England and against the abuses of the kingly power. There was nonotion of a social struggle and no systematic idea of politicalrevolution; a dangerous crisis and intolerable sufferings constrainedking and nation to come together in order to make an attempt at anunderstanding and at a mutual exchange of the supports and the reliefs ofwhich they were in need. 

On the 2d of December, 1355, the three orders, the clergy, the nobility, and the deputies from the towns assembled at Paris in the great hall ofthe Parliament. Peter de la Forest, Archbishop of Rouen and Chancellorof France, asked them in the king's name "to consult together aboutmaking him a subvention which should suffice for the expenses of thewar, " and the king offered to "make a sound and durable coinage. " Thetampering with the coinage was the most pressing of the grievances forwhich the three orders solicited a remedy. They declared that "they wereready to live and die with the king, and to put their bodies and whatthey had at his service;" and they demanded authority to deliberatetogether--which was granted them. John de Craon, Archbishop of Rheims;Walter de Brienne, Duke of Athens; and Stephen Marcel, provost of thetradesmen of Paris, were to report the result, as presidents, each of hisown order. The session of the states lasted not more than a week. Theyreplied to the king "that they would give him a subvention of thirtythousand men-at-arms every year, " and, for their pay, they voted animpost of fifty hundred thousand livres (five millions of livres), whichwas to be levied "on all folks, of whatever condition they might be, Church folks, nobles, or others, " and the gabel or tax on salt "over thewhole kingdom of France. " On separating, the states appointed beforehandtwo fresh sessions at which they would assemble, one, in the month ofMarch, to estimate the sufficiency of the impost, and to hear, on thatsubject, the report of the nine superintendents charged with theexecution of their decision; the other, in the month of Novemberfollowing, to examine into the condition of the kingdom. "

They assembled, in fact, on the 1st of March, and on the 8th of May, 1356[N. B. As the year at that time began with Easter, the 24th of April wasthe first day of the year 1356: the new style, however, is here in everycase adopted]; but they had not the satisfaction of finding theirauthority generally recognized and their patriotic purpose effectuallyaccomplished. The impost they had voted, notably the salt-tax, had metwith violent opposition. "When the news thereof reached Normandy, " saysFroissart, "the country was very much astounded at it, for they had notlearned to pay any such thing. The Count d'Harcourt told the folks ofRouen, where he was puissant, that they would be very serfs and verywicked if they agreed to this tax, and that, by God's help, it shouldnever be current in his country. " The King of Navarre used much the samelanguage in his countship of Evreux. At other spots the mischief wasstill more serious. Close to Paris itself, at Malun, payment wasperemptorily refused; and at Arras, on the 5th of March, 1356, "thecommonalty of the town, " says Froissart, "rose upon the rich burghers andslew fourteen of the most substantial, which was a pity and loss; and soit is when wicked folk have the upper hand of valiant men. However, thepeople of Arras paid for it afterwards, for the king sent thither hiscousin, my lord James of Bourbon, who gave orders to take all them bywhom the sedition had been caused, and, on the spot, had their heads cutoff. "

The states-general at their re-assembly on the 1st of March, 1356, admitted the feebleness of their authority and the insufficiency of theirpreceding votes for the purpose of aiding the king in the war. Theyabolished the salt-tax and the sales-duty, which had met with suchopposition; but, stanch in their patriotism and loyalty, they substitutedtherefor an income-tax, imposed on every sort of folk, nobles orburghers, ecclesiastical or lay, which was to be levied "not by the highjusticiers of the king, but by the folks of the three estatesthemselves. " The king's ordinance, dated the 12th of March, 1356, whichregulates the execution of these different measures, is (article 10) tothis import: "there shall be, in each city, three deputies, one for eachestate. These deputies shall appoint, in each parish, collectors, whoshall go into the houses to receive the declaration which the persons whodwell there shall make touching their property, their estate, and theirservants. When a declaration shall appear in conformity with truth, theyshall be content therewith; else they shall have him who has made it sentbefore the deputies of the city in the district whereof he dwells, andthe deputies shall cause him to take, on this subject, such oaths as theyshall think proper. . . . The collectors in the villages shall causeto be taken therein, in the presence of the pastor, suitable oaths on thesubject of the declarations. If, in the towns or villages, any onerefuse to take the oaths demanded, the collectors shall assess hisproperty according to general opinion, and on the deposition of hisneighbors. " (_Ordonnances des Bois de France, _ t. Iv. Pp. 171 175. )

In return for so loyal and persevering a co-operation on the part of thestates-general, notwithstanding the obstacles en-countered by their votesand their agents, King John confirmed expressly, by an ordinance of May26, 1356 [art. 9: _Ordonnances des Bois de France, _ t. Iii. P. 55], allthe promises he had made them and all the engagements he had entered intowith them by his ordinance of December 28, 1355, given immediately aftertheir first session (Ibidem, t. Iii. Pp. 19 37): a veritable reformatoryordinance, which enumerated the various royal abuses, administrative, judicial, financial, and military, against which there had been a publicclamor, and regulated the manner of redressing them. 

After these mutual concessions and promises the states-general broke up, adjourning until the 30th of November following (1356); but two monthsand a half before this time King John, proud of some success obtained byhim in Normandy and of the brilliant army of knights remaining to himafter he had dismissed the burgher-forces, rushed, as has been said, withconceited impetuosity to encounter the Prince of Wales, rejected withinsolent demands the modest proposals of withdrawal made to him by thecommander of the little English army, and, on the 19th of September, lost, contrary to all expectation, the lamentable battle of Poitiers. We have seen how he was deserted before the close of the action by hiseldest son, Prince Charles, with his body of troops, and how he himselfremained with his youngest son, Prince Philip, a boy of fourteen years, aprisoner in the hands of his victorious enemies. "At this news, " saysFroissart, "the kingdom of France was greatly troubled and excited, andwith good cause, for it was a right grievous blow and vexatious for allsorts of folk. The wise men of the kingdom might well predict that greatevils would come of it, for the king, their head, and all the chivalry ofthe kingdom were slain or taken; the knights and squires who came backhome were on that account so hated and blamed by the commoners that theyhad great difficulty in gaining admittance to the good towns; and theking's three sons who had returned, Charles, Louis, and John, were veryyoung in years and experience, and there was in them such small resourcethat none of the said lads liked to undertake the government of the saidkingdom. "

The eldest of the three, Prince Charles, aged nineteen, who was calledthe Dauphin after the cession of Dauphiny to France, nevertheless assumedthe office, in spite of his youth and his anything but glorious retreatfrom Poitiers. He took the title of lieutenant of the king, and hadhardly re-entered Paris, on the 29th of September, when he summoned, forthe 15th of October, the states-general of _Langue d'oil, _ who met, inpoint of fact, on the 17th, in the great chamber of parliament. "Neverwas seen, " says the report of their meeting, "an assembly so numerous, orcomposed of wiser folk. " The superior clergy were there almost to a man;the nobility had lost too many in front of Poitiers to be abundant atParis, but there were counted at the assembly four hundred deputies fromthe good towns, amongst whom special mention is made, in the documents, of those from Amiens, Tournay, Lille, Arras, Troyes, Auxerre, and Sens. The total number of members at the assembly amounted to more than eighthundred. 

The session was opened by a speech from the chancellor, Peter de laForest, who called upon the estates to aid the dauphin with theircounsels under the serious and melancholy circumstances of the kingdom. The three orders at first attempted to hold their deliberations each in aseparate hall; but it was not long before they felt the inconveniencesarising from their number and their separation, and they resolved tochoose from amongst each order commissioners who should examine thequestions together, and afterwards make their report and their proposalsto the general meeting of the estates. Eighty commissioners wereaccordingly elected, and set themselves to work. The dauphin appointedsome of his officers to be present at their meetings, and to furnish themwith such information as they might require. As early as the second day"these officers were given to understand that the deputies would not workwhilst anybody belonging to the king's council was with them. " So theofficers withdrew; and a few days afterwards, towards the end of October, 1356, the commissioners reported the result of their conferences to eachof the three orders. The general assembly adopted their proposals, andhad the dauphin informed that they were desirous of a private audience. Charles repaired, with some of his councillors, to the monastery of theCordeliers, where the estates were holding their sittings, and there hereceived their representations. They demanded of him "that he shoulddeprive of their offices such of the king's councillors as they shouldpoint out, have them arrested, and confiscate all their property. Twenty-two men of note, the chancellor, the premier president of theParliament, the king's stewards, and several officers in the household ofthe dauphin himself, were thus pointed out. They were accused of havingtaken part to their own profit in all the abuses for which the governmentwas reproached, and of having concealed from the king the true state ofthings and the misery of the people. The commissioners elected by theestates were to take proceedings against them: if they were found guilty, they were to be punished; and if they were innocent, they were at thevery least to forfeit their offices and their property, on account oftheir bad counsels and their bad administration. "

The chronicles of the time are not agreed as to these last demands. Wehave, as regards the events of this period, two contemporary witnesses, both full of detail, intelligence, and animation in their narratives, namely, Froissart and the continuer of William of Nangis' _LatinChronicle_. Froissart is in general favorable to kings and princes; theanonymous chronicler, on the contrary, has a somewhat passionate biastowards the popular party. Probably both of them are often given toexaggeration in their assertions and impressions; but, taking intoaccount none but undisputed facts, it is evident that the claims of thestates-general, though they were, for the most part, legitimate enough atbottom, by reason of the number, gravity, and frequent recurrence ofabuses, were excessive and violent, and produced the effect of completesuspension in the regular course of government and justice. The dauphin, Charles, was a young man, of a naturally sound and collected mind, butwithout experience, who had hitherto lived only in his father's court, and who could not help being deeply shocked and disquieted by suchdemands. He was still more troubled when the estates demanded that thedeputies, under the title of reformers, should traverse the provinces asa check upon the malversations of the royal officials, and that twenty-eight delegates, chosen from amongst the three orders, four prelates, twelve knights, and twelve burgesses, should be constantly placed nearthe king's person, "with power to do and order everything in the kingdom, just like the king himself, as well for the purpose of appointing andremoving public officers as for other matters. " It was taking away theentire government from the crown, and putting it into the hands of theestates. 

The dauphin's surprise and suspicion were still more vivid when thedeputies spoke to him about setting at liberty the King of Navarre, whohad been imprisoned by King John, and told him that "since this deed ofviolence no good had come to the king or the kingdom, because of the sinof having imprisoned the said King of Navarre. " And yet Charles the Badwas already as infamous as he has remained in history; he had labored toembroil the dauphin with his royal father; and there was no plot orintrigue, whether with the malcontents in France or with the King ofEngland, in which he was not, with good reason, suspected of having beenmixed up, and of being ever ready to be mixed up. He was clearly adangerous enemy for the public peace, as well as for the crown, and, for the states-general who were demanding his release, a bad associate. 

[Illustration: Charles the Bad, King of Navarre, in Prison----335]

In the face of such demands and such forebodings, the dauphin did all hecould to gain time. Before he gave an answer he must know, he said, whatsubvention the states-general would be willing to grant him. The replywas a repetition of the promise of thirty thousand men-at-arms, togetherwith an enumeration of the several taxes whereby there was a hope ofproviding for the expense. But the produce of these taxes was souncertain, that both parties doubted the worth of the promise. Carefulcalculation went to prove that the subvention would suffice, at the verymost, for the keep of no more than eight or nine thousand men. Theestates were urgent for a speedy compliance with their demands. Thedauphin persisted in his policy of delay. He was threatened with apublic and solemn session, at which all the questions should be broughtbefore the people, and which was fixed for the 3d of November. Great wasthe excitement in Paris; and the people showed a disposition to supportthe estates at any price. On the 2d of November, the dauphin summoned atthe Louvre a meeting of his councillors and of the principal deputies;and there he announced that he was obliged to set out for Metz, where hewas going to follow up the negotiations entered into with the EmperorCharles IV. And Pope Innocent VI. For the sake of restoring peace betweenFrance and England. He added that the deputies, on returning for a whileto their provinces, should get themselves enlightened as to the realstate of affairs, and that he would not fail to recall them so soon as hehad any important news to tell them, and any assistance to request ofthem. 

[Illustration: The Louvre in the Fourtheenth Century----336]

It was not without serious grounds that the dauphin attached so muchimportance to gaining time. When, in the preceding month of October, hehad summoned to Paris the states-general of _Langue d'oil_, he hadlikewise convoked at Toulouse those of _Langue d'oe_, and he was informedthat the latter had not only just voted a levy of fifty thousand men-at-arms, with an adequate subsidy, but that, in order to show their royalistsentiments, they had decreed a sort of public mourning, to last for ayear, if King John were not released from his captivity. The dauphin'sidea was to summon other provincial assemblies, from which he hoped forsimilar manifestations. It was said, moreover, that several deputies, already gone from Paris, had been ill received in their towns, atSoissons amongst others, on account of their excessive claims, and theirinsulting language towards all the king's councillors. Under suchflattering auspices the dauphin set out, according to the announcement hehad made, from Paris, on the 5th of December, 1356, to go and meet theEmperor Charles IV. At Metz; but, at his departure, he committed exactlythe fault which was likely to do him the most harm at Paris: being inwant of money for his costly trip, he subjected the coinage to a freshadulteration, which took effect five days after his departure. 

The leaders in Paris seized eagerly upon so legitimate a grievance forthe support of their claims. As early as the 3d of the precedingNovember, when they were apprised of the dauphin's approaching departurefor Metz, and the adjournment of their sittings, the states-general hadcome to a decision that their remonstrances and demands, summed up intwenty-one articles, should be read in general assembly, and that arecital of the negotiations which had taken place on that subject betweenthe estates and the dauphin should be likewise drawn up, "in order thatall the deputies might be able to tell in their districts wherefore theanswers had not been received. " When, after the dauphin's departure, thenew debased coins were put in circulation, the people were driven to anoutbreak thereby, and the provost of tradesmen, "Stephen Marcel, hurriedto the Louvre to demand of the Count of Anjou, the dauphin's brother andlieutenant, a withdrawal of the decree. Having obtained no answer, hereturned the next day, escorted by a throng of the inhabitants of Paris. At length, on the third day, the numbers assembled were so considerablethat the young prince took alarm, and suspended the execution of thedecree until his brother's return. For the fist time Stephen Marcel hadgot himself supported by an outbreak of the people; for the first timethe mob had imposed its will upon the ruling power; and from this dayforth pacific and lawful resistance was transformed into a violentstruggle. "

At his re-entry into Paris, on the 19th of January, 1357, the dauphinattempted to once more gain possession of some sort of authority. Heissued orders to Marcel and the sheriffs to remove the stoppage they hadplaced on the currency of the new coinage. This was to found hisopposition on the worst side of his case. "We will do nothing of thesort, " replied Marcel; and in a few moments, at the provost's orders, thework-people left their work, and shouts of "To arms!" resounded throughthe streets. The prince's councillors were threatened with death. Thedauphin saw the hopelessness of a struggle; for there were hardly ahandful of men left to guard the Louvre. On the morrow, the 20th ofJanuary, he sent for Marcel and the sheriffs into the great hall ofparliament, and giving way on almost every point, bound himself to nolonger issue new coin, to remove from his council the officers who hadbeen named to him, and even to imprison them until the return of hisfather, who would do full justice to them. The estates were at the sametime authorized to meet when they pleased: on all which points theprovost of tradesmen requested letters, which were granted him; "and hedemanded that the dauphin should immediately place sergeants in thehouses of those of his councillors who still happened to be in Paris, andthat proceedings should be taken without delay for making an inventory oftheir goods, with a view to confiscation of them. 

The estates met on the 5th of February. It was not without surprise thatthey found themselves less numerous than they had hitherto been. Thedeputies from the duchy of Burgundy, from the countships of Flanders andAlencon, and several nobles and burghers from other provinces, did notrepair to the session. The kingdom was falling into anarchy; bands ofplunderers roved hither and thither, threatening persons and ravaginglands; the magistrates either could not or would not exercise theirauthority; disquietude and disgust were gaining possession of many honestfolks. Marcel and his partisans, having fallen into somewhat ofdisrepute and neglect, keenly felt how necessary, and also saw how easy, it was for them to become completely masters. They began by drawing up aseries of propositions, which they had distributed and spread abroad farand wide in the provinces. On the 3d of March, they held a publicmeeting, at which the dauphin and his two brothers were present. Anumerous throng filled the hall. The Bishop of Laon, Robert Lecoeq, thespokesman of the party, made a long and vehement statement of all thepublic grievances, and declared that twenty-two of the king's officersshould be deprived forever of all offices, that all the officers of thekingdom should be provisionally suspended, and that reformers, chosen bythe estates, and commissioned by the dauphin himself, should go all overFrance, to hold inquiries as to these officers, and, according to theirdeserts, either reinstate them in their offices or condemn them. At thesame time, the estates bound themselves to raise thirty thousand men-at-arms, whom they themselves would pay and keep; and as the produce of theimpost voted for this purpose was very uncertain, they demanded theiradjournment to the fortnight of Easter, and two sessions certain, forwhich they should be free to fix the time, before the 15th of February inthe following year. This was simply to decree the permanence of theirpower. To all these demands the dauphin offered no resistance. In themonth of March following, a grand ordinance, drawn up in sixty-onearticles, enumerated all the grievances which had been complained of, andprescribed the redress for them. A second ordinance, regulating all thatappertained to the suspension of the royal officers, was likewise, as itappears, drawn up at the same time, but has not come down to us. At lasta grand commission was appointed, composed of thirty-six members, twelveelected by each of the three orders. "These thirty-six persons, " saysFroissart, "were bound to often meet together at Paris, for to order theaffairs of the kingdom, and all kinds of matters were to be disposed ofby these three estates, and all prelates, all lords, and all commonaltiesof the cities and good towns were bound to be obedient to what thesethree estates should order. " Having their power thus secured in theirabsence, the estates adjourned to the 25th of April. 

The rumor of these events reached Bordeaux, where, since the defeat atPoitiers, King John had been living as the guest of the Prince of Wales, rather than as a prisoner of the English. Amidst the galas and pleasuresto which he abandoned himself, he was indignant to learn that at Paristhe royal authority was ignored, and he sent three of his comrades incaptivity to notify to the Parisians that he rejected all the claims ofthe estates, that he would not have payment made of the subsidy voted bythem, and that he forbade their meeting on the 25th of April following. This strange manifesto on the part of imprisoned royalty excited in Parissuch irritation amongst the people, that the dauphin hastily sent out ofthe city the king's three envoys, whose lives might have been threatened, and declared to the thirty-six commissioners of the estates that thesubsidy should be raised, and that the general assembly should beperfectly free to meet at the time it had appointed. 

And it did meet towards the end of April, but in far fewer numbers thanhad been the case hitherto, and with more and more division from day today. Nearly all the nobles and ecclesiastics were withdrawing from it;and amongst the burgesses themselves many of the more moderate spiritswere becoming alarmed at the violent proceedings of the commission of thethirty-six delegates, who, under the direction of Stephen Marcel, werebecoming a small oligarchy, little by little usurping the place of thegreat national assembly. A cry was raised in the provinces "against theinjustice of those chief governors who were no more than ten or a dozen;"and there was a refusal to pay the subsidy voted. These symptoms and thedisorganization which was coming to a head throughout the whole kingdommade the dauphin think that the moment had arrived for him to seize thereins again. About the middle of August, 1357, he sent for Marcel andthree sheriffs, accustomed to direct matters at Paris, and let them know"that he intended thence-forward to govern by himself, without curators. "He at the same time restored to office some of the lately dismissed royalofficers. The thirty-six commissioners made a show of submission; andtheir most faithful ecclesiastical ally, Robert Lecocq, Bishop of Laon, returned to his diocese. The dauphin left Paris and went a trip intosome of the provinces, halting at the principal towns, such as Rouen andChartres, and everywhere, with intelligent but timid discretion, makinghis presence and his will felt, not very successfully, however, asregarded the re-establishment of some kind of order on his route in thename of the kingship. 

[Illustration: Stephen Marcel----342]

Marcel and his partisans took advantage of his absence to shore up theirtottering supremacy. They felt how important it was for them to have afresh meeting of the estates, whose presence alone could restore strengthto their commissioners; but the dauphin only could legally summon them. They, therefore, eagerly pressed him to return in person to Paris, givinghim a promise that, if he agreed to convoke there the deputies fromtwenty or thirty towns, they would supply him with the money of which hewas in need, and would say no more about the dismissal of royal officers, or about setting at liberty the king of Navarre. The dauphin, beingstill young and trustful, though he was already discreet and reserved, fell into the snare. He returned to Paris, and summoned thither, for the7th of November following, the deputies from seventy towns, a sufficientnumber to give their meeting a specious resemblance to thestates-general. One circumstance ought to have caused him someglimmering of suspicion. At the same time that the dauphin was sendingto the deputies his letters of convocation, Marcel himself also sent tothem, as if he possessed the right, either in his own name or in that ofthe thirty-six delegate-commissioners, of calling them together. But astill more serious matter came to open the dauphin's eyes to the dangerhe had fallen into. During the night between the 8th and 9th ofNovember, 1357, immediately after the re-opening of the states, Charlesthe Bad, King of Navarre, was carried off by a surprise from the castleof Arleux in Cambresis, where he had been confined; and his liberatorsremoved him first of all to Amiens and then to Paris itself, where thepopular party gave him a triumphant reception. Marcel and his sheriffshad decided upon and prepared, at a private council, this dramaticincident, so contrary to the promises they had but lately made to thedauphin. Charles the Bad used his deliverance like a skilful workman;the very day after his arrival in Paris he mounted a platform set againstthe walls of St. Germain's abbey, and there, in the presence of more thanten thousand persons, burgesses and populace, he delivered a long speech, "seasoned with much venom, " says a chronicler of the time. After havingdenounced the wrongs which he had been made to endure, he said, foreighteen months past, he declared that the would live and die in defenceof the kingdom of France, giving it to be understood that "if he wereminded to claim the crown, he would soon show by the laws of right andwrong that he was nearer to it than the King of England was. " He wasinsinuating, eloquent, and an adept in the art of making truth subservethe cause of falsehood. The people were moved by his speech. Thedauphin was obliged not only to put up with the release and the triumphof his most dangerous enemy, but to make an outward show ofreconciliation with him, and to undertake not only to give him back thecastles confiscated after his arrest, but "to act towards him as a goodbrother towards his brother. " These were the exact words made use of inthe dauphin's name, "and without having asked his pleasure about it, " byRobert Lecocq, Bishop of Laon, who himself also had returned from hisdiocese to Paris at the time of the recall of the estates. 

The consequences of this position were not slow to exhibit themselves. Whilst the King of Navarre was re-entering Paris and the dauphinsubmitting to the necessity of a reconciliation with him, several of thedeputies who had but lately returned to the states-general, and amongstothers nearly all those from Champagne and Burgundy, were going awayagain, being unwilling either to witness the triumphal re-entry ofCharles the Bad or to share the responsibility for such acts as theyforesaw. Before long the struggle, or rather the war, between the Kingof Navarre and the dauphin broke out again; several of the nobles inpossession of the castles which were to have been restored to Charles theBad, and especially those of Breteuil, Pacy-sur-Eure, and Pont-Audemer, flatly refused to give them back to him; and the dauphin was suspected, probably not without reason, of having encouraged them in theirresistance. Without the walls of Paris it was really war that was goingon between the two princes. Philip of Navarre, brother of Charles theBad, went marching with bands of pillagers over Normandy and Anjou, andwithin a few leagues of Paris, declaring that he had not taken, and didnot intend to take, any part in his brother's pacific arrangements, andcarrying fire and sword all through the country. The peasantry from theravaged districts were overflowing Paris. Stephen Marcel had no mind toreject the support which many of them brought him; but they had to befed, and the treasury was empty. The wreck of the states-general, meeting on the 2d of January, 1358, themselves had recourse to theexpedient which they had so often and so violently reproached the kingand the dauphin with employing: they notably depreciated the coinage, allotting a fifth of the profit to the dauphin, and retaining the otherfour fifths for the defence of the kingdom. What Marcel and his partycalled the defence of the kingdom was the works of fortification roundParis, begun in October, 1356, against the English, after the defeat ofPoitiers, and resumed in 1358 against the dauphin's party in theneighboring provinces, as well as against the robbers that were layingthem waste. Amidst all this military and popular excitement the dauphinkept to the Louvre, having about him two thousand men-at-arms, whom hehad taken into his pay, he said, solely "on account of the prospect of awar with the Navarrese. " Before he went and plunged into a civil waroutside the gates of Paris, he resolved to make an effort to win back theParisians themselves to his cause. He sent a crier through the city tobid the people assemble in the market-place, and thither he repaired onhorseback, on the 11th of January, with five or six of his most trustyservants. The astonished mob thronged about him, and he addressed themin vigorous language. He meant, he said, to live and die amongst thepeople of Paris; if he was collecting his men-at-arms, it was not for thepurpose of plundering and oppressing Paris, but that he might marchagainst their common enemies; and if he had not done so sooner, it wasbecause "the folks who had taken the government gave him neither moneynor arms; but they would some day be called to strict account for it. "The dauphin was small, thin, delicate, and of insignificant appearance;but at this juncture he displayed unexpected boldness and eloquence; thepeople were deeply moved; and Marcel and his friends felt that a heavyblow had just been dealt them. 

They hastened to respond with a blow of another sort. It was everywherewhispered abroad that if Paris was suffering so much from civil war andthe irregularities and calamities which were the concomitants of it, thefault lay with the dauphin's surroundings, and that his noble advisersdeterred him from measures which would save the people from theirmiseries. 

"Provost Marcel and the burgesses of Paris took counsel together anddecided that it would be a good thing if some of those attendants on theregent were to be taken away from the midst of this world. They all puton caps, red on one side and blue on the other, which they wore as a signof their confederation in defence of the common weal. This done, theyreassembled in large numbers on the 22d of February, 1358, with theprovost at their head, and marched to the palace where the duke waslodged. " This crowd encountered on its, way, in the street calledJuiverie (Jewry), the advocate-general Regnault d'Aci, one of thetwenty-two royal officers denounced by the estates in the preceding year;and he was massacred in a pastry-cook's shop. Marcel, continuing hisroad, arrived at the palace, and ascended, followed by a band of armedmen, to the apartments of the dauphin, "whom he requested very sharply, "says Froissart, "to restrain so many companies from roving about on allsides, damaging and plundering the country. The duke replied that hewould do so willingly if he had the wherewithal to do it, but that it wasfor him who received the dues belonging to the kingdom to discharge thatduty. I know not why or how, " adds Froissart, "but words were multipliedon the part of all, and became very high. " "My lord duke, " suddenly saidthe provost, "do not alarm yourself; but we have somewhat to do here;"and turning towards his fellows in the caps, he said, "Dearly beloved, dothat for the which ye are come. " Immediately the Lord de Conflans, Marshal of Champagne, and Robert de Clermont, Marshal of Normandy, nobleand valiant gentlemen, and both at the time unarmed, were massacred soclose to the dauphin and his couch, that his robe was covered with theirblood. The dauphin shuddered; and the rest of his officers fled. "Takeno heed, lord duke, " said Marcel; "you have nought to fear. " He handedto the dauphin his own red and blue cap, and himself put on thedauphin's, which was of black stuff with golden fringe. The corpses ofthe two marshals were dragged into the court-yard of the palace, wherethey remained until evening without any one's daring to remove them; andMarcel with his fellows repaired to the mansion-house, and harangued froman open window the mob collected on the Place de Greve. "What has beendone is for the good and the profit of the kingdom, " said he; "the deadwere false and wicked traitors. " "We do own it, and will maintain it!"cried the people who were about him. 

[Illustration: The Murder of the Marshals----345]

The house from which Marcel thus addressed the people was his ownproperty, and was called the Pillar-house. There he accommodated thetown-council, which had formerly held its sittings in divers parlors. 

For a month after this triple murder, committed with such officialparade, Marcel reigned dictator in Paris. He removed from the councilof thirty-six deputies such members as he could not rely upon, andintroduced his own confidants. He cited the council, thus modified, toexpress approval of the blow just struck; and the deputies, "some fromconviction and others from doubt (that is, fear), answered that theybelieved that for what had been done there had been good and just cause. "The King of Navarre was recalled from Nantes to Paris, and the dauphinwas obliged to assign to him, in the king's name, "as a make-up for hislosses, " ten thousand livres a year on landed property in Languedoc. Such was the young prince's condition that, almost every day, he wasreduced to the necessity of dining with his most dangerous and mosthypocritical enemy. A man of family, devoted to the dauphin, who was nowcalled regent, Philip de Repenti by name, lost his head on the 19th ofMarch, 1358, on the market-place, for having attempted, with a few boldcomrades, "to place the regent beyond the power and the reach of thepeople of Paris. " Six days afterwards, however, on the 25th of March, the dauphin succeeded in escaping, and repaired first of all to Senlis, and then to Provins, where he found the estates of Champagne eager towelcome him. Marcel at once sent to Provins two deputies withinstructions to bind over the three orders of Champagne "to be at onewith them of Paris, and not to be astounded at what had been done. "Before answering, the members of the estates withdrew into a garden toparley together, and sent to pray the regent to come and meet them. "Mylord, " said the Count de Braine to him in the name of the nobility, "didyou ever suffer any harm or villany at the hands of De Conflans, Marshalof Champagne, for which he deserved to be put to death as he hath been bythem of Paris? "The prince replied that he firmly held and believed thatthe said marshal and Robert de Clermont had well and loyally served andadvised him. "My lord, " replied the Count de Braine, "we Champagnese whoare here do thank you for that which you have just said, and do desireyou to do full justice on those who have put our friend to death withoutcause;" and they bound themselves to support him with their persons andtheir property, for the chastisement of them who had been the authors ofthe outrage. 

The dauphin, with full trust in this manifestation and this promise, convoked at Compiegne, for the 4th of May, 1858, no longer the estates ofChampagne only, but the states-general in their entirety, who, onseparating at the close of their last session, had adjourned to the 1stof May following. The story of this fresh session, and of the eventsdetermined by it, is here reproduced textually, just as it has come downto us from the last continuer of the Chronicle of William of Nangis, themost favorable amongst all the chroniclers of the time to Stephen Marceland the popular party in Paris. "All the deputies, and especially thefriends of the nobles slain, did with one heart and one mind counsel thelord Charles, Duke of Normandy, to have the homicides stricken to death;and, if he could not do so by reason of the number of their defenders, they urged him to lay vigorous siege to the city of Paris, either with anarmed force or by forbidding the entry of victuals thereinto, in suchsort that it should understand and perceive for a certainty that thedeath of the provost of tradesmen and of his accomplices was intended. The said provost and those who, after the regent's departure, had takenthe government of the city, clearly understood this intention, and theythen implored the University of studies at Paris to send deputies to thesaid lord-regent, to humbly adjure him, in their name and in the name ofthe whole city, to banish from his heart the wrath he had conceivedagainst their fellow-citizens, offering and promising, moreover, asuitable reparation for the offence, provided that the lives of thepersons were spared. The University, concerned for the welfare of thecity, sent several deputies of weight to treat about the matter. Theywere received by the lord Duke Charles and the other lords with greatkindness; and they brought back word to Paris that the demand made atCompiegne was, that ten or a dozen, or even only five or six, of the mensuspected of the crime lately committed at Paris should be sent toCompiegne, where there was no design of putting them to death, and, ifthis were done, the duke-regent would return to his old and intimatefriendship with the Parisians. But Provost Marcel and his accomplices, who were afeard for themselves, did not believe that if they fell intothe hands of the lord duke they could escape a terrible death, and theyhad no mind to run such a risk. Taking, therefore, a bold resolution, they desired to be treated as all the rest of the citizens, and to thatend sent several deputations to the lord-regent either to Compiegne or toMeaux, whither he sometimes removed; but they got no gracious reply, andrather words of bitterness and threatening. Thereupon, being seized withalarm for their city, into the which the lord-regent and his noblecomrades were so ardently desirous of re-entering, and being minded toput it out of reach from the peril which threatened it, they began tofortify themselves therein, to repair the walls, to deepen the ditches, to build new ramparts on the eastern side, and to throw up barriers atall the gates. . . . As they lacked a captain, they sent to Charlesthe Bad, King of Navarre, who was at that time in Normandy, and whom theyknew to be freshly embroiled with the regent; and they requested him tocome to Paris with a strong body of men-at-arms, and to be their captainthere and their defender against all their foes, save the lord John, Kingof, France, a prisoner in England. The King of Navarre, with all hismen, was received in state, on the 15th of June, by the Parisians, to thegreat indignation of the prince-regent, his friends, and many others. The nobles thereupon began to draw near to Paris, and to ride about inthe fields of the neighborhood, prepared to fight if there should be asortie from Paris to attack them. . . . On a certain day thebesiegers came right up to the bridge of Charenton, as if to draw out theKing of Navarre and the Parisians to battle. The King of Navarre issuedforth, armed, with his men, and drawing near to the besiegers, had longconversations with them without fighting, and afterwards went back intoParis. At sight hereof the Parisians suspected that this king, who washimself a noble, was conspiring with the besiegers, and was preparing todeal some secret blow to the detriment of Paris; so they conceivedmistrust of him and his, and stripped him of his office of captain. Hewent forth sore vexed from Paris, he and his; and the English especially, whom he had brought with him, insulted certain Parisians, whence ithappened that before they were out of the city several of them weremassacred by the folks of Paris, who afterwards confined themselveswithin their walls, carefully guarding the gates by day, and by nightkeeping up strong patrols on the ramparts. "

Whilst Marcel inside Paris, where he reigned supreme, was a prey, on hisown account and that of his besieged city, to these anxieties and perils, an event occurred outside which seemed to open to him a prospect ofpowerful aid, perhaps of decisive victory. Throughout several provincesthe peasants, whose condition, sad and hard as it already was under thefeudal system, had been still further aggravated by the outrages andirregularities of war, not finding any protection in their lords, andoften being even oppressed by them as if they had been foes, had recourseto insurrection in order to escape from the evils which came down uponthem every day and from every quarter. 

They bore and would bear anything, it was said, and they got the name ofJacques Bonhomme (Jack Goodfellow); but this taunt they belied in aterrible manner. We will quote from the last continuer of William ofNangis, the least declamatory and the least confused of all thechroniclers of that period: "In this same year 1358, " says he, "in thesummer [the first rising took place on the 28th of May], the peasants inthe neighborhood of St. Loup de Cerent and Clermont, in the diocese ofBeauvais, took up arms against the nobles of France. They assembled ingreat numbers, set at their head a certain peasant named William Karle[or Cale, or Callet], of more intelligence than the rest, and marching bycompanies under their own flag, roamed over the country, slaying andmassacring all the nobles they met, even their own lords. Not contentwith that, they demolished the houses and castles of the nobles; and, what is still more deplorable, they villanously put to death the nobledames and little children who fell into their hands; and afterwards theystrutted about, they and their wives, bedizened with the garments theyhad stripped from their victims. The number of men who had thus risenamounted to five thousand, and the rising extended to the outskirts ofParis. They had begun it from sheer necessity and love of justice, fortheir lords oppressed instead of defending them; but before long theyproceeded to the most hateful and criminal deeds. They took anddestroyed from top to bottom the strong castle of Ermenonville, wherethey put to death a multitude of men and dames of noble family who hadtaken refuge there. For some time the nobles no longer went about asbefore; none of them durst set a foot outside the fortified places. "Jacquery had taken the form of a fit of demagogic fury, and the Jacks [orGoodfellows] swarming out of their hovels were the terror of the castles. 

Had Marcel provoked this bloody insurrection? There is strongpresumption against him; many of his contemporaries say he had; and thedauphin himself wrote on the 30th of August, 1359, to the Count of Savoy, that one of the most heinous acts of Marcel and his partisans wasexciting the folks of the open country in France, of Beauvaisis andChampagne, and other districts, against the nobles of the said kingdom;whence so many evils have proceeded as no man should or could conceive. "It is quite certain, however, that, the insurrection having once brokenout, Marcel hastened to profit by it, and encouraged and even supportedit at several points. Amongst other things he sent from Paris a body ofthree hundred men to the assistance of the peasants who were besiegingthe castle of Ermenonville. It is the due penalty paid by reformers whoallow themselves to drift into revolution, that they become before longaccomplices in mischief or crime which their original design and theirown personal interest made it incumbent on them to prevent or repress. 

The reaction against Jaequery was speedy and shockingly bloody. Thenobles, the dauphin, and the King of Navarre, a prince and a noble at thesame time that he was a scoundrel, made common cause against theGoodfellows, who were the more disorderly in proportion as they hadbecome more numerous, and believed themselves more invincible. Theascendency of the masters over the rebels was soon too strong forresistance. At Meaux, of which the Goodfellows had obtained possession, they were surprised and massacred to the number, it is said, of seventhousand, with the town burning about their ears. In Beauvaisis, theKing of Navarre, after having made a show of treating with theirchieftain, William Karle or Callet, got possession of him, and had himbeheaded, wearing a trivet of red-hot iron, says one of the chroniclers, by way of crown. He then moved upon a camp of Goodfellows assembled nearMontdidier, slew three thousand of them, and dispersed the remainder. These figures are probably very much exaggerated, as nearly alwayshappens in such accounts; but the continuer of William of Nangis, sojustly severe on the outrages and barbarities of the insurgent peasants, is not less so on those of their conquerors. "The nobles of France, " hesays, "committed at that time such ravages in the district of Meaux thatthere was no need for the English to come and destroy our country thosemortal enemies of the kingdom could not have done what was done by thenobles at home. "

Marcel from that moment perceived that his cause was lost, and no longerdreamed of anything but saving himself and his, at any price; "for hethought, " says Froissart, "that it paid better to slay than to be slain. "Although he had more than once experienced the disloyalty of the King ofNavarre, he entered into fresh negotiation with him, hoping to use him asan intermediary between himself and the dauphin, in order to obtaineither an acceptable peace or guarantees for his own security in case ofextreme danger. The King of Navarre lent a ready ear to these overtures;he had no scruple about negotiating with this or that individual, this orthat party, flattering himself that he would make one or the other usefulfor his own purposes. Marcel had no difficulty in discovering that thereal design of the King of Navarre was to set aside the house of Valoisand the Plantagenets together, and to become King of France himself, as adescendant, in his own person, of St. Louis, though one degree moreremote. An understanding was renewed between the two, such as it ispossible to have between two personal interests fundamentally different, but capable of being for the moment mutually helpful. Marcel, underpretext of defence against the besiegers, admitted into Paris a prettylarge number of English in the pay of the King of Navarre. Before long, quarrels arose between the Parisians and these unpopular foreigners; onthe 21st of July, 1358, during one of these quarrels, twenty-four Englishwere massacred by the people; and four hundred others, it is said, werein danger of undergoing the same fate, when Marcel came up and succeededin saving their lives by having them imprisoned in the Louvre. Thequarrel grew hotter and spread farther. The people of Paris went andattacked other mercenaries of the King of Navarre, chiefly English, whowere occupying St. Denis and St. Cloud. The Parisians were beaten; andthe King of Navarre withdrew to St. Denis. On the 27th of July, Marcelboldly resolved to set at liberty and send over to him the four hundredEnglish imprisoned in the Louvre. He had them let out, accordingly, andhimself escorted them as far as the gate St. Honore, in the midst of athrong that made no movement for all its irritation. Some of Marcel'ssatellites who formed the escort cried out as they went, "Has anybodyaught to say against the setting of these prisoners at liberty?" TheParisians remembered their late reverse, and not a voice was raised. "Strongly moved as the people of Paris were in their hearts against theprovost of tradesmen, " says a contemporary chronicle, there was not a manwho durst commence a riot. "

Marcel's position became day by day more critical. The dauphin, encampedwith his army around Paris, was keeping up secret but very activecommunications with it; and a party, numerous and already growing inpopularity, was being formed there in his favor. Men of note, who werelately Marcel's comrades, were now pronouncing against him; and JohnMaillart, one of the four chosen captains of the municipal forces, wasthe most vigilant. Marcel, at his wit's end, made an offer to the Kingof Navarre to deliver Paris up to him on the night between the 31st ofJuly and the 1st of August. All was ready for carrying out this design. During the day of the 31st of July, Marcel would have changed the keepersof the St. Denis gate, but Maillart opposed him, rushed to the Hotel deVille, seized the banner of France, jumped on horseback and rode throughthe city shouting, "Mountjoy St. Denis, for the king and the duke!" Thiswas the rallying-cry of the dauphin's partisans. The day ended with agreat riot amongst the people. Towards eleven o'clock at night Marcel, followed by his people armed from head to foot, made his way to the St. Anthony gate, holding in his hands, it is said, the keys of the city. Whilst he was there, waiting for the arrival of the King of Navarre'smen, Maillart came up "with torches and lanterns and a numerousassemblage. He went straight to the provost and said to him, 'Stephen, Stephen, what do you here at this hour?' 'John, what business have youto meddle? I am here to take the guard of the city of which I have thegovernment. ' 'By God, ' rejoined Maillart, 'that will not do; you are nothere at this hour for any good, and I'll prove it to you, ' said he, addressing his comrades. 'See, he holds in his hands the keys of thegates, to betray the city. '

[Illustration: "In his Hands the Keys of the Gates. "----354]

'You lie, John, ' said Marcel. 'By God, you traitor, 'tis you who lie, 'replied Maillart: 'death! death! to all on his side!' "And he raised hisbattle-axe against Marcel. Philippe Giffard, one of the provost'sfriends, threw himself before Marcel and covered him for a moment withhis own body; but the struggle had begun in earnest. Maillart plied hisbattle-axe upon Marcel, who fell pierced with many wounds. Six of hiscomrades shared the same fate; and Robert Lecocq, Bishop of Laon, savedhimself by putting on a Cordelier's habit. Maillart's company dividedthemselves into several bands, and spread themselves all over the city, carrying the news everywhere, and despatching or arresting the partisansof Marcel. The next morning, the 1st of August, 1358, "John Maillartbrought together in the market-place the greater part of the community ofParis, explained for what reason he had slain the provost of tradesmenand in what offence he had detected him, and pointed out quietly anddiscreetly how that on this very night the city of Paris must have beenoverrun and destroyed if God of His grace had not applied a remedy. Whenthe people who were present heard these news they were much astounded atthe peril in which they had been, and the greater part thanked God withfolded hands for the grace He had done them. " The corpse of StephenMarcel was stripped and exposed quite naked to the public gaze, in frontof St. Catherine du Val des Beoliers, on the very spot where, by hisorders, the corpses of the two marshals, Robert de Clermont and John deConflans, had been exposed five months before. He was afterwards castinto the river in the presence of a great concourse. "Then weresentenced to death by the council of prud'hommes of Paris, and executedby divers forms of deadly torture, several who had been of the sect ofthe provost, " the regent having declared that he would not re-enter Parisuntil these traitors had ceased to live. 

Thus perished, after scarcely three years' political life, and by thehands of his former friends, a man of rare capacity and energy, who atthe outset had formed none but patriotic designs, and had, no doubt, promised himself a better fate. When, in December, 1355, at the summonsof a deplorably incapable and feeble king, Marcel, a simple burgher ofParis and quite a new man, entered the assembly of the states-general ofFrance, itself quite a new power, he was justly struck with the vices andabuses of the kingly government, with the evils and the dangers beingentailed thereby upon France, and with the necessity for applying someremedy. But, notwithstanding this perfectly honest and sound conviction, he fell into a capital error; he tried to abolish, for a time at least, the government he desired to reform, and to substitute for the kingshipand its agents the people and their elect. For more than three centuriesthe kingship had been the form of power which had naturally assumed shapeand development in France, whilst seconding the natural labor attendingthe formation and development of the French nation; but this labor had asyet advanced but a little way, and the nascent nation was not in acondition to take up position at the head of its government. StephenMarcel attempted by means of the states-general of the fourteenth centuryto bring to pass what we in the nineteenth, and after all the advances ofthe French nation, have not yet succeeded in getting accomplished, towit, the government of the country by the country itself. Marcel, goingfrom excess to excess and from reverse to reverse in the pursuit of hisimpracticable enterprise, found himself before long engaged in a fiercestruggle with the feudal aristocracy, still so powerful at that time, aswell as with the kingship. Being reduced to depend entirely during thisstruggle upon such strength as could be supplied by a municipal democracyincoherent, inexperienced, and full of divisions in its own ranks, and bya mad insurrection in the country districts, he rapidly fell into theselfish and criminal condition of the man whose special concern is hisown personal safety. This he sought to secure by an unworthy alliancewith the most scoundrelly amongst his ambitious contemporaries, and hewould have given up his own city as well as France to the King of Navarreand the English had not another burgher of Paris, John Maillart, stoppedhim, and put him to death at the very moment when the patriot of thestates-general of 1355 was about to become a traitor to his country. Hardly thirteen years before, when Stephen Marcel was already afull-grown man, the great Flemish burgher, James Van Artevelde, had, in the cause of his country's liberties, attempted a similar enterprise, and, after a series of great deeds at the outset and then of faults alsosimilar to those of Marcel, had fallen into the same abyss, and hadperished by the hand of his fellow-citizens, at the very moment when hewas laboring to put Flanders, his native country, into the hands of aforeign master, the Prince of Wales, son of Edward III. , King of England. Of all political snares the democratic is the most tempting, but it isalso the most demoralizing and the most deceptive when, instead ofconsulting the interests of the democracy by securing public liberties, aman aspires to put it in direct possession of the supreme power, and withits sole support to take upon himself the direction of the helm. 

One single result of importance was won for France by the states-generalof the fourteenth century, namely, the principle of the nation's right tointervene in their own affairs, and to set their government straight whenit had gone wrong or was incapable of performing that duty itself. Up tothat time, in the thirteenth century and at the opening of thefourteenth, the states-general had been hardly anything more than atemporary expedient employed by the kingship itself to solve some specialquestion, or to escape from some grave embarrassment. Starting from KingJohn, the states-general became one of the principles of national right;a principle which did not disappear even when it remained withoutapplication, and the prestige of which survived even its reverses. Faithand hope fill a prominent place in the lives of peoples as well as ofindividuals; having sprung into real existence in 1355, thestates-general of France found themselves alive again in 1789; and we mayhope that, after so long a trial, their rebuffs and their mistakes willnot be more fatal to them in our day. 

CHAPTER XXII. ----THE HUNDRED YEARS' WAR. --CHARLES V. 

So soon as Marcel and three of his chief confidants had been put to deathat the St. Anthony gate, at the very moment when they were about to openit to the English, John Maillart had information sent to the regent, atthat time at Charenton, with an urgent entreaty that he would come backto Paris without delay. "The news, at once spread abroad through thecity, was received with noisy joy there, and the red caps, which had beenworn so proudly the night before, were everywhere taken off and hidden. The next morning a proclamation ordered that whosoever knew any of thefaction of Marcel should arrest them and take them to the Chatelet, butwithout laying hands on their goods and without maltreating their wivesor children. Several were taken, put to the question, brought out intothe public square, and beheaded by virtue of a decree. They were the menwho but lately had the government of the city and decided all matters. Some were burgesses of renown, eloquent and learned, and one of them, onarriving at the square, cried out, 'Woe is me! Would to Heaven, O Kingof Navarre, that I had never seen thee or heard thee!'" On the 2d ofAugust, 1358, in the evening, the dauphin, Charles, re-entered Paris, andwas accompanied by John Maillart, who "was mightily in his grace andlove. " On his way a man cried out, "By God, sir, if I had been listenedto, you would never have entered in here; but, after all, you will getbut little by it. " The Count of Tancarville, who was in the prince'strain, drew his sword, and "spurred his horse upon this rascal;" but thedauphin restrained him, and contented himself with saying smilingly tothe man, "You will not be listened to, fair sir. " Charles had the spiritof coolness and discretion; and "he thought, " says his contemporary, Christine de Pisan, "that if this fellow had been slain, the city whichhad been so rebellious might probably have been excited thereby. "Charles, on being resettled in Paris, showed neither clemency norcruelty. He let the reaction against Stephen Marcel run its course, andturned it to account without further exciting it or prolonging it beyondmeasure. The property of some of the condemned was confiscated; someattempts at a conspiracy for the purpose of avenging the provost oftrades-men were repressed with severity, and John Maillart and his familywere loaded with gifts and favors. On becoming king, Charles determinedhimself to hold his son at the baptismal font; but Robert Lecocq, Bishopof Laon, the most intimate of Marcel's accomplices, returned quietly tohis diocese; two of Marcel's brothers, William and John, owing theirprotection, it is said, to certain youthful reminiscences on the prince'spart, were exempted from all prosecution; Marcels widow even recovered aportion of his property; and as early as the 10th of August, 1358, Charles published an amnesty, from which he excepted only "those who hadbeen in the secret council of the provost of tradesmen in respect of thegreat treason;" and on the same day another amnesty quashed allproceedings for deeds done during the Jacquery, "whether by nobles orignobles. " Charles knew that in acts of rigor or of grace impartialityconduces to the strength and the reputation of authority. 

The death of Stephen Marcel and the ruin of his party were fatal to theplots and ambitious hopes of the King of Navarre. At the first moment hehastened to renew his alliance with the King of England, and torecommence war in Normandy, Picardy, and Champagne against the regent ofFrance. But several of his local expeditions were unsuccessful; thetemperate and patient policy of the regent rallied round him thepopulations aweary of war and anarchy; negotiations were opened betweenthe two princes; and their agents were laboriously discussing conditionsof peace when Charles of Navarre suddenly interfered in person, saying, "I would fain talk over matters with the lord duke regent, my brother. "We know that his wife was Joan of France, the dauphin's sister. "Hereatthere was great joy, " says the chronicler, "amongst their councillors. The two princes met, and the King of Navarre with modesty and gentlenessaddressed the regent in these terms: 'My lord duke and brother, know thatI do hold you to be my proper and especial lord; though I have for a longwhile made war against you and against France, our country, I wish not tocontinue or to foment it; I wish henceforth to be a good Frenchman, yourfaithful friend and close ally, your defender against the English andwhoever it may be: I pray you to pardon me thoroughly, me and mine, forall that I have done to you up to this present. I wish for neither thelands nor the towns which are offered to me or promised to me; if I ordermyself well, and you find me faithful in all matters, you shall give meall that my deserts shall seem to you to justify. ' At these words theregent arose and thanked the king with much sweetness; they, one and theother, proffered and accepted wine and spices; and all present rejoicedgreatly, rendering thanks to God, who doth blow where He listeth, anddoth accomplish in a moment that which men with their own soleintelligence have nor wit nor power to do in a long while. The town ofMelun was restored to the lord duke; the navigation of the river oncemore became free up stream and down; great was the satisfaction in Parisand throughout the whole country; and peace being thus made, the twoprinces returned both of them home. "

The King of Navarre knew how to give an appearance of free will andsincerity to changes of posture and behavior which seemed to be pressedupon him by necessity; and we may suppose that the dauphin, all the whilethat he was interchanging graceful acts, was too well acquainted by thistime with the other to become his dupe; but, by their apparentreconciliation, they put an end, for a few brief moments, betweenthemselves to a position which was burdensome to both. 

Whilst these events, from the battle of Poitiers to the death of StephenMarcel (from the 19th of September, 1356, to the 1st of August, 1358), were going on in France, King John was living as a prisoner in the handsof the English, first at Bordeaux, and afterwards in London, and was muchmore concerned about the reception he met with, and the galas he waspresent at, than about the affairs of his kingdom. When, after hisdefeat, he was conducted to Bordeaux by the Prince of Wales, who wasgovernor of English Aquitaine, he became the object of the most courteousattentions, not only on the part of his princely conqueror, but of allGascon society, "dames and damsels, old and young, and their fairattendants, who took pleasure in consoling him by providing him withdiversion. " Thus he passed the winter of 1356; and in the spring thePrince of Wales received from his father, King Edward III. , theinstructions and the vessels he had requested for the conveyance of hisprisoner to England. In the month of May, 1357, "he summoned, " saysFroissart, "all the highest barons of Gascony, and told them that he hadmade up his mind to go to England, whither he would take some of them, leaving the rest in the country of Bordelais and Gascony, to keep theland and the frontiers against the French. When the Gaseous heard thatthe Prince of Wales would carry away out of their power the King ofFrance, whom they had helped to take, they were by no means of accordtherewith, and said to the prince, 'Dear sir, we owe you, in all that isin our power, all honor, obedience, and loyal service; but it is not ourdesire that you should thus remove from us the King of France, in respectof whom we have had great trouble to put him in the place where he is;for, thank God, he is in a good strong city, and we are strong and menenough to keep him against the French, if they by force would take himfrom you. ' The prince answered, 'Dear sirs, I grant it heartily; but mylord my father wishes to hold and behold him; and with the good servicethat you have done my father, and me also, we are well pleased, and itshall be handsomely requited. ' Nevertheless, these words did not sufficeto appease the Gascons, until a means thereto was found by Sir Reginaldde Cobham and Sir John Chandos; for they knew the Gascons to be verycovetous. So they said to the prince, 'Sir, offer them a sum of florins, and you will see them come down to your demands. ' The prince offeredthem sixty thousand florins; but they would have nothing to do with them. At last there was so much haggling that an agreement was made for ahundred thousand francs, which the prince was to hand over to the baronsof Gascony to share between them. He borrowed the money; and the saidsum was paid and handed over to them before the prince started. Whenthese matters were done, the prince put to sea with a fine fleet, crammedwith men-at-arms and archers, and put the King of France in a vesselquite apart, that he might be more at his ease. "

"They were at sea eleven days and eleven nights, " continues Froissart, and on the 12th they arrived at Sandwich harbor, where they landed, andhalted two days to refresh themselves and their horses. On the third daythey set out and came to St. Thomas of Canterbury. "

"When the news reached the King and Queen of England that the princetheir son had arrived and had brought with him the King of France, theywere greatly rejoiced thereat, and gave orders to the burgesses of Londonto get themselves ready in as splendid fashion as was beseeming toreceive the King of France. They of the city of London obeyed the king'scommandment, and arrayed themselves by companies most richly, all thetrades in cloth of different kinds. " According to the poetherald-at-arms of John Chandos, King Edward III. Went in person, with hisbarons and more than twenty counts, to meet King John, who entered London"mounted on a tall white steed right well harnessed and accoutred at allpoints, and the Prince of Wales, on a little black hackney, at his side. "King John was first of all lodged in London at the Savoy hotel, andshortly afterwards removed, with all his people, to Windsor; "there, "says Froissart, "to hawk, hunt, disport himself, and take his pastimeaccording to his pleasure, and Sir Philip, his son, also; and all therest of the other lords, counts, and barons, remained in London, but theywent to see the king when it pleased them, and they were put upon theirhonor only. " Chandos's poet adds, "Many a dame and many a damsel, rightamiable, gay, and lovely, came to dance there, to sing, and to causegreat galas and jousts, as in the days of King Arthur. "

In the midst of his pleasures in England King John sometimes alsooccupied himself at Windsor with his business in France, but with no morewisdom or success than had been his wont during his actual reign. Towards the end of April, 1359, the dauphin-regent received at Paris thetext of a treaty which the king his father had concluded, in London, withthe King of England. "The cession of the western half of France, fromCalais to Bayonne, and the immediate payment of four million goldencrowns, " such was, according to the terms of this treaty, the price ofKing John's ransom, says M. Picot, in his work concerning the History ofthe States-General, which was crowned in 1869 by the _Academie desSciences Morales et Politiques_, and the regent resolved to leave to thejudgment of France the acceptance or refusal of such exorbitant demands. He summoned a meeting, to be held at Paris on the 19th of May, ofchurchmen, nobles, and deputies from the good towns; but "there came butfew deputies, as well because full notice had not by that time been givenof the said summons, as because the roads were blocked by the English andthe Navarrese, who occupied fortresses in all parts whereby it waspossible to get to Paris. " The assembly had to be postponed from day today. At last, on the 25th of May, the regent repaired to the palace. Hehalted on the marble staircase; around him were ranged the three estates;and a numerous multitude filled the court-yard. In presence of all thepeople, William de Dormans, king's advocate in parliament, read thetreaty of peace, which was to divide the kingdom into two parts, so as tohand over one to the foes of France. The reading of it roused theindignation of the people. The estates replied that the treaty was not"tolerable or feasible, " and in their patriotic enthusiasm "decreed tomake fair war on the English. " But it was not enough to spare thekingdom the shame of such a treaty; it was necessary to give the regentthe means of concluding a better. On the 2d of June, the noblesannounced to the dauphin that they would serve for a month at their ownexpense, and that they would pay besides such imposts as should bedecreed by the good towns. The churchmen also offered to pay them. Thecity of Paris undertook to maintain "six hundred swords, three hundredarchers, and a thousand brigands. " The good towns offered twelvethousand men; but they could not keep their promise, the country beingutterly ruined. 

When King John heard at Windsor that the treaty, whereby he had hoped tobe set at liberty, had been rejected at Paris, he showed his displeasureby a single outburst of personal animosity, saying, "Ah! Charles, fairson, you were counselled by the King of Navarre, who deceives you, andwould deceive sixty such as you!" Edward III. , on his side, at once tookmeasures for recommencing the war; but before engaging in it he had KingJohn removed from Windsor to Hertford Castle, and thence to Somerton, where he set a strong guard. Having thus made certain that his prisonerwould not escape from him, he put to sea, and, on the 28th of October, 1359, landed at Calais with a numerous and well-supplied army. Then, rapidly traversing Northern France, he did not halt till he arrivedbefore Rheims, which he was in hopes of surprising, and where, it issaid, he purposed to have himself, without delay, crowned King of France. But he found the place so well provided, and the population so determinedto make a good defence, that he raised the siege and moved on Chalons, where the same disappointment awaited him. Passing from Champagne toBurgundy, he then commenced the same course of scouring and ravaging; butthe Burgundians entered into negotiations with him, and by a treatyconcluded on the 10th of March, 1360, and signed by Joan of Auvergne, Queen of France, second wife of King John, and guardian of the young Dukeof Burgundy, Philip de Rouvre, they obtained, at the cost of two hundredthousand golden sheep (moutons), an agreement that for three years Edwardand his army "would not go scouring and burning" in Burgundy, as theywere doing in the other parts of France. Such was the powerlessness, orrather absence, of all national government, that a province made a treatyall alone, and on its own account, without causing the regent to show anysurprise, or to dream of making any complaint. 

As a make-weight, at this same time, another province, Picardy, aided bymany Normans and Flemings, its neighbors, "nobles, burgesses, andcommon-folk, " was sending to sea an expedition which was going to try, with God's help, to deliver King John from his prison in England, andbring him back in triumph to his kingdom. " "Thus, " says the chronicler, "they who, God-forsaken or through their own faults, could not defendthemselves on the soil of their fathers, were going abroad to seek theirfortune and their renown, to return home covered with honor and boastingof divine succor! The Picard expedition landed in England on the 14th ofMarch, 1360; it did not deliver King John, but it took and gave over toflames and pillage for two days the town of Winchelsea, after which itput to sea again, and returned to its hearths. " (_The Continuer ofWilliam of Nangis, _ t. Ii. P. 298. )

Edward III. , weary of thus roaming with his army over France withoutobtaining any decisive result, and without even managing to get into hishands any one "of the good towns which he had promised himself, " saysFroissart, "that he would tan and hide in such sort that they would beglad to come to some accord with him, " resolved to direct his effortsagainst the capital of the kingdom, where the dauphin kept himself close. On the 7th of April, 1360, he arrived hard by Montrouge, and his troopsspread themselves over the outskirts of Paris in the form of an investingor besieging force. But he had to do with a city protected by goodramparts, and well supplied with provisions, and with a prince cool, patient, determined, free from any illusion as to his danger or hisstrength, and resolved not to risk any of those great battles of which hehad experienced the sad issue. Foreseeing the advance of the English, hehad burned the villages in the neighborhood of Paris, where they mighthave fixed their quarters; he did the same with the suburbs of St. Germain, St. Marcel, and Notre-Dame-des-Champs; he turned a deaf ear toall King Edward's warlike challenges; and some attempts at an assault onthe part of the English knights, and some sorties on the part of theFrench knights, impatient of their inactivity, came to nothing. At theend of a week Edward, whose "army no longer found aught to eat, " withdrewfrom Paris by the Chartres road, declaring his purpose of entering thegood country of Beauce, where he would recruit himself all the summer, "and whence he would return after vintage to resume the siege of Paris, whilst his lieutenants would ravage all the neighboring provinces. Whenhe was approaching Chartres, "there burst upon his army, " says Froissart, "a tempest, a storm, an eclipse, a wind, a hail, an upheaval so mighty, so wondrous, so horrible, that it seemed as if the heaven were alla-tumble, and the earth were opening to swallow up everything; the stonesfell so thick and so big that they slew men and horses, and there wasnone so bold but that they were all dismayed. There were at that time inthe army certain wise men, who said that it was a scourge of God, sent asa warning, and that God was showing by signs that He would that peaceshould be made. " Edward had by him certain discreet friends, who addedtheir admonitions to those of the tempest. His cousin, the Duke ofLancaster, said to him, "My lord, this war that you are waging in thekingdom of France is right wondrous, and too costly for you; your mengain by it, and you lose your time over it to no purpose; you will spendyour life on it, and it is very doubtful whether you will attain yourdesire; take the offers made to you now, whilst you can come out withhonor; for, my lord, we may lose more in one day than we have won intwenty years. " The Regent of France, on his side, indirectly madeovertures for peace; the Abbot of Cluny, and the General of theDominicans, legates of Pope Innocent VI. , warmly seconded them; andnegotiations were opened at the hamlet of Bretigny, close to Chartres. "The King of England was a hard nut to crack, " says Froissart; he yieldeda little, however, and on the 8th of May, 1360, was concluded the treatyof Bretigny, a peace disastrous indeed, but become necessary. Aquitaineceased to be a French fief, and was exalted, in the King of England'sinterest, to an independent sovereignty, together with the provincesattached to Poitou, Saintonge, Aunis, Agenois, Perigord, Limousin, Quercy, Bigorre, Angoumois, and Rouergue. The King of England, on hisside, gave up completely to the King of France Normandy, Maine, and theportion of Touraine and Anjou situated to the north of the Loire. Heengaged, further, to solemnly renounce all pretensions to the crown ofFrance so soon as King John had renounced all rights of suzerainty overAquitaine. King John's ransom was fixed at three millions of goldencrowns, payable in six years, and John Galeas Visconti, Duke of Milan, paid the first instalment of it (six hundred thousand florins) as theprice of his marriage with Isabel of France, daughter of King John. Hardas these conditions were, the peace was joyfully welcomed in Paris, andthroughout Northern France; the bells of the country churches, as well asof Notre-Dame in Paris, songs and dances amongst the people, and libertyof locomotion and of residence secured to the English in all places, "sothat none should disquiet them or insult them, " bore witness to thegeneral satisfaction. But some of the provinces ceded to the King ofEngland had great difficulty in resigning themselves to it. "In Poitou, and in all the district of Saintonge, " says Froissart, "great was thedispleasure of barons, knights, and good towns when they had to beEnglish. The town of La Rochelle was especially unwilling to agreethereto; it is wonderful what sweet and piteous words they wrote, againand again, to the King of France, begging him, for God's sake, to bepleased not to separate them from his own domains, or place them inforeign hands, and saying that they would rather be clipped every year ofhalf their revenue than pass into the hands of the English. And whenthey saw that neither excuses, nor remonstrances, nor prayers were of anyavail, they obeyed, but the men of most mark in the town said, 'We willrecognize the English with the lips, but the heart shall beat to itnever. '" Thus began to grow in substance and spirit, in the midst of warand out of disaster itself [_per damna, per caedes ab ipso Duxit opesanimumque ferro_], that national patriotism which had hitherto been sucha stranger to feudal France, and which was so necessary for her progresstowards unity--the sole condition for her of strength, security, andgrandeur, in the state characteristic of the European world since thesettlement of the Franks in Gaul. 

Having concluded the treaty of Bretigny, the King of England returned onthe 18th of May, 1360, to London; and, on the 8th of July following, KingJohn, having been set at liberty, was brought over by the Prince of Walesto Calais, where Edward III. Came to meet him. The two kings treated oneanother there with great courtesy. "The King of England, " saysFroissart, "gave the King of France at Calais Castle a magnificentsupper, at which his own children, and the Duke of Lancaster, and thegreatest barons of England, waited at table, bareheaded. " Meanwhile thePrince-Regent of France was arriving at Amiens, and there receiving fromhis brother-in-law, Galdas Visconti, Duke of Milan, the sum necessary topay the first instalment of his royal father's ransom. Payment havingbeen made, the two kings solemnly ratified at Calais the treaty ofBritigny. Two sons of King John, the Duke of Anjou and the Duke ofBerry, with several other personages of consideration, princes of theblood, barons, and burgesses of the principal good towns, were given ashostages to the King of England for the due execution of the treaty; andEdward III. Negotiated between the King of France and Charles the Bad, King of Navarre, a reconciliation precarious as ever. The work ofpacification having been thus accomplished, King John departed on footfor Boulogne, where he was awaited by the dauphin, his son, and where thePrince of Wales and his two brothers, like-wise on foot, came and joinedhim. All these princes passed two days together at Boulogne in religiousceremonies and joyous galas; after which the Prince of Wales returned toCalais, and King John set out for Paris, which he once more entered, December 13, 1360. "He was welcomed there, " says Froissart, "by allmanner of folk, for he had been much desired there. Rich presents weremade him; the prelates and barons of his kingdom came to visit him; theyfeasted him and rejoiced with him, as it was seemly to do; and the kingreceived them sweetly and handsomely, for well he knew how. "

And that was all King John did know. When he was once more seated on histhrone, the counsels of his eldest son, the late regent, induced him totake some wise and wholesome administrative measures. All adulterationof the coinage was stopped; the Jews were recalled for twenty years, andsome securities were accorded to their industry and interests; and anedict renewed the prohibition of private wars. But in his personalactions, in his bearing and practices as a king, the levity, frivolity, thoughtlessness, and inconsistency of King John were the same as ever. He went about his kingdom, especially in Southern France, seekingeverywhere occasions for holiday-making and disbursing, rather than forobserving and reforming the state of the country. During the visit hepaid in 1362 to the new pope, Urban V. , at Avignon, he tried to getmarried to Queen Joan of Naples, the widow of two husbands already, and, not being successful, he was on the point of involving himself in a newcrusade against the Turks. It was on his return from this trip that hecommitted the gravest fault of his reign, a fault which was destined tobring upon France and the French kingship even more evils and disastersthan those which had made the treaty of Bretigny a necessity. In 1362, the young Duke of Burgundy, Philip de Louvre, the last of the first houseof the Dukes of Burgundy, descendants of King Robert, died without issue, leaving several pretenders to his rich inheritance. King John was, according to the language of the genealogists, the nearest of blood, andat the same time the most powerful; and he immediately took possession ofthe duchy, went, on the 23d of December, 1362, to Dijon, swore on thealtar of St. Benignus that he would maintain the privileges of the cityand of the province, and, nine months after, on the 6th of September, 1363, disposed of the duchy of Burgundy in the following terms:"Recalling again to memory the excellent and praise-worthy services ofour right dearly beloved Philip, the fourth of our sons, who freelyexposed himself to death with us, and, all wounded as he was, remainedunwavering and fearless at the battle of Poitiers . . . We do concedeto him and give him the duchy and peerage of Burgundy, together with allthat we may have therein of right, possession, and proprietorship . . . For the which gift our said son hath done us homage as duke and premierpeer of France. " Thus was founded that second house of the Dukes ofBurgundy which was destined to play, for more than a century, so greatand often so fatal a part in the fortunes of France. 

Whilst he was thus preparing a gloomy future for his country and hisline, King John heard that his second son, the Duke of Anjou, one of thehostages left in the hands of the King of England as security for theexecution of the treaty of Bretigny, had broken his word of honor andescaped from England, in order to go and join his wife at Guise Castle. Knightly faith was the virtue of King John; and it was, they say, on thisoccasion, that he cried, as he was severely upbraiding his son, that "ifgood faith were banished from the world, it ought to find an asylum inthe hearts of kings. " He announced to his councillors, assembled atAmiens, his intention of going in person to England. An effort was madeto dissuade him; and "several prelates and barons of France told him thathe was committing great folly when he was minded to again put himself indanger from the King of England. He answered that he had found in hisbrother, the King of England, in the Queen, and in his nephews, theirchildren, so much loyalty, honor, and courtesy, that he had no doubt butthat they would be courteous, loyal, and amiable to him, in any case. And so he was minded to go and make the excuses of his son, the Duke ofAnjou, who had returned to France. " According to the most intelligent ofthe chroniclers of the time, the Continuer of William of Nangis, "somepersons said that the king was minded to go to England in order to amusehimself;" and they were probably right, for kingly and knightlyamusements were the favorite subject of King John's meditations. Thistime he found in England something else besides galas; he before longfell seriously ill, "which mightily disconcerted the King and Queen ofEngland, for the wisest in the country judged him to be in great peril. "He died, in fact, on the 8th of April, 1364, at the Savoy Hotel, inLondon; "whereat the King of England, the Queen, their children, and manyEnglish barons were much moved, " says Froissart, "for the honor of thegreat love which the King of France, since peace was made, had shownthem. " France was at last about to have in Charles V. A practical andan effective king. 

[Illustration: Charles V. ----371]

In spite of the discretion he had displayed during his four years ofregency (from 1356 to 1360), his reign opened under the saddest auspices. In 1363, one of those contagious diseases, all at that time called theplague, committed cruel ravages in France. "None, " says the contemporarychronicler, "could count the number of the dead in Paris, young or old, rich or poor; when death entered a house, the little children died first, then the menials, then the parents. In the smallest villages, as well asin Paris, the mortality was such that at Argenteuil, for example, wherethere were wont to be numbered seven hundred hearths, there remained nomore than forty or fifty. " The ravages of the armed thieves, or bandits, who scoured the country added to those of the plague. Let it suffice toquote one instance. "In Beauce, on the Orleans and Chartres side, somebrigands and prowlers, with hostile intent, dressed as pig-dealers orcow-drivers, came to the little castle of Murs, close to Corbeil, andfinding outside the gate the master of the place, who was a knight, askedhim to get them back their pigs, which his menials, they said, had thenight before taken from them, which was false. The master gave themleave to go in, that they might discover their pigs and move them away. As soon as they had crossed the drawbridge they seized upon the master, threw off their false clothes, drew their weapons, and blew a blast uponthe bagpipe; and forthwith appeared their comrades from theirhiding-places in the neighboring woods. They took possession of thecastle, its master and mistress, and all their folk; and, settlingthemselves there, they scoured from thence the whole country, pillagingeverywhere, and filling the castle with the provisions they carried off. At the rumor of this thievish capture, many men-at-arms in theneighborhood rushed up to expel the thieves and retake from them thecastle. Not succeeding in their assault, they fell back on Corbeil, and then themselves set to ravaging the country, taking away from thefarm-houses provisions and wine without paying a dolt, and carrying themoff to Corbeil for their own use. They became before long as much fearedand hated as the brigands; and all the inhabitants of the neighboringvillages, leaving their homes and their labor, took refuge, with theirchildren and what they had been able to carry off, in Paris, the onlyplace where they could find a little security. " Thus the population waswithout any kind of regular force, anything like effectual protection;the temporary defenders of order themselves went over, and with alacritytoo, to the side of disorder when they did not succeed in repressing it;and the men-at-arms set readily about plundering, in their turn, thecastles and country-places whence they had been charged to drive off theplunderers. 

Let us add a still more striking example of the absence of all publiclyrecognized power at this period, and of the necessity to which thepopulation was nearly everywhere reduced of defending itself with its ownhands, in order to escape ever so little from the evils of war andanarchy. It was a little while ago pointed out why and how, after thedeath of Marcel and the downfall of his faction, Charles the Bad, King ofNavarre, suddenly determined upon making his peace with the regent ofFrance. This peace was very displeasing to the English, allies of theKing of Navarre, and they continued to carry on war, ravaging the countryhere and there, at one time victorious and at another vanquished in amultiplication of disconnected encounters. "I will relate, " says theContinuer of William of Nangis, "one of those incidents just as itoccurred in my neighborhood, and as I have been truthfully told about it. The struggle there was valiantly maintained by peasants, Jacques Bonhomme(Jack Goodfellows), as they are called. There is a place pretty wellfortified in a little town named Longueil, not far from Compiegne, in thediocese of Beauvais, and near to the banks of the Oise. This place isclose to the monastery of St. Corneille-de-Compiegne. The inhabitantsperceived that there would be danger if the enemy occupied this point;and, after having obtained authority from the lord-regent of France andthe abbot of the monastery, they settled themselves there, providedthemselves with arms and provisions, and appointed a captain taken fromamong themselves, promising the regent that they would defend this placeto the death. Many of the villagers came thither to place themselves insecurity, and they chose for captain a tall, fine man, named William a-Larks (aux Alouettes). He had for servant, and held as with bit andbridle, a certain peasant of lofty stature, marvellous bodily strength, and equal boldness, who had joined to these advantages an extrememodesty: he was called _Big Ferre_. These folks settled themselves atthis point to the number of about two hundred men, all tillers of thesoil, and getting a poor livelihood by the labor of their hands. TheEnglish, hearing it said that these folks were there and were determinedto resist, held them in contempt, and went to them, saying, 'Drive wehence these peasants, and take we possession of this point so wellfortified and well supplied. ' They went thither to the number of twohundred. The folks inside had no suspicion thereof, and had left theirgates open. The English entered boldly into the place, whilst thepeasants were in the inner courts or at the windows, a-gape at seeing menso well armed making their way in. The captain, William a-Larks, camedown at once with some of his people, and bravely began the fight; but hehad the worst of it, was surrounded by the English, and himself strickenwith a mortal wound. At sight hereof, those of his folk who were stillin the courts, with Big Ferre at their head, said one to another, 'Let usgo down and sell our lives clearly, else they will slay us withoutmercy. ' Gathering themselves discreetly together, they went down bydifferent gates, and struck out with mighty blows at the English, as ifthey had been beating out their corn on the threshing-floor; their armswent up and down again, and every blow dealt out a deadly wound. BigFerre, seeing his captain laid low and almost dead already, uttered abitter cry, and advancing upon the English he topped them all, as he didhis own fellows, by a head and shoulders. Raising his axe, he dealtabout him deadly blows, insomuch that in front of him the place was soona void; he felled to the earth all those whom he could reach; of one hebroke the head, of another he lopped off the arms; he bore himself sovaliantly that in an hour he had with his own hand slain eighteen ofthem, without counting the wounded; and at this sight his comrades werefilled with ardor. What more shall I say? All that band of English wereforced to turn their backs and fly; some jumped into the ditches full ofwater; others tried with tottering steps to regain the gates. Big Ferre, advancing to the spot where the English had planted their flag, took it, killed the bearer, and told one of his own fellows to go and hurl it intoa ditch where the wall was as not yet finished. 'I cannot, ' said theother, 'there are still so many English yonder. ' 'Follow me with theflag, ' said Big Ferre; and marching in front, and laying about him rightand left with his axe, he opened and cleared the way to the pointindicated, so that his comrade could freely hurl the flag into the ditch. After he had rested a moment, he returned to the fight, and fell soroughly on the English who remained, that all those who could flyhastened to profit thereby. It is said that on that day, with the helpof God and Big Ferre, who, with his own hand, as is certified, laid lowmore than forty, the greater part of the English who had come to thisbusiness never went back from it. But the captain on our side, Williama-Larks, was there stricken mortally: he was not yet dead when the fightended; he was carried away to his bed; he recognized all his comrades whowere there, and soon afterwards sank under his wounds. They buried himin the midst of weeping, for he was wise and good. "

"At the news of what had thus happened at Longueil the English were verydisconsolate, saying that it was a shame that so many and such bravewarriors should have been slain by such rustics. Next day they cametogether again from all their camps in the neighborhood, and went andmade a vigorous attack at Longueil on our folks, who no longer fearedthem hardly at all, and went out of their walls to fight them. In thefirst rank was Big Ferre, of whom the English had heard so much talk. When they saw him, and when they felt the weight of his axe and his arm, many of those who had come to this fight would have been right glad notto be there. Many fled or were grievously wounded or slain. Some of theEnglish nobles were taken. If our folks had been willing to give them upfor money, as the nobles do, they might have made a great deal; but theywould not. 

[Illustration: Big Ferre----376]

When the fight was over, Big Ferre, overcome with heat and fatigue, dranka large quantity of cold water, and was forthwith seized of a fever. Heput himself to bed without parting from his axe, which was so heavy thata man of the usual strength could scarcely lift it from the ground withboth hands. The English, hearing that Big Ferre was sick, rejoicedgreatly, and for fear he should get well they sent privily, round aboutthe place where he was lodged, twelve of their men bidden to try and ridthem of him. On espying them from afar, his wife hurried up to his bedwhere he was laid, saying to him, 'My dear Ferre, the English are coming, and I verily believe it is for thee they are looking; what wilt thou do?'Big Ferre, forgetting his sickness, armed himself in all haste, took hisaxe which had already stricken to death so many foes, went out of hishouse, and entering into his little yard, shouted to the English as soonas he saw them, 'Ah! scoundrels, you are coming to take me in my bed; butyou shall not get me. ' He set himself against a wall to be in suretyfrom behind, and defended himself manfully with his good axe and hisgreat heart. The English assailed him, burning to slay or to take him;but he resisted them so wondrously, that he brought down five muchwounded to the ground, and the other seven took to flight. Big Ferre, returning in triumph to his bed, and heated again by the blows he haddealt, again drank cold water in abundance, and fell sick of a moreviolent fever. A few days afterwards, sinking under his sickness, andafter having received the holy sacraments, Big Ferre went out of thisworld, and was buried in the burial-place of his own village. All hiscomrades and his country wept for him bitterly, for, so long as he lived, the English would not have come nigh this place. "

There is probably some exaggeration about the exploits of Big Ferre andthe number of his victims. The story just quoted is not, however, alegend; authentic and simple, it has all the characteristics of a realand true fact, just as it was picked up, partly from eye-witnesses andpartly from hearsay, by the contemporary narrator. It is a faithfulpicture of the internal state of the French nation in the fourteenthcentury; a nation in labor of formation, a nation whose elements, as yetscattered and incohesive, though under one and the same name, werefermenting each in its own quarter and independently of the rest, with atendency to mutual coalescence in a powerful unity, but, as yet, far fromsucceeding in it. 

Externally, King Charles V. Had scarcely easier work before him. Betweenhimself and his great rival, Edward III. , King of England, there was onlysuch a peace as was fatal and hateful to France. To escape some day fromthe treaty of Bretigny, and recover some of the provinces which had beenlost by it--this was what king and country secretly desired and laboredfor. Pending a favorable opportunity for promoting this higher interest, war went on in Brittany between John of Montfort and Charles of Blois, who continued to be encouraged and patronized, covertly, one by the Kingof England, the other by the King of France. Almost immediately afterthe accession of Charles V. It broke out again between him and hisbrother-in-law, Charles the Bad, King of Navarre, the former beingprofoundly mistrustful, and the latter brazen-facedly perfidious, andboth detesting one another, and watching to seize the moment for takingadvantage one of the other. The states bordering on France, amongstothers Spain and Italy, were a prey to discord and even civil wars, whichcould not fail to be a source of trouble or serious embarrassment toFrance. In Spain two brothers, Peter the Cruel and Henry of Transtamare, were disputing the throne of Castile. Shortly after the accession ofCharles V. , and in spite of his lively remonstrances, in 1267, Pope UrbanV. Quitted Avignon for Rome, whence he was not to return to Avignon tillthree years afterwards, and then only to die. The Emperor of Germanywas, at this period, almost the only one of the great sovereigns ofEurope who showed for France and her kings a sincere good will. When, in1378, he went to Paris to pay a visit to Charles V. , he was pleased to goto St. Denis to see the tombs of Charles the Handsome and Philip ofValois. "In my young days, " he said to the abbot, "I was nurtured at thehomes of those good kings, who showed me much kindness; I do request youaffectionately to make good prayer to God for them. " Charles V. , who hadgiven him a very friendly reception, was, no doubt, included in thispious request. 

In order to maintain the struggle against these difficulties, within andwithout, the means which Charles V. Had at his disposal were of butmoderate worth. He had three brothers and three sisters calculatedrather to embarrass and sometimes even injure him than to be of anyservice to him. Of his brothers, the eldest, Louis, Duke of Anjou, wasrestless, harsh, and bellicose. He upheld authority with no littleenergy in Languedoc, of which Charles had made him governor, but at thesame time made it detested; and he was more taken up with his ownambitious views upon the kingdom of Naples, which Queen Joan of Hungaryhad transmitted to him by adoption, than with the interests of France andher king. The second, John, Duke of Berry, was an insignificant prince, who has left no strong mark on history. The third, Philip the Bold, Dukeof Burgundy, after having been the favorite of his father, King John, waslikewise of his brother Charles V. , who did not hesitate to still fartheraggrandize this vassal, already so great, by obtaining for him inmarriage the hand of Princess Marguerite, heiress to the countship ofFlanders; and this marriage, which was destined at a later period torender the Dukes of Burgundy such formidable neighbors for the Kings ofFrance, was even in the lifetime of Charles V. A cause of unpleasantcomplications both for France and Burgundy. Of King Charles's threesisters, the eldest, Joan, was married to the King of Navarre, Charlesthe Bad, and much more devoted to her husband than to her brother; thesecond, Mary, espoused Robert, Duke of Bar, who caused more annoyancethan he rendered service to his brother-in-law, the king of France; andthe third, Isabel, wife of Galas Visconti, Duke of Milan, was of no useto her brother beyond the fact of contributing, as we have seen, by hermarriage, to pay a part of King John's ransom. Charles V. , by kindly andjudicious behavior in the bosom of his family, was able to keep seriousquarrels or embarrassments from arising thence; but he found thereinneither real strength nor sure support. 

His civil councillors, his chancellor, William de Dormans, cardinal-bishop of Beauvais, his minister of finance, John de la Grange, cardinal-bishop of Amiens; his treasurer, Philip de Savoisy; and hischamberlain and private secretary, Bureau de la Riviere, were, undoubtedly, men full of ability and zeal for his service, for he hadpicked them out and maintained them unchangeably in their offices. Thereis reason to believe that they conducted themselves discreetly, for we donot observe that after their master's death there was any outburstagainst them, on the part either of court or people, of that violent anddeadly hatred which has so often caused bloodshed in the history ofFrance. Bureau de la Riviere was attacked and prosecuted, without, however, becoming one of the victims of judicial authority at the commandof political passions. None of Charles V. 's councillors exercised overhis master that preponderating and confirmed influence which makes a mana premier minister. Charles V. Himself assumed the direction of his owngovernment, exhibiting unwearied vigilance, "but without hastiness andwithout noise. " There is a work, as yet unpublished, of M. LeopoldDelisle, which is to contain a complete explanatory catalogue of all the_Mandements et Actes divers de Charles V_. This catalogue, which forms apendant to a similar work performed by M. Delisle for the reign of PhilipAugustus, is not yet concluded; and, nevertheless, for the first sevenyears only of Charles V. 's reign, from 1364 to 1371, there are to befound enumerated and described in it eight hundred and fifty-four_mandements, ordonnances et actes divers de Charles V. _, relating to thedifferent branches of administration, and to daily incidents ofgovernment; acts all bearing the impress of an intellect active, farsighted, and bent upon becoming acquainted with everything, andregulating everything, not according to a general system, but from actualand exact knowledge. Charles always proved himself reflective, unhurried, and anxious solely to comport himself in accordance with thepublic interests and with good sense. He was one day at table in hisroom with some of his intimates, when news was brought him that theEnglish had laid siege, in Guienne, to a place where there was only asmall garrison, not in a condition to hold out unless it were promptlysuccored. "The king, " says Christine de Pisan, "showed no great outwardemotion, and quite coolly, as if the topic of conversation were somethingelse, turned and looked about him, and, seeing one of his secretaries, summoned him courteously, and bade him, in a whisper, write word to Louisde Sancerre, his marshal, to come to him directly. They who were therewere amazed that, though the matter was so weighty, the king took nogreat account of it. Some young esquires who were waiting upon him attable were bold enough to say to him, 'Sir, give us the money to fit ourselves out, as many of us are of yourhousehold, for to go on this business; we will be new-made knights, andwill go and raise the siege. ' The king began to smile, and said, 'It isnot new-made knights that are suitable; they must be all old. ' Seeingthat he said no more about it, some of them added, 'What are your orders, sir, touching this affair, which is of haste?' 'It is not well to giveorders in haste; when we see those to whom it is meet to speak, we willgive our orders. '"

On another occasion, the treasurer of Nimes had died, and the kingappointed his successor. His brother, the Duke of Anjou, came and askedfor the place on behalf of one of his own intimates, saying that he towhom the king had granted it was a man of straw, and without credit. Charles caused inquiries to be made, and then said to the duke, "Truly, fair brother, he for whom you have spoken to me is a rich man, but one oflittle sense and bad behavior. " "Assuredly, " said the Duke of Anjou, "heto whom you have given the office is a man of straw, and incompetent tofill it. " "Why, prithee?" asked the king. "Because he is a poor man, the son of small laboring folks, who are still tillers of the ground inour country. " "Ah!" said Charles; "is there nothing more? Assuredly, fair brother, we should prize more highly the poor man of wisdom than theprofligate ass;" and he maintained in the office him whom he had putthere. 

The government of Charles V. Was the personal government of anintelligent, prudent, and honorable king, anxious for the interests ofthe state, at home and abroad, as well as for his own; with littleinclination for, and little confidence in, the free co-operation of thecountry in its own affairs, but with wit enough to cheerfully call uponit when there was any pressing necessity, and accepting it then withoutchicanery or cheating, but safe to go back as soon as possible to thatsole dominion, a medley of patriotism and selfishness, which is the veryinsufficient and very precarious resource of peoples as yet incapable ofapplying their liberty to the art of their own government. Charles V. Had recourse three times, in July, 1367, and in May and December, 1369, to a convocation of the states-general, in order to be put in a positionto meet the political and financial difficulties of France. At thesecond of these assemblies, when the chancellor, William de Dormans, hadexplained the position of the kingdom, the king himself rose up "for tosay to all that if they considered that he had done anything he ought notto have done, they should tell him so, and he would amend what he haddone, for there was still time to repair it, if he had done too much ornot enough. " The question at that time was as to entertaining the appealof the barons of Aquitaine to the King of France as suzerain of thePrince of Wales, whose government had become intolerable, and to thusmake a first move to struggle out of the humiliating pace of Bretigny. Such a step, and such words, do great honor to the memory of the pacificprince who was at that time bearing the burden of the government ofFrance. It was Charles V. 's good fortune to find amongst his servantsa man who was destined to be the thunderbolt of war and the glory ofknighthood of his reign. About 1314, fifty years before Charles'saccession, there was born at the castle of Motte-Broon, near Rennes, in afamily which could reckon two ancestors amongst Godfrey de Bouillon'scomrades in the first crusade, Bertrand du Guesclin, "the ugliest childfrom Rennes to Dinan, " says a contemporary chronicle, flat-nosed andswarthy, thick-set, broad-shouldered, big-headed, a bad fellow, a regularwretch, according to his own mother's words, given to violence, alwaysstriking or being struck, whom his tutor abandoned without having beenable to teach him to read. At sixteen years of age, he escaped from thepaternal mansion, went to Rennes, entered upon a course of adventures, quarrels, challenges, and tourneys, in which he distinguished himself byhis strength, his valor, and likewise his sense of honor. He joined thecause of Charles of Blois against John of Montfort, when the two wereclaimants for the duchy of Brittany; but at the end of thirty years, "neither the good of him, nor his prowess, were as yet greatly renowned, "says Froissart, "save amongst the knights who were about him in thecountry of Brittany. " But Charles V. , at that time regent, had takennotice of him in 1359, at the siege of Melun, where Du Guesclin had forthe first time borne arms in the service of France. When, in 1364, Charles became king, he said to Boucicaut, marshal of France, "Boucicaut, get you hence, with such men as you have, and ride towards Normandy; youwill there find Sir Bertrand du Guesclin, hold yourselves in readiness, I pray you, you and he, to recover from the King of Navarre the town ofMantes, which would make us masters of the River Seine. " "Rightwillingly, sir, " answered Boucicaut; and a few weeks afterwards, on the7th of April, 1364, Boucicaut, by stratagem, entered Mantes with histroop, and Du Guesclin, coming up suddenly with his, dashed into the townat a gallop, shouting, "St. Yves! Guesclin! death, death to allNavarrese!" The two warriors did the same next day at the gates ofMeulan, three leagues from Mantes. "Thus were the two cities taken, whereat King Charles V. Was very joyous when he heard the news; and theKing of Navarre was very wroth, for he set down as great hurt the loss ofMantes and of Meulan, which made a mighty fine entrance for him intoFrance. "

It was at Rheims, during the ceremony of his coronation, that Charles V. Heard of his two officers' success. The war thus begun against the Kingof Navarre was hotly prosecuted on both sides. Charles the Bad hastilycollected his forces, Gascons, Normans, and English, and put them underthe command of John de Grailli, called the Captal of Buch, an officer ofrenown. Du Guesclin recruited in Normandy, Picardy, and Brittany, andamongst the bands of warriors which were now roaming all over France. The plan of the Captal of Buch was to go and disturb the festivities atRheims, but at Cockerel, on the banks of the Eure, two leagues fromEvreux, he met the troops of Du Guesclin; and the two armies, prettynearly equal in number, halted in view of one another. Du Guesclin heldcounsel, and said to his comrades in arms, "Sirs, we know that in frontof us we have in the Captal as gallant a knight as can be found to-day onall the earth; so long as he shall be on the spot he will do us greathurt; set we then a-horseback thirty of ours, the most skilful and theboldest; they shall give heed to nothing but to make straight towards theCaptal, break through the press, and get right up to him; then they shalltake him, pin him, carry him off amongst them, and lead him away somewhither in safety, without waiting for the end of the battle. If he canbe taken and kept in such way, the day will be ours, so astounded willhis men be at his capture. " Battle ensued at all points [May 16, 1364];and, whilst it led to various encounters, with various results, "thepicked thirty, well mounted on the flower of steeds, " says Froissart, "and with no thought but for their enterprise, came all compact togetherto where was the Captal, who was fighting right valiantly with his axe, and was dealing blows so mighty that none durst come nigh him; but thethirty broke through the press by dint of their horses, made right up tohim, halted hard by him, took him and shut him in amongst them by force;then they voided the place, and bare him away in that state, whilst hismen, who were like to mad, shouted, 'A rescue for the Captal! a rescue!'but nought could avail them, or help them; and the Captal was carried offand placed in safety. In this bustle and turmoil, whilst the Navarreseand English were trying to follow the track of the Captal, whom they sawbeing taken off before their eyes, some French agreed with hearty goodwill to bear down on the Captal's banner, which was in a thicket, andwhereof the Navarrese made their own standard. Thereupon there was agreat tumult and hard fighting there, for the banner was well guarded, and by good men; but at last it was seized, won, torn, and cast to theground. The French were masters of the battle-field; Sir Bertrand andhis Bretons acquitted themselves loyally, and ever kept themselves welltogether, giving aid one to another; but it cost them dear in men. "

Charles was highly delighted, and, after the victory, resolutelydischarged his kingly part, rewarding, and also punishing. Du Guesclinwas made marshal of Normandy, and received as a gift the countship ofLongueville, confiscated from the King of Navarre. Certain Frenchmen whohad become confidants of the King of Navarre were executed, and CharlesV. Ordered his generals to no longer show any mercy for the future tosubjects of the kingdom who were found in the enemy's ranks. The waragainst Charles the Bad continued. Charles V. , encouraged by hissuccesses, determined to take part likewise in that which was still goingon between the two claimants to the duchy of Brittany, Charles of Bloisand John of Montfort. Du Guesclin was sent to support Charles of Blois;"whereat he was greatly rejoiced, " says Froissart, "for he had alwaysheld the said lord Charles for his rightful lord. " The Count andCountess of Blois "received him right joyously and pleasantly, and thebest part of the barons of Brittany likewise had lord Charles of Blois inregard and affection. " Du Guesclin entered at once on the campaign, andmarched upon Auray, which was being besieged by the Count of Montfort. But there he was destined to encounter the most formidable of hisadversaries. John of Montfort had claimed the support of his patron, theking of England, and John Chandos, the most famous of the Englishcommanders, had applied to the Prince of Wales to know what he was to do. "You may go full well, " the prince had answered, "since the French aregoing for the Count of Blois; I give you good leave. " Chandos, delighted, set hastily to work recruiting. Only a few Aquitaniansdecided to join him, for they were beginning to be disgusted with Englishrule, and the French national spirit was developing itself throughoutGascony, even in the Prince of Wales's immediate circle. Chandosrecruited scarcely any but English or Bretons, and when, to the great joyof the Count of Montfort, he arrived before Auray, "he brought, " saysFroissart, "full sixteen hundred fighting men, knights, and squires, English and Breton, and about eight or nine hundred archers. " DuGuesclin's troops were pretty nearly equal in number, and not less brave, but less well disciplined, and probably also less ably commanded. Thebattle took place on the 29th of September, 1364, before Auray. Theattendant circumstances and the result have already been recounted in thetwentieth chapter of this history; Charles of Blois was killed, and DuGuesclin was made prisoner. The cause of John of Montfort was clearlywon; and he, on taking possession of the duchy of Brittany, asked nothingbetter than to acknowledge himself vassal of the King of France, andswear fidelity to him. Charles V. Had too much judgment not to foreseethat, even after a defeat, a peace which gave a lawful and definitesolution to the question of Brittany, rendered his relations and means ofinfluence with this important province much more to be depended upon thanany success which a prolonged war might promise him. Accordingly he madepeace at Guerande, on the 11th of April, 1365, after having disputed theconditions inch by inch; and some weeks previously, on the 6th of March, at the indirect instance of the King of Navarre, who, since the battle ofGocherel, had felt himself in peril, Charles V. Had likewise put an endto his open struggle against his perfidious neighbor, of whom hecertainly did not cease to be mistrustful. Being thus delivered fromevery external war and declared enemy, the wise King of France was atliberty to devote himself to the re-establishment of internal peace andof order throughout his kingdom, which was in the most pressing needthereof. 

We have, no doubt, even in our own day, cruel experience of the disordersand evils of war; but we can form, one would say, but a very incompleteidea of what they were in the fourteenth century, without any of thosehumane administrative measures, still so ineffectual, --provisionings, hospitals, ambulances, barracks, and encampments, --which are taken in thepresent day to prevent or repair them. The _Recueil des Ordonnances desLois de France_ is full of safeguards granted by Charles V. Tomonasteries and hospices and communes, which implored his protection, that they might have a little less to suffer than the country in general. We will borrow from the best informed and the most intelligent of thecontemporary chroniclers, the Continuer of William of Nangis, a pictureof those sufferings and the causes of them. "There was not, " he says, "in Anjou, in Touraine, in Beauce, near Orleans and up to the approachesof Paris, any corner of the country which was free from plunderers androbbers. They were so numerous everywhere, either in little fortsoccupied by them or in the villages and country-places, that peasants andtradesfolks could not travel but at great expense and great peril. Thevery guards told off to defend cultivators and travellers took part mostshamefully in harassing and despoiling them. It was the same in Burgundyand the neighboring countries. Some knights who called themselvesfriends of the king and of the king's majesty, and whose names I am notminded to set down here, kept in their service brigands who were quite asbad. What is far more strange is, that when those folks went into thecities, Paris or elsewhere, everybody knew them and pointed them out, butnone durst lay a hand upon them. I saw one night at Paris, in the suburbof St. Germain des Pres, while the people were sleeping, some brigandswho were abiding with their chieftains in the city, attempting to sackcertain hospices: they were arrested and imprisoned in the Chatelet; but, before long, they were got off, declared innocent, and set at libertywithout undergoing the least punishment--a great encouragement for themand their like to go still farther. . . . When the king gave Bertranddu Guesclin the countship of Longueville, in the diocese of Rouen, whichhad belonged to Philip, brother of the King of Navarre, Du Guesclinpromised the king that he would drive out by force of arms all theplunderers and robbers, those enemies of the kingdom; but he did nothingof the sort; nay, the Bretons even of Du Guesclin, on returning fromRouen, pillaged and stole in the villages whatever they found there--garments, horses, sheep, oxen, and beasts of burden and of tillage. "

Charles V. Was not, as Louis XII. And Henry IV. Were, of a dispositionfull of affection, and sympathetically inclined towards his people; buthe was a practical man, who, in his closet and in the library growing upabout him, took thought for the interests of his kingdom as well as forhis own; he had at heart the public good, and lawlessness was anabomination to him. He had just purchased, at a ransom of a hundredthousand francs, the liberty of Bertrand du Guesclin, who had remained aprisoner in the hands of John Chandos, after the battle of Auray. Anidea occurred to him that the valiant Breton might be of use to him inextricating France from the deplorable condition to which she had beenreduced by the bands of plunderers roaming everywhere over her soil. Wefind in the Chronicle in verse of Bertrand Guesclin, by Cuvelier, atroubadour of the fourteenth century, a detailed account of the king'sperplexities on this subject, and of the measures he took to apply aremedy. We cannot regard this account as strictly historical; but it isa picture, vivid and morally true, of events and men as they wereunderstood and conceived to be by a contemporary, a mediocre poet, but aspirited narrator. We will reproduce the principal features, modifyingthe language to make it more easily intelligible, but without alteringthe fundamental character. 

"There were so many folk who went about pillaging the country of Francethat the king was sad and doleful at heart. He summoned his council, andsaid to them, 'What shall we do with this multitude of thieves who goabout destroying our people? If I send against them my valiant baronageI lose my noble barons, and then I shall never more have any joy of mylife. If any could lead these folk into Spain against the miscreant andtyrant Pedro, who put our sister to death, I would like it well, whateverit might cost me. '

[Illustration: Bertrand du Guesclin----388]

"Bertrand du Guesclin gave ear to the king, and 'Sir King, ' said he, 'itis my heart's desire to cross over the seas and go fight the heathen withthe edge of the sword; but if I could come nigh this folk which Bothanger you, I would deliver the kingdom from them. ' 'I should like itwell, ' said the king. 'Say no more, ' said Bertrand to him; 'I will learntheir pleasure; give it no further thought. '

"Bertrand du Guesclin summoned his herald, and said to him, 'Go thou tothe Grand Company and have all the captains assembled; thou wilt go anddemand for me a safe-conduct, for I have a great desire to parley withthem. ' The herald mounted his horse, and went a-seeking these folktoward Chalon-sur-la-Saone. They were seated together at dinner, andwere drinking good wine from the cask they had pierced. 'Sirs, ' said theherald, 'the blessing of Jesus be on you! Bertrand du Guesclin prayethyou to let him parley with all in company. ' ' By my faith, gentleherald, ' said Hugh de Calverley, who was master of the English, 'I willreadily see Bertrand here, and will give him good wine; I can well giveit him, in sooth, I do assure you, for it costs me nothing. ' Then theherald departed, and returned to his lord, and told the news of thiscompany. 

"So away rode Bertrand, and halted not; and he rode so far that he cameto the Grand Company, and then did greet them. 'God keep, ' said he, 'thecompanions I see yonder!' Then they bowed down; each abased himself. 'Ivow to God, ' said Bertrand, 'whosoever will be pleased to believe me; Iwill make you all rich. ' And they answered, 'Right welcome here sir, wewill all do whatsoever is your pleasure. ' 'Sirs, ' said Bertrand, 'bepleased to listen to me; wherefore I am come I will tell unto you. Icome by order of the king in whose keeping is France, and who would beright glad, to save his people, that ye should come with me whither Ishould be glad to go into good company I fain would bring ye. If wewould all of us look into our hearts, we might full truly consider thatwe have done enough to damn our souls; think we but how we have dealtwith life, outraged ladies and burned houses, slain men, children, andeverybody set to ransom, how we have eaten up cows, oxen, and sheep, drunk good wines, and done worse than robbers do. Let us do honor to Godand forsake the devil. Ask, if it may please you, all the companions, all the knights, and all the barons; if you be of accord, we will go tothe king, and I will have the gold got ready which we do promise you Iwould fain get together all my friends to make the journey we so stronglydesire. '"

Du Guesclin then explained, in broad terms which left the choice to theGrand Company, what this journey was which was so much desired. He spokeof the King of Cyprus, of the Saracens of Granada, of the Pope ofAvignon, and especially of Spain and the King of Castile, Pedro theCruel, "scoundrel-murderer of his wife (Blanche of Bourbon), " on whom, above all, Du Gueselin wished to draw down the wrath of his hearers. "InSpain, " he said to them, we might largely profit, for the country is agood one for leading a good life, and there are good wines which are neatand clear. " Nearly all present, whereof were twenty-five famouscaptains, "confirmed what was said by Bertrand. " "Sirs, " said he to themat last, "listen to me: I will go my way and speak to the King of theFranks; I will get for you those two hundred thousand francs; you shallcome and dine with me at Paris, according to my desire, when the timeshall have come for it; and you shall see the king, who will be rejoicedthereat. We will have no evil suspicion in anything, for I never wasinclined to treason, and never shall be as long as I live. " Then saidthe valiant knights and esquires to him, "Never was more valiant man seenon earth; and in you we have more belief and faith than in all theprelates and great clerics who dwell at Avignon or in France. "

When Du Gueselin returned to Paris, "Sir, " said he to the king, "I haveaccomplished your wish; I will put out of your kingdom all the worst folkof this Grand Company, and I will so work it that everything shall besaved. " "Bertrand, " said the king to him, "may the Holy Trinity bepleased to have you in their keeping, and may I see you a long while injoy and health!" "Noble king, " said Bertrand, "the captains have a verygreat desire to come to Paris, your good city. " "I am heartily willing, "said the king; "if they come, let them assemble at the Temple; elsewherethere is too much people and too much abundance; there might be too muchalarm. Since they have reconciled themselves to us, I would have noughtbut friendship with them. "

The poet concludes the negotiation thus: "At the bidding of Bertrand, when he understood the pleasure of the noble King of France, all thecaptains came to Paris in perfect safety; they were conducted straight tothe Temple; there they were feasted and dined nobly, and received many agift, and all was sealed. "

Matters went, at the outset at least, as Du Guesclin had promised to theking on the one side, and on the other to the captains of the GrandCompany. There was, in point of fact, a civil war raging in Spainbetween Don Pedro the Cruel, King of Castile, and his natural brother, Henry of Transtamare, and that was the theatre on which Du Guesclin hadfirst proposed to launch the vagabond army which he desired to get out ofFrance. It does not appear, however, that at their departure fromBurgundy at the end of November, 1365, this army and its chiefs had inthis respect any well-considered resolution, or any well-defined aim intheir movements. They made first for Avignon, and Pope Urban V. , onhearing of their approach, was somewhat disquieted, and sent to them oneof his cardinals to ask them what was their will. If we may believe thepoet-chronicler, Cuvelier, the mission was anything but pleasing to thecardinal, who said to one of his confidants, "I am grieved to be set tothis business, for I am sent to a pack of madmen who have not an hour's, nay, not even half-an-hour's conscience. " The captains replied that theywere going to fight the heathen either in Cyprus or in the kingdom ofGranada, and that they demanded of the pope absolution of their sins andtwo hundred thousand livres, which Du Guesclin had promised them in hisname. The pope cried out against this. "Here, " said he, "at Avignon, wehave money given us for absolution, and we must give it gratis to yonderfolks, and give them money also: it is quite against reason. " DuGuesclin insisted. "Know you, " said he to the cardinal, "that there arein this army many folks who care not a whit for absolution, and who wouldmuch rather have money; we are making them proper men in spite ofthemselves, and are leading them abroad that they may do no mischief toChristians. Tell that to the pope; for else we could not take themaway. " The pope yielded, and gave them the two hundred thousand livres. He obtained the money by levies upon the population of Avignon. They, nodoubt, complained loudly, for the chiefs of the Grand Company wereinformed thereof, and Du Guesclin said, "By the faith that I owe to theHoly Trinity, I will not take a denier of that which these poor folkshave given; let the pope and the clerics give us of their own; we desirethat all they who have paid the tax do recover their money without losinga doit; "and, according to contemporary chronicles, the vagabond army didnot withdraw until they had obtained this satisfaction. The piety of themiddle ages, though sincere, was often less disinterested and more roughthan it is commonly represented. 

On arriving at Toulouse from Avignon, Du Guesclin and his bands, with astrength, it is said, of thirty thousand men, took the decided resolutionof going into Spain to support the cause of Prince Henry of Transtamareagainst the King of Castile his brother, Don Pedro the Cruel. The Dukeof Anjou, governor of Languedoc, gave them encouragement, by agreement, no doubt with King Charles V. , and from anxiety on his own part to ridhis province of such inconvenient visitors. On the 1st of January, 1366, Du Guesclin entered Barcelona, whither Henry of Transtamare came to joinhim. There is no occasion to give a detailed account here of thatexpedition, which appertains much more to the history of Spain than tothat of France. There was a brief or almost no struggle. Henry ofTranstamare was crowned king, first at Calahorra, and afterwards atBurgos. Don Pedro, as much despised before long as he was alreadydetested, fled from Castile to Andalusia, and from Andalusia to Portugal, whose king would not grant him an asylum in his dominions, and he endedby embarking at Corunna for Bordeaux, to implore the assistance of thePrince of Wales, who gave him a warm and a magnificent reception. EdwardIII. , King of England, had been disquieted by the march of the GrandCompany into Spain, and had given John Chandos and the rest of his chiefcommanders in Guienne orders to be vigilant in preventing the Englishfrom taking part in the expedition against his cousin the King ofCastile; but several of the English chieftains, serving in the bands andwith Du Guesclin, set at nought this prohibition, and contributedmaterially to the fall of Don Pedro. Edward III. Did not consider thatthe matter was any infraction, on the part of France, of the treaty ofBretigne, and continued to live at peace with Charles V. , testifying hisdispleasure, however, all the same. But when Don Pedro had reachedBordeaux, and had told the Prince of Wales that, if he obtained thesupport of England, he would make the prince's eldest son, Edward, kingof Galicia, and share amongst the prince's warriors the treasure he hadleft in Castile, so well concealed that he alone knew where, "the knightsof the Prince of Wales, " says Froissart, "gave ready heed to his words, for English and Gascons are by nature covetous. " The Prince of Walesimmediately summoned the barons of Aquitaine, and on the advice they gavehim sent four knights to London to ask for instructions from the king hisfather. Edward III. Assembled his chief councillors at Westminster, andfinally "it seemed to all course due and reasonable on the part of thePrince of Wales to restore and conduct the King of Spain to his kingdom;to which end they wrote official letters from the King and the council ofEngland to the prince and the barons of Aquitaine. When the said baronsheard the letters read they said to the prince, 'My lord, we will obeythe command of the king our master and your father; it is but reason, andwe will serve you on this journey and King Pedro also; but we would knowwho shall pay us and deliver us our wages, for one does not takemen-at-arms away from their homes to go a warfare in a foreign land, without they be paid and delivered. If it were a matter touching ourdear lord your father's affairs, or your own, or your honor or ourcountry's, we would not speak thereof so much beforehand as we do. ' Thenthe Prince of Wales looked towards the Prince Don Pedro, and said to him, 'Sir King, you hear what these gentlemen say; to answer is for you, whohave to employ them. ' Then the King Don Pedro answered the prince, 'Mydear cousin, so far as my gold, my silver, and all my treasure which Ihave brought with me hither, and which is not a thirtieth part so greatas that which there is yonder, will go, I am ready to give it and shareit amongst your gentry. ' 'You say well, ' said the prince, 'and for theresidue I will be debtor to them, and I will lend you all you shall haveneed of until we be in Castile. ' 'By my head, ' answered the King DonPedro, you will do me great grace and great courtesy. '"

When the English and Gascon chieftains who had followed Du Guesclininto Spain heard of the resolutions of their king, Edward III. , and thepreparations made by the Prince of Wales for going and restoring DonPedro to the throne of Castile, they withdrew from the cause which theyhad just brought to an issue to the advantage of Henry of Transtamare, separated from the French captain who had been their leader, and marchedback into Aquitaine, quite ready to adopt the contrary cause, and followthe Prince of Wales in the service of Don Pedro. The greater part of theadventurers, Burgundian, Picard, Champagnese, Norman, and others who hadenlisted in the bands which Du Guesclin had marched out of France, likewise quitted him, after reaping the fruits of their raid, andrecrossed the Pyrenees to go and resume in France their life of rovingand pillage. There remained in Spain about fifteen hundred men-at-armsfaithful to Du Guesclin, himself faithful to Henry of Transtamare, whohad made him Constable of Castile. 

Amidst all these vicissitudes, and at the bottom of all events as well asof all hearts, there still remained the great fact of the period, thestruggle between the two kings of France and England for dominion in thatbeautiful country which, in spite of its dismemberment, kept the name ofFrance. Edward III. In London, and the Prince of Wales at Bordeaux, could not see, without serious disquietude, the most famous warrioramongst the French crossing the Pyrenees with a following for the mostpart French, and setting upon the throne of Castile a prince necessarilyallied to the King of France. The question of rivalry between the twokings and the two peoples had thus been transferred into Spain, and forthe moment the victory remained with France. After several months'preparation the prince of Wales, purchasing the complicity of the King ofNavarre, marched into Spain in February, 1367, with an army of twenty-seven thousand men, and John Chandos, the most able of the Englishwarriors. Henry of Transtamare had troops more numerous, but lessdisciplined and experienced. The two armies joined battle on the 3d ofApril, 1367, at Najara or Navarette, not far from the Ebro. Disorder andeven sheer rout soon took place amongst that of Henry, who flung himselfbefore the fugitives, shouting, "Why would ye thus desert and betray me, ye who have made me King of Castile? Turn back and stand by me; and bythe grace of God the day shall be ours. " Du Guesclin and his men-at-armsmaintained the fight with stubborn courage, but at last they were beaten, and either slain or taken. To the last moment Du Guesclin, with his backagainst a wall, defended himself heroically against a host of assailants. The Prince of Wales, coming up, cried out, "Gentle marshals of France, and you too, Bertrand, yield yourselves to me. " "Why, yonder men are myfoes, " cried the king, Don Pedro; "it is they who took from me mykingdom, and on them I mean to take vengeance. " Du Guesclin, dartingforward, struck so rough a blow with his sword at Don Pedro, that hebrought him fainting to the ground, and then turning to the Prince ofWales said, "Nathless I give up my sword to the most valiant prince onearth. " The Prince of Wales took the sword, and charged the Captal ofBuch with the prisoner's keeping. "Aha! sir Bertrand, " said the Captalto Du Guesclin, "you took me at the battle of Cocherel, and to-day I'vegot you. " "Yes, " replied Du Guesclin; "but at Cocherel I took youmyself, and here you are only my keeper. "

The battle of Najara being over, and Don Pedro the Cruel restored to athrone which he was not to occupy for long, the Prince of Wales returnedto Bordeaux with his army and his prisoner Du Guesclin, whom he treatedcourteously, at the same time that he kept him pretty strictly. One ofthe English chieftains who had been connected with Du Guesclin at thetime of his expedition into Spain, Sir Hugh Calverley, tried one day toinduce the Prince of Wales to set the French warrior at liberty. "Sir, "said he, "Bertrand is a right loyal knight, but he is not a rich man, orin estate to pay much money; he would have good need to end his captivityon easy terms. " "Let be, " said the prince; "I have no care to take aughtof his; I will cause his life to be prolonged in spite of himself: if hewere released, he would be in battle again, and always a-making war. "After supper, Hugh, without any beating about the bush, told Bertrand theprince's answer. "Sir, " he said, "I cannot bring about your release. ""Sir, " said Bertrand, "think no more of it; I will leave the matter tothe decision of God, who is a good and just master. " Some time after, Du Guesclin having sent a request to the Prince of Wales to admit him toransom, the prince, one day when he was in a gay humor, had him broughtup, and told him that his advisers had urged him not to give him hisliberty so long as the war between France and England lasted. "Sir, "said Du Guesclin to him, "then am I the most honored knight in the world, for they say, in the kingdom of France and elsewhere, that you are moreafraid of me than of any other. " "Think you, then, it is for yourknighthood that we do keep you?" said the prince: "nay, by St. George;fix you your own ransom, and you shall be released. " Du Guesclin proudlyfixed his ransom at a hundred thousand francs, which seemed a large sumeven to the Prince of Wales. "Sir, " said Du Guesclin to him, "the kingin whose keeping is France will lend me what I lack, and there is not aspinning wench in France who would not spin to gain for me what isnecessary to put me out of your clutches. " The advisers of the Prince ofWales would have had him think better of it, and break his promise; but"that which we have agreed to with him we will hold to, " said the prince;"it would be shame and confusion of face to us if we could be reproachedwith not setting him to ransom when he is ready to set himself down at somuch as to pay a hundred thousand francs. " Prince and knight were bothas good as their word. Du Guesclin found amongst his Breton friends aportion of the sum he wanted; King Charles V. Lent him thirty thousandSpanish doubloons, which, by a deed of December 27, 1367, Du Guesclinundertook to repay; and at the beginning of 1368 the Prince of Wales setthe French warrior at liberty. 

The first use Du Guesclin made of it was to go and put his name and hissword at the service first of the Duke of Anjou, governor of Languedoc, who was making war in Provence against Queen Joan of Naples, and then ofhis Spanish patron, Henry of Transtamare, who had recommenced the war inSpain against his brother, Pedro the Cruel, whom he was before long todethrone for the second time and slay with his own hand. But whilst DuGuesclin was taking part in this settlement of the Spanish question, important events called him back to the north of the Pyrenees for theservice of his own king, the defence of his own country, and theaggrandizement of his own fortunes. The English and Gascon bands which, in 1367, had recrossed the Pyrenees with the Prince of Wales, afterhaving restored Don Pedro the Cruel to the throne of Castile had notdisappeared. Having no more to do in their own prince's service, theyhad spread abroad over France, which they called "their apartment, " andrecommenced, in the countries between the Seine and the Loire, their lifeof vagabondage and pillage. A general outcry was raised; it was thePrince of Wales, men said, who had let them loose, and the people calledthem the host (army) of England. A proceeding of the Prince of Waleshimself had the effect of adding to the rage of the people that of thearistocratic classes. He was lavish of expenditure, and held at Bordeauxa magnificent court, for which the revenues from his domains and ordinaryresources were insufficient; so he imposed a tax for five years of tensous per hearth or family, "in order to satisfy, " he said, "the largeclaims against him. " In order to levy this tax legally, he convoked theestates of Aquitaine, first at Niort, and then, successively, atAngouleme, Poitiers, Bordeaux, and Bergerac; but nowhere could he obtainthe vote he demanded. "When we obeyed the King of France, " said theGascons, "we were never so aggrieved with subsidies, hearth-taxes, orgabels, and we will not be, as long as we can defend ourselves. " ThePrince of Wales persisted in his demands. He was ill and irritable, andwas becoming truly the Black Prince. The Aquitanians too becameirritated. The prince's more temperate advisers, even those of Englishbirth, tried in vain to move him from his stubborn course. Even JohnChandos, the most notable as well as the wisest of them, failed, andwithdrew to his domain of St. Sauveur, in Normandy, that he might havenothing to do with measures of which he disapproved. Being driven toextremity, the principal lords of Aquitaine, the Counts of Comminges, ofArmagnac, of Perigord, and many barons besides, set out for France, andmade complaint, on the 30th of June, 1368, before Charles V. And hispeers, "on account of the grievances which the Prince of Wales waspurposed to put upon them. " They had recourse, they said, to the King ofFrance as their sovereign lord, who had no power to renounce hissuzerainty or the jurisdiction of his court of peers and of hisparliament. 

Nothing could have corresponded better with the wishes of Charles V. Foreight years past he had taken to heart the treaty of Bretigny, and he wasas determined not to miss as he was patient in waiting for an opportunityfor a breach of it. But he was too prudent to act with a precipitationwhich would have given his conduct an appearance of a premeditated anddeep-laid purpose for which there was no legitimate ground. He did notcare to entertain at once and unreservedly the appeal of the Aquitanianlords. He gave them a gracious reception, and made them "great cheer andrich gifts;" but he announced his intention of thoroughly examining thestipulations of the treaty of Bretigny, and the rights of his kingship. "He sent for into his council chamber all the charters of the peace, andthen he had them read on several days and at full leisure. " He calledinto consultation the schools of Boulogne, of Montpellier, of Toulouse, and of Orleans, and the most learned clerks of the papal court. It wasnot until he had thus ascertained the legal means of maintaining that thestipulations of the treaty of Bretigny had not all of them been performedby the King of England, and that, consequently, the King of France hadnot lost all his rights of suzerainty over the ceded provinces, that onthe 25th of January, 1369, just six months after the appeal of theAquitanian lords had been submitted to him, he adopted it, in thefollowing terms, which he addressed to the Prince of Wales, at Bordeaux, and which are here curtailed in their legal expressions: --

"Charles, by the grace of God King of France, to our nephew the Prince ofWales and of Aquitaine, greeting. Whereas many prelates, barons, knights, universities, communes, and colleges of the country of Gasconyand the duchy of Aquitaine, have come thence into our presence, that theymight have justice touching certain undue grievances and vexations whichyou, through weak counsel and silly advice, have designed to impose uponthem, whereat we are quite astounded, . . . We, of our kingly majestyand lordship, do command you to come to our city of Paris, in your ownperson, and to present yourself before us in our chamber of peers, for tohear justice touching the said complaints and grievances proposed by youto be done to your people which claims to have resort to our court. . . And be it as quickly as you may. "

"When the Prince of Wales had read this letter, " says Froissart, "heshook his head, and looked askant at the aforesaid Frenchmen; and when hehad thought a while, he answered, 'We will go willingly, at our own time, since the King of France doth bid us, but it shall be with our Basque onour head, and with sixty thousand men at our back. '"

This was a declaration of war; and deeds followed at once upon words. Edward III. , after a short and fruitless attempt at an accommodation, assumed, on the 3d of June, 1369, the title of King of France, andordered a levy of all his subjects between sixteen and sixty, laic orecclesiastical, for the defence of England, threatened by a French fleetwhich was cruising in the Channel. He sent re-enforcements to the Princeof Wales, whose brother, the Duke of Lancaster, landed with an army atCalais; and he offered to all the adventurers with whom Europe wasteeming possession of all the fiefs they could conquer in France. Charles V. On his side vigorously pushed forward his preparations; he hadbegun them before he showed his teeth, for as early as the 19th of July, 1368, he had sent into Spain ambassadors with orders to conclude analliance with Henry of Transtamare against the King of England and hisson, whom he called "the Duke of Aquitaine. " On the 12th of April, 1369, he signed the treaty which, by a contract of marriage between hisbrother, Philip the Bold, Duke of Burgundy, and the Princess Margueriteof Flanders, transferred the latter rich province to the House of France. Lastly he summoned to Paris Du Guesclin, who since the recovery of hisfreedom had been fighting at one time in Spain, and at another in thesouth of France, and announced to him his intention of making himconstable. "Dear sir and noble king, " said the honest and modest Breton, "I do pray you to have me excused; I am a poor knight and petty bachelor. The office of constable is so grand and noble that he who would welldischarge it should have had long previous practice and command, andrather over the great than the small. Here are my lords your brothers, your nephews, and your cousins, who will have charge of men-at-arms inthe armies, and the rides afield, and how durst I lay commands on them?In sooth, sir, jealousies be so strong that I cannot well but be afeardof them. I do affectionately pray you to dispense with me, and to conferit upon another who will more willingly take it than I, and will knowbetter how to fill it. " "Sir Bertrand, Sir Bertrand, " answered the king, "do not excuse yourself after this fashion; I have nor brother, norcousin, nor nephew, nor count, nor baron in my kingdom, who would notobey you; and if any should do otherwise, he would anger me so that hewould hear of it. Take, therefore, the office with a good heart, I dobeseech you. " Sir Bertrand saw well, says Froissart, "that his excuseswere of no avail, and finally he assented to the king's opinion; but itwas not without a struggle, and to his great disgust. . . . In orderto give him further encouragement and advancement the king did set himclose to him at table, showed him all the signs he could of affection, and gave him, together with the office, many handsome gifts and greatestates for binelf and his heirs. " Charles V. Might fearlessly lavishhis gifts on the loyal warrior, for Du Guesclin felt nothing more bindingupon him than to lavish them, in his turn, for the king's service. Hegave numerous and sumptuous dinners to the barons, knights, and soldiersof every degree whom he was to command. 

 "At Bertrand's plate gazed every eye, So massive, chased so gloriously, "

says the poet-chronicler Cuvelier; but Du Guesclin pledged it more thanonce, and sold a great portion of it, in order to pay "without fail theknights and honorable fighting-men of whom he was the leader. "

The war thus renewed was hotly prosecuted on both sides. A sentiment ofnationality became, from day to day, more keen and more general inFrance. At the commencement of hostilities, it burst forth particularlyin the North; the burghers of Abbeville opened their gates to the Countof St. Poi, and in a single week St. Valery, Crotoy, and all the placesin the countship of Ponthieu followed this example. The movement madeprogress before long in the South. Montauban and Milhau hoisted on theirwalls the royal standard; the Archbishop of Toulouse "went riding throughthe whole of Quercy, preaching and demonstrating the good cause of theKing of France; and he converted, without striking a blow, Cahors andmore than sixty towns, castles, or fortresses. " Charles V. Neglected nomeans of encouraging and keeping up the public impulse. It has beenremarked that, as early as the 9th of May, 1369, he had convoked thestates-general, declaring to them in person that "if they considered thathe had done anything he ought not, they should say so, and he would amendit, for there was still time for reparation if he had done too much ornot enough. " He called a new meeting on the 7th of December, 1369, afterthe explosion of hostilities, and obtained from them the most extensivesubsidies they had ever granted. They were as stanch to the king inprinciple as in purse, and their interpretations of the treaty ofBretigny went far beyond the grounds which Charles had put forward tojustify war. It was not only on the upper classes and on political mindsthat the king endeavored to act; he paid attention also to popularimpressions; he set on foot in Paris a series of processions, in which hetook part in person, and the queen also, "barefoot and unsandaled, topray God to graciously give heed to the doings and affairs of thekingdom. "

But at the same time that he was thus making his appeal, throughoutFrance and by every means, to the feeling of nationality, Charlesremained faithful to the rule of conduct which had been inculcated in himby the experience of his youth; he recommended, nay, he commanded, allhis military captains to avoid any general engagement with the English. It was not without great difficulty that he wrung obedience from thefeudal nobility, who, more numerous very often than the English, lookedupon such a prohibition as an insult, and sometimes withdrew to theircastles rather than submit to it; and even the king's brother, Philip theBold, openly in Burgundy testified his displeasure at it. Du Guesclin, having more intelligence and firmness, even before becoming constable, and at the moment of quitting the Duke of Anjou at Toulouse, had advisedhim not to accept battle, to well fortify all the places that had beenrecovered, and to let the English scatter and waste themselves in a hostof small expeditions and distant skirmishes constantly renewed. Whenonce he was constable, Du Guesclin put determinedly in practice theking's maxim, calmly confident in his own fame for valor whenever he hadto refuse to yield to the impatience of his comrades. 

This detached and indecisive war lasted eight years, with a medley ofmore or less serious incidents, which, however, did not change itscharacter. In 1370, the Prince of Wales laid siege to Limoges, which hadopened its gates to the Duke of Berry. He was already so ill that hecould not mount his horse, and had himself carried in a litter from postto post, to follow up and direct the operations of the siege. In spiteof a month's resistance the prince took the place, and gave it up as aprey to a mob of reckless plunderers, whose excesses were such thatFroissart himself, a spectator generally so indifferent, and leaningrather to the English, was deeply shocked. "There, " said he, "was agreat pity, for men, women, and children threw themselves on their kneesbefore the prince, and cried, 'Mercy, gentle sir!' but he was so inflamedwith passion that he gave no heed, and none, male or female, was listenedto, but all were put to the sword. There is no heart so hard but, ifpresent then at Limoges and not forgetful of God, would have weptbitterly, for more than three thousand persons, men, women, and children, were there beheaded on that day. May God receive their souls, for verilythey were martyrs!" The massacre of Limoges caused, throughout France, afeeling of horror and indignant anger towards the English name. In 1373an English army landed at Calais, under the command of the Duke ofLancaster, and overran nearly the whole of France, being incessantlyharassed, however, without ever being attacked in force, and withoutmastering a single fortress. "Let them be, " was the saying in the king'scircle; "when a storm bursts out in a country, it leaves off afterwardsand disperses of itself; and so it will be with these English. " Thesufferings and reverses of the English armies on this expedition weresuch, that, of thirty thousand horses which the English had landed atCalais, "they could not muster more than six thousand at Bordeaux, andhad lost full a third of their men and more. There were seen nobleknights, who had great possessions in their own country, toiling alonga-foot, without armor, and begging their bread from door to door withoutgetting any. " In vain did Edward III. Treat with the Duke of Brittanyand the King of Navarre in order to have their support in this war. TheDuke of Brittany, John IV. , after having openly defied the King ofFrance, his suzerain, was obliged to fly to England, and the King ofNavarre entered upon negotiations alternately with Edward III. AndCharles V. , being always ready to betray either, according to what suitedhis interests at the moment. Tired of so many ineffectual efforts, Edward III. Was twice obliged, between 1375 and 1377, to conclude withCharles V. A truce, just to give the two peoples, as well as the twokings, breathing-time; but the truces were as vain as the petty combatsfor the purpose of putting an end to this great struggle. 

The great actors in this historical drama did not know how near were thedays when they would be called away from this arena, still so crowdedwith their exploits or their reverses. A few weeks after the massacre ofLimoges the Prince of Wales lost, at Bordeaux, his eldest son, six yearsold, whom he loved with all the tenderness of a veteran warrior, so muchthe more affected by gentle impressions as they were a rarity to him; andhe was himself so ill that "his doctors advised him to return to England, his own land, saying that he would probably get better health there. "Accordingly he left France, which he would never see again, and, onreturning to England, he, after a few months' rest in the country, tookan active part in Parliament in the home-policy of his country, andsupported the opposition against the government of his father, who sincethe death of the queen, Philippa of Hainault, had been treating Englandto the spectacle of a scandalous old age closing a life of glory. Parliamentary contests soon exhausted the remaining strength of the BlackPrince, and he died on the 8th of June, 1376, in possession of apopularity that never shifted, and was deserved by such qualities asshowed a nature great indeed and generous, though often sullied by thefits of passion of a character harsh even to ferocity. "The good fortuneof England, " says his contemporary Walsingham, "seemed bound up with hisperson, for it flourished when he was well, fell off when he was ill, andvanished at his death. As long as he was on the spot the English fearedneither the foe's invasion nor the meeting on the battle-field; but withhim died all their hopes. " A year after him, on the 21st of June, 1377, died his father, Edward III. , a king who had been able, glorious, andfortunate for nearly half a century, but had fallen, towards the end ofhis life, into contempt with his people and into forgetfulness on thecontinent of Europe, where nothing was heard about him beyond whispers ofan indolent old man's indulgent weaknesses to please a covetous mistress. 

Whilst England thus lost her two great chiefs, France still kept hers. For three years longer Charles V. And Du Guesclin remained at the head ofher government and her armies. The truce between the two kingdoms wasstill in force when the Prince of Wales died, and Charles, ever carefulto practise knightly courtesy, had a solemn funeral service performed forhim in the Sainte-Chapelle; but the following year, at the death ofEdward III. , the truce had expired. The Prince of Wales's young son, Richard II. , succeeded his grandfather, and Charles, on the accession ofa king who was a minor, was anxious to reap all the advantage be couldhope from that fact. The war was pushed forward vigorously, and a Frenchfleet cruised on the coast of England, ravaged the Isle of Wight, andburned Yarmouth, Dartmouth, Plymouth, Winchelsea, and Lewes. WhatCharles passionately desired was the recovery of Calais; he would havemade considerable sacrifices to obtain it, and in the seclusion of hiscloset he displayed an intelligent activity in his efforts, by war ordiplomacy, to attain this end. "He had, " says Froissart, "couriers goinga-horseback night and day, who, from one day to the next, brought himnews from eighty or a hundred leagues' distance, by help of relays postedfrom town to town. " This labor of the king had no success; on the wholethe war prosecuted by Charles V. Between Edward III. 's death and his ownhad no result of importance; the attempt, by law and arms, which he madein 1378, to make Brittany his own and reunite it to the crown, completelyfailed, thanks to the passion with which the Bretons, nobles, burgesses, and peasants, were attached to their country's independence. Charles V. Actually ran a risk of embroiling himself with the hero of his reign; hehad ordered Du Guesclin to reduce to submission the countship of Rennes, his native land, and he showed some temper because the constable not onlydid not succeed, but advised him to make peace with the Duke of Brittanyand his party. Du Guesclin, grievously hurt, sent to the king his swordof constable, adding that he was about to withdraw to the court ofCastile, to Henry of Transtamare, who would show more appreciation of hisservices. All Charles V. 's wisdom did not preserve him from one of thosedeeds of haughty levity which the handling of sovereign power sometimescauses even the wisest kings to commit, but reflection made him promptlyacknowledge and retrieve his fault. He charged the Dukes of Anjou andBourbon to go and, for his sake, conjure Du Guesclin to remain hisconstable; and, though some chroniclers declare that Du Guesclin refused, his will, dated the 9th of July, 1380, leads to a contrary belief, for init he assumes the title of constable of France, and this will precededthe hero's death only by four days. Having fallen sick beforeChateauneuf-Randon, a place he was besieging in the Gevaudan, Du Guesclinexpired on the 13th of July, 1380, at sixty-six years of age, and hislast words were an exhortation to the veteran captains around him "neverto forget that, in whatsoever country they might be making war, churchmen, women, children, and the poor people were not their enemies. "According to certain contemporary chronicles, or, one might almost say, legends, Chateauneuf-Randon was to be given up the day after Du Guesclindied. The marshal De Sancerre, who commanded the king's army, summonedthe governor to surrender the place to him; but the governor replied thathe had given his word to Du Guesclin, and would surrender to no other. He was told of the constable's death: "Very well, " he rejoined, "I willcarry the keys of the town to his tomb. " To this the marshal agreed; thegovernor marched out of the place at the head of his garrison, passedthrough the besieging army, went and knelt down before Du Guesclin'scorpse, and actually laid the keys of Chateauneuf-Randon on his bier. 

[Illustration: Putting the Keys on Du Guesclin's Bier----407]

This dramatic story is not sufficiently supported by authentic documentsto be admitted as an historical fact; but there is to be found in an oldchronicle concerning Du Guesclin [published for the first time at the endof the fifteenth century, and in a new edition by M. Francisque Michel in1830] a story which, in spite of many discrepancies, confirms theprincipal fact of the keys of Chateauneuf-Randon being brought by thegarrison to the bier. "At the decease of Sir Bertrand, " says thechronicler, "a great cry arose throughout the host of the French. TheEnglish refused to give up the castle. The marshal, Louis de Sancerre, had the hostages brought to the ditches, for to have their heads struckoff. But forthwith the people in the castle lowered their bridge, andthe captain came and offered the keys to the marshal, who refused them, and said to him, 'Friends, you have your agreements with Sir Bertrand, and ye shall fulfil them to him. ' 'God the Lord!' said the captain, 'youknow well that Sir Bertrand, who was so much worth, is dead: how, then, should we surrender to him this castle? Verily, lord marshal, you dodemand our dishonor when you would have us and our castle surrendered toa dead knight. ' 'Needs no parley hereupon, ' said the marshal, 'but do itat once, for, if you put forth more words, short will be the life of yourhostages. ' Well did the English see that it could not be otherwise; sothey went forth all of them from the castle, their captain in front ofthem, and came to the marshal, who led them to the hostel where lay SirBertrand, and made them give up the keys and place them on his bier, sobbing the while: 'Let all know that there was there nor knight, norsquire, French or English, who showed not great mourning. '"

The body of Du Guesclin was carried to Paris to be interred at St. Denis, hard by the tomb which Charles V. Had ordered to be made for himself; andnine years afterwards, in 1389, Charles V. 's successor, his son CharlesVI. , caused to be celebrated in the Breton warrior's honor a freshfuneral, at which the princes and grandees of the kingdom, and the youngking himself, were present in state. The Bishop of Auxerre delivered thefuneral oration over the constable; and a poet of the time, giving anaccount of the ceremony, says, "The tears of princes fell, What time the bishop said, 'Sir Bertrand loved ye well; Weep, warriors, for the dead! The knell of sorrow tolls For deeds that were so bright: God save all Christian souls, And his--the gallant knight: '

The life, character, and name of Bertrand du Guesclin were and remainedone of the most popular, patriotic, and legitimate boasts of the middleages, then at their decline. 

Two months after the constable's death, on the 16th of September, 1380, Charles V. Died at the castle of Beaute-sur-Marne, near Vincennes, atforty-three years of age, quite young still after so stormy andhard-working a life. His contemporaries were convinced, and he washimself convinced, that he had been poisoned by his perfidious enemy, King Charles of Navarre. His uncle, Charles IV. , Emperor of Germany, had sent him an able doctor, who "set him in good case and in manlystrength, " says Froissart, by effecting a permanent issue in his arm. "When this little sore, " said he to him, "shall cease to discharge andshall dry up, you will die without help for it, and you will have at themost fifteen days' leisure to take counsel and thought for the soul. "When the issue began to dry up, Charles knew that death was at hand; and"like a wise and valiant man as he was, " says Froissart, "he set in orderall his affairs, and sent for his three brothers, in whom he had mostconfidence, the Duke of Berry, the Duke of Burgundy, and the Duke ofBourbon, and he left in the lurch his second brother, the Duke of Anjou, because he considered him too covetous. 'My dear brothers, ' said theking to them, 'I feel and know full well that I have not long to live. I do commend and give in charge to you my son Charles. Behave to him asgood uncles should behave to their nephew. Crown him as soon as possibleafter my death, and counsel him loyally in all his affairs. The lad isyoung, and of a volatile spirit; he will need to be guided and governedby good doctrine; teach him or have him taught all the kingly points andstates he will have to maintain, and marry him in such lofty station thatthe kingdom may be the better for it. Thank God, the affairs of ourkingdom are in good case. The Duke of Brittany [John IV. , called theValiant] is a crafty and a slippery man, and he hath ever been moreEnglish than French; for which reason keep the nobles of Brittany and thegood towns affectionate, and you will thus thwart his intentions. I amfond of the Bretons, for they have ever served me loyally, and helped tokeep and defend my kingdom against my enemies. Make the lord Clissonconstable, for, all considered, I see none more competent for it than he. As to those aids and taxes of the kingdom of France, wherewith the poorerfolks are so burdened and aggrieved, deal with them according to yourconscience, and take them off as soon as ever you can, for they arethings which, although I have upheld them, do grieve me and weigh upon myheart; but the great wars and great matters which we have had on allsides caused me to countenance them. "

Of all the dying speeches and confessions of kings to their family andtheir councillors, that which has just been put forward is the mostpractical, precise, and simple. Charles V. , taking upon his shoulders atnineteen years of age, first as king's lieutenant and as dauphin, andafterwards as regent, the government of France, employed all his soul andhis life in repairing the disasters arising from the wars of hispredecessors and preventing any repetition. No sovereign was ever moreresolutely pacific; he carried prudence even into the very practice ofwar, as was proved by his forbidding his generals to venture any generalengagement with the English, so great a lesson and so deep an impressionhad he derived from the defeats of Crecy and Poitiers, and the causeswhich led to them. But without being a warrior, and without running anyhazardous risks, he made himself respected and feared by his enemies. "Never was there king, " said Edward III. , "who handled arms less, andnever was there king who gave me so much to do. " When the condition ofthe kingdom was at the best, and more favorable circumstances led Charlesto believe that the day had come for setting France free from the cruelconditions which had been imposed upon her by the treaty of Bretigny, heentered without hesitation upon that war of patriotic reparation; and, after the death of his two powerful enemies, Edward III. And the BlackPrince, he was still prosecuting it, not without chance of success, whenhe himself died of the malady with which he had for a long while beenafflicted. At his death he left in the royal treasury a surplus ofseventeen million francs, a large sum for those days. Nor the labors ofgovernment, nor the expenses of war, nor far-sighted economy hadprevented him from showing a serious interest in learned works andstudies, and from giving effectual protection to the men who devotedthemselves thereto. The University of Paris, notwithstanding theembarrassments it sometimes caused him, was always the object of hisgood-will. "He was a great lover of wisdom, " says Christine de Pisan, "and when certain folks murmured for that he honored clerks so highly, heanswered, 'So long as wisdom is honored in this realm, it will continuein prosperity; but when wisdom is thrust aside, it will go down. '" Hecollected nine hundred and fifty volumes (the first foundation of theloyal Library), which were deposited in a tower of the Louvre, called thelibrary tower, and of which he, in 1373, had an inventory drawn up by hispersonal attendant, Gilles de Presle. His taste for literature andscience was not confined to collecting manuscripts. He had a Frenchtranslation made, for the sake of spreading a knowledge thereof, of theBible in the first place, and then of several works of Aristotle, ofLivy, of Valerius Maximus, of Vegetius, and of St. Augustine. He wasfond of industry and the arts as well as of literature. Henry de Vic, aGerman clock-maker, constructed for him the first public clock ever seenin France, and it was placed in what was called the Clock Tower in thePalace of Justice; and the king even had a clock-maker by appointment, named Peter de St. Beathe. Several of the Paris monuments, churches, orbuildings for public use were undertaken or completed under his care. Hebegan the building of the Bastille, that fortress which was then sonecessary for the safety of Paris, where it was to be, four centurieslater, the object of the wrath and earliest excesses on the part of thepopulace. Charles the Wise, from whatever point of view he may beregarded, is, after Louis the Fat, Philip Augustus, St. Louis, and Philipthe Handsome, the fifth of those kings who powerfully contributed to thesettlement of France in Europe, and of the kingship in France. He wasnot the greatest nor the best, but, perhaps, the most honestly able. Andat the same time he was a signal example of the shallowness andinsufficiency of human abilities. Charles V. , on his death-bed, considered that "the affairs of his kingdom were in good case;" he hadnot even a suspicion of that chaos of war, anarchy, reverses and ruininto which they were about to fall, in the reign of his son, Charles VI. 

END OF VOLUME II.