sharp eye on crops, cattle, pigs, horses, fowl; letting nothing escape his searching ken; keeping the herds and bailiffs in wholesome fear, and his master in the best temper. The honest Ploughman, as keen and scrupulous a labourer in field and barn as his brother the Parson by hearth or sick-bed, rides in a sleeveless frock upon a mare. The Miller, the Skipper, the Cook, the Haberdasher, the Weaver, the Dyer, and the Tapestry-maker show us fine specimens of the trading and working classes, who form the bulk of the nation, and in one sense its greatest strength. Robin the Miller, hardly able to keep his seat for the quantity of strong Southwark ale he has drunk, is a brawny, big-mouthed man with a fox-red beard, equally famous for stealing corn and for winning the ram at wrestling-bouts. As if his tongue could not make noise enough, he blows a screaming bagpipe all the way through the Southwark street. All tanned with sea, wind, and sun, the Skipper or shipman rides awkwardly on a hack, with his coarse cloth gown hanging to his knee and a knife slung from his neck by a cord. In port he revels in Bordeaux wine; but at sea, on board his good barque Magdelayne, none can surpass him in knowledge of currents, harbours, and the changes of the moon. Every haven from Gothland to Finisterre, every creek in Brittany and Spain he knows rock by rock. The Cook, who possesses a highly cultured taste for the strong ale of London, has joined the ranks professionally; for even pilgrims must eat. The boiling of chickens. and marrow-bones, the manufacture of pies, blanc-manger, mortrewes, poudre marchant, and other unknown dishes for the hungry riders, will occupy a good portion of his time during the trip. The five remaining tradesmen, dressed in the livery of their guild and wearing knives, girdles, and pouches wrought with silver, look forward to a time when possibly they may sit * *The blanc-manger here mentioned differed entirely from our modern confection. It was some preparation of "capon's brawn tesed small." as aldermen on the dais of the Guildhall, and hear their fat rosy wives saluted as "My Lady," sailing to feasts with long trains borne behind them like the queen. Nowhere but in the Prologue of Chaucer's Canterbury Tales have we pictures like those of the men and women over whom the later Plantagenets reigned. In the four-and-twenty Tales, which were all that the gifted author completed, we get further glimpses or rather views of English life in the Middle Ages, the tone of thought which coloured social intercourse, and especially the kind of stories which then did the work of the modern novel. Of course, this special set of pilgrims, containing so many varied and strongly-lined characters, never in all probability trotted along the Canterbury road; but in every fresh detachment from the Southwark inns, specimens of the Knights, Millers, Wives of Bath, and other devotees, whose acquaintance we have just made, appeared sprinkling the motley crowds that wended to the favourite shrine of the murdered St. Thomas. CHAPTER XIII. THE BLACK PRINCE. The English nation-Edward's mother-Invasion of France-Sluys-In Brittany-Landing at La Hogue-The Black Prince-Creçy-CalaisThe Black Death-The Commons-Treason-Poitiers-Treaty of Bretigny-Navarretta-Du Guesclin. A STRUGGLE now began which lasted for upwards of a hundred years, and which, though marked with many fluctuations of success, ended in the all but total extinction of English power in France. From that struggle we derive some of the proudest names in our martial history. In that struggle we behold the most powerful of all the engines employed to weld the English nation into a compact and enduring whole. Previous to Crecy and Poitiers, the Saxon and the Norman elements in the nation, though united, were still distinguishable. After the ferment of the Hundred Years' War, every sign of rivalry disappeared. The Englishman stood where once the hostile races fought. Edward the Third of England was the son of Isabella, daughter of Philip the Handsome, who became King of France in 1285. Charles the Fourth, the last survivor of her three brothers, died in 1328, leaving no child: a daughter, born after his death, was set aside by the Salic Law. Edward saw the chance, but could not seize it then. Yielding to the pressure of the hour, he bent his haughty soul so far as to do homage for Aquitaine to the chosen candidate, Philip of Valois. When, how ever, the time seemed ripe, he cast aside the mask of meekness, and boldly claimed in his mother's name the crown her father had worn.* While he acknowledged the Salic Law in part, he ingeniously maintained that though it prevented a female from filling the throne, it did not destroy the rights of her male descendants. Lawyers argued on both sides of the strait; but sword and arrow soon took the place of words. Success in Scotland, such as it was, set the blood of the young English king in a flame for war; so, abandoning the mimic splendour of the tilt-yard for graver pursuits, he prepared for the invasion of France. As an important preliminary, he formed a treaty with Louis of Bavaria, then Emperor of Germany, which enabled him to secure the aid of the Duke of Brabant and the Count of Hainault. His marriage with Philippa formed a close bond of union between him and the latter, who was the brother of that princess. Although the Earl of Flanders adhered to the cause of the French king, Edward won over to his side as a counterpoise that powerful brewer of Ghent, Jacob von Artevelt, who had established a centre of democratic independence in the very heart of the Flemish dominions. The first blow of this great war was struck at Cadsant, an island lying between the havens of Sluys and Flushing. Thither Sir Walter Manny, a famous English knight, led an armament over the sea from the Thames. Gallantly the French and 1337 Flemings, who garrisoned the post, faced the deadly arrow-rain of the advancing English ships; but the English archers shot so thick and true that the defenders of the dikes gave way at last. The English cloth-yard shaft was the greatest weapon of its day. The war thus kindled was carried on in detached enterprises for a time. French ships harried the southern coast of England, burning Portsmouth, Southampton, and Plymouth, and destroy * See Genealogical Table, p. 232. ing all the vessels they could seize. A thrilling episode in this naval pirating was the affair of the Edward and the Christopher, two English wool-ships coming home from Flanders. Being beset by a squadron of thirteen hostile vessels, they fought undauntedly for nine hours against these fearful odds, striking only when "labour, wounds, and slaughter" had utterly exhausted the gallant crews they bore. We discern the barbarism of the times in a little touch which tells us that the wounded Englishmen were flung overboard by the victors. A dash of the Cinque-port mariners in a fleet of boats from Dover to Boulogne in the fogs of mid-January took a swift revenge for the many injuries inflicted on the English shore and shipping. * The year 1338 passed inactively by. In the September of the following year, Edward invaded France from Flanders, and laid siege to Cambray ; but he was obliged to retire, after ravaging the surrounding country. Early in 1340, he returned to Enland, and held a Parliament in order to obtain further supplies. Anxious to give aid to his brother-in-law and ally of Hainault, Edward collected a fleet of two hundred and sixty ships, and sailed over to the coast of Flanders in June. At Sluys,† at the mouth of the Scheldt, he came upon a French fleet of nearly four hundred vessels, led by two French admirals and the great Genoese sailor Blackbeard, and bearing on their decks forty thousand fighting-men. Towering among the ships, the eyes of the English seamen recognized the fine Christopher, lately captured by the French. On the following morning, Edward drew out his line of battle with great skill, although this was his first nautical exploit. Placing the strongest ships in front, those with archers on the wings, and a vessel with men-atarms between every pair of the latter, he kept in reserve a squadron to protect the rear, and stationed a strong guard round * Cambray, on the Escaut, one hundred miles north-east of Paris. + Sluys or L'Ecluse is a well-fortified place, situated on a bay of the North Sea, at the mouth of the Scheldt, and on a canal to Bruges. |