VII.

THE DUKE OF BURGUNDY IN HIS CAMP.

'MAY it please your Grace,' said the Gascon knight,' your servant has accomplished his vow. Lo, here is the big warrior of Borsellen.' 'My liege knows me well enough,' said Jehan, going down on his knee.

'Welcome, Valentin and Orson,' said the Duke graciously. 'Welcome, Giant and Dwarf,' said Claus his fool; but Messire Tristan was too polite to notice this reflection on his person at a moment when he was occupied in doing his duty to so great a prince as John of Burgundy.

The Duke was surrounded by some of the men of the highest rank in his dominions, and those of Duke William his brother-inlaw there were the Counts of Namur and Delamarck, the Prince of Orange, the Counts of Clermont and Fribourg, the Seneschal of Hainault, the Sire of Croy, and others whose names may be found in the lists of the Burgundian Herald Saint Remy.

When Jehan of Borsellen fell back into the crowd he was very kind to his young brother Franck, who stood amazed at the splendour of the presence in which he stood; and indeed Jehan was by no means sorry to show the cadet on what terms he stood with the greatest prince in Europe.

Before he had finished his catalogue, a cry was heard without to make way for the king's ambassadors; and accordingly three of them, Messires Guichard Dolphin and Guillaume de Trignonville, and a secretary of the King's, were admitted into the presence of the Duke of Burgundy, and delivered the message of the Sovereign. Charles forbade the Dukes solemnly to make war upon the men of Liège, and called upon both parties to submit their quarrel to the arbitration of the King's Council.'

Indeed the summons came somewhat too late. The Princes were hot for the contest, and had with them the best chivalry of Picardy, Burgundy, and the Low Countries, as eager as their lords to attack the trading rebels of Liège.

'My knights and gentlemen will scarcely thank the King,' said the Duke of Burgundy. Here is Hue de Launoy has ridden four hundred miles, and brought forty lances.'

'Forty-five, may it please your Grace, and two brothers, and six score fellows on foot. And we well-nigh starved as we came through the Liègemen's country, and if you send us back again, the Lord help us. If your Grace deserts us we must take to the woods and help ourselves.'

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'Did I not always stand by you?' said the Duke; and is there any man that ever served our family who can say I was ungrateful. Look you, Messire Guichard, here is one man who speaks that has broken his fifty lances, there are men round our tents, ten thousand more, all come at my bidding to put down these cursed brewers and weavers of Liège. Who is to pay my honest men-of-arms and gallant gentlemen? Not I, in faith. They must have their pay out of the pockets of the Liègers, and fill their bellies from their waggons.'

'I hear say there are a good ten thousand waggons loaded with all sorts of stores,' here grumbled an old knight.

'But shall we let our prizes pass by? Speak to us, now, Messire Guichard. You have had your say as ambassador of the King-now tell us, Guichard Dolphin, how would you act were you in my place?'

In faith, sir,' said Messire Guichard, if I were the Duke of Burgundy I would have my rights and fall upon the rogues tomorrow'; and when he had delivered himself of this sentiment Monsieur Guichard smiled grimly and felt a great load off his conscience.

'Hear the Dolphin, gentlemen,' said Monseigneur; and indeed all present clapped their hands and applauded. 'It is the best speech I have heard to-day. And will you join us and break a lance or two with us?' continued the Duke.

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'Yes, truly,' answered Dolphin, as every gentleman should, against these low-bred smiths and coalmen-his duty to his Prince being always done.'

'Well said; well said,' cried the Duke; and as you and your train, Sir Guichard, have come as peaceful men, you will need arms, with which my people shall furnish you; and so choose for yourself and St. . . . be with be with you to-morrow.'

Upon this Messire Guichard confessed, not without some shamefacedness, that, foreseeing the probabilities of war, he had brought his armour secreted in his baggage. At which admission (the reader will find the whole story in the Chroniclers) all the company laughed, and vowed that Messire Dolphin was a noble knight; and the

knight of Castle-Sarrasin especially took occasion to pour into his protégé's ears a long dissertation upon the excellences of knighthood and the duty of gentlemen to stand by one another.

The little knight in the course of their march had so imprinted upon the mind of his new acquaintance, John of Borsellen, the propriety of obtaining a still higher rank of knighthood than that which he held; and as it was the custom for the Prince to make on the eve of a day of battle a number of knights, bachelors and basinets, John signified that he should demand to be admitted into the latter rank, or, in the phrase of the day, asked to raise his banner.

How proud was Franck to ride as his brother's squire, and to think that he was going on the morrow to be present at his first battle. He asked leave to ride at his brother's side, and the permission was accorded to him; and, as in duty bound, he and the simple Gascon gentleman, a great stickler for all the practices of chivalry, went to a priest and shrove themselves, and passed many hours devoutly over their beads before they lay down to get rest for the morning's encounter.

Jehan made himself ready for fighting by joining a set of jovial fellows over the dice, and drinking whole gallons of claret wine to the confusion of Liègeois and Orleanists, and to the health of the Flanders Dukes. He was quite drunk when he reeled to his bed; but brisk and ready at daybreak, the whole array of the Dukes did not show a stouter or better appointed soldier.

VIII.

THE BATTLE.

'HARK,' said Jehan; 'these cursed guns are beginning to fire!' The sentence was scarcely from his lips, when an immense stone discharged from the artillery of the Liègemen knocked down a horse and man of Jehan's troop. Franck turned a little pale, and perhaps reined up a little closer to his brother.

'You had better have remained with your mother, Franck,' said Jehan, who at the prospect of a battle became quite goodhumoured.

'That is right, man, stick close by me. They won't fire again for some, minutes and I make no doubts that ere a couple of shots more are over we shall receive orders to fall on them.'

Indeed, as Jehan said, orders were soon brought to the troops in advance-consisting of about five hundred men-to take with them a thousand big varlets on foot, as Monstrelet calls them, and to turn the flank of the enemy's column and attack him in the rear.

The Chroniclers have preserved a curious account of this not very complicated manœuvre. When the men of Liège saw the direction that the Burgundian body was taking, they thought they were flying, and were for breaking rank and setting on them at once.

But the old Seigneur of Perivois, like a wary old knight, said to them: My friends, yonder body that is marching to the right of our columns, and that arrows and guns cannot reach, will come round and attack us on the flank while the main force of the Burgundian lances presses us in front. Keep you firm here where you are well defended, and budge not from your lines; your pikes and arrows will drive off the knights and their lances. Meanwhile, I will take our horse and go round and meet and charge yonder column. We are as many as they, and by the help of Saint Lambert as good or better men.'

All the old soldiers about the captain of the Liègeois saw that his advice was good; but the people and citizens yelled out: 'He is a coward-he flies' and the lord of Perivois, seeing that there was no help for it, said, 'Well, I will show you to-day that it is not my intent to fly, in Heaven's name let us stand close and bear the charge, for here it comes.'