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me king on the death of his father he told his wild companions that the days of his wildness were over; and he advised them to lead better lives in future. As Henry V, Prince Hal made himself famous in English history by his war with France. Normandy, you remember, had belonged to Henry's ancestor, William the Conqueror. It had been taken from King John of England by the French king, Philip Augustus, in 1203. Soon after his coronation Henry sent a demand to the French king that Normandy should be restored, and he made the claim which his great-grandfather, Edward III, had made that he was by right the king of France. [Illustration: KING HENRY V REJECTS HIS EARLY COMPANIONS] Of course, the king of France would not acknowledge this. Henry therefore raised an army of thirty thousand men and invaded France. Before he began to attack the French he gave strict orders to his men that they were to harm no one who was not a soldier and to take nothing from the houses or farms of any persons who were not fighting. Sickness broke out among Henry's troops after they landed, so that their number was reduced to about fifteen thousand. Fifty or sixty thousand Frenchmen were encamped on the field of Agincourt (_aezh-an-koor'_) to oppose this little army. The odds were greatly against Henry. The night before the battle one of his officers said he wished that the many thousand brave soldiers who were quietly sleeping in their beds in England were with the king. "I would not have a single man more," said Henry. "If God give us victory, it will be plain we owe it to His grace. If not, the fewer we are the less loss for England." [Illustration: CHARGE OF THE FRENCH AT THE BATTLE OF AGINCOURT] The men drew courage from their king. The English archers poured arrows into the ranks of their opponents; and although the French fought bravely, they were completely routed. Eleven thousand Frenchmen fell. Among the slain were more than a hundred of the nobles of the land. II Agincourt was not the last of Henry's victories. He brought a second army of forty thousand men over to France. Town after town was captured, and at last Henry and his victorious troops laid siege to Rouen, which was then the largest and richest city in France. The fortifications were so strong that Henry could not storm them, so he determined to take the place by starving the garrison. He said, "War has three handmaidens--fire, blood, and famin
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