ng John, or on peace or war
between 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 and
position of King John before he engaged in the war which, so far as he
was concerned, ended with the battle of Poitiers and imprisonment in
England.

A valiant and loyal knight, but a frivolous, hare-brained, thoughtless,
prodigal, and obstinate as well as impetuous prince, and even more
incapable than Philip of Valois in the practice of government, John,
after having summoned at his accession, in 1351, a states-assembly
concerning which we have no explicit information left to us, tried
for a space of four years to suffice in himself for all the perils,
difficulties, and requirements of the situation he had found bequeathed
to 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 foreign
merchants, and stopped payment of his debts; and he went through several
provinces, treating with local councils or magistrates in order to obtain
from them certain subsidies which he purchased by granting them new
privileges. He hoped by his institution of the order of the Star to
resuscitate the chivalrous zeal of his nobility. All these means were
vain or insufficient. The defeat of Crecy and the loss of Calais had
caused discouragement in the kingdom and aroused many doubts as to the
issue of the war with England. Defection and even treason brought
trouble into the court, the councils, and even the family of John. To
get the better of them he at one time heaped favors upon the men he
feared, at another he had them arrested, imprisoned, and even beheaded in
his presence. He gave his daughter Joan in marriage to Charles the Bad,
King of Navarre, and, some few months afterwards, Charles himself, the
real or presumed head of all the traitors, was seized, thrown into
prison, and treated with extreme rigor, in spite of the supplications of
his wife, who vigorously took the part of her husband against her father.
After four years thus consumed in fruitless endeavors, by turns violently
and feebly enforced, to reorganize an army and a treasury, and to
purchase fidelity at any price or arbitrarily strike down treason, John
was obliged to recognize his powerlessness and to call to his aid the
French nation, still so imper