driven to
extremity, the principal lords of Aquitaine, the Counts of Comminges, of
Armagnac, of Perigord, and many barons besides, set out for France, and
made complaint, on the 30th of June, 1368, before Charles V. and his
peers, "on account of the grievances which the Prince of Wales was
purposed to put upon them." They had recourse, they said, to the King of
France as their sovereign lord, who had no power to renounce his
suzerainty or the jurisdiction of his court of peers and of his
parliament.

Nothing could have corresponded better with the wishes of Charles V. For
eight years past he had taken to heart the treaty of Bretigny, and he was
as determined not to miss as he was patient in waiting for an opportunity
for a breach of it. But he was too prudent to act with a precipitation
which would have given his conduct an appearance of a premeditated and
deep-laid purpose for which there was no legitimate ground. He did not
care to entertain at once and unreservedly the appeal of the Aquitanian
lords. He gave them a gracious reception, and made them "great cheer and
rich gifts;" but he announced his intention of thoroughly examining the
stipulations of the treaty of Bretigny, and the rights of his kingship.
"He sent for into his council chamber all the charters of the peace, and
then he had them read on several days and at full leisure." He called
into consultation the schools of Boulogne, of Montpellier, of Toulouse,
and of Orleans, and the most learned clerks of the papal court. It was
not until he had thus ascertained the legal means of maintaining that the
stipulations of the treaty of Bretigny had not all of them been performed
by the King of England, and that, consequently, the King of France had
not lost all his rights of suzerainty over the ceded provinces, that on
the 25th of January, 1369, just six months after the appeal of the
Aquitanian lords had been submitted to him, he adopted it, in the
following 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 of
Wales and of Aquitaine, greeting. Whereas many prelates, barons,
knights, universities, communes, and colleges of the country of Gascony
and the duchy of Aquitaine, have come thence into our presence, that they
might have justice touching certain undue grievances and vexations which
you, through weak cou