at device rightfully belongs."

"Very well," replied Chandos. "To-morrow, when the truce is over, you
will find me on the field ready to settle the question with you by
force of arms."

With that the angry noblemen parted, and each rode back to his own
lines.

Early on Monday morning both armies prepared for battle. The cardinal,
however, being extremely unwilling to give up all hope of preventing
the conflict, came out again, at a very early hour, to the French
camp, and made an effort to renew the negotiations. But the king
peremptorily refused to listen to him, and ordered him to be gone. He
would not listen, he said, to any more pretended treaties or
pacifications. So the cardinal perceived that he must go away, and
leave the armies to their fate. He called at Prince Edward's camp and
bade him farewell, saying that he had done all in his power to save
him, but it was of no avail. He then returned to Poictiers.

The two armies now prepared for battle. The King of France clothed
himself in his royal armor, and nineteen of his knights were armed in
the same manner, in order to prevent the enemy from being able to
single out the king on the field. This was a common stratagem employed
on such occasions. The English were strongly posted on a hill side,
among vineyards and groves. The approach to their position was through
a sort of lane bordered by hedges. The English archers were posted
along these hedges, and when the French troops attempted to advance,
the archers poured such a shower of barbed arrows into the horses'
sides, that they soon threw them into confusion. The barbed arrows
could not be withdrawn, and the horses, terrified with the stinging
pain, would rear, and plunge, and turn round upon those behind them,
until at length the lane was filled with horses and horsemen piled
together in confusion. Now, when once a scene of confusion like this
occurred upon a field of battle, it was almost impossible to recover
from it, for the iron armor which these knights wore was so heavy and
so cumbersome, that when once they were unhorsed they could not mount
again, and sometimes could not even rise, but writhed and struggled
helplessly on the ground until their squires came to relieve them.

The battle raged for many hours, but, contrary to the universal
expectation, the English were every where victorious. Whether this was
owing to the superior discipline of the English troops, or to the
reckless desperation with