llantly, and after a three weeks' siege Edmund retired to his original
position on the lower Gironde. Even there he found difficulty in holding
his own, and before long shifted his quarters to Bayonne. He had
exhausted his resources, and found that his army could not be kept
together without pay. "Thereupon," writes Hemingburgh, "his face fell
and he sickened about Whitsuntide. So with want of money came want of
breath too, and after a few days he went the way of all flesh." Lincoln,
his successor, managed still to stand his ground against Robert of
Artois. At last Artois made a successful night attack upon the English,
captured St. John, and destroyed all his war-train and baggage. The
darkness of the night and the shelter of the neighbouring woods alone
saved the English army from total destruction. "After this," boasted
William of Nangis, "no Englishman or Gascon dared to go out to battle
against the Count of Artois and the French." At Easter, 1297, a truce
was concluded which left nearly all Gascony in French hands.

Soon after the departure of his brother for Gascony, Edward went to war
against the Scots, regarding the non-appearance of King John on March 1
at Berwick as a declaration of hostility. The lord of Wark offered to
betray his castle to the Scots, and Edward's successful effort to save
it first brought him to the Tweed. Meanwhile the men of Annandale under
their new lord, the Earl of Buchan, engaged in a raid on Carlisle, but
failed to capture the city, and speedily returned home. On March 28, the
day on which his brother attacked Bordeaux, Edward crossed the Tweed at
Coldstream, and marched down its left bank towards Berwick. On March 30
Berwick was captured. The townsmen fought badly, and the heroes of the
resistance were thirty Flemish merchants, who held their factory, called
the Red Hall, until the building was fired, and the defenders perished
in the flames. The garrison of the castle, commanded by Sir William
Douglas, laid down their arms at once.

Edward spent a month in Berwick, strengthening the fortifications of the
town, and preparing for an invasion of Scotland. Early in April, King
John renounced his homage and, immediately afterwards, the Scots lords
who had attacked Carlisle devastated Tynedale and Redesdale, penetrating
as far as Hexham. Edward's command of the sea made it impossible for the
raiders to cut off his communications with his base, and they quickly
returned to their own land,