[1] _C_. de la Ronciere, _Hist, de_ la _Marine Francaise_; of.
Nicolas, _Hist, of the Royal Navy_.

[2] See on this subject A. Coville, _Les Etats_ de _Normandie_,
pp. 41-52 (1894).

Nothing came of this grandiose project, though the burning ruins of
Southampton, the capture of the great _Christopher_, which had borne
Edward in 1338 to Antwerp, and the occupation of the Channel
Islands--the last remnants of the old duchy still under English
rule--showed that the Normans were in earnest. The chief result of their
energy was the equipment of the strongest French fleet that had ever
been seen in the Channel. Though a few Genoese galleys under Barbavera
and a few great Spanish ships swelled the number of the armada, 160 of
the 200 ships that formed the fleet were Norman.[1] Of the two Frenchmen
in command, one, Hugh Quieret, was a Picard knight, but the other, the
more popular, was Nicholas Behuchet, a Norman of humble birth, then a
knight and the chief confidant of Philip VI. Quieret and Behuchet had
long challenged the command of the narrow seas. But for their error of
dividing their forces and preferring a piratical war of reprisals, they
might have cut off communications between England and the Netherlands.
They had learnt wisdom by experience, and their ships were massed in
Zwyn harbour to prevent the passage of Edward to his new allies.

[1] _S_. Luce, _La Marine normande a l'Ecluse_, in _La France
pendant la Guerre de Cent Ans_, 3-31.

The coast-line between Blankenberghe and the mouth of the Scheldt was
strangely different in the fourteenth century from what it is at
present.[1] The sandy flats, through which the Zwyn now trickles to the
sea, formed a large open harbour, accessible to the biggest ships then
known. It was protected on the north by the island of Cadzand, the scene
of Manny's exploit in 1337, while at its head stood the town of Sluys,
so called from the locks, or sluices, that regulated the waters of the
ship canal, which bore to the great mart of Bruges the merchantmen of
every land. It was in this harbour that Edward, on arriving off
Blankenberghe, first spied the fleet of Quieret and Behuchet. He
anchored at sea for the night, and on the afternoon of June 24, the
anniversary of Bannockburn, he bore down on the French, having the sun,
the tide, and the wind in his favour. On his approach Barbavera urged
that the French should take to the open sea; but Quieret and Behuchet
pref