-seven thousand men, into the distracted kingdom.

A fierce battle followed on April 3, 1367. The ill-disciplined soldiers
of Henry were beaten and put to rout. Du Guesclin and his men-at-arms
alone maintained the fight, with a courage that knew no yielding. In the
end they were partly driven back, partly slain. Du Guesclin set his back
against a wall, and fought with heroic courage. There were few with him.
Up came the Prince of Wales, saw what was doing, and cried,--

"Gentle marshals of France, and you too, Bertrand, yield yourselves to
me."

"Yonder men are my foes," exclaimed Don Pedro, who accompanied the
prince; "it is they who took from me my kingdom, and on them I mean to
take vengeance."

He came near to have ended his career of vengeance then and there. Du
Guesclin, incensed at his words, sprang forward and dealt him so furious
a blow with his sword as to hurl him fainting to the ground. Then,
turning to the prince, the valiant warrior said, "Nathless, I give up my
sword to the most valiant prince on earth."

The prince took the sword, and turning to the Captal of Buch, the
Navarrese commander, whom Bertrand had years before defeated and
captured, bade him keep the prisoner.

"Aha, Sir Bertrand," said the Captal, "you took me at the battle of
Cocherel, and to-day I've got you."

"Yes," retorted Bertrand; "but at Cocherel I took you myself, and here
you are only my keeper."

Pedro was restored to the throne of Castile,--which he was not long to
hold,--and the Prince of Wales returned to Bordeaux, bringing him his
prisoner. He treated him courteously enough, but held him in strict
captivity, and to Sir Hugh Calverley, who begged that he would release
him at a ransom suited to his small estate, he answered,--

"I have no wish for ransom from him. I will have his life prolonged in
spite of himself. If he were released he would be in battle again, and
always making war."

And so Bertrand remained in captivity, until an event occurred of which
the chroniclers give us an entertaining story. It is this event which it
is our purpose to relate.

A day came in which the Prince of Wales and his noble companions, having
risen from dinner, were amusing themselves with narratives of daring
deeds of arms, striking love-passages, and others of the tales with
which the barons of that day were wont to solace their leisure. The talk
came round to the story of how St. Louis, when captive in Tunis, had
been ransomed