of quitting the Duke of Anjou at Toulouse, had advised him not to accept battle, to well fortify all the places that had been recovered, and to let the English scatter and waste themselves in a host of small expeditions and distant skirmishes constantly renewed.  When once he was constable, Du Guesclin put determinedly in practice the king’s maxim, calmly confident in his own fame for valor whenever he had to refuse to yield to the impatience of his comrades.

This detached and indecisive war lasted eight years, with a medley of more or less serious incidents, which, however, did not change its character.  In 1370, the Prince of Wales laid siege to Limoges, which had opened its gates to the Duke of Berry.  He was already so ill that he could not mount his horse, and had himself carried in a litter from post to post, to follow up and direct the operations of the siege.  In spite of a month’s resistance the prince took the place, and gave it up as a prey to a mob of reckless plunderers, whose excesses were such that Froissart himself, a spectator generally so indifferent, and leaning rather to the English, was deeply shocked.  “There,” said he, “was a great pity, for men, women, and children threw themselves on their knees before the prince, and cried, ‘Mercy, gentle sir!’ but he was so inflamed with passion that he gave no heed, and none, male or female, was listened to, but all were put to the sword.  There is no heart so hard but, if present then at Limoges and not forgetful of God, would have wept bitterly, for more than three thousand persons, men, women, and children, were there beheaded on that day.  May God receive their souls, for verily they were martyrs!” The massacre of Limoges caused, throughout France, a feeling of horror and indignant anger towards the English name.  In 1373 an English army landed at Calais, under the command of the Duke of Lancaster, and overran nearly the whole of France, being incessantly harassed, however, without ever being attacked in force, and without mastering a single fortress.  “Let them be,” was the saying in the king’s circle; “when a storm bursts out in a country, it leaves off afterwards and disperses of itself; and so it will be with these English.”  The sufferings and reverses of the English armies on this expedition were such, that, of thirty thousand horses which the English had landed at Calais, “they could not muster more than six thousand at Bordeaux, and had lost full a third of their men and more.  There were seen noble knights, who had great possessions in their own country, toiling along a-foot, without armor, and begging their bread from door to door without getting any.”  In vain did Edward III. treat with the Duke of Brittany and the King of Navarre in order to have their support in this war.  The Duke of Brittany, John IV., after having openly defied the King of France, his suzerain, was obliged to fly to England, and the King of Navarre entered upon negotiations