which he had never before manifested. At length, at the end of a month, a large mine opened a breach in the walls of the town; the besiegers sprang inside, and the massacre began. Women, children, and old men fell upon their knees, crying, "Mercy! such poor folks could not have been concerned in defending the town," but none received quarter. The knights and men at arms of the garrison still defended themselves heroically in the streets; three of them planted themselves against a wall, and made such good use of their swords that the Prince of Wales, while passing by in his litter, was struck with admiration, and received them as prisoners to be ransomed. The humble people, "who were really martyrs," says Froissart, were all dead; the town was fired, and the Prince of Wales had retired. He had exhausted his strength, and, in the hope of regaining his health under his native sky, set out for England, leaving to his brother John of Gaunt, Duke of Lancaster, the care of prosecuting the war. The military career of the Black Prince was ended; six years of illness and languor were to bring to its close this life so brilliantly begun, but unhappily sullied by a last act of cruelty, more consistent with the general morals of the time than with the character hitherto displayed by the son of King Edward. The Duke of Lancaster had recently married Constance, the eldest daughter of Peter the Cruel, and, upon this ground, he aspired to the crown of Castile, an imprudent pretension which strengthened the union of the king, Don Henry, with France. The Earl of Pembroke was bringing reinforcements to the Duke in June, 1372, when a Spanish fleet stationed between La Rochelle and the Isle of Ré, barred the passage. An engagement took place, and the English were completely beaten, their vessels being either captured or scuttled. This disaster was an unmistakeable blow to King Edward and to the English nation, which was beginning to look upon the sea as its legitimate empire. {333} The successes of King Charles V. were increasing; he had placed Bertrand du Guesclin at the head of his armies, and had made him Constable of France; but the remembrance of Crécy and Poictiers was always before his eyes; he did not permit any pitched battles to be fought. From siege to siege, from skirmish to skirmish, Du Guesclin was still marching forward, sometimes surprising the enemy, passing through their ranks, as it is said in his memoirs, by a stratagem, which consisted in striking with the point and with the edge of the sword; but when the English presented themselves in a body, the Constable would fall back upon the fortresses, and allow a passage to the enemy, who overran the country but could not surround either the large towns or fortified castles. "Never has king fought so little, and given so much trouble," said Edward angrily, for his French possessions were diminishing day by day. Bordeaux and Bayonne, with a narrow