Agincourt: A Romance: The Works of G. P. R. James, Volume XXJames, G. P. R. (George Payne Rainsford)
General
Agincourt: A Romance: The Works of G. P. R. James, Volume XX
James, G. P. R. (George Payne Rainsford)
Agincourt, Battle of, Agincourt, France, 1415 -- Fiction
Richard of Woodville remarked that they were most of them middle-aged
men, with hard and weather-beaten countenances, who had evidently seen
a good deal of service; but he observed also that--probably, from the
unwillingness of the Burgundian nobility to submit to anything like
strict discipline--there seemed to be few persons of distinction in
the corps, and not one knight but the old Lord himself. Without any
pause, the whole party marched on to Douay, the young Englishman
losing no opportunity of exercising his men in such evolutions as the
nature of the ground permitted, and many of the old soldiers of De
Roucq watching his proceedings in silence, but with an attentive and
inquiring eye.
At Douay they halted for an hour and a half, to feed their horses and
to take some refreshment; and then marching on, they did not draw a
rein again till Cambray appeared in sight. Here all the party expected
to remain the night; for Cambray, as the reader well knows, is a good
day's march from Lille, especially for men covered with heavy armour,
and for horses who had to carry not only the weight of their masters
and their masters' harness, but steel manefaires, testières, and
chanfrons of their own. The orders of the commander, however, showed
them, before they entered the gates, that such repose was not to fall
to their lot, for he directed them to seek no hostel, but to quarter
themselves, without dividing, in the market-place, and there to feed
their beasts.
"'Tis a fine evening," he said, "and you shall have plenty of food and
wine; but we must march on, for an hour or two, at night, that we may
be in time to-morrow. If we have more space than enough in the
morning, why the destriers will be all the fresher."
No one ventured to make any reply, though the men-at-arms of the Count
of Charolois felt somewhat weary with their unwonted exertion, and
would fain have persuaded themselves that their beasts could go no
farther that night. Their leader, or vingtner, who held the rank of a
sergeant of the present day, and usually commanded twenty men, went so
far as to hint his opinion on this subject to Richard of Woodville;
but the young Englishman stopped him in an instant, replying coldly,
"If your horses break down we must find you others. We have nothing to
do but to obey."
The young Englishman took care, however, that the chargers of his
whole party should have everything that could refresh them, and he
spared not his own purse to procure for them a different sort of food
from that which was provided for the rest. The crumb of bread soaked
in water was a favourite expedient with the English of that day, as it
is now with the Germans, for restoring the vigour of a wearied horse;
and he made bold to dip the bread in wine, which, on those beasts that
would take it, seemed to produce a very great effect.
Public-domain text, read in full here on John Shaqi.
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