Landing boldly though with such a handful of men, he was soon joined by the Percies, and other powerful leaders; and so eagerly did the people flock to him as their deliverer from a headstrong reckless despot, that in a short time he numbered as his followers sixty thousand men, who had staked their property, their liberty, and their lives, on the same die. The most probable account of his proceedings up to his return to Chester, immediately before the unfortunate Richard fell into his hands, is the following, for which we are chiefly indebted to the translator of the "Metrical History."[62] [Footnote 57: Froissart relates, in a very lively manner, how the English nobility amused themselves in devising the probable schemes by which Bolinbroke might dispose of himself during his exile. "He is young, said they, and he has already travelled enough, in Prussia, and to the Holy Sepulchre, and St. Katharine: he will now take other journeys to cheat the time. Go where he will, he will be at home; he has friends in every country." The same author tells us that forty thousand persons accompanied him on his exile, not with music and song, but with sighs and tears and lamentations; and that on Gaunt's death the people of England "spoke much and loudly of Derby's return,--especially the Londoners, who loved him a hundred times more than they did the King. The Earl, he says, heard of the death of his father, even before the King of France, though Richard had posted off the event to that monarch as joyful tidings. He put himself and his household in deep mourning, and caused the funeral obsequies to be solemnized with much grandeur. The King, the Duke of Orleans, and very many nobles and prelates were present at the solemnity, for the Earl was much beloved by them all, and they deeply sympathized with his grief, for he was an agreeable knight, well-bred, courteous, and gentle to every one."]