[4] The request seems reasonable enough--viz., that no boat or barge travelling on a river, out of which a person might accidentally fall and so be drowned, should be taken as a deodand, _i.e._ forfeited to the lord of the manor or the Crown as being a cause or instrument of death. [5] Edward’s claim had to encounter the difficulty that, according to its argument, the French crown could not pass _to_ a female (for in that case it would have gone to Joan, Queen of Navarre, the daughter of Louis the Tenth, Charles’s eldest brother), but could pass _through_ a female--that is, through his mother Isabella to himself. [6] The demand in money amounted in all to more than a million pounds in the currency of the time. It should be multiplied by fifteen to convert it into present value. The sum would have been considered large, had it not been dwarfed by the enormous ransom exacted from France within the last few years. [7] These were taxes on capital, the tenth being payable in town, the fifteenth in the country. But the sum actually levied was not the literal tenth or fifteenth of the property taxed. Burdensome as the imposts certainly were, these payments would have passed all endurance. From before the middle of the fourteenth century these taxes had been commuted for fixed sums. So much was levied from each township or manor. [8] This Richard was the Duke of York who was killed after the battle of Wakefield, and whose son was Edward the Fourth. [9] A story is told to the effect that on one occasion he passed the place which had been arranged for his quarters. He would not return. He was in his war-coat, and could not go back without displeasing God. The anecdote seems characteristic of the man, and, indeed, to suit the temper which had suggested the march to Calais. [10] Contemporary estimates of their numbers vary very much. Monstrelet, who probably drew his information from French sources, puts them at one hundred and fifty thousand. Elsewhere he says that they were more than six times the number of the English. The latter, however, could not have numbered as many as twenty-five or even twenty thousand. There would be a tendency, of course, after the battle to diminish and to exaggerate the numbers engaged. It is certain that the French superiority was very great. More it is impossible to say.