“The same wynter the prince of Wales, and such of Englande as were with him at Bardeaux, ordayned for shippes, to convey the frenche king and his son and all other prisoners into Englande. Then he took the see, and certayne lordes of Gascoyne with hym: the frenche kyng was in a vessell by hymselfe, to be the more at hys ease, accompanyed with two hundred men at arms, and two thousand archers: for it was showed the prince that the thre estates, by whom the realme of France was governed, had layed in Normandy and Crotoy two great armyes to the entent to mete with hym, and to gette the frenche kyng out of his handes if they might: but there were no such that apered, and yet thei were on the see xi dayes, and on the xii day they aryved at Sandwych; then they yssued out of their shyppe, and lay there all that nyghte, and taryed there two dayes to refresh them; and on the therde day they rode to Canterbury. When the kynge of Englande knew of their commynge, he commaunded them of London to prepare theym, and their cyte, to receyve suche a man as the frenche kyng was: then they of London arrayed themselfe, by companyes, and the chief maisters clothing different fro the other; at saynt Thomas of Canterbury the frenche kyng and the prince made their offerynges, and there taryed a day, and than rode to Rochester, and taryed there that day, and the next day to Dartforde, and the fourth day to London, wher they were honourably receyved, and so they were in every good towne as they passed: the frenche kynge rode through London on a whyte courser, well aparelled, and the prince on a lyttell black hobbey by hym: thus he was conveyed along the cyte till he came to the Savoy, the which house pertayned to the heritage of the duke of Lancaster; there the frenche kynge kept hys house a long season, and thyder came to se hym the kyng and the quene ofttimes, and made him great feest and chere.”[128] It has been said that the Prince’s conduct was too ostentatiously humble; that in refusing to sit at table with the King of France, and in making him the principal object of attention in their entry into London, he exceeded the modesty of a conqueror, and exposed himself to the charge of hypocrisy. The censure is, we think, erroneous, and arises from ignorance of the feelings of the times. The humility of the Black Prince was that of a vassal in presence of his feudal lord, due, not because he owed allegiance to the King of France, but because that monarch was the peer of the King of England, and in courtesy entitled, especially as a visitor, though a forced one, to an equal measure of respect from his subjects. The victor merely overlooked the fortune of war, and paid to his royal prisoner the homage which he would have shown to his father, and which the King of France would have received from the heir to his own crown. EXTRACT FROM THE LIFE OF MESSIRE BERTRAND DU GUESCLIN. (_Referred to in the Note, p. 104._)