From Aix-la-Chapelle we went to Maestricht, and thence through Tirlemont, to Louvain. This last is a wealthy city, with a fine town-hall. The Flemings seem very fond of bells, which are always chiming, and the great multitude of storks was a strange thing to me; they make their nests on the tops of the chimneys. The country round is very fertile, and the great guilds exceeding prosperous. The small handicrafts have more power there than with us at Strasburg. At Ypres, I hear, they lately mustered five thousand strong in the market-place, and headed by their deacons, engaged and routed the knights and men-at-arms who wished to hold the town against the men of Ghent.[138] They are very brave and determined, and keep better together, as it seems to me, than our folk. I found no small excitement in the city, on account of the war then carrying on between the men of Ghent and their allies, on the one side, and the Earl of Flanders on the other. It began with the old rivalry between Ghent and Bruges—some dispute about a canal from the Lys. The real struggle is between lords and commons. What Bishop Berthold and his party have been to us, that is the Count de Male to these Flemings. The popular side has lost a brave leader in John Lyon. He revived the White Hoods, and stirred up all Flanders against the earl. But two at least of the new captains, John Boule and Peter du Bois, bid fair to fill his place. When I was at Louvain, the troops of the earl were besieged in Oudenarde by upwards of a hundred thousand men, gathered out of all the principal towns, well provisioned and appointed. The besiegers were very strong in cross-bow men, and had with them some great guns, which did no small damage. Many hot assaults were made, both by land and water, and on both sides many brave men slain (Heaven rest their souls!) for the Flemings were no whit behind the knights in foolhardiness. When I left Brabant, report said that a peace was, or soon would be concluded, to be ratified, according to their wont there, by enormous dinners. Certain it is that neither Oudenarde nor Dendermonde were carried after all.[139]