After the king had rested and refreshed himself, the prince invited him and the other captive nobles to a supper in his tent, and Prince Edward himself waited upon King John, saying that he was not worthy to sit at table with so great a prince and so valiant a man. Soon after this the English returned to their own country, bringing with them the French king and many other prisoners. The victorious army was received with the greatest joy; and on the day when the Black Prince entered London, the people crowded by thousands into the streets to see him pass as he rode on a little pony by the side of his prisoner, King John of France, whom he had mounted upon his own magnificent cream-coloured charger. King John was kept, an honourable prisoner, until a peace was made with France. Then he was allowed to return to his own country upon condition that the French should pay, within six years, a sum of money for his ransom. Until the ransom should be paid, the French king's three sons agreed to remain as hostages in the town of Calais, which belonged to the English. They were allowed to ride into French territory as often as they pleased, provided that they gave their word of honour not to remain away longer than four days at a time. King Edward and his son, knowing how honourable their father was, trusted in the honour of these young princes. One day, however, one of the princes yielded to temptation, rode away, and never came back to Calais at all. Upon hearing the news the French king was so shocked that he returned to England and yielded himself up a prisoner once more. 'If honour is to be found nowhere else,' he said, 'it should find a refuge in the breast of kings.' King Edward gave him a palace to live in, and he and his people did all they could to show the imprisoned king how much they loved and admired him for his noble conduct. But King John never returned to his own country. Three months after his arrival in England he died, his end hastened by sorrow at the base and thoughtless conduct of his son. CHAPTER VI SINGEING THE KING OF SPAIN'S BEARD Queen Elizabeth was seated in her private apartment, her white forehead puckered in anxious lines. The trouble between herself and her great rival the King of Spain had reached its height. Throughout her reign English and Spaniards had been contending for the mastery of the new countries which had been discovered on the other side of the ocean, and for supremacy upon the seas. In South America the Spanish king possessed rich mines of silver and precious stones: and Queen Elizabeth's adventurers, half explorers, half pirates, gloried in making descents upon the coast towns, waiting there until the convoys came down from the mountains, and then seizing the treasure, burning the town, and departing.