During the residence of the king of France at Sens in Burgundy, he received positive intelligence, that the dukes of Berry, Orleans, Bourbon, and their confederates, had formed an alliance with the king of England, who had engaged to send a large army to their assistance, to lay waste his kingdom,--and that part of it had already marched from Calais and the other castles on the frontiers of the Boulonois, and commenced the war. They had carried away much plunder, and had set fire to the town of Merck on the sea-shore, thus infringing the truces which subsisted between them. In consequence of this inroad, the king of France ordered his constable, the count de St Pol, to march thither, to assemble all the nobles of Picardy, and to garrison and victual the frontier towns, and to use every diligence in opposing the further progress of the English; for the duke of Burgundy had carried with him all the youth, and the most warlike men, from the countries of the Boulonois, Ponthieu, and Artois, leaving behind only the superannuated and such as were unable to bear arms. The constable, hearing of the mischiefs the English were doing, more of his own free will than in obedience to the king's, hastened to Paris, laying all other matters aside, with the borgne de la Heuse and some other knights whom he left there, at the earnest entreaties of the Parisians, to carry on the war against Dreux. He went then to Picardy and to St Pol, to visit his lady; thence he went to St Omer and to Boulogne, inspecting the whole frontier, and providing necessaries where wanted. The whole country was now alarmed and in motion, insomuch that the English retired worsted; but they very soon recommenced their warfare.