The chief captains on this expedition were the count de Dunois, lieutenant-general for the king, the counts de Nevers, de Castres, d'Eu, de St Pol, the lord de Culant, grand master of the household, the lords d'Orval, de Touteville, de Blainville, de Beauveau, de Bueil, de Beaunoir, de Moy in the Beauvoisis, the marshal de Jalognes, the seneschal de Poitou, John of Lorraine, Poton de Saintrailles, the bailiff of Evreux, Robert Conigan[109], and very many other great lords, knights and esquires, who most valiantly conducted themselves, regardless of all the pains and discomforts they were bodily put to on several occasions. In like manner, the king had made ample provision of all sorts of artillery for his defence, and for the attack of towns and castles. He had the greatest number and variety of battering cannon and bombards, veuglaires, serpentines, crapaudines, culverines and ribaudequins[110], that had ever been collected in the memory of man; and never king had such a train so well supplied with ammunition and every implement for battering towns, nor so numerous a body of men and horses to draw them. These received their pay daily, and were under the command of master John Bureau, treasurer of France, and of his brother Jasper Bureau,--both of whom suffered many difficulties during the sieges of the different towns and castles, for they were very active and attentive to their duty. It was wonderful to see their diligence in planning and forming the trenches and mines that were opened at almost every siege during this expedition; for, to say the truth, there was scarcely any place that surrendered on capitulation but what might have been won by storm, had not the king, out of his benign nature, insisted on the contrary, to prevent the effusion of blood and the total ruin of such places and their inhabitants. The late duke of Brittany was the leader of the conquest of lower Normandy, having with him his uncle the count de Richemont, constable of France, the late Pregent de Coictivy, lord of Retz and admiral of France, who laboured hard at the business, the count de Laval, the lord de Lohéac, marshal of France, his brother de Montauban, marshal of Brittany, Geoffry de Couvran, James de Tilly, bailiff of the Vermandois. Tuddual le Bourgeois was of this party during his life. To find supplies for the support of the king's armies, and for the better government of this duchy of Normandy, the lord de Trainel, chancellor of France, the lord de Gaucourt, sir Thibaut de Vaulpergue, bailiff of Lyon, sir James Cœur, counsellor, and master of the king's wardrobe, exerted themselves greatly: the last, in particular, employed every means in his power to prevent the soldiers, who were daily increasing, from being disappointed of their regular monthly payment. Sir John du Bar, lord of Baugey, and sir John Harduyn, treasurer of France, gained great credit,--and all others who laboured at this time in the service of the king.