The next day, in truth, which was the first of March, 1382, tax-gatherers appeared in the market-place and demanded a tax on a bit of cress which had just been sold by an old woman. A furious riot at once broke out. The rebels rushed to the Hôtel-de-Ville and the arsenal, and armed themselves with new mallets that had been stored up there in view of an attack from the English. These _maillotins_ were, for the moment, masters of the situation; then, as in all popular riots of this time, fury gave way to terror and discouragement. The princes, who took the matter in hand, executed in secret the most seditious and imposed on others the most ruinous fines, with the proceeds of which the duke of Anjou departed for Italy. But the new tax was withdrawn and the leaders of the riot were punished secretly. The Parisian rising had meantime spread to Rouen, Rheims, Châlons, Troyes, and Orleans, where it formed the nucleus of two other revolutionary movements--one in the north in Flanders, the other in the south in Languedoc. The duke of Berri had scarcely appeared in his province of Languedoc when trouble broke out. The pope interfered and put an end to it, but the pope could not stop the executions and cruelties of the governing prince. The peasants despoiled of everything by the soldiers commenced a sort of _jacquerie_ (peasant revolt). They took refuge in the mountains, especially on the slopes of the Cévennes and thence, organised into armed bands, rushed down upon the nobles and wealthy inhabitants, giving no quarter to those whose hands were not callous with toil. They were called the _tuchins_. Affairs in Flanders were still more serious. WAR IN FLANDERS: BATTLE OF ROOSEBEKE (1382 A.D.) The Flemings had rebelled, in the preceding reign, against their French count who amused himself with violating the municipal franchises of the country. Peter Dubois and Philip van Artevelde, son of the famous brewer, had led with success the insurrection of the “chaperons blancs” (white-caps), and at the battle of Bruges (May 3rd, 1382) had overturned the last hopes of Count Louis. Philip van Artevelde pushed the insurrection with the same boldness and in the same manner as his father. Plenipotentiaries from Ghent, Ypres, and Bruges were sent to Richard II of England, offering to recognise him as king of France if he would come to their aid. For a quarter of a century the breath of revolt had been blowing over the middle classes throughout Europe--the enterprise of Rienzi at Rome, Wat Tyler in England, then Étienne Marcel and now the “Jacques,” the “maillotins,” the “tuchins,” and the “white-caps”! Insurrection, smothered in one place, broke out afresh in another, and it was to be feared, as Froissart[c] says, “that all nobility and refinement would be dead and lost in France as well as in many other countries.” [Sidenote: [1382-1383 A.D.]]