After we had given his majesty an account of Rapine’s message, he called for one of his secretaries. There were then in his presence only the Lord Howard[480], an English courtier, who knew nothing of our intrigue with the Constable, the Lord of Contay, who was newly returned from the Duke of Burgundy, and we two who had been in discourse with Rapine. The king dictated a letter to the Constable, in which his majesty acquainted him with what had been transacted the day before in relation to the truce. He told him, that at that instant he had many weighty affairs upon his hands, and wanted such a head as his to finish them; and then turning to the English nobleman and the Lord of Contay, he told them, “I do not mean his body—I would have his head with me, and his body where it is.” After the letter was read, it was delivered to Rapine, who was mightily pleased with it, and took it as a great compliment in the king to say, that he wanted such a head as his master’s, for he did not understand the ambiguity of the phrase. The King of England sent two letters, which the Constable had written to him[481], to the King of France, and acquainted his majesty with all the proposals he had ever made him, by which it may easily be discerned into what a miserable condition he had brought himself, when every one of these three great princes desired his destruction. As soon as the King of England had received his money, and delivered the Lord Howard and Sir John Cheyne, his master of the horse, as hostages, as he had promised till he was landed in England, he retreated towards Calais by long and hasty marches; for he was apprehensive of the Duke of Burgundy’s anger, and of the hatred of the peasants; and indeed if any of his soldiers straggled, some of them were sure to be knocked on the head.