CHAPTER LXXXVI.
A Welshman, of the Name of Ruffin, commands a Troop of the free Companies.
At this time, also, there was another company of men at arms, or robbers, collected from all parts, who stationed themselves between the rivers Loire and Seine, so that no one dared to travel between Paris and Orleans, nor between Paris and Montargis, or even to remain in the country. The inhabitants on the plains had all fled to Paris and Orleans. This company had chosen for their leader a Welshman named Ruffin, whom they had knighted, and who acquired such immense riches as could not be counted. These companies advanced one day near to Paris, another day toward Orleans, another time to Chartres; and there was no town nor fortress but what was taken and pillaged, excepting such as were strongly garrisoned.
They rode over the country in parties of twenty, thirty, or forty, meeting with none to check their pillage; while, on the seacoast of Normandy, there were still a greater number of English and Navarrois, plunderers and robbers. Sir Robert Knolles was their leader, who conquered every town and castle he came to, as there was no one to oppose him. Sir Robert had followed this trade for some time, and by it gained upward of one hundred thousand crowns. He kept a great many soldiers in his pay; and, being very liberal, he was cheerfully followed and obeyed.
CHAPTER LXXXVII.
The Provost of the Merchants of Paris kills three Knights in the Apartment of the Prince.
DURING the time that the three estates governed the kingdom, all sorts of people united themselves together, under the name of Free Companies: they made war upon every man that was worth robbing. I must here inform you that the nobles and prelates of the realm and church began to be weary of the government and regulations of the three estates: they therefore permitted the provost of the merchants of Paris to summon some of the citizens, because they were going greater lengths than they approved of.
It happened one day, when the regent of France was in his palace at Paris, with many knights, nobles, and prelates, that the provost of the merchants collected also a great number of the common people of Paris, who were devoted to him, all wearing caps similar to his own, that they might know each other; and, attended by this crowd, the provost came to the palace. He entered the apartment of the duke,[27] and demanded of him, in an insolent manner, to take the management of the kingdom of France, and to govern it wisely (since it would become his by inheritance), that all those free companies who at present were overrunning the country might be prevented from doing further mischief. The duke replied that he would very willingly comply with his request if he had the means to carry it into execution, but that it more properly belonged to those who had raised and received the imposts due to the realm to perform it. I cannot pretend to say how it happened; but words increased so much, and with such warmth, that at last three of the principal counsellors of the duke were slain, and so near to him that their blood flew over his robe: he himself was in very great danger, but they had put one of their caps on his head, and he consented to pardon the death of his three knights. Two of them were knights of arms, and the other of laws. Their names were, the Lord Robert de Clermont, a gallant and magnificent knight, and the Lord de Conflans: the knight of laws was the Lord Simon de Buci.
CHAPTER LXXXVIII.
The Commencement of the infamous Jacquerie of Beauvoisis.
SOON after the deliverance of the King of Navarre out of prison, a marvellous and great tribulation befell the kingdom of France, in Beauvoisis, Brie, upon the river Marne, in the Laonnois, and in the neighborhood of Soissons. Some of the inhabitants of the country towns assembled together in Beauvoisis, without any leader; they were not at first more than one hundred men. They said that the nobles of the kingdom of France, knights, and squires, were a disgrace to it, and that it would be a very meritorious act to destroy them all; to which proposition every one assented, and added, Shame befall him that should be the means of preventing the gentlemen from being wholly destroyed! They then, without further counsel, collected themselves in a body, and with no other arms than the staves, shod with iron, which some had, and others with knives, marched to the house of a knight who lived near, and, breaking it open, murdered the knight, his lady, and all the children, both great and small: they then burnt the house.
After this their second expedition was to the strong castle of another knight, which they took. They then murdered the lady, her daughter, and the other children, and last of all the knight himself, with much cruelty. They destroyed and burnt his castle. They did the like to many castles and handsome houses; and their numbers increased so much that they were in a short time upward of six thousand. Wherever they went, they received additions, for all of their rank in life followed them, while every one else fled, carrying off with them their ladies, damsels, and children, ten or twenty leagues distant, where they thought they could place them in security, leaving their houses with all their riches in them.
These wicked people, without leader and without arms, plundered and burnt all the houses they came to. He who committed the most atrocious actions, and such as no human creature would have imagined, was the most applauded, and considered as the greatest man among them. I dare not write the horrible and inconceivable atrocities they committed. They had chosen a king among them, who came from Clermont in Beauvoisis; he was elected as the worst of the bad, and they denominated him Jacques Bonhomme.[28] These wretches burnt and destroyed in the county of Beauvoisis, and at Corbie, Amiens, and Montdidier, upward of sixty good houses and strong castles. By the acts of such traitors in the country of Brie and thereabout, it behooved every lady, knight, and squire, having the means of escape, to fly to Meaux, if they wished to preserve themselves from being insulted and afterwards murdered. The Duchess of Normandy, the Duchess of Orleans, and many other ladies, had adopted this course to save themselves. These cursed people thus supported themselves in the countries between Paris, Noyon, and Soissons, and in all the territory of Coucy, in the county of Valois. In the bishoprics of Noyon, Laon, and Soissons, there were upward of one hundred castles, and good houses of knights and squires, destroyed.