With the Black Prince

by William O. Stoddard

The great French ship came on majestically, but Richard had given careful orders beforehand, and the Golden Horn did not avoid closing with her.

"Let them board us," he had said, and Ben o' Coventry had replied to him: "Aye, my Lord 'o Wartmont, and we will slay as many as we may upon our own decks before we finish upon theirs."

So little thought had the English but that they should win, no matter who came.

Louder and louder now arose the exulting yells and shouts from the swarms of armed men surging to and fro upon the fore and after forts and in the waist of La Belle Calaise, as her grapnels were thrown out to fasten upon the Golden Horn. She was much the taller and larger vessel, and even her tops and rigging were full of men.

Alas for these! Had they been so many squirrels in the trees of Longwood, they could not have dropped faster as the English archers plied their deadly bows. Of the latter, too, some were in the cuplike tops of the Golden Horn, and their shafts were seeking marks among the French knights and men-at-arms. It was a fearful moment, for the boarders were ready as the two ships crashed against each other.

"Steady, men! Stand fast!" shouted Richard. "Let them come on, but slay them as they come! Take the knights first; aim at the armholes. Waste no shaft. St. George for merry England! For the king and for the prince!"

"For the king and for Richard of Wartmont!" shouted Ben o' Coventry.

Twang went his bow as he spoke, and a tall knight in full armor pitched heavily forward upon the deck of the Golden Horn, shouting "St. Denis!" as he fell. His sword had been lifted, and the gray goose shaft had taken him in the armpit. He would strike no more.

The Frenchmen were brave enough, and they did not seem to be dismayed even by the dire carnage which was thinning them out so rapidly. The worst thing against them was that all this was so entirely unexpected. They had counted upon taking the English ship by surprise, aided by the treachery of Piers Fleming and his son. The Golden Horn had been steered by them many a long mile out of her proper course, and the same trick may have been played upon others of King Edward's transports; for he had been compelled to employ sailors of all the nationalities along the Channel and the North Sea, excepting a few that favored the Frenchmen.

The fighting force on La Belle Calaise was not only double the number of that on the Golden Horn, but it contained five times as many men-at-arms. There the advantage ended, however; for the rest of it consisted of a motley mob of all sorts, woefully inferior in arms, discipline, and even in bodily strength to the chosen fighters who were commanded by Richard of Wartmont.