His loans from the Florentine bankers amounted to half a million.

His claim on the French crown found not a single adherent save among the burghers of the Flemish towns.

The overtures which he made for peace were contemptuously rejected, and the expiration of the truce in 1345 found him again face to face with France.
[Sidenote: Edward marches on Paris] But it was perhaps this breakdown of all foreign hope that contributed to Edward's success in the fresh outbreak of war.

The war opened in Guienne, and Henry of Lancaster, who was now known as the Earl of Derby, and who with the Hainaulter Sir Walter Maunay took the command in that quarter, at once showed the abilities of a great general.

The course of the Garonne was cleared by his capture of La Reole and Aiguillon, that of the Dordogne by the reduction of Bergerac, and a way opened for the reconquest of Poitou by the capture of Angouleme.