But the chief obstacle which the French king met with in the settlement of the state, proceeded from obscure enemies, whom their crimes alone rendered eminent, and their number dangerous.
On the conclusion of the treaty of Bretigni, the many military adventurers who had followed the standard of Edward being dispersed into the several provinces, and possessed of strongholds, refused to lay down their arms, or relinquish a course of life to which they were now accustomed, and by which alone they could gain a subsistence.[**] They associated themselves with the banditti, who were already inured to the habits of rapine and violence; and under the name of the "companies" and "companions," became a terror to all the peaceable inhabitants.
Some English and Gascon gentlemen of character, particularly Sir Matthew Gournay, Sir Hugh Calverly, the chevalier Verte, and others, were not ashamed to take the command of these ruffians, whose numbers amounted on the whole to near forty thousand, and who bore the appearance of regular armies, rather than bands of robbers.

These leaders fought pitched battles with the troops of France, and gained victories; in one of which Jaques de Bourbon, a prince of the blood, was slain:[***] and they proceeded to such a height, that they wanted little but regular establishments to become princes, and thereby sanctify, by the maxims of the world, their infamous profession.

The greater spoil they committed on the country, the more easy they found it to recruit their number: all those who were reduced to misery and despair, flocked to their standard: the evil was every day increasing; and though the pope declared them excommunicated, these military plunderers, however deeply affected with the sentence, to which they paid a much greater regard than to any principles of morality, could not be induced by it to betake themselves to peaceable or lawful professions.
* Froissard, liv.i.chap.227, 228, etc.

Walsing, p.

180.
** Froissard, liv.i.chap.