IX. CHAP. pride and humbled in spirit were the higher aristocracy of the day. We have seen how the Duke of Burgundy was brought to abandon the claims of his young niece, Jeanne, nor did any other noble assume an attitude of independence or opposition save the Count of Flanders, who, insisting on the restoration of Lille, Bethune, and Douai, refused to do homage to Philip. The latter made several preparations for war. In 1316, he levied a tax for the fitting out of a naval expedition at Dieppe, which he soon after suspended. And in 1318, he forbade tournaments and private war, lest they should interfere with the muster of knights which he had ordered to take place at Arras. Famine and pestilence, however, ravaged the north this year, and suspended hostilities. Negotiations were continually taking place, and were prevented from leading to any result by the rivalry of the king's uncles, the Counts of Valois and Evreux, who each wanted to give his daughter in marriage to the Count of Flanders. The Pope in vain endeavoured to reconcile these differences. There were at the time some troubles in Poitou, where the king had declared his dominions as count annexed to the crown. The Flemings proposed to the Poitevins to associate their cause, but Poitou was a feudal county and rejected the proposal of the Flemings. In his resistance to Philip, and in insisting on the restoration of Lille, the Count of Flanders was chiefly supported by Bruges, and the democracy which prevailed there, whilst Ghent and its inhabitants, amongst whom wealth had more influence, were for making peace with France and abandoning French Flanders. In one campaign the troops of Ghent deserted their count. When during negotiations at Paris, Robert refused to make peace if Lille were not given up, the deputies told him that he must yield. The count, unable to resist, withdrew in consequence and accepted the conditions of Philip, which were of course his retention of Lille, and the marriage of one of his daughters to the heir of the Count of Flanders. The reign of Philip the Long was marked by no chivalrous enterprise or military feat. French and Flemings were disposed more to negotiate than fight. The English under Edward the Second gave no trouble to their neighbours. The families of Austria and Bavaria, struggling for the imperial crown, did not interfere with France, the Austrians, defeated by the Swiss at Morgarten, being driven more than ever remote from the French frontier. In Italy the Viscounts of Milan defied the Pope and his excommunication, in imitation of Philip the Fair. Philip of Valois, son of Charles, was induced to enter the Milanese with an army of knights; but the French found themselves in Lombardy, as in Flanders, completely outnumbered by the civic militia, and they were very glad to be allowed by the Duke of Milan to escape without disgrace. In France the king and princes were continually proclaiming the intention of setting forth for the Holy Land. And as this was a good pretext for taxing, especially the clergy, the pretext was never abandoned. But the common people, as upon former occasions, seeing the vain words and empty promises of their superiors, were influenced to undertake themselves the neglected task. Again, therefore, the shepherds of the north of France, told by some pretended prophet that they were destined to liberate Jerusalem, assembled, flung away their crooks, abandoned their flocks, seized what arms they could find, and marched southward upon their crusade. This second muster of the Pastoureaux surprised the city of Paris, which they entered without opposition, marshalling and encamping in the meadows of Saint Germain des Près, south of the river. The king found no support from the civic arm to disperse them. In time they moved southward and took to slaughtering the Jews of the towns through which they passed, a feat which procured them some plunder, and was at the same time approved by the population. CHAP. IX. CHAP. At last the royal officers of the south, alarmed and annoyed by the excesses of these new crusaders, collected a force sufficient to resist, disperse, and destroy them. The lower and ignorant orders, about the same time, sought to rival their superiors in other ways. Philip the Fair had destroyed the Templars for divers supposed crimes, and it was attempted to abolish other orders of monks. The Beguines were accused, and decrees obtained against them. The Franciscans were threatened. Whilst the king was sojourning in Poitou, a rumour was propagated by the peasantry that the unfortunate beings afflicted with leprosy had poisoned all the wells of Aquitaine. The establishments for the seclusion of lepers had, like that of the Templars, sprung from the crusades, the disease having spread from Palestine to France. And now that all relations with Palestine had ceased, the necessity for these hospitals could not survive the destruction of their present inmates. No doubt some interested person, anxious to get possession of the estates and property of the ladres, spread the report. The lepers, like the Templars, were recluses living upon charity. It is possible that they might have been discontented, and in idleness and suffering had devoted themselves to the preparation of potions, perhaps for their own ills. Report or malice accused them of using these to poison the wells; the poor creatures were seized, and put to the usual interrogation of the torture. Of course they confessed whatever crime was laid to their charge. But some of them had the wit to turn the zeal of the new inquisition in another direction. They accused the Jews of having suborned them to poison Christendom. As the Jews were richer than the lepers, every one was glad to believe and act upon the accusation. It was afterwards said that the Jews had been suborned by the King of Granada. The soldans of Syria and Egypt had ceased to be known, and the Emir of Granada became thus in the eyes of Europe the chief of the infidels. There were, however, no Saracens to spoil or to burn, but a great number of lepers perished in the flames. A hundred and sixty Jews were burned at Chinon. It was thought strange that forty Jews, reserved for the same fate, should have anticipated it by slaying each other. The king gained 150,000 livres by the confiscation of these unfortunate people's property; and he acquired, no doubt, an equal sum by the lepers. Such events indicate how little the people were progressing in intelligence, justice, or charity; how effectual were the efforts of monks and clergy to keep mankind stationary; and how much the endeavours of the lawyers to establish the civil on the ruins of the feudal law, and testimony elicited by torture for trial by single combat, had perverted justice instead of improving it. Still the efforts of Philip the Long were generally in a right and a wise direction. He in a degree stopped the aristocratic reaction which had prevailed under Louis Hutin, without at the same time entrusting the conduct of affairs to the legists, as had been the policy of Philip the Fair. The body of Enguerrand de Marigny had been taken from its gibbet, and honourably buried. The other legists in captivity were released; but, at the same time, the king recalled the alienations which had been obtained of the royal domains by those law functionaries and their families. All grants of crown property since the days of St. Louis were revoked, "they being obtained," said the ordonnance, "by subtle and empty manœuvres, impoverishing the crown exceedingly." The families of Flotte, Nogaret, Plasian, and Boville, the functionaries of Philip the Fair, were thus stripped by the king; whilst Charles of Valois, struck with mortal disease, showed his penitence by bequeathing legacies and making what amends he could to the heirs of De Marigny. The chief object of Philip the Long's efforts and CHAP. IX. CHAP. edicts was to organise a regular administration. He ordered, first, that a certain number of the members of the Great Council should be always with the king, a provision afterwards repeated in the order that the Small or Privy Council (l'estroit conseil) should meet every month. He established the Chamber of Accounts, and regulated the issues of the Treasury, no payment to be made without the king's own signature. The abuses of Philip's predecessors are chiefly known by his efforts to amend them. He took off the gabelle, or tax on salt, and promised that it should make no part of the permanent revenue. He ordered the forced loans made in Normandy to be suspended and discontinued. He reduced the number of sergents, or king's soldiers, in the provinces, commanded those who were still maintained to be under the orders of the baillis, and bade them not to sergenter the country according to their own pleasure, a sufficient indication of their previous conduct. His seneschals were directed to consult ten or twelve notables of the three orders of churchmen, nobles, and burgesses, as to the number and choice of these sergents. Philip regulated parliaments, their number, and their sitting. No prelate was to sit in that of Paris unless he belonged also to the king's council. Parliament should always be attended by a baron or two. It was empowered to send commissioners into the provinces to judge causes instead of bringing the parties to Paris, and thereby creating expenses. And as it seemed difficult to command the presence of a sufficient number of judges, Philip appointed the Count of Boulogne to attend regularly. The king forbade (1316) nobles to sell fiefs or feudal property to non-nobles. The inhabitants of Perigord were allowed previously to give lands on condition of cens, or rent. No castles were to be kept or paid for guarding unless they were on the frontier, and then should be garrisoned by royal troops. The military ordonnances of Philip are few but signi |