k not forward to the
encounter, indignant that the first charge against them was not made by
knights, as would have been seemly, and remain motionless at their post.
The men of Soissons, meanwhile, see no need of dealing softly with them
and humoring them, so thrust them roughly, upset them from their horses,
slay a many of them, and force them to leave their place or defend
themselves, willy nilly. At last, the Chevalier Eustace, scorning the
burghers and proud of his illustrious ancestors, moves out into the
middle of the plain, and with haughty voice, roars, "Death to the
French!" The battle soon became general and obstinate; it was a
multitude of hand-to-hand fights in the midst of a confused melley.
In this melley, the knights of the Emperor Otho did not forget the
instructions he had given them before the engagement: they sought out the
King of France himself, to aim their blows at him; and ere long they knew
him by the presence of the royal standard, and made their way almost up
to him. The communes, and chiefly those of Corbeil, Amiens, Beauvais,
Compiegne, and Arras, thereupon pierced through the battalions of the
knights and placed themselves in front of the king, when some German
infantry crept up round Philip, and with hooks and light lances threw him
down from his horse; but a small body of knights who had remained by him
overthrew, dispersed, and slew these infantry, and the king, recovering
himself more quickly than had been expected, leaped upon another horse,
and dashed again into the melley. Then danger threatened the Emperor
Otho in his turn. The French drove back those about him, and came right
up to him; a sword thrust, delivered with vigor, entered the brain of
Otho's horse; the horse, mortally wounded, reared up and turned his head
in the direction whence he had come; and the emperor, thus carried away,
showed his back to the French, and was off in full flight. "Ye will see
his face no more to-day," said Philip to his followers: and he said
truly. In vain did William des Barres, the first knight of his day in
strength, and valor, and renown, dash off in pursuit of the emperor;
twice he was on the point of seizing him, but Otho escaped, thanks to the
swiftness of his horse and the great number of his German knights, who,
whilst their emperor was flying, were fighting to a miracle. But their
bravery saved only their master; the battle of Bouvines was lost for the
Anglo-Germano-Flemish coalitio