r, Philip of Valois and Edward
III. were preparing, on either side, for the war which they could see
drawing near. Philip was vigorously at work on the pope, the Emperor of
Germany, and the princes neighbors of Flanders, in order to raise
obstacles against his rival or rob him of his allies. He ordered that
short-lived meeting of the states-general about which we have no
information left us, save that it voted the principle that "no talliage
could be imposed on the people if urgent necessity or evident utility
should not require it, and unless by concession of the Estates." Philip,
as chief of feudal society, rather than of the nation which was forming
itself little by little around the lords, convoked at Amiens all his
vassals, great and small, laic or cleric, placing all his strength in
their co-operation, and not caring at all to associate the country itself
in the affairs of his government. Edward, on the contrary, whilst
equipping his fleet and amassing treasure at the expense of the Jews and
Lombard usurers, was assembling his Parliament, talking to it "of this
important and costly war," for which he obtained large subsidies, and
accepting without making any difficulty the vote of the Commons' House,
which expressed a desire "to consult their constituents upon this
subject, and begged him to summon an early Parliament, to which there
should be elected, in each county, two knights taken from among the best
land-owners of their counties." The king set out for the Continent; the
Parliament met and considered the exigencies of the war by land and sea,
in Scotland and in France; traders, ship-owners, and mariners were called
and examined; and the forces determined to be necessary were voted.
Edward took the field, pillaging, burning, and ravaging, "destroying all
the country for twelve or fourteen leagues to extent," as he himself said
in a letter to the Archbishop of Canterbury. When he set foot on French
territory, Count William of Hainault, his brother-in-law, and up to that
time his ally, came to him and said that "he would ride with him no
farther, for that his presence was prayed and required by his uncle, the
King of France to whom he bore no hate, and whom he would go and serve in
his own kingdom, as he had served King Edward on the territory of the
emperor, whose vicar he was; "and Edward wished him 'God speed!'" Such
was the binding nature of feudal ties that the same lord held himself
bound to pass from