you to bear my
device?' 'Nay, ye bear mine,' said Chandos, 'for it is as well mine as
yours.' 'I deny that,' said Clermont, 'but an it were not for the
truce this day between us, I should make it good on you incontinent
that ye have no right to bear my device.' 'Ah, sir,' said Chandos, 'ye
shall find me to-morrow ready to defend you and to prove by feat of
arms that it is as well mine as yours,' Then Clermont said: 'Chandos,
these be well the words of you Englishmen, for ye can devise nothing
of new, but all that ye see is good and fair.' So they departed
without any more doing, and each of them returned to their host.

The cardinal of Perigord could in no wise that Sunday make any
agreement between the parties, and when it was near night he returned
to Poitiers. That night the Frenchmen took their ease; they had
provision enough, and the Englishmen had great default; they could get
no forage, nor they could not depart thence without danger of their
enemies. That Sunday the Englishmen made great dikes and hedges about
their archers, to be the more stronger; and on the Monday in the
morning the prince and his company were ready apparelled as they were
before, and about the sun-rising in like manner were the Frenchmen.
The same morning betimes the cardinal came again to the French host
and thought by his preaching to pacify the parties; but then the
Frenchmen said to him: 'Return whither ye will: bring hither no more
words of treaty nor peace: and ye love yourself depart shortly.' When
the cardinal saw that he travailed in vain, he took leave of the king
and then he went to the prince and said: 'Sir, do what ye can; there
is no remedy but to abide the battle, for I can find none accord in
the French king.' Then the prince said: 'The same is our intent and
all our people: God help the right!' So the cardinal returned to
Poitiers. In his company there were certain knights and squires, men
of arms, who were more favourable to the French king than to the
prince; and when they saw that the parties should fight, they stale
from their masters and went to the French host; and they made their
captain the chatelain of Amposte,[3] who was as then there with the
cardinal, who knew nothing thereof till he was come to Poitiers.

[3] Amposta, a fortress in Catalonia.

The certainty of the order of the Englishmen was shewed to the French
king, except they had ordained three hundred men a-horseback and as
many archers a-horseback