velously surprised at the contents of the letter
which you have sent me. I do not know and can not imagine
what answer I can make. Your present orders will do me a
great injury, and subject me to much blame. For all the
men-at-arms whom I have retained by your command have
already made their preparations for entering your service,
and were only waiting your orders to march. By retaining
them for your service I have prevented them from seeking
honor and profit elsewhere. Some of the knights had actually
made engagements to go beyond sea, to Jerusalem, to
Constantinople, or to Russia, in order to advance
themselves, and now, having relinquished these advantageous
prospects in order to join your enterprise, they will be
extremely displeased if they are left behind. I am myself
equally displeased, and I can not conceive what I have done
to deserve such treatment. And I beg you to understand, my
lord, that I can not be separated from my men; nor will they
consent to be separated from each other. I am convinced
that, if I dismiss any of them, they will all go."

The baron added other words of the same tenor, and then, signing and
sealing the letter, sent it to the prince. The prince was angry in his
turn when he received this letter.

"By my faith," said he, "this man D'Albret is altogether too great a
man for my country, when he seeks thus to disobey an order from my
council. But let him go where he pleases. We will perform this
expedition, if it please God, without _any_ of his thousand lances."

This case presents a specimen of the perplexities and troubles in
which the prince was involved during the winter, while organizing his
expedition and preparing to set out in the spring. The want of money
was the great difficulty, for there was no lack of men. Don Pedro
agreed, it is true, that when he recovered his kingdom he would pay
back the advances which Edward had to make, but he was so unprincipled
a man that Edward knew very well that he could not trust to his
promises unless he gave some security. So Don Pedro agreed to leave
his three daughters in Edward's hands as hostages to secure the
payment of the money.

The names of the three princesses thus pledged as collateral security
for money borrowed were Beatrice, Constance, and Isabel.

At length, on the third day of April, the child was born. The
princess was in a monastery a