_Louis of Nevers_
Louis of Nevers, the eldest son of Count Robert of Bethune, inheriting
from his grandfather Guy alike his brilliant qualities and his grave
defects, was destined, like him, to be crushed by the weight of two
overweening passions: love of gold, and love of self.
At first an ardent patriot, he had set himself at the head of the
communes of Flanders in their struggle against his father's
misgovernment--a misgovernment brought about first by fear of France,
and later on, in his old age, by the spectre continually before his eyes
of the fortress in which he had been so long immured at Compiègne; but
what threats and force and a French prison could not accomplish in Louis
of Nevers, was afterwards effected by hard cash, and presently Prince
Louis the Patriot, his pockets well lined with French gold, so played on
the terrors of his old father, a dotard of eighty-two, that he compelled
him to acquiesce in a treaty with France, which his better judgment told
him would be disastrous for the future of his realm (May 5, 1320).
Perhaps Louis would have gone further still, perhaps he was plotting
even now the immediate destruction of Flanders.
Towards the close of the year 1320 when Robert, after signing at Paris
the treaty in question, once more returned to his native land, thinking
to obtain some little breathing time before he set out on the last
dread journey, his chamberlain introduced to his presence a young man,
who, in a voice broken with tears, avowed that he had been commissioned
to poison him. 'And wherefore didst thou think to commit this crime?'
said the old Count. 'Sir,' replied the youth, 'I was driven to it by the
Prince of Nevers, who bade me follow the instructions of Brother Walter
the hermit'--a monk whom Robert loved well--and little by little he
learned that his death was to have been the signal for an outbreak which
was to hand over all Flanders to the King of France.
Whatever may have been the truth of the mysterious youth's story; Robert
believed it, presently Prince Louis was arrested and thrust into prison,
and it was probably owing to the intervention of the burghers, who
either did not credit the charge against him, or were still influenced
by feelings of regard for their old champion, that his life was spared.
Be this as it may, the Count of Nevers was shortly afterwards set at
liberty on his undertaking to leave Flanders within eight days. This was
on the 6th of April.
No sooner was Louis a free man than he set out for the French capital,
where, three months later, on July 6, 1322, his inglorious career came
to an end, and only two months afterwards Count Robert himself paid the
debt of nature.
Rumour said that both Robert and Louis had been poisoned by Robert of
Cassel--a younger son of Robert of Bethune--and that he had driven his
elder brother out of Flanders with a view to his own succession.
Certain it is that the Lord of Cassel at once set claim to the throne,
and at first it seemed probable that he would obtain it. He had for a
long time past been mustering his forces, and now he had at his disposal
a considerable army; all the stronghold in Flanders were in his hands,
his father's ministers were his staunch and devoted friends, and so
redoubtable did he seem that the French King refused to accept the
homage of Louis of Nevers' eldest son, who also claimed the throne, and
was now in Paris, alleging that it was for the Court of Peers to decide
who was the rightful heir to the county of Flanders.
If Robert had been able to gain the support of the burghers, his triumph
would have been assured, but they knew him to be a proud and ambitious
man; the crime of parricide was associated with his name, and in spite
of his professed devotion to the popular cause they profoundly
distrusted him. More than a year before, Bruges and Ghent had made a
solemn league and covenant together to defend their rights and liberties
against any man who should attempt to infringe them, and had appointed a
committee of ten burghers to watch over their common interests. These
men, convinced that the feeble hands of a youth would lightly hold the
reins of government, without waiting for the decision of the peers,
invited the Count of Nevers to Flanders, proffered him their homage, and
shortly afterwards informed the French King that if he should any longer
delay to acknowledge Louis's right to the throne, they would themselves
undertake the administration of the county.
King Charles submitted the more easily because he too saw in the youth
of the burghers' candidate a guarantee of his own influence, but before
he would consent to receive Louis's homage he exacted from him a secret
promise that as soon as he should have consolidated his power, he would
choose for his advisers the men whom he (Charles) should select.
Louis's first act upon taking possession of his dominions was one
calculated to cause profound irritation to the citizens of Bruges. His
uncle, Count John of Namur, had thrown in his lot with Robert of
Cassel, and in order to purchase his support, Louis appointed him warden
of Sluys, an office which had hitherto been held by the burghers of
Bruges and Damme. Whereupon the committee of ten began to tremble for
their commerce. Soon a mob of angry citizens, headed by Louis himself,
who hoped by his presence to keep them in hand, were on the road to
Sluys, and presently they returned to Bruges with the Count of Namur in
chains. Louis had just succeeded in saving his life (July 1323). In vain
his wife besought the intervention of Charles le Bel. The time-honoured
rights of the citizens of Bruges must be maintained--thus the committee
of ten, and Louis retired in dudgeon to France, and his uncle into the
burghers' prison.
Although John grumbled not a little at the restraint, and especially
that his gaolers would not suffer him to hear Mass at St. Donatian's,
his life in the Steen was not without compensations. The beds there were
good, prisoners were permitted to receive their friends, on festivals
his rooms were decked with flowers, and the burghers supplied him with
good cheer in abundance. Singing and music beguiled the day, cards and
dice the night, and it was owing to the disorder consequent upon these
revels that he presently made his escape. When, at length, the news
leaked out, Bruges was in consternation. In the midst of it, Count Louis
returned, and not alone. The burghers noted with indignation that he had
brought with him as chief Minister a Frenchman, and a Frenchman who bore
a name of evil repute--Chancellor Flotte's son William, the lordly Abbot
of Vezelay--and worse still, that he shunned the counsel of those of his
own race.
For the moment, however, Bruges had nothing to fear. Her rights over the
port of Sluys were acknowledged, and John of Namur publicly forgave the
burghers for his arrest and imprisonment. But Louis of Nevers was no
longer the ingenuous orphan who in days of yore had sought the
protection of his faithful commons. If he were lacking in strength of
will, it was not the committee of ten, but the King of France who knew
how to manipulate him. But in reality he was no weakling. True he was
the tool of Charles le Bel, but in favouring his interests he was
playing at the same time his own game. He was a voluptuary, if you will,
and a voluptuary who found pleasure in low company and unrefined vice.
He delighted in the buffoonery of dwarfs and jesters, whom he enriched
at his subjects' cost. His chief favourite was one John Gheylinc, a
groom whom he calls in his charters his counsellor and his friend, and
if he had had his way he would have given him his daughter to wife.
Added to this he was proud and revengeful, devoid of pity, and not only
an unfaithful husband, but a cruel one into the bargain.
But for all that Louis was no fool; he had inherited alike the perverse
humour and the brilliant intellect of his father and his
great-grandfather. With consummate skill he played Ghent against Bruges,
and Bruges against Ghent, and Edward of England against Charles of
France; and though the chief object of his life was the gratification of
his wayward impulses, in his efforts to attain it he showed no little
ability.
Such was the prince whom the communes of Flanders had set over them, but
Louis rarely honoured the Netherlands with his presence. The dissipation
of his Court at Nevers was more to his taste than the humdrum
respectability of his burgher nobles, and his vicious life was there
less _en evidence_ and less criticised than in the democratic towns of
Flanders. His absence, however, was a greater cause of embarrassment to
his Flemish subjects than his presence in their midst would have been,
for his lieutenant, the Lord of Aspremont, vexed them with oppressive
taxes to enrich foreign favourites, and though in the great towns the
influence of the burghers was powerful enough to hold him in check, in
the country he had a free hand. Here dominated great Leliaert lords who
had been for years past in the pay of France: the Moerkerkes, the
Praets, the Ghistelles, and the rest, men who had fought, or whose
fathers had fought, at Courtrai, and mindful how many of their kinsmen
had fallen beneath the rude battle-axes of the Saxon Karls, thought only
of vengeance. These men were wont to sally forth from their castles to
take fines from those whom they feared most, and if their victims
resisted, they put them to death.
'Intolerable are the manners of the Karls: with dishevelled beards,
garments in tatters, and shoes in shreds, they would fain tame knights.
With their knotted clubs and their long knives thrust into their girdles
they are as proud as lords, and think that all the universe is
theirs--God blast them! But we shall know how to chastise these men.
They shall be drawn on hurdles and hanged on gibbets. The Karls must
bend before us.'[27]
Thus the Leliaert nobles; but they reckoned without their hosts. The
spirit which animated the Saxons of Flanders in the fourteenth century
was the same which had hurled their ancestors against the tyranny of
Richilde in the twelfth; which had driven the Erembalds to dash
themselves to pieces rather than submit to Charles the Dane; which had
inspired the Blauvoets in the eleven hundreds to resist the exactions
of Mathilde, and which only yesterday had nerved their fathers to
withstand and conquer the armies of France.
And, as in those days, there was no lack of leaders--a Bertulph, a
Wulfringhen, a Sporkin was always at hand when he was wanted--so now, in
the time of their extremity, captains were found. These men led their
ragged hosts against the castles of their oppressors, and soon the land
was filled with smouldering ruins. Aspremont, unable to quell the storm,
summoned the Count from Nevers, who entered Flanders early in 1325; but
Louis had no army to curb his turbulent subjects and was thus compelled
to treat with them. Philip of Axel, a citizen of Ghent, was appointed
Governor of Flanders in place of the Lord of Aspremont. Fines were
imposed, promises of amendment were made, but the armed bands were not
dissolved, and no sooner had Louis turned his back than the trouble
began again, whilst the efforts made to extinguish the conflagration
only increased it. Here and there a homestead razed, some stray farmer
kidnapped and perhaps hanged or broken on the wheel; these things but
nerved the Karls to greater efforts, for every man believed that his
turn would come next. Their chief leader was one Nicholas Zannekin, the
richest and the mightiest of them all, a man of the same class as
Bertulph, who, like him, despised the nobles of the Court, and, like
him, was regarded as a slave.
During the temporary lull of hostilities at the opening of the year, he
had deemed it prudent to seek refuge in Bruges, the only town in
Flanders where a man obnoxious to the authorities had some chance of
saving his head, and there he soon obtained as much influence with the
burghers as he had hitherto exercised over the country-folk of his own
race (the men of Furnes). Nor did he cease to remind them, ground down
as they were by odious and illegal taxes, of their rights as free
citizens and the duties which their station imposed, and when Sohier
Janssone (another popular leader) who had taken possession of Ghistelle
Castle, presently appeared before the city walls with booty and
captives, Bruges flew to arms. Zannekin soon rallied to his banner all
the neighbouring communes. Thorhout, Roulers, Poperinghe, Nieuport,
Dunkirk, Cassel, Bailleul, Furnes, threw open their gates at his
approach, and wherever he went he was hailed as his country's saviour.
'The men of Furnes,' says the Flemish chronicle, 'received him as the
angel of the Lord, and showed more submission to him than to any other
man, and gave him greater honour than if he had been Count or King.'[28]
Robert of Cassel, who had gathered together a small band to oppose him,
withdrew when he saw how matters stood, but Zannekin, backed as he was
by the communes, had little fear of him, and it was, moreover, bruited
abroad that Robert himself was not hostile to the insurrection.
Louis was now in Flanders; sometimes at Courtrai, sometimes at Ypres,
often at Ghent, lavish in flattering promises to the burghers, holding
out to them bright hopes of new liberties and larger privileges than any
yet accorded to Flemish towns.
Presently the French King sent them gold, and passed his word that no
treaty should be made with the insurgents without first taking the
advice of the burghers of Ghent. From all which politic proceedings came
this result--the Ghenters forgot their compact with Bruges of 1321, at
first posed as mediators, and then openly went over to Louis's side and
aided him with cash and men. At this juncture Louis attempted to treat
with the insurgents. Let the points at issue be submitted to the
arbitration of Robert of Cassel and the sheriffs of Ypres and of Ghent,
and no sentence of death (this he guaranteed), or banishment, or
mutilation, should be pronounced on any of the rebels. Bruges and her
allies consented, and the arbiters made it known that they would receive
a deputation of the insurgents on the 11th of June ensuing, at the great
Abbey of Dunes. But meanwhile a Karl of Furnes was slain by a knight.
This incident sufficed to throw the whole country round into uproar, and
when, on the appointed day, Zannekin and his friends, all armed to the
teeth, reached the abbey, not one of the judges was there to meet
them--fear had kept them away--and the flame of rebellion waxed fiercer
than before. Louis, at his wit's end, grew doubtful of his uncle's good
faith. The Lord of Cassel, he thought, was secretly allied with his
enemies to wrest from him his crown. Why not make away with him? and
soon letters were dispatched to the bailiff of Warneton to keep a watch
on Robert's movements, and when an opportunity offered, to cut off his
head. This sentence was never executed. Louis's own chancellor warned
Robert of his danger, and himself informed Louis of the motive which had
impelled him to do so. 'I wished,' he said, 'to save the honour of the
Count of Flanders in the eyes of men, and his soul from the vengeance of
God.'
More hated than ever by reason of this odious attempt, and filled with
fear at the news that Bruges had already garrisoned all the principal
towns of West Flanders, Louis, at the head of four hundred knights,
marched into Courtrai, prepared to renew hostilities in good earnest. It
so happened that six burghers of Bruges arrived there at the same
moment, and Louis forthwith put them under arrest. Thereupon Bruges
made ready for battle, and sent messages to Courtrai that five thousand
staunch men and true were on their way to rescue the imprisoned
burghers. Louis, filled with consternation, broke down the bridges over
the Lys and fired the _faubourgs_ along its banks. There had been no
rain for weeks, and the thatched roofs on the opposite side of the
stream had been baked by a blazing sun. A strong wind was blowing in the
direction of the city, and soon Courtrai itself was in flames. Meanwhile
Louis was stationed in the market-place, and with him were the six
merchants from Bruges. Perhaps he had intended to cut off their heads,
perhaps to carry them with him to Lille, but the sight of their prince
standing there surrounded by the Leliaert counsellors, by whose advice
he had fired the town, and now preparing to seek safety in flight, so
worked on the men of Courtrai that they forgot their burning homes and
thought only of vengeance. The very women took part in the combat which
ensued, and their sobs and cries excited their husbands yet more than
the tocsin which all this time was shrieking over the city. Presently
Louis was left alone. Some of his knights had fled, some had been taken
prisoners, not a few had been slain, and when next day the men of Bruges
reached Courtrai, her citizens delivered him bound into their hands.
They placed the Count of Flanders on a sorry steed, and loaded his
counsellors with chains, and thus conducted them all to the capital,
where the sheriffs at once proceeded to try them, for they had murdered,
it was alleged, the peasants of Furnes, and reduced Courtrai to
ashes--with this result: Louis was retained a prisoner in the Halles,
and his counsellors were hurled from the windows of the Steen.
Never had the citizens of Bruges been so mighty as they were now. On
the 30th of June her sheriffs had met in the Halles, and, in union with
the Franc, the city of Ypres, of which town Zannekin was now governor,
and of the other confederates, had appointed Robert Regent of Flanders.
Louis from his prison had issued a charter approving what had been done,
and the ambassadors of the French King, who on the 15th of July had
reached Bruges with offers that the charges against Louis should be
submitted to his judgment, were present to witness their triumph.
True, Ghent was still loyal to the captive at Bruges, but Ghent had been
humbled in battle, and even Ghent was not united. Three thousand of her
weavers had fled for refuge to the camp of Robert of Cassel, and Bruges
replied to the French ambassadors that Louis could not be set free until
Ghent had renounced her treaty with him, and had frankly joined hands
with her. The ambassadors were disposed to agree to these terms, even
though they knew that this meant all sovereignty in the hands of Bruges,
but Ghent was too proud to submit. Though Louis had oppressed and
misgoverned the rest of Flanders he had showered blessings on Ghent, and
now that the worm had turned and conquered, and Louis was in prison, she
would never consent to enter into an alliance with her hated rival. Far
better that all the Karls should perish, far better that Flanders should
become France.
In face of this opposition the French King cited Robert to Paris to
justify his conduct in supporting rebels. The citizens of Bruges
received the bearers of the summons 'with horns raised and dire
threats,' and Robert refused to comply. Then came interdict and
excommunication (the French Kings claimed the right to direct these
ecclesiastical thunders); a few days later, in their conflict with
Ghent, a check; presently, in consequence of the rigour of winter, the
forced raising of the siege of that town; and lastly, rumours of a
French invasion.
To retain Louis longer in prison were to risk, thought many, all that
had been gained. Better release him now of their own free will, and when
they were in a position to make terms, than be compelled to do so six
months hence unconditionally at the point of the sword, which, seeing
the trend and conjunction of events, would probably be the case.
Thus argued Bruges, and presently Louis went forth from the Halles to
the Chapel of St. Basil, where he swore on the Holy Blood that he
nourished no resentment against his captors, and that he would do his
utmost to ward off the threatened invasion. This done he was once more a
free man, and forthwith, after a hurried visit to faithful Ghent,
hastened to Paris, where his patron assured him that as long as he
followed his counsel, he could count on his friendship (this was in the
month of March 1325), but that he was not in a position to help him for
the moment, as he had other business in hand. Then once more Louis
returned to Flanders, and after much confabulation, terms were agreed
upon. The burghers were to build a monastery, and to send some hundreds
of pilgrims to sundry shrines, to rebuild the churches destroyed during
the recent tumult, to pay their just debts to the King and to the Count,
and to swear fealty to the latter. Louis, on his part, undertook to
respect their liberties, the King to re-establish free trade betwixt
France and Flanders and to silence the thunder of the Church. Towards
the close of April 1326 this convention was ratified, though, in all
probability, none of the parties signing it had any intention of
observing its terms. The burghers retained their former leaders, Louis
refused to enter the town where he had lived eight months a captive,
but neither party was at present in a position to recommence
hostilities; for two years matters dragged on, and then the storm broke.
On February 1, 1327, King Charles le Bel had died, leaving an only
daughter, a child of tender years, and a widow who was expecting some
two months hence the hour of her delivery. France at this time was
divided into two great parties. On the one side were the feudal lords,
who, since the days of Philippe le Bel, had seen their power gradually
passing from them into the hands of the King, and on the other, the
citizens, who, during the same period, had witnessed their privileges
daily contemned, their rights trampled on, and their trade threatened by
the avidity of royal harpies. Each of these parties, then, was equally
discontented with the present state of affairs, and each of them found
the present moment a propitious one for changing it. The barons turned
their eyes to Philippe of Valois, the next heir in the direct male line
to the throne of St. Louis. The burghers hoped when the old King died
that his Queen would give birth to a son, and failing this, they wished
that the crown should devolve on his eldest daughter. Their hopes, as we
know, were dashed to the ground by the birth of a second princess and
the succession of Philippe of Valois. But they saw the finger of God in
the extinction of the house of Philippe le Bel; they felt that the time
had come to strike a blow for freedom, and they were only waiting for
the Flemish burghers, who during thirty years had lavished blood and
treasure in behalf of this sacred cause, to raise the standard of
revolt.
'If once these Flemings cross our borders,' the barons had warned the
new King, 'all France will join them.' Philippe determined to take the
bull by the horns, and at Rheims on the day of his coronation he made
his purpose known.
On the Count of Flanders devolved the duty of bearing the King's sword,
but although he was present, with four-score knights, when the royal
heralds called on him to perform his duty, he made no sign. Thrice they
summoned him, and still he was silent. All men were filled with wonder,
and the King demanded an explanation. 'Sire,' he replied, 'they
'summoned the Count of Flanders; I am Louis of Nevers.' 'What,' said
Philippe, in feigned astonishment, 'art thou not also Count of
Flanders?' 'Such men call me,' was the reply, 'but I hold not this
office in fact. In no Flemish city save Ghent do I dare show my face.'
'Fair cousin,' replied the King, 'by the Holy Unction which hath this
day flowed on our head, we will not go back to Paris until we have
established thee in the peaceful possession of thy realm.' Some of his
counsellors would have persuaded him to defer the expedition. France,
they said, was unprepared, and to invade Flanders in the autumn was to
risk disaster; but the King, who saw the importance of himself beginning
the campaign, refused to hear them. He consulted Gauthier de Châtillon,
who had served seven kings in their wars in the Netherlands. 'For the
man who has a stout heart,' he answered, 'this is no inopportune season
for battle.' 'Good,' replied the delighted King, as he embraced the old
soldier. 'Let those who love me follow.'
With all speed he set about his preparations, and the great army which
two months later (August 1328) assembled at Arras, collected from all
parts of Europe, was such that the like of it had been never seen there
before, and Arras had beheld the armies of Philippe IV. and Louis X.
Nicholas Zannekin, with ten thousand Karls, occupied Cassel, a fortified
town some six miles inland from Dunkirk, perched on the top of a hill
which rises well-nigh a thousand feet above the level of the sea, and
stands solitary in the midst of the low land which surrounds it. Sohier
Jansonne had brought him reinforcements to the number of six thousand
men, and though messengers had been despatched to Bruges, to warn them
of the French invasion, these men believed themselves strong enough to
alone save Flanders.
During three days the French King sat down before Cassel awaiting the
retreat of his foes. His knights' heavy chargers, weighted as they were
with their own trappings, and the armour of the men who bestrode them,
were unable to climb the steep sides of the mountain, and thus the
cavalry were forced to remain idle spectators of the skirmishes which
succeeded one another without ceasing. In vain the footmen multiplied
their efforts; they were in each case driven back, till at length
Philippe in despair gave the word to burn the surrounding country, and
presently the fertile plain was filled with flames and desolation, and
all the land re-echoed with the wailing of old men and women and the
shrieks of frightened children; but the Karls in their lofty fortress
were as stable as the hill on which they stood, and at last, weary with
slaughter, the French returned to camp, took off their heavy armour, and
gave themselves over to revelry.
Whilst these things were going on at the foot of Mount Cassel, the Karls
at its summit were holding council of war. The wisest of them would have
waited until the Bruges burghers had had time to bring them help, others
would have gone down under cover of night, and surprised the French in
their tents, but Zannekin dismissed their words with disdain. 'What,' he
cried, 'with the French King before us, not fight! Shall we, then, who
know not what fear is, tremble at this man's fierce looks? Let us rather
thank God that the foes we have so long waited for are now here, and
profit by their confusion to slay them forthwith.' 'Ay, ay,' answered a
thousand voices, and the Karls made ready for battle. 'They were brave
men and free,' notes Villani, 'and they feared not to assail this most
redoubtable host.'
The long summer's day was mingling with night when the Karls went down
into the French camp, and before any one was aware of their presence
they were in the midst of the barons, who, 'without armour and arrayed
in gorgeous apparel, were going from tent to tent to gossip together of
the day's doings.'[29] Presently a knight, one Rénaud of Loire, came
forth to upbraid them for thus 'presuming to disturb the privacy of
gentlemen.' He had taken the intruders for a company of his own troops
returning late to camp. In less than the twinkling of an eye Rénaud was
a dead man. Some of his comrades had essayed to defend him, but they
shared his fate, and the Flemings marched on, not far now from the
object of their quest--the royal pavilion. Philippe, like his knights,
had lately dined, and now, replete with rich dishes and strong drink, he
was dozing in his tent. Suddenly his chaplain plucked his sleeve. 'Mark
ye, sir,' he whispered, as he peeped through the curtains, 'the Flemings
are upon us.' 'A monk's nightmare,' muttered Philippe, and he was
turning again to sleep when Miles of Noyers rushed in and confirmed the
chaplain's fears. In a moment Philippe had buckled on his mail, and
almost alone, for the greater number of his attendants had fled, went
out to face the foe. The first man he met was Zannekin. His battle-axe
was raised to strike, and in another moment it would have split open
the King's skull had not Miles dexterously drawn Philippe aside. Then
the tide of fortune turned, and soon all that was left of the Saxon host
were three great heaps of corpses.
Zannekin was the last to fall, 'and his death cry was mingled with the
voices of the royal chaplains intoning the antiphon of St. Denis.'
Of the sixteen thousand Flemings slain not one had attempted flight, not
one of them had budged an inch. Each man fell where he had stood at the
beginning of the conflict. If courage could have given the Karls
victory, the day would have been theirs, but so great were the odds
against them, that from the first they had but one ground for hope--that
panic inspired by the suddenness of their coming would fight for them.
On this poor chance Zannekin had ventured his all, and he paid the price
of his temerity.
If the townsmen of Flanders had been made of the stuff of their country
cousins disaster might have yet been averted, but these latter were
full-blooded Saxons, and in all the cities, save haply Furnes, the
burghers' power of resistance was in some measure rendered nugatory by
their grandams' Celtic nerves.
So was it at Ypres. When the news of the disaster reached them the
burghers were for instant submission if only Philippe could be prevailed
on to guarantee their lives and their limbs. One man alone kept cool,
and strangely enough that man was a clerk. From the pulpit of his own
church (he was parish priest of St. Michael's) this sturdy
representative of the Church Militant implored his fellow-citizens, 'for
God's sake and the sake of the fatherland,' to show fight. But it was
too late. That very day Miles Noyers entered the town with an
overwhelming force, and the handful of labouring men who had been moved
by their priest's appeal were cut to pieces.
So too was it at Bruges. When the news of the disaster reached them, the
women went into hysterics and the men lost their heads, and in less than
the twinkling of an eye, the lilies of France, run up by their own
hands, were proudly floating over the belfry.
In spite of their pusillanimity, the reckoning which the burghers had to
pay was a sufficiently onerous one: humiliation unspeakable, the city
fathers on their knees suing for mercy in the dust of the Maele road,
and worse--the charter of their liberties cancelled, their ramparts
broken down, and a fine so heavy that they were never able to pay it;
and worse still--not a few of their leading citizens, men of substance
and renown, tortured to death, and all their wealth confiscated.
Amongst these note Lambert Bowine, captain of the Franc, and Willem de
Deken, town burgomaster. His fate was the cruellest of all. He had fled
to Brabant in the hope that the burghers there would protect him, but
they showed themselves as craven as their fellows in Flanders. They
handed him over to the French King, and poor Deken was carried to Paris,
where he was mutilated, pilloried, put on the wheel, taken off again for
fear he should die too soon, and bleeding, broken, in pitiable plight,
but still alive, set in gaol till the morrow, when he was torn to pieces
by wild horses. They gathered up the fragments of his poor mangled body
and hung them on the great gibbet of Mont Faucen, by way of object
lesson for the citizens of the capital.
These items made up the sum-total of the burghers' bill of costs, and it
was the same all over the country. Not a town save Ghent preserved its
liberties intact, and even beloved Ghent saw not a few of her burghers
driven into exile. In less than three months ten thousand Flemings were
done to death.
The Abbot of St. Martin's at Tournai explains how this came about.
'Louis's keen appetite for gold,' he says, 'increased in a marvellous
manner his suspicions, and consequently the number of his victims. And
the most galling part of it was that all this untarnished gold was
squandered on harlots and on favourites, men too of mean estate some of
them. His lackeys, his grooms, and even his barber were at Bruges
installed in palaces which had once been the homes of honourable
burghers.' The city archives bear witness to it.
At last, after long years of waiting, salvation came from England, at
first indirectly, and afterwards through the active co-operation of
Edward III. with the communes of Flanders.
Of course England acted from self-interest. She had no more love for the
down-trodden burghers of Flanders than they had for the comfortable
yeomen on the other side of the channel; and even if her sympathy had
been ever so great, she could not have raised a finger to help them
unless she had been likewise impelled by some less ephemeral motive.
Individuals may sometimes indulge in the luxury of pure benevolence;
trustees, in justice to their clients, can rarely afford to do so.
Occasionally the interests of the latter may go hand in hand with their
own charitable inclinations, and then they may pose as philanthropists,
and if the pit applaud their seeming generosity, so much the better.
In the case before us, however, no such protestations were made. The
freedom of the Flemish communes was vital to the prosperity of England,
and the motives which inspired the respective parties were avowedly
motives of mutual accommodation. In those days the wool growers of the
island kingdom had but one customer, the mammoth guilds of Flemish
weavers, and they, in their turn, could nowhere find such famous wool as
in the English market.
'So fine was the breed of English sheep at this period,' notes Green,
'that the exportation of live rams for the improvement of foreign wool
was forbidden by law, though a flock is said to have been smuggled out
of the realm shortly after, and to have become the source of the famous
merinos of Spain,' and the magnitude of the wool trade between England
and Flanders may be estimated from this fact. In a single year Edward
received more than eighty thousand pounds from duties levied on wool
alone.[30]
When, therefore, in the autumn of 1336, hostilities broke out between
Edward III. and Philip of France, and Louis of Nevers, at the
instigation of the latter, caused every Englishman in Flanders to be put
under arrest, and Edward by way of reprisal forbade the exportation of
English wool, all Flemish looms ceased work, and the towns were filled
with misery. But the sheep-farmers of England suffered equally with the
weavers of Bruges, and soon the English King was forced in the interests
of his own subjects to attempt negotiations, first with Louis of Nevers,
and when this failed, directly with the burghers.
It was in consequence of Edward's efforts to attach the communes to his
interest that the Count of Flanders about this time entirely reversed
his home policy, essaying by the largeness of his promises and
concessions to induce the communes to side with France, and among the
cities which most benefited by his changed humour Bruges stood first.
She was permitted to deepen and widen her moats, to reconstruct her
ramparts, and by a charter, dated April 14, 1337, all her ancient rights
and liberties were re-established and confirmed.
This then was the first boon which Bruges received from England's
intervention--a boon, in truth, conferred indirectly, but no small one
for all that.
Ghent was the only city which did not participate in Louis's favours. Of
the cause of this, of Louis's relentless persecution of the town he had
once held dear, of her heroic resistance and ultimate triumph, thanks to
the patriot Van Artevelde and the support of Edward III., it is not here
the place to treat in detail. These things belong to the story of Ghent.
Suffice it to say that Bruges, which for a time had supported Philippe
and Louis in a half-hearted way, at last, seeing how matters stood, and
that Ghent was conquering all along the line, joined hands with her;
that at a solemn assembly of the representatives of the city and the
Liberty of Bruges, and the cities of Ypres and Ghent, held under the
presidency of Van Artevelde at the Abbey of Eeckhout early in the spring
of 1337, and only a few days after Louis's re-establishment of the
Bruges charter of rights, their alliance was solemnly proclaimed; that
at this assembly it was furthermore enacted that each of the three
_bonnes villes_--Ghent, Ypres and Bruges--should choose three deputies
to watch over their interests and administer the country; that on the
29th of April a deputation from all the towns and communes of Flanders,
headed by Jacob van Artevelde, waited on Louis at Maele, and there
recounted to him all that had taken place; and that he, finding
submission the only course open to him, consecrated the acts of the
burghers with the seal of his approval, and, once more burthening his
soul with perjury, solemnly swore to maintain intact all their rights
and liberties. From that moment until his death Van Artevelde was ruler
of Flanders. Essentially a man of peace, in face of the great conflict
raging between England and France the main object of his policy was to
keep Flanders out of the fray, and for some time his efforts were
successful. So much so that he even accomplished the difficult task of
negotiating treaties of commerce with each of the belligerents.
It was only the perfidy of the French King which at length drove him to
take sides with England. Philippe and Louis had broken their most solemn
engagement before he determined to seek out Edward III. at Bruxelles and
in the name of the communes of Flanders solemnly recognize him as the
successor of St. Louis.
During the nine years of Van Artevelde's government Flanders prospered
exceedingly, and during all that time, thanks to his consummate
abilities and Edward's generous support, she held her own. At length,
when the fear of her enemies was taken away by too much prosperity and
an overweening confidence, the besetting sin of the Flemish people
wrecked all.
The country-side had grown jealous of the city, the lesser communes of
the three _bonnes villes_. The canker had spread further still; town
suspected town, guild was at loggerheads with guild, and even individual
citizens began to cast evil eyes on one another; and, added to this,
there was the hatred of rivals jealous of Artevelde's great position;
and Louis, who was now residing in France, through his agents blowing
the fire.
Presently the crisis came. Early in July the representatives of the
communes had met at Bruges for the purpose of electing a regent, and
Sohier of Courtrai, Artevelde's brother-in-law, with King Edward's
consent, had been chosen to fill the office. On his return to Ghent
after this conference the great tribune was besieged in his house by a
mob of small tradesmen and street roughs in the pay of his rivals and of
Louis of Nevers.
He had been plotting, they said, to hand over Ghent to the tender
mercies of the English, who were going to pillage the town; he would
make the Prince of Wales Count; he had taken advantage of his position
to heap up a vast fortune, and had sent his treasure to London. In vain
Van Artevelde tried to appease them; the sound of his voice but
increased their fury, and his servants, who knew the risk he was
running, dragged him from the window and would have had him seek refuge
by a back way in a neighbouring church. Too late; the mob had by this
time broken into the house, and a cobbler felled him dead on his own
threshold. Thus perished the noblest man of his century, and with him
too fell the grand edifice he had reared. The besetting sin of his
people had once more shattered the mansion of Freedom.
[Illustration: Madonna & Niche]
The Count of Flanders did not long survive his illustrious victim. When
the English victory of Cressy gave feudalism its death-blow, he fell
fighting for the French King, and note this fact--Philippe of Valois was
the one man to whom Louis had ever been faithful.