Five
hundred more were thrust from the gates. This time King Edward was not
in a good humor. He bade his soldiers drive them back at sword's-point.
The governor refused to admit them into the town. The whole miserable
multitude died of starvation in sight of both camps. Such were the
amenities of war in the Middle Ages, and in fact, of war in almost all
ages, for mercy counts for little when opposed by military exigencies.
A letter was now sent to the French king, Philip de Valois, imploring
succor. They had eaten, said the governor, their horses, their dogs,
even the rats and mice; nothing remained but to eat one another.
Unluckily, the English, not the French, king received this letter, and
the English host grew more watchful than ever. But Philip de Valois
needed not letters to tell him of the extremity of the garrison; he
knew it well, and knew as well that haste alone could save him one of
his fairest towns.
[Illustration: THE PORT OF CALAIS.]
But he had suffered a frightful defeat at Crecy only five days before
the siege of Calais began. Twelve hundred of his knights and thirty
thousand of his foot-soldiers--a number equal to the whole English
force--had been slain on the field; thousands of others had been taken
prisoner; a new army was not easily to be raised.
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