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62 HISTORY OF FRANCE. [chap. harasbing, the sieges of castles were to be the way of carrying on the war, without fighting in the open field. The Black Prince, though unable to sit on horseback, advanced from the south in 1371, took Limoges and sacked it with savage cruelty, but he was immediately after obliged to return to England. Charles very wisely made Du Guesclin Constable, though he was not one of the great nobility. The English were gradually driven out of their possessions. In 1373 John of Gaunt, Duke of Lancaster, King Edward's third son, was allowed to march all through France and Aquitaine to Bourdeaux, where he reached with a shattered force, and had to go back to England, like his brother. The English now kept nothing but Calais, Cherbourg, Brest, Bourdeaux, and Bayonne. A truce of two years was made in 1375, during which Charles did much to bring his kingdom into a state of defence ; and as both King Edward and his son the Prince died before the term was over, leaving their kingdom to the child Richard II., the balance was much in favour of Charles. He had also deprived Charles of Navarre of much power of doing mischief by an exchange of the southern city of Mo>itpellier for the Norman county of Evreux. 13. The Revolts of Flanders and Britanny, 1378. — Lewis called Ic Mate, the laot ot the Dampierre Counts of Flanders, had always been devoted to the cause of France, and had married his only daughter Margaret to Philip, Duiie of Burgundy, the King's youngest brother Of this marriage came the union between Flanders and Bur- gundy, and the great growth of the power of the Burgundian dukes. The Count's haughty demeanour and heavy exac- tions made him much disliked, and a party in Ghent and Bruges, called the White Hoods, agreed to resist his de- mands ; when he called on the authorities of Ghent to break up the league, such a tumult arose that he was forced to hide under a bed in a poor widow's cottage till he could escape to the court, where Charles did not think him worthy of assistance. As the Flemings were inclined to the English, while their Count held to the French, so the Bretons were so much devoted to the French, and their duke was so steady to the English that, when John of Moutfort was driven out, Charles thought he might safely declare the duchy forfeit to the crown for his treason. But this at once roused the national spirit, and the Bretons rose on behalf of Duke John. Du Guesclin gave