Page:A C Doyle - The White Company.djvu/79

Rh our most gracious monarch and the King of the French. This being so, it seems most passing strange that you should talk so loudly of war and of companies when there is no quarrel between the French and us.'

'Meaning that I lie,' said the archer, laying down his knife.

'May heaven forefend!' cried the student hastily. 'Magna est Veritas sed rara, which means in the Latin tongue that archers are all honourable men. I come to you seeking knowledge, for it is my trade to learn.'

'I fear that you are yet a 'prentice to that trade,' quoth the soldier; 'for there is no child over the water but could answer what you ask. Know, then, that though there may be peace between our own provinces and the French, yet within the marches of France there is always war, for the country is much divided against itself, and is furthermore harried by bands of flayers, skinners, Brabaçons, tardvenus, and the rest of them. When every man's grip is on his neighbour's throat, and every five-sous-piece of a baron is marching with tuck of drum to fight whom he will, it would be a strange thing if five hundred brave English boys could not pick up a living. Now that Sir John Hawkwood hath gone with the East Anglian lads and the Nottingham woodmen into the service of the Marquis of Moutferrat to fight against the Lord of Milan, there are but ten-score of us left; yet I trust that I may be able to bring some back with me to fill the ranks of the White Company. By the tooth of Peter! it would be a bad thing if I could not muster many a Hamptonshire man who would be ready to strike in under the red flag of St. George, and the more so if my old master Sir Nigel Loring, of Christchurch, should don hauberk once more and take the lead of us.'

'Ah! you would indeed be in luck then,' quoth a woodman; 'for it is said that, setting aside the prince, and mayhap good old Sir John Chandos, there was not in the whole army a man of such tried courage.'

'It is sooth, every word of it,' the archer answered. 'I