Page:History of England (Froude) Vol 4.djvu/519

1550.] The Boulogne question, however, had first to be set at rest. Guidotti having passed and repassed between London and Paris, Lord Bedford, Paget, Petre, and Sir John Mason crossed in February, to treat with the French commissioners who would be sent to meet them. Time pressed for England. 'The misery, wants, and exclamations' of Lord Huntingdon were 'very great.' Sixteen hundred pounds of arrears were due to the crews of the ships in Calais harbour, and thirteen hundred to the English infantry. Six thousand pounds a month was 'all too little' for the Lanzknechts in the English pay at Calais and Boulogne, and 800l. was the whole sum which was to be found in the Calais treasury. At Boulogne the beer was gone, there was bread for but six days, and the troops were on short allowance, Lord Clinton faring like his men. It was only by constant and expensive exertions that supplies of any kind could be thrown in.

The conference was held beyond the river opposite Boulogne. The French were entirely aware of the difficulties of the English, and intended to take advantage of them. The English, flattering themselves with the presence of their troops, intended to ask for the pension which Francis had agreed to pay to Henry VIII., for the arrears of their debts, and for the Queen of Scots, and to accept as much or as little as they could get.

On the 20th of February a truce of fifteen days