Page:The Waning of the Middle Ages (1924).djvu/111

Rh pains to distinguish, according to technical rules, between a pitched battle and an encounter, for it is imperative that every combat has its appropriate place in the records of glory. “And so, from this day forward”—says Monstrelet—“this business was called the encounter of Mons en Vimeu. And it was declared to be no battle, because the parties met by chance and there were hardly any banners unfurled.” Henry V solemnly baptizes his great victory, the battle of Agincourt, “inasmuch as all battles should bear the name of the nearest fortress where they are fought.”

In spite of the care taken on all hands to keep up the illusion of chivalry, reality perpetually gives the lie to it, and obliges it to take refuge in the domains of literature and of conversation. The ideal of the fine heroic life could only be cultivated within the limits of a close caste. The sentiments of chivalry were current only among the members of the caste and by no means extended to inferior persons. The Burgundian court which was saturated with chivalrous prejudice, and would not have tolerated the slightest infringement of rules in a “combat à outrance” between noblemen, relished the unbridled ferocity of a judicial duel between burghers, where there was no code of honour to observe. Nothing could be more remarkable in this respect than the interest excited everywhere by the combat of two burghers of Valenciennes in 1455. The old Duke Philip wanted to see the rare spectacle at any cost. One must read the vivid and realistic description given by Chastellain in order to appreciate how a chivalrous writer who never succeeded in giving more than a vaguely fanciful description of a Passage of Arms, made up for it here by giving full rein to the instincts of natural cruelty. Not one detail of the “very beautiful ceremony” escaped him. The adversaries, accompanied by their fencing masters, enter the lists, first Jacotin Plouvier, the plaintiff, next Mahuot. Their heads are cropped close and they are sewn up from head to foot in cordwain dresses of a single piece. They are very pale. After having saluted the duke, who was seated behind lattice-work, they await the signal, seated upon two chairs upholstered in black. The spectators exchange remarks in a low voice on the chances of the combat: How pale Mahuot is