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338 kings wished to conquer France, but the people wanted only freedom of trade, free ports, free markets for English wool. Gathered round a great wool-sack, the commons consulted over the king's demands, and willingly granted him subsidies and armies. "Such a mixture of industry and chivalry imparts a strange and wonderful aspect to all the history of the time. That Edward who swore on the Round Table a proud oath to conquer France, those solemn and silly knights who in pursuance of their vows covered one eye with red cloth, were not, however, such fools as to go to war at their own expense. The pious innocence of the Crusaders was no longer in keeping with the age. These knights were in reality mercenaries, paid mercantile agents, and armed and armoured commercial travellers for the merchants of London and Ghent. Edward himself was obliged to give pledges, to lay aside all pride, to flatter the clothier and weaver guilds, to hold out his hand to his gossip the beer brewer Artevelde, and mount the desk of a cattle-dealer to address the multitude. "The English tragedies of the fourteenth century have very comical sides. There is always something of Falstaff in their noblest knights. In France, in Italy, in Spain, in the fair lands of the South, they always show themselves as rapacious and gluttonous as they are brave. It is