was best to do. They said, 'Sir, ye cannot pass the river but at the
bridge of Abbeville, for the flood is come in at Blanche-taque': then
he returned and lodged at Abbeville.

The king of England when he was past the river, he thanked God and so
rode forth in like manner as he did before. Then he called Gobin Agace
and did quit him his ransom and all his company, and gave him a
hundred nobles and a good horse. And so the king rode forth fair and
easily, and thought to have lodged in a great town called Noyelles;
but when he knew that the town pertained to the countess d'Aumale,
sister to the lord Robert of Artois,[1] the king assured the town and
country as much as pertained to her, and so went forth; and his
marshals rode to Crotoy on the sea-side and brent the town, and found
in the haven many ships and barks charged with wines of Poitou,
pertaining to the merchants of Saintonge and of Rochelle: they brought
the best thereof to the king's host. Then one of the marshals rode to
the gates of Abbeville and from thence to Saint-Riquiers, and after to
the town of Rue-Saint-Esprit. This was on a Friday, and both battles
of the marshals returned to the king's host about noon and so lodged
all together near to Cressy in Ponthieu.

[1] She was in fact his daughter.

The king of England was well informed how the French king followed
after him to fight. Then he said to his company: 'Let us take here
some plot of ground, for we will go no farther till we have seen our
enemies. I have good cause here to abide them, for I am on the right
heritage of the queen my mother, the which land was given at her
marriage: I will challenge it of mine adversary Philip of Valois.' And
because that he had not the eighth part in number of men as the French