Still a large amount of booty was
gathered, together with enough provisions to afford a bare subsistence to
the army. A considerable amount of booty was also obtained when Harfleur
fell. The greater portion of the inhabitants of the town were forced to
leave it, the breaches in the walls were repaired and new gates erected. A
portion of the treasure obtained was divided by the king among the troops.
The prisoners and the main portion of the booty--which, as Harfleur was
the chief port of Normandy, and indeed of all the western part of France,
was very great--he sent direct to England, together with the engines of
war. The sick and ailing were then embarked on ships, with a considerable
fighting force under the Earl of Warwick. They were ordered to touch at
Calais, where the fighting-men were to be landed and the sick carried
home, and Henry then prepared to march to Calais by land.
CHAPTER XIX
AGINCOURT
The English king waited some time for an answer to a challenge he had sent
to the Duke of Aquitaine to decide their quarrel by single combat; but
Aquitaine cared more for pleasure than for fighting, and sent no answer to
the cartel. It was open to Henry to have proceeded by sea to Calais, and
it was the advice of his counsellors that he should do so; but the king
declared that the French should never say that he was afraid to meet them,
and that as the country was his by right he would march wherever he
pleased across it; and so, after leaving a thousand archers and five
hundred men-at-arms under the command of the Duke of Exeter, he set out on
the 6th of October on his adventurous journey.
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