CHAP. LXXXIV.
THE CARDINAL OF WINCHESTER COMES TO ARRAS TO ATTEND THE CONVENTION.
The cardinal of Winchester arrived at Arras on the 19th day of August, to be present at the convention, attended by the earl of Huntingdon and other noble knights and esquires from England, to the amount of three hundred horsemen. The dukes of Burgundy and of Gueldres, with the counts de St Pol, de Ligny, de Meurs, and the greater part of the duke of Burgundy's nobles, went out of Arras to meet him. The duke and cardinal mutually paid each other the greatest respect, as did the other lords; and they returned together to the gate of Arras, where they separated, and the cardinal and his attendants went to lodge at the palace of the bishop.
Ambassadors daily arrived from various nations. The place of meeting for this convention was fixed at the abbey of St Vaast, where there were apartments sufficiently spacious and numerous for the purpose,—and there the three parties assembled, in the presence of the two cardinals who had first come thither. The cardinal de Santa Croce harangued them most eloquently on the great inconveniences all Christendom had laboured under from the severity and long continuance of the war,—admonishing them, at the same time, with much feeling, that, from their love to God, they would not separate without concluding a peace, and that they would not insist on any terms but such as each might mutually concede to the other.
After this harangue, the convention met on several different days,—and many proposals for a treaty were brought forward, so contradictory that it was difficult to reconcile them. Among others, king Charles's ministers required that king Henry of England should desist from styling himself king of France, on condition of having the sovereignties of Guyenne and Normandy given up to him,—but to this the English ministers would not agree.