Partial respite from war did not diminish the martial ardour of the king and his nobles.  The period of the Black Death was precisely the time when Edward completed a plan which he had begun by the erection of his Round Table at Windsor in 1344.  By 1348 he instituted a chapel at Windsor, dedicated to St. George, served by a secular chapter, and closely connected with a foundation for the support of poor knights.  Within a year this foundation also included the famous Order of the Garter, the type and model of all later orders of chivalry.  On St. George’s day the king celebrated the new institution by special solemnities.  The most famous of his companions-at-arms were associated with him as founders and first knights.  Clad in russet coats sprinkled with blue garters, a blue garter on the right leg, and a mantle of blue ornamented with little shields bearing the arms of St. George, the Knights of the Garter heard mass sung by the Archbishop of Canterbury in St. George’s chapel, and then feasted solemnly in their common hall.  Ten years later the glorification of the king’s birthplace was completed by the erection of new quarters for the king, more sumptuous and splendid than were elsewhere to be seen.  The fame of the Knights of the Garter excited the emulation of King John of France, who set up a Round Table which grew in 1351 into the knightly Order of the Star.

The rival brethren of the Garter and the Star found plenty of opportunities of demonstrating their prowess.  Though between 1347 and 1355 there was, so far as forms went, an almost continuous armistice for the space of eight years, its effect was not so much to stop fighting as to limit its scale.  In reality the years of nominal truce were a period of harassing warfare in Brittany, the Calais march, Gascony, and the narrow seas, which even the ravages of the Black Death did not stop.

In Brittany affairs were in a wretched condition.  The nominal duke, John, was a child brought up in England under the guardianship of Edward III.  Edward was not in a position to spend either men or money upon Brittany.  As an easy way of discharging his obligations to his ward, he handed over the duchy to Sir Thomas Dagworth, the governor, who maintained the war from local resources and had a free hand as regards his choice of agents and measures.  In return for power to appropriate to his own purposes the revenues of the duchy, Dagworth undertook the custody of the fortresses, the payment of the troops, the expenses of the administration, and the conduct of the war.  In short, Brittany was leased out to him as a speculation, like a farm left derelict of husbandmen after the Black Death.  Dagworth sublet to the highest bidders the lordships, fortresses, and towns of Brittany.  He established at various centres of his influence a military adventurer, whose chief business was to make war support war and, moreover, bring in a good profit.  The consequences were disastrous.  Dagworth’s captains were for