Charles IV. had been brought up in the court of Philippe de Valois; his sister, Bonne, had been the first wife of Jean, and he regarded the Valois family with strong affection. But he was too much like them to be of any use as an adviser, although he is said to have reproached his nephew with having, at this time of general distress, ordered for himself a new and splendid crown of gold. He, and probably the Duchesse de Normandie, spent Christmas with their uncle amidst a succession of _fêtes_, and returned to Paris towards the end of January to find the discontent of the people increased; which was not surprising, for there had been a still further depreciation of the coin of the realm; the seigneurs and knights who had been taken prisoners at Poitiers were returning in crowds to collect their ransoms, which were enormously heavy, and as the Jews and Lombards had been banished they could not borrow money on usury from them, as they might otherwise have done, so that there was no way of getting it but to wring it out of the peasants. As there was scarcely a family that had not at least one member a prisoner, a system of universal extortion was going on. They seized the property of their vassals and in many cases endeavoured, by imprisonment and other cruelty, to force them to give up any money they supposed them to have concealed,[14] in order that it might be sent to the English to buy back those, many of whom they did not at all wish to see.
And they were profoundly irritated by this new misfortune. At Crécy, at any rate, they grumbled, every one had fought bravely and done their best; no shadow of dishonour had rested on the lilies of France. The nobles might have been proud and extortionate, but in the hour of danger they did not flinch. They lay in heaps on the field of battle, and a life of extravagance and dissipation was redeemed by a hero’s death.
But now there were suspicions of panic; there had been confusion and mismanagement, and there appeared to be an extraordinary number of prisoners. The early flight of four out of the five young princes also displeased the people, who now began to despise the nobles whom hitherto they had only feared and hated. And whereas it had formerly been the custom for them to serve the King in time of war at their own cost and without pay, they had, in the reign of Philippe de Valois, begun to demand money while in the field, and the sums granted by Philippe had to be increased by Jean just at the time when they seemed to be least deserved.