The next day the force remained where it had halted. The two knights and the men-at-arms scoured the country again for some miles round, and drove in before them twenty-two head of cattle, and these sufficed, with what had remained over, to furnish food for the day and to leave enough for the troops to break their fast in the morning.

So deserted was the country that it was not until the next morning early that the news reached the earl that the men of Ghent had come out against him. Rejoicing that they should thus have placed themselves in his power, he sent out three knights to reconnoitre their position and bring an account of their numbers. After breakfast Philip Van Artevelde had moved his followers a short distance away from their halting-ground and taken up a position near to a small hill, where he addressed them.

Some friars and clergy who were with the force celebrated mass at various points, and then confessed the troops and exhorted them to keep up their courage, telling them that small forces had, with the help of God, frequently defeated large ones, and as all had been done that was possible to obtain peace but without avail, He would surely help them against these enemies who sought to destroy them utterly. Then they prepared for battle. Each man carried with him a long and sharp stake, as was their custom, in the same fashion as did the English archers, and they gathered in a square and set a hedge of these stakes round them. The enemy's knights had ridden near them without being interfered with, for the Ghentois wished nothing better than that the smallness of their numbers should be clearly seen.