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Page 157
soldiers and had little experience of war. They were brave enough, but without a real leader to spur them on and provide a new plan of attack for them, they were soon discouraged.
Geoffrey led his men, unopposed now, through the town until his troops converged with Salisbury's, d'Albini's, William de Cantelu's, and Arundel's. Sure that Bangor was theirs, they then turned about and began a systematic looting from the center of the town outward, firing the houses when they had stripped them of everything desirable. They fanned out like the spokes of a wheel, robbing and burning until the men were sated with loot and set fire to places without even looking within. It was the most efficient destruction of a town Geoffrey had ever seen. ''Take down the cities," he had advised and, of a truth, there was scarcely one stone standing upon another in Bangor when the flames died down.
Because all knew it would be impossible to move the men until they had tasted the women they had dragged from the burning town and examined the prizes they had taken, the king did not plan to move for the next few days. Discipline was relaxed to celebrate the victorywith the inevitable result. Quarrels broke out over women, over loot, from simple drunkenness. Geoffrey was not in the mood for celebration. He took his share of the valuable property, but he could not bring himself to take one of the weeping girls nor join one of the convivial parties. He would gladly have drunk himself into insensibility, but he did not get a chance. Before he had dipped very deep into the wine, he heard that the king's daughter Joan, who was Lord Llewelyn's wife, had ridden in and was pleading with her father to make peace with her husband. That lightened Geoffrey's spirit a little. The king was fond of Joan. There was some hope that Bangor would be the last holocaust Geoffrey would carry on his conscience.
He was waiting to hear what would come of Joan's visit when someone discovered he was sober. From then on,

 
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